Get out.

Two words, wrapped in such vehemence, such loathing. Christine had fled the room without a second thought, tearing down the hallway and slamming her bedroom door. The flimsy lock - an item installed as a show of faith, proof that she could trust him, that he would give her all the peace and privacy she required - seemed hardly adequate now. In desperation she'd attempted to drag the heavy dresser in front of the door, to act as barrier, and had only succeeded in wounding herself, reducing her to childish tears and a threatening feeling that she was about to start screaming. She did scream, but found it only made the growing panicky feeling worse, hearing her own cry of horror echo off the thick walls of his underground prison.

Christine had long thought the mask was to protect his identity. She had assumed there would be a moment when he would remove it, show her his face, let her come to the slow recognition. She had fervently believed his would some face from the crowd perhaps, someone she had encountered accidentally, never realizing he was the one who had been privately grooming her for her ascension. She would smile, she would blush and lower her eyes. He would take her chin in his hands and raise her face to his and say something charming, something that would reveal why he had felt the need to remain so cold, so aloof, so mysterious. "Can't you see? It was me all along?" Her hidden benefactor, her knight in waiting. He would be a gentleman, a true angel among men.

With a single thoughtless gesture she had realized just how immature, how wrong that fantasy had been. For all her attempts to unravel the mystery of the mask, she had never thought… how could she? What lay beneath was unthinkable.

She'd followed him blindly, given him her voice, her trust, her mind. And she'd allowed him to lead her, like a sacrificial lamb, into this tomb below the earth. Into this hell. This hell where she was now trapped with a monster.

Even if Christine wanted to leave, she wouldn't know where to find a door.

Christine Daae, alone and afraid, wrapped herself in her ivory coverlet and sat supplicant in the center of the floor. Kneeling, seated on her heels, and staring blankly at the carpet before her was how he found her still, hours later. Her back was to the door when he pushed it open, and he could see the shiver pass through her body as he entered, as if he were an unwelcome chill. Her fingers clutched the blanket at her neck, her eyes wide, staring, red-rimmed and dark-circled, her hair a messy cascade of brunette curls, wild and untamed. She looked for all the world like a pretty porcelain doll, discarded by an impudent child. Beautiful, abandoned, bruised, broken.

Erik was mortal, this much was true, yet he felt he had lived a hundred lives of ordinary men, and none of those lives particularly ordinary at all. He'd built monuments for great kings and the common rabble alike, heard his prowess as a conjurer of delights praised in myriad tongues, seen the sun rise and set in landscapes that seemed painted from the imagination. Long had he considered himself a creator, a dreamer, a scientist and an artist. Now add to that a maestro, a mentor, an angel. Yet, she was the thing that made him feel impotent, unimportant, hobbled. With the question of, "what now?" looming before him, he was tongue-tied and useless. He wanted to provide comfort, solace, to attempt to put together the remaining pieces of this shattered lie he'd built around her.

Instead, all he could manage was a weak whisper.

"Have you eaten?"

The mass of curls shook from side to side. "No." The voice was raw and hollow. "I don't know how to manage your stove."

"Ah," he replied quietly. "I… I could show you."

She sat still and silent, a trembling summit he would never reach.

By sheer will alone he pulled himself from the room.

Basic, functional motions helped. He boiled the water, poured it into a cup. She needed tea. Strong tea. Black, Turkish, with honey and lemon. Perhaps even a dollop of brandy to warm her and help ease her to sleep.

If she could sleep. In this house. With his face lurking within its walls.

Erik felt the foreign sensation of tears threaten and hated himself for being so weak. She was a woman, wasn't she? Just a woman. Another woman who found him something to be feared and loathed. Another to see him for what he truly was, not a man but a monster. Something not worth of love or affection or anything but the basest, most primal reactionary of emotions. She wasn't the first to make him feel like a thing. She would likely not be the last.

As if he could fool himself with such platitudes.

He leaned against the tiled basin and collected his thoughts. Whatever had caused the pain deep in his chest had left him a great deal weaker. He was exhausted, both physically and mentally. The emotional turmoil of the past few days had strained him body, mind, and spirit and now with this final cataclysmic explosion he was paying the price. He wondered wryly if this episode heralded the end of his pathetic life, and if that end were looming closer than he thought. Perhaps when he went to bed next it would be for the last time, leaving Christine alone in a prison she was incapable of escaping. Leaving her alone with his decaying corpse to slowly lose what remained of her delicate mind.

A sound from the other room interrupted the thought. He gathered up the cup and slowly made his way into the parlor.

Christine stood near the cold fireplace, still wrapped in her blanket. She stared at the cup in his hand as if she had never seen tea before.

"I thought you might be thirsty," he said, realizing at once that it was both an obvious and unnecessary statement to make.

She sat on the sofa, drawing her feet up onto the cushion and wrapping her coverlet around her bent knees. Erik took that as acquiescence and placed the cup beside her, seating himself across from her, at a safe distance. She did not meet his gaze.

"I'm very cold."

He moved to stand up, "I could start a fire."

She shook her head slowly, fingers playing with the edge of the blanket. One of the nails on her right hand was torn, dried blood smeared on her pale skin.

"You've hurt yourself."

"It doesn't hurt."

"I could get you something."

Again, she shook her head.

"What can I do for you?" he could hear the pleading edge in his voice.

The blanket rustled as her hair swept across it. No.

"Please, Christine. Let me do something. Please. Tell me what to do."

She turned her head to stare at the teacup.

"I could make you something else, if you don't like it."

A shake of the head. No.

He turned away then, not able to watch her numb negation of his requests. Perhaps this is the way it was meant to end. He had seen this sort of quiet resignation before.

He knew what came next.

"I think…" Her voice startled him, and Erik's eyes snapped back to find her staring directly at him.

"I think it is time for us to play the question game." She sounded distant, and childlike. It was unnerving.

"And I think tonight I would also like a story."