Ice of Maxixe

Chapter 1: Enter Frost

On a cold March evening, an Italian valley in the Province of Belluno has its young children prepping for bed. Grey clouds gliding across the black sky are outlined by a radiant full moon. The light from the circular grandeur elicit a mystifying sense of bliss in those who look upon its beauty; most particularly, the children who are ready to fall asleep. In one house, from a window, a young girl kneels on top of her bed and stares at the moon and stars around it. She clasps her hands together and whispers with hopeful optimism,

"Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight. I wish it will snow tomorrow day."

With that, she tucks herself under her blankets with a cheerful smile.

After closing her eyes, she misses a shadowy figure flying across the moon with a trail of snowflakes left behind.

The following morning, the door opens and a younger boy runs right into the room. He leaps onto the girl's bed and shouts enthusiastically.

"Wake up! Wake up! It's snowing, Mia! It's snowing!" The boy shakes the girl.

The girl sluggishly sits up while yawning and stretching her arms. The boy faces the window and puts his hands onto the glass to feel the cold fern-like patterns of ice adhering outside of it.

"Look! Look!"

The girl turns around as her fingers rub her eyes to clear the stickiness. She focuses out of the window and grins widely. The city of Feltre's landscape is covered with a sheet of gorgeous white snow. Both children immediately jump off the bed, scram towards their drawers and dress into their warm garments, then dash out of the house with loquacious cheer. Small delicate snowflakes fall onto their faces when they look up and spin in circles. Feet digging under and taking out of the icy layers feel pleasant by the cold presence. Their laughter is joined by other neighboring children prancing all over the snow-covered road. Some of them are building snowmen, and some are making snow angels. As for the girl, a pack of snow hits against the back of her head. She turns and sees her little brother giggling. To reply, she smirks and kicks some of the snow off the ground to him, causing the boy to laugh even more. The two start throwing snowballs at each other, until one of them unintentionally hits another child. Then, that child enters the game by tossing snowballs to whoever is around him. After rousing up everybody nearby, all the children in the neighborhood are participating in a play-fight that started with two. However, the fun does not last for long. Parents begin calling their children to return inside and letting them know that breakfast is set. Most of the younglings leave, but the girl and the boy, who first initiated the snowball fight, are not called just yet.

"Celio, let's build a snowman!" The girl proposes.

"Okay!" The boy merrily agrees.

They craft themselves three sizes of snowballs; a large one for the lower body, a medium for the middle, and a small one for the head. The boy picks up small pebbles of stone and uses them to make the eyes and mouth. The girl takes scattered sticks and sorts them to create the arms and hair. After completing their creation, they stand back to observe it. The snowman is rather poorly made. The snowballs are not round enough. The pebbles are a bit disproportionate and misplaced. The sticks do not stay in the middle snowball and slide right off. Much to their disappointment, they still chuckle at their failure.

"Ooh, ooh! We need a carrot nose." The boy reminds.

"Yeah, but not until we make him look right." The girl said.

The door to their house opens and an Italian woman's accent catches their attention,

"Mia! Celio! Come in, it's time for colazione."

"Coming, mama!" The girl waves, "Let's eat first, then get the carrot after."

"Okay." The boy nods and runs to his mother, "Mama! It's snowing a whole lot!"

"Yes, it has." The mother kisses his forehead, "Did you have fun?"

"Yeah, yeah! Everybody was throwing snowballs, and...and…snowballs went everywhere and go 'whoosh' and 'bloo-sh'!" The boy swings his hands back and forth.

"That's good, sweetie." The mother helps remove his jacket and scarf, "Mia, did you have fun?"

The girl comes in and gets her jacket off by herself,

"Mm-hmm." She nods.

"Well, I made you two Mama's special cornettos." The mother hangs both of their jackets on a pole coat hanger, "Let's eat up and get ready for school."

The boy happily goes to the kitchen to taste the delicious homemade cooking.

"Mama, guess what?" The girl takes her beanie off.

"What, sweetheart?" The mother leans down.

"Last night, I made a wish to the moon. I wished for it to snow, and I went to sleep. I wake up and it's snowing!" The girl eagerly tells her.

"Did you really?" The mother shares her daughter's excitement, "Jack Frost must've heard you."

"…Who?" The name is unfamiliar to her.

"He's a spirito who brings the cold and snow to the world." The mother explains, "When you see snow, it means Jack Frost has passed by. He is very sneaky, and is always happy when everyone is happy. So, as long as you are happy, Jack Frost is happy."

"…" The girl is fascinated by the new story.

"Mama!" The boy calls from the kitchen table.

"Coming!" The mother paces to him and reminds the girl, "Mia, make sure you lock the door."

"Okay."

As the girl turns to close the door, she sees something spectacular. The snowman she and her brother built is now fixed entirely. The snowballs are all round, the neatly placed pebbles show happy eyes and a smile, and the sticks are firmly back in.

Also, somehow…there is a carrot nose already on the snowman's face.

It looks perfect.

While in awe, the girl feels a cold sting on the tip of her nose. She rubs it and unconsciously looks up into the grey sky. From there, another marvel enlightens her.

Right above her house, there appears to be a man floating in mid-air. He is holding a long staff with a G-shaped tip, and is wearing a blue sweater with brown trousers. The falling snow is encircling around his pale skin, and the frosty wind blows from beneath him, breezing through the whitely colored hair.

Striking blue eyes watch the girl like a mythical being over a mere mortal.

Before she could even grasp the flash of a beaming smile on his face, the wind strengthens and carries the enigma into the clouds.

A streak of snowflakes streams, he disappears.

The girl is evoked as a small feathery shine scintillate in front of her. It is a hexagonal-shaped snowflake with brims that reminiscences of crowns.

And from that point on, the girl knows it was him and believed.

Jack Frost flies over South Tyrol and the Dolomites with a reinforced zeal. Feeling accomplished in what he did, he swirls himself in and out of the clouds with a jovial laugh. To be believed in feels so vigorous to his nature. Ever since he swore in his Oath of Guardianship, his purpose has become much clearer. Sure the duty takes away some degree of freedom, but he is the Guardian of Fun; there is no occasion when he can be bored. If he does, then he'll just come up with something that might at first seem precarious, and that gets him into plenty of trouble. Needing to land, Jack discovers he is now above the Ötztal Alps mountain range. With a swish of his staff, he descends downwards and slides his bare feet into the snow on top of Hintere Schwärze. After coming to a complete stop, he breathes out a chuckle and relishes the view he is seeing: an entire land of snow.

"That was fun." Jack plants his staff into the snow, like a gesture of conquest with a flag.

He digs into his sweater pocket and pulls out a freshly orange carrot. The tip is gnawed by minty teeth and shredded inside of Jack's mouth.

"Hmm…not bad." Jack chews.

Also from his pocket, he takes out a parchment piece that has written words of locations on it.

"All right, let's see…Italy is done…" Jack mentally checks it, "Good to switch up snow days every year…Although, I can't really remember that all the time. Oh well, makes it even more fun. Yeah, this looks good. I guess I'll stop from here."

Jack puts back the parchment and unfinished carrot in his pocket.

"Now…what to do…? Oh yeah, speaking of which, I gotta pay a visit to Father Claus. Have to warn him of a future snowstorm during his trip around the world." Jack snickers.

He yanks out the staff and glances at the view once more.

"Man, it is super FREEZING up here." Jack smirks, "I feel great!"

He then yells, "Hey, wind! Let's go to the North Pole!"

His echo bounces across the landscape while a sudden burst of wind sweeps him off his feet. Jack climbs high into the sky and gracefully soars over a great amount of distance.

As Germany passes under him, he notices Norway.

"Whoa, whoa!" Jack halts and drifts around while spotting an interesting thing, "That looks new…"

Deciding to stray away from his destination, he chooses to travel to an area he doesn't remember being to, if not once at all.

This location is near a mountain range and next to a river. Village homes spread throughout a green forest. And the most curious thing of all, there appears to be a castle built right in the river's water. Jack gets his feet back on the ground and scans his surroundings. He is in the village. Homes and shops are all closed or demolished. Emptiness and eeriness are all he can see and hear. Clearly, this area is deserted a long time ago. Jack attempts to search for clues to know the name of this unknown part of Norway. In a brief second, he finds his answer. A wooden post with a sign labeled with a word stands in the center of the village. He goes up to it and reads the dusty chippings. Unfortunately, the word is not in English, but rather in Runic. Fortunately, Jack Frost does have knowledge of reading it, albeit taking a longer time to translate. Slowly, he reads…

"A…ren…delle. Aren…delle." Jack tilts back, "Arendelle. This is definitely someplace I never went to before."

Suddenly, he hears distant voices; masculine voices that sound to be close. Jack glides up and checks for movement. He perceives two men approaching the bridge leading to the castle. Their outfits bear resemblances to explorers, carrying travelers' backpacks, and pairs of binoculars. From their accents, Jack guesses they are of British origin. The invisible Winter Spirit eavesdrops on the men's conversation as they step onto the white stone bridge.

"Ah, there it is, lad." A man with a fully grown beard puts his hands on his waist, "The old castle I told ya about."

"Blimey, she still standing, ain't she?" A younger man makes a record in a logbook from his pocket.

"Of course, ya twit. This beaut is only two-hundred years young. Now the castle in York, aye, that's old."

"Don't suppose nobody's been here for a while, eh?"

"Oh, yes. Some nasty plaguing disease scurry itself around these lands. The whole village is right yonder the river, see? Every mother and child all scamper away from here ages ago."

"You reckon the posh left too?" The younger man refers to the royalty.

"Quite. Must've been a real shamble to everyone, even to the riches." The older man strokes his beard, "Right, we had our look. We should head about."

"Yeah…" The younger man finishes up a sentence in his logbook.

Before the older man walks away, he spontaneously has an epiphany. His heart seems lighter. His mind seems at peace. His senses change radically. He strangely smiles and chortles.

"You know what, James?" The older man calls to his partner.

"…?" The younger man, James, concludes his written sentence.

"I think we should have a gander in it" The older man starts going across the bridge.

"Eh? You mean, go inside? Are you barking mad, Roberts?" James scuttles up next to him.

"What? What's the problem? We're only having a look."

"Problem? You're going off your trolley again, mate. We can't willy-nilly wally right into a castle after what you just said about a…a disease! Or didn't you notice?"

"Put a lid on that. That was almost a century ago! Ain't no whiff of sickness here. Just give it a shot and have a bottle, lad." The older man, Roberts, laughs.

"This is very odd about you; you say this, then you say that, and then you change your mind. Never figured you'd be barmy enough to come all the way here in the first place." James reluctantly follows.

As for the mischievous ghost with the impeccable set of dentures, he sneers while watching his influence in a form of blue sparkles glistening in front of the older man's eyes, "Oh, he's probably not. But why should that stop him from having an adventure?"

Jack figured since these fellows might know a bit about this place, he should get them to share their knowledge with each other and he would listen. The two adventurers and the invisible wanderer cross over the bridge to the front gates. Jack is astonished at the vast amount of climber plants and wall shrubs clinging to the entire structure line of the castle. He catches shields with a crest symbol beneath blankets of leaves on the corner towers, but does not pay any mind. Arriving at the gate, it is visibly shut tight. The chains and machineries to pull it open are in all probability rusted and broken. Roberts steps directly in front of it and assays to push it down.

"Roberts, you old fool. What are you doing?" James criticizes.

"Well what does it look like, ya toshpot?" Roberts continues to push it in different positions, "Trying to get the gate open."

Jack Frost hops up and over the curtain wall, "Not a problem for me."

"Yeah, that's simple thinking, ain't it?" James relieves his frustration of his partner by being sarcastic, "Have you tried knocking first? Seeing how the people who left this place might've locked up and don't want any stranger a hundred years later to be gallivanting around here, eh?"

"Agh, ya blinkered dimwit. Didn't ya know that the second Queen of this castle declared to never shut the gate? Now, why don't ya stop your whinges and do the honors ya'self?" Roberts steps aside.

"I certainly will, you daft gormless git." James steps forward, "And I never heard of such Queen not closing the gate to her own castle. That's plain foolish."

He grips a fist and hits against the wood five times. On the other side, Jack goes over to the chains that connect the gate to the gears. They are indeed corroded and immobile. He whiffs his staff around and freezes a part of the chains.

"Greetings, er…unlikely inhabitants of this castle!" James yells his salutations, "I am James and accompanying with me, is my friend, Roberts! We are travelers of sorts! And my idiot companion here, wishes to enter your grounds without your permission! I have done my protest and decided to ask you myself! Will you welcome us and share your delightful-!"

Jack taps on the frozen part of the chains, and it promptly breaks. The gate wobbles as it has no counterweight. It falls backwards and shatters when it slams on the ground. James's and Roberts's faces are plastered with bewilderedness.

"Good Lord, James, you just broke through the door!" Roberts laughs.

"Brilliant." James places his hand on his head, "Now what we need is a welcome mat and an apology note."

Jack prides himself and stands in front of them when they enter the lower bailey, "Ha ha, see? I can handle it. Pff…ha! Get it? Because I was the one who opened the door?"

The travelers walk right through the Spirit.

"No? Okay. You know, it would be funny if you actually heard me saying it." Jack follows them into the courtyard.

Their feet traipse upon tiles engulfed by weeds and grass. Old marble fountains entirely busted into pieces of rocks. Jack feels a strange buzz beneath his toes. He brushes it off as if it was nothing. The travelers head to the Great Hall entrance. The doors were already wrecked, so there's no need to knock again.

"Blimey, this hall is quite the giant, ain't it? Reckon it could hold the whole village." James admires.

"Aye, and every royal coronation held a party right in here." Roberts observes the workings of the ceiling.

They continue up to the door on the other end of the hall, this time closed but unlocked. The hallways are found. Grungy pictures hang across the walls. Bemired windows filter in small rays of sunlight and reveal dust particles drifting everywhere. Cobwebs loosely sticking in every corner, rats scudding to their holes, the place is a total mess.

"Looks like we've been invited a tad late." James cynically comments.

"Keep ya eyes open, lad. Who knows what we'll find?" Roberts treads cautiously.

"Aside from hazardous dirt and pests, I don't think we'll find much."

Jack skips down the hall untroubled. At the end, he sees stairs leading up to the second floor. There are also three displaying knight armors lined up right before the first step up. He guffaws at how one of the armor suits is missing its arm. Roberts is taking his time gaping at the wonderful portraits, despite them being almost deteriorated. One of them seizes his attention more than the others.

"'Oi, James. Have a lookie here."

James stands next to him and stares at the same portrait, "Ah, the first King and Queen, I presume?"

"Ya presumption is right, mate."

Feeling more eager to go upstairs, Jack calls the other two. "Hey, I found some stairs!"

"…"

"(Sigh). Being invisible is so inconvenient." Jack wobbles his head in a circle.

He taps his staff to the floor three times. Both of the travelers' bodies jolt in shock. They look down the hall, not knowing what made that sound.

"What was that?" James sweats.

"Might be more of them rodents." Roberts assumes, "Come on."

Jack got them to keep moving. His curiosity overcomes his patience, and he goes up the stairs without them. James is distracted by something, and stops. He bends over and picks up a small pearl-like object.

"Oh-ho! It's an eighteenth century earring drop. My quest of discovery shows progress."

"'Suppose it might be. A good little relic, that is." Roberts puts his glasses on to study its features.

James then slides the object into his pocket.

"'Oi, are ya nicking that?"

"I ain't nicking it. I'm…restocking for me wallet." James straightens his shirt.

Another object preoccupies him from going down the hallway. A different portrait on the wall pulls James in to absorb its details. In spite of its degrading condition, the picture is clear enough for him to be gawking at it.

"Whoa. Roberts…who is this?"

Roberts smirks at James's wonderment, "That, lad…is the second Queen."

"Blimey, she's a fine lass, isn't she?"

"Aye…"

Upstairs, Jack arrives in another hallway. He does not know that the other two are still lingering behind. Only this time, it looks to be the living quarters. Showing no interest in bedrooms, he exhales through his nose and decides to return downstairs.

Unexpectedly, a buzz feeling occurs under his toes again.

Jack looks under his feet to see the cause, but nothing is there.

Then, the weird sensation arises on his neck. Like someone poking him, he turns around to face a different direction.

The first room on the right in the hallway is making Jack detect a perturbed ambience.

With his staff held in a defensive position, he moves towards the closed room.

The sensation is growing and tingling all over his skin. Jack rams his staff's arch tip and forces the doors to open.

Expecting bats to fly out or some sort of mystery to be solved, there are no such things that Jack thought to see. The room is essentially empty. The window's glass is fragmented and all that is really left are the climber plants invading from the outside. Not even a piece of furniture is anywhere.

"Huh. Well, that's bizarre." Jack rubs his neck to ease the tingling.

Yet, the troubling atmosphere Jack senses is still around. He holds his hand out and discerns a new type of stimulus. His fingertips and the tip of his nose are stinging. The back of the neck and its miniscule hairs are being pinched at. Jack is familiar with this experience. It is what he's been feeling for the last three-hundred years.

It is ice magic.

"Have I really…NOT been here before?" Jack questions himself.

"By golly!" A voice startles the Winter Spirit from behind.

It is James.

Roberts trails behind him.

"This was the royal bed chamber, eh?" James analyzes the room, "Doesn't look so comfy."

Roberts notices a picture dangling on the wall to the left, "Is that what I think it is?"

Jack checks with them to see what the picture is.

It is a drawing; a depiction of a castle-like structure next to a mountain top.

"Ah, it is." Roberts confirms.

"…The ice castle in the mountains."

"…!" Jack's eyes widen in surprise, "An ice castle?"

"You know much about it, mate?" James asks.

"I only heard rumors of it." Roberts squint, "Ain't believing any one of 'em."

"Same here." James nods, "Did you hear the one about the treasure, though?"

"Aye, I hear. Again, I ain't believing there is one. Folks told tales about secret magic locked away up so high where no man can reach. Also said that to be so, cuz a monster guards its gates for the rest of time."

"What kind of magic that needs guarding like that?"

"Don't know." Roberts shrugs, "Must've been something special."

"…" Jack's extensive inquisitiveness takes hold of him again.

"But who would be kidding? Ya think, if a castle that size is up a mountain, someone woulda seen it by now." Roberts takes his glasses off.

"Hasn't anyone gone up there to find it?" James wonders.

"No way, lad. The snow and weather up there are pretty heavy. Ain't no one gone up and come back down alive." Roberts explains.

"Hmm…I guess this is when I come along." Jack tempts his instincts to develop a reckless idea.

He hops onto the broken window's ledge and says, "Thanks for the tour, boys. It was fun."

Leaping out, he enters flight and ascends skyward.

Subsequently, for going out of range, the blue sparkles in Roberts's eyes fade.

"'Oi, where are we?" The pitch in his voice lowers and he frowns.

"Eh?" James notes the shift in attitude, "You mean the royal bed chamber?"

"Royal bed chamber…? As in, a castle's royal bed chamber…?"

"Uh, yeah? Did you just notice NOW?"

"What in the devil's blazes are we doing in the castle?" Roberts shouts, "We're not supposed to be in here!"

"What are you talking about?" James is befuddled by what he is saying.

"Where's the exit? We're getting out of here!" Roberts pushes James from behind out of the door.

"You…You just you wanted to look around in the castle! This was your idea!"

"Don't be stupid! We don't know if we could still catch the disease!"

"Wh-?"

The incorrigible fun-seeker views the adjacent mountain ranges from above. He gives his best effort to locate this "ice castle in the mountains" thing. But just like what Roberts said, if Jack could spot it from where he is, then he would not be the first one to do it. So, Jack has to change his altitude and get closer. One of the mountain tops is completely shrouded by dark grey clouds. This shows that the weather inside must be very perilous; for humans, perhaps. But for immortal spirits…? Never. Jack designates to that mountain and rockets inside the grey clouds daringly.

Instantaneous negative temperature, enervating low-pressure atmosphere, high-speed glacial wind velocity, frostbite-inducing snowstorms, Jack Frost fails to see anything dangerous.

Better yet, he feels just at home.

"Wow! This place is much better than that old castle." Jack burrows his feet into the snow, "I should ask the other Guardians to come here for a vacation."

Now although the devastating climate does not harm him, his vision is limited due to the amount of snow escalating upwards.

"Okay, let's calm this place down." Jack spins his staff around his head.

With his magic, the wind ceases. The snow around the mountain stops in mid-air, and each flake drops down. Piles of snow dump on top of Jack, and burying him up to almost three inches above his head. Managing to writhe himself within it, his head pops out with a smile.

"That wasn't so bad." Jack wriggles his entire body and escapes from his lovely comfortable interment, "Now, on to find that ice castle."

A/N: Thanks for reading! Please leave a review and tell me what you think about this premise.

The Jack Frost and Elsa crossover pairing has been taking control of me for a very long time. The idea is killing me and I have to get it out to the world! I had to brainstorm a good storyline that really cultivates and fits them together. I just like to get off my chest about my inspirations for this story.

Four pictures from the website Deviantart:
1) "You can't hurt me, little lady" by ahoguu
2) "If I Can Believe" by crimson-firelight
3) "Breaking the Rules" by Ravinesque
4) "My Imaginary Friend and Me" by Kiyomi-chan16

Please check them out, and be fan-gasmed!

I know my opinion for the name of the crossover pairing is irrelevant, but whatever. I prefer "ElFrost" over "Jelsa", just saying.

Anyway, thank you for reading this chapter! Don't forget to review. I hope you will stick along for this adventure.

Credits for cover image: gyeom