At first they laughed.

Stories of magic and conjurers had always circulated the courts and parliaments, like dust from a beaten carpet. Tricksters and magicians would be called up for the amusement of those with too much time and money on their hands and would perform to polite applause and thrown coins. If they were very good the commoner's stage might be switched for a private exhibition and their tattered old cotton suits switched for silk or cut cloth, but the tricks were all the same in the end. For an hour or two the lords and ladies would entertain themselves with the notion that maybe magic really was real. Then the performance would end and the candles would be lit and they would throw the voluntary illusion off and return to the real world, where the twin gods of money and politics ruled.

When the first diplomats returned then, they were taken as poor fools, fooled well enough the illusion lasted even outside of the performance. They were given polite smiles and handshakes and told what a good job they had done, and were sent back to their offices. A couple of them a little too urgent in their reports were given a long holiday. One was given a polite early retirement. The stories about the overworked, deluded men were told with laughter at society parties and court functions. They were only diplomats, functionaries, barely more than common peasants/working-class, choose one. The ice and cold in that little northern country had clearly gotten to them a little. What was it called again? Just below Norway? Unimportant.

The days rolled by. The story was forgotten, replaced in every country by their own gossip and rumours. News between countries travelled by ships and horses, weeks between sealed reports and even longer for more trusted, in-person ones. The quaint little country somehow had been talking about a month or so back – you remember, the one old Edward was in such a rage over, the poor man really should retire – didn't rank such. Newer and more interesting tales displaced Arendelle with barely an effort.

The stories kept coming back though.

Not old diplomats put out to pasture in an easy posting now. Now it was merchants. A hard job when paths between countries were overland filled with bandits or over seas that could still swallow a ship at any time. Men who weren't known for being easy to fool or liable to embark on flights of fancy.

But still, magic?

A little more this time. Memories of the crazy old men were brought up as a curiosity and people wondered if there was something in the water up there. The stories went around again, but this time not just in the courts. The merchants pulled into port and sold their goods on the street, in bars and taverns, and they talked. Now the stories were heard by the commoners and workers. Not people known for keeping their mouths shut. The stories travelled through the towns and cities, and reached the churches.

The priests were old and rich and happy, and didn't make much fuss. A service every Sunday and a collection plate from the poor. When the stories came through to them they nodded their heads and added a few lines about consorting with witchcraft to their next sermon, and went on with their lives.

One country cared more. The prince they had sent was old, but sharp as a knife and not prone to delusions, and their king listened. He didn't believe, but he had sweat blood to raise his small country up to where it was, and he would grasp at any straw, no matter how thin, to raise it up further. A prince was asked for, and duly volunteered, and would be dispatched at the next appropriate event.

The stories were turning into something more now. There were too many of them. They radiated outward from the small little mountain-kingdom. People who were too well-known were talking about them not as amusing little tales around dinner-tables, but as real events. Princes had come back to their countries with wild eyes talking to anyone they could, and all of them were saying the same thing.

Now they weren't stories, now they were news.

The Queen of Arendelle commands the snow and ice.

And people stood around and heard it and did…nothing. Because what can you do when a situation is so beyond anything else you have no plans, no responses or experience to draw upon to handle it? The collective memory of the courts of Europe had been through invasions, revolutions, proxy wars and skirmishes. It had seen pretenders to thrones and rebellions and assassinations. But what do you do when someone tells you 'magic is real and there it is, just to the north in fact'?

The rulers might not have known, but the priests did.

Kill it.

When the funeral was announced, a few nobles who would otherwise not have bothered, went. A few who had met the king and queen before saw a polite excuse to visit and see for themselves. A few spare royals with nothing better to do were dispatched to show how sorry they were and told, very explicitly, to report back. A few princes begged leave to visit, when they heard of two unmarried sisters and a throne.

When all of them came home afterwards, the final shreds of doubt were erased, and something had to be done. Some screamed for action, others for calm.

Those who lived and breathed politics sat and wondered really, what difference did it make? Arendelle's exports were small by the standards they dealt in, barely worth a mention. They were a convenient point to rest on the long journey between Europe and the bigger Scandinavian countries, and merchants didn't give a damn if the queen they never met could make the cold dance around her.

But the voices for calm were drowned out by the cries of others. Some were genuine. Priests saw signs of the end and whipped congregations into a frenzy. Others could only see the threat of a woman who could send glaciers down from the north, and were afraid for their country.

Some were not. Rulers brought up all their life believing in their divine right to rule saw another who had not only that but real power, and were scared what would happen when their own citizenry demanded why their regent had none of God's power to proof their own divinity. The priests who didn't truly believe saw a rallying cry that could rise them up, if only they could find the right words.

Some saw profit, or power, and while their cries were not so different from those of the above, inside their heads their plans reached much further than simply a head on a stake and a body on a pyre.

All of them demanded blood.

Little by little, meetings were suggested and formed, and plans were made. As the weeks turned into months, they were agreed upon. There were handshakes in dark rooms, and weapons were sharpened.

In Arendelle, safe by distance from the chaos she was creating all around her and with Anna by her side now, Elsa ruled as best she could, and tried to hold her country together with both hands. She sat in the meeting rooms, the throne only a few walls away, and thought;

Soon now.

This is, obviously, an intermission chapter. See you next week.