Chapter 3 - The Spring Witch

Anna was having the strangest dream. An old troll called Grand Pabbie was talking to her while a crowd of trolls held up a mirror. "Your brother is in grave danger," Grand Pabbie said darkly. The mirror flickered and showed her the face of her friend Jack, a handsome boy with brown hair and brown eyes. "His heart is frozen in ice." Then ice crystals formed on the mirror as Jack's hair turned white and his eyes icy blue. "He has been whisked away by the Snow Queen herself." The mirror showed a beautiful girl who Anna almost mistook for her own reflection, except with white hair, ice-blue eyes, and a dangerous one-sided smile.

"Only an act of true love can thaw a frozen heart," Grand Pabbie stated. "And a sister give the gift of love." The Snow Queen's face transformed into Anna's own reflection, her hair dark gold in two braids, her eyes blue-green, her cheeks rosy, a hopeful slightly titled smile on her face. The mirror started to crack with Anna's face on it, until it splintered into a hundred pieces that went flying through the air.

Anna awoke in bed with a jolt. It was a cold winter day, the day after Christmas, and she dressed in her black-corseted blue dress to go visit Jack. Downstairs she ran into her grandmother Halima who had raised her.

"Off to see your friend, Anna?" she asked.

"Yes! I'll see you later." She kissed her grandmother Halima on the cheek and then rushed out the door into the snow.

She knocked on Jack's door, but Jack was not home. "Jack's run off somewhere," his mother said to her. "I don't know where." He had been missing since yesterday.

"I'll go find him," Anna said bravely.

Anna searched all of the town of Burgess but couldn't find Jack.

"Grandmother," she said, back at home. "Where do you think Jack went?"

"Only the river Ahtohallan knows," Halima answered. She patted the girl's cheek. "He'll come back someday."

Winter turned to spring, and the snow melted except for at the top of the North Mountain and in the far north. Still Jack could not be found, and was said by everyone to have run away from home.

"I'm going to find him," Anna said determinedly. She dressed in her pink cape and hat as it was still chilly outside. She ran away from home with only a simple good-bye to Halima and no explanation where she was going. She believed she could find Jack and bring him home.

She found an oarboat on the river and hopped in, pushing off behind her. The boat carried her down the river until she came to a cottage with a spring garden. She would stop here to rest, if whoever lived here was kind enough, she thought. She was so hungry though that when she found a vegetable garden she pulled some leaves of cabbage and stuffed them into her mouth. She was caught, however, when a voice called out behind her and she spun around.

"Welcome!" said a black-haired woman in a red dress. "You can call me Mother Gothel! Why don't you stay for a while?"

Anna gladly came in for food and refreshment. It was warm here so she took off her pink cape, hat, and mittens. Mother Gothel fed her at a table. She even gave her a new dress to wear, a light purple lace-up corseted dress with sheer sleeves. Anna happily let her lace her into it. Then the woman said, "Sit down, and let me run a brush through your hair."

Anna sat on the edge of the bed and let Mother Gothel take out her two braids and brush her gold hair. As she brushed it though Anna fell into a daze and forgot everything, and her hair magically grew longer and longer until it fell down to the floor and dragged behind her in a trail. Looking in a hand mirror she saw her eyes had turned green, as if under a spell.

"I'll call you Rapunzel from now on," Mother Gothel said matter-of-factly. "After the cabbage you ate from my garden."

Mother Gothel took the girl firmly by the wrist and pulled her up the staircase of a tall tower, then locked her in the room at the top and left her there. The girl, who now could only remember her name being Rapunzel, was grief-stricken. When Mother Gothel had combed her hair she had forgotten all her past memories, even Jack. Well, almost. She could never really forget Jack.

The girl lived in the tower through the springtime, mostly reading fairy tale books to pass the time. One day she heard a voice call out from below.

"Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!" It was a boy! Rapunzel looked down out her window and saw a handsome boy with messy brown hair, wearing a brown cape. He was familiar to her, but she couldn't quite remember.

She lowered her hair down the tower side. The boy took her golden hair fist by fist and climbed up the tower. At the top she pulled him in through the window.

"I've looked for you everywhere," he explained. At her blank look, he said, "It's me, Jack! Don't you remember me?"

"Jack! It is you!" She embraced him tightly and he let her, smiling. "Grand Pabbie said the Snow Queen took you away."

"She did. I was turned into an invisible winter sprite. But I managed to fly back to find you and then turn visible again," he explained. "I can only turn visible for short times though. I don't remember your hair being so long!" he teased, holding her hair in both his hands.

Suddenly there was another voice from below. "Rapunzel!" Mother Gothel called.

"Hide!" the girl said, pushing Jack into the wardrobe. Then she lowered her hair and let the witch climb up.

"I brought this," Mother Gothel said, taking out a knife from her black cape. "I thought you might want to cut your bangs in the front and give me the lock of hair to keep for you."

"Is that what you want is my hair?"

"I can keep it in a box for you and then you can be free to go. You had bangs when you came here but they grew out. Don't you want bangs again?"

Jack peered out the crack of the wardrobe. Rapunzel took the knife and stood in front of the full-length mirror. She took a lock of her hair in one fist and the knife in the other. Mother Gothel watched her with an evil grin. Rapunzel raised the knife-

"No!" Jack cried as he sprang out of the wardrobe.

Rapunzel cut the lock of hair and it fell off in her hand, leaving a fringe of bangs across her forehead. Her hair shimmered and then magically turned back into two short braids again. The mirror cracked and splintered, the pieces flying everywhere. Mother Gothel grabbed a broom and flew out the window cackling. Jack rushed to the girl's side and took the knife from her hand, throwing it aside, and then embracing her and quickly letting go again.

The girl changed from the purple dress back into her old clothes, her black-corseted blue dress, pink cape and hat, and mittens and boots. "But now how will we get down from the tower?" she asked. She looked like the same old Anna again, her hair in two braids, now that the spell was broken.

"I'm Jack Frost," the boy replied. "I can fly us out."

"Not without a stick to fly on."

"Yes I can, if you believe in me."

"I do believe in you."

Jack took Anna in his arms and flew her out the window on a strong gust of wind. They floated gracefully through the air past the treetops and landed on the soft grass below.

Jack gripped his heart suddenly as if it hurt him. "Anna, I have to turn back invisible, because I'm under a spell. Keep walking until you get to Arendelle castle. They'll let you in there - I'm certain."

"No Jack, I don't want you to leave me!" Anna cried.

"I'll never leave you. I'll be invisible by your side." As she watched his brown hair turned white, his brown eyes shimmered to ice-blue, and he flickered and turned invisible. But she felt a chill on her cheek where he kissed her.