The Fourth Life: With Arno

We start Main Story things in this chapter, and all the dates and stuff line up in such a way that the next Co-op mission doesn't happen until after Mirabeau dies, so you can guess what this chapter is about, and what the next chapter will revolve around.

Disclaimer: I don't own PJO or AC

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"Man, saying bring him peace is a whole lot nicer than gut him and spill his blood, right?"

Arno didn't know what the sudden increase in his heartbeat was supposed to mean when he heard Cheyenne's voice for the first time in so many months. Hell, they hadn't even seen each other since their mission together back in October of last year, effectively three months to the day. However, that wasn't to say Arno was completely in the dark about Cheyenne's activities. There were reports about a girl that was being repeatedly seen with Cheyenne, and rumors were circulating through the Brotherhood about who this girl was, and just what the nature of her relationship with Cheyenne was.

The dominant theory was that she was a Templar, and she was now planning an attack or a coup with Cheyenne in retaliation against the Assassins, and that it was high time for Cheyenne to be reunited with her traitorous grandfather, and Arno certainly knew that when his heart started beating at hearing that sentiment, it was out of intense anger.

The second most widely accepted idea was that the girl was Cheyenne's lover, which led to a myriad of reactions and emotions among the Assassins, Arno in particular feeling pangs of something ugly and unreasonable inside him that he couldn't quite decipher.

The third rumor, and by far the most disregarded yet known for its sheer stupidity, was that the girl in silver was an agent sent by Heaven, or some higher power, to avenge Cheyenne for what the Assassins had done to her, killing her grandfather, training her so brutally in bordered on torture, stripping her of identity, practically enslaving her, etc. Though, perhaps the reason that rumor was so spat upon wasn't because it was ludicrous, but because it made people really, really uncomfortable with its possibility and they didn't want to admit it.

Bottom line was that the only things known about Cheyenne's new friend was that she was beautiful, dressed in trousers, boots and a silver dress, had a bow and quiver, dual knives, some pouches on her belt, tan skin, black hair tied into a braid over her shoulder, a silver circlet on her brow, her name was Zoё, and she had no inclination to meet with any of the Assassins, Novices or the top brass—save for Cheyenne, obviously—which led to wide mistrust and scrutiny.

Surveillance was ordered, of course, since Cheyenne's loose cannon-ness was well-known, and this Zoё equally unknown, leading to pressing questions that needed answering, and Cheyenne clearly wasn't talking, meeting all questions with a sly little smirk and malicious twinkle in her eye, but all Assassins that were sent to spy quickly returned to the Sanctuary—quickly as in a few hours after departure—with two unique afflictions:

Men returned on their hands and feet, barking and behaving as dogs, complete with tongue-panting, begging for treats, and hiking their legs up to pee on the furniture.

Women returned with the minds of small children, lisping, shy, and suddenly unfamiliar with how to utilize a chamber pot, an outhouse, or how to operate the flush toilet the Brotherhood was working hard to perfect.

All in all, the Assassins of the Parisian Brotherhood found themselves with much more laundry to worry about, and it was determined that Zoё was either in possession of a Piece of Eden, was a skilled hypnotist, or she was a witch.

Almost no one bought into the witch idea given the knowledge of the Precursors and their technology, and how said tech was largely responsible for just about everything in the world today, but that didn't stop Abrielle le Pen from insisting otherwise.

Though everyone knew that was just because she had returned from her mission with diarrhea pooled in her trousers, staining the legs all the way down to the knees.

The higher ups had even charged Arno with trying to spy on Zoё, since it seemed like he and Cheyenne had hit it off rather well during their October mission, now dubbed the Women's March. However, after Bellec had come back and kept attempting to sniff at Arno's rear, the Dorian scion politely (read: with extreme firmness) declined.

Besides, it didn't sit well with him, the mentors trying to use his budding relationship with Cheyenne as a means to glean information on Zoё.

That didn't stop the Mentors from still giving him the passing assignment of more or less interrogating Cheyenne about Zoё the next time they were together.

Arno liked to think part of the reason he hadn't seen Cheyenne in so long was because she knew about his passive mission, and didn't want to put him in the troubling position of adhering to duty while conflicting with his conscience. There was probably a more sensible reason Cheyenne hadn't spoken to him in so many months, but thinking like he did made Arno feel better.

Especially because he hadn't seen Elise in almost a year now.

"Yes, Mirabeau does have a way with his words," Arno said to Cheyenne. "However, being a politician, I do suppose words are something he's good with."

"Given how fat he is, words are probably the only thing he's good with."

"Now, now. That's no way to speak of our esteemed Mentor."

Cheyenne shrugged. "I guess. So, la Cour des Miracles to hunt down La Touche in order to find out where Roi des Thunes is at?"

"Yes," Arno blinked.

"Sweetness. Heard you killed Sivert and got the Phantom Blade. Feel good killing a Templar?"

"It felt good killing one of the men responsible for Monsieur de la Serre's death."

"Like, how good though? On a scale of un à dix?"

"Onze."

"Really? Well then, let's see if we can't crank it up to a douze."

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Now, la Cour des Miracles, in the historical context, did not refer to a single area. Instead, it was an umbrella term for several slum areas of Paris scattered around the city. Fortunately, there was one court that stood among the others, and that's where Arno and Cheyenne went first.

They arrived at night, and wove their way through a small crowd to a building that was more of a hut than an actual building, wherein they happened across the sight of some poor man being held down by red-garbed Extremists, while another was unceremoniously sawing his leg off.

The only sounds were that of the crackling fire, the saw going through bone and muscle, and screaming.

"Wow," Cheyenne said. "The last time I was here, they were cutting off some guy's dick and some girl's boobs."

Arno felt his balls involuntarily shrivel at the thought of someone hacking them off with a saw. "And you didn't stop any of that because…?"

Cheyenne gave him a lopsided smirk that was made all the more devious since her hood obscured half her face. "Hide in plain sight. Never compromise the Brotherhood."

Arno crossed his arms. "Like you don't take liberties with the Creed."

"True, true, but this was before I discovered the loopholes."

"Before you discovered the loopholes—how old were you when you were last here?"

"Eighteen, so a little over a year ago. But when I was first brought here…" Cheyenne grinned, "…I was ten. They were cutting off hands and feet. My trainer made me watch so I would get used to the violence and blood….He also threatened to give me to the butchers if I didn't start minding him more. He would've done it, too."

Arno was making a face under his hood, totally revolted.

"Anyway, there's La Touche."

Honestly quite thankful for the distraction, Arno looked and saw the man from the memories he saw from Sivert, and was even less impressed with an in-person show of La Touche. Slouching, dressed in dirty, patched clothes streaked with mud and bird droppings, cracked glasses, a scraggly, unkempt beard, and a shredded, wide-brimmed hat. And forget the smell.

Arno had noted the stench of la Cour des Miracles when he got here, but La Touche arriving brought a noticeably more pungent odor.

The Assassin moved forward, ready to get things going, but a voice behind stopped him.

"Oh, I wouldn't do that. Look."

Arno and Cheyenne looked to see two more Extremists come in, making the total five, La Touche making six.

The man that spoke was wearing a green coat with a mostly-torn up shirt that revealed nearly all of his chest, dingy trousers, and old boots. He had a mole on the right side of his chin, and his hair was brown at the roots, and powdered everywhere else, pulled into the typical style of the day, a ponytail at the back with curls at the sides.

"De Sade," Cheyenne said flatly. "Are you going to incorporate body-part removal in any of your novels?"

"I just might for your sake, darling," the Marquis answered with his sly tone. "In fact, I just might make you the title character—yes, Cheyenne, the Mistress of Removal, in that men come to you to feel your saw cutting across their flesh."

"Yeah, and if I ever hear about that book making print, I'll not only burn down whatever press it came from, but I'll choke you to death with the pages."

"Should I give you two a moment?" Arno asked sarcastically.

"No need, Monsieur Dorian," de Sade said. "It's a short-lived game Cheyenne and I play every time we meet. What we're all here for is Roi des Thunes."

There was a dull thump, and the trio looked to see that the Extremists had finished sawing off that man's leg.

"Yes, it's been discovered that the people of Paris give more money to crippled beggars than old ones, a little bit of trivia Roi des Thunes uses to motivate his less productive underlings."

"Fascinating," Arno said dispassionately. "Do you have anything to offer in finding Roi des Thunes?"

De Sade hummed, thinking tactically. "These rats here…you could charge in, causing the swarm to scatter. Or you could vanish into it, and follow them to their leader."

"…yeah," Cheyenne said. "I'm not a fan of rats, and I'm pretty sure La Touche can't run very fast, so…"

And Shay's granddaughter promptly broke the second tenant of the Creed, the hide in plain sight one, by throwing a stun grenade and drawing her pistols, unleashing five shots in quick succession, blowing out the brains of the five dazed Extremists before the effects of the grenade wore off. When the screaming started, Cheyenne had already been in motion, and she rammed into La Touche, shoulder lowered, and she sent the spindly little man blasting through the rotted wood of the wall.

"Goodness, that girl is something else," de Sade praised. "If I were you, Arno, I wouldn't let a specimen like that slip through my fingers."

"I'll keep that in mind," Arno said. "Now, if you'll excuse me."

"Of course. Oh! And do come see me after you're done!"

The Assassin didn't turn around to offer any confirmation, opting to merely step over the bodies and try to put that lecherous man out of his mind.

Meanwhile, the good marquis had an erection to satisfy, one spurned by the phantasy of Cheyenne's mouth upon his shaft while an animal, a dog or a goat being at the top of the list, took her ass from behind.

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"Where is Roi des Thunes!?"

Arno heard the rough, hard voice, and was really confused as to who it was coming from, because he figured it was Cheyenne, but that sounded way too…manish…to come from Cheyenne.

"H-He's in the catacombs under the old church!" La Touche wailed. "I swear to God!"

"Swear to me!"

"I-I-I-I sw-sw-swear t-t-to y-you!"

"There," Cheyenne said sweetly. "That wasn't so hard."

She conked the former taxman on the head hard enough to knock him out, but not kill him. She turned around, and Arno must've had one of hell of an expression on his face, because she promptly burst into a fit of giggles when she saw him.

"What was that?" Arno demanded.

"That was my Scary Voice. I use it when interrogating people."

"That wasn't a scary voice. That was you channeling the forces of Hell."

"Something like that, yeah. Anyway, to the old church!"

And so Arno and Cheyenne made their way to the old church, and scanned the area from above.

"What do you see?" the Cormac girl asked, all traces of mirth and humor gone for the moment.

Arno looked. "I see smoke rising from vents in the ground, beggars warming their hands by them, meaning fires underground. Extremists are blocking people from getting to the church, so it won't take much to start a small riot."

"Your plan?"

"Block the vents so the smoke builds up inside, and get the beggars to take up arms. In the chaos, we'll slip in undetected, wind our way through the catacombs, kill Roi des Thunes, make our way back out, and go see the council."

"Solid. Let's get to it."

The plan went off without a hitch. Arno covered the vents and Cheyenne instituted a riot. With the Extremists busy dealing with armed, angry, poor people, it was easy for the Assassins to wind their way through the sewers. Since La Touche was still unconscious, there was no one to warn Roi des Thunes of the impending threat to his life, so the King of Beggars had no problem with dispatching everyone around him to quell the uprising, feeling safe in his underground hideout that no one knew about.

Because of that, it was but mere child's play for Arno to casually sidle up to Roi while he went over some records, his back turned, and put a blade into the smelly man's neck. Arno experienced a rush of memories, and from them all gleaned one single, important fact.

He turned to Cheyenne and said, "Sivert and Roi were acting on the orders of someone else. Someone ordered Monsieur de la Serre's death."

"What are you going to do about it?"

"I'm going to find who it was…and I'm going to kill them."

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After a brief chat with de Sade, in which the lecherous man gave Arno a detailed silver pin, the same kind of pin that killed Arno's adoptive father, and a name, François-Thomas Germaine, along with where to find his shop in Les Halles.

As they were making their way back to the Sanctuary to debrief with the council, Cheyenne said, "Are you gonna ask about Zoё anytime tonight, or what?"

"Well, I was actually trying observe a bit of respect and not pry into your business, but since you're offering…who is Zoё Nightshade? What's your relationship with her? Why is she with you? What are you two planning?" Arno asked each question in lazy succession, clearly not enthused with being told to poke his nose into things that he considered to not be his business.

Cheyenne grinned, her green eyes sparkling in that way that made Arno's heart beat differently than usual.

"Zoё is the daughter of the Greek Titan Atlas and the Nereid Pleione. She was cast from her family, the Hesperides, several hundred years ago for helping Hercules do his Twelve Labors. Now she's the immortal lieutenant of the goddess of the hunt, Artemis, and has been for over three thousand years now. Right now, she's my protector, because Orion, the giant son of Gaea and Tartarus, made to kill Artemis and Apollo, has taken a personal interest in killing me for no other reason than I'm a girl who can kill people really good."

Arno had come to a complete halt as soon as he heard daughter of the Greek Titan Atlas, and he had just been staring at Cheyenne the whole time, his mouth slightly agape. When she was done and he regained his senses, he said, "Is that what she told you, or did you make that up all on your own?"

Cheyenne shrugged. "Nothing is true anyway, so does it really matter who Zoё is? She's my friend, we kill people together in the name of the Brotherhood, and we really don't have any plans of running off into the sunset. Orion's less prone to attack in crowded, populated areas."

"Mm-hm, right. I'll just tell the council Zoё's nothing to worry about."

"Wrong," Cheyenne said. "Zoё is certainly something to worry about. I told her about my kidnapping and training at the hands of the Assassins, and she's personally affronted by that. The only thing keeping her from wiping out the Brotherhood is me. All I have to do is let her, and she'll come lay waste to everything."

Arno could feel the truth in Cheyenne's words, and he didn't know if it was that Cheyenne genuinely believed Zoё was that powerful, or if Zoё really was that powerful, but he did know that he wanted to meet Zoё, and that he was going to deliver a fair warning to his superiors to start treading a little more carefully around Cheyenne from now on.

Arriving at the Sanctuary, they found Mirabeau in the council chamber, resting his head in his hand, looking very, very worn out.

"You look like merde martelée, old man," Cheyenne so eloquently stated.

"Cheyenne Cormac!" Beylier, the only black guy of the Parisian Brotherhood, barked. "You will show the Mentor the proper respect."

"Oh, do shut up, Beylier," Mirabeau said with contempt, then he looked at Cheyenne, a tired smile on his face. "For months I have been wrangling the National Assembly, the Brotherhood, and the king. Taken all together they have the political acumen of an especially stupid village council. I believe that excuses my appearance, young lady."

"You need to get laid," Cheyenne said simply.

Mirabeau snorted. "At my age and with my weight, getting laid would pose a serious threat to my health."

"Hey, you said it, not me."

"Indeed." Mirabeau looked at Arno. "What news to you bring of Lord de la Serre's murderers?"

"Roi des Thunes and Sivert were both working under the command of someone else. The late king had this," Arno produced the pin, "on him. It was made by a man called François-Thomas Germaine, whose smithing shop is in Les Halles."

"Under the command of someone else," Mirabeau muttered. "Templars never do anything simply, do they?"

"Nope," Cheyenne chirped. "That's why the Templars are so much better than the Assassins."

Beylier's nostrils flared, but Mirabeau snorted good-naturedly.

"Cheyenne Cormac, you are endless source of humor for me."

"I live to serve, Mentor," Cheyenne said, taking a dramatic bow.

"Of course. In that case, Arno, Cheyenne. Find this Monsieur Germain, and learn of his part in this conspiracy."

"Yes, Mentor."

Arno gave a small bow, and Cheyenne flicked two fingers away from her brow.

When they were out of earshot, Beylier said, "It's very dangerous putting those two together."

"It's only dangerous because you and the others have deemed it so."

"Her grandfather wasn't just a Templar, Mirabeau! He was Shay Patrick Cormac, the Templar who brought down the whole Colonial Brotherhood and killed dozens of other Assassins, particularly Arno's own father, Charles, who was a father figure to many of the Assassins here!"

Suddenly all of the lines and age seemed to vanish from Mirabeau when he stood up from his chair, and Beylier's blood quickened through his veins.

"Shay Patrick Cormac did exactly what I would have done to the Colonial Brotherhood, what any other Mentor would have done, when word of Achilles' and his disciples' actions reached us. Disturbing unknown Precursor sights that resulted in thousands of casualties—utilizing gang tactics to terrorize the populace, slapping our symbol on the flag—all three tenants of the Creed broken! The only reason there is any contention with Shay, is that he carried out the Brotherhood's sentence under the Templar's cross!

"As far as Cheyenne goes, I only find justification in her actions and sentiments. Her grandfather, the only person in her life that she knew and loved, murdered before her very eyes, then kidnapped by his murderer and pressed into our Brotherhood's service, put through a training regimen so brutal and severe it bordered on torture—all of this sanctioned by my predecessor. And during her many years under us, she received nothing but scorn from people who don't even know her, glares and harsh words, and hasn't had a single friend to the day, except for this Zoё Nightshade, and now it appears that she's making one in Arno Dorian. That child has suffered enough for as many lifetimes as she's had years on this earth—I will not have you, or anyone else, attempting to ruin Cheyenne's stab at just a little bit of happiness.

"Am. I. Clear!?"

Over the course of his tirade, Mirabeau had gotten louder and louder, eventually breaking into a thunderous roar that had the attention of the whole Sanctuary, making everyone come to listen and hear everything from contention with Shay. So, at the Mentor's final three words, there were no less than four dozen resonate Oui, Mentor!'s.

Beylier immediately bowed and hurriedly walked away, and the other Assassins hastily went back to what they were doing when Mirabeau turned his fiery gaze on them.

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"Well, that's not suspicious at all," Arno said in response to noticing all the red-clad Extremists crawling all over the silversmith's shop.

"Yeah. Is it that they're keeping Germain in, or keeping other people out?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, Germain made these pin thingies for Sivert and Roi des Thunes, and maybe that's because he's the new Grand Master, the one who usurped your dad."

Arno cocked a brow. "My dad?"

Cheyenne looked at him. "Monsieur de la Serre did more to raise you, and was more of a father to you, than Charles was, wasn't he?"

Arno blinked. "I mean, I suppose by default, since my father only saw eight years of my life, and I was only coherent for half that time, and Monsieur de la Serre took me in from that day forward."

"Yep. So more of a father to you."

"I…I suppose so…"

Arno reached a moment of conflict, and decided to dwell on it later, focusing in on the here and now. He had a silversmith to question.

Infiltrating was easy enough for the Assassins, with Cheyenne and Arno utilizing their berserk munitions to send the brutes into a frenzy, which drew practically any possible heat away from them, and they picked the locks of any doors they came across to ensure a quiet enough trek through the building.

They found Germain alone at his desk, working on something.

"Monsieur Germain?" Arno asked.

The man looked up, an astonished expression on his face, and Cheyenne zeroed in on his eyes: mismatched, left eye blue, right eye brown. It could've totally been a coincidence, but the mismatched eyes were the distinctive feature of Bartholomew Roberts, Sage. Cheyenne knew this because she had done research on Captain Jake Swallow, due to the man's connection with Shay, and the fact that she had once met him, and to this day, felt a strange, unexplained connection of her own with the late, legendary pirate-turned-Revolutionary War hero, and a great source of information on Swallow was the diary of the late Captain Edward Kenway.

Going through the diary, Cheyenne found accounts of Black Bart, how he was a Sage, what a Sage was as per all the information gathered as of the 18th century, and that the eyes were a distinct marking.

Factoring in all that information and weighing it up against Germain's eyes, Cheyenne concluded that the silversmith was the new Grand Master, and was the one responsible for de la Serre's murder. The trick was to prove that to Arno so he could kill the man without feeling guilty about. However, Cheyenne did appreciate the possibility that she was over-analyzing things, and that Germain just had mismatched eyes as a result of birth, and not some Precursor bullshit.

Anyway, she and Arno escorted Germain out of the building and off-premises, not having to worry about any Extremists as they had all killed each other thanks to the berserk brutes, and once they reached a safe enough place, Arno showed the pin.

"I made these and others like years ago as part of a private contract for a man called Lafrenière. I thought it strange, so I investigated further and discovered…well, you probably wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"You discovered he's a Templar," Arno surmised.

"Or that he has an obsession with putting his fingers up inside little girl's butts." Germain and Arno both looked at Cheyenne, who shrugged. "Hey, it happens."

"Well, I don't know about that, but I did discover he's a Templar, yes. He found out that I found out, and he's had me under house arrest ever since, making weapons for him."

"Where can I find him?" Arno asked.

"Just recently, I overheard him and his men talking about protecting shipments at la Halle aux Blés. Whatever they're planning, it sounds ominous." Germain turned the conversation a bit. "If you don't mind me asking, what is your interest in him?"

Arno was about to answer, but Cheyenne interjected.

"He liked to put his fingers up my butt when my mom was still working as one of his maids. My husband and I are tracking him down for a revenge kill."

Arno slowly blinked, not sure he heard all of that correctly, and Germain's mouth kept opening and closing as he tried to form words.

"Uh…um…uh…erm…best…best…b-best of luck to you both, th-then….I'm going to go find a place to hide now."

"Sounds like a good idea," Arno said.

Germain promptly went on his way, just a little bit shocked at just how crude Shay's granddaughter really was, and Arno immediately rounded on Cheyenne, eyes serious and genuine concern written all over his face.

"Cheyenne, please, for the love of God—"

"Why would I love that asshole?"

"—for the love of…" Arno struggled for a second to come up with something Cheyenne would love dearly enough to lie upon its name, and then his mind clicked. "For the love of your grandfather! Yes, for the love of Shay, please tell me that no one molested you that way."

"That no one molested you that way."

Arno frowned deeply at Cheyenne's dodge, and found her cheeky little grin to be more of a mask than sincere.

"Come on. We've got a Halle to investigate, and a Templar to kill."

Humming a merry little tune to herself, Cheyenne turned and literally went skipping in the direction that la Halle aux Blés was in, and after a moment, Arno followed.

After this was over, and Lafrenière was dead (bear in mind that this was an unsanctioned assassination, not that either Assassin cared) Arno was going to figure out who was really his father, Charles or de la Serre, and he was going to get down to however dirty the bottom was in regards to Cheyenne's treatment at the hands of the Assassins.

The words of the Marquis de Sade were rolling around Arno's mind, and with all the concern he was feeling over her wellbeing, the young man came to this conclusion:

He was in love with Cheyenne Cormac, and that really complicated things between him and Elise.

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No one knew it, not Zoё, Mirabeau, and certainly not Arno, but Cheyenne was getting tired of the Assassins and their treatment of her. While she knew that Arno had been tasked with asking around her about Zoё, that hadn't been the main reason she had kept her distance. No, what kept her at bay was a letter from an anonymous source that threatened many colorful things, among them being the revelation to Arno that Shay was his father's murderer, if she was to ever be with Arno again.

So, when Cheyenne heard that Arno had killed Sivert, one of de la Serre's murderers and was going on the hunt for Roi des Thunes, she figured that was the best time to square away her debt to him by helping him accomplish his vendetta. After that, there was no longer any real reason for her to stay with the Brotherhood, and she was going to pack up with Zoё and leave, Orion, Assassins, Templars, and Arno's opinion of her (in the wake of the revelation, no matter how much it hurt) be damned.

It had been a great excitement that day so many years ago when Shay told her that they were going on an epic adventure to see the world after he finished one last job, and it still excited Cheyenne, the prospect of seeing everything the planet had to offer, getting in and out of mischief with Zoё, who by now Cheyenne had determined she had feelings for, she just didn't know what those feelings were, only that they were similar to what she now currently feeling for Arno, which was honestly very scary.

Part of the reason she was in something of a hurry to kill this Lafrenière guy was so that she could escape from whatever Arno was doing to her.

As for Germain and the possibility of him being a Sage, the Grand Master, and the one responsible behind de la Serre's murder, Cheyenne figured she was going to go and kill the man after this extended mission. If he was none of the above, truly innocent, then oh well. It wasn't like Cheyenne cared much for the Creed anyway, as most strongly evidenced when she arrived at la Halle aux Blés, guns and smoke bombs in hand and in use.

Arno arrived just a few seconds later, though everyone was already dead. He did find it just a little bit under monumentally concerning that Cheyenne had a penchant for mass slaughter, but decided to chalk it up to whatever training she had been through that resulted in her disregard for human life.

However, the fact that she was operating with only half a complete soul was certainly a factor.

Anyway, careful to avoid any questions or comments about Cheyenne's training with the Assassins, Arno and she investigated the Halle with impunity, as there was no one around to worry about. They found a ledger upstairs with detailed records of munitions and payments, along with the location of Lafrenière's meeting place that very night, Cimetière des Innocents.

"What do you think we should do about all this gunpowder?" Arno asked, more rhetorically than seriously, as there was no way he was just going to let it sit here for Templars, or anyone, really, to just come along and take for themselves.

Cheyenne looked at him with a manic grin, lanterns somehow having just appeared in her hands. "We blow it all up!"

"I knew you were going to say that."

"Then why'd you ask?"

"…the satisfaction of confirming my hypothesis."

"Hypothesis satisfied. Onto the fire!"

In hindsight, lighting a powder store on fire with them still being inside was a very bad idea, but Cheyenne was a little unhinged after all, and besides…it was a lot of fun running through a burning building, feeling it heat up, feeling Death nipping at your heals, feeling the adrenaline kick in, the rush of not knowing if you were about to bite it or not, with only your skill and ability carrying you through.

The two made it out, of course, getting to a platform suspended by crane, cutting the room to go zooming through the opening in the ceiling. Arno was panicking the whole time, while Cheyenne was cheering as if on a roller coaster. The slide down la Halle aux Blés's roof, and a timely explosion that propelled them through the air like a couple of ragdolls, was also tons of fun if you asked Cheyenne.

For both of them, the cherry of the whole experience was when they landed on the nearby Medici Tower, Cheyenne sprawled out all over Arno's chest. For a few seconds, they just laid there, looking into each other's eyes as their breathing evened back out, Arno's arm subconsciously having made its way around Cheyenne's waist, while her hands were on top of his iron-hard pectorals, able to be felt even through his shirt and coat.

Then they realized the positions they were in and scrambled apart with a small flush on their faces.

That's right, a small flush. Despite having had sex with three different men, and despite having had many passionate nights with Elise, Cheyenne and Arno were a little hot under the collars at finding themselves in such a sensual arrangement with one another.

Cheyenne cleared her throat. "T-To…To-to the Cimetière des Innocents?"

"Y-Yes," Arno said. "To the loveyard—I mean, to the graveyard…yeah…the graveyard…"

By the time they got there, they were both schooled and ready to take care of business for the evening hours. Cheyenne went about and disabled all the alarm bells while Arno went into the catacombs and rescued the citizens being held captive therein, thereby securing a small battalion in the event things went sideways, which of course they were going to.

After a bit of eavesdropping, Arno located a map detailing Lafrenière's route through the cemetery, and the two made the plan that Arno was going to hide at Place X and strike first, and Cheyenne was going to hide at Place Y and strike second in case Arno's initial assault failed.

The next hours of waiting absolutely sucked. Not because they were alone in their hiding spots with nothing to do for so long, but because now their thoughts had ample opportunity to run amok and torture their minds with questions and feelings.

What were they feeling for each other?

Was it actually love?

If so, what did that mean for the significant others already in their lives, Elise and Zoё?

If it wasn't love, then what was this strange protectiveness for each other?

In Arno's case, his father was Charles, but was his dad de la Serre? It made more sense that the latter was his dad, since Arno was far more cognizant of his time under the wing of de la Serre than under Charles, and he was currently on a revenge quest in de la Serre's name; Arno hadn't actually given any thought to tracking down his father's killer, not even right after it happened, or in the years that followed. However, was it not an extreme betrayal of Charles' memory to cast the man out of his rightful seat, and just replace him with another man?

For Cheyenne, the thoughts most dominantly plaguing her all revolved around Zoё. The Huntress was her protector, having kept Orion at bay for all these months, and it was clear that Zoё had romantic feelings for Cheyenne, something Cheyenne didn't know how to handle, and it was also quite obvious that Zoё had sexual intentions for Cheyenne, given how the immortal had no problem with grabbing the mortal's butt and moving her fingers closer up to the front, something else Cheyenne didn't know to handle.

She didn't know romantic love. Hell, she barely knew any kind of love. The three times she had sex it was out of a base need to relieve some pent up stress and frustration by way of some pleasure, so Zoё's advances were alien to Cheyenne. She had no regard for religion, Christianity especially, so she cared not for the Biblical sentiments on her being a woman sleeping with another woman as only married man and woman were supposed to (how could she given the fact that she willingly fornicated with three men whose names she didn't know, and whose faces she didn't see?) but it was the simple fact that a sapphic relationship was an unknown to Cheyenne, and that alone scared her.

What was she supposed to do in that kind of a relationship? They were both girls, so how were they supposed to be arranged? Was Zoё supposed to be the "man?" It didn't seem likely, as Zoё seemed to harbor strong feelings against men. Was Cheyenne supposed to be the man? Also unlikely, as where she might be a sassy, strong-willed little hellion, down inside her she knew that she just wanted to curl up in a set of big, strong arms and feel loved and protected, just like she did with Shay.

So, if Zoё wasn't the man, and Cheyenne wasn't the man, did that mean they, like, switched or something?

Urgh, this whole sapphic thing was hard, because there weren't any bounds or rules or regulations—that Cheyenne knew of—like there were for the usual man and woman relationship, in which the man was the dominant of the two, and he was the one leading things. However, with all this dwelling on the nature of this relationship, Cheyenne came to the heart-thumping conclusion that, over the course of these past few months of being with Zoё, doing things with her—nothing sexual beyond Zoё copping a feel on occasion—that she was in love with the daughter of Atlas.

The realization of that fact made Cheyenne feel lightheaded and woozy.

With Arno, he was also experiencing some vertigo upon coming to grips with the fact that Charles might have been his father, but it was Monsieur de la Serre that had raised him, schooled him, been there to explain those strange happenings at night, and instill a sense of honor and discipline, all of that on top of the notion that he was in love with two girls at the same time, both of them considering themselves to be Templars, he an Assassin, which added two full layers of complications to things.

Their ruminations ended upon Lafrenière's arrival with armed guard and other men dressed in finery. In something of a hurry to get anywhere besides this cemetery so that he get his mind in order, Arno basically jumped the gun and threw a smoke bomb into the middle of things, running in and out of the obscuring cloud of gas, killing Lafrenière and experiencing a rush of memories that he'd make sense of later.

Cheyenne joined him on his hasty exodus, and the two didn't stop running until they were nearly across the city on a rooftop. After a few seconds of tense silence, as they could both feel the thoughts and conclusions of the other, and neither was sure as how to proceed from there, Cheyenne diverted the pressure with a venting questing.

"So? Was it Lafrenière that ordered Sivert and Roi des Thunes to kill Monsieur de la Serre?"

Arno exhaled heavily. "I don't think so, no. In his memories, I saw him writing and then giving the warning letter to the courier who gave it to me. That letter would've told Monsieur de la Serre about the impending attempt on his life. Why would Lafrenière go to such great lengths to warn Monsieur de la Serre, only to kill him?"

"I don't think it was Lafrenière," Cheyenne admitted.

"Then who?"

"Germain the silversmith."

Cheyenne told Arno about her suspicions of the man being a Sage, and how he was a Templar usurper that had de la Serre deposed so he could assume command of the Parisian Rite. She also went on to conclude that Lafrenière was his opposition within the Order, and so Germain deceived the two of them into killing the man, something that made Arno drown in guilt and burn with rage.

However, he did have a logical thought.

"We'll need to debrief with the council before going after Germain. We're already going to be in enough trouble for killing Lafrenière without approval."

Cheyenne made a dispassionate grunt. "Those old shits can go screw themselves with their little knives."

"I thought you liked Mirabeau."

"He's been good to me," Cheyenne confided. "He's taken a lot of heat off my back, but I do cause a lot of headache for him since I do go out of my way to piss off certain Assassins, and then they go bitch to him about it. Still, I can not be doing anything intentional and they'll still go bitch to Mirabeau."

"How so?"

"When I was fourteen, someone poisoned my food in an attempt to kill me. My body beat the poison, in that I obviously didn't die, but my stomach was toast for the next few days. Anything I ate immediately came back out, one way or the other, and so there were complaints about me hogging the bathrooms and making them stink so bad they were unusable. In order to appease the Brotherhood, Mirabeau restricted me to using the Seine to relive myself for the next two months."

"That's cruel and unfair," Arno said angrily.

Cheyenne shrugged. "That's basically my life."

"Well it shouldn't be that way. If I-"

Arno caught himself as his mind failed to complete the thought. If he what, exactly? If he was the Mentor? If he was her protector? Her husband? Lover?

"Have you told Zoё about any of this?"

Cheyenne hummed in the affirmative, and instead of feeling jealous that he wasn't informed first, he instead felt relieved that at least someone else knew, and it was someone that apparently had some power.

Power to make things right.

"You love me, don't you, Arno?"

The man exhaled. "And you love me."

"And you love Elise."

"And you love Zoё."

"We can't make the four of us work, can we?"

"No."

"We're going to have to pick, aren't we?"

"Yes."

"Man, I hate choices. They're such a burden. That's why the Templars need to be in charge, won't have to worry about choices anymore."

"Yes, because we'd all be these docile little yes-men without the power to do anything else but obey."

"Better than living in a world where the poor people die in their own filth, the rich people hoard all the food and money, and pointless wars are fought and families destroyed. Better than living in a world where men can get away with doing whatever they want to girls."

"Cheyenne…" Arno said quietly.

She looked at swim, eyes full of more meaning than words could convey, and then she looked off to the opposite horizon, where the moon was still low enough to be caught in Earth's shadow, making it turn red for a few moments until it left the partial eclipse and resumed its normal silvery color. That all but confirmed it for Arno, and he was left with a new question:

What did he want more, vengeance for Monsieur de la Serre's murder, or vengeance for Cheyenne's honor?

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Percy is going to be ten different kinds of mentally fucked when this is over. Luckily, I have got it worked out how that's going to be handled, and I think y'all are going to like it. Hopefully.

No Zoё this chapter, but her presence is certainly felt. She'll be showing up next time, along with Elise, so more drama. Speaking of drama, a council meeting is the opening of the next chapter, along with Mirabeau's death, meaning confrontation with Bellec, and with Mirabeau being gone, that more or less leaves Cheyenne open to the other Assassins.

So things are starting to ramp up.

Fav, Follow, and Review please!