CHAPTER 25- INTO THE WOODS

"ICE?!"

The Myrtlean crewman shrank under Captain Rajala's stare. "Yes, sir. The whole hold is full of it." He pointed downwards vigorously, in case the Captain needed help finding the bottom of a trading ship after thirty-five years at sea.

He strode over to the commander of the Bellflower, the captured ship he had just come aboard, and pressed the edge of his cutlass under his chin. "Is this some kind of a joke?"

Pressed up against the painted gunwale, the beleaguered seaman shook his greying head as vigorously as he could without slitting his own throat. "Our cargo is ice... um, Captain. Bound for Celestine and then the lands to the South."

The captain paused, bewildered. "They buy water?"

The commander nodded- carefully, as before.

"You're shitting me."

"I am not, Captain. Arendelle's doing good business selling ice to warmer lands. For meat lockers and the like."

Rajala stepped back, lowering his sword, and looked around him. The teal trim on the sailcloth. The cheerful, flowery paintwork on the hull and every available wooden surface barring the deck, as if they were in a Christmas market in Tempel...

This was an Arendelle ship. The land of the Snow Queen.

He could see his men shifting their feet uneasily, glancing down. Magic ice. How was he going to sail back to Myrtle with a hold full of magic ice?

A kick sent the unfortunate seaman tumbling overboard. Rajala tried to think. This was a fine ship, for a foreign build. Not a warship, but supply craft were in demand. It wasn't a total loss...

A little later, with a clang of released grappling hooks, the Bellflower moved free of the much larger Myrtlean warship it had been snapped up by, and started to make headway to the north. A small, black and blue sail now flew from atop its main-mast.

Back on his own vessel, a drained mug of grog in his hand, Rajala watched it sail off with the indifference of faded temper. Selling ice. Outlanders were mad. Still, he had assigned a skeleton crew to take the ship up to Myrtle under his own banner. Small fry. The other captains would laugh at him.

Still, better luck tomorrow, he told himself. Some ship from the west with tea or silks. Not water...

. .

. .

Down in the dark hold of the Bellflower, Otso held a trembling lamp aloft, as he walked between bound stacks of translucent ice. Go down and inspect the cargo, they had said. What are you afraid of, they had said. Why? It's ice. We know it's ice. Why do I have to be down here? Not that he was scared, exactly. Or even if he was, slightly, it was only sensible under the circumstances.

He stood there, surrounded by the witch's craft. He had heard that the Snow Queen could turn people to solid ice if she wanted. The way one story went, she would carry young men off on her sleigh, kiss them to make them forget about their own loves and families, and take them to her palace, where she would have her way with them. Then they'd be turned to ice, statues to decorate her icy halls forever.

Did the statues not have any kecks on, then? He'd always wondered that.

The ice gleamed under the glimmering lamplight, reflections illuminating the edges like the back of a cat's eyes, so that it seemed to glow from within.

What if that was what these blocks were? People who had fallen afoul of the witch, squished up into lumps?

A noise from the gloom nearly made him jump out of his skin.

A scurrying, scuffling noise, pattering from one end of the hold to the other. Mice? No, too fast, surely. Then there was another. Then he could have sworn he heard an unearthly chittering sound, like the laughter of a tiny, demoniacal baby.

Then he saw it, and he was running, running out of the hold, scrambling up the ladder, charging onto the top deck, screaming like a child. That ghostly apparition- white as snow, all cavernous mouth and dark, lidless eyes...

. .

. .

Back in the hold, Otso's lamp lay on the planks, forgotten, slowly rolling back and forth with the movement of the waves.

A small, white figure sat on a block of ice, chortling merrily to itself as it heard the humans up above screaming at each other.

A second snow baby popped up out of its hiding place among the ice blocks, and then a third.

Finally, a loud yawn from the sacking piled at the back attracted their mercurial attentions, and they drifted over to where their favourite pet was just waking up.

Sven shook his head, and looked around curiously. It was dark. The floor rocked. He was still on that ship...

Little Ole and Dole held up a carrot between them, grinning. Doffen was chattering wildly about something.

The carrot smelt amazing.

He took a bite, and crunched away happily.

. .

. .

Janna sipped at the stew in her hand, barely registering that it was not all that bad. That Gerda knew how to improvise.

They had ridden all afternoon. How many times had Elsa glanced over at her, then away again? Well, Janna knew, having fine peripheral vision and a horrible gift for not forgetting things. Nineteen. That was practically an addiction.

It was still bright daylight- they had to stop frequently on account of the wounded. It took most people a long time to make new blood. As for her, her bruises were already browning, and her only headache was metaphorical. And blonde.

There she was, across the smoke of the fire. Sipping at her stew, delicately spooning up the lumps. How did she make eating look so elegant? She ate sandwiches without leaving so much as a crumb around her mouth. Anna was practically feral in comparison. Janna crunched apples like a horse, while Elsa could take a bite out of one and chew it with as much sophistication as a sommelier testing a fine vintage. Was there a school which taught this? All her movements had such effortless refinement, and now she was consuming the same stew as everyone else with nary a slurp or burp to betray some fallibility. It was... Why am I watching this woman eat? Why am I staring at her finishing a meal like it's a strip tease or something? What the hell is wrong with me?

Elsa delicately licked stew from a finger. Damn...

Why do I even care, still? One kiss under complicated circumstances, a whole lot of dancing around, one savage beating, and now the woman hated her. She had waited too long, Niska had moved first, and everything was too broken to even get her head around. This was when any but the most pathetic no-hoper would cut her losses and move on. Focus on what could actually be fixed.

But here she was, lingering. Like a kicked mongrel waiting for her mistress' voice. She wished she were another person so she could slap some sense into herself.

Elsa looked up at her, suddenly. Startled, she looked down, pretending to be focused on her meal. She could feel the Queen's eyes on her, and she couldn't move. She could hardly breathe. A tear ran down the bridge of her nose, landing with a splish in her bowl. She prayed it wasn't visible. She had a reputation to maintain, after all...

. .

. .

Elsa stood up, and walked away from the fire. Anna got up and followed after her. She had had more than enough of this nonsense.

"Elsa! Where are you going?"

Elsa stopped and looked back. They were a couple of hundred metres from the others.

"Please, Anna, I just wanted to be alone for a while."

"But we've barely spoken..." Anna drew closer. "Elsa, you're my sister. What's going on with you? Better yet, what's going on with you and Janna- she just cried. That's disturbing."

"What's going on? There you go, siding with her, chatting away on the ferry like nothing ever happened, after what she did to me, and I'm doing something wrong?"

Anna shook her head, sadly. "I know it's hard, Elsa. It was an awful day for everyone. But... she's lost everything."

Elsa clutched her fists tightly. Anna hoped she wasn't losing control.

"Why is everyone telling me how I should feel? Don't I have a choice in the matter?"

"In your feelings? That... sort of depends on what you're talking about..." Anna answered, carefully.

"Now how am I supposed to make a match after this?" Elsa brushed away tears. "There will be... rumours. Everyone will know. People will talk about me. Joke about me."

"But Elsa, you're-"

"Don't talk like that." Elsa shuddered. "Oh, what does it even matter? Anna, you are a princess, but I am Queen! Mamma and Pappa taught me always to put the kingdom first."

Anna tried to reach for Elsa, but she brushed her aside.

"Oh Elsa, Mamma and Pappa wanted you to be happy-"

"Well you could have fooled me!"

It was half a shout, half a scream. Anna stumbled back in shock. Even Elsa seemed dazed, covering her mouth with both hands and falling to her knees. Spirals of frost spread across the grass.

Anna tried to stay calm, although she was angry, and upset, and hurt. "Elsa. Your people love you. I love you. Just... stop."

Elsa looked up, not to Anna, but to the sound of beating wings.

The ice dragon alighted on the ridge not far from them, more gracefully than Anna would have expected for something the size of a house.

They both stepped towards it, cautiously. The dragon watched both of them with hollow eyes aglow in a face of snow and ice. It huddled down, razor tail whipping back and forth behind it, like an anxious cat. Wings of sheer ice spread like lace across skeletal ice frames, which twitched about, testing the air.

As they got near it, it panicked and barked a warning at them, shuffling back a few feet. The bark nearly knocked Anna off her feet, and left frost on her eyebrows.

Elsa grabbed her by the shoulders. "You have to stay back. I think I can talk to her..."

Anna looked at the towering mass of jagged icicles. "You think it's a she?"

Elsa shrugged. "I'm just guessing", she admitted. She neared the dragon gradually, hands raised, like she was trying not to spook a horse. When she placed a hand on its snout it reared up, and Anna was afraid Elsa would be torn to shreds, but then it dropped back down onto four feet, and allowed her to do it again.

Slowly, Elsa worked her way down the dragon's neck, cooing, gently patting and stroking her creation. Eventually she stood by its shoulder. Then it lowered its front section, resting its head on the ground.

Elsa took a deep breath. "I think I'm supposed to..." She grabbed the base of a wing, as gently as she could, and clambered onto the beast's back.

She kept hushing and cooing the creature to keep it calm, but it seemed to accept her sitting on it.

Anna smiled. "Well. I guess you do have a way with the ladies..."

In retrospect, about the stupidest, most insensitive, and most inappropriate thing she could have said, under the circumstances.

Elsa looked hurt. Tendrils of red and black spiralled within the blue glow of the dragon's body, and it roared. Then it and Elsa took off, flapping away into the sky.

Crushed, Anna watched them leave, shrinking into the distance, silhouetted against the setting sun. Had... had Elsa left her again? Did people really never change?

Why hadn't she kept her mouth shut for once?

"No, no, no..."

She looked around. Janna and Olaf were there. Janna seemed to be panicking. She knew how she felt.

Anna sighed, rubbing her arms in the residual cold. "I guess she did want to be left alone."

Janna shook her head, and pointed in the direction Elsa had flown off in. "Did that look controlled to you?!" She ran her hands through her dark hair. "Of all the ways she could have gone... she's headed right into the high forest! Crashing, more like..."

Anna frowned. "Is that bad? What's in the high forest?"

Janna growled. "Gods, demons, and ghosts..."

NOTES

Okay, that's another chapter. I've been working as hard as I can to finish these over the break, since I'll be working extra hours in January and my writing is likely to slow way down...