Wanted to explore an alternate universe where Anna was given more freedom after the incident and her memories locked regarding Elsa's powers. Elsa has lived an even more isolated life. Feedback is welcome!
The coronation bells chimed, great bronze voices singing out across the fjord. The sound felt immense to Anna, like the mountains themselves were humming along. Their resonant peals seemed to shake the very stones of the castle, vibrating through the polished marble floors, right up her legs and down to her toes, tucked nervously into brand-new satin slippers.
Ugh, slippers, she thought, wriggling her toes slightly inside the unfamiliar confines; the stiff formality felt so alien compared to her worn, comfortable boots – the ones she always wore scrambling around the castle grounds, usually alone.
For thirteen long, echoing years, those massive castle gates had remained stubbornly shut, bolted against the world. The vast halls, which Anna always imagined filled with dancing and laughter, had instead echoed only with her own footsteps, swallowed by silence. Her sister, Elsa… she was an enigma, a whispered name behind that heavy, unyielding oak door. A door that had remained closed to Anna since they were very small children, separating them completely. Anna swore she knew the grain of that door by heart from staring at it for hours, just hoping.
Meanwhile, Anna, though lonely, had been allowed a semblance of freedom; she could roam the castle halls, explore the gardens, even venture into town, albeit always accompanied by watchful guards. It meant she knew the staff, chatted with shopkeepers, understood the rhythm of life outside a single room, unlike Elsa, who had remained entirely unseen behind her door.
But today! Oh, today felt like stepping from a dreary black-and-white etching into the most vibrant painting imaginable. The formidable gates, finally draped in celebratory banners of green and purple (Anna's favorite colors!), were thrown wide. They welcomed not just stiff-backed dignitaries in fancy carriages but the actual people of Arendelle! Their faces were so bright with excitement, and their cheerful chatter filled the air like a complex, layered melody Anna hadn't realized she'd missed so desperately. Sunlight – real, bold, unfiltered sunlight – streamed through the high arched windows that had been kept shuttered and draped for so long. It illuminated millions of dust motes dancing in the golden shafts like tiny, effervescent sprites celebrating freedom.
And most importantly, Elsa – her Elsa – would finally, finally emerge from the shadows of her room.
Anna smoothed down the emerald green silk of her gown for what felt like the hundredth time. The expensive fabric felt cool and slick beneath her slightly trembling fingers.
Focus, Anna, she told herself.
Her heart thundered a frantic, syncopated rhythm against her ribs – a chaotic, almost painful blend of pure, uncontainable excitement (the kind that made her want to bounce and maybe trip over her own feet, which, she had to admit, was highly likely) and a deep-seated tremor of anxiety she couldn't quite quell, a cold knot tightening low in her stomach.
What would Elsa really be like?
After all this time apart, separated by so much more than just a door? Would the sister she remembered from those hazy childhood memories – the one who shared secrets whispered under bedcovers, who giggled over silly, made-up games, whose presence had always felt like warmth and light – still be in there somewhere beneath the crown and robes? Would she offer even a flicker of recognition in her eyes? A hint of their shared past? A tiny thawing of the formality Anna dreaded? Would she even look at Anna, truly look, and see her ? The memory of those thirteen years… it was like an endless parade of unanswered knocks echoing in empty corridors, hopeful notes slipped under Elsa's door only to remain untouched, lonely birthdays spent staring at that impassive wooden barrier, imagining her sister just feet away, living a life Anna couldn't fathom, confined and alone for reasons Anna never understood.
It had built a formidable wall of uncertainty inside Anna. Yet, despite her ingrained habit of disappointment, today hope felt different. It sparked within her, insistent and bright, tangible as the finest ice crystals glittering in the sunlit air, promising, pleading for a thaw after an impossibly long winter. Please, let today be different, Anna prayed silently.
She found her designated place in the grand hall. Wow. It was a dizzying sea of expectant faces, colorful gowns shimmering, and stern military uniforms gleaming all around her. The air felt thick with competing perfumes – heavy florals, sharp citrus, spicy colognes – mingling with the warm, comforting scent of hundreds of beeswax candles burning in ornate sconces. Underneath it all, Anna could smell the clean, salty tang of the sea drifting in through the open doors, a reminder of the world outside finally invited in.
She craned her neck, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet like an impatient child, trying desperately to see over the towering hats and elaborate hairstyles of the taller guests in front. Whispers rustled through the assembled crowd like wind through autumn leaves – speculation, reverence, simple, unadulterated curiosity. Anna caught snippets, disjointed fragments drifting past her ears.
"Thirteen years hidden away," murmured a woman whose neck glittered with jewels, fanning herself languidly with a plume of ostrich feathers. "Practically a recluse! They say she's never even left the castle grounds…"
Never left her ROOM, more like, Anna thought sadly, though she couldn't be sure.
A portly merchant nearby, sweating slightly in his formal attire, nodded sagely, adjusting his tight collar. "Hardly seen her myself since she was a tiny thing. Pale little girl. Wonder what state she's in now? Bound to be… unusual."
Unusual? She's my sister! She's just been locked away! Anna bristled inwardly.
Another voice, younger and hushed with a thrill of gossip, added from behind her, "Is it true she wears gloves all the time ? Even indoors? My cousin who works in the kitchens swears she saw her…"
The whispers, though quiet, seemed to amplify the nervous energy buzzing in the room, a strange cocktail of respect for the Crown and rampant curiosity about the mysterious, unseen heir. Her soon-to-be queen. Her sister.
Then, abruptly shattering the expectant hush and the tapestry of murmuring voices, the royal trumpets! A brilliant, piercing fanfare. The notes hung sharp and clear in the sudden silence, resonating with centuries of ancient ceremony. A collective intake of breath seemed to suck the very air from the vast room. The crowd stilled as one, movement ceasing, every single eye fixed, laser-focused, on the massive arched doorway at the far end of the hall. Anna's heart leaped into her throat. And there she was.
Elsa.
She stepped into view, perfectly framed by the dark wood of the massive doorway like a figure stepping out of a beloved, half-forgotten legend. Poised. Impossibly regal. Radiating an aura of untouchable grace, she seemed to glide rather than walk across the threshold. She was draped in coronation robes of deep teal and royal purple – her colors , Anna remembered dimly – fabrics so rich and heavy they seemed to drink the light, falling in flawless folds around her slender frame. Sunlight, slanting dramatically through the high arched windows, caught the intricate, glittering ice-crystal and snowflake patterns embroidered onto her sweeping cape, making them shimmer and flash with points of cold, blue-white fire.
A palpable wave of hushed awe rippled through the crowd, replacing the earlier speculative whispers.
"My goodness," Anna heard someone breathe nearby, the sound reverent. "Simply… radiant. Like starlight on snow." Another voice agreed, low and deeply impressed, "The very picture of a Queen. Such poise, such dignity." Even the woman in velvet seemed momentarily silenced, her feathered fan held motionless mid-air. But it wasn't the heavy, ornate crown resting carefully on Elsa's head that made Anna's breath catch painfully in her throat, stealing the air from her lungs as if she'd been plunged into icy water. It was Elsa herself. Her sister. Hidden away for more than a decade, suddenly, blindingly revealed.
Gone completely, utterly vanished, was the withdrawn, shadowy figure Anna couldn't even properly recall, just a vague sense of absence behind a door.
This Elsa stood tall, her spine unnaturally straight, her posture radiating a quiet, almost fragile, dignity that spoke volumes of immense, tightly-leashed control. Her platinum blonde hair – oh, it was so achingly like Mama's, Anna thought – was swept up in an elegant, intricate twist, a complex braid woven like frost patterns, exposing the graceful, vulnerable line of her neck and the determined, almost defiant set of her jaw.
And her eyes… oh, those eyes. As they briefly, almost hesitantly, swept over the sea of assembled faces, Anna felt a strange pang, expecting… she wasn't sure what. Warmth? Recognition? Instead, she saw… a deep, carefully banked intensity. A startling, piercing blue that seemed to hold the profound, unnerving chill and the stark, lonely clarity of a winter sky at midnight. It wasn't fear exactly, not the panicked kind Anna knew so well herself. It was the look of someone holding something immense and overwhelming deep inside, someone utterly unused to being looked at.
Why does she look so… intense? So distant? Anna wondered desperately. What happened to make her like this?
In that single, suspended, heart-stopping instant, the thirteen years of aching separation, of bewildered confusion and gnawing loneliness, simply dissolved for Anna. They evaporated like mist in the morning sun, blown away by the sheer force of Elsa's presence.
Replacing the ache was an overwhelming, unexpected surge of pure, unadulterated love – fierce, bright, and absolute. It wasn't just relief flooding through her, washing away the years of doubt. It was something far more profound, more elemental. It felt like seeing her sister, truly seeing the young woman she had become, for the very first time since those foggy memories of early childhood, of playing together before… before the door closed.
This elegant, composed, almost intimidatingly beautiful young woman, wrapped in layers of royalty and restraint, was still her Elsa. The sister whose absence had left a hollow, echoing ache inside Anna, a constant, quiet companion she hadn't known how to soothe or ignore.
A sudden, powerful wave of protective affection, fierce and almost aggressive, washed over Anna, so strong it felt like falling – not the dizzying, uncertain, hopeful tumble for some charming, unknown prince she'd always dreamed of, but a deep, grounding, undeniable fall into the absolute certainty of something akin to sisterhood, miraculously rediscovered in a single, breathtaking glance. She was back. She was here.
Elsa looked impossibly beautiful, radiating a cool, distant light. Impossibly grown-up, bearing the weight of the crown and kingdom on her slender shoulders. And most impossibly, most blessedly, she was there . Right there, breathing the same air, in the same room as Anna.
A nervous, hopeful, utterly irrepressible smile bloomed uncontrollably on Anna's face – wide and perhaps a little goofy, she probably looked ridiculous, grinning like a fool, but she couldn't help it – utterly, transparently sincere. She couldn't tear her gaze away. She wanted to drink in the sight of her sister, memorize every detail, make up for lost time right this second.
But then, as Elsa took another slow, deliberate step forward, beginning her solemn procession towards the waiting Bishop and the altar, Anna's laser focus caught something else, something discordant beneath the flawless regal bearing. A slight, almost imperceptible tremor in Elsa's white-gloved hand. Anna could almost imagine her knuckles white beneath the fabric.
The way Elsa's gaze flickered constantly, darting from tapestry to window to the floor, never quite settling on any single face in the crowd for more than a fleeting heartbeat, as if looking at people, truly looking, was physically painful – something Anna, used to casual chats in town, couldn't fully grasp.
The almost invisible tension tightening her shoulders, holding herself ramrod straight as if bracing against an expected blow or some invisible, crushing force. That stunning, cool composure Anna had first perceived? It now seemed less like innate grace and more like a meticulously crafted mask, painstakingly constructed over years of solitude and held precariously in place by sheer, exhausting force of will. This wasn't just dignity; it was a desperate defense mechanism born of isolation.
Anna realized with a jolt that her sister wasn't merely regal; she was profoundly, heartbreakingly terrified, socially inept from years without practice. Hiding it beneath layers of ice-queen perfection learned through years of enforced isolation and fear. "Conceal, don't feel," the old mantra Papa used to mutter sometimes echoed unbidden in Anna's mind, suddenly imbued with crushing weight, though she didn't understand its true meaning for Elsa.
The realization hit Anna like a physical blow, a punch to the gut that extinguished the last vestiges of her naive, bubbly joy and replaced it with a fierce, almost painful protectiveness that bordered on anger.
My sister. My Elsa. Hidden away, starved of warmth and connection, forced to hide herself away for reasons unknown, and now thrust before the entire kingdom, the entire world, expected to be flawless, perfect, untouchable, with absolutely no experience handling any of it.
Anna felt a wash of a sudden, sharp, almost primal possessiveness rise within her – Elsa was hers , finally back in her sight after so long, and she wouldn't let these strangers, with their prying eyes, their careless whispers and crushing expectations, hurt her or judge her or make her feel even more alone than she already clearly was. Anna wanted to run to her, right then and there, stand beside her, be her shield.
Just as this raw, unfamiliar emotion surged through Anna, hot and demanding, a figure stepped neatly, deliberately beside her, momentarily blocking her view of Elsa's progress.
Ugh, seriously? Anna thought, annoyed.
"Princess Anna," a smooth, cultured, undeniably charming voice murmured close to her ear. Anna blinked, startled, tearing her eyes reluctantly, resentfully, from Elsa's retreating form, which seemed miles away at the other end of the hall. A handsome young man with striking auburn sideburns and eyes the color of warm honey offered a polite, impeccably practiced bow. He wore the crisp white dress uniform of a visiting royal, adorned with unfamiliar medals.
"Prince Hans of the Southern Isles, at your service, Your Highness." He smiled, a confident, easy, perfectly calibrated expression that radiated warmth and approachability.
Okay, objectively, Anna had to admit, he was very handsome. On any other day, just yesterday even, such attention from such a figure might have sent a delightful, hopeful flutter through her perpetually romance-starved heart.
But today was not any other day.
Today, Anna's entire universe had tilted on its axis, her focus narrowed to a single point: the fragile, beautiful, terrified queen ascending the dais.
Her sister.
Anna managed a distracted, fleeting smile, her mind still frantically cataloging the subtle signs of Elsa's fear – the slight stiffness in her walk, the way she held her breath.
"Charmed," she replied automatically, the word sounding distant and hollow even to her own ears.
Her gaze immediately, compulsively, flicked back towards Elsa. Anna watched with painful intensity as Elsa finally reached the Bishop, her gloved hands trembling almost visibly now.
Oh, Elsa.
Hans began to say something else, something smooth and complimentary about the festivities, the grandeur of the hall, or the renowned beauty of Arendelle, but Anna barely registered the words. They were just pleasant background noise, like buzzing flies. Her sister looked so utterly, devastatingly alone up there, bathed in sunlight but isolated by her own secrets, despite being the absolute center of everyone's rapt attention. The visceral need to be near her, to somehow shield her, to offer silent support, was an almost physical ache deep in Anna's chest. Prince Hans, charming and handsome as he might objectively be, was merely a momentary, irrelevant distraction from the only person, the only thing in the entire world, that truly mattered right now:
Elsa.
Maybe, just maybe, Anna thought, today wasn't just about a crown and a title. Maybe it was the beginning of everything finally being open again – the gates, the castle, and maybe, just maybe, the heavily barred door between their hearts, starting right now, with the breathtaking, vulnerable, heart-wrenching sight of her incredible sister.
Anna just had to get to her.
The Bishop, ancient and solemn, began the rites. His voice, deep and resonant, filled the suddenly silent hall.
Anna found herself holding her breath, her eyes glued to Elsa. Every word spoken seemed to increase the tension radiating from her sister.
Then came the moment Anna had subconsciously been dreading, the moment hinted at by the whispers about gloves.
The Bishop presented the orb and scepter.
"Your Majesty," he intoned, "the gloves."
Anna's heart leaped into her throat. She saw Elsa hesitate, her already pale face somehow becoming even paler. A flicker of pure panic crossed Elsa's eyes before being instantly suppressed, replaced by that icy mask of control.
Why is she so scared of taking off her gloves? Anna wondered, confused. Is it just… part of the formality?
But the ritual was absolute. Slowly, deliberately, as if touching fire, Elsa drew off her gloves. Anna leaned forward, every muscle taut, half expecting… she didn't know what. For Elsa to drop something? Faint? Elsa's bare hands were revealed – elegant, slender, and trembling violently. Anna could see the tremor even from her distance. Elsa reached for the orb and scepter, her breath catching audibly. For a terrifying second, as her fingers touched the cold metal, a thin, shimmering layer of frost spread across the surfaces.
What was that? Anna blinked, startled. Did I just see…? But then, just as quickly, it vanished.
Elsa gripped the items tightly, her knuckles white, her jaw clenched so hard Anna feared her teeth might crack. She held them aloft as the Bishop proclaimed her Queen.
A collective sigh seemed to ripple through the hall, though perhaps it was only Anna's own release of breath.
Elsa had done it. She'd faced the moment of exposure – whatever that was about the gloves – and contained her obvious terror.
Relief washed over Anna, so potent it left her feeling weak-kneed. But the relief was immediately followed by a fresh wave of fierce protectiveness. Seeing Elsa's near-unraveling, the sheer terror she fought to conceal, solidified Anna's resolve.
Forget princes, forget decorum.
She had to get to Elsa. She had to talk to her, really talk to her, for the first time in forever. As the ceremony concluded and the organ swelled, signaling the transition to the celebratory ball, Anna didn't wait. Ignoring the dignitaries beginning to move around her, ignoring the lingering presence of the handsome but utterly insignificant Prince Hans somewhere nearby, Anna began to push her way through the dispersing crowd, her eyes fixed on the retreating figure of her sister, the newly crowned, terrifyingly fragile Queen of Arendelle.
