[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/5QbJPTs.png[/img][/center][hr][sub][color=d15e5e]Location:[/color] Royal Residence[/sub][hr][hr]

Warmth, wrapping around her and weighing her down.

The slow, gentle shifting of her body. 

Sea green and summer gold.

A low voice as something settled over her, a glancing touch at her cheek.

Amaya’s eyes drifted shut again, annoyance sparking. She wanted to find the sleep she’d just lost, that gentle, shadowed embrace. But everything felt… lacking, somehow. The cocoon around her didn’t fit the way it was supposed to, the weight too light, the heat too bare. A tired hum escaped her as she took in a long breath and curled tighter into herself. Whatever had roused her, surely it wasn’t that important. It could wait. Amaya could stay, where it was peaceful and warm, and –

Her eyes snapped open. 

Amaya was [i]warm[/i]. Upon waking. 

Sudden awareness came to her. And when Amaya’s tired eyes focused enough in the darkness to take in her surroundings, all she could see was Flynn.

Memories of yesterday’s events crashed through her like an avalanche. The feast. The attack. The murder. Flynn. Elara. Ranni. Flynn. [i]Flynn. [b]Flynn.[/b][/i]

He was looking down at her with gentleness that still felt piercing, somehow.

Later, Amaya would blame the sleep. The disorientation. The chaos from the previous day, and all the ways in which her world had fallen apart and reformed. Surely, one of [i]those[/i] must’ve been the reason why Amaya looked up at Flynn and couldn’t keep herself from [i]blushing.[/i]

[color=d15e5e]“Good morning,”[/color] she answered softly, for lack of anything better to say. Sleep made her voice rough and unsteady. 

Her words were invisible in the air. There was no puff of white, no evidence of her untamed magic capturing the room with a frigid chill. Beneath the blanket, Amaya’s fingers curled experimentally. No aching numbness. She hesitated. Then Amaya forced herself to move, cautious like she didn’t quite trust that her limbs weren’t frozen and sluggish, and that each pull of her muscles wouldn’t be a painful struggle. When her eyes finally pulled away from Flynn’s to look at the walls and ceiling, there were no fresh icicles glinting dangerously in the sparse light. She could feel her magic, vast and fathomless again beneath her skin. But it was calm. 

Amaya found Flynn again, stunned – both at her own [i]carelessness[/i] for letting herself sleep in his arms when she’d woken to ice coating her room more often than not the past few months, and that… this morning, she hadn’t. 

She was on the couch. She’d slept on the couch. With him. Distantly, she registered the state of herself — the messy tangle of her curls, puffy eyes, her [i]nightgown[/i]. It wasn’t important. It felt incredibly important. 

Flynn sat on the edge of the couch, just as rumpled, somehow both too close and achingly far. He wasn’t touching her. Was it better that she’d woken with distance between them again? She could still feel him wrapped around her, the phantom sensation of his hold, anchoring her to him. 

They’d been tangled together in more ways than one. Whatever spell had taken hold of her last night, its touch lingered faintly on her skin. Something tender, buried deep in her heart, tried to reach towards him. His weariness that made her want to coax him to rest, his bold assurances and whispered comforts as she’d come undone… they made an overwhelming portrait when she painted them with her fears and failures. Amaya didn’t recognize the version of herself in her memories. Soft and dangerously unguarded as Flynn held her, his voice rumbling against her ear as he pulled truths and tears from her, his breath in her lungs as –

Amaya was, perhaps for the first time in her life, [i]too[/i] warm. 

Mouth dry, heart hammering, she pulled her eyes away from him to look at [i]anything else[/i]. The hearth. The blackened ash and what remained of the wood. And there, a soft glow hidden amongst the ruins that had managed to hold on throughout the night, stubborn despite the chill.

She wanted to know where her careful walls were. Wasn’t she supposed to be more composed than this? What had Seluna given her all that [i]trauma[/i] for if she couldn’t even use it now to keep herself from falling to pieces first thing in the morning?

Amaya found herself entirely too aware of the distance between them. She didn’t know how to cross it. Was she meant to? Did Flynn expect her to? 

…Did she [i]want[/i] to?

She chanced a look back at him. Amaya remembered his eyes, dark and hungry. 

[color=d15e5e]“I should dress for the day.”[/color]

The words were too quick out of her mouth as she pulled her legs in (very [i]deftly[/i] avoiding any contact with him) to find the floor. Amaya flinched at the chill shooting through her bare foot — the floor was no colder than it ever was in winter, but now it was too harsh against the new heat of her skin.

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[sub][color=d15e5e]Interactions:[/color] Flynn Astaros [@The Muse][/sub]