"We went on the little trip to get away and have time to ourselves and now, in the middle of gathering more recruits, I get pregnant? So not fair." Anna actually pouted, although she had one arm curled protectively around her stomach.

Ezio stopped what he was doing and looked at her, eyes a bit wide.

"You're pregnant?" he asked. "Are you certain?"

"Yeah. Oh, right, sorry. I didn't tell you yet. I figured it out this morning." Anna smiled sheepishly. "You were already up, so I guess you missed my mad dash to the bathroom."

Ezio broke into a grin.

"That is wonderful, la mia dolce," he said, going over to her. He gave her a kiss.

Anna laughed quietly. "You say that now," she said teasingly. "Just wait until I'm getting sick every morning and having crazy mood swings."

"I think I can handle it," Ezio replied, pulling her into his lap. He wrapped his arms around her waist and rested one hand against her stomach.

Anna chuckled after a few moments, though she didn't move away from him.

"You're going to be touchy-feely, aren't you? Even moreso than Altair was."

"Absolutely," Ezio replied shamelessly. He was much more physically affectionate than Altair was, and he was going to make the most of it.

Anna snickered and shook her head, amused. For the moment. She was sure that eventually she'd start batting at him to make him stop, but not just yet.

Ezio held her close, ridiculously pleased and not at all surprised at the timing. The world just seemed to work that way.

Anna settled in there with a little sigh. "You know things just got more complicated automatically, right?"

"Indeed," Ezio replied. He was working on suppressing the automatic desire to make her take it easy from now until the child was born.

"And no, I'm not going to sit out on the sidelines for the next eight months." Anna shot him a quelling look. "Don't even think about it."

"I will not make you sit on the sidelines," Ezio replied after a moment. "For now, at least. However, it might be a good idea later. I seem to recall Iris refraining from participating after a certain point."

"At a certain point, when she was about six or seven months pregnant and wasn't comfortable climbing anymore," Anna pointed out.

"I did not specify when the certain point happened to be," Ezio replied. "But she dropped out of active training closer to four or five months, yes? And only helped when necessary?"

"Yeah," Anna admitted grudgingly, glowering at him. "I can get at least three or four more months of training in before I have to start taking it easy."

Ezio gave her a small kiss.

"I won't stop you," he replied. "Although I might insist that some days of training be lighter than others."

"I suppose that's reasonable," Anna grumbled. Although she already knew that in a few more months she just wouldn't have the necessary energy to keep up the continued level of training she was at.

Ezio cuddled her, one hand still on her stomach.

"I will try to be reasonable about things," he said. "I may not succeed all the time, but I will try."

"Hopefully I'll remember that I appreciate the effort." Anna smiled and curled into him contentedly.

Ezio just held her, still absurdly pleased.

And indeed, Anna did get bitchy as the weeks went on, but Ezio held up under it remarkably, especially when he noticed her belly starting to swell a little.

Anna didn't snap at him much for cuddling her when they were alone, but she did grumble and swat at him when they were with the recruits. After the first time people snickered at her for her apparent dislike of such public displays of affection, she threw a knife at one, just missing him. And then she stomped away growling. The recruits didn't laugh at her after that.

Really, Ezio did try to contain himself when they were working with the recruits. He really did. He just failed sometimes. But he always made it up to her later on when they were done with training for the day.

After a few months, Anna took herself off full-time training and limited herself to helping Ezio and demonstrating things.

"I hate this," she grumbled one day after training, flopping back on their bed and glaring at the ceiling like it had personally offended her.