A/N: Yes! Here is my next story! Hopefully, it will be longer than the others… but no promises. Hmm, I'm running out of ideas for E/E, but then again, you can never run out of fanfics for those two. I just contradicted myself. Oh well, on with the story! Hope you enjoy! (I never get tired of saying that! :D)

Chapter One

Eponine shivered.

This day was no different from the day before. The wind was still as cruel as ever, biting at her thin cheek and stiff fingers. The stones of the ground, wet from the harsh rain of yesterday, felt muddy beneath her bare feet. And the wealthy paid no attention to the poor, filthy beggar girl of the street; the poor passed her by without a single sympathetic nod.

But the girl did not seem to mind. She knew those people had no time for compassion. Had compassion ever played a part in her poor, miserable life? She knew the answer, as did everyone else. Compassion was dead in their minds. And so no one minded her as she walked quietly in the streets of wet Paris.

The rain that had poured down with a fury just the other day was now only a light shower. Eponine did not mind.

As she turned her eyes to the sky, she saw the sun sinking slowly down into its warm shelter. Yes, even the sun had no compassion for the world. When the evils of night arrived, it would run and hide, leaving all people in darkness.

Darkness was Eponine's only friend.

"Eponine!" came a low voice behind her.

"What! Is that you, little boy? What are you doing here?"

"I'm more of a man than you are, 'Ponine," replied the boy nonchalantly.

"But I'm not a man."

"Ah, but only men partake in the communion of stealing! It was once written, I recall, that thieves must be brave, and I'm sure as anything that women are anything but plucky."

"Enough!" said the girl sharply, her eyes flashing as she looked down at her brother. "Gavroche, what are you here for?"

The bright flicker in her eye, daunting and challenging him, changed the child's air of indifference into one of unwilling submission. "Well then! The old boy's been looking for you, if you must know."

"Old boy?"

"Thenardier, of course! They're all just big children with old faces! Bah!"

Paying no heed to the strange boy's reply, Eponine pressed his shoulder lightly, bending her head to his ear to whisper, "Take care!" The fierceness that had enveloped the atmosphere around her changed abruptly to concerned gentleness as she spoke those two words, and her hand rested on his shoulder for a moment longer.

And then she hurried off, disappearing into the crowds; and no one heard Gavroche, who, hands pushed into his pockets, stood watching her, muttering: "What a plucky one that is! Strange girl! And yet, she's my sister." Then he was off again, skipping and singing lustily without a single care in the world.

"Brujon! Babet! Where's the young thief at?"

"Montparnasse?" replied one of them carelessly. "Who knows when that one comes and goes? And who knows where he's at?"

Thenardier scowled. "I want none of your useless poetry! Brujon, come here, will ya? We can't wait for that pretty boy any longer! If he were here, I'd spit on his filthy, polished boots! Find Eponine! She's just as late as he is, and Montparnasse might be with her."

The man addressed looked up at the sky and started whistling the moment Thenardier's words stopped flowing.

"What are you waiting for?" said Thenardier heatedly, "A kick will do you good, dog! Get on! Get!"

In the darkness there came a shuffle, followed by a loud howl and the scuttling of boots.

"Poor Brujon," said a calm, menacing voice. "Only a kick? Or are you saving up for someone else?"

"Montparnasse! Is that you, boy?"

"What of him?" replied the voice and somewhere in the shadows a sinister smile seemed to float around the little innkeeper.

"I'm saving something for you, if you don't come into the light!" answered Thenardier, his voice rising. "I'll alter your pretty face! D'you hear? Montparnasse!"

His threat failed to frighten the young man in the dark. He was answered with a fearless laugh. "What of him?"

Footsteps approached. It was Brujon. "Here's the girl, then!"

Thenardier was still looking around in the darkness like a furious, fuming creature.

"Let him be, Montparnasse," said Eponine, walking past Brujon to her father, and the familiar spark in her eye lighted like fire in her eye.

"'Ponine!" came the delighted response. "Late, too! I might have thought so!"

The girl paid no attention to the young thief: "You called me?" said she, addressing her father with an air of bold indifference.

"What's your father up to now, 'Ponine?" interrupted Montparnasse. He had come forward now; it seemed no use to hide in threatening obscurity now Eponine was present. The glow of Babet's lantern cast shadowy fragments of light on Montparnasse's slim figure.

The young thief was watching with some curiosity Eponine's movement in the dark.

"What do you look at me like that for?" snapped the girl at Montparnasse, and turning to her father, "Will you tell me why I'm here, or shall I leave now?"

A hint of a scowl on his face, Thenardier barked: "Babet! Claquesous! Brujon! Hurry to that house I showed you this morning. Montparnasse, if you're thinking of lending your pathetic knives, get on with it!"

The men shuffled away quickly; only the youngest of them followed leisurely, the ghost of a smile haunting his red lips. "I'll see you there then, 'Ponine," said the calm voice, but the man was already gone.

Eponine was left with her father.

"Well? Am I to thieve for you again?"

"Don't talk to me like that, girl!" said Thenardier harshly, stepping forward with a beast's rage that could hardly be contained in his bright eyes. "Who keeps your little sister from starving? You feed your mother and sister when you help me and don't forget it!"

Eponine looked him in the eye, answering steadily, "I won't forget it. Even if I wanted to, I couldn't." The bitterness turned to resolution, "But I'm not helping you and your dirty work any longer."

Thenardier turned pale, his eyes blazing and lips trembling. "You help me or I'll give you a beating you won't forget, and your little rascal of a brother, Gavroche or whatever it is, won't be forgotten either!" screamed the man, shaking in his passion. "You've kept this up for too long, girl! The next time you see your brother, you won't even know it was him, if you don't! I've had enough of this, 'No, I won't help you.' No this and no that! The next time I hear that, it'll be—"

"Stop," said Eponine quietly. She could still feel the bruises of the previous day, but the pain wasn't what finally broke her determination. It was the mention of a name, that precious, proud little name.

"Well?" replied her father, his pale fists still shaking slightly.

"Where is the house?"

Thenardier smiled a hideous, beastly smile. "Well, then. It seems you've finally come to reason."

Credits to JB for some editing and advice!