"MISSING: Girl of nineteen. Severely scarred and possibly insane. Answers to Helena Guichard. Contact Monsieur Atrur Guichard at…" The article continued to give the Guichard address, however no reward was offered.

"Insane? How could he say I am insane?" Helena sat cross legged on the bed, she had shucked the worn skirt and blouse and new corset and was back in her comfortable shift and robe. She stared at the paper in her hands not believing what she saw. She had been labeled insane in a public paper. The ad had gone out calling for her to be brought back home but no reward was given. She was wanted, but not badly enough for a bounty.

"I can't believe him! How dare he? I can't believe it!" She threw the papers off the bed as hard as she could but being papers they scattered and didn't get far. She sat there seething for a few minutes before looking at the door that led to the lake front room with a determined glint in her eyes.

In a flash Helena was at the door and opening it wide. She looked out into the room to find it empty. With determination she walked to the door across from her own. She rapped smartly on the door to Erik's room. When no answer came she knocked again, this time louder and more insistently.

The door opened and she was looking at a naked chest. Helena stepped back and looked up into Erik's irritated face. His white shirt was open and his hair looked wet, the thought raced across her mind that she must have disturbed his bath.

"What?" He said his eyes glaring into her face. She quickly felt ashamed at having bothered him for something so unimportant as-

'No, it isn't unimportant, it is terribly important,' she thought and her face hardened again. "Erik I need to go out into the city."

"No." She wasn't even sure his lips had moved with the simple word but she did know his eyes squinted further in more anger.

"You don't understand I-"

"No, I do not care."

"I don't care if you care or not, I have to go back to the city and will not take no for an answer." 'Father always said I was too stubborn, especially after- Non! I will not think of this now, I must answer this ad.' She continued and had she not been so angry she might have burst into flames from the searing glares she was given by Erik, "You cannot imagine how important it is that I go to Paris!"

"I can imagine a great deal. Now give me a good reason to listen to your pleas or do not speak of this again."

"I-" Helena paused as she was about to continue to argue. No she had to answer his question, there was no doubt about that. But what she could tell him would have to be thought about.

Helena stepped backwards, turned around and brought her hand to her lips and thought. "An ad went out in the paper calling for my return home. I must answer it. If I do not I will be thought dead."

She turned to look back at Erik whose expression had not changed. "Just please take me there," Helena said, pleading with him. "You can make it so I don't know where we are, I care not, but I must get to Paris. If you want to get rid of me then you can but I must go."

She didn't see any indicators that he had even heard her heartfelt pleas. But he abruptly turned and went behind the red curtain where he had gotten her balms. She waited, not moving until her feet grew cold from not moving and she was thinking about sitting in the chair to wait when he came out with a bowl of a white paste-like substance.

"If you are going out into the city you will have to have a mask, to have a mask you we must first make a mold of your face. Now sit on that stool and hold your breath."

It was one week more in Erik's home before he knocked on her door with a small chest under his arm. When Helena opened the door she seized the box from his arm and set it on the bed.

Her wounds were healing nicely, with only yellow bruises and red scratches to prove she had been hurt. She had also taken to wearing the corsets and worn clothes from the closet in her room. However the burn on her cheek was still red and puffy, in places it was rough and in others it seemed to ooze a liquid. The balm Erik had made had helped some though Helena guessed she would never look the same no matter how much she healed.

Helena opened the hat box to find more masks than she could imagine. They came in a rainbow of colors and styles, each a beauty in its own way. The top one she picked out was white and looked like it would match Erik's own.

"Are you pleased with them?" Helena jumped, she had forgotten Erik was at the door watching her.

"They are exquisite. I love them!" She looked up at his emotionless face.

"Try one on."

Helena nodded and slid the white one over her left cheek. Erik nodded stiffly and she turned to look in the mirror. She smirked at her reflection. She looked mysterious and commanding. She looked… "I look almost like you. Except prettier." She looked at him in the mirror slyly.

"Indeed," he said roughly. Erik turned around and went out the door while Helena smiled to herself. She sat at the vanity to look at herself, thinking about all that had happened since she had come to know Erik. Things had changed between them and although she was still cautious with him she would joke and tease him like she might a cousin. She had not spoken of her past and neither had he. Erik had changed very little. He still seemed to keep her at arms' length emotionally and physically. He treated her as though something he wished he didn't have but was resigned to.

'And now I look like him. It is strange that he wears a mask. I know that I hide something under mine, does he do the same?' Helena had never considered the mask Erik wore. It was just part of him. But her mask was an item of clothing, something she could choose to wear or not. His was the same surely. What was he hiding?

She sat there for a few minutes more in deep thought before she caught sight of the reflection of Ayesha sitting at the door.

"Come to ridicule me as I suspect many will do? Or are you ready for me to leave?" The cat didn't move, not so much as to blink and Helena couldn't see her breathing either. "I suppose the later then?"

Helena smirked and rose from the stool to go close the door to her room. Ayesha jumped onto her bed and watched as Helena looked through the closet. Today she would be going into Paris to meet with her family. Today she had to look like she was in control and stable. She had to appear strong, unfazed, and angry. She would have to be a complete turnabout from what had last been seen of her.

It had been two hours since Erik had left Helena's room after she had tried on her mask. He had been thinking the whole time about out how their personalities contrasted. He was cynical, heartbroken, passionate, and dark. She was like a bareback ride on a wild horse through untouched woods, never the same. She seemed to already have a mask on, an emotional mask, she would laugh and joke like there was no problem in the world but when left to her own thoughts too long she would grow quiet with a distant, pained look in her eyes.

Erik knocked on the door to Helena's room. He had told her that he would take her into town after she had received her masks. But if she didn't hurry he would change his mind.

"I'm coming. Just a minute more," came the call from the other side of the door.

Erik grunted in annoyance and stepped back to his chair.

Five minutes later he walked back to the door and said clearly, "I will wait no longer, come now or do not intend on going at all."

Erik turned around and had only walked five steps when he heard the door open. He turned and had he not had so much control over his face his jaw would have dropped. Instead he silently stood there and took in every aspect of her appearance while she looked at him nervously.

The dress she wore was primarily red but had a sheer black overlay making it seem darker. It had black embroidered roses on the low cut neck, an intricate bustle and puffy-shouldered long sleeves. She wore black gloves and black lace up boots. Her mask was one of the more unique masks; it was covered in black velvet and was shaped rather like flames. It had two fiery fingers that reached over her right eye brow, then the black flame raced down and across her nose to her left cheek then back into her hair. Helena's blonde locks were curled and swept back into a loose knot at the back of her head, many curls falling out to rest on her shoulders. The young woman had made use of the many face colors on the vanity as well.

It was all very striking and different and would have been more so had she not bit her red lower lip and wrung her hands as Erik stood looking at her silently.

"Well, what do you think?"

"I think," Erik said as he pulled a small vial out of his coat pocket, "they will have no difficulty believing you are alive."