Accustomed to the stench of manure, Kristoff fails to wince at the smell of horse dung as he wanders into the Palace stable. Looking around the stale, musty air, he picks out a strand of hay from the feed bale and chews on its tip.

"Ah, palace hay," he mutters, "doubt Sven would have a taste for this fancy stuff."

Sunlight streams through the skylights, illuminating specks of hay and dust floating amidst the rafters. With a keen eye, he allows his gaze to wander between the stalls, observing the horses' coats and their immaculate sheen. The sight of intricately carved saddles and prim manes on the horses irks him somewhat, as though he didn't belong here. Still, he finds the stable a welcome change from the stuffy palace rooms and its hallways rife with intrigue.

Kristoff crosses his arms and listens, only to hear the horses' gentle breathing and birds chirping outside. With a sigh, he turns to leave, but the faintest sound prickles his ears. Low and soft, almost like a mouse's squeak; he stops dead in his place and listens until it happens again.

Weeping.

His face doesn't betray any emotion at the revelation, kicking up bits of hay and straw as he marches towards the sound's source. Neither does he react when he comes across Anna curled up against the side of the stable wall with hay sticking to her dress. Kristoff hesitates at the stall's gate; afterall, this was the first and only girl he fell in love with, and people are telling him how she's able to tear men apart with her bare hands. Still, his fondness for the girl's smile and the cheer that it brings him forces him to enter and approach her. Without a word, he seats himself beside her and tries to think of something to say, anything that could calm the sobbing noise emanating from the pit of her lungs.

"Are you ok?" Kristoff asks, before slapping himself in the forehead for such a meaningless question.

"How'd you find me?" Anna snivels, wiping the tears and snot from her face.

"I didn't, just got lucky here," Kristoff comments, searching his brain for something comforting, "everyone's looking for you, Anna."

For an answer, all he gets is a whimper, and a fresh stream of tears trickling down her cheek.

"I-I t-tried!" Anna stutters, bunching up her damp fists in the hay, "Kristoff, I t-tried, to make her remember, but all it does is-"

"Look, Anna, you can't always be the strong one," Kristoff says, and for some reason, his words are enough to send her crumbling into his chest. He pulls her close to himself, stroking her back as her tears leave warm spots in his tunic.

"I j-just don't know what to do a-anymore," Anna whimpers.

"Maybe you don't, and it's alright," Kristoff whispers, running his hands through her hair, "we don't have to have the right answers all the time."

Anna leans back, gazing back at Kristoff through reddened eyes. She bunches her hands up in his clothes, looking over his shoulder as she whispers.

"Kristoff, you know I love her, right?"

Her words leave an ache in his heart; he bites on his lip and nods, afraid of saying something stupid.

"It's like I've done everything I could and it's just not enough," Anna groans, "and it hurts even more knowing she'd do anything within her power to save me if I was in her place. Hell, she locked herself up for years just to prevent herself from hurting me again."

"Look, Anna," Kristoff whispers, grazing his fingers against her cheek and trying not to let the hurt show in his eyes, "you don't have to face this on your own. There are people who still care for you. Good people. They care for Elsa too, all it takes is a step in the right direction."

Anna snivels, wiping at the last tears from her eyes, "Really? You think they can help?"

"Well, it worked before," Kristoff answers, "and even if they can't help, they can give you the answers you're looking for."

"Please," Anna whimpers, wrapping her arms around Kristoff's thick, stout body. As the boy with ruddy cheeks hugs her back, she feels a surge of strength flow into her bones, and at once she feels her all her vulnerabilities and weaknesses laid bare before him.

And it doesn't feel bad at all.

The dew glistens in sheets of moisture as Anna trots towards the rocky outcrop. With the mossy fragrance rife in her nostrils, she dismounts her horse and pulls a shawl over her shoulders, still aching from where she had taken a tumble onto the ship's deck. Plumes of geothermal steam hiss around her, filling the air with an ominous warmth, but still the girl feels a chill in her heart, worse than the time Elsa had struck her.

Because this time Elsa wouldn't have cared if she really died.

"Hello?" Anna calls out, her broken voice reverberating across the rock valley. Beneath the dawn light, the rocks glow with an unearthly aura, their moss smooth like velvet. Still fuzzy from the whiskey she drank last night, Anna stumbles across a rock ledge, before staggering into the valley's center. A rumble starts beneath her feet, and all of a sudden, fear bites into her heart. What if she didn't like what he had to say? Anna bites on her a lip as a boulder begins rolling towards her, its moss leaving a slick trail of moisture.

Before Anna's able to dodge its path, hands and feet sprout from the rolling rock, and she's looking into Pabbie's eyes: glowing whirlpools of dark, darker than the night sky, holding memories and magic and things Anna never could comprehend in a thousand lifetimes. She stares into them until Pabbie shuts his eyes and lets out a yawn, his green straw hair bristling in the foggy air.

"Good morning, your highness," Pabbie says, voice low and foreboding, "what can I do for you on such an...early morning?"

"Grandfather Pabbie!" Anna says, before words start tumbling out of her mouth in rapid succession, "It's my sister, Elsa. She got burnt by a dragon's fire magic and fell into a coma and when she woke up she couldn't remember me and it's weird because she remembers everything else but-"

"Shh, child," Pabbie whispers, motioning for Anna to stoop to his height, "why don't you come down here for a second? Memories and their meaning often get lost in the translation of words-"

Without thinking, Anna drops to a knee, and Pabbie extends a hand to her forehead. The realisation dawns upon her as he closes his eyes, and she finds herself withdrawing from him.

"Wait, you're going to read my memories?" Anna asks, looking down at the mossy ground, "There's some stuff in there that I'm um...not very proud of."

"Anna, I'm not here to judge what you've done, or change the past. My only concern is your well-being, and Elsa's," Pabbie answers.

The Princess hesitates before leaning closer to Pabbie. She doesn't know what to expect, so she grits her teeth and screws her eyes shut as his stony fingers graze her fringe. The first feeling she feels is utter pain, slicing through her head, before realizing that every experience and memory she endured is flashing across her mind and entering Pabbie's fingertips. There was pleasure, joy, relief, determination - a multitude of other emotions mixed within the images, but none so overwhelming as the pain of losing Elsa. A flurry of sensations slam into Anna's chest, sending her toppling over and backing away from Pabbie.

"Oh my god," Anna gasps, chest heaving in and out, "I didn't know it'd be...it'd be-"

"Like living every one of your memories over again?" Pabbie whispers, "It appears that you've been through much lately, my child. Far too much for a young princess."

"I-I...I...need your help," Anna asks, rubbing at her temples, "Elsa's forgotten who I am."

Light flashes from Pabbie's fingertips in hues of pink and blue as he waves his hands around in the air.

"It's the fire," Pabbie whispers, conjuring Elsa's silhouette, "the dragon's breath possessed a potent magic which burnt deep into her being when she fought it. The fire magic reduced her memories to ash and cinder-"

Anna watches with widened eyes as a reddish hue flickers within Elsa's image, growing in intensity, until it consumes her silhouette in its entirety.

"You may have healed her with your cousin's magic," Pabbie continues, restoring the image to its former wholeness, "but alas, the memories are no more."

Darkness descends upon Anna as the images fade into the dawn air, and at once she asks, "But, but...how come she remembers Kai and Gerda, and the Kingdom?"

"Anna, the magic was wrought from pure darkness and evil, festering deep in the mountains for countless millennia," Pabbie explains, "it ignored everything within Elsa and went straight for the good memories. After your parents' untimely deaths, the only good thing left in her life was you. You were the only person who brought happiness to Elsa, and the magic consumed her memories of you in it's entirety."

The revelation calms the shaking in Anna body somewhat, but she still persists with questions, "And there's nothing you can do about it? You can't restore her memories?"

Pabbie looks down and shakes his head, "There's nothing which can save a book which has been destroyed by the flames, the only thing you can do is…"

Anna purses her lips and tries to fight back the tears as she anticipates his answer.

"Write a new book."

Anna sighs and stares at Pabbie's toes in the grass. She tries to think of something to say, but nothing within her is strong enough to fight the warmth spreading across the face.

"Not all is lost, my child," Pabbie whispers, putting a hand on Anna's shoulder, "Elsa has gained complete control of her powers. The fear of losing you was the one thing holding her back from mastering her magic."

"And...and now that she doesn't remember me, she's not afraid of using them anymore?"

"Yes," Pabbie whispers, "it's good for the Kingdom, for the people around her."

"It's what mom and dad always wanted," Anna mutters, wiping at her eyes, "I guess that's...good enough. Thank you for your help, Grandfather Pabbie."

"It's a pleasure, my child."

With her heart aching even more than when she first stepped into the valley, Anna rises to leave, but another thought gnawing at her mind sends her turning back towards Pabbie.

"Wait, Pabbie," Anna says, snatching the rock troll's attention, "I have something else to ask you."

Pabbie steps close to Anna and looks up at her with an answer already prepared in his mind.

"Why am I so strong?"

"Because you're special," Pabbie answers without a hitch, "just like your sister."

"And no one told me?"

"By the time your sister reached three, your parents knew she was special when they saw her eating ice cream out of her milk mugs. This caused your father a great deal of frustration and anxiety, and he didn't know how to cope with the revelation. The sight of your broken cradle and your three-year old self playing with things you had ripped off the shelves proved too much for him. I told him to let you know, to let it go, but he couldn't."

"And he just...kept it from me?"

"You have to understand that he meant the best for you," Pabbie says, "he wanted at least one of you to be...normal, to be able to help the other in case anything went wrong. Besides, it's one thing to have ice constantly coming out of her fingers, and another thing to just be strong."

"But I was bound to know eventually!"

"Yes, and he held the hope that you would've been a grown woman by then, mature in the ways of the world and able to control the vast power flowing through your muscles. He saw the accident with Elsa and you and...it tore him apart entirely."

"Well, what do I do now? I'm stuck this way forever?"

Pabbie runs his stony fingers along Anna's forearms and looks her straight in the eye.

"You have the strength to change things, not just here," Pabbie whispers, before pointing to her heart, "but in there too."

Anna thinks and think, trying to conjure up something negative in her mind. Accustomed to approaching life with optimism, it takes her awhile before asking Pabbie.

"She doesn't love me anymore, does she?"

Pabbie hesitates on his next answer. He takes a long look into Anna's eyes, glistening with hurt, before realising that to deny her the truth would bring her even greater pain.

"Not right now, no," Pabbie answers, crushing Anna's heart so hard she has to clutch at her chest to regain her composure, "but I do know that true love overcomes everything, including forgetting someone she once held dear to her heart."

Grass tickles Anna's ankles, left uncovered by her shoes. She takes a deep breath of the crisp, morning air, expecting it to wake her lungs up, but all she can think of is how badly she could use a drink right now. Shaking her head, Anna steps forward with two bunches of crocuses, laying them beneath the imposing monoliths of stone before her. As she steps away, the tombstones cast a shadow over her, like the legacy of their reign, and the majesty of her sister's powers. Anna sighs and wonders to herself, how much better it would be for hers to right there in between with them.

A steady breeze develops around Anna's feet, casting ripples in the grass before her. The ribbons she had tied around the crocus stalks come undone, scattering the flowers in a shower of pink and purple petals. Anna gasps, and edges forward in an attempt to fix it, but she stops, and surveys the spray of colour now wrapping around the tombstones.

"Beautiful," Anna mutters, before looking at the sky; blue like her sister's eyes, and swathed with the lightest wisps of cloud, "like you."

The wind picks up, scattering bits of grass and soil into the kaleidoscope of color before her. With a bow, she turns to leave, but a glimmer of blonde hair appearing over the knoll's crest snatches her breath away. Wandering onto the lawn, Elsa's ice gown sparkles in the sunlight with each step of her royal gait. Anna's heart leaps as she catches sight of her sister, but she purses her lips and stands in her place, watching Elsa quicken her pace until she reaches two arms' length from her.

"I didn't think you'd come here," Anna mutters, looking away from Elsa's radiant beauty, "I wouldn't even be surprised if you've forgotten who they were."

Elsa sighs, looking at the petals strewn around the tombstones and muttering, "Just...bits and pieces. I had this date down in the calendar, so I came."

"That's all they are to you then? A date on the calendar?" Anna scowls, trying to keep the bitterness from seeping through her voice, "And I see that it was too much trouble for you to bring flowers."

The Queen points at the grass. A snapping noise crackles through the air, sending ice-crocuses sprouting from the soil and blooming in a shower of snowflakes. Even in the shade, their snow-lined petals glow with a brilliance that takes Anna's breath away.

"I-I'm sorry," Anna mutters, shaking her head, "I shouldn't, I mean, I can't blame you-"

"Look, I think I owe you an apology," Elsa whispers, daring to step within an arm's length from her sister, "for yesterday."

"I don't think I can blame you for that too," Anna answers, keeping her gaze down and away from Elsa, "So I guess your apology is...rejected?"

"It's just that, you're everything I'm not," Elsa says, turning to Anna and watching her braids flutter in the breeze, "You're warm and free and just so...irresistible, and...and I don't even know who you are, but at the same time it feels like I've known you my entire life!"

Anna turns to Elsa and looks into her eyes, trying to detect a part of her that remembers who she is, but all she finds are blue orbs rife with confusion.

"You're beautiful," Elsa whispers, roving her eyes over Anna's gentle, freckled features. She tries to maintain her composure, but the shudder in her lips gives her away, "I must have loved you a lot."

Anna shuts her eyes as Elsa's words clench at her heart. As much as she tries to remind herself that this woman doesn't even care about her, Pabbie's reminder swirls around in her head - write a new book.

"I still do," Anna whispers, unsure of whether or not she meant for Elsa to hear it, but her sister's long arms pulling her into an embrace crushes every imaginary wall she had built around her heart. All of a sudden, she understands the truth behind what Pabbie meant to say - she doesn't have to feel the same way for you to love her with everything in your heart.

Elsa's heart pounds within her chest as she extends a hand to her sister. With bated breath, Anna slips her fingers into Elsa's, the chill of her sister's signet ring biting into her skin, crisp like the winter she represented.

Nothing's changed, Anna thinks, feeling the cold in Elsa's hand giving way to a warmth as inviting as the first day of spring.

I know you're still in there somewhere.