Bamberg, Bavaria, March 16th 1626
The man wrapped a wool cloak around himself as he stepped out from the carriage, but it did nothing to stop the incessant shivering that plagued him and the clergy who followed behind him. Before them laid a scene of desolation: frozen earth as far as the eye could see, with hapless peasants ploughing the dead land in vain. The scene didn't move him, despite being a far cry from his childhood memories playing and toiling in the field.
A bishop approached, his eyes having similar disdain for the devastation. Hans bowed to him as the old man, clad in ornate vestments, swept before him. He knelt and kissed his ring.
"Not good," the bishop snarled, poking his staff at the unyielding earth beneath him, "it's not getting better."
Hans tried to think of something in response, but all he thought of was the bitter-cold that pierced right through to the bone, and how much he'd like to be back at the Castle.
"We're running out of time," the bishop continued, as he sniffed the air around him, like it carried some vileness only he could discern, "running out of money too."
"Yes, reverend," Hans said, bowing his head and hoping it'd end the exchange.
"They'll be dropping off like flies if this continues," the Bishop said, before pointing a finger at Hans, "do something about them."
With a flick of his wrist, the Bishop ordered the priests back into the carriage, but Hans faltered.
"Apologies, your reverend, what should I do about them?"
The Bishop clenched his fists, before he hissed,
"Find someone to blame."
Muffled shouting roused the girl from her sleep. She rubbed her eyes and looked at the gap beneath her bedroom door.
No lights.
The shouting from outside continued, and curiosity caught hold of her. She tiptoed across the room and perched herself on the window sill, pressing her nose against the glass. It's the middle of March, but snowflakes still drifted beneath the glow of a new moon. The breath catched in her lungs as she noticed the source of the shouting - a crowd in the townsquare, and flickers of light scattered amidst the throng. Elsa remembered her parents words, and slipped on a pair of velvet gloves. The shouting crescendoed as three hooded figures were brought out from the town's hall, and Elsa's eyes widened as they were tied to wooden stakes already erected in the middle.
Men began to light fires around them. At once, the shouting died down. Even from this distance, she heard their bloodcurdling pleas, and began to tremble as their words reached her ears.
"No, please, no! We repent, we have sinned, we commit ourselves to the church-"
The fire in the townsquare grew in intensity as the blaze consumed everything in its path. Before long, their pleas turned to screams, and its ghastly noise filled Elsa's head with terror, until the grating of her bedroom door shook her with fright.
"Elsa!" Gerda shouted, as Kai leapt into the room to yank her away from the window, "What on earth are you doing up? Get down from there!"
Kai lifted the girl with ease, and drew the curtains. With a sigh, he tucked her back beneath the sheets. The hearth in Elsa's room roared with life, but it was no warmer than the icy air outside. Gerda's eyes fell upon the frosty handprints left on her windowsill, but she chose to ignore them.
"Look, I'm not a child anymore - why are they doing this to them?"Elsa asked, only to receive stoic faces in reply
"It's just a bad dream, alright?" Gerda whispered, as she helped Elsa slip the gloves from her hands. The sting of frost as it bit back into her hands sent a shudder through the old lady's body, but she tried not to let it show. Elsa sank into her bed, trying to listen to her parents muffled voices as they shut the door behind them.
"What did you see?"
"Three more tonight, in the townsquare."
"Oh, mother of Christ!"
"Shh! They can hear you!"
Elsa strained to hear more of their conversation, but there was only silence. The moon's radiance glowed through Elsa's curtains, and she turned her attention to the ice on her hands.
It's ok, I must've touched the window and the frost somehow gotten onto me.
The longer she looked at it, the more the frost grew.
Oh please, no
Frost covered her hands and crept onto her wrists. A tear slid down her cheek, but even that too, froze over. As much as she tried, Elsa couldn't stop the ìce from consuming her limbs. Panic clenched at her chest, and she choked back a sob, afraid it'll wake her parents. Elsa's lungs burned with fire as she breathed harder and harder at the sight of ice spreading up her elbows, until a loud knock on her door snapped her out of her panic.
"Elsa?" A voice queried.
"Go away, Anna," Elsa said, unwilling to let her sister see her in this state - but the frost had already departed from her.
"C'mon, you never let me in these days, it's so cold without you."
"I don't think it's much warmer here," Elsa said, until she realised that at the sound of her sister's voice, all trace of cold had vanished from the room, now toasty like a summer's evening.
"All right then," Elsa said, "Come in-"
No sooner had Elsa's finished her sentence, then when Anna bounded into the room and leapt into Elsa's bed.
"What happened?" Anna rattled, "Why were they in here?"
"Um, it's nothing," Elsa muttered, as she pulled the sheets over Anna.
"What was all that commotion outside about?" Anna continued, crawling towards the window.
"No!" Elsa exclaimed, holding Anna back, "They're having a...um...meeting in the townsquare."
"Why aren't we going, then?"
"Because it's for the men."
"Why isn't father going, then?"
Elsa's heart warmed at her sister's incessant questions.
"Your curiosity is insatiable, isn't it?" Elsa said, pinching her cheeks.
"I wish you were back at school," Anna groaned, "things aren't the same without you around."
"Everything has to end someday, doesn't it?"
Anna looked into Elsa's eyes; the faint moonlight lent a fragile nature to the girl's fair complexion, so delicate and gentle and unlike herself. Despite being two years younger than her sister, Anna found herself wanting nothing more than to protect such a beautiful woman.
"Not us," Anna whispered, as the gap between them filled with warmth, "I wish we'd never be apart."
A billion thoughts raced through Elsa's mind at her sister's words. Inevitably, one of them would have to leave to handle her father's mercantile affairs, or marry into nobility. And then there was the perpetual frost, the burnings and lynchings. Somehow, she felt that it all had something to do with her. Which was probably the reason they kept her inside and refused to let her out into the daylight.
"I love you so much," Anna whispered, as she sank further into Elsa's embrace. Hearing the words melted away every trace of anxiety within her. She clutched Anna closer to herself, liking the way her sister's steady heartbeat and breathing felt against her. Despite the whirlwind of change around her, Anna was there through it all, and in that very moment, she couldn't care less what happened tomorrow, as long as her sister was right there with her.
"I love you too," Elsa whispered back, as she hoped, in the silence - that this moment would last forever.
The clouds cleared the next day, but there was still an evident frost in the air. So rife was the cold that the town's children - already gaunt with hunger, stopped running about between the houses and shivered in their boots.
Perched at a desk between rows of clay jars, Elsa furrowed her brows and tried to copy the numbers down as neatly as she could. Lost in concentration, Anna's interruption startled her.
"Elsa," Anna said, "the house of Schmidt is here, from Waldorf. They inquire on the prices."
Elsa's mind churned with thoughts.
"That's insane, all the way from Waldorf?" Elsa said, as she glanced towards the map, "Tell them: two pounds of wheat for a pence, and six pounds of barley for a pence. Careful with the oil and wine."
"Aye, sister, I'll see what we can spare them."
The sound of shovelling grain and clinking coins didn't rouse Elsa from her place, but she bolted upright at the ruckus of an upturned table.
"Where's that witch?" a voice echoed through the house, "We know you're hiding her!"
Elsa leapt to the door, only to have a threatening glance from her father directed at her through the gap. At once, she crouched behind and shuddered at the source of the voice: a monk, who clutched onto his staff like it were the cross of Jesus Christ.
"Get out!" Kai yelled, as he shoved Anna behind himself, "Don't we pay the church enough tithes not to be harassed?"
"Bring her out!" he continued his tirade, and the wooden doorpost splintered between Elsa's tightening grasp, "That she may be judged for her sorcery!"
The monk turned and observed a curious crowd of onlookers around the house.
"This home is a breeding ground for witches and pagans," he announced to the crowd, as they hemmed in closer, "it must be burnt to the ground! God wills it!"
The crowd murmured in response, until the monk struck his first blow, sending Kai crashing into the ground.
Elsa gasped, and backed away from the door as the monk lashed out at Kai. The paunchy man stood upright and shoved the monk back into the crowd, only for a chorus of jeering to break out. The throng of curious onlookers now resembled a powder keg, waiting to be set ablaze.
"How dare you!" the monk yelled, only to be struck hard in the face by a sudden red blur that flashed before his eyes.
"Anna, no!" Elsa gasped, as she watched Anna place herself between Kai and the monk. Her hands grasped a shovel, which she swung at his head. Blood spurted from its impact.
The crowd backed away from the sight of crimson upon the pavement.
"Don't you fucking dare!" Anna screeched. The sight of a five foot tall girl wielding a shovel proved too much for both the monk and the crowd, and they dispersed.
The storeroom door swung open, and Elsa slid backwards on the sheen of ice beneath her.
"No, oh, heavens, no," Elsa stammered, as the firm arms of Anna's embrace did nothing to calm her frayed nerves, "t-they weren't looking for me, were they-"
"It's ok, it's ok," Anna whispered, helping her sister onto the bench.
"I think your sister dealt him a strong homily on the virtues of love," Kai said, as he walked in sporting a gash to his head.
"Father, you're hurt," Elsa whimpered, pointing at his wounds. Kai hesitated, before allowing his daughter to touch them. The biting cold seeped into his skin, and within a moment, his pain was gone.
"You never cease to amaze us,"Kai said, before looking at Anna, "Don't tell your mother she did that."
"Whyever not?" Anna asked
"She's afraid of me, isn't she?" Elsa said, as she put her gloves back on, "Her and the Church and the entire Town, everyone's afraid of me. That's why I haven't been outside for a year-"
"C'mon, we're trying to protect you," Kai said, clasping her daughter's hands, "there's nothing more precious to us than the both of you."
"I don't think you can protect me for much longer," Elsa replied, looking at the mess in front of the door, "even if it means imprisoning me here for the rest of my life."
Kai looked at the blood on Anna's knuckles, "You're right. This can't go on forever."
"We'll hold them off, won't we?" Anna quipped
"Maybe today, but one day they'll come back with clubs and pitchforks. What then?"
"Then I'll die here, protecting my family," Anna voiced, without hesitation, "And it would be a worthy death."
Elsa sighed before she entered her room, dreading the solitude that faced her for the rest of the night. At once, she sat at her dresser and began undoing the ribbons in her hair. Out of instinct, she reached for the brush which normally laid on the edge of her table, but flinched as she caught hold of nothing.
"What-"
There was nothing on her dresser. It had been swept clean. Elsa leapt to her feet and swung open her closet. Where there were once dresses, now stood an empty hollow shell. She turned on her heels and raced downstairs; the sight of her parents standing in the living room stopped her in her tracks.
"All my belongings are gone."
"Aye," Gerda said, pointing at a satchel by the door, "we took the liberty of helping you pack."
"Pack?" Elsa asked, as the air turned chilly around her, "What's going on?"
"Look, things haven't been going well, I think you've had some time to think about it by now," Kai said.
"We're moving you to Pretzfeld, to be with aunt Miriam, at least until things quiet down around here," Gerda continued.
"What, that's it?" Elsa said, backing up against a wall, "No discussion, just...move?"
"Well, we're having the discussion...now-"
"How long am I supposed to live there?"
"We don't know," Kai said, "it might be permanent."
"Does Anna know about this?"
"We haven't told her, she's not back from the well yet."
"Well, I'm not going until you do," Elsa snarled, crossing her arms, "otherwise she's going to think I abandoned her without saying a thing."
Just as Kai began to retort, Anna strode in, carrying a bucket of water.
"Why is the horse tied to our fence?" Anna asked, before she noticed the sombre faces, and Elsa's eyes starting to brim with tears, "What the hell is going on?"
"We're sending your sister away," Gerda answered, without hesitation
"What, now?" Anna asked, her face turning white, "How long?"
"Yes, right now - and we don't know how long she's going to be there for."
"No, you can't...you can't," Anna whimpered, as a tear slid down her face, "I won't see her again."
"You know what happened this morning, it won't be long before the entire town comes for her, and besides - you can always write each other."
"That's not enough," Anna groaned, as she fell into her sister's arms, "do you have to go?"
"It's the best for all of us," Elsa replied, taking in her sister's homely scent, "I don't want you or mom or dad to get hurt anymore protecting me."
Anna's voice dropped to a whisper, as her hands clutched at Elsa's dress, "Promise me you'll come back-"
"I will," Elsa replied, brushing her fingers through Anna's hair, "or we'll see each other somewhere else, or something. I don't want to live the rest of my life being apart from you."
"It's time to go," Kai said, motioning towards the door, "it's a long journey, if you leave now there's an inn by the river you can reach before dark."
Gerda picked up Elsa's bags, "We'll walk you to the gates."
The family shivered from the cold as they stepped into the street, save for Elsa. She stared at the enormous snowflake which blossomed beneath her feet, and hesitated. In the back of her mind, she tried to think of the last time she was out beneath the sky, until a tug on her arm roused her. More accustomed to a chair than a saddle, it took Elsa a few tries to mount her horse, but before long - the family set out beneath the glow of the setting sun.
Despite the normal bustle of townspeople heading home, silence filled the streets. Perhaps it was just too cold for people to be out at that time, but even the typical glow of paraffin lamps was absent from the window sills.
"It's quiet," Anna observed; her voice, and the clicking of horseshoes, were the only sounds which echoed through the streets. As they marched closer to the town's gates, the agony of separation grew on Elsa's shoulders, until snow began to drift around her. A snivel punctuated the silence, and a tear slipped from Anna's cheek, before it froze and shattered against the cobblestones.
"Something's wrong," Kai said, as he looked around at the darkness, "it's never this quiet so early-"
"We should hasten," Gerda said, tightening her grip on the horse's lead and walking ahead of Kai. She turned round the last corner leading into the town square, and stopped dead in her tracks.
"What-" Anna gasped, as she took in the sight of hundreds of townsfolk standing in the square, staring back at them, "Why the hell is everyone here?"
Elsa pursed her lips as she understood what it all meant; the pyre had already been set up in the centre - just one, this time.
It was too late.
The glow of their torches illuminated the air, and a man on horseback trotted forth before them. Anna recognised that reddish crop of hair and his piercing voice.
"Is that them?" Hans asked, and the monk by his feet nodded.
"Hear ye! Hear ye!" Hans shouted at the crowd, clanking a cowbell, "Before you stands the house of Oldenburg, who have been accused of harboring a practitioner of witchcraft! In our attempts to investigate the validity of such accusations, the leading man of the house viciously and deliberately attacked a member of the clergy! What say you, noble Bamberg-folk, should we do in recompense?"
A chorus of shouting erupted from the crowd; it rose in its pitch and intensity, until at its crescendo, the crowd surged forward like a swarm of locusts.
"Burn her! Burn them! Burn them all!"
Kai and Anna stepped forward to halt the crowd. Like pebbles before an avalanche, they were swept away by the rabble's fury.
A violent pain throbbed in Elsa's forehead as she came to. She ignored the vile taunting around her, and tried standing, only for strength to desert her, sending her crashing down again. The taste of blood filled her mouth, and in between her blurry vision, she observed Anna, Kai, and Gerda, strung up in the corner of the courtroom, with blood still dripping down their faces.
"Oh my god, no," Elsa muttered, her eyes falling upon Anna's broken body, blindfolded and bruised. She tried to reach out to her, but found her hands trussed like a spring chicken.
"You can't do this to them," Elsa said, only to slump so far forward that she falls out of her chair. A bailiff strode over and seated her upright again, in the middle of the courtroom, surrounded on all sides by her accusers.
"Elsa Oldenburg is hereby accused of being a witch, bring forth the evidence!" Hans announced, without a trace of paperwork in front of him
The words barely registered in Elsa's ears, so virulent was the pain which plagued her head. She didn't even care that a bucket of snow had been dumped upon her, and then another, and another - until her entire body was shoulder-deep in sleet. Upon seeing the girl before them covered in snow, the crowd went quiet, before one lone voice shattered the silence.
"Look! That wretched witch be barely shivering!"
"Witch! Witch! Witch!" The crowd continued jeering.
"What?" Elsa said, brushing the snow from her face. The loosely-packed snow felt like warm sand around her, and the fevered shouting was so loud, it made even thinking impossible.
"Alright, I've seen enough," Hans announced from the podium, his voice barely rising above the crowd's rancor, "Guilty of witchcraft, bring her outside to be burnt."
A pair of strong hands wrenched Elsa from amidst the snow, and dragged her outside into the townsquare. She began to struggle when she noticed the executioner had already finished stacking firewood around the pyre.
"No, no, you can't do this," Elsa muttered, her feeble struggling did nothing to slow her impending doom, "I swear I'm not a witch."
With every step closer to the pyre, Elsa's pleading increased in its ferocity, but fought as she could - nothing stopped her from being handed like a sack of potatoes to the executioner, who bound her facing the angry mob. The vile jeering beset her on all sides, and Elsa searched the crowd for anyone who could help her. The next thing she saw sent a chill into her spine: Anna had been brought out, her blindfold removed. Behind her stood Hans, gripping her by the hair. He wanted Anna to watch what they were about to do to her sister.
"Anna!" Elsa screamed, her shrill voice drowned out by the crowd's jeering, "Don't look, please don't look-"
From the pyre, Elsa saw her sister struggling against Hans's grasp. Blood still streamed from Anna's forehead, and her frantic screams were but a whisper amidst the throng of people baying for her blood.
"Let her go, you monster," Elsa seethed beneath her breath, oblivious to the men as they set the pyre alight. The oil-soaked wood ignited quickly, and tongues of fire leapt up around Elsa.
"No!" Elsa screamed, as clouds of smoke enveloped her, snuffing out the sight of Anna trapped in Hans's chokehold.
Accustomed to a lifetime of cold, Elsa never imagined how ferocious a blazing fire could be. The flames seared her limbs without mercy, and within seconds she silently pleaded for death. Soon, the white-hot pain pierced through to her bones, and silence deserted her. Despite her earlier wish not to cry out in pain for the sake of her family, Elsa unleashed a cry of anguish, and then a blood-curdling scream as the flames gnawed away at her skin and flesh.
In the back of her mind, Elsa saw her sister's once-jovial self being crushed beneath the weight of religious hysteria. She wept out loud as she saw Anna being forced to her knees, to witness her only sister torn away from her and burned alive.
A tongue of fire crept up Elsa's spine, unravelling her bonds and sending a shockwave of blistering agony which manifested as a scream from the bottom of her lungs. Torrents of pain assaulted her body without mercy, but with each passing second, every ounce of hurt and blazing agony felt more and more cold to her. The cold didn't make sense to her, until the flames died down and the air around her felt like the first day of winter.
A smouldering heap of wood and ice beneath her feet was all that remained, as Elsa opened her eyes to the crowd that stood before her. The townsfolk, earlier so virulent in their hatred, now backed away as Elsa looked at her ice-laced hands.
"She's alive! Her sorcery has delivered her from the flames!" A voice yelled from within the crowd, before the entire town erupted in fury once more, "She's a witch!"
"Fools!" Elsa shouted back, this time, the crowd fell silent, "How many have perished in my place?"
The smoke cleared as Elsa's ice spread further through the pyre. Burnt firewood crackled with frost, and before long, icy thorns grew amongst the branches, lending a menacing aura to Elsa as she stepped off the pyre. She hadn't noticed it, but her razed clothes had been overlaid with sheets of icy fabric. The crowd shifted away from her in a circle, fearful of the freezing wind that picked up around Elsa.
Her eyes searched the crowd, and Elsa's heart was crushed when she saw Anna's body limp within Hans's grasp. Her lips had turned blue, and Hans casted her body into the snow like it were a rag doll.
"Fear not the witch!" His voice boomed from the back of the crowd, "God will have His vengeance! Kill her!"
At his words, the crowd resumed its jeering, and descended upon Elsa in droves.
"You killed her," Elsa sputtered. Icy tears brimmed from her eyes, now locked onto Anna's body slumped on the ground.
Ice-magic rippled through the ground. The few people closest to Elsa were reduced to shreds of flesh and bone as icicles tore through their bodies. At that sight, the crowd's rage turned to fear in an instant, and then delirium. Darkness swarmed around Elsa as icy beasts, unresembling anything ever seen on earth, rose from the earth and devoured the townsfolk by the dozens. Maniacal screams filled the night sky as panic gripped the crowd. In their maddened haste to flee Elsa's beasts the townsfolk crushed each other in a frenzy, but the gates had already been frozen shut. Trapped before the unyielding wood, they pleaded towards the heavens for deliverance, and it came swiftly in the form of icy fangs and claws - turning the snow pink with blood. The executioner drew his sword and stepped towards Elsa, but, being driven mad by the sights which surrounded him, chose to fall on it instead.
"Stop!" Hans yelled, as Elsa approached him with trembling fists. In his right hand clutched Anna's body, her face as white as snow, and in his left, a knife, pressed against her neck, "Move one step closer and I'll spill her blood on God's earth."
An icy winged beast, resembling half-falcon and half-dragon, swooped down in the darkness and tore Hans away from Anna. The force of its grasp also tore him to pieces.
"Anna, no!" Elsa cried, as she cradled the younger girl's body to herself, amidst the pink snow. Elsa's hands trembled without pause, until she felt Anna's laboured breathing against her face.
"I couldn't, I couldn't," Anna muttered, a trail of blood leaking from her mouth and nose, "I'm sorry I couldn't save you."
"No, you did," Elsa replied, shielding her sister's eyes from the carnage around her, "you were all I could think about while I was trapped in there."
Elsa looked around her; the snow creatures now resembled mounds of snow surrounded by dismembered remains. There wasn't a trace of life left in the square, save for Kai and Gerda, who limped toward them. The wounded parents stood a few yards away from their children. Elsa sighed in relief when she saw that they were still alive, but their next words shattered what little hope it gave her.
"Anna," Kai whispered, his voice like a knife in the silence, "Get away from her."
Ice formed on Elsa's hands, and she recoiled from Anna, as though the slightest touch would've killed her.
"No," Anna pleaded, clinging onto Elsa's dress, "Don't."
"I don't want to hurt-"
"I'm not afraid," Anna pleaded, pressing a palm to Elsa's chest, "y-you're everything to me."
"Anna!" Gerda called out, as she covered her nose from the stench of blood, "Come here!"
"I should go, there's no place for me here anymore," Elsa stammered, each word cutting into her heart. After being burned alive, she never imagined something else could hurt her as much - but this did.
"No, no! Y-you can't go, please, please don't leave me," Anna begged, the tears mixing with her blood and leaving a scarlet trail down her neck, "Where will you go?"
"Somewhere safe," Elsa said, wiping Anna's face, "Somewhere I can't hurt anyone anymore."
"Please don't-"
"Goodbye, Anna," Elsa whispered. Unwilling to watch her parents turn their back on her, Elsa clasped her hands around Anna's, before she turned and fled, each stride leaving snowflakes in the wake of her grief.
Elsa stirred awake to the tweeting of birds and the softness of snow beneath her. Sunlight refracted through the crystal steeple she had built over her bedchamber, and painted a multi-coloured tapestry on her wall. The Ice Queen's lips curled into a smile as she noticed how the shapes resembled a heart, and only she knew what that meant.
Despite being accustomed to idle luxury, the Queen leapt from her bed and tidied her hair with glee. Her hands began to shake as she studded snowflakes of different sizes into her braid, and dressed herself in azure blue - like the sky they played under, when times were good. She looked at the pair of gloves still on her dresser, and pondered.
Maybe not today.
Her heart was pounding in her throat by the time she reached the grand concourse; the ice turned into a brilliant hue of violet as she shoved the door open. A lone figure knelt by the fireplace, already alight and brimming with firewood. Elsa's heart soared at the sight, but she remained a steely grip on the railings.
"I hope I didn't keep you waiting," Elsa said, her voice echoing around the concourse.
The girl bolted upright, dropping a stack of firewood; she dashed forward, only to slip on the ice.
"Elsa!" Anna squealed, trying to maintain her balance on the ice, "Wait...c-can I come closer?"
Elsa folded her hands behind her back. Years have passed, but the memory of what she's capable of still festered in her mind. Today, though - something else took precedence.
"J-just stay there," Elsa said, as she stepped onto the ornate, crystal staircase, "I'll come to you."
"G-great! And wow, look at you!" Anna said, taking in the sight of her sister's ice-gown, its train draping the stairs, "I don't think I could ever forget that. Not that I want to, I mean-"
"It's nothing," Elsa smirked, hesitating to use the words I wore it for you, "How are mother and father doing?"
"They're great!" Anna chirped, "Arendelle is a wonderful place to live in. Such lovely people."
"You...you still haven't told them, have you?" Elsa queried, as she reached the bottom of the stairs.
"No," Anna replied, looking down at her reflection in the ice, "they don't know I've been coming here."
Elsa paused, lamenting the gravity of Anna's words. Did they know she was still alive? Did they even care? Elsa's gaze fell upon Anna's slim frame, her eyes betraying the sheer excitement of seeing her sister again - and the Queen's fears evaporated.
"That's alright," Elsa said, forgetting about her fears and just longing to be nearer to Anna, "I can't control what they think, or feel, about me."
"You should come back," Anna replied, as she quivered in her place. The girl wondered if it was the cold, or just Elsa coming closer to her. Before long, she finally made out the blues in her eyes - those brilliant eyes which saw her to sleep each night no matter what strange town she happened to pass through.
"I don't think it'd-"
"They talk about you all the time," Anna said, stopping Elsa in her footsteps, "they miss you, Elsa. We miss you. I miss you. All the time."
Elsa clutched at the train of her gown. Her lips began to tremble as she thought about the pain her parents must have felt. In the few years all that mattered to Elsa was the way she had been torn from her sister because of what she did, but it never occurred that the burning affected everyone - even her parents. They were only doing what they could, not to lose another daughter.
"Maybe I will go back," Elsa said, looking around at the splendour of her castle. She built it with the intention of keeping herself safe, but she was really keeping the world safe from herself. Leaving her sanctuary would be like razing it to the ground.
"When I'm ready," Elsa added. She hadn't realised it, but she had come within an arm's length from Anna. The realisation sent her heart fluttering.
"We'll always be there for you," Anna whispered, looking up into her sister's eyes, "I'm not afraid of you, I never was."
Elsa inhaled her sister's scent. The fragrance set her senses alight with joy.
"Can I…" Anna whispered, as she shifted nearer still, "Can I hug you?"
The last hesitation in Elsa's mind faded into warmth as she pulled the girl into her arms. Over the years, she had been looking for safety from her past and from the inexplicable power within her grasp, but she never thought she would find it in Anna's arms.
