Chapter Text
Chapter 1: The Beginning of the Beginning
Queen Elsa sat alone on the balcony of her bedchamber. She watched the summer stars twinkling above her kingdom and window after window grow dark in the homes of her subjects from candles being blown out for the night. "Alone once more," she thought to herself as the warm breeze danced through her hair. Only she wasn't alone anymore. The events of the past few days had in many ways swept away the barriers of the past thirteen years. Hers was no longer to be a kingdom of closed doors and isolation, but a kingdom of love and open gates.
Love. Love for her sister, love for her people, love for the very land of Arendelle, these were what brought about The Great Thaw, once Olaf pointed out to her the cause of Anna’s thaw. Despite what many probably thought, it was never that she didn't or couldn't love. Quite possibly she loved too much, and the fear that her powers would hurt those so dear to her only fed her powers and caused them to be uncontrollable.
Grand Pabbie had tried to warn her that fear would be her worst enemy. Somehow her parents, her father mostly, misunderstood what he tried to tell them. In retrospect, she could look back and understand that their plan to isolate her from everyone and everything was probably the worst course of action in the long run. It did more damage than even her powers could. It damaged her, possibly forever, and hurt and alienated Anna when all she ever deserved was to be loved by her entire family.
Her father’s mantra of “Conceal, don’t feel,” was not what lifted the freeze. In fact, years of bottling every feeling she had up was most likely was caused it. Being open and up front about who she really was and opening herself up to all the love that she had shut out for so long that did it. Not a crocus petal, grain of wheat, nor blade of grass was permanently harmed once the winter thawed. Everything was as it had been. Well, mostly everything. Her secret; the secret her parents had worked so diligently to conceal was known to all. From what her staff could tell, the vast majority of her people seemed accepting of her powers, at least once she learned how to thaw that which she froze. Many still harbored the memories of the two happy little princesses of Arendale who were shut away from them when the gates were closed and welcomed their return in any form. Most importantly, Anna forgave her. She loved her enough to sacrifice her own life for her. After thirteen years of shutting her sister out of her life, believing that it was the best way to keep her safe, Anna still loved her and wanted nothing more than to be close as they once had been.
After Anna's act of true love thawed the heart in which Elsa had frozen, she had held on to her sister, refusing to let go except to punch her former fiancé square in the face. Then she returned to Elsa and latched on to her arms as she had when she was just learning to walk seventeen years previously. It was the most physical contact Elsa had had with anyone in so very, very long. It was frightening and wonderful at the same time.
She could still feel Anna's hands on her arms even though hours had passed, it was late at night, and each had gone to her respective room to try and rest after their ordeal. Elsa half expected to hear that all-too-familiar knock that belonged only to Anna on her door, but it never came. Then, Anna had given up knocking on her door by the time she was a teenager, except for that one time after their parents were killed.
Oh how she had wanted to open the door and hold her baby sister as they grieved together, or at least slip her slender hand under the door to grasp Anna's, which she knew was right there. She didn't. She didn't believe that she could then without harming Anna. In her own grief, her powers had been so out of control that she hadn't even been able to attend the memorial. She had left Annacompletely alone when she shouldn't have; when they had needed each other the most. So why should she have expected, nay wanted, to hear that familiar knock now, after it had gone unanswered so many countless times before?
She did expect and even longed to hear it though. She wanted to open the door and welcome her sister with open arms. It never came though, and she was afraid of falling asleep lest she awake to find that Anna thawing was but a dream - that she indeed was her sister's murderer. She needed to see with her own eyes that Anna was fine. She wanted to make up for thirteen years' lost time. Most importantly was that after thirteen years, she didn't want to be alone anymore. She wanted to build a snowman.
"Why should Anna be the one to come to me? I am the older sister, after all. Despite everything else, I am the crowned queen of this kingdom. It’s my job to look out for her well-being. It's not as if I haven't been trying to do that for the past three years the best way I knew how. Only this time I'll take the hallway, rather than the secret passageway," she told herself, referring to the hidden doorway behind her bookcase that led to several key places throughout the castle, including Anna's room. Among the many things Anna was unaware of was that every night for thirteen years, Elsa would sneak in her room to check on her once she was asleep. So she decided to go to her sister.
Only, going to Anna required Elsa leaving her room - through the door! Old habits die hard, even after the cathartic experience of letting all of her anxieties seeming go. She took a deep breath, grabbed hold of the handle and... opened the door. She stopped a moment, checking the handle for frost, then peered into the darkness of the hall. The hallway was dark and quiet, as it was by then the wee small hours of the morning. With her back and shoulders set straight, her head held high, and all the queenly regality she could muster, she walked down the hallway to Anna's room, and stood there as if she had frozen herself. She forced her hand to the door in order to knock, but then remained paralyzed, muttering nonsensical things to herself when the door opened without her having to knock.
"Elsa?" Anna stood, motionless and surprised in her nightgown, robe, and slippers.
A sheepish grin crossed Elsa's face. She brought down her hand and used it to rub her other arm like she did whenever she was nervous. "Hi! I-a-a-a-a. I wanted to check and see how you were doing?"
"Really?" Anna asked incredulously.
The grin disappeared from Elsa's face as she realized Anna had a difficult time believing her. "Really. It didn't feel right to leave you alone after everything. I needed to see with my own eyes that you were here, safe and... warm." She paused a moment before admitting to Anna that she always checked on her when she was asleep. "So in the spirit of being open, I decided to not wait until you were asleep and sneak in through the secret passageway."
"Wait, what?" Anna turned her head from side to side, looking for any evidence of a secret passageway in her room.
Elsa laughed and walked over to the bookshelf next to Anna's vanity. She pulled down a copy of Dante's Inferno, a book Anna obviously never touched, causing a door to slide open, revealing the secret passageway. Anna tiptoed over to peek through the opening. " No way ! How could I not have known about this?"
“Oh Anna," Elsa softly called her name. "I'm sorry that there have been a great many things you didn't know about."
"Yeah, of course." She glanced at her feet and ran her hand through her hair, her nervous trait. Then she remembered what Elsa said about sneaking in while she was asleep. "Did you just say that you would sneak in here to check on me while I slept?"
Elsa ran her hands along Anna’s bedspread. ”Every night."
This so surprised Anna that she was forced to take a seat on her bed lest she fall on her backside in disbelief. " Every night? For how long?" She motioned for Elsa to sit next to her.
"Since the night after the first accident. I missed you.” Elsa ran her right hand along her left arm nervously. “I knew that Papa said that I had to stay away from you in order to keep you safe, but I couldn't resist just checking to make sure that you were safe and well every night. After all, I had been keeping watch on you since you were born. I couldn't just stop doing what had become second nature to me."
Anna still had a difficult time believing that Elsa checked on her each and every night. This was not how she remembered the previous thirteen years. ”How did I not wake up when you would do this? That hidden door isn’t exactly quiet when it opens and shuts!”
Elsa chuckled. "You sleep like the dead, Anna. You always have."
Anna nodded, knowing it was true. Then she remembered something from her dreams. "Did you... NO!” She tried to push a hazy dream out of her mind, but curiosity got the better of her. “Would you sing to me while I slept?"
Elsa nodded, biting her bottom lip. ”Most of the time I did - at least when we were young, usually lullabies that Mama sang to us before bed, when we shared a room. Then I started again, three years ago when I knew no one else would hear me.”
"I always thought that was just part of my dreams. We never stopped being close there ." Anna grew unusually quiet as it dawned on her how much her sister truly did love her. Elsa shut her out of her life, believing it was the safest thing for her, but that didn’t mean she had ever stopped loving her. "What do you mean, ' first accident?"
Elsa was very slow at meeting Anna's eyes with her own, but she knew that she couldn't start this new, open chapter of her life without telling Anna what had happened in the ballroom all those years in the past - the catalyst to thirteen years of closed gates. So she told her everything and not without tears from both sisters. Elsa certain that after learning the complete truth that Anna would want to move out of the castle, no the kingdom. She was so ashamed of she had done to her baby sister all those years in the past.
Then Anna grasped Elsa's hand and did something wholly unexpected by Elsa but completely Anna-like. "You gave up your freedom, our friendship, your life because you were led to believe it was the only way to protect me? This has all been to keep me safe from you?"
Elsa sighed. Being so open and honest wasn't something that she was accustomed to anymore. "You're my baby sister. I would do anything for you." At this, Anna enveloped her in a giant bear hug.
Anna finally let go of Elsa, only to dramatically collapse on the bed in both real and fake exhaustion. "So much has changed in the past three days. So much..." She paused a moment before quickly rolling to her side and asking, "Is it wrong that I almost want to thank Hans for maniacally trying to take the throne and killing both of us, because if he hadn't we wouldn't be where we are now? I mean, I know that he has to face the consequences of everything, but I feel that I should at least write him a thank you card or maybe send him a fruit basket."
"I, I, I honestly don't know, Anna. Wait, what? A thank you card? A fruit basket?”
“By messenger! You don't think I want to see him in person again, do you? I don't think my hand could handle having to clock him again." She gingerly rubbed her right hand.
Elsa took her sister’s injured hand into her own, gingerly icing it to reduce swelling, then advised her, “You should keep your thumb outside your fist, between the first and second knuckles of your index and middle fingers next time, or you’ll likely break your thumb.”
Anna sat, incredulously staring as her elder sister held up the injured hand and tended to it’s injuries. “How on earth would you, of all people, know that?”
Elsa chuckled, dropping their hands but not releasing Anna’s. “Papa taught me personal defense.”
Anna rolled her eyes somewhat, then continued, "Ok. In all honesty though, if Hans hadn't set all of this in motion by preying on my loneliness and need for love, then you and I wouldn't be here, having this conversation, and I wouldn't have met Kristoff." Her eyes got this dreamy look in them as she mentioned Kristoff. Elsa, on the other hand, tensed up when the younger girl mentioned how lonely she had been and what that loneliness almost caused her to do.
"Oh!" Anna suddenly jerked up her head, startling Elsa. "I need a really big advance on my allowance, Elsa!" Before Elsa could ask why, Anna continued, "I sort of owe Kristoff a new sled, and all the equipment that was on the one that crashed and burned when we were chased by the wolves."
"Wait, you were chased by wolves?" Elsa asked, realizing exactly how much danger her sister had put herself in to bring her back to Arendelle.
"Yeah, but I threw a flaming blanket at them so that they let go of Kristoff, and we jumped across the gorge and were ok. Then in the morning we met Olaf!” Then changing the subject in a manner all her own, Anna said, “Hey Elsa, I don't want to marry Kristoff, right now at least, but am I going to have to since we basically spent two nights alone together? I mean, I don't think there's any chance of a baby, but has my honor been compromised or anything like that?"
Elsa stared at Anna, soaking in her word vomit, then suddenly busted into deep, tear-inducing belly laughter. "Oh Baby Sister, I have missed you more than you'll ever know! No, you don't have to marry anyone until it is right, and you want to!" Then she hugged her baby sister. It just seemed like the natural thing to do, and without thinking she wrapped her arms around Anna and hugged her closely to her.
Anna stiffened a little at first, because it had been three years since she had been hugged on a regular basis - thirteen since the hugs had been from Elsa. It just felt good and right to be this close to her sister again. She found Elsa's term of endearment for her nice and wonderful to hear. She wanted to talk until they were completely caught up on everything, but a huge yawn escaped her lips. Then another and another. She hadn't really slept in days!
Elsa noticed the yawns and felt her own fatigue. As much as she didn't want to leave Anna, she knew that they both desperately needed their rest! "I should let you get some sleep, Anna."
Anna yawned again. "Yeah, I guess so. We have the rest of our lives to catch up." She started to pull back her covers, and Elsa started to leave when, "Elsa, you know, I'm not in any hurry to be alone in the dark either. Would you mind sleeping in here with me tonight? You know, like you used to do when I was little and scared?"
"Are you sure?" Elsa asked.
"I wouldn't have asked. Come on! I can tell by your eyes, you don't want to be alone any more than I do," Anna told her. She sighed and admitted, "I think Elsa, that we've spent more than enough time alone, don't you? At least for tonight?"
"You know what, Anna? When you're right, and when you're right, you're very right. I'm in no hurry to go to my room again. I believe I've spent more than enough time making my own prison within its walls." She crawled under the covers and sighed. "Goodnight, Anna. I've so very thankful and glad that you're my baby sister. I love you. I'm going to tell that you so much from now on that you're going to grow tired of hearing it."
Anna was already drifting off to sleep but managed to whisper, "I’ll never grow tired of hearing it. Goodnight, Elsa. I love you too," before her breathing turned into the gentle snores of sleep.
Elsa stared at the ceiling, listening to Anna's soft snoring, cherishing every breath her sister took, remembering how just a few short hours before, Anna had given her life for her - the very life's breath floating out of her after she froze. Anna was right, in some weird way they owed Hans for this new beginning.
In her sleep, Anna somehow managed to turn into Elsa's side, and she wrapped her fingers all in Elsa's hair as she had when she was just a toddler as a source of security in her sleep. The voices in her head haunted her and kept her awake. One small voice still lurking within her head told Elsa that she should be afraid of hurting Anna again with her powers, but an even greater one assured her that she no longer had any reason to fear what she was beginning to see as possibly being a beautiful gift.
It then dawned on her that she probably needed to have a very important talk with Anna regarding men and women that she just realized their mother obviously never got the chance to have with her, and soon . She cringed slightly thinking about the very awkward talk their mother had shared with her when she turned sixteen. She recalled the foot of snow that had accumulated during the discussion. Something so intimate seemed the most frightening thing in the world to the teenaged girl who was deathly afraid to merely touch anyone.
"Talk about the blind leading the blind!" she laughed to herself before finally dismissing the voices in her head and passing out into her own deep slumber. Thanks to Anna, they had plenty of time to talk about everything; and to build that snowman Elsa forgot to even mention to Anna. Elsa realized that The Great Thaw wasn't the end of the story for them. No, it wasn't the end at all but actually the beginning of the beginning. While Arendelle may have thawed in minutes, she knew that it would be a far more gradual thaw for her to be half as free as her feisty, fiery sister... who just slapped her in her sleep.