Author's Note: Sorry if this chapter came a bit slower than the rest. There was a lot of dialogue necessary in this one and it doesn't seem to come quite as easily to me as action sequences.
Assassin's Creed: Raptor's Bane
Chapter 6
Altair did not know for how long he was unconscious, again momentarily questioning whether he would ever awaken again. As he slogged forward, fighting his way back into awareness, he realized with a measure of alarm that even the eagle within him had gone silent, now barely a shadow of its usual vibrant, screeching self. He feared for it, more concerned for soul than body.
The Assassin drew a gasping breath as he struggled for life, feeling a searing pain through his lungs more intense than the tightness he had been experiencing for the past week. Even more of the snake's venom had entered his body, he recollected dully. This disgusted him somewhat.
He forced his eyes open, blinking in the dusty half-darkness drifting over the floor he was lying against. The stones pressing against his chest were dirty but well worn, a light wisp of salt-scented air stirring the grime strewn over it. Altair reasoned that he was still by the sea, probably within a warehouse. As his coherent thoughts strengthened, so did his body, feeble as it was from the aftereffects of the poison. Not lethal this time, but damaging enough.
His limbs and chest protested sharply as he rolled onto his side, drawing air through gritted teeth, and focusing all his resolve in keeping the pain at bay. As the young Assassin shifted his arm to try to push himself up, he realized with sudden fear that the familiar press of the blades at his back and hip were missing. Barely bridled panic rose in him now as he realized that not only his eagle, but also his weapons had been lost to him, making him feel empty and vulnerable. He had never been unwillingly stripped of his blades, and realized now why it served as one of the worst punishments of the Brotherhood.
The dizzying sense of emptiness struck his heart almost as deeply as the toxin in his blood, and he may have lost his nerve then and there had he not shifted again and felt the reassuring weight on his left arm, a bit heavier than normal, but present all the same. Altair forced himself to breathe again, calming himself shakily as he lifted his arm over his hooded face and stared at the familiar mechanism still thankfully attached to his arm.
There was a sudden, alien clinking sound by his head, and he finally found the reason why his forearm had felt heavier. An iron chain and shackle dangled from his left wrist, trailing some distance from him before ending in a metal loop set securely into the floor against the wall. He turned his wrist a bit idly, noting that the narrow manacle was clasped over and directly in front of his hidden blade, warning him tauntingly that any attempts to release it would either send the blade into his own arm or rend the weapon irreparably. An attempt, he guessed, to make him feel even more helpless.
Altair lowered his arm again and, sliding his eyes shut in concentration, pushed against the stones to try to gain his feet. Though his chest still felt aflame, and his arms trembled from the weight, he managed to straighten into a kneeling crouch. Feeling some shallow sense of accomplishment, he heard the eagle of him give a soft croon, reminding him that it was not yet over. He grew still, head bowed, finding that the pain gentled to a dull throb as he did so.
Fully composed now, he listened; using the only sharp sense left to him now, and heard the movement of several men in his vicinity. Footsteps and muttered voices echoed clearly, signifying that the warehouse was merely a large single room, pseudo-walls formed out of dusty crates. He was in a corner of the large enclosure, closed in on two sides by the stone of the actual building and on one, his left, by piled wood boxes.
Altair opened his eyes, noting the opposite corner of the building clearly visible ahead of him and gauging that the warehouse was about as wide as the two rooms of the Assassins' Bureau. The square windows were set high up in the stone, wide but letting in little light. It was probably late in the afternoon by now, nearing darkness.
This struck him suddenly, making him wonder if his brothers had noticed his absence. A foolish thought, he concluded calmly. He had been about to leave for Masyaf and they would think he was simply traveling home. He could not expect outside help then. This suited him fine, he convinced himself. An Assassin almost always worked alone.
Altair turned his attention back to the chain, the only thing restraining him from climbing the crates and escaping through the easily reachable windows. He stood slowly, testing its length and realizing that it restricted him from straightening to his full height, barely enough to allow him a step in any direction. The iron was weathered and rusty, likely having once been used to secure stacks of barrels in place. He settled comfortably back down onto one knee and began to run the chain through his fingers, checking it systematically for any minute breaks or weaknesses he could exploit.
However, he was barely able to look over even half of the links when he heard approaching footsteps, likely attracted by the jangle of the metal on rock. Altair set the chain down, composing his face into a careful mask and saw the now familiar man round the wall of crates in front of him, still wearing the stolen light tunic of the Teutonic order.
"Finally awake I see," the man said casually, approaching within a few feet of him and stopping just short of the Assassin's reach. Altair looked at him evenly, flexing the fingers of his left hand involuntarily as he seriously considered making a run at him, just to see how he would react. The man was amused at this, watching him tense to fly despite knowing that he could not.
"We would have received you a lot better if you had just cooperated, Altair," the soldier said almost pityingly as he settled himself onto a low box. "Even that brat Isam was smart enough to see that."
The Assassin said nothing, wondering how much the novice had told the enemy about him. It couldn't have been much, seeing as this annoying man persisted on talking to him, attempting to get him to respond. He was unsure why they had even kept him alive, but he would sooner strangle himself with the chain that held him than give them what they wanted.
"Do they not teach Assassins to speak at Masyaf?" the man said irritably, cutting into Altair's thoughts. "Or is speech only for we who do not immerse ourselves in blood everyday?"
He was largely tempted to remain silent; both as a precaution as well as to further infuriate his captor. However, he ceded, now that he had been relieved of his blades, words were the only arsenal left to him. Besides, once he escaped this place—it was not a question of if, only how and when—any information he could glean would help the Brotherhood immensely.
Taking a quiet breath to clear the underlying throb in his chest, as well as to ensure that his voice would not shake, Altair said sharply, "Words leave little room for action."
The unexpected, rather derisive jibe seemed to leave the soldier taken aback; convinced as he was that the Assassin would stay his tongue. Interest piqued now though, he stood from the box he had been perched on and approached the still motionless man, looking him over with something akin to fascination.
"Hmm, as I thought, all you murderers are just mindless brutes," he said with a smirk, pacing before him at a careful distance, evidently goading the Assassin. "Just illiterate tools wielded by your idiot of a master, unable to comprehend anything but slaughter and death."
"You call us murderers, yet you are the same," Altair said coolly, carefully keeping his temper in check. "Though I admit, your use of poison suggests otherwise. I suppose this means none of you were killers in the beginning? You were originally just a group of bandits, desperate for money."
The soldier's eyes widened slightly, minutely, but the shift was still visible to Altair, even behind the crossed helmet half covering the other's face. He sensed he had hit at least a partial truth. He plowed on, taking a page from Malik's book and deftly reversing their roles in the interrogation, "You are neither Crusader nor Saracen; just a gathering of upstart insignificants. Little more than scavengers on the edges of the Holy War, hoping that the great leaders will throw you some scraps—"
"Enough!" the man snarled, approaching him menacingly and visibly restraining himself as he reflexively groped for a weapon at his belt. The Assassin's eyes followed the enemy's hand, now seeing the outline of a narrow dagger concealed under his tunic. Finally, the fool was in range.
Altair sprang forward, his right arm outstretched and his left trailing behind him to allow him the farthest allowable reach. The man gasped, reacting too slowly as the Assassin latched onto the black cross of his tunic and jerked him close. His left hand easily found the hilt of the enemy's small blade and he drew it with a swift jerk. With dark gaze still fixed coldly on the other's startled face, he stabbed the dagger into the soldier's flank.
The blade bit, not as deeply as he would have liked, weighted as he was by the chain and exhaustion, but it was enough. The guard gave an indignant cry of pain, twisting away before the steel could penetrate into his vitals and backhanding Altair rather viciously across the face. The metal of a gauntlet connected painfully against the Assassin's cheekbone and he fell to the side, away from the man. He managed to catch himself on one hand with sufficient grace however and, crouching docilely again, smirked up at the man past a blooded lip.
"Ra'id!"
There was an anxious shout from a few of the man's comrades as they rushed towards the source of the scream. The injured man—Ra'id was it?—staggered away from Altair with fury sketched across his features, retreating to relative safety amongst his fellows and gripping the shallow wound on his side to staunch the bleeding. One cautiously snatched up the fallen knife before following the others out of the white-robed man's line of sight. A pity it hadn't been poisoned.
They gave the Assassin a wide berth now, these snakes, fearful of his ability to strike despite the irons and the remnants of toxin. He caught snatches of angry conversation as they discussed him from the other side of the wall of crates to his left; many were dropping suggestions to either kill him or at least further restrain him. Altair placidly wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and silently promised them that any attempts at either would result in more of their life spilled.
They came to a decision within a few minutes and rounded the corner again. The two unfortunate men in front eyed the Assassin reluctantly as the others impatiently goaded them forward, they just as hesitant to get any closer. From the back, Ra'id's smoldering gaze never left Altair's face, his hand still touching his newly bandaged flank. At the approach of the pair, the chained man stood slowly, deliberately, glowering at them as if daring them to come within reach. One shied, stopping several feet away, but the other advanced with strained determination.
Altair distractedly noticed the escalating ache in his lungs and throat, heightened by the adrenaline coursing through him, but he ignored it, attention instead focused on the soldiers before him. The brave, or foolish, one lunged abruptly, pulling back a fist to aim for the side of his head and simultaneously reaching out to pin his free hand. A quick sidestep was all it took to dodge the punch and as the man leaned down to grab his right wrist, the Assassin pushed forward and drove a knee forcefully into his abdomen. A pained grunt escaped him and Altair threw him backwards, nonchalantly discarding him like an unwanted scrap.
No one else made a move or a sound as the fallen man coughed on the ground, curled against the pain. Finally breaking the silence, Ra'id barked out for all five of the remaining soldiers to attack together, tone ringing with impatience and dangerous authority. The men ran forward in a charge more like a blind, panicked rush, Altair shifting into an offensive stance to meet them head on. There was a moment of violent confusion, the Assassin dodging blows as best he could, managing to break several jaws and even snapping one's knee with a coil of chain, but the sheer number proved too much for him, weak and weaponless as he was.
Altair's breath was torn from him as an elbow connected with his chest, sending him against the cold wall of the warehouse. Two bodies, both with faces bloodied, pushed up against him and painfully gripped his arms at the wrist and elbow, wrenching them behind his back as he thrashed. The others were collecting themselves, nursing fractured bones and bruised prides. Ra'id came closer as the scuffle quieted, his cold smirk back in place now that the eagle had been jessed.
"You've had your fair share of accusations and questions, Assassin," the group leader said spitefully, ignoring his comrades as they limped away to tend to their injuries. "It is time you answered some of mine." The Master Assassin only glared at him, no longer straining against the two men at his back, but still tensed for a fight. Ra'id had grown serious now, dispensing with the pointless taunts and beating around the bush.
"Isam claimed that you are expecting "several more masters" to arrive in Acre by tomorrow," he said, meeting Altair's eyes fearlessly. "I want to know exactly how many are coming and what road they are likely to pass."
"If you are still expecting me to cooperate at this point, then maybe you are more of a fool than I originally thought," the Assassin said flatly, unconcerned by the physical abuse he felt was forthcoming.
However, his words surprisingly seemed to please Ra'id, a sly grin spreading across the guard's features as he heard them. "I thought you might say that," he said lightly, reaching into a pouch by his scabbard to withdraw a tiny bottle filled with colorless liquid, as well as a strange contraption that Altair was only vaguely familiar with. The man drew close to the Assassin, dangling the bottle before his face. "This, my friend, is pure ethanol, a chemical substance found in wines. I'm sure you're familiar of the effect small amounts of it have, errors in judgment and the loosening of tongues for example."
The Assassin recoiled slightly, reflexively, finally recognizing the glass and metal device Ra'id held as a syringe. Picking up on the flicker of fear like a moth to a flame, the leader continued brightly, "The effects of a larger amount should prove more interesting, especially after it's injected directly into the bloodstream. It might not be too much for people like those drunkards on the docks with their heightened tolerance, but I hear the Assassins of Masyaf are banned from alcohol, correct?"
Altair said nothing; drawing back involuntarily and feeling the hands of the other two soldiers tighten as he shifted. His gaze never left the bottle as Ra'id made a show of unstoppering it, filling the air with a sharp, gas-like scent. However, as the guard lowered his attention to the syringe to fill it with the volatile liquid, the Assassin's eyes narrowed and, with a swift kick, he sent the vial and its contents scattering into the air.
Time seemed to still as the viscous ethanol splashed through the air in a clear, shimmering arc. Altair ducked his head, shielding himself with his hood and hiding a smirk at Ra'id's thoroughly confused expression, the second one within the hour. The ill-fated guard holding Altair's right arm received the first hit, taking a small splatter of chemical straight in the face. The Assassin winced slightly at the ungodly howl as the man staggered back, raking at his burning face and eyes as the substance sizzled against his skin.
There were snapped curses as the other two soldiers swiped at drops that landed against exposed hands and faces and Altair was thoroughly grateful for the protection of his layered white robes. He took advantage of the momentary distraction and, twisting, tore free of the other soldier's grip. He turned, grabbing the man by the collar and throwing him against the one still yelling in agony. The cries were cut short as the two collided and collapsed together against and through one of the aging wood crates. Blood pooled as the jagged edges of the broken planks brutally stabbed through the clothes and flesh of the unlucky men.
The Assassin flicked his gaze on Ra'id now, his chest paining and his breathing grating in his ears, but with freedom so close, he was not about to yield. The leader attacked him with startling ferocity; angered as he was at seeing his men fall so easily to their prisoner. He lunged towards him rather foolishly with the empty syringe, neither attempting to draw a different weapon, nor seeming to notice its frailty.
Altair turned aside the first few strikes and punches, but he was struggling now, feeling sweat drip down his face from fending off attacks in such a confined area. He sidestepped to the left, pulling the chain to its limit as he dodged a stab from the needle-tipped glass. As he did so, he was startled at a sudden pressure, a powerful jerk against his wrist.
With some horror, Altair heard a dry crack and the next moment he hit the floor forcefully on his side, yanked down by the metal band around his arm. As pain lanced up the limb, he looked up and saw that Ra'id had stepped on the links of the chain that bound him, pinning both him and it to the floor. The Assassin heard a distant splintering as the syringe was thrown impatiently to the ground some distance away. As he gingerly moved to free himself, the leader's face suddenly filled his vision, sneering down at him.
"My mistake, Altair. You are too much trouble to even bother keeping alive."
The narrow dagger, still slightly stained by its owner's blood, was in Ra'id's hand again and Altair was reminded rather abruptly of an almost identical situation, his and the leader's first encounter on the roof of the Bureau the day previous. Smirking grimly at the circumstance, the Assassin saw a flash of steel hack towards him, and though he raised his arm to defend himself, he was unsure if he had the strength or speed to succeed.
The scream rang clearly in the half-deserted ports and Malik paused in his search for his brother, looking over the waters towards the direction whence it had come.