The Winter Servant

by Elphaba818

Jackson Overland was born a servant in the Arendelle castle, and he does a good job. The only problem? His uncontrollabe ice and snow powers. On the night of Queen Elsa's coronation, he accidentally sets off an eternal winter throughout the kingdom and runs away. But his little sister, the new queen, and some new royal friends are on a mission to bring him back home. RotBTFD story.

5. The Eternal Winter

To all you readers out there who have been patiently waiting this past month for this new chapter, I am so sorry it took me so long to finish writing this chapter and getting it posted online. I've just been so busy with my college classes and homework, I haven't had time to write. In fact, I kind of blew off working on homework today just to finish writing this chapter, so I hope you're all grateful for my negligence! Tomorrow I'm devoting solely to my homework, but I'm hoping some well written reviews from all of you will make up for the policy of 'all work, and no play' for me as I finish the two assignments that are due next week. Please like this chapter enough to leave a nice review when you're done reading! Please!

In all honesty, I will be amazed if I get few reviews for this chapter. This chapter contains one of the scenes of the canon Frozen movie that I'm sure over half of you reading this only started reading it just to see what I intended to do for this part with Jack. Three guesses as to which iconic scene I'm talking about! ;)

Silken Danser has yet to beta this chapter at this time, but when she does, I'll repost it again with her critiques added in. Please be patient will any typos in the meantime and enjoy the latest chapter!

And as always, I would like to take this time to thank all the wonderful readers who were kind enough to leave a nice review at the end of Chapter Four:

- Cloud4012

- Guest (In the future, please leave a name so I can properly acknowledge you in any future AU notes)

- Ambar

- INKsideOut

- Ghost

- LISTILLA.11

- Fangirl309

- FanFic-FanGirl579

Thank you all so much for leaving such kind words in your reviews! I'm glad you all like the story so far! Please, be sure to leave a review when you're done reading this chapter! I hope you all like it!

Please note: I do not own the movies Frozen, Rise of the Guardians, Brave, Tangled, or How to Train Your Dragon. Frozen, Brave, and Tangled belong to Walt Disney Animation Studios, and Rise of the Guardians and How To Train Your Dragon both belong to Dreamworks Animation. This is a fanfic made for fun, not profit!

Remember to review when you're done reading, my dear readers! I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Reviews keep me motivated to write! Even if I get really busy with classes and homework, so long as reviews keep pouring in, I will be inspired to keep writing no matter now busy or stressed I may get! :D

EDIT:

As of 4/8/17, this chapter has been edited by my beta reader Silken Danser. Other than a few tweaks here and there with grammar mistakes, pretty much everything is still the same.

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Chapter Five: The Eternal Winter

Jack's mind was a whirlwind of racing thoughts as his feet pounded down the padded carpeting of the main hallway on the ground floor of the castle. He was scared, confused, and completely miserable.

But one thing was very clear to him.

He had to get out of here.

He had to get as far away from Emma and Elsa as he possibly could.

He had to get away from people in general.

They were terrified of him, and for good reason!

It broke his heart that his little sister and the girl he had loved for years were afraid of him now, but at least they finally understood why he had always kept them at arm's length. It was for their own safety! He hated doing this and leaving them, the two girls he cared for more than he even cared about himself, but he had to get out of here now before he did anything further with his dreaded powers. People almost got hurt with his ice back in the ballroom. He couldn't take a chance of his magic getting loose again and hurting someone for real! People nearly got impaled by ice back in the Great Hall. Thankfully, no one was hurt, but someone might next time.

They could be gravely injured.

Or worse… they could be killed!

Jack all but flew down the hall as he searched for some way out of the castle. It didn't matter what type of exit it was, door or window. He was simply on autopilot as he tried to find a way outside. Should he find an opening, he was jumping out of it the first chance he had. One broken window or door busted off its hinges meant nothing to the panicked teenager compared to the thought of innocent people being frozen into cubes of solid ice or impaled by frozen spikes.

He nearly panicked when he found no such exit anywhere in his haze of terror, but then he spied his saving grace: the palace's main doors that led out to the front courtyard. If he wasn't so scared of himself, Jack would have smiled happily at the sight of them. An exit! He had found an exit! As soon as he was out those doors, everything would be okay! He would be far away from anyone he could hurt inside the castle!

He bolted toward them without a second thought.

Jack wrenched them open with strength that he never knew he possessed, and was ready to dash down the few short stone steps that connected the castle to the pavement of the courtyard, but then he stopped short at what he saw – something he really should have anticipated considering that this was still technically the night of Elsa's coronation as the new queen.

The entire front courtyard of the castle was jam packed with the common folk that lived down in the village, Coronan guards that had been patrolling the grounds, Scottish nobility that had retired from the party early, and a great number of Vikings that hadn't gone to the party at all because they hadn't wanted to get dressed up in formal wear.

While Jack as a person wasn't all that important considering that he wasn't born royalty or as some well-ranked noble, his dramatic exit from the castle's main entrance by throwing the doors open quickly drew stares from everyone in the crowd, and Jack was too shocked by seeing all these people to move for a few seconds. He mentally cursed himself for panicking the way he had when he fled from the Great Hall and thereby forgetting that everyone in the village and even the Coronan, Scottish, and Viking visitors that had chosen not to attend the party were waiting out here to see Elsa and Anna one last time tonight before the new queen and the princess officially retired for the night. The sisters had planned to make one more appearance before they had the festivities dwindle down all over the village and in the castle. How could he forget that?! Now, he was standing in front of all of them when he was in no state to be around people right now. What the hell was he supposed to do?!

A sudden cheering from someone in the crowd snapped him out of his train of thought, and his terror died away for half a second as he stared in confusion at the woman who was yelling happily while she gazed at him.

"It's the royal presenter! Queen Elsa and Princess Anna must be coming out now!" shouted the random village woman.

Within seconds after this random villager shouted that out, the crowd broke out into a thunderous applause as everyone stared expectantly up at Jack, but Jack felt his blood grow ice cold as he stared in terror at everyone looking at him. God dammit! Of course with his bad luck the crowd would automatically assume that he was the royal presenter for Elsa and Anna! With the way things always turned out for him, it was bad he ended up here in front of all these people, but really, it wasn't all that surprising! He couldn't go ahead and run out of the castle – at least not through this exit. He couldn't afford to possibly hurt any of these innocent people. He had to turn around and look for another way out of the palace. There were back doors in the kitchens, right? They weren't too far away! If he could just make it there, he'd be—

His musings were brought to a halt when he heard a lot of yelling behind him, and his head snapped around. To Jack's horror, he had been followed by at least half the guests out of the ballroom. The Scottish king and the Viking chief were at the head of the various Vikings and Scotsmen that were chasing him while yelling out battle cries at the top of their lungs. It was surprising since Jack had doubted that the two warring countries were willingly working together, but in the case of destroying him, the ice monster, it was a mutual threat that they wanted to eliminate. There was no way in hell he would be able to avoid them if he backtracked into the castle to find the kitchen's back entrance. He had to take his chances of not hurting anyone out here in this huge crowd. Better that he run through a bunch of people who were all still ignorant about his powers rather than through a mob of furious Vikings and Scotts that wanted his head on a platter.

Pausing only a moment longer to suck in a deep breath for a desperately needed boost of confidence, Jack squeezed his ungloved hand back into a tight fist again, and then finally forced his feet to move as he hurried down the short number of stairs to start jostling his way through the crowd. So long as he kept his bare hand closed while he made this break for it, everything should be fine. He just had to be very careful about not bumping into anyone.

Because in a massive throng of people like this, one wrong move could cause at least ten people to be skewered with his ice from just one little mishap.

Struggling to keep his emotions in check again as they had been for the last ten years of his life, Jack raced through the crowd, doing his best to avoid colliding into anyone. But it seemed like an impossible task. No matter which way he turned, people pressed nearer to him, wanting to get closer. They all wanted to be near enough to hear him – the one they all assumed to be the grand announcer for Elsa and Anna's arrival down here in the courtyard – and everywhere he turned there were great walls of people, gradually cutting off every path of escape.

He skidded to a stop in terror when one of the Coronan guards with a thick mustache blocked his path.

"Is the queen and the princess coming out?" he inquired.

Jack didn't answer him. He was too panicked to speak. His head darted about in every direction as he searched for an opening in the crowd. He eventually spied a gap in the mass of people, and again kept his ungloved hand close to his chest as he squeezed his way through. People started to stare in confusion as they slowly came to the realization that Jack had no intention whatsoever in calling out Elsa or Anna's names to announce their arrival, but Jack paid their puzzled expressions no mind. He was on the verge of hyperventilating because of how hysterical he was on the inside. He didn't care what any of these peasants, nobles, or royal guards thought of him. He just needed to get away.

He was just passing one of the two beautiful round fountains in the square when he was cut off again by another perplexed young man. This time, it looked like a Viking with thick black hair and a very slight beard.

"Where are Queen Elsa and Princess Anna?" the Viking man questioned.

The frightened servant boy ignored him. Couldn't these people see that he so badly needed to get away from all of them?! Get out of the way! Please!

He spun around on his heel and was about to take off running again, but he came face to face with a rather pretty young woman with a happily giggling little baby swaddled up in blue blankets nestled in her arms. Judging by her tartan dress, she belonged to one of the clans from the Highlands. Jack couldn't remember which one of the four clans wore yellow exclusively, but figuring out whether or not she was related to Clan Dunbroch, Clan Macintosh, Clan MacGuffin, or Clan Dingwall was the furthest thing on his mind at the moment considering that the woman with the defenseless infant was pressing closer to him.

"Young man, are you alright?" she asked him, worry for Jack evident in her tone. "You look terrified!"

Jack gulped, unable to find the words to even respond to her. He was starting to get rather disoriented due to his anxiety. His head whipped around, his fearful brown eyes desperately searching for some way to escape this massive horde of people. But his efforts to find another way out of the great throng of bodies were to no avail. There were just too many people! Everywhere he looked, there were faces staring at him, either still looking at him expectantly to announce Elsa and Anna's entrance to the courtyard or looking at him with confusion, obviously wondering why he looked so scared as he ran from the castle's main doors. He gulped as backed away from all of them, in particular the woman in front of him with the helpless baby. This woman with her child reminded him so much of his late mother and his sister when she was a baby. He started backing away from the mother and child as fast as he could. He didn't want to hurt them! He didn't want to hurt anyone here! Couldn't these people see that he needed to get out of this courtyard?! That he was dangerous?! He had to think of another way out here. Maybe he should just run back into the castle and chance the mob running through the halls… After all, there were less of them in there than—

He lost his train of thought when he felt himself bump into the stone ledge of the fountain he passed by a few seconds ago, and he instinctively caught himself from losing his balance by grabbing onto the ledge with his ungloved hand by accident.

The effect was instantaneous.

Before Jack could whip his ungloved hand off of the stone rim of the fountain, his ice powers shot out from his palm, and the entire circular outline of the beautiful structure was covered in a thick layer of powdered frost, while the water itself in the large bowl was completely frozen solid. The great spouts of liquid shooting out into the air in the very middle was instantly transformed into a large, icy structure reminiscent of a menacing, clawed hand with jagged and extra sharp nails.

As people from all the major kingdoms gasped in either shock, awe, disbelief, or just plain confusion, Jack spun around to stare in horror at his latest accident. Shit! Shit! Shit! No one out here seemed to fully understand what had just happened, but it was still another unintentional outburst of his powers! Oh god, now these people had seen his powers as well! It didn't look like anyone was hurt, thank the heavens, but they were still in danger from him! He had to get out of here! Now! Before anyone tried to—

"There he is! Seize him!"

"Stop that lad!"

Jack and just about every other person in the crowd whirled around. Standing in the main entryway into the castle was Stoick the Vast flanked by Gobber, and King Fergus with the other three main clan lords, and behind all of them were a number of other Vikings and Scotsmen that had been attending the party. The two leaders were glaring murderously at Jack as they pointed their fingers right at him, directing everyone's attention back to the frightened teenager. The outside crowd still didn't fully comprehend what was happening, but Jack just wanted more than anything to simply vanish completely from this horrible mess.

"S-Stay back!" he pleaded, making many people near him become even more puzzled by this scenario. "Please! Just… Just stay back! I don't want to—"

"Jackie!"

Jack's insides twisted into agonizingly tight knots when Emma's little face appeared in the mass of bodies gathered in the entryway. She looked so scared and confused by what was happening as she gazed out at her older brother standing fearfully near the frozen fountain in the exact center of the front courtyard, and she clutched the white silk glove that she had taken from Jack tightly in her little fist as she squeezed her way past all the furious older adults. She wasn't alone either. Within seconds after his little sister emerged from behind the Vikings and the Scotts, Elsa and Anna shoved their way to the front of the mob, and following them was Jamie and all the other servant children, and the rest of the visiting royalty, nobility, and just about half of the other guests from the party. They were all looking at him with matching looks on their faces:

Shock, disbelief, but above all… fear.

As Jack mentally freaked over being chased by all these royals and nobles from the Great Hall, Elsa hurried to join Emma at the front of the few short steps, her eyes filled to the brim with genuine concern and confusion.

"Jack!" she shouted out. "Jack… what's going on?!"

"Jackie!" Emma called out, trying to squeeze her way past the last handful of adults so she could run down the few short steps to reach him. "Jackie! Big Brother! You… You can make—?"

"No, Emma!"

Jack's sudden, terrified shriek cut through the air like a knife, and all eyes immediately zoomed back to him, but Jack didn't even notice that he was the center of attention again. All his focus was solely on Emma. He had to stop her from reaching him! Emma was his precious little sister! He couldn't let her get hurt by him! He had to warn her to keep her distance from him! Couldn't she see that her safety was in jeopardy if she was around him?!

"No, no, no! Emma, keep back! Please!" he begged, actually raising up both his hands in a warning manner to further emphasize to her how serious he was. Then he forced himself to look away from Emma's confused face to meet the gazes of the still thoroughly baffled Elsa and Anna. "Elsa! Anna! Please! Just… Just keep her away from me! Please! All of you! You all need to stay away—!"

He was cut off when a great burst of ice shot unexpectedly out of his bare hand, and it blasted through the air right in the direction of all the people gathered at the palace entrance.

To Jack's relief, the ice didn't actually hit anyone in the group, and it instead struck the castle's stone steps.

But to his horror, people in both the crowd around him and gathered in the entryway still screamed in terror as they all nearly fell over themselves in their mad scramble to move out of the way of the blast, or slipped on the ice that spread rapidly across the ground.

The Viking chief and the king of Dunbroch got the worst of it though. In an effort to protect their people, they had both shoved their way to the front when they shouted to the crowd for someone to stop Jack, and when the ice landed on the stone steps, the two leaders slipped and fell on top of each other and nearly toppled over the few who had managed to stay upright.

Upon seeing the two redheaded leaders slip and tumble over, Hiccup and Merida scrambled past the other bodies to reach their fallen fathers.

"Dad!"

"Father!"

The Viking heir and the Scottish princess tried to help Stoick and Fergus to stand up, but Jack just looked on in horror at what he had done. He was glad that neither of them were killed during his accidental blast of winter magic, but were they hurt at all? Were any bones broken? Did they maybe hit their heads and had concussions?

His internal musings were brought to a halt when the sound of a sturdy steel sword being unsheathed echoed throughout the courtyard, and Jack spun around. The Coronan guard with the bushy mustache who had tried to speak to him before had taken out his sword, and was full out glaring at him hatefully. He momentarily paused in his antagonistic staring at Jack to glance towards the Coronan royal family that were standing in just plain shock at the top of the steps near Elsa and Anna.

"Never fear, your majesties, your highnesses! I'll deal with this beast!" he yelled.

Within seconds, King Frederic and Queen Arianna started shouting out incomprehensible protests to what the guard was doing while Princess Rapunzel and Eugene just exchanged looks of unease. This was not going to end well, they all knew.

But Emma had to be forcibly restrained by both Elsa and Anna when she saw the guard start running straight towards her big brother.

"No! Don't hurt him! Don't hurt Jackie!" Emma screamed at the top of her lungs as she struggled to free herself from the hands that were restraining her.

"I am the queen here, and I order you to stop!" Elsa shouted out, also terrified at the prospect that this Coronan guard was going to kill her childhood friend.

But Jack didn't even notice what any of them were doing. All his attention was focused on the guard that was charging straight towards him with his sword drawn, and the townsfolk quickly leapt out of his way so as to not be hurt by either the blade or by any more ice magic from Jack.

The terrified teenager immediately backed away and raised his arms again as a weak means of defending himself.

"Please! Stay back!" he shouted fearfully at the still charging guard. "For your own safety, please! Keep away!"

But the Coronan guard paid his words no mind, and let out a roar of fury as he got even closer. When he was finally within range to strike Jack down, he raised his sword high above his head. "Die, you freak!"

"Big Brother!"

"Jack!"

"Please, stop!"

The screams of Emma, Elsa, and Anna were all particularly loud, but they didn't hold a candle to the scream of alarm that Jack made.

"Stay away!"

In a moment of pure terror of either accidentally hurting this man with his powers or possibly being killed by the man's sword, Jack's powers flared up again without his conscious command. More ice shot out from his ungloved hand, and within seconds, the Coronan guard's legs were incased in solid ice, preventing him from moving any closer to Jack. The guard let out a yelp of surprise when he realized his predicament, and he started beating the ice coating him with the blade of his sword to try and chip the ice off him.

Jack gaped in horror. Oh, shit! Oh, shit! Oh, shit! The man was frozen from the waist down! And it was all his fault!

"Monster!"

"Spawn of Loki!"

"What… What are you…?!"

These shouts from King Fergus, Chief Stoick, and King Frederic made Jack flinch, and then he looked around at the horrified expressions of the rest of the crowd.

The Dunbroch clanswoman with the baby who had been nice enoughto ask him if he was all right before was now clutching her screaming baby close to her chest, trying to shield the little one from his view as she backed fearfully away from him.

The Viking man he had seen before was trying to discretely pull out a dagger from its sheathe on his hip, ready to use it on him should he take one step in his direction.

A man who lived here in the village was dragging his two dumbstruck daughters several paces backward and out of range of anymore ice, clearly in shock himself by what he was witnessing.

All these reactions made Jack's head spin. This was everything that the trolls had warned him about so many years ago after his accident with Elsa and Anna. People were so scared of him! Actually, forget their reactions! He feared himself! And what the Coronan king just shouted out, about asking him what on earth he was? Jack didn't know, nor did he want to know. He just wanted to be free of this terrible curse!

Everyone knew his secret.

Everyone knew he was born with these cursed powers.

Everyone knew he was a monster.

He needed to get the hell out of here!

"Jackie!"

"Jack! Jack, are you all right?!"

He spun around again. Elsa and Emma were still on top of the steps, but unlike everyone else, they weren't staring at him in terror anymore. If anything, they looked terrified for him rather than of him.

Jack's already broken heart was shattered completely upon seeing their expressions, but he forced himself to ignore the ache in his chest. He gave them both one last sad, apologetic look, and then took off running again at top speed through the crowd, making sure to keep his ungloved hand in a tight fist against his chest. His destination? The side door in the tall stone walls that led off to the castle pastures near the edge of the fjord.

People quickly jumped out of the way as he ran past. No one wanted to be harmed by him. This strange servant boy had powers of an unexplainable nature, and that made him very dangerous. If he was getting out of here instead of sticking around, they should thank the heavens! Just leave them in peace without hurting any of them any further!

The moment he took off, Emma slammed the heel of her shoe down hard on Anna's foot. As the princess yelped in pain, Emma seized the chance to break free from both her hands and Elsa's, and ran at top speed after her retreating brother.

"Jackie! No!" she called out.

People stared in wonder at the little girl that was apparently chasing after the treacherous boy, not the slightest bit afraid, but seemingly worried about the servant kid instead.

Elsa gaped at seeing Emma chasing after Jack, but then quickly swung around to face Anna.

"Anna? Stay here!" she ordered

"But Elsa—!"

Elsa didn't wait for Anna to finish that sentence though, because within seconds, she had gathered up the skirts of her dress in one hand, and was then hurrying down the few short castle steps after Emma and Jack. Emma was her ward, but Jack was also her friend. Just like Emma, Elsa had to somehow stop Jack from running off like this. It was obvious to the new queen that Jack didn't mean to cause people any harm with his newly revealed winter powers. He was a good person, but he feared what he could do. Elsa knew that somehow, she had to convince him to come back inside the castle. She was the queen of Arendelle and he was not only her friend, he was a loyal castle servant and therefore one of Arendelle's citizens! She could put him under her protection from everyone in the other major kingdoms that were all but terrified of him.

Jack didn't even realize that he was still being followed. The adrenaline pumping through his veins made him immune to hearing anything at this moment other than his own frantic heartbeat and the terrified exclamations that people in the crowd were making as he sped past all of them towards the side door of the palace. When he reached the said door, he nearly ripped the wooden door right off its hinges as he flung it open, and then continued running for his life into the castle fields.

It wasn't until Jack had run far into the pastures and was near the edge of the fjord that he was forced to come to a stop, but not because he wanted to.

It was because he accidentally tripped over a semi large rock in the field, and he fell forward, his boot coming off his left foot and exposing the bare skin to the night air.

He gasped when he felt his foot pop out of the leather confines. Other than his hands, his feet were the other parts of his body that sent out great streams of ice. It was bad enough that Emma had taken one of his gloves, but now one of his boots was off his feet?! Fuck!

Ignoring the burning sensation in his lungs from running so hard and so far in such a short amount of time, Jack bent down and scooped up his lone boot. He was about to jam it back onto his foot and work on lacing it back up again, but then he heard the voices of the two girls that he was afraid of hurting the most in this world.

"Big Brother!"

"Jack!"

The boot slipped out from between his fingers as his head snapped straight up in alarm. Emma and Elsa had also squeezed through the castle wall door and were running at top speed across the pasture to reach him. Emma's eyes were brimming with unshed, fearful tears for Jack as she still gripped his one lone white glove tightly in her hand, and the expression on Elsa's face was nothing short of pure desperation as she ran after Emma to reach Jack, her purple cape billowing about in the night wind as she did so.

Wait… the wind!

"Wind, help!" Jack called out desperately.

The invisible breeze stirred up around him at his call.

Jack…

"Stop them! Please! Don't let them get too close to me!" he begged.

To be honest, Jack had no idea whether or not his plea to his invisible friend would do any good, as he had never asked the wind to do something for him before. But to his complete surprise, the wind did as he asked. The instant Jack had begged the wind to slow down his friends, the wind whipped right past him to barrel right into the unsuspecting forms of his little sister and the queen. Emma and Elsa were greatly startled by the sudden gust of wind rushing into their faces, and although neither of them seemed to realize that it was Jack who had told the airstream to halt them for as long as possible, the wind had bought him a minute's worth of time. Maybe two if he was lucky.

If he was going to get away, he had to act now.

But how? How in the world was he going to get away from Arendelle with both of them right on his tail, and from the middle of the castle pastures? Damn him for panicking back there in the courtyard! He should have run for the main gates so he would have had a clear shot of running out of the city all together!

Forgetting all about his discarded boot, Jack gulped and slowly began backing away from the sight of Emma and Elsa, who were both still battling the unrelenting wind whipping about around them. What he didn't realize, however, was that he was backing up right to the edge of the water, and with every step he took on his exposed foot, ice and frost coated the ground after him. Right when his foot was about to unknowingly plunge into the watery depths of the inlet, the ice that Jack was unintentionally creating froze the edge of the water completely solid.

Jack's head snapped around from worriedly watching his kid sister and his queen to witness what was happening to the water. He was freezing it. He was freezing the fjord. Then his head slowly glanced up to look across the water to the far off opposite bank. On the opposite side of the fjord was the evergreen forest on the outskirts of the capitol, and beyond that was the snow-capped mountain range several miles away.

How far did those mountain ranges stretch? Did anyone even know exactly? The North Mountain was a naturally snowy place without any people around. The only people who dared to venture out there were the Arendelle ice harvesters, but they stayed mostly around the base. They never went near the peak. Maybe… Maybe it would be safer out there for him! So long as he ventured far enough near the summit where not even the ice harvesters dared to climb and collect ice blocks, he could live out the rest of his life in peace, far away from anyone he could ever possibly hurt with his god damn magic! There was just no telling how far away he could get from everyone if he didn't at least try to keep running away right now!

But still… could he really do it? Could he just up and leave Emma and Elsa like this? If he left, he wasn't coming back. It was as simple as that.

Jack…

Jack gulped, and then looked up at the dark night sky. The moon was shining brightly overhead, as though encouraging him to just leave. Leave and never return to Arendelle where he might accidentally hurt even more people.

But it wasn't the moon's approval that he needed right now. It was the wind's. The wind was the only thing in this world that he could never hurt. It was his friend.

"What do you think, Wind?" he whispered. "Should I go for it?"

There was a momentary pause, and then the great gale stopped whirling around Emma and Elsa to shoot forward and whistle encouragingly in his ear.

Go…

"Jack!"

"Big Brother! Wait, please!"

Emma and Elsa were right behind him.

It was now or never.

With one final sigh, Jack spared one last glance over his shoulder at his only sister and the wonderful girl he had been in love with for the past four years.

"I'm sorry…" he whispered.

And then, without daring to turn back around and see either of their expressions, Jack hesitantly took one step forward with his bare foot onto the small ice patch he had accidentally made on the fjord during his moment of panic. He was a little worried that he might not be able to make the ice again intentionally this time, but to his great relief, not only did the water freeze underneath his foot, but a turquoise snowflake emblem appeared right where he set his weight down before vanishing completely into the solid ice he had made in the inlet. With newfound confidence, Jack clenched up his hands into tight fists to ensure that none of his ice powers would shoot out again from either of his hands, even the gloved one, and then he took off running across the waters of the fjord.

His bare left foot made more light blue snowflake emblems appear on the frozen surface of the water as he ran for his life, and while his right foot was still lodged inside his snug leather boot, solid ice appeared underneath it, just without the snowflake patterns that popped up for a few moments every time he set down his left foot before disappearing again into the frosty designs of the frozen water.

In the back of his mind, Jack registered that he could he still hear Emma and Elsa calling out for him desperately to stop and come back, but Jack forced himself to tune them out as he finally made it to the opposite bank by the woods.

He didn't dare to stop and look back as he began forcing his way past the various branches of dark green evergreen trees as he hurdled through the dense forest.

His friend in the breeze was calling him to the far away snowcapped North Mountain.

All the time he spent ignoring its plea to leave Arendelle and wondering how to keep his powers a secret were officially behind him.

The moon in the sky would light the way and the wind would guide him.

It was off to the great unknown for Jackson Overland.

But his deepest and darkest secret did not disappear along with him.

---

When the gust of wind whipped up around Emma and Elsa from seemingly nowhere, the queen and the small servant girl were forced to halt in their tracks. Elsa actually had to reach down and grab hold of Emma when the windstorm became so bad that the little girl rose up an inch or so into the air.

"G-Goodness me!" the platinum-blonde exclaimed.

"Where did all this wind come from, Queen Elsa?!" Emma shouted to be heard over the roar of the wind.

"I'm… I'm not sure!"

Emma opened her mouth to say more, but as mysteriously as the gust of wind had appeared, it disappeared again quick as a flash. The little girl and the late teenager exchanged puzzled looks over what had just occurred, but then they remembered Jack, and turned to try and chase after him again. That was when they saw him racing his way across the fjord, freezing the water underneath him with his one bare foot.

"Jackie, stop!"

Before Elsa could try and stop her, Emma took off sprinting in the direction of the fjord. When she tried to step onto the frozen sea to keep chasing her older brother though, she lost her footing on the slippery surface, and fell face first onto the ice.

"Emma!" Elsa cried in alarm, quickly rushing to her side to check the little girl over. "Emma! Are you okay?!"

Mutely, Emma shook her head as she sat back up, her eyes only looking at the small green dot on the opposite side of the frozen waters that she knew to be Jack as he vanished into the green forests that surrounded the city.

"No…" Emma whispered, squeezing the white glove tightly in her hand as she did so. "No… Jackie, come back! Please!"

Elsa felt so bad for Emma. If their roles were reversed and she was watching her sister run away from her out of fear of supernatural powers that no one knew Anna possessed, she knew she would probably be heartbroken and in a state of shock too. That's not to say that Elsa wasn't in shock right now though, because she very much was. In the last ten minutes, she had found out more about Jack than she ever had, despite growing up alongside him for the past eighteen years. Which led her to wonder whether or not she had ever known anything about him at all.

Sure, Jack had become a rather private person, after he started pushing her and Anna away when they were all children, but she had still thought that in some strange way, Jack still trusted her.

But apparently, the new queen had been very wrong.

Jack shutting herself, Anna, and Emma out hadn't been without cause.

He had been trying to keep his strange ice powers a secret.

But how could he assume that she would have hated him for his abilities?

She couldn't speak for Anna, as Anna was her own person with her own opinions, but Elsa was certain that her younger sister would be on her side about this. Jack was still their friend even if he did keep his distance from people! Elsa was positive that Anna no more hated Jack than she did.

And Emma?

Emma was the first to start running after Jack when he fled from the palace courtyard, and judging by her sad expression right now, she was heartbroken that her brother had run away like this, not terrified of him or angry.

Despite Jack's strange powers, his pushing her away all her life, and even the small fight between them back in the castle ballroom, Emma still adored her big brother. There was no doubt about it whatsoever in Elsa's mind.

Elsa sighed, and was about to gently help Emma stand back up so they could go back to the main courtyard and figure out what to do next, but then she noticed something that made her gasp rather loudly in complete shock.

Emma heard her sharp intake of breath, and she snapped out of her own distress long enough to look up at Elsa curiously.

"What is it, Queen Elsa?" she mumbled, wiping away a few stray tears from the corners of her eyes as she did so.

But Elsa didn't meet the child's gaze. Her eyesight was zeroed in on the watery surface of the fjord in front of them.

"The fjord…!" was all she could manage to gasp out in reply.

Emma blinked in obvious confusion, but then she turned her head to see what Elsa was talking about.

Within seconds, her dark brown eyes became as wide as saucers.

The ice that Jack had made on the surface of the ocean when he was running away from both of them was spreading rapidly across the water in all directions imaginable. It wasn't even thin and easily breakable ice either, but the thick sturdy kind that would take anyone ages to smash apart. As the entire sea around the city was slowly engulfed in Jack's magical ice, freezing all the foreign visitors' ships in place so that they couldn't budge at all, soft and fluffy white snowflakes began to slowly glide down in the air from the night sky.

Neither Elsa nor Emma knew how it was possible, but it seemed as though Jack's powers had somehow set off a winter storm in the middle of summer.

"Snow?" Emma whispered, reaching out one of her small hands to catch a particularly fat and fluffy white flake in the palm of her hand. It landed there without any problems, only to dissolve within seconds of encountering the little girl's palm.

As soon as it melted away, Emma shivered from the suddenly cold air and ran her hands up and down repeatedly on her upper arms to try and warm up. Elsa hurried to unclip her purple cloak from around her neck and then draped it around Emma's quivering shoulders. It didn't matter that Emma was of common birth and she was the queen. No way was she going to stay somewhat warm in her summery cape when a small child was right next to her, freezing from the rather abrupt change in the weather.

Emma blinked when the cloak was wrapped around her, but before she could say something in regards to the kind gesture, such as a simple thank you or even a weak protest of being given the queen's coronation cloak to wear, Elsa was rising from the ground, and then offering Emma a hand to help her up as well.

"We need to go back to the courtyard," Elsa explained.

Emma's eyes widened when she heard this, and her head started turning sporadically back and forth between the castle walls in the distance and looking out at the forest across the frozen fjord where she had last seen her big brother disappear.

"But… But Jackie—!"

"We will figure out what to do about all this back in the courtyard, Emma. We are not just going to let Jack run away like this, I promise. But we need to go back and join everyone else before we can do anything else."

Emma still didn't like the fact that she was being indirectly forbidden from trying to run across the frozen sea to keep chasing after her big brother, but after hearing Elsa promise her that something would be done to bring Jack home again, the little girl reluctantly nodded before taking Elsa's hand, with the hand not holding on to her big brother's discarded white glove, and allowed herself to be dragged up onto her feet again. Wordlessly, Emma trailed along slowly after Elsa as they made their way to the side door of the castle walls to head back into the courtyard.

Elsa's head was still reeling from everything that had just happened, but Emma was simply in a state of blank shock. With a sigh, she spared a sad look down at the white glove she had stolen from Jack back in the ballroom. Her big brother not only had strange ice magic and had seemingly caused winter to come to Arendelle several months too early, but he also just ran off and left her behind. Emma didn't know how she felt about that last part. Judging by his reactions to everything he had done back in the Great Hall and out in the courtyard a few minutes ago, the little girl could tell that her big brother was apparently scared of his powers, but didn't he trust her at all? Had Emma only known about his powers, she never would have pushed him as hard as she did, by yelling at him back in the castle.

Why didn't he ever tell her that he could make ice with just a snap of his fingers?

Elsa saw the sad look on her face, and quickly tried to tune her back in to the present.

"Are you all right?" she asked kindly as she held open the door so Emma could head back into the courtyard first.

Emma immediately shook her head at the question as she stepped forward so she could slip in through the doorway. "Uh-uh," she said quickly.

Elsa frowned, but then a more prominent thought occurred to her, and she knew that despite how shocked Emma was right now over everything, and heartbroken from Jack having seemingly just run away from Arendelle, she still had to ask it.

"Emma… did you know?"

Emma tripped over her own feet after hearing that, but after the words sunk in, she paused mid-step in the middle of the doorway, tilted her head upward to meet Elsa's eyes, and then slowly shook her head again.

"No… Did you, your majesty?"

Elsa blinked. Despite only being a ten-year-old little girl, Emma was a very sharp child. Not many other children her age would have thought to deflect such a question back at the one making the inquiry.

"No, I did not, Emma. And neither did Anna. We were just as surprised as you were over everything that just happened."

Emma didn't say anything in reply to that. She just blinked at the blonde's words, but then sighed and nodded once before heading into the courtyard. Elsa was taken aback by her lack of a response. She knew that the little girl had to be hurting right now, but this almost seemed to be some type of repression of emotions that Emma was going through right now.

The way Jack hid his emotions for the past ten years, now Emma was doing the same.

But it wasn't because she was trying to keep hidden magic powers a secret.

It was so Elsa wouldn't worry about her.

But that attitude didn't stop Elsa from worrying about her. If anything, it made the queen ten times more worried about the small child.

Elsa started to follow Emma back into the courtyard while opening her mouth to tell the little girl something – anything.

But that was when it happened.

People in the courtyard had been whispering and murmuring anxiously amongst themselves as they talked about everything they had witnessed Jack do with his ice powers: freezing one of the courtyard fountains, encasing the legs of the Coronan guard who tried to attack him into blocks of ice – which people were desperately trying to chip away with the tips of sharp blades so that the poor man could be free to move around again – and then apparently causing the land to be plunged into an eternal winter as they saw the fat snowflakes fall lightly down from the sky. But all talk and movement in the castle square came to a sudden hush when maniacal laughter suddenly echoed throughout the area.

Dark and ominous laughter.

As people exchanged terrified looks, the laughter continued to echo from seemingly everywhere in the courtyard, with no set place as to where it could possibly be originating from.

Now what the hell was going on?

Just as soon people started wondering this unasked question, something happened high overheard, and everyone in attendance looked up toward the sky. But when they did, nearly all the people in the crowd started to scream in absolute horror.

It was nighttime, so the sky was expected to be dark, but everyone there knew that great swirls of inky black sand shouldn't be hovering high over all their heads and slowly transforming into great, nightmarish black sand horses with glowing yellow eyes. There were so many hordes of them filling the air high above them all, soon it was all but impossible to see the sky beyond the horses. How many were there exactly?! Two hundred?! Three hundred?! No… that couldn't possibly be enough… There had to be a thousand of those horses up there, at the very least!

And riding atop the horse that was nearest to the ground was a frightening man that looked as though he had, in another lifetime, been born in some type of alternate shadow world. He had oily black hair, sallow gray skin, an insane grin, swirling black robes, and in one of his hands was an enormous black scythe. He was still laughing manically as he beheld all the dumbstruck and terrified expressions of the human beings down below him.

No one quite knew what was going on, but one thing was certain to every human being down in the courtyard that was witnessing this:

Jackson Overland wasn't the only supernaturally-powered being around here.

Pitch Black was beyond pleased. Thanks to allowing Jackson Overland to run out here and accidentally frighten everyone with those mysterious ice powers of his, the humans' fear had skyrocketed to unparalleled levels. It was worth the wait these past ten years to slowly turn Jack from a happy boy who loved his ice and snow magic to a terrified young teen who, despite being so scared of hurting other people, had caused an entire crowd that contained people from four different countries to be afraid of him. And their mass combination of fear was more than enough to further fuel his beautiful Nightmares to become at least three times as powerful as they were before!

He really wished that he could personally thank Jack for what he had unknowingly done for him, building up his army for the past decade and then scaring the people in this courtyard enough to make his black sand horses even more powerful than ever, but that stupid teenager had gotten so scared of hurting people that he had run away from the city! That was something that had never occurred to Pitch in his plan to terrorize the human race enough to cause the Guardians to get involved so he could crush them. He had never imagined that his terrorizing the ice-wielder boy's nightmares with visions of hurting others would be enough to make the teenager run away. That was a problem. Pitch needed Jack here so he could further spread fear amongst people with his powers. As soon as he dealt with the task of invoking fear within the humans through his lovely Nightmares, he would have to pursue that boy.

If he wanted the meddlesome Guardians to actually meddle this time, he needed Jack.

It was annoying that he would have to search for the dark-haired boy in the forest and mountains, but it was unfortunately necessary.

He just had to make this attack on the humans quick before he lost any hope of tracking Jack down whatsoever.

With that thought in mind, Pitch forced his grinning lips to make his smile seem twice as twisted as ever, and then he pointed his scythe down at the still terrified humans staring up at him down below.

"Strike fear in every heart!" he ordered.

Upon his command, the black sand stallions galloped down from sky on the air currents to force their way through the humans in the courtyard.

Normal Arendelle citizens screamed as they lunged to get out of the way of the evil stampeding black sand horses that hurtled down towards them from the night sky, but the visitors to the Norwegian country did their best to fight back. The Coronan guards had their swords strapped to their waists and they quickly unsheathed them, and in the case of the Vikings and visiting Scotsmen, those that had been enjoying the party a little while ago quickly dashed to find the nearest weapon available in an effort to defend themselves as well as their country leaders and their families. It didn't even have to be a sharp axe or heavy hammer that they were all looking for. Just something good and strong that they could use to whack one of these horses with would be great!

But their efforts were to no avail. No matter what any of the humans did, their attacks did absolutely nothing to the strange sand creatures. If any of their blows happened to land on one of Pitch's Nightmares, the sand would merely dissolve away for a few seconds before magically repairing itself as though the attack never landed on it at all. The human defenders were completely stunned by this.

What were these creatures?!

Why couldn't they stop them?!

And who was that shadow man that was directing this attack?!

Was Jack's use of ice, which scared the people out of the ballroom and caused them to come out here, related to this mysterious attack on the city?!

Elsa was completely shocked by what was happening, but she knew that she couldn't just stand here. She had to find Anna, and somehow keep little Emma safe! She sucked in a deep breath and glanced down at the little girl. Emma had turned completely white as she clung to the skirt of the queen's dress, and Elsa could hear her terrified sobs as she buried her face into the folds of the fabric. The small girl was all but petrified from how scared she was.

Knowing she couldn't just abandon Emma here, Elsa quickly squeezed the tiny hand that wasn't clutching onto Jack's glove to make Emma look up at her with teary eyes.

"Follow me, and stay close!" the queen ordered.

Emma tried to immediately shake her head no, but Elsa wouldn't take that response. Tightening her hold on Emma's hand to ensure that they weren't separated, Elsa dashed through the mad crowd to try and find her sister, all the while dragging Emma along behind her. Emma was screaming in terror at the top of her lungs as they jostled their way through the mob, but Elsa forced herself to keep going and not stop. If she stopped, they would either be trampled by members of the frightened townsfolk, who were so scared right now they didn't even blink twice when they saw their new queen run past with the little girl, or one of these black sand horses might try to attack them. While the horses were only galloping about around the courtyard and weren't exactly causing anyone in attendance any physical harm, Elsa wasn't taking any chances. Should she and Emma come face to face with one of these monsters, she was shoving the little girl behind her and ordering her to run and find Anna. Emma was only a little girl.

As the queen of Arendelle, it was her duty to protect the citizens of her country.

But even before she was a queen, she was an older sister.

She had to find Anna.

"Anna!" she shouted, her head spinning about in every direction in her desperation to find her sweet little sister. "Anna, where are you?!"

"Elsa!"

Elsa screeched to a halt and whirled around. Anna was near the fountain that Jack had frozen in his escape from the castle, hiding behind the body of their uncle. King Frederic and Eugene were seemingly trying to shield her, Rapunzel, and Queen Arianna behind them as the black sand horses stampeded around them, and all the Coronan guards, other than the one that Jack had fearfully frozen to the ground, were slashing their swords at any of the horses that tried to approach their king and future prince. All the members of the royalty were near the fountains, in fact. While all the Vikings had experience with fighting and were actively trying to find weapons to beat back the monsters under the orders of Chief Stoick, with his son Hiccup and the rest of his friends fighting alongside him, the actions of the members of the Scottish royals varied. The Dunbroch lords and sons were like the Vikings, all working together to fight off any of the horses that dared to come near them, Queen Elinor, the princes Hamish, Hubert, and Harris, and the rest of the servant children who were huddled near the three little redheaded boys. King Fergus was with them, using his oversized fists to try and hit a few of the black horses, but to no avail, and surprisingly, his daughter was fighting alongside him. Merida didn't seem to care at all that she was a princess and therefore was supposed to be playing the damsel in distress right now like what Elinor, Anna, Rapunzel, and Queen Arianna were doing. Instead, the Scottish princess was ignoring her mother's desperate pleas to come hide behind her father and the lords and their sons, and instead she punched and kicked at any of the black sand stallions that her father happened to miss. Merida she didn't seem to care in the slightest that her actions were causing her beautiful turquoise blue and gold dress to get ripped and dirty and that her wimple was sliding off her head slightly, exposing a bit of her naturally curly red hair.

But Elsa didn't care that the crown princess of Dunbroch was fighting off the monsters alongside her father.

She didn't care that the Vikings and the Scotts had seemingly put aside their differences for a few minutes to deal with the current magical attack that they were all facing.

She didn't care that half the townsfolk were screaming as they tried to avoid being attacked by the black sand horses with the chilling yellow eyes.

All Elsa cared about was keeping a firm grip on Emma's hand as she ran to her beloved little sister.

"Anna!" Elsa called out, dragging the terrified Emma behind her as she made a beeline for her sister. "Anna!"

Anna tried to fight against the restraining hands of their frantic aunt to get around their uncle so she could see her better. The moment she got a clear look at her though, her bright blue eyes became wide with pure fear. "Elsa! Look out!"

Elsa blinked, but then she heard something pawing the ground behind her and Emma, and she abruptly spun around.

One of the black sand horses was slowly approaching the queen and the small servant child, snorting menacingly as it closed in on the adult and child.

Emma screamed in complete terror, and even Elsa felt her blood run cold. None of these creatures were exactly attacking anyone, just stamping their hooves and neighing and whinnying threateningly at people, but that wasn't to say that they wouldn't attack, should that mysterious shadow man order them to do so. Just what was going to happen to her and Emma now?!

The Nightmare snorted, and it started barreling its way toward the noblewoman and the commoner child, but that was when Pitch finally snapped his fingers, and all the black sand stallions seemed to freeze in place.

"Time to go. We have an ice-user to track," he ordered.

Within seconds, all the Nightmares seemed to forget all about the townsfolk as they instead took off in the air again to gather around the Nightmare King. People were still terrified, but they were also confused. Pitch paid everyone's matching perplexed looks no mind though. He just grinned maliciously at the crowd.

"Thank you all for supplying me with your fear! It will be put to good use, I promise!"

And then, before anyone could do anything at all, Pitch commanded his vast legion of Nightmares to gallop away through the sky in the direction of the faraway snowy mountains. Within seconds, they were gone.

Between everything that had just happened, what with Jack accidentally revealing his magical powers to the entire world and then the Boogeyman showing up and intentionally freaking everyone out before abruptly vanishing for reasons unknown to the crowd, it was needless to say that people were both rattled and confused. No one quite knew what to make of everything that had just happened, but they wanted answers.

Especially the visiting royals and nobles.

But Queen Elsa was in no mood to act like the queen she was supposed to be right now.

Not when she had a shaking little girl next to her that looked like she was on the verge of fainting from how scared she was, and when her own sister was barreling past their extended family from Corona to tackle her in a hug.

"Elsa!" Anna cried, throwing her arms around her neck before burying her face into her shoulder. "Elsa! I… I was so scared! Please, tell me you and Emma are okay!"

Within seconds, Elsa relinquished her grip on little Emma's hand to wrap her arms around her little sister and hug her back just as tight. "I'm okay, Anna. And so is Emma. What about you?! Are you all right?!"

Anna slowly nodded. "I'm fine, Elsa! I swear! But where's Jack?! Is he okay?! Those… Those things didn't get him, right?!"

Upon hearing what the princess asked, Emma broke down into heart wrenching sobs as she squeezed the white glove so tightly to her chest, the skin of her hand turned white. And her reaction greatly startled both Elsa and Anna.

"Emma!"

"H-Hey now, don't cry! Everything's going to be—"

"Jackie's gone! He ran away! He ran away into the mountains!"

Emma screeched this so loudly, a lot of people in the crowd immediately turned to look at her as she continued to wail, the other foreign royals and nobles in particular. Stoick the Vast took one look at the sobbing child before glancing up at the still snowing sky, and then plastered an ugly scowl on his face before marching purposely towards the distressed little girl and the new queen and her sister the princess.

Emma was too distraught to notice at first that she had attracted the attention of the fuming Viking chief, but Elsa and Anna saw him approaching at once and did their best to shield her as best as they could behind them.

"Chief Stoick? Is there a problem?" Elsa asked pointedly, putting her authoritative queen face back on once again.

"Do you have something you wish to say to our ward?" Anna asked, her tone much snippier than her elder sister's was and with her blue eyes slightly narrowed.

Stoick's eyes narrowed, not the slightest bit intimidated by either of the girls that had taken it upon themselves to act as guards for the little girl who was related to the boy that had caused the winter in the middle of summer. "I do, as a matter of fact, your highness! I want to know whether or not that child has sorcery in her too, and if so, to stop this cold weather at once!"

Before Elsa or Anna could reply, King Fergus was surprisingly nodding in agreement as he shuffled forward on his peg leg, and the rest of the members of the foreign royalty and nobility followed him.

"Aye! That lass was saying that that Jack lad is her brother! Is she an ice-beast, too?!" he demanded.

"Fergus!" said Elinor sharply, furious about what her husband had just called Jack and Emma. "That is enough! You mustn't go accusing an innocent child just because of all that's happened!"

Elsa and Anna's eyes both narrowed into thin slits upon hearing what the king of Dunbroch had just called Jack and Emma, but they did have to admit that they did appreciate what the Scottish queen had said in defense of their small ward. Before they could say anything, however, Emma was poking her head out from behind both of them to throw Fergus a brave scowl.

"I'm no monster! I'm completely ordinary, your majesty!" she growled. "And my big brother is no ice-beast!"

"Yeah! Emma's perfectly normal!"

"Normal! Normal! Normal!"

"She's our friend!"

"D-Don't yell at her!"

"She is—"

"—not a monster!"

"And that goes double for her brother!"

Heads turned as Emma's small group of servant friends quickly ran forward to circle protectively around her, each one of them glaring hatefully at King Fergus for daring to call the girl that they had all been friends with all their lives a despicable monster. Their parents, in particular Olivia Bennett, all rushed forward to try and drag the boys and girls away so that they wouldn't get themselves involved in this any further, but Jamie and his kid sister Sophie, Caleb and Claude, Pippa, Monty, and Cupcake wouldn't allow themselves to be steered away. Emma was their friend. They would gladly stand beside her and defend her from these mean foreign country leaders.

Fergus and Stoick had matching scowls on their faces, but before they or any of the children could say anything further, Elsa took a single step forward to draw all eyes to her.

"I may not have stated my feelings on everything that just occurred quite like that, but Emma and the other children are correct, King Fergus, Chief Stoick," she said pointedly in a regal tone. "Emma is a completely ordinary little girl, and her older brother Jack is certainly not an ice-beast!"

"Not a beast?!" snapped the raging Viking chief. "He blasted that beam of ice at all of us up there on the steps!"

"He nearly killed us!" shouted out the king of Dunbroch in a rare moment of agreement.

"Dad, that seems more like an exaggeration, really," Princess Merida interjected as she stepped forward. "That servant lad was screaming at all of us to stay back. I don't think he was trying to hurt us."

Hiccup nodded approvingly at what the Scottish princess said, but his attention was elsewhere. He kept looking out nervously toward the open courtyard gates, where he could catch a glimpse of the dark evergreen forest in the distance. It was clear to his fellow Viking friends that the auburn-haired boy was more concerned about his secret dragon pal he'd hidden out there earlier this morning and the change in the weather than seriously thinking about this conversation.

"I… I think Princess Merida is right, Dad," he said to Stoick. "I saw the look on his face when he screamed that. Jack looked scared. Confused… Not angry or murderous!"

"But he's still dangerous!" protested Lord Malcom, making Lords Ewan and Duncan nod along with his words. "He almost killed our king!"

"With all due respect, Lord Malcom, King Fergus and Chief Stoick just slipped on ice!" Anna pointed out.

"It was still his ice, though," said Gobber. "And in all honesty, King Fergus and Stoick slipping on that boy's ice doesn't at all compare to what he did to that Coronan guard!"

He jabbed his wooden arm in the direction of the guard that Jack had accidently froze the legs of and that many of the other Coronan guards were still working on chipping away the ice with their swords to free him.

Rapunzel glared at the burly blonde Viking. "It's not your place to bring that up, Lord Gobber!" she declared. "That is the Captain of the Coronan royal guard, so that makes it my family's place to argue about that! But you don't see myself, my parents, or Eugene bringing that up!"

Astrid raised a brow at that. "Wait, hold up. Are you saying you don't care in the slightest that that ice boy almost killed one of your guards?"

Rapunzel clamped up at that, not quite sure how to respond, but that was when Eugene jumped in.

"Personally, Lady Astrid, I think it's rather funny that our Captain of the Guard was frozen like that considering he and I don't usually get along. But the way in which he was frozen doesn't make me think that that servant boy was trying to hurt him at all, or at least if he was, it looked to me like it was self-defense! The guy was charging towards him with his sword drawn!"

Elsa nodded at once. There was no doubt at all in her mind that Eugene was quite right about that. "My sister and I have known Jack all our lives! He's quiet and keeps to himself, but he would never intentionally hurt anybody! That was simply an accident! He was scared!"

"My big brother is a good person! He's a good person!" Emma piped up again, making all the adults look back at her again. "He's not a monster! He's not!"

The Coronan queen stepped forward at that. "I do not believe that Jack should be what we are worrying about at this present time," she declared, surprising everyone there.

But no one was more surprised than her husband. "Arianna?" questioned a thoroughly puzzled King Frederic.

"Winter or no winter, that boy wasn't trying to be a threat," Arianna explained. "He should be a secondary concern at this time. I'm much more worried about that strange man in black that deliberately attacked all of us after that boy ran off!"

The three sons of the Scottish lords shared a contemplative look, and then shrugged amongst themselves.

"Maybe the Coronan queen is right… I mean, sure Jack seemingly decided to make it snow all of the sudden in the middle of summer, but he just ran away. I don't think he's as big a problem right now compared to that guy with those black horses…" Ryan mused.

"Bit fit if Jack is working wi the Shadow Man. Ah think they are baith equally dangerous," Alan said in a whirl of frenetic Doric.

"I'm… I'm not sure if I got all that, Alan, but if you said that you think that both of them are a threat, I gotta disagree. Like Prince Hiccup said before, that servant kid looked scared. But that Shadow Guy? He looked almost happy to see all of us afraid before…" said Wee.

"Again, I'm not a prince, but you and Ryan are right," said Hiccup. "Jack might have caused this weird weather, but I doubt he had anything to do with that man in black…"

The other Viking teens nodded in agreement with what the leader of their friend group said, but that was when Emma stomped forward from around Elsa and Anna.

"There shouldn't be any doubts at all! Big Brother never had anything to do with a guy like that!" she snapped. "He's always locked up in his bedroom whenever he doesn't do work around the castle, and he never talks to anyone! There's no way Jack would have ever met and planned to hurt people with someone mean like that! We have to go and get him! That evil man could hurt him! Queen Elsa! Tell everyone that we have to go get him!"

It took all the willpower that Elsa possessed to not become overly tense at Emma's words. She was the queen of Arendelle now, and it wasn't just Jack she had to focus on in this crisis anymore. Now that there was also some sort of evil, mysterious Shadow Man launching strange attacks on the country, she had to try and figure out who he was first and what he wanted with her people before she could worry about Jack. She didn't want to just forget about Jack considering she had known him all her life and that his powers over ice and snow had seemingly caused a drastic change in the weather, but like her aunt had said, he had to be a secondary concern at this time.

The question was, how could she explain this in a way that Emma would understand and not be angry with her?

She took a deep breath, and then bent down a bit so that she was at Emma's level. "Emma… let's not get carried away, all right? There are many things that need to be discussed right now."

"But… But you promised me, your majesty! You promised me that after we came back here to the square that you wouldn't let my big brother run away like he did! That bad man went into the mountains after Jack! We gotta go find him! That Shadow Man might do something bad to him!"

Elsa's insides twisted up into tight knots as she mentally cursed herself. Technically, Emma was correct about that. She did promise the little girl that after she talked things over with the other foreign leaders, she would do something in regards to Jack. Why oh why did she make Emma a promise like that? Despite personal feelings towards her and Jack, Elsa had to break that promise now.

"Emma… I'm really sorry. Something will be done about Jack soon, but right now… right now we have to think about the good of Arendelle, not Jack…"

Emma's eyes watered with unshed tears, but then she glared hatefully at the new queen, and the hand that was clutching Jack's white glove tightly in its fist started to shake with suppressed fury.

"It's my brother out there! You'd send someone out there if it was for Anna, wouldn't you?!" she screamed.

People full out stared at the sight of the little servant girl screaming at the new queen, but Emma didn't care. She was too angry to care that she was causing a scene and all but humiliating Elsa, who looked rather uncomfortable right now as she had a hysterical child on her hands.

"Emma… that's not fair," Elsa deflected in the kindest tone that she could muster. "I… Well, I—"

But Emma didn't wait to hear anymore. She had heard enough. With one last final scowl, the little dark-haired girl blinked away another wave of angry tears, tore off the purple cape Elsa had given her earlier to stay warm after the sudden change in the weather, and then spun on her heel and stormed away from the gathering of royals and nobles to shove her way through the crowd, heading in the direction of the castle. The adults all sighed, but they still let her go. It was better in their opinion that the child was out of the way. Everything that was happening with Jack was personal for her, so it was better if she wasn't involved.

The children, on the other hand, all chased after her. Even the three small princes of Dunbroch.

"Emma! Hey, wait up!" Jamie called out as he and the other kids followed her.

"Wait up! Wait up! Wait up!" said little Sophie, her pudgy little toddler legs moving at top speed to be able to keep up with the rest of the group.

But Emma ignored her best friend and continued to shove her way through the mob of bodies all watching the other royals and nobles argue amongst themselves, all the while clutching her brother's glove tightly in her hand to make sure she didn't somehow lose it.

"Where are you going?" asked Pippa.

"S-Slow down!" pleaded Monty.

"We get you're mad—"

"—but Queen Elsa and Princess Anna won't just forget about your brother!" said Caleb and Claude hurriedly together.

"Yeah! The queen and the princess are friends with Jack! They'll send someone after him!" Cupcake said in an assuring voice.

"Well, they better do it soon."

"We can't speak for the other monarchs and nobles, but our dad didn't seem too happy about your brother's magic."

"Speaking from personal experience, if our dad sees something out of the ordinary, he squashes it like a bug."

The princes Hamish, Hubert, and Harris all said this rather nonchalantly, but then they were slapped upside the head by the other kids.

"Ow!"

"Hey!"

"Stop hitting us!"

"Will you three be quiet?! That's the last thing you guys should be telling Emma right now!" Jamie snapped.

The princes all stuck out their tongues simultaneously in reply to what the unofficial ringleader of the servant children said to them, but then all the kids realized just where Emma was furiously trudging towards, and every thought that wasn't of confusion and shock immediately blew right out of their heads.

She was stomping her way towards the Arendelle castle stables.

The kids all had to blink twice when they realized where she was heading, and then they exchanged puzzled looks amongst themselves before running to catch up to her as she hurried to slip inside the slightly opened door that led into the barn.

Jamie and the others all poked their heads inside in time to see their friend struggling to heave a rather heavy dark brown leather English saddle off a wall, dump it on the ground before snatching a matching set of reins off the wall as well before throwing it down beside the saddle, and then marching in the direction of the horse stalls.

"Emma! What are you doing?!" Cupcake gasped as she and the other kids all rushed inside the stables, making sure to shut the door behind them so that no one outside would see what their friend was doing.

In one quick rush of movement, Emma whirled around and glared coldly at all her friends.

"What does it look like I'm doing?!" she snapped. "I'm getting ready to saddle up a horse!"

Monty blinked. "Why…?" he asked nervously.

"What do you think?! If Queen Elsa and Princess Anna aren't going to do anything for Jackie, then I am! I'm going out there to look for him!"

"What?!"

"You can't be serious!"

Caleb and Claude's voices were filled with unquestionable shock, but Emma was not at all deterred. What she and all the other kids were unaware of though, was that there were two other sets of ears in the barn that heard and understood what it was they were listening to, and the two beings exchanged looks of surprise before focusing all their attention on the group of kids that had come uninvited into the stables. In the case of one of these eavesdroppers, he crept carefully forward to try and sneak out of the barn to alert his best friend of what this one little girl was planning, being mindful to not make his presence known to any the children so that they wouldn't try to stop him.

Emma huffed in exasperation as she folded her arms across her chest. "Does it look like I'm joking?! Jack's my only brother! It's my fault he got mad and showed his ice to everyone! He left because of me! If the queen and the princess won't send people out there after him, then I'm going!"

"How exactly do you intend to find him, Emma?" Jamie questioned as he clutched his little sister's hand. Unlike the others, he didn't sound shocked by her choice to go out into the woods after Jack. If anything, he seemed puzzled by her decision. "None of us have ever left the castle before, let alone the city itself! You plan to go out there into the woods with just a horse while it's snowing outside? In the middle of summer, no less?"

"Summer! Summer! Summer!" chirped Sophie repeatedly.

Emma firmly nodded. "I know it sounds stupid… but how would you feel if it were Sophie who ran away, Jamie?! Caleb and Claude! What if it was one of you?! Hamish, Hubert, and Harris! Wouldn't you go out there if it was for one of you or your big sister?! I know that this doesn't make sense to you guys, Monty, Pippa, Cupcake… but siblings look out for one another!"

Her words struck a chord in everyone. It was true that three of them were single children and they therefore didn't understand the unconditional love that existed between siblings, but in the case of the others, they had to admit that Emma had a valid point. If one of them had a sibling that seemingly ran away from home and could unknowingly be walking straight into a very dangerous situation, wouldn't they be doing the same thing that she was?

It was a very difficult decision, pondering whether or not they should support or help Emma in this risky endeavor of going out into the world in search of Jack, or try to stop her from doing this by running outside to tell the adults what was going on.

"Jack's my only brother! The only family I have left! I'm not staying in this castle safe and sound while that Shadow Man is out there looking for him!"

And with that, she spun back around on her heel, and was about to continue stomping her way down the aisle in search of a horse she could 'borrow' for this dangerous task, but then she tripped, and went tumbling down face first onto the hay strewn ground, the white glove slipping right out of her hand and falling a few inches in front of her.

Everyone started to rush forward to check and see whether or not she was okay, but they all stopped short when they heard what sounded like a mixture of high-pitched chittering coming from somewhere underneath her.

"Emma…?" Pippa questioned, sounding completely befuddled by what she was hearing.

Emma slowly sat up, but even when she did so, the chittering continued, and everyone saw firsthand that Emma wasn't the one making the strange sound. If anything, she looked just as confused as they were by the squeaking noise. She got down on her hands and knees, grabbed Jack's white glove first and foremost, and started to crawl around to try and find the source of the mysterious sound. But then her hand came in contact with something that was soft and squishy on the ground even though when she set it down, her hand was supposed to touch the regular floor of the barn.

"Eek!" Emma squealed, instantly recoiling for a moment. The other kids all gathered around her in time to see what appeared to be a piece of hay-covered ground darting rapidly towards the entrance of the stables to try and escape.

"Catch that thing! Don't let it escape!" Jamie ordered.

The servant children tried to listen to his command, but they all just ended up whacking into each other in their haste to try and catch the strange bit of moving floor.

But the young princes of Dunbroch were much more agile in trying to corner this unusual creature, and without even needing to speak to each, the three brothers sprang into action.

Hamish ran to shut the stable doors to prevent the small thing from escaping.

Hubert cornered the weird creature in between himself and the now shut doors.

Harris dumped out the contents of grain in some type of animal feeder, and then scrambled towards his two older triplet brothers before slamming it down over the mysterious thing, effectively trapping the unknown animal inside.

"Ha! Got it!" said the youngest prince triumphantly.

"Great job, Harris!"

"That's our little brother!"

His two fellow triplets whooped for joy as they happily jumped up and down in excitement, but the other kids hurried to gather around them so they could catch a glimpse of the tiny thing that the princes had manage to corner.

"Harris, lift up the feeder slowly," said Jamie. "Let's see what it is!"

"Let's see! Let's see! Let's see!" his sister mimicked with a cheerful smile.

The youngest prince was happy to oblige. Sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth while keeping one of his hands at the ready in case the strange little animal inside tried to flee again, he slowly raised up the animal feeder, and everyone gazed curiously down at the animal that had been inside.

On the ground was a small, quivering brown creature that blended right in to the floor of the stable. It seemed to be shaking with fear, but it was also seemingly searching for a way to zip right out between all the children's legs to make a break for it. It needed to find a way out of the barn since one of the princes had shut the barn doors so that it could alert its best human friend as to what the little dark-haired girl was planning to do.

Speaking of Emma, she was the only one out of all the kids that dared to pick up the tiny brown animal by its body and hold it up in the palm of her hand so that they could all get a better look at it.

"It's tiny!" she commented, examining the little animal from head to toe with curious eyes.

"What is it? A rat?" asked Monty.

As though the animal understood what it was the blonde boy with red glasses had just said, the little creature started squeaking furiously in Monty's direction while flicking out its long, slimy pink tongue in the boy's direction.

"Eek!" Monty yelped, backing away from the little animal in Emma's hands rather nervously.

The tiny creature almost seemed to smirk triumphantly at Monty's retreat, but the other kids only became even more mystified by its presence now.

"It's smiling! If I didn't know any better, I'd say that it can understand us!" said Cupcake in wonder.

"Forget the smile! Did you see that tongue?!"

"It was so long and slimy! It has to be some kind of reptile!"

The dark-skinned twins grinned matching grins before high-fiving each other as the others all nodded in agreement. This little animal was obviously a reptile judging by that tongue, but what kind?

Curiously, Jamie took the little reptile from Emma, and looked it over with great interest.

"Maybe it's some type of frog?" he guessed. "I know that there are some types of frogs that are brown…"

The reptile didn't seem to like that suggestion, as although none of the kids here knew this, it was tired of being teasingly called a frog by its mistress's fiancé on a daily basis, and it spun around in Jamie's hand to hiss angrily at the little boy.

"Okay, not a frog!" Pippa said hurriedly. "Definitely not a frog!"

"Of course it's not! It's a lizard!"

"No way! It's a salamander!"

"You're both wrong, Hamish, Hubert! It's gotta be a newt!"

The three princes of Dunbroch grinned from ear to ear at their guesses, but the reptile in question didn't appreciate all the wrong guesses being thrown out into the open about what he was. With one last angry chitter, the creature changed from a shade of murky brown to a vicious scarlet color before hopping out of Jamie's hand to land on top of Emma's shoulder and settling back into its usual coloring of beautiful emerald green.

Emma's eyes sparkled happily as she gently stroked the reptile's head with her free hand. "Oh! How neat! It's a chameleon!" she exclaimed.

"A chameleon?" Jamie repeated, he and the other kids blinking twice as they observed the little green reptile. "I didn't know there were chameleons in Arendelle!"

"There aren't," said Monty, quickly adjusting his red spectacles to keep his glasses from sliding down the bridge of his nose. "None of them live in Norway. It must have come here aboard one of the foreign nobles' ships."

"Well, it didn't come from Dunbroch," said Hubert at once. "Chameleons aren't native to the Highlands. Trust me, me, Hamish, and Harris would know if they were."

As the kids all began to murmur out their suggestions as to where the little green chameleon could have possibly come from, the said creature, whose name was really Pascal, kept searching about anxiously for a way to get away from these kids. He had to find a way out of this barn and tell his mistress and friend, the Princess Rapunzel, what was happening. Pascal was very fond of children, but this little girl was going to get herself killed if she went through with her plan. He had to find a way to get out of this barn and find Rapunzel!

Before the brave little chameleon could do anything, however, Emma was suddenly gathering him up off her shoulder and was snuggling him against her cheek.

"I like him! I'm keeping him for a pet! I'm gonna call him Piku!" she announced.

The other kids all shrugged at her declaration, but Pascal's eyes went wide. No! No, no, no! No way! He already had an owner! He had been Rapunzel's friend for years! Before she had realized that she was the Lost Princess of Corona and had still been unknowingly imprisoned by Mother Gothel up in a hidden tower in the middle of the Coronan forests just outside the capitol city! He would not betray his best friend! He was definitely not going to be made this little girl's pet and be given the name Piku! What kind of name was Piku anyway?! Pascal was a name that was a thousand times better than that!

Within seconds, the little green chameleon was leaping out of her hands and making a desperate dash towards his fellow companion who was watching all this happen from the stall he had been locked in by his owner several hours earlier.

"Hey! Piku! Wait!" cried out Emma pleadingly.

But Pascal did not wait up. He was already Rapunzel's friend and pet. He did not doubt that little Emma was a good girl, even if a little dumb to decide to go out into the world when it was snowing outside to look for her missing older brother, but he was not going to let her become his new owner.

Unfortunately for the little chameleon, he was quickly grabbed by tiny Sophie's small hands when the little three-year-old darted forward to grab hold of the little reptile as he scurried past her.

Pascal squeaked in panic and frantically tried to escape from the tight grip the little blonde-haired girl had around his small body. But Sophie's grasp around his body was surprisingly firm, and she giggled cutely as she watched the reptile desperately try to wiggle out of her small fist.

"Piku! Piku! Piku!" she laughed, waving her hand with Pascal in it around, not even noticing as she did so that the little green chameleon was becoming slightly dizzy from her antics. "Me like Piku!"

The others all laughed. Especially Emma.

"Yeah, I like Piku, too," the Overland girl agreed with an enthusiastic nod. "Can I have Piku back now, Sophie? He's my pet."

"'Kay! Here Emma!"

Sophie toddled back over to Emma and happily passed Pascal back over to Emma, but the moment she released the chameleon onto Emma's open palm, Pascal immediately tried to scamper off again. But Emma was ready for him this time, and before he could take more than one step, Emma quickly squeezed her hand around Pascal's body. Not enough to hurt her so-called new pet, but enough to make sure he couldn't run away from her this time.

"No, no, no, Piku! Don't run away from me!" Emma said with a small giggle. "You don't have to worry! I'll take good care of you! We'll be best friends from now on! In fact, you can come with me right now! I'm going on a mission to find my big brother! He has ice and snow powers I didn't know about, and he accidentally made it start snowing outside when he ran away from Queen Elsa's coronation party! I know Jackie's a good person, even if he is quiet… I just got mad at him at the party! It's my fault what happened, so I have to go out there after him! You can help me look for him, Piku! It'd be nice to have someone to talk to while I look for Big Brother!"

Pascal frantically shook his head in return. He did not wish to go anywhere with Emma. He didn't mind going on an adventure with Rapunzel three years ago when she met Eugene, because Rapunzel was his friend and she had been dreaming of leaving her tower to see the 'floating lights' that appeared in the night sky only on her birthday for as long as either of them could remember. But Pascal didn't know Emma. She was nice, but she wasn't Rapunzel. Pascal had no intention of going anywhere with her, and he continued to fruitlessly struggle against the firm grip that she had around his small green body.

"Looks like Piku wants to get away," noted Cupcake.

"Maybe you should just let it go, Emma," suggested Jamie. "If it doesn't want to stay, we shouldn't force it to."

Pascal frantically nodded his small head at that suggestion, but Emma scowled as she hurriedly shook her head and clutched his tiny green body close to her heart.

"No way! Piku just needs to get used to me, that's all! I'm keeping him!"

Her words earned more desperate chirps from the small chameleon, which the little girl ignored. But they also earned the furiously angry neighs from the white horse that Pascal had been with prior to being captured by Emma and the other kids. The suddenness of the angry whinnying caught all the children by surprise, and they all quickly whirled around.

Princess Rapunzel's noble steed, the beautiful white stallion known as Maximus, was whinnying and neighing heatedly at the children – or rather Emma in particular – as he struggled to try and kick the door to his stall open so he would be able to rescue his princess's best friend in the world. To Maximus, who was used to tracking down criminals on a daily basis prior to first meeting Rapunzel three years ago, what this little girl was doing bordered on the line of possible kidnap. Granted, Emma had no clue that 'Piku' was really Pascal, his princess's pet, but either way, she was still technically trying to take Pascal against Pascal's will. And in the horse's book, that constituted as kidnap. He had to get out of this stupid pen and somehow get Pascal away from this ignorant child!

But to Emma and the others, Maximus's actions were nothing short of being both utterly random and very dangerous.

"Yikes! Whose horse is that?!"

"Is it even tame?! It looks wild!"

Caleb and Claude's words just about verbalized what all of them were thinking, and the kids all nodded in agreement as they hastily backed away from the mad horse that was still furiously kicking his pen doors with his back legs.

Emma was staring wide-eyed and with slight fear at Maximus, and she couldn't help but cringe away from him a bit as she continued to clutch Pascal close to her chest. "I'm definitely not taking that horse," she said firmly. "He'll probably buck me off at the first opportunity!"

"Yeah, no kidding!" Jamie agreed, his own eyes as wide as saucers as he slowly nodded to what she said, even though he wasn't exactly looking at her. "That horse would probably kill you first before that Shadow Man does!"

"You should take Big Sis's horse!"

"Yeah, Angus is great!"

"He can be a bit temperamental at times, but unlike that horse, he's quite tame!"

Hamish, Hubert, and Harris all beamed at their own words before motioning for the Arendelle servant children to follow them deeper inside the barn. Since Emma couldn't risk letting go of Pascal right now for fear that he would bolt away should she loosen her grip on him for even a moment, she slowly led the group in following the young Dunbroch princes further down the aisle of horse stalls in the stables, leaving the enraged Maximus behind as he continued to try and kick open his pen doors so he could save Pascal from them.

The princes were chuckling amongst themselves as they considered what it was they were basically giving Emma permission to do. They knew for a fact that their sister was going to be beyond furious with them, but Hamish, Hubert, and Harris didn't care one bit. This was for one of their new friends, and the heavens knew that other than their sister and by slight extension the other Dunbroch clan heirs, the three of them didn't have any friends other than each other back in the Highlands. Meeting kids near their own age like Emma, Jamie, Sophie, Caleb and Claude, Monty, Pippa, and Cupcake here over the course of this visit had been a stroke of good luck for the three redheaded boys, and despite the accident that they made with the cake back up in the ballroom that nearly got all of them into a load of trouble, the princes happened to value their newfound friendship with Emma and the others more than anything. Who cared if Merida screamed her head off at them later after she discovered that Angus was missing and that it was because they told Emma it was all right for her to ride him during her search for Jack? Emma was one of their new friends, and that therefore made it their duty to try and help her however they could.

As the children all trudged along after the Scottish princes through the stables, Emma hurried forward a bit so she could be walking alongside Hamish, Hubert, and Harris rather than following behind them.

"So, your older sister likes horses?" she asked curiously.

"Oh, yeah! She loves Angus more than anything!" said Hamish with an enthusiastic grin. "If she had her way, she would gladly abdicate the throne just to live like a commoner so she could spend all her free time with him without having to worry about princess lessons!"

His words stunned all the Arendelle children. "She'd rather be a peasant than a princess?!" asked Pippa with clear shock.

"Definitely. Miss-Merry-Must-Marry hates being a princess. Especially a crown princess," stated Harris. "She'd take living like one of the common folk in their simple houses back in Dunbroch over living in our stone castle any day."

"Uh-huh. If our Mum tells Big Sis that she can have a day off from princess lessons, she won't run, she'll bolt to her room to grab her bow and arrows, and then take off on Angus for a day out in the forests of our kingdom, shooting at targets she's set up. She loves to ride and shoot with her bow."

"Well, which horse is Angus then?" asked Monty. "There are a lot of new horses in the barn, what with visitors bringing their horses with them. Which one of them belongs to Princess Merida?"

"That one!" said the triplets in perfect unison as they all pointed at one stall straight ahead before picking up the pace so they could go and stroke the mane of their sister's pet.

Even though Angus was technically Merida's horse, she had allowed her three brothers to take turns learning how to ride horses by giving them lessons atop Angus this past year. After all three of them had been forced to ride with their sister on Angus in order to stop their father from unknowingly killing their mother during the magical bear debacle, Merida felt it was necessary that her brothers learned how to ride. They were just about the same age she had been when their father taught her, after all. Fergus heartily agreed with his daughter, and even though Elinor had obviously been worried for Hamish, Hubert, and Harris's safety, she consented to it as well. After everything that had happened with the bear incident, she did admit that it was necessary for her three youngest children to learn how to ride and – under careful instruction of their father and to some extent Merida – learn how to fight, too. The triplets had lots of fun learning basic swordplay from their father and archery from their older sister, but they loved horseback riding the best. When they grew up, the three of them had every intention of becoming the best horseback riders in all the Highlands! And that was a promise!

Emma, Jamie, Sophie, Caleb and Claude, Pippa, Monty, and Cupcake all looked away from Hamish, Hubert, and Harris to gaze up ahead of them at the horse in the stall that the three brothers were all gesturing towards, but then they all went wide-eyed with surprise.

Angus was a Shire horse that was as black as the summer night sky. He had coal black eyes, an ivory white muzzle and matching fetlocks, and a silky soft ebony black mane and tail. He was a handsome horse, no question, but he was also enormous! Unlike the white Coronan stallion Maximus who was full grown but still not too big, Angus completely towered over the eight small children that hesitantly stepped forward to join the three princes in moving closer to his horse stall so they could get a better look at him. While Angus was undoubtedly strong and would serve a person well for a long-distance journey such as the one that Emma needed to make to find her runaway older brother, his size understandably intimidated all the young servant children.

Emma especially as she was the one who would have to ride him all by herself.

"T-That's Angus?!" she gasped, fidgeting a little in place as she gazed nervously at the massive black horse. "That's… That's the horse you three think I should take?!"

The princes all nodded.

"Uh-huh!"

"He's great, isn't he?"

"Best horse in the whole world! You can count on him to take care of you while you look for Jack, Emma!"

Hamish, Hubert, and Harris all grinned from ear-to-ear at their newfound friends, but their smiles all slowly faded away when they realized that none of the other kids were looking at Angus with admiration on their faces.

"You three have got to be joking!"

"He's… He's too big!"

"Too big…"

"He'll crush Emma!"

"If that horse bucks her off—"

"—Emma could get seriously hurt falling off him!"

"You've all lost your marbles if you think she's going to ride that animal!"

Emma nodded at what her friends had all said as she forced a glare on her face again.

"I am not riding that horse," she declared in a strong, unwavering tone as she squeezed Jack's white glove tightly. "I don't have a death wish! He'll kill me if he chucks me off!"

The princes all blinked repeatedly when they heard what the others said, but after hearing Emma's resolute response, they all burst out laughing.

"What? Angus? No way!"

"Angus has never seriously injured anyone, honest! Sure, he occasionally bucks Big Sis off when they go riding, but never hard enough to seriously hurt her!"

"The worst that's ever happened while riding Angus is Big Sis ended up with a bruised foot because he accidentally set one of his hooves down on her! No biggie!"

Emma's eyes all but bulged out of her head when she heard that. "He's bucked Princess Merida off and stepped on her in the past?!" she repeated, thunderstruck. "You're all mad! No way am I going anywhere near him!"

"Yeah, that's goes double for the rest of us!" Jamie agreed, quickly shoving his toddler sister behind him so that she wouldn't get hurt from a possibly dangerous animal.

The others in their circle of friends all heartily nodded at what their ringleaders said, but the Dunbroch princes were completely unfazed.

"Well, Angus is a stallion at heart, so he likes to run fast," Hamish explained. "Merida likes to ride fast, so she's almost always okay with how fast he goes. But sometimes, Merida can be riding so fast into an area in the woods near our castle that Angus isn't okay with, and he'll go screeching to a stop."

"That's what causes him to throw her off. Our sister doesn't expect him to suddenly stop like that, so she falls," Hubert added. "For instance, there's the one magic area out in the forests back home that has this enormous ring of stones with cool carvings on them! When Big Sis first found them, she was mad at our mum and went out riding Angus at top speed without really paying attention to where she was making Angus go. According to her, when she and Angus rode up to them and were about to enter the circle, Angus freaked and bucked her off just so he wouldn't enter the circle. She wasn't hurt, but that led to a whole other adventure. We'll tell you all about it sometime! It's actually a really awesome story looking back, what happened after that!"

"As for Angus stepping on Miss-Merry-Must-Marry's foot… that happened years ago! We don't even fully remember what happened since we were really little when it happened, but our sister was acting stupid while tending to him. Our dad says that she was supposedly venting her frustrations with our mum about princess lessons to Angus, and she got so mad, she started yelling at the air without thinking about where she was. He got spooked by her tone and reared up in panic, and when he came down, he stepped on her foot by mistake. It was an accident, but all we really remember is that Merida had to stay in bed and keep her foot iced for two weeks. She was so mad that it happened, but I think what made her even madder was that even though she was hurt, our mum simply moved princess lessons from the palace library to her bedroom."

The boys all grinned after explaining all this. While Jamie, Sophie, Monty, Caleb and Claude, Pippa, and Cupcake all looked a little bit more at ease now after hearing that, Emma was unmoved. And not that any of the kids there realized it, but Pascal had morphed from his usual shade of bright green to a murky, fearful yellow as he listened to Hamish, Hubert, and Harris's explanation for the injuries that Angus had been responsible for in the past.

"So you three are saying that you want me to knowingly get on a horse that doesn't like magic and you all admit that it gets easily scared? My big brother who I'm about to go look for so-happens to have magic ice and snow powers! And I have to find him before he runs into that Shadow Man! That horse will probably throw me off a cliff the second that the Shadow Man shows his face!"

Emma said this all with a rather satisfied look on her face, as though her reasoning was justified for not wanting to ride Angus, but upon hearing her answer, Hamish, Hubert, and Harris all scowled at her.

"Look, you've got three choices here!" Hamish snapped. "One, you forget this whole idea about going out into the wilderness and looking for your magical brother!"

Emma's eyes narrowed. "Not an option! Tonight was my fault! I pushed Jackie, so I'm the one who needs to go after him!"

"Two, you get on that insane and crazy white horse back at the front of the aisle that is still trying to bust out of his stall after all this time!" Hubert brought up.

The others blinked, and then turned in place to verify if what the middle prince said was true or not. Sure enough, Maximus was indeed still trying to kick up his stall door with his back legs. Pascal was squeaking desperately at the white horse to hurry and save him, which Maximus responded to with encouraging whinnies. The stallion would get out of his pen in time and save the little green chameleon. Make no mistake about that.

Of course, the children didn't know that was the reason why the white horse was acting so wild right now, though. And they all instinctively cringed a bit as they watched him continue to try and break out of the small stall for a few moments before turning their attention back to the triplet princes of Dunbroch.

"I… I don't want to. That horse looks like it will bite my head off if I let it out of its stall to saddle it up…" Emma trailed off, sounding a little wary at the thought.

"Or three," Harris went on, a rather haughty look spreading quickly across his face. "You suck up your pride and take our sister's horse! He might be a bit wild, but he's fast! You wanna find your big brother before that weird Shadow Man does? Then get on Angus! He's faster than the wind! He'll get you to your big brother in no time flat!"

There was a long pause as everyone stared expectantly at Emma, who seemed to be at a total loss as to what she should do. She stared back and forth between the hot-tempered Maximus who was neighing furiously at the group – or rather at Pascal in particular to which the little reptile was frantically answering back with desperate chirps – and then at the gigantic Angus who was waiting patiently in his stall for one of the kids to be kind enough to start petting him again and perhaps feed him some delicious oats.

Finally, Emma looked back up at the three redheaded troublemakers and nodded firmly.

"Help me get him saddled!" she declared.

Hamish, Hubert, and Harris whooped for joy, but Jamie and the others all gazed at Emma worriedly.

"Are you sure about this, Emma?" Jamie asked. "I know I don't want you to ride that crazy white horse back there, but getting on a horse that bucks people off and even steps on them? That doesn't sound much better to me…"

"I don't have any other choice, Jamie," she countered. "Every second I waste here means one more second that Jack runs farther and farther away from the city, and that Shadow Man could find him! I have to take the fastest horse available!"

The little girl didn't wait for any sort of a reply after that. She simply thrusted Jack's glove and Pascal-dubbed-Piku the Chameleon back into Sophie's hands to hold for a moment before dashing back down the aisle to retrieve the reins she had brought out earlier, and then ran back to all of them to dump them at their feet. She tried to do the same thing with the saddle, but because the leather item was so heavy, she was forced to huff and puff in exertion as she struggled to drag it down the row of horse stalls back to where everyone was waiting. Eventually, it became obvious to all the kids that Emma was taking far too long to drag the saddle herself, so Pippa, Cupcake, and Monty all ran over to help her out.

"We all pick it up on the count of three," Pippa offered.

Emma, Cupcake, and Monty all nodded at that wise suggestion.

"Okay then… One… Two… Three!"

At that final word, the three girls and the one boy summoned forth all the strength they possessed to try and get the heavy saddle off the ground, and they slowly heaved it the rest of the way down the aisle, grunting and groaning from the cumbersome weight of the heavy riding tool, to where the others were still waiting for them near Angus.

When they finally reached them, the quartet dropped the saddle to the ground with a resounding loud thud, and they all slumped forward a bit to hold onto their knees as they panted hard from the exertion of carrying the heavy piece of brown leather.

"Wow… I never realized those things could be so heavy!" Cupcake groaned.

"Yeah, now I get why the adults never let us near them whenever we pop in here…" said Monty, pushing his red-rimmed lenses closer to his face to keep them from slipping down the bridge of his nose. "We'd probably drop them right on our feet if we tried carrying them by ourselves…"

His words caused Hamish, Hubert, and Harris to blink repeatedly, and then all three heads immediately turned to look at Emma.

"Hey now, you do know how to ride, right?"

"We want to help, but we can't in good conscious let you borrow Angus if you can't."

"We trust him not to throw you on purpose, but if you don't know how to ride horses, he could be too wild to control."

Emma huffed in annoyance. "We're servant children! We've all ridden the horses here a couple of times, but only once in a while! Our parents or the stable hands here have to keep an eye on us whenever we do so we don't get hurt, but we don't get to ride everyday if we want! I'm in between being a beginner and somewhat experienced rider… I can't jump over stuff, but I know how to make a horse trot and stop!"

The Dunbroch princes were silent for a moment as they seemed to have a silent conversation amongst themselves while gazing at each other with unreadable expressions. Then they finally turned back to Emma and shrugged.

"That's good enough, I guess. Just if you promise you know the basics," said Hamish.

"I do. I swear."

"Then let's hurry and get Angus saddled up!" Harris cheered.

"Yeah, if we wait any longer, someone might come in and stop us!" Hubert added.

Apart from Sophie, who was much too young to do anything and instead stood off to the sidelines as she cuddled a certain green reptile close to her chest and held onto the important white glove, all the kids worked together to coax the large Shire horse out of his stall and get him ready for travel, fixing the saddle onto his back and slipping the bridle over his head. Angus was a little frisky, slowly realizing that one of these kids wanted to ride him instead of his usual rider, his friend Merida, but kind pats to the neck from the triplets easily calmed him down. Hamish, Hubert, and Harris were Merida's little brothers, and if they trusted these children, then Angus would give whichever child that wanted to ride him the benefit of the doubt. The boys were mischievous troublemakers, but they would never intentionally do something really bad to him.

After all, they all knew for a fact that Merida wouldn't hesitate to use them for target practice with her bow and arrows should she find out that they were responsible for anything bad happening to him.

As soon as Angus was all set, Emma smiled with delight.

"All right! I'm ready!"

"Wait! Grab a cloak first! It's cold out there!"

Heads turned as Jamie scrambled to snatch a small green travel cloak off a hook on one of the walls, and then rushed to give it to Emma.

Emma smiled as she accepted the warm garment. "Oh! Thanks, Jamie! I almost forgot about that!"

"Sure, no problem at all, Emma!" said the Bennett boy happily in return.

As Emma hurried to pin the cloak on over her green servant uniform, she turned a bit to look over at Sophie.

"Can you give Piku and Big Brother's glove back to me now, Sophie? Like I said before, Piku's gonna be my traveling companion while I look for Jackie, and that glove is all I have left of him right now!"

Her words made Pascal squeak and squirm as hard as he could to try and get out of Sophie's grip and Maximus whinnied twice as loud as he continued to pound his stall door with his back legs in a great frenzy, but little Sophie just giggled cutely nodded before giving the chameleon and the white glove back to Emma.

"I like Piku! I'm gonna miss him while you're gone!" said the small toddler with a toothy smile.

Her words made Emma giggle too as she gave the little blonde-haired girl a small one-armed hug with the hand that was clutching her glove since the other one was holding onto the still desperately trying to escape Pascal.

"You'll miss him, but not me? That hurts, you know!" Emma teased.

The kids all laughed a bit at that, but they didn't get the chance to say anything further, because after that, Emma set Pascal down on her shoulder and stuffed her brother's white glove into her cloak's pocket before approaching Angus. She put one foot into one of the saddle's stirrups and tried to pull herself up onto his body, but she was much too short, and could really only hop up and down repeatedly on one foot as she tried to climb on top of him.

"Here! Hang on a sec, Emma!"

"We'll help you!"

Caleb and Claude both stepped forward and worked together to give Emma a boost up onto Angus's back.

As soon as she was situated fully onto Angus's back, Pascal made one last attempt to try and get away. With a panicky chirp, the chameleon made a mad dash off Emma's shoulder towards the back of Angus's body so he could leap off the black Shire horse. But unfortunately for Pascal, Emma's quickly spun around and grabbed him before he could successfully jump to freedom.

"Piku! You've got to stop trying to run away from me! You're my pet from now on! Here! You can stay in here until we get out of Arendelle! I don't want you to fall off Angus while we ride out of here!"

Pascal blinked, but before he could make a nervous, curious squeak as to what Emma was talking about, Emma fiddle about with the edge of her green cloak for a moment until she found the pocket again, and then tucked Pascal away inside to sit on top of the scrunched up white silk glove.

Small Pascal was powerless to resist, and was really only capable of making desperate squeaks over his green shoulder at Maximus to hurry up and save him as Emma packed him away into her pocket. Maximus whinnied back that he was trying to hurry, but the Coronan stallion's efforts were no use. The stall doors remained firmly locked no matter how hard he tried to bust them open.

The kids continued to ignore Maximus, though, and they instead crowded around Emma on top of Angus.

"I know you said that you want to look for Jack, Emma, but are you sure about this?"

"The mountains are dangerous! Especially during winter!"

"What if you get lost?"

"And there are bears—"

"—and wolves out there!"

"Wolves! Wolves! Wolves!"

"And are you sure you can trust Jack? We don't want you getting hurt…"

That last question made Emma blink. She almost looked as though she was confused by the question.

"He's my big brother. He would never hurt me!" she said in a rather matter of fact way. "Believe in me, and believe in Jackie, too! He's a good person! I know he is!"

Jamie and the others still looked a little nervous at the prospect that Emma was heading out on her own with only Angus and 'Piku' for company, but they still nodded. Emma was their friend, and if she believed that Jack wasn't a monster and was a good person, then they would too. She wasn't afraid of her brother despite finding out that he had strange ice and snow magic, so they shouldn't be either. They just needed to believe in both him and her!

So long as they believed that everything would be okay, it would!

Because the belief of a child was powered by many things:

The wonder of all things magical.

The hope for a better tomorrow.

The memories of a wonderful yesterday.

And the dreams of a perfect world.

So long as the three Dunbroch princes and the seven remaining Arendelle servant children in the castle believed that everything would be okay, it would be!

They were all still somewhat scared about the unusual winter Jack had made when he ran away and the evil Shadow Man that had attacked the city with those creepy black sand horses afterwards, but so long as they all believed in Emma, everything would turn out all right in the end!

They knew it would!

"All right, Emma. We believe in you, and if you say that Jack is a good person, then we believe it too! Right, everyone?" Jamie called out over his shoulder.

The others all smiled and made murmurs of agreement as they nodded.

Emma beamed. "Thanks, everybody! That means a lot! Now, I don't suppose one of you would be nice enough to open the stables doors for me? I gotta hurry up and ride out there to go look for my big brother!"

"Sure, Emma! No problem!"

"Give us one sec! We'll have those doors open in a jiffy!"

The dark-skinned twins raced down the aisle of stalls together to reach the barn doors, and then worked together to slide them open so that Emma could ride Angus out.

"Good luck out there, Emma!"

"We hope you find Jack!"

"Stay safe!"

"We know you can do it!"

Emma's smile became so big, it nearly split her face in two. "Thanks, everybody!" she said happily.

And with those final words, Emma glanced down a bit to look at the back of Angus's head, and then lightly kicked her small heels into his sides.

"Okay, Angus! Giddy up!" she commanded.

But Angus didn't move. Angus was so used to the amount of force that Merida used whenever she kicked his sides to get him to go or increase speed, that Emma's light kicks felt like nothing at all.

The group of kids all looked rather puzzled that Angus refused to move, but their expressions of confusion didn't hold a candle to the look of bewilderment on Emma's face.

"Hey, didn't you hear me, Angus? I said giddy up!" she said, kicking her heels a second time.

Again, Angus stayed right where he was.

Pascal poked his head out of Emma's cloak pocket, looking rather relieved by this turn of events. If the horse refused to move, then that meant Emma wouldn't leave Arendelle and he wouldn't be kidnapped and taken far away from Rapunzel.

But Emma didn't share the chameleon's thought process.

"Come on, Angus! Move!" she snapped with annoyance, kicking her heels into the Shire horse's sides a little bit harder than before.

Angus shook his head from side to side, but still didn't lift so much as a single hoof off the ground.

Emma growled, and then her head snapped around so she could glare at the princes.

"Hamish! Hubert! Harris! Why won't he move?! He's not obeying me!"

The triplets shrugged.

"How should we know?"

"Maybe kick him harder?"

"Let me give him a good slap on the rump! That should get him going!"

Harris stepped forward to do exactly as he suggested, but at the same moment that he gave the ebony black Shire horse a good firm smack to get him moving, Emma growled with fury and kicked her heels down into Angus's sides with all her might.

The effect of both these actions was instantaneous.

Between the harsh kick into his sides from Emma and the forceful slap on his bottom from Harris, Angus neighed loudly and reared up in panic. The other kids all yelped and instinctively jumped back from the alarmed horse, but Emma shrieked as she hurriedly grasped Angus's black mane to keep from falling off. Pascal was also squealing in complete terror as he nearly fell out of Emma's cloak pocket, only barely managing to keep from tumbling out by clinging onto the thin green material with his scaly green feet – not that anyone other than Maximus noticed this.

And then, before Emma or Pascal had any chance of trying to calm the obviously spooked horse, Angus came down from the unexpected rear, and then took off like a shot towards the open barn doors, Emma's screams of alarm trailing after her as the horse galloped out of the stables.

---

Elsa had been worried sick about Emma when she stormed away from her and Anna after the queen had to unfortunately tell the little girl that they couldn't just drop everything to go and look for Jack right now. It broke her heart to tell Emma that, but as the new queen of the country, Elsa had to look after the wellbeing of the majority of the population first and foremost before thinking about the wellbeing of Jack, her friend. If she wasn't the queen, Elsa wouldn't have hesitated to go out into the forest after Jack, but as she was the queen now, she had to look after the common people, and also try to pacify the quarreling foreign royals and nobles who were scared and angry about everything that had happened and were calling out for Jack's head on a spike.

It was harder than she could have imagined, staying cool and collected for such a long stretch of time as she dealt with all the cries of anger and fear from everyone, but with Anna by her side adding her own words of agreement to what she was saying, Elsa was positive that she could get things back under control.

Or at least she had been before a scream of terror erupted from somewhere in the palace stables, and a black blur suddenly shot out of it at a whizzing speed.

People shrieked with surprise as they all lunged to get out of the way of what had to be the largest black horse that Elsa had ever seen as it stampeded through the crowd, but their screams were nothing in comparison to the screams echoing from the mouth of the small child that was desperately clinging to the horse's neck to make sure she didn't fall off its back.

And the moment Elsa saw just which child it was that was riding the insane black horse, she lost all form of composure whatsoever.

"Emma!" she shouted out in horror.

Anna gasped at hearing that, her eyes wide with shock as she and the other royals and nobles stared in disbelief as Emma rode right past them.

Emma didn't even look at Elsa or Anna as Angus galloped through the crowd. She was just desperately trying to stay balanced on the insane horse as it dashed toward the courtyard gates. It didn't matter to her if the queen and the princess were angry at her for doing this. They weren't going to do anything for her big brother. So it was up to her to find Jack. Nothing they said or did was going to stop what she had to do.

But Elsa and Anna weren't the only ones who were shocked by what they were witnessing.

In the case of the three prominent teens from the other major nations, they had their own reasons for wanting Emma to stop what she was attempting to do.

When Rapunzel first saw the little servant girl ride out of the Arendelle castle stables on top of the unknown, gigantic black horse, she had been shocked. Definitely shocked. In fact, she thought it was safe to say that her parents and Eugene had been shocked as well, judging by the flabbergasted expressions on their faces. Still though, she had the sense to realize that she shouldn't get involved in little Emma's apparent running away escapade.

Or at least, that was what she thought until she saw a familiar green creature chirping out desperately to her from the pocket of Emma's cloak as the black horse rode past everyone gathered around the two frozen fountains.

"Pascal!" she screamed.

Her scream meant nothing to Emma, though, as the little girl had no idea who Pascal even was, and it therefore didn't register in her mind that the Coronan princess was referring to the small chameleon in her pocket that she had named Piku.

But what was shouted next she did understand, because it was the name of the horse she was riding.

"That's my horse! Angus!" shouted Merida, her blue eyes alight with fury as she was physically restrained by her mother from running forward to try and block Angus from running any further. "Get off my horse!"

Emma cringed at the Scottish princess's words, but she didn't dare adjust her hands to grab hold of the reins to try and make Angus slow down and stop. She felt bad for doing this to Princess Merida, stealing her horse, but she had no other choice! Hamish, Hubert, and Harris had all promised her that Angus was the swiftest horse there was, and judging by how hard she was struggling right now just to stay on him because of how fast he was running, she knew they were right. Emma had to take this horse. Angus was her only hope at finding Jack. She would return him, though. As soon as she found Jack and convinced him to come back home to Arendelle, she would return Angus to his rightful owner. She would!

But Merida had no idea of the thought process that was going on in Emma's head, and because she didn't know that Emma had every intention of giving Angus back to her after she found her brother, the crown princess of Dunbroch was mad. Beyond mad. To her, this little girl was stealing Angus. And Angus was her horse! Of all the horses Emma could have taken back in the stables for her mission to go and look for Jack, she took Angus! Oh, when Merida got her hands on this kid, she was a dead girl walking! That was a promise!

The foreign princesses' thoughts were focused solely on their pets that were being taken away on Emma.

And as for the Viking heir?

His thoughts were centered around his own 'pet' that was hidden out in the forest just outside the city, and it didn't take a genius to guess that that was where Emma was planning to go.

It took everything that Hiccup had not to start visibly panicking. Toothless was hidden out in the woods, and this kid was heading straight for the woods after her magical runaway brother. Granted, no one other than his fellow Vikings from Berk knew that the dragon was out there, so his Night Fury buddy wasn't in any immediate danger, but Hiccup could tell that Emma was having difficulty trying to control this wild horse.

Dragons weren't monsters like everyone had assumed them to be for the past three hundred years, and Hiccup knew that better than anyone considering he had been the first person to befriend and fly on top of a dragon.

But unfortunately, no one other than the people on Berk knew that.

If by some unlucky twist of fate this kid accidentally rode this horse near the thicket of trees that he had hidden Toothless in…

Well, Emma couldn't exactly hurt his dragon, so that wasn't an issue.

But she could unintentionally scare the Night Fury.

And that wouldn't end well for the kid.

Very slowly and quietly, Hiccup backed away from the rest of the group and disappeared into the crowd of confused and alarmed Arendelle citizens. No one paid him any attention as he carefully wove his way through the crowd to get to the castle gates, as all eyes were locked solely on Emma, and for that, Hiccup had to admit he was grateful to the gods for. He had to get Toothless and make sure he was calm and okay, just in case the kid accidentally stumbled upon him during her mad dash into the forest.

Plus, he was worried about whether Toothless could even feed himself now anyway thanks to the change in the weather and the fjord being frozen over. He should take an entire basket of fresh fish with him to make sure his best friend had a nice and hearty dinner tonight.

But Elsa and Anna were completely oblivious to what the Dunbroch and Corona princesses and the Viking heir were doing. Both the queen and the princess of Arendelle had all their attention focused solely on their young ward as they tried to dash forward and block Angus from going any further.

Their actions were quickly stopped though when their aunt and uncle seized them both by their upper arms to prevent them from doing what they intended. It was technically considered offensive to put their hands on the queen and the princess like that, but at that moment, King Frederic and Queen Arianna were only acting the way concerned family should react to seeing their nieces trying to willingly put themselves in the way of a mad horse.

Elsa and Anna both struggled to free themselves from their Coronan relatives, but the grips that Frederic and Arianna had on them were very strong, and their efforts were to no avail.

"Emma!" Anna cried out desperately as their all but honorary little sister galloped right past the remaining people in the crowd and did her best to steer Angus in the direction of the courtyard gates. "Emma!"

"Emma!" shouted Elsa, all manners and dignity forgotten as she called out to the little girl. "Emma, what are you doing?!"

In all honesty, Elsa hadn't even been expecting an answer to that question, as Emma had successfully managed to direct the wild Shire horse to go through the gates, and they were quickly becoming brief specks in the far-off distance.

But to both her surprise as well as the surprise of everyone else in the courtyard, a rushed answer was thrown out over Emma's shoulder in a loud voice so everyone could hear her.

"I'm going after my big brother!"

There was no way of stopping the foolish child as she was seconds away from reaching the edge of the forest and all the city guards on duty tonight were currently gathered in the courtyard due to all the strange happenings with magic that seemed to be happening tonight. It was all enough to make Elsa's head spin.

It was bad enough that Jack had apparently set off some sort of accidental winter throughout the kingdom and ran away from the castle, and there was also some sort of evil man who could make black sand horses with a snap of his fingers on the prowl somewhere out there in the forest.

But now, Emma had decided to act completely irrational by stealing a horse that so-happened to belong to the princess of Dunbroch in order to go out into the wilderness to look for Jack.

Why was all this happening? And why tonight?

Surely her father never had so many troubles spill on top of him all at once on the eve of his coronation as king…

It took Elsa several seconds to tune back into reality as these thoughts swirled about inside her head, but when she finally snapped out of her shock, the new queen suddenly realized that everyone, excluding her sister, was once again worked up into a great frenzy.

This wouldn't do.

Elsa couldn't deal with this right now.

She needed to stop being the queen for a few moments.

She needed some time with just Anna to think.

She had to figure out what to do about Jack being out there in the forest and Emma having gone to search for him. And with that mysterious Shadow Man lurking around somewhere out there in the woods, too.

"Everyone!" she called out loudly in a strong, clear voice to ensure that all the peasants, nobles, and royals in the courtyard could hear her. "Everyone, please! Calm down!"

Slowly, all the commotion died away again, and silence once more reigned over the crowd.

It took all the willpower Elsa had to not visibly gulp and continue to keep up the pretense of being a pillar of both wisdom and strength. She held her chin up high while addressing all those who were looking to her for leadership.

Even though on the inside, Elsa wanted more than anything to just break down into a puddle of tears.

"I… I am sure that everything that has happened tonight must seem like one unfortunate event after another, but I must respectfully request that all of you try not to panic. To those of you who live here in the village, please, return to your homes and try to stay warm. The castle will be happy to provide all of you townsfolk with extra food and warm clothing first thing in the morning. And to all royals and nobles who are here visiting the castle because of the celebrations, please return to your rooms in the palace. Things will be sorted out in the morning."

The Arendelle citizens were still scared, but they nonetheless respected their new queen. With shaky nods and quiet murmurs amongst themselves about Jack's powers and the unnatural winter, the evil Shadow Man that attacked the kingdom, and now most recently Emma's running away from the castle to search for Jack, they obediently dispersed through the gates to return to their homes.

But the visiting royals and nobles from the other major nations weren't so quick to comply.

"Your majesty! I think more explanations need to be given about that ice lad!"

"Queen Elsa, we need to discuss a plan of defense against that Shadow Man!"

"Elsa, as your uncle, I must respectfully advise you to not dismiss the other royals and nobles right now. They will not look kindly at this decision."

"Queen Elsa! That lass stole my horse! How do you answer for what she did?!"

"That little girl, Emma… She took my pet, too…"

"Wait… where did Hiccup go?"

"Queen Elsa!"

"Your majesty!"

"What do you say for—"

It was all too much for Elsa, and when her head finally snapped around to face all the royals and nobles that were addressing her all at once, the sharpness in her features instantly silenced everyone.

"I said," she repeated herself slowly in a cold, frosty tone, "that things will be sorted out in the morning."

She said this with such a finality in her words that nobody dared argue, or even if they were planning to argue with her after overcoming their initial shock, Elsa didn't give them any time to say whatever they planned to say. The new queen of Arendelle simply gave one last quick curtsy and nod to all the important guests to her country, and then motioned for her sister to follow her as she made her way back to the main entrance of the castle at a rather brisk pace without another word. The princess was taken aback by her sister's unusually cool and rude dismissal to both their distant relatives from Corona and their guests from both Dunbroch and the Barbaric Archipelago, but she didn't hesitate for even a moment to question her older sister's actions. With a curtsy and nod of her own to everyone watching her and Elsa with rather stunned expressions, Anna nearly stumbled forward a bit in order to catch up to her elder sister, although she did shoot a rather apologetic look to everyone over her shoulder while doing so.

As soon as she was certain that they were both out of earshot of the angry and worried royals and nobles, and any other nosy castle servants or scared villagers, Anna bit her lower lip nervously and turned to look up at Elsa.

"Elsa? What are—"

Without daring to look anywhere except straight ahead as the two of them crossed the threshold into their castle, Elsa merely raised up one of her blue gloved hands to silence her.

"Not now, Anna," she said in a rather short, dignified tone.

Anna blinked, still not understanding why Elsa was acting so cold to even her right now. They were sisters! They were each other's very best friends! Why was Elsa suddenly shutting her out?

Elsa caught sight of the hurt and confused look on her younger sister's face out of the corner of her eye, and realized she would have to clarify what she meant so Anna would understand her reasoning for not being able to speak her mind right now. She spared a discrete look around to see if there were still any of the castle employees around watching them. Sure enough, she could see Kai and Gerda hurriedly approaching the two of them, after entering the castle via a hidden servant access point up ahead, and they were dragging the castle servant children by their wrists and upper arms, as well as motioning for the three young princes of Dunbroch to follow along behind them. It would have been very disrespectful of them to manhandle members of royalty, even if they were only children. She would have to make this explanation very brief.

Making it look like she was merely bowing her head so as to glance down and fiddle with the clasp of the magenta mantle that was around her shoulders, Elsa nudged her elbow a bit into Anna's side to make sure she would pay attention.

"Not now, Anna. Not here."

And just like that, Anna understood. Elsa wasn't trying to be mean or short with her right now. She was worried about too many ears listening to them. Her sister wanted to wait to discuss everything with her when they were someplace private, that way no one could overhear them. With as much discreteness the quirky fifteen-year-old princess could muster, Anna stiffly nodded in return.

"Okay. Your bedroom then," she whispered back.

Elsa breathed a deep sigh of relief at that. As soon as they got past Kai and Gerda, the two of them would retreat to her bedroom where they could talk in relative safety. They had a lot to discuss.

The queen and the princess had barely managed to regain their composure and look calm and collected again when Kai and Gerda finally managed to reach them with the children in tow.

"Your majesty, your highness," said Gerda, she, Kai, the servant children, and the three triplet princes remembering their manners and bowing or curtsying politely to the two Arendelle royals as they halted before them. "Our apologies for adding more troubles to your plates, but these fellow castle children and the young Scottish princes here are the ones responsible for Emma's departure from the palace."

This was definitely not what Elsa and Anna had been expecting to hear. The sisters exchanged genuine looks of surprise with each other for a moment before turning their attention back to those standing before them.

"Beg your pardon, Gerda?" Anna said, sounding completely perplexed.

"They helped Emma get that horse saddled up so she could run off," Kai explained. "After Gerda and I saw the little girl go riding through the courtyard on the princess of Dunbroch's horse, we hurried to the stables to see if maybe she might have accidentally let any other animals out of their stalls. Instead, we found these children inside. They all admit to helping Emma get that horse ready so she could go and try to find her brother, and in addition to the horse, she also took some sort of green chameleon she found in there to be her new pet. The Scottish princes even said that they offered Emma their sister's horse to ride since it is apparently very fast."

Elsa and Anna were incapable of hiding their shock upon hearing this. Things just seemed to be spiraling from bad to worse tonight, going from one bad scenario to another.

With a dry mouth, Anna bent down a bit to be at the same level as all the children.

"Is what Kai and Gerda are telling us true? Did you really help Emma to run away like that?" she asked.

The kids all nodded.

"We don't care if you two punish us, Queen Elsa, Princess Anna," Jamie said, as he was the leader of the servant kids' friend group. "Emma's our friend! We had to help her!"

"And the three of us had every right to give Emma our big sister's horse!" Hubert piped up. "Angus belongs to Merida, but he's still technically the property of our family! Her taking Angus isn't stealing if we told her she could!"

Elsa fought the urge to massage her temples and make a visible show that she was beyond stressed. Instead, she looked directly at Kai and Gerda.

"Please escort Princes Hamish, Hubert, and Harris to the Dunbroch royal family's quarters, and then see to it that the other children are brought before their parents as well," she requested. "Be sure to tell their families what happened."

"Yes, of course, Queen Elsa."

"Right away, your majesty."

With a few more polite bows and curtsies, the adults led the children away in search of their families.

And now that they were alone again, Elsa and Anna continued silently down the hall. They avoided everyone else as they made their way up the grand staircase and down the many winding corridors of their castle. The sooner they made it to Elsa's bedroom, the better.

It seemed to take an eternity for the two sisters, but finally, they spied the blue designs that swirled about in intricate patterns on Elsa's bedroom door, and they quickly hurried forward to open the door and slip inside.

As soon as she and Anna were safely inside and away from any and all prying eyes, Elsa quickly turned the lock to make sure that they were not disturbed, and let the mask of strength and calm fall off her face as she buried her glistening eyes into the palms of her hands.

"Elsa!" Anna cried, rushing forward to wrap her arms around her. "Elsa! It's all right!"

Elsa forced herself to let no more than a handful of tears escape her eyes before focusing her attention back on Anna.

"How could this have happened, Anna?" she whispered. "Jack's gone… He has magical powers that no one knew about… And now Emma's had the wild idea to go chasing after him…"

Anna blinked away tears of her own when she heard this and saw her older sister, who always appeared to be so strong, in such distress.

"I… I don't know," she said shakily, her voice muffled a bit from tucking her face into Elsa's shoulder. "This was supposed to be such a fun night! We've been waiting for today for years, the day you became queen and overruled Mother and Father's decision to lock the castle gates! But… But everything is just so wrong!"

"And then there's that Shadow Man with those horses!" Elsa sighed. "Who was that? What did he want with all of us?"

Anna sighed and made half an effort at a shrug. "No idea. He… He said something along the lines of being happy that he collected fear from all of us. What was he talking about, Elsa?"

"You're guess is as good as mine about that, Anna…"

"And what about Jack?! He… He has magic powers, Elsa! He set off an unnatural winter in the middle of summer! I… I don't think he meant to do it, but still… how could he never tell us about his powers? I know he doesn't let anybody get close to him… but I still thought we were friends with him!"

Elsa mutely shook her head at that. The new queen shared her sister's confusion about that. Why did Jack never tell them about his powers? They wouldn't have hated him! Powers or no powers, Jackson Overland was still a good person. Why didn't he just tell them that he could make ice and snow?

"I… I'm not sure why he didn't tell us, Anna, but I do know this. His powers didn't come as a shock to just you, me, and everyone else in the kingdom. They came as a shock to Emma, too. She told me herself that she knew absolutely nothing about them when we were coming back into the courtyard to find you and the other royals and nobles."

"Emma… What on earth was she thinking?! She's… She's basically riding out to her unavoidable death going out there alone into the woods!"

As Anna paced frantically back and forth and tried to figure out what could have been going on in little Emma's mind when she decided to go chasing after her runaway and – apparently very magical older brother – Elsa sighed. Emma's careless actions posed a problem. It would have been possible to try and convince the other royals and nobles to not focus on Jack and the accidental unleashing of his ice powers and instead try to get them to focus on the threat that the Shadow Man posed to all of them. But now that Emma had taken Princess Merida's horse to go looking for Jack, everything was different.

Emma's wish to find Jack was understandable and sweet, but it was also reckless and immature.

That little girl was going to get herself killed out there in the woods.

There was no way that Jack would ever dare to hurt his little sister, but that Shadow Man was out there.

And if the Shadow Man didn't kill her, then she could die from freezing to death out there in the cold.

Then, of course, there were also wolves out there…

Possibly even bears…

Yeah, it was definitely too dangerous out there for a little kid traveling alone in the middle of nowhere.

And that left only one course of action to be done.

"I have to go out there after her and Jack…"

Of all things that Anna had been expecting Elsa to say, that was not it, and she immediately spun around to stare at her sister in disbelief.

"What…? Elsa?! You wish to go out there to look for her and Jack, too?!"

"There's no other choice, Anna! Emma's a sweet girl, but she's also stubborn! She won't listen to reason should we send anyone else out there after her. It has to be one of us because she trusts us! And with any luck, I'll stumble across Jack as well while looking for Emma."

"But you just said that Emma will only listen to either you or me! I'll go, Elsa! You're the queen! You should stay here! Or… Or at least let me go with you!"

Elsa vehemently shook her head at that idea. "No, Anna. I'm not risking your life out there, and if something should happen to me, Arendelle falls to you as the last member of our family. I need you to take care of our country while I'm gone."

"Elsa… Elsa I know nothing about leadership! I don't know how to rule a country and be… well… a queen regent! There's no way I can keep the peace in the city between the visitors from Dunbroch and the Vikings from Berk, and prevent them from either killing each other or deciding to march out there on their own to hunt down Jack!"

"You won't be alone. Uncle Frederic and Aunt Arianna are undoubtedly just as shocked as we are by all that happened tonight, but I believe that they're on our side when it comes to Jack. And Queen Elinor seems to be a rather reasonable woman. Listen to their counsel, Anna. They will help you look after things here, I'm sure of it."

Anna's frown only grew, but she still nodded at Elsa's logic. While Chief Stoick, his second-in-command Gobber, King Fergus, and the other three clan lords from Dunbroch seemed to be all for wanting Jack's head on a spike right now, their aunt, uncle, Queen Elinor, and to some extent the rest of the younger generation of royalty and nobility seemed to be on their side in thinking that everything that happened tonight with Jack had been nothing more than a tragic accident. Anna was merely their late parents' second-born daughter, and as such, had grown up knowing she would never rule their country one day, but she was kind and smart in her own way.

So long as she asked for help from their Coronan relatives and the queen of Dunbroch, in dealing with keeping the peace in Arendelle, and somehow managed to persuade the rest of the younger nobles and royals from Berk and Dunbroch to try and convince their people to not do anything rash while Elsa was gone, things would turn out all right in the end.

Elsa was sure of it.

"All… All right, Elsa. But at least wait a little while to make sure no one's around anymore before you sneak off to the stables to get a horse! And let me walk you down there! I want to spend a little bit more time with you!"

Elsa smiled half-heartedly in return. "Of course, Anna. I need to change out of this dress anyway. I can't go looking for Emma wearing my coronation dress and the royal crown."

---

It was nearly two in the morning when the door to the new queen's bedroom opened again. The princess poked her head out first to make sure the coast was clear, and upon seeing that the hallway was completely deserted, she sighed with relief before pushing it fully open and motioning for her sister to follow her as she slipped quietly out of the room.

"It's okay, Elsa. No one's around. Come on," Anna whispered.

"Yes, I'm coming," Elsa said back.

Elsa hurried out of the room with light, quiet footsteps, pausing only momentarily to gently close the door behind her. Her new wintry traveling attire was rather simple. Although Elsa chose to keep her hair pinned back in its coronation coronet hairstyle, the blue coronation gown and magenta mantle she had worn all throughout the day were gone. They were instead replaced by a traditional Norwegian dress with a long, dark blue skirt and a black bodice with silver trim and green, red, yellow, and purple rose prints near the neckline. She wore a light blue long-sleeved blouse underneath, and black heeled leather boots with silver linings and light blue soles. Around her shoulders was a deep blue cape with small tassels along the edge to supply extra warmth, and the cloak's clasp near her neck was in the shape of the Arendelle royal family crest, a beautifully crafted silver crocus pin. She still wore a pair of blue gloves, but unlike the ones she wore for her coronation and the party afterwards, these ones weren't made of silk, but of fine quality wool that kept her hands nice and toasty warm.

She was definitely ready to tackle the forests surrounding the city in the middle of winter.

As the queen and the princess hurried down the hall to reach the grand staircase, Anna turned to look at her older sister and frowned.

"Elsa, are you sure you don't want me to come along?" she said in a low tone. "I know you said you need me to stay here and take care of the kingdom while you do this… but I'm worried about Emma and Jack, too!"

"I'm positive, Anna. You are needed here. I promise you I will find the Overlands and bring them back safely to the castle. I'll find Emma, and then I'll find Jack. Everything will be all right."

"But… But until you find them, you'll be all by yourself out there! I don't want you going out there all alone! What if something happens to you?!"

Elsa bit her lower lip. She did have to admit that it was rather foolish to go out into the forest in search of Jack and Emma all by herself, but she didn't have a choice. She couldn't ask anyone else to risk their lives. She might be the queen, but she didn't want to put anyone else in danger because she had to find the Overland siblings. Emma was almost like family to her and Anna. Their other sister in all but blood. And Jack? Jack was very important to her. He was her old friend. She understood now why he had abruptly started shutting everyone out of his life ten years ago back when they were children. He was just trying to keep his ice and snow powers a secret.

Well, Jack wouldn't need to keep secrets from her anymore when she found him.

She would bring him back to the castle.

He wouldn't have to stay locked up in his bedroom anymore whenever he wasn't busy with his servant duties just to keep people safe from his ice.

Elsa would be right by his side.

Jack wouldn't have to hide away from life anymore.

Not when she had already vowed to be a better friend to him from now on.

"I'll be fine, Anna, I swear," she said finally as she and Anna turned down another corridor. "Nothing bad is going to happen to me. It will all be—"

She was cut off when she walked face-first into another body as she turned the corner.

"Ouch!"

"Ow!"

"Elsa! Elsa, are you all right?!"

Anna darted forward to check and see if Elsa was okay, and she was. She was merely rubbing her forehead a bit from where she had mistakenly collided with the unexpected body.

"I'm fine, Anna. But are you okay— Rapunzel?!"

Elsa had been glancing up to see if the person she had accidentally bumped into was okay, but she was now highly taken aback to see the face of her's and Anna's long-haired Coronan cousin standing before them as she massaged her own head. She seemed to be mirroring Elsa's look of shock as she stared at her and Anna.

"Elsa! Anna! What… What are you two doing still up?" the golden-blonde princess asked.

Anna blinked. "That's our question, Rapunzel. What are you doing out of bed, and why are you dressed like that?"

Elsa hadn't even noticed Rapunzel's apparent state of dress yet, but upon hearing what her little sister just asked, she glanced down a bit. Rapunzel had changed out of her formal, summery purple dress that she had worn earlier to a warmer wool pink dress with a vivid purple cape pinned around her neck with an emblem of the sun. Her blonde hair was still bound back in its tight braid to keep it from dragging on the floor as it usually did whenever left hanging loose, but the pink and purple ribbons that had been exquisitely woven into the hairstyle had been pulled out. A good pair of leather boots were on her feet now, and a pair of pretty pink mittens were on her hands, which were tightly clutching onto the most unexpected item that the Arendelle queen and princess could have guessed she might be carrying right then as though her life depended on it:

The metallic handle of a large, black frying pan.

Their cousin looked like she had been caught with her hand in the cookie jar as she stood there in front of them, frozen stiff with shock and unable to think of a single thing to say for the longest time.

Finally, Rapunzel sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "I was hoping to get out of the castle without anyone seeing me, but I guess that's out of the question, now. Just my luck!" she mumbled to herself.

Elsa's confusion only grew. "Pardon me? You were trying to leave the castle?"

"Yeah… I tried to explain it to you earlier back in the courtyard, Elsa. That little servant girl that ran off on the princess of Dunbroch's horse to find her brother? She didn't just take Princess Merida's pet with her when she took off. She took Pascal, too."

"Pascal? Who's Pascal?" Anna asked.

"My chameleon. I've had him with me since before Eugene rescued me from the woman who kidnapped me when I was a baby. I've… I've never once considered Pascal to be my pet. He's my best friend! I had him stay down in the castle stables with my horse during the party, but it seems as though that little girl took him with her when she ran off to look for her brother… Jack, I think you two said his name was? I don't know whether or not that little girl meant to take Pascal with her when she rode out of the city, but I have to go out there and look for that girl, because wherever she is, Pascal is, too! I have to find him!"

Elsa and Anna exchanged looks of bewilderment. It would seem as though Elsa wouldn't be alone after all in her quest to find Emma.

"Her name is Emma, Rapunzel, and I was just planning to secretly leave the castle to find her, too," Elsa declared. "Emma is mine and Anna's ward. She's a very special little girl, but after that, I intend to go and look for Jack as well. We should travel together. There's safety in numbers, especially when traveling through the forest."

Rapunzel's expression instantly brightened. "Oh! That's a good idea, Elsa! I was worried for a second there that you and Anna would drag me back to my family's guest rooms to stop me from going anywhere!"

"Wait, hold on… Your parents and your fiancé don't know that you're doing this?" Anna cut in.

Rapunzel's smile immediately became very fixed. "My mother and father? I love them dearly, but because they're so scared that someone might try to kidnap me again the way I was right after I was first born, they're kind of overprotective… Granted, they're not as overprotective as the woman who abducted me was, but they're still afraid of losing me. I didn't tell them anything about this! I just left a note on my bed explaining where I went and that I would take my horse Maximus with me, and with any luck, I'd be back within a few days after I found Pascal."

Elsa bit her lower lip. She didn't like the idea of allowing her new cousin to accompany her out into the forest if her aunt and uncle hadn't given Rapunzel permission to do so.

"What about your fiancé? Eugene?" she asked. "Did you tell him what you were doing?"

A sly look suddenly replaced Rapunzel's strained smile. "He actually caught me red-handed trying to sneak out. He tried to go and tell my parents what I was doing, but I took care of him!"

"Huh? Took care of him how?" Anna asked, not understanding.

Rapunzel merely began stroking the curve of the frying pan she was holding with an odd smile on her face before daring to speak.

"I took care of him. That's all you need to know."

Elsa and Anna decided to listen to their cousin on that and not pry any further. If what Rapunzel was silently implying turned out to be true, then the less either of them knew about it, the better.

"Um… all right. But no one else saw you leaving other than him, right?" Elsa cautiously asked.

"Nope. No one other than you two, Elsa, Anna," she replied rather happily.

"Just know that if you agree to go with my sister to look for Emma, you're also agreeing to go and look for Jack afterwards," Anna said. "You might be content with just finding Emma and your little chameleon, but Elsa has every intention of finding Jack, too. We need to get him to come back to the castle and stop the winter before that strange Shadow Man finds him first."

This made Rapunzel pause for a moment as she considered this. Truth be told, although she was on the same side as her parents and didn't think that Jack was a bad person, fifteen years of being told to be afraid of everything in the world thanks to Mother Gothel's clever lies to keep her from trying to leave her tower still resonated with the Coronan princess. Deep down, Rapunzel knew that it was silly to think this way considering almost everything Mother Gothel had ever told her turned out to be lies and that she really had no right to judge Jack since she had a magical secret of her own… But still… her secret saved people while Jack's could possibly hurt people, even if Jack himself didn't mean to do it.

After what had to be the longest stretch of silence as Elsa and Anna waited for Rapunzel to make up her mind, their cousin finally faced them again and nodded.

"I… I'll admit that I'm somewhat wary of Jack's powers, but I don't think it's right for him to have run away like that. I'll help you find him."

Elsa smiled in relief while Anna beamed happily.

"Thank you, Rapunzel."

"You're a lifesaver, Rapunzel! Now I won't have to be nearly so worried about Elsa going out there all on her own!"

Their cousin giggled at that. "It's no trouble at all. I want to find Pascal more than anything, but I was worried myself about going out there into the woods alone. There could be ruffians, thugs, poison ivy, and quicksand! Or cannibals, snakes, the plague… Even large bugs and men with pointy teeth!"

Her wild imagination of what could be out there in the Arendelle forest made both Elsa and Anna stare at her strangely.

"Uh… what?" Anna repeated, beyond confused by her strange range of thought.

"Anna and I may not have left the castle walls since we were children, Rapunzel, but we can assure you that there's nothing at all like that in the entire country!" Elsa exclaimed. "Arendelle is very safe kingdom! Sure, we admit that we can't exactly guarantee that there are definitely no snakes or poison ivy out in the woods, but considering that Jack accidentally made the summer season turn to winter, neither of those things should be a problem. And everything else you just mentioned? Neither of us have ever heard of anyone being troubled out in the forest and mountains by things like that!"

Rapunzel's cheeks flushed light pink with slight embarrassment. "Oh! I… I see…" she said rather bashfully.

"Yeah, you don't have to worry about any of those things out there, Rapunzel! But we should all be worried about standing out here in the open!" Anna said quickly, looking about nervously in all directions to see if there were possibly people around wandering about through the dark hallways. "Anyone could wake up and see the three of us here! You two have got to get down to the stables pronto!"

"Oh, yes. Yes, of course, Anna."

"Ah, yeah! You're right about that! But I don't suppose you two could show me the way to the Grand Staircase? I've been wandering around these hallways for a while now because I couldn't remember the way to get there…"

"Certainly. Follow us please, Rapunzel."

And with that, the three girls set off again down the hall.

They walked in silence for a time, as they were keeping their eyes and ears peeled for the slightest indication that someone, be it castle guest or servant, was up and wandering through the castle corridors, but to the relief of the new queen and the two princesses, they stumbled upon no one as they stole through the halls and down the many stairs of the Grand Staircase. They were relieved to come across no one else, but still took no chances by daring to so much as whisper to each other as they made their way through the castle. At least not until the three of them had successfully managed to slip outside through a servants' exit in the castle kitchens.

But the trio was completely taken aback by what they saw when they stepped outside.

It had only been a few hours ago that Jack's magic had turned summer into winter by accident, but even so, the snow hadn't stopped falling from the sky all this time, and the city was covered in a still ever-growing blanket of snow. It wasn't too bad yet, the amount on the ground, but should Elsa and Rapunzel delay leaving the city any longer, they would have a difficult time trying to get out, because it was clear to all three girls that this snow was going to keep falling from the sky for a good while longer.

Anna was the bravest one out of the three of them though, and took a hesitant step forward out of the castle doorway into the thickly packed snowy ground. Her foot sunk down deep into the smooth and cold whiteness, and she instantly shivered.

"Brr! It's freezing out here!" she whimpered, her teeth chattering slightly as she ran her hands up and down her upper arms to try and stay warm.

"Anna! Go back inside! You don't have a winter cloak on! Rapunzel and I can get our horses ready on our own! I don't want you to get sick!" Elsa exclaimed.

Anna fervently shook her head at her sister's suggestion. "No way! I want to see you and Rapunzel off at the castle gates! As soon as you both leave, I'll go back in and get warm! I promise! But first let me see you safely off! You're both family!"

Elsa sighed. "All right, but let's hurry then. I'll feel much better once you go back in and call for a servant to get a fire going in your bedroom…"

"I'll do that as soon you two leave. I swear."

"Let's go. It's going to take us some time to get Maximus and your horse ready, Elsa," Rapunzel said.

Elsa and Anna nodded, and the girls set off again at a rather slow pace through the great mounds of snow to reach the castle barn.

But as the three of them approached the stables, they saw something that made the trio immediately pause with worry.

The main door to the stable was wide open, and they could see the yellow, glowing light of a lantern bobbing about from somewhere inside.

Someone was awake and wandering around in the barn.

This posed a serious problem in Elsa and Rapunzel's plan to quietly disappear without anyone noticing.

"Oh, dear…" Rapunzel whispered, her bright green eyes shining with worry. "What do we do now?"

Anna bit her lip, clearly at a loss for words, and then turned to look up at her older sister, hoping that she might have a possible solution on what to do.

For a long time, Elsa didn't say anything in response, as she wasn't entirely sure what to do now. The Arendelle queen knew that she and her Coronan cousin needed to go into the stables in order to get horses to travel on, but how could they get those horses if there was someone awake and rummaging about inside the stables?

But their small dilemma corrected itself when they heard what sounded like angry whinnying of a short-tempered horse erupting from inside the barn, followed by what had to be a furious tirade of words from an equally short-tempered Scottish girl.

"Bah! Hold still, you damn horse! I don't care if you don't like me or not! Angus is a thousand times more stubborn than you are, and if I can deal with him, I can deal with you!"

Elsa, Anna, and Rapunzel all blinked and shared puzzled looks amongst themselves for a moment before daring to venture forward and peer inside the barn.

To the surprise of the two sisters and their long-haired cousin, there was a white horse already out of its stall and being forcibly manhandled by a girl around their age with long, completely wild red hair as she struggled to fix a saddle onto its back while at the same time trying to avoid being kicked in the stomach by the angry horse's back legs.

The horse was Maximus, and even though the girl was not wearing a wimple and was dressed more simply than she had been at the coronation party earlier – as she was now wearing a dark teal cotton off-the-shoulder style dress with a floor-length skirt, had a warm black wool cloak tied around her neck by a gold clasp with an emblem of her clan's crest, had a set of taupe leather boots on her feet instead of the heels she had on before and a set of a matching leather gloves on her hands for extra warmth, and even had a quiver of arrows strapped to her back while a matching white recurve bow leaned against a stall door – there was no question at all about who she was to Elsa, Anna, and Rapunzel.

Princess Merida of Clan Dunbroch seemed to be trying to leave the castle as well.

The question was, why?

"Um… excuse me? Princess Merida? Is that you?" Elsa called out rather hesitantly.

Elsa's words were rather soft considering how bewildered she was, but Merida and Maximus still heard her. Both their heads immediately snapped up and spun around to see her, Anna, and Rapunzel still standing in the entryway to the barn. Merida froze up upon realizing that she had been caught red-handed trying to steal what she assumed was one of the Arendelle stable horses, but Maximus happily whinnied when he saw his princess standing there. Now that Rapunzel was here, she could stop this other rude girl from trying to steal him like Pascal and that other black horse had been a few hours ago!

Finally, Merida seemed to realize that the queen and the two princesses were still waiting for her to say something, and she forced herself to forget about her nerves. She drew herself up straight and raised her chin a bit to better project her voice, the way her mother had taught her to do in princess lessons when addressing other people. The seventeen-year-old Scottish princess had always hated her princess lessons when she was younger, but ever since the bear fiasco, she had learned that while her lessons were troublesome, they were still necessary. And she was grateful to her mother for teaching her how to project an aura of confidence around her when addressing others.

Especially right now.

What she had been doing was technically wrong, stealing a horse like this in a foreign country – but she was a Dunbroch.

Pride, stubbornness, and bravery flowed through every drop of blood in her veins.

If this queen or either of these princesses thought that they could stop her from what she had been planning to do, they had another thing coming.

No one could stop what she had to do.

"Queen Elsa, Princess Anna, Princess Rapunzel," she said in a strong, powerful voice. "What a surprise…"

Her words echoed a bit in the expanse of the barn, but Elsa, Anna, and Rapunzel were not the slightest bit put off by the overly confident girl standing before them.

They were still just so confused.

"Yeah, this is a surprise," Anna agreed, her eyes simply staring back and forth between Merida, her bow leaning against one of the stalls, and Maximus that she was in the process of saddling up. "What exactly are you doing in here?"

"And why are you trying to steal Maximus? He's my horse," Rapunzel made sure to add.

This made Merida blink, and she glanced back and forth between the golden-haired Coronan princess and the white stallion with obvious surprise. "He's yours?" she repeated. "Sorry, I didn't know that. I thought he was just one of the regular Arendelle stable horses. I meant to take one of those."

"And why exactly were you trying to steal one of the castle horses, your highness?" Elsa demanded, her own eyes narrowing a bit at the thought. "My sister and I have been good hosts to you, your family, and the other guests from your homeland, have we not? I believe you owe Anna and myself an explanation for this."

Merida huffed and folded her arms across her chest to express her annoyance. "First of all, don't bother calling me either 'your highness' or 'Princess Merida.' I hate being addressed by proper titles! Just call me Merida, and I'll do the same and address all of you by your first names! Secondly, yes. Yes, Elsa, you and your sister have been good hosts to me, my family, and the other clan visitors. This is nothing personal against either you or Anna. But I need to borrow one of your horses so I can go and find mine!"

Elsa, Anna, and Rapunzel only grew more puzzled.

Merida realized that they still didn't understand her, and sighed. "That wee lass that's related to Jack? The ice boy? She rode out of the city on a black Shire horse. My horse. My wee devils for brothers told me, my mum, and my dad that they told her to take my Angus, but that doesn't matter! Angus is mine! If that lassie thinks she can ride out into the middle of nowhere on Angus without asking me for permission, she's got another thing coming! I apologize, Elsa, if you don't agree with what I'm doing, but I have every right to go and get my horse back!"

Merida looked rather satisfied with herself after saying all this, as though her explanation for what she was doing would justify her actions in the eyes of the Arendelle queen and princess, and the Coronan princess.

But the three girls were anything but satisfied with her response.

"Do your parents know you're doing this?"

"You… You don't plan to hurt Emma out there, do you? I mean… you have a bow and arrow set…"

"You can't take Maximus. The way Angus is your horse, Maximus is mine. Please give me the end of his reins."

Merida rolled her eyes in exasperation, but nonetheless passed the end of the reins to Rapunzel before turning her attention back to Elsa and Anna.

"No, I didn't tell my mum or dad that I was doing this, but they won't blame either of you. I run off into the forests around Dunbroch all the time back home. If something happens to me out there, they won't hold either of you responsible, I swear. And no! I'm not happy with that little girl for taking Angus, but I'm not planning to hurt her in any way! I have my bow with me in case I run into wild animals or that Shadow Man out there! It's for self-defense only!"

Rapunzel blinked again after hearing that last explanation, but then turned to give her cousins a rather sheepish look as she held up her frying pan. "You can't blame her for that, Elsa, Anna. I was taking this along to protect myself against any ruffians and thugs I happened to stumble across."

"I'm… I'm not sure if I would have used that exact comparison, but I'm glad you understand where I am coming from, Rapunzel. Now, if you all don't mind, I have to saddle up a different horse now because you, Rapunzel, have made it clear that I cannot use yours!"

Ignoring the baffled looks from the three other girls, the crown princess of Dunbroch spun around on her heel, and started marching away with her head held high further down the aisle of stalls in search of another strong, able-bodied horse.

But before she could walk more than five paces away, Elsa called out after her.

"Just a moment, please, Prin— I mean, Merida. I do believe we might be able to help each other out."

Merida paused in mid-step. She doubted that there was anything that the Arendelle queen could say right now that could work in her interest in finding Angus, but still, it didn't hurt just to hear her out.

"I'm listening. Go on," she said.

"Emma is a ward of the castle, and that places her under my protection as queen," Elsa explained. "I was planning to go out there into the forest to look for her, and then to go and find Jack. He's a very dear friend to both Anna and myself. And coincidentally, Rapunzel has her own reasons for wanting to find Emma, too."

Rapunzel nodded in agreement. "Yes, Emma took my other pet friend with her when she rode out of the city. My chameleon Pascal," she told the curly-haired Scottish princess.

"It's better to stick with other people! You should go with Elsa and Rapunzel!" Anna exclaimed. "Jack's not a bad person, so you don't have to worry about him, but with that weird Shadow Man out there on the prowl, you can't be too careful! You can all look after each other if you go with them!"

Merida carefully considered this. Teaming up wasn't exactly her style. She preferred to do things on her own. Plus, neither Elsa nor Rapunzel looked as though they had ever done anything strenuous before in their lives. Traveling with them would probably mean that she would be the one looking after them and not the other way around.

But then again, Anna did bring up a fair point. There was safety in numbers, especially in a different land. If she had planned to do something like this back in Dunbroch, Merida wouldn't even bother considering going along with the Arendelle queen and the Coronan princess because she had nothing to fear back home. She knew the forests surrounding her kingdom better than the back of her hand. But she wasn't in Dunbroch right now. She was in a whole other kingdom and had never explored the forests here before, nor did she have any idea as to what types of predatory animals could be lurking around out there.

Perhaps it would be the better option to go along with them…

"Very well. I'll go with you both, but only on one condition," she said at last.

"And what would that be?" Elsa asked.

"There's no point in bringing along an extra horse if you're both going along. I ride behind one of you on your horses until we find that lass and my horse. I'll ride on my own on Angus after that."

"That seems fair," Rapunzel shrugged. "What do you think, Elsa?"

"Yes, I agree. You may ride behind me for now, Merida."

"Then help me finish getting this stubborn horse saddled up first, and then let's get whatever horse you intend to ride ready, Elsa. Heaven knows that this Maximus is almost as temperamental as my Angus!"

The girls nodded, and they hurried forward to assist Merida in getting Maximus prepared to go out into the forest. This time though, Maximus was nothing short of being the most patient and friendly horse there was as the four girls took care of a few last minute preparations. The only reason why the white stallion had been acting so stubborn before was because he was loyal first and foremost to Rapunzel and the Coronan royal family, so the fact that Merida was trying to take him against his will so she could ride him out into the woods had been a big no-no in his book. But now that Rapunzel was going to be his designated rider, the Coronan guard horse had no reason to be a pain and refuse to be saddled and bridled. He hoped that he did a good job for his beloved princess during the course of this mission to find that little servant girl that stole Pascal and that black Shire horse.

As soon as he was ready to go, Elsa swept away from the other three princesses and made her way down the aisle until she came to a stop in front of a horse stall containing a beautiful tan Norwegian Fjord horse of a strong build, with amber eyes and a black and white mane and tail.

The horse whinnied happily when he saw her, and Elsa smiled as she gently stroked his snout before unlocking the pen door and leading him out to get him saddled as well.

"That's your horse then, Elsa?" Merida asked.

Elsa nodded. "Yes, this is Sitron. He's lovely, isn't he?"

"Very lovely! Nice to meet you, Sitron!" Rapunzel said happily, walking forward so she could pet his mane for a moment.

Maximus huffed at the lack of attention from his mistress, and nickered loudly at Rapunzel as he pawed the ground repeatedly with his black hooves.

Rapunzel lightly laughed at her stallion's obvious show of jealousy. "Don't worry, Maximus! I haven't forgotten about you! You're still my favorite!" she assured him over her shoulder.

Maximus snorted and rolled his eyes, but he didn't have any chance to do anything further, as the others were almost finished getting together another set of reins and an additional saddle to put on Sitron.

As soon as he was ready, Elsa swung her body up on top of him with relative ease, and then offered Merida a hand to pull her up as well.

But Merida refused the help.

"I'm good. I climb onto Angus on my own back in Dunbroch all the time," she explained. She collected the bow that she had set aside earlier while initially getting Maximus ready to ride, and then she climbed up onto Sitron's back directly behind Elsa. With some slight awkwardness as she tried to figure out how to hold onto the queen while keeping a good grip on her bow, Merida finally elected to swing the bow across her shoulders to carry it in the same way she was carrying her quiver of arrows, and then she wrapped her arms around Elsa's waist.

"Is this all right?" she asked Elsa when she was finally settled.

"Yes, that's fine, Merida."

Then Rapunzel approached Maximus. Passing her frying pan over to Anna to hold for a moment, the Coronan princess swung her legs over her friend's large white body, and adjusted herself in the saddle for a moment until she was comfortable before taking the cooking utensil back from her younger cousin. But as soon as she had it in her hands again, she suddenly realized what a problem it made since she couldn't hold onto both it and the reins at the same time.

The others quickly came to the same realization that she had.

"Maybe you should just leave it behind?" Anna suggested. "I mean… what use could a frying pan be against a wolf or that Shadow Man?"

"Plenty! This frying pan has gotten me out of many sticky situations in the past! You'd be surprised at how good of a weapon it can be!" she insisted.

"Well, how do you propose you carry it then? That purple cloak doesn't happen to have any big pockets, does it?" Merida asked with a raised brow.

Rapunzel started to shake her head, but then Maximus started neighing a bit as he spun his head around to gaze back at her. Without giving his princess any sort of warning of what he was about to do, the white horse suddenly opened his mouth, clamped his teeth down on the edge of the metal, and then yanked the frying pan right out of Rapunzel's hand before turning his head back around to look straight ahead again.

Rapunzel beamed when she realized what Maximus was doing. "Oh! You'll carry it for me, Maximus? That's so sweet! Thank you!"

As she patted his neck happily to express her gratitude, the others simply stared at her in disbelief.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say that that horse understood exactly what we were saying," Elsa mused.

"Actually, he does! Maximus is very smart! Like I said back at the party before… well… everything happened. Maximus is quite possibly the smartest horse there ever was! He understands human language better than any other animal I've ever met, the only exception being perhaps Pascal. Pascal is just as smart as he is!"

Maximus held himself up proudly at that, feeling deeply moved that his mistress thought so highly of him, but the others just gave her strange looks. Rapunzel merely shrugged their puzzled looks aside. She was sure that if she was in their place, what she had just said would seem rather odd. No matter. Elsa and Merida would see what she meant soon enough during the course of this expedition.

"Well, looks like you three are all set. I'll get the castle gates open," Anna offered.

Elsa smiled. "Thank you, Anna. That's very kind of you."

"It's no trouble, Elsa, really!"

Anna quickly turned and dashed ahead out of the barn to open up the gates, leaving Elsa and Rapunzel no other choice but to lightly kick the heels of their boots into Sitron and Maximus's side so they could follow her.

At first, Anna struggled to get one of the heavy gate doors open, but after only a few moments' delay, she finally managed to open one of them up just enough for the two horses and riders to slip through.

"Good… Good luck, you three!" she groaned through her teeth from how hard she was struggling to keep the gate open. "Bring back… Bring back Emma and Jack! And stay… stay safe! Especially you, Elsa! Come back safe and sound!"

"I will, Anna. And you take care of yourself and Arendelle while we're gone."

"See you soon, Anna!"

"Thank you for your help."

And with that, Elsa urged Sitron to take off at a gallop through the barely open gate, and Merida tightened her grip around her body to make sure she didn't fall off as Rapunzel urged Maximus to do the same.

The girls knew they couldn't take their time going through the village, as there was the slightest chance that some random villager could be awake to see them leaving and toll the alarm that their new queen and two of the foreign princesses were slipping away on horseback in the dead of the night. So they made sure to ride like the wind through town, not daring to slow down at all. Not even when they finally made it to the edge of the snow-covered forest.

They were off to find Emma and Jack.

And nothing and no one could stop them now.

Or at least, that was what they thought.

They had barely managed to make it more than fifty yards into the thicket of evergreen trees, when the group was forced to come to a halt as they heard what sounded like the snapping of tree branches a little way off to the right.

"What… What was that…?" Rapunzel asked nervously, accepting her frying pan back from Maximus when he turned his head back around to give it to her for some means of protection.

"Good question. Merida? You said you go out into the forest a lot back at home. Do you know what that was?" Elsa inquired.

Merida was silently readying her bow in her hand as she slid an arrow out from her quiver. "That was no animal, I can tell you that," she whispered, her narrowed blue eyes focusing on a certain cluster of evergreen trees right near where Rapunzel was at. "If I had to guess… I'd say we're not the only people out in the woods here tonight…"

Elsa's eyes widened at that, but Rapunzel squeaked with fear.

"Oh, gosh! It has to be ruffians and thugs! I'm not sure how they could have found out about my hair, but they must surely be here for me! Oh, gosh! Oh, gosh! Oh, go—"

"For crying out loud, Lass, shut up!" Merida abruptly snapped. "Do you want the whole world to know we're right here?!"

Rapunzel bit her tongue and nodded silently with the promise she'd stay quiet, but Elsa's brows furrowed. Merida might have missed the strange thing that the golden-haired princess had just said, but she hadn't. Elsa was confused. What did her cousin mean when she said that ruffians and thugs wanted her hair? Sure, it was unusually long and blonde due to the healing magic of that mysterious golden flower that Queen Arianna consumed during her pregnancy, but other than those two facts, there didn't appear to be anything else strange about it.

What secrets was the former Lost Princess of Corona hiding?

But her musings were interrupted when the snowy branch only a few inches away from Rapunzel's head suddenly moved.

Elsa had barely managed to catch sight of a pair of brilliant green human eyes blinking repeatedly with surprise from seeing the three of them when Rapunzel suddenly shrieked at the top of her lungs.

Her scream didn't do anything in regards to Maximus, as he was well aware that his mistress became easily frightened in scenarios such as these, but it still freaked out Sitron. The spooked horse reared back in the air in panic, causing both Elsa and Merida to fall right off, and Merida accidentally let her arrow fly way off course of its intended target between the stranger's eyes, landing in the bark of the tree instead.

The person – obviously male judging by the yelp that followed – jumped nearly a foot in the air when he saw the arrow whiz past his head, but when he landed back down on the ground, the large object that he had been carrying strapped to his back became tangled in the tree branches, causing him to lose his balance even more. He tripped over his own feet and started falling forward.

Right up close to Rapunzel.

Naturally, the frightened Coronan princess freaked, because less than two seconds later—

CLANG!

—her frying pan swung through the air and whacked the stranger square on the head.

And with that, the person fell face first into the snow, knocked out cold.

For a few seconds after that, all was silent among the girls. Elsa and Merida were slowly picking themselves off of the ground while Rapunzel was all but frozen on top of her horse, her frying pan clasped tightly in her hands and still raised up high in the air due to her shock. When she finally managed to realize what she did, her head snapped around to look at the other two girls with wide eyes.

"Please… Please tell me I didn't kill him…" she whimpered.

Elsa and Merida gave her strange looks.

"I… I've knocked people out before with my frying pan, but that time… that time I hit him harder than I usually would," she slowly explained. "I just… I panicked when I saw him falling towards me! I thought he was going to attack! I… I didn't know what else to do!"

Merida rolled her eyes, but Elsa stepped forward to try and pry what appeared to be the leather straps of a wickerwork basket off their mystery assailant's shoulders and flip him over onto his back.

But when she did so, all three of them gasped.

The stranger was none other than the Viking heir Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III of Berk.

He had changed out of his coronation clothes to a strange type of leather Viking armor. He had on a basic tunic, worn leather pants, and there was dark-colored metal plating his shoulders and upper chest, along with a set of arm brackets. On one of the metal-plated shoulders was a red sigil of what appeared to be some sort of dragon all curled up, and on his one good foot was a sturdy leather boot to help him navigate in the snow. There was also something attached to his hip that looked like it was supposed to be the hilt for a sword, but strangely enough, there was no blade attached, and the basket that he had been carrying on his back was surprisingly empty.

He was dressed for winter, but it didn't look like he had been planning to leave the castle like the three of them had, or at least not in terms of a long journey like they had been about to embark on.

So what on earth was the heir to the visiting Viking tribe doing all the way out here?

How could they have known that Hiccup had merely been returning from visiting his Night Fury dragon hidden less than a hundred yards away from here in a thicket of snow-covered evergreens so he could make sure his buddy got a decent fish dinner, hence the empty basket, and had even gone on a quick nighttime joyride high above the clouds for a little bit of fun?

They couldn't have, that's how.

And how could they know that that same dragon had heard its human companion cry out in alarm before he was so rudely knocked out by the Coronan princess, and despite how bitterly cold it was from this unnatural winter, it was now slowly rising to its feet and stumbling as fast as it could on its frozen stiff legs to find Hiccup, as it could not fly without the teenager operating the prosthetic tail fin in the intricate pedal-system attached to the leather saddle. Not that going by foot did the dragon much good since it was so cold. If it were not so cold, the dragon would be racing across the forest floor at top speed and would be on top of all three girls and their horses in two seconds flat, but because of the abrupt change weather, it was all stiff now and moving only slightly faster than a snail at the moment.

The dragon could only hope that it could find Hiccup in time before anything bad happened to him.

But again, Elsa, Rapunzel, and Merida did not know this, and as soon as Rapunzel had hopped down from atop Maximus's back to get a closer look, the three of them crowded around the unconscious auburn-haired boy.

"Hiccup…" Rapunzel whispered in horror, the blood draining from her face as she realized what she had done. "Hiccup!"

"He's not dead," Elsa quickly assured her. "Just knocked out. You hit him hard."

"I'll fix that!" Merida said at once with a sharp growl.

Both the queen and the princess turned to look at the Scottish girl in confusion, but upon seeing her yanking out the arrow that had hit the trunk of the tree by accident and fix it into place in her bow, they quickly blocked her view of the lifeless Viking teen.

"Are you insane?!" Rapunzel hissed, quickly dropping her frying pan to fight with Merida over her bow. "You can't kill him!"

"Watch me!" Merida snapped back, her eyes alight with fury as she tried to wrestle the end of the bow Rapunzel had grabbed out of her grip. "He's a Viking! An enemy to my country! I'll enjoy delivering him to whatever he and his people call the afterlife!"

Elsa's eyes narrowed, and she pointedly grabbed her by the shoulder and spun her around so she was staring her right in the eye. "You kill him, and I will charge you with murder! You are not in your own country right now, Princess Merida! Both you and he are guests here, and you will abide by my country's laws! He surprised us just now, so I am not angry with Rapunzel for knocking him out, but if you harm so much as one hair on his head, I will have you imprisoned in the castle dungeons!"

Merida's blue eyes grew icy cold. "My parents will fight you on that, your majesty!" she snipped.

"Yes, undoubtedly," Elsa readily agreed, "but they will also know that I would have been acting in the way that any king or queen would to any murderer, regardless of their station in life. You hurt him, and there will be serious repercussions, I can assure you of that."

There was a long pause as Merida glared at Elsa with nothing short of venom in her eyes, but then finally she let out a somewhat loud cry of frustration before lowering her bow.

"Damn you! Damn you both!" she growled. "If we can't kill him, then what do you propose we do?!"

Rapunzel bit her lower lip. "We should take him back to the castle," she suggested. "His father and the others in his tribe will be worried about him."

Elsa sighed as she rubbed her temples. "Normally, I would agree with you, Rapunzel. Returning him to the castle would be the decent thing to do. Unfortunately, that is not an option."

"What? But why?"

"Because if we take him back, we will be forced to explain to everyone what happened and why we were out here. Granted, we have no idea what he is doing out here right now, but we will have to explain that we were planning to go after Jack and Emma. And they will undoubtedly prevent us from trying to go after them a second time."

"But… But we can't just leave him like this out here! He'll freeze to death!"

"Yes. Yes, I am well aware of that. Give me a moment to think…"

"Oh, for the love of all things good and holy, give me permission to kill him already! What do you intend to do otherwise, Elsa?! Take him with us?!"

Silence reigned through the night as soon as that half-made suggestion by Merida was thrown out into the air.

Slowly, Elsa and Rapunzel turned to Merida, and immediately, Merida's furious expression became twice as cross.

"Oh, no! No! No way! I was joking when I said that!"

"Do you see any alternative, Merida?"

"I refuse to travel with a savage Viking!"

"Leaving him behind is out of the question, as is taking him to the castle. There is no other choice."

"Wait, hold on. We can't just take him out into the woods like this. We could be accused of kidnapping!"

"Rapunzel, we either take him with us, we leave him out here to possibly freeze to death, or we return him to the palace where we will undoubtedly be prevented from doing this. Which is the better option?"

"And just how do you suggest we take him with us, Elsa?! He's knocked out now, but as soon as he wakes up, he's going to make a run for it!"

"In the middle of nowhere out in the forest while there's snow in every direction?"

"I would chance it if I was kidnapped! I mean, it's not like we have anything to tie him up with!"

Elsa was silent for a moment as she realized that Merida made a valid point there, but then Rapunzel hesitantly spoke up as she swung her heavy blonde braid out from around her shoulders.

"Well… actually there is…" she said in a quiet voice.

Elsa and Merida both turned to look at her with queer expressions, but before they could ask what she meant, Rapunzel fiddled with the end of her long braid until she pulled off the hair tie at the end of it that kept her hair in the tight up-do, and then slowly began to unwind the main coils of her golden-blonde hair.

The Arendelle queen and the Dunbroch princess watched in astonishment as the Coronan princess unwound more and more of her hair until finally, she pulled out enough of the braid to be able to tie up Hiccup, while leaving enough that she wouldn't have to worry about it tugging too hard on her head.

"This should be sufficient," she said, holding up several bundles of the long blonde locks as she looked at Elsa and Merida.

Elsa and Merida still stared at her in complete bewilderment for a few moments longer, but then Merida broke the silence.

"You… You want to tie him up in your hair?"

"It'll hold, I promise. I actually did this to Eugene the day I met him. He broke into the tower my kidnapper hid me away in and I knocked him out with my frying pan before tying him up."

Her words only served to make Elsa and Merida even more shocked.

"You did this before with your fiancé?" Elsa repeated.

"Yeah… but in my defense, he did technically break into what I considered at the time to be my house. I defended myself against what I thought was someone who was trying to kidnap me from who I assumed to be my mother!"

There was another long pause, but then finally Merida shrugged.

"So long as we tightly wrap it around him a couple of times, it should work, but he's riding with you, Rapunzel! I refuse to ride on the same horse as him!"

"Fair enough."

"Then let's hurry. The sooner we do this, the sooner we can continue on. And Merida? Take that strange sword hilt from him. I do not know what that thing is, but we shouldn't leave him with a possible weapon."

Merida nodded, and quickly pried the strange sword hilt without a blade from Hiccup's hip and stuffed it in her quiver before helping Elsa and Rapunzel in tightly looping the Coronan princess's hair several times around his unconscious form, making it impossible for him to move whenever he woke up. And then, working together, the three of them somehow managed to lift him up out of the snow, and proceeded to drape him over Maximus's back, just behind the saddle so that Rapunzel would still have room to ride.

"What do we do about the basket?" Rapunzel asked.

Elsa was considerably quiet for a time, but then she finally sighed.

"Take it with us, I suppose. It's not like we can leave it behind. Someone will eventually find it. Why don't you store your frying pan inside it for now, Rapunzel?"

"Oh! Good idea!"

Without a word, the Coronan princess packed her cooking-utensil-turned-weapon away inside the basket, and then slung the straps on over her shoulders.

As soon as she was done, the girls quickly remounted the horses.

"Are we forgetting anything else?" Merida asked.

"No, I don't think so," Elsa replied. "Let's go."

Her two companions nodded, and with sharp snaps of the reins from her and Rapunzel, Sitron and Maximus took off again in fast sprints down the snow-covered forest path.

All of them were unaware however that what they had just done had not gone unnoticed.

After a minute or so after they were all completely out of sight, a large black reptilian head broke out from the tree line, and its emerald green eyes looked about wildly for any sign of its precious human companion. When the dragon finally realized that Hiccup was nowhere to be seen, it let out an angry roar.

While the dragon didn't know or understand why the queen and the two princesses had taken his special friend, he did understand this:

Hiccup had been taken away.

His human was in grave danger.

And he needed him.

His usually round and happy eyes narrowed with anger, and then he started shuffling through the snow as fast as he could after the girls who had taken his boy.

Those girls had better be ready.

Because when Toothless finally caught up to them, there would be hell to pay.

---

But little did the new queen and the two princesses know, they weren't the only ones embarking on a journey to try and find the magical Jackson Overland.

For completely different reasons than theirs, so was a certain mountaineer ice harvester.

"Kristoff, put a hat on! Heaven knows it's going to be freezing out there as soon as you leave the valley!"

"Yeah, sure, Mama Bulda. Let me just heave this one last sack into Sven's sleigh first."

"No, now, Kristoff. You always brush things off 'til later and never remember to do them."

"Fine, fine. I'll get a hat on…"

Eighteen-year-old Kristoff Bjorgman rolled his eyes at his adoptive rock troll mother as he grabbed his dark colored bobble-hat and jammed it on over his short golden-blonde hair. Despite technically being a grown-up now and having his own decent profession as one of the many Arendelle ice harvesters, he was still fussed over by Bulda the same way that he had when he and his reindeer pal first stumbled into the Valley of the Living Rocks ten years ago.

It could be annoying at times how much she and the other members of his rock troll family doted on him, but still, if given the choice, Kristoff wouldn't change one thing about any of the kind and loving mythical creatures that took him and Sven in when they were little.

They were his family.

That was something that he had often doubted he would ever have back when he was a kid.

As soon as he got his hat on his head, slid his arms inside a warm outer tunic that would protect him from the cold as soon as he left the valley, and pulled on a pair of strong dark brown boots that would serve him well in his journey through the mountains, Kristoff grabbed hold of the last sack that he needed to pack into his brand new sleigh, and slung it over his shoulder. Then he finally ventured out from behind the set of tall rocks he had been changing behind to be face to face with all the rock troll tribe members, who he found to be looking up at him with big, bright eyes and cheerfully smiling faces.

"We're all rooting for you, Kristoff!"

"You'll make us proud, no matter what happens!"

"Do your best, you hear?"

"We're all depending on you, Kristoff! The future of Arendelle is depending on you!"

"Bring him back, all right? Bring back Manny's chosen one!"

Kristoff felt his cheeks redden from everything the trolls were telling him. "I… I'll do what I can," he promised. "I'll find Jack and bring him back here. I'll bring him here and maybe there's still a chance at correcting both this winter and dealing with the Boogeyman. If the Man in the Moon's prediction has finally started happening, Jack has no idea what he's up against, and if this snow in summer is any indication, he still doesn't have the faintest clue what his center is."

The other trolls all nodded at that last bit as they exchanged murmurs amongst themselves about what was currently happening outside their valley.

The Valley of the Living Rocks was situated on an area of land that had natural hot springs and geysers so the trolls' home was not currently covered with thick layers of snow because the cold temperatures did not affect the valley at all. However, the rest of the kingdom was not so lucky. Kristoff had been fast asleep in his mossy bed curled up beside Sven when Bulda had shaken him awake with cries of alarm and proceeded to explain to him and his animal companion about the snow in the middle of summer. Kristoff had been instantly awake and allowed his mother figure to drag him to the clearing in the valley where everyone was gathering around Grand Pabbie, who was apparently in the middle of some type of silent conversation with the moon in the sky.

After what had seemed like an eternity, Pabbie had turned to all of them and explained that things with the magical boy that they had been first introduced to ten years ago – on coincidentally the same night they met Kristoff and Sven – had reached the breaking point with his magic. He had lost control of them and apparently ran away from the castle right after he set off the unnatural winter. And on top of that, the Nightmare King had evidently decided to strike back against humanity in the kingdom mere minutes after he took off.

Kristoff still remembered how he felt when first saw the Boogeyman so many years ago. He didn't exactly have monstrous features, but he was still pretty spooky-looking, what with his creepy yellow eyes and the way those black clothes of his swirled about in the shadows.

If Pitch was using Jack's accidental unleashing of his powers as a way to strike fear in people's hearts…

That was bad.

Really, really bad.

And that meant that the rock trolls could no longer wait for the day to come for Jack to find them of his own free will.

Everyone had initially agreed a while back that Kristoff should go to Arendelle under the pretense of making an ice delivery next week to try and officially 'meet' Jack. As Kristoff was an ice harvester himself, the mountaineer had heard all about how the magical boy who was employed as a servant in the castle was apparently looking for room and board for new work as an ice harvester up in the mountains, and to be allowed to have his younger sister tag along for the ride. Why Jack wanted to leave his well-paying job in the palace to live on mere handouts out in the middle of nowhere, none of them knew, but upon learning this, the rock troll clan had thought of it as an opportunity. They wished to invite Jack to come back to their valley, with the hopes of trying to better explain the things that were happening to him with his powers now that he was older and could hear everything that they had to say with an open mind.

Or at least that had been the plan until tonight.

Now that Jack had run off and Pitch Black was out there either terrorizing humanity to draw out the Guardians or tracking Jack down, they had to interfere.

Or rather, Kristoff and Sven had to interfere.

While the Man in the Moon had forbidden the trolls from interfering with things involving Jack unless the boy came to them willingly, the moon had never forbidden their human charge or his pet reindeer from getting involved.

Kristoff was the only person in all of Arendelle that could go after Jack and tell him that he knew someone that could explain to him what was going on with his ice and snow powers, and lead him to the trolls.

The fate of the entire kingdom was on his shoulders.

Even if the rest of the kingdom didn't know it.

As Kristoff trudged his way past the rest of the trolls still smiling up at him, he approached his best friend attached to the brand-new sled the mountaineer man had bought only a few weeks ago, which was currently parked at the very edge of the clearing, right near the pathway that led out of the valley and back into the mountains. Sven pawed the ground happily when he saw his human friend approach with the last sack full of supplies on his shoulder.

"'Kristoff! Hurry up! We gotta get going!'" Kristoff jokingly verbalized for Sven's thought process. "Yeah, yeah, boy! I'm coming, I'm coming!"

The other trolls couldn't help but laugh a bit at that. Their human boy's habit of vocalizing whatever Sven wanted to say was an unusual habit, but still quite humorous in their eyes.

As soon as Kristoff finally made it to the sled, he dumped the sack he had been carrying into the back of the sled and double-checked that he had all the necessary provisions.

Sack of additional warm clothing?

Check.

Sack of food for him and carrots for Sven?

Check.

An ice pick and some rope just in case something should happen?

Check.

His favorite lute?

Check.

Yep. He was definitely set and ready to go.

Just as he was about to climb up into the sleigh, however, Grand Pabbie suddenly made his way through the cluster of trolls so as to speak with him, and Kristoff immediately turned and bent down on one knee to be on the same level as his adoptive grandfather.

"Grand Pabbie?"

"I just want to make sure you remember what it is you have to say to Jack to convince him to come here," the elder troll said. "Do you remember, Kristoff?"

Kristoff nodded. "I tell him that I'm an official human representative for all of you, and that I've come to him on your behalf to invite him back here where you can explain why he has his ice and snow magic."

"Good. And if he initially refuses to come along?"

"I tell him that there's a lot more riding on his shoulders because of his powers than he realizes, because at the end of the day, he alone is the one who can save everything. But the only way he can find out how is if he comes back here with Sven and me."

"Right. You got it then."

"Good luck, Kristoff," Bulda said suddenly, stepping out from where she had been standing off to the side to fuss over the state of his clothes one last time, just like how any normal mother would. "Everyone is depending on you! Bring Jack here so we can try to prepare him for the Man in the Moon's final test."

Her adoptive human son smiled in return. "I will, Mama Bulda. I won't let you down. I'll be back soon. But Grand Pabbie? Did Manny happen to mention which way Jack went when he ran away from the castle?"

"Manny says that he was heading in the direction of the North Mountain."

"Got it. I'll be back very soon, I swear. Right, Sven?"

The reindeer bobbed his head enthusiastically up and down in reply.

"'Yeah, if we're lucky, we'll be back tomorrow night if things go well.'"

The trolls all laughed a bit at that response.

"Let's hope so, Kristoff, Sven. Let's hope so…" Grand Pabbie chuckled.

"I'll be going then!"

Without another word, the rugged blonde boy climbed up into the passenger seat of his sled and picked up Sven's reins. He paused momentarily to wave goodbye to all his rock troll friends and family, and then gave the reins a sharp snap with a quick flick of the wrist.

"Let's go, buddy," he told the reindeer.

Sven snorted, but nonetheless took off at a decent trot down the winding path that led out of the valley, and Kristoff turned and waved goodbye one final time to all those in the clearing that cheered after them as they went, before focusing his attention on the road ahead.

"Okay then," the mountaineer awkwardly chuckled. "Find the boy blessed by the moon, convince him to come back here to learn about his powers, and somehow avoid a certain Boogeyman that will undoubtedly hunt us down should he realize what we're up to… Doesn't sound all that hard, right, Sven?"

The reindeer rolled his eyes as he continued to pull the sleight down the path.

"'Speak for yourself! You're not the one doing all the heavy duty work here!'"

---

The snow glowed white near the peak of the North Mountain that night as fat and fluffy snowflakes lazily descended from the sky, leaving no footprint to be seen. The wind was howling from somewhere in the distance back in the direction of the faraway capitol city, hinting at the unexpected swirling storm that had erupted back in Arendelle right after the mishap with ice magic at the new Queen Elsa's coronation party. But the sole person wandering around on the mountain, a dark-haired teen boy dressed up smartly in the royal castle servant uniform but missing a glove and a boot, was unaware of the events that had taken place in the kingdom following his hasty departure, and continued trudging along miserably through the depths of the snow.

Jackson Overland had not dared to stop running all night long. It was amazing how far he had managed to travel, running all the way from Arendelle to the peak of the tallest, coldest snow-covered mountain in the kingdom on foot and while missing a boot, but he was so scared and pumped with adrenaline when he initially left that it wasn't all that surprising. All he wanted was to put as much distance between himself and every other person in the city he could possibly hurt with his stupid ice and snow powers. Every time the poor frightened boy thought about slowing down and daring a small peek over his shoulders to see whether his sister, the new queen, or indeed anyone at all was possibly following him, he would instantly remember the way everyone gazed at him with such fear in their eyes and immediately stop himself from looking back. And after hearing his friend the wind whisper a few more encouraging words in his ear to keep going, Jack would shake his head of any such thoughts about turning right around and heading back to the castle and would force himself to continue on.

But by this point, though, the rush of fear that had prompted his flight from Arendelle had mostly dissipated, and Jack couldn't help but slow his pace down to a simple walk.

Despite the naturally freezing cold temperature on the North Mountain, Jack didn't feel cold. He never once in his life felt cold before, so the chilly climate wasn't a problem in the slightest, but still, he shuffled slowly through the snow as he wandered around aimlessly.

Truth be told, Jack had no idea what to do next.

When he ran away from Arendelle, he hadn't thought ahead as to what he would do once he managed to get here. His only thought was to get as far away as he could from Emma, Elsa, and everyone else he could possibly hurt with his horrible ice powers. He had listened to the call of the wind as it guided him through the forest, whispering to him to keep running and not stop until he got here. But now that he was here, Jack didn't know what he was supposed to do, nor did he have any indication as to why he didn't feel the slightest bit fatigued from running away.

Even though he should be exhausted from the adrenaline rush he was winding down from, and considering he had gotten barely any sleep the night prior from all the nightmares he had dreamt up about all the things that had could go at Elsa's coronation party, he didn't feel tired at all.

He knew he should, but he didn't.

He just wasn't craving sleep.

Jack didn't know what to make of this, why he didn't feel the urge to rest himself and reenergize, but he did have to admit that not needing to sleep was a definite perk to everything that had unfortunately happened tonight. While the dark-haired teen was still heartbroken that he had to leave everything he had ever known behind him when he ran away, especially his sister and the girl he was secretly in love with, not needing to sleep right now was a relief.

Because nine times out of ten, he had nightmares about the things he could do with his powers to those around him.

Now he didn't have to fear seeing the people he loved get hurt in his dreams.

He didn't have to fear for other people, period.

He was far away from the kingdom of Arendelle and anyone he could possibly hurt.

He was the only person around for miles out here on the North Mountain.

He was in a kingdom of isolation, and it looked like he was now this land's faithful servant.

It was a relief, but at the same time, it was a rather sad notion, too.

Jack let out a depressed sigh, and then glanced upwards at the large dark clouds that blocked out the stars in the night sky.

"I'm sorry… I'm sorry, Mom, King Agnar, Queen Idun," he mumbled in a low tone, his eyes becoming slightly moist. "I… I couldn't keep it in anymore. Heaven knows I tried… I really did try!"

The wind spun a bit around him, trying to soothe him in his distress.

Jack…

Jack ignored the whisper in the breeze as he continued marching across the snowy, rocky landscape. He was apologizing to his mother and the late king and queen right now for failing in the one important thing they had always taught him to do. Considering how his invisible friend had always tried to convince him not to hide his powers in the past, he didn't want it to distract him right now while he did this.

"'Don't let them in, don't let them see… Be the good boy you always have to be…' That's what you all always told me to do…" he said to the night. "'Conceal, don't feel… Don't… Don't let them know…'"

For ten years, that little phrase that Kirsten, Tobias, and the late King Agnar and Queen Idun had taught Jack had been his sacred mantra. It had been his way of coping with the internal stress that concealing his powers put on his emotional and physical state of being. While Jack felt nothing at all about what his father's motives had been for teaching him to hide his powers from other people, he did know that his mother and the previous king and queen of Arendelle had only been trying to help him, and he didn't hate them in the slightest for that. But even so… their idea of dealing with his powers by telling him to keep his ice and snow bottled up inside so that no one would find out about them not only caused him a great deal of stress on both his body and mind, it hadn't worked in the end. Their efforts to help him had been to no avail, and he had failed them.

At the end of the day, hiding his powers really didn't matter anymore.

Not when royals, nobles, and foreign dignitaries from all of the most prominent kingdoms in Northern Europe had seen them firsthand.

The moment Jack thought this, he blinked a bit at the sudden realization, and then the first smile to cross his lips since he accidentally used his powers back in the castle ballroom slowly spread across his face.

With a small laugh to himself, he glanced down at the one hand that still had its white glove on. What was the point of hiding his powers behind the barrier of finely made white silk?

None whatsoever.

"Aw, screw it! Now they all know!"

With that final excited yell, Jack ripped the loathed white glove off his right hand and threw it up high in the air. The wind became alive with joy at seeing Jack finally rid himself of the horrible article of clothing that kept his wonderful magic sealed away, and without having to be asked to do so, a strong gust of air carried the offending white glove high up in the sky, far away from the boy who had used it the past ten years to keep his true nature hidden away from the rest of the world.

Let it go, Jack… Let it go…

And let it go he did, as he couldn't hold it back anymore.

With another rather happy chuckle, Jack felt his ice magic gathering in the palms of his hands, and for the first time in over ten years, he let it go free around him without fearing the repercussions of releasing his powers.

Tendrils of icy white snowflakes erupted from one hand, and then the other, making small flurries in the breeze. The wind loved how he was wholeheartedly embracing his powers, and it rustled his smooth and flat hair affectionately before gathering around the snow he had made, carrying it away high in the air to join the other snowflakes in the sky slowly falling to the snowy earth.

Jack was giddy with happiness as he saw how the wind played with his magic. That had been rather fun, but there was still so much more he could safely do with his powers out here.

Things that could wind up being even more fun.

Having fun was something he had been forced to deprive himself of ever since his accident with Elsa, Anna, and little Emma back when he was a kid.

Not that remembering the accident that hurt his two friends and frightened his sister was at all enjoyable, but before that fateful event, the memory of all of them happily playing with his powers in the Great Hall had been one of the best midnight playtimes in his life.

In fact, who was around right now to tell him that he couldn't bring back that wonder he had initially felt that night before everything went so terribly wrong?

No one. No one at all.

He had ice and snow magic at his disposal, and an entire mountainside worth of snow to use as his playground.

No one was around to stop him from recreating one of the best parts about that midnight playtime before he accidentally struck Elsa and Anna with his magic.

He grinned as the memory of a certain snowman he had once made with Elsa and Anna and had a small argument over naming it afterwards popped into his head, and with a few good waves of his bare hands, an exact replica of the small snowman appeared right in front of him, looking just as unconventional as he remembered making it with them way back when. The biggest oval shape ball was used for the head with a carved out, single bucktooth used for its mouth, the smallest snowball was in the middle, and the middle-sized one was on the bottom. The only differences in this snowman from the one he had built with Elsa and Anna back when he was a boy, was that he decided upon building it that it needed a pair of legs, so he sculpted out two additional small mounds of snow underneath the middle-sized bottom snowball to be used as legs, and that it was missing some sticks for the arms and wisps of hair, some little rocks for the eyes and buttons, and a carrot for the nose.

No matter. Except for the nose, those things were easily fixable.

"Hey, Wind!" he called out. "Think you can find me some sticks for the arms and a couple twigs for the hair? I'll deal with the eyes."

The wind whistled out an affirmative in his ear, and within seconds, the gale shot off down the mountain in search of a tree with some bare branches and twigs.

Jack meanwhile approached a rocky wall not too far away from where he constructed the replica snowman, and began searching around the base of it for a few moments until he managed to find a handful of small, round rocks that would serve his snow creation well as makeshift eyes and buttons. As he headed back to the miniature snowman and carefully set two of the stones into place on its face with the remaining three set into its main body to be used for buttons, the wind came rushing back up from down the mountain, and twirling around in the airstream were two somewhat long sticks and a few tiny twigs, which all plopped down into a pile near his feet.

"Thanks, my friend! That was quick, I gotta say!"

The wind played teasingly with his smooth and combed back brown hair in reply.

Jack chuckled at his own imaginary friend, and then stuck the two large sticks onto either side of the small snowman's body before poking each of the tiny twigs straight up at the very top of its long, oval-shaped head.

Now, excluding the fact that it had no carrot for a nose like the original snowman he had made with Elsa and Anna back when he was a kid, this snowman was almost exactly the same.

It was just missing the perfect name.

Naming it all over again though made Jack pause.

Should he name it Frosty like he had initially wanted to back when he was a boy? Two-month-old Emma had liked that name, after all…

But on the other hand, the original snowman had been named Olaf. Elsa had named it that…

He puzzled over this for a few seconds, but then the perfect solution came to mind.

He was having fun with his powers right now, wasn't he?

So who was around to tell him that this snowman had to have only one name?

After all, if on the offshoot chance that he could somehow make the snowman walk and talk just like the real Frosty the Snowman, he wanted it to not only have the super awesome name of Frosty that he and Emma both liked, but also the kind, friendly, and sweet personality of Olaf, the name Elsa and Anna had both loved.

He beamed as he bent down on one knee, created a single, magical white snowflake in the palm of his hand, and let it soar through the air until it landed right at the very top of the tiny snowman's head, where it exploded into at least a hundred more sparkly snowflakes that covered the snowman from head to toe.

"I hereby dub thee, the Great Frosty the Snowman! Guardian of everything fun and magical in all of Arendelle!" he happily proclaimed. "But at the same time, I declare that you are also named Olaf! And you like warm hugs!"

It was all very silly, but Jack didn't care.

It was just a game.

It's not like his powers would make the snowman come to life and make the poor creature confused as to what its proper name even was.

With an amused snort at that last thought, Jack patted Frosty and Olaf the Snowman affectionately on the head one final time, rose back up to his feet, and continued on his merry way across the mountain peak, completely unaware of what his powers had done to the little snow buddy when he made that one snowflake that morphed into many when it tapped the snowman on the head.

As Jack walked along the snowy banks, he made more streams of snow flurries fly out from his hands. A few of them he had shoot upwards towards the sky, and others he had zoom out to either side of him to make the snow on a few nearby snowbanks twirl in the air a bit with the new snow he mixed in.

He was greatly entertained by this, but then he realized that he was still wearing the green Arendelle servant jacket. He had always loved his mother, but he had hated how she made him learn the duties for being a castle butler and wear this stupid jacket. It made him look uptight and proper. While he maintained that persona around other people back in the castle to keep his emotions buried deep inside and keep the people he cared about at arms' length, he wasn't a proper and dignified boy on the inside.

No, somewhere deep inside him, Jack could feel the personality of his little eight-year-old self who had loved to play and have fun every moment of the day with his wonderful ice and snow magic slowly resurfacing.

And that younger version of himself didn't want him to continue pretending to be something he was not.

He was turning away from his old life and effectively slamming the door on his sad and lonely past.

And in this new life, he didn't care at all what the people down in the city had to say about his magic.

From now on, his opinion was the only one that mattered.

And in his opinion, wearing a stupid and uncomfortable jacket like this was ridiculous and completely unnecessary!

With a snicker, Jack all but yanked open all the black buttons for his green servant jacket until he could finally shrug himself out of the coat, and without a single hesitation whatsoever, Jack let the wind whipping past him carry the jacket faraway in the breeze to someplace where he would never have to look upon it again. He didn't dare look back at the coat as it was carried away by his invisible friend. He had no regrets at all in being rid of it. He might still be dressed in the traditional white button-down shirt underneath, was wearing the itchy black servant pants, had one of the black leather boots on his feet, and had the white ruffled neckerchief tied around his neck with the golden crocus pin of the Arendelle royal family's mark of high servitude attached, but just by shedding himself of the green formal servant apparel, Jack felt a tremendous weight he had never even realized he had been carrying for the past ten years lift right off his shoulders.

He was well aware of the fact that he had always been highly stressed while living constantly on the edge from fear of his magic back in the castle, but until now, Jack had never realized just how stressed he really was.

Well, no more!

Those days were all officially done!

He whooped and cheered at the top of his lungs as he started sprinting as fast as he could to the edge of a great ravine a little way ahead.

"Hey, Wind!" the Overland teenager yelled. "I should have followed your advice to run away from Arendelle years ago! It's funny how some distance makes everything back there seem so small!"

The wind was highly amused.

The fears that once controlled you down there in the city can't get to you here…

Jack's whole face lit up. "They can't? Really?" he asked, his voice filled to the breaking point with utter joy and hope.

No… You'll be safe up here…

Jack's wholehearted whoop of joy echoed loudly through the mountain pass when he heard the wind whisper that to him. He had been waiting all his life to hear someone say that he was someplace where he could use his powers safely without fearing for the safety of others.

He skidded to a halt when he made it to the edge of the cliff. There was an opposing cliff directly across from him with a nice, flat and large area of untouched powder-white snow splayed across it. It was the perfect stretch of land for him to settle down on and get situated for his new life of complete isolation from the rest of the world.

The only problem?

The gap between his cliff and the opposing one had to be at least forty yards long, and the drop down into the frozen ravine below was a hundred stories high, if not more.

Any other sane person would have automatically turned around and forgotten all about trying to cross such a treacherous gap between two such cliffs, but not Jack.

No, he had his awesome ice and snow powers on his side!

It was time he saw just what he could do with his powers! To test them to their very limits!

Jack chuckled, and with sharp waves with both his bare hands, snow and frost shot out from his palms to create a frost-covered snow staircase bridge that connected his cliff to the opposite one. It wasn't very sturdy, considering it was made from snow and frost rather than his regular ice. One good rush of wind would probably cause the entire thing to collapse in half a second.

It seemed like it needed a little extra push of wintry magic from him for it to become encased in ice. But how could he make it stronger if his hands didn't have the capability?

The Overland teen puzzled for a moment on what to do, but then he happened to glance downward at the ground near his feet. Upon seeing his one bare foot and the other still clad in the black leather boot he had been wearing with his servant uniform, a wild idea came to his mind.

His feet also had a tendency to make solid ice appear from under him, hence the reason he always kept them covered in his boots while growing up, but if he shed himself of the boot he was still wearing, could they solidify the bridge into ice like he wanted it to be initially?

Jack's face broke out into a wide, excited smile as he considered this, and then he bent down and frantically started tugging his boot's laces free of the tight knot he had tied them in this morning when putting it on.

If keeping his gloves on his hands at all times was an important rule the adults in his life had taught him to never break, wearing his boots was another one. If his father was around right now, Jack didn't doubt that that asshole wouldn't hesitate to break his legs to keep him from standing up on his bare feet, and taking the risk that ice and frost would form around him when his feet touched the ground. And if his mother and the late king and queen were still alive, he was sure they would be horrified by what he was doing, willingly removing the one glove and boot he still had on to fully embrace his powers.

Well, none of them were here right now!

In his personal winter wonderland, there were no rights, no wrongs, and no rules for him!

Just fun games and winter spectaculars!

Out here on the North Mountain, he could be free!

When he finally kicked the boot off, Jack's smile only grew bigger and brighter as he let his toes sink down deep into the beautiful, smooth surface of the snow in front of him. He had forgotten how good it felt to be barefoot all the time. His toes being squeezed together in those boots his parents and the king and queen made him wear? Talk about painful! Nope, no more boots for him! From this day forward, he was going barefoot all the time!

After a while of enjoying the pleasant feeling of having his feet enjoy the fresh air and curl down around the powdery white substance of the snow coating the mountain, Jack looked up and saw the snow bridge he had made still waiting in front of him, and he forced himself to move on. He hesitated only for a moment as he raised his right foot in the air, weighing the pros and cons of setting it down on the snow covered bridge he had made. If his theory was correct that his bare feet would turn the snow into ice the second he transferred his weight onto the bridge, he could reach the other cliff no problem! But if he was wrong, and his foot simply sunk right down through the snow, he was facing a fall to imminent death down the hundred foot drop in the ravine.

It was rather nerve-wracking, but there was only one way to find out for sure.

He had to take this leap of faith and believe that his powers would help him.

With a firm nod to himself for some desperately needed confidence, Jack sucked in a deep breath, squeezed his eyes shut, and then set his foot down on the first step of the snowy staircase bridge.

Just as he had hoped, his bare foot landed right on the frosty stair step, freezing it to crystal clear ice as a snowflake emblem appeared underneath him, fading away into nothingness after a few short moments.

Jack's eyes slowly opened again when he felt the solid surface underneath him, and after verifying that his feet could indeed freeze the snow into ice and carry him across the gorge, his face broke back out into a beaming smile, and then he held out his palms again to create more of the bridge as he moved, and dashed as fast as he could across the staircase bridge he made. With every step he took while hooting and hollering happily at the top of his lungs, the snow transformed into beautiful ice underneath him, creating a flawlessly perfect staircase of ice with an intricately crafted railing all the way across the expanse of the gap to reach the other cliff.

"Woohoo! I'm totally in sync with you right now, Wind! I am one with the wind and sky!" he joyously bellowed.

The wind whistled happily in return as it created blustery air currents to whip through the air alongside him.

Be happy, Jack…

Jack let out a hearty guffaw as he finally made it to the opposite cliff side.

"I will, Wind! You'll never see me cry out here, I promise! I can't remember the last time I was ever this happy!"

His imaginary friend tickled his neatly combed hair again, but Jack paid this no mind, as he was now appraising the vast expanse of smoothed out snowy land spread out in front of him. It was even larger than he had expected it to be at first glance back on the other side of the staircase ice bridge. He had initially intended just to construct himself a tiny house out of ice with his powers, but now that he saw just how big and wide this area of the mountain really was, the locked away creative side of his imagination that had enjoyed doing whacky things with his powers was going into serious overdrive.

He might only be a boy of humble birth and would never come close to being a prince or a king or some other type of hoity-toity noble lord, but who said that he had to live out the rest of his life alone out here on the mountain in some little ice hut or a dreary mountain cave?

He may have run away from his job and duties as a butler and shepherd in Elsa's castle back in Arendelle, but as he never officially turned in his green servant jacket and resignation papers to her and Anna before he took off, he was still technically employed and was still considered to be a castle servant.

Well, if he was still a servant, then he needed a castle to serve in!

Without thinking twice about it, Jack ran forward a bit so that he was in the exact center of the flat, snowy strip of land, and stomped one of his feet down hard.

A gigantic snowflake appeared underneath him, but unlike all the previous ones he had made up until now, this one did not vanish immediately right after appearing. It remained on the ground as it continued to grow bigger and even more intricately detailed with every passing second, until at last it became the equivalency of an entire snowflake-shaped floor made entirely out of ice. Jack grinned happily when he saw the basis of his castle was ready, and then he raised his arms in a silent plea for the ice to rise.

And rise it did.

Enormous pillars of smooth and solid ice rose from the ground underneath the snowflake-shaped floor he had first made, and pushed the beautiful floor upwards toward the heavens. Jack didn't even bother waving his arms to make the pillars stop moving when his new ballroom floor kept rising higher and higher into the air. Somehow, he had this unexplainable feeling deep inside him that the pillars would stop moving on their own once the floor reached the height he had initially wanted it to be. Besides, he was having too much fun doing this, designing his own amazing ice palace! Why should he worry about the pillars underneath the ballroom when he had so many cool and awesome things he wanted to incorporate into his very own castle, like a balcony to lead off from the ballroom and maybe even some super awesome top secret icy passageways?!

And so, with nothing limiting Jack in his construction of this amazing ice castle except the boundaries of his imagination, he continued waving his arms around himself as he spun around, willing his magic to come forth and help him create this spectacular sanctuary for himself. The ice shot up from the snowflake-shaped floor and created walls with several naves along the sides of the ballroom. While the pillars were undoubtedly impressive, the walls were made of such shiny and flawlessly smooth ice, they acted almost like mirrors instead of walls. He even created a series of lampstands of ice sticking out from them as well. With an additional wave of his hands, more ice appeared inside the holder of each one of them that produced such a beautiful, iridescent glow, it lit up the entire interior of the grand ice ballroom. How Jack knew how to do that when he never really experimented with his powers too much until now except for back when he was a kid, he didn't know, but who cared? Making them was fun, and what mattered was that they still provided an additional means of light inside the room should the impressive snowflake emblemed doors that led out to the grand ice balcony overlooking the entire mountainside were closed off.

Not that Jack ever intended to close those balcony doors all that often. Now that he was living in isolation, he didn't have to keep his voice down whenever he talked to his invisible friend in the wind. True, Jack still wasn't sure whether or not the fact that he talked to the wind was proof that he could possibly be crazy, but even if he was insane, he was staying in solitude from now on. There would be no one around to declare him as such now, so he didn't have to keep his friendship with the breeze a secret. He could keep those balcony doors all the time and talk to it whenever he pleased.

With another rush of magic, Jack focused his attention down at the floor, and created an additional coating of ice on his personal snowflake crest that was imprinted on the ballroom floor, and then willed his ice and snow to travel up on the castle walls. His powers flurried through the air to create thousands upon thousands of intricately detailed designs and carvings on each of the walls to add a little flourish to the overall layout of the room, but they didn't stop there. Jack's powers continued to construct more and more ice higher up until he at last willed them to finally make a skylight ceiling overhead to protect him from the elements outside, but would still allow him to be able to look up and see the stars shining brightly in the sky at night. And as his ice did so, they spiraled in frozen fractals in the very center of the iced skylight ceiling until they transformed into the most beautiful, blue iridescent chandelier imaginable. Just like with the ice lamps that dotted the walls, the chandelier produced an equally lustrous blue radiance that made the entire room glow a light shade of wintry blue, and Jack felt his heart jump for joy as the soft blue lights danced on his body.

This was all so magical!

This castle was undoubtedly the most wonderful thing he had ever created with his ice and snow powers!

For the first time since he had accidentally hurt Elsa and Anna and scared Emma all those years ago, Jack was able to stop thinking of his powers as a curse and could consider them to be the special gift that he had long ago initially thought of them as.

He smiled happily and was about to spin around to see his grand ballroom from every angle, but as he tilted his head a bit, he felt the fabric of his white neckerchief slide a bit around his throat. He absentmindedly raised his hand to try and loosen the tightly tied off piece of ruffled fabric, but then his hand brushed up against something small and metallic, and all the joyful and happy feelings he had been experiencing up to now flew right out of his head.

With a small gulp, Jack pried his neckerchief off his neck and glanced down at it. The golden crocus pin of high servitude that Elsa had bestowed upon him for his promotion as the Arendelle castle's head butler glittered in the blue lights from the chandelier overhead and the lampposts on the walls. It was a gift from Elsa and it was a beautiful pin, but just looking at it right now gave Jack an uncomfortable feeling in his gut.

He didn't want to look at this pin right now.

He didn't want to look at this stupid pin ever again.

He didn't want to look at it and be constantly reminded of Elsa and Emma and everyone else down in Arendelle that he had left behind when he ran away from the kingdom.

And one thought crystallized in his mind like an abrupt, icy blast, and his smile returned to his face again as he turned to glance back outside through the balcony doors.

"Wind? I'm never going back to Arendelle! The past is in the past!" he proudly declared.

The wind roared with approval as it blew in through the open ice doors, whipping around him in a gleeful manner. Jack laughed as he spun around in the windstorm, making flurries of snowflakes shoot out from one hand and dance in the swirling tornado while the other one released the neckerchief with the golden crocus pin attached. As one section of the icy twister broke away from continuously circling Jack to carry the neckerchief and pin someplace far away outside where Jack wouldn't have to see them again, the rest of the snowy cyclone kept whirling around him as fast as it could go. Jack laughed as the strong gusts of wind ruffled and messed up his hair from the rigid and reserved slicked back hairstyle he had carefully combed it into for the past few years, making it fall back into its natural and untidy state that he had always kept it in before training as a castle butler. Oh, did it feel good to let his hair be loose from that proper appearance! His dark brown hair was wild and free! Just like him! Let there be no restrictions on him at all!

In fact, if he was going to be a servant from now on in a castle made entirely out of ice, he needed proper attire for serving in such a castle.

Screw these old clothes!

He had already built a staircase bridge and an entire castle with his powers without even breaking a sweat!

Who's to say that he couldn't fashion himself a new wardrobe with his ice and snow, too?

The sky was the limit with his powers.

All he had to do to make them work was to just let it go.

He grinned as the perfect idea for new icy clothes came to mind, and his arms swept through the air to make the ice appear.

While Jack had no desire to create new icy boots for himself right now as he liked being barefoot, his long, itchy black pants dissolved away to make room for pants made completely out of surprisingly comfortable ice that contained a blue hue to it. And unlike his traditional Arendelle servant trousers that stretched all the way to his ankles and were cut off in a neat line at the ends of the legs, these new ice pants ended a few inches above the ankle and were cut off with slightly jagged bits of ice at the ends of them, making them look a tad bit frayed. But that didn't matter to Jack. It made him look free and easy, and that suited him just fine.

In place of the white button-down silk shirt he had on, he constructed his snow to morph around his upper body until it formed that of a loose and airy white shirt with blue ice buttons, the top three he left unbuttoned so that it wouldn't be so tight around his neck. And instead of a formal servant jacket like the green one he had discarded earlier, Jack instead made a light blue ice vest over the snow shirt, with two big buttons made out of a darker shade of blue ice to keep it secure around his middle.

He didn't dare add a snowy neckerchief or a set of gloves to the ensemble. That neckerchief he had been forced to wear for years with the rest of the Arendelle servant uniform was highly uncomfortable, and he wanted his neck to be able to breathe from now on without it. And what was the point of running all the way out here in the first place if he was only going to keep hiding his powers away behind a set of gloves again? Gloves and boots only served to make him miserable, and he wasn't going to the spend the rest of his lonely life hiding his true self away behind them again as he had for the past decade

No, no gloves or boots for him.

He was to be barefoot and glove-free from this day forward.

And nothing would ever possess him to make him consider hiding himself behind such articles of clothing on his hands and feet again.

He contemplated for a moment having a bit more fun with his powers and adding a snowy cape and icy crown to his new outfit and fashioning himself as a type of ice king, but he soon decided against it. He was born a servant back in the capitol city, and a servant's life he would lead even out here in this snowy kingdom of isolation.

That perfect boy known as Jackson Overland who had lived and worked back in the Arendelle royal castle and had unexplainable powers that he absolutely detested and did everything he could to hide them from the world was gone.

In his place was simply Jack, the Winter Servant of the ice castle on the North Mountain, and he was someone who loved his magic and intended to have lots and lots of fun with them from now until the end of his days.

No more, no less.

With his ice castle finally built and his new icy servant uniform on, Jack grinned to himself as he marched toward the balcony doors with the snowflake emblems imprinted on them and stepped outside to look out at the wintry kingdom he would now serve until the day he died. He hadn't noticed it before, as he had been so busy building his palace and dressing himself up in his new ice and snow clothes, but during the few short minutes he had been working, the sun had slowly started rising in the east over the peaks of some mountains directly ahead of him.

Jack walked up to the edge of the protective icy railing he had constructed earlier and leaned his forearms up against it as he breathed in the morning air. As he stood there in the light of day, he knew he had ultimately made the right choice in running away from Arendelle.

Sure, he would never see Emma, Elsa, Anna, or anyone else that he cared about back in the castle again, but at least they would be safe from him as long as he stayed up here in his new castle. And if he was away from them, he could let his powers go wild around him without worrying about the danger his ice and snow magic presented to other people.

Yes, he was alone, but he was alone and free.

He would serve his new ice castle with—

Wait, hold on a minute… How could he be a Winter Servant in an ice castle without any ice furniture to clean and no type of ice or snow monarch and other royals and nobles to serve?

For a few minutes, Jack was stumped on what he could do to correct this, but then a wicked idea popped into his head, and a look of wonder spread across his face.

He wasn't done yet with building things with his magic.

He had some more stuff to make.

A lot more stuff to make.

He snickered at the whacky thought of what he would do next with his powers, and then glanced upward at the pink and purple clouds of morning dawn floating lazily across the sky.

"Guess I've still got some work to do, Wind. The duties of a servant never seem to end…" he murmured in amusement.

The wind soothingly ran its invisible fingers through his dark hair, making it look even messier than ever, but Jack didn't care a bit. The messier his hair was, the better.

Have fun, Jack… Have fun with your magic…

A happy smile appeared on Jack's lips when he heard that. "I will. I promise," he vowed.

And with that, he spun around sharply on his heel, marched his way across the balcony and back into his ice castle, and let the balcony doors slam shut behind him.

It was beyond freezing cold temperatures inside the ice palace, but that didn't matter in the slightest to the new Winter Servant of the castle.

Let the storm rage on outside his castle walls.

The cold never bothered Jack anyway.