Chapter 11. Kilig

Jack

When the exclamation rang through the bedroom, ricocheting off of the frozen walls and piercing his ears with it's alarm, Jack awoke and bolted upright, looking straight up at a pair of startled grey eyes.

Eyes that stared right back at him!

"What is this?" the maid repeated, much quieter than the first time.

Unsure what to do, Jack turned to Elsa, who had sat up beside him with equal haste.

"Jack, I think she can see-"

"My lady," the woman interrupted in a voice that was no longer surprised but was now venomously soft, directing her attention to Elsa, who shrank back in fear despite the fact that she was nearly a foot taller than the tiny maid. "There is a boy in your room."

It wasn't a question; It was a statement seeking a confirmation.

Jack hurried to defend Elsa, getting to his feet and quickly swallowing the wave of shock and the flash of excitement that appeared from yet another person being able to see him. "Wait, I can expla-"

"I'll get to you in a moment, boy," the maid snapped, glaring daggers at him before turning back to Elsa, who stood up as well, and repeating herself. "There is a boy in your room."

Elsa hesitated, before looking down. "Yes, Diana."

The maid nodded. "Perhaps he has been here all night?"

Elsa bit her lip. "Yes."

More nodding. "Perhaps he was here the night before?"

Deep breath. "Y-yes..."

There was a brief pause, in which the maid's sharp eyes flicked back and forth between the two guilty faces that stared at the ground.

Anticipation swarmed in Jack's mind, and he was worried for Elsa. Surely the queen-in-the-making wouldn't be punished on her own coronation day...

Right?

It was completely unexpected when the old woman's round wrinkled face suddenly broke into a radiant smile, her stormy grey eyes lighting like stars as she clasped her gloved hands together joyously.

"Oh rapture!"

Jack and Elsa blinked, alarmed at her sudden glee. "What?"

Jack yelped in shock when Diana suddenly lunged forward, clapping her hands over either of his cheeks and pulling him over to her, turning his head from side to side as she examined his face closely.

She had the strength of a dozen men, and yet her hands were almost as maternal as a grandmother's as she pulled and prodded at his cheeks and forehead and eyelids.

"He's too pale," she muttered under her breath while he struggled uselessly, "but he has a nice strong jaw. Oh, and those eyes!" She grinned, turning to Elsa while still painfully clutching his face. "Darling, he's perfect!"

"Excuse me, lady," Jack said loudly through forced pursed lips, pulling at either of her thin sturdy wrists in the useless attempt to pry her hands from his cheeks, "You're squeezing my face!"

She let out a chuckle and released him unexpectedly, so that he fell backwards onto the ground beside Elsa, who was now blushing furiously and trying not to laugh.

"So... you're not mad?" he clarified, retrieving his staff off of the ground and getting to his feet, rubbing his sore jaw.

Diana's eyebrows rose, but her smile hardly faded. "Mad?" she repeated, "I'm furious!" She paused. "And it's great!"

Jack stared, flummoxed. "Uh... huh?"

"This is amazing, Elsa!" Diana exclaimed in an excited squeal, "I hadn't seen you smile so grandly in years, and then last week you changed..." She turned to Jack, clapping both hands onto his shoulders. "And it's because of you." She paused, smiling breathlessly and resembling a child. "You will be attending the ceremony this morning, I trust?"

Despite his bewilderment at Diana's odd and unexpected turn of feelings about the future-queen of Arendelle having a boy in her room, Jack nodded, turning to look at Elsa. "Um... yeah. I will."

Elsa gave him a small smile that was laced with clashing excitement and anxiety.

Diana was practically hopping. "Oh, this is so great!" she exclaimed, before pausing and looking him up and down, "Of course, you'll have to change; Even the commoners won't be wearing clothes like that. And then we'll have to assign you a seat in one of the front pews, and-"

While Jack listened to this blankly, having no idea how to refuse, Elsa came to his rescue.

"That's quite unnecessary," she told the excited maid hastily but politely, "You see, Jack is not from around here, he, um... He can just stand to the side. Up on the platform." She took a deep breath. "Beside me."

Diana's face fell. "Oh sweetie, that would never be allowed," she replied, shaking her head sadly, "You know how things are. He's a peasant boy, they'd never-"

"On the contrary," Elsa interrupted, stepping sideways and taking Jack's arm in hers (Causing him to start in shock at her unexpected touch) "Today, I am queen. What I say goes." She paused, lifting her chin in a regal way. "And, for your information, Jack is far more than a peasant boy."

Jack stared, eyes and mouth wide open.

Diana beamed. "I have never seen you like this before!" she exclaimed, throwing her hands up in a rejoiceful way, "It's about time you take a stand! Alright, I'll be right back, I need to go fetch you some tea and your dress." She paused in the doorway, looking at Jack pointedly. "I mean it. I'll be right back. Don't try anything funny."

And she disappeared down the hall.

There was a brief moment of awkward silence and stillness where Jack was very aware of Elsa still holding his arm. They both exchanged a look, before chuckling nervously and stepping away from each other.

"Well, um," Elsa mumbled, brushing a stray lock of hair back into place, "Today's... today's the day."

"Yup," Jack said quietly, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. "So, uh, I guess Diana can see me now."

He was still a bit surprised at Elsa's words earlier, after insisting that he stay on stage with her. Yes, with his invisibility, immortality, and Winter powers, he was obviously more than a peasant boy. But the way she said it, it was as though she meant it in a completely different way.

As though he actually mattered.

She nodded. "Yes, apparently she can. It's so strange. I mean, with me and Anna being able to see you since the beginning, and then Diana... You don't suppose the Moon is controlling who can see you?"

Jack opened his mouth, before snapping it shut. This thought had never occurred to him. Could the Moon decide who he was visible to?

No. No, It couldn't. It had ignored him for decades, but It would never tease him in such a cruel way.

Something had happened sometime between Elsa's coronation rehearsal yesterday and this morning. Something somehow had altered Diana's vision and made her able to see him.

But what?

Then the other big questions, the questions that had been bothering him more and more the past few days, flooded into his mind like a furious hurricane in that moment.

Why could Elsa and Anna see him?

Why did Elsa have powers?

Why wouldn't the Moon tell him anything?

Who else had the Moon chosen besides the "Sandman" that Anna and the Wind had told him about?

What did these chosen people, called "Guardians," have that Jack did not?

What made Jack different from any of them?

And why was Jack different from the other humans?

Why was he invisible?

Why did he have powers?

Then there was the biggest question of all.

Why?

And there was that voice, the one he had heard on the night he had met Elsa and brought her to the North Mountain, the one who showed Jack all of those illusions and flashbacks... Who had that been?

This sudden onslaught of scrambled thoughts made his head throb, and he winced, pressing his fingertips to his temple and leaning against his staff to support his sudden wooziness.

"Jack?"

He looked up, and saw Elsa watching him with concern.

"Are you alright?" she asked, stepping forward and reaching out helplessly, not touching him, "What are you thinking about?"

Jack sighed, not knowing where to begin. "I..." He shook his head, deciding it'd be best to change the subject. "It doesn't matter. Are you alright, Elsa? You look..."

She looked scared. She fidgeted with her gloved hands and bit her lip and kept glancing out the window, where the sun was slowly making it's way up the sky.

The ceremony would be starting soon.

"I look nervous, I know," she finished for him, running her hands through her hair and turning away, "I have reason enough, don't I? I have to get this in control. Look!" She held out her hands in distress, where bits of ice lined the white fabric of her fingers, before she yanked the gloves off and tossed them away in disgust. She turned back around to face him. "I have to stop... feeling!" she exclaimed, her voice raising as she waved her hands furiously to express her words, "Those people are expecting a show! I have to hide it, I have to get it in control, and if I make one wrong move, everyone will-"

Without fully thinking about it, Jack set his staff against the wall and reached out, catching both of her sleeves in his hands and holding her still.

Elsa's gasp resounded off of the glittering ice walls, and they stared at each other blankly for a moment.

Blue eyes, nearly matching in color, were mere inches apart and wide in alarm.

"Jack?" she breathed, startled.

He blinked, his eyes immediately darting to the floor. "You, uh..." he began in a stammering mumble, his cheeks burning, "Y-you won't mess up. I'll be right up there next to you, and all you have to do is... make it through for a couple hours. It's only for today."

He forced himself to look back up and meet her gaze, completely unaware of the ice that started up both his arms from clutching either of her wrists.

She looked back at him, her breath catching in her throat. "Jack," she repeated, "I-"

"Remember when I said 'don't try anything funny'?!" a stern voice snapped from the doorway, interrupting her, "This is what I meant!"

They both jumped, and Jack realized how close they were; At some point he had pulled both of her hands towards him, causing both of them to step forward and get a little closer than was considered appropriate...

"Hey, watch it!" he exclaimed as an unexpectedly strong hand grabbed the scruff of his collar and yanked him away.

"Excuse me, young man," Diana snapped, still gripping the back of his shirt as she handed Elsa a cup of tea, "You are the one who should 'watch it.'" She released him, grinning at his angry protests, and turned to Elsa. "My lady, it's time to get ready," she said kindly, before looking back at Jack with a smirk. "And you too."

Jack's eyebrows rose. "Excuse me?"

"See?" Anna said, smiling smugly and placing her hands on her hips, "I told you blue is his color."

Jack gave an exasperated sigh, crossing his arms and glaring at the mirror in front of him. "What's the point of this?"

He was in one of the dressing rooms, where for twenty minutes Diana and a recently woken Princess Anna had argued over what to force the unwilling Winter spirit into. They had finally decided on a simple dress shirt, dark blue in color and made of stiff cotton with long cuff sleeves and gold buttons that clasped all the way to the hollow of his throat. The sleeves, collar, and tailcoat were all sharp and dignified.

The exact opposite of who he was.

"Don't brood, it's bad for your complexion," Diana snapped, thunking him on the head with a wooden ruler before turning back to the chest she had been rifling through. Still unaware of his secret, which Anna had kept with a promise, Diana still thought he was an average human commoner. "Now, as for shoes-"

"Are you kidding me?" he groaned, rubbing the spot she had hit with the ruler and turning away, shaking his head in refusal, "No, no, there is no way-"

"Psst," Anna whispered, elbowing him in the ribs, "When the ceremony's over, you can just chuck 'em off the nearest balcony. I won't tell a soul."

Jack crossed his arms, grumbling incoherently under his breath, but nodded to show he was grateful.

"So, Jack," Diana said, turning to him and brushing off her apron, before moving to another trunk and rummaging through it, "Tell me about yourself."

"Er... what?"

Diana gave a laugh. "You have earned the affections of the royal heir of Arendelle," she told him, "You can't expect me not to ask you of your background. Family, home, career... Who are you exactly?"

"Um..." He and Anna exchanged looks, and the princess gave him an unsure shrug. "Well, I uh... I'm not really anybody. I'm not from around here, and I'm kind of... kind of on my own, I guess?"

Diana turned back to him, raising her eyebrows. "Oh?" she asked, surprised, "No parents? No siblings?"

Scratching the back of his neck awkwardly, he shook his head.

Her eyes visibly softened. "Oh, um," she murmured, clearing her throat, "Well... I, uh, I'm very sorry to hear about that."

"Don't be," he said quickly. He definitely didn't want to be pitied; He believed himself to be stronger than that. "I'm fine now. Seriously. Elsa is helping me. A lot."

She smiled, her pale eyes lighting up, before stating matter-of-factly; "You're helping her too, y'know."

He walked quickly down the hall, scowling at the soft muffled tap tap sound his feet made on the carpeted floor.

Jack hated shoes.

Despite the weighed-down sensation he felt by these simple black monstrosities, he walked faster, eager to find the library before the bells ring.

He eventually found a long hallway, lined with waiting servants, ending with a pair of doors that were open ajar. He slipped into the room, and found that it was small, a personal library for one. Sitting against the far wall was a long table with a large painting hung above it, and on the other side of the room was a small triangular window that gleamed in the now-risen sun.

That's where Elsa stood, her back to him, gazing fretfully outside.

Jack came up behind her, looking out the window alongside her. The morning was clear and bright, perfect for a celebration. In the near distance, a dozen ships sailed on the opaque blue water along the fjords, their sails billowing in the Summery wind. Down below were the gates, surrounded by a crowd of people waiting for them to be open, and a small green dot prancing about the castle gardens was Anna, obviously celebrating.

Elsa was whispering under her breath, and Jack didn't have to hear her to know what she was saying.

Conceal. Don't feel. Don't let it show.

"It'll be okay," he told her quietly, though he wasn't sure himself.

He just didn't want to hear her say those words anymore.

She sighed, and turned to look at him, before her eyes widened. "Jack," she said in surprise, the corner of her mouth turning up as she took a step back to fully see him, "Look at you."

"I'd actually prefer not to, thanks," he muttered with a shudder, holding his staff over his shoulder.

"You're wearing shoes," she remarked, her voice laced with concealed laughter as she brought her hand to her mouth to hide her grin. He sighed irritably, and she quickly backtracked, surprising him by reaching out and smoothing the collar of his shirt. "No, it's a good look for you, really. It's just... different." She smiled. "But I like it."

Realizing what she was doing, she pulled her gloved hands away, her fingers curling into fists as she winced, but ice already lined the collar and sleeves of his shirt anyways, just as it had on his cloak.

Before either of them could say anything, a sudden loud ringing sound resounded throughout the entire castle, shaking the floor beneath them, and Elsa sighed.

"That's the bells," she told him anxiously, "Ten minutes until the ceremony."

She turned away from him and walked over to the table against the far wall, looking up at the painting above it with distress while she chewed distractedly at her lip. He followed her gaze, and his stomach seemed to drop when he saw who the painting represented.

It was her father.

He was a young man, with a look of nervousness embedded into his features as he stood arrow-straight before an unseen crowd, and held an orb and a scepter in either hand.

Taking a deep breath, Elsa slipped her elegant green coronation gloves off of her hands and set them aside, reaching for an ornament and candlestick that sat on the dresser, and mimicked her father's posture.

Ice immediately formed over the two props, and she cringed, slamming them back onto the dresser and reclaiming her gloves once more.

He watched all of this with sympathy and silence, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.

"Can't you just keep the gloves on?" he asked quietly, stepping toward her.

Elsa shook her head. "My skin has to touch what the kings and queens before me have touched," she mumbled, "It makes it more... genuine." She sighed, fumbling to put the first glove on. "I'm terrified."

Jack looked down, rubbing his arm. He was scared too – But he didn't know why.

Not knowing what to say to her to comfort her, he did the first thing he could think of; He held out his hand.

Understanding this, she pulled the second glove over her palm and reached out.

But he shook his head, pulling his hand away.

"Without the glove," he told her, and watched her already-frightened eyes widen in fear. "Elsa, I promise you won't hurt me."

He didn't expect her to agree to this, but she surprised him by sucking in a deep breath and closing her eyes, before tugging the glove off of her hand once more and reaching out again.

This time, he took it.

It was the strangest thing Jack had ever experienced; Stranger than flying on the Wind, stranger than walking through a person, stranger than losing control.

And it was incredible

It was something he had never felt before since he had risen from the ice; Bare skin touching bare skin.

Tendrils of ice wrapped around his fingers from her anxiety, but he paid them no mind as he watched Elsa's hand, smaller and paler and daintier and softer than he could have ever imagined, wrap around his own.

They both gasped at the same time, before looking up at each other, both with highly colored cheeks and bashfully averted eyes.

"Jack, I..." Elsa murmured quietly, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, her grip tightening on his hand, "I can't do this. I can't go out there. All of those people, they-"

"Will love you," he told her confidently, the corner of his mouth turning up into a crooked smile as he boldly took her hand in both of his in the effort to reassure her, "They'll love you because you know how to talk to people even though you don't do it that much, and you say funny things even though you try to act all grown up, and you're-" He paused suddenly, his cheeks going dark blue, before he cleared his throat and summoned the nerve to mumble feebly; "Well, uh, you're... pretty."

Elsa's eyes darted up from the floor and she looked up at him, startled. "I- what?"

Tap tap tap.

"Your highness! It's time to open the gates!"

"Diana," Elsa and Jack whispered at the same time, turning to the door, and Elsa's hand started to tremble in both of his.

"Jack," she said softly, biting her lip, "I'm... scared."

There was the déjà vu again, stronger than before, and he shook his head a little to clear it away. "Elsa..." he began, unsure how to finish.

Then, in yet another crazy act of boldness and nerve, he pulled her towards him.

Because of his height, Elsa's cheek rested against the top of his chest, and her eyes widened in alarm as his arms wrapped around her shoulders and he gave her what neither of them could remember ever properly experiencing before.

A hug.

Jack immediately regret his wild and subconscious action as Elsa's entire body went rigid in shock, and he waited with a motionless heart for the temperamental queen's reaction.

He would surely be frozen by her hostility at any moment.

It struck him breathless, however, when she slowly relaxed, before turning her face forward so that her forehead touched the space beneath the hollow of his throat, and her hands rested on either side of his chest.

No ice appeared where her forehead and bare palms touched him.

Jack realized he hadn't been breathing the entire time, and exhaled in relief, before hugging her tighter and closing his eyes, basking in the contact and realizing that he was glad that out of all the people to be holding like that just then, out of all the families he'd ever envied and the people he'd ever watched...

He was glad it was Elsa.

Tap tap tap.

"Your highness, the people are waiting!"

They sighed in unison and reluctantly pulled apart, both ducking their heads to hide their colorful cheeks as they stammered out unnecessary sentences.

"Um, well... I-I guess we should...

"Yeah... I guess..."

"Yeah."

A brief moment of awkward silence passed, and then Elsa looked up, her eyes lighter than he had ever seen them before, though still wide in fear.

"You'll be up there with me?"

He nodded. "Of course."

She took a deep breath, and reached for her coronation gloves, slipping them on before turning to the doors and throwing them open, where a line of servants waited in the hall expectantly.

"Tell the guards to open up the gates!" she ordered, marching down the aisle with dignity and poise; Nobody would've guessed that she was on the verge of a panic attack.

She was so strong.

Jack retrieved his staff from against the library wall, his heart still thudding rapidly in his icy chest after the events from mere moments ago, before turning to the painting of Elsa's father; The deceased King of Arendelle.

The husband of the first person who had seen him and the father of the first person who had touched him.

The man he had killed.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, as though the portrait could somehow hear him, before turning away and exiting the room.

Jack didn't see the dark figure of a man lingering in the far-off corner, watching the oblivious Winter spirit walk down the hall with a pleased and malicious smile gleaming white on his shadowy face.

Had Jack stayed for a moment longer, he would have heard the familiar voice murmur:

"It's almost time."

*Kilig (Filipino) - n. The sudden feeling of a fluttery, warm, and/or inexplicable rush of joy and zeal one feels when something romantic or idealistic is experienced or witnessed, especially when looked at or touched by somebody in a way that makes one feel nervous and excited at the same time; "The Butterflies in Your Tummy"