Artoria climbs the riverbank, heading back toward the path. She takes little care to make sure that Gilgamesh follows her. She has little doubt that he will, and as much as she wishes she could shake him, if he is plaguing her at least he is not plaguing someone else.

He had mentioned becoming familiar with modern amusements, and she dreads to think how.

Allying herself with cruel men is something she had sought most of her life to avoid, but sometimes it had been necessary. And even in this existence, it seems to have proven unavoidable. She had considered her former Master's ambition and ideal worthy, but when she had seen the means necessary to achieve it, Kiritsugu's indifference, and the ultimate waste of everything he had sacrificed for, she had once again been proven right about him.

For all his gaudiness, Gilgamesh seems less complicated.

Artoria's shoes scuff the pavement, and a glance proves that he is not far behind her.

He is an imposing, strong figure, even not taking into consideration his status as a hero or a creature not meant for this nearly-human form they seem to share. He looks different from everyone around them, and different from her. She knows that this is one reason that not many people seem to approach them, but she is glad for it. While she means them no harm, she knows that they are both dangers to these people. And it is for that reason, if none other, that she makes no effort to flee from him.

If his crude fascination with her is enough to keep his gaze from wandering to something much more cruel, she will endure it. She doubts that he has appetites such as Caster had held, but in his alliance with Kotomine Kirei, she knows that she cannot trust even that.

Her eyes narrow slightly when he comes close enough that she must lift her chin to behold his. It could be that she is squinting at the sun, but she wrestles with the unsettling thought that her influence may be the only thing that stands in the way of whatever he and Kotomine Kirei plot together. She isn't sure which of them is the leader and which is the follower in their shared descent into bloody betrayal, but she knows which of them she holds some power over, even if she does not trust it or fully understand why.

"Where to now?" he asks her.

She searches for the sly look she expects in his eyes, but she isn't quite sure what she sees. She wonders, again, if she has ever really been able to see the truth in people at all.

"I have seen what I came to see. At least, as well as I can," she replies, deliberately vague. Her brow furrows as she lowers her gaze from his eyes and looks past him, back the way they had come.

"Will we return home, then?" he presses.

"The Tohsaka house is not my home, nor is it yours."

Gilgamesh looks displeased, and Artoria isn't sure whether it satisfies her at all to discomfit him. After all, she may have no honorable choice but to try and offer some measure of peace between them, however fragile it may be.

"Where else will you go?" he challenges her, scoffing at the impossibility of it.

Another thought seems to physically pull at the nape of her neck, pressing at the same, instinct-tickling part of her skull. He is as without options as she is in that regard.

"Neither of us have wealth that holds any value here," she points out.

Then her face falls as Gilgamesh reaches into his pocket and withdraws a golden clip which contains folded bills which she instantly recognizes as the currency of this land.

"You were saying?" he asks, showing his teeth in a way that makes her a little more comfortable. It is better when he shows his true nature.

"Stolen, too, I'm sure," she says with a flare of her nostrils.

"And there you would be mistaken, dear Saber. Haven't I told you? All that holds value in this world is mine," he says.

Artoria decides that she is weary of his riddles. She walks past him, deliberately allowing her arm to bump his in a show of restrained aggression. In her dress, with her hair down, it seems to hold far less weight than she would in her armor, or even in the ruined suit Irisviel had once taken such pride in. But Artoria keeps her chin held high as she begins to retreat up the paved path.

Gilgamesh turns on his feet and falls into step beside her. She hears a snort, perhaps of laughter, perhaps of derision. Or maybe they are one and the same in his personal dialect.

"Mystery is hardly entertaining when you create it so crudely," he replies.

"Your understanding is of little concern of mine. Or aren't you a wise king, Archer?" she asks, bristling in spite of the necessity of his closeness if she is to find any way to dissuade him from his worst nature. She wonders if it is a vain hope to believe he has any other.

"Has your tongue always been this sharp?" Gilgamesh counters. He seems pleased enough with this line of conversation, his hands pressed harmlessly back into his coat pockets. "It is hardly any wonder that you are a virgin, King of Knights. A delicate flower with so many thorns…"

Artoria's face sets into an expression of anger and mild disgust, but she keeps her eyes level with the path ahead of her. Her hands twitch at her sides, considering fists as their form but thinking better of it. She breathes in and out, the cool air centering her a little.

"I lived as a man half my mortal life," she says when she has trained her tone into even submission to her will. "And yet it strikes me as particularly like a man to think in such narrow definitions, whatever you believe you know about me."

"My eyes allow me to glimpse into everything," Gilgamesh answers proudly.

"And to see only that which you want to see," Artoria surmises easily.

"You really must stop calling me 'Archer,'" he says, deftly changing the subject.

"I don't see why I should do anything you command me, King of Heroes. You aren't my king, and you insist that I should comport myself as I once was," she says, taking refuge in her station even if it is undeserved.

"I could compel your compliance if I wished it," Gilgamesh insists.

Artoria glances up at him, her gaze once again narrowed with determination.

"You will not," she says simply.

Gilgamesh catches her eyes on him, and she sees nothing but a flash of bitterness in his. He looks more like a disappointed child to her than a king not only of subjects but of the very concept of human heroism. Even looking at his eyes, the irony is clear. He is not human.

He breaks the gaze first, nodding ahead of them as he notes a crossroads where they must stop to allow the cars to pass.

"Will you remain here, then? Homeless out of stubbornness. Or will you conquer for yourself a new castle? Or become a simple laborer, taking to modern life and allowing this world to tarnish you completely?"

"If I did, wouldn't that be simpler for you?" Artoria asks after a moment. It is an earnest question, and she watches him surreptitiously to see if his face betrays an answer more than his words. She almost squints with concentration, trying her best to see it if it happens. Only, it is harder to read faces than it is to see projected movements in battle.

It is surprising when his face takes on a gawking expression, his mouth wide and round as his eyes become.

"Why would you think that?" he asks. His feet remain still for a moment, even as hers start moving as the sign across the road indicates that they should. He isn't long to follow once more.

"Whatever you and Kotomine Kirei have planned, I will put a stop to it," Artoria answers, simple and conversational as if there is no enmity in the suggestion at all.

She hears him snort again.

"What 'plan'?" he asks. "What plan do you think we have?"

"I don't know," she admits freely. "Not yet. But the moment I understand his purpose, I will stop him. I know he is a murderer and the kind who will not stop now that he has whet his appetite for blood."

"So you were paying attention," Gilgamesh replies with a dry wit. Artoria isn't at all amused. She doesn't dignify it with an answer, so he speaks again after some silence: "If your new purpose, after surveying the ruins, is to foil Kirei in his misadventures, would it not be in your best interest to remain under the same roof?"

Artoria feels her breath come a little more lightly. It is not quite a thrill but something like it when she realizes that her half-thought-out plan may not be for nought after all. She keeps her expression very placid. She hopes her face unreadable.

"There may be some truth to that," she says after considering her answer carefully, strategically. She even lowers her gaze and her chin deliberately, as if she is humbled more than intrigued by this turn of events.

"Whatever your devious plot may be, I highly doubt that your respect for law and order in this dreadful place will allow you to take up residence under the stars," Gilgamesh remarks.

Artoria's brow creases for a moment, but she sees no reason not to concede the point.

"Likely true," she says.

"Well if you are not to take up the life of a vagabond, and you wish to kill Kotomine Kirei as he sleeps, then we have little choice but to go home, eventually," he says, persisting in this false labelling. Under the circumstances, it is hard to come up with a better way to phrase it that would matter.

"I have no intention of going back yet," Artoria insists. Her hands clench a little. She has to think, and she dreads the thought of that place and its oppressive air. She glances up at her companion. Furthermore, she would like to be more certain she has at least captured his fickle fancy enough to believe that he is at least torn in his allegiance.

"Then offer me some amusement, Saber," Gilgamesh complains.

Artoria does not make it her particular aim to satisfy his request, but after more useless wandering in sight of the great bridge that is blocked off, she makes her way to a hanging sign that is printed in text that reminds her more of the text she had once read in her homeland. She already has her hand on the door handle when she looks up at Gilgamesh with slightly raised eyebrows.

"You can pay the owners of this establishment," she informs him. It is more warning than request or concession.

Nevertheless, he grins as if he has won some great struggle. She doesn't like it, but she presses her body into the door and makes her way through, not letting go of it quickly enough to allow the heavy wooden thing to fall in against his face.

The smell of food fills Artoria's senses and she feels her stomach imploring her to partake. She does her best to maintain her dignity as she goes to an empty table and pulls out a chair to take her seat.

There is something slightly downturned about the way Gilgamesh carries himself before he pulls out a chair and sits beside her. She cannot tell what it is. Perhaps his energy had been flagging as well, but she allows herself to study him to look for any clue as to the specific cause. At first, his eyes are even closed, allowing her to do this without fear of his unnatural gaze.

"What are you looking at, Saber?" he asks, without opening them. "I thought we were here for food. And here you said I was the one who could not tell the difference between my appetites."

Artoria is annoyed, but she just reaches for one of the plastic-sealed menus held in a stand at the center of the table.

She notices in the periphery of her vision that he finally blinks open his serpentine eyes. She hopes that no one in the restaurant notices enough to fear him. People in this era seem far less familiar with magic and unnatural beings than those of her time, and she does not want him to cause a scene. But while his gaze seems settled on her, she peruses the menu. Everything sounds both delicious and almost wholly unattainable. She has a fairly thin concept of this land's currency, and yet all of it seems almost impossibly cheap. She does not know why Gilgamesh seems to resent such easy abundance.

Gilgamesh sighs impatiently and waves down a waiter with a spotty moustache.

"We'll have one of everything your establishment has to offer, unless there is something which you believe unbefitting a king," he says.

Artoria looks up and feels her heart lunge toward her gurgling stomach. Without thinking, she reaches out and places her hand firmly atop Gilgamesh's forearm, trying to stay his actions and his words.

"No," she says, both to him and to the waiter who stands there with his notepad, looking confused. "I apologize," she continues with a little bow of her head. "Please give us one moment to reconsider."

The waiter nods and leaves, glancing back with a look that seems caught between grateful and horrified.

"Even with our greater need for energy than the average human, there is no need to draw such undue attention. And it would be wasteful," Artoria scolds Gilgamesh the moment the young man has busied himself with checking on attending to some customers who were already eating.

Gilgamesh glares a little at her. His nostrils flare.

"There is no reason that we should not have a feast befitting kings," he says.

"If you would like one, then at least be more discerning," Artoria says. She lets go of his arm and plucks another menu from the stand in the center of the table. She holds it out to him and waves it a little until he snatches it away from her like an irritated cat. "And I will not tolerate needless theft from these people, even if it is in the form of your being unable to pay them."

"Once again you misunderstand—"

"No matter," she insists.

Gilgamesh shifts his glare to the menu where it remains, scanning back and forth for several minutes.

Once Artoria has nearly settled her wandering eyes and appetite on the idea of a pie made from meat and a salad made from vegetables, Gilgamesh sighs and sets the menu down.

"Have I indulged your desire for patience enough yet, my love?" he asks. She is almost certain that this time he has chosen the epithet quite specifically to irritate her.

She frowns at him but grants him her gaze.

"What are you going to eat?" she asks.

"I don't wish to choose as if there is some arbitrary limit to my capacity for enjoyment. My appetites are both boundless and immaterial," he says. It doesn't make much sense to Artoria, but she listens as he rambles. "I can tell the young man to bring me the best of what they have to offer instead of all if it will please you more."

"Why can't you simply choose something for yourself?" she asks, curious about why he seems so annoyed by this simple task. She notices as he glances back down at the menu with a renewed glare at it. She blinks several times as recognition falls into place. She has an eerie sense of dread, not because of what she has realized but because of what else might follow if her intuition is correct. "You can't read it…" she says softly. It is gentle, because she neither wishes to humiliate him nor to stir him to anger. It is simply an observation.

"Of course I can," he says. "I choose not to."

Artoria shakes her head.

"No," she says. "Earlier, I entered Kirei–no, Tohsaka's office and found myself struggling to read the script. I managed it, but it was as if there were a fog before my eyes that had not existed in days before this."

Gilgamesh looks at her, and even if she has had trouble reading faces and people in the past, she knows full well that what she sees is intrigue. His brows are furrowed, though. Cautious intrigue.

"What are you suggesting?" he asks, and for the first time she believes that his asking her a question is without the intent to manipulate her answer. She notices his finger running along an imperfection in the plastic that covers the menu.

Artoria frowns in turn as she considers how to answer him. Her tongue softly clicks, she takes a breath, and she begins to explain:

"I wonder if the knowledge given to us of this era when we were summoned has begun to fade. I know we are speaking in the common tongue of this land now, but when I tried to read it, I had to concentrate more than I would have before. If what I fear is true, I hope that it will not fade in its entirety. That could prove very difficult."

Gilgamesh's mouth forms a sharp smile as she makes her last statement.

"'Difficult,'" he repeats. "Well, if your fears prove true, then I will simply resist something that has been made mine being taken from me. I suggest that you do the same."

"Of course I intend to try," Artoria says. "But you have irresponsibly taken hold of something that neither of us were meant to have." Her frown etches deeper as she is reminded of that night – the mud and her dread of what he was doing to her. Yet she does not look away from him.

Gilgamesh looks toward the ceiling and leans back in his chair. He stares at it for a moment before suddenly righting his posture before resting one elbow against the table. He uses the other hand to pick up the menu and regard it with new vigor. His eyes seem clearer.

"Well, now that I understand my opponent, I will not be bested," he boasts.

Artoria folds her arms across her chest as she looks at him, a thoughtful look on her face.

"Did you struggle with reading during your life?" she asks after a moment.

This time she knows his snort is derisive. He doesn't dignify her with a glance.

"Of course I knew how to read. But I was not a scribe. I was a warrior and a king. I ordered walls built and bested monsters. I loved and I killed. What business had my eyes poring over tablets?"

"I see," Artoria says as her frown shifts to one of taking in novel information.

Finally he looks at her with some venom again.

"Do not dare pity me, King of Knights," he says.

Artoria hisses softly and glances around to try and discourage him from calling her that here. At least 'Saber,' may sound like a foreign name to those who may overhear them. Even if they have no intention of bringing harm to these people, it could cause problems.

"I can recite poetry and tales from the dawn of time without getting one word, one detail wrong," he continues, undeterred.

Artoria lifts her hand in a gesture of peace. Then, she reaches over and plucks the menu away from him, replacing it in the stand.

"Very well, Gilgamesh," she says, trying to appease him. She doesn't like the uneasy feeling in her chest, but it isn't fear. It's something sadder than that. Pity , but for the sake of peace she will not call it that. "What do you like?" she asks, glancing back at the menu still resting before her.

"What?" he asks her flatly. He looks at her with open suspicion now.

"I meant 'what do you like to eat'?" she asked. "Surely with your many opinions, you have preferences."

She believes that she detects a lecherous glint in his eyes as he leans back and laces his hands together behind his head. She feels the toe of his shoe bump the side of her foot.

"Bread," he says after a moment, a smile on his face.

"'Bread,'" Artoria repeats.

"Not on its own," he replies, seeming more relaxed than before. "Bread and beer."

Suddenly, a different man appears from behind the bar, having heard Gilgamesh's unrestrained tone.

"Then you have come to the right place!" the man announces.

Artoria sighs as she averts her gaze for a moment, embarrassed by the lack of discretion but allowing it to pass. She takes the opportunity and tells this man, who seems to be the leader among the serving staff, what her stomach and heart had settled on. She also orders Gilgamesh a sandwich and beer.

When the waiter walks away, instead of looking insecure about her offer of assistance, Gilgamesh looks absolutely smug.

She gives him a cold expression that tries to wither any sense of creeping authority he has over her.

"You will be a darling wife," he says in spite of her look.

She pulls her ankle closer and hooks it around the other to deprive his toe of contact with her foot. Then she decides to press on to the reason she has not yet tried to rid herself of his company. The moment someone has brought Gilgamesh his tall cup full of beer and her a glass of water, she clears her throat and rests both her hands on top of the table, palms facing down. She straightens her posture, briefly closes her eyes, and begins to speak.

"Gilgamesh," she addresses him plainly, then she opens her eyes to look at him.

"Oh my. It seems you have something interesting to say," he says. It makes her skin prickle with distaste, but she pretends he had addressed her more suitably for her greater purpose.

"Gilgamesh," she repeats. "You seemed to imply before that your allegiance was not to Kotomine Kirei and whatever he is plotting in that stolen office."

"Are you asking for something, Saber?" he taunts.

"Of course I am," she says, committing to it. It will be better to know if he resists her. Even if he agrees, she will not have any real assurance that he is not lying, but hearing what he has to say for himself is the only measure of insight she can afford herself while she has his attention. "If you were ever a man, a king , of honor, then you cannot allow him to wreak further destruction. You must not."

"Why mustn't I?"

"You said yourself that he takes pleasure in the pain of others. His only goal is to bring about the suffering of others. He has power in this world, even if I do not know the extent of it. And if over none other, he has power over the child who ought to be in that house."

"Should she now?" Gilgamesh asks. It gives her pause. There is something about it that gives her a sour twist of hope that he is listening to her.

"Why shouldn't she?" Artoria presses him.

"Well, I suppose to allow her to avoid her guardian's penchant for undue suffering," Gilgamesh sighs. "Please tell me now if I am going to become bored with this repetition."

"I am trying to understand you," she says. She pauses for a moment, believing that this will please his strange fixation with her.

He closes his eyes and leans back into his hands. He seems to bask in something she has given him, leading her to believe she had been correct.

"Oh my, what a scene I might cause if I told him what you are up to," he says.

Artoria doesn't feel fear when he threatens such a thing. Only disappointment.

Then his eyes snap open.

"But it would be entertaining, I suppose, to watch your mind do battle with his. I was so wondering when you would wake up, Artoria."

Artoria lifts the glass of water to her lips and takes a pointed, small sip. She sets it down firmly.

"You have no right to use that name."

"You use mine," he points out.

"Because you requested it."

"Then I will make it my mission in the midst of yours to cause you to ask that I call you by your true name," he says, righting his posture when the young, moustachioed waiter returns, balancing a tray and looking at them suspiciously as he sets their food before them.

"You do not intend to betray the confidence I have granted you?" Artoria asks Gilgamesh when the young man again retreats. The scent of the food before her nearly distracts her, but she stares at Gilgamesh until he gives her an answer.

He takes a deep drink from his cup. She notices that his throat bobs more than once before he sets it down.

"I came to you first, my dear," he says.

Suddenly, Artoria decides to take up a knife and fork from the available cutlery, cutting into her meat pie to give her hands what feels like suitable occupation. She takes a bite, pretending to ignore his continued presumption.

"Of course your life means more to me than that of a rightfully dead priest," he croons to her, even as she begins eating.

After she first swallows, she pauses to bow her head in gratitude that she is sure that he does not know how to express. To anyone but him. Then she continues eating, speaking between swallows as is only polite to the ordinary people sitting around them.

"I don't care if you value my life over his. I care if you are willing to show whatever behavior made you ever fit to call a king or a hero in the first place."

Gilgamesh tends to his food for a moment.

"You have not chosen poorly," he remarks, distracting from her point. She can feel his irreverence.

A sudden flash comes to her of the irony – that many would consider a sandwich, even one so fine as this, a paltry selection from such a menu. She smirks a little in spite of her uneasiness, not only at the irony but because it gives her some reassurance that the knowledge of this era will not leave her entirely, even with the march of time away from the end of the war.

"Do you trust me, Saber?" Gilgamesh asks languidly, seeming to take his time. Perhaps he has seized upon the curve of her lips that expresses something slightly warmer than contempt, even if it is at his expense.

"No," she says to him, shaking her head even as the wry smile clings to her lips.

"Then this should be very fun indeed," he says before taking another bite of his sandwich.