Anonymous asked: ♫ Enjolras/Grantaire
RIGHT, so I got Third Eye by Florence + the Machine (also I super love this meme and more people should do it.) I ain’t even a little sorry. Canon era, motherfuckers, because I can.
Grantaire was arguing with him again. Most of Enjolras’ mind was occupied with ripping down the other man’s case, almost enjoying the familiar pattern, but that quiet part at the base of his skull, the part that had been getting louder of late, was distracted. It was discomfiting and foreign, as if he no longer quite knew himself. It did little to inhibit his argument—they were second nature by now, he could spare that scrap of attention—but he was bothered by its persistence. Just when Enjolras believed he had shaken off the strange abstraction, Grantaire would tip his head back and laugh at something Joly had said, his wild curls falling back from the line of his throat, and it would return with a vengeance.
He’s brilliant, the quiet voice noted now. It was true, something Enjolras had noticed before. For all that he dulled its edge with wine and other, stronger spirits, Grantaire’s mind was as keen as the edge of broken glass, quick and incisive, and he soaked up information as effortlessly as he did liquor. Grantaire claimed to know nothing—nothing but love and liberty, he had said—but he could hold his ground against Enjolras, and quote Greek and Roman writings without so much as a pause to recall. He spoke rapidly, as if the thoughts piled up behind his tongue and pressed to be first through his lips, and was prone to winding, tangential thinking, but his points were good and clear and glittering.
Grantaire was referencing Socrates, now, a casual remark dismissed as if it were something any child could make, and Enjolras found his lungs breathless. The wild dark curls and hazed blue eyes were scattering his thoughts, the quick gesture of Grantaire’s free hand sending them blowing away, leaves in a wind. Enjolras was glad, suddenly, that Grantaire was prone to speaking at length, for his arguments were not so easy as he had thought, and the roughened timbre of Grantaire’s voice was making it difficult to hear the words in it. He needed the moment to pull himself together before he could hope to craft a response.
He could be so much, the quiet voice mused, if he allowed it of himself. Enjolras almost snarled aloud at that, and his next volley in their argument was perhaps harsher than Grantaire deserved.
Grantaire, if he was even slightly less determined to sink into the shadowy depths of drink and cynicism, could have been a great mind of their time—Enjolras was confident of this. But instead the man was infuriatingly resolute in his claims that he was worth nothing, and exceptionally good at self-fulfilling prophecy.
“Enjolras,” Combeferre said, and Enjolras shook himself out of his thoughts, turning his attention away from Grantaire. His eyes caught and dragged on the curl of Grantaire’s fingers—strong, with scars on the knuckles from boxing and a smear of red paint across the back of his hand—around the neck of his wine bottle. A prickle shivered down Enjolras’ neck, a feeling like his hair falling loose from its queue and trailing across bare skin, and settled somewhere just beneath his ribs. It took a physical effort to pull his gaze away and look at Combeferre, who was as calm and imperturbable as ever.
The quiet voice would go away, Enjolras told himself, as he had told himself for some weeks now. He just needed patience, and control, and the voice would go away.
The quiet voice did not go away.
He could barely remember, as they prepared to leave the Musain for Lamarque’s funeral procession, how long the quiet voice had been there. It was hardly quiet now, a steady recitation like an epic poem, on the subject of Grantaire’s hands and voice and eyes and mind. And Grantaire was there, for all his bitterness and uncooperative cynicism, brooding silently but ready to accompany them.
“Grantaire,” Enjolras said at last, as the others were starting quietly out the door. He caught the ivory cloth of Grantaire’s shirtsleeve, holding him back until the back room of the Musain was empty save for the two of them and the torchlight flickering over their stocked arms.
“As ever, I am at your service,” Grantaire said with a crooked smile. “How may I help you, fearless leader?”
“I.” Enjolras bit the word off, casting about for the correct thing to say. “Why are you here?” he demanded, and the question was harsh on his tongue. Grantaire’s expression closed like a vault being locked tight, hazy blue eyes going hard and his smile twisting into something harsh.
“I have nowhere else to be, of course,” he said, almost wry, and he retreated a small step until he fetched up against a table. “At least if you are determined to die for your impossible ideals, I shall not live long myself. Why do you ask, Apollo, would you have me leave?” Something flickered across his face, like anger or hate, directed inward. “I know I have failed you in the past, I–”
Enjolras heard himself make a noise, something like a growl, and then he was moving, taking one, two, three long steps forward to grip the green cloth of Grantaire’s waistcoat and pull him in sharply.
The kiss was brief, close-lipped and clumsy—Enjolras had kissed fewer people than he had fingers on one hand, and never more than once—but when he released his grip and stepped back, Grantaire had the dazed look of a man struck by lightning.
“What?” Grantaire said blankly, a hand coming up to touch his lips. “Enjolras, I–”
“I did not mean that I wished you gone,” Enjolras said, and found that his voice was weak.
“Why did you…?” Grantaire asked, half a whisper.
“I…wanted to,” Enjolras said. He frowned, running the words over in his mind, and added, “I think I may have wanted to for some time.”
Grantaire stared at him, and he looked alarmed, almost terrified. “Did one of the others tell you? It would be cruel to toy with me, Enjolras, I did not think–”
“I would not,” Enjolras said, and took Grantaire’s sleeve in his hand again, pulling him close. This time, he reached up, feeling the broad strength of Grantaire’s shoulders under his hands, and pressed their lips together hesitantly. Grantaire was frozen for a long moment, as if afraid that moving would shatter Enjolras like glass, and then a hand came to rest lightly at the curve of Enjolras’ neck, tipping his head up and deepening the kiss.
Enjolras had come to be aware that Grantaire had a great many areas of expertise he had not expected—dancing, fencing, painting, even singing—but surely he had more skill in this than in any of those. His tongue traced lightly along Enjolras’ lip, his other hand settling at the small of Enjolras’ back and pulling him closer, and Enjolras gasped in surprise. Without his permission, his hands had found their way into Grantaire’s riot of dark curls, tangling into the soft ringlets. Grantaire tasted sweet and bitter, like the dark wine he preferred, and his lips were gentle, like the hands on Enjolras’ back and neck.
When Grantaire finally pulled back, Enjolras was breathless, his head spinning as if he had forgotten to breathe, and those hazed blue eyes were nothing but fine rings around the depths of their pupils—like the sea, Enjolras thought dizzily, deep enough to drown in. Grantaire was beautiful—how had he not seen it before? How had he been distracted by the twice-broken nose and weary circles and the scarred cheek? His hand slid up to touch the scar on Grantaire’s cheek, soft as moth wings, and Grantaire’s hand came up to catch Enjolras’ wrist and pull it down.
“Enjolras,” Grantaire said quietly. “Do not do this. Please.”
“Do what?” Enjolras asked, startled.
Grantaire released Enjolras’ wrist and brought his own hand up to cup Enjolras’ cheek, his fingers cool and dry against the flushed skin, his thumb describing a shallow arc over the cheekbone. “Your revolution,” Grantaire said. “Do not—please. You will fight, and you will die, and I will have to watch you die. I could not—I cannot live with that.”
Enjolras felt the dizzy warmth drain away, leaving clarity behind. “You do not know that we will fail. The people will rise, and–”
“They will not,” Grantaire interrupted him, still as quiet and soft as ever, not at all the brash and vocal cynic Enjolras was used to. His thumb completed another arc over Enjolras’ cheekbone. “You will change no worlds if you die today.”
“You are faithless, Grantaire,” Enjolras said, his voice cold and loud in the empty room. He stepped back, and Grantaire did not try to stop him, his hands falling away the moment Enjolras showed inclination to leave. “If you believe so little in the success of our cause, why do you return to every meeting? Why are you here today to march with us if you believe that we will die?”
Grantaire watched him out of steady eyes, still all pupil in the light, but his cheeks were as pale as if a hard blow had been landed. “You should know that, Apollo,” he said, and Enjolras gave an irritated shake of his head, turning toward the door to leave. He could feel Grantaire’s gaze on his back as he pushed through the door into the main body of the Musain.
When he stepped outside into the sunlight, all he could see was Grantaire, leaning against the table and watching him leave like a man losing his grip on the last handspan of a lifeline.
