A/N: I don't know what to say. Really not. Seems that every story of mine needs a huge hiatus. I apologize. Things, and life, and all that. I can't promise speed, actually I can promise glaciality. But I promise I'm still working on it and I haven't given up on it. I hope not everyone has given up on me...
I'd be glad if anyone still remembers me.
PS: Keeping track of all those plotlines is abysmal... I made a huge set of files to keep track and remember it all. I hope it'll work and I'll be consistent. Feel free to point out consistency mistakes...
I'm sorry.
Spirit
Chapter 71: Parted ways
"There is always choice. We say there is no choice only to comfort ourselves with the decision we have already made. If you understand that, there's hope. If not .."
When Gueulemer finally felt himself fit again to stand on his own feet, he was infinitely relieved and hesitated no second in trying to take his leave from the hovel that Toureille used for a hospital of sorts. While he was grateful for the man's help – and it seemed that Toureilles skills did play some part in him feeling at least less feverish and remotely steady again – he could not have born the atmosphere in the small room any longer.
Toureille's skills were of varying quality depending on the actual malady, the patient and the doctor's daily moods, but they were the best the miserable of Paris had to offer – and could usually afford. However, comfortable his place was not.
Apart from Gueulemer, there had been two patients – a boy of about twelve years old who had finally succumbed to a violent, bloody cough in the small hours of the morning, and the Picpus brother – and the latter one was the problem.
Gueulemer did not particularly care to see a child die, but such was the way of the world sometimes, and at least the little one had gone quietly, as opposed to the brother, who had been mumbling incomprehensible and strange things throughout the whole last night in his fever.
His words had been a strange mixture of french and two different other languages – the harsh, clippped one Gueulemer suspected to have been German, while he could not clarify the second one with a more lilting and guttural sound any further than somewhere into the eastern part of Europe.
Russian, probably.
Not that he cared.
But the constant mumbling had been annoying, even if the words were fragmented and the screams full of fury. And it had been enough to know what the man was dreaming about.
Gueulemer was not squeamish and had lived in the streets of Paris long enough to have resorted to any means necessary and possible to ensure his survival, but the man had a way of speaking about murder that had Gueulemer be glad to see the back of him.
It had rather sounded as if he were ticking off a list.
And that was well beyound Gueulemer's business.
"So." Toureille grinned, obviously satisfied with himself. A golden tooth was blinking in that grin, speaking of his relative wealth within the community of the desperate and the desecrated, but if anyone then it was him who would not have to worry about falling on the wrong side of the Miserables. As long as there was no other like him, he was more valuable, safe and sound, gold teeth and all. "How do we deal with this?"
Gueulemer frowned.
"What do I owe you?"
"Money I know fully well you can't pay, friend", Toureille gave back cheerfully. "But that doesn't matter, I have a different kind of idea."
Gueulemer nodded and waited, not feeling like asking the little man for clarification he would give anyway.
"I used a little too much of the medicine I have on you, friend. But that can be remedied. The shelves of little Auguste Ravierre are well stocked."
An apothecary on boulevard des italiens. Not the easiest thing to do, but all things considered, a fair price.
"What do you need?"
Toureille produced a sheet of paper from his pocket. "I have a list", he said, proud, but Gueulemer remained sulky.
"Can't read."
"Find someone who can, then. One of Thenardier's gamines, maybe."
"Maybe", Gueulemer added. Eponine was telling to everyone and their mothers and fathers how she could read – should she put that to good use for once. "Fine."
He took the list, gazed at the incomprehensible signatures on it.
Toureille rubbed his hands.
"Splendid. And maybe you can help me with a little something that's even more within your line of capabilities."
Gueulemer quickly made a count in his head. Of course he had – unconscious and feverish as he had been – no idea as to how much medicine Toureille really had used on him, but all things considered, he probably would not have survived without the little man's help.
A shoplift and a favor seemed adequate enough.
"So what?"
"A moment's patience,", Toureille answered, grin still plastered on his face, and indeed, only a few minutes later, steps approaching signalled the arrival of another person.
Gueulemer stared at him in surprise. Whatever he had been expecting, this had probably not been it.
"Montparnasse?"
He looked slightly flustered, hair wild under his top hat, remnants of sweat staining his shirt, and there was an expression in his face that did not prompt any question.
Gueulemer, as always, refrained from asking and restricted himself to a nod.
"Now that's a surprise." Something about Montparnasse's manner seemed forced, the cheer not quite reaching the eye. "A pleasant one, mind you." He briefly clapped Gueulemer's shoulder and tipped his hat towards Toureille. "Glad to see you found this place and all the better you're up on your feet." Not quite a warm welcome, Gueulemer thought, but what disappointment was to be had was dispelled quickly. He had been used to this for long.
Monsieur?"
"Right on time, as always", the little doctor praised and bid him enter.
Montparnasse stepped up to the Picpus brother immediately, assessing the feverish state – at the moment, thankfully, without incoherent mumbling.
"Gueulemer will help you transport him, I'm sure", Toureille advised, his smile broad as he clapped the larger man's shoulders affectionatelly. "There will be no problems at all..."
He was putting up a hellish speed and did not seem to care if she were able to follow or not.
Cosette stumbled behind her father, trying not to lose her footing as he brutally dragged her out of the cemetery and through the streets of Paris, fast enough that she had no time to even watch where they were going. Her thoughts were racing, but to no avail. Not only was there no way how she could talk her way out of this and bring herself back into good graces, but also she found herself surprisingly unwilling to do so. Her father had behaved quite erratically during the last days; and she felt acutely how her own private world had shattered unexpectedly and thoroughly.
And thus, no more pretense.
When finally the ground changed from cobblestones to gravel, Cosette realized that they had entered a small park wedged in between a few streets. She had no idea where she was, but she could still hear the uproar from the cemetery, far off, behind trees, walls and houses, like a distant background murmur.
It was here where her father stopped and finally whirled around, staring at her angrily. Both of them were fighting for breath after the past exertions, glaring at each other as moments passed.
She recovered first, although at some point she started to think that her father's heavy breathing had less to do with the speed of his steps moments ago, and quite a lot more with the agitation that seemed to have gripped him and was not as easily dispelled as the fatigue of the body.
Cosette waited, and finally, he started to speak.
"Why?"
A single word, full of anger as much as desperation, a tone intense enough to reach her core. She loved him still, her father still, and despite everything she did not want to hurt him.
But, of course, she had.
"Because...", Cosette spread her hand helplessly. "Because I'm tired of being lied to. I'm tired of not knowing. I'm tired of having dreams I don't understand. Because you're putting me in a cage, Papa, and I am no child any more."
"The cage is there to protect you!" His voice was loud and intense, strong, yet strangely tipping at the heights, almost as if he was not fully in control of it. "And look what happened when you left?" The strong gesture seemed to encompass it all; the cemetery, the garden, herself as well as the two figures that she could just see arriving at a distance.
"But I don't want that protection!" Cosette could hear well that she was sounding no better, voice tipping and trembling. "I'm not a child any more, I'm a woman grow."
"You're certainly not acting like one", Fauchelevent growled angrily. "You've seen what happened there at the cemetery! If I hadn't come..."
"I was fine", she interrupted. "I was not hurt. See?" She spread out her arms in a gesture of demonstration. "I'm still intact."
"No thanks to you or your friends, or that horrible beau of yours. You put yourself in completely foolish danger, and for no reason to speak of!"
"What makes you say that standing with those one loves is no reason to speak of?" Cosette shook her head. "And that from you, of all people, you who has always given me lectures on how you should love your fellow man and lend support and help where you..."
"I was talking about charity!" Fauchelevent did not let her finish. "I was talking about respecting your fellow human being. Not making your cause that of the revolutionaries and jump into the middle of a thicket! Not to let a foolish young man dictate all your actions!"
"I'm not even making their cause my own."
Cosette tried to speak more calmly, not to get carried away as much as Fauchelevent had, to remember the rationality that a grown-up should exhibit. "I haven't decided yet what I think of it, but yes, I was looking for Marius and I will not deny it. Although he did not know. And he did not dictate this to me. I made the decision myself."
"And why, Cosette?" Fauchelevent shook his head. "Why would you do such a thing?"
He sounded less angry now, more desperate, even tinged with sadness. The first bout of fury had run its course, and although she could see it lingering in the familiar lines of his face, for the moment other sentiments had taken the upper hand. And his gloom was more difficult to counter than his anger.
"I have said it before, Papa. You have been lying to me. I want to know things, I want to know who I am. I want to find my own life and you are not letting me."
"Don't go that road, beloved child."
Now he was earnestly sad, shaking his head as something miserable wandered through his features. "Don't go there. There is nothing but darkness there."
"But it is a part of me", Cosette countered, almost desperately trying to make him see the point. "You cannot protect me from what I am carrying around with me."
"You can leave the past behind", Fauchelevent said, now beseeching. "You can. It is possible. It... it must be possible."
"It has already found me"; Cosette contradicted. "Didn't you listen? Why are you not even listening to me?" His wilful ignorance was starting to truly hurt her. "I keep dreaming these strange things, things that don't leave me once I open my eyes."
"Specters of the night, nothing more", Fauchelevent continued, but Cosette, knowing him so well, recognized his tone of voice to be false.
"This is what I mean", she answered, thus, now truly sad. "You and I know better. We know different. Tell me, Papa. How did we actually get into the position at the convent?"
Fauchelevent sighed.
"As I told you many times, I..."
"Why do I remember climbing the wall in the dark of the night?"
He fell silent at that and stared at her, aghast, pale, wordless. But Cosette, once she had found the momentum, continued mercillessly.
"Where is the inn that I remember, the one where I know I hid under the tables? Why do I remember to be afraid, so afraid of those tables in the wide guestroom with the low ceiling? The tables where wooden, you know, with scratches and dents everywhere, old and used. I remember."
He had no answer,despite obviously looking for one, for he opened his mouth a couple of times, fumbling for words that wouldn't come.
"Why do I see a dark path in the woods every time I walk down the corridor of our apartment in the night?"
"Cosette, I...", again he broke off, and something about the way he held his shoulders admitted defeat, even though his words would not, even though his eyes still fought. But Cosette, all kindness forgotten in her relentlessness, delivered the final blow.
"Why don't you tell me what you know about the man who tried to kill the man I love...?"
She let the sentence hanging, and this was, when, finally, he had no answer for her. Fauchelevent stood there, gazing at her, and for a wild, panicked moment she thought the expression on his face would mean that finally he would use the strength of arm that she knew he had on her. Yet, only a moment later, she realized that the glaze in his eyes was no fury. Loss of control, yes, maybe, but a different loss and a different control than she would have expected.
Too late, Cosette realized that her father had a fragility about him that she had never noticed.
And she had shattered him.
Moments passed, while he reconciliated himself with her words, with her gestures, with whatever her words had called forth from the darkness of his own mind. His gaze, first still firm on his daughter, began to waiver and lose both strength and intensity. She saw him, literally fading, in front of her own eyes.
When finally he spoke, he was not looking so much at her as at a small patch of green next to her feet.
"Perhaps you are right", he said softly, his voice rough and pained. "Surely you are."
"Papa..." Cosette fumbled for words she did not have, but he did not give her the time to regain her footing, or to adjust to his changed mood.
"No." He raised a hand to stop her mid-thought. "No. You are right." Repeating it a third time. "I am a foolish old man and my time is out."
Cosette blinked. "Whh... what?" she asked, but he did not even seem to listen, did not even seem to note her presence as he continued, speaking more to himself than to anyone else.
"I always knew the day would come... tried to deny it, weak, silly old man." He let out a huff that was almost a sob. "Only a guardian, only a guardian I ever was, and a guardian has no right to ownership, no right to permanence, no right at all..."
Cosette stared at him with growing shock. "What are you talking about, Papa...?"
That word seemed to rouse him a little, and he raised his head, slowly, painfully, to look into her eyes once again, and there was nothing but tears there, threatening to spill over his weathered cheeks. Her father had never seemed old to her, but he certainly did now, as he carried this strage, disquieting, unfamiliar show of weakness on his features.
"I am sorry, little bird..."
It had been ages since he called her that, a nickname she had all but forgotten as the years passed, and yet the word seemed to rattle something within her, something just out of her grasp. Vague memories of comfort and relief and a nagging, nagging fear that it would not last.
Nothing good is forever... you'd best learn that quick
She blinked. Where had that sentence come from, spoken in a cold, sneering voice, distinctively grown-up, yet with the plaintive note of a child? For a moment Cosette had the feeling as if the ground under her feet was wavering, threatening to slip away and leave her falling into nothingness. It was a feeling so achingly familiar to a part of her that she realized that this feeling was at the heart of it all, at the heart of her nightmares, at the heart of the unrest that had gripped her so deeply.
You cannot ever be safe.
"I was only a guardian", Fauchelevent repeated, voice soft and almost broken. "I was allowed to enjoy your company, your purity, but for a limited time only. I have no right to you; not the right of a father, not even the right of a relative."
"What are you saying...?" The words seemed to break what little security Cosette still felt, and her father stepped up to her, hesitatingly placing a hand against her cheek.
"I loved you as if you really were my daughter", he confirmed what she thought to have heard from his previous ramblings. "But I was fooling myself, of course... all right that I had to you was to guide you along until you are strong enough to live your own life." He smiled wanly and continued, seemingly oblivious to the state his daughter was in. "And look what a woman you have become..." He shook his head. "I could not have dreamed it better."
He took a step back, distancing himself from her visibly as much as in his expression.
"So my time has come; my deed is done. And it seems that I must give you into worthier hands now..." He took a breath, deep and pained. "If this is your choice, what you truly want, I will not stand in your way. I have no right to this..."
He closed his eyes briefly, a muscle twitching in his cheek. Cosette was barely able to understand what he was saying, felt shocked and aghast and terrified. This change had come about so quickly and unexpectedly that she was still reeling while her father – her father? - seemed to be a few steps ahead of her.
"I release you, child, if this Is what you wish", he continued. "I am just an old man who has outlived his purpose. You have a home with me as long as you want it, but do not fear my interference. I have done what I could, and I see it now. My time is over."
"But Papa...", was all she could get out before he turned, and seemingly within the blink of an eye she stared at his retreating back. It was the stuff of nightmares, as if some unseen force were holding her feet on the ground and there was nothing she could do but watch.
Watch how her father turned away from her and walked, in a slow, determined step, every muscle of his body radiating resolve as well as pain. Watched as he stepped up to Marius, who, unrecognized by her, had entered the park as well, Adelaide at his side. Watched as the man exchanged words, shook hands, and Fauchelevent left him standing as well, after a sad, fatherly clap onto his shoulder.
And Cosette stared after him, realizing that this had been a sort of goodbye.
Eponine walked between the others as if she were a stranger.
Their associates were filing into the attic on Rue des Brodeurs in twos and threes – it was quite obvious that they had scattered in leaving the place only to arrive here and regroup – and the atmosphere was a tense one indeed as friends greeted friends. Hands were shaken, even hugs exchanged, words an gestures of reassurance between comrades. They had been among the first to arrive – only the group that during the recent days seemed to have been formed out of Bossuet, Joly, Lamarin and Bariiou was already there, occupying a corner without bothering to chose chairs for sitting. They greeted them with relief, and Eponine joined them for a moment, if only not to have to look into Enjolras' eyes.
She really did not feel like facing him now.
Montparnasse's words had shaken her deeply, and as long as she had no idea about what she would do about them. She had reached an impasse, and she knew it, a crossroad, a point of no return. And somehow she thought that it would take him one good look into her eyes to realize this as well.
As intrinsic as he was to this problem, him knowing was, of course, out of the question. She would rather bite off her tongue than lay out this problem to him. No. this was hers to solve, for better or worse.
And yet, she did not seem to be the only one harboring secrets. Joly was courtesy itself, Bossuet funny and charming, with Stephane piping into his quips with a slightly more laconic tone. They were making a good show of it – or would have, if it hadn't been for Marc Lamarin, who hid his preoccupation less well than the others.
Eponine easily recognized all the signs of them wanting for her to absent herself, but she selfishly waited until she was certain there were enough other people in the room to command Enjolras' attention away from her.
Only then she relieved them and excused her self with words so lame that at least Stephane's quick glance told her in no uncertain words that he was aware of why she left – if not why she had stayed – but she did not care. Courtesy was maybe cherished amongst the wealthy, but in the end, she was still a gamine and lived by her own rules.
She had barely gotten to her feet, when a she found herself face to face with Courfeyrac, who had obviously been looking for her. As was his nature, he had started to discreetly organize the assembly – to count heads, to check on the state and mood of those newly arrived – and considering the amount of people filing in, he found himself quickly overwhelmed.
He had remembered her help in the Musain assembly a couple of days ago, and without any clear idea of how she had gotten there or why she even agreed, Eponine soon found herself skimming the crowds for familiar and unfamiliar faces, asking questions, collecting accounts, checking on those present and those missing.
The activity brought back some notion of normality – as strange as it was to consider her dealings with the revolutionaries "normality" all of a sudden. The dilemma was never wholly forgotten, but the unease receded to a queasy feeling in her stomach, and that she could deal with and ignore for now.
Bahorel arrived snarling and barely lucid in his anger, swearing bloody revenge at whoever was responsible – or seemed responsible – for the death of yet another few of their numbers, and it took all of Courfeyrac's credit in his eyes and his negotiation skills to get him to sit down and drink a glass of wine to calm himself down.
Combeferre, arriving as one of the latest, was quite the opposite, and it was from him that Eponine got the clearest account of what had probably happened, since he had managed to gather information from quite a number of spectators before he finally had had to slip away.
According to his observations, the three shots that had killed Madame Deleric, Franc Goudin and Julien Aviolet had come from not only three different pistols – as was natural given the time in-between – but also from three different people. They had used the chaos immediately after to vanish in the crowd and, at least as far as Combeferre was able and willing to judge, had left the cemetery untouched.
What he told her of the aftermath was no surprise to her – much of it she had already expected, some of it seen as she had circled the cemetery, unsure what to do after her confrontation with Montparnasse.
Some had panicked and tried to escape the site of crime, pushing through the gates of the cemetery ruthlessly. According to Combeferre, there had been a number of injured people in this stampede, but nothing more serious than a clean break of the arm's bones.
His account was sober enough, but Eponine guessed from the words between the words, that he had used the pretense of treating the injured to stay on site and observe further; a move she would not have expected from the quiet medicine student.
On the other hand, he was a writer for a revolutionary journal. This couldn't be the first time he found himself in a similar situation.
Out of those who stayed on the cemetery, there had been two different groups: One that had burst into fighting – sometimes students against the national guards, sometimes even amongst themselves, seemingly at random. The other had done their best to put a stop to this and calm the situation down. To Combeferre's surprise, both reason and fury were distributed both amongst the congregation and the National guard, which was probably the only reason why deescalation had been at all possible.
He had left when the crowd had thinned out and he had run out of patients to treat. He had recognized the Inspector Javert amongst the National Guards, and knowing that Javert knew him at least by face he had decided to avoid any unpleasant situations.
"Unfortunately", he concluded, "for all I tried I could not get a description of the attackers this time." He smiled thinly. "It seems all were much too focused on what happened at the grave itself."
"Seems natural", Eponine answered, but mechanically, as his casual remark had brought back the full force of her thoughts on the wretched situation she found herself in. Her first thought was one of annoyance – the assassins seemed to be as difficult to grasp as a fish in quickly running water. But immediately after she remembered, with a flash that ran like a hot poker into her stomach, that she probably would not need pictures, or observations. She knew at least one of them, and where one was, there might be others as well. As difficult as it was to wrench information out of Montparnasse, Eponine believed herself to be one of the few people who might be able to accomplish the deed.
If she were willing, of course.
This revelation made her situation even more dire. It seemed, and there was no denying the fact that she held in her hands a key to the solution of this whole situation.
The revolution they were planning, of course, was not something she could influence largely, but by knowing Montparnasse, and by knowing what he had done, she was potentially able to deliver the assassins to the students, or to at least bring the students to the assassins.
The only price to pay would be the sacrifice of all that was connected to her life before
And for all her bravado, for all the fascination the students held in her eyes, for all the alluring promises, she was not certain if she was ready to do this.
"Unfortunate still", Combeferre answered and actually sounded a little annoyed. Looking at him, he had a deepening frown on his face, although Eponine was not certain if that was directed at the matter at hand or at the fact that she – as she just realized – must have given a slightly distracted image. She was still wondering what too say when a smile reappeared on his face, and he seemed much more gentle, more good-natured than just moments ago. "And yet, that is human nature. The eye is drawn by what the eye is drawn. There is no use in reprimands."
He was much more at ease with himself than a few days ago, but Eponine did not find it within herself to question the motives and reasons for this. Instead, she gave what she hoped was a noncommittal nod and excused herself with words slightly less lame than before, given that she had actually promised to help Courfeyrac.
But as much as she tried, after her exchange with Combeferre, she could not find refuge in activity any more. The burning question of what she should do, where she should turn, was topmost on her mind and not to be dispelled, as she weighed and turned the facts before her.
Montparnasse had been her friend and ally for years. The child she had been had turned into a woman that had, despite their brief foray in a relationship even more deep, always been able to be certain of one thing. For all that he was, for all that he would do, Montparnasse would be on her side.
He had been for so long that she could not imagine a Paris, a world where this was different.
But she was not the same that she had been just days ago. That, too, she saw very clearly. Whether it had been circumstance or actual scheming by Marius' friends, the last days had shown her an unexpected opening. Enjolras and his friends had accepted her into what was their world with surprisingly little resistance. Her capabilities as they were were valued here, and other than her father – and Montparnasse – she had not been treated as a henchman, but as a person in her own right.
That was new, and exhilarating, and in its way infinitely precious, and yet, the choice was not as simple as that.
Eponine could not afford to live only in the day. Living in the streets as she had was an odd mixture of seizing opportunities and planning for things in the long run. The students were planning at revolution; it was not at all a given that they would live to see the next month. It was also not certain that they would still want her around, once the hassle had died down.
And then what?
Eponine had seen too many deceptions in her life to take chances so easily.
And yet, Montparnasse, who had been a thief, and yes, also not fully adverse to violence, had stepped on a path that even by her moral standards seemed questionable at least.
So what now?
She was drifting through the sea of people without seeing any of them, hearing the words spokein without registering a single word, blind and deaf to her surroundings as her thoughts raced and twisted and turned. It was only when she bumped into a young man she did not know that she realized that she could not be here at the moment.
All of them had a goal, they were a crowd, a group.
And as long as she had not made a decision, she could not be one of them.
Perhaps, she never would again.
Unbidden, she wondered what Enjolras would look like if he were disappointed. If he even would be disappointed. Or if, by her betrayal of them, she had just confirmed a suspicion that he might have been harboring, secretly, hidden, all along.
She curled her hands into tight firsts and clenched her teeth against the onslaught of sadness and anger and a sense of loss that she could not even place.
She had thought she had nothing. And it was a horrifying experience to understand that there were some few things that she indeed still had.
And that she could not keep the one and the other.
Suddenly the urge to run, to be out in the open became almost unbearable. She needed to get away from all those hopeful young people who were dreaming of tomorrow, and who, probably, she might never see again; unless she found it in her heart to leave behind all that she had known.
Unseeingly, without saying goodbye to anyone, she pushed through the crowd and towards the door, into the staircase where she was assaulted by the smiles and smells of a Paris tenement.
And met by an inquisitive stare out of cool, blue eyes.
He had waited for her on the topmost landing, outside of the apartment. Leaning against the wall, arms crossed, he seemed almost in repose, but the posture was deceptive. Every fiber of him was tense.
For a moment, she simply held his gaze, unwavering, unblinking, her heart coming to a sudden, violent stop.
"Eponine", he said, almost cold, if not for the tiniest of frowns that appeared on his face. "I will ask you one thing only. Is it something I should know?"