A/N: Thank you to all my reviewers…I got lots of "This is an E/C phic, isn't it…?" comments. Yes, I can assure you Erik will be making his much-anticipated appearance during this chapter… It's short, but better than nothing. And for anyone who thought I could write a Phantom phic without Erik, you must not know me very well. After all, Erik is my hero… (You won't get that unless you're a member of either the Phantom's Opera or Phantom-Gerry boards…)
I've also gotten an equal amount of "Wait…you're being nice to Raoul!" reviews. Yes, I know…a rarity in and of itself. For those of you left unaware, I'm not a big fan of the fop- I mean, Raoul. But I've decided that keeping him in character challenges me as a writer, and it also kind of takes away from the plot when I make him a drunken lunatic. So, you've been given a Raoul-friendly EC phic with a little bit of RC from a fervent EC-shipper.
I know…I'm still in shock, too.
P.S: I'm sort of on the look-out for someone to whom I can send my chapters before I post them…you know, to check over grammar, spelling, clarity of the plot, etc. So, if you're interested, please email me at the address listed in my profile. I'll only need one person to do this for me, so if I get more than one reply to my request (doubtful, but the possibility is still worthy of consideration), I'll let you know one way or another. Kind of like a job application… -shudders- Man, I hate those…even though I've only been through one. Last year…I was the youngest one applying (everybody else was seventeen…I was fourteen…), and I still got the job! Woot woot! Of course, I quit half-a-year later, but… Sorry, went off on a little tangent there…I seem to do that a lot. Please forgive me. –Bows-
So…email me if you're a fairly creative thinker who's good at spelling and grammar. If you're not, then don't.
P.P.S: Sorry that this A/N was so long…I had a lot to say. Now…on to the phic! -Ques trumpets-
You've used everything inside you,
So maybe it's time you tried to find
A brand new power to shine a light,
A light to brighten up your darkest hour…
Andrew Lloyd Webber's Starlight Express
THS SHADOWED PATH
Those pleading eyes…that both threaten…and…
"Christine…Christine…"
"Christine…"
"Christine!" She woke with a start, her hand flying out in front of her blindly. Her fingers connected with the side of Raoul's face, and he stumbled backwards, landing solidly in the chair that sat conveniently at the head of her bed. Christine blinked a few times as the heavy mists of sleep threatened to cloud her vision. She vaguely saw her husband holding his hands to his nose, his long, auburn hair hanging loosely in front of his eyes.
"Raoul!" He glanced up at her, trying to force his normally charming and utterly disarming smile, but the self-denied pain made the gesture appear grim and insincere. A tiny trickle of blood seeped through the cracks of his fingers, heavily contrasted with the pale, ashen color of his skin. Christine was at his side immediately, a handkerchief appearing in her hand from seemingly nowhere as she attended to him like a devoted little nurse. "Oh, Raoul… I'm so sorry… You startled me… Does it hurt?" she murmured as she dabbed at his nose, staining the satin white lace with smudges of deep, ugly crimson.
After a few moments Raoul brushed her aside with a wave of his hand, turning his back and holding his head up towards the ceiling. Gradually the steady stream of blood slowed and stopped, and he glanced back at Christine warily. "I was just coming to inform you that the carriage is set and ready…have Colette and Simone packed your bags as I instructed?"
Christine hovered tentatively at his side. "Yes…I believe I heard them come into my room about an hour ago, but I fell asleep soon afterwards." She hesitated before placing her hand gently on his shoulder. "Are you alright, Raoul? Are you…angry with me?"
He smiled at her timid simplicity, gazing into her wide, apprehensive eyes. She looked much like a small child staring up at a stern parent. Cupping the back of her head with his hand, he pulled her to him and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "No, I'm not angry with you…it's those blasted servants…" Raoul released her and made a gesture of frustration with his hand, the smile evaporating from his face as quickly as it had appeared.
Christine gathered her nightgown skirts into her arms and headed for her wardrobe, fingering through the many gowns that lined the closet. "You mustn't get so upset with them…they're doing their best…" she called over her shoulder as she pulled out her deep emerald dress, folding the skirt over her waist and glancing at herself in the full-length mirror.
Raoul snorted indignantly. "They're doing their best?" he repeated incredulously. "Not only did they awaken you despite my specific orders to let you sleep, but Manuel burned my breakfast this morning, and François failed to get the carriage ready for your departure!" A deep sigh escaped his throat. "The bloody impertinence…" Christine heard him murmur under his breath. She stepped behind the folded curtain of her changing area.
"Must you be in such a foul disposition on the morning that I'm leaving?" she asked innocently, smiling at him from over the barrier. "Parting on such terms begets horrid luck."
Raoul watched her contour through the curtain as she slipped off her dress, the sun illuminating her unclothed silhouette briefly before clouds stole the sight away. He rose from his seat and walked towards her, placing his hands over the top of the barricade. She glanced up at him in just her undergarments, and he watched as a blush crept up her cheeks. Even after two years of marriage, she retained the simple purity of a young girl. Leaning towards her, he kissed her gently on the lips. "I'm going to miss you," he whispered.
"And I, you," she said softly. Christine glanced over his head at the clock, and then met his eyes once more. "But as much as I hate to interrupt this beautiful moment, I really should get going." Fumbling with the lacing of her dress as she pulled it over herself, she looked up to see Raoul stepping out the doorway. She let him leave without another word.
"Goodbye, then…"
Quite unintentionally, Christine glanced at the mirror once more. She stared at herself, her hand caught around the base of her throat. Why was it that despite the many layers of clothing that covered her, she still felt naked? Why did it feel as though someone were staring at her, peering through her dress and her skin and into her very mind…?
Her very heart…
"I'm perfectly capable of packing my own suitcases into a carriage, Raoul," she said stubbornly, watching four servants haul various bags and suitcases from the doorstep. "Just as I can cut my own food and put on my own clothes and brush my own hair." She sighed loudly, and the puff of breath that left her lips caused a stray hair to stand on end for a moment before falling back into her face. Tucking it behind her ear, she turned to her husband once again. "I feel as if my own capabilities have been insulted."
"We have servants for a reason, Christine," Raoul murmured, his eyes following the men as they struggled to lift the last trunk into the buggy. The carriage rocked back and forth violently when the immense weight was unloaded, and Christine pursed her lips irately.
"I could have helped them," she protested, casting Raoul a look of irritation. "You're acting as if being a woman makes me incompetent." Christine sat back against the seat, arms folded across her chest, glaring at her husband through the window. Raoul shook his head good-naturedly and ducked his head inside the buggy, touching his lips to the top of her head.
"You're not incompetent," he sighed, holding her chin with his hand. "And things won't be the same around here without you." He pressed another kiss to her cheek. "I'll miss you terribly." Straightening back up, Raoul glanced over his shoulder at the group of servants who now stood by the doorstep, waiting to be dismissed from the scene. "I've informed François of his instructions… He knows exactly where to go." The driver was walking towards his seat at the head of the carriage, but at the sound of his name, turned and tipped his top hat in the direction of the Vicomte and his wife, exposing a head of frizzing gray hair. "You're leaving early enough in the morning that you should be able to arrive in Paris by tomorrow night. Madame Giry will be expecting you."
Christine nodded, her hand trailing over the black lace shawl that was draped over her head. She reached up to Raoul and stroked his cheek with thin, pale fingers. Apprehension gleamed dully in his eyes, and she brought his face down to her own. "I'll be fine," she murmured in response to his unspoken question. "And I'll be back before you even know I'm gone."
Raoul took her hand in his own and held it up to his lips. "Don't have too much fun, Christine," he whispered, giving her a light, crooked smile. "I don't want to have to track you down in the back streets of Paris." He withdrew his head from the window. "That would be an awful nuisance."
The corners of Christine's mouth turned upward slightly as she watched Raoul signal the driver. The carriage gave a sudden lurch and started out of the de Chagny manor. Christine held her hand out through the curtain, waving back at Raoul as she disappeared out the gate.
Raoul watched until the buggy had vanished from sight before turning to his butler. He opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by a fat raindrop that fell upon his cheek without warning. Raising his eyes to the sky, he saw ugly, black storm clouds gather around the once astonishingly clear heavens, blocking the early morning glow. "Brilliant," he muttered sarcastically to the butler. "God has blessed us with an omen of good fortune."
Taking up his cane, the butler wrapped his overcoat closer to his thin frame. "It's only a little bit of water, sir." His last words were drowned out by a crack of thunder, and then a sheet of rain enveloped them.
Raoul glanced at his butler grimly. "You were saying, Marques…?" he yelled over the deafening pulsation of the torrential downpour. Marques shrugged, and together they pulled their coats overtop their heads and started towards the front door of the mansion.
'Brilliant,' Christine thought to herself as she stared out into the monochromatic portrait of blurring variations of gray. She leaned her head against the side of the carriage door, her eyes looking but not truly seeing the scenery as it passed by the window. Her thoughts, scattered and opaque as the clouds that swirled in the hazy morning sky above her, bombarded her tired, weary mind with relentless fury. She pressed her fingers to her temples, massaging the source of the steady pounding of blood against her skull.
Paris…
Sighing, Christine allowed her eyes to close, the deep groan of the wind outside the carriage sending a chill down her spine. Her mouth was twisted into a thin grimace, and she sighed.
Paris, indeed.
"…Christine?"
She quickly shut her eyes against the tears that had been steadily flowing down her cheeks. The soft creak of the door echoed through the room, and Christine silently thanked whatever twist of fate had allowed her to lay with her back to her bedroom entrance.
The bedsprings squealed faintly as additional weight was added to them. A light, gentle hand passed softly over her arm, and she closed her eyes for a moment before turning to face her husband.
"Your eyes, Christine…!"
She quickly swept a hand beneath her eyelids, wiping away the remnants of her tears. "It's nothing…I got a bit of dust in my eye, that's all…" They both knew it to be untrue, but Raoul gave a small grin, and the briefest trace of a smile crossed Christine's lips.
"You remember what the doctor said, don't you, Christine?" he asked tentatively, moving a bit closer to her. She nodded slowly, eyes wide and questioning. Raoul chewed thoughtfully on his lower lip before continuing. "I sent a letter to an old friend of yours…I hope you don't mind…" Christine cocked her head to the side, eyes narrowing slightly.
"What do you mean?"
Raoul looked even more uncomfortable. He glanced out the window, anxious to avoid her piercing stare. "You're supposed to get away for awhile, Christine…" he murmured.
"…And I thought we agreed to see if I have anymore fainting spells!" she finished for him. "I've been perfectly alright, Raoul! For the past three days I've been lying in this Godforsaken bed…" She hit her fists weakly against the linen blankets that surrounded her. "…waiting for something to happen, good or bad! Well, it hasn't, and I…"
"Madame Giry is expecting you to arrive in Paris in one week. She's made all the necessary arrangements." Raoul stood up, gazing down at his wife. She stared back at him, eyes wide. He tried to ignore the sudden, involuntary tremble of her lower lip. Sighing, he knelt back down beside her bed and took her hand. "I'm doing this to help you, Christine; you must understand that!" He kissed her knuckles gently. "I just want you to get well…to overcome whatever it is that's been bothering you since…" There was a hesitation in his voice, and he ran his fingers over her cheek. "Since we were married, I suppose."
Christine watched him mutely as he dropped her hand and got up off his knees. "They're looking forward to seeing you, you know," he said softly, glancing back at the door. He paused, rubbing his hand uncomfortably against his neck. "And you don't…you don't have anything to worry about, going back. Any…problems…have been taken care of." The implication of his remark was not lost to Christine, and the color slowly drained from her cheeks.
She waited until he was safely out the door and down the corridor before she allowed the desperate moan that had been working its way up her throat to escape her lips.
A single tear slipped down her cheek as she continued to stare out the window and into the vaguely formed shapes of nothingness as they swept past her. Why had she allowed herself to be talked into this? What good could come of returning to a place of so many unresolved, haunting memories? He had not said it, but Raoul had insinuated that he was dead. He, the man who had been an unspoken barrier between them for two years.
A monster to her husband…but a constant voice, a never-ceasing whisper in the back of her mind, a ghost of days never to be forgotten. A light whimper flew from her mouth, and she pressed her shaking hand to her lips. God help her, she would never be free of him… She would always have a part of her heart devoted to a man for which she had never been prepared.
A man who was dead.
Christine hugged her knees to her chest, cradling herself against her own thoughts. "No…" she whispered to herself, burying her head inside her cloak. He was not dead…he was not dead…he was not. Yet, somewhere in the darkest regions of her mind, a little voice said otherwise. And if this voice was to be believed…if it was to be trusted…
"No!"
Two years of restrained emotion welled up within her, and she crumpled to the floor of the carriage, weeping hysterically.
The small piece of charcoal fell limply from his shaking fingers, dropping onto the yellow parchment with sullen indifference. Closing his eyes, he sat back, placing a trembling hand over his face. He did not want to look…and yet every time, the temptation of seeing her again betrayed him. While working, he did not have to worry about it…she was incomplete, unfinished…not herself in her entirety. While working, she was only a project.
Only a project…
He opened his eyes and looked down at her, a burning paradox of fervent desire and fiery loathing welling up within him. How dare she reduce him to what he had become? How dare she reduce him to this, a mere shadow of the awesome presence he had been…was it only two years ago? God, sometimes it felt like an eternity, waiting for Death as the only beacon left to anticipate.
He stared into her perfectly shaped eyes, wide with innocence, and her mouth, full and enticing and beckoning…such contradictions in a single human being. His gaze traveled over her portrait, following the ripples of her wedding gown from the slender curve of her neck to the elegant outline of her legs. Without thinking, his finger followed the direction of his gaze…
No!
With one swift movement he took the paper in his hand and held it to the flame that danced against the shadows of his room. He watched as the page curled in the heat of fire, melting her from existence. The charred, black edges crept towards her face…and he pulled the picture back to himself, holding it against his heaving chest. The only sound in the room was the echoing of his choked and ragged breaths, and he pressed his fist tightly to his mouth, biting down on his clenched fingers until he felt the skin break and the blood begin to flow. He stared down at her, brushing away the remnants of blackened paper. Gingerly he placed her back onto his desk, his eyes never straying from hers.
He swallowed with some difficulty, fire once again returning to his amber irises. He could not make himself believe that he hated her…though he had tried so many times to convince himself of it… He flung his hand out into the darkness, the swift speed of the movement causing the sketch to flutter to the floor. With one swift gesture he knocked over the single candelabra that sat atop his desk, and the tiny flame went out as it hit the floorboards.
He was left alone in the darkness.
Clasping his head with both hands, he squeezed his eyes shut. He felt the familiar need clawing its way out from the inside…this addiction that tore him apart. There had been the opium in Persia, yes, and of course the morphine in Belgium… He was no stranger to dependence. But he could convince himself that they were merely clouds of influence, a light haze to ease the pain. He could convince himself that they were not transgressions against his own mind.
Not this, though…not this.
So many times he had tried to stop, so many times that he had lost count…lost the will to deny himself the one thing that made him forget. Each time he gave in to the yearning, he returned to his sanctuary with a deeper level of self-disgust. If he could not hate her, at least he could hate himself…
Gathering his cloak into his arms, he pulled out a drawer from his desk. Removing a small coin purse, he tucked it into his belt and stepped hesitantly towards the door. He paused before grabbing the ebony mask that sat on the far end of the writing table, and then he left the room in the swirl of his cape.