A/N: Thank you for all of the reviews so far! :) Reviews are like fish to us, and without fish we don't have the strength to play golf!
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Ubisoft and we are poor little penguins who cannot afford to be sued, we're still playing with those golf clubs though...we're still not very good at golf: we find it difficult to hold those clubs. Deepest apologises for the lack of man on man (unusual for us, we know), but don't worry the extravaganza is coming!
"Father I must talk to you." Federico entered into his father's dimly lit office. The desk, where his father was positioned, was cluttered with piles of various paperwork as it had always been in his memory. He knew his father would be preoccupied with the current legal problems plaguing Florence; once which seemed certain to involve Giovanni Auditore at some point, but a burning pain in his stomach told him what he had to say could not wait.
"Federico, what is wrong? Is something the matter?" Federico's father looked up from his desk, and stared into the angered face of his oldest son. "Are you okay?"
"Yes... the problem lies with Ezio... he needs to be sent away father, he has fallen in with a bad crowd." Federico contorted his face into an expression of concern.
Giovanni Auditore stood up from his desk, and walked around to face Federico. "What are you talking about? Ezio is a good boy, and I know the boys he spends his time with. They are not a bad crowd. At least, they are no worse than the crowd I spent my time with when I was his age."
"You don't understand." Federico was angry now, more so than he had been and he walked away from the desk, resting his palms on the back of a chair and breathing deeply. His Leo... his brother wanted his Leo and he would not allow that. He would not allow Ezio to lie with his Leo... and the shame... the shame that he had fought so hard to avoid by turning his Leo away... he would not allow Ezio to bring that shame back down upon his family. If he had sacrificed to avoid that shame, then Ezio would also. If he had spent all those nights awake and weeping; all those daylight hours in a suffering that stopped him even moving from his own bed; if he had had to abandon all those conversations with his best friend; all those kisses from his greatest lover, then there was no way in Heaven or Hell he was going to allow Ezio the chance to get close to his Leo. "You do not understand father... I do not talk about the boys Ezio spends his time with... I speak about a man that Ezio wants to spend his time with."
"Federico..." The tone Giovanni used was one that Federico was all too familiar with; one that he had heard all those years ago as he stood in the same spot. It was a tone laced in confusion and harshness, and it felt patronising.
"I talk about Leo..." Federico dropped his eyes to the floor as he felt his father's rage fall upon him. The same rage – he didn't even need to look up to know it – that his father had greeted him with when he had barged into Federico's bedroom those years ago... the same rage which had greeted Federico when he looked up from his pillow, Leo still positioned behind him, and saw his father standing there staring at his act of passion.
"Federico I told you what would happen if you mentioned that name again!" His father's voice was not quite a scream, but danger dripped from each syllable like poison. Federico felt his nerves falter until he thought of Leo: the sadness that had spread slowly across that face as Federico had turned his back. Even the memory of that occasion sent a pang of guilt through Federico's body, and he felt his resolve strengthen.
"It is not me this time father, it is Ezio. Ezio has become friends with Leo since mother started buying his paintings. I worry for Ezio. He is so easily led. And with these charges, these charges of sodomy..." Federico was almost too ashamed to say the word in front of his father "... hanging over Leo; over Leonardo, I think you need to send Ezio away." Federico moved towards his father and took hold of his hands. "Please father, Ezio needs protected from this man..." Federico dropped his gaze to the floor as his soul dropped from his body and smashed upon it... He wanted to scream and kick and punch. Ezio could not be allowed to touch his Leo. "Please father, he must be sent away, so he may avoid Leonardo and save us all the shame such a relationship would bring to this family."