Chess Piece

The Bittersweet Taste of Home

Her brows furrowed in her sleep.

It was such a rare morning for him to be awake before she had; to open his eyes to the peaceful sunlight that came through the windows, to hear the flickering embers in the hearth across from their bed as the remaining of the fire that had been lit up to keep their room warm in the night, unlike the other day where he had woken himself up before dawn, with the sky the gradient color of orange and blue, with a small amount of stars blinking above him when he had made his way with Sitron through the woods.

And to have her curled up against his side.

They had fallen asleep facing each other, for the first time, eyes watching the other's as he had tucked a strand of her platinum blonde hair behind her ear before his hand had moved across her jaw, feeling the smooth skin as his eyes caught the sight of the faint freckles dusting her cheeks. He had never noticed them before, difficult to unlike Anna's whose stood clear the first time he had met her, seeing how fair her skin was, and he had never gotten the chance to look at her so closely before.

Somehow, as they slept, they had moved toward each other, magnets unable to resist the pulling force between the two, for their limbs to tangle together in search of warmth under the thick blanket, resulting in one of her legs nestled between his while her head rested against his chest, thick hair right under his jawline and ear, and yet her hands remained curled against her chest securely, almost as if even her unconscious self was well aware that she had to make sure she was not being careless.

He had never seen magic before; tricks and sleight of hand performed by so-called 'magicians' ­were nothing but discipline practice that anyone could do should they put their mind to it, but what he had witnessed coming from Elsa, of her ability that she had kept hidden from the world, it was not a mere trick to fool one's eyes. She could summon ice from the palm of her hands, out of thin air, and he had only heard of it from stories, books that he had read.

Brushing the falling strands of her hair away from her face, he could see how much even in sleep her mind was conflicted, for she had been carrying so many burdens in her life for so long, and truly all he ever wanted was to ease her, to see her as carefree as she had been when she had laughed, to see the same twinkle of her clear icy blue eyes. Yet he understood, to a certain level, of her struggles with what she was capable of; people tend to turn defensive when they were faced with something different, their minds settled on what they considered as normal and find it hard to even listen, for she may have seemed fearful to them, up to the point where they could not see how frightened she was.

The shift against his body had succeeded in stopping in train of thoughts, yet Elsa's eyes remained closed, lashes fluttering as a quiet incoherent mumble escaped her lips, other than that she was still sound asleep and he could not resist the temptation to bury his nose in her hair. She always smelled nice, reminded him of snowy days when he would have opened the windows of his bedchamber and find himself face to face with the quiet morning and seeing the thick blanket of white snow on every surface, sweet yet not over that you could be intoxicated, more like freshening sweet.

She reminded him of his childhood, the few good parts of it, at the very least.

--

"Tell me a story."

There was no doubt in his mind that he had grew fond of their trip, the cozy and warm house that he had the chance of staying in, of the fresh air that it offered from it's far distance from even the nearest village where the servants would have gone to should they need to buy supplies, of the woods that gave such a beautiful view that he could wake up to every morning. On top of it all, he would miss how much peace it could bring for both him and Elsa, the latter especially. There were no duties that they should attend to from the morning until late, no meetings that she had to stress over, less pressure against her shoulders.

His head titled to a side as he watched her, blue eyes transfixed in watching her own fingers toyed against his. With her revealing her deepest secret to him, and for the moment that they had shared right before that, Elsa had found it so much easier to show how comfortable she was with him, with her head resting naturally against his shoulder and all, and now he could see just how much she had held back from him just as he did her. "What kind of story?"

It took her a moment to think of an answer, to figure on what she wanted to hear coming from him. "I'm curious about your kingdom," there was a lump had had suddenly formed in his throat when she had spoken, and he dreaded her request to relief her out of the boredom as they sat in the carriage, the Country of Ánslo behind them. "Tell me about the Southern Isles, I've never travelled outside of Arendelle before."

She was merely curious, he had to remind himself that as he removed his hand from her grasp, running his fingers through his hair instead as he had taken a deep breath. There was a part of him, deep within him, that had wanted to bury his kingdom far away from himself, the kingdom he had never considered his home, yet he was unable to refuse not to tell her anything of it, not without showing how weak he had been before he had met her. "It consists of seven small islands in the middle of a large expand of sea," compared to Arendelle, whose land were wide and rich with many natural sources, his kingdom was small. "There were no mountains to block the howling winds and no sandy beaches to muffle the roaring surf."

Elsa had remained silent, no comments had come from her, but the dainty gloved hand resting on his knee encouraged him to continue, the gentle tapping of her fingers against his trousers telling him that she had not fallen asleep and was still listening. "Those who saw the long, low walls surrounding the castle for the first time often had mistaken it for a sea monster." He didn't want for her to see that, of the gleaming black rock that was used to construct it, dared he said that he was ashamed of the building that very much so resembled a serpent. No matter how much others that were born and raised in the kingdom loved the castle, to found it beautiful, he didn't.

"You don't like talking about your kingdom, do you?"

He had not realized that the platinum blonde haired Queen had turned her head until she was looking up at him, her eyes closely watching his, and from the way her face had looked and from the way she had spoken, he found no need to lie. Thus why he had smiled instead as his hand moved up to capture her chin, his thumb running over her bottom lip. "And since when did you able to read people so easily?"

At this, she had returned his smile, chuckling as she nestled her head closer against his shoulder, a twinkle in her eyes made him wonder why he had not seen this part of Elsa before and what had prompted her to be so teasing lately. "I happen to have a husband that taught me how."