Chapter 6 – Now what?
I'm back! Onwards with this thrilling saga:
Elsa ran through the castle gates, cursing the wind, and the snow, and the ice, and everyone else.
She turned back towards the gates, and with a sharp wave of her arm closed the gap with a thick wall of ice. The castle was impregnable now, but the rest of Arendelle was still at the mercy of Weselton.
One thing at a time, Elsa reminded herself. Get Anna first. Make sure she's safe. Then sort out the rest of the city.
She wasn't sure if she had her priorities straight as queen, but they were infallible as Anna's older sister.
She bolted into the castle, making a valiant attempt to yell "Anna!" What came out was actually a breathless squeak, but no one was around to hear it, so it didn't matter.
Elsa ran for the staircase, hesitating only slightly when she saw Kai groaning on the floor. A second of agonizing indecision passed before she ran to him first.
"Kai! Are you alright?"
He managed to sit up, clutching at his head. "We've been attacked."
"I know. I need to find Anna."
"Upstairs."
"Call for someone, put the city in lock down." Elsa threw that last command over her shoulder as she ran, leaving snowflakes all over the floor in her panic. Her legs were leaden as she reached the stairs, and where she grabbed the banister it froze immediately.
Elsa was beyond caring. She forced herself to keep running, ignoring the black spots appearing in her vision, and the fact that everything was getting rather blurry. Now was not the time to collapse; she wouldn't rest until Anna was safe.
Elsa tripped up the last step, and landed on her knees in a patch of ice, snowflakes sparking from around her hands. She lurched to her feet again, and wanted to call out to Anna, but her voice wouldn't cooperate, and instead she just thought louder.
I'm coming, Anna. I'm coming.
Anna's heart was beating so hard it was about to hammer right through her ribs and fall on the floor.
She wanted to close her eyes, but no part of her body was listening anymore, and she couldn't tear her gaze away from the tip of Fluggard's sword, arcing away from her as he considered the best possible way to use it.
The childish part of Anna's brain wanted to wake up and find this was all a nightmare. But the blood looked real, and the fear was real, and the paralyzing terror was real. Nightmares have a sense of etherealness to them, but the situation right in front of her was unfolding with shocking clarity.
Anna couldn't gulp. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't move. She heard a little whimper escape from her, as Fluggard raised the sword with certainty.
He was about to swing it, when Anna heard another sound.
This was a small exclamation of all the terror Anna felt but hadn't been able to vocalize, followed by the familiar sound of crackling ice.
Fluggard turned at the sound, and the moment he moved Elsa panicked and encrusted the entire room with ice. It grasped at Fluggard's legs, holding him to the floor, then snaked its way up his body. He hacked at the ice with his sword, chipping away at it, but it rose higher until he was trapped up to his neck, immobilized and freezing.
Anna's sense of relief was incredibly short lived, as the two men holding her raised the cross bows they still had in their free hands, pointed them at Elsa, and fired.
Elsa's eyes snapped closed, her heart leapt into her throat and she tensed her whole body, hands raised to defend herself. One arrow hit the ice jumping up around her, and stilled with the tip embedded. The other sliced right through a thinner section of ice, and into Elsa's raised forearm, penetrating to the bone.
The shock and pain erased the very last of Elsa's self-control, and the next burst of ice was completely out of her control. Elsa felt something tighten in her chest, she felt the ice rise in her with no warning and against her will, and she opened her eyes again just in time to see jagged, pointed spikes leap from the floor and walls and impale the two men holding Anna.
She stared, unable to comprehend what she was seeing. They were both clearly dead, with points of ice jutting right through their bodies, through their limbs and torso's, and slowly turning red. For a moment, absolute silence descended.
Anna stayed where she was, panting, eyes wide, her whole body trembling.
Elsa felt the last few minutes catch up to her, saw the gore that she had caused - she killed two people! – and dropped to her knees. The movement sent another stab of pain through her arm, and she clenched her eyes shut, almost doubling over.
The next sound that escaped her was a sob, desperate and plaintive, then another one, until she was kneeling on the floor crying her eyes out, with blood running down her arm, and on her cheek and all down her back.
Anna stepped forwards cautiously, keeping her eyes on her sister. She saw Elsa's shoulders heave with another sob, and knelt very quietly at Elsa's side. "Elsa?"
A tearful squeak and another hiccupping sob was all the answer she got, and Elsa tried to curl herself into a ball, but there was still an arrow in her arm and everything felt wrong and painful.
Anna put an arm around Elsa's shoulders, then pulled her sister carefully towards her. She swallowed down her own tears. "I'm okay. You saved me. I'm fine."
"I killed two people!" Elsa wailed.
Anna swallowed again, her lip trembling at the effort of holding back her own sobbing. She had no words of comfort just yet. "You're okay, Elsa. I've got you."
After Kai, the member of staff most familiar and trusted by the sisters was Aaron. He was a serious, middle aged man with greying black hair, a little on the chubby side, but incredibly honest and trustworthy.
He was the one who stood now, at Elsa's side, as she sat almost catatonically in the conference room, surrounded by her advisors and other important Arendelle figures.
Kai was present, but nursing a splitting head ache, and he had requested Aaron be there.
A nurse was trying unsuccessfully to attend to Elsa, but she was sitting with her back resolutely against the back of her chair, and her arms folded across her stomach, hands tucked under her elbows. She was staring blankly ahead, her bottom lip occasionally trembling, which meant the only wound the nurse had access to was the least serious; the little cut on Elsa's cheek.
Anna sat across the table from Elsa, tapping her fingers on the wooden table top, and generally being restless. She was torn between staying with her sister and following Kristoff to the infirmary. She had chosen Elsa for now, mostly because Kristoff was unconscious and wouldn't know if she was there or not.
Aaron cleared his throat, and Anna saw Elsa jump at the sound. "Your majesty, I think we need to address this now."
Elsa pressed her lips together a bit harder.
"All the men involved in the attack on the castle are currently detained in the dungeons, and the rest are being guarded on their own ships. There's no danger of them leaving, because the fjord is still frozen."
Anna sent Elsa an uneasy glance. The Snow Queen had dried off her tears, but it was clear that she was barely holding it together.
"A message must be sent to Weselton at once, but we need to know what you would like it to say."
Anna didn't think Elsa was quite up to composition right now. She slumped in her seat. "I'll sort it out, Aaron."
Elsa looked up when she heard Anna's voice, looking startled, as though she had forgotten that there was anyone other than herself in the room.
"We also need to figure out exactly why this took place-"
"It's me, it's always me," Elsa jumped out her seat and began pacing the room. "They have a problem with me." She pressed her fingers to her temples, and Kai finally saw the gash in her arm.
"Queen Elsa, get that seen to at once!"
She wasn't listening. "They attacked because of me!" She spun around, and Kai saw the long cut down her back.
"Queen Elsa!" he sounded mortified. "What on earth happened?" He turned his attention to the nurse. "Do your job before I fire you!"
The nurse scuttled behind Elsa as she paced, armed with cotton swabs to attempt to clean the wound. It would probably be easier if Elsa would stop moving.
But she didn't, she kept pacing around the room, finally clasping her hands together and pressing her knuckles lightly to her bottom lip. "Oh, god, I caused all this!"
"You did not," Anna said. "Don't even say that."
The door to the conference room opened, and a butler entered bearing a small silver tray aloft with an empty glass on it and a little bottle of scotch.
Aaron frowned. "What on earth is that for?"
The butler poured a glass of scotch and moved in the general direction of Elsa. "To calm your nerves, your majesty."
"Don't drink that," Kai said.
Elsa took the glass as she walked past, and it frosted as her fingers closed on it. She threw the glass back in a single gulp, and that made her stop moving for a moment, because it felt like her insides were on fire, and she nearly choked. After forcing the liquid down, she coughed twice, blinked a few times, then continued her pacing.
The butler held the tray as she went past, and Elsa plonked the glass down again.
Both Aaron and Kai were giving him poisonous looks.
"Is that really a good idea?" Kai asked. "A drink? Really?"
"Her father enjoyed a scotch after a stressful day," the butler defended. He poured another.
Elsa's pacing brought her past him again, and she took the glass en route to the other side of the room.
Kai looked livid, but it wasn't his place to complain about what the Queen was or was not doing.
Elsa didn't choke herself this time, and she had to admit the burning sensation was certainly different to the cold she was used to. Not good, by any means, but different. And anyway, she needed a distraction, she reasoned with herself.
The butler appeared again to collect the glass.
Aaron caught hold of Elsa's shoulder as she passed again, forcing her to stop. "Your majesty, please. Sit down. You've had a long day, and you haven't been well."
"Another reason to fill her full of drink," Kai muttered sarcastically.
The butler and magically refilled scotch glass appeared at Elsa's side again. She reached for it, but Kai was a fraction faster and took the glass from between her fingers. "That's quite enough of that, I think."
Elsa frowned, and flopped into her chair again. "I'm not drunk."
"Of course not."
"No one gets drunk on two glasses of scotch."
"Unless they weight as much as a snow ball and haven't eaten all day."
Elsa's fingers returned to her temples, and the poor nurse tried again to see to her arm. "This is all my fault."
Anna sighed. "It's not. Stop saying that."
Elsa folded her arms on the table, much to the annoyance of the nurse, and rested her forehead on them. "Of course it is. It always is. I'm a terrible queen."
My god, that scotch was strong.
"Weselton can wait until the morning," Aaron said gently. "It's getting late. Go to bed, and we'll address the issue first thing."
"Nurse first, then bed," Kai corrected hastily.
Elsa didn't lift her head.
Anna stood up, and went slowly to Elsa's side. She laid a hand on her shoulder, the uninjured one. "Elsa. Come on. Let's go to bed."
Elsa mumbled something into her arms.
"It's not your fault." Anna repeated firmly. "Come on. I'll stay with you tonight."
Kai was about to make his nurse argument again when Elsa sighed, and slowly stood up again. Anna kept her arm around her, and pointed her at the door.
"But the-"
"Not now," Anna snapped at Kai. "Just let her sleep."
Kai held his tongue.
Anna guided Elsa up the stairs, and now that the adrenaline had left her system, Anna felt bone tired. It was a little hard to tell who was leaning on whom by the time they reached Elsa's room. Anna closed the door softly, then rummaged in Elsa's closet for a night dress to borrow. By the time she turned around, Elsa had fallen face first onto the bed and seemed very intent on staying there.
Anna slid under the blankets beside her, for a second worrying that Elsa would get cold where she was, then remembering that that was a very unlikely scenario. She hadn't noticed how long the cut on Elsa's back was, but she could see it clearly now. Her hand hovered over it for a moment, then she drew her arms under the blankets.
Elsa's eyes were closed, so Anna assumed she was already asleep. She settled a bit more comfortably against the pillows, and closed her eyes as well.
Oh, Elsa, sweetie, it'll be alright. Poor girl. I will update soon, as soon as I figure out where to go from here, because I only planned this far into the story and now I'm kind of winging it. Let's see what happens.
SpicedGold