Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction which uses characters from the movies Frozen and How to Train Your Dragon, which are trademarked and owned by Disney and Dreamworks. I do not own or claim ownership over any of the characters in either of these films. This story my own.
Chapter 1: A Foreign Place and Déjà Vu
Everything around me was completely silent. Where were the muffled sounds of Anna's tired groans and Kristoff's loud tromping? How had I not even woken up yet? I was usually the first one in the castle to be awake except the maids and butlers. I forced my eyes open – I had to start the day and attend to my royal duties as queen.
My head was aching horribly, and I could only see a dark wooden ceiling about twenty feet or so above my head. My arms were down at my sides, and I wiggled my fingers – relieved that they were there – and felt smooth satin-like sheets against my fingertips. However, there were some bumps and tears, and I could feel a seam under my hand. This wasn't my room. There should be a canopy above me (white and blue and gossamer silk) and I should be looking at that instead. Where were the satiny silk sheets that usually covered my bed? Was I in some sort of deserted bedroom in the castle that I had never seen before? Did Anna move me here in the middle of the night? I needed to figure out where I was.
I looked around the room and noticed that it was completely paneled in wood – but the wood was quite crude – with only some Celtic knots inscribed into it – but none of the usual designs or crests of the castle in Arendelle. Also, all of the wood used was cheap pine and cedar, and I didn't notice any that was of a more expensive, imported type, such as walnut or maple. I also noticed that there were faint scratches and burn marks on the wood paneling that had made noticeable dark spots and long scars.
I raised my head and looked down, noticing that I had been covered in a sheepskin blanket, and the bed beneath me felt soft but smelled slightly of smoke. I looked to my right a little and saw a fireplace imbedded in the wall and small wooden stool, a pair of boots, and even closer towards me was a short end table with an oil lamp on it that had smoke rising up from it. I assumed that the oil had run out or the wick had burnt down too much. Then I felt a strange, wet substance slide down my face towards my left eye and I reached up to touch it – it was cold to the touch, and as I pulled my hand away and looked at the substance closer, I noticed that it was a startling shade of green. Maybe some kind of remedy? But if I wasn't at home in the castle, as I had already figured out by the unfamiliarity of the room and the bed that I was in, then what kind of medicine was this? Was there a local healer that had found me?
I sat up in the bed, feeling a slight wave of nausea, but fought through it – since I was used to this same disorientation from my capture in the ice castle by the soldiers and Hans – and how I had been left like this before to wake up in the cold jail cell. I was grateful that I had been brought to a more quiet, warm, and comfortable environment. I was worried though. Where was I? If not in Arendelle, then had I been taken in by some peasant?
My head throbbed again, and as I groaned in shock and pain the rest of my memories came flooding back: the sea, my hopeless search for my parents' sunken ship, the ice that had hit me as I had fallen into the ocean. I took a deep breath, struggling to keep calm. The breathing helped to stabilize my panicking. Without even thinking, I focused some of my nervous energy, summoned my emotions and focused them as one as I pictured creating a small ball of ice. With a wave of my fingers, I saw the bright blue sparks of energy and felt the shock of my ice powers coming to life once again. The sphere materialized in all of a second. I rubbed its cool surface over my neck and face and sighed as the cold object calmed my anxiety.
I quickly pondered over everything – if I hadn't died in the sea, and my powers were functioning – then I was still alive but stuck in some place that wasn't Arendelle. I needed to leave this bed, figure out where I was, and get back home as soon as possible. I hoped that Anna and Kristoff could run the kingdom without me for a few days.
I threw the remaining length of the blanket off of myself and shifted my legs until they were hanging off of the bed – but the fabric against my body felt weird at that instant. Instead of the tight, stretchy fabric of my usual ice leggings and top, I felt warm, roughly-sewn lambskin pants and a loose hanging cotton shirt with leather lacings that crisscrossed over my abdomen.
I placed the ice sphere on the end table so that my hands were free to assess my startling clothing situation. Baggy linen sleeves hung on both of my arms, and I looked over and saw that the fabric was almost covering my whole hand. How had I not noticed before? I reached up and felt for the top lacings, to see how they hung on my frame, and was shocked to feel my bare skin covered only by a few cube-like strings of brown leather. I looked down at my chest as my eyes widened in mortification at the sight of my white bra.
The shirt's lacings ended in a tight 'V' right in the middle of my upper torso, and the top part of my chest was visible through the leather strips. Whose shirt was I wearing? It was way too big on me. The shirt was at least three times larger than any of my normal clothes, and I never wore anything with leather, only my ice gowns or pants – I didn't even think that I owned a linen shirt! This piece of clothing felt better suited towards a man than a woman (even of my tall stature).
Where were my ice clothes? I didn't remember losing them when I fell into the sea – maybe whoever saved me from drowning put them somewhere outside of this room. Had this person seen me naked? I groaned quietly to myself. I assumed so, for I wore none of my original clothes that I had on when I had fell into the sea. It was a little mortifying, but I was grateful to be alive and warm than covered in frostbite with my ice clothes still stuck to my body. I knew that I could just make more of them (I just had to focus and not turn the thin fabric into immovable ice), but I still wanted to find my original pair of leggings and the shirt. However, I would need some fabric to remake my outer layer coat, and a seamstress. I remembered that I had left the overcoat back on the black stone beach, as well as my heeled boots. How cold was it outside anyways? I had no idea, but I wasn't too worried (since I had a high cold tolerance already from being born with ice powers), but I didn't want the new people around me to suspect that there was anything absurd about me.
I wasn't safe here like I was in Arendelle. I couldn't remake my other clothes either – or I couldn't wear them in public at least – because if these new people saw me, they would know that there was something different about me. I would have to keep on these absurdly large clothes instead. My main goal now was to figure out where I was, how to go back home, and whose clothes I was wearing.
I stood up from the bed, and heard it decompress with a hiss. My hair tumbled over my shoulders and hung in a cream-colored curtain in front of my face. I guessed that I had lost my ice hair tie to the sea when I fell and my braid had come undone, but having hair in my face now wouldn't do me any good. Reaching up with both hands, I grabbed my loose hair and pushed it up behind my shoulders, and blew away the remaining shorter strands upwards with a gust of air. They stayed out of my way for only a second before falling down onto my forehead again, so I just decided to ignore them and focus on fixing my shirt.
It was too revealing as of now, and I needed to tighten up the leather strings – maybe even move the whole shirt up a few inches towards my neck so that it covered my chest. I grasped the front hem of the shirt and pulled it up from next to my bra all the way up to my collarbones. Looking down at my chest as I did so, I noticed that the lacings only showed my pale skin and none of my chest. Now to just tighten the strings up. I didn't want them loosening again so that my shirt slid back down to my cleavage again!
I could see that there were two lacings, one on each side, and they crossed over each other in opposite directions. I grabbed each of the strands, both ending in larger knots of the leather, and wrapped them around each other and tied them into a small bow. There was still quite a sizeable amount of skin that was showing due to the hole in the shirt, but it wasn't over my chest in a comprisable or awkward position anymore – and the shirt shouldn't move down anymore.
At least I could move around easily in such large clothing. I looked down at my feet to see if the pants I was wearing were too long. The leather lambskin pants hung a bit loosely around my calves and knees, but the waist fit me pretty well overall. They were stained with a rich, dark green – such an absurd color – and I wondered where these northern people had obtained and discovered such a vibrant hue to make the dye. I liked the rough sage-colored trousers. They weren't my usual sky blue or sapphire garments that I was accustomed to in Arendelle, and they surely were not crafted with as much quality, but I liked their sheer warmth and ruggedness. I felt like a completely new person wearing this absurd, crude clothing – almost as if I wasn't a queen in this foreign place. I felt like a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders, a sense of freedom that I hadn't felt since my escape to the North Mountain after my coronation. I didn't see or feel any shoes on my feet, but there was a pair of cream woolen socks that had been put on my feet. I was determined to find whoever had saved me from the sea; to express my sheer gratitude and appreciation to them for still being alive.
As I scanned the pine floor for the pair of shoes, a wave of nausea hit me and I felt my right temple throb. Raising a hand up to my head, I applied some light pressure to the cut, but I was still quite shocked to feel the cold slime of the herbal remedy that had been applied onto the abrasion. I resisted the urge to flinch, but was grateful that the cut wasn't bleeding.
Then I spotted the large pair of boots that were a few feet away from me by the wooden stool. I noticed, by studying them with a closer and more focused eye, that they were made of lambskin (like the pants were), but each boot also was covered with a layer of wolf's fur. I moved my feet across the floorboards as I made my way to the chair and boots. My calves ached and my feet hurt, but with the warm insulation from the clothes that I was wearing I was able to ignore the pain. I must have been asleep for a while: but for how long exactly? Was Anna worried? I hoped not too much. I was planning on returning to Arendelle as soon as my limbs didn't ache and I could figure out which way to go to find my home again.
I reached my hand out and held the top of the stool with my left hand as I pulled it towards me and sat down upon it. The pair of boots were right in between my feet now, and I bent down and grabbed one. It was very wide at the base, but as I maneuvered the first boot to place it on my foot, I could feel a lining of sheep's wool rubbing against my fingers. They were doubly insulated! How cold was it in this new place? I wasn't too worried, but I pondered this intriguing weather as I pulled the boot onto my left foot. The inner woolen lining rubbed against my foot slightly, but as soon as I had slid my foot into the rest of the boot comfortably, the pressure eased and a warm, slightly compressed pressure surrounded my foot from all angles. Already my toes were beginning to sweat. These new shoes were extremely efficient at preserving heat. It was amazing to think that there were none of these wool-lined, sheepskin boots in Arendelle. I grabbed the other one and pulled it onto my other foot. Bracing my left hand on the base of the stool, I pushed up and (a little shakily) got to my feet. My legs wobbled slightly.
That run across the sea had really done a number on my body. It must have been the ice chunks that had fallen down on me when the large wave had crested over. I was still miffed that I hadn't been able to get over it – the sheer force and strength of the sea was a harder thing to conquer than I had originally imagined. I knew that I could have made it over – if only the water hadn't been so deep and it hadn't been so dark out.
I wiggled my toes in the toasty boots, and I could feel that they were a few sizes too big for my feet, but with the wool on the inside layer, the friction helped to keep my feet from sliding around too much. With both the wool socks and boots covering my feet, I could feel my feet beginning to heat up like dark rocks in a summer stream. Hot feet wouldn't do me any good in this new environment, and I'd be too distracted in case this new place was hostile. My feet needed to cool down; I had to stay agile and light-footed.
Before I'd even finished that thought, my fingers had already shifted, and I soon felt a tingle run down my arms as I saw that two small ice balls had formed in my hands. With another flick of my wrist the larger ice ball that I had used to cool my neck came flying over to me and landed neatly on the floor beside my stool. It was amazing how my powers had become so developed now that all I needed was a thought and something would materialize. Grasping the small spheres in my palms, I reached down again to my feet and placed them inside the shoes right near my ankles.
I reached out and plucked the remaining sphere off the ground, where it had sat by me when I had summoned it. I clenched my hand into a tighter fist as I felt the ice crack in half beneath my fingers. I grabbed onto a half from my right hand and then placed each one into the opposing side of my boots for a more intense and awakening chill. My sigh of relief was immediate. The soothing, numbing cold from the fresh ice slowly melted against the heat of my socked feet and the boots, and already there was liquid condensing along my calves and ankles. The warmth and sweat produced from wearing these heat-trapping shoes begun to die down considerably – almost instantly.
I straightened my knees once more and clasp my elbows with my hands. I didn't feel cold – not one bit – but if I was to go outside and meet a whole new group of people who had never seen powers like mine before, I would need to play the part of a regular citizen. There was no way that I was going to foolishly reveal myself to anyone without their full trust. Mimicking shivering and wearing these absurd clothes instead of making my own would help me be more genuinely accepted by these new people. Or at least I hoped that it would. I had no idea if these people would take offense to my borrowed outfit or not.
I turned around and glanced at my bed. What if it was really cold out there? It was never too cold for me, but if there was snow on the ground and I didn't have a coat I would look out of place. As much as lugging around a heavy blanket on my shoulders was a waste of my time, and a way to limit my mobility, I would rather carry a little extra weight than expose myself. I shuffled a few feet along the pinewood floor, and bent over to grab the sheepskin blanket from the bed. My fingertips skimmed the edge of its smooth surface as I pinched a section of it with my thumbs and pulled the cover towards me. It came off the bed easily, but I had also pulled off the underlying sheets as well. They now laid on the floor in a small pile in front of me. I took a few more steps and crouched down, lifted them up, and placed them onto the bed in a heap. I didn't want to be totally ungrateful for these people's unreserved hospitality.
Now that the bed was in a somewhat resemblance of order, and I now clutched the soft blanket to my chest, I spun around slowly and faced the main door once again. Its main frame was only a few feet taller than me, but its base was close to ten feet wide. Why would these people need such large doors? Did they regularly carry in large furniture items? I thought there was no need for such an absurd door – the largest thing in my room was the bed, and that was only 8 feet across! I made a mental note to ask these people about this strange design. As I walked closer towards the door, I noticed that there were faint claw marks that scoured the surface, and a large, circular iron handle hanging on the right side. What kind of animal had made these marks? Did these people own ill-trained pets? Or maybe the wood that they used had been previously attacked by a pack of wolves and been gouged out.
I was a little on edge, but not too worried, for I had my powers to defend myself. Only a few feet from the door now, I reached out with my right hand and grasped the curved handle. There were slight impurities and rough spots that rubbed against my palm as I positioned my hand to pull, but overall the metal was pretty smooth. I grasped the large metal door handle tightly in my right hand and yanked the door towards me with strong force – ice from my palms encrusted itself onto the cool metal, this recent stress and being in this foreign home and land had loosened my control on my powers. Especially when it came to other cold substances such as metal.
The uneasiness that I still felt because of not knowing where I was had taken a larger toll on me than I had originally imagined. I was hardly stressed too badly in Arendelle, Anna's cheerful laughs, Olaf's insistent hugs and happiness, and Kristoff's good-natured help around the castle all aided in keeping me on the low side of stress. I didn't like that my wariness and fear had returned. Hopefully these new people would embrace me for the short time that I would be here; I was already so grateful to them for nursing me back to health after my tumbling fall into the dark sea.
As I considered my situation, my hand still held firm on the iron handle as the heavy wooden door swung open. The harsh glare of the midday sun greeted me, and I squinted to avoid being completely blinded by the bright light. A brisk, cold wind rushed through the opening of the house and moved the baggy sleeves on my arms. I could smell a strong odor of dirt, livestock, and (oddly) smoke, and a small smattering of snow blew roughly against my face. I was correct in choosing to grab the sheepskin blanket off of my bed – it was pretty cold here even with my powers! As my eyes slowly adjusted to the outside sunlight, I froze, dropping the blanket onto the wooden floor.
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