How the citadel had fared for so long, he didn't know - and yet the parapets rose from the stone, aging sentinels still keeping their posts, dutifully looking over the ruins of the village below. It put a twist into his stomach, a weight in the center of his chest. His eyes didn't burn, and yet he was sure that, given the chance, tears would thread their
trails down his face, leaving wet trails for the mountain wind to chill and chap.
The road, faint as it was, felt both alien and familiar under his feet. He wasn't meant to be walking. The thought came from deep in his thoughts, deeper than he could name. This was not a road he traveled on foot. He was meant to be on a white horse. One that matched his
robe. One that made the red streak of his sash stand out all the brighter.
Blood on snow.
Yet, he walked. Down and into the valley, through the gate of rotting wood, through the alleyways that snaked and switched-back up the mountain. Most of he little square houses sat now without roofs, time and weather having rotted thatching into nothingness.
He had fought in these streets. His waist missed the weight of a scabbard, his shoulder a pauldron with a handful of throwing knives sheathed snugly in leather so very purpose-crafted.
At once, he was stalking up the hill, following the well-worn path to the place where he lived, finished with an assignment in Dimashq, smug with satisfaction. Or perhaps
he was exhausted, barely lifting his feet as he climbed, the weight of water still heavy in his tabard, his hood obscuring all but the ground before him. Fury went through him with the sound of steel on steel, battle threatening Assassin and villager alike.
Grim determination, perhaps, and dread as he knew what awaited him in from a man he had followed
He looked up, shoulders heavy with memory. The tower there had once pulsed with golden light and he had climbed it with anger and terror in equal measure as one unknowing, too full of bruised pride, had threatened them all.
He stepped beneath and through the portcullis, and into an empty Citadel. The training
ring stood thick with weeds, its edges now messy with fallen stones and wood ready to fracture at a touch. Once, his blood had been spilled there. A life-threatening amount. Now, not even the walls remembered the sound of practice weapons striking, of orders being shouted, young minds being trained to find and take every opportunity to strike.
That may have been for the best, he decided as his every step carried him further. Into a library empty of books, a stairwell with pitted steps, rock stained with rust where metal gratings over the doorway had run with snow and water and left its own blood on the ground.
Light leaked through a ceiling once carefully upkept. Now every stone above him clung
to its place with the stubbornness of centuries, momentum keeping the building from collapse - but every dance would one day end.
There the desk sat, a shadow of a monument with proof of entropy sitting heavily where it had landed: a single stone from an arch overhead having fallen and broken the ancient wood in two.
waiting to hear his master's praise? How many times had he sat behind it, giving those longed-for words to others? He had taken up the title of Old Man of the Mountain unwillingly, and with him, it had ended.
The wood was rough under his fingertips, and so was the metalwork of the window that, once, he had jumped through to save his own life.
He had come here with a purpose. All those years ago, when he had lived, died, and lived again, when he had left Masyaf and returned, he had known one truth: the Apple would never give the full truth. That was not its purpose. Not with the manipulation of Juno so deep in its depths. It had told him of so many things - firearms, invulnerable metals.
It had never told him why this place had been home to the Assassins for so long. Why it seemed to call to them, and why they had built this Citadel in this perfect place. It had kept that secret even as he had lived to such an old age and let his life go to keep it hidden deep under the Citadel's walls.
But now? Now in this age of information, where all
Edit: Now contains.... fic? ish?
The road, faint as it was, felt both alien and familiar under his feet. He wasn't meant to be walking. The thought came from deep in his thoughts, deeper than he could name. This was not a road he traveled on foot. He was meant to be on a white horse. One that matched his
Blood on snow.
Yet, he walked. Down and into the valley, through the gate of rotting wood, through the alleyways that snaked and switched-back up the mountain. Most of he little square houses sat now without roofs, time and weather having rotted thatching into nothingness.
At once, he was stalking up the hill, following the well-worn path to the place where he lived, finished with an assignment in Dimashq, smug with satisfaction. Or perhaps
Grim determination, perhaps, and dread as he knew what awaited him in from a man he had followed
He looked up, shoulders heavy with memory. The tower there had once pulsed with golden light and he had climbed it with anger and terror in equal measure as one unknowing, too full of bruised pride, had threatened them all.
He stepped beneath and through the portcullis, and into an empty Citadel. The training
Light leaked through a ceiling once carefully upkept. Now every stone above him clung
There the desk sat, a shadow of a monument with proof of entropy sitting heavily where it had landed: a single stone from an arch overhead having fallen and broken the ancient wood in two.
How many times had he stood before it,
The wood was rough under his fingertips, and so was the metalwork of the window that, once, he had jumped through to save his own life.
But now? Now in this age of information, where all
Centuries ago, he had ordered Masyaf emptied before the hordes. Now, it would house at least one Assassin once more.