"Look out, Your Majesty!"
Elsa ducked just in time to avoid the snowball pelted by Nilda, the younger of Lord Jorn's great-granddaughters. The snowball flew over the top of her head, thanks to Albine's warning. The girls, eight and eleven years old respectively, rivaled the energy of Anna and herself when they had been that age.
As if laying out a sheet, Elsa flung her hands up to summon a miniature storm of soft snowballs, which she dropped over the giggling Nilda. Nilda squeaked and tried to catch the dozens of snowballs in her arms as they fell upon her, some plopping gently upon her grinning face. Most bounced off of her head crowned by her mouse brown braids. Albine pointed and laughed at her sister until Nilda flung some of the snowballs at her next. The queen stood back and watched the siblings as she reminisced about days of old when she and Anna used to play with snow.
"Albi! Nil! Come now, you still have to take baths!"
Elsa looked up to find the girls' mother calling down from the safety of the terrace overlooking the back lawn, which Elsa had temporarily transformed into a winterscape.
"But we were going to skate with Queen Elsa again!" Nilda protested.
"Yeah!" Albine agreed, shaking their skirts to rid them of remaining snow. Apparently, the sisters were allies now.
Lady Margaret smiled at Elsa, but gave her two daughters a firm shake of her head. "You can't bother Her Majesty all evening."
"But Mamma...!"
Both girls started up with excuses of how special the occasion was. They'd had no idea Queen Elsa would be so much fun, and oh, they had no lessons this evening, so couldn't they play just a bit longer? Elsa held back a giggle as she watched the young mother above grow sterner by the second. She was just about to reassure the children that she would return another time when their father walked out to join his wife. He must have seen Lady Margaret's growing impatience, for he put an arm around her and murmured something that softened her gaze.
"You two little ladies come in now or you'll get no story before bed," he warned them.
The sisters exchanged horrified looks and then scrambled to race back to the mansion, giggling at each other as they slipped and slid across the snowy grounds.
"You know your children well, Lord Viggo," Elsa shouted up merrily, still somewhat awed by the girls' sudden cooperation. Lady Margaret took her husband's hand and smiled proudly. Elsa could see the resemblance between the girls and their parents quite clearly now.
"You'll understand yours well too one day, Your Majesty," Lady Margaret said. "You played well with my daughters today. It's been an honor."
Elsa felt herself brighten at the thought of having children of her own one day. She had never allowed herself to fully consider becoming a mother because of her magical burden, but... truthfully, she did like children.
"The honor was mine," she said. She briefly thought back to the woman with the baby she encountered when fleeing from her coronation ball. It was a relief that not all mothers were frightened for their children's safety around her. "Thank you!"
The parents bowed together before they turned to go inside, their arms linking. Elsa watched their backs fade from view before she walked toward the patio herself. Lord Jorn stood leaning against the open ballroom double doorframe, smiling as she approached.
"Ahem..."
Elsa stopped in place and looked at him. He pointed to the land behind her still covered in snow. With a small gasp, she drew her arm out in a semi-circle, quickly thawing the winter scene until it was again summer grass and garden under the shadows of the growing dusk. When she was done, she turned toward him with a sheepish grin.
"Forgive me, Lord Jorn! I was having so much fun, I forgot myself."
The elderly lord chuckled and shook his head. "You had fun, Your Majesty. There is nothing to forgive." He looked as if he were having an inward debate with himself as he idly scratched his whiskery chin. Conscious of this, Elsa took the other side of the wide frame and casually rested there while she waited for him to decide whether to speak.
Finally, he did.
"It's been many years since I've seen you smile that much."
Elsa stiffened as years of solitude and struggle flooded her mind. She tried to think of the last time Lord Jorn would have seen her prior to her parents' deaths. The king and queen had tried so hard to keep the nobility from learning about Elsa's magic that she had not interacted with most of them after the accident with Anna.
"Anna and I used to play like that when we were that age. It seemed like... well, with my powers, there was nothing we couldn't do."
Lord Jorn did not comment when she paused.
"But children can be reckless... and of course, there was eventually an incident where my sister was hurt."
The lord turned toward her in surprise. "Is that when they closed up the castle?"
Elsa nodded.
"I figured it had something to do with you," he admitted. "But back then, of course, people had no idea."
Now, it was Elsa's turn to be surprised. She had often wondered what the kingdom thought when her parents isolated the entire family and the castle.
"Yes... Father and Mother were worried, so they kept my magic hidden. Even Anna had no memory of it after she woke up. And so, our sisterly bond was just swept away after that... and after our parents' deaths."
"You have each other now though," Lord Jorn pointed out. "Better late than never."
Elsa frowned, looking past the long lawn toward the trees across the mountains at the kingdom's back. "That might be true, but I already failed Anna again. She's out there somewhere..."
Thankfully, Lord Jorn said nothing about that. While she was sure her sister would disagree, Elsa could not help but feel responsible for Anna's disappearance. If only she had not been so hard on her when Prince Hans vanished. She'd sort of just... panicked.
Anna's safe. Love you.
The queen relaxed as she recalled the message scratched into the kitchen wall. Somehow, Anna had gotten that message to her. It was inexplicable, but Elsa could trust that Anna was all right.
Kristoff, on the other hand...
"Your Majesty?"
"It's nothing. But I should be heading back to the castle."
Kristoff had hidden Pabbie's flight boots under the furs on his bed. That was where they'd remain until he could figure a way out of the Ice Maiden's fortress. Even if he could find an exit, the ice minions lurked about in the entrance hall, so there was always someone to watch him come and go between the corridor with his room and the mirror hall, where he worked. They didn't bother locking either his bedroom or the mirror hall, so clearly they trusted that he would not be able to escape.
Even if he could get away, it would mean leaving Sven behind. He let out a tight-lipped sigh of resignation as he carefully added yet another shard to the mirror puzzle. The idea of leaving Sven and the other ice prisoners in that room made his skin crawl. Would Elsa be able to defrost them or would they have to force the Ice Maiden to? He had no idea. But if Kristoff was certain of anything, it was that it was only a matter of time before the Ice Maiden noticed her 'vault' had been broken into. He wasn't certain of how she'd react, but he was fairly sure he did not want to be around to find out.
So, therein lied the rub. He didn't want to leave Sven behind, but he couldn't help him without Elsa. There was no way out, but he had to escape before the Ice Maiden discovered that he planned to.
He almost missed the opening of the hall door over his own grumbling, but he looked up to see the Ice Maiden enter. She looked as cold and stoic as ever. Kristoff rolled his eyes and went back to sorting through mirror fragments. In just that day, he'd added six pieces to the growing completed section, not that this impressed his captor. The Ice Maiden stood over him crouched on the floor, checking his progress without comment.
"What's with this thing, anyway?" he asked. Of course, sensing that she would not answer, it felt more like talking to himself. Regardless, he picked up a fragment and turned it over as he looked up at her. "It shows things sometimes. Like... visions or something."
The Ice Maiden did not so much as raise her eyebrow. Scowling, Kristoff stood with the fragment in his hand. "What, it hasn't shown you anything? Or you just don't want to tell me?" He chuckled darkly when she remained silent, thrusting the fragment out towards her as he snapped. "Well?!"
The Ice Maiden flinched away from his hand, curiously enough.
"What?" he asked. He noticed then that she would not look directly at the mirror shard, her cool eyes instead focusing on his wrist. "You can't look at it?" He lifted his hand and sure enough, the Ice Maiden's gaze shifted again to avoid staring at it.
"You're not making much progress," she said, surprisingly calm. He'd expected her to lose her temper.
"I'm not... I'm sorry, what? Maybe I would've made more progress with a little help." He was careful not to squeeze the mirror piece in his hand so hard that he'd cut himself again, but he did step toward her and practically shoved it in her face. "But you seem to be unable to even look at this thing...!"
The Ice Maiden took a couple of steps back, her eyes wide for all of a second before she glared at him. "I can't. As you said."
He wondered what would happen if he threw it at her. But he knew better. She'd see it coming. Then she might actually starve him to death. Dying hungry and cold in the lonely fortress was not the end he wanted for himself. He'd sooner set the place to flames.
And then, glancing down at the mirror shard in his hand, an idea struck him.
"Oh...?" he said, pulling the fragment close to his face as though looking into it. "That's interesting."
"What is it?"
He held back a victorious smile as he looked up at her again.
"I see a ship."
The Ice Maiden's stony face faltered. He caught her almost looking at the fragment, but she stopped herself.
"What else?"
With a shrug, he turned the mirror back and forth in his hand, making a grand show of an attempt to view the scene from better angles. Though in truth, the mirror showed nothing but his reflection at the moment.
"The captain has a mirror shard," he lied, hoping the deception was not obvious. Luckily for him, the Ice Maiden was not looking at him. She looked off toward the open door.
"Where is this ship? Can you see its surroundings?"
He almost bit his lip in thought, but he stopped himself in time as she turned to face him again.
Think. Think quickly.
"Uh... no, it's just all ocean around it," he said. He did not want to lead her toward any civilization lest she take it out on innocent people nearby once she discovered the lie. "See?" For safe measure, he tried once more to get her to look at the mirror shard.
Again, her icy expression cracked as she averted her eyes which betrayed her growing impatience... and something else. Wariness? Fear?
"What does the ship look like?"
Well, crap. He didn't know a whole lot about ships.
"Oh, well it's a... big ship with... white sails and a... oh, there's a flag." He had to give her something distinct to chase after, right? "A purple flag with a golden sun. It's a Coronan flag, then. In the middle of the ocean... yep." He felt himself sweat while he waited to see whether she believed him. He wouldn't believe him.
The Ice Maiden paused for a mere two seconds before she hurried away from him, startling the ice harvester with her haste. She hesitated just outside of the mirror hall and yelled something incomprehensible. Kristoff's rising hopes were crushed when one of the ice minions came to their mistress's call as a replacement to watch over him. But he couldn't help but be relieved when he heard the howling winds outside as the Ice Maiden flung her fortress doors open.
He pocketed the mirror fragment before the minion entered the hall. His plan was crazy. But he had to try, and he would have to act quickly. There would only be so much time before the Ice Maiden figured out his lie.
And he could not be around when she returned.
It was surprisingly easy for Kristoff to go back to his room. He only had to tell his new 'supervisor' that he had to go relieve himself. She turned in disgust, quickly waving him out of the hall as though she expected him to go right in front of her if he didn't leave immediately. Some part of him was stunned that the minion even understood what he meant. Ice minions didn't need to eat or use the privy, did they?
Well, perhaps the Ice Maiden did, and that was why they understood.
"Ugh, focus," he said to himself as he closed his bedroom door behind him. He noticed his hands were trembling. But there was no time to be nervous. First, he collected the red flight boots from their hiding place in his bed. Then, he took the matchbox from where he'd left it on the mantel.
If I see a fire outside of this room, I will see that you starve to death.
The Ice Maiden's threat rang hollow. She'd have to catch him before she made him starve.
He started up a fire in the fireplace and grabbed the tongs off the wall to lift a burning, broken piece of wood. This he flung onto his pelt-covered bed before plucking another flaming piece of wood and setting that on the empty dresser. Then, he took the fire poker to prod one of the lit logs out onto the floor, well away from his feet. He waited only till the flames spread to the floorboards before he dropped the fire tool and fled the room, the flight boots in his arms. He ran toward where the corridor met the entrance hall and shouted, "Help! Fire!" without stopping, hoping upon hope that the ice minions would follow his voice and not him. He was also counting on them to stop the flames before they spread to vault, figuring that the minions would not let the place burn down.
He glanced over his shoulder, glad to see flickering orange light against the corridor walls as the flames in his room continued to grow.
Kristoff stopped before the mirror hall's open door, popping just his head in so the minion wouldn't see the boots in his hands.
"Um... we have a fiery situation out here!" he yelled in. The ice minion snapped to attention and glided across the hall to meet him at the door like she expected him to come in.
He tried shouting, "Fire!" next. Maybe the ice minions needed simpler communication, because that seemed to work better. She shrieked and flew past him into the entrance hall. He turned to hide the boots behind his back but the ice minion did not look back at him as she rushed toward the sleeping corridor, which by now was packed with both smoke and screeching ice minions.
Kristoff looked out to the main fortress doors, not entirely surprised to find them shut once again. The Ice Maiden wasn't stupid. She wouldn't have made it that easy for him. That left only one other option he could think of. He hurried into the mirror hall, clumsily stuffing his feet into Pabbie's flight boots. He started floating upward before he could tie his boot strings. It took some struggling, but he managed to tie them before he reached the hall ceiling. He pushed off with his left hand, then his right, 'walking' with his hands against the ceiling until he reached one of the high snow-covered windows. His still trembling hands fumbled with the latch. Finally, he undid it and pushed against the window, meeting some resistance from the snow against the glass. He grunted and pushed again, harder this time. But the window wouldn't budge. He swallowed back the rising panic that all of this would have been for naught and did the next best thing he could think of; he pulled at the window, nearly giving himself a gleeful heart attack as it flung inward, the wall of snow falling down into the mirror hall. He burrowed through the last of it, digging out a hole through which he could see the twilight outside. His breath fogged out in front of him as he crawled toward freedom. Once his entire body was outside, he launched himself off of the fortress parapet and nearly screamed as he flew forward, even though he knew the boots would keep him afloat. They even carried him higher into the air as he moved. He glanced down once, the sharp cries of the ice minions still in his ears. He could just barely make out the faint orange glow of the fire.
Then, he looked at the sky around him, searching until he found the North Star. Thanks to the trolls, he knew the night sky... as well as how to navigate by it. With a triumphant look in his eyes, Kristoff put his back to the north. He flew south, heading for Arendelle.
A/N: Again, my apologies for the delayed update... I'm engaged and house hunting now, so updates will be every 10-15 days now unless I can manage to post sooner. Thanks for reading, following, reviewing, etc! Let's hope Kristoff doesn't run into the Ice Maiden on his way home... :P