falling away
The bed beside him was empty, cold. His mouth felt cottony and his head was pounding. Although his entire body felt wrenched and ragged, he noted hazily that his ass didn’t feel sore, like it had in the past when he woke up after a night of hard drinking. Small comfort, really; he was so hungover it hurt to breathe.
“Taline!” he rasped, floundering under the weight of the bedding as he searched for his wife.
“I’m here, Ezio,” she said softly, tone inexplicably guarded and frosty. He rolled over and squinted hazily in the direction her voice had come from.
She was already dressed and seated on the enormous sheepskin rug before the fireplace, knitting some astonishingly tiny thing, presumably for their baby. Normally, he would love to watch her knit by the fireside as he dozed; he loved the warmth of the fire on his skin and the soft steady click of her needles, but he desperately needed to pee and the toilet felt very, very, far away. It’s not getting any closer with you just laying here, stronzo, he reminded himself with a resigned sigh. He rolled out of bed, slipped on his vest, which for some reason had been left on the floor by the bed – that’s a new suit, Mother’s going to thrash the elves if she finds out it got left to wrinkle on the floor all night – and landed tailbone first on the hardwood floor with teeth-jarring force. So much for my ass not hurting. His clothes from the night before were scattered in a haphazard blast radius from his side of the bed. Taline must have already been asleep when I got back last night. He summoned a clean pair of underwear from their bag with a sloppy flop of his wrist; unsurprisingly, they didn’t land precisely where he had intended. Taline barely glanced at him as he struggled into his underwear, almost tripped over his suit trousers and staggered into the doorframe. He puzzled over that as he made his way to the bathroom; usually she made an effort to be comforting and helpful on his rough mornings. He barely managed not to retch at the smell of alcohol in his urine. Christ, what was I drinking? he wondered as he cast a quick cleaning charm on the toilet and then washed his hands. He hadn’t gotten black-out drunk in months – Not since I left Roma. Cazzo, my head is killing me – and he hadn’t thought he had drunk enough the night before to feel as poorly as he currently did. He stamped for an elf and ordered a purifying elixir and a liter of water, then sank down against the wall while he waited.
Purifying elixirs were a misery to take, purgatives that were not only emetics, diuretics, and laxatives, but also made the unfortunate person taking them sweat like crazy – and the effects started about thirty seconds after the potion was swallowed. On the bright side, the purgative typically ran its course in about five minutes – five absolutely miserable minutes – so at least the suffering was condensed.
It was even worse than he remembered.
After a shower, and drinking the liter of water the elf had brought with the purifying elixir, it began to feel like he might actually survive the day. His digestive tract felt positively raw and his skin was tender from whatever all it was he had just sweated out of his system and scrubbed clean under a blessedly hot shower. He was a little shaky as he made his way back to his old room, picking his steps as gingerly as an elderly cat. Taline was still knitting by the fire, her soft curves illuminated in the rosy warm glow, and his throat tightened with heart-wrenching tenderness as he watched her for a moment before staggering over to collapse beside her and bury his face in her lap.
“Morning, Mogliettina,” he mumbled against her thighs, nuzzling his face deeper into her lap. Christ, she smells so good. He could feel his cock stirring appreciatively, which seemed entirely unfair because there was no way he’d actually be able to make love to her so soon after taking a purifying elixir. Down, Ezione.
“Good morning, Varpet.”
There it was again – that uncharacteristic frostiness in her voice – he grudgingly lifted his head from the soft, dark safety of her lap to study her expression.
Not Happy was written all over her; her posture was tension-tight and she was flushed and blotchy from crying, eyes bloodshot and eyelids puffy and tender. Cazzo. He sat up slowly. She watched him warily, like a cornered untamed creature. It seemed like a good idea to take her knitting from her before the thin wooden needles snapped in her white-knuckled grip.
“What’s wrong, piccola mamma? Did you have a rough night?” he asked gently as he eased the knitting out of her hands and helped her to her feet.
She leveled a hard, speaking look at him. “You got back very late.”
He grimaced. “Yeah, it’s been a while, since I’ve seen anyone. I had a lot of catching up to do, and with Uncle Mario-”
She huffed softly under her breath and looked away from him. It stung.
“And Cristina?”
His breath caught between his teeth at the sudden rush of guilt and hurt and anger just hearing Cristina’s name evoked in him.
“What about Cristina?” he snapped, suddenly furious with her for lobbing Cristina’s name and an unspoken accusation at him like a grenade. “Huh? What about her?” he demanded, gripping her jaw and forcing her to face him.
“After – after you finished, with me,” she whispered, eyes resolutely downcast and refusing to meet his. “You called her name. You kissed me and called me her name, Ezio.”
He felt sick, dizzy and nauseous and completely unmoored. He tried to remember what he had dreamt about the night before, tried to will himself to wake up. It’s not working. Oh god, why isn’t it working? Cazzo, cazzo, cazzo.
“I was drunk. I don’t remember,” he said quickly, reflexively cursing himself as her face crumpled and she started crying. “It doesn’t mean anything, Taline. I-”
“You still want her! Dream of being in bed with her-” she accused, shoving away from him.
“Of course I dream about being with a woman who actually enjoys making love with me – but I want that woman to be you!” he interrupted her angrily, grabbing her wrist and yanking her back against himself. “I’m married to you. I’ve having a child with you, Mogliettina,” he continued, attempting to gentle his tone as she sobbed and squirmed against him, trying to twist her body away from him and out of his arms. He leaned down to kiss her and she slapped him. He gripped her upper arms tightly and crushed his lips against hers. She bit him. He swore as he released her, tasted blood, and swore again, more thoroughly and loudly. She was still crying, hand raised to shield her face, and the ugly red handprint on her wrist made his stomach churn with self-loathing. Like where to hit her so it won’t show, his sister’s voice taunted. He felt like such a monster.
The door burst open and Altaïr was in the doorway, impeccably groomed and dressed in pristine training whites, taking in the tableau with a sweep of his uncanny eyes. It wasn’t like his cousin to just barge into a person’s room without knocking.
“Is everything all right?” Altaïr demanded, expression hardening as his eyes fell on Taline.
“Fine. Everything’s just fucking fine. Learn to fucking knock, why don’t you?” he shot back, snatching a clean pair of training shalwar out of their bag, angry and embarrassed for Altaïr to see them in this state. Of course his cousin practically rolled out of bed looking like a perfect Master. And, of course his perfect Master cousin would unhesitatingly walk in on him arguing with his wife and looking like hell. Of-fucking-course.
“I heard raised voices. I was concerned,” Altaïr replied, pulling a handkerchief out of thin air to offer to Taline. She accepted it with a watery sniff and a small smile, and his ears rang with jealous rage. He looked away and gritted his teeth as he clawed his still wet hair into a low ponytail at the back of his skull and secured it with an elastic. Altaïr and Taline were speaking together, voices low, in what he presumed to be Turkish, since he couldn’t understand what they were saying. She sounded upset, and Altaïr was responding in even, soothing tones. Cleaning up my messes, he thought with a two-pronged stab of self-pity and self-loathing. I should have insisted that Taline sit beside me last night. It suddenly occurred to him that his wife might spend a bit too much time with his cousin – as Lucia had obliquely suggested during last night’s dinner – but that there was no way for him to curtail it without appearing jealous and insecure. Which I am, he acknowledged grimly. He was jealous of any man who so much as breathed in Taline’s direction; which was pathetic, and he knew it, but he just couldn’t help it.
“I’m sure Aunt Maria has some bruise removing paste on hand,” Altaïr said, having switched back to Arabic. “We can ask her for some over breakfast-”
Cazzo. The thought of his mother’s reaction to that request made his blood run cold.
“That’s not necessary,” he quickly interrupted. “I’ll bring some back from the Motherhouse, and you’ll wear one of your wide pretty bracelets until then, right, Mogliettina?” he continued with a pointed look.
There was almost something defiant in her expression when she met his gaze before she demurely lowered her eyes and tipped her chin in acquiesce.
“Yes, of course, Varpet.”
He was between her and her jewelry casket and she hesitated until he stepped aside, then even so, she skirted wide of him when she passed. It hurt. He wanted to take her in his arms, drag her back to bed and hold her, comfort her, make things right between them, until she smiled at him again, like she had before they’d come to Italy. Bringing her here was a mistake. His heart sank at the thought. He loved Italy – loved Roma and Lucca and Venezia, Firenze and Genova and Milano – but Taline was miserable, and if she was this unhappy in Roma, Lucca was going to be a nightmare. She was already barely eating and her nausea seemed to have gotten worse; she got sick from everything, even at the smell of tea. Was this what it was like while I was away on contract? He was starting to worry for their baby. He forced himself to look away from Taline and recoiled in surprise when he found himself nearly nose to nose with Altaïr.
“Jesus Christ, Aquila! Don’t do that,” he blustered to cover his embarrassment over being caught off guard as he yanked his training shalwar up his hips.
“What happened?”
“None of your goddamn business,” he snapped, putting a hand against Altaïr’s chest and shoving him back, or he tried to, at least. It had about as much effect as if he had been pushing against one of the walls.
“You hurt her,” Altaïr stated, with an uncomfortably obstinate angle to his jaw.
Cazzo.
“Stay out of it. She’s my wife; what happens between us is none of your damned business.”
He could almost see the gears turning in Altaïr’s brain as he assimilated that response and then his cousin’s brows drew down in a stony scowl. “But you hurt her,” he repeated. “You made her part of my family, Ezio, and that makes it my business.”
Any other time he would have been grateful for Altaïr’s unequivocal statement of acceptance of Taline. Any. Other. Time. But right now, right now he had enough of a mess on his hands trying to do damage control with Taline – he did not need the added challenge of trying to do that while enduring the brunt of Altaïr’s lofty morals and socially awkward obstinance.
“Altaïr, akhi, you know the last thing I want to do is to hurt her, right?” he wheedled softly, mindful of Taline overhearing them. “We’re still getting used to each other, and it’s been a little rough going, but we’re getting there-”
“Filomena thinks you beat Taline because she is displeasing to you.”
His shock almost choked him. Not at the fact that Altaïr had said what he just did – because, of course his cousin would just blurt out something like that, of course – but that Filomena would stoop to gossiping about him with Altaïr. Altaïr had always made Filomena uncomfortable. There’s nothing in his eyes when he looks at you. There’s just nothing there, Ezio, like he hasn’t got a soul. Nothing he said seemed to make any difference – not when he assured Filomena that Altaïr could be patient and kind, not when he told her what a gifted teacher Altaïr was, not even when he told her how welcoming Altaïr continued to be to Taline; nothing.
“I don’t beat Taline,” he retorted irritably. “Do I, Mogliettina?”
“No, Varpet,” she dutifully murmured. He heard her jewelry rustle as she searched for a bracelet wide enough to cover the mark he’d left on her wrist. He felt like such a monster. I’ll find some way to make it up to her, something really special, he silently vowed with a quick glance over at his wife. She was doing her best to not look at him. It hurt.
“That mark on her wrist would suggest otherwise,” Altaïr replied cuttingly, tone almost sardonic.
Under any other circumstances, he’d try to encourage Altaïr’s attempts at sarcasm. God knows they’re few and far between, and seldom actually any good.
“And what do the marks Sirocco leaves on your body suggest?” he snapped. “I could come up with a whole lot of theories… but I don’t, because it’s not my place to speculate about what goes on in a couple’s private life. What happens behind closed doors-”
“Siro doesn’t hurt me!” Altaïr insisted. “Not like you hurt Taline, and I know you know it’s wrong.”
He stared, aghast, at Altaïr for a solid hot minute and then cruel, incredulous laughter bubbled up his throat before he could stop it.
“Only you would claim that someone who practically flays your cock isn’t hurting you,” he chortled. “Any normal man would call that torture and run away screaming.”
There was a nearly imperceptible flinch before Altaïr’s expression went perfectly blank, his posture relaxed into a deceptively casual half-slouch, and Ezio felt the previous moment’s mean-spirited laughter evaporate like drops of water on hot metal, to be replaced by a creeping sense of shame that he’d stooped so low when he lashed out at his cousin. He felt his mother’s summons tremor through his blades.
“It should hardly come as a surprise that I apparently am abnormal in that respect,” Altaïr replied with chilling politeness. “Your mother summons us to breakfast. Shall I wait for you to finish dressing?”
There was an enormous bubble of guilt and regret and shame swelling in his throat; he had to swallow it down twice before he could answer.
“I’ll just be a minute. You go ahead.” It was hard to meet Altaïr’s eyes; he felt small, ashamed.
Altaïr had always gotten prickly whenever it came up that he wasn’t exactly normal, which really, didn’t make any sense – he was the youngest Master ever in the Order’s history, his magical talent was prodigious, his training schedule draconian, and his endurance and self-control were superhuman – there was absolutely nothing normal about him. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, that Altaïr was weird – really weird, actually – it was just the way he was. I should apologize to him, if he’ll let me. Altaïr did not like accepting apologies. Emotional stuff made him uncomfortable, and Ezio mostly tried to respect that.
“Taline?” Altaïr had turned to Taline, head tilted slightly as he waited for her response.
She was nervous, fiddling with the ring he’d put on her finger and biting the edge of her bottom lip. His blood heated at the sight. Dio santo, she’s beautiful. She glanced at him before quickly looking away, the fingers of her bruised wrist curling into a fist.
“I’ll come down with Ezio. Bu iyi.”[1]
There was a beat of silence before Altaïr nodded. “Ben senin kararına güveniyorum. Sorarsan sana yardım edeceğim.”[2] He left the door open behind himself.
Ezio crossed the room and carefully closed the door. The latch clicked loudly in the silence between them. He exhaled slowly.
“What did he say to you?”
“Ask him yourself.”
He clenched his teeth, forced himself to slowly exhale again. He would never let her touch him, you know that, you stronzo. He hated himself for feeling so insecure. She’s mine. All, all mine. She’d never let another man touch her, he reminded himself.
“Bring my shirt?” He watched her hesitate before going over to their bag and getting out one of his training shirts and approaching him slowly. He took the shirt from her, the worn jersey soft in his hand, and carefully settled his other hand on the side of her waist, drawing her closer to himself. “I’m sorry, Taline. I never meant-” he swallowed and took a deep breath before continuing. He wanted so badly for her to understand. “I don’t want to be with anyone but you. You, and our baby, are the only future I want.”
She let him kiss her, opened her mouth to him when his tongue brushed her lips. She let him carry her back to the bed, spread her thighs when he reached up her skirt, and she was hot and slick and his for the taking when he slipped his fingers inside her. Yes, oh god, yes. He felt his mother’s summons tremor again through his blades, stronger this time, but he could tell Taline was close and they both needed her to have this orgasm. His name slid from her lips like a prayer when she came moments later and he loved the way it felt to hear her saying it. This isn’t rape, he told himself fiercely as Taline melted against him, muscles loosened and lips softly parted. Mari was just flinging accusations to see if any drew blood. This is duty and pleasure, marital relations subsumed into making love. It feels so good because it’s right; it’s God’s own will that a man should lay with his wife and take his pleasure in the marital bed.
He took his time sucking the taste of her from his fingers – santo dio, she tastes so good – as Taline cuddled up against him, breath wafting warmly across his chest when the corner of her mouth brushed his marriage scar. Her hand slid down his pants, past his half-hard cock to gently squeeze his balls and his hips involuntarily bucked upwards in response. He spread his thighs and lifted his pelvis invitingly as her fingers drifted down to the smooth skin behind his testicles. Keep going, a little further, please god, a little further, he thought, hips bucking upwards in a silent plea to be touched where he was too ashamed to ask for directly. She was making him ache for orgasm, but he was still only half-hard. Damn purifying elixir. Lucia would have understood what he needed; Taline did not.
“Stop. I can’t right now, Mogliettina. I’m sorry,” he mumbled, grabbing the waistband of his training shalwar as she started to pull them down. His heart lurched at the stricken look that flashed across her face before she started crying.
Cazzo.
“Taline? Mogliettina, what’s wrong?”
She’d pushed away from him, curled up in a tiny ball with her back to him as she sobbed tempestuously. She resisted when he tried to pull her back against himself before he finally overpowered her, and then she just hung in his arms, limp and unresisting as a rag doll and still crying.
“Is it, is it because of my body? How I look? Why can’t you make love to me sober anymore, in the light?” she finally choked out, avoiding his eyes.
“Jesus-Fucking-Christ, Taline,” he swore, abruptly sitting up and releasing her to yank his shirt on over his head. This is what happens when I stop taking that damn potion – better pick up more from the Motherhouse’s dispensary. Cazzo, that’s going to be awkward. “No, it’s none of those things. I love your body; how it looks, how it feels, how it – how you – taste. I’m dying to make love to you, but I took a purifying elixir this morning for the damned hangover and Ezione’s not going to cooperate for at least another few hours.” The worn linen jersey of his shirt slithered softly over his skin as he pulled it on, the sensation familiar and comforting. He sighed and turned back to her, pushing her hair aside to trail kisses along her neck. “I’ll make love to you when I get back tonight with all the lights on, okay? In front of the mirror, if you like, so you can watch me watch us making love.”
“Make love to me now, Ezio, please,” she pleaded, clinging to his clothing.
The irony of the situation – that the only time in the last four or more months she actually begged him to make love to her was also just about the only time he was absolutely, physically incapable of doing so – did not escape him. He almost wished his prying sister could have heard Taline pleading for his cock inside her. Oh yeah, I’m such a rapist, he thought with a bitter flash of anger. What does she know about the intimate relations between a man and his woman anyway? Nothing, that’s what!
“Do you want another thrill?” he offered, sliding a hand up her thigh. “I can definitely do that.”
Taline’s response was to bury her face against his chest and sob.
I guess that counts as a ‘no’ then. Not that she’s ever just going to say so directly. He tried to squelch the burst of frustration he felt at the thought; getting frustrated with Taline wasn’t going to help improve their situation.
His blades tremored again, more strongly than they had before; his mother was growing impatient. He thought of what Altaïr – or Mari – might be telling her and his blood went cold.
“Shall we go down to breakfast then?” he asked, trying to make his tone as gentle as possible. “A good meal might help you feel better, yeah? And I think we’ve kept my mother waiting long enough.”
She nodded and smoothed her skirt down her thighs.
“Yes, of course, Varpet.”
She was avoiding meeting his eyes again as she wiped the tear trails from her cheeks and she wasn’t wearing any bracelets, like he’d told her to, but he couldn’t see the mark he’d left on her wrist either.
She must have cast some form of glamour. Should I compliment her spellcraft? Would it sound like I’m condescending to her if I do? He wished he knew what to say to make her feel better, or at least what would help her stop crying so much. He wasn’t used to feeling wrong-footed with women.
Taline had drifted over to the door and glanced back over her shoulder in his direction questioningly, one hand lightly resting on the doorframe. He couldn’t help staring at her perfectly heart shaped ass, the sinuous sway of her hips as she walked; he loved watching the way she moved her body, so gracefully supple and lithe. He had loved it when she used to dance just for him, in the privacy of their rooms, but she hadn’t done that in months – not since the medics had confirmed her pregnancy – and he missed the intimacy and romance of it. She caught him just standing there staring and raised an eyebrow.
“Varpet?”
He felt his cheeks warm and shot a grateful prayer to St. Catherine of Siena that his darker complexion helped camouflage his rare blushes.
“Yeah, I’m coming,” he hastily replied as he closed the space between them and settled his hand on the small of her back.
Per carità, Ezione! You’ve never had trouble talking to women! She’s your wife, just say something nice!
“You’re so beautiful, Mogliettina. I’m so lucky to have you,” he blurted out. Her expression momentarily twisted with something before settling into a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, and he knew he must have said something wrong, but had no idea what it might have been.
“We must both be lucky, then,” she replied, extending a hand to him. Something was off with her tone, and it bothered him that he couldn’t quite pin point what it was.
Not that she’ll actually tell me anything if I ask her what’s wrong, he thought as he took her proffered hand, lacing their fingers together. He liked the way their hands seemed to fit together so easily, naturally; it felt right.
The Roma Motherhouse was just as he’d left it; the building’s Renaissance exterior belied its High Baroque interior. He loved the juxtaposition of the Rubenesque frescos and the antique weaponry adorning the walls, the chandeliers of brutal wrought iron and delicate hand-blown Venetian glass, the Moresque tile underfoot and the hallow-eyed portraits of fallen Masters reminiscent of byzantine icons. He loved the fading minty licorice, slightly leathery scent of myrrh, the woodsy pungent aroma of rosemary from his fellow Assassins’ freshly laundered robes, and the undertones of sweat and dust and blood that seemed to come from the stones and brickwork of the building itself. He paused to watch the lazy swirl of dust motes in the still air, illuminated in a shaft of bright morning sunlight from one of the high mullioned windows.
“Messere Ezio!”
He barely had time to recognize the person who had hailed him before the breath was forcibly expelled from his lungs by an incredibly enthusiastic hug.
“Cenzo,” he wheezed, awkwardly returning the too tight, too close embrace. His former student continued hugging him a long moment after he’d let go, but hastily released him before he could command it.
Vincenzo Bellavere had been a special favorite of Ezio’s among his assigned students in Roma, but not because the strapping nineteen-year-old was likely to be a great Assassin – the usual reason Masters tended to favor certain students – quite the opposite in fact. Vincenzo was all but illiterate, his Arabic virtually nonexistent, the only language he spoke – poorly – was Italian, and, as much as it pained Ezio to acknowledge it, not very bright was a kind overstatement of Vincenzo’s intellect. In all fairness, no one had expected that Vincenzo would be able to serve the Order as a fidā'ī at all. Eligio Giùgovaz, a broken older Master – due shortly to retire and become Rafīk of Tunis, and thereafter drink himself to a swift and ignominious death – had reportedly found five-year-old Vincenzo on the side of a road, close to death, with his head split open like a melon. The Order’s medics, with skill, luck, and magic, managed to save him, but as time passed it became increasingly clear that Vincenzo’s cognitive development was lagging well below the expected thresholds for his age. It didn’t help that Vincenzo initially couldn’t speak standard Italian either. According to the dapīrs, his first language might have been some form of Lagonegrese, but in any event, he had struggled for years to communicate with the Assassins around him. With no parental figure to act as an advocate with his best interests at heart, he’d been quietly slipping through the cracks until Ezio noticed him when he’d returned to Roma from Berlin six years ago. He’d been drawn to thirteen-year-old Vincenzo’s friendliness and unflaggingly sunny good nature, and his heart had broken at how overlooked and socially ostracized the boy was; he’d been lonely at thirteen too. His uncle had taken a little convincing, but when Vincenzo came of age Ezio was allowed to take him on as a Recruit and had managed to train him up to the rank of Novice, where Vincenzo’s upward mobility seemed to have reached a plateau. Vincenzo’s physical abilities far outpaced his mental ones, and his control over his magic didn’t meet the requirements for him to attain the next rank either.
“You come home,” Vincenzo beamed. “I missed you, Maestro.”
He caught himself about to correct Vincenzo’ grammar and forced a smile instead. He’d been correcting the younger man for years, and while Vincenzo’s grammar had improved, their first conversation after his abrupt departure over eight months ago wasn’t the best time for it.
“I missed you too,” he replied. “But I’m only here for a visit-” Vincenzo’s face fell and he hated the rush of guilt he felt at the sight. I’ve been disappointing people my whole life, you’d think I’d be used to it already.
“I’m sorry, Maestro,” Vincenzo blurted out, looking alarmingly chastened.
“For what?”
“For getting you hurt. Granmaestro Mario said you went away to recover. If I’d been better-”
He’d mostly forgotten about that. The scar tissue was still a little tight, but the wound had been largely superficial. Besides, it wasn’t the first time he’d gotten knifed on a contract, and probably wouldn’t be the last.
“Hey, no. Stop right there, cucciolo,” he interrupted, clamping a hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “I didn’t go away because of anything you did-”
“But, Maestro Innocenzo said-” Vincenzo abruptly fell silent when Ezio lifted his hand in a staying motion.
He mostly swallowed his annoyance. Porca madonna, what shitstorm has that Tarzanello been starting now? The underlying reasons for Innocenzo’s antagonism were patently obvious – he, and probably no small number of their fellow Italian Assassins, thought that Ezio had gotten where he was on nepotism and family connections, and if it had been left solely up to his uncle, that suspicion might have very well been true. But his mother was from one of the Order’s most infamous bloodlines and had been raised within the walls of the very heart of the Order itself; she had no intention of letting him get by purely on family connections and risk becoming an embarrassment to her. He’d been so hurt and resentful when she’d packed him off to Germany for three years when he was seventeen, after he’d gotten so badly burned on that early contract, but in hindsight he could see how much it had benefited him. In Berlin, he was just another young fidā'ī, and a foreign one at that, his family name had meant nothing to his fellow Assassins and the Master he trained under. He had gone to Berlin as a mostly friendless Apprentice with a serviceable command of textbook German and returned as a first tier Veteran with full professional proficiency in Berlinerisch and a professional working proficiency in Österreichisches Deutsch and had become one of the most popular and sought after fidā'ī in the Roma Motherhouse. As an Italian national, his ability to speak fluent German had become increasingly useful to the Order over the years as Germanic influence spread across Europe and into North Africa like a biblical plague.
Learning German had been his mother’s doing; his uncle had wanted him to learn Turkish, like him, or Spanish, like Fredo and his father. The sun is set on the Ottomans, he remembered his mother ominously proclaiming to his uncle. And Spanish really only holds dominion half a world away. My son will learn a language that is far more useful closer to home. The Kuffār’s armistice will only hold so much longer before another war erupts out of Germany, and so it is German that my son shall learn. He had watched his mother and uncle argue from between the banisters at his usual vantage point midway up the stairs. Years later, looking back on that memory, he was struck by how strange it really was that his mother had been having that argument with his uncle, rather than his father, but then he shrugged it off as yet another painful reminder that he’d never been anything more than the spare in his father’s eyes. Thank god for Mother and Uncle Mario.
“You know better than to listen to anything Messere Innocenzo tells you, Cenzo,” he gently lectured; Vincenzo was devastated by any sign of disapproval from him unless he tempered it very carefully.
“But I have to listen now,” Vencenzo replied, brow knitting in distress. “Granmaestro reassigned me when he said you weren’t coming back.”
He swallowed a sharp surge of irritation. You rush to reassign Cenzo to the least appropriate of your Masters, and leave Lu a pariah, really Uncle? Lucia was, at least objectively, a skilled and talented fidā'ī; it was his uncle’s bigotry and pettiness that kept her from realizing her full potential. Not anymore.
“I’m here now, aren’t I?” he replied, words clipped short with his displeasure at the situation. Vincenzo cringed like a kicked puppy at his tone and he felt absolutely terrible for abandoning him. “And I’m taking you with me when I go back to Alamūt, cucciolo,” he continued. “It’s long past time for you to learn Arabic, and the Order needs strong, responsible young men like yourself to help the Recruits and Initiates with basic training. That sounds good, better than staying here, yeah?”
“Yeah!”
Vincenzo had started nodding as soon as he heard Ezio say he was going back to Alamūt with him and was beaming with uncomplicated delight at the change in his circumstances. He doubted that Vincenzo had grasped much of what he’d said beyond the fact that he would be his supervising Master again, and had said good-sounding things about him. One of Vincenzo’s lower front teeth had gotten broken, within the prior month or so, from the look of it; the edges of the remaining stump were still jagged. Why hasn’t anyone made sure he that got fixed? Jesus-Fucking-Christ, Uncle. If Altaïr says anything to Al Mualim or Kadija about this level of dereliction of duty, you’ll be given no choice but to retire. He glanced over his shoulder to check where Altaïr was and hoped his cousin had decided to go straight to the Mirror Roads for one of his marathon-length runs. No such luck. He spotted Altaïr lingering by the doorway, scanning the room and its occupants with lackadaisical disinterest. Mannaggia!
“Is that the Aquila?” Vincenzo asked, now also staring at Altaïr. “What’s wrong with his eyes? Why are they such a funny color?”
Vincenzo’s emphasis – the Aquila – rankled. Et tu, Vincenzo?
“Nothing’s wrong with his eyes, that’s just the way they are,” he replied gruffly, beginning to move towards his cousin. “Come.”
Vincenzo didn’t have to be told twice.
“He doesn’t look like how I thought he would,” Vincenzo commented as he nearly trod on Ezio’s heels, still gaping at Altaïr.
He bit back a smile at that comment as he seamlessly shouldered his way through a gaggle of gawking novices. It was a small thing, uncomfortably almost petty, but he was glad his illustrious cousin wasn’t entirely living up to Vincenzo’s expectations. Just wait until you have to talk to him, he thought, lips quirking against wry amusement, before he remembered that Vincenzo couldn’t speak Arabic. Cazzo. Better start teaching him that today.
“How did you expect him to look, cucciolo?” he asked, tipping his chin in acknowledgment towards an older career Veteran – Simcha Seidel – with whom he’d always gotten along.
“I don’t know-” Vincenzo scrunched his nose as he scoured his brain for the words he wanted to use “-I thought he’d be bigger, or something, I guess. He’s awfully skinny. Is it true what they say, Maestro? That he’s half Maraas?”
“Who’s they?”
Vincenzo shrugged. “I don’t know. Everyone-” another shrug “-I guess?”
He huffed an unamused laugh. “The gossips sure love that story, don’t they? The Maraas are like mules, they can’t produce offspring.”
“You sure seem to know a lot about those creatures,” Innocenzo Amerighi hummed, suddenly beside him as he stepped out of the shadows fastidiously adjusting his robes and smoothing his hair.
Preening fucking peacock. He stifled the urge to set Innocenzo’s meticulously greased hair on fire. I bet he’d burn like one hell of a candle. He’d forgotten it was like this in Roma; too many Masters and not enough high-level contracts to comfortably go around. All the Roman Masters were hungry for work and intrigue. The nice thing about the other Masters at Alamūt is that nobody thinks they have anything to prove. At Alamūt, there was too much work for petty infighting.
“Did mamma teach you? Her family – my apologies, Maestro, your family – has a bit of a reputation for consorting with those demons, doesn’t it?” Innocenzo continued with a suggestive smirk. “Like mother, like son…or perhaps daughter?” he added with a leer in Mari’s direction. “Little sister grew up almost nicely now, didn’t she?”
What he really wanted to do was punch Innocenzo right in his big, fat, smirking mouth, but he wasn’t going to do that to his mother and uncle. Al Mualim had uncompromisingly high standards of behavior he expected from the Masters beneath him at Alamūt; while his uncle would understand if he punched Innocenzo, Al Mualim would not. His mother would be horribly embarrassed by him drawing Al Mualim’s censure, and the thought of having to endure her disappointment was a stronger disincentive than any official reprimand could ever be.
“Well hello Innocenzo, how nice to see you too. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?” he replied, forcing a wide smile. One swing, right to the mouth. He’d drop like a sack of grain. “You’re looking well-fed, especially around the middle.” He paused to savor the way the other Master’s deceptively genial expression briefly warped at the jab before reasserting itself; Innocenzo always had been vain about his physical appearance. It was satisfying. “Friendly word of advice,” he continued with another, wider smile. “While I know you don’t mean anything, making provocative jokes like that, my cousin, Altaïr Effendi, doesn’t share my good sense of humor. And he’s awfully touchy about the honor of our women.”
If anyone could get away with punching out Innocenzo, it would be Altaïr. His cousin was known for his unemotive demeanor and preternatural calm. He’d only heard about Altaïr losing his temper a scant handful of times over his life, and had actually seen it happen maybe twice, with the most recent example being the argument he’d been having with Mari on Ezio’s wedding day that inexplicably escalated into something much more serious. He still didn’t understand what had triggered such an explosive confrontation between them, and neither his sister nor his cousin had offered any explanation. They seemed to have settled into an armistice, of sorts, that was only occasionally threatened by tension, and he was perfectly willing to let them sort out whatever it was between themselves. He had his own problems to manage.
“Naturally,” Innocenzo snorted. “Orphaned bastard with no father; all he’s got is his women, and you, Maestro, of course, now that your crippled cousin is dead.”
If Altaïr punched Innocenzo everyone would automatically assume it was with very good reason. He reminded himself of how socially limited and lonely his cousin’s everyday life was to squelch his momentary jealousy; nothing could feel better in that moment than to pummel his fellow Master bloody and senseless. He’d have to settle for repeating Innocenzo’s heartless comment about Malik to his mother and letting her orchestrate a fitting revenge; the Italian Assassins were all a little afraid of Madonna Maria, for good reason.
“Altaïr Effendi. I had expected that you would spend the day visiting with your aunt,” he heard Mario rumble, voice deep and damaged from drink, and his attention snapped to his cousin and uncle. Mario had always had an uneasy, albeit distant, relationship with Altaïr, and his demeanor when they were required to interact often vacillated between suspicion and frustration, slightly muted by a thin veneer of professional courtesy. Altaïr, for his part, invariably acted with the cold professionalism he used towards virtually every fellow Assassin, irrespective of status or rank. There were many who appreciated this egalitarian approach; Granmaestro Mario was not one of them.
“Granmaestro,” Altaïr replied as he tipped his chin, tone perfectly even and respectful, but nowhere near as deferential as Ezio knew his uncle had become accustomed. “As I am sure you are aware, my aunt has business that requires her attention. We are all servants of the Order, and each must contribute in their own way. I have come to offer you my skill.”
“Am I expected to be grateful for your offer?” Mario blustered, clearly having decided to take umbrage at Altaïr’s response and manner.
Mannaggia! Tell me he’s not actually picking a fight with Altaïr.
“I do not require any gratitude from you, Granmaestro,” Altaïr replied, frigidly polite. “It is I who am grateful for every opportunity I am given to serve the Order.”
He watched his uncle’s lips curl into a derisive expression – something almost, but not quite, a smile – with an uncomfortable twist in his gut. Don’t be stupid, Uncle, he silently pleaded. He knew Altaïr could be difficult and frustrating, especially when one wasn’t used to him, but his cousin was also highly regarded throughout the Order and it would be a grave mistake to so publicly degrade him. Eventually, a report of Mario’s actions would make its way to either Al Mualim, or, worse still, to Kadija, neither of whom would react favorably. Altaïr himself wouldn’t complain about Mario’s treatment, but, with so many witnesses, stories about the incident were bound to spread. First to other Masters, a continuously growing number of whom Altaïr had trained alongside or tutored directly, and then up to the other Grandmasters where it was only a matter of time before the incident was relayed back to Alamūt. Eventually, Altaïr would be questioned about it directly, and his cousin would, of course, answer every question with his customary brutal honesty. Then things would get really uncomfortable for his uncle. He glanced over at Vincenzo, still raptly studying Altaïr, and mentally grimaced over the younger man’s broken tooth. Jesus Christ, that makes us look bad.
“Which of you would like the honor of training under the great Master from the Mountain?” Mario asked loudly in Italian, addressing the question to the room at large. “Any takers?”
Altaïr looked over at him, head tilted questioningly, and Ezio met his gaze and donned a reassuring expression. While he was glad Altaïr couldn’t understand exactly what Mario had said, his uncle had just made his contempt abundantly clear. Even though Mario hadn’t said anything objectionable, it was inexcusably rude to not have used the Order’s common language.
“It will have to be someone who speaks passable Arabic or Turkish, Uncle,” Ezio said, pointedly in Arabic. “You can’t expect him to train someone he can’t talk to.”
Mario harrumphed. “You still haven’t learned any Italian?” he asked Altaïr, in Arabic. Ezio was relieved that his uncle seemed to have taken the hint and gone back to speaking the Order’s common language.
“Have you learned any Farsi since we last met, Effendi?” Altaïr inquired coolly. “It would be my pleasure to speak with you in the language of Hasan-e Sabbāh.”
Ezio watched Mario’s mouth tighten at Altaïr’s pointed reference to the Order’s Persian founder with a sinking feeling and caught his uncle’s eye and gave a slight shake of his head. Let it go Uncle, just let it go. Altaïr’s response was a touch impertinent, and while he would have publicly acknowledged that lapse and apologized immediately if Ezio commented on it, Mario’s behavior had been far worse. He could only hope that his uncle realized it would be to his own advantage if the inevitable gossip focused on Altaïr’s comment, and not what Mario had said and done to provoke it.
“No, I have not,” Mario replied tersely and he could have sighed aloud with relief. “Ezio, find someone for him to train.”
“With all respect, Granmaestro, I would like to work with Lucia,” Altair said before he could respond. “I believe she has much potential and her training has been sorely neglected these last several months.”
“I don’t care a fuck about what you do,” Mario exclaimed in Italian, throwing his hands up as he turned to leave the room. “I’ll be in my office if someone needs me.”
Altair watched Mario stamp off with a strange expression on his face before he looked over at Ezio.
“Was that a yes?”
He bit back a sigh. “Yeah, that was a yes.”
Lucia, at least, seemed pleased.
He spent a good part of the morning working with Vincenzo and a handful of his other former students. He dismissed the others early to take an unhappy Vincenzo to the medics to have his broken tooth fixed before they joined the rest of Roma’s Assassins for the midday meal.
“Why does it have to be fixed? It’s been like this for weeks, Maestro. It hardly hurt at all anymore,” Vincenzo protested. “What if it takes a big time? All the good food will be gone. There won’t be enough to eat left for us, and I’m hungry, Maestro.”
“Have I ever allowed you to go hungry?” he demanded irritably. “Do you really think I’m going to start now?”
“No, Maestro,” Vincenzo mumbled, chin nearly dropped down against his chest and avoiding eye contact.
Jesus, I’ve gotten rusty. I used to be so much better with him. He swallowed a sigh and decided to try a different approach.
“I’ll talk to the elves while you’re in with the medic, make sure they know we’re going to be joining the others a little late. They’ll hold back something for us, some meat and polenta, at the very least.”
“What if I can’t eat?” Vincenzo fretted. “Orsina says you can’t always eat right away when they do stuff to your teeth.”
They were getting close to the infirmary. He concentrated and scraped his blades against each other to let the medics know they were coming.
“Who’s Orsina?” he hummed with a teasing smile, reaching over to muss his student’s hair. “Have you found yourself a woman, cucciolo?”
“She says she likes me,” Vincenzo mumbled, avoiding Ezio’s eyes and blushing. “She’s nice and pretty and doesn’t care that I’m a zingaro-”
“I told you not to call yourself that,” he snapped as he opened the door to the infirmary and shoved Vincenzo in ahead of himself.
He hated that Vincenzo had been called that slur so often that he applied it to himself; a stark and bitter reminder of his own failure in protecting his student as a Master should. It reminded him of all the times he’d been called tizzone or ominide when he was younger, and that he was probably still called those things behind his back. He was half tempted to ask Vincenzo, but it would be cruel to put the younger man in such an uncomfortable position, and he didn’t really want his suspicions confirmed anyway.
Vincenzo flushed a painful brick red and stammered out something inarticulate and only vaguely Italian sounding, presumably in his half-forgotten mother tongue, which he seldom reverted to, even in times of severe pain or distress.
Now look what you’ve done, you stronzo, he berated himself, pushing down the guilt and frustration that was threatening to choke him.
“Messere Ezio,” an older medic greeted him, forestalling any apology he might have made to his student. “How long it’s been since I’ve seen you. And young Vincenzo,” the medic continued with a tired, careworn smile. “Sadly, not so long since I last saw you, young man.”
Ernesto Romagnoli had been a medic in Roma for as long as Ezio could remember. Ernesto had treated his various bumps and scrapes from childhood on up to his most recent injury while on contract for Roma, when he’d been knifed in Innsbruck last autumn. It somehow felt like that injury had happened both only last week and also a lifetime ago.
“Dottore,” he replied with a reflexive smile. “Surely my mother told you I’ve been away, since just after you last patched me up?”
“Of course,” Ernesto hummed as he scanned him with a speculative, heavy lidded look. “I would not have believed the rumors that made their way to me if Madonna Maria herself hadn’t told me about the, ah, incident. I am glad to see Asad’s assurances as to your recovery were not exaggerated.”
“No,” he replied, smile straining tight and brittle. He always forgot that Ernesto was one of his mother’s numerous admirers, which, in all fairness, included basically every male Assassin over the age of forty in Roma and not a small number of those closer to his own age as well. Even his uncle, at times, seemed unwillingly swayed by her thrall. He’d found it incredibly embarrassing when he was younger, the way the older men around him lusted after and feared his mother, often forgetting that her son was standing right there when they started talking about her. Now, as an adult, he was mostly bemused that his mother still had so many hardened Assassins all but swooning over her, both in Roma and at Alamūt. Good for her. After everything that has been taken from her over the years, it’s good for her vanity that she still has that, he reminded himself. And now that he was a Master, no one ever forgot he was her son.
“I’m all recovered, back to fighting form – better, even, than I was before. Asad is a fine medic” – and a fucking gossipy traitor – “he learned from the very best in the Order, of course,” he continued, tipping his chin towards Ernesto.
The older Medic merely arched a speculative brow at the compliment and Ezio wondered what, exactly, Ernesto had been told about him, about the Cristina Thing. He heard the rustle of Vincenzo’s robes as the younger man shifted his weight to sidle slightly further behind him.
Vincenzo had stayed almost entirely silent since they crossed the infirmary’s threshold, shoulders hunched and hood pulled low over his face. He hung back, half hiding behind Ezio, doing his very best to be forgotten and overlooked.
“I assume this is not a purely social visit, Maestro?”
“Unfortunately not. It seems my student had a training accident that broke one of his teeth some time ago,” he replied, relieved that the medic wasn’t interested in lingering over topics, or, more specifically, the topic, he most wanted to avoid. “And it’s been left to rot out longer than it should have.” He turned and hauled Vincenzo forward.
“There is a stronger correlation between dental heath and overall heath then many realize,” Ernesto agreed in bland, soothing tones. “I know a talented young Turk with an interest in dentistry. Recently assigned to this Motherhouse for his residency, as luck would have it.”
Vincenzo did not look like he thought that was lucky at all; in fact, he looked positively miserable. Cringing and squirming slightly under the combined scrutiny of Ezio and the senior medic, he managed something more akin to a grimace than an actual smile, lips kept clamped tightly closed over his teeth.
“It’ll be over before you know it, cucciolo,” he added encouragingly as Ernesto scraped his blades in summoning, knowing perfectly well that they were both aware he was probably lying. The medics had an unfortunate habit of using the injury one presented with as a springboard for searching out other things to treat. The young Turkish dentist was undoubtedly going to have a field day looking for other teeth that might need filling or pulling; Ezio highly doubted that Vincenzo had come in for a regular dental checkup in years.
One of the infirmary’s elves appeared with a jarringly sudden snap to escort Vincenzo to the dentist. The younger man shot Ezio one last pleading look before he was led away by the insistent elf. He watched Vincenzo slouch out of the atrium and released a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding in a slow sigh. He’ll be fine, you know that, you stronzo. He wished he felt less guilty about everything. Don’t forget to ask about getting more of those potions.
“Dottore,” he called after Ernesto, who had begun to drift towards one of the honeycomb of passages that lead into the infirmary’s interior. The medic stopped, but did not turn.
“Yes, Messere?”
“D’you have a moment? I wanted to consult with you about something personal. In private. If you have a moment, or two,” he blurted out in a rush, before he had a chance to lose his nerve. Jesus Christ, this is going to be so embarrassing. The memory of Taline’s disappointment and tears at his inability to make love to her earlier that morning spurred him forward, over the strident protests of his dignity and ego. You need to man upfor your woman, Ezione. “It can keep, if you don’t have time right now. Or, you know, whenever.”
Ernesto half turned towards him, expression indiscernible in the shadow cast across his features by the deep hood of his charcoal washed robes.
“For you, I can find time. Follow me.”
What the fuck are you thinking? he berated himself as he followed the medic down one serpentine hallway and then another. What are you even going to say? Hey Medico, could you prescribe an invigorating potion to boost my sexual stamina, so I can perform like a man for my wife? Cazzo, that sounds bad. He exhaled sharply through his nose and clawed a loose lock of hair back from his face. Ernesto had stopped and turned at the doorway of an examination room and motioned Ezio inside with a weary wave of his hand. His body prickled with cold sweat as he crossed the threshold.
In Berlin, the inner infirmary walls had been an almost pastel shade of lime, while at Alamūt the examination rooms were a pale silvery-blue sage green. In Roma the color reminded him of unripened wheat or pistachios, and the uncomfortable examination table, like every other in any of the Order’s infirmaries, was covered with layers of tightly woven coutil, the topmost of which was stripped off after each patient to expose the pristine layer underneath. His mother had the elves make the beds in her brothel the same way, so that the bottom sheet was always fresh for each client, without the girls or elves having to remake every bed dozens of times. It created a lot of laundry.
Take a deep breath,Ezione. It can’t possibly be worse than that brush you had with the Clap while you were posted in Berlin.
Technically, whatever it was he had picked up, it most likely wasn’t actually gonorrhea.
It was just before a scheduled visit home, to Roma, for his nineteenth birthday no less, that he discovered something that looked suspiciously like a lesion, on his cock. After he’d gotten over the initial rush of panic that accompanies finding a possible lesion on one’s cock, he decided it would probably be best to wait until he was back in Roma to get the suspiciously lesion-like sore looked at by a medic. Preferably a medic too old to be interested in spreading embarrassing gossip. Just in case. He’d gone straight from Roma’s Mirror Room to the infirmary when he arrived because there was no way in hell he could face his mother while he was possibly infected with something, especially if that something probably came from having illicit premarital sex. After enduring an uncomfortably thorough examination and mortifying lecture on the importance of abstaining from sexual fraternization with kuffār Ernesto had given him a potion that tasted like sweaty ass – not that he would know how that actually tasted from personal experience or anything, he just had a vivid imagination – and slathered his groin with the infamous green ointment the Order’s medics loved to plaster on everything from hangnails to broken bones and concussions. If it was humanly possible to die from embarrassment, he might have keeled over half a dozen times before that visit concluded.
Naturally, his mother found out all about it, but thankfully after he’d already returned to Berlin. The howler she’d sent was nothing compared to what she would have done to him in person. He’d put off his subsequent visit home for several months. Just in case.
“What is it that you wanted privacy to discuss, Messere?” Ernesto drawled, dripping each word into the spiraling silence between them. He could tell the older man knew that Taline was a kāfir before their marriage from the disapproval radiating across the space between them.
She was vulnerable and she wanted me. She needed my protection and I needed someone to come home to, to love me and start a family with, he wanted to say in his own defense. But he didn’t say any of those things. The only people he owed any explanation to had already accepted Taline without question, all he needed from everyone else was for them to fulfill their duties to the Order. He forced himself to level his shoulders and unclench his teeth. Remember to ask nicely, Ezione.
“My wife and I did not consummate our relationship until after our marriage contract had been signed and sealed,” he stated, fully aware of the older man’s opinions and biases on the subject. He’d gotten enough lectures over the years on that very subject, and while he didn’t actually need Ernesto’s approval – and he certainly wouldn’t be getting any for choosing a wife from outside the Order – soliciting some approval wasn’t really a bad thing, especially when he was about to ask for a favor.
“Your wife could hardly have been untasted. It is my understanding that you found her working in a cabaret.”
Why is that the only thing anyone seems to care about?
“She only ever danced,” he snapped, affronted at the insinuation. “She never permitted any man to touch her.” Technically true. “And she lacked any experience that would have prepared her for conjugal relations.” Completely and absolutely true. God rot that bastard’s soul. “As I’m sure the gossip spread all around Alamūt by the medic she consulted shortly after our marriage will confirm,” he added bitterly. He felt a surge of satisfaction at the way Ernesto’s expression darkened at that breech of the medics’ code of ethics.
“I assume your wife was very upset by her experience, but I am hardly in a position to remediate that injustice. So what is it that you want from me?”
Or not. He drew a deep breath. Just ask already and get it over with.
“Shortly after my marriage” – hours after, technically – “Asad prescribed this potion to help enhance my vigor and stamina, since-” he started, almost stumbling over his words in his rush to get the request out and over with.
“Impotence is highly uncommon in a young man such as yourself, Messere,” Ernesto interrupted, arching a judgmental brow.
“I’m not – Jesus Christ – I’m not-” he caught himself on the brink of shouting and paused to take a steadying breath. “I’ve never had a problem performing for women,” he finished, forcing his voice much quieter and calmer than he felt. “We, Taline and me, we wanted to make a baby as soon as possible. Asad said it would be safer to give me something than her-”
“And now your wife is pregnant. Asad’s questionable course of treatment appears to have accomplished what you required.”
“Yeah… but she got used to me making love to her a lot more frequently, and now that I can’t, as often…” he scratched the side of his neck and avoided the medic’s eyes, focusing instead on the rather anemic looking plant in an earthenware pot precariously perched on the sill of one of the room’s square windows high up the wall, almost against the ceiling. It looked like some sort of herb – parsley or basil or something – in want of water and sunshine.
“So make love to her in other ways,” Ernesto replied impatiently, like that should have been easy and obvious and he was mentally deficient for not thinking of it himself. “Women, vessels of original sin that they are, appreciate many forms of pleasure. I’m sure your mother’s, employees, would be happy to provide suggestions. Or perhaps your uncle would be able to offer some advice you might find beneficial, if you are uncomfortable asking-”
He could feel an entirely unwelcome blush scorching over his body. His face and ears felt about to blister from the intensity and it seemed a miracle that his clothes weren’t smoking or spontaneously combusting.
“I’ve tried that! I’ve been trying to do that, but Taline, she’s convinced that there’s something wrong with her, that she’s the reason we make love less. She won’t listen when I tell her that’s not true! She’s miserable and jealous of imaginary affairs and she cries, constantly! She throws up everything she eats because everything makes her sick and she just keeps getting skinnier and I’m afraid for our child,” he bellowed, frustrated that the medic was refusing to understand how serious the situation had become.
Ernesto had folded his hands together in such a way that they were completely obscured by the generous sleeves of his robes when Ezio had interrupted him, and thereafter hardly reacted to his outburst, except, maybe, to blink once slowly at its crescendo. The following heartbeats of silence as he waited for Ernesto to respond rang in his ears. He studied the various medical wards embedded in the tiled mosaic beneath his feet to avoid the Medic’s chastising gaze. You shouldn’t have lost your temper like that, what the fuck is wrong with you Ezione?
“I need help, Dottore,” he finally rasped when he couldn’t stand Ernesto’s silence any longer. “I’m scared this is going to make her lose our child. I’m scared I’ll lose her too. Please, help me.” I wouldn’t be subjecting myself to this only for the sake of saving face with my wife.
He chanced a glance up at Ernesto and the medic sighed and slowly shook his head as he watched him with solemn eyes. Ezio could feel trepidation beginning to crawl over his burning skin. That’s not an about to help with no strings attached response.
“You didn’t tell her about the potions, did you?”
“No” he admitted, once again avoiding the medic’s eyes. The Order’s standard issue medi-checklist posters were tacked up on one wall. Someone, probably a young fidā'ī, had defaced the one covering pupilar size and reaction to controlled stimuli as an indicator of closed head trauma by drawing on the eye illustrations, changing the pupil shape in some to elongated bars – like those of sheep and goats. There were also comments written around the edge of the poster in illegible Arabic script. It was impossible for him to tell if it was from the same vandal, or a subsequent inspired addition by another individual. He could feel the medic’s disapproval radiating across the space between them.
“Tell me why.”
He hated that it wasn’t a request. However, he knew Ernesto probably wouldn’t refuse him the help he needed after forcing such a humiliating confession; even old medics had limits to their sadism, after all.
“It was only supposed to be a temporary thing-” he started, fidgeting with his Ferryman’s ring as he spoke, flicking his eyes at everything in the room to avoid meeting the gaze of the medic standing right in front of him. “We conceived right away, but she lost the first child we made while I was away, on contract. The medics said it was probably because of stress. Taline, she was very anxious while I was away.”
“My condolences, Messere, on your loss,” Ernesto intoned.
He impatiently waved away the medic’s dryly expressed sympathy. He wasn’t subjecting himself to this humiliation for the medic’s insincere expressions of compassion after all.
“I started taking the potions again after, after – when we could start trying again. Taline, she took it very badly and I thought, I thought, if I gave her another baby would make her smile, like she had, in the beginning. I thought us making love more often would help her love me. She called me her stallion-” his throat spasmed, causing him to choke on the word, and his face flamed “-the baby’s made her so self-conscious, about her body. Made her doubt my commitment, to her, to us…” he gesticulated helplessly. “I can’t tell her about the potions now. It’d break her heart. She’s convinced herself that my desire for her is waning. You know what she’d think, of me, if I told her about it now – I just need it a little longer, Dottore,” he pleaded. “After the baby’s born she’ll be busy with our child and won’t notice if we make love less often. Mal told me once that sleep and showers are luxuries when there’s a new baby in the house, that we’d be very happy, but too exhausted to even want to make love for the first few months. He would have known what that’s like, I guess.”
He’d been openly incredulous when Malik had told him that; he’d never been too tired to want sex and had difficulty imagining such a thing would even be possible for him. Maybe you’re just getting old Akhi, he’d retorted as he cuddled one of Malik’s newborn twins. The baby’s mouth had opened in a wide yawn that suddenly turned into an earsplitting squall. Malik flashed him a tired, knowing smile as he took his howling child back. You’ll see, E-zo. Just wait until you’ve had your own.
His eyes stung and he inhaled sharply through his nose to head off any tears that might try to fall. He hated how much mentioning Malik, even just in passing, continued to hurt. Isn’t it supposed to hurt less by now? He wondered if the loss still felt so fresh to Altaïr as well, but it was less than pointless to try asking him; Altaïr disapproved of public grieving.
“We have all been lessened by this loss, Messere,” Ernesto said softly.
We have all been lessened by this loss, Al Mualim – his mother’s own father – had said to him and his mother when they next visited Alamūt after his father and Fredo had died. We have all been lessened by this loss, Herr Gebhard had said when the first and best friend he’d made in Berlin, Christoph Sachs – tall, blond, gray-eyed Christoph, with the seraphim smile and steely skill sure to elevate him to Master one day – had fallen during a contract in Salzburg. We have all been lessened by this loss, the Rafīk of Nuremberg had written in the short, two-line note informing him that he’d just lost his first student as a Master. We have all been lessened by this loss, their uncle had said to Mari as she howled in grief over the death of her friend and constant companion from childhood, Giulia. We have all been lessened by this loss, Altaïr always said, calm and cool and maddeningly void of any emotional temper, whenever Ezio spoke to him of friends or students who had fallen. We have all been lessened by this loss, he’d written in dozens of condolence letters and official reports signed under his uncle’s name.
He’d heard that phrase so many times over the years the words themselves had become rout and empty.
“Thank you, Dottore,” he replied stiffly. “And the potions…”
Ernesto sighed, expression twisted in disapproval. “Will be ready for you to pick up from the dispensary in a few hours’ time.”
“Thank you,” he breathed in relief. “I am so grateful, truly. Thank you.” He hesitated a moment, trying to decide how far to press his luck. It’ll have to be Lu. It’d be too cruel to make Cenzo come back here on my errand after the dentist finally finishes with him. Poor Kid. He reflexively crossed himself and then half smiled at the unthinking gesture; it wasn’t one he often made at Alamūt. “Lucia will be picking them up for me, if you have no objections-”
“I’ll note that on the prescription,” Ernesto replied sourly. “I have patients to whom I must attend, Maestro. I trust you can find your own way out?”
“Without difficulty.” He forced his smile wider. “I’ll commend your service to my uncle, as well as my mother, of course.”
Ernesto grunted in response and pulled his hood down to obscure more of his face in its shadows, but Ezio swore he caught a glimmer of satisfaction in the older man’s eyes when he mentioned his mother.
Even after three children and all these years. Very impressive, Mother, he thought with a swell of filial pride and affection as he followed the medic out of the examination room and took his leave with a carefully calibrated bow. He’d forgotten to ask Ernesto for a fresh pot of bruise removing paste, but it was a common enough unguent and he could acquire it from any junior medic he happened across while waiting for the dentist to finish with Vincenzo.
His stomach rumbled, loudly.
Oh, right.
He stamped and informed the responding elf that he and his student would need some food set aside because they wouldn’t be able to join the others for lunch – just some meat and polenta and a small salad, if it’s not still too early in the season – Vincenzo would be positively distraught if he’d actually forgotten to secure them food.
He rolled the tension from his shoulders and set out in search of a junior medic to acquire the unguent. Two down, one objective to go.
[1] It’s fine.
[2] I trust your decision. If you ask, I will help you.