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"Frozen Again: 'Love Never Ends"
Act X
Chapter 32
'Guardians of Melodic Harmony"
Glowing with the full lightshow of the aurora borealis, the once pale sunrise over the glacial field known as Ahtohallan on this late February day was a sight to behold.
Especially now that Spring was itching to come to it, and the polar night was in the process of being magically tamed here in the northernmost tip of the world.
Even the fierce arctic winds held little sway when the Windchime King stood over the threshold of the newly redesigned Fortress of Melody & Harmony balcony his manifest cryokinetics willed open to gaze up to the distant horizon with silent Bruni the Fire Spirit immediately at his shoulder to light the yet dusky skies for him at this early morn.
"At 99.72° E at an altitude of 24.46° N, the sun's distance will be approximately 94.500 million miles from the earth in a few weeks' time, its tilted axis perfectly perpendicular to the sun on one day alone. Isn't God marvelous in His heaven that He gave this time of year a precise 12 hours of night and 12 hours of day all over the world at this season?" Even having a deeper sense of the timing and exact celestial locations affecting the shifting seasons of the year now that the naval man was new custodian of this special place, King Agnarr still possessed that childlike quality of wonder and curiosity that his wife found so alluring.
"Thus the word 'Equinox', Agnarr, of which the Spirits hark that we should prepare to soon be in the March Vernal. But I needn't tell you of that small detail, must I, oh perceptive and wise 5th Spirit Guardian of the Elements?" Turning over on their Northern Lights infused, shimmering bed of leaves with a teasing yawn, Queen Iduna shows off her own knowledge of the Creator's masterful workings of the seasons.
She—as both small girl full of wonderment in Northuldra, and then youthful scientist seeking weather patterns in Arendelle—found it fascinating. And now as partnered 'Guardian of Harmony' to his 'Guardian of Melody', Iduna had a more complete understanding of the subject at last.
So, sharing all of Nature's gifts with her chosen mate made this destined journey come full circle all the more fulfilling.
"Speaking of gifts of nature…all these years later, how do you still manage to look like that girl who rescued me all those years ago, my Windlass beauty?" King Agnarr focuses his ice misted, inquisitive eyes now upon his bare shouldered, crimped hair askew woman who had mentally called upon invisible Gale the Wind Spirit to attempt to straighten her frizzy locks thereof.
"Must be that new aurora borealis balm I've been putting on for you." She flirts back, beyond grateful that her formerly moody, brooding husband had gotten over their stroll through the ice memories in the lower portion of this no longer singularly inhabited Fortress of Solitude that had been carved into the glacier centuries ago.
Some of the recent past frozen statues and graphic scenes were disturbing enough to send Agnarr Bernadotte over the edge once upon a time—ranging from his father King Runeard's betrayal in the Enchanted Forest to Prince Hans' power hungry episode in Arendelle Castle. But with each ice quaking step that faced the fragile verglas reminisces, Earth Spirit Jordskjvelvet's stabilizing groundwork of the shaky cavern was at her beck and call.
With her innate, new 6th Spirit of Harmony gifts, Iduna was somehow able to soothe her man's disturbed mind with a song or two along the chilled way that melted the past ice's ill sentiments until the Fortress stopped shaking with his frost fury.
In fact, the skillful architect and master builder in Agnarr utilized that pent-up energy to now redesign and recreate the forbidding "Fortress of Solitude" to be his and Iduna's perfectly suited "Fortress of Melodic Harmony". It now featured several elegantly decored bedrooms complete with all the amenities, plus neat, level shelves filled with rainbow colored, crystalline ice sculptures of beloved ones to make it more 'homey' and patio glass doors for the couple to gaze out over the beautiful landscape they were currently reshaping.
"That's not all the show you've been 'putting on' for me, my love. Is it my imagination, or does every strand of your beautiful hair glow in prismatic light whenever I touch you? That certainly will add a new facet to our lovemaking in the dark." Said with a wry smirk under his palest ginger moustache, Agnarr strokes his sylph-like wife's unkempt mass of curls down with a cool hand full of astonishment at his Iduna's seemingly endless surprises.
"You should see your hair, my melodic Windchime King." Iduna jibes back, still trying to get used to her Ice King husband's slicked back and shimmering hoarfrost coif that was almost entirely white, with just one small tuft of ginger now.
"Touché." His invisible rapier pledged to his chest, a less tense Agnarr answers in a fencing term to the adored woman who could ably equal—and often best—him in verbal riposte.
"Not only verbal, Agnarr." Iduna smiles up at him with pursed lips as she easily knocks his leaned elbow out from under him to lay the man flat across her pillow covered chest.
Did I say that aloud? Or can you also read my mind through this amazing—at times unsettling— new connection of ours via God's nature, my darling? I am beginning to appreciate young Bjorgman's none-too-private situation with our chatterbox Anna better now I am apparently in the same boat…
"Don't you forget it, Admiral. And his Christian name is 'Kristoff'." The other Guardian of Harmony pulls her partner's face up to join hers in a more than tender morning kiss to prove her point on rightly addressing their good and honest son-in-law by his first name.
"Your wish is my command, Madame Harmony Queen…" Agnarr concedes, his voice laughing as he marveled at how his tinkling music icy fingertips seemed to cause verglas rainbows to dance upon his wife's prismatic skin.
"Good."
In response to their harmonized intimate proximity, the horizon above Ahtohallan alights with a variety of shades. The multi-hued tint of which was mirrored in this daughter of Northuldra's glistening wild hair tangled all over the willingly surrendering Arendellian son.
"'The vernal equinox marks the moment the sun crosses the celestial equator—the imaginary line in the sky above the Earth's equator—from north to south.'" A woman's coloratura voice breaks through the early morning mix of shadows and emerging light.
"Uhh…Thanks for the mind-numbing break of dawn info, oh-impressive-Queen-of-all-things-weather-related." Eugene Fitzherbert Przmyslid had had his fill of encyclopedic descriptions about the thrilling topic of the weather. Particularly when he'd rather be catching some more desired shut-eye while they were still in transit.
Just a few precious minutes left before Norwegian landfall and the doubtless deluge of well-meaning, yet supremely noisy relations of the braided variety who'll certainly want to hear EVERYTHING that happened on the other side of the pond in your absence, Queenie.
"Nonetheless, that doesn't explain why the sun is not only fully up—as if it had been awake all night, though we are not yet within the 'Midnight Sun' cycle—but it is decidedly more brilliant to the north than it is still yet to rise in the south towards Arendelle…" Fellow Magic Carpet passenger Queen Elsa obviously had more on her mind that was reaching out to the elements which were calling her more northward than Arendelle shore.
Of late, Elsa had become more attuned with nature through her Elemental status, and had been sensing this…upheaval…in the very environment, emanating from her homeland.
More precisely—in the mysterious, ancient, mystical habitat she had discovered herself, not so long ago, called 'Ahtohallan'.
And something was happening in the unforgiving glacial area that the 5th Spirit couldn't explain, disquieting her blissful heart's serenity for sure.
"Carpet! Quickly! Please veer northward on a divergent course along the Norwegian coast, up to the edge of the Dark Sea—" The temperature immediately drops upon the high altitude vehicle as frost expels from her panicked lips. Elsa suddenly stands tall upon her elegant heeled feet aboard the intuitively stiffening Carpet to take command of the skybound vessel to a rudely awakened Eugene's grimacing chagrin.
"Whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa, Your Legginess! Hey! I promised my ecumenical Lillebror to deliver you safe and sound, straight across the Atlantic airwaves to your peaceful castle in Arendelle. There the Pixie—your easy-to-set-off-her-ginger-anger-at-me little sister Anna—no doubt awaits our arrival, and will rip off my head—literally—if I don't fulfill my duty in the appointed timeframe. When I'm on my way home to my little lady and kiddies, minding my own business and out of your strangely glowing rainbow hair, then, you can go and meander off on some crazy new adventure with your nutcase sibling and her reindeer gamer friends! I utterly respect you as a big brave Ice Winter Queen lady who's in total control, so it's no skin off my extremely enviable Roman nose once you're safely off my Carpet and back on Norwegian soil, just so as you're no longer in my official charge anymore. Capice?" Waving his hands up at the determined blonde bombshell, the agile thief attempts to sit up from his prone position to gain at least some semblance of dignity and influence.
And/or escape any of his extremities from being frozen with his rapid–fire, high-pitched rant designed to amuse and confuse into acquiescence.
Even if the vexed Ice Queen's punishing gaze down at him made Eugene feel a tad in the cold as he lifts Eliana over him as a snowy shield.
"Yes…yes…You're right. Of course, cousin. We must continue on to Arendelle first to discuss this new…aspect…with Anna. Forgive me for being impulsive and rash in my haste. But I sensed something amiss to the north…I must see Anna." The smiling snowwoman was a warm reminder of Anna's love and the sisterly bond she must keep focus on, as Elsa apologizes after a momentary flash of irritation that almost unleashed some icy fury at her unwitting shipmate. She calmly becomes less ruffled with the thought of talking openly again to her other half she had not seen for over a month.
"And see what Papa and Mama think." Elsa straightens her dress in the self-conscious habit and seats herself back down to Carpet's welcoming pile. She was trying her best—the closer she was drawing to her stabilizing rock and strength of her dear sister and best friend—to believe all her recent nightmares and chaotic visions were mere imagination.
Elsa was hoping against hope that all was normal still in Arendelle with their beloved parents safe in the kingdom, despite her unsettling premonitions.
"Oo-kay. We're all good again, Queenie. See? All the paint splatter palette of your wild coif is back to the stunning platinum look I personally prefer to the freaky chameleon thing you had going a few sky miles back. Blondes, that is, after brunettes." Eugene admits the addendum as guilty salute to his bride back home, receiving a tongue stuck out at his comment from Pascal who was comforting on Elsa's shoulder. "Anywhos! Back on schedule to Arendelle, Rugman! And step on it." Eugene blows a relieved breath down at the thumbs-up tassel flashing Carpet he was again at the helm of as he shares a worried shrug with Pascal.
The muted green reptile pats the preoccupied young woman on her pallid cheek as Elsa begins to softly hum a melody, stroking Eliana's soft-serve snowmound brow. Her obliviously pleasant snow creation sways back and forth in time to Elsa's soft, ageless hymn seeking inner peace through her deep faith, hope, and love.
"'Rock of ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in Thee!
Let the water and the blood from Thy wounded side that flowed.
Be of sin the double cure, save from wrath and make me pure...'"
"Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to the Cross I cling!
When I soar to worlds unknown, see Thee on thy judgment throne,
Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee."
From out of nowhere, Anna of Arendelle begins murmuring the haunting lyrics in tune to an old church hymn her Mama Iduna used to love to sing.
"Mama? …Elsa?" In the midst of a dream, Anna had the feeling she was harmonizing with someone else dear singing the melody, as curiosity wakes her from her mandatory afternoon nap her body in birthing upheaval demanded lately.
But closing her eyes tight in an attempt to siphon some of her Kristoff's Spirit Whisperer ability was proving too hard a task for the physically and emotionally drained, seven-and-a-half month pregnant young woman.
SNORE! SN-NORRRE!
Her energy exerted, tired Anna drifts off to sleep again.
"You okay, Feistypants? Anything…wrong?"
No whispered voice could be more concerned than Kristoff Bjorgman's at this moment.
His 'man of nature' vibes were going berserker of late these past couple of days. Between the crazy aurora borealis off kilter in seasons, the strange wildlife migration times going back way too early northwards rather than remain in the better climate south, and the abnormal elemental weather patterns in the far north near Ahtohallan, Kristoff had a lot on his mind.
But somehow he'd been successfully keeping it all from Anna in her delicate state, carefully guarding his thoughts on the subject whenever she was awake.
Good. You're sleeping again, Baby. Kristoff intakes a deep breathe. He and Sven exchange a look as the reindeer silently pulls the small clipper sled along the all but melted snow-turned-to-sludge road for the sudden warm snap here in mid-February.
Yup, Up here in this here usually still frozen Norwegian countryside, I definitely count that as weird weather.
{"Great timing for that place to act up again, Sven! But when I contacted my Mom and Ragi about it in her Antarctic Southern Snow Palace, they responded in that oh-so-cryptic way: {"'Worry not, Snow Prince. The River of Memories that never ceases to flow is seeking its proper level. The true Guardians of Harmony are beginning their discovery of where they're meant to be.' "Huh? Who? What's that supposed to mean?!"}
{"C'mon, Kristoff! You love it when they talk all vague and spooky like that."} Sven sarcastically retorts in his deep, yet wobbly tone back over his large antler at his Ice Harvester partner.
{"Yeah, right, Pal. Argh! Isn't Elsa involved with that pesky ancient river as its 'Guardian'?! And if this concerns Elsa, it concerns Anna! I thought we had finished with all that madness! Running around up there in her condition with the baby just a month away…!? As a first time father-to-be, how can I do anything but worry?!"}
{"Make that two worried first-time fathers-to-be."} Sven mentally agrees with his friend, the reindeer bull in much the same boat as his human partner. Perhaps even more so, with Svala, Sven's reindeer bride, nearing her seventh gestation month back in the cottage stall, rangifer giving birth about that time.
"SIGH. SIGH."
The pair of young males releases a sigh simultaneously, then share a silly, nervous grin like the buddies they were since their shared youth that eases both their anxieties some.
Kristoff glances back from the driver's seat at his extremely full with child wife dozing in the rear fitted bed of the special small sled he had named 'Baby' in her honor.
The Ice Harvester had been kicking himself for the last several miles at having been talked into—against his and General Mattias' better judgment, mind you—taking his restless ginger out on the road 'to get some fresh air' in an attempt to make her 'feel better'.
To think I was duped again by your cute lips and pleading eyes, Anna!
But you know I'd do anything for you, Baby…Especially now, when you need my full attention, with Joseph on his way soon…
The big blond man turned to a puddle whenever he thought of this little princess about to give him the greatest present any orphan boy could ever achieve his entire life.
A family to call his own.
"Snore—Oh! Yeah! Uh- what? Huh? Were you snoozing off in the driver's seat again, my big buttery, muscly hunk? Here, let me take the reins! Good thing at least I'm always wide awake, eh, Sven?" When the sled hits an unseen bump in the sloshy snow road, Anna abruptly awakens, grabbing the reins from her surprised mellow fellow to make the sled veer in a diverging direction.
"Whoa-oh, Anna! What are you doing!? Where are you going?!" Kristoff holds onto his cap as his actual back-seat-driver recklessly steers poor confused Sven down another, more difficult road.
The one heading not to the peaceful countryside - but rather up the blustery North Mountain.
"Don't worry! I got this, Boys! You just sit back and rest!" As if she was not the one who had been sleeping, the ginger calls up to the bemused pair in her adorably smug way that switches one-eighty in a flashed second. "I'm so excited to feel that Elsa's getting real close, via our super great, harmonious spirit sister link! Just meeting my girl halfway!" The wild spirit in gutsy Anna still refused to be exclusively 'bedridden' or 'in confinement'—No way! I've got stuff to do! Places to go, people to meet!—during any part of her pregnancy, nevermind the last remaining month or so before the big event.
The timing of which another big event in the lives of the royal house of Norway – namely Queen Elsa's wedding to Prince Hans – that was about to take place couldn't have been worse timed.
But what did I figure?! That Hans had to go all romantic and make Elsa promise their wedding to be the first day of Spring! Just happening to coincide with my Joseph on the verge of being born! Well, seven and a half months pregnant or not, I'm going to be Elsa's maid of honor if I have to drag my fat self down the aisle! That Red sure has it in for me!
Even though Anna was bellyaching—both metaphorically and not—she couldn't have been more delighted that her best friend, her other half of a true true sister Elsa was finally going to get that happy ever after of her own.
The fact the leading man in Elsa's fairytale was once the villain of her own was a matter that had been long resolved in the heart of this forgiving, good-souled gal with the braided pigtails of ginger.
You deserve a storybook love too, Elsa. I wouldn't settle for less from that guy if I didn't think he's truly repentant and worthy of you now. Prince Hans Westergaard proved that to us all, whether I like him or not.
If he didn't, I would certainly NOT be working my substitute Queen gig while everyone's off gallivanting, baby-on-board tail off this past month while you two were romancing in sunny South America. Then, Papa and Mama went spur-of-the-moment vacationing off on a second honeymoon up in the North Mountain, leaving all the surprise wedding preparations to lil' ole me!
But I'd do anything for you, big Sisty! I want this wedding to be just as stunning as you've dreamed it to be, Elsa. While you were gone, as my first present to you so you don't have to cram, I've been working my buns off for the wedding plans here in Arendelle with all the citizens helping to make it picture perfect!
At the grand finale of which, I'll be sharing my most precious prize—you—with my sworn archenemy. Hmph. Lucky cluck.
Talk about being a selfless heroine! But I'm not crowing. Mattias and Halima and Kristly have done most of the heavy work. I'm just the wedding planner brains of the operation. Hee hee.
Fortunately for her anxious hubby, Anna had been so absorbed in said wedding plans and Elsa's homecoming that she hadn't considered that their usual open psi-link was intermittent at best these past few days. All she wanted to do was meet with Elsa and give her a great big hug.
So why not speed their reunion up a bit by conniving Kristoff to drive her up the trail that led towards the NorthMountain, like on their first journey together that took her to find Elsa? Anna knew cousin Eugene's magic flying Carpet Elsa was traveling via the sky that would be taking this route to Arendelle, so they would no doubt spot them overhead.
Then we can visit Papa and Mama at the Ice Palace in the North Mountain before heading home to show you all I've prepped for your wedding!
Although, in her allegro exuberance to be with Elsa again, Anna all of a sudden felt the tone dampen, a vision popping into her brain she had seen before in her sleep.
…But…it wasn't these cascades near this North Mountain route in my dream just now that I saw Elsa flying over, was it?
Hmmm? More and more suspicious…Hey! Was that…Ahtohallan? Whoa. It looks…different…
"'When I soar to worlds unknown, see Thee on thy judgment throne,
Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee.'"
She suddenly remembered the haunting music playing over a glimpse of her surreal dream full of vivid colors and bright lights in the sled just now. Anna also had the impression now she could hear Elsa's song in her heart growing not only ever closer, but almost…urgent…calling to her to come straight to the North Mountain Ice Palace at this time.
Something inside Anna's soul as she slept told her that her other half, her sister needed her there right now.
I'm coming, Elsa! Wonder what that funny dream was all about? Guess we can talk about it with Mama and Papa up there, too…
"You okay, Baby?" Kristoff cuts into Anna's catapulting thoughts with a tender hand reaching back to touch her cheek, true concern written all over his patient face that trusted her judgment now.
"We will be when we're all together again to figure this all out." Jutting out her jaw, Anna speaks with sheer certainty and determination, with more than a sprinkling of hope thrown in the mix.
Then she leans her grateful lips into her wonderful, sweet man's warm caring hand full of unquestioning loyalty.
"Sooo…Does the supposed captain of this vessel get a clue as to where we're headed yet?" For the last several sky miles from where he was lying prone and gazing upwards at the lovely scenery, Eugene Przmyslid had given up on guessing where he was going.
Besides crazy.
He had relinquished Carpet's 'helm' to the unyielding blonde bombshell with the luscious gams—Stop that, you bad boy!—after the resolute Ice Queen fearlessly stood up and decided to change course from Arendelle in the southwest of Norway to who-knows-where in the mid-north of the country.
"You'll recognize the place soon enough…I think…What on earth?!" Elsa's teasing of her travel companion shifts when her eyes scan the horizon to see an unexpected change over the landscape.
"Ookay! Someone's been renovating! Gotta say, the place got way more glam than last I swung by here. And flawlessly large gemstones are always an improvement to the frigidly angular, freezing sharp icicles of the former dangerously fragile ice spike motif, I must say. Two thumbs up to the exterior decorator. Wouldn't you agree, Frog?" Commenting drolly as always, Eugene and Pascal both gesture their thumbs up to Elsa's scenic Ice Palace now transformed before them.
Not only was the clear, devoid of color, glass-like structure now teeming with hues of varied shades circulating throughout the edifice from stem to stern and pinnacle. But there were elementally toned rhombus gemstones encrusted to every glamorized turret, bejeweled spire, and cabochon steeple tower of the formerly formidable and awesomely stark Ice Palace structure Elsa had erected in her flash of rebellion seven fateful years past.
"Gemstones?" Gazing upon the prismatic beauty reflecting the colors of her bedazzled eyes, Elsa wonders aloud in awe of the change to her palatial creation as Carpet nears in its descent.
Anna said Papa and Mama recently came up here for a 'second honeymoon' stay over, never mentioning any of this immense change occurring…
"But…how?" The Queen of the North Winter was trying to recall if her explosion of Tenerity magic—several months ago since her battle with the Devil Troll had been won—had affected the Ice Palace in this way.
Olaf would have certainly told me if anything out of the ordinary was to be found here while he was passing out his presents since then. Princess Sofia and Prince Hugo had traveled here with Olaf at the time for Christmas to visit with Marshmallow and the snowgies and bring them his Christmas presents. None of them described the Ice Palace like this at all!
"Oh! What's happened to Marshmallow and the Snowgies in all of this change?!" Elsa abruptly cries out in the middle of her pondering, the love for her friends of magic snow creation outweighing all the worry, wonder and curiosity as to what took place here in her Kingdom of Ice in her absence.
"You mean these guys? They seem to be fond of their shiny new fancy gear." A very familiar voice calls down from atop the edge of the ice precipice steps to Elsa as she dismounts Carpet to stand on the North Mountain peak.
"Anna!" Elsa cries out in relief as her baby sister, riding alongside a gaggle of snowgies upon the humongous palm of her bodyguard Marshmallow's frosty hand, waves her escort to set the ginger young female down to ground level.
"Elsa!" The two sisters lovingly embrace one another after nearly two months spent apart, with excitable snowgies dancing all about their beloved creator's high heeled feet.
"Anna. I'm so glad you're all right! What's happened here?" Elsa was relieved to find her smiling Anna well and unchanged—beyond the expected increased tummy size, that is—as Marshmallow and the snowgies glisten at their Queen enthusiastically.
But as for the iridescent jeweled alteration to the Ice Palace's architecture, the snowgies' diamond-shaped bowtie jewels, not to mention the large purple rhombus shaped gemstone dangling from Marshmallow's already decorative House of Augustenborg medallion Prince Hans had bestowed upon his Captain of the Guard…
"You mean, you didn't do this as a homecoming surprise for your frosty friends?" Anna steps back in astonishment, her queasy gut feeling from earlier that she had tried to laugh off as 'Elsa being all glitzy homecoming Queen' now returning.
"By 'this', you mean the decorative alteration to the Palace exterior?" The stunned Ice Queen asks her sister, still in awe of the artistically subtle, yet remarkable changes to her original design.
"Uh, yeah. Wait 'til you see the inside! Come on!" Anna exuberantly takes Elsa's hand to lead her racing up the glittering with incandescent luminosity staircase leading to the Ice Palace entrance.
"What!? There's more sparklers in there?! Whoa, Mama, am I in the right place at the right time! My babies need two new pairs of shoes! Papa's bringing them home!" As for Flynn Rider, his bright eyes had been ringing up $ dollar signs since they had landed as his sticky fingers relentlessly plucked jewel ties from poor little, unsuspecting, frowning snowgies.
Carpet throws his tassels up in reminiscence of another thief from another time with similar monkey-grubbing paws.
All the while Elsa and Anna had been talking, his grabby thieving hands had been relieving endless amounts of playful snowgies streaming from the Ice Palace of their jewel studded neckties.
"Wow." Elsa mouths as Anna didn't even have to knock for Kristoff and Sven to pull open the huge double doors to the Ice Palace.
"They're the largest, finest water gems I've ever seen! I think I'm gonna cry." It was jewel thief expert Eugene's turn to say in his bedazzlement of the palatial crystal jewel encrusted castle, gleaming from its gemstone embedded in ice spiral staircase to its tinkling chandeliers of rubies, sapphires, emeralds and turquoise cabochon.
Kristoff pats his cousin-in-law on the shoulder with a smirked glance down at his colorful snowgie bowtie gem stuffed pockets.
"It was like this when we got here a few minutes ago. I thought you did it to tell me you were about to arrive." Anna shrugs at the brilliant opulence, knowing affixing gemstones and adding glitter décor was artistic Elsa's kind of thing.
"No, it wasn't me…" Elsa answers in astonishment at the sheer quality and quantity of the multi-hued prismatic gems architecturally level and precisely lining every sector of her once stark crystal white palace.
"I think there's a clue who did, though." Kristoff had been studying the newly appearing crystals since he and Anna arrived. And from where he and Sven were flying up close high by the dangling jewel chandelier they were investigating now, Kristoff's senses may have led him to spot the identification clue.
But it was Elsa's keen eye for mellifluous creative detail that instantly recognized the musical harmony's bass clef and melody's treble clef signs when she looked closely at what the Spirit Whisperer was indicating.
"Damn it! Always a catch! There's definitely the same flaw at the center of them all. Gonna chalk the price down some…" Familiar with assessing gems—even of this magnitude—Flynn grimaces at the small, yet definite flaw within each of the otherwise priceless stones he and Pascal were poking at that decorated the staircase railings.
"Yes. I see it there. But it's no flaw. It's by design." Elsa breathlessly concurs, her eyes trembling at the reflection ebbing into her suddenly teary orbs as she gazes intently upon the crystal jewels embedded in the icy tiles of the floor where someone else cryo-magical had been playing chess games last.
"Can this be?…For me…?" The wet-eyed Ice Queen nostalgically places her cool palm upon the ground, the four gleaming elemental symbols softly glowing at her touch's presence, finally speaking to her as she kneels down to close her eyes with a grateful whisper and smile.
For within each and every gemstone and jewel that was glistening from the Ice Palace interior back at them, at the center existed a tiny gold and silver emblem, with four gleaming, tinted symbols shining around each faceted quadrant that protected the two complementing musical bar measures…
"Where're Mama and Papa, anyway? Have you guys seen them yet? I looked upstairs. No signs of any second honeymooners. Wonder where they got off to…" Having gone upstairs in search of her parents who told her this was their destination over a week ago, Anna was left out of this hushed moment of enlightenment.
"What are you all looking at? These gems Cousin Eugene's trying to pinch from us? I'm gonna tell Raps on you, you incorrigible criminal." The impatient young princess sticks her hand into Eugene's pocket to claim back one or two of the snowgie jewel 'bowties' he had filched to examine the fine detail her husband and sister and cousin were all conversing of, above her head.
"Anna! Wait!" With so much mystic information to be processed at once as her orbs and mind were engrossed in deciphering the gem's shining core, her 5th Spirit senses were at a fever pitch. But Elsa was just a millisecond too late with her warning to her baby sibling as she rushes towards her...
FLASH!
And in the second Anna touched the jewel's crystal and squinted her eyes into it to glimpse tiny the golden Arendelle crest being embraced by the miniscule Northuldran wreath emblem of Enchanted Forest leaves, it happened.
The treble and bass clef measures with the four-colored elemental symbol notes indicating melody and harmony alight in an enormous spray of rainbow radiance that enveloped the entire palace from inside to out…
WHOOSH!
In the blink of an eye, everything and everyone else within the Ice Palace ebb away as Elsa and Anna were magically transported in a blinding ice flurry of autumn leaves to a far-off location unknown…
Chime, chime!
Clinging to one another, the two Arendelle sisters suddenly reappear on a nighttime shore at the edge of a brisk, wintry sea in the middle of a thick mist.
Not just any sea either. It was the Dark Sea that gave both nightmares once upon a time since they discovered it was here that they believed their parents were claimed by the water's dearth.
Chime, chime!
The Ice Queen opens her brilliant eyes at the familiar, yet distant and different, ringing of windchimes. They were calling her to listen to their pervading song that somehow made Elsa feel safe and secure in this new environment, chilled and bleak as it may be.
Sparkling above their heads in the sky were many awe-inspiring, translucently reflective icicles. They were elegantly suspended mid air in an almost pristine crystalline perfection, neatly draped like a domed snow globe just over the breathtaking oceanic Winter horizon.
Chime, chime!
"El…sa…Do you hear it, too?" Trembling from the cold, Anna's small voice chokes out weakly from where she lay in Elsa's embrace on the soft snows of the beach front.
"You're going to be fine, Anna. I know this place. I've got this." Hearing the faint tinkle of chimes approaching from the other side of the sea, Elsa stabilizes her very pregnant sister whose body was woozy from the sudden, unexpected shift to this mystical land where the soft white shore was surprisingly made of snow than it was of sand.
The Ice Queen had lived here in mysterious Ahtohallan amongst the elementals where she had faced her fear and learned to overcome it with Nokk's courage, Gale's amity, Bruni's light and Jordskjevelvet's stability. So she knew the quiet, uninhabited land well, it teaching her much about herself, her power and her loneliness that only Anna and Prince Hans could fill.
Chime, chime!
Elsa had been appreciative of the four elements that held sway here and had been her only companions in the well-named 'Fortress of Solitude' that had been her abode for those lonesome nine months before. Yet, at the same time she dreaded the obligation she felt to repay the power they granted her with their obedience to keep watch over not only the kingdom of Arendelle and the Enchanted Forest, but all the rest of the country, too. The once frightened, introverted girl of destiny realized through her experience with the Snow Queen and the Fire Trolls and so many other races that depended on the ice magic she had honed, that God had entrusted great responsibility with her gifts that she had come to accept the necessary solitary life thereof.
Until Hans Westergaard changed not only her life—but her heart to long for freedom, too.
Queen Elsa once thought she could not offer him a real life of full marital commitment as every devoted husband deserved from his loving wife, if she still was obligated to spend her days out here in this virtual wilderness to tame the elements for the sake of her people, her Kingdom in Arendelle. Perhaps the Ice Queen was chosen to be the 5th Elemental Spirit because she was already predestined to outlive everyone she loved so dearly to maintain the Winter season, like the Snow Queen before her has endlessly endured?
Chime, chime!
But, with Hans' long suffering patience, Anna's dedicated generosity, her parents' gentle guidance, and God's forgiving Love, Elsa had contended with these issues of managing her ice magic as well as juggling her responsibilities to Ahtohallan, Arendelle and being Queen of the North Winter already. So why not add love and marriage to the man of her dreams into the mix as well?
As the wedding day loomed closer, Elsa, though beyond blissfully in love with the well proven worthy, extremely superb and selfless Prince of the Southern Isles, still secretly had been feeling pressure from all sides during this guilt-ridden, troubled-with-visions trip back from Paraiso.
The responsible young leader did not want to let anyone down with her own selfish wants and needs for happiness and love. But at the same time, she knew she could not live another day without Hans Westergaard as her life's partner.
Oh, my Hans. I don't know exactly what is happening this time. Just that this is all new to me again. All I know is that I need your strength of mind and courage of heart, please, to take care of Anna, my parents, Arendelle the kingdom I love—and do the next right thing for all of them. And you too, my Raevstorre. I love you so.
The pale blonde with the flowing long hair flexes her nervous fingers, noting the delicate snowflake diamond engagement ring on her left hand sparkle back as she kissed it to her lips. Feeling rejuvenated by thoughts of her lover, Elsa longed for her Hans' sagacious dependability as she gazes towards the frozen glacier's entry. Just like at the Ice Palace, everything seemed a little altered than when last she was here.
Chime, chime!
"No worries, Elsa. I'm not that immobile yet! Whatever you need me to do, I'm right here for you. Like I always will be. I believe in you, Sis. We've got this. Okay?" Anna trusted her older sister unquestioningly, sharing with Elsa some of her own abounding confidence as her weakened frame straightens up with a deep breath and a smile to the other half of her soul.
The inseparable partner sisters take one another's hand, feeling the strength of their bond give them courage to face anything as they walk through the snows of this most interesting beach.
"As long as we're together—" From out of nowhere, Elsa begins to sing their sister duet to brighten Anna's smile.
"I feel safe and warm!" Anna's melody complements her Elsa's underlying harmony, linked eternally hand in hand as the wind chimes keep perfect rhythm with their sisterly tune.
Chime, chime, chime! Chime, chime!
And as if in lieu of their song, the darkness befallen this stretch of the sea begins to lift from its waves along with the rising notes of the nearing windchimes.
"So what happened? Why are we here? Why is it snowy on the beach now with all those ice crystals dotting the sky? And why is the 'Dark Sea' starting to be none too dark anymore?" Curious more than scared, down-to-earth Anna asks all the questions popping in her mind. Her aquamarine eyes scan the rather interesting skyline that vascillated an incoming aurora borealis over the blue ocean waves that were now gently washing, rather than crashing over the snowy white sands.
Chime, chime! Chime, chime! Chime, chime! Chime, chime! Chime, chime!
"I think we're about to find out." Elsa points Anna's inquisitive gaze to the familiar sight of a watery stallion rising from the ocean waves to rear back with a watery whinny amidst the unremitting tinkling windchimes to greet the pair of young women.
"Where do you want to take us, boy?" The young ice wielder with the similarly loose platinum locks coos to the massive water steed with the wet and wild mane, Elsa petting a soft hand to Nokk's water molecules to tame his hydro-tresses.
WHINNY!
In the wintry landscape, Nokk semi-solidifies in her ice and becomes tame enough to allow the Ice Queen to willingly to mount its back. Then Elsa reaches an inviting hand down to her slack-jawed sister on the beach scarp.
"You mean, I get to ride the Nokk, too? This is ama~zing!" The tiny little spirit child in Anna cries out—"Look! No hands!"—waving her arms in the wet air as Elsa's cryokinetics boost her up to the Water Spirit's surprisingly inviting back.
"Ooh! Tickle bumps!" As the Water Spirit begins to trot across the waves, Anna was trying to draw her more circumspect sister out from the quiet introspection of her thoughts of the significant changes of this place Elsa was so connected to.
"Anna! You're silly!" The two laughing sisters ride the cool waves that seemed to have a life of their own, dramatically transforming halfway across the expanse of the sea to warmer, summer-like neap tides on Nokk's rippling back to the other side of the gulf.
Chime, chime!
By the time the girls arrived on the other side of the Ahtohallan's shockingly humid glacier bay, Wind Spirit Gale had sent a welcoming, warm breeze under the surprisingly bright and hot summer sunny sky to dry their traveling clothes right on their blow-dried bodies.
Standing still, Anna enjoys the balmy whoosh of air up and down her many times let out black, and forest green tunic jacket and dress with mustard leaf embroidery. Meanwhile, Elsa elegantly ballet twirls round and round in her chiffon icy pale lavender cape and jewel studded layer skirts until all the water droplets danced away.
"We've gotta get Oaken to invent something like this air massager back home." Anna sighs with the body relief from aches she'd been longing to escape for months now.
"Indeed. Where to next?" Enthused to see the next thrilling seasonal change and all the different alterations to the almost musical chairs landscapes, Elsa almost giddily asks aloud. Anna's melodious enthusiasm rubbing off her sister's anxieties, as the 5th Spirit's excitement rises with each step further into this whole new world of the formerly dark, silent and uninviting chasm of the Ahtohallan.
As if in response, Fire Spirit Bruni's vibrant orangey red flame flickers to life from within the cavern's mouth, enticing Elsa and Anna in as the salamander flits to and fro above head along the stalactite ceiling.
Chime, chime!
Accompanying the growing louder tinkling of windchimes as the air becomes crisp and clear in a valley, musical notes begin to sound as the blonde and ginger duck their heads into the dark cave where a palette of fall leaves had swirled to gather.
Anna and Elsa glance down to where they were standing in a set of footprints which were lighted in autumn's multi-hues. Squinting their eyes to see in the dull light, the pair conclude that the prints were male and female, walking side by side, as if leading all the way through the maze of the cavern Elsa remembered well to be confusing on her own.
"Guess you're going to walk in the larger footprints with your bigger high heels, Elsa. I'm only a size 4 flats." Shrugging, petite of foot Anna didn't care either way but wasn't sure if the mystically lit footprints would self destruct or set off booby traps if the right size foot did not correspond.
The smaller set seemed just her shoe size perfect fit anyway.
"Or we can mimic Bruni. What do you say, Anna? Feel like defying gravity?" ever unconventional Elsa was finding this scavenger hunt game of follow the leader invigorating, her pensive mood of late lifting.
"As long as Joseph doesn't mind being a little roly-poly, I don't!" Anna giggles, her unborn son kicking his eagerness to join in his aunt's playful idea.
"Okay, you two! Up we go!" Elsa easily directs her cool winds to airlift Anna and her tiny stowaway up to the ice sled the Queen of Ice swiftly projects a few feet to hover over the path scattered with autumn leaves.
"Whee! Wow! How I've missed having you around! This is so much fun, Elsie!" Anna chortles as Elsa quickly maneuvers her ice sled through the low hanging cavern, keeping up with the rhythmically musical footprints below on the trail doing a mischievous two-step at times.
"How many times must I tell you and Hans never to call me that!? It's a cow's name!" Elsa was singing with the same sisterly joy by the time the light at the end of the tunnel neared, right on Bruni's flickering fire tail.
"Then, Moo-oovee out of the way!" Making bovine noises, rolling off the ice sled, Anna was full out laughing, Elsa joining right along with her funny little sister's cow joke. The non-timorous two tumble out onto a grassy knoll on the other end of the cavern, hugging one another for the sheer joy of being together as they should have been as kids, exploring this strange place now.
Speaking of strange…
"Grass?" Elsa was first to come to her senses as her cute little nose was pressed against a soft brushstroke of spring green, green grass. Opening her eyes wide, Anna joins Elsa in gazing around at the uncanny verdant locale that was just moments ago a deciduous, autumnal scene.
As an invisible veil of sunlight welcomes them in as if a warm embrace, the Arendelle young women's adjusting eyes drink in an unbelievable view.
"And pretty flowers! And bushy rose bushes and lots of sweet-smelling fruit trees by that babbling brook forked from that pinkish stream! Look at this place, Elsa! Even in this winter month of February, there're so many creatures here! I swore I could hear cardinal birdies, saw many butterflies and woodland armadillos scurrying aboveground by some froggies happily hopping. I even spotted a mountain goat climbing over that big branch hill right by some apparently pleasant wolverine!" Always taking note of animals and nature since she was a kid, Anna exclaims as she props her not-so-lithe body up on an elbow to further survey the ever-changing, scenic area.
"I thought it was all just a cold ice, desolate glacier. You never told me Ahtohallan was so full of life and beauty inside!" Anna comments at the same time her spirit was trying to reach out to tell Kristoff—her psychic partner Wind Whisperer—that she and Elsa were physically all right.
Well, kinda all right, Kristly, if you count being zapped into the crazy Ahtohallan glacier turned upside down on its head all right!
"Because it never was before…" Elsa trails off, perplexed again at the uncanny inexplicability of all four seasons existing so peacefully in such close proximity, with even flora and fauna side by side in perfect harmony. The maze of cliffs and caverns of cold frozen ice she had last viewed here just a few months back had been drastically transformed into this virtual Garden of Eden.
But how? And by whose design?
Chime, chime!
Just then, the ground begins to tremble, starting from the opposite side of the wide open valley where autumn leaves had been scattered, to travel all the way beneath the springtime grasses beneath their feet.
Earth Giant Jordskjevelvet marches into view as his huge fists will a pair of large rock chairs to emerge from the ground at the summit of the springtime grassy hill overlooking the whole vista that Anna had referred to.
Chairs in the diamante shape of elemental rhombus crystals that reminded Elsa of a pair of thrones.
Chime, chime!
Fit for a King and Queen…
CAK! CAK! CAK!
At this moment a majestic, tan with grey and white distinguished markings, large wing spanned red-shouldered hawk signals his loud cry as if to announce the presence of someone important's arrival.
Chime, chime!
Make that two important somebodies, as all of the recently arrived, migrated beasts of nature gather around the pair of thrones at the center of the valley that was previously a hollowed underground cavern.
Chime, chime! Chime, chime! Chime, chime! Chime, chime! Chime, chime!
That's when a surreal iridescent, translucent small sailboat craft glides down the lilac-hued stream towards the astonished young women on a soft summer breeze, the sound of windchimes increasing exponentially.
Even from a distance, the handsome captain of the vessel was unmistakable with his tall, strong gait and proud head held high where he stood at command of his ship that flawlessly rode upon some unseen elemental waves of raw power.
But that's where the similarities ended.
"Papa?" Anna and Elsa both murmur their dear parent's name in unison, exchanging a quizzical glance with one another. Their handsome Father's usual dark blue Sjoforsvaret navy uniform was of silvery ice pale shades and his jacket decorated with the quartet of elemental rhombus gems in place of his naval medals and commendations. King Agnarr stood beneath a stunning cape of mystically shimmering white snow now that seemed to glisten a melody of its own with a new, exquisite power from the sunbeams themselves. The Ice King's signature ginger moustache and highlight sprinkled ginger hair was now almost completely platinum blond.
Just like Elsa's. Save for one last single streak of ginger amidst the platinum.
Chime, chime! Chime, chime!
"Where warm breezes meet icy seas, there are windchimes, full of melodies!"
But it was their secondary parent's stunning visage that totally took Elsa and Anna's collective breath away as her song envelopes the entire landscape to take notice with its irresistible music, set to windchime rhythm in the background.
All of Nature pays homage as an ethereally glowing woman, all dressed in Northern Lights infused, chiffony rainbow sleeve strips and a multi-hued gown magically crafted of autumn leaves, crosses the icy sailboat's deck to stand at her striking shipmate's side.
The new 6th Spirit—Mother Nature, the Queen of Harmony—places an electrifying hand of healing light on her Winter Windchime King's pleased shoulder that the cold could not weigh down upon when she was near.
"MAMA?!"
The once quiet and demure Arendelle Queen had been transformed into an amazing beacon of Harmony's light and Nature's beauty combined that exuded from every loosed hair strand and gleaming pore of her magnificent being full of caring and compassion for all the little ones of the world.
"Come, my darlings, safe and sound! No longer lost, we have been found!" In melodic, dulcet tones, Queen Iduna leans forward and spreads her arms wide, welcoming her little girls in with a motherly embrace that wiped away any reservations they may have had of her new persona.
Chime, chime! Chime, chime!
"Mama! Papa!" Anna and Elsa, squeezed hand in hand, race towards their beloved parents as the mystically glowing King escorts his brilliant Queen across a quickly forged ice slick to the lavender river's shore.
"My beautiful girls!" Nature Queen of Harmony Iduna's already aurora borealis sparkling eyes sparkle even more when they alight upon Elsa and Anna running towards her.
The natural beauty who was Iduna had discovered her full splendor in the blossom of motherhood, her delight in her pair of tender sweethearts that this special man gave her was the greatest joy of her life.
"You look different, Mama." Anna whispers as she runs her hands through her mother's long flowing sepia brown hair, that went ombre midway to golden, orangey and reds, similar to the stunning coloring of autumn leaves.
"Nothing endures but change, my dearest little ones. And the forgiving Love of our Lord." The mother shares her wisdom over her children as she spreads her elemental rainbow sleeves over her blonde and ginger babies.
"Now, scooch in, my babies!" The tears spill over Iduna's fulfilled orbs as she plants invigorating kisses to Elsa, then Anna's cheeks before gathering the young women up in a big maternal hug that showed her own eternal love.
"Snow angel! Gingersnap!" Smiling with fatherly pride, Agnarr's ice glowing gaze instantly defrosts as he kneels down to embrace his little family huddled together at the foot of his ice slide. "You're here. Welcome to the new Realm of Ahtohallan." The Ice King of Melody states more solemnly with a pale white haze outstretched over the changed landscape milieu. It glistened with cool fresh dew at the mere wave of his powerful hand as his pure ice blue eyes meet Elsa's.
The patriarch understood that this would be a difficult moment to face in their family's life, which was saying quite a lot for this family who had seen more than their share of trials and hardships over the years.
"Papa? Mama? Why…? A new 'Realm'? What are you doing up here in Ahtohallan?" Though pregnantly emotional Anna was a basket of relieved tears in her Mama's shushing arms, more stably cool intellectual Elsa still had her wits about her enough to ask what was going on, albeit in an awestruck whisper.
Especially since this place, this Ahtohallan 'River of Memories' was her responsibility as 5th Spirit Guardian thereof.
Not them! Not after all Papa and Mama have been through! This burden is my duty alone that I must find a way to manage and bear somehow for Arendelle and the people I love!
{"Not alone, Elsa. Since the Lord created Eve for Adam, no one was ever meant to be alone. Together as always, side by side. This will be no burden for your Papa and I."} There was a harmonic cadence in Queen Iduna's lyrical words sung straight to her daughter's heart.
"For you, my darling Elsa, I will assume your position as the 5th Element Spirit of Ice, so you can be free to be the young woman and good leader you should be. For us, to at last be the good parents you always deserved, the people we were meant to be, as God intended, for us to watch over our beloved children and our cherished country in this unique way. I will finally be your responsible father and be the one to tame the Winter seasons in your place, my wondrous Snow Angel. I am—praise God for His mercy and strength—at last ready to take on my truest role that I hid from for far too long." Choking back his own emotions, King Agnarr presses Elsa's slender palm against his larger one. Elsa's eyes widen as through that touch she could feel her father's fully matured ice magic manifest within the 5th Spirit of Ice he has embraced. And his frozen magic was now enhanced by the elements now at his command, as the Windchime Winter King's veins pulse with not only the innate cold, but also smoldering heat's power, his heart pounding with earth-shaking strength, his lungs soaring with a fresh zephyr's stamina, his muscles racing with torrents of new stamina. All the elemental influence of which left an incredible sensation for his fellow ice wielder to wordlessly recognize that her Papa was ready to take on the dual role of 5th Spirit and 'King of the North Winter' in her place.
"What are you saying, Papa? Your role is to come home to Arendelle to be its King again, just as you were born to be!" Elsa's demanding edict was betrayed by the loving tears that spill over as the older King shakes his head with a knowing smile down at his strong-minded first offspring as he had been leading his little clan up the hill towards the pair of thrones situated there.
"Not anymore, my Snow Angel. My wild Windlass is the one who brought us here to tame the elements she has always been a favorite of, Ahtohallan responding by accepting our request in magical kind. The elements at your mother's sensible council, and the seasons I can control from the power source here have proven that we are truly 'where we're meant to be'. At least, according to my oh-so-wise Northuldran mother-in-law who's always so damnably right. But don't tell her I said so. She'll never let me live it down." Seating Elsa in the left side Royal Ahtohallan throne beside her mother with Anna seated on Iduna's lap on the right side Royal Ahtohallan throne, Agnarr smirks at the mention of Northuldran Chief Yelana.
Elsa was glad to at least hear her Papa's humor still intact amid all the other alterations about him she was trying to get used to.
"Mama? Does this mean you're not going to live with us in Arendelle anymore? Are you not coming to the big wedding we've been planning? Are you two not going to see baby Joseph be born?" Anna's surprisingly more quiet, affecting questions come from a little, accepting place inside rather than the rebellious roar of her sister's non-compliance with the whole new situation.
"It means, min flicka, that your Papa and I will be able—via the elements who are now our comrades and dear friends—to visit you girls anytime you need us to." The prismatic queen very motherly soothes her frazzled children's brows with each elegantly draped hand. "So that includes important days to our important girls, such as the wondrous birth of our first blessed grandchild and your beautifully perfect wedding day of dazzling destiny. So please have no worry, my darling girls. Your Papa will maintain the North Winter as its Windchime King in conjunction with the Snow Queen in the South, while I will take on the responsibility of monitoring the elements for you, my darling spadbaarns, as the 6th Spirit of Mother Nature. Don't you see? Papa and I were born to achieve this together here in this mysterious land that we have begun to tame and are learning the secrets of, day by day, for our Land of the Midnight Sun. Let this be your moment to shine, my girls." The petite queen seemed very big and impressive to her daughters as looked deep into their eyes while calmly and succinctly explaining what tremendous role this native orphan girl had embraced for the ones she loved.
"Yes, my cherished darlings. Arendelle is your nation, now. It is your good kingdom full of good people who have come to love and respect you both as good, righteous sovereigns there. I have already imparted to General Mattias that I have appropriately renounced my kingship to my trusted and worthy, next in line to the throne of our beloved country upon her return to the kingdom. You, my brilliant and regal since the blessed day you were born to us will now and forever take on your truest duty as Queen of Arendelle. With Anna by your side always, you will be its finest leader, my big girl. I believe in you, Queen Elsa, and know I am entrusting our nation to capable, beautiful hands." 5th Spirit Agnarr uses his easy ice prowess to swiftly formulate an icy royal crown, as 6th Spirit Iduna waves her talented hands to create the elemental gemstones that would glisten and shine upon the permafrost crown hovering down to Elsa's noble brow.
"Remember, whenever you need us, Papa and Mama's spirit will always be with you." Iduna strokes Elsa's shocked forehead free of wrinkles, then tickles her tender fingers to Anna's bulgy tummy, causing the ginger to giggle and snuggle into her Mama close.
Glistening-eyed Iduna then masterfully gives her husband a challenging glance from the throne she held court over, her leafy skirt swishing impatiently with a pressing subject on her mind they had obviously already discussed–-AKA Mother Nature laid down the law.
"Yes…ahem. Of course. We will both attend your marriage ceremony to that Dane on the first day of Spring, my Snow Angel, have no doubt."
Was there yet a trace of animosity in the Winter King's baritone voice out of nowhere towards Prince Hans of the Southern Isles? Elsa's curious eyes gaze deep into her Father's that were opened wider to wisdom than he ever knew in this selfless new role he had freely undertaken.
"And I will be overjoyed to walk you down the aisle, and give my precious child away to worthy Prince Hans, the true hero of Arendelle…and my Snow Angel's heart." The last shred of paternal jealousy doused by a flood of elemental culpability reflected on the winds of his grounded partner-in-life's blistering stare, Winter King Agnarr of Ahtohallan concedes this final remnant of human frailty, his soulmate Queen Iduna of Harmony awarding him her most gratified smile.
As for Elsa, she was speechless at her beloved father's implicit permission concerning her imminent wedding to Hans Westergaard, whom the Norwegian King had aired multiple qualms about since the romance began. And so was Agnarr, though he wished he could express more of his love and caring than his coarse words belied for his dear little girl who was now an independent young woman on the cusp of replacing him as her hero.
So the mighty King of the Winter North awkwardly shifts in his tall silver boots instead.
After all, the Ice Spirit was still a bit frosty on the finer points of apologizing. Phenomenal elemental power or no, he was still their ever-loving dad.
Queen Iduna glances her wise orbs back and forth between her so much alike husband and her elder daughter and then finally to rest upon her vibrant younger child, whom Iduna knew was so precious to them both that she could always find a way to break the ice, so to speak.
"Okay! Who wants to go back to that ama~zing snow beach and build the biggest, bestest family Snowman together!?" Anna, as usual, was that ray of sunshine amid the storm of emotions her dear ones were all grappling with at this juncture.
Bright and smiling Anna of Arendelle knew that the secret magic of building a snowman had the miraculous power to soothe any rattled nerves, even any left after all this familial/royal/ marital/ life-changing and magical eye-opening revelation.
"Forgive me for not saying it enough when I should have all while you were growing up, my Snow Angel. But, as a father, I am so proud of the beautiful young lady you've become, my Elsa, and I trust your choice of the young man who will be your stalwart champion from now on. I want to give you the chance to build a beautiful life, a wonderful family with the one you love. Just as your mother did when she gifted you two to me. I'd do anything to grant you the happiness I've had in my life, as husband and father. Never forget, your Papa loves you so." Quietly speaking to Elsa on the side, King Agnarr's ice melts in his warm heart. The warmth of his fatherly love produces tears as the proud man at last admit these deep truths to his first child who had inherited so much of him that he foolishly wasted her childhood trying to protect her from its cost.
So now, at last, he could make recompense by shouldering the duty that she, as a young woman just starting out in life, rightly viewed as a burden tying her down to a life of solitude he never wanted for her.
And his beautiful Snow Angel who had sacrificed so much already, deserved her wings to fly more than anyone.
"I love you too, Papa. And thank you for all the days, and all the love you shared, even now to pledge yourself to take on this duty in my place. You will always be my hero." Elsa softly chokes out, squeezing her just as teary-eyed daddy's cool palm in hers. She never felt closer to the man whose devotion to his wife and daughters was unmatched in this time of his selfless sacrifice to renounce his Kingdom to take on a new, unknown role.
"Doesn't have to look like Olaf this time either! Maybe we can dress him up with a top hat using the brown velour of this darn skirt that doesn't fit me anymore, a colorful scarf woven from some of your ribbon sleeves, Mama, a nose made of that silvery leather of Papa's armor boots and shiny eyes from the bling off Elsa's jewel cape…" Unaware Anna's pleasant voice rings from the springtime hilltop, echoes through the autumn valley caves, resounds off the summer glacier bay, and carries the four family members walking hand in hand to the snowy winter beach coast where it all began.
To the ever-optimistic, devoted, enduring and courageous hearts full of love in Anna, Elsa, Iduna and Agnarr Bernadotte, this new phase of their family dynamic promised to be just that, dynamic and new. And filled with blessed promises to the bright future God had planned for them if they only set aside fear to bask in His Love that was unconditional and eternal, if one kept the Faith.
The joy and laughter they shared as a family on this special day together, just enjoying one another with no thoughts of burdens or responsibility or duty or cares to hold them back was one these appointed Guardians of Harmony would never forget.
This enchantment of building a snowman on the incredibly snow kissed beach—magic and nature and elements or legends of old aside—totally erased the old, desolate Fortress of Solitude that once stood in this exact place, never to return to haunt the heart of a lonely Ice Queen again as it was replaced by the sparkling new and naturally beautiful merging of ice crystal snows and leafy, woodland scenery Fortress of Harmony & Melody.
Free at last in so many ways, soon Elsa of Arendelle would know the rapture of having her heart forever embraced by the most honest and true emotion that the Lord gave man and woman—Love—that makes them into one complete soul.
Never to feel the pain of loneliness again.
Jeg elsker deg, min kæreste, Hans. I'll be waiting to be with you again soon, my love…
And then we'll be together forevermore in perfect melodic harmony…
Chime! Chime! Chime! Chime!
"Rock of Ages" – Hymn written by Augustus Toplady 1776
min alskare – 'my love' in Swedish
Capice? – 'Understand?' in Italian
min flicka – my little girl in Swedish
spadbaarns – children in Swedish
Ræv storre – Great fox constellation in Danish
Jeg elsker deg – 'I love you' in Norwegian
Min kæreste – my darling in Danish
I dedicate this chapter – and the entirety of this saga written from my heart – to the dearest man who ever wore the honorable title of 'Father" - my Daddy. Though you're no longer in this fallen world, my darling one, I am blessedly assured you are far Above it, now in peace - no more pain - always watching over the family you loved. In my small way, again I hope to please God with the humble gift He has given me to share stories written through the imagination and dreams inspired by my beloved first Hero, my Mentor, my Buddy, my Daddy.
Praise the Lord for the precious treasure of being our generous, genius smart, funnyman Daddy's cherished child for so many wondrous, unforgettable years. Thank you, my beloved Daddy, for always supporting my dreams, giving them wings to fly. Just as my love still lifts with each breeze to you into Eternity. I love you forever and ever, Daddy, and am surely certain I will see you again soon, just as I told you in that last hour, in the blink of an eye.
God be with you 'til we meet again on that blessed day at the pearly gate of the 'Kingdom of Heaven' where I know you wait for us, my Honey.
I hope to make you proud 'til then.
Sending my forever Love as I feel you ever near in everything I do and say,
Your little Buddy
I love you, Handsome Stranger.
