Letters from Joan – Anna Week Day 1: Talking to the Pictures on the Walls

It is lovingly folded and bound with a ribbon of scarlet. The paper is fine, of a crisp blue color, like the paper Papa often writes proclamations on.



With her tiny hands, Anna plucks the letter from off the Portrait Room seat. Perhaps it is one of Papa’s proclamations. Perhaps it is an important message from a foreign and distant land! From some other king or a dashing prince! But no… Taking it up, she sees, in a dignified hand, the words, To Anna. The little princess gasps. She unfurls the paper and, with wide and eager eyes, begins to read.

No message she finds of great royal import, no plea from a dragon-burned knight. Only a single, simple, earnest statement, Anna, your sister loves you. And a signature, Joan of Arc.

Anna’s great eyes grow wider. She looks up at the mighty countenance of Joan, with whom she has talked many a morning, afternoon, and evening. Just yesterday, she had poured her whole heart out to the figure in the painting.

She had let tears spill down her ruddy cheeks as she whimpered helplessly, “Doesn’t Elsa love me anymore? Why did she go away? What have I done?”

Remembering those words, Anna’s mouth falls open. She makes the littlest noise of wonderment somewhere within her throat. Her whole body shivers with joy.

In the days that follow, Anna finds similar letters, all done up with the same care and sensitivity, all from Joan.

Your sister loves you so much, they say. She’s sorry for everything. Don’t cry, they say. You deserve so much more than tears. Please.

Anna’s heart swells with hope as she reads them. She jumps up to the painting of Joan and tries to hug it close.

If Anna were a little older, she might have recognized her sister’s hand. And if she went to the Portrait Room in the wee hours of the morning, she might have found her sister there, like a ghost, pressing a letter to her lips as though it were sacred before gently setting it down…

