Silence. The world had gone entirely quiet for a moment.
Then, a piercing roar.
Silas stared at Sophie's body, his eyes dripping with sorrow. Nohr would pay; they would HAVE to.
They had taken his daughter.
The castle in the Deeprealms had been silent since the battle at Palace Macarath. None of the Hoshidan army had spoken to Silas since that day; not even Mozu, who, like her husband, had been grieving Sophie's loss. However, she had not gone to HIS extremes.
The entire Nohrian army there was dead. And it was by Silas' hand that most of them had fallen. Felicia had almost seen him go entirely to Hell and back on a simple archer.
And yet, through all of this, nobody tried to comfort him.
Nobody, that is, except a certain Kitsune who happened to be passing by.
Kaden hadn't thought much of the Silas situation, so he didn't expect to hear Silas moping around in his room. The fox had been thinking about his own awesomeness when he realized that sometimes, things could happen that WEREN'T so awesome. He approached the paladin, thinking long and hard about his words, before speaking.
"Hey, Si."
Silas didn't even turn to face Kaden, instead opting to let out a frustrated "Go away." It was clear he wasn't in the mood for conversation. Kaden, on the other hand, was.
"That's no way to greet a friend, dude!" he pointed out. "Come on, what's eating you?"
"I said, GO AWAY!" Silas said, this time raising his voice. He shoved Kaden- very uncharacteristic of Silas, if you were to ask anybody else.
"I'm concerned, Silas. I'm asking what's wrong!"
"And I say," Silas shouted, "that you SHOULDN'T CARE. Now BEAT IT!"
Kaden fell back, startled. Silas was odd sometimes, but this wasn't the same Silas he'd grown to know. He was very puzzled.
"Look, I don't want to bug you-"
"So DON'T!" Silas said. He punched his attempted comforter in the face, knocking him back for a moment.
Kaden didn't understand what was up with his pal-adin buddy, but he realized he should probably take a walk and find out about the problem. He eventually decided to drop by the "statue garden" Sakura had planned out, just to check it out. He had a nice bronze carving of himself in there, after all, and he stopped in every day to say "hello, gorgeous" to the statue.
What he didn't expect was his own DAUGHTER standing in front of another statue, that of Silas' daughter, Sophie. Selkie touched the statue's hand, as if it were Sophie's own, and muttered something under her breath. She seemed to be crying? That was far different from the cheery, upbeat Selkie his wife had concieved.
"Hey, precious," Kaden said, silently. "Fleas in your fur?"
"N... No," came Selkie's response. It was slow and tearful, which, as stated already, was SO out of character from his daughter.
"I'm guessing something happened to Sophie while I was out on break?" Kaden asked. "If she needs help, then I'd be happy to-"
"She's dead, Daddy."
Kaden's tail stopped wagging. He realized what all of this meant. Had he expected this? No. But now, Selkie's tears and Silas' violent mood swings all made sense. The castle's normally upbeat feel was now silent, and he understood PERFECTLY why.
"Yo, Selk," came Asugi's voice from the entrance to the garden. As Selkie's cousin, the two fought together quite often; not as much as Selkie with her own brother, but often enough that the pair had become accustomed to each other's fighting style. "Hey, what's going on? Soph's down?"
"More than down, Asugi," Kaden told his sweet-toothed nephew. He, by now, had understood the mood change in the castle, but he was still trying to stay optimistic.
"Bummer," Asugi said. "You two look really burned out by it. Hey, how about a snack to cheer you up?"
He opened a pouch filled with cinnamon rolls; how they had not been crushed would forever be a mystery that only Asugi knew the answer to. The pair of father and daughter took one look at the rolls, and realized that, even in these troubling times, light could always shine through.
And sometimes, this light came in the form of cinnamon rolls.