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Chapter Text

Adair "Adi" Henáf 
- Played by Regé-Jean Page

Élise de la Serre, daughter of the Templar grandmaster and heiress to the de la Serre grand fortune and estate, drank from the champagne flute with the fakest laugh and painted smile. Her eyes met his across the room. He sat by the window, with promise in his eyes. All the same tells that matched hers.

She finished the flute and gently set it down. She trailed through the crowd.

And Adi followed. 

Behind closed doors, they could truly be themselves. 

He followed, blended with the crowd and passing through the ballroom. The music was lively, and the nobles were dancing. A couple was joyfully dancing on the dance floor and loudly boasted the recent engagement. 

Love, he wondered idly. He could have had that in another life too. 

At the doorway, she looked over her shoulder once and met his eyes, skittish as she covered her smile with a dainty hand. This was nothing like the person he knew. It was all an act, to be so coy and bashful. She was giggled behind her palm when her true laugh was as bold as her red hair. 

Greetings from passing by guests distracted her, her presence surging as her voice carried out. She waved to a few strangers. She stopped to kiss the cheek of a cheerful brunette woman in a blue gown.  She bid her farewells to partygoers just as fast as she said hello. Her eyes met his again.

Anticipation built up as he continued to walk in the shadows, as he traced her steps and evaded the crowd. He wasn’t one to keep anyone waiting, much less her.

His scarf was trusted as an accessory, a gas mask and as a way to blend into the crowd, was tucked in his collar. His hood was tucked inside his coat, removable for such an occasion as this. It was a risk to be without his hood, but he stuck to the corners.

Her dress trailed behind her. 

When he turned the corner into an empty room, he had the Phantom Blade at the ready. Yet, he didn’t see the ambush coming when a knife embedded itself in the wood next to his head. 

An arm stuck out and he slammed against a metal bracer, the action leaving his chest open and struck with a blow. 

He yelped out, fabric hot against his mouth as he wheezed out a cough. 

Élise pushed him on the ground, both knees stinging against his hips and one hand on his chest.

“I wouldn’t think so fast, Assassin!” Élise hissed out.  

His phantom blade was aimed at her throat, while her knife was pointed right above his throat.

This was not how he was going to die.

“Get off me, Red!” Adi exclaimed. 

She reeled back at the nickname. The free hand at his chest yanked up his scarf, then shoved it down at the realization. Had it been another Templar, Adi would have already killed them already.

But this was Élise.

“Oh, it’s you,” she said flatly. 

She let go of Adi’s robe and stood up, dusting off her gown like she hadn’t just tried to murder him. Though that was just their every interaction at this point. 

“Yes, who else would it be?” Adi asked, exasperated. He stowed his blade and stood up. So much for the friendly scuffle. 

He could feel looseness loose threads from the side of his robe. Ugh. Time to visit the tailor again.

There was tentative peace, but not because the two factions were suddenly friends. Tensions in Paris were rising, as were in Versailles. There was a change to the air that was coming.

“Why are you here, Monsieur Henáf?”

There was peace, but he wasn’t stupid.

“Why are you here, Mademoiselle de la Serre?” he asked, his come back weak but his resolve strong. He never really did know what to say to her in these interactions.

“Well, this is my party,” Élise said. 

“Is it your birthday?” Adi asked. “Happy birthday. Are you turning a hundred?”

Élise narrowed her eyes and did not take the joke. She crossed her arms. “Are you here to kill my father?” she asked.

Oh. So that’s why she was tense.

“No, Red. I’m here on an errand,” Adi said. “Irrelevant things, to someone of your status.”

“Oh.”

“I would not be here for a party willingly,” Adi said. 

“I thought you liked parties.”

“As if. Small-talk about the weather, about pretty gowns, expensive wine...”

“Then, I take it this is not your favorite type of place,” Élise said.  

“God no. But I don’t want Paris to starve,” Adi said. “Do not worry, it won’t cause any interference to the actions or plans of your cult. Our only coincidence is this location.”

“How sentimental. You should form a club.” 

"That might be the worst idea yet,” Adi said. “But you are quite tense. On with it, then. Do you think someone is out for you?”

“Why would I tell you?”

“Because if someone were to be after you tonight, it would not be my friends,” Adi said. “Even if my alliance would imply otherwise.”

They had had their run-ins before and it always started with a scuffle. But Adi always chose not to fight. While he did not admire the Templars, he still did not believe in spilling needless blood. Élise was an enemy, but not a threat. 

Like the handful of interactions, their first had been a meeting by chance when he was simply a stranger and had offered words of comfort after a memorial service of her close friend during a terrible winter. It was before he became an Assassin, before he knew that she was a Templar.

But she stowed her sword the first time they interacted. But fate crossed their threads. And they kept running into each other ever since.

And with the growing tensions in France, he was more focused on the unrest that was shaking the city up. 

As was Élise too. 

“Well, I would not like to talk about that,” she huffed out and crossed her arms.

“Suit yourself. I’m on my way out anyway,” Adi said. 

“You look nice.”

“What’s that?”

“You are quite nice to look at,” Élise said. 

“Well, merci. You are quite beautiful yourself too. It almost makes up for the terrible personality.”

Élise finally laughed out loud.

“Oh, fuck you.” 

Adi waved his farewell and jumped out to the terrace, disappearing into the night. 

The return trip to Paris did not take long in the carriage, the roads mostly smooth Adi as rode back. He studied the invoice’s contents of food shipments from Versailles and to Paris. He read over the lines and numbers and did not recognize any name from the briefings and dossiers. 

And he still made no sense of it. 

Versailles had always been Templar territory, what with the Assassin presence wiped out nearly ten years prior in calculated hits. He knew about the history. Had read about it and studied it before he entered the field.

“Who killed him?”

“It wasn’t us,” David said. “To my knowledge, de la Serre was not one of our targets."

“To your knowledge? David, you’re the bookkeeper. You should know this!”

“And I can attest that he was not on the list,” David deadpanned. 

“Obviously the Templars won’t care about that,” Jéronimo Mereidas said. His arms were crossed, hood off and gaze as sharp as his axe. “Well? Who killed him?” he demanded. 

“Since when do we solve the murders of Templars?” Véronique asked. 

“Since their panic means more of them attacking us, my dear Vero. So. Fess up! Who killed him?”

“Ask Adi, he was the only one who was at the party in the first place.”

“In that case,” Jeronimo turned to face Adi. “Adi, you fucked up!”

“I just got here,” Adi said. “What are you on about?”

“Grand Master de la Serre is dead.

“What?!” Adi exclaimed. “Since when?!”

“Tonight at the gala in Versailles. The one you were at.”

“You think I killed him?” Adi exclaimed. “That’s outrageous!”

“You were the only one of us there,” Jéronimo said. 

“Oh, so I was the only attendee at the gala where de la Serre was murdered,” Adi stated. “You caught me, Jéronimo,” he held the back of his hand to his forehead, feigning like he was about to faint. “Twas I who obviously killed Grand Master de la Serre because they threw a gala for me and him only.” 

“...Okay, you have a point.”

“Do you realize how ridiculous that sounds?!” 

“If only all assassination missions were that easy,” Sasha Weeks mused. 

“Peace, peace, everyone!” Mentor Mirabeau called out, standing above them in his perch of the Great Hall. “I have received word that de la Serre’s murderer was at the scene and promptly arrested. Our brother’s presence is merely a random event of consequence.”

Adi blinked at the wording. Random event of consequence. Now there was a phrase.

“Now, go in peace,” Mirabeau said. “Go to sleep. It’s late. We have work to do tomorrow.”

The scene dispersed and the Council left, as did the Assassins that had stumbled out of their beds. The safe house assassins waved farewells and retreated into the catacombs.

“Well, that’s that. Anyways,” Jéronimo turned to Adi. “You wanna get a drink? To celebrate your successful mission.”

That was fast.

“It was hardly a mission, more of a fool's errand,” Adi shut the gate behind him and emerged to the tunnels that led to the stairs by the river. “As if Mirabeau doesn’t meet with the Templars four times a month.”

“So, no drink?”

Adi snorted. “Of course I’ll get a drink. It’s on the Brotherhood’s tab anyway.”

Though it was almost midnight, there was still activity in the Café-Theatre. The ruins of it anyways. It was hard to believe that once upon a time, the place was a jewel and a major landmark. 

Some of the Assassins had switched shifts and joined Adi in the café.

He knew the routes of the catacombs before he was stationed to the Café. It had almost been a month of residency in the semi-sound attic, but he supposed it had to do with rising rank and his frequency to do side errands that pertained to the theatre. Madame Charlotte must have put in a good word for him.  

Not that it mattered much. The attic/sun room where he resided and the café were the only decent parts remaining of the once grand place other than the leaking café. 

Yet the large dining room was lively, candles and lanterns newly lit. Jerónimo, Veronique and Sasha sat at the table. Brasseur was in the bar, filling jugs of ale to hand around along with bread and sliced apples. It was tradition and a pastime to drink after a mission and, well. Gossip.

“Adi!” Brasseur took a seat across from Adi and handed him his beer. “So, do tell. What happened at the party?”

“If you’re asking if there was any Templar torture, no,” Adi drank from his beer. “There was no Templar torture.”

“That’s bullshit! They used to do it during the Inquisition. I know it,” Brasseur said.

He had been adamant of his theory.

“Brother, why would the Templars be torturing someone at a gala?” Sasha asked. 

“They save that for Easter mass,” Jerónimo added. He filled his mug with ale and then refilled Veronique’s. 

Brasseur rolled his eyes. He stuck out his tongue, for good measure.

“It was a soiree for Élise  de la Serre,” Adi supplied. “A typical Templar party in Versailles."

“So, a party in Versailles,” Jeronimo concluded.

The Assassin presence had been wiped out nearly a decade now. How it happened, he only heard echoes of. 

“Who was at the party?” Brasseur asked. 

“Every Templar in Versailles’s vicinity,” Adi stated. “You should have seen it. It was a walking convention of corruption with every aristocrat in the city. I'm lucky I got out alive.”

“I’ve never seen a poor man be a Templar.” 

“Don’t get me wrong, one dead Templar is always better, but--”

“Do not speak ill of the dead,” Adi said. “Even if they are our enemy.”

“Oh, yet you speak ill of me,” Jerónimo blew a raspberry. “Get off the high horse, Adair. You’re a mortician turned assassin. You deliver death as much as we do.”

Adi chose not to respond to that. 

Because he had a point. 

“I’m not too surprised about Mirabeau’s reaction,” Veronique said. “You have to admit that the murder of our sworn Templar enemy in the same place you were at earlier does not look too good. But now, the Templars are going to be scrambling,” she said. “Which is more work for us to cover our tracks in case they lash out.”

“Right, because the French Templar Order is so good about communicating to their own about change,” Sasha shook his head. Strands of straw-blonde hair fell out of his tie. He tucked them behind his ear. “Jero, do you remember when they disbarred Germain and their agents hadn’t an idea?” he asked. “It was a mess.”

A bucket was collecting leaks from the roof from the earlier drizzle that had made its way from Paris to Versailles. Somewhere out there, an aristocrat in an expensive suit ran from the rain. And Adi would be lying if he said the mental image did not bring him some amusement. 

“I’ll tell you what’s a mess,” Jerónimo jerked his thumb to the ceiling. “This place. It’s one storm away from falling into itself.  No offense, Madame.”

Charlotte took a seat at the table across them and put her feet up in the chair. “Oh, none taken, dear. You only speak the truth. I’m afraid the rain rotted away some of the wood outside” 

“Charlotte, you must slow down,” Veronique said. 

Charlotte waved her concern away. “Don’t worry. It was nothing more than just emptying the rain buckets into the garden,” she said. “Brandon and Augustin took care of the heavy lifting earlier before the rain swept over.”

“Why not tear this mess down already and just turn this mess into a plaza? Eh? It would be easy and less miserable than this,” Jerónimo said.

“Then there goes my room,” Adi said.

Jeronimo waved his hand. “ Detalhes , detalhes ,” he mused. Details, details.

The preference for outdoor seating for Jerónimo had come from surviving the earthquake in Lisbon. He always spoke of it in comparison to the near crumbled state of the Cafe-Theatre. It was enough to have some decent living areas for the Assassins in the house across, but all Jerónimo extended his presence to was the cafe itself for a drink and a warm meal. He did not step near the rubble.

He had confessed to Adi that the earthquake was why he did not step foot in the cathedral above the other hidden entrance. How poignant that the earthquake struck while he was in mass to cause him to no longer be a believer.

“Even if we were to turn it to a plaza, we’d need an architect, a steward and a miracle worker to fix this mess,” Charlotte said. 

“With what money?”

“I am sure Most Dear Mirabeau could open up his checkbook,” Brasseur mimed himself untying a purse, only to throw an invisible coin across the table. “It’s worthless to even ask him. He never comes up here!”

“We’re too low of a class for him outside the meeting hall,” Veronique quipped. “A mentor in name only.”

“Who killed him, anyway?” Adi asked. 

“Who killed who?”

“De la Serre,” Adi said. 

“Oh! Word is that his step-son did it,” Sasha said. “Stabbed in the courtyard with witnesses.”

“That’s dramatic,” Jerónimo said. “I was expecting that he drank spoiled wine--or I don’t know, someone getting stabbed in the balcony of an opera house to be discovered halfway through the play.”

“That’s very specific,” Veronique said.

“Non, but…Jeró’s got a point. That’s just aristocrats,” Brasseur said.  “They don’t like to get their hands dirty. But your kid killing you in cold blood in the middle of your own party?” he shook his head and downed his ale. “It’s always your own that gets to you.”

“Think it was an inside job?”

“Probably,” Jerónimo said. “But oh well. Not our Templar problem to worry about.” 

Adi shook his head. 

He wondered idly about Élise  and if she was alright. He didn’t know she had a stepbrother.

Ah, he shouldn’t worry about it. 

It’s not like Adi will see her or the step-brother ever again. 

Chapter Text

Churches were familiar to Adi, as it was familiar as picking up a shovel. But he had not been to mass, not in a long time. Certainly not since he came to Paris. But if there was one thing he missed from his old home was the organ.

He loved the organ.

Beautiful, dramatic, loud, absolutely amazing to behold. He loved the organ and the echoes of the church. He loved singing. Loved playing songs on the piano in the neighbor’s house. He sang the songs his mother taught him, played the nursery rhymes along with her as his hands followed the keys. He’d sit on her lap during mass for the earliest Sundays as he could remember, his hands on hers and following the keys along.

His mother an organist, his father a grave keeper. He knew death at a young age, for how it was explained to him, and for his father’s role in keeping the graveyard and digging every day. 

And he knew his father was tired.

Eventually, the church was no longer enough and his mother had to start digging too. And along went him, when his studies were done. Working hard to keep food for the three of them on their table. But his mother did not waver. She stood tall. Stood proud. Reminded him what mattered; home, work and a warm coat. And above all, home. 

He'd speak to her in Brezhoneg, what he had learned from her. Some of the other gravekeepers spoke brezhoneg, though some words were older Breton and different dialects. But he knew enough to conversate and understand. It was a moment of solidarity to share the language. Old Celtic songs would be sung on long nights when the smaller catacombs felt cold and the legacies of death felt heavy.

And he began to play the organ. Terribly. 

He was not the best organ player, or on the piano either. He was learning! Her mother played the organ beautifully, as well as the violin. 

His father would laugh, as would his fellow gravekeepers. It was nice to hear them laugh. See them smile. Adi grew to like that part of his job---though it wasn't much of a job. The camaraderie. The friendship.

"Papa, why us?" he has asked once, when he was nine.

"We take care of people when they cannot take care of themselves. We treat the dead with respect and help them find their eternal rest. We help with the living by offering an empathetic ear. That is what we do."

It seemed simple enough. Hard work to support a living.

The canteen's lid was screwed shut and back in his coat, the taste of stale water not feeling quite enough to take the taste of decay from his mouth. Even the lavender balm was not as potent as it used to be to block out the smell when he rubbed it against his nose earlier that morning. 

Yet the dead still smelled like the dead. 

He got up from the ground of the cemetery and tried not to think about the lives of the dead people on the cart. There were many to take to the mortuary, many to bury. 

And there came the question that pressed at the back of his mind of if the crown were going to order them to bury more skulls in the catacombs again.

And if they were going to pay them this time.

There was a cruelty, he thought, to not having more funerals for the dead. There was a certain disruption to tradition, to grieving, to how everyone ached for loss. A funeral allowed for closure, for a chance for the living to bury their dead. 

But now...

He pushed the cart and tried not to think about how much the day's grief was catching up on him. How the weariness of a long day could be eased with a song, with a smile, with a silly story that livened the mood. But even then, he would end the day sullen. Tired.

He wondered if his father was still working from sunup to five, like he used to. He wondered if his mother joined him in the evening after she finished working, as she lit lanterns to illuminate the dark path between graves. The last amount of money he had dropped off for them was two weeks ago, and he made sure to not be seen as he did. 

For all his work growing up, for all the lessons learned by his father, Adi realized the job never got easier.

The summer wind was unflinching to the death around him. 

The tarp corner flapped up to reveal a woman's hand, pale and lifeless. The blood on her other arm had been cleaned off when he found her. 

He had carried her into the cart earlier, a young woman his age and with brown hair. Slit throat.

He did not conduct the autopsy himself, but he had the copy of coroner’s report in his coat and had read it over fast enough while waiting to be transported. 

The circumstances seemed to be a robbery while she was asleep. At least, if the parroting of the coroner’s assistant meant anything, along with the missing jewelry in her vanity.   

All he knew was her name. Juliet Micheaux, four years older than him. And her vocation.

An Assassin since her youth and an elite veteran by her experience and expertise in the field.

Yet she was found killed in her sleep, alone in her bedroom in the eastern end of the Latin Quarter.

It had been a month and a half since the Grand Master de la Serre was murdered and seemingly, the Templars were in disarray. Enough for there to be conflict. The June heat was heavy, along with the unrest in the city and the crime on the rise. 

He wondered what happened to the Templars and their unspoken truce.

Miscommunication? Adi wasn't sure what to call it.

This wasn’t a Templar’s doing, so he guessed...Maybe. The Council was busy about it as it was, with the meetings behind closed doors and long debates muffled through the wood. The Assassins would be huddled, sometimes, in just trying to eavesdrop. Dimitri would make an excuse about turning in a report, only to be turned away and sent back to the library. 

Missions were on hold. Some of the clubs were closed. A storm a few years had wrecked the flooring of their largest club and it was closed up. It was too expensive to fix. 

At the breakfast table, Adi and the others theorized. Could it be Templars? But even then, they were too clean about their kills. Show offs. A little reckless sometimes too. But they weren’t tactical, not like this. They attacked in purges. In slaughters. If they wanted to kill all the Assassins in Paris, they would do it in one night, not in random attacks like this. Ines would bring up the Colonial purge, sometimes. But even then, it was a hush-hush topic. Not an easy one to talk about.

But since May 5th, counting Juliet, three assassins so far have been found dead. Robberies, per the police report. Slit throats, per the cause of death. 

Throat slits too neat to not be from an Assassin.

The cart needed to be cleaned again once the day was over, but the stagnant smell of death never went away.

Oh, papa. 

Adi stopped the cart to cover Juliet’s hand with the cloth. 

If only you could see me now.

The wake was in the catacombs, where she would rest for the final night before being cremated. He covered her throat with wrapped scarves. Deep green, like her robes. 

It was a long day. 

After a bath and changing into more comfortable clothing, he went back downstairs to the theatre. Though the sun had long since set and dusk. 

He knew the dining area would be sparse with a few assassins, since some took turns at the wake. How ironic, he thought. That he couldn’t stomach all this, and he was the one working at the death business since he was young.

His father was right. Once again.

Adi was not looking for company when he had dinner with the little appetite he had. He just knew that if he was alone with his own thoughts in his room, he would not sleep. 

He already slept less anyways.

He drank his coffee and ate his bread, not having enough appetite for a full dinner. He was tired enough to sleep through whatever the espresso had for him this time, but even being among the theatre was a welcoming feeling than being alone in his room, with his thoughts above the empty office and the books he already read through. 

Madame Charlotte was sitting down in the neighboring booth again, reclining her feet across. She should not be working, not with the speed that her pregnancy was advancing. 

At least she stopped doing the heavy lifting. Adi had insisted, along with Jero and Dimi and whoever of the Assassins were posted in the theatre. ‘Madame, think of little Augustina. Don’t risk your little girl. We would love to help. That is what we are here for.’

“Long night again, Madame?”

“As always,” Charlotte said. “Thankfully, this is the end of it for now. Just sorting through Mademoiselle Rosie’s payment for the new drapery.”

“How is the lady doing?”

“Very well. Recently got a new kitten!” Charlotte smiled. “Cute little thing. It will keep her in good company. She’s been quite alone since her sister went overseas.”

“Well, the theatre is plenty big. And it would be nice to have the tailor nearby.”

“I know, I asked her about it again! But she still isn’t interested. She says her clients are frequent and work is always busy so she does not feel so alone. Even the theft is not enough to ward her off.”

The string of robberies in the area that had impacted Rose's shops. A large amount of silk spools were stolen, at least that had last been the gossip that Adi caught up with whenever he chatted with the tailor herself. But she hadn’t left her shop as of recently.  Adi always saw her in passing when he did deliveries or went to get his own robes mended. 

It was in one of the robberies aftermath when he met the Chief of Police, Charles Lapparent. 

Who, apparently, had his job ethic towards theft be like his name; an apparition. Barely there. Not enough to be believed. 

“What words of wisdom did Monsieur Lapparent offer this time?”

“Get a better lock and a new key,” Charlotte rolled her eyes. Unimpressive as always.

Adi let out a laugh. “Ah, that bastard! The day he does his job is the day we will see Paris burn!”

“That could be any day!”

“Exactly!”

“Now, go eat. Don’t let your food get cold now,” Charlotte said. “You need to rest too.”

“That, I do. I’ll see you later, madame.”

Adi was awakened by taps. 

The open window let in the moonlight, enough to make out Brasseur in the door frame. The old green sheet that served as a barrier was pushed back.

“Brasseur,” Adi greeted as he sat up. “What is it?”

“I am so sorry for waking you, but Trenet sent me."

Trenet? At this hour?

"What happened?"

Brassuer took a moment. “Jacques and Ophelia were both found dead in their bed.”

Adi sat up.

“What?" he asked. "You’re joking.”

Brasseur looked as tired as he was, the constant messenger and bearer of bad news. “I wish I was.”

“Damn it,” Adi exhaled. “How?"

“Take a guess.”

Adi sighed. Heavily. 

“Give me a few minutes. I’ll be downstairs soon.”

Again he walked down the ladder. Then down the stairs. Then down to the catacombs to meet up with Brasseur. And down again he walked into the streets of Paris after sunset had passed. But he was with Brasseur at his side, who was silent. And the cart was heavier with Jacques and Ophelia inside.

Adi was tired. 

Another pair of assassins died. Jacques Broderaux. Ophelia Hill. 

Adi knew them, had studied with them since they were recruits. Ophelia was in love with Jacques. Jacques was in love with Ophelia. They made the relationship work.

Found dead in bed together.

The investigation was wrapped up and of course, they were last to know about the body collection to transfer him to their mortuary in the Isle. The assistant was not be happy to be woken, but. Oh well.

Never mind that they could have had this done earlier in the evening had they not just sent word that he died. 

“Why are we being sent to collect instead of hunting the killer down?”

“I don’t know,” Brasseur said with a sigh. “Probably because our elites are getting picked off one by one. Or probably because the Council is panicking. Or all of the above.”

“Merde,” Adi shook his head. “We’ve done enough missions. We can do the heavy work.”

“Tell that to the Council,” Brasseur said. “Who doesn't leave their seats except to go to bed or send someone to tell us what to do. I got the message from Ines, who got it from Pietro, who got it from Trenet.”

“Can you believe Charlotte’s doing more work than them? While pregnant?”

“I think they fear that if we are more in the field, we will either die or become crazier and more radical and let ourselves get tossed into prison. Like Monsieur Bellec.”

“You’re joking,” Adi said.

“I wish.”

“That’s...the most stupid reason to not have us out here. Especially now, when this city is unsafe.”

“But the Council will never learn, even now.”

Adi rubbed his eyes. He needed to sleep. But he wasn't sleeping so easily now. 

It wasn't death that rattled him. Not when he had been learning this since he was a child. Death was a result. An end.

It was the suddenness of it all. The proximity. Juliet, Jacques and Ophelia died in a day. Jeremiah two weeks ago. Alonzo the month before, when the robberies all began. 

He followed Brasseur into his room on the residence across the fountain. The lights were out in most of the rooms, save for his, as Brasseur tended to the fire and lit more candles. 

“You want a drink?”

“Please.”

"Do you remember when we first began? As novice?"

"When we worked the clubs in the Latin quarter?" Adi chuckled. “Ya. Of course. How could I forget? We were drunk for half the shifts anyway.”

“Things were so boring then,” Brassuer said. “How I wish things were like that now.”

“Well. We wanted action in the Brotherhood, did we not?” Adi asked. “I didn’t think it would be this.”

“We need a miracle worker and an architect to fix all this mess. Well,” Brasseur took another puff of the pipe. “We need an architect to fix the theatre, a miracle worker to fix the Council, and some better liquor than this to get us through the morning.”

Progress in the Parisian brotherhood? That will be the day. 

“When Paris burns and humans can fly, we will see change,” Adi said. “Probably.”

Chapter Text

Arno was happy to finish his studies as an architect, but even happier to be back in Versailles.

And truthfully? He was also drunk as fuck.

So that might have something to do with it too. 

in this lavish party he had snuck into. Not that it was his first time breaking into a party; but breaking into a castle, certainly. 

But even then, he was a little buzzed and managed to succeed. A few more champagne flutes here and there, his second glass of wine that he had been drinking for the last hour. 

He blended in, talking aimlessly about empty conversations and empty passions. Someone got engaged. Someone is planning an annulment. Someone’s mistress was in someone else’s arm. He could have danced, but he kept a low profile. 

All in all, he was having a good time. He knew parties. Remembered them. He made peace with his father’s death in the same castle. 

But now, that was all behind him. He was back in France. He was home. He got his studies finished and was ready to work. 

He succeeded in making something for himself. 

And that was worth something in the end.

Finally, he found his sister and followed her into an empty room to her surprise and amusement. 

“What are you doing here?!” Élise exclaimed.

“What, am I not allowed to see my sister?”

“I was going to surprise you,” Élise said. 

“And this is me surprising you!” 

“You bastard,” Élise hugged him tightly. Then she stood back and looked at his attire. “Is that my father’s coat?!”

“Oops,” Arno said. “It must have gotten mixed up in the laundry.”

Élise laughed, genuine. She was in a good mood. “Well, tell me first. What is this I hear about you being offered to remodel Monsieur Seville's summer villa?”

“As an apprentice ,” Arno recalled. “I have not accepted the offer. I’m not a full architect just yet.”

“You might as well be! You have the studies and the apprenticeship done, with recommendations!”

Arno raised an eyebrow, to which Élise rolled her eyes. “What, you think I didn’t look at my father's letters? Of course I kept up with your work,” she said. “You left London on a great note. Impressive note.”

“I was glad to leave it. I'm grateful for the opportunity that father extended to me. But...I missed home. London is shit compared to being back here. This is home,” Arno gestured to the palace around him. “Versailles is home.”

“You look flushed.”

"I had to climb to get here after I got kicked out the first time."

"How weak,” Élise laughed at him. “But enough! You’ve been here too long.”

“What is this anyway?” 

“It’s another high society birthday party, what else?”

“Seems pretty lavish for just a birthday.”

“Then you’ve been away from France for too long. So go. Before you get caught again .”

“I blended in perfectly well,” Arno said with a grin. “How many toasts...how much wine...hmm...I think maybe ten?”

“Oh, enough. You’re a piss poor drunk anyway.” 

“I'm just a poor boy from a rich family. Spare me this life...of aristocracy.”

“I’ll see you when I go home,” Élise said. “It’s so good to see you again, brother.”

“You too, Élise.”

He forgot to tell her about the letter.

Oh well.

Surely it was nothing important. 

He was on his way out when he saw his stepfather, staggering steps that Arno recognized all too well. In the most hilarious irony, his stepfather was more drunk than he was. 

Well, it was too late to not say anything now. Not like it meant much; he was on his way out. What could the guard do? Tell him to walk faster?

But the guards were not there, nor on the balcony that he had broken in through.

He was in the clear.

“Hey old man! Did you have too much of the king’s wine?” Arno laughed. 

Only when his stepfather held out his bloodied hand did Arno realize that there was something deeply wrong. 

“Merde!” he cursed and ran towards him. “Someone help!” 

There was blood, so much blood. Like a blade to the throat. 

And there was a slim piece of metal that fell to the floor, stained with blood.

“Help!” Arno shouted out again. “Someone help!” he looked down to his stepdad. “Hey, old man--” his voice wavered as he held his hand on his stepfather’s neck, anything to apply pressure for it to stop the bleeding. “Come on now, come on.”

His stepfather was bleeding, and there was nothing to stop it.

"Help! Help! Help!"

The panic was rushing him fast, along with the tears.

Finally, his stepdad raised his hand to his face and held it. With the little strength he had. 

"My son," he breathed out softly. And wiped one of Arno's tears. "My son."

Then his hand went slack and he stopped breathing.

More shouts emerged from the courtyard.

“Guards! Guards! He did it! He’s the killer! He killed Monsieur de la Serre!”

"Wait, no! I didn't do anything -" 

He felt a baton strike his temple and the world went dark. 

When Arno was drunk, he sometimes got into fights. Sometimes. He picked his battles, picked his setting. 

With his London friends, he liked to play cards. Gamble only a little bit.

With his Paris friends, he would get into passionate arguments, loud laughs that echoed in his ears. With himself, he would just drink and drink until the problems buzzed to nothing and he could safely pass out in his bed. He knew his limits. 

Framed for sleeping with someone’s wife? Yes. It’s happened. Framed for cheating at a card game? It did happen and he didn't cheat. He still won the round anyway.

But now? Framed for murder?

That was new.

Arno woke up in the back of a carriage, arms in chains and him on the floor. The carriage had a small window near the top with bars on it and he could hear the horses. Feel the floor moving. 

He tried to use his sight and winced at the pressure in his head. Fuck. Fuck. Bad idea.

He waited until it passed and looked up to the window. His hair was messed up, half out of the tie and half on his face. It was bothering him that he couldn't fix it.

“Hey you there! Where are you taking me?”

“You're finally awake. You're going to Bastille.”

BASTILLE?!

“What?!” he exclaimed. “No! That can’t be!”

“You killed a man in cold blood in front of hundreds of witnesses.”

“I didn’t kill Monsieur de la Serre. I’m innocent!”

“Yeah, that’s what they all say,” the carriage driver said.

“He’s my father, why would I kill him?”

The driver shrugged. “Inheritance? Hell if I know. Rich people like money.”

“I wouldn’t kill him for the inheritance--” Arno choked up. He was too fucked up for this.

“I just drive the carriage,” the driver said. "You got a cell waiting for you there."

And that was what broke him. 

Arno thumped his head against the floor and let the tears flow. 

The carriage driver said nothing. And they continued moving.

Arno had resigned from protesting his innocence to crying.

It didn’t help that he was crying too much and his head was hurting too much to use his sight. He didn’t know how to pick a lock. Why would he need to know that? He should have done something. 

But he was chained up. Locked up. Hungover. Crying. Arrested for murder. Convicted already, just being tossed into prison. Into the Bastille. No judge, no jury. 

This was his life now. Goodbye to the career he worked so hard for. Goodbye to all of this. Goodbye to starting anew back home.

Count on life to have Arno losing another father to murder and being the first witness to find the body in the same castle again. 

Chapter Text

“What’s your name?”

“Arno Victor Dorian.”

“Dorian.” The man laughed. “What are the goddamn odds…”

“What are you talking about?”

“I knew your father,” the man said. 

Which one? The one who got murdered or the one that people accused me of murdering him?

“Charles Dorian.”

Oh. The one who got murdered and whose death tore Arno apart and he still struggled to even think about the tragedy or the little bit of life he remembered of being with his father, until the point that grief became too much that he started to drink wine alone in his bedroom again.

That one.

So rarely did he have anyone say that they knew his father. Just what a loss. 

Arno already never opened up to anyone, even to himself, this stranger who knew his father was no different.

“Bravo,” Arno scoffed mockingly. He added single low effort clap, just to be an asshole. "I congratulate you." 

“His murder was never solved, right?” 

Arno stopped.

“At a gala, with plenty of people but not any witnesses. Stabbed in broad daylight, but not a soul to have seen it.”

The brevity of the statement was off. “How do you know that?” he asked. “Who are you?”

“Because your father was in the Brotherhood, like me,” the man said. “An Assassin.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He was in the Brotherhood since he was a young man, active here in Paris. I trained along with him. Trained him as well. We are in a decades’ long war with the Templar Order. The one your late stepfather was the master of.”

“So both my fathers were in rival cults,” Arno concluded. “That sums it up. You’re fucking crazy.”

“I’m speaking the truth.”

“You’re fucking crazy,” Arno repeated. “Who are you?”

“Pierre Bellec.”

“Well, Pierre, while I am sure your cult is a delightful little bunch," Arno gestured to shoo away the incredulousness of his words. "I am not interested. Not only does it sound awful, I also am most definitely not amused with you dragging my father’s name, as well as my stepfather's name, into all this mess of yours. How low of you to bring their names to someone whose watch you fucking stole while being in prison. I don't care about fucking cults. I only care about proving my innocence and finding my sister.”

And then Pierre laughed. "Jesus, you're really just like Charles."

"You don't know him," Arno snapped. 

"I did. For a long time, kid. He was a brilliant man and a brilliant fighter. One of the most intelligent Assassins we had.  I know it sounds crazy,” Bellec offered the wooden sword. “But the world is changing, boy. Being stuck here can give you opportunity to train. Grow stronger. Learn the ways of your old man. You may as well make the best of it.”

Arno sighed.

And took the sword into his hand.

Adi hated stoms. He did not like it, not for all the gold in the world. He hated that he was stuck with this storm outside. Night time was unorthodox to be awake in. Night time was for sleep. 

And he was not happy to deal with the remnants of a terrible flood that fucked up the catacombs. 

It had been an act of fate, really, that he ended up working instead of sleeping.

He was drinking in one of the barely functioning social clubs, killing time before he would walk back to the theatre. Brasseur was drinking with him, as was Jero and Dimitri. The usual jackasses and himself.

They really did not have much to do now that Bellec was back from doing whatever the fuck he was doing in Bastille. The Parisian Order did not anticipate all the shit with Bastille, or that Bellec even survived in the first place anyways. Neither did Adi.

Adi spent all night in the club with the act of drying out the clothing and bedding that got wet in the earlier rain. Because someone (Jero) left the window open (Jero) to their sleeping quarters (Jero) while they were all drunk downstairs night to wait out the storm. What Templar was going to attack in this weather?

He was mostly dry in the morning, hungover really, when Adam found him. One of the gravekeepers that was raised in Paris, Adam was a nice man. A little older than Adi, handsome, and with the most lovely green eyes Adi had ever seen. Like Adi, he was raised in the business too with his family.

And because the worst came to worst; the cemetery flooded and the catacombs were almost destroyed. 

It was mild damage. But mild in cemetery meant a whole fucking lot. 

He was soaked to the ankle in death, mud, sweat, decay and humidity. The scarf he wore around his nose was tied tight and the rosemary mint balm was practically stuck up his nostrils by Adam. Plant clippings in his cloth mask along with it. Adi remembered the curse he cried out as Adam shoved it up his nose, a loud one that he was sure the souls in the deepet of the catacombs and the burnt Bastille heard. 

Only near the evening was the cemetery crisis under control. And Adi was exhausted. 

He bathed and almost fell asleep in the tub. His robes were back in his room again, following Brassuer’s promise to bring them to the theatre once they all trekked back after the storm. The kitchen smelled amazing, even from his window to the top. 

He skipped dinner.  He was too tired to eat.

Like he did in the days when life was tiring, Adi lit up his pipe and smoked. 

Just a way to wind down after a long day. 

It was odd to be seeing the setting rays of the summer sun through his windows rather than the cloudy nights. It painted a beautiful sight. He would be out in the garden in the peaceful days like this, watching the sunset. Sunsets were always the prettiest after a storm.

But after Bastille got overturned, everything changed. He wasn’t sure exactly how much just yet. 

He finished his smoke and washed up before he got into his sleeping clothes. 

He let the sun rays warm his bed as he fell asleep.

“Adi, wake up!” Brasseur shoved his arm. “Wake up!” 

Adi grimaced at the movement. He moved further into his pillow. What a shitty dream. “What is it?” he mumbled. 

Another shove. “Wake up!”

What kind of fucking dream was this? Why was Brasseur bothering him?

The covers were yanked off him.

He was not dreaming.

The sun’s rays were barely setting into the blue dusk. 

“What do you want, Brasseur?!” Adi exclaimed. “I just got into bed---for forty minutes?! What the fuck, Brasseur?! What do you want?!”

“You need to get to headquarters.”

“For what?!” Adi asked. “What does the cult want this time?”

“Nothing from the Council,” Brasseur rushed. “Well---kind of. It’s not official.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You’ll know it when you see it. Come on, get up!”

“I don’t want to,” Adi grabbed his blanket and pulled it over himself. “Va te faire foutre et bonne nuit. Fuck you and good night!”

Brasseur yanked it off his head again. “Come on, Adi. You don’t want to miss this.”

“Yes I fucking do. Unlike you, I’ve worked hauling wet dead skulls and decaying matter all day while being hungover. I just want to sleep. And frankly, if you don’t fuck off, you’ll join the dead ones soon too.”

Ignoring Adi’s words, Brasseur went to the dresser. “See, this is why we draw straws downstairs when it’s time to wake you up,” he said as he pulled open a drawer. “Because you always throw a tantrum the second you wake into this world.” He rummaged through some clothing. “Hmm…not this one.”

“You draw straws?!” 

“Well,” Brasseur closed the drawer and opened another one. “Not really. I always choose to come upstairs because I’m less likely to die in the process.”

Oh. Adi flopped back onto the bed. “It was one time I threw a book at Jero,” he stated. “One time! And in my defense, he scared me!”

“You gave him a nose bleed,” Brasseur finally pulled out one of Adi’s robes. Just the coat, at least. “Hurry up and put this on.” He threw the robes onto Adi’s face for good measure. 

“Agh!”

“Today, Adi! Not tomorrow!”

Brasseur led Adi down a different hall, a false curve hidden from plain view. 

They were in the royal balcony then. The royal balcony was embedded in the catacombs and hidden away from plain view. The window to the Grand Hall was gated but large enough for them to watch and hear. 

Though Adi was angry and cursing everything the world stood for, he will admit; the architects did an amazing job with the acoustics of this place. 

“Adi, you’re just in time,” Jero gestured for him to come closer. “We have another victim.”

Wait, another dead assassin? Thought it had been a while, his heart stopped. “What?” he asked. 

“A new recruit,” Brasseur said. “Pierre recruited him from prison.”

Oh. Adi felt himself sigh in relief. He had been afraid for another dreaded second. But a new member? He hadn’t seen that in a long time.

“Telling of his character,” Jero said. “To be recruited by Bellec and through prison? Oh, this man is a fucking lunatic. And get this; it’s the same man who killed the Grandmaster.”

“Aht. Not quite. He says he didn’t kill him,” Dimitri noted. 

“That’s what they all say,” Jero stated. “But we all know what happened. He killed him. ”

“The chalice is out,” Ines pointed to the goblet. “They are about to start."

“What did you see in your ritual, Adi?” Jero asked.

Their experience with the chalice was supposed to be kept private. Secret. But it was yet another topic the Assassins chatted amongst themselves about. It wasn't like they could talk about it with friends outside the brotherhood anyways.

For Adi, it was mostly death. Desperation. The catacombs he had grown so familiar with in working in. Walls and walls of skulls. Disappointment. Missing his parents, his mom. Wondering if it was worth going back to home one day. Burials and burials. 

But of course, Adi did not say that.

“Your mother’s bedside table,” he snickered. 

“Don’t be so crass!”

Below them, the man collapsed on the ground, effectively halting the conversation.

Ines turned to Brasseur. "Start the time."

Brasseur looked down at his watch. "Started and counting. What are we betting on?"

"Nothing. We don't have any money. Just bet for the sake of it."

"I say he has five minutes," Dimitri said. 

“Ten,” Veronique said flatly. Adi had not even noticed she was there. 

"I guess it to be seven," Jerónimo said. "He's quite tall. The fainting only really lasts longer on people who are of a smaller build."

"I didn't faint," Ines protested. "I just threw up."

"You're the anomaly."

"You're not funny."

“I give him eternity. This guy is going to die,” Brasseur said. “It’s just a feeling. That drink is fucked up.”

"Adi?"

Adi shrugged. "Fourteen minutes."

“Don’t you remember your ritual chalice?” Jero asked. “I couldn’t taste anything for a week!”

“They used to cut off a finger in the old brotherhood,” Veronique said. “Would you rather prefer that?”

“I would rather keep both hands intact. Maybe if I wanted to feel like it's someone else.”

Ines scoffed out a laugh. 

"Mine wasn't too bad. My head felt like I had a cannon shot through it, but I was fine," Jerónimo said with a shrug. "But it wore off after a few nights."

"Six minutes now," Ines noted. "Dimitri, you owe me an ale."

"We didn't bet on anything!"

“What about the Colonial American brotherhood? What do they do for rituals?” Adi asked. 

“Honestly, not much," Dimitri said. "The blades, the robes, and I think Monsieur Kenway just asks to share resources with the townspeople. Must be nice to have a mentor who cares about your wellbeing.”

That did not sound bad at all. Better than the hot mess Paris was becoming soon. 

“This guy is a saint. Is Monsieur Kenway hiring?” Adi asked. 

Dimitri sighed. “I wish.”

“I almost feel bad for this guy,” Ines mused. “He has no idea what he’s getting into.”

“He’s getting up,” Adi said.

“What?”

“The new guy,” he pointed. “He’s awake.”

Ines called the time. "Six minutes and thirty-five seconds. You owe me candy."

The new guy survived. Good.

The time wasted was over and he was going back to bed.

“Okay, glad the show is over,” Adi said. “Do not wake me up until I’m awake, I am not accepting any visitors or excuses. Va te faire foutre et bonne nuit! Fuck you and goodnight!”

Precious time wasted. When he could have been asleep. 

Only as he went upstairs did he stop and take a moment.

What was the new recruit's name anyways?

Chapter Text

Arno was drunk when he made the decision to look into the Assassins. 

But what would he do, anyways? When he was framed for murder, jailed at  the Bastille, escaped the Bastille, got disowned by his sister who, surprise, surprise, was a Templar all along and also believed Arno was an Assassin sleeper agent sent to kill her father, had no will to do anything, joined the cult his dead father worked for and was now handed a room with shelter and food in exchange for his repairs and stewardness to repair the building? 

“But I’m an apprentice,” Arno had argued, voice still a little hoarse from the bile he drank at the ceremony.

Madame Charlotte had just ignored his complaint. “My dear, we need all the help we can get for this place.”

He lumbered through a bath and chugged too much water. He put on the first set of clothing he could find and passed out on his new bed with old sheets. 

He could deal with all this in the morning. 

His morning duty other than drinking three cups of coffee consisted of what he assumed a lead architect did; look around and see what was wrong. The blueprints of the theater, as well as the materials used in the original construction of it, were being searched for the last he heard when he went downstairs to the office. 

For now, Arno was throwing the old sheets into baskets, preparing them to be laundered. 

So far, from the little walk around he had on the floor, there was a lot of rotting wood and leaks. Most of the books in the desk were spared through the sealed cabinets. The rugs were rolled and the floor left bare. 

The furniture needed a major oiling to get its original shine back, like the rest of the theater. Lush carpets were stacked atop one another in the corner of his bedroom, almost covering one window. In another room down the hall was all the extra furniture. And to his horror, mold in the roof. This place was a fucking mess. 

He thought back to Mister Boveri in his lessons to him about Renaissance architecture, and his bold words that regarded that anything could be fixed. Even people. Even if it meant to rip everything from its hinges and to start over from the barest of foundations.

Is that what he was doing for himself? A self Renaissance for the disaster he was? He felt no connection to the Brotherhood other than it was worth a shot to look into it. Nothing felt right since Elise gave him the tongue lashing and disownment, and the slap that accompanied his knock to go see her. She dragged his name through the mud, damned him to hell and accused him of murder. Arno cried. Begged to be listened to. Argued that he tried to get the letter to the old man.

Elise had scorned. She retreated from the door and returned with the envelope. Threw it at his chest. And told him to go to hell.

And she pulled out her gun and cocked it. “I won’t tell you again. Go.”

Thus began the months-long drunken spiral in Paris. Even now, he still did not believe that leaving London was worth it. He found an empty attic to sleep in with some of the friends he made. At least, he was glad that the social aspect of his personality and existence still worked. Even in the worst of times. 

But now, he was here, he supposed. Thrust into a brand new element, a brand new group and a brand new role. It had been a while since he picked up his clipboard and pencil to write what needed fixing in a new project. The pressure was on. He wasn’t a master of architecture. He was an apprentice. What the fuck was he doing?

Baby steps, Arno. He folded another sheet into the basket. Start practical with seeing the small details then move up. 

"Ah, what the fuck?!"

Arno jumped and screamed. He dropped the sheet.

A gun was aimed at him.

“What the fuck?!” Arno exclaimed. “Who are you?!”

“Who are you?!” the man exclaimed. He wore the same robe the assassins did, only in a shade of deep green. His hood was down.

The man was extremely handsome.

Fuck.

"I am so sorry!" Arno apologized. He held both his hands up. "Madame Charlotte told me the room was vacant!”

The man lowered the gun. “Vacant? What room?" The man took a moment to glance around. "Oh, this room! It is vacant!” He put down the gun.  “A thousand pardons, monsieur,” the man put his hand on his chest. “I apologize. I promise that I do not tend to pull pistols on people upon waking.”

Arno lowered his hands. He cleared his throat.  “It is alright,” he said. 

“…..Wait, you’re him! The new recruit.”

Oh god, I guess I am.

“Yes! I am!” Arno nodded. 

“I saw your initiation, but I was honestly hungover and barely woken up, so I do not remember much. Which, well, I imagine you’re in the same shape after the ritual.”

“More or less,” Arno shrugged. “I would not know what to say. Feels like another day. I was kind of drunk when I found the cathedral, anyway.”

“No way. And you still did the initiation?”

Arno did not have an explanation. “Somehow.”

“Brave man! Braver than I would be,” the man laughed. “What is your name?”

“Arno Victor Dorian. And yours?”

The man smiled and extended his hand to shake. “Adair Henaf. Call me Adi. I’m pleased to meet you.”

“Pleased to meet you too.”

Adi pointed to the room above the ladder. “I live upstairs, by the way.”

Upstairs? Arno glanced up. “The attic?” he asked. 

“Technically? Well, more of the sunroom. The other rooms have vacancies, but I just like this one. It’s quiet. Nice view. Peaceful. I can get a good sleep there. And it is the one room on that floor that does not leak.”

“There's more leaks on this floor,” Arno noted to the buckets that had been placed the past night. 

“Again?! I knew the wood Jero picked out wasn’t thick enough,” Adi shook his head. “Imbécile. I kept telling him we needed roof tiles too.”

These words sounded like Arno’s language.  “Do you do carpentry?”

“The basics of it. It’s honestly just minor repairs, really,” Adi looked at him. “I build coffins a lot.” Like it was a natural explanation for the weather.

He did not expect that. 

Arno blinked. “Oh!” 

“I’ve been an undertaker long before I joined the brotherhood. I still do it most of the time, anyways," Adi said. “When I don't have missions or assignments. Which, well, is actually often that I go work there. Yesterday, I worked all day after the catacombs almost flooded. And sometimes, I do embalming and burials for the Brotherhood…Apologies if I’m a bit cross, mon ami. The Brotherhood...We’ve not been doing well,” Adi shook his head. “We’ve dealt with some tragedy ourselves. We’ve had more members die than join as of late.” 

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Merci, I appreciate it. This is not me trying to scare you, or anything,” Adi said quickly. “I just want to be honest. We have all been struggling as of late, in trying to figure out…” he waved his hand to the window. “All this going on.”

You and I both. 

Adi turned to face him. “I just don’t know what much Bellec has told you. He tends to be all over the place and leave out details like this.”

“Eh…Well, Bellec has told me a lot of things but…I don’t really pay attention to him.”

Adi laughed. “You’ll fit right in. We don’t pay attention to him either.”

Chapter Text

The theatre was a hot mess and it was going to take months, if not a year to rebuild. But thankfully, the structure was sound enough to be a good place to launch from.

Granted, Arno was aggressively re-reading any architecture books that were in the library of the Brotherhood, as well as searching throughout the city for ones he could reference from. The blueprints being stored conveniently in the office downstairs helped, as did the fact that there was a list of supplies and materials the buildings used and what stores to order them from.

It was three weeks of ordering materials from around the city, some arriving at once and some on their way and being made. The roof tiles were the ones that were going to take the longest, especially to get them in the shade of deep blue that would reduce the fading from time. 

One morning, Brasseur went to the office to drag him out after Arno had breakfast.

“Arno!” Brasseur smiled. “You’re with me today! We’re doing training.”

"Training? In what?"

"The field. Come on! Let’s go.”

“Lead the way.”

Arno screamed as he landed from the lift.

“What the fuck was that?!” he shouted. He scrambled back from the lift onto the rooftop. “What the fuck?! What the fuck?!”

“The fastest way to climb a building, my friend,” Brasseur laughed from below. 

“Jesus Christ!” Arno panted out. He gripped the tiles carefully. “Oh my God. Am I dead? Am I dead?”

Brasseur could not stop laughing from below him.

“Look at my hands,” Arno held one out. “Fuck, I haven’t seen them shake so much!” 

“Arno, don’t worry!  You are fine! You did great! In fact, better than most; you did not fall like the others!”

“Like the others?! Did they die?!”

“No, mon ami! They only died on the inside!” Brasseur said brightly. “Adi fell the first time he did the lift. He was fine, he managed to hold onto one of the windows, but it scared him a lot. Ines somehow ripped her glove? But she was fine. Didn’t bleed much.”

Much. Much. 

“How did you do it?” Arno demanded. 

Brasseur smiled. “Like this,” and he took a running start and with speed, he cut the rope of the lift and ascended to the roof, landing neatly next to Arno.

“It’s easy!” 

“For you, it may be!”

“Practice makes perfect. Now come on! We need to do free running."

"Free-running?!"

The shock of it all passed, and Arno got the hang of all this faster. He kind of had to.

“The taller the building, the better the view. But that is just logic. Notre-Dame has one of the best views, but is a little more complicated to climb when you are first getting started. But if you want more of a specific distance to see people, the height of four meters is a great number. This way is the cemetery,” Brasseur said. “The cemetery is this way. In fact, we can see Adi. He should be on his break,” he glanced up at the sun. “It’s only a little past two.”

“How do you know that?”

Brasseur pointed up to the sky. “The sun!” he smiled. “I grew up near Mont Blanc. I spent a long time as a boy outside and we had to learn the time by the sun. Look, there’s Adi,” he pointed to the cemetery below them. 

Adi sat against the wall of the cemetery, a water canteen in his hand as he drank from it. He sat atop a few crates, the sleeves of his shirt pushed up past his elbows. This was the first time Arno had seen him outside the theater without the robes, in the handful of interactions he had with him. 

This felt like he was seeing too intimate of a moment. Adi, just existing. He was glancing at the passing clouds, one knee serving as a place to recline his elbow on, and the other leg swinging off the crate. 

Arno could not help it. He was a romantic. He liked to watch people. He liked seeing the world just be and exist. Maybe it was the slight little piece of himself that he still considered to be alive in him, after everything that has obliterated his sense of hope in the past few years.  After being stuck in prison for so long, he missed seeing people just exist. 

“Jesus, that man is exhausted,” Brasseur commented.

“He told me he builds coffins.”

“Sometimes. Depends what the cemetery needs. Right now, transfer to the catacombs have a higher urgency than burials and after the hot fucking disaster the crown did in the church severation...Ugh. Even I don't work in the cemeteries and I feel the frustration. He’s on skull duty,” Brasseur shook his head. “The day of your initiation, he worked in them all day. Sometimes, he goes at dawn and doesn’t arrive until almost midnight.”

“That’s a long time to be underground.”

“Oui. Adi says he’s fine, but seeing so much death…you can only do so much before it wears you down. Adi’s a kind man. A little hot headed when you wake him up at the wrong hour, but he has a heart. How he works on skull duty willingly is beyond me.”

Two young women that seemed to be of Arno’s age walked up to Adi, along with an older man. 

“Oh, the sisters are back!” Brasseur commented. “The one in green is Manon. The one in brown is Marion. They’re the twin daughters of the owner, Monsieur Marcel.”

“Twins?”

“Yes. They argue who is the oldest. The twins are hilarious,” Brasseur said. “They drop by the theater a lot. Give Jero a run for his money with the amount of death jokes they have. Monsieur Marcel buys coffee from us. We keep the cemeteries well caffeinated.”

Manon was fanning herself with a pamphlet. Adi made a comment to her. She then began to fan Adi aggressively. His laughter was warm, loud enough that Arno could hear it from where he sat with Brasseur. He passed the canteen to his friend.

“They seem like lovely people,” Arno said softly.

He did not just mean the twins in this context.

“And his family?”

“He has never mentioned them. And the man can smile all he wants and insist he is okay, but you can only go so much surrounded by thousand year old bones and not feel sad. And honestly, if we all had families…we wouldn’t be here,” Brasseur said. “Lots of us don’t have much of a home other than here. And well…my sister died. Father is dead. Yours?”

Arno paused. “Well. I am dead to my sister. My father was murdered. My mother abandoned me,” Arno trailed off more quietly. “Stepmother died of illness, but I never really knew much about her. And my stepfather was killed…”

Brasseur did not comment on it, but there was no doubt that he knew about the de la Serre murder. “So you’re all alone?”

Arno supposed he was. “Yeah.”

“It sucks, doesn’t it?”

“A lot. But I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

“Me either,” Brasseur said. Though a little sad. “And now, we have front row seats to the opera house to see our country burn. But we’re here now, I suppose. And we’re pushing through, and I believe that counts for something. It has to. There is only so much we can do to keep going. I’m not saying it is impossible for Assassins to have families, but it’s rare. I’ve given up on having one.”

“Likewise, honestly,” Arno said. “No one is crazy enough to marry me, anyways.”

“No one is worthy enough to marry me,” Brasseur said proudly. Then he smacked his elbow against the wall as he tried to flourish the motion to puff his chest. “Ah shit, that hurt.”

Arno was getting better at reading the time from the sun. The climbing was getting easier, as was the adjustment of his boots against wall ridges. Arno’s hands were sweaty under his gloves. 

Upon sitting on a rooftop of a balcony of Brasseur’s choice, Arno took off his gloves.

And found blisters, blood and sweat that was pouring down his wrist.

“Shit!” he cursed. 

“It’s okay!” Brasseur said. “This is normal!  I forgot to mention it. Recruit’s hands. Here,” he pulled out a small bag. “We can heal it further in the theater.”

“What do you mean by a recruit's hands?”

“Most recruits are not used to climbing,” he said, though it was not a criticism. “Or manual labor. And considering you were in Bastille for a long time, the hands lose that motor skill. It is normal for your skin to react like this. But it is only temporary. Your calluses will heal and your hands will become stronger,” Brasseur uncapped the liquid and poured it into a gauze. 

Arno expected the kit to be handed to him, like for every scrape he had when he was in the de la Serre household since he was a boy. 

But instead, Brasseur used his right hand to hold his and the left with the gauze. “This will sting a little,” and he wiped his hands with the gauze. 

Merde, that shit does sting.

Arno winced at the burn, trying to bite down the pants of pain as he did. But Brasseur was swift and fast with the cleaning of his wound. Too swift, like he had more than enough practice with it.

Oh, of course. Brasseur was left handed.

The smell of the liquid was familiar, though. 

“Is that vodka?” Arno asked.

“Oui,” Brasseur said. “How can you tell?”

“I honestly drink too much.”

Brasseur laughed. “All of us do too!”

The last time someone took care of him like Brasseur did was when Arno was nineteen. At least, when it did not come to being helped up from a brief stumble while playing football or someone helping him carry materials in London after he bruised his shoulder. 

The first memory Arno had of Paris was for a Christmas birthday, a tragedy, a funeral, a life-threatening illness and of his breakdown that he still did not talk to anyone about. In that order. 

He was to visit Amélie Delcroix’s with Élise and his father, a childhood friend who he grew up with in Versailles. She moved to Paris when her father got a higher appointment. Old money, with old roots in the kingdom.  

Amélie Delcroix’s family had invited the de la Serre family for the holidays to celebrate her birthday and Christmas together. A small affair, with only a few more families in company. Being that the snow was going to get worse, his father made the decision to get extended lodgings before the celebration. Both to prevent foul weather and have a well earned vacation. It was the first time Arno had visited the city.

Arno remembered the last moment he had seen Amélie before she ascended the stairs that day, laughing off Arno’s pleas to help her with the supplies upstairs and insisting that she could bring the box down by herself. Arno had gone outside with her mother to help move the ingredients for dinner that she had picked up while his father and Monsieur Delcroix went to pick up the meat from the butcher.

Then Élise started screaming and screaming. And Arno returned to Amélie’s bent neck on the bottom of the stairs, box shattered and glass embedded into her skin. Glass jars, her limp hands, and a pool of blood. The box was too heavy. She slipped. She died on impact.

Her mother had screamed and screamed, dropping the ingredients and running to her daughter’s side. Arno had held her in his arms and as she wailed. As Élise screamed for help outside and for someone to get a doctor. She screamed for the servant to find her father and Monsieur Delcroix as soon as possible.

Arno had assessed the damage to his friend. There was no saving her. Blood stained his hands as he held his mother’s friend tightly as she sobbed. The shattered glass ripped her skin apart. She died in pain. The blood continued to pool. And her mother was in so much pain as she sobbed.

The memory burned into his mind forever. 

That night, Élise blamed him for not helping with the box. His head was already in so much pain as it was, long since they set out from Versailles that morning. He felt like utter shit.

The yelling escalated and escalated, to the point Élise was sobbing in her wrath as she went to punch Arno harshly in the shoulder again. Her father pulled them apart in time before it worsened. Élise was sobbing. Arno was too, coughing and coughing and feeling worse by the second. He stood up numbly and went to his room, ignoring his father’s questions as he locked his door behind him. He had to help Élise. 

His headache worsened, as did his coughs. It could not be cold anymore. Could it be the grief? 

The thoughts only got worse. He wanted to scream. Wanted to die. The sobs were buried into his pillow, as he held his head and cried harder. What was this? His vision kept coming in and out, seeing ghosts and outlines that he knew were not there. Who could he beg for to help? Élise despised him. Would probably shove him down the stairs in her wrath anyways. 

He could barely eat the little dinner he was able to eat in his bedroom. His head hurt so much.

He had made it to his father’s room in the middle of the night, when everything felt wrong. Something felt wrong. He leaned against the wall and stumbled past Élise’s door. He kept going and going, until he could see the slight light. He pushed the door open as best as he could and collapsed in the entrance. A burning fever, a burning headache. Tears and tears. He remembered shaking. He fell. 

He came moments later, laying down in his father’s bed. Candles were lit around the room, as was the chimney. He was still sweating. Groggy.The blue wallpaper was the same as his guest room next door. 

So it wasn’t a nightmare. They were still in Paris. 

“There you are, my boy,” his father said. He was still awake. He was placing a cool cloth on his forehead.

Arno wanted to ask what happened, but his voice lacked the strength.

“Save your strength. You have a fever,” his father said gently. “You convulsed on the ground and fell.” 

Convulsion? What was that?

His head burned, and burned. He was sure that he was going to die that night.

All his father could do was keep the washcloth on his forehead and wipe his tears, until the physician arrived in the morning.

Arno fell asleep again, more or less. He woke once the physician knocked on the door, with a friendly greeting and his bag of medical instruments. The physician did his assessment, feeling Arno’s forehead and listening to his father relay the symptoms to him. 

Influenza was the name. Bedrest was needed, as well as fluids, medicine and not leaving going outside into the cold until he healed completely. Not even to open a window. 

The physician asked Arno if he ever had influenza before; “I will say during this season in the winter, you are responding quite better than most.”

“I never had this before.” Arno would remember. “But is it truly better than most? Because this feels terri--” And as if on cue, Arno began coughing. He covered his mouth with the handkerchief he had in his hand, each cough sending a pain down his back. 

“Do not overstrain yourself, monsieur. And you are doing quite well, especially with a fiebtrioc convulsion. Most would have died by now with how high your fever was,” the physician said. “There is belief between the medical professionals here and in the Colonies that survivors of the influenza pass their immunity to their children.”

His father merely kept brushing the same lock of hair he did for Arno when he was younger and suffered another nightmare. And he said “Well, now that you mention it, my wife and I both got sick with influenza after our wedding. In Milan!”

“In sickness and in health, right off the union!” the physician laughed. “For my own record keeping, I must ask; what is your son's name?”

“Arno Victor Dorian de la Serre.”

The naming caught him off guard. It was genuine. It was the first time he had heard it said out loud. 

It was the first time that night that the tears were not of grief or pain.

True to the physician's word, the fever began to subside, as did the pain that accompanied it. The water was boiled downstairs in the house, with fresh broth in his father’s bed. Arno did not cough up blood anymore. 

“Merci,” Arno said softly, voice hoarse from so much coughing and sobbing. He could finally talk again.

"I hope that you do not interpret what I said as me erasing your father. He was a dear friend. The best man I knew."

"You didn't. I see you as a father too."

"I've seen you like my son for a long time."

“Élise is mad at me. I feel terrible for missing the funeral.”

“Élise is in pain. She is not used to death. No one should be. And it is not your fault,” his father said. “You tried to help Amélie. You held her mother as she broke down seeing her baby dead. You gave her comfort. You helped her father pick up his little girl and wait for the coroner to pick her up. You did more than enough to help her. Even in the midst of a burning fever, you were not laying down. You were pushing through. And that, my boy, was more than enough.”

He remembered his head burning with the fever, his father at his side with a washcloth. His eyes were swollen from crying. Heart broken from the grief and the argument with Élise. 

Élise apologized to Arno after the funeral. He forgave her. 

But Arno remembered the cold feeling in his heart when his fever finally broke. The fights with Élise were getting more and more brutal. More stressful. They both had tempers. 

Deep in his heart, in the midst of the sweat drying and the fever breaking, he knew that this was not the first time Élise would be angry at him like this. 

Nor the last. 

Upon recovery, his father sent him to London for architecture. Practice your English, become the best architect you possibly can. It was either that or live in the Paris slums like Arno proposed as an alternative. His father refused.

“No son of mine is going to be a degenerate drunk in the slums of a city,” he said firmly. “You will get an education. You will be the talented person I know you are. You will never be perfect, but you will try to be a better man than you were yesterday. Because on God's Earth, that is all we can do.”

Try to be a better man than you were yesterday. 

He supposed even now, he could try that at least.

Chapter Text

Arno was getting used to waking up to the sounds of the city now that he had his own bed. Now that his room was becoming less of a storage, more of a home. He got to know the other Assassins that resided in the theater and across the fountain in the dormitory. The Bureau, in all forms of the traditional sense, was scattered between the sanctuary and the dormitory. Books and more records of research were stored there, as well as updated maps of France and generally maps of every kingdom, empire and nation of the world. 

Every day, Arno met more and more people through random encounters. Now, he knew Samaira, who was the archivist who he had only seen outside twice during the evening. She had suddenly run into Arno and cheerfully introduced herself to him, as they were both getting coffee to go at seven in the evening. He mentioned the upcoming assignment of his to assess the social clubs. And thus, he got the task to collect any newspaper copy he came across in the city to bring to her. 

“For archival purposes!” Samaira had said brightly. “It is an idea that Master Kenway recommended to us now that the press is more common. It will also give us another method to keep track of everything going on.”

He helped her carry some materials as she proposed the idea to him, and he had agreed. 

Samaira was very nice. She also gave him a bag of small chocolates she had on her desk and told him he was welcome any time to grab some. “Only you, Vero and Adi! Protein for the bookish only! Everyone else can fuck off!”

The Assassins were scattered around the city, some accessible through some tunnels, some not. Some lay low to stay out of Templars’ way.

To his knowledge, the only Assassins who resided in the theater building, other than himself and Adi, was Ines. Vero lived with Samaira. Dimitri lived on the second floor with the rest of the archives. Brasseur lived somewhere in the dormitories. Jero split his time between one of the barely functioning social clubs and the dormitory.

Sometimes, as he was working late, he could hear Adi in his bedroom up the ladder, stumbling in. If he heard a loud thud, that meant that Adi threw his boots against the wall. 

The first time Adi had done that, it had terrified him. But it gave Arno a laugh when Adi yelled out “It was my shoes! I am so sorry! It is catharsis!”

But there was peace. When the candles were blown out and Adi wished him a good night, Arno felt it was genuine. When Adi slept, Arno could sleep. Just knowing there was another human being nearby, one who did not resent him or want him dead…it felt different. 

So far, no one asked him much about Bastille. No one asked him anything about his past at all. No one pressed on him about his headaches; which made more sense since he had not had many since being here or spoken about them much. He expected Bellec to hover and be over him, like his presence at the Bastille, but he had rarely seen him since his initiation.

Arno was pretty much…left to his own.

Which was not bad, honestly? Better even.

He could do without the pining about his upstairs neighbor, but it was fine. Better even. 

Arno worked better independently when it came to architecture anyways, at least the outlining and planning part of it. The construction was the more collaborative process that he enjoyed. It was incredibly stressful, with so much happening in a small amount of time, but he enjoyed it. 

Now, it was the small gray space of navigating his independence and readjusting to not being so isolated anymore. He missed people. He missed the city. He missed just being out there. He tried hard to not think about the heartbreak that followed the rejection in Versailles, as well as how drunk and terrible health he was. 

But one thing he noticed was that he was sleeping.

A lot.

Sleeping so much. There was no rush on him socializing with everyone. In his little free time he had between figuring out the schematics, he slept. Sleepier than ever. He had not felt like this since his final two semesters in London, when he slept for almost eleven hours uninterrupted following a final project.

But he was not the only one, to his knowledge, that slept a lot; Adi slept pretty much any moment he came back from the catacombs.

Arno would know; Adi always said hello to him. He asked how his day was, and the next moment, the boots were thrown off and he was immediately asleep. Sometimes, he thought Adi would stay awake a little longer as he would be working in the attic. Arno turns one corner and goes back. Bam. Adi is asleep. He never saw him in the morning. But if he walked by the door and looked through the sheet-curtain-door, which he had not, he could bet two livres that Adi was still asleep.

From the jokes Jero cracked about it, there was truth to it; Adi slept a lot. But it was fine. No judgement to it. Seeing that Adi had the graveyard shift, literally, and Arno was not in the mood to socialize just yet, Arno liked having quiet neighbors like this.

But no one bothered him about it. Seemingly, everyone was taking it slower than usual since the storming of Bastille.

But Arno could guess why, from the little comments that Adi made about the dead assassins, plus the sullen looks of exhaustion that seemingly everyone had, even on the sunniest of days.

One Sunday morning, when everyone was asleep and he was the only one getting breakfast, Arno saw Ines go down to the club room, a matchbook in her hand and a small basket of roses in another. Ones he recognized from the garden. She was down there awhile. Just as he was going to ask her if she was alright, she left and went back upstairs. He waited until she was gone. Then he followed the steps down to the club room.

The club room was opened and he saw a small altar at the end, with candles and hand drawn portraits of five assassins. The candles were freshly lit, as were the flowers fresh into a new vase. Of course everyone was baffled by his presence. Of course everyone was exhausted. Their comrades were murdered and he was the fresh-out-of-Bastille-and-architecture-college-educated replacement with baggage and a past, twisted connections to both the Templars and the Assassins. 

And they did not even know the other complicated half of it.

Arno remembered the debate of him being transferred to the sanatorium a few weeks before the storming. His nightmares were bad. His sleeping was worse. It got to the point the guards had him sleep in solitary confinement for a few nights, with just the light of the window to keep him company. In the third week, there was an overheard debate between the warden about transferring Arno to the sanatorium. 

The prison physician saw that Arno was responding better by sleeping alone. So he recommended just that; sleeping in isolation to be less of a nuisance to others.

The fourth week, Arno was back in the group cell and getting better at sword fighting with the wooden sticks. Getting better at hiding more and more of what tormented him in his sleep. Bellec tried to ask, but Arno refused to open up. But Arno did not have to try to carry the guise for too long. Only two days after his return to the group cell, he heard the explosion. He heard the gunfire. And France would never be the same again. 

But now, he realized if he worked, the pain would fade. The focus would be elsewhere. This was a new adjustment, all things considering. This was so new.

Each of the Assassins were hard workers. Brasseur was the one he spent most time in the field training, with free-running, stealth and climbing, but he saw him often enough in the kitchen cooking. Jero was the one who went to bring the reconstruction supplies and brewed the coffee personally, though he would not step into the damaged parts of the theater until they were fixed. “It is not personal, Arno. I know you have our home in good hands, but I personally do not trust this rooftop.” 

The first repair was the stage. And somehow, that took less than a day. Arno was surprised too. There was buzz between the Assassins now about plays being brought into the theater. Actual plays in an actual theater. Who would have thought?!

“Bonjour! How are you?” Adi greeted.

This was the earliest Arno had ever seen Adi be awake and not going to the cemetery. Arno was at the breakfast table, reviewing his final notes before going to survey the clubs. But he had time to talk.

“Uh--hi!” Arno’s own greeting reflect his surprise. “Good morning! I am good! How are you?”

“Good!” Adi had a roll of bread in his hand. He must have already had breakfast then, if his lack of cup said anything.

“I’ve never seen you up this early. Do you not work today?”

“No, my friends kicked me out,” Adi laughed. “Yesterday, I got sent back. They said I was working too much, whatever that means, and that they will bring me back when they need me. It’s unorthodox. It is not right. But do not worry, I have been helping Charlotte with errands. I can never stay doing nothing for too long.”

He was in a great mood. Of course. Resting does that.

“So, a little eaglet told me that there will be plays at the Theater now,” Adi stated. 

“That is the plan, yes. Now that we have a decent stage, it would make sense to have plays,” Arno said. “Or just…people coming here and buying coffee, really. We could use the clientele and money considering we will use so much of the funds to rebuild.”

So much. So much. Even Arno flinched in just handing his report of the estimated numbers to show the Council and Charlotte. Livres do not grow on trees. And a good business establishment would not work if the business place was not working.

“How bad was it?” 

Arno grimaced.

Adi let out a laugh. “Oh, no...Oh no…How bad did we fuck up? How bad was it? Give me a percentage. Rip off the bandage,” he braced himself.

“Well, to put it this way, the average building should have at least ninety percent…With my assessment, only forty one percent of the theater above sanctuary was usable….”

“That is not good!” Adi groaned. “Oh Jesus. It is a miracle that this place did not collapse in on itself.”

“Miracles, definitely. That, and then some. The foundation was rather strong,” Arno tapped his foot onto the ground. “This is what helped it stand for so long. The rooftop too. It is made of good stone, but it is just the interior that needs major fixing from what I’ve seen. But one battle at a time. We can’t rebuild anything really, when we have no supplies, no funds, no plans, no money, no means to supplies, so it is just a matter of time and assessment and figuring out what is next...And hoping the isle will not suddenly sink into the river.”

And with my hands still healing from two more free-running sessions, I could do with not handling so much construction right now.

“Then there is finding contractors and construction workers, as well as flooring and roofing. And repairing the well…” Arno exhaled. One battle at a time. Anything can be fixed, even people. Even someone as chaotic and frazzled as himself. Even the theater. “One battle at a time. But should everything go to plan, yes. We can have plays at the theater.”

“I like that! It will be entertaining to see plays after a long day. It will give us all something else to do.”

“What do you all normally do after a long day?”

Adi paused. “Well…I sleep. And drink,” he stated. “Pretty much drink.”

Arno tried not to laugh, but the snort escaped anyways.

“Yeah, same here.”

Adi laughed. “For a place that is the perfect blend of a library, college, a café and a theatre, the Council is not very much interested in having  extracurricular activities for us,” he leaned against the back of the chair. “We have a library upstairs, yes, but I am pretty much the only one who reads it. I’m not as unhinged as Dimitri, so I stay away from the fight clubs that are around the city. And knowing how radical the royalists are getting about ‘stepping out of line’, one bad brawl can end in prison. Rumor has it that the military took all the fastest horses in the city, so there is no more racing…You would think being in headquarters meant you got more of the big assignments, but that is more for the social clubs and even then, they are not in good shape as of late.”

“I was actually just looking at those,” Arno handed a map to Adi. “You have most likely been in these more than I have. What do you think of their state?”

“Let’s see!” Adi took a seat across from him. “The Vendome club is in better shape than most, last I remembered…Ah. Floor is rotten.”

Arno gaped. “Wait…What...Adi, what do you mean the floor is rotten?”

“First level of the Saint-Jacques social club, in La Bievre,” Adi pointed onto the map. “Floor is completely rotten and unusable. We had to close it a few months ago to the public. Only some of us still use the second floor, really, for record keeping.” He turned to face Arno. “Samaira enters through the window a lot.”

“Jesus, okay. Well. Shit, okay. That challenge will be for a later moment. For now, the goal is to fix as many of the short term problems as possible to get at least two up and running,” Arno exhaled. Repeated it to himself again.

“Yeah, we are not in good shape, my friend. I apologize that this exacerbates it.”

“No, no, no, you are fine!” Arno said. Please keep talking to me, I cannot believe myself about how I am reacting to human conversation, I was in prison for too fucking long— “No worries, I appreciate your honesty. I need it, especially to make improvements. Step by step. A snail’s pace, but a pace nonetheless…I think.”

“Snails still get to their destinations.”

“True,” Arno cleared his throat. “So! For the clubs, I was told that Le Quartier-Latin is the most active one. Is that an assumption or a fact?”

“Fact. We use that one the most for the little coffee clientele we have. I used to live there before I moved here. We used to have a smaller house nearby, but…after some of ours were taken from us, we closed it down,” Adi pointed to a smaller property on the map, a few houses from the club. “We still do not know what to do with it, honestly. We don't talk about it much. Physically, it is in good condition. But the club itself is the largest one we have. Three floors, very spacious. The woods are not as bad. It is a lovely place. Jero, Ines and Brasseur are usually there most of the time.” 

Arno saw that Jero looked up at the mention of his name. Seemingly, Adi sensed it too.

He turned to face Jero. “In fact, this is the social club that Jero left the top floor windows open during a storm and the entire floor got wet!” Adi called out behind his shoulder.

“It was one fucking time!” Jero called out from the other table near the back.

“During a thunderstorm! One time during a severe thunderstorm!”

“I was drunk!”

“We were all drunk! The rain was cold! Terrible! And thanks to you, I slept in soggy trousers!”

“Oh, soggy trousers?” Jero rolled his eyes. “Vadia, por favor. Sleeping alone in your bed on a cold night while wearing soggy trousers is nothing you’re not used to, lack-of-lovers’ boy.”

Oh goddamn it. Goddamn it! That was too good. That was too fucking good. Arno, to his own credit, managed to cover his mouth and subside the laughter. Even if it was for a moment.

Jero struck a nerve there. In retaliation, Adi picked up the half eaten bread roll and threw it at Jero’s face, landing at his nose. “Imbecile!” he snapped.

“Ha!” Jero grabbed the roll. “La puta que pariu pá!”

The whore that birthed you. Son of a bitch. Arno knew that curse, since Jero gave him a brief run-through of Portuguese curses; “So you can survive in our multilingual, multicultural brotherhood.”

“Mab ar c’hast!”

That language Arno did not quite recognize…Celtic. No, Welsh. Not Scottish. But the tone sounded slightly familiar. Now, Adi’s voice made sense. French was his second language. As with Jero’s own French. Arno thought he recognized the coat of arms of the Kingdom of Portugal. 

Jero stood up. “Dê meus cumprimentos a sua mãe,” Jero took a bite from the roll and winked. “Give my regards to your mother!”

“Fuck you!” Adi snapped at him. 

Jero flicked his fingers beneath his chin at him and exited the room, laughing the entire way. 

“Ugh. Insufferable bitch,” Adi rolled his eyes. “But anyways. The Ille de la Cité has some issues with the attic windows---”

Arno could not resist. He started laughing.

“What?”

“It is barely eight in the morning!” he exclaimed. “You’re already bullying Jero this early?”

“Nothing the connard is not used to,” Adi scoffed. “I’ll put some dirt in his eye, or his boots later on when he’s asleep. Or leeches. He’s used to it, he’s fine. It is what he deserves. Besides, you should have seen the mess of how bad the storm left. It was just—You should consider himself lucky there was no permanent damage. It would have made your job a lot worse. But anyways, the attic. That is the bad one. That is the biggest liability,” He pointed to the side of the nearest social club that faced the street. “The attic windows cannot open and that is our primary form of entrance for stealth. Vero almost had to break in with her pistol.”

“This is a good starting point, then. Are you free today?”

“I sure am! Now?”

“Now.”

“‘Let me just put away my plate and cup,” Adi said. “Please, allow me.” He picked up Arno’s empty plate and two cups, without him asking. Then he grabbed a croissant off the counter. “One for the road. Because of course Jero deprives me of my breakfast.”

It was a lovely day in the city, slightly overcast with clouds and sunny. The people were arriving at their jobs, opening up shops and preparing stands. If Arno closed his eyes, this could be the sound from his bedroom window in Versailles.

But of course, it was not.

“You will have to be my guide around this part of the city,” Arno said. “I do not know many of the districts outside the Theatre and the Cite.”

“Well, you are in good luck, because I know too much about this city, as above and so below,” Adi tapped the ground. “I spend so much time in the catacombs, you learn the shortcuts above ground to get to them. The sewers, while gross, are also a good way to hide in fast if you are being chased…I would know. But whatever you do, do not swim in the river.” He pointed to the river below them. “Do not. If you must swim in the river, if there is no other choice, even in an emergency, as soon as you’re out, douse yourself in boiling water and laundry soap. Burn your clothing. That river—” Adi pointed to the water. “That river carries the bubonic plague, I just know it.”

“I will take your word for it,” Arno said with a slight smile.

A few civilians greeted Adi as he walked by. One playfully tried to swat at Adi’s hip with the top of the broomstick, to which Adi laughed. 

“You’re popular.”

“Ah, not really. Although everyone teases that I only crawl out to the catacombs and crawl back to the theater for wine, ignore them.”

“Earlier, I wanted to ask. When you cursed out Jero--was that Celtic?”

“Close! Brezhoneg.” 

Brezhoneg. He knew of only one area that spoke it. “Are you from Brittany?”

“Yes!” Adi sounded genuinely surprised. “How did you know that?!”

“I used to travel there with my father, when I was younger,” Arno smiled. “It is beautiful.”

“My father is from Saint-Domingue and my mother from Tregor, in Brittany. There is a tiny little town named Hamon in the outskirts of Tregor. I was born there, raised there, then I moved here to Paris when I was sixteen. What about you?” 

“Born in Versailles, stayed in Versailles,” Arno chose not to mention his brief months after Bastille of shacking up in Paris and enjoying the gorgeous company of multiple partners. Both the women in the brothels and well, the men in the brothels too. “Then I studied in London for two years. And I came back…a few months ago,” Arno paused. “Hard to believe all of this happened a few months ago.” Arno paused. 

It was August 18th. His birthday was in a week. 

“Oh my God, I turn twenty one in a week!”

“You’re the baby!” Adi exclaimed. He pointed to himself. “I turned twenty one on the 15th of May! I think Brasseur is…twenty four. Almost twenty five. How does it feel to be the youngest?”

“Quite weird, to be honest with you!”

The conversation was cut short as Bellec approached them.

“Good morning,” Bellec greeted. “Dorian. How are you settling in?”

“I’m settling,” Arno said briskly. “Plenty of work to do.”

Especially after seeing that you put more care into getting a higher position into the Council than in making the bare minimum effort to assist with the interior management of the theater.

“Henaf. How are the corpses?”

Oof, the question was not friendly. But Adi took it in stride. Arno watched as he smiled calmly.

“Bonjour, Monsieur Bellec! The dead are how they are,” Adi smiled. “Dead as they were the day that they died.”

“Can’t see how you can be stuck under those tunnels for so long.” 

“It’s not so bad. They make for calm company. One that does not deprive of peace.” Adi continued.

Bellec hated this. 

Arno could only contribute and keep the conversation going.

“And with their long lived experiences?” Arno added, before he could stop himself. “The conversations? It is incredible, really. Truly one of a kind.” 

Bellec shifted uncomfortably. 

“If you excuse us, we have some errands to run. We might go visit my friends in the catacombs.”

“Work is work,” and Bellec kept walking.

Adi, to his credit, held in the laughter until he turned a corner around a shop. 

“Arno, you are fitting in perfectly. No one can stand Bellec. For a man who is all bark…he really does not understand how I can work with the ones who have passed. God, I love seeing him flustered. He hates that no one takes him seriously,” Adi said. “He despises it. He despises me. But it is okay because I thrive on it. Kill them with kindness…kill those who disparage the dead. I can only imagine how insufferable he was when you were in Bastille.”

“Yeah, he was terrible. I would not recommend it.”

“Prison or being cellmates with Bellec?”

“Both.”

“I am just saying this to you as a rule of thumb; never take Bellec seriously. Ever. He will do everything to get under your skin to drive a point. He will dig into your insecurities and yank them open like a curtain. He does it under the guise of building us ‘tougher’ skin, but…he crosses lines for the sake of crossing them. He knows he’s losing the little power and influence he has in the Council, so he acts like this.” He shook his head. “He was worse when he did physical training with us. I lost count of how many bruises I had with his sheer aggression. That wasn’t training. That was a beating. But, it did not last long. Brasseur went up against him and absolutely wrecked him.”

Arno would know. He shuddered. “I practiced sword fighting with him in Bastille. I never want to have a sword fight with Bellec ever again.”

He had enough of that in prison. If he saw that stupid wooden sword ever again, he wasn’t sure who he was going to hit in the head with it first; himself or Bellec.

“You won’t, at least not in training. I don’t think Bellec’s ego will ever recover from the fight with Brasseur. Brasseur used to be in the French Army before he joined the Assassins.”

“That explains a lot. Brasseur is talented. I was training with him the other day.”

“You are in very good hands. I trained with him too.” 

“We did free-running on rooftops.”

“How did it go?” 

The bandages still stung under Arno’s glove. 

“....My hands hurt.”

“Recruit's hands. Yeah, that happens.”

There was really no unawkward way to say it. 

“We passed by your cemetery.”

“Oh! I did not see either of you. I must have been in the catacombs,” Adi said.

You were not. You were smiling, in the sunshine. Talking, laughing. Existing as you and only you. I am so starved of humanity existing that I cannot get that smile out of my head. This is embarrassing. Kill me now. I need to readjust to human communication again before I die of self embarassment.

“You were not,” Arno glanced at his feet, before anything more foolish left his mouth. “Brasseur said you were on your break and we swung by.”

“I didn’t see either of you! Good stealth,” Adi complimented.

How was this man so nice? 

“Here we are,” Adi stopped. The club was there, doors open and a mop drying outside. At least there were some people in. 

Adi turned to face him. “Brace yourself, Arno. You might not like this.”

And the conditions were horrendous.

“Oh no…”

“Alright. Pull out the scroll. Let’s list the discrepancies by the dozens.”

Chapter Text

The breeze was perfect. The city was buzzing with noise again, with more and more people walking through the streets. There was word from the government, though not all were reliable information just yet. 

The laws had changed. Arno was not a citizen yet - but he could be. What that meant, he did not know. There was gossip and news, and more people speaking.

From the Theatre, Arno was trying to figure it out; keeping up with the gossip of his city and trying to fix the goddamn roof tiles. Today, the dining room was closed to the public, but the patio was opened out front with tables and chairs set up to serve coffee and pastries and keep business going. It was the rare day that every entrance was closed, except the front gate.

For the public to have the suddenly popular cafe theater be closed with no explanation, it would be suspicious. 

But to have it be closed for renovations with the large crates of tiles, cement and wood inside the theater and across the fountain, as well with Dimitri loudly complaining about removing tiles and Brasseur replacing them with a matching laughter and further aggravation, it would be obvious and require no explanation. 

Arno's hands felt better with the balm Adi gave him. Though he was not sure if it was because it was the balm itself, or the fact that Adi rubbed it down his skin and gently squeezed some feeling into Arno's hands again.

Brasseur was singing a song aloud, his voice pleasant and elated. Dimitri sang along. 

Along with the fresh coffee Arno had this morning with Adi before he left, and the tight, but all too brief hug of congratulations, he had not said much about his birthday. He used to celebrate it.

The roof tiles were finally in. Arno was covered in sawdust, dust, cement dust, stone and dirt. And he was so happy. 

Arno was checking things in the clipboard he had. Grout? Check. Last of the tiles? Check. 

"Bonjour!" Adi greeted with a bright smile as he walked into the clearing of the theatre soaked in water from head to toe on a sunny day.

"What happened to you?" Arno laughed. "Did it rain in the catacombs?"

"Manon and company decided to spill my canteen over my head because I was 'daydreaming' too much."

"Were you daydreaming?"

"I don't know, I wasn't paying attention."

Arno laughed. 

"I will try my best to not trail any mud. Actually? Is your garden door open?"

"Yes."

"Bonne. I'm going upstairs," Adi began to climb the side of the building. “Oh!” He flawlessly dropped back to the ground. “Do you have a moment of free time?”

Arno glanced around and saw that the roof tile movers had already left the last cartful of tile and that Dimitri cleaned up the grout and gone inside with Brasseur. For the day’s work, most of it was done.

“I do.”

“Good!” Adi clapped his shoulder. “Wait for me in your bedroom.”

Arno’s mind went blank. But he nodded.

But Adi smiled and began to scale the wall anyway.

Arno washed up in the washroom before he went upstairs and silently carried his sketches and clipboard up the stairs. He knew he would not run into Adi. Adi liked to climb. Adi was what Dimitri called unhinged because he liked climbing tall buildings and liked jumping long distances. And above all, “He is a plant who drinks only wine and coffee and lays in the sun and still manages to look great!”

Arno sat at his desk and began to reorganize his papers. For the lack of anything else to do.

He jumped at the brush of a hand on his shoulder. Only to see Adi, in a green shirt and trousers. 

Adi gently set down folded cloth. “Open it.”

“Adi.” Arno’s voice wanted to shake. 

“Come on,” Adi sat next to him. “Open it.”

“You shouldn’t have,” Arno said softly, as his heart melted and face warmed. 

“I wanted to,” Adi put a hand on his arm. “Open it.”

Arno did. They were small cakes, soft and buttered. They were still warm. 

“Adi…” his voice cracked. 

“This is a Bretongne butter cake. With a little bit of my own twist of course.”

“You made it?”

“Ya! I made it this morning and asked Celestine to make sure it did not burn.”

“I don’t know what to say...”

“There’s thank you,” Adi suggested with a smile. “I wanted to. Twenty one is an important age,” Adi sat next to him. 

"I still feel like I'm twenty."

"Give it a few hours, and some wine, and you will feel like you are twenty one,” Adi smiled. "This is a treat back in my home. It's sweet. And it is no fun to eat a delicacy like this alone.” Adi’s accent slightly changed the pronunciation of delicacy. It sounded nice to Arno’s ears. “Besides, I made for myself too," Adi unwrapped his. “We can share!”

"Thank you," Arno smiled.

"Come on, it is a beautiful day outside. Let's eat in the garden.”

"Of course."

The master assassins he barely saw were coming in and out of the catacombs to the theater through the front door, all in their decadent robes and trimmings. The robes were beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. Rich color, rich material, with an elegance that Arno could not take his eyes from. He did not know any of the names of the assassins. Just that they were the best. 

“Well, something is going on," Adi said from the balcony.

Something major was going on. That was for sure. 

“Do you often see them?”

“Absolutely not,” Adi said. “But…it is always a treat,” he sighed dreamily. "Their robes…"

"They're beautiful."

"Very.”

Arno felt a little out of place in his shirt and trousers. At least Adi was in a similar attire, with a shirt and pants that dried out in the sun.

"Should we change?" Adi asked him with a chuckle.

Well, like minded then. 

"I think it is too late," Arno laughed. "Since they already saw us. I feel like I'm wearing my shirt backwards."

"I feel like I'm wearing no shirt at all."

Not that I would mind the sight.

No. He was burying that thought. He was burying it deep. Arno cleared his throat and looked down at the tiles beneath him, suddenly all too attentive to the ridges. 

"I hope they don't try to talk to me."

"They won't," Adi said. "I've been here a while and they don't really talk to anyone. They barely even look at anyone. The wording may be ironic, considering that the status of the crown is unavailable, but that is as close to royalty as we will get to. They're Master Assassins for a reason…I don't know quite yet. But, here, our rank does not matter. It is just us and then it's them.”

“How do you become a Master Assassin anyway?”

“Service to the brotherhood, service to the city, a great sacrifice to the world. You do not break the tenets of the Creed,” Adi shrugged. “It really is not the clearest of terms. But what little we understand is that if you are taken on as an apprentice by the Council, then you are going to be a master assassin. The practice is a little skewed in my opinion, but it is not the worst. Brasseur is Quemar’s apprentice. And then when you become one…you get the robes. It is so secretive to join the ranks of master assassins. But I will say this…if they’re being brought out, then something is definitely wrong.”

Arno cut off a piece of the cake with his fork. “Wait, is it because of my birthday?” Arno asked.

Adi laughed. “Imagine the scandal! How dare you be a Virgo?!”

“Oh, it’s my fault I am a Virgo? How dare you be a Taurus?!”

Adi laughed harder. “In all seriousness; to twenty one summers old and the many more to go," Adi lifted his fork with the piece of cake, like a toast. “To your good health, your growth, your kind spirit. May it be better than being twenty. And may the wine tonight last us til morning!”

“À votre santé!” Arno raised his fork.

“Yec'hed mat!” Adi clinked his fork with his. “Happy birthday.”

The taste of the cake was sweet, so sweet against Arno’s tongue. It was flaky and buttery, the warmth of the cake melting right away. Arno had never tasted something so good like this before. 

"This is delicious!"

"I know right?! I may not be Master Assassin, but I am indeed Master Chef," Adi winked. 

"That was terrible. But the cake isn't. Some points on that."

The moment felt warm, with the sunshine across Arno’s skin. And the flutter in Arno's heart as Adi gleefully had another slice.

Chapter Text

“Bonjour, Arno! The chief needs your help!”

“Bonjour. What happened this time?” Arno asked. He braced himself. He wanted to guess.

Murder. Skinning ring. Something illegal. Tax fraud. Theft. Poisoning the water source.

Brasseur turned to the doorway. “Adi! You come too.”

“My help?” Adi pointed to himself. “Specifically?” 

“Personal request of L’Apparent.”

Adi raised his eyebrows. “Specifically?!”

“As specific as each stained glass of Notre-Dame,” Brasseur beckoned them both to follow him. “You’re going to want to see this.”

Skull, butcher, golden tooth. Upset boyfriend. Of course, this was just another day in the life. 

“Yes, I turned him into mincemeat. Old miser!” Jamie shouted. 

“Jamie, how could you?!” Bella cried out. 

“I oughta chop you up and turn you into haggis too!” Jamie threatened. 

Suddenly, he lunged at Adi, who stood in front of Bella.

Okay. Fuck no.

Arno came in between, swiftly punching him in the face once and sending him to the ground. Bella continued sobbing behind Adi, though Arno was not sure if it was because of the reveal of her father's death, or Jamie being arrested along with her.

Arno's hand stung at the impact and the angle. But he did not care. 

He turned to face Adi. “Are you alright?” he asked.

Adi was gaping. He tried to react, but no word came out. “I—I’m fine. Are you alright?” 

“Yep,” Arno shrugged. “Let’s get this bâtard down to the station.”

Their reward was swiftly given to them and the case was closed. They were thanked by the chief. And if anything of Adi’s reaction gauged at the amusement of the investigative work, Adi said he had a feeling it would not be the last time they were contacted for something so bizzare like that ever again.

And knowing the hijinks of Paris, Arno did not either.

Arno bought the bag of sweets, Adi went to buy the bread. The bread was being baked and Arno waited atop the roof across it, in a comfortable spot enough that he did not risk being spotted by guards.

As the habit of the last time Arno did a case, he was re-reading the review in his journal on a rooftop.

Surely enough, Adi brought a bag of small fresh bread rolls. He took off his gloves and undid the knot. 

“Gods, that smells so good! So, case review?”

“All in all,” Arno handed Adi the bag of sweets for his share. “After being denied Bella's hand in marriage, Jamie was angry at Bella’s father. As a result for revenge, Jamie intercepted the grandmother’s errand list and changed the address of the butcher shop, went to knock out the butcher, posed as the butcher and waited for Russell, killed him and ground him up into minced meat using the butcher’s tools. He disposed of the bones in a butcher sack and threw it down the river, to which the scout discovered it and then informed the Chief, who then informed a messenger, who then informed Brasseur, who then informed us.” 

“That sounds about right,” Adi said. “And it’s only what, three o’clock?”

“Barely,” Arno closed his journal and put it away in his coat. “Never a dull day in the life of an assassin,” he sighed. The cramp still hurts in his joints. He flexed his hands slightly to get some feeling back into them. 

It did not work, other than another flash of pain.

He was getting better in his training with different weapons. Rapiers from the Spanish Brotherhood were the week's previous lesson, with Arno underestimating the delicate blade balance that was required in using it. Callouses were forming, far more different than the construction he studied and was used to.

“And here I was thinking that the skinning ring was going to be the most outrageous thing,” Arno supposed aloud. “…This week.”

He could take Jero’s suggestion of keeping a score of what nonsense Paris threw at him today.

“Remember when everything was boring?”

“Eh, a little,” Arno said. He took off his gloves and went to get a bread roll to split in half.

Adi stopped his hand midair, then went down to hold Arno’s. “You're bruising,” Adi noted. 

Arno felt his breath catch in his throat. “What?” he blurted out.

“Your hand. You’re bruising.”

“Oh—that’s from training. What hurts more is the cramps,” Arno said. “My dominant hand was the one I hit him with, and the one I write with…Novice mistake.” He flexed his hand a little more and felt the burn come back.

“Where’s the cramp?”

Arno turned his hand over. “Here.”

“May I?” Adi asked.

Wordlessly, Arno leaned his hand forward to Adi's. For if Adi spoke, he was so afraid that the please in his throat would be begged out instead. Please touch me. Please. Please. 

“Let me see,” Adi took off his gloves and went to rub his palm gently. Soothing the joints. 

Oh. 

Arno felt his breath shudder. 

Adi stopped. “Did I hurt you?” he asked.

No, not at all.

“No,” Arno cleared his throat. “You’re fine.”

“Are you sure?”

Yes. 

“Yeah,” Arno said, but to his mercy, Adi was focused on his hand again. His touch was gentle.

“I could have handled the man, you know,” Adi said. “You didn't have to hurt yourself for it.”

“Very wordy way to say 'thank you for saving my pretty face'...”

Oh, fuck him.

Adi looked up. 

“What? You have a pretty face,” Arno did his best not to falter. He would not stop now. He would bury himself in the catacombs later, if the burning of beneath his cheeks was not going to turn him to cinders first. 

“—I do?” Adi asked, genuinely surprised. “Me?”

“You're the only Adi here,” Arno said. 

Adi flustered. “Well—” His voice shook slightly. “But you also have nice hands,” Adi said. He gently brushed over Arno's bruised knuckles with his thumb. “I would hate to see them get hurt again.”

“So we compromise and next time, we both get punched by the angry murderer together,” Arno concluded.

“Open mind,” Adi said with a smile. “I'll consider it…But thank you,” Adi said gently. “Your face is pretty too.”

Adi let go of his hand. “Is it better?”

Finally, Arno felt relief in his joints. “Yes.” He picked up the sweet again. “Thank you.”

Adi smiled. “You’re welcome.

Chapter Text

The Assassins were captured. 

"The safety measures in this city are ridiculous. Along with the violence...This is why this city is shambles." Adi kicked at a broken piece of wood. "And all this trash!"

"I don't think it's just the litter that is making our beloved Paris crumble."

Adi rolled his eyes. Arno took that as a good sign. 

Then he stopped walking and held Arno’s arm. "Do you smell that?"

They both looked down onto the puddle they walked right atop on and stained the bottom of the boots in. 

"Blood," Arno confirmed. He lightly at the puddle again and noted the deep ripple. Fresh too.

Fuck.

Arno lifted his scarf to his nose.

"This is no hospital. This is a slaughterhouse…Non, non. I have had to bury many of our own," Adi said. “I do not want that to happen today.”

"It won't happen."

"How would you know?" Adi's answer was sarcastic and sharp.

"And you say I'm pessimistic," Arno said in jest. Though concern was seeping into his veins. 

“You are. Far more than I am.”

“I don't think they're dead.” 

“Not yet at least.”

“Adi. Think logically. Our sisters and brother are far better fighters than we wage for. You think they will not fight their way out in danger? At least try to be hopeful. Come on Adi, you're starting to sound like me,” Arno smiled. “There is only room for one cynic in this brotherhood. And that role is not yours.”

“Whatever you say. I take the ceilings. Stay on me.” Adi slipped on his hood.

Arno nodded and slipped on his hood. 

And Arno was right. Adi was upset. It was after they freed their second Assassin that Arno had to make Adi take a pause.

"Come on. You are clearly agitated."

"Sit down for a minute."

Adi did.

"Try to breathe with me."

"We are wasting time."

"Breathe with me," Arno repeated. “You're shaking," he added gently.

“I'm scared,” Adi finally admitted. 

Arno reached out and held his hands. In the same way that Brasseur had done for him not so long ago. “It is going to be okay," he said gently. "Look at me. It is going to be okay."

“I'm scared,” Adi’s voice cracked. “I’m so scared. I--” his eyes shined, but not with his usual spark. 

“I can do this alone…”

“Fuck no! We need to keep going. I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine.”

In the end, the Assassins were fine and freed. But Adi was still deep in thought, too quiet than his usual self as they walked back to the theater.

“Adi, are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Adi said curtly. “I just need some air.” 

“Are you sure?”

“I am,” Adi smiled, though it was not genuine. He reached out to brush against his jaw. “Thank you. I’ll be home later.”

Before Arno could respond, Adi walked past him to the direction of a safe house. He climbed up a building with ease.

Arno wanted to go after him, but just stayed in his place. He only began to walk away once Adi disappeared around the corner of a pointed roof.

Hours later, near dusk. Adi threw the boot against the wall. 

But this time, what followed was a loud and definitely frustrated "Fuck this shit!"

Arno paused. The pen hovered over the paper. He tilted his chair a little bit and glanced at the ladder leading to the door. 

Should he…

Arno paused for a moment. He...hesitantly continued to write again. 

He did not make it past the equation he tried to write. 

He set down his pen and against his usual judgment to keep a distance, he found himself climbing the ladder and stepping past the curtain into the sunroom. 

Adi was sitting at the edge of his bed, elbows on his knees, his chin to his hands. 

"Hey...are you alright?"

Adi was startled. He wiped at his eyes with his hand. “Yes.” But his voice betrayed the words. “Sorry. I thought you were not home yet.”

“I’ve been home,” Arno said. “I just didn’t set up the candles.” He walked to the bed and sat down next to Adi. 

He thought back to Brasseur's words. Of how he could not believe how Adi could work in a line of work so delicate and not lose his mind. A work so sensitive. That he thrived on coffee, wine and naps. 

Maybe Brasseur had read it all wrong.

Maybe he was reading this all wrong. But if he continued to ask Adi, he was going to get defensive. If he pressed for more details, he would most likely get more upset. 

And did not expect Adi to immediately wrap his arms around him. 

Arno’s breath shook, but he recovered to embrace him back. It was an awkward position, but Arno did not care. Adi needed him.

“I thought I would be over it,” Adi began. “I handle death. I have done this since I was a child. And…I thought it would be easier. I’ve buried too many of our own and it hurts every time. It was such a close call. And--And--Forgive me, my dear. It isn’t easy still…”

Arno remembered how Ines took the basket of flowers to the club room. And how it has not been the last time.

“It never is,” Arno said softly. 

It is not easy to deal with death. Or be wrongfully accused of it. 

‘I didn't kill father.’ He had begged Elise that day he went to find her. Only for her to snap at him the words that still haunted him; ‘He was not your father.’ The man who took him in when no one else would have bothered. 

“We could have lost them,” Adi said.

“But we did not.”

“But we could have.”

“But we did not. They’re alive and well, because of our hard work. They’re okay."

“I’m glad you’re here,” Adi said. “With us. With me. I mean it. Thank you.”

“Thank you.”

“No need.” Arno smiled. 

“I’m serious. Thank you,” Adi said. He reached down and intertwined his fingers with Arno’s.  “My life has changed for the better with you here. I’m so happy you’re here.”

Arno laughed. But his laugh was shaky with so much emotion, so much affection. He was happy he was here. That he belonged. He was close to tearing up.

“Merci,” Arno replied. For the lack of words that could not go past the lump in his throat. “I’m happy I’m here too.”

Adi kissed his knuckle. 

“There is no other person I would rather be breaking down human skinning rings.”

Arno choked up laughing and Adi did too.

“What is it with this city?”

“Was the second human tanner this week or last?”

“Two days ago, yeah,” Adi laughed. “Gods, it was. What is it with tanners and notebooks? Why notebooks?!”

“Questionable origin…..Now I need to double check mine…Oh mon dieu, do we have to check every leather bound book in the theater?”

“ Shit ! We do!” Adi laughed aloud. He laughed too hard, then let it end in a groan. “Oh my gods, why?! Why us?! Why does all this crazy shit happen to us?!”

“I don’t think we’ll ever know.”

“Come on,” Adi sat up. “Have you eaten yet?”

“No.”

“Arno!”

“Have you?!”

“No…”

Arno sat up too. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s grab something from the kitchen before it closes.”

On impulse…well, Arno would be lying to himself if he said it was impulsive. Because he had been thinking about it for so long.

He brought up Adi’s knuckle to his lips and kissed it too.

And he saw it. Adi’s short breath, his swallow and his glance to his lips. 

“Well---I’m hungry.”

“I am too.” But suddenly, it was not for food.

The bed was right there. He wanted to kiss him. But---he could not muster up the bravery to say anything. He couldn’t.

Instead, Arno cleared his throat and straightened his back. “Samaira might have---finished the dessert by now. Or stole it, like she did last time.”

“We’re allowed to go into her stash, you know?”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s right. Let’s---Let’s get a move on.”

Arno was so fucked. 

Chapter Text

“Oh! Arno, Adi! Are you busy?”

“Not at all,” Arno smiled. “What do you need, Madame?”

“Nikolai and Claude have both gone into town to pick up the wine today. Can you both help with their chores in the meantime?” Charlotte asked.

“Of course. What does the chef require?”

“She needs peeled clementine and oranges for the tarts today and the orange peels to be stored for a tea. And we need lumber. It will do you both some good to be out in the sun. You can't be cooped up and be studying all day.”

“Of course, Madame. We'll do it.”

“I call oranges!” Adi exclaimed first.

“Damn it!” Arno swatted at his arm, missing entirely. “You beat me to it.”

“Catch up, Dorian! Chop, chop!”

“Yeah, yeah, let me change first.”

He peeled the orange with his hand. He was almost done. Arno was not finished with the lumber but Adi was just wasting time to be around him anyway.

“Hey you,” Adi said. “Do you want some fruit?” He offered a slice.

Arno grabbed the orange slice off his hand and ate it. Then his face scrunched up in disgust, yet he let out a laugh.

“It's so bitter!” He exclaimed.

“Really?!”

“Christ, Adi, did you dip it in salt?”

“I didn't!”

“Taste that clementine and tell me it wasn't covered in salt.”

Adi bit it. It was sour. And he did not even wince. “You’re pathetic. Salt is too spicy for you? Woooow. A tragedy.”

Arno laughed.

“Last slice?” Adi offered. “This one should be sweeter.”

Adi should have realized then that Arno's hands were both busy as he picked up the last logs of lumber.

So, he did not count on Arno's lips briefly catching on his fingers, teeth gently pulling the orange slice away. His face burned, and he is sure his heart stopped beating. 

Unaware, Arno stepped back and hummed, smiling softly as he chewed and swallowed the slice. His eyes were closed as he savored the taste. 

“It is sweeter,” he said. His eyes opened and noticed Adi’s expression. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah--of course,” Adi said, his voice strained. “I think I got a bitter slice.”

“Ha! I must have gotten lucky,” Arno smiled. “Thank you for the fruit.”

Adi screamed into his pillow.

He was so fucked.

Arno woke up to silence in the second week of October. The air was colder from the rain yesterday. 

He had not seen Adi in almost four weeks. Work, work, work. The supplies were finally here for more upgrades of the buildings. The Social Clubs were almost functional.

One took almost all of September to fix - so much that Arno stayed all four weeks there in the most functional floor yet. All he knew were blueprints, coffee, liquor, and splinters and that he wanted to die. 

Arno pushed himself, more than he should have. More than he had in the final weeks prior to his graduation. He pushed and pushed and burned. He had to get it done.

He had to figure this out or else everything would keep falling apart around him.

This was the only way the circles stopped. Bad thought? Work.

He had to work. He hammered at the nails, but he kept getting stuck in the same place.

He had to work.

Something was wrong with him.

He dropped the hammer when it barely grazed his finger. He was so upset. Now the loop was broken, and the wood could never be fixed. Maybe this is what made the building fall apart. His presence. His impact that was him. Failure. You destroy everything you are around.

You destroy everyone you are around.

Brasseur went to him before Arno noticed and gently guided him away from the beam. He walked him to the top floor, where Arno’s bed was. Still unmade from the morning, still a mess from the tossing and the turning.

“Go to bed,” Brasseur said.

“It’s eleven in the morning.”

“Go to bed.”

“Brasseur, I have a lot to do,” Arno insisted. He needed to go back to work before he destroyed anything else again. “I need to fix this. I need to fix it.”

“Fix what, Arno?”

Myself. This world. Me. Myself. I cannot be fixed.

“All of this,” Arno gritted out. “All—” 

“Arno, look at me. Please do not pressure yourself to fix all this right now,” Brasseur said gently. “Until the crew gets their asses here this week, in two more days, we just need to get it ready. So, go to sleep. I can handle it from here.”

“You’re not an architect.”

“Aht, aht, aht! I am the oldest. Therein fore, I am in charge,” Brasseur replied. He smiled and with a proper shove, shoved Arno to the bed. And tucked the blanket around him.

“Hey!”

“Go to sleep, Arno!”

Arno groaned. But he accepted this defeat anyway.

He woke up shaken. He tapped his index finger to his thumb four times, over and over. So much until his hands begin to burn. He kept going.

The thoughts finally stopped.

He tried to go to sleep.

He thinks he did.

Arno got home yesterday in the evening. Finally, to his own bed, in his perfect spot, in the best of pillows. He missed dinner. But he did not care.

Four weeks gone since he was properly asleep. The past two days were spent in bed, with an ache that could not quite go away. But he slept, mostly. Kind of. But he was too tired to return to the theater.

Not yet. He had to see this project through. It was on the opposite, far end of the city.

Arno just wanted to see Adi. He just wanted to hear from him. But work could only do so much, and he was too exhausted to make it back to the theater walking. He took on the charge of lead architect. He could not fuck this up. He had Brasseur at his side, at least, who could redirect Arno’s manic fretting into simple logic. Samaira had cheerfully left the desk to join him in the quest to fix the club.

Brasseur had to remind Arno that he was also fresh outta college, prison being Bastille, a drunken spiral into Paris, then suddenly getting a home after joining a Brotherhood that his father was a part of. 

But his first major architecture project was complete. 

He renovated the worst social club. He missed his neighbor that he was in love with. 

Arno went straight to sleep. 

Arno woke up at dawn like clock work. Eleven hours asleep. That was nice. It was nice to go back to his old routine.

He got dressed and went downstairs. Coffee was being brewed. He looked forward to this. 

Instead, he found Brasseur at the bottom of the steps. 

"What happened?"

"Therese Sunan got killed."

"What?" 

Brasseur rubbed at his face. It's happening again.

Adi was asleep. 

The muted sunrays settled over his body. He was beautiful. Fuck. He is beautiful. He slept comfortably.

Fuck. He hated that he had to wake him up to this.

Arno walked across the room and sat down on the edge of the bed. He braced himself. reached for Adi’s hand and gently squeezed it.

Adi was startled. 

"Arno?" He jolted under his touch. 

"Shit, I'm sorry."

"For what?" Adi blinked awake. He stretched. 

Arno could not find the words. And then, that’s when Adi knew.

“No…”

“I’m sorry.”

“Fuck.”

Adi’s tears began pouring. And fast.

“Who died?”

“Therese Sunan.”

“FUCK! Why aren’t we going? Why the fuck am I not there?! Did you tell the Council about my breakdown?” Adi’s tone was harsh. Scared. Angry.

“No!” Arno exclaimed. “I didn’t!”

“Then why are we not allowed to investigate?!” 

“I don’t know,” Arno said. “Brasseur told me this morning. But even if we were to investigate it, you cannot do it anyway. You’re emotional.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Adi snarled. “Fuck you. You’re one to talk!” 

Adi let go of him and went to his dresser. 

“I--I didn’t mean it like that,” Arno let out the words. Wounded.

“Of course, you fucking didn’t,” Adi scoffed. He knelt to the ground and yanked open a drawer to get a pair of pants.

Arno did something that he had not done in weeks. One that would cause a headache. A migraine. 

He activated his sight. He felt everything. The sound of the water running in the fountain, the rustle of the curtains downstairs. The sound of people talking. Muttering, like haunted monks. 

It took effort. But he focused only on the one in front of him.

Adi’s pulse was racing. Fast. Faster than he had ever realized a heart could race. Faster than his own.

Just as quick as his vision had been there, he let it go. His headache was only starting to pulse more and more. His mind burned with pressure that always came with using the sight. He let out another deep breath. 

“Adi,” Arno’s voice was soft. “I did not mean it as an insult. I am so sorry. Please forgive me,” he pleaded. “Je t'en prie, pardonne-moi. S'il vous plaît.” He reached for Adi’s hand. 

“Adair, feel your pulse right now.” Arno placed it on Adi’s neck. Right where it was beating, rapidly. His own mind still burned. His head still burned. But he kept his hand as steady as he could.

Adi felt it. “Oh.” His voice was defeated. 

“Now you see why?”

Adi nodded. 

He took a deep breath and leaned onto Arno’s shoulder. 

“What do we do now?”

“Lay down and breathe. Or something…We go somewhere that is not here.”

Adi had managed to calm down a little bit. “Not yet,” Adi said. Arno brushed against his jaw. He could not resist. “Come here.”

And he embraced him.

Adi instantly embraced him back. And he leaned into Arno’s neck. He took a deep breath.

Adi leaned back, glanced up at his lips. Then he let out a yelp. 

“Arno! You’re bleeding!”

“Wait what?”

“Your nose!”

Arno held his hand against his nose. Then he saw the blood.

“Shit!” He exclaimed. Shit, shit, shit, shit, this had not happened before.

Immediately, as expected, Adi went to his dresser and yanked another drawer open. No doubt to find a scarf to help Arno. Being Adi, he did. Because he had a lot of scarves.

“Sit down,” Adi said to him. He pushed him to his bed, still unmade.

This was not the context that Arno wanted to be pushed into Adi’s bed.

Adi got down on his knees.

Fuck. Fuck. These are not the threads that should be crossed now. This is not it. 

Kick me while I am down, huh.

“Tilt your head back.”

Arno did. He hissed in pain as Adi pressed the scarf against his nose, in an attempt to stop the bleeding. 

“What happened?”

“The air must be dry,” Arno said nervously. 

“It rained yesterday,” Adi told. 

It had.

“Um--Elevation. This has happened when I climb viewpoints,” Arno said. He was bullshitting stupid reasons at this point. 

It was barely past dawn. Arno was not a morning person.

“Did you climb today?”

“No. I--I don’t want to think about this right now,” Arno blurted. He set the boundary for himself. “I don’t want to talk about this right now.” He set it for Adi. “I just want to stop the bleeding…”

Adi was still not convinced. Arno knew Adi the most out of anyone in the Brotherhood. He knew his tone, his posture, the way his eyes were always watching. Always thinking. He knew his gestures for showing care for one another, for the hands that were so gentle against his own. He knew it all. 

“Okay,” Adi said with caution. 

Arno knew he was going to press him more about the subject later. 

But he still pressed the scarf against his nose anyway.

Adi stayed with him until the bleeding stopped. Then he excused himself. Where, Arno did not know. All he said was that he was going to eat. To walk. Usually, when Adi walked, it was to run. To climb. To do everything and anything that his body could bear and clear his mind and keep his soul at bay. 

He washed up and returned to get Arno’s coat. “It is warmer,” he said to him. Arno let him. He would give this man a sun if he wanted to. 

The room was so unusually silent. Often, there was noise. There was talking, Adi milling about to look for another book he had not read. 

But now, Adi returned with a large cup of coffee for Arno, with sugar and one tiny speck of milk, and a pastry.

“I have to go,” Adi said. “I…I need to walk.”

“I’ll be here,” Arno said gently.  

Adi leaned over to kiss against Arno’s temple. As fast as it happened. 

But Arno managed to catch his hand and return a kiss to his knuckle. 

They were fine. They would be fine. 

Arno looked down at the expenses sheet for the funeral, the plan for the mass.

No.

They would not be.

"We can't investigate it." Dimitri was the messenger.

"Bullshit. Bullshit!" Adi snapped out. “Bull-fucking-shit! Those fils-de-putain said that? I am gonna kill them. I have had enough of their complacency and inaction. This--” Therese was his friend. This was too much to bear. So much wrath in his veins, along the sorrow. 

He needed to get to work. “Well---Once I get to the chamber, I can ask,” Adi sighed. “I can figure out something in getting the supplies here for the preparation.”

Dimitri looked at him with sheer sorrow. More than before. “You’re not embalming her, Adi,” he said. Practically above a whisper. 

“What?”

“You’re not going to embalm her,” Dimitri said. “She goes to the coroner directly, then to mass for the service.”

“Family call?”

“Council’s,” Dimitri let out a long sigh. “I’m so sorry, Adi.”

Adi left.

The gods spat upon him today. 

Ankou, how have I forsaken you? How can you take the solace I devote to this world?

Adi walked out of the club room and outside to the Pont Marie bridge. The rain was slamming down against the wood of the bridge, as was into the thousand ripples of drops into the river. The Arsenal district was just ahead of him in Le Marais. 

Even so, he did not care much for the surroundings. It was pouring rain. It could be pouring rocks and he would not care either. He did not care. He walked to Sophie's. His hood was down and so was his barrier of emotions that he tried to keep under wraps for the past five years. Arno’s coat was protected under his robes, though. Mostly. Running would exhaust him. His wrath, the four coffees, shoved down breakfast and lunch. 

He went up the stairs of the top floor, where Sophie’s quarters were. The rest of the Council members were across the city, scattered in their respective daily homes and lives. 

Adi heard a faint clap of thunder. But it could have been a gunshot. 

All of this was just getting worse and worse. 

He found Sophie's house. The spot Therese should be reading or napping on her couch was empty. The murder was not here. 

He went up the stupid narrow staircase. First floor. More to go.

Adi arrived at the second floor. He had enough.

“Fuck this,” he unlocked the nearest window and shoved it open. The shutters shook as he did. “Fuck this,” he swung onto the iron windowsill. “Fuck all of this!” He started to climb up to the window. “Fuck, fuck, FUCK! Nemat stlabez! Only a mess! FUCK!” 

He made it to Sophie’s window and entered it, unlocked. Seemingly, she was expecting him. He often did that when he was in the city, just to greet her and say hi. He did not like stairs. And although the frown and deadpan were all the same to her, she still smiled. 

Sophie sat at her desk with a bottle of liquor. She was drinking. Hair unkempt, all makeup gone. In civilian clothes rather than her robes.

“What is it, Adi?” Sophie asked.

“What? I am the one asking you! What is it?” Adi asked. “What is the state of her? What is the cause of death? What were the wounds? She is a daughter to you! Why won’t you let me embalm Therese?”

Sophie sighed.

“Sophie, I have embalmed our fallen for the past year. And for the past nineteen years, I have embalmed and buried a thousand more. I have laid rest to ashes, to bodies with no name, victims, killers, children, mothers, fathers, bodies that did not have all parts, spirits restless and hearts gone. Slaughtered like animals. Missing eyes. A thousand cuts with a casket I had to shut and console a family for not saying goodbye.

I cradle skulls from a hundred years ago in my arms. I have buried victims of the guillotine and the fucking riots in the streets! Burns, plagues, illnesses. Need I go on?! Need I go on how I'm not the most fucking qualified person for this tragedy?!”

Sophie drank from her bottle. 

“Sophie, you know me. You know my studies. I serve my gods to help you... And what you are is desperate.”

“What you are,” Sophie said suddenly. “Is desperate.” She sat at her desk. “You are disrespectful, crude and a man who has one thing - the audacity!” 

Adi gave up.

“It’s truthfully the worst value I have ever seen in you,” Sophie declared. She yanked out a piece of paper and a pen. “You seemed so composed, but this little tragedy is what breaks you? What are you? Where is your objectivity? You lack patience. Respect. The sheer disgrace of you coming into my study and claiming me uncaring.”

She ripped the paper and slid it towards him.

Follow this facade. These walls have ears. Trust no one on this Council. The legends much less. Burn after reading. Brasseur, you, and Arno. Find who killed my daughter.

Fuck. 

Adi crumpled the paper into his glove. 

Sophie set down the pen. He mouthed the words of forgiveness. I am so sorry. She nodded. 

Fear crawled along the chill of the rain against his skin. Cold to his core. Ice. The walls had ears, the legends were not to be trusted. Legends was slang for Master Assassins. What did this mean? What did this mean?

But he put that aside. Wordlessly, Adi reached out to hug Sophie.

She buried her sobs in his arms and fell apart.

Arno walked up the stairs to the top of the study…Only to find Brasseur, heavily drunk. There was once a sofa that was ridden with moths. Now it was gone and there was an empty space with pillows and cushions. Mismatched, but comfortable. Like the old bureau, Samaira had smiled. Said a word in Arabic that he did not understand.

He still wondered what it meant.

"Why are you here?"

He found Brasseur on the pillows, settled against the window. It was still raining.

"Why else, love? I'm drinking,” Brasseur said with a bitter smile. "I rather cry out my sorrows in private here than add to the ones in our home." He patted the ground next to him. “Come sit.”

Arno did.

Brasseur handed him a wine bottle, half full. “Not’ much is left…Got a little too sweet for my tasting. This’s one is yours,” he offered. “Or mine. Or ours. Whatever. There is more. I got a head start on round two.”

“Wine is wine is wine is wine,” Arno said. He drank some. 

Oh, that felt good. 

Arno sighed in relief.

“You know, I served in the military. Had a bastard of a fuckin’ commander…entitled bitch who thought the world of himself. Boring man who could lead an army into fire,” Brasseur said.

“Why did you leave?”

“Same reason anyone does,” Brasseur passed him the bottle. “It broke us.”

Arno drank from it. He enjoyed the warmth instead of the burning. He wiped the top of the smooth glass and passed it back to Brasseur. 

“I did not quite desert. My own health took me out…” Brasseur stared down at the ground. “I saw too much blood. Too much…death. I thought I could take it. But one night, coldest one yet, I broke down. I could not breathe. I felt as if the ice on the ground suddenly shot into me. I sobbed…It was nothing but me and the corpses.”

“I’ve had those,” Arno said. 

“You have?”

Arno nodded. “A lot more than I’d like to admit,” he said. “Though…not to compare our respective hells, but I think it is a ripple of finding your father murdered when you are nine, and then also seeing your other father who took you in getting murdered in the same palace when you are twenty…” He trailed off. 

“That’d do it,” Brasseur clicked bottles with Arno’s. 

Arno laughed. The laughter died down.

“It wasn’t me who killed my stepfather,” Arno said. 

“I believe you.”

Arno turned to him. “What?”

“We all do, Arno. That is honestly why no one has asked,” Brasseur said. “At first we debated when you were off doing the cult ritual, because it was a little too poetic in nature of how…convoluted it all was to have the Assassin adopted son kill his Templar father…Granted, it was us trying to distract ourselves from the murders…But then we got to know you…You’ve a good soul. You would never do something as cruel as that.” 

“I--I thought no one asked because it was seen as positive.” 

“Arno, we are enemies with the Templars, but we are also human,” Brasseur said. “I am sorry that we gave you that impression about us being uncaring…We know a person grieving when we see it. We assumed it was a sensitive subject and moved on.”

“Thank you,” Arno blurted out. “Fuck. Fuck. Thank you so much.” Why was he crying? “I should be the one comforting you,” Arno suddenly said.

“We help each other out, brother. It’s what family does.”

“I haven’t seen Adi all day,” Arno said.

“Me either. It worries me. Dimi told me that Adi is not allowed to embalm Therese.”

“Oh god,” Arno closed his eyes. This was bad. This was bad enough. No one could have heard Adi sob all that time ago, like Adi had feared early this morning.

Had cries like that been that noticeable, the rest of the building would have noticed how often Arno cried himself to sleep.

“How did he react?”

“How do you think?” Brasseur asked. “We can’t see our girl. We cannot say goodbye. We went months…and they get Therese. Whoever the fuck they may be.”

"It hurts seeing Adi like this."

"I know."

"He's the entire heart of this brotherhood. This…soul of his is unlike any I have seen before. Tough when he must be. Vicious if needed. But he…his heart is compassionate. Too much for awful times like this.”

Adi's heart beat had been beating so rapid Arno thought he was going to die.

“So much happening will destroy him. Our heart is breaking,” Brasseur said. “Please take care of him.”

“Brasseur, you say this as if you are going to die.”

“Who knows?” Brasseur hiccupped. “With how the world is going, I might be next.”

Arno felt dread.

“Don’t say that…”

“I say what I say.” Brasseur stroked Arno’s hair. “We do what we do. There’s not much of me left anymore. Not in this soul. But Adi, our Adi, Arno…he’s special. Don’t--do not let any harm come to him. Don’t let this world kill our heart.”

Arno wanted to tell Brasseur that he was wrong about himself. That there was so much left in him. So much heart, so much life.

“Arno,” Brasseur urged. “Promise me. This world has lost so much, we can’t lose him.”

But they were drunk.

“I promise.”

And Arno meant his promise anyway.

The night passed. The talking dwindled. Sleepier by the moment. Maybe Arno could fall asleep properly tonight.

“Brasseur. Has anyone who is not master gone to the actual crime scenes of the murder?”

Brasseur glanced up to the dim candle in thought, then shook his head. “No,” he said. He turned back to Arno. “Not of us, at least. We have not gone in…they’re all considered closed.”

“They’re not closed,” Arno blinked.

“What?”

“The buildings are all still standing, nor demolished. Just abandoned as is. I have been staring at the blueprints so much that they are seared into my skull. I have also been solving crime after crime with Adi that I am starting to feel more suspicious at the inaction of the murders...There’s a trend.”

Brasseur made the connection.

“Son of a bitch,” Brasseur said. “Oh god. Oh no. This….” He drank more of the bottle. It was empty. “We can’t unpack this right now, Arno. We’re so drunk...I need to leave a note before I forget.”

Brasseur stumbled to the desk and looked through a drawer. He found a piece of chalk. No slate. He knocked over a pencil cup, then found a notepad.

Arno found the notepad.

“Murder spree, Therese died, what cause o’death, look at buildings that are broken…” Brasseur listed. “We sleep tonight,” Brasseur said. “And we work tomorrow. I’ve had enough of this shit….” He stood up and almost fell. “I can’t make it to my room like this.”

“How long have you been drinking?”

“Yes.”

Arno stood up and picked up Brasseur and managed to get him to lean on the railing. “Come on. You can sleep on my bed.”

“Perfect,” Brasseur swayed his footing. “I could sleep in the rain outside too…maybe that is how I meet god.”

“That is not how you meet god. That is how you get a cold,” Arno paused.

How could he get a drunk man down a ladder?

“Never mind. You sleep in Adi’s room. You will fall off this ladder anyways.”

“I could sleep in the parlor too…But Adi’s bed is nice. How else would he even spend hours sleeping on it like a cat? You still haven’t put a door yet?”

“No.”

“Weird. You would think Adi needs it for privacy. But, I suppose you two do have your bed as well,” Brasseur shrugged.

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, well—You two are together, right?”

Arno choked.

“No judgement, love! It makes sense. Men, women, people. Equality. It’s all good here,” Brasseur said. “Aww. You like him though.”

“Well—” Arno paused. He was so drunk. “I suppose…Yes, I do want to, but I feel he is not interested.”

“Idiot. He’s in love with you,” Brasseur said. “He was so whiny when you were gone. ‘Oh, I miss Arnooooo so much.’” Brasseur mimicked Adi. “Oh, I miss him…. Advice from your older brother; do not think about the future. Be with him. Do not let the outside world scare you…. you deserve joy too. And Adi also deserves to shut the fuck up.”

Arno laughed. Brasseur leaned on the side of the entrance. The bed was made. Adi must have tidied up before he left, wherever he was. The window was locked, wisely enough, due to the rain.

He got Brasseur settled and made sure to get the extra blankets for him. The temperature was only dropping more and more as the night went on. But Brasseur helped him when he was in bad shape before. Of course, Arno would do it now.

Brasseur dozed off, blonde hair a stark contrast against the blue blanket that was covering his head.

Arno finally went down the ladder. He took off his boots and his shirt, his pants and finally changed into his sleep clothes. The softest cotton. His favorite indulgence was to sleep in clothes like this. Freezing weather, warmest blankets, softest clothing…. what more could a man need?

Other than Adi next to him.

Arno blew out the candles. But left the lamp on.

Just in case Adi came home.

Just in case.

He was fully asleep that night when the knocks woke him up. It had taken a while to have the baby fall asleep again. And for him and his wife too.

“You go get it,” Lola mumbled. “I’ll take care of Erin.”

“Fine.”

He kissed the top of Lola's head as instinct. Erin was crying. Poor baby.

Although his oldest daughter was in the colonies and his youngest was in a crib, he never kept weapons near them. He was a weapon, technically.

But he still picked up his daughter carefully, cradling her tiny head and shushing her as Lola sat up and stretched. She was exhausted. They both were.

“I got her,” Lola mumbled. She held her carefully. “Go beat up whoever is at the door.”

“Will do.” He went to the highest shelf in his hallway and got the pistol.

"Lord, forgive me," he muttered. "Back to my old fuckin’ shite."

Hopefully, no one had to die today. He had not done a kill in a long time. But since when did robbers knock?

He clasped on his hidden blades in mere seconds, the decades old instinct as sharp as his vision. He walked to the door. And aimed the pistol through the door. 

And opened it to see a young woman with bright red hair, drenched in rain and aiming a gun at him. Huh. He had not seen red hair in a while.

“Can I help you?” 

The woman clicked the gun to be ready to shoot. Her French accent at once snapped at him. “Did you kill my father?”

“No.”

“Liar.”

“I ain’t lyin’, love.”

“Why should I believe a rogue assassin and a rogue templar for his word?”

Shay sighed. “Because I am retired, I do not kill anymore.”

“Even more lies. You were made to kill.”

“Well, yes. I lied. I do kill,” Shay let his tone drop from uninterested to threatening. He clicked his pistol against the door and made sure she heard it. “But only for good reason. Who are you?”

“My name is Elise De La Serre.”

Shit, now he knew who she was. 

Élise put away the pistol. He did not put his own weapon away.

“Can I come in?”

“No.”

“Can I talk to you?”

“No.”

“Can I please talk to you? It's about my father.”

“No. My condolences about your father. Go away.”

Elise stuck her foot in the door. “Bullshit! I searched for you for the past six months and I spent two of them in London!”

Shay frowned. “Why the fuck would you search for me in London? Why would an Irishman be in London?” 

He was genuinely offended. What the fuck? Her audacity?!

“Why the fuck would one be in Paris? ” 

“Retirement. Goodbye,” Shay began to shut the door. 

“Wait!” Elise stuck her foot in the door. 

Shay should have slammed it.

“The least you owe me is answers to ten questions. I am no friend of the Templars, nor of the Assassins. Why would I betray you when I’m so desperate that I came here? Please. I just want to know. Revenge won’t help you.”

“Revenge won’t bring your father back.”

“Please, Monsieur. Please.” Elise pleaded. “And I am a proud woman, and I never beg. Only reason I am not on my knees is because I value the leather of these boots. I just want some fucking answers.”

Shay should shoot her in the foot. 

“Seven questions,” Shay said.

“Ten.”

“Six.”

“Ten.”

“Five. And that’s it.”

Elise accepted it.

“Do you know who killed my father?”

“No. Four.”

“Do you know any leads who might have killed him?”

“No. Three.”

“Will you answer everything with yes and no?”

“Probably. Two.”

Elise was angry now. Maybe she would be so fed up that she would storm off his land. Yes, he would send her into the rain. Lola would agree too. 

Maybe Lola should have gone downstairs instead. She was a sweetheart and a pistol, all at once. She woulda shot her already.

“Pick the questions carefully, girl,” Shay warned. 

“...Would you know of any reason why he might have been murdered?”

“No.” Shay could think of a thousand reasons but he would say none. “One.”

Elise hesitated. “Why did you leave the Templar Order?”

Shay paused. He took a deep breath. “Because I don’t kill anymore. So, go away. Never come back. I do not wish you luck,” Shay said. “Revenge is only a fool’s game. Don't play in it."

Elise glowered at him.

“Fuck you.” And she stomped off. 

Shay shut the door and set all the locks. He checked the perimeter and adjusted the security bar.

“Who was that?” Lola asked.

“Daughter of the De La Serre man who got killed a few months ago.”

“The stepdad of the son whose father you killed.” Lola corrected.

“The father killed himself.” It was a complicated situation to elaborate. Lola knew all the details. It was almost midnight. Erin was still upset.

“The son who we are sticking around this fucked up city to make sure there is no harm done? The new little Assassin brat causin' ruckus?”

The last promise he made to Charlie. Old friend. The last one. To watch out for his son, in however way that he could. And he did; but now it was different. 

That was his last kill. 

I tried to retract the blade. He pushed it in.

He had to hide now. Even deeper. But this was for his daughter. There was too much for him to be stealthy and looking over the shoulder in the colonies. The wounds were fresh. He would return, eventually, but now…he had to hide here. Now that the old man was dead and Arno was back in France for the first time in almost three years.

“Yes.”

“Fine.”

“First, your Assassin daughter marries a Kenway---”

“The sanest Kenway, by the way,” Shay corrected. “His grandfather’s nice.”

“Yeah, the guy who taught you to down rum like water, Welsh and whose friends you killed afterward, but now is too sad and old to be angry anymore.”

“At least he’s not British.”

“Oh, come on.”

“It is true. We were few in the Brotherhood that were not British. We had to stick together. Our sailor solidarity. Men of the sea. Captain and Captain. Equality. Eddie is the craziest lot…but he hates me. But he respects Ellie. So…”

“Okay. More rundown on your complicated relationships with your past.” Lola sat up fully. 

Shay sighed. He was glad he had Erin dozing on him for moral support.

“What about your ex?”

“Haytham is many things, mostly all shit, but…he is true to his word,” Shay said. “And I am true to mine as well.”

I protect my child, you protect yours. I protect yours, you protect mine. No harm to my blood. No harm to yours.  

“Granddaughter-in-law. Or daughter-in-law, depending who you ask. Eddie hates me, he also hates Haytham. Achilles hates me and Haytham. Achilles loves Connor. Eddie bugs Achilles. Eddie loves Connor. He loves Ziio. I do not know. The Kenways are complicated…Ellie left me about six pages this time,” Shay said. 

“Morning newspaper, then!”

“Oh, no. No. I’m staying away from all of it. All of it!” 

“Ziio writes sometimes to update me on the drama. Then Ellie tells me. Zi says hi and all,” Lola said. “I still don’t get it. How does the most stupid man we know end up with the best woman in this world?”

“You tell me,” Shay said to Lola. He tucked some of her hair back. “I’ve yet to figure out how you ended up with me.”

Lola laughed. “I meant Haytham and Ziio!” she shoved his arm. “Jackass. Not you!”

“I don’t know…The Kenways are complicated. I cannot even try keeping up with the Kenways. It’s too messy.”

Shay thought Arno would be safe with the De La Serre family, like François had promised. He taught him to fight. To study. Be a young man with a good heart…his words. But he never taught him about the Templars. Nor the Assassins… I am tired of all of it. I retired. My white rifle is long since put away. I only hunt for anyone who can hurt us.”

“And the Assassin murders in the city?”

Shay turned to her.

“Yes, I know about them,” Lola said simply. “I know everything…The girl that died was friends with Eloise.” 

“What was that name….?"

“Therese.”

Of course. Therese and Eloise. Eloise was the teenager that kept Lola company in the orphanage. Erin brought much joy to the children. The real victims of the war outside, of all the death that was building up. Therese was a little bit of everything; a tailor, swore like a sailor, played music, and helped with everything she could. 

Why and how she died was beyond him….

“I had an idea that Therese was an Assassin.”

Shay shot up in bed. “What?” he asked. “What do you mean?”

“That girl’s cuts were neat with the tailoring she did with Eloise,” Lola said with a laugh. “Too neat, really. But she could climb well. Extremely well. She was fast. Swift…. And I saw the hidden blades one time.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?!”

“Because she was not a threat!” Lola exclaimed. “You’ve enough on your shoulders as it is!”

“You worked alongside an assassin for the past four years and you did not tell me?”

Sharply, Lola pointed at him. “Aht! Incorrect. I worked alongside a talented and kind young woman named Therese who poured her soul out in working with my children,” Lola stated firmly. “Who did everything in her power to keep a place running when I was pregnant with our baby. Who also helped with my birth. So, fuck off with---your bullshit. My friend just died.”

“I…” Shay sighed. “I am so sorry, my love. I…”

“We’ve got whiplash.”

“The worst.”

“When did you find out?”

“Earlier during the evening. I heard Eloise sobbing at the orphanage…” Lola sighed. “I already cried with her too. Every time one of these girls die…God, I want to see Ellie. I want to see my girls. All our kids. My grandchildren . Where are my grandchildren?”

“Lay down,” Shay said softly. Lola did.

“The rest of our children are across the Atlantic, my love.” Shay stroked the top of Lola’s hair. But she knew the reasons why they were in Paris, in silence and merely trying to exist. How there was no home for him in Massachusetts, nor New York. Not anymore.

Not anymore…

The last he had seen Ellie, she was radiant. Maybe about Elise’s age, back then. Ellie is now in her thirties… Ellie looks like her birth mother, a past love gone far astray. But Erin? Him. So much like him. It was precious. Lola was still questioning as how the fuck the pregnancy even happened at her age, but it happened, it was rare. Baby was born healthy. Lola survived. She was happy. 

That was all that matters.

The world was burning on all ends. All he could really do…was hold his family close.

Chapter Text

“Arno! You’re awake!”

“Hey,” Arno greeted. The blanket reached past his chin. 

“Hej,” Adi walked to him. “It’s late.”

“I know....”

“Are you drunk?” Adi asked. 

“Yeah....Very.....Brasseur is upstairs, in your bed,” Arno mumbled. “Too drunk to get ‘h'm down the ladder...Old couch in the attic had moths…” Arno further buried his face into the pillow. “I can move to the other one here…so you can sleep.”

“I wouldn’t impose on you to do that,” Adi said softly. “You already stayed up for me.”

“Consider it payback from waking you up so early today.”

“Not the way I want to keep you so late.”

Arno chuckled. “Likewise.”

“If you don’t feel it would be a bother…” Adi began. “I would not rid you of your bed. If you want to share.”

“Of course,” Arno said. 

“Scoot over.”

“There’s a sleep shirt in the drawer…”

“This one?”

“Yeah.”

Adi hung his robe on one of the chairs. His coat returned. “I kept it as dry as I could,” Adi said. “Heavy rain outside.”

“Where were you anyway?”

“Well…I was fighting some things out.” Adi sighed. “I had a long day... But it isn’t like you to drink so much.”

Anymore,” Arno corrected. “I was a mess before I came here to the brotherhood. I only did it to dull the pain.”

“What happened? Other than Therese…”

“I have to tell you something.”

“Anything.”

“A secret.”

“You have my word.”

“I want to tell you...But I’m too drunk and exhausted to do so.”

“I understand. I have plenty too. But...I'm drunk.” Adi let out a soft chuckle. Look at them. Who would have thought? “You’re alright?”

“As much as one can be. But what else can I do other than hold my loved ones closer?” Adi asked. 

He was right. There was something there. What exactly, he did not know. 

“Can you promise you won’t judge me?”

“I would never judge you.”

“You won’t reject me?”

“I wouldn’t either.”

“Okay.” Arno took a deep breath. He still looked at him, disbelieving. “Okay.”

“Get rest, love. It’s been a long day.”

“Okay,” Arno said again. He leaned his head down onto Adi’s chest. He smelled of wine and rosemary. Like his blankets. 

Adi turned off the lantern next to his bed. The weight of Arno on his shoulder as he breathed softly. 

His eyes were so red. 

Arno reached up to his chin. Maybe it was impulse. Maybe it was the bravery of the wine. He pressed his lips onto his cheek. 

He fell fast asleep faster than he did all week. 

“Oh, well,” Brasseur greeted with a bright smile. “Look at you two!”

Adi groaned awake. It was dawn and they were already summoned. 

“What is it, Brasseur?” Adi complained. 

“Brasseur?” Arno blinked awake. “How the hell are you even alive?” He asked. 

“A lot of coffee, bacon, water, bread, and wrath. And I think some whiskey. Anyways, I’ve come to deliver a message for you, Adair. This is terrible timing, but the catacombs flooded again.”

“Oh, goddamn it,” Adi groaned. He was so hungover. He hated this. He hated all of this. 

The rain yesterday was so heavy. Adi should have seen it coming. 

“No one else can do it?” Adi asked. 

“You were asked specifically. All hands on deck. You’re the expert,” Brasseur said. “And I quote Manon on that.”

And Adi knew there was truth in that. He was rising in the hypothetical ranks with the undertakers faster than he ever thought he would. 

What’s a little more salt in this wound after losing Therese, anyway? And being unable to embalm her? Deal with more death.

“You’ve got time to get ready. Manon and the skeleton crew are eating breakfast right now,” Brasseur said. 

“Thank you for letting me know,” Adi said. Though defeated.

Brasseur winked at them and left.

Arno was still dozing in his arms as it was. Adi hated that he had to get up. He felt so good, even though grief weighed on him still. He loved this man so much. He could not get enough of his touch. His warmth. He wanted him. 

“I don’t want to go,” Adi said with honesty. “I want to stay here with you.”

“I do too.”

“I need to get ready. But I can’t…”

Gods, it’s the fact that I…I want to stay here with you.

“I don’t want to leave this bed,” Adi groaned. “It’s so…”

Warm. Soft. I think if I kiss you, I won’t stop. I will not be able to get enough. And the dead would have risen from the ground and spilled into the blood that already fills the streets. And I would not stop.  

“Gods, it’s like a marshmallow!” Adi finally said. “It’s so comfortable!”

“It’s because I put a foam on your side,” Arno said. “Mine is the one with the concrete.”

“Concrete?”

“Yes,” Arno said. “I don’t like soft mattresses, honestly. Guess I got used to it at Bastille.”

“Let me see,” Adi said. He reached out to Arno’s side and felt it. A firm foam that could have been made out of the uncomfortable dining room chairs. “What the hell is wrong with you, Arno?!”

“Plenty,” Arno laughed softly. Tired eyes. 

Gods, Arno must have drank a river of wine if he was still so sleepy like that.  

Then again, it was an extremely overwhelming tragedy already. The fact that Adi still had the note shoved into his glove. Stuffed into the thumb and followed with a tight shove of a spare cork, then a handkerchief. He could not risk the warning on the slip of paper falling into the wrong hands. 

Was Arno getting sick? The nosebleed from the other morning was still on his mind.  

“Are you alright?” Adi asked.

“I don’t know.”

“What is it?”

“My head, again. It’s…not just the hangover, I think.”

“I wish I could make it go away,” Adi said softly. 

“You being here helps.”

But I have to go to work with skulls.

“I wish I can be here longer...Get rest, my dear,” Adi said, with a final resigned sigh. Duty called. 

He leaned over and kissed Arno’s forehead. He resisted the fact that he wanted to kiss him.

He could not risk anything at this point. He stretched and stood up. He looked down on his borrowed shirt and undid the buttons. It was comfortable, really. He could see why he liked it. 

He slid it off his shoulders and stretched as he yawned awake. He walked to the other side of the room, to crack open the windows and let in the slight breeze. Arno’s routine, but he needed the rest. 

“Okay. Time to get ready,” he finally said. He went up the ladder and just as he almost reached the top…

“I can help with the catacombs.” 

Adi paused then lowered himself down a few rungs. 

“What?”

“I can help you with the catacombs,” Arno said. “I…I don’t want you to go alone. And I don’t want to be alone.”

“Are you sure?” Adi asked. “What about your migraine?” 

“It’s fine. I…I don’t know if being indoors is going to help. I need a break from all this.”

“Arno, it is not for the light stomach or light of heart. And I mean this with kindness; this is a lot of---sensitivity. I have been used to it since my youth, but…”

“I want to help you,” Arno repeated. “Please.”

Adi considered it. “Yes.”

“What?”

“Yes. I…Oh my gods! No one has ever offered to help before!” Adi suddenly realized. 

“Oh my gods, you are doing me a great kindness!” Adi pulled him into a tight hug. “You are doing me a great kindness, my dear!”

“What should I wear?”

“Well, honestly? Don't wear your best robes.” Adi walked into his bedroom. “Your trousers are fine, as are your boots. Layer up. It is going to be very cold, especially with the rain.”
Arno did as he commanded. He searched for his work boots, for his work shirts that he used during construction and washed. 

Adi climbed up the ladder. He continued speaking. 

“Whatever you do. Do not leave my side,” his voice echoed. Adi could hear Arno pull drawers open and close. “Don't stray from me.”

“What do you mean?“ Arno asked. Adi could hear him splashing water onto his face.

Dressed quickly, Adi climbed back down, different robes in place and two scarves in his hand.

“The catacombs can be dangerous to those inexperienced. It feels odd explaining this…. We enter with reverence. You need to keep your heart in your hands and grip it tight. Eyes everywhere.”

“Is it haunted?“

“No, dear,” Adi smiled. “It's just a lot.”

Arno just hugged Adi when he was shirtless. What kind of life is he living now?

Chapter Text

"What can I help with?"

"Skull duty. It is not much. You take the skulls downstairs, stack them,” Adi said. As simple as it was on how to tie a bootlace. 

There was a large pile of skulls in the cart that Marion had helped push down. Some large, some small. 

Arno…did not know what to say.

Oh. 

It was beyond the way that he felt in the air of entering a cemetery. Of the heaviness in the air that weighted on his sjpulders. The weariness of death. The heaviness of loss.

Loss was so heavy, for something that so empty. 

The catacombs were filled with noise, the mud splashes from their footsteps and the chatter of the workers. He could hear someone whistling. The creak of a wheelbarrow. Skulls and skulls, piles of bones that were chipped, some in pieces. Some not. 

“Arno?”

“I’m here,” Arno said softly. 

"I know, it is…" Adi sighed. "A lot. If you need air, please feel free…"

"No, I'm okay…. well.” Arno paused. “You are right. It is a lot."

“I would be more worried if you were completely indifferent,” Adi said. “It is a lot to...process. We used to bring priests with us when this project began…as if it made it any easier. But we do not anymore.”

"Keep your heart close. But Adi much closer," Arno concluded.

“Just follow my lead,” Adi said with a gentle, yet sad smile. “We’ll make it work.”

Arno walked through the catacombs and followed Adi's pace.

It felt surreal. All of it. To be walking through a cemetery catacomb, with a cart full of skulls and skeleton bones that were separated and in pieces. But all they had were bones. Ribs and pelvic bones were in another hallway, to be used in a separate task, as Marion has cheerfully explained. Cheerful in the casualness that Arno felt came with the need--no, the survival--and desperation to stay intact in such a devastating place like this. 

It reminded him of the old days in the university. When Arno got drunk with his classmates in their dormitories and got too giggly for their own good; how the King's guard was still angry about the Colonies. How they drew straws on who would be the one to either kill or seduce the Brit that captured them. 

"What if I kill him?" Owain would ask about the hypothetical guard.

"But what if I make him fall in love with me and then I fucked him?" Arno would supply.

"No, we would kill him," Okar would conclude between wine sips. "The fuck would you be dating a Brit for?"

"Same reason as everything done in this world," Arno would say. It was probably unwise to be drinking so high up in the buildings they worked on.

And they all repeated the words in unison.

"MONEY!"

Arno was the only French-Austrian one there. But Owain was from Ireland - only able to be admitted to the university due to his Irish father being a professor and so permanently tied to the place that they could not turn him away. And even then, his mother was Welsh. Money was their shield, but even then, they struggled.

A French-Austrian bisexual student, bastard son of a Versailles nobleman father and Jewish son of an Austrian mother. Then there was Owain - queer as daylight - and not ashamed of it at that. Then Okar - who had a hidden relationship with a lovely man named Raphael who, fittingly as his name, was studying Classical Architecture and had an apprenticeship in the works for the Athenian merchant.

It was always Arno with antics. Arno with the humor. Who would fall first? Who would do it to themselves to avoid Professor Joneson?

It was Arno. It always Arno.

The professor hated him so much. But the classmates did. There was always cheerfulness in the source of stress. In being the outlier, the outcast, in this isolated word. He had to.

Otherwise, how could he survive?

(Owain could not speak Welsh anymore in an academic setting; Arno had seen the caning scars on his back on the nights they spent together, when the stress was put to the side and the clothing was too. He barely talked about it. The British hated the Welsh, even if they blended in with the Anglo language. The cane scars never faded; it was constant, then. Arno had the stories behind the scars on his body from petty fights and drunken ones too.

Even though Owain never talked about it, Arno kept his hands on his shoulders, the only unscarred skin he could find, when they hooked up anyway.)

One day, I'll be able to laugh about this, Arno thought to himself one night, when his drinking was kept to himself when he locked himself in his bedroom after putting up with the biting comments and mocking ones about the Jews from stupid drunken classmates, during Christmas time. One day, he will be able to...no, he would not be.

He would never.

He cried hard that night, into the neck of his bottle and into the loneliness of his dormitory. He already missed his mom. His dad. His first winter away from his old man, when his dad would still find the candles for him in some way for his menorah. He kept it in his room since he was a child and even when he left, he locked the door behind him. 

Even though she would never do it, after the fight with her when Amie died, and he missed the funeral...He locked it just in case Elise took a page out her mother's book and threw it away when he was gone.

Pages from her mother's book. Snide comments. Deflection of new ideas. The condenscension behind 

God. The trust issues ran so much deeper than he ever thought.

He tapped his index finger against his thumb again. Four times. Eight. Twelve. Sixteen. Maybe if he kept going, it would go away. It would fade.

Everyone he loved got hurt. He loved Adi so much.

He didn't want him to die because of him.

Adi reached for his hand.

"Arno, are you alright?" Adi asked.

He got interrupted. 

“Yes..."

The cycle got interrupted. The tapping got stopped. This was awful. Was he going to die? Was Adi going to die? How would he react when Arno told him about all this? About the migraines?

Adi did not believe him. Arno began to tap more. He was so agitated that he wanted to die.

"Is it a migraine?" Adi asked quickly. 

"No, no," Arno said. 

I am so devastated about my existence and how much I want to love you that I want to cry.

"What is it? Do you need some air?"

"No...It's just...a lot."

Let go of my hand so I can make sure you won't die like everyone else has. 

The leather gloves were a thin pair of barriers between this world and the hell within his own mind. But Adi's hand was so gentle with his, the grip so warm and so perfectly. 

I don't want to let go of your hand.

"Yes, it is," Adi said. "I would be more worried if you were numb."

Arno did not let go after all.

"It just...It looks quite scary.”

"Well, it's not quite a scary story. It's just sad," Adi said. He began to walk with him. "The catacombs are needed to store our dead. The smell worsened a few years ago with flooding. There was a public health risk. Eventually, the flooding got near markets and the King ordered immediate transfer to the catacomb for safety. But with…everything going on, the project has had pauses. Lots of people leaving…lots of people dying. It breaks my heart," Adi said. "Graves are to be remembered. For one to rest in peace at the end of life. To remove them from their place of rest and into just...halls of anonymity."

Adi stopped talking. He dusted off some dirt from the bone he had placed on the wall. 

"It just breaks my heart," he said softly. "But someone has to do it."

"But why you?"

"Because someone has to do it. For me, it's closure. For a soul out there,” Adi said. “In my mother’s culture, we venerate the dead. We have a divine…Ankou. He is a servant of death. We respect him. How do I manage it? Simple. With the hard work I try to do in service for the past and the prayers to my gods. I ask for peace that Ankou is with us to help."

"So, you…are pagan?"

Adi laughed gently. "That is what the Christians call us, yes. Any faith that is not of one god." He kept laughing, but he smothered it as best as he could. 

Arno flushed in embarrassment.

“Sorry, sorry,” Adi tried to lower his laughter, but he let out a smile anyway. “It was so unexpected. My apologies. just...wow. Pagan...what a word. But yes. I am not Christian. Much less Catholic. I pray to the Celtic gods and goddesses I was raised with. My mother is Celtic,” Adi set down a smaller bone next to the other. “Breton. She raised me with her beliefs. Maternal grandparents were both Norse. I grew up knowing about my papa's Catholicism too, but…. we did not really do much other than the organ.

Imagine; a Breton woman being the organist of a cathedral with a marriage by declaration to an agonistic African man who escaped Saint Dominique. We were...quite unique. But a lot of us were not Catholic. Some of the older ones did not care. Some did, but the Frañsez..." Adi trailed off. "They did harm to us. The grass may be green, but the roots are soaked in blood. The Catholics did not like us."

“I get that. I'm Jewish.”

Adi turned to face him in surprise. 

Arno met his gaze. “I was raised Jewish. I learned the Torah. Hebrew. But…" Arno trailed off. He let out a heavy sigh. “My mother never married my father, formally. And then I was born. She left when I was almost six.

“Bellec said it was because she found out my father was an assassin...it wasn't. It definitely was not. They split up because they split up. It was not abandonment, like everyone in Versailles said."

He remembered the plate being shattered in the dining room that day, aged fourteen. Fourteen years old and the angry yelling of spilled food and wrath from his stepmother.

He remembered hiding in the room next door and calling for his old man. The divorce that followed the following weeks. The breaking point of it all was Arno.

"He's the bastard son you always wanted with Charles instead of me!"

Arno did not realize that his old man was a widow of his own father until he saw him sob one night. All Arno could do was hold him. She was right. She was completely right.

He did love Charles. But life tore them apart.

"I do not know if she made it back to Austria, if she left for another city altogether. But she loved me. I love her still. I like to think she's causing ruckus somewhere,” Arno sighed. He wiped the dust of what might have been a thigh bone. 

He never did really pay attention in anatomy.

“I got side eyes from the others in Versailles. My stepmother saw me as lesser because I was not…” Arno sighed. His voice was so small. The acts of brutality were small at first, but it...it built up. In its own ways that were not physical hits. “She never liked me.” He could not finish the sentence.

Adi was listening quietly. 

"But the old man--my stepfather---he never thought differently of me. He encouraged me to learn more. Encouraged me to continue reading my mother's scriptures. He even removed the cross from my room, out of respect. I was fortunate. I am fortunate for him. He means so much to me.” Arno’s voice cracked with the realization that he used a different tense.

He loved his father so much. He missed both of them so much.

Even before he passed…His old man celebrated with Arno with a menorah anyway. It felt peaceful to do it in the main room for once, without his stepmother's presence. She was gone soon after that fight. Arno did not leave his room until she did. He could not look at that a dining table anymore. He preferred the kitchen table. Or the table right next to a window. A different size plate. He picked his food. He even made it. 

The enthusiasm for the first time to ever make a meal. His own meal. His old man was so happy. He went along with it.

Elise reacted neutrally to it all. But she was already a permanent member of her mother's circle. But for the most part, the neutrality was there. Kind of. 

The pages of resentment suddenly flared now and then towards him anyway.

"So, in a way, I understand where you come from. It is a little different. Where a world and city are so unwelcoming because you believe differently. And that you are different…But it is nothing we can't handle. Right?" Arno asked. It was the incorrect thing. What was he thinking?

But instead, Adi nodded. Eyes glassy with the same tears that were welling up in Arno’s own. 

"Right," Adi said softly. "But they have us. Our hands, at least, to help heal their spirit. To let them rest instead of rot. Even if it is in these circumstances."

He reached out to squeeze Arno's hand again.

Arno squeezed it back.

"Thank you," Adi said.

"For what? I should be thanking you."

"Me? For what?"

"You have been one of the kindest people I have ever met," Arno said. "The people at home are wonderful. But you...you are kind."

You're everything a human being should be. Full of heart. Of love. Of such spirit and honesty that it makes the evil people cower. 

"Adi!" Manon's voice echoed down the hall. "Do you have more oil?"

Then the moment shattered.

Adi let out a frustrated breath. 

"Yes, Manon!" He yelled back. "We do!"

Back to work. Of course.

But Adi still smiled at him. 

Arno guessed that counted for something.

The mood lifted as they walked around the halls and the atmosphere of the catacombs were…strangely peaceful. Quiet.

Adi was all smiles and gentle laughter. He walked near Adam and gave him a friendly hip bump as he did. Almost sending him stumbling. Adi laughed and laughed. The lanterns were more lit as Arno expected. The grave keepers always smiled as Adi walked through in greeting. Introducing 

“This is the other end of the district,” Adi said as he pointed above him. 

“Really? We walked that far?!”

“Yes! There’s more to them and we are still building through them to be more walkable,” Adi said.

"Mm. I detect condescension in that statement," Arno said with a smile.

"Umm, I detect bullshit in yours! An undertaker's architecture is much more different than one above the ground. We make access."

"Then what else are doors for?"

"That's not how it works! I actually take shortcuts here."

“Is that how you get through so fast?”

“Sometimes.”

“That’s cheating,” Arno accused.

“It isn’t!” Adi exclaimed. “It’s merely using my resources!”

“It’s cheating!”

“It’s a shortcut!”

“Adair!” 

Adi kept laughing. 

Laughter beneath a cemetery. Laughing amongst halls of death. Is this what it was like to be bittersweet? Is this what was like?

To love life so much that you become so conscious of death. Maybe this was the balance that Adi lived in was exactly that he needed. 

Chapter Text

From what Arno had remembered, his sleep habits were all over the place. Sometimes, according to his partners, he kicked. He did not tend to stay the night once he heard about that. Sometimes, he snored. Though that was always dismissed as hearsay. And although he spent the weird weeks after Bastille with drinking so much that he could not remember a single thing, he does remember sleeping in the attic a lot due to the nightmares that both scared the few bedpartners he had. The drinking got worse as a result. 

Yes, Arno cried himself to sleep. A lot. Who didn’t?

But Arno cried in his sleep.

A lot.

After Amie, it happened. Though Arno warranted it more as the side effects after a convulsion.

Arno had his arm in his father’s two weeks after Amie’s service. He recovered, kind of, after the worst of the influenza had passed. And he only really got to go outside at the triple clearance and reassurance from the physician that Arno would not get sick….but that he had to spend less than four hours outdoors. Less. Two at most. Bundled to the point he could barely move. He tried walking on his own, but he couldn’t. 

“When I die, bury me next to your father.”

“Papa…”

“I mean it,” his old man said. “I need to make plans, just in case.”

“What do you mean?”

“Life is short, my dear child. Losing Amie proves it. Short and unexpected…and with worlds like ours, we may never know when our ends will be.”

“There’s a family plot with your father. Currently, it’s just him since he was considered Elise’s godfather.”

Arno remembered hearing stories about the controversy.

“But just make sure I’m buried next to him,” his old man had said. 

And all Arno could do in the cold and in the honesty was agree.

"Of course," he said to him. "You have my word."

The night grew colder upon their return to the theater and their respective baths in the most warm water possible. Dimitri filled them in on what they had missed while they were gone; the funeral was for next week due to a back up at the mortuary with all the dead.

Adi was upset. But he bit back any comment he wanted to make. Arno just hoped that Adi would not go off on his own again to do a walk. The one from the previous day had left Adi more shaken than calm. Calm didn't describe what Adi was. It was everything but.

The rain thudded against the windows again. Arno reached under the tablecloth to Adi's fist and undid it, as well as he could.

Adi slowly undid it and held Arno's hand and only let go when the Assassins all went their separate ways to bed.

Adi and Arno were staying together, again. Upon finding Brasseur completely unconcious in Adi's bed.

"Brasseur?!"

"Mm...hi Adi..."

"And your bed?"

"Yours is warmer," Brasseur murmured. He pulled Adi's blanket over his head. "It's so nice...Now I know why you sleep all day and night. It's my bed now, you know..."

"Sure," Adi sighed. "I'll figure it out."

Arno smiled. "Goodnight, Brasseur."

"You better."

Arno ignored him and placed the sheet back on its hook...and remembered about Brasseur asking about why there is no door yet.

He did not follow that train of thought and instead just followed Adi down the ladder.

There was too much emotion in their systems to settle to properly sleep. Arno now knew how to recognize Adi's temper and how his anger only stemmed primarily in one feeling; hurt.

Adi hurt. 

Brasseur was right. Adi was the heart of this brotherhood. He was the heart, in every single way. And his heart was broken. Arno felt his break along with him. Adi dealt with so much death and yet still had such a compassionate soul and sensitivity to it all. The way he handled the catacombs spoke of his vocation. The way he handled the skulls with respect and reverence said it all. But this was so much. 

Adi was hurt. 

Arno knew of Adi's role in assassin funerals and how, according to the others, he made it his personal mission to make it a neat preparation, an embalment that made the fallen still shine. How they laid in state in their own headquarters until burial.

He was devastated.

But apparently, this was not the first time that Adi dealt with a murder, then catacomb duty.

The funeral for Therese was coming up. But Arno only knew the one with Amie. He was imprisoned for his old man's funeral.

"I have a question," Arno began.

"What is it?"

“Did you know Monsieur de la Serre?”

“Your stepfather? Yes. I knew him as Grand Master,” Adi said. “But not in the way you think. Before his death, the Templars and the Assassins…mostly stayed out of each other’s way. But he was merciful. Kind.”

"What's on your mind?"

"Funerals," Arno said. "And the fact that that I've only gone to one funeral. My father’s…” Arno trailed off. “Just his. And I missed the one for my friend...she fell down the stairs.” Chills crawled against Arno’s skin. “She---had a crate of glass jars from the second floor and she did not want my help. And she tripped--and when we found her---” his voice was so shaky. 

“Her face was so bloody that the casket had to be closed,” Adi finished softly.

Arno glanced up at him. “How do you know that?” he asked. 

“Adam and I embalmed her,” Adi explained. “That is when I met Élise, after the service. She was upset. I stopped and stayed with her and tried my best to console her. To help lessen her tears. The soil was so frozen. We had to boil four pots of water during their mass just so we could bury her.”

"What a small world," Arno said softly, though not without heartbreak.

“Very.”

“She was so upset that I could not make it to the funeral,” Arno said. 

“What happened?”

“I got a fever." Arno paused. He trusted Adi. "I convulsed.”

Adi nodded. So he was familiar with it too…

The thought of Adi probably burying someone who died of a convulsion crossed his mind, but he did not let the thought linger. He tried not to. It could be you, it could be you---

He tapped at his fingers four times. The thought had to pass. He kept tapping, the same system and rhythm. 

Maybe if he tapped long enough----

"Was it influenza?" Adi asked.

"Yes? Yes, it was," Arno said. "How did you know?"

"My love, I am much more than just a mortician," Adi said with a small smile. "And well, I went to the university here for a while. Not to the degree of you, monsieur apprentice,"

"But yes."

“My father insisted that I should rest, but Élise was not happy about going by herself. He stayed with me.”

“That sounds like him,” Adi said. “I met him once. There was a botched mission. It was almost seven years ago. I was seventeen, and my French was not the best. I was trying to escape an ambush, and I did. But I was terrified. The fight was lost, but I remember being scared. I didn’t quite understand the ranking of Templars, who did what, but I just looked up at him and said pitié. Begged for mercy. Over and over.”
 
“What did he say to you?”

“He put away his sword. His only words were genuine; 'Go in peace. I will not speak of you.' I couldn't believe it; my own enemy showed me humanity. You get told that they're all monsters, the thirst for corruption, the need for control. But his gesture of peace…told me all I needed to know about him,” Adi said. 

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“Of course.”

“My old man was in love with my father.”

Adi's eyes softened.

“I think…they were together after my mother left. I always saw him growing up and he was kind to me. He stayed with us often. But I never really knew; I just knew he was my father’s best friend. But I was the reason for my stepmother’s cruelty. Because she knew about it and hated me as a result...She treated me like shit. Like a servant instead of a stepson.”

“To this day, I don't know if I am his son."

“Arno, look at me. You were his son, as much as your father was,” Adi said firmly. “No one will change that. Your stepmother was a bitch.

“Your father was a widower. And a brilliant man. And he loved you so much. You are his son, in every sense of the word. Your father was fortunate to have him. And knowing you,” Adi wiped at his eyes. “Your mother is definitely causing ruckus somewhere.”

Arno let out a shaky laugh. Barely there. They were both crying. 

“The words of love you speak of your fathers…Your old man raised such a bright young man. I’m so sorry for your loss, Arno. For your suffering,” Adi said. “You shouldn’t have gone through this.”

“You’re the second one to offer me condolences instead of accuse me of his murder.”

“Oh, Arno…”

“…I don't even know where he is buried.”

“I’m so sorry,” Adi said.

Tears spilled into Adi's shoulder, where the linen brushed against Arno's nose. But Adi pulled him closer. But rather than pushing it away, Arno let it happen. He had never broken like this. Never fallen apart so fast. With Brasseur, it was different. It was drunken pain about everything, with the pain making the drunkenness worse. 

But Adi continued to rub small circles down his back.

“I miss him so much,” he whispered out. “I don't even know where he is buried.”

“We can look for him.”

"What?"

"In Versailles. There are not that many cemeteries there. And well, the cemeteries in Versailles don't have the project of the catacombs either, so it is much more organized."

"You would do that?"

"Of course,” Adi said. “I know cemeteries too well.” He let out a small chuckle. “All too well. But in all seriousness, no one deserves to not visit their loved one. No matter what the rest of the world says of where their alliances stood.”

"I don't know what to say…thank you. Thank you."

"Of course." He hugged him so tightly. "Of course. Anything...anything. I am here."

"I got tears all over you."

"It's fine," Adi smiled softly. "Don't worry.” He wiped Arno’s tears away. “Don’t worry. I apologize for the catacombs.”

"What? Why?" Arno paused. "Oh Adi, this isn't because of that."

"It's a heavy place---"

"Adi, I've been holding in all of this for years," Arno said. "I think I've cried my soul out more here than I ever had elsewhere. Yes, I'm devastated, but I rather be devastated here with you than be devastated alone."

Adi blanked.

"Shit! Let me--That did not come out right," Arno stumbled. "Um--My brain is in pieces right now."

Adi let out a laugh. "It's alright," he said. "You don't have to be so articulate with me. You've been through a lot. I am honored you trust me. It's been a long night...Long life...Small world....Well...if this counts, I do know your stepsister from the party."

“You were there?!”

“Yes,” Adi said. “I was picking up some papers…not that they were worth much. Elise actually almost tried to slit my throat.”

“What?!”

“Oh my gods, I didn’t tell you. Well, first…I met Elise at your friend’s funeral, after. She didn’t really say much…other than to tell me to fuck off and she was still crying. I was uh, trying to bury the casket and the dirt froze. But we ended up talking for about forty minutes or so. I froze bad. But she just spoke about your friend’s laugh. Her light.”

“Are you sure?” Arno did not believe him. “No, that can’t be. She hates me.”

“Arno, I’m positive,” Adi reassured. “I wouldn’t lie. Not to you. She was sad, but never once mentioned you. Granted, I asked about her friend’s smile. Veered her to talk about something…that was not her friend in the casket.”

“You’re used to it.”

“Since I was young. But yes, she was upset. Doesn’t make what happened to you any less painful. I didn’t know she was a Templar until a year or so later. And we…well, just had odd run-ins here and there. Just petty skirmishes. And there was one at the party,” Adi said. “And... She asked if I was there to kill her father. Your old man..."

"I didn't know that," Arno said, in shock. "What...why didn't you tell me?"

"I am so sorry, I didn't think much of it then," Adi apologized. "Truly. I went in for papers and I left quite fast. I only heard about his death when I got here."

"Okay. So before I went to the party, I got a message for my old man and I couldn't reach his carriage in time. So I slid it under his door...it was a warning that he was going to get killed that night. I didn't know what was in the message," Arno insisted. "At all. Elise blamed me for all this. Said it was my fault and that he wasn't my father."

Adi grimaced.

"Both my fathers killed in the same palace," Arno said. "It's awful. And both times...I saw them die. I don't know what it is, Adi. Something is deeply wrong with all this."

"Um...about a message. Unrelated, but Sophie gave me this."

Arno read the crumpled note.

"And you are barely telling m---" Arno paused. Then remembered the epiphany between him and Brasseur the previous night. "Okay....Me and Brasseur also thought it was suspicious too and we wanted to look into it."

"Week til the funeral. Week til trying to figure out what's going on. Gods, why us," Adi sighed. 

"I don't know if we will ever know," Arno said. "But I'm glad I'm here with you. I say it so much, but I mean it. Every time. And...We try to bring closure with our hands. Some form of it. Right?"

"Right," Adi sighed. "Right. Get sleep, love. We have another long day tomorrow."

After the night they both had, Arno was not sure it was going to be possible. Sleep? What was sleep? He hasn't slept well for the past month. Paris was falling apart.

"Can we do this?"

"We can try." And Adi blew out the candles.

Chapter Text

I must have dozed off…

Somehow, their rest had sent him with cushions onto the floor. The blanket too. Arno was between the state of asleep and dreaming, Adi got to recognize. The frowns in his sleep. The tiny noises he made. They both did sleep heavily that night, though much could be attributed to the exhaustion in his soul and in his limbs.

Adi stirred at dawn, just like always. But he did not want to sleep in. Arno had mentioned that. He just…couldn’t do it. Adi, ironically, never slept in. He just slept in his bed for hours on the most oddly timed naps. 

Then Arno felt his blanket being draped over his side. He had tucked it into Arno. To keep him warm, as the morning was still incredibly cold. What he didn’t anticipate was Arno’s sigh. And the soft brush of his thumb against his jaw. How badly did Adi want to kiss him. To have him be undone under his touch.

Adi prayed that his blush was not boiling.

“Good morning,” Arno said. 

“Hej,” Adi smiled. 

“Where did you go?” Arno murmured. 

“Just for some coffee. Beat everyone to the punch.”

“Mm,” Arno sighed against his throat. “It sounds perfect. Smells perfect too.”

I love you so much.

The words nearly slipped out of Adi’s lips. I love you. I love you. That no matter what crossed his path, it would always be Arno that he wanted at his side. 

It's always been you.

Yet, Arno's mind was heavy. Adi could feel it. 

"My love? What is it?"

“I…I think I want to visit my old mans’ graves. In Versailles. I don’t think I’ll feel focused until I know that they’re fine.”

“So we’ll go.”

"What about--"

"Therese? Brasseur is scoping out the mortuary," Adi said. "He's breaking in, somehow. Since it's Sunday..."

"And you are only telling me---"

"He told me as I was getting coffee. I almost spat on him out of sacrilege. And before you ask, he does not want us to come along." Adi did not tell him why.

("Oh, sweetheart, don't worry about coming along. You stay in. Take a day off," Brasseur had said gently. 

Then he had leaned in, a smile on his face, and said "Go back to fucking Arno." And patted his cheek and walked off.)

"Why?"

"He told us to rest."

"I can't..."

"I know. So we go."

This was the longest, yet shortest carriage ride that Arno had ever gone through. 

He was going home. Home that was not home anymore. The home he grew up running around in, causing trouble in. Laughing and arguing and play-fighting with Elise. Elise had disowned him now.

So much had changed. 

So much.

He walked to the cemetery along with Adi, his hand in his held tightly. He was so shaken about all this that he forgot to bring flowers. He had panicked about it on the way to the cemetery, but Adi had calmed him down. Had told him that it was going to be okay and later, in a different day, they would bring flowers. 

They walked and walked, until the spot that Arno tried to forget about his father's grave.

And. 

“Oh my God,” Arno paused in his steps.

“What is it?”

“They’re buried next to each other after all.”

His father and his old man, next to each other. As they had wished, as they had said. Was this what it was like? He did not know the full story of how their love came to be; he only learned of it as a teenager. And had an idea of it when his old man got too drunk and emotional. He always go teary eyed at the mention of his father. But he always tried to smile.

For Arno's sake.

That’s when the tears broke through. They could not stop spilling, onto the damp ground and down his face. He was not sure whether to sob or smile. Both. 

Arno fell to his knees onto the dirt ground. 

“Oh thank god. Oh god…” Arno sobbed. His hand could not believe what he was seeing. Nor the letters etched of their names on stone. “You old bastards .” He let out a strangled laugh. Half laugh, half sob. They really did it. 

Adi hugged him harder.

Arno pressed his hand against his name and kissed the stone. And he cried. 

Tears poured. They really did it. Arno closed his eyes and pressed his forehead onto the gravestone. He let out a shaky breath. His hand did not leave the etched letters of his old man’s name. He gave him a moment.

What a sight he must make, a grown man sobbing over a grave and clutching the stone. 

Are you used to this, Adi? To see someone crying over their loved one’s grave.

Adi kneeled down next to him and pulled him into his arms.

My son, his father had said to him, in his dying breaths. Bloodstained hands wiping at his tears. My son. 

“I miss you so much,” Arno choked out. “I miss you--” He felt so cold. “Your last words to me--” The words were pouring out now. More than they ever did when he drank. “Old man, you could have asked for help, told me who killed you, but you wiped my tears and called me your son. Why? Why?” Arno’s voice cracked. 

The words left him and all he could do was just kneel at the graves at silence, with Adi's hands on him.

“Do you know who he is?” Elise had asked him upon their arrival at the estate.

“Yes,” Arno said. 

“Then why is he here?”

"Because I'm with him,” Adi said firmly. 

“This does not pertain to you.”

“It does,” Adi said. “Anything that pertains to Arno pertains to me as well.”

“I will not let you push me away this time,” Arno said. 

“So why are you here?” Elise asked. Her voice was bitter. Grip on the doors so tight that her knuckles were white.

“I came here to visit my fathers.”

“He was not your father."

To Arno’s credit, he did not burst into tears. But his anger snapped.

“Elise!” Arno snapped. "Do you even realize the words you say?! Do you even realize how awful your words can be?! Yes, I know you're hurt, yes, I know you miss him. But you can't do this! You always do! You always have!”

“I don’t know what you’re---”

“What about Amélie?” Arno’s voice cracked. He was wrong for thinking that he forgot the tragedy and moved on. He lied to himself. 

He thought about it all the time.

“You blamed me! Me! Me!,” Arno snapped. He jabbed a finger at his chest every time. “I was covered in her blood and you blamed me when I held her in my arms.” He felt Adi’s grip only tighten as he shook a sob down. “ You have this terrible habit of pushing me away every time I try to come closer. I ask you questions, you refuse to answer them. I do nothing, you find a way to blame me. You’re just like your mother, but worse!

“Why are you so angry at me? At the fact that you think our fathers were sinners? Burn in hell. You do believe in it. Your mother made a grand effort to remind me of this fact,” Arno snarled. “And you never ever once stepped in to defend me.”

"I didn't know---"

"Yes you did!" Arno cried out. He was in too much pain to give the stories that haunted him in every step he took here. “I have no more to say to you,” Arno said. His tears were pouring down already. But they were of wrath. Of grief. Of feeling so much pain that he could not contain it anymore. And he was done. “I just came to get my things. My books. My drawings," Arno paused. “My Torah. And everything that my father left to me.”

If Élise was to echo any snide comment her mother would tell her, she kept it to herself.

She was biting back tears. 

“I put everything in your room. He left his books to you,” Élise said in a broken voice. “All of them. His studies, his notebooks. Everything. You were always his favorite out of the both of us. And…I had him buried next to Charles...I left my father’s letters to you. The ones from your father and the ones he wrote to him.”

“Did you read them?”

"Non," Élise said. 

Arno used his vision fast. To hear her heartbeat. 

She did not lie.

“Okay.”

“I never---I never thought they were sinners,” Elise said. Her voice wavering…for the first time that Arno could remember since Amelie’s death. She didn’t turn to see Arno. Elise did not cry. Arno was the one who did. He was the one who hid. The coward, as his stepmother used to remind him.

Arno did not dare to use his sight again. Because he was not sure if he could bear the answer to know if Elise lied this time.

Or if she did not.

In Arno's conveneince, everything that belonged to him was already packed. Everything. 

There were some gaps in the old man's studies, but Arno quickly figured out that it must have been Templar research that was in Elise's hands. 

He did not bother to find out why.

Adi helped him quietly pack his things. To take it. Arno took the small portrait that was moved from the study, of him and his old man before he left for university. Drawings of his, of what he learned in school. Everything that meant anything.

Even his suitcase was still tossed in the corner, the one that Arno had left the day he arrived back. 

Adi kept his arm around Arno’s shoulders during the entirety of the trip back home. It was a blessing, really, to be in his arms during a moment like this. Closure didn’t make him feel happy. But it did help…in finding an answer. Silence was all that filled the air inside the carriage. Is that what closure was? Silence?

He got his things. His old man got his dying wish. They were together in death. When it should have not ended this way. It should have ended differently.

“Thank you,” Arno said softly to Adi. “Thank you, my dear.”

“No need.”

“Yes, there is. Thank you,” Arno said.

“I am with you. In the darkness, in the light. In grief and joy. I am with you, if you'll have me.”

Arno kissed his cheek. “Always,” he said softly. “Always.”

Arno found the spot in the attic on accident, once. No one seemed to know about it. So Arno kept the existence like that; a secret.

He hid his old man's journals there. And somehow, the temptation was worsening to not read it.

He could not bear it.

He read them anyways.

My love, 

It’s been five months since I had to bury you. But it feels more than that. 

I have Arno write to you now, you know. As a way to process the mourning he is going through. But…truthfully, this is also for me. I cannot believe you were taken from me. I cannot believe the circumstances. You are my everything. I know we planned to unify our allegiances to end all this warring nonsense, to leave when the time was right for our boy. But our worlds kept becoming chaotic. 

You were always the kindest out of both of us. Remember how we used to go to the river and dream of sailing away? To Greece, perhaps. You have dear friends there. 

I see our boy grow every day. He smiles like you. He learns so much every day. He misses you so much.  He loves playing the piano, though he is not the best with the notes…

And one day, I will teach him how to handle a rifle I hope he never uses. He reads a lot, you know. I did not tell him that you were an Assassin…And I did not tell him that I am a Templar. I know we both agreed to never tell him.

Because our future had to be better than this, right?

Arno could barely make out the words as his hand shook with the journal in his hand. 

Breathe.

Arno swallowed a sob and sunk further into the corner office behind the shelved walls. Almost like if he were back at his house again and trying to avoid his stepmother’s wrath, in the moments that his old man was not there. He couldn't keep going. There was more in that book. More than he could bear. Elise was trying to solve her father's murder. But he could not see her again, not now. 

Arno figured out that the letters were placed in a journal for the ease of access. 

I can't believe a brother of yours took you from me.

Oh, my love. 

Why did you push the blade into yourself?

Arno dropped the letter. 

What did he just read?

When it came to all this change, Haytham said less commentary. It was an odd few years of all this. But he behaved for his mother. Which Connor guessed counted for something. His grandfather was struggling in his health. Connor took him sailing; Edward felt at one with the sea and sailing in the Aquila helped him get air from being at the Homestead. His hair was still graying, but the blonde still remained. 

“What was sailing like, back in the Caribbean?” Connor asked. 

“It was thrilling,” Edward said with a smile. “Nothing you’d ever think before. The air…the shanties we sang. The laughter. The strategy. Thatch...Blackbeard. Annie. Even Calico. Ade.” Edward smiled softly, his eyes scanning the horizon with no destination in mind. Just him and the sea. “He was the most intelligent man I knew. Him, the crew. Kidd...Rest their heart. Coming here was like the camaderie I missed. Rare though, to find sailorsThere was another lad, like a son to me.”

“What happened to him?” Connor asked. 

Silence fell over the pair.

Edward's expression turned cold and his grip on the steering wheel became a little bit too tight for comfort. He continued looking straight ahead when he said his one word answer.

“Achilles never talks about it,” Connor continued. “I just want to know. Everyone doesn’t talk about it.”

“He was killed. Taken by a former son of mine. Back when a few decades ago, the Colonial Brotherhood was at it's prime. We had a traitor. And as much as I hate to admit, I see where his betrayal came from and I don't blame him. But he killed Adewale. My god, Connor, it hurt. Having someone you care about deeply just---” Edward took a short breath. “Just get killed by one of our boys.

“Years ago, we had a fully functioning brotherhood. And we lost everything."

“Who was he?” Connor asked again. Pleading. "Haytham never talks about it too."

"Haytham? What are you, a commoner? That's your father."

Connor sighed. "Fine...My father...he never wants to talk about it."

"Do not blame him," Edward said. "It is painful for him too...Please drop it, my boy. The Phantom with the White Rifle hurt us.”

Connor dropped it.

But he was still going to find out.

Because there was too much going on overseas, then here, for there to not be a connection.

His grandfather had stopped to say hello to his father, to sit with him awhile and speak about the expedition. His father had merely listened to him and nodded. Spoke with him. Smiled. His grandfather loved his son unconditionally, as Connor grew to learn with the years that came by. Despite all the heartbreak, the betrayals, the nonsense. Connor didn’t believe him, until his grandfather said the words that Connor could not shake yet.

“You will understand it when you are a father yourself.”

He bid his farewell to go into the study with Achilles, for yet another game of the endless ones they kept insisting on playing. Achilles was in good health, considering how everything went batshit insane the past few years when yet another "goddamned Kenway" stepped into the picture. It was only when Connor's mother remarked to him, in between drunken laughter, that "you still won't get rid of 'em anyways!" Along with Edward.

Ziio was excempt. She was here after she followed Connor to the Homestead all those years ago when he was a teenager. And he got the earful and a sharp ear tug from her as a result. Then was the complication of "oh look, your father is a Templar, and he has common sense? Wait what? What? What?"...Then...well. Connor got a migraine if he thought about it too much.

His father was sitting in the downstairs study and reading a newspaper. As he tended to do nowadays. Connor tried to ignore how his father's hand cramped more. He loved his grandchildren so much. The few times that Connor saw him smile was when his father was with his mother, when he heard a story from his father, when Ziio shared letters from her best friend, when he argued with Ellie. And when he saw his grandchildren...

It was a rare joy. 

“Father.”

“Son.”

“Where’s my mom?”

“Your mom is out with Ellie and the little ones down with Prudence,” his father said. “They should be back later on. How was sailing?”

“It was good. Cold. But it was not bad...Um. I have a question.”

“I wonder if I may have an answer.”

“Who was the person you killed the Colonial Assassins with?”

His father blinked. “Well, right for the jugular.” 

“Something I am sure you have experience in doing.” 

His father rolled his eyes. “I do not want to talk about it.”

“It seems that no one does,” Connor stated. Unimpressed. Frustrated.

“What prompts this?”

“There is a series of assassins getting murdered in Paris,” Connor said. “Elite assassins, not just any. The latest were two Assassins. But the correspondence was delayed because of the violence..."

"Still? My god."

"I've seen war. But I'm just saying, this is different."

Ellie had said the same too, upon reading the newspapers. This was different. If even Ziio's best friend, Gracie, said anything in her letters...it was different too. But there was no way that Connor could even fathom to ask Gracie what the hell happened in the Colonial Purge, and how the Parisian Murders were starting to closely resemble it too.

"This was sent maybe a month ago. Samita sent it," Connor said. Samita, the nickname he had for Samaira, ever since he met her when he visited New Orleans once. She was Palestinian, an Assassin from since the Crusades. Who knew a lot in the heritage of who she was and where she came from. 

The rafiq/strategist/historian/expert who sent all the correspondence. Along with copies of the press that an Assassin, Arno, collected for her in bulk. He had to commend Arno, whoever he may be; he kept order in the newspapers, by type, by date and even picked up pamphlets that most would have thrown away. Though Connor would admit that it was taking a while to translate because it was in French. She gave the gist of it. Kind of.  

Kind of. Connor was a little rusty.

But she was the best eyes in the sky he could ask for at the moment. He didn't speak much to the Council...wherever they may be.

“Well, shit. I had no idea.”

“So, you’re telling me you know nothing of the Assassins getting murdered in Paris,” Connor concluded.

“Correct,” his father said. 

“Achilles refuses to talk about this. And grandfather had not much to say about this either.”

“You asked your grandfather?”

“Yes.”

His father shook his head in sheer disappointment.

“What, I can’t ask him questions?”

“Why would you ask him about such a thing?”

“Because no one is giving me a straight answer!” Connor exclaimed. “I ask and keep trying to find answers in what little research and books we have left. And there’s no word on who. Or why. And now, there’s murdered Assassins in Paris and you seem to have no connection to the Templars who could or could not have anything to do with this.” His voice was close to being raised. Something he always tried to refrain to do.

“Back to this, then…” His father sighed. “I’m no Templar anymore. And you know that. I left it all behind for you and for your mother and I would do it again in a heartbeat. And your grandfather does not need this grief on his mind. Do not bring it up to him again.”

“Then what do I do?! No one is giving me answers, and there’s so much happening, and I keep trying to reach out and I can’t do it because I refuse to sail with my girls being in danger, and I can’t leave you nor grandfather nor Achilles behind. And I feel so helpless and stupid---” Connor could not breathe. “There--” His anger was tipping over, but this was different. This was worse.

“Connor?”

A sickening feeling crawled under Connor's skin. He did not know anything. Not what to do. Anything.

“Connor, what's wrong?”

“I feel cold.” Connor finally shook out. Tears poured out his eyes. And for what?

“Come here,” his father said gently. “Come here.” He stood up and guided Connor to the couch. 

Connor flexed his hands, then let go of his fists. He sat down on the couch and refused to look at his father. He swallowed a sob.

“Just breathe, son,” his father said. Nothing else.

Nausea coursed through Connor's stomach. This was not right. None of this way. It was so cold, even when he was in front of the fireplace. Why did he feel so cold? Connor did not look at him. Instead, he just held his head between his hands. And tried to breathe.

“You are scared,” his father said.

“How would you know that?”

“I'm your father. Of course, I know when you're scared. Even with all my faults.”

Connor squeezed his eyes shut. Why was he like this? Why?

“Your head is boiling.”

“I don't have a fever.”

“I know. You are overwhelmed. Do not let this get to you like that. You will only end up harming yourself more. This is not me trying to tell you to stop asking questions. This is me...not wanting you to get so hurt like this.”

Connor nodded. 

“I can't let Ellie see me like this,” he said quietly. “Though she has seen me in far worse.”

“Go lay down in your room.”

“No,” Connor shook his head. “I have too much to do.”

“So, stay here. Listen to the noise outside,” his father said. “Read a book, or something. You can be picky.”

“You're worse.”

Connor took the advice, for once, but he would never admit it. He laid down next to his father on the couch. His father kept reading, a book this time. The blanket from the back of the couch was over Connor in mere moments. Connor was too tired to wash his face.

Connor would not admit that this helped, even though he was terrified of all this. The lack of control. Connor was spiraling, in the worst way. What was going on? What was happening?

“We have a nice fall ahead of us,” his father said. The window was open to the morning sunrays. With leaves gently going with the flow of the wind.

“We do.”

Connor could see it from his spot on the couch. He would not admit to his father that he was right in all this.

Just like his father would not admit that he kept his hand on his shoulder too until Connor fell asleep.

Chapter Text

Ziio leaned into Haytham's embrace as he kissed her hair. Graying, like his. But she looked lovely as she always did. 

"It happened again," Haytham said gently. 

“Again?”

I feel cold.

"How bad?"

"Bad. He fell asleep, though, after a little while. That barely happens. But…he hasn't been sleeping well. Or at all."

“Are we doing the right thing?” Ziio asked. "Without telling him?"

"I think so. I…don't know."

It was something that they never really talked about. The nature behind Connor's pain of too much change in so little time. Too much to process. Or how much it hurt to see him hurt. How the numbness changed into panic before the twins were born. How learning about the Purge after years of relative silence was eating away at Connor now that he knew of the spree of murders happening in Paris.

Haytham kissed Ziio's temple, even though he was the one that was supposed to be comforted. Comforted for what? Contributing to her tears? Their heartbreak?

She brought her knees up onto the cushion of the porch swing and fully leaned into Haytham's arms. 

For all his faults, there was only one thing he valued; that he did genuinely love his wife and son so much. So much. It was not an exaggeration when he told Connor that he would give up the Templars all in a heartbeat. All of it. That he would take back the years of resentment against his father that were for nothing. 

And what made his pain worse was that his father forgave him. 

Jenny did too. Sort of. She could not quite recover from being separated from her family. Jenny was quietly living on the edge of the Homestead, tending to her growing library. She was happy to reunite. Happy to be safe again. She left it all behind in London. Cut down any link, brought the heirlooms with her for the voyage, packed everything up. And she let the Estate burn. 

The rumors were that she died a spinster. 

She did not. 

That beautiful tailor Eleanor fell in love with Jenny. Happily in love. The seamstress of clothing and the Tailor of knowledge.

Things would be better now. 

He hoped.

"He's asking more questions."

"I know."

"Do not blame yourself, child. You did not tell him for good reason," Edward said. “It is not like he would have known. Daid Iorwerth is too Welsh,” he let out a soft laugh. He was so happy to speak Welsh so freely again. 

It took years for Haytham to respeak the language with confidence. Without looking over his shoulder. He never thought he would hear his father sing shanties again, until he held the twins in his arms and sat with them outside as they played in the farm.

“And remember. Edward Kenway died outside that theater. There's no way Shay knew. No one did. I didn't tell him about who I was. I didn’t tell anybody…”

"I did not either…"

Haytham remembered, then. His running, collapsing. His father yelling out in pain.

And Haytham cursed at Shay. Calling him a bastard. The pain in his words. 

(“Stop! Stop! That's my father!”

“What?!”

“Stop!”

“You didn't tell me?”)

Haytham had pulled out his pistol and aimed it at Shay. 

"Leave. You are dead to me."

"I didn't want him to die."

Every time he saw his father hiss in pain, he remembered. Every time he saw him, it was a reminder of how stupid he was. How he got his father almost murdered. 

And his father forgave him. And truthfully, that was one of the reasons Haytham went with Shay on his quest for vengeance. To prevent his father's death. He kept up with the Templars, yes, but not for nothing. There was something going on and he was trying to figure it out.

And he nearly failed. 

“At the end of the day, he was still a son. And I didn't fight for him enough. All of this could have been prevented…”

“He can't be the one whose---”

“He is retired. And you know that Gracie would have killed him if he tried again…” he sighed. 

“You still keep so many secrets,” Haytham said. “And for what purpose?”

“Some need to die with me,” his father said. 

“Don’t say that,” Haytham said. 

Haytham grew to know some of the worst feelings; seeing your son cry. Treating your granddaughter’s first fever. Waking up your wife after a brutal nightmare. 

But another was seeing his father grow older each and every day. Hair grayer. Movements slower. 

His father's memory faltering over time.

“I’ve lived a long life,” his father said. “One with pain. One with love, with victory. With salt in my eyes and the waves of the sea. I got to have you and Jenny back in my arms again. You and Zi gave me a grandson. And I got to see my granddaughter-in-law kick your ass, multiple times. I met my great-grandchildren. None of my life is perfect, but my family…That’s all that matters.”

“You chose family. That’s all that matters to me now.” 

"Haytham. Please don't spend the rest of my final years in pain. We all agreed not to tell him."

"He knows my involvement, yes. But to tell him…it does not just encompass him. It will break both of their hearts."

“I know.”

“Charlie.”

Charles turned to face him.

And he let out a flat laugh.

“Ah, the Phantom. Here you are."

Shay stood before him.

"You needn't waste breath on your reasoning," Charles said. "I know why."

"What?"

"You're here to kill the Sage. So do it."

The deed was done, then Charlie kept laughing.

"What is so funny?"

"Just that. That I die for the right reason. Better it be me than my baby.”

Oh god. 

Shay realized the words all too late. The Templars wanted to kill the son. The son. The child. The little boy who had waved to him as he ran out with the little girl. 

“Charlie---”

Charles reached out and shoved the blade deeper. 

Shay tried to pull away. He could already feel blood on his glove. 

“Watch out for my boy,” Charles said to him. Bitter smile. "He will be okay. He is already with the best heart one could ever ask for, but an extra pair of eyes would not be so bad. Right?” 

Even now, in his soul, he knew Shay would never hurt Arno. He and François might be the only ones in this world that never would.

Shay tried to pull his blade back.

“Charlie, please---”

“Just promise me you will look out for my baby,” Charles said. “Please.”

“....I promise.”

“Thank you. Better it be me,” Charles said. His breath slowed. “And do me a favor...tell François he is still mon soleil.”

My sun.

Charlie's breaths faded completely.

Shay dared look over his shoulder when Charlie's body was discovered. Screaming, at first, from the on-lookers. Guards running to them. 

Then a child was screaming. 

That was Arno. Shay watched as François leaned down to Arno.

“Arno. Arno, look at me.”

Arno, pushed away his arm, and ran to his father, to Charlie, and threw himself on the ground and gripped him tight. The people dispersed as the guards ushered them away. 

Shay could barely make the words out the sobbing. Papa. Abba. Abba!

François lifted him up into his arms. Shielded him away from the body. Elise had stood behind him, with François unaware that she was still there. 

Élise picked up the watch. Her hands were trembling.

“Aitabitxia--” Elise choked out. Godfather, Shay recognized in Basque.

“Oh my god, Elise!”

The woman ran to him. 

Julie. François’ wife. 

She grabbed Elise by the arm and yanked her away. 

Elise refused. Her hand reached out towards Charlie.

She kept screaming. The watch fell from her hands again. 

Shay bit down on his tongue to prevent the sobbing.

What had he just done?

Hours passed as Shay tried to figure out the best way to speak to François. 

Finally, he found him in his study.

François was sitting at his desk, with a bottle of liquor in front of him and his gaze into the fire. The bottle was nearly empty.

“He admired you, you know,” François said. “Never believed the gezur miserableak spoken of you.” The wretched lies, spoken in his native Basque that François refused to let die in this Francophone world.  He drank from the glass. No sips; just gulps. “…You know, to kill me? I would have understood,” François said. “It would make sense to take out a Templar who no longer wanted to be a Templar. But him?...Why?”

"He pushed it in, François."

"What?"

“He shoved the blade in as I was trying to pull back,” Shay said. “He kept saying that it was that it is better it be him than his baby. I was told it was of a dangerous Sage. Of Charles Dorian. But...the Templars meant Arno.”

And that was what confirmed it. François knew that Arno was a Sage. “That’s why he wanted to leave,” Francois said in a horrified whisper. “No…Oh, Charlie, you bastard...”

“You didn't know---”

“You thought I wanted my soul dead? That he would die?” François snarled. “I would have ripped the blade from your body and shoved it into your heart myself. Why the fuck would I do that to my soul?!”

And it only hit Shay that he was not talking about himself. 

“Oh by the gods…”

“You took my soul,” François gritted out. Between his muffled sobs and anger. Tears spilled down his cheek. “We were going to do the exchange to make it disappear so we could leave for a better life together. Do you realize what you've done? We were to tie all this up and leave. And instead, you took my soul.”

"François, I am so sorry..."

"Stop. Stop. Shut up. Shut the fuck up. You killed my soul." Then he spotted the white rifle on Shay's back. "My god. It is you. You are the Phantom. You are the cause of all this. You are the one who---" he could barely get the words across. "Who gave you the order?"

"Anonymous," Shay said. "I do not know, François. I wish I did so---"

"Isil zaitez," François snarled. "Shut up. Stop with your false lamenting."

"I just came to return the watch," Shay said softly. 

"Did you at least allow him the dignity of his last words?"

"Better it be than my baby. And that Arno was safe with the best heart out of us all. And...To tell you that you were still mon soleil.”

François shattered. “Get out. Get out before I put you down and leave your children without a father," he said. "You didn't kill one soul. You killed two."

"François…"

François merely lifted the pistol and aimed it at him. 

"Go."

Shay nodded. He left the watch at Shay's desk and left the way he came in. 

Mon soleil. My sun, though the words were always in affectionate irony. Francois hated the morning; Charles did not mind them. Mon soleil, he would whisper to him across scattered kisses on his shoulders. Mon soleil, wake up, he would continue. His smile forever etched into his memory, like the portrait of them both in Charles' office. A small one, where they could be themselves happily and unashamedly. The rare moments stolen away for them, in their near two decades of love.

Two decades since Charles tried to kill him and failed and fell in love instead. 

Mon soleil. Mon soleil.

Was what why Charles held him closer the previous night when they made love? Was that why he didn't want to let go of him that morning? Was what why he kissed him longer than they should have against any normal circumstances?

Did Charles know he would die?

Shay was many things to him now, beyond the forgotten traitor. The devil himself. The Phantom with the White Rifle, the one that Charlie cried when he heard about his fallen friends across the Atlantic. The one that Charlie never blamed when he found out the reasoning why. He did not believe any of the wretched lies about Shay. 

How ironic. 

François swallowed down the sob along with the liquor, the sobs barely muffled against biting his sleeve of his sweater. No bottles would be enough for this sorrow he felt. Nothing would be enough. He closed his eyes and all he saw was the blood stains across Arno's clothing from when he had thrown himself across Charles'. All he saw was Charles dead in the mortuary.

Maybe an hour had passed when he heard footsteps and knocking on the door.

"Monsieur?"

Arno.

“Come in,” François said shakily to Arno. “Come here, my little one.” 

Arno went to him.

“Shh,” François kissed the top of his hair. Kept his son close. He begged it was a nightmare 

"Look," he returned the watch to him. “A kind samaritan brought this back.”

“Samaritan?”

“A parable from the New Testament,” François explained. “Not in your mother’s scripture.”

But thankfully, Arno did not press any questions.

“Oh. Okay,” Arno said. "Thank you."

"Of course," François said. He kept his voice together. And held his son closer. 

This was what it was like to be a widower now. 

=

Do I keep writing to you? 

It has been years. I still pray to you. Only you. It has always been you I found my peace with. Always you I felt hope with. My truth. My soul. My everything. I will be buried next to you, no matter what. 

Some days, my cough grows a little worse. I try to hide it from Arno. I feel my health is shaky at times; stress, the doctor tells me. Grief, I wish I could explain. But he is right. Stress is tolling on me. But I cannot move on and remarry. I never will. 

Our boy turns seventeen this summer. He grows taller by the day and loves to remind me of it. He’s a trouble-maker. 

=

I am shaking. 

Our boy fell sick. Influenza. He was delirious in his fever; he kept sobbing. Mentioning ghosts, blue walls. Chanting. He convulsed. 

He’s nineteen. 

But I sit here with our boy finally asleep, with his fever breaking. With the snowstorm pouring outside. His eyes are so swollen from crying…It took everything I had to not cry with him too. I held his hand until his night terrors passed, but it broke my heart.

I need to save him. Even if it was by sending him away.

I don’t believe the rumor that the Phantom is dead. Never. The Phantom is not dead. I do not want him to kill our boy. He can kill me all he wants, it’s fine. But not our boy. Not our son. I’ve lost you. I can’t lose him too.

=

My love, do not hate me for this, but I’m sending our son to college; in London. For a GOOD reason! The fellows in Paris are not pleased at my attempts of closure and settling peace for the sake of the people. And Arno is a target. Maybe it is because of your last name, or that I shielded him with my life from all sides of the conflict. The Phantom is haunting us. I arranged my will already, just in case. Just in case…

Sweetheart…I wish we had more time.

There was a morbidity in the fact that Arno kept reading. This was the opposite of closure. This was a wound that kept spilling blood and falling open over and over again.

He could hear his old man's voice as he read each letter, each ink blot. How Arno picked up on his complicated cursive and he adapted it to his own writing. What did this mean for his family? What did this mean for him?

The Phantom. I could not believe he existed. He was a ghost. We kept saying that he was a ghost.

But he didn't.  How did he catch up to you?

"Quoi est esteis?" Arno muttered to himself. "What is this?"

He makes my blood boil. Why….No. I shouldn't write more. 

"Old man, write more!" Arno said aloud. 

I shouldn't waste my time like this. 

“Father, are you kidding me?!” Arno continued. “I’m trying to find out who killed you!”

But I love you. I love you so much. 

Someone is out trying to kill me. It could be the Phantom. But now, I do not think he uses a rifle anymore.

He still hides among the shadows.

Our boy is all grown up and arrives home sometime this week. Our little architect.

I love you, mon soleil. My sun.

We will meet again.

And the entries ended. Arno closed the notebook.

Okay. Okay. He could not continue this now. He could not.

No. He had to put the book down. He could not pass to another page. He could not collect more hundreds of memories that he long since buried. He had to turn around, not drown. No. No. This was too much. 

He put the books into the box and hid them behind a loose board. 

He needed to clear his head. He needed to take a walk. He needed a refund for all the emotional tax that was his lifetime. He needed answers. He needed coffee. He needed a bath. A bath. Dinner. Then a bath.

Surely, it had to get better than this right?

First, he visited Samaira. He managed to get a formidable number of copies of newspapers that she wanted to have for her archives and collections. As well as all kinds of pamphlets that she needed. Why, he was not sure. But he got them for her anyway.

She made a comment about how Arno drank his coffee cold, then Arno had replied that it was how his father drank it like that and he picked up on it as a result. Black with a speck of sugar.

“Did he care if it was hot or cold?”

“No, that is just me,” Arno grinned. “I’m better than you.”

“Fool,” Samaira laughed. “I drink it black.”

“You will not believe what I just found,” Samaira said. In her hands were a thick book. “The individual designs of the Colonial robes. Master Kenway sent a lot of them to me a while ago. I’ve been compiling them over time.”

“Wait, what?!”

“The one---”

“Before the Purge.”

Arno gasped. He had only heard the name uttered, only to be hushed away. No one talked about it. But to see the Assassins, their portraits and their robe design, on the pages beneath his fingertips…it was different. 

“Master Achilles was the only survivor,” Samaira said. “No one wants to talk about it. I’ve asked questions, but the Council says nothing.”

The names of each assassin were unfamiliar to Arno. He noted the ages; they would be his old man’s age by now. Maybe. Then he found the youngest one, at the very end of the book. Baby-faced young man with a big smile; the only one who smiled for the portrait. Name that was distinctively Irish.

“Who is Shay Patrick Cormac?”

“He was active around the community in the Colonies. Helped out with orphanages a lot. Compassionate. His story was sad,” Samaira said. “He committed suicide off the ledge of the Colonial Headquarters.”

“Why?”

“From the little I’ve found on him in our records and letters, he already had bouts of sanity slippage…” Samaira grew quiet. “Shay saw visions. Vicious ones. A broken sight, they all said. Hallucinations, visions...They drove him to insanity, and one day, he jumped off the ledge. Mid-afternoon…”

“That’s awful,” Arno said. His voice was as hurt as Samaira’s. 

“I know,” Samaira said. She glanced down at the page. “I don’t know, he…he stands out to me, somehow. There’s something so unusual about it. He was the youngest one.”

“Like me,” Arno said. “These were his robes?”

Yggsadril was on his belt clasp. Was that Celtic? No...He had not seen it before in any Celtic context to his knowledge. 

“His robes were beautiful,” Samaira said. 

Blue, white and black. And the sash of red that all Assassins wore. He was a handsome young man, that was for sure. A smile. Out of all the portraits, he was the one with the biggest smile. 

Out of all the Assassins, Shay stood out the most to him. Why did he die? The only one to not die in the purge...because he took his own life? For visions? Chanting? Voices...What happened during this purge? Why did everyone die?

And what did this Phantom have to do with it?

Arno managed to find Sophie alone later on that evening in the booth that she usually kept to herself in.

“Sophie...Who is the Phantom?”

Sophie froze.

"Where have you heard that?"

"I have heard rumors about him," Arno said. 

“He is our failure.”

“He still lives? Is he the one who is killing the Assassins?”

“I don’t know. But even if he did...No, it is not like him,” Sophie said. “Whoever is killing our own is getting anyone less than a master.”

“But would he go after you?” 

“I would not let him get out alive,” Sophie said simply.

“Who is this Phantom?” Arno begged. “I need to know.”

“He is a cautionary tale. A tragedy. He…” Sophie let out a broken sigh. “He is what we could have avoided…Our heartbreak is shared, Arno. Despite the seas across all of us. He is a monster of the Colonies. Please. Do not bring him up again.”

Arno wanted to press on more. But he could see the bags under Sophie’s eyes. How the hair she normally kept well done was barely in a braid. How tired she was. Please find out who killed my daughter.

“Oui, madame,” Arno nodded. “I won’t mention it again.”

But that didn’t mean Arno was not going to look into it further on his own anyway.

The water was scalding, so perfect against all the sore muscles in Arno’s body. So perfect against his soul. His brain ached. His temples did too. He managed to find some tied bunches of lavender in a jar, the aroma so perfect in the warmth of the bath as he filled it up, each bucketful warmer than the last. 

The clean towels were warmed up in a smaller pot, though he was vigilant that he didn’t accidentally boil it. 

In a gentleness to himself he did not know he possessed, he leaned back against the warmed up towels he had placed in the corner of the bathtub. The side that got some of the fireplace, some of the lights from the window. Still overcast, still cold. But the shade from the partition against the principal door helped muffle it. 

Even closing his eyes ached. 

But this would help. 

Adi walked in as Arno was dozing.

“Oh, my love, I am so sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Arno mumbled with a smile. 

“You sure?”

“Mm.” Arno motioned to come near him to sit on the stool next to him.

"How was your day?"

"Long," Adi sighed. "But it got better. Now that I am here."

"Likewise."

Adi noted some candles being snuffed out.

"Migraine?"

Arno nodded. "Unfortunately," he sighed. "But the bath helps a lot. Same with the towels...It is a wonderful method to have learned when I was very young."

Adi reached up to gently brush some hair off his forehead. Arno did not wince, for once. It felt good, especially with the slow circles against Arno's right temple; the side of his head that always ached the most with his migraines. 

“That feels so nice,” Arno sighed. 

Adi continued. The gentle movements, the gentle presses against his temple.

Arno was so tired. But he still…nothing would change. It will always be them, in the end. No matter what. Then when the city was burning, when the dead were spilling into the streets, and they were trying to give closure to a mausoleum that was under their feet and never ending. It will always be him he would reach out for. 

The hand that massaged his temple slid down by Arno's own grip. To which Arno kissed the inside of his wrist.

There was nothing about signals being mixed or lost in translation in their unspoken way about this; they loved each other. They felt something so deep for one another. Adi was always smiling with the other assassins, loud laughter and banter. But he did not share the bed with them like he did with Arno. Did not meet Arno's gazes with such warmth.  

Nothing like this.

Adi closed his eyes and as Arno kissed his wrist again. But Arno could see the heaviness Adi's breath. Could feel his hand trembling. Could hear the bitten off gasp escape Adi's throat.

“Come here,” he said gently. “Come closer to me.”

Funny how all their worlds were falling to pieces. Yet there they were. In their world only with the water against his skin feeling boiling now at Adi’s touch.

“Where?”

“Here,” Arno motioned to the water. “If you wan---”

Adi let go of his hand and immediately began to undo his robes. 

Arno focused on how he did it, so he would know for the future. He let his clothing - all of it - drop to the ground, next to Arno’s.

“Gods, I hope the water doesn’t spill.”

“It won’t,” Arno said. “I think...And there really is one way to find out.”

Adi slid into the water carefully, mindful of not making any spill. He settled into it with a hiss, one with the temperature of the water being boiling. Practically, even. Adi splashed some water against his face. 

Arno reached out and kissed him. For once in Arno’s life, this kiss was not rushed. The gentle kisses that followed one another. It was Adi that relented with the slight part of his lips first. Finally…

He kissed him again. The hand on his chest was so gentle. 
 
But he kept kissing him, so gently. No real pressure to heighten the scale. He was so mindful of Arno's migraine. But Arno craved for more. So much more that he still could not imagine was actually happening.

Somehow, this felt more heated, yet not than anything kiss Arno has felt before. Even though Adi was only touching his chest and kissing him. Even though they were without any clothes, in the same tub, it was more heated than being touching each other in between sheets.  Maybe it was because it was not rushed. Maybe it was because it was Adi and anything Adi did to him felt too good.

Maybe it was because it was Adi.

Arno felt his own hands drift to Adi’s waist and pull him closer atop him. 

He knew the motions of this now.

Arno bit at Adi’s lip and the way Adi moaned was beautiful. Arno could taste some sweetened fruit that he had earlier, one that he saw in the kitchen. Arno made the kiss slightly deeper. He knew Adi was trying not to hurt his head more. 

“I am not made of glass, my love,” Arno murmured. Though it was bitten off with a moan when Adi kissed his throat. 

“I know, sweet thing.”

Oh god. Arno didn’t know he was into that.

"I'm just trying to make this kiss last, that is all," Adi said. 

Then Adi leaned to his neck. Biting just as gently as before, but the occasional roughness slipping between each kiss. Don’t hold yourself back, is what Arno wanted to beg. Arno enjoyed some roughness. He wanted him so bad.

But he didn’t want more than just his kisses tonight. 

"I'm just trying to make you be undone."

"You're succeeding."

Adi leanded down onto his chest, where the water barely covered him. Gentle kisses trailed along. Then he picked it up a bit more, bringing him impossibly closer. Flush.

Arno's hand found his way to Adi's hair. He had to be gentle too. "Don't stop,"  his voice was shaky, hands unsteady as he touched his skin. His fingers curled into his hair, the same grip he would have on his own sheets on the colder nights he slept alone. Alone, yet thinking of him. Alone, yet whispering his name, breathless.

He loosened the grip a little. He didn't want to hurt Adi. 

“I have wanted this for so long.” Arno sighed softly and held Adi to him. Yet, even then, Adi didn’t put his entire weight on him. 

“I have too. Tell me where you want my touch.”

Everywhere. 

“I would want you everywhere, but tonight, I just want your kiss. Ki--” Arno felt another at his throat. “Your kisses.”

“Bon,” Adi murmured. Good. “Of course. I am yours. Yours only.”

“I wish I could do more,” Arno said. “For you.”

“My love, do not worry. You do not have to do anything you are not ready for,” Adi reassured. “If a kiss is what you need, a kiss is what you will have. Or kisses, in this”

“And what do you need?”

“Just you. Only you, however you want me.”

“I do want you. I want more, but my head is killing me,” Arno whined.  

“And that is okay. My love, more moments for us will come,” Adi murmured. Then he kissed his lips so gently.  

Then Arno yawned. 

Adi burst out laughing.

“Oh my god,” Arno mumbled. He sank lower into the warm water of the bathtub. “Oh my god…”

Adi continued laughing into Arno’s neck.

“Stop laughing!”

Adi continued laughing harder against his neck. 

“Adair!” Arno splashed at him with water. “Stop laughing!”

“It was funny!”

Arno was mortified. There was no way this was happening to him. There was no possible way. Right? Right?

“Come here,” Adi said. And kissed him, though it was between laughs. Then he broke the kiss. “You need to go to bed. We will have more time,” Adi said. “We will make time for ourselves. But you--” he pressed another kiss to his jaw. “You need to sleep.” Though he was hiding his smile then. Smug. 

Arno couldn't help his embarrassment. He was tired!

“Goddamn it!”

Adi reached up with the wooden bowl that was floating around the water and poured some water upon himself. 

“Okaaaay. Wow. Holy shit. This feels amazing. Smells amazing too. So....First,” Adi said. “I think I can enjoy this water some more with you.” 

He almost turned to leaned on the opposite direction when Arno reached out for him and brought him to him. 

"I get the message," Adi smiled. He leaned back onto Arno's chest and sighed.

“You can lean back,” Arno said. “It's a migraine. Not a backache."

"Not the kind of ache I want to give you."

"Adi." Arno kissed at his shoulder. "Stop."

"I'm just saying...." Adi said softly, though he was smothering a laugh. Arno kissed at his temple to try to keep him quiet, but failed. Arno felt the tension loosen at the familiarity of Adi's body. One he slept next to for the past few nights, but somehow felt much longer than that. 

Adi hummed and leaned his head back on one shoulder. "Just for a little while longer. Then we are going to sleep."

Chapter Text

How was it that they were somehow naked in the bath, yet it was the most tender thing that Adi has ever felt?

It had taken only the water to grow cold for them both to leave the bathtub and dry up. He was still chilly.

Adi stroked Arno's drying hair. It was still messy. So messy. His hair was longer than it had been since Adi remembered. Not that Arno bothered much to do with it; he just brushed and untangled the strands, put it in a hair tie and continued with his day.

But now, even brushing his hair caused much pain. He noticed Arno's winces when he tried to comb out the tangles after the bath. Something about his hand pulsing…his nerves burning. His arms were still in pain, as they had apparently been all day. 

Adi didn't want to even try to think about how his nerves ached so much too.

“How warped is it that somehow, we will still manage to wake up at the crack of dawn?” Adi mumbled.

He knew it was near midnight, from when he had seen the clock before getting out of the bath. Exhaustion had tugged on his bones all day and night. But this has helped. Arno kissing him. Hands roaming. Adi feeling to relaxed. Pleasure that Adi thought he was so undeserving of. He did not deserve good things in this life is what he always told himself. But now, it felt a little more different otherwise.

Then Arno changed that. Kiss after kiss, roaming hands. This was more intimate than sex. His moans, learning what made him smile. How so badly, Adi wanted to know what it was like to taste his own name from Arno's lips, but they were both too exhausted. Too drained. The days had been long, the pains much longer.

But now Arno was in his arms, not letting go of him.

“Maybe one day, we will sleep past dawn,” Adi said with a small kiss to Arno's chest.

“Oh, we will,” Arno said. “Trust me…Once this migraine is gone…” he traced Adi’s jaw with his thumb. “You will enjoy plenty of sleepless nights with me. But sex with a migraine is not a fun time.”

Adi kissed at his thumb. “I thought orgasms relieve pain.” 

“They usually do, for most,” Arno said. “But I am, unfortunately, not part of that population!”

“Oh, my gods.”

“Yep!" Arno said, too cheerfully to mean it. 

“If you do not mind me asking..,what causes your migraines?”

"First, you can ask me anything. And second, well...about the cause. I....hope you don't judge me."

“I could never.”

Arno let out a heavy sigh. Maybe he was skeptical.

“Well. Here goes nothing. And...Okay. I have…this extra sense. An extra sight. I can see through walls. I can hear…too much. Part of it can cause migraines."

The word was at the tip of his tongue...

“Like Altair,” Arno said. 

And the word was enough. Adi let out a gentle gasp. The realization hit him at once. 

“The Vision of the Eagle?”

“Yes,” Arno said. 

“Since when?”

“I...honestly do not know. But I do remember it since I was six years old,” Arno said. “The migraines? Since I was twelve. A little after my father’s death. My old man knew, but he never said anything to anyone else. The convulsions…I think when I was nineteen. The migraines are weekly.”

“Do you know where it comes from?”

“Not at all,” Arno said. "I don't know if my father had it. Or it was my mother. But all I know is that it sucks. So much. And then there's Bellec."

"What about him?"

“ When I was in the Bastille, Bellec pushed me to use it a lot. Every day, at times. I ended up in the infirmary more than most. Bloody noses, what have you, but I always had it ‘attributed’ to being punched in the nose.” Arno wrinkled his nose. "Which was not too good for my money maker…"

“It paid off,” Adi said. “The broken nose…So rugged and handsome.”

Arno rolled his eyes. “You say that at the cost of my pride…” his voice quieted. But he felt a little more at ease now with Adi’s reaction. “I lied to Bellec and told him I lost my link to it when I saw him again. After my ceremony, when I woke up. I made myself indispensable in this brotherhood. But I think that is the only reason he hasn’t pestered me about it.”

I wish I could find answers without being in so much pain. I wish I could be of use. But my brain is broken. My life has fallen apart. I think both my fathers were murdered by the same killer, but I have no guide on where to start.

“Thank you for trusting me with this, my love. Is there any way I can help?”

“You listened. That’s more than enough,” Arno said. 

“I would do anything,” Adi said. He leaned closer and kissed him again. Now that he knew how that felt, he could never get enough. “You are everything,” Adi said even softer. 

“Thank you,” Arno said. He closed his eyes as Adi leaned up to embrace him in return. “Thank you…” He turned to kiss him.

“Are you going to yawn this time?” Adi teased. 

“You’re never going to let that go,” Arno groaned. 

“Not at all,” Adi said. The candle was blown out. “Sweet dreams.”

Arno hummed and his breathing eased out.

The dream began how it always began. Confusing. Pain. Pain. But now, Arno found himself outside the bastille. Burning and shouting, fire. 

A woman's voice was yelling above the crowd. Old French, with the clanging of shields and of spears. But all Arno could do was walk around. Watch. 

Then there was the woman.

Cropped red hair, with armor that reached to her neck. She radiated power. Anger. Power. 

A sword in one hand, the shield on her other arm. It was a triumphant victory, as what Arno could tell. A golden sword, a vicious shout. Victory. Victory. 

Then it hit him.

Is that Jeanne d'Arc?

Chapter Text

"Yves! Are you drunk?!"

"Maybe?!"

The woman slapped him.

"Yves Dorian! Get your shit together! It's bad enough that you were asleep."

"I was ASLEEP?!"

"And now you feign ignorance?! Fils de putain!"

"Uh---" What did he call her? "Jean--"

"Jehanne!" She snapped out. 

"Mon captaine...?" This didn't make sense.

Did Jehanne d'Arc just slap me?!

"Pick up a fucking sword or I will throw you over that fucking wall!"

"Uh---" Arno recovered at the fact that a personal hero just slapped his ancestor. An ancestor? "Oui, mon capitaine." He would not argue. This is a dream. Yet another weird dream.

"You are just as useless as your brother!"

"I have a brother?"

"Had, you jackass. He died!"

"Of what?"

"Of being stupid!"

"I told you he was asleep," the man snickered. 

Johanne rolled her eyes. "I prayed he was dead."

"We couldn't be so lucky to have two victories in one day."

Arno balked. What did Yves do to them?!

He had to find out more about whoever this man was. Yves Dorian of Versailles. He was French. And Jewish, if any of the eye rolls at him and insults meant anything and if anything of his father’s heritage meant anything too. He had a hidden blade under his sleeve. He looked like himself, which probably made sense either in a dream or in this---whatever it was. Whatever Yves was.

He held his palms up and saw the lines. Calloused, scarred, but his palms seemed to be intact. Was he……twenty-five?

Well, if this was a dream, might as well make it lucid. 

"Hey. How old am I?" Arno asked the man drinking an ale. 

"I don't know," the man sneered. "You're over your age limit of zero."

What the fuck is he even talking about?

"That does not explain much."

"You don't either."

What on earth did Yves do to everyone? Did he fuck their wives? Or their men? Or both ?

Gauging by the interactions---

Oh my god, I'm a slut.

Well. Apparently, he was a Dorian. Not much of nobility. But still definitely a player.  Huh. Arno was actually proud of that. Not bad, not bad.

This dream was already unusual as it was. He found Jea---Johanne, as she sat at the bar by herself. He needed answers as to what was going on. But he just...stood next to her at the bar. She stared at him.

"Is this seat taken?"

Good one dumbass, that is Johanne d'Arc. 

"It is now," Johanne said. Irritated. But she did not push him away.

He still….kind of sat down anyway.

"Well, what do you want?"

"Uh, give an apology?"

"Oh, for sleeping during a war?" Johanne asked. "For being hungover for the third day straight? Too late for that....Okay. Look. I know you miss your brother. We all do. He was a nice person."

Wait, Yves had a brother?

"I don't remember how he died," Arno said. And he meant it.

"I do not blame you," Johanne said. “It was not a clean death.”

"How bad was it?"

Johanne hesitated.  "It was bad enough. So much blood. But y ou of all should understand why this war matters now," Johanne said. "For what you believe in."

A Jew?

"And for who you love."

A bisexual Jew?

“And for who we fight for too.”

Then he saw the hidden blade on her wrist that matched his own.

A bisexual Jewish assassin?

"I…know." Though Arno had doubts on what he knew in whatever this was. 

"But I will say this; your strategy did work in the ambush. You made the incorrect equation, but still got a good result."

"...Merci."

"And I….apologize. About your dead brother. I forgot."

"It is alright. I forgot too," Arno said. But he smiled at the small comment of some humanity. And some context...to whatever his mind had going on.

Arno woke to kisses across his back. Not to a battlefield. Not to a bar. A rough palm covered his hand. Soft kisses across his neck, the slight scratch of a beard.

That was right.

Adi.

Okay. Okay. The dream is forgotten. He had to put it on hold for now. Because  this reality was much better. The dream was put aside. If he could get through all he has gone through, he can do this now. 

How telling that he is immediately quietly putting the most unnerving dream aside when he woke up to Adi’s kisses. Arno had priorities. And the main one other than himself was always going to be Adi.

And the fact that it was mutual was a very good one. Adi’s hand went to his chin to turn it towards him. 

“Good morning,” Adi greeted.

“Good morning, my love.”

Adi leaned in and kissed him. 

“Mm,” Arno sighed. “Just like clockwork.”

“And right before dawn.” 

Arno turned onto his side and met Adi’s smile with his own. He kissed him. Softly. Gently. With their wandering hands with not-so-innocent touches, with soft sighs turning to moans. Arno’s skin burned in the best way possible.

It made it easier that they were not dressed already; that of course, clothes were immediately forgotten after the bath. They had too much pent-up tension to waste another moment. Last night, they were too tired to do anything more, even though they were ready for it. 

The excuse was exhaustion. But now? They were both fully awake. And extremely aware of each other’s body against their own. 

Adi felt him up, hand curling into Arno's hair and tilting his head at a better angle. His tongue parted Arno's lips. 

“Get on top,” Adi murmured as he barely managed to pull his lips away.

“Okay,” Arno obeyed. So quickly and simply. Of course, his hair brushed against Adi’s eye, to which Adi tried to bat away. Adi scrunched his nose as it happened, only to have some strands in his mouth. 

"Smooth," Adi said as he pushed them out the way. 

“Oh, shut up,” Arno said as Adi snickered. He reached into his bedside table and pulled out the drawer. There was a hair tie he knew was there and he felt around for. And he could not find it. “Damn it, I swear I had a hair tie in here somewhere---”

Gently, his hair was gathered by Adi’s hand. 

“Would this work instead?” Adi asked innocently.

Oh. Arno knew this and what it meant. Many times, he had been in this position. But never like this.

“Y-yes,” Arno shuddered. He forgot he was into that, into how the pleasure only got more heated. “It does.”

He liked this feeling. And he trusted Adi so much. The grip did not turn tighter, so tight that it went to a yank, like some previous partners did with him. Good. Arno was tender headed and the last thing he wanted was more pain. 

But Adi gripped his hair with caution, but with definite intent of leading. 

“Good,” Adi said coyly and tugged him back into a bruising kiss. Arno tilted his head as he did, letting his feelings sink deeper. He fully straddled Adi now. He felt Adi’s moan as it reverberated against his throat. Arno continued to pepper his neck with kisses. 

It was not so often that words failed Arno like this.  He would give this man the world if he could. And he will, one way or another. 

“Oh gods,” Adi moaned out as Arno grinded down onto him. He was fully hard now, fully a mess. Neck arched against his pillow. He tried to get more friction, an act that did not go unnoticed by Arno. 

Oh, they were both enjoying this.

“How does it feel?” Arno whispered against his ear.  

“Good,” Adi could barely say. “Keep going.”

The sheet was thrown aside as Arno moved down between Adi's legs. 

“Just like that, just like that, mon coeur. You are doing so good,” Arno praised. Voice breathless and shaky. His pace is nearly breaking. 

God, Arno had to hold on somehow. He was almost losing control too.

“Fuck,” Adi said with a gasp. “Arno, please… ”

“Not yet,” Arno said. “Let me taste you first.”

He could taste each other as they finally came down from the high. From the relief and warmth. They caught their breath.

“I take it you feel better,” Adi said with a laugh.

His smile was so kind. There was a glow to him, the kind of affection that was just him. Part of him. Granted, they both just had sex that was so long overdue and it felt great . 

And Arno laughed. He could not catch his breath as he did. 

“Much better,” Arno murmured against Adi’s neck. He felt sweat on his brow. 

Adi brushed some of Arno’s hair back and kissed his forehead. The weight was comfortable, the warmth even better. This was a pleasure. 

This was living. 

God, he was never going to get tired of this.

He leaned up to kiss Adi, tasting himself. He sighed into it. Let himself sink into this feeling that was simply Adi. 

The outside world could wait. But for now, they both relished in the few moments before they had to get out of bed. At least now, Arno could enjoy this. But he will steal more moments. 

No matter what.

Even if it meant another one now...

"Ugh, I need to look presentable," Adi said as Arno buttoned up his shirt. They (finally) made a bed with fresh sheets and put the evidence of morning sex in a hamper.

 Considering…It had taken a long time for it to happen before they got more and more distracted. More bites. More kisses. 

Arno adjusted Adi's collar. 

"I think Brasseur is back in his room now. Unless he got drunk again last night."

"Again," Adi said. He pulled on his pants from the previous night. It would have to do, for now. He is no stranger to a walk of shame, even if it was in a tiny stair ladder from the library.

“Wear your red robe, ” Arno said. “It looks…so good on you.”

“I thought you didn’t want distractions,” Adi said. "But, I will oblige."

He walked up the stairs. 

And found Brasseur asleep in his bed. Completely asleep. His hair was tied up in a loose bun that was already halfway gone. 

Then he looked and saw a bundle of white cotton mixed with wax pressed into his ear.

Did he wear fucking ear plugs?!

Did he know?!

He seemingly was caught in the rain the previous night, if the stretched out clothing on the desk, chair and hanger meant anything. Brasseur was snug and comfortable sleeping. He awoke when the sun was a little brighter anyways.

Adi had too many questions for his burning face and his quiet footsteps that turned worse. He grabbed his red robes; tinged in velvet with a high collar that he needed.

He….slowly walked to his dresser and got his clothes and boots. And quietly walked out and replaced the sheet.

"Well, you look like you saw a ghost."

"I might as well have," Adi said. "Brasseur is upstairs."

"What?"

"He was asleep. And he was wearing ear plugs made of wax and cotton."

Then Arno burst out laughing. 

"Shh! I don't mind our friends knowing. But Brasseur hearing us fucking?" Adi asked. Mortified of embarrassment. "Arno, stop laughing!"

"It is funny," Arno said with a smile. He kept trying to hold in his laughter. And he smothered it into Adi's neck.  "Adi."

"What is it?"

"Red looks good on you," Arno said with a smile as he pressed his hands on Adi's collar.

"Does it now?"

"It does," Arno replied. His hands gripped the lapels of Adi's robes. Each detail, each texture. He could not get enough.  He met him up in a kiss. Adi sighed into it, his arm around Arno's waist. And then pulled him closer by the hips. 

"We just got dressed," Arno said to Adi, voice already shaky. "By my god, do you look so good in this…"

Adi looked at Arno and swallowed. Their bed was right there…

"What if we skip breakfast?" Adi asked.

"Skip breakfast? But we already had breakf---" Arno tried to say it but failed with laughter.

Adi laughed, and he tried to smother it. "Stop making me laugh!" he said. But he failed. "That was horrible!"

"I will bore you, then," Arno said. A kiss pressed against his lips. "I will go on and on and on---" he kept kissing Adi.  "But...we should go downstairs."

"We will make time," Adi said to him. Earnest. 

Adi kissed Arno one final time and held his hand. 

And only let go when they walked into the hallway together.

So far, no one. So far, nothing. 

"Bonjour!" Brasseur greeted brightly as he slapped down onto Arno and Adi's shoulders. 

Arno and Adi both jumped. 

"Hey," Arno choked out. "How was your night?" 

“I was out and about," Brasseur said. 

“How did you sleep?”

“I slept like a rock last night," Brasseur said with a grin. "And you?"

"Very well."

Adi elbowed Arno.

"Let me see if the coffee is ready," Adi managed to say as he excused himself.

Adi went to the kitchen, slyly. Trying to escape as subtly as he could.

Arno accepted defeat. Brasseur knew.

"What color do you want for your door?" Arno asked. 

"Dark blue."

"Got it."

Brasseur winked at him at him and clapped his shoulder one more time and left.

"Excuse me," Élise said, though her voice was struggling to re-adapt to the English language. She stood out as it was. A lot. Red hair, French. Walking with confidence rather than shrinking away. “Where is the Kenway estate?”

“Oh, you haven't heard.” A grocery store owner exclaimed.

“Haven't heard what?”

“The estate burned. With Lady Jennifer in it, God rest her soul.”

"What?" Élise asked. "When?!"

"About seven months ago. Late January."

So, after Élise had visited. After she hid from Arno as best, she could, before he set off to return to France upon finishing his final projects in months. She remembered his laughter in that pub as he enjoyed youth. His youth. The better years of his life and the fact that she missed out on them due to all this bullshit. 

“What of her brother, Master Kenway?”

“Gone.”

“Gone?”

“Gone. Died in the Colonies during the rebellion,” the man said. "Are you friends of the Kenways?"

"...Yes," Elise said. Though it was a lie, kind of. Jennifer told her to stop hunting. To let the revenge and past die and to move on. And she gifted her the necklace. To see if she maybe could change the moral weight of it. But she looked to the ashes of the estate that was once grand and stunning. "I suppose I was."

Then Arno visited for his things. And of course, promptly three hours later. Her mother came home.

“Well?”

“Mama!” Élise sprinted to her and hugged her firmly. 

“You’ve gained weight.”

Funny; Élise noticed that she lost it. 

“I heard about your father,” her mother said. “And that his spawn was the one who did it.”

Arno did not kill their father. He loved him too much. Arno did not kill. There was no possible way at all.  But she believed it at first. She spewed hate at him. Sheer venom as she snarled at him that she did not believe him. That he was a killer. Her brother is no more. Spite, venom.

“About the family plot...I had him buried next to Charles.”

The truth was admitted aloud. Élise knew it was his final wish, as he often said it. As he often reminded both Élise and Arno when the alcohol got too heavy and his heartbreak took the mantle.

“It’s what was in his will,” Elise tried to protest.

“You…buried your father next to that disgusting whore?”

“Mama,” Élise tried to speak.

“What a disgrace you are.”

“He put it in his will,” Élise pleaded. “I wanted to respect his wishes.”

“Respect? Your father lacked it,” her mother said. “And before you ask, no. I did not have him killed. I would have not bothered to spill his blood. Too kind of me, really.”

"I followed everything that he ordered in his will that he signed by the law under the authority of the King--”

“King? What King? There is no more order anymore, Élise!” her mother spat. "Can't you see the state of the world outside, girl?"

“I followed his wishes---And he wanted to be buried next to Charles."

“Next to his concubine. Next to his whore. Next to the sodomite."

Élise tried to get past the lump in her throat. 

“It's disgusting, it really is. And shameful.”

It already was a long day and now this? This hurt too much.

“You have really let everything fall apart here Élise . I expected better of you. Look at the state of this place,” her mother said. 

“I've been trying to communicate with the rest of the order on what to do with the revolution.”

“You are not to be part of the High Order, Élise ,” her mother said. “We went over this at the failure of the soiree. I still cannot believe that even now with the spawn gone you followed your father's wishes.”

So a Templar, stripped of her nobility in the rank she could be by birthright. 

The lump in her throat kept shaking and at least knew that this was it, that this was the last time her mother would see her in any form of dignity or with respect that the little she already had was already gone, especially after London, especially now. 

Élise gripped her mug so tight that she could feel the ceramic burning her palm. 

“I don’t regret it.”

Arno was right; he went through so much while under their roof, and she did nothing. Nothing. The reality of it weighed on her as much as the memories of two fathers gone seared into her skull did. She needed to change it. She needed to do something. Two fathers are gone. A brother is gone. Her own soul is gone.

Her mother glared at her.

“What did you say?”

“I don’t regret it,” Élise said. A tear spilled down onto the table. Her mother was going to kill her. 

All of the weight of the worlds she lived in, between her life and her soul and trying to fathom so much violence and death, was only getting worse because now there was more violence to it. Physical with blood in the streets and in the walls of their home what used to be home.

"I don't regret burying my fathers together," Elise said. She looked at her mother. "I don't regret any of it. And you...you should have not been so..."

Elise could not breathe. Arno inherited half the estate and wanted nothing of it. He gave it to her; all of it. It made sense to not want the house you were so brutally abused in; the walls held the noise. The bad spirits. The weight of trauma. Arno running, Arno hiding. Elise biting down her tears on her knuckle.

To this day, she still had the marks. It was her worst habit.

Arno was right. She did nothing.

"I shouldn't have been so what, Elise?" her mother taunted. "Demanding? Commanding? Righteous?"

"Cruel!" Elise finally cried out. "You should have not been so cruel to Arno."

I regret nothing , Élise had kept telling herself over and over after she stood at the burial by herself, next to a grave keeper who asked no questions. I regret nothing.   I miss you, I miss you, I'm so sorry. I regret nothing. I miss you. I miss you both. I failed you. I failed Arno. 

“Aita, asko sentitzen dut. Huts egin nuen. Huts egin nuen. Huts egin nuen,” Élise’s voice trembled as she said the words in her first language. Apologies, over and over.

The sobs poured down as she saw the buried grave. The gravekeeper simply said nothing; he was used to this. She thought about Adi, the one who stood with her for forty five minutes as she sobbed at Amie’s grave. How Adi stayed; and how the gravekeeper kept his silence. Two different forms of respect. Élise did not want to talk to anyone now.

And how Adi stayed with Arno the entire time he was there to gather his belongings. How he held him close. How he was there, to the end.

Élise knew about the relationship between her father and Charlie; she had found out when she saw her father cry for the first time in her entire life. A few months after the burial, on what would have been Charles’ birthday. When she finally understood the context behind her mother’s fights with him, why they slept in separate bedrooms…It was only then that she knew about how much Charles meant to him. 

To Arno, her mother was dead to him. Dead of an illness, he always said. The illness being hatred.

There was so much more to it that meant the eye and she knew how happy her father was when it came to him. How his face lit up how there was always something special. There was no sin in love. Never at all. 

"You lack the Templar ways."

Élise reached up for her necklace, the past gift that Jennifer Kenway gave her and slammed it on the table.

“Then I am not a Templar, much less your daughter no more.”

Even though she left all of Arno’s things in his bedroom, she packed her things too. Old canvasses and sketch books, filled to the brim with drawings that she always did in her spare time. Arno liked reading, dancing and mathematics. She loved drawing. Painting.

She would forget that part of herself. Force herself to.

Who was she now? 

Arno’s eyes were red when he confronted her about the burial. This was her fault. She let this happen.

She packed her things for the final ride out of Versailles. The last time she would call home. Her apartment in Paris was still there. It was time to return. To ask more questions, to figure out what is going on.

To try to find Arno and make amends when she was ready for it.

Annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd she got drunk and lost the key to her house.

There was a concerned young man. 

“What do you want?” Élise snapped.

Only to see a young man. Maybe a few years older than her. Blonde hair, kind eyes. And…absolutely concerned.

“Erm…Bonjour, mademoiselle,” he greeted. Accent French but definitely not Parisian. “I heard crying.”

“Yeah? Well, too bad. You got the wrong person.”

“Okay,” the young man said. But she knew him. He wore his robes…

“Did Arno send you?” Elise accused.

Then... “Oh! You’re his sister.”

The fact that he still calls her sister made her cry even harder.

"Yes," Elise said. She sniffled. "Shut up, go away!"

“My name is David Brasseur. But I go by Brasseur, mainly,” Brasseur said. “I do not wish to disturb you, but I just want to help you.”

"I know what you are," Elise said. Tried to size herself up. She was drunk and upset, and it was almost one in the morning.

"And I know who you are," Brasseur said. "You are locked out of your house."

"And how can I trust you?"

He removed his robes, along with his weapon belt and there was just him. A young man her age, handsome. In a knitted sweater with a hidden chain under his shirt. She wondered what the necklace was. She did not wear hers anymore. She was so drunk. And locked out. And she wanted to die.

So. She admitted defeat.

“I’m locked out,” Élise said. “Can you pick the lock for me?”

“Of course,” Brasseur said. And he did.

He helped her inside and guided her up the stairs. Closed the windows and curtains and locked the front door with more deadbolts from the inside. It was not much; but it will do. She needed to get the lock replaced anyway. 

Elise was getting dressed upstairs in her room as Brasseur secured the entrances and windows. He was not quite sure what to do; there was a very drunk and heartbroken Templar upstairs and there he was - a very weary veteran who cannot bear to see anyone in pain. And he redressed in all his gear. His hidden blades. Everything.

Maybe bread would help her in the morning. He thought of his hangover cure. So he picked the fresh food he could find and left it for her.

He went upstairs to exit through the window. It was the only way for now.

"Why are you helping me?" Elise asked.

Because you are in pain.

"I heard crying. I went to see why."

The expression across Elise's features was something new. Something that he had seen too many times before when someone saw kindness for the first time. It broke him every time it happened.

And he never imagined it would happen with the stepsister of his best friend who had him incarcerated for being accused of murder. 

"But I am a Templar," Elise said. Voice full of pain.

Oh god. This was bad. Not as in a bad-bad-he-might-die, but bad as in...Elise was as heartbroken as Arno was. Not heartless, as he had imagined, from the stories Arno talked to him about. The apple orchard. 

But he always got a little bit sad when he mentioned her.

"And what about it, my dear?" Brasseur said with kindness. "It does not change anything."

It was all he would say on the subject. 

"I hope you get some rest," he said to her in sincerity and left through the window.

Chapter Text

Lola invited over Therese's mother to try to see if anything could be done to help with the funeral. And so far...nothing could be done. Sophie was grieving. Grieving in the worst way a mother could be. There was never a word for a mother who lost their child. Always a word for widow and widowers in the deaths of a spouse. But never one for the pain a mother went through in losing their child. 

She knew Sophie was an Assassin. She also knew that Shay still resided in Paris.  And she also knew that Arno was a Sage.

“They killed my daughter.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“They just--”

“They think it was the Phantom.”

“It was not. He works the docks and provides for his family and for our orphanage,” Lola insisted.

“I know. I know,” Sophie nodded. “But there are suspicions. Fears, if anything. That he is back and forgive me for what I am about to say,” Sophie began. “But I am starting to not believe that.”

“He has changed,” Lola said. “For the better.”

“I take your word for it,” Sophie said. “Forgive me for the abruptness.”

“No, I understand. It is…”

“Complicated.”

“Yeah. That’s uh…Yeah.” Lola could not blame her at all. Grief somehow ripped all words that they could possibly describe for the state of their world now. And the loss of someone so kind in her life. “I am sorry Sophie. I have no words.”

“Good. I hope you never know the words to the feeling that I am feeling now,” Sophie said. “I have to act indifferent in the eyes of the rest of the council, or else I will be deemed too emotional. I have to act cold--cold as ice--less I be deemed inept. I have to be unfeeling and not show pain lest I be called unfit. And I have to act as if Therese is my daughter of choice and not of birth…I'm sorry, Lola, that I've come to lament.”

Before Lola could say anything, Erin began to babble.

"She's finally awake," Lola said. She stood up and went to Erin's bassinet. "Come on. Go say hi." 

"Oh," Sophie sighed fondly. "Look at her. May I?”

"Of course," Lola let her hold Erin. As she had on the first day she was born. A baby born in an orphanage. The children excited, Sophie excited. Therese overjoyed.

“Hi,” Sophie greeted Erin. She held out her finger to her and laughed lightly as she gripped it tight. "Look at you," she sniffled. "How big she's gotten."

To think this was her when Therese was this age. To think...

And of course, Shay.

“Keep your hands away from my daughter.”

“Shay, put your fucking gun away,” Lola said. Rolled her eyes. “Meet Madame Sophie Trenet. A longtime friend. So put your fucking gun away.”

“I know who she is. And…sorry,” Shay said. Though he didn’t even mean it. He put away the weapon.

“Sure,” Sophie said. Though her voice is still flat. Defeated. She soothed down Erin’s back. "I guess it is time for me to go."

"No, please," Lola pleaded. Shit. Shit. All of this went to hell, so fast. “Sofi, you don’t have to go.”

“It’s fine,” Sophie said with a wry smile. “I already imposed enough. I have more arrangements to take care of."

Sophie did not meet Lola's expression of sheer shock. She watched as she kissed Erin's forehead and lightly stroked her hair one last time as farewell. 

She handed Erin back to Lola.

"Merci mon ami. For your time. For the coffee." Sophie nodded. "I will let you know when the final arrangements are ready. We have Arno preparing them at the moment. Considering..."

"Everything."

"Oui." Sophie nodded. She bid her farewell. 

“Lola…”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Lola snarled.

“These are assassins.”

"That was Therese's mother!"

“What?! You know she is on the Council?!”

“Yes, yet again, not worth the fucking mention,” Lola said. “Shay, these are my friends.”

“Assassins.”

“Friends! Friends!” Lola stated. “Sophie spends time with us in the orphanage! I know her from there. And need I remind you that you are watching out for the son of an Assassin friend of yours out of guilt? If the remnants of the Parisian assassins are so bad as you say, then why remain? Then why watch for Arno, who has a good life for himself and is protected by Madame Trenet? You held a gun out to my friend that was holding our daughter!”

"Gun was empty."

"Liar! A friend, who is grieving for the death of her daughter,” Lola stated. “And guess what? Arno is looking into you. He thinks that you are behind the Assassin murders. And can you blame them? Shay, they’re scared ,” Lola said. “Therese was a midwife and she took care of an orphanage. A fucking orphanage and yet you are telling me she is not worth looking into because she is an assassin. She got murdered and her mother is upset.”

“Of course she is, it's her mother.”

“And you do not care that Arno is suspecting of you.”

“That part of my life is done and over with,” Shay said.

"So, let's leave France."

Shay paused.

Lola let out a small scoff. Because of course she was right. Considering all that they went through in America and all they went through when Shay returned from Versailles in absolute shambles, in the worse state she had ever witnessed him in. He broke down. No words...nothing could describe what state she found him in. "That's what I thought. But this life? Our life? It is not here," Lola said. "Our family? It is here with me. Your wife. And our daughter, Erin. And the rest across the sea and the secrets are going to tear this world apart. But welcome to the consequences of your own actions."

"What else am I supposed to fuckin' do, Gracie?!" He exclaimed. "What else?! You think me unaffected at the fact that there is so many assassins getting murdered?" Shay asked. "You think me a heartless man made of stone that feels nothing?"

"You are not! But we need to try to do something!" Lola said. "Anything. So do what you do best; fight back. Forget that this is Assassins or Templars. Fuck all that! It's more than that. It's more than any of us. Please. We need to try. And we start with not keeping secrets anymore. On this side of the sea and the other."

The purge had consequences. It was something that changed everything. But the moment it all ended was after Versailles. After Versailles. 

Shay took a deep breath. 

"We will figure something out."

Chapter Text

Arno knew one thing for sure; there was never a dull day in the life of an Assassin.

Just like today.

1. Madame Charlotte was going into labor.
2. The storm was worsened while Augustine was at the docks for a new shipment of produce.
3. Adi was a nerve wreck.
4. And it was not even eleven in the fucking MORNING yet.

"Well, it looks like we are delivering a child."

"Mon dieu. Mon dieu! How do we do that?!" Adi exclaimed.

"Well, you went to college! Do you know?!"

“Yes, I went to college, theoretically. Anatomy! For embalming dead bodies!”

“And I went to college to build houses! You're the one with the most anatomical experience.”

“With the dead!” 

Arno flabbergasted. 

"Well---it's an experience all the same!"

"I am a mortician!" Adi exclaimed. "A mortician delivering a baby! Isn't that bad luck?!"

“Now you're the superstitious one?! Adair, please! I am begging you! You are all the chance that Charlotte has right now! Until Jerónimo and Brasseur bring back the doctor!”

Adi let out a long whine. He kept pacing.

"Bein. Fine. I have no other choice, now, don't I?!"

Arno held Adi's chin with his hand. "Repeat after me; I have this under control."

"I have this under control?” Adi asked, confused. 

"This is going to be okay."

"This is going to be okay?"

"I am qualified for this. Just until the mean time that the real physician gets here."

"I am? Qualified? For? This? Just until the real physician gets here?" Adi repeated, though not convinced at all.

"Adi! With confidence!"

“I am not confident in this! Am…Am I even qualified for this?”

“Adair! S’il vous plaît!” 

“Arno, I am a gravekeeper! Not a midwife!” Adi’s voice cracked in the effort to keep the whisper more hushed. “This is….this is not my area. I can’t do this.”

“Adi, I will be with you,” Arno insisted. “We just need to keep Charlotte safe and at the most comfort that we can.”

Adi let out a long whine.

“I….am….qualified?”

“Say it with confidence!” Arno pleaded. 

“I…am qualified….? Just until the mean time that the real physician gets here?”

"Good enough,” Arno said. "Come on!"

"Charlotte, my dear. We are going to do our best." Adi tried.

"Your best?!" Charlotte had snapped.

"You're doing great," Arno said. "Come on. Hold my hand as hard as you need to. You're going to be a great mother."

"I cannot breathe---"

"Breathe with me," Arno said tentatively. "In, and out. Little Augustina is going to be so happy to know she has an amazing mother. She is going to be so happy. You will too.”

Charlotte nodded. As best as she could. 

Ines pressed a cloth against her forehead. 

“I need Therese,” Charlotte sobbed. “I need her here.”

Sophie nodded. “I know,” she said. Fighting tears back herself. “I know.” She tucked back hair from her forehead. “I need her here too. But know that your daughter is going to be so proud to have you as a mother. So happy.”

“I need Therese,” Charlotte repeated. 

“It is going to be alright,” Adi said gently. “Trust my hands. Our care. We can do it. Therese is with our hearts now and I will not let her down.”

A healthy baby girl was born. Augustina Gouze. Healthy, loud, crying. Alive. And well.

“I’m so tired,” Augustine mumbled. “Oh my god.”

“I got her,” Arno said. “I’ll walk her around, let her get some air. You both need rest too.”

“You sure?”

“Of course.”

“Support her head…There we go.”

“Come here,” Arno murmured to the little one. Though he knew she probably did not hear him.

“Merci,” Augustine said softly.

“Of course.”

And the happy couple immediately passed out.

“You may be a day or so old but you do need some culture,” Arno said to Augustina. “Isn't that so?” 

Arno heard distant, so fairly distant gunshots. He stiffened. He looked out the window across the river, near Notre Dame. Last he had read, there were more and more riots. Yet the rest of the city was living between fear and normality. “Normal.” Kind of. 

Arno closed his eyes.

Arno soothed the back of Augustina and hummed a mindless tune to her. He rocked back and forth on the chair, his own gaze focused on the fire. It was weird to believe the past few days, how all of this had changed so fast. How he was holding a newborn in his arms that had fallen asleep as he walked her around the gallery of the Assassins history. Of the lineage she was born into.

Her tiny hand had gripped his thumb.

Shit. This is why he had to fight for answers. For justice. He…could not be so stuck in this world anymore. Not the world with so much pain.

He had the doubt that he could rock a baby to sleep. His nerves were on fire as it was. But he could not deny Charlotte anything, nor Augustine. He would never do that to them. 

But…Augustina calmed. Slowly. Arno had walked her around the room, first. Just to get her (and him) some air. He could feel the tiny weight of the little girl in his arms. To think she will grow one day to be as tall as him, if not taller. Augustine was the tallest one out of the Assassins. It was so odd to believe. 

Calm, quiet breathing that Arno could feel still. She had been awake when he first carried her, a little fussy, then she had settled quietly. But he walked around regardless.He showed her the different statues and paintings, focusing his mind on the little one in his arms and the paintings in front of him. 

The little one might not remember this, but it was still worth a memory to be made.

It was still something for him worth remembering.

“Just wait until you are older,” Arno said. “You know, Adi likes to draw. Maybe he will be able to draw you. And...I have a big sister, you know,” Arno said to his newborn little sister in his arms. “Elise. She likes to paint.”

He did not lie. He still had an older sister. And she did like to paint.

Now, he was laying on the couch, with the little baby asleep on his chest. Charlotte and Augustine were both resting.

He heard footsteps behind him as a door gently shut.

“Mon coeur,” Adi said quietly. And kissed Arno in greeting.

“Bonjour,” Arno smiled. He was still getting used to this. And he loved it.

“How is she?”

“Asleep still,” Arno said.

Adi slid onto the couch next to him and unfolded the duvet over the three of them. A small flicker of warmth.

“She is so precious,” Adi said gently.

“How are the parents?”

“Asleep. Steady recovery, more or less,” Adi said. “A lot of sleep from both of them. Are you alright?”

“I am. Actually.” For once, nothing was wrong. He could not believe he meant those words.

Adi curled up next to him on the couch and wrapped an arm around his elbow. He laid his hand atop of Arno’s and linked their hands together.

To think this might be us one day...

But Arno did not want to get ahead of himself. 

Adi was quiet. Too quiet.

“Adi? What’s wrong?” Arno asked. 

“I miss my parents.”

Arno gaped. 

“You have parents?”

The statement, like Arno’s question, was unexpected. 

Yet Adi laughed.

Arno tried to muster up an explanation.

“I do, actually,” Adi said. Still laughing. “I was not plucked from the graveyard garden, unlike what anyone else says. But yes, I do.”

This was the first time that Adi has ever mentioned his parents. 

All Brasseur had said was that Adi never talked about it. But never that his parents were alive or dead.

Funny that Adi had gone with Arno to his fathers’ graves and Arno just now found out about his parents.

“Are they gone?”

“No. They both live. I was just a terrible son,” Adi said. Though the smile was wry.

“What happened?”

“I broke down. I…tried to…I tried to keep going,” Adi said. “There was one burial I couldn’t process. A child. And it is not that I never buried one before.”

“The first one was when I was nine years old,” Adi said. “Classmate died of a vicious fever. Marcel.”

“You buried your own classmate when you were nine years old?”

“I was measured inside the casket too,” Adi said. “Same height and similar build. I was the average size for a casket. The majority of the time, I had to lay in so we could deem it fit for the ones who passed.”

He...

Adi just said that he was used to measure the sizes of child caskets back in his village by laying down in them. Arno did not know what to say.

“There are many more but the burial that broke me was of a child, smaller than Marcel was. Maybe about five years old. It was not a natural cause...A young girl. I tried to sow back the pieces that they found.”

Arno let out a soft sigh and went to hold Adi closer.

“My father was upset and he got angry with me for taking so long. Then something inside me just snapped. I yelled at my parents over something out of my control. Out of our controls. I felt great shame in the words I snarled. Venom... Called them horrible things. I was upset. My mother tried to console me. But I grabbed my things and I knew Brasseur from many years and I left to stay with him. Then well, I ended up here.”

Arno remembered the burial that had sent Adi into a spiral weeks prior. The casket was so small. How horrified Adi was about the entire night. 

And how horrified Adi was with Charlotte’s birth.

Shit. 

“I want to try to talk to them again. But I do not know if I can. Or if I ever will. I…” Adi choked up. “I go through their window when they are at the cemetery, working together. And I leave money for them in the chest we keep in our kitchen. Four years of me not being home…I don’t know if they want me back.”

“Adi, you were a child,” Arno said gently.

“Hardly,” Adi scoffed. “I was seventeen.”

“You were a child.”

“Still. How could I lack respect for my father and mother, who have done nothing for me other than raise me in a world that we were not wanted? Love that I did not deserve,” Adi tried to keep his voice in a whisper, though it was broken. “Love that---”

Arno’s free hand reached for Adi’s cheek and wiped off his tears.

“Adi, I cursed out my old man for the pettiest things when I was angry,” Arno said. “As a child, teenager and as an adult. And rage. And fear. You are human. And your parents love you. I love you. Our brethren love you. You have nothing to apologize for.”

“Is it worth even reaching out to them? I don’t know if they want me back,” Adi said.

“What makes you say that?”

“We keep all six windows shut in the house. Locked. Except the one in the kitchen. But…If they don’t want me there…Why do they leave their window unlocked?”

Arno did not have an answer for that. But t here it was. The possibility. But the topic was heavy.

“And why have they not spent any money?”

Fuck.

Arno did not have an answer for this either.

Chapter Text

Familiar with the Norse, but raised with the Celtic. 

His mother, Yeuna, a beautiful Breton woman who spoke their native Brezhoneg in their home and along their friends. Nothing but smiles when it came to her.

The carpentry took up most of the work. Adi was the youngest among the workers, if being with your parents at work since you were an infant meant working. The smell of pine wood surrounded him as the coffin lid was placed on top of him. He could hear the shuffling above him as his father measured. 

“Adi, what do you see? Is it even?”

Adi squinted. “Still with light. Move it to the left, abba.”

“Mine or yours?”

“Mine.” Adi reached up to lightly knock on the left side for the wood.

“Let me see---”

He heard the wood shuffling to adjust it.

“It needs to be shortened.” Dari said aloud.

“How short?”

“Five centimeters!” Pamelia exclaimed with a loud laugh. “I told you so!”

The lid was taken off and Adi returned to fresh air, to his father carrying him up and hoisting him in his arms. He had laughed at the action. 

His father had kissed his head and set him on the ground.

The action that Adi had been doing since he could walk. Since he could breathe.

Adi never was afraid of the dark, really. 

He was just terrified of thunder. 

No one knew other than his parents that were the first ones to obviously see their child crying during a vicious storm. He didn't talk about it. Rain was fine. But heavy thunder was enough to have him hide in his bedroom with hands over his ears. He despised thunder. 

But he never feared the dark. Never feared the cemetery.

Never did Adi imagine that the heavy scratches his father used on wood to mark the measurements would become as comforting as a hug. 

Soon, with so many buried, Adi could calculate the average size for someone’s casket on sight.

But that burial was too much to process. 

“Sow her back together."

“I can’t…”

“Get the job done! We’ve got a lot to do.”

“Papa, I can’t,” Adi said. Barely breathing. 

“What do you know?! She was murdered and you expect me to pretend to not be affected by this?Carcasses. Is that what this girl is to you? Hacked to death by a mother who was undeserving of her. Pieces.”

“Move aside.”

“No!” Adi said. “You lack the heart! The soul!”

"Child."

Adi dropped the sowing needle and yanked off his gloves. "Inhuman. Inhuman. Why do we need to shove her into the ground? Why?!"

He was hysterical. Crying and crying, snot and tears down his face. His father was trying to approach him. But Adi shook his head and bolted for the door. 

Now, it was late. The nerves and exhaustion of the previous three days were practically gone. Back to normal, kind of.

As Arno and Adi were getting ready for bed, they heard laughter from the attic.

Brasseur was laughing. Laughing too much. 

Adi glanced over to Arno and they both went up the ladder to check. 

There was Brasseur, on the floor and drinking from the bottle by himself. Laughter and drinking.

"Uh, did I miss anything?"

"I want to kill myself!"

"What?"

"It was a cover up!"

"Are you drunk?"

"It's barely nine in the morning."

"It's almost eleven at night."

"What….hour? It is always wine o'clock. I passed out around two. Woke up at six. Woke up realizing the misery of being alive. Then I began mending that wound!" Brasseur laughed. "With this!"

He pulled out a folded paper.

"They switched the body. I found the real one with the autopsy report. The accurate one. Her body, Adi. I can't unsee it. Any of it." Brasseur was sobbing. "I close my eyes and I still see her."

"Okay. Come here," Arno said. And pulled him into a hug. "It is okay, brother."

"It wasn't a clean kill.” 

He handed Adi a folded piece of paper. Hands trembling too much. 

"This is the autopsy report. I managed to steal the original."

Adi read it over. From what Arno could gauge, the reaction was of horror. 

"My gods. I need to see her to know exactly what caused it."

"No!" Brasseur exclaimed. He shook his head frantically. "You can't!"

"I grew with the dead," Adi said. "I can ascertain the cause of how she was killed.”

“No,” Brasseur repeated. “No!”

“Brasseur!”

“Absolutely not!”

"We must bring Sophie here to speak with us. She said the walls have ears. We are the only ones in these walls."

“Brasseur, you shouldn't have gone alone," Adi said. "I would have prepared you. Give you something to brace yourself for. The state of decomposition. The smell. How the marks look on her skin…”

“There was none.”

“None of what?”

“Her skin.”

Arno gasped.

“She was bloated. There was so much blood.”

“It should have been me,” Adi said.

"Don't say that."

“I am not made of glass!” Adi argued. Though his voice was soft. Because Brasseur was right. He was right in that he was going through so much. Too fast for any of them to process. 

"I know," Brasseur said. Voice weak from the sobs. "I know. You are not made of glass. You are made of gold. Every breath you take is of gold. And I can't fathom seeing you in pain, because if I can spare something---if I could spare someone from any of this tragedy---" he swallowed a heavy breath. "It would be you.”

“You are drunk,” Adi said and took the bottle from Brasseur. “You are drunk and do not know what you are talking about.”

“I mean it.”

“You’re drunk,” Adi said, with a fierceness that Arno…had never heard from him. “'Come on, to bed. Drink some goddamn water.”

Arno had wanted to talk to Adi about it. About his tone, about his anger. If he was okay. But Adi did not say anything other than to not wait up for him as he got Brasseur settled.

Arno had woken up first. Then he kissed Adi’s temple and brought the blanket closer to cover him more. 

The stray cat showed up again, and Adi watched as Arno fed it a small piece of food. The water bowl was filled with fresh water from the fountain--drug free, this time, Arno and Adi had checked--and the stray cat drank from it.

Arno loved feeding animals. Loved petting them as they walked around Paris. The patio was empty, too early for anyone to be working at the moment.

For a while, all Adi could do was watch Arno. Hair barely kept together. There was Adi’s cardigan around him as a blanket. Adi felt a chill and he returned to the couch with the throw blanket. Fleece. It would help keep them warm.

He walked out to Arno’s spot and sat next to him. He held out the blanket and Arno slid under it. He felt Arno’s arm around his waist.

 Silence passed between them, only the ambiance of Paris filling the air. 

“Brasseur is right,” Arno said softly.

“What?”

“About you going to see Therese.”

“Arno…”

“Sit out of this one. It is not that you can’t stomach it. But that is not just a body. It’s the body of a dear friend that is decaying, bloating and rotting. Let your last memory of her be the one with her smile,” Arno said. “With her laugh. Not her no longer having skin.”

“I can handle it.” Adi tried to argue.

“To be an undertaker is one thing. But seeing a loved one dead in front of you is worse,” Arno stated. “My fathers both died brutal and horrific deaths and no matter how hard I try to replace their last memories being their smiles, I still close my eyes and I see blood.”

He paused. Took a deep breath. 

“I know, I know,” Arno said. “It is not what you want to hear. But please hear me on this one; let the casket be nailed shut. We find who killed our brethren and solve it. But please; spare yourself the sight.” 

Adi wanted to argue. 

“Adi,” Arno stated firmly. “Listen to me, please. Spare yourself the sight. This is going to be a cruel statement, but you should have not known death since you were a baby.”

“Arno!”

“Let me finish,” Arno persuaded. “You know tragedy. We know it. But the difference is that when you see it on a close friend, it scars you. Of all the beautiful and hilarious memories I have of Amelie, I still remember her bent neck.”

“This is what I do. It doesn’t affect me.”

Arno remembered how Brasseur had taken the hammer from his hand and guided him back to bed when he could not focus.

“She does not have skin anymore,” Arno argued. But his own tears were held back in his own eyes. 

“This is my religion! I’m not going to stay here and not do something. I cannot believe we are even having this conversation right now. It greatly offends me.”

“That I care?”

“That you think I am a victim. That me being the child of undertakers means I was miserable. I had a wonderful, beautiful and normal childhood,” Adi said. “With brilliant, kind and loving parents who raised me and nurtured me to be who I am today. With a village that raised a child no matter if his skin was brown and the mother was Breton or that his father was African. A village in Breton that stood together until it was horribly taken from us by the stupid fucking crown! What kind of man would I be to dishonor my roots by turning the other way?”

“No, no. Not that. It is just the sensitivity and the state of Therese. You were surrounded by death.”

Adi frowned. This… no. This could not be happening. 

“So many are afraid of death. So many! I do not fear it. Rather being raised to be god-fearing, I was raised to accept what death is; natural. This Catholic infected world makes death be a punishment and a fearsome thing when it is just a normal end and uses that fear to control the world! It is not death itself that is scary; it’s tragic how so much of it is warranted to murder and injustice. That is the real scary thing in this world, Arno; corruption of man. The ones living. I love what I do because I can bring someone peace. Please. Do not shield me. 

“A child can be alongside their parent who is a farmer and learn the purpose of their occupation,” Adi scoffed. “That was my normal, Arno. And it still is. I know you mean well, Arno. I do. You and Brasseur both do. But I am perfectly capable of going into the mortuary and see what happened to Therese and find out who killed her. This is my decision. I am not running from it. And if you do not like it, so be it. Fine. I am not apologizing. But this is my specialty. My vocation. And I am going to do what I do best; find out. And bring some form of closure to this spree.

“The child of a farmer learns how to garden. The child of a merchant learns how to sell. The child of a mortician learns how to bury.”

“I understand that. I’m just scared.”

Okay. Yes. Adi was coming on a little bit too much. Arno meant well. He meant everything so well. He never did consider how his normalcy could scare others much. But not Arno. 

“I know,” Adi said gently. He brushed tears from Arno’s cheek. "I'm sorry. My tone is too harsh. I am not angry at you."

"It is okay," Arno said. His hand on atop of Adi's. “And I will….try to not feel fear. But you must know that no matter what, I can’t help but still worry a little.”

"I can live with that."

Adi kissed his forehead. 

"I will be okay." Adi stood up and walked to their bedroom.

Arno looked over his shoulder as Adi left through the doors and he did not go after him.

He went up the ladder, presumably to get ready. 

“Fuck,” Arno whispered as he held his head between his hands. “Good fucking job, Arno. Good one.” He leaned his forehead against his knees. “Good one.”

The sky was slowly starting to brighten. The bells are ringing.

He felt like shit.

Chapter Text

Brasseur was in horrible shape. 

“You need to stop drinking.” Arno put the sheet back in the pin. The paint for the door had not arrived yet, no door had been built yet. Something that Arno kept reminding himself to put the rush order for. As fast as possible. 

Brasseur had food on the table, but barely touched it. 

“You first,” Brasseur said. Still in bed. He was unkempt. Still drunk. Eyes red from crying, cheeks flushed from the wine. He was never in this bad of a shape. 

Arno sat on the bed and faced him.

“Why did you go alone?”

“We were entrusted with this,” Brasseur said. “Adi does so much for us. It shouldn’t be fair for him to carry the heavier side of all this.”

“Well---”

“Arno,” Brasseur sat up. Looked him in the eye. “He has embalmed every single brother and sister who has been murdered, killed in action or died.”

“What?”

“He has been an Assassin since he was seventeen. But even before this…He has seen a lot. More than you would ever think.  We are assassins. We kill. We hunt. But Adi? He deals with the afterlife. Assassinating and death are two very different things. One means, one end. But this was too much,” Brasseur said. “Way too much. And I cannot…”

“You cannot what?”

“Shit, I might as well tell you.”

“What is it?”

“He has nightmares,” Brasseur said. “Who does not? But this is different. These are vicious ones. He cried himself to sleep a lot when he lived in the safehouse. Cried in his sleep at times too. I stayed with him in his bed often to get used to it.”

Now it made sense, for Adi’s ease with Brasseur taking his bed. 

“Did something happen before?”

“I was a soldier. One of the most elites. I could be a ‘knight’,” Brasseur scoffed. “But they don’t let Jews be a knight.”

Arno saw the star of David. 

“I had one too,”

Arno remembered Johanne’s anger. The defeat in her eyes. The carnage that he apparently slept through. And what he fought for.

“I was a soldier, and the things Adi has been through are still not as gruesome as the ones I have,” Brasseur said. He looked so tired. So defeated. Beyond his age. “He does not deserve the hand that the fates have dealt him.”

“Please, tell me what you can. I want to know,” Arno said. “I want to help him.”

So Brasseur did.

Adi was not a kind person. 

There was a rage that always simmered under that he feared was going to snap any time. Gunpowder with a tentative match. So close to burning. So close to snapping. 

His rage is the worst thing about him. So much about this world angered him. So much of his world had him crying. So much of it. He hated that he cried. It made him feel ashamed. Yet now, he had good people. Good things. Soft kisses from a man he fell in love with at such a collapsing speed. He burned for him. The stranger who he would never notice before, suddenly became the only one he would notice in the crowd. 

Arno was quiet, but snarky. He was the sarcastic one. The one with the eyerolls, the snide little petty comments that always made Adi laugh or even groan. The one who was actually trying to make something of the theater that everyone truthfully neglected for so long. Making a diamond out of the roughened coal.  The one who kissed him so softly, so gently. Roughly, when he wanted to. But Adi was the golden one.

Adi was not golden. Nowhere fucking close to it. Adi was gunpowder. A boy with a gun. And he was ready to fire at any given moment. 

Mortality and humanity. Life and death. He interacted with it every day. He is used to this. But…

It was not normal to just work, eat then sleep? Or even just sleep?

It was not normal? He hadn’t picked up a book in so long, nor a brush. Or a pencil. Nothing.

Adi kept walking. He had work to do.

Adi changed to his gray robe. The one that he felt represented him; death. Gray as the cemetery gravestones, engraved Celtic symbols. Yggsadril on his sleeve, Ankou’s crest. The red scarf is what he stood by, with the loyalty to the brotherhood. 

Brasseur was still in bed. He noticed more books on the desk, though in a neat pile. Adi did not have much possessions, really. Just his clothing, his robes, the handful of notebooks he used. And of course, all the books in the goddamned theater. 

Brasseur was always welcomed to stay with Adi anyways. He could not ever dare to turn him away. 

He was still asleep. 

Adi let him be.

He walked through the catacombs again. He took the report of the autopsy with him, folded and tucked in the inside of his coat. A piece of paper that weighed like thousands of pounds. He walked through the tunnels under the city. He could not manage to mask his anger. He went from tunnel to tunnel.

Manon found him as he wandered and greeted him. Waved him over to where she was with the other gravekeepers with a small fire.

“What is it?”

“I think Les Desecrators are back.”

Adi gasped. “What?!”

“It was near one of the smaller ones that Adam works in.” 

“Fuck!”

Manon began to sprint. 

Adi followed.

“Oh gods,” Adi murmured.

Broken graves. Shattered. Some bones strewn on the ground with mud and ashes mixed. Broken urns. Everything. Adi thanked the gods that Adam was not hurt.

Adam’s health has not quite been the same since he fell ill with the worst influenza that Adi had ever seen. He survived, but only just. He walks slower nowadays. Adi does the lifting.

Adi leaned down to pick up the skull that was the size of his palm. Not too far was the rest of the grave of a woman with the dress on her decayed skeletal ribs. The stone read fragments. 1762. Repose en paix mère et fils. Rest in peace, mother and son. 

Mother died during birth. Baby died with her too. He gently placed it back in the casket. But kept looking around. At least he could find the rest of the infant’s bones. Clean up the area at most. 

But the fucking desecrators would come back again. 

Manon pointed over to the rest of the cemetery as she berated Adam. 

“Adam, c’est extrêmement mauvais!” (Adam, this is extremely bad.)

Adam raised his hands in trying to defend himself. 

“Adi.”

Adi rubbed at his temples. 

“What do we do?”

“We take them to the catacombs,” he eventually said. In defeat. There really was no other way for this to work. Les Desecrators were back and attacking the graves; they needed to track them. “Mano, tell your father to alert Jeannine and Paloma in the East.”

“On it!” Manon ran off.

But that was all that Adi could muster.

“Adi?” Adam asked.

He couldn't find the baby's jaw. Where was it? Where was it? Where was the baby's jaw?

He held onto the gravestone. Cold. Cold. 

He felt cold. He had not felt like this before. Had he felt like this before? Surely he would remember that. Right?

“Adi?”

He felt himself suffocate. And he ran away to the theatre.

Adi made it back to their room. 

“Adi, what’s wrong?” Arno asked. He stood from his desk.

“Why is everything good to me?”

“What do you mean?”

“Good--people. Good things. Good feelings. I don’t know what it is like to feel so good.”

Adi was angry and...scared. In such a way that Arno had never seen before. Ever.

“Because you deserve good things. Good things, good people, they happen. You keep hiding.”

“I am not hiding,” Adi protested.

“You are. Stop hiding and running away from what you feel. You do not have to hold that wall anymore. It will kill you if you do. It will absolutely tear your soul apart to be hurting so much.”

“I am not a kind person! I could not do enough for that baby---”

“What baby?”

“The grave desecrators destroyed the grave of a mother and her infant son. And I couldn’t put him back together. The pieces were missing! I couldn’t find his jaw. I couldn't---” 

Arno took a deep breath. 

"Adi," Arno said softly. "Look at your hands. The little boy never got to see sunlight and grow up. Never got to laugh. And sadly, because our world is so cruel, he and his mother died. But you? You picked him up. You dusted him off. And you did what you could to reunite him with his mom. Most would ignore and shove away but you did not…So, please. Stop saying you are not kind. You are the light in people’s lives and that is a beautiful thing.”

“How the fuck am I gold?” Adi asked. “Tell me, Arno, does our brotherhood need a heart as broken as mine? When Brasseur said those things about me, I felt put on a pedestal. How am I gold and how am I the heart of the brotherhood and yet, they were trying everything to keep me from falling apart?”

“I understand that this is your faith and your religion to the god Ankou, but it is still a heavy weight to carry. You put everything else on your shoulders.”

“It is not a burden.”

“But it is a heavy weight,” Arno said. “So let me carry it with you. I was wrong in telling you to back away. I was terribly wrong. I am so sorry. For you to walk away is not who you are. I love you. I love you. Every part of you. Every part of you. Every fracture, every smile. Everything. You are more. You have not failed Therese. You have not failed your faith. You have not failed any of us. And you most certainly have not failed me,” Arno reassured. “Okay? Nothing you do in this world will ever have me hate you. So please. Let me in. Let me carry this with you.”

Adi kissed Arno fiercely. 

“Thank you,” Adi murmured to him. “Thank you. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I love you.”

“I love you too,” Arno replied to him. And embraced him just as tightly.

Chapter Text

Davenport Homestead

The twins had kept asking Connor over and over when they would be able to sail again. It was precious, truly, to see them grow and hear them every day. Their sweet, peculiar Boston accent like their mother and the same accent with the Mohawk being their dual native language too. Sometimes, he could hear them speak in Welsh to their grandfather. Jenny, like his own aunt, was taller than James. James was more introverted. Jenny more extroverted. She couldn't climb yet, but she could fire arrows with such deadly accuracy that amazed Connor and slightly, just oh so slightly, concerned him at how easy she found it.

She was better than HE was at her age.

James prefered spending more time with books and writing and drawing. He liked visiting the village. Jenny did too. 

But Connor noticed that Jenny's vision was perfect, but her hearing...was not. Not that he was unfamiliar with deafness; his mother was deaf in one ear.

But his mother had not noticed it until Connor was nearly nineteen. Really, it was his father who noticed it when he dropped a ceramic mug across the same room she was and she did not notice it until he walked up to her and asked where the broom was. 

At first, he thought she was ignoring him. Connor still remembered when his father asked him if he remembered an instance that he made his mother angry recently. Connor was confused. Ellie had been at the manor for dinner and she had spoken up and said “Surprisingly, Haytham? No.”

He was even more surprised when his father relayed his conversation with Achilles that confirmed that Ziio was not mad at anybody, surprisingly not at Haytham. She was doing okay. And surely enough, after Connor noticed that his mother did not notice Haytham speaking behind her. 

And surely enough? His mother was deaf. And upon speaking to his grandmother, it ran in the family. She just did not realize that Ziio was losing it at such a young age. And surely, the warfare did not help either.

Connor compensated with protecting Jenny as much as he could. James did too. Connor forbade guns too. 

But now, the children wanted to sail.

And finally, Connor needed to as well. His father was having trouble sleeping and Connor often found him awake at night. How did he know?

Connor was awake too. His father need to sail and his grandfather did too. 

The children asked again and Connor said yes.

“Yes. Actually.”

“Yes!”

“Don’t tell your mother.”

“We won’t,” the twins exclaimed in unison and they ran off to get ready.

“Don’t tell their mother what, Connor?” Ellie stood at the doorway, hands on hips. 

“Nothing.” He lied, to his wife. A mistake, fatal if anything.

“Ah. Nothing?” Ellie asked. She clicked her tongue. “So…Let me get this straight. You lie to me. Your wife. About what?”

“Nothing of importance. Just that...That we are…going sailing on the Aquila.”

“And why not tell me, their mother? Your wife?” Ellie asked. 

Connor cleared his throat. “I…thought you may have wanted to stay in.”

“Said who?”

“Because who is going.”

“Who is going?”

“Me, the--the twins. My grandfather. My mother…” he looked away. “And…myfather….”

“I didn’t catch the last part, Connor.”

“My father.”

“Ah, Haytham. Haytham is going aboard the Aquila?”

“Yes.”

“And why not have me, your wife, the mother of your children, go with you?” Ellie asked. 

Finally, Connor gave up.

“You threw my father overboard last time!”

“It was a long time ago!”

“It was four weeks ago.”

“And he was fine!”

“Zi.” His grandfather said to her. “Ten.”

“Twenty,” his mother answered with sheer confience.

“Thirty.”

“Fifty.”

Ziio bit back a laugh. “You sound confident for a man that is going to lose.”

“I’m just saying, last time, Ellie won.”

“Don’t threaten me with a good time,” his mother said with a loud laugh.

“Are you...Are you making a bet if my father is going to be thrown overboard?! Itsa!” Connor gasped.

“What, you are going to look at me and tell me I’m wrong?!”

“He will be fine. He can swim.”

“Granddad!”

Both of them laughed. Connor gave up and went up to the stairs to the side of the deck, next to the swivel gun.

Connor heard footsteps and then felt familiar arms go around his waist. 

“So, you come here often?”

He smiled. “Not really.”

Yet another feeble attempt of Ellie to flirt with him. Never mind that they were married and had twins. 

Ellie laughed as he spun her around and hoisted her on the ledge of the ship. He pressed a kiss to her.

“Hi.”

“Hi.”

“You need to calm that loud mind of yours. I could hear you worrying all the way till the crow’s nest. And wipe that look off your face. I know everything, Ratonhaketon,” Ellie said. “Everything.”

Connor sighed. “That, I do believe,” he said. 

“You’re still worried about the purge.”

“Every step in the homestead feels like it was rooted in old blood.” He sighed. “More than the bloodshed already spilled in this wretched land stolen.”

“Because it is. And all that is left is to worry. Who else could even know about the purge when the fallen are buried, the records are missing and the survivors won't speak?”

“It would be easier--”

“If they were not family.”

It was still so complicated. They still did not know how to talk about it. Achilles, his father and his grandfather all in the same house. And his aunt a few houses away. If Connor thought about it too long, he would get a headache. Achilles did not speak to him as much anymore. Just quietly played tabletop games with his grandfather, as they had been for over twenty nine years.

Even when he thought about it for a tiny moment, he would get another headache on top of the other one. 

But they don't talk about it. They don’t talk about the complicated emotions that came with everything. Why? Because the past was too painful to acknowledge, and the present was too bizarre to process. 

And because they were Kenways.

Kenways were complicated.

“We need to talk about it.”

“About what?”

“About all of it.”

Ellie glanced at him. 

“That does not narrow the list.”

“Paris.”

“Oh, that list. Sorry, I thought you meant your father,” Ellie paused. “I am not tossing him overboard. This time.”

“This time.”

“This time!” Ellie reassured. “God. Ev’ry time I step onboard, I remember the time he found out I was pregnant. The bastard!”

Connor remembered that vividly. The day that he debuted the phrase of “So help me, I will turn this ship around!” between Ellie and his father. The debut of a frequent phrase he still uses to this day.

The day lived in infamy. Ellie in denial of her pregnancy. With his father being absolutely correct. Ellie and Haytham argued even more, in vague terms that made no sense with any context, about her being pregnant. What made it funnier and stupider was that they agreed to argue on the deck about the pregnancy with ridiculous metaphors and idioms and similes. Faulkner was confused. Connor wanted to throw himself overboard.

“This time. Reading newspapers and pamphlets can only do enough,” Connor said. “And I give up. For all of Samita’s notes and translations, I can’t do it. I can't speak French. I can’t read French. It's different speaking it and then reading it but to do it all…I don’t know French..”

“What did you just say?” Ellie looked like she had gotten slapped. 

“I…do not know French?”

“Are you fucking kidding me?!” Ellie snapped out. She shoved at his chest, not remembering that she was on the ledge. He kept holding onto her regardless.. “I thought you knew French this entire time!”

“WHAT?!”

“Of course I know French! You think me some monolingual fuck?!”

“You know French?”

“Yes! And Irish! And Welsh! And  Mohawk! And Celtic! My father is Irish. To only know the Brit’s English is sacrilegious.”

Her father is Irish?”

“You’re not even religious.”

“Shut up. That is besides the point. This is why you need to communicate with your wife!”

“I am communicating.”

“Weeks after the fact! Just like your father.”

“Ellie,” Connor sighed. Because he knew she was right. “You never told me you knew French!”

“You never asked!” 

“How was I supposed to ask what I do not know?”

She smacked his shoulder.

“Ow!”

“Because if you do not know, you need to ask!” Ellie exclaimed. “That is what a question is! To ask!” 

“Well, I did not know that your father was Irish.”

“My dad’s Irish. Very Irish.”

“Fine. So translate it for me.”

“Well. Fine. But we need to do more,” Ellie said. “Us translating is not enough.”

“What do you suggest?”

“We need someone on the inside that is not just Samaira,” Ellie said. “We need someone else. Someone that can embed themselves in more and infiltrate and find out. Low profile, French speaking, an Assassin. Stephane has strong ties to the community and him leaving would leave the district unprotected. We need Aveline.”

“So let’s go find Aveline,” Connor concluded. He pressed a kiss against Ellie. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. See? This is what happens when you communicate with your wife! You get answers!”

Connor finally laughed. He held her closer. She turned back around and watched into the sea. The oceans were calm today.

But he still felt something deeper.

Across the water, so many knots away, Paris was burning and their brotherhood was too.

Chapter Text

Arno remembered what Brasseur had said about Adi’s nightmares. The night terrors, he had said to him, about all the carnage he had witnessed. 

Brasseur kept sleeping in the attic. He was shaken about Therese. He forbade them both from seeing her.

The burn pits. Adi fell asleep immediately after a long day and night in the catacombs, working hard. He took a bath and boiled his clothing to disinfect from the dead every night.

Arno went with him every day he could. Even if it meant sleeping at his desk the following day because he couldn’t sleep long enough.

Sometimes, in the middle of a restless night, Adi would turn onto his side and kiss him, the adrenaline left over. The soft I love yous that was muttered against Arno’s neck. The breathless moans. Gentle kisses with Arno’s hand guiding him to where to touch him. Adi’s hand in his hair as he thrusted into his mouth.

Therese was buried. Closed casket. Brasseur was in Adi’s arms, keeping him upright. Sophie in Arno’s, hooked firmly around her elbow. But the real autopsy report was hidden in his bedroom, deep underneath Arno’s robes.

He had not shown it to Sophie yet.

Augustina had finally fallen asleep. Somehow, she grew each day. She would be tall like her father; Arno already knew it. Charlotte could walk better. An easy recovery on the mend. Arno loved carrying her and walking her around the theatre. 

All while the world was burning outside.

Thankfully, the isle was far enough away. But sometimes, like now, Arno caught the awful smell of burning flesh and see the smoke across the city.

All Arno could do was close the window and hold his little sister closer.

Finally, a week later, the rain had passed. Arno drowned himself in his work. He ignored the journals that were still hidden in a loose floorboard and burned a hole in his conscience and went for his collection of Shakespeare. A Midsummer’s Night Dream, one of his favorite plays. He was near his favorite scene.

Adi found Arno lounging on the couch with a book in his hand. 

“My love. What are you doing?” Adi asked as he moved to sit behind Arno. He kissed the top of his head as he settled behind him.

“You caught me,” Arno said with a smile. “I am reading a book …”

“How dare you read a book?” Adi murmured against the side of his neck. 

“How dare you be a Taurus?”

“How dare you be a Virgo?”

Arno chuckled. 

“What book are you reading?”

“Shakespeare. A Midsummer’s Night Dream,” Arno answered. He tilted the book a little higher to show him.

“That one is beautiful,” Adi said with a dreamy sigh. “Can you read it to me?” 

“Shall I compare thee to a fucked up humid day,” Arno couldn’t help the smile.

“That’s not how the play goes,” Adi gasped out in a laugh. “That’s not even in the play.”

“Yes, it is,” Arno said. “It says right here.”

“That’s not even in a play!”

“Yes, it is. It’s right in front of me,” Arno said. 

Adi laughed harder. Arno relished in it.

“What scene is it?” Adi gestured with his chin to the page.

“Oberon’s monologue. Act 2, Scene 1. It’s my favorite scene,” Arno said as he settled against Adi. “It’s my favorite.”

“It is mine too,” Adi said. “It is beautiful…Can you read it to me?”

“Of course.”

“Good. Just don't get distracted.”

Arno would climb the highest building and grasp a burning star if Adi asked so.

“Okay,” Arno said, though amused. Distracted. Whatever that meant.

Adi kissed him. “Read to me,” he murmured.

“Alright…I’ll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,” Arno began. He sighed as Adi kissed the side of his neck. He leaned back against his shoulder. “To die upon the hand I love so well...”

Adi placed one hand on Arno’s stomach, the other against his chest. Touches in the right places.

Oh...This bastard knew what he was doing. And Arno loved it.

“Fare thee well, nymph. Ere he do leave this grove, Thou shalt fly him, and he shall seek thy love.” Arno continued. “Hast thou--” He couldn’t breathe properly anymore. Not with Adi’s hand on his chest like that, the sensitivity felt through clothes. Not with the other one reaching between his legs. 

“Keep reading,” Adi said sweetly. “My sweetest rose.”

Prince. 

“Your rose?”

“Yes.”

“I’m your rose?”

“The sweetest, most beautiful one,” Adi said. “Keep reading.”

How the hell was Arno supposed to keep reading after he heard that?

“Hast thou the flower there? Welcome, wanderer. Ay, there it is….I pray thee give it me. I know a bank where the wild thyme blows.” Arno’s throat was tight. Adi kissed his exposed jaw. “Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows.” He let one leg fully dangle to let Adi move his arm more. “Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine, with sweet muskroses, and with eglantine.”

Adi’s hand on his stomach slowly moved downward. He stopped above his belt.

Arno craned his head back. He swallowed. Shit. Shit.  

“Keep reading,” Adi murmured. 

Fuck, Arno was into this. 

Arno pressed his hand down on Adi's and guided him to undo his trousers. The clink of the belt was so loud against Arno’s strained breaths.

“Keep reading, Arno,” Adi reminded.

“Okay,” Arno said, his voice cracked. He nodded.

“You’re going to keep reading for me?”

“Yes,” Arno nodded frantically. He could feel warm underneath his collar. “There sleeps Titania sometime of the night…” Arno swallowed. “Lulled in these flowers with dances and delight. And there the snake throws her enameled skin…” He could no longer concentrate with Adi’s palm pressing down on him between his thighs. “We--Weed wide enough to wrap-- Fuck , to wrap enough to--” he struggled. “Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in.”  

“Finish what you started, my dear,” Adi said. Smug. Smug.

Arno leaned his head back onto Adi’s shoulder. “Oh god--” he moaned. 

“That's not in the book.”

“Adi, please just touch me.”

 “I am touching you. So don't get distracted, Arno,” Adi said. But he kept stroking him. 

“And with the juice of this I’ll streak her eyes. And---” Arno let out another broken moan as he felt Adi’s hand undo his belt. “And--make her full of hateful fantasies. Take thou some of it, and seek through th…” Arno couldn’t focus. Not when Adi was touching him like that. “Through this grove…Adi, please…” He confessed. “Please fuck me. Please baby, please baby, please,” he begged. 

“Keep reading.” Adi used both hands now. One to hold Arno's hip closer to him. Arno could feel how hard he was behind him. That man was going to be the death of him.

“Oh god. Oh god...A sweet Athenian lady is in love,” Arno whimpered. One particular stroke was what did it. “I can’t,” Arno admitted. “I can’t. I need you. On me, in me, I just need you.” He begged. “I can’t take this. Fuck me, fuck me.”

“You want me to fuck you?”

“Yes.”

“Get on top of me.” Adi gave Arno permission.

Arno tossed the book to the side and happily obliged. 

Chapter Text

Adair 'Adi' Henaf

Weeks passed. 

Somehow, the warfare only grew louder. The corpses piled higher.

And the war only got closer.

Arno found his way into the armor room. He still kept finding so much in the damn theater. He had to keep a map on him at this point.

“Impressive, no?” Quemar asked as he entered the chamber. Though Quemar’s step stumbled.

“Monsieur Quemar,” Arno said. He held his arm out and caught him in time. “Careful.”

Quemar sighed, but he hooked his elbow around Arno’s arm and steadied himself with the cane.

“I’m fine,” he grumbled. “So, you found Thomas de Carnellion’s armor.”

“I have no earthly idea about who that is.”

“Well, he was only the Assassin who broke a century long Templar stronghold over Europa.”

Arno was still confused. 

“No…no bells rung there, monsieur.”

“This is an heirloom of the Brotherhood. It used to be that an assassin who did a great service for the Brotherhood and for France would be given his armor in thanks. The seal that opens the vault was lost 200 years ago; it hasn't been opened.”

“Iron that old can rust in stagnant atmospheres like this. Torches didn’t do the oxygen any favors…” Arno clicked his tongue. He leaned closer and surely enough; the seal was nothing a key could fix. Or himself, even. And he was good at lock picking.

Probably because his sight allowed him to see through it.

“Okay, I can see why calling a locksmith was out of the question. Tell me about this seal.”

“It consisted of three rings. One for each of the three doors but the seal was broken before all was lost the fragments are no doubt scattered around Paris with only the vaguest of fuck all clues as to their whereabouts.”

“And if someone would find all of them…Would you say that they had done a great service for the Brotherhood in France?”

“I suppose I would,” Quemar said. Then he chuckled. “Charlie didn’t tell you about this?”

Charlie. His father.

“My father never told me anything about the Brotherhood,” Arno said. “Neither did my stepfather about the Templars. They kept me in the dark about it. I only found out until this year about all of it. Though, it is quite a lot to still learn.”

“Ah…” Quemar nodded. “Now that makes more sense. Charlie was too obsessed and annoying to have not told anyone about the goddamn armor…Yeah. Charlie, Charlie, Charlie…Your father was a handful. He was a wonderful young man. He brought much needed peace to our home. And laughter.”

“What was he like?”

“Stubborn. He was always laughing. All kindness. He was gentle and full of passion. Without judgment, even when most wanted to shove it on others,” Quemar said with a fond, tired smile. “Just sheer chaos. He failed at killing François. That’s how they met…You don't know the full story?"

“Not really. I know…the rest of it.”

The knowing look was shared.

Quemar knew.

“He was sent to assassinate your stepdad. And he absolutely failed. Utterly failed. Instead of assassinating a Templar at first light, he fell in love with one at first sight,” Quemar said with a fond laugh. Then he shook his head. “Oh, those romantic fools. The alliance was formed because of them. And no matter what, I still intend to honor it. They wanted to leave Paris for good but then your father was taken from us. And past his death, I still intend to honor the alliance no matter what. I gave them both my word. Francois watched over my Ines while she ventured out to Versailles, and I watched over his Élise when she ventured to Paris. For your fathers, I intend to do the same for their son, no matter what.”

Arno could not believe it. Surely this was…he was imagining this, right? All he knew of his father was the faint memories and the stories his old man occasionally shared. 

“I didn’t know that about him. He never told me much of who he was. What he did…in the Brotherhood. What his role was.”

“The Dorian lineage is centuries old, as deep as the first days of the Brotherhood in France itself. One of the oldest Assassin families in the continent, actually. Some fell off the map. Most were Legends, hidden in plain light,” Quemar said. “Their history was in their service and devotion to the Brotherhood. Some records never existed with the real surname on it. But since you never knew this, I imagine your stepfather never told you about your father, nor his own ties to the Templars, out of respect to his memory. I hope you do not resent him for it.”

“I would never resent him. Now, I understand. It is like they both had separate lives and I am only finding out about it after they’re gone. It is too late to ask them questions now. But I just have to keep looking.” He tearfully got the words out. He only spoke about this to Adi, on the handful of times he found the wits to do so. “Like this armor, apparently. Think he would have liked it if I found it?”

“Arno. He would love it if you did.”

Arno smiled. He had to do his best to unlock it, then. 

Adi had left a meeting that wrapped earlier and found Arno at his desk, his pencil scribbling away. He wrapped his arms around him and kissed him. “Hard at work or hardly working?” Adi murmured as he kissed Arno's temple.

“Both.” Arno reached up and kissed him. 

"Numbers. Not fun."

"I like numbers."

Adi assessed the desk and how Arno lacked a calculator."

"Wait, you don’t use a calculator?” He asked.

“I don’t need one,” Arno said proudly. At Adi's incredulous expression, he simply laughed. “What, you think I only spent college sleeping around, getting drunk and playing football?” Arno snorted out a laugh. 

“Did you?”

Arno considered him, then he nodded. “Yes, I did. A lot. Safely of course. But I also worked my ass off in my courses anyway. Showed up hungover to lecture, but goddamn was I good at math. My friends told me I was either cursed or blessed,” Arno pondered. “I still do not know which just yet. But I can calculate anything in my head. Occasionally, and only just occasionally, will I use a calculator.” He shrugged. 

Adi watched as Arno worked, as the golden rays began to flow in. It was the most beautiful sight, to see the sunset like this. To see him like this. Gods, when had he felt this before? With anyone? To just exist in silence? It was a peculiar feeling he had never felt before. He has had lovers, but never…never like this. 

Arno kept working, soft pencil writing against paper. The occasional erasing. He sketched slowly. But he did calculations fast. Adi could tell the difference between the drawing and the soft tapping to count out numbers.  

And that he was counting. Not panicking. Not the shaken up touch.

Adi hoped he didn’t ruin the mood when he asked this…

“Arno, I have a question.”

“What is it?”

“Um…It is a personal question.”

“My love, you can ask me anything,” Arno said with genuine honesty. “What is on your mind?”

“Why do you tap your fingers so much?” 

Arno stopped writing. 

“You noticed?”

“I did. In the catacombs. I’m your partner. Of course I noticed.”

“Um…I don’t know. I can’t remember specifically when I began. But I know it happens when I get scared,” Arno admitted. “When I have those awful thoughts in my mind that I can’t get out. When…when I feel cold.”

Adi knew what he meant. 

Adi straddled his lap and held Arno’s jaw. “And your hand cramps when you do,” he added. He had noticed when Arno was massaging his hand and focusing on his knuckles and palm. The winces he saw as Arno focused on his index fingers and thumb and tried to soothe it. 

“I’m sorry. I…feel sensitive about this.”

“No need to apologize. I am here for you. And...I hope I do not overstep when I say this, but whenever you feel afraid, when you feel afraid, and I am there, I want to hold your hand. I don’t care where we are. I will gladly do it.”

“Merci.” Arno's voice shook as he thanked him. 

Adi chuckled warmly and pressed another kiss against Arno’s smile. 

“Oh, I love you so much,” he murmured gently. “I love you, my violet.”

“I do too, my rose, ” Adi said. He pressed a final kiss on Arno's forehead. Then embraced him.

Outside, they could hear the bells of Notre Dame, ever so distant. The world outside existed. But all Adi would care about was his rose in his arms.

Chapter Text

Haytham was finally confronted with a choice with one bullet.

Haytham shot the rope. 

Ellie was confused. Angry, for all the right reasons. This was yet another ploy for the Templar agenda, her claim, in between horrid panic and angry tears. There was not a fierce protector in this world for Connor other than Ellie, for sure. Other than his own mother and Achilles.

But Haytham had surrendered. Helped Connor escape. He shot the rope and effectively changed the outcome of this entire conflict.

"A battle where my own son is to be killed...is no battle worth fighting at all."

Had Haytham wanted to see Connor die, he would have allowed it. He had the capacity to not care. Haytham did not care. But something...something was off. Connor's grandfather was still alive despite Haytham's existence and despite Haytham's disdain from the limited mentions he had about him. Connor asking his grandfather for answers was not much luck either. He would get mournful. Full of sorrow and tears. He still loved his father unconditionally. So much love for him that Connor felt outraged. 

Why him, he had snapped once, of all people? 

And his grandfather had angered and cried all at once; "Young man," he had grit out. "You will understand once you are a father yourself."

His voice was not raised. It was chilled, yet heated all at once. 

He had shakily sat down after next to him and apologized. And his grandfather had accepted it. Then his grandfather had sobbed.

"Oh, my boy," his grandfather said tearfully. "I wish you were spared of this curse too."

"Are you sure that he is genuine?"

Ellie had asked that, once again, worried. She placed a warm towel on his forehead while he was in the bathtub. The beatings in the prison had not helped Connor's migraine at all. Neither had the new scar on his neck, one that would fade over time. But not just yet.

"I am sure," Connor repeated softly, once again.

"I know he is family, but are you sure?"

"Ells, I am sure," Connor said. "You may not believe it yet, but I am sure."

"He has tried to kill you countless of times!"

"Not that many."

"But still."

"Dove," Connor said. "I am positive that he is genuine. I think thet only one who is not sure is you."

"Of course I am not sure," Ellie said. "Considering the fact that he has tried to kill you countless of times."

"Again...Not that many."

Ellie sighed. 

She splashed water on him.

Connor took that as begrudging agreeing and let the silence fall. He closed his eyes and let her continue soothing down the migraine.

Why was his life so complicated?

Ziio was angry, to say the least. 

Haytham threw the ring and cross into the fire and let it burn.

"I choose my family. I was a fool to not have seen that before. And I am so sorry. I hope one day you grow to forgive me and even if you never do, even if you never want to see me again, know that I...I love you. I love you more than anything. More than anyone. I choose you. In this life and the thousands that follow, I will always choose you."

Ziio kissed him. 

"I love you too," Ziio said tearfully. 

She embraced him tightly and he kissed the side of her head. 

"I love you too."

His grandfather was happy that his father was home. So happy. 

Achilles, however, was not.

For obvious reasons.

Nevermind that his own father was shot in the kneecap as well by Charles Lee while in their latest showdown. Connor had to carry his old man out the damn ship and his horse, all while Ellie was yelling at them both to step it up.

Connor gave Achilles an ultimatum, using his own words of redemption against him. He felt horrible about it. But Connor was not going to just stand by and let Haytham - his father - be treated like this. Either he let Haytham stay briefly while he had a house built in the Homestead or Connor left, Ellie and all Kenways in tow. 

Achilles thought about it, then he agreed to let Haytham stay. He was more annoyed than angry, now that he lived with the satifaction that at least Haytham was humbled.

Connor supposed that counted for something.

"Father. I have a question."

"Depending on what it is, I have an answer," his father responded flatly. He kept reading the newspaper.  The Paris Journal.

Rather than ask why, because Connor knew he would never get a proper answer, he just asked a bewildered question. “Wait, you know French?”

“Obviously,” his father said. He lowered one corner of the newspaper. “You don't?”

“I do not.”

His father judged him. As he liked to do. “How do you not know French?”

“Why does everyone know French?!” Connor began, but then he let it go. “Nevermind! That's not the question.”

"What is it, then?"

"How did you notice mom was deaf?"

“Hm…” his father thought about it. “Well, other than the time I dropped the mug…She was always a little quiet. Before she was pregnant with you, she relied mostly on sight. I noticed it too, but I always thought it was just her being observant. Your mother’s cousin is completely deaf. And from what your mother remembers, so was her uncle before he passed away of old age.”

"So it runs in the family, then."

“Seems like it.” “I think my Jenny is deaf,” Connor said. “Ellie and I have had our suspicions. But I do not know...”

"About what?"

"I think it did not skip me." 

"And that is okay," his father reassured. "You will be okay."

Ellie knew long ago that her father that she had grown up to know was not her father by blood. That was Mr. Shay. Gracie had been nothing but kind to her. But now that they were both in Europe, in hiding. 

But her mother drank.

A lot.

The drinking was never merry. When the Templars returned to Boston, the liquor bottles only grew. When Ellie was pregnant, it worsened. When she married, it only stopped because Peggy, Ellie's younger and much more reactive sister, stepped in and cut off her drinking. Ellie's mother resented Haytham, for his role in the Purge. All Ellie knew of it was that it was complicated.

"Zi. My mom is drunk again," Peggy said to Ziio that morning when she was in the kitchen with the twins. "Again."

Ziio finally said a phrase that Ellie had not heard since her own wedding.

"Actually? Let's go pay your mother a visit."

It was not that Ziio hated Alice. She did not! Alice was a nice lady. Ziio did not hate her. 

It was just that she hated Haytham, and by extension, Connor. 

But she claimed she didn't. Ziio avoided visiting Alice and at least, at the very least, Alice was civil with Haytham in front of the twins. But the twins away, it never ended well. Though Alice claimed it was because of Haytham's role in the Purge, she was not quite sure that was all it. 

What did Connor have to do with it?

"Okay," Ziio tried. "Alice. Frie..Look, queen. There is...A mixed concensous about Haytham and well, I almost tried to kill him too! On multiple occasions! It comes with the territory. And with your family. And you are just gonna have to deal with it."

"Huh. Easy for you to excuse," Alice said.

"I am not excusing anything."

"You are. You share a son with him."

"Yes, Connor. Who is also your son-in-law."

Alice tsked and took another swig of her flask. "Oh, easy for you to say."

"Mother," Peggy pleaded. "Don't start this again."

Oh.

Oh?

"Don't start what again?" Ziio asked. "Something about my son?"

"Nothing!"

"Hm. What are you trying to say about my son?"

"Nothing! Connor treats my Ellie wonderfully and is the father of my grandchildren," Alice stated. "What is there not to love about him? Other than the half of his blood."

"Half?"

"Haytham's, obviously," Alice said. "The Kenway bloodline, that now, my grandchildren are a part of. Bad enough that Edward's a pirate. And Welsh." She paused. Corrected herself. "Sorry, sorry. Nothing wrong with him being Welsh."

Well, Alice had not changed at all! 

"Mother," Ellie said. "Don't."

"Please don't," Peggy added. She had been nervous since they set foot inside the house.

"Alice, Haytham took a bullet for the twins," Ziio said. "The reason his kneecap is shattered was because he pushed Ellie, safely, may I add, out the way while she was pregnant. Haytham is not going anywhere. He is part of your family. It is what it is. Let it go."

"Haytham killed my husband!"

Shay, the one that she cheated with? Or James, the one she lied to?

"Which one?"

Ellie gasped. Peggy spat out her coffee. 

"Are you fucking kidding me?!"

"I wish I was," Ziio said. "But evidently, I am not."

Alice blubbered. She was too stunned to speak. Ziio wished she could say she was smug, when she was evidently not. She was angry. 

She was done. 

She was so done about her family getting stepped on. However flawed it may be.

"In the past thirteen minutes, you have insulted me, my partner, my son, my father-in-law, my grandchildren and Ellie, yet you won't bother to answer my question. Which husband of yours did Haytham kill? Because last I remembered, the only one who ran back to the Homestead was James.  And the only one who is killing herself here with poison to her liver is you."

"You married a Templar."

"I'm not married to Haytham. And he's a Templar no more, and you know that," Ziio said. "You've been knowing that, ever since he took a fucking bullet for your daughter! Yet he holds no resentment towards you. He lives with the hate from you. He understands! He knows his fault! But you cannot punish Ellie and Peggy for what happened. Especially Ellie. You say you do not hate Connor, but everything you say implies otherwise! Everything, Alice! Fucking everything! Do you resent your daughter because she married my son?"

"Ziio."

"Don't look at the table. Look at me."

Alice did not.

Ellie jumped as Ziio slammed her hands on the table. 

"Alice, look at me in the goddamn eyes and tell me the fucking truth! Do you resent your daughter because she married my son?"

"Get out of my house."

Ellie wept in the carriage on the way back to the homestead.

This was bullshit. This was complete bullshit. She had the suspicion that her mother resented Connor. But this? This was so much worse. 

This was so much worse.

She walked away without answers and without her mother too.

Chapter Text

Adi’s nightmares returned. He woke up in the middle of the night, his heart racing. The hundreds of bodies he has embalmed, the thousands upon thousands of bones that he has laid to rest. It was a noble purpose he had to do. It was what he was meant to do. 

But now, they were different.

The emotions were of pain, of hurt. Of bloodshed and war. Arno dying occupied the worst of his dreams, the ones that left him too messed up to speak about it the next day. The ones he could not voice aloud. 

Arno continued helping with construction of another safehouse and often, it was him asleep in their bed first. The exhaustion completely knocked him out. Half eaten dinner on his desk next to piles of blueprints that he was still trying to figure out on. 

Arno would only stir when Adi kissed the side of his head and let him know he was back. Arnowould mumble out a response, turn onto his side and lay his arm across Adi’s chest, and completely fall asleep within the minute. He slept like a log, as the saying went. 

Arno slept like a log. And Adi dreamed of the dead.

Arno finally mustered up the nerves to get another book from his old man’s collection. No one touched them from the hiding spot. 

Normally, he would have stayed in the tiny corner in the attic to read them, but he needed the sunlight by the window today. He sat in front of the fireplace.

Augustina sat in his lap, eagerly babbling, staring at the pages. She liked being included.

He picked up a book.

“Are you sure about this?” Arno asked gently. “These are not the stories your Uncle Adi reads to you.”

She grasped Arno’s fingers tightly.

She did not want to let go. 

Arno took a shuddering breath and opened the book. 

Only to find that it was not a journal. This was a book. An actual book. Arno kept reading.

And his old man’s handwriting greeted him.

My love,

Our boy is not doing so well. His migraines worsened and I ran out of options on what to do.
But this book should have solutions. 

Here is hoping. 

Arno was fifteen. He recognized the date. A little after his birthday. His migraine had struck in the middle of the night and he had to miss his classes that day. His old man left his office work to his secretaries to divide up and stayed at his side to nurse him back to health.

Each page had extensive notes. Underlined in pencil, circled, with ink dots around important paragraphs to remember. How Arno loved the outdoors and the sunshine was good for him and his lungs. How total darkness was bad for Arno but he liked windows and natural light. 

How he had to swallow down his vegetables and he noted how Arno despised squash due to the texture. 

One note was next to a small drawing of a cup of coffee and a smiley face; coffee makes migraines lower. Then a wine glass was drawn next to it with a frown; wine makes them worse. 

Which was news to Arno.

But he read the notes his old man left on the margins of what worked and what did not. Lessons in Arno’s own past that he learned of now as an adult. He kept reading.

In the four hours that have passed, he learned so much about why his old man was the way he was about Arno’s health. 

He adjusted Augustina’s position a few times, pausing his reading to move more than a few times to walk around and rock her to sleep. She ended up asleep quite fast. Normally, he would take her to Charlotte and Augustine’s bedroom right away, but they were both quite busy. And Arno liked the little one’s company.

He had a small bassinet in his room anyway.

As Augustina slept, Arno continued to read. A trip down a valley of his sickly youth, with odd recipes and odd tonics and practical solutions that Arno would have never thought were possible. His old man wrote notes inside the margins and used the blank pages of a journal to add more.

Elise was the healthiest one of them both. But there were a lot of notes in it about her as well, especially her favorite foods and affinity for sweets that she shared with Arno.

Her intolerance to mint, but passion for cinnamon. How painting helps alleviate her stress, with four of the portraits in the house made by her, and many more in the making of her sketchbook.

Elise laid down on the floor sometimes of her bedroom to continue drawing and painting. She said it was better for the texture—whatever the hell that meant. She ended up falling asleep on the floor sometimes, with drool on the large pages she tried to practice her outlines on. Arno would resist everything in him to not laugh. 

One summer when they were both sixteen, Arno remembered her kicking down his door, her work dress and apron covered in paint at eight in the morning, and excitedly yelling at him in Basque to come see the finished product. Apparently, she was awake all night finishing it and surely enough, it turned out beautiful. The commotion woke up their father and he was so proud of her. So happy for her.

He hugged and kissed them both on their heads. A moment of joy. The painting was simple. A still life. Elise’s first formal portrait of a doll, now lifelike and beautiful. Sometimes, Elise stood when she painted. But the doll had a name...What was it? 

Aurora.

The painting had a name now, too. Aurora. Dawn. Aurore.

Painting makes our daughter happy.  

Our.

Our. 

Oh, his old man carried his father in every word he wrote. In every breath he took. He loved him. Loved him. Unconditionally. 

When Arno convulsed, his father scoured every single page and source he could, to read anything that meant something to his condition and how to treat it. Tears fell onto the pages. But this time, Arno had smiled. Even now, his fathers helped him. He placed a bookmark and closed the book.

“Thank you, old man,” he whispered to the book and kissed the cover. “I love you so much.”

He heard footsteps and Arno wiped off his tears and closed the book. He set it down on the table. 

“My love,” Adi greeted gently as he kissed the top of his head. 

“Hi.”

“And my little one,” Adi said just as softly. He kissed the top of Augustina’s curls. 

“Where have you been?”

At the sullen expression, Arno straightened up.

“What’s wrong?”

“Brasseur.”

“What happened?”

“Physician came to see him. He says it was a nervous breakdown. He had not slept in a few days...We brought him from the safehouse.”

“Oh god…I need to go see him.”

“I got our girl,” Adi said gently. “Come here, my little one.” Adi lifted her and kissed the top of her head. He held her and sat down. “What were you reading to her?”

“It…” Merde. He hadn’t told Adi about his old man’s personal books yet. “She fell asleep quite fast. I was reading it for myself. Where is Brasseur?”

“My room. Well, his room, now. I will take the little one back to Charlotte.” 

“How serious is it?” Arno whispered to Adi.

“Oh, my dear,” Adi sighed. “It’s the most serious it has ever been.”

Arno picked up his book and let out a heavy sigh. Arno went up to the attic, where the candles were still lit up. He stopped to put his book away and looked over his shoulder to see that Adi was covering Augustina in her blanket and walking out to the staircase.

Brasseur was freshly bathed, with the towel drying on the back of the desk chair. 

“Brother,” Brasseur said and patted the place next to him on the couch by the window. “Sit! Sit! It has been a while!” His voice was hoarse.

“Hey,” Arno said gently and gave him a firm hug and a kiss on the cheek. 

Arno sat down next to him and watched out the window with him. There was still noise for a busy afternoon, especially now that the theater was hosting authentic plays.

“I’m curious. So what was it to have a Templar as a stepfather?”

“It was just like having a father. My father was the godfather of my sister, Élise. So we have always known each other since we were children. But my stepfather…The old man treated me like a son. Got onto me when I slacked off in studies, taught me how to shoot. How to hunt. Fenced, practiced my Latin, Spanish, English and Basque. Learned to be mostly fluent in them,” Arno exhaled heavily at the list. “And boy, did he! London had me fighting for my life with the King’s ugly ass English.” 

“He did not treat you differently?”

“No, no, not at all.”

“Not even…”

“After I convulsed?” Arno finished.

“Yes.”

“He did not. He was a little more protective, more cautious, but he did not treat me as if I was weak,” Arno said. 

“Good. Good.”

“Brother, what makes you say that?”

“Look at me. I’m broken,” Brasseur said. “Only reason I’m not in any sanatorium is because I’m an assassin.”

“I have these horrible thoughts. These horrible pains…I close my eyes and all I see is our Therese. My friend. I regret seeing her. I regret it so much—I have seen so much on the battlefield, but this is beyond any pain I can describe.” 

“We can manage this. We will get you through this,” Arno reassured. “No matter what, brother.”

Chapter Text

“Adi.”

“What is it?”

“I--” Arno swayed. 

“Okay, we’re going to get the physician. Come on. We’re going to our room.”

He remembered what his old man had said to him regarding his health. The convulsions had to be kept secret. As the physician they encountered told him before. There are doctors in the world who believe it to be a demonic possession.

Arno only had three convulsions in his life. One in Paris, the second and third in Versailles. The first was with the fever, the second with a breakdown when he returned from England. And the third with another breakdown again in that same week.

And this one. 

The fourth one.

“Arno Victor Dorian de la Serre,” Arno said softly.

“I remember you!”

“You do?”

“Yes, I remember your father. Your case is one of a kind. Is it still the same condition?” The physician asked.

Arno nodded. 

“He’s going to be alright,” the physician told Adi. “Just needs a lot of rest. No heavy work. No stressful situations.”

“My life is a stressful situations…” Arno mumbled and closed his eyes as Adi pressed the cloth to his forehead again.

He heard the conversation fade after that.

He woke an hour later.

It looked like it was going to be another long night of Adi placing cold washcloths over Arno’s forehead.

Arno wanted to sleep, but the pain would not let up.

“You’re in too much pain,” Adi pleaded.  “I don’t know if you should do the mission.”

“I will recover by then, love.” Arno reassured.  “Mark my words.”

The two days arrived fast. Arno faced Notre Dame, the beautiful building now a centerpiece for an urban battlefield.

“Lovely view, right?”

Arno turned around. 

There stood Adi, in his gorgeous red robes and hood pulled over his head. He was smiling. 

“Adair Henaf, what the fuck are you doing here?” Arno asked with a smile. “You weren’t signed on for this mission.”

“I signed on.” Adi walked carefully across the tile. “...In invisible ink.”

“I thought you were going back to the meat district.”

“That’s next week, I believe…It is best to apologize later, no?”

Arno laughed and embraced him briefly. He kissed his shoulder. 

“Why are you here?” He asked again. 

“I just wanted to check on you, see how you were doing. Especially after dealing with that freak.”

“Yeah, Bellec’s comments just get more and more suspect.” 

“How’s your head?”

“Still on my neck. And your hand?”

Adi still could not get rid of those old aches anyway.

“Still on my arm. And well…it seems I oh so happened to…be added to the log.”

Samita. Samita added him to the mission log. 

“I love Samita so fucking much,” Arno said. Finally, things were working in his favor. “So, now that you’re here, we can do things my way.”

“Oh, your way?” Adi asked. “You can fool Master Bellec, but you can’t fool me.”

“Bellec is a fool, anyways.”

“He sure is,” Adi smiled. “And your head is still killing you.”

“So much,” Arno said softly.

“Which is why I am here to help. Relax, you can take the credit,” Adi said with a wave of his hand. “Not that it matters to me much. You kind of need it.”

“Oh, I fuck up target practice once—”

“Shut it.”

“If I didn’t think so, I would assume you just wanted to spend time with me.”

Adi let out an undignified snort of laughter.

“ Wow ,” Arno said. “You could at least pretend otherwise. It has only been three weeks since the council began to take us seriously ever since the incident.”

“You miss me that much already?”

“Non. I’m not that clingy.”

As if Arno did not jerk him off that morning before dawn.

“Anyways, what do you make?” Arno asked.

“I see two chimneys,” Adi counted. “That’s probably how those bastards stay warm in the sewers. It will be easy to cover it up, and smoke them out.”

“Until a civilian uncovers it because they feel cold,” Arno said. 

“Just lie, say they’re toxic. That should scare them off.”

Arno snorted. “Yeah, as if the people need more lies fed to them…But it could work. Nuisance for them, advantage to us.”

“How many guards?”

“I see...Sixteen on the west, ten to east. Mix of extremists and guards,” Arno said. “One entrance, one exit, down near the front by the market.”

“Above ground or below it?”

“Un..dieu..trieu…” Arno nodded. “Yes, three above. The rest are--” Arno winced, his hand going to his head. No doubt that it was burning with the effort to use his ability and the thin air of the tall viewpoint.

“Love.” Adi touched his arm. “Don’t overdo it,” he reminded. “We only just got you back.”

“I know,” Arno said with a slow breath. “I’m trying.”

“Did you take the second medicine?”

“Yes,” Arno said dryly. “It was disgusting. The taste was worse than the headache.”

“So don’t use your ability,” Adi said. 

“Adi, I’m hungover, not beheaded ,” Arno echoed the old joke with a groan. Though they both knew that it was no hangover and just a terrible night of so much pain. So many close calls to look for the physician again. So much that they did call the physician. “I’m not dead.”

“You looked pretty dead on your feet this morning,” Adi chided.

“I got you to blame for that.” But Adi was squeezing his arm. Grounding him. Not letting him go.

“We’re on thin ice as it is with the council,” Adi said. “So, we’ll do it my way.”

“The time consuming way.”

“The regular people’s way.”

“The boring way.”

Adi let out a laugh.

Arno touched his wrist. 

“Thank you for this.”

Adi reached over to his hand and squeezed it. And brought it to his lips. He smiled. “Of course, my dear.”

The mission went perfectly. 

The briefing afterward…did not.

“Brasseur is missing?”

“We thought it would be a distraction.”

“One of our most skilled brothers goes missing and you call it a distraction,” Adi stated. “Why haven’t you declared him missing?”

“Yet you meddled with what should have been a one man mission.”

“Non, I assisted with what could have been a one man ambush . There was a higher influx of guards and extremists than anticipated, especially with a riot sparking that same hour. I heard the rumors around the city. So I went there to help.” Adi snapped.

“Yet still, you should have not been there.” Bellec crossed his arms.

“And where were you?” Arno asked. “Getting drunk at the tavern again?”

The scolding was harsh and undeserved, but Adi tried to take it in stride. Arno was holding onto the table tightly. Like he was about to fall.

Arno’s head was hurting again.

It always felt like a test, especially from Bellec. A proof to see if he was as composed as they expected, not hot tempered. Pierre’s words during the initial training were harsh, showing no remorse. 

He always tried to not snap back or flinch when he was getting lectured. Arno was quick to defend him, quick to aggravate Pierre and speak sharp truths. But Bellec was unhinged. His comment about Arno dying showed that.

But they couldn’t argue their success.

Mirabeau had dismissed Bellec. Rolled his eyes.

“Good work, Arno and Adi. We will keep you updated on the next task. Dismissed.”

Mission accomplished. May Silvert find peace in his next life. To which Adi internally thought his own rebuttal: may he burn in hell with the rest of them instead.

Bitterness ranks strongly over victory. Brasseur was missing, yet nothing had been said or done about it. Brasseur. Their Brasseur. Their friend.  Just as soon as he recovered from the breakdown, he was thrust back to work in the field.

He walked back to the Café-Théâtre in silence, Arno’s footsteps in sync with his as they echoed through the catacombs. Normally, Arno would be complaining, spouting off curses and kicking pebbles along with him. But his mind was too heavy.

No doubt it’s still hurting. 

Too exhausted.  Brasseur was missing. Brasseur was two ranks below Master Assassin. And he was missing.

“He should be back.” Adi heard the footsteps stop. He felt a hand touch his wrist.

“Brasseur will turn up.”

“Will he?” Adi asked. 

“Of course. Brasseur is so crazy--in every literal way. You know how he jokes about it. He can think and do anything. He is the greatest of us.”

“It’s been too long. You know how he is. He never goes over the deadline. It is not like him. But...I will try to...have faith.”

Arno nodded.

“Faith is all we can have. And...I almost forgot.”

“What did you almost forget?”

Arno pulled out the keys he stole.

“Are those---”

“The keys to Notre-Dame? Yes. Yes they are.”

Adi gasped. “I thought you returned them to the friar!” he exclaimed.

“Why would I do that?” Arno asked. “He didn’t ask for them. I’m sure he had his own set. Besides, I think that stealing the keys is the most tame thing we have done in Notre-Dame.”

Adi was laughing.

“So now you know, if you ever want to break into Notre Dame again.” Arno jiggled the keys. “I know the means.”

Adi laughed and laughed and embraced him once more. Kissed him.

“I love you. With my soul and being.”

“I love you too,” Arno said. “Come, let us get a drink. Or ten. We fucking need it.”