Adrian frowned when he peered in the window of the flat at the address; the entire space was empty. There was not a piece of furniture to be seen in the place, not even a rug on the floor.
"He has to have been here! He's been responding to our letters," frowned Cadence, peering in the window next to her brother. "Maybe he's only just moved?"
The young man shook his head. "Look, there's dust on the mantle. You remember how clean Papa kept the house. If he just moved there wouldn't be nearly so much dust so soon."
The young woman chewed her lip. "Well. Do you suppose we could ask around the Opera for him? He did say he was giving singing lessons to his new…" Cadence couldn't even stand to say the word 'wife'. It was upsetting enough that their father had left them for so long; the fact he was even considering remarrying without thought to his children made her sick to her stomach.
"That's not a bad idea," Adrian conceded, moving down away from the flat back to the main streets while his sister took his arm.
"Papa sure did pick a lovely place to live. The people are strange though. They keep staring at us funny. Do you think they can tell we're foreign?"
Adrian chuckled some, coldly. "No, Cadence. They are staring because of my mask. I forget that people in Venice are simply used to me by now. Besides, we are known for our masks, Parisians are not."
They passed an elegant, dark skinned man as they walked down the street, who regarded them intently as they passed. Adrian gave the man a firm glare as if to ask him what it was he was staring at. The man seemed very confused, and let them pass before daring to speak in heavily accented French. "Excuse me, Monsieur… your name wouldn't happy to be Adrian, would it?"
Adrian froze in his tracks and turned back to the man. Cadence stood behind her brother, peering around his shoulder curiously. "It would be. How did you – My God. You're Nadir Khan aren't you? Our father mentioned you in his letters once or twice. How did you-"
"I could have sworn from a distance you were your father. I was quite shocked to see him out and about in a mask and not with that false nose of his, and with a lady no less. He mentioned you quite often, when he was less of a recluse. I must admit though, I was beginning to think you were a figment of his wild imagination. Please, I was about to have lunch. Won't you join me?"
"We would love to," announced Cadence with a lovely smile, not bothering to wait for her brother's response. Adrian gave her a hard look but sighed and nodded to the man, who smiled broadly.
"Wonderful! You must tell me all about yourselves! Your father was very vague in his descriptions of you both, albeit accurate."
Cadence smiled as they began to walk with the man, entranced by his exoticness and stories of the father she mostly knew through letters. "What did he tell you about us, Monsieur Khan?"
"Well, assuming you are his Cadence, he mentioned that you were tied for the most beautiful lady in the entire world, next to your mother. It's clear he was not exaggerating on that point," Nadir smiled, and Cadence flushed with girlish delight at the praise. "He said the both of you were quite bright, which is also very clear. You certainly speak better French than I do, and you're no more a native than I am."
"Italian and French are both rooted in Latin," Adrian explained. "It is not so difficult to learn one once you know the other."
Nadir chuckled. "He mentioned you looked like him, but took more after your mother in nature. I'm certain that's the case, for your father would have boasted about knowing a hundred unrelated languages fluently, and would have called me a lazy fool for only knowing three."
"Monsieur Khan? Why do you speak of our father in the past tense?" Inquired Cadence as they stepped up to the door of the man's flat. "He is in Paris as well, surely you knew that?"
The exotic man hung his head some as they stepped inside. "Yes, I am well aware. I am afraid his private nature has quite exaggerated itself as of late. He hasn't been to see me in quite some time."
"Do you know where he's living now? We went to the flat he addresses his letters from, but it looks as if it has been empty for years," asked Adrian as they stepped inside.
"Why, he hasn't lived in that flat for ages. I believe he abandoned it as soon as the Opera was finished. He built a house for himself in the Opera, to keep away from the strange looks and rather rude, even dangerous remarks of many of the people. Things I'm certain you've experienced yourself, even if you haven't been here long. Parisians wear a variety of masks, but not like the ones you and your father share."
Adrian frowned some, and was quiet through lunch as Cadence and Nadir exchanged vivid stories of Persia and Venice, each one finding the other's tales quite extraordinary.
"You say the city is truly sinking? Why, it sounds like a Greek myth!"
"Not at all! Seven centimeters a century, they say. And what's more, the water in the Adriatic is rising and might spill into the city one day! Adrian will never be out of work, that's for certain; he's the head engineer trying to keep the water in check."
"More like your father than he said!" Praised Nadir, causing Adrian to smile.
"I am proud to hear you say that, Monsieur. It's been years since we've seen him, but I admire him very much."
Nadir did not dare mention that he could not imagine anyone admiring Erik, though it was becoming increasingly clear to him that the Erik they knew in their childhood was more like the man when he arrived in Persia and less like the man who left… and even less like the man who currently haunted the cellars of the Opera Garnier.
"Monsieur, you say our father is actually living in the Opera? How does he manage such a thing? I've never heard of anybody living in an Opera besides perhaps in the dormitories. Surely those would be no better than braving the streets of Paris?" Inquired Cadence curiously, and the man frowned.
"Well. He built a rather intricate home for himself in the cellars of the Opera,"
Adrian nearly choked on his water. "Our father is living in the cellars of an Opera House?"
"I am sorry to be the one to inform you, children. On my life, I thought he would have told you such a thing. He has been the resident Opera Ghost there for years, after being cheated from his share of the commission on the Opera. Or so he claims. It is rather hard to tell with Erik sometimes, his stories are quite… grandiose."
"Could you perhaps tell us where to find him? It is very important that we see him. Not only for sentimental reasons, but I fear he is about to make a grave mistake and marry a woman-"
"Christine Daae! Yes, I am aware of the situation! Her suitor is quiet upset over the matter! Children if you could talk him out of his madness all of Paris would be in your debt. He is… unwell, I am afraid. I will certainly take you to him if you can make him well again!"
The three hurriedly finished their meal and went straight to the Opera Garnier. Adrian was greeted with dangerous looks, and could only imagine how many more people must have thought he was his father… the local theatre Ghost! Every theatre reportedly had one, but Adrian had never imagined his father would stoop to masquerading as a phantom for any reason at all.
Far below the Opera, Christine Daae pled with her captor. "Please, Erik. I know you wish to keep me forever, but I need sunlight, Angel. I need people," she nearly begged, using her sweetest voice to try and win him over. How the man adored her! It was terrifying the lengths to which he was willing to go to win her love… but she could not stay. No matter how she desired to love him, she could not love a man with death's face.
"No," snapped the man. "You do not think your Angel craves people as well? That is why you must stay with me, My Darling. You must keep your Poor Erik company in his loneliness. You needn't worry; soon we will be married, and nothing will ever make you unhappy ever again."
Suddenly a ring came from a bell Christine could not place, and Erik's whole body became tense. He vanished, and let out a cry from somewhere above her. She could not place the mixed emotion behind the cry… it was some strange combination of anguish and overwhelming joy.
"My children! My sweet, beautiful children!" He cried, returning and moving past Christine into the Louise-Phillipe bedroom to greet the brief victims of the torture chamber very few living people knew existed.
"Papa!" Exclaimed Cadence, throwing herself into the man's arms and weeping joyously. When Christine fell to the floor in a faint, Erik did not even notice as he held his daughter and cried with her.
"Cadence, my darling, my little dove! How much you've grown! And Adrian…" Erik looked from his daughter to the man standing in the doorframe, awkwardly. Cadence let go of her father and wiped the dears from her eyes with a laugh. Erik opened his arms to Adrian, who strode into them and allowed them to embrace him tightly.
"We missed you, Papa. I wish you had never left…"
"Adrian, I beg that you not think ill of me. I've learned so much… so much I never could have dreamed of in our perfect little home."
"I don't think ill of you, Papa!" Adrian promised, firmly. "I could never in all my life think ill of you… unless you have married this Daae woman without first consulting us! I object a thousand times to a step mother my own age!"
Erik frowned deeply, and looked back to Christine, who was now being tended by his old friend who had brought the children to him. "She is fine," the Daroga promised. "She's had a fainting spell is all."
"French women actually do that?" Cadence asked, mortified; she couldn't imagine anything being so dramatic that she might faint!
"Unfortunately, yes. Quite often it seems," frowned Erik.
"What about Mama?" Demanded Adrian, not willing to let the subject drop just yet. "She agreed that she would want you to remarry, but like Constance Mozart did, remember? A completely innocent marriage, only for companionship. Papa she is beautiful, and the way you wrote about her… I do not approve. I do not want to watch you replace our mother as if she never existed, not when she loved you so desperately."
Erik opened his mouth to argue, but Cadence interrupted him. "Papa… Adrian is right. I don't remember much of those early years, but I do remember how much you and Mama were in love. I remember thinking if I could ever find a husband to love me as much as you loved her, I would surely be the luckiest girl alive. This… girl is not a wife for a man who has had such love!"
The older man hung his head some. "I… I cannot explain my affections for her. She views me as a father, I know that much. And much of it is my own fault. Perhaps… perhaps it is my longing for our old lives that has drawn me to her so," Erik frowned thoughtfully. "When I think of her now she does not affect me as strongly as she did even just before you arrived…"
"Papa, why didn't you just come home when the building was finished, like you promised?"
"…I had no money. I was too ashamed to tell you. Do you remember when you were a boy and I came into my inheritance, and you thought we were rich? How disappointed you were when you found out that wasn't the case?"
Adrian nodded, and Erik sighed some. "I thought to write to ask you for the money to travel home, but I simply couldn't. I was too proud. Too demented… traveling alone is such a weary task! There are so many temptations, so many ill paths… I never should have gone without the two of you to keep me on the proper road. I made very many mistakes I am far too ashamed to admit. At any rate, when those of us who worked so hard on the building never were paid, I decided to start… extorting the managers. I taught them how to run an opera, really. The sorts of people to hire, what shows to perform. And I caused a good deal of mischief besides. Initially I had meant to save up enough to leave, but then I met Christine. Poor, innocent Christine, who thought I was the Angel of Music by my own deceitful trickery. I could not leave, not when the poor girl needed me. And then I began to need her," Erik explained, looking back to the girl.
"Papa… Take her back to her suitor. Make her think this was all just a dream. Come home with us, back to the house you built for Mama. We can be a family again. You and I will live together in the vineyard, Adrian will come and visit us on the weekends and we'll visit Mama's grave on Sundays. None of this will ever have to have happened," Cadence pled, taking her father's hands between hers.
Erik's brow furrowed under the mask. "I don't know, my darling. I've come to loathe the loneliness of life…"
"Your life will only be lonely here, not in Italy," Adrian promised. "Cadence will care for you, like Mama cared for her father. You always said they were terribly close. And she is right, I will visit every weekend, and on holidays. We will each give you grandchildren someday that you can spoil rotten, too! Can France promise you that?"
The man chuckled. "No, I don't suppose it can."
"Go with your children, Erik," Nadir urged. "Right this moment if you're going to. I will take care of things here, you have my word. The girl will think it was all a dream. The only evidence of the Opera Ghost will be the chandelier in bits and pieces, just as you left it," the Daroga promised, and Erik took a breath.
"All right. Home to Italy it is."
When Christine awoke she was nestled in bed with the face of an old friend standing above her, smiling with relief. "Oh, Christine! You had quit a bump on the head, I'm so glad you're all right!"
"… Raoul! Raoul what are you doing here? Erik will- Wait. Where are we, Raoul?"
"In my flat, on the Rue di Rivoli," explained a man Christine had seen before, of dark skin with eyes of jade. "I hope you do not mind, I brought you here when I found you in the cellars of the Opera. I contacted your friend here as soon as I recognized who you were."
"You found me in the cellars?"
"Yes. Though what you were doing all the way down there I cannot imagine. There's nothing but rats ghosts down there-"
"Ghosts, yes! Raoul, my Angel! He is the Opera Ghost, a man called Erik! Oh you wouldn't believe where I have been!"
Nadir chuckled and spoke to Raoul. "Quite an imagination Mademoiselle has."
Raoul laughed. "Yes, quite! Some things never change. There is no Opera Ghost, Christine. And no Angel of Music either, I promise you. It was simply some prank by one of the stagehands that went too far, I'm sure of it."
Christine never heard from her Angel again, and was inclined to believe that Raoul may have been right. Perhaps there never was any Angel of Music, or any Opera Ghost at all… perhaps it had all been a dream after all.
Only a handful of people knew that the Opera Ghost had ever existed, and that he was really a man who had experienced extraordinary hardship and equally extraordinary greatness in his long life. He had loved a woman more deeply than even the greatest poets could express, and shared in the lives of his two wonderful children, their spouses, and eventually in the lives of his grandchildren. When finally he passed away at the age of seventy six, his love was there to meet him on the other side with open arms.
Gaia littered her husband's face with kisses, tears of joy streaming down her face. Behind her stood Giovanni, smiling proudly at the couple.
"I'll bet you're glad you fell and cracked your head, aren't you my boy?" The man asked with a knowing smile lighting up his kind brown eyes. Erik held his wife firmly against him and smiled back to the only father he had ever known.
"More than words could ever say."
The End
Author's Note: I'm definitely happier with the end of this story than I thought I would be two days ago. Thank you so, so much for reading! If you like my work, check out my current project, Letting Go, or any of my other stories that you might not have read yet.
Also, this may not be the last you see of this story. There is a good chance I will someday (not quite someday soon, but maybe this summer), come back and revisit the end of this story. The second to last chapter needs major work... and I might even go further back than that and write an alternative ending where our heroine lives. We'll see. For now I am a stressed out bundle of sick, and for my own sake need to stick to one story at a time.
Again, thank you for reading! It means more to me than words can ever express.