Chapter 19

Ezio Auditore's aching body rested silently on a rosewood bench, his rigid frame hunched forward as his stressed forehead creased into his palms. Bruise like marks encircled his fretful eyes as he squinted them shut into dark, pained lines. He stifled a sigh, pressing his thumbs against his ears to drown out the echoes floating through the dim brothel. A soft groan of annoyance rumbled in his chest when the noises persisted into an irritating muffled drone in his head. He pushed the distractions from his mind as he tried to regain his concentration on relaxing each tense muscle in his body. The sharp spike of adrenaline mixed with his own rapid fears had at last diminished from his system, leaving his mind feeling burnt out and his flesh suffocating from exhausting. But all those afflictions were second to the ever-pressing worry that rose paramount over his physical anguish. He had been waiting, for what felt like hours, outside of the occupied chamber where she rested.

He dug his thumbs against his skull with even more pressure as the graphic moaning erupted from down the hall with rising volume. He distracted himself by revisiting moments from the most recent span of elapsed time. He envisioned the flashback of him carrying her limp frame in his protective grip, her pulse faintly thrumming against his body. He remembered his steps weakening through the pale and shadowy streets, his knees trembling beneath him, the dark shades elongating around him as they stretched across the cold earth. "Help! Please! Qualcuno!" he shuddered at the sound of his own raspy voice bounding through the empty alleys. "Please! We need a doctor! Please, chiunque!" but the only reply was the murmur of his dry and panicked echo floating through the air, clashing with the reverberating drone of his faltering footsteps. His shoulders rose and fell with another heavy sigh as he recalled fixing his eyes upon the silent form growing all the more still in his arms. A fire of disgust and anger convulsed through his body as he relived the memory, reliving the terror of her blank gaze. The sudden ghastly pale hue that had crept over her was unbearable as he tasted the familiar venom of absolute helplessness. He was helpless to hold her to this earth just as he had been helpless to save his own father and brothers. He cupped a shaky hand to her chilled face, her empty stare gazing through him; he could still feel her breath against his skin... or was he only imagining it? The unfeeling darkness that slowly overtook her beautiful face made his heart turn violently in his chest, as death wrapped it's gruesome fingers around her like a frozen and unforeseen kiss, stealing the once rosy coloring from her lips in it's embrace. Even as he clutched her tightly in his arms, he could feel her soul drifting further and further away, uncontrollably slipping through his fingers. He grit his teeth behind his lips as the familiar poison burned through him, leaving a foul taste of fury in his mouth. His feet travelled faster through the street, searching for help, all the while begging to God to bestow upon him the strength to keep him standing just long enough to save her.

Ezio tried to still his mind and steady the memories that followed, but the images were cloudy and hard to register. He remembered running with the last amount of energy he could muster as exhaustion granted little mercy to his cause. He remembered kicking open a door, at least, he thought that's what had happened... anything after that was far too hazy to decipher as reality faded to dream as his body succumbed to the unstoppable weight of fatigue. His first coherent thought beyond that point was the simple, yet engulfing, smell of lilac and rose oil perfuming into his nostrils. The smell stirred something within him, waking him and pulling him out from the abyss. He hoisted himself up onto his elbows, lost in his surroundings. He could still see the room in his mind where he had awoken. It was night when he awoke, his body had been laying slanted on the large bed cloaked in silk, the tall candles beside him flickered softly as the moonlight gushed over the marble floor christened with soft flower petals. The walls were painted a seductive shade of purple that matched the elaborate flowing drapes cloaking the chamber. The hypnotic scent flooded his reviving senses, welcoming him, inviting him to stay just a few moments longer. He recognized the alluring trance, and knew it well; Only one place in all Venice flaunted such an aroma... La Rosa Della Virtù.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

Vito Arduino clutched his medical bag in his wrinkled, gloved, grip, as his breath reverberated from within the hallow confines of his doctors mask. The pale face and long curved beak served the simple purpose to act as a specially designed filter to keep out a number of plagues and sinister spirits. Although a tad uncomfortable and a little unsightly, Vito had grown accustomed to the constant weight against his face as well as the overwhelming looks of revulsion granted to him by his fellow Venetians. He warmly shrugged these trivial distractions away, accepting that they would somehow always accompany his job as the only doctor in the district. He enjoyed his work for the most part, spending his days tending to the sick and lame who approached his small corner store, and even making the occasional house call. Today was no different as he had already begun making his way to his first appointment. Vito yawned loudly behind his ashen muzzle, his dull eyes blinking to the breaking sunrise. It seemed that each morning came earlier and earlier and each home that much further away. He counted the blocks to himself as the streets gradually came to life around him. "One more block," the thin lines of his old lips tightening at the thought as he released an anxious grumble. His displeasure only heightened the moment he recognized the sensual lavender decorations adorning the building that loomed ahead. "La Rosa Della Virtù," he sighed aloud once more; it was far too early to attend to venereal infected courtesans.

A very young lady daintily ran to great him, her perfectly braided hair sitting atop her head like charming cat ears. Her panicked, yet delicate limbs seemed to float gracefully rather than prance across the earth, or perhaps his vision was simply not as it once was. His eyes adjusted to her approaching sallow face, but was stunned to see she was much younger than he had anticipated.

" Dottore, deve venire rapidamente!" She tugged at his black sleeve. "You must come now!"

" Cieli child! You are far too young to be giving yourself away to the streets! How old are you?"

"Please senor you must come now!" her tugging began to lead him into the house of lust.

"Bene bene," he shrugged, lugging his bag of medicine and trinkets.

The little enchantress guided the doctor through her home, her frail arm pulling him swiftly up the stairs. A more refined and poised woman awaited him at the highest step, her tall blue dress resembled that of a nun... but unlike any nun he had ever laid eyes upon.

"Madonne," he nodded respectfully.

"Thank you for coming signore. Please, this way." Vito accepted her welcoming gesture and shadowed her footsteps down the lavender hall. Several overnight gentlemen began to sneak from the sealed quarters, tying up loose articles of clothing and returning their remaining change into their pockets. "She is in here." The nun produced a simple brass key from the folds framing her bust and proceeded to unlock the elaborate looking door. Vito cleared his throat in unexpected embarrassment before entering the chamber, gritting his teeth at the thought of what kind of sexually transmitted disease he would be treating this morning. The patient stretched across the bed was not at all what he had been expecting, as the sight of her dying figure drained the flustered blood from his face and replaced it with an icy sweat.

"Mio Dio..." his voice suddenly hoarse. "What happened to her?" Vito's medical instincts pulled him to the bedside of the frozen figure, her chilled complexion clashing with the striking blood painted generously across her skin and tattered undergarments.

"She was brought to us," the nun spoke. "Our doors are open to all who are in need of care."

"Some more than others I see..." he had already begun examining the bleeding in her shoulder. The mistress simply nodded over his shoulder, her serene eyes lined with pity.

"Doctor, do you need anything to aid your work? I can send my girls into the market to fetch whatever you may need."

"Nessuna sorella. That won't be necessary. Perhaps just some water to clean the bandages. They will need to be applied and changed regularly once I sew her wounds"

"Of course," She answered with another courteous nod before leaving, "Thank you Doctor, I shall be praying that God may guide your hands as well as your thoughts." Vito said nothing as he wasted no time having already dived into his medical bag. He opened his tote and rummaged through his supplies, laying out the tools he deemed necessary for his work. His hands had begun to show the slightest marks of dryness and wrinkles from his many years of work. He pressed two bare and callus fingertips against her throat, feeling her faint pulse thrum against his touch. His soft, gray, eyes scrutinized the bruises splattered across her cheeks, undoubtedly shaped like fingers and knuckles that had been left behind across her flesh. Had someone beaten her? He pushed the thought from his head, his job was to heal, not become involved.

A warm songlike voice whispered from behind, "signore," the charming young girl who had led him to the brothel entered the chamber, his guess was she was no older than 16. She held in her delicate hands a large bowl of linen clothes soaking in warm water, the smallest amount of steam floated above the rippled bowl. She smiled warmly from beneath her cascading curls as she offered the gift to his beaked face.

"Grazie bambina. Now go home to your mother and father, this is no place for a child." She wrinkled her nose at his remark before closing the door behind her. Vito began dabbing at the hole gored in his patients shoulder with the warmed, damp cloths, a procedure that he would repeat multiple times throughout the day. When her skin was clean, he checked for infection before tediously stitching her wounds shut. He occasionally noticed her eyebrows wince to the tiniest degree as he sank and pulled the needle into her flesh repetitively. Over the course of a few hours he could already see an improvement in her color, as a faint hint of a rosy shade bloomed over her cheekbones and warmed her pale lips. The pooling sweat of fever broke and subsided over her forehead. He would lean in and place a wet cloth over her face from time to time to help the cooling process until a strange abnormality caught his interest. Although shut, her eyes appeared to be twitching, scanning feverously beneath her lids... searching, or perhaps running from something in her dreams. "Strange..." was all he muttered.

Night had to claimed the sky, sun had long since dipped into the sea as the colors of the blossoming horizon vanished into a starry canopy. Vito rested in the wooden chair beside the bed, thumbing through the old pages of a medical book in the candle light. He only had one more round of bandages to apply before it would be time for him to return home; his bones simply weren't what they used to be. The sounds of raised voices stirred from the hallway and approached the door rapidly.

"Ezio you must wait here, he is not done tending to her."

"Is she alright? Sister Teodora, what happened?"

"You were carrying her but fainted the moment you stepped through the door. I called for the doctor to tend to your friend. I thought it best not to disturb you and let you rest."

"Thank you sister, but please, let me go to her, I need to see for myself."

"Ezio, let the good doctor work. The best thing for you to do now is to pray, that is what will help her the most."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"As you wish."

Vito tried to ignore the conversation behind the door, after all, it was none of his business.

"Ezio..." a raspy breath disrupted his newly acquired silence. Vito checked to his patient, her numb looking lips had at last begun to softly mumble. Her healing process was moving much quicker than he had anticipated, "oh to be young and lively again". He groaned to his feet before soaking some clean bandages in a fresh bowl of warm water that he cleverly diluted with salt to help fight infection. He gently unwound the used cloth from her shoulder, when he noticed the sheet of sweat beading over her skin in shimmering droplets. Confused, he reached to softly touch her forehead to check for fever. Her body suddenly jerked beneath his hand as he recoiled it immediately. He watched in silent disturbance as the twitching of her eyelids evolved into rapid pulsations, her frantic eyes scanning and convulsing beneath them. Her mouth, all at once, flowing with chaotic and tangled words that were not Italian. The sound of her voice fluctuated between a soft feminine voice to a monotone droll, giving him terrible shivers across his spine. The candles around the bed began to flicker to the new and sudden motion filling the room as Vito took several steps back, terrified that he had lost his patient to madness, when suddenly... it stopped. Her eyes went still in her skull and her rambling tongue ceased, as her pale hue vanished, returning her skin to a beautiful, warm, shade that nicely accentuated her chestnut hair. Vito's heart skipped a few beats within his chest as he straightened his beaked mask over his face. "Cazzo..." he exhaled.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

Ezio sat motionlessly outside Alcina's chambers, waiting as patiently as he could to hear some kind of word from the doctor. He found wandering through memories his only solace as he dreamed of brown eyes and soft brown hair. He looked back over the years of his life, remembering his life in Florence, recalling what a strange coincidence it had been that Alcina's family had always been so close to his own and how it brought them together those many years later. He pondered over the theories of both fate and destiny, and whether there were such things. He thought of the Knights Templar and the cruel twists that somehow brought him to where he was today, waiting diligently on that bench, his hidden blades resting against his wrists. His shoulders rose and fell to the motion of a deep sigh as he listened for any kind of movement from within the room. Nothing. His mind revisited the moment when Alcina entered his life, not as a playful child in Florence, but as a young woman, as his partner. He reminisced over her spunky smirk, making a faint smile of his own tease the corners of his lips. He thought of what life would be without her, how his life would have turned out if he had never met her at all... what would life be like if he lost her that very night, and him powerless to stop it. He felt the sharp needles of uneasiness pick and pry around his chest. The affect she had on him only seemed to trouble him all the more. He couldn't be allowed to have any weaknesses, any kind of strings that his enemies could cut or hold against him. The past forty-eight hours was all the proof that he needed. But if the time came, could he allow himself to let her go?

A tender hand rested upon his arched shoulder, "God has a plan child."

"I know," He relaxed under her gentle touch, "I just wish I knew what it was..."

Sister Teodora hummed an amused laugh, "As do the rest of us my son." She sat gracefully beside Ezio, his stern face hidden beneath his canvassing hood. "So who is she Ezio?"

"Her name is Alcina Gavino. Her father worked with my father in Firenze. She has become a partner of sorts."

"What kind of sort?" her voice lit with a touch of humor.

"The sort that has the same line of work as a man like me."

"I see. I'm sure a man like you has nothing but work on his mind with such a partner as that."

"What are you suggesting sister?" Ezio intoned defensively.

"Nothing messer Ezio, it is not my business. But if I did not know better, I would say you care for this woman." Ezio said nothing to this, only stared at the floor beneath his feet. "Have I upset you? That was not my intention."

"No madonne. It is not you that has put me in such a foul mood, it is your words. I fear that they are right."

"Is that such a terrible thing?"

Ezio breathed in another heavy sigh, "it is when I am not safe to be around. I have broken a heart before by the decisions I have made. I promised to not let something like that happen again." He was taken back to memory of Cristina and the exciting fire of his first love, followed by the slow tear of it being extinguished. "I fear my journey is one I must live out alone."

Sister Teodora watched on with tranquil and supporting eyes, "Shouldn't she have a say in that as well?" Ezio looked to the nun, her all-knowing counsel and gentle nature reminded him of his own mother in so many ways.

His acute ears heard a hand grip the door beside him as he raised his head in response. The doctor entered the hall, closing the door behind him softly as if afraid to disturb a sleeping child.

"Well?" Ezio rose to his feet. "Will she be alright?"

Vito recognized the young man's voice from before, "Yes, she's been fading in and out of sleep. I closed the wounds but she will need to rest a few days until I return to remove the stitches."

"Thank you Doctor, we never doubted you for a moment." Ezio ignored Sister Teodora's slight jab at his impatience.

"It is no trouble, truly." Vito nodded.

"May I see her?" Ezio pressed.

"Ahhhh si, if you wish." The doctor politely stepped out of the way for the hooded stranger to enter, his mind somewhat uneasy.

"How much do we owe for you services signore?" Sister Teodora raised her brows in poised regality.

"Perdona molti... there is something I wish to inquire about the patient." Vito rambled nervously.

"Signore I promise you I know as much about the young woman as you do. If you wish to know more about her, I suggest you ask the man with whom you just spoke."

"Bene bene, madonne, I understand. I was simply curious if you knew where the lady was from."

The nun thought back to her conversation with Ezio, "He mentioned her father's work in Firenze, so I can only assume she resided there as well. Why do you ask Doctor?"

"I see..." his pale peak pointed about the room before answering, "I have seen a number of patients sister, and it is not unusual for a patient to act out during heightened stress."

Sister Teodora's eyes narrowed as she intertwined her fingers, "Act out?"

"Si, fever, yelling, cursing, emotional fits..."

"Did she have one of these fits Doctor? Did she harm you?"

"No no nothing like that. I was just wondering..." he paused and cleared his throat awkwardly, "how long she has been speaking Latin?"

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

translations:

Qualcuno- Someone

chiunque- Anyone

Dottore, deve venire rapidamente- Doctor come quickly

Cieli- Heavens

Mio Dio- My God

nessuna sorella- no sister

bambina- child

perdona molti- many pardons