[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/ZPETHbP.png[/img]
Collab between [@The Muse] and [@c3p-0h]
[sub]Location: The Jail[/sub]
[i][h1]Part X[/h1][/i]
[hr][/center]

Flynn’s jaw was tight, his green eyes darkened, locked onto the man behind bars. He didn’t blink as Halcyon spoke, not even as the man drifted from one subject to the next with maddening ease. Each word laced with the same smug undertone Flynn had come to loathe. 

Despite it, he’d been relatively steady. Until he felt Amaya’s fingers stiffen in his. Her body went utterly still beside him, rigid at the mention of the attack. Of her mother and her grandmother. Flynn didn’t need to look to know. He felt the shift in her from his fingertips down to his core. 

Part of him, the impulsive part, thought of leaving Halcyon to rot in this cell for the rest of eternity. 

Instead, Flynn breathed slowly through his nose, grasping for whatever restraint he still had left. Reining the impulse back. 

Halcyon reminded him too much of the men who sometimes slithered around his father’s court—clever-tongued, always smiling, talking people in circles. Their words honeyed but laced with venom. Whispering advice that sounded like wisdom, until you realized too late it only served their own serpentine ambitions. Halcyon had that same way about him, veiled beneath layers of riddles and smirking provocations.

And when the man gave that final smirk—when he turned to Amaya and dropped that last so-called [i]truth[/i]—Flynn felt something snap. 

A gentle voice drifted through the jail, heedless of the growing ozone in the air.

Amaya’s eyes flicked away from Halcyon for the first time as the guard shifted in her periphery.

The Lunarian sigil over her armor, the sheathed sword at her hip, seemed to grow larger the longer Amaya stared at them. She fought the urge to shift closer to Flynn as she looked the guard over – tall, unsure, deferential but unpolished. There was none of the hostility in her eyes that the other Lunarians had shown when they addressed Flynn – none of the dismissal that they’d shown when they addressed [i]her[/i].

Flynn barely heard the Lunarian guard’s voice as she tentatively asked for direction. Reluctantly, he pulled his gaze from Halcyon. [color=337d71]“Nothing. For now,”[/color] he said, holding onto the edges of restraint. [color=337d71]“Until we weigh the measure of his life.”[/color]

The words sank into Amaya like a stone, pulling her down. Flynn’s eyes found Halcyon again, narrowing. 

[color=337d71]“You are no brother of mine,”[/color] Flynn said, his voice cold as steel. [color=337d71]“And do not speak of Amaya or her family again. You're here to speak to me.”[/color]

Restrained fury slipped through his words as he recalled the way Amaya had frozen solid in his hand, despite her lack of magic. How, even now, she still hadn’t moved. 

Motionless beside him, expression blank, Amaya watched Halcyon with quick, sharp eyes as she held back every flinch and reaction. She fought against the urge to slip behind Flynn and shrink into his shadow, where this smiling man could no longer see her. The world was a dizzying, distracting mess – the torrent of Halcyon’s words and the confusion and fear and [i]rage[/i] they elicited, the hollow [i]emptiness[/i] where her magic should’ve been that she couldn’t help but reach for, [i]Flynn[/i]... Amaya felt his anger, his coiled intensity slipping through their clasped hands like ice as it chilled her.

[color=337d71]“The only thing I wonder about,”[/color] Flynn continued, [color=337d71]“is [i]if[/i] you knew about the attack, then why did you say nothing to the guards? Why, instead, did I find you loitering at the temple—only offering me a cryptic warning?”[/color]

He tilted his head slightly, gaze sharp and unwavering.

[color=337d71]“Had I not gone to the temple—had you not seen me—would you have alerted anyone at all?”[/color]

His voice remained even, but there was no mistaking the anger burning beneath it. Amaya’s fingers tightened around his in warning, her eyes still focused on Halcyon – a provocateur trying to overwhelm and disorient. He was looking for a reaction she realized, throwing out as much as he could to see what would catch their attention first. Something coiled tightly around Amaya’s heart, the empty space in her core filling with a tingling, anxious warmth. Halcyon had found a wound to pick at: her.

[color=337d71]“I asked for none of your advice, nor your opinions. This is not a council meeting. You’re under arrest for suspected treason.”[/color] Despite feeling Amaya’s warning, Flynn’s voice grew colder, his protective instincts for his family overpowering her reasoning.  [color=337d71]“What makes you think you’ve earned the right to offer counsel? What makes you think you're qualified to decide anything for this city?”[/color]

Flynn's eyes searched the Halcyon’s, utter distrust etched into his expression. 

[color=337d71]“You sit behind bars for [i]threats against my father’s life[/i], and still, you speak as though you’re owed trust.”[/color]

He drew in a breath and let it out slowly.

[color=337d71]“Please enlighten me on why I should trust a single word from your mouth.”[/color]

[hr][sub]Interactions: Gadez [@Dezuel], Daphne [@PrinceAlexus][/sub]