A/N: Thanks to everyone who's followed/favorited and/or is reading but not reviewing!:)
princessdianaofparadiseisland-Lol, I think that part was funny; I laughed when I wrote it.;) Yeah, Anna shouldn't go run after Elsa...read on and see if she does.;)
On to the story!:)
Chapter 20-Day Ten, Part 3
At 6PM, Elsa and her guard heard the soldier guarding the room they were locked in leave for dinner. They waited to see if someone else would take his place. No one did. "How incompetent of them," Elsa commented. "They must assume that since we haven't made an escape attempt yet, we don't intend to. Well, that makes this that much easier for us. Ready?"
"I've been ready since we became locked in here."
"Let's go." Elsa easily cracked the metal shackles just enough to slide her hands out. She didn't want to waste energy shattering them completely, and besides, that would have made too much noise. Elsa flexed her hands, making a face at the sore red marks on both wrists, and then froze the door to the room shut. Then she made an ice statue in one of the dark corners that looked just like her guard, and another that looked like herself curled up on the cot.
"What was that for?" Elsa's guard asked.
"So that on first glance through the bars on the door, it looks like we are still in here. It will buy us a little extra time. Come on, let's get out of here." Elsa opened the porthole and climbed through, landing sprawled on the ice outside. Her guard followed after her.
Keeping their heads low, they crept along the outside of the ship toward the shore and safety. Soon they had to leave the shadow of the ship out onto the open ice, though. They heard an angry shout of, "They escaped! Look, out on the fjord!" behind them and "I thought you had her chained up securely!"
"Run!" Elsa called frantically. She'd gone only a few feet farther when she heard the crack of gunfire sound through the air. Bullets whistled past just overhead. Elsa immediately dropped flat on the ice. My ice can be impenetrable, but I'm not. The guard stood protectively over her. "Are you crazy?! Get down!" Elsa said, yanking her guard down onto the ice next to her.
"I can't protect you from here!"
"Well, a lot of good you'll do me dead. Stay down!"
"They're going to hit us eventually if we stay here…this isn't safe."
"I know. I have an idea." Elsa flipped over onto her back and made a wide ice archway above and around them, tall enough to stand up in. "We're going to just walk nonchalantly back to the castle. I will extend the archway as we go." She stood up and started walking towards the shore. The guard followed behind her.
On the flagship, Boris and the Duke of Weselton were seething. Elsa had given them the slip, and there was nothing they could do about it. Their bullets bounced harmlessly off Elsa's ice archway, which now looked more like a tunnel. Once Elsa and her guard had reached the shore, Elsa made a very tall, transparent but still impermeable, ice wall all the way from the castle to across the entire border of the fjord, effectively blocking off Arendelle entirely from the fjord. Then she made a small hole in the wall at her own shoulder height and dissolved the archway-tunnel they'd used to reach safety. "Is there a spyglass on hand in the castle?"
"Yes…why?"
"Please fetch it. You'll see in a minute," Elsa said.
The guard was back with the spyglass in less than five minutes. "Here, Queen Elsa."
"Thank you." Elsa looked through it, narrowing in on the flagship. With careful precision, she iced over each cannon completely, rendering them useless. Then she did the same to the other nineteen ships in the fleet. Elsa smiled with satisfaction. "Now we wait for the word of surrender."
"Surrender?" the guard questioned. "Why would they do that now all of a sudden?"
"Because I just disabled all their cannons," Elsa said.
On the ships, everyone was shocked. How had she done that from that far of a distance? King Boris and the Duke of Weselton were livid; Elsa had made them look like nincompoops. She had soundly overpowered their grand military forces entirely without ever engaging in battle. Boris knew he could not win at this point; their main weapons were unusable, it was freezing cold, and they were running out of supplies. He just wanted to get home without turning into a popsicle. "We surrender!" he yelled.
"We do?" the Duke asked.
"Yes, we do. Do you really think we stand a chance to win at this point? Arendelle hasn't fired a single shot, and look at the position we're in."
Elsa heard the king's yell. "What did I just say would happen?" she asked her guard good-naturedly. "If you surrender, come lay down all your arms here in front of me," she yelled back. "Please go get Princess Anna," she told her guard in a normal voice. "And bring some paper and a pen, too."
The guard left and returned with Anna and the paper and pen. Anna promptly grabbed Elsa's hand and said rather loudly, "I missed you! You were gone all day! Hey, what is that from?" Anna eyed a raw spot on Elsa's wrist.
"What? Oh, that. I'll tell you later, Anna. Just not here," Elsa replied.
"All right."
Elsa made a document-sized ice sheet and wrote up a short treaty that set trade embargoes on the Southern Isles and Weselton, but also disallowed Arendelle from exporting its own products to Weselton and the Southern Isles. This way, the treaty severed ties completely, and did not simply terminate Weselton's and the Southern Isles' exports to Arendelle. She thought this might sound fairer to Boris and the duke. Then she wrote out two more copies. "What do you think, Anna?"
"I think I don't know what an embargo is," Anna said.
"This treaty just cuts ties completely with the Southern Isles and Weselton. We make no imports or exports to them, and they make none to us," Elsa explained. "Of course, technically Arendelle already does not conduct any business with Weselton…"
"Sounds fine to me…except won't that affect OUR economy? Like mess it up?"
"No. We're going to open up trade with the United States instead. Arendelle will be just as prosperous as it is now."
Soon, all the enemy soldiers had laid so many arms down that there was a large pile on the other side of Elsa's see-through ice wall. King Boris and the Duke of Weselton laid theirs down last.
"Now, everyone, hands up," Elsa said sternly. "King Boris, Duke…you do know I would be fully within my rights to freeze the lot of you, but I have a much better solution." She handed the treaty through the small hole in the ice wall to Boris and waited for his answer.
"May we have a minute to discuss this?" Boris asked.
"Yes," Elsa said.
The two read Elsa's treaty through. "That's all she's going to do to us?" the duke asked. "It's really rather…lenient, all things considering." Boris was just as confused. He had fully expected Elsa to demand some exorbitant monetary settlement or something, on top of what was in the treaty. "I agree. I can't figure her out." He raised his voice slightly to tell Elsa, "We most certainly accept."
A happy smile lit up Elsa's face. "Then sign there at the bottom, please, on all three copies."
Boris and the duke signed, and handed the treaty back to Elsa. Elsa added her own signature, and then Anna signed as well. "After all, you are second-in-command," Elsa told Anna. "Here are your copies," Elsa said, handing two of the copies to Boris and the duke. She dissolved the transparent ice wall and stepped forward to shake their hands. "We can maintain an armed neutrality, yes?" Elsa reverted the 20-degree temperature back to its original summer one.
An astonished Boris and duke shook Elsa's hand. Boris realized that Elsa had been putting on a front all day, actually since his arrival. She was no tyrant; he could see that. But she would do whatever was best for her kingdom. "We appreciate your gracious reaction."
"You are welcome. If you and your men return to your ships, I will unfreeze the fjord so you can return home," Elsa said.
All the soldiers returned to their respective ships, along with Boris and the duke. Elsa looked through her spyglass to see when they were all aboard their ships. Then she unfroze the fjord. The twenty ships bobbed gently in the water as their sails unfurled. Elsa, Anna, and the guard watched until the ships moved out of sight.
"Now let's return everything to normal!" Elsa said cheerfully. She dissolved all the ice defenses, the ice on the houses and buildings, and the ice on the streets. To the guard she said, "Please send a few messengers to every house in Arendelle to inform everyone that the crisis is over and everything is back to normal." To Anna she said, "If you still want to know what I was doing all day, let's go home and I'll tell you over dinner. I am so hungry-I haven't eaten anything since breakfast early this morning."
"Since this morning?! Let's go eat right now!" Anna took off running back to the castle, pulling Elsa behind her. "Gerda probably has dinner on the table now-it was almost finished when I came down here."
"Slow down, Anna, you're going to make me trip! And please let go of my wrist," Elsa said.
"Oh, sorry, Elsa. I forgot. Maybe Gerda has some salve or something to put on it," Anna said as she slowed down to a walk.
"No, don't ask her! I don't like being fussed over, and you know that's what she'll do. It just smarts a little bit; it's fine," Elsa replied.
"I still want to know what happened to you and what you were doing all day in the first place."
"Well, most of the day I was locked in this nasty little room on King Boris's flagship, if you must know. That room had an uncanny resemblance to that castle dungeon cell, too, almost creepy. Same design, same shackles, same door, same everything except there was a porthole instead of a lattice window," Elsa explained.
"What?! I knew you couldn't have been having a negotiation meeting all this time!" Anna suddenly thought of something. "I think I know exactly where those red marks came from. Show me your other one." Anna grabbed Elsa's other hand and looked at her wrist. The angry red marks lining Elsa's pale skin were nearly identical to the ones on her other wrist. "Elsa, you spent who knows how long today chained up in some icky little room while I sat around and did nothing! I should have come after you!"
"No, Anna, you did exactly what you were supposed to do, which was, in fact, nothing. They would have wanted you to come after me so they could capture you and then use you as a bargaining piece to get me to yield to whatever demands they came up with. Besides, if that had happened, it also would have been much harder to escape. I would have not only had to worry about myself and the guard, but you too," Elsa assured her sister.
"Huh. The guard was supposed to take care of you, not the other way around," Anna remarked. "How did you get captured in the first place? And why did you wait all day before escaping?"
"Let's see…I said all of two sentences when I arrived on that ship before getting knocked out by some wooden beam that fell right on top of me. The next thing I knew, I was locked up in that little room. And I waited all day so they would all be occupied with dinner, thus leaving less of a chance to get caught escaping through that porthole," Elsa explained as they headed inside the castle to the dining hall.
"You were really clever to think that far ahead, Elsa. I think I would have immediately busted out of there without thinking about what might happen afterwards," Anna said as they walked into the dining hall.
"Thanks, Anna. But if I were really clever, I would have come up with an escape plan that didn't require staying there all day."
"Maybe, but the big thing is that it was a successful escape plan, right? Way more than successful, in fact: you got them to surrender immediately after!"
"That's true, I suppose," Elsa said. "Thank you for dinner, Gerda," she added as Gerda set a delicious-smelling plate in front of her.
"So, Elsa, what funny things did you say to them when you were doing your tyrant act?" Anna asked as she took a large mouthful of her dinner.
"Don't talk with your mouth full, Anna," Elsa told her sister. "What do you mean, funny things?"
"Anything and everything you said when you were acting!"
"Well, I called King Boris just 'Boris' when he called me just 'Elsa'. Does that count?" Elsa asked. Then she added in a hoity-toity voice, "My name is Queen Elsa of Arendelle, Boris."
Anna started giggling. "Tell me some more!"
"Ok, what else did I say that was actually funny…" Elsa thought for a moment before saying, "You know, I can't decide if your name is Boris because you're boring, or because you're a boorish boar. Like a pig."
Anna nearly spit out her milk laughing. "Elsa, that was the BEST LINE EVER! How did you come up with that? Gerda, were you listening?"
"I don't know. Probably because he really was acting rather boorish, I suppose," Elsa said as she reached for her own glass of milk.
"Not really, Miss Anna. I assumed you two were having a private conversation," Gerda said. "Miss Elsa, what's that on your wrist?"
Elsa promptly set her milk down and ducked both hands under the table. "It's nothing."
"If it was nothing, you wouldn't have jerked your hands under the table like that. May I please see, Miss Elsa?" Gerda asked.
Elsa reluctantly took her hands out from under the table. "See, it's nothing, nothing at all."
"That isn't 'nothing', Miss Elsa!" Gerda frowned as she looked at the red marks on Elsa's wrists. "It's all red and inflamed. What happened? Just a minute, I have just the thing to put on that." Gerda hurried out of the dining hall.
"This is why I didn't want you to tell Gerda anything about it," Elsa said. "Good grief, you'd think I broke my arm or something the way Gerda is carrying on!"
Anna giggled. "Looks like I didn't need to say anything anyway."
They continued eating in silence for the next couple of minutes.
"Here, Miss Elsa, this will help," Gerda said as she came back. "May I please see again?"
"All right…" Elsa let Gerda dab the salve on her wrists. She involuntarily flinched as Gerda touched a particularly tender spot.
"Sorry," Gerda apologized. "Ok, all finished. Don't go wash it all off when you go upstairs. Does it feel at least a little better now?"
"Actually, it does. Thank you, Gerda." Elsa had to admit it; it didn't sting at all anymore. Well, unless I touch it, which I'm just not going to do, she thought. Whatever was in that stuff must work fast.
"Dessert?" Anna asked suddenly.
"Oh, yes, Miss Anna. Coming right up," Gerda said. She came back a minute later with a bowl of ice cream for both Elsa and Anna.
"Mint chocolate chip, my favorite!" Elsa said.
"Butter pecan, MY favorite!" Anna said.
Gerda smiled. "You two still have the same favorite flavors you did when you were little."
"We do? Hey yeah, we do, Elsa!" Anna realized. "I remember one time when we were four and seven, and we snuck down to the kitchen in the middle of the night. You ate a whole container of mint chocolate chip ice cream, and I thought that kind was nasty, so you pulled out another container of ice cream and it happened to be butter pecan. That was how I found out butter pecan was my favorite!"
Elsa had to think for a minute before remembering what Anna was talking about. This is an actual good memory for once. "And we fell asleep on the floor and got in big trouble the next morning. You didn't eat all the ice cream in your container, so it melted all over the place while we were sleeping. Ironic, considering I could have prevented the mess in the first place if you'd fallen asleep first, before I did. I remember we had to clean up the mess and we couldn't have any ice cream for a week. And I got a lecture on how I was supposed to be making a good example for you."
Anna remembered what Elsa had said that morning about what their parents had thought of Elsa and decided to change the subject. Elsa didn't look like she was thinking about anything that troubled her, but Anna didn't want to take the chance that she would. Anna had noticed that sometimes things that seemingly had absolutely nothing to do with bad memories would set Elsa off and make her upset. So Anna said, "Can I try a bite of your ice cream? Maybe my taste buds have matured a little since I was four."
"A little bite. Don't take a heaping mouthful like you're doing with yours." Elsa pushed her bowl of ice cream over to Anna.
Anna took a medium-sized bite of Elsa's mint chocolate chip ice cream. "Blah, I still don't like it!" She pushed the bowl back over to Elsa.
Elsa giggled. "Some things never change! Well, at least I never need worry about you eating my ice cream."
Anna ate a large spoonful of her own ice cream and swallowed it too fast. "Ack, brain freeze, brain freeze!"
Elsa was alarmed before realizing what Anna was really referring to. "I wonder if it's possible for me to get a brain freeze?" she asked to no one in particular.
"There's only one way to find out!" Anna said mischievously. "How about an ice cream eating race?"
"What? That is so…so…"
"Improper? And who cares, may I ask? Nobody's in here right now but us, not even Gerda. She's taking our dinner dishes back to the kitchen."
"Well…all right. But wait a minute; you have far less ice cream left than I do. Yours is almost gone!" Elsa said.
"I'll give you a ten second head start, then. Ok?"
"All right."
"On your marks, get set, go!" Anna then counted to ten out loud. Then she dug back in to her own bowl.
A few seconds later, they both set their spoons down simultaneously and said, "Done!"
"That was actually rather fun, but I did not get a brain freeze, and I was eating as fast as I could," Elsa said. "I think it's impossible for me to get one."
"Luckyyy," Anna replied. "I like eating ice cream fast and I always end up with a brain freeze when I do that." She started laughing and added, "We should have an ice cream eating contest for the Annual Crocus Festival. You would win easily simply because you don't get brain freezes!"
"Anna, that is a terrible idea. I will not participate in an ice cream eating contest in public! Besides, I probably have an unfair advantage anyway," Elsa said. "Let's help Gerda and take our dessert dishes to the kitchen. Then I'm going upstairs."
"You don't have to do that," Gerda said as she came into the dining hall. "I'll take them."
"Oh. All right. In that case, I think I shall head upstairs for the evening. I'm a little tired," Elsa said as she stifled a yawn. She headed out of the dining hall, looking forward to sleeping in her nice, cozy bed.
Back in the dining hall, Anna jumped out of her chair and knocked it over. "Oops. I'm going to go upstairs with Elsa," she announced.
"Please don't bother your sister, Miss Anna. She stayed up all night last night from what you told me, and who knows what she was doing all day today, although I have my suspicions," Gerda told Anna. "Let her sleep. I can tell she's really very tired even though she tries to hide it."
"I'm not going to bother Elsa! I just want to sit and talk to her." Anna was put out by the suggestion. "And Elsa told me she got knocked out when she was down on that ship this morning. Then when she came to, she was chained up in some icky little room. I'm sure you figured the rest-Elsa escaped and got them to surrender right afterwards. Everything's back to normal now."
"Miss Anna, if you're talking to her, she can't go to sleep," Gerda said patiently. "Perhaps you might read a book while you sit in your sister's room? And my goodness, but that sounds awfully similar to something else that happened before…" Gerda's voice trailed off into silence.
"What sounds like something that happened before?"
"That whole getting knocked out and coming to locked up thing. That's happened to Miss Elsa before."
Anna looked completely baffled. "When would that have happened to Elsa before?"
"Your sister never told you?" Well, why would she have told Anna; Elsa never brings up painful memories voluntarily, Gerda thought. "After she ran away to the North Mountain, the Duke of Weselton sent his guards after her when Prince Hans left to look for you. I don't know all the details, but somehow she got knocked out and they brought her back here and locked her in the castle dungeon. There was nothing I could do to prevent it. To be quite honest, I'm surprised your sister was able to hold it together today when she woke up in that situation. You know how certain things tend to make her upset."
Anna frowned. "That's awful! And that must be what Elsa was referring to earlier when she said that room on the ship had an uncanny resemblance to the castle dungeon. She was all like, 'It was completely IDENTICAL except there was a porthole instead of a lattice window!' I was wondering why she had such a detailed picture of what the castle dungeon looked like. I mean, I don't think I've ever even been down there in my whole life." She smiled as she thought of something else. "Well, I think I know why Elsa didn't lose it today. She knew she could break out of there-she just needed to figure out how to do so without getting caught! And all right-I'll go upstairs and read a book. But if Elsa's still awake, I want to talk to her! Good night, Gerda." Anna ran out of the dining hall and upstairs.
A/N: Yeah, Elsa and Anna have the same favorite kinds of ice cream as my sis and I.;) Anna, you and my sister are weird for not liking mint chocolate chip ice cream! BEST. FLAVOR. EVER.:) Anyway...
Next chapter coming soon!:)