"Are you very certain, Madame Cosette, that you will be all right on your holiday without me?" Toussaint fretted. She twined her hands together before her and shifted on her feet, her dark face looking worried. "I do not like water. I do not like ships. I confess it. But I will bear it, gladly, Madame, to serve you. You must be dressed properly each day, and your hair done up nicely."

"Oh, Toussaint." Cosette waved her hand dismissively. "Please. Not that I would mind your company, by any means, but I am more than capable of making my hair presentable, at least, and of putting on stockings and shoes and things of that nature. And my husband can help me into my corset and dresses. He is no idiot; he can tie and button as well as anyone else."

She winked a little, and Toussaint breathed a sigh of relief. On the ground in the bedchamber, the large trunk Cosette was packing for her voyage to London already had a few necklaces - a simple strand of pearls and Cosette's favourite pendant - along with her black jet mourning bead bracelet and a few select pairs of earrings. She'd packed her rose perfume and some hair pins, along with her silver toilet set consisting of a brush and comb and mirror. Her toothbrush and a carefully sealed contained of tooth powder had been put in the trunk, and she had two new books to read along the way. Now Toussaint gestured to the array of clothing that the two women had splayed out upon the boutis quilt on the bed and asked,

"Will this do, Madame?"

Cosette sighed, brushing her fingers over what they'd chosen. She was trying very desperately not to overpack; she and Javert would be gone for several weeks, and so she kept reminding herself that she simply did not need very much. Javert's fully packed trunk was already downstairs, and it was smaller than hers. But he was a man, she reminded herself; he did not need to account for corsets and petticoats and bonnets. She huffed a breath and pointed to one dark blue bonnet in velvet and silk, relatively simple but elegant, and she argued to Toussaint,

"That one will serve me at least half the time, don't you think?"

"Quite so," agreed Toussaint, and she packed it up quickly in a box, putting it into the trunk. When Cosette saw how much space the bonnet took up, she murmured,

"I shall wear the black velvet one in the carriage, and that will do, then. I won't take any others. Hm. Gloves. Right. Black and brown leather, don't you think, Toussaint? For the winter, since it is cold… I don't suppose I shall be needing any others."

Toussaint gave her a warm look and nodded, plucking two pairs of gloves from the quilt - a pair in light brown leather with cream lace trim, and a more sturdy black leather pair with detailed stitching. Cosette pursed her lips, wondering if she ought to bring anything for a potential evening event, and finally she muttered,

"I suppose a white set wouldn't hurt. They hardly take any space."

"Indeed," said Toussaint knowingly. Cosette sighed again and looked at the bed, dragging her eyes around it, and she whispered, just loudly enough for Toussaint to hear,

"Thankfully I will not have my blood on the voyage, so I will not be sullying clothes."

Toussaint flicked her lips up a little and nodded, and then she picked up Cosette's deep turquoise velvet gown with its wide belt and elaborate brass buckle. She hauled it off the bed with some effort, held it up for Cosette and proposed, "This one is very beautiful, Madame. It was far too heavy when the weather was warmer, but now that it is colder…? It would be very good for travel, don't you think? Nice and cosy. And for sightseeing in London."

"Yes. Yes, you're very right. Put it in the trunk, please." Cosette surveyed her other options. She chose her burgundy silk winter evening gown, nearly two years old and therefore ever-so-slightly out of fashion but still very beautiful, with its cream lace trim and embroidered accents. She put in two of her calico dresses, the mustard-coloured one and one in sage green with a black belt and silver buckle. Then she and Toussaint packed two clean nightgowns, two sets of clean pantalettes, two sets of silk stockings, flat shoes and short heels in black, sleeve supports and a corded petticoat, and one extra chemise. An elegant pelisse with fur trim went in to complement the cloak Cosette would wear for travel, and Toussaint put in two drawstring reticules in black and burgundy velvet.

After all of that bending and packing, they were both sheened with perspiration and panting from the effort, and as Toussaint shut the leather buckled on the trunk, Cosette huffled and flopped inelegantly to sit on the edge of the bed. Just then, the bedchamber door creaked open a little, and Javert appeared there, looking a little amused at the way Toussaint curtsied quickly to him and at the way Cosette seemed breathless and tired.

"Oh! You are just in time, Inspector, " she teased him, for he was in his uniform and had just arrived from his last shift before they left for Calais. He flashed her a playful little smirk and then nodded at Toussaint as he applauded the two women somewhat sarcastically and glanced at the trunk on the ground.

"It appears the ladies are making some progress. I expect we will be lugging two or three more of these, no?"

Cosette pouted at him and then dared to stick her tongue out before giggling madly, and Toussaint planted her hands on her broad hips before she informed Javert stoutly,

"In fact, Monsieur, the Madame is fully packed for the voyage to London! Everything she needs is inside this trunk! She has been most judicious and prudent."

Javert's eyebrows went up, and his lips curled. "Quite so? Hmm. Well. I should not be surprised, now, should I? I did indeed marry a sensible, reasonable young woman."

He eyed Cosette approvingly, and she grinned back at him from where she sat on the bed. She looked him up and down where he stood in his police uniform, and she remarked a bit flirtatiously,

"I shall miss the look of you in that jacket, Monsieur l'Inspecteur."

Toussaint chortled from where she stood, shaking her head before curtseying and excusing herself. Once she'd gone, Javert stalked to the edge of the bed and put a hand on Cosette's shoulder, making her shiver a little, before he asked her quietly,

"Are you indeed all ready to go?"

She nodded. "I can't wait. Really. It is so very kind of you to take me to England. You know I've been wanting to go for ages. You heard me tell my Papa. And for you to take leave to do it -"

Javert tipped his head. "My Commissaire insisted I take the leave, remember?"

"Still," Cosette murmured, reaching up to cover his hand with hers on her shoulder. She flicked her eyes toward her trunk on the ground on then told him, "I tried not to overpack. I do hope I have I have brought sufficient clothing and everything, and that you'll be able to lace me into my corset and help me into my dress each day…"

Javert's crooked smile spread, and his fingers toyed with her shoulder a bit as he mumbled, "I believe I will manage just fine helping you in and out of your clothes, Madame. Toussaint showed me all the detailed workings last night, remember?"

"Yes." Cosette licked her lips and stared at him. "How I love you."

Javert took a little step back and extended his hand to her. "Come downstairs, pretty little Songbird. I need dinner, and so do you. You must have worked up quite an appetite, packing away all of your lovely things."

The Berline carriage that Javert had rented to take them from Paris to Calais was very nice indeed, Cosette thought, looking around the interior of the thing and taking in the green velvet bench seats with the matching green velvet curtains on the glass windows. But as the carriage lurched and rattled down the packed, slick, uneven road between Goussainville and Senlis, Cosette made a sound of discomfort that she could not keep in. She leaned against the wall and stared out the window, trying in vain to find a position in which to sit that did not inject her with extreme pain.

For hours now, they'd been riding along, their Berline carriage expertly driven by a professional coachman who was pushing two fine black horses at quite a pace along the road. They had left Paris just after dawn, and they meant to make Amiens by dinner time. That meant that the carriage was juttering along quite insistently, and that they had only stopped once when Cosette had rather urgently needed to relieve herself in a field somewhere completely in the middle of nowhere in the Val d'Oise. Now she just looked out at the gloomy chill that had settled upon the peaceful agricultural lands and villages that would be vibrantly green in the summer, and she sighed a little.

"You are feeling the rattle and shake much worse because you are so small," noted Javert from across the carriage, "and because you are bound up in a corset."

Cosette smirked at him a little and shrugged. "Nothing to be done about any of that, I'm afraid," she said. "There you sit, you big, bulky man, huddled in your warm clothes. Lucky you."

"Lucky me, indeed." Javert tipped his face and eyed her for a moment. He pulled their leather overnight bag from the seat beside him, the one they'd prepared for the inn tonight, toward him and opened it. He extracted a burlap drawstring bag and a small bottle of wine, and Cosette chuckled a little as he held them up in offering to her. She rolled her eyes a bit and admitted,

"I am a little hungry."

"Mmm." Javert opened the bag and held it out to her, and she reached in with her gloved fingers to pull out four or five of the roasted walnuts inside. She gave Javert a grateful look as he made a move to pull out the cork that was half stuck into the wine bottle. He studied the label and noted softly, "It's just a Merlot I picked up before we left Paris. Nothing special."

"On the contrary," Cosette said in return, taking the little bottle from him, "Everything right now feels special."

He smiled a bit at that and looked out the window, sighing as he took in the tiny village they were passing through. Cosette swigged down a bit of the wine, glancing out to see a cluster of boys making quite a racket around the town fountain as they tossed tiny stones playfully at one another and got scolded by an old woman for doing so. A man at a cart called out that he had potatoes for sale. Nearby, a young mother shrieked at her two daughters to stop fighting and come back right now . It was all very ordinary, all very mundane, just the normal happenings of a provincial village as the people went about their day. As the carriage rumbled through, though, Cosette found herself passing the wine back to Javert and asking him,

"Was Montreuil like this? When my Papa was the mayor, and my Mama worked in his factory, and you were a policeman there? Was it something like this?"

Javert just stared out the window and shrugged. "It was… ordinary. Busier than this, by quite a lot. This place is very small. Your father's factory was large and bustling. There were ramparts, walls, in Montreuil. Streets lined with colourful houses. Many churches."

"Oh." Cosette nodded and chewed her lip a little. She wondered softly then, "It is near Calais?"

Javert flicked his glance to her and confirmed, "It is."

Cosette huffed. "A pity," she considered, "that we might not have time to pass through it on our way. But I suppose it might be very far out of our way."

Javert pursed his lips and shrugged. "I shall direct the coachman to take us through Montreuil tomorrow. When we go from Amiens to Calais. It is no trouble. We may arrive at the inn in Calais an hour or so later than intended. No matter. We can stop for a midday meal in Montreuil."

Cosette looked at him in shock, feeling her mouth fall open. Her cheeks went hot, and she shook her head. "I could not ask you to -"

"I would like to take you," he said firmly. "Two years ago or so, I communicated with the new Chief of Police there. The jet bead factory runs still, under new management. But you can see the building. You can see the town. I will even show you where I lived, if you would like. And, erm… I am an Inspector in Paris, Cosette; I can very easily demand to see records."

Cosette frowned. "Records."

He sighed and gave her a strange look. "Your mother was not given the dignity of a headstone or burial in consecrated ground, Cosette, but records were kept, just the same. If you wanted to pay your respects…"

"Oh." Cosette felt her eyes water heavily, and her throat went a bit tight. She nodded a little, shrugging. "Yes. Yes, all right. Thank you."

There was quiet then in the carriage for a few more moments, until at last Javert held out the bag of walnuts to Cosette once more, and she reached with her hand, sheathed in black leather, and took a few more of them to snack upon.

By the time the rented Berline carriage rolled into Amiens, the largest and finest town they had encountered thus far since leaving Paris, night had settled like a velvet blanket, with prickly white stars dotting the sky all around them. The wheels of the carriage shifted in sound as they made their way onto the cobblestone streets of Amiens, and the flickering glow of oil lamps cast a warm inviting light, beckoning Cosette and Javert toward houses and shops. The air was filled with tantalising aromas - bread and stew - but also the stench of humanity and animals that was missing in the clear and crisp emptiness of the open countryside.

Javert, ever cautious and suspicious of others and seemingly intent on keeping Cosette as comfortable as was fiscally responsible to do, called to the coachman to find the most reputable inn in Amiens. That turned out to be a place called L'Auberge du Cygne Chantant, a place that looked more than fine by Cosette's estimation and left her rather open-mouthed in surprise as the carriage came to a stop outside. She let Javert help her down as the coachman and the innkeeper, a stout and jovial man with decent and clean brown wool clothes, worked to unload their overnight bags and to pack their trunks into storage whilst getting the horses serviced.

"It's nothing at all like the hell I endured, that inn at Montfermeil," Cosette said quietly, looking at the outside of L'Auberge du Cygne Chantant with its slick green and black paint and crisp wooden sign. The glass windows were clean; the candelabras inside were gleaming. Javert approached her and guided her inside on his arm, and they were immediately greeted by the innkeeper's wife, a woman in her forties with a slim figure and a homely face but a pleasant disposition who walked them up a narrow, carpeted flight of stairs and showed them at once to their room, which had freshly whitewashed walls and a wooden bed with clean linens and a fine quilt. The innkeeper's wife built up the fire and took payment from Javert without fuss before politely inviting Javert and Cosette downstairs for dinner. Then she left, shutting the door behind her, and Javert turned as he pulled off his hat. Cosette just gazed at him, and he seemed a little confused until she said rather numbly,

"Sometimes the memories of that place are dim and hazy. Other times, not so much. I have not been in an inn since my childhood. I did not know, I don't think, that there were decent inns."

"Ah." Javert shrugged. "Well. I hardly think, actually, that the place Thénardier was running could properly be called an inn. My understanding is that he swindled every single fool who agreed to drink the swill he passed off as wine, or to sleep in the insect-infested beds there, and that he -"

"They beat me terribly," Cosette interrupted him, and she watched Javert gulp as he set his hat down on the quilt. He nodded. She unhooked her heavy winter cloak and hung it on the rack in the corner, and then as she plucked off her leather gloves, she matter-of-factly added, "They sent me out into the woods to fetch water all by myself when I was very tiny. I really was much too small to carry the water; I spilt half of it most of the time, and that only earned me more beatings. They took such delight in hurting me. I do remember them speaking often about my mother needing to send them money. And my father told me that my mother wound up badly off because she thought I was ill; she thought I needed money. She wound up a whore to save me, but it was trickery. And it all happened in an inn."

"As I say, Cosette, that was no inn. That was a place of deranged torture," Javert said softly. "This is an inn. This is a very fine inn. Those people… they were not really people. They were demons. Devils. You are safe now. You are loved. We are going to London. We are going to have dinner downstairs in this very fine inn."

Cosette took a shaking breath and nodded as firmly as she could. She approached him and began to unbutton the greatcoat that he wore, staring up at him. His own hands untied the thick ribbon beneath her chin and gently pulled away her heavy velvet bonnet, and she teased him,

"Are you practising undressing me, since Toussaint is not here?"

"It seems we are practising undressing one another," he murmured, and she shook her head, smirking.

"No. We must stay dressed, Monsieur. Dinner is waiting downstairs, and my stomach aches with hunger. I know yours does, as well."

He growled and narrowed his eyes, looking frustrated. "Damn it all. Fine. But as soon as I have had my fill of lamb and potato or whatever is being served, I mean to bring you up here and show you just how very skilled I am at removing a lady's dress and corset and everything else. You've no need at all for a maid on this trip, Cosette. I am perfectly capable of disrobing you."

She laughed a little and pushed his coat from him, nodding. "I have no doubt that you can get me nude, husband. The question is whether you can make me presentable again tomorrow morning."

He shrugged and quirked up an eyebrow. "I do promise to try my best. Now. Dinner."

"This was your house?" Cosette stared up at the two-storey stone structure on the corner of a little cobblestone street in Montreuil, flinching when a gaggle of little children went by in frantic pursuit of a dog that had a stolen toy in its mouth. From beside her, Javert shifted a little uncomfortably and admitted,

"Well, I… I lived on the top floor. An old woman lived downstairs. The last I heard, she'd died. Some family lives in there now, in the whole thing. I only needed just the one bedroom, and… I was promoted a good deal when I went to Paris, so."

He cleared his throat, and Cosette just nodded. She sighed and slipped her hand into his, and Javert led her rather quickly away, down the road, keeping his head down, his face low. Cosette knew why he was doing that. He did not want to be recognised. He knew people here. People knew him. He was doing this for her, she knew, and her stomach was in a tangle because of that. She squeezed at his hand and insisted,

"Let's get back on the road. We don't want to be too late getting into Calais."

"Mmm. It won't take too long," he mused. "There. Up there is the factory."

He gestured rather vaguely with his hand, and Cosette was surprised to see the size of the place, a great big brick structure that was long and stour, with multiple gated entrances for workers and areas for carts to come and go. She sucked in air hard, surprised to think that her dear Papa had administered a factory so large as this… and had done so as after breaking his parole and living life under an assumed identity. And her mother had worked here. She swallowed hard and asked Javert cautiously,

"And they made mourning beads here? Jet beads?"

"Just like your bracelet, yes," Javert nodded, pulling her a bit more quickly down the road.

"Inspector Javert?" asked a disbelieving voice, and Cosette saw him close his eyes at the sound of his name. She panicked a little until she flicked her eyes up and saw a grey-haired woman in a dark grey cloak and sombre bonnet, looking quite cantankerous and very surprised to see Javert. She spoke in a rather toad-like voice as she curled up a lip contemptuously, glancing between Javert and Cosette, and remarked,

"I had heard you'd gone to Paris, Monsieur l'Inspecteur, after discovering the deceit of the Mayor."

"Madame Victurnien," acknowledged Javert, and Cosette realised he knew the woman well. "I am, indeed, an Inspector in the Paris Police these days. I have merely come to revist my old haunting grounds on my way to Calais. We are off to London on holiday."

"Oh, indeed." Madame Victurnien grimaced. She gestured to Cosette and demanded, "Your daughter? Pretty girl."

"My wife," Javert said rather harshly, and the old woman looked abashed before pressing,

"Has she got a name?"

"Of course she has," Javert snapped.

"Forgive my husband," Cosette gushed as warmly as she could, moving forward and curtseying to the rather wretched old hag. She flashed the woman a little smile and nodded. "I think he is simply eager to get back on the road, Madame. I am Euphrasie. Pleased to make your acquaintance."

"Euphrasie. A beautiful name," nodded the woman, and Cosette's spine tingled for some reason. Beside her, Javert tensed a little.

"Well. It is as my wife says. Back to the carriage with us. We mean to make Calais by dinner. Good day to you, Madame."

"Yes. Good day." Madame Victurnien gave them a strange look as Cosette thrust her hand through Javert's arm and turned to walk away with him quickly. Neither of them said a word as they went back to where the Berline carriage was waiting in the centre of town. Cosette knew it was much too risky for Javert to go into the police headquarters to try and seek out information about her mother's pauper's grave. They could not tarry. It was not until they had been on the road for a half hour that he finally asked her quietly,

"You told her that your name was Euphrasie and not Cosette. Why did you do that?"

"Because I did nto trust that woman," Cosette said very simply. "Ought I have trusted her?"

"No," Javert said at once. "When I knew her, she was, at best, an intolerable gossip who bought and sold personal information and sought the destruction of individuals' fortunes and reputations seemingly for her own amusement. I suspect she had something to do with your own mother being sacked from the factory. In fact, there were many who said she visited the inn at Montfermeil and laid eyes on you after rumours of your mother's… unseemliness , as Madame Victurnien saw it, started swirling. So I do not much like it that she saw you today. Still, I am glad that you called yourself Euphrasie in front of her. I do not reckon those fools the Thėnardiers ever did so."

"No." Cosette scoffed. "No. They never did."

Javert reached for Cosette's gloved hand across the carriage. "Pretty, intelligent little Songbird that you are. How often I think that you would be an asset to the Police foce."

Cosette laughed at that and shook her head. "Really. Can you imagine me in a little women's version of your uniform, buttoned up the front and everything, top hat on my head, brandishing a sword?"

Javert's eyes flashed strangely, and he whispered, "Don't put thoughts in my head you don't want there."

Cosette choked a guffaw and covered her mouth as she desperately tried not to laugh at him, but as she let her glove fall down, she did give him a very flirtatious look and murmured, "I would slice through all of my enemies and I would sit at a desk in my pretty little dark blue buttoned-up uniform and do all of my paperwork after solving many crimes. Madame l'Inspecteur."

"Cosette." Javert rolled his eyes, but he huffed a bit and stared out the window, touching his forehead. Cosette raised her eyebrows and reached for his knee, grinning.

"Oh, you funny man. It is a joyful fantasy, isn't it?"

"You are being cruel." He did not sound amused, and suddenly Cosette felt her smile fading a little. She furrowed her brow and pulled her hand back from his knee as she asked carefully,

"What's the matter? What have I said wrong?"

She noticed then that his high cheekbones were flushed very dark pink, and when he turned to her, his dark eyes bored into hers, and he finally said in a bit of an acerbic tone,

"I am permitted my follies about you in my mind. I do not much care to be mocked about them. That is all."

"Your follies." Cosette shook her head helplessly. Suddenly the carriage rocked and lurched badly as they hit a deep hole at too fast a speed, and Cosette cried out as her head banged the side of the carriage. She seethed and rubbed her scalp in frustration, and then she met Javert's gaze again when the carriage had steadied itself into its normal, smoother motion. "What do you mean, your follies about me?"

Javert pinched his lips, his entire face and even his neck scarlet now. "You know very well that I am incredibly partial to your ministrations on my manhood with your mouth. Hardly anything else you do brings me more satisfaction. And that act is not exactly standard between man and wife. So that is a folly, isn't it?"

Cosette shrugged, still annoyed by the sore spot where her head had struck the side of the carriage. "Does it matter? We both like it."

Javert leaned back a little and sighed. "You have, on several occasions now, taken pieces of my uniform from me when I have come home and put them on, in what has always felt like a teasing way, and I do not dislike it at all. I find it… charming and amusing, yes, but… I also sometimes like to imagine the world allowing you to be just a little more confident, my Songbird, and I… I do not mind it at all when you get playful with my things, when you strike pillows with my truncheon, or when you put my top hat on and let me kiss you, or when you are completely naked except for my uniform… my uniform… jacket…"

He wrenched his eyes shut then, and he seemed breathless all of a sudden. Cosette's own face seared like fire. All of those little foibles were things she'd done once or twice before but had admittedly accelerated rather recently. Sometimes Javert would come home and start stripping off his uniform from work, and she would kiss his chest and tell him he smelled like the horse he'd ridden on patrol, and that she didn't mind that, and then she would take off her nightgown and replace it with his uniform jacket and nothing else as she descended to her knees and took him in her mouth. For some reason, all of that play in recent weeks had seemed to drive them both just a little mad, just a little wild.

"You are cross with me," Javert guessed from where he sat with his head tipped back. His hands knit together. "You think I am debauched, to like seeing my pretty little wife clad in my police uniform as she does these things with me. Hmm? Is that it?"

"No. Not at all. I think there are many things about us which are very strange indeed," Cosette considered, and when Javert met her eyes, she shrugged. "There are so many years between us, husband. So many. And… you and my father despised one another nearly until the end of his life. And you and my mother… hmm. Still, you and I fell in love. Strange, isn't it? Delightful. A miracle, almost. But strange, still."

Javert said nothing. He just stared at her as the carriage seemed to pick up a little speed, mercifully smoothing out its movements. Cosette continued,

"We are married, yet we are doing everything in our power not to conceive. That is most certainly strange. Some might say it is unthinkable; we must never tell anyone that we go about our lives in such a way. It is contrary to God's will for a marriage, people will tell us."

Javert scowled. "If I lost you to childbirth, I would not care one lick what God's plan had been, Cosette, and I -"

"I know." She smiled a bit and nodded. "I know. Still. Strange. And then… then there are the things that you and I enjoy doing with one another. Using our mouths on each other. I know… I know as well as you that to take pleasure in doing such things is a great anomaly. And yet we enjoy it. We do these things in the privacy of our own home, whilst madly in love, whilst married. Who is to judge us? No one. So who is to judge me for putting on your jacket or your top hat or striking a pillow with a truncheon, or to judge your cock for flushing through when I do it?"

Suddenly Javert's mouth fell open, and he looked utterly shocked at what Cosette had said. He looked scandalised, actually… horrified. Cosette frowned.

"What?" she demanded, and Javert demanded,

"Where did you hear that word?"

She thought back over what she had said to him, and she finally whispered again, "Cock?"

His eyes bugged into circles, and he glanced around as though someone else had heard her. Cosette broke into a fit of mad giggles then, bending at the waist and laughing so hard she nearly got sick. She felt herself being pulled up until her eyes met Javert's, and he was frowning at her. She shrugged helplessly and insisted to him,

"I am not deaf. I have heard many men say the word now. And I have even seen it written in a few of my books! And now that I know what to do with one, I certainly know the word."

Javert touched his forehead and shook his head, though there was a hint of amusement under his voice. "I promised to take care of you, not to corrupt you to your core."

Cosette tossed her hands up and said dismissively, "Entirely too late for that, I'm afraid."

He narrowed his eyes at her. "Well. Whatever we do tonight, let us resolve to sleep well. Tomorrow morning, we sail for Dover. And then, my dear wife, at last, you shall see London… as promised."

Cosette smiled contentedly and reached for his gloved hand, squeezing a little. "You are a good man."

He said nothing to that, just looking out the carriage window again as the sun slipped below the horizon.