Miracle of Zero: Kingdom of the Forsaken
By: James D. Fawkes
Chapter X: A Momentary Rest
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
BANG!
Shirou jerked awake in a flash, disoriented, and the remnants of his dream (blonde hair, green eyes — it had been a while since he'd dreamed of Saber) had barely faded from his eyes before he had thrown himself from his bed and to his feet and reached for Derf.
But his hand had only just curled around the white-wrapped hilt ("Whazzat? What's going on, Partner?") when his brain registered the scene in front of him and the white-hot surge of adrenaline pumping through his veins began to die down.
Louise was sitting on her bed in her nightgown. In one hand, she held a long, thin stick made of wood from a willow tree — her wand. The other hand was splayed over the pages of the Founder's Prayer Book, which lay open across her thighs, with the Wind and Water Rubies sitting atop the faded paper. Across the room, she'd set up her vanity with little bits and pieces of old furniture that she'd salvaged from unused rooms and storage closets that had been long forgotten by the rest of the Academy.
Shirou sighed and dropped unceremoniously back down onto his mattress.
"Again?"
Louise flushed, but didn't say anything.
A little over a week had passed since the farce that Stanton had tried to pass off as a trial. Since arriving back at the Academy, Shirou and Louise had spent most of that time holed up in her room with not much to do except for practicing the spells in the book from Henrietta (Louise) and sitting helplessly and watching her fail miserably (Shirou).
The only time they ever left was for things like attending classes and taking care of physical needs. They didn't even go to the Alviss Dining Hall to eat — Annabelle, who was filling in for Siesta, brought their meals to them, instead, and they had breakfast, lunch, and dinner in Louise's room on her woefully undersized tea table.
If he were honest, Shirou would actually have liked to get out and stretch his legs, but Louise refused to go out more than necessary, and Shirou was not ignorant enough not to understand why. Most people in her kind of position wouldn't want to go out, either.
Within a day of them returning to the Academy, word of what had happened had spread like wildfire, and Shirou thought it was rather depressing just how unsurprised he was over her classmates' reactions. Pointed fingers, strange looks, stares, too-loud whispers whenever they walked the halls or sat in on her classes — it was the negative attention that came with all the wrong kinds of fame, as Shirou knew all too well.
To begin with, you couldn't charge into a battlefield, save the lives of the combatants, and then walk off without a word and not attract all sorts of theories about your personality and motivations.
Not even once retreating, not even once being understood.
In the end, even though Shirou's destination was different, his path was not that dissimilar from the one Archer, the hero Emiya, had taken — in the first place, they were the same person, and there were only so many twists and turns they could each take on that path without betraying who they were at their cores. Though Shirou had the power to do things Archer had never been capable of, it only meant that he was able to save some of the lives Archer could not.
But Louise was not used to all of that attention. She wasn't used to the sorts of rumors being swapped about when they thought she wasn't looking or couldn't hear them — that she hadn't actually been arrested, but rather suspended for failing to cast magic properly (one that was, for Louise, distressingly popular; it seemed like she wouldn't be escaping "Zero" quite so easily), or that someone had tried to make a political move and had it backfire (which was somewhat true).
The ones that got the closest were those who remembered just how easily Shirou had tossed Guiche around in that duel almost a month back, and they thought that Louise had commanded him to blast apart Mott's mansion brick by brick with his bare hands — more accurate than the others, but still not quite true.
The rumor that bothered Louise the most, however, was the one that Shirou was almost positive had been started by Duke Stanton somehow: that Louise had bought a Fire Stone, which Louise had later explained to Shirou was a very powerful bomb (this world's nuclear warhead, as it were), and set it off in Mott's mansion, and she'd been called in to answer for it, but her family's influence had gotten her off the hook.
They'd nearly had to replace her vanity after she'd heard that rumor.
As far as Shirou knew, Kirche and Guiche had also taken to hiding out from their classmates since arriving back at the Academy; apparently, as the only witnesses to what had actually happened, everyone wanted to hear from them. They might have enjoyed the attention for all of about ten minutes, but since then, they seemed to be locking themselves in their rooms to escape the gossipmongers who wanted to know every little detail.
That, and (Guiche had admitted to Shirou one morning) Agnés had threatened them with dismemberment if they told anyone what had actually happened. Apparently, when she was serious, she was scary enough to get even an unruly girl like Kirche to obey.
Regardless, the majority of the last week had been spent in Louise's room with the door locked and the windows closed so that they wouldn't be bothered by nagging gossipers who wanted to hear all about the sordid affair (especially after that one girl had tried to wheedle it out of Louise while levitating outside of her window). And, with nothing else to do, Louise had been practicing her magic by trying to cast spells out of the Founder's Prayer Book.
And failing.
Miserably.
"I'll restate my opinion," Shirou began, "that it'd probably be a better idea to do this outside, where you're less likely to do some serious damage —"
Her vanity wobbled, then collapsed to the floor with a great, loud crash when the legs snapped from the abuse that'd been heaped on them by all of the explosions.
"— or destroy something you'd rather not."
Louise flushed an even brighter shade of red and looked away, refusing to meet his eyes, but still didn't say anything. Shirou sighed again.
"I'll fix it," he promised for the third time in as many days.
"Thank you," she mumbled miserably.
He set Derf down, propped up against the wall as he'd been before, then walked over to the battered vanity and started to carefully pick apart the pieces — by now, he could probably repair the thing in his sleep, that was how well he'd gotten to know its structure, but it was better to be cautious with things like this rather than just bulldozing through. That was the way magic was, too; put too much Prana in when you're reinforcing something, and it'll just break, so you have to be careful and find out the limitations before you can start taking shortcuts.
"Ya know, girly —" Derf gave a huge yawn; Shirou wasn't sure whether or not it was fake — "ya need ta figure out what's too much and what's not enough, first. Aimin' yer spells and all o' that stuff comes later. If ya don't know how much energy ya should be puttin' into yer spells, then they'll just keep blowin' up in yer face."
"I'd like to see you try and rediscover a magic that hasn't been taught in over a thousand years," Louise muttered rebelliously.
Shirou shook his head, but didn't turn to look at her. "No, Derf's right."
Derf chuckled.
"Shirou!" Louise sounded betrayed.
"Some magic," Shirou explained, "only gets more powerful the more energy you feed into it. The more energy you use to cast it, the more dramatic its effects get, so having a lot of energy is a huge boon for that sort of thing, even more so if you're doing magic that requires a lot of magical energy to begin with."
Like Rin's Gandr, ordinarily a simple curse, which she could overcharge and turn into the more powerful Fin Shot that was even capable of physical interference, or on the other end, a Grand Ritual, something that normally required a whole team of magi in order to complete. There were all sorts of magic where simply having a lot of magical energy meant you could do things the ordinary mages would either be incapable of or require assistance to complete.
"On the other hand," Shirou went on, "there are some types of magic that require precise control rather than just shoving as much magical energy as you can into it. If you use too much, then the spell will just fail and explode in your face — if you're lucky. If you're not, then it'll kill you outright."
Like reinforcement, where the slightest bit too much magical energy would cause whatever you were reinforcing to simply break, and if you put too little, you got substandard results. The principle was virtually identical with Broken Phantasms, but those, at least, managed to hold themselves together until they hit something and exploded. That was part of what made them so useful — there wasn't a point to a Broken Phantasm if it just blew up in your hand and took a few of your fingers with it.
Either way, there was a reason why the first thing Rin had tried to teach him was to never do magic that was above his level.
"I…guess that makes sense," Louise mumbled.
"Course it does," Derf added in. "It's like with anythin' ya go about doin'. If ya want ta make a fire, ya gotta have enough to burn, dontcha? But if yeh've got too much wood on the fire, it might get outta control. It's the same principle with magic. Too much o' your Willpower, and it might blow up, but not enough, and ya might not get anythin' at all."
"What the mages of my world call Prana," Shirou said, "or magical energy. From what I can tell, it's the same thing as your Willpower."
He shook his head and stood, then rapped the top of the vanity as gently as he could with his knuckles. It held strong — which meant it would probably survive another day of Louise casting spells at it before it needed repairing again.
"Anyway. Before you start worrying about applying this magic of yours, the first thing you should do is figure out how to measure what's too much and what's not enough."
He turned around to look at her, and she looked back — the Founder's Prayer Book in her lap lay forgotten.
"There are probably a dozen or so different exercises magi teach their kids to help them learn how to measure the use Prana," Shirou said. He saw something like hope lift inside of Louise and stretch across her face, like a balloon was swelling inside of her chest. "Unfortunately, I don't know any of them — my old man wasn't exactly conventional, and by the time I had a proper teacher, those sorts of lessons were unnecessary…"
He ignored the sharp, fleeting pang that accompanied the memory of Rin teaching him and focused instead on Louise, whose shoulders began to droop again. And it was true enough — there was no doubt that magi families had practices and exercises to help teach their heirs how to regulate the flow of Prana, it was just that Shirou had never been privy to any of them. His education had been pretty haphazard before Rin.
That didn't mean that he hadn't learned it on his own. Obviously, or else he would have never gotten anywhere with magecraft in the first place.
"But I guess there is a way for you to learn," Shirou added. He watched the hope rise in her face again. "I could teach you Reinforcement."
"Reinforcement?" Louise asked eagerly.
"Finding, assessing, and filling in the imperfections in an object by injecting Prana." He offered her a bit of a smirk. "You could call it one of the things I'm good at, actually."
She leaned forward and shoved the Founder's Prayer Book off to the side.
"Could you…show me?"
Instead of answering, Shirou picked up a sliver of wood about as thick as the average arrow — a remnant from one of the old table legs Louise had spent the last week trying to blow up — and held it up for her to see.
"Trace, on."
The hammer in the back of his head cocked and fired. The magic circuits flipped on.
BEGIN SYNCHRONIZATION.
ANALYZING COMPOSITE MATERIALS.
REINFORCING COMPOSITE MATERIALS.
ALL PROCESSES COMPLETE.
"Trace, off."
In just a few moments, the entire process was completed. Absently, Shirou thought that his younger self would have been amazed at just how quick and efficient he'd become at something that had once taken him much, much longer to do, but then, even just by the end of the Grail War, he'd gone so much farther than he'd ever imagined possible.
With the Reinforcement complete, Shirou handed the shard of maple wood over to Louise, who took it curiously and turned it over in her hand several times. The corners of her lips turned down and her brow furrowed.
"It doesn't look any different," she told him.
"Try to break it."
She glanced at him and frowned, but took the piece of wood and grasped it with both hands and tried to snap it with one quick jerk.
It didn't even bend.
"What —?"
She scowled and tried again, twisting the sliver of wood around in her palms over and over and applying pressure from just about every imaginable angle, and when it still didn't break, she gave a growl and brought it down over her knee.
Or she would have, if Shirou hadn't reached out and grabbed her wrist before she could.
"Shirou —"
"Trust me," Shirou cut her off, "if you want to be walking out of this room tomorrow morning, then you shouldn't do that."
Louise huffed. "Fine."
She offered up the sliver of maple, and he let go of her wrist and quickly took it back.
"When you do it right," he explained, holding up the shard, "you can give an ordinary piece of wood a strength resembling that of steel, or you can turn yourself into a professional athlete, or any number of other things like that. On the other hand, when you do it wrong and put too much into it…"
Shirou moved his hand safely away from Louise's face and flooded the piece of wood with Prana, shoving way, way more magical energy into it than was necessary. The maple turned hot in his fingers, so hot that he could feel it through his gloves, then glowed for a brief moment, a fraction of a second, and then…
It exploded.
Louise gave a shriek and flung her hands up to protect her face — but she needn't have bothered, because the moment the shard started to splinter and burst, he clapped his other hand over it. A flash of light and heat erupted between his fingers, then a thin, wispy curl of smoke wafted up and vanished into the air.
"…then it'll just explode in your face."
Derf barked out a rusty laugh over in the corner.
Louise dropped her arms back down to her sides, and, face flushed, she gave him a glare and a scowl. "That wasn't funny, Shirou!"
"I'm not laughing," Shirou said seriously.
"Well, I am," Derf's quillions wiggled. "I thought it was hilarious!"
Shirou directed a quick scowl over at Derf ("Ooh, scary!"), then turned back to Louise.
"In my world," he explained, "the first thing a mage learns from his teacher is this: to be a magus is to walk with death."
He remembered the grim look on Kiritsugu's face, the grave expression as he explained to Shirou what it meant to perform magecraft, to reenact mysteries and inject one's own logic into the world. In some ways, he thought, magi were forced to grow up earlier than other children. But then again, Shirou had already understood the terror and finality of death before Kiritsugu had started to teach him magecraft.
One could not walk through hell and come out the other side unstained.
"At any moment," Shirou continued, "your magecraft might backfire and kill you. At any moment, you might make a mistake and pay with your life. At any moment, you might overreach your own limitations and suffer the rebound. At any moment, any number of things might go wrong, and the resultant backlash means death."
He opened up his hands and showed her the remnants of the maple shard. "The first thing a mage needs to learn is how to use his Prana and how to use it properly. For me, at least, I learned by practicing Reinforcement."
Louise leaned over his palm, looking down at the ashy residue that was even then being purged from his glove, sliding off the sides and to the floor. She reached out with one hand and carefully, hesitantly, she touched it with her fingers, then pulled them back and rolled it experimentally between her index and thumb.
The look on her face as she examined the remnants of the maple shard was strikingly familiar, and Shirou tried not to think too deeply on the fact that he could imagine another girl, only with long, wavy brown hair and bright blue eyes, sitting in front of him instead. Maybe it was just that the memory had resurfaced only a week ago, and maybe he was drawing too many parallels, but either way, he could almost see Rin in Louise's place, hand curled over her mouth and brow furrowed as she puzzled out whatever mystery had attracted her attention.
And maybe, just maybe, it made him miss her just a little bit less.
"Shirou," Louise said quietly at length.
"Yes?"
"Could you…teach me?"
He offered her a little smile. "Of course, Louise."
"Just…one thing, first."
"What is it?"
"What's a professional athlete?"
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
"…assess the structure…find the openings…fill them…with prana…"
"Don't rush it. The better your foundations are, the faster you can master it, and the faster you master it, the quicker you can go through the steps."
Louise said nothing, simply scowled down at the shard of wood in her hand — it was another piece of some furniture that Louise had been practicing her Void magic on, and she had been trying, after failing quite spectacularly on a few other pieces, to perform Reinforcement magecraft on it.
"But I can't even get a good grasp on where the openings are!"
"Nor will you, just yet," Shirou answered her. "I practiced every morning for more than five years, and I still made plenty of mistakes when using it."
Louise hefted out a frustrated grunt. "But I don't have five years!" she said.
"And it shouldn't take you that long," Shirou told her. "I didn't have a proper teacher, remember? Anyway, it shouldn't take you five years, but you're not going to master it in an afternoon, either."
She let out another frustrated grunt.
"I know," she admitted grudgingly. "I just don't want to wait!"
She glanced back down at the wooden shard in her hand, considered it for a moment with a furrowed brow, then tossed it away and flopped down onto her bed. She was so small, Shirou observed, that her dangling feet just barely brushed the floor.
And he was struck, suddenly, by the absurdity of the idea that she was going to fight a war, that she was preparing so that she could go into battle when the time came, and the same steely part of him that had protested leaving the Albionese Royalists to their fate raged against the very idea of letting her anywhere near that kind of fighting —
But Louise was too determined to stop, the fluid and empty logical side reasoned. To keep her safe, he could either lock her in a padded room, surrounded by thick, concrete walls — which would only serve to make her angry — or he could be there to protect her himself when she inevitably charged off.
In the meantime, if he could help her get strong enough to actually fight, then he was certainly going to do so.
"Well," Shirou said, "you've already been practicing for about three hours. Maybe you should take a break."
Her stomach let out gurgle of agreement.
"…and eat breakfast."
"…maybe you're right."
He stood and pushed the chair he'd been sitting on back under Louise's tea table with a twirl and a gentle nudge, then slung Derflinger over his shoulder and made for the door.
"I'll go down to the kitchens and see if I can't get something for you to eat."
He grabbed the doorknob and undid the lock with a click— Louise couldn't perform a locking spell, so they'd had to lock the door manually.
One dainty arm rose up off the bed, index finger extended into the air. "Make sure to get me a strawberry éclair!" she ordered.
Shirou allowed himself a little smile. "Of course, Louise."
His hand twisted and the doorknob turned, then he pulled and the door swung open —
"Eep!"
— and Siesta, hand poised to knock, squeaked and blinked up at Shirou with big, wide eyes.
"What? Who's at the door, Shirou? Is that Annabelle?"
"No, it's Siesta."
"Siesta?!"
"E-excuse me!" Siesta sketched a hasty bow. "U-um, Mister Shirou, M-Miss Louise…but, I just…th-that is, um, I mean…what I'm trying to say is…"
Her mouth screwed up and she hefted a frustrated sigh, head drooping and shoulders sagging.
"I'm sorry," she muttered to the floor, "it's just…with everything that's happened, I don't…"
"It's fine," Shirou reassured her. From the noncommittal grunt Louise gave, she didn't seem to agree.
"I thought you weren't going to be back for another few weeks," Louise said from her bed. For Louise, it was the same as asking if Siesta was okay.
"The healers suggested I should," was Siesta's answer, "but I…I mean, all of the bruises and stuff are gone, right? So there wasn't any reason why I shouldn't return to work, and my family is relying on me to help support them and…"
She faded out again, but Shirou understood what she was saying. He was the same way — as long as all his limbs were attached and he was well enough to fight, nothing could convince him against it, and even sometimes when he wasn't well enough (pain, Gilgamesh, he couldn't move his left arm — ah, that was only natural, because his left arm wasn't attached anymore), he'd fight anyway.
"But that's not why I'm here," she continued. Siesta shook her head. "Um, no, I-I mean, I'm going to get back to work, yes, and, um, I've asked to attend to you specifically, Miss Louise, but what I'm saying is, um —"
"Spit it out!" Louise snapped. Her stomach gave another hungry growl, almost as though it agreed.
Siesta blinked. "O-oh! Um, well, yes. That is, I…I'd like to thank you, Miss Louise and Mister Shirou, for coming to rescue me."
She gave a short but deep bow, but it only served to make Shirou uncomfortable.
"There's no need to thank me," he said a little gruffly.
He could handle appreciation for his food and for small tasks, the sort of small things where people just said "thanks" and moved on, but he'd always had trouble with such sincere and heartfelt gratitude. That kind of gratefulness was…awkward, because why should they be thanking him? He'd only done what had come naturally to him and saved those within his reach.
Since it was something that came naturally to him and since he himself was rewarded simply by saving someone, receiving thanks for it left him feeling like he didn't deserve it.
Rin had called him distorted, once.
"Well, I won't turn her down," Louise piped up. "We went through a lot of trouble because of that whole fiasco!"
"I-I'm sorry to have troubled you."
"Ah, no, that's not…" Shirou couldn't see it from his spot at the door, but he could imagine the bright red that must have been painting Louise's cheeks. "Don't worry about it."
"B-but still!" Siesta persisted. "I want to thank you! So, um, there's an old family artifact passed down from my great-grandfather. I-I want you to have it."
Louise sputtered and shot up from the bed.
"Are you insane?! What kind of idiot gives away a historic family heirloom?!"
"It's not like it's that old!" Siesta insisted. "A-and it's the most valuable thing I can give away! I don't have anything else that I can give you to show my gratitude!"
She flushed suddenly and looked away towards the far wall, fidgeting nervously. "E-except, um, m-my hand."
Shirou grimaced. That sounded rather morbid. "Your hand?"
"She means in marriage, you dolt!" Louise snapped again. "And he refuses, anyway! You're not even a Noble!"
Siesta flinched, but also relaxed a little, and an expression of relief — and disappointment? — crossed her face.
"I'll have to agree with her," Shirou said wryly. "I'm not planning on getting married anytime soon."
Or ever.
"Still!" Siesta insisted again. "You saved me! So please, accept my gratitude and take it!"
She bowed again, her entire body stiff and determined, and though it made him uncomfortable, Shirou had also learned that it was best to just accept when someone tried to reward him. Some people just felt that there was a debt to be filled and couldn't be persuaded otherwise.
Usually, he just left before it became a problem. But at times like this, where that wasn't an option…
Shirou sighed. "What is it?"
"Shirou! You can't just take a family's artifact!"
Shirou neglected to mention that he already had, several times, but that had simply been disarming enemy combatants. A good portion of the artifacts he had collected — minus the stuff he had made himself — had gotten into his vault that way. Spoils of victory, as it were.
But he also remembered the little old woman in India who had handed him an elaborate necklace made of gold and glittering green emeralds and refused to accept it back when he'd tried to return it. He'd later sold it to a museum to help fund his airplane tickets so that he wouldn't be limited just to missions and interventions that the Association "allowed" him to take part in.
"I don't really want to," Shirou agreed. "But Siesta is determined to repay us, and if she wants to do so by giving away her family's artifact, then I will accept it gratefully."
"Shirou!"
He ignored her and turned his attention back to Siesta.
"How long will it take you to retrieve this artifact of yours?"
"O-oh!" Siesta blinked. "Oh, um, I can't. I'm sorry — I mean, it's not something I can move by myself, so…"
She left it hanging. From the bed, Shirou heard a great, big sigh.
"How far away is it?"
"Three days from here, in the village of Tarbes. U-um, there's a temple built around it and everything."
"A temple?!" Louise sputtered. "I thought you said this thing wasn't that valuable!"
"It's not!" Siesta insisted. "Um, I mean, it's pretty famous, yes! But my great-grandfather couldn't get it to work again, so he asked the local mages to put a preservation spell on it. He said it could fly, but most people just think it's a hoax. If we tried to sell it, I don't think anyone would actually buy it."
She fidgeted again. "But, um, it's the only thing I have that I can repay you with. So, I know it might not be much, but I'd like you to have it anyway."
She trailed off again, and a long moment of silence hung in the air. Then, Louise let out another great, big sigh.
"At this rate," she said, "I might as well just buy a pair of horses, so we don't have to keep renting them from the Academy."
Siesta's face lit up like a lightbulb. "You'll come?" she asked eagerly. "Oh, you won't regret it, Miss Louise, I promise! I'm sure my family will be happy to welcome you into Tarbes!"
"Yes, yes, I know. But before we make any plans for leaving," Louise's stomach gave another loud growl, "do you think you could get us some breakfast, first?"
"Oh." Siesta sketched another hasty bow. "Oh, forgive me, Miss Louise! Of course! I'll get on it, right away!"
She spun around and rushed out of the room so quickly, the door almost blew closed in her wake.
On the bed, Louise let out another sigh.
"If something strange happens again, Shirou," she warned, "I'm blaming you."
Shirou chuckled.
"Duly noted."
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
It was about midday when Shirou and Louise had finished packing everything they would need to take on their trip and started to load up their horses (and by the look the one was giving him, they were probably the same horses they had ridden to La Rochelle a few weeks before). Waiting outside the stable with her own horse, Siesta was already packed and watching with a patient sort of anticipation.
"We go to Tarbes, we get this artifact, and then we come right back here," Louise was saying as Shirou secured her pack to her horse's saddle. "No traitors, no Reconquista, no Heroic Spirits."
"Hopefully, it'll be that simple," Shirou mumbled back.
But when had it ever been?
"You'll have to stay for dinner," Siesta chattered excitedly, more to herself than them. "Oh, and meet my family, of course! My parents will want to thank you, and, oh, my brothers and sisters, too! I'm sure they'll all want to meet you!"
Louise groaned, low and under her breath.
"One night," she murmured to Shirou. "We'll stay with her family for one night."
"You don't just want to get in, accept the artifact, and leave?"
Louise huffed and squared her shoulders.
"There's this thing called courtesy," she told him. "I'm a Noble, and even if Siesta's family isn't, it would be rude and unbecoming of me to refuse her hospitality."
"You can't just say, 'thanks, but no thanks?'"
"Of course not!" Louise hissed. "If they open up their home to us, it's only polite to accept! Common courtesy dictates that I must spend at least one night with her family if they offer!"
"— and my mother makes this delicious stew. Oh, and my great-grandfather's favorite noodle dish —"
"Well, if you're sure about it, then I guess I won't object."
"I don't really want to do it, no," Louise admitted. "But I don't want to be rude, either, so…so we're just going to have to stay the night."
"As you say, Louise."
"— and you'll just love it there, I know it!"
Shirou tied the last bag on and gave it a gentle yank — it stayed secured.
"We're ready to go," he announced.
Siesta stopped talking and blinked.
"Oh!" she gave a broad smile. "Then let's go! It's three days to Tarbes, heading in the direction of La Rochelle, so there's not a moment to waste!"
With expert ease, Siesta flung herself up and onto her horse, and next to Shirou, Louise did the same, looking faintly grumpy. Shirou looked at his own horse, which stared back with its beady black eyes and gave him a disgruntled nicker.
"Don't give me that. I'm not any happier about this than you are."
One hoof pawed at the ground, kicking up a few reeds of straw.
"Well, it's not like I could fly to Tarbes. Although it would probably be much more comfortable."
The horse snorted and pulled its lips back into a passable imitation of a sneer, black eyes narrowed at him. Its look said, "If you don't appreciate my help, then get there some other way."
"Sure, I could run to Tarbes, but that'd leave Louise without protection. What happens if one of those Heroic Spirits decides she's too good a target to pass up while I'm gone?"
The horse nickered at him again and tossed its great head to one side, as though to say, "Just get on, already!"
"Love you, too."
He put one foot in the stirrups and swung himself up onto the horse's back, then took hold of the reins and steered it (a little more roughly than was probably necessary) around in the other direction. Both Louise and Siesta were staring — one with a look of faint annoyance, and the other on the verge of giggling.
"What?"
"It's a horse, Shirou," Louise said flatly.
"I think he likes you!" Siesta grinned.
Shirou grunted sardonically. "He'd probably toss me off first chance he got if he thought he'd get away with it."
The beast beneath him gave a snort of agreement, flicking its ears back.
"Well, if you're done talking to him, let's get going," Louise said.
"Right —"
"Leaving without us?"
A gust of wind blasted the ground in front of them, and Sylphid, carrying Kirche, Tabitha, and, as was becoming all too common, Guiche, landed neatly in the courtyard, crooning a hello.
"Zerbst!"
From atop Sylphid's back, Kirche waved. "You didn't think we'd let you go on another adventure without us, did you?"
"I don't know how you managed to convince me to come along," Guiche murmured.
"Treasure, treasure!" said Kirche. "The Dragon's Raiment, remember?"
"Oh. Yeah."
"Zerbst!" Louise sputtered. "How did you…?!"
"Your door was open," Kirche said flippantly. "Actually, I'm sure the whole school probably knows by now. I can't have been the only one who overheard you."
Siesta flushed bright red. Shirou very much wanted to pinch the bridge of his nose — wanted to, but didn't.
After the whole incident with the Princess and Guiche eavesdropping, they really should have learned: every wall in the Academy had ears.
"So naturally, you decided you were going to follow us again."
"Of course!" Kirche chirped. "Anywhere Darling goes, I have to follow! I can't let anyone else win your heart! Plus, well…"
Her smile fell and she glanced back at the school with a grimace, then shrugged. Shirou imagined she was probably thinking of all of the rumors flying around and the nosy classmates who seemed to have nothing better to do than pry.
"It'll be nice to get away from all that attention for a little while."
Louise sighed. The moment her shoulders dropped, Shirou knew she'd caved in.
"Fine," she said wearily. "Fine, you can come with us. Just…try to act more like a Noble, okay? And button up your shirt! I don't want the people of Tarbes to see you and think that all Nobles are as…as…lascivious as you!"
Red, red lips pulled into a broad grin, and Kirche gave a throaty chuckle. "Oh, Vallière, don't you know? You can't tame fire. You'll just get burned."
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
The next two days went mostly as Shirou might have expected — in other words, the only way they could have gone with Kirche and Louise spending that much time in close proximity. Much of those two days, spent on a horse with nothing to do but talk and think, Kirche and Louise got into one argument or another, usually having to do with Kirche's personality and penchant for abrupt, amorous relationships. They even continued on into the night after they set camp, snipping back and forth at one another until they finally wore themselves out and got to sleep.
The second day wasn't any better, only slower and a bit less energetic, because no one had slept too well the previous night.
When they stopped for the night on the second day of their trip, everyone was tired and sore and so lethargic that Shirou wound up taking care of most of the labor — tying the horses down to the nearest thing resembling a post, gathering firewood, setting up the simple canvas tents that would serve as shelter for the night, and, to his delight, the cooking (Siesta tried to insist on doing it herself, but with the way she yawned and blinked at him blearily halfway through the argument, it didn't take much effort to convince her).
Since everyone was so tired, they all ate their supper in silence, offering only mumbled thanks and murmurs of appreciation for his cooking skills. Shirou silently promised himself that he would get back to a proper kitchen as soon as he was feasibly able and polish up on them — since it had been so long since he'd gotten the chance to make a proper meal, he had gotten incredibly rusty, which had been made clear as he was preparing tonight's dinner.
By the time the sun had set and the two moons had risen into the sky, everyone else had gone to bed, muttering "good night" to each other along the way, leaving Shirou alone with Kirche, who was the only other person still up.
But Kirche, who still seemed wide awake to Shirou and in no danger of nodding off anytime soon, did not suddenly pounce on the opportunity presented to her to try and seduce him. Quite the contrary, she was unusually quiet and didn't so much as glance in his direction; she simply stared straight ahead into the campfire, eyes locked on the flames and face expressionless.
It was somewhat unnerving, if Shirou was honest.
But it was also somewhat relieving. Shirou had gotten quite used to her advances and had just grown tired of rebuffing her when she didn't seem to listen, so it was a nice change of pace not to have her throwing herself at him whenever he was within earshot.
"It's not just about the sex, you know," she said suddenly.
Shirou blinked at the non-sequitur.
"What?"
"Don't tell Louise," Kirche added quickly. "It's really too much fun, winding her up like that. Everything's always so serious with her, so someone needs to let out all that tension every now and again, and you're nearly as bad, and Guiche is afraid he'll be pulverized if he goes against anything you say, so it might as well be me. So don't tell Louise I said that."
"I…make no promises," was Shirou's response. He still wasn't quite sure where the conversation was actually headed.
Kirche waved it off with an unbothered gesture of her hand.
"Anyway, it's not just about the sex," she repeated. "Or, well…not entirely. Don't get me wrong, it's really nice when a guy knows just what to do and where to touch, when to speed up, when to slow down, when to slap —"
"I get it," he said, a little more gruffly than he intended.
"Right," she said, unperturbed. "Anyway, it's nice when a guy knows what he's doing and knows how to please me, but it's not just about the sex."
"Then what is it about?"
"Passion," she told him, putting a sultry emphasis on the word. "Finding someone who can…light the fire in me. Someone who makes my skin burn and my blood boil with just a simple word or a feather-light touch. Someone whose voice sets me ablaze at just the right moment, but makes me smolder the rest of the time. Someone who just…ignites me simply by existing."
She gave a shudder and her entire body quivered as her head tilted back, and Shirou was struck by the unbelievable possibility that she might have gotten herself off just by fantasizing about it.
"My whole life is about finding that passion," Kirche said wispily, "finding the person who can make me feel that way. Sex is the closest I've ever gotten to that sort of feeling, but in the end, it's always disappointing, because it doesn't last." She shrugged. "But it's amazing while it does."
At last, she turned to look at him, eyes somewhat glassy from the haze of what he was sure had been a sexual climax, and gave him a smile — a simple upturn of the lips, without any sultry or lascivious undertones.
"I don't know if I'll ever find that person," she admitted, but she didn't sound at all bothered by the thought that she might not. "Until I do, I'll keep chasing after that feeling, pursuing casual relationships with whoever lights a strong enough spark. And Darling…"
Her pupils dilated broadly and a flush crept across her cheeks.
"…the spark you lit is the strongest one I've ever felt."
Shirou, uncomfortable, turned away. "I've already told you that my heart belongs to another."
"I don't steal men who already belong to someone," Kirche denied. "Any woman who can't keep her husband in the first place can't lay any claim. If his heart really belongs to someone else, then he wouldn't look twice at me anyway."
He glanced back over at her; she was hunched over, her elbows wresting on her knees, her hands dangling between her legs, and her bronze skin made almost golden in the flickering firelight.
"You said you already have someone," she went on shrewdly, "but she's not here, is she?"
The memory of Saber as she was just before she vanished, standing atop that hill and haloed in the golden light of the dawn, appeared in his head, her features somewhat blurred from the many years it had been since he'd seen her last. Shirou kept his expression the same and tried not to give anything away, but the way Kirche's lips quirked upwards on the one side told him that he hadn't succeeded.
"I thought so." She leaned backwards, her chest thrust out and her spine bent forwards like a tense bow, and gave him a smile that was part triumphant, part grim, and part something else, though he wasn't sure what. "So, that talking sword of yours must've been telling the truth, then. You're from another world. And so is your lover."
Very deliberately, Shirou did not turn his eyes to glare at Derf, who was huddled silently in his sheath. It wouldn't have changed anything — she already knew, and Shirou didn't have the skill to do something like hypnotize her to forget a memory that was more than a week old.
Besides, Saber had been gone for nearly fifty years, now. If he continued on, if he held that image of her in his heart and in his memories until the day he died, if that wonderful miracle occurred a third time, then he would see her again, wouldn't he? Hadn't he already come to terms with that?
And then, Kirche delivered the final blow.
"She's dead, isn't she?"
This time, Shirou did flinch — not much, just a wince around the eyes and a tightening of his lips, but if the earlier tell was subtle enough that Shirou wasn't sure what had tipped her off, this one might as well have been shouted with a megaphone.
"I thought so," Kirche said a bit smugly. "The passion between two lovers who cherish one another with all their hearts is the sort of thing they write stories and sing songs about — something as measly as a few magic runes and an obligation to Louise wouldn't be enough to keep you here if there was someone for you to go back to."
Shirou flinched again as the image of Rin, broken and bleeding and dead, popped up in his mind's eye. It took a minute to drive that memory back where it belonged.
Saber was gone — had been gone for so long that he could barely remember the shape of her face or the sound of her voice. Ilya had died not long after. Rin, his best friend, who had supported him even in his stupidest moments, had been killed. And Sakura…who even knew if she was still alive, if Zouken's twisted magecraft hadn't done something irreversible or if she hadn't been hunted down in the aftermath of that fight with the Association merely for knowing him?
There was nothing for Shirou to go back to except for his ideals, no one left alive who really understood him — and, in the first place, wasn't this world in need of saving just as much as his own?
"That changes nothing," Shirou responded.
"On the contrary — fire is life is passion. Passion is for the living, Darling; the dead can no longer love."
Not even once retreating,
Not even once being understood.
He was always alone.
Thus, his life has no meaning.
"There will come a time when you find yourself in my place."
His fingers curled into a fist.
"There is no longer any person alive with a claim on your heart," Kirche told him simply. "So I will pursue it, as I pursue the spark that exists between you and I. Age is simply a measure of experience, Darling, so I don't care about yours. The only thing that truly separates us is an old flame — and no flame is meant to burn forever."
But Shirou couldn't listen anymore. He stood suddenly and silently, and without a word, he snatched up Derflinger and slung the sword over his shoulder, then he turned his back on the fire, stepped over the log he'd been sitting on, and made his way towards the tent where he'd be sleeping. There was a shrill ringing in his ears, and he didn't dare to look back, lest he say something out of anger.
"Darling," she called after him.
Shirou stopped. He stopped, and for a moment, he just stood there, his fingers shaking, his chest painfully tight, and hating himself for wondering if maybe she was right. It had been so very long since that time, those two weeks (lived twice) that had been so wonderful and terrible at once. It had been so very long since he'd seen her face, heard her voice, felt the warmth of her skin beneath his fingers.
How much longer would he continue on? How much longer until he saw her again? Pursuing his ideals had carried him this far, but…
But the miracle of meeting her, the miracle of living with her, the miracle that had graced his life an impossible two times. After all these years, could it happen a third time? Could he see her again, one day?
Or was he simply chasing an ever-distant dream?
He'd never let it reach him before, this sort of indecisiveness. He'd always clung to that beautiful vision because it was too beautiful to lose.
"The dead can no longer love," Kirche had said. "No flame is meant to burn forever."
She had struck something, something so deeply buried that it had caught him by surprise when she had unearthed it. A doubt, perhaps, a shadow of a doubt, a shadow of a shadow, something too weak on its own to bother him…
But…
But was it all meaningless? Was it all worthless? Was he hanging onto this belief so desperately, even though it wasn't true? Was it nothing more than a fantasy, crafted around the words from a half-remembered dream?
When the time came, would he even…would Saber still…
"Shirou…I love you."
No. His heart slowed and calmed and his hands steadied. No, that was right. What Kirche spoke of, those were the words of someone young and inexperienced, someone who had never truly loved. She didn't really understand what it meant to be one half of a whole, to be so completely joined with another person that you were empty without her.
Love was not about knowing. The heart did not listen to the brain so easily, was not swayed by logic and reasoning and materialism. To be in love was not to recognize, "I'm the most compatible with this person, therefore we must be in love." It wasn't something you could prove in the thinking or with empirical evidence. That wasn't how it worked.
Love was faith and trust. It was believing in another person, knowing in the heart that you were deeply connected to another person. It was knowing, not through logic and evidence, but through intuition and intimacy, that there was someone who understood you and accepted you as you were, and it was understanding and accepting that person in the same way.
Shirou had faith that at the end of the road, when it was finally time for him to set down his sword and rest, Saber would be there waiting for him.
"You've never been in love, so you don't understand," Shirou said finally, without turning around. "When she left, she took everything of myself with her, and she left everything of herself with me. What you're trying to compete against, Kirche, is not a withering bonfire or an old candle that might be snuffed out at any moment, but the light of the sun itself."
And when he closed his eyes for a moment, he could see her gentle smile, could see her lips curve around her declaration of love as dawn broke on the horizon behind her and illuminated her in golden light. That beautiful dream, that utopia where she had gone to rest, if he searched for it tirelessly, then he could make it there.
"I carry that light within me, every day," he went on. "It can never disappear."
Inside of him, the Image of Victory gleamed, impossibly bright and impossibly flawed, the one sword he could not make. The sheath was gone — had disappeared from him when the Grail was dismantled — but that shining visage of that sword, her sword, could never be taken from him.
"If you chase after me, you'll waste your whole life chasing me. But I suppose it makes me a bit of a hypocrite to tell you not to pursue an impossible dream."
"Darling…"
"Don't chase after me, Kirche. My path is one you can't follow. Fall in love with someone else and achieve happiness."
He left her without another word.
Knowing her, she probably wouldn't listen, and he wouldn't be surprised when she didn't.
After all, he hadn't listened either, back when Archer had told him what fate awaited him at the end of the road.
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
CONTINUE?
[YES/NO]
Tousaka-sensei's Lecture Corner #8
"We're back again!" Ilya crowed. "Time for the next Tousaka-sensei's Lecture Corner! Welcome!"
She thrust her hands into the air towards the banner that had been set up above her. It said, "Tousaka-sensei's Lecture Corner" in bright, bold lettering.
Ilya let her arms drop and leaned towards the camera. "Tousaka-sensei is still feeling under the weather," she whispered conspiratorially, "so Professor Velvet will be joining us again."
"Professor Velvet, huh?" Waver puffed on his cigar. "I think I like that."
"Don't get used to it," Ilya said flatly.
"Ha." Waver blew out some smoke. "I know, I know, this is Tousaka's gig, I'm just standing in for her."
"That's right," Ilya smiled. "At the end of the day, even when you're a total badass, you're still just second best!"
"Heh!" Waver grunted. "I remember when punks like you used to give me respect! Kids these days…"
"Says the middle-aged man who hangs around in his underwear playing video games on his off days," was Ilya's reply.
"And I ain't ashamed," Waver said, taking another puff of his cigar. "You gotta live life by your own rules. Don't let anyone else tell you what kind of person you should be."
"Which is just a justification old men like you use to rationalize behaving like children," Ilya said succinctly. Waver grunted again. "Anyway, today, in celebration of our 10th chapter, we have a special guest!"
"Wait, special guest? I didn't hear anything about a special guest!"
"It was in the department memo sent out a week ago. Didn't you read it? It said that we were inviting a special guest onto the show this chapter."
"Memo? What memo? I didn't get any memo! And for that matter, what kind of idiot would actually accept an invite to guest star on this stupid segment —"
BOOM!
With a crack like thunder, a gigantic bear landed on stage.
"UUUUUUU – LA – LA – LAAH!"
Arms raised, the red fur rippled. White teeth gleamed from between rugged crimson hair, pulled into a broad grin. It was —
"Ack! Wait, that's not a bear! That's —!"
"Iskandar-san!" Ilya waved cheerfully. "Welcome!"
"Ho-ho!" Iskandar grinned. "It's good to be here, Miss Ilya! Say, I thought I heard my vassal's voice, just now."
"Idiot!" Waver punched Iskandar in the arm. "Rider, you idiot!"
But Iskandar just blinked and looked down at him. "Is that you, boy?"
He leaned over, inspecting Waver for a moment, then leaned back and grinned again. "You've gotten taller!" He slapped Waver on the back. "Good on you, boy!"
"Ack!" Waver jerked forwards and nearly swallowed his cigar. "Pah! Watch it, you stupid oaf! And what's with that greeting? All the stuff that's happened since you went and got yourself killed, and that's the first thing you say to me?!"
"Well, sure," Iskandar blinked, scratching at his cheek. "Unless you aren't happy to be taller. Aren't you happy to be taller?"
"Ugh. Just…You know what? Nevermind."
"Anyway," Ilya interjected, "we need to get back on topic! Remember, Professor Velvet? The Grail! The Grail!"
"Right, right." Waver puffed on his cigar. "The Grail."
"Grail, eh?" Iskandar rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Say, boy, this wouldn't happen to be anything like that trinket we fought for in that War, would it?"
"In the broadest sense, it's similar, yeah."
"So it's a wish-granting device!" Iskandar dropped his fist into his open hand. "Ha! Then it could —"
"Idiot!" Waver grunted. "I said, 'in the broadest sense!' If you'd been here last time, you'd already know — the Halkeginia Grail isn't something you fight over!"
Iskandar scratched his head. "It isn't?"
"No!"
"Iskandar-san," Ilya piped up, "the Halkeginia Grail is only meant to summon the mages' familiars. If a Heroic Spirit is summoned, then he gets a flesh-and-blood body and the skill, Incarnation, but it's not a ritual to achieve True Magic or grant a wish."
"I see, I see." Iskandar nodded, then grinned. "So if I'd been summoned by this Grail, then I could have had my wish granted anyway! Ha! Boy, I've decided! I'm going to appear in this story!"
Waver let out an indignant squawk. "That's not up to you!"
"It isn't?"
"No! It's not!"
"But why not?"
"Because you're not writing this story! Idiot!"
"So I've just got to talk to this author guy, then. Ha! Maybe he'd like to join me!"
"Idiot! You idiot!"
"Anyway," Ilya turned the camera in her direction, "since those two are having a lovers' spat, I guess it's up to me to finish up with the Grail lecture. Right. Last time, we talked about limitations, so this time, we're going to talk about history."
She stuck her finger up in the air and rest one hand on her hip, and she grinned. "I learned this pose from Rin!"
She cleared her throat.
"So the Halkeginia Grail wasn't actually Old Man Brimir's idea. As I'm sure most of you have already figured out, it was originally conceived by that infamous troll, Kis —"
"WAIT A MINUTE!"
Waver grabbed the camera and turned it back in his direction. "If I'm gonna be roped into doing this stupid show, then I'm gonna do it, damn it!"
In the background, Iskandar laughed.
Waver coughed into his hand and took another puff on his cigar. "Anyway, the idea for the Halkeginia Grail goes to the Old Man of the Jewels, Zelretch. Old Brimir was his apprentice back in the day — c'mon, who saw that one coming? — which means that all Void Mages are inheritors of the Second True Magic and can use a fraction of its power."
"Which explains the World Door and World Gate spells," Ilya added. "I mean, opening up a pathway between parallel worlds? Anyone who gave it any thought should've realized that!"
"But what does that have to do with this Grail?" Iskandar asked, puzzled.
"I'm getting there!" Waver grunted. Puff. "As I was saying, the Grail was built as a collaboration between Brimir and Zelretch. Though it's designed to handle all kinds of familiars for all kinds of mages, its primary function is actually balancing the inheritance of the Void."
"Like Louise, Joseph, Vittorio, and Tiffania, right?" Ilya asked.
"Exactly," Waver answered. "Everything was set up so that each of the four Brimiric nations would only have access to a specific spell set and was hardwired with a specific Void Familiar. Usually, Void Mages summon regular humans as their familiars, but in the case where something upsets the balance — like, for example, the first Void Mage of the four to summon summons a Heroic Spirit — the Halkeginia Grail will compensate by summoning an appropriate being to each of the other three."
"But if there's one Heroic Spirit in Gallia, one yet unrevealed in Albion, one unrevealed in Romalia, this Shirou guy in Tristain, and that three man team bouncing around, doesn't that make six Heroic Spirits outside of the main character?" Iskandar wondered. He dropped his fist into his hand. "Haha! Someone's summoning Heroic Spirits! That means I could still show up!"
"Wha — I thought you weren't paying attention to the story!"
Iskandar blinked. "I never said that."
"Wha — but you — !"
"Anyway," Iskandar interrupted, "what do I have to do to wind up on this roster, eh? I want to get in on the action! It's a whole new world to conquer!"
"Donate $500 to the author so that he can afford to buy a new laptop," Ilya said simply.
"I can do that!" Iskandar grinned.
"Monthly," Ilya added flatly.
Iskandar didn't falter. "Even then!"
"Do you have it on you?" Ilya asked innocently.
Iskandar looked down at himself, at the breastplate which covered his chest, at the two-layered skirt which covered his thighs with fabric and leather, down to his sandals. He had no pockets, whatsoever.
"Uh…"
"Cash, up front," Ilya declared. "No checks or credit cards."
"I'm good for it!" Iskandar insisted. "I just need to get into the story and start conquering, and I could get it —"
"No IOUs," came the final nail.
Off to the side, Waver grunted. "I'm getting too old for this crazy –BLEEP–."
Tousaka-sensei's Lecture Corner #8: End
— o.0.O.O.0.o —
To be continued
I can practically hear everyone shouting, "YOU'RE LATE. AGAIN." But man, this thing just…fought me, every step of the way. And I've been trying to do a few other things, as well, so a bunch of stuff just got in the way.
Anyway, a few details are going to be retconned — fair warning. I've grown tired of that damn sword and how powerful it is, and I've also looked back at Revenant Sword and cringed at just how little I understood of Fate/Stay Night when I first started writing it, so I've decided to rewrite it with some changed details and a new sword to give Shirou. Don't worry, though, those of you who loved the original story, Fate/Revenant Sword won't be taken down or replaced; I'm going to post the rewrite as a separate story, called Fate/Revenant SSS, but it's really so different from the original (in terms of the plot, even though the beginning starts mostly the same) that saying it's a rewrite isn't entirely accurate. It's more like a Rebuild.
Try to guess what the SSS stands for.
I'm also revising Chapter One of this story and a few of the details in later chapters; I hope that Shirou is a little more…in character, I guess? It's hard to estimate just what Shirou would be like after 50 years of being a hero of justice, without facing the inevitable despair that broke Archer, so I hope this version will be a bit closer.
I know that a lot of people get kinda frustrated when they hear, "I rewrote this part" from a writer, and one of the big complaints I found on BL was that I rewrite stuff too much, so I started out MoZ with the promise, "I'm not going to do much, if any, rewriting this time, I swear." And then, I realized, "Actually, 'rewriting' can also be called 'revision,' and the point of revision is to fine tune the story and your writing, so it's only a good thing." So I'm backing out on that promise — if I think something needs to be revised, then I'll revise it. This story will keep growing until I post the final chapter, so there will be points later on where I think I should have done something differently, and in those cases, I will go back and revise those parts.
That was supposed to be the original point of the review system: to help authors find and learn what they did wrong, and then fix those things. The opinions of a few purists on a forum known for its harshness, rigid adherence to canon, and less than welcoming community shouldn't have ever gotten in the way of that, and I'm a bit ashamed that I ever let them.
Maybe I should also qualify that the only thing that really changes for this story, aside from the "teaching Louise" scene in Chapter 1, is the name of the sword? I haven't revealed what it does, yet (in this story, at least), so I didn't think it made much difference, from a reader's perspective.
Anyway, for those of you who've paid attention to the TLC stuff, you should probably be realizing by now that the "inciting incident," i.e. the event that caused the events of Miracle of Zero to derail from canon, was not the summoning of Shirou by Louise, but the summoning of "Reina Sheffield" by Joseph. And yes, that name is in quotes for a reason; it's [spoilers]'s cover ID in Gallia.
As always, read, review, enjoy.