Disclaimer: I do not own POTO or Elisabeth.
Chapter Three
The Wedding
By the end of the day, all necessary preparations had been made, and all was set for the wedding. Raoul had chosen a small chapel where a priest would perform a minute, quick ceremony and secured three train tickets for Mamma Valerius, Christine, and himself to go to Sweden. The train would leave at quarter after eleven.
Seeing that the ceremony was to be so quick, Christine didn't think she would need a wedding gown of any sort- she planned to simply wear her traveling gown. Raoul had other plans.
"Christine, you must wear a wedding gown," he said. Then he produced his mother's old wedding gown. It was a beautiful gown but it was made in the 1860s style, which required the wearer to have a large crinoline on beneath it so that the full, heavy skirt could be supported. Christine could faintly remember her mother wearing a crinoline beneath her gowns. The wooden cages were quite obstructive, but Christine consented to wearing both gown and crinoline.
"Wake up, Mademoiselle! Mademoiselle!" Christine rolled over in her bed with a yawn.
"All right, Elaine, I'm awake." Lazily, she climbed out of the high four-poster bed and wrapped her kimono around her.
There was a soft knock at her door. Raoul's voice asked, "Christine, are you ready yet? We need to leave for the chapel soon." The wedding! Christine had almost forgotten. She hurried into her dressing room, where she found the gown and crinoline waiting for her. She dressed quickly and looked at herself in the full-length cheval mirror, just to see if there were any last minute changes that needed to be done.
Elaine burst in, "Mademoiselle, what are you doing? Don't you know that it is bad for a bride to see herself in the mirror on her wedding day?"
Christine turned away from the and said in quite an uncomfortable way, "No, I didn't." Being a superstitious woman (even though she was a devout Catholic), Elaine's statement shookChristine up a bit.
"Christine, we need to go," Raoul said through the door.
"I am ready. Here I am." Christine tried to shake the distressing forecast of a possibly unlucky marriage and opened the door and stepped out into the hallway with Raoul.
He softly kissed her cheek. "You look beautiful, Christine."
"Thank you." Christine surveyed Raoul in his tuxedo. "And might I add that you look handsome?" Raoul chortled, his laugh resounding through the silence of the corridor.
"Come, Christine. Jacques must be getting antsy." Christine took Raoul's hand and they began to walk down the hall. Raoul then shot his bride a playful look, and they took off running through the halls of the mansion like the giddy children they had been when they first met. It reminded them both of the games they used to play at Perros, by the seaside.
They reached the carriage in such a fashion, laughing hysterically. Raoul helped Christine in, and then sat himself beside her. The carriage slowly hobbled through the mansion's gates and out into Paris. Raoul took Christine's hand and squeezed it tightly.
"Are you excited?"
"Yes!"
The bliss that the couple was basking in was broken when the sound of a carriage behind her caused Christine to turn around. The road was quite deserted, besides the two carriages, because it was still quite early in the morning, and most people in this section of Paris didn't get up or at least leave their cozy homes until about an hour later.
"What are you looking at, Christine?" Raoul asked, turning his gaze to the carriage also. "That is quite a curious carriage," he mused.
"Yes, it is curious." The carriage was closed and was entirely black, even the wheels, which were fashioned out of wrought iron. It was the sort that had no driver's seat, for it was driven from the inside, with the reins coming in through little holes in the front of the seat. The windows were suspiciously fashioned so that you couldn't see in them.
From then on, Raoul didn't pay any more attention to the carriage, but Christine couldn't take her eyes off it. She could've sworn that, from the carriage, there came a voice singing one of the folk songs that country people sang at weddings. She'd heard several of them once, when Papa had taken her for walks in the countryside after coming to Paris, to remind her of Sweden. The mysterious carriage remained behind the one in which Christine and Raoul were riding, it followed them all the way to the chapel. When Christine and Raoul's carriage stopped, though, the black carriage ducked into an alley, in which it seemed to disappear.
Raoul helped Christine down from the carriage.
"When should I come back, Monsieur?" Jacques asked.
Taking Christine by the hand and leading her towards the chapel, Raoul replied, "Wait here. We shouldn't be more than a quarter of an hour."
"Yes, Monsieur."
When Christine and Raoul entered the chapel, they saw that Mamma Valerius was already waiting for them there. She was to be their only witness before God, except for three elderly nuns. The priest looked up when he heard the large wooden door close.
"My children, come, come," he beckoned cheerfully. Christine and Raoul obeyed. The priest was a friendly looking man. He was on the plump side and had rosy red cheeks.
Christine and Raoul stood before him at the altar as he said the marriage mass. They said the vows, and Raoul produced the rings from his pocket. As they slipped the rings on each other's finger, Christine and Raoul could hear the soft tears of Mamma Valerius behind them.
Just after Raoul placed the gold band on Christine's finger, he froze. Christine looked up. The priest was frozen too, as were the nuns and Mamma Valerius. She was the only person in the room who had free mobility. Christine was trying furiously to shake Raoul out of his stationary position, when she heard the chapel doors open and then softly click closed. Immediately, she lifted her head to see who had come in. Standing at the end of the aisle between the pews was Erik, his usual black mask nowhere to be found. Christine felt for a moment as if she had frozen too, staring at the horrible corpse who was making his way towards her. Erik began to sing softly:
"It's an old story, but new for me
two men love the same girl- you.
You've already chosen. I am the loser.
I'm only a guest at your wedding.
You turn away from me, but you only pretend.
You would be loyal to him but you have been wanting me.
He holds you in his arms, but you smile at me."
Now he was inches away from her. He reached up and gently caressed her cheek.
"And where that will lead to, you know as well as I do."
Christine jerked away from him, fixing her gaze on Raoul and trying to find some help in his dull eyes. Erik's fury boiled. He seized her shoulders roughly and sang bitterly:
"The last dance belongs to me!
The last dance I dance only with you!"
He pulled Christine close to him in a dance hold and forced her through the steps of the waltz.
"Erik!" she cried. He just let out an evil laugh and continued to force her through the waltz, whirling her around the church. Finally Erik stopped dancing, allow he continued to hold Christine up against him. Casually, he continued his song:
"Time becomes old and tiresome.
The wine becomes stale.
The air is sultry and stifling
In this Hall of Mirrors.
Invisible eyes look at us
While everyone waits for the rendezvous."
Once again, Erik angrily sang the chorus, all the meanwhile exploring Christine's body, much to her horror. She implored him to stop, but he only laughed and continued running his hands over her. She let out a moan, against her better judgment, and a malicious grimace spread over Erik's face. He wrapped his arms around Christine and sang the final verse seductively into her ear:
"And I am waiting in the dark, and always look at you
and seem the big loser,
but I know I will win
the last dance!"
And as soon as Erik released Christine, he was gone without a trace.
A/N: Please R&R! Pretty please?
The song that Erik sings is "Der Letze Tanz (The Last Dance)" from Elisabeth. Many thanks to Stacy's Musical Village for providing me with the English translation!