Welcome to The Dance of the Falcons! Do note that this is myfirst draft, and therefore is bound to be awkward and clunky. There are also OCs present... I originally planned this to be a friendship story between two men, but I am getting frustrated of not seeing girl Assassins save Winifred. So I made two. (Everyone else belongs to Abstergo Ubisoft.)

This story goes back and forth in time, spanning from the fall of Alamut to about the reign of Napoleon. It will not address AC 3 and 4. The Three Musketeers do show up, as well as Ezio, Altair, Machiavelli and the like.

So with that being said, here we go!

Prologue: Atop Les Invalides

Arno Victor Dorian was hurting.

Two years had passed since the fateful encounter with Germain; two years since the death of his childhood friend and his love; two years since his return to the Order. And yet the pain was still fresh in his mind, the futility of the final moment when Elise, his beloved Elise, had not listened to him and had rushed head-on to her death. If he had been faster, if he had been stronger…

If. If. If.

And so he sat on the roof of Les Invalides, overlooking Paris that spread before him, a morose expression his face. He wasn't handsome, although he might have been deemed attractive; now, tempered with grief, his expression was serious, that faint mirth gone, his mien razor-sharp. A face of an Assassin, although he had not yet realised it, and will not do so for many more years; a face that knew the gravitas of life, and the cost of taking it. The face that had accepted the cost for the greater good, the face that knew no allegiance, except to better the world. His brown hair was held with a ribbon at the nape of his neck, but it was hidden under the hood.

"There you are," said a low voice. "I had to look all over for you."

The man in the blue coat looked up, saw a woman. Slender and tall, she stood on the roof, a little behind him, dressed in grey and black. A grey coat and black trousers, an offence punishable by death, yet she wore them, partly because she needed to, but also because she was sure she'd never be caught. The hood was off, exposing her dark, glossy hair that was plaited like a tail. A sword was at her hip, a pistol on her belt. She looked every part a man, except Arno knew that she was not.

"Aliénor," he murmured.

Aliénor de la Fere sat next to him. Arno realised it would have been absurd for this woman to sit next to him, let alone know him by name, had the Revolution not happened. But here she was, her feet dangling, her eyes looking into the sunset. The descendant of Olivier de la Fere, she would have been living in Versailles, serving under La Austrichienne, dressed in silks and complaining of the clogged furnace. But the downfall of her father had been the downfall of her house, and her path had taken an unexpected turn; then again, so had his.

A common story indeed; the games in Versailles were indeed complicated and more than treacherous, and many fell with one wrong word or an errant glance. But Aliénor had apparently inherited the spirit of her forefather, for she had sought out the Assassin Brotherhood, and had begged admittance into the order. Arno knew of her as an apprentice, but she had been apprenticed to someone else, and so only vaguely noticed her. She had been a girl then, as he had been barely older than a boy; but now she was a grown woman, an Assassin in her own right. An educated woman who had her own thoughts, she had been the one to demand Arno's re-admittance. He had not wanted it, but she had proved to be a good friend, a good comrade, and a trustworthy partner, and who was he to refuse her friendship?

"Still hurting?" Aliénor asked softly.

Arno glanced at the woman, but she was still looking at the sunset. He did not want to answer, so he kept his silence.

"You are, aren't you?"

"And how is that any of your concern?" Arno snapped, then saw a flash of pain cross her face. "Pardonnez moi," he said hastily.

"Apology accepted," replied Aliénor. "It is a personal matter, after all. But you also have to realise, you're lucky, you know," the daughter of de la Fere continued. "Very lucky to have enjoyed the love, had someone love you back." She shrugged. "I never had that chance."

"No?"

"After St Just ordered my father's death… no." She smiled. "Hunting down the culprit, sending him to his death was all I could ever think about… although the public did that, in the end. Publicum iustum est. And afterwards… well, I hadn't the time. The order demands all of me, and I'm not as lucky as my ancestor. So I am a Catherinette."

"Ancestor?" Arno echoed. But Aliénor ignored it. She turned, her face serious.

"I need to talk to you," she said quietly. The sun was setting, casting a dark shadow over her face, turning her alabaster skin to a mesh of black and white, giving her cheekbones a higher profile. Arno looked at her.

"Well, talk," he urged.

"I know you're distracted recently," Aliénor said. "Arno, I hate to say this, but… you need to focus."

"Did you come to lecture?"

"No." She shook her head. "But what I'm saying is… the Assassins never really had a chance at a happy life, Arno. Altair ibn al-Lahad's personal life was filled with grief, and the famed Assassin Ezio Auditore gave everything up for the Order."

"I already know, Aliénor." And that he did, oh so well; if she hadn't been the daughter of a Templar, if he hadn't been the son of an Assassin… who knew? "I know that too well. What is your point?"

"No, you don't know," came back the sharp reply. Arno frowned, displeased. "Look, I know this is unfair, but none of us have the luxury to look at the past as much as we want to. A new age is coming, and France is still wounded, Arno. Look around you. The Jacobins are turning on each other, people are still starving, the peasants are revolting… and our work isn't done yet." She sighed. "So you have to make a decision, sooner or later. You can leave the Order, live a normal life as normal people do, spend time mourning the losses. Or you can remain, but then… now isn't the time to mourn for us, Arno. And your distraction can cost you your life. And mine. Jean-Philippe's. Arno…" she took a deep breath. "We can't lose you."

"But we can afford to lose you, Aliénor?" He raised an eyebrow. "Did the elders set you on this?"

Aliénor smiled bitterly. "I wish. No." She brushed the back of the hand against her cheek. "My life… is dispensable," she murmured. "The elders know it… and I know it. No one will mourn me when I'm gone, but you, you…" he heard her take a deep breath. But instead of continuing, she stuck her hand inside the folds of grey wool. "Here," she said, pulling out a slender volume from the folds of her grey coat. "Maybe this'll help you make the decision."

"What is this?" Arno asked. The volume was old, bound in leather, the paper brittle; the leather was smooth under his fingertips, and bore no markings, save the Assassin symbol overlaid with a mark of a feather. "I don't think I've ever seen this."

"No," the woman agreed. "It's my possession, not the Order's. My maternal ancestor was a Venetian named Bianca Nero, who went by the name of La Rossa. She was an Assassin, you see… it looks like the Assassin Brotherhood takes in a lot of youths whose parents have had misfortunes. Like me." Another smile, but it almost appeared as if she was on the verge of tears to Arno. "Anyway, when Ezio Auditore da Firenze travelled to Masyaf, he found this book, or the original of it, and when he returned to Firenze, he gave the copy of the book to La Rossa. That book," she pointed at the volume in Arno's hand, "was bound by Ezio Auditore's wife. And well, I later found out that the woman in that book is La Rossa's ancestor. So call it my grand family history, if you will."

"And this is supposed to help me?"

"I think it will." And then she stood up, pulled on her hood, and with a twist of her heel, she was gone.