❄  Thunder  ❄

The butler cowers behind the dining room doors, the castle beyond freezing.

Elsa’s furious.

“My King and Queen, Princess Anna, Kristoff,” he bends, tailcoat sweeping the flooring that’s now under a thick layer of ice. He clutches the letter in his hands a little tighter.

“Kai,” Elsa glances up, visibly controlling her temper. “Have you heard any news of the boys yet?”

Kai gulps. “N-no,” he lies. “I haven’t.”

“Then why have you called?”

“I-I have Prince Minseok’s usual weekly letter,” he says quietly.

“From his pen-pal?”

“Yes, my Queen, I presume so.”

“Hand it over here,” chirps a much warmer voice.

Kai hurriedly stands, handing the letter over to Anna who smiles and dismisses him.

Elsa doesn’t question anything, going back to snapping at her guards and footmen to ‘do anything to find the Prince Minseok and Luhan’. Anna, in the meantime, excuses herself from the dining table, slipping the letter safely in her chest pocket beneath her fur cape over her shoulders.

The temperature in Arendelle has extraordinarily plummeted, as if the Queen’s openly challenging her own son—it’s no mystery Minseok had been behind that sudden snowstorm. Elsa’s on a rage that she let her own son slip right out under her nose, using the genes she passed on to his advantage.

Anna softly shuts the door of Luhan’s empty bedroom behind her, locking it with a soft click before quickly pulling out the letter.

She hesitates, but her fingers are ripping it open—perhaps the boys have already made it? Kristoff had reported that morning the sudden absence of Dawn and one other reindeer, which is instantly related to the disappearance of the two boys—Dawn is Luhan’s deer, afterall.

Anna doesn’t know how long it takes to go by reindeer to detour around a sea to reach the kingdom on the other side, but she scans the letter anyway.

Hi Minseok,

How close are these two already?

I don’t know if you got the invitation…

Oh Anna’s pretty sure he did.

But I never received a reply? Sorry, and if I’m rushing you I really don’t mean it, but we’re just afraid they won’t let you in the palace if we don’t get any news from you before the actual date…

Oh this guy’s pretty nice.

And I don’t know if the letter got lost or anything—the weather over here is horrible >< it’s like a cyclone over here… is it bad for you, too? I’m sorry, I’ll see what I can do about it if the letter’s lost. I hope this letter got to you fine…

Anna drops the letter.

No way.

A dry laugh escapes her pretty, pink lips. It is truly a small world.

❄

“Hello good sir! Would you like to buy some ice?”

“Are you from Arendelle, boys?”

“Indeed, sir!” Luhan smiles his standard, winning smile, looking like a sunbeam in the middle of all the snow and darkened skies.

“I heard the weather’s bad,” the old man crossing the roads makes his way towards them. “I’m a traveller, see—was going to head over, but apparently the Queen’s going on a bit of a…” the man clucks his tongue again and chuckles.

Luhan and Minseok share a look before smiling. “Ah is that so?” Luhan grins, shrugging. “We travelled here through the snow too, but its mostly these reindeers that are doing all the work.”

“Where are ya heading to, boys?”

“The North!” Minseok chirps up for the first time. “We kind of have to make our way around the Eastern Sea though.”

“That’s a long way, boys,” the man says before swinging his rucksack down and rummaging through, pulling out two baguettes. “One for each of you,” he smiles, handing them to them, Luhan and Minseok thanking him.

The boys aren’t really up to the surprise awaiting for them at the end of their adventure… Minseok still has zero idea the parental figures Jongdae was seen with are royalty, and Jongdae himself is the young Prince of Corona—they have no idea, unlike Minseok and Luhan’s parents, that Rapunzel and Eugene, or Flynn Rider, reside in the castle in the heart of Corona.

❄

“Luhan? Did you hear that?”

“What?” but Luhan isn’t so dumb to ignore his uneasy deer.

“I don’t think cutting through a forest was a great idea, Luhan.”

“It’s faster!” the light-haired brunette protests. “We—”

A howl slices neatly through the still night air.

“But there are ing WOLVES, LET’S GO!” Minseok shouts, raising his whip to bring it down on the deer, which rear up and rushes along the dark trail inbetween the dense pine trees.

While Luhan steers, gripping onto the reins, Minseok glances around, jumping out of his skin, finding the glowing eyes and shadows whipping in and out of the trees, steadily drawing closer. A lithe furry body leaps into the circle of their firelight and Minseok, startled, lashes out an arm, solid ice flying out of his fingertips and impaling the wolf through the throat.

Minseok gasps, the very same hand brought up to his lips, horrified at himself. The other wolves slow down, gathering confusedly around their fallen comrade before leaving the dead behind and continuing the chase.

“Good job, Minseok!” Luhan chirps, but Minseok’s close to tears.

“WHAT HAVE I DONE?” He cries. “I-I… I killed it!”

But that doesn’t stop a wolf from daring to leap at them, digging its overgrown claws into the wood of their cart. Minseok grabs a plank of wood they had planned to use as firewood later on, whacking the wolf with it, but the ice from his hands wrapped around the wood begins encasing the wood in ice. The wolf easily lets go of the cart once smacked on the head with the frozen block of wood, Minseok watching it fall to the snow on the ground and lie a little too still, horrified.

“Hey, at least they’re off our track,” Luhan says after a while, slowing the deer down, in response to Minseok’s silence. “It’s natural—the Queen almost killed my mom, her own sister, because of her ice powers, twice, don’t worry about it too much. They’re just wolves.”

Minseok, however, is more than just concerned about the wolves. He’s heading to a land of happy, rejoicing people of sunshine and flowers. At home in Arendelle he may be accepted, but what if he’s considered dangerous—a monster—over there?

❄

Minseok’s glad they set off three days early—they had to pass through many other towns along the coast, easily keeping up their act of simple tradesmen. They had run out of ice to sell, but upon passing through a town shrivelling under the heat of the sun and nearby desert, Minseok managed to produce a thick cube of ice, which Luhan expertly traded for gold and food. They had to make it out of there fast though, because while Luhan could stand the heat, Minseok isn’t quite as good with it.

They have now stopped at a village built right on grassland moors, offering more ice in trade for gold and silver, for they are taken in for the night.

“Thank you so much sir,” they chorus, grinning brightly before heading off to the stables to tie up the reindeer.

Not only are they provided food, but shelter from the storm outside. Minseok has tried not to bring along flurries of snow into the small, tightly-packed town, but even without his help, the storm’s whipping through the houses anyway.

They settle down in the stables, listening to the wind howling agonisingly against their door.

“The storm’s bad towards the North, he said,” Luhan mutters, repeating what the owner of the property had usefully informed the boys with as he invited them in. “Isn’t that in the direction of Corona? Where we’re headed?”

Minseok nods, biting through the last of the sandwich the man was kind enough to make for them.

“What’re we gonna do?” Luhan whispers.

“What else? Go through it.” Minseok swallows.

“What??”

“We don’t have much choice. I’ll push it back, if I have to.”

Luhan slowly redirects his gaze towards the small window at the very back of the stables, noticing how blankets of snow are beginning to sweep in alongside the heavy winds and rain. He glances towards his friend, feeding the reindeer before helping himself to bed early.

Minseok might think it’s a good idea to fight with the bad weather head on with more bad weather, but Luhan shivers in his woollen sweaters and fur coats, worried not only for himself but also for the rest of the people residing in this town and perhaps any other towns along the way to Corona, where the people have only known sunshine and clear skies.

❄

Thunder booms overhead.

Jongdae sulks, detaching the fitted arrow from the bow. This weather gives him a very slim chance of catching any game, but idly sitting in the castle all day makes him restless.

All he’s been doing all day this past few days was sit on one of his mother’s squishy couches and simply waiting.

It makes him feel ridiculously idiotic, but he does it anyway.

Jongdae tilts his chin towards to sky to observe the flashes of forks of light through the heavens between the heavy masses of clouds.

A few splatters of water fall upon the skin on his face. He decides to call it a day.

With a few light pats on his black stallion’s unkempt mane, Jongdae digs his heel into its side, making his slow way back home to the castle under the cover of the low pine branches through the rain.

The weather in Corona’s been getting progressively worse—pushed back upon itself, if you would like. Jongdae makes no move to expand his storms back out, letting the snow from the South steadily climb upon the town, watching with uninterested eyes out the window as maids and butlers scurry around him, muttering his measurements under their breath and carrying measuring tapes on their wrists.

The residents of not only the castle but all around the island were all wrapping up in warmer furs, happily welcoming what they thought must be winter.

❄

Happy sixth day of Christmas!

If you were wondering, the days of Christmas is in reference to the 12 Days of Christmas song.

Half-way through the story! Argh this chapter was so choppy-- sorry about the random excerpts everywhere .__.

Look familiar?

Bear with me for a little while longer!

❄