Chapter Ten

A Frozen Cell

The first thing Anna saw when she opened her eyes was her breath swirling and dancing in front of her face when she exhaled. Her surroundings were unfamiliar, and she came to realize that she was incredibly cold. She groaned as she rubbed her eyes, and there was a dull pain on the side of her head. Then it all came rushing back to her. Her room, everything was frozen, his voice, those intense blue eyes. She gasped and quickly scurried to her feet, only to be met by a wall of nauseating dizziness. She sank back to her knees and began to hear hushed voices around her.

Quiet, she's awake! Move I can't see! Is it really her? She quickly looked around and came to realize she was in a cell, constructed if iron bars and stone. However, she got a closer look and could see that everything was frozen with a thin layer of ice. Hearing the whispers around her, she looked up and realized she wasn't alone. The room was divided by a stone walkway, each side of the room having their own rows of cell blocks. The back walls were solid rock, but the makeshift walls of the cells were thick iron bars with space enough between to see into the cells next to, and across from her. There were other people in the cells around her. There were two men who shared a cell directly across from hers, another man in the cell to her left, and a woman who was two cells down from the two men across from her. All but the woman, who was curled up in the corner of her cell, were looking at her.

"Hey, you alright there, kid?" the man in the cell next to her asked.

"Uh," she wasn't quite sure how to answer that. "No?"

She looked up at the man who was leaning his arms against the iron bars that separated their cells, his hands hanging over on her side. "You seem to be ok," he said cracking a smile.

"W-where am I?" she stuttered in the cold.

"You, princess, are currently in the dungeons beneath the palace of the Southern Isles," he answered her. "You got here a few days ago and you were knocked out pretty good."

Her eyes grew large, "I'm in the Southern Isles?" she cried. "How? When? Why?" Her panic level beginning to elevate. "Get me out of here! Let me out immediately! I-I'm a princess for goodness sake!"

"Pipe down will you!" one if the men from across the hall yelled at her.

"They don't discriminate between royalty and towns folk, kid," the man next to her said. "As a matter of fact your in the presence of nothing but royalty."

Anna looked at him, shocked and confused, "What do you mean?"

"Allow me to introduce myself," he said. "I'm Prince Leander, and those two morons over there are my brothers, Henrick and Sebastian."

She looked at the three men in awe. "You? Your, Hans' brothers?" she exclaimed.

"Wow, good know I'm known as 'Hans' brother,' " Sebastian called from his cell. He crossed his arms in irritation.

"In the flesh," Leander bowed.

Anna studied the three men closely. It was becoming more and more apparent that they were related to Hans. Both Henrick and Sebastian had the exact same hair color as Hans. Sebastian even had the distinct sideburns as his much younger brother. Leander, on the other hand, had a much lighter sandy brown hair, but he was built exactly the same as Hans was. Tall and lean, he too had the side burns but they continues down his face to create a chinstrap along his jawline. He was actually quite incredibly handsome.

"Hey! Is it really her?" a new voice called from further down the hall, but the source of the voice was just out of her sight, blocked by a stone wall.

"Calm down of course it's really her!" Leander turned and yelled behind him.

Anna raised an eyebrow, "And that was...?"

"Ilias, my other brother," he answered her. "Don't worry about him."

She peered outside her cell at the woman who was sitting in the floor facing away from them. "Who is that?" she asked.

The princes face turned sad, "That's Queen Nora, Of the Southern Isles. My mother."

She looked over at the woman cowering in her cell, trying to cut off the world from her mind. Anna never really gave much thought as to what Hans' mother might look like but she certainly wouldn't have imagined her like this. So small and frail, and completely defeated. Anna just wanted to leave her cell and go to her, to somehow manage to comfort whatever was ailing her.

"Yeah," Prince Leander interrupted. "She hasn't taken to kindly to all of the...ice."

Anna looked at the bars her cell was made out of. She easily wrapped her hand around the iron and noticed that it was indeed covered in ice. She looked around and saw that everything else from the ceiling to the walls to the floor was covered with ice. "Why is everything frozen?" she muttered.

"My brother is a bit too excited about his new magic powers," Leander sighed, rolling his eyes.

"What?" Anna stammered. Did she hear him right? "Powers?"

"Little Hansy found himself a wizard that gave him ice powers," Sebastian grumbled from his cell.

She couldn't believe what she was hearing. "Ice powers?" she exclaimed. "Like my sister?"

"Yep. That's why he wanted them. He's gonna get revenge on you and your sister for throwing him in the hoosegow for a year."

"But I don't understand, why would he take me and bring me here?" she shook her head.

"Because he knows Queen Elsa will come and get you," he said blatantly.

She blew a piece of hair from her face. "And how do you know so much about this plan of his," she asked.

"Because he told us of course," he commented, trying to ignore her ignorance. "He tried to get us all on board with the whole taking over the kingdom thing along with Arendelle and freezing it over again, permanently."

"What?" she cried. "He can't do that! That's insane!"

"Unfortunately for him we all thought he was nuts and we tried to stop him," he continued, not stopping to answer her questions. "Most of my brothers ran away on a ship like a bunch of weenies before Hans froze everything over. As you can see, Henrick, Sebastian, Ilias and I stayed and tried to stop him, but he managed to convince Didrik and Tobias to side with him. So now they're kind of like his frozen henchmen. There was no way we could beat him so now were all stuck down here."

Anna's head was spinning. Hans has ice powers? She simply wouldn't let herself believe it. And Prince Leander was right, Elsa would find out she's missing and come after her. "No, no Elsa can't come after me!" she yelled. "It's too dangerous!"

He shrugged, "That's what were all saying, kid."

Anna couldn't believe it. She couldn't believe any of this. She was stuck under the palace of the Southern Isles, Hans now all of sudden having ice powers, knowing Elsa would probably come after her and potentially get herself killed. She threw her head into her hands. It was all giving her a massive headache.

She began listening to the conversation between the two men across from her.

Henrick spat, "I swear when I get out of this rat hole, I'm of a take Hans and..."

"Give it a rest you idiot," Sebastian cut him off. "There's no way you can go up against him when he's capable of shooting an icicle through your chest."

Henrick stood up. "Well you don't know what's at stake here! I'm next in line for the throne, and he thinks he can just throw me in here just because he can make a little snow?"

His cell mate stood up along with him, "You're next in line for the throne? Don't flatter yourself! You're unfit to rule over the Southern Isles!"

"Would you just give it a rest already?" Leander interrupted, before they started tearing at each other's throats. "Don't you understand? None of us are fit to sit on the throne."

The room went silent. All eyes were staring at the handsome prince just hanging on his words. Anna thought for sure she was about to witness an all out war between the three brothers, but no one said a word. Not even from Ilias, who Anna still had yet to see.

"That's why there's been any debate at all about who's going to rule," Leander shattered the silence. "It's because not you, not me, not any of us are suited to take over the Southern Isles."

"What happened to the king?" Anna asked, confused. As the words left her mouth she could see the queen curl up into a tighter ball from the corner of her eye.

Leander looked over at his mother with sad eyes, then back at Anna, "He was poisoned sometimes last week and died. There's been some...controversy about who did it, but I think were all pretty sure on who's done it now."

Anna's jaw dropped. She couldn't believe Hans was capable of doing something like killing his own father. But then again he did almost murder Elsa right in front of her. Still, she didn't think anyone could be so evil. He must have a weakness of some sort, she just didn't know what.

Anna laid on the cot in her cell, facing away from everyone. Her headache was amounting to a migraine and she closed her eyes hoping that she could disappear, just for a little while in her dreams.

Elsa, please. Don't come after me.