Oliver Bowden: Brotherhood

"My uncle mentioned a sister," Ezio began.

Machiavelli turned to him. "Yes. Lucrezia. She and Cesare are…how shall I say? Very close. They are a very close-knit family; when they are not killing those other brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, whom they find inconvenient to them, they are…coupling with each other."

Maria Auditore could not suppress a cry of disgust.

"We must approach them with all the caution we would use to approach a nest of vipers," Machiavelli concluded. "And God knows where and how soon they will next strike." He paused and drank half a glass of wine. "And now, Mario, I leave you. Ezio, we will soon meet again, I trust."

"You're leaving this evening?"

"Time is of the essence, good Mario. I ride for Rome tonight. Farewell!"

The room was silent after Machiavelli left. After a long pause, Ezio said bitterly, "He blames me for not killing Rodrigo when I had the chance." He looked around at them. "You all do!"

"Any of us might have made the decision you made," said his mother. "You were sure he was dying."

Mario came and put an arm around his shoulders. "Machiavelli knows your value-we all do. And even with the Pope out of the way, we'd still have had to deal with his brood-"

"But if I had cut off the head, could the body have survived?"

"We must deal with the situation as it is, good Ezio, not with it as it might have been." Mario clapped him on the back. "And now, as we are in for a busy day tomorrow, I suggest we dine and then prepare for an early night!"

Caterina's eyes met Ezio's. Did he imagine it, or was there a flicker of the old lust there? He shrugged inwardly. Perhaps he'd just imagined it.

Ezio ate lightly-just pollo ripieno with roasted vegetables; and he drank his Chianti cut half-and-half with water. There was little conversation at dinner, and he answered his mother's string of questions politely but laconically. After all the tension that had mounted in anticipation of the meeting, and which had now melted away, he was very tired. He had barely had a chance to rest since leaving Rome, and it looked now as if it would be a long time still before he could realize a long-cherished ambition of spending some time back in his old home in Florence, reading and walking in the surrounding gentle hills.

As soon as he decently could, he made his excuses to the company and set off for his bedroom, a large, quiet, dimly lit space on one of the upper floors, with a view across the countryside rather than the town. Once he'd reached it and dismissed the servant, he let go of the steeliness that had supported him throughout the day, and his very body slumped, his shoulders sagged, and his walk eased. His movements were slow and deliberate. He moved across the room to where the servant had already drawn him a bath. He approached it, tugging at his boots and taking off his clothes as he did so, and, naked, stood for a moment, his clothes bundled in his hands, before a full-length mirror on a stand near the copper tub. He looked at his reflection with weary eyes. Where had the four long decades gone? He straightened. He was older, stronger even, certainly wiser; but he could not deny the profound fatigue he felt.

He threw his clothes onto the bed. Under it, in a locked elm chest, were the secret Codex weapons Leonardo da Vinci had once fashioned for him. He would check them over first thing in the morning, after the council of war he'd be holding with his uncle. The original hidden-blade never left him except when he was naked, and then it was always within arm's reach. He wore it always; it had become part of his body.

Sighing with relief, Ezio slipped into the bath. Immersed to his neck in the hot water, breathing in the gently scented steam, he closed his eyes and let out a long, slow breath of relief. Peace at last. And he had better make the most of the few short hours he had of it.

He had dozed off and begun to dream when the softest of noises, the door opening and closing behind its heavy tapestry hanging, caused him to awake, instantly alert, like a wild animal. Silently his hand sought the blade and with a practiced movement he attached it to his wrist. Then, in one fluid motion he turned and stood upright in the tub, poised for action and looking in the direction of the door.

"Well," said Caterina, grinning as she approached, "you certainly haven't lost any inches with the years."

"You have the advantage of me, Contessa." Ezio smiled. "You are fully clothed."

"I expect we could arrange something to change that. But I am waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

"For you to say that you don't really need to see for yourself. For you to say that you are sure, even without seeing my naked body, that Nature has been as kind to me, if not kinder, as she has been to you." Her grin broadened at Ezio's confusion. "But I remember you were never as good at paying compliments as you were at ridding the world of Templars."

"Come here!"

He drew her to him, pulling at the girdle of her skirt as her fingers flew first at the blade, detaching it, and then at the laces of her bodice. Seconds later he had lifted her into the bath with him, their lips glued to one another's and their naked limbs entwined.

They did not linger in the bath long, but soon got out, drying each other on the rough linen towels the servant had left. Caterina had brought a vial of scented massage oil with her and drew it from a pocket of her dress.

"Now, lie on the bed," she said. "I want to make sure you are good and ready for me."

"Surely you can see that I am."

"Indulge me. Indulge yourself."

Ezio smiled. This was better than sleep. Sleep could wait.

Sleep, Ezio found, was obliged to wait three hours. Then she curled up in his arms. She fell asleep before him and he watched her for a while. Nature had indeed been kind to her. Her slender yet curvaceous body, with its narrow hips, broad shoulders, and small but perfect breasts, was still that of a twenty-year-old, and her cloud of fine, fine light red hair that tickled his chest as she laid her head on it carried the same scent that had driven him wild all those years ago. Once or twice in the depths of the night, he woke to find he had rolled away from her, and when he took her in his arms again, she nestled up to him with a tiny sigh of joy and closed her hand round his forearm; but she did not wake. Ezio wondered later if this hadn't been the best night of love of his life.

They overslept, of course, but Ezio was not about to forgo another bout in favor of cannon practice, though a part of his mind reproved him for this. Meanwhile, he could distantly hear the sounds of marching men-clattering men moving at a running march-and shouted orders, and then, the boom of cannon.

"Target practice with the new cannon," said Ezio, when for a moment Caterina stopped him and looked at him quizzically. "Maneuvers. Mario's a hard taskmaster."

The heavy brocade curtains across the windows shut out most of the light and the room remained cocooned in comfortable dimness; and no servant came to disturb them. Soon, Caterina's moans of pleasure drowned out any other noise to his ear. His hands tightened around her strong buttocks-she was pulling him up urgently toward her, when their lovemaking was interrupted by more than just the roar of cannon.

Suddenly, the peace and the softness of the big room was shattered. The windows blew away with a mighty roar, taking a part of the stone outer wall with them, as a gigantic cannonball smashed in and landed, searing hot, inches from the bed. The floor sagged under its weight.

Ezio had thrown himself protectively and instinctively over Caterina at the first instant of danger, and in that moment the lovers transformed themselves into professionals and colleagues-after all, if they were to remain lovers, they first had to survive.