Hello all of my faithful readers, if I still have any... Thank you so much for coming back to this slow going Aladdin rewrite. I know I said last chapter that I was going to start developing Anna and Jackson's relationship this time... Astrid and Fishlegs got in the way. I didn't think I would, but I really like this pairing. Still, yet another chapter spent on world-building and setting the stage. I can't believe I've written nine chapters and made almost no progress in the story. Right now I can't even promise it will pick up in the next chapter since I'm wiating for a royal visit that will help Hiccup pinpoint the "warmth within the cold". Yes, I'm baiting you, no, I'm not ashamed!
Please enjoy :)
EDIT: Due to changes down the line, I've updated the stable and Astrid's main duties.
A lot of good ways
It was late when Hiccup finally finished the clean-up after the execution and checked on Dig-Build to ensure they had finished the repairs. North had smiled widely and waved, vowed they were indeed finished while he breathed erratically during Hiccup's inspection of the work done on the outside and each step he took towards the entrance caused the guild-master to almost choke on his breath. After the fiasco with Fisherman guild, Hiccup couldn't muster the energy to deal yet another punishment. He'd hand-signed acceptance, and quickly turned away from the builders who couldn't quite hide their relief of getting away with the inside of the building still needing some work. Then he had pulled North close.
"Next time, keep all your hands and leave the princess to me. I am only lenient once."
The guild-master had lost all colour in his face and signed understanding.
After this Hiccup could finally head down to the Enchantress's library. He had to go before he slept. If he slept the thought he'd held onto all day might be gone when he woke up.
The library was empty, but Fishlegs lived down here, in an alcove that held nothing but his bedding and a chest of cloths.
"Light."
When the orb on his staff reacted to his voice and tiredly lit up, the lump on the bed first froze in the middle of a breath, then sighed. "Hiccup?"
The vizier withdrew his staff and the glow dimmed. "There's a new angle. I might have misunderstood the Cave's words."
Fishlegs rubbed his face. "Do I really need to be awake for this?"
"Yes. Need help?"
"No! I'm up! No slugs!" Fishlegs flailed and sat up, patting himself down in search of the slimy creatures only to find Hiccup leaning leisurely on his staff, no trace of magic in sight. "Shit, I'm awake now. Thanks for the memories."
"You're welcome, and I'm not afraid of your evil eye. Stop glaring at me and get up. I need your input."
The bookkeeper groaned, yawned until his jaws hurt and stretched as he got up from the bedding.
"The only reason I'm not snarky right now is because you wouldn't come find me for nothing. Are you dying?"
"Not snarky, huh. That aside, I heard a comment today about personal value. It got me thinking. The Cave of Wonders also talked about value, but I only focused on the last part. The whole sentence was; Only one may enter, one whose value lies hidden, a warmth within the cold."
Fishlegs leaned one hand against the back of a chair and rubbed first his eyes and then his flighty beard with the other. His glassy gaze stared through the wall.
"This is my thought," Hiccup went on. "What if the warmth within the cold isn't an ability, but a trait. The Enchantresses lived long lives, but they weren't immortal and as far as I know their successors weren't their daughters. So what if, to become Enchantress, you needed this trait, and this trait is also needed to enter the cave."
"I don't know, Hiccup," Fishlegs said slowly. "Sounds awfully farfetched."
"I know. That's why you have to help me direct the thought to something more grounded. But it's true that magic affinity isn't hereditary. So does any of the books in here speak about how an Enchantress is chosen?"
"Why Enchantress? You want to make one?"
Hiccup let out a laugh that he quickly choked on.
"Don't put such dreams in my head, I might think of something crazy." He caught Fishlegs' look. "What?"
"Is there a part of what you're doing that's not under the label of crazy?"
"…touché. But to answer your question; no. What I need to know is what kind of personal trait a warmth within the cold is."
"Someone who's really good at making fire," Fishlegs yawned. "Or a good person. You know, those things you feel when you get a helping hand in a time of need?"
"Are you still asleep?" Hiccup asked through clenched teeth, then rubbed his face. "I'm starting to wonder if I should just try my luck."
Fishlegs was awake at once and his voice turned serious. "Don't."
The vizier looked at him, then averted his gaze.
"I'm serious Hiccup. Don't. I'll think of something properly. I'll search the whole library if I have to. Be reasonable in the meantime and get some sleep. You'll think better when you're not about to drop from exhaustion."
Hiccup didn't want to mention he hadn't had a proper night's sleep for years. But ever since he found the cave and been denied entrance he'd felt drained. As if something that had been holding him up was suddenly gone.
"I might have actually loved her," he spoke quietly. "I might be grieving."
"Then grieve," Fishlegs said. "I will inform the queen you need a day off, tell Astrid to do your rounds… I mean your duties in the city. Just don't do anything you won't be able to regret."
Hiccup closed his eyes, pinched the bridge of his nose in hopes it would help keep his feelings in, keep his head in the game and the weariness off.
His tears were so hot they burned.
"Hiccup," Fishlegs spoke beside him and his voice was as firm and warm as his hands. "Have faith and go sleep. We can make up a proper plan once you're not about to keel over."
Astrid heard the quiet scratching of claws on the walls and got out of bed without even opening her eyes. Her hands found the bowl of water sitting on the rock at the head of her bed and splashed the icy water on her face to help her wake up.
First she went to the cell. Thornado, the old screamer, grunted at her and got up. He needed daily exercise and went out twice a day to fly for a stretch. Astrid suspected he caught his own food as well because for the amount of food she provided him, the old dragon was very healthy and big. Beside the cell of the fairy mount hung three sacs of wet nano dragon skin that moved ever so slightly. The parasites that lived in the snow. Astrid wished she knew what they ate, if it was snow or leftover magic from the Ice Sprite. Whatever it was, they were large enough to see with the naked eye and could eat their way through a human body in only a moon cycle. But fairies lived off of these little killers.
"Takes a killer to kill another of the same kind," Astrid muttered and took down two of the sacks and carefully opened the cell door.
The fairy mount was black. It was a truly magnificent beast who Astrid often thought was made out of black snow, the way it sparkled in the light, and sometimes even in the dark.
"Breakfast, Night Mare," Astrid announced and poured the two sacs of parasites into the manger. "Freshly harvested by your favourite guild, the Ice-Breakers."
Night Mare rubbed her smooth nuzzle against Astrid's shoulder first before she bent down her head to eat. The cavernous room was dark despite the roof of it actually being the same clear ice that covered the city. It's just that the snow didn't blow clear from this part the same way, but Night Mare didn't seem to mind as she ran through the darkness as if it was brightly lit, jumping over obstacles left by stablemasters of the past.
Silently, Astrid took a cloth and rubbed the fairy mount's wings and body clean, earning a few slight slaps to the face by the happily waving feather tail. Night Mare leaned into her touch.
"All done. You're beautiful as always. You'll be let out soon. The dragon mating season is just starting and the queen's annual visit to the Fairylands to inspect the damage is just around the corner. Just a moon's cycle. You'll get to see both the moon and the sun."
The mount made a sound that made her think of running sand.
"Oh, yeah. Before that, the suitors are going to come and the city will be full of mounts like you. Sorry I haven't heard from the queen if she'd like you to breed yet, so I'll keep the cell locked this time too."
Night Mare scraped a foot against the ground and Astrid guessed it meant the mount was indifferent to the matter.
"I'll come again with your supper. Good day, Night Mare."
Closing and locking the cell behind her Astrid sighed and went to hang up the empty sacks outside the stable where someone from Ice-Breaker would pick them up and leave the full ones.
Windwalker, a very rare type of hunting dragon that had developed to cross the snowy dunes, was watching Astrid with large eyes. When it came to hunting fairies, this dragon was peerless, and probably the main reason Night Mare was happy to stay in the cell. However, they had a difficulty breeding, and only lay one egg whereas many other dragon species laid at least four. This was Hiccup's favourite dragon who dictated Astrid's life, though required little care from anyone who wasn't Hiccup. Still, she did need to be fed and did enjoy the scratching stick, as long as Astrid was holding it at the very end and holding her arm out straight. In Astrid's opinion, the wild dragons were easier to care for than the pathetic beast Hiccup favoured. At least they gave a fair warning before they bit anyone.
"Here you go, Windwalker. Fishbones and shrimp shells, and if you're cooperative I might even pour some of Gobber's sauce over. I know I can fix that limp of yours."
The dragon immediately pressed against the wall, crooked leg tucked in tightly and stared at Astrid as if the human was about to pounce.
Astrid groaned and wished for patience. She'd given the dragon years of her life and they had only come as far as Windwalker not fleeing the room when Astrid entered. That the dragon had figured out she would be fed by just scratching the wall a little didn't count as progress.
"One day I'm going to find the people who caught you and give them a piece of my mind," Astrid growled.
"For one; Hiccup already got to them. Two; you were there with him."
Astrid jumped and spun around. "Fishlegs? What…" she quickly lowered her voice. "Did something happen to Hiccup?"
The book keeper shrugged helplessly. "Yes and no. He needs sleep but…" he cast a look all around him. "The hunters are preparing to head out for yeti."
Astrid straightened and pressed close to her husband. "Just sleepless?"
"No. He mentioned grieving someone he might have loved."
"I haven't seen him since he returned with Windwalker covered in blood after being out all night."
Fishlegs hugged Astrid closer and buried his nose in her hair. Astrid was his wife and Hiccup's friend if he ever had one. But there was still a distance between all of them, enforced for safety. Astrid knew nothing about the cave or the key and Fishlegs knew nothing more about the underground city than of its existence and what Hiccup happened to slip. Details Fishlegs was careful to forget. This was their own choice, made between them alone outside of Hiccup's knowledge. Somehow it felt safer this way. A paranoid trust even they couldn't explain. Hiccup might even laugh at them if he knew.
"What do we do?" Astrid whispered.
"I can divert the queen's attention. Someone else must keep an eye on the other half."
Astrid hid her face in Fishlegs' shoulder to muffle her groan before she shot back up. "There's so much to do below right now, but sure; I'll do the babysitting for today. How could the old queen accept her youngest to become this way?"
"Guilt?" Fishlegs suggested with a helpless shrug.
"Oh, stop it. You're not supposed to actually answer rhetorical questions."
"I know, I'm supposed to let you spew complaints all over me until you feel better about your task."
"You know that and still won't heed my needs. Why am I married to you?"
Fishlegs looked at her, burning to cast out the obvious answer but couldn't help himself, nor the grin that spread across his face.
Astrid glared at him for a second, before her mouth twitched and they were both laughing.
Anna woke up early. Her sleep had been restless and filled with dreams that left her queasy. Olaf was still asleep, and she envied him. But she wanted to have him around today. She was going to meet with the boy from the city, Jackson, the one she had decided was her friend. But during the night she had gone over their last meeting, and suddenly she wasn't so sure. Jackson defended the dragons, had talked to Hiccup, and Hiccup had talked to Jackson as if he knew him.
So Jackson wasn't entirely her friend. Not yet. But Anna would change that. She just had to talk to him and…
The events of the past two days flashed through her mind again. Elsa with Hiccup, Jackson who said greetings was the key, Elsa who tiredly rubbed her face as she spent hours reading through papers that bored her, Elsa ordering Anna to be present at the court and ordering Hiccup around. Anna had watched Hiccup bow to Elsa and carry out her orders the same way every other servant did.
Hiccup was not above Elsa. All of Anna's accusations about the vizier trying to take over the throne fell flat in the face of Hiccup not even questioning Elsa's orders. What was his game then?
Muffling a groan in her pillow, Anna got up and sat in front of her mirror. Thinking of Hiccup just made her angry, and she didn't want to be angry when she was about to make a friend. Making Jackson her friend would be much harder if Anna was angry. She needed to be pretty, calm and smiling. Maybe if she was charming enough…
Anna watched her own face grow red in the mirror. She'd never seen a naked man and had never been curious, until now. She couldn't even tell if it was a good or a bad thing that she wanted to know what Jackson looked like naked and failed to even imagine it. She'd barely even seen Hiccup without his clothes on!
To Anna's absolute horror, her face grew hotter and her heart stuttered so hard it hurt.
"What a thought!" she cried at herself in a whisper. "No! Forget, forget! I didn't think that."
"Didn't think what?"
Anna jumped up, her heart in her mouth, and spun around.
There stood Astrid, a servant of the castle, with her arms full of clothes. Anna only knew who this woman was because when Elsa wanted to do some physical exercises, she went to Astrid.
"What?! Why are you here?! What do you want?!"
The blonde woman rolled her eyes. "Should I ask why you're already up and blushing in front of your mirror or why you aren't sleeping still?"
Anna gawked, then found herself indignant. "How dare you! Why are you even in my room?! You have no permission to be here! Guards!"
The door was closed and no one appeared at Anna's call. In fact, the room and hall outside was frightfully silent. Why hadn't the guards answered?
"I come in every second morning to gather up your dirty clothes to replace them with clean ones," Astrid said drily and opened Anna's dresser and started hanging the dresses. "And I have been doing so for several years. By order of the queen, if you were wondering."
The princess watched, stupefied, as Astrid walked around her room, straightened it, picked up the clothes Anna had thrown around herself the night before, and made her bed with two yanks on the blanket.
"So, what are your plans for today?" the woman asked as she worked.
"What?"
Blue eyes glanced at Anna, making her feel like the other was mocking her. "I'm making small talk, highness. Idle conversation to fill the awkward silence between us. Humour me?"
"…humour? You want me to make you laugh?"
Astrid's movements paused, but she resumed picking up a pair of shoes from under the desk. "No, highness. I meant for you to make small talk with me, as a polite gesture, because it makes me feel better about working while you stare at me."
Anna felt her face heat, but this time, as she drew up to retort, her mind caught up with what Astrid had asked. Her plans for the day? Idle small talk? She remembered that class. Her teacher was that stout man with the mousy voice. She cared little about him, but this was a class Anna and Elsa had taken together when Anna was nine.
She'd gone to exactly two classes because making small talk with Elsa was a waste of time. She already knew everything about her sister!
But she didn't know that much about Astrid.
"I'm… heading to the city," Anna said, looking to Astrid for some sign that she was doing good.
"You're going down quite often. What do you do?" Astrid asked and stood with her arms covered with Anna's laundry.
The princess stared, feeling strange. She'd never done this before and felt, again, that maybe she shouldn't have dismissed her classes so thoroughly.
"Well, today, I'm going to see a boy. From one of the guilds. I want him to teach me… greetings."
Astrid's eyes opened wide. "Well, that's a surprise, considering what kind of student you are."
"What do you mean?"
The blonde woman's eyes searched Anna's face, but the princess couldn't fathom what the other was looking for.
"I'm married to one of your teachers, and I'm told you're arrogant, distracted, haughty and dismissive, not to mention full of yourself. How come a boy from the city was able to make you interested in something you have always huffed at?"
Anna's mouth hung open, her mind short-circuited. Images of yesterday's court, the Cage, Hiccup and Elsa blended with indignancy and fury at being spoken to like this and underneath that was the image of Jackson's expression when he stared at her that overlapped perfectly with the face Astrid was making.
The tears came suddenly, hot and unbidden, and Anna stomped her foot. "How DARE you?! Get out! And if I ever see your face in my room again I will have you executed in worse ways than those poor fishermen yesterday! Guards! Take this intruder away! GUARDS!"
Astrid stood still before her and nothing answered Anna's echoing call.
"Of course, your highness," said Astrid calmly. "As you wish. Should I notify the queen about this or would you prefer to do it yourself?"
"GET OUT!"
The woman bowed, stepped away and walked out, back straight and expression blank. "I take it you speak to the queen then," she said before closing the door.
Anna stood there, chest heaving with emotion she couldn't handle. She didn't want to talk to Elsa. For the first time in her life she couldn't stand the thought of going to see her sister. Because of the court and the cage yesterday and the guards still not responding to her. Suddenly Anna wondered if they ever had. But what was the meaning of having guards if they didn't protect her from bullies like Astrid?
"Anna? Are you sad?"
The princess lifted her gaze and saw Olaf had awakened and stood before her. Her face felt cold. Oh, right, she was crying. She rubbed the wetness off her cheeks.
"I'm not sad, Olaf. I'm angry."
"How did anyone make you angry?"
"What do you mean, 'how did'? It's 'how dared'!" At least it made more sense to Anna if phrased like that. "How dare that woman look down on me! I'm not going to tell Elsa. I don't need anyone coming in here to clean up my clothes and make my bed!"
"But Queen Bora gave the order that a servant should clean your room before you awoke," the snowman protested mildly.
"I don't care if it was mother's order!"
Anna stormed over to her vanity table and stared at her reflection. Her own face glared back with ferocious hatred, a far cry from the charming person she needed to be in order to win Jackson over to her side. So Anna closed her eyes and cried.
Astrid stood outside Anna's room, listening closely. The difference between Anna and everyone else was that she grew up without ever being disciplined, never reprimanded and never faced consequences. In this cold place where you died if you didn't work for your food, shelter and fire, there was none other like Anna. Thus she was alienated from everyone else, and now, hearing her cry, Astrid heaved a sigh of relief. Hiccup's method of disciplining Anna via frustration and humiliation wasn't one Astrid would normally agree to, but with the princess acting the blind assassin, Astrid would rest her case. She would have even been impressed if Hiccup wasn't such a calculating manipulator by nature, able to carry out this little ploy against Anna while simultaneously balancing layers of secrets concealed from the queen.
"He's spent too much time around fairies," Astrid muttered and started walking towards the boiler-room, a place she hated. It was an invention of one of the past queens, located just above ground level and entirely made of ice, filled with the weavers' furniture and tools. In the centre stood a waist-high ice crater filled with boiling water, giving the room its name. The heat from the steam collided with the cold of the room and always made ice crystals in Astrid's brows and eyelashes.
"Good morning, dear," the eldest woman, the Weaver, greeted Astrid as she entered the steam-filled rom.
"Morning. I have the princess's clothes and shoes here. She just banned me from her room though, so you won't see anything else from her in a while."
"Banned? The princess? Can she really do that?" asked the Weaver's grandson.
"No. But who am I to refuse a direct order from the royal family. I told her I won't tell Elsa, and Vizier is currently unavailable. So expect the princess's laundry en masse in some…" Astrid glanced at the sphere that showed it was early daytime, "seven to ten days."
"I give it four," the Weaver's daughter, current head of the family, huffed into the boiler, her face lacking both eyebrows and lashes was red from the steam.
"The princess is a stubborn one," the husband said thoughtfully.
"Key-word; princess," Astrid pointed out. "She will make a fuss and complain, but she appears to have lost favour with the queen recently, so unless her majesty takes action and orders me to keep cleaning the princess's room, you won't see any laundry from her."
"You know how to make a valid point, dear," the old Weaver noted from where she was sorting out the clothes and handing them over to the waiting arms of her family. "But what was that about Vizier? Why is he unavailable?"
"Wish I knew. Husband only said Vizier had spent the nights in the queen's library recently."
The weavers made noises and faces of dismay as they worked.
"He's only human," the Weaver said after a while. "As long as it's only one day, he should be allowed to rest."
Astrid nodded and left, brushing the ice off her face before she exited the room, then stood with her hands over her eyes outside, bearing the pain of the much more solid chill of the hallway that made her skin feel taunt. Now that she had finished her morning official duties, it was time to go downstairs and have a word with Gobber.
Fishlegs only ever left the Enchantress's library for two reasons; to spend time with his wife, and to answer the queen's call. Hiccup had once made a horrible joke about how only the most beautiful women could get Fishlegs up. The bookkeeper still regretted his rebuttal. Hiccup hadn't made an improper comment since, no matter how much Fishlegs tried to ruse one out of him.
Next time Fishlegs saw the vizier, he would make sure to mention he got up for Hiccup as well. The keeper couldn't imagine Hiccup's reaction, but anything but hurt was entertaining. Much more so than standing before one of the current queen's ice guards and its empty eyes.
"Guardian of Ice. I, Bookkeeper Fishlegs Ingman seek an audience with her majesty the queen regarding Vizier Hiccup's physical health."
A blue spark in one of the guards' eyes was his only answer for a long minute, with was positive. Silence wasn't dismissal, which had happened instantly one of the first times Fishlegs had requested an audience. Still, how this system even worked was beyond the keeper. The ice guards were everywhere, came in all sizes, forms and didn't appear to have the same function throughout. Before a queen could be bestowed the title she had to go through three tests. One of those was to create ice guards who answered to her and her alone. That's all Fishlegs knew, and even that was something he'd obtained through careful observation and spying through his work as a tutor of the princess. Anna herself had proved useful, happy to brag about her powerful sister, though not a source Fishlegs had been able to utilize too much or found overly reliable.
"Her Majesty awaits you in the royal archives."
Fishlegs jumped slightly at the ice guard's sudden voice and signed his thanks out of habit.
"The archives? What could she possible be doing there?" the keeper asked aloud.
The archives were located high in the ice palace and was made of frosted, dry ice to create a safe space for the reports and documents stacked away in enormous cases partly made of leather and bone. The guard at the door stepped aside as soon as Fishlegs came into view and he pushed the door open.
"Your…"
"Bookkeeper. What's this about Hiccup's health?"
Fishlegs stood still mid-bow, staring up at the woman who suddenly stood right in front of him. He'd never known even her breath was cold enough to form frost on his eyelashes. How could Hiccup stand it having this woman panting him in the face?
"…majesty. Hiccup is… I mean, Vizier has per my advice taken a day off to rest. He has barely slept for several days now, even since before he left and was gone for a night."
The queen stared back, before suddenly deflating, letting out a sigh that had Fishlegs closing his eyes and felt them freeze shut, followed by a new understanding for Hiccup's fondness of fire worm dragons. The man must be shrouded in more spells than Fishlegs even realized for him to be able to come this near the queen on a daily basis.
"What has he been doing? He didn't report anything unusual to me before he left for that mission."
Fishlegs desperately breathed on his gloves and put them over his eyes.
"Oh, forgive me Keeper. I forgot you're just human. Wait here a minute." The queen's footsteps were light as she hurried off, and that alone alleviated the cold considerably.
'I hereby swear by my life bound to the forest of bones to never again call for the Ice Queen's attention by using Hiccup's name and health ever again,' Fishlegs swore silently to himself. 'And to take Hiccup's exaggerated complaints about Elsa and her cold at face value. Merciful Freya, it hurts!'
The queen's footsteps returned, and so did her presence of intense cold.
"Hold out your hands to me."
Fishlegs had no choice but to obey. To his great surprise, warmth suddenly washed over him. A heat orb? The sense of touch in his hands had gone numb and prickled uncomfortably from the sudden heat, but as his face slowly warmed up and melted the frost on his face and eyes, Fishlegs' sight slowly returned to view a colourful pouch and its contents.
"What's this? A glowing coal?"
"No. It's an invention of the very first human vizier. She wore it as jewellery, they say. Her family has since developed a resistance to my magic. Thankfully."
Fishlegs happily ignored the wistful sigh of the queen and stared at the uneven jewel lying inside a pouch of nano dragon hide, full of awe and awareness of what he was holding, shining warmth on him. His hands trembled as he closed the pouch. Hiccup's guess about a "warmth within the cold" was way off.
"Much appreciated, your majesty," Fishlegs said with genuine sincerity as he handed the stone back.
"Don't mention it. What I wish to know is what you know about Hiccup. Why hasn't he been sleeping?"
Fishlegs kept his head bowed. He was nowhere near as adapt at deceit and manipulation as Hiccup. "In the name of honesty and faith, your majesty, I don't know. I hadn't seen Vizier for almost all dark when he suddenly came down with an order from your majesty to learn subduction and containing spells. He looked quite haggard then, and he stayed up all night. Through my wife, Astrid, that I know Vizier has been… preoccupied during dark, I suppose. From what I understand, the hunting guild lost two hunters right after last light."
"Oh, yes, I remember that," The queen muttered and was silent for a long time, but the temperature stayed steady, so at least she wasn't upset. Fishlegs also didn't think she was as bothered by the dead hunters as much as she was about Hiccup being distraught about it.
"Thank you, Bookkeeper. Please continue to be Hiccup's friend."
The stout man bowed respectfully and cast an inconspicuous look around. "If I may be so bold, your majesty?"
"Go ahead?"
"I understand you have spent the past couple of days here in the archives, but it doesn't look like cleaning or organizing is going on?" He couldn't spot Tothn'ail between the cabinets either, so the fairy was either still hanging in the throne room or licking her wounds in some dark corner.
"Ah… no, I'm not cleaning…"
"Of course, your majesty. My sincerest apologies. I shall take my leave."
Elsa bit her lip as the bookkeeper, Hiccup's friend, took a step back towards the door he'd barely taken two steps through when entering. Out there, down the hall, Elsa caught a flash of Anna as the princess rounded the corner and swiftly stepped back.
"I really can't do this alone."
"Majesty?"
She startled, and only at the look of the keeper's face did she realize she spoke her thought aloud. But she really couldn't. If Hiccup needed rest Elsa wouldn't disturb him and Tothn'ail was still under probation for her transgression. Being locked up in here alone while Anna roamed the city without a care in the world, it was more than Elsa could live with.
"Keeper, can I request your help?"
The man stood at attention. "Of course, my queen."
Anna glanced around the corner and watched the door to the archives close. Her old tutor, that mousy man with his squeaky voice who could talk for agas at a time, stayed inside.
"At least it's not Hiccup today."
The princess glanced at the guards. In this hallway there were six of them; Elsa's outside the archive, two from their mother and the three ice mirrors from one of the earliest queens that today held no other function than being mirrors, in Anna's opinion. They had held a different function when they were first made, and that's as far as Anna had listened before she fell asleep in that class. Why her mother had thought it necessary for Anna to know about past queens was beyond her. Elsa was the queen now and she reigned supreme, just like every other queen before her. Anna felt her shortened version of her own history and power was much better than anything of the meaningless trivia her tutors had spent days talking about.
Anna made her way to the gate to leave the castle.