Author's note: When the last chapter ended, Erik had just sworn that Christine would not spend the rest of her evening in agony, plagued by cruel and irritating ballet girls and forced into unpleasant discussions with other people. Now let us see how he sweeps in to the rescue – Erik, the Hero!
Disclaimer: They are not mine; I only write for entertainment, and because I've got nothing better to do this morning and afternoon until tonight at exactly 11:59 pm, when I will be attending the premier of a truly fantastic movie…
Chapter Thirteen:
The Dance, the Mirror, the Choice
Christine resumes the narrative…
"May I interrupt?"
Blanchette instantly whirled around to face the person who had interrupted her prattle. Her eyes lit on seeing the masked, fantastically costumed man who stood behind us, seeming as if he was waiting for one of us to speak.
He was dressed in a Byronic, wonderful attire of red, white, and gold, with a sword hanging at his side, a long, billowing cloak, a high collar with a flowing, lacy cravat, studded with a large black gem of some sort, and a pair of knee-length, black boots. His hair – from what we could see of it – was thick, slicked back on his head, and a warm golden-brown, with hints of blond in it. He was very handsome, notwithstanding the white mask that covered almost all of his face, save his mouth and chin, which were left uncovered.
I read 'fresh meat' in Blanchette's eyes and silently willed the man to run. Run, I told him with my eyes. Run for your life.
Blanchette fluttered her eyelashes at him and said, vivaciously, "Oui, monsieur – ask us for any favor."
He glanced down at her, from his extremely tall height, and seemed to brush her off like an annoying little gnat. "A favor?" he asked, lightly. "Very well, then, mademoiselle – do one for you mother."
Then he paused a beat before adding the final verbal deathblow.
"Go home and stay there until you've learned to be a lady."
Blanchette's cheeks flamed crimson and she shot him a look that would terrify most people. He stood firm, however, and gestured off to the crowd.
"Your way?"
The girls trooped off, with nervous giggles and whispering, and Meg, after giving me a look that asked my permission to leave, slowly followed them. Flushed and suddenly full of sweet relief at knowing that my irritating persecutors were gone at last, I turned to the man and smiled at him thankfully.
"Monsieur, I do believe that you have been the first person this evening to successfully carry out the feat of stopping her gossip." I said, as he took my hand and kissed it. His lips brushed against the skin of my wrist lightly, but I felt the heat behind them. Something in his touch thrilled and disconcerted me, all at the same time. He straightened up then, towering above me at his statuesque height, and our gazes met. Again, I felt the feeling of heat and ice rushing through my veins.
"If I performed any service, mademoiselle," he replied, in a vibrant, wonderful voice that seemed all-too-familiar, "I am glad to have obliged you. However, I must confess that I interrupted your friend to ask if you would allow me the honour of a dance, not to simply drive her and her lackeys away…although I can tell that you didn't all-together appreciate their company."
He smiled at me, and the expression was gentle, sweet, and almost hesitant. Such a smile merited no return but a smile of my own. His gentle demeanor encouraged me, and I curtsied to him, gazing into his eyes. They seemed so…so familiar.
"I would like nothing better, monsieur." I told him.
So he offered me his arm and, together, we stepped onto the dance floor. The orchestra was resting for the moment and all of the guests had stepped off of the floor to mingle at the sides of the room: talking, laughing, and generally making merry among themselves. My partner gestured gracefully for me to wait for him and I nodded, silently, wrapped up in my own thoughts. He crossed to the orchestra and spoke to the conductor for a moment. I watched his back as he conferred with the maestro, wondering how someone could resemble the Phantom of the Opera so impossibly much. The only thing that was different between this man and Erik was…I didn't know what the difference was.
Is there a difference?
I stiffened upon thinking of that and it was only when my mysterious, masked partner returned to my side that I remembered that I was still alive.
"Shall we, mademoiselle?"
With a start, I shuddered out of my reverie and looked at him bemusedly for a second. He was there, standing by me: as tall, aloof, and handsome as ever in his spectacular costume – Vlad the Impaler, perhaps? I wondered, reflecting on the vampire-like appearance of the crimson and gold attire that he wore – and his eyes were regarding me questioningly, with a bit of concern mingled in their depths.
"Is there something wrong?"
I shook my head, forcing myself to forget all that I had just been thinking of and to make an attempt at enjoying the rest of my evening. "No, monsieur." I said, smiling brightly, trying to reflect my words with my expression. "Nothing is wrong."
He grinned, the brilliance of the expression nearly blinding me, as he took my hand and carefully – as if I was a porcelain doll that he had no wish to break – brought me into his arms, whirling us into a dance position. As the orchestra began to tune up in the background, he whispered to me: his chin nearly touching my shoulder as his smoldering eyes bored into my neck, his breath welling against my skin and his hand lifting mine like the burning, sculpted grasp of a marble statue. I closed my eyes, savoring his touch, as he breathed into my hair, "I hope you like the dance of the Spaniards, mademoiselle."
And then the music began.
I stepped away from him, so that a distance of about five feet separated us, as a single guitar strummed a few fleeting, enticing notes. I could almost hear the swirling, dust-filled wind of a deserted, sunset-filled Spanish square as silence filled the gap left by the guitar's absence as my partner and I faced each other, staring deeply into each other's eyes. Then, a steady, pulsating beat of drums ebbed into the air as the guitars and strings joined in, and I began to dance, even though I had never known that I could dance like this. I twirled across the floor, my feet barely touching the marbled space, and then I felt the strength of my partner's arms around my waist as he caught me and spun me around. I stepped away, turning my back on him, and flicked my arms into the air.
So went the dance.
As we spun, dipped, and moved in and out of each other's grasp, performing wild, passionate moves that could only accompany the most beautiful of Spanish dances, I realized that I had never felt like this when I had danced with Raoul. I felt as if I was a bird: free and passionate to fly on the winds of summertime above the fields of the world. Something wild and unrestrained filled me, lifting me up on great, sweeping wings as I let it go – all of my worry, fear, and pain from the past months.
And my partner didn't stop me. He didn't bring me back to reality by slackening in his movements, by letting me return to reality.
No, he was the one who had set me free into this passionate freedom.
As the music slowed in a momentary interlude, he brought me gently into his embrace; and, just as our gaze met, his eyes seemed to blaze with burning, overpowering emotion. Then he twirled me around, faster than ever before, and the dance was instantly ten thousand times more intense. We whirled at a speed that seemed it was quicker than light itself, becoming more and more involved in our dance as the music strained to keep up with our spinning arms and whisking footsteps.
Then, with one last, overwhelming, beautiful breath of music, it was all over and we remained in each other's arms, breathing hard and staring at each other…wondering: desiring to know if we had really just done that, as our suddenly spell-bound audience applauded us with a heart-pounding ovation. He was still holding me – his right arm supporting my waist as his left held my hand stretched out to its full length – when I heard a voice come from the crowd somewhere behind him.
It was a voice that was filled with utter fury.
Raoul!
I must have mouthed the word, for my partner gently eased his slender hands off of me, stepping away with a fluidly graceful bow. His beautiful eyes bored into mine as he looked up at me and said, "Until we next meet, Christine Daae."
My name – he knew my name!
I was too shocked to react, as he stepped into the crowd and instantly melted into its mass. I tried to call after him, for I had to find him, to see him again. He wasn't just an anonymous guest at the masquerade – and it seemed as if he knew that as well as I did. That he knew that I would know.
"Christine!"
Oh no – Raoul.
I turned around, fully expecting to be slapped across the face in the next blinding second, but he hadn't quite reached me yet, so I was able to compose myself and make an attempt at settling the wild, exhilarated beating of my heart.
What kind of a bride are you anyway, Christine Daae? I asked myself, without a hint of remorse in my soul. You've just danced a completely out-of-line dance with a man that you don't even know while your fiancé was out of the room, as if you had planned it all along – as if you were a flirt!
Nonchalant, I looked down, brushing my costume back into order as Raoul, breathless, finally fought his way through the crowd to my side as I stood in the center of the dance floor. And then I thought a completely rebellious thought.
I don't care.
"What on earth do you think you're doing, Christine Daae?" Raoul asked, his voice low and angry as he took my arm and pulled me off of the dance floor. I returned his look of jealous ire with a cool gaze that must have maddened him, for he certainly didn't calm down. "Do you realize that you've just made a complete wanton of yourself? Standing out there and dancing with a man that you don't even know, as if you do the same sort of thing all the time – what were you thinking?" He stood back and glared at me again, fulminating in his fury.
"That's it, Raoul," I replied, calmly. "I wasn't thinking. Excusez-moi."
Without giving him another second to come up with some sort of reply, I turned my back on him and, gathering my voluminous, cream-coloured satin skirts into both of my hands, I swept off the floor, through the crowd, which obligingly parted for me, and made my way towards the door.
I was so angry.
Why couldn't he just see, for once and for all, that I didn't love him, that I no longer wished to have anything to do with him? He seemed to think that my care was his sole responsibility – that, if I weren't under his constant watch, I would somehow err in my path! He didn't have a single ounce of trust for me in his being—
Then, suddenly, he was there.
My partner. The man who had set me free and given me happiness for five minutes of that evening…five blissful, wonder-filled minutes. Only one other person had done that ever…
The Angel.
I froze in my place, unable to move, forgetting that Raoul was still out there, somewhere in the crowd. All I could think of was the man whom I had spotted across the room, at the other set of doors that led out of the ballroom. He already had his hand on the doorknob and in a second, as I watched, he pushed the door open and ducked out, his long, full cloak sweeping and billowing out behind him. I caught a glimpse of the side of his masked face as he vanished into the darkness beyond the door and then I knew exactly whom I had danced with that evening.
Erik.
Why hadn't he revealed himself to me? Didn't he know how much the last months had agonized me – or did he even care? He knew about my engagement to Raoul, but wouldn't he somehow realize that the attachment was only a farce? That the marriage would never take place? That I would die before I gave him up to live as Raoul's bride? The man was a genius. His mind excelled that of any person I had ever known before in my life or would ever know – couldn't he somehow know that love was something that could never happen between Raoul and I?
Desperate to know the answers to all of those questions and knowing that the only person who could make a reply to them would, in all likeliness, disappear from my sight and leave my life again before I could so much as move, I dashed to the door, threw my weight against it, and ran from the ballroom. Once I had reached the shadow-cloaked, black darkness of the Opéra Populaire's halls, I paused, trying to get my bearings. Erik and I had only had one meeting place in the entire time that we had known each other and he would go there, to that one place, if he desired to see me. I could only find him there.
My dressing room.
With a frantic sense of fear, I tore down the empty halls, away from the music, light, colour, and laughter of the ballroom. I felt as if I was trying to find my way through a labyrinth, searching in its never-ending, twisting, dead-end walls for someone whom I could never hope to find.
I had to try – I wouldn't lose him!
After what seemed an eternity of running and fruitless searching, I finally began to recognize my surroundings. Before I had even stopped my dash down the hall, I was fumbling at the doorknob, which took another precious few moments, and then I had fallen gracelessly into the room, breathless and pale from my run. Quiet, still darkness greeted me: a familiar scent of roses and lavender curling around me like gentle, warm fingers. I stepped into the room, crossing the thresh-hold hesitantly, my slippers whispering on the floorboards. I scanned the room in futile hopefulness…
But of course – he wasn't there.
I should have known that Erik, the master of secrets, darkness, and trapdoors, would never openly reveal himself to me unless he truly desired to. It just wasn't something that he did. I had known that when I had first met him in the wings of the theatre on that far-off, dream-like day.
And I knew it even now.
I turned towards the door, intending to leave the room to its silence until rehearsals began again, but then something in it caught my attention. The mirror that took up almost all of the space on the empty all gleamed, inviting my gaze. Feeling that I was somehow experiencing a warped, strange sort of dream, I let my footsteps trail over to it, until I stood directly in front of the cold, give-nothing glass. Hesitantly, I put out a hand and let my fingertips run over the gold-engraved frame of the mirror, as I remembered everything about it from years before.
It was a special mirror – a mystery mirror.
Suddenly, I recalled myself as a small, spare, flat-chested eleven-year-old with big, hungry eyes and a wealth of hair that was too massy and thick to manage with any amount of ease as I had stood there, in front of that mirror, gazing at my reflection.
One of the older girls in the ballet – had it been Gisèle, who had gone off to some sea-side province and married a young fisherman, or Denise, who had gone on to become a great ballet dancer in the English theatre? – had been telling me about it. It had been a rainy, gray day: the perfect day for telling stories and exploring the mysterious, inviting depths of the Opéra Populaire, which was something that we did when Mme. Giry hadn't been keeping our concentration on our practicing.
I remembered standing in front of the mirror, staring at it as the older girl – I believe it was Gisèle, now that I think about it – motioned to it, with a mock-serious, playful expression sparkling in her friendly, gray-blue, older-sister eyes.
"You see this mirror, Christine Daae?" she had asked. "This, my dear – this is a magic mirror. Sometimes, La Carlotta says, she feels that she is being watched as she sings in her room before the premier of an opera. And then there is always no one there."
"It is a magic mirror."
My own words echoed back to me as I watched the scene, detached from my own consciousness, reliving the past. It always had been a magical-looking mirror: huge, black and gold, and icy, as if it was hiding secrets behind its depths and knew it. I remembered how, when Carlotta had given the room up and it had been put to use as my sewing room, Erik had given me singing lessons from behind it, and how I had always expected to catch a glimpse of him, concealed somewhere in the room.
But now…now the mirror seemed as if it was broken, even though it was still perfectly intact. Like a mirror, my dreams had been shattered over these last months…the dreams that I had hoped…what had I dreamed of, anyway? Some foolish aspiration of a fantasy that Erik would give up his life as the Angel of Music and come to be with me? Some vain, frivolous hope that he could ever love me – he, a man who was, above all, the master of mystery: the prince of obscurities?
I wanted to collapse onto the cold, hard floor and put my face in my hands, letting my tears fall through my fingers and dampen the satin of my skirts, but I held myself upright, unwilling to succumb to my…misery. But even then, I couldn't stop the tear that slid slowly, reluctantly, like a dying soul, down my cheek and dropped onto the graciously curved, embroidered neckline of my gown. Vexed, I hastened to wipe it away, but the tears just kept coming.
Suddenly overwhelmed to the point where I couldn't take it anymore, I sank to my knees and surrendered to my tears. Through my quiet, restrained sobs, I whispered the five words that I had held back all those long months.
"I need you, Erik."
My grief turned into a frenzy of both anger and fear then. I didn't want to live without Erik. If he wouldn't come to me, I would simply go to find him. No one could tell me that I didn't need him, because I did, and nothing would ever change that.
"I don't care anymore, do you hear me?" I muttered to the mirror as I slid my hands to its frame, searching for the device that would trigger its door mechanisms. "I just don't care! Let them all say I'm possessed and that we're both dark and evil – I don't care!"
I punctuated each of those last three words viciously, pulling on the mirror's frame, and then something clicked somewhere deep inside the mirror, and I stepped back, left breathless, trembling, and weak from my passionate outburst, and watched as the mirror slid open with silent, fluid grace. I stared into the darkness beyond it for another long moment, wondering if I could find my way back to the lair – without Erik to guide me. Wondering if he would take me back, after all that had happened.
It was simply a chance that I would have to take.
Once I was inside the passageway, I watched the mirror glide closed again behind me, and then the candles in the lanterns on the walls lit themselves, their amber light flickering wanly against the dark walls. I took one down and, holding it up, ahead of myself, began to walk slowly and carefully down the stone corridor, keeping my free hand on the wall beside me.
I don't know how long I had walked, or how many turns I took, or even how I had managed to recall the path that we had first taken to the lair together: Erik and me, but I suddenly found myself at the head of a flight of steps, which led down onto a stone dock, to which was moored the black gondola boat…
At which stood the Phantom of the Opera, who was waiting for me, and watching my approach with both darkness and light in his beautiful, mismatched eyes.
"Angel…"
* * * * * *