QUICK NOTES:

This chapter has been edited for development. I've added more description of the landscape for two reasons: 1) because it's so meaningful to Kristoff, and 2) because a specific detail within it will have significance later.

Arendelle and its peeps aren't mine.

Chapter 3

High above Arendelle, where the early snow lay like a fine white dust upon the earth, Kristoff Bjorgman secured the last blocks of ice onto his rig. The summer months had been productive and the ice plentiful, and he had a good haul, here, at the end of the harvesting season. Now he would return to the village and distribute each block to his buyers before taking residence in the loft above the queen's stables, where he would spend the winter and earn his keep. He would not be returning to the mountains again until spring.

"All right, old friend," he murmured, scratching a large reindeer behind the ears. "Time to head down."

But neither made a move to depart just yet. Instead, they regarded the sweeping landscape before them, each lost in their own thoughts. Downslope from the mountain's flanks lay a deep arctic tarn, already locked in solid ice from one bank to its opposite. The sky above was brushed with thin clouds in a faded palette, creating a backdrop against which the highlands and their scattered groves of spruce stood out in sharp relief. A rivulet of bracing freshwater ran from beneath the ice and over a lip in the basin. It made its way through the rough terrain, increasing in speed and volume as it meandered and then raced and then plunged toward the sea.

He shook his head as though to clear it, though why he'd allowed the queen and her sister to persuade him to winter in Arendelle in the first place remained something of a mystery to him. He'd spent the better part of six months, last year, suffocating in the narrow streets and starched threads of the city and generally pining for the open wilderness. Village life didn't really suit him, not to mention the way of things at the castle. It just wasn't his usual habitat, and if he was going to be honest with himself, he didn't particularly enjoy his time there.

Except ...

Well, except for Anna.

But he dismissed that thought as quickly as it had arisen. What was the point? His, um, friendship with the princess was tolerated by those in authority, though Elsa encouraged it well enough. Still, some day—and some day soon, he mused bitterly—Anna would be given away to a prince of substantial provenance. Married off to form some sort of contractual alliance with one of the prosperous states in the south.

But then an echo of Sven's voice cut into his thinking.

Would the queen allow it?

Kristoff sighed, and his breath condensed lightly in the air before him. Would she have a choice? His attachment to the princess was frankly inappropriate, and whether or not Queen Elsa approved of it was of little consequence. She would be pressured from all corners of influence to engage her sister advantageously, and even her own, genuine fondness for Anna's loyal reindeer king would not be enough to keep the two of them close …

Not that he wanted to marry her or anything. The thought made him wince. Of course he didn't want to marry her—where had that even come from? It's true that they'd shared a rather harrowing experience the previous summer, but they'd hardly spent a fortnight in each other's company before he'd had to depart for the glaciated hills of the outer kingdom. And even then, it was an odd sort of friendship: clumsy, exasperating, but most of all ... uncomplicated. They could sit in companionable stillness as they watched the sun set, for example, though this had been no small challenge for Kristoff when they'd first met. He would never have described himself as feeling at ease in the presence of others—certainly not before he'd met the princess. Somehow, though, in spite of his awkward silences and her equally awkward compulsion to fill them, they'd grown comfortable with each other.

"Guess what?" she'd said to him once, positively trembling with the chance to withhold information from him.

He'd shaken his head at her, raising his hands hopelessly before letting them fall loose at his sides.

"How could I even do that?" he'd retorted. "There are about as many possibilities for … whatever it is that's going on in your head … as there are, I don't know, stars at night. Or, well, snowflakes on the North Mountain. In winter."

She'd wrinkled her nose at him. "Come on," she'd said.

"Fine. You've adopted a truffle pig named George."

Anna had snorted. It was loud and indelicate and totally unappealing—and also adorable.

"You've discovered a rare flower whose, uh, nectar can make a person young. Like, forever."

"That'd be nice, I guess."

"You're ready to admit that ice is better than chocolate."

"Riiiiiiight."

"It's true."

And the princess had poked him in the chest with an aggressive finger.

"Says you," came the rejoinder. "And you'd best keep it to yourself. Blaspheme in my presence again, Kristoffer, and I will rearrange your face."

Every other word was emphasized with a stab of the finger, so that Kristoff had had to cross his arms defensively. The idea of grabbing her wrist or swatting her away was not even remotely an option, and he suspected that she was well aware of this. Enthusiastically so.

"You asked!" he'd cried.

"And you were wrong. Now try again."

…

…

"You're going back to the asylum," he'd continued archly.

"Nuh-uh. I mean, not any time soon."

"You never should have left in the first place," he'd said mildly, and they'd walked on in amiable silence for a moment. He remembered looking out across the pier at the easy play of light on water. At the time, he'd been willing to allow that ice in its liquid state could be as impressive as the stuff he harvested.

It was a moment of weakness, to be sure.

Anyway. As long as he ignored the unfortunate, er, context of their strange little bond, it was enough. Their friendship was simple and it was warmth and it was perfect.

But he couldn't ignore that unfortunate context, could he? The fact remained that Anna was a princess. She was royalty, and he … Well, he hauled ice for a living. No, it was just a dream—a silly and stupid dream—to think that he had a chance at … whatever. He would lose Anna, in the end, just like he'd lost everyone else in his life. It'd be better for him to leave before he got too attached.

What he failed to recognize, though—and what his reindeer friend could easily have pointed out to him—was that it was already too late.

He should have stayed in the mountains, he mused. He knew this. And yet. And yet ...

The reindeer tossed his head and chaffed at his harness, as much to say "Let's go" as to interrupt his companion's dark and tedious mood. Kristoff sighed again and pulled his hat down over his ears. Then he stepped onto the bench and gathered the reins.

"OK, Sven," he conceded, spurring his friend into a trot. "We're going, we're going."

Sven cast a shrewd glance over his shoulder and snorted, his breath forming brief plumes of humidity in the chill air.

Kristoff slouched in his seat. "Don't look at me like that."

So, I'm a slow pacer. There's a lot of contemplative stuff going on in this story. Also, I've avoided writing much Kristoff in the past, and I kind of felt the need to give him more of a voice, here.

Please review, if you'd be so kind. As others have said before me, it means a lot.