Ezio watches for a second, and that raw little note –– Quell, a nickname –– makes Kovacs' dismissal of the cause feel that much more desperate. It is not lost on him that in other circumstances, they could kill each other. Here, that cause is the thread Ezio must cling to.

"And a good deflection," Ezio replies. It was a taunt, too, but they both know it; it doesn't need to be said. It also doesn't need to be re-asked. He just heads back off into his mothers' old quarters. Dinnertime.