Julian squeezed Elara's hand. "She won't."
As Thorne walked away to alert the stage manager, Elara felt like she might vomit. "I can't do it," she hissed to Julian. "I haven't sung with an orchestra in five years. He's going to conduct it too fast. He's going to try to sabotage me."
"Let him try," Julian said, turning her to face him. He looked intense, fierce. "You are not the victim anymore. You are the predator. Go up there and scream at him. Sing it like you're sentencing him to death."
"Julian," she whispered. "I'm scared."
Julian did something then that broke the contract: he cupped her face in his hands and kissed her. It wasn't for the cameras; it was fierce, desperate, and possessive.
"Sing for me," he breathed against her lips.
The bell chimed. The gala was beginning.
The backstage area of the Metropolitan Opera House was a labyrinth of ropes, pulleys, and nervous energy. Elara stood in the wings, the heavy velvet curtain the only thing separating her from four thousand judgment-filled eyes. She was wearing the costume of the Queen of the Night: a dramatic, billowing gown of dark blue velvet studded with rhinestones that looked like stars, and a jagged silver crown.
Underneath the costume, she was shaking.
"He's going to kill you out there," a stagehand whispered sympathetically as he adjusted her mic pack. "Thorne is in a mood. He's already yelled at the first violinist."
Elara didn't answer. She closed her eyes. She thought of the cold nights in her Queens apartment. She thought of the tips she had to beg for. She thought of Julian's sister, Arya, a woman she never met, but whose ghost haunted the man she was falling for.
This isn't for me, she realized. It's for the ghosts.
"Places!" the stage manager hissed.
The lights on the stage dimmed to a deep, ominous blue. Thunder rumbled from the percussion section. The audience went silent.
Elara walked out. The stage was vast, a wooden desert illuminated by blinding spotlights. She couldn't see the audience; they were just a black ocean of breathing darkness.
But she could see him.
Marcus Thorne stood on the podium, bathed in a spotlight. He looked up at her, his baton poised. His eyes were cold, dead sharks swimming in a sea of arrogance. He offered her a tiny, mocking smile. Go ahead, his eyes said. Fail.
He raised the baton.
Usually the intro to "Der Hölle Rache" is fast, but Thorne took it at a breakneck speed. It was reckless—a tempo designed to make a singer trip over their own tongue, to run out of breath before the phrase ended. The orchestra scrambled to keep up. The strings soared furiously.
Elara felt a spike of panic: It's too fast. I can't breathe that fast.
But then she looked at the conductor's podium again. She saw the malicious glee in Thorne's posture, and the panic vanished. In its place, a cold, white-hot rage ignited in her chest.
You want fast? she thought. I'll give you fast.
She planted her feet. She expanded her ribs, taking in a massive gulp of air that seemed to pull the oxygen from the entire room. She opened her mouth.
"Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen..."
Her voice exploded out of her, darker and more powerful than it had been in the restaurant. It wasn't just sound; it was a physical force. It cut through the frantic orchestral texture like a laser.
Thorne's head snapped up. He hadn't expected the volume; he hadn't expected the precision. He flicked his wrist, urging the orchestra faster, trying to drown her out. The violins were a blur.
Elara didn't waver. She rode the tempo like a surfer on a tidal wave. She matched his speed and exceeded it. Every German consonant was spat out with venomous clarity. She wasn't acting the part of a vengeful mother; she was the vengeful mother. She was singing to the man who stole her life.
"Tod und Verzweiflung flammet um mich her!" Death and despair flame around me!
Then came the moment of truth: the vocal gymnastics, the famous staccato passage that climbed into the stratosphere.
Thorne pushed the tempo to an insane degree. It was musical suicide.
Elara locked eyes with him. She didn't look at the audience; she stared directly at the man trying to destroy her.
The notes rang out like machine-gun fire: perfect, crystalline, pitch-accurate. She hit the high F6. It was a sound that defied physics: pure, piercing, and filled with such raw, unadulterated emotion that people in the front row actually flinched.
She held the note, sustaining it with a lung capacity that seemed impossible.
Thorne's hand wavered. He was losing control. The orchestra was following her, not him. Her voice was the conductor now; she was dragging the entire symphony along in her wake.
She held the note longer than written. She held it until she saw a bead of sweat roll down Thorne's temple. She held it until the arrogance drained from his face, replaced by fear.
She cut the note off with a snap that echoed through the hall. The final chords crashed down.
Elara stood center stage, chest heaving, her eyes blazing.