This is probably one of my favourites I've written for this month! (having said that I haven't finished yet but oh well).

It's not particularly shippy, mainly because Elsa is a kid, and it's canon divergent (obviously) but it's like it could kinda set the foundations for a future relationship? Idk haha /.\

Day 10- Can't Break Through

"Elsa?"

The window was shut. That was different.

It wasn't locked, though, so Jack dismissed his uneasy thoughts as nothing more than paranoia, pushed it open and slipped through into the Princess's bedroom.

He could see that Anna was asleep in her bed, as usual. Jack smiled fondly at the toddler and pulled the covers up where they had slipped down. He had had few interactions with the girl; by the time Jack could visit it was usually far past her bedtime, leaving him to talk with Elsa alone.

Elsa...

She hadn't jumped out of bed when he entered the room. She hadn't complained when he went to Anna before her. She hadn't even thrown a snowball at him from the other side of the room, which had occurred with surprising frequency since their meeting.

Jack turned to question her, wondering if she were asleep already, or maybe she was still with her parents?, but when he he looked, his eyes widened. Elsa's half of the room, normally tidier than Anna's but still full with toys and books was...empty.

No blue bed. No snow sculpture in the corner. No little chair with her dress for the next day draped over it. The entire half of the room was empty, as if everything had just disappeared.

Jack turned to Anna and saw what he hadn't before; her little face was screwed up in anguish, her body curled up in itself as she hugged a stuffed toy to her chest. Her cheeks were wet and a little red, as if she had been crying and scrubbing at her cheeks before she fell asleep.

"...Elsa?"

Jack had rarely been into the other parts of the castle, only a few times with Elsa as he didn't want to intrude, but now he understood that it was of the utmost importance. He opened the girls' bedroom door quietly and slipped through, creeping through the shadows on the off chance that one of the staff members spotted him. Arendelle was an odd place, half in and half out of the modern world; some of it's denizens believed in their old spirits and gods, and so a different version of him, but some didn't. He couldn't be too careful.

He wasn't sure what he was looking for, so he carried on down the corridor until he put his foot down on carpet and could feel the air change. It was as if there was a cold draft, but there was no wind, and when he looked to his left he saw not an open window but a door. Slowly he approached and pressed his ear to the door, one hand laid gently on the surface. Behind the wood he could hear a quiet sobbing, feel more of that icy cold air, and he knew that behind the door was his little friend.

"Elsa?" He whispered. There was no response and so he tried again, a little louder. "Elsa?"

The crying stopped abruptly and there was a small gasp, before a tearful voice spoke out.

"Jack?"

"It's me." He replied, and there was the slip of fabric on fabric, a tiny thud and then the padding of bare feet on the floor before the door unlocked opened and he glided inside, unprepared for what he found.

The room was covered in ice. Frost covered every wall, every surface. Pointed shards of ice protruded from the walls and corners of the room and, he realised with a sense of dread, they all pointed at the bed on the back wall where he was certain Elsa had been asleep just moments before.

"Oh, Elsa." He murmured, looking down at the girl. She wore her usual nightdress, her hair braided as normal, but her tiny hands were covered by gloves; not the delicate kind ladies wore to parties, but a thick kind meant for long carriage journeys in winter. Her face was thinner than normal, her eyes deeply set as if she had been sleeping badly, and she clutched her dominant left hand to her chest tightly, as if protecting...something. "What happened?"

Immediately Elsa started sobbing again, throwing herself at Jack's chest for comfort, though he noticed she kept her left hand cradled to her chest even when he tried to take it in his own hands. There was something stiffer about her; though she hugged him and looked at him for comfort, she wouldn't let herself be caught up in the embrace, keeping her body almost angled away from him. He managed to coax from her a garbled version of what had happened, and his anger grew as did his pain. He hurt for Elsa.

"Hey, hey, it's okay." He shushed her once her story was over. "You can't hurt me, remember? I'm the spirit of winter. There is nothing you can do to hurt me." Jack saw her little head nod twice, quickly, and he hugged her tighter. "Now, shall we see what we can do about this bedroom?"

"N-no! Papa says I can't use my-"

"And I say Papa is wrong." Elsa looked up and Jack returned her gaze a little sternly. "You can do it with me, alright? I'll help you. You can't hurt me."

Elsa nodded again, uncertainly,and Jack grinned, flicking her nose with a finger. A snowflake slipped into the air as he did so and hit her nose; she blinked in surprise, then shook her head and began to smile.

Soon she was giggling in delight as she sat in Jack's lap, three feet above the ground, her arms outstretched to mirror his. Jack instructed her to point her hands at each patch of ice on the wall and will it to go away. She copied him exactly, even scrunching up her face just like he told her too and, though it took a few tries, it began to work. The ice began to recede, the frost slowly melted and eventually disappeared entirely, and soon enough the room was back to normal.

Jack grabbed Elsa's pudgy little gloved hands and raised her into the air before gently placing her on the ground.

"There." He said with a smile. "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

"No." Elsa giggled as he landed in front of her. "It was fun."

"Good." He knelt down and held his palm out in front of her, a snowflake dancing just above his palm. "Now, how about I give you some lessons, huh? So you can learn to control those powers of yours." Elsa nodded a little bashfully at his words, and the spirit grinned. "Well we won't be needing these, for starters."

Jack tugged the gloves off her hands and threw them a little way away from them. Then he took her hands in his and nodded.

"Much better."

He was about to give her a teasing lecture on just how one should behave in one of his classes and how very privileged she was to be the first person he ever taught, when she tugged her hands out of his and threw them around his neck, diving into his arms so hard he fell over.

"I love you, Jack." She mumbled against his shoulder, and Jack felt the familiar bubble of excitement in his gut; the same one he got on the rare occasion that somebody saw him, and an uncontrollable smile spread across his face, lighting it up like the northern lights.

"I love you too, snowflake."