Thank you so much for your patience, guys! For those who asked, my thesis is in Molecular Phytopathology, which sadly has nothing whatsoever to do with 19th century Paris. The thesis saga is continuing, so updates are still irregular – but at least this is a nice long chapter for you! The title comes from a song from the wonderful 1998 French musical, "Notre Dame de Paris" (highly recommended!):
Les oiseaux qu'on met en cage
Peuvent-ils encore voler?
Les enfants que l'on outrage
Peuvent-ils encore aimer?

Translation, adapted from the official English version:
Could the birds they put in cages
Ever ride upon the wind?
Could the children life has injured
Ever learn to love again?

Chapter 26 – The Birds They Put In Cages

Erik clutched his mask to his face, his eyes shut. His ears were ringing with the sound of gypsy coins. Egrot's hand dropped from his shoulder.

"My God," the man said again. And then, "That doesn't look so good."

Erik swore and twisted aside to fix his bandage. He yanked the knot tight and straightened up, the bandage gripping his skull like a vice. Egrot's curiosity burned so bright Erik would have sworn he could see the man's crimson face and glittering eyes in the darkness of the roadside.

"It was a hunting accident," Erik threw savagely, in a low voice. He could practically feel Egrot strain to catch the words.

"Good God! What were you hunting?"

"I was not hunting. I was the prey."

He watched the thoughts chase one another across Egrot's round face like changing backdrops: a hunt in the woods, a nobleman's rifle, a stray bullet, a terrible accident, oh the humanity... Bravo, he seethed at himself. A tale fit for an opera libretto.

"Andersson..."

Erik picked up his portfolio. Egrot caught his arm; Erik thrust him off, incensed, yet Egrot's next words were a surprise:

"I was glad to hear from you again. After the way you departed last time, I was not sure – but that's in the past." He flung his hand wide: "Come, my friend, Madame Egrot will have my hide if I don't bring you back in time for supper."

"Supper." Erik looked from Egrot to the carriage behind him, then back to Egrot. Then at the carriage. The coachman gave an elaborate stretch on his box-seat, pretending he was not eavesdropping.

"Roast beef and an excellent red from the cellar. No fish, I swear it." Egrot beamed for all the world as if the ludicrous tale of stray bullets had somehow cemented their friendship.

The edges of Erik's vision spun and wavered dangerously. This man had seen him without his mask. This man – this man was alive – was offering him a supper invitation. Christine, he shaped the word like a man crossing himself.

Egrot cleared his throat. "Look, I'm dreadfully sorry about all that nonsense earlier, but you must come back with me. I absolutely insist on it."

As if on cue, the coachman popped down off the box and held open the door. There was a long pause. Then Erik stepped forward and walked towards the carriage as in a dream, a nightmare of a cage. Come, come inside... Come and see the Devil's Child.

If it is a trap, he thought, I'll kill him.

But he would not. Erik knew this as clearly as if he had heard Christine say it. He mounted the steps of the carriage and sat down, took off his hat and placed it carefully on the worn upholstery of Egrot's ancient conveyance. Egrot heaved himself into the seat opposite and shut the door. The horse whinnied; the springs cried out; the wheels skidded on the gravel, then turned. The moment of death had flashed past, as if he had glanced away from the window of a train and missed it.

"So." Egrot clapped his hands to his pudgy knees. "What are they saying in Paris? It's true, isn't it: the army is on its way here?"

Erik leaned into his seat. The back of his shirt was soaked through. He locked his hands together and felt the pulse between his fingers: beating, fluttering life.

"I don't give a damn about the war, Egrot," he said pleasantly. "I am here to build a courthouse."

"But, the army – the Prussians! Now wait, Andersson. You can't mean to remain here."

"Can't I."

Egrot groaned, "Not you as well! My wife has family in Bordeaux, but she is determined not to move from the house. It is insanity, you must help me convince her! Towns are being looted from here right to the border, all those soldiers needing supplies... Our men, the Prussians. If they pass through here, we'll have nothing left!"

"No," Erik said simply.

Egrot stared at him with frank disbelief. Then, quite suddenly, his expression changed. "A hunting accident, you say."

Erik's silence lasted only a heartbeat. "That's right."

"Because if you know how to shoot, perhaps I could – uh, ask your aid... If we are to remain here, we could at least protect ourselves from the looters."

Erik measured Egrot with a long look, taking in the man's flustered expression and the anxious way he was twisting his gloves. "You are asking for my help."

"You did say you were the one who had been shot, but I thought..."

Erik felt his mouth curve in the beginning of a hard smile. "My help does not come cheaply, Monsieur Egrot. But perhaps you will be willing to aid me in return?"

"Naturally, my friend, naturally! What is it you require?" Egrot looked so relieved, Erik could hardly believe his luck. Was a man's house really worth so much to him? Then again, he thought, he had had a home once, too. Of a sort. And it had been looted.

"I am in need of a clerk for the construction site, Egrot. And someone with local knowledge when it comes to recruiting labour."

Instead of looking annoyed, Egrot actually puffed up with delight. "I would be honoured! And in return, you will remain to help guard the house?"

"I will," said Erik. After all, he decided, the army would never come as far as Sedan anyway. Then before he could stop himself, he added, "I should be glad of some writing paper and ink later, if you would be so kind. There is a letter I would like to write."

o o o

Madame Giry put up the 'closed' sign on the ticket window and pulled out the account-keeping book to record the day's takings. Deep inside the Théâtre Français, the dull roar of applause marked the start of the night's performance. Even after all this time, Madame Giry noticed wryly, she still waited for the orchestra to launch into the overture. Old habits died hard.

At first, she had thought of this job as a temporary measure, only until the Opéra was rebuilt and everything and everyone returned to their place. Or almost everyone, if she dared to hope that Monsieur Duchamp's architect had truly left the Phantom behind. But instead of restoring the old building, the Emperor had commissioned a new one, and a project that might have taken a year now seemed set to last a decade. The war, of course, put a halt even to the work on that. There was no use dwelling on it. They all had to move on. Both Meg and Christine seemed to have taken well to the Variétés, even if their dancing was no longer strictly ballet, and in the few months since they had been living away from the theatre, both girls seemed to have grown up faster than Madame Giry would have believed possible. The Opéra had never been a good place for either of them; there were too many secrets and too much grief in its catacombs. And yet, Madame Giry admitted to herself, she had loved it. Even when the horrors had started, even when the disturbed child she had grieved for showed himself to be a man far more dangerous than she could have guessed. She had loved the Opéra all the same, as one loves a once-brilliant aunt who is growing old and losing her mind, dying a slow death.

It might have been nice if this dying aunt had left them some inheritance. However, the Théâtre Français did pay enough to cover the rent, and the rest, as Meg had pointed out, would have to take care of itself.

Another round of applause reached the box-office, and Madame Giry gave the accounts book a wistful smile. She could not help expecting the music to start. She did miss the music.

She reached across from her chair to shut the door, but someone on the other side gave it a push.

"May I intrude?" Signoret, the managers' junior secretary, ducked his head into the tiny room. "A gentleman from the Variétés is asking after you."

Madame Giry acknowledged him briefly, then returned to totting up the figures in the book. "I would be obliged if you could tell him to wait, monsieur. I will be there presently."

But he had already opened the door, to reveal a sharp-featured, angular man in an impeccable suit and kid gloves. "Camille Michaud," the gentleman introduced himself brusquely. "Secretary to Monsieur Offenbach. Forgive my abrupt intrusion, but I'm afraid I need to speak with you."

Madame Giry rose from her chair, resting her hand on the chair-back. "What is it about?"

"You were the ballet mistress for the Opéra?"

Madame Giry lifted her brows slightly. "You know that, monsieur, else you would not be here. This is about my daughter?"

"No, no," Camille Michaud reassured her. He looked uncomfortable. "It concerns another of the Opéra Populaire girls. A young lady by the name of Weiss."

Madame Giry glanced at the young secretary, who was still shadowing the doorway. "Thank you, Monsieur Signoret."

"Er, yes." He sketched a bow to Camille Michaud and retreated down the corridor. Madame Giry returned her attention to the gentleman.

"Helena Weiss," she prompted.

"That's right." Camille Michaud looked grave. "You are aware that her father is a Prussian?"

Madame Giry regarded him steadily. "It has not been my habit to investigate the parents of my students, monsieur."

"I see." Camille Michaud took out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead, then sighed. "Come with me, if you will."

"Impossible. I must finish the accounts—"

"I'm afraid this is urgent. The girl is asking for you."

And there it was again. That irritable, slightly baffled expression of a manager with a crisis on his hands, demanding that she make it go away. How many times had Madame Giry seen it in her years at the Opéra? Enough that the response to it was instinctive, as much a reflex as expecting an overture after the applause:

"Of course." Her hands were already moving of their own accord to lock away the accounts ledger in the drawer. She shut the box-office door behind them.

Not ten minutes later, they were backstage at the Variétés. The corridors were quiet; too much so. Knowing how gossip flew through any theatre, this apparent indifference to whatever the trouble had been seemed peculiar, but Madame Giry set the thought aside for now. She followed Camille Michaud down a corridor she recognised as the way to the ballet dressing-room, from the few times she had been able to meet Meg and Christine here after their performances.

"Right here." He opened the door slightly for her, enough to be polite. "I shall be in my office upstairs. Thank you for your help, Madame Giry. If there is anything we can offer you..."

"Twenty thousand francs a month and a box on the grand tier," Madame Giry sighed. She waved off the secretary's blank look with an impatient gesture. "I shall find you if I need you, Monsieur Michaud."

"Very good." He touched his hat-brim and made his grateful escape towards the stairs.

Madame Giry took a moment to pin a stray lock of hair back into the coiled braid on her head. Then she opened the door, and walked briskly into the dressing-room.

"All right, mademoiselle," she said when she spotted the hunched figure in the corner, on one of the benches that ran the length of the far wall. The benches and the wooden floor were strewn with usual clutter of clothes, bits of ribbon, stockings and jars of greasepaint discarded by the other ballerinas on their way to the stage. "Would you be so good as to tell me what has happened?"

When Helena looked up, Madame Giry stopped still. The girl had been weeping, but that was not the cause of her red and swollen eyes, nor of the puffy left cheek across which white tracks slashed three curved lines. Somebody had raked their fingernails across her face, from the corner of her eyelid right to her mouth. The other eye was bloodshot and already half-closed; it took no great experience in such things to know that by tomorrow, it would be black and swollen shut.

"I stumbled, coming offstage... an accident," Helena managed, but when she saw Madame Giry's appalled expression, her courage seemed to crumble into a grimace. She hunched over again, hugging her stomach and pressing her forehead to her knees as if she was afraid she would fall apart. Hanks of her messy blonde hair hung down in wet points. It was not water in her hair, Madame Giry realised with a start. It was red and sticky, and as sickeningly familiar as an envelope sealed with a death's head, floating down from the rafters into her hands.

For an absurd moment, Madame Giry caught herself wondering in horror what the idiot boy in the basement could possibly have against this girl. Then it was over and she was here, and this young woman, whom not even the most strenuous rehearsal could ever drive to tears, was sobbing like a child. She still wore her leotard, and her shoulderblades protruded from her skinny back like half-buried knives.

"Helena. Look at me, my dear."

Helena complied, dragging the back of her hand across her mouth and nose. As gently as she could, Madame Giry put two fingers under her chin and tilted her ruined face up to the light. The blood had come from her nose, Madame Giry judged; her lips and teeth were pink with it. The fingernail tracks across her face told the story well enough. Her own girls had done this. Her own students.

"It happened here, in the dressing-room?"

Helena nodded against Madame Giry's hand. "They said my father was a spy."

Monsieur Weiss worked in Les Halles, delivering vegetables for the market – but ever since the news of the first Prussian victories, this spy-fever had been growing. Meg had mentioned that Helena's circle of friends had dwindled, and that a few girls gave her a hard time about having a Prussian father, but not in her wildest imaginings could Madame Giry have expected to see this, here. It happened in villages, in occupied towns... And here.

"You mustn't tell my parents, Madame Giry, please. If you say it was an accident, they must believe you. Please."

Madame Giry released the girl's face, promising her nothing. "Come, my dear, get up. You can walk?"

"Yes." Helena struggled to her feet, almost without Madame Giry's aid. "I'm sorry to be so much trouble. Madame Veilleux, our repetiteur, had already gone home, and Blanche and Meg and the others were only here for the matinee. I didn't know who else to call."

"It is no trouble. Come, you must get dressed."

When Helena was ready and Madame Giry had helped her fix her hair and clean up her face as best she could, they went out into the corridor.

"You won't make me talk to Monsieur Offenbach, will you?" Helena asked.

"No." There would be little point in asking Jacques Offenbach, himself a German, to take Helena's side in this. If the scandal got out to the papers, they would no doubt accuse him of being a Prussian sympathiser, and public opinion, fickle as ever, would have audiences snubbing his theatre within days. Besides, if Offenbach's secretary had brought her here, they already know what has happened. They would express sympathy and do nothing. No, Madame Giry decided, complaints to the management would not work.

They were nearly in the wings before Helena seemed to realise where they were going. Her eyes grew wide when she saw the line of dancers in their red-and-green peasant skirts, twirling onstage in front of a backdrop of village houses. Out of time, Madame Giry noted mechanically, and struggling to control their breathing.

"No, Madame Giry..."

Just then, the dance number ended, and the girls trooped off the stage quickly, farewelled by half-hearted applause. Ignoring Helena's protests, Madame Giry walked directly into their path, holding Helena by the elbow. The first girl stumbled to a halt; the others stopped so as not to cannon into her.

Madame Giry gave them a moment to admire their handiwork, then let go of Helena's arm. She looked at each girl in turn, long and hard. She knew exactly what they saw in her face, and she waited until even the Variétés girls looked as uneasy as her former charges. "Those backdrops, mesdemoiselles. They look heavy."

Then she took Helena's arm again and led the girl through the stage doors towards the exit, leaving them all behind. For just a few breaths, she was fifteen again, and heartsick, while a crowd of ballet students around her laughed at a boy in a side-show cage.

She caught the crowded omnibus home, picked up the mail, and went upstairs. She was nearly at the door when she noticed the names on the two letters.

o o o

Christine brought the plates and cutlery from the kitchen and began to set the table for supper. Her own plate went on the right side of the table, and Meg's on the left, and Madame Giry's in her usual place with her back to the balcony. The curtain billowed lightly, brushing the chair, and that was excuse enough to move it aside and leave the window bare and open. The tiny balcony was empty. Upstairs, they were hosting a dinner party, and the still-light air of early evening was full of conversations, laughter, the smell of roast goose, and the chatter of the coach drivers below punctuated by enthusiastic off-key singing. No shadows waited for her. Christine fingered the fine fabric of the curtain, then drew it shut. Sometimes, she thought, when one is used to being watched all the time, the most difficult thing of all is freedom.

She was determined that it would get easier. Time was all she needed; Raoul had not believed her but it was true. Whether it was the madness of going to Erik's house that night, or the equal madness of his own visit to the Variétés in broad daylight, something had driven out the frightened sleepwalking creature from her mind. Bit by bit, the rest of her was unfolding to fill up all that new space, stretching luxuriously like a thing uncaged.

"I am seventeen years old," Christine said to the empty room, and grinned at her own folly. There was a war going on somewhere, and everyone was afraid, and the papers were muttering that the army might have to retreat all the way to Paris. Workmen were packing up the paintings from the Louvre and sending them west to Le Havre, and cattle had been brought to graze in the once-elegant carriageways of the Bois de Boulogne. But she was seventeen years old, a girl like any other, and she was sick and tired of waiting for something magnificent and terrible to happen to her. Instead, she had started to visit her father's grave again, strange as the place was after her last encounter with Erik, and to accompany Madame Giry on her shopping trips. She had even gone with Meg and Helena the previous week to see if she too might be able to make some extra money, but the gentleman had said she was too skinny. In any case the place had made her nervous, and keeping one secret from Madame Giry was hard enough. One day, Christine promised herself, she would be strong enough to tell her about the night in Montmartre. But not yet.

She caught her reflection in the glass front of a cabinet, all dark curls and shadowed eyes, and only for a second did she imagine a masked man behind her shoulder. In the next instant he had dissolved into a flush of guilty pleasure under her skin, into hands skimming her hips and white light pouring onto a forbidden map. Christine coughed, and hurried out of the dining-room and into the kitchen.

The kettle went on the stove, the bread went into the basket, the ground coffee went into the coffee pot. Christine lit the gas and the blue flames licked at the kettle merrily. She had everything under control – but she nearly leapt from her skin when Madame Giry came into the kitchen.

Christine cringed mentally at the quizzical expression on Madame Giry's face. "I didn't hear you come in. I was just making coffee."

"Indeed," Madame Giry said soberly, "That would explain the coffee pot."

Christine gave her a half-embarrassed smile, and Madame Giry touched her cheek in greeting. "These came for you." She held out two envelopes, one of which had been opened.

"Letters?" Christine asked in surprise.

"This one was addressed to me, which is admirably proper, but I daresay you may write back to the young Vicomte yourself. The other," – Madame Giry shook her head slightly – "is not so polite. But I think you had best answer them both."

Christine found the treacherous blush creeping up her cheeks again, but mercifully Madame Giry made no comment. She took the letters. One was indeed addressed to Madame Giry, and sealed with the Chagny crest. The other was plain, and bore a return address in some place called Bazeilles. The sender's name was M. Andersson.

Madame Giry took pity on her. "Go on, my dear, I can prepare the coffee."

With a quick thank-you, Christine took herself and the letters out to the living-room, not knowing what to make of this. Her feet seemed to float above the floor. She tried to keep her calm. They were only polite letters, she told herself, both of them. Social niceties, nothing more. Yet her hands were trembling with impatience.

Raoul's letter first, she decided. She uncurtained the window to let in the fading sunlight, then climbed up onto the couch and unfolded the single page.

Dear Madame Giry...

Relief welled inside her at the sight of Raoul's familiar handwriting. Madame Giry had been right, the letter was polite and brief, but it was warm, and reading it felt good. Like coming home, like finding an old friend again. Like being forgiven. The surprise came at the end, on the very last line. Should you or Mlle Daaé be able to reply, Raoul wrote, address the letter to the 12th corps, Sous-Lieutenant de Chagny.

The army. Christine set the letter in her lap, and looked at it for a while. She tried to imagine Raoul as an officer. It fit, somehow. He had worn an officer's stripes for the Masquerade at the Opéra, and she had teased him then about wanting military glory... I have all the glory I need right here, he had laughed, and kissed her full on the mouth, right in front of everyone. I have you. But, Christine thought, he did not have her now. And this was no game of dress-up, but a real war, and people died... She tried to rein in her anxiety. She would write back to Raoul and find out everything, and perhaps he would not be at the front at all but somewhere else. Not everybody in the army had to fight, she knew that much. Why would they send somebody like Raoul, an aristocrat and a new officer, into battle? Christine shook her head at herself, and her childish fancies. Not everything was a life-and-death struggle, and here was a letter from a friend, a boy she had known since childhood. If he was happy as an officer, then she would be happy for him, too. But still. She would write and ask.

She took a deep breath, and picked up the second letter. It felt as thin as the first one, and when she opened it, she thought at first there had been some mistake. There was no text, not a word. Instead, on a thin sheet of letter paper, with the ink soaking through to stipple the reverse of the page, there was a piece of music. It was not long enough to be a song, or even a vocal exercise. It was not even finished. But when Christine traced the vocal line with her fingertip, she heard the piano accompaniment as clearly as though it sounded in this room again, and Erik was here and playing for her. Three rising notes, silenced, and then – her voice. Her own voice. On this page at least, she was singing.

Christine put her hand over the notes, as if she could touch the music. Madame Giry's footsteps sounded behind her.

"My daughter did not say when she would be back?"

"Oh," Christine tried to recollect her thoughts. "No. But she should be home soon, I don't think she will stay at Helena's for supper."

Madame Giry's face changed, as though an invisible smile had died away. When she spoke, her voice was strained. "At Helena's."

Unnerved, Christine nodded. It was no lie, she told herself, Meg had indeed planned to go by Helena's house after they were finished for the afternoon, and the last of the good light was already long-gone. She really should have been home by now, but the omnibuses tended to be crowded... It was no lie, but looking up into Madame Giry's face, she suddenly felt exactly as she had on the morning when she had returned from Montmartre, and found Meg waiting.

Without saying another word, Madame Giry went into her own room, and emerged a moment later wearing her hat and gloves.

"Helena Weiss was attacked today," she said flatly. "In the theatre. I was called to take her home to her parents, Christine. My daughter was notable by her absence."

Christine felt her heart descend into her stomach, and remain there. "Um," she said inanely.

"You do know where she is?"

With Madame Giry's eyes boring into her, Christine could do nothing but nod miserably.

"Then please get your hat."