fandomhigh | BWI Airport Portalocity Lounge, Saturday Morning

Celia had had a trying morning, thus far.

She'd boarded a train in New York at the crack of dawn with a large trunk that she was pretending to struggle to carry. Hector had given her a cursory pat on the top of her hat and a tug to one stray curl, accompanied by a stern look that Celia knew meant Don't make me regret this. She'd fallen asleep on the train, and the conductor had awoken her...here. She'd not expected Maryland to be quite so much...brighter, or louder or confusing -- and in fact, Celia had been to Baltimore before, once, and she was very sure that this was unsettlingly different. She'd stumbled off the train, been ushered through a security checkpoint filled with people dressed strangely and giving her even stranger looks and now she was...here.

If not for the glittering sign bearing the name 'Fandom High,' she'd think she was in the wrong place.

Celia slumped gratefully into a chair, dropping her trunk on the floor beside her, and let out a sigh. Then she immediately straightened up. It wouldn't do to have her new classmates think her a lazy slob at first meeting.

[YAY NEWBIE SHUTTLE.]

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"A little," Celia said with a slightly shy smile. "I'm still -- practicing."

Surely this wasn't the challenge. She wasn't ready yet, he'd insisted she wasn't.

"A ball, I think, sounds very much like opening night," she added. "Too many people, each of them a little drunk, and everyone's too excited to be truly quiet."

"As far as I can remember, that sounds about right," Elsa agreed, ducking her head a little, smiling faintly as she did so. "But like I said, it's been quite some time, and there never really was anything for a child that age to do at a ball except try to keep from getting underfoot."

There was a reason children weren't generally invited to them.

"They might be more fun, now that you're above waist-height," Celia offered, smile widening. "Though I'd prefer a bit of a quiet corner over a crowd any evening. I'd probably be a terrible debutante."

"I imagine you'd be about as good at it as I am," Elsa noted. "I can't even dance. A quiet corner is really, very much my speed."

Really. Very much.

"I can't dance either," Celia said conspiratorially, "but I'm just gifted enough to fool most people into thinking I'm not a complete disaster when I do."

Gifted in tricking the mind, that is, not in dancing.

"I can't even fake it," Elsa replied, and if her laugh was about as much awkwardness as conspiracy, she'd thank Celia not to mention it. "I would probably just try to get someone else to dance in my place, if someone expected it of me. Which is terribly rude, I know, but..."

She attempted an uncertain smile to go with that awkward laugh.

"... Better that than I hurt somebody?"

By stomping on their toes, of course.

"I've heard our shoes might be considered deadly weapons, in the right circumstance," Celia said, agreeing. Or at least, she thought she was agreeing. "My father once danced with a lady who stepped on his toe with a boot so pointed that he had to perform all of his tricks seated on a stool the next evening."

Celia rather thought he'd probably deserved it, but then, she hadn't been there to see it happen. She'd been in the dressing room of the theater, asleep in an armchair until he'd finally come home at dawn.

She was less homesick by the second, really.

And Elsa was at least slightly more at ease than she had been. This conversation was helping her relax, slightly.

"Tricks? Is your father a magician of some sort, then?"

Of the smoke-and-mirrors persuasion, of course. Elsa wouldn't have been comfortable at all, asking about the real thing.

Celia smiled a little ruefully. "Yes. My dear father is Prospero the Enchanter. I don't suppose you've heard of him? I don't think we've ever toured in Arendelle."

"The name isn't familiar," Elsa noted, "but then, we haven't had anybody tour through Arendelle in years. The gates have been closed since... since about the same time I last attended a ball."

You know. For reasons. Who knew?

"The gates have been closed?" Celia repeated. "Did you have trade or immigration disputes?"

It was the only reason she could think of a city cutting itself off from travelers.

"No, it was... something internal." Elsa bit her lip, unconsciously wrapping her arms around herself. "The King gave the order to shut the gate one day, suddenly."

The King. She pulled in another slow breath.

She missed him.

Celia was quiet for a moment, watching Elsa and unsure how exactly to move forward when it was obviously a sensitive topic.

"Then you must be excited to be out beyond them, at least for awhile," she offered, finally.

"It's... a little overwhelming," Elsa admitted, her smile now mostly betraying her relief that Celia's question let her skirt around the messier parts of Arendelle's gates closing. "The method of travel aside, there are so many people here."

"I'll be grateful when we get to the school," Celia agreed. "Surely they'll let us have a bit of peace before classes start, don't you think?"

Keep dreaming, Celia.

"I can only hope so," Elsa agreed with a nod. "Perhaps we'll get a chance to settle into our rooms some before we have to worry about being present in a classroom."

Oh, sweet summer children.

BWI Airport Portalocity Lounge, Saturday Morning

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