Altair had been surprised to find Darim in his room, seated on a low stool as if waiting for a death penalty, fingers laced together between stiff knees, forearms resting on both thighs. His son was covered head-to-toe in the familiar garb of an Assassin, body strapped with short sword, with throwing knives, with pouches, with hood up and crossbow on. It was several days after the bump in the library, after the fleeting glances at Tazim, after the skirmish by the ring.
Slowly, Darim stood up.
"What have you done with my son?" Altair asked lowly, but gently.
The reply, a quirking edge of Darim's lips in the shadow of the hood, looked shockingly familiar, especially with a fresh and new addition to the corner of them. A scar, pink and angry. Fresh.
For a moment, the sight was regarded with silence. He thought, at first, maybe he was hallucinating from the Apple again. He thought he was looking at his own reflection standing in front of him, younger, a mirage of his former days when he believed things couldn't get any worse than they already were at the time. It wasn't an illusion, though. It was Darim. "Where did you get that?" and Altair pointed at his own lip as he asked.
"Malik," Darim answered, finally tipping his head up so Altair could see the face below the hood. "Now we match."
Altair's brows furrowed, pinching his face with an unreadable hint of emotion. The air of the room, hot as always, consumed him, and he couldn't tell if the flush up his neck was from the heat or something else. "We do." They stood quietly for a little bit, though their eyes never left each other. "I got mine from Malik, too," Altair finally whispered, too afraid his voice might crack if he raised it any higher. Not the same Malik, but they both knew that much already.
"How?"
Gently, Altair shook his head. "I will tell you later," he said reassuringly. "Why are you…?" and he nodded his head at his son.
Darim looked down at the floor again, looked at himself, looked at his hands. His shoulders tightened as they rolled back, body rigid with a trained posture. He looked up like before, had a sort of determined resignation on his face. "I'm ready," he said on an exhale.
"For what?" asked Altair.
A slightly shaky sigh escaped Darim's lips, but he held himself up straight, flexed his wrists by his sides. "Anything," he said, and then added, "I'm ready to help. I'm ready to be an Assassin again. I'm ready to help Masyaf become the way it was before."
Both of Altair's brows lifted, and he stared at Darim as if the man had said there would be a trip to the moon. He knew exactly who to attribute this change to, but the very presence of it was still such a surprise. Darim, the son who had raced away to find Sef and never returned. Darim, the son who lashed him with a sharp tongue for fumbling over names and places because of the Apple. Darim, the son who threw up his hands and galloped away on a horse in Alamut because he cried quietly for the hundredth time over his missing friend and wife. Altair wondered, in the back of his mind, if this is what Malik had felt that day in the bureau.
…because you are not the same man...
Finally, Altair nodded his head in approval. "You were always ready."
"No," Darim said quickly, "I wasn't. I was lacking something, but"—he straightened himself up once more, head high—"I have it now." There was a pause. "Dad."
Shocked, Altair snapped his eyes up, stared hard at Darim with a gaze that inquired what his hitched breath denied him the ability to ask.
Darim closed the distance between them with long, but slow steps, came to rest just in front of Altair, chin lifted, eyes soft. "I'm sorry," and it was such a quiet, yet strong whisper, something more genuine than any jewel perched in any crown or ring. And then he was hugging Altair, a strong embrace around the shoulders, something that he really had not done since he was a small boy. It was there between them, hanging on the hot and dry air much like grapes on a vine, waiting, teetering. I love you. Neither of them could say it, and the words instead exploded through the return of the hug, reverberated back and forth through their arms and chests.
Altair's voice just barely scratched the surface of speaking: "I'm not the one to whom you owe an apology," and Darim could swear on his life that his father was crying.
"He will get his," Darim said.
