I was born in a cloud...
Now I am falling.

Elsa, the first child of the King and Queen of Arendelle, was born, as you might not expect, on the hottest day of the year. In a distant part of the castle, nestled into the coolest, darkest room they could manage, Elsa's mother, the Queen, still could not find solace from the heat inside of her.

She'd always been warm blooded, the Queen, enjoying horse riding through summer fields and swimming in the crystal blue fjords as a child. She was a woman of light, outspoken and feisty, everything her calm, gentle husband was not.

After the midwife had cleaned tiny Elsa up, she was pressed into her mother's arms, murmuring softly as babies always do, eyes shut tight against a world she knew nothing of quite yet. When the Queen pressed her lips to Elsa's tiny cheek, the flesh stung like the shock of an ice cube against one's skin when you're not expecting it.

Elsa's little finger reached up to swipe blindly at her mother's lips, frosting her chin in a thin layer of ice. The midwives and servants jumped back in recognition, now afraid to the touch the child they believed to be cursed.

The Queen's face split into a grin, laughing at how wonderful it was to stare down at her baby girl and see in her a gift, a power not so different from her own mother's.

The others in the room, noting the Queen's joyful reaction, chose to accept the child as she was and ran to fetch the King so that he too could share in these first moments with his wife and daughter.

The King had known of the gift, which ran in his wife's bloodline, but had never seen the effects in person. He had only heard stories of the beautiful, misunderstood mother-in-law who was dead long before he'd ever met his lovely, kind, but ordinary wife.

"She looks like her, Mother who I miss so much, who was always cold to the touch, but gentle, so gentle." She went on whispering to herself, as she looked down at her daughter- just the same, beautiful, beautiful.

The King was worried. His worst fear had been realized, a child cursed with the powers of deep winter, who could grow to be ostracized and murdered like his wife's mother, or worse, a villain herself. He'd prayed, spent months fantasizing about a little boy or girl with dark hair and fair eyes, who might marry a handsome prince or princess and live the life a child of a King and Queen might deserve.

Instead was this beautiful daughter with blonde hair like snowdrifts upon the crown of her head, exhaling steamy December breath in the midst of July. She was unique and the King was compelled to love her as all fathers love their children, but he feared for her and for his currently ignorant kingdom that might one day seek to destroy or worship her. Most of all, he wanted her to be happy and safe at all costs. The Queen wanted the same and when the time came for Elsa to take the throne she vowed to tell her all about her own mother, who, before her untimely death, had discovered the secrets behind the gift's origins and purposes.

She smiled again, handing her baby carefully over to the midwife who handled her now more like a precious crystal bowl than an infant. She placed her in the basinet by the window, which looked out at a piercing blue sky, not unlike the irises that remained closed for a little while longer to the truth of their existence, which did not know hot from cold, love or hatred, power or weakness…just yet.

See how they resemble one another
Even in their plastic little covers

Anna was born three years later in different circumstances. It was April and all the kingdom was burning green, gold, red, and blue and the breeze that rushed through the streets and forests of Arendelle brought with it the first hints of Spring's warmth, glowing in the relieved faces of Arendelle's subjects who had been dealing with mysteriously long and severe winters the last few years.

She came quickly and loudly, screaming and crying her way into a world that was so happy to see her flushed cheeks and strawberry blonde hair. She squirmed in the arms of the midwife, grasping at the fabric of her dress tightly and yanking with all the strength of three infants.

The Queen knew already that she was stubborn. She also knew that this girl was not like her first. She was warm with sweaty little palms that reached out to grasp the Queen's.

"Bring them in, I want them to meet little Anna. They're going to adore her."

Elsa came bounding in before her father who smiled crookedly at his wife who gazed back as if to share a secret. This one is warm. She will not suffer for nothing. Little Elsa who was strangely graceful even at three years old climbed atop her mother's bed, pressing her cool hands against her hip, and stared down at her baby sister nestled into the Queen's chest.

"Mama, what's her name?"

"Anna- short, but beautiful"

"She just looks short to me! Are babies always so tiny?"

Elsa giggled and the sound seemed to lull baby Anna to sleep. The King had come to stand beside the three girls, responding while teasingly mussing up his daughter's perfectly braided hair: "No. Not always. After all, you were quite massive my dear, nearly crushed poor Gerta with a stomp of your pudgy little foot."

Elsa turned her best faux-glare on him, all the while reaching around for the baby girl's hand. Elsa, who'd been born with a gift (or a curse— depending on who you asked) didn't know what the appeal of heat was. In the dead of winter, her favorite time of year, she didn't even bother to have her fireplace lit. She would've happily slept outside in the snow every night. No, Elsa had never really gotten why people looked forward to steaming tea and summer weather until she cupped her sister's hand in her own.

"Elsa, darling, Anna means gracious."

"Mama, what does gray-shus mean?"

"It means that now that I've named her Anna, she is destined to be beautiful and kind."

"Okay, then what does Elsa mean?"

"Well sometimes words are complicated, even names. To me, Elsa means truth and strength. You were a very strong baby when my belly swelled with you and I hope that your name will always give you strength and the courage to be honest."

"I would never lie to either you or Papa."

"I know darling, it is my hope that one day when you're grown that you have the strength to be honest with yourself."

The King, all the while, stood by observing the conversation. His wife's words were enough to bring shiny tears to his eyes, this day resembling so much the day of Elsa's birth when his fears and anxieties began with no seeming end in sight. The King loved his daughters and vowed to raise them in acceptance of the other. Anyway, Elsa's powers were hardly a problem as he once thought they'd be. The girl was able to turn glasses of water into frozen cylinders, but that was about it. There was an incident with a large bathtub turned amateur indoor sledding arena, but that could be overlooked. His little girl was happy and okay with her curse, accepting it as part of her reality and blissfully unaware of what damage it could do to the people around her and, more importantly, herself.

He told himself that Anna would know of Elsa's powers. She would be raised loving and accepting of her family, regardless of their faults. Anyway, Elsa's powers were nothing like he imagined they would be. They were safe, even a bit juvenile, nothing to worry about just yet.

Author's Note: Hello! This fic should be interesting, more emphasis on Elsa's character development, but I'm gonna try to tackle both sisters. The first few chapters are mostly going to deal with their early childhood, then the next few will deal with the revelation of Elsa's powers as bad and dangerous and then it will actually follow through on the plot of the film and what comes after. It's primarily a character piece, but it will be Elsanna eventually. I just love these characters so it should be fun to write this. Updates might be a bit slow cause a bitch has gotta get a university education, ya feel me? Anyway, yeah there will be Kristoff/Anna, Hans/Anna, Chocolate/Elsa, Marshmallow, Olaf, OCs, eventually M rated (so no kiddies- incest ahoy). Most importantly, I'll be exploring Elsa's gift/curse and its origins and meanings waaaay more than the film does.

The title of the fic is from a song of the same name by Bon Iver called Blood Bank.

Subtitles from Snowflake by Kate Bush / Bloody Bank by Bon Iver

xx A