Lupe,
Forgive me. Forgive an old man who that was everything to you save what you truly needed as an innocent and curious young man. I was so wrapped in my own passions and drives that I neglected my duties as your mentor. You are so insightful, so free, so firmly set in your resolve that an Old fool like me would grow envious.. As a matter of fact, I do. When your uncle delivered you to me those many years ago, it was easy for me to take you in. If anything, you were like a little brother to me if not like the son I never had, or ever thought I wanted.
You always had a heart to travel, to do things differently; to see new places, meet new people, to grow in your own knowledge of the world outside of the creed. When you get this, I am not for certain if the flame of my life will still be flickering, for even now I feel my time is short. But I know that what you are doing wherever you are -where ever that may be- it will surly reflect the greatness you have within you.
Though I do ask for your forgiveness, I do not expect it. All I ask is that you never lose your light, never lose who you are. Stay true to yourself and to remember that boy I still remember from all those years ago. If not for a dying old man, for the brotherhood.
Wherever you may be, I hope you find your way back home with what it was you were looking for.
Sincerely your Mentor and Friend,
Ezio Auditore
Farewell
I scanned that aged piece of parchment again and again, just as I had when I first found it on my doorstep twenty years ago. That word kept blaring in my head like a chorus of trumpets; "home," "home," "home!" The old man wrote this to me when I had been around the Old world searching for the meaning of that word and right then it hit me what home was. But by the time I reached Florence, he had already been laid to rest.
It was just like him to leave me when I finally figured something profound. Even in my current age, his words and teachings rang on my memory. The years I spent walking, my feet ached from the remembrance. The blood I had spilled, my wrist twitched from the muscle memory. The riddles and languages I learned, the trials I put myself through to prove my worth-my temples began to throb and I quickly placed my weary and seasoned fingers to them, applying pressure to stop the pain. Age is but a number after all.
I glanced back at the parchment again. My eyes fixed on the name at the top, Lupe, my name. That wasn't my name, yet it was. The whole order, from Hispania to Japan knew me as Lupe, the Night-Stalker, Apprentice to the Mentor, Ezio Auditore, The Pilgrim Assassin. But it was not my name. I didn't even remember my name, my birth name. But Lupe was my name to all my brothers and sisters, whether I liked it or not.
I didn't hate my name, Lupe, that is. My uncle gave it to me when he gave me over to Ezio and it stuck. I never had a name before that. No one names the son of a holy man and a whore, no one wants to acknowledge such vulgarity. My birth name is nothing but ash in the road of my past. Where its remains lay, I knew not, nor cared to know.
I got up from my large chair grasping my wooden cane in my right hand as I walked around my dimly lit study. A longer room with windows on either side flanked by bookshelves closer to the door on the far end, but closer to the finely crafted wooden desk stood six suits of armor, each one of them bearing the iconic symbol of the creed on the sash and the hood drawn over the face. Six suits of armor from the six branches of the creed I visited. I passed by each suit not glancing at any of them, I knew the order by heart.
As I reached the door I clasped the brass handle and looked back. My gaze fell upon one last suit of armor standing behind my chair. The suit that started it all for me. An assortment of clothing I had picked up from all around Italy, the hood drawn over the face, the ebony and scarlet cape that proudly bore the symbol of the creed slung asymmetrically over the shoulders, and the dark bushel of wolf's fur I had added to adorn the top of the armor. Ezio said it made me look intimidating.
I smiled at the memory once again feeling a hot tear seep from my eyes lids. I blinked my eyes to banish it and turned the knob. I am old now, but the years I spent traveling the world made me the last person to ever forget anything, and yet; I couldn't remember anything prior the day before it all began to change.
Age is but a number.
