RoseBlood(30)

Then Erik closed his eyes behind his mask, and let down his barriers, opening up about the role the Stradivarius had played in his history.

He had stolen the instrument when he was ten years old. There was even a picture of him holding it, dated 1840, taken shortly after he’d escaped the gypsy carnival that served as his home after leaving his mother. With only the violin to his name, Erik found solace with a kind architect, and mastered the instrument while he learned about crafting blueprints and building structures. He was forced to leave six years later when the old architect died. Erik left there a young man, still honing his musical talent, while he discovered the cruelty within the wide world and himself: first running with circuses as an attraction, then becoming a masterful assassin. When at last he found his way back to Paris at age twenty-six, the Strad was as much a part of Erik as an arm or a leg. It was the violin he used to seduce Christina Nilsson—the girl who would become his beloved Christine—and to unleash her otherworldly voice.

During his time with her, Erik engraved the initials O.G. on the lower bout, close to the waist of the instrument. The letters stood for Opera Ghost, the faceless and ominous identity he embraced so he might haunt the catwalks and basements of the Théatre Lyrique during Christina’s odyssey from a chorus girl to a diva. Erik only had to hear her sing one time to know she was his twin flame. He took her under his wing, convincing the young and na?ve chorus girl that he was an angel, sent to train her voice. He watched his prima donna rise for three years, all the way to a London tour, then lost her to another: a Parisian financier with a flawless face, who she’d known from her childhood.

What a cruel dice destiny had rolled, to present him with his twin flame only to snuff out all of his hope. But that wasn’t the end of their journey . . . they met up again later, as mirror souls will do. Many more tragic layers were added to their star-crossed history, before it ended with Erik serenading his beloved Christine on her deathbed, playing the same violin that had first tied them together.

Upon hearing the close to Erik’s story, Thorn’s heart ached with sadness. “Father, I can’t. I can’t take this from you.”

He held out the instrument, but Erik shook his head.

“Remember what I taught you about pity, child. That violin was crafted by an artisan witch. It holds its own special magic. A magic I want to share with you, my son. If you wish to honor me, you will play it often, and with your whole heart.”

Thorn’s entire body lit up, not with pulsing energy this time, but with the splendor of a father’s love, for Erik had called him his son. From that day on, Thorn did just as his father asked. He honored him by playing the violin every chance he had. Ironically, the first time he played it, he experienced his first dream-vision with his own flamme jumelle, Rune—and saved her from drowning. Thereafter he decided that must be the magic the instrument held: the ability to bring two souls together when they needed each other the most.

Diable mewled quietly, shaking Thorn out of his thoughts. Audrey and Jackson were climbing the stairs, headed back to the atrium. Thorn waited until they were out of sight, then opened the mirrored doorway, stepping across the marble floor. He and Diable took the route beneath the stairs, avoiding strands of sunlight and staying close to the walls. The cat was here to offer distraction, in case Thorn needed to make a quick escape into one of the many secret passages. It would be safer were there trapdoors in each of the dorm rooms so he wouldn’t have to risk a trek in the open. But since the school’s investors had overseen the domestic renovations for safety standards—both the living quarters and bathrooms—Father Erik left anything suspicious out of the designs. No two-way mirrored walls, no hidden entrances. But he did arrange for vents in each dorm room, which allowed for eavesdropping. A fact they took advantage of last night.

Thorn had turned away when they’d stepped into the hidden passage to spy on Rune through the slats in the wall above her bed. He couldn’t cite nobility for the act. It wasn’t as if he’d never infiltrated a lady’s room in the past—claimed his drowsing prey.

The point was he and his father didn’t follow that practice anymore. Most of their kind didn’t. Both males and females had found other means to appease their appetites. Which meant Rune wasn’t their prey. How could she be, since she was one of them herself ?

Which was why Erik needed so much more from her than to feed. As did Thorn, although he could never admit what he needed.

Arriving on the girls’ side, Thorn slipped the keys from his pocket and paused at Rune’s closed door. Diable looked up at him with lime-green eyes and slitted pupils, glaring with annoyance at the detour.

“Just give me one second,” Thorn whispered, amused by the cat’s assuming air. “You go on . . . get the other girl’s door open for me.”

With a haughty sneeze, Diable sauntered ahead, rubbing along the line of doors as he went. Thorn had seen the cat unlock countless rooms in the opera house while hanging from the knob with one foreleg like a monkey and using the other paw—claws extended—to dig into the keyhole and release the mechanism. The trick would keep him occupied for the next few minutes.

Thorn turned to Rune’s room, his gloved palm cradling the door’s handle. The imprint of her energy lingered there, electrifying him through the leather. She had seen him in the mirror twice now. By her reaction, there was no question . . . yesterday when she first arrived, and this morning as she met her peers for breakfast. He suspected she could hear him, too.