Chapter VII

Stolen Lives

Making sure no one was looking, I opened the wall that led to the Phantom's lair. The passages were dark and quite dirtier than I remembered, but I climbed down staircase after staircase, hoping the Phantom was still hiding in his Hell.

The boat was not there when I reached the lake. That should mean that the Phantom is still here, I thought to myself. I looked down at the glistening water, and realized that it wasn't that deep, so I lowered myself into the water, and at first, I thought I'd die of coldness when I first got in. The water was absolutely freezing and it went up past my hips and up to my waist. I began to trudge through the water, though, looking all around me. I didn't notice before all the figures carved into the wall. Most of them were of unclad women who were blindfolded with their arms tied above them. Others were of ravens and wolves. It was an odd combination of art. I couldn't quite understand it, but I think I understood the message being sent with the nude women.

When I finally arrived at the cave, a gate was down, barring the way to the entrance. I saw the Phantom playing haunting music on his pipe organ. When I took a hold of the gate, he stopped playing and turned to look at the gate. Once he saw me, I could see his despair, but he didn't open the gate.

"Let me in!" I cried. My eyes began to swell with tears. "Please!"

The Phantom looked at me, a fire burned in his eyes as he yelled, "Leave me!" Then, he turned back to his organ. I began to cry.

"Please let me in! Aeron..." I cried again. "Aeron..." I whispered his name because all strength had left me at that moment, and I wasn't sure if it was from the sheer coldness of my whole body or the fact that I had struggled through at least a mile of freezing water. I was guessing it was from both. The Phantom looked at me once again, his face looked horrifying with the mask so carefully hiding the right side of his face.

"Why did you come here? You shouldn't have come!" he shouted. I whimpered while tears flowed from my eyes and down my cheeks.

"I have to talk to you!" I pleaded. "Please...let me in..."

The Phantom looked at me as if he didn't understand. "Don't cry..." his voice was hushed and it sounded as if he were begging. "Don't cry, Rose..." This made me cry even harder. "Don't cry!" the Phantom yelled. His voice was both harsh and sad.

"Please..." I whispered, sounding as if I was losing my voice, "just let me in..." When the Phantom made no move, and he looked away, I whispered in a chilled voice, "I'm cold...Aeron..." The Phantom looked at me again, concern on his face, but the same fire in his eyes, and for a moment, I thought he was going to turn me away again. He looked at me, then at the water in which I was standing in. Then, he slowly rose from his seat and moved toward a lever and pulled it.

The gate gradually opened, creaking slightly while chains from above worked to pull it up. I moved through the freezing water and onto the ramp. My teeth were slightly chattering, and my hands were turning a blue colour. At first, we stood there, looking at each other. I had my arms wrapped around my body. The Phantom's bottom lip quivered, and he quickly moved away and into another room. Hoping he'd return, I waited. He came back with a thick red blanket in his hands. I was positive it came from his bed. He walked up to me and wrapped it around my body. I could feel the warmth of the blanket shoot through my veins. The Phantom stood there with his hands on my arms for a moment, then he put his hand on the back of my neck and pulled me toward him, embracing me in a secure hold. I began to softly cry again, wondering why the Phantom would kill anyone. He didn't really seem as if he would kill anyone.

"Please don't cry, Angel," the Phantom coaxed. "Don't cry, my angel..." I tried to gather myself to please him.

I gently pried myself away from him and looked him in the eye and asked, "Why did you kill that man?" The Phantom's expression didn't change.

"What makes you think I killed him?" the Phantom challenged.

I looked at him with anger. "You know you killed him! Why?"

The Phantom turned away and began to walk slowly towards his room. "We all die, Rose, why does it matter if they die a moment early?"

"You took away a life and a friend!" I yelled at him.

The Phantom stopped and turned to me. "The world took away my life!" he boomed. Now, only anger filled his eyes as he looked at me with pique. I stood there, shocked and confused at what he just said. "I HAD A LIFE, BUT THE WORLD TOOK IT AWAY! I HAD TO HIDE IN DARKNESS AND SUFFER LONELINESS! NO ONE CARED!" he roared with rage. Then, he looked at me, searching deep into my eyes as if looking for a window to my soul. "But you...you seemed to care...you answered my cries and you heard my songs of solitude..." The Phantom turned his head and looked away.

I moved up the ramp with the blanket still draped around my shoulders, and I made my way up to him. Once I came up beside him, I took a hold of his hand and moved it to the side of my face. He closed his eyes, then slowly opened them and looked down. Silently, I saw a tear fall across his cheek. I let go of his hand and wiped away his tear. The Phantom still had his hand on my cheek as if holding my face. He looked at me and began to say something, but his words never came out. He removed his hand from my face and began to walk away.

I followed him as he moved into his room. "Why...why did you kill him?" I took off the blanket from around me and laid it on his bed. The Phantom paced around his room. I hadn't realized how decorated it truly was. There were pictures and paintings everywhere I looked. It looked as if he had done them himself. My heart almost skipped a beat as I noticed that many of them were of me. I saw a desk with at least ten candles glowing from the surface, and on the desk there were about five different masks. All created for different occasions.

The Phantom stopped at one of his desks with sketches on it, and traced one of the figure's outline with his finger. "Isaiah..." the Phantom growled, "He planned to block your path to glory..."

Suddenly, the Phantom looked up at me, his eyes ablaze. "And Vashti," he spat through gritted teeth. The Phantom moved his eyes across the room as if searching for something. When he seemed to find it, he looked back at me. "Vashti will fail in her attempt to become a star." The Phantom said it as if he knew it was certain to happen, which made me almost wonder what he was scheming inside his mind.

"What's going to happen?" I questioned. The Phantom turned his back on me and walked over to his sketch desk, then once he reached the desk, he turned back to me, giving me an answer that I was not looking for.

"Your rehearsals resume tomorrow," he said in a low voice, turning back to his sketches. I gave a small sigh of relief, praying that these nightmares would not come again. The Phantom looked at me again, this time looking at my sodden clothes. "You must change. I'll take you back by the boat." The Phantom walked over to a dresser which stood beside his sketch desk and took out a simple day gown. He walked over and handed it to me, then walked out of the room, lowering a curtain over the doorway.