All and Nothing

Author's note: I wrote it 'cos I ship it, and because I wanted to write an epic worthy of the ship. Not much to say beyond that. It's going to get grim and will likely stay that way so be warned.

…

Chapter 1

…

If you'd asked Elsa what brought her out onto the open water in the middle of the night in question, she wouldn't have had an answer. On mild summer nights she frequently had trouble sleeping, and without any paperwork or delegation to occupy her time with she usually patrolled the castle restlessly. She rarely left the castle, unless it was to cross the courtyard or sit by the fountain watching the stars.

That night, a perfectly normal night with a half-moon in the sky and a mild wind ruffling the tower pennants, something like a small, indistinct whisper drew her attention to the ocean. The waves were miniscule, the water like dark rippling glass clear as a mirror. The impulse hit her hard. She took so few risks with her powers, even now with the 'incident' long past… what could a little excursion hurt? Before she knew it, she was out of the castle and tiptoeing across the beach, looking around in case anyone saw. Not that anyone would have said anything, even if she had been seen, but old habits were hard to break.

The first step onto the water tore an excited little giggle from her. When she'd ran across the fjord before she'd barely registered what she'd done, so consumed by her fear and panic, but deliberately freezing the water – for fun, no less – so she could walk across it was about as close to an act of rebellion as she was likely to get. The ice she made was only a few inches thick, and shifted as she moved her feet so that she didn't so much step across the surface as glided. The brightest stars twinkled in the reflection of the water, and underneath the murk she spotted the flickering of fishes fleeing from her footsteps.

She was half a mile out before she realized it, and stopped there to gaze at the moon and breathe in the sharp salty air. The cold refreshed her, blew the cobwebs from her brain as one of her advisors was fond of saying. The heat made her feel sluggish and irritable, the crisp marine breeze was the perfect medicine. She titled her head back, closed her eyes and filled her lungs with the stinging chill.

Suddenly, Elsa felt a presence tugging at her, a whisper on the wind. Half a mile out at sea, who could have been there? But sure enough, when she looked behind her, there was a small boat, caught in the spaces between the icicle stepping stones she had created. She hesitated, unsettled by its sudden appearance, though it looked to be empty. And yet, the pull towards the little boat felt almost physical, as though an invisible rope had been looped through her temple and was getting tighter.

Slowly, she approached it. It wasn't like any boat she'd seen made in Arendelle; it looked like the shell of some enormous insect, round and shiny-hulled and covered with a sheet of leather. All over it was carved with strange interlocking symbols. Elsa repressed a shiver; symbols could mean magic, and even a hint of magic not her own made her nervous. Nevertheless, she drew up beside the boat, pulled back the leather and peered inside.

And even through her shock, horror and confusion, she felt a sensation wrap around her heart akin to burning.

There was a girl in the boat. Or the remains of a girl. Curled up like a wounded animal, dressed in a tattered white gown and so pale the only part of her that didn't blend in with her dress was the brilliant shock of red hair splayed out across the inside of the boat. Irregular dark stains across the front of the gown could only have been blood. The broken shaft of an arrow protruded from her upper arm, and another from her calf. She didn't appear to be breathing.

Elsa let out a shuddering breath.

"Oh, you poor…" she began, leaning over the boat, but she couldn't finish. Not knowing what to do, she reached over to brush the girl's hair away from her eyes.

As soon as her fingers touched the girl's skin, the girl woke with a pained gasp. Elsa let out a little scream and fell backwards, only stopped from falling clear into the sea by her panic conjuring a sheet of ice to break her fall. She clambered back to her feet and held the side of the boat, watching the very much alive girl take deep wheezing breaths and struggle to move. She was mumbling something high pitched and frantic, could have been her native tongue or just delirious rubbish for all Elsa could tell.

Elsa reached into the boat to grasp the girl's wrists, to hold her still. The girl's eyes fluttered open and peered at her through her matted hair.

"Stay still," Elsa commanded with an authority she pulled from the very reaches of her being. Truthfully, she felt as helpless as the girl in the boat. "Don't move around, you'll hurt yourself. I'll help you."

It was impossible to tell if the girl understood what she was saying, but she stilled. She held Elsa's gaze for a moment that seemed to stretch for hours.

"So blue…." Elsa thought absently.

Then the girl's eyes rolled back in her head and she slumped further into the boat. Elsa held her wrists for a moment, feeling her thread pulse beat against her fingers, pondering the best course of action.

And though common sense, which in Elsa's head sounded an awful lot like Advisor Holm, dictated that she should leave the boat where it was until the coast watch could be sent to investigate it, she got behind the boat and pushed it to shore herself.

…..

At dawn Elsa was watching the sun cast shadows over the hallway outside the guest room as she waited for the doctor to emerge when Anna came charging down the corridor in her usual excitable flurry. She was even more frenzied this morning, her hair sticking up like it was trying to escape from her head, wearing one slipper and no robe. She flopped into the chair beside her sister and gripped her shoulder as if trying to physically leech the information out of her.

"Tell me everything!" she demanded, grinning eagerly. As with most important things, Anna missed the gravity of the situation entirely.

"There's not much to tell," Elsa told her. "I found a boat, there was a girl in the boat, she's injured, so I brought her back here and called the doctor."

"Aw, come on! That can't be all there is!" Anna moaned, tugging at her hair in frustration. "Where do you think she came from?"

"I don't know."

"How did she get injured?"

"No idea."

"Is she gonna be okay?"

"The doctor hasn't said anything yet…"

"What were you doing out there anyway?"

"I…." Elsa hesitated. "I was getting some air."

"You were, like, a mile out at sea!"

"Half a mile. And who told you that?"

"I heard the servants talking. Everyone's talking about it."

Elsa groaned and rubbed at her temple. So much for her peaceful little ocean stroll.

"Did she look really bad?" Anna asked, with a concerned glance at the closed bedroom door. For all her awkwardness, she was a caring little soul.

"I thought she was dead," Elsa said quietly. "She looked dead."

They sat in silence for a while, before Anna excused herself to get dressed. She promised to bring Elsa some coffee and pastries to maintain her vigil with. She'd been gone less than ten minutes when the doctor finally emerged.

He was grim-faced and tired, wiping his hands with an iodine-soaked cloth. The front of his apron was splashed with blood and other fluids and Elsa couldn't help staring as he removed it. She pulled him into her study to discuss the patient.

"How much do you want to know, or will I just leave the report?" he asked her. As the royal physician, and the man who had delivered both princesses, he was used to speaking to the royal family as an equal.

"Give me the basics, please. I'll read the report later," she said.

"She'll make a full recovery, but slowly," he began. "She's malnourished, of course, and dehydrated. I removed two broken arrows from her arm and leg, neither wound was infected so I suspect she was cleaning them with sea water. One other arrow wound on her torso, a near miss. Early stages of frostbite on her fingers and toes. Broken ribs already in the process of healing when she was put out to sea, lash marks across her back."

When he stopped his listing, Elsa let out a breath.

"She was running from something," he said with an air of the macabre. "And whatever it was, it got a few good licks in before she got away."

"Yes," she agreed. "Well, at least she's safe now."

"Safe?" the doctor chuckled without humour. " My queen, perhaps making an enemy of the person who did this would not be a wise idea."

"I do not believe you've been added to my roster of advisors, Doctor," she told him stiffly. He raised his eyebrow, but held his tongue.

Just then, Anna reappeared with the coffee and pastries she'd promised, and the doctor took his leave. The sisters ate together, then Elsa claimed she was going to catch up on her sleep. Anna skipped away to find Kristoff, or Olaf, or just plain mischief.

Before she left for her quarters, Elsa tiptoed into the spare room to check on the injured girl.

The tattered dress had been cut off of her and replaced with a clean blue nightgown, which did a lot to make her look more alive. Against the starched white sheets the dark circles under her eyes stood out so much more, and the hollows in her cheeks. If one looked closely they could map out the veins under her skin. Her hair, though, was magnificent, freshly washed by whoever had dressed her and bright as flame, lying in long cascading spirals across the pillows. Before she even knew she was doing it, Elsa had threaded her fingers into the damp mass and was gently playing with it.

The girl breathed deeply and turned her head towards Elsa's hand. Elsa snatched it away as though she'd been burned, cheeks flushing pink, and took herself off to her bedroom.