Shadow Song
Chapter 2: Angel Of Music
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“If I am the phantom, it is because man's hatred has made me so. If I am to be saved it is because your love redeems me.”
― Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Isabella Swan paced the 35 steps of her cell once more. Alice and Edward looking on mournfully from a cell to her right just out of arm's reach even by their standards. She went over in her mind again the sudden change to her life. 24 hours ago she had been safe in her own bed, warm and well if not happy then content that nothing else could do her further harm. Not with the pack keeping watch. Her dark eyes flashed with hidden fire. She might be a captive at the moment, she might become a meal later but she would not, she resolved firmly. Be made a mockery of. Let them hold her until the years turned her red brown tresses to silver and the smooth of her skin be as her gram. The y could end her life snuff out her fire but she would not give them the satisfaction of breaking her spirit.
"Good for you Bella!"
Alice's voice, normally like silky chocolate now carried a rough edge, whether driven from fear or anticipation of their fate Bella chose not to question. Her golden eyes certainly held worry. Edward on the other hand had uttered not a word since she had collided with him in the clock tower. Even after assuring himself she was truly real and not a figment of his desperate imagination. He sat in a corner resolutely ignoring her.
Baffled and not a little hurt by his behavior Bella had done much the same. Frowning in his direction her mind meshing events from those blissful weeks of school when they were together and it felt as if she had the world at her feet. It no longer seemed to fit, like a piece of art restoration that the hue's in the paint have changed. Chewing her lip in thought she was about to ask Alice, by means of a sticky note from the latter's purse thrown into the space when suddenly from behind her there came the distinct rattle of metal keys and that long turning click prison doors seem to have.
"Isabella Marie Swan, you are to follow me"
The words, spoken by a male immortal carried all the silent weight of law, she might have just formed her resolution but there was wisdom she knew in wisely picking one's battles. So she followed without a word of compliant Alice uttering a sharp cry from the cell as she passed. Frozen as a marble statue her friend did not come to for several moments. Luckily the male, whose name she later learned was Felix had in some fashion or another been informed of her talents and stopped waiting patiently until the fog of her trave lifted, venom tears rushing into the golden depth of her eyes. Almost in direct correlation did the heart of the mortal sink as the worst possible idea had already formed in her mind before Alice uttered softly.
"Oh Bella, I'm so happy for you!"
Happy? Happy!?! She was being held captive in an ancient castle full of immortals with age beyond measure and shortly to become a snack and Alice was happy for her?! Utterly baffled Bella shook her head with a sigh, her faith in her friend's abilities plummeting with these words as with a soft growl she was prompted to move again. Perhaps she thought Alice saw a quick and easy passing for her, seemed likely given how events stood, yet why the tears? They had all walked out on her easily enough months before without compunctions or grief. Was it some bizarre delayed reaction? Shaking her head again she said nothing pressing her lips into a fine line as she began to ascend the cold marble stairs. She passed up 10 then 15 and as her foot struck the 20th she found herself coming through a back entrance to the very throne room she had been dragged from bodily a short time ago.
“Ah Miss Swan, good of you to answer our summons so... promptly”
The voice that caressed her head caused Bella to start, even in so formal an address there rang an undercurrent, the well cultivated tone, grammar and even his patterns of speech declared that here before her sitting in a polished ebony thrown looking as untouchable as any roman god; was an immortal who could sing. Little comfort as she was shoved to her knees before him. Fire snapping in her brown eyes as she locked gazes.
“I have done as you requested, now, as the most interested party in the room, have you decided on my fate?”
Instantly a chilled hand was wrapped about her throat cutting off her oxygen supply while a knee had pressed her face down onto the marble floor with nothing more than a twitch from behind. She barely had time to register the weight when it was removed just as quickly with a sound like thunder. As she slowly moved to a kneeling position again her breathing hitched, there standing over her like protective dark avenging angel was the same immortal who had summoned her. Utterly confused she glanced back to see what had become of the other when two pale fingers stilled her movement.
“No Isabella, his fate is none of your concern, tell me pet, did he cause you harm?”
Caught off guard Bella reached up to massage her throat as if checking for damage, jumping on reflux when finding gentle cool fingers already there, they traced to her chin, gently outlining each muscle and sinew some of which she had no idea were in her possession, before descending her neck collum with the same unhurried painfully light touch, it was rather like having a butterfly prancing on your throat had the poor creature landed on an iceberg first. Wisely she held still, not uttering a word until he seeming satisfied released her to speak
“No, I don't think so”
Just as soon as it began this strange moment ended, Bella found herself again alone on the floor, kneeling as before with he sitting with calm indifference his expression returning to the air of studied detachment. Raising her head she studied him. The white blond tresses and pale white skin, though, she would have named it closer to fine layered cystals. Happily before her thoughts could wander any further she was called to order by a surprising statement.
“Good, well then to business, Isabella, I have not decided your fate, as it is a choice you must make.”
She dared not hope, after all what had his kind shown her in recent months but cruel dreams once so beautifully woven and then shattered to pieces at her feet like broken stained glass. Her voice took on a tone that, while still respectful dripped with contempt.
“I, the captive, the mortal? The liability, as you so called me only a short time ago, get a say? Forgive me for not leaping for joy, but your people have a habit of giving the option of choice while at the same time throwing me headlong into a future that I never had a say in to begin with.”
She couldn't be sure but for just a moment there was a spark kindled in his crimson depths. A flicker of some emotion across the still plain of boredom, quickly leashed before he spoke.
“Brave words Isabella, quite brave indeed, but, I have a feeling this is a choice you'll want to make.”
She now glared openly barely registering as the back door of the room opened once more to reveal the snow white forms of Alice and Edward being tossed to the floor a shot distance away, how much of this discussion, they had heard Bella didn't care. She would not be mocked again!
“Meaning you've already set me up, very well get on with it, I have nothing left to lose what twisted ploy have you devised for everyone's favorite expendable mortal Bella Swan?”
Alice gasped in horror at the words tears brimming afresh in her golden eyes. She opened her mouth no doubt to speak and deny the statement when a hand motion from the royal silenced her, helped no doubt by the hand that clasped her throat. While another set similarly muzzled Edward without any apparent effort.
“No Alice, this time I get to speak, and if I die for it then so be it, every step of our relationship has been that way, every decision has been, what's best for the Cullens and how can we keep the grand secret safe! A secret you flaunted publicly and without shame, no doubt hoping for an excuse to make another grand exit, not a thought for the lives you leave behind you. Some missing the skilled doctor who hand could have saved lives, others the kind ear to which any troubled heart could have found peace and others worse still. Left to pick up the pieces of a dream that was nothing more than stained glass, the edge of which cut deeper than any of you will ever know.”
She turned back to face the throne exhaling sharply.
"So now I ask again, what frase have I been thrown into now, acting as nothing but a pawn or a minor character to be swept aside without merit or regard when the moment suits any of you”
Applause met her ear as she ceased speaking neatly filling the heavy silence, the other two immortal royals has arrived. Aro looking as pleased as if this had been some prize winning musical thrown in his honor, indeed his crimson eyes glittered like anything in the torchlight.
“Well spoken Isabella, Marcus did I not say she would be glorious!”
With her anger momentarily derailed, Bella frowned at him, unsure if this was mockery or sincere flattery, as she disliked them both. Caius rose from his throne a pale hand raising itself palmward to her, almost as in invitation. At a loss for anything else to do she accepted it hesitatingly, her hand hovering just above his own for a moment before he closed the distance pale fingers snaring about her wrist like the coils of a snake..
“Isabella is right, for too long she had been thrown into the shadows, neglected, cast aside, now is your time my dear to take center stage, throwing off your role as minor player for the one of leading lady, with the power to choose your fate.”
He moved with her to the other side of the room where a white piano sat, nearly at one with the wall, so exact was the paint patterns on the wood.
“All this can be yours my dear, if in return you would do me one simple favor in return...”
If temptation was the gateway to knowing our own weakness then the promise of power was all the more a lure, power held answers, the literal pandora's box to be opened whenever one wished it. The idea of regaining control of her own again was like a drug, numbing her reasons and justifications against whatever this favor might be. Yet in the end curiosity won out and she spoke
“Not all leading ladies end up well, your majesty. Still...”
“What's the favor?”
The words were hardly out of her mouth when she found herself nearly nose to nose with Caius, whose eyes betrayed his dark hungry passion. The Lust for music alone that held his sanity in check for centuries and for a moment she witnessed the chained madman behind the facade. The darkness of a broken soul. It was a darkness she recognised. The realization struck leaving her little attention for the words whispered between them.
“You Sing, Isabella, one show one night one performance, and you get your life back, deny me and everything you love will be swept away like footprints in a floodtide”
“Very Well I shall sing for you, may I ask which show I have the honor of joining?”
Aro smoothly interrupted her and prompted as if by her question, neatly sliding between them, as Caius reluctantly released his hold, took a seat at the bench his pale fingers doing their office as before she could blink a familiar melody filled the the room causing her to blink.
“That Phantom? Well, I suppose it could be worse ”
“Well Isabella, this is a gala event would you mind a short demonstration of your talents?”
She only shrugged and waved him on to continue turning from the forms still laying prone on the marble floor to face the window as the beginning bars of the Aria caught the air. Drawing a breath Bella closed her eyes and began to sing”
“Think of Me, Think of me fondly, when we said goodbye...”
Scarcely as the first note left her mouth when the piano silenced, struck mute in amazement, each note needed no aid as it rang silvery and pure. Thin from stress or sadness it made no difference. Caius stood as if struck stock still and staring only coming to when she stopped moving closer drawn like a addict to the next hit as she stood lost in the music she could hear replayed in her mind; every violin, every cello, every piano key as clear as it had been the first time she too had heard the music. She was swept away into the grand world where all is sweetness and beauty.
“Remember me. Once in awhile promise me you'll try..”
So she went on completely unaccompanied until she got to the aria at the end, where she was silenced by three pale fingers resting gently on her lips.
“Enough, Isabella”
His silken voice sounded rough, strained though she could not see him but a strange rumbling sound caught her ear.
“A wonder my brother named, I now give you another. Isabella from this day until the curtain falls my muse, my Angel Of Music shall you be...”
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
“If I am the phantom, it is because man's hatred has made me so. If I am to be saved it is because your love redeems me.”
― Gaston Leroux, The Phantom of the Opera
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Isabella Swan paced the 35 steps of her cell once more. Alice and Edward looking on mournfully from a cell to her right just out of arm's reach even by their standards. She went over in her mind again the sudden change to her life. 24 hours ago she had been safe in her own bed, warm and well if not happy then content that nothing else could do her further harm. Not with the pack keeping watch. Her dark eyes flashed with hidden fire. She might be a captive at the moment, she might become a meal later but she would not, she resolved firmly. Be made a mockery of. Let them hold her until the years turned her red brown tresses to silver and the smooth of her skin be as her gram. The y could end her life snuff out her fire but she would not give them the satisfaction of breaking her spirit.
"Good for you Bella!"
Alice's voice, normally like silky chocolate now carried a rough edge, whether driven from fear or anticipation of their fate Bella chose not to question. Her golden eyes certainly held worry. Edward on the other hand had uttered not a word since she had collided with him in the clock tower. Even after assuring himself she was truly real and not a figment of his desperate imagination. He sat in a corner resolutely ignoring her.
Baffled and not a little hurt by his behavior Bella had done much the same. Frowning in his direction her mind meshing events from those blissful weeks of school when they were together and it felt as if she had the world at her feet. It no longer seemed to fit, like a piece of art restoration that the hue's in the paint have changed. Chewing her lip in thought she was about to ask Alice, by means of a sticky note from the latter's purse thrown into the space when suddenly from behind her there came the distinct rattle of metal keys and that long turning click prison doors seem to have.
"Isabella Marie Swan, you are to follow me"
The words, spoken by a male immortal carried all the silent weight of law, she might have just formed her resolution but there was wisdom she knew in wisely picking one's battles. So she followed without a word of compliant Alice uttering a sharp cry from the cell as she passed. Frozen as a marble statue her friend did not come to for several moments. Luckily the male, whose name she later learned was Felix had in some fashion or another been informed of her talents and stopped waiting patiently until the fog of her trave lifted, venom tears rushing into the golden depth of her eyes. Almost in direct correlation did the heart of the mortal sink as the worst possible idea had already formed in her mind before Alice uttered softly.
"Oh Bella, I'm so happy for you!"
Happy? Happy!?! She was being held captive in an ancient castle full of immortals with age beyond measure and shortly to become a snack and Alice was happy for her?! Utterly baffled Bella shook her head with a sigh, her faith in her friend's abilities plummeting with these words as with a soft growl she was prompted to move again. Perhaps she thought Alice saw a quick and easy passing for her, seemed likely given how events stood, yet why the tears? They had all walked out on her easily enough months before without compunctions or grief. Was it some bizarre delayed reaction? Shaking her head again she said nothing pressing her lips into a fine line as she began to ascend the cold marble stairs. She passed up 10 then 15 and as her foot struck the 20th she found herself coming through a back entrance to the very throne room she had been dragged from bodily a short time ago.
“Ah Miss Swan, good of you to answer our summons so... promptly”
The voice that caressed her head caused Bella to start, even in so formal an address there rang an undercurrent, the well cultivated tone, grammar and even his patterns of speech declared that here before her sitting in a polished ebony thrown looking as untouchable as any roman god; was an immortal who could sing. Little comfort as she was shoved to her knees before him. Fire snapping in her brown eyes as she locked gazes.
“I have done as you requested, now, as the most interested party in the room, have you decided on my fate?”
Instantly a chilled hand was wrapped about her throat cutting off her oxygen supply while a knee had pressed her face down onto the marble floor with nothing more than a twitch from behind. She barely had time to register the weight when it was removed just as quickly with a sound like thunder. As she slowly moved to a kneeling position again her breathing hitched, there standing over her like protective dark avenging angel was the same immortal who had summoned her. Utterly confused she glanced back to see what had become of the other when two pale fingers stilled her movement.
“No Isabella, his fate is none of your concern, tell me pet, did he cause you harm?”
Caught off guard Bella reached up to massage her throat as if checking for damage, jumping on reflux when finding gentle cool fingers already there, they traced to her chin, gently outlining each muscle and sinew some of which she had no idea were in her possession, before descending her neck collum with the same unhurried painfully light touch, it was rather like having a butterfly prancing on your throat had the poor creature landed on an iceberg first. Wisely she held still, not uttering a word until he seeming satisfied released her to speak
“No, I don't think so”
Just as soon as it began this strange moment ended, Bella found herself again alone on the floor, kneeling as before with he sitting with calm indifference his expression returning to the air of studied detachment. Raising her head she studied him. The white blond tresses and pale white skin, though, she would have named it closer to fine layered cystals. Happily before her thoughts could wander any further she was called to order by a surprising statement.
“Good, well then to business, Isabella, I have not decided your fate, as it is a choice you must make.”
She dared not hope, after all what had his kind shown her in recent months but cruel dreams once so beautifully woven and then shattered to pieces at her feet like broken stained glass. Her voice took on a tone that, while still respectful dripped with contempt.
“I, the captive, the mortal? The liability, as you so called me only a short time ago, get a say? Forgive me for not leaping for joy, but your people have a habit of giving the option of choice while at the same time throwing me headlong into a future that I never had a say in to begin with.”
She couldn't be sure but for just a moment there was a spark kindled in his crimson depths. A flicker of some emotion across the still plain of boredom, quickly leashed before he spoke.
“Brave words Isabella, quite brave indeed, but, I have a feeling this is a choice you'll want to make.”
She now glared openly barely registering as the back door of the room opened once more to reveal the snow white forms of Alice and Edward being tossed to the floor a shot distance away, how much of this discussion, they had heard Bella didn't care. She would not be mocked again!
“Meaning you've already set me up, very well get on with it, I have nothing left to lose what twisted ploy have you devised for everyone's favorite expendable mortal Bella Swan?”
Alice gasped in horror at the words tears brimming afresh in her golden eyes. She opened her mouth no doubt to speak and deny the statement when a hand motion from the royal silenced her, helped no doubt by the hand that clasped her throat. While another set similarly muzzled Edward without any apparent effort.
“No Alice, this time I get to speak, and if I die for it then so be it, every step of our relationship has been that way, every decision has been, what's best for the Cullens and how can we keep the grand secret safe! A secret you flaunted publicly and without shame, no doubt hoping for an excuse to make another grand exit, not a thought for the lives you leave behind you. Some missing the skilled doctor who hand could have saved lives, others the kind ear to which any troubled heart could have found peace and others worse still. Left to pick up the pieces of a dream that was nothing more than stained glass, the edge of which cut deeper than any of you will ever know.”
She turned back to face the throne exhaling sharply.
"So now I ask again, what frase have I been thrown into now, acting as nothing but a pawn or a minor character to be swept aside without merit or regard when the moment suits any of you”
Applause met her ear as she ceased speaking neatly filling the heavy silence, the other two immortal royals has arrived. Aro looking as pleased as if this had been some prize winning musical thrown in his honor, indeed his crimson eyes glittered like anything in the torchlight.
“Well spoken Isabella, Marcus did I not say she would be glorious!”
With her anger momentarily derailed, Bella frowned at him, unsure if this was mockery or sincere flattery, as she disliked them both. Caius rose from his throne a pale hand raising itself palmward to her, almost as in invitation. At a loss for anything else to do she accepted it hesitatingly, her hand hovering just above his own for a moment before he closed the distance pale fingers snaring about her wrist like the coils of a snake..
“Isabella is right, for too long she had been thrown into the shadows, neglected, cast aside, now is your time my dear to take center stage, throwing off your role as minor player for the one of leading lady, with the power to choose your fate.”
He moved with her to the other side of the room where a white piano sat, nearly at one with the wall, so exact was the paint patterns on the wood.
“All this can be yours my dear, if in return you would do me one simple favor in return...”
If temptation was the gateway to knowing our own weakness then the promise of power was all the more a lure, power held answers, the literal pandora's box to be opened whenever one wished it. The idea of regaining control of her own again was like a drug, numbing her reasons and justifications against whatever this favor might be. Yet in the end curiosity won out and she spoke
“Not all leading ladies end up well, your majesty. Still...”
“What's the favor?”
The words were hardly out of her mouth when she found herself nearly nose to nose with Caius, whose eyes betrayed his dark hungry passion. The Lust for music alone that held his sanity in check for centuries and for a moment she witnessed the chained madman behind the facade. The darkness of a broken soul. It was a darkness she recognised. The realization struck leaving her little attention for the words whispered between them.
“You Sing, Isabella, one show one night one performance, and you get your life back, deny me and everything you love will be swept away like footprints in a floodtide”
“Very Well I shall sing for you, may I ask which show I have the honor of joining?”
Aro smoothly interrupted her and prompted as if by her question, neatly sliding between them, as Caius reluctantly released his hold, took a seat at the bench his pale fingers doing their office as before she could blink a familiar melody filled the the room causing her to blink.
“That Phantom? Well, I suppose it could be worse ”
“Well Isabella, this is a gala event would you mind a short demonstration of your talents?”
She only shrugged and waved him on to continue turning from the forms still laying prone on the marble floor to face the window as the beginning bars of the Aria caught the air. Drawing a breath Bella closed her eyes and began to sing”
“Think of Me, Think of me fondly, when we said goodbye...”
Scarcely as the first note left her mouth when the piano silenced, struck mute in amazement, each note needed no aid as it rang silvery and pure. Thin from stress or sadness it made no difference. Caius stood as if struck stock still and staring only coming to when she stopped moving closer drawn like a addict to the next hit as she stood lost in the music she could hear replayed in her mind; every violin, every cello, every piano key as clear as it had been the first time she too had heard the music. She was swept away into the grand world where all is sweetness and beauty.
“Remember me. Once in awhile promise me you'll try..”
So she went on completely unaccompanied until she got to the aria at the end, where she was silenced by three pale fingers resting gently on her lips.
“Enough, Isabella”
His silken voice sounded rough, strained though she could not see him but a strange rumbling sound caught her ear.
“A wonder my brother named, I now give you another. Isabella from this day until the curtain falls my muse, my Angel Of Music shall you be...”