The Queen's Admiral

Chapter 2: A Hero

"Fredrik! Fredrik!"

Someone was calling my name from seemingly far away. I was on my knees shaking, with my arms covering my head. I was too terrified to even look up and find out what was happening.

I felt something hit me in the left cheek, hard. Then came another one on my right cheek.

"Snap out of it, Fredrik!"

I looked up and came face to face with the end tip of a carrot. I saw a twig aiming for my cheek again and I instinctively veered.

"Olaf," I gasped at the snowman that had been with my family since long before I was born.

"You have to stop this storm now," the snowman insisted. "You're scaring people."

I realized he was right. People were running and shouting frantically in the streets and my loss of control was making things worse.

"It's an attack!"

"Is it the Queen? Has she released her army of ice men?"

"Are they coming? Are they coming?"

"We're doomed!"

I forced myself to breathe deeply just as Aunt Elsa taught me. Slowly, the ice receded and I turned to the people before me.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. That was my fault!" I cried. People turned to look and recognized me at once.

"Prince Fredrik? Is the Queen alright? Can you feel her?"

"Is she still alive?"

It was a natural thing for people to think that just because I inherited my aunt's ice powers we also possessed some sort of telepathy between us. The truth was I was in the dark just as everybody. Right now, I was just as panicked. But I forced myself to calm down. "A ruler must always reassure his people," Aunt Elsa used to say. "The kingdom is only as strong as its ruler." I saw from the people's faces they were expecting salvation from me. I knew that I must at least try.

"I'll do what I can," I told them while accepting Olaf's twig-hand to help myself up.

People made way for me and I shut my eyes as I walked passed them so as not to see their pleading eyes. But I couldn't stop hearing their words.

"Save us your highness."

"Raise the wall again."

"You're our only hope."

Deep breaths, deep breaths, you can do this. You have to.

I opened my eyes and was about to call for a small boat when I realized something about the way the bells rang. The cadence of each clash had a two second interval between each.  That rhythm didn't mean attack but a sign of good tidings.

How can that be? The wall was gone.

A small fishing vessel docked into the port and two men jumped off their boat.  They shouted: "It's not an attack! It's not attack! A ship returned! An Arendelle ship!"

And then I saw it: In the horizon the tip of a mass and a unfurled sail unveiled in the sun. Green. Purple. The floral crest of Arendelle. I bolted towards the port, with Olaf scurrying at my heels.

The port was overcrowded by the time I reached it.  I pushed through the mass of bodies to see the entire vessel reveal itself across the fjord. It wasn't the flagship where my aunt should be but a smaller vessel—one of the trading ships that volunteered to join the military campaign. Could it be that this is what was left of our fleet?

Then a burst of icy snow tore the cloudlessly blue sky just behind the ship and rained down into the fjord. It sent everyone including myself cheering.