one

The hour had come. Zodiac Rolex paced out the overlapping geometric shapes he had carved into the floor, inspecting each one as carefully for error as closely as he had once scrutinised cadets on line-up. He needn't have worried – each of his lines were perfectly straight, his angles impeccably measured, the overlapping shapes beautiful in their scientific symmetry. Not for the first time, gazing at those marks, Zodiac felt resolve swell behind his ribs. It was an almost physical wave, akin to nausea, almost overwhelming in its totality. He had to do this, he told himself. He had to see this through.

For Martha. For Michael. He fixed his mind on those names, as one attempting meditation might fix their gaze on a candle, and raised his hand, fingers open, his arm deceptively relaxed despite the way that his thoughts churned within. However, it was really just the same thoughts repeated, over and over again. In this abandoned car factory on the outskirts of town, his own mind was his only companion.

For now, of course. Soon he would have his Servant.

This was it. He had to do this. He had to see this through. For Martha. For Michael. For every mage that lived in fear.

"Fill."

For Martha, he thought, and her image filled his mind – a beautiful dark-skinned woman, snowflakes caught in her corkscrew curls and laced through her ink-black lashes, melting slowly. Her eyes had been light brown, a near-gold.

"Fill. Fill."

For Michael, he thought. His daughter had worn her hair in neat braids, tied off at the end with little iron filings twisted around them, and her hands had always been covered in motor oil from helping her father in the garage. "Daddy, show me how," had been almost a catchphrase for her.

"Fill. Fill. Fill." This was it. He had to do this. He had to summon. He had to fight.

He had to win.

With this grim determination, Commander Rolex returned to war. It was as easy as jumping off the bottom step in a staircase.

She had not expected the wind to hit her so. Mina Kobayashi was glad that she had chosen to perform the Summoning Rite in a relatively remote park, where the intense zephyr brought about by the magic might not be so easily detected as unnatural. She could barely see past her hair, whipping about her face, and could barely hear her own voice as she continued speaking the words with a stubborn, steady dedication. Her words were stolen away by the air almost as soon as they had left her throat: "let each be turned over five times! Simply breaking asunder the fulfilled time!" Though the words meant little to her, she had studied them carefully and memorised them precisely, knowing that no aspect of this ritual could possibly be left to chance if she hoped to succeed. Doing it wrong was dangerous, she guessed, but she had not allowed herself to think about it.

Failure was not an option. Not for Mina. "Let silver and steel be the essence!" Silver, she thought. Steel. Those would be her guiding words throughout all of this. She knew that the Grail Wars were dangerous – knew that civilians died in them, sometimes. No wish was worth that, not even the wish that Mina held to her heart so dearly. What was the point of seeking justice, vengeance, catharsis, if she caused some other poor soul's death? She knew it was likely no other mage in the War would be so concerned about the lives of innocents. She had to hope she was awarded a Servant who shared her value for human life. A partner who understood her desire to keep casualties to zero. "Let stone and the archduke of contracts be the foundation!"

The wind tore at her clothes, clawed at her skin. Was it her imagination, or was there something burning intensely at the centre of the summoning circle? Her heart leapt. "Raise a wall!"

This was it. She could see something – someone – taking shape at the centre of the summoning circle.

Had it worked? Was this the beginning of the Holy Grail War?

Was she one step closer to her wish?

"Against the wind!" Mina Kobayashi shouted. "That shall fall!"

Though she had no way of drawing the comparison herself, Clarice Harrison would have no doubt been amused to recognise just how much easier her own Summoning Rite seemed to be progressing. For one, she had taken the time to bind her golden hair back into their idiosyncratic twin tails, so that she would have a clear view of her summoning circle throughout the whole incantation. For another, the wind that had gathered to harken her words as she intoned those ancient, archaic, sacred words was a much more restrained and controlled gale, localised entirely within the boundary marked out in chalk on the floor before her, unable to breach her invisible defences. She watched it as a child might watch a tiger at the zoo, fascinated by the power behind the unnatural force but confident that it would be unable to reach her.

"Close the four cardinal gates," she continued, and watched as her etched sigils flared into life and light in turn. "Come out from the crown." Her voice was perfectly level and controlled. Her focus was complete. She knew that she would have to summon a powerful Servant to do well in this Grail War, which was why she had chosen this place, atop intersecting leylines, but truth be told, she wasn't entirely concerned about summoning the most powerful. This was a new Grail, and a fledgling War. That did not tend to attract top level mages. Her uncle had advised her to wait six years and try for Fuyuki Grail instead, but, well.

That was six years away.

And this was now.

"Rotate the three-branched road reaching the Kingdom."

Her blood-amber eyes were narrowed and focused as the next set of sigils flared into blazing life. Magic in motion, she thought, was truly beautiful.

"I shall declare here." Her voice was almost a monotone. "Your body shall serve under me!"

Water rippled out around Dimitris Speratos's bare feet as he stepped backwards, observing the way that the river rippled before him. He was glad he had gone to the effort of coming out here to a deserted stretch of Long Beach at night, all the better to be close to the water and magnify his magical abilities like sunlight through a concave lens. He was glad that he had taken the time to take off his shoes – all the better to feel the flow of mana around him, to feel the air shift as the Holy Grail took note of his call and began to manifest a heroic spirit in response to his summons. The runes he had etched into the sand might have been more temporary than the paint or chalk or blood ones preferred by other mages, but it felt more like Dimitris, and he thought when it came to something as intrinsic and elemental as a Summoning Ritual, that had to be in his favour.

He focused on his words, and meant sincerely what he said next. "My fate shall be with your sword." He knew that much. He would rely on whatever spirit he managed to bring forth from the nothingness, body and mind, and prayed that they would be up to the task. He knew the classes of Servant he hoped to summon – as he had no artefacts, he had to focus on them carefully, try to manifest them in his mind. "Submit to the beckoning of the Holy Grail." Spoken in his rhythmic Greek accent, it sounded almost seductive, all sibilant and sinuous. He had always had a persuasive way of speaking, Dimitris thought ruefully. It was part of what made him such a good college lecturer. His was the only class in which most students had perfect attendance. "If you will submit to this will," he continued. "And this reason." He took a deep breath, and watched the water churn before him as though there were something underneath thrashing, attempting to escape. "Then answer!"

He almost had to smile.

Surprising no-one, Agravaine Ironheart had opted to perform his Summoning Ritual in a graveyard. He had chosen the oldest section of the oldest cemetery, one of the huge, sprawling ones in Queens, and positioned himself between the tombs of Lupo the Wolf and the poet, Claude MacKay. Both headstones were covered in ivy and climbing moss. He still wasn't entirely sure what he was hoping to draw from the spirits interred there, but could only hope that it bode well for the heroic spirit he intended to summon, and summon soon at that. The ghosts of this place had not objected to his presence when he had first entered this sacred space, but now that he was drawing a Servant out of the ether, a being that ought to have been long dead, sustained by a sort of magic beyond ordinary undead ken, well, they were beginning to get restless.

It would be best not to draw this out any longer. At least the ritual was nearly over - though he could detect no sign of the Avenger he had set his focus and his heart on. He could make do with another Servant, of course, but...

"An oath shall be sworn here." There was a cool sincerity behind his words. Agravaine was no stranger to oaths, and he always tended to keep his. The wind that had risen around him whipped at his coat and lifted his hair into a type of halo around his head. "I shall attain all virtues of all of Heaven."

Holding his right hand aloft, he slowly closed his fingers over his palm, forming a fist, narrowing his eyes. For my family. For our honour. For the Ironheart name.

"Let it be filled. Again. Again..."

"...again. Again." In the abandoned subway tunnel under the city, deep within the bowels of the underground, Esther Tsulukidze's words echoed. Her voice was soft, but it reverberated back to her a thousand thousand times, warm and determined. Her shadow danced on the wall beside her, stretched and contorted into grotesque proportions.

Her eyes, in the dark, looked like little pools of black ink. Her hands, scarlet. She spoke into the dark like she expected it to answer.

"I shall have dominion over all evils of Hell."

In her beautifully furnished apartment on the Upper East Side, Amèlie Appiani-Liguratti was struggling to hold her summoning circle together, was barely managing to contain the flow of mana that had been triggered by the beginning of the ritual. She had studied as much as she could, had followed Monica's advise and tutelage to a precision point, and yet here she was, her bones rattling within her skin, every hair on her head alive like an electrical wire, her internal organs threatening to leap out from within given one half a chance.

She was just glad she had told Francis to stay at his friend's house tonight. She was glad she had not risked having him around for this. A part of her wished she had been sensible enough to take her own advice.

No, she thought, determinedly, no, I have gone through so much - what is this, but a set of words and a set of symbols? I am more than this! I am, I will be, a Master! I will hold, I will control, the Grail! I am more than this!

I am nearly there...!

She steeled herself and continued the chant, with all the refinement and elegance for which she was known. To look at her, you would never have been able to tell that her Magic Circuits were almost frying from the effort of summoning. Her voice shook only slightly as she completed the ritual. "From the Seventh Heaven, attended to by three great words of power!"

Was it just her imagination, or was her blood boiling within?

She had never been more glad to finish a Ritual in her whole life.

"Come forth from the ring of restraint, Protector of the Balance!"

Eight calls.

Eight mages.

Eight answers.

I ask of you: Are you my Master? Are you my Master? Are you my Master?

Are you my Master? Are you my Master?

Tell: Are you my Master? Let me ask: Are you my Master?

Are you my Master?

And just like that, the War had begun.

The Masters

Zodiac Rolex

Clarice Harrison

Mina Kobayashi

Demitris Speratos

Agravaine Ironheart

Esther Tsulukidze

Amèlie Appiani-Liguratti

? ? ? ?

Please, please review and let me know what you think so far! Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you enjoyed.