Forest of Shadows

by Kamilla Benko

  From the dressing room, Anna suddenly heard footsteps followed by voices.

  “Poor thing, there is so much on her mind,” a voice floated through the door. Anna recognized it as Gerda’s.

  “She bears so much,” Kai agreed, his voice loud and clear as they passed right by her door.

  The council meeting must be over by now. Which meant that at any second, there would be a knock on her door, and Elsa would ask to come in. Any second now, she’d tell Anna how sorry she was that it took her so long to listen to Anna’s suggestion and that Anna was right, they needed to look at the books in the secret room. Then Anna would show her Secrets of the Magic Makers and the loose page with the spell, and they would fix everything. They would do it together. After all, they were sisters.

  Anna sat up straighter on her rug and waited…and waited. The knock never came.

  ——

  Anna’s dreams were nightmare-tossed yet again. She dreamed of dark shadows in treetops, Earth Giants destroying the village, and a shipwreck on a stormy sea. And then—ice. Anna had told Elsa she did not remember the moments during which she’d turned to ice. But that was a lie. She would never forget the horror of warm flesh turning cold, then all sensation fleeing as her warm blood frosted into stone-cold crystal. She would never forget the last bit of heat escaping through her final breath, would never forget seeing her sister sob, and the unique pain of not being able to do absolutely anything at all. Tonight, Anna’s nightmares would not let her forget. And so Anna’s dream morphed….

  She was a girl of ice, standing outside the castle, only able to peer into the window and never enter through the doors. Inside, she could see Elsa reading aloud to a girl, whose glossy white hair was pulled back in two braids. Anna didn’t recognize the girl—her back was to the window—but she did recognize the girl’s dress, a soft green one with sunflowers embroidered on the hem. Anna’s birthday dress. She could see Kristoff entering the room, strumming his guitar and smiling at the girl.

  Who are you? Anna wanted to yell at the ivory-haired girl. Turn around! But her frozen lips could not speak, and Anna had to wait, impatiently and horribly, until, at last, the girl turned around to reveal…Anna’s eyes. Anna’s nose. Anna’s smile. The white-haired girl was Anna—but she wasn’t. Anna had been replaced. By this other person. And no one in the room, not Kristoff, Olaf, Kai, Gerda—not even her own sister—realized it. Or maybe they did and they simply did not care. A high howl pierced the air, and the ice shattered. It broke away from Anna like a suit of armor, revealing her true self beneath. Suddenly, she could run, but the castle had shifted into a wide white tundra, and there was no place to hide before the wolf appeared. Because it was already there.

  Without turning around, Anna felt the yellow eyes of the wolf fixed on her back. She ran. Yet, no matter how hard she pumped her legs or how fast her heart beat, nothing seemed to change. There was just a flat expanse of gray snow below her and even grayer sky above. The world was colorless and bleak and without hope, and then—

  An explosion of red pain burst through her vision as the wolf’s claws raked and sank into her back.

  Anna expected to wake up—she always woke up.

  But this time, she didn’t.

  Instead, the wolf flipped her over onto her back, opened its huge jaws, and swallowed her whole.

  Anna’s eyes flew open. Sweat sheened her skin and she felt hollow, as if her insides had been scooped out, like a gutted pumpkin. Something prodded her back.

  “Troll’s toes!” Anna exclaimed to nobody as she pulled the book out from beneath her. Sometime in the night, she must have dozed off on the floor and rolled onto the book, its thick spine digging into her own, explaining the sharp pain of the wolf’s claws in her nightmare. Anna let her head sink back onto the floor and flung her hand over her eyes.

  “This is getting ridiculous,” she muttered, hoping the sound of her voice would chase away the lingering fear. “You’re too old for this kind of stuff.” Though, she didn’t feel old. In fact, that was kind of the problem. These last two days, she had felt oh so very young indeed. And that ache that always lurked just beneath the sea of her thoughts surfaced, sending a ripple of sadness through her.

  How she missed her parents. Her mother would have fixed everything with a story or two about silly and magical things, like shaggy goats outwitting trolls, or an empress who forgot her clothes. And her father, he would have chased away any lingering fear with a candle that crackled and emitted a sweet, soothing scent, or a warm mug of hot chocolate.

  Mmmm…hot chocolate…with marshmallows.

  “Come on, Anna.” She spoke out loud again, trying to shake the loneliness. “They’re not here, but you can definitely get your own mug of hot chocolate. It’s not like the wolf is hiding beneath the bed or something.” She let out a soft little “Ha!” for good measure. The sound wasn’t very convincing, but there was no one she had to convince but herself. And so, she got off the floor, and the terrible, awful nightmare that had ended differently than it ever had before—with the wolf finally winning—slipped from her tired mind.

  Anna realized she was still in her travel cloak, but she didn’t care. She could change into her pajamas once she got back. Taking a flickering candle from her bedside table, Anna was her own source of light in a castle of darkness. The flame was weak, yet just bright enough for her to make her way through the familiar halls and down to the kitchen. And—wait. What was that?

  Lifting the candle up a little higher, Anna paused on the stairs. She thought she’d seen a bit of movement, a skim of white. But as she strained her eyes to peer beyond the candle’s light, Anna didn’t see anything unusual or out of place or snarling with fangs.…

  “You’re being silly,” she chided herself. “Keep going. Remember: marshmallows!” Still, the memory of the nightmare resurfaced and trailed her through the corridors, down the stairs, and into the kitchen.

  The kitchen was the beating heart of the castle, the cheery red-glow of its stoves producing delicious banquets and even more delicious heat that cut through the autumn’s creeping damp.

  Tonight, though, the kitchen felt oddly empty and quiet. The pots and pans, instead of being clanged around by busy cooks, were hanging quietly on their hooks in neat lines next to colorful garlands of garlic, dried peppers, and herbs that draped from the ceiling, dropping down to tickle the lids of jams, beets, and pickled herring. Usually, at least one cook remained to keep an eye on the fire stoves, but Elsa had dismissed the cook staff, too, including Olina—which meant only Anna, Elsa, Olaf, Gerda, and Kai were sleeping in the castle that night. Which explained why it felt particularly quiet, dark, and empty.

  That—and the fact that Sven and Kristoff still weren’t back yet. At least, Anna didn’t think they were back yet—she didn’t know for sure. Usually, outings to the Valley of the Living Rock didn’t last this long, and since he knew things weren’t going too well with the villagers, he’d know not to linger. He was a mountain man; he could take care of himself. But still, Anna began to worry and hoped they had made it back. Despite her optimism, she always worried for those she loved. It was what made Anna…Anna.

  She sighed, heart heavy, and shuffled over to the stove. Making hot chocolate was simple, and while she wasn’t great with cooking that required twenty different detailed steps and ingredients and lots of fine chopping, she was adept at mixing delicious chocolate powder with milk and setting it on the stovetop. But as Anna stirred the pot of warming milk to stop a skin from forming, she heard a soft clatter.

  She stopped stirring. “Hello?” she called hopefully. “Kristoff, is that you?”

  No response.

  She thought she heard the sound of footsteps fading away, but from the other side of the kitchen leading toward the stairs. Maybe Kristoff was wearing his earmuffs and hadn’t been able to hear her through the fluff. Typical Kristoff. Or maybe it was Olaf. Perhaps he was up for a night of reading a gripping passage about existentialism or a book o
n another -ism.

  Quickly, Anna turned off the stove and removed the milk. The hot chocolate would have to wait. The footsteps were too intriguing. If it was Olaf, she’d leave it alone. But if it was Kristoff, she had to know what the trolls had said about the Blight. Still…it wasn’t really cold enough yet for Kristoff to be wearing his earmuffs. Like Elsa, the cold didn’t seem to bother him as much as it did the non-mountain folk. After all, he’d grown up in the cold. Taking the candle, Anna followed the footsteps up the stairs to the rest of the castle.

  “Kristoff? Is that you?” she asked.

  It sounded like the person was walking through the portrait gallery, then the second great hall, and finally, the Great Hall. She stood in the doorway, lifting her candle as high as she could. It only shed light on the polished wooden floor. She hadn’t heard the footsteps leave the Great Hall, which meant Kristoff, if it was him, was still there in the dark room with Anna. She stepped inside, peering behind each column that lined the wall of the cavernous room. She yanked at curtains and moved from one to the next.

  “Kristoff?” Anna called. Her candle’s flame danced this way and that. Nothing, nothing, nothing, two yellow eyes, nothing, nothing—Anna stopped breathing.

  Two yellow eyes.

  She brought the candle back around and saw the form of a wolf.

  White and massive, exactly like the one in her nightmare.

  Except this time, it was different.

  Because Anna was awake.

  ANNA HAD ONCE HEARD that when someone faced death, their life flashed before them.

  But as she stood there in the gloom of the Great Hall, with the yellow eyes of the wolf fixed on her, it wasn’t her life that flashed through her mind—it was the details of the Great Hall. The quivering red curtains that outlined each pillar. The gleam of the curtain’s rod in the glow of the candle. The heat of the candle wax as it dripped onto her skin. She noticed all of this in the breath it took for the wolf to growl. Then it leapt at her.

  Anna jumped out of the way, the knife-sharp claws missing her by mere inches. The wolf growled in frustration, and the sound seemed to reach into Anna and scrape against her insides, but she managed to drop her candle, grab the curtain, and tug—hard, sending the curtain’s rod clattering onto the floor. Snatching it up, Anna half ran, half stumbled toward the great double doors that seemed as far away as the moon.

  One stride, then another, and then—she was through!

  Slamming the doors shut, she pushed the curtain rod through the two handles, locking the doors in place just as the wolf threw its bulk against the other side with all its might.

  THUMP!

  The doors rattled, but stayed shut.

  THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!

  How long would the curtain rod hold? Anna had never seen a wolf so large. Or rather, she had, but only in…Something stirred inside of her, something she knew she needed to examine closer, but the little feeling about what could have brought the wolf from her dreams into the castle would have to wait for when she wasn’t running for her life.

  “HELP!” Anna yelled as she sprinted away. “WOLF! BIG, MASSIVE WOLF! IN THE CASTLE!” The only thing that beat faster than her heart was the single insistent question pounding through her brain: What to do? What to do? What to do? She’d faced a pack of wolves before, when she and Kristoff had journeyed to the North Mountain to try to find Elsa—but Kristoff and Sven weren’t here right now. She needed to find Elsa, and quickly. She flew up the stairs in the second great hall. She needed to find help. But as she sprinted down the hall that led to Elsa’s bedroom, she saw a flash of white up ahead. The wolf—it had somehow escaped the Great Hall!

  She groaned. It was just like in her dreams; the large-as-a-bull wolf seemed to outwit and outrun her at every turn. But how? She knew wolves were fast, but they couldn’t possibly be this fast. Gasping for breath, Anna pivoted and sprinted down another hallway. She turned left, right, and then left again. She didn’t know exactly where her feet were taking her, but she realized she would be near Kai’s room if she made a final left. Maybe she could hide in there!

  As the castle’s steward, Kai had protocol for everything, from the right way to hold a teacup to the exacting ritual of snuffing out the candles and oil lamps one wick at a time. There was a chance that maybe he already had a plan for a wolf breaking into the castle. A wolf! A wolf! A wolf! Her breath came short and fast. From somewhere behind her, she thought she heard a howl. Only twenty more feet until she reached Kai’s room…five feet…one foot…

  “KAI!” Anna catapulted into the steward’s room and bolted the lock behind her. She noticed his form lying in his bed. “Kai, wake up! There’s a wolf in the castle! What do we do?”

  But the man remained completely still.

  Unease trickled through Anna. It wasn’t as if she were being quiet. In fact, she was being very loud. Why wasn’t Kai waking up? She lit a candle from his bedside to see.

  Kai twisted and turned under his blanket, and as the light hit his eyelids, he muttered, “No, please…don’t!”

  He was in the middle of a nightmare.

  Anna knew from personal experience that no one should be woken in the middle of a bad dream.

  But there was a wolf now pawing outside the room.

  Usual rules did not apply.

  “Kai, wake up!’ Anna shook the steward’s arm. “Please, please, please wake up.”

  Kai’s eyes snapped open, and Anna staggered back. The steward’s eyes were usually the same brown-green color as changing autumn leaves or muddied creeks. But instead of looking into warm hazel eyes, she was staring into two inky pits. His pupils had swallowed his irises, turning his eyes completely black. Just like the cattle.

  Suddenly, Kai sat upright, and screamed.

  And screamed.

  And screamed.

  And screamed.

  He screamed as though long claws were tearing out his heart. As though sharp teeth were sinking into his skin. As though he were being eaten alive from the inside out.

  Anna placed a hand on his shoulder to try to comfort him, but he didn’t react to her touch. It was as though she were invisible. Kai couldn’t see her—couldn’t sense her. He was lost.

  The pawing outside the door grew faster. Hungrier. More desperate. And as the scratching grew in intensity, Kai’s black eyes suddenly shifted again. One moment, they were black, and the next, they were yellow…and glowing.

  Anna’s heart seemed to fly up into her throat and she almost choked as she staggered backward.

  What was happening?

  The scratching stopped. Or had it? Anna couldn’t be sure, as Kai’s scream continued to fill the room, making her clutch her ears. She needed to get out of there. She needed to find Elsa, Olaf, Kristoff, and Sven, to warn the others. The people of Arendelle were in danger. All of this was Anna’s worst fear, worse than her wolf-filled nightmare. Because it was real. It was happening. How and why, she would still have to think on later.

  She took a step toward the door. Kai’s yellow eyes stayed transfixed somewhere beyond her, as though witnessing unseen horrors. She crept by him and pressed her ear to the door. Nothing. Not so much as a yip. But what if the wolf was out there, waiting for her in silence? And worse: what if it wasn’t out there, and was headed for others instead?

  “ELSA!” Her sister’s name ripped from her throat as she undid the lock and ran out of Kai’s room, leaving him screaming and writhing. “ELSA! ELSA! ELSA!” she yelled.

  Minutes before, Anna had felt the quiet of her home. But it wasn’t quiet anymore. Now she could hear more screams echoing throughout the castle. Screams she recognized as Gerda’s. Anna had the sinking feeling that if she went to her, she would be too late, that Gerda would have the glowing yellow eyes like Kai. She practically sobbed. “ELSA!”

  The door to their parents’ bedroom slammed open, and a moment later, Elsa appeared in the hallway, still in her work dress but wrapped in their mother’s scarf, and with heavy bags und
er her eyes. Olaf waddled behind her, in a fuzzy yellow robe and with a matching sleep mask pushed up on his forehead. He also held the snow globe from earlier.

  “What’s wrong?” Elsa asked.

  At the sound of her sister’s voice, Anna almost collapsed with relief that Elsa wasn’t asleep and screaming. And Elsa’s eyes were blue—blue as the sky, and blue as a song.

  “A-a wolf!” Anna sputtered, wrapping Elsa and Olaf in a fierce embrace. “Wolf! Kai! Gerda!” she gasped and then choked out, “Eyes! Glowing yellow eyes!”

  “Elsa,” Olaf whispered, “she’s not making any sense.”

  The next second, Anna felt a cool hand on her forehead as her sister checked her temperature. At Elsa’s touch, Anna felt her frenzy subside, just a little.

  She wasn’t sure if it was Elsa’s magic, or if it was just because the gesture was so familiar and comforting, but it made her want to cry. Their mother had done the same thing whenever Anna had woken up in a sweat from the fearsome nightmare that had plagued her childhood.

  Anna managed to take a deep, shuddering breath. “That’s because nothing makes sense!” After they bolted upstairs into the council chambers and locked the doors, Anna told them what had happened. The story came out jumbled, details piling up all out of order. Elsa didn’t interrupt. She listened, and when Anna at last came to the end of it, she gave her a firm and understanding nod.

  “Are you sure you didn’t just have a bad dream?” Elsa said.

  “It sounds like it,” said Olaf, pushing his sleep mask up a little higher.

  Anna stared at Elsa. “What? No! There is a wolf in the castle!”

  Elsa rubbed her temples. “It’s late. We should get back to bed.”

  “What?” Anna pulled away from her sister. “You don’t believe me?”

  “Question.” Olaf had unbolted the lock and peeked through the doors. “Wolves usually have four paws, two eyes, and long, sharp teeth, right?” When the sisters nodded, he pressed a hand to his mouth and tilted his head. “Then I’m preeeetty sure we should believe Anna.”