Meanwhile, in a different realm…
Queen Elsa of Arendelle was busy. She had a lot in her hands, preparing the castle for the next ball in celebration of the Festival of Spirits and Magic, which fell in the autumn. It was said that this time was when the veil between the worlds – mortal and fairy, living and dead – was thinnest. Grand Pabbie and his family had agreed to put on a spectacular magic show, and people were growing all the squash they could.
"No, please," Elsa was saying to workers at the front gates. "Those green banners are for summer. The red and orange ones are for autumn, to match the leaves."
The servants put down the green tapestries and picked up red ones.
"Thank you," Elsa said sincerely.
Just then, Kristoff ran out of the castle.
"Your Majesty!" he said, panting.
"Please, I've insisted you just call me Elsa!"
"Oh, right. Elsa. Listen, I've been trying to keep Sven out of the vegetable garden. Squash is his new favorite food! He won't stop eating –"
Elsa sighed and lowered her face into her hand. How many times had she said not to bring the reindeer in the castle grounds until all the squash was harvested?
"What's that?" Kristoff suddenly asked.
What was he talking about? Was there another banner mistake or an animal getting in?
But it was neither. Elsa looked up and saw that the sky was growing dark and thick with gray clouds. She was confused; it had been a perfectly clear day. Unless…had she done this? No, no, this was terrible!
Then she heard the thunder and felt the first drops of lukewarm rain.
Elsa breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn't causing this. She couldn't make it thunder or rain.
She turned to the servants.
"Get yourselves inside!" she ordered. "I'll take care of the decorations."
She and Kristoff picked up as many banners each as they could and hurried into the castle, with the rain continuing to pour harder and harder.
"I think we'll just have to put these aside," Kristoff said when they entered the entrance hall. He lay his stack of banners down next to a wall. Elsa followed suit.
She was soaked from head to toe. So was he.
"Elsa!"
Anna entered the hall from one of the other doors. She looked even more soaked than her sister or her beloved. Olaf walked behind her, muttering about how wonderful rain was.
"Anna, are you okay?" Elsa asked.
"Yep, I'm fine," Anna answered. "But it's pouring out there. One minute I was in the garden with Olaf and the ducklings, and the next everyone was quacking without end and scampering back to the pond. Well, the ducks were. Olaf and I don't quack."
Elsa chuckled.
Then the lightning stuck.
BOOM!
The whole hall flashed purple for one moment.
"I think the castle was hit!" Elsa cried out.
She, Anna and Kristoff headed upstairs, running into Kai on the way up.
"I saw it, Your Majesty!" Kai gasped. "A bolt of lightning hit the highest tower!"
"Is it okay?" Elsa asked.
"I checked, Your Majesty. Oddly, nothing appears to be damaged."
Elsa wouldn't have cared if anything was; there was nothing in that tower save for an empty old wardrobe. She was just grateful that an entire section of castle hadn't caught fire.
"Thank you, Kai," Elsa said.
Another bolt of lightning appeared in a window. Elsa noticed that it was not yellow or blue, as one would expect lightning to be, but a deep purple.
Strange… Elsa thought.
"If you all would excuse me," she said and left. She felt she had to check out the tower.
Elsa made her way through the castle's passages, which she knew well since she and Anna had navigated them quite a bit as children. Finally, she reached the spiral staircase leading up to the highest tower in the castle. Curious, and a bit worried, she ascended.
The tower room was as sparse as it ever had been. It was a round room with four big windows and wooden walls, floor and ceiling. At the far end of it was a dusty old wardrobe, sitting undisturbed by the passage and many huge moments of history.
Except…what was this? From inside the wardrobe Elsa swore she could hear something like the ocean.
The queen of Arendelle stepped forward and opened the wardrobe doors, which for many years had remained untouched.
She gasped.
At the far end of the wardrobe was an elegant palace window, and through it she could see a most remarkable room. Its walls were made of some sort of pink gemstone, and its floor was a dark teal color. In the middle of the room was a pink planter where a magnificent red and orange flower was growing. Strange vines were hanging from the pointed ceiling, and there were three other windows in the room that looked out to a pure blueness.
What was even more remarkable was that where there should have been stairs coming up there was what looked like a lidless trap door.
And then someone rose up through it.
The person was a young woman. She had wavy blonde hair that was only a shade darker than Elsa's and her eyes were as blue as sapphires. Elsa soon noticed that she wore a tiara, so she must be royalty, and in her hair were streaks of pink. Elsa's mouth opened in shock when she saw that the girl was wearing what looked like the top half of a swimsuit bedecked in pearls and jewels, and she let out a shout of surprise when the stranger's bottom half came into view.
She had no legs. Instead, she had the pink, orange and purple tail of a large fish.
Elsa was watching a mermaid in a castle under the sea.
The mermaid turned to the window into which Elsa was staring, and her mouth fell open too.
She swam up to the window and mouthed the words Who are you?