24. Do You Want Some Exposition?
Carol Duffin watched with amusement as what the Minister of Tourism called the "second shift" arrived in intervals at the waterfront, equipped with snow shovels and push brooms to collect some of the snow that was flung during the first fight back into a few piles close to selected forts so that the battles could begin again, albeit on a smaller scale. Olaf orbited throughout the playground area, joining the children who came and went in their games.
"Good thing the Daloans and the Khentiians have already called it a day," Haugen said as an aside as they and Newark surveyed the action. "I bet they'll be raring to go after the magic show on Saturday."
"So none of the locals have any qualms about Queen Elsa dumping massive amounts of snow on Arendelle again at random points in time?" Newark asked, observing how eagerly the citizens played with the Snow Queen's handiwork.
"Are you in Arendelle to study Her Majesty's standing with her people or her magical powers, Professor Newark?" Duffin jibed.
"I am interested both," Newark stated frankly. "The primal fear of the unknown and the abnormal, and the rational fear of dangerous forces should make the residents scared to death of her. But they're obviously not."
Olaf carefully shepherded a very small boy up one of the ice slides, and chattered encouragement as the child glided back down to the ground.
"There are some who are afraid of her, or at least disapprove of her," Haugen acknowledged. "The extreme cases have chosen to emigrate, or were given a fair trial and banished for their behavior during the Winter in July. Most of the remaining discontents are people who complain about everything anyway, so the Queen takes them for what they are, just as she asks us to take her for what she is - whatever it is that she is. Even if we don't agree on what she is, the vast majority of us agree on what she isn't."
"I see. So nobody looks out his or her window right now and sees all this unexpected snow on the ground and worries that the Queen has lost control or worse?" Newark queried.
Olaf was taking a turn on one of the swings, with an older, stronger boy pushing him since his short, globular legs were of little use to get started or build acceleration.
"If they do, they keep it to themselves," Haugen said simply. "As you saw today, most of us relish the chance to watch Her Majesty use her magic."
"And so do many other people from around the world, if I understand correctly," Duffin mentioned, giving Newark a pointed look. "Humanity also has a rational curiosity about the unknown and the abnormal, and a primal fascination with wonders and mysterious forces."
The snowman egged on the boy to push him faster and higher on the swing. By and by, his carrot nose flew off, but was quickly retrieved by a young girl, who affectionately replaced it on his face, inadvertently upside down.
"Well met, Miss Duffin," Newark said politely. "Wouldn't have science without that side of human nature, would we?"
"And as Professor Holmboe told you this morning, people get sickened, maimed, or killed during chemistry experiments, and yet the spirit of inquiry is stronger than its ever been. Even many common professions are quite dangerous," Duffin pursued. "Anyone who works on the seas will tell you that, as will miners and quarrymen. Have you ever seen a farrier try to shoe an irate horse? Just living in nature can be risky. I've traveled through deserts, sojourned in mountains, waded through swamps, and stumbled through jungles in my search for evidence of real magic, and it has given me a deep appreciation for the safety of our modern civilization."
"Very true. It's just that the Snow Queen got off to a rocky start with the public. It's one thing to trip over your own cape at your coronation ball and quite another to accidentally freeze your entire country," Newark noted dryly.
Olaf seemed to sense that something wasn't quite right about him, yet couldn't establish precisely where the problem was. He first tried interchanging his legs, but it made no difference, so he switched them back.
"Queen Elsa wasn't the only one had some explaining to do afterward. You must admit that not knowing your own strength and being out of practice because you've spent the past thirteen years trying very hard not to use your powers are more convincing excuses than 'I was just following orders,' and 'I didn't think it was my responsibility to do or say anything,' and 'It's just good business to raise prices sky high during an emergency,' " Haugen justified.
Newark arched an eyebrow. "Fair point. I suppose you find out what everybody is made of during a crisis."
The snowman next swapped his stick arms, but found that transferring the second arm was decidedly more difficult than the first, since his elbow now bent the opposite way and his twig fingers curled away from his body. With some effort, he figured out how to maneuver his arm in reverse.
"And we quickly found out that during a crisis, Her Majesty is still committed to what's in the best interests of the people of Arendelle, to trying not to harm anybody with her magic," Haugen stated with conviction. "She was a progressive and benevolent ruler before her powers were revealed, so why should that change? Our university and health care system have been in development since she's been in charge of the kingdom, and her natural resources conservation and research programs have been in place since she was Crown Princess. We might not have seen her much, but we knew she was working for the good of the country and its future. Again, I know I sound like an advertisement, but it's all perfectly true."
"No need to defend yourself, sir," Newark said, showing an open hand in a conciliatory gesture. "Or Queen Elsa. She could clearly take over the world - or at least squeeze out all sorts of excessive concessions from other countries who seek treaties, yet it seems her only tacit command is that everybody plays together more or less nicely. A Pax Arendellea."
"Oh, I like the sound of that!" Haugen said brightly. "May I appropriate it?"
"By all means," Newark said with a genuine chuckle.
"You might want to check with the Queen first before you use it in any public relations capacity," Duffin cautioned with a wry grin. "The Latin term that the professor is modeling it after does have a slight overtone of 'peace by conquest.' We wouldn't want you to get thrown out on your ear."
"Speaking of which, how did you get the job?" Newark posed. "Did you just walk up to your magical monarch and ask for a position promoting Arendelle as a premier stop on the grand tour, with her as the main attraction?"
Dissatisfied with the current operation of his arms, Olaf rotated them in their sockets so that his palms were facing their usual direction and his elbows crooked normally, but now his thumbs were on the bottom of his hand rather than being topmost.
"Almost. Once I had some time to process what I witnessed on coronation night and make the connection with what happened on the night of her birth, I was exhilarated and wanted to see more of that. So did a lot of other people that I talked to here. Then I went to one of the open courts and pitched my ideas. Princess Anna persuaded the Queen to at least think about my proposals and bring in a small test group in to review Arendelle as a vacation destination," Haugen recalled. "You see, my family is in the import-export business, and on our first voyage after the Great Thaw, the simple fact that we hail from Arendelle made us minor celebrities in many foreign harbors. Everyone wanted to hear the story and quite a few expressed a desire to see such marvels for themselves. So I knew we had potential." He glanced at the less intense snowball fights and ice playground. "It took a lot of coaxing from Princess Anna to get Her Majesty to perform in a magic show, but once we got her on stage, she was just a ... a natural."
"And a star was born," Newark quipped.
"Speaking of which, Minister Haugen, you implied that you can remember the night Her Majesty was born. The blizzard, the ice storm, and the aurora?" Duffin invited, still on the hunt for any information about the time before the gates were shut.
Olaf gave up on his arms and returned them to their original arrangement.
"You've heard about it? Yes, the dancing, glowing snow. And the exquisite ice crystals and frost patterns. And the lights in the sky," Haugen mused, staring at the ground as though spellbound by the snow on the cobblestones. "And how the ice and frost disappeared at the sun's first light the next morning. I was five years old, and I stayed awake almost the whole night, just looking at it. I didn't doze off for long, for fear that it wouldn't be there when I woke back up."
"Sounds altogether enchanting," Newark said meaningfully. Haugen nodded without taking his eyes off the snow.
"So you thought it was magic?" Duffin put forth.
"Yes. But that's how five-year-olds think. It's easy to believe in magic at that age, sometimes even easier than believing in reality," Haugen reflected. "Back then, if my mother had told me not to play in or by the streams because I could slip and drown or be swept over a waterfall, it wouldn't have made any impression on me. But since she told me not to because the bakkhest -the brook horse, a kind of water spirit- would lure me onto its back, and I wouldn't be able to get off, and then it would carry me into the water and drown me, I obeyed her."
"Ah, numerous cultures have a very similar water spirit tale, even right down to it often taking the shape of a horse, like our kelpie back home," Duffin said, nodding in comprehension. "And there are also many comparable legendary beings and stories from unrelated societies involving the forest and the night."
"And all of them being used for the same purpose: To keep gullible and stupid people from falling victim to their own gullibility and stupidity by taking advantage of their own gullibility and stupidity. A stroke of genius," Newark perceived, smiling slightly.
In a burst of inspiration, Olaf flipped his head upside down.
"It's all about knowing what plays well with your audience, and what doesn't," Haugen said, smiling in return. "Of course, the adults, being shrewd and intelligent, merely listened patiently and patted my head indulgently when I told them about how the ice and frost floated up into the sky and vanished - 'like magic.' I was somewhat confused why none of them put any stock in what I said, since they were always telling me about all these scary magical creatures lurking in and around water, forests, mountains, caves, dark alleys, and nighttime crossroads. The world was utterly teeming with magic, according to them."
"But eventually you figured out the real dangers that the scary magical creatures symbolized, and no longer needed those sorts of ploys to keep you safe from things that a child can't fully understand," Duffin posited.
Something appeared to feel better to Olaf with his head upturned, even though all his friends were hanging off the earth like bats dangling from the roof of a cavern.
"Or to keep me from cutting corners or going off task when I was helping out around the household and the warehouse, in the case of beneficial but tiresomely vigilant and fastidious beings like the nyssen," Haugen added with a laugh. "But yes, in due course, I was as shrewd and intelligent as anybody else, and was practically certain that what I glimpsed that morning was just a trick of the light meeting an over-stimulated imagination ... until I saw her freeze the fountain and blast ice at the steps." He gazed out at the harbor with an unusually yearning look on his face.
The way Haugen emphasized the word "her" and his expression gave both Newark and Duffin pause, and they shared a sidelong glance. The Minister of Tourism was quite possibly smitten with at least the Snow Queen's magic. Newark winked surreptitiously at Duffin, who pressed her index finger over her smiling lips and shook her head.
Duffin allowed the silence to linger for a moment before prompting, "And then you knew magic really does exist."
Finding sudden insight, the snowman tried focusing his eyes on his carrot nose. With a cross-eyed squint, he finally discerned the source of his awkward feeling. He plucked the carrot off his face and oriented it properly relative to his eyes, then returned his head to its correct aspect. Olaf wiped his brow in relief.
"It was something of a jolt at the beginning. We couldn't very well dismiss that as a trick of the light meeting over-stimulated imaginations," Haugen said, quickly recovering his self-assured yet unassuming demeanor. "Fortunately, my gullible and stupid inner five-year-old took the shrewd and intelligent 26-year-old by the hand and reawakened that 'primal fascination with wonders and mysterious forces.' Most of the people I've talked with had much the same response after the Great Thaw. And 'A World History of Real Magic' immediately became the most requested tome at the library and bookshops here in Arendelle."
"All around the world, actually. A veritable international bestseller, once news of Queen Elsa's magic spread. And just envision the sales when the second volume goes to press," Newark joked.
"But there's always the worry that the sequel won't be as good as the first one," Haugen teased.
"You two sound just like my publishers," Duffin bantered back. "Now I have to cope with sales performance projections. And to think, they were happy enough when their niche-market gamble first made a slight profit."
"Well, who knew there was an incredibly powerful magic-user living in a small northern country, almost in the Western Isles' own backyard?" Newark pointed out.
"Who indeed? Didn't anyone in Arendelle think Queen Elsa was a little out of the ordinary?" Duffin trawled. "That the blizzard and ice storm might have been heralding or generating a special birth? The Queen hinted that she didn't get out much as a child, but didn't anybody ever notice the Crown Princess leaving a trail of frost or followed by snow flurries?"
Undaunted by his previous episode on the swing, Olaf cheerfully jumped on a merry-go-round and, keeping a firm grip on both his nose and one of the handhold bars, urged the children to spin him as fast as they could, causing a slight torsion effect in his personal flurry as it whirled with him.
"You'd have to ask the castle staff or her old tutors. We never saw her much, even before the gates were closed," Haugen said with a shrug. "You don't exactly see Crown Princesses playing in the streets with commoners, even in small northern countries. Well, maybe if Princess Anna had been the first-born, but you know what I mean. And after the gates were closed, we'd only see her briefly a few times a year. Interestingly enough in retrospect, only in winter when it was snowing with a good bit of snow already on the ground."
"Let me guess, some of the populace had already nicknamed her something like 'the Snow Princess,' " Newark smirked.
"Brilliant deduction," Haugen conceded wryly. "But later on we also sometimes called her 'the Forest Princess,' due to her concern that we were cutting down our trees faster than they could grow and the study she commissioned -with the King's approval, of course- to find the best ways to manage our woodlands and what we needed to do in order to keep pace with demand. Timber is a very important part of our economy, both as a trade good and in ship-building. It was her first bit of official business."
"I see. How old was she when she had this idea?" Newark asked.
Haugen worked it out for a moment. "About sixteen, maybe seventeen. You can always ask her."
"Remarkable, either way," Newark commended. "And remarkable that a King took a Princess' suggestions seriously and permitted her to take credit for it."
"Just because we're a backwater doesn't mean we're backward," Haugen said humbly. "We've been lucky enough to have had seven rather enlightened monarchs in a row now." He paused. "Although lately there has been some discussion about a few of King Agnarr's policies."
"Shutting the gates? The Queen hinted this morning that the castle was closed because her magic was dangerous. I suppose her father couldn't very well announce that was the real reason," Duffin said quietly.
"He told us it was because he decided the royal family didn't need so many frills at the citizens' expense. And we did see a corresponding reduction in taxes and fees. It played well with his audience," Haugen said in a clipped tone.
"Come now, you really can't blame him for not stating the true cause, or for choosing to be wary with his heir and his country and their futures," Newark argued. "The Queen also hinted this morning that it wasn't easy to arrive at her current level of control. Remember that we are only seeing the final, polished version and not a rough draft. This morning, she let us experience what 'not very tense' feels like if she doesn't restrain or redirect her magic somehow. It was not nearly as pleasant as the conditions of the snowball fight."
"The Queen has also hinted that her magic is easier to control when she doesn't force herself -or isn't forced- to conceal it all the time," Haugen countered, his tone still clipped.
"True. But there should be some sympathy for the complexities of a father's duties. There are no guidelines about how to set and enforce limits while encouraging a healthy kind of individuality and experimentation," Newark advocated, and contemplated Olaf and the town's children playing. "Speaking from experience, it's hard enough with comparatively ordinary children; I can't begin to imagine what it would be like with a daughter who has magical powers directed by her will and triggered by her emotions."
"Neither can I, I guess," Haugen granted, and also turned his attention to the children and snowman at play.
"At least it looks like everything has turned out fine in the end," Duffin proposed, trying to bring back the conversation's lighter mood. "Maybe it's not a classic 'happily ever after,' but the people of Arendelle seem to know and appreciate how lucky they are. And this is one of the most child-friendly places I've ever been to."
"Well, all this doesn't happen every day," Haugen confessed. "Plus, you haven't seen the moping and tantrums that sometimes occur when playtime has to end. And I'm talking about how I carry on, never mind the children and other adults." Duffin and Newark laughed quietly. "Speaking of which, it must be near five o'clock."
Olaf had called all the children on the playground equipment over to him, and they complied, a few somewhat more reluctantly than others. The adults immediately broke off their snowball fights, and helped usher the children away from the slides, swings, and merry-go-rounds. The Minister of Tourism lent a hand, and Newark and Duffin also found themselves assisting. Many of the children were already departing for home or were being gathered by their parents. Most of the adult locals were likewise heading back to their regular matters.
Haugen walked over to a group of obvious tourists who seemed undecided about their next move. "There is one more marvel to see today, ladies and gentlemen," he said amiably.
The clock's bell chimed once, and now everyone stepped away from the snow and playground equipment. The clock's bell chimed a second time, and there was a brief, faint blue-white glow that spread across the area. The clock's bell chimed a third time, and the ice playground, snow forts, ice fabric safety net, and the built snowman fragmented into small pieces and hovered, and the snow on the ground floated up. The clock's bell chimed a fourth time, and all of it soared high into the sky and formed Elsa's signature snowflake. The clock's bell chimed a fifth time, and the snowflake dispersed as fine particles with a flash of light.
"Like magic," Haugen said to no one in particular.
Olaf and a small flock of children strolled away, giggling about something, while a few of the others reclaimed the scarf, carrot, and coal from ground where the non-magical snowman had been.
Duffin looked at the accessories from the built snowman being carried away, then back up at the sky, and finally back at Olaf. "He is such a happy fellow, isn't he," she remarked, her voice catching a little.
"Obviously not a malicious bone in his body, to use a figure of speech," Newark agreed. "And to think, apparently the Snow Queen didn't even know she made him 'alive'..."
"She does work in mysterious ways sometimes," Haugen noted with a laugh, shaking his head. "On occasion, we're hard pressed to tell when she planned it all out and when she just made it up as she went along."
"Knowing that would ruin the magic," Newark snorted.
"No, that's just a woman's prerogative, magical or not," Duffin said smugly. "Gentlemen, it's been a pleasure, but it's time to get ready for dinner, even though I don't have to worry about any last-minute fighting over the bathroom." She curtsied to Haugen and Newark, who then bowed to her and each other, and the trio went their separate ways, each one mulling over the afternoon's events.
From the library window, Elsa had kept her eye on the mini-thaw, as she usually did when she made playground equipment with an automatic expiration hour. She had made a private vow that no child would ever again be harmed, directly or indirectly, by her magic. And although her magical designs included many safety features that would be activated in special circumstances, she knew better than to be too complacent. She had the mental images to remind her that children were capable of great feats of willfulness, impulsiveness, and obliviousness, especially when told to stop doing something they enjoyed. She also knew that the design safety features were ultimately founded on fear -the old, familiar fear of someone getting hurt- and that fear and her magic were an unreliable combination, which could set the whole vicious cycle in perpetual motion if she hadn't been mentally focused and emotionally disciplined when she created something.
"If we could build an engine that ran on second-guessing, I could power the world," Elsa said to thin air.
There was a knock at the door; she could tell it was Helga. "Your Majesty, it's five o'clock. Time to prepare for dinner."
"Thank you, Helga," Elsa called as she finished reshelving the records she had needed to analyze the potential of an inland development project. It would require more thought, more research, and possibly a meeting with the residents of a few of the smaller mining communities. She rubbed the knuckles of her right hand, which was a small step toward breaking her hand-wringing habit, and walked out in the hallway.
"Oh, and Master Kai says I might need some ice to wake up Princess Anna," Helga said as she held out a small jar. "She can be awfully hard to get going after nap."
The most gracious and serene Queen of Arendelle obliged with a very cheeky smile.
Author's Notes - Sorry that this chapter is original character heavy and somewhat "meta," but they are good narrative devices to discuss Elsa and Arendelle. Most of Olaf's capers in this one should be imagined as background events. I have no idea how he would pull off the arm switcheroo gag.
I figured there does need to be some explanation for why the people of Arendelle are "okay" with Elsa having magical powers. We are a pretty weird species, in that sometimes we react with fascination, acceptance, and reverence and other times with fear, rejection, and violence toward the same phenomenon. Bonus points if you can find half of a "Rent" shout-out.
Elsa's forest initiative would be very forward thinking for her era. Back then, even if we knew that plants and animals could be made extinct or extirpated by our actions, we weren't quite clued in that maybe -just maybe- we shouldn't and/or didn't have to do the things that would lead to ecological collapses. Her concern for Arendelle's forests is both an example of Elsa being a "good queen" and will be a plot point later on.
I imagine Elsa's relationship with her father to be complicated. Trying to raise a daughter who has magical powers directed by her will and triggered by her emotions, who probably has a genius-level intellect in at least at some subjects, and who is going to be a working queen would not be for the faint of heart, even if she didn't also have post-traumatic stress disorder. The wonderful world of Disney...
Newark's remark about how people only get to see the "final version" of Elsa and not the "early working drafts" both ties in to that complexity, and is partially a shout-out to the long struggle to adapt the Hans Christian Anderson tale to the big screen for modern audiences. Only the final version of the Elsa/Snow Queen character is good; all the early ones were villainous or morally ambiguous. There will be future discussions about how the tragedy of accidentally shooting her little sister in the head and being kept apart from society made Elsa the person we get to see.
The "plans it or just makes it up" is, of course, a shout-out to the "Pirates of the Caribbean" franchise.
