Chapter Eight – Close Encounters of a New Kind

The Road to Persia – 1875

Christine

My feet ache like a thousand hot coals are burning them from all sides, shriveling them up until there is nothing left for me to walk on. My horse has long since fallen ill and I left him at one of the camps days back. Maybe it was weeks, I don't know. There is no measure of time out here in the desert. I know that it is a new year, but there will be no resolution for me. There are no definite things in my life now, nothing at all.

I collapse down upon the dirt road, the sun beating down on my head. My skin has gradually adjusted to the sunlight and I am no longer violent red like the bricks on the de Chagny Mansion. Rather the contrary, I am an unrecognizable tan color, one that would earn me many bad looks in Parisian Society where my pale skin was regaled.

Holding a scarf over my face to protect my eyes from the brilliant rays of sunlight, I look at my surroundings. Nothing. Nothing but a barren wasteland. It serves me right, running away like I did. It serves me right for trusting people with my secret. I watch intently as a tear drops from my burning face onto the cracked earth beneath me, sizzling upon contact. I was certainly not prepared for this heat when I left Paris.

Looking upon myself, I realize what terrible shape I am in. My dress, my once-beautiful riding dress, is torn at all of the hems, and the ragged bottom edge reveals my cracked bare feet; I simply couldn't stand boots. Along the way I've abandoned my many layers of clothes, including my corset and many of my undergarments. All that is left from when I departed Paris is my dress, pantalets, chemise, and cape for warmth at night, along with a scarf I was given by a woman by the side of the road.

Wiping my eyes with my sleeve, I stand up and continue on into the oblivion of the East. Days, weeks back I asked a pushcart man where I should head to start a new life. He told me, "Sardes, milady. Sardes has all of the best jobs." It did not register with me then that he meant prostitution as a job, but when a sign came up in the road I headed towards this Sardes. Now I have no choice but to go there.

I round a bend in the road and see up ahead of me a hunched figure stumbling along. It seems hurt, so I rush to it and see that it is, in fact, a man. His skin is badly burned from the sun and his body is barely covered, his only clothing being a pair of ragged pants. "Help," he whines, his voice hoarse.

"Sir," I reply, trying not to sound too frightened, "what has happened?" I bend down beside the man and put my hand on his back. "Sir?"

With that, the man grabs my wrist, newfound strength within him, and throws me upon the ground. Pressing a grimy hand to my mouth, he grabs my waist and hauls me over his shoulder. I try to scream but am met only by the dirty film on his hand. The man carries me off into a little patch of shrubbery and throws me onto the hard-packed earth, his hand still stifling my screams.

Terror wracks my body as the man uses his free hand to roughly push the hem of my dress up and over my waist, revealing my pantalets and the bottom of my chemise. I work to push him away with my hands and feet, but my legs are restrained by his and he responds not to my little fists. I sense that he is untying the laces of my undergarments and I attempt to bite at his fingers, but he acts as though it is nothing. As he reaches for the waistband of my pantalets, there is a sickening crack and he is knocked to the ground.

Above him stands a man neither too tall nor too short with native looks about him. He extends a hand to me and I tentatively take it in my own, allowing him to lift my slight form from the ground. I brush myself off as the man moves to inspect the form of my attacker on the ground. "Sir?" The native man turns to look at me, his gold eyes bright. "Is he…dead?"

"No, my lady, he is not dead. He'll have quite a nasty headache when he wakes up, though," he answers, motioning to a large rock on the ground beside my attacker. "That was quite the encounter," he mentions. "Are you all right?"

"Yes, I'm fine," I reply, a little more upbeat. "Thank you for saving me."

"It was nothing, my lady. I am no stranger to saving lives." The man begins to walk away from me, but I run to catch up.

"Tell me your name. I must know what I may call my savior." I look at the man with pleading eyes, as he is clearly not interested in telling me much. "Please, sir." He stares back at me, his gold eyes boring into my own brown ones.

"You may know me as the Daroga. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll be on my way." The man who calls himself the Daroga walks away from me down the dusty path.

"Wait!" I shout, running after him. "Take me with you," I plead. The Daroga looks at me skeptically, and I add, "I don't know where I'm going or what I'm to do once I get there. At least show me my way to the nearest city, Sardes preferably, if you can."

The Daroga sighs. "Follow this path until you reach a fork. Take the left path and keep going for another few miles. It'll put you right in the center of Sardes, but after that I cannot give you any help. I know not the city, merely how to get there."

"Thank you, Daroga," I reply, curtsying with what is left of my dress. "I hold you in the highest respect." But he is off in the direction from which I came. Turning around, befuddled at his sudden rudeness, I look ahead of me. "Sardes," I say, to nobody in particular, "here I come."

Erik

I pace around in Antoinette's parlor, waiting for her to come and join me. It has been nearly two months since Christine's flight from the wedding and Antoinette hasn't spoken more than a few words to a soul, not even her husband. I worry for her health and her sanity, more than I have in the past.

"Erik!" Antoinette's voice, full of shock, greets me from the doorway. "What in God's name are you doing here? It's dangerous…"

"Antoinette van Ellsworth, do you really think it matters anymore? Your husband knows who I am and so does your daughter. It seems pretty safe for me to arrive unexpectedly in your own home. But, if you'd rather I leave…" I know that leading her on like I do will make her allow me to stay.

"No, Erik. Stay. I've been meaning to talk to you since New Year." Her stern face softens into a half-smile.

"It's quite a while to wait to speak to me, Antoinette. You really should've called on me or sent Meg…excuse me, the Marchioness to fetch me." Upon bringing up Meg's marriage, Antoinette's soft look goes rigid again.

"Erik, I meant to talk to you about that day…" Antoinette sits down beside me on the couch and motions for the maids to take their leave from the room, leaving us in privacy. "The day Meg became the Marchioness."

"What is there to talk about, Antoinette? That you betrayed Christine's trust, maybe? That you tried to thwart an attempt to make Meg what was rightfully her position? I know the story, Antoinette. I overheard the baroness speaking of it." I had, in fact, overheard the story. The Baroness von Oldenburg had not struck down Meg as a perspective bride for the Marquis. Rather, it had been Christine.

"I did not betray Christine's trust, Erik…"

"I would not tell such lies, Antoinette, when your daughter filled me in on everything after the fact." Antoinette blushes a rosy red, her pale cheeks stained with the color.

"Erik, I did it for her sake. She should not have run away like she did, and to Persia nonetheless…"

"Persia?" I shout, standing abruptly. "Christine's gone to Persia? Is she mad? She'll get herself raped or worse, killed! She'll make no alliances there!"

"Maybe that's what she wants," Antoinette replies coolly, and I hunch down beside her, looking up at her face.

"If you think that's what she wants, then why did you try to stop her from leaving?" Antoinette's flush increases, the skin of her cheeks now a deeper shade of crimson.

"I have my reasons, Erik," she answers me, her voice bitter.

At that moment, Gaston appears at the door. "Am I interrupting anything, darling? Oh, Erik, it's wonderful to see you again." I stand up and Gaston shakes my hand amiably. "How have you been?"

"As good as is possible, Gaston. And yourself?" This courtesy is very new to me, and I stumble across my words. Never in my life has somebody wanted to pose a polite and proper conversation with me on the grounds of friendship. It was always sarcastic discussions regarding my life as a deranged and disfigured musical genius.

"I'm doing very well, thank you. Why is it that you've decided to call upon us?" Aha! There had to be a point to this forced conversation; he merely wants to know my business with his wife, not that I can blame the man.

"Well, I came here to discuss what we are to do about Mademoiselle Daaè's flight from Paris. It's quite possible that she's in a great deal of danger and I know that none of us here wish her hurt or in any way threatened." Gaston sighs tremendously.

"Maybe we should sit down. Don't you think, my dear?" he asks Antoinette, and she nods. Once the three of us are situated, me on a chair and the couple on the couch, Gaston speaks again. "There is nothing we can do about Christine's disappearance, Erik, besides hope. If what Antoinette says is true, she's taken off to Persia..."

"As I've only just found out," I interrupt, an action warranting a severe glare from Antoinette.

"She has taken off to Persia," Gaston continues, "and there is very little we can do with such a great distance between here and there. If you have any ideas…"

"Do you doubt my abilities, Monsieur?" I reply coolly.

"Erik…" Antoinette reprimands me angrily, put out by the fact that I am resorting to my old tendencies to act superior to people.

"I don't doubt you whatsoever, Erik," Gaston tells me, "but I do doubt whether or not Christine is worth our trouble any longer." I stand up almost instantaneously, shaking the chair. In a louder voice, as if having to overcome my rage, Gaston adds, "Antoinette agrees with me! She needs time to herself to come to terms with some things. If this is truly the wrong decision, she will return."

"Have you no mind, Gaston? Would you wish her to return to you in a casket with a headstone? God damn it, know you nothing of Persia? It's not right that she's there! She will return to you dead!" My face is flushed from yelling and my heart beats rapidly in my chest.

"Erik, please," Antoinette pleads. "Calm down and we can discuss this issue rationally."

"Rationality is what concerns you? Your hypocrisy drives me mad, Antoinette van Ellsworth! You speak to me of being rational yet you disown a girl you know as your child! Have you no common sense?" I walk briskly towards the door. "I shall give you two weeks to think your opinions over. After that I am leaving for Persia, with or without your blessings." With that, I storm from the room.