32

Gavroche came home that evening a bubble of pure excitement, with Courfeyrac, Prouvaire and Bahorel in tow.

He chattered excitedly about their day spent riding horses and how wonderful it had been, whilst the men chipped in occasionally to explain finer details. The horses themselves were kept on a farm not too far from the Guardian's building; the couple that ran it took in the spirits of horses that arrived there, and offered out riding lessons to anyone who wanted them. According to Courfeyrac, it was a massive, sprawling collection of stables in the middle of all the other houses, but it was in the opposite direction to anywhere Éponine had ever bothered walking.

"You could come next time," Courfeyrac suggested as she conjured them cakes to eat.

"I've never really wanted to ride a horse," Éponine said, breaking a bit of sponge cake off in her hand and popping it into her mouth. It tasted strongly of vanilla, was very sweet, and Gavroche would probably love it. Brushing the crumbs off her fingertips she held her hands over the top and imagined the appearance, texture and flavour of butter cream icing. "I also can't imagine it coming to much use here."

"It doesn't need a use," Bahorel said. "You just have to enjoy it."

"Yeah, 'Ponine," Gavroche said, bouncing around the room chasing Hyacinthe. "You can come next time. It was so much fun. Courfeyrac fell off a horse."

"It wasn't my most shining moment," Courfeyrac admitted. "But everyone else got a good laugh out of it."

"The thought of you falling off a horse would be my only incentive," she said, "Now stop pestering, please, and put this cake on the table."

Courfeyrac's lower lip jutted out as he accepted the plate off her. "Would you really find the idea of me falling off a horse that entertaining?"

"Of course I would." She conjured another plate, and began to work on conjuring some éclairs.

"You're cruel," Courfeyrac sighed, placing the plate and cake on the table. Prouvaire swooped onto it and dragged his finger through the thick layer of icing on top of the cake, then placing it in his mouth.

"Thank you for that," Éponine murmured, imagining chocolate on top of the cream-filled choux pastry fingers she had created.

"I was just testing it," Prouvaire objected, as Courfeyrac and Bahorel both gathered to mimic his actions. "We're all testing it," he added, the innocent expression he had arranged onto his face wilting somewhat under the force of Éponine's scowl.

"Can we eat now?" Gavroche whined, flopping onto the sofa, having tired of his game with the kitten. Hyacinthe hopped onto the sofa and then clambered onto the boy's stomach, crouching there and staring at Courfeyrac, Prouvaire and Bahorel with suspicious blue eyes.

"I'm just going to make some macaroons," Éponine said. "Bahorel, stop eating the icing and put these on the table, please. And no picking chocolate off the top!"

Bahorel took the plate off her, but disobeyed her final order by shoving an entire éclair in his mouth at once. He put the plate next to the cake and then braced his hands on the edges of the table, clearly struggling to chew the pastry he had crammed into his mouth.

Éponine shook her head as she began to conjure macaroons.

"Your cakes are almost as nice as Bérénice's," Prouvaire informed her.

"Really?" Éponine didn't believe him. "But she's a professional."

"And you could be one as well," Prouvaire said. "I like Bérénice, but the only good thing about having her around is the cakes she brings, and even that isn't necessarily worth the arguments her presence causes between Bossuet and Joly."

"It's a shame," Bahorel said. "They were so close. The offer is there, though, if you want to move in with Feuilly, Grantaire and I."

"After decorating the house to my specifications, I don't want to leave it," Prouvaire shrugged. "If anyone is leaving that house, it is those two, after the effort I put in."

"I'm surprised they didn't leave when you painted Bossuet's bedroom lime green," Courfeyrac said. "He really opposed to that colour in particular."

"And Joly to orange," Bahorel chipped in.

"Anyway…" Prouvaire sighed. "I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if Bossuet didn't move in with Bérénice soon."

"Are their arguments that bad?" Éponine asked. "It was awkward when they had one in front of us, but…They were always very close, weren't they?"

"Yes, but I think that's the problem," Courfeyrac said, folding his arms over his chest. "I think that Joly feels he's losing his friend to Bérénice."

"And is he?" Éponine rearranged some of her conjured macaroons so they weren't piled so haphazardly on the plate.

"Bossuet is in love," Prouvaire said, "And Joly is grieving. I think Joly thinks it is a very unfair turn of events."

"Can we eat cake now?" Gavroche whined. "This conversation is boring."

Éponine rolled her eyes. "Come and sit at the table," she ordered, carrying the plate of macaroons over to place them with the rest of the cakes.

She ate her choices of desserts whilst Gavroche continued his chatter concerning the horses. She half heard his request that, if they found a dead horse wandering around, they could take it in; she vaguely heard Courfeyrac, Bahorel and Jehan bouncing ideas off each other about how it would be best to keep a horse in a house.

All the while, her mind was very firmly back at the side of the river, hearing those whispering, panicked voices.

She had wanted so desperately to look for them, but she also knew that there was sense in the words that Enjolras had spoken. Now she was away from him, she was yearning to go back there and try and find some answers…

She bit into an éclair, cream covering her tongue, when she heard the voices once more.

"It's going dark, and I don't like the dark," one of the voices was saying.

"Oh, stop being such a baby. We don't even need to go to sleep if you're that scared –"

"What else would we do, Arnaud? What would you suggest? Light a fire and sing songs?"

"Please stop bickering, you two. I haven't gone through all of this to listen to you two argue! Something will come, I promise, we just have to be patient…"

Éponine realised that the chatter around the table had stopped, and aside from the voices, the room had become very quiet. She looked up. The three men and Gavroche were all turned away from her, heads twisting towards the looking glass on the wall.

With a start she realised that there were shapes moving in the glass. She had unintentionally created a Portal, she very quickly deduced.

"Is that…?" Courfeyrac trailed off, slowly getting to his feet. He glanced at the rest of them, and suddenly moved, vaulting over the sofa and hurrying over to the looking glass. Bahorel hurried after him, with Prouvaire hot on his heels, Gavroche scurrying behind them both.

Éponine sighed and stood up as well, walking at a slower pace over to the mirror and gently pushing her way through them all. "I'm sorry, this was me, I did it by accident," she said, flapping her hands. "It's really not that interesting."

"It's a Portal," Courfeyrac said. "I haven't seen one before."

Éponine squinted at the Portal. The image was dark, all purples and blues as night had fallen, but she could still see people. There were six of them; it was too dark to work out exactly what they looked like, but she could see that three of them looked smaller than the rest, and one looked particularly fat. She also recognised the scenery around them; it was the valley beyond the river, and she could see the river itself, but there was nothing else past it; none of the houses or buildings or even the paved embankment running along it.

Her breath left her in a rush. These were the people she had heard earlier in the day. They were there, beyond the river, in a place she couldn't see, and yet she could hear their voices when she was walking along the river as clear as if they were whispering in her ear.

Swallowing, she reached up and put her hand on the mirror. The Portal shivered and dissipated beneath her palm. Only her reflection remained, and through that she could see her wide, dark and confused eyes staring back at her.

She could also see the three men watching her with curious eyes. She considered explaining what she thought the Portal had been, but then decided against it.

"As I said…" She turned around to face them, wrapping her arms around herself. "It's really nothing interesting."

The men looked at her. She could tell they were trying to look at her in a way that would encourage her to reveal all, but it was hard to take them seriously when there were smudges of butter cream around Courfeyrac's mouth, chocolate on Prouvaire's forehead and specks of macaroon all over Bahorel's chest.

"If you all go and sit down now I will conjure a chocolate cake," she said. She wasn't sure if she had ever seen people move so fast, but before she could even process what had happened, they were seated at the table.

Sighing, she began to conjure her promised cake, pushing the image of that group of people to the back of her mind.

XXX

After the plates had been cleared away, the table wiped down of smears of butter cream and chocolate and rogue crumbs, and the three men had ambled off home, Éponine put Gavroche to bed.

"What was that Portal about?" Gavroche asked through a long, sleepy yawn, as she pulled the bed sheets up to his neck.

"It was nothing interesting," Éponine insisted, smoothing a hand over his hair. "Please, don't think about it too much. Just try and sleep: you've had a long day."

"I want a horse," Gavroche muttered.

Éponine smiled as his eyes closed slowly after a few more blinks, and she brushed a stray smudge of icing sugar from his cheekbone. "Good night, Gavroche," she said.

"G'night," Gavroche sighed, rolling over.

Éponine left his room, closing the door behind her. Then she leaned against it, her hands linking together behind her back.

She stared around the room. From behind her, through the wooden door, she heard Gavroche snore quietly. Pursing her lips, she made her decision and moved forwards, yanking her shawl from where she had left it draped across the back of the sofa and throwing it around her shoulders, knotting it over her chest.

It was time, she had decided, to go back to the river.