Fire and Ice
A Frozen Fan Fiction

By: Sleeper 3173

Chapter One:
Oaths Given

Queen Elsa was bored.

There was no other word for it. It had only been a few days since the end of the "Eternal Winter." At first she had been afraid (and almost lost her new-found control of her powers) that her people would share the same feelings that the Duke of Weselton had of her: that she was a monster.

However, thanks to the efforts of her sister Anna and their cousin Rapunzel (after being reluctantly told the truth) in telling as many people as they could what was really happening all those years the castle gates were closed. As a result, the people blessedly decided to lay aside their doubts and wait to see if she could prove herself on her own merit.

It still didn't change the fact that she was bored.

She had never realized just how much of her fears of her powers had occupied her mind. Now that she didn't have to worry about that anymore, the work hat she had been unofficially doing since her father died just seemed like... well, work. Especially since it was work she made for herself. She was going over a list of trade commodities that had come through Weselton, commodities that now needed to be gotten elsewhere.

As she read, she idly floated a marble sized snowball between the fingers of her left hand, a smile on the corner of her lips at the joy of not having to hide anymore. She stopped and looked up as the sound of laughter drifted up from the courtyard below.

Just as Anna had been trying to make up for lost time with her by spending as much time as she could with her, so to did Anna seem to want to make up for all the time lost in the world. Right now, she was doing that by playing with the local children in the courtyard.

Setting aside her papers, Elsa stood up and walked over to the window. A dozen children were in the courtyard, all of them chasing a laughing Anna. She stood and admired her sister's dexterity as she flipped, spun, and jumped out of the reach of delighted children. It was only till the pack of children split up were they able to corner Anna and dog pile her. Several shrieks of laughter later, and Anna was able to pull herself free and waved goodbye to the children who chased each other back to town. Elsa smiled, as she knew where Anna was going next. Sure enough, a couple of minutes later, a flushed and sweaty Anna burst into the room, giggling.

"Did you have fun?" Elsa asked her sister innocently. Anna laughed and darted forward to grab Elsa's hands and twirled both of them around.

"Oh Elsa!" she exclaimed. "Why couldn't we have always lived like this?" Instantly she stopped twirling them and the light faded from her eyes. "I mean... umm... I didn't... I'll shut up now."

Elsa's face softened and she cupped Anna's cheek in her hand.

"Its ok Anna." she said softly. "I really mean it. I know we both love and miss Mom and Dad, but with hindsight, I don't think their solutions to what was happening was the right way to go. Especially the part about separating us. Yes, you would have been in danger, and you still would have fought before I let you back in, but I am convinced that together we would have discovered the secret to controlling my powers years ago. So if there must be an answer to your question, then it would be that Dad was just as scared as I was and let that fear guide his actions. Don't worry, I already promised, I am never shutting you out again, no matter the price."

Anna's lip quivered as she looked up at her sister. After so long of being shut out by her sister (even though she knew now that it wasn't entirely Elsa's choice), that to be suddenly on the receiving end of all her love and attention was like a dream come true. She suddenly flung herself forward and wrapped her arms around her sister.

"I love you Elsa." she said softly, hugging her tightly.

"I love you too Anna."Elsa answered, a small smile on her face as she hugged back. After a minute the sister's separated, and Elsa swatted Anna on the arm. "Now go on, go get cleaned up, dinner will be ready soon."

"Ok!" Anna exclaimed, and after one last brief hug around Elsa's waist darted off.

Elsa watched her sister leave, and once she was well out of hearing, cursed their father bitterly. She had missed so much, things that could never be regained. She wandered how long she would have been confined to her room if her father was still alive. Till she was 25? 30? Even longer? She knew her mother hadn't approved, she had seen it in her eyes.

She sighed.

There was little point in dwelling to much on the past. She blinked and realized a layer of frost was building up on the portrait of her father at his coronation. Closing her eyes, she focused on Anna and willed the ice away.

The past belonged in the past, and it was time to let it go. She smirked at the irony that the same feelings she had after exiling herself to a life of loneliness were what she had now that she and Anna were reconnected.

"Excuse me, Your Majesty?" a timid female voice interrupted her thoughts, Elsa hadn't realized how long she had been lost in thought and looked up to see Emilie, her new personal maid.

"Yes?" Elsa replied, clasping her hands in front of her.

"Dinner will be served shortly." her maid answered. "Will you be changing?"

Elsa looked down at her dress, thinking. While she would have loved to have worn her ice gown all the time, but Kai and Gerda had convinced her that wearing traditional dresses and gowns with ice embelishments on them. They had helpfully pointed out that she didn't have to worry about her clothes literally melting off her for some reason.

"No." she answered at last. "I don't think I will Emi. I think it will be just me and Anna eating together tonight, so there is no need." Emi curtsied.

"Of course Your Majesty." she said with a timid smile. "I will see you in the dining room shortly then." Elsa nodded, and watched her maid retreat from the room. Walking back to her desk, she looked down at the pile of abandoned trade documents before deciding to try and finish it later, or outright put it off till tomorrow.

She had been telling the truth to Anna. Nothing mattered to her more then her sister's happiness. Not her kingdom, not herself, nothing, And if Anna's happiness required her to spend her every moment awake with her, so be it. She owed it to her. Elsa smiled. Luckily that wasn't the case. Creating a short cloak for herself, Elsa left her study for the dining room.

~FIRE AND ICE~

It was a mild surprise that Anna was sitting at the table in the dining room before Elsa even got there. Ever since the two sisters had reconnected, Anna had always skidded into the dining room five minutes late.

"Well this is a surprise." Elsa remarked in a light voice as she sat down and waited for the waiter to serve the food. She looked at Anna and noticed she was still flushed and had a faint sheen of sweat on her forehead.

"Anna!" Elsa admonished. "I thought I said to go clean up. Why are you still sweaty?"

"Sorry Elsa." Anna said sheepishly. "I was trying to hurry, so I got the fire to hot when I was heating the water. Don't worry, I'll cool down... again... in a few minutes." Elsa smirked and sent a blast of icy wind at her sister, who sighed in relief and her flush faded.

"Thank you... ooo! Carrots!"

Elsa laughed at her sister's exuberance, and the two of them got started eating, making small talk. It wasn't until the pudding (chocolate of course) that she noticed that Anna's flush was back. A sliver of worry edged into her heart.

"Are you sure your ok?" Elsa asked,

"Yeah." Anna said with what she could tell was faked and forced. "I think I wore myself out playing with those children. Been awhile since I played like that for that long. I think I will be going to bed soon."

Elsa blinked in surprise, then nodded.

"Of course." she said. "I told you before that you should take it easy after... after what happened." Anna looked down at the table, running her hand through her hair where her white streak used to be.

"I... I can't Elsa." she finally admitted. "You know I am not scared of you or your powers... its just that when I was freezing to death, I trusted my fate to my naive feelings and beliefs, probably from being unable to leave a giant castle for most of my life. I'm not... I'm not dumb enough to not realise what my fate will be. I am going to do something stupid again and die a long time before you will Elsa, and I just want to experience as much of life as I can before then."

With a loud thud, Elsa's chair fell over backwards as she hurled herself out of it and wrapped her arms around her sister.

"Anna!" Elsa cried out, tears threatening to spill down her cheeks. "Don't you ever say something like that again! I swear that as long as I live I will never let anything like that happen to you. I-I'd do anything. I want us to grow old, grey, and ugly together." Anna chuckled softly as she sank into her sister's embrace, struggling not to cry herself.

"You'll never be old and ugly, Elsa. You are going to die as beautiful as you are now." Elsa pulled back to look into Anna's eyes.

"That will be the day you die. I've already spent 13 years without you. I refuse to spend a single day more of my life without you." Anna looked up at her and a single tear coursed down her face as what Elsa's words sank in. She chuckled weakly.

"I guess I've already proven that I already feel the same." Elsa smiled and kissed her forehead.

"Yes you have. Now let us have no more talk of you dying young, ok?" Anna nodded.

"I promise." She giggled weakly. "Still think I am going to go to bed early." Elsa nodded.

"Ok then. I will see you in the morning."

Anna nodded and slowly left the room. Elsa watched her leave before biting her lip and looking down. She knew she loved her sister very much, but her promise came as a surprise even to her. What surprised her even more was that she meant every word of it. A hand suddenly touching her shoulder made her jump and break her train of thought.

"Your Majesty?" her maid Emi said cautiously. "M-may I speak openingly?" Elsa turned her head and looked at her maid for a few seconds then nodded.

"I won't tell anyone what you said." Emi said quickly. "It might make keeping your oath difficult if others were to know." Elsa nodded her head in thanks before Emi continued.

"I can understand what you are feeling. I had an older sister... she died a week before your wi-... er... coronation. I would have followed her into the shades, since I was now all alone, except she made me promise to wait a year to see what would happen."

"What do you mean?" asked Elsa with a confused frown. Emi smiled brightly.

"Our mother was your mother's personal maid before the gates closed. It was my dream to follow along her path, but that depended on whether or not you would follow your father and keep the castle gates closed."

"So that is why Gerda was so eager to hire you." Elsa said with a small smile.

"Yes Your Majesty. She knew that my mother taught me everything she knew. I hope I have fulfilled all of your expectations." Elsa's smile widened.

"Yes you have. I have been very pleased with you."

"Thank you Your Majesty. Would you like me to prepare a bath for you?" Elsa thought for a moment then nodded.

"Yes please... a warm one this time." Emi smiled brightly and curtsied again, knowing how rarely the queen took anything but an ice cold bath, before hurrying off to fulfill her queen's request. Elsa smirked slightly and followed at a much more demure pace.

~FIRE AND ICE~

Elsa sighed in contentment as she sank chin deep into the water, a light cloud of steam rising from the surface. She would never even tell Anna this, but she had always enjoyed a warm bath. For some reason, the warmth gave her the feeling it was plugging a hole in her heart that she didn't know she had. However, she couldn't have that many, as her powers would sometimes react violently with the warm water, or even cool water for that matter. She blushed when she remembered the one time the bath water froze solid. It had taken her mother and Gerda two hours to chip her out of the ice block. But now that she has control of her powers... she closed her eyes and let the mysterious hole be filled.

She knew not how long she had been there, but when she jerked herself awake, the water had grown cold and the candles in the room had burned low in their holders. Rising out of the tub, she dried off then created a robe she put on and tied around her waist.

Stepping out of the bathroom, she walked the 20 steps to her room, reminding herself yet again to have the paint on her door to be stripped off. She had outright refused to move into what she still considered her parent's room, but every time she saw her door, she remembered all the times Anna stood by it, begging for her to come out. Speaking of...

She walked in, and smiled at the sight of Anna curled up in her sitting chair. Already her hair was falling free and a lock was in danger of falling into her mouth.

"Come on Anna." she called out to her sister as she walked over to her wardrobe to pick out a set of sleep ware. "You know you can't sleep there. Your back will be sore in the morning." She selected a night dress and stepped behind the changing screen and put it on after dissolving the robe she had created. When she stepped back out, Anna was still curled up in the chair.

"Anna..." Elsa said, a touch of exasperation entering her voice. "Didn't you hear me? You need to go to your bed." Anna didn't acknowledge her or even move. Elsa frowned and started moving towards her.

"Anna?"

She reached her side and bent down to shake her awake, but recoiled in shock. Anna's skin was burning with fever and she was moaning softly in discomfort.

"ANNA!" she shouted in panic, instantly coating her sister in a blanket of snow. "Please! Someone help me!"

~FIRE AND ICE~

The royal doctor had never seen anything like it.

Since Anna had rarely gotten sick (and Elsa had never gotten sick at all), he had no prior experience on what to expect from her. Despite their desire to keep things secret, they were forced to summon a more learned travelling doctor from a neighbouring kingdom. Instantly, the news spread that Princess Anna was deathly ill with a fever that not even Queen Elsa's powers could completely cool, and she rarely left her younger sister's side. The few times she did, it was to hurriedly rush through the market looking for herbs that might be used to help her sister.

Several people noticed that Elsa now carried a dagger on her hip, something her mother never did. Some argued it was the result of a hard learned lesson from dealing with Prince Hans. Others guessed that due to its celtic design, it was a gift from the Kingdom of DunBroch (it was actually a gift from the then Princess Merida to her great-great-great-great grandfather), while yet others thought it was merely a fashion statement. Only her maid Emi knew the real reason why she carried it, and like the rest of the kingdom, fear gripped her heart at what Princess Anna's, and Elsa's, possible fate might be.

The day's crawled by, and Anna's fever refused to break, and it was only due to Elsa's efforts that it hadn't taken her. Most had given up hope on her recovery, indeed, the local carpenter had built a beautiful casket, while the stonemason had carved out a headstone (date to be added later of course) in the same style as her parent's. Even the faithful Kai and Gerda considered it a matter of when, not if.

Elsa hadn't left Anna's side for almost two days, making sure that the cocoon of ice and snow around Anna didn't thin at all. For the first time in her life, she felt heavy bags under her eyes from the lack of sleep. Yet despite her efforts, Anna's fever was slowly rising, well past the 110 degree limit of the doctor's thermometer. He has already given up, and just waited for the end. Elsa could not be convinced of the same thing though.

The minutes creeped by slowly as Elsa struggled to keep her eyes open. Her vision flickered a few times then she lost the fight and her head slumped forward as sleep claimed her. Unnoticed, Anna's icy cocoon started to melt rapidly.

Dawn was breaking when it happened.

A loud scream of terror jerked Elsa awake and she looked around quickly. A large cloud of steam was billowing around Anna's bed and Elsa's heart skipped a beat.

"Anna!" She called out loudly.

"Elsa!" Anna called back, panic and terror clear in her voice. "Help me!"

"Hold on Anna!" Elsa created an icicle and used it to shatter the widow, and then blew the steam away and out with a blast of icy wind. Turning to face Anna's bed, she froze in shock.

Anna was sitting up in bed, her skin finally having lost its flushed look, but with tears of terror running down her face. All this was lost on Elsa, as she was staring at Anna's hands which she was holding away from her body.

"Elsa..." Anna's voice was quivering. "Help..."

In each of Anna's hands was a ball of fire.

A/N: For those of you who followed me over from "Birds of a Feather," have no fear, that story is neither abandoned or put on hold. I just had to write this before I could do anything else with that. To everyone else, welcome!

A few days ago, I went to see the movie Frozen, and as soon as the credits rolled, the idea for how I would write the sequel popped into my head. The problem is, that idea wouldn't stop bouncing around my head like the plot bunny that it was. My fellow writers will understand what I am speaking of. And so, on Tuesday night, I started writing.

Now, I know where I want this story to go, what characters I want, and even good chunks of the dialogue. However, I am not sure I am going to write anymore. That will depend all on you, the readers. Leave reviews, either positive or negative, letting me know if you want me to keep writing.

If I do keep writing, I will need you to tell me if you want music in the story like there is in the movie (as well as someone to write said songs, I can't do that at all), as well as a book cover (If you have the talent of drawing and want to donate our services message me) so that the whole thing will look pretty.

So please, leave a review and let me know what you think. See you all later!