Hi.

~E~

A Chance Encounter

Elsa 6

Act III

~E~

Her destrier rode hard, trampling through the path and leaving a trail of dust on his wake. Elsa, while well used to riding, found the experience taxing after the first hour. She began to ache and had to occasionally slow down, both for her own sake and to conserve her horse's energy, lest it grow tired and trip.

The stallion was well bred and trained, however, and presented no problems. Thus, Elsa rode, the long hours giving her plenty of time to her thoughts.

What she was doing was crazy. Perhaps that was so. Still, she felt in her heart that it was the right choice. So she rode, and the blizzard followed her wake. Massive clouds covered Arendelle, rushing through the sky, keeping pace with the Snow Queen. The closer she approached to her destination the more tumultuous her thoughts became, and the stronger the blizzard got. Hail and snow and wind roared, creating almost a solid, moving wall as the massive storm followed behind her.

Her dress was not designed for riding, doubly so for the duration and severity of her riding, but her magic coursed through it and so it held. Elsa paid it no more mind than her own aching limbs. If her destrier would not complain or falter, neither would she.

At last the forest through which the road snaked gave way, revealing an open plain, a hill sitting at its center. As she approached she could see the perimeter her army had set up around the occupied installation at the hill, their camp lying behind the palisades marking the edge of the war machine's range.

She saw frantic movement among the soldiers as they saw her approach. She slowed her frantic riding before entering the camp. The blizzard emerged from over the forest; dark, heavy clouds surrounding the hill, before blotting out the sun entirely. At once heavy snowfall commenced, winds howling. Good.

She was recognized quickly and no soldier dared flag her to stop. The hastily roused host scrambled to form a path for her, standing on each side of the road at attention as she passed. Elsa stared ahead. When she reached the end of the camp and the beginning of the perimeter, only then did she pull on her horse's reins again, making the proud beast come to a halt.

She dismounted, not without difficulty and relief, and gently run her hand through the panting stallion's neck.

"You did well," she murmured. "Thank you. Rest, now."

The horse huffed, only now allowing its exhaustion to show and Elsa felt pride swell in her her chest.

"Your Grace!" she heard a panting shout from behind and took a breath. Her hands reached up to fix her braid. When she was satisfied she turned, finding a man standing in front of her, no doubt having been running. A commander's armor was still half-way strapped to his chest. She'd obvious arrived at an inopportune time.

"What is your name and station?"

"Your Grace, I am Commander Stelig, 14th division infantry, in charge of the containment. By your leave?"

"Speak."

"We had not received word of your arrival. Should we prepare for your retinue?"

She shook her head. "No, Commander. You are to do no such thing. Take my horse, see him fed and rested. Rouse your men. Have them attend the perimeter. The time is now."

The man's eyes widened. "We are to assault, then? Finally?"

"No. I will go. Do not think to interrupt or defy. Do naught but listen. I will end this myself. I will save our countryman. Only have a doctor at the ready, as he might need care."

The man pursed his lips, clearly fighting with her order. "Your Majesty, will all due respect to your direction, your blizzard itself is good enough. Under the cover of the snowfall, our approach should-"

"No!" she cut him off, eyes flashing blue for an instant. "No more," she bit out through grit teeth. "No more. No other Arendellian dies today." With that, she passed him the reins of her destrier and reached down to smooth out her dress. "Attend to my orders, Commander. Witness the wrath of your Queen from a safe distance."

Thunder chose that moment to boom, the storm around them well and truly underway, Elsa at its epicenter. With no more words to the Commander, she turned towards the hill and began wading through the barricades.

He was right on one count, at least. The storm lowered visibility greatly. Soon, she vanished from the eyes of the Arendellian soldiers and into the white nothingness.

Elsa was not encumbered by the snowbed, her senses not beholden to the storm's fury. She raised her arms up high, magic coursing through her body and limbs and responding to her desires. White streaked out of her extended arms and the blizzard grew heavier, the snow falling quicker and thicker, winds picking up speed. Her dress flapped this way and that as she made her way, now well and truly in her element amidst the storm.

She could not see, but she did not need to. Her magic was in the storm, and that was all she needed. She felt the incline on the ground as she steadily climbed the hill. The installation was set on the top, with one road leading to it from each side, the rest of the hill dug to be too steep to climb. With her white dress and the heavy storm, there was no fear of being detected. Ahead of her was a metal gate and the walls that marked the edge of the premises.

She felt more than saw, the Grandlandians. Four of them were around the open gate, shielding their faces from the winds and snowfall with shields, coats or just their hands. She approached with measured steps, but they could not see her amid the snow. She heard them bark to each other, shouting in an effort to be heard over the roar of the winds to little effect.

Her arm rose, hand open. The freezing air around the four guards changed course, snow and hail trailing around them as if magnetically drawn. The cries of alarm fell on deaf ears as each one was covered, head to heavily-armored toe, in snow in a manner of seconds. With the clenching of her fist the snow hardened, becoming solid as ice, before condensing.

Elsa let her arm drop and kept on walking, stepping around the four mounds of reddish snow that even now were being covered by the snowfall.

Now inside, she set about dismantling the confused defenses of the occupying force. The snow worked to cover her approach, granting her the stealth that she could not have achieved on her own.

She worked from the outside in. She climbed the wall and barricades, reaching the mounted war machines. Any man unlucky enough to be in her path were set upon by the blizzard itself. Machine after machine glazed over, gaining an icy sheen, before crumbling, the metal parts of it breaking and rendering them useless.

From the perimeter she worked her way inwards, finding patrol by helpless patrol and giving them over to whatever afterlife they believed in. A snap of her fingers saw men flash-frozen, the shake of her fist saw them break like so much glass.

She realized that, even as she was moving as a metaphorical hot knife through butter, she was too slow. She needed to get inside, but she also needed to make sure that the outside and the facility's premises were empty of hostile forces. She raised her hands, closing her eyes. She felt the snow around her heed her command and rise, drawing rock and wood with it, gaining new form.

When she opened her eyes again she witnessed her army. A score of snowmen, ranging in size from human to lumbering giant, all bearing weapons made of ice and armor she had not seen before but felt strangely familiar.

"Go forth," she commanded. "Bring death to my enemies."

Marshmallow's summoned kin obeyed, dispersing into the blizzard. She saw one of them, small and nimble, shaped like a woman, scale up the side of a building and pull itself onto a balcony, where a Grandlandian sentry was stationed. The man had time only to let out a cry of surprise before the white form plunged the ice that served as both hand and blade into his side and through his chest.

Elsa moved, navigating between the various parts of the factory complex towards the center, where the only facility that could house a barracks and potential prisoners was. All around she heard the telltale sounds of her army and the invaders clashing, the snowstorm raging and adding to the confusion.

The central building was guarded a force of six armed men, three of them with crossbows. As she approached, she saw that the size of the building afforded the men some measure of cover from her blizzard, enough so that they could see spot her from a fair distance.

Shouts went up as she came into view, men fumbling with their weapons, pointing at her and yelling to each other. Elsa witnessed this, saw them pull out their swords, raise their spears and aim their crossbows, and felt only fury.

With a primal shout she threw her arms forward, magic singing in her veins. The blizzard pulsed, the winds and snow momentarily pausing as if time froze, before resuming their mad dash as Elsa's attack surged forward, visible only through the ground in front of her turning a bleach white color.

The arrows flying at her flash-froze and shattered upon coming in contact with her wave of force. The soldiers, alarmed, brought up hands and swords and shields to try and protect themselves from the onslaught.

Elsa continued walking forward, tipping over one frozen form that stood in her way, his expression perpetually locked in surprise and agony before it smashed into millions of pieces, as if made of crystal.

She tried the door, but it was locked. With a thought, the handle and the door itself froze over, ice creeping into crevices and expanding. The door groaned before, inevitably, buckling and breaking, allowing Elsa entrance.

Her entry, initially, passes rather anticlimactically. She employed as much caution as she knew how, leery of the confined space and the sudden removal of her blizzard as a factor, and moved slowly. She paused to listen, she peeked around corners, she took her time move slowly and soundlessly, but it proved to be unnecessary. The first room -some sort of entrance hall with various doors and a desk full of abandoned ledgers- as well as the next few hallways she took, were empty.

She must have walked through most of the floor by now. Supply rooms, sleeping quarters and a mess hall; all empty. Most of the soldiers had been outside and she'd already dealt with them, but surely there must be more. When she finds a door that leads lower, to an underground level, she thinks that this must be where they are.

Her conclusion proved true. The stone stairway deposited her on a short hallway, lit up by a single torch. At the wooden door she found at its end, she paused and pressed her ear against it.

She heard voices. Frantic conversation of at least three men, maybe more. Her Grandlandian was good, but the soldiers spoke too fast for her to catch everything.

"-left by now-"

"Ioch said-"

"-Ice witch-"

"Demon!"

"...just a blizzard-"

She pulled away from the door, kneeling in front of it. She placed her open palms against the floor, uncaring about the dirt there. She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath.

First she heard a rushing sound as her magic surged through the floor, under the door and into the room, turning everything in its path stark white. Then she heard the sudden grinding of ice, intermixed with wet squelching sounds and -however briefly- howls of pain that were almost instantly quieted.

She got back to her feet and tried the door. When it did not open she froze the knob and the door's hinges. With a good shove it toppled over and she was able to inspect her handiwork.

The room was glaringly white, all surfaces frosted over with that shiny sheen that indicated her magic. Ice shards extended from the floor, the walls and the ceiling, making the room look more akin to a frozen cave from high up the mountain.

Impaled at various points on the ice were the four soldiers that inhabited the room. Dead before the could realize what was going on. Elsa navigated the spikes; she'd created so many that even crossing the room required some maneuvering and squeezing.

A hacking cough. One of them yet lived.

She spotted the survivor who, to his arguable luck, had only been impaled once, through the stomach, and stuck into place. Elsa was no doctor but she didn't think he'd be walking this one off.

She slid up next to his prone, held up form. He'd slumped around the spike that had run him through the back but his flitting eyes did land on her when she walked up. His eyes widened, mouth opening and closing quickly but offering nothing but nonsensical sputtering and globules of dark blood. His passing would be slow and torturous.

"Tell me where the prisoner is," Elsa offering, dusting off her Grandlandian, "and I will make your death swift."

His eyes seemed to gain a degree of focus, his sputtering slowing and beginning to form coherent sentences.

"...ice witch…" she managed to make out among too-quickly spoken words. "... mercy, mercy…" the words was repeated, like a mantra.

"Tell me where he is," she pressed.

"The … the cells … another floor down. Mercy, ice witch … please-"

Elsa interrupted him with an ice spike through the head, holding true to her word and ending his suffering. What she hadn't expected had been for her stomach to suddenly churn at the gruesome sight of her spike going into the back of his head and out of his right eye socket.

She took a sudden step back, dry heaved and doubled in on herself, emptying the contents of her stomach on the frozen floor with painful, gasping breaths in between heaves.

When her stomach was painfully empty and she heaved air a few more times she managed to regain her composure, though she still felt pretty rattled. She avoided looking at the cooling corpse again, and continued shimmying between the ice spikes to reach the other end of the room.

The next few rooms appeared empty, though recently lived in, and she managed to locate another stairway that led down. The next level lacked even the most basic of decoration, its walls smooth, paintless stone and lighting faint.

She saw two solitary guards standing in front of the metal bars of the cells. Her hand flowed forward as she rounded the corner, dragging frost with it through the air and she moved, pushing her hand as if lobbing a stone. The magical frost surged forward, following her movement, and descended on the two guards who had barely had time to react to her presence. It bodily picked them up and slammed them against the far wall, but the stream did not end. Frost and snow battered them, covering them entirely and forming an ice prison around their bodies.

Satisfied that they weren't going anywhere, Elsa let the magic stop and inspected the four small cells. All were empty but one, where she saw a small form huddled against a corner, covering its face with its limbs. Elsa's heart ached.

A blast of her magic froze and broke the lock and she pushed the door open. The huddled figure must have noticed the whining noise of the metal as the door creaked open because it visibly flinched, attempting to curl further into itself.

Elsa approached with careful steps, kneeling down in front of the shadowed figure. She gently put a hand on a shoulder, causing another flinch.

"Ernie," she called out, her voice breaking slightly before she managed to bring it under control. "Ernie," she said again, stronger. "I'm here. You're safe. Look at me."

Slowly, so very slowly, a head emerged from the tangle of limbs, and Elsa's heart constricted painfully again.

Ernie's face was half-swollen, one of his eyes forced shut, and he was bleeding from several spots where something dull had dug into his skin. If she had to guess from the trembling and their locked state, some of his fingers were broken.

"Ernie," she called out again, because his dull eyes looked at and through her. "Come on, kid, or Hiccup will have my hide."

That seemed to shake the young man into returning to reality. Light returned to his eyes as he focused on her for the first time.

"... your Grace?" he croaked, his throat obviously sore.

"Yes Ernie, it's me."

"Are you … real?"

"I am. I'm getting you out of here. Can you stand?"

Her hand on his shoulder turned upside down as she stood, before offering it to him. He extended his left hand, slowly, as if scared, but eventually grasped it.

"I … I think so."

She helped him up- he was surprisingly heavier than his slim frame might suggest- and steadied him on his feet.

They had worked him over, but it seemed that they hadn't broken any bones on his feet, which was good. She took one of his arms and draped it around her shoulders, helping him stand and walk. It proved challenging, because the boy was taller than she was and he leaned heavily on her, making her pant from the exertion of assisting him.

Slowly, she got him through the hallways, up the stairs, and all the way to exit of the building. As they walked Ernie seemed to regain strength, to the point where he could stand on his own without keeling over. She left him by the doors and bid him wait while she hunted around nearby rooms, finally locating a coat that was big and thick enough for him.

Now relatively certain that he wouldn't freeze to death, she flung the doors open. Her blizzard still raged outside, winds and snow instantly rushing in through the sudden opening. She helped support Ernie again and they trudged out into the storm. The dead bodies had thankfully been covered by the snow.

She forbade the winds and snow from reaching Ernie, but his only defense against the cold was the coat and Elsa lamented not grabbing him a better pair of boots, too. She tried to hurry him along, as quickly as his dizzy steps could take him.

Slowly they made their way through the clear road, then out of the compound entirely and into the woods that would lead them to the end of the hill. Passing through the woods took longer because they had to go slow, lest they trip on roots and rocks hidden by the snow.

Elsa felt a sudden chill to the back of her neck, a strangle dread tingling its way down her spine. Despite the snow storm still raging around them, she knew it had nothing to do with the cold. She stopped their slow hobble, taking a second to look to her left, then to her right. Then, she heard it.

"Where are you going, queenling?"

The feeling intensified.

She carefully untangled Ernie's arm from around her, made sure he could stand steady on his feet, then turned around. There, standing some distance away from them was a tall man, dressed in long, heavy coat. His hair was the shade of faded bronze but greying at the temples.

Looking at him made Elsa's dread rise, so much so that she wondered at the sudden feeling. There was nothing immediately threatening about the man. But the longer she stared, the less sense things made.

The first thing she noticed was the snow. Trails of it, carried by the winds, were everywhere. But the man's immediate vicinity seemed to lack snowfall. She squinted, finally realizing that the snow melted when coming within a small distance of the man, turning into water droplets that fell to the ground. Looking at the ground now, she noticed that there was a steady circle around him where the snow seemed to have vanished.

Most damning of all, the man's eyes flashed a vivid red for an instant, and faint wisps of smoke rose from his fingertips.

"Ernie," she called out behind her, voice forcefully steady and clear. "Listen to me. I need you to keep going, alright? As quickly as you can. Go straight ahead and you should find the Arendellian perimeter."

"My Queen-"

"Run, Ernie," she cut him off. "That's an order."

Thankfully, the young man obeyed her, shuffling away as quickly as his tired frame could carry him, vanished among the foliage and snow until Elsa -who had not taken her eyes off of the man- could no longer hear him.

"Who are you?" she demanded, the storm responding to her agitation with a sudden flash of lightning.

"My name is Antioch," the man replied with heavily accented Arendellian. His voice was deep and carried itself easily, so that even the low tone he used was heard through the drone of the storm.

Elsa instantly made the connection. Antioch, this must have been the infamous Ioch she'd heard so much about.

"Why are you working with the Grandlandians?" she asked. "What are they offering you for all this?"

"Our interests aligned momentarily," the man responded. "I used them to draw you out."

The red tint in his eyes was unmistakable now. Within Elsa, her powers stirred, reacting to his presence.

'Some say the world will end in fire…'

"Are you … a sorcerer?" she dared ask.

"Like you?" the man replied, his mouth moving to form a slight smile. "No. I am something much greater. I am what you could have become, if you hadn't so callously revealed yourself internationally."

Elsa's mind could barely process anything beyond the fact that she was not alone. There were people like her out there, other people touched by magic. She had so many questions.

But few for this man. This enemy. Her brow furrowed as the feeling of dread inside her now had solid facts to latch onto. There was no hand-waving this threat to her kingdom- or to herself.

"What do you want?"

"I could explain," he said, "but I don't see the point, when I fully expect you to be dead by the time our meeting is over."

Elsa felt something she had only felt twice before, more recently and ironically at Hiccup's hands. The clear certainty of not only lethal intent, but also ability.

"Nonsense," she replied. "If you really didn't want to talk, we wouldn't be. So, indulge me."

The man tilted his head slightly, as if assessing her. She showed no trepidation, and silence reigned for a few moments while the storm raged around them.

"I seek out those of our kind," the man explained after a few beats. "Normally they are difficult to discover, and much moreso to reach before they have unfortunately perished. But you made it easy for me, didn't you? The hard part was getting to you."

"Why all this?"

"There are many things about yourself that you don't know, queenling," the man responded. "Our kind can interact with others of our species. We can enhance and draw from each other's abilities, making us stronger together than we would be individually."

Elsa had a sinking feeling that she knew where this was going.

"You suck our people dry," she breathed, eyes wide.

The man smiled again. "I was curious what would happen if one simply … did not stop, drawing away. I was not disappointed."

There was no mistaking the tongues of flame licking the man's arms, now.

"You … monster," she managed to breathe, still reeling over all that she had learned.

"Think that way if you want," the man responded, clearly indifferent to her horror. "I am older than you can imagine, stronger than you could ever be and will outlive your bloodline's descendants. What you think of me does not matter."

With a shake of his shoulders the long coat was released and fell to the ground, revealing a simple set of clothes underneath.

"Now, I have satisfied my desire for conversation. Shall we start?"

Elsa wasted no time throwing her arm forward and producing a spike of ice from the ground behind him.

A flash of light momentarily forced her to look away and when her vision cleared, she saw the half-melted lump of her spike, barely off the ground. Steak was coming of the man's skin and the ground around him began to sprout flames.

"You'll have to do better than that."

Her ray of frost was met by a brilliant line of fire bursting from the ground, halting its advance.

The man was fully ablaze now, almost too bright to look at, his eyes a solid, vibrant red that seemed to stare into her soul and freeze her in her tracks.

She stared as the Ioch extended his arms to the side and twin lines of flame were created, cutting the surrounding icestorm and making a mess of steam as snow and water gave way.

She had the presence of mind to bring up solid hunks of light blue ice, blocking the advance of the burning blades as they cut a path through the forest to get to her. She could feel her ice melting. She had to turn on the offensive.

She directed the blizzard around her to pelt the man with a rain of condensed, sharp ice,even as snow and ice rose from the ground around her, creating dozens of half-sentient copies of loyal Marshmallow but also typical Arendellian infantry. With a mental jolt, she sent her army forward.

When she felt the strain against her shield pull away she dared to lower the ice and take stock of the situation.

Her weaponized blizzard was raging all around, throwing hail and thick ice, but seemed to not faze the massive wall of flames that surrounded her adversary.

Fiery creatures were battling her ice army everywhere around that she could see and half the forest had caught fire while the rest was battered and broken by the blizzard.

Fire and frost danced as the two traded blows for what seemed like an eternity but could not be more than a few seconds, Elsa feeling the strain in her imagination as she found it impossible to get the aura of heat surrounding Ioch while constantly having to fend of his waves of flame with equally large piles of snow and frost.

With a start, Elsa realized that she was sweating. The temperature was rising. More of the blizzard was being vaporized than before. She was concentrating her powers on creating as much frost as she could, but she was being steadily pushed back as more and more of the ground burned.

"There is much you do not know about your powers," Ioch said, and Elsa felt a flash of rage that he felt safe enough to do so.

"For example, mediums. Bodies of water seem to work well for you, clearly, but so does the water in atmosphere. You know what else there is the air? A little something called oxygen."

Before Elsa had time to respond, fire seemed to erupt within her protective dome of frost. She had a split-second's idea of what was going to happen before it did and she moved, trying to bolt out of the way.

She was too slow; the flames too quick, bursting from the air practically on top of her. Searing pain in her left side nearly blinded her with its intensity.

She could not help the agonized scream the escaped her lungs as her left arm and shoulder burned. She felt to the snow, which muffled her scream but did little to ease her pain. For long moments she wished for the bliss of unconsciousness, anything to take away the agony, but there was too much adrenaline in her system. She was probably going into shock.

She felt, more than sensed, the man draw closer. The oppressive heat, scorching her exposed skin and melting away the familiarity of the snow around her.

The sole of a boot at her side, pushing. For a brief moment there was weight on her mangled arm as the man pushed her over and she screamed again; by the gods did she scream. She felt as if her lungs were burning as well.

She could, just barely, open her eyes and stare up at the still half-burning form of Antioch, looking down on her, lips pursed. He looked almost disappointed.

His long digits began to reach down towards her, and Elsa closed her eyes.

'Spirits of winter,' she prayed to herself, to the power within her, to the world around her; to anyone that might listen. 'If you can hear me…' her mind desperately grasped for words, but only the most basic form of pleading could surface. 'Please … aid me.'

She felt the flame descend, and despaired, her thoughts turning to the Kingdom she would leave unprotected, to the lover she had never had the opportunity to explore life with. To her sister.

'Oh gods, Anna. Please.'

Not a heartbeat later, she gasped as a wave of force welled from within, as if of its own accord. Her eyes remained shut but she could sense the massive cloud of frost that erupted from her form, forcing Ioch back and his flames to flare to life once more.

She felt something sharp and wooden on her back pushing her -not painlessly- to her feet. She staggered, still blinded by the incredible agony pulsing through the remaining nerves on the left side of her torso, even as wave after wave of frost emerged all around her, as if of its own volition.

She felt a blissfully cold touch on the mangled remains of her arm, momentarily clouding the pain, and a soft voice by her ear.

'I'm here,' the blizzard whispered. 'Be brave."

Finally, she understood. There was nothing else controlling the frost that was pushing Ioch back and saturating the air around her. That was her. Her powers, her will- awakened. Unleashed.

She placed her one good hand over the ruined remains of her left shoulder, almost feeling the ghostly touch of another letting go as she did so. A layer of ice grew over her burned flesh, covering her entire arm and left side. It wouldn't heal her, but it numbed the pain just enough.

She could feel the blizzard around her pick up strength. Snow and hail drop in angry swirls and howling furiously.

She opened her eyes for the first time, even as she extended her remaining hand forward and the frost danced around her. She acknowledged the blueish tint of her vision; it seemed as if she was able to perceive things differently now, see aspects of the world that she didn't know existed until this moment.

Her eyes glowed a bright, deep blue, and she could see. Everywhere she looked, snow and ice and frost came into being. Power that she didn't know she had, hadn't dared to look for, reaching out from the deepest recesses of her psyche. But where the fearful manifestations of her power had turned a worrying red, her ice now had a dark blue quality to it, ancient and sturdy.

Antioch's inferno fought her blizzard, gouts of white-hot flame and currents of searing air battling her snowstorm at every turn and turning it away.

Elsa was not afraid. She knew what she had to do. She brought her arm up, swirling it above herself once, twice, three times and on and on, her left side giving off nothing but a dull throb as she let herself go, almost lost amidst the broken dam of her powers.

All around them, the snow of the forest and blizzard rose and joined, swirling in tandem, forming a tornado of frost with the two sorcerers in its eye.

She could see, with her eyes, the flash that danced along the edges of the tornado, helping her direct it from atop its long wooden stick. She could hear the chuckle, even over the roar of the elements that she directed.

'I'm here,' the voice reminded her, but she already knew.

She turned her attention to Ioch. No snow or ice or frost had managed to penetrate his own personal bubble of absolutely controlled atmosphere that burned constantly, but Elsa was about to change that.

"You are a scourge on this world," she managed to speak, and the deep and echoing hue of her voice registered with some surprise on the back of her mind.

Ice the likes of which she had never before created began to grow from the ground around Antioch. It grew slowly, but it grew, undaunted by his efforts to melt it away. This ice was a dark enough blue to pass for black and as it rose from the ground, so did Elsa's rage.

"For your crimes and atrocities against our people, I judge you." She did not know where the authority came from, but she knew, as naturally as she knew to use her powers, that she had it. The dark ice surged, locking around Antioch and growing inward, hiding him from view as his prison cell closed shut.

Even with the unnaturally thick, dark ice and the fact that she knew Antioch could not move anymore, she could see the red glow of his efforts from within.

"I judge you and I sentence you," she spoke as her fingers traced the air, creating runes and shapes that manifested themselves in bright blue gashes along the walls of the ice prison, forming a solid pattern all around it. She did not understand them but she knew what they were, almost by instinct, having given complete control over to the ancient power within her that used her mouth to speak. She knew that this would hold.

"To live banished and imprisoned, unable to see the light of the sun, for a thousand years."

The ancient, runic spell now complete, the dark prison glowed with light even as the frozen ground beneath opened and the block of solid ice began to descend. It vanishing entirely from view as the ground closed up behind it.

And just as suddenly as it had started, it was over. She could not feel the oppressive heat anymore.

She blinked and her vision blurred, losing its blueish tint. The blizzard around her slowed, before calming, sheets of snow vanishing or falling harmlessly to the ground, covering the ruined remains of the forest around her.

Elsa took a step forward. Then another. Nothing marked the place where the monster had been buried. She let out a breath that was half a laugh. It was done. It was over.

She pulled her remaining hand to brush at her eyes, trying to push the errant snow away, but she realized that the blurring of her vision wasn't due to snow. With that realization came the return of the feeling of her left hand and shoulder, still encased in ice but rising in intensity as the pain throbbed again and again.

She took another step, stumbled, and fell. She managed to catch herself on her knees, breathing harshly, and lied down on her back. Their clash had ruined the forest in a wide radius, making it look like she was in a massive clearing. She found it funny momentarily, her chest wracked by a pained chuckle which she didn't hear, drowned out by the consuming ringing of her ears.

The shock must have been wearing off. The pain in her arm increased; her vision grew dimmer. She could no longer feel her limbs. She was cold. She found the idea bizarre but there was no other feeling she could associate with what she was going through. It wasn't fear. She was not afraid- of that she was certain.

All she could see was the grey expanse of what she assumed was the dispersing blizzard.

Her eyelids grew heavy. There were now spots on her already blurred vision. She would pass out soon, she knew that. At least she had taken the monster down with her.

One of the spots in her vision grew. And grew. And grew, slowly covering her eyes in black.

She felt the sudden gust of wind strike her and darkness become her world as her consciousness faded.

~E~