Chapter Text
Prelude - Birdsong
Repubblica Fiorentina, 1476
The first time Ezio meets Leonardo, he is an apprentice for his father’s bank and far, far incapable of ending another’s life. It’s much too early for that, and yet in the few weeks that ensnare after, it seems much too short a time for one to change so much.
The Ezio before then was young, brash and outspoken.
“Oh dear, that wound looks fresh. May I?”
Ezio stiffens as Leonardo steps closer to inspect the wound, fingers ghosting over his lips, but being careful not to touch, lest he hurt him.
“It was just last night.” Ezio manages to say but doesn’t comment on how it got there, and the movement of his mouth causes Leonardo’s fingers to trace the skin, sending tingles radiating through his cheeks in a way that didn’t when the doctor had touched it.
“It has been treated well. Though I think it may scar. Hm. A scar through the mouth…” he trails off as if in deep thought, but does not move an inch from his closeness in inspection. His fingers linger.
A deep repressed memory is brought to the forefront of Ezio’s mind of when he was fifteen. His tutor - an elder man - had placed his large hand rather roughly on the back of Ezio’s head in a reprimanding manner to make him look at his book and not out the window. It had sent similar tingles through his body that had made it even more difficult for Ezio to concentrate. He had never been one for academics, but for some unexplainable reason he always looked forward to those lessons.
The moment drags on and Ezio spares a cautious glance at his mother, who simply smiles warmly.
“Leonardo is fond of anatomy.” she explains.
As if remembering himself, he snaps out of his daze to step backwards all too quickly and Ezio lets out the breath he was holding.
“Ah, forgive me messere. I am a painter, drawn to unique features. They make the body so much more interesting to look at, no?”
Ezio doesn’t speak, and instead nods dumbly in a gesture that must seem stupid to the intellectual.
The young, brash, and outspoken Ezio is reduced to silence by a single barely-there touch and a few words expressing approval at his unique features.
It’s vain and he knows it, but it was a worrying thought for a seventeen year old boy that his face would be permanently disfigured. Federico had teased him that it was his only asset, and Ezio had kindly told him to go fuck himself, but under the defence Ezio thought that it might be true. That his pretty face, the one thing that had gotten him places, had been taken from him by the likes of scum like Vierri de Pazzi throwing a rock. A godforsaken rock.
Of all the ways to gain such a horrid scar, it was the most delectably uninteresting.
But here was Leonardo, claiming the very opposite and so firm with the way he spoke like he knew it to be fact and not opinion.
Something sharp in him returns and he does his best to grin at Leonardo with bravado he pulls from his ass. It rarely comes from any other place, truthfully.
“Well, let’s hope the ladies will think along the same lines as you, eh Signore?”
That draws a rich laugh from the artist and a knowing look from his mother which he avoids.
“Maybe it’s time you get back to your other duties hm?” She says with an amused expression as Leonardo laughs. “Thank you for your help, son.”
The laugh eventually dies down into a silky gruff. “It was nice to meet you, Ezio. I hope our paths cross again.”
Ezio feels warm. “Me too.”
Serenissima Repubblica di Venezia, 1486
A lot has changed since then. Their paths had done so much more than simply cross, becoming more and more entwined as time passed, like the bands of ivy that grew along the East outer wall of Firenze. A sight he hasn’t seen in years.
He remembers their first encounter every time he washes his face in the morning with cold water from the ewer and basin, wet fingers running over the marred skin. It had truly changed his opinion on his appearance from then on.
Leonardo likes that the scar makes my face look interesting was the first processed thought he had, which gradually - as the many mornings over the years passed - had shortened to Leonardo likes that my face looks interesting, and eventually became Leonardo likes my face.
He wasn’t sure why it had shortened itself to become that and his mind supplied no answers other than the fact that, to his mind at least, it just made sense. But to Ezio himself, it made no sense at all. It was just a thought of many that lingered in the mess and he was content with just letting it sit there without being picked apart. There was far too much on his brain to be picked apart instead.
That was another issue. There was always much to think about. New things to plan. There was no room for a boyish reminisce of old times before everything changed. So he allows himself the little moment every morning while he wets his face with water and spends the rest of the day focused on what he has to do.
It helps to think of old times. Occasionally on the days he feels particularly sentimental, he thinks of his brothers and the lives they would have lived if they survived. Would Federico have joined their father in his work? Had he already joined him without Ezio’s knowledge, barely able to keep himself quiet with the exciting belief that Ezio would one day also be joining them in the true family work as well?
He thinks of Petruccio, smiling through all his ailments, grinning because he knew how to get under Ezio’s skin. He always was soft for his younger brother’s smile, even when his request was as bizarre as collecting feathers without any apparent reason. He would purposely get out of bed just to irk him, and Ezio would fall for it every time, as worried as a mother hen.
He didn’t think Petruccio would be much for running across rooftops or even being able to hurt a fly, but he assumed that his younger brother would find his own way of helping out the cause.
Would Petruccio ever have gotten better? Would he even have lived to his twenties?
Ezio swells with an overwhelming pain. It hurt to think of his father and Federico, but to think of Petruccio; too young, too innocent to die a death that was so early for him was unbearable. Even if his fate was to die at the hands of his disease, it was better than being taken by the hands of Templars.
It’s a grim thought; Petruccio being just as in the dark about everything as he was. Federico at least would have had the understanding of why they were being killed as the rope was fitted mercilessly around his neck, knowing they had been betrayed to the Templars, but Petruccio wouldn’t have had any grasp of it, even less than Ezio did himself all those years ago. He was just a scared little boy.
Was Petruccio even tall enough to reach the rope or did they have to get him a barrel to stand on?
Ezio sighs deeply when he rubs his face with his cloth. He had gotten carried away, thinking further than he usually allowed himself. He will have to spare Claudia and his mother a visit soon, but the villa was far and his days were short and filled with everything but time. He had made a short visit before arriving in Venezia but it had already been close to five years since then. The years had slipped by without his knowledge so quickly, filled with endless errands and operations. He hopes his sister still remembers what he looks like, wonders if she’s grown any taller.
Before he puts on his robes, he stretches out every muscle he can to insure he doesn’t pull on anything throughout the day.
It was an important day as well. Today would be the day he would be testing Leonardo’s flying machine that will aid him in preventing the assassination of the Doge Mocenigo. It was a rare turn of events in which Ezio found himself staying the blade instead of unsheathing it.
Somehow he felt it was considerably more stressful. It was a lot simpler to take a life; that was done in seconds. Keeping someone alive was quite the opposite, and with the security of the basilica the Doge was residing in, it would take another five years before he would get within a metre of it.
If, of course, it hadn’t been for Leonardo’s invention. The man was genio and his help was invaluable, but it was all down to whether his machine actually worked. He had no doubts about Leonardo’s skill at making things, nor was he a stranger to leaping off tall towers, but there was a dull sense of apprehension about the whole endeavour that had wormed its way into his stomach.
Ezio knocks on his door in the familiar fashion once he makes it to his friend’s workshop, lowering his hood before entering.
“Leonardo?” he calls, when he finds it empty.
“Ezi- ow!” There is a familiar voice from behind the desk and a dull thud, followed by Leonardo appearing from behind the wood rubbing his head, hat slightly askew. “That was rather ungraceful.”
Ezio can’t help the endearing smile from forming on his face and tries to smother it. “Are you alright?”
“Quite.” Leonardo fixes his hat, but soon cannot help smiling eagerly either when he steps forward to greet Ezio. “I’m glad you’ve arrived. I was just…” He turns around to the desk that he had attempted to headbutt and frowns. “Never mind. I managed to finish the last minute alterations on the invention that will reinforce the wings and prevent the high altitude wind from tearing through the paper.” He redirects Ezio’s attention to where the machine was hanging in the corner of the room.
“Good to know.” Ezio eyes the contraption as if he knows exactly what’s changed, and scratches his head. At least it was one less thing to worry about, though he had to admit the wings ripping off mid-flight wasn’t a concern until Leonardo brought it to his attention.
“So. Which tower is the Mad Man leaping off today?”
That gets a grin out of Ezio for the first time in days. Had it really been that long since he last smiled?
“Which ever my Mad Inventor so desires. I give my word to fly.”
Ezio did not fly.
Ezio glided a few pathetic yards before plummeting to the ground in an embarrassing display. Luckily, Leonardo had the foresight to pick a tower that was far enough away from the general public, and they heard nothing of flying demons over Venezia’s South District while they tugged the monstrosity back to the workshop in the cart.
“That was ridiculous.” Ezio grumbles once they get inside, cheeks burning.
“It was not! It was a scientific breakthrough! It actually worked.” Leonardo closes the door behind them and helps Ezio push the invention into the middle of the room.
“Leonardo, it failed.”
“Failed in your view, because you were expecting a particular outcome. In science, failure is good. Failure teaches us what needs to be improved. See, we would never have known that the duration of the flight would need extending if this practice had not failed. That is what practice is for! Wouldn’t you rather have had this happen now than later?”
Ezio eyes his companion carefully and his mind is once again brought back to the day they first met.
One thing Leonardo is not, is insincere. He always saw the good side to everything, whether it be a facial scar, or a failed experiment. Ezio was envious of his optimistic outlook on life, and his adjacent need to always be earnest in his opinions. Opinions that, despite his idealism, were unshakeable in their rigidity. Nothing could make Leonardo change his view on something once it was secured, likely backed up with a hundred different sources of evidence he had gathered himself.
“I suppose you are right.” Ezio says eventually, then looks over the contraption with despair. “I don’t presume you have another lying around in the back, do you?”
“Hm. I can fix the wings easily, they were not the problem.” He looks over the broken machine carefully and rubs his chin in thought. “The issue is the flight duration. Alright, give me a moment to think and look at the plans, I’m sure I can come up with something.”
Ezio doesn’t even get to sit down before Antonio bursts through the front door of the workshop and startles both men.
“Ezio, my men tell me that Carlo has his plans in motion. By this time tomorrow the doge will be dead.”
“Cazzo.” Ezio curses under his breath, then straightens his posture when he sees Antonio looking at Leonardo with concern. “Oh, forgive me. Antonio, this is Leonardo, master inventor of this… pezzo di merda.”
“Hey! It’s not the machine’s fault, it’s mine. I’ve checked the blueprints a hundred times, and I don’t know how to extend the flight. At least not this quickly.” Leonardo throws a rogue stack of paper from the table in annoyance. “Give me a week and I’d have it figured out.”
“It’s time we don’t have, I’m afraid.” Antonio says solemnly, and then looks over at the machine. He sighs and touches Ezio on the shoulder to make him turn away. “Ezio, a moment.”
They step aside to speak in private, and Antonio keeps his voice hushed when he talks.
“So you are still going to take on this mad idea of leaping off the building in this man’s winged contraption that can apparently fly?”
Ezio understands his apprehension, but it annoys him nonetheless.
“I’ve never needed wings to leap off buildings before.” He points out.
Antonio lifts a questioning brow. “Yes but you had hay. And it’s not as if you were flying across Venezia whenever you soared from the rooftops. Birds fly. Men fall.”
“Until men start growing wings, we will have to rely on machines. I trust Leonardo with my life. His design won’t fail me.” Ezio glances across at Leonardo as he speaks of him, watching the way he rubs his chin in deep thought. His brows are pulled together in stress.
“I wish I was as trusting as you. The only man I trust is my barber. And yet, I’m terrified of the stronzo. He has almost equal skill with a blade as you do.”
“Perhaps I should change career paths.” Ezio returns with a quick grin.
“Ah, che idea del cazzo!" Leonardo cries in frustration and throws a bundle of paper into the fire, drawing the two men's attention away from their conversation.
Ezio sighs into his hands. Just as Antonio opens his mouth to no doubt close up the idea altogether and suggest that they try something else, Leonardo leaps out of his chair with an enthusiastic “Eureka!”
“What is he doing now?” Antonio leans over to whisper to Ezio, and Ezio can only shrug in return.
“Fire. Heated air under the wings will make the machine rise. We light a dozen across the city that will carry you all the way to the Palazzo Ducale.” He marks a map to demonstrate what he means, and Antonio makes a noise of approval and turns to Ezio.
“My men can do that, as long as you take care of the guards.”
“Leave them to me.” Ezio responds, before glancing over at the broken invention. He leans onto the desk to address Leonardo properly.
“How soon can you fix the machine?” He presses. He doesn’t want to pressure his friend, but once again time is against them.
“If I work on it tonight, I can get it finished by tomorrow evening. Will that do?”
“Perfect. Grazie for your help, my friend.”
“You are most welcome.” Leonardo responds, with a little nod. “Do you need somewhere for the night?”
“Thank you, but Antonio has prepared a room for me already. And I must clear the way for the fires for the machine or we won’t be getting anywhere.”
“My door is always open.” He reminds with a smile, before retreating to his desk. Ezio takes that as his leave, but as he turns to make his departure, he remembers something he had been saving for their next meeting.
“Before I depart...” he begins in way of explanation, and reaches for the Codex page in his robes with a smile.
“Another Codex!”
His hand brushes something as he clutches the Codex page in his robe and the furred feel of it jars through his entire arm, Leonardo’s excited voice suddenly sounding far away as Ezio takes out the page in what feels like slow motion, like treading through a viscous syrup.
He stares as the forgotten feather falls out of the inside pouch where he was keeping the old paper, freezing as he watches it float gently to the ground. It was a short baby eagle feather that was still fluffy and grey, one he had collected a few days ago from a nest at the top of one of Venezia’s tall bell steeples that he had been climbing for a vantage point.
For the entire of today, something had been itching at him since the morning, something that had worsened since he took the test leap with the flying machine, but Ezio had failed to put a name to what it could’ve been; the deep coiling sensation that twists into him. He was no stranger to difficult assassinations, but there had been something that had made him feel as though using Leonardo’s machine was the right decision to make for this one.
But now, staring at the baby feather, Ezio knows why that is.
He thinks carefully about Antonio’s earlier words.
Birds fly. Men fall.
Oh, how dear Petruccio would have loved to watch him soar. How Ezio would have loved to be the one to teach him. He would be thrilled to see Leonardo’s machine and the prospect of it being able to make a man actually take flight like the birds he was so fond of. The overwhelming pain he had buried this morning at the memory of his brothers resurfaces, but it is less intense and more thoughtful, more hopeful, that they are at peace in death. Ezio knows little of a life after this one and has little to believe of such, but he has faith that they flew and didn’t fall.
Like the eagles he collects the feathers from, an impressive wingspan outstretched in a symbol of pride. He hopes they are proud. It’s still a painful thought that they aren’t around to see it all for themselves, and Ezio believes he will never truly be over that - but the brief feeling of unhappiness is soothed by Leonardo’s selfless act of gifting this machine of flight to him without any hesitation all because he asked him, with no promise of returning it. Because with this machine, Leonardo is not simply giving him a contraption that will open an opportunity for an assassination, he is giving him a moment of flight.
“Oh, Ezio. Did you drop this?” Leonardo abandons the Codex page to pick up the feather instead, inspecting it carefully before holding it out to him.
When Ezio blinks back to reality, Leonardo is furrowing his brows in concern at his silence and the distant look in his eye.
“Are you alright?”
Ezio just places his hand around Leonardo’s outstretched one encasing the feather.
“Thank you Leonardo. For everything.” He repeats his gratitude, exuberating it tenfold.
Leonardo’s expression betrays his utter surprise. “Well, of- of course, amico mio. Always.” He looks down at their clasped palms with pinking cheeks. “Are you sure you’re alright?”
“I am much better now. More than you know.” He answers, and it is entirely genuine. Antonio clears his throat behind him and he releases his friend’s hand once he remembers himself, his own face warming as he trades the feather for the page.
“Not to rush the goodbyes, but we have a Doge to save.” The thief admonishes, and Ezio pulls on his hood in acknowledgement.
“I will see you soon.” he says subsequently to Leonardo, finally turning to leave with a much, much lighter heart than the one he carried when he arrived.