. A U T H O R ' S | N O T E ; This is my first time ever writing fanfiction, let alone Assassin's Creed fanfiction, so bear with me if it's absolutely horrible. XD AC: Set in Roma, Brotherhood-based, no spoilers for Revelations. Will upload more regularly on my deviantART, WWotS. Comments and critiques very widely welcomed. 3 PG-13, for blood and violence and all of that good stuff that makes a fanfiction fun. Kidding, kidding. x3
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Where else could the so-called "wolf-people" get the pelts that they wore so boldly?
It should have known better; it really should have, and that much it knew. So many of its brothers and sisters, lost to such traps after being unable to staunch the curiosity that was always awakened by their ceremonies and promising calls. Now, as they looked toward the sound of its yelp as the trap tightened around its leg, it wished it hadn't ignored the signs.
Though his robes glowed under the full moon, he was barely visible against the alabaster, equally (if not even more so) illuminated stone ruins.
The people of Romulus were… what was the word? Interesting? Amusing? Intriguing? He couldn't explain, though unique was as close (and as simply) as he could get to explaining it. The way they moved during their ceremonies was admittedly a bit hypnotizing. As they circled around the bonfire, the two people on either side of the blaze matched each other step-for-step. The fur that cascaded down their backs glowed under the light of the moon, while their faces burned with the orange light of the fire. They seemed to dance as they moved. Ezio shifted his weight, rolling up from his sitting position and into a crouch, disliking the vulnerability he felt when he was resting on something other than the balls of his feet. He wondered if the thieves had noticed his absence. Ezio had been sleeping in La Volpe's guild of the late, after finding that the guards had discovered where he normally slept at night. They now had lapsed into the aggravating and uncomfortable habit of stabbing pikes into haystacks and cart loads as they did their rounds.
It took him a moment to realize what sound had pulled him suddenly from his idling thoughts. Lifting his head, blinking, he saw that the people of Romulus had stopped moving, their gazes turned toward the underbrush of the more green section of the ruins beside them.
A trap?
Ezio rose, stretching momentarily and took the opportunity to move closer. He crept around the clearing, ducking behind the deteriorating stone pillars and the crumbling granite archways as he went, until he was practically beside the feral horde, barely hidden behind a dangerously thin pillar.
The people, garbed in wolf hides, descended slowly upon the brambles in which the sound had come from, spears at ready. Ezio's eyes turned the color of liquid gold as he used his Eagle Vision, the curiosity spiking in his mind causing him to silently wonder what had been captured.
Ezio recoiled from the use of the sixth sense, withdrawing as if he had been bitten by a snake, suppressing a hiss of surprise. He blinked rapidly a few times, blinding by the violent blue that had blared through the mob of crimson aura. A single figure causing that much light was surprising for Ezio. It had been hard to see much, but he had caught a glimpse of a lupine form.
Animals… they showed up as grey, always. On occasion, the aggressive ones would fade to a dim red, but he had never seen an animal with a blue light, let alone a light this overpoweringly bright. To make sure his vision wasn't fooling him, though he had never happened upon an instance in which it had, he used it again, only to find the same sight.
The spears, pushing away the brambles, revealed a massive black wolf. The wolf was snared by a cord, cutting into the flesh on his leg. A snarl ripped from the creature's chest, the loud sound having the potential to be easily mistaken for a roar of some sort, as the wolf lifted its scarred lip from its gums, white teeth illuminated almost pointedly, threateningly, under the light of the moon. Fresh, pink scars crossed over older maimed tissue. The wolf, even in his vulnerable state, showed no fear, even as the people of Romulus howled their success, apparently at their long-awaited capture of the "elusive beast", (or so their excited cries said) and drew back their spears.
It wasn't afraid of death.
If anything, the creature had long ago accepted it as its brethren died around it, unable to stop the followers of Romulus, these "wolf-people", from taking its family's pelts. So here it was, eyes fierce, the edges of its mind numb from the pain of the trap, darkness encroaching on the borders of its normally sharp and precise vision. It narrowed gaze focused upon the eyes, the human eyes, not those of its brother's head, worn like a cap on the human's head. It gazed into the eyes of its murderers.
Defiance pulsed through it as it stopped growling. No longer did these men and women face a snarling beast, but they faced an eerily calm animal. The radiating dominance that the wolf put out made them flinch backwards momentarily. Tail lifted, head high, and fur standing up, every lupine instinct that the Romulus had developed told them that this was their master and their leader, and for a moment, they obeyed, withdrawing slightly. Then, the lingering nature of the human race lunged forth with the swiftness of a panther, demanding power in a greedy sweep. The mob moved forward. And thus, ignoring the overpowering pain of the sinew cord sinking into its flesh, the dark-furred wolf settled onto its haunches and accepted its fate.
The assassin wasn't sure what was more disturbing: the wolf accepting his death with the ease of an elderly man that knew his time had come, or the people of Romulus acting so quickly and eagerly to kill the species of animal that they identified as family and their roots. Ezio examined the male wolf briefly. An outcast, he guessed, from the scars that sparingly maimed the animal's pelt. Without realizing it, he found his fingers brushing across the scar on his lip as he thought about the life the wolf had probably lived. Due to its rare pelt color, the wolf had undoubtedly lived a hard life so far. Wolves weren't so different from people, and that much he had discovered while watching wolves in the wild. They were prejudiced toward anything different; they hated feeling insecure, and both change and difference brought insecurity. The wolf had probably been rejected by society and childhood for his differences, as… as Ezio had been. Ezio Auditore, the honed assassin and accomplished killer, felt sympathy for the weakened creature snared in the trap.
The first spear struck, sinking deep into obsidian fur, lodging itself in the wolf's back hindquarter, but eliciting nothing but a wince from the animal as the people of Romulus cheered and bayed of their victory. Where the last one had stood to impale the lupine creature drew yet another, spear aimed for the wolf's other haunch. They were… they were torturing their prey. From the looks of it, they were planning on putting spears into non-lethal points until the wolf died of either pain or blood-loss. His sense of righteousness kicked in instantaneously.
Nobody, animal or human, deserved to die like that.
Ezio remembered the man who had declared that all books be burned, and threw an opposing man into the flames for deeming otherwise. He remembered tackling the man, only for him to be swept away by an angry crowd, still alive. He remembered them tying the man to the stake, and lighting the fire beneath him. He remembered scaling the platform and leaping through the rising flame. His fists clenched and unclenched slightly, mind lost within the memory of his hidden blade extending; it was as if he could still feel the blood splashing against his skin as his palm flicked upward, shoving his hidden blade through the man's head, the flames licking greedily at his back.
The thud of stone ripping through flesh and colliding with bone made him flinch, though the black wolf was still silent under the pain. He heard the shuffling of another Romulus follower moving to replace the last, and within moments, he found himself gliding through the air, eyes closed as his instincts guided him; as his instincts guided his hidden blade to the man's throat. Weight alighting perfectly upon his victim's chest, tipping the balance as his blade sliced through the skin of the wolfman with the ease in which a hot knife glides through butter. His tongue ran briefly over his lips, touching the blood that had splattered onto them, opening his eyes as his crimson blade withdrew. He lifted himself into a battle crouch as howls of outrage ripped through the pack.
They lunged at him, daggers and axes flashing for his throat. His hidden blade deflected the first; his bracer, the second, but the third from behind evaded his immediate detection. He had just enough time to sweep around and ward off the attack with his own dagger, and then impale the pelt-cloaked man in the stomach with his hidden blade.
His leather spaulders were grazed from behind, leaving yet another line in the collection of cuts that covered its surfaces, and he whipped around.
The next attack he countered, grabbing an arm and shoving his hidden gun into the human's gut, a sharp crack echoing as the trigger was released. Startled by the sudden noise caused the pack to back away from the assassin, and Ezio pushed the body aside. A cry behind him made him turn yet again, bracer rising to ward off an expected attack. He was met by a man falling toward him, the life fading from his brown eyes, his raised axe falling to the ground as its wielder passed into oblivion. Ezio sidestepped the falling body, wary gaze turning to the people of Romulus before following their paths of sight. Jaws, with an iron grip still locked around the man's calf, were sunk into the vital vein that lay within the leg.
Mutterings of demonic spirits, followed by prayers to Remus to spare them from this brother's wrath, whispered through the crowd behind him as the wolf rose. The handles of the spears that still protruded from his haunches dragged on the bloodied earth. His right paw, still snared above the joint, bore no weight.
Ezio pivoted his body to the mob, hidden blade flashing out threateningly once more, and after a series of snarls and growls, the people of Romulus fled. He turned to the he-wolf, a myriad of grazie's written in his eyes, but the black wolf had already crumpled into the pool of his own blood, his head turned away, breathing labored. Ezio kneeled beside the creature, hands pressing into the wolf's matted fur. What to do…
When he returned wandering gaze to the injured beast, were trained on him all of the sudden, and Ezio suppressed a shiver. The wolf's eyes clouded over and the trapped animal lost consciousness.
Its vision blurred beyond belief and dark around the edges, and its mind, fogged with pain, could not process the events that unfolded before it. Ears clogged with the same blood that now trickled out of them were also of no use; the sounds of battle were dulled out and seemed like, to the wolf, hallucinations of its dying mind; deliriums of a crippled body with confused senses. Only adrenaline and unease of still being alive brought it to its paws. And then, as its waning strength faded, it crumpled helplessly to the ground.
It detected, through the haze in its mind, a human crouching before it, the human's hands pressing into its fur. Its senses, clearing up for a single moment to be able to process something, came to life. And for a single moment, the wild animal looked clearly into the eyes of its savior with a strange, sharp clarity, and then drifted away.
Ezio took the creature into his arms, ignoring the creature's blood on his robes as he did so. He cradled the brave wolf, the back of its neck held gently by the nook of his left elbow. A flick of the wrist drew his hidden blade from its sturdy sheath, and he pressed the tip through the wolf's fur until the tip came to rest on skin. He adjusted the angle of the blade so it would go straight up into the ribcage and into the heart for a painless death.
It was strange, holding another predator here in his arms. As wolves were the predators of the wild, assassin's were the predators of society. Predators of two worlds were here, one supporting the other.
One putting the other out of its misery.
Sympathy crossed Ezio's features as he gazed down upon the black wolf. His blade twitched forward, breaching the skin, but something stayed his blade from delving further. He took a deep breath. He couldn't let sympathy override the fact that the creature was suffering, and would die of blood loss within the hour. He took a deep breath, and pressed the blade forward.