Holding his breath, the Bishop squints at the margins of a hymnal and concentrates on painting in a nativity scene. The musty scent of scrolls and bibles lingers over his snowy white hair, and with the windows shut against the wind, only the occasional creak of a chair punctuates the silence. A ping pierces the still air as he dips his paintbrush too violently into a tiny pot of gold paint. Folding the sleeves of his wrists twice over, his wrinkled cheeks balloon and his forehead, criss-crossed with the lines of age, furrow in an intense display of concentration as he paints in the halo adorning the infant Christ.
Wisps of dust dance in the solitary ray of light shining through a crack in the curtains. A knock on the door sends a shudder through the Bishop's thin, elderly frame. He makes the sign of the cross before clearing his throat.
"What?" he scowls at the door, examining his painting for any defects the latest intrusion might have caused.
"Your holiness," a priest's voice announces, "the time for confessions has come - and I must be gone to perform the anointing of the sick at Lady Marion's estate. It's her h-husband…he-"
"Oh alright," the Bishop sighs, pulling a veil over the hymnal and drawing the curtains, "you better get going before he passes."
With a swift motion, the Bishops drapes a heavily-ornamented maroon robe over his shoulders and dons a gilded cross. His head dips low under the cross's weight as he leaves the privacy of his drawing-room, and he drags his feet along the stairs to the sanctuary. The stale smell of neglect from the church upstairs gives way to a woody fragrance as rows and rows of pews come into view. But the Bishop heads straight to the confessional and shuts the door behind him as he plonks himself down onto the bench, worn down from years of priests hearing sins and secrets.
The slightest chill on the back of his neck sends the Bishop's hair standing on end; he bolts upright and sniffs at the curtain separating him from his penitent customer for the day. His winkled lips curl into a smile as he slips a hand beneath the curtain, revealing the pontifical ring on his finger and signalling the start of confession.
"F-father, forgive me, for I have sinned," a strained female voice starts behind the curtain, "please hear my confession and pronounce-"
"Certainly," the Bishop interrupts, covering his mouth and trying to hold back the laughter, "your majesty."
A gasp sounds out in the darkness, and he feels the temperature dip beside him.
"H-how, h-how did you know it was me?" the woman says, her voice breaking with each word.
"Your majesty, I held you in my arms when you were a baby; you froze the baptismal water before your tiny feet touched its surface. When you were ten, I gave you the confirmation in your room, the goblet froze solid and the wafer shattered under the power of your frost. During the coronation, when I placed the orb and sceptre in your hands, you might've guessed you got away with the ice creeping from your fingers – but I knew. So, after all these years, I think I'd be familiar with the scent of your frost by now."
"Y-you told me to take off my gloves, e-even though you k-knew?" Elsa's voice creaks under the frustration within her, "why did you do that?"
"Because the people have the right to know," he replies, "I was the one who told your father not to lock you up in the room, to allow you to let it go, because they would've found out anyway, and such a gift is not meant to be hidden."
"It's not a gift!" Elsa scowls, staring at her gloves freezing over, "God cursed me with this wretchedness!"
"I think we're beyond the talk of gifts and curses. Few come here to worship or pray to Jesus Christ anymore," the Bishop leans into the curtain and whispers, "because the people think you are God!"
"I am no God!" Elsa shoots back, clenching her icy fists and gritting her teeth, "I'm a sinner, I'm messed up, fucked up, I'm stupid and dirty and I keep making the wrong decisions and…and…and…"
The Bishop leans back in his seat and waits for Elsa to continue her tirade.
"Will that be all for your confession?" he says, listening to Elsa's heaving breaths behind the curtain.
"I…I c-came here to confess that I…I killed a man," she stutters.
"I know."
"Wait…what? You know? How did you know?" Elsa gasps, directing her foggy breaths away.
"It's my duty to know the sins of the Kingdom, your Majesty," he says, "and besides, everyone's talking about the corpses found rent beyond recognition in the west woods last week. It had to be you; the snow was not yet melted in the morning."
"I did it, Father, I...I killed them!" Elsa confesses with a breaking voice, not bothering to wipe the tears streaming down her face, "they betrayed me and I hated them for it; I wanted so badly to keep Anna safe that I'd do anything just for her to have the life she always wanted. But, right after I killed him, I thought I'd feel guilt, regret, or even the sorrow of watching someone die. Instead, I felt good about myself. I'm a horrid excuse for a human being!"
Elsa's head falls to the ledge with a thump, and amidst the hoarse sounds of her sobbing, frost skirts its way up the curtain. The Bishop bows his head and utters a prayer for Elsa. Despite decades of prayers for the commoners, he struggles to piece together words fitting for her circumstances.
"My child," the Bishop starts, lifting his hand from the frost eating away the wooden ledge, "our forefathers believed that the rule of kings and queens was determined by the heavens, that they be answerable to no man but God himself. In the crown, our Lord vests the responsibility of an entire Kingdom's worth of hopes and dreams, but at the same time he imbues it with the power to rule."
Elsa's sobbing eases, and she lifts her head to listen.
"For the High Command to plot against your rule was not a sin against any earthly human, but a sin against God himself. It was justified for them to die, and you were merely the instrument of the Lord's vengeance."
"But...it doesn't change the fact that...I'm a monster aren't I?" Elsa chokes out, before catching herself short at the word monster. She shuts her eyes and tries to remember the last time the word was directed at her. A chill surges through her head as the glinting, green points of Hans's eyes swims back into her memory, before the crescendo of a million crystals shattering forces her eyes open, and she stares at the frosted-over curtain with her chest heaving foggy breaths of air.
"I...I have something to tell you," the Bishop whispers, lowering his voice to a drone, "something that will set everything straight: your father had a chance to kill King Adolphus once."
Elsa perks her ears and hangs onto his every word with ice glistening in her eyes.
The Bishop clears his throat and speaks each word as though they were heavier than lead, "I was there at the Theatre de Bourgogne in Paris where the Royals celebrated Louix XV's coronation. The princes of the Southern Isles were gathered around King Adolphus, and for whatever reason still eluding me to this day - he insulted the Queen of Arendelle as she entered the Theatre."
An icy gasp interrupts the Bishop's story and Elsa shrieks, "My mother? He insulted my mother?"
"No one knows exactly why he used that coarse gesture on her in front of all the nobles. Perhaps it was to intimidate the other Royals present, since he had just consolidated power in his own Kingdom with the coup - no one really knows. But what we do know is that your father was royally obligated to defend her honor, so as was customary among men of rank and nobility - he challenged Adolphus to a duel on the spot."
"A duel?" Elsa gasps.
"Aye; pistols at dawn, witnesses, twenty paces, everything. The King of Arendelle gave plenty of notice to the neutral countries that he would rescind his challenge if Adolphus were to apologise. But you know what kind of a human Adolphus is, if he's even fit to be called one - he's a madman."
"And they actually fought it out?"
"They marched their paces and Adolphus shot first, but his pistol was overloaded and misfired. Your father had a chance to kill him right there and then, but he fired into the air, sparing his life. The King was criticized for his actions after, for failing to take the opportunity to kill off the one evil ruler in Europe, but he held fast to his convictions, and he paid the price for it."
"He paid for it? What do you mean he paid for it? My father did the right thing!" Elsa insists.
The Bishop pauses and stares at his clogs, pondering on the words teetering on the edge of his lips.
"I thought you knew," he says.
"Knew what?"
"How your parents died."
Grating her nails against her thighs, Elsa clenches her teeth and pushes down the pain bubbling from the pit of her stomach at the mention of her parents' deaths.
"They perished in the sea," she mutters, staring at the floor, "they got caught in a storm and their ship sunk."
"...and what great misfortune, I might add. They were...so young, so full of hope for you and Anna's futures. No child should ever have to bury their parents."
"They kept something from me, didn't they?" Elsa whispers, lips dripping with intention.
"I was on the ship that sailed after them, to search for proof that they truly perished. We combed the seas for days, only picking up stray bits of wood and sail. But on the fifth day we found the ship's nameplate floating amidst clumps of seaweed, and decided that all hope was lost."
"and…? and?" Elsa gasps, gripping the edge of her seat.
"About five miles from where the ship sunk, we found a survivor on a thin bank of gravel: a boy, no more than eleven, he worked in the scullery and must've been in the crow's nest when the vessel went under."
"Someone survived?" Elsa shrieks, at the curtain, "Why didn't anyone tell me about this?"
"There wasn't anything to tell really. The poor wretch was driven mad by thirst; sores had erupted on his flesh and burst under the heat of the sun, staining the gravel a ghastly shade of pink. His skin hung loose on his bones, and his hair had fallen in clumps. The crows had already begun circling him, and they would've gotten to him first if we hadn't."
"Did he die?"
"I gave him the Anointing of the sick, but he passed away while writhing in hideous agony on the boat back to the ship. Throughout the last minutes of his ordeal he kept screaming about the storm, the capsizing, and pirates chasing them."
Elsa bolts from the chair and exclaims, "Pirates?"
"Yes, your Majesty - he claimed to have seen white crescents emblazoned against red flags fluttering on the pursuing ships right before they were driven into the storm."
"Barbary Pirates!" Elsa gasps, "They attacked the Royal Ship? But...none of this makes any sense! Isn't the North Sea too far from the Barbary coast?"
"Your Majesty, the Southern Isles have been a seafaring kingdom for centuries. Their children were taught the patterns of the winds and the signs of the weather since they could walk. Their ports supply ships from all nations, from the lowest of slave ships to the mightiest imperial frigates-"
"You're saying, Adolphus sponsored the attack on my parents?"
"The Pirates didn't even need to attack the Royal Ship; all they did was chase her down into a wind current sure to lead into a storm. Mother nature would've taken care of the rest."
"They killed them!" Elsa yells, icicles sprouting from her feet and ripping through the booth, "They gave the storm's information to the pirates and told them exactly where to find the Royal Ship! It was their idea, their plan, their treachery!"
"My child, what I'm trying to tell you is: evil will always endure, unless good people like yourself take hold of destiny's reins and crush it," he says, thumping his fist on the ledge, "killing in itself doesn't make one evil, but the intent in one's heart does."
"But what of the people? What would they say about a mad ice queen who-"
"-uses her powers for justice? I believe they'd be honored - Kings and Queens have been killing for countless centuries over petty reasons."
Slumping back into her chair, Elsa's head begins to spin under the gravity of the truth revealed to her.
"But...but why? Why didn't anybody tell me?" Elsa asks, pressing her thumbs into her temples and shaking her head.
"We have no evidence the Southern Isles was behind this - but at the same time, the truth is as light as day. Once your father died there was no stopping the corruption budding beneath the soil from blossoming into the daylight. Before the coup, the Southern Isles's hold over Arendelle's treasury was stronger than ever - and the few good men who stood against evil were cast into the shadows. I was merely the steward to the Throne, a powerless caretaker whose only job was to place the crown on your head."
"Does Anna know about this?" Elsa asks, gripping the ledge and anticipating his answer.
"No, and I think her Highness has a lot more on her hands than to deal with inter-kingdom politics."
"But they were our parents!" Elsa yells, spreading frost through the splinters of wood ripped up from earlier, "wait, what did you say about Anna?"
A shudder runs down the Bishop's spine, and he knows it's not the cold air wafting through the booth. He rubs his hands together and begins to piece together the words Anna whispered to him in the middle of the night.
"Has Anna been coming for confession?" Elsa yells, blanking out the Bishop's mind with the ferocity of her voice. Despite the drawn confessional curtains, the Bishop's silence is answer enough for Elsa. With a swipe of her arm, she draws the curtain and stares at his face sleet-white like the first snow of winter.
"What has she been telling you?" Elsa demands, her voice booming through the church.
"Your Majesty, royalty was always borne from blood and secrets," the Bishop says, staring into the Queen's electric-blue eyes, "and I pray one day you'll discover the lengths your sister goes to protect you."