The world was strangely quiet after the inn fell. Perhaps it was only because the screeching and groaning of protesting wood had stopped after the collapse, and the strength of the fire had been damped around them. Maybe it was just the shock of it all. Lancelot couldn't tell. His ears were ringing, his knees aching, and his shoulders stinging from where embers had burned through his shirt.

He shook his head and staggered up. A hand clamped around his arm. He fought it for a blind moment before he realized that Percival was just trying to pull him to his feet.

"Have you seen Gwaine?"

"What?" Lancelot blinked up at Percival, his rattled brain slow in catching on.

"Gwaine! I saw him just before the building fell, but I can't find him now."

Lancelot swiped at his eyes, but the action only seemed to push more grit into them. "He shoved me out of the way. I thought he was right behind me."

They looked back at the inn's smoldering remains. The fire that had consumed it was mostly out, leaving smaller tongues of flame behind to lick away at whatever was left behind. Smoke hung over the street, covering it and the knights with a fine layer of black and coating their throats with every breath until Lancelot was ready to choke. He coughed and spat, wiping at his watering eyes and running nose.

The wind had shifted again, pushing the fire away from them and toward the higher parts of the city and the citadel beyond.

Lancelot glanced upward as he stumbled after Percival, but smoke obscured the sky. Pity. It would have been nice to see if the gathering clouds were going to dump rain on them. Otherwise, the fire might burn for days, destroying the city and leaving thousands dead. But the only thing falling from the veiled sky was ash drifting downward like fine snow.

"There's someone under here!" Percival's frantic call brought Lancelot back to his senses. The big knight was tugging at a charred beam at the edge of the wrecked inn, his arms straining at the task. Lancelot stumbled over to him, finding a spade handle to jam underneath the beam to help lever the debris away. A woman's voice rose with panic.

Together they cleared away enough of the rubble to find what they were looking for: a woman trapped under both the wreckage and the still form of a man whose tangled hair obscured his face.

"You take her," Percival said. "I'll get him."

Lancelot dragged his gaze away from the man. The hair was the right length, the build just right. It could have been Gwaine. But he was so still…

He forced himself to focus on the woman. Her breathing was so shallow and rapid that Lancelot wondered if she was getting any air at all, and though her eyes were wide open, she didn't seem to see him. Her lips were moving like she was whispering the same prayer over and over again. He couldn't blame her for that. Similar pleas to the quiet heavens had been racing through his head since his first sight of the flames.

"M'lady?" Lancelot rested a hand on her shoulder. "M'lady, can you hear me?" She didn't answer. Whether she was injured or the shock had driven the reason out of her, it was clear the woman couldn't tell what was going on around her. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder and swept her up and out of the wreckage, picking his way through the debris until he was back on solid cobblestones. Percival followed him with the man hanging limply in his arms.

"Lancelot!"

He looked up blearily to find Leon racing toward him with a company of guards behind him. Lancelot kept walking until they reached him.

"Here. Let them worry about her," Leon said. "You look like you're about to fall over." He gestured for one of the guards to take the woman from Lancelot. "Get her back to the citadel. Gaius and the other healers are set up in the great hall. Take the most grievously wounded there and- Lance!"

Leon guided Lancelot down as his knees gave out. The jolt of bone against stone rattled his head and sent his vision swimming.

"Are you alright?" Leon asked.

"Maybe?" Lancelot answered. "If I could catch my breath…"

"In all this? Good luck." Leon almost smirked. He tilted Lancelot's head toward the light. "Looks like you face-planted in the street. Your eye's already turning black, and your cheek with it. It's going to be a while before the ladies are swooning over you again, but I don't think anything's broken."

Lancelot choked out a laugh, then sobered and glanced around. "Gwaine…?"

"Percival's got him." Leon nodded off to Lancelot's right and called out to the other knight, "How is he?"

"He's got a nasty burn on one arm and a cut on his head, but he's making as much sense as he normally does." Percival's grin flashed white in the gloom. "I think he'll be fine."

"'m already fine. Lemme up, you oaf." Gwaine planted a shaking hand against Percival's chest and tried to push him away, but the big knight refused to budge.

"Get him on his feet and send him on to the citadel," Leon said. "He's no good to us if he's ready to pass out every third step."

"I'll see to it," Percival said. He put an arm around Gwaine's shoulders and pulled the dizzied knight to his feet.

Leon turned back to Lancelot. "Got your breath back, then?"

Lancelot took a deep breath. His head wasn't spinning anymore, and he didn't feel like he was about to hack up a lung. "Yeah," he said. "I think I'll make it." He took the hand Leon offered, wincing at the ache in his knees.

"Good. The fire's still spreading, though I think it'll be contained by the city wall on the east end. The citadel's less likely to burn, but the stables and the market are all wood, and they'll burn as quickly as the buildings did here." Leon set off at a quick pace, forcing Lancelot to ignore his aches and pains if he wanted to keep up. "Arthur and the rest of the guard were headed toward the market and Ring Street when I saw them last".

"Why Ring Street?"

Leon looked surprised at the question. "That's where the coal stores are. Well, the next street over, anyway. If the fire gets there and ignites all that coal dust…" He shook his head, his expression grim. "They'll be able to hear the blast all the way to Nemeth."

"Are they going to water it all down, then?" Lancelot asked. He vaguely recalled Elyan saying something about the dangers of built-up coal dust, but it seemed like that had been in another lifetime. Something about it exploding, if he remembered it right.

Leon ran a hand through his hair, the sweat and ash molding it into grooves that made him look like a wildman. "Yes, but they'll need as much help as they can get. With that, and with the fire breaks," Leon said.

A contingent of a few dozen city guardsman rushed by. Their presence- their energy- was somehow reassuring. One of them, probably their commander, stopped when he saw Leon. "Sir. Do you need anything?"

"Not right now. What are your orders?"

"The king sent us to help finish evacuating the lower town and create firebreaks where we can, wet down the surrounding buildings, and find survivors if they're there," the commander said. He looked strange without the armor the men of the guard normally wore but then, if they came too near the fire wearing chainmail, they'd be overwhelmed by the deadly heat.

Lancelot shuddered and pushed away the memories of Blackheath that rose, unbidden, in his mind. He'd seen enough deaths from fire last winter. He wasn't in a hurry to see more. "Sir Elyan was directing the forces making the firebreaks down there," Lancelot said. "If he's still there and you think it's clear enough, tell him to head toward Ring Street. He has experience with forges and keeping them from burning."

"Aye, sir," the guard said, giving them a curt nod before Leon gestured for him to go on his way.

They headed for the market as quickly as they could in the chaos, dodging guardsmen as they dispersed to fight the fire, or civilians as they rushed to save their possessions and head for safety. Wherever that was. Lancelot hadn't thought about where they would head. Outside the city to the river, perhaps, or into the citadel itself, with its solid stone walls and the catacombs below.

"Now would be a good time for that rain that was threatening earlier," Lancelot observed as they emerged from a narrow street into the market's open square and were greeted by the fire's dull red light. Maybe it was his imagination, but it seemed to have grown until it was twice the height of the buildings it consumed.

"Do you think Merlin could make it rain?" Leon asked.

"I don't know. I don't know what sort of power that would take, or if Merlin can change the weather at all". Lancelot didn't know what the sorcerer's limits were. He had only ever seen him what Merlin called 'minor' magics, but it all seemed wondrous to Lancelot.

"Well, wishing won't make it rain or bring Merlin here," Leon said. "We have to keep going. Arthur needs us".