Now you get the gist of this story, this chapter goes back to what happened before Sven gets kidnapped and Anna and Olaf meet William, Bert and Tom. We go back some time after the first Frozen and some time before Frozen II.
It was a pleasantly bright May afternoon in Arendelle, the fjord lapping gently around the city's busy harbour and the air full of that ever-present crisp coolness of the kingdom's northern climate. In the study of her magnificent ice-roofed castle, Queen Elsa sat at her desk in the study jotting down her signature at the foot of a document she was working on. As always her snowy blond braid snaked over her left shoulder bared by her favourite ice gown. The frost train curling down to the floor and her delicate glassy heels balanced her queenly appearance with the taste of freedom she expressed through her hairstyle and powers. She was also quite attentive with her work, something her dearly departed parents had always groomed her for. But getting work finished also left her free to join her beloved sister in whatever activities she'd be getting up to. A small grin appeared on Elsa's face at the very thought, just as she placed the quill in the ink pot.
A second later, there was a knock on the door. "Come in." Elsa called over, and the portly mild-mannered butler Kai, smart as ever with his neat receding ginger hair and his traditional dark green bunad jacket, leaned into the study. "Good afternoon, your majesty. Lunch will be ready shortly." Elsa was glad to hear this and set the document down on the desk. "Wonderful, Kai. It already smells divine." "Yes, your majesty, I couldn't help but notice also, just how strongly it smells." the butler observed, glancing back curiously. "What do you mean by that?" Elsa chuckled as they headed down the rich, red-carpeted stairs past antique suits of armour. "It's just that...it's a little odd smelling it even from up here. It isn't usually this potent." Kai explained. As they went further down the steps, the hot, meaty scents simply flooded the air. "Actually, you're right, Kai." Elsa agreed, lowering her brows. Even a couple of castle guards, standing on duty in green overcoats and shakos, lightly sniffed in suspicion. "Has someone left the kitchen door open?" Elsa asked Kai once they had reached the ground floor. When they came up to where the kitchen was, the door was still shut. The queen and the butler grew puzzled. "Not to worry, your majesty, I'll just see how the staff are getting - " Next thing the door swung open and thick greyish smoke billowed everywhere! Elsa and Kai had to cover their mouths and started coughing as torrents of fumes spread through the hallway, threatening to sting their eyes! The nearby guards came over and stared wide-eyed at their queen and the butler nearly choking half to death from the hot clouds spilling from the kitchen door.
A tiny dumpy figure holding a wooden spoon stumbled through, stopping just in front of Elsa and Kai. "Whoa, what a cookout!" the dwarfish, white, carrot-nosed figure exclaimed in his goofy, childlike voice. Halfway through a cough, Elsa could hardly comprehend any of this. "Olaf…?" she went incredulously. The round-eyed snowman in front of her tottered on his snowball feet, smeared all over in coal black splotches, more than half of his face smeared. Wisps of smoke trailed from his scraggly twig hairs. "Oh lord…" Kai lamented in dismay. "Oh, hello, Elsa! Hi, Kai! Ready for some gourmet grub me and Anna whipped up?" Olaf excitedly chirped, waving the spoon in one of his twig hands. Still covering their mouths to stifle their coughs, Elsa and Kai just stared down at the snowman grinning up at them. Soon men and women in aprons, the kitchen staff, came blindly charging past Olaf choking and trying to feel their forward. Taken aback, Elsa would have said something, when the last to come staggering out, standing behind Olaf was a certain princess with strawberry blond hair in braids and holding a spatula. "Anna?" Elsa's jaw dropped at the very sight of her sister grinning awkwardly, patches of black across her freckled face and her pale green frock. "Oh. Hey, Elsa! It's my first day of cooking!" she exclaimed joyfully, throwing up her arms. "I think we're getting somewhere." she then finished, not even dropping that grin. All Elsa and Kai did was crane their heads past Anna, everything in the kitchen utterly invisible in the smoke. "Oh, about that. Olaf was a little generous with the stove." Anna explained when she remembered. "I just learned you put wood into the stove for fuel! Isn't that a breakthrough in culinary skills?" Olaf happily squeaked to Elsa who, technically speaking, was his mother seeing as how she had created him. Elsa had no idea what to say. Anna had obviously persuaded the cooks to let her and Olaf help out, and now they had turned the kitchen into a crematorium! "Wonderful." Elsa commented once she had found her voice. "So what's on the menu?" "Oh, you're going to love it." Anna told her with an excited expression on her sooty face. "Aagh! Fire! Put it out!" came the panicked cries of one of the castle maids. Anna and Olaf's smiles dropped from their faces, growing concerned with the after-effects of their first cooking session. "I'll handle this." Elsa told them, striding into the kitchen. With a few waves of her hands, blossoms of frost thinned out the smoke. Tables, pots, the large black iron stove and other cooking equipment became more visible now that the queen's powers had cleared up the mess Anna and Olaf had made.
Now that the smoke had been put out, Elsa sat at the dining table waiting for Anna and Olaf to finish washing off all that soot. Presently the two came in looking a lot cleaner and sat around the queen. "Olaf?" Elsa spoke up when she noticed the snowman grinning in anticipation for lunch. "What happened to your arm?" Olaf looked to his right and found, to his slight surprise, the spoon he had been holding was right where his arm should be. "Well, would you look at that?" he remarked with interest. He waggled the spoon this way and that as though it was a prosthetic. "Must've been when I tried to stick it back in the jar where all the other kitchen things belong." "Kai, could you retrieve Olaf's arm, please?" Elsa requested, faintly amused by this predicament. Though Kai left to take care of it, the spoon arm came in useful when the servants brought him and the sisters chicken and vegetable soup. The snowman gaped in wonder at the tasty-looking liquid, sniffed at the steam it emitted, then scooped the spoon into the bowl so he could slurp it all down. As the sisters sipped their spoonfuls leisurely, they exchanged little smiles at how the snowman simply lapped up his starter. "Olaf seems to find his new arm handy." Anna joked and Elsa nodded with a chuckle. "Your arm, my good sir." Olaf had just jammed the spoon into his mouth, then turned to Kai presenting him with the missing twig. "Oh, thank you Ka -" Soup spilled from his mouth onto Kai's hands and Olaf clapped his spoon-arm over his lips! "Oh, Olaf…" Elsa groaned whilst Anna grew bashful. "Fowwy…cm't kmmp ip mm…" Kai hardly reacted but for a rolling of his eyes at how the soup dripped off his hands and the cuffs of his bunad. "Sorry about that. I'd put in a little too much." Olaf apologised once he had got his mouthful down. "Think nothing of it, my boy." Kai calmly replied, pulling out the spoon and reattaching his arm in its place. "In fact you needn't worry about germs, seeing as how you have the advantage of being…well…" Kai continued, then trailed off before leaving with the spoon. "Kai, I can make it up to you with - " "There's nothing to make up for, your majesty." the ginger-haired butler assured Elsa on his way out. "Enjoy your meals." Elsa just shook her head and went on eating her soup. "He's right, you're going to enjoy what Olaf and I just helped everyone cook." Anna told her proudly as they grew close to finishing. "I'm sure…" Elsa guessed, though she couldn't help but remember that little smog her sister and Olaf had caused in the process. Gerda, the tall, motherly servant in the cap that matched her green dress and jacket, cleared away the soup bowls. "I must say I was not expecting the princess to involve herself in cooking." she commented, but Anna folded her arms with a confident smile. "Well I may be a princess, but there's so much I've wanted to be able to do. Then one day I thought to myself, 'What would everyone think when they found the princess of Arendelle can do a mean roast beef like the one they're bringing in right now?'" Everyone turned to the door, Olaf gasping and clapping his hands in pure happiness, Elsa's face going blank. The lump of beef the servants were bringing in on a wide platter was producing more of that grey smoke from earlier. What's more, the meat was brownish-black. A servant had to waft away the vapours to keep it from stinging his eyes. Another strained from the effort it took to cut through the meat that seemed to hold together like stone.
Eventually the sisters and Olaf were each served slices of this beef along with potatoes and vegetables, the snowman ecstatically and ravenously munching into his share. When Elsa put her fork into her first slice, she stared at it apprehensively. Usually roast beef was best when nicely browned with a slightly pink centre. Anna and Olaf had cooked it the whole way through, leaving not a speck of pinkness. But Anna didn't seem to have accounted for this. Nor for that matter, did she seem to have known in the first place, because she was munching down her lunch in the least ladylike manner only Elsa knew she was capable of. "Mv'rmthmg mkay, Mlsm?" the princess asked through chunks of meat she had stuffed in her mouth. "She's just asking is everything's okay, Elsa.'" Olaf explained helpfully, before putting his fork through a chunk of beef Elsa doubted he would even get down. "Olaf, small bites, please." Elsa requested, hoping to maintain some semblance of table manners. "Cut them into smaller bits. You'll get them in easier." Anna recommended. "Oh! That's what the knife is for!" Olaf said as though he had just worked out a puzzle, not what you used a utensil for. "How's your beef, Elsa?" Anna asked brightly. "You've hardly touched it yet." "Oh, excuse me, Anna, just a bit slow today…" In truth, the young queen was hardly looking forward to tasting this beef. But neither did she want to offend her beloved sister. The very thought of Anna blubbing at what everyone thought of her cooking, rushing upstairs then the slam of her door as she cried her eyes out was too much for Elsa to bear. Determined not to let that happen, she popped her slice in, then chewed. The beef had none of the flavour nor tenderness one could hope for. It had the texture of pulped wood and Elsa could hardly place the taste. Anna and Olaf weren't doing too badly, gobbling their platefuls down, but every bite Elsa took rolled about in her mouth longer than she would care to remember. When Anna looked to see how she found it, the blond queen made an effort to smile through her bites, though the taste of overcooked beef made it a challenge.
"So what did you think?" Anna asked with a grin of anticipation once everyone had made it through lunch at long last. Elsa paused for a couple of seconds to think up a fair and impartial appraisal. "Well...it's good...nice." she replied, though she found herself trailing off. "Super!" Anna went happily, very nearly leaping out of her chair. "Because Olaf and I plan to help Kristoff and the ice men out with supper tonight." 'Oh brother…' Elsa definitely wasn't going to say this out loud. She was acquainted with Anna's boyfriend Kristoff well enough to know that he would never let anyone put her dear sister down. But what she was really afraid of was how the other ice harvesters might judge Anna's cooking skills. "Really? Great. What do you have in mind?" Elsa asked in the hopes that Anna knew what she was doing. "Well apparently they'll have pheasant on the go. We can give that a try next." Anna suggested optimistically as ever. There were times when her gutsy attitude helped in a given situation, but in terms of cooking, this didn't sound so promising. "Oh. Well hope it goes well…" Elsa replied, mentally praying that ice harvesters would be a forgiving audience.
