Thank you to everyone who reviewed the first chapter. I'm so glad you're enjoying this story (it was actually the very first I wrote in the POTO fandom).

Compassion

Hands pushed Christine none too gently from the room then the surgery door closed behind her. She stood there in the hallway of the physician's house, uncertain of where to go, or what to do, overcome by a great weariness. A plump older woman with round cheeks and wearing the uniform of a servant appeared from a doorway at the end of the hall.

"This way, Madame," she said. Christine looked around, wondering whom she could be talking to. Approaching her, the housekeeper took Christine's arm and gently led her into the kitchen. Walking her across the room to the sink, she said, "Let's get you cleaned up, Madame. You've had a terrible shock."

Cleaned up? As the woman began to run water into the sink from the pump, Christine automatically stuck her hands under the stream. Handed a bar of soap, she began to scrub, watching the white lather turn pink, the water a faint crimson as it swirled down the drain. The blood, she had forgotten about the blood. So much of it…on her hands, the sleeves of her dress…his blood…her Angel's blood….

She staggered back from the sink, suddenly unable to breathe. Spots flared in front of her eyes and dizziness washed over her. The housekeeper took her arm again, guiding her to a chair. Christine sat, bowing her head over the kitchen's table, burying her face in her arms.

"Here, Madame, drink this." Christine looked up to see the woman holding a glass out to her. She took it from her, swallowing quickly before she had time to think about its contents. The whiskey scorched the back of her throat, the fumes burning her sinuses. Choking and gasping, but no longer feeling faint, she set the glass down on the tabletop before she dropped it. She wiped at her watering eyes with the back of her hand, and the servant quickly handed her a handkerchief. "I know you must be very worried about your husband, Madame, but Dr. Jarred is the best surgeon in all of Paris, if not France. He studied under Dr. Lister in Glasgow."

The woman said the name as if being taught by Dr. Lister were a great honor, which Christine probably supposed it was, but she knew nothing of illness or injury save her own minor mishaps. Strained muscles and aching feet she knew how to treat but…there had been so much blood…. She studied her hands, finding traces of it still under her nails, and the tears began to flow again. "Please, God, I can't lose him, I can't," she whispered.

"Your husband's in good hands, Madame. Please, don't worry until the doctor says you have a reason to."

Using the handkerchief to dry her eyes, Christine said quietly, "It's Mademoiselle. He—we aren't married."

"Fiancé then, or lovers? Surely he must be very important to you judging by how you speak of him."

Christine ran her hand over her face, both irritated by the woman's prying yet needing desperately to talk to someone about her Angel. "He is my best friend, my mentor, my teacher." The housekeeper set a glass of milk in front of her, along with a plate holding a slice of homemade bread slathered with what appeared to be butter and strawberry preserves. Though the food looked tempting, her stomach still churned from the whiskey, and her worry. "He's the most important person in my life," she finally whispered. "And I have cruelly abused him. He has loved me and cared for me for ten years, and I have betrayed him by promising my hand to another." She closed her eyes against new tears. If she had not betrayed her Angel, he would not now be lying in the other room fighting for his life.

"Ah, well, I can see why you're so upset. Come, Mademoiselle, eat something, keep your strength up. The bread is fresh, made it myself this morning. Once you have some food in you, things will look brighter."

"Perhaps, Madame." She suddenly remembered the horses and carriage she had left in front of the surgery. "My horses—"

The other woman peered out the window over the sink. "Jean has taken them to the stable. He's a good lad. He will make sure they are well cared for until you are ready to leave."

"Thank you." Christine brushed away the last of her tears and picked up a slice of bread. The woman was right; she had best eat something. When her Angel was out of surgery, he would have need of her strength.

Raoul stood impatiently by his horse, watching as the gendarmes searched the cemetery. There was no sign of Christine or the Phantom, save for his sword, lying in the same place Raoul had thrown it. Riding for the police and back had taken nearly two hours, and in that time the still falling snow had covered any footprints they might have left behind. One of the gendarmes approached him, the Phantom's sword in hand.

"I'm sorry, Vicomte. This is all we could find."

"So you're just giving up? This maniac has my fiancée and you're going to do nothing?" Raoul had to mentally restrain himself from drawing his sword.

"There is nothing to do, Vicomte, not without evidence that this man, this opera ghost even exists. The traffic on the main road has destroyed any clue as to which way their carriage went."

Clenching his fists so hard he could feel his nails cutting in to his palms, he said as calmly as he could, "The Phantom was injured. I ran him through with my sword. Do you think there might possibly be some value in asking any physicians in the area if they've treated anyone with such a wound?"

The policeman shrugged then spoke to him in the patronizing tone one used with the slow-witted or the mentally ill. "He might not have been seriously wounded. If he had been, he would not have been able to force Mademoiselle Daaé to go with him. She is capable of running away from him, is she not?"

Closing his eyes, Raoul counted silently to ten, then twenty. They all thought he was insane, and who was he to contradict them? If he had not lived through it, he would find it hard to believe the tale of being attacked by a masked and cloaked man in a graveyard of all places. Nothing he could say was going to convince this man that Christine was in danger, or that there even was a Phantom. He had had a difficult enough time convincing the police that he was the Vicomte de Chagny, though he supposed he didn't blame them. He must have been quite a sight riding up to the police post bareback on a carriage horse, sweating, out of breath and bleeding. Hardly the image of a Vicomte. "Yes, she is quite capable," Raoul finally answered, though he did not voice his greatest fear, that Christine might not want to escape from her Angel of Music.

"Well, then, she'll turn up. Or else she'll have run off with him. Happens you know. Actresses are fickle creatures." The gendarme handed him the Phantom's sword. "Guess I'll let you have this. Since you're the only one who's ever seen this opera ghost, you can return it to him."

"Thanks, I'll be sure and do that," Raoul snapped at the retreating man's back, furious at being made a mockery of. "Right through the heart, where I should have put my sword the first time," he added under his breath. Tying up his horse, he walked over to where he could still make out the bloodstain beneath the snow where the Phantom had lain. Working outward from that spot slowly, he spied one drop of blood, and then another, finally following the trail to the back gate of the graveyard. There the blood was pooled again, under a thin layer of snow. They must have stopped here for a few minutes, he thought. The lack of any footprints besides his own again showed him the incompetence of the police.

"I know I wounded him badly, I know it!" he hissed. "Damn the police, damn that monster!" The bells from the nearby church began to toll the quarter hour as he stood there. Almost noon. He could spend the rest of the day and night hunting for a physician who might have treated the Phantom. He was cold, tired, and wounded himself. A more efficient and more profitable use of his time might be to return to the Opera Populaire and question Madame Giry again. She still knew more than she was telling, of that he was certain.

The Phantom would return to his home with Christine. And God willing, with Madame Giry's help, he would give that creature a welcome he would never forget.

Christine rolled her head on her neck and stretched her back. The housekeeper had shown her to a rather comfortable parlor in which to await the doctor's news, but she had chosen instead to wait on a bench in the hallway just outside the surgery. In her head, she knew her Angel would neither know nor care where she waited, but it made her feel better the closer she was to him.

The tall clock at the end of the hallway chimed twelve times. Was it that late? Had it really been almost six hours since she had sneaked down the stairs from the ballet dormitory that morning? Oh, to have that time back, but with the knowledge of how badly it was to end. What would she have done, knowing it was the Phantom driving that carriage, knowing how much he loved her?

At that moment, the door to the surgery opened, and Dr. Jarred appeared. "Ah, there you are, Madame–"

"Mademoiselle Daaé," she explained again. "He is my teacher, not my husband."

"Forgive me, Mademoiselle." The surgeon sat down on the bench next to her. He was a tall man, with a closely trimmed beard and jet black hair. "As you know, your teacher was stabbed with some sort of knife–"

"Sword," Christine corrected. "We were attacked at my father's grave. It was a sword."

"A sword, that explains much. Your teacher was unarmed, yes?"

She bit her lip, feeling the blood drain from her face. "Yes. I thought he had been killed. But Rau—our attacker missed his heart. Please, sir, does he live?"

The doctor nodded, a small smile curling up the corners of his mouth. "He lives, and barring infection, he should for a good many years to come."

Clamping a hand over her mouth to muffle her cry of joy, Christine felt tears burning her eyes. "May I see him?"

"In a few minutes. I just wanted to ask you some questions about your friend, about his disfigurement. Is it a birth defect, do you know? I have seen similar cases, but never a person so ingenious as to create such a work of art to hide it." He held out the white mask to her.

Christine took it reverently, her fingertips tracing over the soft leather. "I think he has lived with it all his life, though we have never spoken of it."

"Does it cause him pain?"

She looked up into the physician's eyes, seeing only an intellectual curiosity mingled with genuine concern. Christine placed her hand over her heart. "It pains him greatly here. The world has not treated him kindly." She took the doctor's hand in both of hers, bowing slightly. "I wish to thank you for your compassion in his treatment. I don't know what I would do if I lost him."

"You're welcome. He should be moved into the recovery room by now. Let me take you to him." Rising, he led her down the hallway and through several doors. "I think it best he remain here for several days, until I'm sure there's no chance that the wound will turn septic. He also lost a large amount of blood. He will be very weak for a while."

Shaking her head slowly, Christine answered, "I don't know if he will agree to that. And the longer we remain here, the greater the chance the person who attacked us will find us. He would not want to put you and your household in any danger by his presence."

"Mademoiselle, I will not turn an injured man out onto the street, no matter who is after him," Dr. Jarred said. Christine felt a rush of relief at his words. Opening another door, he ushered Christine into a room.

Her Angel lay in a low bed, naked from the waist up save for a large white bandage around his stomach, a blanket covering the rest of him. He was very pale, making the reddened skin of his deformity even brighter against the white of the sheets. She immediately went to him, ignoring the chair beside the bed and kneeling on the floor next to her Angel.

"He'll probably sleep for a few more hours. If you need anything, just ring the bell." He pointed to a bell pull hanging next to the bed. "Please have someone alert me when he wakes."

"I will," she promised then the doctor left the two of them alone. Arranging her skirts so she was as comfortable as possible on the floor, Christine took the Phantom's hand in her own, lifting it so she could press her cheek against the back of his fingers. His skin was warm and smooth against hers, and she closed her eyes at the sensation.

"Oh, Angel, I'm so sorry, so sorry. I should have been stronger. I should have believed what my heart was telling me all along, that you were real, that you finally came for me as I dreamed you would for so many years. How could I not know, Angel? Why did I need to feel your blood on my hands before I believed? How could I have hurt you so much?" She kissed his knuckles tenderly then laid her head down on the mattress, giving in to her tears.

Pain…a dull, crimson flame licking at his side, constant, like the lap of the ocean against the shore. It pricked at his curiosity, this long forgotten sensation. His last memory of a hurt this deep and unrelenting came from many years ago, a time before the opera house, before…Christine! The events came rushing back to him. The cemetery…Raoul…Christine…dying. Only he thought death should feel less painful than this.

With an effort, the Phantom forced his eyes to open. Unfamiliar surroundings met his blurred gaze. Blinking a few times brought things into focus but made them no more recognizable. He was in a small room, plain, empty save for the bed in which he lay and a small side table and chair. Gray light from a long narrow window illuminated the room. Through the glass he could see snow falling.

His heart began to race as he realized his mask was gone. He shuddered, blind panic overwhelming him as he tried to push back the childhood nightmares of being caged, trapped, a prisoner of someone else's whim. He started to move, his first instinct to run, to hide, but the sharp flare of agony in his side stole both his breath and his vision for several long moments. When the pain settled back down to a dull throbbing, the Phantom opened his eyes again.

This time his mind was clear enough to realize he was not alone. Christine sat on the floor next to his bed, resting her head on her folded arm atop the mattress. Her eyes were closed though the Phantom could make out the dried tracks of tears on her cheeks. Slowly, he lifted his hand, moving it to rest gently against her head. Her hair was the finest silk against his palm, and he gave in to the temptation to burrow his fingers into her thick curls. A swell of love for her rose in his chest so great he thought his heart might burst from it. "Oh, Christine…" he whispered.

He had thought it had been a dream, but she had saved him, forced him to the carriage when he had had neither the strength nor the will to move, driven him to a physician, made sure he was cared for. He had always thought it was Christine who had need of his care, his guidance. How strange, how wonderful that it appeared the truth was the other way round, that it was he who desperately needed her.

She stirred under his hand, her head coming up and her eyes opening. She caught his hand as he disentangled it from her hair, holding onto it. "Angel, you're awake."

Leaning over him, she kissed his cheek—his scarred and deformed cheek. A lump rose in his throat and he had to blink back tears. He looked up at her again and the expression of absolute joy in her eyes was nearly his undoing. When he finally felt he could speak without his voice shaking, he asked, "Where are we?"

"Dr. Jarred's surgery. He saved your life."

He shifted in the bed, taking another look around the room. "Where are my clothes, Christine? We can't stay here."

"Angel, please, you nearly died. Please, just rest for now. I know Raoul is probably looking for us, but we are safe at the moment." Rising, she reached for the bell pull on the wall. "Dr. Jarred needs to examine you now that you're awake."

The rush of fear washed over him again. Christine seeing him without his mask was bad enough, but other people were more than he could bear. "Christine, where is my mask?" he snapped, his tone harsher than he intended it to be.

She turned toward him, her eyes meeting his. Ashamed now, the Phantom dropped his gaze, only raising it again when she placed his mask in his hand. He settled it in place, his churning emotions calming. The look Christine gave him was speculative, as if she almost understood. When she spoke, he knew she did.

"I promise you are safe here, Angel. Dr. Jarred is a good and compassionate man. He sees you as I do, a person, a man with a soul. And if he did think otherwise, I would be quick to disabuse him of that notion." Her eyes flashed dangerously then, and the Phantom felt the beginning of a smile on his lips. Perhaps it was he who needed to change his mindset.

A knock sounded on the door and at Christine's "Come in," the surgeon entered. He introduced himself and then pulled the chair over next to the bed. "Mademoiselle, I'll have to ask you to wait in the hallway," he said to Christine.

She looked at the Phantom. Again, it was as if she could see his every thought, his hidden fears. Reaching down, she took his hand. "No," she answered. "My place is with my Angel."

The doctor raised a questioning eyebrow, his gaze going to the Phantom. When he did not protest, Dr. Jarred replied, "Very well." He proceeded to examine the Phantom, checking his temperature, taking his pulse, and inspecting the incision. "How is the pain?"

The Phantom wasn't quite sure how to respond, his experiences with illness and injury few and far between because of his self-imposed isolation. Finally, he answered, "Bearable if I lie still, but any movement causes pain." His gaze went to Christine. "I don't know how much Christine has told you, but it is dangerous for us to stay here. We need to leave as soon as we can. This…pain hinders that."

"I can give you morphine to relieve the pain, but your condition is serious. The blood you lost has weakened you severely. I do not recommend leaving here for several days, if not longer."

The Phantom started to argue, but Christine squeezed his hand. "Angel, please, let him give you something for the pain. It would be best if we left under the cover of darkness, would it not? We could both use the time to rest."

And to plan. They would need a plan to deal with the boy. "All right," he replied, and suffered the indignity of having a hypodermic needle plunged into his hip. The doctor left shortly after that, with a promise to have his housekeeper send them some food.

Once the physician was gone, the Phantom removed his mask, the feel of the leather against his skin one more irritation than he could stand. He wanted to talk to Christine, but the drug made him tired. Despite his best efforts, his eyes closed and refused to open again. The last thing he heard was Christine's voice whispering, "Sleep, my Angel. I'll be right here when you awaken."