Ralyn set his hand gently upon the little girl's shoulder, the flames licking at the remains of the frame of the house and the billowing smoke reaching high into the chill winter sky. Amid the rolling roar the tiger could hear the discernable pops, snaps and crackling noises that weren't just wood, but that of muscle and fat boiling and charring amid the conflagration. He made the child watch, it broke his heart, but he made her watch until the entire building collapsed in on itself.
Weeping, the bunny turned to him, "Why'd you do it, Master?" she asked.
"To demonstrate for you why the laws of magic are what they are, and broker no room for failure. You must learn from this lesson, my pupil, that to break these laws invites certain destruction. Never allow pride to blind you to the consequence of your actions."
"Were.. were they bad people?"
"No. Just misguided. They still died the same, despite that. Always remember there's more than one side to the apparent truth."
"Couldn't you have stopped them?"
"Yeah. I could have. They wouldn't appreciate it. they would have called me an interloper, that I didn't know what I was doing, to stop them then might have spared their lives, but they wouldn't learn, they were too far gone. Too caught up in their foul experiments and binding pacts to realize they had lost the things they thought they sought."
The bunny was silent for a moment. "Can that happen to you, Master?" she asked in a small voice. Ralyn looked down at her, meeting her emerald gaze and the shadows that shifted within her eyes. "Aye, Kyna. Even I can fall, even your mother, even you. If you remain alert for the signs, it can be averted. It doesn't have to be this way. It doesn't have to end in flames." 'Again' he thought, not able to say the last part aloud, and repressing the flood of emotions the memory brought.