Order Your White Horses
"But I lavish unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who love me and obey my commandments."
-Exodus 20:6
Instinct overtook Erik—sent him lunging forward, flinging his body over Christine's. They tumbled together in a tangle of limbs, clods of snow flying. All the while his mind tore apart the fragmented seconds. The shot came from a pistol, of decent caliber. The shooter was nearby, from the sound and smell of gunpowder. Neither of them were hurt. Christine's brown eyes were wide with shock. There was no sticky wetness of blood or pain singing through her muscles. God, she felt so good beneath him, soft and feminine and fragrant. His to protect and shelter.
'You made me love you.' Love him? Did she? Could she? No time for that now.
Shattered fragments of stone pelted his shoulders from where the bullet had destroyed a stone angel not two paces from them. So, the shooter was not only a dead man, but an incompetent dead man.
In a flash of a second, Erik leapt up to face his enemy. The righteous, protective anger was like kerosene to the fire of rage within him.
"You," Erik snarled, his voice a vehicle for his hate.
Raoul de Chagny held a smoking pistol, looking every inch a highborn aristocrat with his white horse, billowy white shirt and the elegant rapier at his side, glinting with silver. It was a credit to Christine's hold over him that he failed to notice de Chagny's approach. Erik's own armament consisted of a dagger and his Punjab. His hands and feet could also be considered deadly weapons, in a pinch.
"Are you out of your fucking mind, de Chagny? You could have hit Christine! Did that thought even enter your empty skull?" the boy's golden brows snapped together, blue eyes glinting, holding Erik's unwaveringly. Erik hated him and his easy confidence so much that a metallic taste coated his tongue.
"I'm an excellent shot," was the boy's flat rejoinder.
Erik snorted, unlacing his cape. A casual flick of his wrist sent it fluttering over Christine, who sat with shock-glazed eyes on the ground. Its weight would hamper him in a fight. Raoul tossed aside the spent pistol and drew his rapier.
"So what was that? A warning shot? How honorable. It will be your last mistake, boy. You should have killed me when you had a clean shot."
The boy was finished talking, handsome face set in a mask of concentration. As de Chagny took his initial position, sweeping his blade in a mocking salute, Erik felt the faintest stab of foreboding. His opponent was younger, strong, and as the son of a great house, had no doubt been trained since boyhood with the sword. His first formidable adversary since the khanum's assassins in Persia some ten years prior.
"Raoul, please don't! Don't hurt him!" Christine said, staggering to her feet. Erik threw out a hand to bar her. One side of Erik's mouth tipped up.
"I appreciate your confidence in my skills, love. Stay behind me. The boy might decide to thrust and impale you by accident." The boy's blue eyes narrowed, both at Erik's casual endearment and at the insult. Hope surged through him. The boy doubted his hold on her!
"You've a glib tongue, Sir. We'll see how you like it when your blood is on my blade."
"Stop this! Erik, Raoul . . . please!" Christine's voice grew higher, shrill with fear.
"My my, aren't we ambitious?" Erik shot back, ignoring her. The sound of the gunshot so dangerously close to Christine kept him from attempting reconciliation for her sake.
A flutter of movement caught his attention. Christine shoved aside Erik's restraining arm and planted herself firmly between them, arms stretched out to each of them.
"Please, don't do this. I couldn't bear to see you hurt," she pleaded.
"Who, him or me?" Erik snapped. She said she loved him? Let her prove it against the man whose ring she wore!
"Either of you!"
"This man, this thing, is not worthy of you, Christine! He betrayed your trust; he's a liar, a murderer and a madman! Don't plead mercy for his sake!"
Something snapped, his vision blurred red. With an inarticulate shout, he lunged for the boy. A thing! This boy presumed to judge him as something less than human? He was the same as the faces beyond the bars, the men who laughed as Javert beat him over and over again!
Erik led with a hard cross, feeling a vicious pleasure when his fist connected with the boy's jaw. He drew his knee up, catching de Chagny in the gut. The boy stumbled back but recovered, flicking out his sword in a quick slice. Erik was ready for it, jumping back. The blade whistled as it cleaved the air. His Punjab slid into his left hand, thin and black and eager. He drew the dagger as well. De Chagny swung a hard diagonal slash, aiming for the vulnerable juncture between shoulder and neck. The boy was trying to kill him. Erik observed this from far away, as he bent backwards to avoid it.
Both of them were possessed by the same fear: neither could countenance a rival for Christine's heart.
You made me love you.
De Chagny slashed a horizontal sweep and Erik was a half second too slow jumping back. A bright line of pain sliced across his belly, the hot trickle of blood cooling in the snowy air. His grunt of pain was swallowed by Christine's thin wail. He couldn't spare her glance, or de Chagny would gut him. Through the tatters of coat, vest and shirt, Erik glimpsed a wound across his heaving belly. The boy tilted the blade, as if admiring the tainted steel.
"How do you like it, Monsieur? Even monsters bleed red." It hurt to take a deep breath, but Erik found the air to growl, "You'll regret that, boy."
The dance began again, and continued for what seemed to be a small eternity. Each swing and miss increased the boy's frustration and ate at his energy. At just the right moment, Erik loosed his Punjab, catching de Chagny's free wrist and twisted it straight behind his back, elbow locked. A kick knocked the rapier from his weakening grasp. Erik knew from experience that this lock torqued the muscle and tendon in the shoulder and was particularly painful.
"Coward! Face me like a man!" de Chagny challenged, spitting the words from behind clenched teeth. Christine's plea fell on deaf ears.
Maybe this was the opening he needed. Force her to a choice. It fueled him.
Savage delight filled Erik at the fetid stench of sour sweat, exhaustion and the first whiff of fear. The sight of de Chagny on his knees in the snow was sweet. Erik leaned close and whispered in his ear, "Ah, but by your own words, I am no man at all. Why should a man's honor bind me?" A hard yank on the captured arm. This time, de Chagny could not contain his cry of pain. Tendrils of spittle dripped from his yawning mouth. Christine's pleas were as repetitive and inconsequential as a barking dog.
"Your boy called me a thing, Christine! A creature! Even creatures have the right to defend their own lives !"
Suddenly, the boy twisted, and threw a rock into Erik's face. His grip loosened on the Punjab and the boy wiggled free. Rage severed his link to reason as blood filled his mouth. Rocks! Like the rocks that killed Sasha, like the rocks children threw at him. The boy had found his rapier, but Erik was intent incarnate, an Angel of Doom. He dodged a wild blow and struck, swift as a cobra, the dagger opening a long gash down his opponent's sword arm. Erik evaded a blind thrust, caught his sword hand and twisted the wrist. A wet crunch announced a breaking bone. Erik grasped a fistful of golden hair and set the bloody tip of his dagger at the leaping pulse. Erik grinned, knowing what a macabre thing it was with blood-reddened teeth and the bone white mask. Fear mingled with disgust and hate filled his eyes. Erik had seen that expression a thousand times before. Each before the final blow descended.
"You should have killed me when you had the chance."
"Erik! No!" he heard her footsteps, whispering thumps of sound in the snow. She dove forward, grasping his forearm.
"Stop! Please, for the love of God, stop! Please!" she sobbed, face contorted in agony. For one flash of second, Erik considered burying the knife in the boy's neck, feeling the red-black spurting of his heart's blood, and watch the light die in those blue eyes. Only then would his heart be safe—safe from the pain of her leaving. It was all right to kill when you were afraid, wasn't it?
You made me love you. So this was love then, was it? Christine, her brown eyes wide in naked appeal for mercy. If he killed the boy, she would be forever lost to him. Erik released the boy with a shove. He felt curiously numb at this crossroads. Erik swayed, feeling the trickle of blood down his belly and thighs. She had chosen in the clearest way possible: begging for his life over a blade. Erik dismissed the stinging moisture in his eyes as sweat.
"Oh Raoul!" Christine cried, hands hovering over his mutilated right arm. God, it was salt in his wound to see her fawn over the boy's injuries! The boy's blue eyes were dazed with pain, but he still was valiant enough to shelter Christine with his body. As if she was in any danger from him.
"I wish you well to each other. Consider this my wedding gift." Erik's wrist flicked. The dagger flew and stuck, quivering, between de Chagny's spread fingers.
XXX
Gummy eyes opened to find his rooms at the Château de Chagny, clean, warm and redolent with the scent of cologne, brandy and leather.
Philippe.
A hot throb in his upper arm, echoed by the dull ache in his broken wrist. His body remembered every landed blow clearly. A small sound must have left his lips, for there was the creak of a chair and the rich murmur of his brother's voice ordering the maid. Then Philippe's handsome face filled Raoul's vision. Even to Raoul's cloudy appraisal, his elder brother looked wan and tired, hair unkempt and cheeks dusted with stubble. For once, the smug tilt of his mouth was gone, the jaded amusement in his eyes replaced with sincerity.
"Where is Mother?"
"With Father. He took a turn for the worse last night. The doctor is still with him." Raoul digested this with a sparse nod. Father, now nearing seventy, had been battling a stubborn illness, a tumor of the stomach, for nearly ten years.
"And Christine?" He felt slightly bereft that it was his brother to greet him when he woke and not his bride to be.
"She left soon after the doctor dosed you for the night." Raoul was not too weak to hear the implied judgment in his brother's voice, but he had neither the energy nor the words to defend her. He had already spent too much defending her. A bubble of sadness floated toward the surface of his thoughts. All that effort and he was still unsure in his hold on her heart.
"How are you faring, little brother?" Philippe's voice was gentle.
Raoul tentatively wiggled his fingers and winced as the pain crept up his arm. The family doctor had fashioned an immobilizer of flat splints and wound Raoul's forearm with cloth stiffened with starch. It itched abominably.
"I've been better."
"You're lucky he didn't kill you, you idiot!" Philippe snapped, for the third time. Raoul closed his eyes, letting the scolding words wash over him.
"I told you to stay away from the man, Raoul. I warned you."
A headache gathered behind Raoul's eyes, pounding in time with his hurt wrist. His laudanum-laced nightmares roiled with images of Erik Rousseau, his half face twisted in demented glee as he smiled with blood-reddened teeth. He had never seen anyone move that fast, as if he had seen the move before Raoul made it. Armed with a dagger and a piece of rope, he had bested Raoul—who prided himself on his skill with swordplay and aspired to become a solider.
"What do you know about him? God, I'm sick to death of being treated like a child who cannot be trusted with the truth! Who is Erik Rousseau?" he demanded, thumping his good arm on the downy nest of pillows where he was situated. Philippe merely raised a brow, leaning back and lifting the front legs of the chair off the floor.
"Are you quite finished? Would you like some more laudanum? A temper tantrum will make the pain worse." Raoul shook his head, compressing his lips against a surge of nausea.
"Answer the question, Philippe," he said, grimly intent.
The Comte de Chagny sighed, steepling his fingers beneath his chin in one of Father's gestures. There was a long, breathless pause as Philippe considered Raoul. At last, he said, "You shouldn't excite yourself, Raoul. I'll tell you when you have recovered." Raoul sank back against his sweat-dampened pillows, grinding his teeth in frustration.
"The next time we meet, I'd like to know what I'm facing. The man fights like a demon, Philippe. He had a knife to my throat. He would have killed me, if not for Christine."
A discreet shiver raced through him. It was just now sinking in how close he'd come to death. A cruel hand in his hair, the cold prick of a knife against his skin . . . and a demon's single-minded intent behind it. Philippe's grey eyes were serious.
"I will tell you this: I know he murdered a well-respected mason's daughter in Italy—he was one of Father's contacts in the area, remember? Giovanni, I think his name was. Anyway, this Erik killed his daughter when she wouldn't consent to lie with him. Pushed her off a balcony. He's a villain."
Hot-cold fear washed over Raoul. Terrible fear for Christine's sake. A madman, a liar, an extortionist, and now a lecherous murderer! Was there no end to this man's list of sins? Whatever his words of acceptance in the cemetery, surely a madman would consider honor a trifle!
"Philippe, send for Christine. Please. She's in terrible danger. This villain thinks himself in love with her!" Raoul said, grasping his brother's sleeve. Philippe raked a hand through his hair.
"God love you, Raoul. You certainly know how to pick them."
XXX
Christine couldn't get warm. Despite the heaps of blankets and flannel nightclothes, despite the warmed bricks placed at the foot of her bed, nothing could penetrate this chill. Shock, Madame said. Whatever peace she and Erik made was gone, shattered by Raoul's bullet and soaked in their mingled shed blood. She couldn't bear the sight of Raoul so still in his bed. He looked so much like Papa as life eased out of him. So she fled. Neither could she face the betrayal in Erik's ever-changing eyes when she pled for Raoul's life.
A dry husk of a laugh left her lips. She had been right: it would end in pain for all three of them. Oh, why didn't Raoul see that in thrusting the sword to slay what he thought was a monster, he impaled her in the same stroke? Why couldn't Erik see beyond his own pain?
"It's a bloody mess, is what it is," Meg observed, leaning against the doorjamb. Her dancing step barely made a sound as she crossed the worn carpet.
"You, the Vicomte, and Monsieur Erik," she clarified.
Christine managed a wan smile, remembering a very similar conversation with Madame two days prior.
"Yes. Quite the mess. But what do you propose I do about it? Either way I chose, someone gets hurt," Christine said, biting back tears. Meg snorted, dark eyes hard.
"You can't think about that, Christine. Stop worrying about what everyone else wants. Maman, the Vicomte, Monsieur Erik. Forget it all! What do you want? Who do you love?" When Christine didn't answer, Meg prodded her shoulder chidingly.
"It's simple, Christine." An irrational surge of anger filled her.
"Oh? And you're the great authority on it, are you? Are you in love?" Christine snapped nastily.
"I am, actually," Meg replied primly, "Had you even cared to look, or ask, I'm engaged. To Marcel. You know him as the Baron de Castelot-Barbezac. He proposed on the night of the masquerade."
Christine's jaw fell, and she glanced down at Meg's left hand. A sizable square-cut diamond shone on her slender finger, flanked by twin rounds, both slightly smaller. Even in the warm, semi-darkness of the room, Christine could see the glint of their luster. Fine quality all of them.
"If you hadn't been so bent on self pity, you would have noticed," Meg said sharply. Christine's misery deepened. Add 'horrible friend' to her list of character flaws. Tears welled and fell, quickly swiped with cold fingers.
"Oh Meg! I'm so sorry! I've been completely wretched." Meg's reply was quick and merciless: "Yes, you have." Holy Virgin, she was so much like her mother! Christine grasped Meg's hand, peering at the ring.
"It's beautiful. The Baron is a very lucky man." A faint rosy blush stained Meg's cheeks.
"Isn't it? He really overdid it. He's poor, you see. His fortunes fell apart when he lost all his ships in a storm. He said he spent his last franc on a season ticket to the Opera so he could see me dance. I don't know where he found the funds for a ring." Christine treasured these details. Maybe they meant forgiveness. Without Meg and Madame, Christine would be truly alone in the world. Nothing frightened her more.
"Should I have told him you aren't one for trinkets? A new pair of ballet slippers or a box of chocolate would have sufficed?" Christine ventured a tease, hoping for the easy flow of giggling and happiness that had flavored their friendship. It worked. Meg's smile bloomed like a rose.
"This type of trinket I like!" she nudged Christine's shoulder. The smile faded a bit.
"Christine, I've missed you so much! I haven't had anyone to talk to about all this!" Christine laughed through her tears.
"I've missed you too! Do you forgive me?" Christine ventured.
"Of course I do, you ninny!"
They moved in a sobbing embrace, new and shining in forgiveness. Christine relaxed into her embrace, clinging to the comfort and camaraderie she offered. This, at least, was clean and pure and hers. The ice in her veins was melting. Meg pulled back, sniffing, and held Christine's shoulders in a firm grim.
"Now I mean it, Christine. You can't go around moaning about how difficult this choice is. You have to make it for yourself."
They sat together chatting about Meg's wedding plans when Madame entered the room. She surveyed the scene of soggy forgiveness with a gleam of approval in her gimlet gaze. Christine's hot gaze implored. Upon returning bedraggled from the cemetery, she had begged Madame to seek out Erik, both to assure that his wounds were tended, and to prevent his leaving. Too much of a coward to face him herself, she also could not allow him to slip through her fingers again. Madame gave a small shake of her head and Christine's heart sank to her toes.
"Christine, mon cherie, there is someone here to see you."
Whoever their guest was, he didn't wait to be introduced. The thud of boot steps behind Madame made Christine scramble beneath the covers to preserve her decency. Her heart hammered at the sight of a tall, dark-haired form . . . then the guest stepped into the light. The Comte Philippe de Chagny lacked his usual brash charm. Now, his face was lined and grey. The snow still dusting his wide shoulders, he looked like he'd aged twenty years overnight.
"My father is dead. Please come, Christine. My brother needs you."
XXX
Nadir dog-eared the page in the heavy tome across his lap and rose with a joint-creaking stretch. He relished the pleasure of a roaring fire in a warm study as the wind howled outside, spitefully flinging snow against the leaded glass and rudely thrusting its cold fingers through the cracks and crevices in his old house. After a sumptuous supper of rice and lamb roasted in the Persian style with saffron and spice, Nadir considered himself very well content.
He banked the fire and took his taper, about to ascend the stairs and retire for the night. He was interrupted by a furious pounding on his door. Nadir muttered a curse in his native tongue, knowing without a doubt who stood beyond the door. Erik had an uncanny talent for interrupting his sleep. Mustering scolding words, he set the taper on the banister post and unlatched the heavy locks. Icy wind stole Nadir's breath and snuffed out the taper.
"Erik, you really must learn to-" the words died on Nadir's tongue.
Erik leaned against the stoop, doubled over, eyes dark with pain set in a naked face. Where had his mask gone? A shocked curdling in Nadir's stomach told him that years had not improved his wrecked visage.
"Merde," Nadir muttered.
With a curt gesture, Nadir ushered him inside, kicking the door closed behind them. When Erik staggered, Nadir drew his arm across his shoulders. Together, they lurched drunkenly up the stairs. Erik's breaths were shallow and tight. The very fact that he lacked the wherewithal to jibe Nadir was enough to frighten him. His housekeeper appeared in the doorway, clad in nightgown and cap, bleating "Who?" like a fat owl.
"Fetch hot water, bandages, brandy and clean clothes. Now!" Nadir roared. The woman disappeared with a distressed flutter.
Nadir half walked, half carried Erik the remaining steps to his bedroom. Erik merely grunted as Nadir helped him onto the bed, clots of mud and snow flying across the clean coverlet. It was only when the housekeeper returned with the things he asked for and a helpful gas lamp that Nadir saw the damage. He was also suffering from early stages of exposure: he wasn't shivering and the skin around his mouth was a frightening shade of blue. His fine suit coat was in tatters, an assortment of bruises and cuts marring his person. The main worry, however, was the deep gash running across his belly, still seeping blood. That looked like a saber slash!
"Come, sit up. We need to get these filthy clothes off you." Erik stood passively as they shucked off coat, vest and shirt. Nadir made no comment at the sight of the scars marring his back.
"Mary, Joseph and Bride!" the woman muttered, crossing herself.
"Be gone woman!" Nadir shouted, dismissing her with a curt gesture. Erik sat on the edge of the bed, dazed and staring.
"Erik. Erik!" Nadir shouted, until those blue-grey eyes fixed on his face.
"I need to clean your wound. Lie back and try and stay still."
Erik lay as still as corpse until Nadir poured the brandy on his wounded belly. The scream that tore through the air was like a dying wildcat. Following that was a virulent stream of curses in five different languages, all aimed solely at him. Nadir rejoiced in the profanity, anything except the blank stare of a dead man. The necessary disinfecting took several more excruciating minutes, and once it was over, they were both limp and damp with sweat. Erik collapsed back in a weak heap and Nadir raked a hand through his hair.
"Allah above, Erik! Is there no end to your foolishness?"
The duality of Erik's unmasked face was unnerving, as used to seeing him in his mask as Nadir was. A sick fascination trickled through him as his eye wandered over the twisted red flesh, the throb of blue veins, the sagging eyelid.
He was truly hideous.
"I'm afraid not. But at the moment, I would happily expire to oblige you, Daroga," Erik replied through clenched teeth. Thank Allah, he was feeling well enough to be sarcastic! Nadir wound bandages around Erik's middle, all the while debating on whether to fetch a physician. The wound probably needed to be stitched, but that was beyond Nadir's scope of healing. The bandage would prevent any further blood loss, at least.
"Are you going to tell me how you came across the wrong end of a sword, or do I have to guess?"
Something like a smile flirted with Erik's mouth and he regarded Nadir through one slitted eye.
"Your conjecture could be amusing. Fire away." Nadir snorted, washing his hands.
He soaked a cloth and began patiently dabbing at the smaller cuts and scrapes dotting his torso. Erik endured these ministrations with scarcely a peep, though Nadir could tell some spots hurt from the twitch of his muscle. Saving face after unseemly screaming, Nadir supposed.
"If you must continue to douse me with such fine brandy, would you at least give me a sip?" Erik complained. Nadir obligingly poured a healthy tot. His bedroom would smell like a distillery for quite some time, he mused.
"Now to my guessing. Hmmm. A brawl with the emperor's personal guard? Aspirations to govern, eh Erik?" His troublesome friend began to laugh between swallows of brandy, but when it hurt his wound, he tapered into a weak cough. Nadir continued his monologue in tandem with his doctoring. Distraction helped.
"No. An assassin from Persia, perhaps? Difficult considering both the khanum and the shah are dead."
"They are? When? How?" Erik asked, brows raised. Or, Nadir supposed the right brow lifted, having on a few sprouting hairs along the upper curve of his eye socket. A deformity of the muscle gave him a perpetually quizzical expression on that side. He was feeling well enough to shiver now, gooseflesh stippled his torso, his sparse chest hair bristling.
"Oh, some years ago. Of typhoid. The khanum died first and the shah, never one to disobey his mother, followed a couple weeks later." Nadir paused, then added, "A rather gruesome end, typhoid. Its victims die consumed alive by fever and in a puddle of their own shit." Divine justice, Nadir thought to himself. Erik peeled off his gloves and attempted to order his tousled hair. He did have such a peculiar sense of vanity.
"So all the ones who sought to kill us are dead. We've survived them all, Daroga." His tone was quietly amazed. Had he truly expected to die by violence? Nadir's mouth twisted in wry amusement. He gestured to Erik's wound.
"I'd say you still have at least one would-be murderer left, Erik. He did try to gut you. The poor fool doesn't know it would take an act of God to do you in." Erik's mouth tilted in reply and he offered a mocking salute of his brandy snifter.
"God has been trying since the day I was born. I imagine my existence is a blight to His credibility. But I'll not make it easy for Him. Do continue with your guessing." Nadir bit his tongue. Matters of faith always divided them, despite their abiding friendship. His professed atheism was much the same as his habitual mockery—it hid a deep well of hurt. Nadir cleared his throat.
"Let's see, then. What else could it be? A duel with a Duke? Did he step on the hem of your cape, Erik? I know how that irks you." Erik grunted in amusement. Nadir grinned, trying one last time.
"Simple clumsiness, maybe?"
"Wrong on all counts, Daroga. You've lost your detective's touch." Nadir's patience frayed.
"Erik!" he snapped. His friend sobered.
"It was a duel, of sorts. But a poorer cousin to a Duke . . . a Vicomte." He saw Nadir's horrified expression.
"Don't worry. I didn't kill him. Christine stopped me. I gave him my favorite dagger as a wedding gift. I took his horse, though. I broke the boy's wrist. Have you ever broken a man's bones, Daroga? I suppose not. Your mercy would give a man a clean death. It's much like snapping kindling for a fire, but . . . juicy. A wet sort of snap," Erik illustrated his words with a snap of his fingers.
"Anyway, he couldn't manage riding, in that condition. So I left the carriage. A small courtesy to the bride, you see. The carriage horses would respond nicely to a lady's touch." Pain and brandy had the same inebriating effects, Nadir noticed as Erik babbled. It was his style to minimize the pain with mockery or humor. He did neither now.
"The horse was flighty thing. Had trouble seeing, as most greys do, and spooked. I would have managed just fine without the wound, but . . ." Erik gave a tight little shrug of his shoulders.
"It's a long walk to Paris." Nadir glanced out the window at the snow swirling in the wind and saw all too easily Erik's proud figure trudging through the snow, red drops of blood trailing behind him.
"I can imagine," he said faintly.
Nadir left Erik to finish his ablutions and padded downstairs to rummage up the remnants of his supper. It was a testament to what he endured when Erik fell upon the food like a starving wolf.
"Is it a great imposition to ask for more, Daroga? I find myself terribly hungry." Erik said this with a slight abashment and faint surprise. A ghost and phantom he professed to be, Nadir found it oddly gratifying that he would succumb to a need as basic as hunger.
"No, not at all! I'll fetch some more." Nadir leapt to his feet, hiding a smile. Apparently dueling roused quite the appetite.
A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who reviews my story! I love love love it!
Two more things: I always had a problem with the '04 movie's fight scene in the cemetery. For one, Raoul, however well-trained, has none of Erik's experience with hand-to-hand fighting and would lose nine times in ten (at least in my mind). Second, however awesome a fighter Erik may be, he would not fight in his cape. He even gets caught up in it a couple times in the movie! (steps off soapbox) All right, that's all I have to say about that. More up soon!
Plus, added a couple lines to make the emotion feel more real. Let me know if it worked.
FieryPen37