The Art of Manipulation || Phantom of the Opera & Loki the God of Mischief ||

16. Magician Revealed

Chapter Sixteen || Magician Revealed

"To be good, all I ever needed was to be loved."
~ The Phantom in Le Fantôme de l'Opéra by Gaston Leroux

~*~

Gasps, screams, and shouts burst from the auditorium as everyone had a good look at what laid beneath the Phantom's mask. All around me the performers shrieked in fear, their hands flying up to their eyes to shield them from the terror above them. They all cried, "Horror! Horror! Horror!" The cops were frozen in their places, completely forgetting about their duty and the reason they came to the opera tonight.

Up high on the walkway Erik had screamed, his form shriveling under the gaze of his spectators. Beside him Christine stared at the mask and black wig in her hands, not knowing what came over her or exactly how she had gotten this far in their plan. They weren't supposed to get this far. They were supposed to take Erik after he came onstage. And now...now what had she done?

What had I done?

With a snarl on his face, Erik looked all around him, the fear and embarrassment he had felt morphing into anger. He glared back at the stage lights, the few strands of hair he had covered with a black wig nearly disappearing in their strong glare. Next to him he spotted a lever, the thick rope connected to it leading up and disappearing into the ceiling. Growling, he kicked the lever open and slashed the rope with the sword he had worn for both costume and defense. The rope hissed through the air, going up into the ceiling from which it came. And then, tinkling like a thousand ice cubes falling into a champaign glass, the chandelier began to shake, the premature rumblings of a disastrous earthquake. All at once it began to fall, the rope Erik had cut no longer able to hold it up. The poor mortals beneath it scrambled over each other to escape from the wrath of the falling chandelier.

On the walkway, Christine screamed as Erik brought her close. Kicking another lever the floor of the walkway opened up, plummeting them both through the hole in the fake bonfire and to the pits of Hell.

And as they fell through the trapdoor inside the fake pit of fire, the chandelier followed, crashing to the stage and creating another inferno; a real one. Down they went, chandelier and Phantom. In less than a minute two beautiful things crashed and burned, tearing everything and everyone down with them.

I got pushed this way and that as the theater's employees ran to their escape. I stood rooted to the ground, watching with wide eyes as the opera house went up in flames. The devastated roar of the fire and the cries of the people filled my ears to the brink and I had to cover them to shut out the noise. Rising above the crowd I heard Carlotta's voice, "Oh, ma no! Piangi, my love!" A couple of dancers who had heard her howl rushed to the curtain it came from and ripped it open. They, too, screamed once they saw the balling Italian woman and the dead man she wept over. The lasso around Piangi's neck stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the colors of red that surrounded it.

Erik. I must get to Erik.

Under the floor boards of the stage I heard muffled yelling, "Let me go! Let me go!" Another faint growl made its way to my ears, and I dashed after it just as Raoul bumped into me, his attention on the fleeing Madame Giry.

I watched him fade into the crowd, hearing his voice slowly disappear into the shrill noises surrounding us, "Madame Giry!"

I heard Christine struggle against Erik's strong hold, her cries leading away to the cellars beneath the Opéra Populaire. I followed the sound, locating them and then teleporting to the winding staircase they descended. I kept a safe distance away from them, slipping from shadow to shadow as I watched the glow of Erik's torch move its way along the damp walls. Erik's voice shook the ground as he yelled at his prisoner, "Down once more to the dungeons of my black despair! Down we plunge to the prison of my mind! Down that path into darkness deep as Hell!" His last word rang in the air as I struggled to keep up and remain unnoticed.