A/N This is it. This is the end. I'm not going to get all mushy here because I'm sure you're anxious to find out how this epic story resolves itself. PLEASE do read the author's note at the end. Love you guys.

For the last time…enjoy.

Chapter Forty-eight

The travel-stained coach rattled away in a cloud of dust, the hooves of its four horses ringing loud on the yellow, sun-baked earth. Only one passenger had disembarked at this lonely stop in the countryside; a tall, lean young man in neat, if shabby clothes, and blond hair just long enough to be tied back with a black ribbon. He watched the coach until it disappeared over the brow of a hill, then turned to face the valley.

Ignoring the heat of the August sun on his face, he revelled in the feel of the sweet mountain breeze that blew across his face, laced with lavender and the dusty scent of freshly cut crops. He could hear the bees buzzing industriously in the hedges at his side, the sound of their small wings beating against the warm air orchestrating a soothing melody combined with the occasional twitter of a bird in the trees. The experience was one unchanged for centuries, the people who lived here a mere afterthought in the great cycle the land continued on through, regardless of politics, weather, or war. There was a peace to such certainty, a contrast to the unpredictable and never still cities in the north who, even now, were carving out a new political chess board in Paris that would be played on for years to come.

Enjolras, for it was Enjolras, drank in the sweeping majesty of the Alps in the distance, and the small towns dotted below him in the valley, wondering how he had ever chafed against that peaceful certainty. How had he found such beauty restrictive? And why had the isolation felt like a prison and not a blessing? He had run away to Paris with a head full of dreams and a heart full of passion that needed to be poured out, but also filled with a restless anger that had no form or reason, other than the ineloquent cry of a youthful heart for something more than what he had.

It had been a boy that had left these peaks and valleys, but it was a man that had returned to them, still searching for that something more, but with a little wisdom and experience to guide him.

He turned slowly, taking in the view around him, feeling it ease the ache in his body that left him laid awake some nights in the dark, wracked with a restless desire with a name he daren't speak; felt it soothe the pain the same way a voice inside of him had, telling him to go home to find the peace he craved.

Still gazing in wonder at this cathedral of the elements Enjolras slid out of his jacket and picked his few bags up out of the dust. He had only brought the bare essentials with him for the trip, leaving the bulk of his belongings – his many books and the rest of his clothes – back in Paris to be sent on when he had found a place to stay. He had left that job in the capable hands of Margo, Musichetta, and Combeferre, all of whom had been far more supportive of his venture than he had expected or thought he deserved. When Musichetta, eight weeks pregnant and still hollow-eyed with grief, had taken him by the hands and said how glad she was that he was trying to build something new for himself it had moved him to tears, a somewhat common reaction for him in those early weeks.

But he was here now, back home for the first time in seven years, and he had actions of great importance to complete. Slinging his bags over his shoulders, he hurried with sure strides down the curving lane to his right, it's familiar face like that of loved one absent from his life for too long. The analogy struck him as more than appropriate, considering his destination, and he leapt over a rut with a sense of elation in his steps that he had not felt for some time.

After a few minutes of brisk walking a house came into view, small and neat, built of local stone and surrounded by fields and gardens. His heart rate doubled as he took it in, feet quickening their pace. It was time to begin what Aimee had inspired, in the quiet of Margo's verdant haven, and start rebuilding some bridges.

The gleaming brass knocker was heavy in his hand as he thumped it against the door three times in quick succession, then stood back on the sun-bleached stone step to wait. Nerves had sprung up in his stomach somewhere between the wrought-iron gateway and the door, but there was no turning back now. Measured footsteps echoed from behind the door as their originator crossed the hall; the door rattled slightly before slowly opening.

"Julien?" The feminine voice was soft to his ears, disbelief, joy, and hope all sounding within it.

He smiled shyly, dropping his eyes to his dusty boots before flicking them back up to the woman stood in the doorway. "Hello, Grandmama."

"Oh, you beautiful, brave boy, you came home! Finally!" She hugged him fiercely, slipping from French to English and back again in her emotional greeting.

Holding his grandmother close Enjolras smiled against the lace collar of her dress, understanding a few of the words his American grandmother was babbling into his hair. She had always been special to him, with her radical views and support of his ideas, giving him a safe place to talk and think and to just breathe when his father became too domineering and home became a cage of silent, and often not so silent, judgement. And when he had finally snapped and left home at the tender, angry age of eighteen, his father's angry words and his mother's silent pain chasing him out of the door on the heels of his righteous pride, one of things he had truly regretted leaving was his grandmother.

She finally let him go, pulling back to look him over with eyes the mirror image of his own, sharp and intelligent and as blue as the never-ending sky above them.

"Let me look at you," she demanded, her words still holding a hint of the American accent she so proudly clung onto. "I haven't seen you since the last time I was in Paris, which was what…five years ago?"

"Five and a quarter," he corrected, pushing the loose strands of his hair off his face automatically at her scrutiny, reacquainting himself her form as she did the same to him.

Eloise Mayle – nee Callow – was a tall and stately woman who easily matched her grandson both in height and wit, despite nearing her seventy-third year. Though throughout her life she had been described by many as 'a terrifying woman of disdainful intelligence with a tongue like a snake, just as likely to laugh at you as with you', with those she loved she was humorous and loving, passionate about things she believed in and loyal to a fault – all attributes that had passed down to her daughter's only son…along with a healthy dose of his father's stubbornness, as Eloise was fond of pointing out.

Her hands were gentle on his shoulders and a fond smile softened her lips as she looked him up and down. "Five years is too long, Julien," she reprimanded without heat, her hands dropping away, "but by God have you become a man I can be proud of."

His smile faltered a little at her words and though it was but a momentary slip she noticed immediately, eyes narrowing.

"I am proud of you regardless of the mistakes you have made," she insisted, cupping his cheek briefly, "and maybe I am a little proud of you because of them. It takes a great man to reach for something others only dream of…and an even greater one to admit he was wrong and try to fix it." She grasped his hand in hers, her wrinkled skin pale and delicate against his.

"I'll get Marie to bring some lemonade to the parlour." Tucking his arm through hers she led him into the cool of the house. "We have much to talk about, young Enjolras. Such as why you apparently forgot how to write to your Grandmama while you were away…"

LINE BREAK

They did have much to talk about and so for the next hour Enjolras answered question after question and told story after story, only pausing to wet his throat with lemonade that brought back enough memories to make his eyes dampen. He spoke of life in the city, of his studies and his friends, and finally, tentatively, of the revolution.

"I heard about Jerome de Courfeyrac," Eloise said gravely, eyes sombre. "But when I saw his mother last week she said he was improving every day, even regaining a little of his humour."

"He is a far braver man than I ever have been," Enjolras replied, eyes once again drifting to his boots resting on a beautifully woven Persian rug.

It was disconcerting to be back in a house so richly furnished and the itch of discomfort would not cease under his skin. His grandmother's dog looked up at him dolefully from the rug at his feet, liquid brown eyes blinking sleepily. For a moment he wished he could settle into this life again so easily, to not feel the need to jump to his feet to take the silver tray of refreshments from the maid who had served them earlier, but knew that was something he could never do. He had struggled against this life for as long as he could remember having an opinion and nothing could change that, not even his love for his grandmother.

Not that Eloise was a selfish woman in the least and undoubtedly an inspiration to many for her philanthropic works…but she still lived in a way that did not sit easily with him. The life of silver tea services and a new gown for every ball and servants and rules and restriction and tradition…the life he had left behind and never missed.

"Nonsense," she replied, her voice snapping him back to the room and his feeling of misplacement. "I've known both of you since you were born and you are each a match of the other." She took a sip of her drink to punctuate her declaration. "Make no mistake of it, Julien, for Jerome to lose an arm, even fighting bravely for something he believed in, is a tragedy…but it does not somehow make him braver or more worthy than you." She eyed him closely. "Some wounds, though unseen, can be just as painful as a missing limb."

He met her gaze and smiled reassuringly. "I know," he said, "and I am trying to remember that. But…"

"Guilt is something not easily healed," she finished for him. "I do understand, Julien. I may not have fought in a war, but I have felt guilt for many years about pushing you away from your parents."

He looked at her quizzically. "Why would you ever think you did?"

She shrugged elegantly. "I may have encouraged your ideas too eagerly, fanned the animosity between you and your father a little too much. I suppose much of it stemmed from the fact that I could never understand what your mother saw in the man…but, and it has taken me some years to realise this, your mother knows what makes her happy far better than I do. And if her happiness happens to be wrapped up in the stubborn, close-minded, if well-meaning man that is Jacques Enjolras, then I shall have to keep my opinions to myself."

Enjolras raised a sceptical eyebrow at this. The idea of Eloise Mayle keeping her opinions to herself sounded highly unlikely – in fact some kind of divine intervention or saintly vow of silence might be needed for such a thing to become a reality.

She huffed in response. "Well, maybe not keep them completely to myself. I may merely attempt to help the man see the error of his ways by polite and fair argument. Even if it does very little for your father it may at least get Daniella on my side and I will do anything to try and mend the rift between your mother and I."

"A very wise young woman suggested something similar to me," he said, smiling slightly at memories of Aimee. "Perhaps we can span the gap together?"

"Perhaps," she replied, her mouth turning up at the corner as his did. "I'm assuming you haven't been to see them yet?"

He shook his head. "I wanted to see you first, of course," he said, giving the flattery with a grin that she received with an inclination of her head. "But I just wanted to take in the country. It's been so many years since I was here last and if I'm to do some good here I feel I need to learn it again."

Though he had little idea of what good he could do. He was basically penniless, with an incomplete university education and very little chance of passing the bar, not that was even sure he wanted to be a lawyer, which left him with even fewer options than he had started with. All he wanted was find where he fit in, where he could do the most good…where he belonged. For some time he had found that with the Amis and with a life devoted to the revolution, but that chapter had ended with the collapse of the Musain; there was nothing left to go back to. No matter how hard you tried, you can't recreate the past to live in it again. Moving forwards was the only route for him now…he just had yet to find the right path.

Eloise nodded in understanding, her eyes lighting up as she obviously recalled some piece of important news. "Speaking of doing good," she said, setting aside her glass and giving him her full focus, "there is this dear little school that has been set up near Lourmarin, you know, the little village that we used to ride through all the time when you were younger, before your father bought the new house on the other side of the valley. A young lady who has just moved back from Paris, like you, has turned her house into a girls' school. I don't know if you remember it – an excellent jeweller and clock-maker used to live there, her father I believe, though I don't know what happened to him. I keep meaning to pay her a visit, but I haven't found the time yet…Julien, dear, are you feeling quite well?"

Enjolras was barely breathing, staring at his grandmother in shock. It couldn't be, could it? Could this be the answer to his rushed, awkward prayer, on his knees by his bedside, asking for a path to be revealed to him? Was this a sign that what he longed for was where he was supposed to be?

Even as Eloise asked him again if he was feeling alright another voice, a soft small voice that had begun to speak to him in his weeks of thought and decision, prompted him.

Go to her, it said. Go to her and find your purpose together.

"Grandmama," he interrupted dazedly. "I know this may sound incredibly rude of me, but…I'm afraid I have to leave immediately."

"Leave?" She gave him a startled look and as he launched to his feet he heard her intake of breath as realisation hit.

"Your 'wise young woman' that you spoke of wouldn't happen to be the same one, recently returned from Paris, who has set up this school in the old jeweller's house, would it?" she asked, rising with him and catching him by the sleeve. "Do you know Mademoiselle Lyon?"

He paused and looked at her, a sudden smile lighting his face. "Indeed I do," he replied, his veins buzzing with the need to move, to go.

"Then I suggest you borrow a horse," Eloise said, understanding filling her eyes. "Walking will take you an hour or more. As the crow flies, if you remember the way, it may halve your journey."

He began to protest but she held up a hand. "By the look on your face, dear boy, I doubt this is a social visit that can wait. Leave your bags here and go and see her. It has been a reunion a long time coming, I suspect."

It had. Nearly two months, in fact, since he had last seen her, rattling away from the city in a coach very similar to the one that had brought him home. "Thank you," he said, his acquiescence implied. "Do you still have Ochre? I saw you hunt on him for years; with that massive stride of his he'll get me there in no time and he never puts a foot wrong over hedges and walls."

His grandmother's face twisted in regret. "No, not anymore," she admitted. "I took a fall last year and the doctor…" she waved off his words of concern, "I was fine, but the idiot doctor insisted I couldn't ride any more. And you know your mother, especially when she has your father behind her – there was no possibility of me getting on a horse ever again. I have a little carriage now but it's in town for repairs and the carriage horse threw a shoe, so the only horse I have, I'm afraid, is…Equinox."

At this Enjolras groaned. Equinox had been his horse from when he was fourteen up to when he left. It was a magnificent gelding, dark brown with white markings, and every other boy he knew was green with envy, even Courfeyrac, who had been Enjolras' hunting partner. However, to say that he was a challenging mount would be an enormous understatement.

"I have survived too much," he said between gritted teeth, "to have my neck broken by that psychotic horse."

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic, Julien" his grandmother sniffed, ringing her small silver hand bell to call a servant. "He's not insane, merely…enthusiastic."

Equinox was indeed 'enthusiastic' when Enjolras leapt onto his back ten minutes later, tossing his head and sniffing the air, eager for a run despite the grey hairs in his coat that suggested he was not as young as he once was. Enjolras could barely hold the horse still long enough to jam his feet into the stirrups and call back a thank you before they were clattering out of the yard at a sharp trot. It became a near gallop once they hit grass and then they were speeding away across the fields.

Clinging to Equinox's back with his knees, bent low over his neck like a jockey, Enjolras watched the ground disappear beneath him in a blur, each fluid stride taking him ever closer to his new beacon of hope.

The cool mountain breeze whisked its way through Aimee's hair as she straightened momentarily from digging in the garden, the zephyr tickling the wooden chimes hung from the arbour behind her. She closed her eyes and let it wash over and around her, so clean and fresh compared to the conflicting stenches of Paris.

To banish the ghostly aftertaste of smoke and blood she filled her lungs deeply and bent her head to her work again, refusing to remember the nightmare that had woken her early that morning. Though time had passed and she was safe at home, some nights the past echoed too loudly in her mind, bringing with it phantom faces and shadows and guilt so thick it felt as if The Patron was once again gripping her throat. Several times she awoken herself screaming with bile rising from her stomach at the imagined feel of blood on her skin, it's source ranging from herself to her father to Enjolras to The Patron. On nights like this she abandoned any more thought of sleep and sat downstairs, wrapped in a blanket, playing the piano or reading the small black Scriptures given to her by the kindly priest from the church on Margo's street until the sun rose and another busy day opened up before her.

It had been nearly two months since she had returned home, to the joy of the townspeople who had been left with no word from either of them and completely ignorant of what had befallen them. Even the village priest, a barrel-chested, serious man, had been unable to discover anything when he had undertaken the long journey to Paris earlier in the spring. For all intents and purposes, both father and daughter had fallen off the face of the earth. Their house had been shut up, the garden left to go to seed, and their names had become associated with mystery and sorrow.

So when Aimee had wandered into town some eight weeks earlier they had swarmed around to help get her back on her feet, helping her open up the house again and, after some persuasion, sent their daughters to school with her. Even this far from Paris the revolution had made an impact: people spoke more freely and were eager for both their sons and daughters to hold some kind of education to get ahead in this new world that was being created before their eyes.

There were fifteen girls, aged six to fifteen, under her tutorage learning to read, write, do basic mathematics and science, as well as to sing, sew, and cook. It kept her busy and earned a modest wage. Coupled with the decent amount of cash her father had saved in the local bank she could safely say that she was happy and comfortable, if very busy. Not that she minded being busy, but it was quiet moments like this, tending to the garden her mother and father had grown together, that gave her chance to think and wonder; hands in the dirt but her thoughts very much farther away.

The set of wooden wind chimes stirred again in the breeze as she attacked the weeds with vigour, pushing away the soft, romantic thoughts that had begun to unfurl in her mind's eye – dancing in the apartment, walking hand in hand through the city, stolen kisses in the stairwell of the Musain. All memories that were dear to her…but memories which were also painful without Enjolras. Though alone in the garden she glanced around self-consciously as she cuffed a tear from her eye. Enjolras had his own problems to solve and questions to answer if he was to heal and she had more than enough to be doing without wasting time sighing like a heroine from a romantic novel.

But somehow, she couldn't get him out of her thoughts today. The letter she had received a few weeks earlier from Eponine and Combeferre had mentioned that he was doing well, keeping busy connecting loved ones with their relatives who had died in the fighting. One from two days ago sent by Margo, written in Musichetta's blocky writing – for she was now living with the kindly widow – said that Enjolras was planning on going home, which she was glad of, truly. His family, and him, came before any ideas of romance.

Pleased to have rationalised the issue to herself, she rose to her feet to dead-head her mother's yellow roses. Despite the state the garden had fallen into, the beautiful flowers had battled through and after a little taming were almost back to the elegant tangles of floral sunshine of which Leonora had been so proud. Humming to herself Aimee was soon lost in her task, moving methodically from one elegant green stem to the next. Time lost its meaning as she worked, mind blissfully blank and her world reduced to the flowers in front of her. After a while she knelt to continue weeding around their roots, noting that she would need to dig some more manure into the bed that autumn; the soil was looking poor. So caught up was she in her task that when a voice called from directly above her she jumped upwards with a gasp, brandishing her gardening fork like a weapon.

The horse on the other side of the low hedge surrounding the garden startled violently at the sudden movement, leaping to the side in a half rear of alarm. His rider, caught off guard as much as his horse, pitched sideways out of the saddle with a yelp of surprise to land with a thump on the floor.

Horrified, Aimee immediately hurried to the gate, letting herself out into the lane and approaching the pair with cautious steps. The horse eyed her suspiciously as his rider groaned and curled inwards, obviously a little winded and bruised, but made no movement as she grasped the dangling reins and looped them loosely over a branch in the hedge. It would stop the horse from wandering away but would release quickly is it spooked again.

The rider was still on the floor, gasping softly. Now feeling more than slightly worried she crouched down beside him and laid a hand experimentally on the man's shoulder.

"I'm so sorry; I didn't mean to scare your horse. I was just a little surprised…" Her words trailed off as the fallen rider rolled onto his back.

Enjolras blinked up at her for minute, dried grass in his hair that hung long around his face, looking a little dazed. All of her words stopped in her throat in shock and confusion. What was he doing here?

After pushing himself slowly into a sitting position he gave her a crooked grin that made her heart catch for the first time in forever.

"I'll live," he said reassuringly, throwing his horse a dirty look. "It's not the first time Equinox has dumped me onto the floor…though I hope it's the last."

"I was so lost in my thoughts I didn't hear you ride up," she admitted, hauling him to his feet and allowing him to brace himself on her shoulder for a moment to find his balance. "I didn't mean for you to come off."

"It doesn't matter," he said, waving the issue off as he looked up at house, a modest two storey affair in weather stone. "I shouldn't have startled you like that. So…this is home?"

His sudden, and unusual, arrival had thrown her off balance as effectively as Equinox had him. Why was everything with their relationship so…bizarre?

"I can see why you wanted to come back," he said, peering at the garden. "I'd forgotten how beautiful it was here; how peaceful."

"Julien, what are doing here?" she asked, maybe a little more sharply than she had intended. "And why are you on a horse, with no luggage? I thought you were going to see your family?"

"I did," he replied, cocking his head a little, quizzically. "Wait…did you want me to write to you first before I came to see you? I mean, I would have but I forgot to get the address from Combeferre and you didn't give it to me yourself." Contrition touched his voice. "I didn't mean to come barging back into your life, honestly, I just –"

"Julien!" she cut in. "Of course I'm glad to see you; more than glad, in fact."

He grinned at that, the expression that had appeared so seldom before sitting comfortably now on his face.

"I'm just a little surprised, that's all," she added more gently. "But definitely happy to see you."

"It's understandable you're surprised," he nodded, looking around the garden again as he thought. "Do you have any stables?" he asked eventually. "Or a tie-up post? I may not be fond of him, but I don't want to leave Equinox out on the road. He could get stolen and I wouldn't want someone else to be burdened with his difficult self. Would I?"

This last question was directed to the horse, who only snorted once and gave them both a very disdainful stare.

"There's a paddock around the back, actually," Aimee replied, still finding it difficult convince herself that he was actually here, with her, at her home. It wasn't that it felt strange necessarily, seeing him there in a setting that, to her, was the most personal and familiar sight she knew. It was simply that he looked so right here that the longing for them to be together, here, in a place she knew and loved with the man she wanted to get to know and learn to love for the rest of her life…it was so powerful it nearly crushed her heart with want.

Enjolras un-looped the reins from the hedge and led the horse around the side of the house, finding the empty paddock easily as if he had lived here all of his life. In mere minutes he removed the tack and turned the horse loose, stopping to stand and watch him with a somewhat reproachful but strangely fond gaze. Something about him had changed, she decided. There had been a loosening, an unbinding, a reforming of what had been there before. It was still all Enjolras, but just…calmer…freer…more hopeful. It sat well on his shoulders, she decided, shoulders that had definitely broadened since she had seen him last. He was beautiful and she wanted him to never leave again, but she couldn't repeat what they had shared together in Paris. If they were to move forward it had to be stronger than that.

"Julien," she asked again, leaning beside him on the old wooden fence. "Why are you here? I thought you had gone home? Or at least that's what Musichetta told me in her last letter."

"I did," he replied, turning to look at her, the light catching his eyes and making them shine. "I arrived this afternoon and went to visit my grandmother first. Rebuilding some bridges, as you suggested."

"Then why are you here?" she asked slowly, wanting to wipe away the smudge of dirt across his cheekbone.

He smiled at that, a smile that she couldn't quite fathom. "She happened to mention that a young woman from Paris had set up a school in one of the local villages. That her father was a jeweller and clock-maker and that she was doing a lot of good." He held her eyes with his own steadily. "I knew it was you and…I had to come and see you."

The moment suddenly felt too intimate, like he had peered down to her soul to see the cracks and repairs there. It was too much, too quickly, and she broke away from it as instinctively as if she had touched a hot kitchen range.

"It has been a while," she agreed mildly, pushing away from the fence and beginning to walk back towards the house. "So what have you been doing since I saw you last?"

Enjolras fell into step beside her as if it were the most natural thing in the world, clasping his hands behind his back. He seemed to be thinking deeply about something.

"A lot of different things," he said slowly, "each of them ones I needed to do, for my sake as well as for the sake of those I helped. Some administration work, trying to locate bodies of loved ones for families, no matter what their social standing – that nonsense seems to be breaking down in Paris somewhat thank heavens – to allow for burial."

"Combeferre wrote to me and said you helped Courfeyrac to get home, finding transport and nurses and such," Aimee said, on instinct walking towards the bench beneath the honeysuckle arbour. "He also said that Musichetta has taken your old rooms at Margo's house and is planning on staying there until after the baby is born and possibly permanently if she can find enough work, not that Margo will let her go without a fight. Oh, and Annette and Feuilly are finally getting married. It'll be a few months, of course, but still, he's actually asked her and she said yes. Musichetta wrote and said she wouldn't be surprised if Eponine and Combeferre get engaged fairly soon, though I'm sure Eponine will take some time to come around to the idea. Not that she doesn't love Combeferre, but she won't think it's a good idea for reasons that only make sense to her and…" She saw the smile he was smothering as he nodded attentively, settling back onto the bench. "And…" she said with a self-depreciating smile, "you already know all of this because you've just come from Paris and I'm just babbling now. Sorry."

He laughed and shook his head. "Don't apologise," he said. "I've missed the sound of your voice." His hand tentatively came to rest a hair's breadth away from hers on the bench seat. "I've missed you."

Her little finger slowly curled over the top of his. "I've missed you too," she whispered, flickering her eyes up and finding his waiting. "But I want to start afresh, Julien. I don't want to just pick up where we left off because none of that was real. The people we were, the relationship we had…it wasn't who we really were, not for either of us."

"I know," he replied, completely earnest. "I know that now, but I do want to try again. Not just for me, but for you." Done with the pretence he grasped her hands warmly in his and turned to face her, their knees resting lightly together. "I never felt at home where I grew up. It never…fitted me. I mean, I went to the dinners and the hunts and had discussions with the right people and danced with the right girls, but it always felt suffocating, like I was an actor playing myself in a stage show that happened to be my life. Of course, I can see now that my parents were only trying to do what they thought was best for me in the only way they knew how. But I didn't know that when I was younger and so…I ran. I ran because I was looking for something I thought I couldn't find here and for a time I did find it. I found it in the Cause, I found it in my studies; I found it in my friends. Yet even then," he paused, gathering his words to place them in the right order, "yet even then I felt I always needed something…more." His finger skimmed her eye socket and she pushed into the touch of his hand, eyes falling shut. "What I didn't realise, for the longest time, was that the something more I was looking for…was you."

Aimee thought she might cry with everything she was feeling. To know that he felt it too, to know that there was nothing hanging over their heads but the promise of a brighter tomorrow, a tomorrow spent together pushed a tear from beneath her closed eyelids. She opened them to the feel of Enjolras smoothing the droplet away across her cheek.

"I know I'm not perfect," he whispered, "and I know that each of us carries things we may never be able to let go of…but I want to start again. Here. With you." He tipped his forehead against hers. "You saved my life when everything else in it seemed to have ended…I want to do it right this time for you…if you'll have me."

What she wanted to say almost couldn't be put into words, but for him she tried, turning her head and pressing a kiss to his palm. "I will have you, Julien Enjolras, now and forever. We have both made mistakes and missteps, but unlike so many we get to start again. The people whose relationship started with you saving my life and ended with me saving yours…we have to let them stay in the past where they belong. They may have been our beginning…but our future is what we make it."

"Does that mean I can kiss you now," he breathed against her lips, eyes never leaving hers.

"It does," she murmured, Enjolras pulling the final syllable into his own mouth from hers.

It was a kiss that marked a new beginning of an old story; deep but innocent. They held each other close for a long breath, fingers tangled in hair and eyes pressed lightly shut to savour the sensations.

When they broke apart they did not go far, but stayed resting their foreheads together, rediscovering the complexities of each other's eyes.

"You know," Aimee began lightly, "I do happen to have a place available for a schoolmaster here."

Enjolras pulled back a little, eyebrows raised in interest, the corner of his mouth quirking up. "You do, do you?"

"Mmhm," she hummed, nudging the tips of their noses together. "I can only teach to a certain level in the more academic subjects and I feel like some of these girls could do so much if given the chance."

"And you think I can give that to them?" He glanced away, up to the sky as if his answer was held within the skipping white clouds. "Combeferre did always say education was the way to better a nation," he said, almost to himself.

"We could also take on some boys if you were here to help me," Aimee prompted, twining one of his longer errant curls around her finger. "Educate the next generation together?"

He leant in and kissed her once more, the passion he had thought lost forever warming his bones once again. "I can think of nothing I would rather do," he said against her lips.

She pulled back to smile at him, everything perfectly slotting into place for the first time.

"Then welcome home."

Et Fin

A/N Holy fudge. It's finished…

I want to thank each and every person who has ever reviewed this story. Because of your encouragement this little idea I had nearly two and half years ago has grown and blossomed into something of which I am truly proud to be the author.

I want to thank my Mum, for talking with me for hours about the plot as we rode on horseback through the country lanes in all weathers, encouraging me, editing some truly shocking first drafts, and refusing to let me get away with lazy writing.

And, as weird as it sounds, I want to thank these characters for coming to play with me. For hanging around in my brain and enduring all of the crap I have thrown at them. You have made me a far better writer than I ever thought I could be. I don't know if I will write a Les Mis fic of this length again, but it has let me know that I can do it. (Watch my page for more updates).

As a final request, well, two final requests actually, to you amazing people who have read this story, I ask this of you.

Please review. I know it sounds like I'm begging, but even just a quick goodbye would mean the world to me. I want to see just how many people this story has touched, because that it why I do it. For you.

And secondly, as the 'end credits' song, as if were, please go and listen to 'Bottled Up Tight' by Luke Sital-Singh. It truly is the perfect for this story. If you want to tell me your 'end credits' song for A Different Version of Events, please do. I'd love to hear what your suggestions are.

Thank you once again, mes amis. Goodbye and bless you.

Libz xxx