HUGE ANOUNCEMENT, FOR THOSE WHO AREN'T NEW HERE AS OF 1/10/20:

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(*gasp gasp gasp gasp*)

(*stumbles up to table*)

(*slaps down redone manuscript in triumph*)

WHAP

IT'S HERE

IT'S DONE

THE FROZEN 2 UPDATE IS DONE

THANKS FOR WAITING, THAT TOOK WAY LONGER THAN ANTICIPATED

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OKAY. So, as of NOW, Ice Alliance is—OFFICIALLY—a ROTG/Frozen 2 fanfiction, which means that it is now set AFTER Frozen 2, and, from here on out, CONTAINS FROZEN 2 SPOILERS.

SO MANY SPOILERS.

ALL OF THE SPOILERS.

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(Oh... and the next "real" chapter will be coming ASAP!) And, no, I honestly can't believe that I was able to make this work, either, and am kind of proud of myself. When I admittedly saw the epilogue costume design spoiler three weeks before the movie, I had a full-on three-hour panic attack, because… how do I say this…

THE ENTIRE PREMISE OF ICE ALLIANCE WAS THAT ELSA WAS THE QUEEN OF ARENDELLE.

BUT! I got the workaround to work… I think. And, I would love love love LOVE for everybody to thank: MY MOTHER-IN-LAW, for giving me so much help with the baby over the last two months so I could write! Without her help taking care of the Squishy Bumpkin (adorable tiny human who keeps physically grabbing my computer and closing my files?), this update would probably have taken me until April.

I am not exaggerating.

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So… almost every single chapter (YUP) has had some alterations, and I really want to tell you to Just Go Reread It And Please Applaud Me. However, the chapters that got the BIGGEST (and/or, most important) alterations are 1, 5, 6, 8, 10, 20, 29, and 30. But, for those of you who don't feel like doing this, here's a brief-ish summary of everything I've changed in the updated draft (Ice Alliance has suddenly increased in length from 314,995 words to 334,822 words; there's a reason for that):

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IN A NUTSHELL: Pregnant Queen Anna needs a maternity leave, so Elsa's been temporarily reinstated as the queen to babysit the Council and make sure they don't screw everything up. By the way, she secretly hates this and wants nothing more than to jump on the Nokk and ride back to the Forest ASAP, but is trying to get as much work done as possible in the meantime because Hashtag AwesomeSister. Oh, and most people don't believe in the "Fifth Spirit" thing. Prepare to hate the Council even more.

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IN A MUCH LARGER NUTSHELL:

Let's start with chapter one, where I give Jack Frost—the Fifth Guardian (Get it!? DO YOU GET IT?!)—an ROTG canon-compliant powerup and costume change. He sheds it immediately in favor of his old navy hoodie/brown skinny jeans combo, but that'll come into play later. I also spend a few paragraphs smashing the reader over the head with the Fifth Guardian thing, including the part where that Gigantic Crystal of Magicness rises up out of that square-shaped Guardian Compass design in the floor, bursting into a million pieces and reconfiguring the center of the design from the old "G" into Jack's image. (DO YOU SEE THE CONNECTIONS?! DO YOU SEE THEM!? *pulls out whiffle bat of parallelism* DO YOU SEE?! TELL ME THAT YOU SEE.)

I also tweak the timeline, so that there's ONE year between Frozen 1 and Frozen 2, NOT three. Then, I make it so that ROTG takes place about 6 months AFTER Frozen 2. IA takes place about 8 months after that. This makes it so that Elsa is 23, while Jack is 19/almost 20 (give or take 300 years). I think I can get away with this because the "three years" between Frozen 1 and Frozen 2… to me, I would assume that they did that mostly to make sure that Anna would be "of age" for the epilogue to work without question (Anna is 3 years younger than Elsa). I skirted this problem by saying that Elsa rewrote the succession law to allow for then 20-yr-old Anna to take the throne. Oh, and I have Anna and Kristoff get married in April after her coronation.

(On a vaguely unrelated note: why does Disney keep telling us that Elsa's birthday is the Winter Solstice? I mean, putting Anna and Elsa on opposite solstices… cute… but Frozen takes place in JULY, when "THE QUEEN HAS COME OF AGE." I assumed that this meant they were coronating her because she'd just turned 21, not… uh, 21, plus 7-8 months? Like, maybe coronations are just always held in July, and ONLY JULY, but… gaurgh. I can't be the only person who thinks that feels kinda weird/overly complicated. Therefore, according to me, Elsa was coronated in JULY in Frozen 1 because she'd just had her JULY birthday. Also, I've given Jack Frost a February birthday, even though that has literally zero impact on the plot.) ;)

The Council was originally established by King Agnaar, who—after having to come to the throne so young—wanted to protect Elsa from the same potential fate. While a good idea in general, I think that everybody on here is already aware of what the Council is actually like, which definitely is not in perfect consistency with what usually happens when the well-meaning Agnaar tries to protect Elsa.

During the events of Frozen 2, Elsa was out of Arendelle for a grand total of about two weeks (including initial travel time, according to me). During this time the Council, once again in charge, managed to unravel so much of her work that Anna and Elsa realized Arendelle needed to not just have a queen, but to have a CONSTANTLY vigilant, active queen fighting to maintain their political progress at all times (lest the power-hungry Council drag everything back to their self-favoring status quo). Therefore, when Anna got pregnant after marrying Kristoff in the following spring—and started needing more and more breaks to rest, as a result of it—she and Elsa rewrote the succession law to allow for Elsa to be reinstated. And yes: this was King Kristoff's idea. He didn't want to deal with the Council any more than they did, and Elsa already knew the ropes to ruling a kingdom.

Now that Elsa has been temporarily reinstated as the Queen of Arendelle (for Anna's sake; she can't WAIT to go back to the Forest), the Council hates her more than ever. However, they think the fact that she's BACK, while still single, is giving them one more shot at a king. As it turns out, they absolutely despise Anna, not just because she's as politically active as her sister was, but because she married a commoner. In their eyes, this makes Queen Anna a disgrace, because—as the Council sees it—finding herself a royal, male replacement was all she was ever really good for anyway. But now, the "real" heir is back, and—believing that Anna (on a maternity leave) has stepped down permanently, they have decided that it's time for Elsa to get married. Elsa, of course, passionately disagrees with this idea, because it's super sexist, and because she has NO intention of stealing Anna's throne. And besides, she's the Fifth Spirit. Right?

RIGHT?

Not according to the Council. The majority of the Arendellians who actually witnessed the events of Frozen 2 believe her, and of course the Northuldra do, but the idea that the Queen of Arendelle is now suddenly a "Nature Spirit" has stirred all kinds of controversy… and conspiracy theories. In short, VERY few people actually believe that Queen Elsa is the Fifth Spirit at all. Some believe that her initial time in the Forest was purely a diplomatic mission with the Northuldra. Some believe that it was propaganda. Some believe that it was a clever way to increase stability in the kingdom by allowing for TWO people to sit on the throne, which would usually be terrible, but Actually Works, when those two people are Elsa and Anna. Meanwhile, the Council believes that the events of Frozen 2 were all merely an elaborate stunt that Queen Elsa has pulled on them as a way of running away from her responsibilities—and/or, that she's actually insane. But either way, the queen has had her irresponsible little "vacation" up in the forest, but now she's back on the throne, she's single, and they're going to "help" her by finding her a nice Royal Dude to marry, so that they can shift things back to the status quo and get rid of their two meddling little queens entirely.

Meanwhile, even though she's just trying to get as much work done before Anna has to step back up again as possible—trying to be a good queen, etc—in her heart, Elsa just wants to go back to the Enchanted Forest, where she belongs. Jack Frost is HIGHLY supportive of this idea. Oh—and, neither character realizes it yet, but this plot change implies that, if Jack can successfully get rid of Anna and Elsa's Council, it won't just make their lives easier. It will make it so that Anna can take a normal maternity leave (WITHOUT everything going up in flames), and Elsa will literally be set free and not have to be the Queen ever again. Which is great, because she hates it, even though she didn't realize this until after she got away.

Let's see… other stuffs I've changed…

Regarding Elsa's mortality: She's not sure if she's still mortal or not. Jack concedes that it can take a couple of decades to really know that sort of thing for sure, to be able to tell if her body is actually aging (he'd have personal experience with this). (Anna froze/came back as well, but—well, she's CLEARLY supposed to be a bit older. Therefore, it's totally plausible that Elsa was ALSO merely "suspended" via the magic freezing, vs. actually dying.) This definitely isn't a way of implying that I already have had plans for how to fix Elsa's mortality issue built into the plot of Ice Alliance for ages, because WE'LL GET THERE WHEN WE GET THERE. ALSO, IT WILL HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH OLAF, AND CLOSING THAT GAPING PLOT HOLE OF WHY HE MELTED BUT NONE OF THE OTHER SNOWMEN DID.

Regarding Elsa's new powers… I have it so that the events of Frozen 2 with Elsa's powers were "nature taking over her powers, and using them in ways she's still struggling to replicate." Basically, Nature had her on a sort-of magical high for the entire time, helping her get to Ahtohallan. Oh, and the memory statues thing? Well, turns out, that inspired her art gallery (she did figurines before; the art gallery was ACTUALLY inspired by the cake topper statue she makes in Frozen Fever), because Gale showed her the value of using statues to record history. Therefore, she does non-supermagic versions (just by herself) to keep as a sort of journal. The freezing water droplets thing into actual historical moments 1) Only works in the Enchanted Forest, and 2) Takes so much out of her that she now only uses it in times of dire need (FORESHADOWINNNNNG; I'm totally going to use that later). Oh, and of course, her memory-statue powers are way stronger in Ahtohallan itself, but the freezing-to-death thing has her freaked to the point where she hasn't actually gone back to the glacier since the events of Frozen 2, and would only do so in an actual emergency (MORE FORESHADOWINNNNNNG).

On that note: in "Monsters or Miracles," I had to basically rewrite Elsa's entire reaction to Jack's death, because… well, he could look it up, but he's not really sure if he drowned or froze to death. Frozen 2 Elsa would definitely not find drowning/freezing to death relatable at ALL.

And, how about that theme of "I've never had friends before?" Well, Honeymaren and the Northuldra are wonderful, but—much like with being the Queen of Arendelle—it's hard to actually get all that close. Elsa's just—that different, and feels a little off, trying to relate. When Jack Frost shows up, she's overwhelmed at how it feels to suddenly have a friend who can actually UNDERSTAND some of what she's been through. Jack relates to the fact that she wants a friend who can RELATE (see chapter one?).

Olaf got seriously aged up, although he still has some adorable playfulness in him. Also, regarding Olaf's parentage… he claims Jack Frost as his "paternal figure," but I got rid of the "no really he's actually my dad" part. It just… it was kinda weird. I mean, it WORKED, but I didn't like it, so I chopped it. This was partially because Olaf's Frozen Adventure was adorable. ;)

Anna got empowered (YASSS!), so I aged her up, too. She's just as politically active as her sister was, and is now far less naïve, even though Elsa doesn't fully realize this yet, which will come into play later. And Queen Anna is awesome—in part because she's much more "people-smart," whereas Elsa is "book-smart," and still is very willing to help Anna with the research, drafting, and number-crunching side of things when she's in Arendelle.

As for Ahtohallan…yes, I wrote it so that Elsa THOUGHT she was potentially seeking out Jack Frost in Frozen 2 (or a Fem! Version of him; it was a female voice… although Jack, upon hearing this in the First Meeting Scene, is VERY eager to point out that NO MA'AM JACK FROST IS A GUY PLEASE TRUST ME HE'S MALE I SWEAR), and THOUGHT that she was having her suspicions confirmed when she was riding up to Ahtohallan to find that it was frozen. Then—because I have ZERO interest in throwing out the "female empowerment" part in favor of just sticking Jack in there—Nature, through the voice of her mother, essentially tells her, "oh, honey, this isn't about him, it's about YOU; you don't need his approval, nor anyone else's, to fulfill your destiny." According to me, in Frozen 2, Elsa totally thought that she was going to find Jack Frost, but instead found herself—who she'd been really looking for, the whole time. While she still kinda hero-worships him a tiny bit (always will), having to accept herself FIRST, WITHOUT fantasizing the whole time about getting Jack Frost's approval, sets up a WAY healthier relationship. (This will come into play again more later; the Council is currently making her question herself!)

I also use titles a lot more (I hope I got it to still flow organically!), because it's a big transition from Queen Elsa/Princess Anna to The Fifth Spirit/Queen Anna/King Kristoff. I was very careful with the visual placement of the "Fifth Spirit" thing, though, because I didn't want it confused with the "Spirit of Winter."

Rapunzel is still Anna and Elsa's cousin, although POOF now it's through DADDY AGNAAR, not IdunaMom. According to me, as of now, Rapunzel's mother was Agnaar's little sister, who was totally at home during the whole "time for dad to die and for Agnaar to meet his future bride" deal. Let's pretend that this doesn't feel forced.

Prince Frederik knows about Elsa's "vacation" as the Fifth Spirit, but isn't quite sure what to think of it yet (it hasn't come up, but he's guessing it was a political move, rather than a Real Magical Thing That Actually Happened). The Council made up a bunch of excuses it their letters to the suitors. Meanwhile, Elsa has accepted that a political marriage for her would TRULY just be on paper, because the Nokk ain't goin' that far away from Ahtohallan. That being said, she's beginning to question if the Council is right, and thinking that—um—maybe she is still obligated to make a good political marriage, because even though she's no longer the queen, she's still a member of the royal family. She's "just the spare" now (hee hee, references!), but it would still help the kingdom. Jack just about has a coronary, hearing that she's legitimately questioning her decisions about wanting to stay in the Forest, and such.

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Did I cover everything? No? Definitely no, but these are the main relevant plot points that have been inserted/revised into Ice Alliance. Thanks again for reading, thanks for tolerating me, thank you ESPECIALLY for all your kind and encouraging reviews, and have an amazing and magical day! :) :) :) :) :)