For some context: A few of us on tumblr had been discussing what would have happened if Agdar and Idunn had returned safely, in which case Elsa would remain locked away. Others said options were 1:become a villain or 2: suicide. I brought up option 3: psychological instability. I had said then " the depression, anxiety and hopelessness over the years may have driven her kinda crazy. Thinking she's broken, she may become…well, broken. Which would then in turn lead to further loss of control and possible death by her own hand- or captivity by her parents (perhaps the cuffs would come into place)."

This is the result.

"See you in two weeks!"

Wrapping my arms around my parents in a firm hug, I tried to exude nothing but excitement for their upcoming trip. It was hard to mask the trepidation I was actually feeling inside. Travel by sea, especially at this time of year, was often fraught with danger. I'd heard the stories, or at least read about them, anyway. But my parents assured me that they'd taken every precaution to get back home to Elsa and I safely. They would have the best ship and the very best crew. They'll be fine, Anna, I tried to reassure myself.

What did give me a small burst of hope, though, was seeing Elsa at the top of the steps to see my parents off. At 18 years old, Elsa looked every bit the perfect young woman I imagined her to be. She's an adult now, I reminded myself. How could adult Elsa be any less perfect than the 8 year-old girl I remembered?

Seeing her there, dropping into a flawless curtsey, filled me with optimism. Maybe, without my parents around, I could see Elsa more. Maybe they were the ones keeping her locked away. Maybe I could see her – maybe we could spend time together, to keep each other company – while our parents were gone. Maybe.

At the top of the stairs with Mama and Papa, Elsa looked nervous.

"Do you have to go?" I heard her ask, nearly pleading.

Yes! I thought. Of course they have to go! Elsa, now you and I can see each other while they're away!

But despite my hopes during those two weeks, I didn't see Elsa. She stayed locked away in her room as usual, no matter how much I cajoled her to come out.

She stayed in there, as she always did, not seeing a soul until my parents returned two weeks later and came to see her in her bedroom as they always did.

As the years passed by, I saw Elsa less and less. Weekly dinners became monthly, then bi-monthly, and then more like biannually.

I had always longed to see my sister. Like literally- just to see her would be nice. But even though I wished to see her so badly, seeing her outside of her room after all these years later brought out more shock and concern in me than it did excitement. It became almost wrong to see her outside in the halls – as if she didn't belong there anymore. And after 12, 14, and then 16 years hiding away, well- maybe she didn't.

I heard her though, sometimes. Just a few doors down the hall from me, I often heard noises. Crying, high-pitched whines, sometimes moans. Crackling noises became pretty common but I didn't know what that sound was coming from. Pleading, shouting when my parents visited. But even more often: pure, untouched silence like freshly- fallen snow.

When I was still a child and Elsa had been navigating her teenage years from behind her bedroom door, every now and then a suitor would come to court my sister. I rarely saw my sister with them- they would occasionally come to dinner (well, the suitor always came and my sister often did not), or take a walk alone through the gardens – so I can't say much as to what their interactions were like. But I always hoped the men that came to court Elsa liked their women quiet and unseen, like my sister usually was.

Most of them seemed nice enough. Some were downright sweet. I didn't know why, but nothing ever came of these meetings. No proposals, no future plans to continue a courtship. Neither party made a move. As the princes and kings left, their faces were always dark with disappointment. When Elsa turned 21, she saw her very last suitor. No one else came to see her after that. Whether that was by the hand of my father or a foreign king I do not know.

As for me, I dreamed of a handsome prince swooping in to steal me away from my somber home full of secrets and whispers. I would have attended every meal with any suitor. I would have told him I loved him. I would have held his hand and smiled at him and shown him the latest dances I had learned as he gazed into my eyes and pressed warm, soft lips over my own.

But I was never given that opportunity.

"We have to find the right person for you, Anna," my father explained to me when I brought up the topic one afternoon. "I only want the best for my princess."

If only I had known then what I do now- that my father didn't attempt to find a match for me until he was sure whether he would be looking for a husband for his daughter, the princess – or for me as his daughter, the queen.

On my 21st birthday, the castle had a big celebration. I was a woman now, and even though I wasn't the eldest- even though I wasn't the heir- coming of age was a big deal. We had a nice party for my parents and I and the staff I was friendly with, and I spent most of the day outside with my parents who had taken off for the special occasion. Swimming, horseback riding, tree-climbing- I did it all. Who knew when I'd get to do it again?

"It's not every day that a princess comes of age," Gerda told me happily when I hugged her as strongly as I could in thanks for the rich chocolate cake she had made.

But Elsa – the heir – came of age 3 years ago, I longed to say. It's been 16 years that she's been shut away. Why didn't we have a party for her, then?

I just so happened to see Elsa a few weeks later, standing in the middle of the hallway halfway between her bedroom and Papa's study.

What is she doing out?! I wondered, before I tried to shake the thought away, terrible as it was.

Elsa herself didn't seem to know what she was doing out, either. She seemed unsure - hesitant and aimless. She stood there silently, simply staring at nothing down the hall and wringing her gloved fingers. I wondered how long she had been just standing there.

"Elsa?" I said, partly in surprise and partly to bring her out of her reverie.

I was afraid I would spook her, but it was a moment before she turned her head slowly to see me standing a ways away beside her. Her gaze darted up to my face before falling down to my shoes.

"Anna," she said to them. Her posture was stiff, her shoulders up near her ears and I noticed her hands shook by her sides. She was as jittery as a rabbit.

"….are you okay?" I asked her. "Were you on your way to visit Papa?"

Elsa didn't answer me, her gaze falling just past my face before she glanced to her side and remained staring at the wall there. Her gloved hands migrated from in front of her to tightly clenched under her armpits.

"Anna, you…you're a woman now," she struggled to say, her words light and airy yet somehow heavy as stone. I realized that for some reason she wouldn't (or couldn't?) look me in the eyes anymore.

So she did know my birthday passed. I wasn't sure, anymore, if Elsa was able to measure the passage of time in that room of hers. What do the days, or years, for that matter, signify anymore if every day is the same?

"I…I hope you are…happy, Anna," Elsa said, her words coming slowly, like she had a mouthful of peanut butter, her voice raspy with disuse. "I wish…" she trailed off, looking somewhere else, anywhere else but me, and took a few steps backwards towards her bedroom.

I couldn't put my finger on it, at the time, but besides acting just plain odd, something about Elsa was…off.

I remembered how, when we were kids, Elsa would always be watching me. She watched me to make sure I was safe, she watched me to make sure I was happy. She watched me to keep me out of trouble, and I knew that she was always watching me then because she loved me. Having her gaze sweep past me and not return felt like a swift kick to my heart.

"I…I'm s-sorry I…" she didn't (or, once again, couldn't?) finish her sentence, trembling and suddenly staggering back to the sanctuary of her bedroom once more, leaving me to feel even more lost than Elsa had looked, standing so out of place out in the world of the castle.

I think it was on Elsa's 26th birthday that I finally admitted to myself that something was wrong with my sister. Something wrong enough that it kept her in her bedroom for 18 years.

It had been 18 years now since Elsa abandoned me and the world around her for the confines of her bedroom.

I counted every birthday of my sister's carefully, measuring the years of her life in years that she had spent behind that stupid white door.

She really never came out anymore. I caught glimpses of light blue eyes and glances of white-blonde hair through a cracked doorway when someone brought food or when our parents came to visit, which happened less and less frequently.

On Elsa's 26th birthday, I peered from afar to watch as my parents attempted to coax Elsa to come out of her room, her door cracked open enough to let their words be exchanged.

Elsa's gloved hand gripped the knob tightly, ready to slam the door closed again at a moment's notice.

"We love you," Mama said, fingers flexing as she restrained herself from reaching out towards her eldest daughter. "Please, Elsa, just for today."

I saw a shake of a head before the door closed once more. "I…c-can't."

That night, having had a slice of Elsa's birthday cake in silence with my parents, I took a slice up to Elsa's door.

"Elsa?" I called out, giving my usual knock. It felt strange – I had given up knocking on this door years ago.

"Happy birthday. I- I brought you some cake." I was just about to place the plate on the floor when the door opened suddenly, startling me so much the cake nearly flew from my hands when I jumped.

And there was Elsa – right in front of me. She was dressed the same as always, in one of her day dresses with her hair pulled back in a bun. But her eyes were hollow and vacant. She actually met my eyes for a second this time, but her gaze was so empty that she didn't even seem like the same person anymore. I couldn't put my finger on what had changed in them- they were still the same, icy blue color. Ah, that's it, I realized as my heart fell with a thud in chest. There was no life left in them.

"Elsa, you-" opened your door, I wanted to say but didn't. "Happy birthday," I said instead, holding out the cake. My fingers just passing the entryway of her door, I felt an icy coolness that seemed to divide the air between her room and the outside. Strange. I tried to smile warmly at her. I blinked back the tears that sprung to my eyes thinking of birthday celebrations when we were kids. Opening presents together, since we shared all of our toys. Smooshing birthday cake into each other's' faces. I was always so excited when it was my birthday and for a few short months I was only two years younger than Elsa and not three.

"Thank you," Elsa said so softly it was a whisper. Her hollow eyes dropped down to the floor again.

"Here," I said, holding out the cake to her. "Super chocolate-y, your favorite!" At least it used to be. Do you still like chocolate, Elsa?

She glanced quickly at the cake in my hands before shaking her head. She gestured with her chin towards the floor.

I stood there, confused. "Huh?"

Elsa took a step back, cringing into herself. "I- I can't," she mouthed, anguished, trying to make words but no sound came out. She pointed one gloved finger down towards the floor.

It took me a minute to puzzle out what she wanted. "Oh!" I placed the plate on the floor, giving it a small shove past the doorway.

I watched, the chocolate cake I had just eaten coming back up into my throat as my sister bent down to the plate and touched it hesitantly with a gloved finger before whisking it up and closing the door.

On Elsa's 30th birthday, it was not Elsa that received my parents' visit, but me.

There had been no celebration, nothing unique to mark the time that had passed to make my sister now in the third decade of her life. Twenty-two years behind the door, I couldn't help counting.

My parents were now showing signs of their old age. While they already had Elsa as heir, it was time that my parents had begun to make arrangements for after their death for a smooth transition to a new ruler.

My parents were always tired, now. Ours was not a happy, energetic household. There were secrets behind walls and young girls grown to women behind doors. Father had developed a chronic cough that interrupted many conversations. Mother sometimes found it difficult to get out of bed in the morning, often taking naps throughout the day to build up her strength.

"Anna," my father started, clearing his throat and giving me a somber look as he sat on one of the padded chairs in my bedroom. "We have something we need to tell you." My heart sank as I sunk down onto my bed across from him and my mother.

Papa sighed heavily. "We had hoped it wouldn't come to this," he started, nervously. Papa was never nervous. "Not that- not that we don't trust you, it's got nothing to do with you, you see, but-"

"Agdar." My mother cut him off from his anxious rambling, laying a gentle hand on his arm. She gazed at him with warm but pleading eyes. She looked weary- so, so weary. A single tear slid down her face. "Just tell her."

"A-alright," my father began again. "Anna, you…" he took a deep breath. "As of this morning, you are now officially Crown Princess of Arendelle. You are- you are now the heir."

What!?

"What!? But – but what about Elsa?" I felt my limbs go all shaky and my heart started beating so hard it hurt. "Papa- what? How? Why!?"

"Anna, you may not know everything that is going on, but I am sure you understand that your sister cannot rule Arendelle when we are gone, as she is."

"But what do you mean, as she is! How is she Papa? You both still won't tell me anything that's going on!" I was sure to direct some of my glare at my mother as well. I was so sick of the secrets, of the lies. "If I'm going to be queen I at the very least deserve to know why!"

As my parents hung their heads, looking defeated, another thought occurred to me. "What about Elsa?" I asked. "Have you told her? Does she know? And on her birthday, no less!"

"Yes, she does know," Mama said. "She said-" her voice cracked. "She said you'll make the finest, warmest ruler that Arendelle has ever seen." Her voice broke on the last words and she began to cry silently.

I remained blind to her show of emotion, enraged at all the secrecy. "But you're not telling me why! I mean sure, it would be difficult to rule the kingdom from her bedroom, but why? Why did you make me heir? Why doesn't Elsa ever come out anymore? Why did she leave the – the world in the first place?!"

"It's difficult to explain, Anna," my father said. I could see that despite his emotion earlier, he was starting to close up again at my prodding.

My blood was boiling. "So difficult that after twenty-two years you still can't even begin to tell me?!" I was shaking now.

"There are multiple reasons, Anna," my father said tiredly. There was no use in raising his voice against me this time. He knew I was right. I knew I was right. "And they've changed over time. The reason was different when you both were younger. But Anna, Elsa is no longer heir because- well, because she is sick."

"What- what do you mean, sick? And what was the reason, then, when we were younger?"

"Anna," my mother cut in, reaching out to grab my clenched fist. She pulled my fingers away and stroked her thumb over the back of my hand as she spoke. "There are some things you don't need to know right now."

"That you shouldn't know," my father added.

"What do you mean, that I shouldn't know?! If I'm going to be the damn ruler of this kingdom I think I ought to know!" I snatched my hand out of Mama's, rising from the bed.

"No, Anna!" My father shouted back at me. "There are some things you are better off not knowing."

It didn't occur to me until after they had left my room, the implications of their words still not sinking in, that it must've been precisely that it was Elsa's birthday that caused them to change the heirship. They had been waiting for Elsa to turn thirty, for some reason I could not fathom, in the dark as I was. As if her birthday had been some kind of…deadline.

OK, guys - It's gonna get worse. Way worse.

This fic will be three chapters - one each week.

Next up, Hans makes his appearance, things finally fall into place for Anna, and Elsa….well. See the line above.

Please, please let me know what you think. Criticism welcome as well. I don't necessarily agree even with what I've written (particularly in the parts that come). But I'm so fascinated with this idea- what really would have happened if their parents had safely returned? We know that Elsa would've continued to be locked away…and what does that do to a person after so many years?