The pain was excruciating.
"Hans !" she shrieked as loudly as her voice could, eyes shut close, as to make sure she would be heard by whoever's fate had told them to pass nearby.
A broken promise for a broken promise.
She glanced down at her blood-stained stomach that had left a streak of the reddish substance on the snow behind her as she crawled with the help of her slender arms to save her own life.
(Who else would save her if she wouldn't ?)
"Hans..." she breathed out and ceased to move as if her strengths had suddenly gone away from her frail body and disappeared forever.
It would not take long before the Queen's demise.
(Hans.)
His name sounded salty on her tongue, an unheard cry for help, a plea that would go unnoticed and unanswered unless someone whose name it luckily was would be wandering around here. The hope burned the corner of her lips each time she pronounced thatname.
You're no match for Hans.
(He wouldn't allow them to accomplish their bloody task.)
She tried to keep on staring forward. She couldn't just look back, or the past would catch up on her and swallow her until she was completely forgotten. She would be stuck into neverending oblivion.
(But isn't it everybody's fate ?)
She coughed and looked at her wound. It gave her nausea and a irrepresible urge to throw up as she was losing more and more blood, and grew weaker as the seconds fled away.
(It will not take long before the Queen's demise.)
A halo of bright light encircled him as heappeared in front of her in a saint-like manner, and she thought it might be an angel that had come down on this dreaded place on earth to take her soul away with him. Or was it a demon sent by the devil itself ?
She caught herself wondering whether he was truly there or if she was imagining all of this. He couldn't possibly be there, could he ?
Elsa...
"Don't let me go, Hans... please..." she peaded in a whisper that sounded so painful yet quite empty, like it was meant to never leave her mouth.
Her arms absent-mindedly reached out before her, hoping to be able to grab some parts of him, and elbow, an ankle, a wrist would be enough, just so she would at last be sure he wouldn't be leaving her anytime soon. But truth to be told, she already knew she would only catch the emptiness of the cold air winter blew against her so porcelain-like skin.
"Take me with you Hans... you can't just leave me like that !" she cried out, still she tried to control her voice not to betray herself. "Is that a proper way to treat the woman you claimed to love all along ?"
But as she expected it although she wouldn't admit it, it went unanswered, more like a rhetorical question than some to which he would respond.
The Queen's demise...
"You promised me, Hans !"
(And her throat was dry from screaming and aching from the biting air that penetrated it to her lungs.)
If only she could let the blinding light embrace her and take her away from that dreaded place she had found herself in without even being able to understand how.
"It'll be just you and I... only the two of us..." she whimpered, and there he was, his warm hand cupping the side of her face, that genuine smile upon his so handsome features, a mere inch away from her.
Oh how she longed for the kiss. The kiss that never came.
She couldn't repress the urge to curse herself for falling irrationally for those 'so handsome features' and that smile of his, internally knowing that if she hadn't, she wouldn't have put herself into this mess to begin with. But she had and she'd be lying if she said she hadn't lived her happier moments by his side.
A long life isn't worth living if it isn't spent with you, he had whispered, not expecting her to listen since she was supposed to be sound asleep already.
A warm blow caressed her jawline, and she was aware by this moment that it was all she was going to receive, and God did she think her heart might explode from beating this fast ! A violent shuver ran down her spine, and she remembered he was the only one who could make her shudder.
There I believed the cold never bothered you,anyway.
Her heart - if it was even still there - shattered into pieces while he started to fade away uncontrollably, deaf to her pleas and her heart-splitting cries.
Beware the frozenhearts.
She gritted her teeth.
Bastards. (Except you.)
She couldn't allow them to find her. She wouldn't be the one to let them put an end to her reign. She wouldn't be the one to let her realm fall into their mischievous hands.
She wasn't the perfect little Queen they expected her to be. She had never been anything near that. Still her people assumed she was good enough for the throne, since she had spent her whole life studying, alone, in that empty, icy room of hers, readying herself to take her parents' role when the time came. She had never thought it would come this soon. The Council had never seen any reason to give the throne to anybody else - thanks to the education she had received from her parents - so she fitted well for them, but not enough for others.
You'll fall from your pedestal, My Queen. I will personally make sure you will.
(The wicked, cursed, sorceress.)
Those didn't want the powerful Snow Queen to run the kingdom. Not a person who could kill them all with a flick of her hand. They wanted her harmless, but she wasn't. And she would most likely never be.
Now you shall never lay a foot outside of that so precious castle of yours without covering your asses, Your Grace, or you're irremediably bound to get hurt. Don't say I didn't warn you.
They used to keep on repeating thatshe wasn't the problem, that they simply needed a King to perfrom his duties, his authority, because they obviously wanted a couple of monarchs to rule the kingdom properly. Accorded to all of these narrow-minded men, it seemed impossible for anyone to possibly love her back, if it wasn't for her kingdom, or for her incredibly stunning body
I still am your Queen, and nothing gives you the right to speak that way of me !
and that she wouldn't accept to marry for the sake of the realm since he was there. (They could still arrange that, he had mysteriously said, a wide evil grin spreading its way on his lips.)
You can't rule such a huge and prosperous kingdom on you own with such little experience, my Queen. You undeniably need a King by your side, and I'm not talking about a traitor such as him.
(It certainly will not take long.)
Overmy dead body.
She had had to think quickly before they'd force her into a marriage with some Prince that would mainly be interested in her realm or be wishing to fulfil his most lustful desires with her.
Stop worrying that much, Elsa, they are no match for us as long as we remain together.
(He wouldn't allow them to lay a single finger on her, whatever it might take.)
She lifted her shaky fingers at her temples. Her mind was devoid of any clear thought, but she still understood.
That was not his blood.
The cut was deeper than she had assumed. The liquid had trickled down her cheeks like teardrops she hadn't been able to shed yet. And the pain was excruciating, her head throbbing, her vision blurred.
She leaned her face closer to the immaculate snow and rested it against it, and it soon took the dark red color of her blood. She closed her eyes and waited, her muscles sore. What she waited for, she hadn't got a clue, but all she could notice was how numb she felt.
Good night, Admiral Freckles.
You need a husband who can satisfy you both in the kingdom's stuff and grants your wishes in your private life.
(Did he even think of something else but that sometimes ?)
I may be the man you need, my Queen.
It's Queen Elsa, to you. she had coldly reminded him.
(The Queen's demise.)
"Over here !" a disembodied voice yelled, and it seemed to be so faraway from her.
She fluttered open her eyes only to see her fingers covered with her blood, just like the snow underneath.
She feared her heart might stop beating, but it was the only thing she could still hear. Whatever was going to happen, she liked to convince herself it would be for the better.
Voices became closer, whispers, shouts, people talking in low-voices as to make sure she couldn't figure out what they were saying. It was of no use, they could have been screaming near her, no sound could be louder than the uninterrupted sound of her beating heart. Still one could could be heard among the othres.
"Don't touch her !" it said. "She's mine."
(He had waited for far to long to let them do the nasty job.)
It shall not take long...
... before the Queen's demise.
His footsteps pounded in her ears as he approached her.
"Well, well, well..." he snorted, his blood-stained sword in one hand. "Looks like the job hasn't been finished yet."
He stood so close. Too close for her liking. Far too close for her safety. But who was she kidding, she knew this was going to happen.
He brought the tip of his sword to the cut on her forehead, and she winced in pain, clenching her jaw and she glanced up at him and noticed the wide smirk curling his lips.
"So, where's your Charming Prince, my Queen ?" he mocked, feigning concern. "I don't see him anywhere nearby."
Their laughter was so unpleasant to hear. Her vision was blurred by the tears she shed out of pure pain.
"Fine. I'll take care of her, now go take care of him. I think I can handle her myself." he ordered, dismissing the other men who walked away muttering to themselves.
He spun around and stalked to her, staring, his sickening satisfied smile still upon his lips. She gave a small push to elsa's head with his toe, earning a painful moan from her as she gripped a handful of snow.
"Is it painful, my Queen ?" he mockingly asked and laid his foot on her cheek, burying it a little more in the snow.
Get away from your Queen, you bastard !
(His voice was strong and full of ire when he rescued her. Why did the Queen cry back then ?)
"Didn't I tell you that I'd make sure you'd fall from that pedestal of yours, Your Grace ?"
He seathed his sword back in place and knelt down beside her, landing his fingers on her jawbone and rubbing it lightly.
(She would not be calling for death to seize her and take her away, she wouldn't die as a coward, but as someone who fought for the sake of her people.)
"Things didn't have to go that way. If you could've only loved me, everything might have been easier, My Queen. This didn't originally have to happen."
Elsa ? My love...
(It didn't take long before the Queen's demise.)