June 5th, 2019
Meeting survivors is always a delight. If for no other reason, it means that there’s one more person out there that we hunters didn’t fail. I rolled into Frankfurt on the request of another hunter who wasn’t nearby. I know some hunters who collect favors to call in in such instances. I’m not one of those.
If someone needs help and I’m in the area, I’ll help. Of course, if I’m on another case, a request might get backburnered, but if I’m idle (it does happen), and it’s not all the way across the country? I’ll come running.
I don’t like to put lives on the line for a favor. I won’t say that hunters who do are assholes or folk who need to reevaluate their priorities, but I think my cause is a little more noble than theirs.
And if they came to me for help, I’d lend it if available.
Anyways, on to the case: my hauntee is a young man who was an avid hiker. He’s recently relocated from Germany, (ironically? from the original Frankfurt). He’s granted me his couch to crash on while I work here.
Step 1 in any hunt is to beat the ground around the site and gather as much information as possible. In this particular case, it meant interviewing Kurt Hertzvel, my hauntee. If only every hunt started this easily.
Kurt told me he’d been down at a lake in the nearby state park just hiking the trails when a pale, young man approached him. The man carried a “bulbous” guitar and wore only a set of khaki colored capris. While it struck Kurt as odd that this individual was out in the wilderness with an odd looking instrument and in such dress, he was also distinctly intrigued by and attracted to him.
It led him to approach the young man. As soon as he got within arm’s reach, the strange man lashed out and grabbed Kurt.
Kurt was hauled toward the water’s edge and only just barely broke away from his grasp. He came away with a nasty, bone deep bruise on his arm and shoulder.
The man screamed at Kurt, but Kurt’s a pretty quick runner and escaped.
This tells me a few things: since the creature didn’t pursue Kurt past the water’s edge means if this is a ghost, it’s tied to something in the lake.
If it is a ghost tied to the lake, or something in the lake, that will make it horrifically difficult to deal with. I’m hoping that’s not the case since I’m not really equipped to scuba down and find some waterlogged corpse or totem.
Option B: is this is a water spirit similar to the Azuki Baba or Naiad. Not as difficult to deal with, but still a tough cookie. Tomorrow will be more research. I don’t want to go into this in any sort of blind.
June 6th, 2019
Okay. So this thing has been far from quiet. I did some pointed research into the area and I’m a little surprised that I’m the first one to tackle this hunt.
In the last two decades there’s been eight drownings at the lake and 16 disappearances in the state park. Couldn’t find any witness statements that would point toward something supernatural, but that number is certainly worrisome. On the website, the area is cautioned but not off limits to the public. Might look bad if any further official sanction of the disappearances and deaths had occurred. I guess it’s similar to telling people not to jump into a hot spring known to have a lethal concentration of CO2.
I’ve got an interview, under the guise of a local journalist, with Greg Yoltz, a local historian.
Sometimes things just aren’t written down. Hell, if you go back far enough, nothing was written down and everything was passed along by word of mouth. Heck, near on half my cases come to me via digital word of mouth.
June 7th, 2019
Greg was way more helpful than I expected. After I put my pen down last night, I resumed my web search for more information on the region. I turned up more disappearances dating almost back to the founding of the town.
Greg confirmed what I’d dug up and even provided me a couple of WIP history books for reference. He relayed to me that the lake was considered a sacred place by both the indigenous people of the area and the original settlers from Europe. He told me a story about a Nøkken who guards the lake. He said it would sometimes appear as an attractive young man with an instrument or a stark, white horse with even starker and darker eyes. Both would tempt interlopers down to the water’s edge and drown them.
Sounds like my kind of creature. Or at least the kind of creature that my particular profession will tackle.
June 8th, 2019
Going to head out there in the middle of the day. I’m leaving this with Kurt just in case with instructions to contact Dino.
Dino, if you’re reading this, bring more than:
A silvered knife (I’m packing my stiletto)
Shotgun with silver shavings
An iron club
I don’t expect this to go poorly, but it never hurts to be prepped. That was a lesson long taught by my mentor. Never underestimate and always overprepare.
Here goes nothin’.
June 9th, 2019
Firepower for the win.
I hiked out to the lake and the place is rather gorgeous. A body still enough to reflect the sky and trees perfectly with a number of water lilies dotting the shallows around the shore. Some might even call it idyllic. I had to walk around the lake a couple times before, on my third circuit, a young man with black eyes and a mandolin (Kurt got the guitar bit wrong) appeared by the shore.
He addressed me by name and when I asked it’s, it laughed at me, saying that names have power. I introduced it to the power of my shotgun.
The silver shavings did their job and I dragged the spirit’s surprisingly corporeal corpse out and double tapped with my stiletto and club just to make sure it wasn’t going to get back up. I also carried it well away from the water (lesson learned when the Azuki Baba came back).
I’m sure that there’s something to its statement about names. Maybe it’s tied into Fae or Faeries. I’ll do more research a little later in case another one pops up.
June 12th, 2019
Huh. If you know the name of a nøkken, you can break its grasp on you with just a word. Good thing to keep in mind, but no idea how to learn the spirit’s name.
Oh, and it stayed down. Two more trips out to the lake have confirmed that.
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