I'M SO INCREDIBLY SORRY THIS TOOK SO DARN LONG TO GET POSTED! I have been insanely busy recently and have slowly been chipping away at this chapter for weeks. Finally tonight I made myself sit down and finish it. I hope it's not too disappointing.
Alessandra barely saw Ezio for the next six weeks. When she did it was always in passing, barely a word exchanged between them. Ezio was kept busy chasing down phantom leads as to the identity of the traitor and trying to outthink the Borgia at every turn. He had just received a message from Machiavelli that another safe house had been raided. It was a small one in the south, empty at the time of the attack, but now under Borgia control.
Ezio rode his black war horse to the site, the longer, meandering path giving him time to think back to the events a month and a half before.
He had expected Alessandra to take a few weeks to decide, not a mere twenty minutes. Though the decision had been made over a month ago his mind kept slipping back to it. Ezio wasn't displeased with her choice, and her involvement meant no more lies, but he didn't think Alessandra fully understood the implications of her decision. She wasn't a killed; not like him. She worked hard to keep those around her safe to even contemplate hurting someone else. Her mercy would be her downfall.
Horatio on the other hand would make a fine assassin one day. Nine years old and he was already cold and calculating. With combat training and a little maturity he would prove to be as skilled as the legendary Altair Iban-La Ahad, though hopefully with greater humility and respect for the Order.
Ezio came within a few blocks of the safe house and dismounted, tethering the horse to a post. He scaled a building and allowed his vision to fade to blue. Ezio didn't knew how he came by the ability, or how exactly he could do it, he just did. With his line of work the uncanny ability to sense not only enemies, but targets was priceless. He'd heard rumors that some of the ancient assassins had been able to do it too, but they were only whispers, vague allusions of some mystical sixth sense. He wouldn't have believed them if he hadn't been able to do it himself.
The shadows around him deepened and bright patches of light became blindingly white. Dark navy and rich cobalt flooded his view from the sky to the earth, making his head spin momentarily until he adjusted to the new way of seeing. Everything seemed to glow, surrounded by a haze, blurring with movement. He knew from experience to watch for the red haze that marked his enemies but to ignore the light blue of standard civilians. As Ezio crouched on the roof he scanned the surrounding area for the safe house. It wasn't hard to find, coated in a hazy gold like a coin on a hot day, it stood out from its drab fellows. Ezio had never been to this particular safe house, it was frequented by thieves more often than assassins. However, Machiavelli had insisted in his letter that Ezio investigate it and remove anything that could aid the Templars.
Having located the building, Ezio allowed his vision to lapse back to normal, blinking a few times to clear it completely. He looked at the den with his normal eyes and saw a squat cobblers shop huddled between a butcher and a tanner. The location was sure to reek to high heavens on a hot day and smell horrible every other day of the year. It was a street that patrols would avoid just to escape the stink and surrounded by taller buildings, providing easy roof access. It was an ideal location for a thieves den, but it seemed that hadn't saved it from the hand of the Borgia. The work of the soldiers was evident by its current state.
The windows were shattered and the door hung broken in its frame. A Borgia banner had been hung from the roof claiming the building as their property. Several men guarded the door chatting idly and looking bored. Whatever violence had taken place in the establishment had long since ended.
Ezio was preparing an aerial attack on the soldiers, he would have been able to kill all three before they even knew of his presence, when shouts from down the street stopped him. A patrol was approaching, calling for the men guarding the building to run for a prison transport.
Two of the soldiers obeyed without question, leaving the third to meet the new group. The patrol drew close enough that Ezio could see what was causing the uproar.
A figure in white hung limp between two of the guards, it was obvious from his robes that he was an assassin. Ezio gritted his teeth in anger and gripped his throwing knives. From this distance he couldn't make out which recruit he was. Ezio moved closer to the edge of the roof, straining his ears to hear what was being said.
"...sneaking into a weapon depot not far from here. He was placing explosives all over the place. I managed to shoot him in the leg before he could do any real damage." one of the men holding the recruit was saying.
From the amount of blood on the man's clothes Ezio suspected they had done more than simply shoot him. He looked to have taken a rather severe beating.
"Why didn't you finish him off?" the man watching the safe house asked.
"The Captain General likes it when we can take these ones alive. Besides, this is the bastardo who turned traitor. He deserves whatever the General wants to do to him."
Ezio cursed silently. The unconscious man was Antonio. Wagon wheels rumbled on stone as the requested transport arrived, pulled by two red clad horses, the carriage looking battered, but the iron across the door strong.
Ezio could have attacked; could have killed every soldier there and brought Antonio back to the lovely doting Alessandra. But he didn't. Some unseen force stayed his hand, keeping him on the roof and away from the action. Blades remained in sheaths as Antonio was tossed unceremoniously into the vehicle.
"Cazzo." Ezio hissed. Antonio knew nothing important enough to cause the Brotherhood to collapse, but that didn't mean that what he did know wasn't dangerous. Ezio tried to force himself into violent action, to stop the coach and save the boy but he couldn't. A nasty, dark part of him was in control and it kept him frozen in place. He didn't want to think of that part, but it was impossible. Ezio knew exactly why he allowed that carriage to start off down the street, allowed the soldiers to joke about what Cesare Borgia was going to do to the young man.
Ezio knew that that dark part of him, the part that had been dragged to the forefront of his mind hated Antonio. Antonio was young, he had his entire life ahead of him; a reflection of Ezio when he was young and carefree, still untouched by the true cruelty of the world. Antonio could have chosen to be anything he wanted to be, and yet he joined the Assassins, a choice Ezio had never been given. Antonio had the chance for a life beyond all of the death and chaos that Ezio endured; a life with Alessandra. Antonio was everything Ezio had lost and everything he could never be. He hated him for it.
The wagon turned a corner and disappeared out of sight. Ezio released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. He contemplated following the wagon but knew he wouldn't be able to do anything to stop it. Instead he launched himself off the room onto the unsuspecting heads of the remaining guards. They died silently, weapons buried deep in their chests. They weren't the ones around, but they were the closest and so died unnoticed. Not stopping to bother with the door Ezio entered the building through a shattered window.
Machiavelli had suggested investigation, not recapture and so that's what Ezio did. He didn't expect to find anything of great value; after all, the building had already been raided. The rooms had all been cleared out, only broken furniture remained. Ezio sighed and kicked a chair. These last several weeks it seemed that he had been thrown from one problem to the next with barely a chance to breath.
After searching each room and finding nothing in the normal spectrum he allowed his vision to blur and refocus in blue. To his surprise there was something different. He stood in a small office in the back of the building, the room shrouded in deep shadow. To his right in the corner a section of floor was shimmering gold. He strode to it and knelt, feeling along the edge of the gold for any seams in the stone. After a moment he felt a gap large enough to work a blade into and pried the small slab up. Beneath the stone Ezio found a small earthen chamber containing a small box. There was no clasp, but branded into the dark wood was the seal of the Assassins. Carefully Ezio removed the box from the ground and replaced the stone. Clutching the thin case he exited the building through the back and made his way silently down the alley.
Once away, he circled the area back to where he'd left the black warhorse. The animal was still there, as was the trampled body of a young man. He'd obviously been trying to steal the horse, but the animal had different ideas. Despite its ties being cut and hanging loose it was in the same place as Ezio had left it. It flicked its ears lazily as he approached and started off at a slow trot when he urged it forward. He left the would-be horse thief in the street for the guards or some unlucky roman to find, in too bad of a mood to bother dumping the body.
What's in the case you might ask…you'll find out later *le winky face* again, I'm so so so so so so sorry this took so long to get out.