I've Come to Kill You (Elsa x Hans)

The Third Attack

"Elsa, come downstairs."

Hans flung the window open, and stepped back. A gust of wind blew into the room, washing over an idly-bathing Elsa. She had been sitting in the wash for hours, her gaze wandering over the surface of the water. Even the tall wax candles, which floated on small lily pads, had long since gone out. The broken queen looked up at Hans, and brought her knees closer. 

"Elsa, you have two other children. They need you." Hans urged. To his dismay, Elsa only nodded. With a frustrated sigh, he placed both hands on his head, and paced to the far wall. The fire had changed his wife, in more ways than expected. She no longer ate with the family. She was a snake, a narrow-eyed serpent that would only slither through the halls to feed before returning to the shadows. 

"I'll try something else." Hans unbuttoned his jacket, and let it fall to the floor. He knelt beside Elsa's tub, and draped his arms over the side. She didn't look at him. Rather, she watched the sun, and the verdant trees that swayed on the horizon.

"Hey." Hans planted a soft kiss on her cheek. A faint smile crossed her face, but she turned away. 

"I still miss her, Hans. I'll miss her today, tomorrow," She ran a manicured finger over his arms. "And every day succeeding." 

                                                            ❅ ❄ ❆

When Elsa woke up, there was no sign of Hans. As she stood up in the bath, shivering and cold, she caught a waft of his cinammon scent on the breeze. Water dripped all over the floor as she stepped out of the tub. She pulled a soft white robe over her shoulders, and traipsed around the room.

A note rested on the nightstand, its corners partly curled. Elsa leaned over it, and scanned its contents. It was a letter from Hans, one she read softly to herself. "I'm going there, Elsa." She swallowed, and continued reading. "They won't stop until we give them a response they can't forget." She pressed the note against her chest, and cursed several times. He was gone, aloft on the waves in a leviathin ship.

Until that evening, Elsa rested. Until that evening, she sprawled out over couches, and ignored her children when they tugged at her hair and skirts. But as soon as the sun began to set, Elsa could sense that something was amiss. She had only felt this way twice before.

Rain thundered from the sky, pattering angrily against the cobblestone streets. The Gods were clobbering their drums with unbridled persistence. They were wailing songs of anger and wrath. Elsa raced outside, her small figure once again smothered by a woolen cloak and hood. Sure enough, the orange glimmer of torches shone through the dark. There was another ship at the dock, this time boasting the sails of seadogs. Men dropped from its deck like the rain itself, and Elsa could only imagine their Cheshire-like grins. Well, not for long.

In a matter of seconds, she was surrounded. 

"A woman?" One of them sneered. "By herself? Who had the brains to leave a woman by herself?" He paced forward, and stopped when the height difference between them was impossible to ignore. "What can a woman do that a man can't?"

Elsa stared up, unafraid. Her eyes twinkled, as if something magical was dancing around inside her mind.

"Everything."

A strange rumbling started somewhere, deep in the heart of Arendelle. Thickets of ice began to bend and twist around the men, herding them together. They rose higher and higher, their branches stretching skyward, toward the invisible stars. Several capes became entangled in their icy limbs, and the same men who had hurled threats moments ago found themselves defenseless, ripped from their feet. Elsa lifted her arms, higher and higher. Some of the men were disappearing into the storm, their swords piercing the ground near the feet of their comrades. 

"You're a monster, Queen Elsa."

There was one man left. He was drenched, and his face was covered in mud. He had a rugged look about him, one Elsa might have liked under different circumstances.

Suddenly, it hit her, what she had done. Once again, fear had taken control. The attack was over. No harm had come to the citizens of Arendelle, but a piece of her humanity had suffered in their place.

She turned around, and, huddled up in her robes, returned to the castle.