Dall'acqua al Vino

[moffnat]

"I'll only rot when I'm dead and buried," came L'Ombre's reply. "A little smog doesn't bother me."

Coming upon a final fork on the path, he turned to her immediately and pointed to both directions at once, a smile hidden under his cowl that would have warned her of the test he was providing. "Pick a direction. Which way do you think we should go? If you choose incorrectly, I leave you to die down here, and if you choose wisely...well, I suppose you won't know which is right and wrong."​

 

[Lillian Gray]

"Look, bastardo, I'm not happy to work with you either, but how about instead of testing me with your silly game, we actually figure out which side is which hm?" Valeno snapped. She didn't like the attitude he was giving her, the sneer she could feel hiding beneath his cowl.

Instead of running headfirst down either side, she first examined the floor, checking for trip wires of any sort. Finding none, she moved the the ceilings for more obvious and dangerous traps. She'd once ran straight down a tunnel with axes waiting on wires, and it was a mistake that nearly cost her a few limbs. It wasn't something she suspected from Templars though, it was much too noticeable. In the end, she threw a few rocks down each side, waiting to see what would spring. Nothing. It was as if the tunnels were mocking her decision, the challenge L'Ombre placed her with, and she was furious it tested her so.

Instincts pointed left. Above the streets, the house was bound to be more to that direction than any other. Which is why she ended up waltzing down the tunnel to the right. Again, choosing the obvious side just seemed wrong.

"Coming?" She called, bored.​

 

[moffnat]

L'Ombre would not indulge in her foolish games, her insisting mediocrity or her empty taunts and threats. He was a man of steel and she was only a lamb, lead by a false sense of purpose and a maniac in a white hood. No, The Shadow would not give her insults the time nor the devotion it took to become angered by them. She will die soon enough, and the world will be spared another assassin's ambition.

At least, that's what he would tell himself to make the mission pass time.

He did not follow. He walked ahead of her once again, knowing full well that she would not be able to see things the way he would and spot a trap half a mile away as he could, as the curse allowed him to. The glow from his eye socket seemed to blossom the further they submerged into the tunnel, offering a small light that was barely bright enough to illuminate the carvings and architectural designs on the walls they passed. "Stay close," he muttered, much to his pride's expense. "I won't have my sister's friend dying on my account, much as it would please me."​

 

[Lillian Gray]

"You think because I am a woman I'm not good at what I do?" She was boiling with anger the way he flaunted himself, although really he'd only just walked past her. Still, the air about him suggested he was full well capable of wanting to do the mission alone. For some reason they'd been paired together, Catelina's doing of course.

"I will not die." She hissed behind him, making sure to keep her voice low. "And neither will you, get off your...your tall horse, high horse, whatever kind of horse you're on, and work with me you fool. It will only result in the loss of both our heads."​

 

[moffnat]

Does she ever stop talking?

L'Ombre continued to ignore her, finding himself rather content to do so. It seemed that the less he said, the more angry she became and it replenished a sense of amusement in him that would otherwise have remained absent. Though humor is not the same as enjoyment, to be sure. He kept his back to the assassin as the unlikely duo made their way through what remained at the catacombs, and after a long, tense trek, the two finally reached a massive iron door.

The Shadow scanned the massive thing with a golden eye, searching for traps embedded in the metalwork, in the floors or walls or what lay just beyond the great barricade. Nothing? How peculiar. When he was convinced that the door itself was no harm to him or to Valeno, he gave a small nod of acknowledgment that she likely was unable to see.

"It's safe."​

 

[Lillian Gray]

Valeno entered through the iron door, what was before her puzzled her senses.

Nothing. The room was empty, a set of stairs leading up into the rest of the old Auditore manor. After all that, the groaning and moaning between the two, a maze of hallways, and they were met with an empty room. She struggled to see the significance, and paced around the room silently in thought.

It was too easy. That much was obvious.

"Do you think they have found it already?" Valeno asked more to herself, but wouldn't have shot down a reply from L'Ombre. "But then why set the traps..."

Something wasn't adding up.​

 

[moffnat]

"Auditore set the traps. He was no fool. No one has found this research yet, I'm sure of it." He looked to the stone floor and beyond, seeing nothing but dirt under their feet. He looked left and saw only more tunnels hidden behind concrete walls, twisting and winding around each other in a confusing web of intentional deception. To the right, more dirt. Forward there was nothing.

"The plans are in the house," he stated at last. "These catacombs are a diversion, meant to mislead people. I feel them..."

Where are they?​

 

[Lillian Gray]

"Feel what?" Valeno asked curiously.

Going forward seemed to be useless, she felt like her companion would've already left her behind if there was another way to go. He seemed to know too much, to understand what was coming before it was even there, and it was unnerving to say the least. What was it that aided him? Surely not that strange golden eye...

"Catelina was the one to give us the information, perhaps she was mislead?" The thief offered up the information. "We can either check the house, otherwise I'd like to return. Spending time among Templars is not how I enjoy evenings."​

 

[moffnat]

"No. They're here, I'm sure of it."

L'Ombre didn't know what lay within the tunnels they were traversing, perhaps it was simply old and once held secrets that have since been exploited, but he was convinced that the documents they were searching for rested within the abandoned Auditore manor. Without giving a word of confirmation to Valeno or telling her what was going through his mind, he leapt up and snatched the lowest rung of the ladder and hoisted himself up, climbing like a cat through the ventilation shaft that this seemed to become.

I hope she hurries. I am not waiting for her.​

 

[Lillian Gray]

The assassins was fed up with his mystery and shadow. Whatever information he had, he was intent on not sharing it. Following blindly after a man who gave her no trust, (and she none in return) was unpleasant, and she'd definitely had enough. Valeno was done following him.

"I'm going back." She called angrily. "You and yours games, this is no place for it. I do not trust you, and you do not trust me, si?"

Valeno didn't follow him up the ladder, turning on her heel and heading back into the tunnels from where they came. She could get out just fine, but she wouldn't waste any time in the empty house, not when her information was so lacking.​

 

[moffnat]

Surely, that was not the correct decision. Upon her declaration to return to the brothel, one that set a sense of relief over the Shadow's mind, voices came from the end of the tunnel.

"....she's here! I know it!"

"Come on men, search for her! Search for the Assassino di Valeno!"

It made him chuckle at first, to know she had been discovered in this inconvenient labyrinth and he had not, but the more he thought about it the more he came to realize. I dropped the mask she gave me. Her reveal is my fault, not hers. In his prideful and arrogant need to prove himself he had exposed her and potentially risked her life. What will Catelina say?

"Cazzo," he cursed, hauling himself up to the second level before offering his hands down to her. "Come. I won't drop you."​

 

[Lillian Gray]

"I will do it myself." She spat.

There was no way they'd seen her come in, she made every attempt to walk in shadow. Not a man had seen her, else her throat would have been slit already. So what was it then? In any case, it wasn't the time for idle thoughts. Valeno hoisted herself up alone and quickly moved to cover the hole.

She didn't want his help, didn't need his hand, all he'd done was play his mind games with her and now they were stuck inside until the Templars were gone. This was the game she hated playing most, hiding. It did her no good to be seen, even more so when she had to wait out her pursuers.

"I am waiting until they are gone, and then I will return." She warned him. "I want no part of your games any longer, do you understand me?"​

 

[moffnat]

He gave an arrogant snort. "You'd turn around when we're so close? Fine. I care not. Catelina is what's important to me, not you." Never you. "Just see to it that you don't go alerting them of my presence, too. That would certainly be cause for distress." The guards had been right to assume him the much more dangerous threat, but he need not tell her that. He was a downright prick, stubborn to the bone, but he wasn't one to pick a fight with someone assigned to help him, no matter how tempting it was.

He left her there, standing upright in a barren room of the Manor Auditore. He had to tread lightly here. One wrong move, one creaky floorboard or wrongly cast shadow, and it was over.

This had better be worth my time, Catelina.​

 

[Lillian Gray]

She waited, not a sound above or below her. That man was a quiet one, and it put her on edge to know that he was nearby. Perhaps that was what it felt like to be prey. There was the knowledge that the enemy was nearby, only, he wasn't against her, simply against her Creed. They worked under the same cause for the moment, so why did it feel so tense to be away from his side?

Valeno slipped back into the tunnels and was surprised to see two lights far down at the end of the tunnel. She hid behind a wall, keeping her breathing quiet as she listened in on their conversation as they passed.

"Donni di Veleno is here, cazzo, we have to keep her here." One grunted.

"There's nothing here." The other replied.

"No, but her contact is far more interesting. The, uh, the Rosa Promiscua. Beautiful ladies, if you watch your tongue."

Valeno listened to them compare certain women from the brothel she lived in. Rolling her eyes as they talked about breasts and how they moaned and groaned. It was an act, the assassin knew that, it was entertaining to think the men thought they were so amazing in bed that she almost missed the end of their conversation, their voices trailed off as they reached down a far tunnel.

"It's the Lady they want, the Mother."

"They figure she should know something useful, if not, it's one less place for the Assassins to hide."

Catelina?

Ignoring her earlier gut feelings of predator and pray, she sprinted back towards the house and scrambled inside. Why? She had no clue. L'Ombre was related to her, that was it, and with the new information in her belt she figured he might just return. If the assassin told him first, it gave him less of a reason to try and hunt her down after.​