un: someday, life will be fairer (open)

[untamedantinous]

The library is currently occupied. To be more precise, it is occupied by one young blond man, settled in at a large table with books spread out around him. Off to the side, there is a glass of wine, half-drunk. He looks much better than he had upon his arrival, no longer dirty and bloodstained, but still a bit fragile. Some of the marble that usually adorns his countenance has been chipped away, and he is not certain if it will come back.

He is not certain of many things, here in this strange new not-afterlife, but he is certain that both the writings of Rousseau and Voltaire exist. He has the proof, right here next to him, old friends that he is relieved to have in hand. (Someday he'll find his own copies of them, maybe.) The young fellow that had healed him -- Magnus, wasn't it -- had mentioned France becoming a republic. So in lieu of talking to people, Enjolras has chosen to dive into history books and catch himself up on the last 200 or so years.

(He'd rather read than face what lies before him here. He's not sure what to do, and he doesn't like being purposeless. There is yet time to talk, time to find Grantaire, eventually, but he doesn't want to think. Not right now.)

Comments

[timebethine]

There's that same touch of sorrow that attended lately; Laertes knows not how to answer his grief. "Here's to embarrassing our fathers, then, and to finding our hearts' true homes," he says, raising an imaginary glass. "May those you left behind find you here again, hale and whole."

[untamedantinous]

It's been a strange two days for him. From Paris to the mansion in the blink of an eye, and he keeps looking for distractions so he doesn't need to think about the friends he left dead on the ground back home. "Indeed," with that same wry twist of his lips again, and he raises his own glass to Laertes. "Perhaps they might. I do not know what became of all of them, after all."

[timebethine]

"Is there something in these books that roused you to fight?" Laertes asks. "Or only love of France, and your people?"

[untamedantinous]

"Oh -- the books did not especially help," grinning. "My father despaired of them, but I was willful, and -- well, I wished to see our people, France herself, as a republic of old, free and righteous as she should be; like in the first revolution except done more judiciously. Then we should have France on her own terms. She is great because she is France, not on the account of any soldier or so-called emperor who only fought to make himself great and powerful." A pause. "But I digress. It was the books, and our history, and my brothers, my friends from school, a bit of everything."

[timebethine]

"A love of the world as it is, fueling love of the world as it might be." He grins, sincerely enchanted by the conviction in Enjolras's voice and the affection that shines through it. "You should take up writing philosophy. I'd be your votary. You couldn't be worse than Lombard."

[untamedantinous]

He does tend to have that effect on people, even when it is not intentional. He grins back, taking another quick drink of wine. "You flatter me, I am not half as wise as our own philosopher at home, nor nearly as peaceful. He is much better suited to writing that sort of thing than I." There's a pause. "I do think you would get on with them, if they are to arrive."

[timebethine]

"I'll look out for them the way I do your Socrates--with eager anticipation." Tilting his head a little, returning Brutus to the table, Laertes asks, "What are you, if not peaceful? Although I strive to be moderate in all things ... I fear I am neither moderate nor peaceful, at the heart of me."

[untamedantinous]

There’s a bit of an amused snort. “I am rather the opposite as well, I should think. As admirable as peace is, it is —I appreciate the actions that lead to them more than the result, I should say.” There is a fire in him, it is banked at the moment; but it’s easy to see how it could come ablaze at the least provocation.

[timebethine]

"You might do well to speak with Lan Wangji, then. He's taught me a trick of meditation that helps to calm my mind when I run hectic--unless you have no interest in calm."

[untamedantinous]

“I am not yet certain, here. It seems a very strange sort of place.” He may look into it, sooner or later, but not just yet. He needs to get more settled.

[timebethine]

Laertes can't help laughing. "It is, my friend," he says. "Some weeks ago, I found my lover transformed to a child. There's madness here too deep for me to plumb."

[untamedantinous]

“….Oh.” He shakes his head again. “It almost sounds like something out of the Romantic novels Prouvaire is..was fond of.” Despite that correction, he is smiling, though it’s a little sadder than he would readily admit. “Do things like that happen often?”

[timebethine]

"That, I--" know not comes to his lips easily, but he redirects "--don't know. I've only been here a month. On my first day, though, a man came flying at me on a sword, and I thought I'd lost all my wits."

[untamedantinous]

"Flying at you on a sword," he repeats, blinking owlishly. "That does seem a fine trick. Is it magic, or a trick like some --showman, perhaps?" He's already been exposed to some magic here, after all, so it is not totally out of the question.

[timebethine]

"If Lan Wangji is a showman, I would never gamble against him--his face might as well be marble, for all it gives the lie to his performance. No, I think his cultivation is true magic," says Laertes.

[untamedantinous]

"Well. That is certainly something to look forward to, then, I suppose." This place is going to give him a headache, sooner or later. "Mm, yes, I think I met him. My arrival is a little fuzzy."

[timebethine]

As it certainly would be, if he'd fought and died before arriving. Laertes makes a sympathetic noise. "If some new mischief happens, I'll seek you out to warn you. Then you may decide whether to fight it, or make your peace."

[untamedantinous]

"If it is some mischief like what you spoke of, I do not know how much one may fight against it." There's a wry grin. "I would have been quite a nuisance as a child."

[timebethine]

"Oh? What kind of nuisance?" Laertes asks, grinning back. "I was a terrible tattletale."

[untamedantinous]

"Argumentative, for the most part. Loud. Rebellious." There's a flicker of amusement. "Clearly I have not transformed all that much."

[timebethine]

"Then surely you were a charming child, as well," teases Laertes, although charming isn't precisely what he means. It feels wrong, somehow, to call a child compelling, but Enjolras compels with more natural authority than a king.

[untamedantinous]

"My mother certainly thought so," with an all-too-innocent smile. "My father disagreed; and I entirely disagreed, and threw them off at sixteen to go study law." He probably was just as compelling, though, intense and indignant whenever he felt something was amiss.

[timebethine]

"And hence, philosophy. Even then, it seems you had an admirable clarity of purpose. Not many can say as much, at sixteen."

[untamedantinous]

"I have been told that I am not like many men." He doesn't sound proud, or even slightly embarassed, like a normal person would. He simply states it as the fact it is.

[timebethine]

"No, you are not." He has the same eerie, angelic singularity of purpose that Laertes only briefly glimpsed in Galahad--but where Galahad is mist and starlight, silver and glass, Enjolras is an engine of flesh and blood. Laertes has fallen asleep with Galahad in his arms, and still Enjolras feels more solid and touchable.

He is not permitted to touch.

"I'll continue the hunt for Socrates," he says. "And if I find it, I'll share that with you, too. If nothing else, I hope it will be more welcome than mischief."