A/N: I do not own anything except my OCs.

Prologue

January 8, 1760

Five men stood in a small room on the upper floor of a Boston house. The room itself was quite bare, only holding a crib, a small Chippendale style chest-of-drawers and a rocking chair. One man held a small, moving bundle in his arms, a bundle which seemed to singularly hold the attention of all five men "Well, what are you going to name her, Thomas?" Haytham Kenway asked, smiling down at the black haired man called Thomas Hickey.

"Katherine Almena Hickey," Thomas murmured, smiling down at the raven-haired, blue-eyed baby that lay in his arms, a toothless smile turned up to him. "'er mum's name was Almena."

"Cute little girl...she will be a wonderful addition to our Order...when she is old enough," Haytham said, looking at the other three men standing in the room. "A girl could be just what we need, don't you all think?"

Murmurs of agreement answered his words as Thomas Hickey laid the baby in the crib. "She'll be jus' what we need one day...a girl always is."

March 5, 1770

The next ten years passed smoothly for the growing Templar Order and the growing girl-child, Katherine Hickey, affectionately called Kitty by the men in the order. When she was a few weeks old, Kitty's blue eyes turned a beautiful violet color that matched that of her late mother's and her black hair grew in perfect ringlets that framed her face when she wore it down.

When she was four, Kitty began being trained in a way similar to Haytham: learning how to become the shadows when it suited her, how to scale the buildings in Boston and, most importantly, how to kill without being seen. The last of these three things she merely observed until she was seven and was given the target of a man with Assassin sympathies. When she returned with the finger of the man, she was roundly rewarded by all five of the men.

Along with the physical training she received from her Master Kenway, she was also educated mentally by Master Johnson and Master Lee; Master Johnson taught her about other civilizations and their cultures and languages as well as the history of the Order while Master Lee taught her arithmetic, sciences and logic. Her two teachers often treated her to books with difficult words and ideas that they would quiz her own once she finished reading them. By the time she was nine, she could read, write and speak English, French, Italian, Latin and the Iroquois dialect belonging to the Mohawk tribe. The latter of the languages she learned when she went with Johnson to speak to the members of the tribe. She would often slink away from Master Johnson while he was speaking and play with the other children, absorbing and speaking their language.

All five top members of the Templar Order spoiled the girl from a young age; Master Kenway spoiled her with new dresses and shoes and hair ribbons while Masters Johnson and Lee spoiled her with story books and books she enjoyed reading, Master Church spoiled her with fancy jewelry that was honestly too grown up for the child, but she enjoyed looking at the sparkling chains and jewels and her own Papa, Thomas Hickey, spoiled her by buying her first a kitten when she was three, then a pony when she was six, a puppy when she was eight and a fine-looking, black mare when she was ten.

It was safe to say that Kitty was pampered and groomed to become the Princess of the Templars, but now, at ten, she was beginning to form her own opinions about the world and become more strong-willed and bull-headed. It was all the men could do to steer her in the direction they needed her to go. Several attempts to hold the ever tightening reins they had on Kitty were made the first on her seventh birthday when Master Kenway presented her with breeches, a shirt and a waistcoat that she could wear when they went out to train and again on her tenth birthday when he presented her with a pair of hidden blades made in the same style as his own. The hidden blades had an insignia on them that Kitty had been taught to treat with the utmost malice, but instead she only loved them that much more.

She often followed Master Kenway around Boston when he went out to run errands and would stand at his side wearing her "street clothes" as she had taken to calling the traditionally male clothes she was permitted to wear. Inevitably, she would always get bored and disappear in a crowd Master Kenway was walking through, but he never worried about her; she always returned safe and unharmed save a few bruises every once in a while.

Today was like any other day to Master Kenway. "Where's Kitty, Haytham? She went out with you and here you are without her," Master Johnson asked, looking up from his book with a wry smile when the dark-haired man walked in. The room into which the Londoner had walked into was just as Spartan as the nursery Kitty had lived in before containing only a dining table surrounded by tall chairs in front of a fireplace; in one corner sat a magnificent grandfather clock.

"Hmm? Oh, Kitty? She decided to explore the town a little more," Haytham replied, taking a seat at the table.

"Is that safe? I know you've trained her some, but should she really be permitted to wander around Boston unsupervised?"

"Well, we let Thomas go about town unsupervised, why shouldn't we let his daughter?"

William chuckled just as someone knocked on the door. Haytham frowned and walked to the door and opened the door to a guard with his hand on the shoulder of the black-haired, ten-year-old girl the pair of men had just been speaking with her twill cap in one hand at her side. "She says she lives here, but I told her no self-respecting man would let her run about in breeches like she was," the guard says stiffly, a bruise blooming under his right eye.

"No, I'm afraid she is my charge; she can be a handful, but we'll straighten her out, sir," Haytham says, smiling as he drew the girl into the house. The guard nodded, bowing slightly before retreating.

"Are you really going to punish me?" Kitty asked, looking up at Haytham with her violet colored eyes that seemed to peer into the depths of his very being and question all he believed.

"Did you give him the black eye?"

"Well...yes, Master Kenway."

"Then...no, no I won't. But you must be more careful, you know," Haytham said in a would-be-stern voice. Kitty nodded, looking down at the toes of her scuffed, leather boots. "Now, go change; we have to go to King Street."

"Yes, sir," Kitty said, bowing slightly before running up the stairs on the right.

"And be quick about it! We don't need to be late!" Haytham called after her.

Kitty went straight to her room and divested herself of her "street" clothes before pulling a linen shift over her head. Her nurse, a broad, homely woman whose grungy brown hair had began to turn gray at the temples, came in and helped her dress, putting on her jumps and tying her pocket about her waist before putting on two woolen petticoats and her white cap. "The Master wants you to wear this new dress, Miss," her nurse murmured, holding up a yellow, silk gown. Kitty's eyes lit up as she allowed her nurse to slip the fine garment over her head and lace it up. Next her nurse tied a wool neckerchief about her neck. "Go on now, child."

**Meanwhile**

Once Kitty had disappeared upstairs, Haytham turned back to William. "Just what are you planning, Haytham?" William asked, smiling up at the other man.

"There is much unrest and the only way to soothe it is to uncork the bottle."

A few moments later, thumping footsteps were heard on the stairs seconds before Kitty appeared wearing her yellow dress with a full skirt that just barely brushed the tops of her boots. "I'm ready, Master Kenway!"

Haytham smiled, handing Kitty a cape, then led her through Boston, a guiding hand on her narrow shoulder. Once they arrived at King Street, Kitty looked around at the angry, yelling people, then looked up at Haytham for guidance. He smiled encouragingly at the girl, then turned and began talking to two men.

With her guardian distracted, Kitty allowed her sharp eyes to examine the crowd, observing those that seemed to be instigating the unrest. Her eyes finally came to rest on a boy, obviously half-Indian and somewhat familiar to her, and an older black man who were watching Haytham. Kitty frowned as the boy disappeared in the crowd to follow one of the men Haytham had been talking to.

"Master Kenway...what is that boy doing?" she asked, looking up.

"He thinks he is going to stop my plan..." Haytham murmured, watching the boy until he was out of sight. "If he succeeds in catching the man I sent, I will need you to follow him."

"I cannot do that in a dress," she murmured, looking down at her dress.

"No...not effectively. There are some breeches, a shirt and a waistcoat in the church behind us...go and change quickly...I will collect your dress and other articles later."

Kitty nodded, running into the church and hiding in one of the stairwells to change. Though she had needed help dressing, undressing proved to be a simple task as the most difficult part being unlacing the dress, but if she reached behind her back just so, she found she could grab the end of one string and untie the bow. Once she loosed the dress and let it fall to the floor, the rest just seemed to fall off without much effort. Dressing back up in her "street" clothes was simple enough as she was used to dressing quickly. The finishing touch was effectively hiding her black hair under her cap.

She left the church and immediately climbed to its peak, just in time to hear a gunshot ring out in the square. She tracked the sound to Master Lee standing on a roof opposite the boy Master Kenway had instructed her to follow. Kitty dove off the belfry and began to run after the boy. She tailed him all day, pretending to be one of the street urchins when he noticed her. Soon, he was leading her out of Boston; Master Kenway had not said when she should stop following him so she continued, whistling for her horse as the boy entered the frontier and mounted his own horse.

Kitty followed at a safe distance, her misgivings about following the boy for so long slowly dissolving. The longer she rode behind him, it took about a day to get wherever the boy was leading, the more certain Kitty was that this boy was one from the Mohawk village she visited with Master Johnson. Soon they seemed to arrive on a homestead. The boy rode straight to the manor, jumped off his horse, went inside and began to berate the older black man that he had been with in Boston.

Kitty slid off her horse and slapped his hindquarters to convince him to run off and hide. She sneaked slowly up to the window to listen to the pair inside the manor. She made it to the window just in time to hear the boy say something about his father. Who could his father possibly be? she wondered her brows knitting together.

The old man presented the Indian boy a box, and, before Katherine got a good look at what was inside it, she heard someone running closer. She looked around for a place to hide and jumped into a pile of leaves at the last minute, hardly daring to breathe until she saw them all run back out of the house and toward the river. Kitty let out a sigh of relief as she rolled out of the leaves, her hat falling off her head and letting her hair to fall about her shoulders. She picked it up and dusted it off, but didn't bother putting it back on.

Right at that moment, Kitty's stomach gave a disgruntled growl reminding her that she hadn't eaten since she had broken fast the day before. She bit her lip and looked around warily before going into the house and going straight to the kitchen. There wasn't much food, but there was enough to sate Kitty's hunger at the moment; a few grapes and a loaf of bread was all she needed. Before she could get out of the house, she heard the boy and the old man coming back into the manor. Kitty knew she was cornered before the pair even came into the kitchen so she slid her hidden blades out and turned to them.

"We aren't going to hurt you, girl," the old man soothed, approaching her. "You have the mark of the Assassin's on your blades, don't you?"

Kitty looked down at her blades, the Assassin's insignia burned into the leather. "Yes, sir," she murmured, fighting the instinct to run.

"Then you have reached a safe place, my child."

"But-"

"Our Order must have sent her to help us grow in America, isn't that right?"

Kitty knew the opportunity was too good to pass up and she was nothing if not opportunistic. She nodded, holding herself straighter. She could use the accent she had assimilated from Haytham to her advantage to convince the Assassins that she had come from London.

"Yes, sir, it is true. When they heard you were still here and training someone, they sent me to help grow the Order," Kitty said in a clear voice, bowing her head to the older man.

The old man nodded. "I am Achilles and this is Connor."

Kitty looked up at Connor, her eyes narrowing slightly. "It is nice to meet you, Connor. I hope that, in time, we can become friends."

Well? What do y'all think so far? Please R&R...it makes me happy to see what y'all think.