[table][row][cell][img]https://i.imgur.com/MrFrT8O.png[/img][/cell][cell][img]https://fontmeme.com/permalink/241224/2dff96a131a2215857bd81cacd3d277e.png[/img][/cell][/row]
[row][cell][sub]Location: Outside Eye of the Beholder[/sub][/cell][/row][/table]
Nyla’s smile faltered just slightly as the dog at Thalia's side growled, as if it could understand each layer hidden between her words. Or, perhaps, it could sense that something inhuman hid beneath a veil of magic, wrapped around her like a second skin. 

Still, it seemed she'd struck a tender spot. As intended.
Thalia had reacted. And Nyla committed the bruise to memory. 

Thalia’s bite was practiced and precise, the sort of verbal blade honed by years spent in the upper echelons of society. But Nyla had danced through sharper rooms with kinder smiles and colder knives. If Thalia was trying to draw blood, she’d have to cut deeper. 

But the insinuation that Flynn had ever sought out the company of courtesans nearly made her burst into laughter. Silly thing—did Thalia even know him at all? 

Once, Nyla had taken him to a brothel—one of the more elegant ones, tucked discreetly in the eastern quarter of the Capital, far from the noise and prying eyes of the main streets. It had been on a whim. To show him the layers of the world he’d never been made to walk. Under a starlit sky, alcohol on their lips, laughing as they stumbled through the doors with the rest of their friends in tow. He’d been to one once before, he’d admitted—long before she’d known him. But that night, with her, he hadn’t known where to look. Not at the soft, reaching hands. Not at the painted smiles. Uncertain, but amused, those fathomless green eyes kept finding their way back to her. 

She let the memory fade, schooling her expression back into serene, unaffected charm.

[color=DBA73D]“You mistake me, Lady Evercrest…”[/color] Nyla’s voice floated, light and silken, her head tilting just enough to seem wounded by Thalia’s pointed words. [color=DBA73D]“I was no ‘[i]present[/i],’ as you say… I danced and sang for a few royal events, yes. But I am simply that. A performer.”[/color]

[sub]And perform, she had.[/sub]

[color=DBA73D]“That’s why I recognized you,”[/color] She said softly. Not a lie. Not the whole truth, either. [color=DBA73D]“I’m not sure what you take me for, but…”[/color] She offered a faint shrug, [color=DBA73D]“Not all of us can be so fortunate as you.”[/color] 

Then, with a warm smile and mock humility, she added, [color=DBA73D]“And truly, I wouldn’t [i]dare[/i] compete. You always did look the part.”[/color]

As she said it, her gaze slid past Thalia and landed on the Priestess from earlier. She glided past them with a small, polite smile. Relief flickered in Nyla’s eyes as she briefly met the woman's gaze. The brute hadn’t returned to the temple to harass her after all. Good.

But— 
She glanced down at the basket of cookies in her hands. 

If the Priestess had made it all the way here already—how much time had passed? And where in the world was Ass? How long did it take for him to redress himself?

Her gaze returned to Thalia, her mind regrettably lingering on one of the woman's last jabs —that she could be a [i]footnote[/i] in someone else’s story. It clung to her, heavier than it should have. She tried to brush the thought aside. She was no such thing. 

Nonetheless, she’d gotten what she’d been looking for. Watched a hairline crack form beneath that polished Evercrest veneer. No sense in dragging it out further. Not when the real skill was knowing when to smile, when to disarm. 

[color=DBA73D]“I didn’t mean to offend, Lady Evercrest,”[/color] she lied, the words sugar-coated, [color=DBA73D]“if I did.”[/color]

She let the words hang a moment, then lifted the basket slightly, offering it with a graceful gesture of her free hand.

[color=DBA73D]“Care for a cookie?”[/color] she asked, tone warm and just a touch amused—like the conversation hadn’t been barbed at all. [color=DBA73D]“A peace offering?”[/color]

[hr]
[Sub][b]Interactions:[/b] Thalia [@Qia][/sub]