The idea of "getting it all out once and for all" filled Elsa with trepidation. She thought she already took care of that – regardless of what it almost did to Olaf. Maybe if Anna knew that –
"Elsa, you start off," Anna told her first. "Clearly when I got angry at them, it didn't make a difference. Maybe it will coming from you."
"I already got angry at them. That's why I had to come here," Elsa reminded.
"But you didn't tell them everything, did you?" Anna asked. "They should know exactly what they did to you. I tried to tell them and it didn't work. It wasn't even my place, anyway. It's yours."
"I think they know how I feel," Elsa figured.
"You need to explain it to them," Anna still pressed on. "Maybe then they'll think twice before they make you feel that way again."
"We will, trust me," Malin spoke up.
"How can we?" Anna objected. "We've tried everything, and we still can't! This is all that's left! The one thing we never did for 13 years! Be completely honest with each other!"
"Even if it….destroys more than it heals?" Elsa tried to be subtle.
"You won't freeze or hurt anyone this time, because I'm here," Anna promised. "You know I won't let you go too far."
"And yet you're setting up the possibility," Elsa nitpicked. "It might be better if we just went home first."
"And then what? We bury everything again, pretend we're getting better, then make the same mistakes again in the next crisis?" Anna foresaw. "Then keep doing it all over again for the rest of our lives? I can't live like that anymore! You can't live like that! Even they can't!"
Anna went closer to Elsa and urged further. "Elsa, you don't have to conceal anything from them anymore. Tell them everything you always wanted to tell them, whether a 'good girl' would say it or not. It's the last chance they have to really learn! And stay learned!"
"This doesn't sound like you want to 'learn' them," Elsa pondered. "It sounds like you just want me to yell at them. Because you've given up doing it yourself."
"But you haven't given up on them! For some weird reason!" Anna shot back. "Tell them how hard it's been for you, and then they might stop pushing you!"
"At least then someone would stop," Elsa muttered almost too quietly. But not enough.
Yet Anna still exclaimed, "That's good! Brutal honesty! All right, you practiced on me, now it's their turn!"
"What good would that do? Really?" Elsa still questioned Anna instead. "What good have just words done? You thought words were all you needed to get me out of here the first time. Look how that turned out!"
"Maybe if someone knew how to talk better themselves, it would have!" Anna argued. "And I don't mean with fancy grammar stuff! I mean with honest stuff! And who didn't teach you how to do that? Because it wasn't me!"
"Maybe if someone knew there were things that should stay buried, it would have been easier," Elsa shot back.
"Maybe if someone wasn't so good at burying, she could tell the difference," Anna retorted. "And maybe if someone had ever fought back against other people, she wouldn't be fighting with me instead of them!"
"Maybe if someone remembered how dangerous fighting is for me! Maybe if someone was more careful, which they could have been at least twice in the last 13 years! Then maybe they wouldn't have done anything to deserve getting yelled at in the first place!" Elsa got really brutally honest.
"But I didn't, and they did, and you've let them off the hook long enough! I did too! After what they did to you, why can't you stop?!" Anna demanded to know.
"You always need to know so much. No matter what damage it does," Elsa accused.
"What damage?! You've done enough of it because of them! What else are you so afraid of?!" Anna asked a very familiar question.
"FINE!" Elsa yelled, ice spikes rising from the ground around her and making Anna finally back off. Their silent three-person audience backed up as well.
But this display of magic wasn't as bad as the last time Anna pushed Elsa in this palace. And she had more words to say afterwards.
"What do you want to know?" Elsa started sarcastically. "What do you all want to know?" she addressed the rest of them. "How I cried myself to sleep the first night without Anna? How I never went a whole week without doing that for years at a time?"
Pointing to Gaspar, she went on, "How I saw you cringe every time you saw my powers after that night? How you stopped cringing and then just….gave up in those last few years?" To Malin, she asked, "How I felt when you stopped visiting me for days at a time when I was 13? Even weeks?"
"It got too hard…." Malin explained. "It was all I could do to keep going on…."
"You go on?!" Elsa exploded. "As if I wanted to go on after you died?!"
Further proving otherwise, Elsa expanded, "I let Anna 'bury' you all by herself! And it was all I could take not to freeze my window and jump! The only reason I didn't, other than her, is because I knew you and him would just be disappointed one last time! Not sad, not even grief stricken….just disappointed in me. That's all I let myself believe. It was very easy by then."
No one found any of this easy right now. Not Elsa, not her parents, not Kristoff by this point – and certainly not Anna. Yet Elsa was only fueled on by Anna's newfound reluctance.
"There. Something like that?" Elsa asked. "Or maybe they should hear how I hated myself every single time you knocked on my door. Or how I still haven't gone more than a week without some kind of nightmare since I was eight. Or how I felt I was a failure every day I felt anything, even right after the thaw? But since that's a feeling too, why should that matter?"
"No, it…." Gaspar couldn't even finish that much.
"Well, here's the funny part," Elsa started. "Turns out you can't not feel. Turns out it's impossible. But I can't blame that on my powers. Even if I was normal, you would have told me to conceal anyway. Part of being a good ruler and all. That's how you learned it, right?
Gaspar would have objected, but he and Elsa knew he couldn't. "Right. That's how you make the tough decisions," Elsa confirmed. "Like letting your own daughter believe she was a monster, and giving up on trying to stop her. Like making shackles to lock her up that didn't even work. Like teaching her how to make the only person who ever loved her feel all alone."
"We still loved you…." Malin tried to tell her.
"Did you?" Elsa asked. "I loved Anna with my entire heart every day! Even when she thought I hated her for no reason! I thought I wasn't worth love like that for 13 years, and I still know more about it than you do! You love and fear me, even now! Just like I…."
At that, Elsa's momentum stopped. She had already admitted the next part to Olaf, but they weren't Olaf. This time she really had to face the awful truth. And all the awful feelings it brought up.
"I'm so tired of this," it made her admit. "When do I get to stop feeling like this? When do I get to stop feeling like I'm selfish for wanting things? Sometimes I almost think it'd be good to stop feeling after all! At least until I try to stop!"
Elsa seemed a little more composed, as she let herself recall better things. "But I can't. I need to feel. I need love, joy, pride, compassion, comfort, empathy, mercy, warmth…." She let herself fill that need for a second before continuing, "I became a monster when I stopped letting myself feel all that. Even all the bad feelings I had instead were still feelings. And you can't just get rid of those either."
"That's why I hate feelings too. I hate and love them so much. Just like my powers." Steeling herself, she revealed to her parents, "But I really learned that when I realized how much I loved and hated you."
Gaspar and Malin looked like they wanted to be anywhere but there. At that point, they might have preferred to be back in the ocean. Still, they stayed anyway, even as Elsa couldn't stop herself yet.
"That's why I renounced you seven months ago. Because I spent my whole life trying to be you, and it almost killed me. It did kill Anna. And I couldn't be who I wanted to be if I kept caring about you. But here we are." Elsa let out a bitter laugh. "Here I am, making the same old mistakes of my past. I guess I am just like you after all. It took me long enough."
"We don't want you to be us," Gaspar weakly said. "We wouldn't wish that on anyone…."
"Your wishes don't mean anything," Elsa admitted. "You can never say the c-word again, stop being afraid and support me the rest of my life. But it can't make up for when you didn't. Nothing can. I helped you scar me for life, and scar Anna….and those scars can't ever go away. Those lost 13 years are never going away."
Resignation and some finality was on Elsa's face and voice now. "You can realize you were wrong and say sorry all you want. But there's nothing you can say or do to make it okay. Nothing you could have done this whole month. I can still love you and I could forgive you one day….but you could never, ever make it up to me. Or Anna. All you did by coming back is to prove it."
Elsa unconsciously made her way to the staircase. When she was more conscious of it, she wrapped up, "There it is. Now you know everything. Every depressing, hopeless thing. I hope you handle it over the next 13 years better than I have."
She turned and walked up the steps, even as she heard the trembling and near collapse of her parents. They actually fell on their knees by the time Elsa got to the top floor and left everyone's view.
When Anna finished watching that, she saw the other thing she'd achieved from all this. As it turned out, the sight of her broken parents was even worse. If the Anna from 10 minutes ago could have felt that….maybe she wouldn't have to feel the other things.
Kristoff had been the only quiet one through all this. Yet he wondered if he was the only one who noticed through all her emotional rants – at least the big ones after the ice spike thing - Elsa's powers hadn't leaked out once.
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The seediest, most criminally infested bars in Arendelle were both rowdy and on edge. Rowdy because of the chaos the law had to deal with last night – and on edge because they'd probably get pinched in the crossfire for it. But with word spreading that the Snow Queen and the Princess had run away again, the rowdiness won out for now.
One of the more senior criminal figures of the bunch was content. Suspiciously content, if anyone noticed. That was why he kept to himself so no one would notice. Yet someone noticed him and followed him as he headed down the back halls.
"Funny business, that ball last night," the man heard behind him. He turned to see a figure wearing a green hood over his face, with a gruff but….oddly familiar voice.
"From what I heard, they could have killed the entire royal family. Yet as it turns out, the only person they bothered to attack personally was the Prime Minister," the figure recounted. "Why single him out? The Southern Isles has more reason to go after the Queen and Princess, after all."
The figure backed the other man up, as he scrambled to make sense of this rant. Or find another way that it could make sense.
"Those men would have needed a powerful, criminal ally to help them hide in Arendelle. Who knew how to help them blend in," the figure went on. "He probably asked for a fortune. Maybe even a favor. A favor like….singling out and punching out an old partner who sold him out. The kind of selling out that'd still linger over 20 years later. Especially if he's….moved up in the world since then."
The identity of the man in the hood was quite obvious by now. Yet he still lowered it just enough to confirm it. "Hello, Max," Prime Minister Van Garrett greeted. "Go on, admire your handiwork," he pointed to his still bruised eye.
"I should have paid them to do more," Max growled. "After what you did…."
"You gave me the job to rob the palace. You could have ignored my begging by killing me or putting me in a coma. You paid the price for mercy," Van Garrett figured.
"You could have not ratted me and my crew out. A crew that was the last people alive who'd take you in then!" Max hissed. "You couldn't have conned your way into government if we weren't that merciful! But you're right, I am paying the price for mercy now. But old habits can change."
Before he could change them, however, Van Garrett got the drop and pinned him against the nearest corner of the wall. "Oh! How unbecoming of a Prime Minister! What would your precious royal family say? Especially if I told them?" Max mocked.
"No one believed you then. That's why you never even tried blackmail. Not while the King and Queen were alive to protect me," Van Garrett ignored the knot in his stomach over that point. "Then I got too powerful and you had other things to do. As you just confirmed, one of them involved shacking up mercenaries of the Southern Isles."
"I wish!" Max revealed. "They're just old buddies of that disgraced prince of theirs. He just wanted them to mess things up until he got out of prison! Then your friends would declare war by the time he got out, he'd come back and beat them, some garbage like that!"
"So this isn't even an official Southern Isles operation," Van Garrett realized. "Just one prince laying the groundwork for…..some war that wouldn't even start for months."
"You wanna put it like that, go ahead," Max answered.
"Finally, a break," Van Garrett sighed in relief, then released his hold on Max. "I suppose that earned you a little something."
"Oh, you're paying back debts now," Max mocked. "You owe me over 20 years worth of debts. Plus interest for me not blackmailing you!"
"Luckily I had a down payment all set," Van Garrett teased.
Without another word, he took Max and led him out of the bar. They went to the back, where a horse and carriage was waiting – not the official one of the Prime Minister, however. But it was big enough for both of them to fit in the carriage, along with two big satchels.
Van Garrett handed Max one of them and clutched the other one tight. When Max opened his satchel, he saw the need for secrecy. He could barely see anything else through all the shining gold, however.
"That's 25 percent of my entire fortune. Everything I saved for the last 20 years. More than I ever could have given you back then," Van Garrett teased, holding his other satchel of gold closer in case Max got any ideas.
"You'll only get the next 25 percent after you take me to your Southern Isles friends. Whether they give you a finder's fee from the 50 percent I give them….you can work that out among yourselves. Provided all goes well when I see them," he offered.
"What is all this?" Max got suspicious. "Power made you go all batty?"
"It's not my power I'm fighting for," Van Garrett answered. "So are we even enough to go for a ride or not?"
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Anna finally found Elsa sitting on an ice bench. That must have been a new addition. Not like she had much time to tour the place last time. All she did last time was keep pushing Elsa until she exploded – and now here they were again.
But if Elsa could actually open up, Anna could stop being stubborn too. Even if it was too late.
Still, when Anna sat down and saw Elsa with that blank look on her face, her heart felt too heavy to talk. Not heavy with ice this time. Yet she finally gave an uncharacteristically quiet – if not uncharacteristic, period – "I'm sorry."
When Elsa looked at her, Anna made herself expand. "I'm sorry I pushed you over and over like that. Again. Maybe I did just wanna see them squirm. I didn't want to at the end, though," she confessed. "All I got out of it was….knowing I made the same old mistakes all over again. Just like they did. Like you think you did."
"It's like you said," Elsa admitted. "We have peace for a few months, then relapse, then do the same stupid things we vowed never to do again. Then we make new vows and break them anyway. I guess that's supposed to be our new routine forever."
Anna was about ready to accept that. Until she actually thought about it.
"No….no, wait a minute," she started going over. "We did the same thing….but we did it different. You did it different!"
"Because I actually yelled at them," Elsa figured.
"No, before that!" Anna got excited. "You ran away again, yeah! But this time you told Kristoff to come get me! You wanted me to find you and bring you back! You didn't freeze anything, you didn't hurt my heart, and you didn't wanna stay away forever! That's different! That's progress!"
If Elsa could have objected, Anna didn't give her the chance. "Yeah, and then you yelled at Mama and Papa! But that's not the best part! You yelled at them and you didn't use your powers once! I mean, when you started yelling at them! But then you were in control the whole time!"
As Elsa started reflecting on things other than her words, she started working out the same math Anna did. She didn't remember one flurry falling – not like the thousands from when she sang with Anna here last time. Because there were none. She got emotional and nothing else happened….
"Well, I wasn't in control before you got here," she excused. "Olaf can tell you that. Maybe I just got all my anger out early."
"No, you were pretty upset. But you did it magic free," Anna smiled. "Even they'll figure that out at some point."
She paused and made herself concede, "And for what it's worth….they actually listened to you. They were pretty upset, but they didn't make you stop. They let you feel that time, anyway. That's pretty different, at least for them."
"I suppose," Elsa admitted.
"Maybe that's what makes it okay," Anna predicted. "We're still pushing each other, running away, giving terrible orders….but we're fixing them a lot faster! We're talking them out now! Maybe we'll never stop messing up, but now we can make it right when we do! We keep doing that, it won't be so bad doing the other stuff over and over too!"
"Shouldn't we actually stop doing the other stuff at some point too?" Elsa reminded.
"You can't stop years of bad habits overnight. What are you, from a fairy tale?" Anna had the gall to mock Elsa for. "But they're not so bad now. The more we work this stuff out, the less bad it gets! Even if they'll never go away! I mean, look at me! I realized I pushed you too much a lot faster this time!"
The return of Anna's high spirits ended as suddenly as it started, however. "I guess that's taking a lot longer to fix. I really am sorry." She reflected further and asked, "Do you think this is my fault?"
"Why would I think that?" Elsa asked with genuine surprise.
"Van Garrett. He said my insecurities shouldn't mean more than Arendelle. That's the only thing he got right," Anna realized. "If I didn't push him because I was afraid you'd close the gates, maybe he wouldn't have said that wrong stuff. Then maybe you wouldn't have stormed out, found them, got in that fight and came here. Maybe they would have calmed down before you even found them."
Getting further down on herself, Anna reflected, "Maybe we'd all be home right now and we'd still be a family. Like we would have if I never made you get outta bed 13 years ago…."
"Anna, stop it," Elsa got serious. "None of that is your fault."
"Well, I'm tired of you thinking it's yours!" Anna confessed. "You gotta give yourself more credit than that! I have to give you more credit!"
"You give me more credit than I've ever deserved," Elsa shared.
"No I don't. If I did, I wouldn't have minded you closing the gates," Anna said. "It shouldn't matter anymore. You've done so much more to prove yourself than opening gates. I have to stop being so afraid that you'll go back to….then. Even if you close things."
"You're not the only one who's afraid of that," Elsa reminded.
"Well, I shouldn't be. And neither should you," Anna figured. "I was scared when they came back, I was scared when Van Garrett wanted to close the gates, and I was scared when you ran away. I have to stop. You're too strong to ever go back to then again. And I should stop making you do things to prove it."
"Anna, if you never forced me, I'd still be in my room right now," Elsa said. "We wouldn't be sisters again. I can't risk doing anything that might….put that at risk again. You're not the only one who couldn't handle that."
"You should do what you want to do. Not what I want, not what they want, not Van Garrett, the council, anyone," Anna insisted. "Even if you….use old habits, you'll still be the same great Queen, amazing sister and wonderful person you've always been. I know you will."
When her parents told Elsa they knew she could do something last night, she felt their pressure and fear. But when Anna said it, she felt nothing but faith, honesty and love.
"I'm not closing the gates. Not because you want me to or not," she still told Anna.
"You'll be fine no matter what. I believe in you. Or at least I'm gonna start right now," Anna promised. "You sacrificed yourself for me, way more than anyone should, way more than anyone deserves, way before I ever did for you. I just want to be worth it…."
"You've always been worth everything," Elsa said with all her heart. "Because you've always believed in me. Even when I locked the door," Elsa took in once again. "You're the only one who ever did."
It was true. Her parents were too afraid to do that, to say nothing of Elsa. But she was so devoid of belief in herself, she did anything to make them believe in her - no matter how impossible the task was. If she couldn't live up to their standards, what hope was there?
Yet as with all things that didn't seem to have hope, the answer was Anna.
Anna, who never demanded perfection or holding anything back – who only wanted Elsa. All of Elsa. As if that alone was really enough.
And it wasn't just Anna anymore. It was Olaf, who saw her as the kind of parent she herself lost so long ago. And it was Kristoff, who didn't just give her a head start, but sent her Olaf and let her have the space she needed today. And it was the people who had enough faith in her to outweigh any Van Garretts.
Did any of that really change, whether her parents believed in her that way or not?
She wanted their approval and their love – she always would. But maybe….she didn't need it anymore. Not when she had so much of it from other sources now. At least more than two of them.
But it would always be one that meant more. And not in the unhealthy way those two did.
Elsa had felt so hopeless moments ago, regardless of Anna's role in it. Yet all it took to make her believe, in something other than misery, was Anna.
Anna had felt bitter and cold moments ago, regardless of who was to blame. Yet it all took to make her feel sunshine, warmth and value again was Elsa's adoration, love and smile. And like that, everything else melted away – like it would whenever this happened again.
But Anna still had one grudge left to hold. "Don't think you're getting off easy for the hugs, though. You really thought Kristoff could fill in for you?"
"I didn't think I had time to find Olaf," Elsa excused.
"Too bad, cause neither do I," Anna warned before hugging her tight. Then she broke off and hugged the last of Elsa's breath out, taking care of this morning's hug. "You know, if we can do hugs in advance now…." she figured.
Elsa tried to back away, but found no escape as Anna kept breaking off and hugging her in order. She backed away after the third hug enough to fall off the bench, but Anna just sat down on the floor with her. "Sorry, we gotta get the New Years hug off the books first! Just in case!" she teased.
Elsa couldn't even tell Anna to stop, since her hug attacks were too fast for her. She just dissolved into grunts, half no's, and even a little giggle or two. She even hugged Anna briefly just to throw her off track, but she came right back and took her right back down to the ground.
At that point, they both devolved into giggling and laughing. They didn't need hugs to feel closer by then, though.
Nevertheless, when Elsa sat up first and helped Anna do the same, Anna still hugged her left side – a real hug, not a game hug. Elsa returned it with a real one-armed hug of her own. It was the best she could do in this position without falling on her back. But it didn't have to be perfect for Anna.
Nothing ever did.
When they stopped looking at each other, they looked straight ahead and saw they weren't alone. The truth was, they hadn't been alone for most of this talk. They just weren't oblivious to the world around them now.
A world where Gaspar and Malin were standing and watching nearby. It made Elsa tighten her grip around Anna as a result.
It might have looked like she was protecting her from them, but that wasn't it. Not completely. She didn't want Anna to look at them and feel cold again – to go back to then from a few minutes ago – so she tried to pre-emptively fight it off. Like Anna would do for her.
Whatever this was, it would probably go better on their own two feet, though. So Elsa got herself and Anna up to face whatever came next. Together.
"There's only two things I can ask you," Gaspar began. "One….whatever bitterness you have towards me, please spare your mother. I made her a victim of all this too."
"Gaspar, you shouldn't…." Malin wasn't allowed to finish.
"No, I shouldn't have," Gaspar agreed for different reasons. "But I'm not keeping you from being a mother anymore. Whatever love they still have for any of us deserves to go to you."
"So you're giving up on getting it?" Anna asked.
"I'm not doing anything. Not until you tell me. That's the second thing," Gaspar answered.
"We're not following. I didn't ask Elsa, but I know we're both not getting it," Anna told him, and Elsa indeed couldn't argue.
"I've never gotten it. Not for 13 years. But that's because I never let you try and stop me," Gaspar theorized. "I never let any of you stop me. Many say kings, husbands and fathers aren't supposed to be challenged. They never met me."
Gaspar went to his daughters, then did what he hadn't done – at least as himself - since he was a boy. He knelt in submission, as thousands had once done for him.
"I am none of those things. I haven't had a right to call myself those things in years. And thus, I am no longer just playing a servant," Gaspar declared. "If you want me to leave you alone, I will. If you want me to stay, I will. Whatever our future is, it will not be decided by me. I finally ask you….please, tell me what you want to do. Let me do what you want for once….and forever…."
A King of Arendelle had never submitted his will to another ruler. A father may have never submitted his will to his daughters like this before – at least not this formally. But no King or father had ever been so lost before.
He was ready to submit to Anna and Elsa's will, no matter how vengeful it was. Or whatever doors it would shut forever.
But instead, he got this request from Elsa. "How about first things first….we all get up and take a tour?"