The Phantoms of the Opera And The Things They Do To Annoy Nadir.

The Magic Forest - Cherik Phic 2

Another Cherik ficlet that took waay too long to write up. I worked on it on and off for the past number of weeks (thanks school, thanks a bundle) and only managed to finish it the other day. I posted this on my tumblr yesterday (@ pippa-writes) but as with the other one, I'm putting it here too.

So while I go and write a short story for Beneath the Silk Mask (more details about that towards the end of Porcelain), enjoy Christine waking up after her shy Maestro reveals his face to her. Enjoy!!

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It was, perhaps, only the cracking of twigs that shook her from her cloudy dreams, from vague haunting images of folded, yellow skin and dark holes that were supposed to hold a nose and cheeks. Through the haze, her eyes managed to wedge themselves open.

A bird stared down at her from a high branch, unmoving, unseeing. Her breath hitched. She sat bolt upright, her heart pounding against her ribs.

How had she landed herself here? Her memory had clouded the last few moments before she passed out, and now all that remained through the fog were...

Those eyes....

Eyes so blue and sharp, they could very well cut a piece of her soul out and present it to her on a platter, so intelligent she found herself childishly stupid, but so generously and soothingly polite that such a feeling never lasted very long.

She raked a hand through her hair, pulling an array of grasses and twigs from her curls. The forest was exactly as it had been before - the open picnic basket, its contents only half packed away, the blanket ruffled from their seated positions, the same towering trees and unblinking eyes staring at their master's guest.

And there! She had to stare for a long moment before she realised what it was: his mask. The mask which hid the face of her honest Maestro, now abandoned to the mercy of her consciousness. She reached out a quaking hand.

The material was cold and heavy in her fingers, and a small but surprisingly painful part of her sank at the thought of having to wear it near constantly. The ties fluttered against her bare arm with wispy breaths and only made her heart strain further against its tether. The forest was exactly the same, she thought, but for the disappearance of her shy Maestro.

Maestro... Ah! Yes, she remembered it all now! A smile graced her lips at the thought of her arm threaded through his. How strange it had been, to see her exquisitely distinguished, elegant Maestro so far below ground, surrounded by old sets, props, trinkets, and now a forest of dreams. And how happy he'd seemed to live such a fairytale, as opposed to his stiff, business-like demeanour he'd presented this past month. It was so... unlike him.

Or perhaps it isn't...

He had been speaking of dreams coming true, after all. Perhaps this was his dream, and he was one of the few fortunate ones to see it come to life.

And she had been the one to shatter it.

A glum guilt settled in her chest, and she cast sorrow-lidded eyes to the mask in her hand. She hadn't seen his reaction to her fainting, but it couldn't have been good; as calm and genteel as her Maestro was with their music lessons, as lovingly as he played the piano in the music hall and, sometimes, his own flute, he was just as easily distressed over matters of the heart.

And so, she decided against the anxiety that had been blooming within her chest for a while now, he must be found and apologised to. She pushed herself from the blanket to quivering legs and took a ginger step, hardly daring to trust her balance. A dark cloud tunnelled her vision, but she pressed on, rather aimlessly, into the forest, ignoring the glassy eyes that followed her.