"If...    was...    sapling..." The lion's speech faded with it's last breath and the wood of it's jaw grew stiff. The only sounds that answered the girl's questions were the constant and incoherent babbling of the stream and ruffling leaves in the background. However, forest the lion did not move again. The soft green lush mossy fur that had covered it began to wither rapidly until it was brittle and took an ugly colour between grey and dark green. The leaves of the lion's once great mane crisped; they drained of colour until reaching yellowish hues of autumn and beginning falling onto the ground. As the mane thinned of leaves beneath was revealed a thorny skeleton of a brush that had held that majestic crown together. The transformation from a mythical forest creature to just another piece of dead wood reached completion as the last few drops of that shining golden dew drippled from the open veins of the creature's abdomen and mixed with the water. In mere moments the body had lost much of the resemblance to those noble animals of prairie and turned into just another tree trunk by the stream. Only a careful long look or knowledge of what the trunk had been could lead an onlooker to spot the faint curves of liony face and tell the twisted limbs apart from simple dead branches. Most of the animals that had answered the roar had now begun to slowly disperse one by one as they pushed their face through the wall of trees surrounding the opening and confirmed the tragedy with their own eyes. It was as if whatever force that had compelled these simple creatures to gather around the glade had vanished, or perhaps the woodland creatures moved to take their grieve elsewhere, letting the weeping human girl stay with the corpse.<br/><br/>It was a very empty moment. The early noon sun that had come out to take a peek through the tattered blanket of clouds was warming. It had in all unnoticed subtlety dried the droplets of dew that had been spilled on the flowers as it helped dry Astrid's clothes, but the warmth of sun was a small comfort. Calden too was very quiet. His internal confusion showed on the tattoo pattern in the colours switching between deep blue and darker tones as depressing thoughts coursed through his mind. He didn't like animals dying any bit more than Astrid and had often been just as down when they had brought some small dying bird to a village elder and been told that there was nothing to be done. This time though, watching the creature turn into an un-moving and dead husk was not the worst. Before he had always been there with her, letting her grasp at his tunic and rest her weeping head against his shoulder while he suppressed his own tears and ruffled her hair, coming up with whatever the silliest reasons for why it was alright; why everything would be alright. Now, he was without a body, a faceless mark on her shoulder. From his fixed prison he could only stare up at the tears flowing down from Astrid's eyes, and slowly the frustration and feeling of helplessness began again seeping in to fill his soul.<br/><br/>Calden tried to offer a comforting word, but the act of speaking it without actually being able to be there for her felt somehow awkward, and made him sound somewhat more hesitant and distant than usual. "Hey. Astrid. It's okay. It-" His voice began to tremble and broke into sobbing as well, and even Calden wasn't sure why. After a few attempts where his voice came out as too muffled by emotions to spout out full words, the boy managed to continue. "Astrid, what do we do?"