Disclaimer: I own nothing. Nothing! No Ezio. No Altair. I own nothing. This is purely for amusement, nothing else! I just write to better myself as a writer, and learn and develop my style. And for the readers enjoyment, after all.

Summary: Will you live or will you die? That is the question that Olivia Steel faces as her life is on a collision course with danger and a reunion with the man, Ezio Auditore—the man she loved and left behind three years ago. With more secrets than she can carry, will Olivia be able to change the tide in the never ending battle of Assassins versus Templars? Or will she be the one to seal their fates?

Pairings: Olivia(OC)/Ezio, sort of established romance

Author's Note: This is a sequel to "Life, Death and a Choice". You don't necessarily need to read that to enjoy this story, but if you don't want to feel lost at times, I suggest going to read that before this one. (*Also note that Life, Death, and a Choice is currently be edited! Chapter 10 and up have yet to be edited and updated!) This story will definitely have a different tone than the last one, but will not feel too separate from it I hope. Anyways, I hope that you all enjoy it and come to love it.

Songs that Inspired this Chapter:

Olivia's Main Theme Song: "Rise" by State of Mine

"Memories" by Within Temptation

NOTE: The opening of this story is a recap of the last scene of "Life, Death, and a Choice".

The Lie of Purgatory

By ThroughtheMirrorDarkly

CHAPTER ONE

"Birthed From the Sea"

9th February 2011

Monteriggioni, Italy

Auditore Villa

Desmond was wretched out of the animus, the sheer amount pain coursing through his chest was too intense and the next thing he knew was that he was on his knees, expelling his stomach's contents. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, all he do was feel the pain radiate through his soul. It wasn't his pain, but that of his ancestor, Ezio. There had been only one other time that Desmond had to be pulled from the Animus so abruptly and that was the hanging of Ezio's father and brothers, even then he was able to put a distance between him and the agony. He had known what was coming, Shawn had given him a rundown of what to expect when the execution happened, and he had prepared himself for it.

He had no time to prepare for this. No way to not be gutted by the loss.

Desmond let out a raw sob, bile running down his quivering chin. His dark eyes were unfocused, and he shoved away Lucy's offer of a towel. Instead, he scooted away with his back pressed against the Animus and his knees drawn up to his chest. His eyes narrowed into slits, and he glared at Shawn. "Is she dead?" He asked, his voice come out of his mouth like shards of broken glass. His hands were clenched into knuckle white fists at his side, and his body shook with breaths. "Is she really gone?"

"Desmond," Shawn said, hesitantly.

"Don't look at me like that!" Desmond snapped. "You put me in there, you put me through the lives of my ancestors, and you expect me to what? To not care? To not feel? I feel everything, and I felt this! I want to know, is Olivia Steel really dead?"

"I second his outrage," Leo spoke up, his voice uncharacteristically soft. His jaw was set tight, and his eyes glared daggers at Shawn, Rebecca, and Lucy. "Olivia is my best friend, and I think I deserve to know what happened to her. Where is the fucking harm in letting us know what happened to her? Did she really die because of the Shroud or what? Because I know my friend, and she is a fucking survivor, she can't die like that. She doesn't deserve to die like that!"

"It would technically be 'didn't', as in past tense…" Lucy corrected, faintly. She flinched back from the twin glares that were pinned on her, and cleared her throat. "Shawn, you know the history better than the rest of us here. You've been monitoring all the changes to Ezio's timeline, right? Is Olivia really dead?"

"Well, I'm pleased to inform you two drama queens that Olivia Steel is indeed alive and did not die at the hands of the Shroud," Shawn commented, his tone lacking its normal bite. He hand his hands on his hips, and walked over to his work station. "From what correspondences were recovered of the famed Red Hood, she is said to cropped up in southern Italy a few years later out of the blue. There were letters exchanged with Machivelli and Lorenzo de Medici in a request for aid. If she sent Ezio any letters during this time, they were never found. She gave Medici some sound advice about his finances at one point because in the original timeline—"

"Shawn, no one cares about Lorenzo's bank statement in any timeline," Rebecca told him, with a scoff.

"Why? Why would the Shroud do that?" Desmond asked, a burst of anger rushed through his veins like wildfire. The unfairness of it all stung his heart, and he could taste the lingering sorrow and grief on Ezio's on his tongue.

"From what I can tell is that according to the Assassin lore is that the Shroud took Olivia somewhere. It's unclear of where or why, so we can only speculate on that account," Shawn commented, lightly. "We know from some of Machiavelli's writings that the Ones Who Came Before had a hand in it, though that shouldn't be surprising given the fact that Olivia is a bloody time traveller."

"The knowledge of her "death",' Rebecca continued, with air quotes, "was kept under lock and key. La Volpe and Machiavelli—probably against Ezio's wishes—used rumors to make it appear as if the Red Hood was leaving Italy all together." She pulled up the images of the letters between the Red Hood and others, a few depictions by famous artist of the famous rogue, but there is one image that was just Olivia Steel. It was a simple portrait of the woman behind the notorious legend that was done by Leonardo Da Vinci in 1501. "Borgia made a critical error in dividing his forces. The Kingdom of Naples, the place in which the rumors said Olivia fled to and the destination of the ship she was supposedly on, spurred Borgia to send men all through Italy in search of her. The peninsula was in turmoil which cost Borgia a lot of money and men; the First Italian War had broken out, and Borgia's merciless pursuit of the Red Hood was seen as an obsession, losing him much needed support. He wasn't able to become Pope until 1494, two years later than the original timeline. This allowed the Assassins to gain a firmer foothold in Italy more quickly, and branch out in neighboring countries."

Desmond felt the tension along his spine ease ever slightly. At least some good came from this mess, but it still didn't feel right at all. Ezio had been through so much, and to lose Olivia—even if she inevitably returned—still felt wrong. He swallowed the knot in his throat, and turned away from the monitors.

"Rebecca, can you bring up the picture of Olivia? The one that Da Vinci did," Leo asked, with a slight frown on his face.

"Sure thing," Rebecca said.

With a few clicks, the picture was brought up. "That background, that's not Da Vinci's work."

"How can you tell?" Desmond asked, squinting at the picture. He gave the image a dirty look, not too happy with the Pieces of Eden on his ancestor's behalf. Hadn't Ezio been enough for the woman he had fallen in love with to have those ancient pieces of crap to fake her death? The man just couldn't catch a break.

"It's a breadcrumb," Leo replied, a slow smile stretched across his face. "While the portrait of Olivia is definitely Da Vinci, the background is Olivia's style of painting."

"What?" Desmond blinked. "How is it a breadcrumb?"

"I think it is something deliberate," Leo said, slowly. He tapped his fingers along his jawline, and he walked forward with his brows furrowed. "Why else paint it like that? Maybe it's a clue? But a clue to freaking what?"

Lucy turned a critical gaze to their new companion—who had been more of a nuisance than anything helpful—and folded her arms over her chest. "Are you saying that this painting is hiding a secret message?" She asked, with thinly veiled disbelief.

The young man's demeanor completed changed before their eyes. The easy going smile slipped off of his face, and his green eyes flashed with annoyance and irritation. "I am a genius. I'm not saying that to be boastful or smug. I am a certifiable genius with an IQ that is sky fucking high. I graduated from MIT at the age of seventeen, and the only reason that I haven't been hired by some of the most influential scientific establishments in my world is because I happen to have Asperger's Syndrome, OCD with depression and anxiety," he stated, with his hands shoved into the pockets of his hoodie. His jaw clenched and unclenched then he let out a slow breath through his nose. "Apparently there is only a certain level of insanity that the scientific community is willing to house, but I am not it."

Lucy stared at him, flabbergasted.

Desmond cocked his head to the side. It made sense that there would be something more to Leo, like there had been to Olivia. Why would whatever had brought them to this world have wasted the effort on someone who would be a burden? No, whatever was behind this was purposeful and did nothing without expecting a great result. "Why didn't you tell us earlier?" He asked, no judgment in his tone.

Leo gave him a look. "She pointed a gun at me," he jerked a thumb in Lucy's direction, "and then you tied me to a chair!"

"You appeared out of thin air!" Lucy defended, vehemently.

Rebecca smirked. "Hey, that rhymed."

"Now is not the time, Rebecca," Shawn said, with a sigh.

Rebecca snorted, a small pout on her lips. "Party poopers."

"And besides, I wasn't wholly convinced this wasn't a dream until I was still here after days on end!" Leo said, with a glare at Shawn and Lucy. It seemed their uptight attitudes grated on his nerves, not that Desmond could blame him. "And besides," he added, in a more mild tone, "it was kind of fun to torment you all with the whole fanfiction thing, and stuff."

"You got a kick out of that?" Lucy asked.

"I reiterate I was tied to a chair," Leo replied, calmly. "I had to get my kicks somewhere."

"Oh, Dear Lord," Shawn pinched the bridge of his nose. "This is getting us nowhere. What is painting that makes you believe it's a code?"

"Down to business, huh?" Leo rolled the tension out of his shoulders. "Olivia liked to draw, but painting was never her favorite medium. It reminded her too much of therapy that they put her through as a kid. It completely ruined the experience for her."

"That's a shame," Rebecca stated. "She is really talented. Her painting, The Eagle's Path, is very welled liked by many art critics for the realism and life put into it, and of course, people still speculate to this day why Leonardo da Vinci kept it with him until he died. It was obvious it wasn't his work, and a lot people attribute it being a masterpiece done by his lover or something along those lines."

Leo smiled, broadly. "Olivia would get a laugh out of that. It would have made her happy to know that she caused such a stir," he said, his voice thick with emotions. It occurred to him right then that he was unlikely to ever see his friend ever again. That Olivia had lived her life, and she was gone. It was like being punched straight through the heart, and it hurt to even breathe. "But when Olivia did paint, it was always with a purpose. She said she would never pick up a paint brush unless there was true intent behind it, and nothing less. There were only a few times she ever painted. One time she painted a picture that you could fill the agony and pain coming off of it with the dark blacks, greys and vibrate reds all clashing together. It was a depiction of her childhood. One other time, she painted a set of paintings that were a secret map that if someone knew how to read it, then they would learn of a cave in the woods out behind Olivia's old house. It was filled with crystals and geodes, Olivia told me. If you put a lantern in the center of the cave…it would light up all the crystal and it looked like you were standing in starlight.

"Now this painting is something else all-together," Leo pointed at the computer screen. "This is has to mean something, otherwise why would she paint a background in her own portrait. I just don't understand what she is trying to say."

Desmond managed to clamber to his feet, and stared at the screen. The woman portrayed in the picture, held the dignity and air of a queen. Her grey eyes were sharp and bore into the soul of the person who looked upon the portrait, and her fingertips traced an eagle necklace at her throat. An epiphany flooded through his mind with all the subtly of a battering ram. "Where is this painting at now?"

"A private collector in London, England," Rebecca replied. "Why?"

"I think Leo is right. I think Olivia left us a coded message, but only someone with eagle vision can see it," Desmond stated, his eyes riveted on the necklace.

"Are you sure?" Lucy asked, an eyebrow arched.

"I would stake my life on it," Desmond said, seriously. "I have a feeling we need to get that painting and fast."

"Are we serious right now?" Shawn asked, looking around at them appalled. "Are we honestly contemplating art theft?"

"Really? Of everything that is going on, that's what you are hung up on?" Rebecca asked, sarcastically.

"I'm just saying that perhaps we should explore other options before we put all our eggs in the basket labeled "Olivia Steel's remake of the Da Vinci" code," Shawn stated, shoving his glass back up his nose to their proper place.

"That's a mouthful of a label," Desmond snorted. "Though it is really accurate."

"What is really accurate?" A voice questioned.

The air seemed to be sucked right out of the room. Shawn had gone white as a sheet, his entire face lost any trace of color. Rebecca gnawed on her lower lip, looking like a kid caught in the candy jar. Lucy appeared to be muttering a prayer, and asking the world to swallow her whole. Desmond had a more profound reaction to the voice, feeling as if he had been punched in the gut and his blood turned to chunks of ice in his veins. He turned around to face the man who stood at the entrance of the sanctuary. So many emotions boiled up within him, and it was only Lucy's hand on his shoulder that kept him from launching himself across the room to land one good punch on the smug bastard's face.

It was his father, William Miles and head of the Brotherhood.

"Alright!" Leo shouted the question on everyone's mind and in the most tactless way possible. "Who invited the bastard?"

Leo was officially Desmond's new best friend and hero.

Venice, Italy

15th July 1482

The orange light from the sunset floated through the windows casting a pattern across the quiet room. Several more portraits done by the Maestro Leonardo sat around the room waiting to be shipped to Monteriggioni while the famed Assassino leaned over his desk. His palms laid flat against the wood as his golden eyes traced the remaining names on his list. When Ezio Auditore had started his mission to avenge his family, he had been a different man. Young, naïve, hot-headed—though his temper still claimed him on occasion; he had come so far from those days, stumbling through all walks of life. He had grown up in nobility, and then the betrayal happened. His father and brothers executed. He had to kill to survive, had to steal, and much more. He found that he did not miss being part of the gentry of Italy, preferring the truth of thieves, mercenaries and whores to the painted and backstabbers that polluted the government and laws.

But if there was one thing he missed out of everything, it would be her.

Olivia Steel, the Red Hood. His companion, his friend, his love.

The image of her face—the fear, the panic—still lanced through him like the shape end of a sword, and his heart clenched tight at the helplessness that still echoed through him. The Shroud of Eden had been hidden beneath Monteriggioni, and it had stayed there, silent and powerless for years. Until that fateful night that it claimed his love's life. It had taken control of her, had led her to her death and a void had been in his life ever since. He regretted not acting on his feelings for her before, regretted that they only shared one blissful night before she was ripped out of this world. He had spent hours, searching through every scroll, every book, trying to find out more about the Pieces of Eden as if some magically clue would appear and he could have her back.

No answers could be found.

"Tell me," Ezio demanded. "Tell me that you don't love. Look me in the eye and tell me that you don't love me."

No words fell from her lips because she couldn't tell him that. She couldn't tell him that because she did love him, and his hands cupped her face. A shaky sigh fell from her lips as Olivia looked at him with the greatest sadness in her eyes, and her fingers clung to his arms. It was as if she had never wanted to let him go.

He had never wanted to let her go, either. He had never contemplated life without her, had never imagined it to be a real possibility. She had been so strong and vibrant; slipping into his life like a puzzle piece he hadn't known was missing. They had been bound by the same grief and loss, and together walked the path of vengeance and justice. Where the Assassin went, the Red Hood had not been far behind. Living without her presence was like living without the sun, cold and despairing. Four years had passed since then, and he still could not find a way to heal his heart. Ezio rolled up the list, and shoved it into the pouch at his hip before he lowered himself into the chair. He raked a hand across the rough of his beard, and lifted his eyes to peer around his room idly. There was this emptiness in his life that no amount of distractions could fill.

Oh, he had tried to kill the pain. He fought guards, killed targets for Lorenzo de Medici, anything to keep his mind off of her. It wasn't until he learned that his uncle, Machiavelli, and La Volpe were using her reputation—the legend of the Red Hood—to divide Borgia's forces, and more. It made him angry that they would use her memory like that. It was the only that was left of her and they used it for their own means. He had started to drink then, trying to drown everything out and find solace at the bottom of the bottle. He had gotten drunk enough to have a few fleeting affair, but the sick feeling he was left with the morning after only drove the pain deeper into his heart. He knew all of it was a meaningless endeavor. Nothing could erase the memory that Olivia had cast upon his heart; with a single heated night of passion she had undone him. No to mention, the years of unshakable loyalty could not so easily be tossed aside. She had been his best friend and confidant, the voice of reason and ear that would always listen. The lines around his eyes crinkled when he frowned, heavily. His outlandish behavior lasted a good three months, before Zio Mario finally stepped in to put a stop to it.

Mario painfully reminded him of his duty that could not be ignored, and the older man sympathized with his nephew. His uncle told him that the matters of the heart were never easy, and that Ezio had to learn to live in spite of the pain. Mario seemed to believe that the Red Hood would return, believed that there was a greater plan or reason the Shroud took her away. Ezio didn't believe in gods or higher powers, but knew the objects like the Shroud and the Apple needed to be kept locked away before they hurt anyone else. If he could find a way, he would destroy them.

Ezio forced such thoughts away. They served little purpose right now, and there was still much to be done. As beautiful as Venice was, the corruption ran deeply and the Templars had flourished because of it. His wound the red string, like Olivia did when she was alive, around his index finger before he started to strap on his armor; the string was a little reminder, of all that he had lost and all that he left.

The Kingdom of Naples, Italy

18th July 1482

The lapping of waves brought many things upon the shore of Naples. Shells, dead fish, and things that had been lost at sea. Never before though had the dock master, Enrico Giambetti, seen a body be brought to shore as if birthed out of the waves and foam. His wife, Cecilia, would often come for walks and had coming running to the docks in a clear panic. He approached the white cloaked figure that laid, still and prone, on the dry sand where him and his wife had dragged the body away from the ocean's touch lest it reclaim the person. Enrico couldn't believe his eyes as the person's chest rose and fell unhindered, and he glanced down at the red fabric wrapped tightly around the person's waist. There was something about it that sent a prickle of warning down his spine, and he avoided touching it all cost. With a careful hand, he pulled back the person's hood and once again found himself stunned beyond belief.

It was not a man, but a woman!

Skin fair as the snow caps on the mountain tops, and up-turned nose like he imagined a fairy would have. Dark lashes set against high cheekbones, and pink lips were parted, dragging in deep, steady breaths. Her coppery brown hair was wet, shimmering with specs of sand in the sunlight.

"Mio dio," Cecilia gasped, underneath her breath, "do you think the poor soul shipwrecked?"

"I am unsure, my love," Enrico replied, flummoxed. He did not know what to make of a strange looking woman that wore man's clothes, a sinful and disgraceful thing, but perhaps desperation drove her to such. He startled slightly when the woman twitched, her eyelids fluttering and she struggled to find her way to the waking world.

Steel grey eyes peeled open, glazed with pain and confusion. "Wh—what?" Her voice was raspy and raw, like she had not used it in a long time. Her pupils dilated with fear when she saw him and his wife hovering over her, and she tried to pull herself away.

"Easy, child," his wife said, in a soothing tone. "You are safe now."

Enrico offered no consolation. He did not know this woman, and had a bad feeling in the pit of his gut. Weakened and baffled, she may be—this woman held herself taut and prepared for a fight. She fought to keep her eyes open, fought to sit up, but she would still lash out if she thought she were in danger. His wife may believe she was a poor lost soul, but he did not think she was some innocent. He'd recon that she was a pirate, or more likely a pirate's whore. Shipwrecks were not uncommon things, but survivors certainly were. "What is your name?" He asked, his brow furrowed into a deep frown.

Those solemn eyes turned up at him, and he felt like his soul was being judge. As if she were unraveling the depths of his character with that one glance up and down. Finally after what seemed like forever, the woman slumped against the sand, her strength dwindling. "O-Olivia," the strange woman croaked, her head bobbed up and down. "My name…is Olivia…"

"What happened?" Enrico asked. "Do you know how came to be here?"

The woman attempted to answer, when a voice echoed from the depths of her mind, "Sleep, novice."

And she collapsed against the sand, out cold.

END OF CHAPTER!

It was nice to wrap up "Life, Death and a Choice" and start the sequel. I will warn everyone that while I will work on this story, I won't be posting any more chapters frequently until I am finished editing and updating "Life, Death and a Choice". I have the chapters 1-9, already updated, but am still working on the rest. Once I get the edits down, updated on here, and posted on AO3 then I will start posting updates. Just wanted everyone to know.

Thank you all so much!

RRs are appreciated. :D