I wanted it to be you.
The words were suspended in time. Swelling and pulsating in the air and resounding off the walls of the tiny room. She was breathing them in. They were in her lungs, on her skin, in her thoughts. Saturating every crevice and surface.
Breathing seemed quite a complicated thing at that moment. Elsa understood the basic mechanics of it – breathe in and release– but it wasn't coming naturally to her. It was as if her body had forgotten how, and she now had to make the conscious effort. Except she was overcompensating, and her breaths came heavier and faster. Labored and unnatural.
I wanted you.
She remembered the wedding night, after the guests had gone and the new husband and wife had sailed off into vast waters. The quiet castle walls, rooms and hallways lit by candlelight. She'd traversed through every hall and nearly every vacant room with only her shadow to keep her company. The library had been her final stop, and as she'd gripped the handle and pushed the door open, Elsa had wondered if the library had been her goal all along.
The musty scent of books and old parchment had been near suffocating, but she'd cut through it and across the room to the sofa waiting for her at the end of it. She'd caught a vague scent of lilacs from the fabric, and a thin layer of moisture collected around her eyes. An odd tingling ache had overcome her, nesting itself in the pit of her stomach.
I wanted you.
She poured ink all over the upholstery, ink taken from a bottle she'd swiped from a nearby desk. The following morning Elsa had ordered the sofa be destroyed. Burned. It was the strangest request she'd ever made, and she could see the strangeness of it reflecting in her attendant's perplexed eyes as he carried it out without question.
But it hadn't been enough.
There was the night of Elsie's birth. A day that had come too soon and shaken her resolve. She had not expected the feelings that came over her when she passed the sleeping infant into Kristoff's eager arms. Nor the empty feelings that accompanied them after.
I wanted y—
She balled her hands into fists.
Well, I wanted a lot of things too.
"Don't." Elsa wasn't sure how much time had passed in the silence between them. Five seconds? Ten Seconds? Each passing moment felt infinitely long.
Anna knit her brows in confusion.
"Don't? I don't think you—"
"You can't do this."
"Elsa, I—"
"You promised," Elsa insisted firmly, accusation bleeding from her words. "You said—we would never discuss what happened—what happened that—" that night. She couldn't bring herself to say it. To say it out loud would give it substance, and what happened that night hadn't happened at all.
"You promised."
"I—I know I did," Anna answered meekly, a trace of guilt stiffening in her face, "I realize that I'm breaking my word. But it's different now."
She was almost pleading when she uttered those last words, as if it could imbue them with the hope and optimism of the simple naïveté she clung to. Elsa searched Anna's eyes and could see from the resolute and nervous look in them that she was not about to let this go.
"I need to go" Elsa declared after a terse pause. She hurriedly pulled a ring from her finger and set it on the dresser drawer. "This is for Elsie. I thought it would be nice for her to wear it to her christening. It was mother's ring. You can string it into her necklace for the ceremony."
Anna gazed down at the ring and then at Elsa. She looked perfectly composed. Not a hair out of place, or a crease on her brow.
"Why are you avoiding this?"
Elsa was anything but composed. She was an expert at concealing. Throw her into a den full of lions and she'd be nothing but smiles.
"You're avoiding me," Anna insisted, taking a step too close for Elsa to ignore.
"We can't do this right now," Elsa replied evenly, avoiding eye contact with her sister. She took a step back, her movements brusque as she practically slingshot herself away from Anna, but her face remained poised and unruffled. "We need to be in the cathedral in an hour and you still need to finish getting ready."
She was already making her way toward the door when Anna bolted after her.
"Wait! Elsa, no." she clasped onto Elsa's wrist, and with her free hand she closed the closet door shut. "We need to talk about this."
Elsa's whole body tensed, as rigid as the statues in the south gardens. Anna still had her fingers firmly fastened around her stony arm, too anxious to let go.
"Why?" Elsa muttered, her voice came low and deep, and rumbled under her breath. Anna couldn't see her face, but the thickness in her sister's voice only increased her own apprehension.
When Anna didn't reply, Elsa tore her hand away from her grasp.
"Why?" She asked once more, but it was less a question and more an accusation, laden with an overwhelming anger and bitterness that Anna had not expected. "Because it's different now?"
Elsa turned to face her, anger teeming in her eyes. Anna recoiled, unprepared for the Elsa that stood before her.
"Yes," she half whispered.
And Elsa replied with a soft and cynical laugh.
"Tell me," Elsa began, staring unflinchingly into Anna's eyes. "Just how are things different now?"
Anna couldn't seem to find her voice. She felt like it had wedged itself in her throat, tight as a ball.
"I'm waiting," Elsa stared expectantly. "Can't think of anything? Not a word?"
But the only thing that passed between them was the heavy silence in the room. Anna broke her eyes away and dropped her stare to the pile of dresses remaining on the floor, wishing she could crawl beneath them.
"Then allow me," Elsa went on, fighting back the quiver that was threatening its way into her voice. "Well, you're married now. Married. That's different. You're a mother and a wife. You have a family to look after. That's pretty different."
The tension in Anna's throat grew tighter and she couldn't swallow back the nerves that had taken her voice hostage. Not that she had any reply, and no amount of protesting could make Elsa's words any less true.
"Yes, you're right, Anna. Everything is different now." Elsa was shaking now, her voice quivered and cracked, and her hands trembled. "So, this now...us talking. There's no place for it. We swore to forget about it. A long time ago."
"I never promised to forget," Anna finally spoke up, almost defiantly, as courage made its way back to her and returned her voice. She stared boldly at her sister, and with greater assertiveness added, "I don't want to forget."
A startled looked flitted across Elsa's face, her eyes went wide in surprise and her mouth lightly agape. That tightness that often seized her chest and constricted her heart whenever they accidentally touched, had taken hold of her again, a little more bitter and aching. She quickly tucked away the surprise on her face, burying it under her crumbling composure.
"But you did promise we'd never—we'd never be having this conversation."
"Then…I guess I lied."
A long stretch of silence came over them. Elsa leaned back against the closet door, tipping her head back, and closed her eyes. Anna bit her lip and played with the stray hairs that had come undone from her hair bun. Her eyes remained fixed on Elsa, conscious of her every movement; the small rippled in her throat as she swallowed, the swell and fall of her chest with every breath she took.
"You're so unfair," Elsa finally replied, exhaling sharply.
"And you're not?"
Another muted pause fell over them, but it wasn't as tense as before. If anything, it was a relief. A refuge from the words that twisted and weighed them down.
~X~
"Anna's still not ready yet?" King Claudius asked as soon as he saw Augustus and a wifeless Kristoff make their way into the cathedral. He was pleased to see that Kristoff was far more comfortable in his skin than he used to be. Unlike his own son-in-law, a cocky former thief who had less than humble beginnings, Kristoff had not been quick to assume his princely role. But that was quickly changing.
Queen Isabella rose from the pew and smiled warmly at the boys. With the exception of the king and his wife, and a few attendants waiting diligently at the entrance, the guests had yet to arrive.
"This is Anna we're talking about." Augustus was quick to point out. "I think it's safe to say that she is never ready. You can always count on her for that, uncle."
Kristoff laughed, all the while nodding in agreement.
"Well, she's hardly late…yet," the queen chimed in, clumsily defending her niece.
"Don't worry, she'll be on time today," Kristoff assured.
The king gave Kristoff a mystified look. "And just how do you plan on managing that?"
Kristoff responded with a self-assured grin, a look that was more befitting of Eugene than the former mountain man.
"I told him to tell Anna that the ceremony is an hour earlier than it actually is," Rapunzel interjected as she made her entrance, her voice echoing off the walls.
She waddled in, feet bare, her hands supporting her lower back and her swollen belly protruding forward. Eugene was practically glued to her side, his wife's jacket draped over his arm and her purse strapped over his shoulder.
"When you can't force a lush to drink water, sometimes you've got to convince her that it's wine," Rapunzel elucidated wryly.
Eugene glanced down at his wife, casting her a dubious look.
"Seems pretty sneaky to me, and what's with that analogy?"
"Says the former thief," Augustus jibed and the cathedral chorused with their laughter.
"I think it's simply brilliant," Kristoff enthused. As much as he loved his wife, he'd come to dread attending formal ceremonies with her. Despite his best efforts, Anna only seemed to grow more lax, and his queen increasingly annoyed. The last time they had stumbled in late was to a ship christening ceremony, a ship that was named in the princess's honor. Elsa's eyes had been poisonous daggers. She could have killed me with that stare.
"I'm amazed that you've never tried it before," Rapunzel confessed. "It's practically chapter one in the relationship handbook. I use it all the time on Eugene."
"W-what?" Eugene sputtered.
"Well, you spend more time on your hair than Narcissus spends admiring his own reflection," his wife teased, reaching her hand up and ruffling his hair.
"You should be grateful for my handsome locks," was Eugene's smug reply. "Between your hair and mine, our child will be follicly gifted." Grinning broadly, he leaned over and took a kiss from Rapunzel's mouth.
Kristoff's smile drooped a little as he watched them. The teasing and the playful banter, he and Anna used to have that once.
What happened to us?
"I'm actually surprised that you came at all, cousin." Augustus admitted to Rapunzel. He looked her up and down, amazement and disbelief pronounced on his face as his eyes settled on her swollen stomach.
"We tried to convince her to stay home," Eugene explained as his eyes knowingly met the king's. "But 'crazy' here was quite adamant about coming."
Eugene stared pointedly at his wife even as King Claudius nodded his agreement.
"Don't you two start with your looks again," Rapunzel warned her husband and her father. "And same goes for you, Augustus." She turned to give him his equal share of the dirty look she'd cast Eugene and the king. "I'm six months along—"
"Almost seven," Eugene corrected.
"And the physician doesn't think I'm in any real danger of suddenly going into labor—"
"He didn't think it would be wise for her to travel," Eugene added and Rapunzel rolled her eyes.
"—but he came along to make sure that nothing happened. Totally safe." She gave her husband a backhanded slap on his side before her mother guided her by the arm to a nearby pew.
"Have you two decided on names yet?" Kristoff asked.
Eugene and Rapunzel exchanged bright glances.
"We have decided on names, but we were sort of waiting to announce them once we got a little closer to delivering," Rapunzel explained as she rested a hand over her belly. "Call us superstitious, but it seemed like bad luck to say anything too soon."
Eugene nodded.
"Nothing worse than bad timing."
Kristoff agreed, all the while wondering if Anna would make it on time after all.
~X~
"You really have the worst timing with these things," Elsa remarked, remembering that unspoken night; Anna's silent and unwavering stare, and the warm glow of candlelight that had glinted in her eyes. Those eyes had left Elsa speechless and lost deep within the pools of her sister's blue irises.
"What things?" Anna had a blank look on her face, and it crossed Elsa's mind that maybe her sister wasn't always as simple as she sometimes appeared to be.
"Things. Like now. Like…" In spite of everything, she still couldn't bring up that night in the library. "Like then."
"Why won't you say it, Elsa?"
"Say what?" Elsa bit the inside of her cheek. With every word that came out of Anna's mouth, Elsa was pressed further into a corner, and her composure cracked and caved under the pressure.
"You know what. I see it in your eyes every time." Anna could hardly miss the miserable look in Elsa's eyes, as if the unspoken words alone brought her physical pain.
"I don't know what you expect from me. Why do you insist on dragging this out, Anna? It happened ages ago. Why now?"
"Because I feel it. Don't you? This massive thing between us, it's so suffocating, and it just…it just keeps getting bigger."
I feel it, she wanted to say, but the voice of reason continued to whisper in her ear.
"If there's something between us, it's because you put it there. I didn't want this. I didn't ask for any of this. You're the one who-who…"
"Say it."
There had been mouths, and hands, and soft pert flesh. Breathy whispers in the dark. Whimpers and cries, muffled by lips and long drawn out caresses. The memory of it persisted with vivid detail, and closing her eyes only enhanced it; her body recalling every sensation and touch.
"You're the one who kissed me." The words were barely more than a whisper, but they had power over Elsa, making her feel weak and small.
"And you were there…kissing me right back," Anna shot back unflinchingly.
Elsa cringed and looked away. Shame swallowed her up and waves of nausea rippled from her stomach and out to her toes and fingertips.
"I—I s-shouldn't have," Elsa sputtered, her face redder than Anna had ever seen it. "I got caught up in the moment, and, and it was…. It was a big mistake. That whole night was a mistake. And this, now, talking about it is a mistake."
It was Anna's turn to flinch.
Is this really what I wanted? Anna wondered. She had never seen her sister look so upset, not even when they'd learned their parents would never come home.
"You're probably right," Anna admitted dolefully. "This is probably a mistake. All of it. Sometimes I wish I could undo that night, and that maybe we wouldn't be where we are. And I wouldn't—" her throat constricted sharply and she fought back the threat of tears. "I wouldn't have so many regrets. But I think, even if we could undo that, we would've somehow ended up here anyways. The thing is, it wouldn't change how I feel."
"I can't hear this from you."
Anna smiled sadly.
"I just needed you to know."
"You know what I know? You're my sister! That's what I know, and that's all I need to know."
"You think I don't get how messed up this is?"
"I'm not sure that you do."
"I tried everything to deny these feelings I have. And now it's like I'm imprisoned by the choices that I've made. But despite all my bad choices, the one I regret the least is us that night." Anna confessed, taking a tentative step closer. "I'd never felt so alive, the way I felt being with you. And I thought that maybe if you felt it t—"
"I can't listen anymore," Elsa snapped, the anger seething off of her, just moments away from exploding. "Everyone is waiting for us. I'm leaving." She pushed passed Anna, her composure completely stripped away, and nothing but fear and anger to conceal the dangerous feelings constrained just under the surface.
It was without question that the ceremony would not go on without them. At worst, there would be a cathedral full of guests waiting for them to show, even with the time bought from Kristoff's little fib to Anna. But Elsa hardly cared anymore, she just needed to breathe, and she would only suffocate if she stayed.
"I was awake that night!"
Elsa froze. Her hand was curled around the door handle. Just one quick turn and pull and she would have been out the door. But she couldn't move. Every muscle, every instinct betrayaed her. Anna said nothing, but she could feel her eyes boring into her back.
It took everything in her to swallow the tightness in her throat and speak.
"I don't know what you mean," she answered slowly, her voice thick and cracking.
"The night of the first Grand Ball," Anna replied.
Elsa didn't dare look back. Her eyes were fixated on the door handle, and her stiffened hand was still fighting her instincts to run.
"I was drunk, and you brought me to your room," Anna went on. "I had so much to drink that night that I could barely keep my eyes open. But I was awake."
"You were awake?" Elsa echoed, dazed and stunned.
"You keep pushing all of this on me, but you're just as much to blame as I am." Despite the conviction in her voice, those words didn't shed away any of her guilt.
"You were awake," Elsa repeated, mostly to herself now, barely aware that Anna had still been speaking.
Anna wasn't sure what she expected from Elsa, but she certainly expected more than the frozen statue and she'd turned into.
"Elsa?" She waited for an answer and, when none came, Anna reached for her. Her fingers had only grazed Elsa's slumped shoulders, but it was enough to startle her back to reality, even if it was to shrink away from Anna's touch.
"You went through so many gowns," Elsa nervously remarked, her voice a little strained as she turned, staring at a pile of dresses that remained on the floor. She moved passed Anna, avoiding her eyes, and crouched down the pile, taking an armful. "It's probably gonna take the better part of the day for the chambermaids to get all this straightened out."
Anna followed her with her eyes, and watched her as she tried to stack and steady the dresses over the already growing pile on top of the chest that she kept at the at the far corner of the closet pushed up against the walls.
"Stop it," Anna begged softly.
"If we pile on anymore dresses, they're gonna slide right off," Elsa observed. Had she heard Anna's plea, her face didn't show it. "Maybe we can just push the rest to the corner."
"Stop it!" Anna was standing behind her now. "I couldn't care any less about the dresses."
Elsa tried to inch past her, but Anna sidestepped and blocked her.
I'm literally cornered, she realized as she faced the corner walls, with Anna and the storage chest obstructing her path.
"Say something."
Exhaling sharply, Elsa turned to face her sister. Her head was cocked a bit to the side, and wisps of her dark, tied-up hair curled along her neck. But what she noticed most was her eyes; her large, brilliant blue eyes. They were just inches away from hers. Elsa hadn't expected to be standing so close, not quite a foot apart. Too close. She planted her hands on the storage chest behind her and leaned back into it, forcing more space between her and Anna. A task made harder by the piles of silky fabric that covered the surface of the chest. Elsa had to cling onto the fabric just to keep steady.
"You were awake. What more is there to say?" Elsa glared back at Anna, and they seemed less like sisters and more like a coerced prisoner and her captive.
"I want a real answer from you." Anna leaned forward, undermining Elsa's efforts to maintain a semblance of distance between them. "I deserve that much."
Elsa considered it for a moment. A real answer. Regardless of the consequences. But she couldn't afford to be so reckless and irresponsible. At best, she could only offer a half truth.
"We don't always get what we want," she answered grimly, and she remembered every moment of resentment that she'd felt toward Kristoff. Hating him for having all the things she wanted. And Anna. Hating herself for things she shouldn't.
Anna searched Elsa's face, studied her eyes, but she could find nothing more than a scowl staring back at her.
"I guess we don't," Anna replied coldly. "I guess we just—"
But she didn't get the chance to finish that thought. Leaning over her sister as she was, with only one arm to steady herself on an unstable surface, her hand slipped and she fell forward. Knocking right into Elsa.
Elsa yelped in surprise and groaned from the impact. She was pinned awkwardly against the storage chest. Between Anna's weight pressing on top of her, and the silky gowns cushioned beneath her, Elsa's hips were pushed up onto the chest and her feet off the ground. Their bodies were forced into an uncomfortable embrace, their faces so close that their noses were touching. Anna hadn't moved, her quickened breath warm on Elsa's lips, and Elsa realized that a few of the gowns has slipped down during their tussle with gravity and had compromised her sister's footing.
"Here, let me help," Elsa mumbled, increasingly flustered and unable to shake the sense of Déjà vu from their predicament. She slipped her arms around Anna's waist and held on tightly, doing her best to ignore the undeniable flutter in her stomach. "Try to stand now."
Anna gripped her hands on Elsa's bare shoulders, using her sister as an anchor to pull herself up. She'd managed to plant one foot firmly over the silk-covered floor when Elsa, unable to steady both their weight, began to slide forward. Anna was quick to slip her arms around Elsa's neck just as they cascaded down onto the floor, plopping hard onto a pile of dresses with an avalanche of silk gowns not far behind.
Dresses heaped over them and they were practically entombed in silk and chiffon. It reminded Anna of the makeshift tents she used to build in her room when she was a child, using bedsheets and chairs. Except, back then her only companions were her make believe friends. She had snuck in a possum once, and clothed him in her doll's fashionable apparel, but the castle staff had been in an uproar about it when the critter escaped from her room and challenged the head cook to an embittered tug of war over a lobster tail. The cook had nearly quit after that.
It took Anna a moment to regain her senses and realize that her face was pressed against Elsa's neck and her arms encircled over her shoulders. Elsa was also very much aware of the way Anna straddled her lap, her hips jutted forward and her knees and legs clamped firmly around Elsa's thighs, denying her the freedom to move.
It occurred to Anna that neither of them had made an attempt to pull away. Elsa's arms remained fixed around Anna's waist and their chests were pressed against the other. Somehow, being blanketed in darkness under a mountain of dresses, their bodies entwined, and the air warmed between them with every breath they took was like being intoxicated. Only she was drunk on a feeling, that longing aching feeling that shaped every bad decision she'd ever made.
She pressed her lips against Elsa's neck, tentatively at first, nipping along the smooth flesh just under her jaw. A soft gasp hitched in Elsa's throat, and Anna was roused to take it further, tracing open-mouthed kisses along her jawline, working her tongue and wet lips to illicit another response as she slowly made her way to Elsa's mouth.
As soon as their lips touched, their mouths came together fiercely, crushing and taking, almost painfully so. Elsa pressed harder still, pushing into Anna's mouth, pulling at her hips. Pulling and releasing in waves. She could feel every intake of breath on her lips as Anna struggled for air; taking in tattered breaths even as she began to rock her hips, and Elsa drew from their mounting arousal, curling and squeezing her hands on Anna's firm hips.
She took Anna's bottom lip, nipping it softly, careful not to bite down too hard, nipping and sucking, and drawing out a breathless groan.
"I want—" Elsa gasped, then paused, realizing what she had been about to say.
What am I doing?
She pulled away, pulled her lips away, and although she couldn't see Anna, she could feel her heated breath on her face just as she was certain Anna could feel hers.
"We shouldn't," her mangled voice managed to say between gasps.
"Yes, we shouldn't," Anna murmured back, leaning forward. Her mouth once again on Elsa's, kissing and nipping at her lips.
"Stop."
Elsa tried to pull away, but she was trapped by the storage chest behind her. She squeezed her eyes shut and bit down hard.
Anna jolted back. The mountain of dresses came falling down between them and they could see again. Barely. Elsa's eyes ached, overwhelmed by the light. When her eyes readjusted, she could see a small trickle of blood welling and staining Anna's lip.
"It had to stop," Elsa choked out.
Anna swiped her thumb across her mouth and smeared off the blood. It was hardly much, but the sight of it left her wide-eyed and stunned.
"You probably should go," Anna rasped as she rose to her feet, but instead of waiting on Elsa to leave, she moved to make her own exit.
"You weren't wrong, Anna," Elsa called out to her, pushing herself up to her feet. "You weren't wrong about me," she repeated even louder and Anna paused in her tracks, Elsa's shameful confession still resonating in the air between them. But Elsa couldn't leave it at that. She couldn't submit to her admission without another half-truth to keep the distance.
"Back then…I wanted you too."
Past tense. A fixed point in time with a definitive end.
Anna clenched a fist and walked out the door.
~X~
"How nice to be so young," the queen remarked, slipping her arm around her husband's and resting her head against his shoulder. "It's so nostalgic. Watching them, and remembering how we used to be. It makes my heart ache a little."
"Are you saying we're old?"
The queen chuckled, "At the very least, seasoned. And maybe a little old."
"Our hair is grayer."
"If only we didn't have to deal with wrinkles," she bemoaned softly.
"Don't fret, my dear," her husband gently soothed and kissed the top of her head. "I love your wrinkles."
He sought out her hand and entwined their fingers.
"I miss everyone," the queen said ruefully. "I always imagined that we'd all grow old together. We'd drink and sit around telling stories of the good old days, argue over whose grandchild was the cutest…which would be ours of course, and complain about getting old and fat."
"What was it that Hawkins used to call us? The Six Musketeers?" the king remembered, and a small smile touched his lips. "Irene and Julianna, hated that. They used to team up and elbow him every time he said it."
The queen laughed. "How could I forget? But that was all your kid sister's doing, not mine. Irene always went along with everything Julianna said. And Julianna was just bitter because Hawkins kept calling her 'Freckles'."
The king shook his head, his mouth curled in amusement at the shared memory.
"She was certainly very passionate, and daring. Our mother was always beside herself, afraid she was going to crack her head open sliding down the bannister, or racing against the boys." The king had been just as guilty of worrying and hovering over Julianna like a concerned parent. With a twelve year age difference, it had been hard for him not to. "I don't think she ever lost a horse race to Hawkins or Argos."
"Argos used to call her a spitfire."
"Time gets away from us so easily," Claudius remarked somberly. "People slip in and out of our lives. Sometimes painfully so."
"It wasn't all bad," queen assured. "Some good still came out of our sorrows."
"Even for Julianna?"
She pressed her hand against her husband's cheek and leaned forward, planting a soft kiss on his nose.
"Those kids are our proof. Rapunzel, Augustus, Elsa, and Anna. Little Elsie…" She searched her husband's face at the mention of the infant's name, and she could see the hesitation and doubt in his eyes. "You're still thinking about it, aren't you? The rumors."
"She looks so much like her, Isabella."
"I know. But it's not our place to say anything. We had our secrets then, it's time they get to have theirs now." The queen turned her eyes to their daughter and the boys. Even grown, they all appeared as children to her. Their vibrance and laughter eased the ache in her heart a little. And that was enough.
~X~
To everyone's surprise, Anna made it to the cathedral well before the ceremony went underway. As soon as she arrived, the Archbishop pulled her and Kristoff off to the side for a quick word, and Elsa took charge of little Elsie; carrying the child in her arms as they greeted arriving guests and helped direct them to their seats. Elsie babbled and smiled toothlessly at them, all the while shaking and chewing on her rattle.
"She a splitting image of her," Elsa overheard the king of Andalasia whisper curiously to his queen as they took their seats. She turned and caught their eyes before they shamefacedly looked away, and it was clear that the visitors had been referring to herself and the infant in her arms.
There's has been some talk, the Major Archbishop had told her just a month before. It has to do with the child…her strong likeness to you has spurred many rumors.
Elsie was now chewing on Elsa's hair and banging the rattle on her head, strings of drool dripping down the queen's long braided hair. Their resemblance was undeniable, Elsa acknowledged as she caressed her niece's rosy cheeks, but the same could also be said of her own mother, the late Queen Irene.
Scanning the dozens of faces in the cathedral and listening closely to the rumble of their chatter, Elsa could hardly make out a word. But it was hard to miss the inquisitive glances that a handful of them cast their way, and she wondered if it was skepticism that she saw in their eyes or perhaps her own paranoia.
Many are questioning her parentage…saying that she is your child, and not Princess Anna's… that the princess's marriage is a ruse to help cover for your indiscretions.
It was a strange feeling to consider that there were possibly those amongst their guests who believed her to be such a person, and Elsa wasn't sure if she should feel humiliated or infuriated, or simply indifferent.
It wasn't long before they started the ceremony. The archbishop sermoned on the inevitabilities of hellfire and damnation and ended on a prayer before he called forth the parents and godparents. Anna and Kristoff came forward before the alter, Elsie lay asleep with her head resting on her father's shoulder, her tiny hand clutching the ring held in place by the necklace she wore.
Eugene helped Rapunzel to her feet and they followed, taking the spot opposite of their cousins around the stone basin. The archbishop began yet another sermon and commanded Kristoff to hold Elsie over the basin. He did so carefully, his daughter had yet to stir awake and he did not want to startle her now. Kristoff waited for the archbishop to apply the holy waters, but instead he began a prayer, a prayer that ran for so long that Kristoff though his arms would break off and he surely would bleed out on the alter before the onlooking congregation.
If you hurry this along, I promise to come to church more often, he silently pleaded.
Looking at Anna, Kristoff noticed that she hadn't seemed quite herself since she'd arrived. She hadn't said a word to Elsa, and she'd hardly spoken a word to anyone else. Even her makeup was a bit odd; her shade of lipstick darker than she'd had it earlier. Anna squeezed her lips together like she often did when she was agitated, and bit her lip.
She winced.
There was a slight mark on the curve of her bottom lip, like a cut or a bruise. Kristoff couldn't quite tell under the darker shade of lipstick. Her lips were a little swollen too, he realized. Not like a bee sting, but fuller. Like—
Kristoff closed his eyes.
It's just my imagination, he told himself. But nothing running through his thoughts could offer a better explanation.
...to be continued...
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This chapter didn't turned out the way I had planned. I did make a few revisions since posting it to help clarity a few things. So see you next time...along with jilted exes, magical mishaps, stony grandpas, and Elsa's one true love...Augustus James Hawkins. I'm sure there was a joke somewhere in that last sentence.