Nightmares

"Elsa!"

It wasn't the whisper that woke Elsa up. She'd been lying awake in her bed for the past 30 minutes, listening to the whimpers and thrashing sheets of her sister across the room. She was a light sleeper and Anna always had vivid nightmares. It used to scare Elsa before, when she'd wake up from a deep sleep to Anna's screams, but now she was used to the distressed calls coming from the little girl's mouth. She knew all she had to do was wait patiently till Anna woke herself up and the younger sister would come to her bed whimpering with fright. Tonight was no exception.

"Elsa!" the call came again, this time a bit more frantic. Elsa waited a couple moments before turning over to reply.

"What?" she whispered into the dark. Bed springs squeaked and a loud thump was heard. Anna came running into sight, holding her head. Her brown hair was pulled into 2 short ponytails that their mother had probably done before bed.

Without needing to ask, Anna hauled her small 4 year old body up into the bed and Elsa immediately made room for her. They lay next to each other for a couple minutes, silently staring at the canopy above Elsa's bed. Finally Elsa broke the silence, "What were you dreaming about?"

Anna wasn't a very hard child to read. She spoke her mind and often it got her in some trouble. Like the time she asked one of the kitchen staff why her skin was a different color. The lady hadn't seemed to mind, but Mama and Papa weren't too pleased.

So once she started talking there was no shutting her up. "Well there was this huge bird, right, and I was stuck on this hill, only it wasn't a hill, but a nest where this huge bird had her baby eggs. And this bird was trying to feed me to her babies and only I started kicking and screaming at them, ya know how Kai does to the birds in the garden? But they just kept trying to eat me!" This went on for several minutes, complete with hand motions and random fists at the air. "And oh Elsa, I was so scared!" she finished with a dramatic intake of breath. Elsa rolled her eyes, but pulled her sister to her anyways. This is usually how the nightmares worked. Anna would get it all out in a, in her mind, crazy horror story then Elsa would hug her until she calmed enough to fall asleep. She would never admit it, but Elsa liked when her sister depended on her like this though she acted annoyed when it was brought up.

Tonight seemed different than the others somehow. Instead of falling asleep like she usually did Anna pulled away sharply and shivered. "Why are you always so cold Elsie?" she asked crossly, jutting her bottom lip in a pout.

Elsa cringed. Mama and Papa had told her Anna was too young to know about her powers so she'd been very careful not to do the magic when the young girl was around, but she couldn't help the icy temperature of her skin. She completely forgot that other people could feel cold when she herself couldn't.

So Elsa shrugged bitterly wanting more than anything to tell her sister everything about the snow she could create. What did Papa know anyways? He didn't have any magic. "It's just so weird," Anna whined jumping up and hopping around the bed with a sudden burst of energy. "No one ever wants to get near you. Ronald in the kitchens is always complaining about serving you breakfast and being too close. He calls you the Ice Princess because you're so cold." She whispered dangerously, flopping down by Elsa who had sat up.

"He does not!" Elsa said indignantly, a bit louder than she intended. The nickname slightly stung.

"Does too!" Anna giggled, impervious to her sister's embarrassment. "He told me so! He says the cooks talk about how you can change the weather, but I didn't believe him. Because you would tell me, right? You would tell me if you could do something like that?" her eyes got as big as saucers, the exact shade of brown as Papa's.

Elsa was too angry to speak. How dare they talk about her? How dare that Ronald boy tell Anna such an important secret? She'd show him Ice Princess. Next time he went to say something, she'd freeze his lips shut. Elsa glanced at Anna who was still looking at her with big puppy dog eyes. The older girl slid out of bed and put on her slippers. She crossed the room to open the door quietly. No guards were in the corridor, probably out patrolling some other part of the castle. "Get your slippers and follow me," Anna squealed with excitement and fell out of the bed as ungraceful as a Princess could get. "And be quiet." She said sternly when she heard Anna smack a limb on her dresser.

Together the sister's tip toed from the room. Anna skipped around corners and bumped into walls, snorting loudly. It was only with Elsa's sharp eyes and ears that they didn't get caught because of her childish antics. If they were caught out of bed, Papa would not be happy.

They came to a stop before the arched doorway of the ballroom and Anna crashed into her sister's back. "What are we doing, Els-" Elsa put a hand over her mouth quickly. She heard the man before she saw the lantern swinging towards them from down the hall. Elsa shoved Anna into the room, which was fortunately empty, and shut the door before the guard could see them out after curfew. Her hand stayed put on Anna's mouth and her ear pressed to the thick wood as the guard's boots shuffled past and faded into nonexistence. Only then did she remove her hand which was covered in slobber.

"Ew Anna," Elsa complained. She rubbed the hand on her nightgown, "Did you have to lick me?"

"You don't taste good either," Anna rubbed her tongue furiously, "That's what you get. What are we doing here anyways?" she crossed her arms and tried to look angry, but it didn't exactly work on Elsa who knew Anna could never get angry with anyone.

"Just… watch," now that she was here about to do it, Elsa didn't feel to good showing off her powers. Papa had sternly told her not to and she'd never disobeyed him before. The idea made her uneasy. But they were her powers, she should be allowed to show who she wanted.

And Anna was her little sister, she'd never hurt her.

It took a second of concentration to summon the magic. Over the years it was easier and easier to pull on the ice she felt in her body and it only took a couple of tries to center it in her palm. Anna watched wide eyed as her big sister twisted her hands and a swirl of white and light blue color appeared from thin air. At first the shapes forming on her sister's hand didn't register as anything but pretty colors. But Anna was old enough to put 2 and 2 together.

"You are an Ice Princess!" she exclaimed, leaping back. The magic disappeared and Elsa stared at her sister, hurt by her insensitivity.

"I am not!" she argued, "Look," with stomp of her foot thin ice spiraled from her foot across the room, covering the floor and causing Anna to slip and fall on her butt.

"That was mean!" she cried, trying to stand up and failing. She'd banged her shin pretty hard, but she was always hurting herself. Elsa skidded over to help her up. She had a lot more practice with ice than Anna did.

"I'm sorry Anna," Elsa held her close to her side and gently pulled them backwards till they were skating slowly in their slippers, "I didn't think you'd fall over. I just wanted to show you what I could do," Elsa laughed loudly, "But it was pretty funny." Anna scowled, but even she laughed at her own mistake.

"Why didn't you tell me Elsie? Does Papa know? Does everyone 'cept me know?" she hiccupped.

Elsa sighed and ruffled her sister's hair lovingly. "I couldn't tell you. Papa didn't want you to know till you were old enough. But you know now so what do you want to do? I can even make snow if you want to have a snowball fight." She waved a hand and sharp bitter wind entered the room and large puffy flakes fell on the 2 who were balanced on the ice. Anna reached for the snow, wonder etched on her face. She'd never seen anything like it, but she'd heard about places where there was tons of the white stuff.

"This is amazing!" she shrieked, jumping and sliding around, trying to catch the snow before it hit the ground. Elsa followed the example until the whole room was alive with their laughter and the silent storm of white.

Elsa had never had someone to play in the snow with. Except for the castle staff, no one knew about her magic and that meant no one could play with her when she got bored. This was fun.

Once the room had filled with snow up to their ankles and they were no longer sliding on the ice under their feet Anna stopped and picked up a handful of the snow. She stared at the packed slush in her hand and glanced at her sister, but instead of throwing it like Elsa thought she would, Anna hesitated. "Kai told me about snow once. He told me that most kids built-" she stopped looking around nervously. "I don't know if he was kidding or not and I don't really know how, but," she smirked at Elsa mischievously and held the ball of snow out to her sister who smiled back encouragingly, "Do you wanna build a snowman?"