"Come over here, I need you to do something."

"What's this for?" Eponine turns to see what Courfeyrac is referring to. He's in her closet holding a broken mirror, checking his teeth in it.

"Ohmygod put that down right now!" she slams her candle down on the dresser and takes a stride over to him just before the mirror slips out of his hands and shatters entirely. She isn't sure if it's her emotional doing or if it's just because Courfeyrac is clumsy. She blames him regardless. "Way to go."

"I'll get you a new one!" He's on his knees trying to pick up the shards but she gestures for him to leave it alone.

"You can't. I made it. No one but me can look in it. It was ruined as soon as you picked it up anyways."

"Then I'll help you make a new one. Wait, you made a mirror? What does it do? Tell you if you're the fairest in the land?"

"Get out of my closet, Courfeyrac."

He leaves his shards to accept the candle she's holding out to him. "But seriously, what does it do? Why are you the only one allowed to look in it?" Eponine tilts his candle holding hand with her right until the wax is dripping into her left. She doesn't stop until there's a black pool filling her palm. "Why do you keep so many secrets?" She blows the candle out nods for him to set it down before taking his hand in her wax-filled one. She knows that even with the wax her hand is cold, but he doesn't mention it when the wind their fingers together. "We've been doing this for two weeks now; we're friends."

"Are we?" she looks up from their hands.

"Yeah of course, why wouldn't we be? I like you, I'm pretty sure you like me-you laugh at my jokes at lunch anyway, I mean-"

"Do you actually like me though?" Eponine scowls and looks back to their hands. "Because after all of this I'm sure you'll want to get back to your regular life. You're not going to bother me in math anymore or sit with me at lunch. This is a one time thing. Once your ties are cut from this girl, it's all over." Courfeyrac starts to say something but Eponine cuts him off again. "I know what people say about us. That I've bewitched you or something. That we're sleeping together and that once you sleep with a witch your mind becomes hers. That you asked Stacy to prom and she said no, so you went mental and your impulsive off the rails rebound is me. The sooner we finish up all of this, the sooner you get your life back." Eponine takes a lighter out and holds the flame close to the back of her palm.

"Woah, hey! Not cool!" Courfeyrac pulls their still entangled hands away from the flame.

"Do you want to do this or not? Don't be such a baby."

"I don't want you to burn yourself for my sake!"

"Don't worry, you'll get a turn too." She brings the flame close to her hand again, but Courfeyrac is gripping her tight with apprehension. "You need to calm down or this isn't going to work. You'll ruin the wax mold." He loosens his grip a bit. She holds the lighter to her skin for five seconds, biting her cheeks while she does it to keep from cursing. "Now you."

Courfeyrac takes the lighter reluctantly. "What does this do?"

"It burns you."

"No, but magically. Why am I burning myself? You keep saying that you don't get something for nothing, but I don't understand what I'm giving here."

"Your flesh, your pain; we could have done it with a knife but this is less messy, and even though knives represent the fire spirits, I think actual fire works better."

Courfeyrac strikes the sparkwheel and swallows. "And this is going to work?"

"I don't know." Courfeyrac lets the flame die.

"What?"

"It's not my book," Eponine says defensively. "I didn't write the spell and I've never tried it before. Based on the ingredients and methods it should, but the last two spells we tried didn't work and they were from the same book." Courfeyrac starts to pull his hand away, but Eponine holds him tight. "I already burned myself, if the spell is real we can't leave it unfinished. And if it's real, we'll want to finish anyway."

Courfeyrac is trying to keep his breathing steady, but the sharp rise and fall of his chest betrays him. He raises the lighter to his hand but every time the flame licks his skin he flinches away.

"Look, I can't hold the lighter for you. You have to do that yourself. But if you do this, you can have five questions that I'll answer. You can't leave the spell undone or it's going to hurt me a lot more than a burn."

He looks at her. "Do these spells hurt you?"

"Is that one of your five questions?" Eponine asks raising a brow.

Courfeyrac bites down hard on his lip and practically presses the lighter to the back of his hand. Eponine counts and when she reaches five he drops it to the ground and lets out a whine. She takes a red ribbon braided with blonde hair and wraps it around their hands quickly. The blonde hair is stolen from the girl Courfeyrac doesn't want to love anymore, how he got so much of it; Eponine doesn't want to know.

"Now picture me as the girl you like."

"What?"

"Just do it!" Courfeyrac scrunches his eyes closed and hums a little bit. Eponine focuses on the wax inside their hands it heats up again and begins to trickle out of the hands and onto the ribbon and hair. She stops when there a black puddle on the floor and the ribbon is thoroughly covered. "Ok." Courfeyrac opens his eyes.

"Do you have any burn cream?"

Eponine shakes her head and unwinds the ribbon from their hands before letting go of him. "Part of the spell is the lingering pain. You have to wait for it to heal." She hands him the ribbon. "You need to wear this."

"Like on my neck?" Courfeyrac asks, looking warily at the wax-encrusted hair.

"On your neck, your wrist, your ankle, I don't care. But your hand needs to heal before it falls off."

"That's gross."

"Again, I didn't write the spellbook."

"Who did write the spellbook?"

Eponine sits on her messy bed and flips the spellbook his way. "Is that one of your five questions?" He sits next to her and picks up the book. It's old, but more from use than age. It couldn't be more than a hundred.

"No. My first question is, why do you miss school the day after we finish each spell."

Eponine sighs as if the question is uninteresting. "Like I said, the spells hurt if we do them wrong. Ask me something better; I won't make that one count."

"How does it hurt? Is it like a headache? Cramps?"

"I can't explain it; you won't understand."

"Try," he shifts closer to her and hands back the book.

"Let's see," she taps her forehead with the cover trying to think of something that Courfeyrac can relate to. "I'm retching, and if you looked at me you would think I was dry heaving, but I'm getting rid of backed up magic. And the trapped magic is trying to escape from everywhere, but it's bad and it's slow and it makes my entire body bad and slow."

"Trapped magic," Courfeyrac repeats.

"Energy that I tried to put into the spell, but it didn't work."

"So you're actually a witch then? These aren't just incantations that just-" he waves his hand and the air. Eponine bops him on the head with the spellbook.

"Yes I'm a witch! What do you think we've been doing these last two weeks!"

Courfeyrac laughs, "I don't know, at the beginning you told me you couldn't do certain things! I thought that meant you didn't have magic the way they have magic in the movies."

"What I meant was that I can't destroy things. At least not yet. I don't know how. I can only create."

Courfeyrac stands up abruptly. "Woah hold the phone, bud. So you can't destroy the feelings I have for this girl?"

"I'm trying to. But it's making me sick. Again, my magic doesn't work that way. Some witches can do it. The one who wrote this spellbook can," she tosses the book at him, "But I wasn't born with that. I don't know if it's even something I can exercise like a muscle and gain, or if it's something I'll never have."

"Can't you ask someone?"

"Who? Who would I ask?"

"I don't know? Your mom?"

Eponine looks at him with hooded eyes because that is the dumbest thing she's ever had suggested to her. "Do you want that to be your third question?"

"Ok not your mom then, she doesn't have magic, right?" Eponine nods. "And that probably means that magic isn't something that runs in families. And you don't know any other witches."

"Right and right." Eponine lays back and sucks on the burn on her hand.

"Ok so my third question is what the hell are we going to do if it turns out that you can't perform destructive magic."

Eponine rolls to her side and looks at him deviously, "I could always make her fall for you."

Courfeyrac swallows. "I don't think that's possible."

"Relationships fall apart all the time. Once she realizes she's madly in love with you she'll dump her boyfriend."

"She's not dating anyone."

"Then why is it so impossible? She's not dead is she?"

"No, it's just complicated," he says smiling sadly.

"We could still try."

"You just want more of my mother's baked goods."

"True," Eponine goes back to sucking on her hand. "But I'm also a pretty powerful witch," she says around it.

"Then why didn't you ever make Marius fall for you?" Eponine shoots him a dagger filled look. "It's obvious you're in love with him. This is my third question. Why didn't you ever put a spell on Marius?"

"Because I figured it would happen naturally and when it didn't, I knew he would never be as happy with me as he would be with Cosette. So I let it be."

"Not that I think you should break Marius and Cosette up, but I think you could make anyone very happy."

"Whatever you say Courf. What's your fourth question? My parents are going to be home soon and they aren't going to be happy if I have a boy over."

"What's with the mirror?" He goes over to her closet and picks up the biggest shard. "Why are you the only one allowed to look in it?"

"It's a scrying mirror. I superglued some broken glass together and coated it with silver nitrate. It can only be looked into when you're trying to tell the future. If you use it for anything else it's just a regular mirror."

"Ok, fifth and final question- am I useful in any of this? Can I scry? Is me burning myself really helping the spell? Or is it all you and I'm just here to provide hair and vervain?"

"Of course I need you." As soon as the words leave her tongue she knows she means it in more than one way. Without Courfeyrac she'd be truly alone. Marius is often absent from lunch and never comes over after school anymore, but Courfeyrac distracts her from that hurt in a weird way. He doesn't have to come home with her everyday to help her with the spells, but she's been finding excuses to have him join in. It isn't just for the daily brownies either. His company is nice too. "I tell you what. If you get me the supplies to replace the mirror, we can try scrying together. Maybe we'll even see if the spell I want to try will work. But I need the stuff by Saturday and you'll have to come here at midnight."

Courfeyrac is nearly jumping he is so excited. "What do I need to bring?"

"A glass pane and swimming trunks."

He stops bouncing, "What do I need my swimmers for?"

"It's a surprise," she winks