Of Assassins, Samurai, and Magic

A/N: And the next chapter is up! I've tried to keep everyone as close as possible to their characters in the anime though I'm sure there will be a few OOC moments. Comments and reviews are much appreciated. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: The characters and the worlds I write in do not belong to me. The stories that I write are intended for entertainment purposes. I do not make any money from them.

*** ~ Chapter 16: Meeting with the Empress ~ ***

Jail Scaglietti marched down the hallways of Japan's infamous imperial palace. Before coming here, he had heard many stories about the place. Rumour had it that the palace was haunted by the Empress' predecessor. And that demons took people in the middle of the night as they lay sleeping and helpless. And then there was that one about the Captain of the Samurai, a woman with the most unusual shade of hair. She apparently could topple anything, no matter how big, or how small, with just a look. Nothing but silly gossip Jail knew, but nevertheless, he felt the need for caution was necessary. So he brought a bodyguard along with him.

"The dining hall is this way Scaglietti-sama" the attendant leading him said. The alchemist was rather surprised to learn his guide spoke English. Quite fluently in fact. He had to hand it to the Empress, she knew her stuff. Not that it really mattered. Jail was well versed in languages, Japanese among them. So it wasn't to say he didn't understand what was being said. He just couldn't speak it well.

"Thank you" Jail replied, also in English, and continued to follow the girl.

Jail hadn't paid much heed to the young lady leading them beyond the girl's gift with words. In all honesty, this attendant and all the rest looked the same to him. Their flowy, colourful and extravagant robes covered up everything distinguishable about the people under the garb. And with so many of them flurrying around the palace on this errand and that, Jail stopped trying to tell them apart after confusing his attendant with another for the fifth time in the span of minutes.

Unlike his gracious hosts, Jail wore something of the simpler nature. A white silk long sleeve shirt with tan coloured pants. Over top that was his brown skin trench coat, which went all the way down to his calves. It offered the maximum protection against the elements as well as the explosions that followed from his concoctions gone wrong. Alchemy could be a life threatening profession at times, more so when your experiments tended to explode without a moment's notice.

Brown leather boots adorned his feet, lined with sheepskin to keep him warm and his feet comfortable. The hours upon hours spent on his feet were astronomical. But that was the price to pay for being the best alchemist of his time. The ingredients didn't walk themselves over to the cauldron after all. Brown leather gloves coated his hands, and to complete his outfit, a brown leather belt with numerous pouches wrapped around his waist.

Jail's dark violet shoulder length hair was tied in a low ponytail for aesthetic purposes. Realizing the colour was unusual in this side of the world, he didn't want to scare the locals by appearing crazy or something with billowing wisps of stray hair flying all over the place. He could do little about his amber coloured eyes however, and did his best to appear friendly whenever he saw someone cringe in fear upon sight of them.

Rounding the corner he saw his attendant disappear around, Jail soon found himself on the red carpeted floor on his behind, holding his throbbing nose. A gasp behind him drew his attention upwards, to the thing he'd unknowingly walked into. A rather large thing he noted, now that he looked at it. A significantly humongous thing towering over him menacingly. An armoured hand reached for him.

"My lord!"

The clank of steel upon steel echoed loudly through the hallway. Jail's body guard gritted her teeth in aggravation as the monolith of armor blocked the downward slash with its gauntlet.

"Scaglietti-sama!" the attendant shouted in surprise, well beyond the metal giant down the hallway. The girl rushed back to her fallen guest. "My apologies Scaglietti-sama! I should have warned you the Emperor's armor was being moved today. The storeroom it was in ran a leak and we had to move it as soon as possible."

"The… Emperor's…" Jail gawked. Here he was, on the floor, staring up at the former Emperor's samurai armor. It was a truly magnificent piece of art. Gold lined the edges of the blood red armor. Red silk held the armor bound in place. And Jail could have sworn he saw black plates of onyx woven into the arm guards as well as other places on the suit.

But right now Jail didn't have time to stare at the suit of armor in awe. No. Right now, he was staring at the hollowed eyes behind the demon looking mask which covered the face of the wearer. There were no eyes. Just black pits of nothingness. Jail went pale.

"Again my apologies Scaglietti-sama" the attendant said helping Jail to his feet.

Seeing as the suit of armor was not attacking further, Jail's body guard retracted her blade and sheathed it. She did not move from her spot however, keeping her body between the obviously haunted armor and her master. How did she know it was haunted? She felt no magic coming from the thing. And yet here it was, moving on its own. But as weary as she was, she was not afraid. It was her duty to protect her lord, even with her life when it came to it. Fear had no place in distracting her from her job.

"I-it's quite alright y-young man." Jail could not help stuttering. He swallowed uneasily, his eyes still on the blood coloured armor. "L-l-l-let's continue to the dining hall" he said quickly. "We w-w-w-wouldn't want to keep the E-Empress waiting."

Hastily inching around the giant of metal, Jail quickly followed behind the attendant, shaking. With a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure they were not followed, Jail's eyes widened when he saw the armor reach up with gauntleted arms twist its helmeted head off. Before it did, Jail turned back to stare at the attendant's back, sweat dripping down the side of his face.

"Are you alright milord?" his bodyguard whispered, falling in line with her master.

"F-f-f-fine D-Deed" Jail replied tight lipped. "That was just… unexpected."

Griffith Lowran tugged hard at the helmet on his head. After the fifth tug, he was freed from the contraption and able to breathe again. When Signum requested his help in moving the Emperor's ceremonial armor, he didn't realize he'd have to go this far in doing so. Why, when there were so many attendants roaming the palace, was he the only one stuck with this job? He was an important advisor to the Empress yes, but still. Since when did advisors move armor around the palace weighting more than three grown men?

Griffith sighed and slowly trudged towards the storage room in the west wing, one heavy footstep at a time. Signum demanded efficiency and speed when moving the armor. How he came up with this brilliant idea, that being wearing the armor himself rather than carrying it piece by piece back and forth, he did not know.

It wasn't the greatest of plans as the former Emperor was half a head taller than him. That left Griffith peering out of the thin slit where the mouth was in the face mask. He could barely see a damn thing that way which caused him to walk someone. It must have been a bit shocking to see the old armor moving around by itself. For when he reached to help the man up, he was attacked by-

"Oh gods!" Griffith examined the left gauntlet of the armor. To his horror, he found a sizable scratch where the blade of the sword met the armoured arm. Griffith groaned and hung his head. Signum was going to kill him.

It took Jail a few minutes to shake off his residual tremors. The chance meeting with the haunted armor was a pure fluke he convinced himself. A coincidence. Nothing more. It was probably related to magic somehow. Either that or… Jail swallowed uneasily. Or it was because of a curse. But there were no such things as curses. Those were silly stories told to children to scare them-

An inhuman roar.

Jail wanted to faint. Now, standing in front of the group was a large blue demon wolf. It was the size of a mountain cat at the very least, if not bigger. And it had the largest brown coloured eyes he had ever seen. But that was not what caught Jail's attention. No, it was the unconscious green haired man draped over the creature's back. Deed stiffened next to Jail at the sight, her hands already on the handles of her blades. First the haunted armor and now this? Just what sort of place was this!

Jail's attendant, seemingly used to such things, simply shook her head at the demon wolf. The blue wolf in turn grinned a teethy smile and then darted off down another hallway and around the corner.

"Forgive the intrusion there Scaglietti-sama" the attendant said turning back to her guest. "Normally the palace is not so lively, I assure you. Please follow me, we're almost there."

"R-right…" was all Jail could say.

Nanoha frowned. "You sure he'll be alright. He went really pale."

Aina Triton, the head chef in the imperial palace laughed. "Verossa-san will be just fine" she assured the brunette as he continued to chop some vegetables. "He's always been squeamish around blood and tends to faint at the sight of it." To the chef's right was her assistant chef slicing up some bloody beef.

"If you say so…" Nanoha looked at the door to the kitchen again. A hand on her shoulder drew her attention back.

"Don't worry Nanoha" Fate said smiling. "Zafira-sama will take him to Shamal-sama. He'll be fine."

"Hai!"

"Milord?" Deed glanced at her master in concern. Jail was white, very white since that encounter with the demon wolf. And as much as she hated to admit it openly, Deed was feeling rather uncertain about things herself. Had it not been for the knowledge of her unique talents, she might have turned around right then and there, refusing to take her lord any further, meeting with the Empress or not.

"I'm fine Deed" Jail said shakily. He cleared his throat and straightened out his jacket. He even stood straighter. Jail could not falter now. Not after he'd gotten so far. His goal was in view. He could see it! There were just a few more pieces of the puzzle to acquire and meeting with the Empress was the beginning of it.

"Ah Laguna-san" a melodic voice danced through the air. "Shamal-san was looking for you."

Jail turned to the owner of the voice and found himself entranced by a rather beautiful samurai. One that wore gold plated armor. And had pink hair. Wait. Pink hair? Jail gulped, his amber eyes widening.

"Taichou-sama!" The attendant leading Jail bowed lowly. "It is an honour to be in your presence" the young girl said.

"The Captain of the Samurai" Deed whispered to Jail. Burgundy eyes sized up the woman. Deed noted her a worthy adversary, the aura surrounding the samurai being a very powerful one at that.

"Raise your head Laguna-san" Signum said. "The only one you should be bowing to is the Empress."

The pink haired captain looked to Jail and his bodyguard. "And they are?"

"Scaglietti-sama and his attendant" Laguna replied, still bowing to the samurai. "The Empress' guests."

"Ah yes" Signum said in recognition of the name. Blue eyes narrowed slightly, noting how scrawny and weak the man looked. The woman at his side however was one of great strength.

"I am Signum, Captain of the Samurai and personal body guard to the Empress. An honour to meet with you Scaglietti-sama." Just like Laguna, Signum's English was flawless. She gave the pair a curt bow. Turning her attention back to the attendant, Signum spoke again. "Shamal-san is in the gardens waiting for you. I will take the Empress' guests the remainder of the way."

"Hai!" Laguna said. She turned to Jail and Deed and bowed to them both. "A good day to you Scaglietti-sama. Attendant-sama." And she was off.

Blue eyes turned back to the pair. "If you'll follow me, I shall lead you the rest of the way."

Jail whimpered.

A/N: For those of you wondering why I put Verossa Acous as the fainted chef, I always thought of him to be a rather spoiled rich guy. That's probably not the case, but the way he came across to me in the anime, always in fine white suits, his hair perfectly styled, letting his magic dogs do all the work, I kind of wondered if he actually got himself bloody at all for anything. Lol. He seemed the perfect candidate for being squeamish at the sight of blood. Hehe.

As for Laguna Granscenic as being one of the many less important attendants to the Empress, as I had put Vice as the lieutenant of the samurai in a previous chapter, it seemed to make sense that Laguna was nearby and helping out too.

For those of you unfamiliar with the non-English words, I have translated them below.

Hai = Yes

Taichou = Captain

For an explanation of Japanese honorifics (eg. [name]-sama), please check out: http:/en[dot]wikipedia[dot]org/wiki/Japanese_honorifics