"Emily!" I ran forward to embrace my sister. "I had a terrible dream, where you were dead!"
Emily smiled. "I am dead, sister," she explained. "That wasn't the dream: this is."
I looked around, and found a log for me to sit on. "That makes no sense. You're here, how can this be a dream?"
Emily sat down next to me, crossing her ankles underneath her dress. "Well, it's rather difficult to explain. You're dying, you see."
"I'm dying?" Those words sounded foreign to me. I had never been even remotely close to death before. "How can I be dying?"
My sister examined me with serious violet eyes. In them, I could see my own, caramel colored ones; they were utterly bewildered.
"I think you know why, Amme." She hesitated. "After all, it is partially your fault."
"My fault?" I repeated. "I don't remember stabbing myself, or anything of that sort."
"No," she agreed. "You did not. But you still chose not to live. Why is that, Amme? What happened to you, to make you decide this?"
I stared at the river running rapidly in front of us. Watching the water, and not my curious sister, helped me think: why did I choose this?
-
"You're telling me Emily's her dead sister?"
Erik glared at the doctor. "I've said that three times already, I'm not going to say it anymore."
"Fine," he sighed. "And I suppose it's not going to change things, anyways. She's dying, and there's no way we can stop it."
The Phantom winced and looked away. On one hand, he wanted to go back to the opera house, and pretend. Pretend that Amme was fine, that she would be coming back to him soon. On the other hand, he couldn't leave her. "May I be alone with her?" He finally whispered.
"Absolutely not!" The doctor snapped. "I'm not about to leave my patient with a known killer!"
"If she's already dying, and there's nothing we can do about it, what are you worried I'll do?"
He fumed, but could think of no comeback. "Ten minutes! That's all you get!" He strolled over to the door, and was about to yank it open, when it slammed open.
The Phantom jerked around. "What are you doing here?" He growled at Joshua Eddison.
"I have more right to be here than you!" Josh snapped.
Erik reached for his lasso, and the doctor spotted him.
"No!" He cried. "I don't want any murders here! Understand?" When the Phantom didn't stop moving, he said louder, "Understand?"
"I heard you the first time!" Erik snarled. "You don't need to shout!"
"Who's shouting?" Josh smirked.
"Both of you! Lower your voices instantly!" The doctor barked. "We have a dying woman in this room!"
"Yeah," Josh said. "And I came to see her! Move over, you!" That was, obviously, addressed to the Phantom.
Erik hissed, catlike. It was eerily similar to something Amme might have done. "Get out before I kill you!"
"Oh, come on!" Josh laughed. "Would you really kill the man Amme loves, even if she is dying? If you really cared about her, you'd let me live."
The Phantom froze, shocked. "The man she…what?"
"Oh, yeah," Josh said breezily. "She loves me. Why else would she collapse right after finding out some other woman's carrying my child?"
"You're delusional," Erik informed the other man coldly. "However did you arrive to that conclusion?"
"Your old love, Christine, told me so herself," Josh replied smugly.
-
"Christine!"
Christine glanced up. Meg stood in the doorway, looking very, very irritated.
"Just a second," she gasped, trying to keep a firm hold on her struggling two-year-old. "The nurse just put Louise to bed, and then she'll come and take Nicolas off my hands." She wormed the toddler's fingers away from her pearl necklace.
"You can still talk, though," Meg observed. "And that's all you need to do right now."
"But…." She shifted to keep Nicolas from escaping. "I need to keep…." She winced as he pulled her hair. "All my attention on him, so…." She tried, one-handedly, to grab her necklace back from her thieving toddler. "So I can't talk very well."
Meg sat comfortably in a chair. "Can't you listen, though?"
"You can help, you know!" Christine snapped, lunging forward as Nicolas toddled as fast as his chubby legs could carry him away.
"Children under five and I don't mix."
"But that doesn't mean you can't…MEG!" She screamed.
"You don't need to yell! I'm right here!"
"Not you," Christine retorted, as her daughter came into the room, carrying Nicolas.
"I have him, Mother," Little Meg said.
"Do you know if Louise is asleep?"
"Yes, but Roselle is throwing a tantrum. She's hungry," Little Meg explained.
"Great," Christine groaned. "Um…Meg, if you really want to have a conversation, you're going to have to wait a few minutes."
"It's about Amme," Meg sighed.
Christine looked up sharply. "What? Is she dead? Why didn't you say…?"
"No," Meg said quickly. "She's not dead. Not yet, at least. But Raoul said that you said that she liked Joshua Eddison?"
Christine stared at her friend, her mouth hanging open. When she pulled herself together, she asked, "Is this really the moment for this?"
"But it's important!" Meg protested. "I don't think this has anything to do with Joshua! He's too stupid, and his ears stick out too much!"
"Let me get this straight. You don't like Joshua Eddison because his ears stick out too much?"
"Yes, that sounds right."
Christine shook her head. "You are, without a doubt, the shallowest woman I have ever met."
-
The doctor glared at the other two men, who were busy glowering at each other. "If you two don't mind, I have to check my patient. Now, behave, or get out."
Both of them chose the former, even though they continued to glower.
The doctor swore as he listened to her heart.
"What's wrong?" Erik asked, coming next to him instantly.
"I'm losing her. Unless a miracle happens, there's no way she can live much longer."
The word "miracle" triggered something in Erik's mind. "I want to try sometime."
"What?" The doctor asked suspiciously.
"I'm going to…it's difficult to explain. Just give me two minutes alone with her."
When the doctor hesitated, the Phantom added, "If it doesn't work, it won't hurt her in anyway. But there's not much time, damn it!"
"Don't let him!" Joshua snapped. "He'll probably kill her, or something."
The Phantom rounded on him. "She's already dying!" He screamed. "I'm not waiting for your permission! Now, get the hell out of here before I kill you! And I will kill you!"
Josh stalked out, yelling over his shoulder, "Two minutes only, monster!" The doctor followed, slamming the door behind him.
Now, Erik focused all his attention on Amme. She was laying eerily still, her skin even paler than normal. He brushed a few strands of raven black hair from her bone-white face before reaching deep inside of himself, and shoving every last drop of magic into her.
Quickly, he felt her life force. Like a candle, it flickered when the magic came closer. Erik was not sure what to do from here. It was one thing to be told the woman you loved was dying; it was quite another thing to actually feel the life fading slowly away from her. He finally decided, after a moment's contemplation, to try calling it back, like he had done for Fate.
But elves, he quickly learned, did not react the same as horses. Amme trashed and bucked; a well-aimed but completely unconscious kick in the Phantom's stomach nearly sent him careening into the wall. When she managed to bite his shoulder and a few drops of blood appeared, he nearly did break his concentration.
"Damn it, Amme. Hold still," he muttered, as if she could hear him.
-
I felt a small tugging at my consciousness, as if some evil being was trying to tear me away from my beloved sister.
"Someone wants you," Emily observed dispassionately.
"Someone wants me away from you," I corrected her. I fought the pull hard. For a few moments, I felt as if I had won. But then, it came back at full force. I let out a scream of frustration, and punched the air, as if that would keep me there.
"Someone misses you," Emily continued, quite calmly.
"I do not care if the entire country, no, the entire world misses me!" I had never been so serene as my sister. "I can't to leave you!"
"Why?" Emily asked. "We shall see each other again. I am sure of it."
"I don't want to leave you!" I corrected myself.
"Why?" Emily asked again. "You could be happy there."
"Happy?" I let out a cold, hard laugh, and then a scream as the pulling got more frantic. "How could I be happy there? Not when ever person I know has betrayed me in some way!"
Emily slid off the log. "Now, listen, sister. You cannot let the actions of that Erland shape the ending of your life."
"Not Erland," I whispered. "I could not care less about him now."
Now she was confused. "Someone else, then? Really, Amme, what's the matter?"
I tried to push the yanking back, and, for a second, it worked again. "I'm so sorry, Emily. I'm so sorry I let you die."
"Is that why you want to stay?" Emily giggled. "But I'm happy, here. Have you been kicking yourself this whole time? Really, sister of mine, you put far too much weight on yourself."
I was so shocked, a relaxed my fight. Instantly, I felt myself getting farther and farther away.
"Stop blaming yourself, Amme!" Emily called after me. "And remember, let other people in. You always did want to do everything yourself, sister!"
I tried to respond, but, suddenly, everything went black.
-
"Two minutes are up, monster!"
Erik turned to scowl at the blond man, but the doctor rushed in between them before any blood could be shed.
"Well?" He asked briskly. "Did it work?"
Erik returned his attention to Amme. "I…have no idea," he admitted.
The doctor began to check her closely. "Well, her breathing's normal, and her heartbeat's steady, but it's also way too slow. I don't think you did much good; there's no way any human could survive with their heart going so slowly like this."
Erik took a deep breath and ran his fingers deep into his hair. With another sigh, he turned and strolled out the door, fighting tears the whole way.
The moment he stepped into the hall, a tiny, black ball of fur came pelting at high speed out of nowhere. Its frantic meows soon became much more calm. In fact, they almost sounded content.
-
Just to give you all a heads-up, there's just one more chapter and then an epilogue left.