A/N: Hello out there! Not sure if the lack of comments for the last chapter was a reflection of how people felt about it?! I posted it at a different time to when I usually update and less people seem to have read it than usual so I wondered if perhaps the 'new chapter' notifications for Chapter 25 got lost? Feeling a bit worried!
Please, please 'feed the author' and say hi if you are enjoying this - or let me know your thoughts - too slow? Too fast? Not enough C+E? Anything not make sense? More fluff?:) This is my first ever fan fic and I would really appreciate feedback!
Anyway, for those still following - THANK YOU SO MUCH! Hope you will enjoy xx
So many thoughts now whirled around Erik's mind since his introduction to Charles. Leaving the de Chagny house, he realised that the weight of yesterday's anxiety had been lifted – Christine's son was a gift, not a punishment! The boy, young as he was, understood music. He played the piano as if it was a part of him, he used music as way to express his feelings. And his voice! There was a rich quality to it, such a beautiful, pure tone…
Erik clenched his fists reflexively. No one but Erik would tutor this boy - Charles was far too unique to be coached by some tin-pot music teacher - he must be the one to guide and shape this young man, to develop his potential. Imagine what the boy could achieve under his tutelage! Erik's lips pursed. Who would have thought the Vicomte would be capable of producing such an heir...
Erik had things to attend to for the rest of the morning, but he suddenly felt a nostalgic pang of longing to be back safely beneath the Opera House at his organ, hidden from the world so that he could devote himself to the music that he heard so clearly flowing within him again.
~xXx~
As soon as he was back within the confines of his hotel room, Erik wasted no time in starting to note down the composition that had begun to form in his mind. Already he could feel the delicate strands of melody rising within him, the notes dancing tantalisingly before his eyes.
When inspiration struck it was very difficult for Erik to put his mind to anything else let alone keep track of time. Before long the small desk was swathed in loose sheets of paper, all covered with Erik's distinctive scrawl. He occasionally took up his violin and played a little before returning to jot down notes again. It was a simple lullaby really, nothing terribly complicated but he knew that it would tease at him and plague his thoughts until he had set it down in full.
There was something else, though, some vague feeling that he couldn't quite put his finger on that bothered Erik. It seemed to hover in his mind without fully landing; it gnawed at the edges of his brain as he tried to concentrate on his composition.
By eight o clock that evening Erik found himself frustrated, with throbbing, aching eyes. Ah. Glancing around he realised he was sitting in the dark, the room only faintly illuminated by the gas street lamps beyond the window. While his cat-like night vision was excellent for prowling around in deep shadow, it was not good enough for writing notation in near pitch-black conditions without causing him a severe headache. Erik got up to light the lamps around the room.
Breaking from his music for a moment or two his thoughts turned, as they usually did, to Christine and then again to Charles. He was truly a fascinating child, Erik mused. As musically talented as his mother (if not more so) and just as strikingly good looking, although in a quite different way. It had to be said, the boy did not seem to share much in common with the fop. Christine had said the Vicomte had found it difficult to bond with the boy, avoiding his company – yet another example of the hateful man's complete idiocy, more proof that he had been unworthy of the life that fate had bestowed upon him. Erik grimaced in disgust, muttering to himself as he flicked back through the untidy pages of staff paper he had completed so far.
"Worthless, arrogant buffoon. Christine gave him a beautiful child and the imbecile chose drinking and cards. He should have been proud to have a son so prodigiously talented – how can a man be angry if his son obsesses over music? Why should the boy waste his time on other foolishness if there is a piano in the house waiting to be tamed and mastered?"
The boy reminded Erik of himself…
Erik sighed, closing his tired eyes for a moment, trying to banish painful recollections of his own childhood from his aching head. How lucky Charles was to have such a devoted, loving mother as Christine. And, when Erik's plans came to fruition - Charles would have someone else in his life who would appreciate him.
Yes.
Erik would appreciate and nurture the boy's talents; he would step in where the Vicomte had failed.
As a tutor? Or as a… father figure? Was that what Christine was hoping he would be?
He pictured the three of them together.
No... that was not right…
Erik rubbed his hands over his bare, unmasked face. A familiar wave of self-loathing washed over him as his fingers traced across his gaunt features, the deep valleys and ridges of his scarred, withered cheek, his sunken eye socket, the bloated, asymmetric lips. Christine might have come to accept this abomination but it was not the face of a family man, he thought to himself bitterly. With or without a mask, this was surely not a face any child - let alone the child of a handsome Vicomte - would wish to look upon.
Growling with frustration, Erik threw himself down on the bed. He had not slept for a few days and his intense burst of creativity was beginning to make him feel weary. He sighed and closed his eyes. The vision of himself, Christine and the boy swam before him…
As Erik slept, his unconscious mind busily sifted all the information it had been given that day. It presented its findings to him as best it could.
Erik dreamed.
His beautiful Christine was singing, her peerless voice powerful and full of emotion, her tender words made more lovely through music. As she sang a strange, dark angel swooped down from the sky on bat-like, leathery wings, his voice joining hers, passionate and full of need.
Their voices entwined in a soaring duet of love… The angel's wings wrapped around Christine as their song continued. The dark wings seemed to glisten and twinkle with points of light like embers, then they began to glow orange, gold, white till they burst into bright flames that soared heavenward before burning down to nothing, smoke and ash swirling around them. Christine and the now wingless angel stood unhurt and from between them, stepping over the ashes, came Charles.
Christine stood behind the child and - in a gesture that Erik recognised and flinched at even before it happened - she sank down and reached over Charles' shoulder towards his perfect face –grasping his chin and snatching it off like a mask to reveal a grotesque visage so very familiar to Erik.
But there was no terror, no surprise. As his corpse-like features were revealed Charles turned towards her smiling; Christine stroked his mangled cheek and beamed at him. Behind them, the dark angel reached out his arms and a new pair of dove grey, feathered wings began to grow from his back. He spread his freshly sprouted, feathery wings protectively over Charles and Christine. The angel wore a gleaming white mask which, Erik observed uncomfortably, reflected the exact shape and contours of the damaged face he assumed it hid. The angel leaned down and Christine removed his mask too, revealing an unblemished visage. All three dream figures looked up expectantly at Erik, the same look Christine had given him at the house that morning. They were waiting for him to react, to understand. Then the figures began to merge and fade like mist before his eyes...
Erik awoke with a start, his heart beating rapidly, a sweat on his brow. He practically jumped off of the bed. He had fallen asleep in his clothes and felt… odd. What an unsettling, vivid dream.
It meant nothing. Surely – just a ridiculous nightmare…
He crossed the room and filled the wash basin with cold water from the large enamel jug, then he washed his face and neck carefully, enjoying the sensation of the cool cloth on his brow and temples.
Sighing, Erik checked the time – it was gone three in the morning and definitely time to rest. Feeling calmer, despite his still hammering heart, he changed into his nightclothes, turned out all the lamps and settled himself comfortably beneath the bedclothes. However, he now felt wide awake and try as he might he could not settle back to sleep. Instead, he attempted to pin down the thought that had been niggling at him and kept returning.
Charles. Something about Charles. He had such familiar traits: Musical prodigy... Perfect pitch and tone… Obsessive tendencies… Entrancingly beautiful voice… Erik felt such a strange connection to him…
There was an obvious conclusion to these observations which Erik had been avoiding.
Erik was not a stupid man, by any stretch of the imagination. His towering intellect could solve complex puzzles and understand scientific and mathematical principles, he could speak several languages fluently. A man of logic, the current issue simply hinged on a flaw in his usually impeccable processing.
Erik believed he could not produce children.
But could he?
He had always thought himself to be incapable. How could a living corpse, 'bringer of death' produce life? It sounded absurd. But the strange, new thought persisted... and with a knotted stomach Erik began to question himself - why did he believe that to be so? What reason did he have to believe himself infertile? As he closed his eyes in thought a barrage of echoes from his past whispered viciously to him:
"it's not as if you'll have children."
"It's a joke you've even got a cock, you won't get any use out of it, you disgusting freak…"
"Go on! Kick 'im in the balls – 'e won't need 'em!"
"Thank Fuck it'll never breed."
"Well, it is safe to say that you are the end of this family line. Your father's name will die with you for you will produce no heirs."
"Nothing's going to mate with that thing... is it even human?"
"Don't be cruel. I'd rather DIE than touch that… sickening creature."
Erik's mind reeled miserably, recalling the vile taunts. He had never thought deeply about it. Perhaps he had merely accepted as fact what he had heard repeated so often by others across the years. Perhaps it was possible for him to father children… More to the point -was there any concrete reason why it would it not be?
No.
No.
No?
A deep, tingling sense of dread began to rise from the pit of Erik's stomach.
The child's birthday was in…
So that meant Charles was conceived around…
It was... possible…
It was more than possible…
Erik sat up. He got out of bed. He sat down again.
Suddenly the little thought that had been fluttering around his head, an elusive butterfly, landed. Clear as a bell he recalled Charles' comment:
.
"Mama said my voice is an instrument. She says it is my gift from her Angel of Music."
.
Finally, Erik understood the full significance of these words.
A/N: At last! Erik has caught up with the rest of us on this :)
Would you like to see the scene where Erik confronts Christine? (I wrote it but wondered if we really need it now we are all on the same page, so to speak.) Or shall we just skip forward to find out about Charles' new music teacher? Please let me know what you think in the comments - I am open to suggestions on this! xx