The first time Anna ever had to play the part of acting Queen was several years after her sister's coronation. Arendelle was being battered by the worst blizzard in living memory, the people all commanded to take what was needed and find shelter within the castle walls. Ballrooms and dining halls alike were filled with makeshift beds and playgrounds for the children. Everyone in the kingdom was pitching in to do their part, and Anna felt a great swell of pride for her people. She felt guilty that despite her providing shelter to them, the people were practically and happily managing themselves without her guidance. It made her feel a bit useless. They didn't really need an acting Queen at all.

Nonetheless, she threw herself into the chores and menial labor as much as she could in order prove she could at least do this much to help. Until the townsfolk chased her off with well meaning words, insisting it wasn't the job of royalty to scrub sheets or cut vegetables.

"Least of all in your condition, Princess." Anna closed her eyes to gather herself. She wasn't some fragile doll; she was a Queen. Only temporarily, but still. She left the hall where dozens of people were squabbling about how best to prepare the rations for dinner. She shook her head, simply grateful they were arguing about how to cook the rations instead of pressing for more. She wasn't sure how long the storm would last.

She strode purposefully through the halls, trying to tune out the inane small talk of the townsfolk posturing about Elsa and her baby. Wondering aloud if it would be a prince or a princess? Did Queen Elsa have a name picked out? If she birthed a girl, would the crown pass to Anna's son, Gunter? Would the child of a traitor ever be truly fit to take the throne? What if the child was... odd? If they took after their father they'd be untrustworthy; the people never did warm up to Hans. If they took after their mother would they be a monster? No one used that word within hearing distance of Anna, but they didn't show the same care around Kristoff, and he told her everything. The people wondered which they feared more. The child of a murderous, power-hungry man or that of a witch? There hadn't been such malice among the people since Elsa set off an eternal winter the day of her coronation.

Even then, it had been easily forgiven, the people eventually rejoicing in their queen's power and coming to see it as a blessing. Elsa had lost some faith among her subjects when she had taken Prince Hans as consort, regardless of any penance he might have paid, they didn't trust him. When Elsa had announced she was expecting there had been murmurs about Prince Hans' supposed contributions to their future ruler, but the people had been joyful for their Queen and kingdom all the same. Not a soul spoke ill of Elsa. Not until now. Not until this.

When Elsa had entered her third trimester, cold had settled into Arendelle despite the time of year. Just flurries and some morning frost at first, nothing concerning. It had only gotten worse as time passed by. Snow now covered Arendelle in a thick, sparkling blanket. Houses were buried to the windows, the castle doors frozen shut. The storm continued to rage. People stopped being happy about their Queen's pregnancy.

Anna placed a protective hand over her own round stomach. No one had spoken of Gunter taking the throne when he was born. No one had spoken about pushing Elsa or her magic from the throne before. It felt like a deep betrayal. Anna knew it was fear and hunger that made them say such things, but all the same it filled her with sorrow, anger, and a twinge of fear for her family.

She was worried about the line of succession, too. Elsa still had a month more before the baby was due, but she wasn't faring well. She was sick. Elsa was bedridden, delirious with fever, and not eating. Anna had glowed bright and healthy while carrying Gunter. Her labor had been trying, but rewarding. Her son, now four, was well worth the effort it took to bring him into the world. She had assumed it would be much the same for her sister. She had been horribly wrong. Elsa had gradually withered, scarcely gaining any weight despite everyone's attempts to make sure she stayed well fed and healthy. She'd grown weak and cold. She was so very cold. Anna couldn't understand how Elsa could be co cold when her fever was burning through her.

Elsa's powers crept over Arendelle slowly this time. Not like her coronation when Arendelle had swiftly plunged into Winter in a matter of hours, the initial storm calming, but the cold and snow staying. Now the snow and wind and ice were relentless. They could not be stopped. It had not been a matter of hours, or days, but weeks, and months. Winter took Arendelle slowly this time, but was unyielding in its ferocity. There would be no reprieve from the storm until Elsa made it so.

Anna worried at her lip. Would Elsa be able to make it stop, though? If Elsa passed in childbirth would the snow lift? If she lived, would she have the strength for it? She was too weak now, agonizingly insistent that she couldn't. Make. It. Stop. Anna tried not to think about what would happen if Elsa lost the baby. Love was the key to control. If Elsa lost her child, what would become of her heart? What would become of Arendelle?

It was a Queen's duty to prepare for everything. She always knew she'd hate being Queen. She was glad to let Elsa wear the crown and bare the burden. This whole situation is just proving her right as she stares at the door to the room she's been avoiding since Winter settled in to stay. She took a deep, harrowing breath, ignoring the way it shook as she exhaled.

Pushing the door open she was met with the man's back to her from where he sat on the simple bed. His red hair was overgrown and disheveled. His shoulders slumped in a way that was wholly unfamiliar to Anna and bore no resemblance to her mental image of him. Prince Hans looked defeated.

"I thought you were meant to be resting." Her voice is clipped. Her stomach churns. She hates talking to him.

"And I thought you were meant to be ruling in yours sister's stead. Doesn't a Queen have better things to do than to visit old friends?" His voice is mocking, dripping with implications and Anna can feel herself bristle.

She grinds her teeth together to hold back a retort. She's a terrible politician, she knows. Elsa always said she had too much temper, too much passion. She never made it sound like a bad thing, though.

"It is a Queen's job to take care of her kingdom. That includes evaluating potential threats and planning on courses of action accordingly."

"Oh, I'm a threat?" His voice tilts, almost disbelievingly. "Do tell, my Queen. How am I a threat?"

Anna eyes the crutches that lay at the foot of the bed. It doesn't look like he's touched them any time recently.

The acting Queen straightens her back. "Because you might try to claim the throne upon Elsa's death." She hates that she said it out loud. Hates acknowledging it as a possibility.

Hans goes rigid, and she feels internally gleeful that she said something that actually effected him. His tone more so than his words catches her off guard, "Has Elsa gotten worse?"

Anna wilts a bit at how his voice cracks on her sister's name.

"Nothing's changed. She's still alive, if not well." Anna cannot keep the truth from him as much as some bitter part of her wants to make him suffer. For once she is not only in literal control of their interaction, but she feels like she is, too. She's never truly felt like she had power over him before, regardless of any actual authority or title she possessed.

Hans visibly relaxes, if only slightly, and turns away from the window to face her. His eyes are dull, his face ashen. He looks hollowed out and worn, older than his years, but not wiser for it. Anna thinks that he and Elsa would make quite the pair right now. Like a picture of tragedy.

Hans deserves it. Elsa does not.

"I don't want the crown," he says. Anna rolls her eyes. She doesn't believe him no matter how many time he says it. "Can I see Elsa?"

"No." The answer is immediate, not worth thinking on. "You're on bed rest," she adds, a bit less harshly.

Hans had an accident of sorts on the day the lake froze several weeks earlier. His leg had been crushed, though Anna didn't believe his claims of a fallen tree landing on his leg. Kristoff had been with him, but was reluctant to be straightforward with Anna about what exactly happened. He did feed her enough clues to draw her own conclusions though. She was rather certain it had been crushed when the lake froze over too suddenly. Why Hans had been in or even around the lake was a complete mystery to her, but a lie told to keep Elsa happy was one she wouldn't call him out on.

Elsa had already become terribly ill by then, and thinking she'd hurt someone so much would have helped no one. Shortly thereafter the grievous injury had seemingly become infected and Hans had been stuck in bed as he gradually recovered. The frigid cold befalling Arendelle had done little to aid his recovery, but all the same he asked over Elsa and their baby frequently. Anna didn't want to indulge him, and Elsa hadn't asked, so she left him confined to his quarters.

Part of her knew Elsa wasn't lucid enough to ask after her him, that keeping them apart was a cruelty to her sister, but she hated the thought of them together. And she didn't trust Hans not to pull something. If Elsa had a boy, but passed away, Hans could try to take the throne, claiming himself regent until his son, Elsa's heir, came of age. She couldn't let that happen. She had to make it clear to him that she wouldn't.

"Elsa's alright for now, but I want to make it clear that in the event of her death, I will remain regent until her child comes of age. Should she lose the baby," Anna shuddered at the thought. The world couldn't be cruel enough to take their parents away and then to take Elsa and her baby as well. "Should she lose the baby and her own life, then I will remain regent until Gunter comes of age." She takes a breath, more sharply than she meant to, and chokes on it. "There is no version of events where you rule Arendelle for even a minute." She doesn't mention the possibility, however likely, that Elsa will lose the child. If that happens she doesn't know if 5here will be an Arendelle left to rule.

"Will you keep them from me? If Elsa doesn't make it, will you deny me our child?" His voice is hoarse, but there's a spark of challenge in his eye for the first time since she walked in.

He could easily manipulate a child, groom them to be his own puppet upon the throne, turn them against her and her own children. It would be a mistake to let him near the child without Elsa's strength or protection. Anna meets his gaze. "No. I won't."

He nods and Anna turns on her heel to leave the room. A moment before the doors slams behind her, she hears a quiet, "Thank you."

Anna hates Hans. She hates being Queen. She hates thinking about her sister dying. She hates that she has to deal with all of these things at once.

She strokes a hand over her belly, calming herself slowly. She resolves to try and help the townspeople with the chores again. If they won't let her help then maybe she'll find Gunter and play a game with him. Or maybe she could find Kristoff and-

"Anna!" Oh, there he is. Kristoff comes bounding at her from down the hall, wide eyed and panicking.

"Kristoff! What is it?" Olaf's screaming nonsensically behind him as he shuffles into view at the end of the hall from where Kristoff had presumably emerged. Anna tries to focus on Kristoff over the snowman's antics.

"It's Elsa! The baby! You need to-"

She's already moving, running full speed through the castle with no sense for propriety or courtesy as she crashes through the full castle halls to reach her sister. She knocks over several people, sends a basket of laundry flying, and jumps over a table that is being moved from one room to another for who cares why.

She's only just reached the East wing when she has to halt abruptly. There's thick ice rapidly forming all along the walls. It's creeping toward her and Anna can suddenly see her breath, feels her ears and nose chill. The temperature is dropping rapidly, but she to reach Elsa.

In the same moment that Anna thinks of her sister, Elsa's scream tears through the air, loud and desperate. Anna's heart drops. She gingerly tries to move forward across the ice slick floor.

"Don't worry, Elsa. I'm coming." She says quietly. She wishes she had gloves. Her fingers are so cold she's quickly losing feeling in them.

Another scream.

Kristoff catches up with Anna and begins helping her along. Olaf is spinning in circles on the ice around them, still jabbering away so fast Anna can't understand him. She can hear the storm getting worse outside, wind battering against and howling through the castle. Ice spikes are beginning to form on the ceiling and floor and walls all alike. It takes an agonizingly long time to reach Elsa's chamber. The door is, predictably, frozen shut and covered in about a foot of ice to boot.

Kristoff takes out a pick to start hacking away at it in an effort to reach the doors themselves.

Anna doubts it'll matter.

She sits down and listens to her sister's screaming. Anna rubs her hands together and curls up to try to keep herself warm. She was dressed in heavy layers, but it did little against the unnatural cold.

Anna thinks of all the things she loves and all the things she doesn't want to lose.

She sings quietly to herself to distract from the cold. Olaf calms and settles next to her. He just listens. Kristoff keeps working.

Hours later the screaming stops. Anna thinks her heart stops with it. Every horrible possibility starts running through her head.

Then the air begins to warm, the ice melting away, the feeling in her body returning. Anna jumps to her feet. On the other side of the door, a baby starts to cry.

She and Kristoff manage to get the door open after only few seconds of squabbling with each other. Inside stands a midwife who looks absolutely mortified, an infant swaddles in a rich green blanket in her arms. Anna can't really blame the poor girl for looking so petrified. There had been a doctor in the castle, but he had probably been frozen out when Elsa went into labor. Anna smiles momentarily at the child before her feet carry her to the side of the bed where Elsa is.

Her eyes are closed, and for a second Anna thinks the worst has come to pass, but then Elsa shifts, blinks her eyes open, and offers her sister a weak but very happy smile.

Anna clasps her sister's strangely cold hands in hers, ignores the chill that shoots up her arms from the contact. She focuses on the relief. Her sister is okay. The baby is okay. Everyone is okay.

Behind her Kristoff has taken the baby into his arms, cradling them gently to his chest.

"So?" He speaks. "What's the little one's name?"

Elsa's eyes slide away from Anna's and rest on Kristoff and her baby. Anna admires the way her eyes light up while looking at her child.

Her voice is still hoarse when she speaks, "Jack. His name's Jack."

AN: Found this in an old file. I have a half finished chapter for this story, too. I'm gonna wrap that one up and then decide if I'll go anywhere with this story.

Please enjoy! And thank you for reading. Feel free to comment, favorite, follow, or PM me for whatever reason.