Living in a castle definitely had its merits, Grantaire decided, as he laid his head on the side of his chair and good naturedly contributed to the shouting match in front of him.

"That's hardly the fucking point though, is it? I can't believe you could be so short sighted as to-"

"Enjolras, seriously, you're going to take down a light fitting."

This was definitely one of them.

Combeferre wriggled his glasses to the end of his nose and peered out over their rims, glanced to his side. "Oh good, it's started again."

Grantaire stretched out in his chair, all the way to his toes. "Some idiot had the audacity to talk about a thing. You know how he gets about things."

"Was that idiot you?"

"Not initially."

Combeferre raised an eyebrow at Grantaire, and then surveyed his best friend, the person he most frequently fantasised about kicking in the shin, for a moment and a half before snapping and saying "Fuck this, I'm going to bed. It's good practice, I suppose, Enjolras has been freaking out about this debate we've got." He stood up.

Combeferre's blonde friend, the Greek, had stopped speaking and was looking at Grantaire through slitted eyes. Just looking. Jesus fuck, he's like a cat. Halfway between a look and a glare. "Don't you dare tell me off for making noise, you haven't got a leg to stand on."

Combeferre's Greek friend tossed his head and carried on talking. His delicate neckbones stood out.

Combeferre's Greek was actually a politics student from near Belfast. He drank strong black coffee from a cafetiere and occasionally bit his nails. He was intense and Grantaire hated him.

He watched Combeferre go to bed through similarly narrowed eyes, then turned to Grantaire and said, "I'm going to bed. We'll be discussing this further tomorrow."

"Sounds cool, Enj. See you then."

Enjolras flicked his eyes towards Grantaire again, almost too quickly for him to read the expression, and disappeared upstairs with an air of flightly majesty.

Grantaire snuggled further up in his chair and sipped his whiskey. He had just reached the stage where, if you flip your head from side to side, it feels as if your sight is being left behind. He was too soft and warmy to bother going anywhere soon. (He also wasn't quite sure whether or not he could stand). Besides, it's nicer to watch some things retreating when you're not sober.

Grantaire woke up cold and bent the wrong way. There was something in his hair. It kept displacing itself, falling off and arriving back on again. Grantaire wrinkled his nose and shuffled indignantly.

"Grantaire?"

"…"

"Grantaire?"

"Piss off."

"Grantaire, it's me."

He opened a sleepy eye.

"Oh, hey Prouv. You're, err. Stroking me."

"I didn't want to wake you up and start leaping about in shock. You sometimes do that when you've had a fright." Jehan, in his morning wild-haired glory sat on the arm of Grantaire's chair and started absent-mindedly hugging the cushion he'd taken from behind his head. "Did you spend the night down here?"

Grantaire looked blearily around. The fire had burned out in the grate, the sky was cold and grey and Northern. He was colder than he was when he went to sleep and his whiskey was gone. "Ngh. Must've".

"Aren't you stiff?"

"No. But don't take that as a negative testament to your hair-stroking skills".

Jehan hit him in the face with his cushion. "Fuck off."

"You should have known that was coming."

"Fuck off. At least I'm not going to have neckache."

Grantaire rolled his head (the fibres in his neck were absolutely rigid. This day was going to be horrendous) and stretched out his feet. "What's the time?"

Jehan glanced at his watch. "Half eight. I've got a lecture in half an hour and you've got a tutorial with Dr. Valjean at ten. The essay you're due him is on your desk. I returned that Voltaire book, by the way."

Grantaire was wide awake now.

"Why do you know my timetable?"

"You don't. Someone's got to."

"Jehan, that's really odd."

"So is going home with two girls and waking up with four, but I haven't remarked on that until now. And Combeferre felt bad about Enjolras spilling coffee on the book that you lent me, that I lent him, that he lent Enjolras, so he proofread your essay for you. He had to change 'Mary Seacole was a total badass, I shit you not', but apart from that he said it was quite good. Are you coming to see the debate tonight?"

"What debate? Wow, I am so hungry. What debate is that?"

"Intercollegiate, University versus Hatfield. Training for the Cambridge match." Jehan cuddled the pillow close to his chest again. "We're going to have lunch in the Musain before, are you in?"

"Oh fuck."

Jehan looked instantly alarmed. "What?!"

"No, nothing, I've just remembered where I know the debate thing from. I've got a fight with Enjolras to finish, oh shit."

Jehan blinked. "That's never stopped you before."

"Yeah, but I don't like to spread them out. That just gives him time to think about how much he hates me."

Jehan looked at him gently. "He doesn't hate you.

Grantaire let his head fall back. "Yeah, whatever. Musain. What time?"

"I don't know. Twelveish. Set up a tab if you're there first." Jehan slid off the arm of the chair and put the cushion back on Grantaire. "I'm going, I want to get something to eat before I starve to death in the lecture hall. I'll see you there?"

"Yeah, sure. And thanks for the book, by the way."

Jehan smiled. "It's fine. Ten o'clock."

"Jehan, I'll be there. Thank you."

There was a part of him which he hadn't yet worked out, and it came in the form of a very slight pain.

Deep down, he supposed, he knew he mostly liked girls. He always had. But his boy was pretty enough to be a girl. And He also had passion. It was… who the hell knows. Some sort of' venerable fire', which you'd have expected to have died out on Crusade or in the French Revolution. Enjolras was archaic, everything about him. If you pissed him off, he'd set his jaw in one way, tilt his head in another and stare at you until you either backed down or cried (that had happened)

(although not to Grantaire.)

He'd sit and brood moodily and stare into empty cups and lie on sofas like a Bellini sculpture and then stand up and be opinionated about something and then lie back down again. Grantaire wrote it off to having lived in Northern Ireland. He was so fucking wonderful that Grantaire disliked him on principle. He disliked everything about him so much that it came right around in a full circle to an almost fierce love. He spent every living moment baiting Enjolras, but he'd always be there at the end, just watching him talk, and feeling something hot being tugged at under his skin.

Dr Valjean (mid fifties, expert in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth French peasantry and with a daughter at the University whose main purpose seemed to be to illicit debate as to why you'd choose to study at the Uni your dad taught at) had looked at him several times and said "I don't know. 'Pragmatic, strategic, audacious pro-feminist of the early nursing world' doesn't quite sound like you somehow. Adding a footnote purely to say 'because he was a twat' is more your style."

"You did find that funny, though."

Dr Valjean raised an eyebrow at him over the top of his reading glasses. "It's got to stop. I'm master of your college. I know you. I know you're bright. Some of this material is publishable." He scanned a pencil down the margin. "'Cardiomyopathy of the British Empire.'" He nodded to himself, took a moment, and turned back to Grantaire. "You know what I want from you next week." He closed his book, Grantaire's essay marking the page. "We're finished, I think."

"Thank you, doctor."

"No 'hilarious' footnotes, this time."

"No."

"Remember," Dr Valjean peered at Grantaire over his glasses and pointed a pencil at him. "I know where you live."

Grantaire smiled weakly and walled out of his teacher's office. He was the envy of most of his friends for having Dr Valjean, no matter how many times he told them he had to feign an interest in the French feudal system to get him. He was a good man; stricter than Hell, especially where stashing alcohol in the cabinets was concerned, but he was good. Combeferre liked him particularly.

The Musain was renowned for being a student café, and avoided by everyone else because of it. Jehan was already there, making notes on something, every now and again pausing to glance up at Joly. He wouldn't be listening. Grantaire knew that trick.

As soon as he came through the door, Joly raised his eyebrows at him in greeting. "Hello. You don't look well."

"He slept in the common room last night" said Jehan, not even bothering to look up.

Joly turned back to Grantaire. "Why?"

"I don't know. I didn't seem to go upstairs."

"Were you drunk?"

"...marginally."

Joly continued surveying him. "Hmm. Have some bread. You look hungry. I've torn one of my nails partially out of my nailbed, look. 'Chetta says it's nothing. It really hurts, though. Did you see anyone else on your way here? Don't eat bread like that, you'll choke."

Grantaire, unable to say anything over the slice of bread in his mouth, gave him a Look until Joly squeaked "I'm just worried about you!"

"Grantaire, stop winding him up. Oh, hello."

Combeferre had walked in and sat down beside Jehan. Beside him, Enjolras unleashed a tidal wave of paper onto the table.

Joly looked up at him. "Just a bit of preparation you're planning on doing then, is it?"

Enjolras sat down an empty seat away from Grantaire. He chanced a glance over at him. He was wearing jeans and a red, V neck jumper that he wore so often he'd worn holes in. Grantaire thought about asking him if he owned any more clothes. One of the holes, over his wrist, showed the junction between two bones. He watched them working under Enjolras's skin.

He wondered if Enjolras's skin would taste of cream, but dug his nails hard into his arm until he stopped.

"Hello. What the motley shit is going on with all that paper?"

"Ah, you've arrived, then." Grantaire looked over his shoulder to see his oldest friend lolloping along across the floor to them, beaming away. Feuilly followed him, his Blackburn Rovers cap almost hiding his eyes.

"Too right I fucking have, and I've been beaten to it by about eleven trees."

Enjolras, who had been in muted conversation with Combeferre, looked up warningly. "Just sit down, Courf."

"Ye-as, Come ahn Courf. Sit daun."

"I don't take the piss out of your accent, you English bastard," said Courfeyrac, taking a hefty swat at Grantaire's ankles. "Anyone seen Marius?"

"If he doesn't turn up soon, you're going to have to stand in for him," said Combeferre darkly, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "You can give him all the notes after. Of course, you'll have to dig him up first because Enj will have killed him."

Enjolras smiled dryly.

Feuilly slithered in next to Grantaire and whispered, "Can I have some of your bread?"

"'Course." Grantaire leant over and picked up the bread basket that he had rescued from Enjolras's paperlanche and placed strategically close to him. Two of his knuckles came within about a centimetre of Enjolras's ankle.

"Thanks. Where have you had this squirreled away?"

"It's just been under my chair," said Grantaire, resting his mouth on two of his knucklebones. "What's that all over your hands?"

Feuilly looked down, looked up again and wiped his hands on his trousers. "Oh. Charcoal. I've just come from the studio. That's why I haven't eaten yet. Thanks, I'm starving."

"Engineers use charcoal now, do they? Huh. I thought you were pulling a reverse Michael Jackson or something."

Feuilly looked as if he was about to do something, although he didn't quite have an idea what yet. He was spared by a "Hello!" from behind him. Pontmercy had just sauntered it, and evidently he hadn't seen Enjolras's face yet. Grantaire absently noted that that's probably what Gabriel looked like when he punched Satan in the face.

"Where the hell have you been?" he burst, half standing up.

Marius stood, stunned. Some other diners did, too.

"Um, hey…"

"We needed you here half an hour ago."

The friends' faces flipped from one to the other in rapid succession. It's quote fun when it's not happening to me, Grantaire thought. He looked from Marius to Enjolras again. There were two smudges of colour on his cheekbones. His eyes were like hot ice, but they always did that when he was angry. If he were ever to become radioactive, his superpowers would centre around his eyes, Grantaire was sure of it.

"Leave it, Enj, it's not a problem. Marius, come and sit down, he's just overreacting."

"I am not overreacting!"

"You are, you're being a drama queen. Marius," Combeferre pulled out a spare seat to the other side of him, once removed from Enjolras, who was glaring hardly at both of them.

Marius walked around warily, glancing over his shoulder at the contents of the café every now and again. Most people were looking as far away from the table as they could, all except the dusky waitress. One man was staring straight at an empty wall.

"Come on Pontmercy," Courfeyrac pounced from his other side as soon as he'd sat down. "You owe us an explanation."

"I'll tell you later, Courf."

There was a general cry of dismay.

Marius glanced nervously at Enjolras, whose gaze hadn't softened (it very rarely did). "May I speak freely? Without fear of being hit?"

"I'll protect you," said Combeferre.

"Well." Marius leant forwards and spread his hands on the table. "I've met someone."

"Oh."

The table lapsed back into a disinterested murmur.

"Wait! Don't you want to know who she is?"

"Marius, next week you'll have forgotten her."

"I won't!"

"You will, Marius. You're a baby sheep," said Courfeyrac, ruffling his hair. "You follow everyone around bleating endearingly, and then trip off after someone else. Remember Rosa?"

"And Emily."

"And Ursula."

"And Lucy."

"And Anne."

"No, you bastard, that was me," said Grantaire, snapping himself back into the conversation. "Tell us about her Marius, what's she like?"

"Oh, Grantaire! You'll never guess who she is!"

"Anne Widdecombe."

"Bahorel."

"Musichetta."

"Oi!" The book that Jehan had be annotating up until seconds ago flew at Bahorel, who dodged it, laughing. It hit the floor and spread pages everywhere. It lay ignored for a long time, until it was picked up and silently replaced by the melancholy waitress.

"No," said Marius blithely amid the chaos, "she's Dr Valjean's daughter."

"Cosette?"

"Wait, you mean," Grantaire shifted further forwards on his seat "she's actually real? I thought she was just an urban legend."

"No," Marius said, "she's real. She's so lovely. She's studying English Lit, can you imagine?"
"I'm studying English Lit," said Jehan indignantly.

"I was reading Cicero in the library and she asked me how to spell malum aureum"

"Wow, she must be serious."

"She's the girl of my dreams, Bahorel." Marius said defensively. "She's gorgeous. She's got this lovely wavy blonde hair" (Grantaire's eyes nipped, unbidden, over to Enjolras) "and sort of bluey eyes and she's kind of this tall. She was in a white dress with this long pink cardigan on, it was quite pale pink, and she was reading Chaucer, and she had this sort of face-"

"Did she have a nose?"

"Yes…"

"Wow." Grantaire sat back, recovering. "That does sound like a face."

Marius balled up some bread and threw it at him. "Shut up Grantaire! None of you are taking this seriously. I knew you wouldn't!"
"No, I'll tell you what you're not taking seriously," said Enjolras darkly. "We have to be in the hall, prepared, in four and a half hours and we haven't even written an argument. Marius, if you don't even care, give your place over to Courfeyrac."

"I do care!" he whinged. "I want to do well! Besides, Cosette is going to be there."

"Did she tell you that, or did you get it going through her bins?"

"I invited her, actually," he said hotly, "and she says that she's really looking forward to it. She used to be a debater, too."

"Well, in that case she can teach us everything that she knows. Marius, we're putting you in third. You're not opening after last time-"

"And Enjolras really likes to argue," said Combeferre with a wink. "Here's our motion. We thought that if we took the opposing view…"

Grantaire felt something against his ankle. He looked up to see Bahorel's raised eyebrows flitting between him, Feuilly and Joly. He nodded.

"Um, guys, do you mind if we leave? You know we're not going to be much use, and you sound like you have a load of stuff to get straightened out-"

"Yes, we have. Bye."

"You're very gracious, Enjolras." Bahorel rolled his eyes. "Come on, you three. Let's not interfere with the Almighty's work."

"You know, we didn't actually eat after all that," said Feuilly, once they were outside. "Do you think it's alright to leave Marius in there? I thought Enjolras was going to eat him alive."

"Enjy is a temperamental bastard. Although it was strange to see him losing his shit at someone who isn't you, Grantaire."

"Hmmn."

"I think he's stressed."

"Enjolras?"

"Yes. He does a lot."

"Enjolras is stressed. Thank you very much for your medical opinion, Dr Joly." Bahorel deadpanned. Joly pulled a face at him before saying, "Poor Marius, though. He did seem to like her."

"Poor Marius falls in love with anyone that smiles at him. Did anyone actually see what happened to Prouv's book, by the way? You're a crap shot, Joly"

"I think he had it with him when we left," said Bahorel, lighting a fag. "Hang on," he leant back to the window. "Yeah, he's got it. He's waving it about to make a point. God, he needs a haircut. Think you could do it for him, Jol?"

"I wouldn't want to. He's really wriggly. I wouldn't want to take off his fringe."

"I'd want you to. I'd pay you money."

"Don't be horrible to him!" Feuilly said. "Jehan wouldn't be Jehan without his hair, it's part of him. It's Romantic."

"Ooh, lovey" said Bahorel with a wink.

"That's with a capital 'R' and you know it. D'you want to go to Macca's, I'm starving."

"No. Salt intake."

"Pizza Express?"

"Peanuts."

"There must be somewhere you can go, Jol."

Joly tipped his head to the side. "We could always go back to the college."

"Oh, yes, Joly. We could always go back to the college."

Grantaire caught Feuilly's eye. He was still carrying around his design portfolio, and there were streaks of black on his face from where he'd run his hand through his hair absent-mindedly. "Upstairs at the Musain? They won't kill Jolllly here, and if we're lucky, we might see Enjolras make someone cry."

Bahorel exhaled. "You're so hard on him. He's a nice guy."

"Really?"

"You just have to dig deep. But you're a historian, you like doing things like that."

"How are we going to get back in without them seeing us? We've just left, we can't walk straight back into view, we'd look like twats."

"Diversion. Make the waitress do something."

"No, Bahorel, she's an accident away from a nervous breakdown as it is."

Grantaire looked at them. "Just walk in. Enjolras doesn't notice anything apart from what he's talking about, and when he's talking no-one notices anything but Enjolras. You're making it seem like James Bond."

"I'll meet you up there," said Bahorel, taking another drag. "Wait until I've finished this."

They walked quickly and quietly through the doors (again), trying their best not to make eye contact with anyone and half-ran for the stairs. Joly gave them a small thumbs-up. "They didn't see. We don't look like idiots. Does she look familiar to you?"

"Who?" asked Grantaire, craning over his shoulder.

"The waitress. The one who looks like she's about to cry."

"Oh. Maybe, I don't know. I think she only does downstairs anyway. Sit down, you idiot. I haven't had breakfast this morning, I may die."