“Enough!” cried Connor from behind me, and I turned to see him staring at me, and then at Benjamin, with a disgusted look on his face.
“We came here for a reason . . .” he said.
I shook my head. “Different reasons, it seems.”
But Connor pushed past me and waded through water, now ankle deep, to Benjamin, who regarded him with defiance in his bruised and bloodshot eyes.
“Where are the supplies you stole?” Connor demanded.
Benjamin spat. “Go to hell.” And then, incredibly, began to sing: “Rule Britannia.”
I stepped forward. “Shut your mouth, Church.”
Not that it stopped him. He continued singing.
“Connor,” I said, “get what you need from him and let’s be done with this.”
And at last Connor stepped forward, his blade engaged, and held it to Benjamin’s throat.
“I ask again,” said Connor. “Where is your cargo?”
Benjamin looked at him and blinked. For a moment I thought his next move would be to insult or spit at Connor, but instead he began to speak. “On the island yonder, waiting to be transported. But you’ve no right to it. It isn’t yours.”
“No, not mine,” said Connor. “Those supplies are meant for men and women who believe in something bigger than themselves, who fight and die that one day they may live free from tyranny such as yours.”
Benjamin smiled sadly. “Are these the same men and women who fight with muskets forged from British steel? Who bind their wounds with bandages sown by British hands? How convenient for them that we do the work. They reap the rewards.”
“You spin a story to excuse your crimes. As though you’re the innocent one and they the thieves,” argued Connor.
“It’s all a matter of perspective. There is no single path through life that is right and fair and does no harm. Do you truly think the Crown has no cause? No right to feel betrayed? You should know better than this, dedicated as you are to fighting Templars—who themselves see their work as just. Think on that the next time you insist that your work alone befits the greater good. Your enemy would beg to differ—and would not be without cause.”
“Your words may have been sincere,” whispered Connor, “but it does not make them true.”
And he finished him.
“You did well,” I said as Benjamin’s chin dropped to his chest and his blood splashed to the water that continued to rise. “His passing is a boon for us both. Come on. I suppose you’ll want my help retrieving everything from the island . . .”
16 JUNE 1778
i
It had been months since I’d last seen him, yet I cannot deny I thought of him often. When I did, I thought, What hope is there for us? Me, a Templar—a Templar forged in the crucible of treachery, but a Templar nevertheless—and him an Assassin, created by the butchery of the Templars.
Once upon a time, many years ago, I’d dreamed of one day uniting Assassin and Templar, but I was a younger and more idealistic man then. The world had yet to show me its true face. And its true face was unforgiving, cruel and pitiless, barbaric and brutal. There was no place in it for dreams.
And yet, he came to me again, and though he said nothing—not so far anyway—I wondered if the idealism I’d once had lurked behind those eyes, and it was that which brought him once more to my door in New York, seeking answers perhaps, or wanting an end to some doubt that nagged at him.
Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps there was an uncertainty that resided within that young soul after all.
New York was still in the grip of the redcoats, squads of them out on the streets. It was years later, and still nobody had been held responsible for the fire that had plunged the city into a grimy, soot-stained depression. Parts of it were still uninhabitable. Martial law continued, the redcoats’ rule was harsh and the people more resentful than ever. As an outsider I studied the two groups of people, the downtrodden city folk giving hateful looks to the brutal, unruly soldiers. I watched them with a jaundiced eye. And, dutifully, I continued. I worked to try to help win this war, end the occupation, find peace.
I was grilling one of my informants, a wretch named Twitch—because of something he did with his nose—when I saw Connor out of the corner of my eye. I held up a hand to stop him while I continued listening to Twitch, and wondered what he wanted. What business did he have with the man he believed had given the order to kill his mother?
“We need to know what the loyalists are planning if we are to put an end to this,” I said to my man. Connor loitered, overhearing—not that it mattered.
“I’ve tried,” responded Twitch, as his nostrils flared and his eyes darted to Connor, “but the soldiers themselves are told nothing now: only to await orders from above.”
“Then keep digging. Come and find me when you have something worth sharing.”
Twitch nodded, slunk off, and I took a deep breath to face Connor. For a moment or so we regarded one another, and I looked him up and down, his Assassin’s robes somehow at odds with the young Indian boy beneath, his long dark hair, those piercing eyes—Ziio’s eyes. What lay behind them? I wondered.
Above us, a flock of birds made itself comfortable on the ledge of a building, cawing loudly. Nearby, a patrol of redcoats lounged by a cart to admire passing laundry women, making lewd suggestions and responding to any disapproving looks and tuts with threatening gestures.
“We’re so close to victory,” I told Connor, taking his arm and leading him further down the street, away from the redcoats. “Just a few more well-placed attacks and we can end the civil war and be rid of the Crown.”
An almost smile at the edges of his mouth betrayed a certain satisfaction. “What did you intend?”
“Nothing at the moment—since we’re completely in the dark.”
“I thought Templars had eyes and ears everywhere,” he said, with just a hint of dry humour. Just like his mother.
“We did. Until you started cutting them off.”
He smiled. “Your contact said it was orders from above. It tells us exactly what we need to do: track down other loyalist commanders.”
“The soldiers answer to the Jaegers,” I said. “The Jaegers to the commanders, which means . . . we work our way up the chain.”
I looked up. Not far away, the redcoats were still being lewd, letting down their uniform, the flag and King George. The Jaegers were the link between the army command and the troops on the ground and were supposed to keep the redcoats in check, stop them from aggravating an already hostile populace, but they rarely showed their faces, only if there was real trouble on the streets. Like if someone, say, killed a redcoat. Or two.