Choosing to say out of the Alliance, the Cinders are isolated in their own conflicts, and when Helia Cinder reaches to the void for answers, she inadvertently draws a creature out. Expecting to be eaten alive, she is instead left with a man with no...
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Talamayas had Helia out of harm's way faster than the rocks could fall, though she certainly wouldn't thank him for holding her against his chest as he moved blocks from the conflict. A blade nearly sliced off Talamayas' fingers as Helia freed herself, but she moved with him as they fled. While she wanted to be nowhere near him, at least she recognized that he wasn't trying to bury her in rubble. Talamayas could deal with that as long as she didn't get herself killed.
The mages gave them no time to rest, as they hopped through the city in the opposite direction of Blaze's compound. It was no coincidence that they were keeping them far from home base, and Talamayas was grateful only for the fact that it would keep Wren out of this. If he saw a Sol fighting mages, he would assume the worst, as the Songs always did.
Helia was not willing to fight her people, so the best they could hope to do was lose them. There wasn't enough city to keep them enclosed for long though, and they could not flee into the desert. This wasn't Sol territory for yet a few miles and putting him and Helia out in the open was a bad idea when he had no idea how many Songs were floating around here. To avoid that, they zig-zagged around the town, steadily approaching its borders, but the mages somehow found them in each nook or cranny they used to obscure themselves.
It didn't take long for Talamayas to ascertain that they had a way of tracking Helia. They did not have heightened senses like vampires, so their precise targeting made little sense otherwise. Both he and Helia had their magic muted enough that if they ducked into trash cans and put the lid on, a mage could pass by with no doubt to them being anything other than refuse.
Talamayas could evade pursuit easily, blending in with his generic cloak and muted magic, but Helia was neither disguised nor did she look like she belonged here. Still, they had avoided the townsfolk, so it wasn't intel leading their assailants on. It was more. There had to be something on Helia that they were following. It had to be her.
Talamayas stopped, catching Helia with an arm and spinning them into a narrow alleyway. Carrying her sparked the most unpleasant light energy against his body, but he had little choice. As a human, she was too slow, and he would never get enough space between them and the Cinder assassins at their backs. If he splattered her people that would fix the immediate problem, but she'd shake his protection and loathe him until he was dust. That would cause issue for Vice, so here he was picking an angry cat out of a tree while it clawed him even though it was in danger.
Talamayas slipped his hand around her back and hopped down several more alleyways before dropping below a tarp and pushing her against the flat of a wall. When she looked like she was going to spit in his face with anger, he placed a single finger to her lips to keep her quiet as he listened for their pursuers. They were far back but heading straight for them still. Light magic flared under his finger, and he snapped it back before she bit it off. It calmed the woman little as Tala slid his hands back into her hair, raking his fingers over her skull and along the edges of her face, searching for any adornment. A hairclip, earring, or necklace that Blaze could have enchanted
