The door creaked ever so slightly as the Doorward pushed it open spilling light into the Queen's study as Elsa looked up from the papers spread out before her. Anna stepped through the portal, a smile appearing on her face as she saw her sister. Elsa looked back down to her papers. The study was her father's, shelves lined the walls and were filled with books, light filtered in through the window that filled the final wall, even so Elsa had beside her a candle casting her in an orange hue and turning her hair to spun gold.

She listened to the door close and heard the footsteps of her sister approach.

"How long have you been in here?"

"An hour or so," the queen said back, "At most."

Anna glanced at the candle beside her sister, the butlers replaced the candles nearly every night, this one was nearly guttering out, "Oh, okay…" She pulled a chair over from one of the sitting tables and sat next to her sister, "Elsa, when was the last time you went outside?"

"This morning," she said not looking up.

"I don't mean the garden, or the balcony. I mean out into town. Out the gates"

"Anna, please, I don't have time for this."

"When?"

The queen sighed, "When we had that party, wasn't it? We made a festival ground in the square."

"That was my birthday" Anna said.

"Yes, that's it."

"That was two months ago, Elsa"

"Hmm," Elsa's attention was already back firmly on the papers. Anna leaned over to look at them. A bunch of official looking letters, and off to the side were maps. She sighed and got up, "Come on, Elsa, let's go out, let's take a walk! Anything, you're spending so much time in here."

Elsa jerked her arm away from her sisters grasp, "No, Anna. I have work to do."

"But Elsa-"

"These trade papers are not going to go over themselves, Anna. I need make sure they're in our best interests, I need to approve them…" she trailed off as she looked over a map, seeing how far away one trade partner was from another.

"Don't we have Eddard for this?"

"Mom and Dad aren't here anymore, Anna. I need to know how these things work before I can have someone else do them, Anna"

"But right now? Come on, Elsa."

"Anna, enough! We can't all just dance through life like you and your, your boyfriend!"

Taken aback, the princess was speechless. The queen stared at her sister before turning back to the table and the trade agreements. A few moments passed, the only sound that of the girls breathing and the faint sound of a finger moving over parchment.

"You can go now, Anna."

Elsa watched her sister leave the room before looking out the window. Smoke rose from bakeries, she could almost hear people yelling from the markets. With a sigh she went back to her papers.

Stepping out of the room, Anna sighed to herself and turned to the Doorward, "Gregory, How long has she been in there?"

"All day, your highness. We've had to replace the candles twice."

"I just don't know what to do," Anna said. On either side of the princess sat an animated snowman and a reindeer. All three stared into the water, "She's shutting me out again, Sven. She's locking herself up and I can't bring her out again."

She looked at the reindeer, empathetic eyes stared back, "Maybe you should leave her alone?" Sven said.

Anna looked behind her to Kristoff, and made a face, "What? No. She should be out here with us!"

Kristoff shrugged, "In my experience if people don't want to talk about these kinds of things, it's just best to let them be. That's what I'd want."

"You'd shut yourself up and want to be left alone?"

"Uhh yeah?"

Anna made another face, got up, and started walking along the pier, arms outstretched as she balanced on the edge, "We have got to get her out of there."

The girl swayed, arms waving and fell back, into the man's arms. She looked up into his face, "Maybe she just needs some time. Let her get there on her own, you know?" said Kristoff.

"I just need to find out what's wrong with her."

"Well the first time she was out with people she got run out of town," Olaf piped in.

"But she came back after that," said Anna.

"It's not really something you could get over that quickly," Kristoff said, "How long ago did you say she started locking herself in her room?"

"Ever since we were little…" the girl trailed off, looking at her feet, before her head jerked up, a smile on her face, "We just have to show her that she shouldn't be scared of people!"

"We should just leave her be, Anna"

"I think Anna's right; sometimes people need help with these things. When it happened to me I couldn't have gotten through it without my friends."

The pair stared at the snowman, "How long were you wandering around before we found you?" Kristoff finally asked.

"About a day" the snowman said with a smile.

"Olaf's right. We need to help her with this."

The ice harvester shook his head, "Anna, you're listening to a snowman, remember our talk about bad decisions?"

"Olaf's practically family!"

"He is?"

"I am?"

"Of course," Anna knelt down to Olaf, "I always thought she was just scared of hurting me."

"People are always scared of being hurt themselves," he said back.

"So we should find someone that Elsa knows won't hurt her."

The pair of them looked at Kristoff.

"Hey hey. No. I say we leave her alone. You should do it, Anna. She's your sister."

"She already knows I love her, Kris. It has to be someone else."

"Anna…"

"Pleeeeeeease?"

The palace garden was in bloom, the tulips swayed in the faint wind the scent wafted along the halls of the palace. Purples streaked with yellows, whites with reds, and in a specific patch, orchids, tulips, anemone, hydrangea and carnations, all a faint light blue like ice.

Elsa smiled as she smelled the flowers. Anna had planted them under her room's window after the coronation. She breathed in their scent and her mind was filled with the thought of Anna digging in the dirt, planting the bulbs and plants herself.

Oh Anna.

Elsa wasn't sure of this whole plan of hers. 'A day off' was how she described it. Anna would take care of any petitions, of any problems and she wouldn't take no for an answer, no matter how much Elsa had protested. So here she was, waiting in the gardens debating going out or going back inside.

She took another lap around the garden, smoothing out the dark blue skirt she'd worn. Leaving her work and going out into town? She felt more like Anna than herself. Now that she thought about it that might be the only reason she was out in the garden.

Maybe she should go back in, make sure Anna knew about how to-

"Good morning, Your Majesty"

It was her Ice Master and Deliverer. That's right, she was going to be chaperoned. Make sure she didn't just come back in.

She hadn't met the man often, maybe two or three times. His courtship of Anna was the talk of the town, if the maids were to be believed.

"Oh uh… Kristoff," she took her hand away from the door as the man strode into the garden.

"You ready?" he asked. Elsa nodded and the pair walked to the garden's street exit. Just before leaving Kristoff stopped, "Oh, wait, almost forgot. Can't take a break if everyone knows you're the queen." He reached into the pack slung over his shoulder and pulled out a long purple scarf, almost large enough to be a shawl.

He swung it over her, wrapping it around her head and tying it into a loose knot under her chin. "Oh… " the overall look was like a bonnet. She did her best to hide the surprise at the overly familiar gesture, "uh, thank you" She stared at the man as he pushed the gate open, he looked back.

Watching her glance back to the castle Kristoff sighed, "Look, I was against this from the start, it's all Anna's idea. I'm not gonna stop you if you want to go back inside."

A day where she wasn't queen? Anna could use some help, what if something came along and she didn't know what to do?

"Are you coming?"

She shoved he hair under the shawl and scurried out the gate.

Outside the gate somehow the world seemed brighter, people moved here and there, from building to building or simply along the streets. Seeing that the garden gate was open a boy and a girl ran up to them.

"Is the palace garden open?"

"Er, yes. Of course." Elsa said, looking at the children. A blond youth and a raven haired girl, they both cheered at the news and pushed past her and into the garden.

"Pretty nice disguise, right?"

"They didn't even know who I was, did they?"

"That's kind of the point," he said back. He nudged her shoulder, "Come on."

He doesn't care that I'm the queen either, does he? She hurried after him.

Just down the street was a cart and harnessed to it, a reindeer. That's right, Anna told her that he'd always have the animal with him; it was like his pet or something.

"Sven, we've got a guest today," the man said, unhooking the animals harness from the cart. The animal made a snorting noise and took a few steps forward and sniffed at the queen.

"Hello… Sven"

"Hello" the reindeer said back.

Elsa stared at the animal and then to Kristoff, he was grinning. She did her best to stifle a giggle and a smile.

"Ahh, you can smile," he said, "So, where to first, Your Majesty?"

"If I'm not the queen for the day, should you really be calling me that?"

"Oh uh, right," he scratched at his head, "So, where to, uh, Elsa?"

Elsa looked around the square before the palace. A cool spring breeze blew off the water and she breathed in the scent of the ocean, "How about the market?"

"Alright then."

Before she knew it, Elsa was in the press of people in the market square, it took some getting used to. At first she shrunk away from the people, but it couldn't last forever, eventually she pushed back. Eventually she found a sort of contentment; it was nice to be a part of the hustle and bustle, to be a part of the hoi polloi and not its focus. People bumped into her, said hello, no one bowed and she had to shove her way through them to reach a stall. It was like playing with Anna when they were little.

After moving through the press the two of them sat on a stone palisade that over looked the harbor, other than the reindeer no one took any notice of them. Elsa watched the people moving to and fro, these people she was the queen of. She sighed and looked up at the castle itself. Somewhere in there Anna was making decisions.

Watching her lips tighten, and her brow furrow, Kristoff nudged her shoulder, handing her an apple.

"Thank you."

"So why are you locking yourself up in the castle again?"

Kristoff patted her back as she coughed from the surprise. She looked up at him, "You're certainly curt and to the point, aren't you?"

"Hah, when I first met Anna I was just rude. Nice to know I'm moving up."

"Hmpf…" Elsa snorted, "I don't want to talk about it."

"Hmm…" Kristoff looked back out at the square, "Hmm, okay, how about this, I tell you something, you tell me something?"

"Like what?"

"Did Anna tell you about when she met my family?"

Elsa thought for a moment, "That was... the Trolls right?"

"Yeah. Did she tell you what they did?"

"Just that they told you about how I froze her heart…" Elsa's voice trailed off. Kristoff pressed on.

"Well they tried to marry us too, you know."

"What?"

"Yeah I know."

"Why?"

"I think at that point they'd have tried to marry me to any girl. They even wanted me to get rid of Hans. I told them I'd never do that," he said before realizing who he was talking about, "Er, not that I wouldn't now, I mean. I'd completely try to get rid of him now. We didn't know what he was like and, uhm- c-can I start over?"

As Kristoff did his best to try and sort out a proper sentence, Elsa smiled. Anna, it seemed, had found a man that was so much like her, though her sister smelled better. Kristoff smelled of soap but under that was dirt, and pine and well reindeer.

Elsa let out a giggle, "I know what you mean. Thank you" she enjoyed the thought of it being Kristoff and not Anna coming to her rescue. Maybe there could have been a sword fight.

"I don't think I ever really thanked you for what you did for us. Anna and I."

"I didn't really do anything, besides the sledge is more than enough," he thought for a moment, "Is Ice Master really a thing?"

"Not really," she admitted with a laugh, "Anna wanted you to have a title; I think we were all hoping you'd be able to figure something out for it."

"Ahh…"

Elsa sniffed at the air and closed her eyes, "Is that… chocolate?"

It was.

Elsa rubbed the speck of brown from her mouth as she stepped away from the stand, a small packet in her other hand. Sven sniffed at it as she rejoined her chaperones.

"Ahh ah. No no. These are not for you," she said, pulling the packet away from him.

"Here, Elsa, catch," an orange blur shot through the air and the queen grabbed it. A Carrot.

"Uhh"

"For Sven"

The Elsa's mouth turned into a little 'O' and she held the carrot up, pointing it at the reindeer. Sven chomped off half the thing from her hand, to her surprise. She smiled as the animal crunched down on it, and then ate the rest of it. Elsa sat down as she scratched under the reindeer's chin.

"It's your turn you know," Sven said after a few more minutes.

"My turn?" Elsa asked, scratching Sven's snout.

"I tell you, you tell me," he said, chewing off the end of a carrot.

"Oh. Right," she looked back at the castle, from here the tops of its spires poked up between two houses. She could see one of the window's she'd always look out of when she was little. She sighed.

"If you don't want to that's-"

"It's just that… All my life I was… shut away. And now… now I'm queen. I… I never got to be… Ugh," she shook her head, "I promised myself I wouldn't be like this, I'd just be-"

"Yourself?"

She nodded, "But, I have to do things the right way. I've got to prove I'll be good at it. Be the good girl. Be a good ruler. Maybe they'd really forget."

"Forget what?"

She rubbed her arms, looking down "What I am."

"Ah… that… For uh… for what it's worth, I always thought you were amazing. Your powers I mean. I mean making ice and snow out of nothing? That's great. You're not a monster."

Elsa closed her hands, and from the gaps in her palms a slight fog rose. When she opened them again, a small Reindeer head stared up at them, "You and Anna are the only ones that never seem to mind," she handed him the sculpture, "Thank you."

Kristoff held it up, no tool marks, perfectly smooth, crystal clear slow frozen ice. It was Sven. He smiled. Elsa lapsed into silence again. Sven glared at Kristoff. He shrugged mouthed 'what am I supposed to do'

Sven snorted, jerking his had up.

'What?'

He did it again, Kristoff looked behind him.

That might help, maybe.

"Hey," he took Elsa's arm, "Come on."

High above the city standing outside of the lighthouse's lamp, Elsa leaned over the wrought iron railing. The smell of the sea and the city mixed and swarmed around her, the wind tore at her skirt whipping and spinning it about her legs. She closed her eyes and for a moment it was almost like the ice palace again.

"You know I've never seen it like this. Up in the mountains you get the view but, not the smells. Hey!" The shawl billowed away and Elsa's hair spilled out, "Oh come on, I spent ten krone on that scarf!"

Elsa laughed as he reached over the railing. He sighed and, like her skirt his hair thrashed in the wind. He glanced and her and laughed.

"You know, just because you're queen doesn't mean you can't be yourself. You've got tons of people in the Castle don't you? Can't any of them take care of things for a day? Everyone should have a day off, Elsa."

She smiled, "Maybe."

They stayed in the lighthouse for some time pointing out parts of the city they knew: where Kristoff got his sledge, or clothes, the ice storage rooms, anything they could think of. Elsa had far fewer places to point out.

An hour later, Elsa wanted to return to the palace and true to his word Kristoff obliged. He bought a new real shawl, and with it over her head, they made their way back.

He didn't know if the Doorman was in on the whole thing, but he'd stopped them all the same, refusing to let them into the castle proper. Until Elsa took off the shawl.

"Y-Your majesty!" the man sputtered, bowing so fast Kristoff thought he'd end up in the ground, "I'm so sorry"

"It's alright," she said, kneeling down and touching the man's shoulder. Kristoff as sure he'd seen him flinch at the touch. He was sure Elsa had seen it too.

Kristoff nudged Sven, and the pair turned to leave, before stopping dead as the queen cleared her throat.

"Kristoff."

"Yes, Els-"

"Ha-rumph!" jowled the doorman. Elsa mouth twisted up, holding back her giggles.

"Er… Queen Elsa?"

"As a friend of the crown, you are hence fourth allowed all access to the castle, at any time of your choosing."

"What?" The door man glared at the young man.

"It means I have to let you in."

He looked from the doorman to the queen, "O-oh," save for a man who nearly lost his hair, Kristoff gave the most awkward bow Elsa had ever seen," Uh... thank you."

As he righted himself Elsa was smiling, "I'm sure Anna and I will need a 'day off' soon."

The last of the stewards was leaving as a final person came into the audience chamber. Unlike the rest of the people that would come in, she didn't look around and marvel at the columns, or wonder at the paintings on the walls or the sculptures, she just looked straight ahead.

Anna was sitting upon the throne. Well, more like lounging maybe. She looked exhausted.

"Oh I'm sorry, we're closed, please come back tomorrow!" she called out.

It wasn't until she was halfway across the room that Anna realized it was her sister. She sprang out of the chair, "Oh my gosh, Elsa, I'm sorry."

The queen laughed, "So how did everything go?"

Anna waved away the question, "Oh well, you know, I'm a natural. Easy peasy, didn't even freeze the kingdom. Er, sorry. Uhm- how was your day?"

Anna didn't know her sister was capable of a bear hug, "Oh! Uh, that good huh?" she wrapped her own arms around her sister.

"It was a wonderful time, Anna, thank you." Elsa felt so warm as she embraced her sister, she'd missed this. She didn't want it to end, "Come on. I got chocolates."

"Chocolates!"

Elsa swayed slightly; she could feel a bit of a food coma coming on. Maybe she'd had too much chocolate after dinner with Anna. She waved out a match after lighting the long tapered finger of a candle. It really had been a wonderful day.

She'd been hesitant at first, about Anna and Kristoff. Heaven knows what happened the last time she'd brought a boy home. But Kristoff was a good person. Maybe she could do right by him. Of course they'd have to give him a real title. No matter how much Anna may like him a princess couldn't marry a peasant.

She smoothed out the shawl on the chest of drawers. It was dark blue with a thin white trim to it with faint purple flowers embroidered around its edge. Kristoff had insisted on buying it for her.

He'd probably look very good in a uniform.