Manon woke reluctantly. She was warm, tucked deeply among soft down blankets and cushions. Everything was so velvety soft – and warm –that she wanted to stretch, purr, and curl back up like a cat in a sunbeam. There was the sense of being a tired child tucked in tenderly after a long day's play.
Then she froze. These weren't the utilitarian coverings of the bed she had laid in for days before. A bed which was narrow, and firm, and incontrovertibly far from "warm."
This was not her bed.
Manon bolted upright, only to crash back down as pain lanced through her side. She should have remembered by now. She looked about frantically, assessing the room from her nest.
She was enveloped, it seemed, in a dark dream of a spider's web. Black gossamer curtains fluttered around the bed, completely encircling it. Through it, she could make out dozens of flickering candles. Surrounding her were the most extraordinary assortment of luxurious bedding imaginable: deep down quilts, an embroidered silk coverlet, velvet cushions, and brocade bolsters. Even the bed itself, she noticed with bemusement, was whimsically carved into the shape of a swan, its head curving gracefully by Manon's feet.
No, this was certainly not her bed.
She closed her eyes and replayed what she remembered of the night before. That music, slinking in and around her. The way she'd been drawn to it without thinking, towards the mirror. Cold, desolate emptiness when it had stopped, and—ah. The mask, glowing above her.
With difficulty, Manon pulled herself upright and sat on the edge of the bed. Her bodice, yet again, was splayed to reveal fresh bandages about her waist. She would have blushed if she was capable of it anymore, but still felt an unpleasant embarrassed lurch in her stomach.
Yet her embarrassment fled as she pushed the gossamer curtains aside, all thoughts replaced by wonder.
Before her lay an immense, beautiful, bizarre cavern.
The chamber where she sat seemed to be perched on the edge of an enormous lake. It was ringed unexpectedly in carved pillars, rising from the hewn rock floor into a high ceiling that disappeared into a mosaic of jagged rock.
Manon rose and stepped from behind the sheer curtains. Whatever she had been expecting, it wasn't this.
Her chamber opened into a sort of a grotto that jutted out from an edge of the lakeside, and it seemed that several chamber-like areas had been carved into the uneven floor and walls. Velvet curtains and gilded mirrors draped in fabric were interspersed, segmenting the space. A mahogany desk lay in a corner, its surface cluttered with odds and ends. Quills and pens, bits of dried flowers and wood carvings and oddments, cups and bottles and sheets upon sheets of music. Candles and oil lamps were dotted all over, illuminating the grotto.
In pride of place, perched on a dais, sat a magnificent pipe organ.
It was in the soft glow of its surrounding candelabras that she finally saw a dark figure seated at the organ.
With one hand, the Phantom was scribbling on paper propped up against the keys, a silent hum at his lips. His other hand glided across the keys playing an unheard piece in the air above them. Absorbed in his work, he hadn't yet noticed her.
Her attention was fixed so fully upon him that she didn't notice the few steps leading to the next level. She tripped, as usual.
He noticed her then, and whipped around just in time to see her hit the floor. As he approached her unhurriedly, she was surprised to see his eyes half filled with exasperation and half with amusement.
"Foolish girl," he said mildly as he picked her up from the floor.
"I was just distracted," muttered Manon. As he hauled her to her feet she could not help but catch the scent of him as he reached for it…warm, smoky, and distinctly male.
"How could one be so graceful with a sword but so very awkward everywhere else?" Manon blushed as he smirked. The Phantom continued. "If you insist on leaving bed, at least stay seated elsewhere."
He led her to a single chair at his mahogany desk. He leaned against a railing and regarded her with folded arms.
"Welcome to my humble abode," he said with eyes fixed on her as she continued to look around her, trying to take in the bizarre space.
"It's certainly…distinctive," she finally commented. She couldn't deny the improvement that was this cavern's strange yet homey mixture of elemental cragginess and Baroque luxury. He snorted but didn't reply.
Silence fell. Manon fidgeted.
"It was your music," she said, not asking.
He merely continued to gaze at her.
"It was extraordinary," she pressed, sincerely, inadequately. "It seems you are a knight errant, a surgeon, and a maestro all at once."
He barked out a laugh, and Manon's breath caught. She found that she liked the sound of it, deep and cool as it was. Part of his smile disappeared into the mask, as his lips curved into a dark smirk on the other side of his face. She secretly noticed the graceful way his unkempt hair fell in front of dark brows.
The Phantom wore simple black trousers and a loose open shirt revealing the welcome familiar chest…
Manon closed her eyes and looked away gritting her teeth.
Manon, stop it!
Leaning his shoulder against the stone wall, the Phantom watched the pantomime playing across Manon's face – not with his usual cynicism, but with quiet consideration.
He spoke again.
"I apologize if you were alarmed to wake in your new surroundings. The room in which you previously slept has been uninhabited for too long to be fit to dwell in now."
"My alarm soon gave way to amazement," she responded with sincerity "I mean, this place…" she gestured unnecessarily, but retracted her arm quickly, grimacing. "How did you come by it?"
He nearly laughed. How did he come by a cave under an opera house? But he saw only honest curiosity in her face.
"Fortunate circumstance," he replied dryly. Then he walked a few paces and sank down onto the organ bench, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees as he looked at her consideringly. He gestured towards the walls and continued, "It is…undisturbed here, and it is quiet. I can pursue my work in peace." He toyed with a dried rose that rested among the sheet music on the organ.
"What work is that?"
The rose fell from his hands onto the desk.
He looked at her for a moment.
"Music."
Manon shivered at his words. Erik glanced up from his reverie and registered the thin muslin of the ragged shift she still wore. Wordlessly, he stood and leaned across her to the opposite side of the desk and retrieved his own thick cloak from a hook on the wall.
She swallowed visibly as he swung it elegantly over her shoulders and clasped it gently beneath her throat.
She glanced up briefly in thanks and then looked away quickly, wrapping the warm, fine wool tightly about herself modestly.
He studied her for a moment more, tapping a finger on his folded arms, then turned back to the organ. He settled himself on the bench, picking up the stained quill lying on the keys. He was about to dismiss her when Manon approached.
He raised his brow, but slid over on the bench to make room for her. She sat.
"May I?" she said cautiously, her eyes on the organ.
He nodded silently and watched her as she perched on the edge and gently placed her fingers on the opaline keys.
Erik watched her covertly, feeling both the desire to shove her away from his beloved instrument and to watch her explore it.
He unwillingly found himself captured again by the curve of her shoulder. His eyes followed the path of a stray lock of her hair, brushing gently across her collarbone and along the pale curve of her neck.
Wrenching his eyes away from – disgusted with himself, disgusted with her – he forced his eyes to settle elsewhere, anywhere, landing on the inkwell.
A slight sound from his right brought him back. He turned and looked at her stiffly, and followed her suddenly riveted gaze that was fixed on a spot some inches over his shoulder.
His eyes fell on a small niche carved out of the wall…on the glowing rosewood, the slim neck, the dully-glinting tuning keys, and dusty strings of a violin.
Oh, he thought. Interesting.
After that night, years ago, the Palais Garnier had been abandoned by those two buffoon managers, André and Firmin. They had left it all too hastily to the mercy of the charred decay that was now consuming the once-magnificent structure. While the wounded man inside of Erik had reveled in the ruination of the beautiful building that had both given him reason to live and robbed him of it, the musician and artist inside of him had mourned the loss of such a monument to the arts.
The violin itself was, admittedly, rather stunning. It had been one of the few pieces he rescued from the ruin engulfing the Opera Populaire.
He looked at Manon again; she was still staring at the violin. Does she play? Erik wondered suddenly. In an impulsive effort to be friendly, he reached over into its niche and brought it out. The translucent red varnish made it seem almost luminous in the dim light. He caressed the fret board lightly with a fingertip before presenting it to the woman beside him.
As he held it out to her, a look of fearful alarm wrenched her features. She all but threw herself backwards, groping blindly at the bench, and promptly toppled off the edge.
Erik caught her, but only just. He tried to ease her back to sitting on the bench, but she again struggled backward before slumping against him in a dead faint.
He lifted her easily, wondering if this damned woman was more trouble than she was worth. He hefted her into her arms and brought her over to a nearby divan. Lowering her down he noticed that yet again her wound was bleeding through its bandages.
Damn it, he thought savagely, It's not as if I have an unlimited store of supplies with which I can tend to this wench constantly! Nor patience, for that matter…
He nonetheless proceeded to wrap her snugly in a velvet throw and blew out several of the nearby candles before retreating into the shadows.