"Childhood should be carefree, playing in the sun; not living a nightmare in the darkness of the soul."
– Dave Pelzer

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Author's Note:

WARNING, DANGER WILL ROBINSON! Okay, this chapter contains no explicit physical torture or sexual assault. However, a nightmare creates EXTREME emotional distress for Elsa as a childhood trauma that she thought she had suppressed comes back with a vengeance. If this will cause you discomfort, feel free to skip to chapter 8. The purpose of this chapter is not gratuitous torment; it does give some insight into one of the wounds Elsa has been carrying around since she was eight years old. She goes to a very, very dark place here.

The last sentence is the key: Elsa promised herself one thing – she would not allow the Duke's men to take her back to Weselton alive.

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It was the second evening of Elsa's imprisonment. She knew that because they had brought Anna to see her twice more. It was the same routine as the first time: The guards would unlock the door and slam it open. Anna would be held in the doorway so Elsa could see her. She remained gagged to prevent the sisters from exchanging any information or making plans in some secret sister code. Elsa would ask if she was okay and get a nod in return. Anna would be pulled away and the door slammed shut and locked.

"How could something that's only happened three times seem so … regular, as though it had been going on since the beginning of the world?" Elsa mused. Her spirits were briefly lifted by the sight of her sister; she drank it in as though it might be the last time she would be with Anna on this earth. In truth, each time could be her last; the possibility that her captors would decide to kill her and take their chances at escaping before her Navy and Marines realized she was dead increased with each passing hour. They could look at the loot piling up in their ships' holds and decide they already had enough to make the trip worthwhile.

Elsa settled back onto her pallet. Gerda had brought her food again, probably at approximately midday. Elsa still had no sense of time; the only markers she had were Anna and Gerda. She tried to sleep as much as she could; to pass the hours and to maintain her strength. Her anxiety and the need to remain alert for an attack kept her sleep from being very restful or refreshing. She could tell the lack of sleep was taking a toll on her.

Trying to find a more comfortable position, she tossed and turned briefly before falling into a doze, then deeper into sleep.

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Elsa felt pain in her shoulders from the tight bonds pulling her arms behind her. She was wearing a sleeveless sackcloth shift saturated with pitch; the stink added to her nausea. Combined with the lurching of the tumbrel taking her to the city square for execution, she would have vomited if there had been anything in her stomach. They had not fed her since the sham 'trial' ended with the solemn pronouncement of her sentence of death by burning. She could only gag futilely, the heaving of her empty stomach choking her with foul-tasting bile.

Elsa's hair was short; they had hacked off her braid when they had stripped her naked and dressed her in the shift. The Duke had overseen her humiliation with salacious glee. He explained that he didn't want her long hair burning and choking her with the smoke; that would kill her too quickly.

"We've taken great care to build the pyre for a long, slow burn, Your Majesty!" Her title was an obscenity in his mouth. "It will take at least an hour for you to die; the fire will devour you slowly, savoring every inch of your body as it does. I look forward to the perfume of your burning flesh and the music of your screams!" He laughed with cruel mirth and left her to the guards to bring along.

The tumbrel pulled up next to the stake, the bundles of firewood arranged neatly with a path open for them to chain her to it. The guards dragged her out of the cart; she stumbled and almost cried out from the pain of stubbing her bare foot on a sharp rock. She was so weak her knees buckled and she would have fallen if the two guards hadn't caught her. This caused more pain in her shoulders as they yanked her along.

The stake had been positioned on a raised platform of stone; this would give the crowd a good view of her coming torment. The guards carried her up the stairs and cut her bonds. Positioning her at the stake, they pulled her arms behind her around the stake and shackled her wrists. Then they wrapped chains around her torso and legs, insuring that she would be held upright until there was nothing left but ash and bone.

Elsa could hear the crowd screaming "Witch!", "Monster!" and "Sorceress!" The Duke had aroused their blood lust with wild tales of the evil she had done. She did cry out when she was struck on the mouth by a thrown rock, but two of the guards holding the crowd back jumped the thrower immediately and hustled him away. They weren't taking any chances that she would be knocked unconscious before suffering the agony of the fire. She tasted bloody froth on her lips, coppery and bitter, then spit out a piece of broken tooth.

She tried to blink away her tears. The dazzling glare of the bright sunshine almost blinded her after her confinement in the black gloom of the dungeon. She looked around and her gaze found what she was looking for: a head of bright red hair, on the dais with the Duke. Anna! Elsa could tell she was sobbing and calling her name, but she was restrained with shackles that held her to a chair at the Duke's right hand. He was smart enough to realize that nothing would hold Anna back from her sister if she were left unbound.

A guard stood next to Anna with an unsheathed sword. Elsa was still restrained from using her magic by the threat to Anna. Her hatred for the Duke forcing Anna to watch this barbarity was so consuming that she almost, almost let her magic strike him down. Maybe a clean, quick death for both of them was better than letting Anna be shattered by the atrocity she was about to witness.

The Duke rose and addressed the crowd but Elsa wasn't listening. She concentrated on Anna, mouthing "I love you," and hoping her sister could understand what she was trying to say. She would keep Anna in her sight until she finally died. The last thing she would see in this life would be her beloved sister.

The thundering roar of the crowd penetrated Elsa's concentration. She saw a guard approaching with a lit torch. "It begins," she thought. The swaying flame of the torch was almost hypnotic; it entranced Elsa until she forced herself to tear her gaze away from it and turn back to Anna.

Out of the corner of her eye Elsa saw the guard thrust the torch into the wood arranged around her. She could feel the first tendrils of heat on her legs and smell the tickle of the wood-smoke. Iron discipline kept her from looking down, from looking away from Anna. The flame spread slowly, creeping closer; it licked at her feet and she …

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... screamed as she rolled off the pallet and onto the floor of the dungeon. "No! Gods, no!"

She flailed around wildly, her arms extended and her hands raised to fling her magic at the threat. Heart pounding, she panted like she had run ten miles across the fjord again. She only realized where she was when the guard outside banged on the door and roared "Shut up in there! D'ya want a beating?"

"Oh, gods, it was a dream, just a dream." She sprawled flat on her back, put her arm across her eyes and tried to gather up the bits and pieces of her shredded composure. It took long minutes for her breathing and heartbeat to slow to normal and bring a shaky calm to her. She dragged herself off the floor to sit on the pallet, her head in her hands and sobs wracking her body.

When she was eight and they had gone to the trolls to cure Anna, Grandpabbie had shown her a vision of a crowd attacking her for her magic. A poor explanation of the meaning of "fear will be your enemy," left the little girl shaken to her core.

Not long after that Elsa had read a history of St. Joan of Arc. She had seen the painting of Joan in the castle's art room; the heroic pose of the woman in the portrait had intrigued her and led her to do further research on the saint. She was fascinated and enthralled by the valiant exploits of St. Joan in her gallant effort to free her people from foreign invaders. Her horror when she read what happened to end Joan's heroism had choked and nauseated her; she instantly imagined herself in Joan's place; burning as a witch, a victim of one of the cruelest deaths possible. Her mother had found her crying hysterically, thick ice coating the desk, the book and spreading out around the chair she was sitting on. It had taken Queen Idun hours to soothe Elsa's heartbroken weeping and find out what had caused her daughter such anguish.

Elsa never went into the portrait room again.

When her parents died, it had taken Elsa several months to overcome her grief and function with some composure as Queen. When she finally settled into the role, however awkward and contrived it felt, she had instructed Kai to sell the painting of St. Joan. She didn't explain why, and he didn't feel comfortable asking. Several weeks later he had told her they had gotten a good price for it from some museum in Paris and she buried that nightmare with the rest of her past.

The Duke's threat to burn her as a witch had exhumed that trauma like some wraith from a cold damp grave.

Elsa's weeping slowed and finally stopped. She wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand and took several deep breaths in a shaky attempt to regain her poise. "Well, no more sleep tonight, that's clear." She looked down at the icy outline of her body where she had lain on the floor. A wave of her hand and it was gone.

She stood and began to pace, fighting to keep from recalling the dream. "Anna, think of Anna. Think of Olaf. Think of the time before the accident, when you loved your magic. Remember how you felt building the Ice Palace." The happy memories were like a talisman she could use to drive off the demons haunting her.

Eventually she calmed herself enough to sit on the pallet again. She wouldn't lie down; sleep was something to be avoided for now, regardless of how much she needed it. Elsa promised herself one thing – she would not allow the Duke's men to take her back to Weselton alive.