Prologue: Cold Sweat

Spine, shivers

Eyes, met

Head, in it

Heart, set

Cold, on my mind, yeah

Ice dripping, cold sweat

-Tinashe, "Cold Sweat"

"Elsa...Elsa...Ellllsssaaa..."

All the world was dark, but that haunting voice still beckoned her by name.

"Come to me, my Elsa...Come to me, and be mine..."

The poor girl wanted to verbally refuse, yet the feeling of suffocation in her throat and her body frozen in fear prevented her from reacting. She couldn't see anything, not even her own trembling hands in front of her.

All she could do was feel the surrounding darkness shift and lap against her skin, as if it were sampling her.

"Come to me, Elllsssaaa...Come to me, and ...Kill her..."

Those last two words were whispered in a tantalizing tone, the echoes buzzing near her like wasps she didn't have the ability to swat away.

No.

Please.

I don't want to hurt anyone.

All of these were words she would have shrieked out if she could, but the terror in her veins held her within its python grasp.

"Elllssaaaa...Elllsssaaa...Elllsssaaa..."

The voice continued to coo her name over and over again. It wouldn't stop, overlapping until one million voices could be heard all around, calling for her simultaneously. Some called with a slow warmth in the timbre of lullabies. Some with a furious malice the pitch of grating nails. Some with amused hunger in a tone so low and unintelligible, she was certain she would find a growling predator behind her if she only had the strength to turn.

What desired her so badly? Who was the "her" it was demanding her to harm?

"Elllssaaaa, come to me and kill her. Kill her, Elsa. Kill her."

No. No. No. No.

The sob building up in her chest threatened to explode from within her if it wasn't granted release. She never wanted to hurt anyone. She had already ruined the lives of her parents. She had almost killed her only, baby sister. Oh no, oh please no! The voice couldn't be talking about Anna. Not her beautiful, sweet Anna. Oh please, please no...

"Kill her, Elsa. Kill her. Kill her! Kill her!"

The voices were no longer sweet. One million commands hissed in unison now. Like a flames bursting forth from a newly lit forge, the frozen child could feel a sensation erupting through the darkness.

Pain. Anguish. Greed. Malice. Evil. So much Evil.

She was certain her heart should be thundering within her chest now from all of the overwhelming fear. Where-where was it? She couldn't feel her heart beat! She couldn't hear it! She couldn't hear or feel anything but the presence of evil building around her in its swarm.

"Kill her! Kill her! Kill her! Kill her!"

The girl's eyes darted around, still finding nothing around her. With overwhelming agony she assumed that this must be hell. That she was finally sent to the land of fire and brimstone for being born into the world as a menacing curse. As the voices continued, a strange itching began to build over her entire body. It was itching to move, even more than before-itching to act-to answer the calls-

"Kill her!

NO, SHE WOULDN'T!

"KILL HER!"

SHE COULDN'T.

"KILL HER! ELSA, KILL HER!"

OH, PLEASE. OH, PLEASE.

For the first time, the girl finally saw something flashing in the shifting darkness around her. At first she thought she had finally given into madness, but the flashing continued. It was a white light coming ever closer, ever brighter.

With eyes unable to close and her mouth sewn shut by some invisible force, she stared with horror as the lights were suddenly in front of her. Two of them, peering out like vacant eyes. At she met them directly, amidst the voices of the damned, it was then that Elsa truly knew hell.

"Come to me, E-"

"Elllllllsssssssssssaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"-

-"Nooooooooooooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahhhhhh!"-

Young Elsa of Arendelle wailed in the dead of night as she awoke violently from her nightmare.

She couldn't stop screaming and flailing, since the need to cleanse her skin and purify her lungs from horror had been building up for what felt like a millennium in that heinous dream state.

As her eyes adjusted to the darkness around her, she realized amidst her sobbing that her entire room was now, from floor to ceiling, encased in ice.

*BANG*

*BANG*

*BANG*

She almost jumped through the frozen canopy of her four-poster bed when she heard someone pounding and calling to her with distress from the other side of her bedroom.

"ELLLSSSAAA! ELSA, PLEASE OPEN THE DOOR! PLEASE ELSA, PLEASE! SOMETHING FElt WRONG AND I HEARD YOU SCREAMING! PLEASE JUST LET ME IN AND LET ME KNOW YOU'RE OKAY!"

"Anna..." Elsa was barely able to whimper out as she recognized the sound of her 12-year-old sister pleading with her like usual to open up.

'Kill her!'

The deadly whispers from the dream came rushing back to her in addition to the flagrant state of her powers.

"Go away Anna!" Elsa shrieked, her voice breaking between her ragged breaths as she tried to ward her sister away from the danger. "Just go away! Leave me alone! I don't want you here!"

'I don't want to hurt you,' she wept within her mind, fearing that what the voices had commanded her to do in the darkness might actually come true.

"ELSA, PLEASE! I PROMISE I'LL NEVER BOTHER YOU AGAIN! NEVER IN A MILLION YEARS! BUT PLEASE, JUST ONCE, OPEN UP!"

All the 16-year-old princess could do was curl within herself and continue crying from heartbreak at her sister's request as the sound of more voices and hurried footsteps began building in the outside hall.

"Anna! What is going on here!"

There was the frantic voice of her father, King Agnarr…

"Oh Papa! It's Elsa! I heard her screaming and I can't budge the door! Please Papa! Make her open it!"

"Agnar...the door-it's-"

There was the quiet yet worried tone of her mother, Queen Iduna...

"I know Iduna. Anna! Go to your room! We'll handle this."

"Wait-What! No! There's no way I'm-"

"Anna! Listen to your father! Go now!"

"But Mama!"

The voices of the few servants remaining congregated behind the door as Elsa wallowed in loathing from the spectacle, still unable to keep herself from crying.

"Gerda, please escort Princess Anna back to her room and make sure she stays there until she falls asleep."

Elsa was secretly grateful to her parents. She knew they couldn't risk Anna seeing her room and realizing that the door wouldn't budge because it was frozen shut. Amidst Anna's protests, Elsa heard her father murmur to one of the guards something about beating the door in.

Why couldn't she have just kept quiet? Why was she such an abomination? Why did she always have to cause all of this trouble, even now at the age of sixteen?

She had made one singular, solemn wish for her birthday last night. For things to be different. What had she actually been hoping for?

*BANG*

*BANG*

*CRASH*

She flinched as the door was broken down by a few guards who the King had quickly dismissed after, not giving them a chance to inspect the premise. The only person she could see just outside the door was Kai, the head palace steward, one of the only two servants in the entire castle to be informed on Elsa's abilities. Gerda, the head housekeeper and previous governess to the princesses, was the second. Both had raised Elsa and Anna in their parent's frequent absence, and also assisted in concealing Elsa's deadly secret from the rest of the staff.

"Elsa! What the devil happened in here!" her father demanded, looking about the room frantically as if he expected an assassin to be fleeing the scene.

Her mother fled to her side as she blubbered on. The minute her mother paid no mind to necessary precaution and went to fling her arms around her daughter, Elsa squeaked and scurried back from the human contact.

"Noooo!" she protested, curling more against the headboard of her bed. "I don't want to hurt anyone! Please don't make me hurt anyone!"

"Elsa, please," Her mother said with her quiet voice, pain brimming in her eyes from seeing her child so helpless. "You have to tell us what happened!"

The teenage girl couldn't pry her hands away from her face as she attempted to confess.

"Mama-Papa...I-I had a horrible nightmare and-"

"A nightmare?! That's what this is about!"

Her father's sudden bellowing sent her into another fit of hysterics.

"We practically wake the entire kingdom, gather the guards to beat down the door and almost endanger your sister-all in the name of a bad dream! Elsa, you must get a hold of yourself this instant! You aren't a child!"

"Agnarr!" Her mother shot up, raising her voice, which only happened on truly rare occasions when she was passionate about something. "Is that all you can think of! Elsa hasn't had an incident of this magnitude in years! Aren't you the least bit concerned in comforting our daughter!"

"Your majesties," Kai said in a hushed, but intense tone from the hallway. "I implore you to forgive me, but if we all do not lower our voices, your other daughter is certain to hear us and the entirety of our worries will be for not."

Elsa knew that Kai was the only individual in the palace that could get away with reprimanding the royals, even as carefully as he did it.

The king let out a heavy, repressed sigh and sunk into a frost covered chair in a position that aged him increasingly.

"Elsa dear, there is nothing more important to me than your safety. Please know that everything I do, is to ensure that."

Elsa couldn't look at him. He pressed a hand to his temple as he continued, his voice slipping with an indication of built up stress that Elsa hadn't seen from him since the accident eight years ago.

"But I am also faced with many, many difficult tasks to upkeep so that you may enjoy that safety," he said. "You're a smart young woman, as we've educated you to be. I know you are already aware of the strain hiding your abilities from the majority of the council puts on your mother and I." He let out a heaved breath and looked to her, trying to project some kind of regained paternal composure. "Why do I tell you to conceal your emotions?"

This question was rhetorical of course. Elsa already knew the answer; it was part of the mantra her father had made her repeat every day since she was eight years old.

"To protect others from myself, and myself from others," she recited, a hollow yet dutiful tone in her voice.

"Good girl," her father said with a sad, almost forced smile. "As King, I follow this exact principle, with no powers to speak of myself. As a ruler, Elsa, your personal feelings are a potential weapon for disaster if you ever let them slip through at the wrong time. Those that seek to manipulate you can't be granted the opportunity to critique the rationale of your decisions. Everything I do to protect this kingdom-our family-from that sort of outcome, I do with this knowledge. One wrong move...and everyone knows. Do you...understand?"

Elsa could only stare at him with silent tears streaming down her face. A heavy weight of increased depression and guilt had finally managed to mute her sobs, though the fear she wished to express to them didn't subside.

King Agnarr looked to his eldest child with eyes that begged her to forgive him, to find some kind of mutual understanding with her because of her natural maturity.

"Elsa, dear, please...I need you to tell me you understand," he asked again, his voice graver. "Because tonight, we were closer to one of those dangerous outcomes than we've ever been before. You know your duty, you're almost of age. If you are to ever become a queen, any display like this has to come to an end. No matter what the cause."

The silence that hung for a few moments between them all was deadly.

An empty breeze seemed to flow eerily through the air as Elsa focused her attention somberly on a large mirror in front of her, the one on the wall opposite of her bed. She still couldn't look at her parents, so she tried finding her reflection in the spots of the mirror that weren't covered with frost, anything to pay attention to and avoid their gaze.

As she did this, what she found made her spine go rigid and her knuckles turn white as the gripped they blankets in her hands from fear.

"Please Agnarr," Iduna implored once more, going dutifully over to her husband's side while trying to talk sense into him. "Elsa knows all of this! Tonight-it's not the time for one of your lessons. Tonight, what's most important is-"

"No mother," Elsa suddenly whispered, softly cutting her mother off. "It's okay, father is right. I need to take my duty to our family more seriously, and continue to work on concealing my emotions to avoid future displays."

Iduna looked at her with surprise, still not entirely convinced.

Elsa realized her mother was trying to follow her gaze to the mirror, since the intense focus she had on it was highly noticeable. The princess did this for two reasons. She knew that if she met either of her parent's eyes, the wall of resolve she was trying to rebuild would promptly disintegrate.

She also knew from her mother's reactions, that the Queen wasn't able to see the shadow being reflected in the mirror's frost covered glass. Elsa kept her eye on it steadily, fearing where it would go or what it would do if she let it out of her sight.

"I'm proud of you, dear," King Agnarr said, a soft smile turning up on her father's face as he took her stoic ruse for an immediate show of inner strength. "She'll be just fine, Iduna. Elsa understands, we couldn't ask for a more trustworthy heir to the throne. Just as I've said all of these years, she will master control. Right, Elsa?"

"Yes father," Elsa replied in the same empty whisper that was lost on her father, as he just seemed to be relieved she had found a way to collect herself and calm down. "I'm sorry to disturb your evening. Thank you for helping me to come to my senses...I'll be...fine for the rest of the night…"

Elsa tried her hardest to escape the shiver in her voice as she watched the shadow in the looking glass shift, like it was moving closer. It was just a wavering black mass in the farthest corner of the mirror. The ice glaze that covered some of the glass from her waking concealed most of it, but Elsa knew it was there. It evoked the same feeling in her the darkness within her nightmare did.

It was an aura of beckoning evil.

King Agnarr nodded with assurance toward his daughter.

"That's my good girl. We'll have Gerda prepare a room in the east wing for you for tonight until the door repairs are made first thing in the morning. We'll make sure Kai has this area curtained and watched until then, so no-one will see. Don't worry, we'll take care of this."

"Thank you father," Elsa said, nodding softly. Her body did not move from its upright position in her bed, her eyes didn't move from the mirror.

The shadow was getting bigger, and she swore she could see two white lights flashing ever so faintly on its form. The princess prayed that she was simply suffering from a hallucination.

Her father turned, advising Elsa he'd send Gerda to fetch her when the room was ready for her. Her mother did not move as swiftly after her husband as she typically would. She stood in the doorway with a conflicted look, eyes searching her daughter's face with soul reading intent that only a maternal gaze could.

"Elsa," Iduna said quietly, "Are you certain...there isn't something more you need to tell us…"

That was it. It was her last chance. A voice inside Elsa screamed from within to tell her.

JUST TELL HER! DON'T CONCEAL! TELL YOUR MOTHER! TELL HER, PLEASE TELL HER!

That's what mothers were supposed to do for their daughters. She had to be strong for her father, but her mother would understand. She had to.

"I-I…" Elsa struggled as words tried to form out of her lips, the sound a mere croak after how long she had spent crying.

'KILL HER! KILL HER! KILL HER!'

The voice from the dream, dear god, the way it echoed in her memory now was unbearable. All of the voices thrummed against her mind as if they were here in her waking reality. Thinking of them gave her that itch, that desire-No! No! No!

There was no way she could tell them. A childish accident with her powers while playing with her young sister had resulted in perpetual isolation. If she told them now what she was hearing in her dreams, in her head, they'd think she was mad. They'd treat her like a murderer, a monster, a demon…

Elsa prayed for madness, as the alternative seemed far worse.

"I'm certain, mother," Elsa replied calmly, only moving to bundle her glove covered hands deeper within the blankets to avoid showing the additional frost that was spreading from her renewed fear. "Thank you, I'll be fine."

Out of the corner of her eye, Elsa saw her mother move to discreetly wipe something from her cheek as she then sighed heavily. It was clear she didn't believe her daughter at all, but there wasn't anything she could do and the 16-year old girl begged that the hint would be taken. This was something she would have to deal with on her own to avoid endangering everyone further. This was also for the good of her own self preservation.

"Good night then... Elsa," Iduna said with so much sorrow in her voice, that Elsa couldn't stop the brimming of tears in her eyes as the queen turned to walk through the open doorway, leaving her alone.

Even behind the blurry vision of the fresh tears in her eyes, Elsa saw the dark shadow in the mirror was now right behind her reflection. The white eyes on its form flashed, hell now finding a way to her on earth.

She knew Kai was keeping watch somewhere in the hall, so she curled into a ball in her blankets, as if the position would keep all the anxious terror inside her properly contained. Dainty, crystalline snowflakes started to appear in the room and a pillow muted her quiet sobs this time.

No matter what was wrong with her, insane or haunted, the young girl was now certain of one thing. The hope that she had about finally joining her family outside of the walls of her room were promptly dissolved. She was more of danger to her sister and everyone now than ever, and she should NEVER come out again.

Covered in a cold sweat, the princess of Arendelle shivered through night.

All the world slept peacefully, and that voice still beckoned her by name.

"Elllsssaaa...Elllssaaa..."

AUTHOR'S LOG:

June 5th, 2016

After almost an entire year at sea, taken captive by emotion pirates aboard the ship, Hiccelsa, I am finally permitted to come above deck. The word ship is an understatement, as it is more of a marauding fleet, tearing through the Big Four seas to prove their supremacy. I'm not sure how it came to this. I was first captured by a captain with the name of DannyPhantomSG1 on the currents of Youtube during an unsuspecting entertainment cruise. I wandered upon their creation, "one last time [hiccup/elsa]" and I was unable to escape the ties of madness that chained me to the ship Hiccelsa from then on. The treasures that further caught my obsession once I was in the brig of the ship are as followed:

"How to Thaw a Frozen Heart," Captain: Wixeron

"Like Growing Frost," Captain: Lysistrate (Whom I found a personal mentor in as I survived my first perilous months under the influence of the crew.)

"The Man From Berk," Captain: KE12

"A Chance Encounter," Captain: R-dude

"The Ice Comes Calling," Captain: William563

"The Dragon Master and the Snow Queen," Captain: cgsmithmo

Not only have I been permitted in the open air, but now I also find myself captain of a newly built vessel in their fleet. My torture has come to an end. It is now time for me to write and explore these unknown waters with a new crew, or perish a lonely fangirl death. Who will join me? I shall keep a record of my journey, for I know not where it might take me. Several siren songs seem to already lured me on this path, "Cold Sweat" by the Tinashe is the first. More to come, so those that may stumble upon these records, please send me a message in a bottle with your reviews and thoughts on the current status of things. They will be reciprocated with message in kind.

Disclaimer: A force of phantom power compels me to state that I do not own any of the references to Frozen (Captain:Hans Christian Anderson, Disney) or How to Train Your Dragon (Captain:Cressida Cowell, Dreamworks). All character cameos that make it aboard this vessel belong their respected creators, just as my original characters will be under my command.

Till next we make port,

Tasia'sEndlessDreams

P.S.-Please forgive the lack of line break between the dream and Elsa waking. Lord knows I've tried, but for some reason that is the one spot in the story the doc editor would NOT let me put one. It kept deleting them every time I put one and saved it. Also, forgive my highly exaggerated tone in these author notes. I thought it would help liven up the typical announcement at the end of each chapter. I'm also kind of a drama queen.