Elsa's porcelain skin glows beneath the fireplace's flickering glare as she tosses another stack of old documents into the flames. With a sigh, she slumps back into her mahogany chair and resumes reading the memos from a policy meeting she had neither the heart nor the attention to be interested in. The blur of words and numbers overwhelms her already fragile mind; she takes another sip of brandy to calm her nerves - followed by a steady glug of coffee to steel her focus.
The Queen narrows her eyes at a paragraph and jots down notes in its margin for review. Engrossed in her work and accustomed to the chill of winter's wind, Elsa fails to notice the draft wafting through an open window. She continues writing notes until the candles around her office grows dim from the cold, and a shadow creeps upon the documents scattered beneath her weary gaze.
The touch of her intruder's lips to her ear sends Elsa leaping from her chair and extending an ice blade from her fist. She means to scream in shock at the cloaked being poised before her - but she clasps a hand over her mouth at the tinge of blonde hair peeking from beneath her hood.
"Jumpy, much?" the woman whispers, her lips curling into a smile at the sight of Elsa dressed in a sheer nightgown.
"Jesus, Anastasia!" Elsa gasps, shattering her sword into a shower of frost and materialising a ice gown over her nightclothes, "You-you came in through the fucking window! I told you to meet Kai at the gates and he'd-"
"Shh," Anastasia whispers, pressing a finger to Elsa's lips, "we don't want too many people knowing about my presence within your Palace walls do we?"
"There's nothing wrong about inviting you here!" Elsa insists, swatting away her visitor's hand, "I...I just need your help with...something."
"Well, that was the reason you asked me here, was it not?" Anastasia says, plonking herself in Elsa's chair and sipping from the glass of brandy, "Or are there...other reasons you so desire my presence for?"
Elsa whips around and scowls, "I desire no such thing from you! E-except I was hoping you could help me with the identity of those still seeking me and my sister's lives."
"Very well then," Anastasia sighs, the smirk from earlier fading into a grimness spreading across her face, "but I have to report to the Tsar, and he will be displeased if I give you advice without fee."
A velvet pouch clinks as Elsa slides it across the table to her guest. Anastasia clasps her hand over Elsa's, and a chill runs through the Queen's hands as she stares into her eyes.
"Is that all?" Anastasia whispers, lingering her touch on Elsa's knuckles.
"Fifty gold pieces," Elsa answers, staring at her hands and feeling the chill give way to warmth, "Spanish, as you requested."
"These are for my master," Anastasia says, trailing her fingertips beneath Elsa's wrist, "but I was wondering about what you could give me."
"What-" Elsa answers, just as Anastasia passes the tip of her tongue over her lips. Her eyes widen at the sight, and she ponders about the last time she kissed Anna: brief and poignant, with the taste of her tear-stained lips sharing every moment of hardship she had endured for her. Elsa's heart clenches at the reminiscence of Anna's wounds beneath her fingers, and her fingers bunch up into fists at the choice she now has to make.
Without a word, Elsa leans into Anastasia's lips, telling herself that this too, had to be done for Anna. But the moment Anastasia's sweet vanilla taste floods into her mouth, every memory about her sister and their tribulations dissolve into one long sigh. Her guest's rain-soaked scent sends a warmth rushing down her spine, and despite Elsa being the one to pull away first - she finds herself missing her touch as soon as it leaves her.
"Alright then," Anastasia whispers, closing her eyes and exhaling a foggy stream of air. She smirks at the very apparent blush on Elsa's cheeks and the absence of ice on her hands, and whispers, "We can get down to business now, Ice Queen."
Elsa freezes her gown over one more time and tries to keep the stammer out of her voice, "S-someone sent assassins to kill me and Anna while we were out hunting." She unsheathes a dagger, still stained with Anna's dried blood, and places it before her guest's intrigued gaze.
"We captured one of them alive, but he only gave up the name Dragonnades under questioning before he died. I'm left in the dark over who to go after next."
"How many of them were there?" Anastasia asks, lifting the curved blade to her eyes and examining its inscriptions.
"Twelve, not including the one we captured. But he claimed to be a hired hand."
"And you took this from him?" Anastasia asks, twirling the dagger between her fingers.
"No, he had nothing on him. The others all had swords and daggers like this one."
"The Dragonnades are a silly bunch of religious zealots," Anastasia sighs, "they worship a crimson rock buried deep beneath the caverns of Tarsanth, believing it's capable of ending the world in a fiery hail of brimstone."
"Tarsanth? But that's a volcano in Finland isn't it?"
"Yes, for thousands of years they bothered no one and no one bothered them. But as recently as a decade ago, they started doing murder for hire. It wasn't until Austria hired them to kill a group of Russian diplomats that we started taking an interest in their activities."
"Jesus Christ!" Elsa exclaims, "So what do I have to do?"
"Well, you could go down there and ask them nicely who hired them to kill you," Anastasia answers, "but I wouldn't expect them to treat you with much kindness - you just killed a dozen of their brethren."
"What-"
"And no outsiders who ventured to the Tarsanth caverns ever returned to tell their tale. It's little wonder they've been left alone for centuries. Are you even seriously considering this?"
Elsa stares at her feet and imagines a molten hot pool of lava surrounding them, with each breath of acrid air she takes raising blisters in her throat. But she knew the time for hiding was over - and there was no changing things unless she took her destiny by the reins.
"I have to," Elsa whispers beneath her foggy breath, "I have to put an end to this."
Anastasia tucks away a lock of hair from Elsa's eyes and whispers in her ear, "You're doing this for her, aren't you?"
Elsa stares into her eyes, "I'll do anything for her-"
"And she would, for you too."
Elsa grimaces and rubs her brows. The memory of Anna buckled over on the floor weeping into her shoulder flashes through her mind, and all of a sudden the guilt begins to creep back into her soul. Just needing to distract herself, she pushes away Anastasia's hand creeping up her knee and asks, "Something strange happened while we were interrogating the captured assassin."
Anastasia raises an eyebrow at Elsa and waits for her to continue.
"I...I tortured him," Elsa stutters, trying to keep the memory from resurfacing, "it was awful - but the man held on in face of the sheer amount of pain he was put through. Despite that, he gave up his allegiance the moment I mentioned Anna's name. It just seems so…odd."
"Well, um-" Anastasia falters, staring over Elsa's shoulders, "it's the men of other nations; they must've gotten wind of how she started the coup, and you know soldiers! They're prone to exaggerating feats of others strengths. They think Anna has the strength of ten men, with bones forged from iron and muscles woven from steel. Your little prisoner must've thought you were sending Anna in to tear his limbs off, and that sent him over the edge."
"What-? Why would the rumours spread to other countries- Wait, that doesn't even matter," Elsa starts, before shaking her head and grasping Anastasia's hands in farewell, "I've kept you for too long, and it's a long way back to Finnmark. Please extend my gratitude to the Tsar, and well wishes to his family. I'll show you to the gate-"
"You don't have to," Anastasia quips before placing a peck on Elsa's cheek, "and I hope we can meet somewhere more personal next time – like your chambers, perhaps."
Elsa whirls around from the door's handle and utters a curt, "No!" right as Anastasia's silhouette disappears through the open window. With the curtains fluttering about in the wake of her hasty exit, Elsa strides over to the windowsill, attempting to make out a glimpse of her guest's figure disappearing into the night – but only a frosty darkness greets her weary gaze.
"Jesus, what a crazy woman-" Elsa mutters, before turning to her table and packing her work for the night, "oh Christ, Tarsanth!"
The Queen's brain whirrs into motion as she tries to remember exactly where in Finland the Volcanic ranges lay. Elsa turns to a shelf and flips through several sheaves of maps inherited from her father – but only succeeds in finding the H to K folder. With a snowy flip of her hair, she leaves her office and strides down to the library, intending to search the archives for a map of the Finnish Peninsula.
The door to the library swings open beneath the lightest of the Queen's touches, and a leftover warmth the fireplace greets her face. Neglecting to bring a lantern or light the room's lamps, snowflakes peel from Elsa's hair as she marches through the dimness of the Palace library's second floor. Accustomed to walking in a regal fashion, her feet sweep over the carpet in complete silence as she scans the shelves for the atlases. Guided only by the dull glow from the first floor's fireplace, she picks out the F folder and flips it open-
Just as the echo of a muffled gasp reaches her ear.
Filled with pain and anguish, the sound causes the breath to catch in Elsa's throat, and a tremble to run through her hands. The maps slide from her grasp and flutter to the carpet, stopped only by the silent crackle of frost freezing them in mid-air. Elsa jams a palm over her mouth to muffle her breathing as she waits for the sound to repeat itself. Of all the people in the castle, she knows only two people who could be in the library at this hour in the night – herself and Anna.
The gasp echoes through the darkness again, and Elsa's heart freezes in place at its sound - higher this time, and undoubtedly feminine. With the stealth of an leopard, Elsa crouches and meanders her way through the dark maze of dusty bookshelves and tables filling the library's second floor. As she nears a balcony overlooking the first floor, the still air carries the faintest whisper of heavy breathing to Elsa's ear, and she ducks further against the floor until her chin is reddened from dragging against the woolen carpet.
Elsa slides her cheeks beyond the balcony's railings and immediately recoils at the shadowy figure of a woman reclined on the couch. Despite her unchallenged reign as Arendelle's queen and her Lordship over the entire castle, Elsa can't help but feel like she's intruding on someone's privacy in her own library. But a muffled groan coming from the couch stirs Elsa's curiosity, and her heart pounds with anticipation of the sight she's about to witness.
The breath halts in her throat as she edges an eyelid past the railings. Moonlight streams through the floor-to-ceiling curtains adorning the library's walls. Hidden beneath the shadows, the woman's figure shifts with each labored breath she takes, until at last - she pushes herself up on the couch, allowing a beam of moonlight to fall across her hair, glistening a radiant, shimmering blonde in the still night air. Her eyes adjust to the darkness, and she makes out another figure kneeling between her legs.
Anastasia? Elsa's mind churns, gripped by the sight before her. Jesus, has she seduced a gullible palace maiden?
The Russian woman's hands grip between her legs as she utters another groan, unbridled and laced with passion. The crimson lining her cheeks glows beneath the moonlight, and her body convulses with heat coursing through her bones. With a sigh, Elsa hastens to make her exit - but the sight of red hair emerging from beneath Anastasia's dress sends shards of ice running through Elsa's hands.