A/N: Thank you for the reviews! :) Here's more…
Chapter XXXVI
.
Nadir Khan exited the third saloon that day, never having once indulged from the glass of wine he had been required to purchase or risk unwanted suspicion and possible expulsion from the premises. During hours of leisure, he preferred not to partake of alcohol, which was so prevalent among these Parisians, and instead enjoyed a strong black tea imported from his homeland. But to gain what information he must and blend in without actually posing questions which would bring unwanted attention, such a ruse was necessary. And so, as clear-headed as he was when he entered the establishment an hour ago, his deductive skills he had employed for over thirty-five years as Daroga to the Shah soon warned him that he was being followed.
He continued on, past several shoppes, turned the corner and came to a halt against the wall. His ploy soon paid off, but the young fair-haired girl in black servant's dress was not the pursuer he expected. Surprise that she immediately tried to curtail swept across her face to see him waiting.
"Pardon, monsieur."
Before she could hurry past, he spoke.
"You wish to speak with me, mademoiselle?"
"You? No, I…" She gathered her wits and dispensed with all feigned ignorance, her countenance growing more confident. "You are Monsieur Khan, oui?"
He inclined his head in a distant, courteous nod. "I am."
"You were at the chateau a few days past. I saw you speak with the Vicomte de Chagny."
He narrowed his eyes pensively. "And you are…?"
"No one of importance," she hastily evaded, "only a maid hired to work there. I know you seek information on Christine Daaé, and perhaps, the wanted man they call Phantom?"
Three days he had searched and covertly sought information, keenly listening to the scuttlebutt of those men who were loud and loose with their tongues from the ale and liquor they imbibed, yet learning nothing he did not already know. The same hearsay of the scandal that rocked Paris more than a month ago still made the rounds, nothing new, and regrettably, no sightings of a masked man had been recounted.
"What information do you have, mademoiselle?"
"The Vicomte has someone imprisoned in his dungeon."
Alerted to her surprising words, he insisted, "You are sure? You have seen this?"
"I spied him slipping through the door that leads there. He has never given the order for any of the staff to go with him or to go in his stead, and the first time I saw him carry a basket of rolled bandages with him."
"Indeed." It was hardly proof of criminal activity; nonetheless he asked, "And have you an idea as to the identity of this unseen guest you believe the Vicomte to be harboring?"
"Why, the Phantom of the Opera, of course."
At his wary silence, she rushed to explain, "He would not lock Christine Daaé in a cold and filthy dungeon. From the doting way he speaks of her, if she were his prisoner he would lock her away in one of the guest bedchambers. I have heard him speak ill of the Phantom, many times, curse him in fact. It must be the Phantom who the Vicomte holds there. He goes down below every night before he retires for the evening, when he does not think anyone is near to see him go. But I have seen – more than once."
To nightly visit such gloomy environs did seem uncharacteristic for the gallant young noble. After his initial conversation with the Vicomte on the matter of Christine, he had posed the question of the Phantom's whereabouts since the night of the Opera House fire. The boy denied any such knowledge, his manner calm and indifferent, and Nadir had seen no reason not to believe him… perhaps that was a mistake.
The Vicomte de Chagny had been at the fatal end of the Phantom's noose and a hapless victim beneath his blade, but more than any physical injury received to his neck or his arm, he had suffered in a manner no member of the aristocracy would permit: his pride had been wounded - not by an equal but through a man he considered far beneath himself. And that made the blow to his dignity sting more harshly and the desire for revenge throb more strongly. The Shah, whom Nadir once was forced to serve, taught him this truth through vile acts to his subjects that Nadir daily witnessed. Apparently the young Vicomte, for all his outward displays of honor, drank from the same cup of self-superiority laced with vengeance.
"What is your name, girl?"
She flinched, and he did not imagine her hesitance.
"Lillith."
"Well, Mademoiselle Lillith, I thank you for your information." He nodded in polite farewell. "Bon Jour."
"Monsieur – wait!"
He stopped walking and turned.
"Is that all?" she asked incredulously. "Will you do nothing?"
His eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Why are you so concerned what action I take? In truth, why do you wish me to help the Phantom, if that is indeed who is imprisoned there?"
"Help him?" Her short laugh seemed forced and unnatural. "You seek the Phantom, and I want him gone from the place where I live. He is dangerous. After what he did to the Opera House – should he escape his cell – I do not wish to awaken one night to find the chateau on fire."
Her words seemed sincere, even somewhat terrified, and he made a decision to trust her.
"Is there a way into the chateau so that I may enter undetected?"
Her expression brightened. "The servant's door is on the east side of the manor and leads into the kitchen. I could leave the door unlocked for you. The Vicomte stays down in the dungeons no more than a few minutes, and retires to his rooms by ten o'clock."
Nadir thought of the skeleton key in his possession. "There is no need. Do nothing to arouse suspicion. Behave as you normally would. I assure you, I will look into the matter."
Her crystalline blue eyes shone with relief as she thanked him then hurried away.
x
Nightfall brought Nadir loitering in the vicinity of the Vicomte's estate. In the glow of the full moon, a glance at his pocket watch assured him all who dwelled within would have retired for the night, and he told the driver to wait while he used a skeleton key to let himself in by the servant's entrance. The kitchens were dark, a sole gas lamp with its flame turned low anchored to a wall in the distance. Never one to be deemed graceful like his missing friend, Nadir was thankful for its flickering glow that would prevent him from crashing into walls, chairs, and tables in the dark. He spotted an unlit candle in its holder on a wall table and took it. Following the maid's apropos directions, he found no need to light the wax taper until he slipped beyond the door and into absolute darkness leading to what he presumed was the dungeon.
With the candle held before him casting light on the downward spiral of stairs, he carefully managed their placement, at last coming to the level that bore a corridor of iron-studded wooden doors, all of them closed. A brief search through their barred windows soon confirmed the little maid's suspicions.
He hurried over to the prone figure lying motionless on the hard-packed, earthen floor. Maskless, with his face badly beaten, the man's identity was still made clear.
"Erik, my friend, what has that scoundrel done to you?" Nadir tsked in a sympathetic tone.
Nearly twice his age and girth, he could not manage the Phantom's lean weight and ascend the spiral stairwell without fear of stumbling and sending them both to the bottom with necks broken. He ascended the staircase as swiftly and silently as he was able to seek the driver's aid. Every minute that he remained at the chateau elevated the danger of being caught. Nadir sourly ruminated how he always managed to wind up trapped in these complicated snafus involving Erik, when all he wished for at this moment was a cup of strong black tea with cinnamon cakes, while relaxing before a warm fire. He was getting too old for this mode of intrigue. Idly he wondered if Madame Giry liked cakes with cinnamon, then forced his full attention back to the problem at hand.
The communal driver was new to his employ but had proven circumspect in Nadir's affairs the three times he hired a cab this past week and discovered him always to be the driver. Young and strapping, the quiet man proved more than able to handle Erik's tall, lean form and lifted the inert Phantom into strong arms. Nadir did not think he imagined the sympathy in dark blue eyes as they stared at the wounded and unconscious victim he carried, the driver's strength reflected inwardly in that he never once flinched to stare upon the tragedy that was Erik's face, the horrific malformations of his birth apparent and set apart from the discoloration and swelling of abuse suffered.
Nadir led the way upstairs, holding the candle aloft, and blew it out, replacing it, as they slipped outside to the waiting carriage. Once the driver tucked the Phantom securely inside, Nadir then instructed him to drive them to the Opera House, specifically to the area behind it, where the Vicomte once moored the gondola outside the cave. It would be a mistake to take Erik to Nadir's flat, his neighbor a meddlesome woman with loose lips who could hone in on unexpected company and doubtless spread the tale. Once more he enlisted the driver's aid to lay Erik in the hull of the boat, then pulled from his waistcoat a pouch of coins and shook several out into his palm, handing them over.
"For your troubles," he said. "Should anyone ask, you did not see me here, nor did you drive me tonight."
"It isn't necessary, monsieur. I will not tell a soul."
He eyed the fair-haired young man in confusion, never having encountered one of the working class who refused coin, especially well-earned. With his hair long and pulled back with a black ribbon, his face clean-shaven and intelligent eyes that seemed to retain all they held, he seemed more patrician than workman.
"What is your name, young man?"
"Bradon, sir."
"Well, Bradon, while your honor is commendable," he said in a fatherly tone, "never refuse compensation for a job well executed. In fact…" He thought to the minutes ahead and the layout of Erik's subterranean dwelling. "If you can spare another hour, I could further use your help."
"Of course," the boy said without hesitation, and Nadir made a mental note to seek the young man out any time he needed a driver in the future.
Once they arrived to the lair, with Bradon's help, Erik was put back into bed. And though by his senseless state it was perhaps unnecessary, Nadir again tied wrists and ankles to the posts, leaving enough slack so that Erik could rest and turn to his side in comfort, that is should he deign to move... It disturbed him that his injured friend had never once come to wakefulness the entire time, since the rescue from the chateau's dungeon. In the strong lamplight, Nadir did a more thorough examination, cutting away the bandage, and frowned to see the hole near his ribs, though thankfully no infection seemed apparent – miraculous, considering the environs in which Nadir found him.
There was no exit wound, and he wrinkled his brow in concern, knowing the bullet would need to come out. He was in dire need of a surgeon, the delicate task again falling to Nadir's shoulders since the Phantom was a wanted man, in clear need of constant care – care he could not give. Since learning of Christine's Daaé's disappearance from her anxious fiancée, Nadir felt a need to try and locate the confused girl – not for the Vicomte's peace of mind but as his duty to a friend. Once Erik stirred to complete wakefulness and recalled all of what his mind had forgotten, he would want to know – demand to know – news of the troubled young woman who had so captivated his every thought.
But tonight, Nadir must play surgeon and cut out a bullet. It would not be the first time he had played physician to his reckless friend, as grimly he recalled their final days in Persia.
A trip to his modest home to gather needed supplies was in order; then he would have Bradon drive him to the other side of the city, to enlist Madame Giry's aid.
Even then, he could not be certain the Phantom would live to see the dawn.
xXx
In the score of days that elapsed, a routine rapidly developed for the theatrical forest dwellers of Brocéliande. Simple costumes were made, varied lessons established, and crude performances endeavored. Two men left and returned with their wives and children, along with a dimwitted brother. Their number now surpassed what it had been with the original renegades, and Erik was surprised to find a modicum of talent within the motley band of degenerates. Skills underdeveloped could be polished, if not to a mirror sheen, at least to a passable dull glow.
Each morning, after breaking the fast, Christine spent a parcel of time instructing the young Tobias in his letters. Once his back had scabbed over and he could again contribute his share of tasks in the camp, lessons were relegated to the break taken for the evening meal. Erik was impressed with how intelligent a pupil the boy proved to be and how quickly he learned. He only hoped that aptitude to absorb useful information extended to experience taught, but was reasonably certain with how humbled the lad behaved when in his presence that he would have no further trouble with Tobias obeying his orders.
It was…refreshing to have his commands heeded with little to no threat involved, what those fools at the Opera House never gave him despite the managers' inexperience in the mechanics of the theatre. Of course these current rebels assumed him to be another man, somehow mistaking him for their former masked leader - but it was still his word they followed, his leadership they respected, his ideas they did not ignore. And with Christine by his side, he was at last making their coveted dreams a reality - never to the plateau to which it could have once risen, in their time; still, an acceptable alternative for this archaic era.
When not helping to build a rudimentary stage or overseeing auditions and rehearsals, Erik spent his free hours working to fashion a bow for the rebec acquired at such a crippling cost. After careful calculations, helped along with what knowledge he had absorbed from his extensive library of the 19th century, it appeared this third primitive attempt might prove a success. Thankfully, he possessed materials from the original broken bow to fashion a new one – horse hair tightly wrapped around the thin block of wood being one of the requirements. Had he not had that, the task would have been made more difficult, in locating a dead horse to pilfer quality hairs found from its tail. An experience he had no desire to master, much less attempt.
After one last inspection, assured the sliver of wood was in no way faulty and would not break like the last failed effort, he brought the rebec to his shoulder and assumed the pose to begin. Yet before he could draw the bow across the three strings and learn the mystery of their sound, an exclamation came from across the tent by his diligent bride.
"Oh, hells bells and buckets of blood!" Her sewing fell to her lap as she slipped her finger into her mouth.
Instantly he was by her side. "What have you done?"
"I don' think I'll effer learn," she said around her finger, which he took possession of, watching as the blood welled from where she had viciously jabbed it with a bone needle. He swiped a gentle finger against the minor injury. "At least there are two women in the camp now who can make a decent stitch," she said with a little pout. "I don't seem equipped for the most basic of household skills. At the Opera House the seamstresses were only ever allowed to mend costumes, and whenever a day frock was needed to replace a worn one there were always plenty of castoffs from which to choose. I don't even know how to darn stockings!"
He kissed the wounded digit. "In time, you will learn the mystery of needle and thread, though there does not appear to be a requirement for stockings in this medieval era."
"Nor for any undergarment really."
"I have no complaint."
She giggled at the rakish twinkle in his eye then sighed. "I only wish I wasn't so slow to learn things, Erik. Unlike you, who has mastered every task in this century and ours, every instrument brought you – even constructing a bow for heaven's sake!"
He glanced at his growing collection and the small table he had crafted to hold them, keeping them free from the damp ground. To his astonished delight one of the men who returned with his family was in possession of a lute that had belonged to his wife's father and that he had no knowledge of how to play. Erik offered five pieces of gold for the instrument, telling the band that if any man brought him other unique instruments he did not yet own, they too would be well compensated. In the two decades he had lived in the lowermost cellar beneath the opera, he taught himself to play and excelled with both the violin and pipe organ. He anticipated learning and mastering the rudimentary instruments of this era as well - all that he could possess.
"I have yet to determine if my amateurish endeavor will be rewarded in triumph," he said, studying his meticulous handiwork. He did not doubt his ability to succeed, eventually – after all, he had accomplished the much greater feat of breaking down his pipe organ in pieces to rebuild it below, as there had been no method available of transporting such a cumbersome instrument to his lair.
She gave a little deprecating laugh. "You couldn't be an amateur at anything involving crafting or the arts, even if you barely lifted a finger to try. Whereas I…"
He looked at her somberly. "Cease to demean your efforts, Christine. You possess so little faith in your ability to adapt to change, no matter how large or small, and that mindset has often kept you bound in shackles of reticence. Good God, woman, see how far you've come in learning a whole new mode of life!"
Grudgingly she nodded.
"Perhaps, in our time, my methods were not always circumspect or suitable, even selfish - but had I never interfered, you would have remained an underling in the chorus and never stepped forth to reveal that you possess a voice so sublime."
"When Madame Giry said what she did to the managers during the rehearsal of Hannibal that day, telling them I could sing the aria in Carlotta's place – I felt frozen," she admitted, "every thought and lyric swept from my head. I didn't want to be there, to have all eyes on me alone, and wished for the floor to swallow me whole. But I knew that you were out there, somewhere watching, and I wanted so to please you."
He smiled with tender affection. "To hear your voice take wing - that was the greatest reward a teacher can attain. It is as I told you when you were a child under my instruction: possessing a skill requires practice, and mastering that skill takes diligence at the practice. You achieved that with your song and can apply that rule to anything you set your mind to. Never surrender a goal that is important to your heart."
"I like to think that at least I learned the last part of that lesson with my presence here."
"Indeed, you have." He nodded distantly and studied the finger he still held, and the tiny bead of blood that had appeared, again swiping it away with his thumb, which brought him to glimpse the pink scar across her palm from the broken lantern of their era.
"I am reminded: I have learned more with regard to the secret of the stones. It lies within the shedding of blood –"
Instantly she snatched her hand from his. "I told you, Erik, I don't want to hear any more about that awful place. We are making a life here and now. That is all that's important."
He frowned at her persistence to remain ignorant to any newly gained wisdom he acquired. "I vowed not to send you back through the stones."
"Then why must you continually seek answers in that horrid old grimoire?" she pleaded. "Why is that your goal? I wish that book had burned along with the witch's cottage!"
"Christine," he sighed in vexation, "there is nothing amiss in gaining knowledge to be well informed."
"And you are adept in that – at whatever you set your mind and hand to. It is your nature, and I should dearly love to hear you play while I once more immerse myself in attempting suitable stitches for this mask. I have no wish to seek out Cateline for further aid – the woman already thinks I was born helpless." She gave a disgusted little groan then offered a hopeful smile. "Your music relaxes me, Mon Ange, and I am eager to see if this bow works and what novel sounds you bring forth as you did with the lute…"
He recognized in the flurry of her erratic words a blatant attempt to change the subject, but she had hit the mark of his interest to do so – he, too, was eager to know if, this time, he would meet with success.
And so, he laid the newly crafted bow to strings, the rebec held against his shoulder – and proceeded to run the length of the bow along the tightly wound strands. He winced at the cacophony of sound, but as an expert violinist soon grew familiar with the arrangement of notes as well as the needed placement of his fingers and was producing a faultless melody. Not as rich and full-bodied in sound as his Stradivarius of the nineteenth century – but for this era, a worthy substitute.
At least, in the deep, dark streams of his faulty memory, he had not forgotten how to play. Christine's beautiful smile brightened their tent, the mask she stitched discarded in her lap and forgotten as she watched him with delighted approval.
The minutes waltzed by as his bow danced along the strings, his fingers traveling their length, graduating into more difficult and swifter moves, with nary a pause and few mistakes. He had no doubt he would master this instrument by the time they set out for their first performance.
"My lord, Phantom?"
The uncertain voice on the cusp of manhood that came from outside their tent could belong to none other than Tobias, and Erik immediately ceased playing.
"Enter," he said darkly, displeased to be interrupted while so immersed in his music.
The boy slipped through the flap, his wide eyes going to the rebec in Erik's hand and the newly crafted bow held in the other, at last lifting to his masked face.
"I…I had no idea you could play, and so well, milord."
Clearly the ruffian who guided these men before Erik mysteriously seized his life had no such skill. By the astonishment in the lad's eyes that were brimming with questions, Erik sought for a feasible answer to waylay any burgeoning suspicion.
"I do not tell you every one of my secrets. I had no reason to bring forth my ability to make music until now."
Tobias looked unconvinced. "And you mended the broken bow too?"
Apparently by the awed confusion in his voice, the absentee fool, Le Masque, was no craftsmen either.
"What is your purpose here?" Erik quietly demanded. Tobias looked further perplexed and Erik stifled a bark of impatience. "Why have you come to my tent to seek me out?"
"Eustace sent me to tell you we have a new act to auction."
"Audition."
"Oh - aye. Audition."
Erik shared a look with Christine, who gave an indifferent little shrug, though her eyes sparkled with curiosity to see it.
"Very well." He set the rebec and bow down. "We shall be there shortly."
The boy lingered, as if awaiting more instructions, and Erik inclined his head in silent demand. "Go now."
"Oh - aye. I will tell them you're coming."
Once Tobias left, Erik shook his head and held out his hand to help Christine to her feet.
"I sometimes wonder if there is no more than space for lease between that lad's ears."
Christine giggled and accepted his help up, giving a little gasp when he abruptly drew her close.
"I beg to differ; he is a bright boy," she excused, pressing her palm to Erik's chest and lightly curling her fingertips against the black linen shirt. "I am amazed at how quickly he has learned all I have taught. He will be penning his own prose in no time."
"Perhaps then I should enlist his aid in composing the type of song prevalent to this era," he amended before bestowing a gentle kiss to her upturned lips. "The workings of Beethoven and Mozart are much too rich and robust for this bucolic time. Nor can I achieve the full-bodied sound required with such archaic instruments."
"You make the prospect sound like a fine wine," she teased.
"Ah, but Christine. Music is wine to the soul. It has charms to soothe the savage breast and inspire one to heights of glory."
She smiled brightly, a sheen glossing her eyes. "Oh, my Maestro, I have missed you so. To hear you speak as you did then inspires me and gives my wings flight." She echoed his bittersweet words of what seemed eons ago back to him. "I have every confidence in your ability to inspire the people of this century." Lifting herself on her toes, she returned his butterfly kiss.
"With your voice in accompaniment, my Swedish nightingale, how can we fail?"
They left their tent and walked to the area with the makeshift stage. Upright barrels supporting wide planks of rough wood and a slipshod curtain of wool made a poor substitute for the innumerable intricacies of a lavish theatre. Yet it was the best they could manage with such limited resources, the dynamic Age of Progress literally centuries away. Upon that ramshackle stage, four men cavorted, in the midst of rehearsing a skit to a bawdy song Erik taught them for their act, having overheard it in the days of opera from uncouth stagehands, during one of their coarse celebrations backstage:
.
"Now the Queen of Spain was an amorous Jane
A lascivious wench was she
She longed to play in her loving way with the king across the sea
So she sent a royal message with a royal messenger
To invite the King of England down to spend the night with her.
He was dirty and lousy and full of fleas
But he had his women by twos and threes
God bless the Bastard King of England.
Well when Phillip of France he heard it by chance
He declared before his court,
"The Queen prefers my rival just because I'm somewhat short."
So he sent the Count of Zippity-Zap
To give to the Queen a dose of clap
To pass it on to the Bastard King of England.
When the King of England heard the news
He cursed the Gallic farce
He up and swore by the royal whore he'd have the Frenchman's arse
He offered half the royal purse and a piece of Queen Hortense
To any British subject who'd undo the King of France.
So the Earl of Sussex jumped on his horse and straightway rode to France
Where he made a pass and he stripped the sash from Phillip's pajama pants
And in front of a throng he slipped on a thong
Leaped on his horse and galloped along
Draggin' the Frenchman back to merry England.
When the King of England he saw the sight he fell in a faint on the floor
For during the ride his rival's hide was stretched a yard or more
And all the maids of England came down to London town
And shouted 'round the battlements, "To hell with the British crown."
So Phillip of France usurped the throne
His scepter was the royal bone
With which he bitched the Bastard King of England."
.
Set a short distance apart from the rollicking laughter of those watching the clowns onstage, Erik stood with arms crossed and unemotionally surveyed the skit, Christine by his side.
"Why would they have a man dress as the queen when there are women to take the stage?" Christine quietly asked in puzzlement.
"Perhaps for the same reason those idiot managers cast you as the pageboy in Il Muto," Erik surmised. "The more absurd the theme, the more ludicrous the performance."
"That makes sense," she stated quickly, not wishing to stir the embers of old offenses. "But could such a song pose trouble if the king's soldiers should hear?"
"It is doubtful," Erik mused indifferently, "as those bluebloods the song spotlights have not yet been born. The names to these peasants are all false. The audience to whom we play will see it as no more than a tale of fiction to amuse, as any traveling minstrel who spins words into yarns that entertain."
Christine seemed unconvinced. "Are we not changing history by introducing ideas that have not yet been uncovered? People not yet born, songs not yet written by those who are not yet alive to write them…?"
It was not the first time she posed such questions, though surely, if history were to change the slightest degree due to their habitation in this period of time, neither Brittany nor France's fate could fare any worse than what Erik had experienced.
He casually studied the buffoons hamming it up on stage, the "Queen of Spain" of the song one of the men draped in linen to pass as a dress with berry dye ridiculously spotted on cheeks and lips. "The song nor its presentation is hardly of any merit to alter the history of the world," he countered dryly.
"Milord Phantom," Bertram called out from the stage, catching sight of him. "We have another skit for you to approve."
Erik nodded pensively. Le Masque was wanted by the law, but the name Phantom had also gained recognition in Paris, and such a pompous form of address would surely arouse interest he did not want. He spoke that which he never once thought he would say –
"My name is Erik. From this day onward, it is by that name you must call me."
"Milord -?"
"Not 'milord'," Erik interrupted Eustace. "Only Erik."
He sensed Christine's astonishment. A quick sidelong glance displayed the approval in her beautiful dark eyes. Before this day, to only three people had he divulged his true name, and then rarely used: Madame Giry, the Daroga, and his beloved Christine. To be known and called by anything but an impersonal title felt peculiar, however necessary.
By the men's dumbfounded expressions, they too considered it odd that he would alter his moniker a second time since he'd been with them, and he shook his head at their ignorance that he should have to explain.
"Once we take the show to the villages, should anyone happen to overhear you address me by title – do you not think it would raise a red flag?"
"A red flag...?" Eustace asked uncertainly.
"Stir unwanted interest that could result in capture. Mine, as well as yours." He sighed at their continued silence. "You will address me by my given name alone. Now, you have a new act you wish me to approve?"
"Oh, aye," Eustace was the first to break from the trance the others maintained and hurried across the stage. "Boy," he said to one of the newcomers, a lad of approximately seven years. "Come up here. It is time."
The masculine Queen of Spain left the stage as a woman and her son took the steps up to the platform. The scrawny boy instantly bent his knees and curled his hands beneath his chin while wriggling his nose, as if he were a rat – and indeed, that is what he portrayed in the ridiculous words that held no rhyme or reason. The skit lumbered back and forth among one of the men, the lad Tobias, and the woman – all who complained of a rat in their stores of food, defecating their clothes, and gnawing at their chairs – never seeing the pesky rodent, the small boy always skirting away before he could be spotted by those on stage and playing it up to the audience. The lad had raw talent, stealing the show with his over-exaggerated actions and clownish expressions. As the end of the farcical skit neared, Tobias voiced an idea to trap the rat. A morsel of bread was laid on stage, a curtain pulled away, and Erik heard Christine gasp to see her lost and found accoutrement of whalebone that she once wore beneath her 19th century skirts now hanging by a rope high above the boy's head.
"Oh, really," she muttered in exasperation. Erik stifled a chuckle, discerning it would not be well met.
Tobias nimbly jumped offstage and raced away, the two adult players moving to the rear of the stage as the boy slowly and eagerly crept closer on hands and knees toward the morsel of bread. Once he reached his goal, an arrow suddenly shot through the air slicing through the rope, and the cage of whalebone fell, trapping the boy who played the rat.
The players on stage surrounded the cage and the captured rat with loud hurrahs, and the sharpshooter, Tobias, approached, bow in hand, congratulatory thumps given him on the back.
The skit was absurd, the lines horrific, and the acting, save for the boy's, wooden and amateurish at best. But for this era, by the shouts of approval and laughter from those watching, it would be well received.
"You may include your skit in our repertoire," Erik halfheartedly approved. Under his breath to Christine, he added, "It hardly compares with the artistic storytelling contained in a libretto, but I suppose it's the best to be done with a handful of clumsy reprobates."
Christine giggled. "I rather liked it – though I'm not thrilled with the prop used in the finale, but I suppose if it must be included, it does serve its purpose. With that risqué song of earlier, Tobias's solo and Bertram playing the reed, and of course you accompanying me on whatever instrument you choose to play while I sing, I think we have a good foundation with which to begin our first production."
"Make no mistake - your song will be the crown jewel in this lackluster diadem of a traveling theatre."
She smiled at his poetic approval and took hold of his arm, linking it with hers, as they strolled away from the others.
"And will I be singing The Jewel Song from Faust as I did at the well?"
He narrowed his eyes in thought. "The peasants there did receive it with enthusiasm, even if they did eye you as though you were barmy while you played with your invisible jewels."
"You remember," she softly exclaimed, her smile growing wider.
"You stole their hearts that day, as you did mine." He dipped his head to bestow a kiss to her crown of curls. "The song will work well midway through the performance, but for the finale I have planned for you to sing, I have something else in mind."
"Do I know it?" she asked like an eager child.
"I have only recently put words to music."
"And is it a love song?"
"It is a ballad of two tragic lovers. A tale bittersweet and sure to leave the audience in an emotional state, so they do not forget. Patience, mon ange damoiselle. I will teach it to you this night, and next week, we shall set out to the first village of our repertoire."
"Next week?" she said in surprise. "Do you think we're ready?"
"You need little rehearsal, though of course I insist that you daily keep your voice conditioned."
"Of course," she smiled, not expecting any less from her Maestro. "I love to sing for you, especially as you play, though I wish you would agree to sing a duet with me."
He nodded faintly at her persistence, still leery to have all eyes upon him, even if every troubadour in their band would be masked. Standing halfway behind the curtain and playing the rebec as she sang center stage was preferable. The one occasion he shared the spotlight with her at the opera, his opera, it had ended badly. Tragically. A spectral disaster that never ceased to haunt his dreams, and well he deserved their harsh reminder. Deserved much greater punishment than that.
"Erik...?"
"I shall insist the troupe rehearse their skits each night we set up camp." He returned to her initial question. "With the masks almost complete, there is nothing to prevent us from setting out on our quest to forge a life through music in this new existence."
"A life I happily embrace, with you always beside me…" She slipped her hand into his and he gave her slim fingers a gentle squeeze. "To guard me and to guide me."
He smiled at her reference to their past, what then had been a travesty to hear her sing such trusting words to his despised rival, similar words Erik later echoed back to her in his plea upon a bridge... But those dark moments were behind, forevermore, literally in another time. While a path unknown but full of promise lay stretched out before them, triumph theirs to conquer.
Erik was no dashing knight and never thought a monster such as he would be given a second chance in life, in love, the truth of it still bewildering to him. The recipient of such good fortune, he was determined never to fail his lady bride again.
xXx
A/N: No real cliffie here – gosh, I'm being nice to you guys lately… Enjoy it while it lasts. ;-)
Writer of the bawdy ballad is Rudyard Kipling. He penned it a few decades after my setting of PotO, and I'm taking a bit of artistic license to include it in my story. In my search for a song to fit (also remembering the type of skits I've seen performed at Medieval Faires) it seemed perfect.