Chapter Text
“What do you think?”
Grantaire blinked at the building in front of him. “Uh…”
Floreal poked him in the ribs. “You can muster up a little more enthusiasm than that.”
“Wow, look at that building. Magnificent!” Grantaire exclaimed.
He was rewarded with a kiss for his efforts. “There now. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”
Grantaire just hummed. He always preferred his cities a little rough and edgy. Their new home in Paris was neither of those things. It was beautiful and old, and perfect for someone who wasn’t Grantaire. But it meant the world to Floreal, and Floreal meant the world to him, and now he was moving in.
The house and all that came with it had been Floreal’s dream since she and Grantaire were children growing up in the South of France. She had inherited it from her grandmother when she was a girl and had grown up dreaming of turning the property into an inn. Her grandmother had already transformed her family’s country estate into such a place. Floreal grew up at that inn, and so did Grantaire, his parents having been hired to manage and run it as Floreal’s grandmother got older. Now that her grandmother had passed away, and now that she and Grantaire were done with college and had scrimped together some savings, it was time for her to finally move into her dream home in Paris. And Grantaire was moving in with her.
“Ahem.” Floreal raised her eyebrows expectantly at Grantaire.
“Aren’t you tired of doing this?”
“Never.”
“That’s because you aren’t the one doing the lifting.”
“Do you want me to carry you?”
“And wound my masculine pride? You wouldn’t dare.”
“I would dare especially if it would wound your masculine pride,” Floreal said, reaching for Grantaire.
Before she could get him, he scooped her up and carried her over the threshold, giving her a little bounce, making her laugh. “Welcome home, wife.”
“Thank you, husband.” Floreal beamed.
Grantaire set her down gently and closed the door of 55 Rue Plumet.
____
They had a system: Floreal unpacked and slowly made their house a home. Grantaire was their resident handy-man, fixing the many leaks and creaks in the building.
“How old is this place again?”
“Old,” Floreal said from the floor, where she was sorting through stacks of old papers.
“How old?”
“Well, Floreal said, finishing one stack of papers. “It was passed down through my family from my great, great, great, great grandparents, and I don’t think it was new when they lived here. You do the math.”
“You know I’m bad at math, so I’m going to guess….1000 years old.”
“Precisely,” Floreal said, not looking up from her papers.
Only when Grantaire plopped on the floor opposite her did she stop her sorting.
“I can’t help but think this is an unfair division of labor,” he said.
“In what way?”
“Well, I just regrouted the shower and am about to go fix the leak in the ceiling, and you’re sitting here reading.”
“Organizing.”
Grantaire pried the papers from her hand. “Researching?”
Floreal shrugged, caught. She smirked.
“Well then,” Grantaire said, rifling through the pages. His wife extended her hand expectantly, waiting for him to return her things. “Ah-ah. We both work, or neither of us do.”
“There is a lot of work to do,” Floreal said balefully, glancing around the room. Her eyes landed on the peeling, yellowed wallpaper.
“That there is.”
Floreal studied him for a minute, the struggle clear on her face. She wasn’t lying when she said there was a lot of work to do. Their first priority was making the apartment on the top floor habitable so they could sleep without fear of the ceiling caving in. Once that was done, they could focus on the lower levels, which would be transformed into a gorgeous guest space, with a huge dining room, several lounges, and about a dozen guest bedrooms and bathrooms. They just had to get to work.
But there was also Floreal’s pet project: the book she wanted to write about her family. In addition to leaving behind the lucrative Parisian property (and the one in the country), Floreal’s great, great, great, great grandparents also left behind a wealth of personal effects, including books, art, and a diary kept by her ancestor himself. Floreal read that journal and fell in love with the stories her great, great, great, great grandfather wrote down.
Grantaire glanced at her, checking to see if she had come to a decision yet. Evidentially she had, because she jumped up to her feet. He quelled a feeling of disappointment. Lazy afternoons with Floreal were his favorite kind of afternoons. He braced himself to get up and join her, when music filled the room. Floreal strode back in with her phone, which was playing one of her more relaxing playlists, which she set down next to Grantaire. Then she pushed him back, back, back until he was rested against the wall. And only then did she rejoin him on the floor, lying down and resting her head on his lap.
“Read to me,” she commanded, handing Grantaire a photocopy of the diary.
“Bossy.”
“Yes. Now read to me.”
Grantaire rolled his eyes fondly. “Fine. What exciting adventures of Marius Pontmercy shall we read today? How about….” He riffled through the journal, the pages of which he knew well. “When he stopped those thugs from jumping the old man and his daughter?”
Floreal scrunched her nose. “No.”
“You don’t want adventure?”
“Read me what he wrote the day he first saw her.”
“Fine. But after that, we’re going back to thwarted robberies. And something more exciting than your nerd ancestor stalking your great grandma, who by the way, sounds way out of his league. Maybe we can read the bits about the rebellion.”
“No!” Floreal clutched his shirt. “I don’t want to hear about the barricades.”
“You’ve read those parts before.”
“Yes, but it’s a beautiful day. The sun is shining. I don’t want to read about those poor boys. Not today.”
“Those idiots you mean,” Grantaire said. He flipped through his papers to find the pages she wanted. “Fine. We’ll read about Baron Marius Pontmercy: Stalker Extraordinaire.”
____
The next day, they decided to tackle the attic together. In it were stowed generations and generations of family heirlooms and--
“Junk. This is all junk,” Grantaire said blowing dust off a frankly creepy doll.
“Oh really?” Floreal said, pulling a sheet off a shelf and revealing two large, silver candlesticks.
“Those real?” Grantaire asked.
“Maybe,” Floreal said, examining them.
“Well, if that’s not real silver, they’re boring.”
“This isn’t supposed to be fun, R. This is serious work.”
He wrapped his arms around his waist. “You’re right.”
“Thank you.”
“Whoever finds the weirdest thing wins and the loser buys them dinner.”
Floreal shoved Grantaire off her with a laugh and immediately raced to the opposite corner of the room. “Found a one armed-headless doll.”
“You’ll have to go better than that. I just found this fucking awesome walking cane,” Grantaire said holding it up. Floreal stuck her tongue out at him, and resume her search.
It took about three hours for them to go through everything in the attic, and they shouted out their findings, which were impressive. But Grantaire’s favorite find happened at the very end, in the last corner. He cleared a large stack of books, some photo albums and some old needlework samples off what he thought was a coffee table. But once he was able to rip off the white sheet over it, he saw that in fact, it was a large wooden trunk, with the letter R engraved in the side.
“Jackpot!”
Floreal raced over to his side, and together, they started to dig through the trunk. In it was a completely random assortment of objects. There was a hand-drawn notebook with moths and other insects. It was blank towards the end, incomplete. It rested on top of box of knickknacks: unusually shaped rocks, and pages decoding hieroglyphics and theatre tickets for June 15th, 1832.
There was a book of Latin and Italian poems, with dried flowers pressed in the front cover. There were beautiful, fragile paper fans. There was a pair of truly impressive top hats. Well-worn boxing gloves. A law book, with some actually hilarious comments written in the columns (as well as several rather unflattering doodles of a man named Blondeau). There was a medical bag with a stethoscope, plenty of clean handkerchiefs, a mirror, and a pamphlet explaining the dangers of electric currents to the human body. And finally, carefully wrapped up and preserved were sheaf after sheaf of parchment. Speeches, it turned out, upon closer inspection. Some were complete, others were filled with editing notes. They all started out with neat handwriting, but as the writer became more impassioned, the handwriting became looser, and sloppier, like the author couldn’t be bothered with penmanship once his ideas started flowing.
“I think I won,” Grantaire grinned at Floreal. “This is a pretty weird assortment of stuff.”
“You won,” Floreal confirmed. “Now let’s go get dinner.”
____
It wasn’t all just sunny afternoons, reading and laughing on the floor in each other’s company, or sifting through family oddities. They did actually have to do work. Grantaire focused on manual work: painting, mending hinges on the windows and doors, fixing the floor, and the million other little repairs needed in the old house. Floreal handled the more managerial tasks, filling out legal forms, finding vendors for the inn, and assuming all financial responsibilities. Their divide and conquer method meant they were making a lot of headway. The downside was it also meant they were usually too busy to see much of each other.
Worse still, Floreal ran into an old friend of hers from school: Phillippe. Grantaire had never liked Phillippe. Phillippe had been smug, and was always flirting with Floreal, even after she and Grantaire started dating. And now to add another reason to why Grantaire didn’t like him: Phillippe was an investment banker. And rich. And very interested in seeing Floreal again, so he could “invest in her new business”.
Sometimes, Grantaire was dragged along to dinner with them, or their business lunches, and to be fair with Phillipe, he did have some good suggestions on how to run a new inn (the bastard). But in between sound business advice, Grantaire had to suffer through Phillipe’s monologuing the exciting places he had travelled, or the cool people he met. Worse, Phillipe was keen to introduce Floreal to all his friends at the elite echelons of Parisian society, and sometimes Grantaire was dragged along.
Other times, Grantaire would beg off, saying he was tired after spending the day renovating, and Floreal would go by herself. This was a different kind of misery than having to plaster a fake smile on his face and laugh at high society jokes. Because after a long day at work, Grantaire really just wanted to spend time with his wife. He was very choosy about the company he kept. A lifetime of bad friends with a handful of asshole relatives made sure of that. But just because Grantaire would rather alone than spend time with a bunch of fake people didn’t mean Floreal should be denied her fun. And although it was obvious Phillipe was head over heels with Floreal, Grantaire didn’t feel threatened. He trusted Floreal.
None of that cured the complete and utter boredom he felt on nights like tonight when it was still only early evening, and Grantaire was already at a loss of what to do. He sat in the big armchair by the fireplace, absent mindedly flipping through the notes and books Floreal left scattered about. He had spent so many bored evenings flipping through them that he sometimes thought he must know them as well as she did. He might even know some of them better than her. While she was obsessed with reading about the adventures Marius had in his youth, Grantaire loved pouring over the historic maps and reading the background information Floreal had gathered.
He didn’t like reading about Marius or his friends. At first, he had been swept up in the epicness of it: the romance, the bravery, the action. But as time went on, Grantaire felt unease when he read those parts. It was more than unease. It was….he felt dread. But why he should feel that over long-dead men was beyond him. It made him uncomfortable, so he avoided it all together.
Reading the maps again wasn’t a sufficient distraction while he waited for Floreal. Not for tonight, at least. Tonight he wanted to walk through history, not just read about it. Tonight, he was going to explore the catacombs.
The catacombs had always held a certain fascination with Grantaire. Even as a boy, he loved reading about the seemingly endless dark passageways deep underground. What kind of horrible secrets lurked below? Child Grantaire wrote stories about them and scared Floreal with them. She told him he was mean. Adult Grantaire decided to explore the catacombs and pissed Floreal off. She told him he was a reckless idiot.
It was true, the catacombs weren’t for the faint hearted. Or law abiding, as it turned out, since exploring on your own was illegal. But since Grantaire hadn’t been caught yet, he wasn’t terribly concerned about it. (That was the point of the conversation with Floreal that she got so exasperated that she stormed out).
Grantaire found this awfully unfair. After all, he was as careful as he could be. And what was life without a little adventure? He could just easily die crossing the street and getting hit by a stray car as he could exploring the underground Paris. So once he was sure Floreal was gone, and hadn’t forgotten anything, he grabbed his kit, and headed out.
For some reason, he found it peaceful down below. It had started out with him just wanting to see if could find an entrance. Once he found it, he promised himself he would take just a quick peek. A quick peek turned into an hour, and that hour turned into many.
Grantaire followed the map he had sketched out. Although the catacombs were becoming more familiar, he didn’t trust just his eyes and memory. He knew men got lost and died down there before. He didn’t intend to join their ranks. Eventually, he reached the end of what he knew, and so he could either be satisfied, or keep exploring.
He took a few steps forward, then took a left. It took him less than five minutes to regret that decision. He found himself in large, cavernous chamber whose walls were lined with skulls. Grantaire cursed and dropped his flashlight, which turned dead as soon as it hit the ground. His breathing quickened. The air suddenly seemed much colder. There was a buzzing sound that suddenly seemed to fill the room.
“Hello?” Grantaire called out. It almost sounded like something electric. Maybe he had stumbled on a lost film crew or something who were trying to shoot the catacombs?
For a second, the buzzing continued before stopping abruptly. Then he heard it: whispers. Hundreds and hundreds of whispers. He couldn’t make out what they were saying, but that was beside the point. He was in an underground tomb, and someone was whispering.
“Oh, fuck this.” Grantaire said, backing away as quickly as he could. As soon as the cavern was out of sight, he turned around and all but fled the catacombs, not stopping until he was aboveground. Once he was back home, he locked the door, turned on all the lights, dove into bed, and wrapped himself up with all their blankets, peeping out, hoping that whatever he had heard down there hadn’t followed him home.
____
The next morning, he felt foolish. He woke up with the sunlight streaming in, and Floreal wrapped around him. He was embarrassed. For once he was glad Floreal refused to go catacombing with him. She would have laughed at him for being ridiculous. Now in the light of day, it was so obvious that someone must have rigged up a sound system in the cavern. That was the buzzing he heard- electricity. Some asshole must have thought it was funny to put a whispering track in the skull room. And okay, now that Grantaire was no longer scared out of his mind, he could see the humor in the situation.
Still, it weighed on his mind all day, as he sanded down the new kitchen cabinets. And as he painted the walls to the sitting room. He was never one for the supernatural, and so he was doubly embarrassed about his behavior last night. He had just felt so sure that he wasn’t alone last night, that there was some force beyond his understanding in that room with him. Complete bullshit.
He had to go back, to prove to himself he wasn’t the kind of person who ran from the dark. He would go down there, and figure out how the room was set up, and maybe find a way to get back at the pranksters who orchestrated the whole thing.
For once, he didn’t wait for Floreal to leave before getting ready. He wanted to go and resolve this thing, because maybe there was a small part of him that was still scared. There was a small part of him had sensed something dark and powerful in that room and he couldn’t quite shake it. The sooner he got there and could prove to himself the night before had been an overreaction, the sooner things could return to normal.
“I’m off,” he said to Floreal, who was still getting ready for a night out with Phillippe and a few of his friends. They were going to a museum opening or something like that.
“And where are you off to?” Floreal asked. She looked beautiful, in a little black dress with her hair pulled back in a bun. There was something effortlessly chic about her. Grantaire never understood why she chose to be with him.
He shrugged. “Out.”
Floreal crossed the room and examined Grantaire’s outfit, from tight black jeans to his baggy black t-shirt and hoodie. “Are you trying to dress like a ninja?” she asked finally.
“Don’t be ridiculous. Ninjas didn’t wear black, that’s a common misconception.”
“So you’re not wearing this ridiculous getup so you can sneak back in the catacombs?”
“I would never!”
Floreal stared him in the eye as she reached around and picked out of his back pocket a flashlight, then patted his hoodie, under which he had wrapped a good amount of rope around his torso. She raised an eyebrow.
“Okay, so I might have been considering it.”
She sighed and turned away from Grantaire, and walked over to the dresser.
“Look, I’m sorry, Floreal. If it bothers you, I won’t go.”
“Here,” she said. She returned to him and handed him his pocket knife.
He took it. “Really?”
She kissed his cheek. “I’m about to go have my fun, you go have yours.” She paused. “I am sorry, you know. That we haven’t spent much time together lately.”
And she looked it. Which was ridiculous. “Floreal, I didn’t want to go with you. You asked, and I said no.”
“Still…”
“We’ve known each other for how long now?”
“Twenty years or so?”
“Right. Since we were kids. We’ve always had different interests, and we’ve always ended up here.” He clenched her hand. “You go, make new friends. And business contacts, if you can. Because we need help with the inn.”
“I’m already on it. I’ve made a lot of great contacts, the renovations are ahead of schedule...We should go on a trip somewhere. Soon.”
Grantaire pulled her close and kissed her properly. “I have the coolest wife.”
“Damn straight. Now let me go so I can finish getting ready.”
He watched her go fondly. He was lucky- he hadn’t just married someone he loved - he had married his best friend. Everything about their relationship was safe and comfortable. It was easy being married to Floreal.
“It’s summer solstice, you know,” Grantaire said.
She just hummed an acknowledgement.
“Longest day of the year.”
“Your point?”
“Don’t use those extra hours to stay out too late,” he told her.
“Why’s that?” she grinned.
“Well, like you said, you’re going to have your fun. I’m going to have my fun. Maybe later we can have some fun together.”
Floreal rolled her eyes. “You’re so cheesy.”
“You love it.”
“God help me, I do.” Floreal stole one more kiss. “Now I really have to go, or I’ll be late. See you later.”
“See you later,” Grantaire echoed.
____
It took him longer than expected to get back to the spot he went to the previous day. It was his own fault for not marking it. The next time he was terrified out of his mind, he would have to make an effort to be a little bit calmer.
Eventually he did find the room. He heard the buzzing sound from the hallway, and followed it. He repressed a shudder. No. No, this room had scared him once, but now he was being level headed about it.
He stepped into the room, the whispering started again.
“Motion sensor audio,” Grantaire mumbled to himself.
He tried to ignore the whispering, because even though he knew there must be a sound system hidden in the room, hundreds of disembodied voices talking amongst themselves was downright unsettling. Then he heard it.
…..Grantaire…
Out of all the voices, one word was clear. His name.
He took a step forward, no longer afraid. Someone was guiding him. He followed the voice to the opposite wall, where there was an arch engraved in the stone. The other whispers fell silent, and the only voice left was the one saying his name.
….Grantaire….
The air stilled, and time for a second seemed to stop.
He reached his hand out to touch the arch. Then there was darkness.
____
When he came to, he was lying on his back. His head was practically throbbing in pain. And there was a gun in his face.
“On your feet!” a man barked at him.
Grantaire scrambled to obey. Shit. Floreal was going to kill him. He promised he wasn’t going to get arrested for trespassing. “I can explain.”
“You will explain during interrogation,” the man said. “This area is restricted.”
“Yes, I get that, but the gun is a little excessive, don’t you think?”
Grantaire squinted. Gun and bayonet, apparently. What the fuck?
“No more talking. You will walk forward.”
Grantaire’s mind was racing. This guy wasn’t dressed like any police officers he had seen before, and his weaponry certainly wasn’t standard issue. So this guy was…what, an overzealous volunteer patroller? Had Grantaire stumbled across a really intense LARPer?
“Look, I think there’s been a misunderstanding-”
The man clipped Grantaire on the back of his head, then nudged him with the edge of his bayonet. It wasn’t hard enough to draw blood, but having the pointy blade poking the space between his shoulder blades wasn’t a pleasant experience.
“Oi!”
Grantaire and the man looked, and saw two men standing in the doorway, one bald, the other small, waving cheerfully. The man snarled at them, and that was the opportunity Grantaire needed to wrestle his rifle away from him. The other two men rushed forward to help restrain the weaponless man.
“He’ll sound the alarm!” the bald one said.
“We can’t kill him,” the small one said, scandalized.
“Of course not. We should have brought rope…”
Grantaire ended the argument by hitting the man over the head with his own weapon. He fell down, unconscious.
“There you go,” Grantaire said, discarding the gun. “Thanks. For the distraction.”
“Thank you, for…that,” the bald one nodded at the unconscious man.
For a second, the three young men all stood, staring at each other. Grantaire felt like he should say something to break the silence.
“There are some things you can’t share without ending up liking each other, and knocking out a dude with a gun is one of them,” Was what he came up with. “So, the three of us…we’re good.”
“Well said!” The bald one clapped him on the back.
“Thanks,” Grantaire said. So they weren’t big Harry Potter fans then, since that reference went way over their heads. Oh well. They still seemed decent enough.
“Come,” The small one said. “Help me search his pockets. He might have something of use.”
“Oh, we’re robbing people now?” Grantaire said. That was kind of a bonding exercise too. Friends that commit crime together stay together and all that.
He watched, fascinated as the men patted the soldier down. It was only now registering that they were all wearing period clothes of some kind. The fallen man wore some kind of military uniform, but a very dated one. And his new companions were both wearing cloth trousers, hats, shirts with billowy sleeves, and cravats.
“Are you….cosplayers or something?”
The bald one tilted his head. “Are we what?”
“Um….never mind.” Grantaire said. Maybe this was just how they dressed. If so, he certainly didn’t want to offend them. “It’s just…what era are those clothes from?”
“I could ask you the same,” the bald one said. “Our clothes are from the modern era.”
“O-kay,” Grantaire said. Maybe they were really dedicated historical reenactors. “Fine, don’t tell me.”
“They aren’t the latest fashions, but these are suitable for any gentlemen in 1827.”
“1827,” Grantaire repeated with a laugh. “Okay, I can play along.”
The two men exchanged confused looks.
“We should go,” the small one said. “His comrades will search for him, and he did not have anything of value.”
“Well…good luck?” Grantaire said, scooping up his backpack.
They both stared at him. “You must come with us.”
“I don’t bloody well think so.”
“You said that we liked each other.” The bald one said, looking almost offended.
“Yeah, sure, I like you, but my path is that way.”
“There will be more National guardsmen that way. They’ll capture you for sure.”
Grantaire bit his lip. “I don’t know.” He stepped back into the main hallway and did a double take. The passage way he had come from was now blocked off by a wall of rocks. “That wasn’t there before….how long was I passed out?”
“It’s settled then,” the small one said. “You’re coming with us. I’m Joly, by the way, and this is Bossuet.”
“Grantaire.”
“Excellent. Now come along, Grantaire.”
He followed them, through the dark winding passages. He tried to memorize them, but they were going too fast for him to. They only slowed down when they reached the street surface again. Grantaire superfluously checked his phone to see if he had any missed messages or calls from Floreal. He didn’t, but that was probably because he didn’t have a signal either. Shit. He switched the phone off to conserve the battery.
“What were you doing down there, if I may ask?”
“Just exploring.”
“How daring! How brave!” Joly enthused.
“I think it was brave just to be in that room,” Bossuet said. None of them had any confusion as to which room he referenced. “That place always makes me uneasy. There is something unnatural about it.”
“I thought that was just me,” Grantaire said.
“They’re catacombs,” Joly said. “They are supposed to be unsettling.”
Grantaire squinted around. Something was wrong. He didn’t recognize this part of Paris. The streets were so different, so narrow and winding. These weren’t the wide boulevards he roamed just this morning. And where were all the streetlights? Why were the buildings so old? Just where had they emerged from?
“Wait, that’s the Musee Rodin!” Grantaire exclaimed pointing.
“The what?”
Grantaire ignored them. That was the Musee Rodin. He had dragged Floreal to go with him just this last weekend.
“My friend, you are mistaken, that’s the Hotel Biron.”
He wasn’t mistaken. He recognized the building and he turned around to tell Joly and Bossuet so, when he noticed something disturbing in the skyline.
“Where is it?”
“Where is what?”
“The Eiffel Tower,” Grantaire said.
“The what?”
“The Eiffel Tower. You know, the giant metal landmark?”
“Of where?”
“Paris!” Grantaire exclaimed.
“Are you concussed?” Joly asked, looking very concerned. “That man did hit you rather hard over the head.”
“I’m not…no. What is wrong with you?” Grantaire stared at them. Why were they lying?
“Grantaire, my friend, I am sorry, but I haven’t the faintest idea of what you speak,” Bossuet said. He did look sincerely sorry.
Grantaire took a deep breath, trying to stay calm. They were at the Musee Rodin. If the Eiffel Tower were still there, he would be able to see it. It was possible that someone had blown up the Eiffel Tower, and the reason he couldn’t see it was because it was now a pile of rubble. But they would have felt an explosion of that size. So the only other explanation he could think of was that the Eiffel Tower hadn’t been built yet. Which meant…
“I think I’m going to pass out,” Grantaire said.
“See! You see? I told you,” Joly said, rushing forward to guide Grantaire to a curbside.
Grantaire let someone else be responsible for his motor functions for a minute, because the truth was sinking in. It was impossible, and yet, what other explanation could there be? One or two of the odd things he had witnessed could be explained. But all together? This was not his Paris.
This was 1827. 1827, the era Floreal so romanticized. Of course if he was being sent back, he couldn’t be sent back somewhere cool, like Paris in the 20’s, or ancient Egypt, no, he had to be sent back to a city that was about to bleed.
Joly rubbed reassuring circles on his back, murmuring comforting things while Grantaire blinked back tears. He was very, very far from home, and Floreal was probably waiting for him. She would be worried. He did that. He made his wife worry.
“You should lie down,” Bossuet suggested.
Grantaire took a shuddering deep breath. He had to stay calm. He was going to get home, he just needed to stay calm and keep his head. It would be madness to try and find then navigate his way through the catacombs at this late hour, especially when he was already exhausted. He could spend one night in the past. He could do that. He would. Maybe when he woke up, he would find this was all just a terrible dream.
One night was not too long a time. And he would make it up to Floreal when he got back.
“This better not be some really fucked up reality show,” Grantaire muttered, rubbing his face. “Well, uh, thank you for…everything. But I should get going.”
“We’ll accompany you to your lodgings,” Joly said firmly. “You’re in no state to be roaming the streets of Paris alone.”
“I’ll be fine.”
The look Joly gave him brokered no room for argument.
“I don’t actually have lodgings,” Grantaire said, shrugging. Maybe if he acted like it wasn’t a big deal, they wouldn’t react like it was.
“Nor I,” Bossuet said. “I am at the mercy of my friends’ more charitable impulses.”
“You’ve been living with me for a month. That isn’t impulsive,” Joly snorted. He turned to Grantaire. “You are more than welcome to join us until you find a place that suits you.”
He considered arguing, but then again, a safe place to sleep for the night did sound appealing. Better than sleeping on the street.
“Thank you,” Grantaire said. “I really appreciate it.”
Joly just beamed. He and Bossuet linked arms with Grantaire, and together the trio made their way through the streets. Until Grantaire stopped abruptly, because the wheels in his brain were still turning, and he came to another realization.
“Wait….Joly. Bossuet.”
“Yes?” Joly looked at him patiently.
Shit. It wasn’t be a coincidence. He didn’t know how common the surnames Joly and Bossuet were in Paris in the early nineteenth century, but what were the odds that he should travel back decades in time and meet two men named Joly and Bossuet unless they were also Marius’s Joly and Bossuet. Which meant he could also theoretically meet his wife’s great, great, great, great grandfather in his youth.
“Nothing,” Grantaire said, resuming the walk. “The names just sounded familiar.”
Holy shit. He could find Marius. He could find this man whose life so influenced that of Grantaire and his wife.
“Perhaps you know some of our kin,” Bossuet mused before they fell into a comfortable silence. When they spoke again, they spoke of other things.
____
Grantaire barely slept. His mind was too busy screaming in protest at everything he had seen. The few hours of sleep he managed to get were not peaceful ones. He did not belong here, that much he knew. He had to get home.
When he woke from his fitful sleep, he found a clean set of clothes at the foot of the sofa where he had slept.
“Thought you might want some new clothing,” Joly said from his breakfast table, where he sat reading some large textbooks.
“What time is it?”
“Good point,” Joly said, speaking lowly. He cast a look at Bossuet, who was sprawled on his bed. “Look at him. Bless. I hate to wake him.”
But wake him Joly did, but roughly ripping the sheets off. He shrugged at Grantaire.
“It isn’t my first time waking him.”
Bossuet muttered rebelliously and rolled back over. Joly threw a pillow at him.
“I am awake, you monster.”
“Get dressed if you want breakfast.” Joly said, completely unsympathetic to Bossuet.
“Good morning, kind sir,” Bossuet said to Grantaire as he shuffled to get changed. “You would never so rudely wake a friend, would you?”
“Nor would he ever so rudely keep a hungry friend from breakfast,” Joly said pointedly. Bossuet stuck out his tongue, but did not stall any more.
“I can’t take these,” Grantaire said, gesturing to the clothes.
“You can’t very well walk around in those!” Joly said. “I’m sure they’re very fashionable where you are from, but Paris is a little more unforgiving. Trust me, we’ll attract less attention if you put those on.”
Joly looked so earnest and well meaning, so Grantaire changed. Besides, if he was really in the past, he didn’t want to attract attention with his modern clothes. Who knew what kind of trouble he might cause? By the time he was done (it took a while, figuring out all the layers and buttons), Bossuet was at least functional.
“Thank you,” Grantaire wasn’t sure what else there was to say to his strange hosts. “I should...get going.”
“Oh?” Joly looked disappointed. “But we only just met you. Surely you’ll accompany us to breakfast.”
“I don’t have any money,” Grantaire said truthfully. He doubted his credit cards would do him much good here.
Joly waved this aside. “You will repay me some other time.”
This hardly seemed a fair deal to Grantaire, since he was sure he wouldn’t. He couldn’t exactly mail Joly a check later. But on the other hand...when would he have a chance to eat breakfast in 1827 again? Surely him staying for one more meal wouldn’t delay his return that much.
“If you insist.”
Joly let out a delighted squeal, before jamming a hat on Grantaire’s head and ushering him out the door. As soon as they reached the pavement, Grantaire wrinkled his nose. People always complained about how stinky Paris was, but 2015 Paris had nothing on 1827 Paris. When he got back, Grantaire was going to send the sanitation department so many flowers.
“Are you unwell?” Bossuet asked.
“It’s just the air is...unpleasant,” Grantaire said. The sun was quickly heating up the pavement and the result made him want to gag a little.
Both Joly and Bossuet laughed. “Ah. You are still acclimating to Paris?” Bossuet said.
“Yeah, that sounds about right,” Grantaire said, covering his nose, which just made both of them laugh harder.
“Did you just arrive?”
“Yeah.”
“From where?”
“South,” Grantaire said vaguely.
“A man of mystery!” Bossuet said, not at all put off by Grantaire’s taciturn nature.
At breakfast, he found that he did genuinely enjoy Joly and Bossuet’s company. They were a bit eccentric, but then again, so was he. He was actually a little sad to be leaving him.
“I think I should get going.”
“Always in a rush,” Bossuet huffed.
“No, it’s just….I dropped something last night. In the catacombs. I want to go get it. It was a list of flats,” Grantaire said, casting around wildly. “My mother wrote to her contacts in Paris, asking if they might know of any potential places I could lodge. And obviously, I need a place to live…”
“But you can’t!” Joly said.
“Really, I would love to stay-”
“Of course you’d love to stay, we’re excellent company. But that’s not what I was going to say. What I was going to say was that the National Guard have begun patrolling the catacombs.”
“Why?”
“To make sure no one did exactly what we tried to do last night.”
“Which was?”
Joly and Bossuet both suddenly seemed very interested in their empty breakfast dishes.
“Which was?”
“Stealingweaponsfromtheirarmory.”
“What?”
“Shhh!” Joly hissed.
“We were going to steal some small weapons from their armory. We thought it would be amusing.”
And you’re fucking revolutionaries and need weapons so you can try and overthrow the government. Grantaire wanted to shout. But he supposed he could understand why they wouldn’t tell him, a stranger that, since they were basically committing treason.
“So they’re patrolling…I can sneak in.”
“The area we found you in is right under their headquarters.” Joly said, looking shocked Grantaire didn’t know that.
“And after last night….they probably have a permanent guard at hand. You would be caught and arrested.”
Grantaire’s heart sank. He had to get back, but he couldn’t very well do that if he was shot by a National Guardsman, or arrested. He would have to be patient. Bid his time, search the catacombs while simultaneously avoiding detection. He would have to be careful. He was very bad at being careful.
He tried to calm himself. This was just….a weird experience. Surely it would only take a few weeks to get back home. And then he could laugh all of this off like it was a dream.
Joly squeezed his hand. “I know you want to get back. You want to find your mother’s list.”
“Mmm-hmm,” Grantaire lied. “Yes, the list. Which will help me find a place to live. You sure you won’t help?”
“We are helping you by telling you not to back,” Bossuet said. “Look, from time to time, we or other friends of ours have reason to use the catacombs to get around the city. We can look for your list when we are down there again, or perhaps even bring you with us.”
That was probably the best Grantaire could get. After all, he had only a limited knowledge of the catacombs, and these men were his best chance at finding the area again. He would just have to lay low until he could get back.
“In the meantime,” Joly said. “You must stay with us, until you can find a suitable lodging.”
Grantaire felt a rush of gratitude towards his two new friends. Without them, he could probably be dead in the catacombs, or starving out on the street. “Thank you.”
____
This odd domestic arrangement continued for about a week, until one day over breakfast, Bossuet and Joly exchanged conspiratorial looks.
“Grantaire?”
“Hmm?”
“Have you any political opinions?”
“I have far too many political opinions.” Grantaire said, browsing the newspaper. Then he looked up suspiciously. “Why?”
Joly and Bossuet looked at each other, then nodded determinedly.
“We were wondering if you would be interested in coming with us to a meeting some of our friends are hosting. We’re a political club.”
“Oh.” Grantaire was surprised. Not that Joly and Bossuet were in a political club- that he already knew. He was surprised they were telling him about it, and thought he would actually be interested. Then again, what else did he have to do? There was no internet. “Sure, I can check it out.”
“Excellent,” Joly beamed. “We will tell you when our next meeting is.”
____
It turned out their idea of “telling” Grantaire was grabbing him when he returned from one of his walks and shoving him in a carriage before piling in themselves and saying “Time for the meeting!”
Joly chattered on cheerfully as he carriage trundled along. “I told Courfeyrac about you already, and he thought he might be able to find you work.”
“I don’t know Courfeyrac.”
Joly shrugged. “Still, he said he would find you work.”
Grantaire leaned back in his seat. He didn’t want to appear ungrateful, but getting a job would make his situation seem a lot more long-term than he intended. Still, he needed money. He couldn’t be a burden to Joly any more.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. Thank Courfeyrac, who you will meet tonight.”
“We’re here.” Bossuet said, peeking out the window. “Follow me.”
Grantaire did, with Joly trailing behind them. The sign above the door informed him they were in the Café Musain. They did not sit with the other patrons, but instead, went to a room in the back of the establishment.
“Welcome!” Bossuet said with a flourish, pushing Grantaire forward.
He was in the center of a room filled with young men around his age who were all staring at him. Being thrust in front of people tended to have that effect.
“Hello,” Grantaire waved at the group. Because if he was good at anything, it was faking confidence. He glanced around. None of the men there were Marius. He quelled the twinge of disappointment he felt.
“This is the fellow that you found in the sewers?” asked one in the back.
“Sewer Man!” another one said, toasting Grantaire.
“Let’s not let that one stick,” Grantaire muttered.
“A trade,” said one of the men up front.
“A trade?”
“What should we call you, if not ‘Sewer Man’?”
“I’m Rene Grantaire. I go by Grantaire most of the time.”
“Pleasure to meet you, Grantaire. I’m Mathieu Combeferre, though I prefer my surname.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Pardon?” Combeferre said, frowning.
“Hmmm?” Grantaire said, adapting his best innocent face.
He was introduced to the rest of the group. It was easy to remember their names, since he was familiar with them already. It was just a matter of matching the names to the faces. Combeferre wasn’t as scary as Marius’s diary made him expect, but he was watching Grantaire closely. It made him feel like he was being examined. Okay, scratch that, Combeferre with his x-ray vision was exactly as scary as Marius’s diary made him expect.
“I thought of a better moniker for you,” Combeferre said.
“Rene Grantaire isn’t good enough?”
“R,” Combeferre said. The room fell silent, like they were waiting for a reaction.
“R…it’s a pun,” Grantaire said slowly.
Apparently that was the reaction everyone was waiting for, because room erupted in laughter. Bahorel clapped Grantaire on the back.
“We are quite fond of puns,” Feuilly said wryly.
Grantaire forced a smile, but his heart was racing. R. R like the one in the trunk he and Floreal found in the attic. He shook it off. No. It was a coincidence. It was a letter of the alphabet. There were only 26 of them, for fuck’s sake. It was a coincidence that didn’t mean anything. He wasn’t going to stay here long enough to get an engraved trunk. He was going to find a way back to Floreal. He would find a different passage through the catacombs. It was a setback, not a defeat.
He was so immersed in his thoughts that he didn’t hear the door swing open. It didn’t register until Courfeyrac leapt up from his side.
“Finally! There you are, come meet Grantaire.”
“I apologize for my tardiness.”
“Never mind all that.” Courfeyrac grabbed Grantaire’s shoulder and spun him around. “Grantaire, meet our fearless leader. This is Enjolras.”