Wren's bones were creaking by the time he headed to bed. Even the baths hadn't eased the tension from his shoulders after dealing with Tala and Neil's issues. After, they'd started some basic training, and Shan had thought it funny to drag Wren in, so now he was exhausted. He'd gotten weak in sitting around here, so it wasn't an entirely bad idea to get back into shape.

Neil had accepted working with Tala, even though he looked as if he'd been about to walk out on him. If Wren hadn't said something, he very well might have, and Wren knew that was not what Silvia Copse wanted. The poor girl had gotten dragged into the infiltrator training that was normally given when mages were children, and that was bound to be rough for her. It was best that she came back to these two overly-proud leaders not fighting amongst themselves.

If someone had told him back all those years back that someday he would be coming to Talamayas Sol's emotional rescue, he'd have named them a traitor to their kind. Wren doubted the man appreciated it, so he wasn't surprised as Tala stalked toward him in the hall before he could squirrel himself away in their room.

Tala was on him like a storm front, and Wren braced himself as the man cut him off from the room with a hand to the wall. It was the first moment that they'd been alone together since he'd spoken out of turn, and Wren couldn't meet the man's eyes. If he wanted to yell at him, he might as well just get it over with. The silence was worse, and Wren shuddered as Tala leaned into him and brought his face to the side of his neck. Tala moved closer and pressed him into the wall with his entire body.

"Tala, please," Wren said, his hand shifted to the man's chest to keep him away, but it offered little protection when Tala wanted to be in his space. "I know you're angry with me, but this sort of thing is unnecessary."

"I am not angry with you," Tala breathed against his neck, pressing him so hard into the wall now that it was hard from him to breathe anything but the man in. The desert assaulted his senses, sand and dust from them training outside along with Tala's natural sweet but spicy scent, almost like cinnamon. "I want you, Wren," Tala purred into his throat, and Wren turned a heavy shade of red.

"What does that even mean, Tala?" Wren asked in desperation to make any of this make sense. Why did he like to sleep next to him, to be this close, to swallow him in the dark magic that flowed from his skin?

"I have no idea," Tala finally said, and a pitiful laugh escaped him. "I don't know, Wren. I just want you, all the time, anywhere, near me, with me, touching me, fighting for me. You didn't have to do what you did for me today. Any normal mage would have stayed quiet, let whatever it was play out, but you defended me, kept my closest ally from walking out on me, and I can't stand how it feels to not be touching you. I don't know why or what it means, but I just want this." Tala drooped his face on Wren's shoulder with a frustrated groan, and Wren sighed.

"I'm tired. Can you at least be all over me where I can fall asleep?" Wren pleaded, and Tala lifted his face. Crimson rolled over his eyes with some sort of hunger that was unnerving, but Tala let him walk into their room.

Before he'd even settled down to sleep, Tala was all over him again, and Wren allowed the man to remove his mage overcoat before dragging him onto his cot. They still hadn't found a better room, and Wren looked around at all the scrolls and shelves around them. This was comfort for Tala, sitting in a cramped room, down near the dungeons, wrapped around the man who'd taken the person most precious from him.

Something had warped in both of them over the years.

Morning wasn't something Wren had experienced in a long time, and he covered his eyes with a shallow spell to dim the light of the sun as he stretched and flopped onto Tala's throne. Shan looked like he wanted to scalp him, but Wren just turned and stuck his tongue out, knowing the man couldn't harm him. Of course, that meant that Shan turned to Tala, and the Sol leader shifted his focus to Wren with a strange look.

"You don't get to rule unless you bed the king," Tala's voice rumbled with a smirk. "If you sit in the throne, you give me permission to fuck you, Wren. I know how much that excites you and how often you entertain that as my intention."

Tala was referring to all the times he'd though the man was making a move on him, but Wren had slowly understood that it was just Tala's way of trying to figure him out. Wren groaned and slid down off the grand stone chair it to lean against a wall. The last thing he needed was Talamayas in his space again.

Several men laughed, and Wren's glare silenced them but didn't remove their amused smiles. These Sol men were getting too comfortable with him, and so was Talamayas. Even Shan liked him, but the man also didn't like how acclimated he was getting to the position Tala gave him. Being at the man's side was a position of power, even if it was a means for Tala to watch him.

The magic from the guards brought the visitors in, and Tala rocked on his heels as he fought with his desire to crush the light magic that stood before them. This would be the first time Tala had ever allowed a mage to step foot in his castle and leave with prior agreement, and most in the castle were abuzz about the decision. Wren had found the Sols very chatty since he'd started descending into the baths near daily, always talking about Tala this and Tala that. They were like a fan club who were too scared to say most things to his face, so they said it to his shoulder prisoner instead.

It had been agreed that if the mages were to train here, it would be during the day, as any other time would just be Talamayas slaughtering them. No one was at their peak strength here, Tala weakened in the daytime and the mages lacking a home field advantage.

Neil was with them, but Forest Copse and Tide Cascade were pale as if they'd just committed to their own deaths. It was a fair reaction considering Talamayas' reputation and the fact that all they had to protect them was Neil's word. It took neither of the mage generals long to notice another source of light magic in the room, and both looked to Wren with confusion.

"Forest, you've gotten bigger," Wren said in a friendly tone as he walked up to them.

The man looked nothing like Silvia. Long brown hair trailed his lower back but was tied up in preparation for combat, and his skin tone was closer to Neil's than Tala's. Silvia must take after her Cascade mother. The girl looked more like Tide Cascade, who stood ready for a fight with his pitch hair hinted with the blue color in the brighter lights from the water magic in his veins. Darkness rolled through his navy eyes as well, showing his distaste for vampires. Forest's were lighter blue and not as guarded as he looked him over.

"Wren Song? I heard some strange things from Alec and Silvia about you, but neither were quite sure that you weren't just in their imaginations." Forest looked over Wren with the normal concern any mage general might. His trained eyes crawled over every visible scar, a few obvious on his upper chest in the juncture of his mage robes near his neck, and more on his hands.

"Yes well, there isn't much not strange going on in my life at present," Wren said with a pleasant smile that tilted Forest's lips into a frown. "I am not a prisoner here, Forest," Wren added in the hopes that it would ease his fears.

"Neil told me your situation. I'm sorry," Forest said with a light bow of his head, and a low growl rolled from Talamayas' throat. It drew Forest and Tide's gazes, and they prepared to fight for their lives from the perceived threat.

"Please don't give merit to Tala's defensiveness concerning me," Wren said. "You pitying my having to deal with him frustrates him, but I'm not all that miserable. You needn't worry about me, Forest. I'm actually excited to talk with some other mages for the first time in a while. I will also be the one healing you two if you're injured. Training seriously with vampires is not something you should do without someone to fall back on to heal you in a pinch."

"Thank you, Wren. If I ask you honestly how safe I am here, will you be able to answer?" Forest asked, drawing out another growl from Talamayas. This mage really knew how to test Tala's patience. It was an insult to insinuate that Tala's word of their safety was not enough, but also predictable considering the Sol leader didn't let mages out of his castle without some serious arm pulling.

"You're in no danger, Forest. That one though, not so sure," Wren said with a chuckle as he pointed to Tide where he was becoming increasingly frightened and his power was growing in him to fight his way out of here. "Talamayas won't harm you outside of a training capacity because you're Silvia's father, but I'm unsure about an unassociated mage."

"Well, he is not unassociated. Tide is Silvia's uncle, but he is also less open to this whole thing. Getting him to work with Neil was a feat, and the Arc leader is beyond timid."

Forest smiled, and Wren cringed from the growing frustration in Talamayas that was shown by a flush of dark energy. Calling Neil timid was an insult, and Talamayas was overly defensive of anyone he cared for. Those who tolerated him were few.

"Tala, please. You're frightening both of them." Neil spoke up for the first time, his sharp red eyes focusing on Talamayas as he walked in front of them. "If I can deal with that, you can put up with Forest and Tide." The that was Wren, and Neil crossed his arms with a frown of displeasure.

Tala looked to be having a malfunction, unable to chastise Neil for referring to him that way but also wanting to defend his favorite pet. If they stood here any longer, they were all like to kill each other, so Wren motioned for Forest and Tide to follow him. Neither of them moved.

For hell's sake. They wouldn't follow his lead because he wasn't in charge in here.

Though that was debatable some days.

"Shan, will you take them out to the training fields with me before Tala is a complete wreck," Wren asked, and the general hopped up to join him. Both of them saw that Talamayas was not handling this well, and giving the man focus on their purpose would be a much better ice breaker that trying to talk it out.

"If you wouldn't mind coming this way," Shan said, and Forest and Tide finally moved. Getting their feet off the ground was about as hard as calming Tala was going to be.

"Neil, go with them," Wren said as he wandered back to the Talamayas and the short vampire leered at him but did as he was told.

Begrudgingly Neil stalked off after Forest as more of a protective gesture than any adherence to Wren's instruction. Wren didn't care either way as long as he prevented Tala from breaking anyone down into tiny pieces. By the time Wren arrived at Tala's side, he had his teeth set, his fangs bared, and he inhaled heavily as Wren stopped a mere foot away.

"Come on, Tala," Wren touched his arm to try and coax him, and Tala's crimson eyes lasered on it. It was rare Wren touched him willingly, and it eased the huge, grumpy man into following him down the corridor after them.

"I don't like having them here," Tala ground out as they walked, but he didn't need to. That was not a secret to anyone here. "Forest might be tolerating Neil because he cares for his daughter, but he is no sympathizer, and Tide Cascade is nearly the opposite. I want to crush them both."

"Isn't that what the training is for," Wren said with a sigh that drew a sparkling gaze down from Tala. A smirk crawled the vampire's lips, and Wren laughed lightly. "Just don't hurt them for the sake of it, Tala. They're here to train as well."

"Yes, they are here for their own benefit, not Neil's. I don't like it. If they turn on him–"

"They won't, Tala. They're uncomfortable but not hostile. Believe me, I'd sniff them out as men with ulterior motives rather quickly. Don't judge Tide Cascade just because he is new to working with vampires. The man isn't enthusiastic and neither are you, but you both benefit and this is peaceful. Both are things worth enough to Tide to be here, and neither are a plot to kill Neil."

"How can you be so sure," Tala growled down to him, but the look in his eyes showed that he was listening to Wren's advice. It always surprised him that Tala put stock in what he said.

"They didn't look at him, Tala," Wren said, and Tala cocked his head. "Battleground mages do not remove their gazes from a perceived threat, and they were comfortable with Neil at their back when they arrived. They didn't so much as glance, which means they trust him. Those who lie and backstab don't trust anyone because they are used to their own backstabbing ways. When Tide was worried, he also edged toward Neil as opposed to Forest. They respect his position and his power and rely on him as much as he does them."

"And if they turn on me? Use these fights as a ruse to kill one of the most prominent, brutal house heads, what then?" It was a reasonable question with what Tala had done to Silvia and who he was, a torturer of the desert that no mage escaped.

"Tell you what, Tala. If they make a move to harm you beyond what is training, I'll protect you."

The hand slamming on the wall in front of him scared the hell out of him, and he flinched back to Tala's bared fangs and low growl as he cut off his passage outside. Now what had he done?

A nervous sweat broke out of Wren as Talamayas leaned and ran his nose over his cheek, inhaling in the way he did when he invaded his personal space for no discernably valid reason. Maybe Wren should suggest Shan teach the man words so Wren didn't have to try to pry meaning out of him every time he got too close. There was no difference between Tala's anger or affection, and that made every day full of hurtles for Wren to jump through.

"I was speaking in earnest," Wren said into Tala's neck as the man leaned his head into his shoulder and pressed his forehead to the wall.

"I know," Tala whispered.

"Then why are you upset?" Wren had learned to not use the word angry because it was rare Tala was straightforward with any emotion enough to identify it.

"Because I don't know why you said it." Tala growled low, pulling his face far enough back from Wren that their eyes met with an inch between them. It was better than Tala breathing on his skin but not by much.

"Well, I think it'd be good for you to work with some mages. You're too isolated out here, and it's healthy to branch out to your one ally and interact with his. I also despise subterfuge that preys on an earnest desire for peace, so if they are doing something underhanded to get to you, I will stop it."

"I see," Talamayas said, turning a cold shoulder to him and walking away.

It left Wren to dust himself off and follow in his shadow. The tone with the words had almost sounded like disappointment. What had Tala wanted him to say? That he wanted to protect him, to keep him safe? More and more, Talamayas treated him like one of his people, and while Wren didn't want anyone to hurt Tala, it wasn't something he could easily say to the man. The other reasons were better.

After all, all that was keeping him above ground level was a blood writ. Without it, he would be chained down in those dungeons again, and it was hard for him to forget. Even while he chatted with the Sol men in the baths like they were friends, ate with the desert nomads in the evenings, or slept next to Talamayas, he knew they were all just waiting.

To throw him back there.

Word Count: 2923