May 5, 1789
Élise continued following the trail of blood in the Palais de Versailles' gardens, believing that it would lead her to the killer. She was sure that the man responsible for her father's death was an Assassin, but she was aware of the possibility of a coup within the Templar Order itself. The trail eventually brought her to a door, still in the palace, she impatiently kicked the door open, but finds nothing but more blood.
"Merde." She sighs. "Where the hell are you?" She prepares to search more, but is interrupted by Arno's voice.
"Élise! Élise, where are you?" Arno worriedly said. He entered the room, and saw the red-head searching for leads.
"I'm here." She says angrily. "Will you help me find the bastard?" She asks, but he doesn't know what to answer.
"He must have gotten away already, Élise." He hesitantly says.
"I need to know who he is, Arno." She says impatiently. "Are you going to help me or not?"
He lays his hand on her shoulder. "First, you'll need to tell me what the hell is going on."
She sighs. "I promise I'll explain this later.. now please help me!"
They both search the room for any evidence, Arno opens the wardrobe, nothing, the bed, nothing, the table, nothing. "Merde, there is nothing here!" But then he sees a drop of blood, soon followed by another, and another.
"Élise, here." He tells her. "Blood." He starts following the small trail, soon followed by her. It led them through the corridors, and then to a private bedroom. Élise was the first to enter, but there was nothing there.
But then it was Arno who actually found something relevant. He picked up a finely made necklace from the ground. The chain was made of silver and there was a perfect red cross hanging on it. A very small part of the chain was red, red with blood.
"What is this?" He asked, showing the necklace to Élise.
"Oh god..." She eagerly picked the necklace off his hands and examined it, locating the drops of blood. "This... this belongs to..." She starts, but immediately stops, remembering that Arno knew nothing of the Templars.
"What is this, Élise?" He asked, showing a puzzled face to her.
"My father was betrayed, Arno." She started. "This... this belonged to one of his subordinates."
He was even more puzzled by her answer. "Subordinates? What subordinates?"
"I need to go back to the party and talk to someone." She tells him, ignoring his question. "I'll explain all of this tomorrow."
Arno tries to talk to her, but she then hurriedly runs off. He was confused, all of this didn't made sense at all. That cross... he had a small memory of a similar cross. And was trying to remember it, but it was proving to be hard.
Élise approached her father's trusted advisers: Chrétien Lafrenière, Marie Lévesque, Louis-Michel le Peletier and Charles Gabriel Sivert. As she walked to the advisers' location, she heard the gossip between nobles. "Her father was killed right here!" "She's François de la Serre's daughter" and other annoying statements that only made her sad. She wanted to loudly cry for her father, betrayed by a subordinate of his Order, and she wanted to slowly kill her father's murderer.
"Where is Sivert?" She heard Lafrenière ask le Peletier and Lévesque. "He's disappeared ever since François died!"
Overhearing that, Élise noticed that Sivert indeed wasn't there. Was he also murdered? Or did he play a part on De la Serre's death?
"Don't worry, Chrétien. I'm sure he'll come back." Lévesque told Lafrenière.
"It's not only about his well-being that I'm worried about." Lafrenière answers. "I don't trust Sivert, he's no better than an outlaw."
François never did really trust Sivert, he found him constantly wanting to do things his own, radical way. When they saw her, she immediately cleaned her eyes with a handkerchief, fearing that more tears would drop.
"Oh mademoiselle Élise." Lafrenière started. "We're... sorry for your loss, I still don't know what happened." He completed.
"Neither do I." Élise replied. "Where's Sivert?"
"He's gone..." Lafrenière started, but was interrupted by Lévesque, who with a reassuring smile says "He's gone out to investigate the Grand Master's death, mademoiselle."
"Merci, madame Lévesque." Élise replied. "Monsieur le Peletier, do you know anything of the current situation?"
"No, mademoiselle De la Serre. I haven't even seen Monsieur de la Serre's body." The politician answered.
She sighed, there was something wrong with Lévesque and le Peletier. Lafrenière seemed to be as worried as her, but the two other advisers didn't seem worried at all.
"Well, I presume you three will be astonished with something I've found while investigating my father's death." Élise told them.
Lévesque and le Peletier shared worried looks, while Lafrenière still had his attention on Élise. "What have you found, mademoiselle?" He asked her, taking a step forward on her direction. Élise then picked the Templar necklace from her pocket and gave it to Lafrenière, who examined it and noticed the blood on the silver chain. Lafrenière quickly looked at Élise's neck, and noticed that she still had her own necklace with her.
"This was done by one of our own..." Lafrenière assumes, looking at Lévesque and le Peletier. "Where did you find this, mademoiselle?"
"Me and..." She hesitantly started, but decided not to involve Arno in this. "I followed a trail of blood near my father's corpse..." She remarks, a tear appearing in her eye after remembering the moment. "And it led me to a room, where I found this bloodstained Templar necklace." She completed.
"You've done good, mademoiselle Élise." Lafrenière says with a reassuring smile. "This was of great help, it confirms some of my suspicions."
Élise nods, and then tells the advisers that they can meet later and discuss about the uncertain future. She walks off the room, the tears start to appear in her eyes, but they start to disappear as she remembers the brief moment of happiness she shared with Arno only minutes before. She begins to search for Arno, but he is the one to find her first in the room she left him. "Who did you find me?" Élise asks him.
"I still want an explanation, and I was becoming worried with you" He replies, caressing her cheek. She noticed his eyes were still wet, after all he also loved her father, he adopted him in a moment where he was in panic after seeing his biological father just die in front of him, and history seems to repeat itself.
"I promise I'll explain at the estate" She assures him, moving towards him and hugging him tightly. "The world just seems to be falling directly on my shoulders, my father died too soon." She murmures, tears forming on her face, again. They stay in the embrace for more time than they should, and then they walk to the carriage.
"So you're going to stay in Versailles?" He asks, while the carriage transports them to the estate.
"For longer than I originally would, I guess." She lays her head on his lap. "Once I explain all of this, you'll understand everything."
The carriage finally arrives at the De la Serre estate, and they both walk off it. Élise holds his hand, trying to forget what happened in this terrible night. As they both enter the estate, they are surprised by Olivier, the estate's butler and lead servant.
"Mademoiselle De la Serre!" He shouts upon seeing Élise and then hesitantly looks at Arno, but seems to ignore him. "They're... these ruffians! They have raided the estate, I managed to hide, they're upstairs!"
"Merde!" Both of them say, and Élise immediately goes to a nearby table and opens the drawer, picking two daggers and giving one of them to Arno. The table was for urgent surprises, like this one.
"Mademoiselle, you and... and Monsieur Dorian here need to run!" Olivier starts, but is ignored by them. They make their way to the upper floors, but are seen by the ruffians. Élise quickly throws her dagger at the ruffian's face, and then removes it. The man's scream alerted the other thugs, who then appeared and quickly prepared to eliminate the couple.
"Arpinon, what's going on!?" The bandit leader shouts from another room. Arpinon tells him of the "intruders", and the leader appears and confronts Élise and Arno.
"Monsieur Duchesneau, don't worry, I'll kill them right here!" Arpinon told the leader, and Duchesneau told him to continue. Élise quickly dodged a brute ruffian's axe swing and proceeded to stab him with her dagger, but he continued alive, with a wound on his belly. Arno engaged in a fight with another ruffian who was wielding a dagger like him, swiftly blocking the bandit's attack and piercing his blade on his throat. Élise then pushed the brute on Arno's direction, and he impaled the ruffian through the heart.
"Fucking morons!" Arpinon roars, ordering three other ruffians to engage the couple. A ruffian wielding a sword faces Arno, and gains the advantage for a brief moment, but Arno dodges three consecutive attacks and punches his nose. The thug's hand then goes to his bleeding nose, and Arno uses the moment as an opportunity to knock him unconscious with his dagger's hilt. He then grabs the ruffian's sword from the floor and slashes the throat of another thug who was about to strike Élise. She proceeds to punch the remaining thug, shattering his teeth and snapping his neck. She then picks the thug's pistol from his corpse and points it at Arpinon, but realizes Duchesneau is the real leader here. However, Duchesneau is quicker and manages to escape and lock the door he entered.
"Duchesneau! Fucking snake, mercy!" Arpinon drops on his knees and pleads for mercy. Arno tells Élise to leave him be, but she then whispers on the ruffian's ear "You should have thought twice before sneaking on MY family's estate!" before kicking his face and thus, leaving him unconscious. She turns to Arno, if it wasn't for him, she would probably be dead now, it was difficult fighting with such a fancy dress.
"And again, I'm not understanding nothing!" He says, louder than he intended. But she pouses her finger on his mouth, whispering in his ears that they have to go and interrogate Duchesneau. Arno tries to open the door Duchesneau locked, but Élise impatiently kicks it open. Duchesneau turns to see his attackers, drawing dual pistols from his jacket and pointing them at them.
"Let me go quietly, and I won't hurt you two." He nervously says, still impressed and scared that two people managed to defeat all his men. However, he knew of their alignment, he was not a hired muscle like Arpinon, and he feared for his own life. Élise noticed that there was some paperwork on his pockets, "So he isn't just some common criminal". She thinks to herself.
Impatient, Duchesneau opens fire and one of the bullets hits Arno's shoulder, while the other misses Élise by a few centimeters. Arno notices that Duchesneau's pistols had three barrels each one. He picks up the dagger he was using before from his suit's pocket and throws it at the ruffian. The dagger encounters Duchesneau's belly, who screams in pain and drops on the floor still alive. Élise walks to the thug and throws the dagger out, kneeling before him and trying to stop the bleeding, succeeding.
Élise then stands up and looks at Arno, his shoulder bleeding from the bullet he took. "Oh god... I help this sack of crap and then leave you there!" she exclaims in disbelief for herself and then tries to stanch Arno's wound. He also helps, and their team work proves to be effective.
"This was a long night huh?" He tells her with a weak smile.
"And it still ain't over." She answers, pointing at the screaming figure on the floor. "He isn't a common ruffian, he was here for my father's documents."