Winter's End

Chapter 13: The Fête

Author's Note: Longer chapter this time, hope you guys like it. Thanks again for your support! And don't forget to check out the awesome fanart that's been done for this fic on my tumblr, calenheniel.tumblr.com/frozen. Lastly, this was released a little late so it coincides with the 1st day of Helsa Week on Tumblr, the theme of which is "Falling for you." (I may have taken it a little tongue-in-cheek, though, considering the content of the chapter.)

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Jugglers, fire-breathers, sword-swallowers, magicians . . . he'd seen it all before.

In fact, Hans had witnessed far more impressive feats of strength, comedy, and trickery during the years of his naval training, travelling abroad to countries in the south and east—feats that would put anything the King and Queen could put on in the Southern Isles to shame.

Considering, however, that he'd been stuck in that horrible little room all day, the guards being too numerous for him to manoeuvre around without being spotted, he relished what little time he was given outside of it, and outside of the palace itself.

He certainly hadn't expected to be let out, anyway.

But she'll be wanting it back, I suspect.

He smirked at the thought even as the guards nearby shot him dirty looks for the inexplicably self-satisfied expression, and he wondered at how much they probably despised having to look after him when so many tempting smells wafted over from the hot food stalls along the main road.

He was safely tucked away again, just as before, near the rear of the festivities—at the very outskirts of the road where only the drunks stumbled along, or those too old and sick to join the events hobbled by—but he still had a fair view of the proceedings from his position, hidden as it was. It was probably the Queen's doing, he guessed, though he wouldn't have been surprised if it had been Elsa's suggestion, either.

Elsa—so informal of you, Hans.

He chuckled to himself even as the crowd let out a huge cheer, and he supposed that it was for their Queen's arrival, since it rolled on for a few more beats than it would have for the magicians' parlour tricks.

And the Snow Queen must be with her.

She would have figured out by then, he assumed, that her letter was gone. After all the days and months he'd spent going over everything that had happened in Arendelle, he'd come to realise that she, if nothing else, was observant—and probably, not unlike himself, quite particular about where she put things.

Admittedly, then, it was surprising how easily he had absconded with it—and how he hesitated after he'd taken it, just before leaving the room, when he'd paused to stare at the serene expression on her pale face, the snowflakes vanishing from the air. It had been a long time, after all, since he'd seen any kind of snow (much less the magical sort that could be summoned and disappeared on command), and he'd never seen her able to calmly control it like that.

She certainly couldn't have done that the last time I was there.

He hadn't hesitated in the same way in actually reading the letter once he'd gotten back to his room, though. There wasn't any point in pretending that he was a man of "noble" character when he could see that tanned complexion staring back at him in the mirror and feel the rough lining of the cheap gloves chafing his fingers.

Of course, upon reading it (and re-reading it until he'd memorised it, since there was little else to do all day in that room), he'd eventually grown bored of it, as he had with most everything else. The contents contained little in the way of new or interesting insights into the Snow Queen, or into her relationship with her sister, and he wasn't sure why he'd expected anything juicier than what was actually written.