Javert approached with the slow, deliberate gait of a man who never doubted his authority. His long shadow stretched before him on the frost-bitten ground, merging with the prisoner’s own. A thin mist curled from his mouth as he spoke again, every syllable deliberate.

“You were late to fall into line. A quarter of an hour ago at least.”

He halted just a pace away, so close that Valjean could hear the leather creak at Javert’s belt, the steady rhythm of his breathing, slow and cold as the wind that scraped across the yard.

For a moment, neither moved. Javert’s brown eyes, hard and colorless as iron, bored into the prisoner’s lowered gaze with an intensity that seemed to strip flesh from bone.

“If I must speak to you a third time today,” Javert said, his voice dropping lower, “you will answer for it in ways you will not soon forget.”

There was no malice in his tone — only the flat, unwavering certainty of a man who had long ago replaced compassion with duty.

Without waiting for a reply, Javert turned on his heel, the hem of his coat sweeping the dust, and resumed his patrol, leaving Valjean to his silence and his chain.