A/N: Today was rough-crying in the car rough, but I keep my promises and I said before Midnight on Friday 3 I treasure your comments more than I can express! Keep telling me your thoughts.

Chapter 16

"Christine!" Raoul dashed across the room, mask askew. His sprinting disrupted the gentry enough for curiosity to follow his path across the floor. At last he stood before them panting and unmasked. Of course he couldn't be bothered to adhere to the principles of a masquerade, Erik thought. He had no need to. No, Raoul with his dark suit and cape and his air of entitlement had no need for the concealment.

"I thought you weren't coming, dearest Lotte." He seized Christine's hands, heedless of Erik's presence.

"Raoul," Christine said. "I apologize for misleading you about my attendance, but I found that I already had the partner I desired."

"Partner? And who might that be?"

"Erik," Christine said, flushing. "My-"

"Teacher," Erik said, too enraged to notice how Christine's smile dimmed at the label. She had begun to feel as though she were merely a prop, a beautiful doll to watch under the music. Across the room, Meg struggled to weave through a cloud of her admirers.

"Erik, this is-"

"The Vicomte de Chagny," Raoul interjected.

"How wonderful to meet you at last, Christine speaks often of your childhood games." Sarcasm dripped from his tone, and Christine felt herself shrink as Raoul gave Erik the disinterested onceover of the raised rich.

"And you monsieur are the reason Lotte is so often unavailable for lunch," Raoul said.

Masked as he was in the sea of faces, Erik's usual intimidation factor was undercut. The red death costume here was commonplace, the height advantage he claimed over the Vicomte was nothing more than regular. Christine's reassuring hand upon his arm was the only thing that kept Erik still in the face of his rival. This milksop boy with his perfect face and open countenance. Yet he, the boy, remained oblivious to the way Christine herself stood between them. Her bare arms glistening in the marbled candlelight. Her gaze entreating Erik to stand his ground.

"Raoul, my training must take precedence. My voice-"

"Is lovely indeed," Raoul said.

"Christine is the finest of my students," Erik said, eyes aglow with warring indignation and pride. "Without the timbre of her voice, opera would be denied its greatest asset."

"Erik is just being kind-"

"I am being entirely honest, Christine."

Behind them, the clock chimed eleven. A flurry of movement and music refilled the air. "Perhaps once the new year is rung, we shall meet unobstructed."

He referred of course to the unmasking of the year, the time where the haze and masks would be stripped away so that nothing stood between the partygoers by the strength of their bare smiles.

Erik bristled. Christine's presence at his side was warm as he watched the Vicomte be pulled into other pursuits.

"A pleasure, monsieur," Raoul said, but his eyes stayed fixed on the curve of Christine's smile until he turned away. "Perhaps we may dance later?"

Erik could not fault him for that. He himself was entranced by the proximity of her-her curls, heat-frizzed and fragrant, the painted red of her cheeks and mouth, the curve of her body in the structured corset of her costume.

"I-"

"Come find me should you wish it," Raoul said lightly before walking away.

"Were I in his place," Erik whispered into her hair, "I'd not leave your side til our hands touched. Until you deigned to smile at me, until I was the only music you could hear."

"You are, Erik. You ever have been." She was dressed like the rising dawn, and her mask (accursed thing!) was silver as the stars that faded from her skirt. The tulle layers of pink and lavender clouded around her ankles-oh how Erik wished the privilege of pushing them aside to reveal her stockinged legs, the pale curve of her knee, the secrets above.

He knew she wore no corset, for her breaths were unobstructed, and beneath his reaching fingers her could feel the shape of her. "Do you regret it?"

"Never," and in those two syllables he received salvation.

"Christine," Meg squealed, having at last extricated herself from an unwanted conversation and pushed her way to them. "You look divine!" She yanked Christine into her arms and squeezed her so tightly that Christine's laughter was stolen with a gasp. Meg's proximity to Christine did not enrage Erik as Raoul's had. He watched the pixieish dancer with interest.

Meg was in every way Christine's opposite. Where Christine was softly curved, Meg was muscular and thin. Her blonde hair was moderately waved, while Christine's dark curls overtook the air. Her bouncing energy was antithetical to Christine's careful beauty.

"She looks like an angel," Erik agreed, and Meg's eyes went wide.

"Christine, his voice," she hissed, intending to be quiet. The mostly empty champagne glass in her hands betrayed her intentions.

"Meg, this is Erik."

"ERIK?! E! E!"

Erik startled back from the rapturous laughter that overtook them.

"Forgive me monsieur," Meg said, "Surely you can understand the thrill of unearthing long-kept secrets. Her eyes sparkled with merriment as she presented her hand to Erik. His masked kiss brushed over Meg's muscles with the easy deference of a gentleman.

Christine seethed to see the way her friend's cheeks flushed red at the purr of Erik's voice. "Madamoiselle Giry, I have heard of you often."

"Enchanted," Meg's high giggle sent irritation over the curve of Christine's spine. She curled into Erik, shocked at the depths of her jealousy. She needn't have worried. A man walked by with a tray of sweets, and Meg departed almost soon as she arrived.

"Thank you," Christine said, when once again they were left alone. Erik's hand curved over her waist and settled in the small of her back. She felt herself begin to shiver, the dull pulse of desire overtaking her veins.

"For what?"

"For indulging me, ange. For being here despite your discomfort and enduring the interrogation of the masses. I know that it isn't easy-"

"To witness the world at your feet, Christine? There is nothing but pride-"

"Jealousy," Christine breathed.

"Of that boy? How could I be?"

Christine's hands slip up his chest, "Because you neglected to remember that I am here with you, Erik. Only you. You have me in your arms. I arrive and depart with you."

"Is that a promise," he purred into the haze of her hair, "Will you come and go at my beck and call, dearest Christine."

She shivered in his arms as another song began, "I should say no, I should dismiss your jealousy as wrong-"

"And run from me, Christine?"

They spun to the music, Erik's natural grace propelling them through dance after dance after dance. In music all was forgotten.

Until the clock struck twelve.

Erik's grip on her other wrist was firm, perhaps enough to had fled in the resulting chaos of midnight to the cacophony of shock that had filled the ballroom at the sight of the unmasked face of Red Death.

The circumstances of which kept Erik silent. How could he wholly regret the fervent kisses of an angel? How could he resent the passion that knocked his mask askew. It could have been far worse.

Disgust, fear-old companions of life, but Christine's soft hand upon his face, the careful way she'd drawn his unmasked and scarred cheek to her breast to conceal his scars amidst the horror of the masses-those things he could not handle. He could not endure the tenderness in her eyes, the way she'd made Meg hand her the mask that had clattered to the floor.

He couldn't bear the way that she'd demanded privacy, the chatter of the crowd returning to disinterest after he was masked once more, heart abeat with the horror of it all.

He was not equipped to process the way she'd tugged him into the shadows, away from the horror, away from everything and into the dark, where he was sovereign.

A kiss, a stolen kiss on an extraordinary night, her willing descent into the darkness. Even now she followed him.

"Erik," she said with a yelp, "Stop!"

She stumbled in the dark, falling forward only to be caught in his willing arms. Christine, his Christine. And yet she trembled. Surely it must be fear? Surely her tolerance of him had worn away at last to reveal the truth? Naturally she'd want to be returned to the safety of her dressing room.

"Do you tremble in disgust, Christine? Is it the realization of the dark, the knowledge that you are alone with a monster?"

"No."

"No?" He had not expected denial. He was unprepared for the way she reached for him, even now after suffering the ultimate humiliation. He knew that kissing him in darkness was wholly different from being perceived by one's peers in the arms of the opera ghost. "Is it the fear of ruin, the horror of being consumed by the dark, undiscoverable-"

"My heel broke," she said.

"Your heel broke?"

"I need you to-"

"Release you into the arms of the vicomte?"

"Carry me home."

"Home?"

"To your house," she said, extending her arms.

And what could he do but pull her into him? What could he do but enfold her into the warmth of his cloak and pull her close enough that he could feel her breath upon the curve of his jaw as he carried her further into the dark.

Christine awoke to warmth. The first sight that she registered upon opening her eyes was Erik crouching before the fire.

In his shirt sleeves, his back spread broad and capable. Long limbed, fine as the china from which he sipped tea. To Christine, the curve of his spine seemed a ladder that she longed to climb with her tongue. It shocked her, the magnetism inherent in the movement of Erik's limbs.

A night of presumed horror and all she could consider was the taste of his lips, the taste of other parts. The fire popped and hissed to life, and she watched him. If anyone had seen him like this, she thought, they would not have screamed.

They would see the competence in his hands, the arch of his muscles. What was a face to the hum of his voice that filled the room like seduction itself? In truth, she had long stopped considering his face anything beyond normal.

She was so used to it now: the mangled divots of his cheek, the twist of his nose, the sallow, stretch of his veiny forehead. And his eyes. Erik's beautiful eyes, golden and glowing. Wanting… Oh, how long he had watched her and wanted. She had so seldom been wanted.

Yet he wanted her: her voice, her body, her very heart and soul. All clear in those golden eyes. Erik's eyes.

He turned now, alert to her shift in breath. All at once she became aware of something long hidden. A realization that must have lived in her for months, if not years: she loved him. Not only as an angel, but as the man he was. With celestial intent and mythos stripped away. Erik. She loved him as Erik.

"I didn't mean to wake you," He said. She sat, his cloak pooling around her knees. He seemed so far away, and there were so many things between them that remained unsaid.

"You didn't. Erik I, I am so sorry…I never meant for." The pause between them left space enough for forgiveness.

"Christine," Erik said, "I could not regret tonight. I could not regret you in my arms. Being the envy of the room. I could not regret your kiss upon my lips. No time spent with you in my arms could ever be wasted."

He was so very far away, the gleam of his mask in the firelight. It was his usual mask, no longer that of Red Death. He was only Erik now, and how she resented the mask which concealed from her half of his expression.

He had so often been the penitent that it seemed only right that she should be the one on her knees now, "Ange-"

A sharp gasp escaped him and he fell to his knees before her, "Do not kneel at the feet of a devil, Christine. No matter how much he may love you." His fingers dared to trace the curve of her jaw and she trembled. "No matter how much he wants you."

"Erik…"

"My name in your voice," Erik said, shivering. "My name, Christine. An ugly monstrous thing."

"No," She said, and her dress seemed a prison around her legs. He could never be close enough, she decided. His eyes, golden warm. His hands, so beautiful in the firelight.

His hands pressed to the curve of her cheekbones, trailing down to caress the pulse of her throat. "You do not run from me," he said.

"Why must you say that as though you are waiting for me to run." She pressed her hand to his heart, to the silken softness of his waistcoat.

"Because I know you must."

"Why?"

He laughed, a hollow sound. "Because though I could not regret for a moment the time we have spent together, your continual presence in my life remains an unobtainable anomaly."

"Don't I get a say, a choice?" She reached for the mask then, the stark lines of it mocking her. He stayed her hand.

"Oh Christine, you needn't be brave anymore tonight."

"Then you needn't be uncomfortable," she said, and with one fell swipe knocked the mask aside. It clattered to the ground, rocking until it fell silent. He watched her carefully. Their breaths seemed to synchronize to the crackle of the fire.

She looked at him, watched him watching her. "Would you believe me if I confessed?"

"Confessed," he breathed, "What need has an angel for confession?"

"Need enough, ange. I fear that my mind and my body have been at odds."

"Is that so?" His long fingers twined with hers, cool and dry and utterly indecent. His golden eyes were honey-soft, wary. She wished to chase the doubt from his mind.

"I have kept secrets-"

"Christine-"

"Secrets I must confess about angels and desire. Love."

"You speak of love as if it is easy, Christine, something that may be gifted-"

"Earned. I loved the angel you were, and now the man you are. I only wish that…I feel as though everything has been my fault. I never meant for them to see you. They don't deserve to see you."

"To know you would confine yourself to a life of ridicule for loving an ugly man. A monster. You said it yourself, Christine."

Christine bristled, "Your tendency to over prescribe vocal exercises is metaphorically monstrous, but you are not a monster. Can you not see that by painting yourself so you discredit my emotions, my feelings. You are beautiful"

"Then you are more blind than I would wish you to be."

Christine strangled the modesty in her, and reached for him. She allowed desire to control the way she touched him. She felt the muscles of his shoulders, the warm pulse of his wrists, the dip of his throat. Lips replaced fingers as she explored the structure of his face, reveling at the soft gasp that escaped his lips.

"Erik, would you not call the sea in all its majesty and violence beautiful?"

"Are you comparing me to the ocean, petit," he scoffed, but lost his breath when her lips ghosted the shell of his ear.

"I compare you to something wanted, something beautiful despite its contradictions. Your scars do not define you-"

"A lifetime disagrees. A lifetime of cruelty. Violence beyond belief,"

"And yet you are here," she said. "We both are."

"Can that be enough? Tomorrow when the people around you mock you for embracing a monster, for kissing this face…better I leave-"

"Don't you dare," Christine cried out, unable to hear him defame himself for a moment longer. Her arms twisted around him tightly. She did not let go, would not let go until he promised he would stay. Her lips stole the promise from his mouth, and when he finally surrendered to her advances, she felt victory hum in her chest.