WARNING:
The FADA (Fanfiction Addiction Detection Agency) has come to the conclusion that this story can be highly addicting. The Author cannot be held responsible for drops in the reader's grades due to new chapters. Large doeses of Requiem can lead to dependence. The Author is not responsible for withdrawal symptoms which can occur when author fails to update speedily enough.
Well I'm back, and I know it's soon but last night after a bout of insanity, which I am sure you don't want to hear about, I sat down and my muse came up and beat me with ideas.
In less than an hour I managed to type over two thousand words. Which is a record for me, so I went through and edited it enough to post for you, and then added it to the whole story in another document where I'm adding and editing and cleaning it up.
A family friend of mine knows a few literary agents and so he's going to help me try and submit this when it's done.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter as much as you've enjoyed the last 19 chapters.
Redemisti crucem passus: Thou hast saved me by enduring the Cross
Megan could not bring herself to return to the Opera House again, it would only bring her pain when she knew, deep down, that the Baron would not allow her back. She knew, deep down, that it would only be to say "goodbye" and she could not let go of it just yet. The Opera House had been a part of her life as long as she had been alive, it was as much a parent to her as her mother and father. A part of her would always be left behind with those memories, but she knew she had to leave, and she did not regret it. She left to save Erik, and she had decided long ago—whether she knew it or not—that his life meant more to her than her own.
So she stayed with her mother and the Baron set messengers with notes, trying to call her to tea so that they might begin preparation. She remained at home, wrote back that she was ill. Finally a note came that her mother and she were going to come stay in the hotel where he was staying, they would have their own room of course, but he could not allow them to live so far away any longer.
Megan and her mother packed up what was precious, said goodbye to the Landlord and his kind wife, and left behind their home with little emotion. The Opera House had been a better home to them both.
There was a paper sitting on a table in the lush apartment, and Megan paid it little mind, instead, with her shawl wrapped tightly around her shoulders she walked around the room as though in a dream, wondering how Erik was fairing. Her life was no longer her own, a willing sacrifice.
Her mother made a strangled sound and Megan turned.
"He taught you to read non?" She asked, Megan didn't turn from the window but nodded softly and murmured that she could. "Read to me." Megan turned to see what the matter with her mother was and saw the paper. Splashed across the front page was an image of Erik behind bars like some animal in a cage, his mask had been stripped from him and one had was pressed tightly to that side of his face.
She made the same noise her mother had and snatched away the paper, swirling away struggling to read as quickly as she could.
"Aloud." Her mother whispered. The pain the older woman felt was not her own. She felt worry for her daughter. There stood Megan, ready to marry a man beneath her to save the man who looked to be in more danger than Megan. Now all that seemed to be falling apart, and Madam Giry worried for her daughter.
"The monster living beneath the Grand Opera House tormenting Parisians for years, who once kidnapped the Count de Chagny's wife, Christine, who was at the time a singer there, has been captured.
"Police found a passage down from the bowls of the Opera after having been called down to look into recent disturbances surrounded the Baron Castelo-Barbezac's new Fiancée Megan Giry.
"He killed three officers before he was finally taken into custody.
"There was call for a trial, but due to the several murders and the report of the Countess de Chagny his guilt is evident.
"He has been sentenced to death by Guillotine on the fifth of next month. Soon this creature of legend who has tortured our fair city for so long will be out of our lives and mothers can sleep safely at night, knowing their children are safe at last."
When Megan was finished she could only stand there, trembling so hard that the paper rattled in her hands. She finally dropped it and began to pace nervously around the room, chattering to herself and wondering what could be done. At last uttering words that her mother did not know the girl knew.
With a final curse Megan stormed out of the room and fairly flew to the Baron's quarters. She would get an explanation even if it negated her engagement. If Erik was safe she saw no reason to marry the Baron.
She burst into the room without even knocking and stood before the Baron, ignoring his startled business companions.
"What have you done you horrid monster, you promised you wouldn't hurt Erik, you promised he would remain safe!" She shouted. The Baron smiled and murmured apologies to his companions, a maid ushered them into another room while he faced Megan.
"My precious, do explain whatever it is that's upsetting you. You know I would do anything to assure your happiness." He smiled, reaching to offer her a small hug. She jerked away and wished she had something to throw at him.
"Erik! You promised he would be safe if I agreed to marry you and now he's going to be killed! He doesn't even get a fair trial!" She found her hand near a tea pot and lifted it in one hand easily enough; lobbing it at him and spattering hot tea all over the wall when he dodged.
"Dearest I cannot control the whims of Paris. I promised I would not harm him and I did not. I did not tell the police where he was and from what I heard they weren't even after him when they were there, but he tried to harm them, and killed some of them. Just because your monster angered someone else does not mean I have to save him, that was not part of the bargin we made in that hellish place." He told her, gripping her shoulders this time and crushing her against his shoulder in what was meant to be a comforting hug.
"We will be married at the end of this week and will probably be back in London before his execution anyway. If you like, I know a judge, I might be able to arrange for you to say goodbye to him if you like." He tilted his head and smiled down at her even as she struggled to get out of the embrace. It was hurting her shoulders and ribs.
"You're the monster." She said softly as she finally jerked away. She left in a rush and then, once she was in the halls of the hotel, trudged slowly back to the rooms her mother and she now occupied.
She walked down to the small café in the lobby and had a tea, trying to calm her fraying nerves and trying not to cry. If she cried she might never stop. Though she felt as though she could cry an ocean's worth of tears she knew that she couldn't let that happen. She was the one who had gotten everyone into this awful mess and she had to find some way to get Erik out of this. She couldn't let him die.
It had been almost three hours by the time she returned to her mother in their new rooms. She opened the door, expecting to see her mother sitting on the small couch in the sitting area. Instead she saw her mother and a strange man, a few years younger than her sitting together at the small table where they'd had their breakfast.
When Meg entered the room he leapt up from the table and ran at her, halting just before they collided. "Megan it is so wonderful to finally see you, I've heard about you from my mother, and, my father said that Erik mentioned you." The man laughed. "He said Erik mentioned you asking about my mother even." He looked her up and down, as though comparing her against what other people had told him.
"I…don't know you." She told him, not in the mood for games. Tears pushed at her eyes, begging to be let free, and her heart hurt in her chest.
"Of course not. I'm sorry. My name is Chèri Leroux, my father is a writer, Gaston Leroux, and a friend of Erik's. Though I doubt Erik mention's him ever, Erik's a bit closed mouthed about things." Megan did not doubt that this man, or at least his family, truly were friends with Erik. She wanted it to be true, but even so she believed it wholly.
The secret was he never faltered at calling him Erik. Her mother still tried to call him the Phantom, but this man, only knew Erik as Erik. "My father writes late into the night and often forgets to eat, I think it is in that passion that he and Erik find their common ground," She didn't doubt it, "but the point is Erik often lets my mother sit up in his box with him to watch the Operas. He says it is the least he owes my father." He laughed softly.
"Father has helped Erik buy food and furniture as well as set up bank accounts of his own, so that if he wishes it Erik never need show his face. When we found out about his predicament we knew something had to be done to help him. I thought maybe you would like to help, I think you care for him a great deal." He took her hands between his and stared at her. He opened his mouth as though to beg her to help but she cut him off quickly.
"We have to save him, I cannot let him die." She said, nodding deftly.
"First in love with a Ghost and now planning a prison break. Ah, where did I go wrong." Megan's mother sighed heavily, but there was a smile buried on her face, provided you knew where to look.
"Madam?" The boy asked but both women shook their heads.
"I will stay here, tell the Baron you are sick and turn him away, otherwise he may suspect something." Both nodded and Megan turned to the man.
"First I think you should come with me and meet my parents, they both know Erik better than I and I think they are curious to see the one who saved his life. And the only one to fight back when he tried to kill them." Madam Giry made a low sound in her throat at that.
"I downplayed the parts where he was angry when I told her what was happening." Megan murmured as they left. Leroux did not seem to hear her.
He sat huddled in the corner of the cell—cage—he had been offered. The air was filled with the sounds of men whimpering and moaning, dying all around him. The stench of flesh and sorrow and death all around him, worse than any nightmare he had lived through and all for a little Ballerina.
"I love him more than life."
Her words echoed in his head, again and again and again drowning out the sounds of the suffering all around him.
At first he thought it was a vision come to taunt him of a life lost but soon he realized it truly was Sorelli who stood before him. The Prima Ballerina of the Opera House he had built and ruled.
"You're finally captured." She whispered, leaning against the bars and staring at him. He nodded, no more pretenses.
"It seems that I have been." He agreed.
"You deserve to die for what you did to Phillipe." He looked up, startled.
"What?"
"They never even found his body. I couldn't even bury him properly." She told him, and for the first time in years, Sorelli cried.
"I did not murder him. He came to find his wayward brother and the thing in the lake killed him." Sorelli glared. "I will confess to my crimes. I do not get a trial so what does it matter anymore to lie?" He asked and she stared at him intently.
"You are the man Megan dances for." She said suddenly. "The man she loves enough to bare her soul for. I danced for Phillipe." She looked away.
"I did not murder him."
"I believe you. Did you…this thing in the lake…did it leave his body?" She asked. And he understood her question. She was still superstitious and she wanted him to be laid to rest.
"I never looked." He told her. And that he could admit that finally swayed her and she believed him truly when he said that he did not kill her love. "I do not suggest you go down there alone, but I am certain the police or the managers will eventually go down there, looking for what they think to be theirs. I am sure they will find him, and even if they do not know him to be him, they will bury him properly. Your love will be laid to rest." She nodded and reached her hand into the bars.
"I think…when you say things like that…I can see the man behind the monster that our little Megan cared so much for."
"Did she tell you of me." He had to know. Surely the admission of love had been a trick to catch him off guard…though he hadn't quiet grasped why it needed to be done when the Baron had a gun to him. Though, the pain it caused him to hear…maybe that was the pleasure.
"Never a word. But a ballerina in love bares her soul for him. I could see her sacrificing herself to you, should you be willing, I just did not know to whom. The Baron came with police, but they left long before he did and now she and the Baron are to be wed. I know it is not him she loves and I know the police were there for the Phantom, you." She sighed and pulled her hand back when he refused to take it. "It had to be you." She explained.
"I never figured you one for intelligence." He told her truthfully.
"I never figured you for a man." She shot back. And then she turned away, and left. "Do not break little Megan's heart." And he was left to wonder just what was going on. Megan suddenly admitted love to him, Sorelli told him not to break Megan's heart, but he didn't even want it, she'd given it freely to him. "I still blame you for Phillipe's death, even if you didn't kill him." She whispered. He nodded.
"I blame myself as well." It was true. He should have been more careful. He killed it was true, but only when it was to his advantage. Phillipe truly had been innocent and he truly hadn't meant for the man to die. He was certainly a better Count than Raoul.
The true problem was he did not know why he hurt so much when he thought about Megan loving him and he didn't know what to do with her heart.
Why did she say those things? She couldn't mean them…no one loved him. They couldn't.
And yet here was even Sorelli thinking him a man. He was a demon…a monster…surely, and still no one around him seemed to agree any longer, except for those who wished to kill him. Those thought him even worse than a beast, a demon, like his mother had.
Megan…Sorelli…They saw a man, and he wished, somewhere far away, that he could see that man too, but he couldn't. He looked in a mirror and saw the monster.
Just a monster, who had a precious angel in his grasp and could do nothing more than strike out against her and send her away.
He fell into a fitful sleep with an image of Megan's blood on his mask burned into his mind's eye.
agibail009 : Aw, you're so sweet. Well I can't tell you if he's going to live or not, that would spoil the end of the story. But I love you tons and I promise that I'm a sucker for stories ending with "Happily ever after."
Forensic Photographer711: I hope this is fast enough for you, I'm not rushing the story mind you, just trying to speed up my updates. It is true that Leroux said that and I am sticking largely to the Leroux version. Ahem. Yeah I like Madam Giry. She seems the type that while no man will be good enough for Meg, she does still want Megan to be happy above all else. So I tried to reflect that in my writing. I am glad that you thought it was a good place for her to admit it, though we have to wait a bit longer to know just what Erik is thinking. Poor thing, I don't think he knows himself what he feels for Megan.
I remembered him being said to smell of death but actually that's going to be discussed a little later, just hang on to that thought. I do enjoy that you liked that part though, I thought it was sweet, but I wrote it so...of course I liked it.
Your whole existance. If I might say, AWESOME. I love that people enjoy my story that much, and when I hear things like that it makes me want to write faster, and even better.
Wandering Child24: Hey, I'm an english freak too, I think it's a good thing and I'm glad there's someone out there to comment on the story itself as well as the words I use to tell the story.
Jen Summers: Oh good, someone also noticed how Raoul was such a freaking SISSY! "Erik is to music as you are to writing." I don't think one compliment has ever meant much more to me. I practically mail-bombed my friends, emailing and IMing them all telling them what you said. But I don't think the majority of them cared...still it meant a lot to me.
And just because you're not the type to review every chapter in great detail doesn't mean that you're not a dedicated reviewer, it is HOW you review, and you're an awesome reviewer. I wish I could keep you locked in my basement so I can bring you out to compliment me all the time. You seem to know everything I worry about in my writing and everything I hope to achieve in writing and you tell me I do it and I'm wonderful at it. It's fabulous! I love that someone thinks of my story as a world away from their own and that I draw you, my readers, into it. I've struggled with trying to do that my whole life and that someone thinks, not only that I can, but that I do! It's amazing. I also appreciate that the things I put in fit and flow.
Sometimes I realize that I have to add something to make something work later, and I feel like maybe it doesn't fit, and so that someone says not only does it fit and flow, but that I don't add in unecessary things (a habit english teachers have tormented me about in papers since I was young) it makes me want to dance (which I can't do because I am so busy writing, happily). I love that you think that my story is so real, and it makes me smile big every time I hear (read) it. I love your reviews. Thanks so very much.
Quixotic-Feline: You know, even before I read your reviews I start grinning, just trying to think of what amazing thing you're going to say next. I never was prepared for someone trying to Keel-haul the Baron. I loved it. I even sat for a moment, trying to find a way to ACTUALLY keel-haul him in the story. But it wouldn't fit. I hope you like what does happen though. Also glad you got off Caps mode. I loved that you thought they were both in character. It was hard to write because I couldn't see her comforting Megan, but I needed her to say some things that someone comforting would say, so I had to be really creative and YAY someone liked it.
BTW? My mother is that "Men are scum have some chocolate" type, only it's usually cookies and milk with her. Ah but I love her. Also, thanks, now I can't get an image of Erik with a big pink bow on his head out of my mind. Not sure if that's good or bad. My punctuation did go have tea. Silly me, it's a huge flaw of mine, that I try to fix. My stories are usually filled with either fragments or Run-ons. I never manage a half-way point. Thanks for pointing it out and I do try to stop, it's just hard.
ALexis, Anime-Queen46, Kaledena, and Rising Twilight: It is people like you who keep this story going and urge me to write better. I wish all of you well, and hope that you continue to enjoy this story until the end.