II. Sabian Thénardier

"You lost the letters?" M. Thénardier said, whirling to face his son.

Bravely, Sabian held his ground, squaring his narrow shoulders and facing his father. Once upon a time, M. Thénardier had been an imposing man, a man of means and influence and money. Now, he was as destitute as any other Parisian street urchin. Still, Sabian had reason to be scared of him: he was still a large man, with a wicked temper and a quick hand.

"You lost the letters?" Mme. Thénardier piped up, Sabian's mother staring at him like something she'd just stepped in in the street.

"I was caught off guard," Sabian said, clearing his throat and trying to keep. "I ran into a rally, the gendarmes showed up... I just got jostled and I dropped the letters, all right?"

M. Thénardier moved before Sabian knew what was happening. The side of the large man's hand connected with the boy's cheek and sent him stumbling a step backwards. Azelma, sitting in the far corner of the small room, gasped and looked on, horrified, even though the sight itself wasn't that unusual.

Sabian blinked and rubbed his cheek, too shocked to be in pain. He knew it would bruise and he wondered, absurdly, what Marius would think of the dark mark that would soon cover the boy's hollow cheek.

"Get those letters back," Mme. Thénardier, completely uncaring about her son's pain and her husband's cruelty, said with a glare. "Get those letters back, and don't think you'll get a new pair of shoes until you do."

Sabian looked down as bare feet, the soles of which were already black with dirt. "I can't get them back," he said, still looking at his toes.

M. Thénardier's eyes narrowed. "Why not?"

The boy swallowed, steeling himself for the inevitable onslaught that would come when he told his father the truth. "I..." he paused, and cleared his throat again. The action was futile and did nothing to make his voice less hoarse. "I went back for them, but they were already gone. The gendarmes... the gendarmes must have taken them."

Azelma gasped again, this time in disgust. "You idiot!" she cried.

This time Sabian was ready for the swipe, and jumped out of the way of his father's fist. He wasn't fast enough to avoid a hit from his mother, though, and fell against the shabby, moth-eaten wallpaper.

"The gendarmes have the letters!" his mother wailed to his father.

His chest heaving with rage, M. Thénardier glared at his son. "Get out."

"But I-" Sabian tried to protest.

"Get out!" his parents roared together.

Sabian looked around the tiny apartment he shared with his parents, his younger sister and his often-absent younger brother, and realised that other than the inn his parents had owned when he was younger, this was he closest he had ever had to a home.

He looked in his parents' eyes but found no mercy there. He turned, dejected and headed for the door. He could find somewhere to sleep for a few days, perhaps, and then try his luck with them again. He briefly entertained the thought that the gendarmes would show up and arrest them for fraud, show them to the cells and keep them locked up for the rest of their days, but he knew that they would throw him to the wolves before they ever admitted their guilt. M. and Mme. Thénardier turned their backs on their son,

As he went for the door out into the stairwell, Azelma rushed over to him and pressed a slip of paper into his hand.

"The last letter," she said, not unkindly, and Sabian would have hugged her if such a display of affection hadn't brought his parents' ire down on her.

"Thanks," he said, quietly, and slipped out the door.

His family lived on the third floor of a four story building, narrow and crumbling, built in the style that had been popular during the reign of Bonaparte. The stairs were rickety and splintered easily, the wallpaper, patterned with fleur de lis, was faded and torn. He stood on the thin landing outside his parents' door and could smell the faint scents of cooking from the second and third floor.

His stomach rumbled, and he thought about going downstairs and begging for some scraps, but he knew what both of the lower tenants thought of his family and was sure they weren't going to help. He looked at the letter Azelma had given him and his heart stopped when he saw the name printed in his sister's halting, scratchy hand.

M. Marius Pontmercy.

Despite everything that had happened since he'd last seen Marius, despite the throbbing of his cheek, Sabian's heart stopped and his throat grew dry. He looked up, to the floor of the landing above, and for a second all he could hear were Marius' footsteps as he paced back and forth in his loft.

"Marius," Sabian said to himself, as though tasting the name. "Marius."

His heart was beating again, faster now. Faster and faster and faster. His hands were getting sweaty. He was, he realised, nervous. He was never nervous. The sight of gendarmes or an empty wine bottle in his father's hand was cause for fear, certainly, and he knew what it was to be afraid, but he was never nervous.

His fight or flight response was finely tuned in the direction of flight, and so when he was afraid he ran. Now, though, he didn't know what to do. The letter in his hand, begging for alms, was the best shot he had at getting a few francs, enough money to stay alive until his parents forgave him. If they forgave him.

But the letter was addressed to Marius, and Marius rendered Sabian inert.

The sight of the man had been enough to paralyse Sabian, and the thought of having to actually talk to him, let alone beg him for money, was driving him to apoplexy. He heard movement in the apartment behind him, heard his parents bicker in raised voices, and decided that he had to move. Up or down.

The door behind him began to open and he leapt into action, scurrying up the stairs as quickly as his long, skinny legs would carry him. He whirled around in time to see his father exit the apartment with a fresh, unmarked bottle of wine clutched in his fist. Sabian swallowed as he watched the loutish, lice-ridden man that had once been a fixture of a community, descend to the street.

"Hello," he heard someone say behind him.

Once again, he froze, rooted to the spot. He knew that voice, rich and deep and full like chocolate. Marius Pontmercy was standing right behind him. Sabian took a deep breath, but it did nothing at all to calm his breathing or slow his heart.

"What are you doing up here?"

Something in Sabian snapped into life. He spun around and put on his most charming grin and tossed a mock curtsy to Marius. Marius blinked his beautiful blue eyes and beheld the dirty wretch in front of him and Sabian found he couldn't look the man in the eyes.

"M'sieur," he said, and paused when he heard his own rasping voice. "I'm ever so sorry to disturb you, M'sieur."

"Sabian, isn't it?"

He knows my name, Sabian thought and his heart thundered in his ears. "Uh," he said, unsure how to go on. "Yes. Yes, I am Sabian. I live downstairs."

"I know," Marius said and instantly seemed to lose interest. His intelligent, sharp eyes, bluer than the bluest sky Sabian had ever seen, clouded over and Sabian knew his mind was on something else. Sabian, who had looked into the man's eyes only briefly, had to look away immediately. As absurd as it was, it broke the boy's heart. "Come in, if you want."

Sabian jumped like he'd been shocked. "M'sieur?"

"Come in," Marius repeated, stepping back into his loft and beckoning absently to Sabian, "if it pleases you."

"Of course it pleases me," Sabian said before he could stop himself and quickly followed Marius inside. It was much like his family's apartment, but there was even less furniture. A single bed, a chair, an old writing desk stuffed with papers below a dusty mirror mounted on a nail in the wall. There was no wallpaper, and there were three windows looking on the street. Sabian's family had only one.

Night was quickly falling over Paris, the boy could see, but to him it felt like the middle of the day, so radiant was Marius to him. Marius crossed to the bed and picked up a book and began to read it, mouthing the words. Sabian was reminded of the man's performance in front of General Lamarque's house earlier in the day and he cleared his suddenly dry throat.

As desperately as he wanted to be in Marius' company, he wanted to flee, find some dark, cold hole and lie there forever. He wanted to be gone from this place and that was the most confusing thing of all.

"M'sieur," Sabian said, doing his best to appear demure and innocent. "I have this for you."

He lifted the letter and made to press it into Marius' other hand. "What is it?" the man said, as if remembering Sabian was there.

"A letter from my sister, sir," Sabian said, hanging his head. "She's not well, M'sieur. She's got a cough, see, and it won't get better."

"It sounds like you've got a cough," Marius said, eying him and then the letter, which he took from Sabian with one graceful move.

To his everlasting shame, Sabian flushed crimson. "My voice," he said.

Marius read the letter over, and Sabian saw comprehension break through the man's casual disinterest. He looked up and examined Sabian, and then went over to the desk. He put the letter down and began to sort through some of the papers on it.

"I can read, you know," Sabian said suddenly.

"Oh?" Marius said, turning back to the boy. Marius frowned. "Were you at General Lamarque's home earlier today?"

"No," Sabian lied. He wasn't sure why.

"I thought I saw someone that looked like you," Marius said, and went back to sorting through his desk.

He saw me, Sabian thought. His heart was pounding louder than thunder or cannon. He could barely think, could barely breathe. Finally, he remembered why he was there. "Please, M'sieur, my sister, sir. She wrote to you, sir, since she can't come to see you herself. She don't want you to get sick, too."

Marius lifted a pile of letters that Sabian recognised immediately. The boy went white as a sheet. Marius compared the letter to one from the pile. Sabian realised he had to distract the man before he discovered the Thénardiers' treachery, and ran across to the mirror. With his forefinger, he scratched a figure in the shape of an 'S' in the dust.

"Look, m'sieur!" he said. "I can write, too."

Quickly, he sketched out an 'A', a 'B', an 'I', another 'A' and an 'N'.

"My name!" Sabian insisted, and grinned proudly. He looked to the book on Marius' desk, at the small pile in the corner nearest the bed. "I can read!"

Without thinking, he snatched the letter from Marius' hand and began to read it aloud:

"Monsieur Marius Pontmercy," it began, "please, I need your help. I am very sick and I am coughing all the time. My parents are very poor and our apartment is very small and we have only one window for sunlight and fresh air and we can't afford a doctor. Please help me, monsieur, I need medicine."

Sabian folded the letter and felt bizarrely proud of himself. He had read! He had written! He had proven himself to be more than a gutter snipe, more than a simple, uneducated urchin. He hoped against hope that Marius would notice.

The man was frowning, though. Sabian realised he was looking at the boy's feet and at his chest. Sabian's blood ran cold when he realised he still had the red ribbon pinned there.

"You were at General Lamarque's house," Marius said. "What happened to your shoes?"

"I lost them," Sabian answered, deciding to tell as much of the truth as he dared. He found that he didn't want to lie to Marius, but he was so used to lying that telling the truth tasted strange in his mouth. "When the gendarmes arrived."

Marius sighed. "Here."

He pressed a single five franc note into Sabian's hand. For the briefest second, their fingers brushed and Sabian thought his heart was going to explode. "M'sieur!" he exclaimed. "Thank you, sir! Thank you so much!"

"It isn't enough for a doctor," Marius said.

"It's enough for shoes," Sabian said before he realised what he was saying.

Marius laughed and it was the most beautiful sound Sabian had ever heard. He wanted it to continue forever, but realised he was already pushing his luck. Thanking the man continually over his shoulder as he left the apartment, a grin a mile wide on his face.

Marius simply went back to reading his book. An encounter that had filled Sabian with emotions he couldn't comprehend and couldn't control had been, for Marius, a matter of an instant, over and done with and just as quickly forgotten.