Affectuoso:
The journey upward, moved along much slower than the Phantom had anticipated. It was clear to him that this man, though he wanted so much to be apart of what he called a grand adventure, was not used to getting down from the plush seats of an office desk and into the dark and the depths of an ancient theatre. Victor stumbled over his fancy designer shoes and his clean crisp suit, as the Phantom rushed through the dark passages, only a torch to light the way.
"Slow down, you move to fast and I can hardly see in this dark," Victor cried as he fell hard into another wall misjudging the darkness.
"You are lucky that I have even given enough thought to bring a torch, I manage this in pitch blackness. Its almost easier then!" The Phantom answered as he slowed his pace, "and you most certainly are not dressed properly for this kind of excursion," he added and carried on his way.
"I was not warned that we would be adventuring. I would have come costumed much like yourself," Victor retaliated but it didn't seem to faze the Phantom. They carried on in silence, their pace only slowed a little.
No light appeared to ease the journey but they moved only slowly and steadily to their final destination, the dressing room and the young Diva. To Victor it seemed like the dressing room would never come into site. His eyes had now grown accustom to the darkness and he wasn't struggling to keep up with the Phantom and his ever fading torch. It was clear that it would soon loose its flame all together and they would have to continue along without it. Rats ran over the toes of his nicely polished shoes, but he had stopped caring about them. It almost would have been simpler, Victor through, if he had gone bare food. He swore that should he have to make the trip again it would be in proper attire. The trek seemed to stretch on forever. Victor was amazed at the grandeur of the opera house. It was clearing a large building from the street but once inside it was much more than it had appeared. It wasn't long into the journey that he has started to enjoy and marvel at the passages and the secrets that really were quite real. Soon enough a dim light could be seen ahead of them. They reached the mirror and Victor was amazed at just how much of the stories were true. He looked into the dimly lit dressing room, from the point of view of the spirits and the lurkers, and there at the vanity table, seemingly keeping a silent night vigil, a figure sat watching over the young woman asleep in her bed.
"Maria," Victor whispered as he looked past the Phantom.
"Madame Giry, we must call her," Phantom said in a hushed voice, "careful she may be able to hear you if you speak to loudly."
"I haven't seen my older sister since that young woman was taken from Canada, and I thought we had come this far to see her. Please let me see my sister," Victor said, his eyes pleading with the Phantom.
"Very well," he answered and pushed at the side of the mirror. It slid aside slowly and without a sound.
"Maria," Victory whispered as he walked into the small room.
"The ghosts of this place have begun to play their tricks on my ears as well," she sighed as she whispered to herself, "I hear the voices of my past and my loved ones."
"Maria, I am here," Victor said as he walked and placed a hand on her shoulder.
Matthew walked slowly through the mirror and took a seat on the bed next to the beautiful sleeping woman.
"You are here," Maria cried as tears swelled in her eyes, "my own dear brother, here and within reach," she sobbed as she embraced him.
Tears swelled in Victors eyes as well. This woman, a woman who had always protected him, nurtured him as her younger brother, was now within his arms, shivering as through she were frozen and sobbing. He could feel the pain that the woman had suffered and saw the physical scares on her body. He could only imagine the mental scaring that had happened.
"I feel as thought I am dreaming, my brother, my own baby brother is here with me in the nightmare of my life. This living nightmare is no place for you," Maria sobbed as she turned and looked back at the woman asleep in the bed, "and yet we have a beauty that, no one would know was collected by a man of the most dark of intentions. You have clearly come to bring her back into the light. To save her from this hell."
"We are here to save the both of you," Victor said as he hugged his sister. He didn't want to let her go ever again. It have been so long and they had been so close to each other. She was like a second mother to him. Their parents were always so busy that it was this woman, his sister, who raised and nurtured him. He remembered her as a beauty herself and here she stood in his arms, prematurely aged beyond her years. Her eyes held in them many horrific stories and pain. These eyes were once brilliant and filled with the excitement of a better life, and yet here they were now made dark and old with tears.
"You must then wake her and take her now," Maria said as the greatest sense of urgency rose in her eyes, "take her in her sleep from this place. Please be quick flee before day breaks."
"We will do nothing of the sort. We remain strictly on the right hand of the law, although, you can see in the Phantom's eyes he would take everything in his own hands. Let me be the voice of reason and listen carefully to the plan at hand. Erik you must rouse Christine from her sleep, so that she can agree to everything and is not force any longer to be strung along by any lies. Let her now be the keeper of her life," Victor said as he placed his briefcase on the dressing table and motioned for his sister to take a seat at the sofa beside him.
Matthew stared silently down at the sleeping beauty. Her slumber was so deep that he was stunned that the conversions, in the small dressing room, had not broken her sleep. Was she under some other horrific spell? Perhaps she was not the Christine that he had imagined her to be, but the mythical sleeping beauty, after all wasn't he, himself a man and myth?
Without thinking he pulled the white mask from his face. Maria and her brother gasped at the action. He leaned in slowly to the beautiful sleeping woman and planted a gentle, spell breaking kiss on her lips.
Her eyes fluttered open and focussed on the face before her. A sleepy smiled crossed her face but a look of pure joy had erupted in her eyes, "my prayers and my dreams have been answered," she said as she sat up in bed and wrapped her arms around him, "you have returned, sooner than you had promised," she whispered, happily, into his ear and then realising that there were more people in her small room she moved to get out of bed. "Victor?" she asked with and air of surprise.
"Good to see you again Gabriella," Victor smiled.
"This must be a dream, how is this all possible?" Gabriella smiled as she pulled herself out of bed and walked around the room.
"This is strictly business," Victor winked.
"Have you been dealing with the devil?" Gabriella played along.
"Not the devil but the Phantom you had always spoke so highly of. You, several years my elder and you kept filling my head with stories. You truly did have an impact on my impressionable youth," Victor laughed.
"And look at you now," Gabriella giggled as she moved to hug him, "not the boy you once were."
"And you not the sly, troublesome girl you once were," he laughed and let go of her as he noticed a look of jealousy in the Phantom's maskless face.
"That was stolen from her much too soon," Maria said as she looked sadly at the young diva, "none of us are what we once were. You two are not the timid children that played so well together. You, my brother, are not the boy who would come crying filled with fear and questions about the stories of Gabriella's imagination. But Gabriella you are not the young girl who could dream to no ends as you once were."
"I dream once again," Gabriella smiled as she knelt down on the floor before her dear nurse, "and you not the big sister but a protecting mother now to me. Your brother is right to see you in such light and be filled with tears. You have gone through just as much as I have. Let us please lead this to an end. What news have you?" she asked as she looked from Matthew to Victor.
"A contract to break all contracts," Victor smiled, "literally. Shall we beet him at his own game?"
"Oh yes," Gabriella said excitedly, "what is the game?"
"News had spilled out of his wickedness," Matthew said stepping forward and helping the young woman up from the floor, "we believe him to be coming to have you sign a new contract to keep you in his possession until he can force you to marry him."
"I will not sign anything," Gabriella said bravely, "not a contract or a marriage licence I will not do it!"
"Ah, but Gabriella that is the game in itself," Victor said seeming a little more like a youngster who has become very giddy with the ideas of some mischief, "I have drafted a contract already to keep you from his grasp, so long as you are within the opera popular it would allow the Belville's to manage you as cosigners to your profession."
Gabriella glanced at Matthew who carried a large grin on his face, "and you as well, you would be my new manager?"
"Yes, but only until you are finished here in less than two days," Matthew said with a smile, "after that time, and our plan has run its course, you will be free to manager yourself."
"Yes, and it make anything that you may be forced to sign, under the eyes of Fauxvoix, irrelevant and incomplete as you must have one or all of the Belville's to sign with you," Victor said as he placed the contract in Gabriella's hands.
"He can force you all he wants, it would mean nothing," Matthew whispered into her ear, "you are protected."
"He will think something is up, if I give in too willingly to another contract," she said as she looked through this new document in her hands.
"That's why you must protest to all extents of your power. You must make it clear that you do not want to be in that position, he will force you. I hate to see you in danger again but this may be what it will take to free you," Matthew said lovingly.
"And as for my flight from the opera?" Gabriella asked the excitement dashed from her eyes.
"That is the lesson he is to learn,"Matthew smiled as he replaced the mask on his face, "it will be our greatest performance yet, Christine. The perfect disaster!" he said taking her in his arms.
"Let it be then, if I am to risk my life to win a chance to live a free and safe life, then I will do it and it will be the masterpiece to end my career if it must be," she said her eyes sparkling in the darkness.
"This is to be our strange duet," he said and kissed her hand.
"Let my fate be sealed then," she said as she signed the document and passed it back to Victor, "you both must go, day will be breaking soon," she added with a sigh.
"Yes and you must prepare for two days of make believe. Everything is up to you now, until we meet again on that stage. Tonight will put into motion my plan, be prepared for a bit of a fright tonight at the performance," he said and with a wave of his hand the Phantom and his companion disappeared back through the mirror.