Princess Soapfish

>Anna looked over the paintings leaning against the walls of the drawing room. All of the beloved artworks destroyed by the ice bursting from the castle walls at the end of the three-day winter stood before her as if new.

>"This is amazing, Rapuh-uh, your Highness." Anna smiled up at her cousin and corrected herself in her expression of gratitude toward the Princess of Corona. "Where did you to paint so well?" Anna asked.

>"I got up every morning at 7 A.M. and fought as hard as I could. That's all it takes." Rapunzel smiled broadly and rested her hands on her hips.

>"Elsa's going to be so happy. She felt terrible when I told her all my "childhood friends" got hurt by the ice. She thought I was talking about people, until I brought her into the great hall and showed her all the broken frames and torn canvases." Anna sighed, and smiled back at Rapunzel. "Let's go find her."

>Anna and Rapunzel set off down the hall to the sitting room to find Elsa, Kristoff, and Prince Fitzherbert of Corona sitting quietly opposite each other on a loveseat and a couple of chairs.

>"Did someone die?" Rapunzel asked.

>"My parents" said each in sequence, and then looked around at the last sadly.

>"Uh... oh." Rapunzel pursed her lips.

>"Well Blondie, we got to talking about our childhoods and found out we all had something in common." Eugene explained.

>"Oh, I'm sorry. About... all that." Rapunzel whispered. The urge to brighten the mood of the night struck her and she blurted out the first thing that came to her mind. "My Queen, the Prince and I are famished. Might we retire to dinner?" Rapunzel asked Elsa.

>Elsa looked up at the clock on the mantlepiece. "It's a bit late for the kitchen staff to still be here. I'll have Kai and Gerda bring us something." Elsa rang a small silver bell and Kai appeared in a moment.

>"Yes, your majesty?" He bowed and awaited his orders.

>"Would you bring a sampling of foods from the cold pantry, and a bottle of spirits? My guests are famished." Elsa requested.

>"At once, your majesty" Kai responded, and withdrew himself to the kitchen.

>"He shouldn't be a minute" Elsa said to her cousin.

>Rapunzel sat beside her husband and clutched his hand in her lap. "Eugene and I just love it here, Queen Elsa. We were thinking of staying until fall rolls around."

>"Fall?" Anna said before Elsa could react. "That's great! We can have Oktoberfest, you can show me how to do my hair, we can make those salty bread things you guys brought..."

>"Pretzels, Anna." Elsa interrupted her sister and turned her attention towards Rapunzel and asked her with barely perceptible panic "You're staying until fall? Won't you get bored just hanging around here?"

>Eugene piped up amicably. "Oh, not with you and Anna to visit. It's a lot comfier around here in summer than Corona, anyway, your majesty, especially with the snow. Makes for good stay-in-bed-all-day weather, if you know what I mean." He turned and smiled at Rapunzel. "Right, blondie?"

>"Yes... the servants tell me you were quite happy to stick out the cold in our warm beds... even the royal bedchamber." Elsa smiled back at them.

>"Oh, we're sorry about that again, Elsa. Aren't we, Eugene?" Rapunzel said as she squeezed her husband's hand.

>"Deeply sorry, your majesty. All the rooms in the castle are so nice we really couldn't tell which one was which." Eugene cocked his head and contorted his face until his cheeks stuck out and his lips were drawn back against his teeth.

>Elsa stared at him curiously until he brought his face back to normal and felt around his mouth as if missing something. Eugene leaned in to his wife's ear and whispered. "Doesn't the smolder ever work on you royal types?"

>"Sorry to keep you waiting, your Majesty," said Kai as he came back into the room with a tray of jar and dishes of food. He set it on the table amidst their seats and made to alight when Elsa called out to him again.

>"Kai, would you mind also bringing us a jar of Lutefisk?" she asked.

>"Of course, majesty," said Kai. He turned about and left, and chuckled to himself once out of earshot.

>Rapunzel opened a jar of preserved fruit and speared a few pieces with a fork onto her plate, and then a can of corned, beef. "Anna," she asked her cousin, "What's lootafisk?"

>Anna swallowed the olive she chewed and smiled at her cousin, black bits stuck in her teeth. "You've never had lutefisk before? It's all people eat around here in the wintertime." She bit loudly into an apple and swallowed the chunk all at once. "Kristoff and I were living on it for days when we were looking for Elsa".

>"Is it good?" Eugene asked. "What is it?"

>"Fish." said Kristoff in between bites of a very salty ham. He poured himself a glass of acquavit. Eugene gestured to him to pour another two for himself and Rapunzel.

>"Just fish?" Eugene said, then inhaled the herbal scented potion and took a hearty gulp. He wheezed and coughed as the strongest liquor he'd tasted in his life stung at his throat, and turned to Rapunzel to caution her against drinking it, too late. The Princess of Corona sipped hers politely and nodded in admiration.

>"Is that licorice?" Rapunzel asked. Eugene stared at her and wondered how she'd taken it so much better than himself.

>"Licorice and Fennel" Elsa answered her, and bit into the corned beef at the point of her golden fork.

>Kai returned with a domed silver tray in his hands. "The lutefisk, your majesty" he said as he placed the tray aside the other and lifted away the dome. Inside, on a glass-covered dish, lie the pile of preserved fish, amidst a plate of small squares of bread and pasted cheeses.

>"Thank you, Kai. That will be all for tonight." Elsa excused him and the servant departed with a bow of his head.

>"Well Kristoff, you're closest, would you do the honor of serving our guests?" Elsa asked.

>"Sure, Elsa." Kristoff removed the lid from the dish of fish and set it aside the tray.

>"Oh ye gods what is that?" asked Eugene.

>"That's lutefisk, Eugene. Please have some. Kristoff, if you would..." she beckoned to Kristoff to serve the Prince a slice.

>"Oh, sure, Elsa," Kristoff said. He spread some of the pale, pasted, cheese on a slice of bread and slapped a chunk of the white fish on top of it. He handed the plate to Eugene.

>Elsa smiled broadly at him as he drew it back before him. "Enjoy it, Eugene. It's our best." she said.

>"Uh, I think I'll just have some of that corned be - Ow!" he yelped as Rapunzel jabbed her elbow into his ribs. He gulped and looked down at the fish in front of him. "Is it supposed to smell like that?" he asked.

>"Hmm, like what? Anna asked him as she leaned over and fixed herself a helping topped with lingonberry jam. "Mmm, yummy," she said, and took the morsel into her mouth.

>"Like, uhh..." Eugene met the Queen's gaze, looking down on the lutefisk in front of him, and grimly shoved it into his mouth. He wanted to cry as the smell wafted up from within to tickle the back of his nose and chewed in horror.

>Kristoff gave the queen herself a piece of the jellied fish, and watched in amazement as she took a bite with gusto.

>Beside him, Rapunzel made a portion for herself. Eugene swallowed as hard as the could on the half-chewed plug of north atlantic cod and gulped down another stinging blast of acquavit. "Blondie, don't!" he cried out, again too late to prevent his wife taking the Arendellers' bizzare food into her mouth. She chewed it gleefully and had a further sip of her own glass of liquor.

>"How did you do that?" he asked his companion. Around him, Anna, Kristoff, and the Queen all tucked into a second slice.

>Rapunzel turned her head to his ear and whispered: "I stopped breathing through my nose. You do the same, Herbert. Don't screw this vacation up for me." The smell of lutefisk wafted from her open mouth into his nose.

>"Queen Elsa", he asked, "how often will we be served this... this, delightful food, if we extend our stay?

>"In keeping with the best hospitality of Arendelle, it would be my pleasure to ensure you three servings of Lutefisk a day - breakfast, lunch, and dinner." Elsa chopped the air, marking off the meals. "And for snacks, too. Whenever you want something from the kitchen I'll be sure there's plenty of lutefisk available for you." Elsa grinned and awaited his assent.

>"Well, Eugene?" Rapunzel asked him, the overpowering odor of the fish flowed out of her mouth and grabbed him the nose.

>"Blondie, please," he whispered to her, "these people are crazy."

>"Heck, Eugene, if you guys are going to stay that long I can take you up into the mountains, show you how to harvest ice." Kristoff patted him on the shoulder.

>"And Rapunzel, I simply must know how you intended to stay so long without leave from Aunt and Uncle. I'd have to send them a messenger were you to be gone so long, along with an invoice... for the food and lodgings. Arendelle is so much poorer a kingdom, you know," Elsa cheerfully reminded her.

>"But we'll have lots of free time together, too!" Anna chimed in. "Now that all the paintings are fixed I can introduce you to Joan and the others."

>Rapunzel and Eugene looked at each other with terror in their eyes.

>"On second thought, Queen Elsa, maybe we have stayed long enough. I'm sure you could use some time with just your sister; patch things up without us getting in the way" Rapunzel said in hope of excusing herself as rapidly as possible from another two months of lutefisk meals.

>"Sorry to tempt your hospitality, Snowflake, Strawberry, Bigfoot, but the girl's right. We need to be going sooner rather than later." Eugene rose from his seat. "In fact I think I'll go back right now!"

>He bolted from the room and and rushed down the hall to the water closet, and finding it empty, retched the unwanted dinner into the ceramic receptacle. With a pull of the chain, only the memory of the gelatinous staple remained. Eugene sighed in relief.
>Eugene ran the corner sink full of water and cupped his hands beneath the surface to splash some onto his face. He rinsed his mouth free of the Neptunian nightmare and drained the sink clear, and stared at his unhappy expression in the mirror. Angry knocking sounded from the door before he'd had the chance to recover fully.

>"Eugene, are you done in there?" his Princess curtly called out to him. He opened the door to find Rapunzel holding her chin up regally.

>"Sure, blon... die," he responded as she rushed past him and hacked her own stomach into the toilet. Eugene grimaced at the sound of her guts turning themselves inside out to extinguish the nose-searing stench of Arendelle's native produce. She washed her own mouth out and coughed in relief.

>"How can they eat like this?" Rapunzel said.

>"Blondie, please, don't remind me so soon" Eugene begged her.

>"We're not leaving." Rapunzel continued.

>"What? After what she just said? You want to go through this three times a day?" Eugene asked.

>"Eugene, it's humid back in Corona. Sticky. Pascal may enjoy it but my hair doesn't. Think of the hair, Eugene. I haven't frizzed up once since we got here." Rapunzel turned and gazed determinedly into his eyes. "If she wants us to leave she's going to have to throw us out."

>"Well, I'm staying if you're staying" Eugene replied.

>Elsa laid back in her easy-chair and smiled. "That'll teach them to fool around in my bed," she said out loud. Kristoff and Anna laughed at the weakness of the Coronan's consitutitions.

>The next day broke to find the castle abuzz with carpenters and other tradesmen. Repairs to the damaged walls continued; new furniture was turned out only feet from where it would sit.

>Rapunzel and Eugene debated coming downstairs for their breakfast.

>"Are you sure we can't just go out to town and eat there? I saw a really nice waffle house out there a couple days ago." Eugene's stomach churned in anticipation of Elsa's pledged lutefisk.

>"Eugene, we're her guests. Even if she's trying to get rid of us, snubbing her hospitality would be rude. It's called etiquette, you should know this stuff, I gave you that book to read before we even left." Rapunzel chided her impertinent husband.

>"I'm not making any promises, Blondie," Eugene complained, "and if we sit down to more of that garbage fish I'm taking the first mermaid taxi home."

>"Mermaid taxi?" Rapunzel began to ask him as they approached the door to the royal dining room. The guards opened if for them and Rapunzel and Eugene walked into the midst of a pitched argument.

>"What do you mean we don't have any blackberries?" Anna asked with particular emphasis on the word "mean". I always have blackberries with my porridge."

>"I'm sorry, your highness, but your sister has given us our orders. The berry stores are not to be eaten." Gerda explained to Anna, only exacerbating her unamusement. "We still have several pounds of raisins, though," she said, and touched her chin in concern.

>"Raisins? Shriveled up little grapes? Oh, she is going to hear about this..." Anna got up from the table, leaving her unfinished porridge and storming past Rapunzel and Eugene.

>The two of them sat down at their places, marked with royal placemats of Corona. Gerda approached them and bowed her head.

>"Your highness, what may our kitchen staff prepare in your honor?" the housewoman asked.

>Rapunzel and Eugene looked at each other for a moment and considered their luck.

>"Was she kidding last night?" Eugene whispered.

>"I don't know." Rapunzel whispered back.

>"Uh, a steak and some eggs would be nice." Eugene said to Gerda.

>"And for mildady?" she asked Rapunzel

>"Sausage quiche?" Rapunzel dared to request in defiance of Elsa's orders.

>"Very well your highness, it will be but a moment." Gerda disappeared behind the kitchen door.

>"Well that was easy" Eugene said with a broad smile across the table corner. "I guess we're staying after all."

>Gerda returned after a quarter of an hour with their orders. With no lutefisk in sight, Rapunzel and Eugene silently thanked their good fortune and tucked into their breakfasts. Before they finished, Anna returned, still deep in the huff in which she'd departed.

>"I'll take the raisins, Gerda," Anna said as she sat back at her seat and stirred her porridge, now quite cold. The housemaid slipped back into the kitchen and returned with a crock. Anna stirred a handfull of small black fruits into her bowl and reluctantly spooned the porridge into her mouth.

>"Hey, strawberry, why don't you come and join us?" Eugene beckoned to Princess Anna. She looked up and nodded in acknowledgement, then rose from her seat and took one beside Rapunzel at the 12-setting table.

>"Heh. Strawberry." Anna said to Eugene as she sat down. "Nobody's going to be eating strawberries around here any time soon. Or blackberries, or raspberries. Might as well write off the whole fruit kingdom." Anna gave a depressed sigh as she spooned another raisin-strewn dollop of barley porridge into her mouth. "These things don't pop at all. They're not squishy," she said once her mouth was empty again.

>"What happened, Anna?" Rapunzel asked. "Is Elsa telling everybody except the two of us what they can eat now?" she waved her index finger back and forth between herself and Eugene to indicate the strange reversal of roles in subject to Elsa's seeming dietetic tyranny.

>"I don't know. She's talking to the farm guy and she seems really mad about something. No berries for anyone until she gets everything sorted out, she said." Anna sighed forced herself to chew another spoonful of the punishingly raisin-studded grain mush before it got any colder.

>"You want some of my steak, red? That orphan-chow doesn't look too good from here." Eugene asked her, remembering his own unhappy childhood - three meals a day of mushy orphanage cereal - rarely had they included fresh fruit - only on holidays.

>"Here you go, kid." Eugene shoved her his plate with its unfinished portion of his steak, strewn with hard, yellow, clumps of yolk and creamy bernaise sauce.

>"Mmm, steak for breakfast. Wish I'd thought of that," Anna said.

>The finely tenderized meat cleaved apart like so much clotted cream under the edge of her spoon. Anna took a chunk of the beef into her mouth. She closed her eyes to savor the sensation of the fibers melting apart against her tongue and hummed in satisfaction.

>"You two didn't get the lutefisk?" Anna said, mouth half-full of puddingy steak. "Elsa must really be distracted." she took the last of Eugene's breakfast up from the plate and set her spoon down beside it. Gerda appeared in a moment to clear their places. She scowled at Anna's half-full porridge, studded with nearly as many raisins as she'd added in the first place, before she carried their dishes away.

>"What were you two going to do today?" Anna asked her cousin. "I was going to go down to the market and buy some flowers and some new books."

>"That sounds great. Maybe they'll have the ones I used to read. I think I could teach you a lot more about art if we had some imprints for you to study," Rapunzel said. "And Eugene, you could find that waffle house you were so eager to see.'

>"Maybe. I wouldn't want to intrude on girl time. Where's the beastmaster? He must be doing something already if he's not here with you, red" Eugene shifted in his seat to look out the castle windows down onto the harbor.

>"Oh, Elsa sent him off to hand out ice already. I know it's his job and everything but sometimes I wish she would just do wave her hands out the window and do it herself" Anna lolled her head around. "It's like we're both dating him sometimes with how much she has him carting around her ice." I wish we could take a vacation somewhere warm, like Corona."

>As she was speaking the last of her request, Elsa came in from the hall.

>"We might have to move there permanently; Anna." Elsa said.

>"To Corona? Why?" Anna said.

>"I need to speak to Rapunzel about that. Princess," Elsa said, beckoning to her cousin, "I must ask you to come with me to the courtroom."

>"Of course, your majesty. Sorry Eugene, Anna. Why don't you two go into town together?" Rapunzel said as she rose from her seat.

>"Thank you, Eugene." Elsa said. Rapunzel waved at her husband before she whisked the two of them away.

>Anna looked across the table at Eugene and raised her eyebrows at him. "Really? You want to?"

>"Sure, Strawberry. You can show me all the little places the Queen doesn't want visitors to see."

>"Let's go!" Anna said.

>Eugene offered Anna his arm and the Princess of Arendelle set out from the keep, for the first time with a royal escort.

>Meanwhile, Rapunzel and Elsa met Arendelle's minister of agriculture in the antechamber of her courtroom. He recounted for the two of them the figures he'd collected in the previous weeks

>"As I have told her majesty, the kingdom will be quite impoverished of perishable food supplies in short order. The early frost damaged the berry crop in particular, which was nearing the end of its harvest. That which had not already been eaten was to be preserved for seed, but this is now impossible. As it stands today, outside the palace gardens, Arendelle will be absent fresh fruit of any kind within a week's time."

>Elsa was the first to break the silence. She turned to face Rapunzel and squeezed her hand while she plead.

>"Rapunzel, I need your help with this. With Weselton cut off, Corona is the closest trading partner we have. We would need food imports at three times the rate we have now, until next year. Arendelle just doesn't have the means."

>Rapunzel took a curious look at Elsa for a moment and considered her plea.

>"I'm sure father would be happy to send you all the food you need if I asked him. But he might not be able to appreciate only getting lutefisk in return, Elsa."

>Elsa glumly cast her eyes carpetward.

>"About that. I'm sorry for trying to see you both off so disrespectfully. You're welcome to stay as long as we can keep you... as long as we can feed you, anyway."

>"I may be able to help with your harvest problem, as well,"

>Rapunzel turned to the Minister.

>"You said the castle garden was intact? I'd like to see for myself."

>He led the two of them out into the castle's back yard. There beneath the shade trees lay the well-kept brambles and berrycanes of the Queen's preserve. Rapunzel tested their resilience and then that of the berries themselves. The black and blue berries sprung back healthily at her touch. The rasp and logan and boysens less well. In the corner of the garden, beneath a tree carved with numerous sigils of love, arrow-crossed hearts and other devices, Rapunzel found a thicket of white fruits.

>"They don't seem to have suffered from the frost at all. Do you even eat these?"

>Elsa looked quizzically at the minister.

>"No, my lady, it's kept for its looks. I believe them to be mistletoe."

>"Mistletoes don't have thorns..."

>Rapunzel reached out and carefully took a clump of the fruits in her hand. A thorn around the back side of the branch nicked her finger.

>"Ah!" cried Rapunzel as she drew hand back.

>A tiny spot of blood showed where the plant had pricked her. Before Rapunzel's eyes the white fruits turned pink. The wound on her thumb sealed over in a moment. Elsa rushed over with the minister. The fruits of the mistletoe darkened from pink into red.

>"What happened? You were just looking at them." Elsa said.

>A strange stillness came over Rapunzel as she looked at the fruits. They'd taken a speckled pattern now, with darker red spots over the pink, that seemed strangely familiar to her. Taken with the oddity of it, she thought to try something she'd not done for the last two years.

>She sang; and the familiar glow of her magical hair streaked across the thicket's branches. The fruits now glowed, golden, in the shade.

>Anna and Eugene strode down the main street of Arendelle toward the dock. People called out to the princess as they passed. Eugene's smoldering looks left the womenfolk hushing each other in admiring gasps.

>"People seem to have gotten over the winter pretty well, eh, red?"

>Anna waved to some children chasing a chicken around the butcher's shop and sighed.

>"They love it whenever we come out of the castle. I think they wonder what we're doing in there all the time. I used to wonder what they did out here all the time. Since they opened the gates I've been coming out every day and saying hello to everyone. It's silly but, I think seeing us makes them feel better about everything.

>"Rapunzel's parents don't really care much for mingling with the masses. I'm still glad they let a guy like me marry her. Speaking of which, you getting serious with the beastmaster yet?"

>"Kristoff?" Anna cupped her hands over one another and looked down at the pavement. "He's the first man I've ever met who actually loves me."

>"Things didn't work out with Prince Westergard?"

>"Who?" Anna said.

>"The prettyboy with the white coat and no personality. He chatted us up at the Coronation ball like we were your parents, scrounging around for secrets."

>"Oh, Hans. His name was Westergard?"

>Anna's face crinkled into a dismissive frown and shook her head.

>"Glad I dodged that arrow."

>Finally they arrived at the bookseller's. He greeted them happily and ran off to the back of his shop to fetch something. Anna spotted a collection of poems.

>"The Ugly Duckling, The Nightingale, The Angel, The Sweethearts. Hmm. By Hans Chris - eww, why are Hanses everywhere I go?" She put the book back on the counter display for the next customer.

>The bookseller returned from the back with a brown paper package.

>"Princess, pleae see that your sister gets this as a gift from me? I was so happy to see her stop by the other week. I'm sure she'll enjoy this one, it's the latest Dickens."

>"Oh, sure."

>Anna took the package under her arm and set to looking around the shop. Finding nothing new in the genre of courtly romance she'd enjoyed using to help Kristoff brush up on his reading in the last weeks, she sighed and awaited Eugene at the counter.

>"The Queen certainly loves her reading doesn't she? One wonders where she finds the time." the bookseller said.

>"Oh she still spends most of her time by herself, except now she's always in the study or the library, or the..."

>Behind the bookseller, tucked between two journals standing upright against the cashbox Anna spied a letter bearing the wax seal of the court of the Southern Isles. She immediately hushed herself and made a show of something on the shelves opposite the counter catching her eye.

>"That one there, what's that about? Princes?"

>The bookseller turned to see which she meant.

>"Which book, your highness?"

>"That big one with the red cover."

>While his back was turned Anna snatched the letter away, then wedged it between her arm and the package.

>"The Principia Mathematica, your highness? no, I'm afraid it's more a textbook, not something one of your station would appreciate, I'm sure."

>"Oh, too bad."

>Eugene came back to the counter, his hands full of tomes.

>"Blondie's going to love this. How much for the stack, my good man?"

>The bookseller quickly added them up in his head.

>"Hmm, ten kroner."

>Eugene looked askance at Anna.

>"Strawberry, do you think you could get this one, we didn't bring that much coin wth us."

>Anna reached into her pocket and retrieved a coinpurse with her free hand and set it on the counter.

>"Oh, Princess Anna, I couldn't take your money. I will simply add this expense to the yearly bill"

>"Hmm, okay," Anna said and took her purse back.

>The bookseller stuffed all of Eugene's books into a sack and tied it shut neatly.

>Once they'd left the shop and were outside, Anna quickly tore open the letter from the Southern Isles.
>>59858611
>Anna stared at the paper in front of her. Her eyes flew over the letters as greedily as a pack of carrion birds.

>"Wait, what!?" Anna cried, almost too loud to go unnoticed.

>"What you got there, red?" Eugene said.

>Anna turned to see if the bookseller pursued them.

>"It's a letter from the Southern Isles. It was in the bookstore, and this is their royal seal."

>"How did you get it?"

>"I got him to look the other way and then I grabbed it."

>"You stole it? Right in front of him?"

>She looked up at him, face flush with embarassment.

>"Oh no, I did!

>Anna clutched her hands against her face. The paper crinkled in her hands.

>"What should I do? Should I give it back? Or, or, throw it away?"

>Eugene laughed quietly and patted Anna on the shoulder with his free hand.

>"Oh, don't worry. You're the Queen's sister, aren't you?"

>"But what if Elsa finds out? She could do anything. She could lock me up this time!"

>"If it ends up like that, strawberry, you can come back to Corona with blondie and me. I could use a nimble little thief like you if I ever put the band back together. The boys would love having you around."

>Anna looked up at him with the beginnings of tears in her eyes.

>"A thief? Huh. I guess I am. But anyway, look. I can't read any of this. Can you?"

>Eugene scanned the page trying to find any words he knew, but was stymied.

>"Sorry strawberry, I don't know. I think it's in some kind of secret code, but that doesn't explain why a bookseller be getting letters from the king of the Southern Isles."

>"He must be a spy!" Anna gasped stuffed the down the front of her vest.

>Eugene snapped his fingers and pointed at the air in front of him.

>"That makes perfect sense, red. He's the only guy in town who knows what everyone else knows. He even knows what you know."

>"We have to tell Elsa!" Anna shouted.

>Eugene caught the scent of the waffle house he'd admired on first disembarking on Coronation day.

>"Sure, red, right after lunch."

>Elsa stared down at the swarm of tangling vines bristling with gold-glowing fruit in wonder. The minister of agriculture reached out and twisted one of the small golden globes from its stem. A golden bud immediately burst up from the vine in a flourish of glittering dust. The minister bent down and studied it with his eyes. After scratching his nose in thought for a moment he turned to Rapunzel.

>"My lady, is this not the Sundrop? The Coronan flower of legend?

>Rapunzel knelt down and took the bud between her fingers.

>"Yes", she whispered in amazement. "I believe... it is."

>The minister stood and swiveled his eyes around at the bramble. No less than 2 dozen berries hung there before him; he counted them off mentally and then considered the one in his hand, still glowing gold. He turned and nodded to Elsa, and then quickly popped the berry into his mouth.

>"Wait!" Rapunzel gasped.

>The minister swallowed the berry too late for her warning. He clutched his insides and groaned as his face twisted up with pain.

>"Oh no..."

>An orange glow showed from the midsection of the minister's body as if the sun had risen inside his body. Elsa and Rapunzel shielded their eyes and turned from the brightness. A whirring hum sounded from the Minister's body as he lay face down on the grass. Once it had passed Elsa turned back and peeked out through her fingers. On the ground in his place laid a pile of the minister's clothes, soaking wet and steaming.

>Rapunzel turned back and tore through the pile of clothes as if searching for something. Tucked inside the shirt was a formless fleshy mass wrapped in jelly too small to be identified as a person.

>"Rapunzel, what happened!" Elsa shouted.

>"The Sundrop can't be taken directly, like he did. I've never even seen those berries before. You have to make an infusion or do something else to dilute it. Elsa I'm sorry but I think... he's dead."

>"How could he have been so stupid?" Elsa cried from behind cupped hands.


>Elsa stood next to the thicket. The golden fruits mocked her with their alluring glow. The minister had served Arendelle since before her father's coronation. Without his lifetime of experience they might never recover the fruit crops before the end of summer. Elsa brought her hands away from her mouth and took a bunch of the bramble in her hands. No one else would be killed unnecessarily by the strange magic Rapunzel's blood had infused into the mistletoe, if she could do anything about it.

>Elsa screamed in anger as frost flew from her hands. Shards of ice tore the vines apart. Smashed glowing fruits strewed juice across the damaged berrycanes and brambles as she threw the tatters of the tainted vines across the grass. Elsa had nearly uprooted the mistletoe entirely when Rapunzel took her by the hand and spun her around.

>"Elsa, stop! Look!"

>Elsa looked out across the garden. Streams of glittering light rose from everything the berryjuice had touched. Elsa gasped exasperatedly as tears formed in her eyes. Rapunzel released Elsa's hand and knelt down next to what remained of the mistletoe. A few small fruits clung to a single stem unravaged by the frost. Elsa ran across the garden to look at the others. Through a miracle, it seemed, the plants were all like new. Though the minister had died, his example had nevertheless shown Elsa the way to save the harvest. Realizing her mistake, Elsa spun on her heels and joined Rapunzel under the shade tree.

>"Are there enough here to save the rest of the Kingdom?"

>"I don't think so, with just these three."

>"Look around, maybe some of them didn't burst!"

>Elsa and Rapunzel sprung to their feet and searched around the garden for any of the sundrop berries left intact. Elsa had gathered a handful when she reliazed some of them, pierced by thorns, oozed liquid. Unwilling to repeat the brave sacrifice of the minister, Elsa called for the only person in the world she knew would be immune to their effects.

>"Olaf!"

>Olaf came bounding out out of the castle and stood before Elsa, his tiny wooden arm crooked into a salute

>"Yes, my Queen!"

>Elsa held her hands in front of her and Olaf peered at the curious pile of berries shining in her palm.

>"Olaf, would you keep these safe for me? It's very important."

>Olaf stuck his wooden arms out eagerly, but Elsa shook her head in dismay.

>"Um, no, Olaf, can you keep them in your mouth?"

>"In my mouth? Why?"

>"I need you to keep them cold, but without freezing them, and then we're going to go on a little trip in the countryside, just the three of us. You're the only one who can do it, please, Olaf."

>"Okay!"

>Olaf held the hollow beneath his carrot nose open and Elsa let the berries fall gently onto the snow. The gentle cold inside Olaf's mouth hardened the shells of those berries seeping juice. Rapunzel brought another handful to him, then Elsa and soon Olaf's mouth nearly overflowed.

>"Zeeze things taste punny," Olaf mumbled.

>Elsa and Rapunzel combed the garden once more and met beside the minister's clothes.

>"What will we do about him?"

>"I'll have to think about that. For now, let's get these out to the country."

>The Queen, the Princess, and the Snowman bristling with berries hurried off to the stables. A powerful white horse whinnied with excitement when he saw Rapunzel. She climbed onto his back and helped the others up. Elsa sat Olaf between them. Rapunzel took Maximus' reigns in her hands and turned back to Elsa with a warning.

>"You two should hold onto something - Maximus, go!"

>Rapunzel kicked into the stirrups and the horse started off like a bolt.

>Elsa grabbed onto the saddle and clutched Olaf between her knees as they flew from the stables through the courtyard and down the long bridgepath to town. She yelled to Rapunzel over the wind whipping past them.

>"Our first stop should be up on the hill!"

>Elsa pointed to a crowd of houses up in the green, rolling hills overlooking Arendelle.

>Anna and Eugene left the cozy little home on Arendelle's side street smelling of batter, bacon, and syrup, the trappings of waffles which stuffed their bellies. Eugene licked the last of the syrup from his lips and patted his stomach.

>"Thanks for the early lunch, Anna."

>Anna swallowed the last of her bacon and scrunched her face up happily.

>"I hadn't seen the old cook since I was little. She always gave me extra waffles."

>"You should see the town more often. There are a lot more things to do out here than in there, believe me. Castles and towers. 4 stone walls keeping you in and everybody else out."

>Eugene sighed as the thought of what Rapunzel must think of the lonesome lock-up case of her cousins, musing at the strangeness of a whole family whose kids who spent their lives secluded. She hadn't yet spoken with him about the peculiar similarity of their circumstances.

>"Let's drop this off at the castle and see how the girls are getting along."

>"Kristoff might be back from his deliveries - and then we can finally go out and see the ice lakes."

>Eugene thrust his jaw forward in celebration.

>"Yes! That's great thinkin'. Spend a little more time outdoors in the sun."

>When they arrived back at the castle, a familiar tan horse was tied up in front of the guardhouse with fleur-de-lis symbols on its tack. Anna called to the man on duty inside.

>"Where did this horse come from?"

>"An ambassador of the Southern Isles arrived by ship while you were in town, my lady. The Queen has departed the castle as well, and so the Captain set a personal watch on him in the receiving hall."

>"The Queen - my sister left the castle?"

>"In a dreadful hurry, my lady. The Princess of Corona took her by horse. Magnificent animal. No word on when they'd return.

>Anna turned to Eugene, her lip curled in doubt.

>"Do you think I should see this ambassador alone?"

>Eugene plucked the letter from Anna's vest and and sneered in the direction of the castle.

>Eugene and Anna peeked their heads around the corner of the receiving hall. True to his word, the Guard Captain stood watch over a sharply dressed man standing at the far end. Eugene ducked back around and planned strategy. Anna kept her eyes on the ambassador and grumbled under her breath.

>"Ugh. Red hair. Sideburns. He looks just like Hans! Oh I hope I get to punch him too."

>"Anna, come on."

>Eugene brought her back around the corner and stood her opposite him.

>"Okay, I've got an idea. Let's see why he's here and if there's anything fishy about it, we'll just wait until Elsa gets back and she can deal with him then. Right?"

>Anna pouted for a moment and then sighed through her nose.

>"Okay, fine. We'll just see what he wants."

>Anna looked disapprovingly at the frayed collar of Eugene's informal traveling clothes.

>"But we have to change first. Come on!"

>Anna led Eugene up the stairs to the dressing room. She opened the door to the King's old closet for him.

>"Find something more... Princey to wear."

>"Princey?" He thought of how little he liked the sash and tunic Rapunzel had put him in. Now was his opportunity to dress like he thought a real man would given a selection of royal wardrobe. "Can do."

>Anna ran to the door on the opposite side of the hall and stripped off her town clothes. The simple green vest and skirt weren't impressive enough for receiving an official embassy from another state, she thought, and so she plucked from her personal wardrobe the dress Elsa had given her for her 18th birhday. Silk and crushed velvet festooned wih bright patterns of rosemaling, all in royal pink and purple.

>Anna clasped the dress on behind her back and found a matching pair of shoes, then left back to the King's closet. Eugene stood regally before the mirror, straightening every seam on the black coat and dark grey pants Anna recognized as having once been her father's.

>"Oh yeah, this is how a real Prince looks." Eugene said.

>"Ahem." Anna cleared her throat.

>Eugene turned and showed off his chosen costume. Anna drew nearer and made sure all of his buttons and loops were properly closed. The emptiness of the chest caught her eye. Normally it would be full of decorations. Decorations, she recalled, which now must lie under the sea. Anna opened an armoire on the side of the room. To her delight a number of unused decorations; pins, medals, and gold and silver ropes lie there on velvet pads.

>"Let me put a few of these on you. Then you'll look perfect."

>Four of the medals on his left breast, a silver rope under his right epaulet, and a medal hung round his neck made Eugene a perfect picture of royalty in her eyes.

>"Okay, let's go do this."

>The two joined arms and set off back down the stairs. A guard glared momentarily at Eugene as they passed, but cast his eyes to the side and bit into his lip as if silently concealing laughter. When they arrived in the antechamber where the Southern Islander awaited them, Anna bowed and introduced herself.

>"Princess Anna of Arendelle".

>She tugged at Eugene's elbow.

>"Oh, yeah."

>Eugene offered his hand to the ambassador, who did not immediately accept it.

>"Prince Eugene of Corona".

>Seeming shocked by the announcement, the ambassador vigorously shook Eugene's hand.

>"My pardon, your majesty, I expected only the soveireigns of Arendelle on this visit. I do wish I'd been informed of Corona's... official presence."

>"Think nothing of it."

>"What brings you to Arendelle, Mr. Ambassador?", Anna asked.

>"I had hoped to discuss that with the Queen. I understand she is out on business?"

>"Important business, yes," Eugene said, "With the Princess of Corona."

>The ambassador took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his hands with it in dismay.

>"I had hoped to discuss the subject of reparations. The irregularity of Prince Hans' acts demanded the fullest apology from his highness King Erik. Might you wish to hear them?"

>Maximus flew down the trail from the Hagebak farm. Far behind, the farmer and his wife danced and hollered praises after their Queen. The plan had worked - a few sunberries bursting upon the ground had brought back all of the crops killed by the untimely winter.

>"Ha ha! It worked!"

>Elsa shook with laughter as the wind whipped through her hair. Ending the winter had felt only half as good as knowing the mistakes she'd made didn't have to be permanent, that with the help of her friends all of it could be undone. She hugged Olaf around his snowy head.

>"Oh, I love you, Olaf."

>His eyes swiveled around to peer up at her and he mumbled back in reply through the berries still lying in his mouth.

>"I mo, Ersa. I lub oo too."

>She hugged him tighter still.

>"Where to next, Elsa?" Rapunzel asked.

>"Two more up here in the hills, then the valley farms, and if we have enough, the ones in town! Go right at the the next fork!"

>Rapunzel spurred Maximus on and the tall white horse dug into the old cart path with his hooves harder than ever. Elsa could hardly believe she'd wanted to stay cooped up in her room for so long, finally able to enjoy the freedom of riding on horseback.

>The Hummel farm was next. When Maximus stopped in front of their gate, the farmer's children scattered from the field and ran into their house. Hummel appeared in the doorway armed - a crossbow in one hand and a stack of bolts in the other.

>"Why are ye here? Ge'way."

>Elsa climbed down from Maximus' saddle and approached him slowly.

>"But we came to help. I've found a way to save everything. if you'd just let us into your field."

>"More sorcery, innit? You just stay where ya are, witch. I new yer the one what caused this in the first place. Just be on you way, won't be needin' wickedness on my land."

>Elsa looked up at Rapunzel.

>"Ye heard me! Queen or no I'll not be takin' any witches' help."

>Elsa took Maximus' reigns and led him down the road away from the farm.

>Elsa stopped once they were out of sight of farmer Hagebak and helped Olaf down from Maximus' saddle carefully, so as not to spill any of the sunberries. Elsa held him around his sloping, snowy, shoulders,

>"Olaf, I want you to go back and throw some berries around on the ground like Rapunzel and I did at the other farms. Okay?"

>Olaf gasped through his mouthful of berries and jumped into the air.

>"You mean I... I get to help bring back summer?"

>Olaf spun around on his heels and fell back on the road, his eyes closed as if he'd fallen unconscious. Rapunzel and Maximus arched their eyebrows at him quizzically. Elsa smirked at her tiny snowman.

>"Yes, Olaf, without you, summer will be over for the Hagebak family. Can you do it?"

>Olaf sprung to his feet and struck his twig hand against his forehead in a wrong-facing salute.

>"At once, my Queen!"

>Olaf twaddled off as fast as his stumpy feet could him back to the farm and snuck under the fence. Farmer Hagebak and his family stood, still in the front yard, holding each other. The smallest of the children sobbed to his mother about the emptiness of his stomach. She knelt down and rubbed his cheek and comforted him with a small kiss on the forehead.

>Olaf plucked several glowing fruits from his mouth and pushed them into the dirt slightly to keep them rolling away. Olaf leapt upon the nearest berry to make the juice burst out and bring the farm back to life, but nothing happened. He stepped back and saw that the fruit had not broken under the weight of his fluffy body. He thought to himself for a moment and looked around the farmyard. A post hammer leaned against the wall of the farmhouse and Olaf tried to take it between his twig hands, but it slid from his smooth, featureless, fingers as he tried to bring it aloft.

>For a moment he considered going back and informing Elsa of his failure, but all at once a gem of an idea came to Olaf.
>He laid the head of the hammer on the ground and snugged the end of the handle against his chest, and walked forward into it. Soon, the hammer too unwieldy to carry had impaled him, and Olf cautiously walked it back to the berry-strewn fields. He leaned himself back, lifting the head of the head of the hammer aloft, and let it fall down upon the sunberry. A joyous spurt of shining liquid burst from under the hammer's head and fell upon the failed crops. He ran off to the next and repeated the process of lifting the hammer with his body and slamming it down upon the fruit.

>Golden streams of light rose from every corner of the Hagebak farm as Olaf ran around the field. Once all the berries had been smashed, Olaf wedged the hammer against a fencepost and pulled it from his body, and ran back to Elsa and Rapunzel.

>"Elsa, I did it!"

>Elsa and Rapunzel turned up from their conversation and smiled in wonder as the streaming lights filled the horizon. Elsa shook Olaf's hand and helped him back aloft Maximus' saddle befoe Rapunzel helped her up, and he strode back down the road past the farm. Farmer Hagebak and his children ran around their field shouting oaths to God, and as Elsa passed, the farmer himself waved and cheered to Elsa. His children blew kisses to the Princesses, and Elsa squeezed Rapunzel around her stomach comfortingly.

>Once they'd visited all of the farms in the hills and the valley, Maximus brought them back to town. His flanks sagged with fatigue as they tread the knurled streets and whined to Rapunzel to let him take a rest, before an allluring scent caught his nose. With the last of his energy, Maximus trod over to the waffle house and stuck his head in through the front window. The last lingering aroma of batter and syrup which had taken hold of Eugene maddened him, and Maximus removed his head to try and enter through the doorway.

>"Whoa, whoa, boy." Rapunzel pulled on his straps.

>"Elsa, it has been a long day, hasn't it?"

>Elsa and Rapunzel climbed down from Maximus' saddle to enter the sweet-smelling townhouse. He whinnied at them plaintively, and Rapunzel turned to comfort him.

>"I'll bring you something good, just wait here."

>Maximus leaned against the side of the house and spotted Olaf's nose; the juicy carrot sitting just out of reach on his back, and rolled his eyes in despair.

>The doorbell's clinking as the two girls walked into the waffle house brought a shout from the kitchen.

>"We're closed! All out of batter for the day. You'll have to get your breakfast at home I'm afrai-"

>The cook trailed off as she sighted Elsa for the first time since the Coronation.

>"Your majesty!? You came to eat here? At my house? Oh my, let me get back to the kitchen."

>"No, no, it's all right."

>Elsa tried to stop the castle's old cook from making a fuss.

>"I'm not hungry, but there is a very noble gentleman, the Captain of the Guard of Corona, outside, who seems taken with your waffles."

>"Oh? Is he not able to come in and sit down?"

>Rapunzel grinned humorously.

>"He's a horse."

>"A horse?"

>The old cook excused herself past them and stepped outdoors. Maximus lolled his head up from the wall hungrily and begged at her with his eyes.

>The cook entered again, dumbfounded, and interrogated Rapunzel.

>"He eats waffles?"

>"I think pancakes? We don't have any waffle places in town."

>The cook blinked at the ridiculousness of the request, but then the demands of royalty were ever-peculiar, and she set off back to the kitchen.

>"The two of you sit down and I'll make enough for everyone!"

>Elsa and Rapunzel sat at the table nearest the front and poured themselves cups of milk from the pitcher at the table. Rapunzel tested hers with a sip.

>"Ehm. Warm."

>Elsa took the cups in hand and frost crept over them, and brought her own to her soft pink lips.

>"Ah, there's nothing better."

>The cook called out from the kitchen.

>"Does the Captain have a preference of syrups?"

>Rapunzel chuckled at the question of her horse Captain's taste in syrups.

>"I think he likes blueberry!"

>Elsa sipped her milk and smiled across the table at her cousin. After a moment, she slammed her cup against the table.

>"Syrup!"

>Elsa grabbed Rapunzel by the wrist and dragged her back out through the door.

>"What? Where are we going?"

>"The castle!"

>Elsa released Rapunzel's arm and ran off with Olaf in her hands.

>Rapunzel ran alongside Maximus and pulled at his saddlehorn. Maximus turned his head up and blew a raspberry at her.

>"What? Come on!"

>Maximus leaned back against the wall defiantly and shook his head "No".

>"Ugh."

>Rapunzel sighed and ran off after Elsa. The cook called out from inside the waffle house.

>"Girls? Where'd you get off to? All these pancakes are going to get cold in a hurry if you don't eat up."

>Maximus sat up from the wall and sauntered into the waffle house. A buttery pile of pancakes lie on the table behind the old cook. Maximus bared his teeth in a horsey grin. The cook backed away from the door as the horse Captain advanced, a hungry glare in his eyes.

>"Oh, oh my."

>Once they reached the castle, Elsa rushed Olaf into the castle's kitchen. A guard ran after her trying to get her attention to some matter about the Southern Isles, but Elsa couldn't wait to test her suspicions. The guard caught up to her at the kitchen door.

>"Your majesty, the ambassador is still waiting for you!"

>Elsa shushed him with a raised finger.

>"Guard this door. When Princess Rapunzel comes, let her in. No one else."

>The guard snapped to attention.

>"Yes, your majesty!"

>Elsa slammed the kitchen door and tore through the shelves for a saucepot. Olaf sat on the countertop and grew more concerned by the minute at her ravenousness. Eventually Elsa found a small pot and went to the cupboards for a jar of honey. She turned to the stove and despaired at the lack of a fire burning within, and scrambled about for the flint.

>Rapunzel burst through the kitchen door just as Elsa lit the stove.

>"We ran all the way back here so you could cook?"

>Elsa poured a jar of honey into the sauce pot and stirred in enough water to loosen it until it could be stirred with a spoon.

>"Olaf, how many of the berries do you have left?"

>"I think about ten."

>"I'm not cooking, Rapunzel, I had an ephiphany about pancake syrup."

>"You did?"

>"When your mother was sick with you as a child, they made her an infusion from the sundrop and she recovered, right?"

>"Yeah, that's why I had such pretty hair, once."

>"The minister collapsed because he got too much of the same power. Your mother only got part of it because it was so diluted."

>"Elsa, what are you doing?"

>She'd stirred the honey over the hot stove until it acquired a white luster, and now took a whisk in hand. Elsa took the pot off the stove and whipped the softened honey until it began to cool and seize, then back onto the heat. While the honey melted again she fished out a mortar and pestle and put it to the snowman's lips.

>"Olaf, give me the rest."

>Olaf disgorged the berries from his mouth into the mortar and Elsa ground them into a paste. Elsa slowly poured the golden mass into the whipped honey and removed it from the heat again to give it a final treatment of whisking.

>"Rapunzel, what if you diluted the sundrop it into something solid?"

>Her intimate knowledge of cooking slowly bubbling to the surface, Rapunzel stood beside Elsa and stared into the pot. The glow hadn't subsided in the heat, and as Elsa whisked more furiously it grew brighter and brighter. Rapunzel backed away from her toward the door.

>"Elsa, it's not something you should play with. That poor man died."

>"But it makes perfect sense, don't you see? It's only diminished in volume, not potency!"

>Elsa stirred a cup of flour into the sticky mix in the pot and spooned it out onto a sheet pan, and covered the blindingly bright mass with a tea towel.

>The Ambassador from the Southern Isles recounted Hans' crimes as heard them from the French nobleman who'd brought the Southern Isles rogue home in his brig.

>"Now then, have I left anything out?"

>Anna shivered at the unpleasant memories of Hans' betrayal and interjected with the one slight he'd overlooked.

>"He made me think he was in love with me. How can anything King Eric has make me feel better about that?"

>"I see."

>Eugene leaned forward and waggled an accusatory finger toward the ambassador.

>"In addition, your Excellency, the Kingdom of Corona will expect the most forthcoming and exuberant assistance in reparation with Arendelle. I pledge Corona's vigilance in seeing your Prince's debts repaid."

>Anna turned to Eugene and nervously raised her eyebrow. He nodded enthusiastically and Anna threw him a thumbs up before focusing her attention on the Isles' man again.

>"What does your King offer?"

>The ambassador pulled a sealed proclamation from his satchel and read it aloud. The most renumerative of the offerings was first.

>"His Highness, King Eric extends to Arendelle the title deed to Vendyssel, in hopes that its proximity to his own Kingdom will encourage a greater cultural and economic exchange between our lands."

>The Prince and Princess stared and blinked, dumbfounded.

>"Would you excuse us for a moment?"

>Anna took Eugene by the hand and rushed him into the hallway.

>"What the heck is he talking about?"

>"I think he's trying to give you a house. A lousy deed? Sounds like he's trying to get off cheap."

>"Well what should we ask him for? Did you think of anything while you were changing?"

>"I say we go back in there and ask for Hans' weight in gold. These royal types love that kind of thing."

>"Well, that is a lot of gold. But shouldn't we try to hit him for something really big first, that way when he says no, he'll think we're letting him off easy. That always worked on Mom and Dad."

>"That's a great plan, strawberry!"

>Anna and Eugene returned, poker-faced and sat beside the ambassador. As far as the ambassador knew the Princess of Arendelle expected as painful a trade as he'd ever negotiated.

>"I already have a house, so you can keep the deed to Vendyssel. I'm more interested in chocolate."

>His eyebrows raised quizzically. the ambassador repeated her last word as a question.

>"Enough chocolate to fill the great hall. That is the price of Arendelle's satisfaction."

>Eugene spoke up too in hope of making the already grandiose request unacceptably enormous.

>"And new ships to replace the ones damaged by ice."

>The ambassador's eyes swiveled down and back to look sidelong at Anna.

>"And that would be all Arendelle would ask?"

>The Prince and Princess nodded in unison.

>"Very well. Allow me to return to go shipboard briefly and I shall return with promissory notes. Agreed?"

>Euguene and Anna nodded again.

>One he'd left the drawing room Anna and Eugene jumped from the couch and screamed with laughter.

>"How did that go so well!? I thought negotiations were a lot harder."

>"Well, red, that's what happens when Flynn Rider's making the deals."

>"I can't wait until Elsa gets back. This is going to be such great news!"

>"Rapunzel's not going to believe I made it through like a real prince."


>Meanwhile in the castle kitchen the Princess of Corona stared in wonder as her cousin chilled the paste bearing the miraculous juice of the sundrop. The ice melted as quickly as Elsa could freeze it, until finally the shine below the towel died down and the pan seized up with a series of loud cracks. Elsa hurriedly upended it on the counter. Candy. Rapunzel knew it from her books in an instant as Elsa took a huge knife and cut it into squares.

>"You made sundrop turkish delight?"

>"Just like mom used to."

>Elsa sighed as she took a piece and held it up to her eye. Yellow specks riddled its surface and glowed at her like flakes of gold catching the sun.