A/N: Soon I get to go back to glorious angst. Which possibly nobody appreciates as much as I do. In the meantime, have some more of that fluff I'm so terrible at writing. :p
FIRST SNOW! where I live today. In celebration (only because it's appropriate, I don't actually love snow very much), what do you think, want two chapters today?
7 (If You're Real, Bleed for Me)
Jack awoke with blood still crusting his face, his hands, his bare feet. When he moved, groaning, mumbling incoherently, some of the scabs broke, sending new trickles of red across his frostbitten skin. His hoodie had saved him from the worst of the liberated chandelier's shattering, but it hurt to close his hand around his staff; it hurt to brush his sodden hair, flaky with dried blood, out of his blurry vision; it hurt to stand up, the bottoms of his feet stinging as they took his weight.
"Not fair," he muttered, brushing shards of ice from the folds of his clothing, wincing as he smeared blood across the fabric. "I'm a spirit of winter. I died once already. I shouldn't still have to bleed."
Sighing, he rubbed the sleeve of his sweatshirt across his eyes, trying to clean out the worst of the blood. One cut over his eye wouldn't stop bleeding; the sensation of cool water running down the side of his face reminded him that even if he bled, he wasn't really alive. The liquid in his veins was still as cold as his skin.
"Definitely not fair," he added darkly, and looked around.
The men were gone. Elsa was gone.
The hand not holding his staff clenched into a fist, which hurt still more as his nails dug into his fresh cuts. "Ow," he said loudly, and opened it to watch the blood drip onto the floor. He was standing in a thin, streaky pool of it, the edges fading to a murky brown. At least he probably couldn't die from blood loss. Or from falling fifty feet and having a chandelier fall on him.
"Ugh," Jack said, and stepped away, leaving frost-feathered scarlet footprints on the pitted and cracked glacial floor as he wove painfully around the slanted barricades Elsa had left scattered around the room. "Elsa?" he called tentatively, in case she was here, in another room—but he couldn't imagine she would have just left him bleeding on the floor. He stood in one of the arched doorways for a moment, peering down the hall, then turned and leapt back for the broken balcony, bouncing off walls like he was inside a pinball machine.
Standing on the brink, his lacerated feet curled over the very edge, Jack looked down at the mountain, streaked with night. He didn't know what had happened to Elsa, but he guessed the men who'd attacked had probably taken her away. Probably back to Arendelle. Her sister, who was presumably queen by now, since Elsa had abdicated—rather forcefully, from what he gathered, though maybe not in a particularly official manner—would undoubtedly set that right, would order Elsa set free again.
And he, Jack—he was free, wasn't he? He could go wherever he wanted. He had no reason to go after Elsa, no reason to believe she needed him to go after her. His sister was still out there, across the ocean, and a hundred friends in between, he was sure. Or he could just go home; he'd been to Arendelle, spreading magical Guardian cheer to some children, he could tell North he'd done as promised and go back to entertaining his friends.
Elsa wouldn't be so alone once she was back with her sister. She'd be lucky. Jack wanted to be back with his sister; a part of him wanted it every day, wanted to hear her shrieking laugh, see her accusing stare when she knew he was messing with her again. Elsa wouldn't even remember him, wouldn't have time to believe he'd abandoned her.
Jack jumped.
-o-
He went after Elsa. Of course he went after Elsa.
He didn't know how long he was unconscious, except that the sun was on the horizon when they were attacked, and it was full dark when he awoke. That could be hours or days; he didn't let himself worry about which. The sun rose while he was soaring back to Arendelle proper, drenching him and the wind both in pastel rays of hope that looked altogether too much like the colors on one of Bunny's eggs.
Summer reined again in Arendelle, sunlight draping itself in waves across the land, scintillating with what Jack imagined was unreasonable smugness. He bulleted over the fjords, patterns of ice making ripples on the surface below him, and he had to take a moment—just a moment—to dwell on the fact that Elsa had completely frozen over the fjord. When Jack had been younger, he'd spent a lot of time off the coast of Ireland and the United Kingdom, cavorting with mermaids and trying to freeze bits of the ocean. He only ever managed to solidify himself a bobbing floe to rest on the bright seafoam-façade of the water. Freezing the fjords was undoubtedly easier than the ocean—but he could still barely imagine it.
So what, Jack couldn't help but think, could make her unfreeze it? And he carefully didn't imagine that Elsa's death would undo all that power.
-o-
When he reached the castle, there was a calm settled over it, reflecting off the summer sun and the lazy estival winds. No mourning black draped the windows; no tattered black flags flew from the towers, just the shadows of drifting clouds.
Jack could've walked in the front doors—who would see him to stop him? He was still an invisible creature here, a bit of superstition, frosty kisses on window panes and the wind rattling the glass in a season so easily forgotten. He could have gone anywhere, but he didn't; he crept from window ledge to window ledge, looking for Elsa, afraid she would see him and afraid she would not.
At last he found her, poring over a heavily-illustrated book with the strawberry-blonde he knew to be her sister. Anna was talking incessantly, waving her hands; Elsa had a quiet smile, more focused on her sister than the pages of the book. Jack didn't intend to interrupt, he didn't mean to break that contented buzz of summer and conversation—but one hand stretched out, pressing against the glass as if he meant to push the window open. A thin silhouette, Elsa dancing, a spray of ice ascending from her upraised hands, curled across the glazing.
The motion caught the real Elsa's eye; she looked up, away from Anna, and frowned. He saw her lips move in the shape of his name, questioning. Hesitantly, he urged the window open, stepping down into the room.
"Jack, what are you doing here? Are you okay?"
"A chandelier fell on me, but no big deal," he said, raising an eyebrow. Elsa opened her mouth to respond, but Anna interrupted.
"Elsa, who are you talking to?"
Elsa paused, then said, "Anna, this is Jack Frost." Jack smiled thinly, expecting confusion and a belabored attempt to make him appear—but Anna looked at the space toward which Elsa was gesturing, and her eyes widened.
"What? Oh! He just—he appeared. Out of nowhere. Is that normal? I don't think that's normal!"
And just like that, Anna believed in him. Her sister pointed and Anna automatically had faith that her sister was right, that there was someone standing in that empty space. He'd never had someone learn to see him so quickly, and the feeling that shivered in his heart approximated warmth.
"Elsa, what happened?" he asked hurriedly, to cover it. "Who were those guys?"
Elsa smiled wryly. "Their leader was the man my sister wanted to marry."
"Your sister has terrible taste."
Elsa gestured to Anna. "Jack, this is my sister, Anna."
"I know," he said, and grinned. Anna threw a cushion at him. He immediately knew they were going to be friends.
"Jack, please don't take this the wrong way, but are you… real?" Elsa asked, distracting Jack from the projectile pillow just in time for him to fail at dodging it. He made a face at her and said,
"Course I'm real. What else would I be?"
"I thought… I thought I made you. Like Olaf."
"Olaf," Jack repeated.
"I'll get him!" Anna said brightly, and went scrambling for the door, calling, "Olaf! Oooooolaf! We have a friend for—oof! Olaf!"
She returned a few minutes later with a snowman waddling in her wake. "Hi, I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs!" he declared, with the air of ritual. "Who's this?"
"Olaf, this is Jack."
"Oh. I was hoping it would be another Sven. Jack, can I call you Sven? It would make it easier for me."
"No." Jack crouched down in front of Olaf, examining him intently. "Cute," he said. "I wonder if I could make snow talk. Or is one of you a ventriloquist here?"
"He—he doesn't just talk," said Elsa hesitantly. "He's… alive. For whatever value of the word, I guess."
Very slowly, Jack lowered himself to the floor, clinging to his staff for support. "You said you made him?"
"Yes."
"You… created life."
"…Yes. I guess?"
"You created life! You made a living thing!"
"That's not very nice," said Olaf indignantly, waving his stick arms. "I'm right here you know!"
"Could you do it again?" Jack asked excitedly, standing up. "Make Olaf a buddy or something?"
"But I have buddies," the snowman insisted. "I have Anna and Elsa and Sven and Sven—unless you mean—" His eyes went wide, and he lowered his voice to a not-very-subtle loud whisper. "—a lady buddy."
"I could try," said Elsa dubiously, waving her hand in quick spirals, creating a double of Olaf with long twiggy hair, pointy feet, and the suggestion of an hourglass figure.
"Beeeeautiful," Olaf said dreamily, but the snowwoman did not leap to life and join Olaf in song. Jack sank back against a chair and Elsa looked upset.
"I'm sorry! My powers… haven't been as strong since—"
"Since we got rid of eternal winter?" said Anna brightly.
"Would you guys stop with that," said Jack, "you don't know it was eternal—"
"'An act of true love can thaw a frozen heart,'" recites Anna. "That's what the trolls told me. You're just… a little thaw-y right now! It'll get better. Probably. Or I mean maybe it won't. And would that really be a bad thing? If you can't start another eternal winter then—"
"Anna."
"Okay, okay, sorry, no need to get touchy about it."
"Anna, Olaf, could you two give Jack and I some time to talk alone?"
"Ooooooh, he's one of those boys," said Anna, flouncing in several enthusiastic circles.
"Anna."
"Alright, alright! Come on, Olaf." Anna marched the two of them to the door. "Just remember, Elsa, you can't marry a man you just met!"
The door slammed shut on her admonition, leaving Elsa and Jack alone with the failed snowwoman. Elsa gazed at it for a moment, then took it apart with an infuriated twist of her hand.
"An act of true love?" Jack asked.
"Anna sacrificed herself to save me from Hans—the intended fiancé," she added at his puzzled look. "Turns out he just wanted our kingdom, who knew. It—it turned her back to normal—"
"That's normal?"
"Normal for Anna. Not frozen, anyway. And it let me thaw the et—the unexpected winter," she corrected, lips twitching. Jack beamed, a little smugly.
"Sorry I left you," Elsa said, reaching out to touch the dried blood smeared down the side of his face. The cut over his eye finally stopped bleeding on his flight here; he hadn't even noticed. Her fingertips were cold, slender pinpricks of ice against his temple. "I thought—I made you up. That you were just snow."
"That's a pretty common mistake." Jack shrugged. "Do you believe I'm real now?"
Cautiously, she nodded. Jack looped himself up onto the crook of his staff so he could gaze down at her, smiling widely.
"Then can I stay? You know, for now."
He didn't really mean to ask it, it was an idiotic request, and now he was afraid she was going to say no. She wavered, then said, "I thought… you told me you were a Guardian of Childhood?"
"Well, yeah. But being cooped up all those years?" He dropped a foot to kick his own staff out from under him, twirling it up to balance on his shoulder and landing with his arms spread, bowing slightly. "Sounds like you didn't get much of a childhood yourself. Or Anna either," he added thoughtfully. "So you probably need a Guardian. As long as you believe in me, of course."
"I'll always believe in you," she said, and the smile she flashed him was as blinding as sun shining over the fresh-fallen snow, as brilliant as sunrise through a row of icicles. "I'd love it if you stayed."
