Chapter 42 #4
I loved him enough to save him, to secure his freedom before mine.
We would have had a beautiful life together—a simple one, uncomplicated with worries or cares. We would have skimmed through our days with a blissful, peaceful love.
But he had never set me aflame in the way Erik did. He could never have joined in the song of my heart, matching it pitch for pitch, crescendoing from the basest of lows to the most dizzying of highs.
“Raoul, you have to go,” I said, speaking up in a bid to seize control of the situation. “You have to leave us.”
He only doubled his struggles, kicking wildly even as the noose tightened.
“Please,” I begged, unsure now if I was talking to him or Erik.
With a deft flick of his hand, Erik grabbed a lit taper from one of the massive candelabras nearest him.
I froze, unsure of his intention.
An unbidden scene flashed before my eyes: Raoul alight as if on a pyre, flaring into oblivion like an exploding Roman candle. My stomach roiled as I cast the hateful thought away.
Erik approached him, turning back every few steps to look toward me, to assure himself that I was still there. I felt like Eurydice in the underworld, praying that her beloved Orpheus would keep going, keep heading toward the light.
Don’t look back, don’t look back!
He didn’t again until he was just a step below Raoul. Exhaling deeply, Erik raised the candle, and my mind played out the string of impending events all the way to their terrible conclusion.
First, Raoul’s hair would catch fire; then the flames would descend, melting his face until both of the men I loved shared the same ruined countenance.
I didn’t realize I was holding my breath until dark stars began to flash before my eyes, breaking me from my spell, and I sucked in a great, undignified gulp of air as I cried, “Erik, please!”
Without a word, he raised the candle higher. Higher and higher, past Raoul’s face, up to the taut line of the hanging Punjab Lasso. Seconds passed, silent and horrible. Tension choked me as effectively as the rope around Raoul’s neck. But then the lasso snapped, releasing its prisoner.
Raoul fell to the ground, cracking his knees on the stone steps.
Before I could rush to his side, Erik was with him.
“Take her,” he said, his voice so ragged I could barely make out the words, let alone their meaning. “Forget me. Forget all of this.”
Erik looked up, studying the ceiling, his expression slowly turning to horror. He goaded Raoul to standing, gripping him by the armpits. There was a frenzied urgency to his movements.
“Erik?” I wanted to calm him, but I was scared to step too close. What if Raoul tried to run off with me? I did not trust that Erik would spare his life twice in one evening.
“Leave me alone,” he said, whirling round to me, his eyes dark with pleading. “Forget all you’ve seen.”
Again, he glanced away, listening to something. I followed his gaze toward the lake, straining my ears.
When I finally heard a snippet of the disturbance, my blood ran cold.
People—very angry people—were heading our way.
It was a mob.
As they approached, winding their way through the hidden passages and dark, watery corridors that made up Erik’s domain, I could begin to pick out their shouted commands, their cries for revenge. They were after the Phantom of the Opera, and they wanted blood.
“Go. Now,” Erik ordered, all but shoving Raoul down the steps to me. I caught him, steadying him, but before I could break away and return to Erik’s side, Raoul’s arms were around me, weak but insistent. He had heard the shouts too.
“I’m not leaving you,” I told Erik. I’d made my decision. I’d pledged myself to him. I would not leave him alone to fend off the intruders barreling our way.
But Erik was unmoved. He hurried about the room, trailing his fingers over shelves, occasionally stopping to pull on a hidden lever or adjust unseen mechanisms. When his feverish pacing brought him back to where I stood, trapped in Raoul’s quivering hold, he seemed surprised to still see me there.
“Don’t let them find me.” He grabbed Raoul’s arm, shaking him to action. “There’s a second boat there. Take it,” he instructed, pointing to a shadowed passage at the far end of the room. “Leave me here. Go now—don’t wait. Vicomte!” He slapped his cheek. “Vicomte, you need to protect her!”
It was his frustrated growl that stirred Raoul from his dazed recovery. Suddenly, the hands at my shoulders gripped me with urgency and purpose.
“Christine, we have to go. We have to leave this place before—”
There was an explosion of shattered stone and screaming metal. I didn’t know exactly where the mob was, but I was certain they’d reached the fifth cellar.
“Erik, you can’t stay here, not with them coming.” I tried to squirm free of Raoul’s grasp, but his fingers dug in with a ferocity that made me want to howl. “Come with us.”
Erik stilled, halting his strange preparations and turned to face me. It felt as if time had stopped, as if I could go to him, take his hand and all would be well. But then he shook his head and the cording that wound between us, tethering one to the other, snapped.
“Oh, Christine, swear to me that you’ll never tell,” he pleaded, eyes glassy with regret.
It was hard to breathe. I felt as if I’d taken a mortal hit to the chest. Erik was sending me away. Away from this. Away from him. For good this time.
“No,” I protested, still confident that I could right this if only I showed him how strong my devotion was.