A/N: Sorry for the delay in updating this chapter. I know I have typically been putting out one per week and now this is almost two weeks since chapter 16 came out, but Christmas is often a busy time, as I'm sure most of you can understand.

Hopefully you remember what happened last time. If not, feel free to to re-read the previous few chapters to catch yourself up. Some reviewers have said they intend to go back and re-read form the beginning of Retribution since so much has happened from the start of this story all those months ago. If you do, don't hesitate to post some reviews for those earlier chapters. Reviews were sparse back then, so I'd love some feedback on those early parts of the story as well.

But without further delay, the story continues!


Chapter 17 - Capture

It was late afternoon, the day after the escape from Arendelle. The Boreas was sailing smoothly through the relatively calm waters of the North Sea, heading south towards the location where they had been a week ago, locked in the intense combat with the Odin.

Anna and Kristoff were only now making their way back up to the deck after having woken form sleep. Nikolaus, Eugene and Rapunzel didn't even consider waking them, because they all knew the couple were exhausted. The previous night, all five of them had stayed up till nearly four-o-clock the next morning, still running on adrenaline form their harrowing escape, and cautiously keeping their eyes behind them, making sure there was no other ships sent by Tollak that were trying to follow them. By the time they actually did retire, it had been over a day since Anna had any sleep, and Kristoff had spent a good deal of time in an uncomfortable jail cell, so they slept soundly through the entire morning.

Stepping out onto the main deck, the two were greeted by Rapunzel.

"Ah! Good afternoon you two!" She exclaimed. "We were starting to wonder if you had fallen out one of the holes in the ship during the night."

Anna sleepily yawned and let out a bit of a chuckle. "Heh... no. We just kinda slept in. We didn't really wanna sleep this long, either."

"Oh don't worry about it." Rapunzel replied. "You two needed a good night sleep."

"Yeah, but... what about you three?" Anna asked, gesturing to her and the two men. "You all need sleep too."

"That's alright." Eugene spoke up from a reclined position against some barrels. "We've been taking turns having naps. I just woke up too."

Once again, Anna was touched by the sacrifices her friends were willing to make in order to help her with this endeavour. It really was more than she could have ever hoped for.

"Thank you... all of you." Anna said with a smile. She left a brief pause before she continued. "So, what's happened recently? Anything in particular?"

"Not much, Your Majesty." Nikolaus replied this time. "There has been no sign of any ships trying to follow us, which is good news."

"And how much longer till we get to Ã…lborg?" Kristoff asked as he and Anna walked up to stand near Nikolas as the ship's wheel.

"Well... probably about twenty-four hours. Assuming the weather keeps up this nice." He replied. The weather was indeed nice. A warm spring day. Not a cloud in the sky but plenty of wind to keep them swiftly moving towards their destination.

Anna knew it took time to get all the way there. After all, it was quite a distance from Arendelle. "That's good." She answered as she leaned against the edge of the ship and looked out across the waves.

After waking up from his nap, Eugene had come up to join the others on the quarterdeck. He was still a bit sleepy and decided to take a seat next to Rapunzel, leaning against the very aft end of the ship's railing. He didn't really want to doze off again, but he realized that it would likely happen anyway. Fortunately, Kristoff started up a conversation, keeping Eugene awake.

"So... you certainly seemed to know more about ships and sailing than what I would have expected." He commented. "Nice job with the Solstice, by the way." Kristoff hadn't had a chance to properly thank Eugene for what he had done to prevent the Coronan ship from running them down. If it wasn't for his rather effective sabotaging, he would likely be back in a cell again at the moment.

"Haha, yeah..." The Prince replied. "You'd be surprised the things you learn when you spend years as an outlaw."

"How to sabotage ships was one of those things?" Kristoff asked in return.

"One of many..." Eugene replied cryptically, implying that there were a number of interesting stories to tell in that regard. All of which would be best saved for later.

"Speaking of which," Kristoff continued as he took a seat on a barrel that was sitting on the deck. "Looks like I'm now an outlaw in my own country."

"Ha! Join the club." Eugene Exclaimed, a smirk on his face. "You'll get used to it after a while."

"Yeah, my parents are not gonna be too thrilled if they hear about this..." Rapunzel added while absentmindedly fiddling with her fingers in her lap. "And I guess we're all in a bit of trouble with the Arendelle council when we get back."

Even though all of their intentions were good, Rapunzel knew that the ends did not always justify the means. Even if they came back to Arendelle with Elsa safe and sound, there would still probably be some kind of political incident when word got out of royals from Corona helping to steal an Arendellian ship... even if it was helping the queen herself.

"No we won't be." Said Anna forcefully, breaking the others from their thoughts. "Because when we get back, we will have Elsa with us again! And Tollak may think that he and the council can stand up against one queen, but not two!" She faced them all with a very confident look on her face. She was through letting the council push her around. "We'll all be cleared of any charges! Elsa and I will make sure of it!"

It was nice to hear. They all understood that legally what they had done was a crime, and that even the Queen is not above the laws set out for the kingdom, but the knowledge that Elsa and Anna would both defend them together made them all feel considerably relieved.

"Good to know." Eugene spoke up, breaking the bit of awkward silence that had followed. "There's already enough kingdoms out there that don't like me."

Rapunzel giggled and nudged Eugene in the side with her elbow. He responded by looking at her with a smile and shrugging. "What? It's true!"

Anna walked by them and headed over to Nikolaus. The lieutenant had been fairly quiet for most of the trip so far as he kept his place behind the ship's wheel. Eugene had swapped positions with him for the brief few hours when he got some shut-eye, but he was the only one who really knew what they were doing behind the wheel of such a large vessel.

As Anna approached, he broke his silence and spoke up. "So, what's the plan when we get there? What do we look for in order to find Elsa?"

"Well, if she's still alive... and I know she is... she must have found land by now." The Queen replied, slouching against the splintered and barely functional railing at the front of the quarterdeck. Her resulting posture gave her a very un-regal appearance, quite contrary to her new position.

"So I guess we'll start off by looking for land near the battle site." Nikolaus replied, trying not to laugh at Anna's somewhat exaggerated mannerisms.

"Oh!" She perked up and spun around to face him again as she remembered something. "What about the search ship that was sent out a few days ago? What was it called?" She scratched her chin in thought.

"The Aksel." Nikolaus reminded her.

"Yeah!" Anna responded. "What about them? Do you think they'll help us?"

"Well they'll certainly be surprised to see us..." Said Nikolaus as he gazed out across the Boreas' bow, wondering how the Aksel would react to having an unexpected visitor. "They will probably have a few questions too, considering the circumstances. But they don't actually know what we did. That we stole the Boreas, I mean." He clarified.

The crew of the Aksel would have no clue as to what had gone on in Arendelle for the past several days. The ship had departed almost as soon as they had returned, so they were unaware of Tollak's most recent orders, or even about Anna's rather hasty coronation. It was difficult to say how they would react when the Boreas, manned by a crew of only five people, four of them royals, came to join them.

"Hmm... What do you know about the captain?" Anna asked Nikolaus, hoping he could share some insight on the man, potentially hinting at how he would react.

"Captain Anton? He's a good man." Said Nikolaus. "Been in the navy longer than I have. I have a feeling he would be more loyal to you than Tollak or the rest of the Council. Especially after we tell him about Elsa being alive."

"You know, that's another possibility." Came a voice from behind them. It was Kristoff. He was walking towards them, offering a very good point to their conversation.

"What?" Asked Anna, not understanding what Kristoff was getting at.

"Maybe they've already found her?"

The realization wasn't anything particularly new to any of them. They all knew that there was a chance Elsa would be discovered by the Aksel, just not a very good one considering it was not their task to look for her in the first place. Get there, recover her belongings, and get out. Tollak was very specific. Still, it was a possibility. Anna honestly didn't know if it really made a difference who recovered Elsa, so long as she was, in fact, brought home.

"Well, whether they find her first or we do, it doesn't matter." She said, and then turned to face forward again. "As long as she's rescued."


It was not like the Duke of Weselton to get his hands dirty. That's why his General and bodyguard, Ghemor, was rather shocked when he insisted to come along to search the Island for their target.

"I would feel more comfortable if you remained on the ship while we search for the sorceress, Your Grace." He told him in his gruff voice.

"No." The Duke replied. "I want to be there myself when she is captured. After what she did to me the last time we had dealings... Locking me up and cutting off all trade without even letting me see her ONCE!" He remembered back to when he was thrown out of Arendelle. All of his demands to see the Queen, to possibly convince her to reverse her decision, fell on deaf ears.

"Soon, she will have no choice but to have an audience with me!"

They were searching the island for quite a long time. Many groups had been sent out to circle the shoreline while the primary group with the Duke and Ghemor searched the interior. Admiral Bronok had remained aboard the Viper with the rest of the crew, keeping the ship well hidden as close to the shore as possible between two outcroppings of rock.

The half-dozen men with the Duke were making progress though. Being a small island, there were only so many places someone could hide. But night was approaching, and the search was dragging on.

"Your Grace," The General spoke up again. "Now that the sun has gone down, I highly recommend you return to the ship for the night." It was much harder to keep the Duke safe from surprise dangers in the dark.

"I told you, I'm not..."

The sound of a twig breaking up ahead of them stopped the Duke mid sentence. The General quickly looked up in the direction of the sound as the other men surrounding them each focused their attention in that area as well. None of their own people were ahead of them, so the sound must have come from someone else.

With silent hand motions, Ghemor ordered his men to get into a defensive formation. They came into a tighter circle around him and the Duke, protecting them from whatever was stirring in the shadows of the trees.

They all slowly crept forwards, keeping their eyes mainly ahead of them, but also checking all around to make sure no one crept up from behind. No further sounds were heard ahead, but as they moved forward they eventually came to a small rock formation that was hidden by the trees.

It was hard to spot at first, but out of the darkness, Ghemor could see a peculiar pattern of colours and shapes that didn't seem to belong in the natural setting of a forest. He stared at it for a few seconds and could see that it was a set of five pairs of horizontal red stripes. They were evenly spaced, and the more he glanced at them, the more he began to make out that they were patterns on a coat. Specifically, the coat used by the officers and crew of a ship from Arendelle.

They had found them!

"Contact!" Ghemor yelled out.

As if the men surrounding them had been noticing the man hidden ahead of them as well, they all sharply turned to face him. The startled man was ready to try and jump out of the way, but the sheer numbers he was up against prevented him from doing so. One of the Weselton men raised his sword and was about to bring it down on the Arendellian crewman, leaving no choice for the defender but to try and deflect the blow with his own weapon.

The sound of metal clashing against metal rang out through the area. Just as the outnumbered man was about to deflect another blow, Captain Anton, Lieutenant Sebastian, and the other crewman on the island from the Aksel, burst out to try and even up the odds. Elsa came forward as well but was kept behind the three men.

However, as quick as the reaction was, they were too late. The man closest to the enemy was swarmed and unable to move leaving Ghemor the opportunity to fire his crossbow bolt directly into his chest.

Everyone halted their actions for a moment, leaving the man who was shot stumbling where he stood as he dropped his sword.

"No!" Anton yelled as he watched the scene unfold. Behind him, Elsa audibly gasped and brought her hands up to cover her mouth while the others watched in horror.

The man teetered for a second, and then fell forward, landing face first on the ground.

"NO!" The Arendelle captain cried again, getting ready to continue the fight against the people who had killed yet another one of his men.

"Not so fast!" The Weselton General called out before Anton could barely move a muscle. "You either all surrender now..." He loaded another bolt into his crossbow as the men around him all pointed their swords towards the four remaining people they had been searching for. "...or your Queen can share his fate!" He pointed the tip of the loaded weapon directly at Elsa's head. She was standing several feet from him, but it would be unlikely that he would miss such a shot.

Even though she had been reluctant at doing so recently, Elsa considered using her magic to get out of their current situation. She was more than capable of freezing all of them solid where they stood. Or she could have created a giant ice wall in-between the two sides. She quickly dismissed the idea however, when she realized that the bolt from that crossbow could fly a lot faster than her hands could move to take her actions.

Reluctantly, she lowered her head in a sign of defeat. Captain Anton and the others dropped their weapons to the ground to show their compliance as well. The Weselton soldiers picked up the discarded weapons and began to pull others, such as knives and pistols, from the belts of their prisoners. Several of the men cautiously approached and surrounded Elsa, their swords pointed at her. All the while, Ghemor's crossbow remained trained directly at her head.

It was only until the men had re-arranged themselves that Elsa even noticed the man who was behind all of this. The Duke of Weselton.

He was standing a few feet away from her, looking quite proud of himself. She returned his glance, attempting to show some of the disdain she was feeling towards him for what he had done, which was essentially a declaration of war. But despite her rage, fear was the emotion that played most heavily on her face. And the Duke noticed it.

"Well, well, well..." He haughtily began. "I come all this way, and take all this precaution to find you. To find the woman they say can single-handedly vanquish any opponent she goes up against... yet here you are, surrendering just like that." He slowly walked around to his left, edging closer to the surrounded Queen. "It's been a while... Your Majesty."

The way the Duke mockingly uttered Elsa's title made Sebastian want to shove those words right back down the sniveling old man's throat. He couldn't help but make a slight jerking movement towards him, but he was held in place by the men who were now restraining him, Anton, and the other Aksel crewman.

Noticing the rage in the Lieutenant's eyes, the Duke looked over to regard him. "And who are you?" He asked, his tone suggesting that he felt Sebastian was nothing more than scum in his eyes.

"I'm the Captain here." Anton spoke up before his officer had a chance to answer. "You'll talk to me!"

"Ah, I see." The Duke replied. "And you would probably be his first officer." He added as he noticed the ranks of the two men which were visibly displayed on their uniforms. He then looked at the third man. He had no rank insignias on his uniform because he was nothing more than a crewman. "And that would make you... what, exactly?"Asked the Duke.

"Leave him alone!" Anton shot back. "I said you can deal with me!"

After giving the crewman a final glance, the Duke continued. "Well then, if he's of no importance, I see no need to keep him around."

Without a word, Ghemor pointed to two of his men who reached out and grabbed the Aksel crewman by the arms. They swiftly pulled him into the darkness of the forest where a struggle could be heard for a few seconds, followed by a choking sound, then silence.

"STOP!" Elsa cried out this time. Anton and Sebastian could do nothing but watch in horror as another one of their men was killed.

"No need for unnecessary baggage." Said the Duke. "You three, however, will be of use to me." He looked back at his General as the two men who had dragged the crewman into the woods had returned. "Bind their hands!" He ordered.

The men began to tie the hands of Anton and Sebastian behind their backs, but everyone still maintained their distance from Elsa. Ghemor walked up to her as the Duke dared to lean in a little bit closer. Close enough to whisper to her as she glared back with her half-fear, half-anger filled eyes.

"As for you, my Queen, I know full well what you're capable of. So I'm afraid you'll be taking an unexpected nap for the next few hours."

Before Elsa could consider exactly what the Duke had meant by his somewhat ominous words, Ghemor had raised the butt end of his Crossbow up to head height and quickly lunged it forward.

The last thing Elsa remembered was the sight of its swift motion towards her face, and a sharp pain that brought her into the all-encompassing blackness of unconsciousness.