Chapter 5: The King and Queen

Jack sat in a nearby tree as he waited for Katherine to come back. She had left to check on Santoff Claussen and Ganderly but had yet to come back. He chewed his lip as he wondered what to do next when something ruffled the underbrush beneath him.

He gripped his staff and gently floated to the ground, peering into the murky darkness trying to identify what had just gone beneath him.

A black horse made of sand then burst out of the tree line and charged at Jack. He slammed his staff into the ground and a wave of frost crashed into the horse causing it to evaporate into the dark forest. Jack panted and glared into the dark woods, willing something to come out.

After a few painstaking moments he shook his head, annoyed that he had let his guard down.

He jumped into the air ready to get out of here when something caught his eye. A black shadow darted through the tree line. Jack bit his lip and followed it slowly, trying to be as careful as possible.

"No…oh you gotta be kidding me!" Jack whined silently to himself as they came to the castle. A stream of black sand then began to swirl and glide around one of the balconies. Jack stared in confusion before something hit him.

He cursed under his breath before leaping into the air and gliding toward it. Jack flicked his staff and a small platform of Ice appeared on the side of the wall. He perched on top of it and slowly walked over to the cloud of black sand that had grown in size.

The Spirit gripped his staff tightly before shooting a blast of ice at the cloud causing it to disperse and fade into the night air. Jack loosened his grip and glared at the dark cloud as it seeped into the woods.

He knew he should probably leave before something else happened, but he was curious about who had attracted the annoying parasites Pitch sent out in the night.

He flipped into the air and peered into the window unable to see anything. He turned ready to go when a small light caught the corner of his eye.

Jack gasped and quickly shrank out of view. He could feel his heart race in his chest at the close call. As much as he dared he etched his way into the light. He could see a woman sitting up in bed and a man next to her still asleep.

The girl slipped out of bed and grabbed a nearby candle before walking out on the terrace

"Anna." Jack knitted his brow in shock as the girl came into view. He mussed over whether he should ask her if she was ok, when she let out a scream and dropped the candle. Jack looked around and then noticed she was looking at him.

"No no no, Anna, Anna it's me remember?" Jack said, shushing her as he flew over and clamped a hand over her mouth.

"Anna, what's wrong?" the other man asked as he came out onto the balcony. He

gasped and his gaze went from one of confusion to one of anger as he spotted Jack. Jack winced at how bad this looked and quickly removed his hand from Anna's mouth.

The man glared at Jack and walked over to him and grabbed his arm.

"Let go of me!" Jack groaned as he tried to wrench his arm free but failed under the man's grasp. Anna grabbed his other arm and they both began to pull him into the room.

"What are you doing here?" Anna yelled at him as she recovered from her shock.

"Let me go then I'll tell you." Jack snapped back trying once more to free his arm but only making the man tighten his grip.

"That's not happening anytime soon." The man glared at him as he got out a piece of rope and tied it around Jack's arm and tied the other end to the bed frame. Jack groaned in annoyance as he fought against the rope.

Anna and the man both glared at him. Anna then whispered something into the man's ear. He nodded and walked over to Jack.

Jack glared at him and gave him a warning look as he reached out to try to grab his staff. He gripped his staff with his free hand, moving it as far away as he could as he kicked the man in the shin.

The man groaned in annoyance and pinned Jack's legs down with one of his arms well yanking Jack's staff out of his hand and walking over to Anna, staff in hand.

"Thanks your Majesty." Jack spat at Anna. "Oh by the way, how can he even see me!"

"Serves your right, you can't just come into someone's bed chambers and spy on them, do you not see how messed up that looks! Also I told him."

"Ok in my defense.." Jack interjected.

"You have no defense Jack." the other man then said, raising his hand to silence him. "Do you not realize how spying on someone in the middle of the night is terrifying."

"I was not spying!" Jack then yelled at them struggling against the rope that held him in place.

"Of course you weren't, you just thought you would come say 'hi' in the middle of the night?" Anna deadpanned sitting down on the edge of the bed.

"No ok, I was trying to help you."

"How?"

"Which one of you had a nightmare that ended suddenly?" Jack questioned. Anna's eyes wided at this in surprise.

"How did you know that?" she whispered.

"Your welcome redhead I was on your balcony cause I was ending it!"

The other man rolled his eyes at this and crossed his arms over chest. "How do you suppose you can prove that?"

"Well Mr. King concert, prince, whatever you are, if you would kindly give me my staff back I can prove it to you, in fact I can even get an alibi." Jack said giving up on freeing himself from the rope.

"First of all, my name is Kristoff and second, give me one good reason I can trust you." he challenged.

Jack tilted his head back and whined. "Listen, you can't trust me, I have no reason for you to, so you're just going to have to take my word for it."

Kristoff's eyes widened at this as if surprised. "Please, I promise you can even come with me if you want to go that far."

Kristoff raised an eyebrow, but seemed to think this over. He turned to Anna, both of them then walked over to the corner of the room and began to whisper to each other. After a few moments, Kristoff came over to Jack and began to untie the rope around his wrist.

Jack rubbed his wrist where the rope had cut into the skin, before reaching out for his staff. "Give it."

"Not at all." Kristoff said as he handed it over to Anna. "I'm not risking you using magic on me."

Jack sighed but turned on his heel and walked toward the balcony with Kristoff following behind. The spirit quickly opened the balcony with a flourish and walked outside into the cool night air.

"So how are you going to get this proof of yours again?" Kristoff asked, stepping out after him and closing the door. Jack sighed, willing all the patience left in his body to help him not lash out at this man.

Jack extended a hand out to Kristoff who looked at Jack in confusion.

"Just trust the process." The winter spirit groaned, fed up. Kristoff grabbed Jack's wrist and gasped at how cold his body was.

"Yeah I know, winter spirit " Jack shrugged before closing his eyes.

"What are you doing?"

"We have to fly to get there."

Kristoff raised an eyebrow and gasped as a current of air lifted them into the sky.

Jack lifted them up higher into the air, his head on a swivel as he looked around. Kristoff gasped as Jack suddenly jerked him away from the castle. Squinting Kristoff could vaguely make out a golden speck in the distance that was growing closer.

The king gasped as they landed on a massive swirling cloud of golden sand that danced through the air, beginning to swirl around them. Jack's grip faltered on his wrist as he landed on the cloud of sand.

"I'm going to assume this has something to do with your proof?"

"Yep." The spirit nodded as he stuck his hands in his pocket, whistling as he strolled around the golden cloud looking around. Kristoff gasped as he noticed a small plump man in the middle of the cloud waving his hands around the air sending streams of sand throughout the air.

Jack walked over to the little man and tapped him on the shoulder. The man turned around and gave Jack a kind smile before an image of the young man and a question mark appeared above his head.

Kristoff watched as Jack nodded along and said something to the man. Pushing himself to his feet Arendalle's king slowly walked over to them. Jack knit his brow upon seeing him.

"Oh right, may I introduce Mr. King, prince of Arendalle." Jack said, giving him a mock bow. The golden man elbowed Jack in the leg and gave him a disapproving look. Kristoff smirked at Jack and choked back a laugh.

"Anyway." Jack continued rolling his eyes. "You saw nightmares as well?"

Sandy nodded confidently and

"I think he's royalty, his sister in law is deemed the snow queen." Jack said, crossing his arms over his chest glaring at Kristoff.

"For the record I am only royalty through marriage though and certainly don't have any magic of my own."

"Wait, you're not born royalty?"

"No I don't even know who my parents are, they took off when I was young." Jack's glare melted away at this and his posture loosened.

"Oh." A tight silence filled the air before Jack cleared his throat and thanked Sandy.

"So I suppose you would like to get home before your wife is completely convinced I killed you." he suggested.

Kristoff laughed at this and nodded. "That would probably be best." Jack froze as an idea came to him.

"Come here." He then instructed, beckoning Kristoff to follow him. Kristoff cast him a wary look but obeyed.

"Reach out your hand." Jack instructed reaching his hand out towards a stream of golden sand. "It's harmless I swear."

To prove his point Jack gently slid his hand through the sand. Kristoff's mouth fell open as sand morphed and delicately formed into several small rabbits that bounced around before turning back into the golden sand.

Hesitantly Kristoff followed the process. The moment his hand touched the sand a herd of majestic deer leapt into the air and pranced around the two of them.

"What the, I, how.." Kristoff muttered in awe.

"You formed the dream." Jack said, nodding toward the herd of deer that had scampered off and back down to the earth. Kristoff immediately snatched his hand out of the sand.

"I did what?"

"Relax, Mr. King, you didn't do anything bad. I do it all the time, you just made whatever the dream is about, appear in solid form."

"Wait, so does that mean he's…." Kristoff trailed off pointing at Sandy who had returned to distributing the dreams. "He's the sandman, like the myth?"

Jack smirked at the king and slung his staff over his chest. "I do believe so, your highness."

"Ok, you need to stop with the titles." Kristoff said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Ya that's not happening anytime soon." Jack said, leaping into the air and extending his hand to Kristoff who gripped his wrist and was pulled back into the air.

Anna rushed over to Kristoff and wrapped her arms around him the second they landed on the balcony.

"Well what do you know I didn't kill your husband." Jack said, smirking at her. Anna rolled her eyes and handed him back his staff.

Jack jumped onto the railing of the balcony and flipped off catching the wooden branch neatly in his hand.

"Now if you'll excuse me, I must go Mr. King and Redhead." Jack said bowing midair to the couple.

"If you keep calling me by some title I will tie you back up again." Kristoff threatened. Jack laughed at him and flew off into the air.

Elsa slipped into the dinning room and sat down next to Kristoff and Anna who both wore a smug smile on their faces.

"So, when were you going to tell us about your ever amazing royal guest?" Kristoff then asked. Elsa blushed and sat down quickly.

Anna smiled at her. "He knows about him now." Elsa looked at her horrified.

"You actually believe him!"

"Yes."

"Anna, that is impossible. He is a fable, nothing more and I intend to find out who this man actually is."

"Please don't kill him." Kristoff called out after her as she slipped out the dinning hall and into the hall. Elsa hurried to the courtyard doors and pushed them open.

"Jack!" she called out as loud as she dared praying no one heard her.

"Yes Queeny." A voice then said, Elsa turned and jumped back in shock as Jack floated in the air hovering above her.

"What did you do?" she hissed at him through clenched teeth.

"What, oh you mean about your sister and inlaw, yeah I decided to help them with a nightmare problem." Jack said, flipping to his back and toying with his staff.

Elsa's gaze hardened at him "You mean to tell me you went and spied on my Family in the middle of the night, even though it had nothing to do with why you're here."

Jack winced. "One thing led to another and I only meant to stay and make sure that whoever had the nightmare was ok."

"How would a nightmare harm someone?"

"It wasn't the nightmare I was worried about, it was whether or not they were afraid afterwards."

Elsa sighed and clasped her hands together, before turning to head inside.

"If it makes you feel better your brother tied me to a bed and held me hostage, so something tells me I wouldn't have been able to hurt him even if I wanted to."

Elsa's shoulders tightened at this and she was thankful her back was to Jack as she fought back the urge to smile.

I present chapter 5, I hope you enjoyed and that you had an amazing new year.

~Mixitupqueen.