A/N - Christine Persephone - Oh yes! Oh yes, Alyx is completely right, the fact that St. Cyr and his family die is kind of the catalyst which sparks off the whole story! Sorry, I should have mentioned that. Oops. This is just kind of an AU where he doesn't. Because I love him.
Oh - and I stole an (ever so slightly amended) line from The Scarlet Pimpernel. Ten points to anyone who can spot it!! (And Maya, if you can't, I'll forbid you to watch Doug for a week!)
And aww ... poor Raoul. He gets such a bad press. Everyone try to be nice to him, please? I feel awful about what I'm going to do to him. Next time, I'll write a happy-Raoul fic, I promise.
* * * * * *
Erik saw her only twice after the meeting in the hotel grounds; both times, ironically enough, entirely by accident.
The first time was in Covent Garden, where the flat he had taken was to be found. It was a warm night, unusually so for England in May, and Erik found himself, yet again, unable to sleep or to breathe in the flat which was beginning increasingly to feel like a cage. The flat began to feel uncomfortably close, and Erik's old claustrophobic instincts, legacy of a lifetime's captivity, were returning with a vengeance. Finally unable to bear the close, stifling atmosphere of the cramped little flat any longer, he made his way outside to stand in the moonlight, momentarily startled into the shadows as waves of people began to pour from the Opera House. He stood absolutely still in a small alley just off the main street, willing his heart to slow, and furious at his inability to bear crowds with equanimity.
Just as the crowds of people issuing from the Opera House were reduced to a trickle, and he began to think that he might again be able to make his way home without panic, suddenly, in a spill of moonlight that was momentarily a divine spotlight on her, she was there.
For one wild moment, he was sure he was hallucinating, but then he saw the man to whose arm she clung, and his heart gave one intense thump of recognition and wrenched within him. He had never seen her look lovelier; she was laughing at something the dark-haired man on her other side had said, and her eyes were sparkling, flushed with the excitement of being on the other side of the footlights for once.
He heard Raoul hail a cab, and watched as the dark-haired man handed Christine into its dark interior, laughing at something she had said, a hastily suppressed softness in his eyes that Erik might have recognised had he been able to tear his eyes away from Christine.
The cab drove off, and Erik was left standing alone in the middle of a now-almost deserted street, having unconsciously moved out of the protective cloak of the shadows to be closer to her, if still too far away to touch.
He stood very still for a long time, until his heart stopped hammering, then made his way back to the flat it would be a travesty to call home.
He lay down stiffly on the narrow bed, knowing he would not sleep but unable to think of anything else he could do. He lay absolutely still, wretched and sleepless until dawn, when the sun's rays filtered through the inadequate curtains and the vocal ecstasy of a lark joyfully declaimed the arrival of another endless day.
* * *
The second time was about a week later, through long bay windows, warm with light and laughter spilling out into the blackness of the street at night.
Passing through one of the more exclusive parts of London on his way back to his flat on the reasoning that it was likely to be relatively deserted at this time of night, Erik glanced up at one of the houses, warmly lit and spilling the sounds of life and love out into the street, faintly wistful.
Nothing could have prepared him for the shock that he received.
She stood alone by the window, staring out into the darkness of the night, an untouched glass of champagne in her hand, wearing an uncomfortably expensive evening dress which somehow looked wrong on her. As he stared at her, his heart suddenly painfully fast, she raised one hand to her temples, briefly closing her eyes, and he almost started forward in concern before he remembered himself and, taking a step backwards, shrouded himself in darkness again.
She had a headache, he realised. There was that familiar crinkle of pain around her eyes, the almost imperceptible tightness in her eyebrows, the brief closing of her eyes when she thought no one was looking. As he watched her, concerned and pained by the thought that she was suffering, he saw Raoul move up behind her and lay his hand on her shoulder. She started like a guilty child and laughed too quickly at his greeting. Her smile forced, too wide, she nodded and touched him on the arm, doubtless telling him that she would join him in a moment. She remained by the window to stare out into the dark a moment longer after he had left her, before she sighed and disappeared back into the party.
Too distressed to safely make his way all the way across London, and unable to bear the thought of being shut up in the poky little flat he had come to hate for yet another endless night, he made his way to the end of the street and concealed himself behind the thickly twisting trunk of a magnolia.
He sank down onto the ground, lush with the grass, tended so lovingly by a painfully stereotypical English gardener who had an incomprehensible Yorkshire accent and talked to the plants as if they were his personal friends, and drew a shaking breath.
It was no good; unimaginably painful as the idea of being too far away from her was, these chance encounters for which he had no chance to steel and prepare himself hurt him more than he could bear, and the thought that she might one day catch sight of him and panic at the thought that he was still stalking her remained an ever-present worry at the back of his mind.
And yet ...
He could not return to France; even had there not been a significant price on his head throughout the country, there were too many memories he was not yet ready to face or strong enough to bear. And the rest of the continent was simply inconvenient; Germany too loud and coarse, Spain unbearably garish, Rome - oh, God, no - and the East uncomfortably difficult to establish oneself in without having to answer a lot of awkward questions.
England was so perfect. The people were so politely reserved, never asking difficult questions he didn't know how to answer, each keeping to their own business; the English stiff upper lip that the rest of Europe so mocked suited him admirably.
He rubbed his hand restlessly up and down the trunk of the magnolia, feeling the burn of bark against his hand as if from a distance. It would all have been so much easier if they had continued their honeymoon tour throughout Europe as they had planned to do, he thought wearily.
There came the staccato clicking sound of feminine high heels on the pavement, accompanied by the slightly duller thud of a pair of men's shoes and the muffled sound of conversation. Erik glanced up sharply, angling himself carefully along the line of the tree to ensure that he was completely invisible.
As the couple continued up the road towards him, their words became more distinct.
"Looked ghastly in the dress, of course, but then what can one expect? One can't pass off a flower girl as a duchess, whatever Bernard Shaw would have us believe, and one can't take a guttersnipe chorus girl from France and expect her to fit into society simply because her husband can afford to buy her a decent wardrobe. No breeding, that's what it is, no posture."
Erik felt the scrape of rough bark along his hand as he clenched it around a branch.
"Just as you say, m'dear."
"You know they're planning to settle down here, don't you? Marjorie Gilmore told me. They're going to start looking at houses. Can you imagine? Our being forced to have that jumped-up little ballet dancer in our house? We'll have to invite them, of course, it wouldn't be the done thing not to." There came a sigh of regret. "And he such a nice young man. Philippe de Chagny's brother, you know, dear, that nice young gentleman we met at the Forsyths' last year." Another sigh. "No, he's charming, it's just that absurd child he's picked up. Whatever possessed him to do it, I can't imagine; and whatever was dear Philippe thinking, permitting it!"
"Quite, m'dear. Oh - taxi!"
Their voices faded as they folded into the black interior of a cab, and Erik was left with blood seeping from his hand from the burn of the branch and his heart aching for her. She should have known how they would receive her! In a society where blood was all-important and money only acceptable if made in "civilised" ways, they would never see her as more than an ill-born French chorus girl who had been involved in scandal at a French Opera House.
He closed his eyes and welcomed the ensuing blackness. That they were to settle down in England was a most unexpected and unwelcome development; that he should remain here was now quite impossible.
Erik rose slowly, and made his way back to Covent Garden.
The next morning, he slipped his notice and two months' advance rent under his landlady's door, and bought a ticket for the first ship he came across, neither knowing nor caring where it was bound for.
It was not until he overheard the conversation of a French mother and her small child that he realised he had boarded a boat that would take him straight back to Paris.
* * *
Christine made her way briskly down the corridor, adjusting the vase of flowers in her arms, humming happily to herself. The headache that she had gone to bed with after the nightmarish society party last night had gone, and she felt secure again, reassured by the conversation she and Raoul had had in the warm blackness of their room last night. She paused outside the living room, hearing voices come from within. She soon identified the speakers as Raoul and St. Cyr, and the serious note in their voices stopped her from breezing in and disrupting them.
"St. Cyr ..." Raoul sounded hopeless. "You can't leave."
"I have to, Raoul. It ..." he drew a deep breath and pressed his knuckles to his face. "It wouldn't work."
"She need never know," Raoul pleaded.
Christine heard St. Cyr cross the room and toss back a tumbler of brandy, before he turned back to face her husband. "But I know. And now you do - I can't stay under those conditions." He paused. "Perhaps if I go away for a time, I can forget about her - perhaps even find a wife for myself while I'm away. But if I stay here - can't you see? - I might end up betraying your trust. I couldn't bear that - I respect you too much for that. I respect her too much for that."
There was a long silence, before Christine heard Raoul sigh. She could almost picture him distractedly drawing a hand back through his hair as he looked at his stubborn friend.
"You know that I bear you no ill-will for what you have told me here today," he said quietly, crossing the room to shake St. Cyr's hand. "And I swear she will never learn of it from me."
St. Cyr nodded seriously. "I will write," he said after another silence. "When I am again a little more my own man."
The two men shook hands and St. Cyr made for the door. Panicking at the thought that she might be caught eavesdropping, Christine forced herself to push the door open and breeze into the room with a smile and a cheery greeting.
Both men froze at the sight of her, Raoul suddenly motionless in the act of pouring himself a glass of brandy before forcing himself to smile and reach out to her. St. Cyr stared at her for a moment in confusion, then bowed stiffly and hastened out of the room.
Christine looked after him in confusion, placing the vase on the table as she looked up at Raoul.
"What's wrong with him?" she asked, bewildered. "Is he all right?"
Raoul smiled cautiously, taking her into his arms and kissing her on the top of her head. "He's just ..." he hesitated, "... had a little bad news. He's going away for a while."
Christine turned in his arms to look him in the face, one eyebrow raised. "Raoul, has anyone ever told you that you are a truly appalling liar?"
He laughed uncomfortably and traced the line of her hair with his hand. "Christine ... believe me when I say I should love nothing better than to tell you the real reason for his departure ... and trust me when I say I cannot."
Her brow furrowed in concern. "Is he all right?"
Raoul took her into his arms again, pressing her head against his chest and stroking her hair back. "Not really," he answered honestly. "But he will be, given time."
Christine frowned. "Raoul ... you would tell me if there was anything seriously wrong, wouldn't you?"
He kissed the top of her head. "Of course I would," he whispered. "Please believe I have a good reason for not telling you the whole."
She nodded slowly, tracing her finger along the petals of a drooping red rose in the vase. "Of course I do," she murmured. "Of course."
* * *
Christine was surprised to find how much she missed St. Cyr. Raoul continued to be busy with his estate back in France, and with only English society beauties to occupy her time, all of whom seemed to mean more than they said, she found herself unbearably lonely.
Christine found herself longing for Paris and her friends, who did not judge her only as the wife of the Vicomte de Chagny.
And one friend in particular ...
She sighed and picked up her needlework again, staring down at the slightly crooked rose she had spent an hour stitching yesterday while she waited for Raoul to get home. She stabbed her needle too hard through the thin silk and sucked in her breath as it drove into her finger, drawing blood. She threw the needlework frame down onto her footstool and stood up to pace the room distractedly, sucking her finger where the needle had broken the skin.
She heard a hesitant tap on the door and groaned inwardly. I can't bear another mindless conversation with a drivelling sixteen-year-old who wants to practise her French, she thought with a kind of weary desperation.
"Come in!" she called, arranging her face into what she hoped passed for a smile.
St. Cyr opened the door a little way and looked in.
"St. Cyr!" She jumped up and hastened to greet him. "How wonderful to see you! I didn't know you were back in England!"
St. Cyr forced a smile and bent to kiss her lightly on the cheek.
"Christine ..." He gestured to a chair, and Christine sat down, slightly confused at his unaccustomed formality.
"What's wrong?" she asked, feeling the first icy pinpricks of fear. "What's happened? Are you all right?" She reached down to grasp his hand, and his silence confirmed her anxiety. "St. Cyr, tell me what it is!"
He took both of her hands in his own and held them very tightly, not meeting her eyes.
"Christine ... my dear ..." He drew a deep breath. "Christ alive, I'm no good at this."
Christine felt tears start in her eyes and blinked them back. "Is it Raoul?" she whispered.
St. Cyr looked up at her, his hands crushingly tight around her own, and nodded once, his own eyes unusually bright. "I'm so sorry."
Christine felt tears slip down her cheeks. "No," she whispered, turning her face away and trying uselessly to withdraw her hands from St. Cyr's. "No ..."
His hand was on her face, forcing her to look at him. "He didn't suffer. It was over in an instant."
"No." She was sobbing now, denial burning through her, reaching out as though she expected Raoul to walk through the door. "No!"
And then St. Cyr's arms were around her, tight, rescuing, something warm and real in a world that was so suddenly upside down, and she clung to him as a rock in the unbearably cold sea that was so inexorably, in a blinding rush of icy water, rushing her away into the blackness of subterranea.
