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It's been a few days since Sturm has revisited the Freehold Hollow, but one can only vent their frustration thru physical violence for so long before guilt begins to set in. She knows that she left things a mess - and even though she doesn't want to risk a fight - the knows that attempting to fix it is probably the only thing that's going to get it off her mind.
So she's kneeling beside the table-sized hole she made in the wall - tools and materials spread out on the ground around her - and trying her best to fix the damage with only her crafting skills and what little she can remember from the several YouTube videos she watched beforehand...
Their Mantle seems to arrive before they do, a wash of Summer heat, the scent of baked asphalt starting to cool in the evening, a crackle of milspec radios trying to find a signal. The Mirrorskin breezes past on their way somewhere within the Hollow, then slows, and stops. They're about six feet tall, lanky, with mirror-dark skin shimmering with the ambient light; their hands tuck into the pockets of their trenchcoat, and they lean their weight on one leg.
Even crouching, Sturm is still big - both wide, and tall - and she's ditched her usual black overcoat in favor of a more sun's-out-guns-out look to free up her range of motion while working. Without sleeves in the way, it's very easy to see the scarrification - various rune-like shapes and designs; perhaps a different "dialect" than the kind Sigrun wears - that litters her icy not-flesh.
She hangs the tool she's currently using from one of her icy horns, turning away from her project to grab another. She stops when she notices Teagan; looking the Mirrorskin over with her sullen gaze. "... do I know you or somethin'?"
Their broken-mirror eyes glitter and shimmer. "Are you legit trying to fix a wall in the Hedge like that?" There's a bit of cognitive dissonance occurring in Teagan's world right now. Let us count the conflicting pieces of information securely fastened behind Teagan's unshifting appearance (fucking hell, bitch, give away a feeling now and again):
1) r u n e s + v v v v giant l a d y = jotunn aaaaaaahhshit
2) an injury to one is an injury to all SUMMER VENGEANCE how dare u
3) oh no the jotunn is hot help
4) sigrun i'm sorry for that thought
They click their tongue against the roof of their mouth, hands staying tucked into the pockets of their trenchcoat. "No, but I know who you are." Their chin tips up. "You're the Jotunn who called my girlfriend a skinhead."
"Look," the giant gestures to herself - she's built like an industrial freezer, chewing on the end of an unlit cigarette, her hands are rough and scarred, and both her black tank top and blue-gray cargopants are caked with drywall compound. "Do I seem like the kind of person who deals with change easily? I'm just doing what I already know how to do."
She takes the cigarette out of her mouth, and tucks it behind her ear before shifting her weight into a cross-legged sitting position. She looks up at the Mirrorskin's masked expression.
"I can see how that'd be her takeaway," her voice is a low rumble. "...but that isn't what I said."
"Oh, I'm looking," drolls the Mirrorskin lazily, all their weight still leaned on one leg, taking one hand out of a pocket to run their scarred palm over their hair, ruffling it with long fingers. "And I see someone who doesn't know how to Hedgespin. Are you, like, new?" It could be taken as a slight against the Jotunn, or it could be taken as an honest question; that's part of the issue when your tone is as flat as a board.
They scratch their jawline, an absent gesture, and let their hand drop, though it doesn't fall into their pocket this time, but on to the hilt of the machete tucked under their jacket; the blade hangs from a ring holster at their belt. "No? Because if it wasn't, holy shit, you said it real fucked up."
"No, not really. I just keep my distance. This is comfortable. I can do this without having to think much about anything," she gestures to the tools in front of her - and hanging from her head. "Other shit? Not so much."
If Sturm notices their hand fall to the weapon's hilt, it doesn't seem to cause a change in her expression. Much like the icy peaks she resembles, her features are impassable as she chews over what to say next. "You weren't there," her frown deepens - frustration beating out exhaustion in the end. "... and you don't know shit about me beyond the stories you've heard."
"Yeah, there's easier ways to do it." The Mirrorskin shrugs their shoulders lazily then. They've made it clear those easier ways exist, and they're not too invested in shoving their ideas on how things should be done in lives that aren't their own down people's throats.
It doesn't appear to be a threat; if anything, it's comfortable, as lazy as everything else about them. "I was not, as far as you know," the Mirrorskin points out; their broken-mirror eyes shimmer. "I do not. But I trust my family."
A hefty sigh escapes the frost giant's lips, and she turns back to what she's doing, taking the tool down from her horn. It's probably not worth it to give anyone else the whole spiel, right? Right? Well, even if it isn't, Sturm is hardly the type to just let sleeping dogs lie.
"Whatever, then. If that's that, then that's that. I'm not going to talk at a wall." She grumbles, of course, completely unaware of the humor in that statement. Y'know, on account of she's literally talking into a wall. "... but I don't think it's fuckin' fair, considering I went out on a fuckin' limb for your friend - and considering what I fuckin' got for it."
"I'm not a wall, I'm a mirror," answers the Mirrorskin, sounding vaguely annoyed for the first time in the conversation. They don't move, just sort of staring at Sturm, their broken-mirror eyes glittering sharply. Their fingers flex around the handle of their machete, a self-soothing gesture.
"Which friend?"
She grunts in response to the correction, chewing on her answer for a while, not wanting to throw anybody under the bus. "Does it even matter which?" She keeps working - probably finding comfort in having a constructive thing to do with her hands - and her silence goes on long enough that it's probably annoying, too.
"Glitch." The way she says it sounds as if she had to drag it out of herself.
Ambush predators learn patience above all else, and so Teagan... just... waits. "I wouldn't have asked the fucking question if it didn't fucking matter," they reply, just sort of standing there, hand on the handle of their machete, absently petting it. Everything is fine, they have a machete.
"Glitch is not my 'friend.' I mean, yes, but. Glitch is my Player One. What the fuck did you do for Glitch?"
"Fine then. Your Player One," she grunts. Sturm keeps working away at her project, only stopping when she hits a point that she can't remember from the video. Frustrated, she sets down her tools with shaking hands and stands up - reaching her full, imposing 6'11. "I didn't do anything for him except listen to his..." Her face twists into frustration during the pause - beyond the scowl she'd been wearing previously. "His stupid, fucking offer of escape. I didn't need it, and I shouldn't have let someone convince me that I could just go someplace and... have it be okay."
Despite her obvious frustration, she manages to keep her tone even-keeled after the rocky beginning.
"Yeah." That's correct. She corrected the words and now they are correct. Teagan nods their head the once. They slowly turn their head to the hole in the wall, look at it for a long moment, and then turn back to look up at Sturm. They tip their chin up to look up at her. "... yeah, I don't know what the fuck that's all about, but that's probably because I've spent the last several days stitching my girlfriend's brain back together, so, like, fuck all if I know."
"But if Glitch offered you help, he meant it, and if you tried to take it, it's because you needed to, probably."
"Well. I'm sorry about your girlfriend's brain," she grunts - it's a half-hearted apology at best, but her gruff delivery can't hide the little kernel of concern in her voice. Sturm shoves both hands into her pockets, and leans back against the wall - hunching her shoulders in an effort to seem less like a giant obstacle. "There was bad blood as soon as we saw one another. She asked me if I was one of Them. I got... so fuckin' mad. I said she was one to talk - what with her wearing their shit and all - but I never said she was one."
"The thing is," Teagan answers lazily, still leaned on one leg, "That's no more Their shit than a mirror is Their shit. They can't make anything. They can only steal things. Right? So all the shit that we say is Theirs, it wasn't Theirs first. And it's pretty shit to concede them the entire territory of all of the Norse faith and way of life. Whether the 'them' we're talking about is Them them, or fucking Nazis."
"So, like, I get it. But also... " A loose, lazy shrug. "Maybe it's oversimplified for me, because fuck what they made me, I'm going to be what I want."
"... but they still evoke the same feelings, even if you're reclaiming them." She puts emphasis on Jack's turn of phrase, hoping she's using it properly. "... because every time I've seen those symbols in my life, they've been bad fuckin' news - and... even if they're hers now - even if she's proud of them now - she's gotta know there're still people who're gonna be confused by it, right?"
The outline of her bulky hand can be seen through the pocket of her cargo pants. She's tracing a line of something with her thumb - a nervous tic, probably.
A vague shrug of their shoulders. "I mean, yeah. Nobody can control how you feel. Not even you. The question is what you do, not how you feel. And I'm not even, like, pissed off that you had a feeling. Nobody controls their feelings. But... like... unless you thought that Glitch was willfully bringing you to see someone who was going to hurt you, which, like, would probably be fucking with any Oath for any Court or any Freehold... then ... question mark?" They literally say 'question mark.'
"Like, I get it. But also, if Glitch is on your side, and Glitch is bringing you to see someone who he says is gonna help you... probably... you know... not? A Skinhead?"
"Which applies to her the same as you. Don't get me wrong. You both acted like fucked up shitheads."
"I know that - and the reason I thought..." The giant growls in frustration as she searches for the words. "It was more complicated than that, but there's no point in dredging all that shit up again." The corners of her mouth droop back into place. "... especially when it's not what I'm mad about. If we had just had a fight, I'd probably'd be over it by now. Taking beatings is old hat." Beat. "...but she did control what I was feeling - and that's what put me over the edge."
They scratch their cheek with their opposite hand, still resting their hand on the handle of their machete. "Hmm." Teagan's eyebrows arch up at that. "She did what now?" Their mouth pulls to one side, somewhat dubious, but they don't say 'hey you're lying, Sigrun would never do that.' Who can say what a Fairest would do when they think they're being attacked?
A deep rumble wells up from inside Sturm's chest when her mind makes the connection to what the look means. She takes a step away from her comfortable slouching place, puffing out her chest and gesturing with her hands - clearly frustrated with her inability to find the right words. "She... used some fuckin' contract. Made me see her differently in my... fuckin' head - so she could force me not to fight - while she still had her weapon out and was ready to use it."
"Oh." And now the tumblers fall into place, the lock clicks open. "Paralyzing Presence." They press their lips together. "So -- I'm not gonna speak for her, but I am gonna point out that like -- if she had wanted to hit you when you weren't fighting, when that happened, when she used that? She could have. And you would have been helpless, at that moment. That's... part of... you know. The reason sometimes people use it. To get a free hit in."
"But she didn't, because... mad as she was, and I get how it landed, using something like that is -- " The Mirrorskin pauses. "I get that you'd have rather been hit. I probably would have been too. But she was trying to not kill you. Or get killed. That was de-escalation."
"... but I was already outnumbered, she didn't need to do that." Sturm's growl is reaching a gutteral, inhuman depth. She's... in pain, but isn't sure why. The pieces just are not there. "A warrior does not meet an equal with a Völva's tricks. She treated me like prey."
That thing she does? The one where she tries to shrink by stooping her shoulders and hunch her back, because she worries about whether or not people are scared of her? She's... definitely not doing that now.
A long, slow sigh. They gesture toward the big hole in the wall. "Maybe she thought she did, given that. Look. I'm not saying that everything Significant did during that encounter was good. I'm saying she wasn't trying to disgrace you or humiliate you. She was trying to keep herself from trying to kill you as much as she was trying to keep you from killing her. Or Glitch, by accident."
And then they pause. "I'd say 'or Johnny,' but ain't nobody fucking hit Johnny unless he wants them to, 99 times out of a hundred. Even the King of Summer hasn't managed it many times." A little shake of their head, and they sigh.
"So I'm gonna suggest something, if you're good with a suggestion."
There's a confused look in her face, and she doesn't say anything in response. Maybe words aren't working properly right now, but she seems to catch herself - and there's a flicker of recognition - and embarrassment - when Teagan gestures to the damage she did last time she got this angry.
... and after shoving her fists back into her pockets, she does nod. Suggest away.
"Maybe -- and hear me out to the end, please -- maybe the two of you could, like... " And here the Mirrorskin rolls their lips in, letting them pop out again with a small 'tck' sound, " ... accept that both of you acted badly in ways that are deeply rooted in each of your trauma, and agree that Glad-of-War is a shithead who should shove his walking staff all the way up his asshole until it pops out his empty eye socket, and like... "
"Apologize to each other for the shitty things each of you did, and how you hurt each other even if you didn't mean to, and agree that the honorable thing to do is to bury that entire conversation and try to move on from it."
"Because, like, if you don't? Gallow's Burden, or whoever out there is pretending to be the Visitor of the Hanged, because fuck calling that asshole a God? He wins. He wins again. He beats both of you, again, by turning your hands from fighting him to fighting each other again. And the longer the two of you stare at each other and say 'she hurt me this way' and 'she hurt me that way,' the longer you're not turning your attention to the skies and looking for ravens you could be shooting down and pissing on." The Summer's Mantle flares at that, a wash of fury and heat as they're called to remember what little they've been told about what Sigrun went through, even as they invoke the Names of Óðin that Sigrun taught them.
Their Mantle subsides, and they shrug, vaguely. "Y'know. Just a thought."
Sturm snorts. It's less of a laugh, and more like anger and tension escaping through her nostrils the way steam might escape from the nose of a pissed off cartoon character that just got hit by a falling anvil... because that's what this is. The proverbial falling anvil.
As the frustration bleeds out and gives full control of her mind over to embarrassment, her shoulders slump back to their normal slouch and she sinks back against the wall. She's silent as her pocketed hand adopts that same worried motion.
"I... don't know how to just ignore an open wound - fuck - I don't even know why fucking I care so much. This shit was so much easier to manage before."
A long, slow sigh out their nose, and Teagan shifts their weight subtly, a concession to comfort rather than an actual shift of stance; there's only so long joints like to hold any one position, after all. "I'm not asking you to ignore an open wound. I'm asking you to take active steps to bind up that wound and care for it, because if you don't do that, it's going to get infected, and fester, and you'll end up losing that whole limb."
The Mirrorskin scratches their eyebrow. "Well. I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess. You can tell me if I'm right or not. It was a lot easier before because, number one, you're being a person now and not, you know, a Jotunn, sent to fight over and over, and resurrected again and again by Old One-Eyed Fuckface," probably not an official name of Óðin, "and number two, you're coming face to face, literally, with the fact that the enemies you had over There? They were always just people, too. And that's a shitty fucking realization, that you were hurting other people. That you can't justify it anymore. It kinda forces you to care."
What? No, Teagan is not saying any of this because they've dealt with this in the twenty years they've been back. Why do you ask? Stop looking over here. They're just very smart. Yeah.
"You're... partially correct, I think." She pauses for a while. A few seconds past when one would reasonably assume she wouldn't elaborate further. Her gaze is on the ground - looking at her tools. "Not to... let on exactly how terrible I really am, but I was hurting people long before I became... this. It wasn't a new thing, just a variation on a theme - and sure, the realization that I was fighting - and killing - people like me is hard to deal with, but it's nothing compared to having the wool pulled from my eyes." She looks back up, scowl returning. "I locked it away... but it's hard to ignore what happened when what happened is staring you down with a weapon. It's hard to pretend it was just a dream when there's proof in front of you that it... very much wasn't."
Slowly, she takes a knee. Starting to gather up her shit, and put it into the discarded duffle bag. She can finish up this project later, right?
A vague laugh, a little bit of bitterness sliding from their lips. "That was my second guess." Was it, though? Possibly. It can be tough to tell with Teagan. "Aight. Well. Unfortunately, it was real. And unfortunately, Sigrun is someone whose people you'll have to deal with, if not the woman herself. But I'd really rather you were both on the same side. Not avoiding each other at best."
They tick their tongue against the roof of their mouth. "I'd like to talk to Sigrun about this -- I mean, I'm gonna, because I have to -- but I'd like to get the two of you together to purge this wound and bind it so it can heal. Y'all are making Glad-of-War glad by this fighting, so let's make it over with."
A pause, and they add, "Plus, I can help you fix this, later, if you want. It's pretty easy, if you know how."
She shrugs - and it looks like it's effort. If she seemed tired before, it's nothing next to how she's feeling now. "Originally, I'd wanted to settle this with hólmganga. I don't really know why - it just seemed... right that a grudge should die the same way it was born," she slings the now-packed bag onto a nearby table. Probably the table she threw to start this whole mess. "...but I don't really care anymore. I don't have it in me to keep being a fucking obstacle. So yeah, why not. I don't give a shit what you tell her. Glitch and Jack have my number if you need to get ahold of me."
She tugs on her coat, slings the bag over her shoulder, and then shoves both fists back into the pockets of the overcoat. "... I'd appreciate that, though. Thank you for offering."
"I mean, if y'all want to do that, and that's what the two of you agree on, I'm not going to stand in between you." The Summer raises their hands, turning their palms out to Sturm. "I'm not saying y'all should resolve this the way that I think you should. Just that you should... you know. Resolve it." Another absent scratch of their cheek. "And you're not an obstacle, that's not what I'm saying. Just -- I don't want this shit to end up hurting both of you, or keeping you back from doing shit like, you know, putting out that fuckhole's other eye."
They tip their chin up. "No problem. Once this is sorted, let's -- I'll show you how Hedgespinning works."
The giant makes a low grunt when Teagan rejects her self-deprecating remarks. She doesn't look very amused - but then again, how could you tell the difference from her normal expression? "Agree to disagree - regardless of whether that's what you're saying." It's matter of fact the way she says it. She's so used to playing the heavy that she doesn't know how to turn it off. "... but you tell me if she's amenable to that suggestion, and I'll meet her and we can figure it out. In the meantime, I haven't slept well in a week, so I'm going to hopefully sleep off feeling like a dumpster fire."
She turns like she's going to head out, but stops. "Take care, uhh..." She snaps her fingers, trying to remember a name - then it occurs to her she never got one.
They curl up one corner of their mouth, then. "Call me Teagan. Talk to you later, Sturm." Because of course they know her name. A loose salute given in farewell, and then the Montebank reaches out their hand, touching the shadow of the house they were standing by. They dissolve into that shadow, slipping away, invisible.
... and then Sturm heads the fuck home and (hopefully) get some good sleep for the first time in a goddamned week.
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