Of State

by Red Star

In their time, political marriages are a fact of life. Elsa's heart is thawed and expanding; Hiccup's is broken and receding. Theirs is a shared life of dragons, talking snowmen, parchment, ink, flames, ice, steel, and blood. Through all this, love may yet be found.

2. Thanatopsis

Author's Note: Over 14,500 words; 22 pages, and 64 kilobytes. This is the longest single chapter I've ever written, and I'm not going to promise similar lengths for the others.
I will be starting a forum-"Matters of State" on this story, where I will post notes and thoughts. Questions will be answered (providing the answers do not spoil anything in coming chapters) and headcanon shall be put down, so please read and post.
And don't think I don't see you favers and followers: thank you for your interest and support, but pleasepleaseplease review. I live in a cold state and reviews help keep my typing fingers warm and tapping.

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Of State

Chapter 1

Thanatopsis

The wind blows in from the south, and he smells the burning before he can see it.

There's the disturbingly homey smell of burning timber, the almost cleansing tang of melted metal, an omnipresent sulfurous whiff whose origins he's never been able to nail down.

Then there's the burning flesh; that can remind him far too much of a dinner roasting over the firepit back home. He often gives thanks to various gods and goddesses that this scent is frequently overpowered by its more pleasant company.

Hiccup is (officially) High King of the Norse, Lord of the Dragon Riders (semi-officially), Protector of All Civilized Nests (most unofficially), and he is tired. Since his father died he has spent more time on Toothless's back then ever before; not exploring or discovering for its sake, but on the business of governance and alliance. The speed he once cultivated for sheer mutual pleasure is now an essential convenience for a king whose armies and fleets are advancing, whose subjects are uncertain and bemused, whose enemies are scattered and dispirited. Now that quickness takes him from island to ship to battlefront, at times too late and others too early. Behind him is a trail of secretaries, officers, and guards (the latter a recent innovation), who doggedly follow him even when he goes beyond their sight. They know where he's going: he doesn't let anybody down.

But he does feel a weariness; in his head, in his heart, and in his stump. Hiccup wants his chair, his hearth, his house…

…his wife…

But he knows these are for later. As early as within a few days he can rest in his own bed, and Toothless can have his scratched up and constantly slagged slab of granite again.

Today is Hiccup's victory, one that will inevitably lead to another.

He sees it now, in the twilight glow. Black smoke rising from an almost flat collection of islets; scattered ember-like glows that are in reality gardens of flame that are consuming walls and longhouses; winking lights from blades of all kinds. Everywhere there are beasts with jagged wings, hostile snarls, and whooping brigands on their backs. His ships have swarmed into the local waters, bearing the insignias and symbols of a new union that dominates the northern waters (some, he observes, displaying signs of hasty craftsmanship or revision). Many of the ships are the traditional long, low resting boats that had carried his ancestors in war and peace for several centuries. Others are the descendants of these older designs, but longer, wider, sleeker, with barn-like enclosures built just before the stern. All bear the eccentricities of the tribes and chiefs who built them.

He banks to the right, turning to make a slow pass to look for a particular ship and its particular sail. The smoke obscures and none of the islets have any features that he'd consider attractive to a quartermaster looking to build a camp for his masters. There's a lot of trees but little in the way of the mountains and cliffs of his homeland. Hiccup has heard of places where the land is flat all the way to the horizon and beyond but is never sure what to call them; people can't agree on whether "plain" or "steppe" is the correct word. Whatever the term is, he's never seen one, and wonders if these might be similar.

Toothless gives out the authoritative welcome hoot of the Alpha, and Hiccup turns his head to see Meatlug droning towards him, followed by the wider flaps of Barf-Belch. He raises a hand in greeting and looks down again, trying to find his cousin's flagship.

A coiled Monstrous Nightmare beneath Snotlout's curled horns—all in yellow and red—suddenly catches his eye. Tied to a dock that managed to escape immolation that had burned a small fleet, Shiplout bears a sharp bow teethed with the shed-off claws of a dozen dragons, four heavy crossbows and a shelter big enough for two Nightmares. It is Hiccup's gift to an eager cousin, who bent his head down and fearlessly charged his enemies.

People are moving down there, horned heads stepping on and off Shiplout, calling out names and orders and curses. Other clusters of humanity mill around further from the shore, bare headed under the suspicious glares of Snotlout's warriors, casting frightened glances at the burned remains of the Northern Alliance's last eastern holding.

Toothless sweeps in low, issuing a series of barks. Dragons look upwards and give cries of welcome; riders look up and after a moment their own cheers begin to rise to Hiccup's ears. Swords and hands rise in salute and no officer is needed to clear a landing for Norse royalty. The Night Fury meets the earth again as well as can be expected on a recent battlefield; dancing over discarded helmets, broken shields, and shattered pieces of wall before his claws can seize the soil. He utters contentment and regards the bowed heads of his brethren with lordly gratitude.

Vikings, for all their humanity, often stand on ceremony less than their mounts and as Hiccup reaches for his prosthetic his hand in intercepted by one that practically engulfs it. He looks into a pair of bright blue eyes and a grinning mouth that's missing a few teeth but won't stop moving.

Welcome to Dredgar!

We got them, my lord!

King Hiccup!

Long live the King!

Sign my hammer!

Sign my shield!

Sign my head! I took it off that big bastard over there!

It's like finding a nest full of unusually deep voiced baby-birds (only worse smelling). So many voices cheering, calling, laughing, boasting, and praising. Hiccup ends the rather one sided handshake to remove his helm, and it seems like this only excites the bloodied warriors even more. He gives a tired smile—it's the only one he has right now—and the Vikings see it and understand. His left hand swings back towards his iron appendage and turns away the riding implement, cycling out his terrestrial foot in the same action. He slides off Toothless's back into a respectful clearing shaped by the Vikings who now regard him with glad smiles and bright, triumphant eyes. They're proud of themselves. Of him.

Of what they've done for him.

Someone is pushing through the crowd. A lean, wiry Viking with a red tunic and the Hoffersons' gold hair and headband slips past two exceptionally burly—not to say sweaty—axmen. Ásketill, his brother-in-law, touches a hand to his forehead and brings it down in a bow, a new obeisance for a new king.

Hiccup's response is to grip the seemingly offered forearm, "Where is he?"

"This way, my lord," Ásketill responds, all formality, and turns to tunnel through the wall of restrained violence. Astrid's older brother had been established in his own household when Hiccup and Astrid had met, and they were never close. Respectful, a little awed by his young chief, Ásketill is competent and skillful but otherwise unlike his irreverent sister.

The king and the Alpha follow, both beset by outreached hands and a renewed plea for the signature of a sneering severed head. He hears a series of loud thuds, a tired Meatlug and Barf-Belch landing with all the grace of a rocky landslide.

He pauses for a moment, straining to hear Stormfly's wings working in the air…

Gone.

…then scowls briefly, now stomping after Ásketill's steady, unknowing gait.

Snotlout is perched on a chest with a broken lock, watching a miserable chain of humanity pass by and eating a chicken leg. Behind him, Hookfang sprawls across the collapsed remains of a tent, struggling to stay awake. The saddle strapped to his back carries a hammer with sharp edges, and a heavy sword that is almost as long as Snotlout is.

Dried blood blazes across both.

The chicken leg rises to Snotlout's mouth again and he tears off a strip of roasted meat with no relish. It's something of an absentminded meal. Hiccup could almost sympathize; he's had days where eating is as much of a function as walking across a room. He's too tired and focused to enjoy it.

Ásketill approaches Hiccup's cousin to announce him, but Hiccup moves faster. Striding up to his appointed brigadier, the High King asks, "What are you eating?"

Snotlout blinks and looks up. His face lights up without a sliver of shame and he stands, raising hands and poultry in greeting.

"Hey, little cuz! Told ya I'd kick ass."

"What are you eating?" Be relentless. Hiccup doesn't want to discipline a commander right in front of his troops, but his concerns are not for Snotlout's reputation among the ranks.

His cousin blinks, and then looks at his half-eaten meal. Behind him, Hookfang has raised his head to salute Toothless, whose grunt is apparently a draconic version of "as you were" because the larger beast lowers his head again.

"Uh…chicken?" Snotlout pauses, then adds: "With a little too much salt?" The king might be looking for specifics.

Hiccup is fed up with the conversation already. "I gave you orders, specifically regarding captured foodstuffs: all of it goes to our freed people. That's them?" he gestured towards a suddenly stalled flow of men, women, and children, staring at the peculiar new fellow in black armor and leather. Some wave back.

"Yeah, that's everybody," Snotlout blinks again, looks at the greasy bone and flesh in his hand again, glances at Hiccup, then laughs.

The High King's blood suddenly rises and his hands tighten. Snotlout is shorter than he now, but can still bench-press the equivalent of four Hiccup Haddocks and a punch had better be quick and devastating.

Snotlout continues to laugh and then presents the chicken. "Hiccup," he says through his chortles, "this is all that's left."

Now it's the King's turn to blink.
"We overran the prison early on," Snotlout explains, lowering the leg to his waist. "Another company took their stores a little after. Bastards tried to make a stand in the forts, much good it did them," he nodded at a nearby wall that was about to collapse into cinders. "Drago used this place to train up his first group of slaves…" it was generally agreed among the dragon-riders that Drago Bludvist was no trainer, in the sense of the word, but he was a skilled enslaver of dragonkind, "…but it seems that when he started moving further into the archipelago this just became a waystation for recruits from whatever stink-bucket they crawled out of. Things fell apart, they tried to fortify again, but…" he trailed off at Hiccup's expression.

"So, uh, yeah, we gave them everything and…well, it was like throwing a live chicken into a flock of starving Terrors," Hiccup recalls an experiment conducted by the twins along such lines. "Everything is just about gone. I mean, there might be other stockpiles, but some lady gave me this; thanks for coming to help, she said."

And now Hiccup is embarrassed. His cousin would never take food out of a poor woman's hands; there's dimness and a little cruelty in Snotlout but they groan under the weight of nobility.

By Odin's missing eye he's tired and when he looks into his cousin's eye there's some exhaustion there too. He shouldn't have brought it up; let him have the damn chicken leg.

"Never mind, sorry I brought it up," Hiccup moves on, hoping to bury the topic. "Good work, excellent work. The Northern Alliance is dead."

He pauses, then turns to face the wretched masses behind him. They are in rags, dirty, wounded, burnt, bewildered, but alive and his.

"Our enemy is dead," he tells them in a raised voice. "This place, right here," he points at the patch of earth beneath his foot, "is all that they had left. They died with Drago, we just needed to push them over."

There are smiles now; someone gamely raises a cheer, but most settle for applause.

And that's fine. If they want to cheer, they can wait a while. Families, villages, and tribes are waiting for them. Everyone can go home.

"We've looked at the list? Accounted for every captive?"

Hiccup turns back to the brigadier and his deputy, and their faces are the response. For a moment, he says nothing, stares through the two other Vikings, and then opens a palm, waving fingers towards it.

He wants to know.

"We're going through the list right now," Snotlout says, and nods at the restarted line. "In front of that line I've got two guys with tables and charcoal, checking everybody off before they get on the boats. But the thing is…"

He looks into his cousin's eye. There's no pride, or pleasure.

"Hiccup…we—we counted one hundred and seventy."

"Excuse me, sir," Ásketill interjects unhappily, "one hundred and seventy three."

One hundred and seventy three. Hiccup looks at the line again and realizes just how longer, or fatter, it should be. He curses his blindness.

"Where are the others?"

Snotlout shrugs and says, "We don't know. They were loaded on some spare boats and taken away about two weeks ago. The rest were supposed to follow a few days later but they couldn't arrange the shipping. Probably our doing; we came in burning everything that wasn't ours or foreign," he paused. "Well, the right kind of foreign, anyway. Scouts said there were about eight Northern Alliance ships around here and that's the first we'd seen in days."

"You have prisoners, right?"

"Yeah, like a bajillion. I've got them corralled over there," Snotlout points out a somewhat-finished fortification around some hastily built long houses with greenish thatch. Stalking around it are armed warriors of the type who scowl suspiciously at boxes of kittens.

Hiccup touches Ásketill's arm. "Bring me your largest man with the largest ax you have. Put him together with a box or something and send him over there. Snotlout," he turns with a scythe in his voice, "introduce me, would you?"

"There was no point to this—any of it. You do realize that, right?"

Night has fallen, fires have been breathed into being, the first shipload of rescues is being readied, bags of captured food carried onboard.

He paces in front of an uneven row of bound, kneeling wretches, surrounded by narrow-eyed men with lots of sharp things. Toothless, sensing his displeasure with the prisoners, circles them. Occasionally, his huge head stretches toward a random man, displaying his teeth and sniffing speculatively. A rumbling, hungry sounding purr emanates from his throat and one fellow soils himself.

"Drago died; I saw it myself," Toothless passes by and Hiccup runs a hand over the dragon's snout. "Dragged down by his own monster, fleeing from a dragon perhaps a twentieth its size. He must have lost consciousness and drowned; a kid named Halvard was fishing and pulled up his ugly carcass, pissed on it, then came to tell us. We tied a rock to him and sent him back to feed the fish. I've still got his arm; want to see it?" This last is directed at one officer whose face is far too composed for Hiccup's temper.

It's a foreign countenance, flat, with a thin moustache dripping from its upper lip, a small nose, coarse black hair and guarded eyes. This man is one—among several thousand—of the reasons Hiccup has arrived where he is. Trickling, then flooding in behind Drago, bullying weaker Viking tribes into alliance or subjugation, mercilessly stripping their "friends" of food, water, tools, and men, treating women as pretty and impressively mobile pieces of furniture. They looted, murdered, and raped their way across the peninsula, citing liberation as their motivation and dragons as the sworn enemy of these men of ideals.

Then their wave broke upon the rocks of Berk; and suddenly pet dogs turned their teeth against their owners, while the once-fearful free tribes rallied around Hiccup.

But the foreigners still fought; even sought out actual allies instead of slaves. Hiccup's maps were cluttered with uncollected reckonings.

"I've lost good men and women," Bertha the Big-Boobied would never let him rest if he didn't remember her sex's contribution, "trying to get you to understand this—that when Drago died, your cause died with him. You've lost men, and yet you keep escalating your suckiness. You know something? That's just made your situation here worse."

Something large and excitable shuffles close behind him.

"Hiccup," Fishlegs mumbles into his ear, "someone to see you."

The High King of the Norse whirls on his false leg to face his chief secretary, who makes a sideways nod to his left. The Viking Ásketill has sent reminds Hiccup of the rough rocky pillars that tower and slouch around Berk, only far more solid.

"What is your name?"

"Davodill, milord," the name and style comes from someplace far beneath the Viking's feet.

"Davodill…" Hiccup feels a little lost.

"Actually, its Davodill the fourth, milord," the giant smiles. "Named for me Pop-Pop, I was."

"He must be very proud," Hiccup assures him.

"I hope so, milord," Davodill bashfully replies.

"If not, he will be. When we're done here, I'll choose one of the enemy's weapons to send home with you. Present it to him."

"An honor, milord," Davodil's black eyes brighten over a close cropped but thick beard. "Ifin it's not too much trouble, milord, could you sign it?"

"Certainly."

Davodill sets down a wooden block—in the firelight, Hiccup momentarily believes it is a stump the Viking ripped up for want of a useful stand-in—and plants the head of an ax big enough to plow farmland into the ground, leaning casually on the handle. Someone produces a bucket for Fishlegs, who sits and opens his portable writing slope to pull out parchment and pencils. His wife and her brother are already picking their way through the huddled prisoners, tugging away trinkets and clothing.

Hiccup stalks to the officers, considers for a moment (not really), then points to the complacent man whose face had offended him. A burly sentry with black curls everywhere appears instantly and grabs the foreigner, carrying (dragging) his burden to Davodill's block, pressing the captive's face into the unfinished wood.

Satisfied, Hiccup looks at the others.

"Three hundred and eighty-two," he begins gravely. "That is how many people—men, women, and children—were taken from five different tribes during your retreat."

Defiant grumbling bubbles up among the prisoners. Hiccup only raises his voice while Ruffnut and Tuffnut become hostile in their looting, teaming up to pull the pants off a scrawny reprobate.

"According to our count, two hundred and nine of those people are missing. You will tell us where they are or what has happened to them."

The foreigner next to Davodill bursts into laughter. "Did you hear that, boys? King Dragon Pampers is giving us orders! Thinks he's Drago—"

Hiccup makes a slicing motion with his hand. The sentry's grip disappears, while Davodill sweeps up his ax and cuts into wood in one smooth motion.

"Is that it?" Hiccup asks while the foreigner's surprised eyes rest on his former comrades. "Is that why you kept going? Because 'surely King Dragon Pampers would give up any day now'?"

The only sound is that of Tuffnut removing a rather ornate belt he fancies.

"Interesting," Hiccup rubs his chin thoughtfully, then points at a suddenly appalled looking fat officer whose necklace is being examined carefully by Ruffnut. The burly sentry cracks his fingers and reaches for the indicated captive. A sharp inhalation and the officer suddenly keels over.

"Oh, for the love of Sif," a boot is driven into the man's side. "C'mon, c'mon, it's just yer bloody head; bad form to faint in front of the king."

Ruffnut touches the man's neck, "Nah, he's dead." The necklace is pulled off and tucked into her pouch.

"Well, that's just plain disrespectful, it is," the guard mutters. "Beggin' yer pardon, Majesty, but I'm afraid you'll have to pick another melon."

Hiccup rolls his eyes and gestures towards a ragged youth, turning to pace again. There are some squawks from the man, which are ignored. He opens his mouth to address the stubborn invaders again when somebody shouts a word.

"Uttland!"

Nonplussed, he blinks and looks around. Ruffnut and Tuffnut shrug, Fishlegs looks toward Davodill, who leans against his ax and regards the doomed foreigner with satisfaction.

"We sent them home, to Uttland," the youth sputters, staring up at the king. "Two weeks ago. We send them back as slaves and wives, to get money for the cause."

"Shut up, Erlend," someone in the kneeling group shouts.

"We've lost, you stupid bastard! And I signed up to kill dragons, not for any of this," Erlend snaps back.

The sentry lets his prisoner up at Hiccup's nod. The king grabs Erlend's arm and pulls him away from the rising voices of his outraged former comrades. Fishlegs follows, clutching his little desk, while the twins scramble out of the group of Uttlanders, landing kicks and causing any sort of discomfort they can. Toothless slithers past all the Vikings to march beside his rider.

The little parade ends by the immolated docks. A few foreign boats drift mindlessly in the small bay, one has dug itself into the mud beneath the shallows. Landing ships are there too, with a few sailors moving things off and onboard, glancing up curiously at the prisoner and his strange escort.

Hiccup removes his hand and studies Erlend. Now he can see the blood on the chainmail and gaping holes in a coat that is too large for the young man. Now he sees the fright and exhaustion in Erlend's eyes, and it dawns on him that perhaps today's victory is even greater than he first thought.

"Where did they go?"

"I'm not sure; I wasn't in on the decision," Erlend thinks. "They would probably be brought in through Radvo; biggish port, many of the tribes trade there and…" he trails off.

Hiccup waits. Toothless draws up behind the prisoner and rumbles deep within his throat.

"It has a reputation," Erlend blurts out. "All the big slave dealers are there."

"Slave dealers," Hiccup repeats softly. "Is there a lot of them in Uttland?"

"I don't know. Probably more than dentists; that's not a popular profession back home."

"Tell me more."

And Erlend does. He speaks of small squares where human merchandise is examined while enduring the commentary of overly-helpful dealers, who like pointing out the whiteness of teeth and the strength of a back. He talks about the muddy but long roads leading out of Radvo to distant villages across the frozen countryside. He explains that marriage contracts are held as invalid by the slavocracy; that wives are taken from husbands; children ripped from their mother's grasp; and gods help the virgin.

Hiccup listens, his eyes only leaving Erlend's face to ensure Fishlegs is keeping up. Ruffnut stands by with fresh sheets of paper.

When Erlend is finished, Hiccup is still staring. He can see that Erlend is now even more uncomfortable, looking more like a child facing a disappointed mother than a warrior of the cold seas.

Finally: "Did you ever have a slave?"

No; his family's wealth extended to a few healthy yaks. Frankly, his father sneered at the entire practice; thought the dealers were feeding laziness.

"Why did you join Drago?"

He hadn't actually; recruiters from the Northern Alliance had passed through the market where he'd been working. It had sounded exciting and righteous (he mentioned another foreign town: Klotthas, which meant nothing to Hiccup.) By the time he'd set foot on one of the warships, Drago had been dead for perhaps two days.

"Whose coat is that?"

His ex-commander's—"ex" because the man had been cut to pieces in the battles of Widow's Peak. Erlend had survived, brought back the man's body—"Not sure why, guy was a prick"—and was promptly rewarded with a command he didn't want.

Again, Hiccup went silent, then turned to look at his boats, whose sailors suddenly went in a frenzy of work.
"Do you know what 'parole' is, Erlend?" he says at last.

The young man blinks. "I…I don't. Sorry."

"Don't be," Hiccup replies breezily. "It wasn't the sort of word Drago would know or let others know. It works like this: you give me your weapons and solemn oath to go home quietly and leave us alone, and I let you go."

Erlend stares at him.

"Go?"

"Yes. Home. That is, you'd go home. But you would all have to promise to not try to fight us again," Hiccup explained. After another moment: "Ever."

"All?"

"Yes. All of you," Hiccup waves in the direction of the makeshift prison camp. "Give me your word and you can all go home. Except for the officers."

"But, why—"

The king leans forward. "Look, no offense, but I'd rather not have to deal with you guys any more than I have to. Mathantir is waiting; harvests need to be collected; breeding season is near; you know how it is."

"Yes, sir," Erlend says uncertainly.

"So we're going to have you explain it to your people. Documents will be provided, with my signature and seal," Hiccup glances over at Fishlegs who snatches fresh paper from Ruffnut and begins scribbling away. "We'll even provide the ships to carry you home. And while that's going on, I'm going to have you carry a message for me to your chieftains."

Erlend is dazed, but flinches when Hiccup pulls a knife out of his right arm-guard. The prisoner is spun by Hiccup's hand and the blade makes short work of the bindings around Erlend's wrist. He is then pushed towards the male half of the Thorston twins.

"Take him to the rank and file; no talking with the other commanders. Tell Snotlout to gather up his fleet captains and meet me here."

Tuffnut pushes Erlend so that he walks in front of the Viking, but the Uttlander takes only two stumbling steps before something occurs to him.

"My lord," he calls out to Hiccup, who is approaching a hopeful looking warrior with a decidedly unhappy face squeezed between his two paws, "what about the officers? You said we can all go home, except for the officers; what does that mean?"

High King Hiccup pauses, then turns back. His face reveals nothing, but Erlend feels like he is about to regret asking.

"We're going to give them a proper send-off."

---

The pile of state documents shifts and Elsa lifts her head to the window of her halted carriage. There are horses and uniforms everywhere, the clinking of bridles and creak of leather rising like a preparing orchestra. From behind the royal coach she hears the snorts and wooden groans of the following conveyances as they come to rest.

The coachman vaults down and opens her door, steps swinging out, and Queen Elsa I of Arendelle alights into the daylight. She almost immediately regrets it—the sun seems to be right overhead and filled with displeasure at her.

There are some who joke—and she is unsure whether she can laugh—that summer is revenging its exile on Arendelle with the high temperatures that keeps the town in the shadows, splashing in the fjord, or lined up at the lemonade carts. During her walks, she's caught her subjects lined up behind her to enjoy a cool breeze that apparently stirs up in her passage.

The queen's procession has halted among old tall trees, pulled off the gravel highway that connects the capital to Elsa's northern provinces. Just ahead is a trail—ruts really, dug out by several generations of sled runners—stemming away from the road, past the old growth, and up the mountainside.

A corporal of the guard approaches with a cream-colored mare, Snowdrop, who is fresh from the stables and has borne no burden on the road. Standing at attention, he presents her with the reins.

"Thank you," she smiles, like her mother taught her. Like a queen should do.

He gives a minute nod—well trained—and stoops with joined hands to help his queen clamber on her horse. She settles into the side-saddle, sweeping back her dress—no frost weavings today, blue and white velvet, with a waistcoat and sapphire brooch, suffices. Her hair is in a braid that now seems inviolate.

The trail is as clear as her thinnest ice, and Snowdrop gets the idea very quickly. A light escort forms—lightly armed, more for formality than actual protection—and they begin the climb at a trot.

Time passes: solid, dried earth gives way to mud. Then mud is covered by heavy, back pinching slush and clumpy snow, the stuff that renders March so ugly. Finally there's white powder and they meet the crevice that suddenly opens on a great sea.

Elsa pulls on the reins to look. It's a small shock to have to narrow one's eyes to try and pick out the peaks on the opposite shore; she thinks of mountains as big and sloping, in an eternal shoving match with each other in the confines of their ranges, tolerating rivers and maybe the occasional lake but not this veritable ocean.

"Your Majesty," a sergeant says, riding up beside her; asking permission to speak.

"It's beautiful, isn't it," she replies softly; permission given.

"Yes, Ma'am," the sergeant nods dutifully. Then, "Used to come up here with my father for the fishing. Lots of trout, fat and—" he glances at her face, "…tasty. Fried them up on the bank right there."

He points to the bank—the only one that seems to exist on Lake Orno. And it is small too, for such a large body of water. Probably a hundred men of median size could link hands and block it off. It is squashed between two sudden walls of jagged stone that does not invite climbing.

Small wonder there was no settlement attached to it. As it is there is one shelter (more like a barn) and a few stone circles marking fire pits. One of these has a small blaze crackling, warming a man stretched out a few feet away with a canteen by his side and several layers of blankets piled and wrapped about him. Another man, stout, dark-bearded and mittened, rises from a kneel beside him to stare at the queen's party.

Beyond the scraps of civilization on this tiny shore is a long rectangular field of darkness pressed in at all sides by solid white, dotted by slivers of ice being wrestled out of the water by several burly men. Two sleds sit on the ice, tied to large and bored-looking animals. One is rather large, with wooden rails forming barriers to the slippery cargo stacked neatly in its bed. The other is small, large enough to carry a family and all its belongings down a whitened highway. A cube of ice slides into place behind a bulging rucksack and a pair of new but frequently used tongs falls against the fabric. Kristoff Bjorgman has caught sight of his queen and girlfriend's sister, and he unhitches Sven on his way to greet her.

And he has to greet her; Anna tells Elsa that Kristoff does not particularly care for people, but he's been nothing but polite to her. Visits to the castle, even when Anna meets him outside, invariably include hunting the queen down and declaring his presence.

Sergeant dismounts and offers his hand to Elsa, who descends gracefully from her mount and makes her way to the little fire. The standing ice harvester (why else would anybody be here that day?) removes his woolen hat and bows.

"Joakim Disling, Your Majesty," he says, "Welcome to Lake Orno."

She acknowledges his greeting and then turns to the lying man; surprised brown eyes stare up at her from a circle of knit and heavy weave.

"Is this man all right?"

"Dropped a block and fell in," Kristoff says as he clumps up. Sven immediately makes for Elsa's hands, perhaps the only other being besides Anna who would willfully do so. She scratches ears and notices the prone man has a bulge around the ankle.

"I wish you a swift recovery," Elsa looks at Disling. "He should be someplace warmer."

"As soon as we've finished, Ma'am," Disling says and he knows it's not good enough so he continues: "We're partners. If we go back with nothing to sell, he'll lose money too. This way, at least his family will get by while he recovers."

It's the truth but Elsa still doesn't like it. She gives Sven a parting rub and heads for the ice. Kristoff and Sergeant follow, while Disling watches in confusion. The other men on the ice pause in their work, watch Elsa glide over towards the large sled that is a little over half-full of ice. She studies the clear blocks for a moment before lifting a small white hand. A small puff of white leaves her fingertips, drifts over the sleigh's box and spins into a cloud the size of a small house. White vapor stretches towards the top blocks and suddenly something falls out of the magical ether: a six sided, sharp-edged brick with almost no opaqueness within itself, landing on the lake's offerings with splendid alignment and a smack that causes no cracks. Frozen dust shoots up and finds no resting place before another block lands next to the first, swiftly joined by yet another at its side.

The other ice harvesters stand, some rising from a crouch by the open water, watching their inventory increase ever three seconds (Disling pulls out a scratched and faded pocket watch for the sake of accuracy at the bar later.) Mouths are open, one pair of tongs falls to the ice, but when Elsa glances over there's no fear and she keeps at her work.

The partnership's sleigh is full within a minute, and the queen—spying it and making a snap decision—waves her cloud over to Kristoff's, where it proceeds to double his take for the day. Finally she spreads the fingers of her hand and swings it over her shoulder, as if releasing something quickly, and the cloud dissipates into a brief shower of snow flakes.

Queen Elsa turns to the icemen. "Your sled is full, Master Disling. It's time to give all your attentions to your partner."

"Yes, Ma'am," Disling says with satisfied delight, and begins barking orders for a hasty departure. Tongs, saws, forks, and axes are tied up in bundles, strapped onto the side of the sleigh, while one man lays down a bed of sticks on top of the ice blocks. Disling mounts the driver's bench and orders the horses forward, gaining the shore and stopping beside his fallen partner. The injured man is gently but rapidly picked up—he had been placed on some sort of plain but sturdy stretcher—and placed on top of the stick-bed, separating him from the ice's chill. The horses are moving again, the ice harvesters give deep nods (in place of bows) from their perches on the sled to the queen, wave to Kristoff and disappear down the trail they had cultivated for so long.

Now the queen and Kristoff are alone, except for guards, horses, and Sven.

Or, perhaps, one might say there is the Queen's Majesty and Kristoff.

And Sven.

"I hope I did not overstep anything," Elsa began, with the royal grace.

"Nah, don't worry about it," Kristoff replied, with the peasant's crudeness. "Worst that might happen is their customers might get ideas about speediness, but that won't last long."

"So if they want it faster, you would…?"

"Tell them they'll get it when it comes," Kristoff says with the air of a final verdict.

It's a side Elsa doesn't believe Anna's ever seen, that of a merchant with goods to sell and contempt for his buyers. She's heard about it from Kai, who offers Kristoff small beers during deliveries, and who isn't unsympathetic to the ice harvester.

He doesn't haggle with us and delivers faithfully and honestly, Ma'am, which is more than I can say for Master Iverson (who holds a royal warrant to supply the castle with frequently tunneling and collapsing candles, and is profoundly disliked by her chamberlain.)

But Kai will still dutifully report that young Bjorgman (who is older than Elsa and seen more of the country than both sisters to whom it formally belongs) counts his first payment from the royal household and becomes noticeably pleased. The stack of kroners slips into his jacket (icemen and banks will occasionally walk the same path, but both will clutch a little harder to their things in the awkward silence while doing so) and Kristoff launches into a sunny diatribe about this hotel or that house or a farm where ice had apparently magically appeared for years and only now had some big smelly lout suddenly become attached to it and demanded payment for some reason.

"So, I suppose you do not consider the customer to always be correct?"

"I know ice, Elsa," it's a bit of familiarity he's not comfortable with, but he has a point to make. "Where to get it, how to heft it, who needs it, where to put it, and what to do with it. All that, and I know how to not lose anything while I'm harvesting it. Lokan was lucky."

Elsa must have looked confused, because Kristoff explains: "The injured man. There's probably a break in his foot, but he'll be up again. Maybe even keep his toes. I've almost lost mine a couple times; half of those guys—" he gestures towards the long departed sled, "—have lost some of theirs. I know some men who've lost legs; they're all at the guildhall now or counting blocks at the warehouses, if they get jobs."

This is a part of Arendelle Elsa hasn't heard about and she waits for more, and Kristoff doesn't keep her.

"Frostbite, gangrene, weight…weight kills. I was at the warehouse one April and someone got the ropes wrong on a five-hundred pounder that killed old Knut. Blood everywhere," he grimaced. "Had to let five piles of ice fall into the fjord and melt. The guild raised prices to help Knut's family—wife and two kids—and you'd have thought we'd let Loki free. The innkeepers and chefs went running to the regency and that was it. Ice is ice, right? Any idiot can make it."

For a moment, Kristoff is silent, and Elsa lets him be so. He's remembering old slights and hurts, things he keeps from Anna.

"I'm sorry," he finally says, "I shouldn't…it's just that these are good men doing dangerous work and these people try to bilk them over the smallest things."

"I understand," and she does. It's something she vowed to be mindful of as she'd studied before her majority.

All problems she would tackle…so long as they made it to the castle.

Arendelle owed her princess more than it knew.

Kristoff is stuffing his tongs into an already clanking bag of heavy canvas. When he's done, he leans over to examine the ice Elsa made for him.

The queen tried to peer around him. "Anna told me you were ranging further out these days."

He nodded absently and said: "It's your fault, you know."

Elsa's eyes widen and Sergeant steps closer in case thrashing is required.

But Kristoff turns and wags a finger, a smile growing. "Summer feels like it has something to prove now."

Elsa smiles, Sergeant chuckles, and Kristoff turns back to the ice. "The heat wave caused a big run on the ice stores and everybody's taken what they can from the closest lakes and rivers. Arendelle usually doesn't get Orno ice, it's the locals who buy it, but it's big enough that we should be able to make it last," he looks at her. "Unless it's a longer summer."

Not him too. Why do they think I know? She can't predict anything, can't read the weather, no magic expert—if she had been, she probably would have built thousands of Olafs instead of making earplugs out of socks.

She shrugs and Kristoff seems to accept that.

"This is beautiful, you know," he taps the ice, "No clouding, no leaves, no pebbles, no bits and pieces of anything…"

"Anything?" Elsa asks, struggling to smother dismay.

"Yeah, that's what happens when you get your ice from the wild," he says, and then straightens, turning to her. "You know, you should have put your seal on this stuff, people will pay extra for your ice."

"I'll keep that in mind; now, about this anything and its bits and pieces…"

"Oh, there was something I wanted to talk about with you," Kristoff made a motion with his mitten-covered hand, as if to snap fingers. "The cold season is coming and that's usually when things slow down for me and…well, I usually rent a room and do some odd jobs…"

Elsa sees it coming and prepares herself.

Even if I was sure about you, how would it look?

"…Sven's gotten a little spoiled, but I feel like, you know, now that…"

Better before he talks to Anna and she starts wheedling, because then who knows what would happen. I don't think I can stand it anymore. All those little tea parties outside my door…

"…but I think I can get by without them. Also, Anna keeps buying me stuff, and, well, it gets…"

She's a princess and reputation matters. If people start talking, she—gods, he's waiting for an answer. What did Anna say, "Queen it up?"

"I'm sorry, Kristoff, I don't think it would be appropriate at this time."

The iceman stared at her and she feels a little disappointed. Anna goes on about Kristoff being raised by "love experts"; what did he expect?

"Uh, okay…I guess I understand that, with the tour and all. Maybe when you get back?"

There's a familiar feeling of utter appalment rising within her and she lets ice slip into her words.

"My decision is not going to change after just a few weeks, Kristoff. And anyway it is not a matter of timing it's a matter of appearance."

Kristoff's confusion only seems to deepen and she is ready to give up and leave (queens should not have to explain their reasoning to their sister's suitors, anyway) when she catches a similar look on Sergeant's face.

Something is wrong here.

"What?"

The iceman glances at the sergeant and scratches his head. "Uh, I'm sorry. I guess I didn't think it was…" he searches for a word, "…improper to ask the queen if she knew of any houses for rent."

Elsa blinks.

"A house?"

"Yes," then, because for some reason it seemed to matter: "With a stable. And a stove, if we can swing it."

"For rent?"

Kristoff purses his lips. "Well, maybe with an option to buy. But I'd wait on that."

The queen looks away, all regal dignity gone. One hand goes to her arm in what Anna calls "Elsa's feel-bad pose" which triggers sudden hugs. At home, that is.

"Sorry," she says. It's the only thing that could be said. "I…I misunderstood," she hurries on before they can think up the right question. "The crown has some…you'd have to ask Kai, I think…yes, yes, ask Kai. I'm—I don't know the city that well."

Anna probably does; dinner conversations with Anna after an outing is like meeting an excited explorer who returns with treasures from unknown lands. Anna could have told him about every rental house in Arendelle, because Anna couldn't wait to leave the castle walls while Elsa had taken a month to arrange a tour of her outlying provinces, something traditionally done right after a monarch's coronation.

So much…disruption. I've let too much slip out of my hands.

"I'll do that, then," Kristoff suddenly says, beckoning over Sven. "Thank you," another glance at Sergeant, "Your Majesty."

"You're going home?"

"Why shouldn't I?" Indeed, the ice on his sled is piled high, and he tosses prickly strands of rope over the top, crouching down to catch the opposing ends and put them in knots around the bottom of the sled. "I've got a full load—thanks, by the way—and the castle wants its ice. You know, that's something else I've been meaning to talk with you about, I don't think your—damn!"

Elsa starts but Kristoff is glaring angrily at the ropes that refused to meet despite his considerable efforts (she's shaken his hands before and she's awed that anything could defy that grip.) Ropes are gripped, different combinations are tried, and nothing works.

Finally, he straightens up and removes his hat to roughly scratch in his hair, muttering invections and casting doubt on the ropes' parentage, when a stream of white spellpower flows past him and splashes against the pile of cubes. Emerging from a snowflake-shaped device, frozen blue cords wrap around sled and burden, embracing ice and wood in a tight web. After a burst of snowflakes completed the enclosure, Kristoff hesitated for a second, and then tapped a cold tendril with a covered hand.

"It's strong for its size," Elsa says from behind him. Again, she tries to see his face. "It won't melt for at least a day; I gave it a little—" she searches for a phrase, borrows from Anna with fingers that flick outward: "—oomph."

He turns and smiles. He knows where the queen learns her vocabulary.

She clears her throat. "But you should be able to saw through it. There is…" What? She searches her memory and finds that thirteen years of her books, pencils, and chalk have left her a stranger to her own home's depths.

"There is a place where we keep them. Kai—or Gerda, or someone—can tell you where it is."

When I get home, get Anna to walk me through the castle so I don't embarrass myself in front of tradesmen again!

"Thanks," Kristoff is still smiling, and it is the kind, worldly one that Elsa knows Anna has fallen in love with.

She wants to cry.

But is it real? Gods and goddesses, why couldn't you have given me the power to be certain?

Hans had been that curious mix of patient and imprudent. With the Queen's guards at his command, herself in chains, and her only possible heir dying from what could only have been Elsa's magics, his greed turned his head and caused him to move too fast. But even then, he'd been silver tongued and knew just which levers could raise admiration or shatter hearts in a person.

Elsa and Anna share the shame of believing in the wrong man. But all they have is each other and Elsa refuses to let gloves and locked rooms keep her from protecting her sister ever again.

Sven is harnessed in a matter of minutes and Kristoff has him pull the sled a short distance to see if its weight exceeded the reindeer's control. Satisfied, Kristoff climbs aboard and gives a bow that is offered in good humor but not in mockery. It doesn't follow protocol, but Arendelle is not large or grand enough for such things.

Besides which, saving royalty allows for some impropriety.

He asks if there's anything for Anna, meaning messages or gifts.

"Send her my love. I'll see her in a few weeks." Gifts would come from her own hands. Elsa was selfish with Anna.

Kristoff nods, says a polite farewell to Sergeant, shakes his reins, and he and Sven soon disappear into the trees.

Elsa watches them go and starts towards her horse and the other guards only after the glinting ice blocks vanish. Sergeant follows close behind.

"Your Majesty?"

"Yes, Sergeant…" nothing comes to mind but consternation. She has done nothing today but embarrass herself.

"Mette, Ma'am; Ingver Mette," he supplies as if they had just been introduced and he hadn't stood guard at her doors for two years. "You know, Ma'am, he has a good reputation around town."

"Does he?" she replies dully, as a private leads Snowdrop to her and prepares for her foot.

"Little debt," actually none after his first paycheck, "Bills paid on time. Hard worker, on the lakes and in town. Countless recommendations."

The queen nods tiredly as she folds her legs into comfort. Mette mounts his own horse and she leads them down the hill. Horses and men walk in silence for a while, and then the sergeant dares to trot up to his queen's side.

"Your Majesty," he says softly and her head turns fractionally in his direction, "Mistakes were made. Trust your guard; we have looked into him and…"

"Thank you, sergeant." It's an order, not a real expression. He understands and pulls away.

"Mistakes" he says.

They'd worn the uniform of her sworn guard the day Hans tried to kill her.

She's tired of the trip already and it is only Monday.

Tuesday she rises in her tent and greets the sentries with more cheer than she usually does, as an apology for the previous day. She breakfasts on croissants that are about a day old but still acceptable and declines coffee (she loves the smell, but can only drink it iced—in its standard state the heat sits in her stomach like a rock and she's uncomfortable for several minutes.)

They arrive at the provincial seat of Roldheim, where she accepts a small bundle of flowers from a little girl who is so shy the blossoms shake in her grip. Elsa gives her warmest smile and rests on her heels to thank the child, a trick she learned from her mother. There's an excited giggle and she runs back to her father, chattering at him. He pales a little as Elsa's eyes land on him.

Lunch is a stew of duck and potatoes, shared with the governor and a local baron, who puts her up for the night. She meets members of the local miner's guild whose hair is still wet and did not manage to completely purge their nails of dirt. They take her hand carefully, as if they're picking up the best family china under their mothers' stern glower.

A light supper, a letter for Anna, and she climbs into a far too large bed and wishes her sister was there to make fun of the giant stuffed bear in the corner. Thinks on the little girl's words.

She's not a monster at all, daddy!

Toast, various jellies, and sausages greet her on Wednesday morning. She takes a sample from each jar of fruit preserves and sends an attendant to the market to buy her favorites for home. The girl arrives in time to leap into her carriage, passing the jars to one of the coachmen as they leave the town.

There's nothing but villages for the next day and a half. She pauses in each town for quick conversations with mayors and accepts little gifts.

In one town, a boy presents her with a beautifully carved six-pointed snowflake.

"Sorry, it's not white," he says earnestly, and she can tell he means it. "I ran out of time to paint it."

"White? Like this?" She opens a palm and conjures a frozen match to the sculpture in her other hand.

His eyes brighten and his mouth opens and the children in the square perk up and swarm around them.

"You know," she says, carefully forming the words. "A white snowflake is only with us for a little while."

A flick of her hand and her creation pops gently into a cascade of white magic.

"But this," holding the sculpture with both hands now, "this is permanent. And the clouds make more flakes than I ever could. But you made this, and that's why I love it."

The boy beams and Elsa feels like she did back in the middle of that fjord when she and Anna became sisters again.

She has sandwiches made up with cold venison and mustard, eats a thick one while reading reports from the foreign office. The papers suffer no stains but is pelted with little crumbs of wheat.

They set up camp and she sits quietly—if somewat uncomfortably—beside the fire, watches staff and guards play cards, abandoning decorum as the evening goes on. When they think she isn't watching, liquor and less…courtly games appear, along with a slowly rising chorus of curses. One tiny, usually bashful handmaiden uses a particularly salty phrase at her hand and Elsa suddenly laughs. Everyone looks at her and then at their indulgences and all she does is get up and move to her tent, still chuckling.

Breakfast on Thursday consists of some eggs and bacon the guards had picked up in Roldheim, shared with their queen in a needless act of apology (she eats it, but she has no quasi-religious attachment to it as others do.)

Sorlo is a gateway to Uttland—less a country than a restive collection of tribes, all supposedly owing suzerainty to Arendelle's crown—and there are many technical foreigners in the city. When she arrives there's strange furs, clothing, and helmets everywhere. Her Arendellans cheer her arrival, and there is applause from the Utts—uncertain, the sound of people who agree with the idea of an arriving queen but are not completely sold on what comes after.

There's a working lunch of mutton stew with the governor, the mayor, and the commander of the Sorlo Regiment which guards the border here. No incursions, the "wild" tribes seem to have their own little business going on, but there's still trade. No real problems. Everyone stays on their side and everyone is happy.

She beds down in the local fortress after another venison sandwich and wonders what business a group of tribes who've rarely agreed about anything but invaders could have in common.

Friday brings a short stack of crepe-like cakes topped with a tangy butter that plays well with the tiny carafe of warmed syrup beside it. She calls a meeting of her caravan chiefs and goes over every item for the journey of the next few days. Lists are made for restocking and teams are assembled, made up of palace staff, royal guardsmen, and volunteers from the local regiment. All march on the marketplaces like a grim army.

Elsa takes the opportunity to write another letter. She rambles about odd clothing and so many military men. Anna is reminded to keep up with the queen's procession on the map she was given at home; her sister is determined to improve her grasp on their country's geography.

We head for Alvsted, she writes, which is the political, commercial, and cultural center of our Western Uttland province. It is our most northerly major city, though smaller than Arendelle City and Sorlo. Our great-great grandfather King Oskar II founded it as a military base and port, to support his conquest of Uttland, but these days it only has the Northern Rangers and fishermen.

The pen hovers for a moment before she decides on the next sentences.

I am told that there are more reindeer than people in Western Uttland, but they also do a robust trade in their meat, so be careful when reading this to Kristoff. In my last letter, I told you that he was looking for a house and Kai was to assist him. On reflection, I should have given you instructions as well: this house will be Kristoff's and not yours. If you have been helping him look that is fine but please remember that he will make a decision based on his needs, tastes, and monies, and not yours.

Pause, then a line under "not yours."

Please write me soon. I'm especially interested in hearing about Olaf; he can get underfoot, but more than once lately I've been on the edge of conjuring a brother up for him.

Elsa closes her eyes. Tries to write something, anything, besides what she is going to put down next.

The other night I was sitting outside and watching the staff and guards at work and play and realized I do not know most of their names or faces. Many of the guards are new—brought in after Mr. 'of the Southern Isles'—but I've only dealt with the maids and servants through a door. I miss you so much; you would probably talk to everyone like a friend. You are friends with everybody.

She finishes and signs it with relief, sealing it in an envelope and placing it among the outgoing signed government business papers. Hardboiled eggs and sliced tomatoes piled on some lefse make up her lunch, after which her staff reports that all is in readiness.

King Oskar's Highway is well maintained but still bumpy. It also cuts through forests as thick as dust in an abandoned house, with huge, high trees that loom over the road like it's an uninvited guest. The guards eye the trees suspiciously, watchful for adventuresome (and doomed) bandits and clutching lances and swords in eagerness. But thieves have their comfort levels and it does not seem as if the Vallmar and Alvsted forests can provide it. There are people there: an old man is sitting with a string of fish and a bound up fishing pole on a fallen log, smoking and looking at nothing until the procession reaches him. He looks up with interest and Elsa halts the coach.

In worry for the stranger, she pokes her head out the window. "Are you all right?"

The old man blinks. "Fine, fine, thank you. Just a little tired. Why do you ask?"

"You were sitting here alone. Can we convey you anyplace?"

"No, no, thank you again. It would just be out of your way. But you are a kind lady. What is your name?"

A watching lieutenant canters forward. "This is the Queen's Majesty herself, Elsa of Arendelle."

"Really?" The old man does not rise, but he gives a deep nod. "I beg your pardon, Your Grace, I don't see many queens—or kings—around here. You are my fourth and probably my last."

"Are you sure we can't take you anywhere?"

"Quite, quite," the old man says cheerfully. "Goodness, you are too kind. I'm just sitting and thinking and I'm almost done. Please don't fuss over me. But thank you for fussing anyway; don't hear of kings doing that too often. Where are you going?"

"Alvsted," Elsa replies, waving at the coachman. "Do you know it?"

"Know it?" White eyebrows rise. "When I was a young man, I did. But I haven't been around there in forty years. Not after Klotthas. Goodbye, Queen Elsa, Odin bless you."

"Goodbye; take care."

Klotthas, Klotthas. I've heard it—no, read it.

She closed her eyes and thought. A name came to her from an otherwise unremarkable book laid out on a tiny desk, read through tears and ears stopped up by tiny gloved fists.

Oh yes, Klotthas. No wonder.

There are villages that have ensconced themselves among the trees from which they live, but none that Elsa feels comfortable asking for shelter or food. They set up camp deep within the woods and she feels a little guilty because camping ranks amid Anna's surprisingly extensive list of activities they need to do now. She combs her hair, examining it in a small mirror. Then curls up on a cot she now understands and falls asleep thinking of hard ground and tents.

The next few days are like that: the highway, some villages that have sprouted up on or off the road, a camp, a cot. One day it rains and Elsa frets over her people, but the guards politely and firmly refuse any offers of magical though dubious help and her attendants crowd the carriages and tents.

Then, the road comes to a split, one branch wandering off into the coastal provinces while another rises up the side of a mountain. There is a slow turn to their right in their climb and they see Alvsted.

The mountains seem to draw away from the city, carpeted in green that tries to march up the sides of the bowl-like valley. The town is a closely built collection of wooden buildings reinforced by stone, enclosed by a low wall, remnants of her ancestor's original intentions. It's not Arendelle, but the streets are cobbled, straight and uncluttered, the buildings in good repair, and carts are moving in accustomed order. The castle—surprisingly tall, turreted, and fat, a remnant of warlike, empire-building days—sits on a low bluff, overlooking the city and is in full function, with men moving about the battlements and a large flag drifting over the gate in a wind blowing off the sea.

The ocean is everywhere: Elsa can hear waves slapping against rocky shores and pebble-strewn beaches and the greedy squawks of ubiquitous gulls. She smells salt in the air and—as they draw near—the aminic odor of fish. She sees the deep blue, sparkling in the sun now and rolling white, and wants to run to it and disappear among the surf for a while (as she'll do at home, while Arendelle sleeps and her mind boils and sputters.) The town and its docks tries to embrace it but there's still wide stretches of empty beaches and open water. Boats rock on the water, tied to the long piers or anchored offshore. There are more pulled ashore, with men standing around or clinging to the hulls.

The royal procession enters the open city gates and a hundred white gloves clap on spear shafts that rise at the approach of the queen. Flags hang from windows, roof edges and flutter in the hands of the city's people. And what people: Arendellans descended from southern colonizers and Uttlanders wearing either the national dress or a mix of that with their customary costume. In Sarlo there had been a distinction: Arendellans had cheered and the Uttlanders had watched. Here they all applaud her.

They proceed to the castle, headquarters and barracks for the Northern Rangers as well as the governor's seat. A square lined by little shops, a tiny city hall, and an impressive clocktower has sprouted around the fortress's entrance since it was built, all well painted and seemingly well-to-do. They are bedecked by green-and-purple banners, some displaying her silhouette in gold while others bear the Golden Crocus, the common symbol of her realm.

A small crowd is gathered within the large open gates, a mix of civilians and military officers still arranging itself by rank. Elsa's coach swings in front of the gathering, where a low ranking officer in full dress strides forward and pulls open her door. She alights from the door and meets the curtsy of small but brawny Governor Signy Gimse, clad in officious forest green at the head of a short receiving line. Next to her is chiseled, graying Colonel Gudmund Bjørklund clad in his regiment's white tunic and green trousers, meeting her eyes with a friendly solemnity. Behind them both is an older plump man, bearing spectacles, a close cropped white beard and a white cassock decorated with red rectangular glyphs.

"Welcome to Alvsted, Your Majesty," Gimse says from her deep curtsy, and rises. "We are honored to have you with us."

"A pleasure, Governor," Elsa replies easily. "I am pleased to see the city in such good condition. If the rest of Western Uttland is in such a state, we should talk about your future career."

Gimse blanched—comfortable in her current office, no doubt, but Elsa wanted new councilors, ministers, and magistrates and she would have her way. The governor swiftly recovered and held out a hand to the colonel.

"Your Majesty may remember Colonel Bjørklund from the coronation review," one that had been delayed three days past its schedule. "He and his regiment guard the border and help keep good order in the region; they've also contributed to our good standing among your provinces."

Heels click and medals clink, and there is a surgically precise bow at the waist.

"At your service, Majesty."

"General Fleischer sends regards," Queen Elsa tells him with a royal smile. The colonel is one of Fleischer's protege.

Governor Gimse gestured to the old man. "Your Majesty, may I present Artem Kun."

Smile again, though the name means nothing. "How do you do, Master Kun."

Kun gave an unpracticed bow that made it seem as if he was ready to topple over. "Queen Elsa, I am so honored."

"Master Kun has been a faithful agent of Your Majesty's foreign, treasury, and trade ministries here and across the border," Gimse explained while directing a fond smile towards the man. "The Kuns have been one of the most prominent Utt families for generations. Artem here has gone back and forth across the border in various diplomatic capacities for over thirty years. He's been recommended for the Golden Crocus."

"I expect you shall receive it, Master Kun," The relevant list has not made it to her desk yet, but if she doesn't see his name, perhaps she can add it with her own pen.

She turns her head then, sensing that a solemn moment is needed. The gate opens upon a broad parade ground, with a cobbled path leading directly to the great keep. In front of the heavy doors is a statue: a great urn festooned with laureled vines and bearing the word "Klotthas" standing upon a huge marble block, which is dark with names. Wilted and freshly plucked flowers are sprawled across each other at the base of the urn and below the lower names on the ground. Elsa—surrounded by the provincial authorities, Royal Guards, and Northern Rangers—approaches with grave steps, hands bare, still, and neatly folded. The retinue fans out around her and the memorial, watching as she studies the urn and its base. There's so many names, and they are odd ones, foreign to her eyes and ears disposed to Arendellan monikers and their Viking cousins.

Names are special words; no little bag of bone or flesh becomes a human without one. No place is worth the journey without one. Though they may have their foundation in basic language, only names have the ability to usurp other words in conveying meaning.

Nineteen years before Elsa was born one unseasonably warm July day, Klotthas became one of those names, an example of nature's ability to sweep away human presence by all manner of instruments: wind, water, rock, and flame.

It was an inoffensive little village, of a race that could be found on every coastline. It kept to the seaside, from which it harvested mackeral and herring, sufficient for its wants and to fill a few small drays for Alvsted's market. Some families kept humble little herds of sheep and cattle; its men left occasionally for labor on neighboring farms or to seek their fortune in the provincial seat or Free Uttland, but generally returned. Close-knit and content in its solitude, Klotthas suffered little strife and garnered little attention from sheriffs, governors, or crown.

It was so quiet and so small that no one realized it had died until one mutilated and ash-blackened boy stumbled onto the road to Alvsted, where he had stood staring dumbly at a column of Northern Rangers back from exercises. He was all that was left of a tiny, solitary, innocent town. No refuge was spared, no beast went uncremated or escaped an unyielding grip, and no flame seemed quenchable.

Everywhere in Arendelle, Klotthas is a word to describe complete immolation. In Uttland, it is a memory of the demonic nature of dragons.

Elsa has closed her eyes in respect and meditation. Then she raises her hands.

Do the magic.

Fingers flex and littles motes of icy magic appear and dance in the air. She wills it and the magic swirls and coalesces, forming stems, leaves, and petals. One of the guards inhales sharply as a dozen cold, clear flowers manifest in the queen's hands and she places them carefully at the foot of the urn.

She opens her eyes and looks over at Kun and there's a shine in his eyes tells her all that is needed.

"Master Kun, do you think I should visit Klotthas?"

The question is asked across a heavy oak table in Alvsted Castle's keep. From the rafters hang carefully preserved regimental colors, provincial flags, and King Oskar II's old campaign standards. Swords hang in decorative circles on the walls alongside racked axes and maces. Elsa's guards intermingle with Rangers along the walls, while castle stewards and royal servants wander in and out clutching platters and carafes.

Artem Kun swallows his wine before he answers the queen's question. The salmon is fresh, lovingly (if not skillfully) prepared, and Elsa has made her way through most of it, following the green beans and buttered bread.

"It may be appreciated, ma'am, but I doubt anyone would blame you for foregoing. Frankly, the wilderness has been reclaiming the village and there's very little to see. Some foundations, the odd fireplace, perhaps, but it is progressing to the point where you wouldn't know a town had been there if you hadn't known beforehand."

"Was no one interested in restoring it?"

"Forgive me, ma'am, but would you want to live in such a place? On an enormous graveyard?"

A point. Kun put down his wine glass and considered his half-eaten plate.

"It isn't simply that; Klotthas had no mines, no grazing or farmlands of any note. Nothing happened or could be gained there that did not occur anywhere else along the coast here."

"Except that it was a home," Elsa thinks of her family's castle, that oddly cozy turreted pile of bricks that she once thought she would never see again, and how happy she was to be proven wrong.

"True," Kun smiles sadly at her. "Homes are rarely appreciated. I'm glad that our queen does so."

She looks at him, a sudden thought: "Was there—did you lose anyone in that attack, Master Kun?"

"Possibly. The Kuns are not a small—or very picky—family, ma'am," he told her. "There was an aunt by marriage from there, but…" whatever his gaze is upon, it is very distant.

"There was never a chance to meet her family," Elsa finishes, in a gentle voice.

"No," Kun sighs, straightens an unused spoon. "There never was. Sweet woman; always had a honey roll ready when we came over. Then one day I came home from the capital, there was a notable cloud of black smoke in the distance, and when I came up to my uncle's farmstead, there were shrieks coming out the windows. There was no recovering from that."

"I am very sorry," Elsa tells him, meaning every word.

"That's very kind of you, Your Grace, but my aunt was affected far worse than myself. The only thing that brought her comfort was young Drago."

Kun speaks as though the name should be known, so confident in this that Elsa is almost embarrassed.

"'Drago,' Master Kun?"

The old man looks astonished for a moment before he chuckles ruefully.

"I'm sorry, ma'am, a small bit of provincialism there; perhaps I've stayed around here too long. If you mention Drago around here you get applause."

"He's a local hero, then?" Elsa feels the conversational threads under her fingers, begins to curl around them.

"I should say so: he's the last survivor of Klotthas."

"Really?" The survivor had gone unnamed in Elsa's book. "And he lived with your aunt and uncle?"

Kun nods. "For perhaps three years; Aunt Lumi doted on him and he helped out around the farm as best he could. But he was a restless young man, Drago Bludvist, and when his right arm had bulked up he left for Uttland, saying he was going north to fight the dragons."

Elsa is amazed. "By himself?"

"At first," Kun replies, straining back to allow a steward to collect his plate. "Then one fine day he showed up in Radvo wearing a dragon's skin and began recruiting. Said he was going to eliminate the dragon scourge for good and all, avenge Klotthas, and liberate Uttlanders and other peoples from fear."

"That is a very…" words failed Elsa for a moment, "ambitious promise to make. It was successful?"

"Quite," Kun says with a smile. "Uttlanders battled dragons for centuries in their homeland. Wars can be as hereditary as blood. Besides, Drago promised fortune and glory for those who followed him, which struck many as better than sitting around playing midwife to pigs. If memory serves he has several thousand men fighting with him now."

Impressed again. "Has he been able to keep to his promises?"

"As well as anyone with a home-grown army can," Kun shrugs, picking up a spoon and eyeing a dish of pudding being placed before him. "I don't know the details, but he doesn't seem to have any trouble finding volunteers. Claims to be preparing for the final stroke."

"He sounds like quite a man," Elsa purses her lips. "Perhaps…perhaps an introduction might be made."

Kun stares at her. Uncomfortable—Drago hates firebreathers, doesn't mean he'll like ice crafters any better—Elsa prepares to withdraw her proposal until the older government agent speaks.

"Perhaps it can. Please excuse my gape, ma'am. Your predecessors had no interest in such things, so Your Majesty surprised me."
She smiles, relieved at awkwardness fading as quickly as it appeared.

"You can arrange it, then?"

"I will do my utter best, ma'am," Kun said thoughtfully, tugging at his snowy beard. "I haven't spoken to Drago for a few years—ships in the night and all that. But once I find him he should be happy to meet you; a royal endorsement would be a great boon to his cause."

They turn to their pudding and move on to other matters, the queen extending their conversation to the other diners. It's ten before Elsa feels she's able to finally end the day, making for her great-grandfather's chambers which had been kept ready for royal visits such as hers.

There is a distinct masculinity in King Oskar II's old rooms. She's greeted by a snarl from her rug (Elsa does not blame the bear; if people were stepping on her with dirty feet all the time she imagines she would snarl angrily too.) There's a large bed with heavy wooden framework and posts, hung with new-looking blue curtains and a highly polished summoning bell on a nightstand next to a bottle of mineral water, some glasses, and a burning candle in a brass holder. A writing desk sits in front of a set of windows that look out onto the castle, town, and sea. An unnecessary fire blazes within an imposing sculptured marble fireplace. Her trunks are present and she fishes out her nightgown, considers starting a letter while changing and decides against it. Too much to put down; organize, prioritize, then write to Anna. Elsa doesn't want her sister's mind to wander.

She throws a few logs onto the fire for the sake of appearances, sends a gust to snuff out the candles, and climbs into a bed that is too large for her. Curls up on her side.

Misses Anna.

She stands at the top of the staircase leading to her frozen palace, now overlooking a vast body of water. The stairs are descending into the water, reaching don, down into the depths until darkness swallows them. As she watches, bubbles begin drifting up the submerged steps, starting out small and distantly spaced, then becoming larger and closer together, almost like the water is boiling.

Somehow, it's not surprising when Anna's strawberry locks surface and then her grinning face appears. Elsa waves because it makes sense to do so (and polite as well.) Anna waves back, and turns her hand around to beckon.

Come in. The water's fine.

The queen takes five steps before she stops to look down and think. Really think. The water is deep and dark. Suddenly, Elsa is afraid—for herself, for Anna, and tells her sister to get out.

Dismissive wave. It's not that deep, and look, I have a light!

The princess reaches into the water by her side and pulls up the candle from Elsa's nightstand, sputtering in the sudden wind from Anna's action until she stills it again. Then she starts to do a backstroke around the staircase, candle perfectly upright in her hand. The queen tries to say something but all that comes out is a distant clang, as if from…

…the bell tower facing the castle. Elsa spasms in her bed and sends a thin crust of ice haloing across the sheets. She hurls her blankets aside, feels the frost tugging at her nightgown and dissolves it with an irritated hand motion. The same hand grabs a night robe from a chair by the desk and she knots the belt as she opens her door into a darkened hallway. The guards on either side look at her, startled, then turn to her with a snap of their heels.

"Your Majesty," says the senior one, a corporal.

"What's happening?"

"We—" the corporal stops and looks past his comrade. Elsa turns her head to see a white coated officer running towards them with a lit lantern.

"Lieutenant Ernst, Your Majesty," he said, sounding less winded than he had any right to be. "Colonel Bjørklund's adjutant. He sent me to tell you not to worry about the alarm."

Elsa stares at him. "Isn't that the entire purpose of an alarm, lieutenant?"

"Well…yes, strictly speaking, ma'am," Ernst replies with an uneasy frown. "But, there's no need for you to worry, ma'am; some sort of oceangoing emergency. Your Majesty can return to bed."

She looks at him for a moment, then steps back across her threshold, and closes the door. The robe comes off and is hurled at a trunk, followed shortly by the nightgown. Like the sorceress she is, the Queen of Arendelle appears before her guards and soldier in glittering icy fabrics, with a ghostly train floating behind her.

"Lieutenant, be so kind to escort us to the colonel," she tells him with a calm voice and cool eyes. The two guards quickly take up position beside her while Ernst stares, his mouth slightly gaping.

"I…Your Majesty, there is really no need…" Ernst is a good officer, merely trying to obey his commanding officer.

But it is Queen Elsa I's army, she knows it, and says with polite indifference: "I shall decide that myself. Lead on, lieutenant."

He bows, hesitates before turning (protocol frowns on presenting one's back to royalty), and moves off at Elsa's nod. They make their way through the halls, down staircases of polished oak and shiny granite, and past frantic, murmuring soldiers who often look right through the queen as they pass before stopping to stare after her and belatedly bow.

Elsa moves like a stately ship contemptuous of white-capped waters, pretends to take no notice of a mobilizing garrison, though her eyes dart about noting bobbing torches and dozens of men running for the gates in heavy trench coats. Beyond the castle walls the city is awake, houses and apartments lit up with flames of various sizes and standing with open mouths, expelling men dressed for the sea and women dressed for the gawking. They are all heading for the dockyard.

Elsa raises her eyes to the sea and finally sees what must have sent the bells ringing: clouds hanging over the black waters, lazily spinning through the sky and trailing vapors after them like remora swimming in a shark's wake. The clouds in themselves are not extraordinary, but the golden aura they are reflecting is.

Alvsted's docks are big—not designed for the great freighters and liners like the capital and other southern ports are, but impressive for a northern town. There are several dozen fishing boats tied to the piers and two whalers floating beside one long, wide wharf. The city's sailors and dockworkers are out in force, swarming the piers and boats. When chilly heels march past the first of the warehouses, the ringing stops; apparently every necessary person in the town is awake. Bjørklund has carved out a little piece of serenity on the end of the longest dock, surrounded by aides and speaking to a bristly-bearded man in oilskins.

At Elsa's passage voices halt and eyes widen. Colonel Bjørklund notices the spreading silence and turns his head, blinking at his queen's arrival (and—in all likelihood—her dress; in the torchlight, her dress glitters in a chaotic but attractive fashion.)

"Your Majesty," he says, and gives a very dark look to Lieutenant Ernst. "We did not expect you."

"So I gathered," she smiles one of her royal smiles, designed to assure subordinates of her personal satisfaction as to their performance while firmly reminding them who is the fount of all authority in Arendelle. "Lieutenant Ernst said something about a marine situation?"

"Well in hand, ma'am, as Ernst should have told you," the colonel's glare hardens. "Roughly two hours ago, one of the city watchmen 'thought' he saw a glow on the horizon. Couldn't tell if it were the moon or not, so he held his silence and carried on his patrol. After he'd checked the warehouses and had a short break, he went up pier four to investigate some splashing he'd heard—an otter or something, I think. When he looked at the ocean again, the glow had…" Bjørklund pauses in consideration, "…increased significantly. He ran to his station and alerted his commander, who ordered the bell rung. The portmaster," the man in oils gave a deep bow, "arrived here before I did. He tells me that all of the larger ships are accounted for, or not expected back for some days."

Elsa takes in the docks, the men tossing buckets, ropes, and bullhooks into their vessels, women carrying blankets and brandy and gently situate them in secure places. There's urgency among these people, who may glean their living from the sea but know never to trust it.

"So it is a ship afire?"

"Undoubtedly, Your Grace," says the portmaster. His voice sounds like it needs oiling, and his breath could start a fire of its own. "Big one too; for that kind of glow I'd have to say a triple decker," his head shakes at the mystery of it all. "Don't see many of those 'round here. Considering the boats those carry, they may not even need much rescuin' but by Njord's beard we'll bring everything we have."

"Quite," Bjørklund nods. "So you see, ma'am, we have everything in hand. My boys will join the rescue and we're setting up one of the warehouses as a hospital, should it be needed. Now," the colonel's hard face dips down in a slight bow, "it would please everyone here greatly if Your Majesty would see fit to return to—"

"Odin's balls."

Elsa blinks, her guard stiffens, Bjørklund's face rises again and she almost steps back because she has never seen a man as prepared for murder as the colonel is. He pivots with a red face, turns wrathful eyes on a young officer who is lowering a spyglass, mouth working in horror.

"Larsson. How dare you use that language in front of the queen, get out of my sight!"

Luckless Larsson starts, sees his commanding officer and points to the glowing horizon—and Elsa notes a flickering brightness on the waters, like a lantern set above a rippling pool. In fact…

Bjørklund sees it too, trades anger for puzzlement, and reaches for Larsson's glass. When he brings it to his eye, he holds his composure but Elsa can still see his grip tighten and his frown reaches for his chin.

He needs to shave. There are small silver bristles poking from a dimple.

The colonel turns to the harbormaster and begins speaking in soft, hasty tones. Elsa snatches the glass from his hands and raises it, focusing on…yes, she was right: that wasn't one fire.

Focus on the distant brightness. Fire is climbing up masts, devouring sails, throwing elevated, carved sterns into sharp relief. Sparks float upward, climbing on escarpments of black smoke. Figureheads occasionally drift across her view, sending her heart pounding. Forty years since the last dragon attack on Arendellan soil and it would be her luck to be present at the next one. She counts.

Eight.

She sees no human movement among the fiery tongues, no swimming or floating escapees in the shining waters. Just eight floating bonfires sailing towards her. Towards Alvsted.

Towards the people around her, their livelihoods bobbing in the water, their homes waiting for them just a brief walk away. All flammable.

Bjørklund and the harbormaster are yelling orders. Some boats are unloaded, while others are burdened even more, sailors out to intercept and deter. No rescues, only survival now; save the boats, the docks, and the town.

Elsa looks around. Two skiffs are casting off, powered by oars, manned by excited, fearful men. She turns to her guards.

"No one leaves the docks. Those boats won't even get close to Alvsted."

She steps away and faces the growing radiance. There's death on those strange ships, but they will never make port. This Queen Elsa has decided.

Her hands—small, soft, and white—rise up, leaving white flurries of magic bending beneath her arms. A blizzard blasts from her fingers, reaching across the water like the arm of an angry goddess and slapping into the flaming ships. The waves rise in protest before solidifying into opaque blue-green ice, leaving the boats suspended in tilted degrees and crossing the still-burning masts.

Elsa's will and hands shift. The concentrated snowstorm—become snakelike and circuitous, bending over the startled heads of the Alvsteders—draws a line from the new frozen graveyard through the waves back towards shore. From this line grows a field of ice large enough for two teams of horses to traverse it side-by-side, expansion halting because she wills it. The finger of magic comes to a stop at a rock-strewn beach and it is there—in a cold denouement that cracks the air—that she anchors her coarse but strong and not unpretty creation.

Elsa brings down her hands. She's grinning and she can't help it; for all her old fears and self-loathing—a curse hiding behind a lovely mask—few things make her feel better, sets the blood pumping than the exercise of her magic. A cold breeze off the ice path arrives and she breathes it in. Refreshing.

She turns around. It seems like every eye in Alvsted that works is upon her. There's open mouths and uncertain, quivering smiles. One of the boats that had cast off has been returned to the side of the docks, bumping against the damp, mossed wood while its passengers stare at their queen and her work.

She folds her hands.

Calm, calm.

Queen it up.

Colonel Bjørklund is serenely regarded.

"Now I'll return to bed, colonel."