Ezio gazed at her, entranced.

‘Let my words also bring hope,’ Minerva continued. ‘But you must be quick, for time grows short. Guard against the Borgia. Guard against the Templar Cross.’

The vault darkened. Minerva and Ezio were alone, bathed in a fading glow of warm light.

‘My people must now leave this world. But the message is delivered. It is up to you now. We can do no more.’

And then there was darkness and silence, and the vault became a mere underground cellar again, with nothing in it at all.

And yet …

Ezio made his way out, glancing at the writhing body of Rodrigo Borgia, the Spaniard, Pope Alexander VI, Leader of the Templar faction - bloody in his apparent death agonies; Ezio could not bring himself, now, to deliver a coup de grace. The man seemed to be dying by his own hand. From the look of him, Rodrigo had taken poison, no doubt the same cantarella he had administered to so many of his enemies. Well, let him find his own way to the Inferno. Ezio would not give him the mercy of an easy death.

He made his way out of the gloom of the Sistine Chapel into the sunshine. Once on the portico, he could see his friends and fellow Assassins, members of the Brotherhood, at whose side he had lived so many adventures and survived so many dangers, waiting for him.

PART ONE

Yet it cannot be called prowess to kill fellow citizens, to betray friends, to be treacherous, pitiless, irreligious. These ways can win a prince power, but never glory.

Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince

1

Ezio stood for a moment, dazed and disorientated. Where was he? What was this place? As he slowly regained his senses, he saw his uncle Mario detach himself from the group of his fellow Assassins and approach him, taking his arm.