Chapter 8: What Lies Beneath.
Christine got to her feet very slowly, eyes fixed on the space which once was her mirror. Still moving very slowly, she walked towards the tunnel that was now revealed. All of a sudden she stepped on something very fluffy and a loud MEOW sound followed. Looking down, she saw the black cat sitting at the foot of the mirror frame, her lamp-like yellow eyes staring fixedly at Christine.
"Did you…" She could not think how this cat, could do such a thing. Kneeling down, she lifted the cat aside to look at the spot where she had been sitting. It looked the same as it ever did.
She stood back up, one question set firmly in her mind.
Shall I go down there…?
Now that she thought about it, going down a mysterious passageway that seemed to have been revealed by a cat did not seem a very clever idea, but then again what could possibly be so dangerous about it?
"Hey come back!" The cat had started to walk down the tunnel. Not pausing to think Christine chased after it, though it was so dark it was impossible to see her due to her black fur.
She had taken about five paces in, when, quite suddenly, she heard a clicking noise behind her. She turned around. Nothing seemed to have changed. Christine was shaking now, afraid to go on down, but she needed to find her cat.
"If only I had some source of…" Light erupted all around her. On either sides of the wall were what appeared to be arms holding up torches. The cat now stood out clearly about a metre in front of her.
Completely losing her nerve, Christine scooped the cat into her arms, turned round and ran back to her room. Her face then collided with something she could not see and she felt her nose start to bleed.
"What the?" Her eyes were watering with the pain. Opening them, she found herself standing very close to the threshold back to her room. She had not noticed the cat jump out of her arms because the collision had shaken her.
She put a hand out in front of her, and sure enough, she could not put it past the mirror frame. What appeared to be a pane of glass had fixed itself in place of the mirror. Now she had no choice. She had to follow the tunnel.
The cat had been sitting at Christine's feet waiting for her to realise this. "Okay kitty, lead on." The cat turned round and continued her walk down the tunnel. Even though the tunnel was full of light, it was still as creepy as it had been when it was dark, and possibly even more so with all these 'arms' holding the torches up.
The cat started walking down the corridor. The arms bent in with the torches to allow more room for Christine to get through as she walked after it. It seemed to take no time at all to get down the long corridor, which didn't heighten her spirits as she was in no particular hurry to get to wherever it was the cat was leading her.
They reached the end of the corridor and Christine found herself standing at the top of a very long set of steps, which seemed to spiral down around a great black hole in the middle.
The cat had already begun to descend the stairs. Christine hurried on after her. Although she did not like the idea of what could be waiting for her at the end of this labyrinth, she did not much fancy the idea of getting lost in it.
They reached a landing in the staircase and the cat stopped abruptly, Christine continued to walk on.
MEEEEEEEOOOOOW
She stopped just in time as her right foot had pressed down and slightly opened a trap door, which had collected so much dust it was impossible to see. Shaking slightly, she backed away. It seemed you could go round the edge. Just after Christine thought this the cat leapt over onto the next set of stairs. Christine however, edged round the side. She could just about see the outline of the trapdoor.
If there are any other things like that I'm heading back to my room.
There were, however, no more traps on the staircase, as Christine realised when they at last reached the bottom. Now they were standing at the edge of a vast, deep lake.
"Oh, no… no way, I HATE WATER!" She had turned around to leave.
"Then why not use the boat?" She jumped. Where was this voice coming from? She looked around, but the only thing she could see was the cat, who was sitting at the edge of the lake next to a small boat which was big enough to carry two people.
Christine gulped. "Who's there?" Her voice was feeble and there was no answer. "WHO'S THERE?" There was no answer. Not pausing to think, she got into the boat, and started to row across the lake.
She had been rowing for about ten minutes when she realised that she had no idea where she was going. This time there was no way for the cat to signal where to go. She doubted that the cat even knew where to go.
She came to a dead end. Christine abandoned all hope, stopped rowing, and sat down next to the cat, which was curled up in a ball sleeping.
Maybe someone will come and look for me… But who knows about that passage except for me and this... She yawned. Cat…?
She sub-consciously stroked the cat, starting to feel very tired. Her nose was still aching, but no longer bleeding. Then she noticed a soft 'click click' sound, coming from straight ahead. The solid piece of wall had vanished. The cat sprung awake. Getting to her feet, Christine started to row inside, not knowing what she was going to find…
She had entered what appeared to be some sort of antechamber, or… was it a dock of some kind? She did not much care. She was frozen from the journey from her room to this place and she wasn't about to stop and get any colder. The cat leapt out of the boat onto the stone floor and Christine followed, shivering.
They passed through a stone doorway into what appeared to be… "A music room?" She whispered. There was every sort of instrument you could possibly imagine and in the middle of the room was a grand piano. Sitting on the stool of the piano was a man.
He did not seem to have noticed that Christine had entered the room. However the cat had walked up to the foot of the stool and leapt onto the man's lap. Christine could see a hand reach out and start to stroke it and the cat once again curled up and began to sleep. The man stretched his fingers out towards the keys of the piano and began to play a soft tune.
"… Angel?" The man did not stop playing. Apparently he had noticed her enter. She took a few steps closer to him, noticing a violin case on top of the piano.
"Stop!" He sounded frightened. He stopped playing the piano at once. Christine could not understand why. She was hardly going to attack him. She soon found out why however, the man, who she had come to the conclusion was Erik, turned round on his stool.
On the right side of his face was a horrible pure white mask, and she had only heard of one person who wore a white half mask. "THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA!" She screamed, then turned round and ran back towards the boat, only to realise that the oar had gone.
"Christine, wait!" She did not know where to go. Her legs felt like rubber. Her vision was starting to blur. She could not give up. She had to run, to get away from this…nightmare. She did not know where to run. She went face first into the wall and her nose began to bleed again. There was a blur of white… and she fainted.
Christine felt something nuzzling her nose, but was too tired to move; whatever it was. Her brain seemed to be working twice as slowly as normal. Maybe because she had hit her head so many times.
"Porsche come here." Called a voice from what seemed like miles away.
Porsche, so that's what the cat is called.
The nuzzling stopped, and Christine heard footsteps coming towards her. Making sure that her eyes were shut tight. She waited for the footsteps to stop. She felt ice being pressed to her nose, which made it difficult to keep still. As soon as it stopped she squinted into the light. She saw the phantom walking away from her and he left her completely alone.
Ok time to get out of here.
She got up feeling slightly dizzy after she had fainted, and made her way to the door. Poking her head round the corner she could see some sort of kitchen. Well, she could see a range, a table of some kind, a few plates, and a cupboard which she assumed contained food. The room looked empty.
Taking a few paces into the room, she noticed Porsche sitting in front of another door, her lamp-like yellow eyes boring into Christine's.
Meow. This was what Christine thought would happen. Sure enough, she heard footsteps approaching the doorway. Christine dived under the table. She was thankful that there was a table cloth on it.
"What is it Porsche?" Said Erik. Christine heard another Meow, and the soft sound of paws coming her way, closely followed by footsteps. "Under the table, eh?" Now Christine panicked, and did something which was both very brave, and extremely stupid.
She kicked the Phantom as hard as she could in the shins, and was rewarded by a yelp of pain. Seizing her opportunity, she got out from under the table and ran for the door. She was almost there when she felt a very strong grip take hold of her.
"Let…" She gave an almighty tug, but couldn't get free. "Me…" She tugged again, still with no success. "Go…" She tugged again, just managing to slip through his fingers.
Bolting into the next room, she slammed the wooden door behind her. There was a key in it, which she turned, locking the door. She was standing in what was unmistakably an armoury, though there were no guns, just a wide selection of swords. She looked around the room frantically, the door she came through was the only one in or out, but above all, she now had a choice of weapon to use.
A sword to her right caught her eye. It had a long, thin blade, with a skull design as the hilt. She picked it up off its rack. It was light for a sword, but for such a thin piece of metal it was quite heavy. She studied it more closely. It was very well made.
"Like it?" Christine spun around, sword held at the ready. There, at the opposite end of the room, stood Erik, The Phantom of the Opera, the man who had taught her to sing, her angel of music.
"Keep away from me." She said voice shaking, yet holding her sword hand very steady. "Don't think I don't know how to use this… we've had to use swords in productions."
"I know you have. I've seen all of them." He said, quite calmly, taking a sword down from behind him. "That really hurt back there." He sounded as though he was mocking her. Christine was now very white. "Don't worry. I'm not going to kill you."
If I can injure his sword hand I may be able to win, or at least escape.
She edged towards the door, and was very surprised to see that Erik was not attempting to stop her. She soon found out why…
"Looking for this?" He held up the key.
"Give it to me…" She knew there was no way she could win, but it was worth trying just so she could get out of this place.
"I'll fight you for it… Not to the death of course." He said, pocketing the key. "First to disarm?"
Christine could not speak, but nodded and then after a few moments managed to say. "So if I win?"
"You get the key."
"And if you win?" She was dreading the answer to this.
"I keep the key." He said, his voice quite plain.
"Yes but then what?"
"You go back to your room and lie down. Your head must be pounding."
Christine weighed her chances. She could win, and get out of here, or could lose, and stay.
"You're on." As soon as she said this, Erik swung violently at her. Christine parried the attack easily however. Her father had taught her about swords and how to use one when he was still alive…
Christine attacked three times, forcing Erik to step backwards a few paces, a smile formed on his face, as did one on Christine's.
"You do know what you're doing don't you?" He sounded half amused, half impressed. He tried an uppercut, which Christine sidestepped. "Much better than the other dancers."
She wasn't about to let him lull her into a false sense of security. She swiped downwards at him, which he parried.
"Just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I can't fight." She was watching his every movement, making sure that he did not back her up into a wall.
He was an extremely good swordsman. It was much different to fight for real than to stage fight. He swiped sideways at her. She ducked, the blade missing her by inches.
"You're not a woman yet child." He said mockingly. Christine lunged at him.
There was a flash of light and a puff of smoke. Erik had vanished. Christine looked around to see where he was. Then she heard movement behind her. Knowing where he was she dived out of the way, up against the west wall. She took another sword down from the wall.
"One not enough?" He panted. He seemed to be getting tired.
"I thought this makes it fair…" She swung one sword after the other at him, which nearly disarmed him. "You have your tricks, I have two swords." He uppercut her again, which she sidestepped.
"I don't need tricks to beat you, but that doesn't mean I can't use them." There was another flash of light, this time he had gone completely. "Up here!" He dropped from the ceiling, knocking a sword from her hand. "Just give up."
"I…" She swung once. "Don't…" She swung twice. "Think…" she swung a third time.
"So?" He said, a note of sarcasm in his voice.
"Precisely." With that she uppercut him, knocking his sword clean out of his hand.
HA, how about that? I won!
Victorious, she walked over to Erik, sword pointing at his face. She was very tired, but she did not need to speak for him to hand over the key.
"Where did you learn to fight like that?" He asked, curiously.
Christine unlocked the door, pondering her answer. "My father taught me when I was young."
"He must have been a great teacher." Christine slammed the door behind her but, almost immediately, she came face to face with him again. "Just where do you think you're going?"
"I beat you, so I get to leave." She said, tying to push past him, but he was too strong, and she was too weak after the fight. "That was never part of the agreement." He said.
Yes it was now… oh damn!
"You will go back to your room, lie down, and when you are ready, we will begin your lesson. You haven't had one for a while and the production of Il Muto is fast approaching." With this, he lifted Christine up over his shoulder, ignoring all of the kicking and screaming.
Just like a child, poor thing.
When they reached the guest room, he put her down. He had to keep holding her back as she tried to escape, but eventually she gave up. "You can wait here and calm down, then have your lesson."
With that, he closed the door, and Christine heard the click of the door locking.
Meow.
She turned round. Porsche was sitting on the bed, again curled up into a ball, half asleep. "You have got me into a lot of trouble…Porsche."
She lay down next to her, exhausted and then fell asleep almost instantly.
