Chapter 9

A/N Apologies for not posting for such a long time. I know what I want for this chapter, but the words refuse to flow! Hope you like this chapter!

Elsa moved along the corridor, her head up, her face impassive. She was on her way to the study room, the place where she did all her reading and business. Her strides were purposeful, her eyes looking ahead as she pretended not to notice the few servants who passed by and the way they discreetly swerved to the other side of the corridor to avoid her.

Her parents were firm rulers, but they also cared about the welfare of their people. Elsa remembered how the King and Queen of Arendelle remembered the name of every servant, every helper, every guard. They would stop them on the way, asking after their family – a father who had fallen sick or a wife who had given birth. And now she was the complete opposite of her parents. She never wanted to like that, to be so aloof, to be so cold. But what could she do?

A servant appeared from the corner ahead, her arms full of boxes of different sizes. Perhaps Anna had ordered some new clothes or bought something from town. Elsa swept her eyes to the boxes, looking for some identification marks or names but found none. The boxes were stacked up high, blocking the servant's sight of view and she did not know that she was approaching Elsa head-on. Elsa turned to her left and was about to cut to the other side of the corridor when she heard the girl exclaimed beside her.

"Oh!"

She turned just in time to see the girl stumbled. The boxes fell onto the floor.

Elsa would usually pretend not to notice such things, but before she knew it, her arms stretched out and broke the girl's fall.

"Thank you… Your Majesty! I'm sorry!" The girl's eyes widened when she saw who it was. She curtseyed, then bow in apology, and bowed again and again. The girl had red hair, much redder than Anna's strawberry blonde hair. She had freckles too, the same shade as Anna's. Elsa held her elbows and stopped her endless bowing.

"It's alright, just stop….stop this," she said.

The girl's eyes misted and she bowed again. "I'm sorry for being so clumsy, Your Majesty. Please forgive me." It was only then that Elsa realized that the girl thought that she had asked her to stop being clumsy. As if a stumble meant that the person was clumsy and it could be commanded to stop.

Elsa was rooted to the spot. Was that how they saw her? Someone who would be angry at her staff over the smallest matter? For not being graceful and agile? The girl's head was low as she quickly bent down to pick up the fallen boxes. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," she kept repeating.

"No, just stop apologizing," she said, making herself clear this time.

The girl stopped and stared at the queen. She bowed one more time and then bent down to pick up the boxes. Elsa helped, and she could not help noticing the greenish-black marks on the servant's wrists when the sleeves of her uniform rode up. The fading marks of a bruise, almost in the shape of a hand. She picked up some of the boxes for the girl and handed it to her. The girl's eyes were still misty, in awe that the Queen of Arendelle had helped her. She mumbled her thanks and apologies (once again) in the same breath.

"Are these for Anna?" Elsa asked.

The girl's eyes grew wider.

"No, Your Majesty, these are for you. For your coronation!" she exclaimed.

Her coronation?

It was only then that Elsa remembered. Her birthday was coming in two months' time. And with her parents officially dead, it was natural that the Crown Princess would be crowned as the ruler once she was of age. And it seemed that cabinet was more than eager for her to go through the ceremony.

She would officially become Queen Elsa of Arendelle.

Elsa grimaced at the thought.

"Your Majesty?"

Elsa broke out of her reverie.

"Is there anything that I can help?" the girl asked.

Elsa shook her head. No.

The girl bowed and then carried the boxes and went in the opposite direction.

Elsa took a step, and then stopped.

Queen.

She hardly had a childhood. Her curse had made sure of that. Growing up, she was afraid of herself, afraid of her own shadow. Every waking hour, she was petrified that someone would discover her secret. She turned away from everyone, shy away from every single touch, unable to be close to the ones whom she loved. And now, like a death sentence declared by a jury, she would be Queen. She could no longer hide in the study room and ruled from there as she had done all this time. She would need to attend her own coronation, meet the people of Arendelle and attend public events. She would need to receive foreign dignitaries, shake their hands, dance in balls and travelled to other countries to establish diplomatic ties. Everyone's eyes would be on her, the Queen of Arendelle, as she showed herself in public, wearing her regal crown and signature gloves. One wrong move, and everyone would know.

The air suddenly felt colder, and Elsa suddenly found herself unable to breathe. She leaned against the wall.

Breathe. Breathe. She willed herself to take a breath, and then another, as she looked at her hands that was clutching her chest.

Breathe. And she saw the frosty, fern-like patterns spread from her fingers to the bodice of her dress, turning her dress from blue to white.

Ice, crusting her fingers and hands. She pulled her hands away from her dress, and the ice stopped, but something made her looked at her feet. Ice. Slowly fanning from her shoes outwards.

The sounds of two person chatting caught her attention momentarily. Someone was approaching the corridor. They would see her, and the ice. They would scream and raise the alarm.

Elsa looked at both directions. The nearest door was less than five meters away, the door to the library. She sprinted towards the oak door, and she barely had the time to close the door behind her before two servants turned the corner and appeared in the corridor.

Elsa leaned against the door, panting hard. The servants walked pass the door, their voices fading as they reached the end of the corridor. They did not notice the ice on the floor.

The imminent danger was over, but Elsa's heart continued to beat wildly. She moved across the room. The library contained hundreds of books of different genres, ranging from nursery rhymes to history to agriculture. Elsa went to a nearby shelf and randomly grabbed a book. She looked at the cover, at the part where her hands touched the leather bindings.

No frost.

She heaved a sigh of relief.

Elsa sat down at the nearest couch and opened the book. It was a book on mythology, and as she flipped through the pages, she found her heartbeat calming down. There were many pictures in the book, and she looked through them, trying to distract herself with the drawings. A drawing somewhere in the middle of the book drew her attention.

The picture of an old man surrounded by a backdrop of ice and snow.

'Old Man Winter' The title read.

The chapter was brief. It spoke of Old Man Winter, also known as Father Frost, as being responsible for the winter season, and for bringing snow to the lands. There were variations of Old Man Winter, some depicting him as a friendly old man who would bring presents to the children, while others claimed that he was who would punish naughty children. The different legends agreed on one thing though – that the frosty fern outlines usually found on windows on winter mornings were most definitely the work of Old Man Winter.

A short paragraph near the end of the chapter caught her eye.

Some people, though, believed that Old Man Winter came in another form – the form of a playful, young man, who goes by the name of Jack Frost.

Jack Frost.


Elsa spent the rest of the day in the library, looking through all the books on mythology. There were a few more books, but only two of them mentioned Winter Old Man, and none of them mentioned Jack Frost. She went back to the study, as her mind jumped from one thought to another. But they were all about Jack Frost.

She did not realize that someone was in the study room waiting for her until he gave a loud cough.

"Your Majesty," he greeted her when he finally got her attention. It was Gus, her father's advisor. He was her father's friend, and had been advising the late King ever since the latter was crowned at the tender age of twenty-five. Gus had stayed on after her father's death, and had continued his duty as advisor, which Elsa was grateful for. He held a letter in his hand.

"Gus," she acknowledged him half-heartedly.

"Your…"

"Is anything the matter?" She wanted him to leave the room. She needed time to think, to sort out her thoughts.

He fidgeted on the spot, gulped, hesitated and then thrust the letter to her, a contrast to the usual formal way that he conducted himself in front of Elsa. The letter was addressed to Gus, and the wax seal had been broken.

"I'm sorry," he apologized.

Elsa took out the letter.

It was a letter addressed to Gus as advisor to Queen Elsa. The letter started off with their condolences on the death of the "well-loved" King and Queen of Arendelle. It then moved on to talk about how well Elsa had governed Arendelle since then. Those were the only two positive things in the letter. Elsa finished reading the letter before she looked at the signatures at the bottom. There were five signatures, representing five of Arendelle's largest business partners. Among them were the signatures of the Duke of Weselton and that of an official representative from the Southern Isles.

"What does this mean?" Elsa asked Gus. She knew what it meant. She just wanted him to say it, hoping that she had somehow misinterpreted it. "What do they hope to gain from this?"

"Elsa," Gus called her name. He had been calling her Your Majesty ever since her return, but now he was calling her name, just like when she was younger, before she was banished to the Valley of the Rocks. "You know what they want."

Elsa looked out of the window, her hands behind her, crushing the letter in her hand.

"No, I don't. Tell me."

"They want Arendelle, Elsa. You either choose one of the princes as your husband to assist you with the ruling, or they will claim that you are too young and too inexperienced to rule and will vote to establish a council to rule in your stead. Either way, they win."