III.
The burning sensation on the back of his hand told Mordaunt everything he needed to know. With Assassin gone, the Grail War was over for him. The only thing left was to pack it in and find somewhere safe to heal up his leg. It was in that moment he recalled the priest saying that, in the event of defeat one could find shelter at the church until the Grail War reached its eventual conclusion. "Perhaps I'll take the old man up on his offer." The assassin thought as he started to disassemble his rifle. "Oh, right."
Ali had spent most of his time waiting for an update from Saber. His opponent had fired several more magically-fueled shots in his direction, but even Ali could tell they had been nothing more than test fire, the shooter probing for any weakness or reaction from Ali or his barrier. He had almost settled on trying to actively find his opponent when a gruff, dark voice called out from an unseen location.
"This appears to be over." Mordaunt shouted down to the young mage who only seconds before he had been trying to kill. "Yours won. My Servant is gone, I'm out of options. I'm no fool. I concede."
Ali scoffed, more with disbelief than anger. "You know, it's funny." He shouted up into the night air, not one-hundred percent sure where to direct his voice in particular. "I get the feeling you're telling the truth. Well, au revoir to you then. Well fought my good sir."
"I trust there's no hard feelings?" Mordaunt could sense a slight malicious edge to Ali, and wanted some sort of confirmation the young mage wasn't going to try anything even though he was already beat.
"On the contrary." Ali responded, starting to like the professional air of his opponent more and more. "You have my compliments. There's something about you, something different to your usual mage. I like that."
"Yeah," Mordaunt said quietly to himself as he finished disassembling his rifle. "That's 'cause I'm not like you lot. Don't think like you lot."
Ali waited for a minute to see if the conversation would continue, but was disappointed when the only sounds he heard were the continued rumble and crackling of nearby fires, and the myriad human sounds of panic and chaos.
Saber emerged from the boutique surprised to see his Master looking so calm. "And the Master?" He asked as he approached Ali.
"Nothing to worry about on that end." Ali replied smilingly. "Excellent work my good man. With that little diversion taken care of we can continue onward toward our real objective."
"As you wish, Master." Saber replied dryly. Had Ali been any more invested in the emotions of others, he perhaps would have noticed the slight waver in his Servant's voice, the subtle sense that something was just ever-so-slightly-different.
Louise was beginning to realize that she was going to be able to utilize the bike for only so much longer. The roads were getting tighter and more littered with abandoned or overturned vehicles. Worse still was that other parts of the road and sidewalk were also littered with the dead. Some had been trampled or simply run through and left to bleed out, but other bodies showed signs that, while living, they had been forced to endure far worse. Some appeared as though all the skin had been stripped from their flesh- left pink, bloody, and exposed to the cold night air. Others were burned to cinders, either caught in the fires that had been set to the nearby building, or perhaps intentionally set alight to die in agony.
The fires nearby were also much fiercer and more out of control. Not only did the increasing volume of smoke obscure her vision, giving Louise less time to react, but twice already part of a nearby burning building had broken free and nearly fallen on Louise, and she had both times only just been able to swerve the vehicle out of the way without losing control.
It was just as she was making the resolution to abandon the vehicle when a group of shouts erupted from an alleyway to Louise's left and heralded the collision of a loose brick with the front wheel of the bike, which sent both her and the vehicle tumbling along the road.
Louise was grateful that she had considerably reduced her speed when the incident had occurred, her lowered velocity resulting in the crash being far less damaging for her body. The young mage rolled and hopped to her feet with admirable agility considering her state and the surprising nature of the crash. Louise deployed her mana shield in preparation for the coming combat. She felt as though her mana pool had recovered somewhat faster than she had anticipated. Perhaps the outgoing drain all this time had been greater than she had realized, and its being absent now had helped her more than she expected.
They were emerging from behind the curtain of smoke now, dozens of zealots appearing from behind rubble and from down alleyways, some running at Louise headlong, others clumsily dragging themselves forward, injuries incurred in enacting their bloody work now slowing them down.
Louise burned on the inside just as the inferno raged around her, the climbing flames making it so she did not feel the cold of the frigid winter night. If anything Louise was too hot, her burning blood pumping through her tensed limbs with each strike, sweat flicking from her face with every evasive movement she took. Things were dire and far too much was at stake, it was true, but Louise could feel it again, that thrill of battle that had at times taken over her, and she was happy to let it run rampant now, her exhaustion forgotten in the violent excitement.
Again and again she repelled her attackers, maddened citizens flying away from her like dandelions on a gust of wind, and yet they still came on. Louise knew she had to be getting close to their target, it was the only thing that could explain how much more devoted this particular group was. Though their legs were twisted and broken, or their flesh was rent and bleeding from countless impacts and tumbles, still they came on, seemingly insensible to pain.
Though her feelings still strongly longed for combat, Louise's body was starting to tire. She desperately desired to not kill any of the citizens if she could help it, but their tenacity was wearing her down, and it wouldn't be long before they overtook her.
It was at that moment, as Louise was starting to worry she might have reached her end that the loud neighing of a horse was heard from nearby, the noise of the massive animal drowning out the shouting of the crazed populace. Moments later the metallic scraping of the beast's rapid footfalls on the concrete sounded and the shadow of a mounted soldier burst into view through the obscuring smoke.
"Back you curs!" Rider shouted as he kicked out at the zealots and raised his horse against them, its powerful legs threatening to crush anyone foolish enough to be under it.
"Rider!" Louise called out with relief. She pulsed one more of her assailants away with her mana shield before reaching out to meet Rider's own outstretched hand, the Servant scooping the mage up and onto his mount.
"Funny running into you here." He said with his usual sangfroid. "I hope you don't mind me lending a hand?" Rider drove the horse on, the powerful creature easily forcing the remaining citizens out of its path.
"Not at all." Louise replied, relief audible in her voice. "Sorry I wasn't able to make it to the catacombs to meet you."
"It's fine." Ride replied as he retraced the route he had taken to reach Louise. "It just started to feel like it was taking longer than it should and I got worried. But we'll reach it soon enough."
"No need." Louise replied, her assertion confusing the Servant. "They aren't there."
"What makes you say that?" Rider said skeptical.
"Because the zealots were getting more and more belligerent as I had made my way towards that other neighborhood, and it seems like there are fewer of them the closer we get to the ossuary. Besides," Louise paused.
"Besides?" Rider asked, his interest piqued.
"She wouldn't let herself be beneath anyone during what's supposed to be her big moment of triumph. She'd want to watch from on high as everyone scuttled beneath her. And I can see a, frankly, ridiculously tall tower back in that other area."
"A perfect view, eh?" Rider smiled. He was more and more appreciating just how much Louise was coming into her own.
"Do you sense that, Saber?" Ali asked as the pair continued walking through the burning cityscape.
"Yes. Magic has been thick in the air for some time, but now," Saber calmly sliced the legs from an onrushing zelaot as he spoke. "it stinks of the most vile sorcery."
"Meaning we're close." Ali said as his barrier violently repulsed another attacker, the burst of energy sending them reeling away to collide messily with the side of a nearby building. "And if we're close, then I would bet that this other Master is much like myself and has a taste for a view." Ali's eyes traced the form of the Montparnasse Tower as he spoke, its dark black surface and monolithic shape causing it to stand out from the buildings around it almost as much as its ridiculous height when compared to those same neighbors did. In the wash of raging flames and swirling smoke the tower appeared as the last charred log left standing as a campfire starts to burn itself out, its ebony surface reflecting the growing inferno back in twisted relief.
"Though, despite the height," Ali said with some aversion, "it's a rather hideous thing isn't it?"
It had taken a surprisingly small amount of effort on Maria's part to get Camille back to the hotel room she had been staying in. Usually obstinate and headstrong, which the Juge liked about her, Camille was currently neither of those things, seemingly not even sensible to what was going on around her.
With one heavy, boot-laden foot Maria kicked the door to the extravagant suite open, her arms occupied with holding Camille as she carried the injured mage, and crossed the room to a couch where she deposited the other woman. She spent some time scurrying around the apartment looking for various things Camille might want or need, her mind a flurry of conflicting and contrary priorities as she did so. She was still incredibly worried about Camille despite the impressive qualities of healing magic that had absolutely saved her life, but she was also feeling powerfully stressed by the nature of the correspondence she had received concerning the current state of Paris.
Camille, for her part, simply sat and stared out the window in the direction of the growing flames that rose like a fractured reflection of the cityscape below them. Her one remaining hand clutched instinctively at the corner of a blanket Maria had wrapped around her shoulders, though she wasn't even fully aware that it was there. She raised her other arm to grip at the other corner of the blanket, but it took her several moments to process why she couldn't feel the fabric gripped between her fingers. She turned her gaze from the window to look at the stump where her hand used to be and only then seemed to recall what had happened.
"Oh. Right." Camille mumbled the words almost silently.
"Okay." Maria said, more as a confirmation of her thoughts than to anyone in particular. She appeared from the suite's small kitchenette and placed two glasses, one of water the other of wine, on the table in front of Camille. She also set a bottle of painkillers next to the water. "I don't really know how much something like these'll help with something that extreme but... doesn't it even hurt?"
Camille looked up, her eyes clouded over and her gaze faraway, only just then fully perceiving that Maria was both nearby and addressing her. "Hmm?"
Maria dropped down on her knees and wrapped her arms around Camille, pulling the mage tightly to her. "Don't look at me like that. Where's that pushy bitch I fell for?" Maria pulled back and held her face only a few inches from Camille's. "I'll be back soon. The shitty part of being a public servant is that I have to go out and help during whatever the hell is going on out there right now. Look-"
"I'll be fine, Maria." Camille's words were flat and emotionless, the complete lack of conviction hardly reassuring the Juge. "I have no more part to play. There's no more reason for me to do anything." She could feel some feeling coming back as she spoke, but she could feel that it was the sort that was usually accompanied by tears and she didn't want Maria to see her like that. Not right now.
"I'll be right back." Maria said before planting a quick kiss on Camille's head. She walked towards the door and took one last look before leaving. Camille had already turned her gaze back towards the window, and the firestorm outside.