Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad

Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad: "Safety and peace, brother."

Malik Al-Sayf: "Your presence will deliver us both."

―Malik Al-Sayf and Altaïr at Masyaf, 1191.

Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad (1165 - 1257) was a member of the Assassin Order and, from 1191 until his death, the Order's Grand Master.
Raised to be an Assassin from birth, Altaïr obtained the rank of Master Assassin by his twenty-fifth year. However, following his failure to obtain the Apple from Robert de Sable in early 1191, and subsequently allowing the Templars to attack the city of Masyaf, headquarters to the Order of Assassins, he was demoted to the rank of novice and sent on a quest for redemption.
Tasked with the deaths of nine individuals, who, unbeknown to him, made up the ranks of the Templar Order in the Holy Land, Altaïr began a quest to change his ways and liberate the Kingdom from the corruption of the nine. During his quest however, Altaïr learned of a plot far more sinister than originally believed. Completing his mission to kill the nine targets, and cleansing the Order of its treacherous leader Al Mualim, Altaïr rose to the rank of Grand Master, taking the Assassins into a new, more secretive direction.
With the Apple in hand, Altaïr changed the ways his Order lived their lives; writing the details in his fabled Codex for later generations of the Order to read. His name would continue to resonate through the Order in later years, greatly influencing the lives of his descendants in years to come.
His bloodline would go on to contain an important figure in the Assassin Order, Desmond Miles.

Desmond Miles

"Save it. After what those Templar bastards put me through. I'm ready, willing, and able."

―Desmond agrees to join the Assassins^[src]

Desmond Miles (born 1987) was a traveling hermit and descendant to a long line of ancestors who swore their allegiance to the Assassin Order. In September 2012, he was kidnapped and incarcerated at Abstergo Industries, a Templar organization, and forced into a machine called the Animus to relive the memories of his ancestor, Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad, during the Third Crusade, in order to learn the location of "the Apple", one of the Pieces of Eden.
Eventually escaping with the aid of Lucy Stillman, Desmond once again used an Animus to explore the memories of another ancestor of his, Ezio Auditore da Firenze, during the Renaissance so as to learn the ways of the Assassins through the bleeding effect.

Ezio Life

Ezio Auditore da Firenze (born 1459) was a Florentine noble during the Italian Renaissance and, unbeknownst to most historians and philosophers, a central member of the Assassin Order. A descendant of Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad and ancestor to bothDesmond Miles and Subject 16, Ezio was unaware of his Assassin heritage until the age of 17, when his father and two brothers, Federico and Petruccio, were murdered. Ezio fled his birthplace of Florence and took refuge at the Villa Auditore in theTuscan town of Monteriggioni.
Learning of his heritage from his uncle, Mario Auditore, Ezio began his Assassin training, as well as his quest for vengeance against the Grand Master of the Templar Order, Rodrigo Borgia, who had ordered the executions of his father and two brothers. During his quest, Ezio managed to not only unite the pages of Altaïr's Codex for the first time since Domenico Auditore, but also to save the cities of Florence, Venice and Rome from theTemplars' control. He ensured the future travels of Christoffa Corombo to the "New World" and, in liberating Rome from Borgia control and preventing the rise to power of Ercole Massimo's Cult of Hermes, helped spread the Renaissance and Assassin ideals of independence and free thought throughout Italy.
Shortly before the death of Rodrigo Borgia in 1503, Ezio was pronounced the Grand Master of the Assassin Order. In the years that followed, Ezio begun a quest to rediscover the lost history of his Order. Travelling to the aged-fortress of Masyaf in order to learn more about his ancestors, he discovered the fortress overrun, and made his way to the city of Constantinople, so that he might uncover the location of the Seals of Altaïr.