The visits grew slower as the days grew shorter, for Anna's wedding was drawing close and there was much to keep Elsa away. Then came a whole week when she did not come. Instead, she sent him a long, narrow package wrapped in brown paper which, when opened, revealed a fossiltree cane. The lustrous silver grain of the wood had been carved into a spiralling motif of ferns. The bone handle molded comfortably to the palm of his hand, and the shaft took only a little sanding to bring to the perfect height. Best of all was the note that accompanied the gift. It read, in Elsa's own hand, Let the trolls keep your old crutch. This one will suit you better. -E

Finally, at moonrise one night a week after the delivery of the cane, Blank scrabbled to its feet and bounded for the door in excitement, a sure sign that the Queen was imminent.

Hans, who had been in bed, rubbed his eyes and dragged himself out of bed and into his clothes. He presented himself, half-asleep, in the solar, and suddenly became very much awake.

Elsa was standing in the middle of the room wearing a dress that had no earthly business in a ruin like this. Shimmering in shades of lemon, lavender and ice-green, with a low, clinging bodice and a skirt that undulated if you so much as looked at it, she was dressed like a woman who wanted something.

Hans found himself bowing, the untucked ends of his shirt flapping behind him, the hastily-pushed-up sleeves making him feel ridiculous.

"Hans, what are you doing?" she laughed. "Come here, I've rescued the best vintervijn from the reception."

The reception. The wedding. Of course.

"Urgma was dead to the world when I dropped off the latest charts in her room, and I didn't dare wake her to ask where she keeps the glasses. We'll quaff it like pirates, just us two." Her voice was giddy with suppressed excitement. Her breath tingled in his face, citrusy and cold.

"I'm game if you are," said Hans, helping himself to a swig. The vintervijn was very good, icy and bubbly and pale as moonlight.

"To the bride!" Elsa exclaimed.

"And the groom," Hans added, to be polite.

"Thank every god it isn't you," said Elsa, flopping in her usual seat furthest from the fire.

"I hear no lie," Hans admitted. He took a second, more generous sip.

"I've never been so relieved in my life to have a thing be over, barring the insignificant exception of my imprisonment for ten years at the hands of my loving parents," said Elsa. "Weddings are a nightmare. Be glad you'll never have one."

"A hit, a very palpable hit."

"Did you ever want that...before?"

Hans took another swig. "I didn't give it much thought," he said. "Royal marriages are traditionally arranged by the parents in the Southern Isles, so hoping and wishing wouldn't have made much difference in any case. I always sort of hoped I would get lucky, like Lars."

"Tell me more about Lars."

"Well, he likes his wife."

"Go on."

Hans blinked, and sat down opposite Elsa. "There's no more to say. He likes her, that's all. They get along well enough, and if they fight they do it behind closed doors."

"That's your highest aspiration?" Elsa leaned forward. Hans tried not to notice how the narrow straps of her dress pressed against the pale flesh of her biceps. "To like her, and not to fight in public?"

"If I was lucky, yes. What else is there?" Hans drank again, realized he was hogging the booze, and passed it over to Elsa.

"Oh, I don't know," said Elsa sarcastically, "there's love, and companionship, and shared interests, and...well."

"My parents didn't love each other," he observed without judgment. "My brothers and their wives, my cousins, my father's lieges... Every match of importance in the Southern Isles, as far back as our history tells, has been one of utility, not romance. My father's advice was always this: if romance is important to you, take care whoever you fall in love with comes equipped with a good military, or the gold to buy one."

"You needn't scoff so," said Elsa. "I can see you don't believe in love, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist."

"I believe in it," he answered shortly. "I only wish I didn't. Look at me, a disavowed thirteenth. I'd be better off as a bastard. I'm at your mercy for the rest of my life. Do you feel like arranging a marriage for me? I can't imagine I'll fetch much on the open market, but perhaps you could place an ad: 'On Offer: One Red-Haired Cripple, Menace To The Crown; Still Possesses Most Of Own Teeth And One Good Eye."

"You're hardly a menace now," Elsa laughed. Then, "What do you mean, one good eye?"

Hans squinted at her. "Souvenir from my nephew Pieter, along with the leg, although of course I owe the tattoo to my brother." He stroked absently at the raised scars on his stomach. Elsa's eyes followed the movement of his fingers. "They slathered my eyes in excrement from my very own bucket and it festered while I was busy making up my mind whether to live or die. It's nothing to fret about; I still have the other one."

"Which eye is it?" asked Elsa. "No, wait, don't tell me, I want to guess!" She rose and glided over to him, inspecting first one one side of his face, then the other. She was standing very close. Hans noticed that she had a small freckle, just one, dab in the center of her left cheek. Her eyelashes, under the soot-colored makeup she'd brushed onto them, were blonde.

"Mm," said Elsa, leaning closer. She took him by the beard and turned his face first this way, then that. Hans tried very, very hard not to stare at her cleavage, which was precisely eye-height and appealingly near.

"It's your left one, isn't it?" She released him and turned away to perch elegantly in her seat, feet demurely crossed at the ankles.

"Right on the first try," he applauded. "Is it that obvious? I knew sooner or later the ocular muscle would atrophy, but I'd hoped I had a little more time. Guess I'll start wearing a patch."

"It really isn't obvious," Elsa assured him. "It's not wandering yet, if that's what you're worried about."

"Then what gave it away?"

"Well," she said, taking a sip from the bottle, "your left eye was thinking about how many tons of ballast a ship needs per weight total, or whatever, and your right eye was thinking about looking down my dress. So I figured either lefty's the blind one, or I don't look nearly as fetching as my mirror would have me believe."

"If your mirror had the view I did, it wouldn't have let you out of the house at all."

"Hah, Mr. Westergaard."

"And did your dress work?" he asked casually, leaning back. "Did you manage to hook anything more interesting than the one eyeball remaining to your landlocked political prisoner?"

"I don't need a dress for that," said Elsa. "A crown and a country and a mystical power over life and death seem to do the trick all on their own, funnily enough. It's been mentioned to me from more than one quarter that I'd make a mighty fine ally— 'scuse me, wife. The Southern Isles aren't the only country to prioritize matches based on utility."

"Yes, the ability to cover an arctic wasteland in springtime will tend to draw the suitors. And have you fallen head over ankle for anyone or are we still in qualifying rounds?"

"Oh, it's decades too soon to tell. I know I'll have to make a sensible marriage, but curse it all, I can't see myself marrying any of them. Useful or not." Elsa rolled her eyes and threw her head back. Hans tried not to notice the pale length of her throat.

"Lars says love is bound to grow from the seeds of a joined life and a shared bed, if you but take the trouble of watering them. Does that not soften you to the prospect?"

"I'm sure your brother is not wrong," she conceded. "My parents' marriage was...if not arranged, then at least heavily encouraged, and I suppose they must have loved each other. Anyway, Anna says they did, and she would know. But still...is it so much to ask that I start out with liking and fondness, if I can't start out with love? So far I've not cared a fishbone for any of them."

"What about the Duke of Vakretta?" he suggested. "He has a good head for trade, and he's said to be very learned. Good for conversation over dinner."

"The Duke of Vakretta doesn't know how to shut up, and if I thought I had to marry him I would drown myself in tomorrow's bath."

"All right, maybe not the Duke of Vakretta," Hans conceded. "You might try the Vicomte of Tureign. He controls the longest swath of coast south of the Isles. Could be a good ally."

"If I want someone for an ally, I'll send an request on the royal letterhead," said Elsa disdainfully. "Vicomte Michellangelo has a laugh like a schoolboy's nervous fart, and he laughs at everything. I couldn't bear to wake up next to that for the rest of my life."

"The Prince of Edapest?"

"That tow-headed lump of— "

"Not Adelbert," Hans corrected quickly, "the second one. Prince Jarich. He's fought in six wars. Probably knows a lot of stories."

"Fought in six wars and been injured in none," scoffed Elsa. "I don't trust a man who calls himself a soldier but wears not a single scar to lend credence to the claim."

"Ah." Hans took a long, thoughtful chug. "I confess, I had not looked at it that way. So if I've got this right, your ideal mate would be taciturn, melancholy, and covered in scars, is that it?"

"It'd be a start."

"Good luck with that, Your Majesty," he said, raising the bottle in a facetious toast. "It sounds to me like you desire the undesirable, but in that case perhaps your Consort will come cheap. I would advise you to marry whoever offers you the best dower, and keep a harem on the side."

"Oh, really. Would you follow your own advice, were you in a position to?"

"Wouldn't I?" he responded without thinking. "If you want your hull repaired, go to a shipwright. Want your horse shod, go to a groom. Want your bed warmed, seek out an expert and pay her in gold."

Elsa let out a delighted gasp. "Hans of the Southern Isles," she crowed gleefully, "have you been in the habit of paying?"

"Certainly," said Hans, and realized he was being laughed at. "Why? Don't you?"

Elsa chuckled. "I think I'd be noticed if I crept into Redtown. Tell me everything."

"Ah, you know how it is, when you've been at sea," he said, hesitating.

"How would I know such a thing?" she said. "Go on, I'm curious now."

"Well, say you've been at sea for three months," he said, warming to the subject. "All you've had to eat is the sort of thing that packs well or can be caught on the open ocean. First thing you'd want to do, soon as you get a chance, is buy a bowl of something hot and fresh, doesn't matter what."

"I can't tell if that's a euphemism or not," she said.

Hans shrugged. "It is and it isn't. Most bawdy-houses serve up more than one dish."

"I'm completely lost."

"Well, a sailor will put in to shore, take his pay, and make for whatever inn seems likely to satisfy the most of his urges. A bowl of stewed beets instead of salt codfish, wine instead of grog or sour ale, a straw tick instead of a hammock, a pretty wench instead of his own calloused hand. Most fellows know what they like and where they can find it. First night to land, they find it fast."

"You were a Prince of the Southern Isles," she pointed out. "Surely you wouldn't settle for a straw tick and a bowl of beets."

"No, I wanted something much better. I wanted stories."

"Stories," Elsa repeated, one eyebrow lifted suggestively. "Just stories?"

Hans, to his credit, didn't even blush. Perhaps it was the ordeal with the trolls that had softened them toward each other, or all their games of Fangensflukt, or that hers was the only friendly face he'd seen in a year. More likely it was just the vintervijn. They'd started their second bottle.

"Of course not just stories," he said. "Stories and a vigorous plunge, and maybe a neck rub for afters. But the stories were really the selling point."

"What sort of stories?"

"Whatever sort I couldn't get from my men. I liked epics and adventures, and myths pretending to be true, and the truth pretending to be myth. I liked stories that stuck with me and made me ponder. I liked a woman who knew just how to tell it, so you never wanted it to end, so you felt in a way it never did end, but went on growing in your mind like a seed and sprouting little stories of its own. Yours about the maid who fucked a volcano would have had me begging at your feet till the end of leave."

Elsa giggled, a strangely young sound. "I never would have guessed it. I'd like to hear one of these marvelous tales you've heard."

"Someday I'll be glad to tell you one," he said, "but right now I can't do justice to more than a vile chantey or two, so I'm afraid you'll just have to wait."

"Then I'll have a vile chantey," she decided. Pursing her lips at his rising cry of dismay she said, "I insist! I told you the whole rambling history of Isloga and Hildis; you owe me."

"You truly don't want me to sing. The sorts of songs I know are not...for decent company."

"I'm tired of being decent, Hans. Sing! Your Queen commands it!"

You're not my Queen, Hans wanted to say, you're my captor. But he could not lie to himself. Not about that, of all things. "Only promise not to judge me too harshly," he said, giving in.

From Arendelle a cannon boat

Set out upon a caper.

She was as good as minted gold

But her Captain, he was paper.

The god of wind hated to see

Such riches go to waste.

So he puckered up his godly cheeks

And blew that Cap away.

"When we were on shore leave, we used to switch out the name of the country and sing it at foreign sailors to taunt them. Got my wrist broken once, for belting that at a pikeman from Valaan Saari. But none of us dared sing it at sea."

"Why not?" asked Elsa. "Didn't want to tempt the god of wind?"

"Didn't want to tempt a nervous captain," said Hans. "'A gold ship with a paper captain'— that's what we used to call a ship too good for her command. And that comes a step too close to mutiny, for some. Mutiny carries the heaviest punishment in the Southern Isles, heavier than treason. Traitors are merely hung. A mutineer will be eaten alive by rats."

"How horrible," shivered Elsa. "Tell me more."

Hans laughed. "I don't think you're offended at all, Your Majesty."

"Try harder," she suggested.

So he sang:

"There be no time for ease aboard a ship;

the Cap'n will not tolerate no lip.

And if ye dip into his liquor stash,

You're sure to feel the wrong end of his lash.

The portly life it tells a different tale,

where streets abound wi' Janeys broad and hale.

But have a care wherein ye sink yer oar,

or John'll see ye never row it more."

Elsa seemed to like it. "But it's hardly vulgar at all," she said. "Certain promises were made, Hans. Your reputation as a peddler of base filth is beginning to look precarious."

Hans laughed. "All right," he agreed, "here's one I picked up in the slums of Borgia. Settle in, for it's an epic."

"A-walking in the town one night

I was followed by a thief.

A bully with a pocked red nose,

a gorse-bush grew beneath.

So quick as lightning I made tracks

to flee his greedy claw.

I'd barely started to relax

when a sweet-faced lass I saw.

"O sir, where do you go?" she asked,

while leaning out her window.

I answered, "I'm a-running, lass,

because I'm being followed."

"You'd better catch your breath," she said,

"and I'll pour you an ale."

Then Sally, of the hair so red,

asked me to tell my tale.

Flattered I was by her request

and gladly I complied.

But Sally seemed to lose interest

and soon led me inside.

She lit a candle, pulled the blind,

and tugged my Johnson free.

"Aha!" she cried, "Now that's the kind

of tail I like to see!"

Oh how I blushed as pink as beets,

this lad of tender years.

But Sally fell upon her knees

and calmed my youthful fears.

"Just seat yourself right there," she said,

"And I'll sing you a song."

She sang so well that soon I begged,

"Oh don't make it too long!"

"It isn't short, this song I tell,"

she mumbled round my oar.

"But worry not, I'll sing it well—

I've sung it oft before."

She deftly rowed that oar of mine,

she dipped it out and in,

until it overflowed with brine

that dribbled down her chin.

"Ah! Marry me!" I loudly cried,

"You have me in your power!"

"You'll find in me a costly bride,

for I charge by the hour."

"I'll pay in love," I promised her,

"and a cottage by the sea.

We'll be a happy couple, dear,

if you'll come live with me."

But at my words a cudgel flashed

and bashed me in the eye.

Not Sally but old John Moustache,

who'd crept in on the sly.

He'd snuck in through the window

for to oversee our play;

and now I drew no coin to show,

he meant to make me pay.

"Ten coppers for my Sally's lips,

ten more to ice her knees,

another ten to wipe those drips

you've left upon her cheeks."

"I have not thirty coins!" I said,

"I have not even five!"

"Then you will pay in blood, my friend!"

He raised his bludgeon high.

Now fearing for my life and limb

cornered by this big lout,

I eyed the window he'd come in

and broke it jumping out.

The glazing cut me as I fell

but I did not delay;

I hit the ground and ran like hell

hotfooting for the quay.

Big Johnny was not far behind,

a-braying like an ass.

I boarded the first tub I spied

and prayed it cast off fast.

The captain of that leaky rig

he listened to my tale

and offered me a swabber's gig

as soon as we set sail.

And that is all the tale of what

made this man an enlister.

the Sea's a brutal mistress but

at least she has no mister."

Elsa was laughing heartily by the end. "Who taught you that one?" she asked. "It's quite grand enough for the halls of ancient Schune."

She was mocking him, but kindly, and Hans answered honestly. "I learned most songs from crewmates. Some of them are old, and some we made up to pass the long night hours on the Skalding. You get that many young men together and toss them about in a ship for six months, there's one topic they'll find their way round to again and again. 'Course, I joined up when I was fourteen. I was a lonely, sheltered kid. I was as shocked at the way sailors talk as you, most likely."

"Only fourteen," mused Elsa. "It seems so young to go out on your own."

"For royalty I'd call it average, though cabin-boys were usually younger. I started at the bottom, or close to it. That was the only way to learn everything I needed to learn. My first posting was the Gale's Chance. I learned how to do all the basic things, all the knots to tie and how to rig the sails for different conditions. How to weatherproof a deck, that sort of thing. At first people distrusted me because I was high-born, and the thirteenth son, but when they saw I only wanted to learn they didn't mind me so much.

"By seventeen I was first mate on the Chance. My shipmates were my only friends, the only people I gave a damn about. It gets like that aboard ship; you're only as good as what you can do, and no better. I worked hard and I didn't ask for special treatment, so they forgave me for being a Prince. I begged my father for a ship of my own. There were some things about the way the Chance was run that I didn't like, and I suppose I thought I could do better."

"And he let you?" asked Elsa.

"...Eventually," said Hans, looking away. "Mostly it came down to money. My father knew I could be a good investment and a cheap one. The only crew he allowed me was the scraping of the barrel, though that turned out for the best, in the end. We got the most grueling missions clearing the Skalding Sea. Pirates use the Skalding Sea as sort of a highway; natural conditions conspire to make it incredibly difficult to patrol effectively. I presume my father hoped this would get me out of his hair; if I could turn myself to good account, so much the better."

"What was the first ship you captained?" asked Elsa.

Hans felt his face relaxing into a smile as the name rolled over his tongue. "The Nordlys. Things aboard that old broad were...comically bad, at first. My crew was mainly criminals condemned to transportation, mostly for theft of Crown property. You've got to understand, though, that nearly everything in the Southern Isles is Crown property. The Krone Trading Company is the source of most of the country's livelihood. The Krone has its fingers in any trade that crosses open water, which is just about all of it since the Southern Isles are, well, isles. And of course…"

"The Crown owns the Company," finished Elsa.

"Precisely. Most of my crew were thieves, runaways, tract-breakers. A few sodomites. A cabin boy who had impersonated a nun. That sort of thing. Most of them untrained in any but the most basic of seafaring skills. But my first mate, Georg, had been with me on the Chance, and together we turned that floating pile of brigands into something of substance. There's a certain kind of valor in a crew of people who've already been to the bottom; they see things more clearly than the well-fed sons of merchants and tradesmen. They were willing to put up with conditions I doubt my brother's polished comrades aboard the Wind's Mistress would ever tolerate.

"After the first year, I was promoted to Admiral, and another ship, the Flighty, was placed under my command. Together we made the Skalding Sea as impassable to pirates as these mountains are to a shrimp. Conditions were stark, and often violent. But I loved the men who served under me, and I was happy."

"It's too bad you didn't stay at sea," said Elsa quietly.

"Yes," agreed Hans. He could not think about it without pain. "I took a tub full of criminals and turned it into a floating wall for pirates to bash their brains against. So my father took the Nordlys and gave it to my brother Caspar, who had recently lost his own ship in a squall just off Edapest."

"He didn't," groaned Elsa.

"Don't act surprised," said Hans bitterly. "There I was, twenty-three, an Admiral without a ship, land-bound and directionless, back in the bosom of my loving family. I'm afraid you met me at an ugly time in my life."

"So I'm beginning to suspect," said Elsa. "Drink more. And for heaven's sake think of something cheerful. I'm still in a celebratory mood. Do you have any more songs? Do you think you could teach me one?"

"The easiest to learn are also the dirtiest. You quite sure you want to expose your royal ears to that kind of filth?"

"I insist."

"All right," said Hans, grinning.

"Though lonely the seafaring feller,

when I was a salty ship-dweller

I loved a young clam,

my bivalve Madam;

all I wanted to do was to shell her.

The sun would have set in the east

before my appetite ever ceased.

For hours her flavor

I gladly would savor;

one small taste of her was a feast.

Alas that our love couldn't last!

Too soon were our happy hours past.

A storm blew up hard,

the ship fell apart,

and I crushed her to death with my mast."

Elsa had an excellent ear for harmony, and picked up the words in just one or two repetitions. Her singing voice was sharp-edged and penetrating, suiting her personality to a drop. They sang it imperfectly a few times then managed one flawless rendition, and both burst into excited applause at their achievement.

"That one I didn't learn from my comrades," said Hans, "but from…" He paused, trying to weigh in his mind just how much he was going to regret this evening when he woke hungover.

But Elsa insisted. "Oh, go on, do tell," she said, her eyes sparkling. "I can guess, anyway, from how red your face is. You match your hair."

Laughing good-naturedly, Hans complied. "Aye," he said, "you're not wrong. The finest whore in Cloudcove taught me it." He allowed himself a small moment to regret that wine always made him expansive and nostalgic, and went on. "Her name was Mylenna. Bright as a minted coin she was, and clever. She knew the best stories and the best songs."

"I think you must have been in love with her," teased Elsa.

"Not in love, no," said Hans, quickly. Then (why not admit it?), "Maybe I was. A little. I was a lonely boy and she talked to me like I was a man. Took my cherry and everything, and a fellow doesn't easily forget the woman who does that. Must have been ten years ago, for I'd barely turned sixteen. I thought I was so high and mighty, too. I was sure I'd never climb into a whore's bed, thought it was beneath my dignity. Well, I can tell you, in every way but birth Mylenna was my superior. Eleven years up, wise as a serpent, witty and charming. She read seven languages and spoke eight, and knew drinking songs in every last one."

"Beautiful, too, I suppose?"

Hans considered. "We-ell," he said after a moment's thought, "not exactly beautiful, no. Not in the way you might see painted and hung on a wall. In truth she was mousy, haretoothed and pigeon-toed. Swains would sing that her eyes were like the grey of the sea before a storm, but have you ever seen the sea before a storm? It's nothing to write home about, murky and dull. No, I'd not say she was beautiful, but she dressed herself like she was. Knew how to set off her assets, such as they were. And when she talked to you— if she decided to talk to you, if you were one of the lucky few admitted through the hidden door and up the winding stairs to her private chamber— if you got that far, you started to think nothing could be more beautiful than dishwater eyes and an overbite."

"She must have been quite a talker," said Elsa drily.

Hans chuckled. "Among other things," he said. "And that's what counts, in the end. It's not a woman's quim men long for, when they're trapped in a tub on the Skalding. Maybe that's how we say it to ourselves and in our songs: we talk around what we really want, we wrap it up in vulgarity and jest, to keep the edges of it from hurting us. And sure, first night back on land, a thirsty sailor will dip his piggin anywhere and not care where. But what we want, mostly, is a woman's laughter, and her jokes, and her songs. The sounds she makes when she's finally taught you to do what she likes, and the little kiss she leaves on your cheek when she leaves, to let you know she didn't mind sharing your company for an hour."

"You were in love with her," said Elsa again, half wistful this time.

"She was good to me, and I was in awe of her. My heart didn't break when she married and bid me a last farewell, so it can't have been a very deep sort of love; but I think of her from time to time, and hope she's happy, and wish her well."

"If it's not deep," said Elsa thoughtfully, "is it truly love? How can a person even tell?" She sipped her champagne pensively. "I spent half my life believing love was for other people, that it was a thing to give, perhaps, but not to receive. That it's a virtuous thing, a duty and a penance. I am trying to unbelieve it now, because Anna swears it is not true. And I do believe her— to a point. I believe that she loves me, as I love her. One person in all the world loves me in any way more concrete than the abstract love of a people for their Queen. One person, just one. And the worst of it is, I cannot tell if that number is high or low."

"You are asking the wrong person," he said, heart clenching. "But Anna is not the only person who loves you. I...I'm certain of it."

"Well, what would you know about it?" she said— not cruelly, but with finality. "What would either of us know?"

Hans looked over at her; but she had averted her face from the flickering hearthfire, and he could not read her eyes.

"I know a little," he said quietly. "I know it hurts like the touch of honed steel, hurts so that you feel it in all your body. And you feel it all the time. You think, I must finish mending these sails, and I love her. I'm late for dinner, and I love her. Blank is in a mood again, and I love her. Only you're thinking it without words, because there aren't words. Maybe if there were it would hurt less."

Elsa was looking at him queerly. "You didn't feel that about Mylenna," she said quietly, "or about Anna either. When have you—?"

"Well, that's how the songs make it seem," he mumbled. He should not have drunk so much; it was making him say things that were better told only to the blanket thing, or to no one.

"Not the songs I've heard," said Elsa. "I don't think it's supposed to hurt."

"Well, the ones I've heard, then. At any rate, it doesn't matter. They're just songs. Likely I took them too serious; Lars always said I think too much on things, which coming from him means something." His voice was unsteady. He hoped she couldn't tell.

"Sing me one."

"Another chantey?"

"A love song."

"Perhaps we've had enough singing for one night," he said. "Perhaps Your Majesty would care for a game of—"

"Hans." She bit her lip, her cheeks stained faintly pink. "Please?"

Hans, unable to refuse her even at the risk of giving himself away, sang:

"She could never be more than alone.

She was the ocean, or so she seemed to be.

She wanted nothing more than to be known;

but who is big enough to hold the sea?

She was the ocean: so, to her, it seemed.

Into herself she took ten thousand loves.

But none were big enough to hold the sea,

The depths of her so wide and wild and rough.

Into herself she took ten thousand loves,

Of shell and fin and gill and scale and leaf.

They lived inside her, wide and wild and rough,

And she was all they ate and drank and breathed.

With shell and fin and gill and scale and leaf,

They could not know how she was set apart

All they could do was eat and drink and breathe.

They could not scry the mystery of her heart.

Not one could see how she was set apart.

Engulfed by her, too close to understand,

They noticed not the hollow of her heart,

Or how she beat her fists upon the sand.

But one outside her, close enough to stand

In fingertips of waves she vainly spent—

With human eyes watched her abuse the sand

With human heart knew what her hurting meant.

In fingertips of waves she vainly spent

He wanted nothing more than to abide,

Because he knew just what her hurting meant;

And he would not be happy till he tried.

Inside her surf he longed ever to bide;

To know her, as her lowest creature knew.

And he could not be happy till he tried,

Though he should perish in her livid blue.

Longing to know her, as her creatures knew,

He plunged into her, recklessly and deep.

She felt him founder in her livid blue;

The ocean, hot and fast, began to weep.

He sank into her, recklessly and deep,

His body cooling, blank and white his eye.

The ocean, hot and fast, began to weep:

The only one who loved her had to die.

His body cold, vacantly white his eye.

By him she had been wanted and been known

By knowing her and wanting did he die,

and she would never be more than alone."

The singing of it took time. It was not the sort of song one sang sitting down, so he stood leaning on his cane. He found he could not both look at Elsa and remember the words, and so he looked instead out the window, across the sleeping mountains.

When he finished, and thought he could bear to look at her again, she was standing beside him. She was so lovely, with a paleness that seemed to glow most brightly in the shadows and a scent like the mountain wind. It made Hans feel clean just to be near her.

She rested her fingers on the hand that held the cane. She had taken off her gloves, and her touch was warm.

"Hans…" she whispered, her face turned up to his.

"Your Majesty, I—"

"I wish you would stop calling me that," she said. "I wish…"

But he did not find out what she wished, because he bent his head to hers and kissed her lips.

This is not decent; you must not do this, his mind screamed at him, but for once he found his thoughts easy to ignore.

Against every odd she was kissing him back, eagerly but unsure. He realized: This is her first kiss, it is not meant for you, but resolutely ignored that too. Her lips, still chilled from the cold wine, warmed to his quickly. One hand settled comfortably at his nape, the other became entangled in a fistful of his linen shirt.

When she shyly parted her lips for him, he nearly lost his grip on his cane. She tasted of winterwine poured over snow; she tasted like a sunrise. He wanted to taste her, more of her, and broke from her mouth to trail kisses down her slender white throat. She moaned, the sound of it humming gently against his lips, and pressed herself closer to him. His hand curved around her small waist, slid upward to cup the panting fullness of her breast.

"Please—" she gasped, and then—

A pointed, wet, and very cold nose was thrust between them at precisely loin-height: Blank, its saber-toothed maw grinning almost like a human, peered up gleefully from one to the other. Hans and Elsa sprang guiltily apart, like they'd just been caught in wrongdoing.

"Blank!" Elsa yelped, her face burning pink. "I—" She shot Hans a look of such heart-stopping confusion that he choked on whatever he might have said. Then she turned and hurried wordlessly from the room, and Hans was left alone with Blank.

In that moment all of the thoughts he had kept at bay for the last five minutes swarmed violently into the light.

At the fore was: Oh gods, she'll hang you for treason.

A/N: Thanks for waiting, friends! Fun fact, making a move on a female royal out of wedlock actually was considered treason in various monarchies over the years, because of inheritance laws. Hans should know that's not an issue in Arendelle, which follows absolute- instead of male-preference primogeniture. However, Hans is not thinking with his upstairs brain right now and can be forgiven his confusion.