A Journey of Two

Chapter 9

She was dead. She had to be dead. If not, where could she possibly be? Anna opened her eyes very slowly, as though it would hurt her if she opened them too fast. At first, she thought that she'd gone blind, because she saw nothing but white all around her, but quickly dismissed that idea and gasped when she saw Elsa laying still on the ground behind her. Seeing her sister promptly reminded Anna of what had just happened to them in Ahtohallan.

"Elsa! Are you okay?" said Anna as she grabbed the sides of her sister's arms and began shaking her violently, fearing the worst. "No, no, no, wake up Elsa. Please tell me you're okay." When Elsa still did not move, Anna began to shake her even harder, tears streaming down her face. "Please, please. I can't live without you, Elsa."

"And I can't live if you keep on shaking me like that," groaned Elsa as her eyes fluttered open.

Upon hearing the sound of her sister's voice, Anna let out a huge sigh of relief. "Oh! Thank goodness you're okay! I'm so sorry, Elsa, when I saw that you weren't moving, I thought that I had, I had..." But Anna couldn't bring herself to finish her sentence.

Elsa seemed to understand this, and she gave Anna a reassuring squeeze. "It's alright. I know that you would never intentionally hurt me." This seemed to comfort Anna, and she started to blink back her tears.

Grabbing on to Anna's hand for support, Elsa slowly stood up and looked around her. "Woah, what happened to our clothes?"

Anna looked down and realised for the first time that they were no longer wearing their travel outfits. Instead, they seemed to be draped in clothes that were as white as pure snow. She dragged her fingers across the material, which was silky smooth. It felt strangely warm to the touch, and yet it also gave off a cool sensation. "I don't know, but these are pretty nice!"

"Where are we?" asked Elsa.

"I have no idea." Anna looked around, trying to get a better sense of where they were, but in every direction that she looked, all she saw was a white expanse. Even looking down at her feet made her feel disoriented, because it looked like she was standing on nothing at all, yet she knew she had to be standing on something, because she was not falling down. Everything about that place felt strange, but not in a bad way.

Hand in hand, the sisters slowly walked around this strange new place. Anna secretly hoped that they would bump into someone who could tell them where they were, but deep down inside she had a feeling that they were the only ones here. Until she saw two blurry shapes in the distance.

At first Anna thought that her eyes were playing tricks on her, so she squinted her eyes to try and get a better look. "Hey Elsa, is it just me, or does it look like there's two people up front over there?"

"I see them too," said Elsa.

"Well then, let's go up to them and ask for help," said Anna, but before she managed to take a step, she felt Elsa tighten her grip around her arm. Anna looked up and saw that her sister's eyes were full of worry.

"What if they're bad people?" hissed Elsa. "You have to remember, Anna, we still have no idea where we are."

"I know, I know. But we really do need to know what happened to us and where we are. I say we go up to them, but we prepare to run in case anything goes south, okay?"

Elsa nodded in agreement. As the two proceeded with caution, the blurry figures slowly became more and more solid. They were now only a few metres away, and their mouths fell open when they saw who the two figures were.

Elsa was the first to break the stunned silence. "Anna, that's, that's –"

"Mama! Papa!" cried Anna as she ran into the loving embrace of their parents.