Chapter 3: Frozen
The door clicked shut.
Silence. A thick, frozen silence that seemed to swallow the sound whole. Elsa didn’t move. She sat in the center of the bed, the duvet a fortress around her, and stared at the space where Anna had just been standing. Naked. Marked. Terrified.
Her marks.
A violent tremor started in her hands, a fine vibration that travelled up her arms and into her core. The frost on the bedside table thickened, crawling upward with a sound like breaking glass. It coated the water pitcher, the spectacles case she never used, her childhood copy of The Snow Queen. White. Relentless.
“What did we do?” Anna’s voice, broken and small, echoed in the vault of her skull.
Elsa’s breath hitched, coming out in a visible plume. The room temperature was plummeting. She could feel the drop in her teeth, a dull ache. She could feel other things, too. A deep, pleasant soreness in muscles she didn’t consciously know she had. A faint, throbbing memory of pressure and heat. A phantom taste on her tongue—not lavender. Something wild and bright and entirely Anna.
She gagged.
Shoving the covers back, she looked down at her own body. Pale in the grey morning light. The mark on her throat was a brand. But there were others. Faint, bluish fingerprints on the inside of her left thigh. A constellation of tiny, sensitive spots along her collarbone. Evidence. A map of a journey she hadn’t taken.
“No,” she whispered to the empty room. “No, no, no.”
This wasn’t a dream. Dreams didn’t leave physical proof. Dreams didn’t make your sister look at you with that kind of soul-shattering horror. This was something else. A blackout. A possession.
Her magic. Had it…? No. Her magic made ice and snow. It didn’t erase memories. It didn’t orchestrate… this.
She stood up, her legs unsteady. The floor was so cold it burned her feet. She paced, a tight, frantic circle at the foot of the bed, her arms wrapped around herself. Each pass presented the evidence anew: the crumpled sheets, the indented pillows lying side-by-side, the general, undeniable mess of it.
Stop. She commanded herself, squeezing her eyes shut. Think. Logically.
She had gone to bed at eleven. She remembered brushing her hair. Remembered the weight of the day—trade agreements, a minor dispute from the fishing village—lifting as she blew out the candle. She remembered the quiet darkness. Then… nothing. A void. Until she woke up with Anna in her arms, skin on skin, and a feeling of such profound, satiated rightness that it had, for one blissful second, overshadowed the terror.
That feeling was the worst part. The traitorous warmth still pooled in her stomach.
A knock at the door. Three polite taps.
Elsa froze mid-step. “Who is it?” Her voice was too high, strained.
“It’s Gerda, Your Majesty. I’ve brought your morning tea.” The muffled voice was kind, familiar.
Panic, sharp and acidic, flooded her throat. The room was a crime scene. She was standing naked in the middle of it, covered in kisses that weren’t hers. “Just—just a moment!”
She moved like a whirlwind. She snatched her heavy silk robe from the back of a chair, pulling it on and yanking the belt tight. She grabbed the twisted sheets, hauling them up to roughly cover the pillows, trying to erase the shape of two bodies. She saw a single, long strand of red hair coiled on the white linen. Her heart stopped. She plucked it, holding it for a second before shoving it deep into the pocket of her robe.
The frost. She couldn’t hide the frost. It was everywhere now, a glittering confession on every surface.
“Come in,” she called, her back to the door, pretending to look out the ice-veiled window.
The door opened. Gerda’s soft footsteps entered, then halted. Elsa heard the faint, sharp intake of breath. The clink of the tea tray being set down on the frozen dresser.
“Your Majesty… the cold,” Gerda murmured, concern outweighing protocol.
“I had a restless night,” Elsa said, the lie smooth and brittle as an eggshell. “My control was… less than perfect.” She forced herself to turn around, offering a small, tight smile.
Gerda’s wise old eyes swept the room. They took in the frenzied frost, the hastily made bed, Elsa’s rigid posture. They lingered, just for a fraction of a second, on the visible edge of the bruise on Elsa’s neck, peeking above her robe. A thousand questions hung in the air, unasked. Gerda had helped raise them. She remembered the closed doors, the isolation.
“Shall I have a fire laid?” was all Gerda asked.
“No. Thank you. The cold is… clarifying.” Elsa’s fingers twisted together behind her back. “Was my sister seen this morning?”
“I believe Princess Anna returned to her chambers very early. She told the hall guard she couldn’t sleep and had gone for a walk.” Gerda’s tone was neutral. Too neutral. “She has asked for a bath to be drawn.”
Anna was covering their tracks. The thought should have been a relief. It just made it all more real, more conspiratorial.
“I see,” Elsa said. “Thank you, Gerda. That will be all.”
Gerda bowed, her glance flickering once more to the frozen room. “Majesty.” She withdrew, closing the door with a soft, final click.
Alone again, the performance collapsed. Elsa’s shoulders sagged. She walked to the full-length mirror that stood in the corner, its frame now laced with icy vines.
The woman who looked back was a stranger. Hair like a blizzard. Eyes wide and frightened. A queen’s robe hiding a body that felt suddenly, terrifyingly unfamiliar. She leaned closer, tracing the bruise on her neck with a shaking finger. The skin was tender. A flash, then—not a memory, but a sensation: sharp pleasure-pain, a hot mouth, a breathless laugh that was Anna’s and yet wasn’t.
She jerked her hand away as if burned.
What are we?
The question wasn’t about the act. It was deeper, more fundamental. Something was inside her. Something that moved her body while she slept. Something that wanted her sister in ways that turned her waking stomach and set her veins on fire with shame.
And it had left a message. Written on their skin. In the ruined bed. In the silent, understanding horror in Anna’s eyes.
It was waiting for them to go to sleep again.
Elsa met her own reflection’s gaze. The fear was still there, icy and clear. But beneath it, something harder was crystallizing. A grim, cold determination.
This wasn’t a mistake. It was an invasion.
And she would find out what, or who, was responsible. Even if the trail led her straight back into the dark of her own mind.