Revelations

FIFTY-SIX

But hardly were they within the confines of the inner bailey than Abbas himself appeared, behind a detachment of rogue Assassins. Abbas, recognizable still, but an old man, too, with sunken eyes and hollow cheeks-a haunted, frightened, driven man.

“Kill him!” bellowed Abbas. “Kill him now!”

His men hesitated.

“What are you waiting for?” Abbas screamed at them, his voice cracking as it strained.

But they were frozen with indecision, looking at their fellows standing against them and at each other.

“You fools! He has bewitched you!”

Still nothing. Abbas looked at them, spat, and disappeared within the keep.

There was still a standoff, as Assassin confronted Assassin. In the tense silence, Altair raised his left hand-the one maimed at his initiation into the Brotherhood.

“There is no witchcraft here,” he said simply. “Nor sorcery. Do as your conscience bids. But death has stalked here too long. And we have too many real enemies-we can’t afford to turn against each other.”

One of Abbas’s reluctant defenders doffed her cowl and stepped forward, kneeling before Altair. “Mentor,” she said.

Another quickly joined her. “Welcome home,” she added.

Then a third: “I fight for you. For the Order.”

The others quickly followed the example of the three women Assassins, greeting Altair as a long-lost brother, embracing their former opponents in fellowship again. Only a handful still spat insults and retreated after Abbas into the keep.

Altair, at the head of his troop, led the way into the keep itself. They stopped in the great hall, looking up to where Abbas stood at the head of the central staircase. He was flanked by rogue Assassins loyal to him, and spearmen and archers ranged the gallery.

Altair regarded them calmly. Under his gaze, the rogue Assassins wavered. But they did not break.

“Tell your men to stand down, Abbas,” he commanded.

“Never! I am defending Masyaf! Would you not do the same?”

“Abbas, you corrupted everything we stand for and lost everything we gained. All of it sacrificed on the altar of your own spite.”

“As you,” Abbas spat back. “You have wasted your life staring into that accursed Apple, dreaming only of your own glory.”

Altair took a step forward. As he did so, two of Abbas’s spearmen stepped forward, brandishing their arms.

“Abbas-it is true that I have learned many things from the Apple. About life and death, and about the past and the future.” He paused. “I regret this, my old comrade, but I see that I have no choice but to demonstrate to you one of the things I have learned. Nothing else will stop you, I see. And you will never change now and see the light that is still available to you.”

“Kill the traitors!” Abbas shouted in reply. “Kill every one of them and throw their bodies onto the dunghill!”

Abbas’s men bristled, but held off their attack. Altair knew that there was no turning back now. He raised his gun arm, unleashed the pistol from its harness, and, as it sprang into his grip, aimed and fired at the man who, seven decades earlier, had, for a short time, been his best friend.

Abbas staggered under the blow of the ball as it struck him, a look of disbelief and surprise on his wizened features. He gasped and swayed, reaching out wildly for support, but no one came to his aid.

And then he fell, crashing over and over down the long stone staircase, to come to rest at Altair’s feet. His legs had broken in the fall and stuck out at crazy angles from his body.

But he was not dead. Not yet. He managed to raise himself painfully, high enough to hold his head up, and look Altair in the eye.

“I can never forgive you, Altair,” he managed to croak. “For the lies you told about my family, my father. For the humiliation I suffered.”

Altair looked down at him, but there was only regret in his eyes. “They were not lies, Abbas. I was ten years old when your father came to my room, to see me. He was in tears, begging to be forgiven for betraying my family.” Altair paused. “Then he cut his own throat.”

Abbas held his enemy’s eye but did not speak. The pain in his face was that of a man confronting a truth he could not bear.

“I watched his life ebb away at my feet,” Altair went on. “I shall never forget that image.”

Abbas moaned in agony. “No!”

“But he was not a coward, Abbas. He reclaimed his honor.”

Abbas knew he had not much longer to live. The light in his eyes was already fading as he said: “I hope there is another life after this. At least then I shall see him, and know the truth of his final days…”

He coughed, the movement racking his body, and when his breath came again as he strove to speak, the rattle was already in it. But when he found his voice, it was firm, and it was unrepentant.

“And when it is your time, O Altair, then, then we will find you. And then there will be no doubts.”

Abbas’s arms collapsed, and his body slumped to the stone floor.

Altair stood over him in the silence that surrounded them, his head bowed. There was no movement but that of the shadows stirred by the flickering torchlight.