Palais Garnier, Spring 1884

Emma followed Lucienne down the hallway toward the Opera House stage. Lucienne had shared the stolen macarons with Emma last night, and she felt refreshed and ready for more dancing. However, a ballet rat was sprinting down the hall toward them. Odd, Emma thought. The ballet rats would usually head to the Opera House stage for practice, especially since there was going to be a staging of Le Prophète tonight, and the girls needed additional practice. Anyone who didn't comply to the rules, Emma heard, would be flogged. She had never seen anyone get flogged, but the girls whispered about the cruel punishments inflicted by the corps de ballet teacher, Madame Devereaux, and they were always sure to follow her instructions.

Apparently the little girl rushing toward Emma and Lucienne thought otherwise. Her face was pale and her blue eyes were wide as she stumbled toward the pair, who had stopped.

"Are-are you running away from Madame Devereaux?" Emma inquired. That expression on the rat's face was terror… and Madame Devereaux did instill terror in the corps de ballet. Perhaps this girl feared flogging…

The ballet girl stumbled and collapsed in front of Emma, who caught her with her arms.

"What's wrong?" Lucienne asked.

The small girl was visibly trembling. "You're-you're-you're Emma, aren't you? The girl with the English mother?"

Emma nodded. The girls always found that fact strange; perhaps it was because the English didn't come to Paris often.

"You… you see… the scene-shifter… "

"What about him?" Lucienne said impatiently. Her brazenness always surprised Emma, even after spending several months with her.

"The scene-shifter… Louis Durand… he's dead!"

The blood rushed from Emma's face. How… how is it possible? Sure, scene-shifting was dangerous work, but Louis Durand was experienced.

"How?" Lucienne gasped, mirroring her thoughts. Her fearlessness had left her, leaving her shocked.

"Louis... Louis Durand was found... he was... dead hanging from a set piece from the Le Roi de Lahore," the girl blurted, as if to quickly get it over with.

Emma felt as if the world was tilting beneath her feet. Louis had been murdered. But no... The scene-shifter was a warm, friendly figure who had been loved by everyone. No one would hold any grudges against him.

Or would they?

"Wh-wh-who?" Lucienne asked. Her face was visibly pale.

The ballet rat shook her head. "I don't know," she said. "No one knows. I heard there's an investigation going on, but really, no one's sure of anything."

Suddenly, a thought struck Emma. What if... what if the murder of Louis Durand had some sort of connection to the events Lucienne mentioned three years ago? A kidnapped singer... a dead Comte... and a vanished Vicomte.

Emma suddenly wondered why she had to be in the middle of all this. She was just a silly ballet girl—she wasn't capable of anything interesting, really.

Lucienne tapped Emma on the shoulder. "You know... you know about those events I told you about last night?" She was pale and shivering, reduced to a shell of her former self.

"Yeah?"

The ballet girl had leaned in too, eager to hear what Lucienne had to say.

"You see... in addition to the kidnapping of Swedish singer Christine Daae, the mysterious death of the Comte de Chagny, and the disappearance of the Vicomte de Chagny, there was also a murder. It was the murder of a scene-shifter, Joseph Buquet..."

Emma's eyes widened. "No way. That's... " A wild coincidence.

Or is it?

"Uh, I don't think it's safe to do this," Emma pointed out as she and Lucienne snuck out of their rooms for the second night in a row.

"Oh, it's fine," Lucienne said quietly. After several hours, she had returned to her usual self, but with a strange kind of hushed quietness added to her usually carefree personality.

The girls crept down the kitchen for the second time, and yet again, Lucienne instructed Emma to stay at the kitchen door while she snuck in.

Emma stood, anxiously waiting, for several minutes while Lucienne snatched food from the kitchen. She waited, wondering what was taking Lucienne so long to come out.

And then it happened.

Emma felt a strange, prickly feeling at her back of her neck, as if she was being watched. She felt a stab of fear, wondering if someone had spotted her. Now she was definitely going to get flogged.

And Lucienne—perhaps Lucienne had been found, too! Or perhaps she was hiding in the kitchen.

Emma turned around, eyes wide, about to exclaim that Lucienne was in the kitchen—and her heart stopped.

She stared down the hallway at twin points, gleaming in the darkness. Those were—those were eyes, weren't they? Eyes glowing in the darkness. Those were they eyes of the devil himself.

Emma found herself unable to move, unable to breathe, as those eyes bored into her. She felt vulnerable, vulnerable as an insect pinned to a display. Those eyes were examining her, inspecting her...

And then, with a strange whoosh like that of the wind, they were gone.

"Sorry I took so long. Some clumsy chef or servant misplaced the macarons today," Lucienne said as she stepped out of the kitchen. "Some new recruit, I think. Someone who can't tell a macaron from a biscuit, although I took some of those, too—"

Lucienne's eyes fell on Emma. She was pale and trembling, breathing harshly, the sound awfully loud in the otherwise-silent corridors.

Meanwhile, a black figure slunk through the hallways.

Emma—was that her name? he pondered. Yes. Emma.

His heart, even now, ached from losing his Christine. She was his, until he let her go with that Vicomte. He had released them after Christine had shown him love, with that kiss. Even now, he trembled at the memory of it. She didn't fear him, she kissed him... she didn't run away or scream as so many others had.

He was supposed to pass away several days after, but he didn't. He remained alive, as much as he wanted to die. He had gone to the daroga and admitted to him that he was going to die. Except he didn't. Yet his obituary appeared in the newspaper two weeks later.

And Erik continued to live, pondering what he had done.

He regretted releasing Christine now. He shouldn't have let her go, shouldn't have released her. How he missed her so... Well, now it wouldn't matter, now that he had a plan to get her back. And it would involve that little English girl, Emma.

Erik wasn't supposed to run into Emma. He had been sneaking toward the kitchen to steal some food—every man needed sustenance, after all—when he saw her. This was the first time he had gotten a good look at her. And he had continued to watch her.

Emma had noticed him, yet he had continued to examine her, her mouse-brown hair, her gray-blue-eyes, her pale skin. Eventually, he had left, deciding to enter the kitchen through a different route.

And yet... that girl looked plain, but Erik had noticed something about her. Her voice had untapped talent, but she didn't seem too keen on using it. He had peered at her from his hiding place in Box Five, watching her dance in the ballet and listening to her singing when Lucienne prompted her to.

Perhaps he should change that soon. And perhaps win Christine back in the meantime...