Chapter Twenty-Four

Tears of the Phoenix

When they returned from their shopping excursion back to the house in Miyama, the futons were just being delivered by several workmen hired by Fujimura. And it seemed that Taiga had decided to come along to observe the proceedings, perhaps on behalf of her grandfather, but more than likely because of her insatiable curiosity.

"Emiya-san!" she called, noticing Kiritsugu's and Shirou's approach in the midst of her working on her kendo on the lawn. After she bowed, her beaming expression found Shirou's wide-eyed one and she immediately gushed: "Oh my gosh! Who's this? He's so adorable! Is this your child then, Emiya-san?" And already she too was glancing between them, searching for a family resemblance.

Shirou naturally shied behind Kiritsugu as much as he could.

Kiritsugu meanwhile felt a painful twinge in his heart, but as usual he kept it hidden. After all, when he'd said, "my child", he'd of course meant Ilya.

Even so, he answered, "Well, he was the only survivor in that great fire in Shinto. I…couldn't just leave him…."

Taiga's jaw dropped. "Really? Oh you poor thing!"

And before anyone could stop her, Taiga, temporarily abandoning her shinai, threw her arms around Shirou despite his efforts at retreat, and hugged him tightly to her. "Don't worry, your big sis's here to look out for you!"

Shirou gave a strangled squeak, but luckily Kiritsugu was already intervening to gently pry her off of Shirou.

"Ah…Taiga-san…" he said, clearing his throat.

Taiga looked up at him, and then seemed to remember herself and withdrew her embrace. Bowing her head to a gasping Shirou clutching at his throat, she said, "Please, forgive me!"

"You're forgiven," Kiritsugu said with a dry chuckle as he lifted Taiga to her feet.

Shirou meanwhile gave Taiga a genuinely annoyed expression and then appealed to Kiritsugu, his golden-brown eyes asking, "Why did you let this strange lady almost choke me?"

But then Kiritsugu's smile seemed to reassure and temper him. "It's all right. Shirou, this is Taiga Fujimura. She's a friend. Taiga-san, this is Shirou."

Taiga grinned as she stood, brushing grass of her the skirt of her uniform. She must've come straight from school. "Hello, Shirou. It's lovely to meet you." She waved, waggling her fingers.

And something flickered in Shirou that told Kiritsugu that something about Taiga warmed him to her, just as Kiritsugu had experienced. The boy's small mouth made an attempt at a kind of half-smile. But he still couldn't seem to find words to speak.

Kiritsugu sighed. "He's having a little trouble…finding the right words…right now," he said.

Taiga guessed correctly at what Kiritsugu was insinuating, and gave Shirou her bright grin again, her hands clasped behind her back. "That's okay, Shirou. You can take your time. I always do." She winked.

Shirou quickly hid his face behind a small fist, as though he was holding back on a laugh that was about to erupt from inside him, and he'd thought better of it for some reason at the last minute.

Kiritsugu laughed again. "You seem to have a way with children, Taiga-san. Have you ever thought about becoming a teacher?"

Taiga glanced up at him, and her smile turned into something inward, as though she were briefly and seriously reflecting on his answer. "Well, I hadn't given it much thought…until recently. But yes. You see…I ran into a couple of very eccentric foreigners the other night and…I began to think…maybe one day…I could teach…like another language, maybe. Maybe English?"

"Is that so? Do you know any English?" Kiritsugu asked as he began moving toward the house so he and Shirou could divest themselves of and put away their shopping.

"No, that's part of the problem I had the other night—Oh, here, let me help you," she offered, holding out her hands for one of the grocery bags.

And even though Kiritsugu rather amusedly suspected that she had only reached for the grocery bag on the pretense of coming across something like a package of cookies, he accepted her assistance appreciatively. "Well…if you want…I'd be happy to teach you."

"Really? You know English?" Taiga's eyes went wide.

"Mm-hm. And German." But that bespoke too much of his time spent with Irisviel, and he shut that door again. It was bad enough that Ilya had been snatched a little further out of his reach than he'd thought.

"German?"

"Yes, but I won't teach you that. Just English. If you'd like."

"Okay."

Taiga seemed to read something in Kiritsugu's hasty retreat from his own mention of German, but she elected not to pry as she did her best navigating the beginnings of a sparsely furnished kitchen that had just had a refrigerator installed that morning while Kiritsugu had been flying in. (Had it really been the same day?) Kiritsugu was already devising a thank-you gift that included a choice bottle of sake to be delivered to Fujimura once all of this was done.

"Are you sure?" Taiga asked after something of an awkward silence passed between them, filled only by the sound of Shirou making his own effort to navigate the kitchen and help put things away. Rather like Kiritsugu, Shirou could only seem to deal with unfamiliar and uncomfortable situations with action. That and he also seemed to harbor a natural impulse towards helpfulness.

"Of course," said Kiritsugu, making an effort to sound cheerful again. "As another way of thanking you and your family for all of your help with everything. And payback for the remedial kendo too," he added, almost teasing.

"Hm." Taiga's smile came back, and seeing that alone had a very uplifting effect. "All right then." And she winked again. "Two dates already, huh? Could it be that that the mysterious man is falling for the young, cute, and forthcoming high school kendo champion?"

Kiritsugu shook his head, but somehow he still could smile. "What a thought, Taiga-san."

The loneliness didn't really creep in until night fell. Shirou had been tucked into his own futon in one room, and Kiritsugu had slid into his own in another, and was left with nothing but his own thoughts and the void of the dark ceiling above. Actually, this was probably his first time sleeping in a proper anything, let alone a bed, since that one he'd woken up in after collapsing in Einzbern Castle. The pressing matters of daily life had kept everything at bay, but now there was nothing to distract him from that yawning emptiness, emphasized by the fact that there was no one there sleeping beside him, as he had grown so used to in the last nine years.

Iri….

Kiritsugu reached up to the darkness, feeling the full weight of the pain in his heart for losing his wife. It would never go away, never leave him be, never stop haunting him. Irisviel had joined all of the other ghosts in his life, but more than that, it seemed she had the most to try and say to him just on the edge of the veil.

And Ilya wasn't even with him, like he had been hoping for all this time. He thought mournfully of her too, of her spending another dark night alone like he was. By now, Elke would have told Acht something incriminating to Kiritsugu's relationship with him, not that it hadn't had its moments of rockiness before. However, he recalled with clarity and dread Jubstacheit's warning about what would happen if Kiritsugu betrayed him.

For he had, technically speaking. But what stirred Kiritsugu's quiet, dark wrath over the matter was that the old idiot didn't appear to be willing to give Kiritsugu the opportunity to explain himself. Which meant his only option was the plan he had laid out in his brief moment of weakness during the War: break in and get Ilya out by force, killing anyone in his way. That was why he couldn't rid himself of his weaponry just yet, though he'd already taken great care to have all of that left with an old contact out in Germany so he wouldn't have to smuggle them next time he left the country, and so that Shirou wouldn't come across them by accident.

The real problem would be the barrier, which had been strangely unwilling to open for him, to the point where his efforts had injured him internally, and forced him to brew a healing concoction before returning to Japan.

The spot on his wrist throbbed again, as though irritated. Kiritsugu examined it in the gloom, his dark eyes almost feral as he worked to concentrate his mana, willing strength back into his Magic Circuits. If he didn't get them back up to full power soon, what chance did he have of successfully breaking down that accursed Bounded Field when he next traveled to Germany to make a second attempt to extract his daughter from the castle?

Then there was Shirou to think about. But he already wondered if he could ask Taiga if she might be willing to watch him while he was gone. After all, she would be on winter break from school soon. On the one hand, he hated the thought of leaving on a "trip" so soon after bringing Shirou to live with him, but his need to rescue his daughter was more than he could bear living with without acting on it for long as well.

And…even with Irisviel dead, gone in every sense of the word, Kiritsugu couldn't help his longing for her back in his life. It was a more intense longing than he had ever experienced before with the loss of a loved one, made worse by the knowledge that in this life, he would never hold her again, never speak with her, never feel her warm presence beside him. On top of that, he missed Ilya with equal fierceness. Both these longings clawed at his insides, as though consuming him from within. If he couldn't get his daughter back, then his soul would surely be devoured along with his sanity and everything else.

It was enough to make him tremble with everything inside him threatening to crumble inward.

Ilya….

When sleep finally did find him, it was far from peaceful. It was full of Irisviel's sad voice calling out to him incoherently, and he still couldn't find her beneath the sinking weight of the water he was drowning in, even as he could feel her tears. He woke again with a gasp and her name on his lips, the sound coming out in an agonized croak. There were tears in his eyes here too, and this time, because he was entirely alone, he no longer held back, and in the dark of the wee hours of the morning, he wept openly for his broken heart, for Irisviel's death, for Ilya waiting for him all alone in that gloomy castle, making every effort not to cry out…so he wouldn't wake up Shirou in the next room.

"So can you look after him?" Kiritsugu asked Taiga as the two them shared a cup of tea at the table they had just brought in that morning.

Shirou looked up at Kiritsugu, blinked between him and Taiga. He still couldn't seem to say a word, it seemed, but so far he had been a prominent helper with everyone else hired by the Fujimuras to make the slowly progressing repairs on the house. In this, Kiritsugu also felt guilt about dropping everything to leave again for Germany so soon. But…he had made the assessment in the moonlight the previous evening, standing out in the little open garden, that his Circuits were primed and ready again, and he was confident that if he went now, he could break through that barrier and leave the rest to his guns to save Ilya.

Taiga still looked a bit thrown at the request, and she glanced between the apprehensive Shirou and the urgent Kiritsugu. "I…well…."

Kiritsugu bowed his head. "Please. I beg of you, please."

Taiga stared at him another moment, and then let out a sigh of resignation, relaxing into a smile. "All right. I can do it, Emiya-san."

It was this alone that gave Kiritsugu the courage to return her smile with gratitude. "Thank you, Taiga-san."

And from there, Kiritsugu left to dig out his laptop and make the flight arrangements as best he could through other of his old contacts, also from his assassination work. Shirou followed him, peeking in on him, but Kiritsugu didn't mind. When the boy inched forward in his stocking feet, as though on the verge of asking him any number of things, Kiritsugu tried to answer all those things as best he could.

"I'll come back, Shirou, I promise."

He tried not to think about how much this mirrored the promise he had made to Ilya before he'd left her.

"There's just something I have to take care of," he went on.

Shirou watched him a moment, and there was something in his eyes, like he was reading his face and trying to get a read on it, so he could commit it to memory perhaps. And then he nodded and padded away out of the room to rejoin Taiga with their tea.

The earliest flight Kiritsugu could manage was the next morning, but that was just as well. He wanted to give Taiga time to prepare. In the meantime, he printed off and gave Taiga a copy of his itinerary, and bid her farewell as she went off to go back home and pack a bag for staying over.

After packing his own bag, Kiritsugu did his best to cheer Shirou up for the remainder of the quiet afternoon. Shirou, who had still not asked for anything like a toy, had taken up the practice of crouching in corners and watching the world go by, or perhaps, if he went outside, he might add the exercise of poking at something with a stick. So Kiritsugu had bought a deck of cards and coaxed him into letting him teach him how to play a few games until dinner.

As ever, Kiritsugu worked with an end goal in mind, though this one was a little more positive: get Shirou to crack a smile. He had almost done when he first met Taiga, but since then, nothing but forlorn absorption of what went on around him, melancholic acceptance. That wasn't what Kiritsugu wanted for him, though he knew the boy was still trying to work something out in his own head after what had happened to him. Even so, if he could make this broken little child happy again, maybe then—

"Oh…I think you've won this one," said Kiritsugu, seeing his defeat for the first time in the seven games they'd played thus far.

Shirou blinked, as though confused, as though unsure of what a person did when they won a game of anything. Kiritsugu felt for a moment that same bittersweet feeling he'd had while he'd been teaching Irisviel how to be a person. Which made him feel all the more bittersweet, now that it seemed he had to teach this boy the same thing.

"Congratulations." Kiritsugu inclined his head. "You've won. And you should be happy, because you earned it. You worked hard for it." That indeed was true. When Shirou had pulled his focus into the game, it was like he changed into someone thoughtful and willing to work through any problem.

Now Shirou watched him, and something flickered in his golden-brown eyes like he understood. And very meekly, he let his mouth spread into a small smile of contentment.

Kiritsugu's own smile widened. "I thought I might find one of those eventually." And he reached out and gently ruffled the boy's red hair.

Though Shirou recoiled initially, he did relax, and gave Kiritsugu an even bigger smile for it. Something warm and golden like light passed between the two of them, and Kiritsugu again felt that same feeling he'd felt as he'd come to love Irisviel, as they had brought Ilya into this world and raised her as best as they could together.

Later that evening after dinner, Kiritsugu came out after his bath wrapped up in a brand new kimono—a black one, the only gesture at the moment it seemed he could make in mourning his wife. He sat on the porch that surveyed the enclosed garden of the house, and looked up at the waning moon, hearing the distant splish of the bath as Shirou finished up.

I wish you could see this moon, Iri. It's not full, but it's still pretty. Can you see it, where you are? Where have you gone...? Will I…be able to find you again…? I want to hope….

He heard soft footsteps at Shirou's approach, wearing his own little kimono.

Again, he looked on the verge of bringing up something, but was timid about taking the next step forward.

Looking over his shoulder at him, Kiritsugu chuckled softy, fondly. He patted the empty space beside him. "Come sit with me, Shirou. You can, if you want to."

Shirou hesitated, and then stepped over to sit beside him, though further away than Kiritsugu had indicated. Still, it was a start.

The two of them sat in silence as they watched the moon through the glass that shut them within to keep out the winter cold. When it got warmer, they'd be able to open up the glass so that they could dangle their legs over the side of the porch, and take in the balmy breezes.

Finally, Kiritsugu said, "I won't be gone long either, Shirou. I want you to know that too."

Shirou looked at him again, and then he looked back up at the moon.

And in a very small voice, that was hoarse from recent lack of use, he said, "Okay…jii-san."

Kiritsugu sucked in his breath, not even registering at first what Shirou had addressed him as, just grateful that at last the boy was speaking. He looked over at Shirou, and Shirou looked at him again, blinking those big, golden-brown eyes.

And then he laughed. "'Old man'? Do I seem old to you?" He asked the question gently, not accusatorily or like he'd been offended. After all, he hadn't.

Shirou nodded. "But…like you know…everything," he clarified.

"Hm." Kiritsugu turned to look at the moon again. "Well, that isn't true. I don't know everything."

Shirou fiddled with his hands. "To me…you do. You have to. You…knew where to find me…so you could…save me." And then, even more quietly: "So…thank you…jii-san."

So he sees me as some kind of old sage?

Kiritsugu gave another dry chuckle. "There's no need to thank me, Shirou. But…I'm glad I could save you."

"Yeah?"

Shirou and Kiritsugu looked at each other again, and Kiritsugu saw in Shirou's golden-brown eyes a kind of renewed life, like the phoenix who rose from the ashes of the Shinto fire. The Grail had destroyed that tiny pocket of humanity in Kiritsugu's attempt to destroy it, before its hole vanished out of sight, as though absorbed by the darkness of the night…but even for the one scarred life that it had left behind as a survivor, there was still hope.

That was indeed a comforting thought.

Back on the cold mountain, Kiritsugu made his way up to the barrier once again, hugging himself against the bitter cold. Even with his coat on, he couldn't seem to shake off the chill, as though the temperature had dropped drastically since his last time coming here. As though Jubstacheit were literally trying to freeze him out.

Hitting the edge of the Bounded Field, he was forced to stop. It was like hitting an invisible wall. But this time, he would not give up until he worked out this barrier the same way as he'd always been able to work out barriers.

He began as usual, putting his hand out to the shell of the Bounded Field, and deconstructing the construct with his usual, unmagelike approach, and for a few moments, a ray of hope shined through him as it seemed everything was going as smooth as it normally did.

That's it… he thought. I'm stronger now, so it's easy….

But then he came to another block in the barrier that he couldn't work out. In fact, it literally punched him in the gut.

That was new.

With a gasp, he sank to his knees, holding his stomach and ready to heave up his insides but for his sheer willpower not to do so. After giving himself a minute to shake it off, he regained his feet and tried again.

Again, and again, and again, that same punch to the gut. And whenever he worked through the pain enough to keep plowing forward, the block was always prepared with the standby reaction of shocking his Magic Circuits. Or maybe it was something else that caused that reaction. Several times he worked at it, several times he endured this painful reaction to his Circuits, and even as he cried out, he kept going.

Then the pain ran through his very heart, like something slicing through it. Giving another hoarse cry, he collapsed again, this time clutching his chest, past caring that he was still getting sucker-punched in the stomach as he did this. He took several shallow gulps of air, the sweat profuse on his brow, his entire body trembling in the way weak bodies do in the aftermath of violent vomiting.

And then he did vomit.

"How pathetic."

As Kiritsugu wiped away the sick from his mouth with the back of his hand, he looked up into the cold, red eyes of Elke.

"Damn you," he snarled. "What do you want now?" He gave her a smile that was at once joyless and savage. "Have you come to taunt me some more? Or maybe you're finally going to stop being an idiot and lift this goddamn barrier and let me see my daughter?"

"Do not be so ridiculous, Kiritsugu Emiya," said Elke. "This, after all, is your punishment for your betrayal. I thought someone as clever as you might have worked that out by now."

"Yes, but you see, that won't stop me trying to get back in. As Ilyasviel's father, I will save her at any cost."

"Even at that of your own life?"

Kiritsugu took another moment to catch his breath, still clutching his throbbing chest. "Yes," he rasped.

"Curious. Because I am given to understand you have already replaced Ilya with another child," Elke said coolly.

There were a million mage methods the Einzberns could have undoubtedly used to learn of Shirou's existence, but Kiritsugu couldn't have cared less about that.

"Bullshit!" he snapped. "No one can replace my daughter! No one can replace another person's existence, let alone their child! Ilyasviel is my daughter! It's bad enough I wasn't even allowed to care for my wife as I'd truly wanted to! If I'd had my way, I'd have taken Irisviel and Ilya out of this godforsaken wasteland years ago!"

"Well, you are correct in the regard that Ilyasviel cannot be replaced, given her unique origins compared to the rest of us, but even so…." Elke sighed and started to turn away. "I grow weary of speaking so inanely with you."

"Get back here, you bitch!"

Kiritsugu whipped out the Thompson Contender, resorting to the hope that if this time, he used his origin rounds, he could tear a hole in the Bounded Field and get in that way.

Unfortunately, the alternative, undesired result occurred, and while the bullet itself was fragged, the magic of it rebounded on Kiritsugu and sent him flying back and slamming into the pine behind him. Sliding to the ground, he heaved and vomited again, and then coughed up far more blood than he had the last time. The snow was painted like an amaryllis blossom.

Even so, when he looked up, sweat pouring down his white face, and saw that Elke had disappeared, the mere fact this legs still worked and his heart still pumped was enough to force him back to his feet and run at the barrier with a savage yell. He beat on it outright, like a wounded beast beating on the bars of its prison cell.

"ACHT! YOU BASTARD! LET ME IN! YOU HAVE NO RIGHT…TO TAKE MY DAUGHTER AWAY FROM ME! NOT NOW…!"

Again he experienced the sensation of being socked in the stomach, and fell back, panting and coughing up more blood, shaking and feeling like an enfeebled old man. Perhaps Shirou's moniker for him was more right than he'd originally thought.

"Shirou…Ilya…damn it…."

Reaching up with a trembling hand, he tried one last time, and the shock sent him falling back, spread-eagle in the snow, gagging on more of his blood.

His wrist skipped over the bit this time where it throbbed, and outright screamed at him, as though scolding him for his efforts.

"God…damn it…."

Now it was all he could do to keep from passing out as the edges of his vision darkened and threatened to consume the whole picture. He even felt part of his soul already rising up, as though preparing to leave his body and float away into the ether, even as he could feel himself still taking in and letting out shallow breath after shallow breath.

He could make out the shape of the looming castle too, and he reached out a hand, his heart reaching with him, if not painfully further.

"Ilya…."

He closed his eyes and let his hand drop, resting just for another minute before gathering what strength he had left to get himself up onto his hands and knees. Wiping away the blood again as before, he did his best to crawl away back down the mountain at a limping pace, like a wounded hound.

Ilya…wait…just a little bit longer…Daddy has to figure this out…he'll come back again…when he can think…when he can get you out…please…I know…I know you must be so tired of waiting…after all…I told you…I'd be back by now….

Again, he prayed beyond anything that his thoughts somehow reached his child, who was no doubt still looking hopefully out of that window, believing that he would come, that he might be late, but he would come, because he'd promised her.

After all, you said you'd punish Daddy severely if he ever broke a promise to you, Kiritsugu thought with a smile so terribly sad that for anyone to have seen it would have been more than painful.

And even as he finally managed to clamber back up onto his feet and continue bipedally with his limp down the wailing mountain, he cried and sobbed like a lost child as he forced to admit defeat a second time, kept going only by the vow that he would return again. Again and again, as many times as it took…for him to reclaim his daughter.

Upon his return to Japan, Kiritsugu arrived at the house in Miyama—the new Emiya residence, as it could also be referred to—to find everyone hired by the Fujimuras in the midst of more renovations.

Wearing the same suit and tie as he'd left in, and stuck in a kind of sober daze from the moment he'd been discharged from the clinic he'd gone to in Frankfurt before leaving Germany to recover from his wounds (as well as metaphorically lick them), he passed through the buzzing activity as though he were a dark phantom, again feeling that isolated sensation of going through the world as one outside of the normal confines of time.

There was an empty chair in the middle of the enclosed garden, and he sank into it gratefully, tenting his fingers in his lap, and for a long while he could only stare off without seeing what was going on in front of him, his mind and his heart focused on nothing but Ilya, and how he kept failing to save her like he'd promised. He was vaguely aware of Taiga going around with her kendo stick, which meant that Shirou was probably occupied with helping to carry more things into the house that didn't include furnishings. He was glad though that no one felt compelled to approach him, but then maybe they could all tell just by looking at him that he needed a minute.

But then…someone approached him anyway. Though it was someone he didn't mind approaching him, somehow.

"Jii-san?"

Shirou stood there, blinking his golden-brown eyes, and he somehow seemed a little older than when Kiritsugu left. But seeing him was enough that he could muster a real smile, if a small one.

"Hello there, Shirou. I came back, just like I said."

"Yeah. I'm glad." Shirou smiled too, and that too was uplifting for Kiritsugu's own dampened spirits.

"Did you enjoy your time with Taiga-san?"

"I guess so. She can't really cook so…she ordered take-away a lot." Then Shirou added, after a moment's childlike thought: "I think I'm going to learn how to cook…so I can do that next time she has to watch me."

Kiritsugu somehow didn't wonder at how Shirou had already figured out that this wouldn't be the last time he'd be left in Taiga's care like this. He sighed, but he kept up his smile, as he reached over and ruffled Shirou's red hair and then stood. "Well, I had best thank her. Want to come with?"

"Uh-huh." And Shirou followed at Kiritsugu's side, as if it were the most natural thing, as they went about looking for Taiga, since she'd somehow disappeared with that tiger-striped shinai of hers.

"Don't worry about it, it was no trouble!" Taiga waved a hand when they'd found her and Kiritsugu gave her his profound thanks. "Shirou's a wonderful little boy, after all. We had fun, I think. And don't even think about paying me!" she added, pointing her shinai at Kiritsugu when he reached for his wallet.

"Taiga-san…."

"No, no, call her Fuji-nee," Shirou whispered, tugging on Kiritsugu's pant leg.

"What?" Kiritsugu blinked confusedly at Shirou.

"She told me I have to call her 'Fuji-nee'." Shirou twiddled his fingers.

Kiritsugu raised an eyebrow at Taiga. "Big sister Fuji, eh?"

"Well, I can't help it if he adores me that much," said Taiga, flipping her pony-tailed hair.

"But what's with the Fuji—?"

"Anyway, if you want to repay me, perhaps we can start on those English lessons, eh, Emiya-san?"

"Ah, very well. But I warn you…you might regret having me as a teacher."

"What, you take no prisoners, or something?" Taiga winked that wink of hers, shouldering her shinai. "Neither do I, Emiya-san."

At this, Kiritsugu couldn't help a sincere, outright laugh, even if it still wasn't very strong. "Very well then. In that case, there's no need to address me so formally from now on."

The color rose in Taiga's cheeks very briefly, and then it seemed she steeled herself, and replied with a grin. "Very well then! In that case, why don't we have that kendo refresher tomorrow? I've got a free day, after all…Kiritsugu-san."

After getting over his initial numbness, now Kiritsugu felt nothing but a restless need to work off his frustration, and what better way to do that than with a kendo lesson? And Taiga, for her part, made sure it was all done right. With the dojo that came with the new Emiya house, it seemed she had the intention of making it a piece of her domain as a kendo champion. She arrived early in the morning and spruced up the place all herself with a sudden burst of energy that contradicted her usually laid-back attitude. So clearly, she could be motivated when the motivation suited her.

She even added her own banners touting philosophical quotes on finding one's inner peace, to complete the scenery. And then of course she insisted on the traditional wear, which found her and Kiritsugu midmorning, sparring with shinai and wearing the required umanori hakama. And for Kiritsugu's part, his muscle memory slipped easily back into the motions of the whole exercise after a couple of spars. Even so, Taiga certainly was living up to her name as the so-called, "Tiger of Fuyuki" quite flawlessly.

Kiritsugu told her such when the two of them took a break to catch their breath, he himself having thrown himself completely into their spars and feeling a satisfying rush of exercise endorphins serving to boost his energy and work himself out of that rut of despair he was dangerously close to digging himself into concerning his second failed attempt to rescue Ilya.

Taiga gave a little bow at the compliment. "Thank you, Kiritsugu-san. Coming from you, I feel somehow particularly proud of myself."

Shirou meanwhile, had been sitting on the sidelines, hugging his knees and watching the spars play out with a clear curiosity.

Noticing this, Taiga invited, "Wanna give it a go, Shirou?"

Kiritsugu wiped the sweat off his brow and smiled Shirou's way. "You can, if you want to, Shirou."

Shirou looked between them and looked at his hands, and then he said, "Can I just…hold the shinai? I wanna know how it feels first."

Kiritsugu handed Shirou his own shinai as Shirou stood to accept it. It was immediately awkward for him to hold it out of its sheer weightiness, at which point Kiritsugu pointed out they should probably fit him with a child-size shinai.

"Yeah, it's pretty heavy," Shirou admitted as Kiritsugu took the shinai back. "But…I think I'd like to give it a try."

"There's always archery too, Shirou," said Taiga, and she mimed shooting an arrow. "Just let it fly, like a bird!"

"Dabbled in that too, have we?" Kiritsugu raised his eyebrows, reassuming his fighting stance as an invitation for he and Taiga to resume.

Taiga accepted by taking up her shinai and copying him. "A bit."

And the two of them both grinned a bit like tigers as they came at each other again, while Shirou watched them both with ever-growing fascination.

That night, it seemed Kiritsugu was too worn out from the activities of the day to bear indulging in weeping again for Irisviel's and Ilya's fates as they stood. Which turned out to be just as well, as this time it was Shirou who was crying out. At the sound, Kiritsugu sat bolt upright, just as he and Irisviel would do when Ilya had had her nightmares about Lord Justeaze.

Sliding open the door that divided their rooms, Kiritsugu found Shirou sat up in his futon, shaking with his white face hidden in his tiny hands. He knelt beside the boy and gently pried those hands away, rubbing them between his large ones in a comforting gesture.

Shirou lifted terrified golden-brown eyes to him. "It was all a dream…" he whimpered.

"What was?" Kiritsugu asked, but he thought he knew. After all, after living with Natalia, he'd gone through a period where he'd had nothing but nightmares about that terrible night that Arimago Island burned. But Natalia hadn't really been the comforting sort.

"I could see them all…everyone crying out as they…died…." Shirou gulped, as though holding back tears. The fact that he was dry-eyed about it at his age was perhaps more disturbing. "And the fire…." And then he covered his mouth, making a sound like he was holding back a sudden urge to vomit.

Kiritsugu was about to run for a bucket when it came out in Shirou's hand, but instead of vomit…it was blood he coughed up. Seeing it, Shirou gave another whimper, shaking even more than before.

But Kiritsugu thought he knew, and he was already going through what herbs he had in the house that would serve as a magical healing countermeasure.

Though Avalon was still inside Shirou's body, the fact that Saber was gone from this plane meant that it would need some assistance from time to time in maintaining its healing power, at least until Shirou didn't need Avalon to heal that particular part of him anymore that was damaged in the fire.

But Kiritsugu trembled at how Shirou seemed like that tiny, dying boy again.

Still, he managed to reassure him.

"It's all right, Shirou. I can help with that."

And he carried Shirou to the main room connected to the kitchen and set him at the table. He helped Shirou wipe away the blood with a wet cloth, and then he went about putting together a medicine similar to what he'd given himself when he'd had to heal himself after his first attempt at rescuing Ilya. Shirou pulled a face when Kiritsugu set the medicine in front of him, and indeed, just the smell of it screamed, "this is medicine and it will be icky".

Kiritsugu however was more than patient. "This is something I created with my magic. Remember, I was telling you about that? Although the proper term is, 'magecraft', but it amounts to the same thing in what you'd imagine."

"So…it's like a…potion?" Shirou cupped the small glass full of the newly made medicine chilled in ice to bring down the temperature faster, being that it was something not to be drunken hot even though brewing it boiling water was required to make it.

Kiritsugu nodded. "Yes, you could call it that."

Shirou took a deep breath, preparing himself for the plunge. "Okay." And with the haste of one trying to get something unpleasant over with as quickly as possible, he threw back the glass and gulped it down as fast as he could before he had to pause for breath, whereupon he gulped down the rest of it just as fast before shoving the glass away and gasping in relief.

"Well, that might have been bad, but at least you feel better, right?"

And indeed, as expected from his own use of healing medicine, Shirou gave a small belch behind his tiny fist, and then, blinking a moment or two, sighed and said, "Yeah. I do feel better. Thank you, jii-san."

Kiritsugu took the empty glass away and washed it out in the sink. "Of course, Shirou."

And though there was a silence after that, before Shirou finally got up and said he felt he could go back to bed then, that silence had been filled with the unspoken affirmation that Shirou knew he could trust Kiritsugu to always do the best he could to take care of him. Even if the boy was too afraid or too reluctant to ask for his help.

I'm sure he feels he doesn't want to be anything like a burden to me…a man who…isn't his real father…after all, Kiritsugu thought soberly as he dried the glass with a dishtowel and put it away. He looked forlornly over his shoulder at the boy's retreating back. Oh Shirou…you couldn't be more wrong…about your being a burden. Not just to me…but to anyone.

Shortly after this incident, Kiritsugu felt guilty again about so soon making another arrangement to try and rescue Ilya again. That and this time he was gone longer, because his doubled efforts to break through Jubstacheit's unyielding barrier caused him double damage to his body. Or was it, quadruple damage? The ratio certainly felt that way, which Kiritsugu couldn't entirely explain.

On instinct, he made a trip to the hospital immediately after returning from Germany, and as it happened, he was seen by a doctor assisted by none other than Akiko Fukui.

"Ah, Emiya-san!" She bowed. "How lovely to see you. At least, I hope you're here on something inconsequential?"

"I do too," Kiritsugu admitted, absently rubbing his throbbing wrist. "But then, this is a hospital."

"Yes, you have a point," Akiko agreed grimly, even as she went on with her hopeful smile.

And indeed, the doctor, a Daisuke Wakahisa, told him after he'd done an analysis of his blood, that he appeared to have minor symptoms similar to that of a patient undergoing radiation therapy for cancer treatment, minus the hair loss or anything outward or obvious.

"You just don't seem as robust as a man your age ought to be," Dr. Wakahisa concluded, looking over the chart. "But I'd like to see you again in a few months' time, just to see if anything changes."

"All right. Thank you, Wakahisa-sensei."

As Kiritsugu left the hospital, his thoughts drifted back ominously to that moment in the Grail, when Angra Mainyu and the Grail cursed him.

Had that been…literal…after all? He did vaguely recall the dark cursed mud of the Grail leaking out of the Irisviel shell's fingernails as they'd dug into his wrist when he'd been choking it.

Shuddering, Kiritsugu shook off that terrible image. He didn't want to remember his wife that way. It was painful for him enough already, with the lonely nights that stretched out before him.

When he arrived back at the Emiya house, he found Taiga in an unusually grim mood as she greeted him at the gate, wearing a sweater and a pair of jeans.

"He started asking me this morning when you were getting back," she said. "And to be fair, you took an awful long while getting back this time, but I didn't know what to tell him, so he got tired of asking me and shut himself inside." She sighed, hands on hips, and she threw a glare at Kiritsugu. "What is it that's abroad that's so important you have to leave like this? I think Shirou's starting to get scared you aren't going to adopt him."

Taiga was certainly raised as a rather brazen child, able to give an adult a reprimanding look like that. But she did have a point.

"I do intend to adopt him…I just…wanted to see if that's what he really wanted," Kiritsugu admitted contritely, though at the same time carefully evading her first question. He ran a tired hand through his dark hair, his heart tearing in two, torn between his need to save Ilya and his need to make sure Shirou wasn't abandoned either. "I suppose I got my answer then. But I wish…he'd said something…I was starting to think…maybe…."

"I don't think he knows how to," said Taiga, more gently, and as peace gesture, she held out a hand to take his travel bag.

Thanking her, Kiritsugu handed it to her to carry inside while he sought out Shirou. He found him where she said he'd be, clammed up in his room, hiding under the blankets of his futon, which he'd presumably pulled out just for that purpose.

"Shirou?"

Slowly, Shirou peeked out from under the blanket, giving Kiritsugu a scowl that clearly said in a contemptible tone: So you're back, huh?

But Kiritsugu was submissive and apologetic. "Want to come for a walk with me?"

After scowling at him a minute more, Shirou nodded.

The two of them went out to the little neighborhood park, and since it was a nice day, there were a lot of people out. Though Shirou walked beside Kiritsugu with his hands stuffed grumpily in his coat pockets, Kiritsugu couldn't help being distracted by the reminders all around him of what he had lost in Irisviel and, quite possibly, Ilya. There were husbands and wives out with their small children, and there was a gathering of housewives who all had children of their own, or were even at varying stages of pregnancy. Everywhere he looked, he saw Irisviel and Ilya in some shape or form, thought back to flashes of moments of Ilya running to her mother in the snow, the two of them laughing.

He didn't realize though that Shirou had started to watch him until his small voice piped up:

"Ah…jii-san…? I…I'm sorry."

Kiritsugu, genuinely surprised, blinked and asked, "Sorry? For what?"

"For…being angry…. I mean…if you want me…to go away…."

The poor little boy sounded on the edge of tears, but he was doing everything in his five-year-old power to hold them back.

"Shirou…."

But then an argument broke out in the middle of the park, one that disturbed the general peace. Looking up, Kiritsugu saw that it was between a husband and his wife who didn't appear to be living the idyllic married life after all.

"Why do you always have to bring this up?!" the husband snapped.

"Why do you always have to shove it under the rug?!" his wife snapped back.

In a bursting fit of his anger, the husband smacked his wife across the jaw, causing several onlookers to gasp and a patrolling policeman to start forward.

But Kiritsugu reached them first. As the man raised a hand to his wife again, Kiritsugu came between them, caught the man's hand as it struck down, and twisted it around so that he had the man with his hand turned painfully behind his back.

"Aggggghhh! What the hell are you doing, asshole?!" the man shouted, but then went deathly still the moment he heard Kiritsugu's dangerously quiet voice in his ear.

"You know, you ought to take better care, if you love your wife. She won't be with you forever. Or maybe you're actually looking forward to the day when she dies?"

"No…I…."

Though Kiritsugu's actions spoke with the mind of the man who was the trained killer, his words spoke with the heart of the husband who would have given anything to have his Irisviel back, even in a situation like this where the two of them were biting each other's heads off over something trivial. There were times where that had happened, and then the two of them had mended things between them, and Kiritsugu remembered being so happy over those moments that it was enough to bring tears to his eyes….

The man swallowed in fear, and the wife pleaded tentatively, "Please let him go…."

Kiritsugu bristled at a hand at his shoulder, but calmed himself when he saw it was just the approaching patrol officer.

"Thank you, but I'll take it from here," he said, genuinely appreciative.

Kiritsugu nodded and stepped away, releasing the husband, who gave him a look of loathing over his shoulder as he rubbed his own from having his arm twisted back so painfully. But Kiritsugu quickly forgot how miffed he was with the husband for laying a hand on his wife when he realized that Shirou seemed to have disappeared from the vicinity.

"Damn it…." He palmed his forehead at his own lack of forethought and went frantically looking for him, searching every tree, every bench.

He was on the edge of reporting him missing when he came across him underneath a small bridge that went over a beautifully carved man-made creek in the middle of the park.

"There you are," he said with a sigh of relief, but his guilt returned when Shirou looked up at him from where he had his face buried in his knees, and the little boy sniffled as tears ran down his cheeks.

Hastily he wiped them away, but he still shook even as he tried to reign in his tiny sobs.

Part of Kiritsugu was relieved though that the boy could still cry. Even so, he knew he was partially the cause of these tears. "Shirou, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you."

Shirou shook his head. "It's okay…."

"No, it's not. I'm…." Kiritsugu heaved another sigh and held out a hand, offering a smile. "If you want…I'd like it…if you'd be willing to call yourself my son. Would that be okay? Can I be your father, Shirou?"

Shirou stared at him, the tears still rolling down his cheeks like drops down a window in the aftermath of rain. And then he sniffed again and said, "Yeah. That'd be okay. You're the only…father I have now…jii-san." He bit his trembling lip, like he were going to start crying again.

But Kiritsugu reached over and laid his hand on his mop of red hair, still smiling for him. "Then let's do this right, eh, Shirou?" And then he reached down and helped Shirou wipe away the rest of his tears, after examining his hands, which appeared to have gotten cut from trying to scramble up a tree, which was why he'd opted for hiding under the bridge instead.

It seemed though that Shirou had seen enough of what had happened to know that Kiritsugu had been stepping in the middle of that husband and wife's argument for a good reason, when Taiga, sharing a cup of tea with them, listened to Shirou prattle on about how Kiritsugu had done that while Kiritsugu patched up Shirou's hands with bandages from the First Aid kit.

Though Taiga too expressed her awe at Kiritsugu's heroics, Kiritsugu was, as usual, humbly quiet, if anything, only saying, "I just couldn't let that go on. That's all."

But he was gladder that there was something like happiness flickering like a flame in Shirou again. Admiration too, but Kiritsugu wasn't as drawn to that. Still there was even a bounce in the boy's step the next day when the two of them went to the government building and at last filled out the paperwork for legally adopting Shirou as Kiritsugu's son.

"Now, you are Emiya Shirou!" Kiritsugu declared, as the two of them walked hand-in-hand out of the building. "That deserves a lot of undue celebrating. Why don't we start with a parfait? Have you ever had one?"

"Um…." Shirou chewed on a fingernail on his free hand. "I don't remember."

"Well, you're going to have one now." And Kiritsugu took him to the nearest Western style café and ordered him said parfait.

Even though the two them didn't say a word while Shirou ate it (Shirou mostly because for most of it his mouth was too full), Kiritsugu was content enough watching him eat it, and he could see that Shirou was happy too with what he had.

Later that night, they had Taiga over and Kiritsugu made a large dinner with Shirou's help, and they all toasted to Shirou's being adopted with a loud, "Kanpai!", though of course only Kiritsugu and Taiga had sake.

But even as Kiritsugu's thoughts briefly and melancholically touched on the memory of when he had had Irisviel try sake and plum wine to comedic effect, there was still a small happiness waiting for him after he took that first sip of that clear, rice wine he and Taiga shared this evening.

"Now, don't tell your grandfather I let you have some," Kiritsugu told her rather playfully.

To which Taiga replied with the blush of oncoming intoxication: "Kiritsugu-san, don't kid! You think my grandfather hasn't already let me have some himself?"

The following day, after spending all night thinking about it and considering the steadily warming temperatures outside, Kiritsugu took Shirou with him to a gardening store, and the two of them returned with a bunch of hanashobu iris bulbs, as well as some mulch and fertilizer and garden trowels.

At the Emiya house, they carried them to the flowering tree at the edge of the enclosed garden, the two of them set to work planting the bulbs in the sun that whispered to them of the promise of a spring that would soon be full of cherry blossoms.

As they were finishing up, Shirou ventured to ask why he'd chosen to plant irises specifically.

Kiritsugu patted the freshly turned soil tenderly, thinking of the bulbs ready to germinate beneath. To speak of his wife and daughter with anyone outside of his previous life was still too difficult. But he managed to admit, in a voice laced with affectionate sadness, "I lost someone…very dear to me. They died. But…there was nothing left to bury…no grave…and I don't even have…any photographs…so…this is all I can do, to build them a shrine to their memory….because their name…was very reminiscent of the English word for these flowers. So…."

Shirou watched him solemnly, and could tell that he could leave it at that.

Meanwhile, the breeze lifted with a hopeful warmth, and Kiritsugu lifted his eyes to the sun, his smile as sad as his voice, as his heart reached out for Irisviel again. "But I want you to know, that I'm very appreciative of your help today, with planting these bulbs, Shirou. I think…this person would be happy to know you helped. So thank you." And he turned his smile on his newly adopted son, and that smile was just a little happier for it.

That was enough to get Shirou to smile back.

So from that day on, every morning found Kiritsugu rising as early as he could muster to tend to these growing blossoms, and pay his respects to Irisviel's memory, as he waited for the day when the irises would bloom, so that when he could finally bring Ilya here, they could be among the first flowers that he would show her.