Chapter 15: Ezio

When Jenna pulled over, I took over. I knew the Auditore Palazzo was still standing. I had spent 3.7 million American dollars restoring it twenty years ago. It had been many things over it's long life, but now it was one of my homes again. I took us to there. It was safe, secure and under a different name. Actually it was under a shell company that no one knew about. The rumor was that a rich playboy bought it and used it as a love nest. I had never had a woman stay there with me, ever.

I pulled into the back lot of the place. The walls were high, so no one would see Altair carrying in a bloody and beaten Alanna and myself dragging a half comatose Desmond.

I looked at Altair. "Put her in the room upstairs to your right. That was Claudia's room."

He nodded, and headed up the stairs. Jenna followed me up the stairs, giving me a hand with Desmond. "Claudia?" She asked as we deposited the now totally unconscious man into a bed.

"My sister. Well, my late sister. She died a very long time ago." I turned from her. Thoughts of my family were painful at times. I was the last one left. The last Auditore to live and the last one to, well, never die. The thought was quite depressing to say the least.

Her hand reached up and touched my shoulder. "I am sorry to hear that. I have only lost my mother. She died in childbirth with me."

I gave her a small smile. "I have lost many in my life. My whole family is gone. All I have left is Altair and Alanna. They are my family."

She pushed her hair out of her face and behind her ears. "So, are you going to explain how you and Altair got your names?" She smiled at me.

I couldn't help but laugh. She had dimples. "Tesoro, you would not believe me even of I told you. But, you are cute when you show off those dimples."

Her face went crimson fast. Her hands flew up to cover the blushed skin. I laughed harder. She was adorable in that girl-next-door kind of way. "Stop laughing, I blush easy alright."

"I see that, but it is cute. Very old world. It is rather fetching to see a woman do that in this day and age." I winked at her and walked over to the room Alanna and Altair were in. I knocked. "It's just me, mio amico. May I come in?"

"Yeah." The muffled reply came from behind the door.

I entered the room with Jenna on my heels. He had Alanna on her stomach, cleaning the wounds on her back. I could see the damage done to the flesh, but I had sustained worse. She would be fine in a few hours. "So, how long til she is on her feet?"

The Eagle looked up from his work. "Too soon to say. I would put it at a few hours, if not a day. Some of the metal went in deep." He went back to wiping the blood away.

"Shouldn't she get to a hospital? I mean infection could set in and she could die." The younger woman stood at my side.

"She will be fine, believe me." I touched her arm, but she pulled away.

Her blue eyes narrowed. "She looks like she's dead, Ezio!"

"That's because in all truth, she is." Altair placed the rag in a basin of water on the nightstand. "We all three are if you must know." He stood and walked over to the window. "Well, we should be, many times over."

Jenna crossed her arms over her chest. "Want to explain that one?"

I sighed and sat at the foot of the bed. "What I am about to tell you does not leave this room. Only a few people know what we are and they are in this house. Rebecca and Desmond know, and now you will as well. My name is really Ezio. Ezio Auditore da Firenze. I was born here in this palazzo in the sixteenth century to Maria and Giovanni Auditore. Altair's full name is Altair Ibn-La'Ahad, the famed Grandmaster of Masyaf. Alanna Isabella Dowd was one of his assassins back then. The Apple did something to us. Made us immortal and now, we are protecting it from the Templars."

She just stared at me for a moment. Trying to take everything in. Desmond had done the same, so I was not surprised to her reaction. It was hard for a mortal to hear that while they grew old and died, we would stay the way we were forever. Or until the Apple released us. It was a bit depressing, to say the least. I would have loved to grow old with a woman and die when it was time.

She blinked, then spoke. "So, let me make sure I heard you right. He is over 800 years old, so is she, and you are over 500?" I nodded. Jenna pointed to Alanna's prone form. "She's dead right now, but will come back to life in a few hours, because you three are immortal. Made so by the P.O.E we pulled out of Abstergo. Did I get that right?"

Altair walked back over and stood in front of her. "You have it in a nutshell and I will promise you this. If you breathe a word of this to anyone outside this house. No, let me rephrase that. Anyone outside this room, I will personally lay open your throat and watch the life bleed out of your eyes as the blood runs down the front of you. Do I make myself clear?"

I watched her eyes widen in fear. The old man had that affect on people. Hell, he still could do that to me and I have been dealing with him for a few hundred years. "Yes sir."

"Good, now I need to get a shower and a change of clothes. Got anything here that would fit me?" He looked at me.

"Go raid my closet. I will dig into the safe and get some cash for some things at the market. There is no food here and I don't know about you two, but I am starving." I stood and walked out of the room. "Come on Jenna, I will explain more on the walk through this place."

She look one more look at Altair, who from the look on her face, had scared the shit out of her, and walked quickly after me. She walked beside me through the halls. "Now, why are you in hiding? I mean, I know you were also a Grandmaster in your time. Don;t you think the Brotherhood could use your knowledge more than ever?"

"Jenna, we are a walking freak show. We can not die. Hell, because of that, we can not live normal lives. We have to stay far from real danger, because of we are shot, it would give us away. I do not want to end up as someone's science experiment. Neither does Altair or Alanna. They have been through too much with each other as it is." I pushed open the door to my old room. "I could not live with myself to see anything happen to either one of them."

She shook her head. "I think I understand. You are a family. You would lay down your life, if you could, to see that nothing happen to them. But the real question is, would they do the same for you?"

I turned and looked her in the eye. "I know they would. Altair and I have been a team for many, many years. We have both gone down for each other. Alanna carried Altair for two hundred and fifty years, keeping him safe until he awoke. She loves him more than her own life. She would sacrifice herself if that meant for him to survive. That, my dear, is the true love everyone loves for, but he is as hard headed as the stone this place is made from. He will not bring himself to admit he feels the same way."

Pulling a painting from the wall, I opened the safe I had hidden there. I knew it would come in handy one day. It also held the things that were most valuable to me in life. My mother's ring, my father's dagger, my older brother's necklace, and my little brother's feather collection I spent an afternoon collecting for him. I felt a tear run down my face at the thought of them. Even five hundred years later and the memories of them hanging from the gallows still made me sick and brought me to tears.

"Ezio, are you alright?" I felt her smaller hand on my shoulder.

I wiped the stray tear away. "I'm fine. Just old ghosts coming back to haunt me is all."

Grabbing what I wanted, I locked it back and along with it my memories of the past. It was the only thing I could do. They were always there in the back of my mind. Mainly happy memories, that was what they were, memories.

"Alright, where are your clothes and they had better not be from when you first lived here."

Altair snapped me from my thoughts. I shook my head with a smile on my face. "Come now, don't you want to wear leather and lace again?"

He made a face of disgust. "Hated it then and still hate it now. How you wore the shit is beyond me."

I chuckled. "I, for one, liked my clothes, but the robes allowed more movement. I will give that to you. Besides, the leather turned the ladies on." I smiled at the blond woman next to me.

She rolled her eyes. "You have more mood swings than anyone I know." She headed for the door. "One minute you are smiling and telling jokes and the next talking about the past with this haunted look in your eyes."

"Comes with being old. Well, at least I am not as old as he is." Pointing a thumb at the Arab, I smiled broadly.

"Yeah, yeah, fuck you, you little Italian asshole. I believe if we are going by our actual years awake, I only have you beat by like ten. Alanna has us beat by a hundred and fifty." He moved over to the closet and began to rummage through the hangers. "Don't you have jeans and tees?"

"Bottom drawer of the dresser." I walked towards the door. "Don't destroy the room."

"Whatever." He headed for the dresser and started to pull out drawers. "Don't forget to pick up something for 'lanna. She might be a bit mad at you if she wakes up with no clothes. I wouldn't mind, but she might kill you, then me. Or just me, then you. Well, we would both be down for the count." He held up a pair of black jeans and a black shirt. "Thank you."

Jenna watched him. "Do you wear any color besides black?"

"Yeah, red, but Ezio does not like the color. So, I am stuck with just black. It works." He walked out of the room, clothes thrown over his shoulder.

"I think that is the most I have ever heard him talk." I shook my head. "Come on. Let's go find out everything we need from the market."

We walked next to each other down to the parlor where Rebecca and Mike were. The younger assassin was asleep on the couch, but Rebecca was looking out the window at the small garden I had out back. "Just got a hold of Shaun. He will be here in a half hour."

I cocked an eyebrow. "How did you get a hold of him? I have no phone here and they took my cell when they captured us."

She shrugged. "Jenna gave it to me."

Turning my head, I eyed the new assassin. "Hey, I'm a woman. I do not go anywhere without my phone. Even on a mission."

I merely just shook my head. The women was something I would never in time understand. Even being married once before and had many lovers, I still did not grasp what went on in their heads. "Anyway, any takers for going to the market with me? I need to get some clothes for Alanna and some food for this place."

Both women looked at me then each other. Eyes narrowed at the other. Oh shit this was not good. Watching them, I thought I might be witness a cat fight over me. "How about we all three go? I would love to have two beautiful women on my arms as we stroll through the streets of Firenze."

That got a smile out of both of them. I still had it. I was just that good. Giving them my best smile, I held out my arms and they each took one. "You, Ezio Auditore, are a whore." Jenna said to me with a smile on her face.

I smiled right back. "Hey now, I resemble that remark. Or is it resent? Nope, with me, it's resemble. Yea, was right the first time."

All Rebecca did was laugh. It was nice to hear laughter in these empty halls. Memories flooded my mind, and I smashed them back down. I would not think of them right now. It was not the time, nor the place. I had the arms of two women and I was thinking about my family. "Let us be on our way, ladies."

I noticed when I was getting ready to write this, I never really had Ezio serious. He was always joking, but that is how he hides. Thought I would throw that out.