Screams sounded down the square. Alyss turned her head and saw Aeron charging through the crowd. A vendor grabbed onto his arm and started arguing with him about the damage done to her stall in his haste. He tried to yank free from her grasp or shove her aside when she couldn't be budged, but he didn't make much progress. Alyss's eyes bugged and she darted away to the nearest alley leading off of the square, thankful that he hadn't seen her before he'd been waylaid or no shopkeeper could have stopped him.
She twisted around the maze of the town, having no clue where she was going or how to get there but doing her best to get as far away as possible. She wasn't familiar with the streets and ended up wasting precious minutes doubling back towards the center, but eventually she made it to the houses set up on the outskirts of the city.
Fwoosh. Fwoosh. Alyss could hear him flying behind her. Clearly, her lead had not been enough. She was reinvigorated by his nearness and managed to run even faster than before in her attempts to escape him. Alyss replayed the memories in her mind of how she had suffered and hungered since leaving the palace. She had traveled, she had walked, she had fought for her freedom. She had earned her freedom, and she was desperate to keep it for as long as she could. To get home. To leave behind forever the crazy magic and dead golems and endless secrets that she was something more than she appeared, like so many had hinted. To leave behind forever that crazy world and the people in it who almost seemed to think she was one of them. She wasn't; Alyss was sure. She was just a girl who needed to keep running, to run faster, to go, go, go.
All of her fatigue seemed to be burned away. She was no longer a hollowed-out shell working on pure bravado. She was a running machine, each stride synced perfectly with the swing of her arms. More than her second wind, she felt adrenaline and focus powering her to run beyond her strength and endurance. It felt good, and powerful. She would have enjoyed it, if the sound of constant wing beats hadn't reminde3d her of impending doom should she fail. Fwoosh. Fwoosh. Fwoosh.
He banked, turning briefly away from her. She ignored the oddness, the strangeness, running with all her heart forward. Then she saw it. He'd made a flaming wall of pale blue fire, suddenly rearing up before her eyes. She could have hit herself, watching her steps to be sure she wouldn't stumble but missing such and obvious thing. Alyss flinched at the heat but tried to break through the wall, screeching in agony at the pain of being burned. So the flames weren't just a magical illusion, but truly physical and painful. She tried to force herself to walk further though them anyway. Just two inches of complete pain and she would get through it and away from him.
The wall of flames burst open and spread through the rest of the town.
Alyss jumped back to avoid being burned alive by the now miles-deep barrier. Her skin and clothes were completely repaired once she severed contact with the wall, but still she could remember the feeling of the burns, and she couldn't bear to try to break through it now that it was so impossible a task.
Screams split the air. Alyss turned toward their voices, almost compelled to go to them and help. The sounds of his wings were getting louder as he came closer, though, so she swerved aside to try to get away from him somehow.
She moved in the opposite direction of what she had heard him doing. But he was there, waiting. She looked back to see a shadow of him fading off to the right. She shrieked, trying to turn back to the town, but the wall of fire moved to rapidly surround her on all sides like another impenetrable prison waiting to block her with every step she took. He folded his wings along his back and dived down for her, swooping straight up into the air until he cleared the rapidly disappearing wall. Aeron scooped Alyss up in his arms.
He was whooping in exhilaration at the speed, the sheer joy of flight. She screamed in fear at the trajectory. He evened it out to a more horizontal plane of movement, and her protests quieted. He took a peek at her face. Her cheeks were blushed and her eyes closed as she silently savored the sensation. He smiled fondly himself.
Her eyes snapped open then. "What are you doing?" she screamed in rage. "Let me go!" She kicked and punched at him, as well as she could with her wind up-blocked by her unwieldy position. He growled back at her protests.
"You really want me to drop you at this height?" he asked.
She stilled abruptly. She made not a cheep more of protest. He hefted her more securely. She squeaked in surprise, but said not a word. He now held her so that his left arm came under both of her armpits and across the front of her torso, his right hand holding her under the butt and across her thighs like he was just carrying an unruly toddler in his arms. It was demeaning, but he refused to hold her in another way or release her as she repeatedly begged him to.
They were traveling quickly, scenery becoming one smooth blur beneath their feet. The shadow of a mountain range rearing before them shaded their eyes from the pure light of the full moon. It continued to stand sentinel at their backs as the duo sped steadily along
