She absolutely was lovely, thank you for noticing! Zaika was positively soaking up the attention, big eyes closed down to slits as she leaned into those cheek rubs, utterly content and blissful.

"A fair point..." Mikka mused, peering down at the cup in his hands. "It's not so much my safety I fear for... more those who might come to harm should I falter."

It terrified him to be fair. The idea that a mistake on his part could spell so much destruction and despair in those who put faith in him, for all the bard could likely assume that worry was for the people he might fight alongside rather than anything so far-reaching as the truth of it.