Children

It had never been in Elsa's plans to have children. She imagined living her life as a recluse in the castle, appearing when she had to for state affairs, and then one day Anna would outlive her and assume the throne when Elsa died and then pass it on to her children.

But plans change.

After Anna forcibly dragged her sister out of her shell, Elsa found herself mingling with people like a proper queen and then one day she met a man, a grand duke from Russia with floppy, curly black hair, Anna's age, and charming in the most annoying way.

And then she found herself saying yes to the man when he asked her to marry him. And then she found herself getting married to him. And with a ring on her left hand finger and a prince consort she imagined children were the next step in her shattering walls.

Anna and Elsa were at breakfast one Sunday morning while their respective husbands had decided to go on a hunting trip or sledding trip or whatever thing Kristoff had mumbled was "manlier than picking out place settings for your ball."

"Freya, eat your eggs," Anna said to her year old daughter who was more interested in bounding around the room on her wobbling, newly-walking legs. She hopped about the room chasing snowflakes that Elsa had conjured for her.

The young girl had Anna's hair but it was Kristoff's face that Elsa saw in her niece. It was a much more lovely version of his (that was the first thing Elsa said to him the night Freya was born but he was too busy admiring his daughter to note he'd been insulted).

The sisters chatted about things through the hour until Elsa needed to go sign documents for the Archduke of Austria. But when Elsa stood she nearly collapsed again at the pain and nausea that hit her stomach like a punch from the inside out.

"Elsa!" Anna cried and immediately rushed over to support her sister's body. "Kai, fetch the physician!"

Elsa was aware there was a flurry of movement around her, she felt Anna's hands on her arm before she was handed off to what must be her physician.

Anna remained outside Elsa's room, bouncing her daughter on her knee. She'd sent a rider out to fetch the men from their escapades in the forest and she anxiously bounced between checking the halls when she thought they might have come home and pressing an ear to Elsa's door trying to hear any news.

Inside the room Elsa lay in bed in her nightgown and her hair dismantled from its bun and into a messy braid. After a few bouts of vomiting her stomach felt fine again but she refused any form of food Stellan offered her.

"Elsa," he said when he returned with water, "I've been your physician since the moment I delivered you 24 years ago."

Somehow this didn't sound like a promising way to start a conversation. Elsa gulped down the water.

"And now it's my turn to deliver a new little prince or princess for you. You are pregnant, Your Majesty."

Elsa felt a few things at once, chief among them was relief that she was not dying as he made it seem. The second was complete and utter terror. And the third was complete and utter joy. A flurry of questions rushed through her mind as she imagined herself a mother, imagined her husband a father. A flurry of butterflies filled her stomach at the thought that they had created life together. They created a child that would look like them, that was made up of each other them.

But weeks later the fear kicked in when Elsa realized the most important question she should be asking.

"What if it's like me?"

Anna looked up at Elsa, leaned against the doorframe, from tucking in her sleeping daughter to meet her sister's eyes.

"Blonde?" Anna asked.

Elsa sighed and held out her hand to puff a few snowflakes into the air and Anna nodded and mouthed a soundless "oh". She finished putting the young princess to bed and quietly led her sister from the room.

"So what if it has powers like you?" Anna said as they walked down the hall.

"'So what?' Anna look at how I grew up, how you grew up," Elsa said. They passed Elsa's closed door.

"And why would your child grow up like that?" Anna said, "Everyone knows about your powers, so there would be no need to hide them in your son or daughter. You can teach them how to use them. You'd have someone like you. Someone who could understand you. And someone who could waltz around in the snow in a shoulderless dress with you like a weirdo."

"Ha, ha," Elsa said.

Her husband assured her it would be fine. Anna continued to assure her. Kristoff threw his own cents in as well, and Olaf was elated at the idea of Elsa's child having powers like hers.

When Anna had gone into labor, she kept yelling about how Kristoff was never going to touch her again and random shouts of "why did this happen?" to which Elsa tried to tell her that when a man and woman love each other…Anna threw a pillow at her head and Elsa was asked to wait in the hall.

Elsa's own labor had not been so difficult. Granted it hurt, a lot, and it took a good amount of time. But she forgot all the sweat and all the pain and all the contractions and all the pushing at the sound of her son's cry as he was pulled from her. She threw her head back to let out a sigh of relief and thought she might cry.

"A healthy prince!" Stellan said, cleaning off the boy before handing him to Elsa.

He squirmed and squealed but at the sound of Elsa's voice he calmed immediately and tried to focus his tiny eyes on her. He knew her voice, he immediately acclimated to her touch, he knew her. And she knew him.

"Hi," she laughed as she offered him one of her fingers which he latched onto with both hands.

His hair was black like his father's. His face was more reminiscent of his than anything else but his eyes were a stark shade of blue that Elsa recognized as her own. At some point everyone burst into the room. Anna gushed over her nephew, Freya was eager to meet her cousin, Kristoff made a comment about how he looked like a raisin, and the prince consort was near to tears at the site of his son.

Elsa knew the second she laid eyes on her son that he was not like her. His hair was too dark, his skin not fair enough. And the magic in her body did not respond to him at all, the way it responded to snow or ice or chills in the air. That magic possessing her body had not been passed to him. The power was hers alone. Perhaps in twenty generations one of her decedents would be shooting snow flurries the first time they sneezed but it was her son. And she was thankful.