Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood Read Online Free PDF Page A

smile.
    “She wants to say a thank-you,” said the mother.
    “Thank you,” said Sofia dutifully, looking up at him with a mixture of awe and trepidation.
    “Stay with your mother in future,” said Ezio kindly. “Don’t leave her alone like that,
capisci
?”
    The little girl nodded mutely.
    “We’d be lost without you and your family to watch over us,
signore
,” said the mother.
    “We do what we can,” Ezio said, but his thoughts were troubled as he entered the citadel. Even though he was pretty sure he could stand his ground, he was not looking forward to his encounter with Machiavelli.

     
    But there was still time enough before the meeting, and to avoid brooding on the course it might take, but also from natural curiosity, Ezio first climbed the ramparts to have a closer look at the new cannon Mario had installed and was so proud of. There were several of them, each with a pile of iron cannonballs neatly stacked by their wheels, beautifully chased in cast bronze. The biggest had barrels ten feet long, and Mario had told him that these weighed as much as twenty thousand pounds, but there were also lighter and more easily maneuverable culverins interspersed with them. In the towers that punctuated the walls were saker cannon on cast-iron mounts and lightweight falconets on wooden trolleys.
    Ezio approached a group of gunners clustered around one of the bigger guns.
    “Handsome beasts,” he said, running a hand over the elaborately chased decoration around the touchhole.
    “Indeed they are,
Messer
Ezio,” said the leader of the group, a rough-hewn master-sergeant whom Ezio remembered from his first visit to Monteriggioni as a young man.
    “I heard you practicing earlier. May I try firing one of these?”
    “You could indeed, but we were firing the smaller cannon earlier. These big ’uns are brand-new. We don’t seem to have got the trick of loading ’em yet and the master-armorer who’s supposed to be installing them seems to have taken off.”
    “Have you got people looking for him?”
    “Indeed we have, sir, but no luck so far.”
    “I’ll have a look around, too—after all, these things aren’t here for decoration and you never know how soon we’ll need them.”
    Ezio set off, continuing his rounds of the ramparts. He hadn’t gone more than another twenty or thirty yards when he heard a loud grunting from a wooden shed that had been erected on the top of one of the towers. Near it, outside, lay a box of tools. As he approached, the grunts resolved themselves into snores.
    It was dark and hot inside the shed and smelled appallingly of stale wine. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dim light, Ezio quickly made out the form of a large man in his none-too-clean shirtsleeves spread-eagled on a pile of straw. He gave the man a gentle kick, but its only effect was for the man to splutter, half awake, and then turn over with his face to the wall.
    “Salve, Messere,”
Ezio said, jostling the man again, less gently this time, with the toe of his boot.
    This time the man twisted his head around to look at him and opened one eye. “What is it, friend?”
    “We need you to fix the new cannon on the battlements.”
    “Not today, chum. First thing.”
    “Are you too drunk to do your job? I don’t think Captain Mario would be very happy if he got wind of that.”
    “No more work today.”
    “But it’s not that late. Do you know what time it is?”
    “No. Don’t care, either. Make cannon, not clocks.”
    Ezio had squatted down to speak to the man, who in turn had pulled himself into a sitting position and was treating Ezio to a gale of his breath, pungent with garlic and cheap Montalcino, as he belched luxuriously. Ezio drew himself to his feet.
    “We need those cannon ready to be fired, and we need them ready now,” he said. “Do you want me to find someone else who’s more capable than you?”
    The man scrambled to his feet. “Not so fast, friend—no other man’s going to lay hands on my