They stuck to the King's Road, and Elsa realized the next day that they must be on the Eastern King's Road, where before they had been taking the Western King's Road. It would add more time to their trip, but as the good farmer had told them, there were plenty of inns along the way.
Their second day after escaping Helmut's men, he pulled his horse over to a stream and started wading through the bushes. "Help me out," he said. "I need to get a lot of this."
"What is it?" Elsa asked, sliding down off of her horse. She watched as he started peeling the bark off of alder trees.
"Alder tree bark," he explained.
She rolled her eyes and started helping him. "Yes, I can see that," she said patiently. "But why are we collecting it?"
"We're going to dye your hair," he told her.
She paused and stared at him. "We are?"
"Yep. A disguise. In case there were any of Helmut's men left who'll be out for revenge."
"Makes sense, I suppose," she said. "Can you make dye this quickly?"
"Eh, it won't be great," he admitted. "Usually you need a few days, but… it'll get the job done. We'll dye your platinum locks, I'll shave my beard and put a boot over my prosthetic, and now that we've got the dog…" he glanced at their horses. "Just the horses might give us away. We may have to switch them out."
Elsa frowned but saw the necessity in his suggestion. "Our clothes, too?" she asked.
"Yeah," he agreed, looking down at the fine tunic he was wearing, the well-sewn vest and tailored trousers.
"I've got it," Elsa said, and with a wave of her hand they were wearing black and navy and off-white clothes with a rough, home-spun feel, clearly patterned after the clothes they'd seen on the area's farmers. She'd even made some black fabric boots for Hiksti in place of his one brown leather boot, and took the time to make sure his left boot fit snugly over his prosthesis so that his gait would be as normal as possible.
"I like this," Hiksti said, adjusting the sleeves. "Nice and cool. Perfect for a hot summer's day."
"There are a few advantages to my powers," Elsa said with a smile.
"More than a few," he told her with admiration.
By the time they were done, Elsa was a dull dishwater blonde with a simple bun, and she saw Hiksti's chin for the first time. She ran her fingers along it consideringly. "Not bad," she finally concluded. "Even I'd have to look twice to see it was you." She grinned impishly. "Makes you look younger."
He leaned his face into the simple touch. "I suppose at my age I'll take what I can get." They chuckled together and he lifted his eyes to the dull dye job. "I prefer your natural color, though."
Hiksti took the time to dab a lot of the dye onto Elsa's pale mare, especially around the face and mane and tail, to make her look like a horse of a different color. "It's the best we can do," he said. "Now we ride hard for the next inn."
They were half a mile away from the inn - they could see the lights of its windows - and just approaching the outskirts of the small town, as dark was settling fully over the land. Because of the failing light they had to walk their horses, but they made it safely.
The stable boy took their mounts and they went inside for their dinner. They ate quickly, didn't make small-talk with the locals, and went upstairs to their room with Lif. They were rather too tired to canoodle, and instead just closed their eyes and slept.
Lif's low growl woke Elsa, and Hiksti was already sitting up in the bed, his left hand going for his sword. Elsa opened her mouth to speak when her husband leapt from the bed and toward the doorway, which she just realized was open to the darkened hallway beyond.
Lif began barking like crazy, and Elsa hurried to light a candle, afraid to use her powers to illuminate their room for fear of giving them away. By the time she got it lit Hiksti was on top of a man and Lif was chasing another down the hallway. Hiksti raised his sword high and clubbed the man unconscious, then got up and pelted down the hallway after the other.
By now people were awake and sticking their heads out of doors. "What's going on?" asked a reed-thin old man, peering about through a pair of round spectacles.
Elsa gave him a worried look. "Two men just tried to enter our room!" she said, sounding and looking scared and worried. "My husband knocked this one out, and chased the other. Please, help him!"
No fewer than four men charged out of their rooms and down the stairs in pursuit, yelling fit to bring down the inn, and by now half the town was wide awake and wondering what was going on.
Hiksti came back a few minutes later with Lif and the men who'd followed to help him. He was limping and there was a small cut above his eye, but he was alive. Elsa flew into his arms. "Don't you ever do that again!" she scolded. "What were you thinking, running after a robber in the dark?"
"Sorry," he said, wincing as she examined the cut. "I'm okay." Lif whined at them and Hiksti reached down to pet the dog, rubbing behind his ears affectionately. "Good boy," he praised. "Who's a very good boy? Who's earned himself a nice big steak? You have! Yes, you have!"
"What's all this about?" asked the innkeeper, a portly woman with greying black hair.
"The man upstairs," Elsa said. "What's become of him?"
"Tied up and we're waiting on the magistrate," the innkeeper said. "He's out cold, though. Who is he? Why was he in your room?"
"That's what we'd like to know," Hiksti growled. He stalked past him and into the inn. The brigand was bound like a hog for market and laid out on the table, but he was still unresponsive to the world. He started rifling through the man's clothes. "Does anyone recognize him?" he asked.
Everyone there shook their heads, and Hiksti found nothing of use in the clothes. He snarled at the comatose man and sat down, ordered a steak for Lif and some bread and soup for himself and his wife, who sat next to him to await the magistrate.
The magistrate arrived before the steak did, rubbing sleep from her eyes and adjusting her wig. "What's the emergency?" she asked curiously, blinking around.
"This man and another tried to enter our room tonight," Elsa said. "My husband knocked this one out and gave chase to the other, who ran away."
"Lif got a bite out of him, though," Hiksti supplied. "Find a man with a dog bit on his right leg, and you've found the man who was in our room." The steak and soup and bread came out and Hiksti gave Lif his promised reward.
The magistrate peered down her rather long nose. "Hm, I feel as if this man is familiar," she said thoughtfully. "Do you know who he is?"
Elsa shook her head, but Hiksti hesitated. "Possibly a member of Helmut's Hellions," he said quietly. He had a few bites of his soup, quickly, like he was pressed for time.
Everyone started murmuring at that. "And how would you know this?" the magistrate asked.
"Who else could it be?" asked the reed-thin man who'd been in the room next to theirs. "Those are the only rapscallions I'm aware of in these parts."
"Or it could be someone with a personal vendetta," the magistrate explained. She shrugged. "I can never assume anything. It's my job to gather evidence."
Elsa stood up. "Good gentlemen and women," she said, addressing the crowd. "I'm sure that you're all quite tired and eager to see your beds again. If my husband and I could speak with the magistrate alone we would greatly appreciate it."
There was some muttering, but by and large the people emptied from the room, leaving just the magistrate and the villain alone with Elsa and Hiksti.
"What is this?" she asked them, looking back and forth.
"What do you know of Princess Elsa of Arendelle?" she asked quietly, lowering her voice to a near-whisper in case anyone was trying to listen in from another room. Her soup and bread still lay untouched before her.
The magistrate lowered her voice, too. "Well… it's said that she's a surpassing beauty with white hair who can command ice and snow. She stepped down from her throne in favor of her younger sister, Queen Anna. And… I believe that she's married to a cripple."
Hiksti's face twitched at the word.
"And what if I told you that Helmut's Hellions, including this brigand and his man, abducted Princess Elsa and her husband, and were going to hold them for ransom, only the Princess and her Prince escaped, and are now being hunted?"
The magistrate gave her a long, assessing look. "I would say some proof would be required," she murmured. "And if these claims were true, then of course I would be happy to take said brigand into custody."
Elsa glanced around to be sure that they were well and truly alone, and swirled her fingers above the table-top. There she formed a perfect snowflake the size of a dinner-plate, which spun slowly in place until the magistrate laid her fingers on it, only to jerk them back at the freezing temperature. When she raised her hands to gaze at Elsa in wonder, the Snow Queen let the snowflake disappear. "Is that proof enough?"
The magistrate turned her gaze to Hiksti, looking at his legs. "You do not seem a crip-" she said, only to cut herself off when Hiksti lifted his prosthesis out of his boot just long enough to show her the gleam of metal where flesh should have been. "I stand corrected."
"Will you help us?" Hiksti asked. "We just need to get to the Southern Mountains."
"Why, I would be delighted to help royalty," said the magistrate.
Elsa smiled.
"If only royalty were as delighted to help us."
Elsa's smile died. "What do you mean?" she asked.
"These brigands have been terrorizing this countryside for three years, now," she said crisply. "Three years. I have sent petition after petition to King Frederic, begging for help. He sends a few guards once in a while, for a month or so, and they kill a few, only to pack up and leave before the job is completely done. So… our men are rather busy protecting their own wives and children and farms and livelihoods, and haven't the time to help anyone else. You see?"
Hiksti leaned on the table and gave the magistrate a very direct stare. "I see," he said quietly. "If you help us out, we'll make sure that a petition gets through."
"Better than that," Elsa said. "We'll make sure it's properly taken care of."
"Is that a promise?" asked the magistrate, her eyebrow climbing.
"It is," Elsa assured her. "One way or another, we will solve the problem."
"In that case," said the magistrate, "You'll have your men. We'll escort you to the southern mountains, but where the road ends, so does their time."
"That's all we need," Hiksti said. "Thank you."
The magistrate nodded, and set about finding able bodies to take the villain into custody.
They got fitful rest for the remainder of the night, and woke with the sun to find an escort of armed, capable-looking men from the town. It took them two more days of thankfully uneventful travel to reach the foothills, and they made camp with the men who were going to head back in the morning.
Elsa held Hiksti's hand as they lay in their tent, staring at the orange glow on the walls from the fire outside. "No sign of them," she said.
"Maybe we'll be lucky," he said. "And they gave up."
"Maybe," she said. "But something in me tells me that that's not the case."
"Me, too," he sighed regretfully. He pressed a kiss to her temple. "Get some sleep," he said. "We'll be walking from here on out."
"We won't be taking the horses?" she asked him.
"And take them through uncertain rugged terrain and then through the door?" he asked. "Or leave them outside of it with no way to fend for themselves?"
"Good point," she admitted. "Walking it is."
"We'll be fine. We have everything we need." He smiled at her, and she smiled back.
"As long as we have each other," she agreed.
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Mark of Arendelle: Aw, thank you, man!
Riverdog: Thank you for the review! Glad you like Lif's name :) Stay tuned, I'll post the next chapter in a week!