#all shall return to light
Fifth and final (for now) sequel ficlet to All Shall Return to Light, my AU fic in which Enjolras is a girl and a vampire slayer and Combeferre is her Watcher. Links to the first four below:
i.Farouche (in which they encounter Werewolf!Fantine)
ii.Turning (in which Fantine learns they know Cosette)
iii.Reunion (in which Fantine and Cosette reunite)
iv.Planning the Storm (in which they plan their attack on the person who was holding Fantine prisoner)
v. Purity
The unicorn was the difficulty.
Enjolras, Combeferre, Courfeyrac and Bahorel had smoothly liberated Gilbert’s prisoners as soon as he was alone in his house. They had subdued him and freed the werewolf, the fairy, and the talking raven. They’d staked the vampire, who had tried to eat Courfeyrac upon his release from the cage. Combeferre had appropriated all the curious magical plants with unconcealed glee, putting them into a large leather bag.
But the unicorn was flaring his nostrils, and lowering his head to point his horn directly at the chests of the four friends. They couldn’t let him out without getting gored.
“How do we soothe a unicorn?” Courfeyrac hissed, at Combeferre. “Aren’t you the expert on these things?”
“What things? Unicorns and how to soothe them? Why would you think that?”
“You talk like you’re the expert on everything. Why not unicorns?”
“They’re supposed to be tamable by virgins,” Bahorel said, with a glance at Enjolras. “Medieval stories are full of virgins betraying the poor trusting beasts to packs of hunters.”
“I could try,” Enjolras said, with a total lack of self-consciousness. She approached the unicorn and stretched a tentative hand into the cage. The unicorn snarled and snapped his teeth. Enjolras hastily withdrew her hand.
“Either someone has been up to mischief, in which case she needs to tell us all about it—” Here Bahorel punched Enjolras lightly on the shoulder. “—or else the virgin theory is a bust. What now?”
“The myth about the virgin is, at its core, about purity,” said Combeferre, musing aloud. “Perhaps the reality isn’t about sexual innocence but about some inner purity, a purity of the soul. Perhaps it’s an absence of moral compromise.”
Bahorel shrugged. “I don’t feel compromised. Perhaps I will be the medieval virgin.” He sauntered up to the unicorn and attempted to pet him; the unicorn’s flashing teeth made him desist immediately. “Well, so much for that.” Courfeyrac and Combeferre tried in turn and were promptly rejected as well.
“Cosette!” Suddenly, Combeferre knew how they would manage this. “What could be more innocent than a child? Courfeyrac, can you run back to their apartment and have Fantine bring her here?”
It took Courfeyrac nearly an hour to go to Valjean’s apartment and come back. It was a tense wait for Combeferre, who eyed the unicorn vigilantly the entire time. Enjolras, for her part, seemed entirely serene. Bahorel stretched out on Gilbert’s comfortable velvet sofa and helped himself to their reluctant (and restrained) host’s supply of bonbons.
When Courfeyrac rushed in, trailing Cosette, it was Valjean and not Fantine who accompanied her. “Fantine was at the market,” Courfeyrac explained.
Cosette hung back from the unicorn, fearful, despite Enjolras’s and Combeferre’s best reasoning and Courfeyrac’s best cajoling. Bahorel elected to try making funny faces at her. This appeared successful. Cosette began to giggle. “Good girl,” Bahorel said, grinning. “Now, you see, there’s no reason to be scared of a nice horsie just because it has a silly horn on its head—” He broke off at the sensation of Enjolras’s hand on his shoulder.
Valjean was staring at the unicorn, transfixed. The unicorn, for its part, had gone utterly still and was staring back. Slowly, as if under a spell, Valjean approached the unicorn and stretched out a hand. The unicorn didn’t snarl, or back away, but instead nuzzled Valjean’s hand. He opened the cage. The unicorn followed him out like a duckling following its mother, and he led it onto the street. “I will bring it to the countryside,” he said. “I think it will be happy in the forest. Take Cosette home, if you please?” And then he was gone.
“Innocence,” Combeferre murmured. “Purity of soul.” What could be purer than a souled vampire, who had sworn never to do anyone any harm? Not the purity of one who had never been tainted, but the stronger, more solid purity of one who had been tainted and cleansed.
“Come,” said Bahorel. “Combeferre, why don’t you bring Cosette back to her mother? And then, Enjolras and Courfeyrac, we can decide what to do about Gilbert.” A decision that could not be pure, whatever else it was. Gilbert’s eyes widened in fear, and despite his gag he began to make protesting sounds. Combeferre nodded and, taking Cosette by the hand and hefting his bag full of plants, left his friends to their necessary task.
