Thank you to those who favorited and followed. I hope this pleases the senses. :)
Frozen-Disney
Otherwise - Mine
When the party entered, the bench behind them rose back up into place. There was a moment of panic among them until Hans lit a nearby caged lantern, which through some unseen mechanism, lit dozens of other caged wall lanterns on either side of the curved staircase.
"Interesting." They said in unison, and then began down the passageway.
It smelled almost musty, but it accented the cool dampness that secreted from the spaces between the stone so that the overall smell was almost homey. Like a library that had the window open in winter. Though she could sense it, Elsa was never bothered by the cold, but rubbed her arms to give the illusion she was. Hans had popped his collar all the way up. Anna, poor thing, hugged the satchel for warmth.
"It is definitely not summer in here." She mumbled.
"Are you sure neither of you have any idea what this place is?" Hans moved the lantern around, illuminating nothing the wall lanterns weren't already lighting. It was all stone steps and stone walls, cirling in a downwards spiral that seemed to get smaller with each advancement downwards. Elsa was getting the distinct feeling of being squeezed.
"None at all." Anna said. "Papa never mentioned it, neither did Mama. I can't see why they never said anything before, if they knew...Though, why didn't they know? All you had to do was tap that little flower and whoosh! Secret passage way."
"Actually I kind of had to push it reasonably hard." Hans said, moving ahead of the sisters as the hall became too narrow to accommodate them in a row of three. "I don't think anyone could find it by accident. I mean, I did, but that's because I saw the outline under the flower. We have similar passages with these sorts of entrances all over the palace back home."
"I don't think we have any secret passageways. Other than this one." Anna mused, slowly removing a truffle from her bag and stuffing it in her mouth.
"We do, actually, but all of them just lead to different rooms in the castle." Elsa commented. Anna looked at her and said, with her mouth full, "how wud yew know?"
Elsa almost told her it was from their exploring as children. At least, that was the foundation. It'd become a bit of a hobby for her to discover the nooks and crannies of the castle after the accident. She'd run around at night, plagued by either boredom or insomnia, tapping every brick and stone she could find, and tugging every lamp or light and looking behind every tapestry. She'd found two passages that led from her room, one to Anna's, which she admitted she used once in awhile to tidy the poor mess that was the girl's living quarters when she wasn't inside, and the other that led to the kitchen and was perfect for late night snacking excursions.
Instead, she said, "I stumbled upon a book on it. And there was...was that time, when we were kids ... don't you remember?"
Anna paused, her chewing slow and thoughtful, then gave a single jerk of her head in confirmation. "I think it was, uh, from our room. Right?"
"Mhm." Elsa stopped talking after that.
The staircase became more narrow. They were forced into single file, Elsa in the back as her cape was easily tripped over. Hans continued to lead, lantern at his side since those on the wall still lit the way. Elsa could see by the tilt of her head that Anna was admiring the young man's behind. She would have scolded her if she hadn't caught herself doing the same.
Then they came upon a door. It was a nearly-medieval wooden one, with a large ring in place of a doorknob and many bolts and nails that didn't seem needed for the function of the door. The hinges were three times the size of normal ones, and surprisingly showed very little rust. Hans took the liberty of ripping it open and stepped through with the sisters in tow. The room beyond had high ceilings and seemed to be stone like the passageway; nothing else could be seen by the light of the staircase lanterns.
Hans groped the walls inside until he found another lantern, lit it, and then stood to the side of the doorway and stared.
The room was indeed stone, and had higher ceilings than Elsa thought possible. They couldn't be that far underground, could they? She didn't think they'd walked that long. Then again, she might have just been very focused on not saying anything to Anna about her powers while still giving good answers to her questions.
There were three tapestries on either wall in varying shades of blue. When Elsa stepped in and looked at them, she got a strange, numbing sort of feeling in her gut. This quickly morphed into a lead-weight in her stomach sort of feeling when she saw what was on the tapestries; people with nearly white hair and blue eyes, spouting snow from their fingers. Some were naked - which she noticed brought a blush to Hans's face - and others wore what seemed to be clothing of ice. Anna gasped.
"Whooooaaa. They're so pretty!" She turned to Elsa, "They kind of look like you, Elsa!"
"Is it some kind of strange...civilization?" Hans mused, glancing at Elsa and then back to the tapestries. Elsa tried her best not to look at them and gripped her hands together, feeling thin ice that coated her skin crunching under their cover. She shuffled over to the end of the giant room, where there was a piece of paper, almost thick as leather, with ancient scrawl across it, pinned to a wooden pedestal. She glanced over her shoulder, seeing Hans and Anna still enamored with the various tapestries, and read.
We the people of ice and snow.
Hidden we remain like this chamber, of leadership and power we possess.
Of the Gods, we are descended.
Nymphs and faeries, of us, are jealous.
Humans of us are fearful.
We are not known, but hunted when found; rarely loved, often hated.
We are cursed.
Cursed to hide.
Cursed to die.
Cursed to feel and not receive feeling back.
There is only one way to expel this malediction from us so we may once again be normal;
To find the first line; the pure ones.
To find them, one must -
"Elsa?"
Elsa whirled around and saw Anna heading towards her. She clenched her jaw and forced her lips to lay casually around her teeth. Her heart thumped in her ears and her knees were weak. She didn't think she'd breathed or blinked the entire time she was reading the parchment. She put her arms behind her back as if she was stretching, secretly tugging the thick paper from its holdings.
"What are you doing over here? You find anything? I found a dust bunny and some more of those flowers in the walls, but otherwise there's just those weird tapestries. Hans can't find anything either, but kinda wants to take one of those tapestries out, but I dunno if -"
"I don't think that is the best idea. T-Taking the tapestries, I mean." Elsa leaned back against the pedestal. "I don't think they were really, uh, meant to be disturbed. You know?"
Anna nodded. "Yeah, I guess I know. It's just kind of - well actually really weird. I mean, why are they throwing ice around? Why do they all kinda look like they're related to you?...Why are they naked."
Elsa faked a sneeze as she ripped the paper from its last two holdings. Anna said bless you, then quickly ran over to the pedestal as Elsa took a side step and turned away from her, paper clutched in one hand behind her back as she rubbed her supposedly perturbed nose with the other.
"What's this? Is this what you've been looking at?" Anna tugged at the little bits of paper that were left at the pinnings. "Wow, look at this paper! It's so old. It looks older than all the staff put together. And you and me. And Hans!" Elsa began rolling the paper while Anna was distracted, back towards a tapestry. "And this pedestal, too! Wow, guess everything is old in here. And dusty. Doesn't look like it's been touched in ages. But the paper is gone - I mean I know that was obvious first thing - but I wonder where it went. Did you see any paper like this, Elsa? Around this thingy, perhaps?"
Anna looked around the pedestal and tried to lift it. Elsa turned around and pretended to be looking while flattening the rolled up paper and folding it over once, tucking it between her corset and the bodice of her dress. When she turned back around Hans was looking with Anna and gave her a strange glance.
"Do you see anything, Hans?" Anna asked, leaning over to look under the pedastal in a way that made her and Hans's hips brush together.
"No, I haven't found anything, and it doesn't seem Elsa has either. While this is very...strange, I think we better get back to the party before they wonder where the Queen and Princess have gone." Hans jerked his thumb behind him, and Elsa hurriedly agreed. She wanted to finish reading the paper immediately.
She had to find out how to get rid of her powers, and quickly.
