stillness, quiet
“Khanum?”
The muqarnas above her were the clear, pale blue of mid to late morning and the dull ache in her lower abdomen had been slowly regaining its intensity for the last hour or so, based on the color changes in the ceiling. She’d known, even before Yusriyah’s expression and the phials in her hands confirmed it, that her baby was already lost.
“Taline?” Asad sounded tired, no, not tired – resigned – and the very edges of his tone were softly shaded with something that almost sounded like… resentment. She dragged her eyes in his direction.
“Kadija Effendi is here to see you.”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Of cours-”
“No,” Kadija interrupted him, as she shouldered past Asad into the room. “You may leave us, Hekim. And have the elves bring me a chair, my cousin and I have much to discuss.”
“Your word is not absolute here, Effendi,” Asad snapped, bristling like an angry cat. “I can order your removal if I deem your presence injurious to my patient.”
“Could you now?” Kadija hummed, dismissive and completely unconcerned. “Must I summon the elves myself for a chair?”
Asad’s eyes narrowed as he drew his blades. Kadija barely glanced at his blades as she exhaled a dismissive huff of breath.
“I am here to convey the will of Al Mualim, even Al Zahra herself does not have authority to deny him,” Kadija continued, baring her teeth with something too chilling to be called a smile. “Close the door behind yourself, Hekim. The corridors of this place have sharp ears.”
“It’s fine,” she said quickly at Asad’s continued hesitation. “I wish to speak with my cousin.” The last thing she wanted was to give Alamūt more gossip, or alienate her most powerful allies.
“As you desire, Khanum.” He leveled a sour look at Kadija and shut the door sharply when he left.
She felt guilty for not siding with Asad, but not so much that she’d risk crossing Altaïr’s powerful sister to avoid displeasing the medic. Yusriyah was much more attuned to the precariousness of her situation then Asad seemed to be, and had never put her in a similar position. Yet, she reminded herself. Running away from Ezio, and losing another baby, changes everything. Presumably that was why Kadija had come to see her – to discuss what comes next. It was not an especially comforting thought.
The stretching silence between them was broken by a sharp snap that heralded the appearance of a straight-backed hardwood chair, devoid of any cushion or cloth that would have diminished its austerity.
Kadija scoffed at the chair beneath her breath with a shake of her head as she drew it closer to the bedside and seated herself.
“You know, he can be remarkably petty, given his seniority,” she commented dryly, teeth flashing unnaturally white in the shadow of her hood. “It doesn’t even have armrests.”
“I’m sure there was some sort of miscommunication,” she offered hesitantly, keeping her eyes lowered to the quilted healing ward she was tracing on the topmost blanket of the mound the medics had heaped upon her. “Perhaps the elves misunderstood, or there are no better chairs available-”
She froze as Kadija coughed a rusty sounding laugh.
“We both know none of those things are true, but it is kind of you to suggest it all the same.” Kadija’s levity vanished as quickly as it had come with a chillingly speculative look as she leaned back against the chair, arms folding across her chest. “But is it really kindness, or self-interest that drives you?”
“When is kindness ever not in one’s self-interest?” she parried, nail snagging one of the stitches of the ward.
“A saintly sentiment,” Kadija hummed dismissively, leaning even further back until her chair was balanced on the back two legs. Her teenage students loved doing that and it always made her a little nervous, waiting for them to come crashing back down forwards, on all four chair legs, or over backwards. It was the most disarmingly mundane thing Kadija had ever done in her presence.
“An acknowledgment of fate turning like a wheel, and that perhaps I will need some kindness myself, sooner or later,” she corrected softly. She wanted to ask when Ezio was expected to arrive, but didn’t really want to know if her sanctuary was limited to minutes, or hours.
“Like when Ezio returns? I’ve already reported your presence here to my aunt.” The front two legs of Kadija’s chair hit the floor with the swift sharp crack of a kırbaç and she flinched before she could stop herself, fingers involuntarily curling and snapping the thread her nail had snagged. “I also instructed her to stall him leaving Rome. It won’t amount to much, but she will give you all the time she can.”
She carefully picked the trailing fibers out of the chink left in her nail from the broken thread and forced herself to exhale slowly. My sister is Strong, Altaïr had said. Everyone admires her strength; she wields it with such beauty and grace. Her uncle’s pendent was heavy around her neck, whispering against her skin. Strength is not only force or sacrifice. Strength survives. Survive. She swallowed, forcing her fear and doubt and uncertainty back down her throat, to be transmogrified into something different, something useful, in the churning cauldron of her belly. The strange and seductive power imbuing every particle of air and matter in Alamūt settled over her like dust, and she could almost hear its siren song in the blood coursing through her veins, promises of safety and strength. Strength.Her own strength was sapped by exertion, exhaustion, and blood loss, by despair and grief and fear and sorrow, and Alamūt’s magic was too powerful, too hungry, and there was no way she would be able to control it in her current state. She needed time, and allies.
“Please, do not doubt my gratitude – and I mean no disrespect – but I do not understand why the Madonna would delay her son, why you are here, telling me these things,” she said softly, tone tempered perfectly even under the full force of her will. Survive.
Kadija’s impossibly perfect teeth flashed in what most people would probably interpret as a smile; she preferred Altaïr’s blunted and direct honesty to his sister’s calculated charade. Kadija played nice, but didn’t bother to be kind, and there was a meticulously plotted agenda locked away behind her ineffable eyes and she knew exactly when and how and what to say to keep that agenda progressing smoothly. She didn’t know how or where she fit in Kadija’s plans – only that she somehow must – because Kadija’s time was precious, and yet here she was, visiting her in the infirmary, putting effort into being nice, and smiling at her like she had all the time in the world to chat. Altaïr just would have said what he meant.
“I’m telling you these things to bring you comfort and assure you of your security,” Kadija replied. She almost sounded bemused. “Regardless of how things land between you and Ezio – although I’m fairly sure he’ll get here and go on and on about how sorry he is, and promise you anything you want, no matter how impossible, and maybe even stage a melodramatic almost serious suicide attempt, until your resistance crumbles and everything gets forgiven, as it always does for him – you have been made a part of our family, and we protect our own.”
“Not always,” she blurted out and immediately wished she could snatch the words back.
“I’m sorry?” Kadija’s expression tightened, smile faltered and eyes slightly narrowed.
She grimaced and rubbed her tongue against the roof of her mouth. She really hadn’t meant to say that aloud.
“What did you mean by not always, Taline?” Kadija pressed.
“Cristina didn’t forgive him and take him back,” she whispered, hating herself for remembering how Cristina had looked at Ezio on the street that first day in Rome. Like she would have let him fuck her right there if he had asked it. She hated how tightly her chest constricted with jealousy at the memory.
“Aunt Maria didn’t give her the chance. Why else do you think she was so set on sending him here to recover,” Kadija replied, with a strange quirk of her mouth and the muscles of her jaw, something not quite a grimace and more of a wince than a smile. “It certainly wasn’t for anyone involved’s happiness. Ezio hated being here, until you.”
Until me. She raked her hair back from her face, tucked a thick chunk behind her ear. Ezio hated being here until he met me. Fear coiled in her stomach while something else fluttered in her chest.
“Oh.”
Kadija’s eyes flashed gold. “Indeed.”
She watched Kadija push her hood back and scrape her nails across the stubble of her shortly shorn hair, disingenuously casual and unhurried. My sister sends her regrets that she is unable to join us tonight, her many duties have detained her.
“Did you tell Asad Hekim that Al Mualim sent you so that he’d leave?” she asked, keeping her eyes respectfully lowered.
“I was not ordered here, dear cousin, but Al Mualim did give me a message to convey when I informed him of my intended visit to you.” The corners of Kadija’s lips curled. “I am to assure you of Al Mualim’s protection, and that he has forbade any mistreatment of you, for being Cathari, or any other reason, so long as you continue to conduct yourself in the Order’s service.”
“So I am safe here, but only so long as I am useful.”
“You are safe here, regardless of your usefulness,” Kadija corrected. “There are many ways to serve the Order, and your family will support your upkeep, if Ezio does not.”
“My family is all dead,” she whispered, dry tongue thick in her mouth and lips numb. “I’m the only one left.”
Kadija harrumphed. “And what of Madonna Maria? Is your mother-in-law not part of your family? What of Altaïr, and myself? While I can understand your hesitancy to consider Mari family, she is still your sister-in-law.”
“But, you are all Ezio’s family… and-” she sighed “-and I’m just a Cathari dancing girl he picked up in some cabaret-”
“And I was an unwanted child locked in a shed,” Kadija interrupted, teeth barred and eyes narrowed. “Aaliyah found me, claimed me, and made me a part of her family, our family, and her sisters celebrated the arrival of a daughter. Aunt Berenice wanted to change my name to Maria – I’m sure Ezio’s told you about the family tradition – but Aaliyah wouldn’t let her.” Kadija’s expression momentarily softened before resuming her empty assassin’s mask. “Ezio married you; we’re your family now.”
She hesitated, rubbing the rough edge of her damaged nail against the pad of her thumb. She could still count the number of times Kadija had actually spoken to her on one hand, and it struck her as decidedly odd, almost alarmingly so, that Kadija now decided to tell her such personal, private, things about their family and her own introduction to it. There were so many questions she wanted to ask, so many things she wanted to know – about Ezio, Madonna Maria, Mari, and Mario, about Altaïr and about Kadija herself – they all just blurred together into overwhelming white noise and she wasn’t brave enough, by even half, to ask most of them.
“Why were you locked in a shed?”
The question had already slipped from her lips before she recognized it was her own voice speaking. Strangely, Kadija seemed less surprised by her question than she was with herself for asking it.
Kadija shrugged. “Shame? Fear?” She shrugged again. “They were a very superstitious lot. It was quite a conundrum, what to do with me.” Kadija leaned against the back of the chair, watching her. “You ought to file that,” she jutted her chin at her hand, “before it gets caught on anything else.”
“Yes, of course. You’re absolutely right,” she faltered, trying to find a better response and coming up empty. Nothing about Kadija invited any expression of sympathy, but she didn’t know how else to respond. “Would I be allowed a nail file, do you think? My breakfast was supervised, even though I only had a spoon.”
“Perhaps. With that cut on your neck you can hardly fault their caution.”
That explains a few things. Staying in the infirmary for protection was one thing, being a prisoner there was another.
“Will I be allowed to leave?” she finally asked into the spiraling silence Kadija seemed disinclined to break. She wasn’t used to being the one uncomfortable with silence, the one who broke prolonged lulls in the conversation.
“Is that what you want?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. The ring Ezio had put on her finger felt heavy, heavier.
“You need to know the answer to that question before I can answer yours.”
Kadija rose from her chair and she was struck by how tall she was, how formidable she looked. My sister is Strong, Altaïr had said.
“But for now, you should rest, and know that Ezio may only see you if you ask for him. That choice is entirely yours.”
“What if I ask for him, and he chooses not to come?” she asked softly, resuming her study of the blankets heaped upon her.
Kadija scoffed softly beneath her breath, but it didn’t feel unkindly meant. “He’ll come. Your difficulty lies in keeping him away. But you’ll have help with that, if you ask for it. Safety and peace be upon you.”
She took her leave as soundlessly as smoke.
She listlessly flipped through the book of fairy tales Altaïr had brought her, beautifully illustrated and thoughtfully translated into Turkish. The sort of book one didn’t have to read the words to enjoy; crisp binding, velvety soft vellum pages and vibrant colors, gleaming golden details and embossing. He’d given her a treasure she could hold in her hands as casually as breathing and shrugged away her gratitude.
Ezio has returned, he’d informed her. You only need to inform the medics if you’d like to see him.
Does he know?
Yes.
Is he angry?
Altaïr had shrugged. With you, no. Just with me. I’m the villain who took you away from him.
Only because I told you to.
He’d shrugged again. Ezio feels hurt and needs to be angry at someone. It’s best that person is me. I am immune to its effects.
Even so-
It’s nothing, he’d interrupted her, eyes almost glowing with a flash of some emotion so intense it was terrifying. Ghorbāne shomā, salāmat bāshin.[1]
She didn’t understand what those words meant, and he’d left without telling her.
Altaïr was still very much an enigma to her. She was used to being able to read people, but the facets of his personality were too many, too smooth, and too opaque. He gave her several skeins of beautiful fine yarn, the sort used, almost exclusively, for knitting baby layettes, before she had told anyone she was pregnant again. He remembered the students she’d mentioned by name in passing and asked how their studies were progressing. He reordered the foods she’d liked, and noted the ones she hadn’t, when they had dinner together each week. That he seemed to like her felt like a reasonably safe assumption, but she couldn’t be sure that his behavior wasn’t actually motivated by not dislikingher coupled with his iron-clad sense of duty.
“Good morning, Taline. How are you feeling, better than yesterday?” Yusriyah inquired as she entered the room, carefully securing the door behind herself.
“Good morning, Hekim,” she replied, gently closing the book. The weight of it on her lap was comforting, strangely reassuring.
“That’s a beautiful book,” Yusriyah commented with an encouraging smile. “Did one of the novices fetch it for you from your things?”
She shook her head and reflexively tightened her grip on the book. “A gift from Altaïr Effendi. He gave it to me earlier this morning.”
“Good heavens, that must have been early. I hope he didn’t wake you?”
“Not really,” she shrugged, avoiding the medic’s eyes. “I didn’t sleep especially well.”
“No? Any reason in particular?” Yusriyah hummed, checking her watch as she pressed two fingers against the inside of her wrist.
“Ezio’s back, from Rome. Altaïr mentioned seeing him,” she murmured, attempting, and probably failing, to sound unconcerned. “He’s going to come for me. I don’t, will I have to face him alone?”
“At some point, yes. He is your husband, after all,” Yusriyah replied as she jotted something down on her chart. “But you don’t have to see him while you’re here, unless you want to, and he certainly won’t be visiting you alone. Either Asad Hekim or I will be in the room if you choose to see him, or both of us, if that would make you feel better?”
“He already knows,” she whispered as vision went blurry.
“Asad must have told him. Your husband didn’t get that information from me.” There was irritation bleeding through her voice as she scribbled another note in her file and forcefully underlined it. Twice.
“Has he come to see me?” she ventured to ask, anxiously crumpling the topmost blanket into her hand. “Altaïr said he was angry…”
The medic added another note to her file before responding.
“Once, that I’m aware of, and he was denied access,” Yusriyah replied. “Is there someone who can stay with you, if you return to your home, or perhaps someone you’d rather stay with?”
She shook her head. “I wouldn’t want to be a burden.”
“I’m sure it wouldn’t be a burden,” Yusriyah said with a reassuring smile. “But we can always assign an elf to keep you safe if you’re sure you don’t want to involve anyone else.”
“What if I want to go away? Just… disappear?”
“The wives of Masters, especially ones from prominent families, aren’t allowed to disappear, Taline. And I’d be worried for your well being if you were to try,” Yusriyah replied, concern creasing a hard vertical line between her slightly overgrown eyebrows.
“Yes, of course,” she hurriedly murmured, tucking a thick lock of loose hair behind her ear. “I’m sorry for asking such a silly question. You needn’t worry over me.”
“Taline-”
“I tried that already-” she hitched her shoulders in a shrug “-and it didn’t work.”
Yusriyah didn’t look at all reassured.
“You aren’t alone,” Yusriyah told her with a very pointed look. “There are people all around you, willing and able to help. All you have to do is let us know that our help is needed.”
“Like how the other medic helped me?” she asked, ashamed at the bitterness that bleed through her tone.”
“Taline-”
“She told Ezio!” she interrupted, words bursting out of her mouth with a will of their own. “She told Ezio about the baby! And she spread private things about me – about my marriage, about my body – for her own amusement! You don’t understand what it’s been like – gossip surrounding me like a bad smell, whispering that suddenly stops when I venture too close but picks right up again when I turn away, the sidelong looks and strange comments from total strangers – all because I asked the wrong person here to help me. I’ve had more than enough help already. I don’t want anymore!”
Yusriyah’s expression warped with pity and anger as she forced her pursed lips into a closed-lipped smile, of sorts, and exhaled a long deep breath through her nose before responding.
“I am truly so very sorry that happened to you,” she said, folding her hands together over the chart resting on her lap. “And it angers me that it was done by one of my fellow medics here at Alamūt, someone you were supposed to be able to absolutely trust with any personal information, no matter how sensitive or salacious. That your trust was betrayed like that.” Yusriyah hesitated a moment before reaching over to lay her hand on top of more or less where her knee would be beneath the mound of blankets various medics had heaped upon her. “I understand your wariness, especially given what’s already been done to you, but I hope you know that you can trust me, that I am on your side, no matter who we’re up against, and that I only want what’s best for you and will help in whatever way I can for you to achieve it.”
“Yes, thank you, Hekim,” she murmured, dropping her eyes to the cover of the book still resting in her lap. “I’m sorry for my outburst. I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that.”
“There’s nothing to apologize for,” Yusriyah assured her. “You’ve been under enormous stress and have just suffered a terrible loss. Besides, I found your outburst reassuring; it shows me that you’ve still got enough fire in your soul to move forward with your life. And I suspect you’ll need it.”
“Yes, thank you, Hekim,” she repeated, for lack of anything better to say. Her skin prickled as though it felt a sudden chill, but she contorted her expression into a closed-mouth smile like nothing was wrong anyway. “You needn’t worry over me.”
“Just what I wanted to hear.” Yusriyah hesitated, swept a searing searching look over her top down and back again, and then slowly rose from her bedside. “I’ll be back to check in on you later, okay?”
“I’ll be here.”
She forced her smile wider, not so much that it felt shaky, just a little brittle. Yusriyah didn’t look entirely convinced, but left the room with a polite nod nonetheless. She waited several echoing heartbeats after the latch had clicked before she exhaled and scrubbed her hands across her face tiredly. Ezio will never let you leave him, Kadija had told her after her first miscarriage and Altaïr had basically told her that as well, although not as directly.
There’s nowhere to run. A sob lodged itself in her throat. Nowhere to hide. Hot tears started falling from her eyes and she didn’t even try to stop them. This is my life. She looked around her infirmary room and allowed the sobs to come.
I must have dozed off, she thought as she rubbed her eyes, trying to clear her head of grogginess and shrug off a strange sense of disquiet, a feeling of being watched and not quite alone even thought she was, at first glance, alone. The room’s still bright with mid-afternoon sunlight, so I can’t have been asleep for very long. She felt an effervescent tingling, almost like carbonation fizzing up her nose, just before she noticed something near the window. Appearing in full and reasonably direct sunlight, it wasn’t a shadow so much as the impression of a man, taking form right before her eyes as a current of Alamūt’s raw magic condensed and solidified into living matter. A man with a halo of white fire and sea green eyes and Lucifer’s own smile, dressed all in shades of white. He’d been with Ezio at the cabaret the night her whole life changed, and she’d felt his presence again at her mother-in-law’s house, where his magic rippled along the filaments of reality like a spider tending its web. She’d thought – hoped – it was just a coincidence.
“Do not be afraid,” he intoned in flawless Armenian with a smile so radiantly beautiful it verged on sinister.
“Ai hai Lilitu,” she whispered, keeping her eyes lowered. Why is he here?
He scoffed, but acknowledged the greeting with a dismissive flap of his hand as he settled against the windowsill.
“I almost forgot, you’re Cathari,” he drawled as she felt his eyes sweep over her. “That greeting always gets the most amusing reactions, especially in this area. But it never works on Cathari.” He sighed. “Straight to business then.”
“What business could you have with me?” she asked, watching him through her lashes as he watched her.
“I really wasn’t expecting all this when I dropped you into Ezio’s lap-” he indicated their surroundings with a sweeping gesture “-but I should have known that any child of Maria wouldn’t do something only half measure. It’s a family trait, has been for generations. Was your chest still bleeding the first time he fucked you, or was he gallant enough to dress the wound first?”
“Excuse me?” she sputtered. “That’s none-”
“No, it isn’t,” he smoothly agreed. “I was just curious, but never mind.” His lips were parted slightly as he studied her, head tilting off kilter. “Altaïr is…fond of you, in his own stunted way, isn’t he?”
“I, I don’t take your meaning. I’m loyal to my husband, absolutely loyal,” she replied, fingers involuntarily clenching a handful of bedding into a fist. She felt the tension running up her arm before she realized why and forced her fingers to relax again against the blankets. “They call you Cesare, don’t they?”
“Mmm, yes. They call me that,” he hummed with an inquiring arch of his brow. “It is my name, poppet.”
She took a deep breath to steady herself. Do not be afraid, he’d said. As you wish.
“It’s what you tell people to call you, but it’s not your real name, it can’t be. It’s much younger than you are.”
“Clever girl.” He huffed a short laugh under his breath before his eyes narrowed slightly and his amusement faded into a more serious expression. “I am one of the immortal children of your Dark Mother. Show me the appropriate respect.”
She worried the edge of her bottom lip between her teeth, held her silence, and kept her eyes dutifully downcast. Be careful. He’s powerful and dangerous to anger. She nervously touched her fingertips to her forehead, lips and heart. Protect me, Mother. Her skin was hot and tight, itching under the intensity of his gaze.
“You haven’t answered my question yet, Taline,” he hummed, abruptly severing the unfurling silence. “Would you like me to repeat it?”
“Yes, please.”
“Altaïr seems fond of you – allows you in his rooms, seeks out your company – presumably he somewhat trusts you, at least as much as he is capable of trusting an outsider…” He watched her for a long moment, then elaborated when she remained silent. “You are close to him, correct?”
“I’m not sure anyone is actually close to Altaïr,” she ventured. “He’s very guarded.”
“Guarded is a rather charitable way of putting it,” he replied wryly and then sighed. “He regularly speaks to you and shares his personal time and space with you. You are in a position to notice if he changes his behavior, if something starts seeming a little off with him… You follow my meaning, yes?”
“I won’t spy for you,” she whispered, knowing it wasn’t the answer he wanted but unable to honestly give him any other.
“Spy for me?” he chortled. “You couldn’t spy on him even if you tried. He’d catch you out in an instant.”
“But you do want me to keep an eye on him,” she pressed, the sting of his dismissive response overshadowing her quieter feelings of confusion and relief.
“A friendly eye, of course, but yes.”
“And presumably tell someone if anything seems different or unusual with him?”
“Obviously,” he drawled, seeming mostly bemused by her questions.
“Why?”
His demeanor shifted, shading towards more serious as he contemplated her and presumably decided how he was going to respond. It’s not an unexpected question. Surely it can’t be that difficult to answer?
“My sister gave you a necklace on your wedding day, didn’t she?”
She blinked, momentarily disoriented by his non-sequitur response to her question, then hesitantly tipped her chin in confirmation. He tilted his head and his lips curled into a vacant smile as he watched her. His scrutiny, although far from critical or unfriendly, was unsettling.
“Lucky girl,” he drawled, allowing a long pause before abruptly shifting into a clipped and almost business-like recitation. “Altaïr’s mother made a deal, years ago, promised him to my sister in return for something she wanted rather badly at the time. Following her untimely death, the Order agreed to honor Aaliyah’s deal, in return for something it wanted.” He paused again to study her for a moment, to make sure she was following his narrative. “The arrangement suited everyone, until quite recently. Suddenly Jamil had second thoughts, decided to meddle in matters he doesn’t faintly understand, and rescinded Sirocco’s previously unrestricted access to her twice promised property-” he bit off the remainder of his sentence with a sharp snap of his teeth and a chilling smile. “Naturally,” he continued after a moment’s pause, tone once again suspiciously cool and unconcerned, “my siblings and I are rather aggrieved by this behavior, but there’s no reason to concern yourself with that.”
“Why are you telling me this? What do you want from me?” she asked softly. His narrative was intriguing, but her curiosity was tempered by wariness of being maneuvered into an agreement she didn’t want to make.
In addition to the stories she’d been told about rusalki and sirens, her aunt had also warned against trusting Lilith’s immortal children. They are as much a danger to us as we are to lives more fragile than our own, whether we intend to be or not, Siran had lectured her and Anoush again and again as they practiced casting and controlling their magic. If she concentrated hard enough, she could conjure the warm sunlight on her skin, the scent of growing things and ripening grain, and the soothing cadence of her aunt’s voice. She wished it hurt less to remember.
He sighed. “Forgive the presumption, but, to convey my concerns more clearly, let’s just assume that you are desperately attached to Ezio, okay? And one day he left on a contract, or whatever, and eventually you noticed that he hadn’t returned, hadn’t responded to any of your letters-”
“I didn’t mean to-”
“-how would you react? What would you do?” he continued, ignoring her attempted interruption. “Would you grieve? Would you give him up as lost? What might you do to try to get him back?”
“Are you just concerned about Altaïr? I don’t-”
“I’m less concerned about him than I am about everything around him,” he interrupted her sharply, expression clouding with impatience. “Altaïr is not a normal human being, he is not even just an exceptional human being. He was designed to be beyond exceptional, and he has been conditioned to perform beyond even his breeding. He’s live ammunition thrown into a fire, a weapon capable of massive and catastrophic destruction without a safety, and it would be incredibly inconvenient, to me, if he detonates.”
“Why?”
“Various complicated and rather boring reasons you needn’t concern yourself with, poppet,” he replied with a dismissive flop of his wrist. “All you really need to know is that most things that are inconvenient for me are likely to be quite catastrophic for you, and I’m sure your desire to avoid catastrophe is at least equal to my desire to avoid inconvenience, yes?”
She tipped her chin in a cautious nod. There were obvious and enormous gaps in his narrative and she suspected that some of the information he was withholding might actually be critically important to her, or Ezio, or especially to Altaïr. They can never understand us, no matter how hard they may try.
“Excellent!” He beamed approvingly and the brilliance of his smile combined with his overall beauty consumed all the oxygen in the room like a blinding magnesium flash, breathtaking and more than a little terrifying.
Does he always wear all white? It seemed like an odd coincidence that the both times she’d actually seen him he was dressed, head to toe, in shades of white – just like her mother-in-law. Another odd coincidence, unless it isn’t?
“One other little thing,” he hummed as he pushed away from the wall and buttoned the middle button of the single-breasted dinner jacket he was wearing. “Let’s keep this friendly chat between ourselves, shall we? Telling anyone about it would only raise questions that won’t get answered, and you wouldn’t want the Order’s upper echelons to suspect you of hiding anything from them.” He carded a hand through his hair and checked his reflection in the windowpane.
She tried to swallow the thorny knot of unease lodged in her throat and managed a jerky nod. Only now I am actually hiding something.
“That’s a good girl,” he purred. “No wonder Ezio likes you so much more than any of the others. Don’t worry, poppet, he’ll have you breeding again before you know it. You might even manage to keep it next time.” He sauntered towards the door. “Third time’s a charm, you know,” he added over his shoulder and then vanished into thin air just as he reached the door.
[1] I’ll sacrifice myself for you, may you be healthy.