I think it's still Leap Day somewhere, everything is upside down according to tradition, women can brazenly take the initiative and propose to men, even - and I manage to update the fic.

So sorry. I started to study a new field and have been brutally overwhelmed by the amount of studying I need to do, my life has been revolving around cramming and frivolities like social relationships and hobbies faded away somewhat. But still working in APU! (I swear though, I'll never complain about GRRM taking forever with A Song of Ice and Fire again.)

If you haven't seen it yet, check out the new background info google doc I made, it has a character listing, the music I listen to when writing and some other stuff;

https: [double slash] goo [point] gl [slash] zMTHR6

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VIII

where a queen examines a puzzle

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"Quite a brawl, by the look of things, Your Majesty," Dr. Gravdal said, methodically taking his things from his bag one by one, cleaning and returning each to its proper place, occasionally stopping to make an addition to his notes. "They're both rather battered, but rest assured, they'll live. There shouldn't be lasting injuries on either - not even any damage to their fine features, I believe."

The court doctor's examination room also doubled as his study. It was an eerie place, Elsa felt, a cabinet full of drugs and chemicals in large brown glass containers on one wall, and the tall, imposing shelves along the other filled with foreign books on illnesses, injuries and the finer details of death and its workings. On the higher shelves, gruesome samples of life's missteps floated quietly in large jars of spirit.

Elsa repressed a shudder. She distantly remembered the endless, useless examinations she'd gone through in this room as a child, a hazy muddle of fear, embarrassment and quiet despair in her mother's eyes. The memories had blended together over the years into a disturbing, nameless unease she associated with the room.

A strange medical, chemical odour always hung in the air, smelling salts and camphor, perhaps, mixed with rubbing alcohol and something else. It gradually seeped into the clothes of each new palace doctor, eventually infusing them with an unnerving presence that followed them where-ever they went. Dr. Gravdal had a mighty beak of a nose that made him look like an old vulture, and in his black, long-tailed coat smelling of illness and infirmaries, he reminded Elsa of some ominous harbinger of death and misery, despite his quiet kindness. She sometimes wondered if the good doctor's deep fascination in death and all its aspects really helped him ward it off, rather than invite it in.

"Do they require any special care, Doctor?" Does Prince Hans need any special care, she meant. "How long will it take for them to heal?"
"They've both suffered several injuries, including fractured bones, Majesty," the Doctor said distractedly, cleaning an instrument with alcohol. "I've patched them up, but healing takes time. I'd recommend several days of bed rest for both, and caution for a good while after that, too." He placed the instrument in a drawer, took another from his bag and begun to clean that before continuing, talking to Elsa over his shoulder. "They're active young men, and I noted both belittled their pain during my examination. I assume they'll try to tough it out, as they say, and try to return to normal as soon as possible. Which is a bad idea."

Dr. Gravdal turned to glare at Elsa over his spectacles. "A very bad idea, indeed. Injuries ought to be respected. A fractured rib is no laughing matter, Your Majesty. Vigourous movement might displace the bone, which could puncture the lung, leading to death." Elsa's eyes widened. She felt, vaguely, like a child being chastised, as if he blamed her for the fight.
"I'll make sure they'll rest enough," she offered. Dr. Gravdal grunted an assent, scrutinising her with his sharp eyes for a heartbeat more before turning his attention back to his work. Elsa waited for a while before she piped up, her voice faltering in the silence.

"Is- is he in any pain?" The doctor gave her an inquiring look. "Mr. Vestergaard, I mean."
"He would be, but I administered a hefty dose of laudanum. He should be soundly asleep until tomorrow afternoon. With your permission, I'll keep monitoring him and administering the doses for a few days… but no longer," he said, so distractedly Elsa wondered if he wasn't talking to himself more than her. "Mr. Bjorgman too. I'd like to have them on as little medication as possible."
Elsa thanked him quietly and slipped away, relieved to escape the memories etched in the room's high, yellow walls.
"Won't do to give too much," Dr. Gravdal muttered, scribbling in his notebook as she was closing the door. "Won't do at all."

It was late evening, and Elsa should have gone to her rooms to prepare for bed, exhausted after an eventful day. It's what she'd told Anna as she'd warmly hugged her goodnight after a vivid, hours-long conversation that had stretched and meandered on over the day. Anna hadn't minded, and had slipped off to tend to Kristoff, half-conscious as he was from the medication.

But instead, Elsa found herself heading downstairs, to the cell level. She would just check on him quickly, no harm in that. He was a political prisoner, after all, and in fact it was her duty to make sure he was all right, to avoid a diplomatic crisis with their neighbour, she told herself.

In her bosom, a persistent tangle of worry over him had kept billowing through the day, despite her attempts to suffocate it. She'd sat with Anna as she fussed over Kristoff, doing everything she could to care for her beloved. Watching her tender administrations had set off some alien tremor in Elsa's heart, a new yearning she'd never encountered before. Her thoughts had waywardly drifted off to Prince Hans, and every half-suppressed groan and grunt that escaped Kristoff while the doctor cleaned his wounds and inspected him made Elsa flinch slightly and remember that all the while, her steward lay similarly injured in a cold dungeon, alone, waiting for the doctor to spare him a moment, too.

She'd had to keep silent. She couldn't let Anna know she wanted to give her care and comfort to the man who'd betrayed and tried to kill them both. Elsa sighed as she ran her fingers along the cold, rough stone walls of the cellar levels, iceflowers slowly blooming on the walls at her trail.

Anna hadn't approved at all, as she'd feared. She had still been agitated after the library incident, bristling with fiery, incredulous indignation, demanding that Hans be removed from Arendelle at once.
"Why is he still here? Why is he walking around freely? I can help you rule. Kai or the royal cabinet will help you rule. There's no reason to keep that snake here." She'd paced around, restless like a caged animal, before spinning around to face her. "Elsa, he'll try to kill us again, he's plotting something, I'm sure of it! He's dangerous, can't you see that?"
"Anna, he's useful," she'd sighed, trying to pacify her. "I told you, he's excellent at politics." She'd swallowed before making the confession.
"I need him."
Her sister had stared at her with wide eyes, her expression so full of disbelief and hurt that Elsa had felt absolutely rotten.
"Need him? That man? No, you don't," she'd huffed. " What we - what Arendelle needs is to be rid of him, for good. His words are poison. Come on, Elsa, I'm sure you're far better at ruling than him," she'd coaxed, and the clear, bright faith in her face and voice had pricked sharply at Elsa's heart.
"No, Anna, I'm not. I'm really not. I'm- I'm in over my head. It's all so much. The country is in dreadful shape. And there are other problems, too."

She'd had to sit down, rubbing her eyes, preparing for the admission. "There've been attacks of dissent against me."

"What?" All anger had vanished from Anna's countenance, and she'd stepped closer, placing a comforting hand on Elsa's shoulder. "What attacks? By whom?"
"I don't know," she'd sighed. "Anonymous pamphlets full of disgusting lies about me have been spread around town. Accusing me of witchcraft, and - and other, abhorrent things."
Anna's eyes had narrowed.
"He's behind it, I bet."
"Prince Hans?" A stern nod. "He's locked in a cell and always escorted by a guard when he's out. It can't have been him. He can't do anything without me knowing about it," she'd said. Anna hadn't believed her for a moment.
"It's him, I'm telling you," she'd huffed, pointing a finger at Elsa. "You'll see. He wants revenge. You're harbouring a scheming viper at your bosom, and sooner or later you'll get bitten."

Revenge.

She scraped her knuckles across the rough stones in a vain attempt to attain some clarity to her thoughts. She quickly pulled her hand back to her side when she reached the guard, and nodded a curt greeting to the surprised man springing to his feet while trying to hide a game of solitaire spread over the stone steps. Elsa informed him that she was there just to check on Mr. Vestergaard, nothing more, and no, she didn't need to be accompanied, thank you. She could feel her pulse pick up and drum nervously under her skin as the cell door was opened for her and she stepped in.

Elsa stood still on the steps of the dark cell, listening as the soft quietness settled itself back in over the echo of the door clanging shut and the guard's receding footsteps. It took her eyes a while to get used to the dimness, the shadows dancing on the walls in the torchlight coming through the tiny peephole in the door. She could make out his form lying on the cot, so still that if it hadn't been for his slow, steady breathing, he might have been mistaken for a corpse.

"Prince Hans," she called politely, just to be sure. He didn't even twitch.

Elsa walked to him, slowly, half-expecting him to jolt awake any moment, a strange thrill of impropriety and illicitness vibrating in her. The prince had been propped up into a half-sitting position with various things; a pillow, his towel, his winter coat and other assorted pieces of clothing, all bundled up. Elsa thought distractedly that she ought to allocate him some more pillows and a spare blanket or two, before she caught a better look of his face in the faint moonlight and gasped.

His handsome features were in awful shape, swollen and bruised so badly he was almost unrecognisable. He had black bruises all over his upper body, as well, or at least on what skin she could see from under the blanket. Some were bandaged. The thick smell of liniment hung in the air, and Elsa saw that the un-bandaged bruises were glistening with it. She gave a sigh, taking in in the extent of the damages, and then gingerly sat on the edge of the cot. It creaked under her weight.

"Hans," she called again, softer, once more rousing no reaction from him.

Elsa sat there in silence for some time, watching him and listening to his heavy breathing. Staring at men was very improper and most unqueenly, but since he was unconscious, she could study him at peace. She let her gaze travel across him, lingering here and there; making its way from his hair and the tip of his long, thankfully unbroken nose to his freckled chest and broad shoulders, to his strong arms and bruised hands, to the contours of his steadily heaving body beneath the blanket, and finally settling on his bare left foot poking out at the far end of the blanket.

Elsa wondered if he was cold. The cell was quite damp, now that she thought about it, she'd forgotten how dismal it was down here. She reached over to pull the blanket back over him, but a wild fancy struck her and she ran her finger down the sole of his foot, very softly, just to see what would happen.

Prince Hans twitched his foot, grunted and shifted slightly. Nothing else.

Elsa tucked his foot in and sat back up, contemplating him some more. His left arm was sprawled up, and he'd turned his face towards it so that the shadows cast by the cold moonlight hid the worst damage. From this angle, he resembled himself again; handsome, young - and vulnerable. Elsa placed her hand carefully on the blanket, sensing more than feeling his body underneath, trying to make some order of the tangle of feelings and emotions fluttering and churning in her whenever she was in his presence.

I need him, she'd told Anna.

When did that happen? There was need, truly, in more ways than she cared to admit; a new type of need was growing and gaining strength within her, tangling itself with other feelings so rampantly she couldn't tell her emotions apart any more. He enticed her, that she could identify, the persistent pull, a near-constant desire to press against him and feel his touch.
It's folly, she thought, running her fingertips feather-light along the blanket and the chest beneath, reckless, dangerous folly.

She wished she could read his mind. Elsa examined his face, the large jaw, high cheekbones and long eyelashes, trying to piece all the little hints and bits of the puzzle she had collected together into a coherent portrait.

He tried to act like one man, detached, sardonic and formal, but every now and then the mask slipped. She'd started to take notice of the slip-ups, whenever he got excited about a topic or made quips that subtly revealed his opinions. And especially whenever she got him talking about himself. In those swift instances, he forgot to be proper and calculating and controlled, and something - someone else - shone through. Like a painting, fraying off and revealing a different picture beneath. It was captivating.

Elsa closed her eyes, clutching her hand into a fist atop of the blanket.
Know your enemy, they said. So she'd studied him, intending to learn who he was and how he thought, trying to find a weakness and gain an advantage over him. She'd meticulously collected little pieces and bits of him, categorising and organising them like an obsessive natural taxonomist, labouring to decipher meanings behind different anecdotes and reactions and flickering expressions.

But she'd lost herself; she had waded in too deep, and he'd sunk his hooks into her. And despite becoming hopelessly mesmerised by his complexity, she still couldn't figure him out. The pieces simply didn't fit. They seemed to come from two different men.

One, who was manipulative and dangerous, a ruthless crook plotting murder and treason, who cruelly ridiculed the weak and delighted in their pain and had tried to decapitate her.

And the other, who was her indispensable advisor, who had saved her life, who taught her control, self-assurance and politics. Who had kept her citizens safe. Who murmured gently to animals when he thought he was alone and had an impish sense of humour and loved adventure books and almond-cake, and whose eyes shone like sunlit foliage when he smiled and whose velvety voice she could have listened to for hours.

Who longed for the respect and love of his family and understood what it was to forever fall short of who you were expected to be.

Which one was real? Maybe they were both him, simultaneously. Was that possible? I'm missing a crucial piece, she thought. Or perhaps some of the pieces were fake. He's dangerous, Anna had said. It was true, wasn't it? Elsa knew that for a fact, didn't she?

Elsa squeezed her eyes shut. Dangerous, despicable traitor, she thought, trying to revisit the animosity and trepidation she'd felt when she'd first struck the deal with him. She called to mind the pitch-black moment of despair on the ice when she'd thought all was lost, attempting to rouse hatred for him in her heart. If he'd had his way, we'd both be dead, Anna and me. He's a murderer, she tried, but the feeling didn't come.

Instead, she remembered him describing with practised detachment how he'd watched his pet be killed. The memory rippled into him talking to Sitron in an indescribably tender voice, his face pressed to the horse's neck; then the same voice, soft and low in her ears as they rode; and finally to his alarmed, pale face with the wide green-golden eyes as he held her in his arms in the stream, the light dancing around them.

He wants to kill me and steal my throne, Elsa told herself, opening her eyes and staring hard at him, but the thought clanged empty without any real weight.

She opened her fist and flattened her hand.
If she focused, Elsa found she could feel his heartbeat beneath her palm.
This wouldn't do.

He was always looming at the periphery of her thoughts, now. Elsa would hear his voice murmur her name in empty rooms, so vividly she almost felt his breath caressing her neck and ear, could almost smell his scent and feel the warmth of his chest at her back. Hold on to me, he had said, arms strong and safe around her. Elsa sighed a deep, trembling sigh.

The ride had been a dreadful mistake, in hindsight. It had also been possibly the most thrilling experience she'd had in her entire life.

He'd cut such a fine figure, controlling the horse with grace. She'd forgotten what she'd been doing and had been admiring him for a long while, when suddenly he'd looked straight at her. Elsa had jumped back and hid behind the curtains, her heart thumping in her throat. She'd decided that since he now knew she'd been embarrassingly ogling him, she might as well go watch from a closer distance. She'd found him talking to Sitron in a tone she'd never heard before, a soft, incredibly gentle murmur full of affection that had send whispers shivering through her. A tone that no-one had ever used with her.

Prince Hans had looked incredibly handsome, his hair tousled and damp, shirt loose and sleeves rolled. He'd seemed somehow unsettled, not as collected and measured as he usually was. Elsa had suddenly wanted to make him talk and laugh, to keep him in this unusual state.
And then he'd talked so callously of the kitten, Hindbær. Believing she'd gotten a new piece fitting the picture of the cruel monster, Elsa had felt inexplicable, crushing disappointment. But in the light of the next day, she'd seen that the piece was an entirely different one, one that showed a man who had been forced to learn to hide his feelings and view affection as undesirable weakness, and had felt the pull to him again.

When they'd ridden, she'd felt bewildering elation, a new thrill, no, several singing within her, mixing with a completely new sort of fear or excitement she'd never felt before. And there had been something about the movement, the thundering rhythm of speed, power and danger, the closeness of his body, all of it had mixed into a heady tidal wave of emotion that had carried Elsa away with it, and she'd wanted to scream out of the sheer, brilliant joy of being alive. And when he'd stopped the horse and they'd outridden all of the tense messy difficulty that remained far behind in Arendelle, down in the valley, almost out of sight - and she'd turned to face him, trembling from the excitement, loath to relinquish his touch, and the look on his face had almost made her forget who they were, and in that instant the thing she'd wanted most in this world was for him to lean down and kiss her.

It was impossible, of course.

But she'd asked him to ride further, hoping to almost forget again, and that was alarming.

How much of him was an act? Was it just a performance he'd put up in order to manipulate her? Elsa thought again of the stream, of the alarm in his eyes, of all the times he'd pulled her out of the whirlpool of panic.

Maybe Anna was right, and it had been a horrible mistake to keep Prince Hans in Arendelle. Everything would be simpler and clearer, had she simply shipped him off with Du Fourberenard, the Galterrean ambassador, and forgotten about him. Perhaps it would still be the best thing to do, to pack him up and send him off. Elsa slid her hand slightly higher on his chest, and his heartbeat became clearer under her palm.

Too late, she thought. He's here and I'm tangled in a web of politics, contracts and manipulation with him. She suspected she couldn't have forgotten about him now, even if she'd tried. If she was quite honest with herself, she suspected she didn't really mind being tangled with him, either.

Elsa crossed her hands in her lap and sat there, in the darkness, looking at his profile, examining her feelings. A waterdrop hit the floor, somewhere.

"Drat", she said, after a while, the sound echoing softly from the walls of the dungeon. "Damn," she added for emphasis. Most improper.

Another wild fancy struck her, and she leaned carefully on her right hand, taking care to not lean on Prince Hans, and reached gingerly forward until she could reach his hair, tangling her fingers lightly in it. Gently, she ran her fingertips down the side of his head, noting with great interest how the hair changed from the silky strands on his crown to the coarser, thicker sideburn on his chin.

Hans sniffed in his sleep. Like a fox cub, flickered in her mind.

Elsa pulled herself up and clutched her hands by her chest, caressing her fingers. Highly scandalous. She'd gone mad.

This absolutely wouldn't do. Elsa could feel him pulling her deeper, down into some unknown abyss, and the waters tenderly caressed and called her with a sweet siren song, and even though she knew drowning meant death and danger and disaster, she'd started to feel like it might be worth it, this enticing promise of sensations yet unknown.
He was gaining the upper hand over her. She had to do something, to keep her head above the water.

With a sigh, Elsa tore herself up from the cot and threw one last lingering look at his unconscious form, before turning away with a sharp, determined twist. She could still feel the strands of his hair around her disobedient fingers. Maybe that's it, she thought, rapping softly at the door and waiting for the guard to open it, I have to wrap him around my fingers and get a grip so good I can drag him around, myself.

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* Laudanum is a strong narcotic drug containing around 10% opium. It was very widely used to heal pretty much anything (from diarrhoea to aches and pains to insomnia to the common cold, and much more) from the late 1600s until the early 1900s, when it was finally understood that opium, cocaine, heroin etc. are actually quite addictive, and their usage began to get restricted and controlled.

It is very potent, and suicide by Laudanum overdose wasn't at all uncommon in the mid-1800s.