Gentle? Erik doesn’t know shit about gentle, at least, not if you ask him. Neither of his parents were to be faulted for it, in all doing as well as could be asked of them. A reclusive boy, a strange boy. A cursed boy. A boy that will live like a curse, believing he is one. He was a strange thing. Deeply, concerningly strange. Things that go bump in the night often were, after all.
Settling the mountain appeared to be work, work that his father had taken to expeditiously. Work that Erik had somehow been roped into assisting with, in his short time visiting. Where he had expected to spend time with the viking king, he would be rather disappointed. It was all work, no play. Winter was coming, settling over the mountain already. There was much to be done before things got worse, he could understand that. But they spent so little time with him… whatever. Erik begrudgingly did the work.
He’d been checking the remaining traps while his father went to retrieve sharper knives. Returning to the makeshift camp, Erik saw him. The intruder. The stranger, a scrawny kid, was trying to steal from them. A threatening, low, growl wrenched from his chest. It was accompanied by the faint, sickening rattle that often accompanied any vocalisation from the cursed child. His gaze flashed, bounding to close the gap between them. Though Erik did not speak, his intent shone clearly. This was a trespasser, and he planned to deal accordingly.
"Speech"
