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Rossignol	By : Savaial Category: M through R > The Phantom of the Opera > Het Views: 5240 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own The Phantom of the Opera, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Rossignol
- 2-Two
- 3-Three
- 4-Ch 4
- 5-Ch 5
- 6-Ch 6
- 7-7
- 8-Ch 8
- 9-Ch 9
- 10-Ch 10
- 11-Ch 11
- 12-Ch 12
- 13-Ch 13
- 14-Ch 14
- 15-Ch 15
- 16-Ch 16
- 17-Ch 17
- 18-Ch 18
- 19-Ch 19
- 20-Ch 20
- 21-Ch 21
- 22-Ch 22
- 23-Ch 23
- 24-Ch 24
- 25-Ch 25
- 26-Ch 26
- 27-Ch 27
- 28-Ch 28
- 29-Ch 29
- 30-30- Epilogue
- 11
- 12
- 13
"No, try again." I played the note, holding down the reverb pedal. The Vicomte scowled, but made another attempt. This time he found success. "Very good," I said, "I believe you have it now. Sing the first three again and we will call it a day." He did so and I immediately got up from the piano.

"You aren't the lost cause you think you are Vicomte, you are simply untrained. Think of it as your first battle. You were scared because you didn't know what to expect, but as time went on you learned and your fear became manageable."

"With one basic difference," Raoul said, taking a deep breath. "When I stumble here I'm not likely to get a bullet for my clumsiness." He walked into the parlor, looking a little shaky. I had made him do a tremendous amount of breathing exercises; it was to be expected. I joined him on the couch, offering him a cup of now cold mint tea. He took it and drank it down; apparently not even noticing it's temperature.

"Celeste looks much better," he said suddenly, almost grudgingly. "She has life in her eyes now; she's not that shell I brought back from America. You must be doing a lot with her."

"Actually, I haven't. I think much of her improvement is due to the quiet of my home and some regular, decent meals."

"You haven't started working with her on her voice?"

"Not as such. I want her to make it her goal, not ours." I thought of her joy at speaking and smiled. "I think you will be satisfied with my attempts though, I have a feeling Celeste does want what we want."

"Celeste? You've stopped addressing her by her proper title?"

"And why not monsieur? Her proper title is an uncomfortable one, and to call her a de Chagny would not be correct either. At her core, isn't she simply Celeste?"

At this, Raoul gave a blink of surprise so like what Christine might have done I almost laughed.

"Yes, I suppose you are right," he said, "What's more, I would prefer to think of her that way. It makes me think about how she was as a child, before my father started drinking too much. Philippe said she just couldn't stand to see him that way, but then, none of us liked it." He fell silent, staring at the coffee table.

I didn't have the right or the heart to tell him the truth.

"My mother drank,” I volunteered quietly. "It is hard to watch, isn't it? I even hid her bottles to keep from seeing it, but it did little good."

Raoul sat up. "We did the same thing, Philippe and I, but we got thrashed for it and had to quit. Mother watered down his liquor on the sly, but that too had little effect, he'd just drink more."

"What do you think started it all?" I asked, propping my legs up on the table with a casual air.

"Oh, I really don't know. I don't suppose it matters now. I think it was something his father did and just started to rely on it more and more as he got older as a way to deal with stress." He paused, looking at me askance. "Did your father drink too, or just your mother?"

"I never knew my father; he died shortly after the honeymoon I was conceived in."

"Oh. I am sorry monsieur."

"Don't be, I am fairly certain he would not have endured me any better than my mother did. You can imagine my birth was not especially celebrated." I touched my mask for emphasis, for the Vicomte looked genuinely confused at my vague reference to my ugliness. "To put it plainly, a mask was put on me before a diaper."

"Oh." Raoul began to look uncomfortable. "Again I am sorry, I am used to seeing you the way you are and I forget what you must have to endure." He looked away briefly, obviously embarrassed.

"You haven't offended me," I replied, somewhat amused by his reticence. "I wear a mask in the hopes that I can forget. If someone else can, so much the better."

"Celeste hasn't asked you about your mask has she? Should I tell her not to?" Raoul's eyebrows knitted together with sudden worry.

"If she wants to know she will be told," I answered simply. "I'm too old to continue hiding from people Vicomte. If my face wouldn't stop a clock I'd walk aboveground au natural. I don't fear opinions, only prejudice." I smiled, casting him a look he could not fail to find unthreatening. "Would you like to play chess while we wait for the women to stop their visit?"

"I- I don't know how to play." Raoul swallowed hard. "Another thing I never tried, I mean."

"It doesn't take long to learn," I said reassuringly, laying the board out between us. "White or black?"

"White," he answered immediately. I chuckled at the symbolism.

"White for a white knight, eh Vicomte," I said, my tease not pitched to be unkind. "It's just as well, I prefer the black." I winked as I began to set out the pieces. And he laughed.

**************************************************************************************

The normalness of saying good-bye to everyone as a group.... It lingered long after our guests were gone. Celeste seated herself at the chessboard to study what Raoul and I had accomplished, her azure eyes roaming with interest. I watched her silently for a time, enjoying her. She still knew how to be quiet, especially when I wanted it; she seemed to sense its importance. With her in the house I could play or brood to my heart's content, she did not upset either of these necessities in my life.

She wore my robe still, but Christine had helped her into a different gown. It was one I had commissioned for the imagined honeymoon ensemble. A modest piece despite its origins but made to play up the female form. I was slightly shocked to see it on her actually, both that Christine would have chosen it and the Raoul hadn't batted an eye to see it. While revealing little, it fit very well. Too well. My resolute detachment to Celeste’s femininity was shaken by such showcasing. Knowing the mechanics involved in how I was being influenced made no difference to my starved libido.

After awhile Celeste got up and came to me. I watched her approach with a feeling akin to fear.

"Erik, what was the opera you sang from this evening?" she asked, taking a seat beside me at the hearth. She spoke so quietly I almost didn’t hear her.

"Tosca. I take it you aren't familiar with it." I found that idea hardly surprising. Spending ten years out of country in a madhouse probably left her very much in the dark about a few things.

"No, I'm not.” Celeste shook her head. “Would you mind telling me the meaning of the song?"

I found her question just a bit odd. Christine had never wanted to know the exact meaning of foreign songs. I passed it off as simple feminine curiosity for Celeste to ask.

"How the stars seemed to shimmer,
the sweet scents of the garden,
how the creaking gate whispered,
and a footstep skimmed over the sand,
how she then entered, so fragrant,
and then fell into my two arms!
Ah sweetest of kiss, languorous caresses,
While I stood trembling,
searching her features concealed by her mantle.
My dreams of pure love, forgotten forever!
All of it's gone now!
I die hopeless, despairing,
and never before have I loved like this!"

"Not the most uplifting of meanings, is it?" I asked upon finishing the recitation. "Tosca, like most of Puccini's work, is not very happy."

"Happy doesn't always make for an entertaining story. Sometimes we want to be sad." Celeste sighed. "Of course, not knowing the meaning allows you to feel instead of think." Her fingers played with her wedding ring nervously, and her eyes stayed upon the floor.

"Then how did it make you feel when you heard it? It obviously made an impression or you wouldn't be asking about it." Now I was curious. Celeste seemed agitated now, and her voice was gaining strength.

"Powerful, angst-ridden," Celeste answered without pause. She closed her eyes, sighing heavily. "And also desirous… I heard longing and love and despair." A shudder passed through her small body.

"Then you heard what was meant, the words are nothing," I replied. "The melody is what tells the story in opera." Suddenly, I wanted out of this conversation. Talk of love and desire, of longing; I could not afford to dwell on these things with her in the house. Celeste was worthy of such feelings, I imagined, but I had learned my lesson the hard way. I was not meant to have a mate. Aside from that I had her mental health to contend with. If a perfectly healthy woman couldn’t stand my wooing, a sick woman might go out of her mind.

"Yes, the melody....” Celeste was twisting the plain gold band around and around on her ring finger. "My life has been bereft of music Erik, you have brought it back and now I find myself happier by the day." She looked down at her hand suddenly, her face drawing into an expression of anger. "I can't get this thing off," she said vehemently, uttering a curse. "He bought it too small and I have calloused up around it. I want rid of it!" She tugged hard, turning her finger purple.

"Stop Celeste, just stop,” I ordered, and took her by the hand. "Let me look." I peered at it. It was indeed too small. The bastard had probably done that on purpose. "Get a needle and thread from Christine's dresser, she had some embroidery here,” I said, getting up. "I'll help you get the ring off if that's what you want."

"You're damn right I want it off," Celeste muttered as she walked away. I smothered my amusement at what the Vicomte would say upon hearing his delicate little sister using such foul language. He'd probably drop dead.

By the time I got a bowl of soapy water into the parlor, Celeste was already back. I threaded the needle she'd managed to find, and slid it between her hand and the ring on both sides. I pushed her hand into the bowl of suds and twisted the offending metal around a bit to loosen its grip. Celeste began to shiver and I stopped. "Am I hurting you?"

"No Erik, not at all." she said tightly, suppressing another round of shivers without much success. The soapy mixture threatened to slop out of the bowl.

"Then what ails you?"

"I vow it's alive," she answered, her voice low and eerie. "It's absorbed all my hate, it feeds off me. It doesn't want to let go. I can feel its shiny yellow teeth digging in at night, chewing..."

I didn't find myself prone to flights of fancy or very much influenced by those who did, but Celeste's guttural animosity to her wedding ring gave me a shiver of my own.

"I'm stronger than it," I answered grimly; "I swear I'll get it off." I raised her hand out of the bowl and took the threads in my hands. "Hold your finger out straight, but don't tense up."

The ring should have come off easier. I tugged at it gently, knowing brute force hardly ever got a job like this done, but in the end I employed great duress. When the glimmering gold landed in my hand it seemed to turn dull, as if I had indeed destroyed a vampiric life form. Celeste raked it with venomous eyes, her fine lips turning up into sneer. I gave it a cursory glance, intending to throw it into the fireplace, but something about it held me back an instant. Taking a closer look, my stomach clenched. It did have teeth. The entire back edge looked very much like a bent saw blade. Tiny pieces of her flesh still hung inside. I looked at her finger. She was bleeding.

Cold washed over me, the herald of my blackest angers. I closed my eyes, fearful that if I moved I would simply surrender to the kind of rage that took no prisoners. I could not, would not, submit Celeste to my demons. Pierre Lescot, he would pay dearly, but not today. I clenched the ring, feeling it try to bite me. The fireplace wasn't good enough. I opened my eyes.

Celeste still sat beside me, but only barely. She seemed poised for flight, her wounded hand and wounded arm held against her body. The readiness to flee me fairly sang in the air between us. I took a long, deep breath, conquering myself.

"Would you mind letting me keep this ring?" I asked, holding it up before her widened eyes. She shook her head, seeming to relax at my emotionless tone. "Wonderful. Let's get your finger bandaged, shall we?"

She nodded.

I led her into my own bedroom. It wasn't until we reached the center of the room that I thought about my coffin. I stopped to look back at her. She stared at the casket a moment before returning my gaze. "It would be like a closet," she said with a shaky smile.

Perhaps it was my close call with full-blown wrath, or perhaps it was fatigue, but I suddenly felt like a very old man. The poor child had been through hell and now the devil Himself had vowed to watch over her.

"Erik is your guardian angel Celeste, and Erik has been the angel of music from time to time, but Erik is also an angel of death. No excuses, no pretense." I walked on to the bathroom and opened the door, standing silently. Two heartbeats passed and she moved, but not for the exit. For me. Without a murmur she came to stand beside me in the gaslight. Her finger dripped rhythmic blood onto the marble tile. It seemed to me she shook when I guided her wound underneath the flowing water.

"Tell me the truth Celeste," I bade as I applied a healing ointment. "Do you wish to go back to your brother?" I knew I had frightened her, despite her willingness to do as I asked.

"What for Erik?" Celeste asked through gritted teeth. "You're the same person you were before I saw how you slept." Her gaze stayed on my actions as I bound her injury.

"You are right, I am. I'm not Bluebeard; there are no locked doors in my house. What you see, you see." I wrapped the gauze around a few times and tied it gently. I hadn't yet met her eyes. My gaze fell upon the bodice of her gown, ivory white splattered with arterial red. I aged another year. A woman should never wear her own blood. "I will never harm you Celeste," I vowed gently.

"So you have said and so I believe." She met my eyes and held them. I felt her slip inside me, coating the cavernous walls of my dirty soul with her faith. I found it so utterly profane that she should taint herself with me that I froze to the spot, unable to move or look away from her bottomless eyes.

I was her guardian. Why then did it feel like I could find salvation in those eyes? She trusted me without question…

The urge to give her my voice for the nefarious act of seducing her rose like a tempest in my breast. I could smell her; feel her delicious heat reaching for my ice-cold flesh. Two steps and I could have her in my arms. She would allow me to hold her; she wouldn’t think anything about it. Despite having her innocence brutally ripped away she was still innocent to my wrathful lusts.

I took one step closer to Celeste. Her eyes widened in surprise, but not in fear. Her blood splattered breasts moved with her slow, deep breaths. The scent of her seized me like the call of a siren, stirring my blood to unimagined heat. My arms went rigid as I fought for control. I wanted to pull her against me, to feel her soft body curve into mine.

She was beautiful. I had seen her loveliness from the beginning, but pity had made me insensible to her charms. Now all I could see was what had been before me all along and nothing else. Her long black hair, flowing as silken cords, would feel like heaven in my hands. In my mind I could see her, feel her touching me. She would feel like the satin that made her gown. Her heat would chase the chill from my bones…

Raoul De Chagny had been a fool to leave her with me! I blackened everything I touched. Celeste would be no different. She would come to see my abhorrent nature and she would leave.

I turned and fled the bathroom before I could weaken, stumbling out into the parlor for my hat and cloak. I had to go; I had to get away from her. I could not help Celeste recover from all her abuse, not by submitting her to my selfish yearnings.
- 11
- 12
- 13
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Rossignol