Brave: A Les Mis AU

Chapter 11

Just as Eponine was getting Cosette under control, the door opened, and Valjean came in, angry. "Eponine!"

"Monsieur!" Eponine squeaked, "It's not what you think!"

She watched as Valjean picked up the remains of Cosette's dress, and anger filled his eyes. "Cosette!" He looked at the bear, not knowing it was Cosette, and advanced.
"No! Listen!" Eponine said, shoving him and getting her arm scratched by his sword in the process. Cosette suddenly snapped out of her wildness, and took off out of the room.

"Thank your stars, Eponine," Valjean said, "It almost had you."

"That was Cosette! It's the truth! There was a witch and she gave me a spell, it's not Montparnasse--"

"Montparnasse or not, I'm avenging Cosette!" Valjean roared, running out of the room. He locked the door behind him, and gave Jehan the key. "Protect this with your life."

Jehan looked nervous, and really wanted to help Eponine, who sounded distressed, but they had to not open the door.

Eponine shouted one more time, then noticed two little shapes coming down the hall. "Oh no, you didn't eat the tart, did you?" Azelma and Gavroche looked at each other, then shrugged their furry shoulders. "Wait, we can use this. Get the key," she told them, and they followed Jehan down the hall, and jumped on them, leaving them without harm or the key, and curled up in a ball, shaking.

As the child-bears opened the door, Eponine yanked down the tapestry and started looking frantically from a needle, using some of her hair as thread.

She raced down the hall, watching the men prepare to go after Cosette, and she went down to the stables and retrieved Bishop again, hoping she could catch up to Cosette in time.

As she rode along, she was trying to sew, which she had never mastered holding still, much less on the back of a horse on rocky terrain.

When she found Cosette, however, the men had gotten there first, and had her tied down. "Don't hurt her!" Eponine shouted, then the two children came up behind her. They had run this whole way.

"Children?" Jehan asked. They had been dragged along for no reason, and they looked even more scared curled up inside of a wagon.

Suddenly, a deep, murderous growl came from the mist surrounding them. "We're not alone..." Joly said fearfully, moving towards a wagon and grabbed a mace.

Finally, the owner of the growl came forward. It was Montparnasse, and he was angry. He stood up on his hind legs, and roared. Everyone became frantic, running to find a weapon, or at least a hiding place. The bear didn't react when arrows were fired, and simply pawed a sword and it bent in half.

Montparnasse growled, starting to move towards Enjolras, who was trying to get a sword out of the back of a carriage. The bear lunged, crushing the cart to pieces, but Enjolras wasn't there.

"What the...?" Enjolras looked up as Grantaire pulled himself off of him. "You saved me?"

"Of course, what do you think I was going to do, stand by and watch you get eaten? Not a chance," Grantaire replied, sitting up next to him. "Hope you don't mind."

"Thank you." Enjolras was staring at him in amazement. A loose arrow shot in Grantaire's direction, and Enjolras grabbed Grantaire's arm and yanked him behind a barrel. "I've taken a partiality to you, and I would prefer you lived." He looked down at his feet. "I suppose being in love isn't quite as stupid as I thought, not if it's with you."

Grantaire smiled, looking at Enjolras's hand on his arm, watching as it went to take his hand.

Montparnasse seemed to pick up on a smell he preferred, and turned towards Eponine, who had been knocked backwards in the fray. He came forward, about to lunge, when suddenly a raging fury of black fur came at him from the side and slammed him into a boulder. Cosette was livid, and the huge bear was getting dizzy being bashed into the stone, when finally, a rock fell from above and crushed him.