Chapter Text
The rain had settled overnight into a fine grey mist, upon October air now grown chilly with the promise of coming winter. Grantaire had listened to it, half awake, throughout the restless night, fine raindrops almost rasping against the circular windows that were placed high around the dormitory, windows that would let in streaks of warm sunshine on clear mornings.
The sky stretching high above the Great Hall was far from that today however, but gloomy and promising no subsiding of the dreary weather that had moved in over dinner last night. It was so dark in the hall, that the hundreds of candles scattered above them were lit, their flames reflected dully on the glossy, polished tables. It was days like these, Grantaire mused, as he helped himself to another slice of toast, that made early mornings all the more unendurable. The hall itself felt chilly today, despite the quantity of students sitting on the long benches, making the most of breakfast before they had to go to their lessons. From his rather slumped position at the Gryffindor table, he could feel the rather feeble efforts of the fire in the high, arching stone grate, just past the Hufflepuff table. He was now half-wishing he’d sat with the rest of his own house today.
“Why,” Courfeyrac asked of the sky loudly, his enunciation somewhat impaired by a mouthful of Cheery-Owls, “Is Herbology our first lesson?”
Next to him, Bahorel took a long sip of warm tea, and tried not to look too smug. Sixth years were usually smug, Grantaire had noticed this term, as half their timetables were normally vacant. He could afford to be pleased with himself after the hour and a half he had to spend outside in the cold, damp grounds.
“My essay for Babbling is only fourteen and a half inches.” Jehan said, his nose wrinkling in annoyance, the tape measure he had conjured disappearing into thin air, “Do you reckon she’ll notice?”
“Cross a paragraph out and write it again.” Grantaire offered, around a mouthful of toast and jam, “Instant four inches. Works like a charm.”
A snort issued from the area to his left, and he didn’t have to look over to know exactly whose mouth it had come from. Grantaire reached for his goblet of orange juice, its contents bright and glimmering from the candlelight above.
“Disapprove of my below par methods?” He said loudly, grinning, before he turned his eyes on Enjolras, who was currently neatly folding his Slytherin scarf into his bag.
“I’m sure they work very well for you.” Was all he said in response, and Grantaire had to admit that he felt somewhat disappointed at the appeasing reply.
“Mornings obviously turn you into a more agreeable person, Enjolras,” Grantaire tried again, beginning to swirl the goblet of orange juice around so that it glinted further, “And make you far more accepting of shortcuts in all-so-important subjects.”
Enjolras paused for a minute, looking at him, and Grantaire determinedly held his gaze, and ignored the fact that it was far too early, far too early for the way his hands suddenly felt clammy, the way his heartbeat now seemed to be beating erratically somewhere by his throat.
“I would have thought,” Enjolras finally said, and Grantaire was sure, very sure, that he wasn’t imagining the small smile that was now lifting the corners of Enjolras’s mouth, “That you know me well enough to know how essays aren’t always high on my list of priorities.”
Grantaire gave him a genuinely amused, toothy grin, and allowed him to return to the remains of his breakfast.
He had to allow Enjolras that, he reflected, as Combeferre directed the conversation towards their plans for the Hogsmeade trip in a week’s time. Ever since he’d known him, Enjolras had placed much above his own schoolwork; things that didn’t help him, but helped others. All the way from when he was a serious-faced eleven year old, to now, as he sat at the Gryffindor table, with his fair hair curling about his face, as if the strands were trying to reach him, to skim lovingly against his lips, his long, fair eyelashes; the features of his face that Grantaire wished his own eyes didn’t trace in raw longing.
“I can’t believe I’m practicing Quidditch in this tonight,” Bahorel’s voice cut across Grantaire’s constant and spiralling distractions in the fair-haired boy across from him, and he looked back at his breakfast plate,
“Nothing like a rainy, muddy practice session.” Courfeyrac told him gleefully, busy wrapping himself in his scarf, his dark curls springing out from under the red and yellow woven fabric.
“I seem to remember last time, you got the password for the prefect’s bathroom off Courfeyrac, and followed your practice session up with three straight hours in the prefect’s bathroom, trying out all the bubble bath.” Combeferre said lightly, spearing a grilled tomato onto his fork.
Bahorel instantly brightened at the prospect.
“Prefects.” Eponine muttered, from Grantaire’s left side, and Musichetta giggled.
“You have to cut them a little slack,” Grantaire said, eyes drifting to Enjolras once more, where, currently hidden under a fold in his robes, lay a shiny prefect badge, “It must be so hard to conform to, and work with, a system that prizes academic intelligence above all other forms of merit.”
Enjolras coloured, and a mental chime of twisted success rang in Grantaire’s head.
“If handled correctly, being a prefect is in no way an endorsement of that,” He snapped, “The responsibility can, and should be used to help students struggling in any manner.”
Grantaire, who knew better than anyone that Enjolras was the last person who would abuse any position in power, and had to be talked round by Combeferre into even accepting his prefect badge, couldn’t resist sitting back in his seat and sending Enjolras a smirk.
“If you say so, dear.”
Enjolras blushed, scowled, and in one swift movement, got to his feet and swung his bag over his back, stalking away from them without a second glance.
Grantaire watched him leave as Courfeyrac sighed heavily, and reached for his orange juice once more.
“I think he’s warming up to me.” He said.
“It’s only taken six years.” Said Feuilly, by way of announcing his arrival.
“You shouldn’t wind him up so much, R.” Combeferre said in his measured tones, fixing Grantaire with a glance that was only slightly exasperated.
“Temptation is a mistress I cannot deny.” Grantaire responded, and checked his watch, “Hadn’t we better get going to the greenhouses?”
“Typical.” Feuilly sighed in mock dramatic fashion, and he began wrapping five pieces of toast in a napkin for the journey.
The walk to the greenhouses was unpleasant, the grass muddy underfoot and the trees that were fading from summer dripping on their heads. The greenhouses lay clustered near the castle; the lake just visible ahead of them, grey and dreary today. The rich smell of soil hung in the air, and the greenhouse windows were misted from the clashing temperatures, the old, intricate glasswork stained green. It was warm inside, the kind of warm belonging to a tropical climate, and the six of them that still took Herbology; Grantaire, Joly, Combeferre, Courfeyrac, Feuilly and Musichetta all went gratefully in, dumping their bags around the work station, far away from the Snargaluffs over in the corner, which had developed a nasty habit of snagging themselves on nearby people with their thorn covered vines.
Professor Longbottom arrived last, after the few minutes of waiting where Feuilly had fed the Chinese Chomping Cabbage the remains of his toast, and the few others taking Herbology to NEWT level had filed in, all of them looking somewhat sodden from the walk. The smell of damp began to permeate the room.
The days weren’t yet gone when someone didn’t, at least once a week, ask Professor Longbottom to show them the coin that had marked him a member of Dumbledore’s Army, during the days of Voldemort’s second rise to power. And it was usually Courfeyac. Grantaire himself didn’t mind it either, it was oddly calming to have a reminder, each week, that some dark things could be brought to an end, even if some of them continued to thrive like the poisonous plants that grew in this hot greenhouse.
Today, Professor Longbottom set them the task of treating the wilting leaves of a few of the Venemous Tentacula that usually stood along the length of the greenhouse. Grantaire might have held more sympathy for them, if they didn’t keep grabbing him every time he made to move past. Professor Longbottom had kept up the compromise he had told them had existed in his own school days, and they were allowed to swear loudly whenever the plant stabbed unexpectedly at exposed skin, something Grantaire found himself taking full advantage of.
“FUCK!” He said loudly, five minutes into the lesson, as a vine tangled in his hair, and pulled on it hard.
“Hang on,” Joly said, far too calmly for Grantaire’s liking (he supposed it was all part of his practicing his bedside manner for when he achieved his dream and worked at St Mungo’s), “Diffindo.”
With an oddly disappointed, and squelchy noise, the Venemous Tentacula let go of Grantaire, and sidled sulkily back towards its pot, its leaves gnashing their teeth.
Owing to that early, hair-related discovery, tending the Venemous Tentacula turned out to require much concentration, which was perhaps for the best, as Grantaire’s mind was often inclined to wander to thoughts he’d rather not think about. Enjolras, for example, was never far from his mind, and thinking about him rarely brought much pure happiness, only the kind that was warped and interwoven with the toxic feeling of hopelessness and self-hatred. He knew trying to illicit curt responses from Enjolras was a poor substitution for actual conversation, but the latter was too rare for Grantaire to survive on. So he encouraged Enjolras to dislike him, encouraged rolled eyes and waspish retorts, and he relished the twisted proximity it caused them.
The rain had steadily increased by the time the lesson ended and they began the walk back up to the castle for the half hour break. Courfeyrac stayed behind to help Professor Longbottom put the Venemous Tentatcula back in their normal places, and no doubt hear his rendition of the Battle of Hogwarts for the umpteenth time. Whilst they were usually turned out into one of the courtyards, the drizzle meant they were able to stay in the castle for the break, and they headed to the classroom on the second floor, where they usually spent the time.
The proud, arching ceilings of the classroom made the room cold, like the rest of the castle, and the thin window panes rattled gently from the rain, but it still felt oddly cosy; in a way that Grantaire had found only Hogwarts could achieve.
Jehan, Marius, Bossuet and Eponine were already there, sat around a few of the desks; one of the jars they’d snuck out the Potions classroom a few weeks ago now before them, lit with the blue, dancing flames Joly had showed them all how to do in their second year.
“Nice free period?” Musichetta asked them as she planted a kiss on Bossuet’s forehead in greeting. He blushed and grinned.
“Oh yeah, we got lots of work done.” He replied, dragging a chair across for her to sit down on. “We tried to get into Jehan’s common room.”
“And it made me feel very secure in the knowledge that I shall always be able to avoid you all up in Ravenclaw Tower.” Jehan concluded, looking a little smug. “Which reminds me, Professor Flitwick said he wanted to talk to one of the Ravenclaw prefects about something, Combeferre.”
“Preeeefect.” Musichetta, Grantaire and Bossuet all said in unison, mock repulsion dripping from the stretched out word. Combeferre’s lips twitched.
“I thought that would have got old after last year-”
“-Nope.” Bossuet grinned.
“I’ll meet you in Arithmancy, Marius.” Combeferre said, re-hoisting his bag over his shoulder and heading towards the classroom door. He got there just as Courfeyrac arrived, his curls slightly sodden and a bright smile on his face. It widened at the sight of Combeferre, and Grantaire, slouched back against his seat, idly watched them have a brief, inaudible exchange before Combeferre went to leave, his hand coming up to touch Courfeyrac’s shoulder in farewell, a fluid, comfortable gesture that spoke of a closeness. And Grantaire noted the way Courfeyrac’s smile widened. The cold seemed to have made his cheeks pink.
“Professor Longbottom is the coolest.” Courfeyrac said when he’d eventually joined them, flopping down into a free seat and beginning to worm his way out of his scarf, “The way he resisted the Death Eaters teaching here! How he led Dumbledore’s Army from inside Hogwarts!”
“You should marry him.” Grantaire informed him.
“He’s regrettably, almost definitely straight.” Courfeyrac sighed in mock sorrow, before moving on, “What are we doing with our free period, then?”
“Library.” Said Eponine glumly from her corner of the desk, “I haven’t even looked at that Ancient Runes essay.”
“Same.” Marius said brightly, looking up from his battered copy of New Theory of Numerology. “I was going to do it in our free period at the end of today, if you want to join me?”
Eponine revitalized at this prospect considerably.
“Well, I’m going to give Hagrid a hand with the Knarls he’s got for the fourth years.” Feuilly grinned, stretching his arms above his head, “They keep eating the cabbages, apparently.”
“Nerd.” Bahorel said, who had walked up to them in time to hear this comment.
Whilst Feuilly grabbed Marius’s New Theory of Numerology and proceeded to hit Bahorel on the arm with it, Eponine handed Grantaire some of the Drooble’s Best Blowing Gum they had managed to save since the food trolley on the train.
By the time the bell rang for the start of the second lesson, violet bubbles were bobbing lazily along the ceiling, and Feuilly and Bahorel had both been hit a lot by a New Theory of Numerology, which was an unfortunately large volume.
“Let’s see what the fates have in store for me this week.” Bossuet said cheerfully, clambering to his feet and hitting his shin against the table leg in the process.
Grantaire had not yet been quite able to work out whether Bossuet’s taking Divination was some form of precaution for his seemingly continual ill luck, or whether it was some ironic form of humour. He certainly predicted his many imminent disasters with unusual relish.
Whilst Jehan and Bossuet began the walk to the Divination classroom, Marius left for Arithmancy, and Feuilly for the grounds, and the remaining five of them decided to head to the Great Hall, in an attempt to find the only other person with a free period. They left the bubblegum bouncing off the arched ceiling, which the elderly caretaker, Filch, would no doubt not be best pleased at. Grantaire’s sympathy was not much engaged after he’d been given detention by him for slapping a suit of armour about the face when it refused to stop singing ‘Ding Dong Merrily on High’.
As expected, Enjolras was in the hall, seated at the Ravenclaw table now and reading a newspaper. His Screech Owl was at his elbow, pecking hopefully at some toast he had evidently saved for it from breakfast. It looked at Grantaire as they approached; its round eyes narrowed and its pale plumage ruffled, and Grantaire was forcefully reminded of its owner.
Enjolras looked up as they approached, and the figures in the photos on the paper below him began to wave angrily, apparently not keen on being ignored.
“Flitwick told me the eagle knocker informed him some Gryffindors and a Slytherin tried to get into the Ravenclaw common room earlier.” He said, a small trace of humour in his eyes that Grantaire took down to rebellion against houses and their off-limit common rooms.
“Imagine that.” Eponine said dryly, flopping down on the bench and propping her head in her hands. Grantaire followed suit, sitting down on the table and resting his legs on the bench, casting his eyes about the hall.
Enjolras returned to the newspaper, thumbing through it,
“Is that The Daily Prophet?” Courfeyrac asked, leaning forwards on his elbows to see it better from his seat.
“Euryalus just brought it.” Enjolras said, and Grantaire swallowed a snort with difficulty at the reminder of the owl’s name.
“I thought you hated it?” Musichetta questioned,
“It’s nice to know what the biased and deceptive papers are saying.” Enjolras replied, rather hotly, sounding personally offended by the inevitable corruptibility of the media.
“Their prejudices are truly shocking and new-fangled.” Grantaire commented, hoping the sarcasm he’d laced the remark with was the dramatic side of dripping.
“No matter how consistent an issue it is,” Enjolras responded, calmly turning a page, and not looking up at Grantaire, “It’s still grating, and I’m sure you’d want to change it if you thought you could.”
“No doubt.” Grantaire replied lightly, and Enjolras still didn’t look at him. Perhaps he didn’t trust himself to, not after losing his temper earlier that morning, “But I can’t change it.”
And then Enjolras did look up, and Grantaire was frozen by suddenly being met with those steady, grey eyes, as if a hand had slipped round his heart and pinched it.
“Why do you think that?” He asked, and he seemed to be striving for patience. Grantaire turned to the owl, struggling to hide his grin.
“‘Euryalus, do the gods set this fire in our hearts, or does each man’s fatal desire become godlike to him?’”
The owl hooted, as if it had indeed caught his reference, and Enjolras sighed heavily.
“So my apparent desire to improve the world will prove fatal, will it?” He said,
“Fatal to your happiness, no doubt.” Grantaire replied with a small, lopsided smile, before sliding off the table, “Do excuse me, I’ve seen some people I need to scrounge a History of Magic essay from.”
Enjolras watched him head over to a small cluster of people on the Hufflepuff table, and heaved another sigh of frustration,
“Why is he so stubborn?” He asked of no one in particular, “Why can’t he admit that change is possible where there’s enough momentum?”
“For the same reason you won’t say you’re wrong.” Courfeyrac said, “You’re both stubborn mules with your own set opinions. To be honest, most of the time I think he’s acting up to get a rise out of you.”
“Why?”
“Ah good, you’re finished?” Courfeyrac said quickly, and he dragged the paper out from Enjolras’s hands, “The politics are awful, but their ‘blablabla’ page is something else.”
Enjolras let him flip to the gossip section to amuse himself, and begin to segments aloud which Bahorel laughed noisily at (which made Euryalus ruffle his feathers uncertainly), and instead let his eyes rest on Grantaire, who was still with the cluster of Hufflepuffs at their table. He watched as he made them laugh, and felt an odd twinge in the regions of his gut, an almost frustration that he couldn’t share that light-heartedness with him. No, their conversations always seemed to end with Enjolras furious and agitated, and Grantaire would smile that toothy, lopsided smirk that set Enjolras’s temper on edge all the more.
He was somewhat glad when lunchtime came, and the rest of the group arrived, and food appeared on the table before them. Grantaire re-joined them halfway through, carrying a plate loaded with steak and ale pie and mashed potato, and telling them all about the Hufflepuff fifth year that had asked him to go with her to Madam Puddifoot’s at the Hogsmeade Weekend. As that was the third time he’d told them something along those lines, Enjolras was no longer sure how truthful he was being, and he put that resulting exasperation down to why he was currently stabbing his sprouts with particular relish.
Courfeyrac was still busy reading out amusing sections of the Daily Prophet, in between mouthfuls of his Cornish pasty, and his quips were getting bitterer as he headed towards the more political section of the newspaper. Bahorel, Musichetta and Bossuet were currently trying to add some spice to Bossuet’s cauliflower, each prodding it with their wands and shouting ‘Adicio Condictus.’ The cauliflower seemed to be remaining determinedly bland. Combeferre appeared to be coming out of a small reverie he had been under, and turned to Enjolras, and the two of them spent the next half an hour debating the usefulness of Veritaserum, and ultimately rejecting the morality of using it in Wizengamot trials.
The bell to signify the end of lunch rang just as the cauliflower ignited, and they all exited the table fairly swiftly as a result. All of them, spare Combeferre, Musichetta, Bossuet and Bahorel, had Charms for the next hour and a half, so they headed out the hall and out towards the Grand Staircase, where the interwoven network of moving staircases were framed by thousands of portraits that winked, laughed and called out to them as they passed.
Grantaire was first onto the staircase that currently led to thin air, and he flopped back against its stone railing and let out a long sigh as they all crammed onto the steps, and felt the usual slow judder as the stairs began to swing across towards the second floor landing.
“I hope we’re turning vinegar to wine again.” He said, as Feuilly decided to wrap him in a large, rather violent looking hug. “I’m thirsty.”
For some reason, he flicked a glance at Enjolras as he finished speaking, but Enjolras couldn’t make out much more of his expression, as Feuilly’s hand suddenly went onto Grantaire’s face.
Feuilly and Grantaire continued their odd form of affectionate wrestling up onto the second flight of staircases, whereupon Courfeyrac joined in. The staircase swung jerkily, and Grantaire, at the front of it, slipped forwards, and Enjolras found his own hand whipping out and grabbing Grantaire’s arm.
Grantaire, steadied several centimetres from the edge of the stairs, blinked, and took in Enjolras’s hand still clasped around his upper arm. His eyes flicked quickly up to his face, seeming to be searching for some expression, that Enjolras had no idea if he was successful in. A second or two passed, the staircase gave a soft bump as it aligned with the third floor, and Grantaire’s face broke into a grin.
“Got you worried.” He smirked, before releasing himself and hopping onto the third floor landing. And Enjolras was left to reflect that Grantaire’s smile didn’t always seem to meet his eyes.
Much to what Enjolras imagined as Grantaire’s sure-to-be dismay, they weren’t continuing their work on turning vinegar to wine in class that day. Elderly Professor Flitwick had them conjuring water into the goblets placed in front of them, which was a liquid Enjolras was sure Grantaire would be far less enthusiastic about.
He had found it hard to concentrate all morning, despite his lack of lesson time, and trying to perfect the charm came slowly, through the maze of his distracted mind. He was abnormally and irritatingly conscious of Grantaire two desks down from him, waving his wand lazily in the hand movement Flitwick had illustrated on the blackboard. He felt he could still feel Grantaire’s robes on the tips of his fingers, and the corner of his mind was showing him, as if it were a reel from old-fashioned Muggle movies being replayed; the surprised expression on Grantaire’s face, as if it were some shock that Enjolras cared, before his face reverted to the usual smirk he wore when confronted with Enjolras.
It seemed strange, Enjolras brooded, as Feuilly next to him filled his goblet with clear water for the third time, strange that in such a large circle of friends, he and Grantaire were so unable to put the same term on their own relationship. They had seemed at odds since they had first met, whenever that had been. Enjolras couldn’t remember the exact moment the people who now meant so much to him entered his life, only that they had, and he was immeasurably glad of it.
They seemed to be on different wavelengths, he and Grantaire, each treading some constant, unswayable path parallel to one another, but never quite meeting. Grantaire’s playful yet sceptical nature irked Enjolras, who could see the inconsistency between those two traits, and was certain of an insincerity in Grantaire’s declared impartiality of the state of the world and its inhabitants. And whatever Grantaire thought of him, Enjolras had not quite been able to construe. And whilst six years might have seemed to prove sufficient to give him some clarity, he had found they had only given him a slight indication of Grantaire and the thoughts that moved inside his head, only guessed at by the expressions in his eyes, beneath the tangles of his dark hair.
The lesson passed with Enjolras’s thoughts far from creating water, and the rain swept in over the castle again; pattering against the windowpane with the promise of continuing throughout the afternoon. Courfeyrac grew more and more frustrated throughout the course of the lesson as the goblet before him kept refilling itself with rather strong smelling murky water, and Marius, as he got up to leave at the end of the lesson, knocked into the tall, pretty Gryffindor girl who sat at the other aisle of desks. Enjolras missed their sudden halt, and the way Marius’s mouth dropped open, and the way Cosette’s face turned scarlet.
His mind felt more focused during Defence Against the Dark Arts, as he took in the theory of several counter-jinxes and hexes that spidered their way in chalk over the blackboard at the wave of Professor Lamock’s wand. It had long been the class he had deemed as most useful, and Professor Lamock’s youth and her straying somewhat from the Ministry syllabus only added to his liking of it. Apparently not quite so enthralled, Bahorel and Eponine ploughed their way through a pack of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans; in muted whispers each provoking the other to eat the more hazardously coloured ones, which culminated in Bahorel’s consuming of a phlegm flavoured one which reduced the two of them to silent hysterics.
The castle felt even darker as he headed with Combeferre and Joly to Muggle Studies; their last lesson of the day. The rain had now started to pound on the windows, far more than the soft patter of raindrops that had been the background noise of that morning. The brief glimpses of the grounds through the tall windows along the corridor on the first floor showed the thick haze of clouds had descended lower, blurring indistinctly with the lake; the mountains in the distance lost; creating the eerie feeling that the school was afloat. He didn’t envy Feuilly, Bossuet, Bahorel, Musichetta, Grantaire and Courfeyrac the next hour and a half they would spend in Care of Magical Creatures, outside by Hagrid’s Hut. Enjolras rather regretted taking the seat by the window for the class; which was on the outer wall of the castle rising high against the lake, and his focus on the lesson (‘Muggles and “the Internet”’) was diverted by the torrents of rain cascading onto the iron grey stretch of water outside, pounding on its surface, the wind driving it as if it were rough seas. The draft from edges of the thin glass spiked goosepimples on his arms, and more than once Combeferre had to nudge him with his elbow when a question was put to him.
He was therefore rather glad when, at last, the final bell rang, and they could leave, across the first floor corridor, through the arching doors (which liked to be politely asked permission before use) and down the marble staircase to the Entrance Hall, and into the Great Hall that smelt promisingly of dinner.
The six that had just had Care of Magical Creatures were already there, ladling copious amounts of warm Shepherd’s Pie onto their plates. They looked as if they had been swimming in the lake instead of attending a class.
“Fun lesson?” Combeferre asked, with an impressively straight face as he took as seat beside them. The look Courfeyrac sent him; half his face hidden in his drenched scarf, seemed to limit the amount of humour he could find in it.
“We had a grand time.” Grantaire said on Courfeyrac’s behalf, and Enjolras felt his own eyes lingering on the curls that were plastered to Grantaire’s cheeks, slowly sending rivulets down the side of his face.
Without so much as a comment, Joly took out his wand, and gave it a tired flick in their direction. Enjolras felt a rush of warm air graze over him, and next moment, his friends looked far drier. Courfeyrac had stopped shivering.
“Oh.” Bossuet said.
“Thank you.” Feuilly said meekly, through a mouthful of carrots.
Eponine and Marius joined them a moment later, both weighed down by an armful of library books.
“We left Prouvaire in the library.” Eponine grinned, dumping her stack of books onto the table with a bang that caused several second years nearby to look round in alarm. “He’s having a love affair with the goddess Cliodna and her otherworldly birds at the moment.”
“I look forward to the poetry.” Courfeyrac grinned, before noticing that Marius hadn’t quite seated himself, but had his legs either side of the bench, as if he had made to sit down but forgotten to do so. His eyes were fixed at something over Enjolras’s shoulder, and his cheeks were flushed.
“Marius, my little crumpet, you’re hovering.”
“Oh.” Marius said, re-animated by Courfeyrac’s words, and inelegantly put his other leg over the bench, and slowly sat down, his eyes flicking back to the spot he had just been staring at. Mildly curious, Enjolras turned to look over his shoulder, and through the shoulders of some Gryffindor seventh years, saw Cosette. She was currently chatting with a girl on her left, but the pink of her cheeks seemed to suggest she had some idea she was being stared at.
“What’s wrong, Marius?” Joly asked him, with all the concern of someone weighing up potential maladies.
Marius didn’t answer immediately, and seemed to fix his eye on the bowl of nearby broccoli with difficulty. Then, he let out a low mumble, which sounded enormously like ‘Cosette’.
“Ha!”
The loud exclamation from Grantaire made Enjolras start. He flicked him an irritated glance, and decided to focus his own attention on eating. Unobservant of one of the members of his audience’s annoyance, Grantaire appeared to have found his stride.
“Marius is in love!” He grinned, leaning forwards on the table, regardless of his dinner, his hands clasping the crook of his arms as his elbows slipped forwards on the smooth table, “Up springs glittering Eros, like a tempest as he pierces you with darts! Look at you sitting there now increasing your pain with the fumes of your sighs! You poor, raw recruit of love, lost and speared by an arrow’s wound. Magic to make the sanest man go mad.”
He concluded this rambling speech with a sip of pumpkin juice.
“How many things did you just reference?” Joly asked, somewhat despairingly,
“It’s a love story, baby, just say yes.” Grantaire finished dryly, and returned to his shepherd’s pie, still smirking.
Meanwhile, Courfeyrac had seemed to swell with each word Grantaire had spoken, and he now turned to Marius, and cupped his face with his hands,
“I’m so proud.”
“I’m regretting mentioning it.” Marius mumbled, pink-faced.
Courfeyrac spent the rest of dinner trying to persuade Marius to go and talk to Cosette, much to Enjolras’s growing irritation. He only stopped when Combeferre mildly suggested he do so, just as Bahorel got up to leave early for his Quidditch practice, woefully calling out farewell in such a loud voice he attracted the attention of half the hall.
Grantaire seemed thoroughly amused by Marius’s apparent affections, and when they finally got up to wend their individual ways back towards their dormitories, he flung an arm about Marius’s shoulders, as if Marius’s woes were something he was well-versed in. Something Enjolras heavily doubted; from Grantaire’s scepticism and the fact that he had never seemed taken with anyone for more than a half hour at a time.
He caught Enjolras’s eye as they made to head out the double doors and into the Entrance Hall. Joly’s spell had dried his hair so that his tangled head of curls looked wilder than normal. His face looked pale, dark shadows spanning beneath his eyes, as if he hadn’t slept well in a while, and his thin lips were set into the half-smirk that he so often wore.
“Mighty Slytherins first, of course,” He grinned, giving a grand arm gesture towards the oak doors, his other hand still clasped on Marius’s robes. Enjolras shook his head slightly at him as he conceded, half amused, half exasperated.
They went their separate ways once out in the Entrance Hall, the ceiling spanning up towards the rafters they couldn’t make out from there on the ground; torchlight flickering in brackets, the Grand Staircase just visible over the top of the marble steps that rose towards it. Courfeyrac, Musichetta and Bossuet went up the marble staircase, heading towards the upper floors, and Gryffindor Tower; Combeferre at their side as he headed for the Ravenclaw Common Room. A symphony of loud goodbyes came from Courfeyrac, fading as they went out of sight, although Enjolras was fairly sure he could still hear his voice echoing on the staircases. Joly and Feuilly began to walk towards the corridor that led down a small flight of steps, and towards the Hufflepuff Common Room. Grantaire, at last releasing Marius, gave Eponine a farewell hug, and headed after them, Marius hurrying after him.
Eponine seemed a little less boisterous than usual that evening, but their descent down the stone steps to the dungeons was still punctured by a verbal stream of comments, from remarks about her Ancient Runes essay, to the conditions for the first Quidditch match of the season. She was just telling him how Marius was going to lend her his copy of Modern Magical History as they arrived at the stone wall that marked the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room. She left Enjolras at the stairs that led towards the girls’ dormitories, and Enjolras headed to his own room, past the tapestries telling the deeds of Medieval Slytherins and into the small room he shared with the other sixth year students. He suddenly felt the absence of the large group of people he was so constantly near as he clambered into his four-poster bed; the green bed sheets glimmering from the lake rippling on the other side of the water-tight windows.
He’d taken out The Muggle Conspiracy from the restricted section that day out of morbid curiosity, but an hour in he found it was everything the title suggested and reading it made him far too furious to even consider sleeping. He flung it across his bed instead, letting it slide off and hit the floor, before settling back and casting his eyes to the green canopy above him, glinting in the lake light.
The eerie glow of the lake gave him the constant feeling that he was underwater when he lay in this bed; as if he were lying on the bottom of the sea, too tired to swim upwards as the currents washed over him. He felt it wasn’t far unlike the way he felt even above ground, when the sun was on his skin, or the wind sharp and cold as it knotted his hair. That constant, frustrating, drowning feeling of wanting the world to be so different from the way it was, and the occasional exhaustion as it resolutely stayed the same.
But there were at least others who felt it too, he considered, which made it both worse and comforting. He’d seen Courfeyrac, so gentle and kind, reduced to inconsolable fury, and heard Combeferre express his frustrations in a voice that had shaken.
But then there was Grantaire. Grantaire, who mocked, and scorned, and set hooded eyes on Enjolras in a way he could not understand. Grantiare, who thought every effort futile, and yet seemed to speak of love with a warmness and a sympathy. Unless that too had been a sarcasm Enjolras had missed. He thought of him now, siphoning out the green coverings above him and instead conjuring Grantaire’s face in his mind, along with the genuine smile he’d given Enjolras at breakfast that morning. That had set some twisted feeling inside him, he reflected, the knowledge that Grantaire could be amiable instead of set to rile him. Perhaps that was why he lost his temper so often with him; that amongst the frustration he felt with Grantaire’s personality, he felt oddly jilted that with him, and him alone, Grantaire’s warmth could change as quickly at this northern weather. That with him alone, Grantaire was some half-stranger, as they trod around one another, too harsh in their words for their steps to be cautious. That after all this time, they alone were still not friends.
When he finally fell asleep, at some point when the snores of one of the other sixth years was drifting through the room, before he pushed it from his mind, Enjolras was left to momentarily consider exactly why he had been so distracted all afternoon, and to that he came up answerless, but at the same time, somehow, he felt oddly dizzy.