(2018-03-16) Nokken and Fossegrim
Nokken and Fossegrim
Summary: Audgrim meets Nokken and Autumn embraces him.
Date: IC Date (2018-03-16)
Related: None
Player Characters: Audgrim (Puce, as GM)

Maybe it's a dream, maybe a long forgotten memory. Audgrim finds himself in the woods; thick and heavy with the dampness in the air. Rain forest? It's not the trees from the land of his childhood. Everything seems bigger somehow. When he looks at his hands, the claws are gone. He's wearing shorts. Is he a little boy? There is the sound of water gently lapping not far off, otherwise the woods are eerily quiet.

Momentarily, Audgrim is happy for being a boy again; maybe his actual life was the dream and this is the reality. He starts to run, but then slows, frowning. Looking down at himself, then up at the trees and the sky. The trees are unfamiliar and yet familiar at the same time.

Hearing the water, he's drawn towards it. Even as a boy he was always near the river, playing or swimming, back home in Norway. Becoming a Swimmerskin was almost fated for him.

The air is warm, calm, and misty as Audgrim runs. It doesn't take him long to come up to a small lake. Some might consider it a pond as he can see the other side. Birds are quiet in here, the trees so tick that that are tricked in to thinking it's night soon. At the edge of the water, the only other living thing Audgrim can see around is a horse, drinking from the edge. It's coat and tail practically gleam they are so healthy and well cared for. The horse doesn't look up as it drinks, an ear turning and swivelling Audgrim's way.

Audgrim crouches down carefully, dipping his fingers into the pond, smiling widely. He's going to go for a swim, but he eyes the horse curiously. He doesn't know that much about horses, but there were horses around him when he grew up - they were still used on farms back then. "Hi there," he says in Norwegian, voice pleasant and warm. Boyishly naive and curious. He straightens up and walks towards the horse, hand outstretched. "What are you doing here?"

The horse snorts into the water and continues to drink, tail swishing lazily.

The air is getting a little colder. Nothing really noticeable to Audgrim, but other people might be uncomfortable, in shorts at least. It's warmer by the horse, just from it's mass and the heat it gives off.

"You're such a handsome one," Audgrim coos, moving closer and daring to reach a hand out to brush the horse's neck. He doesn't notice the chill in the air, still quite happy where he is. "I'll tell mom all about this later, at dinner. Who do you belong to, Horsie?"

When Audgrim's hand touches the horse's neck, it doesn't move along as it normally would, instead it sticks to the horse! The horse gives a whinny and starts to move in to the water.

Audgrim pulls on his hand, but it's thoroughly stuck. His eyes widen; he remembers. He remembers the Fossegrim, the tales his mother told him. She used to call /him/ Fossegrim, jokingly; he was always playing the violin by the river. "Stop!" he begs, putting his feet down in a vain attempt to halt the horse, and himself, but he's dragged along. He's just a weak boy. That water, that moments ago looked so nice to go for a swim in, is now looking menacing and cold and dark to him.

The horse doesn't care at all for the small boy's pleas and continues to move into the water. Deeper and deeper it's powerful body pulls Audgrim along. First to his waste, then his neck, and quickly over his head. The Horse doesn't swim but walks along the bottom of the lake.

Down.

Down.

Down.

Audgrim's panic is real. He's got water up to his chest, then his neck and then he's under the surface, taking one big deep breath before he sinks below the surface. The faint light filters through as he looks up, waving his free arm, kicking with his feet - to no avail. He holds his breath as long as he can and then he can't anymore and inhales water… And realises he can breathe. He gulps in oxygen, water like air to him, eyes wide and confused.

He stops struggling. Instead, he slides up on the horse's back, to ride it there at the bottom of the lake. His heart is beating hard and he's scared, but he's alive and he isn't drowning.

Jumping up to ride the horse confuses it for a moment. It's expecting flailing and fighting from Audgrim after all. It whinnies again and rears it's head, trying to shake Audgrim off now as it picks up speed along the bottom of the lake. Even though they are under water Audgrim can smell the faint wafts of Autumn leaves in the wind, dry and brittle.

Perhaps he was always a bit of a thrill seeker. Curious and prone to end up in trouble. Audgrim reverses the roles, not consciously, but born out of a will to live and to always have hope; he clings to the horse. He digs his fingers into its mane and squeezes his legs. Riding it, trying to control it now, as they speed along the bottom. He begins to grin, still scared - or is it thrilled? Isn't he Fossegrim? Isn't Nokken his equal? His mind is a jumble of thoughts. He sees flashes of himself as Audgrim the adult Nightsinger. He remembers true fear, in the hands of the Duke. And his fears as a boy; the Nazis during the war, the ones that killed his father. The constant fear of his mother being taken away too. And yet the constant hope and ability to cope with it, with the "It will be alright"-attitude.

He inhales the scent of Autumn deep into his lungs. He accepts the fear as it is. Something to listen to but not to bow down to. Something to respect but not let overpower yourself.

The horse allows itself to be controlled, racing along the bottom of the lake, pushing itself faster and faster towards the other side. Eventually the pair are going up, slowly as the incline is gradual. As the pair moves upward, Audgrim can feel himself getting larger, the horse smaller beneath him until the horse seems to disappear beneath him. Eventually Audgrim emerges from the water, adult again, and somehow dry, the warm breezes of an Indian Summer and his new mantles embracing him.

Now where the heck is he?

Audgrim tries to cling on to the horse, as it shrinks away from him in the water. When it's fully gone, he stays briefly beneath the surface of the water, remembering who he is, knowing what happened - he can sense it. Autumn's blessing. He emerges like the Fossegrim he is, rising up and - then he's just on land somewhere, dry, and not a little surprised. He has no idea where he is, feeling the tug of Port Angeles so at least knowing which way to go.

Patting himself down, he realises he has no phone. In fact, he's just wearing a pair of shorts. "Think Autumn has a sense of humor," he says, then grins even so, and starts walking off to find a road and perhaps someone to give him a lift if they dare.

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