All or Nothing

She'd thought about it, of course, agonized over it. A few times she'd gotten up from where she'd been trying and failing to bury herself in work to find Merida, throw herself at her feet and beg for forgiveness, but every time she'd made it as far as the door and stopped dead, unable to go any further.

Just because it was the right thing to do didn't make it easy.

There was a sullen pall hanging over the castle. The servants were sulky and bored now that their interesting visitors had left. Elsa had been hiding away in her office since the...incident... at the table, taking all her meals there and inventing paperwork when there was none left to occupy herself with.

And Merida...

Elsa hadn't seen her at the tower, although she knew Lua was being fed and exercised. She had managed not to run into her at the dining table because mostly Merida hadn't been leaving her room to eat, and if she was haunting the halls again like she had at the start of her stay she chose to do it in the hours Elsa was asleep or working.

A full week had passed before anything happened.

That anything was Anna, who flung open Elsa's office door with such fury the doorknob took a chunk out of the wall. Elsa, startled, almost flung a sheet of ice at her but managed to stop herself.

"Anna," she sputtered. "What...?"

"You need to talk to her. Now."

Elsa thought to feign ignorance for a moment, but Anna's expression was murderous. She's never seen her cheerful little sister so angry.

"I don't think it would do much good," she mumbled instead, and winced at how mulish it sounded when spoken aloud.

"You have to," Anna hissed, stomping over to the table. "She won't listen to me. She's packing up her stuff, she says she's leaving tonight!"

The word leaving hit Elsa like a fist. She blanched, searched for composure and couldn't find it through her growing panic.

"She can't leave," she blurted out. "That's insane, she has nowhere to go!"

"That's what I said," Anna told her, throwing up her arms. "I told you, she won't listen to me! She said she's 'clearly outstayed her welcome.'

Elsa groaned, rubbed her temples to keep her shame at bay.

"I didn't mean it, I don't know what came over me."

Yes, you do. You know exactly what came over you.

"Don't tell me, tell her! And do it quick!" Anna yelled, grabbing Elsa by the wrists and hauling her out of her chair.

Elsa fought against her sister's efforts to shove her out of the door, as much as she didn't want Merida to leave the idea of even talking to her again made her feel panicky. Anna half-pushed, half-dragged her across the office floor as Elsa dug in her heels and tried to pull herself loose.

"Anna, no, I can't..."

"You can and you will..."

"Just...ow! Let me go...!"

"You get up there and you make this better!"

Anna proved too strong in the end, Elsa took a moment to wonder how that had happened as Anna shoved her bodily into the hall, slammed the door and locked it.

"Don't come back 'til you've fixed it!" she called from inside.

Well. What choice did she have?

Her heartbeat thrummed sluggishly as she dragged herself through the corridors to Merida's room. Thankfully there were no servants around (probably all downing brandy in the kitchens) to ask her if she was okay. She might have turned around had she encountered one.

She stood outside Merida's door for a solid three minutes before she knocked. When there was no answer, she opened it softly and entered.

Merida's back was to her; she didn't hear her come inside. A small burlap sack, half-full, was squatting on the bed like a toad. She was holding up two dresses and threw one down with an annoyed huff, stuffed the other one into the sack as if it had insulted her somehow.

"What are you doing?" Elsa asked, quietly but sharply.

Truthfully, she would have liked Merida to be angry with her when she turned around, to spit at her that it was none of her damned business. Or cold silence, a refusal to acknowledge that she was there at all.

Instead, she looked right at Elsa, tense and nervous.

"I'm leaving," she answered after a moment.

"Why?" Elsa blurted out, far more harshly than she meant to. "Where could you possibly go?"

"I'll figure something out," Merida mumbled, stuffing a pair of flat shoes into the sack. "I've stayed here for far too long. I've taken advantage of your hospitality, and I'm sorry for that. I won't trouble you much longer."

A flare of anger bubbled up inside of Elsa, directed more at herself than at Merida.

"You can't. I won't allow it," she growled.

"You can't stop me," Merida shot back.

Yes I can. I have to. Somehow.

"Everything you own is property of the crown," she sputtered. "You're not permitted to remove it from Arendelle."

It looked like Merida might lash out for a moment, her face crumpled with sudden fury, and just as suddenly it was gone.

"Saves me the trouble of packing then," she muttered, tossing the sack off the bed. She stalked past Elsa and went for the door...

….only for Elsa to shoot a spout of ice across the handles, fusing them shut. It had happened instinctually, she barely felt herself do it, just knew she had to do something, anything to stop her. She stood with her hand outstretched, wanting to say something but unable to form words.

"What? Do you need the clothes I'm wearing, too?" Merida turned on her in a rage.

Elsa stared at her, speech stuck in her throat and refused to move.

"You don't want me here," Merida continued. "I asked you to make me a servant and you wouldn't. You could have sent me to the refugee town and you didn't. What do you want from me?"

Elsa couldn't stop it.

It fell out of her mouth, she couldn't catch it.

"I want you."

The words hung in the air, and now Merida's anger was obscured by confusion. If she could, Elsa would have clawed the words back, buried them inside of her so they would never surface again.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Merida asked her, shrugging helplessly.

"I don't want you to leave me," Elsa whispered, because now that the words were out they wouldn't stop falling. "I want you to stay with me. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

The first sob burst out of her and it brought her to her knees, it burned and ached but at the same time it was blessed relief. She couldn't even see Merida anymore, the tears were coming so fast and every time she tried to wipe them away there were more.

"You took my heart," she sputtered between heaving breathes. "The first time I saw you, you took my heart and you've had it ever since. If you leave me, you'll take my heart with you."

Distantly, she felt herself being gently pulled forward, her hands tugged away from her face and her tears wiped away. Merida's face swam back into focus through her bleary vision. Astonishingly, she didn't look angry anymore.

"That's what all this has been about?" she asked. "You've got...a thing for me? Is that right?"

A year and a half of feverish longing reduced to a thing. Even through her tears, Elsa had to laugh. She nodded, tremulously.

Merida made an odd sound under her breath, awkwardly pushed back her hair.

"Are...are you sure about that?" she asked. "I mean...have you seen you?"

"All I see is you," Elsa mumbled.

Merida made the sound again. Then, she took a deep breath and seemed to decide on something. Elsa steeled herself. Rejection would be hard, but it couldn't be worse than...

"All right then," Merida shrugged.

….what?

"What?" Elsa blurted out.

"We'll give it a go," Merida told her, as if it was just that easy.

Elsa gaped, her mouth once again opened and shut with no sound. This was better than she could have hoped for.

"I don't think I feel as strongly as you do," Merida continued, and now a rosy blush suffused her cheeks and swallowed up her freckles. "But I like you, I'm willing to try it out."

"Yes," Elsa said at last. "Yes, please."

She smiled, though a few stray tears trickled through, and she could honestly say she had never been so happy in her life. Merida laughed.

"If it makes you smile like that, it has to be a good thing," she said.

It was risky, and could shatter this thing that had been decided between them, but when Elsa took Merida's face in her hands and pulled her forward to bring their mouths together, she didn't pull away. They kissed, and it was tear-stained and salty but it was mutual and so sweet Elsa never wanted it to end.

Suddenly exhausted, Elsa slumped forward, and Merida caught her to cradle her against her chest.

"I'd best unpack then," Merida grumbled, and despite herself Elsa laughed.

…..

The first weeks of their relationship (oh, what a thing to have! Even the word made Elsa grin like a halfwit) were comprised of stolen kisses, fleeting touches and crippling shyness. They had hurried moments in Elsa's office where Elsa would pull Merida onto her lap and press her mouth to hers, and trace along her throat to her collarbone. Merida didn't reciprocate quite, but let Elsa do as she pleased.

They had moments at the dining table where one would gently tap the other's foot with hers discreetly, to show she was thinking of her. When they passed each other in the hall they would risk a quick stroke of the other's hand.

Merida accepted it all with good humour, though now with her feelings out in the open Elsa's mind was plagued with a new worry; that her own feelings were so much stronger, and she could never quite know what Merida was thinking. She seemed to enjoy the affection, and it was quite enough to keep Elsa satisfied, but she was always wary of pushing her too far too fast.

And the thought of being discovered weighed on her too, she's had to warn Merida that it was technically against the law in Arendelle for two women to be together in this manner.

"So?" Merida had shrugged, playing casually with the end of Elsa's braid as she sat on her lap. "I'm not from Arendelle, and you're the queen."

"It's not that simple," Elsa groaned, running her fingers along Merida's spine.

"It should be. Whose business is it what we do with each other?"

"There are those in the castle that would make it their business," Elsa mused. "We should figure something out, if you spend too much time in here the servants will gossip."

Then it occurred to her; the sally port. Nobody had taken any notice of Meena while she used it.

"There's a passage in the castle almost nobody knows about," she told Merida. "It leads right to my chambers."

"Why would they build something like that in the castle?" Merida asked, astonishingly innocent.

"I think it was built to smuggle in the old king's mistresses," Elsa answered. "That's why it's called a sally port, some of the kings were very fond of prostitutes."

"Is that what I am then? A 'sally'?" Merida laughed, and Elsa gave her an affectionate little squeeze.

"No, of course not," Elsa said. "But it is very discreet, Meena used it for months and nobody..."

She stopped, but of course she had said far too much. Merida frowned down at her, crossed her arms.

"Meena? The women with half a dress?"

Elsa gulped and nodded.

"What was she doing in the sally port, then? If it leads right to your chambers."

"She was providing me with a ...service," Elsa mumbled. Her cheeks flamed and she knew it served to make her look guilty.

"What service?" Merida asked sharply.

"You tell me, you were the one talking to her for three months," Elsa shot back.

"She was talking to me, I was just being polite," Merida growled. "But she came here to see you, didn't she?"

"We didn't do anything," Elsa finally bit out. " I couldn't. Not for lack of trying on her part..."

"Stop, I don't want to hear any more," said Merida, getting up and making for the office door.

Elsa trotted after her, caught her just before she reached the door. She couldn't let her leave angry.

"Meena was a mistake," she admitted. "Please don't hold it against me."

Merida pouted for a moment, then nodded. She gave Elsa a quick, fleeting kiss, and then was gone.

Elsa stayed in her office and mused on it for a little while, and a pleased satisfaction filled her. She could not tell what Merida was thinking, truly, if she was just going along with all of this to make Elsa happy and because perhaps she found the kissing and touching pleasant.

But she had gotten angry at the thought of Elsa with someone else, and that in and of itself was promising.