17
There is a city in Erik's mind. It does not exist, but it closely resembles Paris, long into the blackest night. Raoul has spotted this painting on more than one of the Phantom's canvases, and sketched out across various easels throughout the lair. When Erik has left he studies them, over and over, each time finding something he had not noticed before. There is something in them that is fascinating, and more than that, calming. He can stare at them for hours, and forget that he is really standing barefoot on the rocks of a dim little den beneath the earth.
Darkness spreads over the rooftops and shingled slopes. Dark, but not foreboding, or hopeless. Erik has allowed hope to enter his art, in the form of tiny, glimmering stars around the absent moon. Light, dim, dark yellow with the slightest touch of pale green is the distant horizon.
Raoul has been in this prison for three months now, and he cannot think straight anymore. He itches with curiosity that cannot be quenched through such solitude. Erik is never around to answer them, and even if he was, he would declare Raoul an imbecile and be gone. Such things worry Raoul. He wants to paint now. Paint, or find a way to not stumble over his own fingers while idly playing at the organ.
More than that, he worries, because now he seeks approval.
