28th July, Les champs de feu

Charcot hung his head a bit then. "I dunno. Guess I didn't do nobody else any good, neither. I don't know how long I was there."

"Maybe," began Paol, trying to steer Charcot away from that sort of thinking, "Maybe you'll see that little English girl you fancied." But the words were hardly out of his mouth before he wished them unsaid. Of all the cruel, stupid things to say!

But the phrasing did not seem to bother Charcot. Instead, he raised his head with a tentative smile. "Ha. Yeah. Let me know if you see her." He spoke without any irony. Seeing - or encountering - that pretty little girl would be one redeeming factor of this whole wretched situation.

"What's she look like, then, your girl?" he asked with a shadow of a smile.

"I dunno. She's small, and she has dark hair, and... she looks like a little mouse. Couture knows what she looks like." Oh. But Couture wasn't with them. "She's pretty."

"Like a mouse?" Roux asked. Despite himself, he started to laugh. "I'm sure she'd like that, your girl. We'll tell you if there are any tiny mice-women about."

"Aw, shut up," he retorted, but with a slight grin. He did not even notice that they had steered him away from a quite depressing mood. It would no doubt catch up with him later.

"What about you, Roux? Didn't you get in a fight with Quentin over an English girl?"

Colour rushed into Roux's face at reminder. Quentin had beaten him bloody over that one. Though, she had kissed him. So, there was that.

"She didn't like him," he mumbled. "Couldn't let him bother her."

"Did she like you though?" Charcot prompted, curling into a ball once again to ease the ache.

"She didn't seem to mind me," Roux said, flushing even more fiercely. But then, she had not stayed around after getting food from him and Paol. So who could say.

Glancing at Roux, Paol had to hide a smile. That was one way of putting it. "Maybe she'll return the favour," he said, thinking of the food.

"One can hope," Roux said. He sighed. "I had some bread I was saving. Probably long gone now."

He leaned down to peer at Charcot. "He still awake?"

"Looks like," Paol said, lowering his voice. He felt oddly relieved. "Aye, I had some in my pack, but..." He realized he wasn't even certain what had happened to his pack after he'd taken it off. "Oughta start sewing rations into my coat, at this rate."

"Would solve a lot of problems," Roux agreed. "They'll probably feed us at some point, right?"

"Hope so. Probably not before tomorrow, though." He eyed Charcot. "I think he might have the right idea."

"He probably does," Roux said ruefully. He shifted position, and winced as all of his scrapes and injuries made themselves known. "Hopefully it'll be as easy as that."

But Paol was not listenening, staring instead at the russet haired figure weaving among the soldiers some yards away. "Uh...Alain?"

"Quoi?"

Roux turned to see what it was that his friend was staring at.

"Is there trouble?"

He nodded toward the woman who had stopped and was now staring quite unabashed in their direction. "Ain't that...?"

Following Paol's gaze, Roux gaped at the woman. It was her. The English girl he had fought Quentin over. It was practically unbelievable. He could feel his face flushing again as he caught her frank stare, and quickly ducked his head.

"Speak of the devil," he muttered, cheeks burning. He chanced another glance in her direction. "That'd be her, alright."

The woman's face seemed to split into a grin and then she was gone.

"Guess she still don't mind you," Paol murmured, easing himself gingerly onto his back.

"Guess not," Roux said, staring openly after the woman for a moment. He turned abruptly back and shook his head. "No matter either way, I suppose."

He checked to make sure that Charcot was actually asleep, and then studied Paol more carefully. Between the burns and the blood and the dirt, it was not a reassuring sight.

"Sure you're alright?" he asked, voice pitched low. "Your face is bleeding some."

"My face?" He put a hand up, wincing as it brushed a gash above his temple. So that's why his head ached so badly. But he had no memory of hitting it on anything... He looked at Roux, some automatic reassurance on his tongue, then shook his head. "I dunno." He tried to smile. "Some water and a bit o' sleep and I'll be alright, I think."

His eyes strayed to the purple stain -- or maybe it was just a shadow -- on Roux's coat. "You got anythin' that needs patching up?"

"Nothing that'll kill me before morning," Roux said. He rubbed tiredly at his eyes, and then had to blink away the burning from dirt and gunpowder. "Least we made it this far, right?"

Paol's brows knit together, and he looked more closely at Roux, searching his face as though it would tell him something his friend was keeping back. But he could read no danger there.

"Aye, that's so," he agreed, letting his head sink back on the trodden grass.