"Greta."

Upon her return to the castle, Wolfram takes the young girl where they can speak privately. He pulls up a chair and pulls her onto his lap. He craddles her head against his chest and closes his eyes.

"Daddy?"

Immediately, Greta realizes that something is wrong. The man who co-adopted her along with Yuuri is being way too quiet.

Silence is golden, but in this case, it's frightening. Especially coming from Wolfram.

"Greta..."

A lump forms in his throat, but he finally manages to force it down and to say his adopted daughter's name and give her the news.

"S-Something happened while you were away, visiting Beatrice. Someone entered the castle without permission and attacked Yuuri while he was sleeping. I.. I'm afraid he's gone, Greta."

Wolfram chokes back a tear and braces himself for Greta's reaction.

Greta sits quietly on Wolfram's lap, mulling over what she's just been told. At first, her young brain has trouble processing the information it's just been given, but then it starts to sink in and her brown colored eyes well with tears.

She hops down, onto the floor, and shakes her head vehemently, her hands balled into fists.

"N-No! I don't believe it! It isn't true!"

Greta is in shock.

Wolfram stands up and walks over to her. Even though she's no relation to him, because he adopted her, she is all he has left of Yuuri. He takes her into his arms and holds her tight.

"I'm sorry, Greta. I loved Yuuri too."

He whispers softly into Greta's auburn-red curls, the tears he manage to hold back before falling freely from his eyes.

"I'm sorry..."

Shortly thereafter...

Greta walks down the hall to her room. She goes inside and closes the door. She didn't know her adoptive father, Yuuri, long before someone infiltrated the castle and killed him, but in her heart, he was her father. She loved him. Now, that he's gone...

She walks across the room to the window and opens it. She sticks her head out and tries to guage the distance from the window to the ground. Now that the most important person in her life is gone, she has nothing left to live for.

Conrad walks around the castle grounds, feeling numb.

His Majesty is gone. No matter what Gwendal and the others say about it, what happened to His Majesty is all his fault.

He wishes he could just take his sword, prop it up with some rocks, and throw himself against it.

As much as he would like that, he just can't bring himself to do it.

/I'm a coward./

He wrinkles his nose in disgust and stops walking, irritated with himself.

The senses he developed as a soldier kick in and he looks up. His jaw drops to the ground and his eyes go wide with shock.

He holds his arms out in front of him and dashes forward.

"Arrrrrgh!"

"Got you!"

"Conrad...?!"

At the last possible second, Conrad catches the small child in his arms. He craddles her firmly against his chest, tips his head back and closes his eyes. He thanks Shinou he caught her before she hit the ground.

"Greta. Are you alright? What happened?"

He asks, concerned.

"I..."

Greta starts to answer him, then stops. She almost too ashamed of herself to answer him.

"I... I wanted to be with Yuuri."

She mumbles softly, looking away.

"Greta..."

This chapter is only 500+ words.
Strange. I thought it was more than that.
The chapter felt a lot longer when I was writing...
err... typing it.

Oh, well...
I hope that, even though it was sad, you enjoyed reading it.

Thanks for reading and reviewing!

- Aden :)