"You had better appreciate how difficult it was for me to come here, girl," comes the imperious voice. A waterfall of silver hair down her back, bloody, gem-bright eyes sharp against a snow-white face, a well-ruffled dress and long, sleek stockings that cut off in a pattern like a crown above her knees—you've never seen her before, not once in your whole life, and yet you know her like the stars know heaven. "Those nuisances could potentially ruin everything while I'm gone."

Meltryllis relaxes, just a little: the impossible ocean churning beneath the stumps of her thighs no longer hisses with foam and the sea-salt snap of her mana softens to a cool breeze. You, of course, are far less reserved, for which you'll blame the hour and absolutely nothing else; jumping off the bed, you throw yourself at the woman, hugging her as tight as you can with only one arm. She's soft the way roses are—a pretty way to hide the thorns.

"Ishtar!" You lift your face to look at her—she's tall like this, almost as eerie as seeing her feet touch the ground—and smile. "What are you doing here?"

She doesn't hug you back at first. There's a strange tenseness to her shoulders, like a knight halfway to the deathblow and still wondering if they will strike or be struck. A curl of water, smooth and slow, slips across your bare ankle but moves no further.

But in the end Ishtar breathes out, low and heavy, and doesn't shove you off. Your smile widens until it's a grin, wry and wild—and then she rests a knife-thin finger under your jaw, right on the artery and tilts your head further back until your eyes meet. Hers are the red of racing hearts, of flushed cheeks and bitten lips and fresh scratches down a lover's arms. "I came for you, fool."

BAHBABOBO—

—you snap entropy through your veins and it swallows the shallow weakness of your flesh beneath the star-dark at the end of the world.

"Ishtar," you say mildly, hand dropping from the embroidered elegance of her dress to hang by your side as you take a single step back, "I'm married."

"Ah," she says softly, glancing between you and Meltryllis. You're not sure what she's seeing, only that she seems satisfied by it; her mouth curls into a sumptuous grin. "So you are. Such arrogance! To bind your heart to another without begging for the blessing of your goddess. You should kneel and grovel for my forgiveness."

"I probably should," you say, quite truthfully. To have strewn your dress with the flowers of Avalon and Kur, the glittering gems of Babylon and Bishamonten, and dance across the sky with only Manna beneath your feet—oh, the spectacle that could have been. You'd always wanted your wedding to be big. Loud and lively and laughing. "But I have a feeling that I wouldn't have been able to marry Meltryllis at all if somebody had discovered part of the wedding involved traditional ceremonies entreating Ishtar to bless the proceedings. There are those who take a… dim view, shall we say, of anything that could be mistaken for trying to summon a Servant happening in my vicinity."

Ishtar hums, sweet as plums. "They fear you."

"I've always wondered why," Meltryllis chimes in, flowing closer across the carpet to rest her arms around your neck. She's a cool press against your back, heavy with affection. "I mean, just look at her! The last time she tried to scare off a seagull from her fish and chips it mistook her for one of its babies and tried to feed her the chip in its beak."

You swat Meltryllis on the thigh and Ishtar laughs. It's pitched lower than you're used to and makes you think of biting into dark chocolate. "I don't think they fear me, not exactly. Not these days. They just get a little nervous at the thought they may have once had reason to."

"So they fear you and they underestimate you." Ishtar sounds proud, her smile slow and sharp like it's being honed across a whetstone. It chases away the shadows that press in from the corners of the room and glitters off the bone-bright walls. "Well done, Ritsuka Coralli. You have learned well of war."

"I suppose it would be rude to refuse praise from a goddess," you say with a wry shrug, bouncing Meltryllis' arms a little as your shoulders move. You don't question how she suddenly knows your surname. "I've had my fill of war, though. These days I just want a perpetually lazy Sunday of a life."

"And yet, here you are." Ishtar studies you for a time and you study her in turn, watching the subtle flick of her blood-and-wine eyes and the easy way she stands so perfectly still, not even the expensive ruffles of her royal-purple dress shaking in the air that shifts and sways around her body. "There is something wrong with this place. You've felt it, haven't you?"

"Like a bone set wrong and itching in the rain," you say. Even the walls are strange in this place. They're too clean. They don't remember the scars. "Is that why you're really here, Ishtar? To set things right?"

It does not for one moment cross your mind that Ishtar could be your enemy, that she could be the one who lured you here with treachery and slow, seeping poison. It's a thought so silly you don't even need to consider it to dismiss it out of hand. You trust her in ways that would be hard to explain to anyone who hasn't hung the fate of the world on the certainty that when you reach out a hand you will already find hers waiting.

"I will accept your apology in advance for suggesting I am a liar," Ishtar says, frowning, exchanging an unreadable glance with Meltryllis over your shoulder. "I am not in this world because of you, but I am in this place because of you. You should understand better than most what it meant that I gave you my hammer, you silly girl: a promise that no matter the time, no matter her face, the goddess Ishtar would want to see you again."

She leans down until your eyes are level, blood to gold, and that single moment, that single gesture—you think Gilgamesh would have a heart attack in shock, to see the Queen of Heaven bowing her head before a mortal.

"I will not tell you why I am walking your Earth, Ritsuka Coralli. It is none of your concern. There are things that I must do and things I must protect. But I will tell you this." Ishtar steps forward and presses a slender finger into your chest. She could kill you like this, faster even than Meltryllis could react, a snap of divinity and a hole in your heart. That's what trust is. The difference between could and would. "Call. When you are cut, when you are bleeding, when you are cold and shaking and the sword is at your throat, call."

A pause, like the space between lightning and thunder.

"Call," Ishtar repeats, her eyes as sharp as stars, "and I will come. No matter where. No matter when. I will come. And my frightful cry will descend from the heavens to devour all who stand before you."

Did—Did she just quote one of her own hymns in order to aggrandise herself? What are you saying. It's Ishtar. Of course she did.

(You mock because it's easier than admitting that you're blushing and hiding your face in Meltryllis' cheek; easier than admitting you're so genuinely touched Ishtar still cares for you that it feels like you might cry.

Meltryllis drops her arms to squeeze you around the waist and you know she gets it too).

"I'll—I'll keep that in mind," you choke out a little wetly. "Hopefully it won't come to that. Not because I don't want to see you again! I just don't want to be half-dead because of it."

"You will not be dead at all if I have anything to do with it," Ishtar and Meltryllis say at the same time before staring at each other and laughing: Meltryllis high, Ishtar low, the same sound an octave apart. Eventually, the latter continues. "I have little interest in repeating the Descent a third time. Though I suppose it would be better that you fell to my sister than any other of those grasping, greedy malcontents."

Less than a day back at Chaldea and you've already got goddesses quibbling about the fate of your immortal soul. Maybe this place isn't so different after all.

(Like all the lies you tell yourself, it's a lovely one).

You brush your hand over the delicate embroidery that decorates your gauzy sleeping pants, dozens on dozens of flowers carefully stitched in bright yellow thread. Oh, how soft; oh, how lovely. Like conversations under the Moon, like the fresh blush of friendship, like how the light gets in. You don't remember packing these. You're quite sure you know who did.

Meltryllis toys with your hair, ruddy strands coiling around her fingers—a testament to the perfection of her control that though those fingers are spun from a raging, coiling storm of water you can hear hissing against your ear, you are not even damp. You press yourself a little closer. And yawn, so hard your jaw cracks. Whoops.

"Though I am impressed at how quickly you have tired out my wife, Ishtar," Meltryllis says, just shy of teasing, "we should bring this affair to a close. The morning will be a—well, it will be long, I imagine."

"Such are the frailties of the human form," Ishtar says, her voice that strange edge between fondness and condescension, low and rich and tangling itself deep in your gut.

You roll your eyes but still step forward to hug her again—this time she accepts you without reservation, leaning down to press her lips to the crown of your head in something resembling a benediction. For a moment she just holds you, the sleeves of her dress soft against your waist, and you forget that this is not your room, that this is not your Chaldea, that this is not ten years past and lived and loved and lost, that you are not a fresh-faced child standing star-struck beneath the Sumerian sun.

Perhaps Ishtar forgets it too; her eyes are dark with something you cannot name when you drift away back into the circle of Meltryllis' arms, and the air around her tastes like the sweet melancholy of the moments before rain. But it's gone as quick as it appears and when you breathe again it's nothing but rich roses and the warmth of a clear sky.

"Be well, Ritsuka Coralli," she says, all pale, monochrome beauty given flush and fury by an empyrean soul. You would pity the fools who stand against her but you're pretty sure you know who they are and they can take care of themselves. The world is fond of rhymes. "Be well, and remember this: it is never wrong to love."

You blink and she's gone. The room seems darker for it. But that's fine. You can miss the Sun and still be fond of the shade.

"We should sleep, my love," Meltryllis says, kissing the shell of your ear. "The morning is not so far away."

"We should," you agree, your eyes pinching shut as you yawn again, jaw tight. "But that was—unexpected."

It's difficult to properly squeeze your wife's fingers when they're hissing tendrils of the sea spun into human shape, but you do your best and she squeezes back.

"Unexpected, but not surprising."

You tilt your head up and back to catch a glimpse of her face: the wry twitch of her lips, the haughty amusement of her stare. It's so strange to contrast her to Ishtar. Ishtar, who is beauty seen and lived and loved, who is the aching hammer of the heartbeat and the dry swallow of the throat; Meltryllis, who is breathless fear itching up the spine and low, pooling tension in the belly, who is the cold elegance of steel sharp against the night and the deep, transfixing rush of waves against the rocks. They are the two loveliest women you have ever seen and they look nothing alike at all.

There's a lesson in there somewhere. But you're too tired to wonder what it is.

"Not surprising?" you ask instead, the cool tiles of the plain white floor biting against your bare feet as you move over to the bed. Your left hand sinks a little into the mattress as you push yourself up. Meltryllis follows you, her body ebbing and flowing in a scintillating spray through the air until she reforms next to you, where you've lifted up what part of the thick covers weren't already thrown back. Her legs and fingers are empty spaces now, so you're the one to snap your fingers and shut off the lights as you settle back on the surprisingly plush pillows.

"I was not expecting Ishtar to be the first," Meltryllis says, turning over to watch you, the rolling tresses of her hair falling in front of her eyes. "A goddess is a rare thing even for you, my love. But this is Chaldea, and you were once Ritsuka Fujimaru. No—I was not surprised that a Servant came to visit you here, and I am sure she will be far from the last."

"Are you sure you're not putting me on too high a pedestal?" Your voice comes out rough, burred with sleep. "I'm not much of a Master these days, you know."

A laugh that burrows beneath your skin, warm with affection. "Were you ever?"

Fair enough, all things considered.

You curl into the sleek stretch of her waist and close your eyes.

Sleep comes easily, and dreams not at all.

The morning finds you sitting across from Gray in the cafeteria, munching on an apple-and-cinnamon muffin as she devours what you're pretty sure is her second eggs benedict of the day. It's a hot blast of flavour every time you breathe in, tickling your nose and making you want to sneeze—you've never been that fond of spices, but Gray seems to add them to everything. Sometimes you wonder if she's really English.

You nibble a bit more of your muffin, then plop it down on your ceramic plate, leaning back on the bench as Meltryllis reaches over absently to hold you up. "Did you get any strange visitors in the night, Gray?"

Gray chews for a little bit, then puts her knife and fork down with a frankly Reinesian level of elegance—they make not the slightest clink against the bright metal of the table. She glances between you and Meltryllis, her hood deep enough that you can't quite tell if she's raising an eyebrow. "Reines and I are nothing like the two of you, thank you very much."

"I—I don't know what you're insinuating here," you say, absolutely refusing to blush, "but that's not what I was talking about!"

"Ritsuka," Gray says with an astonishingly innocent smile, "how can you not know what I'm insinuating but also say what I'm insinuating is not what you were talking about?"

"That's not the point here," you stammer out so quickly you almost bite your tongue, glancing in mute helplessness at Meltryllis to come and save you from this cruel and unusual punishment. What did you ever do to Gray to make her betray you like this?! Besides calling her Lady Pendragon. Because that doesn't count. It was too good a chance to waste!

Meltryllis offers you a single, consoling pat on the head. "What my wife is trying to get around to saying is that Ishtar came to visit us last night and we were wondering if you experienced anything similar."

Gray blinks in surprise, green eyes wide. "No, not at all. I only slept for a couple of hours, but if anyone came into my room even Add didn't notice them."

"I thought so," Meltryllis says, idly rubbing a hand against the curve of your spine, slow and soothing. "It was an interesting visit. She wore a different body and she had a different soul. Still unmistakably Ishtar, just… smaller. More than a shadow but less than a ghost. I'm not sure if she was a Servant at all."

You hadn't noticed it in the heat of the moment, fresh with surprise and joy and a soft sort of melancholy, but Meltryllis is right. While Ishtar had commanded the room without thought or effort, well—you remember what it was like the first time you saw her sitting on the throne in her temple. Beauty bled from the cut of her jaw and war hammered itself from the iron bands of her stomach. You'd looked up and it had felt right. As if there could be no other shape to the world than this: her above, and you below.

You'd shaken it off, of course. But the memory of that presence remains and compared to it the Ishtar you met in the night was… not. She was terrible and lovely and the force of her attention had licked down your spine and straight into your gut—and that was all. No wonder Meltryllis had picked it up immediately. Another sign you're out of practice. You'll forgive yourself this one, though. You were understandably distracted.

"She wasn't a Servant," you agree, taking the chance to snatch another bite of your muffin. Mmm. Delicious. "I missed it at the time but—she wasn't. She was just Ishtar. No class, no container, and… well, she didn't even call me Master."

Maybe it's arrogant of you, to think something like that. And yet... no matter the time, no matter her face. Perhaps you have reason to think it. Certainly Meltryllis and Gray agree—they both nod as if that settles it.

"Did she say anything interesting?" Gray asks, before digging back into her breakfast. The terrible temptation of too-rich fat and hollandaise wafts from across the table and you ward it off with another sip of your bitter, nutty coffee. Your mug echoes off the table when you put it back down. "The timing is…"

Gray shrugs, an awkward bop of her surprisingly broad shoulders—she's not wearing her cloak, just a casual grey hoodie with a splash of Chinese characters you can't read on the front, so you can see where the thin fabric strains to contain the taut spring of her torso, the iron-hard flex of her arms in motion. She's still small, barely up to your nose when counting her hair-bun, but she's small the way a machete is, and for much the same purpose.

"It wasn't her," you say, because you know Gray had to ask. "She spoke mostly of… personal things. And promised that if my back was ever against the wall, she would come burning in rage and thunder to defend it."

"I think, perhaps, she was trying to warn us," Meltryllis adds, a thoughtful cast to her features, one hand tapping a rhythm you recognise from somewhere (probably one of her performances) on the table. "Both in the promise and in her parting words."

Gray tilts her head to the side, birdlike in her curiosity. "Oh?"

"Be well, and remember this: it is never wrong to love," you quote; lovely words from a lovely voice that you can't quite mimic, your own softer and always faintly tired, like a worn-down room stacked with old and forgotten toys. "I'm pretty sure it was just a blessing. Nothing complicated."

Even so, the words have settled somewhere deep inside you, somewhere intimate, in the hollows between your bones and skin where your blood lingers like moss upon a grave. You've always been quiet, introspective, all gangly thoughts and awkward silences. As a kid, it made you seem mature; as an adult, it makes you seem patient. Unflappable. But you've never really been that good at putting those thoughts to language, fitting them in the shapes and songs of sentences—and Ishtar has cut right to the core of you, the truth you have always lived by but never known how to say.

Maybe Ishtar thought you needed the reminder. After all, you're visiting Mash right once you've finished breakfast. You don't need it, though. It's not like that. It'll never be like that. But you appreciate the kindness all the same.

"Maybe so," Meltryllis says with a lazy shrug, taking a sip of her tea. "You would know better than I, my love."

You giggle, just a little. That'll be the day.

"What are you doing next, Ritsuka?" Gray asks.

You're silent for a moment, taking a chance to look around the cafeteria instead of answering. It's much the same as it ever was: large, with rows of rectangular tables and benches, the roof and and walls and floor the same off-white as the rest of Chaldea. But the room doesn't hiss with the electricity of a hundred heroes jostling each other for a chance to talk or argue or steal food off each other's plates. The only other people in here this late are a few technicians in their green shirts who occasionally poke a glance at the three of you but don't seem brave enough to strike up a conversation.

"Going to see Mash," you say eventually, Meltryllis' hand soothing between your shoulders. "Are you coming?"

Gray shakes her head. "I shouldn't."

"I don't mind," you say, "really."

"No," she says, a little quieter, "I'll get started on looking into why we triggered Chaldea's automatic defences and why nobody noticed they'd fired. My master always said that if you ever had to attack, you should always have as many angles as possible."

Honestly it sounds more like something Reines would say than Waver, but you'll allow it.

Meltryllis leans over to press a kiss against your cheek before she speaks, her lips gentle and faintly wet. "The sooner the better, then?"

You look mournfully at what remains of your muffin.

Alas.