A Whisper of Light

"Your Majesty. Born with the powers, or cursed?"

"Born. And they're getting stronger."

Elsa wasn't so sure sometimes. Pappa told her she had been born with these powers, but in the hushed conversations she overheard, the ones her parents held under the cover of darkness, sometimes Elsa would catch the word curse mumbled like something terrifying. She was young, but not so young to fail to recognize fear when she saw it. Elsa was sure her parents loved her, but even love had its limits when she could touch things and make them freeze to solid ice, when she could take the warmth of summer and transform it to the frigid chill of winter.

Only Anna had ever called it magic, what she did.

And now she was unconscious, barely alive, her skin cold and her hair white.

"Do what you must."

"I recommend we remove all magic, even memories of magic, to be safe–"

"But she won't remember I have powers?" Elsa asked. Her tongue almost slipped. She almost said magic, just like what Anna called it. When the troll looked down, that was all the answer she needed. Elsa stepped in between them, shielding Anna from his touch. "No, you can't do that!"

Anna was the only one to call it magic. Anna was the only one to know, and to not fear.

She couldn't forget.

"Elsa, be good–"

"I will!" Elsa interrupted, and her father jerked back from her uncharacteristic outburst. For a brief moment, Elsa didn't understand. She had always been well-behaved, but was a single interruption enough to provoke such a reaction from her father? Only when she heard her mother gasp and step away did she realize. Released along with her shout had been a wave of cold, spreading from her foot all along the ground to freeze the entire terrace where they stood.

"Elsa–"

"I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to." Elsa tried her hardest to take it back, but the harder she tried the more her power slipped away from her, and the more her power slipped away the more her panic grew. The ice crept up the sides of the terrace and onto the secondary ring, and then the third, and then the fourth, until the Valley of Living Rock resembled an arctic plain.

Grand Pabbie stepped forward and placed a hand over Elsa's forehead, and she calmed. Just like that, the ice halted in its tracks. Elsa stepped backwards, knees trembling so badly she nearly slipped on her own ice, and Grand Pabbie shook his head with eyes downcast.

"I'm sorry, Elsa," Grand Pabbie said. As he spoke, his hands weaved colors into the sky, visions that Elsa watched with growing trepidation. "Your power will only grow. There is beauty in it, but also great danger. You must learn to control it. Fear will be your enemy."

Red flashed over her eyes.

"How can I control it?" Elsa asked quietly. "I don't want to hurt Anna again."

"Learn to control your emotions. Learn to let go…"

...of Anna.

Learn to be alone.

Elsa understood what Grand Pabbie was suggesting, and judging by the resignation on her parents' faces, so did they. Until she could control her powers, she was a danger to everyone around her. It was true that it would be safe to remove Anna's memories. They could go on living together, Elsa hiding her curse every second of every day as Anna lived blissfully unaware of her struggle. It was true that Anna would be safe like that.

But if memories must be removed, it would be even safer to remove them from Elsa.

She couldn't harm someone who didn't exist to her.

"I'll do it," Elsa said. She turned and put on a brave smile for her parents, reassuring them that this was what she wanted, that she wanted Anna to remember her even if she couldn't remember, because Anna could remember for the both of them and that was enough.

"Are you sure?" Grand Pabbie asked. His already wizened face grew even wearier, heavy sigh pulling down his lips and deep remorse clouding his eyes.

"I'm sure."

As her mother bore Anna away by horse, Elsa watched them shrink away into the distance. Her eyes never once left Anna, taking in every detail for the last time. The way Anna slept alternating between heavy and light breaths. The way Anna rubbed at the bridge of her nose where the freckles were strongest. The way Anna was, very simply, Anna. Elsa watched until she could not see her anymore.

"Goodbye," Elsa whispered.

Elsa felt her father squeeze her hand in reassurance, and then Grand Pabbie placed a hand over her forehead, and Elsa closed her eyes. Despite everything she said, that part of her that never wanted to let go fought a futile battle to hold on to the memories, until the darkness became too much.

And that was the last time Elsa remembered she had a sister named Anna, a sister who liked warmth but would build snowmen with her anyway; a sister who was clumsy and tripped over air; a sister who was too single-minded to take no for an answer and snuck away chocolates but always remembered to save some for Elsa; a sister who was at once endearing and irritating.

A sister who Elsa had loved.


When Elsa awoke, she was in their resort home on the North Mountain.

"You'll be staying here to learn to control your powers," Pappa said. "There are already enough supplies here to last you for years. Your mother and I will make it a priority to visit you as often as we can."

Elsa nodded.

She waited for more.

"Is something wrong, Elsa?"

"N-No," Elsa said when she realized she was staring. "I just thought that you weren't done speaking. I was waiting for – I'm sorry. Everything's fine, Pappa."

There was nothing else.


She was so used to hiding.

When the time came for her father to leave and return to his duties as king, Elsa simply lived on her own without once using her powers. It was an age-old lesson emblazoned in her mind. Never let others see. Elsa kept her powers to herself, and the only one who had ever coaxed her out of it was –

No one. Elsa blinked and shook her head, feeling a pounding pressure in her behind her eyes like a hammer was driving a nail through her skull. The harder she tried to recall, the more it hurt.

And then she flung an arm out like that could ward off the pain, and all it did was send a wave of snow crashing against the wall.

Elsa stumbled back from the recoil, instinctively looking left and right for anyone who might have been around, anyone who might have witnessed her act of magic. It was nearly a full minute of breathless fear before she remembered she was alone. No one was here to see, and no one was here to judge.

Breathless not from fear but from exhilaration, Elsa allowed herself to experiment.

She quickly forgot all thought of the past, of constraint.


It was easier now.

Without anything to distract her, and without having to worry about being seen, Elsa let her powers run free for the first time in her life. There was something glorious, something breathtaking about seeing something borne from her mind with a simple wave of her hand.

The first things Elsa made were animals. An entire ensemble of horses and hawks and foxes and every beast she could think of, and then mythical creatures, griffins and chimeras and sea serpents. All of them sculpted from unmelting ice, and all of them unique. She had many of the same creatures, because Elsa preferred that they not be alone, but no two were the same.

Each horse was of different size and shape, some built as stallions and others as mares. Each hawk was of different pose, some perched on a branch and others in pursuit of prey. Every last detail was crafted with meticulous care, and Elsa had all the time in the world to do it.

But creating animals grew boring after a time, and Elsa moved on to snowmen.

They were easier, of course, simpler and not needing to be lifelike, but somehow they were more special. Elsa waved her hand and snow compacted into a large ball to serve as the base. When she moved to create the rest, she paused.

Elsa frowned.

It felt like cheating.

She wasn't sure where the feeling was coming from, but she let her power fade back. Dropping to her knees onto the snow, Elsa collected the powder with her hands and slowly rolled it into a misshapen ball. It would never be as perfect as if she just used her powers. She knew that, but she continued with her mortal, human methods anyway because it felt so much more right.

It would be better with someone next to her, but Elsa had never had that anyway.


"Are you lonely here, Elsa?"

"No, Pappa."

She was answering truthfully. She had always kept distance from the servants, her care for their safety sometimes being mistaken for the haughtiness of a spoiled princess. Kai and Gerda were her closest caretakers, but Elsa had no misconceptions about the fact that they were on the payroll. Maybe she would like more visits from Momma, but having Pappa come around once a week and Momma every other week was enough.

"Is there anything you need?" Pappa asked.

Pappa sounded quite insistent.

"I would like some more books," Elsa replied, more to ease her father's conscience than anything. She knew he wanted to provide her with more because he felt he was slighting her in some way, but Elsa had honestly never been happier than being here, alone.

At length, Pappa nodded.

After some more pleasantries – Elsa thought it and was slightly guilty, but they were exchanging pleasantries, the usual light and polite conversation she had been taught to hold, not with family but with foreign dignitaries – Pappa left.

The doors closed shut behind him, and Elsa was alone again.

When silence filled the halls, Elsa was surprised to find she preferred it.


After about two months, Elsa took her first step outside.

She had spent her time indoors, exploring the resort that she had only been to once before and when she was too young to remember properly, but even the large manor yielded all its secrets in the face of an inquisitive child. So when Elsa exhausted all the secret passageways, all the increasingly boring halls and their boring suits of armor, their boring portraits and boring vanities, she stepped outside.

Elsa gazed around in awe of the mountain, looming so tall it cast a perpetual shadow over where she now lived. And the thought leapt across her mind: Why should she live at the base of the mountain when there were greater heights to be climbed? She shook her head. Pappa had told her to stay here and learn control, and that was what she would do.

It was winter now, and natural snow coated the valleys. Contrary to what other people might think, not all snow was the same. Not only the common knowledge that no two snowflakes were the same – thought that was a myth, identical snowflakes were rare but certainly existed, and all of Elsa's were of the exact same pattern – but it was something inherent in their nature. Each one felt different.

She didn't have much experience with people, but Elsa likened it to how each person had their own experiences and aspirations. Maybe others couldn't hear, without her gift, but each snowflake sung to her. When she knelt in the snow and ran her hands over the plane of white, the snow greedily stuck to her hands and filled her mind with a content purr.

"You want to be more," Elsa deduced.

So it was that her feet launched her into dance, moving her through wide arcs and turns as the snow followed, spiraling upwards and moving into a helix, and then a fractal…

When she was done, she looked up and saw a single snowflake over the sky, and with a smile she let it dissipate through the air.


"Are you okay, living here all alone?"

"I'm perfectly fine, Mother."

"Is there anything else you need, Elsa?"

"No. Thank you, Father."

"Is there anything at all that we can do?"

"…No, there isn't."


The visits from Mother and Father were getting shorter now.

Perhaps it was her own fault, unresponsive as she was, but Elsa had little to speak to them about. She didn't know about their lives, and they didn't know about hers, so much of their time was spent in awkward silence that was almost pervasive. Elsa stared and they would break eye contact first, and so she would look away and feel their gaze on her again until they inevitably left.

She was fine with that.

By the time four years had passed, Elsa saw Father once every two weeks, and Mother once every month.

She was fine with that.

Although, she was getting rather bored of her sculptures. There was no challenge in it anymore, no thrill in recreating things she could do without a second thought, so she turned her attention towards architecture. She still did reading, of course. Her favorite was geometry, so one day Elsa decided to apply her powers to what she had learned.

Waves of white arced from her fingertips and she directed them into flowing gossamer tapestries to replace the banal cloth. A controlled avalanche knocked out the staircase, and another wave of snow swept it out the front doors and off the mountain, likely to be picked up by travelers who would find it fortunate to find material of such fine make. Snowflakes swirled and solidified into thick ice, building a new staircase, one that gleamed blue and reflected the light.

Elsa looked up at the chandelier, frowned, and decided it would be unwise to bring it down.

That would have to wait.


She felt very angry all the time.

Elsa wasn't sure why, but her mood fluctuated between joyful and aggravated at the proverbial flick of a switch. When last time Mother had visited, Elsa very nearly shouted at her for some small thing she had done, something she couldn't even remember now. She doubted it was very offensive at all–

Oh, yes. Something about returning to Arendelle.

Elsa had refused.

There was nothing waiting for her there, and after six, nearly seven years of isolation, she couldn't bear the thought of returning to a kingdom where she would have to conceal all over again. Here, she could do whatever she desired. Here, she could be who she was.

When Elsa had explained so, her mother nearly burst into tears. She didn't understand why the sight was so very upsetting, but she understood even less why Mother cried in the first place.

She let the thought fade. Thinking about it only made her more confused, and Elsa had other things to do. After animal sculptures and architecture, she decided she would create a statue in the likeness of a human. It would be a challenge, after seeing no one for so long, and maybe it would be easiest to base it off Mother or Father but Elsa hardly needed to see any more of them.

No, this would be purely creative.

Elsa took a deep breath and began. Rather than simply creating the entire thing all at once, first she drew moisture out of the air and froze it into a giant block, then began slowly chipping away at it. It was better this way, when she wasn't quite sure what she wanted. At the very least, she would be able to tell if it started becoming misshapen.

With each thought, Elsa carved away more of the ice. Her fingers flew through the air like she was conducting, and each time more of the ice shattered off. Ice was like that, a crystal that needed to have its excess cleaved away so that only the essence of it was left. Beneath the bulky exterior lay a heart that was pure and flawless, and her task was to polish the ice until it was the image she desired.

It quickly became thoughtless.

When she finally finished long hours later, Elsa took a step back and admired her work. And then blinked, and blinked again at the strange sight that welcomed her. She had created a child, one with two pigtails and a wide, toothy smile, eyes glistening with mischief evident even in ice. And it was so unbelievably detailed, far more so than Elsa had expected her first work to be. It was disconcerting. When she stared at it long enough, she felt an inkling of recognition and it scared her, to feel something like longing where there should have been nothing.

For the first time in years, Elsa lost control and the sculpture shattered.

She would try again and again to reproduce it, but she never succeeded.


Three more years later, and Elsa never saw her parents again.

They must have forgotten about her.

Elsa was not so very surprised. She had almost forgotten about them.

So it was that at the age of eighteen, Elsa moved all of the supplies aboard a sled of ice and directed it to follow her as she left the manor behind forever.

All these years, she had stared up at the North Mountain, gazed at its majesty and wondered what it would be like to look down and not up. Now that she had no more ties to anything or anyone, Elsa decided it was time to take that challenge.

It wasn't easy to make it up the mountain, even for her. The cliffs were steep and the winds were powerful, and Elsa eventually had to abandon her supplies in favor of remaining concentrated on herself. She never once felt cold, however. And when she realized that the wintry storm was well within her power to control, she seized on the winds and made them her own, changed their course to fly her up the mountain.

Where there were impossible chasms, Elsa created staircases to cross. Where there were fields of ice and snow, Elsa moved them underfoot so they rippled and moved her to where she needed to be. All of this was her element, and Elsa broke even the last limits she didn't realize she still had. Now she was one with the wind and sky.

She picked out a place and decided to make it her own.

Where she stood would be her Palace of Ice, and there she would stay.


Even Elsa wanted some company, even if not a lot, so she made many, many snowmen.

Not entirely for company, however. She needed them to guard her palace, now that she no longer lived in the home of Arendelle royalty and any stranger who decided to brave the mountain might knock on her door. All of them were refused. After some time she realized that they mostly came during the spring and summer, so Elsa pulled snow from the clouds and created an eternal snowstorm all around the mountain, and that thinned her would-be guests but still did not get rid of them entirely.

Marshmallow was very useful for discouraging them.

As for the others, the smaller variety, she had them clean and bring her sustenance when she needed it. Not very often, these days. Her power sustained her well enough, and her body was so cold she might as well be a corpse. What she had later retrieved from those old supplies was probably enough to last her a lifetime at the rate she was getting through them.

"Hey, Elsa!"

Olaf. One of her first creations, and also the loudest and clumsiest. Elsa honestly had no idea why she kept him around. She supposed he was amusing, in his own bumbling way.

"There's someone out there collapsed in the woods! I tried to drag her here but she was too heavy, and Marshmallow won't ever listen to me. Such a bad kid, you know, I think you should really think about talking to him about his attitude–"

Tell me about this person.

"Oh, right," Olaf said, and he made to clear his throat as if he had one. "Just a girl, Elsa! I think you should help her, I think she's feeling really bad out there."

Is she close?

"Real close," Olaf nodded. "Just a hop, skip, and a jump away."

I will attend to it.

She had nothing better to do anyway. And if Elsa always warded off her visitors, she made sure they left safe and sound as well. No one wanted dead bodies on their front door, and if this girl was as close as Olaf made it sound, Elsa would prefer she be escorted away alive. With the long ends of her dress trailing behind as she walked, practically glided, Elsa opened the doors and left to find her little guest.


"H-Help…"

Elsa waved the trees aside, bare branches snapping under the pressure of snow. Laying there in the middle of the forest was a strange girl lost in the woods and weak from cold, her cloak only ceremonial and not meant for any truly harsh weather. It was a wonder she had survived this long. Elsa watched as she curled inwards to preserve the little warmth she still possessed, breath leaving in short gasps as she weakly cried out for help. She was so far gone she didn't even realize Elsa stood only a few yards away.

It might have been the easier thing to do, sending this girl off the mountain immediately so she could be helped by her own kind.

Elsa was determined to do just that until the girl rolled over and her hood fell, revealing a shock of red hair and a pale, freckled face.

Her breath hitched in her throat at the sight. Elsa had no idea why, but she felt an instinct to rush over and help the girl, hold her in her arms and spirit her away to safety. She was just so very familiar. That couldn't be right. Elsa hadn't seen anyone in years, and for years and years before that, she had only seen her parents before they too had abandoned her. So how–

Another weak gasp, and Elsa made up her mind.

She hurried over and picked the girl up, taking care to control the cold that always suffused her skin so she didn't worsen her condition. Elsa wasn't sure if it was from her cold, or if it was simply the shock of being rescued at all, but the girl fainted in her arms. Her lip were turning blue, and her skin looked to be so wind-dried that it would split and bleed at any second. Elsa endeavored to hurry back lest the girl die before she could make it back.

It only struck her how very strange this was when she was halfway to her palace. Elsa hadn't touched anyone in years, and to hold someone now with her bare hands was a foreign sensation. Even after all she had been through, this girl was warm, warmer than Elsa could ever be. After her isolation, it felt like being next to a furnace. If they were any closer, Elsa thought she might burn.

Curious, Elsa reached out to touch her cheek.

But she paused a fraction of a centimeter away when she heard a voice, a whisper so faint she wondered if she had only imagined it. She must have imagined it.

Why else would she have heard the girl whisper her name?


a/n: Unedited, just a very fascinating idea that I wanted to try my hand at. Most likely will not be continued, but I hope you liked this anyway! Follow me on tumblr (kaiserklee), and feel free to send me prompts~ :D