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I apologize for the delay, but I had much to do, and little drive to write for this. =S

I do not own Frozen or any of it's affiliates, copyrights or ideals. Only my imagination is my own.

~ C F Winchester.

Sanity

Chapter Six:Worry.

"Now really Kai, you can't think that way. The child is simply lonely."

Kai rubbed his face with a handkerchief, whisking away sweat. He tried a different approach. Besides him, a pile of carrots sat looking forlorn but peeled, sliced and washed. He picked up a potato to skin it.

"She speaks to the pictures on the walls, the armor in the halls, and to any of us not at all!"

Shaking her head, the other looks out the window in the kitchen. Winter was coming soon. Not yet; but soon. Anna would soon have a birthday, and Elsa too. This was no time to speak of such things as where the kingdom would go or to whom and for what reason.

"Anna is a lonely child. She speaks to the air in thought to hear her own voice."

Kai shook his head, adamant. He tossed away his potato into the sink and picked up another, gouging out any eyes he came across with perfect precision. His knife grated over the skin before committing to the purpose of peeling.

"No, she speaks to the air and expects an answer from it! She does not simply suppose and think, she holds conversations with it, the pictures, she pauses for their speech, and calls them by names! Several times I have walked by to see her sitting by the picture of Joan of Arc and having a conversation with it!"

"Oh you speak nonsense."

Kai's face hardened and he adopted a tone as if one were reading a script, or speaking from rote memorization. He did not care to adopt the tones Anna had been speaking in,they had been far too conspiratory, far too familiar.

"Oh Joan, what do you think of this? Isn't it a lovely day Joan? Did I tell you what I saw today, Joan? On my honor I tell you I have heard her thus!"

Gerda shook her head again and turned back to the dough she was pounding. Kai tossed another potato to join the growing pile of peeled ones in the sink and scooped another few to set in front of him. Besides him, washed celery waited patiently.

"It matters not. Elsa is the eldest."

"Gerda, you can't be serious, the girl never comes out of her room, I don't even know what she looks like anymore, so long I have not seen her! Besides, she can't...you simply cannot rule a kingdom from your bedroom! She has no control, she will be unable, how can she lead?"

"No listen here!"

Gerda had heard enough and she spoke in sharp tones as her hands pounded the dough with un-warranted force. Her eyes were focused on the task at hand, not bothering to look Kai in the eye. Kai simply peeled another potato.

"If truth be told, the girl has considered the option of stepping down from the line-"

Kai set down his knife and brought the celery towards him, washing it even though it was already washed. He separated the stalks and broke off the leaves. Gerda shook her head at him, but he continued. He knew very little about the royal family...but he knew that Elsa did not care for celery leaves. Anna however, ate them.

He gruffly had to admit that was perhaps the limit of his knowledge of the girls. It wasn't true but it might as well be. He spoke again.

"You see what I mean however? This proves my point. This will leave the kingdom to-"

"Hush! Anna is not mad. Simply lonely. Very, very lonely. She had created imaginary friends and attached them to faces she is familiar with. She is a smart girl. She knows the difference."

Kai took a breath and rolled up his sleeves, looking about for a cutting knife he seemed to have misplaced. He wanted to dice the celery now.

"I fear you may be wrong. Perhaps at once time, yes. Now? I fear her imaginary friends have become very real...for her and her alone."

He located his knife and began to dice the celery. Gerda sighed.

"She knows the difference."

In another part of the castle, the sun shone in slices through the curtains, dancing about since they had been taken and tossed about in the frenzy of an energetic ball of green dresses and strawberry hair, Anna whirled about the room, having no care of danger from injury as she turned this particular study into a jungle gym. She grinned at the exhilaration of her speed and sheer freedom. No rules, no regulations, no cares, she was free. Yes she was alone, but she was alone and free!

She paused when an admonishment rang out in the room.

"Young lady; you are a princess! Kindly behave like one for at least an hour! You came in here for a book, how did you end up behaving like a monkey?"

She turned about to look sheepishly at the speaker.

"I'm sorry. But it's so fun to be free, to enjoy life! I'm alive! Why can't I enjoy that?"

He scowled at her in reproof. Then he adopted a mock tone of thought.

"Perhaps because you have duties to uphold? A certain decorum as a member of royalty to pledge?"

Anna let out a tortured sigh that sounded more like a frustrated yell, but it was muted, and the reproving glare was enough of an admonishment. Anna tried again with a softer sigh.

"All that weight must be getting to you, you used to be more fun Atlas."

Atlas, for his part, simply shrugged.

Anna, for her part, simply grinned.

+~E~+

Hello Double. I am glad you like the psychology used here. It makes you wonder who will win I the end...and if you can truly call it a victory. XD. Curry, I always try to respond to a review, because I feel they are so very rare. I may have written a lot on here, but I usually write for "the other side of the track" meaning I enjoy exploring ideas that are not popular, odd ideas that usually don't follow the typical mold. So I don't usually get a flood of reviews as I would had I constructed a fluff or something else.

But then, if I did that just for the reviews, I would have felt like I sold my soul away. XD

~ C F Winchester.