Assassin's Creed Drabbles

↳ unwritten prophecies

you are meant for the gods, but beneath the wrath of the storm, he asks the one question no oracle is ever granted—what do you want? rated 18+ for smut

THE MASKED CULTISTS trickle from the cave. Eupheme—your sister in training—leaves too and urges you to do the same and be free of the darkness hidden below the sacred Temple of Apollo. But you won't go. Not yet. All evening, the Pyramid under the great, bronze serpent has called to you, a moth to a flame. You move toward the artifact in a trance, the voices you've heard since entering the cave growing louder with every step...until there's silence. "You're not supposed to be here."

You know the rough voice and to whom it belongs. "Deimos," you breathe, heart racing at the sight of the Cult's champion as he emerges from the shadows—his golden armor nigh glowing in the dim firelight.

He steps closer, warm-tawny eyes darting from the artifact to you. Most of the cultists are frightened by the power of the Pyramid—a force they cannot truly comprehend or control—and none of the would-be Oracles have ever shown any inclination for being able to harness its potential for prophecy. Deimos looks down at the artifact and can feel its call and energy thrumming in his veins. He has never doubted that he has the blood of gods. But to find another like him? A blessing and a curse.

"Does it speak to you as well?" He asks. The edge in his prior words faded.

"Yes," you answer. The voices grow more numerous, louder. You squeeze your eyes shut, trying to focus on a single thread of the tapestry of history and fate. "Of the past." There are glimpses of Leonidas at Thermopylae, Themistokles at Salamis, and battles even more ancient for which there are no tales to be told or heroes to be celebrated. "The present." Perikles gathers with his generals in the shadow of the Parthenon, and Spartans train for the upcoming war. But then the landscape becomes unfamiliar—seven hills—and wood and mud villages spring up on the banks of a mighty river, growing larger, grander, until the city of bricks turns into one of marble. An Eagle rises. "And of events that have not yet come to pass."

Deimos extends his hand, fingertips barely touching the smooth bronze plates covering the artifact, a gesture for you to do the same—and a test. You know not what you'll see—the future or the past, but the Cult's champion hopes it will be the latter. Stepping closer, you reach out to the Pyramid, pressing a hand against one of the sides as Deimos does the same.

The oracle has spoken! To prevent Sparta's fall, the child must fall first. Your breath catches as a woman lunges forward. Her face twisted in anguish. She fights against the hands restraining her but her cries are swallowed by the wind and rain. "Please! You can't! No! No, no." Lightning streaks across the dark sky. "Nikolaos!" At the cliff's edge is an ephor of Sparta, holding a swaddled babe aloft in the air, inching closer to the chasm below Taygetos.

And then the fall. The scream. A sister's outstretched hand.

The vision twists, shifting like smoke, and you see something else—the boy again, older this time. His body hardened and face set in an expression too cruel for a child. A woman stands before him, cloaked in shadow, her voice smooth, coaxing. "Your family abandoned you," Chrysis tells Deimos. Lies repeated so often they become the only truth the boy has ever known. "Your mother left you to die." The priestess steps forward, cradling an object swathed in dark linen. She lays the gift before Deimos and reveals a sword—the Sword of Damokles. "But I will give you new purpose, my child."

You stumble back from the Pyramid and glimpse Deimos, breath coming in sharp, shallow pulls. He stares down at you, his expression a storm of barely contained rage, but there's a rawness, vulnerability even, that you've never seen before in him. "You saw it," he murmurs, his voice quieter than you've ever heard it. Not the voice of Deimos—the Cult's blade—but the voice of a broken man who has spent his life trying to reconcile with the prophecy spoken by Praxithea when he was only a babe. A prophecy that tore his family apart and doomed him to this life of pain and suffering.