Erik looked at the pale, bare back of a sleeping Isabelle, several battle scars disrupting the otherwise velvet plane of her skin. Moving forward, he kissed the smooth line of her shoulder, his hand caressing her arm and heard her wake, her eyes fluttering open. Her hair hid most of her face from him and he moved it away, looking at her. He looked at her mouth, still a deep rose from his kisses and recalled when a small pained sound escaped those lips when he had slid into her warmth, breaking her thin, protective barrier.
He ran his thumb along her full bottom lip and she reached up with her hand that wasn't trapped under her side to stroke his marred cheek. He leaned down and placed a gentle kiss against her neck and her fingers stroked the back of his head, twirling his hair in her fingertips. She rolled onto her back and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, holding her to him.
"My beautiful Erik." She whispered and he felt tears prick the back of his eyes at her tender words, at the memory of how she had stroked his skin, both marred and unmarred, as he had made love to her.
"Never leave me Belle, never go." He whimpered into her skin and she held his face in her hands, making him look at her.
"If I don't, then my government will track me down and drag me back."
"I'll stop them."
"They'll kill you if you try. I don't want your death on my conscience." She said burying her face in his neck.
"Tell me about this war of yours." He said and she sighed against his skin making him shudder. He turned them onto their sides so he could lay his hands on her back.
"It's not my war. Its been going on for seventy years my time. It started out as just a war against terrorism, then it turned into a war for oil, a few more countries got involved and its final phase was a world war, the Third World War."
"Third? That means..."
"That there were two others? That's right. But that's not something for me to tell." Isabelle said and shivered as he started to run his fingertips up and down her spine. "I cannot tell you more, I wish I could, but I am restricted from giving you that information." She said and he nodded against her. "Now, Erik. Tell me about your childhood." He went very still in his arms.
"It was not a happy one." He warned.
"I still want to know."
"If you so wish. My mother, even though I loved her a great deal, hated and feared me because of..." he rubbed his marred cheek against her skin. "When I was just a child, there was a group of travelling performers in town, gypsies. She sold me to them. I remember her cold words to this day 'take him, rid me of this creature, take the Devils' Child' I remember calling out to her, promising that I'll be good, apologizing for whatever wrong deed that I had done to make her give me away. But she had turned her back on me and was walking away, I remember crying out and calling her mother, she stopped, turned and said, 'I have no child'." His voice caught, faltered and she felt the hotness of the tears against her shoulder.
"Erik, you don't have to finish."
"No, I do. For the next five years I was put on display at the 'Devils' Child'. I was put in a cage with only straw for a bed. I remember the people coming in and out of the room, their laugher and screams, my keeper would beat me in front of them with stick for no reason at all." He said and her hands ran over the scars on his sides from these beatings, her touch momentarily chasing away these terrible memories. "Then one night, we were in Paris and a group of ballet dancers from this Opera house came in. One of them was Antoinette Rousseau, who is now Madame Giry. She didn't not laugh, she did not scream, she just stood there, looking at me in sympathy and pity. After they were gone and my keeper was counting the coins took the rope binding me to my cell and I strangled him. He was the first man I had I ever killed. But I didn't know I still had an audience, Antoinette was still there. Instead of screaming and yelling for the police she helped me escape from them and hid me here. Here I've been ever since." Erik finished and she took her face from his neck, reaching up and brushing the tears from his face.
"You're forty, right?" she asked suddenly.
"You are amazingly accurate. Why do you ask?"
"How old were you when you came to live at the Opera House?"
"Ten. Why the questions?"
"Just curious." Isabelle said and hid her face against his chest.
"Isabelle," he started and she looked at him, placing her fingers on his lips to keep him from saying more.
"Trust me Erik." She said and he nodded, lightly sucking on the tip of her index finger and releasing it.
"Okay, Monsieur, calm down and tell me again what you saw for the Managers." Madame Girl said and Gaston took another drink out of the wine bottle. He had come to her first, as she was Isabelle's employer and told her what he had seen on the flies. One of the ballet girls had called in Andre and Firmin, and they were all now sitting back stage.
"I was up on the flies with Isabelle, Mademoiselle Knight."
"Why?" Andre asked.
"She had been viewing the Opera from above and we started to talk. Our talk had turned to Buquet and the event of his death when...he showed up."
"Who?" Firmin asked.
"The Opera Ghost." Gaston said and a frightened ripple moved through the ballet girls who were close by. Andre attempted to laugh it off.
"The Opera Ghost? Now I know you've been drinking too much wine. He left the Opera House after Miss Daae married the Vicomte." He said.
"Just like he had left after Buquet died?" Gaston said and Andre's smile fled.
"Then what happened?" Firmin asked.
"She told me to run, to leave her. I did, but only under the assumption that she would be following. She didn't and I went back to try to defend her." he said.
"Tell us what you saw."
"Isabelle and the Phantom were...embraced. Kissing with such passion that it could only suggest that they were...lovers. He picked her up in his arms and vanished." Gaston said and took another swallow of wine. Shocked whispers began to circle among the girls and Madame Giry silenced them.
"And now?" Andre asked.
"Monsieur," Meg Giry spoke up and they looked at her. "After I first heard Monsieur Fly Master's story I went to Mademoiselle Knight's room. Her door was unlocked and her room was vacant of her." the whispers started again and again Madame Giry ceased them.
"Are you all talking about me?" in the opposite doorway stood a lively looking Isabelle in her dress from earlier and her hair pulled back into its tight French braid. Her cheeks were flushed and she was smiling.
"Isabelle!" Gaston said and stood, moving towards her. She stepped back.
"Calm down and sit down." She said and he sat back down.
"Mademoiselle Knight, will you kindly tell us where you were these last few hours?" Firmin inquired.
"Yes of course Monsieur. I was on the roof." She said simply.
"Doing what?"
"Soaking in some night air. Was I really gone a few hours?"
"Yes Mademoiselle you were. I assume you've heard Gaston's story?"
"Yes and it is nothing but a story, the obvious culprit of too much wine. The Opera Ghost? He doesn't exist, and if he did, he does no more. He is now merely a specter in which to frighten the ballet girls into obedience." Isabelle said.
"And how do we know you are telling the truth?" Andre asked.
"I can vouch for her Monsieur." Madame Giry said. "She has never lied to me or anyone, she is quite truthful and trustworthy. Gaston has probably had too much wine this evening."
"I haven't..." Gaston started.
"Monsieur Fly Master, I suggest you stay away from the wine bottle. We don't need another reminder of the dark past of the Opera House after five years peace." Firmin said and then addressed every one. "Now I suggest that you all go back to your chambers and go to sleep. It has been a long night for everyone."
"And Mademoiselle Knight, next time you think about taking a moonlit stroll on the roof, please do tell someone, we wouldn't want a repeat of this." Andre said with a small smile and she smiled back, bowing her head at him.
"Yes of course Monsieur, it won't happen again." She said.
"There! It's settled then!" Andre said. "We should all take Firmin's advice and go back to bed. Night all!" he said and they swept from the room.
"I suggest that you go back to your quarters Monsieur," Madame Giry said looking at Gaston. "And sleep off the wine." Gaston nodded and left, but not without shooting a look at Isabelle saying that this wasn't over. Since the excitement was now past, the ballet girls went back to their dormitories leaving Madame Giry and Isabelle alone. "You were with him tonight weren't you? Intimately, with him."
"That's really none of your business Madame Giry."
"When it concerns him, it is my business."
"What happens between him and I, stays between him and me. He told me of your role in his childhood. I only hope I can help as you did." She said, changing the subject.
"It is the past Isabelle, you cannot change the past." Madame Giry said and a strange little smile came over the younger woman's face.
"You should never say something like that to someone like me Madame Giry."
"Why not?"
"Because we tend to do just that, change the past. Now I must retire Madame Giry, I am very tired. I will see you in the morning." Isabelle said and left, leaving Madame Giry alone and thinking about her cryptic statement.