[A/n] Did someone say betrayal? Because there's plenty to go around in this one-shot.
Hans might have been great at double-crossing, but this time, it seems that he's been beaten at his own game. Written for the Twelve Shots of Summer Challenge, where there's tea parties and one-shots galore, plus great constructive feedback! We also have cookies, because why not? Set near the end of Frozen, with a divergence from canon in one particular way.
Elsa stands in the freezing, bitter cold. She has escaped from her confines, but Prince Hans was right to keep her isolated. She's dangerous to the entire kingdom, and this curse threatens to destroy her and everything she has ever loved. Her remaining options are limited and hopeless. Will she climb back to her ice castle, tortured by the knowledge that her powers are the cause of this endless blizzard? Will she hide like a criminal from the soldiers hunting her until she is finally killed?
Whatever she does, she can't stay here. She must leave - otherwise she will die. Elsa lifts a hand to shield her face from the icy onslaught and sees Hans emerging from the blizzard toward her.
"Take care of my sister," Elsa says, hating the fact that this is farewell. "Please."
"Elsa," Hans says, and she registers genuine grief lining his features. "Elsa. Anna is dead - because of you!"
Elsa's eyes widen in complete shock, and her knees become unsteady. But she scarcely has time to comprehend what his words mean, for she hears a panicked plea floating above the snowy winds. Could that be Anna's voice, crying out for her?
"Anna!" Elsa cries, straining to find its source. She turns around, squinting in the snow and trying to find her sister. Panic floods through her as she desperately attempts to convince herself that the voice had been real, that Hans had been merely mistaken, that she could find Anna and apologize to her for everything...
Her gaze finally fastens on Anna, standing not too far away and holding her cape tight around herself in an attempt to keep warm. The icy wind whips at Anna's hair, and she looks as if she's freezing.
"Anna-" Elsa begins gratefully, but a sudden, enormous pain erupts in her side and she falls to her knees, nearly delirious with the white-hot torture flooding through her senses. Her hands instinctively clutch at her stomach and come back covered in blood. She stares down at the wound in her flesh, uncomprehending, as agony screeches through her body. She can scarcely muster up the strength to move, let alone speak.
Elsa tastes the blood in her mouth and attempts to piece together her pain-addled thoughts. Out of the turmoil, a single imperative dominates: she must warn Anna. But if Hans has fatally wounded Elsa, that can only mean terrible things...
Her face twists bitterly.
...he must be a traitor, Elsa realizes, a liar who probably has grand and evil designs for the throne. There's no way Anna is safe under his reign.
Elsa tries to scream, tries to tell her sister to run, but somehow her lips are frozen. Yet, Anna sees her through the storm and immediately rushes to her side.
"Run," Elsa manages in a strangled whisper, but she can't see Hans. There is only Anna, and Elsa's vision swims with icy stars. Surely she is dying, surely this is the end... "Anna, he'll..." she coughs, and blood blooms in crimson patches against the ice.
Anna clutches Elsa's hand in both of hers.
"Oh, Elsa," Anna says, and a sudden, uncharacteristic evil creeps across her features. "If only there was someone out there who loved you."
Elsa can't even react. Her lips move in soundless words, as if she's trying to find something to say, but her mind draws a horrendous blank. A crackling sound snaps in her ears, as if something has been set aflame. Her breath solidifies like a stone in her chest as Anna disentangles Elsa's feeble grip from her hands and stands. Anna does not even meet her gaze. Instead, she looks straight across at Hans.
"If...only...someone..." she hears Hans repeat.
"I thought I'd follow in your example," Anna says, her usual ditziness returning. "Just brilliant! Anyway, I'd call it the antithesis of a pick-up line, wouldn't you?"
"What are you doing here?" Hans demands. "Aren't you..."
"Dead?" Anna asks. "I think you mean to say dead, right?"
From the sound of it, Hans is speechless. Elsa can't blame him. No one saw this coming.
"Well," Anna says, just loud enough to be heard over the winds, "I don't look very dead, do I?"
"How are you still alive?" Hans demands. "You should be dead. You were struck in the heart, weren't you?"
"Please," Anna says with an exasperated wave of her hand. "You thought you were leaving me to die, that you had me trapped! As if it could have been that easy. Firstly, did either of you actually see me being hit in the heart with ice?" Elsa realizes that she hadn't been facing Anna when her magic had supposedly frozen her sister's heart. Is it possible that Anna had been lying about the whole business? Did that mean that she had journeyed to Elsa's ice palace, and faked a lethal hit to the heart?
"Hans, I'd suspected that your loyalty to me wasn't absolute," Anna says, shaking her head sadly. "As it turns out, I was right."
"No," Hans says, starting to realize that he has made a terrible, terrible mistake.
"I'm really sorry it turned out this way," Anna shrugs. "At first I thought you would make a great lackey when I became queen. But, Hans, first I had to check if you were actually a lovestruck fool. Which, um, you weren't."
Elsa can see Hans take a shocked step backwards.
"It was fun, though," Anna says, as if trying to make him feel better. "You have a great singing voice."
"You never...you never loved me?" Hans says, his voice fading into a whisper. He sounds as if he cares, but perhaps he's just trying to regain his footing after finding out that his 'helpless' victim had been the grand chessmaster all along.
"It could be a movie!" Anna laughs excitedly. "Two people pretend to fall in love with each other at first sight and proceed to strategize for control of the kingdom!" Her voice lowers. "Of course I didn't love you, silly! I'm really glad I didn't trust you completely."
Elsa can hardly believe what she's hearing. Anna, strategizing for control of the kingdom? Engineering this entire course of events just so she could ascend to the throne with Elsa safely out of the way? Manipulating Hans, who had sought to trick her? It's as if this Anna isn't her sister, the sweet-hearted, genuine young woman who Elsa had loved so dearly.
Anna's gaze drops. Elsa, lost in her pain, cannot believe that Anna regards this scene with such cold apathy. Did she never love me? Was it all an act?
"Oh, Elsa," Anna says.
"Anna," Elsa manages through clenched teeth. She can feel herself slipping, and the storm howls around them with renewed intensity.
"For all those years," Anna says. "For all those years, I knocked on your door and you didn't answer!"
Elsa squeezes her eyes shut, unwilling to think about what she has heard. Had she ever truly known Anna? She remembers their snowy playdates, and then the little girl knocking on her door, pleading to be let in. When they had entered their teenage years, the frequency of those interludes had plummeted. In fact, the night of the coronation had been the first time in years that Elsa had spoken to Anna, face-to-face. Perhaps the isolation had changed her. Perhaps being continually rejected by her own sister, being trapped in an empty castle all day with a gnawing resentment, had jaded and darkened Anna's personality. All Elsa had seen was that sunny, smiling Anna for a couple days, and she had believed in the façade wholeheartedly.
She has never known who her sister is. And that realization shatters her.
"No," Elsa whispers, feeling as if she might scream. "No."
"You've lost a lot of blood," Anna says. Meaning, it won't be much longer.
Anna has become this because of her, Elsa thinks. Had she opened the door, had she offered companionship when Anna needed it most, maybe it wouldn't have come to this. Elsa opens her eyes, and Anna stands still, transfixed by her sister's lucid blue gaze.
"I'm sorry," Elsa says.
And with that, the vicious gusts subside into nothingness. The snow collapses into watery lumps, the ice still unforgivingly solid. But there is no heat, no life, no joy in this transformation, merely a watery grey sun drifting above pale grey clouds. Elsa lies motionless on the ground. The dark red is a stark contrast against the eerie, pale ice.
"She's dead." Hans breathes, as if he had been expecting another outcome. His sword is bright with blood. "I...I killed her."
He gives a start at the sound of Anna's voice. "Guards!" Anna yells. "Guards!" Her voice is a sorrow-stricken wail, and now that the snowy torrent has passed and they are visible, her soldiers obligingly rush towards them.
"He..." Anna is suddenly sobbing, and Hans sees that she has knelt next to Elsa and is holding her blood-stained hand. "That man tricked you all," Anna cries, the picture of grief and vengeance. "He told you I was dead and tried to kill Elsa so he could be king! He's a traitor!" Hans blinks at the incriminating weapon in his hand, crimson with Elsa's blood, and knows that he has been sorely outmaneuvered.
And, as they all know quite well, the punishment for treason is death.
When Anna had first met Hans, she had thought him an easily controllable idiot. But really, once she had spotted the signs, it was obvious that he was nearly as clever as Anna herself. Coming up with the whole 'frozen heart' bit had required a good deal of ingenuity on Anna's part. Not only would it allow her to confirm her suspicions of Hans' treachery and eliminate him, but it also would provide her with a clear path to the throne.
Travel to Elsa's ice castle and get her sister suitably agitated. Stay far back enough to be able to dodge the oncoming snow blasts (this had been a bit tricky, but luckily she had managed). And then, sprinkle a bit of snow in her hair, feign being deathly cold, and there she was. She also had to persuade Kristoff to rush immediately for help and not stop by the trolls to confirm her malady, but that hadn't been too difficult. Once Hans thought he had her cornered, would he act to rescue her?
Just as planned, he had shown a streak of malevolence, an evil hardly befitting a possible servant. Nope, he wasn't suitable.
She had counted on the fact that if he were treacherous enough to abandon her in her supposed hour of need, he would also act hastily and get rid of Elsa as soon as possible. Two birds with one stone! He had been useful, certainly - she would have needed to arrange an 'accident' for Elsa if he hadn't been present, and that kind of business got very sordid very quickly.
And all along, he thought he had been the one betraying her! No, once he had shown his true nature, it was simple enough to dispose of him. If there was anything her childhood had taught her - a lifetime of staring at closed doors - it was this: do not trust anyone.
"Your Majesty."
Anna's heart nearly stops.
"Kristoff," she says, and without realizing it she rises from her throne.
She sees it all, from the way he stands and the way he averts his gaze. He knows what she has done. He genuinely believed her heart was frozen, and valiantly fought his way through the blizzard to bring her to 'safety.' But he had seen her, standing by in smug victory as her sister knelt to the ground in the last torment of death, and her eyes blazing with revenge and control as she ordered Hans' execution.
It has all gone as planned. Anna has been crowned queen, and there is no resistance to her reign. So far, she has ruled with a wise and gentle hand, being sure to open her doors and connect with her people.
The ends justify the means, Anna thinks. But here is Kristoff, a witness to her sins, and she knows she must deal with him somehow. She cannot conceive what foolish notions led him to appear before her - after all, in a moment of weakness Anna had managed to persuade herself to let him go so he could perhaps escape the kingdom.
"Kristoff-" she manages.
He shakes his head. Something in Anna's chest burns fiercely. Elsa had pretended to be a true friend for those few years and then abruptly turned against her, leaving Anna pleading at her door like a lost little puppy. And Hans had plotted to trick her for control of the kingdom, all while faking Love At First Sight. But Kristoff had stayed by her side, unerringly loyal, determined to help her achieve her goal throughout it all. And for that, Anna will reward him.
"Guards!" She orders. "Leave us. I would like to speak in privacy."
And with that, her armored guards nod and rush out of the room in obedience. Anna waits until all sound has faded, and then speaks. She tries not to notice the hurt in Kristoff's eyes.
"I'll let you live," she says, wrapping regal splendor around her demeanor. "If you swear that you will not betray me."
Kristoff's mouth presses into a thin line. "I just wanted to tell you," he begins, "that you are not the Anna I thought you were. And that...I think it's despicable. What you've done." Anna feels as if she has been dealt a punch to the gut, and she fights for air. Despicable. "You know," Kristoff says, his voice rising, "some silly part of me wanted to see if it really was you, if the Anna I traveled across Arendelle with had become queen by killing her own sister and fiancé!"
"I didn't-" Anna says, breathing hard, as if perhaps trying to persuade herself. "I didn't. He planned to manipulate me and he left me for dead - and she cast me out and refused to speak to me - it's not my fault!"
"That doesn't change what you did," Kristoff says emphatically.
"Do you think being locked up in a castle all day with no one for company - and your sister, your childhood companion, suddenly refuses to talk to you for twelve long years - and your parents look pained each day, as if there's a terrible secret they cannot bear to tell you - and you're all alone save for the occasional servant who tiptoes around you, as if you're in a jail - do you think that is normal?"
"Uh, no?" Kristoff volunteers.
Anna lets out a breath. "Right. I needed to become queen, to make sure that the doors of my palace will never be shut to the kingdom again." At least, that is what she tells herself to fend off the darkness that curls around her soul, the never-ending whisper that haunts her in her waking dreams. Anna, you wanted power - after being endlessly trapped, you rose at the opportunity for control. Your heartless sister could never rule. No, you must be queen instead.
She knows what the right thing to do is: obviously, she should quickly declare Kristoff a traitor and have him killed before he can pose any further threat. But somehow, she tells herself that she must give him one last chance, just as she had done for Hans, and Elsa...well, Elsa had twelve years worth of second chances.
"Think what you might about my actions," Anna says. "But I have become queen, and you were loyal to me when I most needed it. And for that, I offer you a position as the kingdom's official ice-deliverer, and perhaps, if you wish, even as a royal consort. I must have your word, though-"
" - I can't serve you," Kristoff blurts. "I'm sorry."
Anna blinks down at him, hurt. Then why had he come? "You can't?"
"No," Kristoff repeats. He's still reeling from the shock of it, that the lighthearted girl from his memories could ever have become this manipulative queen. But she hasn't transformed; she has merely shown who she was all along. The other Anna - the one he had loved - was a sham, a mere pretense to obtain the throne.
Anna stares at him for a long moment.
"You have betrayed me," Anna says finally.
"No," Kristoff says, much more bravely than he feels, "You betrayed us all."
"Leave," she says, and she doesn't realize that her voice is barely holding back tears. "Leave. Before I change my mind."
He does.
But the fear, the guilt, the horror, the horror! ...
... that never will.
Fin