"You never mentioned you were inviting your mother," Gaia remarked curiously; she had always gotten the feeling relations between Erik and his mother were tense at best. Erik didn't move a muscle.
"I didn't."
Madeleine smiled. "Your father did, Mamoiselle. Madame, excuse me," the old woman corrected quickly as the music for the next dance began. With a hesitant look to Erik who's whole posture seemed to beg her not to leave him alone with the woman, Gaia curtsied politely and stepped aside. There really wasn't much else she could do. Was she supposed to decline Erik's mother, a guest of her father's a dance with her own son?
Erik took his mother's hand in his and danced. "What are you doing here, Mother?"
"Don't sound so upset! I was invited by your father-in-law, just like I told your bride. Oh Erik, she really is lovely. I never thought…" Madeleine trailed off, at a loss for words.
"You never thought anyone would marry me at all," Erik finished for her. "I never thought so either. You wouldn't like her besides her looks," the masked man told his mother simply, and she looked shocked.
"Well why not? She seems perfectly lovely."
"Because she isn't perfect."
Madeleine frowned at that. "Of course not, Erik. Nobody's perfect. Has she seen… you know?"
A triumphant sort of smile played on Erik's lips then. "Yes, she has. And she loves me anyway. I suppose that makes her a better woman than you."
"I was hardly older than she is when I had you, Erik. I was still a girl," she offered in her own defense.
"Yet somehow she is more able to love me than you ever were."
"I loved you, Erik. In my own way, I loved you. I just… couldn't show it. I couldn't stomach the idea until just before you ran away. Where did you go?" She ventured, but Erik remained silent causing Madeleine to frown. "I don't blame you for hating me. I was wretched to you. Coming here was a horrible idea."
"Yes, it was Mother," Erik replied firmly. "Just when my life is starting to take a turn for the better here you are to step all over it."
This assault made Madeleine reel; the words were bad enough, but Erik's voice had been able to convey emotion more potently than any face ever could. "Don't speak to me like that, Erik. I am still your mother-"
"Not anymore," the man's voice was now full of hopeful realization. "I have a new life. A wife and a father who love me. I don't need you. I am disowning you, Madeleine," Erik announced.
Madeleine gaped. "Who was it who raised you? Who chased the monsters away when they came in your dreams? Who fed you and clothed you-"
"That was about all you did, Madeleine. You fed and clothed me, nothing more. I certainly wasn't raised! If anyone raised me at all it was the dog! Sasha was more of a mother to me than you ever were. But I suppose I do have to thank you; if you weren't such a wretched excuse for a woman I would have never come to Italy, and would never have met my wife. So with that I urge you to eat, drink, and be merry, but I also urge you never to show your face in Rome again after today. This is my home now, and you're not welcome in it," the music stopped and with it their dance as Erik pulled away to rejoin his wife with a firm kiss.
Gaia frowned some, concerned. "Are you okay, Erik?"
"Gaia, I've never felt better," he promised with a genuine smile. "I think it's about time we open our gifts don't you?" After inspecting her husband for a long moment, she nodded and smiled back.
"Okay," she agreed, moving to get a strip of black fabric she had prepared the night before as a blindfold and dangling it in front of him. "You can't open yours so you're going to have to come with me," she grinned, tying Erik's eyes with the strip of fabric gently so as not to knock his mask out of place.
Obediently Erik followed his wife into the study, which had been closed and locked for the duration of the evening so far. She nearly jumped out of her skin with excitement when she let them into the room, leading her husband in by the elbow as their family followed. Gaia lit the lamps and finally pulled off her husband's blindfold, kissing his shoulder as she did so. "Well? What do you think?"
Before Erik stood a grand piano in all its glory, made of cherry wood and embellished with ivory amaryllis flowers as pure white as the keys of the piano themselves. Erik stared in awe; when she had said all she had gotten him was a piano he had assumed it was like the simple upright piece he had grown up playing church hymns on… this was a work of art in itself, surely an expensive antique.
"Gaia, this is too much," he told her, looking down at her grinning face with wide eyes. "It's stunning."
"Nothing is too much," she promised, moving to her toes to peck his cheek. "Go on then, play it!" She urged, pushing her husband toward the bench.
"I haven't played in years…" he insisted, but moved to the bench anyway. The closest he had come to playing an instrument this fine was sneaking into the church to play the pipe organ, which was another beast entirely. The keys were slightly larger than he remembered them being on the upright, but his hands were larger too since he had more than doubled in age since he last played. After playing a few scales to get used to the strange feel of the instrument he moved into Chopin's Nocture in C sharp minor with as much grace as the composer himself might have had. Gaia sat next to him, awestruck by the sound; Erik had mentioned he played the piano as a boy, but this was not simply playing the piano. Erik's fingers seemed to float over the keys, stroking them ever so gently as if stroking a lover, and they sang for him just like a lover would with unmatched grace and purity. The whole room applauded when Erik had finished, murmuring among themselves about his talent; surely he couldn't be any older than twenty but he played like a seasoned composer!
"Erik, you never told me you were so good!" His bride scolded. "I would have gotten a piano ages ago…"
"It never came up," he shrugged and kissed her with a smile. "Thank you. It's easily the most beautiful piano I've seen let alone had the opportunity to play. I'm sure I will get plenty of use out of it in our new home," he offered, and Gaia feigned surprise for the good of her father and the rest of her family
"What new home?" She pried, and Erik moved down to the basement and up into the study again to bring her the papers, neatly tied in a powder blue ribbon. Gaia opened them, and once again she nearly cried with joy. Once again, the tears that welled in her eyes were real; she still could not fathom the magnitude of the gift he was giving her. It was something she had dreamed of ever since she had been old enough to recognize her distaste for Roman life. They would have their own little sanctuary, a place to grow old together away from the hustle of city life. They could live at their own pace, do whatever they pleased wherever they pleased to do it and would have no one to hold them accountable for their actions.
Gaia kissed her husband deeply, and Erik returned the gesture in full. "I love you, Erik," she promised from the bottom of her heart, and Erik kissed her again.
"I love you too, Gaia. I think it's about time for us to leave the party?" He suggested, and Gaia nodded eagerly. The pair said their goodbyes to the guests, who would stay and drink well into the night while the pair retired to a quiet hotel to spend their wedding night.
Erik carried his bride over the threshold of their room, in spite of the fact the legend only applied in their own home. It was simply another excuse to be closer to the love of his life. Gaia grinned as he set her back on her feet once they were inside the room. "Erik, it's beautiful! Look they've even put roses on the bed…" she smiled, moving to sit on the edge of the bed that was indeed littered with red and white rose petals. With a sigh of happy exhaustion she laid back with her arms spread across the large bed, kicking off one of her shoes even as Erik moved to her feet to remove the other one for her. Gaia smiled as Erik kissed the top of her foot before moving his kisses upwards to her shin, knee, and finally her thigh. She sat up gently, every nerve suddenly on edge at the foreign touch. Gently Erik pulled off her garter, kissing where it had once adorned before unrolling her stockings to kiss her bare leg. Quietly she wondered at his confidence, curious as to whether or not it was just an act and if he was really as nervous as she was.
"Does it really hurt? Contessa said-" she started quietly before her breath caught in her throat as Erik kissed her neck gently.
"I've heard it only hurts for a moment or two, and only the first time," he admitted quietly, repeating what he had overheard around a gypsy campfire. The Gypsies were an even more open race than the Italians; everything Erik knew about sex and sexuality came from their debauchery around the evening fire.
Gaia nodded and moved to meet her husband's lips with hers, kissing him deeply. Erik was trying his best not to think about the enormity of the night ahead of them. He moved on instinct and desire to please alone, trying to entice her as much as possible in case her nerves overtook her for any reason. He had dreamed about this night ever since proposing to her, and in more than one scenario something had removed his mask and she had recoiled…
His bride hummed softly as they kissed, and the vibration set Erik's body on fire. She moved to try and untie the back of her dress but was unable to reach in her lace sleeves. "Do you think you could..?" She asked, and Erik nodded as she turned some so he could reach the ribbon. Gaia slipped from the bodice, pulling it down shyly; Erik had surely seen most of her form before under the tattered nightgown she had worn the night Marco broke in, but somehow it was different tonight. The ache in her breast and her longing to be touched eventually won over her shyness as Erik kissed her again and his warm hands brushed against her stomach before venturing up cautiously to her breasts. She hummed again at the touch and buried her face in her groom's neck to kiss there languidly. When she reached up to move Erik's mask, he pulled her hands away with much more control than the last time she had tried to remove it. She frowned some but the pleading look in Erik's eyes elicited a kiss and a nod of understanding. When he was ready they would make love completely bare, but for now he still needed his crutch.
Erik undressed as Gaia slipped out of the remainder of the dress and into the sheets that smelled faintly of roses and sandalwood. She breathed in the smell of her husband deeply as he draped himself over her, careful not to crush her under his weight. Erik's guess had been right; it hurt only a moment before she dissolved into bliss beneath him, toes curling as she clutched at him in pleasure the likes of which she had never known. She had always thought sex couldn't be any nicer than stroking something soft or falling asleep in warm sheets, but it was so much more than that. Gaia had been alone for so much of her life that the closeness overwhelmed her every sense much as it did Erik's when they both reached their release and tangled their limbs, she knew Erik was thinking the same thing she was; how wonderful it would be to never be alone again.