A game, or real life? (Ezio x reader)

Don't leave me...

My dearest diary,

It is now November 17th, my 65th birthday. And sfortunatamente (unfortunately), here I am confined to my bedroom, feverish and coughing. Honestly, if Ezio even catches me up... but it was worth it. I missed writing.

Aurora, Leandro and Yusuf have yet to return from their mission in Firenze. Nearly two months have gone by, and little Mariana is still here with us, most likely already asleep in her bedroom. She misses her parents. I knew that oh so well. Sometimes, she'd come ask me when would Mamma and Papà come back. Of course, I couldn't know for sure, so I'd always reply "soon". But I could understand them. Of course I could. With such a threat going on, of course they'd stay away, regardless of how much it hurt. But with some luck, they'll be back soon.

As I lay in bed, during those long hours spent looking up at the ceiling, my thoughts drifted back to this last harvesting season. To Shao Jun, and to the horrible fright caused by Ezio's will to stay behind while little Mariana and I stayed at Machiavelli's. Ahh, those sleepless nights. Two whole days before a carriage came to pick us up. Two whole days of tossing and turning. Two whole days of praying for Ezio's safety. But when we got back home, Ezio looked...different. There was a certain glimmer in his eyes when he came to greet us. I still don't know what that was, but...I wonder what happened while we were away. At least one thing was certain: he HAD been attacked. The living room was destroyed, and honestly, I lost count how many hours it took for all the maids to clean up the blood that decorated the floor. But at least, he had made it out. He was okay.

Ahh, growing old does things to you. Though I always worried about Ezio back in our youth, I had never feared for his life as much as I feared now. We were both old, mere shadows of the warriors we once were. To be honest, getting out of bed in the morning was labor enough. Il dottore (the doctor) has even advised me to start walking around with a cane. Honestly, I've come a long way, from being a lazy 17 year-old, through a very energetic mother and deadly assassin, to an old bag of bones who can barely move anymore. Life works in mysterious ways indeed.

I smiled softly as I placed my quill down, before I was suddenly overcome with a violent coughing fit that left an uncomfortable ache in my chest. Guess it was time to go back to bed... Drinking a bit of water to soothe my throat, I blew the candle out before I finally made my way to bed, still slightly warm from the last time I was laying there, my fingers itching to write. Soft moonlight poured in through the open curtains as I buried myself beneath the sheets, trying to steady my labored breathing while I waited for Ezio to come back to bed. But he didn't. At least, not while I was still awake.

Nearly two weeks went by before I was finally back onto my feet. And though I was doing much better, Ezio, in contrast, started complaining more and more about his chest pains and his coughing fits. It was getting more worrisome, as time went by. He constantly felt winded, and even now, as I relished in the shadow of our tree, I could hear him coughing as he worked in his office. I rarely ventured there myself, more so to go fetch a book or hand him some water. But from what I gathered, he had started writing a journal. A Codex, of a sort, like Altaïr had before him. It honestly made me think: should I write one as well? For Desmond, perhaps? Or would my diaries be enough? Oh, who knows. I don't even know if they'll survive the ravages of time.