A/N – And Meg makes an appearance. Hurrah!

For Christine Persephone, just because I'm so honoured to be in receipt of the Sarah Brightman Happy Puppy Dance; and for Steph for helping me brainstorm. This chapter is at least half her fault; and, hence, she deserves half of any credit that may be going.

And Steph – get that Raoul-loving demon back inside you! Repeat after me: Jim Weitzer … Matt Cammelle … Chris Carl … Steve Barton … Oliver Thornton … (joking! Joking … I swear. How do you fancy him as Walter Hartright?)

Much love to everyone who's reviewed – I've absolutely loved writing this story, and I'm so inspired and made happy by all your reviews – love you all.

Christine gave St Cyr her answer the next day. Confused as her feelings were about Erik, she was certain that she could never marry the man who had sacrificed so much to protect her after the death of his best friend; and her heart shrank from the thought of keeping him in the cruel torture of suspense while she sorted through her tangled feelings for her music teacher.

"Breeding will out," the wives of Raoul's friends had been wont to remark in pointedly loud voices as Christine tried to shrink into a corner to escape their notice; and never had Christine been so aware of the truth in those biting words as that day. The barest moment in which unguarded pain stamped itself across St Cyr's handsome features was all he allowed himself: he concealed his disappointment beneath a well-practised façade of good-humour, and sought to assuage Christine's guilt as best he could by minimising the situation.

But in spite of all his declarations that of course they would still be friends, as Christine looked upon his fixed smile as he waved her into her hansom, she knew that their friendship had changed, and would never be quite the same again.

However, as the days wore on, her thoughts did not resolve themselves. She was aware that she felt different towards Erik: when they were together, she felt awkward, and sought to please him as best she could; then she felt foolish and withdrew her earnest efforts in case he should notice the change in her. She felt angry with herself: her behaviour was utterly irrational, and she knew it; and yet she could not shake off the feeling that something had changed between them. The change was not in him – he was as kind and yet frustratingly reserved as ever – and so it must be in her. But quite what that change was, she could not fathom; nor could she understand why her skin tingled whenever he stood near her, or why she could not keep herself from stealing guilty glances at him as they sat in his warm music room, he reading or writing, his face a study in concentration lit by the flickering of the firelight.

It was one such night, late in the evening, that they sat inside, the steady drumming of the rain against the roof a soothing background to the scene of quiet domesticity within.

Erik had spent much of the evening working, scrawling music across sheet after sheet of flawless cream paper with feverish urgency, and as the hour grew late, he gradually relaxed. At last, with a sigh, he laid down his pen and sat back in his chair to survey his work. Christine, watching him surreptitiously from beneath the cover of her book, suppressed a smile as he registered the disarray of paper spread over the desk with a frown, half of bemusement, half of dismay. It amused her to observe how absorbed he could become in his work; and it worried her not a little less that she had quite shamelessly taken advantage of that fact to spend almost the entire evening watching him.

She hastily looked back down at her book as he glanced over to her, feeling herself blush like a small child guiltily caught distracting a working parent.

She heard him rise, evidently abandoning the mess of papers strewn over the desk and floor as a bad job, and pad softly across the room towards her.

"What are you reading?" he asked.

Christine, who had in fact not read more than a paragraph since taking up the book several hours earlier, was disconcerted by the question and embarrassed not to know the answer. Instead of replying, she offered him the book to look at himself, hoping against hope that he would not notice the fiery blush that seemed to increase proportionally as she willed it to subside.

Appearing not to notice her heightened colour, Erik accepted the book and inspected the cover.

"Wuthering Heights," he remarked approvingly, handing it back to her. "An appropriate book for a night like tonight." He gestured towards the window, where a flash of lightning had just illuminated the driving rain still beating against the window. "Have you noticed that every mother in the novel dies in childbirth, just as Emily's did?" He gave the familiar little half-smile that always came out as lopsided because of the constant placidity of the mask, and crossed the room to look out of the window into the rain. "A question of how our own experiences influence our art."

Christine found herself smiling. Erik would frequently offer small facts relevant to the minutiae of her life to her, and with his instinctive understanding of what would interest her, she never failed to be captivated by his capacity to impart knowledge.

"I fear I have wasted your day," he said at last, turning from the window. "We have hardly time for a singing lesson now."

Christine swallowed the protest that rose instinctively to her lips that time spent with him was never wasted, and instead suggested that he might play for her. "To make the day not entirely devoid of music," she added, her eyes sparkling.

In spite of the fact that he must be tired from his long hours of composition, Erik acquiesced at once and seated himself at the piano, thumbing through scores.

"What would you like to hear?" he inquired, and an idea struck Christine.

"Why don't you play for me on your violin again?" she suggested. "I haven't heard you play it in so long."

He hesitated, and she saw doubt in his eyes.

"I mean … not if you'd rather not," she stammered, not quite understanding why he should not wish to, and yet sensing that she had unthinkingly touched a nerve deep inside him.

He shook his head. Inwardly, he was in turmoil: it had been so long since he had played his violin. To play it for her again would strip away his final remaining protection against her, and with it the lingering pretence that he could live without her. He was not even sure he could remember how to play …

… but as he moved mechanically to withdraw the case from the wardrobe in which he had stored it, and his fingers did not stumble on the catches, it all came pouring back to him, and as he lifted his most beloved instrument into his hands, he could suddenly remember how he had felt all those years ago. The joy of absolute adoration yet untainted by the forbidden fruit of the terrible knowledge that would destroy them both. Unaware that Christine was watching his changing demeanour with something between alarm and curiosity, he winced as a rush of pain swept through him as he once again saw her face, contorted with fear; heard her screams echo through the cavernous cellars.

Slowly, he lifted the violin beneath his chin, and tested the sound. Across the room, Christine sat mesmerised as he adjusted the tuning pegs, perfecting the sound. At last, he drew the bow across the strings, and Christine shut her eyes as the air rang with music that was suddenly alive. Lament and joy swept through her, leaving her shaking with the force of its onslaught, and she found herself weeping.

At last, the music ceased, only the whispering breath of the last notes dropping, pearl-like, into still water remaining. Christine opened her eyes and looked at Erik: he was sitting so still he might have been carved from marble. His eyes were closed; even as she watched, a single tear escaped from his closed eyelids and slid down the cool surface of the mask.

"Erik," she whispered, her voice choked with tears. Unthinkingly, she stretched her hand out to him, wanting desperately to feel him kiss her fingers again, to feel his cold touch burn against her skin.

As soon as her hand connected with his, his eyes snapped open; he rose to his feet with a startled movement. One hand rose to his face, touching the mask and instantly withdrawing. He seemed utterly startled, as though he had been awakened from a deep sleep without warning.

"Forgive me …"

He took a step backwards without seeming to realise the motion. His hand went again to his mask, and Christine stood, nervous.

It had been so many years since she had heard him play his violin, and Christine was startled and more than a little frightened by the difference in her own reaction. Although she had felt the familiar rush of emotional admiration of his transcendent talent, the emotion was now different somehow … and that ineffably fierce desire to feel him take her into his arms was definitely unfamiliar.

Christine touched her fingers to her throat, feeling her face burning.

Erik's voice reached her, just a little unsteady. "I think that perhaps I am rather too out of practice to offer you a tolerable performance," he said, replacing the violin swiftly in its case and closing the lid with a sound of finality.

He retreated to the piano, and the rest of the evening passed off in tolerable calm as he played deliberately light songs for her.

But even as she laughed at a ludicrous song about a tree-dwelling frog, Christine was in turmoil. Somehow her feelings had changed in a way she had never dreamed possible: and she could not imagine how she was ever to tell him.

It was a Wednesday several weeks later that Erik was to be found making his way through one of his network of secret passages in the Opéra Populaire to the Rue Scribe. On account of Christine's schedule, which was becoming increasingly busy with extra rehearsals, they would occasionally have their lessons in the Opéra itself to save Christine the time wasted travelling to and from Erik's flat. He was thinking with satisfaction about that day's lesson, in which he had finally persuaded Christine to begin work on Mimi's part of the score – only for a vocal challenge, of course – when his attention was caught by the sound of excited chatter coming from the corridor.

"Mary said Nicole had news."

"About Christine!"

His attention caught in spite of himself, Erik hesitated. The squeak of laughter that issued from one of the small girls' throats made up his mind for him, and with lithe speed born of long familiarity with the Opéra's extensive network of secret passages, largely constructed by himself, he followed the girls to the ballet corps dormitories.

He arrived just after the two girls he had observed in the passage had squeezed their way into the huddle of ballerinas that had formed around a tall girl with dark hair whom he recognised as a dancer from years ago. He combed his memory for her name, but only a small blonde ballerina's plea of "Oh, please, Nicole!" finally gave him to remember her fully.

The other girls crowded even closer.

"What is it?"

"It's the Marquis!" Nicole looked around, bursting with self-importance and excitement, and, lowering her voice to a stage whisper, concluded, "He's asked her to marry him!"

Erik reached blindly for the wall, suddenly unsure of his feet. The corps gave a collective gasp, which rapidly dissolved into equally collective squeaking and shrill shrieks of excitement.

"She won't marry him." The girls all turned to see where the voice had come from. Little Meg Giry was sitting curled up on her bed with a book, having until then taken no part in the conversation. "Whether he's asked her or not –" pre-empting her friends' request, she held up a slim hand "– and no, I won't tell you whether he has, because it's frankly none of your business – she won't marry him. So I suggest you don't go spreading that rubbish about." This last was delivered with a hard stare at Nicole, who flushed.

"Well, why shouldn't she?" she demanded defiantly. "How do you know she won't?"

Meg laid her book down on her bedside table. "Because her singing teacher would never stand for it," she said simply, and Erik felt the room grow distant as the ground shivered beneath his feet. "She will never marry while she's still under his tuition. He is extremely strict and she wouldn't upset him for the world."

"But the Marquis is so handsome!" protested little Robyn.

"And rich," murmured Anna, slightly better versed in the ways of the world.

"Well-connected," added Mary. She and Anna exchanged knowing, slightly pitying glances for Robyn's romantic sensibilities.

"And doubtless it would be the best thing in the world for her to marry him," concluded Meg. She took up her book again, a clear sign that she did not intend to participate in the conversation any longer. "Nevertheless, she won't, and there's an end to it." She opened her book, and proceeded to ignore the barrage of protest that ensued from her friends.

At precisely that moment, Christine was sitting on her own bed at home, in much the same attitude as Meg. She too held a book – the long-neglected Wuthering Heights – and was, regrettably, doing no more justice to it than she had the last time she had taken it up at Erik's flat.

She was, instead, staring at the opposite wall, patterned with a particularly dull floral motif she was always meaning to have changed; but today, its banality suited her. It did not draw her attention away from her thoughts, which had of late been so convolutedly tangled that allowing herself too much time to focus on them inevitably resulted in a headache.

She would have liked to be able to claim that her thoughts were largely concerned with St Cyr and how best to help him through the pain she had caused him. She was ashamed to admit that she had hardly thought of him once except with fleeting guilt for the very fact that she thought of him so little.

One man alone occupied her mind; and it seemed absurd to her that she should spend so much time wondering about his own closely-guarded feelings when he had expended so many years in loving her.

Christine dropped her book on the floor in an expression of frustration. If only she were sure! She had spent days analysing his behaviour, worrying every gesture he made and every word he spoke from every angle she could possibly think of until nothing seemed certain.

She felt he must love her: his kindness, his careful attention to her every move and wish, the very fact that he continued willing to tutor her after all they had been through! all translated to her belief that the feelings he had entertained for her seven years ago had not faded into a memory.

But if she were wrong … and he was certainly entitled to hate her after everything that had happened between them. He did not hate her, she was sure – felt – was almost certain – but as Christine knew from bitter experience, there was a world of difference between the treasuring of a friendship and the romantic attachment she had come to long for.

But whether he could find it in himself to reciprocate her feelings or not, Christine knew she could not hold the secret much longer. Every time she was near him, she longed to reach out and touch him, and did not dare; she knew that one day soon her self-control – so inferior to his own! – would desert her and she would open herself utterly artlessly to the possibility of rejection.

And rejection, she felt, she could not bear.

Better, surely, she reasoned, to broach the subject herself, consciously, with prepared words, than to allow herself to drive him away with clumsy, ill-prepared declarations of feelings unwelcome to him?

Christine looked down at the book which had landed open on the floor, and the picture on the centrefold – a delicate line drawing of Cathy and Heathcliff standing just apart from each other – settled her mind.

She was due to see him the next day for a singing lesson: she would tell him before the lesson, and if he ordered her out of the flat directly, at least she would be spared the torture of enduring his current kind detachment.

Feeling inexplicably cheered by the relief of finally having made a decision, Christine stood up and replaced Wuthering Heights on her bookshelf. She sat down again and wrapped her arms around her legs, resting her head on her knees and casting a silent prayer to Heaven.

Erik strode blindly into his flat, shrugging his cloak from his shoulders and leaving it where it fell, ignoring Marguerite's happy greeting which rapidly turned to vocal displeasure as he failed to acknowledge her.

His head was swimming as he sank into his chair, and he reached for the decanter of brandy that sat on the table with a gesture of desperation. He rarely drank, but when he did, he noted with furious pain, it was inevitably caused by Christine.

Meg's voice rang in his head.

"Doubtless it would be the best thing in the world for her to marry him."

She had not told him that the Marquis had asked her to marry him. What did that mean? He felt his heart crack at the answer that instantly occurred to him, and swallowed his brandy rapidly, his throat burning. Was she still so afraid of him that she could not tell him the truth?

The news did not in itself surprise him: he had seen the expression in St Cyr's eyes whenever he watched Christine perform, and had recognised it with an emotion that might almost have been sympathy had he not felt the cold rush of fear that accompanied it. He was so like Raoul: handsome, charming, utterly kind and – an increasing rarity in this day and age – an aristocrat worthy of his noble name. That he loved Christine as well as her late husband had, Erik did not doubt; and how could she help loving him back?

Meg was right, of course – for all her deceptively sweet pixie-like features, she had a surprisingly sharp and perceptive mind beneath her improbably beautiful mass of blonde curls – if Christine was ever to be truly happy again, she should remarry: so dependent was she upon the love of those around her that without the steadfast devotion of one who would never leave her, she would never feel quite secure. And if she must remarry, Erik could think of nobody more suitable than the Marquis de St Cyr: the admission was painful but essential.

However, he knew just as well as Meg did that while she remained under his tuition, she would never marry; and he felt at least fairly confident that she would not willingly sacrifice his instruction in favour of a lesser musician. He did not flatter himself with the thought: he knew this dedication to him was based not on any personal attachment, but rather on the simple fact that he was the man most likely to resurrect her voice to its former glory.

But how much happier she would be if she could marry the Marquis – even if she had to endure temporary sorrow by the death of her career.

If Erik's reasoning was specious, he did not recognise it. So accustomed was he to think of himself only as a blight upon Christine's life that it had become habit to believe that she would be more fortunately placed almost anywhere than in a situation in which she was forced to endure his company on a regular basis.

Erik was not a man given to self-pity, largely because he had never esteemed himself worthy of even his own sympathy. He was far more accustomed to blame himself for his misfortunes, and was more comfortable with self-hatred well-practiced throughout his life.

It was so that he felt now: his duty was clear. He did not deserve her; he could never hope to own her love; and it was his responsibility as the older and wiser of them to sacrifice his own unimportant happiness to secure her the life she deserved. It did not signify what became of him: she was all that mattered.

And perhaps, one day, if he cherished the fire of his love for her tenderly enough, he would be able to see past the unbearably painful image of her in the Marquis' arms to the reasoning that this really was best for her.

He had to move quickly: he was not sure his resolve could endure further interaction with her, however shamefully his heart begged for just another hour with her. She was due to come to him for a lesson the next morning: he would tell her then.

Tomorrow he would be strong.

Tonight …

He unlocked the third drawer of the dresser where he kept his most treasured possessions, and withdrew the small golden ring which had once – however briefly – graced her finger. As if in a dream, he slipped it onto his own finger and reached into the drawer for a single sheet of paper. Christine's face, minutely rendered in fine ink lines, gazed up at him. He stared at it for a long time; and then he bent his head into his hands.

Tomorrow, he would be strong.

Tonight, he would allow himself to remember what it was to love her.

The next day – or perhaps simply a continuation of the last one, for without sleep days just become longer – Erik sat in his chair, holding himself very still, as if through controlling his movement he could halt the passage of time. He watched the clock's hands tick with torturous steadiness towards ten o'clock.

He felt nothing.

He was frozen inside: his duty was clear, his sacrifice accepted; and now he felt nothing but a kind of sick apprehension, willing the clock's hands to slow that ten o'clock might never arrive and he might never have to relinquish her; and in the same moment wishing that it could all be over. He realised with a start that he was beginning to fear that he would not be able to go through with it, and took a hasty drink of brandy to bolster his resolve.

At five to ten, there came a cheerful knock on the door, and Erik felt his heart thud once, dully, inside him. He rose slowly to answer the door, and cursed himself for fifty kinds of a fool as she breezed in with a beaming smile and a diffusion of the perfume of her hair into the air.

She spoke first, dispensing with her accustomed greetings in a manner that would have struck Erik as strange had he allowed himself to examine her behaviour as usual.

"I need to talk to you." Now that Erik looked more closely, he could see that she looked flushed and almost apprehensive, but happy. He turned away that he might no longer see the light in her eyes.

"As it happens, I also wish to speak with you."

"Oh!" She threw herself down onto the sofa and curled up in anticipation. "You first."

"I have been thinking a lot lately," he began, averting his eyes from her and mentally drawing on his prepared speech. "And I have come to the conclusion that I no longer wish you to visit me here."

Her smile faded as she uncurled her legs and rose slowly from the couch.

"I don't understand." She tried to smile. "Is this a joke?"

He looked back at her, realising too late what a mistake allowing himself another sight of her was. He turned away hastily and gripped the edge of the bookshelf in an effort to steady himself.

"No," he said shortly with all the composure he could muster, unable to formulate a more complete response.

Christine stared at him, icy panic flooding through her, the colour draining from her face. "What are you saying?" she whispered, not daring to reach out and touch him.

"I never want to see you again," he said flatly, without turning to look at her.

She stared at his back in blank incomprehension, terror freezing her insides. Then suddenly she rushed to him, catching his shoulders, shaking him to face her, lent strength by her sudden terrible fear.

Unexpected human contact had always confused and startled him, and his current despair made him tenser than ever. The panicked force with which he whirled away from Christine's touch made her lose her balance, and he had to bite his lip to keep himself from reaching out to catch her as she stumbled and fell to the floor, covering her face with her hands as she began to cry. He shook off the savage grief which threatened to overwhelm him, knowing that if he allowed her to speak to him he would forget himself.

"Don't touch me!" he thundered, taking a step away from her and clenching his hands into bloodless fists in an effort to maintain control.

"Look at me!" she demanded, her voice scratching with tears. She reached out to him desperately, but one look at the tension locking his shoulders was enough to make her refrain. "Look at me!"

He did.

"Tell me you don't love me," she demanded feverishly. "Look me in the eye and tell me you don't love me!"

He stared at her. He felt as though all the breath had been snatched out of his body; he could not do it. It would be the ultimate betrayal of the love he had cherished for so long, everything that was dear to him; the worst prostitution possible of the truest emotion he had ever felt.

Christine scrambled to her feet and came towards him, shaking her head. "You can't do it," she whispered. "You know it's not true!"

Erik closed his eyes. He saw the Marquis; he saw her smile. Then he opened them and looked her steadily in the face.

"I do not love you," he said. His voice was perfectly level, his eyes clear. "Perhaps I never did."

Christine stared at him. She was deathly pale; she did not speak. Erik himself felt he could not speak another word if his very life depended on it: he could not breathe, and when finally Christine turned, still silent, and fled, the door slamming shut behind her with a noise that sounded like the gate to hell closing on him, he knelt beneath the shadow of the piano, bent by the crushing weight of pain more intense than he had ever imagined.

Halfway down the hall outside, he heard Christine sob; and all the strength he had built up over the past seven years melted away from him. He wanted to scream – to howl – to break something – and he found that all he could do was weep tears that felt like blood and threatened to suffocate him beneath the mask.

In spite of this, it never occurred to him to remove it.

It was less than an hour later that Antoinette Giry arrived at his door, her face grim.

"There has been an accident," she said crisply, without preamble. "You had better come at once."