For a solid minute, the group stood motionless on the dock, Elsa's arms around Mary, Anna and Olaf watching from the sidelines, and Mary giving Elsa that same glassy stare. Behind them, the ship bobbed impatiently in the harbor.
"What do you mean, nothing happened?" Elsa finally released her snowwoman. She had to hold her own arms to stop them from shaking. "Something had to have happened – There was nothing left of you but an eye! Did you do that to yourself on purpose?"
"Yes," said Mary dully. "I suppose I did."
Elsa scowled. "If you're trying to guilt-trip me, it's not going to work." She grabbed Mary's hand. "You're coming back to your room, and you're forbidden from sneaking out of the castle." No matter how hard Elsa glared into Mary's eyes, they stayed perfectly blank.
Mary stayed silent. Elsa huffed, then dragged her by the hand towards the castle. Mary followed along without protest.
By the time Anna reached the castle, there were two guards stationed by Mary's bedroom door and one on the ground outside beneath the window, but there was no Elsa to be found. After a bit of searching, Anna tracked her down to the garden. Elsa stood at the far side, her back to Anna. The mud had all dried up by now, but the garden still didn't look too great. The chilly air wasn't exactly conductive to its usual selection of beautiful flowers.
"Elsa, what's up with-?" Hold up. The air was a little too chilly for April. "Uh, Elsa-?"
Elsa screamed, and the next thing Anna knew, half the garden was covered in snow.
"Elsa!" Naturally, Anna's first impulse was to run straight towards the out-of-control sorceress.
Elsa screamed again and dropped to her knees. A frigid wind swooped through, but this time the ice actually stopped midway through freezing the rest of the garden. Anna reached Elsa's side to find her head inches from the dirt, staring at a tiny brown beetle. Elsa's snow had made a perfect circle around the insect.
"I'm sorry," Elsa said hoarsely. "I didn't mean to lose control."
Anna knelt down to put a hand on her back. "It's gonna be okay, Elsa. Believe it or not, I was a moody preteen girl once. I argued with our mom all the time, but eventually I got over myself. Mary will come around, too. You've got to be patient."
Elsa shook her head. "I can't do this, Anna. I'm not Mary's mother. It was stupid of me to try and act like I was... and now look what I've done to her."
"You haven't done anything. She's guilt-tripping you, remember?"
"But what if she isn't? What if- What if she was trying to..." Elsa feebly turned her head to meet Anna's eyes. "...to melt herself?" Then, in a near-whisper, she added, "What if Mary doesn't want to exist anymore?"
"Elsa, that's not-"
"Mary's not a regular person." Elsa's voice was growing frantic. "She came from my mind. What if, somehow, my own isolation, my depression, led her to this? How am I supposed to live with myself?"
"Well, you can start by not feeding yourself that baloney," said Anna. "Mary's being a drama queen, and that's all there is to it."
Elsa gingerly rose to her feet. "I... I guess you're right. She's... She's trying to provoke me..." It almost sounded more like she was talking to herself than to Anna.
Elsa made for the garden exit, and Anna followed after her. In her hurry, Anna nearly tripped over the big mound of snow Elsa had left in the grass.
Apparently, despite lacking the will to live, Mary had found the strength to lock her door from the inside. Elsa and Anna were forced to stand outside in the hall, the guards respectfully moving out of their way. Hopefully, Mary was actually on the other side this time.
"Mary?" Elsa rapped on the wood. "Listen, I know my reaction the other night upset you, and I'm sorry for what I said. I didn't mean to make you feel unwanted or useless. You're part of our family, Mary, and I've never once regretted creating you. I love you, and that will never change." She was met once again with silence, though this time Elsa caught the sound of the mattress creaking, so she knew Mary had at least heard her. "I can't delay the voyage any longer. Goodbye, Mary. We'll speak more when I get back."
With that, Elsa turned for the stairs. "Anna?" She put a hand on her sister's shoulder and smiled. "I know you'll take care of her while I'm gone."
Anna smiled back. "I handled you when you were making an eternal winter – I think I can handle an angsty snowwoman."
Olaf didn't quite understand the concept of sadness. Admittedly, there were a whole lot of concepts Olaf didn't quite understand, but sadness was the one he didn't quite understand the most. Olaf had only come kind of close to grasping it once, the time Anna had turned into an ice-statue. For a second there, he'd thought she'd stay a statue forever, which would've been no good. It'd made Olaf feel cold and damp inside. Well, actually, he was made of snow, so he usually felt like that, but this had been different. It was hard to explain these things when you were a snowman of very little brain.
However, despite his limited understanding of the concept, Olaf was fairly certain Mary was feeling very, very sad right now. Luckily, Olaf had an easy fix for this. One warm hug, and Mary would be good as new.
"Mary?" Olaf bounced past the guards to Mary's bedroom door and knocked. "It's me, your favorite brother!" He waited patiently but received no reply. Mary probably hadn't heard him. It was pretty hard to make a good, loud knock when your arms were literally the size of twigs.
Olaf tried the doorknob, but it didn't budge. Huh, Mary must've locked it by accident again. No big deal – Olaf was the master of unlocking. One carrot-in-the-keyhole later, he was waddling into the bedroom.
"Who wants a hug?" cheered Olaf, spreading his arms wide.
Mary was sprawled across the bed, her shoes and glasses lying in pieces on the floor. She bore an uncanny resemblance to an elderly cat who'd just learned it had to share the house with the new puppy.
Olaf took her silence as a yes and ran over to give Mary a big squeeze.
"I don't want a hug." Mary's resistance only made the hug stronger.
"What?" Olaf let out an incredulous laugh. "But everybody wants hugs!"
"Don't you get it?" Mary snapped. "Being a snowman is a horrible life!"
"Are you kidding? I can use my nose as a lock pick! What's not to love?"
"Get off of me!" Suddenly, Olaf's butt found itself in the hallway, and his head and torso quickly followed suit.
"I was just trying to cheer you up, Mary," said Olaf. "I'm your brother. I worry about you."
"Brother?" spat Mary. "Is that what you think? That we're part of a family?"
"Well... yeah," said a disarmed Olaf. "I was pretty sure we were."
"I'll tell you what we are: toys. We're nothing but Elsa's stupid toys, and she's outgrown us." As she spoke, Mary's icy fingers clamped around the edge of the door. "Elsa will tolerate her snowmen, but she's never wanted us. We're an unfortunate side effect of her powers, an accident she's forced to put up with. I can't do this anymore. I can't keep living like some house pet, and you wouldn't be able to either if you weren't a pathetic, annoying, worthless idiot."
Slam.
Olaf stared at the closed door before him. A minute later, he caught the sound of a lock clicking, followed by the sound of furniture being pushed in front of the doorway. Generally, this would be seen a sign that Mary wanted to be alone, but Olaf was a snowman of very little brain. "Mary? Mary? I think you locked your door by accident. Again. Hello? Mary? Don't you want to play?"
What Olaf didn't realize was that there was someone standing across the hallway, watching his struggle to open his sister's door.
Anna clenched her fists.
Now that Olaf had mercifully left and the door was barricaded by her dresser drawer, Mary had no intention of allowing anyone into her room ever again. She would simply stay in bed doing absolutely nothing, and nobody could do anything about it. Mary had no responsibilities, no obligations, not even the need to eat food or use the bathroom. She would lie here motionless forever. Really, it made no difference if Mary stayed here or at the bottom of that chasm.
Mary wasn't planning on caring about anything ever again, but then, it's hard not to care when a princess suddenly climbs in through your bedroom window.
"What are you-?" Mary impulsively sprang to her feet and ran to her windowsill to help Anna inside. "Are you trying to break your neck?"
"Don't worry," said Anna, "I've been doing this for years and I haven't- Whoa!" Luckily, Mary was there to break Anna's fall... with her face. "Sorry, sorry..."
"What are you doing in here?" grumbled Mary, prying Anna off of her and pulling herself to her feet.
"We need to talk." As she spoke, Anna shut the window behind her and dusted off her dress. "Look, I know you're upset, I get it, but you need to stop acting up. Elsa's starting to freak out. Even Olaf's worried, and I didn't know he could get worried."
"So what?" Mary looked away, folding her arms. "I'm not going back to my old life. I can't keep living like that. Wandering the halls, not knowing what to do with myself, feeling-"
"-lonely and bored and useless and forgotten?" finished Anna. "I know what it's like, Mary." She reached for Mary's hand. "I went through the same thing."
"But- But you seem so happy now." Mary glanced away. "What did you do?"
"I dunno," shrugged Anna. "I guess once Elsa's coronation came around, I decided that instead of sitting around being miserable, I'd meet new people, make friends, go on adventures, reconnect with Elsa... and then I did it. All of it."
Mary silently cursed herself. After her time in the chasm, she'd thought her tears had finally run dry, but there were still a couple left. "I... I..." Mary tried to tell Anna about what the crippled man had done, but the words wouldn't come. "I miss Elsa," she found herself saying. "I miss her already."
Anna gave a sympathetic smile. "Me too. It's pretty freaky knowing she's gonna be spending the next few weeks on a boat in the ocean after, y'know... the stuff that happened."
"Right," said Mary dully. "The stuff that happened."
There was a brief lapse in the conversation so the two of them could stare off into space.
"But it's a pretty stupid thing to be scared about." Anna forced a laugh. "I mean, what's the absolute worst-case scenario? Lightning hits Elsa's boat and it catches fire and gets a huge hole and pirates attack right as it starts to sink? Know what would happen then?"
Mary shook her head.
"Elsa would bust out her powers. She'd put out all the fire and patch up the hole with ice and whoop all the pirates' butts." Anna grinned. "That sounds awesome, actually. See, now I want that to happen..."
The floor was moving. The floor was moving. Oh lord, Elsa was going to lose her lunch. She could already feel the sweat freezing to her forehead.
"Your Majesty!" Fritz hurried into the queen's quarters, shivering at the sudden drop in temperature. At his approach, Elsa looked up from the novel she'd been reading. "I got some seasickness medicine from the crew." He checked the bottle in his hand. "It's something called... opium."
"I'll pass," said Elsa flatly. "Thanks anyways." She rolled over under her bedsheets, clutching her stomach.
"Do you need anything else?" asked Fritz. "Fluffed pillow? Glass of water? Foot massage?"
Elsa shook her head. "I just need to rest." She set the novel down on her bedside. Trying to read had given her a killer headache, anyways.
"Okay." Fritz turned around and slinked out the door. "Get better soon, El- Err, Your Majetsy. Get better soon, Your Majesty." He reached for the doorknob.
"Fritz, wait!" Elsa found herself springing out of the covers. Fritz paused, giving her a concerned look. "I... I'll take that fluffed pillow," Elsa said lamely.
"Of course, of course!" Fritz ran to her side and obediently fluffed it. "Anything else, Your Majesty?"
"'Elsa' is fine, Fritz."
Fritz reddened. "Right, right. I meant to say, 'Anything Elsa, Your Majesty?' Wait, what?" He flushed, then made once again for the door. "I, uh, I'll just be leaving..."
"Wait!" Before she could process what she was doing, Elsa grabbed Fritz's arm. "Don't go." Fritz stared at her fingers. She had never seen him look so simultaneously terrified and delighted before. "Please... stay."
"What's the matter?"
"It's this boat," admitted Elsa, sheepishly releasing his arm. "You're my friend, and I would... I would feel better if you stayed here a while."
"Oh! Because of your parents!" The instant the words left his lips, Fritz hiccuped and clamped his hands over his mouth.
Elsa shut her eyes and counted to ten in her head. "Yes, Fritz. Thank you."
"I'm so sorry Your Elsasty I'm such an idiot please don't fire me-!"
Elsa gave him a reassuring smile. "It's alright. And it's not that, really. It's Mary."
"Mary?" That seemed to snap Fritz out of his funk. "What's wrong? Is she okay?"
"No..." As she spoke, Elsa returned herself to her covers. "I don't think she is."
It's cold here, it thought.
It... thought? It thought!
Immediately, it was flooded with an overwhelming sense of claustrophobia. Every iota of its being told it to escape, and so it clawed its way out in a frenzy, bursting from the void, from the womb, out into the open air...
The creature erupted from the big mound of snow and took in its surroundings. It seemed to be in an open area filled with vegetation, surrounded by walls of stone. Roughly half the plants were covered in powder, but it didn't look like natural snowfall. It looked like the snow had erupted, somehow. The creature took a cautious step forward.
The first thing in its line of sight was a group of fluffy, bright yellow birds. Could these be... its siblings? The creature eagerly dashed towards them, but before it could get close, a massive, darker-feathered bird threw itself between the creature and the goslings. The fowl released an earsplitting quack that sent the creature running.
The creature didn't stop until it reached the far side of the garden. Why had that bird attacked it? Was... Was there something wrong with the creature? It scurried over to a nearby pond and gazed at its reflection.
If it had any breath, it would've caught in the creature's throat. Ice. It was made of ice. The creature looked down at its own paws, as if to confirm what the reflection showed it. Its claws were, indeed, made of ice. What did that mean? What was it? What was it?
The creature growled and dug its claws into a tiny brown beetle unfortunate enough to crawl into its path.