SCSF: Ah, but that is the mystery! I would genuinely not be surprised if Douglass thought that was how to keep things "mysterious", never mind that it makes for a quite bad reading experience...

She's absolutely not the first. Robert Jordan did the same thing with his mentor wizard character who refuses to explain jack shit and just makes cryptic remarks in earshot of the protagonists, even when at least one of them is in active distress thanks to her refusing to tell him what's happening to him for no fucking reason. In fact she's what led one critic to coin the term "Jive-Talking Wizard".

For myself, I think it would not look especially silly, but I would not exactly know.

I tried it out and it felt like, well, a facepalm. Fitting.

Looking at the next chapter... I think the main problem with Shra here is how very much she stays on the background and how calm she is. That does not fit such a young child very well.

I have nieces and nephews her age and it absolutely does not. Last Christmas one of them burst into tears because we pulled some crackers and the loud noise upset them. She should also be upset because her mother and father aren't there. But Douglass clearly didn't know a goddamn thing about babies and children in general.