Kristoff had never been good at situations like this.

Elsa lay, curled in upon herself, on the dank floor of the small, stony chamber. She had worn herself to exhaustion trying to recover her magic, yet the only change she'd managed to effect was to reduce herself to tears out of sheer frustration. Kristoff had watched, wanting desperately to help. Yet whenever he'd offered words of encouragement, they only seemed to make Elsa all the more aware of how badly her attempts were failing.

So instead, he had focused on coming up with an escape plan that didn't require the use of her powers at all. Unfortunately, the number of obstacles in their path were such that, even if Elsa's magic had been at full strength, he still wasn't sure how they'd have been able to pull it all off. For starters, they had no idea where Sven was being kept. Their sled was in a sorry state of disrepair. The labyrinthine tunnels might have allowed them to sneak around sight unseen, but he only had any sure sense of one way out, and that way led straight through the robbers' den. His mind soon developed the annoying habit of tossing these and other similar facts back at him every time he attempted to think his way out of their current predicament.

His own mental exertions had left him almost as worn out as Elsa. Still, he refused to sleep. He clung to a ridiculous hope that, tired as he was, the parts of his brain that kept throwing roadblocks in his way might doze off first and allow him to work through the rest of the problem in peace. He also felt that it would be unwise for both of them to sleep at the same time. If any of the robbers came to check on them, if the door of their makeshift cell were to open, he wanted to be ready to act, even if he had no idea what he might do. If nothing else, he considered it his responsibility to try and protect Elsa.

He wasn't the only one still awake, however. As far as he could tell in the dim light available to them, Elsa had barely moved at all in the last hour. Yet he'd heard sounds – small, stifled sounds that he was sure Elsa thought would be too quiet to reach him – that let him know she wasn't sleeping either. They weren't much more than sniffles and the occasional whimper, but he was fairly certain they weren't the sort of noises that might bubble up from the depths of a dream.

For the life of him, he couldn't decide whether he ought to try and talk to her. Maybe his next attempt at reassurance would go better, help calm her enough that she might be able to doze off, at least for a little while. He didn't know much about medicine and healing beyond some basic first aid, but it seemed to him that plenty of rest was rarely a bad prescription. But would starting a conversation really help with that, or would it only serve to drag her mind further away from slumber? And if he slipped up and said the wrong thing, he could quite possibly end up making matters far worse.

Well, the good news was that at least the thoughts of everything standing between them and freedom had finally left his head. Now they'd been replaced by thoughts of sleep, or their mutual lack of it. He himself seemed to have reached that bizarre state of being too tired to sleep, where the mind's obsession with its continued wakefulness prevents it from shutting down properly. But that also left it stubbornly unable to focus on much of anything else either. He wondered if the same thing was plaguing Elsa's mind, or if other demons were gnawing at her instead.

So he just sat there in the dark, feeling the cold stone behind his back and beneath his bottom. Since nothing he could think of was proving to be helpful, he decided to try and focus on thinking about exactly that… nothing. Maybe the miraculous answer he'd been seeking since they'd first been captured would finally poke its head out if it didn't sense him looking for it so hard. Or maybe, sufficiently starved for thoughts, his mind would end up falling asleep out of sheer boredom. Or maybe he'd simply spend the rest of the night thinking up more maybes.

Then, into that dark space that he was trying so very hard to keep empty, an unbidden memory slowly drifted up from the dark corners of his past. It crept up on him stealthily, so that he was hardly aware of it at first. Only when his own humming registered in his ears, in fact, did it present itself to his conscious mind. He fell silent for a moment then, startled to discover the recollection just sitting there, practically staring at him. He hadn't thought of it in years, but now that he had, he was surprised by how clearly it all came back to him.

He shifted slightly against the wall, straightening his knees and stretching his legs out across the floor before him. Closing his eyes, he let his mind drift backward. And then, in his mellow tenor voice, he began to softly sing.

Lay your head upon your bed
Of moss and fern and stone.
Have no fear and shed no tear,
For you are not alone.

The moon is high up in the sky
To light you on your way.
And by its light, throughout the night,
I'll watch until the day.

I hope it seems within your dreams
That you are safe and sound.
But if you're lost, like ship that's tossed,
Know that you will be found.

I'll be here, my darling dear,
Beside you all night long.
So close your eyes, and 'til you rise,
I will sing this song.

Crystals glow, and though you grow,
Still put your faith in me.
Do not fret, nor e'er forget
That we are family.

He held the last note longer than any of the rest. Even so, the song finally came to an end, as all songs are wont to do. Then Kristoff sighed… and smiled.

"What was that?"

He opened his eyes, though his vision barely grew any the brighter for it. All the same, he turned his head in the direction of Elsa's voice when he answered.

"I'm not sure it has a name. Bulda used to sing it to me and Sven when we were little, especially on those nights when I found myself thinking about my parents for one reason or other. Sometimes, I just missed them so much, I couldn't keep from crying. Then that would upset Sven, of course. But Bulda would just come over to us, and she'd pull us in close to her, and she'd start to sing. And she'd keep singing it, over and over again, until we finally fell asleep.

"When we'd wake up the next morning, she'd always still be there, just like the song said. Half the time, we'd find that all the other troll children had rolled up around us, too, so that we were completely surrounded. Turns out, it's a lot more comfortable than you'd think, being hemmed in on all sides by rocks. Well, at least it is when those rocks are family."

There was a sound that Kristoff could almost have believed was a tiny laugh. Then, after a short pause, a quiet humming followed. It was Elsa's voice this time, experimentally feeling out the gentle, rolling melody. As he listened, Kristoff's fingers twitched. They wanted to accompany her, and now felt the absence of his lute most keenly.

After Elsa had completed a verse, she fell silent for a time. Just when Kristoff thought that the conversation had ended, though, she piped up again. "So Bulda made it up?"

"Nah," he said, grateful that he'd at least stumbled upon a welcome distraction that might take their minds off their worries for a while. "She told me that Grand Pabbie used to sing it to her when she was little, and that Grand Pabbie's mother had sung it for him before that. It must go back generations, maybe since before the founding of the colony."

"I'd say it goes back quite a bit further than that," said a coarse voice out of the darkness. "Though I guess that would probably depend on exactly what colony it is you're talking about."

Kristoff's head snapped around toward the door. He focused on the gap beneath it, expecting to see the shadows from a pair of feet standing just outside and blocking the ruddy torch light. There were none.

"Haven't heard that third verse before, though," came the voice again. "That's definitely new. Wherever you're from, it must be near the ocean, hmm?"

Elsa found her tongue first. Keeping quiet so as not to draw the guards' attention, she asked, "Wh-who is that? Where are you?"

"Oh, sorry! Spend so much time in the dark, I sometimes forget it's even there. Wait just a second."

There was a clinking sound, like several hard objects rattling against one another. Then with a flash, a red-orange glow suddenly appeared that most definitely did not come from underneath the door. In fact, it came from the opposite wall entirely and almost at the ceiling. Kristoff and Elsa both looked up, squinting against what seemed like an almost blinding brightness after so long with so little light. It came through a long but narrow crack. It took a minute for their eyes to adjust, but once they did, they saw that something else was peeking out from behind the fissure – two large, round eyes set in a face that was nearly the same color as the wall in front of it.

"A troll?"

"That I am." The figure took a second to adjust its position, and they caught a glimpse of an overly-wide, toothy grin through the gap in the stone before he set his eyes to the crack again. "I thought you were too when I heard that song bouncing off the walls. Sound can travel quite a distance through these tunnels, especially when you have a troll's ears! Normally, I wouldn't come anywhere near that ugly bunch who've set up shop in here, but that lullaby got me curious. Just couldn't resist coming to investigate. Thought maybe one of my cousins might've gotten lost or something. Imagine my surprise when I found two humans instead!"

Elsa glanced over at Kristoff, who returned her look with raised eyebrows. Meanwhile, the troll's wide eyes were examining them both more carefully now that there was a bit more light to see by. "Say," he said in a puzzled tone, "why are you all tied up like that?"

"The robbers attacked us," Kristoff explained in a voice not much above a whisper. "They dragged us back here, took our sled and everything in it, and locked us up in this old storeroom of theirs."

"Really? That doesn't sound like ol' Milda. Well, the first part does. She and her gang'll try to take anything they can get their hands on if it passes within a bird's flight from here. Got her pigeons trained to go out and watch the roads for her. Don't ask me how she pulled that off. But she normally leaves the people alone. Doesn't like to hurt anyone if she can help it."

Again, Kristoff and Elsa exchanged a look, though it was considerably more incredulous this time. "This Milda," Kristoff said. "Old woman? Short? Grumpy? Bit on the heavy side?"

"Yup, that's her!"

"Are you sure? Because she didn't exactly seem like the nonviolent type to us."

"Oh, she'll rough people up a bit if they give her trouble. Once she's got what she wants from them, though – and mind you, that's just about everything they might happen to have with them – she normally let's them go on their way. She'll even get angry with her boys if they start beating on someone who isn't trying to fight back." The troll's eyes narrowed. "From the state you're both in, I'm guessing the two of you didn't go down quietly."

"No," Kristoff agreed, "not exactly." Drawing his legs in again, he began using them to push himself up the wall until he was finally standing upright.

"Well, you're quite a ways from the ocean," the troll continued. "So what was it that brought you out here to the middle of nowhere, anyway?"

"Look," said Kristoff, coming to stand directly beneath the fissure, "I'd really love to chat about that and… well, everything else, too. I didn't even realize there were still troll clans living this far north! But do you think we might be able to go someplace else to talk? You know, some place with a little more room. Where we can stretch our legs a little. Someplace a bit less cavey, preferably with a slightly smaller number of robbers who are trying to ransom us!"

The eyes blinked twice before crinkling in amusement. "I think we might be able to manage that. Might take me a few minutes to make the arrangements, though. Just wait right there. I'll be back in a bit."

"Be careful," Elsa hissed from her spot on the floor. "They've posted guards outside."

"Yeah, but here's the thing, you see. People with any brains to begin with can usually find themselves better careers than thievery, can't they?" He winked. "By the way, the name's Rohl." And with that and a twinkle, both the eyes and the light vanished.

"I thought you said all the trolls fled the north long ago," Elsa whispered into the stillness that followed.

"I thought they did," answered Kristoff, and he shrugged even though the gesture was lost in the renewed darkness. "I mean, I never figured ours was the only clan out there. I even heard Grand Pabbie talk about a couple others once or twice, but it always sounded like they'd left for the south around the same time as his ancestors. If he knew that there were still trolls living up here, he never said."

"So do you think we can trust this one?"

"Do we have any choice? I'll tell you right now, though, I trust him more than I do a bunch of thieves. I suppose that's something. Besides, if he really can help us get out of here, that's more than enough for me right now."

"I know, but… Well, it's just an awful lot to expect that kind of help from a complete stranger who doesn't know anything about us except that he heard you singing some old song that he happened to recognize."

"Hey, Anna hired me to take her up the North Mountain with nothing more than a coil of rope, an ice axe, and a bag of carrots. And back then, I wasn't exactly the same sociable fellow that I am now. Sometimes people help others just because they think it's the right thing, you know. After all, it's exactly what Anna would do."

"Yes, well, Anna can also be a little… um..."

"Naive?" Kristoff offered. "Trusting? Or were you aiming more for 'optimistically generous?'"

"Anna is special. Sometimes, I don't think I appreciate exactly how special she is. She always sees the best in everyone, even when they don't see it in themselves."

"That doesn't mean she's the only one who would ever help a stranger," Kristoff said, somewhat indignantly.

"Really? Didn't you once say, 'People will beat you and curse you and cheat you. Every one of them's bad'?"

"No! I never said that."

"Kristoff."

"I didn't! Though I might have, um... Well, it's possible that I maybe, er… sang it. But how would you know that? You weren't there!"

"Anna and I did promise each other that there'd be no more secrets between us. We've spent as much time as we could catching up on everything we both missed. And Anna… Let's just say that she talked about you a good bit of that time."

It was almost surprising to Kristoff that the tiny storeroom remained dark. He felt like his face must surely be glowing as brightly as any torch right about then. He cleared his throat self-consciously, then replied as boldly as he could, "Obviously, I was talking about people people – I mean, human people, not trolls – at the time. I've always trusted my family, after all. But more than that, I was… well, I was wrong. There are… that is, I suppose there are... you know, some people who… well, who are, in the end… um… probably at least as good as any reindeer."

Elsa sighed. "I know you must be right. It's just that lately, I guess I've been having a hard time following Anna's example. We haven't exactly been having the best of luck with strangers, have we? First, it was Hans and the Duke. Then came the Snow Queen, the soldiers in Kråkeheim, and now these bandits. It's almost enough to make me think my father was right to be so afraid of how the world would react if they learned about my powers. So far, this magic seems to have brought out the worst in nearly everyone."

"That isn't true, and you know it. It's brought out the best in a lot of folks, too. Look at the citizens of Arendelle. They've been nothing but supportive. Look at Grand Pabbie and Bulda and the rest of my family. King Ulrik was a perfect gentleman once he realized that you weren't the Snow Queen. And it was like you said, his soldiers were only following orders. It was never personal.

"Everyone else you mentioned was obviously making trouble long before your secret slipped out. If it hadn't, then they all would have found some other excuse to stir things up. That doesn't mean that most people would act that way. And if thirteen years growing up with trolls has made me any judge of their character, then I still think this one is..."

But what exactly Kristoff thought of the troll, he didn't get the chance to say, because at that moment, a commotion erupted from the passage outside.

• • •

Rohl had to squeeze through the tightest part of the already narrow tunnel. Only the smallest of human children could have hoped to crawl along this dark path, but the troll was able to navigate most of it standing upright. Granted, it did get uncomfortable in a few places. Fortunately, he didn't have that much farther to go.

When it finally opened out onto a much taller and broader tunnel, Rohl cautiously poked his head out and looked around. There wasn't much to be seen except far off to his left, where a faint glow from around a bend turned the otherwise gray rocks to a dirty burnt umber. That would be the guards and their torches. Before he could do anything else, he'd have to get them out of the way.

Tiptoeing silently forward, he peeked around the corner to see what he was up against, then almost snorted in derisive disbelief. There were two figures there, sitting on low stools a short distance away from the door that must lead to their prisoners. One of them – a muscular man with a thick neck and thinning hair – was leaning back against the wall, his head lolling to one side. His mouth hung open and a thin rivulet of drool ran down his chin. The buffoon was asleep!

His partner was a woman with unkempt, coal black hair that appeared to have only a passing acquaintance with a brush – or with gravity, for that matter. It stuck out from her head at all angles, like the burrs of a thistle. As Rohl watched, her head began to slowly tilt forward. Further and further it went until, like a boulder going over a cliff, it suddenly dropped. Her chin nearly bounced off her chest as the sudden movement startled her back to wakefulness. She shot a dirty look at the man beside her, as though her lapse had somehow been his fault. If she'd been about to say something to wake him, though, it was lost in the gaping yawn that immediately gripped her. Once it had passed, her eyes were already halfway closed again.

Some guards, Rohl thought scornfully. Better for me, though. Wits'll be even duller than usual, and that's saying something.

He looked past the two inept guards to the door they were so ineptly guarding. There didn't appear to be any lock that he could see. That was good, since it meant he wouldn't have to try to pick the keys out of anybody's pockets. There was, however, a sturdy wooden beam that slotted through metal brackets on both the door and the wall to either side. Hmm. Undoubtedly, that wouldn't be a problem for a full-grown human man to lift out of the way. It might prove to be something of an issue for a short stone troll, though, even if he was considered pretty strong for one of his people.

Pulling his head back out of sight, Rohl considered his options. He quickly discarded the ludicrous idea of a direct attack. It was tempting to just wait until both worthless watchers had fallen asleep, and it didn't seem like it'd be a very long wait, either. But he couldn't see how he could possibly lift that beam off the door without making way more noise than even these two oafs would likely sleep through. No, he needed them to leave. They wouldn't have to be gone for long. He'd only need time enough to get that door open, and then he and the two prisoners inside would be able to make a run for it.

And so, with that idea in mind, Rohl settled upon a plan and immediately put it into motion.

"Hey, you two!" he called out, cupping his hands around his mouth to help magnify his voice. There was the satisfying sound of someone nearly falling off their stool. "Milda wants to see you. Right now!"

"Wha' for?" came the woman's sleepy voice.

"I don't know, do I?" Rohl replied. "Bad enough getting woken up this time of night to come fetch your sorry backsides. I'll be hanged if I'm going to waste time asking questions. The sooner I'm done, the sooner I'm back in my bed."

"But we're supposed to be watching the prisoners," said the man, who sounded at least as groggy as the woman. "Who's gonna watch them if we ain't here? You?"

"Milda didn't say nothing about that, and I wasn't about to volunteer. She just said she wanted to talk to you two lazy bums right away, and she didn't feel like stumbling down here in the middle of the night. That's what the rest of us are for. I guess she figures the prisoners can keep on their own for a while until you get back."

"I dunno," drawled the woman. "She told us that we wasn't supposed to leave this spot for any reason, not 'til we was relieved."

"Fine then! I'll just go back and tell her that you were both too busy sleeping through her old orders to follow her new ones. I'm sure she'll love that. Haven't had an excuse for a good whipping around here in years. Ought to be entertaining for the rest of us, too. I'll be sure to put down a bet on which of you two will soil yourself first." With that, he turned back up the passage and, exaggerating his steps so much that he was practically hopping from one foot to the next, made quite sure they would be able to hear the sound of his retreat.

"Hey! Hey, wait just a minute," the woman called after him.

"Yeah, we're coming, we're coming," said the man. Then, more quietly, he mumbled, "Ain't been whipped since that time Ma caught me behind the shed with that pig. Don't wanna go through that again. Nope. No, sir."

Grinning, Rohl quickly curled himself up into a ball and rolled to the side of the passage, where he looked no different from any of the other rocks that littered the tunnels. He heard the sound of two pairs of feet pound past him and, peeking out, caught a glimpse of torchlight fading out of sight around the next twisting bend.

Springing up, he hurried back in the other direction. Grabbing one of the stools as he went, he dragged it across the floor and dropped it just to one side of the door. Clambering up onto the little wooden platform, he found that he was just tall enough to be able to wedge his shoulder beneath the end of the crossbeam. Hoping that leverage and luck were both in a friendly mood, he set his feet and, with a prolonged grunt of effort, heaved upward.

Slowly, the beam rose off the nearest bracket. A little higher, he thought. Just a little higher. If trolls could perspire, he would soon have been sweating with the effort, not to mention with worry that the guards might return at any moment. Finally, he had reached his full extent, his arms raised as high as they could go. Still, the plank stubbornly remained within the far bracket on the other side of the door. Rohl was starting to tremble with the effort of holding up the heavy beam. He didn't think he'd be able to keep it up much longer.

Suddenly, physics took over. The beam slipped a little, sliding perhaps a centimeter through the brackets. It slipped again. With what strength he still had, Rohl curled his fingers around the end and shoved as hard as he could. The crossbar jumped away from him… then fell back flat across the metal support bands.

Rohl was just about to let loose with a string of impolite trollish when the bar began to move again. The end closest to him started to rise up. The far end dropped. Then, almost in slow motion, the beam overbalanced. Pivoting around the far brace, it half flipped, half slid off its mounts. Tumbling to the floor, it landed with a bang and a thud that echoed off the walls and seemed to repeat up and down the passage for an eternity.

Screwing up his eyes in a grimace at the racket, Rohl held his breath and waited for the sound of footsteps running back to investigate. Many excruciatingly long seconds passed. No one came. He opened his eyes, looked down, and groaned.

The beam had landed right in front of the door. And as sore as his arms felt at that moment, he didn't think he had the strength left to pull it out of the way.

"Hey, you," he called out to the room beyond. "The big one. This crossbar isn't exactly the lightest thing in the world. Think you could help a bit?"

• • •

It only took a moment for Kristoff to recover from his surprise and realize what the source of that raucous noise must have been. Then he hurried over and, setting his shoulder to the door, pushed. It swung open with additional scraping sounds as the thick wooden beam was dragged across the rough and uneven floor. Flickering light poured into the little room. The troll followed shortly thereafter.

Rohl both was and wasn't what they'd expected. In general size and form, he matched the various members of Kristoff's extended family well enough. Yet back-lit by the torches from the passage, he looked strangely misshapen, almost as if he had a hunchback of some sort.

"Come on," he said, gesturing at Kristoff. "Get down here and let me get those ropes off you."

That was when the trick of the light became clear. As they watched, the troll reached over his shoulder and unslung a dark gray pack off his back. Rummaging around within it, he quickly pulled out a thin sliver of what looked to be clear crystal. He repeated his gesture impatiently. "Hurry up. There's no telling how soon those dunderheads may come back."

As Kristoff turned around and dropped awkwardly onto his haunches, the troll muttered quietly to himself. "Honestly. And they say rocks are dense."

Kristoff felt the pull on his bindings as the sharp edge of the shard sawed back and forth across them. In a remarkably short time, the ropes fell away. Doing his best to ignore his badly cramped muscles, he then scrambled over to where Elsa lay and began picking away at the knot that bound her ankles together. Rohl and his crystal knife set to work on the cords around her arms and wrists. After making short work of those, he bumped Kristoff out of the way and, ignoring the stubborn knot, quickly finished the business of cutting the prisoners free.

"Now, what say we get out of here?"

Neither human had any argument with that proposal, though it wasn't quite as easy as they would have liked. Elsa's legs, having been tied up for so long, were stiff and uncooperative. Kristoff had to help her to her feet, and he continued to support her – all but carry her, really – as they made their way out of their prison cell as quickly as they could manage.

In the light of the one torch that had been left in its bracket, they finally got their first really good look at the troll. Even recognizing his pack for what it was, though, there were other things about him that struck Kristoff as peculiar. For one, he wasn't clothed in the mossy green fabric that the southern trolls all seemed to prefer. Instead, he was wearing a tunic of what looked almost like shaggy brown fur.

There was also the fact that he happened to be completely bald.

All the trolls that Kristoff knew had grass-like hair sprouting out of the tops of their heads. It started off small and sparse when they were young, but like a well-tended lawn, it grew steadily thicker and longer with age. Yet even though this troll was clearly a full-grown adult, his crown was every bit as bare as his bulbous nose.

They weren't given much time to dwell on these facts, though. The troll immediately took off down the tunnel, leading them away from the old storeroom at a pace that Elsa found difficult to maintain at first, while she continued to work feeling back into her legs. It didn't help that they soon moved beyond the reach of the torchlight, either. Fortunately, they didn't have to stumble around through utter darkness. Their guide had dropped his knife back into his pack and pulled out a much larger crystal that was glowing a deep red-orange. At least that gave them light enough to see where they were placing their feet.

"Well now," said the troll once he apparently felt they'd put enough distance between them and anybody else who might hear, "I've given you my name. Didn't catch yours. Seems like that'd only be a fair trade for breaking you out back there."

"I'm Kristoff, and this is Elsa," Kristoff replied distractedly. He was trying to keep track of every turn and side passage they were taking, but even his keen sense of direction was being stretched to its limit. Rohl appeared to adhere to the school of thought that said the best way to shake off possible pursuit was to avoid anything even remotely resembling a straight line. That the myriad tunnels let him indulge that instinct so readily certainly seemed to prove the old robber woman's (Milda's?) claims about just how easy it would be to get thoroughly lost in them.

"And thank you for helping us escape," said Elsa, covering for Kristoff's lack of proper etiquette. "We're deeply in your debt." By this time, she was no longer leaning on Kristoff for support, though her gait was still a touch stiff. Looking around at the rocky walls, she asked, "Do you live in these tunnels?"

"No, of course not," replied Rohl, clearly finding the idea distasteful. "Nah, my clan's got itself a lovely little grotto right beside a hot spring. Helps keep us nice and warm when the weather gets bad, which it does a lot this far north. Been worse than normal this year, though. Looking forward to getting back and taking a good, long soak, I'll tell you that right now."

"Well, I'm hoping one of these tunnels leads to it soon," Kristoff grumbled as he banged his head against a particularly low bit of ceiling.

"Not exactly," Rohl chuckled. "Home is a good three days' hike from here."

At these words, Kristoff came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the passage. "Three days? Trolls never travel that far from home!"

Rohl turned around and blinked up at him as though he'd just said that grass was never green. "What kind of trolls have you been living with? If you don't send out scouts to explore, how are you going to find anything? How are you going to know when trouble's approaching? How do you find the best and brightest crystals?"

He hefted the glowing jewel in his hand. "That's why I keep coming back to these caves. Those bandits are annoying to be sure, but they're either too dumb, too lazy, or too scared to have explored more than the few chambers they use. Down deep in the dark, though..." He whistled. "You should see some of the things I've found in here. Like this beaut, for instance. Biggest fire crystal I've ever come across."

Kristoff's jaw fell open. "That's a fire crystal?" He dropped down on one knee to get a closer look. "I've never seen one that big! Usually, they aren't much larger than my thumb."

"I know, right?" Rohl beamed proudly. "Most of what I find, I pass out to my relatives, but this one's just too darn useful to give away. Oh, but you should see the water crystals I brought back from my last expedition. Once we get home, I'll get my girl to show you the one she has. You've never seen one so perfectly smooth and round, let me tell you."

"Home?" Elsa interrupted. "We can't leave yet. Certainly not to travel that far away, at least."

"What, would you rather go back to where I found you?" asked Rohl drolly.

"No, she's right," Kristoff agreed, and he stood, though his gaze continued to linger on the oversized fire crystal for a moment longer. Then he seemed to shake himself out of the trance and met Rohl's eyes instead. "The robbers captured another friend of ours. We're not going anywhere until we find him and set him free, too."

Rohl looked back and forth between the two of them, then frowned darkly. "Geez, when you get into trouble, you don't do half measures, do you? Why didn't they put this friend of yours in there with you, then? Oh, wait, let me guess. He was the one who gave them the most trouble when they ambushed you, so they figured they needed to keep him under closer watch. Probably sent you two off as leverage to help keep him under control. 'Do as we say or your friends get it' sort of thing, right?"

"Not exactly." Kristoff reached up and tousled his own hair in an embarrassed sort of way. "You see, his name's Sven, and he's a reindeer."

"A rein-… You can't be serious. You want to go back and risk your necks for a reindeer?"

This time, it was Kristoff's turn to scowl. "He's more than just a reindeer; he's my friend. We grew up together. Sven's saved my life more times than I care to count. What kind of friend would I be if I wasn't ready to try to do the same for him?"

"Look, friend. I may not think very much about the brains of most of those idiots back there, but when there are that many of them, they don't need a lot of smarts to cause a whole lot of trouble. In fact, when it comes to starting a fight, a bit of stupidity is usually considered helpful. Milda might not be as mean as she acts, but plenty of her boys are. They've probably figured out you're missing by now, and you can be sure they won't be too happy about that. If you show up there again, don't expect to get as warm a welcome as you did the last time."

"Fine. Then you don't have to come with us. Besides, you've done more than enough already. Just tell us how to get back there, and we'll find Sven on our own. Then we'll try to figure out how to get out of this place without getting into even deeper trouble."

Rohl ran a stubby-fingered hand over his broad face. "You don't even have a clue where they're keeping him, do you?"

"No, but I'm sure we'll..."

"There's one chamber that they like to use as a stable from time to time, whenever they manage to nab a horse or something from one of their little capers. Broad entrance. Easy to get the animals in and out. Odds are, that's where they'll be keeping your reindeer pal."

"Oh! Well then, if you can just tell us how to find it..."

But Rohl shook his head. "Even if I drew you a map, you'd still never make your way there without taking a wrong turn somewhere. After that, you'd probably never see the outside of these tunnels again." He heaved an exasperated sigh. Then he threw up his hands. "Alright, alright. Fine! I'll help rescue this reindeer of yours, too. Just tell me one thing, right now: that's the last of you, right?"

They both nodded.

Still shaking his head as though he couldn't believe what he'd managed to get himself into, Rohl turned and set off, beckoning back over his shoulder for them to follow. "Come on, then. Best get this over with before I come to my senses."

Elsa and Kristoff traded quick looks. "After you, Your Majesty," he said, the words accompanied by a sweeping gesture that took in Rohl's wake. Looking a bit nervous, Elsa set off after the troll. Kristoff brought up the rear.

As they moved off, Elsa became little more than a dark silhouette to Kristoff, the light of the fire crystal merely burnishing the edges of her outline. Yet even that was enough for his eyes to be drawn down to her hands where they swung beside her. It was a smaller movement that had attracted his attention, though. Her hands were moving constantly, the fingers flexing and floating through a complicated series of fluid motions that he'd come to recognize all too well.

Yet despite their frenetic dance, there was not the slightest hint of blue-white sparkle along their edges to break up the deep, blood red glow that illuminated their way.