Froyo Vignette 1

 "We'll see what his twelve big brothers think of his behavior."

 

- - -

 

"Leave us."

 

The court of the Southern Islands filed out in a hush. Hans knelt in his tattered finery, left alone in the harsh gaze of his eldest brother, Albrecht. Albrecht, Prince Regnant. "Albrecht the Just." Albrecht, with his steely eyes behind narrow framed lens, with his graying temples, with his immaculately groomed mustache, might any other time be mistaken for a kindly intellectual. But in this room, there was no doubt to his royal nature.

 

"Albrecht, Brother, I can explain-"

 

"Can you?"

 

Hans raised his head, his eyes pleading to his brother. "The Queen of Arendelle is a witch! She commands winter itself, I was only trying to save-"

 

"That is not what demands explanation." Hans immediately lowered his gaze away from his king again, having seen a pale flicker behind his brother's shoulder. "Ambition needs no justification. But what is unforgivable..." Hans screamed as he felt an impossible weight come crashing down on his bent knee, shattering the bone, but his brother's words still cut through the wall of pain he inflicted. "What is unforgivable is that you failed."

 

Hans gripped his knee, curling into the smallest creature he could. The shadow flickered again, raising Hans by his throat to look at his king. "You do not have the courage, the willpower, to commit a true betrayal. You can break a teenage girl's heart, but you know, and I know, that had you succeeded, Arendelle would fall under my suzerain. This, and only this, is why I will forgive your crimes. But failing? That requires correction."

 

Hans's vision blurred, his hollow gasps for air having done nothing to save him. "I will make you better, Hans. Just as father made all of us better. And you will prove your usefulness to our kingdom."

 

Hans felt a blade pierce his side, and something beyond pain filled his mind.