The Summoning of Heroes: Part I- The Maeyers

The mighty CuChualainn could not bear the humiliation of dying on the ground like an animal, so he tied himself to a stone. He died laughing as animals ate at him; and so he fell, a king among warriors.

Enya had heard many different accounts of the great hero's death, but this was the tale that her father had always told her as a child. As she climbed the rolling hills of her family's homeland, Ireland, she vaguely wondered how her brother, Aiden, was faring in his task. The Grail War would be starting soon, and this was to be the first time that the Maeyer family was to participate. Their family had been druids for 2000 years (that they knew of at least), yet they had refused to join the Mage's Association until Enya's great-grandfather, Fargus Maeyer, the last Maeyer Irish druid, joined almost one hundred years ago. Despite the fact that their family had always been a well regarded mage family, the Mage's Association from the Clock Tower refused to do them the courtesy of even acknowledging them until great-grandfather.

Enya huffed as she reached the top of a particularly steep hill. Growing up outside of Ireland-though she and her family still visit the "old family homestead" on holidays- it was easy to forget the beauty of the Old Country. However, Enya and her twin were not here on holiday, they were here on a mission; retrieve their artifacts for the great summoning of heroes. Her and her brother were to both compete in this upcoming Holy Grail War.

That is, assuming that the Grail actually chooses both of us, she thought as she looked at the command seals that had formed on her right hand, which still burned by the way. Trying to ignore the subtle but annoying throb of pain the newly formed command seals, which she had been very excited to receive this morning after two days into her journey as this marked her as a chosen mage for this Grail War, she took out her map. If the rumors were true and she had divined everything correctly, she should be able to locate the artifact she was looking for. Unfortunatley though, Enya was not a good map reader and she had a terrible sense of direction, despite her status as a druid mage.

Good God, I'm a shame to my family name! Finally frustrated with herself after being unable to find the rock she was looking for, Enya took out her stones; divination was one of her strong suits. If she couldn't use the map that the old druid, Brenden, had given her that supposedly led to the burial site of the legendary hero she was looking for, then she could divine its location.

Finding a good place where the natural mana flowed well, Enya sat down and took a deep breath. Meditating momentarily to clear her mind, she then shook the bag contains the divination stones. Closing her eyes and opening her mind, she dumped the bags contents on the earth she was sitting on. Enya knew that under normal circumstances, divining on the ground was a bad idea and that it often yielded poor results, if it yielded any results at all. Usually, doing this ruined the stones, but Enya had a good feeling about divining in this manner in this case; her intuition from her first divination was telling her that she was quite close to the burial site, the energy flow in the area surrounding her was excellent, she was near the place the hero's head and spear arm had been taken, Tara (which itself is a good energy source), and the artifact she was looking for would be somewhere among the earth.

Moving the stones around a bit to divine the location of the artifact, the rush of the vision came to Enya in her mind's eye. A sudden wave of tiredness came over Enya as soon as the vision ended. Divination was extremely useful for finding items such as artifacts, but most mages preferred to use the technique as a last resort because it tended to drain a lot of mana, and honestly, the visions are more like an unpleasant head rush; which usually made Enya slightly nauseous.

After gathering the stones and putting them back in their bag, Enya decided to lay down and rest a bit on the soft, lush grass beneath her before following her vision. Thinking to herself, CuChulainn isn't going anywhere. She even doubted that there was anyone else in the area as she could not feel out any other mages. Though she knew that the mage Bazett wanted to try competing as well, Enya had a feeling that the older woman would not be beating her to this particular possible servant, given the fact that Enya made sure that Waver (with a little bit of bribery of course!) had given the woman too much work to do in London for her to be able to journey to Ireland before or during Enya's journey.

Since Enya was a little girl on her father's lap, listening to the stories of Ireland's ancient heroes and of the Holy Grail Wars, Enya knew that the Ulster Cycle hero, CuChulainn, was the hero whom she wanted to be her servant should she ever compete. And Enya would be damned to the deepest bowels of Hell if some thirteenth generation mage like Bazett was to beat her to it!

Aiden felt slightly guilty for lying to his older twin: he already had his artifact, but he had come with Enya to the Old Country to do his summoning. However, Enya was under the belief that after they parted ways at the international airport in Dublin, Aiden was traveling to find his artifact-his catalyst-for the summoning of his own hero for this Grail War. Though his travel to the Bay of Shells was difficult, it wasn't nearly as difficult as stealing the late Kayneth El-Meloi's artifact used in the previous Holy Grail War had been; but hiding the artifact from Enya while on the plane and through the airport and customs was the hardest part. The bangle Grainne had worn during her and Diarmuid's flight from the wrath of Fionn was old and frail, which made hiding it even more difficult. Indeed, Aiden nearly shat his pants when the Irish customs officer roughly searched his carry-on. He was afraid that the man would accidentally break the artifact that he wanted to use as the catalyst to summon the famous Knight of the Fianna.

After he'd watched the sun go down, it was time for him to get to work. Aiden had chosen the Bay of Shells to summon his servant for several reasons: it was the area of Ireland most closely associated with Diarmuid and Grainne's story when the woman cast a Geis on Fionn's best Knight, causing Diarmuid to flee with Grainne from Fionn himself; this story is one of the most recognizable stories associated with the hero; and the location was the easiest location to get to that was associated with the knight that also had the most favorable energy conditions. Aiden figured that all of these factors would provide the best conditions for the summoning of the heroic spirit he was hoping to receive in order to maximize the servant's potential.

Finding an appropriate spot in the bay, Aiden set to work in digging the ground to make the seal. Completing that part, Aiden felt a swell of pride while admiring his work, Father and Mother would be proud! This war would determine who would be the heir to their parents' power: it was the fairest way that the twins and their parents could think of in order to determine who was most fit to carry on the Maeyer name and family knowledge of magecraft.

Moving on to the next step, Aiden's heart nearly stopped and he stared at the empty crest in horror. He'd forgotten the most crucial step in order to summon a servant of the grail war! He forgot that he needed to fill the damn seal in order to make it work. Sighing irritably at his forgetfulness in his excitement at receiving his command seals only hours ago, thus marking him as a competitor in this Grail War, he started back towards the village. Filling the seal with metals created through alchemy would be the best, but I don't have time! The chicken blood from the chickens in the village will have to do...

As Aiden walked back to the village, his thoughts drifted to his sister, Enya. There was no doubt in his mind that Enya would try to summon a lancer as well, most likely CuChulainn; Enya had always had a fascination with the Irish hero since she was a child, and especially given the fact that Bazett suddenly and out of nowhere was given a mandatory assignment from the Clock Tower far away from Ireland (of which Aiden had no doubt that Enya was the cause of), he was more than certain that she would specifically be trying to summon Cuchulainn in his strongest form: a lancer class servant. Therefore, as of now, it was only a matter of time before a lancer class servant was summoned. The question was: would it be Aiden or Enya?

At this though, Aiden quickened his pace to a sprint towards the village. His sister was known for her competence and her unmatched divination skills; she has likely already found her catalyst, and thus, she would likely be summoning her hero very soon as well. Whether or not she summoned CuChulainn as a lancer, she would be summoning him in one form or another; however, Aiden's catalyst could likely either summon Diarmuid or Grainne, given the fact that the artifact once belonged to them both, and Aiden did not want to get stuck with Grainne, who would likely come as a Caster class servant if he was unable to summon Diarmuid, whom, as far as Aiden knew, could only be summoned as a Lancer class servant.

I'll be damned if I don't get to compete in the Grail War with those two fuckers...Justin thought bitterly to himself as he poured cow's blood in the seal he'd dug into the earth near the slaughter house he worked in. He was a second generation mage; his mother, Tara Howard, having dabbled in mage craft during the brief time she had spent with his biological father, Fredrick Maeyer whom had come from a long line of druid mages. But not long enough in comparison to his bitch-ass, battle axe of a wife, Rowena Maeyer. Justin Tennison laughed at his father, the man who wanted nothing to do with him, his own flesh and blood, after accidentally impregnating Justin's mother. It was ironic, truly: Fredrick saw Tara, who had just begun to practice magecraft, and thus, the first generation mage, as an unworthy partner in marriage due to her "weak bloodline"; yet, Rowena Maeyer, the woman Fredrick married only a year after Justin's birth, found Fredrick's bloodline to be so much weaker than her own that he took her family name as his own, as did both of their children who were conceived in wedlock.

"Fill, Fill, Fill, Fill, Fill! Repeat in five times," Justin read from the book on magecraft, which his mother had stolen in order to improve her magecraft in the hopes to win Fredrick back after he rejected her and Justin. When he had heard about the Holy Grail War and of its battle royal to win the wish granting miraculous artifact, he knew that his younger half brother and sister would likely be competing, and he did not intend to pass up this golden opportunity that he is his father's rightful heir, not those pompous little shit heads birthed by their bitch mother! Justin had seen their work at the Clock Tower two years ago during his brief stint there. It was his siblings' first year, but it was his third. Oh how pompous and arrogant they had been! Just because of the families they'd come from! Justin quickly found that the Clock Tower was not the place for him to nurture his wondrous gifts as a mage; it was a place that rewarded long bloodlines and famous names. In Justin's opinion and experience, it was not a place that nurtured natural, God-given talent, nor the superior dark arts and blood magic that he and his mother had practiced; something of which his father scorned as a Druid practitioner. Oh how superior the druids falsely believe themselves to be! Justin knew that with his raw, but still being refined talent, along with his gift of being born with more mana than the average mage-a trait that he learned in the Clock Tower's archives on mage families ran strongly in his father's bloodline-he had just as good a chance at winning the Holy Grail as his half brother and sister.

Enough! Justin told himself; he needed to clear his mind at the moment in order to summon the most powerful hero he could. He would have his revenge on his father later, but he needed this servant and the grail to do so. Flipping the book's pages, he began to chant the incantations to invoke the heroic spirit, whoever it would be; Justin was not exactly sure how to summon specific spirits, but he knew that he could draw a strong one since the Grail will match a Master with a compatible heroic spirit, and well, he had been chosen to be a master quite early given the fact that he had received command seals on his hand a year before the Grail War was due to start. He was confident that he could draw a strong servant without a catalyst.

During the last sentence of the incantation, the seal on the ground began to glow brightly, a bright, almost neon purple to be exact. In fact, the light had become so bright that after he'd read the last sentence of the incantation, he had to shield his eyes, an act he loathed to do; he wanted to see what it looked like when a heroic spirit was summoned! After the light faded and Justin was able to adjust his eyes back to the darkness, he was struck speechless.

"I ask you," said a silver haired woman in a voice so calm and cold it chilled Justin to the bone. She asked him her question, but Justin was unable to answer because just then, a group of men-security for the slaughter house no doubt- approached them. Pointing their bright flashlights in Justin's face, he heard a voice:

"Who's there?! Identify yourself!"

The woman servant, slowly turning her head to look at the men behind her, eerily answered, "Didn't your mothers ever teach you any manners? 'Tis rude to interrupt an ongoing conversation!"

One of the men, pulling out a pair of handcuffs, while the others unholstered their guns, said, "I don't know who or what you are lady, but you have a lot of questions to answer down at the police station! This is private property and you are trespassing!"

Slowly turning around to face the men, she gave a wicked smile, "You all sound like old, tiresome men, but you do not look the part." Waving an elegant, blue colored clawed hand with purple veins protruding from the top of the claw, whose blue color faded into her pale skin tone just below her elbow as well as her purple veins, the woman continued, "I can help you there."

At the wave of her hand, a silver, magical force swept through the men, startling them. At first, it seemed as if nothing happened, then suddenly, the men began to age very quickly. Their screams turning into the weaker moans of very old men, they aged rapidly until there was nothing left of them but bones. Having been startled to the ground, Justin could only watch the events unfolding before him and stare in terrified amazement.

After finishing her work with the guards, the woman turned her attention back to Justin. Her clawed, elongated, yet elegant feet matched her hands in color and also had the same protruding veins; all of which ended just below her knees in the same fashion the color of her hands and their veins did. Her eyes were the color of the night's sky, and they were so dark they were nearly black. They also seemed to be lined on the waterlines in a smokey black with, and with what appeared to be, black eyeshadow lining the bottoms and the tops of her eyes and blended to extend to the sides of her hairline. A beautiful contrast to her silver-almost white hair, which was so long, it came down to her bottom. Looking at her exquisite hair, he noticed her manner of dress as well; it seemed that she pulled her long, thick hair in front to cover her breasts, and it appeared that she only wore a long, deep crimson-brown skirt with a high slit in the middle of the front starting at the middle of her thighs, which were covered in intricate purple tattoos. In fact, her whole body was covered in these tattoos, even her chest and face, which she had thin tattoos coming to a point just below her cheekbones and ending just before the bones themselves ended, acting almost as a strange bronzer meant to highlight them, as well as two ragged tattoos staring at her hairline to end at a point just above her black, bold arched eyebrows.

Though most would consider the servant to be deformed due to her clawed hands and feet, Justin thought her exquisitely elegant and beautiful, but hauntingly so; almost like an elegantly beautiful otherworldly creature. As she approached him, he realized that she must be almost six feet tall!

"I ask you again," she said in a deep, confident feminine voice with almost no tone. "Who is it that summons me? A servant of the Caster class."

Embarrassed that his ass had fallen to the ground in fear and awe of his servant's terrible power, Justin quickly recovered himself. "It is I, Justin Tennison! You're master in this Holy Grail War!" He said this, bringing his hand up and showing her his purple colored command seals.

"Very well then master," she smirked. "Our pact is sealed."

Staring at her momentarily, Justin was not completely sure as to what he should do, then he remembered something important; he needed to know her name.

"My name you ask?" She said; he'd forgotten that as master and servant with a completed pact, they could hear one another's thoughts. Looking up at the moon she answered pensively, "During this time period, I have no recognizable name," her hard, calm gaze coming back to him she continued, "I have had many names throughout my lifetime. Though I suppose my most famous was Chronas."

Placing CuChulainn's earrings, which she had dug up only hours ago, onto a makeshift pedestal-the rock itself that served as the Irish hero's crude burial marker-and damn it had been a bitch to move, even with magic! Enya had everything in place; now she just needed to do the incantation to invoke his spirit! Despite her excitement though, she still felt terribly guilty for having to kill those hounds; she liked dogs, they were good and loyal beasts deserving of the highest honor. They weren't called "man's best friend" for nothing! She gave them all a peaceful, painless death before bleeding them, and she had tried to choose old and decrepit hounds from the vets whom were due to be put down anyways; but doing so still made her cry for them a bit. In fact, she was still tearing up at the thought as she wiped a tear away.

If it had been any other hero, she would have used the blood of livestock to fill the seal used to summon the heroes of the Grail, but this was THE CuChulainn! This particular hero was well known to be associated with dogs, and Enya was hell bent on winning this Grail War; she needed to maximize his stats as a heroic spirit of the Grail as much as possible, and using the blood of hounds would help her in this task, as well as summoning him in Ireland near his burial site, along with using the rock of his burial site as a pedestal for his catalyst. Hell! Enya had even considered wearing one of the hero's earrings for the summoning because she thought it may strengthen their bond and thus strengthen their connection and his power as her servant, but she decided against it after much consideration.

Pouring the blood and filling the seal, she began the incantation and summoning, but with a modifier at the end meant to increase her odds of summoning him as a lancer class servant, his most powerful class; "Come forth! Hero of the Mythical Spear Gae Bolg!" The bright bluish light was blinding, but Enya refused to shut her eyes or shield her face. She had been waiting nearly all her life to meet the great Cuchulzinn! Unfortunately though, the light blinded her greatly and when it faded, all she could see was the black of the night.

Griping Gae Bolg in his spear hand, CuChulainn blinked and tried to orient himself. Though he knew why he was there due to the knowledge that the Grail automatically instills in him upon his summoning, he didn't know much else as to where he was and who he was with. Emer? He swore that he could feel her presence. His vision coming into focus and red, beastial eyes adjusting to the darkness, he could see better in the darkness than any human. Looking at the figure before him, his heart lept in joy! Emer! The young woman before him looked and felt like Emer, but there was something off about her...

Letting his eyes completely focus before assessing the disoriented woman before him, to his sadness, he realized that she was not Emer...

Recovering, he felt bad for the poor disoriented lass as she was rapidly blinking her eyes, attempting to focus, and feeling the air in front of her. Sighing, he was disappointed that she was not Emer, but at least she was beautiful and reminded him of his Emer. Trying to help her and fearing that she may trip and fall due to her blindness and disorientation, he grabbed her arm to steady her.

Startled by the sudden grip on her arm and her inability to see to whom the hand gripping her belonged to, Enya asked, "Who's there?!" It came out as an embarrassing squeak.

A man's laugh rumbled before he answered with great confidence, "It is I! CuChulainn summoned for this Holy Grail War!"

Enya's eyes finally focusing, she was awestruck when she saw him! He was even more magnificent than she had imagined! Brushing his hand off her arm, she recomposed herself as a mage and showed him her blue command seals. "Welcome to the twenty-first century CuChulainn. I am your master for this war! I am the Druid mage Enya of House Maeyer," she stated proudly.

"Very well then Enya the Druid. I'm guessing then that it was you who summoned me to be the Lancer of Blue for this war?"

Wait, did he just say "Lancer of Blue"? Her mouth dropped in shock; was he implying that there were other Lancers?!

Enya heard him laugh, "I must say lass! So far, I am glad to be in your service! Your facial expressions are quite comical!"

Recovering from shock, Enya asked worriedly, "Lancer of Blue?! Are you saying that there are other Lancers competing in this war as well?! If so, that is most unprecedented!"

The man in the blue suit covered in what Enya assumed were silver ruin markings, raised his head up and put his hand on his forehead, and teasingly asked her, "You didn't know? There will be eight lancers to be exact; one Lancer for each team and seventy nine other servants." He laughed again when Enya suddenly felt lightheaded and began to sweat before hitting the ground flat.

Lancer could only stare in disbelief as the lass before him fainted. "Geez," he sighed as he checked to make sure his master was alright. He stepped back when she startled awake. Her eyes wide as saucers, she asked him, "Seven-seventy nine other servants?! Oh my God!" She started to panic and hyperventilate; that meant seventy nine servants and seventy nine other mages were to be competing in this war!

Good grief. It seems I've overestimated this one. Too bad; I felt great power and potential coming from this lass when our pact was completed and sealed. Sounds of people approaching broke him from his thoughts and he quickly went to Enya's side in case he needed to protect her.

A rather large group of men from the nearby small, quaint village, probably seeing the bright light from Enya summoning her lancer, approached them. Enya nearly burst out laughing when she saw that they were carrying torches and pitchforks.

"What the bloody hell?!" One man exclaimed.

"What the fuck is going on here!" Another said with a thick Irish accent.

"They be one of those tourist freaks no doubt looking for trouble!" A rather large man said threateningly and readying a rather frightening looking machete upon seeing lancer ready his spear to attack.

"Stand down Lancer!" Enya said in her most authoritative voice.

"Master, there's over a dozen of them and I believe they mean to do us harm."

She confidently told him, "Not to worry." Waving her hand over the men, she chanted, "Eirigh as stad!" Lancer felt and saw the magical force of her spell wash over the mob, who all immediately froze in place. Brushing the dirt off her jeans from her fall just moments ago, she turned to Lancer, who looked as if he had just been stunned as well. "Come Lancer. We have a long walk ahead of us tonight," she said this smiling while throwing her long dark hair over her shoulder.

Awestruck by his master's power and how easily she used a spell to stop them while expending such little mana, Lancer was beginning to think he was going to like Enya as his master. A strong, beautiful, intelligent woman; if he had to be the servant of a woman master, those were the attributes he'd want her to have, and Enya fit the part perfectly. Smiling to himself, he carried his spear over his shoulder and caught up to Enya, who looked over to him and smiled at him in acknowledgement.

Author's Note: Sorry if I butchered Irish mythology, but it's quite unclear and there's several versions of these stories. BTW: Justin is not a bad guy; he's a complicated character who is neither good nor bad. Also, I thought a mob scene would be a little humorous, and don't worry, Enya didn't harm them (sorry if my gaelic is wrong, I don't speak it); she just stunned them briefly enough for her and Lancer to get away safely and she's assuming that since they are country folk from a very small village, people will just brush this instance off as superstition.

No disrespect to anyone; I had to take a few liberties with these stories, but type-moon does the same.

R&R Please! And please no flaming! ^.^

Next up: Rin, Shirou, and Waver!