Action Log: Morning of the 19th.

[brosif]

Characters: The horse formally known as Sif
Open? Yes!
Where: Schwanheim or the woods, depending on the time.
When: Morning of the 19th.
What: The magic peddler gave Sif a very special hat. Too special.
Warnings: Sif is an angry horse, yo.

In the village of Schwanheim, there is a horse in place of a prince. Her color is lovely – a deep, rich brown. Her temperament is not. She runs through the city, vision blurred, knocking over whatever lies in her way in an attempt to leave the village walls. There is a bandage around her front left Fetlock, but it covers no wound.

Being in the city enrages her. Sights and sounds are filtering into her mind in a way she is wholly unused to. She thinks of the face of a peddling man and is enraged further. She will find him.

Comments

[sorcerous]

"Perhaps I didn't take the hat off soon enough for your liking?" returns Loki, mildly, sharp words and a sweet tone. "I should have lunged for it as I gave chase, then. I am so very sorry."

He sweeps his cloak from his shoulders, and whistles for his own mount. She trots into the clearing, whinnies, and Loki hushes her, reaching to her saddlebag.

He offers Sif a skin of water, from the saddlebag, and the cloak.

[brosif]

She takes both, fastening the cloak and rinsing her mouth out with the water. She crouches down against a different tree, one she has not just been ill all over. The world feels new and she slow in it.

“I was not...in control of my mind or senses,” she offers, resting her forehead in her hand. “I was very far away.”

[sorcerous]

"Where did you get this?" he asks, half-turning away. He doesn't dare come closer. Best to, instead, find what caused this, and ensure it never did again. Best to be a sorcerer and not a man; best to save her, and not want her.

[brosif]

“A peddler.” She laughs at herself, though there is nothing of humor in it. She knows better than all of this. “I meant to have the mages look at it, but it found its way onto my head regardless.”

Eyes closed as she fights back another wave of nausea. Her body is unsure of her, now.

“I have no idea how you do this. It’s terrible.”

[sorcerous]

"It is a skill, to retain your mind and to understand your instincts. And there is a reason that I return to the same few forms, over and over again." Cultivated beasts of land, birds of the air, creatures of the sea. He has enough forms to suit his needs, and can change between them. Others are dangerous.

[brosif]

“The apple. When I – when she went over to it, all I could think was ‘he has a knife’.” She seizes up at the memory, under the folds of the cloak. “He has a knife. And it didn’t matter, because you had food. She went anyway.”

She tells the story to the ground, not to Loki. Her greatest fear: immobility in the face of a threat. Not being in control of her own body. She has just experienced half a day of it.

[sorcerous]

"I always have a knife," Loki dismisses.

But he understands, and his gaze lingers on her. That's not enough. He has to say more.

"But I never would have used it on a horse. Especially not one like you made."

[brosif]

“I did not know it was you. Only that I was being chased.”

He could have been anyone. Any hunter.

[sorcerous]

"Nonsense. When you heard my voice, you knew it was me."

Though he's not sure, and perhaps it shows, in his voice, in his body.

[brosif]

“I knew it sounded sweet. I knew you wanted me. I knew you had a knife.”

And she is there again. Immobile. She repeats, in her head, steadily:

It sounded sweet. You wanted me. You had a knife.

[sorcerous]

Loki raises his eyes skyward. Only one solution to that: let her find out how to control herself.

Preferably with someone safe.

Preferably with him.

He sighs, and he steps in, and places the hat back on her head.

[brosif]

“No!”

Her protest comes out strangled, for the cords of her throat are already changing when she realizes what Loki has done. The betrayal cuts deeply. When she changes fully into the mare she is angry enough to be in charge of her own mind.

She charges at him. She will hurt him for this.

[sorcerous]

Unfortunately for Sif, in short distances, a human is much quicker than a horse. At dodging, particularly: Loki only has half her limbs to work out, and she is quite unfamiliar with equine reflexes.

As such, she misses him entirely, and he darts off of one tree and up into another.

"Sif!" he calls. "Can you hear me?"

[brosif]

It is true that Sif has no mastery of her limbs in this state. It is a struggle to stop short of the tree, and she is not succesful in avoiding it completely. Her right side crashes into it, bark and dust clinging to her coat.

She can hear him, but his voice is only one noise in a myriad of them. The birds, the river, the grass itself. All the sounds of the forest assail Sif at once. She jerks her long neck about, trying to follow the threads.