Heir of the Palais Garnier

[prince_of_vere]

One of the wealthy patrons of the opera was in the mirror room.

Laurent stood just outside, watching him through a pane of glass. His lair was dark, and the mirror room was bright, blindingly bright, and getting brighter by the minute. It made it very easy to watch without being seen, as did all the clever inventions of the phantom.

It was the handsome, nosy patron of the opera. This did not surprise Laurent. He was, after all, remarkably nosy, and remarkably persistent. If any of the opera patrons was going to end up in one of the phantom's traps, it could reasonably have been predicted that it would be this one.

He knew, not from experience, but from explanation, that the interior of the mirror room would be getting uncomfortably warm now. Enough to make a man squirm, or shed clothing.

Laurent had been watching for several minutes, ever since one of the alarms had rung to inform him that one of the pressure plates had been activated in one of the traps. There were many traps, and each one had a wire connected to a bell that would ring if it were activated. The pressure plate activated the trap and began a constant ringing of the respective bell. Laurent reached up and disconnected the wire.

This wealthy patron of the opera was a ghost hunter. Laurent had encountered them before. Most of them he simply ignored as not worth his time. This one intrigued Laurent, though he knew it was only because the patron was young, and handsome, with a healthy, well-formed body that looked more suited to a stage hand than a young heir. Most of the patrons Laurent had seen were fat, pale, cosseted things. This one was golden.

It would be getting hot now, inside the mirror room. Dizzyingly hot. Dry heat, despite the watery subterranean lair. The phantom had been most pleased about that, when he'd shown Laurent how it worked. Dry heat, wicking the moisture from the air, meant that the glass would never fog. He could watch every moment.

Laurent laid his palm against the outside wall of the room. It was pleasantly warm against his hand.

He'd encountered this patron more than once. He thought, though he was not certain, that this patron had seen him more than once. Each time, Laurent had been masked, and they'd been at a distance.

Once, Laurent had been in his box. He'd been in the shadows, impossible to see from the lower seats and difficult to see from the stage. There were the other boxes, but they never really paid attention. They were all glitter and gold, dressed to draw attention, and interested in others like them. But once, Laurent had looked out across to the far side of the boxes, and he had seen a young man, this young man, staring at him. Or, at least, staring at the shadows of his box. Laurent wasn't sure whether he could be seen, dressed in dark red with a death's head mask. He had slipped through his secret door, and away.

He'd seen the young man frequently after that. He was often at the opera house. He seemed to have open access to the place at any hour of the day or night.

Once, Laurent had been watching the rehearsal. He'd seen the young man on the stage. That had intrigued him, and he'd slipped closer, wanting to know if he was audience or performer, or merely being given a tour of the workings. Laurent had been as silent as ever up in the riggings, but this young man had looked up. Laurent had been all in white, with a beautiful, androgynous white mask with gold-painted features. The sailcloth then hung from the riggings ought to have hidden him in folds of white and ivory, and the young man could only have been gazing thoughtfully into space, but Laurent felt as though the young man saw him and saw through him.

There had been more than one close call in a corridor. Laurent had made note of the trap doors and secret passages that the young man had found and solved. It was deeply perplexing. It was concerning.

It would end here.

The glass walls and floor of the mirror room would be scalding to the touch now, though Laurent expected the young man would have better sense than to touch them. At least until he collapsed. The outside wall was uncomfortably warm against Laurent's palm.

The air inside the room, he had been told, would now be gaspingly hot. The young man would likely be feeling some degree of dizziness now, perhaps severe. He might soon lose balance or consciousness. Or he might stay conscious as the room became an oven, as it began to cook him, then to sear and burn, and eventually to char the skin and bones until nothing was left but ash.

The phantom had informed him that he would likely have to replace a few of the panes, after the room was activated. A few of them were always damaged in the process. He had said it with a touch of glee that made Laurent's skin crawl.

The young man would be in agony now. He would understand, now, that this room was meant to kill him. He would understand that all his stubbornness and folly and pride had led him to this.

He would be gone.

Laurent yanked the lever that deactivated the room. All of the traps could be deactivated or solved, if you were fast enough and could spot how the puzzle worked. But they also usually had failsafes on the outside. Christine, the phantom had explained, once got trapped inside this one.

The room went dark. It would still be hot inside, as the trapped air spilled out to warm Laurent's cold lair, but it had stopped heating.

Laurent stared into the dark cell, though he could see nothing. He realized, belatedly, that the mirror room was now darker than his lair, and therefore he was the one who could be seen through the viewing pane. He stepped quickly to one side, though the young man inside could not possibly have seen anything but a mask and a cloak.

It occurred to Laurent that he now had a logistical problem. A scorch mark was easy to tidy away. A young man was not. The mirror room had two doors. One of them opened, one-way, from an underground passageway that branched into the Parisian catacombs. Laurent came through there, occasionally, if he was in a hurry. The other door opened into the heart of Laurent's lair, for his own ease of access, or for the entry of those few allies the phantom might ever have been willing to spare.

It wasn't too late. He could still reactivate the room and dispose of the intruder. But something in Laurent balked at that. He was not certain whether the problem was that the young man was innocent--and he was, as far as Laurent knew, as far as he had heard from the rumors and gossip around the opera house--or that the young man was appealing.

And Laurent was so terribly lonely.

Loneliness had never been a problem before. It was a permanent state. It was a fact of his existence.

And yet, as he began to realize that the young man could not be saved without him being able to catch a glimpse, at least, of Laurent's domain, Laurent began to wonder whether he might just keep this intruder.

The young man had, after all, been very determined to find his way here. He could just stay.

Laurent paced, considering how to handle the situation. The young man was larger, physically. Significantly more muscular. Laurent had wiry strength, but he expected that if it were to come to a physical altercation, he would lose.

There was a firearm buried in a cabinet drawer. Laurent could fetch it, and hold it upon the young man, to make sure that his commands were followed. But there was something distinctly vulnerable about that. It betrayed fear. And, if the young man were to get a hold of it, the situation would quickly reverse. Laurent wouldn't be able to operate doors or traps while keeping a gun trained on the young man. It was too inconvenient an advantage.

Which was why Laurent was bare-handed when he opened the door to the mirror room. There was a knife in his boot that he was accustomed to using. If the young man attacked, Laurent could kill him with it.

Standing outside of the mirror room, Laurent waited. He was dressed severely, in a dark blue tunic, a black cloak, and black trousers and boots. His hood was up, and his face was covered by a plain golden mask. Of Laurent himself, nothing was visible but his mask-shadowed blue eyes, some stray strands of blond hair, and the pale, sunless skin of his throat and hands.