Okay! First of all ... the Snow King has reached over 200 reviews! Yay!

Second of all, sorry for not uploading this weekend! I was super busy setting everything up for my uncle's surprise party Saturday (which lasted until one in the morning) and finishing his Jawa picture. If you want to see the picture I drew for him, you can see it (along with some other pieces of my artwork) on my DeviantArt profile. The link is in my bio on my profile.

Now, if you read any of this then I'm shocked because I know this is the one chapter you all have been waiting for since Chapter 1.

Enjoy.

Chapter 21: Nerves (Jack's POV)

Dica and I watched with wide eyes as Elsa knelt down to Olaf's height to give him a hug. Please tell me she didn't hear everything we just said. But she only laughed.

"Really?" Her eyes shot over to me. "What all were you saying about me?"

I felt my palms grow sweaty as anxiety started to kick in under her scrutinizing gaze. "Well, um, you see," Come on, Jack, think of something! "It wasn't anything bad, it's just that ... uh ... That we ... er ..." This was getting me nowhere. "I don't know what to say."

"I'd say nothing," Dica suggested from the other end of the couch. "Nothing's good." She gave me a pointed look. "Go with nothing."

Taking the hint, I closed my mouth and, thankfully, Elsa turned her attention back to Olaf. As the snowman began to describe practically everything in North's workshop, I looked over at Dica and wiped some nonexistent sweat from my brow. Her only response was to roll her eyes and take another sip from the glass of eggnog in her hands before turning to Elsa.

"How have you been feeling, Elsa?" She asked.

"I've been feeling fine," Elsa replied. "A bit more tired than usual, but much better than last night."

I should hope so, I thought silently as Dica nodded her head. "Your body is still healing from all of the continuous stress it's been under. You should probably get some more rest tonight and tomorrow, but you should be feeling normal again by tomorrow night."

Elsa smiled and nodded in agreement. "Thank you. Where's North at?"

"Oh, he's in his office," Dica said. "Apparently there have already been kids who need to be put on the Naughty list for Christmas this year. It's really sad considering the year has barely begun. But at least it's one less toy for the yetis to worry about." She paused to drink some more eggnog. "Jack told me about Annalise, by the way - I'm sorry."

"There's nothing that can be done," Elsa replied shrugging. "She couldn't go on believing in a fictional character forever."

"Well, that's certainly true," Dica agreed. "I'm sorry about the Castle of Arendelle, too. I heard that he damage was too extensive for them to repair it, but they're talking about trying to rebuild it if that makes you feel any better."

I felt mildly surprised when Elsa shook her head in a negative response. "I'm just glad that nobody got hurt. I didn't really have many happy memories there, anyways. Have you heard anything about Vengeance or Pitch Black?"

"Nope," Dica replied. "They're probably both stuck in their own little holes in the ground, waiting for the perfect moment to strike for revenge - as usual. You would think that they'd find something better to do with their time by now."

"Do you think Vengeance will start targeting the kids now?"

"Unlikely unless he gets bored again. It's the adults who kill each other and fight wars so it's the adults that he likes to go after. But you never know. He might just get back on his high horse and go after the kids again if he gets bored enough with the adults." She gave Elsa a smile of reassurance. "Don't worry about them, Elsa. They won't be back for a while."

Sitting back, I watched the conversation between the two girls as Elsa thanked Dica. It was the most interaction that either of them had ever had with each other and them both seemed to be getting along very well. A yawn broke through Elsa's lips and I sat up immediately.

"We should get going," I said, lifting her into my arms before she could protest. "Are you coming with us, Olaf?"

The snowman ran off shouting, "I'm coming!" over his shoulder as he went to take some snowglobes. I could feel Elsa's eyes glaring holes into me.

"Jack," she muttered so low that only I could hear it. "Put me down. I can walk through a portal to the Ice Castle."

"But Dica said you need rest," I argued teasingly. A grin was trying to force its way onto my face. She looked a little cute when she was angry and I knew that she was only mildly annoyed with my actions - if she didn't want to be in my arms then she was perfectly capable of getting out of them by herself.

"Yes, but that only means that I'm tired. Being tired is not the same as being disabled."

Fortunately, Olaf returned at that moment, saving me from having to respond. He was carrying two snowglobes in his stick arms and threw one of them onto the hardwood floors.

"Let's go home," I suggested in a whisper, pressing my lips against Elsa's ear. Olaf followed closely behind us as Dica waved goodbye from the couch.

At the Ice Castle, I wasted no time getting Elsa put in bed. She seemed a little irritated at being treated similarly to a child, but I was just happy to have her awake and thawed. I walked out of her room, closing the door tightly behind me before she had the chance to resume our minor disagreement, I heard her move around in her room a little bit before finally settling back down into bed. Good, I didn't want her falling asleep during my proposal.

Throughout the night, I paced continuously. I paced in my room, under the chandelier, on the balcony, and even in Olaf's room a few times where the talking snow man listened somewhat attentively to my unintelligible nervous rants. When I wasn't talking to Olaf, I vented to myself or the Moon. My fingers constantly ran through and pulled at my hair. I was surprised that it hadn't started to come out yet.

My decision was final - I would propose to Elsa tomorrow night. She seems to have recovered from her grief about Annalise enough for a proposal to be appropriate, and I don't know how much longer I could take of the nerves eating away at me for every minute of every day. I had a plan - there was no reason to put it off any longer.

However, the thought of proposing to her in less than twenty four hours did nothing to calm the nerves that made my stomach twist and turn on itself. My hand when into the pocket of my hoodie and I started to fidget with the ring. Realizing what I was doing. I removed my hand from my pocket and it promptly flew back up to my hair.

Why was I so nervous? Dica was right - the chances of Elsa not agreeing to marry me were slim to none. She loves me; she's said so on numerous occasions. I was positive that she had no romantic view regarding North, Bunny or Sandy. The worst that she could do is say that she wanted to wait and I could do that, right? I mean, I waited for over four hundred years for her to even come into my life! I could wait a little bit longer for her to marry me.

But there was still that slim chance that she could say no for another reason. I wasn't exactly sure why it was there, but it was. Eating away at the feeling of calm that I was attempting to create like acid. My eyes drifted over to her bedroom door. There hadn't been any sound from it since least night, but she would soon be waking up with the rising sun.

I had to get out of here. Elsa couldn't see me like this. Turning around, I caught a glimpse of my reflection in one of the ice walls and cringed. No, she definitely couldn't see me like this. My eyes were wide with panic and my hair was messier than usual. She would know that something was up and get even more suspicious.

Quickly, I flew off the balcony as I heard movement in her room as she woke up from her sleep. I wasn't flying anywhere specific, just nowhere near the Ice Castle. After a while, I realized that I had only resumed my pacing in the air once the Ice Castle was out of sight.

The rest of the day continued in much of the same fashion for me. I would return to the Ice Castle to check on Elsa and make sure she was okay. Sometimes she would be sleeping and other times she would be working on her statue of Annalise. When she was awake, I would talk to her until she started to give the tell-tale signs of suspicion which were my cues to get out of there.

As I flew from the Ice Castle yet again, the sun had reached its peak in the sky. I was walking around the city park where we first met in failing attempts to clam my nerves. I couldn't talk to any of the Guardians - the wouldn't be able to help me any more than they already had and Dica would just slap me while telling me that I was being ridiculous and that I needed to snap out of it.

Suddenly, my feet stopped moving and I inhaled deeply. There was a sweet scent in the air. It was vaguely familiar and I breathed in again as I looked around for the source. My eyes landed on a small chocolate shop and I smiled while mentally smacking myself.

Chocolate! Elsa loves chocolate! Her love for it was actually more on the borderline of an obsession really, and I hurried across the street to the store. Inside, there must have been hundreds and hundreds of different types of the sweet candy. All in different colors, shaped, forms and decoratively designed packaging. I grabbed a fairly small box and walked back out, grinning.

Elsa might disagree with stealing, but the rules of the game changed whenever chocolate was involved.

Putting the box of chocolate in my pocket hoodie, I took off into the sky again and checked on Elsa. She was fast asleep in her bed, oblivious to my presence. Once I was positive that she was alright, I left again and landed on a particular hill that over looked a small town.

My feet resumed their pacing. Occasionally, I would kneel down on one knee and mumble a speech to myself before standing back up while shaking my head. The words coming out of my mouth weren't right. They sounded too forced.

You know the saying Time flies by when you're having fun? Well, time also flies by when you're panicking over proposing to your girlfriend because the next time I looked up , the sun was starting to descend towards the horizon. My heart leapt to my throat and my stomach tied itself into knots and I returned to the Ice Castle where I found Elsa dressed in her normal outfit as she stood back to study her completed ice sculpture of Annalise.

"That looks good," I said, making her turn around as I walked closer to her. "How are you feeling?"

"Completely recovered."

I smiled at that. "Good, because I have a surprise for you." I took one of her hands and started to walk away, but she didn't move.

"Jack," she said, frowning as she looked up at me. "Are you okay?"

Noticing that my hands were shaking, I released my hold and wiped them on my hoodie. "I'm fine," I assured her, forcing another smile through the nerves. "Come on."

Still she didn't move. She only stood there, looking at me with apprehensive and confused ice blue eyes. Beautiful eyes. I swallowed around the lump in my throat and held out a hand to her.

"Don't you trust me?" I asked, feeling relieved when she didn't hesitate to take my hand in hers.

With my heart pounding a thousand times faster than usual in my chest, I flew her into the setting sun. She watched me the entire time we were flying which didn't do anything to ease my mind. I was hyperaware of ever little movement she made, from the slightest sigh of breath to a shift of the eye.

Eventually, we landed on the familiar hill and Elsa beamed at me, recognizing our location before turning back to the town as Sandy's dream sand began to swirl down in ribbons into the houses. I remained behind her, fidgeting awkwardly as I watched her reactions. She was smiling with her eyes full of wonder. Much like when I originally took her here to see dreams being made for the first time. She seemed pleased ...

My hands when into the pocket of my hoodie, bumping into the elegantly wrapped box of chocolate that had escaped my mind. I cleared my throat in the hopes of removing the lump in it and Elsa looked at me with questioning eyes.

"Uh ..." I started, pulling out the box and holding it out to her. "Here ... this is for you ..."

She took the box, watching me with curiosity written all over her face. "Jack..." she said slowly. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"Yeah!" I assured her. "I'm fine, it's just..." I took a deep breath. "I think this is how it's done," I muttered, getting down on one knee as I took the ring that suddenly felt like it weighed kilograms from my pocked. "Elsa, I've been wanting to ask you this fro a while. ... You're the most beautiful thing that has ever existed to me and I would give up everything just to see you smile. I love you with everything I am, was, and ever will be and I was wondering if ... well ... if you, Queen Elsa of Arendelle, would marry me?"

So, just in case you didn't read the author's note at the beginning of this chapter because you were so excited for the proposal, I'll repeat what I said;

First of all ... the Snow King has reached over 200 reviews! Yay!

Second of all, sorry for not uploading this weekend! I was super busy setting everything up for my uncle's surprise party Saturday (which lasted until one in the morning) and finishing his Jawa picture. If you want to see the picture I drew for him, you can see it (along with some other pieces of my artwork) on my DeviantArt profile. The link is in my bio on my profile.

I sincerely hope that the proposal lived up to everyone's expectations.

Also, I WILL BE CLOSING THE POLL FOR THE WEDDING CAKE TOMORROW so please be sure to vote if you haven't already done so!

You all know the deal with asking questions. ;) Thanks for all of the amazing reviews, favorites, and follows!

Zerlinda