Author's Note: This is by no means the end of the story, but it is the end of the chapters that I had already written prior to posting on this site. So...ideas, readers, ideas! As always, please review. Your comments help me write. :)
WARNING: There is very brief, mild language in this chapter and a scene of attempted rape. I assume that since the story is rated PG-13, that this is not offensive, but this is to let you know in advance.
Chapter 7: Track Down This Murderer
Gently, Erik detached Christine's arms from him and stepped away from her. She looked wordlessly up at him, and he pressed her down onto the bench. "Wait here, my love."
"No!" Christine cried, but Erik was already making his way down towards the mob. Christine rose and followed him, refusing to obey his command.
"Christine, I said to stay there!" Erik repeated, holding out a hand to stop her.
"No." Christine said, taking his hand. "Anywhere you go, I go too. That's the vow I made you, remember? First coerced, to save Raoul's life, and now of my own free will, Erik. If you go to face them, I go with you."
-
Madame Giry looked up at Erik, and he met her gaze. His booming voice called out to her, a note of cruelty there.
"Good Madame, have you come to see my fate play out? Have you come to finish your part in my sad tale? Or do you come to rescue your little ingénue from the clutches of the beast!"
Giry's tired eyes filled with sorrowful tears. "Erik, you above all should know that I would never betray you."
The officer stepped in front of her. "Madame, please go back to the others." He cleared his throat. "Erik…" He turned back to Madame Giry. "Pray tell, Madame, what is his surname?"
"He has none." Giry said quietly. "He has only the name of Erik, which was given him by me."
"Very well." The officer began again. "Erik, you are charged with the murder of Joseph Buquet, a stagehand, Signor Piangi, a singer, the attempted murder of the Viscomte Raoul de Chagny, and the abduction and unlawful imprisonment of one Miss Christine Daae. In the name of the law, I charge you to come down and give yourself over to these good officers in the service of France, that you may be tried for your heinous crimes."
Madame Giry flinched as the officer recited each of the charges against Erik. She knew what the penalty would be, and that there was no chance of acquittal. The shell of fortitude around her cracked, and the tears came. She clung to Meg's hand, her heart breaking, knowing that there was no one who could save Erik now. There was no way for him to run, no place for him to hide. A mob two hundred angry men and women strong stood between Erik and escape. Not even the Phantom of the Opera could have beaten such odds, and Madame Giry knew that in his obsessive love for Christine, Erik was only a man.
-
The mob was growing impatient. They had little love for fancy words and long-winded speeches. They had come for blood, and by God, that was what they would have. Brandishing pieces of debris that they had picked up along the way and waving their torches menacingly, they ignored the urgings of the officers to remain on the shore. They began to push past them, calling for the Phantom's death.
"Revenge for Buquet! Revenge for Piangi!" they cried as they advanced, casting aside the threats of the officers and the cries of Madame Giry and Meg. One burly man broke free of the group and grabbed Christine's elbow, pulling her into his arms.
"Aren't you a pretty little thing?" He ran his hands up her bare arms, leering at her in the torchlight. Christine writhed and screamed, but he was stronger than she. "I was in the opera tonight, I saw you on that stage. I had heard of a woman who sang like an angel, but you were no angel tonight." He tore the sleeve of her dress, and smiled when he felt the material of her chemise. "Your undergarments are not so fine as the outer, little prima donna. How do you afford tuition at such a fine establishment as the Opera Populaire, I wonder?" His meaning was clear.
Christine pulled one hand free and slapped him hard across the face.
"Bitch!" he yelled, and grabbed her hair, forcing her head back and pressing his mouth down painfully on hers.
Erik roared in anger and lunged towards the man, shoving him away from Christine and grabbing the frightened girl up in his arms. "Don't touch her!" he shouted to the crowd, his face furious. "You've come for me, you dogs, not her!" He clasped her to him, turning and retreating back up into the circle of candles around his organ.
"Are you all right?" He set her down on the bench, took her face in his hands, kissed away the tears of pain and fear that were spilling down her cheeks.
She clung to him with both hands, a helpless child again. "They're going to take you. They'll take you away from me and I'll never see you again. They'll take you where I can't go, Erik!"
-
Madame Giry stood, helpless, watching the scene that she had so long feared play out before her eyes. She screamed out angrily when the man tried to force himself on Christine. Erik rescued her, as she was certain he would, but what shocked her was when Christine reached out and held him close to her, refusing to let him go back down to the crowd that demanded justice.
Could the girl love him? After all that Erik had done, could Christine truly love him?
It seemed that she did.
But it was too late.
"Nothing can save you now." Giry whispered helplessly, and then, something occurred to her.
"Except, perhaps, Christine."
-
Christine looked down at the mob, hungry for blood. She looked back at Erik's tired face. "I can't let them take you."
"Do you want to die, Christine?" He looked tenderly down at her. "If I go down there, they won't harm you. You can live, Christine. You can go back to the world, the sunlight…even Raoul."
Christine looked up at him. "If you go, they'll arrest you. They'll try you and execute you. I'll lose you forever."
"Not forever, my love. Just for a while. But I'll think of you. There will never be a day that I won't think of you. Even in Heaven."
Christine bit her lip, tears streaming down her face. "And what will you do in Heaven, Erik?"
A small smile curved the corners of his mouth, a gaiety that he did not feel. "I'll visit your father, Christine." He touched her cheek lovingly. "You told me once that he did not believe that he was ever visited by the Angel of Music. I'll go to him, and we'll spend hours together, talking of you. I'll tell him stories of our lessons, of the Angel of Music that came to his daughter just as he promised, and how that angel loved her."
Christine gave a small cry, and, her heart breaking, reached for him and pressed her lips to his.
He lifted her from the bench, holding her tightly to him, gently kissing her, careful not to hurt the places on her lips so recently bruised.
Her hands combed through his hair, held his mouth down on hers. Her heart begged for him to stay, her soul cried out that without him her voice could no longer sing, he was her soul, the essence of her being. Her mouth longed to shape those words, her voice tried to utter them, but only a small moan emitted, and deep in her mind she knew that he was leaving her, that this time it was she who must be left alone, that he would die and leave her as her father had, and this time there would be no Angel of Music to comfort her and guide her. All these things and more she knew in those moments that she held her angel, her Erik, close against her, and with them she knew that she must say none of these things, and the only way that she could stop the words was to keep him here, his lips pressed to hers, blocking all utterance, all sounds and all thoughts, except the one that she so longed to say and had not as yet spoken.
"Erik, I love you."
So...where do you want the story to go from here? Should Erik go with the mob? Should Christine find a way to save him, as Madame Giry thinks she can? I have no more chapters pre-written, so your ideas will help to determine which way the story goes!