Once he and little Maria had returned to the Rosa – after a meal and some rest for the night, of course – Ezio found himself called to a meeting by La Volpe at his hotel. Leaving a message with Lucia, so that Mother, Claudia, and little Maria wouldn't worry so much for him, Ezio made his way into the depths of the Rosa and then back down into the tunnels that had been such a boon for him and his brother and sister Assassins ever since Machiavelli had pointed them out.
Truly, he didn't look forward to making do without them, once he and his departed from Roma; whenever they were compelled to do such a thing.
Once he'd made it back to La Volpe Addormentata, following the signs on the wall that had clearly been renewed by some helpful thief or other, Ezio sighed with relief as he dusted the crumbs from the bread he'd taken along to eat from his hands, since he hadn't been able to have breakfast before he'd received La Volpe's message. Making his way up to the main floor of the Inn that La Volpe had established so well for himself, at least once he and little Maria had aided the man in restoring it, Ezio soon found himself pulled aside by one of the younger thieves who was evidently serving as La Volpe's messenger at the moment.
Apparently, the man wished to hold the meeting he'd called in his office, a place that Ezio hadn't visited quite enough times yet to make his way there without checking for the sign that La Volpe had so helpfully put up. Once he'd made his way into the office that La Volpe maintained, he found that the man was about to rise from the desk that he'd been working behind for what seemed to be some time, if the volume of paperwork on his desk was any indication.
"Ezio, it's good to see that you came so quickly," La Volpe said, a pleased expression on his face as he settled back into his seat. "There's something I need to speak with you about."
"Bene, but there's also something that I wish to discus with you, as well," he said, settling down in the chair that La Volpe offered to him.
"What would that be, Ezio?"
"It's time to pay a visit to Lucrezia's lover, Pietro," he said; he'd spotted the man when he and Aeon had made their way through the Castello Sant'Angelo, while the man in black himself had gone on to rescue Caterina in his own strange, unearthly way.
He'd known that the information he'd gathered would come in handy sooner or later, so he was glad to have it.
"Bene, I already have people looking for him," La Volpe said, nodding.
"Sí¸ and that's good, but a working actor shouldn't be hard to find, particularly a famous one like this one."
"Sí, but the man is apparently famous enough to have his own minders," La Volpe said, shaking his head. "And, there's been some indication that he's gone to ground, since he's afraid of Cesare."
"He'd have to be mad not to be," he said, shaking his head; either mad, or with more skill than his profession would suggest. "Keep looking, will you?" Still, he hadn't heard anything that even hinted that there was anything more to Lucrezia's plaything than what he'd first seen while observing the pair of them during their clandestine meeting; a meeting that Cesare had clearly had his own people observing, as well. "Now, what was it that you wanted to talk to me about, Volpe?"
"It's a rather delicate matter," La Volpe said, seeming to wrestle with himself for a long moment, before deciding to press on. "Someone has warned Rodrigo to stay away from the Castello Sant'Angelo."
"And you suspect Machiavelli?" he asked, suspecting what he was about to hear, but wishing to hear such words from the source, all the same.
"It's a difficult thing, I know, but all of the information that I've been able to gather points to the same conclusion," La Volpe said, the look on his face suggesting that he was marshalling his arguments. "However, the attack on Monteriggioni, and then this whole business with Rodrigo…"
"I know that this whole business with Machiavelli has been preying on your mind, but we mustn't allow ourselves to be driven apart by mere suspicion."
Just as he was about to get up, having said his piece and knowing that La Volpe would need to think about what had been going on before he made any kind of decision about what he was going to do next, Ezio turned at the sudden slam of the door as it was suddenly, roughly opened. A young thief, clearly wounded in a running-battle of the kind Ezio had become uncomfortably familiar with during the course of his work with the Brotherhood, staggered into the office, his gaze seeming to lock on La Volpe.
"Bad news! The Borgia know the locations of our spies!" the man shouted, even as Ezio rushed to catch him before he could lose his hold on the door and fall to the floor.
"Who told them?!" La Volpe demanded, rising from his seat with a face like a thundercloud.
"Maestro Machiavelli was asking about our search for the actor, Pietro, earlier today," the man said, and Ezio struggled to keep himself from visibly wincing.
He couldn't help but notice the fact that the man sounded distinctly unrehearsed, even though this was one of the way he'd had some of his and little Maria's recruits working to destabilize more than a few of the remaining holds that the Borgia possessed on the people of Roma. If nothing else, even as he found himself entirely annoyed at the timing, Ezio found that he had to admire the elegance of what was happening. Even if it wasn't one of the Borgias' plans, it would have much the same effect if he allowed it to go much farther.
"Ezio," La Volpe said, turning to him with the expression of a man who had just had a particularly unpleasant suspicion confirmed; Ezio sighed, knowing how any defense of Machiavelli would make him look in the thief's eyes.
"They've got four of our men under guard!" the young thief shouted, drawing their attention once more. "I was lucky to get away when I did!"
"Where are they keeping them?" he asked, guiding the wounded thief over to the chair that he'd been previously seated in, if only long enough so that he would be able to tend at least some of the young man's wounds in what time they clearly had.
"Not far from here: near Santa Maria del Orto," the young thief reported, shooting him a grateful expression as he finished bandaging the worst of his wounds.
"Grazie, Ezio, but we should get moving," La Volpe said, and Ezio let the man pull him back to his feet, offering his own arm to the young thief as he did so.
The three of them quickly made their way out to the stables that La Volpe maintained on his property, with the man himself calling for the pair of them to ride as swiftly as they could.
"I still do not believe that Machiavelli has turned traitor," he called, as the pair of them rode for Santa Maria del Orto.
"I will allow that the man has done a great deal of good for our cause in the past, and yet, you must also consider the latest happenings: first the attack on Monteriggioni, then the business at Castello Sant'Angelo, and now this. I hardly see who else could be behind it all."
"We can discus this later!" he called back, as the pair of them continued on their way. "We may still be in time to save them!"
As he and La Volpe continued their headlong, heedless dash through the narrow streets of Roma, Ezio could only hope that his declaration – preemptive and optimistic as it may very well have been – ended up proving true when they arrived. The journey seemed to take longer than it likely lasted, which he'd been expecting considering who he'd found himself worrying for those thieves who had been taken captive by the Borgia, but when Ezio finally caught sight of the covered wagon that the Borgia guards were attempting to force the force the four thieves that they had captured into, it was with a distinct sense of relief.
Even as he and La Volpe descended upon the guards, cutting them off from their would-be victims not only with the strength of their sword-arms, but also with the weight of their horses as they pushed through the thronging guards. The added height helped to mitigate the advantage of reach that the group of halberdiers would have otherwise possessed, and Ezio shifted to cut down any of the Borgia guards who moved in his direction.
"Run! Head back to base! We'll meet you there!" La Volpe shouted, once he'd managed to clear out the ranks of Borgia guards threatening him.
Breathing more easily once he'd managed to clear out the front ranks of the Borgia halberdiers, leaving only those who had possessed either the good sense to run, or those who had been too grievously injured to move; more of the latter than the former, it had to be said.
Turning to follow in the wake of the escaping thieves, shepherding them so that they wouldn't run into anyone else who might cause trouble for them – or at least would have ample protection if such a thing were to happen – Ezio only allowed himself to relax fully once he saw the surrounding environs of La Volpe Addormentata coming into view once more. Dismounting inside the stables, he and La Volpe made their way back into the inn, while the four thieves that they'd rescued made their way down into the hidden passages that Ezio had found himself becoming steadily more well-acquainted with the longer he spent in Roma.
It truly did remind him of the catacombs he'd found in Venezia and Firenze both, back when he'd still been starting out within the Brotherhood.
As he and La Volpe made their way back into the inn, Ezio looked back as the thief flipped the sign on the door to the side that read "closed", without even breaking stride. As he and La Volpe settled down at the bar, Ezio more than glad to have the chance to sit on something that wasn't bouncing around as much as even the most well-trained mount did as a matter of course, he looked over briefly as he heard La Volpe ordering refreshments.
Both for them, and for the men who were even now making their way into the room where he and La Volpe had previously settled themselves.
However, even before the first of those men had settled down at the bar alongside them, La Volpe had begun his interrogation.
"What were you able to find out?"
"There's a plan to kill the actor this evening," the leader of this particular group, a scarred man who didn't seem to have reached his physical prime yet, said. "Cesare is sending his butcher to do it, personally."
"Who is that?" he asked, unsure of just which one of Cesare's hired thugs he'd have to be dealing with next.
"You've seen him," La Volpe said, turning to him with a distinct expression of distaste. "Micheletto Corella; no one could forget a face like that."
And indeed, Ezio found himself recalling the face of the man the face of the man who had been standing at Cesare's right hand during the attack on Monteriggioni, as well as in the stables of Castello Sant'Angelo when he'd paid a visit to that place during the course of his work. A cruel, battered face; a face that seemed to have far more years about it than the body it was attached to could have lived, if the voice he'd heard in the stables was any indication. A face with hard, empty eyes, and a mouth scarred so that it seemed permanently fixed into a sardonic smirk.
Not a man that Ezio would have wished to meet, at least under any other circumstances than the ones he was about to be arranging.
"The man can kill his victims in one hundred and fifty different ways, it's been said, but it's widely known that his favorite method is strangulation," La Volpe said, taking up the thread of their conversation once more. "He's certainly the most accomplished murderer in Roma; no one has yet managed to escape him."
"Let's hope that I can change that tonight," Ezio said, knowing that, with Aeon by his side, he would have a much better chance of making good on his resolve than someone who was forced to work without the aid of the man in black.
For all that he didn't wish to rely too heavily on the ephemeral Assassin, Ezio could hardly deny that the man was an asset like no other.
"Where is it to take place?" La Volpe asked, returning his attention to his thieves once more. "Have you managed to find out?"
"Pietro's performing in a passion play this evening," that same thief, who seemed to have appointed himself as the spokesman for his group, said. "He's been rehearsing in a secret location."
"He must be terrified," Ezio said, feeling a hint of sympathy for the man who had found himself in Cesare's sights for what would be a minor indiscretion to anyone who was not completely mad.
"And?" La Volpe prompted, glancing briefly Ezio's way, before returning his attention to his gathered thieves.
"He's going to be playing Christ," one of the younger thieves snickered, inordinately amused by everything that was going on; La Volpe glared at him, and even Ezio found himself looking askance until the young man had sobered. "He's to be suspended from a cross," the man continued. "Micheletto will come at him with a spear, pierce his side, only it won't be make-believe."
"Do you know where Pietro is?" he asked, turning his attention to the thief who seemed to have taken over their conversation.
"I can't tell you that," the younger man said, shaking his head. "We couldn't find out. But, we do know that Micheletto will be waiting at the Terme di Traiano. His plan seems to be this: his men will be disguised in costumes, therefore making the killing look like an accident."
"That still leaves us without any real way of telling where this play is due to be held," he said, knowing that there was little he could do to change the circumstances they were currently operating under, but still finding himself annoyed by them, all the same.
"We can't tell you something we don't know, Messer Ezio," the first thief spoke up again, a tolerant sort of annoyance on his face. "Still, I doubt it'll be far from where Micheletto is planning to gather his people."
"Sí, I suppose that's the best I can ask for," he said, nodding. "I'll go there and shadow him; he will lead me to Lucrezia's lover. Grazie, mi amici."
"Anything else?" La Volpe asked, sweeping his gaze over the gathered thieves.
When he was answered in the negative by the last of the men who he had called to meet with him, and more than that when the refreshments that he'd ordered were brought over at last, La Volpe stood up, calling Ezio over to speak with him as his thieves all fell upon it with almost visible gratitude.
"Ezio, I know that neither of us are particularly eager to believe this, but I am convinced that Machiavelli has betrayed us," the leader of the Brotherhood's allied thieves said, his expression as grave as Ezio had ever seen it.
"Is that simply because he'd been acting mysteriously? Or the way he keeps to himself to a great degree?" Ezio asked, feeling more than a little amused for the fact that he could have just as easily have been speaking about Aeon as he was about Machiavelli.
"Sí, I suppose our men in black do have quite a bit in common with one another," La Volpe said, with an amused chuckle of his own.
"Can I still count on your aid for this?" he asked, wishing to know just what kind of support he was going to be operating with, so that he could begin to make plans in earnest.
"Sí, as long as you make sure to keep an eye on Machiavelli," La Volpe assured him "Set Messer Aeon on him, if things keep going wrong like this."
"I'll keep that option open," he said, smiling softly as he turned to make his way back down into the hidden tunnel system again.
There were more than a few things about La Volpe's manner, as the pair of them had been speaking, that let Ezio know that he would be better off relying on the men and women that he and little Maria had recruited. At least until he'd managed to find out who was truly passing information to the Borgia and had managed to root them out. Like as not, Aeon would end up lending him aid in the matter, since the man in black seemed to be just as dedicated to the Brotherhood as any of them.
Perhaps even moreso, given everything he had proved to be willing to do; binding himself to the Apple by whatever means he had being only the first part of it.
As he made his way up into the lower levels of the Rosa in Fiore, Ezio chuckled as he felt his stomach rumbling. It looked like he was going to be joining little Maria and the rest of his family for at least one more meal, before he had to leave to rescue the man who'd fallen afoul of Cesare Borgia and his depraved proclivities. He'd have to consider just who he was going to bring along on mission when he inevitably departed again.
On the one hand, the fact that he'd managed to secure La Volpe's confidence once more meant that he would have little trouble working with the thieves who made their homes within Roma, but on the other there was no denying that this would be a prime opportunity to train more of the recruits that he and little Maria had gathered from those unfortunate districts that still remained in the hands of the Borgia. Reminding himself to think about such things in more detail later, Ezio rubbed the kinks out of his neck as he made his way back into the semi-public area of the Rosa in Fiore.
Because, while it was true that come this evening he would have a great deal to do, he would always do the best he could to make time to spend with his family.