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I don't own Frozen.
'Kay, next!
Stiff.
Stiff and sore and numb and just plain uncomfortable.
Why, oh why had she decided to wear heels today? It's not like they can be seen by any means; the intricate ceremonial dress' layers kept her feet hidden. She's not walking anywhere anytime soon either and even if she did, the only indication that she was wearing heels would've been her click-clack walk.
Queen Elsa stood in all her royal regality holding the orb and sceptre in the very same position she had feared to hold a month ago at her coronation. She stood before her throne in all her graceful splendour, trying with all her might not to grimace because of her numb feet and trembling arms. Even her favourite royal blue dress and purple cloak, one she was usually most comfortable in, was starting to weigh heavily on her stiff shoulders.
This is definitely a form of torture, she thought with an inward wince staring at the easel bearing a canvas and the painter seated before it. And Anna wants a 'family' portrait done? She scoffed softly in amusement at the thought of her never-sit-still-sister having to endure what the Queen was forced to stand through.
"Do you need a moment, your Majesty?" Knud, the painter, asked behind the canvas in response to the sound she had made.
A relieved sigh as she lowered her arms was all answer he received. He smiled knowingly as she stretched; touching up a few things here and there on the painting while he waited.
"How long would you say we're going to be here for, Master Bergslien?" Elsa asked, successfully keeping the whine out of her voice.
Knud stood up from his seat and took a step backwards in order to appraise his work and gauge the remaining time they had until the final product. Chin in hand, he tilted his head and frowned at some or other abnormality his artistic eye had caught.
"Well," he squinted at the painting, "I think four more hours would suffice."
So focussed was he on playing spot-the-problem with brush strokes that he completely missed the Queen sag in a most undignified manner before she straightened again. Resigned to endure her torment to the bitter end of two-hundred and forty minutes more.
"Are you ready ma'am?" he asked seated before his work-in-progress yet again.
"I don't have much of a choice, do I?" she muttered under her breath, though not unkindly.
"I suppose not ma'am," the painter answered. Elsa could hear the smile in his voice with his face being momentarily obscured by the canvas. "But, I'd just like to add my two skillings if I may. You're by far the most patient monarch I've had the pleasure of painting thus far. A most accommodating subject to paint, Majesty."
"Thank you, Master Bergslien. Heaven knows it over quicker if the subject stands still long enough." A faint blush dusted her cheeks. She raised her eyebrow suddenly, "Wait, didn't you paint my father's coronation painting as well?"
Knud barked out a laugh, "Oh yes my Queen I did, and many before that as well." He chuckled, leaning around the corner to look at her fully, "King Adgar, gods rest his soul, was as fidgety as Princess Anna still is."
Both of them smiled at the memory of the first family painting when Elsa and Anna had been mere toddlers. The original composition differed drastically from the one hanging in the dining room today. Everything went to the reindeer as soon as Anna became bored a mere five seconds in, resulting in the youngest being seated in the Queen's lap while Elsa stood next to the chair with the King behind the little blonde girl.
"He always ended up looking as stiff as a board in each painting I had done with him as a subject." Kund finished with a chuckle, disappearing behind the canvas again. "Oh, and your Majesty?"
"Hmm?" she shook her head to focus in the present, "I mean, yes Master Bergslien?"
"It won't be necessary to hold the royal artefacts anymore."
When silence was his only answer, Knud leaned around the canvas to peer at the Queen in curiosity. Elsa allowed hope to shine unchecked in her expression as a smile formed with her disbelieving eyes. A newsboy capped head nodded with amusement clearly seen in his façade, affirming his earlier statement. With a beaming smile and no hesitation she dropped the cursed orb and sceptre right then and there.
The old painter screwed his eyes shut tightly, waiting for the noisy clang that should echo in the empty throne room. When none came he opened his eyes and saw two piles of snow next to the Queen, with the objects protruding out from them; a good-natured chuckle from the artist resounded in the room instead.
Knud returned to his painting, glancing out at the Queen every once and a while to capture the fold of her skirt properly. While he painted the time away, Elsa moved her snowdrifts, with her torture devices in them, away from her and out of the painter's line of sight. With that taken care of, she let her thoughts wander.
She thought of her mother and father.
It's been a month since the open gates. Reconnecting with her sister is a slow but steady process. Elsa still lapsed into her old 'conceal, don't feel' mantra when things became too stressful for her. But Anna was always there to coax her out of it. Being Queen was difficult, but not nearly as difficult as she thought it would've been. Everything she had been taught by her father had come in handy and she often counselled his journals to refresh her memory. The open gates really have their own advantages as well. Ruling seemed more doable with them open than with the closed future she had resigned herself to when she was younger.
But…
Would they have been proud of her?
'Of course they would've!' a voice sounding strangely like Anna answered her in her mind. 'And don't you dare deny it.'
Elsa smiled at that thought, staring off into space as a chiming sound twinkled in the background of her thoughts about her sister. Knud was busy cleaning a brush in one of his numerous jars filled with multi-coloured water. Drying the brush on his paint stained apron, he plunged the bristles into a deep royal blue before adding the colour to the canvas, his eyes flitting to the skirt more often than before.
As if Elsa's thoughts about Anna acted as a summons, the doors of the throne room creaked open to admit the feisty redhead that was her sister.
"Hey Elsa," she called loudly over her shoulder as she closed the door, "I heard you were in here so – oh…it's –"
"Portrait day." The two sisters echoed in a monotone.
"Right." Anna smacked her forehead, "I forgot."
"What have you been doing all day to merit your attention for so long?" Elsa teased while her sister skipped towards her.
"Ha, ha. Very funny." She commented sarcastically. "I'll have you know that I have an extremely long attention span – Hey Knud! – and that it takes a lot for me to be distracted, thank you very much."
Anna stood before her sister with her hands on her hips while Elsa tried to keep her giggles in check.
"What's so funny?"
"Oh nothing," her laughter escaped then, "it's just difficult to take you seriously when you disprove your own statement while saying it."
"Wait what?" the spitfire was obviously affronted, "I never –"
"Good day Princess," Knud interrupted purposefully, "how has your day been?"
"Oh just great actually!" she beamed, skipping over towards him; "I went out with Kristoff and – oh wow, Kund! That's so beautiful! You really captured her Queenly scowl perfectly."
"I do not have a Queenly scowl!" Elsa retorted with a frown from where she was standing on the dais.
"Sure you don't," she leaned close to the grinning painter and stage whispered, "That's totally not a Queenly scowl on her face right now, is it Knud?"
"And you weren't distracted at least three times thus far at all, right?" A smirk retorted.
"Right!" Anna straightened with a grin before it fell abruptly, "Wait…"
Knud chuckled at their banter and returned to his painting. He couldn't afford to get distracted as easily as the Princess could. They had already been painting for well over eight hours, with a lunch break in between of course, but still. The faster he could finish this the better. At least the Queen would be entertained for the last two hours of the process.
"So, how has your day been?" Elsa asked, forcing herself not to shift her weight from foot to foot to encourage blood circulation. Instead she willed an icy chill to envelope her feet, turning her heels into ice.
She sighed in relief.
"Better that yours that's for sure." Anna smirked knowingly, "did you just ruin another pair of heels by turning them into ice?"
"I don't make a habit of ruining my footwear, like some people I know."
"That's like your fourth pair that's been iced!"
"And how many pairs of your shoes have become waterlogged because of some or other mishap that resulted with you in town?"
Anna mumbled her answer ducking her head away grumpily.
"Excuse me?" the blonde simpered, "I couldn't hear yo–"
"Ten. I said, ten."
"Ten! I thought the amount stood on nine." Elsa said in surprise.
"Well," the redhead drawled, kicking her feet out before her, "there was an incident. Today."
"Was anything broken?"
"Wellllll…"
"Anna."
"What?!" the youngest exclaimed innocently at her sister's glowering face, "There was a pig and a pie and the ocean somehow ended the whole thing and – Look, it wasn't that bad. Kristoff caught the pig before it could wreck anymore havoc."
"What broke?" Elsa asked rubbing her face tiredly.
"A few stalls and a rowboat…"
"A rowboat." She repeated in a monotone, "How on earth do you break a rowboat?"
"It's quite easy actually. It sunk into the fjord like a stone!"
"Anna!"
"What?! It really wasn't so bad! Okay, fine the boat needs to be replaced, but Kristoff already fixed the stalls and the fruit that was displayed on it wasn't bruised that badly. The pies were ruined completely – by the way they tasted so good – and –"
"Anna."
The redhead swallowed her words and looked up at her sister. Elsa tempered her Queenly scowl to a less severe but sterner frown.
"You need to be more careful."
"I know…" she lowered her head, chastised.
"People look up to you; you're their Princess. They still need to get used to your…eccentricities."
"I was just trying to help…"
"I know you were," Elsa's voice softened, "Why was the pig even on the loose?"
"A little boy had lost it somehow." Anna explained contritely, still looking at her feet. "It was his pet, you see, and I wanted him to stop crying. When I saw the pig I just reacted. I'm sorry."
The eldest sister released a deep sigh, "It's okay." The youngest looked up hopefully, "But I think you should go and help re-bake those pies you destroyed."
"Already volunteered!" Anna beamed, "Asked Miss Malark as soon as I was fished out of the fjord."
"How did you end up in the fjord anyway?" Elsa asked, amused.
"It's actually a very funny story."
Time flew by with Anna retelling the incident in minute detail, coupled with hand gestures and noises to make the story more interesting. Knud found it more difficult to finish the Queen's skirt with her laughing so much at her sister's tale while being enraptured by the story himself. The dress had moved numerous times, changing the folds and the shadows, but he was used to this type of movement after ten years' experience abroad. The bodice and upper-body had the most detail in and Knud had been able to capture that part perfectly. The lower part was more rushed than the upper, but it gave it that artistic quality that he was known for. So, no harm, no foul.
The painting was announced as finished and Anna wasted no time to drag her sister out of the throne room. Knud stayed behind, packing up his supplies while listening to the sister's laughs echo in the room as they exited it.
When he was alone and mostly packed up, he paused to regard his painting again. That abnormality that he had felt earlier was still there, but this time he knew where it was. The Queen, like her father before her, stood stiff and formal on the canvas. Her throne was in the background with muted colours while her formal blue dress and white hair stood out in the foreground. Selecting the thinnest brush in his set, one he usually reserved for the finest of details, he positioned it over the painted Queen's linier mouth.
Two twitches in the corner of the mouth and a few touch ups in the oil paint later, the Queen had a warm smile in place of her formerly stoic lips, all thanks to her sister's influence.
Completely satisfied with his work, Knud packed his paint up and left the throne room in search of Kai's help to transport the painting back to his studio until it is dry enough to be presented to her Majesty in the near future.
The painting stood smiling in the empty hall, a foretelling of what the future will hold the young Queen of Arendelle.
I used a comic strip as some inspiration. The last part where Knud changes the shape of the mouth, was the end result of the comic strip.I don't know who drew it, sorry, but it was a very sweet idea that does not belong to me.
The pig, pie and ocean thing was out of a deleted scene from the movie. It's hilarious! Check it out if you want to know what happened in town with Anna.
Next installment will be posted tomorrow :)