't t'rns o't th're w's a pl't.

He welcomes the sea spray on his cheeks and against his clothes as he walks back to the city later, much later. After inevitably telling Eiríkur the whole story… more or less. Less.

But strangely enough, the strangest part of the whole thing had not come to the taciturn fisherman as a surprise.

"A mermaid, you say?" and he'd shaken his head, "I'd have thought you'd know better than that, Norge."

Norge'd shrugged that skepticism without further comment. She was different than whatever Eiríkur could possibly know about mermaids, but he wasn't going to be caught dead saying that.

"Think all you want," his friend had told him, "But I'm a fisherman. In Norway. Don't you think I've seen a thing or two out of the ordinary?" And he'd sounded more or less amused.

"Congratulations," Norge had commented dully, feeling inwardly exasperated at himself for a reason he couldn't name properly.

"…though the name issue is something new," and Ís had chuckled. Actually chuckled…

And as he walks back home now, hands in his pockets, eyes strayed towards the straight blue horizon, he can't help recalling his friend's laugh and frowning like he frowns whenever there is something he can't understand.

It's a girl, isn't it?

She must be a real princess…

… what's her name?

He groans in frustration, takes a hand out of his pocket to massage the bridge of his nose as if that would actually help him. Help him. "It's a girl," Eiríkur had said, and there is just no way out of that one.

No damn way out because it's damn right true.

Next time, fall for something that won't eat you while you sleep, said Ís, damn him, he just told him too many things.

"Get another hat, Norge… I'm not telling you this because I particularly care, you know that. But if you get another hat and soak it in human blood, it's as good as any."

"… why do you know that, brother?"

"Why wouldn't I?" he'd gestured towards his simple cottage that overlooked the beach, "Look where I live. I need to know some basics."

"Right," and he'd been skeptic. About Eiríkur's honest reasons. But he'd never for a second doubted that what he'd just learned was true.

And he doesn't like it, doesn't like it at all, it's all becoming too personal and too much a burden, and so much more than he thinks he can bear. Maybe he'll just flip it all to hell and go back to Oslo, to his boring apartment floor and routinely city life.

Blood, magic, love.

As if he'd suddenly fallen into a damned fairytale or something. Hans Christian Andersen or whatever. A Dane, damn him.

Everyone knows mermaids are Danish, Norge!

… great, now his mind is distorting things and plotting against him. He heaves a sigh and sits on a moss-covered stone almost where the waves break, knowing it is a spot he'll have to leave as soon as the tide begins to rise.

Damn Eiríkur. Damn him well damned. Norge can't undo it now. It's late.

Because now he knows what to do and he can, he rightfully can finally get rid of that woman that pesters his life like that… only that he doesn't really want to. If he has to be honest with himself, the rarest occurrence of them all. He idly wonders, a fleeting thought, what it is she might want. To leave or to stay. Who knows. That doesn't matter now, what matters is the weight of the realization shaking his foundations. That if she leaves, it's not going to be because he's made things easier for her. Nevermind the detail of getting enough human blood to soak a hat, albeit small, in it. That's not important. It could be his own blood and he'd not care about it. He wouldn't mind it. It's not that.

It's not that.

… I can't help liking you, Norge!

The Gods help him. It's not that.

He buries his face in his hands, closes his eyes, and listens to the waves sway back and forth, back and forth, with thundering gentleness against the rock where he's sitting, and the seagulls mewl over water puddles; and he lets the landscape take over him. Maybe, if he's lucky, he'll either forget or fall asleep.

A/N

Short and angsty chapter. There had to be one somewhere, Norge isn't happy that he's fallen in love, as you see.

BTW, Norge, *that* was not the best place to take a nap.

{ Self-promotion moment! I wrote two Fem!Denmark x Norway oneshots- Sjømannsvise and Bubble world. Also AU. Check them out! ;) }

Aaand, what do you think now, guys? Suddenly the plot woke up! =D

...also. INEVITABLE HCAndersen reference. Sorry.