"Isabeau?"

Her heart stutters in her chest at the wheezy hiss in her ear, and she glances over her shoulder, a hand flying to her chest. At the sight of… absolutely nothing, she looks back down at her paper cornet, wide eyed, and finds several of her candied nuts missing. She pauses, before glaring at the red-haired teenager standing over her with a smug grin on his face and his hand closed over something.

“Henri!” She huffs, folding over the paper to act as a makeshift lid. “You stole from me.”

Henri shrugs, popping a sugared pecan in his mouth. “Maman said you had to share.”

The fair is especially busy this afternoon, and Isabeau had hardly known where to look first when she entered. Every few steps a new stall appears, piled high with polished copper pots, embroidered ribbons, wooden toys or pyramids of fruit so carefully stacked they look as if they were glued together. A monkey in a fashionable waistcoat screeches from a performer’s shoulder as children laugh around him, while a short distance away a woman argues loudly about the price of a goose with a frustrated trader. A little boy clings to his mother’s skirts as they walk, holding a bright red sugar sweet so large it nearly hides his face. The air smells of warm bread, smoke and horses, and Isabeau thought there could not possibly be another person left in Artois who was not already standing in this square.

“Mm—“ Henri wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, making a face before he turns to the portly man beside him. “Papa. Isabeau wants to explore.”

“Hm? Oh, yes, oui. Of course.” Edouard glances briefly at the apothecary’s stall nearby, where her mother is speaking to the keeper inside. “Ah, stay close, do not get lost, and…”

He kneels down, and his round face is now directly in Isabeau’s line of sight. He reaches out, carefully adjusting her glasses, giving a small smile from under his stylised moustache and standing up.

Isabeau blinks, and those conflicted feelings hidden at the back of her mind come forth again. She knows she should dislike this man, the man who is trying to steal her mother away from her, but she could not help the strange warmth swelling in her chest at the little gestures he would demonstrate. She is suddenly aware of the arms of her glasses pressing against her ears, the slight pinch on her nose, and how they had felt when Edouard had first brought them home and put them on her face.

Henri’s loud voice interrupts her train of thought, and the moment is gone. “Yes, yes. Whatever. Come on, baby.”

She huffs but duly follows, keeping a tight grip on her cornet of candied nuts and her eyes trained on the back of his head, careful not to lose sight of him in the crowd.

“Where are we even going?” Once they leave the heart of the mob, she catches up beside him, slightly out of breath. His legs are far longer than hers, and he seems more than eager to leave the bustling throng behind them.

“Wherever,” he shrugs, before snatching a shiny apple from one of the stalls as they pass by, quick to withdraw his arm before the distracted vendor notices. At Isabeau’s appalled stare, he rolls his eyes and tosses the fruit at her. “What? He has plenty.”

Isabeau just about catches it, wide-eyed. “But— Why?”

He grunts, and it is Isabeau’s turn to roll her eyes at the typical response from him. She nestles the apple gingerly into her cornet, and almost walks into his back as he stops.

He has a little handbill in his hands, no doubt snatched off of a nearby pole or maybe from the hands of a small child — there was no knowing with him. His eyebrows are furrowed as he squints at it, before tossing it carelessly behind him as he starts moving again. Isabeau catches the bill, skimming it as she hurries to follow him again. ‘Cirque du Freak’? It was an eye-catching poster, but not anything Henri would be particularly interested in. Why was he so jittery? What was wrong with him?

“What is wrong with you?” She pockets the bill, saving it to discard properly later, watching him intently. His dark eyes are roving the area before them, darting to look at her for a second before he looks away. She frowns. “Henri? I—“

“Soubry.”

Henri stops dead and lets out a soft curse under his breath, before slowly turning around. Isabeau’s eyes widen behind her glasses, following his gaze.

Before them stands a group of four boys, all about Henri’s height, and definitely double his body mass. The one at the forefront wears a menacing expression on his bulky face, and his scowl tightens as Henri meets his gaze.

“…What do you want?” Her step-brother’s voice is raspy, and the flinty look in his eyes makes her shiver.

“What do I want?” The laugh that leaves the stockier boy’s mouth is devoid of mirth, and he pushes forward one of the shorter boys in the group. “Don’t ask me. Ask the one whose brother you nearly killed.”

This boy looks like he would rather be anywhere but here, and his hazel gaze drops to Isabeau for a split second. She, meanwhile, is staring up at Henri. The grimace on his lips, his inability to look the shifty boy in the eye, tells her all she needs to know about the accusation.

“I…” He looks as if he is about to apologise, but his eyes harden and he turns back to the first boy. “Why the hell would you bring him to me like this, you bastard?”

The smirk drops off his burly face, and he pushes the hazel-eyed boy away from him, his dull eyes trained on Henri. He takes a slow step forward. Henri watches him, unmoving.

Isabeau is suddenly painfully aware of the distance closing between the two boys. The crowd of people seems impossibly far away now, oblivious to what is happening. Henri’s fists curl loosely at his sides, but still he does not move.

“Henri—“

She is cut off by the unmistakable crack that fills the air. Henri staggers back, a thin hand clutching his face, and a rivulet of blood seeps between his fingers and drips onto his clothes. The boy pulls his thick arm back for another hit, but is stopped by the shorter one, whose eyes are wide and darting.

“S-Stop. Not now.” He glances wildly at Isabeau, who stares dumbly back. “His sister. Not in front of her.”

The stocky boy glares at her, and for a fleeting second, she has the wild thought that she might be struck next. She steps back instinctively, hands shaking around her paper cornet, and an unsteady sigh of relief leaves her once they begrudgingly turn away.

“Don’t let me find you again, Soubry,” he calls back, leaving to disappear back into the crowd. “Unless you’d like to have your nose shoved back into your head next.”

Isabeau watches as they leave, her breath coming slightly ragged, and only snaps out of it at a soft groan from Henri.

“Henri?” By now, he has moved his hand from his nose, and she gasps at the state of him. “Oh, Henri, your face.”

The skin below his eyes has turned a sickly purple colour, and tears prick at the corners of his eyes as he sits heavily on the ground, wiping the blood from his fingers onto his trousers. “Merde. Ah, mortbleu, that hurts.”

“Are you— okay? What should I—“ She looks around frantically for her mother or anyone really, but Henri swears, flicking her arm hard enough to sting.

“No. If Papa or— or Maman ask, you tell them I… tripped. On the floor.” He rubs the side of his nose, catching her bewildered gaze. “I am fine. Nothing broken, see?”

“You are bleeding. My god, I— What on earth was that?!” Her voice rises, and she shakes as she stands before him. “What were they talking about, you nearly killed someone?!”

He huffs, averting his gaze to the cobblestoned ground. “That was nothing. Ignore them.”

“Ignore them?” She has half a mind to shove him in anger, but he has evidently had quite enough of that for today. She sits down beside him with a sigh, fingers flexing against her cornet.

It is silent for a few minutes, as Henri tries to soothe the throbbing injury. Eventually he moves, standing up and brushing himself down, before plucking Isabeau’s cornet from her hands and slinging the apple back at her.

“You do not need these. Apples are good for you, anyway,” he grins, tossing a couple candied nuts in his mouth. “You should be nice to your dying brother.”

Isabeau mutters under her breath, fluffing her skirts out. “Have them, then. If your teeth are still intact after that punch.”

He laughs, shoving her lightly as they make their way back into the throng of people at the fair.