Frollo had ordered various servants to fetch the proper necessities for Quasimodo, without giving too much away which could lead to unflattering gossip. They cast each other suspicious glances at his requested items: infant clothes, a cradle, linen cloths…Was the Minister expecting some secret love child or keeping family perhaps?

When one of the bold ones attempted to inquire about the contents of his list, the judge shortly replied, "It is not your place to question my orders; just do as you are told."

He commanded that these items be delivered to Notre Dame where he would visit later on, even with a constant throbbing in his head from last night's angry drinks.

X

The young man whistled happily as he climbed up the steps and pushed through the church's doors late in the day. As a handsome teenage boy with his riotous blond curls and red fur-lined tunic, he was the image of lust for life. He scanned around the nave until he located the Archdeacon.

"Father Augustin!" he called, his boisterous voice echoing and startling the man.

Gathering his composure, Augustin greeted the teen. "Good day, Jehan. What brings you here at this hour?"

"I've been all over the city looking for Claude and heard that he might be here. Have you seen him?"

"Ah yes, he's up in the bell tower actually. Although I'm not sure he is in the right mood to see you now."

Jehan shrugged his shoulders. "Nonsense! My brother's always pleased to see me!" he happily assured as he turned away and headed for the stairwell.

Jehan lightly pondered over the priest's words; he may have said that his brother was not in a pleasant mood, but then again Claude was always in a foul one, so what difference would it make?

"Claude!" he called out as he neared the top of the tower. "Claude! Are you up here?"

As he reached the top of the staircase, Frollo speedily marched down the steps, gritting his teeth and looking incredibly annoyed–as usual.

"Jehan!" the judge angrily hissed. "Will you be quiet?!" he said before turning around and making his way up the steps, the teen following his brother to the bell tower.

"'Quiet'?" Jehan questioned. "What are you doing up here anyway?"

Frollo huffed in frustration. "Never mind that! Whatever trouble you're in or amount of money that you desire, I cannot help you with right now. So if you would be so kind as to leave me be, I'll visit you another time."

"But I really do need your help today…" Jehan's plea was interrupted by a gurgling sound coming from the top of the steps of the tower. Glancing up and back at his brother, Jehan raised an eyebrow and asked, "What was that?"

Frollo shook his head and climbed back up the steps with Jehan in tow, curious to see what his brother was hiding.

Upon reaching the top, Jehan's eyes immediately fell upon the wooden cradle a few feet away from where the small voice came. While Frollo busied himself at a nearby table pouring milk into a hollowed out cow's horn, Jehan eagerly asked, "Claude, is that what I think it is?"

"Partially, so to speak," he answered dryly and glancing back at Jehan. "This child is now my responsibility and I have decided to care for it here in the church."

"You're a father now?!" Jehan asked in disbelief. "You know, I always had a hunch that you had a secret love life you weren't telling me about."

Don't say "hunch", he thought a grimace. Frollo gave him a cold look before saying, "This child is not my flesh and blood. I have just taken him into my care due to certain unforeseen circumstances."

Jehan stepped closer towards Quasimodo's cradle. "Come on, I'm sure that this child can't be all…"

The boy stumbled backward in shock and horror. "Good Lord! What is that?!" He shakily ran back and gripped his brother's arm. "What is that thing?!" he repeated, trembling and pointing back at the cradle.

Stoically, Frollo answered, "That monstrosity is now my ward." He pried Jehan's nails out of his arm and walked over to lift the baby up. Frollo walked back over to the table where a shaken Jehan backed up a little from the two. He watched as his brother picked up the horn and carefully fed it to the child.

The teen watched with morbid fascination the odd pair. "Why not just put it to a wet-nurse?" Jehan asked, still apprehensive of getting too close to the deformed infant. "Isn't that what you did for me?"

"Easier said than done," Frollo answered. "My endeavors have been utterly fruitless in finding a wet-nurse willing enough to feed a child as hideous as him."

Jehan examined the child's protruding wart over the left eye as he hungrily drank from the horn. "By the way, what's the little beast's name?"

"Quasimodo."

Jehan chuckled at this. "Good one." The teen scanned the tower, his gaze wandering upward towards the bells in the high ceiling. "Charming place to keep a child," he remarked. "So how did you come to be the caretaker? Unless he really is the product of a secret love affair; if so, well done!"

Frollo glared at his brother. "I have already told you that I did not sire this boy! It was orphaned and I was named his guardian. Besides, I would never be so careless as to commit such a disgusting sin as fathering a bastard child!"

"Then what does that make Quasimodo since you have no wife and he isn't yours by blood?" Jehan challenged, enjoying the sheer annoyance evidenced on the Minister's face.

"It simply means that I have taken him in as my own out of the goodness of my heart," he unemotionally answered. To prevent any further inquiries (and to avoid recounting the actual story), Frollo quickly changed the subject. "Anyway, what did you want in the first place, Jehan? If it is money that you seek, I will not help you."

Jehan's face turned up into an innocent smile. "Brother," he said sweetly, hands folded before himself. "I only wanted to pay you a visit, but then I remembered something... You know how much I value your good grace, which is why I come to you in need of a few pieces of silver. You see, I too experienced some unforeseen circumstances that have robbed me of my allowance."

Frollo took the now empty horn out of Quasimodo's mouth and gave him a light pat on the back before laying the boy into his cradle. He looked doubtfully at his little brother. "By any chance did these "circumstances" happen to be the succubi of Rue Glatigny, or perhaps a so-called "bad hand" at one of your card games?"

"Of course not! Give me a little more credit than that!"

"Hmm…a few more drinks you have put down on your already-extensive tab at La Falourdel's?"

Jehan frowned at his brother's inquiry. "That's not the point. I am in desperate need of money!"

"Then elaborate, please," Frollo said calmly and crossing his arms. "What do you so desperately require money for?"

Stretching the truth, Jehan replied, "Why, because there is a poor soul out there in great need of a new suit, and we are a charitable family, are we not? And I want to be the one to provide this poor man with said charity."

Frollo remained unmoved at Jehan's subtle lie. "'Charity?' Please, do you deem me a simpleton? I know fully well that you intend to waste my money on ridiculous luxuries to your heart's content. You do not need yet another suit! By the way, how are your studies? For your sake I pray that you are not getting involved in any more quarrels."

Jehan nervously sucked the air through his teeth and ran his hand through his hair. "Well...one of my books has been misplaced, and another was stolen."

Frollo rubbed his temples at the egregiousness of his brother's disregard for such materials. "Are there any books of yours that did not suffer the same fate?"

"I didn't lose my Aristotle book," he replied.

"That's a start. Jehan, you must be more responsible—'For each will have to bear his own load.' Take proper care of your possessions, especially when they are of priceless, intellectual value such as books."

"Except for Aristotle," Jehan protested. "Which is why I got rid of it."

Frollo blinked at this. "You purposely disposed of one of your school books?"

"Yes, I did. You always said to avoid such heathen ideas, which is why I have shunned the man's works." Jehan, in truth, had pawned off said book, and the money earned had gone straight into the pot of another card game. But he figured this would be the last thing Claude wanted to hear. "Anyway, I told you, the reason I sought you out is because I still need money."

Frollo's muscles tensed up as he wanted scold Jehan further and maybe wring his neck for such carelessness, which he gladly would have done had it not been for a cry emitting from Quasimodo's cradle.

Taking the baby once more into his arms, Frollo heard his brother remark, "But, I see that you have your hands full, so I suppose we will just have to discuss the value of education later. But Claude, there is still the pressing matter of some silver…"

"Jehan!" Frollo growled as he attempted to calm the wailing infant in his arms. "If I give you money, will you please leave?"

Jehan flashed a mischievous grin. "For you, brother, of course." He held out his hand expectantly towards Frollo who pulled out a coin purse from his pocket and tossed it to Jehan.

"Now be on your way already," he ordered.

Jehan smiled wickedly and thanked his brother before heading out, weighing the bag in his hand triumphantly.

Frollo cautiously rocked Quasimodo in his arms even though he continued to bawl, the sound ear-splitting to the Minister as he could feel a headache already forming in his skull.

The whole time the judge had been here, he had entered a never-ending battle in little Quasimodo's incessant crying. When he described it to the Archdeacon in an earlier visit, the man explained that the boy needed time to adjust after losing its mother and being handed off to a new guardian.

"Quiet!" he nervously begged, hoping that the baby would just cry itself back to sleep. Frollo couldn't even remember Jehan being this fussy as a child, which frustrated him even more.

He remembered the defeat that resonated knowing that he could have been rid of the child to the depths of the water well easily had fate not intervened.

Calm yourself, Claude, he thought, finding it difficult to do so. Remember that you are in control.

Frollo focused on trying to regain his composure and less of the crying that grated his ears, leading him to fall back on what he usually did when faced with a challenge:

"Pater noster, qui es in caelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum.

"Adveniat regnum tuum.

"Fiat voluntas tua, sicut in caelo et in terra."

Suddenly the crying had become quieter. When Frollo looked back at Quasimodo, the boy gazed up at him in awe with his dark blue eyes.

The Minister was shocked that this tactic had such an effect. Without hesitation, he continued:

"Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie, et dimitte nobis

"Debita nostra sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris.

"Et ne nos inducas in tentationem, sed libera nos a malo. Amen."

Steadying himself, the judge watched as the infant's eyes shut and rested his head in the crook of his guardian's elbow.

For some unknown reason, Frollo was captivated by the sight of the child now asleep in his arms. Suddenly he was taken back to the days when he had cradled Jehan like such after the deaths of their parents and he was forced to become the parental figure to his brother.

Shaking off these meddlesome memories, he carried Quasimodo back and carefully laid him down in the wooden cradle, relieved over the beautiful sound of silence.

Frollo looked out the window and saw the night was quickly approaching. The headache was pounding and he was exhausted from the first day of repeated parenthood. Without another thought, he shuffled towards the nearby table and took a seat before resting his tired head in his hands.

The Minister wasn't aware of how drained he was until he was surrounded by darkness as he fell into a deep sleep.

x

*A/n: Jehan's here now...what a little sh*t. I did my research and found out that if there was no wet-nurse available then the babies would use cow horns as a bottle of sorts.

Latin translates to the Lord's Prayer