Adele had to stifle a guffaw behind her fan.
Gareth scanned the cast list. “Where is Senator Clark? Isn't he in this show?”
“No. They never use him in plays about us. He complicates the plot.”
Gareth laughed again.
The onstage Cesare began to sing in a rumbling growl, “Behold, I am Cesare. I am the death of humankind. Bring me Princess Adele.”
Flay entered stage left, a tall beautiful woman with long black hair, clad in black robes. Princess Adele followed with her hands chained but her head unbowed. Other vampires, all in black, crouched or scurried around the stage, up and down the backdrop, in and out of torchlight. It was an extraordinarily disturbing effect and gave the real Adele chills to watch.
Cesare launched into an aria about vampires and their destruction of human culture in the north. It was a boastful, arrogant litany of vampire successes, not at all untrue, if a bit long. The scuttling vampires around him provided a mournful, unsettling chorus.
Greyfriar asked, “Where's Gareth? Just Cesare?”
Adele whispered, “There's no Gareth.”
“I'm not important?”
“No one knows Gareth…yet. They know Cesare. And Flay. They're the villains. And besides, the opera is named after you. The Greyfriar. That's you.”
“Is it?”
Adele turned toward him. “Isn't it?”
He stared at the stage.
Act III drove forward with Princess Adele about to be sacrificed before the gathered British vampire clan. The proud young woman stood surrounded by black-clad figures, including the smug Cesare and sinister Flay. The princess sang a sad call to Greyfriar, whom she believed dead.
“Is Greyfriar even still in this play?” Greyfriar complained impatiently. “Where have I gone?”
Adele rolled her eyes and slapped his fidgeting leg with her fan. “Did you ever think the princess could save herself? She may not need a man to do it.”
“Then why call it The Greyfriar?” he muttered. “All these people paid money for this. I'd be upset if I had paid money for The Greyfriar to hear this much Cesare singing.”
Suddenly the princess's aria drew to a bittersweet end. As Cesare and Flay closed in around her, a trumpet cried, a spotlight shot out onto a black-cloaked vampire who threw off his shadowy raiment to reveal he was the Greyfriar. Mayhem ensued as Greyfriar fought to reach the princess.
The real Greyfriar gripped his chair arms with excitement.
Adele said, “There, you see. He was disguised as a vampire.” She paused. “How odd.”
The operatic swordsman engaged Flay in a choreographed battle. They moved across the stage and back, leaping, spinning, and twirling with admirable athleticism. Although it was a fight to the death, it was an impressive ballet with two figures, man and woman, closing, touching, and drawing apart.
Adele sat back in the royal box with an annoyed huff at the almost erotic dance between two characters, but it was Greyfriar and Flay, not the princess. She watched the two colliding, pushing off, lingering together with deep emotional stares. Greyfriar's rapt attention on the duo below added to her aggravation.
Finally, onstage, Greyfriar struck down Flay and turned on Cesare. The evil prince threw his cape over his face and fled, vanishing into shadows. Swordsman and princess came together in a crescendo and began a song of love and redemption.
It was nice, but it lacked the passion and physicality of the ballet with Flay. There had been a raw emotion between the two rivals that was lacking in the traditionally proper lovers of Greyfriar and the princess. Not at all satisfying to Adele. The authors had missed the mark.
After their song, Greyfriar and the princess raced from the stage to make their escape from London. In the imperial box, Adele was ready to stand for the traditional intermission, but the music shifted into something new. A spot fell on the body of Flay, and the vampire slowly rose to her feet.
Flay began the most beautiful and horrifying aria that Adele had ever heard. It was full of passion and heartache and rage. Flay expressed her hatred for the princess, which Adele found enjoyable. Then the aria shifted again and Flay dropped to her knees, and wailed that she loved Greyfriar. They could never be together because of the fact that they were enemies. Flay knew Greyfriar was good and pure and true, something she dreamed but could never be. Flay's last wrenching note faded into tears.
The curtain dropped on the act. Adele's cheeks were wet and she realized she had crushed her fan in her fist.
The hours passed and characters came and went across the stage. Finally, the armies of Equatoria surrounded the unassailable walls of a London castle, leaving only Cesare and his chief weapon, Flay, trapped. Greyfriar volunteered to enter the villains' lair, even though it was likely he would be killed. He couldn't bear for one more soldier to die if he could prevent it. With him standing alone, the grotesque set piece for Cesare's castle settled to the stage around him. It was physically disturbing. The lines were uneven. Doors were crooked. Floors slanted. It was disorienting to the audience.