To Break Walls

Chapter 16 Jack's POV

Wow so this is super short, but there's more chapters guys haha.  Love you guys!!!! Thanks so much for reading. I appreciate you all. Maybe leave a comment for me? :)

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I had taken a while getting food for Elsa, longer than usual. It didn't help that I had left way later than I expected to. I couldn't bring myself to leave.

I had wanted to get her something special. That's when I remembered her favorite pastry, some kind of raspberry-filled bread with chocolate icing on top. I'd had to go to three different places to find it, and even now I wasn't sure that it was it. It had chocolate icing drizzled across, that's all I knew. I hoped it was the right one. One top of that, I carried a sack with some soup, bread, and canned food. Enough to last a while.

It was well into morning by the time I left Arendelle. Hopefully Elsa would have slept in a little later than usual. I hurried back to the ice castle.

There was something weird, something off when the castle first came into view. A huge mound of snow that hadn't been there before, the whole area just seemed disturbed. I shook my head clear of the thought and landed on the balcony. The doors were shut, but they usually were on the cold days. This one seemed particularly cold and dreary, the sky dark and snow falling.

I opened up the doors and it was a moment before I perceived what was in front of me. The entire room was red. The ice was red and black, cracks all along the walls. Ice spikes were all pointing inward on one thing. One person. Elsa was crouched down on the floor, her head in her hands.

"Elsa?" I gasped. I felt the sack drop and glass shattered inside of it. I rushed to Elsa, trying to figure out what was wrong. I took one of her hands, unsure of what to do.

"What happened?" I asked anxiously. She looked up at me, slowly and I felt my heart break as I saw her face. It was stricken and her eyes were full of tears. I took both of her hands in mine and held them tightly.

"Elsa, why are you upset? Tell me. Please."

"Anna," she whispered. "Anna came to see me." I tried to figure out what direction this was taking.

"Did you two fight?"

"She- she tried to get me to go back to Arendelle, but I refused. Say- Saying that I had to be here, s- so I wouldn't hurt her. Jack, Arendelle is covered in snow. I've frozen it."

The words hit me like a brick. I had been to Arendelle a total of three times since I met Elsa. All the times, I never questioned that its state was unnatural. It never crossed my mind that it should be summer. I had never imagined that Elsa could do that.

Elsa seemed to be along the same train of thought.

"All those times you went to Arendelle. . . Why didn't you ever tell me?" she demanded, tears streaking down her face.

"I never realized, I didn't see," I tried to say but she just shook her head and turned away. "Elsa, I don't understand why you're so upset."

"Because I can't be rid of it!" she yelled. "I can never be free! I was supposed to alone up here and now I can't because they want me to unfreeze it. But I can't! They don't understand that. I just want to be rid of this curse!"

"Elsa," I said, my ears ringing. "Don't say that. It's not a curse. Don't say that."

"It's my curse! It's destroyed my life, destroyed my chance at a life! It destroys everything and I just can't do it anymore, Jack. I can't do this anymore. I don't know what to do."

She tried to say something else but it became inaudible because she had started crying.

"Don't cry, Elsa. Please don't cry," I begged, pulling her into my lap. "It's okay. We can fix this. We can do this."

"We can't," she sobbed. "I can't do this anymore. I c- can't control it. I try to but I can't."

"It's not something that's meant to be controlled," I said.

"I should be able to! I have to control it. But I can't." Her voice was clearer now, more steady.

"It'll be okay. We can fix this."

"No, we can't!" she shouted, leaping up. The walls around us were cracking, a swirling mix of amber and red.

"Elsa," I said, desperately. I reached out to grab her but she stepped away from me.

"Just leave me alone, Jack. I have to be alone. You have to leave."

"I'm not leaving," I told her angrily. She ignored me and walked out onto the balcony. What had I done? I didn't know what to do.

"I just don't know anymore, Jack," she said, suddenly sounding exhausted. She turned to me and I walked out onto the balcony. I pulled her up against my chest and held her tightly.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. It was all I could think to say. She hugged me and I kissed the top of her head. "Come on, lets go inside."

I picked her up and she faintest trace of a smile crossed her face. But it was gone before I could say something about it. I set her down in bed and went to pick up the sack that I had dropped in the floor.

"You might feel better if you ate something," I suggested, pulling out the pastry. Her eyes flickered.

"Is that one of those raspberry chocolate pastries?"

"I think so," I said sheepishly. "I wasn't exactly sure."

I handed it to her and sat down by her feet. She took a small bite and smiled.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome," I said simply. "Elsa, things will be better. It can only get better from here, right?"

She opened her mouth to answer me. That's when the ground started trembling and we heard the roar outside.