Mario had spent the time ensuring that San Gimignano, now under the sober and reformed control of his old comrade, Roberto, and its territory, no longer posed a threat, and that the last pockets of Pazzi resistance had been weeded out. Monteriggioni was safe, and after the victory celebrations had been concluded, Mario’s condottieri were allowed a well-earned furlough, using it according to their tastes by spending time with their families, or drinking, or whoring, but never neglecting their training; and their squires kept their weapons sharp and their armour free from rust, as the masons and carpenters ensured that the fortifications of both town and castle were well maintained. To the north, the external threat that might have been posed by France was in abeyance, since King Louis was busy getting rid of the last of the English invaders, and facing up to the problems the Duke of Burgundy was causing him; while to the south, Pope Sixtus IV, a potential ally of the Pazzi, was too busy promoting his relatives and supervising the construction of a magnificent new chapel in the Vatican to give much thought to interference in Tuscany.

Mario and Ezio had had many and long conversations, however, regarding the threat that they knew had not disappeared.

‘I must tell you more of Rodrigo Borgia,’ Mario told his nephew. ‘He was born in Valencia, but studied law in Bologna and has never returned to Spain, since he is better placed to pursue his ambitions here. At the moment, he is a prominent member of the Curia in Rome, but his sights are always set higher. He is one of the most powerful men in all Europe, but he is more than a cunning politician within the Church.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Rodrigo is the leader of the Order of the Templars.’

Ezio felt his heart turn over in his body. ‘That explains his presence at the murder of my poor father and my brothers. He was behind it.’

‘Yes, and he won’t have forgotten you, especially as it was largely thanks to you that he lost his power-base in Tuscany. And he knows the stock you come from, and the danger you continue to pose him. Be fully aware, Ezio, that he will have you killed as soon as he gets the chance.’

‘Then I must stand against him if I wish ever to be free.’

‘He must remain in our sights, but we have other business nearer home first, and we have stayed our hand long enough. Come to my study.’

They made their way from the garden where they had been walking into an inner room of the castle, at the end of a corridor that led from the map-room. It was a quiet place, dark without being gloomy, book-lined and more like the room of an accademico than a military commander. Its shelves also contained artefacts that looked as if they might have come from Turkey or Syria, and volumes that Ezio could see from the writing on their spines were written in Arabic. He had asked his uncle about them, but received only the vaguest of replies.

Once there, Mario unlocked a chest and from it drew a leather document wallet from which he took a sheaf of papers. Among them were some Ezio recognized immediately. ‘Here is your father’s list, my boy – though I should not call you that any more, for you are a man now, and a full-blooded warrior – and to it I have added the names you told me of in San Gimignano.’ He looked at his nephew, and handed him the document. ‘It is time for you to begin your work.’

‘Every Templar on it shall fall to my blade,’ said Ezio, evenly. His eye lit on the name of Francesco de’ Pazzi. ‘Here, with him, I will start. He is the worst of the clan and fanatical in his hatred of our allies, the Medici.’

‘You are right to say so,’ Mario agreed. ‘So, you will make your preparations for Florence?’

‘That is my resolve.’

‘Good. But there is more you must learn if you are to be fully equipped. Come.’ Mario turned to a bookcase and touched a hidden button set into its side. On silent hinges it swung out and open to reveal a stone wall beyond, on which a number of square slots had been marked out. Five were filled. The rest were empty.

Ezio’s eyes gleamed as he saw it. The five filled spaces were occupied with pages of the Codex!

‘I see you recognize what this is,’ said Mario. ‘And I am not surprised. After all, there is the page your father left you, which your clever friend in Florence managed to decode, and these, which Giovanni managed to find and translate before he died.’

‘And the one I took from Vieri’s body,’ added Ezio. ‘But its contents are still a mystery.’

‘Alas, you are right. I am not the scholar your father was, though with every page that is added, and with the help of the books in my study, I am getting closer to unravelling the mystery. Look! Do you see the way the words cross from one page to the next, and how the symbols join?’

Ezio looked hard, an eerie feeling of remembrance flooding his brain, as though a hereditary instinct was reawakening – and with this the scrawls on the pages of the Codex seemed to come alive, their intentions untwisting in front of his eyes. ‘Yes! And there seems to be part of a picture of some sort underneath it – look, it’s like a map!’

‘Giovanni – and now I – managed to make out what appears to be a kind of prophecy written across these pages, but what it refers to I have yet to learn. Something about “a piece of Eden“. It was written long ago, by an Assassin like us, whose name appears to have been Altair. And there is more. He goes on to write of “something hidden beneath the earth, something as powerful as it is old” – but we have yet to discover what.’

‘Here is Vieri’s page,’ said Ezio. ‘Add it to the wall.’

‘Not yet! I will copy it before you go, but take the original to your friend in Florence with the brilliant mind. He need not know the full picture, at least, what there is of it so far, and indeed it may be dangerous for him to have such knowledge. Later, Vieri’s parchment will join the others on this wall, and we will be a little closer to deciphering the mystery.’

‘What of the other pages?’

‘They are yet to be rediscovered,’ said Mario. ‘Do not concern yourself. For you must concentrate on the undertaking you have immediately before you.’

8

Ezio had preparations to make before he left Monteriggioni. He had much more to learn, at his uncle’s side, of the Assassin’s Creed, the better to equip himself for the task that faced him. There was also the need to ensure that it would be at least relatively safe for him in Florence, and there was the question of where he might lodge, since Mario’s spies within the town had reported that his family palazzo had been closed and boarded up, though it remained under the protection and guard of the Medici family and so had been left unmolested. Several delays and setbacks made Ezio increasingly impatient, until, one morning in March, his uncle told him to pack his bags.