Prologue, Part I
Disclaimer: I neither own the rights to Disney, Frozen, the Disney universe nor any of its associated media, derivatives or products. I do not profit from this work.
Second Disclaimer: Cover Art texture credit goes to PrincessBubblebutt on Deviantart, or Cynical Romance. com (remove the spaces).
Once, long, long ago, an angel fell from Heaven.
It is a story known all throughout the world, one with which we must each day live—and one which affects our story tonight at its core. For when the Devil was cast from Heaven and fell to Hell for his pride, he swore to spite God in all he did. You know of the apple, how he made mankind, too, as fallen as he. You know of the Cross, how mankind was redeemed at the greatest price. You know of your own lives, how you have allowed good to triumph on some days… and bad on others.
Evil delights in those days when your hearts are cold with bitterness or hot with fury, but do not believe he is content to sit on the sidelines and watch! No, for as subtle as the he may be, in his spite he can never be happy, and seeks only to bring unhappiness to all creation, as well. And so one day, oh, many generations ago, Evil created a mirror.
This was no ordinary mirror, children; no, this was a lying mirror, a twisted mirror, for it showed only the worst parts of people, never the good. It made all the world as ugly and terrible as its creator. The most tender-hearted of people would appear diabolical in its reflection, and the most beautiful of landscapes like scorched, lifeless ground. The Devil was cruelly proud of his terrible invention, and he boasted to his demons that he would bring the mirror to Heaven, to make God Himself look uglier than the devils.
But as Evil tried to ascend to Heaven, from whence he had been cast, he found himself shrieking with agony at the beauty and goodness. The mirror, formed of hatred and bitterness, likewise could not withstand the light and love of which Heaven is composed, and so, as both it and its maker cowered and descended again to darkness, the mirror shattered into a million pieces, and these pieces fell to the earth. Even still today, if you travel to the northern countries, and venture into the woods thereof, you can hear the mountain men sing of the demon mirror:
"In times long gone,
And times long past,
The devil's work
Created glass
Of kind and nature most profane.
He tried to fly
To Heav'n above
To shame the Lord
But see, for love
Was the dreadful mirror's bane.
So shattered glass.
And again, both fell,
Shards to earth,
Devil to Hell.
Never to meet again.
But mankind, so cursed
By a curse long past
Was tormented by
The mirror's glass,
And to the earth the shards did rain.
But fear not, men,
For curses have no part,
Nor power over
The pure of heart.
And love will triumph and ever reign."
These pieces were blown about by the winds, into people's eyes, into their hearts. You may have heard the story of how one of these pieces got stuck into a young boy's eye, and his heart became cold and bitter, and he was taken by the Snow Queen to her palace in the far north. This young boy's dearest friend, a little girl, followed him valiantly to the Snow Queen's lair—braving a sorceress, robbers, and snow monsters—until she found her friend in the Queen's frozen castle. Her tears warmed his heart, and together their innocence, purity and love defeated the Snow Queen's power, and they escaped again to the warm world below.
The two children eventually grew up, and they were married. Their marriage was a very happy one, but in all their years together they were never blessed with a family of their own. When the woman, by now aged, heard that the Queen of her kingdom was to have a child, she and her husband went to the castle to offer their services as nursemaid and footman. They vowed to care for the child as their own, and the queen gratefully accepted.
The infant was born, a beautiful girl with dark hair like her mother's. The exhausted queen left the girl in her new nursemaid's care, and she took the child to the cradle in the baby's nursery. She did not notice that the window was open, and as she turned away, a strange new woman entered the room through the window, lifted from the ground as if by swirling winter winds.
She approached the cradle silently, and the baby shrank back, terrified of the strange white-haired woman, who was dressed like a queen of ice and snow. The strange woman held out a large shard of ice-like glass to the baby, glinting in the light, and the infant began to wail.
The nursemaid turned, startled, and saw the strange queen-like woman standing there. She recognized her instantly, for the Snow Queen had not aged a day in all the years since Gerda had seen her. She cried out for her to be gone in the name of God, and the Snow Queen, unable to disobey such an order, was forced to flee once again to her icy lair. But it was too late, for just before Gerda had turned at the child's cry, the vengeful Snow Queen had driven the icy glass shard into the infant's heart.
Gerda and Kai brought the baby to the queen and king at once, weeping and begging for their forgiveness. The two monarchs granted it immediately, but they feared for their infant daughter, whose hair had turned white and eyes an icy blue. A truly pure heart would not have been affected by such wickedness in the slightest, and there are few hearts purer than that of a newborn infant, but a curse of the Devil even more ancient still lay on the unchristened child, and so the icy shard remained buried within her. To prevent her from becoming cold and uncaring, as Kai had himself so many years before, the king and queen hastened the girl's baptism, and so it was that while the shard's magic remained a part of her, the greater evil of the curse had no hold over her, and her heart remained kind and good. Kai, Gerda and the bishop vowed, along with the King and Queen, to never tell the child of the true origin of her powers.
But the Snow Queen was not through. Ages upon ages she had waited- waited to finish a plan that had begun countless centuries before, and was determined that it should continue, christening or no. And so it was that she appeared in the northern country's neighbor, an island kingdom to the south, and asked for an audience with the king.
The king was a harsh man, almost as cruel as the Snow Queen herself, and so when she offered him two shards, one for him and one for his firstborn when the boy came of age, he gratefully accepted. These shards, however, were not of the same sort as the icy shard with which she had pierced the princess. They shone not as jagged ice, but instead glowed as burning embers. The king accepted, and drove into himself the first and largest of the shards. The smaller he placed in a little wooden box, which he hid in his room, to save for his eldest son's twenty-first birthday.
But his plan did not go as expected, for of the thirteen princes of the kingdom, the oldest would not be the one to receive the cursed powers. Instead, it was the youngest who found the box before its time.
The boy had meant no harm, for he was lonely and had only wanted someone to play with him. At seven years old, he was the youngest of all thirteen of the king's children, and often ignored. He'd gone into his father's room to look for his oldest brother, whom he idolized even though the man of twenty had little time for him, and instead found a small chest full of many treasures. Among these treasures was a surprisingly ordinary little wooden box.
He'd opened the box, curious, and stared at the glowing, ember-like glass shard. Even as the king walked into the room, the boy had pulled the shard out of the box.
The king screamed in fury, and the boy, startled, jumped up and clutched at his chest, accidentally driving the fiery shard deep into his heart. His brown hair turned deep red, as red as coals, and his heart felt as if it were aflame. The king tried to pull the demon glass out, but the damage was already done. The boy was cursed.
The king's hatred, fueled by his own burning shard, turned itself upon the boy, and soon all the court followed suit—especially the eldest brother, who was furious at having his birthright stolen away by the youngest of the brood. The king called to the Snow Queen, who upon arriving became furious that such an accident had occurred. Though she threatened to cover the Southern kingdom with ice, the king convinced her that not all was lost, and the Queen agreed to enchant the boy, to cause him to forget what had happened. Then, to ensure that his youngest son would not accidentally rediscover his powers, she fashioned for the king a special pair of gloves, imbued with her own magic, which could hold his magic at bay even for several hours after being worn. The king began to enforce that all the princes wear gloves at all times, as a matter of custom and fashion, and so the boy never did remember, and he never realized that he was different.
Perhaps this would have all been alright, were it not for the hatred of everyone around him, for reasons he never understood. This hatred, along with the demon glass in his heart and the lack of any love from those who should have loved him the most, came to define who he was in every way. He became as bitter and angry as his father before him. Some would say he wanted only power and wealth, but in truth it went much deeper than that. He wanted to be appreciated, valued, honored- all those things with which people try to fill the hole left in their hearts by an absence of love. Perhaps more than anything, he wanted the respect and admiration he knew he would find as a king. When his father died and the eldest brother, still furious with the youngest, took the rule, the boy began to desperately search for a way to win a throne, any throne- in any way he could.
When he first arrived in Arendelle six years later, by now twenty himself, the young man sought to marry the eligible queen. Instead, however, the younger princess, driven by loneliness and desperation, fell head over heels for his charms, and he willingly took advantage of such a fortunate situation. When it was revealed that the queen herself had powers of ice, he was stunned, for even then he did not remember his own hidden abilities. Hatred of the queen, of the beauty she could create (for as the Cross has shown, Heaven can use even the most evil of circumstances to bring about good), desperation for the crown, and jealousy of her loving sibling, a privilege he'd never known, all drove him to try to kill her—not just to take her throne, but to exact revenge for all the hatred with which he had ever been treated, for circumstances he had never understood.
And yet, as always, love—pure, true love—defeated evil, and the prince was sent home again in chains, to face the revilement and disgust of his twelve older brothers. But a far greater damage had been done that day in Arendelle, For although neither Hans nor Elsa could have known it, as the two shards came into contact for the first time, and under such conditions, their powers had begun to flare and freeze all the more forcefully, and at last the Snow Queen's plan began to come to fruition.
But I am getting ahead of myself, for our story starts many years before that point. Do not fret, children, for Good never has and never will be bested by Evil. Listen now, hush, and I will tell you a story—the story of how true love defeated the Snow Queen once and for all.
"No, fear not, men,
For curses have no part,
Nor power over
The pure of heart.
And love will triumph and ever reign!"
A/N: …Okay, so.
Some of you may remember this story from when I first posted it six years ago on this site. And, some of you might still be upset with me for removing it a few years back. In the words of my boyfriend, "Your feelings are valid." I know how frustrating it can be to see a favorite story go missing.
I want to apologize and offer a short explanation for why this story was removed, and why it is being re-uploaded now. At the time of its removal, I was suffering severely from my obsessive-compulsive disorder; as some of you may remember, I am a very devout Roman Catholic, and oftentimes religious people who suffer from OCD experience periods of what's called "scrupulosity"—essentially, believing perfectly normal actions are grave sins, or that minor moral faults are more serious than they are. Since fanfiction is not, technically, in line with copyright law, I became convinced that posting fanfiction was a major moral transgression, and took my pieces off the site. However, thankfully, I could never bear to discard them, and kept the original documents intact.
Recently, I went to the new Frozen II movie and was inspired to re-edit this and repost this story, as I remember some of my early fans really enjoying it. As I went back and reviewed the work, I found several issues with the original manuscript, but several really valuable moments as well. I have made some minor revisions and additions to the storyline, which I hope will pull the narrative together more cohesively and communicate a better view of forgiveness and reconciliation, which is one of the major themes of the story. I still don't think this story is my best work—there are several parts I would have liked to remove altogether, such as the inclusion of the songs, which I have nonetheless decided to leave in to maintain the original story beats—but if someone finds some enjoyment in the story, then that's all I hope to do.
To my new readers: this story takes place immediately after the events of the first Frozen movie, disregarding the sequel, and seeks to tie that story into the original Snow Queen tale, along with several other fairytales by Hans Christian Andersen. As such, it will have overtly Christian overtones, both due to Hans Christian Andersen's original story beats and, frankly, just due to my religious storytelling style. The story treats the events of Frozen as if they happened in a fictionalized but still very historically accurate version of our own world, and direct cultural references are made to Norwegian traditions and ways of life in the 1700-1800s. I hope you enjoy it. Please note that updates may take a while, as I am currently in grad school, which is a very time-consuming activity.
In short, mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. ;) And I'm glad to be back. Happy advent, everyone, and once again:
Pax et bonum!