Chapter 10:
When Max wakes up, she re-reads her directions on the note the contact gave her.
"Tamir makes his living as a black market merchant. So the Souk district should be your destination. I would suggest you seek out the following places: a small souk northeast of here, the madrasah to our east. And in the gardens north of this Bureau. Focus on these places and he should become well known to you". She sighs and slips the brown and white feather out of her sleeves and smooths it. Her head is pounding, and she struggles to her feet.
Her head swims as she totters over to the base of the fountain and leisurely pulls herself up and out into the sun. She needs some breakfast, and to find her target before midday, preferably. She's wandering through the streets with her hood up, and the guards don't even seem to notice her today. She turns the head of a templar, but he looks past her without a lingering glance.
"One, please." She stops at a fruit stall and pays an angry looking woman for a small sack of olives to carry with her, and she leisurely carouses the stalls and munches on the olives. She approaches a man on a bench, who pointedly looks away from her.
"I'm looking for the Souk district." She asks, and he points to his left, still refusing to look at her. She nods, and moves in the direction of where he pointed. She's headed to a black market, and the people won't be so helpful as the people in the open market. The street starts to decline, and the soggy, rotting stink of the sewers gets stronger as she continues down the street. A distressed looking woman runs past her, and Max barely jumps out of her way. Looking around the corner that the woman came from, two men are arguing in the middle of a semi-empty courtyard.
"This must be the black market." Max moves in the shadows to where a bench is against the wall, and she sits next to a drunkenly snoring man who smells of his own waste. She's close enough to hear their argument.
"Your men have failed to fill the order, which means I have failed my client!" The man in the red tunic is shouting, and Max notices all the mercenaries around the black market, their eyes going from their activities to the man. He must be Tamir, to have so many guards with him.
"We need more time!" The second, rougher looking man responds. A weapon deal? Tamir could be gathering weapons to supply his next templar activity.
"This is the excuse of a lazy or incompetent man. Which are you?" Tamir accuses, and the merchant bristles at the insult.
"Neither." He defends, and Tamir smiles, though he's obviously agitated.
"What I see says otherwise. Now, tell me, what to do intend to do to solve this problem of ours? These weapons are needed now!" He shouts, and Max peers around again, a few odd people enter the market, and go straight to the stalls with no-nonsense strides.
"I see no solution! The men work day and night, but your... "client" requires so much, and the destination..it is a difficult route." The merchant ponders, Max can see that he's getting nervous.
"Were it that you could produce weapons with the same skill you produce excuses!" Tamir snarls, and the merchant crosses his arms over his chest.
"I've done all I can." The merchant declares, and Tamirs lip curls away from his teeth.
"It is not enough."
"Then perhaps you ask too much." The merchant replies, cocking one hip. He's getting cocky, Max knows there are few ways for this to end.
"Too much? I gave you everything! Without me, you would still be charming serpents for coin! All I ask in return was you fill the orders I bring you! And you say I ask too much? You dare disrespect me?" Tamir snarls, his hand twitching over where his dagger is hidden, badly, under his vest.
"Please, Tamir. I meant no insult!" The merchant stammers, noticing the pommel of the dagger.
"Then you should have kept your mouth shut!" Tamir draws his dagger and plunges it into the merchants belly before he can react. Max flinches as he cries out, and a woman across the market screams and people clamor to get away from the scene.
"No! Stop!" The merchant chokes when Tamir pulls the blade back and steps back, letting the merchant slump forward, his shaking hands trying to staunch the blood.
"Stop? I'm just getting started!" Tamir steps forward and plunges the blade into his belly again, and three more times, each time, Max's toes digging harder into the soles of her boots. She's boiling with hate, her fingers twitching over where her hidden blade lies cold against her forearm. She wants to kill him, make him beg for his life.
"You came into MY souk! Stood before MY men! And dare to insult ME?" Tamir twists the blade and yanks it out, the merchant coughing up blood, and finally dying when Tamir slashes his throat. The merchant falls backward, falling in a crumpled mess on the cobblestones. A stone settles over Max's stomach when his fingers stop twitching and one of Tamirs servants moves forward to try and move the body away.
"No. Leave the body. Let this be a lesson to the rest of you. Think twice before you tell me something cannot be done. Now get back to work." Tamir moves away from the scene and walks around the market, talking with the merchants so casually that you would never believe he had just murdered a man a minute ago. Max stands from the bench and blends with the crowd moving through the market. Max waits for his to turn his back to her, she doesn't want to tangle with his mercenaries in this crowd of people.
He turns, and her blade slides down, she crouches to pounce, but he's gone, and there's a scream from the crowd that surges back against her.
"Max plunges forward against the crowd, to where a white cloaked figure crouches over Tamir, holding his face to his ear, hidden blade wet with Tamirs blood. Max crouches next to the figure, and Fangs eyes look back up at her. She's frozen. He shows up to take her target, after so long? She doesn't even know how to react, so she doesn't, she just ignores him.
"Be at peace." Max sets his soul off, and draws her feather across the wound of his neck, coating it in the thick blood. A shout from behind her and Max is off like a shot to evade the mercenaries. She scales a wall, and sprints across a rooftop, swinging up onto a higher roof, leaping to another, and hearing the quiet lungs working in sync with hers only a few steps behind her. She's inching closer to the sanctuary, but she dodges into a roof garden to lose the last of the mercenaries. Fang tumbles in after her, and she's straddling him with her hidden blade against his throat before his muscles can relax. She slaps a hand over his mouth when the mercenaries rush past, his eyes stare up at her, wide, and she glares back down at him.
At the most inappropriate time, he's admiring her. How does that hood and the scar on her eyebrow make her look so much more beautiful? She digs her fingernails into his cheek before releasing his mouth, but she doesn't move her blade away from his throat.
"Where the hell have you been!" She hisses, and he can't keep his smile down. He missed her, he really did.
"Missed you too, Maximum." He murmurs, but her lips curl away from her teeth. She's mad he was gone for so long and that he took her kill. She rocks the blade forward, and it bites at his neck. His eyes open a little wider, something in her warped.
"Don't call me that. I'm Maria now." Her tongue easily forms her assassin name, and he frowns. When every assassin is initiated, they're given a new name. Fang became Altair, Max became Maria.
"Let me up Max." He asks, and her eyes narrow. He's getting to her. She wants to let him up, but she's so pissed, and she could kill him right now, but she doesn't want that. She let's up just slightly, and he flips them with no effort, and he has her trapped, holding her down by her biceps. Under his hands, her muscles are taut and defined, nothing like the skinny princess from two months ago.
"Hey." She wriggles and tries to get out, but he holds her down easily. She drives her knee up into his side, and he flinches, but refuses to let her up.
"Let go! I have to get back to the sanctuary!" She protests, but he lowers his face to just a few inches from hers, effectively shutting her up. Suddenly, she's princess Max again, wide eyes and painfully innocent expression.
"What the hell happened to you while I was gone." He whispers, his breath caressing her mouth, eyes searching her face for every difference. The few times he met her back in Florence, he mapped her face, her hands, her ankles, any part of her he could see. Now she was changed. She was killing men and scaling buildings with her arms made of rock.
"I grew up." She replies shortly, and he smiles sadly, his fringe falling onto her forehead.
"I didn't think you would be able to do it." He mutters, and she protests right away.
"Why, because you thought I was weak! I'll have you know that Al..." He cuts her off, dropping his lips against hers mid-sentence and she freezes. She can't even close her eyes, she's too shocked, she's a statue. When he pulls away from her, she's still staring at him with a wide eyed, blank expression. He can't say he isn't disappointed, she didn't even react, she just turned into a statue. He smiles as brightly as he can and ruffles her short hair.
"This is cute. Keep this." He says, and he's gone in a flash, leaving Max in the sweet smelling hay with her head spinning, juggling so many questions that she can't move.
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A+ for actual game script? Maybe? Thanks for reading this far and please leave me a review with any questions of things you would like to see in the future :)