"Baby, it's me!" Bernard said, as he was on all fours near the bed where Shar-On's body lie, void of life. He could just see the scared Ryssa shivering in the darkness from the shadows the bed cast over her. "It's daddy!"

Hearing that title, Ryssa snapped out of her shocked state and whimpered with relief: "D-Daddy...!" Scurrying over to him quickly, she grabbed onto his hands, allowing him to pull her out the rest of the way. Burying her face into his paint covered smock, she cried heavily at the awful sounds she heard when the knight came in to rape and murder her mother.

When he wrapped his arms underneath Ryssa, Bernard's heart nearly stopped as he felt something damp--wondering if she had been hurt as well. His rapidly beating heart settled when he realized she merely had been so scared, she had an accident there on the floor previously under the bed. "Thank the Goddess," he breathed, wrapping her up tightly in his smock to keep her from looking at the horrific display that had been above her the entire time.

The sight of the woman lying there in a pool of her own blood made his knees weak and his throat dry, and Bernard would have begun crying himself if Ryssa's own tears weren't a reminder that he had to be strong for the both of them.

Ryssa begins calling Bernard father well after her own father is beheaded, as he does his best to be there for his friend's daughter, and the woman he secretly loved for 30 years. That poor baby. hugs her

Did a few things different with this background and piece all together--trying new things is FUN. ;B

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