Assassin's Creed: Unity Part 29

"And now, I must take my leave," he was saying. "A good day to you."

He looked at his guards and with an imperious wave of the hand, ordered them after Arno, with the simple, chilling words: "Kill him."

Two guards were moving forward on Arno, who swung his upper body to meet them, his sword hand reaching across his front.

His blade never cleared leather; my sword spoke once, twice: two fatal arterial slashes that had the guards pitching forward, eyes rolling up in their sockets even as their foreheads made contact with the b.l.o.o.d.y boards of the platform.

It was quick; it achieved the objective of killing the two guards. But it was b.l.o.o.d.y and not at all discreet.

Sure enough, from nearby came a scream. In all the commotion of the execution it wasn't quite urgent or loud enough to panic the crowd, but it was sufficient to alert more guards, who came running, mounting the steps of the platform to where Arno and I stood ready to meet them.

I surged forward, desperate to get to Germain, running the first of our a.s.sailants through with my blade, withdrawing and spinning at the same time in order to slash backhanded at a second guard. It was the kind of move Mr. Weatherall would have hated, an attack born more of the desire for a speedy kill than the need to maintain a defensive stance, the kind that left me vulnerable to a counter. And there was nothing Mr. Weatherall despised more than a showy, incautious attack.

But then again, I had Arno on my flank, who dealt with a third guard, and just maybe Mr. Weatherall might have forgiven me.

In the s.p.a.ce of just a few seconds we had three bodies piled at our feet. But more guards were arriving and a few yards away I caught sight of Germain. He had seen the tide of battle turn and was making a run for it-racing toward a carriage on the thoroughfare at the perimeter of the square.

I was cut off from reaching him, but Arno . . .

"What are you doing?" I screamed at him, urging him to go after Germain.

Deflecting the first of my attackers. Seeing Germain getting away.

"I'm not leaving you to die," called Arno, and turned his attention to where more guards had appeared on the steps.

But I wasn't going to die. I had a way out. I glanced up to the thoroughfare, saw the carriage door gaping open, Germain about to climb aboard. Thrashing wildly with my sword I vaulted the barrier, landing badly in the dirt but not quite badly enough to die at the hands of a guard who thought he'd seen his chance to kill me and paid for the a.s.sumption with steel in his gut.

From somewhere I heard Arno shout, telling me to stop-"It's not worth it!"-seeing what he'd seen-a phalanx of guards who rounded the platform, creating a barrier between me and . . .

Germain. Who had reached the carriage, clambered in and slammed the door shut behind him. I saw as the coachman shook the reins and the horse's crests were whipped by a wind as their muzzles rose and their hocks tightened, and the carriage set off at a lick.

d.a.m.n.

I braced myself, about to take on the guards, when I felt Arno by my side, grabbing my arm. "No, Elise."

With a cry of frustration I shook him off. The squad was advancing on us, blades drawn, shoulders dropped and forward. In their eyes was the confidence of strength in numbers. I bared my teeth.

Blast him. Blast Arno.

But then he grabbed me by the hand, pulled me into the safety and anonymity of the crowd and began pushing his way through startled onlookers at the periphery and into the heart of the mob, the guards behind us at last.

It wasn't until we had left the scene of the execution behind-until there were no more people around-that we stopped.

I rounded on him. "He's gone, d.a.m.n it, our one chance . . ."

"It's not over," he insisted, seeing I needed cooling down. "We'll find him again . . ."

I felt my blood rising. "No, we won't. You think he'll be so careless now, knowing how close at heel we are? You were given a golden opportunity to end his life, and you refused to take it."

He shook his head, not seeing it that way at all. "To save your life," he insisted.

"It isn't yours to save."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm willing to die to put Germain down. If you don't have the stomach for revenge . . . then I don't need your help."

And I meant it, dear journal. As I sit and write this, and mull over the angry words we exchanged, I remain certain that I meant it then and mean it now.

Perhaps his loyalty to my father was not as great as he had professed it to be.

No, I didn't need his help.

10 NOVEMBER 1793.

They called it the Terror.

"Enemies of the Revolution" were being sent to the guillotine by the dozens-for opposing the Revolution, for h.o.a.rding grain, for helping foreign armies. They called the guillotine "the national razor" and it worked hard, claiming two or three heads a day in the Place de Revolution alone. France cowered beneath the threat of its dropping blade.

Meanwhile, in events even closer to my own heart, I heard that Arno had been laid low by his Order.

"He's been banished," Mr. Weatherall read from his correspondence, holding a letter, the last vestiges of his once-proud network having got in touch at last.

"Who?" I asked.

"Arno."

"I see."

He smiled. "You pretending not to care, are you?"

"There's no pretense about it, Mr. Weatherall."

"Still not forgiven him, eh?"

"He once pledged to me that if he had his chance to take a shot, then he would take it. He had his chance and didn't take it."

"He was right," said Mr. Weatherall one day. He spat it out, as though it was something that had been on his mind.

"I beg your pardon," I said.

Actually, I didn't "say" it. I "snapped" it. The truth was that Mr. Weatherall and I had been irate with one another for weeks, maybe even months. Life had been reduced to this one thing: lying low. And it made me howl with frustration. Each day spent worrying about finding Germain before he found us; each day spent waiting for letters to arrive from an ever-changing series of drops. Knowing that we were fighting a losing battle.

And yes, I seethed, knowing that Germain had been so close to feeling my sword. Mr. Weatherall seethed, too, but for slightly different reasons. What went left unsaid was that Mr. Weatherall believed me to be too rash and hotheaded; that I should have waited and bided my time to plot against Germain, just as Germain had done in his takeover of our Order. Mr. Weatherall said I was thinking with my sword. He tried to tell me that my parents would not have acted with such incautious haste. He used every trick he knew, and now he used Arno.

"Arno was right," he said. "You would have been cut down. You might as well have slit your own throat for all the good it would have done you."

I made an exasperated sound, shooting a resentful look around the room of the lodge in which we sat. It was warm, homely and I should have loved it here but instead it felt small and crowded. This room and the lodge as a whole had come to symbolize my own inaction.

"What would you have me do, then?" I asked.

"If you truly loved the Order, the best thing you can is offer to make peace. Offer to serve the Order."

My mouth dropped open.

"Yield?"

"No, not yield, make peace. Negotiate."

"But they are my enemies. I cannot negotiate with my enemies."

"Try looking at it from another point of view, Elise," Mr. Weatherall pressed, trying to get through to me. "You're making peace with the a.s.sa.s.sins but you don't negotiate with your own people. That's what it looks like."

"It wasn't the a.s.sa.s.sins who killed my father," I hissed. "You think I can truce with my father's murderers?"

He threw up his hands. "Christ, and she thinks that Templars and a.s.sa.s.sins can just make up. What if they're all like you, eh? 'I want revenge, b.u.g.g.e.r the consequences.'"

"It would take time," I admitted.

He pounced. "And that's what you can do. You can bide your time. You can do more on the inside than you can on the outside."

"And they'll know that. They'd have smiling faces and knives behind their backs."

"They won't murder a peacemaker. The Order would think it dishonorable, and what they need above all is harmony within the Order. No. If you bring diplomacy, they'll respond with diplomacy."

"You can't be sure of that."

He gave a small shrug. "No, but either way, I believe risking death that way is better than risking death your way."

I stood and glared down at him, this old man hunched over his crutches. "So that's your advice, is it? Make peace with my father's killers."

He looked up at me with eyes that were sad because we both knew there was only one way this could end.

"It is," he said. "As your adviser, that's my advice."

"Then consider yourself dismissed," I said.

He nodded. "You want me to leave?"

I shook my head. "No. I want you to stay."

It was I who left.

2 APRIL 1794.

It was almost too painful to come here again, to the chteau in Versailles, but this was where Arno was staying, so this was where I came.

At first I thought the information I'd been given must have been wrong because inside, the chteau was in the same-if not worse-condition than it had been when I was last here.

Then again, something else I'd learned was that Arno had evidently taken his banishment from the a.s.sa.s.sins badly and had gained something of a name for himself as the local drunk.

"You look like h.e.l.l," I told him, when eventually I found him ensconced in my father's office.

Regarding me with tired eyes before his gaze slid away, he said, "You look like you want something from me."

"That's a fine thing to say after you up and vanished."

He made a short scoffing sound. "You made it fairly clear my services were no longer required."

I felt my anger rise. "Don't. Don't you dare talk to me like that."

"What do you want me to say, Elise? I'm sorry I didn't leave you to die? Forgive me for caring more about you than killing Germain?"

And yes, I suppose my heart did melt. Just a little. "I thought we wanted the same thing."

"What I wanted was you. It kills me knowing my carelessness got your father killed. Everything I've done has been to fix that mistake and to prevent its happening again." He dropped his eyes. "You must have come here with something in mind. What was it?"

"Paris is tearing itself apart," I told him. "Germain has driven the Revolution to new heights of depravity. The guillotines operate nearly twenty-four hours a day now."

"And what do you expect me to do about it?"

"The Arno I love wouldn't have to ask that question," I said.

I waved a hand at the mess that had once been my father's beloved office. It was in here that I had learned of my Templar destiny; in here I had been told of Arno's a.s.sa.s.sin lineage. Now, it was a hovel. "You're better than this," I said.

"I'm going back to Paris-are you coming?"

His shoulders slumped and for a moment I thought it was the end for Arno and me. With so many secrets poisoning the lake of our relationship, how could we ever be what we were? Ours was a love thwarted by the plans made for us by other people.

But he stood, as though having made the decision. He raised his head and looked at me with bleary, hungover eyes that were nevertheless filled with renewed purpose.

"Not yet," he told me. "I can't leave without taking care of La Touche."

Aloys La Touche was a new addition to our-or should I say "their"-Order. One of Germain's appointments, he had joined the ranks of the Crows. Besides a kind of dull, burning hatred I felt for all of those close to Germain, I had no particular feelings for the man either way. Arno could kill him for all I cared. Even so.

"Is this really necessary?" I asked him. "The longer we wait, the more likely Germain will slip through our fingers."

"He's been grinding Versailles under his boot for months; I should have done something about this a long time ago."

He had a point.

"All right. I'll go see to our transportation. Stay out of trouble."

He looked at me. I grinned and amended my farewell. "Don't get caught."

3 APRIL 1794.

"Things have changed a great deal since you left Paris," I told him the next day as we took our places on a cart back to the city.