So,
I'm hoping this chapter makes sense. I'm counting on you to let me know if it doesn't! I wrote it overnight, and typos tend to happen when I do that. As always, I hope you enjoy the update. Thank you so much for reading. :)
ssg.x.
CHAPTER 8
THE RISKS OF WINTER
Elsa lay down on the frigid floor, pressing her face against a cold she couldn't feel to peer under the doors. She was trying to see a light, a boot, the hem of a dress, anything that would be a sign that there was someone on the other side of the chamber doors she still couldn't open. Elsa fumbled to stand, feeling utterly hopeless.
"Why is this happening?" she shouted, stomping her foot in frustration. The entire room lit up a cerulean blue, and the sheer force sent the snow on the floor in every direction. Panic was turning her into a shimmering vortex of sleet and hail. She tore her cape off and threw it off to her side, cursing under her breath. She rolled her shoulders back before launching her arms forward again, this time towards the wall and the stone fireplace that protruded from it. She'd already blasted the window several times by then, and knew trying to destroy it was a futile effort. Something was protecting it, something powerful.
Far more powerful than me.
Still, it didn't stop her from throwing everything she had at it and just about anything else in the room. She needed to take her anger out on something because she was so very close to taking her anger out on someone instead.
Hans was hiding in the wardrobe. Well, not exactly hiding. Elsa had suggested he take cover while she made several more attempts at getting them out of that room. It was a good thing he was in there, because there was no guarantee she wouldn't have "accidentally" froze his shrivelled little heart into an ice cube and used it in a drink.
Elsa finally flopped down on the floor beside the wardrobe, exhausted.
"No luck, huh?" came Hans' voice from inside it.
"No," she said stonily.
"Is it safe to come out now?" he asked. In response, Elsa waved her hand tiredly, sealing the wardrobe doors shut by icing the locks.
"I still have a few questions for you."
Hans huffed, irritated, but the truth was that he really was better off in the wardrobe. He could wrap himself in the clothes in there to keep warm.
"How did you get the letter to me if you were shut up in this room?"
Truth be told, that was the only question Elsa could come up with, because it was the only thing that didn't gel with Hans' story. If he wasn't working with his parents, if they had actually locked him up in here on his return from Arendelle, then how was he able to get that letter to her without his family intercepting it?
"I bribed a guard who brought me my food one afternoon. He made sure the letter went through the proper channels."
"In exchange for what?"
"Just a few trinkets I had."
"Trinkets? What kind of trinkets?" Elsa asked, pinching the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. "Who gets locked up with trinkets?"
Hans was quiet for what felt like an eternity. She wondered if he was trying to come up with a decent lie. Maybe it was just taking him longer than usual because of the cold. When he answered, his response wasn't what she was expecting.
"I bribed him, okay? End of story. Next question," he said sharply.
Oh…
She had touched a nerve. Her heart started beating a little faster and her stomach ached. She couldn't even question a man she believed could still be a viable threat to her kingdom, for God's sake. She could build an entire palace out of ice, but what she really needed was a spine.
Okay, maybe Hans was actually telling the truth. He was a lying weasel back in Arendelle, but so far he seemed to be coming clean to her on a variety of subjects. How many men would admit to being a power-hungry, sociopathic, blood-thirsty monster? Elsa didn't have much experience with men, but she guessed that was pretty rare. The admitting part, anyway.
Elsa gnawed on one of her fingernails, at a loss for what to do next. But then Hans spoke again.
"My grandfather's gold spyglass, and his wedding band," came his muffled voice. "I used to play in this room alone as a child. There's a box hiding under a loose floorboard just to the left of the window seat."
I used to play in this room alone as a child.
Elsa frowned, remembering her own lonely childhood. If this was another lie meant to tug at her heartstrings and get her to drop the line of questioning, Hans would be sorry. Really sorry. But if it was true…
She stood and walked to the window seat. She crouched down by it and began feeling around for the loose floorboard. Once she found it, she brushed some snow aside and used her fingernails to lift the wooden slat. She carefully set it aside, and tentatively reached into the dark space in the floor.
Right there.
She pulled out a rosewood box with a flock of eleven pearl swans swooping across its lid. She cradled the box in her lap and carefully lifted the little gold latch to open it. Inside was an empty matchbox, a handful of pebbles, two white feathers, a spool of string, and a woman's wedding band. There was still plenty of room left for a spyglass and a man's wedding band to match the woman's.
"Why?" she asked, lifting one of the feathers to her face and running it thoughtfully along the line of her jaw.
"Why what?" he muttered.
Elsa shrugged her shoulders. "Why did you tell me?"
"Because you wanted to know, Queen Elsa," Hans replied a little sarcastically. "Remember, about a minute ago?"
"I mean what made you change your mind?"
A pause.
"I don't know."
Elsa believed him.
She returned the feather to the box, and the box to the space in the floor. She fit the floorboard back into its groove then walked over to the wardrobe. She closed her eyes and waved her hand to rid it of the ice keeping it from opening.
She could hear Hans pushing on the doors, but they didn't move. The ice she thought she had just removed was still very much there.
"Hey," he called nervously. "Are you still there?"
Elsa stood and placed her hand directly on the icy locks, closing her eyes again and really focusing.
Nothing.
"It isn't working," she said, beginning to panic again. More frost began to climb up the walls. "Why isn't it working?"
"Why isn't what working?" Hans asked apprehensively, feeding off the dread in her voice.
"I can't get rid of the ice! Why can't I get rid of the ice?" Of course there was no one around who could give her an answer, but she asked out loud nonetheless. If she couldn't get rid of that little bit of ice, she certainly wouldn't be able to thaw the entire room. The temperature would just keep dropping and dropping, until -
"Okay, calm down," Hans said coolly. "We'll figure this out. I'm sure I can get out of here myself. I just need to employ a little elbow grease. Stand back."
Elsa stood aside and waited. She heard Hans throw himself against the doors of the wardrobe, followed by a muffled curse and an "ow".
This might take a while, she thought, returning to the window seat. There wasn't as much grease on Hans' elbow as he thought, she guessed. She sat down, adjusting her skirts around her legs as she curled them up under herself. She could see what looked to be an envelope sticking out from beneath the seat cushion – the whatever-it-was that Hans had quickly hidden when she first showed up. Hans was still trying to force the doors open with little success. She pulled the envelope out from its hiding place and opened it. Inside was a letter.
Her letter. The letter she'd written to Hans.
She read it over again, refreshing her memory. It had been a few weeks since she'd sent it. It was impersonal but polite, written merely as a courtesy to the family. There was hardly anything about the letter that made it worth keeping as far as she could tell, let alone giving away family heirlooms for the opportunity to reply to it.
Calmer now, she went to have another go at getting Hans out of the wardrobe after returning the letter to its hiding spot under the seat cushion. Absorbed in thoughts of whether or not she should ask Hans why he had kept it, she didn't hear the wardrobe's doors finally bending and giving in to the dogged prince's will.
The wardrobe tipped off to one side and struck the wall as the doors burst open. Hans leapt out, finally free, but the icy floor prevented him from sticking the landing. The sole of one boot slipped out from under him, and he crashed into Elsa hard enough to knock the wind out of both of them. The two of them landed in an inelegant heap a few feet away from what was once a perfectly functional wardrobe.
Elsa opened her eyes. She was lying on her back, covered in various items of men's clothing, her head resting in the nook of Hans' arm and shoulder.
"Are you alright?" he asked.
"No thanks to you," she said, only because she felt she had to say something mean just then to put a little distance between them. Her first instinct was to ask him if he was hurt, and that didn't sit well with her.
She pulled a navy frockcoat off her face and threw it to her side. Before she knew what was happening, the muscles in the arm she was laying on tensed. Hans' other arm wrapped around her waist and hauled her lithesome body on top of his own, then rolled them both over so that he was covering her. She was about to scream and tell him how repulsive he was when an icicle that had broken off from the rafters above hit the floor, shattering on impact precisely where her head would have been had Hans not moved as swiftly as he had.
It was the second time he'd saved her from herself today.
He has freckles, she remarked dazedly, looking up at him. She closed her eyes for a moment to catch her breath, involuntarily inhaling his scent – a combination of spearmint and wild tarragon. It suited him, she thought, breathing deeply. There was also something familiar about it, though she couldn't quite put her finger on what. Above her, Hans' chest moved up and down, up and down, and his naked Adam's apple leapt as he laboured to catch his own breath. For just a second, she felt something that might have been his lips against the top of her head, but she could have imagined that. His scent was leaving her dizzy. She opened her eyes as he raised himself on his forearms, his green eyes growing wide with embarrassment as a blush rose beneath the light spray of freckles across his nose and cheeks.
"I'm sorry," he said, clumsily sitting back and offering her his hand to help her up. She hesitatingly took it and let him pull her back to her feet. "Are you alright?" he asked.
"Y-yes," she stammered this time, her heart beating wildly.
But it was a lie.
She was not alright. Nothing would ever be alright again.
As long as Elsa was locked up in this room, Anna was in danger. Her kingdom was in danger.
And, much to her abject horror, Elsa might have just fallen a little in love with the man who may be the cause of it all.
