"Again," Altair ordered, crossing his arms to watch her try again. Next would be from the wall behind the hay, which wasn't very tall. It was only eight feet up, and as long as she didn't freak out and start flailing she'd be fine.

Iris obeyed, even when the starting surfaces got higher and higher. Once they reached the top of a building, though, she called it for the day. Her nerves couldn't handle any more for the moment.

"No more," she said, stumbling out of the hay again. "That's it, no more."

Altair eyed her for a few moments before he nodded. Back to something more normal to help settle her nerves. "Up," he ordered, starting to climb himself. "I'll meet you at the top of that church."

Iris blinked a bit, a little dismayed at more heights, but comforted herself with the fact that she wouldn't have to jump off of them again and started climbing. This was something she was good at, and actually made really good time.

Altair still beat her there, but he wasn't surprised. And once they were up there he gave her some time to relax and do what she wanted. He knew he had to let her nerves settle before he did anything else with her.

Besides, she'd get used to jumping off buildings.

Iris ended up stripping off about three layers for the moment and just relaxing in the slight breeze that played over the church tower. It felt good to just sit there for a bit.

Altair noticed how much better she looked without the layers and forced himself to look away only through extreme willpower. But he managed to, somehow.

Oh he was so screwed. And he needed to hurry her training up so she'd be done.

Iris didn't notice him staring at her, but only because she was daydreaming about him. She couldn't help but imagine how he would look without all the layers of clothes on, or even without anything on at all, and she couldn't get the thoughts to go away.

Altair gave in and admitted that yes, he liked her, and he would like to know her much better. So now all he needed to do was keep a leash on himself until she was through with her training and took her Leap of Faith.

And then he could jump her.

Elsewhere, Ezio was having similar thoughts, although his thoughts were accompanied with colorful swearing at himself in untranslated Italian. He'd come to the conclusion that yes, he wanted to know Anna better and no, it wasn't like any other time in the past when he'd been attracted to a woman. This was different, and it was driving him to distraction.

Anna looked up from stretching herself out, shifting from doing splits to leaning over one leg to stretch out her back and side.

"Didn't you say something about your uncle wanting to test me?" Because she was fairly sure she'd heard that somewhere in the midst of his mumblings.

"That is the plan, as soon as your stretches are done," Ezio replied absently, still trying to slog through his thoughts.

Anna snorted and took a few more minutes to finish up. "Fine, I'm done. Still distracted by thoughts of watching me get my ass handed to me?"

No, just thoughts of watching her ass, but Ezio wasn't about to say that aloud.

"Are you that eager for defeat?" he replied instead. "Although it will be good training for you."

"Yeah, yeah," Anna muttered, rolling her shoulders. "Let's just get this over with so I can go find a spot to hide and nurse my wounded pride."

Ezio didn't reply, but walked with her to where his uncle was waiting. The match would be quick, he figured. An apprentice against a Master Assassin? There would be no contest.

Anna swallowed once as she looked at Mario. He grinned and tossed his sword to the side for the moment.

"Just your hidden blade, apprentice," he ordered, standing across from her. "You won't always have access to your other weapons."

Oh she already knew that, but she obligingly handed them off to Ezio anyway, already trying to figure out if there was anything she could use to her advantage.

Ezio set the weapons aside and stepped back out of range to watch the sparring match. Or rather, to pretend to watch the sparring match while really admiring Anna.

Anna was quick to dodge when Mario came after her, and then she spent a few moments just dodging and moving around the designated sparring area, keeping a little ahead of him. She was smaller and lighter, and she had practice running, so that wasn't a problem.

And then he lunged at her, and she had to block and duck around off to the side, shifting to present a smaller target. Her eyes flitted around to see if there were any other advantages she could use, and she darted to the other side of the arena, getting up on the fence just in time to hop over him and behind. Mario blinked, surprised, but didn't let it slow him down as he went after her again.

"Are you going to dance all day?" he taunted. "Or are you actually going to use what skill you have?"

Anna's eyes narrowed and she waited for him to attack before she blocked it with a bracer instead of with her blade, managing to clip him with a quick punch she'd meant to hit his jaw. She took advantage of his small step back, forcing him on the defensive.

At least until he did something she hadn't seen before, grabbing her wrist when she tried to attack him and throwing her over his shoulder. She landed hard, and before she could roll away or get up he had his blade over her throat.

"Not bad," he said after a moment. She'd fared better than he'd expected, anyway. "Not as good as my last student, but decent."

Anna's eyes narrowed at that. She hated being compared to people. So instead of taking the hand he offered to let her up, she swept his legs out from under him and pounced, bringing her blade to his throat.

Ezio raised an eyebrow, but nodded slightly. He recalled Altair mentioning that female Assassins were more ruthless than males, and he had to agree. That had been a particularly underhanded move.

"I'm impressed," he commented.

"Where did that come from?" Mario asked, looking up at her and making no move to get up.

"You never defined rules, and you never actually called quits. Besides, no one plays fair, so I have to take every advantage I can get." Anna got up, retracting her blade. She'd learned that long before being dumped into the Renaissance, though.

Ezio nodded again. Again, he approved of the answer. It seemed like Anna would make a good Assassin, once he could get her to learn all of the skills.

Mario nodded and got to his feet. "Well, seems you'll do fine after all." He grinned briefly. "Come, Ezio. We still have things to discuss."

Anna snorted and meandered off to go explore the town.

Ezio followed his uncle once Anna had wandered off to go exploring.

"She is learning very quickly," he commented.

"Indeed." Mario walked back over towards his office slowly. "She will be a good addition to the Brotherhood once she has finished her training." He looked at Ezio with a faint smirk.

"And perhaps something a little more to you?" Because he wasn't blind. And Ezio hadn't even tried to be stealthy earlier.