At last, in mid-afternoon, he was heartened to see the little walled town of Monteriggioni bathed in sunshine on its hill in the distance. Mario effectively ruled the district. Another mile or two, and they would be within his territory. Heartened, the little group quickened their pace.
'Nearly there,' he told Claudia, with a smile.
'Grazie a Dio,' she replied, returning it.
They'd just started to relax when, at a turn in the road, a familiar figure, accompanied by a dozen men in blue-and-gold liveries, blocked their way. One of the guards carried a standard bearing the hated, familiar emblem of golden dolphins and crosses on a blue ground.
'Ezio!' the figure greeted him. 'Buon' giorno! And your family - or at least, what's left of it! What a pleasant surprise!' He nodded to his men, who fanned out across the road, halberds at the ready.
'Vieri!'
'The same. As soon as they released my father from custody, he was more than happy to finance this little hunting party for me. I was hurt. After all, how could you think of leaving Florence without saying a proper goodbye?'
Ezio advanced a pace, ushering Claudia and his mother behind him.
'What do you want, Vieri? I should have thought you'd be satisfied with what the Pazzi have managed to achieve.'
Vieri spread his hands. 'What do I want? Well, it's hard to know where to begin. So many things! Let's see. I'd like a larger palazzo, a prettier wife, much more money and - what else? - Oh, yes! Your head!' He drew his sword, motioning his guards to stay ready, and advanced on Ezio himself.
'I'm surprised, Vieri - are you really going to take me on all alone? But of course your bully boys are right behind you!'
'I don't think you're worthy of my sword,' retorted Vieri, sheathing it again. 'I think I'll just finish you off with my fists. Sorry if this distresses you, tesora,' he added to Claudia, 'but don't worry - it won't take long, then I'll see what I can do to comfort you - and who knows, maybe your little mamma as well!'
Ezio stepped forward fast and connected his fist to Vieri's jaw so that his enemy staggered, taken off guard. But, regaining his feet, Vieri waved his men back and hurled himself on to Ezio with a furious roar, piling on blow after blow. Such was the ferocity of Vieri's attack that while Ezio parried with skill, he was unable to land a meaningful blow of his own. Both men were locked together, wrestling for control, occasionally staggering back only to fling themselves at each other with renewed vigour. Eventually Ezio was able to use Vieri's anger to work against him - no one ever fought effectively in a rage. Vieri wound up to throw a huge haymaker with his right; Ezio stepped forward and the blow glanced uselessly off his shoulder, Vieri's momentum carrying his weight forward uncontrolled. Ezio tripped up his opponent's heels and sent him rolling in the dust. Bleeding and bested, Vieri scrambled to safety behind his men, and stood up, dusting himself down with his grazed hands.
'I tire of this,' he said, and shouted to the guards. 'Finish him off, and the women too. I can do better than that scrawny little tadpole and her carcassa of a mother!'
'Coniglio!' yelled Ezio, panting for breath, drawing his sword, but the guards had formed a circle round them and extended their halberds. He knew he'd have a hard time closing with them.
The circle tightened. Ezio kept swinging round, trying to keep his womenfolk behind him, but things looked black, and Vieri's unpleasant laugh was one of triumph.
Suddenly there was a sharp, almost ethereal whistling noise and two of the guards to Ezio's left crumpled to their knees and fell forward, dropping their weapons as they did so. From each of their backs projected a throwing-knife, buried to the hilt and clearly aimed with deadly accuracy. Blood billowed out from their shirts, like crimson flowers.
The others drew back in alarm, but not before one more of their number had fallen to the ground, a knife in his back.
'What sorcery is this?' yelped Vieri, terror cutting his voice, drawing his sword and looking round wildly.
He was answered by a deep-throated, booming laugh. 'Nothing to do with sorcery, boy - everything to do with skill!' The voice was coming from a nearby coppice.
'Show yourself!'
A large bearded man wearing high boots and a light breastplate emerged from the little wood. Behind him several others, similarly attired, appeared. 'As you wish,' he said, sardonically.
'Mercenaries!' snarled Vieri, then turned to his own guards. 'What are you waiting for? Kill them! Kill them all!'
But the large man stepped forward, wrested Vieri's sword from him with unbelievable grace, and snapped the blade over his knee as easily as if it had been a twig. 'I don't think that's a very good idea, little Pazzi, though I must say you live up to your family name.'
Vieri didn't answer, but urged his men on. Not very willingly, they closed with the strangers, while Vieri, picking up the halberd of one of his dead guards, rounded on Ezio, knocking his sword out of his hand and out of reach just as he was drawing it.
'Here, Ezio, use this!' said the large man, throwing him another sword, which flew through the air to land on its point, quivering in the ground at his feet. In a flash he'd picked it up. It was a heavy weapon and he had to use both hands to wield it, but he was able to sever the shaft of Vieri's halberd. Vieri himself, seeing that his men were being easily bested by the condottieri, and that two more were already down, called off the attack and fled, hurling imprecations as he went. The large man approached Ezio and the women, grinning broadly.
'I'm glad I came out to meet you,' he said. 'Looks as if I arrived just in time.'
'You have my thanks, whoever you are.'
The man laughed again, and there was something familiar about his voice.
'Do I know you?' asked Ezio.
'It's been a long time. But still I'm surprised you don't recognize your own uncle!'
'Uncle Mario?'
'The same!'
He gave Ezio a bear-hug, and then approached Maria and Claudia. Distress clouded his face when he saw the condition Maria was in. 'Listen, child -' he said to Claudia. 'I'm going to take Ezio back to the castello now, but I'm leaving my men to guard you, and they will give you something to eat and drink. I'll send a rider ahead and he'll return with a carriage to bring you the rest of the way. You've done enough walking for one day and I can see that my poor sister-in-law is.' he paused before adding delicately, 'tired out.'
'Thank you, Uncle Mario.'
'It's settled then. We'll see you very soon.' He turned and issued orders to his men, then put an arm round Ezio and guided him in the direction of his castle, which dominated the little town.
'How did you know I was on my way?' asked Ezio.
Mario looked a little evasive. 'Oh - a friend in Florence sent a messenger on horseback ahead of you. But I already knew what had happened. I haven't the strength to march on Florence but now Lorenzo's back let us pray he can keep the Pazzi in check. You'd better fill me in on my brother's fate - and that of my nephews.'
Ezio paused. The memory of his kinsmen's death still haunted the darkest part of his memories.
'They. They were all executed for treason.' He paused. 'I escaped by the purest chance.'
'My God,' mouthed Mario, his face contorted with pain. 'Do you know why this happened?'
'No - but it is something I hope you may be able to help me find answers to.' And Ezio went on to tell his uncle about the hidden chest in the family palazzo and its contents, and of his revenge on Alberti and the documents he had taken from him. 'The most important-looking is a list of names,' he added, then broke off in grief. 'I cannot believe this has befallen us!'
Mario patted his arm. 'I know something of your father's business,' he said, and it occurred to Ezio that Mario hadn't shown much surprise when he'd told him of the hidden chest in the secret chamber. 'We'll make sense of this. But we must also make sure your mother and sister are properly provided for. My castle is not much of a place for women of any quality, and soldiers like me never really settle down; but there is a convent a
bout a mile away where they will be completely safe and well cared for. If you agree, we will send them there. For you and I have much to do.'
Ezio nodded. He would see them settled and persuade Claudia that it was the best temporary solution, for he could not see her wanting to remain long in such seclusion.
They were approaching the little town.
'I thought Monteriggioni was an enemy of Florence,' Ezio said.
'No so much of Florence as of the Pazzi,' his uncle told him. 'But you are old enough to know about alliances between city-states, whether they are big ones or small ones. One year there is a friendship, the next, enmity; and the following year there is friendship again. And so it seems to go on for ever, like a mad game of chess. But you'll like it here. The people are honest and hard-working, and the goods we produce are solid and hard-wearing. The priest is a good man, doesn't drink too much, and minds his own business. And I mind mine, around him - but I've never been a very devoted son of the Church myself. Best of all is the wine - the best Chianti you will ever taste comes from my own vineyards. Come, just a little further, and we'll be there.'
Mario's castle was the ancient seat of the Auditori and had been built in the 1250s, though the site had originally been occupied by a much more ancient construction. Mario had refined and added to the building, which nowadays had more of the appearance of an opulent villa, though its walls were high, many feet in thickness, and well fortified. Before it and in place of a garden was a large practice-field, where Ezio could see a couple of dozen young armed men engaged in various exercises to improve their fighting technique.
'Casa, dolce casa,' said Mario. 'You haven't been here since you were a little boy. Been some changes since then. What do you think?'
'It's most impressive, Uncle.'
The rest of the day was filled with activity. Mario showed Ezio around the castle, organized his accommodation, and made sure that Claudia and Maria had been safely housed in the nearby convent, whose abbess was an old and dear friend (and, it was rumoured, long ago a mistress) of Mario. But the following morning he was summoned early to his uncle's workroom, a large, high-ceilinged place, whose walls were festooned with maps, armour and weapons, and furnished with a heavy oak table and chairs.
'You'd better get into the town quickly,' Mario said one day soon afterwards in a businesslike voice. Get yourself properly kitted out. I'll send one of my men with you. Come back here when you've finished and we'll begin.'
'Begin what, Uncle?'
Mario looked surprised. 'I thought you'd come here to train.'
'No, Uncle - that was not my intention. This was the first place of safety I could think of once we had to flee Florence. But my intention is to take my mother and sister further still.'
Mario looked grave. 'But what about your father? Don't you think he'd want you to finish his work?'
'What - as a banker? The family business is over - the House of Auditore is no more, unless Duke Lorenzo has managed to keep it out of Pazzi hands.'
'I wasn't thinking of that,' began Mario, and then interrupted himself. 'Do you mean to say Giovanni never told you?'
'I am sorry, Uncle, but I have no idea what you are talking about.'
Mario shook his head. 'I don't know what your father must have been thinking of. Perhaps he judged the time not to be right. But events have overtaken any such consideration now.' He looked hard at Ezio. 'We must talk, long and hard. Leave me the documents you have in your pouch. I must study them while you go into the town and get yourself equipped. Here's a list of what you'll need, and money to pay for it.'
In a confused mood, Ezio set off for the town in the company of one of Mario's sergeants, a grizzled veteran called Orazio, and under his guidance acquired from the armourer there a battle-dagger, light body-armour, and - from the local doctor -bandages and a basic medical kit. He returned to the castle to find Mario waiting impatiently for him.
'Salute,' said Ezio. 'I have done as you requested.'
'And quickly too. Ben fatto! And now, we must teach you properly how to fight.'
'Uncle, forgive me, but as I told you, I have no intention of staying.'
Mario bit his lip. 'Listen, Ezio, you were barely able to hold your own against Vieri. If I hadn't arrived when I did.' He broke off. 'Well, leave if you must, but at least first learn the skills and knowledge you'll need to defend yourself, or you won't last a week on the road.'
Ezio was silent.
'If not for me, do it for the sake of your mother and sister,' Mario pressed him.
Ezio considered his options, but he had to admit that his uncle had a point. 'Well, then,' he said. 'Since you've been kind enough to see me kitted out.'
Mario beamed and clapped him on the shoulder. 'Good man! You'll live to thank me!' In the following weeks the most intensive instruction in the use of arms followed, but while he was learning new battle skills, Ezio was also finding out more about his family background, and the secrets his father had not had time to divulge to him. And, as Mario let him have the run of his library, he gradually became troubled by the fact that he might be on the verge of a far more important destiny than he had believed possible.
'You say my father was more than just a banker?' he asked his uncle.
'Far more,' replied Mario gravely. 'You father was a highly trained killer.'
'That cannot be - my father was always a financier, a businessman. how could he have possibly been a killer?'
'No, Ezio, he was much more than that. He was born and bred to kill. He was a senior member of the Order of Assassins.' Mario hesitated. 'I know you must have found out something more about all this in the library. We must discuss the documents that were entrusted to you, and which you - thank God! - had the wit to retrieve from Alberti. That list of names -it isn't a catalogue of debtors, you know. It carries the names of all those responsible for your father's murder - and they are men who form part of a still greater conspiracy.'
Ezio struggled to take it all in - everything he thought he knew about his father, his family, it all now seemed to be a half-truth. How could his father have kept this from him? It was all so inconceivable, so alien. Ezio chose his words with care - his father must have had a reason for this secrecy. 'I accept that there was more to my father than I ever knew, and forgive me for doubting your word, but why is the need for secrecy so great?'
Mario paused before replying. 'Are you familiar with the Order of the Knights Templar?'
'I have heard of them.'
'They were founded many centuries ago, soon after the First of the Crusades, and became an elite fighting force of warriors for God - effectively they were monks in armour. They took a pledge of abstinence and a vow of poverty. But the years rolled by, and their status changed. In time, they became involved in international finance, and very successful they were at it, too. Other Orders of Knights - the Hospitallers and the Teutonic Knights - looked on them askance, and their power began to be a cause for concern, even to kings. They established a base in southern France, and planned to form their own state. They paid no taxes, supported their own private army, and began to lord it over everyone. At last, nearly two hundred years ago, King Philip the Fair of France moved against them. There was a terrible purge, the Templars were arrested and driven away, massacred, and at last excommunicated by the Pope. But they could not all be rooted out - they had fifteen thousand chapters throughout Europe. Nevertheless, with their estates and properties annexed, the Templars seemed to dis appear, their power apparently broken.'
'What happened to them?'
Mario shook his head. 'Of course, it was a ruse to ensure their own survival. They went underground, hoarding the riches they had salvaged, maintaining their organization, and bent more than ever now on their true goal.'
'And what was that?'
'What is that, you mean!' Mario's eyes blazed. 'Their intention is nothing less than world domination. And only one organization is devoted to thwarting them. The Order of the Assassins, to which your f
ather - and I - have the honour to belong.'
Ezio needed a moment to take this in. 'And was Alberti one of the Templars?'
Mario nodded solemnly. 'Yes. As are all the others on your father's list.'
'And - Vieri?'
'He is one as well, and his father Francesco, and all the Pazzi clan.'
Ezio pondered this. 'That explains much.' he said. 'There is something I haven't shown you yet -'
He rolled up his sleeve to reveal his secret dagger.
'Ah,' said Mario. 'You were wise not to reveal that until you were sure you could trust even me completely. I was wondering what had become of it. And I see that you have had it repaired. It was your father's, given to him by our father, and to him by
his. It was broken in. a confrontation your father was involved in many years ago, but he could never find a craftsman skilled or trustworthy enough to restore it. You have done well, my boy.'
'Even so,' said Ezio. 'All this talk of Assassins and Templars sounds like something from an ancient tale - it reeks of the fantastic.'
Mario smiled. 'Like something from an old parchment covered in arcane writing, perhaps?'
'You know of the Codex page?'
Mario shrugged. 'Had you forgotten? It was with the papers you handed over to me.'
'Can you tell me what it is?' Ezio was somehow reluctant to involve his friend Leonardo in this unless it became strictly necessary.
'Well, whoever repaired your blade must have been able to read at least some of it,' said Mario, but he raised his hand as Ezio was about to open his mouth. 'But I will ask you no questions. I can see that you wish to protect someone, and I will respect that. But there is more to the page than the working instructions for your weapon. The pages of the Codex are scattered now throughout Italy. It is a guide to the inner workings of the Assassins' Order, its origin, purpose and techniques. It is, if you will, our Creed. Your father believed that the Codex contained a powerful secret. Something that would change the world.' He paused for thought. 'Perhaps that is why they came for him.'
Assassin's Creed: Renaissance Page 9
