Part Five: The Grail
by Julia Nolan
     "We’ve reached it!" Niniane said with awe, spying, after days of travel, the cup.
     "This is it?" Zelgadiss said with some disdain.
     "Don’t be fooled by appearances," Niniane said.  "The Christ was a simple carpenter…"
     "But the cup belonged to a rich man, Joseph…"
     Niniane scowled.  "You take all of the fun out of this.  But I’m sure that this is it.  Can you feel the magic emanating from it?  This could be the cure to both of our problems!"
     As Niniane reached for the cup, though, Merlin and Xellos entered, nearly pushing each other out through the doorway to get there first.
     "You profane the Grail with your presence!" Niniane screeched.  "Begone, demons!"
     "Be gone Pagan Goddess," Merlin said calmly.   "You have no more right."
     Niniane scowled.  "The idea came from my people."
     "Now you’re getting petty," Merlin said.  "And the Grail belongs to anyone who can use it.  Can you say as much?"
     "I could," Niniane said, sulking.  "And you know that it belongs to my people."
     "What, again?" asked Zelgadiss.
     "My people are of the Gods," Niniane said proudly.  "God, daemon…"
     "They’re practically the same," Merlin said.
     "They have been destroying my friends…"
     "Sounds like a blood feud," Zelgadiss pointed out bluntly.
     "First Ban…"
     "An idiot," Merlin said.
     "And they tried to kill Igraine…and stole her daughter, Morgan."
     "Morgan came willingly."
     They were interrupted by Rezo, followed by Eris, running through the door.  Merlin and Niniane continued uninterrupted.
     "I had hoped to have you dead, as well, by now," Niniane spat at Merlin.
     "Traitoress!" Eris screeched.
     "She really doesn’t have a clue, does she?" Niniane asked Zelgadiss.
     "She’s sadly deluded," Zelgadiss said.
     "Maybe, if I find time, I could change that…" Niniane said, smiling.
     Zelgadiss shrugged.  "You could try…
     As they stood about, glaring at each other, Morgan and Lina burst in.
     Spying the Grail, Lina screamed, "Treasure!"
     "Keep away from it!" Morgan yelled.  "It’s mine!"
     Margawse and Nagha followed them.
     "No mine!"
     "Mine!"
     "Mine!"
     "You’ll destroy it all with this bickering!" Niniane cried despairingly.
     The chaos became worse, when, to top it all off, Amelia and Guenivere entered the room.  As Amelia climbed on top of a table to jump off of, Guenivere yelled, "Stop, in the name of Justice and the State!  You can’t do this in my kingdom!"
     "Yes," Amelia said, "In the name of Justice, I challenge you!" with that she gave a flying leap off the table and landed on Zelgadiss, knocking him down. Zelgadiss properly blushed.
     As the ruckus became worse, Gawaine and Gourry entered, scratching their heads.
     "What’s going on here?" Gawaine asked Gourry for reasons apparent not even to him.
     "I dunno," Gourry said.  "Hey, Lina!"
     Niniane spied Gourry and Gawaine.
     "Come over here, Gawaine, Gourry! I’ve got a slight problem that I think that only someone of your obvious braveries could help me with." She fluttered her eyelashes.
     The two men obligingly walked over to her.
     "How did you do that?" Lina asked Niniane, scratching her head.
     "Oh," Niniane said, looking disdainfully at Lina.  "You really wouldn’t have a clue."
     "Why not?" Lina demanded.
     "Oh…just…this is a little sensitive."  Niniane snickered.
     "What?"
     "Well, it’s a femme fatal trick, not that you’d know any, what, with your boyish figure."
     "What?  I don’t see you looking particularly feminine."
     "Oh, yes," Niniane said. "It’s these robes. I’d really been meaning to lose them by now."  She reached her hands to her shoulders and lightly unpinned the gown.  The gown obligingly fell to her feet and she stepped out of it, pulling her veil off.
     "You see?"  Niniane said.  "Tennyon wasn’t completely making up the dress that he said "more expressed than it concealed.""  Lina grunted.
     "Wait," Eris said.  "I’ve been wanting to change too!"
     Eris ran off behind a covering and quickly changed into a short black clingy dress with a black spiked cape, elbow length gloves, and short black boots.
     "Oh, by the way," Niniane said.  "You can call me Vivian now."
     "And you can call me Ellis," the one previously known as Eris said.
     "No," Vivian said.  "You’re Eris now.  You were Ellis."
     "Huh?"
     Vivian sighed.  "It just has to do with name meanings.  Eris means discord, Ellis "one who is called by God.""
     "Oh," Ellis said.  "I guess then that I was Ellis, just no one called me the right name, and now I’m Eris."
     "Where did she get that outfit?" Guenivere asked.
     "It’s a secret," Xellos said.
     "I’m beginning to agree with Merlin," Vivian said.  "You do sound like a broken record."
     "How did you know that he’d said that?"
     Vivian looked at the winking Xellos, glared and bit off saying "It’s a secret."  She finally said.  "I will not say that.  Humph."      She returned her thoughts to Lina and continued the conversation she had been having with no prior notice, "Now, Lina," she said, "Do you see what I meant about the femme fatal stuff?"
     Lina scowled at her.  "Fireball!"
     To most people’s amazement,  Vivian calmly stretched out her hand to meet the fireball. Although the still remaining white glove was vaporized, her hand was uninjured and the fireball was carefully absorbed into the hand.
     "Merlin was wrong," Vivian stated calmly to the unanswered question of how she had just absorbed a fireball.  (Most likely no one cared but Vivian)  "The training was not to keep me pure, whatever that means. It was simply to give me the power to absorb energy…in nearly limitless amounts. It was only with the other trainings that the purity issue came into play, for which I solely blame Merlin…" she scowled slightly.  "But, whatever.  Lina, was that all you can do?"
     "Well…I could do that Dragon Slave or the Giga Slave," Lina said, counting them off on her fingers.
     "Hmmm…I’m not worried about the dragon thingy, but the Giga…"
     "Don’t do it, Lina-san!" Amelia screamed.
     "I wasn’t planning to," Lina said, exasperated.
     The room erupted again and this time was saved by Arthur and Mordred walking in.
     "Silence!" Arthur said, and for once someone listened.
     "So we are looking for the Grail." Arthur said. It was more a statement than a question.  "Someone, take the cup so that we can look at it."
     Everyone looked around the room carefully.
     "I’ll do it," Vivian said.  "I feel confident in my powers."
     She carefully approached the cup and stood, her hands almost on it for a few minutes, concentrating, before finally grasping it in two hands and lifting it above her head.
     A pale blue light surrounded her, extending to a radius of three feet.  And then, Vivian started looking pained, until she finally lowered it back into its place.
     "It…it hurt," she said, in an astonished manner.  "Someone else…"
     They all carefully tried to lift the Grail. Only Amelia, Gourry, and Gawaine even managed to lift the goblet, and even they could only keep it in their hands for seconds.  The others were shocked or burned by it before they could even get a grip on it.
     "So now what?" Zelgadiss asked.
     Arthur smiled slightly.  "They say that the Grail can only be used by those pure of heart. I suppose that none of us are so.  It is beyond our reach."
     "But I still want it!" Margawse said, angrily.
     "Shut up," Vivian said, glaring at her.
     The whole group sat in dejected silence for a few minutes as Igraine and Sylphiel slipped in and Sylphiel carefully threaded her way over to the chalice.  She carefully picked it up and held it aloft.
     Guenivere was the first to notice her entrance and said, "Look!"
     However, the distraction was too great a disturbance for Sylphiel and the world went dark.

 Return to the Three Moons
 Return to Broceliande
 Return to the Castle of Air and Darkness
 Return to the Ivory Tower
On To Part Six: The Astral Plane