"Good morning, Princess Anna!"
"Couldn't ask for a more beautiful day, eh, Your Highness?"
"Have a wonderful festival, Princess Anna!"
"And a Merry Midsummer to you, Edvard! Gregory! Helga!" Anna sang back, waving as she practically danced across the bridge. The sun had not long risen above the eastern mountains, but already the day was as bright and brilliant as any she could remember. Tents and stalls that had been erected the night before were already hosting their first curious guests, out early to explore the many delights that the entire town would be enjoying in the hours to come.
It was the first Midsummer's Eve since the castle gates had opened a year ago. The holiday had always been special for her, because it had been the one time each year when she had been allowed, with full parental permission and escort, to leave the castle for a time. It had been a tradition every June for the royal family to hold a feast and a seaside bonfire as their way of thanking all those who worked within the castle walls.
This year, however, Elsa had declared that the festivities would be expanded beyond anything they'd ever been before. Indeed, they would rival those surrounding the coronation itself. After everything the kingdom had weathered since that day, Elsa had felt that a massive celebration was considerably overdue, and there hadn't been a single voice of dissent on that score.
Both the palace and the town had been festooned with brightly colored banners, streamers, and flowers. Food and drink would be made available in great abundance for all, though everyone had been cautioned to save room for the evening feast which promised to be especially lavish. There were to be games and dancing and ice skating (which had been a big hit when Elsa had first converted the courtyard into a rink last year). Anybody who failed to find something worth enjoying today had to be stubbornly determined to be unhappy. But the main event in Anna's mind – the one thing above all others that she simply could not bear to miss – was scheduled to occur shortly before the revelers were all called to dinner…
"Hoo hoo!" a familiar voice called from the stall that Anna was strolling past. "Beeg summer party today, yah?"
"Mr. Oaken!" Anna immediately changed direction and walked over to the cart that had been parked in line with the rest of the merchants along one side of the square. A colorfully painted sign up near the roof proudly declared the merchant's name: Oaken's Tokens. And below that, in smaller letters: Fine Curios, Souvenirs, & Lutefisk.
"Oh, it's all sue exciting, isn't it?" the oversized man said as he leaned on the ledge of the open shop window. "Ze whole familee has come down vit me today. They're all running aruend here somewhere, looking at everything. Of course, I'm vatching ze store. I expect to do beeg business, ya know! Ah, but I promised to make time later to dance vit my special sweetheart, so that will be gude too!"
"Aw, that's so sweet," Anna said as she perused the items displayed on the shelves before her. "And these are lovely! Did you make them all?"
Oaken's chest swelled with pride. "My son!" he declared "He's ze artist in our familee."
Anna picked up one little figurine to examine more closely. It was mostly black and white, with large ears and a tail made of string. In a fit of whimsy, the sculptor had decided to dress the curious creature in red shorts and yellow shoes. It was odd, yet strangely adorable. Setting it back down, she considered the other knickknacks also available for sale.
"Ooh!" She scooped up another figure and lifted it into the light. "Oh yes. This one's perfect!" Smiling, she extended it toward the shop's proprietor. "I'll take it."
"Ah, gude choice! Ve also offer free gift wrapping services, for your convenience."
"No, thank you," she said as they completed the exchange. "But I do hope you enjoy the festival!" Then with a wave, she was off again. There was so much still to see, and certain stops she knew she absolutely had to make.
Wending her way through the close-packed buildings near the docks and climbing a small rise, she reached a patch of green grass that had been temporarily fenced in. At the small gate in the fence, a queue of boys and girls were already lined up, all eagerly awaiting their turns. Anna walked to the opposite side, leaned on a fencepost, and watched the goings-on within.
"I never knew you were so good with children," she said coyly when it looked like her presence might go unnoticed.
Kristoff looked over in surprise, and his face did a strange little dance as it tried to decide whether to grin or scowl. Ultimately giving up on both, he shrugged. "That would be Sven, not me. All I have to do is put them on his back and give him the occasional carrot. He takes care of the rest." He patted his friend's neck as the reindeer trotted past, circling just within the fence to the delight of the brother and sister perched on his saddle.
"I think you sell yourself short," Anna teased. "I've seen the way you are with Crystal, Flint, Orel, and the rest of the trollings, you know."
"Yeah, well, they're family," Kristoff pointed out distractedly as he helped the young riders dismount.
"Oh, is that the trick? Well, if that's all it takes, then I'm sure arrangements could be made…"
Just like that, Kristoff was no longer the slightest bit distracted. "Anna!"
Straightening, she smiled coquettishly. "Anyway, I just wanted to remind you that I'll be saving you a dance later. Or two. Maybe more." Turning, she looked back over her shoulder, fluttered her eyelids, and waggled her fingers in his direction.
Then proceeded to grab frantically onto the fence as, with her first step, her foot hit a slippery spot and nearly flew out from under her. As she pulled herself upright again and tried to restore some measure of dignity, she heard the tittering of the children, amused by her near spill. But that was fine, and she smiled easily at them before she headed back down the small hillock. Their laughter didn't bother her at all.
Especially because she was nearly positive that the snickering sound Sven was still making had begun just a second or two before her misstep. And she was also pretty sure that it'd had something to do with the expression she'd just managed to glimpse on Kristoff's face.
Once again, she threaded her way between the shops and storefronts, stopping briefly to peer into a window here and there to admire the wares for sale. She didn't linger long, though, and was soon walking back through the increasingly busy plaza. Here, her progress slowed considerably since she couldn't seem to walk two steps without someone calling out to her in greeting. These days, it seemed like she knew everyone and everyone knew her. And it was wonderful!
She remembered one of her escapes into town through Bolli's tunnel when she had been younger, and how she'd been left feeling isolated and alone even as she'd sat amid the bustling activity at dockside. Everyone had been a stranger to her then, and she'd known so little about their lives. Despite how much she had wanted to strike up a conversation with each and every one of them, she'd simply had no idea where even to begin because theirs lives and hers seemed so completely different.
But oh, how times had changed! No longer did she feel like she was caught hopelessly in-between the palace and the people. They'd all been through so much together that it was impossible to deny just how intertwined their worlds had become. Now she could chat with them about their families, their businesses, their hopes for the future. Children routinely asked her to repeat their favorite parts of The Story, and she would always oblige them whenever she could. Today, though, there were too many other things for the young ones to see, and it was usually an insistent tug on a parent's hand that ended most of the conversations she found herself drawn into.
Eventually, she made her way through the press and back to the bridge, slightly out of breath but thoroughly exhilarated. Pausing for a moment, she surveyed the milling crowd from a position no longer in their midst, and she smiled. These were her people. She was their princess. Elsa was their queen, and she was her sister. The moment was so close to perfect, it was almost heartbreaking. And yet, Anna had the inescapable feeling that the day was still holding on to something even better.
Hurrying back across the bridge, Anna bounded into the courtyard, spinning merrily to grin at the door guards as they saluted. She did not stay to talk, however, for she was still clutching her purchase from Oaken's, and she was growing increasingly eager to deliver it to one of the people whom she suspected would be responsible for several more of the day's nearly-perfect moments.
At the other side of the courtyard, built up just before the palace doors, a performance stage had been erected. Actors, jugglers, storytellers, and artists of all sorts would be using it off and on throughout the morning and into the afternoon. But that evening, just before the feast, a concert had been scheduled to showcase any and all local musicians with both the talent and the courage necessary to entertain what by then would surely be a huge and enthusiastic crowd. And the headline performer at that show – who just happened to be at the foot of the stage right now listening to the first act warm up for the opening set of the day – was none other than…
"Marie!"
The brunette's head turned at the sound of her name, and she beamed at the sight of her dear friend hurrying over to join her. "'Allo, Anna," she said. Ten years living in the French capital had added a light, pleasant accent to her voice – one that Anna still continued to be slightly surprised by every time she heard it. "You certainly were out early. We only got down here ourselves but a minute ago."
The other part of that 'we' added his own smile to the ones surrounding him. "I'm surprised Kai didn't have to knock on her door to wake her up. As I heard tell, she would have slept through Coronation Day if not for his services."
"Don't listen to him, Marie," Anna chided. "He doesn't know what he's talking about."
"Oh, don't I? Well then, I'm sure Kai has to be around here somewhere. No doubt he'll set me straight. Oy, Kai! Hey, has anybody seen Kai?"
"Shh! Just you be quiet, Josef Mikkelsen!"
His grin grew wider. "Is that a royal order, Your Highness?"
She glared at him with no real anger as she complained to Marie, "Nine years now and I still can't get him to just call me Anna."
"Well, he's a bit bashful that way," Marie replied with a knowing wink.
"Josef? Bashful?" Anna shook her head in disbelief. "I'll grant you that there was a time when he would barely say a word if he could help it, but he's not that same man anymore. You should have seen him fighting off those soldiers while we were escaping the castle!"
"I wish I could have." Marie craned around just in time to see an elbow come up to cover an all-too-conveniently-timed coughing fit. Since her return, Josef had volunteered to be her escort as often as his duties had allowed, but despite her prodding, he hadn't talked much about his role in the resistance, his time in the dungeons, or the part he had played during the escape. She didn't get the impression that his silence was a product of the events being too painfully traumatic or anything. Rather, it seemed to her that he simply didn't feel his contributions had been worthy of all that much discussion. From what she'd heard from others, she would have disagreed, but she was content to let him keep his modesty. She actually found it rather endearing.
"Hmph. Looks like we might have an audience after all!"
"Didn't I tell you?" Anna said brightly to the newcomer who was looking down at them from the front of the stage. Well, more like looking straight across at them, actually. Either way, it was certainly true that a respectably large group of curious townsfolk had now begun to gather in the courtyard. "Though I will admit, I was surprised when Kristoff brought in your application to perform today, Rohl!"
He gave an indifferent grunt. "What can I say? After he told the rest of his clan how we met in the caves, everybody suddenly wanted to hear more of our northern songs. Ended up starting something of a craze, particularly among the younger generation." He jerked his head over his shoulder at the three other trolls who were noodling on a set of reed pipes, running through a few quick drum cadences, and tuning an odd-looking three-stringed instrument. To Anna's eyes at least, they all appeared to be older adolescents. At least the way they had grown out their grassy hair so that it hung down their backs seemed to hint at that typically rebellious age.
"Ordinarily, we prefer to keep to ourselves, of course," Rohl went on. "But when I told the tales of my various explorations and asked why this clan didn't have a scouting corps, I guess that started quite a few others thinking, too. Considering the part I played during the liberation, a lot more humans are aware of us now than before. And there are some in the clan, young and old alike, who feel that we've stayed hidden long enough. So as a first step, Grand Pabbie agreed that this little artistic exchange might not be the worst of ideas."
"Well I, for one, can't wait to hear something completely new," Marie declared eagerly. "I've always found listening to music from other cultures to be absolutely fascinating."
"Fascinating might be expecting a bit much," Rohl cautioned, "but we'll do our best to keep you entertained." Then, responding to a shout from one of the other band members, he looked back over his shoulder.
"Yeah, okay. I'll be right there," he called. "Sorry, but they're a bit nervous, what with this being the first time they've played in front of a crowd and all. They want to go over the song list one last time. I'll catch up with you all again later, right?"
"Absolutely," Anna agreed as Rohl turned away and shambled off. But the sight of his retreating back as he went to prepare for his set actually served to jog a memory that had temporarily slipped her mind.
"By the way, Marie," she said, "I wanted to tell you how much I'm looking forward to hearing you perform this evening, and I really hope that you do well. But I know that some believe you shouldn't wish somebody good luck before they go on stage, so I thought maybe I could do something a little different instead."
The entire time they had been talking, Anna had kept her hands hidden behind her back. Now she swung them around and, with a little bow, presented her gift in dramatic fashion. She knew she had chosen well when Marie gasped, then reached out and gingerly picked up the small statue with the greatest of care.
She ran a finger along the finely sculpted line of the horse's back, traced the curve of its flowing tail, and then delicately scratched the underside of its chin with one fingernail. Though the wooden sculpture was clearly intended to be sturdy enough to amuse a child, it was no caricature like the other trinket Anna had examined. The horse had been captured mid-canter, and while the paint was simple, it had been carefully applied and helped to add an additional layer of realism.
"Oh, Anna!" Marie breathed. "It's beautiful!"
"I'm so glad you like it. Happy Midsummer's Eve!"
'Thank you! Thank you so much!"
Josef looked ready to add a comment of his own, but another voice interrupted him and drew all their attention.
"Anna, there you are! I've been looking all over for you. I thought I'd catch you in your room before you got up this morning."
A stifled laugh from the stablemaster was even more forcefully curtailed by a petite elbow driven pointedly into his thigh.
"Sorry, Elsa." Anna did her best not to look at the smirk that Josef still couldn't quite hide. "What is it? Did we miss something in the preparations? It's early enough that we might still be able to..."
"No, no, nothing like that," Elsa said, entering their little circle and greeting both Marie and Josef with a smile and a nod. "As far as I know, everything's running perfectly. I just… Well, I was kind of hoping to give you your Midsummer's present."
"Ooh! I've got yours in my room. Let me go grab it and then we can exchange…"
"Actually," and Elsa looked slightly embarrassed or maybe just nervous, "I was hoping I could give you mine first. That is, if you don't mind."
Surprised but curious, Anna saw no reason to argue. "Okay. So… What is it?" Then, seeing that Elsa's hands were empty, she amended her question to, "Where is it?"
"Um, I can't really bring it to you," Elsa answered in an oddly evasive sort of way. "But I can take you to it right now, if you'd like. And if Marie and Josef wouldn't mind."
"By all means!" Marie consented easily, then added with a smile, "So long as you have her back in time for the concert, of course."
"You know I wouldn't miss that for anything, Marie." Bending down, Anna gave her friend a quick kiss on each cheek, adopting the French custom that Marie had explained to her. Then with a smile of her own and a wave for Josef, she followed Elsa around the stage toward the palace.
As they turned the corner, Anna heard the Master of Ceremonies clear his throat to get the crowd's attention. "Ladies and gentlemen," his voice rang out. "Our first act of the day is certainly unlike anything Arendelle has seen in generations, and they've come down from the mountains today to charm us with a mix of both traditional and more recent material, though I suspect it will all be quite new to us. So please give a warm welcome to our very special guests… the Trolling Stones!"
Anna experienced a twinge of regret for having to miss Rohl's debut performance, but her curiosity had been well and truly roused by all of Elsa's cryptic non-answers. "So, where exactly are we going?" she asked, trying hard not to sound too eager.
"About that," Elsa said, her eyes now alight with an excitement all her own. "You might need to change your clothes…"
• • •
"Elsa, what are we doing here?" She had to raise her voice to be heard over the stiff wind.
"I already told you. We missed celebrating your birthday this year because of all the chaos, so I wanted to get you something extra special for Midsummer's Eve!"
"Yeah, but are you sure you couldn't have given it to me back at the castle?"
Anna looked up at the towering crystalline facade that climbed skyward above them, and felt like she'd been transported back in time to the previous July, the last time she had been forced to wear mittens and a heavy cloak during the warmest months of the year. Two hours ago, she'd been running about in one of the light dresses she always favored in spring and summer. But here, the North Mountain was as cold and snow-covered as ever while she stood, shivered, and watched Elsa knock three times on the palace's enormous front doors.
It was only a matter of seconds before the two giant slabs of ice swung inward, but their way was hardly less impeded. The entrance was filled by two white columns thicker than most tree trunks, which nevertheless seemed too small to support the massive snowball balanced atop them.
"Hello, Marshmallow!" Anna called out. Somehow, it always felt like she needed to shout just a little for her voice to reach all the way up to where the giant's ears ought to be. Hollow eyes blinked down at her for a moment until recognition finally dawned, and then a broad smile split his snowy face.
"Ah-na," he said in his slow, deep voice. "El-sah. Come." He stepped back and gestured them in with a wave of an arm that could easily have capsized any of the smaller boats in Arendelle's harbor.
Anna first entrance into the palace's main foyer had filled her with awe and wonder, and that sensation had barely been diminished despite her many subsequent visits. Every time was a new experience. Depending on the hour of day and the angle of the sun, the entire room could change. The light filtering through the walls would shift their colors from the deepest of purples to fiery oranges and golden yellows. Reflections and refractions made her feel like she was standing in the center of a giant prism. If she hadn't been so impatient to get back down to the revelries, she could have been quite content to just sit and watch the room evolve with the passing hours.
"Where is Skadi, Marshmallow?" Elsa asked, drawing Anna's attention back to their host. One of his icy fingers, nearly as big as Anna herself, pointed to the sweeping staircase that led to the upper floor. Smiling her thanks, Elsa grabbed her sister's hand and proceeded to half-lead, half-pull her up the stairs.
"What kind of present is this, exactly?" Anna asked, trying hard not to get her foot caught in one of the gaps between steps.
"A special one, like I said," Elsa replied mischievously. "Don't worry. You'll find out soon enough."
They practically burst though the open archway into the second-floor overlook, Anna stumbling to a halt when Elsa finally ceased her headlong rush. The room was much the same as Anna remembered it from the first time she'd been here, except for the addition of an ornately decorated chair in the middle of the floor. It appeared to rise straight out of the ice and yet, in defiance of all mechanical conventions, now rotated to face the two guests.
"Hello," said Skadi, smiling serenely as she stroked the feathers of a small snow bunting that was perched on the side of her hand. She raised an eyebrow at Elsa. "Today is the day then?"
"It is," Elsa agreed, nodding energetically, "if you're ready and still willing."
Anna's head swiveled back and forth between the other two women. "What day?" she asked. She could appreciate a good surprise as much as anyone, but this was getting a mite ridiculous. "Ready for what?"
As Skadi rose to her feet and, with a little toss of her hand, sent the bird fluttering over to a nearby perch, Elsa turned to look her sister straight on. "It's the day you've been waiting for since you were five years old, Anna, even if you didn't always know it," she said with a twinkle in her eye. "And it's something that I never could have given you before."
"Elsa?" Anna felt a cautious excitement growing, but the cautious part was making her nervous. Elsa's warm smile helped, but she was still more than ready for this teasing to end.
"I've spoken with Skadi," Elsa explained, "and she's agreed to restore your memories, just like we'd asked Grand Pabbie to do. You'll be able to remember things the way they really happened! All our games in the snow, all the fun we had together… We'll be able to share them properly again, just like you wanted!"
There was a beat where Anna simply continued to stare at her sister. Then her hands flew to her mouth. "Oh, Elsa," she said, the words mitten-muffled. "Elsa, you didn't have to do that!"
"Maybe not." Elsa reached up and pulled Anna's hands away from her face, holding them both in her own. "But I wanted to. I know it's been bothering you ever since you found out the truth about what happened, and now we finally have the chance to make things right. After all this time, we can… Anna? What's wrong?"
Anna's head was shaking back and forth and, for some strange reason, her face wore an expression of acute embarrassment and guilt. "I'm sorry," she squeaked. "I should have told you. I tried to tell you before when we were in Skadi's castle, but then she started talking about you taking away her memories, and there was that whole business with you holding in magic when you shouldn't have been, and then you having to decide whether to stay there or come back here, and then we invited Skadi to come with us instead, and then you had your lessons, and Ragnarr, and one thing after another and…"
"It's okay, Anna," Elsa said. She almost laughed because Anna's distress over having simply forgotten to tell her something was reaching nearly comical proportions. "It's fine. Whatever it is, you can just tell me now."
Anna dropped her head and bit her lip before she sheepishly raised her eyes. "When I said you didn't have to do this, I really meant that you didn't have to do this. Because… well… you kinda… sorta… already did."
Elsa blinked. Then she blinked again. "Wait, what?"
"Remember when you restored my memories, the ones that Skadi took from me? I told you afterward that I remembered everything. Everything, Elsa! I remember that time I fell from the old oak tree and you caught me with a huge pile of snow. I remember when you used to freeze poor Prof. Engelstad's tea and Nanny's big… erm, well… I… I remember that night in the Great Hall! I remember sliding around on the floor after you covered it with ice. I remember building our little snowman together. I remember the tickle bumps, and jumping from one snow pile to the next, and… and I remember… well… everything.
"Please don't be upset with me," she finished meekly.
"Upset? Upset!" Elsa launched herself forward and wrapped Anna tightly in her arms. "Anna, I'm not upset. I'm just so happy for you!" Anna practically melted into the embrace, returning it with one of her own. Then, Elsa felt her sister's body shaking. "Anna? Anna, why are you crying?"
"I'm not crying, silly," she said, playfully slapping Elsa's shoulder. "I'm laughing!"
"Oh. Care to let me in on the joke?"
"It's just that you were so determined to give me a special present for Midsummer's Eve because you missed my birthday, right? Except that you didn't! You actually gave me the best present ever, on my birthday! Give or take a couple of days maybe, but I don't think anybody was really counting."
Elsa couldn't help but chuckle herself. "I guess I did. But that leaves us with a bit of a problem."
Anna withdrew just far enough to give her a questioning look. "We do?"
"I'm afraid so. Because now I don't have anything to give you for Midsummer's Eve."
"Ahem. If I may?" The two both turned as Skadi's voice broke into their conversation. "I believe that I might be able to help you there."
Elsa and Anna exchanged bewildered glances. "Um, you can?" asked Elsa uncertainly.
Skadi nodded. "Or, if you wish to be entirely accurate, I am hopeful that we can." And before either of the girls could question the choice of pronoun, she had already lifted a hand. A small gesture was all it took for the balcony doors to swing open, and through them stepped a slender figure whose snow-white face they both recognized immediately.
"Elsa?" Anna whispered, gripping her sister's arm for reassurance. Elsa was shaking her head.
"No," she murmured. "No, it can't be."
"Anna!" Elsa's voice rang out from a completely different mouth. "You have no idea how long I've wanted to meet you face to face. Although really, I suppose you could say I've already known you your entire life."
Suddenly, a suspicion kindled within Anna's mind. "Elsa, is that…?"
But her sister was already taking a step forward, her face aglow with utter amazement. Hesitantly, she held out a trembling hand.
"Fare?"
The snow figure that looked so very much like Elsa – with the exception of its odd, upswept hair style – smiled. "I hope you don't mind," she said, indicating her entire body with a broad wave of both arms, "but this is the way you always saw me. Now it's become the way I see myself."
"Fare!"
Elsa bolted forward and grabbed the other's shoulders. Her eyes were busily tracing every familiar line while she marveled at what, to her, was quite literally a dream come to life. "How? How is this possible?"
"It is possible," Skadi answered, "because of you, Elsa."
Reluctantly, Elsa tore her eyes away from her other self to look at Skadi. "Because of me? I don't understand."
Skadi smiled indulgently. Then her eyes shifted to a spot about two paces to her right. Elsa and Anna watched as a chiseled form rose up from the floor, much like others had done from the palace courtyard months before. It was a snow soldier, and it stood now at rigid attention.
"We have each seen the other's creations," Skadi said, beginning to walk slowly around the immobile figure, "and I'm sure you've noticed that yours and mine are quite different."
Elsa nodded. "Yours are much better. They're far more detailed and realistic than anything I've ever been able to make."
"And you think that makes them better?" Skadi asked in precisely the same tone that their old tutor, Prof. Engelstad, had always used when one of his students said something that played directly into the lesson he was preparing to teach. "Did you notice nothing else?" Elsa, looking confused, tried to grasp whatever point it was that Skadi was attempting to make.
"Yours never talked," piped up Anna a bit timidly.
"Yes!" Skadi agreed, pointing at Anna as though she was suddenly the star pupil. "They never talked. They never smiled. They never joked or laughed or cried. They never did anything except what I commanded them to do. They were merely puppets – extra arms and legs, nothing more.
"But you, Elsa. Olaf and Marshmallow could do all of those things. Even the bear, Polla, was able to do more on her own than anything I ever created. I gave snow form, but you gave it life!"
"I didn't mean to!" Elsa exclaimed a touch defensively. "At least, not at first. I didn't even know what I was doing. I just… did it."
"Exactly. Without any training and with no hesitation, you were able to perform this miraculous feat. And do you have any guess as to why you were able to so easily do what I could not?" Elsa shook her head. "Does the figure beside you not give you any clues?"
Fare was still smiling when Elsa turned to look at her again. Elsa tried to think, tried to puzzle through this riddle, but her mind just kept coming back to the same thought over and over again. Fare! She's here! She's real!
"Do you remember the first time we met?" asked Fare. "I do. I was… well, I was a bit of a jerk, to use a polite word for it. I was really quite awful. I mocked and belittled you without any concern for how it might make you feel. In fact, I was trying to hurt you. I wanted to make you angry. Angry enough that you would be able to push past the block you'd reached with your magic. It was a stupid thing to do, but I was so young then. We both were. Neither of us is the same person now. Thank goodness, right?" She laughed.
And Anna gasped.
"I believe your sister has guessed the secret," said Skadi, her smile growing wide enough to encompass them all. "Would you mind sharing, Anna?"
"Memories," Anna said with breathless awe. "When Olaf and I were traveling north with Skadi, there were several times that I wondered how he knew certain things, things he'd never experienced for himself. When Kristoff and I first met him, he knew you by name, Elsa, even though you had left before he could ever have met you. And he remembered liking warm hugs, just like when we built him that night in the Great Hall! And he knew how to talk and everything, though there obviously hadn't been anybody there to teach him. Elsa, you had to have given him those memories!"
"Whereas for me," Skadi admitted, "memories were something I simply wanted to be rid of. I hated them, almost feared them, and dedicated centuries of my life to finding some way to eradicate them. They were a curse, not something to be shared or given to another as a gift. Never would I have imparted them to one of my creations. The very idea would have seemed ridiculous to me.
"But then, I spent those weeks traveling with Anna and Olaf, and I marveled at his behavior. To him, every new experience was exciting and wonderful, every new day a chance to have an adventure. His memories, those you gave him and those he had made, did not hold him back. They gave him the ability to do amazing things, like making friends and becoming part of your family.
"When you lost him, I struggled to understand your grief at first. I always saw my creations as disposable. If one fell, another could take its place, and nothing significant would have changed or been lost. I was so unused to the notion that they could ever be anything more than that, even though I had come to recognize that Olaf was different during the short time I had known him.
"I have had time to reflect since then, and I have spent months living here with Marshmallow as well. Though his memories are very different from Olaf's, they still make him extraordinary. He is possessed of a loyalty and a fierce devotion that will drive him to greater feats of courage than anything my soldiers have ever done. He has an imagination and a kind heart. I have never met anyone who treats my animal friends with as much tenderness as he has shown to them.
"So it was that, after much consideration, I finally decided to see if I could follow your example. I even had the perfect set of memories available to me." She turned her smile upon Fare. "I was overjoyed to find that, even after having lived as long as I have, there are still new things in this world that I can learn."
Anna, who had remained standing away from the others during this entire exchange, now moved forward. With a curious tilt of her head, she considered Fare's face, so very much like her sister's. Fare abided her inspection without comment until Anna, with one quizzically cocked eyebrow, spoke.
"So you used to live inside Elsa's head?"
Fare nodded.
"What… What was it like?"
Fare gave the question serious thought before answering. "Comfortable," she said. "Very organized, except when it wasn't. Familiar, yet always with something new to explore. Warm." (This caused Anna to giggle.) "Full of love. And joy. And fear, sadness, anger. But also full of you, Anna, and your parents, and the friends that you shared." Fare shrugged.
"In short, I suppose it felt like home."
Anna looked to Elsa and grinned. "I like this present."
"Oh, I'm not the present," Fare corrected. "That isn't quite ready yet, though hopefully it will be soon. But we're going to need help." Her eyes flicked over to Elsa. "From both of you."
Elsa looked startled. Clearly, this had not been a part of whatever discussions she'd had with Skadi earlier. "Umm," she managed, "what exactly do you have in mind?"
"Well, you've met one old friend today that you never expected to see again. We thought maybe you might like to try for two."
Skadi came and stood beside Fare. "Now that I've had some experience with the techniques involved, I believe it may be possible to help you bring back Olaf."
On its perch, the snow bunting chirruped. It was the only sound in the room.
"That's… not possible." Elsa looked back and forth between Fare & Skadi. "Is it? I mean, creating him once was one thing, but bringing him back? Neither of us has ever done anything like that. And even if I did give him his original memories, he made so many on his own afterward. Those would be gone forever, wouldn't they?"
"Perhaps," Skadi replied carefully, "but perhaps not. Memories he made while he was by himself might be lost, certainly. But his mind was a gift from you, Elsa, and I feel certain that means it would have worked much like yours as well. A mortal mind forgets, and so would his. I doubt that a few gaps here and there will even be noticed, especially when something tells me his most important memories were the ones he shared. He spent most of his time with his friends, did he not? Memories made together are only lost when all have forgotten them. And there are few who know better how to walk among the dim paths of the past than the two of us."
"I know your mind, Elsa," said Fare. "I grew up in it! I'm certain I can find every recollection of Olaf you have – even ones you can no longer recall on your own."
"My centuries of study should do for me what familiarity will do for Fare," Skadi said to Anna. "And I have visited your mind on several occasions. Allow what I do now to help atone for what I did then."
The royal sisters looked at each other, both equally uncertain. Yet when their eyes met, an unspoken agreement passed between them in an instant.
"For Olaf?" asked Elsa.
Anna nodded. "For Olaf."
"Well then," Elsa said, turning back to Skadi, "what do you need us to do?"
Soon, they stood facing each other, an arm's length apart. Between them, but each off to one side, stood Fare and Skadi. "All you need to do," Fare was saying, "is think about Olaf. Try to remember everything that you can, even things that you just happened to experience together. That should make it easier for us to find where other memories might be hiding. When we give the word, Elsa, it will be up to you to channel the magic to reform his body. We will assist in adding the memories to the flow."
"One word of warning, however," Skadi added. "All of the memories will have to be brought together before they can become Olaf again. And because we will all be connected by the magic, that means that you may find yourselves seeing certain things from a perspective that is not your own. This is nothing to be concerned about. They will merely be glimpses of another's memories briefly passing through your mind on their way to their final destination. Try not to let them frighten you. It is more important that you continue to focus on Olaf. Understand?"
Anna and Elsa both nodded. Satisfied, Skadi looked across the gap between them. "Ready?" she asked Fare. "Then let us begin."
Anna felt the pressure of ice cold fingertips upon both of her temples, and the shock of it startled her. It was difficult to decide whose were colder. She saw Skadi and Fare touching Elsa's face as well, saw Elsa close her eyes, and then remembered the instructions she'd been given. Closing her own, she began the hunt for every moment that she could remember spending with Olaf.
Images of the little snowman immediately began to flash before her mind's eye. His dejected face as he reattached the broken stub of his nose. His pride when she'd told him of the vital role he would play in their mission to retake Arendelle. His excitement as he'd floated in mid-air while Elsa had performed her exercises under Skadi's supervision. His gloom when considering the possibility that Elsa might stay with the Snow Queen, breaking up their little family.
She remembered his steadfast loyalty and friendship that had sustained her during their journey north, and the look of shock and betrayal on his face when she, having lost all memory of him, had knocked him from Skadi's sled. She remembered watching the aurora with him, so much brighter and more captivating closer to the pole, and the wonder that had filled his wide eyes. She saw him sitting by the fire that Skadi had kindled in the middle of the wilderness, trying to find the perfect spot where he could enjoy the heat that he loved so much without melting away to a puddle.
Suddenly, a different image leapt into her mind. Olaf, suspended in mid-air, abruptly engulfed by flames. She gasped and tried to recoil.
"Steady," a voice said to her, though she wasn't immediately certain who it belonged to or even whether it had bothered passing through her ears on its way to her. "We are not done yet. You must continue to focus." Shaken but reminded of the part she needed to play, Anna forced her mind back to the task at hand.
Olaf, sitting beside her in Skadi's sled, recounting the events that had happened to him after he'd first been created. Falling over a frozen waterfall, trying to play tag with the frightened woodland animals, wandering around aimlessly until his path had finally crossed her own. Then she heard echoes of him naming Skadi's polar bear companions – Bernie and Barney – simply because he wanted to make friends with them and you couldn't very well be friends with someone if you didn't even know their name. She saw him charging around the corner of the castle upon Polla's back, wildly out of control but barely even concerned by it.
There he was, walking around the palace gardens under his own little snow cloud as the autumn leaves blew about and kept trying to stick to him. Several briefly caught in his "hair" while one managed to impale itself upon his nose. Next, he was having his first taste of ice cream. Even though he didn't need to eat, that didn't always stop him from wanting a taste anyway. He nearly fell off his stool when the spoonful of sweetness slipped into his mouth. Now he was running around the streets of the dockside market district, thrilled beyond words to be playing a game of hide-and-seek with the neighborhood children. And here he came gliding up behind her and giving her a little push to keep her from falling as Elsa directed her in her first skating lesson.
Olaf using an icicle as a spyglass to declare the return of Kristoff, the pungent reindeer king. Olaf being blown away by a sudden gale-force gust of wind just as the two of them had managed to reach the frozen surface of the fjord. Olaf looking stricken and completely lost as a tormented Elsa clung to…
Again, the sudden appearance of such a foreign and horrifying memory caused Anna's focus to falter, but this time, she forced herself to move past it without any outside prompting. Think, Anna. Think! she exhorted herself. Remember!
The race back to the palace from the troll's hollow, with Olaf wanting to know who this Hans person was. The trolls' celebration at Kristoff's return with which Olaf had energetically joined despite having been convinced minutes earlier that Kristoff had to be crazy to have brought them to a valley full of rocks. Their flight from Marshmallow, in which Olaf had tried bravely but futilely to deter his hulking little brother. Her conversation with Elsa at the Ice Palace, into the middle of which Olaf had cheerfully inserted himself after having waited the precise minute that Anna had specified.
Olaf beside Anna at the bottom of the stairs, as seen through Elsa's eyes. The shock, the marvel, and a surge of immense fondness for the last night of childhood happiness that Anna and Elsa had ever spent together. A brief flash of Olaf as seen from behind and, beyond him, the tiny form of a five-year-old girl giggling with pure joy. Eight words that echoed inside her mind in two distinct voices. Hi, I'm Olaf, and…
"Now, Elsa!"
Anna's eyes flew open. In the small space between the four women, magic was already swirling. Sparkling motes of blue and glistening flakes of white twisted and danced together, spinning faster and faster until the two became indistinguishable. In through the open balcony window, borne aloft by the paper-thin layer of ice that encased them, flew several black stones and a handful of small sticks. Darting between their legs, these joined the miniature whirlwind. In the heart of the tempest, discernible shapes began to form and grow. Not daring to breathe, Anna watched, waited, and silently prayed with all her heart.
She wondered if, with a goddess standing right beside her, her prayers would have a better chance of being heard.
With a sound like a sigh, the winds died away. The figure that was left standing before them looked right, as far as Anna could see. All the parts appeared to be the correct size and shape. But then, that had never been the troublesome part. What really mattered was all that lay hidden inside: everything that had made Olaf… Olaf.
The next few seconds seemed to stretch on for hours.
The snow suddenly shook. The head tipped back, then began to slowly turn. Feet shuffled beneath the body as the turn continued. Wide, dark eyes looked up at the four faces that stared back down at him with intent interest. After completing one entire circuit, the snowman stopped, again facing Elsa.
"What?" said a familiar voice. "What are you all looking at? Do I have something on my face?" Twiggy arms reached to pat chin, cheeks, forehead, and…
There was a sudden gasp. "My nose!" Pushing through the gap between Skadi and Anna, the little figure hurried over to a stretch of wall so smooth and perfect, it could be used in a pinch as a makeshift mirror. Fingers poked at the spot just below the eyes where something was decidedly not. "Where's my nose?" Turning around, he looked toward Anna. "I can still get a new one, can't I?"
"Don't you remember what happened to your nose?" Anna asked cautiously.
"No."
Anna exchanged a nervous look with Elsa.
"I mean, I remember it broke when I used it to unlock the last cell in the dungeon, but I have no idea where it got to after that." Gingerly, he again fingered the place where his nose should have been. "I miss it," he said sadly.
"And," Anna prodded, "do you remember who we are?"
The look he gave her was exactly the same as the one he'd worn when they'd both first entered the Valley of Living Rock with Kristoff. "Why? Don't you know?"
"Please, just… humor me, okay?"
Slowly, as if worried that any sudden moves might spook her, he nodded. "O-o-okay. Well, you're Anna, Anna. And that's Elsa. And that's Grandma Skadi. And you are…" He stopped. Then tilted his head to one side. Then squinted.
"You look… really… familiar," he said, "but I don't think we've met. I should probably introduce myself. Hi, I'm Olaf, and I like warm hugs!"
The next second, the little snowman found himself on the receiving end of two of the warmest hugs anybody could ever have wished for.
"Whoa, hey! Aw… I love you guys, too! But maybe you ought to tone it down a little in front of, you know, the new girl?"
Down in the foyer, Marshmallow lifted his head in curious surprise as the crystalline walls of the palace rang with the sound of four voices joined in jubilant laughter.
Back upstairs, Elsa was radiant with joy. "Thank you, Skadi, Fare!" she enthused. "Thank you so much. This is… Well, it's unbelievable."
"Ooh, so you're Fare?" Olaf asked, picking up on the name and considering the woman again in light of this new information. "You're a lot more real than I imagined."
"Thank you. Truth be told, I'm considerably more real than I imagined as well."
"Okay," Anna exclaimed, "now you two just have to come back with us to the festival! As our personal guests, of course. It's the least we can do after this. We'll show you everything! There'll be singing and dancing and all kinds of food and fun! I know you'll enjoy it."
"No, I think not," Skadi said, although she offered a kind smile in return. "I am afraid my time alone in the north has left me rather partial to quiet days spent at home. All those crowds." She shook her head. "Perhaps another time, when I have had more of a chance to grow accustomed to people, and the people have grown a little more accustomed to the idea of me.
"But you should not let that stop you!"
Fare started, then looked at Skadi. "But..."
"I saw that wistful look on your face, girl. And I know how much time you spent inside Elsa's head, sharing her dream of someday roaming beyond the confines of her room, even as she feared to leave it. Now you have the chance to go wherever you will. Do not squander it on my account."
"But it's the middle of June," Fare protested. "It's cold up here on the mountain, but down there in Arendelle..."
"And here I thought you were the one with such a talent for remembering things," Elsa laughed. With two waves of her hand, undersized snow clouds appeared above both Fare's head and Olaf's.
"Oh, oh, look!" Olaf said, jumping from foot to foot and pointing. "We're flurry buddies!"
"But won't I make people, I don't know, nervous?" Fare asked.
"After Olaf and Polla, eternal winters, rock trolls, backstabbing foreign princes, invading grand-kings, and ancient goddesses of winter?" Anna dismissed the idea with a wave of her hand and a reassuring grin. "I doubt they'll even notice."
"So it's settled then," Elsa said in a queenly tone that brooked no argument. "And we really had better get going if we don't want to miss all the very best that Arendelle has to offer!"
"Yay! We're going to a party!" shouted Olaf as he skipped out of the room on his way to the staircase. "Can Marshmallow come too?"
Elsa and Anna exchanged worried looks. "Well..." Elsa began.
"He has been stuck up here for an entire year," Anna pointed out. "And you know the children would love him."
"Alright, fine," Elsa relented. "At least nobody will be able to throw snowballs at him this time of year."
A short while later, the two sisters and their three snowy friends were descending the stairs from the palace. Anna and Elsa were lagging slightly behind, while Olaf was chatting animatedly with both Fare and Marshmallow.
"So this time, I think I'm going to pick one that's a little more sophisticated," he said, gesturing to the middle of his face. "One that makes me look dashing and debonair. One that says, 'This is a snowman who knows how to buckle his swashes!' That is, if I wore swashes. Or pants."
Then abruptly, in the middle of the stairs, Anna stopped dead in her tracks. She was wearing the strangest expression on her face.
"Anna?" Elsa asked, a little concerned.
"I just realized something," Anna said. "We finally did it!"
Elsa's mouth quirked into a sideways smile. "We've done a lot of things lately. You're going to need to be a little more specific."
"Don't you see, Elsa? After all these years, we finally did it! Together!" She grabbed her sister by the shoulder and turned her to face the bottom of the stairs, where Olaf was continuing to expound on his plans for a new nose. Wrapping her hands around her sister's arm, she pulled herself close to Elsa's side. "We did it," she said again with a contented squeeze and a huge grin that could easily have belonged to her five-year-old self.
"We finally built a snowman!"
~ THE END ~
AFTERWORD:
I feel like you should know that this was not the story I originally set out to write. I can say this with some certainty because, when I first embarked upon Echoes of Falling Snow, I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.
Okay, so maybe that's not entirely true. I had a few, very basic ideas that I knew I wanted to explore. But I certainly had not planned for this to turn into a sprawling, multivolumed, cross-generational epic. It literally became one of those stories that grew in the telling. And while I did intentionally begin dropping seeds for things to come as I started to get some sense of where the whole business was heading, a lot of the moments that might have appeared to be the result of carefully thought out, long-term planning were actually just me remembering things I'd casually thrown in earlier and then stumbling upon serendipitous ways to call back to them. It's more than a little humbling to consider the amount of sheer good luck that's allowed this entire story to hold together as well as it has.
So now here we are, nearly three years and three-quarters of a million words down the road from where we began, and you can at last see for yourselves how all the pieces have come together – even if some were still moving around up until the very last minute. Heaven knows it wasn't perfectly told. I certainly recognize that I'm a much different writer now than I was when I started. I'd like to think that different might mean better, but that's ultimately something my readers will have to judge for themselves. All I can honestly say is that, as a chronic perfectionist, I always worked hard to deliver the very best story that I could, even if I rarely felt that any of it was actually good enough.
While I chose to split this saga into three books, it could easily have been more like six or seven based on the word count of a typical fantasy novel. I'm frankly flabbergasted that I managed to write that much, but I suspect this probably means that I won't be going back and attempting to tackle Book 3 any time soon. I simply don't feel like I have that much left in the tank after all this. Plus, after everything I've put them through, I don't know that I could continue to torture these poor girls like that, especially during what would probably be their absolute darkest times following their parents' deaths. And on top of it all, I really don't have anything resembling a story worked out for those missing years – just disconnected scenes strewn about here and there. Granted, I started this whole enterprise with even less than that, but I made up for it with energy and ambition that I'm afraid has been largely spent.
That said, there remains the possibility that I might at least dip into that time period with some scattered one-shots. There's one in particular that I really do want to write, because I think it would be a lot of fun for both me and my readers. So we'll see. We might not have completely seen the end of the Falling Snow universe just yet!
But for now, before I finally draw the curtain on this chapter of Anna and Elsa's lives; before we bid farewell to Kristoff, Olaf, Sven, and the rest of their quirky little family; before we wave goodbye to new friends like Rohl, Fritz, Josef, Skadi, Fare, and Marie; there is one more thing that I absolutely have to say.
Thank you, dear readers! Thanks to those who've been with me since the very beginning. Thanks to the ones who joined up along the way. Thanks even to the ones who may stumble across these stories and read them months from now. It's only because of you that I actually managed to arrive here at this Afterword. If I had been doing this solely for myself, I feel certain that I would have abandoned it some time ago during any one of my many crises of confidence. Yet because of you – because of your kind words, your encouragement, and even your silent support – I can actually step back now, point at this mammoth work of fictional prose, and say with at least a certain amount of pride, "I did that. I actually finished it. And you know… maybe it wasn't half bad."
So from one twisted little fixer-upper to each and every one of you: go out and find your own place, hold on to your dreams, test your limits and break through, stuff some chocolate in your face, raise each other up and round each other out, don't let the frostbite bite… and maybe try to make today just a little more perfect for someone you love.
Yours now and always,
Artoo Emnaught
