#sakuraayanami

original fic here.

“Ow.”

“Sorry,” Kristoff says, not feeling particularly sorry. He readjusts the piece of his tunic around Elsa’s arm, and gingerly begins to wrap it.

“Don’t do it too tight,” Anna advises, poking her head in his field of view.

“You’re blocking my light,” he tells her, “And I won’t.”

Okay, maybe he shouldn’t have punctuated that so much. Elsa lets out a pained yelp.

“Kristoff!” Anna barks.

“Sorry!” He means it a little more this time. Maybe that had been too tight. He unwinds the bandage, tries again.

“If you wrap it too tight she might lose her pinkie,” Anna says, looming over them again. “Are you sure–”

“I’ve got this!” Kristoff snaps. Is he sure. Like the fact that Anna’s hands had started shaking as soon as Elsa revealed the cavalcade of bruises under her shiny new dress isn’t the only reason he’s doing this.

“I probably won’t lose my pinkie,” Elsa comments inconsequentially.

He ignores her. Ignores them both, so he can concentrate on finishing up with the splint. “There. We should get some ice, keep the swelling down–”

“I think I’ve got it,” Elsa interjects, smiling slightly as she waves her working hand. A magical flurry drifts into a scrap of cloth, forming a compress, before settling on top of the splint.

So that’s another part of his tunic ruined. “Fine,” Kristoff grits out. Great. They’re all just having a fun time here, having to splint up Elsa’s hand because some water horse thought it was a good idea to drag her through the sea by it.

He pretends not to notice the significant look the sisters exchange with each other, opting instead to rummage through the rucksacks. Everything’s fine. The Forest is free now, they can all go home. He even got the stupid words out to ask Anna to marry him, and she even said yes.

He doesn’t know why he’s being a jerk. He doesn’t know where to put the swooping, sick feeling in his chest, except maybe in a bag labeled His Fault. Get her out of here, right? And he had, without even a backward glance, when what he really should’ve done was drag both of them out of the Forest right then, mist or no mist.

“Kristoff?” He hears Elsa ask from behind, “Is everything…okay?”

For some reason the hesitant way she’s talking to him just makes him bristle even more. He doesn’t need to be handled with kid gloves. “Oh, sure,” he says, in a voice so horribly hearty he can barely recognize it as his own, “Why wouldn’t they be? It’s not like any of us got maimed or set on fire or almost squished into paste by rampaging Earth Giants–”

“I’m sorry about what happened with the Earth Giants,” Elsa immediately says, “If I’d been there–”

“Yeah, you could have broken your other hand at them,” Kristoff retorts. “Why don’t you take another crack at them now? I’m sure there’s still at least one square inch of you that isn’t black and blue. Or, hey. Call up your water spirit friend, I’m sure it’s dying for a rematch.”

“They wouldn’t attack again,” Elsa insists, “They were just scared, Kristoff.”

“I’ve been scared before,” Kristoff says, “And I never tried to hurt everyone around me.”

“Hey, Kristoff,” Anna says before Elsa can reply. She’s looking between the two of them with a very anxious smile on her face. “It’s, um. It’s okay to be upset about all the reckless charging into danger stuff. Elsa and I, we already talked about it.”

“Oh, you’ve talked about it,” he says, rounding on her now. He glares at the piece of bandage poking out of the neck of her dress. “That’s just great, Anna. I mean, if you’re handing out tips about not wanting to get yourself killed–”

“No one wanted to get themselves killed,” Elsa interrupts sharply.

He meets her gaze defiantly. That I’m the Queen voice hasn’t worked on him for at least a year now. “Really? Could’ve fooled me.”

Elsa makes a frustrated noise. “I told you already, it was the only way to find the truth and free the forest. I had to–”

“Had to?” His voice breaks. “Elsa, you died! First Anna, now you–what’s gonna happen next? Are you just going to keep trading off?”

Kristoff doesn’t need Anna’s sudden wet gasp, or the abrupt silence that follows, to know that had been too far, too fast.

“I–” He wants to take the words back. No; he wants to go back home, to the trolls, where the most anyone gets hurt is a chipped nose. He wants to grab hold of the two women that make up his family now, and not let go until they promise to never put themselves in a place where they could get this hurt again. He wants to be young enough to not know that this would be an impossible ask, for Anna and Elsa to be less than themselves, for them to give less than absolutely everything to the world.

“I think it’s probably your turn, next,” Elsa says, after the long, horrible pause. Her tone’s light enough, but there’s no mistaking the slight waver in her voice, or the glassy sheen of tears in her eyes.

Kristoff lets out a shuddery sigh, and slumps down against his sled. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” He buries his face into his hands.

Someone sinks very carefully next to him. “It’s okay,” Elsa assures, when the burning in his eyes still hasn’t stopped, “It’s been…it’s been a long day. Right, Anna?”

Another someone on his other side, looping her arm through his. “Yep,” Anna agrees. She’s almost cheerful, even though her voice sounds a little like she’s getting over a head cold. “Super long, super scary.”

When he finally feels brave enough to look up again they’re both smiling at him. Like they’ve forgiven him already. Like he doesn’t have a choice except to be forgiven. “I’m still mad,” he says.

Elsa bumps his shoulder with hers. “That’s probably fair.”

“You owe me a new tunic,” he tells her, “And none of that weird, cheap stuff Oaken’s been trying to sell–real leather or bust.”

“Wait, why?” She rolls her eyes when he looks pointedly at her splint. “Oh, for–don’t I pay you an absurd Ice Harvesting salary for this exact purpose?”

“Personal damages shouldn’t come out of my salary,” he points out. “And technically, Anna pays my salary now, remember?”

“Yeah!” Anna pipes up, “I’m the queen, and I decree that you have to buy Kristoff a super nice outfit.”

Elsa looks over at him first, then Anna. Then she laughs. “I’ve made a terrible mistake.”

Omg I remember exolvo! I love that AU ♥️

hfkhdjdjdj

(〃ω〃) TOO NICE OMG

Uh, it was kind of difficult at first. The company I worked for assigned someone from the company to help me move into my apartment and get settled, but after those first three days, I was on my own to kind of figure stuff out.

It’s still difficult sometimes, since I can’t read kanji all that well and when I need to find something at grocery stores, there’s a lot of broken Japanese and gesturing involved, but I’ve pretty much settled into a routine by now where I don’t have that much trouble going about my daily life.

NO.

NO MORE MULTI-CHAPTERS.

original fic here.

The longing sneaks up on her. One minute she’s still brushing the sleep from her eyes, wondering about the significance of Bruni having antlers in her last dream; the next she’s slip-sliding down the hallway and out the castle, still wearing pajamas.

For some reason the tombstones still take her by surprise. Even when she’s looking for them, they come into view earlier than she expects. The sun is just peeking over the horizon, bringing out the steadily growing green over solid rock. Nature and life reclaiming themselves in six short years. At the foot of each there’s a finely crafted wreath of ice; Elsa must have stopped over here before heading to the castle yesterday.

Weird, how this place still sticks to them like a bur. This isn’t where Mother and Father died, where they would forever rest. It’s not even where their memories live on, but they keep coming back here anyway, even after the bodies have been found, even after the truths have been uncovered. Here, where Anna buried them; here, where Elsa couldn’t.

“I thought you’d want to know,” Anna finally says, fiddling with a loose thread on the hem of her dress, “I’m getting married today.”

That’s all she’s got, really. What else is there even to say? Shame you can’t make it? Too cruel, even for the moments she’s angriest with them.

She doesn’t feel angry right now, just a strange sense of–waiting. Waiting for what? She’s not sure, but she’s willing to stick around and find out. “I asked General Mattias. Remember him? Of course you do, you commissioned that portrait–I asked him to walk me down the aisle, since. You know.”

Anna sighs, decides who cares about grass stains, anyway?, and just sits down on the ground. “I don’t know. I guess I…I guess I want to say I wish you could be here.”

“And I do,” she feels compelled to quickly add, “I really…but then I start thinking about what else might still be true, if you were.”

“How much longer would you have kept the gates closed?” It always come down to this–this thing that Elsa forgave so easily, but Anna still can’t–like the bur trapped itself in her somehow, just under the skin, so she can’t do anything without bumping up against it. “How much longer would you have kept Elsa in her room?” She turns her head a little, looks just in Mother’s direction. “How much longer would you have just let him? How much longer would you have kept everything a secret?”

“I’ve been thinking a lot about this recently,” she says, picking up steam, “What if you never went off to find Ahtohallan? Elsa would have never had a coronation. I might have never met Kristoff. Or what if you had found it and come back? Or what if you tried to find it earlier? What if the Accident happened later? Or didn’t happen at all? What if–”

“What if you never tried to shave all Bjorny-Bear’s fur off when you were four?” A quiet, amused voice asks from behind, “Things might have turned out completely utterly exactly the same.”

“Bjorny-Bear!” Anna exclaims as Elsa kneels down on the grass next to her, “I forgot all about him.”

“I thought you’d try to fix your day-of jitters with a chocolate raid or twelve,” Elsa comments, “Isn’t it bad luck to berate your deceased parents right before your wedding?”

Anna rolls her eyes. “I don’t know, probably.” Between the trolls and the Northuldra and the scary planner they hired to tell them about Arendelle royal wedding minutiae going back seven generations she’s had to wade through enough rites and superstitions to choke a narwhal. Still, she doesn’t want it any other way, and Kristoff agrees: what’s the point of a wedding if it doesn’t celebrate every part that makes them them, right?

(She’d dug up some old pictures of Mother and Father’s wedding a while ago. Their ceremony had looked lavish, sophisticated, and one hundred percent Arendellian; nothing so subversive as a teensy Northuldra compass to mar the hundreds of crocuses they’d stitched onto Mother’s dress.

Mother herself had looked perfectly, genuinely happy. Anna doesn’t get it, and she kind of hopes she never will.)

“And I wasn’t berating,” she says out loud, “I was just…well. Do you ever think about it? What might have happened?”

“If they never died?”

She shrugs. “Or just, I dunno. Whenever.”

Elsa hms thoughtfully. “I used to, more,” she replies, “In my room. Mostly about how much happier everyone would be if I didn’t exist.”

Anna takes in a sharp breath.

“Sorry,” Elsa says, looking immediately apologetic, “That wasn’t appropriate for today, I shouldn’t–”

“It’s okay,” Anna says, waving her off, “I’m the one who dragged myself to a graveyard before sunrise, remember? Pretty sure we left appropriate behind like, three years ago.”

“If not before,” Elsa agrees. Then she looks up at the tombstones herself. “I don’t think about them much now. What-might-have-beens, I mean.”

“How come?”

“There are just too many possible variables in play,” Elsa replies, “What if Runeard had survived his treachery? Mother might have never left the Forest. We wouldn’t even exist. Or what if she had, and married Father anyway? What would have happened to us, if Runeard still had control? Who knows the damage Arendelle might have caused then. Our past already haunts us enough without adding what-ifs into the mix. Better to just focus on our lives as-is, I think–no more and no less.”

Anna just stares at her.

“…What?” Elsa asks, a little defensively.

“You sure look like my sister,” Anna says, “But you can’t be–something halfway reasonable about the past just came out of your mouth.”

“Hey!” Elsa gives her a playful shove. “That was one time.”

“If by one time you mean one full-time job…”

“Fine, fine,” Elsa laughs. She gets up and extends a hand. “Come on. If we’re not back by eight to get dressed, Kristoff will hear about it and get a coronary.”

“He really might,” Anna agrees. She lets herself be pulled up, then uses the momentum to wrap her sister in a hug. “I’m happier you do exist,” she says into Elsa’s shoulder. “You?”

She pulls back. Elsa’s eyes dart around the clearing for a little bit, but then she lets out a sound like a mix of weariness and laughter. “I’m…getting there.” She’s looking steadily back at Anna now. “Most days. Today, definitely.”

Anna nods. “I’m happy,” she says. Looks past Elsa now, at Mother and Father’s graves. Maybe this is the thing she’s been waiting for–to be able to tell them that, and have it be the truth.

Maybe it will help them rest easier. She hopes so.

The sun has fully risen now; Anna can feel its heat on her back. When she looks back at her sister Elsa is smiling at her. “Good,” she says, picking up Anna’s hand. “Let’s get you married, sis.”

Thank yooooou! ☆*:.｡. o(≧▽≦)o .｡.:*☆

(´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀) (╥_╥) ｡ﾟ( ﾟஇ‸இﾟ)ﾟ｡…. I loved it