The wagon rattles as it bumps over a pothole, rousing Anna from her sleep and into the glare of the morning sun peeking through the tattered canvas. A pang of anxiety strikes her heart cold, she turns over in her position amidst musty-smelling bales of hay and peeks through the cloth. Her shoulders sag in relief as she sees the same empty dirt road she's been riding on for an hour, or a day, or a week. With fatigue bearing down on her from the ever-present worry of getting caught, Anna's stopped counting the time she's spent dodging Prince Karl's omnipresent hand.
An ache in Anna's shoulders forces the girl to slump back into the hay; she clutches her shoulder and winces at the pain biting at her muscles. The wagon bumps again, and a growling develops in her stomach. Whatever little bread and clothes she's managed to steal from the countryfolk proved woefully inadequate for the needs of a Princess accustomed to luxury. She longs to be back within the warm castle walls of Arendelle, but not with Elsa like that, Anna reminds herself.
The horses' neighing distracts Anna from her thoughts, she peeks out the flap and swallows hard at the sight of two suits of glinting armor standing by the roadside.
"Goddamn soldiers with nothin' better to do," the elderly farmer in the driver's seat croaks. His wrinkled hands tighten on the horses' reins, still oblivious to Anna's presence in his wagon.
Anna presses herself flat on the planks, keeping one eye fixed on the soldiers in the distance. Amidst the rumbling of the wagon's wheels, she hears her heart pounding in her throat. As the wagon approaches, she sees the grimace on their faces clearly, fatigued from days of patrolling. One of them carries a pair of thick iron shackles by his belt, the other with a gleaming brass horn. No doubt the Southern Isle's command had been preparing well to capture her.
A shudder breaks out across her body as she sees a soldier motion for the wagon to stop.
"Good day to you Mr. Lutz!" A soldier calls out, "you wouldn't mind if we check your wagon?"
"Oh c'mon, let me be on my way now - you know there's nothing worth checking here."
Despite Mr. Lutz's protests, the soldiers' insistence wins out. Anna backs into the wagon's corner as goosebumps break out across her skin. As the soldiers disappear around the wagon's edge, she loses her mind momentarily, ripping open the cloth separating her and the farmer. Clasping a hand over Mr Lutz's mouth, his glistening hazel eyes come into view as she clambers into the driver's seat. She snaps her gaze to the wagon's still-empty rear before looking deep into the man's eyes and motioning for silence. He nods, and Anna leaps from the wagon barely a second before the soldiers peer down the back.
"Ah, it's just hay and cow dung-" one soldier says to another.
"Er, yes!" the man croaks, watching the girl's reddish mane dart between the trees, "Just hay I'm carryin', best you be lettin' me go my way now, kind soldiers."
Like a deer fleeing its hunter, Anna runs without daring to look back or catch her breath. The princess doesn't stop; not even when she's lost her bearings and the sun beats down on her head with the ferocity of dragon's breath. Her lungs heave acid, but still the girl runs, until her legs give way like spaghetti and she slumps to the ground clutching her sides. Anxiety still burns into her soul; Anna rolls over onto her back and stares back into the green thicket behind her, expecting to find an army of soldiers in pursuit, but the cooing of a pigeon steadies her breathing somewhat.
Anna stares at the pigeon, throttling her memory back to a happier time when Elsa would make snow pigeons to bring her lumps of chocolate truffles every time she got too busy with Kingdom affairs. I've got to get back, Anna thinks, her heart still pounding in her chest. With trembling fingers, she unfolds a stolen map hidden in her clothes, but a sudden chorus of shouting causes her to drop it.
Anna flattens herself against the grass as the commotion in front of her intensifies. "Shit," she mutters, keeping her eyes peeled for the noise's source through blades of sun-baked grass. She clasps a hand over her mouth when a girl no older than her comes into view. Her red hair glimmers in the sun as she strides up the grassy knoll, but she trips and tumbles over and over. The glinting greens in the girl's eyes lock onto hers for a fleeting second; Anna's quivering hands clamp down even harder on her own mouth as a pair of soldiers behind the girl pause their pursuit and pick her up by the waist, hauling her off down the knoll.
Unable to bear the sight of what she just witnessed, Anna crawls to the knoll's edge and sucks in a gasp that empties every trace of air in her lungs.
A sprawling fort dotted with watchtowers and gates sits on the plains; patrolling its immense walls - dozens of soldiers from the Southern Isles' army. Within its walls, hundreds upon hundreds of girls and women cram shoulder to shoulder in the square, with a steady stream being processed through the front gates. Anna squints at the surreal sight before her; she tries to make some sense about why such an immense gathering of women is taking place in a military fort. Her heart plummets as the realisation hits her like lightning.
Each and every one of the women possess a head of red hair.
The clouds part, bringing with it rays of sunshine raising a glimmering sheen amongst the sea of red-headed womenfolk in the square. The more Anna stares at the sight before her, the more she picks out fear and confusion amongst them. Almost instinctively, she tries to cover her hair, as if some invisible hand is going to pick her up and cast her into the cauldron of similar red-heads, where she'd undoubtedly be discovered.
With her nerves stretched taut and ready to fray, the snap of a branch behind Anna sends her whirling around. The glare of the noon sun casts a shadow over the face of the figure hovering over her, and at once Anna draws a knife and thrusts blindly. Her heart nearly stops when she hits nothing but air, and instead feels a hand closing around hers.
"No!" A voice gasps, shrill and feminine; it betrays every bit of alarm which had plagued Anna over the past week. Anna jerks upright and comes face to face with a young girl, no older than herself, only to be shoved back down into the dirt.
"Fuck-"
"Shh!" the voice hushes. The girl plods down beside her, adjusting a hood over the stray lock of red dangling across her forehead. Before the princess can open her mouth to speak, the girl drapes Anna's hair with a shawl, keeping her finger poised on her lips in silence. The redhead turns her gaze to the crowd of other redheads in the fort, before staring into Anna's glistening eyes. A calloused hand, tiny but filled with strength, squeezes Anna's own. She holds her breath as words tumble from the girl's lips in a whisper.
"Keep your head down until we reach the brook, and keep that fucking knife away from me."
A pang of fear strikes Anna's heart cold as she allows the mysterious redhead to bring her away from the forest path and deeper into the woods. She could be anyone really, but there was something in her eyes which glistened with genuinity, so Anna doesn't stop running after her, not even when her lungs heave fire.
By the time she hears the sound of trickling water, Anna's surprised she's even still standing. She buckles over by the brook and stares at her muddied and bruised reflection in the water, unrecognisable from her usually pristine palace skin. She looks over at the girl splashing her face with the icy brook's water; her skin rough and a few shades darker than Anna's from working in the sun.
"So...what was that about?" Anna asks, wiping the sheen of perspiration on her forehead, "Why are you helping me?"
"No point having another girl taken away," she answers, adjusting her hood again, "almost changed my mind when you tried to stab my guts though."
"Taken? By who?"
The girl pauses her washing and stares at Anna, "Jesus, were you born yesterday? The Prince is tearing up the Isles in search of the she-beast."
"The she-beast? What?"
Without waiting for Anna to finish drying her face, the girl rises to her feet and starts walking along the brook, forcing the Princess to scamper after her.
"The Princess of Arendelle who massacred the royal family and single handedly wrecked the fleet," she mutters, "she has iron claws like a golem of legends, and can grow to ten feet tall beneath the moonlight-"
"Wow, um, that's some, um, scary shit!" Anna quips, rubbing at the goosebumps rising across her skin.
"Aye, the girl's monstrous visage fades in the daylight, and she resembles nothing more than an ordinary girl with red hair. Which is bad news for us redheads, since the Prince discriminates against no-one in vengeance. He'd kill all the red-haired girls in the Kingdom if it meant being rid of one enemy."
"So the women gathered in the fort…"
The girl whips around and snarls in Anna's face, "It is sin! My sisters are in there! All because of this one girl who crept into our lands and forced the hand of Prince Karl!"
"Oh god, all that for one girl?" Anna gasps, feeling blood rushing to her cheeks, "What's going to happen to them?"
"Hopefully the soldiers don't take a liking to my sisters and let them leave after being processed. God knows how long it'll take, and the soldiers aren't known for being very friendly towards women."
Anna recalls the girl sprawled out upon the knoll in an attempt to flee the soldiers, her glistening green eyes betraying a look of utter fear.
"So the girl escaping the fort just now-"
"They're probably going to.." she says, before shaking her head, "look, I don't even want to know."
A chill creeps up Anna's spine as she realises that her simple presence in the Kingdom has swept a tidal wave of atrocities upon the population.
"Where're you going?" Anna asks, trying to distract the guilt descending upon her head.
"My aunt's farm," she answers, "across the border in Weselton."
Anna's ears prickle at the girl's answer. Without another word, she follows her footsteps scampering along the brook's pebbly shore.
A dull ache burns through Anna's legs; exhausted from days of walking with her peasant companion, she lies in the shade and clutches at the insatiable hunger clenching at her stomach. Despite the endless miles, the other redhead made no complaint, continuing to plod on in the incessant cold, while Anna grew progressively weaker with each step. Being unused to hunger, the little bread and apples proved insufficient for her, while the famine-hardened peasant girl shrugged it off like it were just another bad season.
Hunched beneath a tree, the Princess of Arendelle looks over her shoulder once again for her companion to return. The surf sloshes against the shore in long, lazy waves, lulling Anna to a state of half-sleep; she's kept awake merely by the honking of seagulls splashing in the water, and the nagging thought of Elsa still comatose back home. Beyond the strait, the duchy of Weselton looms with its never ending wall of trees.
Anna snaps her head at the sound of rustling leaves, but she relaxes when the red-haired girl appears from between a bush and slides next to her.
"Good news," the redhead starts, putting a smile on Anna's face, "there's an abandoned boat stuck on the beach. No oars though, so we're going to have to paddle through the surf with bare hands."
"Oh! That won't be a-" Anna starts, before feigning a frown, "I mean, that sounds difficult!"
"Alright, let's get the hell out of here," the girl snarls, leaping to her feet and darting towards the beach.
The world spins around Anna as she stumbles after the redhead. After running barely twenty yards down a shrubbery slope, her knees turn week and her vision tunnels in on the sight of her companion putting her shoulder to a tiny fishing boat beached on the shore.
"C'mon!" the girl grunts, "Help me get it into the water!"
Despite her hunger-induced delirium, Anna feels strength flowing through her arms when she clenches her fists. Still, the idea of revealing her identity when she's this close to escaping the Southern Isles proves more worrisome than tempting. So, when she braces her shoulders to the boat's wood, Anna feigns a scowl when she pushes the boat, but the vessel easily dislodges from the wet sand beneath her strength.
"Put your back into it!" the redhead grunts, "Almost there!"
A smirk crosses Anna's lips; she leans a little more weight behind the boat, sending it sloshing into the surf.
"Phew, that was easier than I thought," Anna's companion comments, wiping the perspiration from her brow.
The princess hitches up her dress and starts sploshing towards the boat, "Well, all that's left is for us to paddle across the-"
"Halt!" A voice echoes across the beach. The pair whirl around to the sight of a horse in the distance churning up sand as it gallops down the beach; its rider's armor glinting in the sun.
"Oh Jesus, I made sure there wasn't anyone," the girl scowls, before turning to Anna, "leave the talking to me. Get on your knees and pretend to be retarded."
"What-"
"Just act stupid! I'll talk to him, and cover your goddamned hair!" the girl snarls.
With the horse and rider rapidly bearing down on her, Anna's eyes dart left and right. Her companion leaves her ankle deep in the water with her heart pounding. The princess casts another glance over her shoulder at the forests of Weselton lying on the horizon. So close, yet so far. She turns again to the rider, now a stone's throw away. Panic erupts in Anna's mind; she momentarily loses her judgement, and sticks a hand in her mouth.
Icy cold water seeps up Anna's dress as the rider dismounts. The girl shows no fear as she approaches the soldier with a curtsey. With a scowl, he snatches a scrap of paper from her hands and goes over it. Anna bites down hard on her fingers when she spots a crossbow hanging from his hip. Amidst the sloshing of seawater, she listens in on their conversation.
"All in order then, sir?" the girl asks, keeping her gaze lowered.
The soldier whips her off hood with a grunt, "You have red hair. Orders are for you to be processed at the nearest military fort."
"Aye sir, if you read my papers, I hail from Orkney, you see? They be done with their processing a long time ago eh," she says with a distinct accent.
"Very well then, miss," the soldier scoffs, handing her back the piece of paper, "but what of your friend? She ain't got no identity or none-"
"This be my sister eh," she says, extending a finger at Anna, "she's a little off in the head. Special, you see? She ain't be needin' no papers or nothin' since the guards wouldn't even look at her-"
"Ah to hell with it then, bugger off you two!" he grunts, waving her away.
A sigh escapes Anna's lips and she rises to her feet without thinking. The faintest of breezes coaxes the cloak from her forehead. At once, Anna adjusts the fabric back into position, but her heart falters when she looks up to see the soldier's stare burning into her eyes.
"No!" Anna gasps, too late to stop the soldier striding towards her on the wet sand. She flinches when his hand grabs hold of the cloak, and a sickening rip echoes through her ears when he yanks it from her head. The sight of one solitary lock of blonde hair amidst the tangle of red on Anna's head sends the soldier staggering backwards.
"S-s-s-she...She-beast!" he sputters, his trembling fingers loading a bolt into the crossbow and pointing it between her eyes, "G-g-get on your f-fucking knees, or, or, or, I'll s-shoot you!"
Anna shrieks and falls to her knees with her hands up.
"Holy shit!" the other girl screams, recoiling from the soldier's drawn crossbow.
"Jesus christ, fuck, d-don't shoot!" Anna cries, her mind searching for an explanation, "Please, I can explain!"
Anna cranes her head to the wall of trees in the distance. Somewhere in that vast expanse of greenery, was the medicine which could bring her sister back. There was the girl too, who'd surely be executed for unknowingly helping the Kingdom's greatest enemy. The girl who had helped her out of her own kindness and expected nothing in return.
Hell, Anna thought, I'm not coming this far for nothing.
"You're u-under arrest, you s-sick f-fucking monster!" a voice booms in Anna's ear, "I'm t-taking you to...to-"
'No," Anna mutters, shaking her head. Her vision tunnels on the crossbow's trigger, quivering beneath the grip of his hands.
The slightest movement of his trigger finger sends every muscle in Anna's legs flexing in tandem. Her hands bunch up around clumps of wet sand. She grits her teeth as he pulls the trigger, and flings a handful of sand in his face.
"Ugh!" the soldier grunts, staggering backwards and sending the arrow over Anna's shoulders.
Anna leaps to her feet. The damp sand sinks beneath her weight as she spins around on her heels and shatters his crossbow with a kick. Before he's able to react, she grabs a tuft of his hair and punches him in the face, sending a trail of blood flying through the air.
"Shit!" the other girl cries as his limp body splashes in the water.
"Go, go, go!" Anna shrieks, motioning towards the boat drifting away. She stares at the unconscious soldier lying in the water, but remains frozen in place. Unable to wait any longer, Anna picks her up like a sack of feathers and dumps her shaking body in the boat.
"Holy shit!" she cries, watching Anna clamber into the boat, "W-why the f-fuck didn't you tell me who you were?"
"No time to talk," Anna says, paddling at the water with her bare hands, "I have to get to Weselton before they find his body."
The girl backs away from Anna into the boat's corner. With widened eyes, she ventures a question.
"Y-you're not really a monster are you?" she asks, "I-I mean, w-we slept together at night."
"No, god no!" Anna scowls, "The next thing they'll be saying would be flames streaming from my nostrils and thunderbolts coming out of my arse!"
"Well, why the hell are you going to Weselton?" she asks, "Y-you're royalty aren't you?"
"Look, if your sisters were in trouble, you'd go to whatever lengths you could to save them, wouldn't you?"
Without another word, the girl seats herself behind Anna and paddles with all her might. The splotches of seawater on Anna's arms gives off a rippling sheen beneath the sunlight as she picks up a rhythm, and the boat zips through the water like a dolphin.
She watches the Princess of Arendelle push their boat into the pebbly shores of Weselton, orange sunlight dancing off her slick red hair like it were soaked in blood. The royalty of the Southern Isles' would have her believe that nobility was some far away concept hidden behind stone castle walls, who changed histories with a single flick of a pen or the stroke of a sword. But before her stood a red-haired girl no different from her peasant sisters, and it all seemed so surreal.
"Look, Anna, I know our Kingdoms are at war...but-"
"There's nothing to say anymore," Anna whispers, pulling the girl into her arms, "you've helped me more than I could've hoped or dreamt for, and I owe you my life."
Despite their friendship, the girl still squirms momentarily within Anna's arms. After hearing all the tales of the Princess's strength, she couldn't imagine Anna's embrace could feel so gentle.
"I have to go," she mutters, allowing herself to linger for another moment within Anna's arms before parting, "the forest you're looking for is an hour's hike up north. Beware though, the border is contested and there're bound to be patrols sweeping the woods."
"Thank you," Anna whispers. Her heart clenches when she watches the girl turn away and start off towards a cluster of houses at the foot of a ridge, but she steels her resolve and makes for the hills.
With the scrap of paper from the palace doctor in one hand and a blazing torch in another, Anna scampers through the forest on tiptoes, searching beneath every tree for that one golden flower which could set everything right. The moonlight filters through the forest canopy in rays of white, casting shadows against the evergreen pine bark.
"Maybe it grows beneath the taller ones," Anna mutters, passing her torch's glare over the tree's roots. A cluster of button mushrooms lingers in the damp soil, but no sign of any flower.
"Christ, I'm going to be here until sunrise," Anna complains, darting to the next tree and continuing her search. She whirls around at the noise of a twig snapping in the distance, but upon seeing nothing but the night fog swirling in the dimness, resumes running from tree to tree.
An uneasy dread settles upon the Princess as the minutes turn into hours. Despite the cold, sweat trickles down her forehead in beads of liquid cold. Each frosty breath she takes exacerbates the gnawing hunger in her belly, and the constant glare of the torch makes her head spin. Amidst the forest's fog, Anna spots two lanterns and hears the faint clinking of armor. Uncertain of whether the sight is real or a hallucination, she hides her torch and presses herself up against a tree trunk, waiting for the shadowy figures to pass.
The surreal sight appears as a glint first; a glimmer of light lingering in the pitch darkness of the forest floor. Anna finds her feet taking her to the light source before she even comprehends what it could be. An aura falls upon her head as she draws nearer to the light; the aching in her joints and the gnawing in her belly fades away, until only a pure sense of complete well-being remains.
She falls to her knees beside the flower, its luminescence bathing her freckled face in a radiant glow. Unable to believe her eyes, Anna leans forward and touches the wound on her shoulder to its petals. A gasp escapes her lips when the dull pain which had haunted her for days disappears into nothingness. She runs her fingers along the wound, but instead of an ugly scar, her skin feels fresh and intact like the day she was born.
"Alright," Anna whispers, pulling out a knife, "time to go home."
She had expected the flower to possess the sweetest of scents, but as Anna leans down and prepares to dig the flower from its roots, her skin prickles with uneasiness, mostly stemming from the sickly cloying and sweet stench invading her nostrils. Anna leans towards the petals and sniffs, only to receive an earthy scent, like moss.
She whirls around to find the source of the smell a moment too late: a lantern filled with incense held by a shadowy figure. The blunt object smashing into her head sends her slamming into the ground. Anna gasps for air as she lies in the earth; her fingers bunch up around tufts of soil in an attempt to stand up, but each incense-filled breath robs more and more of the strength from her limbs.
"Wasn't easy finding this," a voice reaches her ears, "but it appears to be working well on you so far." The smooth drawl turns Anna's blood cold when she recognises it.
The shadowy figure leans closer to Anna, and the stench of incense fades into the cloying aroma of vanilla. The figure pulls the hood from its head, and Anna's eyes widen at the woman with silky blonde hair staring down at her. Blood fills her mouth, its iron taste nothing compared to the utter taste of dread filling the pit of her stomach.
"You will thank me for this one day," Anastasia whispers, shoving her hands beneath the flower and ripping its roots from the soil, "it's better for all of us. Some mortals were born with an unfair advantage anyway."
Anna struggles to move her limbs, but the numbness has already crept to her head. With electricity crackling down her spine, all she manages is a shrill cry, "you fucking whore!" before even the voice is robbed from her. Tears spill down Anna's cheeks as Anastasia flees with the flower tucked under her arm. She tries to think of something, anything that could help her in this predicament, but even hope deserts her when she sees the two lanterns from earlier moving towards her, and shouting in the distance.
She tries to cling onto enough of her consciousness when the soldiers' hands grab at her limbs, but even that too deserts her, and the memory of Elsa's fair, radiant skin remains in her mind until it fades away into blackness.