This Icy Force Both Foul and Fair Has a Frozen Heart Worth Mining

Adopted by Trolls

This story officially began back when I was eight. I could tell you the whole story in one chapter, but that would take much too long. Especially if I were not to take any breaks. I'll instead just briefly cover what happened the night the trolls took me and Sven in for this chapter. 

After a long day of ice harvesting, Sven and I were on our way with our one block of ice to the ice stand not too far up the road. We were far behind the other ice harvesters, however, and it had become dark outside. At least, the aurora lit our path so it seemed earlier than it was. 

I was completely exhausted and just sat on my ice block while Sven pulled on the sled to our destination. "Come on, Sven," I said to him as soon as a sat on the block of ice on my sled. We were getting closer and closer to the ice stand just a bit later than the other ice harvesters, but not too much later. 

Suddenly, out of nowhere, two horses came charging by going in the other direction. The riders did not exactly pay any attention to me as their horses sped by. I would not have paid them any attention either, except for one thing that caught my notice about them; a thick blanket of ice trailing behind one of the horses as they sped past us. 

I was completely intrigued by the sight of it. "Ice?" I wondered as the sight lit up my eyes. Then, I quickly forgot about our job to get our block to the ice stand, unhitched Sven from my sled, hopped on his back, and finally we raced after the horses. 

"Faster, Sven," I urged on the way there as we followed the trail of ice left behind by the one horse. We followed them all the way to the Black Mountains, well almost all the way to the Black Mountains. I jumped off of Sven's back as soon as I realized the horses were headed for the Black Mountains. 

I had heard stories about the Black Mountains from my parents before they died. They were forbidden to mountain folk like us because children went missing in the Black Mountains. The stories, however, were from the beginning of the Vikings' era of time in the region in which Arendelle was now a significant, legitimate kingdom. So, I was not sure how accurate they were nowadays when the Vikings were long since gone. 

Anyway, back to the story. 

"Sven!" I whispered to him so he would not go into the Black Mountains, either. But, my curiosity was still piqued by the ice trail produced by that one horse. I just had to know why that horse left a trail of ice behind it. I also wondered if the rider even noticed it. So, I decided we should follow the horses and riders from a different point from there and then. 

We crept up to the western side of the Black Mountains, hid behind a rock and pulled Sven out of the area leading into the Black Mountains, too. I could hear a someone speaking from where we were. I could not hear what the person was saying very well, but I did have a clear view of who was talking, at least. 

I saw a man, a woman, and a young girl probably around my age with hair that was just a paler degree of blonde than my own clinging to the man desperately. When I got a closer look, I also saw that the woman was holding onto something very tightly in her arms. Upon an even closer inspection, I saw it was another girl wrapped up in blankets, completely out like a light. Was she asleep or something? 

"Please, help!" the man said out loud. "It's my daughter." I realized he was the one speaking, but to who? There was no one else in the Black Mountains as far as I could see. Just a bunch of rocks. 

The rocks suddenly began to move towards them, however, and stopped just short of completely crushing them. I gasped at this before the rocks actually stopped, though, like I was worried for some reason I did not know and could not explain. After the rocks suddenly stopped, just when I thought the situation could not get any weirder, the rocks suddenly unfolded into strange-looking creatures who stared up at the man.