Anna looked in the distance, her eyes unfocused. Her quill, dry by now, was resting on the blotting paper.
She had dutifully worked through most of the afternoon trying to check the accounts, and had managed to sign nearly all of them. But focusing had become harder and harder as time went on. At one point her eyes had come to rest on the photograph on the wall she had shown Gerda earlier, and working had simply become impossible after that. The rows of numbers did not only dance to make it harder to follow them, they had begun to weave patterns. Patterns that looked like runes. And snowflakes.
A few years ago, the mere idea that she would have to think hard to remember when she had last seen her sister would have been laughable. Even after Elsa had moved away from the castle to live in the forest, Anna had seldom stayed more than a week without seeing her sister. Indeed, any unusually long interval of time during which visits were impossible – for instance because Anna was away on a diplomatic mission, or because the roads were blocked - would have been something rare enough to be remembered for some time. And now it took her some time to remember when their last encounter had been, and she had to actually check the dates on the letters to find out when they had last exchanged news.
And the worst was that she did not even remember when she had stopped remembering. The transition had been seamless, from a week without seeing Elsa being a week too many, to a couple of months not being that intolerable a wait, to years passing by unnoticed.
Anna still cared a lot about Elsa and loved her dearly, of that she had no doubt. It was just that… well, she was queen now, and married, and with children. She had duties, and other people to love. Gerda and Kai had been a whole new adventure, something precious and wonderful that had only just begun. It was a different kind of love than the one she had for Elsa or for Kristoff, but no less powerful - possibly even more so, in fact.
But, Anna realised as she rolled the ideas over in her head, it did not explain everything. She had kept seeing Elsa after Gerda, then Kai, were born. Indeed, her sister had never visited more often than when Anna had been pregnant with Gerda, and had either been there or sent a message every day for the first months after her niece's birth. Later on, Anna had visited her sister and the Northuldra as soon as Gerda had been old enough to travel. And Elsa had been present the day her niece had walked her first steps. And she had been there just as often before and after Kai was born, and during the first years of his life.
And then… then the visits from either of them had become less frequent. And the letters had followed. And Anna had not noticed it, and right now she could not even remember how it had begun. It had been, Anna realised with a sudden pang of guilt, like growing out of a toy or a game when she was younger. Day by day, month by month, she would play less and less with it, until one day she stopped completely, and did not even notice she had stopped until she found the discarded toy someday, and suddenly felt the fond memories come back to her. Sometimes the nostalgia was enough to entice her to start playing with it again, until the cycle restarted. She had even reflected once that it must have been very unfair to the toys, and had apologised to them in case they turned out to be able to notice this.
Anna sighed, and pushed her chair back from her desk. She gave a longing glance at the stack of remaining papers. It was down to a couple of sheets now, but they would have to wait for a little longer. She needed time to think, and she had the habit of pacing around when she was thinking hard.
Especially when, like now, the subject of her thoughts made her so sad.
She needed to visit her childhood friends.
Gerda's horse slowed down, and she did not press it on. There was barely any light left now, and going any faster would have been dangerous. She had packed a small lantern when leaving – one of the things her father had always said you should never leave home without, even if it was bright outside - but she was not quite sure if it would be able to light her path well enough to allow for some speed. She thought of turning around - any hope of keeping the secrecy about Kai's disappearance and her own disobedience of the rules was long gone by now - but could not bring herself to do it, not now that she was almost certain that Kai was out there.
"Kai!" she bellowed once again as loudly as she could.
She strained her ear for an answer, but only got faint echoes of her own voice. She looked behind her. The city had now disappeared from view since she had gone down a small ridge, but she was confident she would be able to find her way back – and if not, her horse would.
As she looked again at the path, her eye caught a small light in the distance. She directed her horse toward it, shouting for Kai again. As she got nearer, she realised it was a very small, purplish flame, burning very slow to the ground without moving. She called out but got no response.
Eventually she drew level with the small flame. She did not smell anything burning. Gerda had heard about will-o'-the-wisps, but she was pretty sure you did not get them around these parts, and she was almost certain they were not supposed to be pink. She decided to dismount to examine it further.
The flame disappeared as soon as she jumped down her horse. Keeping a hand around her mount's rein, she reached into her bag and lit up her small lantern. She examined the ground, and let out a small cry as something caught the light. She gingerly picked it up, but she had already recognised it. It was a button, identical to those that adorned the vest Kai had been wearing today. It seemed to have been torn when his jacket got caught in a bush.
Still firmly holding the reins of her horse, Gerda walked in circles, calling out Kai's name, and searching for more clues. But she could not find anything else, apart maybe that the ground seemed to have been trampled here and there, but she had no idea if this was recent or not. In the light from her small lantern, she thought she saw the surrounding bushes and trees still shaken by the wind, which was strange since she did not feel much more than the occasional draft.
She climbed back into the saddle and moved forward, calling out to Kai and trying to hold her lantern as high as she could. But there was no answer, and she could not see anything apart from bushes, grass, twigs, and dead leaves. She had a vague idea of where she was, and was pretty sure she had come here many times with her parents or Olaf when the weather allowed it, but in the nearly full darkness the familiar landscape had turned into something almost entirely alien.
She noticed the small flame in the distance by pure chance, when she happened to look away from the lantern. It was another small purple-tinted flame, burning low to the ground. Gerda urged her horse toward it. She had just reached it when it went out, and she could not spot anything on the ground in the light of her lantern.
She was about to dismount again to check, when she noticed another light some distance away. That one was definitely coming from a fire, which seemed to be lit in a small cave. Gerda could not make out much, but she thought she saw something on the cave floor near the fire.
Shouting again, she pressed her horse toward the cave, wondering exactly where it was. She knew she was not far from the city, possibly not more than half an hour on foot, and she had gone there for many walks with her family, yet she did not remember any cave. Kai and her would not have missed such an opportunity to play.
The cave entrance seemed to be a dozen feet above the path where she was riding. As she was getting nearer, she desperately tried to get a better view of what was inside. She was getting more and more certain that the thing near the fire looked like someone sleeping, someone who may have been wearing a green coat.
She had just shouted Kai's name once more when the ground shook. Her horse neighed and tried to rear up, but she pulled the reins and patted its neck to calm him down. As she looked up, Gerda saw the light from the fire rising until it was out of sight, as if the cave itself had been moving upward.
The ground shook again. For a second, she thought she saw a gigantic shape, slightly darker than the sky, slowly moving away. Then there was only a low, regular rumbling, slowly decreasing.
Gerda felt that the mature, sensible thing that a responsible twelve year old in her thirteenth year should do now was to turn away and ride back to the castle, and tell everything to her parents, and let the grown ups take care of the rest. There was probably a very good explanation for what she had just witnessed, and they would find it. But right now, she did not feel mature, sensible, or responsible. She wanted to find her brother, and she was under the impression that a mountain had just kidnapped him. The fact that she was not even sure he – or anybody - had even been in this moving cave did not factor in the equation. At least now she had a goal.
Brandishing her lantern in front of her to light her path, Gerda pressed her horse forward in the direction of the dark shape.
Anna stepped slowly into the gallery. Only a few candles of the large chandelier had been lit, leaving most of the room in shadows, and some of the paintings barely visible, but Anna knew each of them by heart anyway. She still liked to come into this large room when she wanted to ponder on her own for a while or when she felt in a gloomy mood, which still happened to her sometimes. Right now she did not want to disturb Kristoff – she knew he liked to spend some time alone with Sven when his friend was recovering from a sickness. It seemed to happen more and more frequently nowadays, although the large reindeer would always be up and about in a couple of days. She would have to go check on him after that, but right now, she needed some time to think on her own.
She paced slowly across the gallery, her gaze resting on each painting as she passed them by, even when she could barely see them. She only stopped whenever she passed by a painting of her family, especially the old ones when Elsa was still queen. There were also a few photographs of Elsa's latest visits now, their monotonous sepia colours for once withstanding the comparison with the vibrant hues of the paintings now dulled by the gloom.
She had never wanted to stop seeing Elsa, or writing to her. Yet it had happened, and she had not even realised it. And she still did not understand exactly how. Elsa's letters and visits had become less frequent, and so had her own letters, visits and invitations, but she could not remember when it had started. There was a time where she would always carry a letter for her sister whenever she went outside in case she encountered Gale. There was a time where she would rush for her quill to write an answer as soon as the wind spirit brought her a message from Elsa. There was a time where she would count the days or even the hours until their next meeting.
And now she would see dead leaves carried by the wind, and make a mental note to write to Elsa soon, and forget it half the time. Now she would file the increasingly rare letters from Elsa in a drawer and plan to write back whenever she would find the time. Now her own daughter had to remind her that it had been years since she had last seen her sister.
"What happened, Joan?" Anna asked, stopping in front of a large painting of an armoured woman brandishing a sword. "Did I stop caring for Elsa? Why did I let us drift away like that? Is it because of the kingdom? The children? Or is it because Elsa wanted it that way?"
Joan of Arc failed to answer, as she had always done. Anna stood in place for a while, her gaze fixed on the defiant expression of the painted woman while she tried to look into her own mind. She remembered standing in this very spot, decades ago, when she was barely older than Kai, and discussing with Joan about Elsa, although she had needed to crane her neck higher at the time. She had longed for Elsa's presence for her whole childhood. She had cherished it as soon as the doors had been opened, and had enjoyed every second of being at her sister's side ever since. She deeply loved her, and that had not changed. So… how could she have borne to drift so far away from her that she needed to think to remember when she had last seen her? Was there a limit to the number of persons you could love more than anything?
"Was it me who started it?" Anna asked to no painting in particular as she resumed her walk along the gallery. "Or did she… but no, I would never have let her grow apart again."
She had always supported Elsa unconditionally, ever since she had learned the truth about the separation during their childhood. She had accepted without hesitation her decision to move away from Arendelle, glad that her sister had finally found a place where she belonged. She had never even thought of questioning her choice, or any that she had made after that. And she was pretty sure she had never given Elsa cause to complain, at least knowingly - anyway, even if she had accidentally hurt her sister, Anna would have realised it quickly enough to apologise, and Elsa in turn would have known her sister well enough to realise she had meant no harm and was simply her clumsy old self. Anna had gotten better at diplomacy but she still occasionally talked before she thought.
Could it have been something more subtle, Anna pondered, pacing the almost dark room. Could their lifestyles be responsible for this? Saying that Anna and Elsa now lived very different lives was an understatement - Anna lived in a castle, surrounded by her subjects, friends and family, a world grounded in reality and punctuated by the various meetings a Queen needed to attend and all the joys and constraints that family life would bring. Elsa lived in a magical world, shared between the nomadic life of the Northuldra and their spirit friends, and the unearthly world that was Ahtohallan. The Northuldra took care of all the children in the tribe together, and Anna knew Elsa gladly joined them for this task, but raising children as part of a group did not offer the same special bond one could form inside a family. And Elsa did not have children of her own nor was she in a relationship in the same sense as Anna was - she had good friends among the tribe, but did not seem to have formed a stronger bond with anyone, as Honeymaren had once somewhat wistfully told her. Elsa undoubtedly loved her niece and nephew, but being an aunt was not quite the same thing as being a mother - especially when said aunt was not always present.
Was this difference enough to cause people to drift apart, Anna mused to herself as she turned round a corner, knocking on the plinth of a bust like she always did when she reached that point. Had she pushed Elsa away without even realising it, by behaving as if Elsa could not understand what a family life like hers was like? Had she unconsciously added another door between them, a door formed out of the differences in their lives? Did Elsa eventually come to see Anna's life as a constant reminder of something she would never have nor even understand, even if she did not want it?
"Am I still that clueless?" Anna asked the bust. "Is it all my fault? Did I cause Elsa to run away again?"
Silence fell again in the large room as the bust failed once more to answer. It was broken by the sound of the doors opening. Anna whirled round to see her husband striding into the room.
"Anna!" he said. "Thank goodness you're here!"
"What's wrong, Kristoff?" Anna asked, quickly walking up to him. Even in the darkness, she could see that her husband was unusually upset, if the tone of his voice had not been enough of a clue. "Is Sven all right?" she said as she got closer, and thought she could see the red in Kristoff's eyes.
"N… no," Kristoff said, as Anna gently embraced him. "It's… not looking good. But, Anna, the children are gone!"
"What do you mean, gone?" Anna asked, feeling a chill going down her spine.
"Kai has run away from the city, and Gerda went after him!"
"Wait, what?! That's… why? How do you know that?"
"Err, I told him. Sorry, Anna, it's my fault," Olaf said, entering the gallery. Behind him Anna could see the worried faces of some servants and a couple of soldiers.
"What happened?" Anna demanded.
"Gerda had been looking for Kai…" Olaf began.
"Yes, the poor thing, she was looking for him and I told her he was probably hiding somewhere!" Anna cried. "But… why did she decide to leave the castle to find him?"
"She, er, wanted to fix it by herself. She felt responsible for chasing him away. She did not realise he was sad because Sven was… not feeling well."
"Sven is still not feeling well?" Anna said, grabbing Kristoff's lapels. "Why did you not tell me? How badly is he feeling? Can the doctor cure him?"
"He… he hopes so," Kristoff stammered, "but it does not look good. Er…"
"And Kai learned about that?"
"He may have overheard the doctor telling me that," Kristoff said, looking at his feet. "I'm sorry, Anna, I.. I did not pay enough attention to…"
"And what's that about Gerda leaving the city?" Anna said, whirling back toward Olaf. "Don't blame yourself, Kristoff," she added, turning back to her husband, "I should have been there. I keep messing everything up. Why did Gerda leave the city?" she asked Olaf.
"It was, er, the guards…"
"The guards? Which guards? Did guards come to kidnap her? Who could have done that? Arendelle is not in conflict with anyone! Who would want to kidnap my daughter? Was there nobody around to help?"
"No, it was the Arendelle guards. They said they had seen…"
"Arendelle guards kidnapped Gerda? But why would they do such a thing! Do you know who they were? I will go talk to them! It's all a misunderstanding!"
"No, they had seen Kai leaving the city, well, a boy that could look like Kai. So Gerda decided to follow him and…"
"Why didn't they stop him? And her?"
"I apologise, Your Majesty," said a guard who had been hovering near the door. "Her Highness was on horseback, and made good time. She was far away by the time we managed to get our own horses, and with the wind…"
"And Kai? Why didn't you stop Kai?" Anna snarled.
"I… I was not sure it was His Highness, Your Majesty," the guard said, backing up in front of this unusual fury. "And there was an extremely strong gust of wind when he went by, and by the time we could leave our box there was no trace of him and we were not even sure that…"
"YOU LET MY CHILDREN LEAVE THE CITY WITHOUT DOING ANYTHING?" Anna thundered, her voice echoing in the gallery and across the corridors.
"Anna," Kristoff said, laying his hands on her shoulders, "please calm down. It's not their fault."
"Yes, you're right," Anna said, calming down slightly, though her eyes were still flaring as she bore them into the guard's, who had backed away further, cowering. Even Olaf had taken a step back. "It's my fault," Anna went on. "Where was that? Which gate?"
"The, uh, the Northern Gate, Your Majesty," the guard stammered.
"Fine. Prepare my horse. I am leaving in ten minutes," Anna said, striding out of the room.
"Anna, wait!" Kristoff called after her. "You can't leave like that!"
"Yes, you're right, Kristoff," Anna said, slowing down. "I have to go and see Sven first. I'll be leaving in fifteen minutes instead," she called to the servants.
"Anna! Anna, listen to me!" Kristoff said, running to keep level with her. "Don't rush like that, on your own! We have to organise search parties!"
"Our children are out there, Kristoff! In this freakish weather! They are in too much danger! Hey," she added, patting him on the arm, "you organise the search parties. I will go ahead."
"Anna, the weather is a danger for you too! You have to be careful too! You can't leave on your own like that!"
"I can't stay here and do nothing!" Anna cried. "I have to go. This is all my fault! I stayed locked in my office without paying attention to my children or you, and now this happened! Sven is dying and my children have been blown away by this freakish wind!"
"You know, Anna," said Olaf, who had been running trying to keep up with Anna as she strode toward her room, "that was the strange thing, the wind. It was very calm all the time when I was with Gerda on her horse, but it picked up speed as soon as I climbed down."
Anna stopped so abruptly that Kristoff nearly cannoned into her, and Olaf did cannon into Kristoff.
"What did you say?" she demanded, turning to Olaf.
"Er… that the wind was very calm as long as I was on Gerda's horse…"
"But that was just a lull?"
"No, I mean… there was still a lot of wind around us… I could see things being swept away near us, but we could barely feel a breeze. And as soon as I climbed off the horse I felt all these strong gusts of wind. I lost my head a few times and the guards had to help me get it back while we were coming to the castle."
Olaf's voice trailed off as he looked at Anna's expression. The Queen stood motionless for a few seconds, her eyes lost in the distance. Kristoff saw a strange, sad smile form on his wife's lips. Then Anna slowly walked up to the nearest window and opened it. A draft instantly coursed through the corridor, causing a distant door to slam. Anna leaned out and shouted at the top of her voice.
"Gaaaaale!"
Only the howling of the wind answered. The draft entering from the window managed to dislodge strands of hair from Anna's bun and blow them in her face.
"Gale!" Anna shouted again. "I know it's you out there! Where are my children?"
The wind kept howling, barely covering the crashing of the waves that could be heard in the distance.
"Fine!" Anna shouted. "I'm coming! I know where you are!"
The howling of the wind ceased suddenly, and the draft that had been coursing through the corridor abated just as abruptly. The sea also became instantaneously silent. A bunch of dead leaves briefly danced in the light spilling out from the open window into the night, then were blown away toward the north. A few seconds later, the din from the wind and the sea resumed as fiercely as before.
Anna closed the window and went on walking toward her room, a look of resolution set on her face.
"Anna? What was that?" Kristoff asked, catching up with her. "You don't think it's… you don't think the spirits have something to do with all this?"
"Yes. And it's my fault."
"Why?"
"I… forgot what was important. Or I was clumsy again. I have to fix this now."
Kristoff looked as if he was about to disagree, then sagged.
"There's nothing I can say that will make you change your mind, is it?"
"No. Please organise the search parties, my love," Anna said, kissing him. "And stay with Sven. I will go and see him right before I leave."
A few minutes later, Anna entered the stables. She had changed into her travel clothes, and was carrying a small bag. Kristoff was sitting in Sven's stall along with Olaf.
"The search parties are getting prepared," he said as she joined them. "Are you sure you don't want to wait for them?"
"No. I have to go to the Enchanted Forest. The sooner the better."
"All the way there? Why?"
"Because I think that's where I'll learn where Gerda and Kai went. Maybe that's where they are. The search parties will be looking for them around the castle in case I'm wrong."
"Hold on, Anna, hold on. How on Earth could Gerda and Kai be in the Enchanted Forest? That's more than a day of horse travel!"
"It can be much shorter when the spirits help you."
"Why would the spirits help them leave us?"
Anna took a deep breath.
"How long have we not seen Elsa, Kristoff?"
"Ooh, I was wondering about that too!" Olaf interjected.
"Oh, uh, that must have been… yeah, must have been a while now that you're talking about it," Kristoff said. "Maybe… six months, something like that."
"I think it's longer than that," Olaf said. "But I can't remember if it's three years, 8 months and 5 days, or three years, 7 months and 28 days" he said with seriousness. "I lost track of a week at one point."
Anna and Kristoff wordlessly turned to look at him. He raised his head above his body to look at them and chuckled.
"I understood it all when you explained to me that sometimes you would enjoy something more when you did not have it as soon as you wanted it. So I realised it was all a plan to enjoy seeing her all the more later on. I said nothing because I thought it would spoil the plan, and that was a good plan, because now I think we will enjoy seeing her really a lot more after all this waiting. I did not spoil the plan, did I?" he asked eagerly.
Anna remained silent for a few seconds. Just as she opened her mouth to speak Sven let out a long, tortured wheeze.
"Oh, I'm sorry Sven," she said, as Kristoff patted his friend's flank. "I came to see how you were doing and I'm ignoring you." She crouched to be on level with the reindeer's head. "You are going to be all right, right?" she said softly.
Sven wheezed a few times, as if gathering his strength, then managed to let out a few hacked brayings.
"I'll be all right, Anna," Kristoff said, in the voice he used to speak for Sven, although more strangled than usual. "But what is wrong with Gerda and Kai?"
"Oh, er, that's… don't bother with that, Sven," Anna said after a brief thankful glance to Kristoff. With the years, she had gotten quite good at understanding the reindeer's expressions, but it was not so easy in his current state. "It's… Gerda and Kai left the castle after a stupid row," she went on after another wheeze from Sven, "and I did not take the time to sort this out before it was too late, so now I have to go find them. And I think… I think the spirits know where they are. I don't know why they did this, but maybe it's because we haven't visited Elsa for some time. So now I'm going to fix this," she added as she stood up.
Sven wheezed and let out an urgent braying.
"I want to come with you," Kristoff said almost automatically in Sven's voice. "Wait, what?" he said in his normal voice.
"That was not very funny, Kristoff," Anna said severely. "I'm pretty sure that was not what Sven wanted to…"
Sven groaned and wheezed, while feebly moving his legs. To Anna's surprise, the reindeer seemed to be trying to stand up, although it was clear this was way beyond his strength.
"They're family," Kristoff said in Sven's voice, although now choked with tears. "I want to do this together. I want to see them… one… last… Come on, buddy," he said in his own, equally teary, voice, "don't say things like that."
Anna crouched back and gently stroked Sven's head.
"It's OK, Sven, it's OK," she whispered gently. "You'll come with me," she added once the reindeer had calmed down.
"What?" Kristoff shouted. "Anna, you're not serious?"
"Yes, I am," Anna said gently. "Sven is right. We don't know what will happen next. And… this is not a time to get separated. Not again. We have been separated for too long already."
"We, uh, we have not been separated for a long time, though," Kristoff said timidly. "I mean, us two and the children, and Sven."
"No, Kristoff," Anna said, flashing a loving smile to her husband. "But… sometimes one separation is too many. Now… find a carriage, and some people to help put Sven on it."
"Anna… do, uh, do you think it's really safe for him to, uh…" Kristoff began, before being interrupted by another difficult braying from Sven. "Not much less than waiting for you in this stable," he said in Sven's voice. "I want to see the sky again! OK, OK," he said back in his normal voice, "let's do this. But you do realise that means I'm coming with you, right?"
"I was hoping you would, Kristoff," Anna said, squeezing his arm. Kristoff responded by embracing her.
"It will be slower, though," he said. "Do you want me to drive behind with Sven while you go ahead?"
"No," Anna said. "The important thing is for us all to be together. And… I have faith that Gerda and Kai will be all right, as long as we don't wait too much to go after them."
"Yay! Road trip!" Olaf said enthusiastically, jumping from the stall and joining the hug. "I can come too, right?"
Gerda started as she realised she had been about to doze off again. Her horse had found its pace and was now progressing steadily along a small path that seemed to go in the right direction – which was the one she thought the "moving mountain" had taken - but she did not want to fall asleep while riding. She was afraid of falling or, worse, missing another clue on her brother's whereabouts. She thought she had managed to catch glimpses of the large mass moving away in the distance - although she was still unsure of what it was she was following. She occasionally felt some distant tremors, as could be caused by incredibly big and slow footsteps. Giant moving rocks rang a bell from her childhood days, unless it was from one of her mother's tales, but right now she was too tired to try remembering further. She kept on going because she felt too exhausted to turn around, and because the one thought she managed to focus on was that she wanted to find her brother.
She jerked her head up as she realised her eyelids were closing again. Or had closed – she was pretty sure that her bed could not possibly have been on the side of the path where she had just seen it. She yawned, shook herself, and reached into her travel bag to find something to help her stay awake. But she had already eaten the few biscuits she had taken with her, and she had drained her small flask of water. She rummaged a bit, trying to get hold on something she could chew on to keep herself awake, another trick her father had once taught her. But whatever foresight she had displayed when composing her travel bag had not included this eventuality.
She yawned again. The breeze that had been blowing constantly on her face was now not enough to help her stay awake. She was also aware that her horse would need to rest soon. She had little idea how long her trip had lasted, but she had not missed that her mount had been whinnying more and more frequently. Stopping would soon become a necessity in any case, but it meant running the risk of losing the one lead she had to find her brother. On the other hand, it would allow her to get some rest...
"Why are you doing this, Gerda?" Kai asked her. He was riding alongside her on another horse made of rock and purple fire.
"I want to find you," Gerda said, forcing her eyes open. Kai flickered and disappeared in the darkness of the night.
"I am very worried about you, Gerda," said her mother. She was walking on the path, holding her horse's rein. She also looked many years younger and was wearing the same dress she did on one of the portraits where she appeared with her aunt.
"Sorry, Mother. Why don't we see Aunt Elsa any more?" Gerda asked, blinking and clutching at the reins.
"We have been swimming in the darkness with her," Sven answered in her father's voice. He was walking where her mother had been a few seconds earlier, but he had also been there before when only her mother was there.
"She was not entirely real after all," said Olaf's head, who was resting in her saddle. "She needed your finger to unlock her door."
Gerda shook her head. The visions disappeared, but her eyes still stung horribly. She felt her head spin. She had not felt this tired since the day she had wanted to stay up until the end of a ball. She had eventually fallen asleep on a couch and woken in her bed where her parents had carried her.
She tried to hum a tune to wake herself up. She managed to sing a few bars, with disjointed lyrics where she said she wanted to find her brother and loved him and was sorry she disobeyed her parents, before even that became too tiring to do. The pace of her horse seemed to slow down. Her mount was tired too.
As she looked blearily around her, she noticed a small, purple flame shining on the side of the path. It flickered out as she came closer, but another one appeared some distance away, apparently to the side of the path she had been following. Gerda tried to look in the distance for any sign of the moving mountain, but failed to see anything. With a groan of effort, she directed her horse toward the small flame.
It was not long before she could see the cave. It looked like the one she had seen before, only maybe a bit larger and definitely empty. There was also a purple fire burning in it. Gerda did not have the strength to wonder about the safety of this cave, or even about its strangeness. It was only a matter of minutes before she was going to fall asleep, and she was not sure either how long her horse would be able to keep up. Stopping meant she would let Kai's trail grow cold, but maybe with some luck she could find it back in the morning with a better light and a few hours of rest.
The cave was large enough to allow her horse to enter. The fire was roaring heartily, even though it did not seem to be caused by anything. There was a pool of water on one side of the cave, formed by a steady trickle that ran across one of the walls. Gerda slumped off her horse, and managed to replenish her flask from the trickle while her horse drank from the pool. For a second, Gerda saw two reflections of her horse's head in the water, but she chalked it up as another sleep-induced hallucination. She took a swig from her flask. The water was fresh and tasted good, but at this point she would have drunk about anything and certainly was not about to remember her father's advice on the precautions to take with water you found in the wilderness. She tied her horse to a rocky outcrop, and pulled a blanket from her bag. A few seconds later, she was asleep in front of the fire, wrapped in her blanket.
Her horse neighed softly, then settled to rest too. After a while, the floor seemed to shake and rock gently, but neither horse nor rider woke up.
Kai opened his eyes. It took him a few seconds to realise he was not in his bedroom, despite having slept surprisingly well and warmly. It took him a few more seconds to remember how this had come to happen, his row with Gerda, his incredible dash across the city, getting lost in the countryside, and falling asleep near this warm fire. He stretched and looked around him at the cave that had sheltered him during the night. And discovered it was not there any more.
He was standing on a beach made of pebbles. A grey sea was extending beyond it, under an equally grey sky rolling with huge clouds. As he stood up, an enormous wave rose and crashed on the shore, a dozen feet from him. The prince jumped back to avoid the advancing water. The sea began to dance, large waves rising and crashing in showers of foam. Kai was sprayed with a fine mist of salted water, and retreated further away from the shore.
He turned to look at the land. It did not look much more welcoming than the sea. The pebbles from the beach slowly gave way to larger and larger slabs of jagged rock as the ground rose toward an edge beyond which he could not see. The wind howled through the rocks.
Kai felt his panic rise. Even though it had been partly powered by despair, his mad dash of the previous night had been somewhat enjoyable – it had the appeal of doing something utterly forbidden, and of escaping the confine of the castle where he had been locked for what seemed an eternity, not to mention how awesome jumping dozens of feet in a single bound was. Even the night in this unexpectedly comfortable cave had felt a fitting conclusion to this adventurous evening. But now, standing under this pale, grey sky, on this alien shore, he felt really abandoned and far from his family. The countryside around the castle may have looked very different at night, but at least it clearly bore the marks of civilization - there were recognisable paths, the occasional fence, and some debris or lost tool that reminded him he was still quite close to people. This beach on the other hand did not seem to bear the mark of a human hand anywhere. Kai could very well believe he was the first person to ever set foot in this hellish landscape. The fact that he had no idea how he had come here only added to the horror.
"Hello?" he shouted. "I'm lost!"
His voice was drowned in the din from the waves and the howling of the wind. Not even an echo came in response.
"Gerda? Mama? Papa?" Kai shouted, beginning to run.
He had no idea where he was going, but he kept running all the same across the deserted beach. He stumbled and fell on the pebbles, and was occasionally splashed with some salty water whenever he got too close to the sea or when a particularly large wave crashed.
But soon the effects of his run of the previous day began to catch up with him. Kai felt the soreness in his legs as he stumbled on the pebbles, carried by his panic, shouting for Gerda or his parents. He was also hungry – his last meal felt like a long way away now, and he remembered with particular regret having turned down Gerda's offer to go fetch some sweets in the kitchen the day before. In fact, his whole row with Gerda was now repeating itself in his mind, and for the first time he was considering the possibility that his sister may simply not have been aware of what was going to happen to Sven instead of not caring. He could not push the simultaneously disquieting and comforting thought away - maybe Gerda did care, even if she had neglected to visit Sven, but in that case he had been rude to her while she had only tried to cheer him up, even if she had not said the right words. And now he was going to disappear, just as Sven would, all alone on this depressing landscape. Maybe he had already gone away in the cave and this was what came after, and his parents and sister would find his body in the cave and be sad and he would not be able to be sad with them any more.
"Mama! Papa! Gerda! Olaf! Sven! I'm here! I'm here!" he shouted again and again, tears running across his face as he stumbled aimlessly on the pebbles.
Getting up after falling became more and more difficult. Kai was getting cold, from the wind and the sea spraying him. And then he fell again, and did not try to get up any more. He tried shouting again for his family, but his voice was strangled by a sob. He curled on himself as he burst into tears, feebly calling out for his sister and his parents between each sob.
The waves crashed in the distance and the wind howled forlornly as the boy curled further, as if trying to dig himself into the ground. He thought he heard something else above the din – a sound like footsteps, but it may have been simply the sea crashing on the pebbles. He did not care now - he was abandoned by everyone, and he had been mean to his sister, and he would spend the rest of his existence all alone here.
Then he heard the voice – it was kind and gentle, and very close to him. It was not a familiar voice, although it may not have been the first time he heard it.
"What are you doing here, little one?"
Kai turned his head. The tears in his eyes made his vision blurry. He perceived a figure dressed in white, towering above him. The thought came to him that angels could come to take people away, and a new sob wracked his body.
"Kai? Is that you?"
The figure seemed to crouch to get a better look at him. Kai peered through the tears at a face that looked a bit like his mother's, surrounded by a halo of white hair. Unless it really was a halo.
"What are you doing here all alone? Does your mother know you're here?"
Kai tried to speak, but sobs got in the way. He felt cold fingers caress his face delicately.
"How did you get in here?" the voice asked gently.
Kai did not resist as cold hands gently took a hold of him and lifted him from the ground. The arms of the white figure were cold too, but they held him in a comforting, loving embrace that reminded him of his mother's. A memory of being carried in arms like these rose in his mind, associated with a feeling of wonder and love.
"Come with me. I'll take you somewhere safe," the voice said, holding him tight.
Kai clutched at the figure and buried his head in the white hair, trying to stop crying. He felt a jolt, as if the person carrying him had jumped. Then a few seconds later, there was the unmistakable rocking that you felt when riding on a horse.
Kai managed to wipe his eyes. From where he was, he could only look at the ground under the horse.
It was the sea.
