Hello mes amis! This is the ultimate evil Les Miserables fic, my second foray into AU. I don't own anyone save for random walk-on characters. Everyone else belongs to Victor Hugo.

This entire fic was spawned on one 'innocent' question...

Prologue: Paintings

Paris, 1831

Gilles Feuilly always liked looking for different subjects for the paintings he made on his fans.

He made it a point to walk up and down Paris every now and then, searching for new faces to depict. Many of them were miserable, yet a little more dignified, like he was.

One afternoon, he found himself in the neighborhood of Les Halles. He set up his rickety chair and his painting tools on the sidewalk, determined to paint whatever he saw.

Sunset found him still there, working furtively on the last painting he intended to make. There were several fans lying open to dry at his feet; the rest had already been sold.

"Busy, I see?" a voice greeted. Feuilly smiled as he noticed Enjolras standing beside him.

"Work, of course. Are you meeting the rest at Corinth?" the fanmaker asked the student.

"Oui. Six o'clock," Enjolras said in a low voice. He looked at the fans scattered at his friend's feet. "Portraits?"

Feuilly held up one fan, depicting a quick sketch of a huge, surly looking man with a number on his arm. "He lives in that garret across the street."

Enjolras looked at a second fan. "How about them?" he asked, pointing to a picture of two women; one very young, one looking too old for her years.

"Mother and daughter; serving maids at the Rue des Filles du Calvaire."

"The third fan; you painted Marius as he walked by?"

"After the serving maids."

"I see. Acquaintances of his."

"Apparently more so. He told me once of the serving girls in his grandfather's house, how he grew up with the younger one."

"Who is the current cause of his disspation?" Enjolras asked critically.

Feuilly shrugged and held up a fourth fan, depicting a lean looking police inspector. "He was pacing about, and thankfully he's gone."

"A good thing," Enjolras said. He glanced at the fan that Feuilly had just finished painting; this one showed an elegantly dressed old man, a young boy, and a saucy looking girl. "I know them, of course."

"The Thenardiers?" Feuilly asked. "They were here not long after Marius was."

Enjolras raised an eyebrow. "Something of trouble brewing. But tonight, we have graver matters to discuss."

Feuilly nodded as he blew on the paint to make it dry faster. "We'd better go then. Today was a day full of chance encounters, I should think."

Enjolras gave the fans one last look. He glanced upwards, to where a window open and shut hurriedly. "I don't think so, mon ami. There is no such thing as a chance encounter."