12
It only took about ninety minutes for Anna's message to reach Elsa. She was staying in the main Northuldra Village near the entrance to the Enchanted Forest. Elsa heard Gale's flitter sound and saw the message descending towards her and she reached up and grabbed it.
"Thank you, Gale," she said politely and then open the seal to read it.
"Oh dear," she said to herself than looked to find Yelena and Honeymaren. It didn't take her long to find them and she asked them to join her around the camp fire provided to them by Brunei.
"What is it, Elsa?" they asked.
"I have to go to Arendelle for an extended period I'm afraid."
"Are there problems there?" asked Honeymaren.
"There will be, the man I told you about, Hans, who tried to kill both myself and Anna in order to try and steal Arendelle's throne is on his way to the kingdom now."
"Why is he returning?" asked Yelena with concerned.
"Because Anna has requested him to return to answer questions about the incidents of four years ago."
"Why on Earth would your sister invite him back?" said Yelena, "especially after he deceived her and you, then tried to kill you both?"
"My question as well?" piped in Honeymaren.
"It's because of what we saw at Ahtohallan," replied Elsa, "that revealed some disturbing aspects about Han's childhood and Anna feels she has to ask him about that so she can, I don't know, get some closure or a better understanding of why he did it."
"Well, you need to be careful Elsa," started Yelena, "from what I have heard about him, I wouldn't trust him as far as I could throw a Rock Giant."
"Trust me," began Elsa with some determination in her voice, "I will be taking every precaution, unlike last time, I have control of my powers, also I intend to take Brunei and Gale with me for back up."
"Well, that should intimidate him a bit," smiled Honeymaren, "I'll walk with you to the shore so you can summon the Nokk?"
"Thank you, that would be nice," Elsa than looked to the sky, "Gale, feel like coming to Arendelle with me to help protect Anna?"
Gale stirred up some leaves in an affirmative answer.
"Good, can you go get Brunei and bring him to the shore, because I want him to come to"
With a rush of leaves and wind sound Gale rushed off to find Brunei while Elsa and Honeymaren walked towards the shore.
"I envy you Elsa," began Honeymaren, "you have grown so much into being the Fifth Spirit."
"Thank you, though it was hard, and still is leaving Arendelle behind, but this is where I belong."
"I've never lived with a Fifth Spirit, naturally, I wasn't born when the forest was cut off from the outside world. Yelena tells me about your grandmother and how wonderful a Fifth Spirit she was."
"I never got to meet my grandmother," responded Elsa a little sadly, "I didn't even know my mother was Northuldra until we came here. All we had of her heritage was her scarf and the lullaby about Ahtohallan. I loved her very much."
"I can see that, Yelena did say that your grandmother, and your mother what she remembered of her, were not magical, well, not as magical as you. She said your mother had a special relationship with, as you call Wind Spirit, Gale and that is how it usually is. Each Fifth Spirit would be particularly close to one of the Spirits, sometimes two. She says that your grandmother had especially strong relationships with both Brunei and Gale.
Every now and then through history, a Fifth Spirit would be magical."
"I know, my mother was rewarded with me, but I was also charged to use my powers to free the forest from what my grandfather did."
"That's true Elsa, though Yelena believes that you are the second most powerful Fifth Spirit ever, with the most powerful one being the very first."
"Yes, she told me that too, apparently the first spirit built Ahtohallan. I often wonder who she was, though I can feel her presence at Ahtohallan, but she hasn't revealed herself to me yet."
"I'm sure that will come in time," replied Honeymaren with a smile.
"Then of course, there is the question of my successor, supposedly my first-born daughter, or and something tells me that it will actually be Anna's first-born daughter."
"Oh, there's plenty of time for that for you, as they say you never know the future."
Elsa sort of smiled as they reached the shoreline, just as they did Gale had returned carrying Brunei in her wind. Elsa put out her hands for Brunei to land in, which he quickly snuggled into.
"Well little guy," she said smiling, "would you like to go for a trip?"
Brunei's head popped up affirmatively with what looked like a very happy grin.
"Okay then," said Elsa as she summoned the Nokk who appeared almost immediately and knelt so Elsa could get on her back.
"Thank you Honeymaren, I will see you soon, if I need some help, I'll get Gale to bring you a message."
"If you need help Elsa, we'll be there as soon as possible, safe journey."
With that, Elsa motioned the Nokk to start galloping, she saw Honeymaren waving to her as she turned south to follow the shoreline towards the Arendelle.
Hans stood at the stern of the ship watching as his lifelong home disappeared below the horizon. There was a hint of sadness in him as he knew he was probably seeing it for the last time because he had no intention of ever returning. That also gave him a hint of relief and excitement as he felt his new life was beginning now where ever that new life maybe.
None of his brothers came to say goodbye to him, which didn't surprise him as there was no brotherly love between them. Fritz had shown up though and he felt that he was his only true friend in the Southern Isles.
After the Southern Isles had disappeared from view, he approached the captain of the ship at the wheel, who let him take over. One of the few joys he had from his time at home was sailing and he knew he was better than any of his brothers at it. After all, he spent far more time at it then they did as he enjoyed the solitude and thrill of handling a ship. It was his only real freedom from the constant abuse he received from his siblings.
As he steered the ship, he began to concentrate on what was ahead for him, Arendelle. He still couldn't figure out why Anna would request him to return, but he was actually grateful and he wanted to make sure he took full advantage of it this time. To his advantage, he had a better knowledge of the two sisters of Arendelle, especially of Elsa's powers, as that was something, he did not factor in at all with his last scheme.
He knew that he had to be fully cooperative with whatever they wanted to question him about, no secrets, keep any plans he may have completely secret until it's too late for them to act. Of course, the first thing he needed to do was to apologise for his actions of four years ago, he had to appear to have complete remorse over his actions of then. He knew there was no way he would ever earn their trust, that was just a given, hell, he wouldn't trust him if he were them.
His plan last time was simple, win the heart of one of the sisters and marry them. As he told Anna, Elsa was preferable as she was Queen and that would have been it, he would have been King by marriage and he would rub his brother's noses in it. There was Hans, the brother who would amount to nothing, suddenly King of Arendelle. But that didn't happen, he had actually arrived in Arendelle secretly a few days before Elsa's coronation to do some research before putting his plan in action.
Of course, when he realised that Elsa was a lost cause, he targeted Anna instead and everything was going perfectly right up until they announced to Elsa that they were going to get married at Elsa's Coronation function in the palace. He was surprised by Elsa's complete refusal to bless their marriage, he did expect some reservations and he was sure he could win her over, but the total rejection was a hard place to come back from. Then of course, all hell broke loose when Elsa's powers were revealed and he remembered the first inkling he got of how powerful she was, was when the fjord froze over and it began snowing. It was then he thought he might have to kill Elsa, though, with that power, he would have to plan it well and he had doubts if he could actually do it. Killing someone, especially a young woman didn't come naturally to him.
Then of course the next thing that went wrong was when Anna decided to go after Elsa, he knew he had to do the right thing and look after Arendelle while she was gone, in fact, it gave him a chance to endear himself to the citizens, but he could see his plans evaporating around him. What would happen if Anna didn't come back, how would he succeed if that didn't happen? He kept his composure, but inside he was seething a little, some many years of planning and it was falling apart.
Then of course Anna's horse came back alone and he knew he had to go look for her and Elsa. What he found even astounded him more, the ice castle Elsa built and the giant snow monster, it had him thinking how powerful was Elsa and if he even had a chance of killing her.
His opportunity came when Wesselton's men went after Elsa in the castle, against his orders as he recalled, which made him even think less of the Duke. He remembered with amusement what they called him in Arendelle, the Duke of Weaseltown and he thought that was very appropriate. Hell, he actually approached his father about six months after the events in Arendelle trying to raise an army to attack Arendelle. Fortunately, his father wasn't interested and Wesselton's plans evaporated as no one wanted to attack Arendelle with the knowledge of Elsa's powers.
But, Wesselton's men did give him an opening, he stopped Elsa killing them, which probably was a good thing because a mad vengeful Elsa would have been far worse to contend with. By sheer luck though, the arrow from Wesselton's guard's crossbow took out the ice chandelier in Elsa's castle and she was knocked out by one of its shards when it hit the floor and shattered. Sheer luck yes, he did actually aim it in that general direction, but never believed he would actually hit it.
He remembered sparing her life when some of the others wanted to kill her there and then, which he thought at the time was the strategic thing to do because he knew Anna would never have forgiven him if he allowed them to kill her. When they got back to Arendelle and he put her in the dungeon and he was sure she could reverse the winter spell. He was surprised that she couldn't at that point. Though, he did admire the fact that she put the kingdom first as she believed if she went far enough away, her influence on the weather would be diminished. He did think about doing that for a short time as it would have been easier and preferable to killing her.
But when Anna returned and told her that Elsa had frozen her heart and needed an act of true love to heal it, something just snapped in him. Suddenly it just became too easy and he just thought, this is it, everything has fallen into place. So, he told Anna he didn't love her, which was true, that it was a scam and that he would have arranged an accident for Elsa even if they had married. He figured that would depress Anna enough that she would just accept her fate and she would simply freeze to death and he could make up any story he wanted. He also knew that telling Elsa that she killed Anna would seriously depress her as well, which would make it easier to execute her.
But killing Elsa, easier said than done, but everything was just falling into place so perfectly, in hindsight, it was too good to be true. He abandoned Anna, feeling very cocky and over confident, told all the other dignitaries that he had married Anna before she died and therefore as the ruling monarch of Arendelle, condemned Elsa to death. Now just go down to the dungeon and execute her.
But no, her powers allowed her to escape, he hadn't factored that in, frustration, not as easy as it seemed before. So, he went out onto the ice to find Elsa and he did find her. Again, it fell into place, when she asked him to look after her sister and he told Elsa that she had killed Anna, which, to be honest, he thought that Anna was dead by then. Elsa sank to her knees and onto the ice in deep depression and sorrow, just one strike with his sword, then out of nowhere came Anna who froze just as he was delivering the fatal blow. Actually, he frightened him that it became so easy for him to kill Elsa, how easily he found himself being able to commit murder because of his lust for revenge.
However, when his sword hit the now frozen Anna, it knocked him unconscious and when he awoke, it was summer again and Anna was alive and his whole plan had crumbled into a disaster. Then of course Anna punched him in the face, he could still feel that blow. Disgrace, depression, ridicule, that was going to be his life now, even worse than before. But out of the blue, Anna asks him to return, again he couldn't figure it out, but he had to take advantage of it.
In the back of his mind, he still remembered how Elsa got mad enough to try and kill Wesselton's men and a thought popped into his head. He had plenty of ammunition, so he thought, to get her mad enough to maybe extract some revenge on his brothers, though she wouldn't know it was on his behalf.
He watched as the sunset below horizon knowing that he could start exploring this idea of getting Elsa angry in the morning. Of course, when he got to Arendelle he expected nothing but a hostile reception, but that was fine, it's easier to be the obvious villain then trying to hide it. No secret plans this time, because as of yet he hadn't any yet, just an idea. For now he knew he had to be a good guest and hope the opportunity arose.