Chapter One:

Trifling Games

Of

Make-Believe

The opera house was calmly silent that day—the day in which Christine Daae found the book, mysteriously buried beneath a heap of old costumes…

It was close to the winter holidays, then.

There was next to no one at the Opéra: the people of the world being occupied instead with busily preparing for the upcoming winter festivities and such. There was Christmas and the New Year to look forward to. Almost everyone was gone from the Opera Populaire—everyone from the reigning diva, La Carlotta, to the manager, Monsieur Lefevere, to the lowliest stagehand who could afford to leave. Those who couldn't leave remained and kept one another company.

Among those who had remained for the holidays—chiefly—a few scattered stagehands, the concierge, watchmen, and around fifty members of the chorus and the corps de ballet. In command of them all was Mme. Giry: the formidable black-garbed ballet-mistress. It was she who kept everything in order, and practically single-handedly, at that!

Of course, no one had ever doubted that she was incapable of running the Opéra in the M. Lefevre's absence. Mme. Giry was not one to be trifled with, and even the nefarious chief of the flies, Josef Buquet, knew that it was very unwise to cross her. The ballet mistress's icy rage was legendary.

Mme. Giry's primary concern, however—and her only pride and joy, though she had never openly admitted it—was the girls in the corps de ballet.

They were a young and worrisome set, ranging in age from little twelve-year-old Jammes to graceful and twenty-eight-year-old La Sorelli, who was the Opera's prima ballerina and famous mistress of the fabulously wealthy Comte Philippe de Chagny. Mme. Giry had trained and cared for almost every one of them from when they had been very young. There was not one whom she did not know well—after all, she had nursed most of them through influenza, colds, and broken hearts. She did not pretend to play mother to them; she was a severe woman whose character was reflected in the unrelieved black of her garb.

But they were her responsibility to look after and care for, and she took her responsibilities very seriously.

Thus it was a wonder to seventeen-year-old Christine Daae, Meg Giry—Mme. Giry's own daughter—and eight of the other ballet girls that they were permitted to leave the dormitories that day and roam about the more remote portions of the opera house. It was not Mme. Giry's habit to let them very far out of her sight, but she was feeling ill that day, and her headache was so intense that she wished to be left entirely alone.

Christine was the eldest of the group.

An orphan of only three years, she was a pale wisp of a girl with alabaster skin and mounds of silky, spiraling dark hair: her dark brown eyes were large and wide in her delicately thin, almost elfin face, and to the world, she was perpetually silent and grave. Only when she was in the company of the other ballets girls did she come alive with laughter and chattering, her wan skin flushing and her eyes sparkling—but when she was alone, or in public, her eyes grew distant and tainted by dark sadness. She was lonely, and still mourned the death of her beloved father.

But she had grown adept at hiding her grief.

She had been unanimously but wordlessly elected to be leader of their foray group at the beginning of their exploration of the gigantic opera house. It was she who led them from room to room and down numberless darkened corridors and winding stairwells that were lit by only the grey light of the rainy sky outside, slanting in through the angular black-paned windows. The girls giggled and whispered as they walked: shivering and clinging to one another in excited dread that was likely both pretended and real.

The opera was rumored to be haunted…

But Christine did not believe in ghosts.

She opened creaking doors and peered into the shadows that lurked in the corners of long-unused closets, walked with her light dancer's gait into abandoned garrets swathed with cobwebs. Pitch darkness held not even the faintest appeal in her mind—in fact, it rather frightened her—but shadows, supernaturally inhabited or no, did not unnerve her.

The blow of her father's death had opened her eyes to the coldness of reality at a stage in her life when she was still very young, and she had acquired a practicality and seriousness that was not meant to be found in young girls. She had tasted the bitterness of loss. In death, her father had taken a part of her soul with him into his grave. But there was another reason why Christine did not fear the shadows…

She had an Angel to watch over her.

Creeeeeeak!

"Oh! Christine! Come—look! It's an old prop room! Oh, let's go inside and look at all the old costumes: oh, do let's!"

Meg Giry's enthusiastic outburst brought Christine suddenly out of her silent contemplation of the rain that was falling outside the window that she stood beside. Acknowledging that she had heard, the dark-haired beauty looked up, and moved her head to the side, turning her face towards her friend. Meg waved her hands animatedly, gesturing the open doorway behind her.

Through that doorway, Christine glimpsed what was only a small corner of a room that was surely enormous. It was one of the expansive attics that loomed in the highest floors of the Opéra, and was quite apparently the most utilized storage space for all the props, costumes, and other random objects that were currently unwanted down below. She looked into the faces of the other girls, and saw excitement and interest lighting their young faces.

Sighing, she reluctantly left her contemplation of the rain.

"All right," she said, coming away from the window. "Very well—let's go inside, and see if there is anything within that we haven't come across yet. Come along now: you first, Jammes. Everyone goes—no stragglers, do you hear me, Genevieve? I wouldn't want to leave you out here, and then come back only to find you off in some corner with Paul! Inside, now…"

One by one, the ballet girls passed through the door: bursting into the long-silent room and filling it with life, noise, and colour. As they all quickly spread out, losing no time whatsoever in running off into the deepest recesses of the room, Christine stepped through the doorway, taking a long moment to stare around herself. Her dark eyes scanned over every inch of the chamber, making note of every detail.

The immense chamber had a vaulted ceiling that was pierced here and there by thick glass skylights; its floorboards were wide and creaked noisily as she trod upon them. Shadows ranging in shade from pale iron grey to the most unbroken ebony were everywhere, and the air was thick with the scent of faded perfumes, greasepaint, and dust. There were thick cobwebs everywhere. Standing in uniform rows was rack upon rack of old costumes. There were enormous brassbound trunks, hat stands, and numerous chests of drawers. There were baskets and old chairs, painted papier mache horses and old ballet slippers, feathered masks and pots of long-dried face-paint.

Meg stood silently at her friend's side for a moment, and then commented, in a quiet and almost reverent tone—

"It makes me remember…just how old this place really is."

Christine had no words to reply to that immediately; she simply continued to look, mesmerized by the mystery and age of her surroundings. There were memories in this room—the magic of time long-gone—and she could almost hear the many echoing voices of the past in her mind's ear.

Time past…

Time lost…

Time forgotten…

She stepped across the dusty floorboards, only vaguely noticing the delighted exclamations and pattering footsteps of the other girls as they ran about, discovering all that lay within the seemingly boundless attic.

A clock with elegant filigree hands and a yellowed face stood beside a clothing mannequin, which had a drooping feathered boa—the colour of which might have once been magenta and orange—laid over its shoulders. She reached out, and delicately brushed her fingertip over the broken glass of the clock's face: her dark eyes flickering across the jaggedly shattered surface.

Then she spoke.

"You can feel their whispering…" she murmured.

Meg shivered, and rubbed her hands over her upper arms, hugging them tightly to herself. She looked slightly worried now. "It's so quiet up here, Christine!" she said. "No one could possibly hear anything from up here—the world could be falling down below us…and we wouldn't know it!"

Christine chuckled slightly, and turned towards the younger girl.

"Of course we would know, my own dear Margot!" she replied. "We would simply be the last to fall."

"Oh, you!"

And Meg stamped her foot slightly, without realizing it, in all likeliness. She was a child, even younger than Christine, and many of her little girl's mannerisms had not faded from her yet. Christine let her wry smirk widen into a sparkling smile, and she laughed as Meg rolled her eyes and tossed her blonde curls, exasperated.

"I'm going to go look down this row of the costumes!" she announced. "Perhaps they might have one of La Carlotta's masquerade gowns stored here—from 1830?"

Christine burst into a fit of giggles in spite of herself.

"Meg Giry, you are preposterous in your suggestions! Go look at your costumes—I'm going to go try to find myself a good book."

Meg scrunched her nose up in bewilderment.

"Only you would think to look for a book in an old prop room, Christine! I may be preposterous…but you are an idiosyncrasy!"

Christine sank into a deep, swelling, mock-regal curtsey.

"And I am proud of it," she answered.

Meg rolled her eyes again, this time with a long-suffering shake of the head accompanying the action, and flounced off in the direction that she had indicated with a wave of her hand a moment earlier. Christine watched her disappear into the rows of costumes, and stood by herself in the quiet for a moment.

Then she turned, and went off on her own search.

As she passed down the crowded sort of aisles that were formed by the racks that the costumes were hung on, Christine caught a glimpse of her companions from time to time. One moment she would see the hem of a pale skirt whisking around a corner, or a flying lock of hair as its owner went running by. She heard their laughter and prattling, heard the floorboards creaking and groaning under both their feet and hers. The rain continued to patter down onto the slates of the roof overhead, and she heard her own breathing with an almost crystalline clarity.

But there was nothing else.

So much for a haunted opera house, she thought, with a vaguely sad sensation settling over her mind as she reached out and ran a gentle hand down the crinkled chiffon sleeve of an old medieval-themed gown. Its colour had probably once been vibrant and exotic to look upon: the shade of sunset, perhaps.

Now it was faded and dusty.

The musty air was beginning to hang close in her lungs, and her throat felt itchy. Exploring in attics was all a very novel idea…but not very enjoyable in reality, when one considered all of the side effects that came along with it.

Leaving the costume, she continued on her walk.

Within moments, she reached a dead end in the row, and turned the corner: there, she found yet another aisle to walk down, as lifeless as the next. Decades of opera history passed before her eyes, putting her in a daze.

What kind of life has this place known…? I feel entirely infant-like, alongside such greatness…

Then her thoughts halted.

She stopped.

Her head turned; she looked down, to the side.

There, beside her, was a large pile of costumes: obviously not valued enough to merit a place on the racks, or the person who had placed them there had simply been in a great hurry. Perhaps they had been alone when they had come up to the attic to store the costumes. She wasn't afraid of being by herself—but the shadows were a bit ominous.

On top of the costumes…was a curious mask.

Kneeling down, she looked at it closely.

It was plain in comparison to the other face-coverings that she had seen in the opera before then: all white, without even a bit of a harlequin pattern around its single eye-hole. And, apparently, it would only cover one half of its wearer's face. Christine hesitantly stretched her fingertips towards it.

The mask's one glaring eye-hole was dark and peculiarly angled—as if to reflect in its contours the frown of its wearer—and she felt almost daunted by its presence. She felt her breath hitch in her throat as her sensitive fingertip pads touched the smooth surface of the mask. It was cold, and hard. She picked it up, and held it carefully in both her palms. Hesitating for a moment, she lightly tapped one fingernail against its surface.

Chink-chink!

So it was glass—porcelain, to be more precise.

Christine set the mask down, regarding it thoughtfully as it rested serenely, almost regally, atop the pile of costumes. It looked as if it had a right to be there—as if it owned its place, and was accustomed to holding its court. Somehow, it made her feel as if she'd stumbled across some great myth that she shouldn't have seen—such as the legendary Chiron enjoying the midday in the Seine River, or Queen Mab and her faery retinue sporting in the glades of the Bois. She didn't know why. She—or part of her, at any rate—didn't want to know why.

Suddenly, she felt very content to leave the mask where it was: to get up, and walk away from it, turning her back on its secret past and its glaring eye.

And she almost did.

But then, tarnished gold glimmered at her: burned into the aged caramel leather of a book spine.

A book.

Christine felt her skin break out into ripples of coldness; ice ran down her spine, and into the roots of her hair, making her scalp feel as if it were crawling. But she reached down, past the mask, past the costumes…until her fingers closed around what was undoubtedly, unconditionally, unabashedly a book.

It was a rather large book.

Still silent and apprehensive, she drew the heavy book out of its place in the open trunk: pulling it forth from the pile of costumes. She sank back from her kneeling position, curling her legs beneath her, and held the book in her lap, pillowed amongst the masses of her skirt of thick navy wool. She stared at the words emblazoned on its cover: her eyes ran back and forth over it, again and again and again.

Instantly, her mind plunged into old, old memories—returning to a time that seemingly buried in her past, when her life had been all about a girl named Little Lotte, who played with her friend in the attic of a cottage by the sea, making up funny little games about goblins and shoes and riddles and frocks. Even now she could hear the painfully beautiful strains of her father's violin and, more importantly, the sound of his voice, telling a story….

And the words on the book said?

"The Labyrinth…"

Cast list!

Christine Daae: Emmy Rossum

Meg Giry: Jennifer Ellison