Elsa tried not to be disappointed. “I know you will find it. You have always been there for me.”
“I’ve always thought you’d make a fine leader. We need you to lead us now,” Lord Peterssen said. “Will you bring back summer? We can’t hold on much longer.”
Elsa’s arms drooped to her sides. “I truly don’t know how.”
“You are your father’s daughter,” Lord Peterssen said with resolve. His eyes searched hers. “I know you can dig deep inside yourself and figure out a way to stop this storm. We’ve been patient, but we need you now more than ever.”
Be patient. She heard Grand Pabbie in her head.
A storm was raging outside and growing fiercer. The time for patience had passed. She needed Anna’s memories to return and the curse to end. That might be the only way they could save Arendelle and the kingdom: they needed to do it together. “I know,” Elsa told him. “I want to stop this winter badly, but I can’t do it alone. I need to find someone who can help me.”
“Princess, we can’t—”
“Stop right there!”
There was a commotion in the hallway and then shouting. Lord Peterssen was ripped away from the bars. Elsa couldn’t see anything from her vantage point. Suddenly, she glimpsed the top of someone’s head. A white toupee flapped in the wind.
“Lift me up!” she heard someone cry.
His face appeared in the bars on her window. “Princess Elsa,” the Duke of Weselton announced, “you are a threat to Arendelle. You are going nowhere.”
Hans collected fresh supplies and borrowed a second horse for Anna from the people in the cabin they found. The couple insisted they stay overnight before continuing on their journey. After all they had seen with the summer snowstorm, the appearance of Olaf didn’t frighten them at all. By morning, they were begging them not to press on.
“These mountain trails are treacherous even in the most optimal conditions,” the man told them. “And this weather will make it impossible.”
“It’s hailing now, too,” the wife added. “Please, Prince Hans, if you are who you say you are, go back to Arendelle.”
“Maybe they’re right,” Hans said, looking out their cabin windows. All they could see was white. “The storm is getting worse. Soon we won’t be able to get back to Arendelle at all.”
“We have to keep going,” Anna insisted. “You know as well as I do the only way to stop this winter is to find Princess Elsa.”
I want to bake my own cookie for Papa! she heard a child’s voice say in her head. Wait for Miss Olina, another person said.
Who was “Miss Olina”?
“And what if she doesn’t want to be found?” Hans asked as the couple added the last of their wood to the fireplace. “You don’t want to hear this, but Elsa is only thinking of herself. She probably wants to hold the kingdom prisoner.”
Prisoner. Anna’s head seared with pain and she saw a blond woman chained to a wall, snow falling all around. She was hurting. Elsa?
“What’s the matter?” Hans asked.
“Nothing.” She held back from telling Hans what she was seeing. “I’ve just got a slight headache.”
“Maybe that friend of yours was right—this weather is too much on you.” Hans sounded slightly annoyed. “We should turn back to Arendelle before it’s impossible to travel. You can shelter at the castle with me till the storm passes.”
“It’s not going to pass,” Anna reminded him. Not until I help her stop the storm.
She held her breath. What had made her think that? There was another flash, and she saw herself as a little girl sledding across a room full of ice. Why was she seeing memories of moments she couldn’t recall?
Hans frowned. “You’re probably right. I think Elsa wants Arendelle to suffer.”
“No! The princess wouldn’t do that, would she?” the wife asked.
For a man who was supposedly in love with Elsa, Hans had a funny way of showing it. And as charming as he could be, he really did like to rehash the same point over and over. “No,” Anna said, getting aggravated. “I think the princess is frightened. If we could just talk to her, I’m sure we could work this out before the situation worsens. That’s why we need to find her quickly and keep going,” Anna stressed.
Hans sighed. “I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
“Elsa would never hurt Anna,” Olaf interrupted. “She loves her more than anything.”
Anna and Hans looked at the snowman. A gust of wind blew the door open, knocking Olaf’s head off.