Introductions

Only once she was securely behind the latched door of her dressing room did Christine dare to address Erik. "If you are there, be an honorable man, and make yourself known."

Silence was the room's only reply. She let her hand slide from the door and went to set the heavy score upon her table. Her face in the vanity mirror showed plain her irritation, but it was not enough to cloud the fear at the edges of her wide blue eyes. If Erik had not followed her here, then where had he gone instead? What would he do to that poor professor? It was up to Christine to temper him.

When she took her seat upon the tufted stool, the reflection of the great wall mirror behind her showed the back of her head, her loose golden curls bound in the dark green ribbon that matched her dress, and she wondered if that was how Erik was most used to seeing her—if holding her in his view was even possible from beyond the mirror. Whenever he took her through it by whatever mysterious means it required, she never had a view of her dressing room. It was only the blackness of the corridor. The damp, cold stones. The burning eye of his strange lantern. Perhaps when she was in this room, she was just a Voice to him as ever he had been to her.

"You have behaved well, Christine." The sudden arrival of his voice sounded as if it were in the room with her, and she twisted in her seat to focus on the place it ought to be near the chaise. But of course nothing was there.

She clenched her hands in her lap. "You give me little choice, Erik."

He laughed, and it was edged with the same low, sinister quality of the perplexingly beautiful sound that made her flee the practice room.

"You must leave that poor man alone," she said. "You must not harm him."

"Would I ever do such a thing?"

"Didn't you make the bust of Haydn strike him? I am sure that you did. You are reckless, Erik."

"On the contrary, my dear. Did you observe Erik's hand? I think not. No, that pillar was simply unstable. Old and unstable and the bust was bound to take a tumble sooner or later. But I cannot help if I found it amusing."

Christine's eyes fell to her hands as they wrung in her lap. She did not want to believe he would lie to her. Not about something so simple after all else he had confessed. "Then you are cruel to laugh," she said. "I do not like you well when you are cruel."

"Ah." He sighed, and it was as if the air of it brushed her ear. "When does my Christine ever like me well?"

Her hands gripped each other all the more tightly, and she shook her head. It was not a question meant for answering aloud.

"Come, Christine." His voice slid back to its place beyond the great mirror. To the darkness.

"I shall not."

"I have told you, you are not to leave the Opera. You are not to be beyond my protection."

"And what is it you mean to protect me from?" It was such a more achievable thing to be bold with Erik when she could not see him. "Kind and gentle old men like the Professor Claudin?"

"He is not as gentle as he seems, child. Nor so very old. He is two or three years past fifty at most."

"Can you protect me from the cold looks and sneering whispers of my fellow artists? From the giggling of the corps de ballet as they make signs at me when they scurry past in the passage?" Christine had done her best to turn her cheek to every instance of scorn she experienced at the day's rehearsal. Once the company fully delved into the engrossing work at hand, it faded, but Christine was far too painfully aware of the seat taken from her during their dinner hour, of the wet glass left on her score to make the ink run, of the thick dust and footprints on her cloak after it spent a day on the floor below the hook she had certainly hung it upon that morning. As little as she wished to think of Commissary Mifroid's request to take note of potential suspects, she could not but remember each friend who treated her today as a pariah.

"You cannot," she said when Erik made no reply. "So I beg of you not to make my heart heavier with threats to one who is innocent of that which pains me most."

"I make no threats, my dear. Beware how you wrong me. Now, come to the mirror."

"No, Erik." She did not know why she was refusing. She was very tired, and she could sooner rest if she went with him. She did not cherish the idea of walking the quarter hour to her flat in the cold night air in a dirty cloak. The bed in Erik's home was more comfortable, the music so soothing. But that Erik demanded she come in such a tone, like she was a child in need of sheltering, made her will set against it.

As she fixed her gaze on the mirror before her at her dressing table, a sudden flashing of light rendered her dizzy and she could only barely discern how the shapes of the room elongated in the reflection behind her. Her green ribbon multiplied and folded, and she turned on her stool to see innumerable swimming and spinning Christines that were an instant later replaced by one very still and solid black figure in the center of her dressing room.

Never before had Christine realized how close the ceiling was. Erik's hat nearly brushed it. The mirror behind him, now as ordinary as it had always been, showed the back of his cloak in well-lit detail.

Christine's hand went to her throat and she stood, shrinking against her table. "You… you come into my room…"

"You don't mind, do you?" Erik unfurled a hand, and then turned his masked head to look over the furniture. "I've always thought this a charming room. Private. Well set away from the others."

Christine's momentary shock slid once more into her previous affronted feelings. "You don't frighten me, Erik."

"I should dearly hope not!" He plucked a fallen cushion from her chaise and tossed it to the end of the couch before taking a seat and removing his hat as if he meant to have a long and comfortable conversation with her then and there.

"What do you mean—" Christine's fingers dug against the wood of the table at her sides. She dared not take her eyes from him. Even though he looked relaxed, like he intended to behave himself, she knew that he could coil like a snake at any moment. "Why do you say the professor is not gentle? Do you think… Do you think he killed Lord d'Arcy?"

Erik laughed. He lifted a hand toward his face, but it fell back upon the chaise. "Why must you make me laugh when I am wearing my mask, Christine?"

"I see nothing to laugh at."

"Ah, forgive me."

Releasing the table, Christine took a step toward him, but offered no acknowledgement of the request. Erik would have to look to God if he wanted forgiveness for his wicked humor.

"But no, my dear. I suppose it is possible your dear professor may have killed Lord d'Arcy. And for you for that matter. But I do not think he did. Because I know who did."

"Who?"

"Your young vicomte, of course."

"You don't know that. You can't."

"I am sure of it."

"Unless you were the one who witnessed—" But Christine did not dare repeat Mifroid's theory of the slanderous witness who first observed the murderer take Christine from the room and then entered it to write the words on the wall. Surely Erik overheard the suggestion as he lurked beyond the understandable perimeters of that meeting yesterday, but Christine dreaded reminding him of it in fear that he might take revenge on such a witness on behalf of Christine's scandal.

Believing the odd professor guilty of the murder-cum-rescue was so much easier on her heart than accepting Erik's insistence it was Raoul. But she had written to Raoul yesterday afternoon and not yet received any reply. The longer she went without hearing from him, the more Erik's ideas undid her hopes.

She could not keep her gaze upon him and it fell to the floor, where a scrap of white cloth behind the leg of the chaise stood out in the shadows against Erik's black.

"Has your maid been negligent?" Erik must have followed her line of sight, because he bent to pick it up. As he flipped it over between his black-gloved fingers, Christine's breath caught. It was spotted with dark stains.

She stepped forward and took the cloth from Erik's outstretched hand. As she unfolded its wrinkles, returned the handkerchief to its square shape, and beheld the elaborately embroidered C in its corner, her hand began to tremble.

Erik's fingers folded around her wrist, but his grip was light, just enough to steady her shaking. "You've never used one like this before," he said.

"It's not mine." Her voice was a whisper. The handkerchief was identical to the one Raoul loaned her the night of the party. Desperately, she tried to remember what she had done with it. Surely tucked it into her dress. Had it remained there, become spotted with what soaked through her clothing, and then fallen out when she changed attire the next morning? What then of the thoroughly sodden handkerchief Mifroid's men found with Lord d'Arcy? Pulling her eyes from the stiff brown spots on the cloth, she looked down to meet Erik's, but could not see them beyond the deep hollows of the mask.

His fingers slid from her wrist and he tapped the initial. "It is Chagny's, then."

Christine shook her head as if she could make it untrue. "He… he came in here that morning, when I woke. He knelt just there." She gestured desperately to the other end of the couch where she had opened her eyes with the first memories she retained. "He must have dropped it then."

Even though he had loaned Christine one the night before, Raoul said he had gone home in the interim. He could have brought a fresh one with him to the Opera that morning and happened to lose it as he fretted over her.

"Oh? I was not aware the vicomte was consumptive. That is blood there, Christine."

She folded the handkerchief to hide the spots. "Perhaps he… he…" Did Erik know about the handkerchief Mifroid showed her and Raoul? Was it possible he was not yet returned to the Opera or not otherwise eavesdropping on that interrogation? If he did know, what conclusion would he draw from this discovery? That the handkerchief Raoul loaned Christine had remained with her the whole time and that the one used to smear the blood words on the wall had been brought to the room of death by someone else? And perhaps lost there in the act of murder and left behind, to be later found and used by the slanderous witness to inscribe Christine's name? As much as she wanted to reject the idea, her mind was no longer capable of it. How could Raoul's handkerchief have come to be in that room if Raoul himself never was? Every accusation Erik made against him felt undeniable now. It was like a firework went off behind her eyes.

And then Erik was standing before her, though she had no recollection of him moving. His hands were on her shoulders, though she could not feel them. The handkerchief was gone. He was saying something she could not hear and she blinked up at him, straining against the cotton wool sensation in her ears.

A sharp banging snapped Christine back into herself and Erik's hands became tight and heavy, the floor solid beneath her shoes. Her eyes flicked to the reflection of the room's door as she heard a voice rise through it behind her.

"I hear you in there, fiend! Open this door at once!" Another strike upon the wood. "Christine!"

"Raoul," she breathed, and she stepped away from Erik, wrapping her arms about herself.

He laughed low, under his breath.

"Go," she hissed at him. "The way you came."

"Why should I?" Erik made no effort to keep his voice from reaching the door and Christine resented him deeply for it. "Aren't you going to let him in?" he asked.

"Christine!" Raoul's voice came again.

"Go away, Raoul," she called, but her words trembled.

"I shan't! What has he done to you? I'll fetch the fireman to break down the door."

Christine's fingers pressed at her temples and she shook her head. "You let him hear you," she whispered to Erik. "This is your doing."

"And what is 'this'?" Folding his arms under his cloak, Erik put his back to the mirror. "Do you think I'll let you invite a murderer into your room unsupervised? Open the door to him if it pleases you, Christine. I will not go."

It most certainly did not please Christine, but as Raoul shouted once more about retrieving the fireman, she flew to the door and unlocked it. Opening it only enough so that he might see her face, see that she was in no danger, she entreated him with her most desperate look. "Please, Raoul. You must leave at once."

"Christine!" He pushed at the door, and she braced her weight against it. But then his eyes widened and she knew he had caught sight of Erik behind her. And then no amount of her strength was enough to keep the door between them, and she stumbled back against her dressing table as Raoul forced his way into the room.

Though the room was small, she managed to catch hold of him before he could reach Erik and she threw herself between them, her arms straining against Raoul to press him away from the mirror. "Don't," she gasped, though she could not say to which of them she meant most to plead.

To her desperate relief, Raoul obeyed her urging and he stood still. His eyes smoldered with blue fire across the room at Erik's black shape, which had not moved from its posture against the mirror, as if he were but a statue in evening clothes.

She could feel Raoul's pulse pounding as she held him. It terrified her to be so close to him after her thoughts of minutes before, but she dared not release him. And it was a good thing because then Erik laughed at him and Raoul grew stiff and pulled from her.

"No," she gasped, and her fingers dug into his coat like claws.

"Such energy your little killer has, Christine."

Raoul froze, it seemed he was taking in every aspect of Erik's appearance as he absorbed the words. Before he could speak, Christine tried to press him toward the door. "You must go," she begged.

Erik shifted where he stood, seemed to unfurl, and Christine's heart seized. But he only withdrew his watch and languidly checked the time.

"Please Raoul, you are in danger here. You must go home."

"I'm not afraid of this charlatan." Raoul's hands moved to Christine's arms, but he did not push her away. "I know who you are. You are Erik. You are a liar and a fiend and you have abused Christine. I know all about you."

Erik laughed, and Christine shook her head, fixing him with a stare of reprimand. "I do not mean from his hand. He will not touch you. I mean from the police."

"The police?" Raoul pulled from her, but as he moved away from Erik this time, she let him go. "He called me a killer. Surely, Christine, you do not—"

"She knows you killed d'Arcy," said Erik. "Isn't that right, Christine?"

Turning away from both of them, she pressed the door closed. Though it was unlikely anybody would venture to her end of the corridor at this hour, heaven help them if they were overheard. They were surely all three done for.

Raoul stepped after her. "Christine? Tell me you don't believe this."

She shook her head, but she could not face him. She burned to ask him about his handkerchief, but dared not do it in Erik's presence.

"Christine!" Though Raoul's tone was intense, his voice was no louder than a stage whisper. "It is obvious he killed d'Arcy. He means to twist your mind." He took her arm, but she jerked from him. Her eyes found Erik across the room behind Raoul, but she could only shake her head again.

"He committed murder when he made the chandelier fall." Raoul's face was red with indignation. "He would do it again. You said so yourself." When Christine did not reply, he turned about to address Erik. "He is a violent madman."

"Perhaps." Erik's relaxed, amused tone touched the sparks of fear in Christine's breast, transforming them into embers of frustrated despair. Truly, she could not believe either of them. There would be no solution to this.

"Neither of you did it." Her words came out staccato sharp. "Or one of you. Or both of you. And I do not know. I cannot know! And furthermore, I do not think you can know, either of you. If somehow your memories are as blackened of that night as mine—And why shouldn't they be? Therefore, you both must leave me. I cannot endure this. I must see neither of you again. Let this mystery be our end."

Underneath his cloak, Erik's arms fell to his sides and he pushed from the mirror. Raoul stepped toward her, but she put up her hands. "There is no memory," she said. "There is no proof. There is nothing else for it."

"Christine," Erik's voice came fast. "I could prove to you definitively that it was not done by my hand. There is a way. A scientific way."

"She will not be duped by your humbuggery," snapped Raoul.

Erik glanced to him. "Are you so very uneducated, little vicomte?"

"Raoul, please," Christine gasped before he could retort. "What are you talking about, Erik?"

"If I could see the man's body, I could prove to you that I did not kill him."

"That is a convenient excuse," Raoul interrupted. "As his body happens to be buried!"

Slowly, Erik turned until he was fully looking at Raoul. Fewer than three feet remained between them. He was the taller man by several inches, but with Raoul's shoulders looking broad under his overcoat and his fists trembling with restrained anger at his sides, it seemed he meant to be just as formidable.

The three feet became one before Erik spoke again. "It might be unburied."

As much as Christine wished to dart forward to come between them, Erik's suggestion froze her in place. The sacrilege of it! Even for a man as shunning of Christian ways as Lord d'Arcy, it was unthinkable. Her lips formed the word No, but she lacked the breath to make a sound. But Erik seemed to hear it all the same, for he left Raoul and came to her.

"Unless," he said, "you would prefer to believe me guilty? I daresay it is a convenient excuse for you indeed to think me a monster, isn't it, Christine? To deny me a chance to prove to you my innocence when I have been innocent of so very little else in my cursed life."

She shook her head, she wanted to reject the accusation at once, but the words twisted a knife of genuine guilt into her heart. He filled her view, Raoul disappearing beyond him.

"Before all this," Erik said, "did I not do just as you wished? Did I not give you leave to live as you pleased?" He flicked a hand in Raoul's direction. "In exchange for mere pearls, droplets of your friendship?"

Raoul's insulting words from the other day in the carriage rushed back into Christine's ears. How generous of him! But though Erik told her often how he loved her, he had never again once demanded that she love him. Not since she made her rejection. If she felt anything more for him than horror or pity, if she was truly his friend, he deserved better from her in this.

"And it is just as convenient for you, I think," Erik went on, "to believe someone handsome, someone born well, like this boy here could not possibly be guilty."

Christine's hands caught his arm before he could gesture at Raoul again, as if every wave of Erik's hand might cast some dark spell upon him. "No," she said softly. "None of that is convenient for me at all."

Erik fell silent, and his gloved fingers moved to cover Christine's on his sleeve. He stared down at her and she met his gaze unfalteringly. She knew she ought to speak of the sanctity of the churchyard, of the grave nature of the sin he was suggesting. But in this corner of her dressing room, with the light far behind him, she could at last see his eyes beneath the mask. And in her heart, she knew she could not be true to her declaration to abandon him from her life as she a moment ago insisted. If this was the way to resolve it, then she had no choice.

He must have seen the acceptance in her expression, for he pressed her hand before releasing it, and he returned to the center of the room. "It is settled then. We'll dig him up. And I shall show you."

"We?" Raoul demanded breathlessly from where he supported himself against the dressing table.

Erik turned to him. "Shall we take your coach or mine?"


Thanks so much for reading! I'm taking a hiatus from this fic while I finish up a novel I'm working on, but I will come back to this as soon as it's done! My first novel is actually being published later this year. It's a Death and the Maiden story! I'll put the details in my profile as soon as they're available, or follow me on twitter to keep posted: ElisaInTime