"You decided to come back." Malik, his eldest son commented as Faheem slipped into the room he shared with his two boys. If the master assassin thought himself stealthy, his son proved him wrong every time.
Despite the harshness of the boy's comment, and the underlying doubt, Faheem smiled and mussed the boy's hair, even as his hand was swatted away. "I will always return, my son. Even if it may take some time."
Malik, with his arms folded over his chest, scoffed. "I do not care, but you worried Kadar."
Faheem hummed, moving from Malik to remove his gear piece by piece. "Did I? I am sorry to hear. This would certainly explain what a child your age was doing awake."
If Malik caught the sarcasm in his tones, he did nothing about it, only huffed. "I am not a child. Kadar is a child, I am not and I have every right to be awake."
To hear a boy of six make such claims might have been amusing in other circumstances. Only he feared his son truly believed it. There was a wisdom Malik possessed that was beyond his years, yet he was still a child all the same. Faheem pressed his eyes shut, and released a heavy sigh. "Of course not. How foolish of me to make such a thoughtless mistake." Malik might have puffed his chest out a bit in pride, but Faheem had his back turned to the child.
Once changed out of the grimy robes he had been trapped in since leaving Masyaf, he turned back to the sulky child and scooped him- Malik made a good show of protesting as he did- into his arms. "Come now. You have stayed up long enough. Some rest will not kill you, my son."
"But I am not sleepy." Malik protested.
Ignoring the boy's arguing, Faheem crossed his chambers to the larger bed far in the corner, the smaller of which was shared between his two sons when he was not away. Tonight he took Malik to bed with him, beneath the covers where he rested the child on his chest, bare now.
Tired as Malik looked, his son stubbornly refused to sleep even then and instead sat up, looking down at him. "I am not tired." He restated irritably.
Faheem made a sound that was half a grunt-half a chuckle. "But I am tired, little Mal, and I would like my sleep as much as yours."
Looking every bit the six year old that he was in that moment, Malik puffed his cheeks out and outstretched his hand to pinch his father's nose. "No!" He exclaimed, still hushed as to not wake his sleeping brother across the room, but with enough of a hiss to get his point across. "You have only just returned and will leave again soon. You cannot sleep yet."
'ah' As understanding washed over him, he could not help but think his child cute. Dishonest and stubborn, and flushing now as if he thought he'd said something wrong. "What would you suggest, my little prince? Would you like to play?" Faheem folded his arms behind his head as he spoke, stretching in the bed, more comfortable than he had been in his many weeks of travel.
"I am an Assassin. Assassins don't play." How long now, he wondered, had Malik known what they were? A very long time, he predicted. Perhaps he had always known.
"What then?"
The boy thought on the question, as if not entirely sure himself; then he nodded decisively to himself. "I want a story."
"Of what?"
"You were gone a very long time," Malik pointed out, and seemed to sink into a pout again, "You must have a story to tell."
Faheem shrugged, reaching up to rub the boy's back. Malik was tired, and though stubborn the soothing motion always proved to have him asleep before long. Tonight, however, it seemed it would be a tad bit more difficult to convince him to sleep. "I cannot say that I have."
They stared at one another for a long time, as if to challenge one another or wait for the other to falter. It was the boy who diverted his eyes first, and trailed his tiny fingers along his chest until his fingers trailed over the wrecked tissue of a scar, stretching from beneath his breast to his stomach. "These marks you have are ugly." He stated blatantly, "And they are everywhere."
"Mm. Those are scars, little prince, and they are anything but ugly."
"I know what they are," Malik snapped, defensively. "But they are still ugly. What good is a broken body?"
Reaching upwards more, he ruffled the child's hair again, much to Malik's disdain. "You do not understand. Each scar has its own tale, each magnificent in its own way."
"If you had a story to tell you should have said so from the beginning." Malik traced his finger over the scar again. "If it is not ugly, and has its own tale then where did this one come from?"
Hand working down Malik's back again, Faheem sighed, "This one came from a battle long ago, with a knight who saw fit to treat others with cruelty. A cruel man, but skilled with the sword, and I was still young. I was injured, but it was I who escaped with my life." He explained, watching Malik's expression as his eyes grew big with interest.
"And this one?" The scar he traced now was across his stomach, reaching his side. It was smaller than the last, but deeper.
"Here was a result of a betrayal and misplaced trust. A dear friend of mine plunged his blade deep inside me."
"Why?" Asked the child.
Faheem considered the question, "He was not true to our creed from the beginning. His loyalties lied… elsewhere."
"What happened to him?"
"My old friend is no more. It was unfortunate; he was a kind man as I knew him," And a friend that he had mourned for, for a very short time.
Malik was silent, and then continued, tracing the lines of his father's chest until he found another scar across the shoulder blade. "What about this one?"
There was a moment in which Faheem was silent, not sure if he should speak the truth. "This one was from revenge, and not worth speaking of."
"Tell me."
They stared at one another for a short time again, but this time it was Faheem who faltered. How pathetic it seemed that the only person in the world capable of staring him down was his own son, a boy of six. "This one was for your mother." And it was all he would say of it.
The boy peered down at the scar for a long while, and then smoothed his fingers over it again. "Then it is the most beautiful of them all." The next scar he pointed to was over his arm. "This one?"
Faheem produced another half chuckle, a sound few others besides his sons had ever heard. "This one came from protecting a small boy in a village far from here. I was told I was careless, but the boy was safe, and so this was worthwhile."
There was a silence between them as Malik ran out of visible scars. Then he spoke. "I still think scars are ugly."
"Oh?"
"Except yours." He added, "I like yours. They suit you."
"Thank you, Mal."
Malik pouted. "I am calling you ugly, you should not thank me."
He might have laughed a light sound from his lips rare and almost unproduced since his early childhood. Briefly, he mussed the boy's hair, then wrapped his arm around his waist and tugged him to the bed. "Sleep now, my prince." He leaned over to kiss his child's forehead.
"but I am not-" His words were lost when Faheem began smoothing his fingertips over his eyelids, light, comforting movements. Malik protested, however weakly, but as always fell asleep at his father's gentle gestures.
"Good night, little prince."
For the first time in nearly three months, they were together.