[center][h2]Drachma[/h2]
[h3][i]Foreigner’s District, Near a Fire[/i][/h3][/center]

A simple bird flew amidst the chaos engulfing half of the city, amidst its bird brethren. 

If one were, for some reason, observing a flock of fleeing birds though, and if their eyes were of sufficient merit to earn them the name ‘Archer’, they might notice that it held two items as it flew. Of course, even this was nearly impossible to notice, as it flew amidst others.

Moreover, this would not occur regardless. After all, its maker had been careful to place it out of the sight of those Servants and magi who occupied the space. If nothing else, its maker’s observations and surveillance had been enough to where something like that was trivial. 

It would not do for the bird to be noticed. 

And so, as it flew, it released the two items it held: a glass vial, and a black rock. The two items were sent careening into the flames below that the bird and its brethren were escaping from. 

[b]Bind.[/b]

The vial shattered, and fire emerged from it, melding with the fire that surrounded. 

[b]Bind.[/b]

The black rock dissipated, consumed by the fire, and tainting those flames with curses, strengthening their nature, hastening their spread. 

Compared to the curse that had assaulted the Matou estate the previous night, this one was of a different nature, a distinct individual curse in its own right, even if the ‘result’ was the same. That was a consequence of its ‘vessel’ coloring it in all likelihood, but in terms of mystery and power it did not lose out in the slightest to the previous night’s curse. 

[b]Bind.[/b]

And so, the meaning and burden attached to those flames propagated itself faster than the mundane fires did, seeping into and contaminating those flames as they spread, now no longer content with the mere fragment of a city that they would have ordinarily kept to. The isolated blaze started by a handful of drunken fools evolved into something entirely different. 

It wasn’t as if the bird’s Master wouldn’t take advantage of an arbitrage opportunity, after all. 

And so, the fires spread. 

And so, the fires burned. 

And so, the fires [b]bound[/b].