“Certainly, sir, and where is that errand taking you, may I ask?”
“Corsica,” I said. “I’m going to Corsica.”
“Ah, in the midst of a revolution, so I hear . . .”
“Quite right, Holden. A place of conflict is a perfect place to hide.”
“And what will you be doing there, sir?”
“I’m afraid I can’t tell you. Suffice it to say, it has nothing to do with finding my father’s killers and is therefore of only peripheral interest to me. It’s a job, a duty, nothing more. I hope that, while I’m away, you will continue your own investigations?”
“Oh, certainly sir.”
“Excellent. And see to it that they remain covert.”
“Don’t you be worrying about that, sir. As far as anybody is concerned, Master Kenway has long since abandoned his quest for justice. Whoever it is, sir, their guard will drop eventually.”
25 JUNE 1753
i
It was hot on Corsica during the day, but at night the temperature dropped. Not too much—not freezing—but enough to make lying on a rock-strewn hillside with no blanket an uncomfortable experience.
Cold as it was, though, there were even more pressing matters to attend to, such as the squad of Genoese soldiers moving up the hill, who I’d like to have said were moving stealthily.
I’d like to have said that, but couldn’t.
At the top of the hill, on a plateau, was the farmhouse. I’d been keeping watch on it for the past two days, my spyglass trained on the doors and windows of what was a large building and a series of smaller barns and outbuildings, taking note of comings and goings: rebels arriving with supplies and leaving with them, too; while on the first day a small squad of them—I counted eight—had left the complex on what, when they returned, I realized had been some kind of attack: the Corsican rebels, striking out against their Genoese masters. There were only six of them when they came back, and those six looked exhausted and bloodied, but, nevertheless, without words or gestures, wore an aura of triumph.
Women arrived with supplies not long afterwards, and there was celebration far into the night. This morning, more rebels had arrived, with muskets wrapped in blankets. They were well equipped and had support, it seemed; it was no wonder the Genoese wanted to wipe this stronghold off the map.
I had spent the two days moving around the hill so as to avoid being seen. The terrain was rocky and I kept a safe distance from the buildings. On the morning of the second day, however, I realized I had company. There was another man on the hill, another watcher. Unlike me, he had remained in the same position, dug into an outcrop of rocks, hidden by the brush and the skeletal trees that somehow survived on the otherwise parched hillside.
ii
Lucio was the name of my target, and the rebels were hiding him. Whether they, too, were affiliates of the Assassins, I had no idea, and it didn’t matter anyway; he was the one I was after: a twenty-one-year-old boy who was the key to solving a puzzle that has tormented poor Reginald for six years. An unprepossessing-looking boy, with shoulder-length hair, who, as far as I could tell from watching the farmhouse, helped out by carrying pails of water, feeding the livestock and, yesterday, wringing the neck of a chicken.
So he was there: that much I’d established. That was good. But there were problems. Firstly, he had a bodyguard. Never far away from him was a man who wore the gowns and cowl of an Assassin; his gaze would often sweep the hillside while Lucio fetched water or scattered chicken feed. At his waist was a sword, and the fingers of his right hand would flex. Did he wear the famous hidden blade of the Assassins? I wondered. No doubt he would. I’d have to beware of him, that much was for certain, not to mention the rebels who were based at the farmhouse. The compound seemed to be crawling with them.
One other thing to take into account: they were clearly planning to leave soon. Perhaps they’d been using the farmhouse as a temporary base for the attack; perhaps they knew that the Genoese would soon be seeking revenge and come looking for them. Either way, they had been moving supplies into the barns, no doubt piling carts high with them. My guess was that they would leave the next day.
A night-time incursion then, would seem to be the answer. And it had to be tonight. This morning I managed to locate Lucio’s sleeping quarters: he shared a medium-sized outhouse with the Assassin and at least six other rebels. They had a code phrase they used when entering the quarters, and I read their lips through my spyglass: “We work in the dark to serve the light.”
So—an operation that required some forethought, but, no sooner was I preparing to retire from the hillside in order to concoct my plans, than I saw the second man.
And my plans changed. Edging closer to him, I had managed to identify him as a Genoese soldier. If I was right, that meant he was the forward party of the men who would be attempting to take the stronghold; the rest would be along—when?
Sooner, I thought, rather than later. They would want to exact swift revenge for the previous day’s raid. Not only that, but they would want to be seen to be reacting quickly to the rebels. Tonight, then.
So I left him. I let him continue his surveillance and, instead of withdrawing, stayed on the hillside concocting a different plan. My new plan involved Genoese troops.
The observation man had been good. He’d stayed out of sight and then, when dark fell, retreated stealthily, noiselessly, back down the hill. Where, I wondered, was the rest of the force?
Not far away; and an hour or so later I began to notice movement at the bottom of the hill and, even, at one point, heard a muffled curse in Italian. By this stage I was about halfway up and, realizing that they would soon begin to advance, I moved even closer to the plateau and the fence of an animal enclosure. Maybe fifty yards away I could see one of the sentries. Last night, they’d had five altogether, around the entire perimeter of the farmyard. Tonight, they would no doubt increase the guard.
I took out my spyglass and trained it on the nearest guard, who stood, silhouetted by the moon at his back, diligently scanning the hillside below him. Of me, he would see nothing, just another irregular shape in a landscape of irregular shapes. No wonder they were deciding to move so quickly after their ambush. It wasn’t the most secure hideout I’d ever seen. In fact, they’d have been sitting ducks were it not for the fact that the approaching Genoese soldiers were so damned clumsy. The conduct of their observation man flattered the operation as a whole. These were men to whom stealth was clearly a foreign and unfamiliar idea, and I was beginning to hear more and more noise from the bottom of the hill. The rebels were almost certain to hear them next. And if the rebels heard them, they would have more than enough opportunity to make their escape. And if the rebels made their escape, they would take Lucio with them.