It only took a moment for Daveney to catch a glimpse of Joly's figure marching away from the restaurant towards a square across the street. She watched for carriages before she lifted the material of her dress and scurried off after him. She was an image of pastel green and white moving through the stone streets. Her mother would have told her that proper ladies never scurried but she was hardly thinking about her image at that moment. Daveney's own siblings were nothing like her or the ABC boys so she understood some of the discomfort Joly was feeling. Her older brother had refused an offer to join the ABC just months before he accepted a position in a governmental office, caring more about upward movement than the people below. They rarely spoke to each other now unless it was in formality or bitterness. Daveney hoped that things would not progress the same way for Joly and Barthelemy.

Joly stopped at a stone bench in the square, sitting down before he threw his face into his hands. Daveney's step quickened once more until she found her place beside him on the bench. He flinched slightly as her hand came to the top of his back but his muscles relaxed once he looked up to see who his company was.

There was a silence between them that could have lasted hours but it wasn't uncomfortable like some silences were. The entire world continued to move around them as people walked through the square and carried on about their day. Now that Daveney had stopped running there was absolutely nothing unusual about this scene, it was just a young woman and a young man sitting together. Daveney's eyes remained on Joly as he raked his fingers through his hair, trying to calm himself down mentally before he spoke. Joly had always been careful about what words he used but he knew in such a frenzy he couldn't trust his own tongue. He had been ready to have it out with his brother right in the middle of the restaurant and that wasn't like him at all. He was struggling to pull his regular self out of this pit that Barthelemny had sent him into. Joly had felt sadness before but he had never experienced such a back-stabbing level of betrayal.

"I don't understand how he could do this." Joly finally spoke, his words hitting to the ground as his gaze remained there.

"I'm sure he has a reason." Daveney replied, hoping for Joly's sake that the reason was a good one. "You'll just need to talk to him."

"Courfeyrac shouldn't have pulled me out there." Joly's words were as scattered as his thoughts. He couldn't pick through all the things rushing in his head in a logical order so the statement just seemed to fall out out of nowhere.

"I don't disagree." Daveney nodded, thinking of Courfeyrac's asinine need to throw himself into every conflict as if he was the only one who could solve anything. Daveney had been aware of the danger Joly faced by confronting officers but she had seen solutions other than just sending Joly away with force. She would have intervened in a softer manner, knowing that for once her femininity would have been in her favor. Men softened their words and their actions around women like Daveney and her friends so it would have been easy to pull Joly out of the situation with words and a flirtatious smile. Stooping to such a low might have bothered Daveney in the long run but it would have removed Joly out of the situation without the embarrassing confrontation he had had with Courfeyrac. "He's hot-headed and cocksure, but you can't let him get to you."

Joly managed to let go of the shortest laugh possible, amused by Daveney's distaste. "And here I thought you liked him."

Daveney welcomed the shift in topic. She had come out here to console Joly but the truth was she had always been better at joking around than dealing with the emotional side of things. Daveney always did her best to make people smile or laugh, even at her own expense but it was Adelaide who was better as consoling people in their time of needs. Daveney would play the part of the thoughtful listener when needed but she usually found it difficult to find the words to say at the end of it all.

"Courfeyrac is well..."
"He's Courfeyrac." Joly offered with another laugh.
"Exactly." their laughter mixed as Joly's head lifted to look to his companion. She leaned

over and rested her head on his shoulder, feeling him relax even more into their closeness. "You mustn't let them get to you Joly, you're far too good of a man for that." Daveney hated the idea of watching Joly become lost to cynicism and pessimism like some of the other men. It was far too uplifting to have a little spite like him reminding them all to smile in dark times. He was a flame in the group that brought light and warmth instead of destruction and passion. Most of the men burned with such a passion that they got swept up by the lightest of wind but Joly's fire was something different and it was truly infectious. Daveney found herself that much happier in his presence and she would hate to lose that.

"I just don't understand." he said, his voice falling again, making Daveney wish she had stayed off the topic. "None of it makes sense."

"I know." she had no explanations for him, after all she was as shocked as anyone to see Barthelemy in uniform and sitting at a table with men of the law. The lawmen were not their true enemies but they were pawns for the aristocracy which meant they had to be watched with a careful eye.

Daveney lifted her head from Joly's shoulder and tried to get a good glimpse at his face, wondering if she had come to gain some of Laurel's talents for reading expressions. It was clear that Joly was in pain but Daveney wanted to know more so she could try and figure out some way to reduce it. She didn't like to watch people suffer which was exactly the main reason she had aligned herself with the ABC boys. There were days when she wished she wasn't vexed by her sex and had more of a chance to move among their ranks and contribute. The girls had been permitted into the meetings at the inn but Daveney had aways found that the more of them that came the less serious the talk was. Enjolras had always continued on with his plans and his rants in their presence but the other men had been easily distracted. Daveney would have killed for the chance to move amongst them without affecting their ways.

Daveney had been a tom boy in her youth, going so far as to cut her hair short with a pair of scissors. She had insisted on pretending to be her brother in games when he was not around and had gone so far to call herself David at times. She grew out of that act as her mother threw her into dresses and her body started to change into that of a young woman but Daveney didn't lose that little tom boy completely. She fussed less about dresses and allowed her face to be painted when necessary but for the most part she preferred the days when she was permitted to wear pantaloons and her hair was allowed to be tied back with one small ribbon. Those days without hairpins or heavy makeup allowed Daveney to feel more like herself than ever. She hoped that the revolution would do more than just free the impoverished from their shackles but that it would also allow women some more freedom in their dress and their behaviour.

"The others must think me a fool." Joly spoke once more, his thoughts bouncing back and forth through the entire debacle.

"We were all as shocked as you were. No one thinks less of you Joly, I assure you." Daveney reached over and took his hand in his, squeezing gently to provide him with some comfort. Despite Adelaide's natural tendency to be the nurturing one, Joly was actually happy that it had been Daveney of all people to come out here. He worried the others would have scolded him for making such a scene or perhaps even provoked him into going back inside to finish what he started. At the very bottom of it all Joly knew he didn't want to pick a fight with his brother in public. The idea of fighting family was exactly what had set him off in the first place. He wondered if Barthelemy even realized that by wearing that uniform he had positioned himself against his own brother and all of their friends. Enjolras always talked about how the uprising would come and that it was just a matter of time too so Joly wondered if it would come too quickly to save his brother from fighting on the other side. If Barthemely didn't smarten up they would be shooting at each other and it wouldn't be completely unthinkable for one to die at the hands of the other.

A breeze swept through the square, loosening a bit of Daveney's hair out of the bun that the rest was neatly tucked into. She moved her hand off of Joly's back and pulled the strand of her back out of her face, catching his attention with her minute movements. His fists unclenched and his shoulders dropped slightly, not into a slouch but into a more comfortable position. "I wish you hadn't bet on Grantaire."

"What?" Daveney was astonished not only by Joly's words but by the way he was looking at her.

"Well, I'm planning on competing as well." he said, giving her a sheepish smile.

Blushing wasn't something that Daveney did often and yet she felt a hint of pink creeping onto her cheeks in a way that made her quite comfortable. She liked to believe she was a fortress when it came to not being swayed by men's affections. She actually considered herself cursed by her own beauty, not in a way that was vain or childish but in such a thought that she worried her looks detracted from her interactions. Joly was being sweet but she hoped he wasn't getting whisked away in some fairytale just because of her beauty. The idea of things getting messy or complicated between the two of them scared her, especially as she felt her heart speed up a little bit as he reached over to take her hand.

"Shall we go back inside and have lunch?"
"Are you sure?"
"Well Grantaire did say you looked famished didn't he?" the jest earned Joly a small slap

on the arm but it caused him to smile and that was something Daveney was proud of. Joly stood from the stone bench in a small leap up and then held his arm out for his female companion, helping her up and leading her away from the square. This time Daveney didn't scurry across the street, instead she trusted Joly as her guide as they stepped in time together, heading back towards the restaurant. Joly froze only for a moment as they hit the curb before the restaurant just in time to encounter his brother and the lawmen exiting. The chilled look Joly gave his brother made Barthelemy hang his head before pushing past them to catch up with his company. Joly said nothing but a small squeeze on his arm from Daveney had him unclench his jaw before they reentered the restaurant.

The table of their friends seemed to stop the frenzy of their chatter as the two absent members of their company returned. Everyone turned their head to the duo who sat back down in their seats beside each other. Courfeyrac was the only one who didn't bother to look at Joly or Daveney. He had been scolded by the rest of the company for his interference and now for once he was quite silent.

"We weren't sure if you were coming back but we waited to order." Combeferre said with a warming smile.

"Yes, so you two better know what you're having because I'm starving." Prouvaire chimed in, creating a rumble around the table and pulling a laugh from Joly's lips. Everyone seemed to take the chuckle as a cue to relax, they could discuss the unfortunate situation with Barthemely later but for now they could just enjoy their luncheon. Grantaire's bottles of wine had come and after such an altercation Joly was relieved to have the sweet nectar calm his nerves. He drank his first glass quite quickly, finding that it helped him settle back into the conversation of the table with ease.

The group had mere minutes after ordering their meals to actually enjoy their conversation. The first disturbance was forgotten but a second came on swift wings that seemed keen to ruin the day. A young man in a plain navy suit appeared at their table, his chest heaving with harsh breaths that showed the urgency in him. "Miss Adelaide?" the man was unfamiliar to the group which was why he mistook Daveney as her friend. Both girls looked similar with blue eyes and brown hair but at the mention of her name Adelaide rose from the table, catching the messenger's eyes and attention. The men of the table rose also, their formality mirroring the situation earlier where Daveney had left their presence. The young man in the navy suit pushed forward, coming around the table to stand before the risen girl. "I'm sorry," he apologized for the confusion. "Miss Adelaide I have a message for you."

"Go on then." she said, not understanding his secracy.
"You're father has returned to the hospital."
"I need to go." Adelaide did not need the rest of the message, within a flash she appeared

more urgent than the messenger. She picked her gloves off the table in a frenzy, dropping one carelessly and finding it difficult to bend in her dress to retrieve it. What did it matter? She had a dozen more pairs where that came from but she only had one father.

Bahorel picked the glove up quickly as he watched with a worried look as Adelaide went to the door. "I'll accompany her." the man spoke to the others, allowing them to sink back into their seats, worried looks written on their faces as two more of their company abandoned their table for the outside.

Bahorel caught the carriage door before Adelaide could be locked inside. "To the hospital." he nodded to the driver before he closed the door behind him and took a seat across from Adelaide. His hands gently moved some of the taffeta pink of her dress, making sure none of it fell underneath his brown leather boots. Bahorel was used to speaking up only when he had a witty comment or something important to say so now words were lost on him as he looked upon the worried face of the girl across from him. Instead of speaking he reached across the carriage and slid Adelaide's discarded glove onto her hand, taking the other one for her to put it on as well. It was a gentle motion but one that was meant to calm her, instead it brought her to tears.

"I'm sorry." Bahorel whispered, regretting the decision to make such a move. He hated to see such an image of beauty in so much pain. Everyone was well aware that Adelaide's father had been ill; he had been in and out of the hospital for almost a month now. Now, just as things seemed to be looking up it appeared that there had been a downfall. Bahorel hoped for Adelaide's sake that it was nothing too serious but he would stay with her as long as she wanted him there. His hands fell upon her dress again, shifting it gently so he could move across the carriage to sit beside her, feeling that a physical closeness might make it easier to comfort her. He hesitated, moving his arm back to place it around her but not actually touching her incase she did cry more.

Adelaide's breath heaved as she found it hard to take in air between the sobs and the tightness of her corset. As she felt Bahorel's arm hovering around her she took it as a silent invitation to move in closer to him. She practically threw her head into his chest, hiding her face against him and taking in his protection. She usually wouldn't have acted to informal in public, even in a closed carriage but at that moment her emotions got the best of her. Make-up was no doubt running down from her eyes, likely staining Bahorel's clothing but that did not stop him from pulling her closer, his arms now wrapped around her tightly as if he could take away her pain in such a way. He knew there was little he could do but support Adelaide here and hopefully calm her down. He had no more words to whisper in the creaking wooden carriage so he simply allowed her to do what she needed to.

The carriage ride felt like a lifetime for Adelaide and although she felt safe in Bahorel's arms, his closeness did not ease her worry. She did not give the messenger time to tell her what was wrong exactly so her mind began to imagine all of the worst things. Her deepest fear was that she would not get there in time, that he would be gone before she even stepped inside the hospital. It took over her, eliciting heavier sobs from her lips as she began to picture her father's body laying lifeless in the room as she entered.

Bahorel's arms pulled Adelaide closer to him, instinctively thinking that such a move would calm her but in this silence Adelaide was left to the disastrous effects of her thoughts. As a child, Adelaide had developed the most vivid imagination. She had no brothers or sisters so she had often been left on her own, needing to create entertainment for herself. Rather than falling into lonliness Adelaide had made up entire worlds in her bedroom that consisted of lives she would never live. All the minute details of her special worlds had remained in her head for quite sometime but as she aged she began to lose the images of those spaces she had created. Still, she retained her wondrous ability to create and although she felt no need to make up worlds to escape into she did have a tendency of imagining scenarios within her own world. Today that tendency was not working in her favor.

"Adelaide," Bahorel's voice was hesitant but strong as he realized he needed to do more to calm her. "It's going to be okay." but what if it wasn't? He could only tell her what he hoped to be true but the fact was that Adelaide's father had been ill for a while now and his condition did not appear to be improving. This hospitalization would likely only make matters worse and Bahorel assumed that it would make things even harder for Adelaide. He had been young when he had lost his family so much of his suffering had been repressed and lost to him. The figures of his parents danced in his mind like silvery ghosts but they were nothing more than that. Bahorel knew that if Adelaide lost her father now she would never be able to forget him.

The carriage came to a sudden half, jolting the two of them forward slightly. They had arrived. Bahorel threw the carriage door open before the footman could even descend from his perch. With urgency he stepped out of the carriage and held his hand out for Adelaide, helping her out so they could get a move on. Bahorel stopped only for a moment to lift wipe some of the dark makeup underneath Adelaide's eyes, not minding her disheveled look himself but knowing that eventually she would look in a mirror and the sight would only upset her more. Bahorel had never seen Adelaide looking anything other than stunning so it was clear she put effort and time into her appearance. He didn't want her to have an even worse day than she was already having because she didn't like her reflection.

In truth there was nothing that Bahorel could do to put Adelaide back together. Until the girl knew that her father was going to be okay she was going to be in shambles. Bahorel was right to believe that her appearance mattered to her but she was not so shallow to place her looks at a higher level of importance than her family. Her family would always come first to her. She moved away from his hands and didn't worry about taking his arm again as she moved towards the hospital doors.

The Hotel-Dieu was one of the older hospitals in Paris but it was known for excellent care and high standards. Adelaide knew her father would have insisted coming here the moment he felt ill again, preferring to stick with familiar doctors instead of bouncing around with people he didn't know.

Monsieur Pinard was a proud man and he was not the type of man who would ever be marching alongside Adelaide's schoolboy friends. Adelaide's came from old aristocratic money and they thrived in it. Even here at the hospital Pinard received the best treatment a man could buy because he did in fact buy it. He paid doctors to keep his secret, hating the idea that anyone would think of him as a dying man. In the public's eyes he was perfectly well, Adelaide's friends only knew of Pinard's sickness because Adelaide had been unable to keep her emotions locked inside like her father would have liked.

Adelaide's pale pink dress stood out against the bland white walls of the hospital as she glided through the halls, gaining directors from nurses and other orderlies until she found herself in the correct location. Adelaide reached her father's room just at the same moment as someone was leaving it.

For the second time today Barthelemy showed up in a shocking way. He exited the room without a word as he caught the eyes of Bahorel and then Adelaide. Both of them were mentally questioning what he was doing here but neither one of them dared to ask. Barthelemy stood out like a sore thumb in his new uniform. The navy coat with a white cross overtop of it and red trimmings was quite casual from the brown and tan coloured clothing that they were used to seeing him in. Even his fair was different and for once his face was clean-shaven. He seemed shocked to see them there, clearly having thought he would have been gone before Adelaide arrived.

Adelaide had no time to question Barthelemy or even worry about his presence. Instead the girl pushed forward, leaving Bahorel where he seemed to be frozen in the hallway. Adelaide needed to be with her father and even Barthelemy's odd appearance couldn't stop her from making that happened. The puff of pink disappeared into the hospital room just as Bahorel regained his ability to walk.

The two men stood in a standoff in the hallway, Barthelemy knowing that Bahorel could go after him as Joly had wanted to back at the restaurant. Here in the hallway he was alone with little explanations or protections that would stop Bahorel from hurting him. Bahorel was certainly more of a threat than Joly and Barthelemy was aware of that. He had wrestled and fenced with the man before and knew he was a more skilled fighter than he was. The last thing Barthelemy wanted was a brawl in the hospital but he knew how loyalties ran deep with the boys. In their eyes he had betrayed them and there was little he could say that would change that. What he could say he doubted they would believe.

Bahorel stepped up to Barthelemy, their heights about equal but there was a strength in Barthelemy's stance that was not mirrored in the other man. Barhelemy seemed much smaller than he had ever been. Over the summer he had shown himself as such a bolstered ball of energy with a booming voice and a hearty laugh but here he was but a timid man, too afraid to look his friend in the eye.

Bahorel's turned his head, looking in at the heart-wrenching scene inside the hospital room. Adelaide's pink dress fell in front of light blue bed sheets and her paling father. Monsieur Pinard turned his head slightly, exposing a large gouge on his neck that had clearly been covered by collars and scarves over the past couple weeks. Bahorel had thought the wound had happened at the beginning of the month but as he looked at the older man's neck he could have sworn he was looking at a fresh injury. It would have been useful to have had Combeferre here with his medical knowledge. Bahorel himself was a student of the law so wounds said nothing to him other than the fact that clearly an injustice had been done here against a sweet girl's father.

Unable to look at the wound for too long without feeling slightly sick Bahorel turned his attention back to Barthelemy. "What are you doing here?" he finally asked, trapping the other young man in the hallway with his words instead of his fist. "Did you have something to do with this?"

"No! How could you think that?" Barthelemy reacted quickly.

"Then why are you here?" Bahorel shifted away from the doorway so that he was standing in the middle of the hall. He became a physical barrier for Barthelemy, trapping him there until he explained himself.

"To check on him." Barthelemy's eyes remained down, even as he turned his head to look into the room.

"How did you even know he was here?" as a prospective lawyer Bahorel was being trained to see holes in stories and right now Barthelemy's was riddled with them.

"It's complicated." he deflected.
"You did this."
"No!" Barthelemy shouted in denial, refusing to be backed into a corner. He was

somewhat defeated after the troublesome encounter with Joly but that didn't mean he would completely break. He would not take blame for something he did not take part in. There seemed to be a shift in Barthelemy in that moment, he looked around anxiously before he opened his mouth again. "Look at him, no man did that to him."

Barthelemy's body turned towards the door as he looked inside. Pinard seemed to lift his head slightly in response to the confrontation outside of his room. His eyes connected with Barthelemy a stern look crossing his weak face before he rested his head back down upon his

pillow. Barthelemy knew he needed to get out of the hallway and move away from here before any more attention could be brought to Pinard but Bahorel still stood in his way.

"What are you trying to say?" Bahorel asked, confused by Barthelemy's cryptic words.

"We don't live in the world that you think we do." Barthelemy's words only confused Bahorel more.

"Clearly not with you in that uniform." it was a statement made to cut into Barthelemy and it did indeed wound him but for now he ignored the string.

"It'll all make sense eventually. You'll understand...you all will." With his words placed carefully between them Barthelemy found courage to step up against Bahorel. Bahorel's back straightened ready for a fight if it was to come. He welcomed a brawl when the opponent deserved a beating and after his behaviour today Bahorel saw Barthelemy as a worthy victim. To his disappointment Barthelemy just pushed past him. "You'll see." he muttered before he took off down the hall.

Barthelemy's pace quickened as he reached the stairwell that would free him from the hospital's containing grasp. He needed to take his jacket off and to breathe in some fresh autumn air. The warmth of the afternoon was stolen by the autumn breeze but Barthelemy welcomed the wind as he stepped outside and began to walk the length of the hospital. His day had been far more hectic than he had expected. Barthelemy knew that eventually his brother and their friends would find out about his new allegiance but he hadn't expected it to happen so soon. He had dropping out of university, leaving his school days behind him for a gun, a uniform and a secret that he wished he could tell his friends.

There was a reason Pinard's wound looked fresh despite the fact that he had been injured almost a month ago. There was also a reason why Pinard insisted on keeping his condition a secret. It was more than just his image as a societal man but his fear of what had happened to him. He had told his family he had been attacked by a wild dog but close inspection made it clear that the marks on his necks were from something much bigger. The members of the guard had been keeping tabs on Pinard's condition because of these mysterious facts and today their suspicions were confirmed by the freshness of his wounds. There had been no second attack but the first one was being awakened by the mere fact that tonight the moon would rise bright and full. After all, it hadn't been a wild dog that attacked Pinard, it had been a werewolf.