Icebound

❄ twenty one

Hiccup.

After soaring through the clouds, both Hiccup and Snotlout lowered their dragons from the altitude when they espy smoke rising from the deepest part of the forest. They landed at a small clearing just a few meters away from the campfire just in case it wasn't Astrid.

"Our dragons should stay here," Hiccup says authoritatively. He frowns at Toothless. "Sorry bud. It's for your own good."

"We'll be back." Snotlout tells his dragon before he follows Hiccup out of the clearing.

As the duo crawl through the vegetation, Hiccup stops when he hears muffled laughs and banters coming from their destination. He gives Snotlout an understandable look, but that doesn't stop the both of them from finding out.

After a few minutes of crawling their way into bushes, they both stopped when they see a circle of men crouched around a fire kindled from gathered firewood.

Either they were bandits or hunters, there was no sight of Astrid from their faces. No woman was even present in the group.

"-Says that the snow witch's castle shouldn't be far from here." One of them was saying, his voice having a thick Scottish accent.

Snow witch. It was clear as day that they were talking about Elsa.
"When night falls, we move in and prepare to attack." Says another one fiercely.

"What about the guards?"

"Well, with Rourke and his men now exiled from the kingdom, kidnapping the queen will surely be a piece of cake." The Scot adds. "Oi, dinner's supposed to be ready a minute ago!" He angrily tells a young man roasting a wild boar from another campfire.

Hiccup had heard enough, so he crawls back to the dragons. But as they stand up and brush away some dirt from his pants, they both freeze like statues when they see their dragons being captured by the rest of the bandits.

"Hey! Get away from him." Snotlout shouts, catching an attention of a bandit that was trying to whip his dragon with a scourge.

While Snotlout attempts to retrieve his dragon, Hiccup unsheathes his sword and dares the bandit whom had Toothless completely tied up. "Fight me, you coward." Hiccup taunts. The bandit was a tall and brawny man. A frizzy beard was enough to recognize that the man was full of masculinity.

"You look familiar." The bandit says. "Aren't you Stoik's son? Oh, I was there. I saw how your own pet dragon, this," he pulls the rope that is tied hardly around Toothless's neck, making him flinch to his direction. "Killed your own old man."

He was busy watching Toothless's, as though he's never seen a dragon before his entire life. When Hiccup sees that he is distracted, he sprints toward him in a blur and is able to tackle the man down the ground.

"GAVIN." The bandit screams with all his might, and birds rustle out of the foliages above them.

Snotlout succeeded on getting his dragon back. He climbs on its back and calls to Hiccup. "Let's go!"

Instead of finishing him off, Hiccup throws a painful punch to the brawn underneath him and hastens on untying Toothless up.

Right when he's about to mount the night fury, the bandits from they were spying at appears from the edge of the clearing, all armed with weapons.

"Dragonrider!" The man in the front yells with anger, seeing his two men lying on the ground. As Toothless takes off, a flamed arrow almost catching his artificial tail on fire.

~ ¤ ~

Elsa.

The clouds gathered into a storm as night replaces day. It rained on Arendelle with big drops, causing some streets to be flooded and the sea level rising, almost swallowing up the docks as well. Elsa remains inside her bedroom with Jack. She's seated on the window to watch the rain land on the glass, as the white-haired guardian watches her with crossed arms.

"What was it like when you were invisible for years?" Elsa asks, looking away from the window. She tries to make eye contact with him, but he immediately averts to the wall. A muscle of his jaw clenches as he swallows a lump in his throat.

There was a glint of sadness from his electric blue eyes. When he mustered up enough courage, he faces her once again. "It was lonely, to be honest. I was like a ghost, except I didn't fly through walls. The whole time, all I ever did was watch you, see you suffer. You were uncontrollable with your powers, and I wanted to help. But I couldn't. Because you stopped believing in me and possibly, also stopped loving yourself."

"I did stopped." Elsa confessed in a tone that made her sound younger. Jack takes a seat in front of her and grabs her hand. Elsa's dark red lips form into a small curve when Jack grows a snowball from their hands. "But I didn't stopped loving you, Jack."

A knock arrives from the door. "Elsa?" Anna's voice appears. "Are you in here?"

Watching the pearly white door handle twist, Jack grabs the opportunity to pull her into a light kiss. It was quick, but enough to make her heart missed a beat. "I'll always be here for you, Elsa. No matter what."

And with that, he's gone in a blink.

"Elsa, I was wondering if you could slice the cake for the..." Anna becomes lost for words when she sees her sister peacefully staring beyond the window. "Oh. I get it. I'm so so sorry if I barged in like this."

"No, it's fine, Anna." Elsa stands up from her seat, his warm lips still lingering around hers as though they were still kissing. "What do you want me to do, again?"

"Uh, I was wondering if you could do the honors of slicing the cake of the young birthday celebrants downstairs."

"Oh, okay. Let's go then." She begins pulling her sister softly out of the room with her.

"You sure you don't want to change?" Anna glances down at Elsa's plain dark blue gown. Elsa raises a brow but doesn't stop on walking. "I mean, since you always change whenever there's an occasion-"

"Elsa!" Hiccup appears at the end of the hallway.

"Hiccup." Elsa says his name under her breath. She lets go of Anna and walks toward him with a bright smile. Anna follows behind. "Did you find her yet?"

"No. But you need to get out of the castle now."

"What? Why?"

As though on cue, a high-pitched scream echoes from downstairs, sending awful shivers down to Elsa's spine.