A/N: My dear lovely readers, I sincerely apologise for the inexcusable length of time this chapter took. I can only say that I'm going to do my best not to let this happen next time. I hope this chapter makes up for the delay.
Within an hour of waking, Vanessa and Enjolras were on the streets of Paris, enjoying the warm bustle of the market. They meandered between stalls, maintaining a polite silence and speaking only when truly necessary. In her right hand Vanessa held the list from Madame LaMotte, and hooked over her left arm, a basket swung as she walked. The quiet of the pair was not reflected in their surroundings, the market was noisy and crowded, and the unlikely couple had to stay very close to prevent them losing one another.
Above the clamour of sellers and buyers, Vanessa heard the unmistakable sound of women giggling and glanced up in the direction of the noise. Over to her right, a gaggle of young girls huddled, all of them staring at her companion. A small smirk found its way onto her face as she glanced up at the tall blond beside her. There was no doubting it, he was oblivious to women.
How could anyone be so blind?
From the midst of the little swarm, a shock of black hair emerged, prowling towards the pair with feline elegance. Tossing her hair and flashing a coy smile, the girl stepped into their path and fluttered her eyelashes at poor Enjolras.
He stopped abruptly, almost walking straight into the bold creature. "Pardon me, mademoiselle," he said, sidestepping towards Vanessa and looping an arm around her shoulders, gently pushing her onward.
The raven haired girl glanced between Enjolras and Vanessa, she narrowed her eyes at the latter before stomping back to the safety of her gaggle. A low chuckle filled the space between them and Vanessa looked up at Enjolras in shock. He shook his head and grinned. "Goodness, did you see her face," he muttered as they hurried away. His arm slipped from her shoulder and fell back to his side, and Vanessa suddenly felt a chill across her back. "I swear I could see her imagining your death."
The snort Vanessa released was anything but ladylike, and she quickly turned her attention to the list in her hand. "We need to stop by the butcher's, then I swear I must get something to eat or I'm going to eat you!" she groaned.
A brief look of horror crossed Enjolras' face. "Maybe we'll get breakfast first," he mused.
The pair walked down the length of the market before Enjolras came to a stop outside a small bakery. "Here," he said, "I'll go get some pastries for us."
Vanessa leaned against the wall and turned to face the market. The mid-morning sun filtered through the market and flooded the courtyard the bakery occupied. Tilting her head back, Vanessa sighed, the conversation with Genevieve the night before returning to her.
With a subtle glance into the small bakery, Vanessa felt her heart somersault in her chest. Enjolras was talking with the baker, smiling that serene smile that sent shudders down her spine. The warm glow of the baker's ovens sent a halo of honey flickering about his milky skin and his golden hair
How her heart was betraying her!
In an attempt to distract herself, Vanessa turned away. Her eyes drifted lazily around the open courtyard and a wave of realisation washed over her. This courtyard, now so peaceful and warm, had once been full of people, clamouring and scrabbling for a view of the men who would change the world. Her beloved Grantaire had dragged her from the café to see his Apollo speak here.
That had been the first crack in a beautiful relationship. After hearing the heart-wrenching speech of the great Enjolras, Vanessa had fled the courtyard. Of course, Grantaire had followed her and tried to calm her fears, tried to tell her that he wouldn't join them on the day of the battle. That he would live for her.
It was all a lie, and a lie that Vanessa could see straight through.
Footsteps drew near and Vanessa's eyes snapped open as she spun around. Enjolras stood beside her, holding out a freshly baked croissant to her. "For you," he said cheerily. The easy, carefree smile on his face made Vanessa's stomach churn for a moment. Would she ever get her damn emotions under control?
She reached out and snatched the pastry away from him. "Thank you," she muttered.
Something wasn't quite right, this much he knew, thus Enjolras smiled warily and kept his distance as Vanessa stormed away. He watched her hair whip behind her as she disappeared into the crowd. It didn't take him long to completely lose her in the mass of bodies, and he found himself cursing the ubiquity of brunettes. With a frustrated sigh, he shoved his way through the people in a vain attempt to keep up with her. "Vanessa," he called, trying to spot her slight figure.
Within minutes, he had lost her and himself completely in the crush of the market. Spinning on his heel, he looked around. "Vanessa," he called again.
"Alexandre?" a quiet, yet unmistakable voice murmured behind him. Whirling around, Enjolras sucked in a breath.
Before him was a petite blonde whose soft ringlets of hair framed her heart-shaped face. Her baby blue orbs stared up at Enjolras, astonishment glittering in them. "Alex?" the demure little girl asked again as she wrung her lily white hands together.
A couple of slow, incredulous blinks filled the silence between them. Eventually, Enjolras found his voice. "Evangeline? What are you doing here?"
Still staring, Evangeline shrugged. "Shopping for a new dress. Alex, I thought you had left Paris. Maman wouldn't tell me anything," the delicate creature sobbed as she wrapped her arms around his waist.
With a hiss of pain at the pressure on his torso, Enjolras smoothed down her feather soft hair. His mind was a blank sheet of paper, the words all erased. A frown creased his brow. "Maman told you I'd left?""
The blonde curls bounced as she shook her head. "No, Maman won't even use your name."
It would have been less painful if a fiacre had knocked him over.
"So she's finally decided to disown me?" he said, his voice muted in the hubbub of the market. "It seems your father has finally got his way." His eyes darkened as they fell upon a discarded coin, glinting on the mud-caked ground. With a fierce kick, he sent it skittering across the market, where it would later buy a starving child a mouthful of bread; even in fury, Enjolras was a saviour.
Glancing back at the small blonde before him, Enjolras saw the quiver of perfect rosy lip and glittering of periwinkle eyes full of tears. "Why can't you just come home?" she asked, her voice trembling.
Enjolras gave a frustrated sigh and ran a hand across the back of his neck. "Evangeline, I can't. Your father made that quite clear." He turned away, setting his jaw against the derisive words that would surely come.
As he turned, Vanessa swept back into view. Across the chaos of the market, those shocking green eyes found his before sliding past him to the petite girl clinging to his arm. Surprised by the sight before her, she raised an eyebrow and took a step backwards. The look of panic on Enjolras' face, however, told her that assistance might be required.
With a few elegant steps, she was beside him. "I lost you, what happened?" she asked.
"I got a little distracted," his eyes slid between the two women beside him as they watched each other. There was a look of awe in Evangeline's eyes as she stared without embarrassment at the brunette. Vanessa meanwhile, watched the tiny blonde with a cool indifference.
Eventually, she looked up at Enjolras. "Who's this?"
Glancing again between the two women, Enjolras smiled. "This is my half-sister, Evangeline. Evangeline, this is –"
"The angel," Evangeline breathed.
The silence that wove between the three was deafening. Vanessa stared at Evangeline, her eyes wide with shock. Slowly, Enjolras returned his gaze to the blonde as well. "What did you say?" he asked.
Panic flooded Evangeline's pretty face as her baby blues flashed between the adults towering over her. Eventually they rested on Vanessa, still wide with confusion and something Enjolras could have sworn was adoration. She swallowed thickly and turned to her brother, her eyes still glued to Vanessa. "This is an angel," she whispered.
"Sorry, I'm no angel," Vanessa said with a shrug, controlling the surprise in her features as best she could. She held out a hand. "My name's Vanessa."
Evangeline shook her head. "No, I mean you're the grisette Maman called an angel." She rushed forward and wrapped her arms around Vanessa's waist, squeezing hard.
Dumbstruck, Enjolras only gawped. His mother had told him of an unnamed woman – his saviour on the barricade. But there was no possibility, it simply couldn't be . . . Could it?
"Evangeline," he murmured, gently placing a hand on her shoulder. "I need to speak to Vanessa for a while, in fact, I think I need to go back to the apartment. I'm glad I saw you today, but please, do not speak a word of this to anyone." His voice was low and filled with a dangerous tone that demanded obedience.
The little blonde nodded and with a last, tear-filled hug, she turned and left, melting into the crowd.
As soon as her bouncing curls had vanished from sight, Enjolras turned to Vanessa. His eyes burned with a dark fury. "Well?" he asked.
Raising an eyebrow, Vanessa turned to him. She crossed her arms over her chest and raised her head before giving a nonchalant shrug. "Well what?" Her voice betrayed nothing as they stood, facing one another in the bustling market.
Her offhanded behaviour was the only answer Enjolras needed. With a single nod, he walked back in the direction of the café, silently fuming beneath his cool exterior.
The market seemed to blur past as he stormed back home, he didn't utter a word as he traversed the creaking stairs and slammed the door behind him. Naturally, Vanessa had followed, uneasy with leaving him to his own devices. As the door rattled on its hinges, she sighed. Evidently, it was going to be a rather long day. She set the basket down on the table and began fighting with the laces of her boots. Once she was free of the ache-inducing footwear, she slumped onto the sofa, her head resting against the soft fabric. Before long, her eyes began to slide closed, and she was almost asleep when Enjolras finally emerged.
She heard his footsteps pass behind her to the kitchen, heard him clattering around in the cupboards, before he moved again, and finally came to a stop in front of her, two cups of cocoa in his hands. He offered one to her and sat down on the chair across from her. "So," he said, his voice hushed.
"So," Vanessa repeated, setting her cup down on the table between them.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
Shrugging, Vanessa played with the hem of her sleeve. "It didn't seem important."
Enjolras almost laughed. "Not important? Vanessa, you saved my life, how was that not important?"
A wry smile passed over her face before Vanessa answered. "To be fair, I wasn't planning on ever seeing you again. After I knew you were over the worst of it, I informed your mother that you were still alive, and then told her my address so she could pick you up and care for you at home. It was sheer bad luck that I found you on the bridge that night."
Through all of this, Enjolras had sat in quiet contemplation. Now he sat forward, intent on getting answers. "But why didn't you tell me? And how did you even get me out of there, why don't I remember you?" His questions flooded forth in a garbled mess.
Vanessa held up a hand. "Firstly, I had no intention of you ever putting two and two together. I didn't want you to know, because I didn't want to be the one that saved you. You probably don't remember because I contacted your mother before you were anywhere near lucid. And, I dragged you from that window by myself, carried you back here under cover of night." Her eyes shimmered with tears. "All while my love's body went cold in an abandoned café."
Words couldn't explain the sorrow Vanessa felt as she laid the truth bare. Now he knew the sacrifice she gave for love, for Grantaire.
Silently, Enjolras reached across the table and placed a hand on her arm, his eyes finding hers in the dimming light. "Thank you," he whispered. "But I sincerely wish you hadn't bothered." In a single move, he rose to his feet and stepped away, before the door once again shut behind him, separating them by a few planks of wood.
"You and me both," Vanessa muttered as she brushed at her tears. Curling her knees up to her chest, she sat on the sofa until the early hours of the morning, the memory of that godforsaken night playing over and over again behind her eyelids.
The broken stairs creaked and groaned beneath Vanessa's weight as she scrambled up them two at a time.
She had to save him!
Upon reaching the second floor she stopped, two young bodies were laid side by side by the wall, this must have been what that fool who called himself their leader was doing while he was hiding up here. The stench of blood was overwhelming up here, even worse than it had been on the streets outside. Vanessa closed her eyes for a moment, sending up a prayer for each of these brave, stupid young men.
As she opened her eyes, they fell upon two bodies at the other side of the room, one sprawled against the wall, and one halfway out of the window, his boot caught on the small hook which had once held the shutters back. Running straight to Grantaire, checking for a pulse, anything to tell her she wasn't too late. As she moved him away from the wall slightly a pained gasp escaped her lover's lips and his eyes flickered open.
"Oh thank God!" Vanessa breathed as she smoothed his wild black curls from his face. "Grantaire, can you hear me?"
"Yes." His voice was so weak, so pained. A thought passed over his face, lighting up his dull eyes.
"Nessa, Nessa is he alive?" he asked.
He desperately tried to force himself upright, getting as far as kneeling before collapsing back into Vanessa's arms.
"Stop, please Grantaire, don't struggle. You'll make it worse. I'll check." Reluctantly, she let go of him and ran across to the body hanging from the window, she grabbed his legs and pulled. She dragged him back into the building and laid the broken body on the floor; she knelt next to him and placed a hand gently against his neck, feeling for a pulse.
The silence as the pair waited for anything was deafening. Vanessa was ready to give up and go back to Grantaire when . . . . There!
The tiniest of pulses.
But it was there, and it was steady. "He's alive. Just." Vanessa laughed. She turned to look at Grantaire, and panicked when she realised he had closed his eyes and turned away from her. "Grantaire don't leave me!" she cried, dashing back across to her fallen lover. She brushed a hand across his cheek. "Please, don't leave me."
Slowly, Grantaire's eyes opened once more. "Vanessa," he whispered, "I want you to do one last thing for me."
Vanessa shook her head, dreading the words she knew were about to come. "No, no Grantaire don't you dare!"
"Nessa, please!" Grantaire said, his face contorting in pain. "Nessa, the world needs him to live."
With tears streaming down her face, Vanessa sobbed "And I need you to live!"
Grantaire smiled and in a rare show of true affection, he reached up and placed a hand on her cheek, brushing away her tears. "Vanessa, look at me. You may think you love me, and that you will never be able to live without me. But you've done it before, and I know you will do it again –" A groan of pain stopped him from continuing for a moment. "Please Vanessa, he has to live. I may not have believed in his ridiculous revolution, but I believe in him. Look after him when I'm gone," he begged.
Vanessa nodded silently and leaned down to kiss her drunken fool of a lover, that impossible man who would never love her as much as he loved his idol, his Apollo.
She knew the exact moment that Grantaire left her, she could feel the part of her that was him rip away from her, leaving her empty. She stared down at his lifeless body and let the tears fall. She sat like that, unmoving and unaware of anything, until Grantaire's last words struck her. Look after him when I'm gone. She had promised she would. She turned her attention at last to the golden haired boy who had always been the apple of Grantaire's eye. She could almost see him breathing – were it not for the crimson blooms on his shirt and coat and the stains of blood that covered his face, she might almost have thought he was sleeping. He was angelic in appearance; the scarlet flecks against his skin were a stark contrast to his ice white skin. Never had he looked more like the marble lover of liberty that Grantaire had joked about.
God, how she hated him!
Slowly, she rose to her feet and walked over. This man had led her lover and her friends to their deaths, how could he ever do anything good for the world? All he'd done for her was destroy her life. "I hate you." She whispered, "I hate you, you stupid, son of a –" She never finished that sentence, her tears stopped her words. With a sigh she knelt down beside him once more to check whether he was still alive or if her cause was as useless as his damned revolution had been.
Apparently not.
"Well, I'll give you this, Apollo," she muttered as she hooked an arm around his chest and another under his legs, "you're a hard one to kill." She lifted his broken frame and carried him down the stairs and into the night, determined now to keep her promise and make sure the almighty Apollo lived on.
A/N: So, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, please leave a review. Reviews make me happy, and frankly, I could do with some happy at the moment.
Mags