Frozen: Conceal, Don't Feel

by Jen Calonita

  “You must tell him not to worry so much,” her mother said. “What is meant to be will be.”

  “I know. I’m sure he does as well, Tomally, but sometimes the future feels so far away,” Freya said.

  “Then focus on now,” Anna said. “Right now you’re doing something really fun with me.”

  Her aunt laughed. “That is true. We are blessed in so many ways.”

  Anna pulled the cookies out of the oven to let them cool. They were a light golden yellow, just how she liked them. She always timed them perfectly.

  “Speaking of food, I almost forgot…” Freya dug into the woven basket she had brought and unwrapped the parchment paper. Inside was just what Anna wanted: several blocks of the darkest, thickest chocolate she’d ever seen.

  Anna lifted one to her nose. The chocolate smelled divine. “Thank you! I promise I’ll make this batch last till your next visit. Maybe.”

  “Fair enough.” Freya laughed. “I may even be able to bring you some chocolate from another kingdom. My husband and I will be traveling the next few weeks.”

  “Traveling?” Anna’s eyes lit up as she placed another tray of cookies in the oven. “Where are you going? How are you getting there? Are you bringing your daughter? Does she like to travel, too? What are you wearing?”

  Freya started to laugh again. “So many questions!”

  Anna’s mother shook her head. “Always. The girl never stops talking.”

  Anna smiled. “I can’t help myself.”

  “We’re going alone, and our daughter is staying home with…help,” Freya said, struggling to find the right words. “The journey is long, and it will be good to have someone stay back and take care of our affairs. She’s older than you by three years, so she’s practically an adult.”

  Anna began to prepare the icing by beating egg whites and powdered sugar. “I’ve never traveled before. I’ve never even been off this mountain.”

  “I know,” Freya said thoughtfully. She looked at Anna’s mother. “It would be wonderful if you could finally visit Arendelle.”

  Anna dropped her spoon into the icing with a loud thud. “Could I? I’d bring cookies. Which are your daughter’s favorites? The snowmen? Your husband likes the spice cake, I know.…”

  Her mother jumped in. “Anna, slow down.”

  Freya was quiet for a moment, lost in her own thoughts. “If I could finally find a way for you to visit, would you like to come stay with me?” Freya asked, her voice cracking.

  “Like to come? Of course I’d like to come!” Anna squealed in delight.

  Her mother smiled sadly at Freya. “Anna’s always wanted to visit Arendelle. Do you think there is any way to make that sort of trip possible?”

  “We don’t know unless we ask,” Freya said to Anna’s mother. Then she looked at Anna. “You’ve waited long enough.”

  It was like they were speaking in code. They weren’t making sense to her. It was just a trip to the kingdom. Why were they so hesitant? Anna wanted to ice the cookies fast so she could focus on the conversation. Quickly, she tested the icing on the first snowman, letting it drip from her spoon onto the cookie, then watched it spread out and drip over the sides, covering the snowman in white. She did several more snowmen, then put down the icing and spoke up.

  “I want to visit Aunt Freya in Arendelle so badly,” Anna said. She didn’t want to hurt her parents, but she knew staying in Harmon wasn’t her future. “Can I go? Please, Ma?”

  Her mother sighed and looked at Freya. “We’re so busy with the bakery we couldn’t afford to have you gone for long.” She paused. “But I’ll talk to your father. It’s not a guarantee,” she stressed, “but I’ll ask. You are bound to wind up there eventually.”

  “I’ve always wanted to meet your daughter,” Anna said to Freya. “It would be nice to bake with someone my own age. No offense.” Freya and Anna’s mom laughed.

  “Someday soon you two will be together,” Freya said. “Your meeting is long overdue.”

  Arendelle. Anna could almost imagine the kingdom she’d spent so many years looking at from a distance. She’d see more than the tops of the turrets. She’d be right there in the middle of everything, with Freya, who knew the place so well. “Do you think Papa will say yes?” Anna asked her mother.

  “Perhaps,” Ma replied.

  Freya smiled and took Anna’s hand. She seemed hopeful. “When I get back from my trip, we will find a way to bring you to Arendelle.”

  I might die of boredom.

  Elsa would never say those words out loud, of course. But as she sat in the portrait hall in a large velvet chair and stared up at the ceiling, she couldn’t help thinking them. Her parents had been gone only a week, but already she was feeling the weight of their absence. She’d done all her studies for the next three days, sat in on the visits her father had outlined for her, walked around the courtyard daily, and visited with Olina in the kitchen. The castle’s chef was the closest thing she had to a real friend, if she was being honest. Miss Olina—who insisted Elsa call her Olina now that she was practically an adult—didn’t care that she was the future queen of Arendelle. She gave it to Elsa straight.

  “You need friends—or better yet, a suitor,” she had told Elsa that morning. Elsa was sitting in the kitchen with her, eating eggs for breakfast.

  Elsa groaned. “Now you sound like the Duke of Weselton.” She knew where the conversation was headed: she was about to get a lecture.

  “Would it be so wrong for you to find someone who is your equal?” Olina asked.

  Elsa sighed deeply.

  “You listen, my darling girl.” Olina waved a wooden spoon, the pink in her cheeks from the heat of the stove growing deeper as she got wound up. “You spend too much time alone.”

  “But—” Elsa said, but Olina cut her off.

  “I know you’re learning how to follow in your father’s footsteps, and that’s good, but when was the last time you went outside the castle walls? With someone other than this staff? A good queen knows herself inside and out, and you are too inside your head. The only way you can understand the people you serve is to get to know them. Enjoy their company. Hear their stories. In the process you might figure out what you enjoy, as well, when you’re not focused on your studies and your future.”

  Olina made a good point. What did Elsa enjoy doing other than spending time with her parents and learning how to be a wise ruler? Olina was right. She needed friends. She needed a hobby. She needed something to do. But what?

  “Oh my goodness!” Olina said, spying Kai coming through the door with a large box. Various scrolls and hats were falling out of it. Olina ran over to help him place the box on the floor. “Let me help you with that.”

  “Thanks,” Kai said. “That was heavier than I anticipated.” He noticed Elsa. “Hello, Princess.”

  “Hello.” Elsa nodded.

  “Who told you to carry it all the way from the attic by yourself?” Olina scolded him, stepping back to the stove and stirring the contents of a large pot. Whatever she was cooking smelled wonderful. “How is it going in the attic?”

  “Good. We cleared out several boxes. You can see the floor again now.”

  “You didn’t throw out anything the king or queen would want, did you?” Olina asked, placing her hands on her hips.

  “No, no, just these random old hats and broken things.” Kai held up a Viking hat with one horn and a chipped blue vase. “Thought you might like this.” He pulled out a large pot.

  Olina’s eyes lit up. “Look at that! I could put this to good use.”

  “I’ll go up to the attic again tomorrow when it isn’t so hot and see what else there is. I’ll bring you back anything special. Good afternoon, Princess Elsa.” Kai lifted the box again and walked out.

  “Good afternoon,” Elsa said.

  She’d never realized there were things stored in the attic. She’d never even been up there. She had a whole afternoon ahead of her. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to have a peek at
what was stored right above her bedroom. It wasn’t a hobby, but it was a start.

  After saying goodbye to Olina, Elsa decided to stop in her room to grab a lantern. With her parents away and no engagements being held at the castle until their return, it seemed like everyone was trying to catch up on long-overdue chores. She passed workers cleaning brass fixtures in the hallway and someone delicately brushing dust off their family portrait, painted when Elsa was eight. Finally, Elsa began to ascend the attic stairs, the heat rising as she climbed.

  The lantern washed over the dark, cramped space. The room was musty, as if it hadn’t been visited in centuries, even though Kai had just been there. Elsa could make out dust marks on the floor from the boxes Kai had taken downstairs. The space needed a good cleaning. Furniture was piled in one corner, a sled hung from another, and the tight quarters were crammed with massive trunks with chipped paint and faded rosemaling. Elsa made her way to the closest trunk to have a peek. It was locked. The next one contained nothing but quilts. The third was full of old hats and a few capes. The fourth one was also locked, but the mechanism was loose, so Elsa gave it a hard pull, and it came right off. The trunk was full of boring ice axes, fur-trimmed gloves, and snow boots that looked like they had been used to climb the North Mountain. She could see why Kai was emptying out the place. The excursion had been a waste of her time. There was nothing to see up there. Or was there?

  Her father had lived in the castle since he was a boy, and she’d hate to see his childhood things tossed out by accident. After all, this was their history. She needed to protect it. Elsa stepped around one of the trunks, and she waved the lantern into the dark recesses. The light caught on a broken frame with a yellowed map of the kingdom. Her father might like to see that. She stepped close, her eyes lingering on handwritten markings, and lifted the frame up to the dim light. That was when she noticed there was a trunk behind the frame. This one was different from the others. It was painted white, with brightly colored flowers on the front of it. Elsa realized immediately why it seemed familiar: it looked exactly like her hope chest.

  Could it have been her mother’s, before she married?

  Elsa ran her hand along the top of the trunk, removing a thick layer of dust. The painted markings on it were identical to the ones on her own, but instead of an E painted on top, the tracings of a different letter were buried under all that dust. She rubbed hard at the spot, wiping the dust away until the letter became clear. It was an A.

  A? Her mother’s name was Iduna. Her father was Agnarr, but this clearly wasn’t his. Who was A?

  Elsa racked her brain, trying to think of who the trunk could belong to. A name was rolling around in her head, but it wouldn’t come forward. A…A…A…She willed her mind to figure it out, but it was stuck.

  Instead, she thought again about that argument she had overheard between her parents. They had referred to a “she.” Her mother had seemed insistent on seeing the person, while her father kept stressing how risky it was to visit. She’d never heard them that upset with each other before. Now she wondered: could “she” and “A” be the same person?

  “Princess Elsa!”

  She stepped away from the trunk as if she had been caught snooping.

  “Princess Elsa!”

  She quickly put the frame back where she had found it, hiding the chest from sight, and headed down the stairs. There was a commotion of some sort. She could hear people crying and others calling her name.

  “I’m here,” Elsa called, instantly feeling guilty for making anyone worry about where she was. She rounded the corner and found members of the castle staff gathered together. Gerda was inconsolable. Olina was crying into a handkerchief. Several people were embracing and in tears.

  “Princess Elsa!” Kai clutched his chest. “You’re all right.” His face was blotchy, as if he’d been crying, too. “We thought…”

  “Thought what?” Elsa felt her heart speed up. A lump rose in her throat as she watched Olina blot her eyes. Everyone was looking at her. Something was terribly wrong. “What is it?”

  Lord Peterssen appeared from the middle of the crowd. His face was somber and his eyes were bloodshot. “Elsa,” he whispered, her name sounding broken on his tongue, “could we speak in private, please?”

  The minute she locked eyes with him, she knew.

  “No.” She started to back up. She didn’t want to hear what he had to say. The walls seemed like they were closing in on her. The crying and the sobbing grew louder. She felt her heart racing. Her mouth was dry and there was a ringing in her ears. She knew what he would tell her would change her life forever, and for just a moment, she wanted to stall him. “I don’t want to speak in private. I want to stay here with everyone.”

  Gerda put her arm around Elsa, steadying her.

  Lord Peterssen looked around, his eyes wet. “All right. Elsa, there is no easy way to say this.”

  She inhaled sharply. Then don’t, she wanted to shout.

  “Your parents’ ship didn’t make it to the port.” His voice faltered.

  “Maybe it’s gone off course.” Elsa felt her fingertips starting to tingle. It was a strange sensation. She pulled away from Gerda and shook them out. “Send a ship to find them.”

  He shook his head. “We already have. We sought word from every nearby port, every kingdom. Now we have received responses from them all: the ship never arrived. Moreover, the Southern Seas can be treacherous, and there have been many storms lately.” He paused. “There is only one conclusion left to draw.”

  “No.” Elsa’s voice was rougher now. Gerda immediately burst into tears again. “That can’t be!”

  Lord Peterssen swallowed hard, and she watched his Adam’s apple move up and down. His lip quivered and Olina let out an audible sob. Several of the others bowed their heads. She heard Kai praying. “Elsa, King Agnarr and Queen Iduna are gone.”

  “May their souls rest in peace,” said Olina, closing her eyes and tilting her face to the heavens. Others did the same.

  “No,” Elsa repeated. Her whole body began to shake. Her fingers began to tingle again. She had the sudden feeling she was about to burst into a million pieces, exploding in fragments of light. Lord Peterssen reached for her, but she backed away, trying to disappear. Kai held up a thin piece of black silk. He and Gerda hung it over the portrait of her parents in the hallway.

  Her parents couldn’t be…dead. They were her only family. Without them, she truly was alone. Her breath became ragged and her heart beat so fast she thought it would leap out of her chest. Every sound she heard was magnified a thousand times. “No!” Her fingers were burning now. “No!” She turned and ran, not stopping till she reached her room.

  Elsa fell through the doors with such force they slammed shut behind her. She landed on the circular rug and didn’t have the strength to move. Instead, she curled up into a ball and stared at the pink wallpaper where a portrait of her as a child stared back at her. That girl was smiling and happy. She had a family.

  Now she had none.

  The burning sensation in her fingers was growing stronger, her heart pulsing so fast she felt like she could hear it. Tears began to stream down her face, wetting the top of her collar and reaching her hot chest. Shaking, Elsa forced herself to stand up, looking for someone—anyone—to talk to. No one was there. She had closed herself off once again. Elsa went to her hope chest. Her hand shook as she brushed the green wooden lockbox under the quilt. She rummaged around until she found what she was looking for: the small one-eyed handmade penguin she had confided in as a girl—Sir JorgenBjorgen. She held the penguin with shaking hands, but couldn’t put her thoughts into words. Mama and Papa were gone.

  I might die of boredom. Wasn’t that what she’d thought earlier that day? How could she have been so selfish? She clutched Sir JorgenBjorgen so tightly she felt like he might disintegrate in her burning hands. They started to shake so badly she couldn’t hang on to him. She threw the doll across the room and he landed on her bed.<
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  Alone. Alone. Alone.

  Dead. Dead. Dead.

  Gone. Gone. Gone.

  She closed her eyes. She felt a scream rising inside her. It was so primal she knew it would rattle the whole castle, but she didn’t care. It gurgled to the top of her throat, threatening to overtake her, until it finally did, and Elsa screamed so hard she thought she might never stop. Her hands went from hot to burning cold as they flew out in front of her. Something inside her opened, like a chasm that could never be closed again. Opening her eyes, she saw it, unbelievably, form in the air in front of her fingers.

  Ice.

  It shot clear across the room, hitting the opposite wall and crawling up to the ceiling. Terrified and still sobbing, Elsa jumped back in fear as the ice continued to grow. It crackled as it moved under her feet, spreading along the floor till it climbed up the other walls, too.

  What was happening?

  The ice was coming from inside her. It didn’t make sense, yet she knew it was true. She’d caused this to happen. What was happening?

  Magic.

  She’d heard Papa use that word when he and Mama had been arguing. Had they been talking about her?

  Elsa sank down along the nearest wall, collapsing in grief.

  Alone. Alone. Alone.

  Gone. Gone. Gone.

  More and more ice shot out as she choked back sobs. Was her heartbreak causing this? Had her parents known she was capable of such strange magic? Or was this something she had been born with and didn’t know she possessed? She’d never been more frightened in her entire life. Without her parents, there was no one she trusted enough even to ask. She needed them now more than ever before.

  She banged her head on the wall and closed her eyes. Her voice was barely a whisper. “Papa, Mama, please don’t leave me here alone.”

  Anna couldn’t remember the last time she’d crawled back into her bed when the sun was still shining. Papa and Ma had insisted she retire for a spell. She’d been up late the night before, assembling a traditional Arendelle wedding cake the Larsen family had paid her handsomely for. She rarely made that particular type of cake because it was so time-consuming—between the icing and all the layers that needed to be baked, it took hours—but the end result was worth it. Anna knew that the Larsens’ daughter, who was getting married later today, was going to love it. So it was with a grateful, sleepy sigh that she pulled up her quilt, fluffed her pillow, and closed her eyes.