9.
"Who are you, Erik?"
He turned slightly, his long hands still wrapped around the warmth of his porcelain cup as he poured tea from the samovar.
"What does that matter?" he asked derisively. "I have owned many names and identities."
I regarded him silently for a moment, attempting to convince myself it was interest glowing in his grey-gold eyes and not annoyance. "Such as?"
There seemed to be a glint of satisfaction when he answered. "I have been and seen things you could not imagine."
"You place little faith in my imagination. I know that you have been a musician, scholar, and traveler. Do you wear more guises than those?"
He smiled. I watched his clay fingers mold over the lip of his cup, the pale light gleaming in the dark hollows beneath his mask. Shadows gathered there. "Mademoiselle, I have been the right hand of the Shah of Persia, his court magician who performed skill unparalleled and feats of slight of hand so beguiling they debated for weeks whether it was sorcery or legerdemain." He had set down his cup and was staring at his palms. He bent each long finger in succession into the flesh of his hand until a fist was made. "But that did not last."
"No?" I asked softly.
"You see, nothing lasts," he whispered distantly. "Not even the soul."
I shook my head. "What you are suggesting is blasphemy."
"Is it?" he hissed. "You ask me who I am, yet you have no stomach to hear my answers."
"So you are Erik the heretic? Erik the magician? The thief? The . . . murderer?"
His eyes did not move from his trembling fist. "You are wise to catalogue my sins."
"Erik the victim?"
"Never a victim!" he suddenly roared, glaring at me with barely contained passion.
"But," I murmured, wondering if he was going to become angry and want to kill me, "is that not what you were, many years ago in the cage?"
He reeled as if struck. "Do not speak of that!" His white lips grew all the whiter from repressed rage as he sought to control his aggression beneath the hardened black mask.
"You could not have been there of your own free will," I observed. "Will you not tell me—?"
"No," he growled, both hands creasing over his masked face. "I shall tell no one of that time." I noted he was breathing harshly, that I was deliberately provoking him. After spending a fortnight hardly saying a word, leaving him his solitude as I darned stockings and listened, when he thought I was asleep, to his hushed and bitter sighs, I sought an outlet for all that I had witnessed the first night. Somehow I was compelled to take up his arm, press my thumb against his veins, already destroyed by morphine. Somehow I was possessed to wish I could feel the sockets that served as his eyes, to understand if they were flesh or merely bone.
"Don't you understand?" I asked. "I have seen you. And I am not afraid."
"You should be," he murmured with a diabolical laugh from behind his hands.
"Erik . . ."
"Why do you not tell me of yourself?" he suddenly interrupted. His voice had risen back to the disinterested flat line he used when making business deals. If only he would play his violin. "Who is Manon Lapaine?"
Unexpected as his request was, I was somewhat pleased by the simple and irrational utterance of my Christian name. He had called me "Manon" the day Collier had tried to strangle me, the day . . . Erik had saved my life . . .
"Not nearly so grand a person as you," I murmured.
"Ah, but more devout, I think."
I shrugged, and his irritated look led me to believe he found me to be too blasé.
"I have lived in a limited sphere, compared to some. My life, I suppose, has had little impact on the world as a whole."
He looked up, the gold in his hawk-like eyes piercing though subtle. "you are a nurse. Surely your contribution on that account cannot be ignored."
"It is not as heroic as it appears, nursing," I concluded. "Besides, I do it to be of use, not out of any calling."
"That's not true," he stated plainly.
"Well, perhaps I want more." I smiled. "Oh, I know I'm selfish, Erik. What could be more fulfilling than the saving of lives? But there were so many more I could not save. Babette, Collier—"
"That was not your fault," Erik said with sudden anger. "You survive, Mademoiselle."
"Survive to what? I'm thirty-two years old, Erik. I should have married long ago." I saw his hand tighten around his porcelain cup. "I'll never have children . . ."
"I understand that you miss your brother," Erik responded, "and I understand these conditions are not what you are accustomed to, but you need not lament your petty life's shortcomings." There was a sharp edge of despair to his voice, like a broken mirror. Somehow I could see a shard of glass creeping into the fleshy part of his thumb. "You do not seem to realize—"
"What color are my eyes, Erik?"
"What?"
I stood up and moved to where he was sitting. I bent over to look at him. He rose back in the chair in surprise, his white hands creeping back like startled spiders, the red of his cravat brushing against the pale of his shirt. "My eyes—are they hazel or brown?"
"What?" he repeated dumbly as I transfixed him with my gaze. I peered into the tiny dots of color inside the black, equally silver as they were brass, fading in and out like ripples in a puddle.
"Don't look at me!" he commanded, tearing away, leaning over the chair to keep his balance.
I touched my throat as a way of regaining control. "I'm sorry," I said. "I really—must be going mad. I'm sorry . . ."
"The Arab women, the women in Persia," he murmured. "They hated my eyes. As if someone had cut out my skull and imprisoned gold and silver within." He sighed. "I—I do not like to be looked at, Mademoiselle."
"I'm sorry."
"They're brown," he said.
What does Charivari tell you, he had asked me. I was still too shocked to have the paper within my hands to formulate a reply.
"Erik . . . really . . .?"
"Go on, read it," he said irritatedly. 'I haven't had a chance to look at it yet."
"You must tell me how you get a hold of these things. Newspapers, food, your books—"
"I would never neglect my books," he interrupted, pressing his pale hand against the spines of several dusty volumes, all of which I had opened and put down again in the course of the month of February we had spent together. All of his books were either in foreign languages or impossibly complex.
"But how? You don't seem to realize how difficult these things are to obtain. The army above is starving and you—"
"I've never believed in their insignificant squabbles," he said with distaste, "and so I see myself free to exploit what connections I've made." He shook his head, his hands automatically clasping the ties on the back of his mask. "Countries mean so much—where one comes from is of such importance. Why is that, Mademoiselle?" Sensing he did not expect an answer, I said nothing. "Would you believe that I am French, born of two French parents? And still they would accuse me of spying."
"You must admit, the fact that you know so many languages, it's hard to place you."
He smiled. "You can be very logically-minded on occasion."
"Yes, but please tell me how you are coming upon such extraordinary provisions."
He made a harsh, derisive sound. "I do not need to explain myself to you. I keep you alive, don't I?"
"Then I shall have to believe the worst," I exclaimed.
"Isn't that always what you believe of a man in a mask? He's never to be trusted." He lifted the paper from my hands. "Your brother believes that, doesn't he?" I looked down. "Toli appears to be alive and well."
"You needn't act so superior," I muttered. "You know I owe you my life many tiems over; how can I repay your for a debt? I feed you morphine as a thanks."
"No one has ever been fair in life to me," he replied softly, turning away. "I never imagined you to be any different." He stood and turned until I could only see the high expanse of his back and shoulders, encased in black silk, remarkably well-maintained. I studied his thin, frail-looking frame that was nonetheless capable of dispatching a grown man. How awkward, how lonely he looked. His half-finished house, draped in ghostly cloth and books. He had still never given me admittance to his chamber, that secret room that contained his sheaves of paper and his violin and countless other treasures he would nto share with me—just as he would not share himself with me.
This month had been terribly and unendurably long. It was so cold, these five levels below the ground; I soon took to wearing some of Erik's cloaks and his mannish socks, much to his chagrin. Yes, the embarrassment between two modest but hungry members of the opposite sex had always been there. Some nights I meditated on my compromising position—he could have taken me and then murdered me with his Punjab lasso—and wondered if I was mad to trust this man. Yet, he shunned contact; and if he ever thought of me carnally, he never expressed it in a way to give me any compunction.
No, he was always exceedingly polite, even when I knew I annoyed him, my attempts to entertain myself exasperating him, my consumption of food irritating him when he ate so little. It was stifling—and yet, his presence was comforting. I knew that there was no one on earth, save Jean, with whom I could have endured this enforced isolation. Erik was mysterious, puzzling, fascinating—and though he tried to conceal it, in his sharp and mincing movements, I knew he was still lonely. I could only hope . . .
"You are not too afflicted with my presence, I hope," he said suddenly. "I understand your gratitude would overshadow any other considerations. But I do not wish to feel the jailer—I happen not to wish to be beholden, with my rudimentary moral sense . . ."
He looked at me at last. I could not, in the light, distinguish the hollows in Erik's eyes from the mask. "All I wanted to know," I said, "was where you were receiving your things."
I flatter myself into thinking my eyes were as gently teasing as I meant my words to be. I could only conjecture as to whether he understood my intent. But as it was, he turned back to me, handing Charivari from his pure pearl hands to mine, reddened with work.
"I have a man I employ to purchase certain things for me."
"You mean a servant."
"If you must use such common language."
"You must pay him a lot."
There was almost delight in his face. "How well you understand the world sometimes. There is hope for you yet, Mademoiselle."
Author's Note
Sorry, guys, for the short chapter. Don't worry, the next one will be better. I'm having to do a lot of reading lately. Thanks again to the reviewers. Pertie: yes, what Manon and Erik have isn't a conventional fluff relationship. HDKingsbury, thanks for getting through the entire story. And I am pleased to hear that the nightmare scene was effective. OreWaTensai, you don't know how happy it makes me when you say Manon is not a Mary Sue. Nadiil, I hope this update was soon enough. I'll try to be better next time. MadLizzy, thanks for reading all the story in such a short time. Immok, thanks for your comments as always. Thanks to Mademoiselle Phantom, Faust, and Masters of Night for reviewing.