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The warm metal of his hidden blade kisses the knuckle of his severed ring finger as it clashes with Malik’s dagger, a loud clang ringing out just beside his ear. Malik’s wrist curves beneath his and locks in place, hilt catching on the leather of Altaïr’s vambrace; with a quick step and a boot slid between Altaïr’s feet, he wrenches the trapped wrist backwards, cocking Altaïr’s elbow at an odd angle and pressing it to the small of his own back.
“One for me,” Malik taunts, lazily spinning the hilt of his dagger between his fingers as Altaïr hops away and puts several feet of distance between them, flexing his wrist and massaging the pain out with his other hand.
Altaïr’s scarred lip tugs upward in frustration. Malik takes first – as always, his mind reminds him, and the annoying feeling of inferiority that has seemed to be omnipotent during their training sessions, lately, blossoms further in the pit of his stomach.
It’s just the two of them, today, the normal gaggle of novices that like to slyly perch in the trees and attempt to hide from their sight and watch their training sessions, enraptured, gone on a training venture to Acre with one of the other masters for the week. Altaïr’s glad to have some solace, for once – just he and Malik, alone, each dancing around the other with a blade in his hand like they had in the days of their youth, the copse of cedar trees that ring the clearing yawning a shadow over them, their branches flush with summer leaves, the scent of spices and smoke from an incense burner faintly masking the scent of horse shit from the nearby stables and the warm Masyaf wind threading through their hair. The peace they’ve known since Al-Mualim’s death has been good to them; days like these, Altaïr thinks, are the best of it.
Fingers curl into a fist beside the sleek blade that juts outward from his ubiquitous bracer, and he watches Malik with careful eyes, knees bent and limbs tensed in preparation for his second-in-command’s next move. Malik’s right foot moves, and Altaïr moves with it, strafing to the left just as a chuckle rumbles deep from the throat of the other man. There’s a small cloud of dust that curls up from the ground, the imprint of a boot dragged through the dirt, but Malik is still in the same position he had been five seconds ago, grinning. Altaïr nearly scrubs his hand down his face in frustration, unable to believe he’d been so on-edge and ready to catch Malik when the man made his next move that he’d fallen for such a simple feint.
“Perhaps you should have gone to train with those novices,” Malik taunts, slowly circling to the right, inching closer, closer, closer to Altaïr. “It might have done you some good.”
“Just warming up,” Altaïr snaps back. He lunges for Malik’s left side, making a move for his ribs, just below where his arm isn’t, but Malik is quicker. A blade catches his, once again, and Malik throws his weight behind his single arm to force Altaïr to withdraw before hopping back on nimble feet.
Malik flips the hilt of his dagger around so he’s palming it with the blade to the right. “Is that the best you can do?”
Altaïr doesn’t deign him with a reply, ignoring the jibe and going for Malik’s throat, this time. His hidden blade meets the leather of a bracer and slides along it, Malik’s arm raised in a mimic of Altaïr’s own; the strike ends in a deadlock, his blade pressed to Malik’s bracer and Malik’s dagger pressed to his own, their faces close, foreheads nearly touching. He can feel Malik’s breath against his cheek, warm and steady, their eyes locked.
He steadies his arm, and the grin that spreads across his face when he realizes the advantage he has is met with a quizzical furrowing of Malik’s brow. It happens in a quick second – Altaïr’s boot slides between Malik’s leg, he lunges forward and presses his lips against the other man’s in a fleeting kiss, and he takes the moment of confusion to catch Malik’s wrist with his other hand and wrench it behind his back, as was done to him.
“One for me,” he chirps, stepping back to put distance between them.
Malik stares him down with death in his eyes and the faint dusting of a blush upon his cheeks. “That was cheating,” he huffs.
“Everything is permitted,” Altaïr parrots the second half of the Creed, much to the other man’s chagrin.
Malik wastes no time in attacking Altaïr, coming at him with more force than before. Their blades clash, and Malik sidesteps several swipes from Altaïr with deft feet, weaving around him on the defensive before taking opportunity of an overestimated swing to slip beneath Altaïr’s arm and bring the pommel of his dagger crashing down hard upon the other assassin’s nose.
“Fuck!” Altaïr spits, retracting his blade and stepping backward, hands flying to his face. Blood slicks his fingers and upper lip, and the bridge of his nose throbs like a motherfucker.
Malik slips his dagger beneath the sash tied around his waist and approaches Altaïr, hand resting upon the the man’s shoulder as he turns a clinical eye to the inflicted wound. “Too hard?” he asks, pulling Altaïr’s hands away to look closer at his nose.
“You think?” Altaïr snaps. His words taste like copper in his mouth, blood seeping between his lips; he foregoes any care he might have had about not staining his white Mentor’s robes and drags a sleeve beneath his nose to clean some of the blood off. “Hurts like hell.”
“Let me make it up to you.” Malik’s words are a murmur, and a hand curls behind Altaïr’s neck, threading through the short, dark hairs there. Warm lips press to his. Altaïr nearly sighs into Malik’s mouth as the other man rolls his bottom lip between his teeth, slides his tongue over blood and into Altaïr’s mouth in the commandeering way Altaïr loves. The twinned tastes of blood and everything that’s inherently Malik make for a heady combination, and Altaïr lets his guard down, chest pressed flush to the other man’s, arms coming to wrap around Malik’s neck, lips moving heatedly. For all his decades of training as an assassin and the sensory skills he’s spent his lifetime honing, he doesn’t notice Malik’s hand slipping from his neck, trailing slowly down his spine, then leaving his body entirely, until the edge of a dagger is pressed just beneath his neck, nicking the skin there.
“I believe that’s two and three for me,” Malik says breezily when he breaks the kiss and pulls back from Altaïr.
Altaïr huffs and thumbs blood from his lip, embarrassed that he had his own trick turned against him. “Asshole,” he grumbles.
Malik lets out a snort of laughter. “Ready for round two?”