Hello everyone, I wanted to thank those who have reviewed, favorited, and followed so far. It gives me the motivation to continue on with this story. For clarity, vieillard means old man in French, and yes, I'm aware that Carmen was not revived in France until 1888, but for the sake of this story it will be revived ten years earlier. Thank you, and I hope you enjoy this exposition.

Chapter 1: Settling In

"Come on Vieillard, it's just this way," Aemelie beckoned with the backs of her heels grazing her buttocks, a small trunk by her side and cello case strap sliding off her shoulder.

The Scotty chuffed in response, struggling to climb up the steps with his short legs and poor stamina.

Monsieur Delacroix merely looked at the scene with a smile, patiently waiting at the doors of the opera house and thinking of the irony behind a blind woman leading her guide dog. In his first impression of the duo, he figured Mademoiselle Aemelie's companion was a guide for her. Now, he was not too sure.

At last, the poor dog panted up the final stone step of the Palais Garnier, which signaled Aemelie to grab hold of her belongings and turn towards Monsieur Delacroix with a shameful grin.

"I'm so very sorry for Vieillard, monsieur. He's never been fond of exercise. We may proceed when you are ready," she excused, the strap of her cello case clutched firmly in her right hand as she stabilized it on her shoulder.

As he went to push at the handles of the large oak doors to his opera, he chuckled bemusedly, "His struggle is entertaining to me, Mademoiselle Aemelie, so you're quite alright." Of course, Vieillard, who was resting momentarily on the ground, had enough breath to chuff gruffly at the man with obvious displeasure causing the pair to giggle at the absurdity of his almost-human ways.

Just as Aemelie stepped through the threshold into the bustling Palais Garnier, her senses were overwhelmed with new smells and sounds so she simply paused in step to take it all in. While one would be in awe at the ivory and gold room they stood in, Aemelie saw what was beneath the surface instead. She could smell remnants of char that a new oak scent sought to overcome, hear construction workers, dancers and musicians working in the auditorium close by, and feel a draft coming from somewhere other than the opera doors that stood open. Stepping forward, she ran her long slender digits along a marble mold that ran itself around the room, noticing twists and turns of the carving that signified a thick vine. Vieillard retook his position by her feet as her guide, trotting slightly ahead of her light footsteps despite his clear need to rest.

Casimir Delacroix watched in curiosity as she took it all in, wondering if she could truly sense the beauty of the room she stood in at the moment. "May I ask, mademoiselle, what your thoughts are of this theater," he inquired, closing the doors behind him and bending at the knees to pick up her forgotten trunk.

"This place is absolutely magnificent, monsieur. The house breathes and sings as if it were alive," Aemelie commented in a daze, her focus being split between four different things at once. She said no more as she continued to wander around the foyer, breaking away from the molding to explore the draft she felt before.

Unknowingly stopping her fingers from sliding under a tapestry to feel at a curiously placed seam in the wall, Monsieur Delacroix offered to show Aemelie her new room. The sound of his voice caused her to pull her hand to her chest and snap her head back towards him.

"Yes, of course. I'm sure you have some work to attend to after you get me situated," she cleared her throat, making a note to come back to the foyer in order to investigate the crack on her own time.

From there, she listened to the manager talk about the opera they were to put on for opening day as she followed him and Vieillard through countless doorways and stairs, cataloging the twists and turns they made in the back of her mind.

"You see," Casimir stated, "I imagined Carmen would be a great way to attract a crowd to a 'cursed' opera house due to the popularity of it before Monsieur Bizet passed away. It will be dedicated to him, of course."

"Of course," Aemelie agreed wholeheartedly, "I'm sure Monsieur Georges Bizet would appreciate the sentiment were he still with us."

He nodded excitedly, turning around another corner and climbing up more stairs. At this point, poor Vieillard had fallen dreadfully behind, wheezing in despair as he struggled to catch up to his master. Aemelie had no worries that her companion would lose their trail, though. For all of the energy he seemed to lack, he made up for it in his powerful little nose.

At long last, they reached Aemelie's new lodging, both Casimir and Aemelie gently setting down their luggage onto the worn wood floor. Dust invaded her nose and caused her to emit a few delicate sneezes behind her hand before she could truly assess the new living space. Behind obvious layers of age that coated the room, Aemelie sensed that it had been left untouched by the fires with the only thing she could smell being that of mildewy sheets she assumed covered the furniture and the sort of stale smell one discovered upon opening an old trunk.

Seeing her pursed lips of polite disapproval, Monsieur Delacroix quickly came up with an excuse by saying, "I'm sorry for the state of this room, but construction is still being done on the lot of them and it's actually quite private from the rest of the opera house. I figured you would appreciate the quiet during your cello practices."

Aemelie nodded, figuring that while the room was in need of some cleaning, the location would be ideal for her cello playing. "Thank you for the thought put into my accommodations, Monsieur Delacroix. I'm sure Vieillard and I will enjoy it here."

There was an unsettling silence between the two before Casimir got the hint that it was time to leave and snapped back to his senses. He departed quickly, letting her know dinner would be served to her door and if she needed anything, to come find him in his office, but he was not two seconds out the door when it seemed as if he had an epiphany and realized that she would not have the ease of finding his office due to her condition. "I'll come back in a few hours to take you on a tour around the opera, but until then, rest," he called, his body hidden behind the door with a blond covered head poking out around the corner.

"Of course, monsieur. See you soon," she smiled in his direction before he closed the door.

Finally alone, Aemelie took the chance to get acquainted with her new space. Having lived so far from the opera house, and with the inn she stayed at draining her savings day by day, Casimir offered, rather, insisted that she lodge at the Palais Garnier. Only a bit of her pay was pulled each month for food and water at the opera house, so seemed to her that it was an obvious choice. Now, as she felt along the walls and softly bumped into forgotten furniture, she couldn't imagine being able to appreciate the manager's kindness more so than she already did.

In her exploration she discovered that her room had a window, one with a warm seat that presumably sat under the sun, that the vanity and changing screen, items somewhat foreign to her in the past years, were located in the far corner of her room, and lastly, her bed, although covered with a pungent sheet, seemed to be the resting place of all the dust in Paris instead of the resting place of a 26 year-old woman. Vieillard seemed to like it just fine, though, as he had already managed, with great struggle, to find a spot on the corner of the bed and rest as Casimir suggested.

Reaching out to find the spot between his ears, Aemelie lightly scratched through the wiry coat while she mentally set a plan in the future to clean out her room. She stood up and patted her dress free of dust, but instead of then reaching for a broom, she crouched down to snap open the case of her cello. While she would have loved to begin vanquishing the dust from the mattress, window sill, and vanity top, the urge to play her cello after a long morning was too strong to ignore.

With her bow in the right hand and cello in the left, she walked straight to where she remembered the bench under the window being and sat down on the soft cushion to arrange her instrument. Then, after slowly taking a breath and deciding what to play, the horsehair on the bow made contact with the strings, emitting the deep beginnings of Bach's Suite for Solo Cello No. 5. The sorrowful song travelled through her door and down the empty hallways that led to her room, but while she believed it were only her and her companion who were enveloped in the music, the notes, as if they were a slow, devastating flood, leaked into the darkest crevices of the opera house.

It was only a few strong strokes of that bow that was needed to awaken the most infamous inhabitant of the Palais Garnier, and it was those same strokes that set in motion a new plot filled with obsession.