Disclaimer: I don't own Erik or his life-story. I would marry him, if he asked me, but you probably already knew that.

Chapter Twenty: A Tragic Tale Concluded

Erik

Just minutes later, Erik was leading Danielle back to their lair in the cellars. Strange, he mused. As soon as that little Vicomte started his story, I thought I would never have the opportunity to make this journey with Danielle again. For that matter, I thought I would never have the opportunity to come this way by myself.

All truth be told, he wasn't exactly leading Danielle anywhere. It was more like stumbling along in front, hardly realizing where he was going, while Danielle pulled him in the right direction when his feet wandered off the path toward home. Eventually they did end up at the correct location, and he fell into the nearest chair in the den.

Danielle sat down as well, though she managed to do so with much more grace. How does she stay so composed, Erik wondered as he stared fixedly at her, his mind just barely capable of coherent thought. Obviously, it was because she had discovered, or had guessed, everything she had been told. Nothing was new to her, so why should she be stunned?

"How did you know all of those things," he rasped, his voice as unsteady as the rest of him.

"I didn't know all of them," Danielle replied, leaning against the back of her chair in an infuriatingly relaxed manner. "For instance, I didn't know you were a murderer. That involved a little deduction on my part, as well as the whole business with the Vicomtesse. The only parts of the whole story I knew to be fact was his description of your face, your identity as the Phantom of the Opera, and your genius, though I had no idea you had found such…creative… ways of using it as creating that torture chamber you kept Nadir and the Vicomte in."

All of these sentences were spoken in such a way that anyone who couldn't speak French would have assumed that she was explaining what she had bought that day at the market. All foreigners would have imagined that this stream of speech consisted of "I bought a loaf of bread because I didn't know we still had some, and I thought that a few apples might be refreshing."

"Then how did you guess the rest," he asked, puzzled beyond words.

"I knew almost as soon as I came here that you were dangerous," she stated serenely. "The way people feared you, I knew there had to be some truth in it. At first, I was inclined to be skeptical, but they all acted as if you were the Devil himself. A few practical jokes wouldn't earn you that kind of reputation, so I assumed that you must have hurt, possibly even killed, someone at some point."

"Then why did you trust me?"

"I trusted you because I believe in second chances. When I meet someone, as far as I'm concerned their slate is clean. The sins of the past don't matter. Also, and you might think this sounds crazy, but I just felt like I was supposed to be the one to give you that second chance. You could call it a hunch, or fate, or whatever, but I thought that it was very important that I accept your offer.

"As for the business with the lady," she continued, "I didn't know who she was, when it happened, or how it happened, until tonight. I could tell from the way you acted in that old, abandoned dressing-room that you had a past, a painful past, with one of its former occupants. I figured that it must have been with a female because it was so obviously decorated for a woman in mind. When I walked into that same room and saw the Vicomtesse, I knew who that woman was. I had already inferred that there had been some tragedy, and the Vicomte merely gave me the details.

"I had figured out," she cleverly continued, "that Marie Giry had done something monumental for you because she had mentioned earlier that she was a friend of yours. The only other person who calls you a friend saved your life.

"Really," she resumed after a pause, "all the new information I gleaned from that lecture was the bit about the gypsies and the fact that you had caused the fire that had burnt down most of the Populaire."

"I just don't understand how you could have linked all of that together in the past few months, and then be willing to live here," Erik said, as if she had presented him with an overwhelming problem that he believed he would never fix.

"I told you already," she pointed out like she would to a child. "I wanted to give you a second chance."

"If you knew half of what I've done, you wouldn't call that a second chance," he sighed. "That wouldn't even by my thousandth."

"Well, Christ said that we should forgive people seventy times seven times," Danielle assured him. "Since no one could possibly keep track of that many wrongs, he was trying to say that we should never stop forgiving. You haven't even wronged me once, so there wasn't actually anything to forgive."

"I kept things from you," he muttered, ashamed of the information he had held back, information she had been entitled to know. "In fact," he said with determination, "I think I should hold nothing back now that you know so much."

Danielle tried to tell him that it was none of her business, but he insisted that she know the type of man he used to be. They both settled back for a long tale, Danielle holding his hand in an effort to encourage him.

He told her everything, and through it all she never once let go. He told her about how miserable his life had been with his parents, and how they had feared that they had given life to the devil's spawn, or one of his demons. Danielle had been especially irate because of this. She told him that she considered him one of God's greatest blessings for her.

Erik told her about his escape from his mother and father, and how he had been caught in the woods by some traveling gypsies who had set up camp. He detailed the horrors he had suffered at their hands: beatings, public humiliation, and starvation. He grudgingly admitted that he had learned much from them in the way of slight-of-hand, which had served him well, but said bitterly that it was very poor compensation. He went on to tell about his escape from the gypsy caravan with the help of Marie, one of the only people who had ever shown him mercy.

This opened a new chapter in his life, he told her. He had finally gained a friend and a home away from prying eyes and the judgment that came with them. He had grown to love this hideaway, this palace of creativity. His brilliant imagination had finally had a place to assert itself and flourish. He learned how to read French with Marie's help, and then taught himself to read music. He studied architecture and science, performance and composition. When he was nearing manhood (he thought he was about seventeen, though he couldn't be sure), he had decided that he wanted to see the world, nearly forgetting that his face would always be a barrier. He traveled to the East, where he would at least be seen as an eccentric Westerner, making his mask less of a curiosity. He went to almost every country on the map, and picked up almost every language he encountered.

Eventually his travels had led him to Persia. Here he took a position as royal architect and general court entertainer. He had also been given a few more shady tasks, such as devising new and painful methods of torture, one of the royal family's favorite pastimes. He had not only devised them, he said, but he had taken some sort of insane pleasure testing them on human beings, though, to be fair, none of them were exactly innocent. His heart had been filled with almost nothing but hatred for mankind then. Humanity hated him, cursed him, and abused him, so he just hated, cursed, and abused right back. He then told her all about the palace he had designed and the shah's orders to have him killed after its completion. Then, Danielle finally became acquainted with the details of his life-debt to Nadir, a murky subject which had always held great interest for her. After all of that business, he finally made his way back to France and back to the opera house, leaving behind him the darkest period of his life, as well as many corpses as evidence of his skill. This, he believed, had been part of the ease with which he had escaped. They thought he was alive, but no one wanted to be the one to look for him, lest he find himself at the wrong end of Erik's Punjab lasso.

He was around twenty-four or five then, and he had already begun to weary of his hazardous, malignant existence. A matter of days after his arrival, a little girl named Christine Daae made her home in the opera house. At first, things had been innocent enough. She was lonely and grieving; he was lonely and despairing. They both needed a friend, and Erik had been more than willing to become hers. He listened to her pray in the chapel, asking her father to hurry up and send her the Angel of Music. He had seen his opportunity and had taken it. All he had wanted to do was comfort the poor thing, so he lied. It wasn't until much later, after he had offered to give her voice lessons to be precise, that he had realized that his pity had turned to something deeper. He had nurtured her voice until it was more beautiful than any other sound generated by a human being (besides him, she had pointed out, though he hadn't really considered himself human at the time). Music had always been his greatest comfort, never leaving him. Naturally, music had led him to his first love.

It was then, at the time that she had turned thirteen that his obsession began to emerge. He developed a crazy idea of making her fall in love with him and of making her his wife. He had been troublesome for the management before then, but he became even more problematic after this notion took root. Danielle had already heard the rest from there. He had been driven mad by his love and had been willing to do almost anything to achieve his goal.

Once all that was over and done with, he had taken refuge at a monastery. A year later he had returned to the opera house. It wasn't until Erik came to know Danielle that he learned to live again. After he had begun lessons with her, he had finally been able to forget Christine. Now, he was free of that terrible love.

By the end of this narrative, Erik could no longer hold back his tears, and neither could Danielle. When she saw the heaving sobs he was suppressing, she flung her arms around his neck. He hesitantly wrapped his around her waist and buried his face in her soft hair.

All at once, Danielle began to sing into his ear. The melody wasn't operatic, or even very beautiful, but it was impressive, nonetheless. It was a simple folk song, one that she had probably learned during her time at school in the country. She made it powerful despite its simplicity.

Sing me to sleep, the shadows fall,

Let me forget the world and all.

Tired is my heart, the day is long,

Let it soon come to evensong.

Sing me to sleep, your hand in mine,

Our fingers as in prayer entwine;

Only your voice, love, let me hear,

Singing to tell me you are near.

Love, I am lonely,

Years are so long,

I want you only,

You and your song;

Dark is life's shore, love,

Night is so deep,

Leave me no more, love,

Sing me to sleep.

Sing me to sleep, with you alone,

Stay with me and remain my own,

Gladly my heart will know no pain,

When I awake from sleep again.

Sing me to sleep and let me rest,

Of all the world I love you best.

Nothing is faithful, nothing is true,

In Heav'n or earth, but God and you.

Love, I am lonely,

Years are so long.

I want you only,

You and your song,

Dark is life's shore, love,

Night is deep,

Leave me no more, love,

Sing me to sleep.

Once her song was finished, Erik pulled away, his tears finally dried. He could scarcely look her in the eye from embarrassment because he had wept in her presence, and because he was afraid she would see how much he wished she had meant those words. He, eventually, raised his head and stammered an apology for his behavior.

"Don't be silly, Erik," she whispered, still shaken from their fit of crying. "It doesn't matter to me."

That said, she pulled his head down closer to hers and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, and then turned around, heading for her bedroom. Erik just stared after her, too bewildered to move.

He knew that she had kissed him before; Nadir had made that clear. But that was the first time she had ever done it while he was awake.

Danielle

Danielle had much to reflect upon as she readied for bed. She hadn't thought it was possible to love Erik more than she had before hearing his life story, but it was obvious to her now that she had been terrifically mistaken. She had never believed that she could be so moved by compassion, either. Her heart was breaking for him. All she wanted to do was heal his wounds.

Finally under the covers, she could scarcely sleep because she was so grieved by Erik's story. She wished that she could have come into his life sooner. If she had been in Christine's place all those years ago, Erik's love story would have ended on a much happier note for everyone.

Christine. Now she knew what glorious vision had captured Erik's mind for so long. Really, it came as little surprise when she had realized why the Vicomtesse de Chagny was standing in that dressing-room with Erik, of all people. She was truly beautiful with her long golden hair piled gracefully on top of her head and the blue satin of her dress clinging to her form. Danielle also knew of her reputation as one of the greatest singers in the history of France, though she had enjoyed a very short career. Part of that repute was most likely due to the brevity of her time as prima donna, adding romance to an already astounding talent.

Although, Danielle sincerely wished that she could hate Christine, she found that she couldn't. This wasn't because of her natural aversion for true hate, but because she had seen kindness in her crystalline blue eyes. There had been pity there, and hope for a brighter future for Erik. She hadn't wanted to break his heart. Danielle felt an odd pity for Christine. It must have been a terrible decision: to either break her teacher's heart, or that of the man she loved, as well as her own. Her thoughts of the pair were tinged with regret; in a way, she wished that she hadn't known their relationship to Erik. She had been curious before, but now she knew what memory she had to compare herself with.

Some good had come from that night, despite its melancholy: she now knew that Erik was free to love someone else. Perhaps Clytie would have her Helios, after all.

A/N: The song Danielle sings in this chapter is called "Sing Me to Sleep." The composer is Edwin Greene and the lyrics are by Clifton Bingham. I wouldn't swear that this fits the time-period, so call it poetic license.

A/N: According to Greek mythology, Clytie was a maiden who loved Helios, the sun-god, but he didn't love her. This was strange because usually in these stories, the girl resisted the god. Things didn't go well for women who were loved by gods. For instance, Zeus' mistresses always had to suffer terrible punishments from his wife, Hera. In any case, Clytie loved Helios so much that she went outside and watched him pull the sun across the sky all day long. Eventually, she was transformed into a sunflower. Danielle practically worships Erik, and she has no idea that he worships her, hence the reference to a woman whose love wasn't requited.