A/N: So the site's been fixed now, which is great! Some of you may have missed out on the previous chapter though, which was posted a few days ago, so if you haven't read it already make sure you go back so you're up to date.

And now for the letter...

Her heart would not cease its hammering in her ears as she entered the library, and it was only after she crossed the threshold that she began to soothe her haggard breathing. The door remained open in her wake as she traipsed over to the mantle piece, the fire welcoming her presence with a warm hug of radiance that she greedily soaked up.

Though fighting against a tremble which sought to control her nerves, her dainty fingers worked quickly to open the envelope, and as she laid her eyes on the all too familiar handwriting, she felt her heart sink in apprehension.

My Little Lotte,

I have suffered every day since our forced parting. It pains me so that I cannot see you, though I cannot accept the fate that you have foolishly brought upon yourself. But know that I have not given up hope, I will never give up on you, and Iwill come for you.

These past months have been utter torment for me. I cannot apologise enough for not coming for you. There have been some complications that I had to see to, namely the tracking down of The Persian, a one 'Nadir Khan'. I spoke to him some months back and requested that he contact you, to see how you were. Do you remember his visit, Christine?

He is a strange man. A man who does not like to stay in one place for long, it would seem. After informing me of his visit to you, I did not see him again for some time. I knew I would need his assistance if I were to come for you, but luck has not been on my side. He disappeared and it was troublesome trying to find him. I fear that if I had not run into him one late night I would have... well, I am not certain of that.

Safety precautions urged me to not reveal the nature of this letter to Khan, who I can trust only as the carrier for now. Sometimes I doubt his loyalties and wonder which party he serves, mine or his.

However, I write to tell you that I have a plan to free you. If, by any chance, this letter does not reach you, then I know that I have failed. But, if you are reading this then I implore you to give a message to Khan next you see him. I will take it from there...

I love you, Christine. I want you to know that. I have thought it every day since last we saw each other.

Time has not withered my heart, nor its devotion for you.

Yours lovingly,

Raoul

As she blinked, a stray tear dripped from her jaw and landed harshly at the bottom of the page. The ink ran quickly, making her dear friend's name bleed away until it was nothing but a smudge. "No, no, no," she whispered brokenly, her head shaking heavily from side to side as one of her hands shot out to grab the mantle piece. But even the strongest structure could not support her now. "Raoul... My dear... What are you thinking?"

What was he thinking? Although Christine had made her intentions to remain with Erik clear, she had not often dwelt on the possibility that Raoul would not believe her words. How could she have been so ignorant?

Her hand slipped from the hearth and, with an anguished cry, her legs began to quiver under her weight. She sank to the floor in a sobbing heap, clutching the letter fiercely to her chest.

She did not wish Raoul to be harmed under any circumstances, but how was she to reply to this letter without a complication? Or... perhaps it was better if she did not write back. The thought ran through her convoluted mind. Yes, perhaps she should simply ignore him, make him think that he had indeed failed her. It was cruelty in its kindest form, and she would do anything to protect him, to protect Erik.

She would do anything to protect all of them.

Suddenly, Christine scrunched the letter up and enveloped it with her fingers, pressing the edges roughly into her skin, not caring about the unpleasantness it caused. It was only a silly little piece of paper, and yet if felt as though it was dragging her downwards, down to the floor and further still, until she reached the fiery gates of Hell that she was surely destined for. And was that not what she deserved for her actions, for the grief she had caused? In her current distress, it seemed only fitting.

Her head lolled forward, her neck swiftly becoming stiff from its position, as she balled up her hands into shaking fists and pressed them viciously into the floor. They alone could not very well hold her weakening body, but somehow, she was grateful for the pain if brought her.

"Do not cry," a disembodied voice beside her ear soon whispered, its tone lulling and hypnotic and she was almost tempted to obey its soft plea. Almost. "I do not like it when you cry."

When Christine turned towards him, she could not stop her face from trembling, her body shuddering under a violent wave as he came to kneel beside her. Unsure on how to comfort her, Erik's hands reached out to cup the air around her cheeks, his fingers stroking, searching, but never touching. She followed his movements and his hesitancy merely made her release another hideous cry. She longed for him to be bold, to initiate some sort of contact with her, to reach out and embrace her and hold her in his arms...

But he did not hold her.

"Please."

He had never truly held her.

"What is it?" he asked, dropping his hands to let them hang between his bent legs.

"Let me in," she cried, staring at the contrast between his translucent skin and his black trousers—how sickly his fingers looked as they just lay there, unmoving, but how much she wanted them to touch her. She could have captured them in one easy movement, pulling them to her face or into her palms, but she stayed still, as still as Erik and as still as stone. "Won't you let me in?"

He pressed his mouth into a firm line as he stared at her curiously. "How many times are we to have this conversation?" he murmured, jaded by her persistence. "My reasons are my own. Why can you not accept that?"

Her bitter tears rolled down her cheeks as she raised her head, her mouth gaping, opening and then closing like a fish out of water. "Because I... I..."

"What?" he asked despondently.

"I... I do not know!" she exclaimed, closing her eyes before raising one closed fist to her forehead, cradling it tightly in a need to inflict pain on herself again.

For a single moment, she empathised with Erik—never being able to express himself in a calm and collected way, never quite finding the right word to fit his ever changing emotions... That was, until she felt him convulsively tugging at her wrist and she was left painfully in her own shoes again, all too aware of his icy fingers prying hers apart.

The letter! Her eyes flew open.

Not a sound was heard in the following minute besides the crackle of the fire, which soon melted with the soft sound of paper crinkling, unfurling and smoothing out...

"It would appear your young man is quite persistent," he said, his voice above no more than a whisper, but there was an eerie harshness to his tone which made her hair stand on end. "Erik knew he was right to suspect, he knew..."

"Erik, I am so sorry," she cried hopelessly. "I tried to tell him—you know this! He would not listen to me! Please don't... don't hurt—"

As quick as a flash, his hand flew out and grabbed her forearm, his tight grip forcing both of them up onto their knees. With his other hand, he violently shoved the letter right under her nose as his eyes burned with dark jealousy and betrayal.

"How many?" he snarled, curling his fingers into the paper. "How many letters have you sent him in secret, you scheming temptress? How many letters have you written declaring your love for one another? How many, Christine?"

"Erik, you don't understand!"

"Tell me!"

"Let me explain!" Her pained pleas ceased to be as she watched him suddenly throw the letter into the fire, the flames engulfing the lost words. She stared at the paper as it curled into itself before looking back at Erik, who was still glaring at her.

"Explain, then," he growled with cold indifference. "I would so like to hear what you have to say for yourself."

Reeling, Christine leaned her head away from him, her features aglow with undisguised disgust. "Do you think that I have something to do with this, Erik? Is that really what you think, that I would plot against you?"

"Erik does not know what you would do," he spat. "He only knows that you despise him."

Ignoring the pain in his eyes, she instead surprised him as her free hand lunged forward to cling to his forearm, fingers wrapping around the thin limb with a grip that matched his own. "I do not despise you," she said, impassioned. "And I have only sent one letter to Raoul—you know this, you know this! There have been no more letters! I would not betray you, Erik. Why can you not trust me? Why can we not live our lives peacefully without all this... all this conflict?"

Steadily, Erik's posture became slacker until he all but slumped forward and his hands clumsily slid up slender arms to lightly hold her shoulders. As he brought his masked forehead down to rest upon hers, Christine's hands slowly moved to awkwardly hold his arms.

"You are such a good girl!" he exclaimed. "Such a good girl to your poor Erik. He treats you badly and yet you remain with him. He does not understand."

With his head now nestling into the crevice of her shoulder, he gave himself over to his frustration and to her care. How horrible he was to her, he wondered drearily, but, oh, how wonderful her hands felt! Firm, yet tender against his elbows. But it was not until one of her hands—her marvellously kind hands!—found its way to his miserable excuse for hair that he began to weep. And he shuddered beneath her touch. Her beautiful touch.

"Hush," she whispered against him, along with many other phrases and reassurances which she hoped would be a comfort to him.

But Erik did not hear her words. No, his mind had driven him into his own sombre thoughts, where the woman he loved lay buried, oppressed—a captive of darkness, his darkness. He had been a fool to think that she could have survived in his world without light, without... what had she said to him many months ago? '"I need my freedom, Erik... I need to feel as though I can be myself...'"—Yes, that was it. Freedom. She needed freedom.

He had once thought that he had been able to give her what she wanted, that he had been able to quench her thirst for sunlight and for the world above. But it had not been enough. It would never be enough. Like a songbird, she lived in a gilded cage. Her freedom was a farce, a sadistic illusion that he had created in her honour, believing that she could learn to live behind bars. And he, too, had believed it as he had lived behind these bars his entire life. But not anymore. The glass in front of his eyes had shattered. The illusion was gone, and in its place stood what was always there: two captives, two lost souls... two victims.

"Perhaps that is why the songbird does not sing as sweetly as it once did," he murmured, stopping Christine mid-sentence. "It needs its freedom. Yes, it needs to spread its wings and fly. Fly and be free. Oh, it is too late for Erik, but Christine... Christine may yet have her wings back."

Her hands dropped to her sides and she leaned away from him, eyeing him warily. "What are you saying?"

Rising to his feet, he stood to his full height and straightened out his jacket and hair, as if his little episode had never occurred. He appeared so nonchalant that Christine began to wind her fingers around the fabric of her dress in anger. "You have always had your decisions made for you and staying with me was no exception. It is time for you to truly decide."

"Decide? Decide!" She, too, rose to her feet and glared at the man before her in a rage that throbbed through her veins. "My choice was made—"

"Not willingly."

"—and I stick by it!"

He paused at this, staring almost distantly as though he could see right through her. "Christine, I am freeing you of your bargain." His gaze snapped to hers. "You are no longer bound to me. You may leave."

Frigid and speechless, Christine remained rooted to the ground long after he left the room. Her mind was spinning and suddenly the idea of standing did not seem quite so pleasant any more. Trembling, she attempted to make sense of the situation she was now in.

Erik had released her.

She was free.

But she did not feel free.

Despite his surprisingly sound words, she knew what he said was false. She would never be free without his music, without him. His hold on her was too strong...

And the soul he held did not want to be free.

"Erik!" she yelled, quickly scampering from the library and through the winding hallways, searching for him in vain. After releasing her skirts in a gesture of her vexation, she turned her head to see his silent figure standing morbidly at the threshold of her bedchamber. She approached him cautiously. In black, with his head bowed, he appeared more like a mourner standing over a grave.

"When do you wish to leave?" he asked her as she climbed the steps behind him.

A sharp pain numbed her heart at the impassivity of his question. "Please do not ask this of me," she whispered into his jacket, reaching for his shoulder, but only grasping empty air as he swiftly wandered into her room and away from her touch.

"Why shouldn't I ask?" he snapped, whirling around to show her his now bare face—the mask which lay at his feet stared at her and she stared right back. "This is what you want, is it not? Your freedom."

Mouth dry and mind in disarray, Christine could do nothing but watch as he paced anxiously about the floor. Silently, her hand crept up to hold the door frame, her fingers squeezing the structure for support when she saw him start to pick up things at random—articles of clothing, trinkets of all sorts, sheets of discarded paper—and throw them onto her bed without a second care. He seemed frantic, yet entirely focused, as if an unseen force held possession over him and was now controlling his long limbs, carrying them to and fro as his arms swept and gathered and deposited and—

"What are you doing?" she murmured quietly, stumbling towards him.

"I am packing for you," he replied coldly in a light, melodic tone.

"But..." She raised her arms and hands helplessly to illustrate her confusion. "Why?"

"Why? I shall tell you, my little songbird." Christine took a step back as he sneered. "I am packing because you are leaving me tonight to return to the world above. Is that not wonderful news?"

Turning around, he caught sight of the necklace, his precious gift to her, lying on her vanity. Gliding almost ominously toward it, he reached out with his fingers, lifting it ever so gently into the air and, for a moment, he did nothing but gaze at the twinkling jewels. Christine grew wary of the possibility of him carelessly throwing it onto the pile accumulating on her bed, but managed to breathe a sigh of relief when he merely placed it back down again.

"Oh, Christine," he breathed, her name a sacred prayer on his lips, like an ancient ritual full of sacrilege, as if he faced being struck down by even daring to whisper the name. And sometimes, as he lay awake whilst she slept in the next room, he thought about his own death—how much easier it would have been for both of them if he were to perish in the night. But perhaps it was just weakness that allowed him to torment himself by staying alive, the thought of seeing her smile or hearing her voice driving his black heart to thrive. "I want you to stay, but can't you see? You cannot."

"Why not?" she asked, quivering as she neared him still.

"Need you ask?" he answered, not noticing the quiet padding of her feet nearing him. "Consider this. What if you had never spent all this time down here? Where would you be now? In the sun, with him, surrounded by servants and the bourgeoisie. You could have been happy! And instead I am condemning you to a life of solitude and forced poverty! So give me one good reason why you should want to stay!"

No words came to mind and she was left gaping at him unintelligibly. "I... I..."

"Tell me why you want to stay!" he screamed at her, but still she remained unable to answer. "Tell me! Why do you not speak! Do you seek to torment me with your silence!" His irritation and doubt continued to brew until, suddenly, he felt a smothering pressure against his shins. It was as if the breath had been knocked out of him for when he peered down, he saw Christine on her knees, her arms having wound themselves around his legs in despair.

"Please stop!" she begged, her cry muffling against stiff fabric as her little hands clutched at him so fiercely that his pliable body fell to the floor to join her on his knees. There, he remained frozen, hands suspended in the air, as her arms moved to tighten around his torso—the feeling of her surrounding him was as intoxicating as it was suffocating. "Stop this, stop this," she repeated over and over again into his shirt. "This is madness!"

"It is only fitting," he choked out, finally finding his voice. His muscles began to tense and he gave a sharp intake of breath as her palms slid up his back to rest on his shoulder blades, pressing him to her. "I am mad, myself, dearest."

As soon as the endearment had left his mouth, however, an uncomfortable pressure started to spread through him—her nails were beginning to dig into his jacket and she stared up at him with wild eyes, her fingers desperately grasping the black material as if she would do anything in her power to stop him from escaping.

"Dearest?" she spat with a fury to match that of the Opera Ghost. "After you push me away, after you pack for me, after you decide that I am to leave you tonight, you have the gall to call me dearest?" Edging her hands further up his back, she allowed her fingers to lightly curl over the tops of his shoulders as her expression softened into one of pleading. "All my life, I have had decisions made for me, and now... and now, in a way, I know how to speak my own mind. I know how use my voice in a way that will make people listen. You taught me that. You have taught me a great many things... Yet, when I use my voice to speak, you will not listen."

"What do you want, Christine?" he rasped, not able to suffer her terrible vagueness any longer. "I will listen now. I will listen." It would have been so easy, she thought, to let him take her away from this place, to let him take her back to the world above. But the thought of parting with him now was... strangely unbearable, and she was taken aback by the sudden urge to tighten her hold on him when he uttered one tantalising word, "Stay."

Closing her eyes, she buried her head into his shirt, feeling the unsteady rise and fall of his chest. "Yes," she whispered back, the word falling from her lips as naturally as rain from the sky.

This woman never ceased to baffle him and now here they were, kneeling on the hard ground—one could say intimately—but all Erik could think of was why? He had released her—twice!—but her hands now pressed his body to hers as if she were actually afraid to let him go. As if he would ever leave her! The very idea was absurd. But, it did not do anything to calm his untamed thoughts, raging like waves upon the sea through his mind.

From beneath her fingertips, she could feel the tension start to accumulate again before he began to shift against her, almost in unrest, as if he were no longer comfortable being this so close to her. "No, no," she heard him say. "I... I will not care what you decide, I will not care what you decide! Just say what you really mean! Shout at me, curse me! I know you only stay to appease me. I know that it is not what you truly want."

"And how would you know what I want?" she challenged, clutching at him as he attempted to break free of her grip. "I did not even know what I wanted! Oh, how can I make you see sense! You shall soon drive me mad if I am not allowed to—No! No, do not run from me. Don't you dare run." And she clung to him with all her might. "Please do not turn from me now. Please see that I do not want to return to the world above. Please see that I only want to stay here, with our music and with you and that I love you and..."

Time seemed to slow as her words innocently slipped out.

Erik stared at her, his mouth falling open but with no sound coming forth. Those words, those beautiful, yet dangerous words, had tumbled so effortlessly from her that surely they must have been a lie. Yes, he thought, a lie, that's what it is, a very lovely lie. The most wonderful lie he had heard in his life.

"You... are lying," he shuddered to say with a nod of his head, wanting to spare himself the humiliation of her jeering, to drag himself away from her arms. But... he could not. Despite every instinct in his body telling him to flee, he stayed still in her embrace, secretly longing to hear that lie again and hating himself for it all the more.

"No," she murmured, her hands slipping from his shoulders as she frowned. "It is not a lie I speak. I... I believe it to be the truth."

Her words were regimented in tone, almost detached, yet as she said them, her heart began to thud.

Love.

"I... I do. I think I love you."

Slowly, she raised her eyes and beheld the man before her, as if for the first time. And she did the only thing that she could think of at that moment—she seized his face and kissed his forehead, his cheeks and finally his cold, still lips.

"Do not send me away," she mumbled into his skin as she tried not to feel as though she were embracing a marble column, and, pausing briefly to look from his eyes to his chin, she pressed her lips hesitantly to his again.

An instance of stillness passed and then she felt the ever hopeful tug of his mouth, shy and timid, moving against her—the beginnings of a surge, like electricity, dangerous and quick and shocking to behold. Heavy sighs and tears were reaped in the heartbeats following the parting of their bashful lips and neither dared to move, each continuing to kneel on the unforgiving ground. When at last the intrepid silence was broken, Christine felt the coolness of his forehead resting on hers before his melodious voice rang through the air.

"Perhaps it is not a lie, after all. That would be too cruel," he whispered into the corner her mouth, their shallow breaths mingling. "But surely this cannot be real. No one has ever... no woman... Oh, I am too happy for this to be real and you have made me so very happy, my love... Oh! My love! My love! Dare I even believe? Oh, and I am a happy man! If I died right now in your arms, I would not care. Only, let this not be a dream. I could not bear it if... No... No, this could not be a dream. My dreams are never so... real... so soft."

"I am here; I am real," she murmured, slowly laying her palms against his cheeks, letting her thumbs run over the marred skin, and then he was crying once more, tears of suppressed joy and bewilderment running down his face.

In the candlelight, his black eyes glistened and Christine could feel her heart swell as he collected her hands and pressed kisses to her palms, her fingers, all the while whispering words of benignity against her skin. Christine closed her eyes as his breath danced against her fingertips before his hands slid up to lightly hold her shoulders. Her own hands found their way to the back of his head, her fingers toying with his hair, as she pressed closer to him, wanting to savour this feeling of release and complete serenity for as long as she could.

And with him in her arms, she felt complete.

When Erik finally pulled back from her warm arms, it was only so that he could slide his hands over her shoulders and up to her face. He swallowed thickly and gazed at her in wonder as he cradled her cheeks. "Do you truly mean what you say?"

"Yes."

"You love me?"

"Yes. Yes, I think I do." Laying her hands on his heaving chest, she not only felt the flat hardness of his body, but also the racing of his heart—the heart which now belonged to her—and she realised, with a shaky breath, that it was all she needed. "I love you," she told him in earnest.

His cool fingers twitched against her flushed cheeks, stroking away her nerves with his feather-like touch. "Then I am afraid I have truly driven you mad."

Just as she opened her mouth to object, the most glorious sound reached her ears and she found herself drawing nearer to the source. Under her hands, she felt the hearty bounce of his chest as his dulcet laugh filled her ears and she decided in that moment that it was the most beautiful sound she had ever heard. His crooked mouth, his curled up lips; she loved the exoticism of it, and suddenly she wanted to be the sole reason for his smile.

Before she could stop herself, she had leaned forward and captured his mouth, desperate to absorb his happiness and to share in it. She smiled against him before coming to her senses and pulling back, her cheeks growing warm under his touch as she looked to the floor, embarrassed by her own boldness. "Forgive me," she muttered, but as she summoned the courage to glance at him, she was struck by the gentleness in his eyes.

"I will never forgive you for giving me such a beautiful thing," he told her sincerely, his heart skipping a beat at hearing her elicited sigh, drawn out by his touch.

His gaze dropped and his chest tightened as he found that he could no longer ignore the call of her lips. Leaning forward with the utmost care, he brushed his lips against her warm skin, her cheek, her chin, her nose, pausing briefly between each kiss before returning to her sweetness. He breathed her in, feeling her mouth skim across the side of his face and he could not remember a more delirious and wonderful sensation.

Her breath teased his ear and neck as she sighed again, her hands tilting his head so that she could claim his lips once more. To both her shock and delight, he kissed her back with such a reverence that she had never known.

It was subdued rapture, a tidal wave which had engulfed them, crushing them under the weight of their own affection. Starved hands, tender looks, shy blushes—they were mere novices, finding their way together.

Lost within their kiss, Christine said goodbye to her childhood dreams of earth shattering love and knew that, for her, there would be no happily ever after. There would be no handsome, societal husband or cherub faced children running through their grand household.

No, there would be only Erik. And she was glad of it.

A/N: This was a very satisfying moment for me to go over and rewrite. It's probably one of the chapters I enjoyed writing the most. Let me know your thoughts on it!