A/N: So I had this horrible realization that once winter ends and spring comes around, the popularity of Jelsa is sure to wane. I don't want that to happen D:
Also I'd like to give special thanks to the frequent reviewers for this story- you know who you are ;)
VII: Darkness Consume
During hours of the night, Jack liked to take strolls under the glow of the moon. When the light of the sun ceased to shine through the windows of the castle and disappeared over the horizon as an orange gleam, the people of Arendelle began to settle in for the night; as did Elsa, Anna and Kristoff.
But not Jack; spirits weren't meant to sleep.
Elsa looked up from where she was pulling over the covers on her bed to see Jack pushing open the window to her room as he casted a long, moonlit shadow on the floor. "I'll take it you're going out for a bit?" She asked with an amused glimmer in her eye, watching the spirit hop onto the ledge before turning to grin at her.
"As per usual…unless you wish for me to stay with you."
The queen swallowed something small and turned her gaze back to her sheets. The candlelight in the room cast flickering light over her features, darkening her eyes. "It would be boring to watch me sleep. Go out and do something interesting."
The spirit raised a brief brow at her statement, giving her a crooked smile as he replied, "If you ever want to come out with me one night, there's another place I want to take you."
A small pause before Elsa said softly, "I think I know what that place is." Jack turned from his owl-hunch on the window sill, putting his feet back onto the floor as he looked at her questioningly. "That so?"
"Yes," Elsa replied, dropping her fluffed pillow on the bed as her eyes met his sapphire gaze from across the room. "I know because…" Jack found that his feet had been moving him towards Elsa while she spoke in that smooth lilt of hers, and when he stood before her she knit her eyebrows together softly as she looked at him.
"Because I can see that place whenever I look in your eyes."
Elsa dropped her gaze to the floor suddenly and chuckled, more to herself than to him. "That sounded dumb, didn't it?" She wrapped her arms around herself in an unsure manner, and Jack felt something pull inside of his chest hard enough to sting.
"No, it didn't," He said to her in hushed words, tilting her chin up with cold fingers as she met his gaze with sparking eyes.
"Tell me what you see then, when you look in them," he said as he watched the shadows dance over her face. Elsa swallowed something bigger this time as she replied quietly, "Aurora Borealis. I've only ever seen it in paintings."
He released her chin to place his hand on her shoulder. Slowly, the smile spread across his elf-like features as he said, "Trust me Elsa, paintings will never do it justice. Come see the lights with me."
She bit her lip, a tiny gesture that might've been missed if he hadn't been so close. "I would love to, Jack," her voice came out small and tight as she turned away from his hand, "but there's something I haven't told you."
Jack watched the queen turn her back to him, slender shoulders tense with something that made a slow uneasiness rise in the spirit. Her words reached his ears in a voice so soft that it threatened to be swallowed by the silence around them.
"The reason we've cleaned this castle hadn't been just for the spring. It was also for…something else."
The burning inside of Jack made his throat constrict, tight enough to nearly choke him. He knew what she was going to say, but he silently prayed to the Moon that it wasn't so, that it was only a bad dream.
"Before my parents were caught by the sea," Elsa began again slowly, "They arranged for something to be held exactly two weeks after my coronation. Arendelle has been in dire need of new allies, and to gain new allies it needs to make new ties with other countries."
New ties with other countries…that could only mean one thing.
"Elsa, you're not saying that-"
She turned back to look at him, candlelight flashing over her features as she curtly interrupted with, "I am. There will be a ceremony less than a week from now, and there will be suitors from at least five different kingdoms coming. And all of them will want one thing."
Jack wasn't sure if he was standing on solid ground anymore; the floor was slowly tilting underneath him and making a queasy feeling swell in his stomach. It only made sense for Elsa to find a suitor, to marry for the sake of alliance. In the line of royalty, love was never a priority.
But even so, the small, furious thumping against insides made him clutch at his arms uneasily. He felt sick as the shadows flickering across Elsa's face seemed to whisper to him in evil little voices, mocking him for his foolishness.
"Jack," Elsa's voice reached him from a muffled, faraway place, "you're white as paper." He felt like paper too, bleached and thin, ready to fall over from the smallest breeze.
"I…I have to leave somewhere," He said suddenly, and before her words could pull themselves from the abyss that began to form around him he turned and leaped out the open window.
The cool night air brushed his face in that familiar caress as he leaped from one rooftop to the next. The feeling ripping apart his insides was weighing him down like a boulder; he felt too heavy to fly. All he could do was jump, and jump he did, running over tops of houses with blind eyes and feet. Everything whipped by him in an unsteady blur.
His foot caught over the edge of a chimney, sending him to tumble and smash against the ground. There was a ringing in his ears, dissolving into a low rumble that felt as if the earth were splitting apart underneath his hand. He dug his palm into the ground, futilely tried to steady the world around him.
The spirit knew that if he went back, she would be waiting at the window. Her hands would be clutched together as she told him in frantic words that it was only for politics, and that it had never been her choice. But the look in her eyes when she turned in the dim light brought a sudden, horrible realization upon him.
People married to have somebody with them for the rest of their life. And Elsa had the rest of her life to live, to live with someone who could grow old with her.
Jack couldn't grow old with her. Two hundred years had never put lines on his face, because he was trapped in eternity. She was mortal, a solid girl with a solid life; he was only an idea that faded because nobody believed in the winter. She'd been the first to believe in him, believe in winter.
The string between them that came into existence at the sound of her voice was slowly being loosened. It was falling apart, pulling them away from each other.
He was stupid, stupid to think that she and he…that they…
…had any future together.
"Why," He rasped out at the moon hanging over him, a bright circle of white in the blackness, "did you let me hear her? Why did you let her fill the hole in my life, if you knew that it wasn't going to be like that forever?"
Alone. He'd been alone for so many years, a hollow existence that bleached the reality before his eyes. Colors were dull until her eyes painted everything bright again, sounds muffled until her voice made them clear and strong. Everything he touched with numb fingers, until her skin made his fingers spark with nerves that made him shiver all over. When he held her and smelled her vanilla softness, he felt dizzy by how strong it smelled to him; he could *still* smell her.
And when he tasted her breath on his lips, it tasted sharp, it tasted real…
She made him feel alive.
For the first time in an eternity, she made life tangible to him, she made it worth living.
And now she was going to be taken from him.
His fingers clutched at the fine, silky fabric of the cloak; he remembered how it felt heavier than his old cloak when he put it around his shoulders, how solid it felt. It fit him much better than he thought it would.
"My father wore this only a few times," Elsa stated, more to herself than Jack as her pale fingers brushed over the silky fabric. "He said it reminded him of me. He didn't know why." She turned to look at Jack as her hand tightened around the silk almost unnoticeably. "It just did."
I know why, the thought echoed in Jack's mind, it's because you and I are both children of the moon.
He pulled the cloak off with shaking hands, and stared at it. The silver gleam of the pendant in the moonlight burned his eyes, and he threw the cloak away from him to land on the ground with a muffled thud.
Jack grabbed at his face, whispered empty things to himself as the dull, aching noise pounded against his entire being. When she's gone, when her light finally extinguishes from this earth, he knows that there will be nobody like her, ever again.
And the emptiness will seep back into his life.
Standing at the window gaping before her and feeling the night breeze tickle her face, Elsa's hands balled into two tight little fists. Jack seemed so stricken by the news. She didn't expect him to take it lightly, but the way his face paled as his eyes clouded with something thick and heavy told her that it was more than that.
When she first heard the spirit's words reach her in the immense stillness of the palace, his voice rang in her ears with its smooth rumble. When she felt Jack's hand touch her shoulder, firm and solid, it ignited something inside her chest, a slow burning that seeped its way into her entire being.
He made her feel warm.
Everything about Jack had been so astounding to Elsa, watching him walk and smile and laugh like he'd finally tasted the sweetness of life. When he held her close to him, his cold breath kissing her face soft like snowflakes, his eyes looked into hers in a way that made her heart beat that much quicker and her breath come out in small gusts.
He looked at her in a way that she knew nobody else ever would.
Elsa bit her lip and felt her eyes become wet, cold like arctic water. She wanted to cry, but from what she didn't know, and that's why she felt afraid. She didn't know if he was going to come back.
"Please," she whispered out the window into the dark, "I don't want you to leave me."
Nothing but the hum of nocturnal life answered her plea. She waited by the window as seconds stretched into minutes, minutes into hours. Elsa wondered then, if she should go out searching for him; but she knew of Jack's ability to travel great distances in small periods of time. He could be halfway across the world and she'd be none the wiser.
The queen knew, then, that if she was going to accomplish anything tomorrow she needed to sleep. She left the window open as she crawled into her bed, with the dim hope that he'd come back before the sun rose to wake her and tell her why he seemed so afraid.
Even though Elsa didn't need covers, she pulled them up to her chin and held them close. She felt too open in the dark without blankets to cover her. When she closed her eyes she saw Jack behind them, Jack turning to her with a wily grin as he tossed a snowball into the air; Jack popping his head out of the snow mound and shaking his head at her; Jack with his arms wrapped around her waist as he ran over the wind through the sky; Jack grabbing her shoulders and telling her to go find Anna before it was too late.
Jack bringing her hand to his lips and then placing it on his bare chest. Jack's eyes gazing into hers as their noses brushed, breathing cold against her lips. Jack's sapphire eyes shining like stars filled with so many things that she wanted to know.
The memories faded to black as sleep somehow managed to hush her overdriven mind.
In her dream there was a room, large and empty enough to echo. She couldn't see anything before her or behind her, but somehow she knew she was in a room.
And there was someone else in the room with her.
"Did you miss me, darling?" The voice hissed in her ear from behind her, or was it beside her? It was smooth and oily like black water, and she felt something curl in her gut.
"What do you want?" She hissed into the dark, afraid to move lest he find out where she was. The blackness was almost overwhelming and she wondered what dark corner of her mind she was in. There were too many shadows in her thoughts to count.
The voice chuckled, a deep growl that made the ground shiver. "I thought my intentions were obvious. Sorry for taking so long to come back, I've had a few…nuisances to deal with. But now we have time to ourselves, time to get to know one another."
Elsa felt her jaw tighten as she stared into the blackness ahead of her. "I know enough about you already, and I don't want anything to do with you. Get out of my head."
"Why would I want to do that?" Pitch replied in a tone that made needles prick into Elsa's spine. "I like your mind, Elsa. It's nice and full of dark things, perfect for a creature like me. It is for you too."
"No," the word left her lips suddenly and was swallowed in the dark, "It's not. That darkness you love so much is not who I am."
Then, softly she asked, "Why do you want me?"
The stillness around her seemed to radiate with barely concealed annoyance. "Take a few guesses," Pitch's voice boomed in the dark, "I'm sure you're smart enough to figure it out in due time."
Elsa hated the feeling of being trapped in her own mind. She didn't want to talk to Pitch, she just wanted to wake up, wake up and see Jack leaning over her, gently shaking her awake as light spilled through her window.
"He's not coming back, you know," Pitch said smooth and low, and the words pierced Elsa's chest like broken glass.
"How would you know that?" She bit into the dark as her voice echoed in its vastness.
Pitch replied calmly, "I know that he stayed around you for your entire life only to flee once you told him of your plan. He left because he knew he couldn't have you, and that's just too much for poor little Jack Frost to bear. Don't you see, Elsa? He loves you like a dragon loves his gold- selfishly and possessively."
Her jaw tightened hard enough to ache. Shut up, she wanted to scream at the blackness, shut up shut up shut up! But she knew that would only delight Pitch to see her break down in his grasp, so she maintained her posture with no small effort.
"I know you're lying," She shot back calmly, "you're only trying to make me doubt myself. But I know Jack doesn't love me like that- he cares for me in a way your demented little mind could never comprehend."
She could practically hear the arched brow in Pitch's voice. "Then where is he, hmm? Out chasing the night while you're stuck here with me? I may not know too much about how 'caring' works, but I know that's not how it works."
The knot in her stomach tightened at the truth in his words. Why would Jack leave her by herself if he cared for her? Even in my loneliest time, he was there for me. He was only gone those years because he wanted to protect me.
But was that really true? All around her the black abyss seemed to shift and moan with her uneasiness, as she looked down at her hands and gasped. Her hands were little, like a child's, and suddenly she felt much smaller.
She was scared of something, and the darkness around her seemed to grow stronger because of that. Again, she felt needles prickle down her spine as she felt Pitch dissolve from the black to stand behind her.
Pitch's voice was no longer loud and booming. It was soft and full of…something. "He may have left you forever, Elsa," His words rang sweetly in the dark, "but I'm here for you. And I'll stay with you."
Lonely. She'd been so lonely for so long, she thought nobody understood her, not even Anna. When Jack showed himself into her life she thought she'd found somebody who understood the cold.
But he didn't understand her at all. He didn't even care for her.
When Elsa spoke again, she was surprised by how small her voice sounded, how weak it was. "You said you won't leave me?"
Pitch leaned down and placed a hand on her shoulder, smooth and heavy…and cold. Elsa always liked the cold. She found it comforting.
"Never, love," He whispered into her ear, "you and I are more alike than you could ever imagine. For what goes together better than cold and dark?"
The blackness shifted and pulsed as if it were trying to tell Elsa something. She'd always tried to shut the darkness away into the back of her mind, if only to make room for the light in her life. But there was no light- light was just a trick of the mind. She was going to listen to the dark for once and hear what it had to say.
Elsa finally replied to Pitch, and when she did her voice felt like it was coming from somewhere else.
"Nothing."
There was something that darkened the air around him; Jack could feel it. He pulled himself up on weak legs and looked out into the night, past the dark buildings and sleeping life. It was coming from the castle.
He began to run towards it, then paused to look back at the cloak lying sullenly on the ground like a dark puddle. He walked towards it, stooping to look down at the moon pendant gleaming up towards him.
"It would look much better on you than hanging forever in my parent's wardrobe."
He couldn't abandon the Man on the Moon. He made him who he was.
And he was Elsa's guardian.
He picked up the cloak and pulled it around his shoulders, and the weight of it made him feel lighter somehow. He was going back to Elsa, and he wasn't going to leave her side again, he was sure of it.
He leaped over the roofs, sailing past windows with sleeping children as his feet bounced over the wind. Elsa may be mortal, she may find someone else that she loved more, but if that's the way it was then so be it. He only wanted for her to be happy.
But the darkness that stung the air like needles grew stronger as Jack approached the castle and landed on the roof. He felt something inside of him grow unsure as landed on the sill of Elsa's open window and peered into the room. Elsa wasn't in her bed.
But he felt her spirit somewhere else in the castle, radiating with a sort of power that made his insides burn. It was strong, but for the wrong reason. It felt…treacherous.
No, the word pounded in his head, no no no. This power could only come from one other being.
He ran past the open door and down the hallway, his blood pounding in his ears. And then he saw a figure standing silently in the dark, in front of Anna's door. He kept running towards her, watched her reach towards the doorknob with a hand tinged with ice. Her skin almost looked black.
"Elsa, please," He called towards her, "don't listen to him." But his words reached deaf ears as the queen opened the door quietly before turning to look back at him. Her eyes gleamed a silvery-yellow that made his stomach churn.
And then her eyes left his as she began to walk into the room, towards the figure sleeping soundly on the bed.
Jack made one long, clean jump that sailed him in the air past notElsa. He landed and stood between her and Anna now, arms stretched out before him as his eyes gleamed. "You won't hurt her," He whispered to notElsa, "I know you won't."
The queen narrowed her silvery-gold eyes at him, and all around them the ebony air began to shift, swirling itself into one tall, black pillar that stood beside notElsa. Pitch looked at Jack with curled lips.
"She's too far gone from the light to hear your voice, Jack," The dark spirit sneer at him with his words dripping poison. "You made her into this, you know. She thought you left her."
"But I didn't leave her," Jack's voice bounced against the wall and came back to him in a calm whisper. "I'm here right now, aren't I?"
Pitch's fangs gleamed at him in the dark. "She doesn't know that. For years, she'd been trying to smother the dark inside of her. I managed to coax it out; I'll admit though, she was much harder to reach than that foolish prince. Her spirit had a lot of light in it."
Elsa, please. You can't let him control you like this. You can't let fear be your worst enemy.
Elsa was wrong when she said she couldn't hurt him; she already had, in more ways than one.
"How dare you do this to her," Jack said to the dark lord in a seething growl. His knuckles whitened as he gripped his staff, planting his feet firmly in front of the bed; he'll be damned if he let the same happen to Anna.
Pitch gave a petulant snort as notElsa remained deathly silent beside him, her eyes a dull, golden glint. "I suggest you move aside before I have Elsa do it for you." When the dark spirit said this, Jack heard the crackling gleam of notElsa's hand swirling an ice sword into existence. She gripped the glimmering sword firmly as her dead gaze remained fixed on the spirit.
Jack took a deep breath as he stared into those dead eyes. He could see her spirit struggling behind them, wrapped in Pitch's chains of fear. She didn't want to do this.
"I'm not moving," Jack said in a firm hush, and Pitch's vicious smile somehow widened into a nightmarish row of gleaming spikes for teeth.
"So be it."
He saw notElsa raise the ice sword in the dark, felt the turmoil rage inside of her as he brought his staff up to deflect it.
Then a whizzing crack of a noise rang in his ears as he saw notElsa's sword fly out of her hand and clank onto the floor. An object shot into the dark, then back again towards the window as Jack watched Pitch's eyes widen before narrowing into angry amber slits.
"Sorry, mate," Jack heard a low rumble of a voice come from behind him, a thick accent that was unmistakably Australian. "Can't let you take any more souls tonight. 'S already one too many."
The birth of spring…
"Lay off Rabbit," Pitch spat as Jack turned behind him to see gray fur shining in the silver glow of the moon, "this is none of your concern."
Could it really be him…?
The dark figure of Bunnymund hopped off the window and gripped the boomerang in his paw, sizing Pitch up and down with glinting green eyes.
"It is our concern when you've been terrorizing others," Jack heard another voice from behind Bunnymund, a normally sweet, giggling lilt that was hardened with anger. Rainbow feathers caught the moonlight as another figure drew herself up beside Bunnymund with arms crossed.
The keeper of memories…
"Not you too," Jack heard Pitch sigh, but the dark spirit's voice was tinged with something anxious. The Tooth Fairy hovered beside the rabbit like a hummingbird, drawing closer to Anna as she glared at Pitch.
"We figured you would go back to your lair to lick wounds," Another thick accent that spoke of cold places, and Jack was sure that he must be dreaming at this point as a large bulk of a man climbed through the window, his boots shaking the floor as he landed on it. "We did not figure you would come back so soon."
The giver of gifts…
Twin swords gleamed in North's large fists as he stood beside the other two guardians.
By now, Pitch had become noticeably tense as he sized up the threat before him. Elsa remained frozen by his side as her spirit ebbed and throbbed. Keep fighting.
"Let me guess," Pitch hissed through clenched teeth, "my old friend from the dark ages has tagged along as well."
"Your guess would be right," North replied with a jolly grin, and then there were flashes of golden sand rolling through the window bright as the sun.
The weaver of dreams…
The golden sand pooled onto the floor silently before swirling into a man that glowed in the dark room like a torch. Sandy didn't speak, but his eyes told Jack everything as they narrowed at Pitch.
Then, it was as if Bunnymund had noticed the winter spirit for the first time as green orbs fixed themselves on him.
"Frosty," the large rabbit rumbled as his furry fingers deftly twirled the boomerang in his hand. "Long time no see." Jack opened his mouth, but the only thing that came out of it was a small noise.
"Witty as ever, too," Bunnymund chided.
There they all stood beside one another in the large room, the four Guardians looming over Anna in her bed, who had now begun to shift around and mutter at the noise.
"Sandy, could you take her somewhere safe?" Tooth chirped as she began to crack delicate knuckles. "This might get ugly."
A/N: I'm idly thinking of making the next chapter a bunch of funny bloopers I thought of when making this story. R&R and let me know if I should make a chapter with humorous moments to lighten the mood a bit!
