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Elsa looked out the window of her car. She hadn’t wanted to come here, but Gerda had insisted that it was important to meet other people like herself before she came of age, and Camp Royal would be just the place. She just needed to get out of the car and walk onto that boat. That was all.
“Your Highness, are you going to get out?” Kai asked from the driver seat.
“Oh, yes, of course,” Elsa mumbled. “Thank you, Kai. I’ll see you in two weeks?”
“You'll enjoy yourself,” Kai replied. “Your father used to look forward to this every year.”
Elsa smiled, but she still felt unsure about being in the middle of so many people. Still, she got out. She was at the back of a big crowd rushing onto the two different boats. She shouldn’t have dawdled so much in the car, since now she would be the last on board.
“You there!” a man with a clipboard shouted at her. She realized he’d already been trying to get her attention.
“Yes?”
“Finally! Now get on board!”
Honeymaren hated being late, but here she was, the last person arriving at the dock. She had been wanting to attend this camp for years, but it never worked out with her performance schedule until this year.
One of the ships had already left. Absolutely not the best start to the day.
“Get on, we’re about to leave!”
Destin Mattias looked out at the crowd who had just arrived for Camp Royal. As usual, there were several familiar faces. A lot of the kids loved coming back year after year, and he loved mentoring them. He’d been doing this for quite a few years now, and it never got old. He remembered every single one. He had noticed a familiar country on the roster–the same kingdom as one of his favorite campers years before.
He gave the same old speech, about the importance of tradition, but also cooperation and so much more. He rarely changed it, because it worked, and once again he got the usual enthusiastic response. Everyone went off to their dorms before dinner, and he returned to his office to look over some paperwork. As he sat down at his desk and began looking through his notes, he heard a knock at the door.
“Come in?” he asked. A new girl was at the door, looking uncertain. “May I help you?”
“I don’t think I’m supposed to be here,” she told him.
“What do you mean?” he asked. He motioned at the chair across from him. “Sit down and let’s talk about it.”
He had seen so many new campers arrive and then feel utterly intimidated by all the people around them, for many of them it was the first time they had been surrounded by other young people of similar rank. She probably just needed a pep talk and some reassurance.
Yelana looked down from the balcony of the dining hall at Camp Pop. Several familiar faces were down below at the tables, some of them already improvising songs together. She smiled to herself thinking about when she had been young and enthusiastic, but now, her job was to instill some discipline and impart skills to young people. They had talent, but they needed to practice.
After dinner, they were going to learn their first dance number.
“Sorry, I don’t dance,” she heard an unfamiliar girl say.
Yelana looked at her. She was blonde, had a very striking look, and there was something familiar about her face.
Yelana walked toward her. “What do you mean?”
“Just what I said,” she told her.
“When you signed up for this camp, you knew that we would be focusing on every aspect of performance, and that includes dance. If you have an injury, we can discuss accommodations, but you will dance here.”
“Um, no, I didn’t sign up for this.”
“What do you mean?” Yelana asked the girl.
“I didn’t sign up for this camp. I ended up on the wrong boat back at the dock.”
“Oh,” Yelana muttered. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Elsa of Arendelle,” she replied.
“Arendelle?” Yelana asked. It had been a long time since she’d heard that name.
“Honeymaren?” Mattias said, looking at his roster and not seeing the name. “Where are you from?”
“I’ve lived a few places,” she replied. “My family was on tour a lot.”
“Oh…” Mattias hummed. “Do you mean you were supposed to go to Camp Pop?”
“That’s right.”
Mattias sighed. He’d have to call. There was a good chance the mix up went both ways.
He hadn’t had a reason to call in years, but he picked up the phone, and dialed the number by pure muscle memory.
Yelana took Elsa into her office, closing the door behind them.
“Tell me how this happened.”
“Someone told me to get on the boat, so I did,” Elsa said. “That’s it, I swear.”
Yelana nodded. She leafed through the student roster, seeing if anything popped out at her.
The phone rang.
“Excuse me, Elsa,” she said, picking up the phone.
She cleared her throat before answering. “Camp Pop, director speaking.”
“Yelana, it’s Mattias,” the man on the other end said.
“It’s been a while,” she replied.
“Thirty-four years,” Mattias replied. “Too long.”
“Well, I don’t think you called me just to chat,” Yelana replied.
She could hear Mattias sigh on the other end. “Right, so, I think you may have one of our students. We have one of yours.”
“Yes, I have one of yours. How are we going to take care of this?”
Elsa followed the camp director out of her office, down the hall, and outside toward the edge of the camp. She saw some others coming toward them.
They met in an empty outdoor amphitheater.
“Mattias,” Yelana nodded.
“Yelana,” the man replied.
“So,” Yelana continued, “this is Elsa of Arencelle.”
Mattias looked at Elsa. “Are you related to Agnar?”
“Yes, he’s my father… well, was…” Elsa replied.
Mattias frowned. “I’m sorry to hear that. He was with us for several years.”
Elsa nodded.
Yelana cleared her throat, looking at the girl standing next to Mattias.
“Ah, yes. This is Honeymaren Natura.”
Yelana smiled. “Welcome. I’m familiar with your family’s talent.”
Honeymaren stayed quiet, but Elsa felt like she was studying her.
“You know, Yelana,” Mattias said, looking around, “we used to have a joint talent show in this theater back in the day.”
“Of course I know that,” she replied.
“It looks practically the same,” he said.
“Are we going to discuss why we stopped doing that?”
“I don’t think this is the time to get into that,” Mattias said.
“You might be right,” Yelana nodded.
The students hummed with excitement. Several of them had been coming to their respective summer camps for several years now, but this was the first time anyone could remember meeting anyone from the camp next door.
The outdoor amphitheater between the camps had sat unused for decades, but the groundskeepers had maintained it the whole time. Now everyone from both camps were filing in from either side, though nobody had given any further explanation.
The directors of the two camps came on stage together.
“We have an announcement to make,” Mattias began. “Thirty-four years ago, we discontinued a treasured tradition of having a talent show at the end of each summer, in this very amphitheater.”
Yelana stepped forward. “Even though we’ve neglected this tradition entirely too long, we have decided that this year, we will bring it back. This evening, we want you to get to know each other, and find people that you would like to work with, from either camp. In a few weeks, we’re going to have our show.”