AN: Some variants of the hulder-lore tell of her begetting a child with a human man and then leaving it in the care of her lover, and my mind just ran with it. Chapter title from another of Gåte's songs. I own nothing.

iselilja

His world hasn't changed much when she brings him back from hers.

His grandfather is smoking his pipe on the front steps when he comes home, and gives him a look that tells Laxus no secrets are to be had under the Dreyar roof this winter. But he makes no outward mention of it, only offers his pipe and asks if he's had a good journey.

The winter is cold and long as a sickness, with dark things at the corners of shadows and scheming trolls in the forest depths. Laxus doesn't go further than the sleeping orchard's boundary, for he's seen what lurks in the world below and knows better now than to venture out alone in the winter darkness. Instead he spends his evenings with his grandfather before the hearth, offering stories of the world she'd shown him, a dark and twisted place with a haunting loveliness that strikes a longing in him in the coldest hours of the night, when the wind howls like wolves against the rafters.

He doesn't see her that whole winter; there's no sign of her dancing feet, or the twitch of her cow's tail around the naked trees. And as the months pass, he stops looking, and stops expecting to find her laughing at his back whenever he turns.

But one morning he finds something. A wicker basket, on the front steps when he rises to tend to his herd. Dew soaks the grass and the fresh apple tree leaves, and the cloth in the basket is damp when he lifts it away–

–and it's a small pink face, cheeks bright from the frost still clinging to the spring evening, and eyes wide and dark beneath hair brown like the forest soil. The babe makes a sound at the sight of him, brows pulling together in discontent at the cold spring air against her pert nose.

And he knows her for what she is, without even having seen the slight curve of her not-quite human ears.

.

.

.

She cries through the spring, until the summer heat makes the days long and hazy and she falls asleep easily beneath the ever ripening apple trees. And as the months slip by, the girl grows strong and hale, quick-footed once she finds her legs and even quicker to laugh. She picks apples and weaves wreaths of spring flowers, and sings of things Laxus doesn't know where she's heard – of mysterious shadows and creatures with clever tongues and bright, yellow eyes. But he doesn't question it, because she's of that world as well as his, and her odd things are hers to keep and nurture if she pleases. She follows at his heels when he looks to the herd, and spends her evenings with her great-grandfather, whittling blocks of wood into shapes unlike the commonly made cow or sheep.

If he finds it odd, Makarov doesn't comment on her creativity, and Laxus smiles when she shows him her work, tucking the strange wooden creatures she gives him in the pocket of his vest. For safekeeping, he tells her. She grins a toothy grin, and tells him it will guard against the shadows.

And Laxus believes her.

Of her mother he hears nothing, but even as the girl grows he sees her in the curve of her easy smile, and the fall of her dark hair – wild curls that he picks leaves and flowers out of whenever she comes home from a ramble. She refuses to wear shoes – another oddity, but he's stopped trying to make her, and his grandfather only laughs at her stubbornness on the matter. Laxus wonders sometimes at the old man's easy acceptance.

Then, one warm spring day with the apple trees in full bloom and his daughter's laughter rustling the leaves, his grandfather finally breaches the subject.

"She's grown much, this year."

Laxus lowers his pipe, but doesn't immediately respond. Then, "The odd blood of her mother runs strong. That would be the cause."

Makarov smiles a strange smile. "Indeed, but it's not so strange that blood would run strong in her veins." He looks at Laxus. "As it runs in yours just as strong."

He nearly drops his pipe, and some of the ash scatters across the wooden planks. Makarov laughs. "Don't look so shocked, my boy! Didn't you ever think it strange, that your mother was such a rare topic in this house?"

His pipe now forgotten, Laxus can only stare. "You–" The question eludes him. "You never said."

Makarov shrugs. "We might not speak of it, but it's not an uncommon thing." He looks at Laxus. "But the love of her kind will drive a man's wits from him. It did my son no good, when he chased after your mother."

Laxus' fingers tighten around his pipe. "You said he fell down a ravine, chasing a sheep." He voices the words carefully, as he has all the years he's questioned his father's absence.

"It might as well have been." Makarov sighs. "A guided tour to their world will see you safe on the other side…allegedly. But going alone, uninvited…" he shook his head. "I warned him, but your father was a stubborn man." He threw Laxus a sidelong look. "As are you. I've wondered why you haven't tried to seek her out again."

Laxus looks out across the slope leading down to the fjord, and the apple trees in bloom. He catches a dark head of hair, disappearing amidst the blossoms of the low-hanging branches. She's chasing the sheep dog, small hands reaching for a tail too quick for her to catch. Laxus smiles.

"I have what I need here," he says at length, relighting his pipe.

Makarov smiles. "But do you have everything that you need?"

Laxus doesn't answer, but keeps his eyes on that dark head of hair weaving between the trees, and keeps her laughter in his ears, a physical tether to the world he treads. He can't follow where her mother has gone.

He won't be his father.

.

.

.

The years go by, and the girl grows tall and strong, fierce in her affections and ever gracious with her smiles. She takes a liking to the neighbour's eldest son, and Laxus sees them wed beneath the blooming apple trees, white blossoms in her dark hair and her feet bare beneath the hem of her dress. Not soon after, there is yet again laughter in his orchard, and with the passing years, several heads of hair fair and dark alike weaving between the trees.

His grandfather passes then, one cold, autumn night when the rain is relentless against the roof, and the boughs of the orchard sag low with the weight of their silent grief. And Laxus spends his evenings on the steps alone, Makarov's pipe at his lips and his memories like the smoke curling towards the darkening skies. There's grey in his beard now, and his eyes are tired and straining in the dim light. The years have been long and though not unkind, the exhaustion of a life lived is wearing at his bones.

Then one night, he looks up and she's there.

She stands beneath one of the naked trees, her feet bare as he remembers and sunk in the snow, and her face not a day younger than the last he saw her. Snowflakes have gathered in her hair, and her eyes are mirrors to her hidden world, like dark pools in the forest depths where the nøkk waits to lure their prey. Amidst the white of the orchard, she's a flower out of place – meant for a warmer soil than this, but resolute in her stubbornness.

Laxus doesn't move, afraid to send her running, and her smile curves, that clever twitch he so fondly etched into his mind long ago, before she steps towards him on silent feet. The pipe is forgotten between his numb fingers, and he can only watch her approach in startled silence.

"She's married," he blurts then, voice hoarse. It's the first rational thought that comes to mind.

She smiles, a secret thing in the softly falling snow. "I know. I saw."

His suspicions are confirmed, then. She's been watching. "You've seen a lot of things."

Cana nods. "I have. Spring laughter, and autumn woes." Her looks softens. "Her cries carried, when she was a babe."

"You could have been there."

Her smile turns sombre. "I know your world," she says at length. "There is no place for me here – your kin shows little kindness for mine. If I had come, all would know her lineage, and she would not be married."

He doesn't disagree, because there is truth to her words. His is a deeply superstitious folk. "So why are you here now?"

She only smiles at his gruff question, but doesn't answer it. Then she holds out her hand, surprising him. "Come," she says instead, that beckoning lilt to her lovely voice that's called to him on lonely nights. "It's cold, here."

It is cold, and he's not really dressed for going outside, but Laxus rises from his seat regardless. His back aches, but he ignores the pains of his years as he takes the first step, then the next. Her hand is still lifted towards him, palm turned up in silent pleading, the skin soft as he remembers and white under the pale moonlight. White like the snow, but not cold, never cold.

His daughter is married, and his grandfather passed, and Laxus spares only a last, solemn glance towards the little farmhouse before he takes her hand –hearthfire-warm fingers curling around his, tugging softly like a promise–

–and passes through the sleeping apple orchard for the last time.

AN: This was written on a whim, but I hope you enjoyed it! Please drop a note if you did, your feedback is food for the soul.

nøkk: a water spirit from Scandinavian lore.