My HTTYD readers have been told this before, but to those of you who are new here, I have to make something abundantly plain.

I abhor reviews/comments that are just "please/plz update/update soon" and nothing else. There is nothing that will put me off working on a story quicker than that, it makes me feel soooo anxious. I have no problem with a "hope you update soon" as part of something else, but I get nothing from aforementioned types because there's nothing about the fic in them. So yeah... if you want more updates, please stop being pushy and demanding. I'm a human, not a machine for your entertainment and I don't respond well under pressure.

Anyway...

I don't know that this will forever mostly be in Iduna POV, but since shes the one having an emotional time it's working for now.

-IEA-

Iduna was about to start explaining her survival and time 'away', but Elsa suddenly chimed in.

"Before anything else... where do you plan to sleep tonight?"

"Excuse me?"

Elsa raised one slim eyebrow, then shrugged to herself.

"I meant, do you intend to go back to your... old room, or would you prefer I have somewhere prepared for you?"

Iduna blinked a few times. She hadn't thought of that. The thought of going back to the room she'd shared with Agnarr made pain pulse in her chest.

"Somewhere else."

Elsa nodded, squeezed Anna's hand and offered her sister a tight smile before leaving the room. Anna was still a fidget, drumming her fingers against the cushion of her seat and her hands on her knees, tapping her slippered feet on the ground. Finally, Iduna could take the silence no more.

"Anna-"

"Mom-"

"Oh, you first."

"No, you."

They shared a nervous giggle, something Anna had definitely got from her.

"I know everything is like, super crazy and you probably feel like you can't fit it all inside your head, but... I am really happy you're here. We missed you a whooole lot."

Her younger daughter was so very honest, her smile so earnest and genuine. Iduna could only nod, welling up a little with the acknowledgement despite everything. After a few deep breaths, she managed to find her voice again.

"Thank you Anna. I am... glad to be home."

Elsa rejoined them before either found any new words, carrying a heavy cup of something that she handed over to Iduna.

"What is this?"

"Oh, some fancy wine, it was a gift for my coronation. I already had it tested, it's not poisoned. It's quite potent, but you looked as though you could do with 'a stiff drink', as Kristoff would say. Drink it slowly, or Alice will scold me like I'm still a child."

Iduna took a small sip, and Elsa wasn't lying about the strength, the taste heavily sweet but carrying a burn all the way from lips to belly.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Elsa took her seat next to Anna again, the two definitely sitting closer than strictly necessary, but really Iduna considered that the least of her concerns when it came to her daughters closeness.

"So... how did you make it back here? How did it take you so long?"

Iduna took another sip of wine, grateful for the bracing burn as it chased away some of the sickly flutters in her stomach. Survivors guilt, she'd heard it called by soldiers who came back when their comrades hadn't.

"I remember the ship going over, sort of. I can still hear Agnarr calling out to me as the sea came up to claim our decks. The next thing I knew was being so cold, and everything around me was black. I felt the water break above my head, found myself in the middle of a storm. I called out for Agnarr, I even went back underwater to see if he was there... but there was no sign of him. He was just... gone."

Another sip of wine. Her tolerance would be low, but she had not had much anyway. Getting it all off her chest was somewhat cathartic after so long alone and lost. Adrift for years, Iduna was still getting used to having found the safe land of home.

"I swam. Or tried to. The current pushed me along, and then I felt sand sticking to my hands and I pulled myself out of the water. I tried to call out for him again, but there was nothing."

They were silent for a few minutes, and Iduna found herself worried they would blame her somehow. Perhaps she could have tried harder to find him? Called out longer?

"It wasn't your fault mother."

"What?"

Elsa was looking at her with an unreadable expression, but her tone was even and there was no accusation in her face or words.

"Losing father. It was not your fault. It's a miracle of the gods you survived, and made it back. Do not blame yourself for what was beyond your control."

"It doesn't feel that way."

"Your ship went down, would you blame anyone else for surviving over the other passengers if it were any other ship?"

Iduna frowned, but eventually sighed.

"No. I suppose not. But if a ship you were on went down and you lost... Anna, wouldn't you feel guilty?"

Elsa seemed to recoil from the very idea, the room chilling again before Anna reached out and clasped Elsa's hand between her own, leaning in closer as though her own wamrth could thaw the ice that Elsa carried.

"Hey, hey. I'm right here."

Iduna knew their closeness was wrong, but when she saw how naturally Anna responded to her sisters emotions, how the years apart had not severed their bond completely, it was harder to hold the situation in her mind as completely black and white.

The heat of the fire touched her again, the constant back and forth enough to make a wave of fatigue wash over Iduna, and her poorly stifled yawn did not go unnoticed.

"It is getting late. We'll talk more tomorrow."

Iduna's... concerns flooded back at that, fairly certain that her daughters would not be going to seperate beds once they saw Iduna off to her own for the night. They shared a silent look before Anna hopped up from her seat, coming over to lift Iduna to her feet and begin leading her out of the room.

"It's ok mama, we'll still be here in the morning but you need to rest. Hey, what do you want for breakfast tomorrow? You probably have to eat sorta carefully, right?"

That vibrant energy, the way Anna seemed to thrum with life had not changed a bit, and she still chattered away with her broad smile and all but skipped on the spot.

"Yes, for the moment I have to be mindful."

"Your Highness, and... Your other Highness" of course, Iduna was no longer 'Your Majesty'... that would take some getting used to from the staff "this way."

Kai led them to a room prepared for her, laid out with luxurious materials and heavy covers, one of the few bedrooms in the castle with its own fireplace lest Iduna somehow feel a chill.

"We'll figure out where you want to spend your nights more permanently tomorrow, and I'll make sure you have some fresh clothes to put on tomorrow. I imagine Alice is itching to have your hair and everything done properly in the morning too... right. Well, goodnight mother. I hope you rest well."

Iduna felt a small smile steal across her face at that half-resigned, half-fond way Anna mentioned Alice. Anna hugged her again before slipping away, giving Iduna no time to ask which bed she'd be in that night. Then again, perhaps she didn't want the answer to dwell upon. Clambering into the plush, silk-soft bed and pulling the thick blankets up over her, Iduna realised she was more tired than she thought, and let sleep claim her for the night.


Watching her sister snore lightly next to her, Elsa still thought the fact Anna slept so ungracefully was adorable. No matter how many times their mother had tucked her in in 'lady like' ways, closing her open mouth or putting her arms down rather than leave them slung over the pillow, Anna was still prone to the occasional drooling, open mouthed snoring, her hair forever a mess no matter how neatly it was tied the night before.

Although really, Elsa thought their mother had far larger concerns about how Anna spent her nights now.

Gods, their mother was alive. Really, actually alive and home. They'd mourned her, held a funeral and Elsa had frozen her entire bedroom so thoroughly she was worried the wall would crumble before her eyes. A lump still rose in her throat when she remembered Anna outside her door that night, begging to be let in now they only had each other. Truly, Elsa counted her blessings that Anna had been willing to forgive her all of it.

As though sensing Elsa's turbulent mood even in her sleep, Anna curled up and burrowed into her sisters body, sighing happily when Elsa laid an arm over her. Her heart seemed to swell in her chest with how much she loved Anna. It wasn't only Anna's frozen heart that thawed that day... she'd broken down the ice around Elsa's heart too. And given Elsa the control of her powers that had always seemed so impossible.

"Hey, go to sleep."

Anna mumbled sleepily into her chest, one teal eye cracked open to peer up at her.

"Sorry. Thinking."

Yawning, Anna simply snuggled her again and was asleep in seconds. Elsa smiled at her cuteness, and did her best to quiet her brain.

Sleepovers were how it started for them, really. They had years of missed slumber parties to make up for, according to Anna, especially since they'd shared a bedroom before the... incident. So Anna had just started inviting herself into Elsa's room at night, dressed in her nightclothes and usually carrying chocolate. They'd talk until Anna fell asleep (Anna always fell asleep first, unless Elsa had been working 'too hard'), and Elsa never had the heart to oust her sister from her bed, even though those first nights, Elsa did fear that her powers might still do their own thing in her sleep. As a girl, she'd woken to snowfall before.

And the other thing they had to make up for, according to Anna, was cuddling. Anna was so tactile, forever holding Elsa's hand, playing with her hair, asking Elsa to braid hers when she was truly determined to stop Elsa doing more paperwork of an evening.

Elsa still remembered the first flickers of guilt, and their first shy kisses, those first clumsy touches. It seemed another lifetime ago that Anna didn't take up space in her bed, that Elsa didn't spend most of her nights drawing the sweetest sounds from her sisters lips.

She'd wondered aloud a couple of times to Anna - had their years apart been the cause for why they felt that way for each other? But her sister was less interested in that, and saw it in simpler terms of "I love you and you love me, and what we do feels right". Elsa was slowly coming to see it from her point of view, so long as Anna respected the paramount secrecy.

Sleep finally claimed her, though it was with a tingle in her belly after thoughts of those first nights exploring Anna's body, of being explored in turn. Anna was still dead to the world, but the sun was barely rising when Elsa looked to the small crack in the curtains.

Anna grumbled as Elsa made to leave the bed, mewling softly when lips pressed to messy hair before she snuggled deeper into the warm covers. Elsa slipped out herself, heading for the bathroom to relieve herself and clean her teeth. She dressed in the bathroom, because if Anna woke in time to see her in any state of undress... Elsa usually ended up running late.

The morning staff were starting to mill about, but she knew none would enter her room until Anna had been seen awake. That had been a rule back when they had more innocent sleepovers, but Elsa credited her staff with intelligence. They knew. They just pretended not to.

"Ah, Your Majesty! Good morning."

"Good morning Alice, did you need something?"

"Yes. Your mother is asking for you. She requested to see you both, but I informed her that the princess is not such an early riser, and I promised I would pass on the message if I saw either of you."

With a quick bow, Alice excused herself, paper in her hand covered in measurements... perhaps she meant to make the previous monarch some new, more fitting attire that wasn't borrowed from her daughters? Elsa couldn't think who else she might have been measuring when dawn had barely broken.

Bracing herself as though heading to some kind of important political meeting, Elsa drew in a few deep breaths before she headed toward Iduna's current room. Anna was better at this, better at ignoring all the tension and smiling, and keeping Elsa from accidentally freezing things...

Elsa knocked, a soft voice inviting her in. Iduna was sat on the very edge of her bed, a steaming mug clutched between her thin hands. Her hair was down but clearly had been brushed, and she wore what Elsa recognised as Anna's old dressing gown. If nothing else, Alice seemed to have taken it as her personal duty to care for the no-longer-lost lost queen.

"Mother?"

-IEA-

Ooooh, what a fun chat these two could have.