Women's Work Chapter 10

A/N
This story has just passed the 3100-hit mark. It's not as popular as "Frozen Together" (49,000 hits), but I'm still thankful to all my faithful readers.

o

"Your Highness, you have a visitor," Kai announced. His voice was formal, but his expression was puzzled.

The King looked up from the tariff law he was about to sign. "Very well, Kai. I've got a few minutes. Show him in."

"There's a small difficulty with that, sir," his servant replied. "He insists that he has to meet with you in the stable area. He says no one else should be with you except the Crown Princess."

Now he had Agdar's full attention. "Could this be some kind of assassination attempt? Do we know this man?"

"Yes, sir, we do. He's the alternate ice delivery man; he's been to the palace many times. He is… how shall I put it? He is somewhat odiferous, but I believe he means no harm. He said it was very important, sir."

"Hmm." He signed the document with a flourish and rose. "Please tell our visitor I will be with him in a few minutes. I'll have to find Elsa."

"Yes, Your Highness." Kai bowed quickly and left.

Elsa wasn't hard to find. She was always looking for new, creative ways to keep her power from building up inside her. Her current "hobby" was to wander around the palace in search of flowers in vases, and make frozen copies of them, vases and all. When she was done, she'd bring her work to the kitchen, where Gerda would leave them in the sink until they melted. This time, Agdar found her in the library, bracketing each "real" vase with two icy mirror-images.

"That's quite a nice effect, Elsa," he called from the doorway.

"Thank you, Father," she nodded with a partial curtsy.

"Would you walk with me, please?" he asked. "We have a visitor in the stables. He specifically asked for the two of us."

For a moment, she looked stressed. Then she gestured and "grew" some extra flowers in some of the vases, and visibly relaxed. "All right," she nodded. She walked two steps behind him as they followed the hallways that led to the stables.

When they got there, Kai was waiting for them. Next to him stood the alternate ice delivery man, a good-looking blond youth about Elsa's age, standing next to his sleigh and the reindeer that drew it. There was no ice in the sleigh today, just a large gray rock. Kai whispered something, and the young man took off his hat and bowed clumsily.

"You may rise," King Agdar said, and the young man straightened. "I'm told that you wanted to see me and my daughter about something important?"

"Yes, sir," the youth said nervously. "Well, actually, no, sir, it's not me. I mean… well, would it be all right if…?" He glanced awkwardly at Kai.

"You're dismissed," Agdar said kindly. Kai nodded and left. The ice man waited until he was gone, then turned and spoke to the rock.

"There's no one here but me, the King, and the Princess," he said to it. After a second, the rock shifted, flipped over, and unfolded itself into the chief of the trolls, complete with his staff. Agdar forced himself to keep his expression neutral. Elsa stepped back in dismay. The last time she'd seen the Grand Pabbie, it had been the worst day of her life, and the mystical pictures he'd shown her had terrified her. He wasn't a source of good memories to her.

The troll chief stepped down from the sled, using his staff as a walking stick. "Your Highness, I apologize for this unusual way of contacting you. It was convenient that a human who knows us is also someone with access to the palace."

"I welcome you," Agdar answered courteously. He wasn't sure who outranked whom here, so he would treat the chief as an equal until he learned otherwise.

"The last time our paths crossed, it was a time of crisis for you," the Grand Pabbie went on. "Did your youngest daughter make a full recovery?"

"She did, sir," the king replied. "She suffered no ill effects, except for a memory loss." He paused. "That memory loss has recently reversed itself."

"Indeed?" the troll asked. "I sensed that my work had been undone in some way. That is why I came. Has she suffered any ill effects from what she has been through?"

"No, she's a perfectly healthy, normal girl."

"There were no repercussions at all?" the chief wondered.

"None that I am aware of," the king said.

"Except that she doesn't trust trolls now, because you took away her favorite memories," Elsa added with a slight edge to her voice.

The Grand Pabbie looked up at her. "Did you have any role in this?"

"Well… the memories were about me, but she got her memory back all by herself," Elsa stammered.

The troll nodded. "The mind can be persuaded, but that persuasion is not a guaranteed thing. Sometimes the memories do return on their own. Whether that is a good thing or not will depend on you." He looked her up and down; she had the uncomfortable sensation that he was looking right through her. "Hmmm… yes, you have gained a great deal of control over your power. Perhaps not as much as I might have hoped, after all these years, but certainly adequate."

"That part is not her fault, sir," Agdar interjected. "I compelled her to hide her power for years. She made no progress during that time. She has been learning real control for about half the years that have passed. There have been no more incidents since that one mishap that brought us to you."

The Grand Pabbie nodded again. "In that case, your progress is even more impressive. Elsa, one of the reasons I came here is to bring you an important message. Somehow, in a way that I do not understand, your destiny has been changed."

"Is that because I've learned to control my power?" she asked.

"It goes much deeper than that, Elsa. I sense the fulfillment of a very old prophecy." He looked away, raised his hands, and chanted,

"Fate be changed, look inside.
"Mend the bond torn by pride."

He looked back at her. "Either you, or someone close to you, has mended a bond torn by pride. As a result, your fate has been changed."

"I think that would be me," Agdar admitted. "It was my pride that held her in prison for four years when she could have been learning to control her power. I've seen my folly, and made it right, to the best of my ability. But what part of her fate has been changed? What would it have been, and what will it be?"

The troll shook his head gently. "It is not for us to know what might have been. And I am not God – I cannot see the future. All I can do is to assure you that the decision you have made, and the changes that have come to pass as a result, will have a much greater impact than you can imagine. I believe it will be very much for the better, and it will affect Elsa's loved ones as well as herself."

Elsa looked confused. "But… if we don't know what my destiny would have been, then how will we know if it's been changed?"

"A perceptive question," the Grand Pabbie nodded. "The future is a tricky thing – it is always difficult to know how these things work. In the past, people in similar situations have told me that they somehow knew their fate was changed, at the moment it happened. All I can say for certain is that something good has occurred in the timeline of your life, and you will bring the ones you love along with you on that altered timeline."

"This sounds confusing," she admitted, and her father nodded in agreement.

"It may become clearer at some point in the future," the troll chief said. "My mission was not to confuse you. In fact, my real reason for this visit was to check on Anna. If she has suffered no ill effects from what has happened, then I am content. Delivering my message about your destiny was secondary." He grunted as he climbed back into the sled. "I've done what I came to do, and I'm pleased that you've made such progress, Elsa. Take this last piece of wisdom with you:

"Things concealed will be revealed,
"And what you did cannot be hid."

Before she could ask him what he meant, he had flipped around and folded himself back into a rock. Agdar glanced at his daughter. "I guess that's the end of the conversation."

"He can be like that, sir," the ice man offered. "He isn't being rude; he just has a lot on his mind. I guess my work here is done."

"I hope that work didn't interfere with you making a living," the king said kindly.

"It's not a problem, sir," the young man replied. "At this time of year, an ice man mostly makes endless trips from the lakes to the storage cellars and back. It was kind of fun to do something different for a change. But I do have to get moving, if I want to bring the Grand Pabbie home and find a place to bed down before it gets dark." He pulled out a carrot from his coat pocket, allowed his reindeer to bite off half of it, and ate the other half, which made Adgar cringe and Elsa squirm in disgust. Then he hopped into the driver's seat, flicked the reins, and rode out the side gates to... wherever his next destination was.

"Father... what did that mean?" Elsa asked.

"I honestly don't know," he answered. "The last time we saw him, he saved your sister's life, took some of her memories away, and gave you some advice that I totally misinterpreted. I hate to say 'ignore him,' but we seem to do better when we work out our own destinies, rather than relying too hard on the trolls and guessing at what their mystical pronouncements mean."

She heaved a sigh of relief. "For a moment, I was afraid that you might take another guess at his meaning, and I'd wind up in my room again for four more years."

He rested his hand on her shoulder and shook his head. "Even if I wanted to guess at his meaning, which I don't, I have no clue at all what he was telling us. 'Let it go' is working perfectly well for you, so we'll stick with that. Destiny will play itself out, with our cooperation or without it, just like it always has." He smiled at his daughter. "Everything is going to be just fine."