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Chapter 52

They set out for the Arsenale district a few hours later. The sun was just beginning to rise when they split up to the locations Ugo had assigned to them. Ezio found his way to a shipyard and, much to his relief, found several men in a cage being taunted by their guards. They looked like many of the men Ezio had seen scattered in the streets the night he had rescued Bartolomeo. They were undoubtedly his mercenaries.

There were four guards in total. Ezio decided that if he could get rid of them, the mercenaries could take their weapons and likely make their way back to Bartolomeo while he rescued the second set. He cautiously approached the cage, minding the sound of his footsteps as he did. The guards had their backs to him to harass their captives, but the mercenaries saw him easily. He motioned for them to be silent as he released his hidden blades.

One of the guards had been leaning a bit too close to the cage, so as Ezio's plunged into the necks of two other guards, two of the mercenaries grabbed the first guard through the bars and slammed him against the cage until he was left unconscious. Meanwhile, the final guard was drawing his sword. Ezio dodged his swing and tackled him to the ground. A moment later, and Ezio's blade was in his neck too.

The guard who had been knocked unconscious turned out to be the one with the key, and the mercenaries had already located it and were using it to open the door to their cage as Ezio wiped his blades clean.

"Grazie, messere," said one of them. "We owe you our lives. We would be honored to fight with you, but we have already sworn our services to-"

"Bartolomeo d'Alviano," Ezio cut him off. "He has sent me to rescue you. Do you know how to get to him from here?"

"Of course, but what of our brothers? Many others have been captured as well."

"I will attend to them," Ezio promised. The other man nodded and picked up one of the guards' swords.

Ezio moved quickly to the other location Ugo had given him. There he found a similar situation. Two guards went down quickly, and the other two drew their swords. Ezio threw a knife into a third one as the last man standing made a desperate rush toward him. Ezio easily dodged the attack and grabbed that guard's wrist, yanking his sword away from him. Before the guard had time to react, Ezio drove the sword through his chest.

As he explained to the men in the cage why he was there, he found the key in the final guard's pocket. He opened the door, and they each thanked him and picked up weapons. Ezio was prepared to follow them to Bartolomeo when he heard some shouting a few streets away, accompanied by the sound of metal striking metal. One of the voices belonged to a woman.

Ezio instinctively ran toward the noise, and his fears were confirmed when he reached a nearby square. A cage on the other side of the square held eight mercenaries who anxiously watched as four guards advanced on Rosa, who held out a sword. She had evidently been successful in freeing her first set of mercenaries, as this was the location she was supposed to visit second. Her latter attempt had landed her here, confronting four combatants on her own.

She was weighing her options as Ezio found them, and it was then that she (without seeing him) decided to turn and run. As she did, one of the guards swung at her, and his sword was just long enough to reach her back. Rosa yelled as she stumbled, and Ezio yelled even louder, directing the attention of two of the guards toward himself. He was quickly trying to decide if it would be more effective to help her flee the area or to attempt to fight off the guards, so he was stopped for a moment as a group of men rushed past him. They were the mercenaries he had just freed.

"We'll take care of them," one said to Ezio. "Go help your friend!"

Ezio rushed to Rosa without further hesitation, and the two made their way out of the area.