"Okay, this is it."

With a gentle pull of the reins, the driver stopped his horse in its tracks and brought the carriage to a halt.

"Are you sure about this?" he asked.

"Definitely. I know the area well, trust me."

"All right, but make it quick. I don't have all night."

"It shouldn't take longer than 10 minutes. I'll see you in a bit."

Kristoff opened the door, hopping out with his lantern already lit. Holding it up, he could just make out the treeline of the forest which marked the beginning of the Valley of the Living Rock.

As he stepped into the foliage, he thought wistfully of how much faster he could have travelled if his reindeer were still with him. He pushed the thought away; there were more important things at hand. He was, after all, sent here on the queen's orders.

Walking deeper into the woods, Kristoff soon came across an area he had come to know like the back of his hand: a large clearing, with dozens upon dozens of medium-sized rocks, just barely visible in the lantern's light.

"Hey guys, I have something to tell you. It's a direct order from the queen herself, so listen up."

Normally, the rocks would have all rolled towards him, unfurling into the shape of the trolls. But this time, they did not move.

"Guys?"

Kristoff turned here and there, looking for any response from them. He didn't realize that something had gone wrong until he stepped in something wet, and he didn't realize why they didn't respond until he looked down at what he had stepped in: a small, dark-green puddle. To someone unacquainted with trolls, it would be an unidentified substance, but Kristoff recognized it instantly.

It was troll blood.

Alarmed, the ice harvester extended his arm out to try and illuminate more of the scene around him.

"Gothi? Cliff? Bulda?"

None of the names he uttered produced any response from the trolls they belonged to. As his light shone further around the area, he saw more puddles and trails of green blood.

Kristoff ran up to a grouping of rocks and looked down at them. In the glow of his lantern, he saw deep gashes in each rock, as though someone had cut into them with something sharp.

Panicking now, he looked at other rocks, and saw they had all been sliced up in a similar fashion. Amongst them, a few trolls had transformed into their true forms, but they suffered the same fate as their friends around them.

"Oh my God. Oh my God."

Kristoff bent down to see if any of them were still breathing, when he heard a voice call out from the darkness behind him.

"It's useless, Kristoff. They're dead, every last one of them."

He whipped his head back to see that there was one last troll alive: Grand Pabbie, the troll elder, sitting alone on a tree stump. Walking closer to him, he saw that in his left hand he held a small axe, its head stained with emerald liquid.

"Pabbie...what did you do?!"

"I had to kill them," he replied sadly, staring at the ground. "I tried to do it while they enjoyed their last moments of sleep, but a few of the children woke up..."

Kristoff couldn't believe what he was seeing and hearing. He would have never thought that Pabbie, the kindly old troll, the same one he saw heal Anna and talk to her family about true love, would have ever been capable of something like this.

"Why?"

"I didn't want to do it, Kristoff, believe me, I truly didn't. But it is better this way. At least now they'll be spared from the horror that is to come when that monster awakens."

He held the axe out for Kristoff. "Take it. Kill me, put me out of my misery. It's all I deserve."

Tears of anger and grief streaming down his face, the mountain man charged forward and tackled Pabbie to the ground, the axe flying from him. Grabbing hold of his moss shirt, he brought punch after punch down into his face. As his fist struck the troll's stone-like skin over and over, he felt a knuckle break. He barely noticed the pain, hitting him in the mouth one last time and knocking several of his teeth out.

"How could you Pabbie? YOU BASTARD, HOW COULD YOU?!"

Bruised and bleeding, he stared back up at Kristoff.

"Our time is over, my boy. A new era is upon us, and we have no part in it. We're insignificant to them, less than insects. Please, just end my existence. If you have any sense at all, you'll kill yourself when you're done with me."

Kristoff let go of Pabbie's shirt, slowly rising to his feet. Taking the axe into his hands, he closed his eyes and brought it down into the troll's forehead. Pulling it out and tossing it aside, he only glanced at the now-dead body for a second. He shook his head as he looked around at the corpses of the trolls, most of them still frozen in a sleeping pose, as though they could still wake up at any moment.

Under better circumstances, Kristoff would have buried each and every one of his former family members, but there was no time. He picked his lantern up and started to head out of the forest, quietly sobbing to himself.

When he had made his way back to the carriage and climbed back inside, the driver took one look at his reddened eyes and injured hand and winced.

"God Almighty, man. What happened in there?"

"Forget it. Let's just get the hell out of here."

With as much strength as he could muster, Agdar pushed the bookshelf in front of the small hallway, concealing it from prying eyes. It was a task that he would have normally delegated to servants, but no one could know of the area's existence, nor of a certain forbidden text he had hidden away within it.

In spite of Idunn's urges to destroy the book, he had found he could not do so. It was almost like an outside force was influencing him to keep it, but Agdar himself doubted it. He blamed himself: he simply did not possess the resolve.

"Disappointing, Agdar. Very disappointing, indeed."

Turning away from the bookshelf, he saw the familiar dark man from the unknown kingdom. His cape lightly blew out from behind him, even though the room lacked any breeze.

"I give you the knowledge you so desperately craved, and you squander it and reject it by hiding it away from yourself."

Agdar stood his ground, mustering up as much courage as he could.

"I don't care for your knowledge, demon. You will leave me and my family alone, understand?"

The strange man narrowed his black eyes, dropping any pretense of formality. "You are not in a position to order me about, human."

"You don't frighten me."

The thing smirked. "Is that a challenge? Because I could very easily meet it."

Agdar felt a chill run down his spine, but he did not let it show.

"I told you before, and I will only tell you once more: stay away from me, and stay away from my family. Now get out of my kingdom and don't come back. Ever."

"Hmph. Very well then. As a gentleman, I will honor your request. This is the last visit you will have..."

He turned on his heel and began to walk away. But before he was about to step out, he glanced back at the king of Arendelle.

"...from me, anyway."

He continued, walking right through the closed library door.

"...and that is why I am asking you all to leave. This place is not safe anymore."

From the light of the early morning sun, Elsa took another quick look at the paper that sat on the podium she stood behind.

"I am giving you all exactly one hour to go back to your homes and grab any necessary items you will need. Food, medicine, clothing, blankets, take only what you can carry. Do not overburden yourself. Our ships only have so much room."

She peered into the eyes of the large crowd of Arendelle citizens that had gathered in front of her, scanning the expressions of different people; some looked tired, some looked sad, but they all looked scared.

Elsa shut her eyes, partially to reflect on the situation, partially to prevent anyone from seeing any tears that threatened to well up.

"...I'm sorry, I don't...I don't know if you'll have anything to come back to...forgive me..."

She opened her eyes. Abandoning her written speech, she addressed the people unscripted.

"I am glad you accepted me back, even after I froze this land. I'm honored to be your queen, and I wish you all a safe journey. Thank you..."

She looked at the crowd, then around at her guards and servants that stood near her.

"...all of you."

The crowd dispersed, filing out of the gates and heading back to gather up their small necessities. Turning away from the podium, Elsa headed back for the castle doors.

"Kristoff, where are the trolls? They should have been here by now."

Walking in tandem, the ice harvester touched his hand, feeling the bandages that covered it, in addition to the wounds he had received after his encounter with the shoggoth.

"They're dead," he said quietly. "They're all dead now."

Elsa stopped. "What do you mean?"

"Pabbie lost his mind, he slaughtered them. I had no choice but to kill him."

The queen sighed deeply. "Another atrocity. Unbelievable. Not a single one survived?"

"No. First Sven, now them...my entire family...is gone..."

Kristoff's sentence trailed off, the final words of it getting caught in his throat. Putting a comforting hand on his shoulder, Elsa spoke.

"Kristoff, I'm sorry. Truly, I am. I know what it's like to lose family. But there's very, very little time. Anna is already down at the docks with both of your things. Go to her, and get the two of you onto a boat."

Keeping his emotions in check, he nodded.

"All right."

He started to jog down to the harbor.

"Kristoff!"

He turned to look back.

"Yeah?"

"...please take good care of Anna..."

Exchanging one last look with his queen, he nodded to her.

"I will. I promise."

With that, the two friends parted ways, never to see each other again.

The schooner moved wildly about in the waves, threatening to be capsized.

"Grab onto something!" Agdar shouted to his wife. Clinging to a railing near the stern, Idunn could barely see her husband, her vision largely obscured by the wind undoing her twist bun and blowing her hair into her face.

The captain and his sailors did their best to fight against the storm, throwing buckets upon buckets of seawater overboard, but things were starting to look hopeless.

Using the port railing to steady himself, the king slowly but surely made his way over to the queen.

"Grab my arm!"

Just before she could do so, a giant webbed hand shot out of the water and wrapped its long fingers around Idunn. She shrieked as she was pulled overboard, down into the freezing, choppy depths.

"Idunn! NO!"

It was too late. His wife was gone.

With a flash of lightning, Agdar, the captain, and his sailors thought they saw something in one of the waves. Something huge.

Inhuman roars mixed in with that of the roar of thunder as the wave crashed down onto the ship.

Elsa watched the last boat pull away and make its way across the fjord to join the others. Arendelle's hundreds and hundreds of citizens waved at her, and she waved back.

She could still just make out the form of a certain person standing near the stern of one of the ships, her strawberry-blonde hair contrasting with the blue of the sky.

Elsa waved at Anna and the rest of her people until they had disappeared around the corner of the mountain. After they had finally left her sight, she let her arm drop to her side, and stood there for a short time longer, feeling the breeze on her face.

With the Elder Sign painted onto each boat, Elsa knew that they would be able to safely make it to Britain, their destination. She looked at the fjord, at the mountains, at the main town, and finally, her castle.

There was still work to do.

With a full kitchen staff, the queen had not had to cook for herself in quite a while. But tonight was different.

Her carrots already finished, Elsa cut into a piece of potato, taking a bite. Even though there was no one else around to scrutinize, she still ate like a proper lady, the way she had been taught by her parents.

When her dinner had been finished, Elsa looked at her dessert: a small plate with a few pieces of chocolate. With the first piece, she was able to swallow it without a problem. With the second piece, she thought of how chocolate was Anna's favorite. With the third piece, she remembered how it was just the type of snack they would try and steal from the kitchens, sneaking out of bed at night as children.

With the fourth piece, Elsa was only just able to chew on it and swallow before her lip began to tremble.

The fifth piece did not even make it to her mouth before she dropped it and pushed the plates off the table, her face in her hands.

Elsa sat there in the chair for a long while, all alone, the only person left in the entire kingdom, crying harder than she had ever cried before, tears continuing to fall from her face as the night took over the castle and shrouded it in darkness.