The Sky Is Awake
IX. People Don't Really Change
Elsa looked up in time to see the last leaf fall from the tree outside her window. She put down her pen, glanced at the date she had written at the top of the letter and felt a cold wind stir in her stomach. This time of year always came too quickly.
A knock at the door. Three orderly raps instead of the upbeat rhythm that usually echoed in her heart. Elsa blinked. "Kai?"
"Your Highness, I have your morning meal."
Elsa turned back to the window and her gaze landed on the tallest watchtower, barely visible behind the north wing. It was a frozen tempest in winter, and eventually her father had reformed the guard's patrols to spare them from the watchtower on the worst nights. But not all the tower's visitors were guards. Some were curious children trapped behind closed gates.
"I'm coming."
Outside, Kai waited patiently with a tray, neat and proper. When Anna delivered meals, she always tried to strike a pose as Elsa opened the door, more often than not sending the drinks flying.
Kai bowed. "Shall I bring it inside for you, my lady?" He and Gerda always asked, no matter how many times she refused them, and Elsa always did. Always.
She wondered if Anna had appetite for breakfast.
To his credit, Kai only smiled when Elsa nodded and held the door open. She clenched and unclenched her gloved fingers as he set the tray down on her desk. Eventually, she found her voice. "How is Anna?"
"Bedridden, I'm afraid," Kai answered, "although Master Smolt assures me her fever will pass. He was rather upset to find the princess back in his clinic so soon."
A smile flickered across Elsa's lips. "Was she looking for them again?" And Kai must have known she meant the decorations, because he nodded meaningfully. "Are they beautiful this year?" Elsa asked quietly.
"Always, Your Highness. Gerda went down to the village recently. She tells me the citizens are organising a marching band."
Music. There had always been music when they went with Father and Mother. "Spread word that those under royal service are free to participate if they wish. I'm aware they've not had much chance to perform in court recently."
"Of course, Your Highness." Kai began to tidy the papers Elsa had been working on, which only gave away his hesitation because he had never doubted that Elsa could manage her room on her own, even as a child. "May I inquire; how are the– other preparations faring?"
And suddenly Elsa's fear for this season grew, because she could no longer stand behind her father and let him speak for her. She managed to keep her voice steady. "You're holding them."
Kai looked at the letters. She could almost hear him thinking, wondering, if they were the reason for the shadows under her eyes. "I know I have already suggested this last week," Kai began, "but the governors would gladly have taken this burden off your hands."
"It isn't a burden. This is my responsibility."
Kai looked at her sadly. It struck Elsa that he and the staff were getting older; that she was, too. "With all due respect, Princess Elsa," Kai said softly, "your coronation is still a while away. There is no need for you to take on a queen's duties so early."
She closed her eyes, kept her hands – gloves – clasped in front of her. "It's just for this one time. One day," she added, as if that changed anything. Kai bowed his head and said nothing. Elsa took in a breath, exhaled, and felt the tension in her neck ease, just a little. "Kai?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Has it already been a year?"
His sad eyes flickered to the king's portrait on her wall. "Almost, ma'am."
She nodded. She gave him a small smile. "Thank you, Kai."
He smiled back. "The festival looks lovely this year, Your Highness." There was a hint of suggestion in his voice. Elsa caught it, and shook her head. His smile did not falter.
As Kai began to leave the room, Elsa spoke up. "Do you know, Kai? What she wants this year?"
He paused at the door and seemed to consider this. Then he chuckled. "I believe you are asking the wrong person, Princess Elsa."
OoOoO
Two. That was Elsa's solution by nightfall. Over the next week, at least half a dozen ships would dock at Arendelle's shores, and among them were two particular dignitaries that she needed to watch carefully. Father had said so last year.
But this year was different. This year, Elsa was all that stood between Arendelle's politics, and Anna.
It was just one day.
Her head fell back against the straight back of her chair, a soft sigh escaping. Her stomach was empty, her dinner sitting cold at the edge of her desk. It had been left outside her door with a quick knock – which was not like Kai, but Elsa hadn't had the mind to pay it any attention. Now, as she pulled the tray towards her and saw the gold-foiled bunny tucked beneath the napkin, she understood why.
No, not like Kai at all.
She would have made a strange sight, walking down the icy corridors without a coat. Elsa knew she should take one, just in case someone saw her and wondered—but there was a dull throb in her temple and she simply did not want to think about anything. She only wanted to check, that was all.
She stopped in front of her old bedroom door.
Elsa leaned in to listen, her hand on the doorknob. The silence reminded her of the night Anna had slept outside their parents' room. She thought of the watchtower, cold and dark. Then she heard something – a scratchy sound not unlike congested plumbing, and she rested her brow against the wood. For a while, she simply stood there, listening.
Because she'd done the same thing, this time last year, until her mother had exited with an empty soup bowl and found her there. Your sister makes a terrible patient, she'd said. Elsa had started to smile, but then her mother asked, Would you like to see the festival this year, Elsa? And her gloves had almost not been enough.
I can't, Mother.
That was not the question, sweetheart.
Mother… please.
The queen had shaken her head, but she had never given up quite as easily as her husband. What starts with Anna and ends with Elsa? she'd sung softly, the way she used to before the gates closed on her daughters' own festival.
And Elsa had stayed silent, even though she knew the answer deep in her heart, always. She should have said something, anything. But that was the last time she'd talked with her mother alone, before she boarded the ship… and then it was too late to say anything at all.
Tonight, Elsa had to open the door on her own.
She turned the handle.
The moon greeted her through the window, hovering in the frame as if it had been waiting for her. Immediately, Elsa's eyes fell on the bed; not because she had been searching for it, but because Anna had moved it into Elsa's former spot, where the sky's light could always reach. The silhouette of half a dozen blankets piled on top.
Elsa drew her hands to her chest and looked around. The desk, the bookshelf, the battered chest of old toys… She touched the wall next to her, and smiled in the darkness.
Anna hadn't changed anything.
Then Elsa's eyes fell on the floor.
Anna snorted in her sleep.
Elsa gingerly stepped over a tangle of dresses in her path, then another… and another. Finally, she sighed. She turned around and picked them all up. As she draped everything over the armchair, Elsa's gaze lingered on the dolls lining Anna's desk. Their stitched smiles beamed up at her, and she realised with a strange feeling in her chest that she recognised most of them. She straightened them gently.
A fitful scuffling came from the bed. Slowly, Elsa moved closer. Anna was barely visible beneath the blankets, her wild hair a dark mess under the moonlight. Elsa knelt down and peered at her sister's sleeping face. Anna still drooled, still slept in awkward positions. She still looked like the child Elsa knew.
But the silver strand glistened like frost – and Elsa remembered a flash of ice in her fingers, that day outside the physician's door. She drew back—
—and bumped into the bedside table. A book clattered to the floor.
Elsa held her breath.
Anna slept on.
Moving slowly, Elsa picked up the book. It had fallen open at the middle, a pen clipped in the pages; a combination she did not expect to find at Anna's bedside. Curious, she brought it to the light. And smiled.
She moved to the window ledge. It was exactly the same as the one in her room, but for some reason this felt smaller, as if the space could not recognise her longer legs. Elsa pulled them to her chest, propped the book against her knees, and picked up the pen. Then she paused, because she thought she'd caught a glimpse of the auroras through the dark clouds – and Elsa wondered.
She wondered about the festival. She wondered when Anna's geometry homework was due. She wondered if her parents were somewhere in the lights, watching. And she wondered how long she could stay in this moment, right here.
OoOoO
"Psst, Elsa!"
She was dreaming of snow in the great hall – but not of that night. Of every other night that her sister had climbed into her bed and asked that one, special question. She dreamed of Olaf.
"Wake up, wake up, wake up!"
Elsa opened her eyes with a gasp, and the snow snapped straight to her fingertips. A familiar blanket slid off her shoulders. "Anna-"
"Shh! It's coming!"
She knew that – the ice was on her skin, slithering up the wall at her back – she couldn't hold it back. "Anna, please, you have to-"
The sky burst alight.
Anna squealed.
Fractals of colour danced in Elsa's eyes.
"One!" Anna laughed. "Two!" As a second blazing trail streaked into the dark sky, blooming bright green. "Three!"
And they kept coming, one after another, until the night was blanketed with smoke and her sister's laughter. One last firework flew higher than the others, hanging suspended for a fraction of a second-
"Sixteen," Elsa whispered, as a distant cheer rang from the village. Midnight. Five days later, there would be nineteen.
Anna squeezed her hand. Elsa looked over and watched the fading fireworks flash in her sister's bright eyes. Anna grinned back.
Guess what? she mouthed. The sky's awake.
And so it was.
"I'm sorry," Elsa murmured.
The lights wavered in Anna's bemused gaze. "For what?"
That you get sick every year, trying to see your own birthday celebrations.
Looking at her weirdly, Anna suddenly leaned over. "Is that my homework?" She flipped through the pages and made a face. "Did I really get every question wrong?"
Elsa ran a hand over the folds of the blanket – her blanket. "Not every one… only the majority."
"Right… oh no, hang on-" Anna's face scrunched up. "Achoo!" She felt around for the tissue box. Elsa gently pushed it into her hand. "Ub, danks. Ugh. Watchtower in winter? Bad idea. Wait, I think I said that last year."
The ice was at her back again.
Anna blew her nose loudly. "But you know, it's totally worth it, getting sick and all, because you can see everything up there – I think they're having a marching band this year. How cool is that? They haven't had one since the last time we… went." She grimaced.
That had been ten – eleven – years ago.
Elsa rested her head on her knees.
After a long while, Anna said, "Hey, Elsa?"
She turned her head slightly. Anna was sitting with her back against the ledge, too close, too warm. But Elsa was too tired to feel the ice anymore.
"Happy birthday."
For the first time in forever, she wasn't hearing it through a keyhole. Behind her eyelids, Elsa pictured a warm table and the king and queen's smiles as their daughters sang birthday wishes to each other, every day, until the final fireworks on the fifth day; always three more in the sky than there had been on the first.
The winter festival used to be theirs. It still was.
Elsa's fingers lightly brushed the top of Anna's head, as if everything were dust. Their weight settled for a short moment. "Happy birthday to you, too, Anna."
And it only lasted seconds, but it must have been enough for Anna, because she made to nestle her head against Elsa's side. Then she hesitated. "Can I?" she asked.
Elsa remembered a time when her sister was so much smaller and only asked questions that had no answers. That time was supposed to be an eternity away… but in this room, all it took was one word: "Okay."
Anna curled up, hugging the geometry book. Elsa draped the blanket over her.
Anna yawned. "I miss Mama's chicken soup."
Elsa closed her eyes and felt her body relax. "Do you ever wish, Anna?" she asked softly.
"Hmm?"
"That you were a normal girl."
She felt Anna's head shift. "Do you?"
"I can't."
"That wasn't really the question."
Elsa smiled faintly. No. No, it wasn't.
"Elsa?"
What starts with Anna and ends with Elsa?
"It's alright, Anna. Go to sleep."
Outside, the northern lights shimmered.
Everything.
A/N: Alas, I have rewritten and scrapped this chapter four times. I am done.
It's my headcanon that the sisters were both born in winter, and that Arendelle turned the five days between their birthdays into an annual festival. So as children, Anna and Elsa treated the entire festival as their mutual birthday. Because if Rapunzel can have lanterns, our sisters can have fireworks. Fanfic liberties galore! Also, thanks to darkrunner's wonderful oneshots, my headcanon now believes that Kai is the bomb - check out their fic Kjærlighet Vil Tine!
As always, thank you all so much for reading!
8/2/2020 note: Before finding out their birthdays, my headcanon was that Elsa and Anna's birthdays were both in winter, five days apart and celebrated by a week-long festival. Hope that gives enough context. Also, the amazing laikaken drew fanart for this chapter—please check it out in the end notes and give it some love!