A/N: I know this is really soon to be updating, but I've already got the whole story completed, and since this is the first day since I first posted that has let me upload anything (stupid document manager wouldn't work...), I'm anxious to just get the whole thing up. Thank you guys again SO much for the reviews! You're all so nice!!
Jungle Julia - I could just hug you! Thank you for all the sweet comments. And to answer your questions, the next chapter will be the last, and will definately end differently than Leroux.
Erik'sangel527 - Thank you! I am SO in love with the two stories of yours I've read so, so it's unbelievably awsome to get reviews from you!
For the first time, Christine was kneeling at Erik's feet, sobbing uncontrollably through the shouts in the background and the sound of rushing water. Erik remained calm, with his arms crossed casually over his chest. "Erik, please!" Christine begged, her hands braced on his dress shoes. "Please, don't let them die! I'm begging you, Erik, I—"
"I will do what you ask, Christine, but you know what you must do in return. The scorpion has not moved from its place on the little table." Oh, how calm his voice was! Like the tranquil water that barely heaves below the raging storm.
She got to her feet, then, and rushed over to the ebony box. She reached inside and found the bronze statue, giving the latter half one turn. Christine brought her desperate blue eyes up to meet his, and proclaimed, "I have turned the scorpion, Erik. I am yours."
Erik stood still, his figure more tense than it had been. "You swear this, Christine?" he asked skeptically.
"I swear on my eternal salvation, I will be your living bride."
His eyes widened, and she saw that his hands shook. Nodding, he went to the door of the torture chamber; when he returned, the sound of draining water had been a relief for nearly a minute, and he was dragging a body with him.
Christine nearly called out the name of her former fiancé, but she bit her tongue to still the impulse. Instead she sat quietly, and listened to his slow breathing while Erik carried in the Persian. While the two men recuperated in their unconscious states, Erik walked the distance of his sitting room over to her.
His amber eyes were lit with an unhinged excitement, and his arms trembled as he lifted them towards her. He drew back, however, upon seeing her expression. The enthusiasm dulled in his face, and he warned, "Remember, you swore on your salvation to be my living bride. You will not kill yourself?"
Christine shook her head, but refused to meet his eyes.
"I—I will bring them aboveground."
When he returned, he saw that Christine had not moved from her place in the corner chair. There was a book on her lap, and when she saw him she shut the pages and laid it on the table beside her. He kneeled before her, his head turned up like a puppy craving attention. Unsure of what to say to his wife, he remarked:
"You were reading."
"I was thinking," she replied, her voice small, like a pebble pleading with the sea that overtakes it.
"It is not always good to think too much on matters," he advised. "We can work ourselves into a frenzy that way."
How strange his words seemed! Christine replied, "I suppose, Erik."
"Oh, I wish you would not act in such sadness. We are alone now, and no one will find us until we are properly wed, and then no one would dare to take away my living wife." He said those last words with such pride, such utter happiness, that Christine felt a little of her misery dissipating. How could she curse him when he loved her so well?
"Oh, Christine! You will be happy, so happy! As my wife, I will do anything for you. I will make you as happy as you have made Erik. I swear it, and would on my salvation, except I have forfeit that heavenly reward. No, none such as me would be allowed into heaven now. Oh, but you are my heaven, Christine! And you will live like an angel, with anything you wish for within reach. Would that please you? You will see later, you will see just how wonderful our lives will be! Christine—" He choked on her name then, and his torrent of words came to an end. "Christine, please—do not kill yourself. Erik could not bear it if you took your life. I could not bear it…"
Tears were streaming down his face now. Christine guessed he must have seen her pitiful expression. In sudden sympathy, she said fervently, "Erik—Erik, I—" But he only sobbed harder, the force of his emotions wracking his entire body.
As she watched his pathetic display, her hand rising off the arm of the chair to comfort him, Christine recalled their conversation about living wives. "Living bride?" she had asked in confusion. They had been speaking on the significance of her ring. "What other type of bride is there, for a man to wed?"
"No other, except for Erik. Erik would surely have a dead wife."
"You cannot really mean dead…?"
"Oh, if only I did not! But my wife would be quite unhappy. She would never love me, you see, and so her face would become gaunt and sad, and she would become so quiet, never speaking to me, and she would look the very picture of a dead wife before she killed herself." Then, quickly, he interjected, "Oh, but I would try with all my being to make her content, never doubt that! I would entertain all through the week, and buy her everything she could want; she would never believe I do not love her."
"No…I don't believe she would."
Christine realized that she was crying, as well. Poor Erik! He was so terrified that just the thought of being near him was enough to make her kill herself. And that was what he had expected all his life. He had expected never to be loved, and to have those he loved not only terrified of him, but killing themselves just to be rid of him.
Did she want to be rid of him? She would never kill herself over her fate, that seemed ridiculous to her now, but did she want to be rid of him at all? Looking down on him, she saw the way he had looked in the cellar passageways, the way his imposing figure had stared at her with adoration and unbelief as they danced to his voice. She remembered every lonely day her angel of music had brightened. She remembered stripping him of his mask, and the way he had crawled to her in the aftermath of that storm.
"Oh, my poor, unhappy Erik!"
Erik lifted his head, and caught the warm tears that fell glistening from her cheeks. They flowed over his deformed features, and he welcomed them as they seeped into his mouth. The tears were hers, and she was giving them to him.
Christine lowered her head, and pressed her shaking lips to his forehead. This time she could not concentrate on his eyes, but she didn't care anymore. The feeling that shot through her then was more powerful than it had ever been, and she finally recognized it. It was what she had felt after their dance, when the music had ended and his eyes were bearing down on her. It was what she felt at the end of a duet with him, when they were out of breath and lost in the other. She had wanted this. All along, she wanted this nearness, wanted to kiss him.
Her lips traveled over his face, brushing gently against the wet, skeletal features. He gasped at first, and then leaned into her touch with all the uncertainty of a small child receiving something beautiful and foreign. She stopped at the corner of his mouth, not quite touching his lips. "I will be your living wife," she promised through her tears. A small smile held up her mouth. "I will sing for you, and talk with you, and kiss you whenever you like. I will love you, Erik. I love you now."
He brought his cringing form slowly upward, and his glowing eyes shook as they watched her expression. "Christine! Can you mean it? Can you love Erik?"
"I do love you."
He lowered himself to the ground and grabbed at the hem of her skirt. "Angel…angel, you're an angel…" he murmured, still trembling greatly. His eyes were tightly shut.
"Oh, Erik. Stand, my husband."
He brought himself to his knees, and she lifted herself from her chair, and fell into his arms.