"Do you understand why I'm angry, Silver?" In the twelve-ish years Lilia had spent with this child, he had next to no recollections of ever using the word "angry" to reprimand him.

"Yes, father," the boy murmured, his eyes drifting onto anything but his father.

"Well then, out with it!"

"Because I disobeyed you and went to the woods in the north by myself." His fingers fiddled with the deep gashes on his left upper arm, pondering whether he wanted to hide them.

"Heavens, no, child!" Lilia heaved a quick sigh and shot a sharp look at Silver's injuries, "Do you know what kind of danger you got yourself into? Just why would you do such a thing?"

"But the water fairies by the pond told me that if I were to become a knight, then I must be capable and brave enough to deal with the magic beast rumoured to be lurking there lately…"

"Oh blast those little imps!" Lilia threw his hands up in the air.

"I thought… I thought…" sensing his father's increasing agitation, Silver began to stutter. When the water fairies giggled and convinced him to go, they emboldened him with plenty of good reasons, what were they again? "They said… you would've been proud of me."

"I'm very disappointed." Lilia spat, and it broke him a little on the inside to see Silver's face fall.

It hurt more to hear those words than to have the talons of a magic beast tear into his arm. "S… sorry…" he blurted out shakily, as if it were his last line of defence, " I'm sorry, father…! I'll do more training and… and I'll be strong enough to… to fight on my own… next time."

"That's not it." Lilia seized Silver by the shoulders, crouching down to meet him at eye level, "What if I hadn't come for you in time? What if it had snapped your neck instead of gashing your arm? You are no fool, my dear, use your head! You could've died out there!"

In Silver's widened, moistened eyes, Lilia saw himself. He hadn't seen this much distress on his own visage in a long time. He didn't realise he was gripping onto Silver's shoulders so tightly that it hurt him until he noticed Silver was clenching his left fist in pain.

In wordlessness, Silver appeared to be stifling his whimpers. His young mind was trying to piece together what little he knew of "death" and to comprehend Lilia's dismay. Perhaps, before today, he had thought both to be monstrosities in his nightmares only.

Lilia breathed in deeply, watering down his anger and pretending it took his worry too. He seated himself next to the boy on the bed, left knee touching the boy's right. He stroked Silver's back rhythmically and began to speak with his storytelling voice.

"Once, I had come quite close to death myself," Lilia recounted, "Close enough to take a peek at the world of ghosts.

"It wasn't a pleasant place, dull and colourless. The dimension itself is distorted and connected in peculiar ways, it must be very easy to get lost in there, and when one does, one is lost forever. When I came back, I thought 'Whoa! That's messed up!'"

He made sure to end it on a lighthearted note, hopping then plonking back onto the bed, causing Silver to bounce up, letting out a small giggle at his father's exaggerated expressions.

Silver glanced up at Lilia, expecting the rest of the tale, but he caught Lilia staring down at nothing, lips parting only barely, "Perhaps I was lucky, or perhaps I was saved. Perhaps it was a way of obliging me but… I'm thankful I survived.

"If I hadn't," he ran his fingers through Silver's hair and left a kiss on his forehead, "I wouldn't have found you, I wouldn't be here as your father. How would you feel if—"

Silver latched onto his sleeve before he could retract his hand or finish the question. A sentiment flickered in the child that made his eyes dilate and his sternum constrict, not unlike the fearful moment he felt blood trickle down his arm back in the woods.

Lilia let his hand drop back onto the boy's head, smiling affectionately, "Then how do you think I would've felt if I had lost you today?"

Silver paused. He gave thought to how much he loved his father, and he gave thought to the fury he had seen daubed all over his father's face. He gave thought to the way his father's eyebrows had furrowed, the way those sharp crimson eyes had bored holes into him, and the way his father had gripped his shoulders all too tightly.

He leant into Lilia's chest, clinging onto him with the arm he could hardly move.

Lilia drew Silver closer into an embrace, feeling the child's heartbeat against his skin brought him more relief than his ever gentle countenance would let on.

This wasn't a battlefield, wasn't a war. One mistake wouldn't lead to certain death. He had fought for far too long and for what? For a world like this. A world where they can have second chances, to learn and to be wiser.

"Silver," he spoke into Silver's hair because he didn't want to move, "If you are to continue down this path," — my path, he inwardly added, "you will continue to cross paths with danger" — death, at times.

"I know you are a brave child, my dear, but never be fearless," he found it difficult to hug his son as tightly as he would've preferred while taking care not to touch the wounds, "Jumping head first into danger puts yourself at risk. And if you can't protect yourself," he remembered the many weights that had slipped off his shoulders and into the soil, "you cannot protect anyone."

Silver shifted, hiding his face, "Is that why you were disappointed?"

"Yes." Lilia didn't feel like elaborating more, he was supposed to have washed away his worry.

Yet it still throbbed in his mind. The smell of blood. The red dripping down an arm that used to be unblemished. A child so young, so unready — his child — backed against a tree trunk and still foolishly standing in place, stubbornly pointing his magic baton with a shivering hand, even as his doom closed in on him with a beastly snarl and—

Lilia cupped Silver's cheeks. Knowing his own eyes looked like glass about to shatter, he closed them, resting his forehead against his son's, and assured ever so endearingly,

"I'm proud of you for coming back to me."

It was a rare thing, for fear to pound in his chest and echo in his ears and for every possible terrible ending to flash before his eyes.

It made him reconsider whether he truly envied or pitied those who have someone to hold close to heart, now that someone did weigh on his shoulders and solely his. He never thought it would be this unsettling but…

It keeps him awake.

End of Chapter 2

A/N: I need to take some time to incorporate the ending of Endless Halloween Night into chapter 3 so I might not update for a while, plus I'll be busy with some irl stuff and with translating the personal stories of Halloween 2021... There are also other (either very sad or very precious) fic possibilities that Endless Halloween Night opened up so... yea... there's just a lot on my mind right now (in a good way? lol)