Assassin’s Creed®

by Oliver Bowden

  Ah, Aloys la Touche. The new addition to our – or should I say ‘their’ – Order, one of Germain’s appointments, a man who amputated the limbs of beggars. Arno could kill him for all I cared.

  Even so. ‘Is this really necessary?’ I asked him. ‘The longer we wait, the more likely Germain will slip through our fingers.’

  ‘He’s been grinding Versailles under his boot for months. I should have done something about it a long time ago.’

  He had a point.

  ‘All right. I’ll go see to our transportation. Stay out of trouble.’

  He looked at me. I grinned and amended my farewell. ‘Don’t get caught.’

  3 April 1794

  ‘Things have changed a great deal since you left Paris,’ I told him the next day, as we took our places on a cart back to the city.

  He nodded. ‘A great deal to be set right.’

  ‘And we’re no closer to finding Germain.’

  ‘That’s not entirely true,’ he said. ‘I have a name.’

  I looked at him. ‘Who?’

  ‘Robespierre.’

  Maximilien de Robespierre. Now there a name to conjure with. The man they called ‘l’Incorruptible’, he was president of the Jacobins and the nearest France currently had to a ruler. Thus, he was a man who wielded enormous power.

  ‘I think you’d better tell me what you know, don’t you?’

  ‘I’ve seen everything, Élise,’ he said, his face crumbling as though unable to cope with the recollection.

  ‘What do you mean, “everything”?’ I asked him carefully.

  ‘I mean – I see things. You remember when I killed Bellec? I saw things then. It’s how I was able to know what to do next.’

  ‘Tell me more,’ I said, wanting him to open up, but at the same time not wanting to speak to him.

  ‘You remember that I killed Sivert?’

  I pursed my lips, damping down a little surge of denial.

  ‘I had a vision then,’ Arno continued. ‘I have had visions for them all, Élise. All of the targets – men and women with whom I have a personal connection. I saw Sivert denied entrance to a Templar meeting by your father, the first seeds of his resentment towards him. I saw Sivert approach the King of Beggars. I saw the pair of them attack your father.’

  ‘Two of them,’ I spat.

  ‘Oh, your father fought bravely, and as I told you before, he managed to take out Sivert’s eye; indeed, he would most definitely have prevailed were it not for the intervention of the King of Beggars …’

  ‘You saw it happen?’

  ‘In the vision, yes.’

  ‘Which is how you knew that an initiation pin was used?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  I leaned into him. ‘This thing you do. How do you do it?’

  ‘Bellec said that some men are born with the ability, others can learn it over time through training.’

  ‘And you’re one of those born with it.’

  ‘It would seem so.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘From the King of Beggars I learnt that your father resisted his overtures. I saw Sivert offer him the pin, with talk of how his “master” could help.’

  ‘His “master”? Germain?’

  ‘Exactly. Though I didn’t know that then. All I saw was a robed figure accepting the King of Beggars into your Order.’

  I thought of Mr Weatherall with a pang of regret that we had parted on such bad terms, wishing I could share with him the fact that our theories had been correct.

  ‘The King of Beggars was rewarded for killing my father?’ I asked.

  ‘It would seem so. When I killed Madame Levesque I saw behind the Templars’ plans to raise the price of grain. I also witnessed your father expelling Germain from the Order. Germain invoked De Molay as they dragged him away. I saw Germain later approach Madame Levesque. I saw the Templars plotting to release information that would be damaging to the king.

  ‘Germain said that when the king was executed like a common criminal he could show the world the truth about Jacques de Molay.

  ‘I saw something else, too. I saw Germain introduce his Templar confederates to none other than Maximilien de Robespierre.’

  8 June 1794

  i.

  I could barely remember a time when the streets of Paris weren’t thronged with people. I had seen so many uprisings and executions, so much blood spilled on the streets. Now, on the champ de Mars, the city had gathered again. But there was a different feeling in the air this time.

  Before, Parisians had come ready for battle, certainly prepared to kill, and prepared to die if needs be; before, they had gathered to fill their nostrils with the smell of guillotine blood, whereas now they came to celebrate.

  They were arranged in columns, with the men on one side, the women on the other. Many carried flowers, bouquets and branches of oak, and those that didn’t held flags aloft, and they filled the champ de Mars, this huge park space, looking towards the man-made mountain at its centre, on which they hoped to see their new leader.

  This, then, was the Festival of the Supreme Being, one of Robespierre’s ideas. While the other revolutionary factions wanted to dispense with religion altogether, Robespierre understood its power. He knew that the common man was attached to the idea of belief. How they wanted to believe in something.

  With many republicans supporting what they were now calling ‘de-Christianization’, Robespierre had had an idea. He had come up with the creation of a new creed. He had put forward the idea of a new non-Christian deity: the Supreme Being. And last month he had announced the birth of a new state religion, with a decree that the ‘French people recognize the Supreme Being and the immortality of the soul …’

  To convince the people what a great idea it was, he had come up with the festivals. The Festival of the Supreme Being was the first one.

  What his real motives were, I had no idea. All I knew was that Arno had discovered something. Arno had discovered that Robespierre was Germain’s puppet. Whatever was happening here today had less to do with the needs of the general populace and more to do with furthering the aims of my former Templar associates.

  ‘We’ll never get close to him in the middle of all this,’ observed Arno. ‘We had best retire and wait for a better opportunity.’

  ‘You’re still thinking like an Assassin,’ I chided him. ‘This time, I have the plan.’

  He looked at me with raised eyebrows and I ignored his attempts at humorous disbelief. ‘Oh? And what plan is that?’

  ‘Think like a Templar.’

  There came the sound of artillery in the distance. The babble of the crowd died then rose again as they readied themselves, and solemnly the two columns of people began moving towards the mount.

  There were thousands of them. They sang songs and called, ‘Viva Robespierre!’ as they advanced on the mount. Everywhere the tricolore was held aloft and fluttered in the gentle breeze.

  As we approached I saw more and more of the white breeches and buttoned double-breasted jackets of the National Guard. Every one of them had a sword at his hip; most had muskets and bayonets, too. They formed a barrier between the crowds and the mount from which Robespierre would deliver his address. We drew to a halt before them, waiting for the great speech to begin.

  ‘All right, what now?’ asked Arno, appearing at my side.

  ‘Robespierre is unassailable; he’s got half the Guard out in force,’ I said, indicating the men. ‘We’ll never get within yards of him.’

  Arno shot me a look. ‘Which is what I said.’

  Not far away from where we stood was a large tent, ringed by vigilant-looking National Guard. In there would be Robespierre.

  He would no doubt be preparing himself for his great speech, like an actor before a show, ready to appear before the people as regal and presidential. Indeed, there was no doubt in anyone’s mind to whom the Supreme Being referred; I’d heard mumbles of it as we’d made our way inside the main arena. True, there was a c
elebratory mood in the air, what with the singing, the laughter, the branches and bouquets we all held, but there was no shortage of dissension either, even if it was delivered at a far lower volume.

  And that gave me an idea …

  ‘But he’s not as popular as he was,’ I said to Arno. ‘The purges, this Supreme Being cult … All we have to do is discredit him.’

  Arno agreed. ‘And a massive public spectacle is the perfect venue.’

  ‘Exactly. Paint him as a dangerous lunatic and his power will evaporate like snow in April. All we need is some convincing evidence.’

  ii.

  From the mount Robespierre gave his speech. ‘The eternally happy day, which the French people have consecrated to the Supreme Being, has finally arrived …’ he began. The crowd lapped up his every word, and as I moved through the crowd I thought, He’s really doing it. He really was inventing a new god, and he meant for us all to worship it.

  ‘He did not create kings to devour the human race,’ Robespierre said. ‘He did not create priests to harness us like brute beasts to the carriages of kings …’

  Truly this new god was a god fit for a revolution.

  Then he was finished and the crowd were roaring, perhaps even the naysayers were caught up in the communal joy of the occasion. You had to hand it to Robespierre. For a country so divided we were at last calling with one voice.

  Arno, meanwhile, had found his way into Robespierre’s tent looking for something we could use to incriminate our supreme leader. He reappeared bearing gifts: a letter that I read, which proved beyond doubt Robespierre’s link to Germain.

  Monsieur Robespierre,

  Take care that you do not allow your personal ambitions to come before the Great Work. That which we do, we do not for our own glory, but to remake the world in De Molay’s image.

  G

  There was also a list.

  ‘A list of names – about fifty or so deputies of the National Convention,’ said Arno. ‘All written in Robespierre’s hand and all opposed to him.’

  I chuckled. ‘I imagine those good gentlemen would be quite interested to know they’re on that list. But first …’ I indicated some barrels of wine a short distance away. ‘Monsieur Robespierre brought his own refreshments. Distract the guards for me. I have an idea.’

  iii.

  We performed our tasks well. Arno had ensured that the list grabbed the attention of some of Robespierre’s fiercest critics; I, meanwhile, had drugged his wine.

  ‘What exactly was in that wine?’ Arno had said as we stood and waited for the show to begin – for Robespierre to make a speech under the influence of what I had slipped in his drink, which was …

  ‘Powdered ergot. In small doses it causes mania, slurred speech, even hallucinations.’

  Arno grinned. ‘Well, this should be interesting.’

  Indeed it had been. Robespierre had rambled and slurred his way through his speech, and when his adversaries challenged him about the list, he had no sensible answer.

  We left as Robespierre was clambering down from the mount accompanied by the boos and jeers of the crowd, probably confused by how the festival could start so well and end quite so catastrophically.

  I wondered if he could sense the presence of hands behind the scenes, manipulating events. If he was Templar, he should be accustomed to it. Either way, the process of discrediting him had well and truly begun. We only needed to wait.

  27 July 1794

  i.

  Reading that last entry back. ‘We only needed to wait.’

  Well, pah! A pox on it, as Mr Weatherall would have said. It was the waiting that drove me insane.

  Alone, I whirled across the bare floors of the empty villa, sword in hand, practising my swordsmanship, and I found myself looking for Mr Weatherall, who would be sitting watching me with his crutches close to hand, telling me my stance was wrong, my footwork overcomplicated – ‘And will you stop bloody showing off!’ – only he wasn’t there. I was alone. And I should know better, really, because alone was no good for me. Alone I pondered. I had too much time to wallow in my own thoughts and dwell on things.

  Alone I festered like an infected wound.

  All of which was part of the reason that today I lost sight of myself.

  ii.

  It began with news that spurred me into action and then a meeting with Arno. Robespierre had been arrested, I told him. ‘Apparently he made vague threats about a purge against “enemies of the state”. He’s scheduled for execution in the morning.’

  We needed to see him before that, of course, but at the For-l’Évêque prison we found a scene of carnage. Dead men were everywhere, Robespierre’s escort slaughtered, but there was no sign of Robespierre himself. From a corner came a groan and Arno scrambled to kneel with a guard who half sat up against the wall, his chest sticky with blood. He reached to loosen the soldier’s clothes, find the wound and stop the bleeding. ‘What happened here?’ he asked.

  I stepped closer, craning to hear the answer. As Arno struggled to help the soldier live, I stepped over a puddle of his blood to bring my ear closer to his mouth.

  ‘Warden refused to take the prisoners,’ coughed the dying man. ‘While we were waiting for orders, troops from the Paris Commune ambushed us. They took Robespierre and the other prisoners.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘That way,’ he said, pointing. ‘Can’t be going far. Half the city’s turned out against Robespierre.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  And of course I should have helped tend to the man’s wounds. I should not have hastened away to find Robespierre. It was the wrong thing to do. It was bad.

  Even so, it was not as bad as what happened next.

  iii.

  Robespierre had tried to escape, but as with many of his plans lately it was thwarted by Arno and me. We reached him at the Hôtel de Ville, with the Convention troops moments away from bursting through the door.

  ‘Where’s Germain?’ I had demanded to know.

  ‘I’ll never talk.’

  And I did it. This terrible thing. This thing that is proof I’ve arrived at the edge of what it means to be me, which I can’t stop, because to get here I’ve come too far.

  What I did was pull my pistol from my belt and even as Arno was raising his hand to try to stop me, I was pointing my pistol at Robespierre, seeing him through a veil of hatred, and firing.

  The shot was like cannon fire in the room. The ball slapped into his lower jaw, which cracked and hung limp at the same time as blood began gushing from his lips and gums, splattering to the floor.

  He screamed and writhed, his eyes wide with terror and pain, his hands at his shattered and bleeding mouth.

  ‘Write,’ I snapped.

  He tried to form words but could not, scribbling on a piece of paper, blood pouring from his face.

  ‘The temple,’ I said, snatching up the paper and reading his words, ignoring the horrified look Arno was giving me. ‘I should have known.’

  The boots of the Convention troops were close now.

  I looked at Robespierre. ‘I hope you enjoy revolutionary justice, monsieur,’ I said, and we departed, and behind us we left a weeping, wounded Robespierre, holding his mouth together with hands that were soaked in blood … and a little bit of my humanity.

  iv.

  These things. It’s as though I’m imagining them being done by another person – ‘another me’ over whom I have no control, whose actions I can only watch with a kind of detached interest.

  And I suppose that all of this is evidence, not only that I have failed to heed the warnings of Mr Weatherall and perhaps most egregiously failed to act upon the teachings of my mother and father, but that I have reached some place of mental infection and it is too late to stop it. There is no choice but to cut it away and hope that I survive the amputation a cleansed person.

  But if I do not survive …

  I must now conclude my journal, at least for tonight. I have some letters
to write.

  Extracts from the Journal of Arno Dorian

  * * *

  12 September 1794

  i.

  And I suppose here is where I should take up the story. I should take it up by saying that when I met her at the temple the following day she looked pale and drawn, and I now know why.

  Over a hundred years ago the Temple du Marais had been modelled on the Roman Pantheon. Rising behind an arched frontage, with its own version of the famed dome, were high walls. The only traffic in and out was the occasional wagon full of hay passing in through a postern gate.

  Straight away Élise wanted to split up, but I wasn’t sure; there was something about the look in her eyes, as though there was something missing, as if a part of her were absent somehow.

  Which in a way, I suppose, was right. I took it then to be determination and focus and I’ve read nothing in her journals to suggest it was anything more than just that writ large. Élise may have been resolved to reach Germain but I don’t think she believed she would be killed, only that she was going to kill Germain that day or die in the process.

  And perhaps she allowed that serenity of the soul to swallow her fear, forgetting that sometimes, however determined you are, however advanced your skills in combat, it’s fear that keeps you alive.

  As we’d split up to find a way into the temple’s inner sanctum, she’d fixed me with a meaningful look. ‘If you get a shot at Germain,’ she’d said, ‘you take it.’

  ii.

  And I did. I had found him inside the temple, where he was dark within the dank grey stone, a lone figure among the pillars inside the church.

  And there I had my shot.

  He was too quick for me, though. He produced a sword of uncanny powers. This sword was the kind of thing I would once have laughed off and said must be a trick. These days, of course, I knew better than to scoff at things I didn’t understand, and as Germain wielded the strange, glowing thing it appeared to harness and unleash great bolts of energy as though converting them from the air around him. It appeared to glow and spark. No, there was nothing laughable whatsoever about this sword.