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Chapter Text

When Cassandra had first heard the news that the Lost Princess had finally been found, she had shrugged and continued eating breakfast. Aside from the passing satisfaction of learning the answer to a decades-old, kingdom-wide myth, the arrival of the Lost Princess didn’t particularly interest her. Her father might be home less often, now that there would be more guard detail at the palace, but aside from that she didn’t anticipate this news to affect her life much.

Cassandra had goals to focus on, and unless the Lost Princess was about to gift her a feathered helmet and saber with which she could proudly take her place beside her father in the high ranks of the Royal Guard, then she wasn’t a distraction that Cassandra could afford. So when her father had first come to her with King Frederic’s offer of becoming lady-in-waiting to the princess, she was hesitant to accept. As a lady-in-waiting, her duties would be limited to sewing, dressing, bathing, and all-around nannying her charge and could not be further away from the heart-racing swordplay that called to her from the barracks. And why her, anyway? Cassandra was hardly known for having a gentle hand or nurturing manners, and in her opinion was clearly not the logical choice for the position. Perhaps her father just wanted her to stay out of trouble — she could only obscure her nighttime excursions from him so much.

In the end, Cassandra accepted the position, mostly because it would probably harm her chances of making it into the Royal Guard one day to turn up her nose at an invitation from the King of Corona. But a part of her, to which she would never give voice, was...intrigued by the prospect of being so close to the legendary princess. She had no idea what to expect; based on the rumors around town, she had been held prisoner for 18 years, staged an escape using a dangerous thief as a hostage, intimidated violent criminals into giving her safe passage from pursuers, reduced her former captor to dust before throwing her out a window, and then brought a dead man back to life just because she could. If all that was true, then she sounded pretty badass, and Cassandra was looking forward to learning a thing or two from such a fearless adventurer.

One glance at her new liege was all it took to shatter those hopes to pieces.

The Lost Princess — Rapunzel, as she enthusiastically informed Cassandra upon their introduction — was like if the unburdened cheer from a whole kingdom had been shoved into one person’s soul upon her birth, and now she was simply bubbling over with it. Far from the rugged rogue Cassandra had foolishly expected, Rapunzel was built like a reed in the wind, with short hair the color of chocolate cupcakes framing her heart-shaped face. She had the disposition of a golden retriever and greeted every new person like they were her personal hero, shaking hands with excessive vigor and a buck-toothed smile so wide it nearly escaped the bounds of her freckled cheeks. She frolicked through the palace on bare feet and carried around a weird lizard on her shoulder everywhere. Cassandra literally could not have imagined someone less suited to her personality. Finding the positives in this lifestyle change was becoming increasingly difficult.

It was a period of about 12 seconds after meeting Rapunzel before Cassandra learned that the dangerous thief she had traveled with was not, in fact, her hostage, but rather her boyfriend. And even he denied Cassandra the pleasure of living up to her expectations of a renowned criminal, because the only thing he wanted to do all day was examine his pores at the spa and try on increasingly fancy adornments. Cassandra figured they were both vapid airheads who deserved each other.

But despite her reasoning and conversational incompatibilities, something about the princess drew in Cassandra’s fascination. She couldn’t put a name to it. It was like a retinal after-image — whenever Cassandra tried to focus on it, her perception of it dispersed. It lay somewhere between Rapunzel’s ink-stained knuckles and the depth behind her eyes, hinting at an unspoken pain that showed itself when the princess thought no one was looking at her. Whatever it was, it urged Cassandra to stay by her side, at least until she understood it better.

It was because of this something that Cassandra didn’t mind confiding in Rapunzel about the true nature of her ambitions, and had felt uncharacteristically self-conscious the first time the princess had come along to watch her sword training. It was the reason Cassandra caught herself sneaking glimpses at Rapunzel while she was painting, noting with a smile how she tilted her head to the side and stuck her tongue out between her lips when she was trying to mix the right color. And even though she didn’t understand it yet, it was also the root cause of her distaste for Eugene; she had reasoned to herself that she simply didn’t approve of someone with a long history of taking advantage of people, or just that his egotistical attitude rubbed her the wrong way. But their personal differences couldn’t justify the way that her heart would leap into her throat and her breath would escape her every time the man would lean in to kiss the princess. That was due to something entirely different.

It wasn’t until a month into her duties, during the Contest of Crowns, that Cassandra got a grasp on the nature of it. During the tournament, Rapunzel’s grating whimsy seemed augmented to inhuman levels and Cassandra was so sick of it she nearly gave up on Rapunzel and whatever it was that kept her close to her, and moved halfway across the continent to Ingvarr.

As appealing as the offer to train amongst a culture of women warriors should’ve been to her, a part of her was ashamed that she was even considering it. So she was certain if she told Rapunzel of her plans before the final contest, she would’ve made sad puppy eyes and said some saccharine garbage about friendship and loyalty, but the spark of that something flared to life when Rapunzel defied expectations and promised to support Cassandra’s dream. It burned in the back of Cassandra’s mind as the capture-the-flag battle pushed the two of them to their limit, and when Cassandra abandoned the flag that would have finally put a sword in her hand so she could help Rapunzel to her feet, she was finally able to give it a name.

Cassandra had a hopeless crush on the Lost Princess.

—

Two years later, Cassandra’s feelings had not diminished, nor had she done a single thing about them. It wasn’t that she was a coward, it’s just that there was one tiny little thing that forced her to hold her tongue for all this time.

“Mornin’, sunshine! How is my light of my life today? I hope you’re not tired of horse racing yet, because I’ve got a doozy of a bet going with Stan right now and I’m gonna need your help to shove his outdated mustache in it!”

Eugene Fitzherbert loped casually through the doors of Rapunzel’s chambers while Cassandra was busy choosing the princess’s outfit for the day. He had a habit of chattering instead of waiting for people to respond to him, and every word out of his mouth raised Cassandra’s blood pressure by another degree. But she had long since trained herself to walk the line between playful disdain and genuine loathing when it came to Eugene, so that she didn’t wear the contents of her heart too plainly. She could pretend to tolerate this man who had Rapunzel’s affections for reasons Cassandra would never understand for the simple reason that she didn’t want to upset Rapunzel.

The princess swung her legs over her silken bedsheets and crossed the room to Eugene in her night slip to greet him with a small kiss. “Well, I’m sure there’s a more polite way to show up Stan that doesn’t involve his mustache, but I’d love to go for a ride with you today!” she said, already turning to seek out her riding boots.

“I don’t think so, Raps,” Cassandra interrupted, stopping Rapunzel mid-stride with a hand on her shoulder. “Your whole day has been planned out down to the minute and there’s no time to spare on an excursion like that. Tell Stan it’ll have to wait, Fitzherbert.”

Eugene rolled his eyes at her. “Always with the positive energy, Miss Rain-On-My-Parade.”

Cassandra twitched an eyebrow. “It’s not my job to be positive. It’s my job to be realistic. As much as I’m sure you’d enjoy a ride together right now, I doubt the ambassador from Rochester would appreciate his hearing being snubbed so you two could have a laugh.”

Eugene opened his mouth to counter, but Rapunzel held up her hand with a sigh. “She’s right, Eugene. I can’t today. But I’ll...pencil it in for next week!” she said with a hopeful smile.

“I’ll hold you to that, blondie,” the man said, clicking his tongue as he backed out through the door. “See you for dinner, though?”

“See you then!” Rapunzel said, sending him off with a spirited wave. Her smile wilted just a little and her eyes dropped to the floor as she made her way to the pale green satin dress Cassandra had selected for her.

“I know it’s a pain, Raps, but you can’t just shirk your duties,” Cassandra said gently, sensing the drop in her mood. She figured that for someone who had been trapped in a tower all her life, having such limited freedom even after her escape must be pretty disheartening.

“No, no, I know,” Rapunzel said, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear. “It’s not that. It’s just...I hate to disappoint Eugene, you know?”

“Eugene?” Cassandra blinked. “He seemed fine to me. What are you worried about?”

Rapunzel bit her lip. “He seems fine, but I know this is hard for him. My life has changed so much since we met, and I’m not the same person I was when we escaped the tower. I can’t give him as much of myself as I had before.”

For a moment Cassandra’s brows drew in consternation at the fact that Rapunzel was worried about how hard it was for Eugene to live his dream life in a castle surrounded by luxuries, while she herself was clearly bearing the burden of the lifestyle change. She considered pointing this out, but decided against it. “He’s happy to have whatever you can give him,” she assured her.

“I know you’re right, but I just can’t shake the feeling that...he would be happier with somebody else,” Rapunzel’s voice got softer with each word she spoke, like this was something she was afraid she could somehow speak into being true.

Cassandra’s heart tripped over itself at these words, but she quickly righted it. The shameful but honest part of her was delighted at the prospect of Eugene leaving Rapunzel for someone else. She had never thought he was right for her and of course the longing in her heart ached to push him out of the picture. But Rapunzel loved Eugene, no matter how much Cassandra wished it weren’t so, and the part of her that strove to keep Rapunzel smiling overpowered the selfish, stupid part. Cassandra put a comforting hand on the princess’s shoulder and offered her a reassuring smile. “He counts his lucky stars every day that you chose him. No one in the Seven Kingdoms could make anyone happier. Now let’s get you ready for the day, alright?”

—

Cassandra wondered if her pep talk with Rapunzel had somehow manifested the disaster that followed in the form of Eugene’s proposal.

As a general principle, Cassandra detested the idea of public proposals, especially ones during a celebration in honor of the receiver. The scenario not only puts pressure on the other person to say yes or humiliate their partner in front of a crowd, but detracts from the commendation of their accomplishments. But she should have expected to leave it to Eugene Fitzherbert to insert his foot fully into his mouth by making Rapunzel’s coronation banquet about him with a tone-deaf speech about what he wanted out of life.

As Rapunzel’s main confidante, Cassandra was privy to the princess’s anxieties about being confined to the palace. But even a random person on the street could reason that the girl who spent 18 years of her life locked in a tower would not react warmly to the possibility of living out the remainder of it stuck in a castle with a perpetually predetermined routine such a short time after escaping. So as the person who freed Rapunzel from that tower, Eugene should’ve known better than anyone that settling down and becoming complacent with life was the last item on Rapunzel’s priority list.

And yet.

Escorting Rapunzel back to her chambers after the banquet was like escorting a bomb that was ticking rapidly toward exploding. Cassandra could sense the tension rolling off Rapunzel’s shoulders like waves of electricity, and decided against trying to talk to her until they were in private. The moment the huge ivory door was shut behind them, Rapunzel released all of her carefully contained emotions at once, experiencing grief, shame, rage, guilt, and a hundred other expressions in the seconds that followed.

“Cass, I am a horrible. Person,” she finally asserted after stomping around in a circle for a few minutes.

Cassandra was perched on the edge of a loveseat near the bed beside a perturbed Pascal, both of them watching Rapunzel with an even mix of concern and interest. “Why are you a horrible person, Raps?”

“Did you see what I just did?” Rapunzel exclaimed, flinging her arms out. “My loving boyfriend just took a huge risk for me and I humiliated him in front of every important person in the Seven Kingdoms!”

“Alright, let’s take a step ba—”

Rapunzel’s posture suddenly straightened and she stared forward with wide eyes like she’d just spotted a huge spider. “Oh god. I need to go find him and take it back, he’s probably sick with anxiety!”

Cassandra grasped Rapunzel by the shoulders before she marched back through the door and sat her down beside herself on the loveseat. “Rapunzel. Look at me. Breathe. Don’t worry about Eugene for a minute.”

“How can I not be worried when I just...broke his heart and crushed his soul?” Rapunzel said, her eyes wild. “Like a grape!”

Cassandra frowned at her choice of words and then shook her head. “Just for a minute, alright? You can worry about him again in sixty seconds. Right now let’s worry about you, okay?”

Rapunzel just looked at her for a heartbeat, biting her lip. Then she exhaled, and her shoulders sank down from their place next to her ears. “Okay.”

Cassandra offered her a smile and patted her hand. “That wasn’t so hard. Why don’t you just tell me what you’re feeling right now?”

“I...I’m sad,” Rapunzel began, slowly and with focus as though the words were splinters she was digging out from her brain. “I’m conflicted...and I’m ashamed. I’m ashamed because the worst thing I’m feeling right now is...anger. I’m so angry, Cass, and I know I shouldn’t be, and that makes me feel worse. I’m so angry and it feels so wrong, like it’s a poisoned apple in my chest that I need to just rip out of me.”

Cassandra blinked at that. “Wow. Okay. So you’re mad. Why does that bother you? I’m pretty mad about what happened too and I don’t have half as good a reason as you do right now.”

“What good reason?” Rapunzel demanded, desperation straining her voice. “I don’t understand why the person I love asking me to be with him forever should make me angry. That should make me happy! That’s what I should want!”

“You could waste your energy all night berating yourself with things you think you should be feeling. Listen to your heart, isn’t that the kind of touchy-feely stuff you’re always telling me? Listen to it for a minute, Raps, and it’ll tell you why you’re angry.”

It was rare for Cassandra to impart emotional wisdom upon anyone, but she had never seen Rapunzel so torn up over her feelings. Cassandra was an expert at coping with her own shameful emotions, while Rapunzel was used to complete inner harmony.

Rapunzel sat with her brows furrowed for a moment, staring intently at Cassandra’s hand over her own. Maybe she was trying to wrest the truth out of herself, or maybe she was working up the courage to admit it out loud. Finally, she squeezed Cassandra’s hand and said, “It just...didn’t feel like he cared about what I wanted. And he knew I was nervous about this dinner and he put so much more pressure on me when I was unprepared. He expected me to say yes and I...I didn’t.” Her voice broke at the end of her sentence and Cassandra realized she was crying. “Why didn’t I say yes?”

Cassandra pulled her into a hug, patting her hair and steadying her shoulders as they started to shake. “You’re just not ready, Raps. It’s okay.”

“What if he wants to leave me now?” Rapunzel wailed.

Cassandra forcefully suppressed that selfish part of her again. “He won’t. He loves you and he’ll wait until you are ready.”

Rapunzel didn’t answer, just crying into Cassandra’s sleeve for a few minutes. Cassandra was content to hold her until she felt better, grateful for the small moments when she could show her affection for the princess without laying it bare. Cassandra would gladly hold her all night, but it occurred to her that there was something else Rapunzel needed. She held her out by the shoulders and gave her a mischievous smile. “I have an idea that will cheer you up.”

—

Sneaking Rapunzel out of the palace in the middle of the night did cheer her up. But suddenly regrowing 70 feet of magical hair as a result of the midnight excursion definitely caused more problems than it solved.

The first thing that shot through Cassandra’s mind the moment Rapunzel’s head sprouted lengths of golden hair as though some invisible hand had pulled it from her scalp like glowing taffy wasn’t astonishment at how the rocks had made that happen, or even worry over whether Rapunzel was okay. The primary concern that rose within her was the glaring evidence that Cassandra had disobeyed her orders to keep Rapunzel safe and contained. If she couldn’t figure out a way to fix this, she would be dismissed from her position as Rapunzel’s lady-in-waiting, and would probably not be allowed near her ever again.

This thought lodged itself in Cassandra’s head like an arrow, and she had to focus on not panicking while smuggling the princess back to her bedroom. What would she do if the king and queen found out that she had jeopardized their beloved daughter’s safety? She could kiss her dream of joining the Royal Guard goodbye, that much was sure. Her heart clenched like a fist when she realized that her father wouldn’t even be able to look her in the eye. But what scared her the most was the threat of being ripped from Rapunzel’s side like a burr from a coat. The thought of Rapunzel smiling at a different handmaiden the way she smiles at her, of another woman bathing and dressing and comforting Rapunzel like Cassandra had done only hours ago...she couldn’t bear it. It was bad enough to be second to Eugene in Rapunzel’s heart, and she thought she would rather die than be thrown away and completely replaced in the princess’s life.

So when they made it back to Rapunzel’s chambers, Cassandra broke every one of her weapons trying to cut the hair off so they could get rid of the evidence of their transgression. With each failure her terror intensified, and it was all she could do to keep from crying when the last one shattered.

Rapunzel turned to her with concern apparent on her face, approaching her like she would a spooked horse. “Cass, we’re going to figure this out, I promise,” she said.

Cassandra shoved the heels of her hands into her eyes to suppress the burning there. “This is all my fault,” she croaked.

“It’s not so bad! It’s just hair. Magical, super long, indestructible hair, but it’s not going to kill us.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” Cassandra snapped, and instantly deflated a bit when Rapunzel flinched. She grabbed a fistful of golden locks and shook it. “King Frederic isn’t going to see this and figure it just grew back spontaneously while you were here sitting in your room! He’s going to know you got out, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that I helped. He’s going to throw me out of the palace the second he does.”

Rapunzel stared with her mouth agape for a moment, then she clenched her jaw. “I won’t let that happen, Cassandra.”

Cassandra sobbed pathetically. “He’s the king, you can’t stop him.” She turned to Rapunzel and gripped her shoulders, meeting her eyes with intensity. “Rapunzel, promise me you won’t tell anybody about tonight. We’ll never see each other again.”

Her heart beat with the rhythm of her fear. Hide it for her, lie for her, or they would be parted forever.

Rapunzel looked at Cassandra with a gaze so heavy it could’ve smothered her heart, and promised.

Chapter Text

The hair ended up not mattering. Well, at least not in regards to Cassandra’s position. In other regards, it changed absolutely everything.

After Rapunzel’s hair became unveiled during a throne-room clash with a would-be cutthroat, King Frederic was inconsolable, and when he accused Cassandra of endangering his precious daughter, she feared for a moment not just for her dreams but for her life. But Rapunzel stood her ground and told her father that it was her own choice to defy his rules, and lied that she’d waited until Cassandra was asleep to sneak out. In the end, the king tightened castle security and forbade Rapunzel from going anywhere without a guard escort, but he allowed Cassandra to stay where she was.

Cassandra made a beeline for Rapunzel’s chambers afterward to talk to her. The princess had defended her because she knew how worried she was about being dismissed, but at the cost of her already limited freedom. The thought of it made Cassandra’s head spin, partly with guilt and partly because she couldn’t believe Rapunzel wanted her at her side just as much as she wanted to stay there. She needed to be with her to thank her and make sure she was doing okay.

But just as she put her hand on the gilded handle to Rapunzel’s door, she stopped. Eugene was in there talking to her, and he sounded serious for once. Cassandra suddenly remembered that the two of them hadn’t gotten a chance to talk since his catastrophe of a marriage proposal, and decided to back away and give them some time alone. She breathed in deep, coming to terms with the inevitability that the two of them would kiss and make up and she could go back to being soundly second place.

Half an hour went by and Cassandra came back to try again, but they were still talking. She furrowed her brows and walked away to go find some task to distract herself with, telling herself that Rapunzel would come find her when she was done.

After another painstakingly slow hour, Cassandra could not keep her mind off of Rapunzel for another second, and she returned to that door, leaning an ear on the smooth ivory-coated wood. It sounded silent inside, so she gently turned the handle and peeked in. Her first impression was that both Eugene and Rapunzel had gone elsewhere, because the curtains were drawn and it was dim and quiet inside. Then she saw a small shape scampering toward her from the bed, and looked down at Pascal tugging on the hem of her dress, urging her toward where he just came from.

Cassandra cautiously stepped in from the hall and squinted in the scant light, and saw Rapunzel’s lengths of hair streaming out from a lump under the covers of her bed. Cassandra shut the door and darted over to the princess, sitting on the edge of her bed and placing a hand on the top of her head, which was the only part of her not buried in blankets.

“Raps?” she ventured. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” came a deeply muffled reply.

“Is it your father? I’m sure we can get him to let up on the security measures, he’s just in shock right now and you know Queen Arianna will talk some sense into him.”

A few moments passed in tense silence, and Cassandra saw Rapunzel shake her head from beneath the covers.

Cassandra sighed. “Raps, you gotta talk to me. I’ve never seen you act this way, and I’m gonna go get the royal physician if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.” Cassandra wasn’t used to bargaining like this, because Rapunzel had always offered updates on her emotional state liberally. It was rare to ever have to press her to get her to open up.

Slowly, Rapunzel craned her neck to turn and face Cassandra with the most pitiable expression imaginable. Her green eyes were tinged with red and surrounded in puffy, tear-stained skin, and her lips quivered pathetically. Pascal waddled over to curl up under her chin, looking as sad as possible for a lizard. Rapunzel met Cassandra’s eyes and said in a cracking voice, “I just broke up with Eugene.”

For a split second, Cassandra could not hide the shock on her face. Her stomach dropped like Rapunzel had just pushed her off a cliff, and her eyes blew open wide in the darkness. She had fantasized about hearing those words since she met Rapunzel, but never in a million years did she really think she ever would. She swiftly tamed her features into an expression of concern, puckering her brow and pulling the corners of her lips down. “Oh, Rapunzel,” she said, still too windblown to think of something appropriate to say.

Rapunzel sat up and put her face in her hands, hitching a sob. Completely stricken for words, Cassandra scooted up next to her and put an arm around her shoulders, and Rapunzel collapsed onto her chest. Cassandra felt like she was dreaming, like she was in some perverted reality where her most selfish wish had come true, but as a consequence the light fueling the woman she loved had been snuffed. As Rapunzel wailed in her arms, Cassandra felt disgusted with herself that she had ever hoped for this. Even if Eugene was out of the picture, how could she try to win Rapunzel’s heart now? Only a scoundrel would move in under such miserable circumstances.

Eugene had been rejected, Rapunzel was heartbroken, and Cassandra was paralyzed with shame. Cassandra could have lived with her lovesickness if it meant Rapunzel would have been happy. Now it seemed that no one would be.

—

Because fate was cruel, or perhaps because Rapunzel had wished to spare herself the guilt, the Day of Hearts reared its frilly pink head only a week later. Couples from around Corona gathered in the palace square to sign their love in the journal of Herz der Sonne, and for yet another year Cassandra found herself eyeing them with what she told herself was disdain, but was really envy. Cassandra’s name would never be in that book, not next to the name of the person she truly loved, and the egregious reminder of her doomed affection on the Day of Hearts never failed to sully her mood.

Except this year, it was so much worse, because Rapunzel was dealing with celebrating the occasion after becoming freshly single by latching onto Cassandra and insisting on celebrating their Best Friendship instead of any sort of romantic love.

Cassandra had ended up sleeping beside Rapunzel on the night of her breakup to comfort her, but from the moment the sun peeked over the horizon on the next morning the princess seemed back to her carefree self. She danced about her bedroom during her morning routine, which Cassandra had reluctantly helped her through despite her concern and confusion. She didn’t even talk about Eugene at all for days, and whenever anyone tried to bring it up with her she would obstinately steer the conversation elsewhere, insisting that it was in the past now and she was over it. As a result Cassandra was more worried about her than she would’ve been if Rapunzel had stayed lying in bed crying all that time instead.

So Cassandra was dreading the Day of Hearts more than usual, because she was at a loss to predict what Rapunzel would do. She still barely understood why she had dumped Eugene at all, because she didn’t know how to ask on the night it happened and after that Rapunzel acted like he had never even existed. So when the princess approached her on the morning of the festival, Cassandra gave her a hesitant smile, ready to react to absolutely anything.

“Cass, don’t you think that the Day of Hearts is a little...shortsighted?” Rapunzel began, sitting beside her on the windowsill.

“What do you mean?” Cassandra asked cautiously.

Rapunzel tilted her head and looked to the side. “Well, I mean...It’s all about celebrating the romantic love between Herz der Sonne and General Shampanier, but doesn’t it seem silly in hindsight that they had to get married to put an end to that conflict? Couldn’t they have just talked it out like friends?”

Cassandra got the feeling that Rapunzel was burying her meaning in some kind of metaphor. She eyed her and said, “I suppose...”

“What I’m saying is...we can safely say that marriage isn’t the pinnacle of love, so why should the kind of love between married couples be the center of attention on the Day of Hearts?” Rapunzel continued. “When friendship matters just as much, if not more?”

A pit of dread sank into Cassandra’s stomach as the pieces started to fall into place. “What are you getting at, Raps?”

“Why don’t you and I spend the day together?” Rapunzel suggested with a beaming grin, confirming what Cassandra was afraid of. “To celebrate our friendship!”

Cassandra should’ve said no, should’ve come up with some excuse regarding her duties or her well-known hatred for the holiday or anything else, and perhaps she would have if she wasn’t so concerned about injuring Rapunzel’s fragile emotional state. So she swallowed her pride and let the princess take her by the hand and teach her how to weave a friendship bracelet. She bore it with grace when Rapunzel gifted her a card covered in cartoon hearts and glitter with the message “I’m so glad you’re my friend!” And she shielded her heart when Rapunzel took them outside on what would’ve been a romantic picnic were it not for Rapunzel’s persistent emphasis on their platonic bond.

They sat together on a thick blanket under the branches of a willow tree near the shore of the water, and Rapunzel sang some made-up melody while they lounged in the shade and ate. After they had finished off their egg salad sandwiches and strawberry cupcakes, Rapunzel caught sight of a couple floating in a small rowboat in the bay, and abandoned their blanket to drag Cassandra along the docks to where a man was selling off special Day of Hearts boat rides for lovers.

“Are you sure about this, Rapunzel? We’re not exactly dressed for boating,” Cassandra said, digging up the most credible excuse she could think of. She had gone along with Rapunzel’s plans all day because she knew her companionship was needed, but there were some things her pride would simply not permit. Floating in a cozy boat with the oblivious object of her affections in a strictly friendly sense might have been one of them.

“Come on, Cass, it’ll be fun! Like a little adventure!” Rapunzel chirped, clutching both of her hands with glee.

“Hasn’t the king forbidden adventures?” Cassandra countered.

Rapunzel rolled her eyes. “He told me he would loosen the security for the festivities.”

Cassandra doubted whether that was true, but she decided not to argue it. “I still think it sounds dumb.”

“Don’t tell me you’re scared of the water,” Rapunzel said, smirking.

Cassandra knew she was taunting her, but she could never resist a challenge. “Okay, you know what? We’re getting in the stupid boat. I’ll show you who’s scared.”

“That’s the spirit!” Rapunzel said, pumping her fists in the air. She skipped over to the rental stall and exchanged a few coins for a little wooden rowboat sitting on the water, which two men helped her and Cassandra clumsily clamber into. Cassandra grabbed an oar and started paddling out from the shoreline, and soon the two of them were alone with the water.

Cassandra set the oar down and looked across at Rapunzel, who was dragging her fingertips thoughtfully through the water’s surface. “Are you happy now, princess?” she asked.

Rapunzel met her eyes with a sincere smile. “Yes. Thank you, Cass,” she said. “The palace guards think I don’t see them watching me all day, but I really needed to get away from them for a bit. It’s nice to just be alone with you.”

Cassandra said nothing, only softened her gaze and smiled back at her, leaning back in the boat and enjoying the quiet as the two of them looked out at Corona towering over the placid waters. Even from this distance, Cassandra could see the foil heart streamers strung up across the roofs reflecting the golden light of the late afternoon. The sun warmed her skin while the breeze rifled through her curls, and she took off her servant’s headdress to better enjoy the sensation.

Suddenly, Rapunzel spoke up from the edge of the boat where she had been attempting to play with the tiny fish. “My first date with Eugene was on a boat like this. During the lantern festival on my birthday. It was the first time I had ever seen them up close.”

That was a lot for Cassandra to process. Rapunzel was talking about Eugene willingly for the first time since she decided to leave him, and Cassandra felt like she had spotted a rare bird in the wild and worried that whatever she did next would scare it off. She considered just keeping quiet, but she was afraid to discourage Rapunzel from saying more. “Do you miss him?” she said carefully.

Rapunzel sighed and drew herself back from the edge of the boat. “Yes?” she said, with that uneven smile that came on her face whenever she was uncertain about something. Then her shoulders sank. “No...I don’t know. I can’t decide how I feel.”

Cassandra hummed. “Do you...feel like you made a mistake?” she asked, her heart pounding as the words left her lips.

“I...no.” Rapunzel averted her eyes, pensively staring at her bare feet. “I thought about what you said about listening to my heart, and I realized things had felt wrong with Eugene since before he proposed. He wants to be comfortable and secure, and I know I can’t blame him since he’s been uprooted his whole life. But I can’t be stuck in one place again, not for a long time. And he always believes the worst in people, and I think there’s always going to be a part of him that’s dishonest.”

Cassandra made a mental note for herself not to dwell on the fact that her advice had led Rapunzel to the decision of leaving Eugene. “Well, I could’ve told you that last part a long time ago,” she said, smirking.

Rapunzel chuckled halfheartedly. “You really don’t like him, huh? I could never tell whether you were just teasing.”

“We never got along,” Cassandra shrugged. “But he had his moments where I could almost tolerate him.”

“Cass!” Rapunzel laughed, splashing her with droplets from her fingertips. “You know it wouldn’t have been so hard for me if Eugene wasn’t a good guy. He saved me from the tower and he risked his life so I could be free, and I loved...still love him for it.” She looked away again, tucking a strand of hair back into its bulky braid. “But I...everything has changed since then. And my heart tells me that we’re not right for each other anymore.”

Cassandra reached across and put a hand on Rapunzel’s wrist. “I know you went through a lot with Eugene. He was literally the first person you met in your entire life aside from Gothel, so it’s okay that he’s still important to you. But that doesn’t mean you have to be with him forever. The beauty of being free now is that you get to choose where your life goes.”

Rapunzel looked up at her, her green eyes fragile as glass. “Thanks, Cass. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Cassandra wrapped her arms around her in a hug, and they sat together with Rapunzel’s head leaning against Cassandra’s shoulder until the sun began to set on the Day of Hearts. It may not have been the romantic date Cassandra dreamed of, but it felt good to spend time with Rapunzel like this. Despite the sorry state of her heart, she was grateful to have Rapunzel as a friend.

—

Things calmed down in the following weeks, and even though Rapunzel bumped into Eugene a few times around the palace, she seemed to finally be recovering from her breakup normally. She was spending more time than ever before with Cassandra, to the point where it was almost a hindrance. Cassandra loved being around the princess on principle, but just as much she valued her alone time, and it was getting hard to focus on combat practice or training Owl or even her duties as lady-in-waiting when Rapunzel insisted on accompanying her to every task.

So when the king and queen took a day off and left Rapunzel in charge of the kingdom, Cassandra was looking forward to the tasks she could get done while Rapunzel was busy being queen for a day. But of course, a supernatural ice storm would show up out of nowhere to throw the kingdom into peril on the one day that Rapunzel was responsible for it.

Cassandra lent her sword and her support to Rapunzel through each of the seemingly endless crises that the universe dealt them that day. After getting news that the storm had caused the king and queen’s carriage to fall into a snowdrift, Eugene instantly rode off to their aid, throwing Rapunzel into an emotional maelstrom. But to Cassandra’s pride and relief, she put her angst to the side and decided to turn her attention to resolving the blizzard before it threatened the lives of her people. Rapunzel had a knack for making the most outlandish plans pull through, and her gut instinct to restore the Demanitus device was no exception.

In the end, Rapunzel had nearly lost both Pascal and her parents, weathered a deadly storm that threatened the entire kingdom, and almost said goodbye to Eugene under dire circumstances. But the event that seemed to cause her the greatest burden wasn’t among the personal close calls of the day — it was having to turn Varian away in a moment of need.

Cassandra walked into Rapunzel’s chambers on the following day to escort her to lunch, and found her sitting at her windowsill with her journal. She gently closed the door behind her and approached the window. “Hey, there’s a huge bowl of hazelnut soup in the dining hall with your name on it.” she said.

Rapunzel tried to give her a smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Okay. I’m just finishing up writing about yesterday, and I’ll be right there.”

“Oh yeah? Is there anything you want to talk about?”

Rapunzel sighed and set her journal down. “I can’t stop thinking about all the ways it could’ve gone wrong, and how it would’ve been my fault.”

“You did everything right, Raps,” Cassandra said. “Your parents and Eugene are back and safe, and you took the right risks to protect your people.”

“Not everything. Varian was counting on me for help, and I let him down. What if I made the wrong choice?”

Cassandra sat down beside her. “You made the only choice. If you had followed Varian to Old Corona, you would have abandoned countless people in their time of need for who knows how long. Anything could have happened without you there.”

“I know, I know,” Rapunzel said, hugging her arms. “That’s why I turned him away. But I can’t help feeling like I did something awful.”

Cassandra shrugged. “Making difficult choices is part of ruling. Try not to overthink it.”

A moment passed in thoughtful silence, and then Rapunzel looked up at her with her brows drawn, looking as fragile as a flower blooming amid frost. “Cass...what if I don’t want to become queen?”

Cassandra wasn’t surprised by this sentiment. Between Rapunzel’s general free-spirited demeanor and her insistence that she had no desire to remain at the castle forever, Cassandra got the feeling that Rapunzel bore her crown with unease. She didn’t want to lie to Rapunzel and tell her she had no obligation to take the throne, because that was a hairy matter that Cassandra was ill-equipped to preach about. But seeing Rapunzel’s shoulders sink with shame at her fear of responsibility, Cassandra tried to strike the balance between comfort and realism. “That’s one difficult choice you won’t have to make for a long time,” she said.

Rapunzel turned to her with a real smile this time, looking up at her with warmth. “Will you be with me when that time comes?”

Cassandra’s heart thumped at these words, and she couldn’t imagine having any other answer as she took Rapunzel’s hand. “I will.”

—

Of course Varian would kidnap the Queen as a hostage and build a killer robot army to exact vengeance upon Rapunzel right after Cassandra had assured her that she had made the right choice. That’s exactly the kind of thing he would do to make her life that much more difficult.

The fact that he pretended to be complacent for weeks to trick Rapunzel into feeling like she was forgiven before betraying her pissed Cassandra off the most. If you’re going to punish someone you have a misguided grudge against, commit to the part. The damage done to Rapunzel’s sense of trust and faith in herself was a low blow, and Cassandra couldn’t wait to inflict twice her pain on this vindictive child.

So when they arrived in Old Corona to intervene in Varian’s hostage plans, Cassandra came ready for a fight. Rapunzel had her heart set on trying to talk the boy down first, saying she owed it to him to at least try to help him after her failure had instigated all of this. But Cassandra knew what a person with nothing left to lose looked like, and she made sure her sword was sharp before they left.

Unfortunately, the sharpest sword in the world couldn’t have prepared her for the dozens of weaponized automatons protecting Varian and his home. When had this kid had the time to build all of these, anyway? Why couldn’t he be this efficient when he was trying to be useful to society instead of destroying it? Cassandra grit her teeth and challenged the behemoths to give cover to Rapunzel and the king as they infiltrated the house. She kept her foes occupied, but her sword slashes glanced harmlessly no matter where they landed and fighting a number of inexhaustible opponents started to take a toll on Cassandra’s form after a while. She shoved an opponent onto its back and then stared intently at the walls of the house, as though hoping Rapunzel could feel her desperation and emerge victorious while she watched.

Eugene was shouting something many paces away, instructing everyone to use the terrain as a weapon by leading the automatons into impaling themselves on the black rocks. Easier said than done, Cassandra thought as the ruthless advance of an automaton forced her backward toward the trees. She had parried blow after blow, too fast for her to get in a counter, when her already exhausted footwork failed her and she tripped over a fallen branch and fell on her rear. She was barely able to recover her sword in time to block the automaton’s fists bearing down on her like a huge sledgehammer, but the force of the strike broke something in her arm. Crying out in pain, she rolled over and struggled to her feet, but there was no time to examine the damage with the colossal robot quickly closing the distance between them again.

Shoving the pain from her mind, Cassandra ran back toward the heart of the clash, counting on the automaton to follow her. It chased after her with its thundering gait, and it would soon overtake her, but Cassandra only needed to make it a little further. Picking up pace with the last of her energy, she sprinted head-on toward a black rock that pointed at her like a jousting spear, and a split second before her pursuer reached out toward her heels she ducked to the ground and slid past the rock. She looked back just in time to watch the automaton’s unstoppable momentum launch it into a collision with the pointed rock, which gouged out its timing cylinder like a fish on the end of a pike.

As the motions of Cassandra’s defeated enemy fizzled out, a shadow loomed behind her and she whipped around to see an enormous automaton piloted by Varian, clutching the queen in one hand and reaching out to grab Cassandra with the other. She wasn’t quick enough to dodge the giant claw and it closed around her torso, crushing her injured arm against her side. As overwhelming agony swelled in her mind, she heard Rapunzel call out, pleading with Varian to stand down. In response, the grip around her tightened and she felt her lungs spasm for air while her ribs cracked like twigs.

Cassandra saw Rapunzel’s hair come into contact with the rocks that surrounded her and then the blinding blue glow that followed, and chalked it up to her delirium from the exhaustion and physical torment. The next thing she knew she had fallen to the ground, and the remaining automatons had been skewered cleanly. Before she could get her bearings, Varian was being led away from his destroyed robot by the royal guard, staring back at Rapunzel with an unmistakable expression of loathing.

Rapunzel was at Cassandra’s side in an instant, while the king held Arianna to his chest nearby. Cassandra sat up with difficulty, and Rapunzel rushed to support her. In seconds, her steadying hands turned into arms thrown around Cassandra’s shoulders.

“Oh Cass, I’m so grateful you’re alright!” Rapunzel cried, tucking her face into Cassandra’s collarbone. “I’m so sorry I let you get hurt!”

“What...happened?” Cassandra said. “I saw you touch the rocks, and then some flash of light.” She turned her cheek against Rapunzel’s hair. “Are you okay?”

Rapunzel pulled away, looking into Cassandra’s eyes. “The rocks responded to me, like I could control them. I think...I think they have to do with my destiny.”

“Wow. That’s incredible, Raps,” Cassandra said, clutching her side with her good arm. “I would have been toast without your destiny.”

Rapunzel held her by the shoulders again. “Don’t even say that! I don’t even know what I’d do if I’d lost you.”

Cassandra was spared from whatever emotional response she would’ve made under her impaired state by the sudden shifting of the rocks around them. Slowly, they tilted forward until they all slammed into the ground at once with a deafening boom, pointing together toward the newly crumbled hole in the wall that separated Corona from the rest of the world. Rapunzel stood slowly, staring out through the opening into the wilderness beyond with an unreadable look on her face.

The king and queen approached their daughter while Cassandra watched, and though she couldn’t hear their conversation she could infer the gist of it. Frederic seemed intent on keeping Rapunzel as far from anything to do with the rocks as possible, while Arianna and Rapunzel gestured intently toward the newly-formed path. The king looked away, seeming to fight an internal battle, before relaxing his stance and conceding to reason. Judging by Rapunzel’s expression of teary gratitude, something crucial in him had been swayed.

Cassandra struggled to her feet as Rapunzel started to return to her with a huge grin on her face, and then watched as her smile fell when Eugene intercepted her path. He was pretty roughed-up after the battle, looking singed and bruised in many places, and he wrung his hands in an uncharacteristic gesture of meekness. The two of them just stood avoiding each other’s gazes for a moment, and Cassandra could feel the awkwardness from where she stood.

“I’m glad you’re okay, Blondie,” Eugene finally said, breaking the unbearable silence.

“I...yeah. You too,” Rapunzel answered, still not meeting his eyes.

More uncomfortable silence, and then Eugene spoke up again. “What are you going to do now?”

“I have to follow where these rocks are pointing me,” Rapunzel said. “There’s a mystery that I need answers to and I know I can find it at the end of that path.”

“You’re not going alone, are you? That sounds like it could be dangerous,” Eugene said, and though he tried to imbue it with his usual lighthearted humor, it sounded transparently vulnerable.

Cassandra’s heart clenched, and she saw in Rapunzel’s eyes that she understood the implicit question. She took a deep breath and put a hand on his shoulder. “Eugene...we both need to rebuild and rediscover our futures. It’ll mean something different now, and as much as I care about you...” she bit her lip and sighed. “Involving you in my new path will only confuse us both. I hope you can understand.”

Eugene tried to hide his crushed expression, but Cassandra saw his shoulders sag. “I get it, Blondie,” he said at length. “I understand. But be safe out there, you hear?”

Rapunzel tried her best at a smile. “Don’t worry. There’s nothing that Cass and I can’t handle.”

Cassandra’s breath caught when she heard this, and she fought to suppress her blush. Rapunzel wanted her to be at her side while she sought out her destiny? Just the two of them, supporting and protecting each other out there in the world?

It didn’t mean what Cassandra hoped it meant, but...

But, well, she hoped.

Chapter Text

Rapunzel’s disposition shifted in the weeks she spent preparing for her expedition. She was suddenly back to skipping down hallways and singing as she strolled through town, visiting shops and doing favors for townspeople. Her attitude had swung back to that of the energetic sunbeam that was the norm for her before she ended things with Eugene, and this time Cassandra could tell it wasn’t a deliberate front. The stifling walls surrounding the princess had finally crumbled for the second time in her life, and she was barely restraining herself from leaping straight over the rubble and into the world that she had always been denied.

While Rapunzel ran around making arrangements for the outset, Cassandra was confined to bedrest to recover from her injuries. She should have been just as enthusiastic to go, considering this was her chance to really prove her strength and dedication to protecting the royal family. Because that’s what this was — Rapunzel invited her along as a bodyguard to protect and support her, and the only reason she had imagined it would be for anything else was that the painful delirium from the aftermath of the battle with Varian had addled her judgment. When she took up the position of lady-in-waiting, she knew that the chances of her getting to pick up her sword in honor of Corona had just become very slim. So now that the circumstances she had always hoped for and yet could never count on had become a reality, why was a part of her disappointed?

It wouldn’t be the first time that her wildest fantasies had come to pass, only to leave her feeling hollow and unfulfilled.

Eugene, for his part, seemed to be bearing this further rejection with some degree of grace. He had finally packed up his things and moved out of the palace and into a modest home in town that the King and Queen had gifted to him (even if he wasn’t to be their future son-in-law, he had still brought Rapunzel back to them and that was something they could never show enough gratitude for). The fact that he had not made the motion to move out earlier indicated to Cassandra that he had finally let go of the possibility that their relationship wasn’t unsalvageable, and she didn’t quite know how to feel about that. Rapunzel hadn’t doubted her decision even when the grief of it had weighed on her, but it was clear that Eugene really had built the structure of his future on the foundation of her presence in it, and was only now starting to pave out a new one. Cassandra’s feelings toward the man may never have been in the vicinity of warmth, but coming to this realization felt like seeing a hatchling bird fall from its nest outside her window and knowing she could do nothing about it.

Rapunzel had offered to help with the moving process, but Eugene said it would be best if this was something he did on his own. Just as Rapunzel hadn’t wanted to involve him in the start of her new life, neither was she welcome to aid in the start of his. Instead, a friend from his past by the dubious name of Lance Strongbow had resurfaced and insisted on moving in with him so he wouldn’t be alone, and Cassandra witnessed how the two of them turned the moving process into a head-to-head strength contest.

Once Cassandra had fully healed and the camper they were to travel in had been built and tested, the two of them loaded their bags inside, tacked up Maximus and Fidela, and crossed the threshold of Corona along the path of flattened black rocks. The journey was smooth at the beginning; Rapunzel and Cassandra took turns guiding the horses so the other could rest, and oftentimes when Cassandra was at the driver’s seat Rapunzel would bring her journal and painting supplies up and sketch beside her. Cassandra tried not to peek, but there was only so much wild scenery she could occupy herself with before her eyes wandered to the pages. She couldn’t help but think that the way Rapunzel recorded her thoughts was beautiful, pairing statements and updates with expressive paintings and sweeping colors. Cassandra thought if she kept a journal, she would stick to a bullet list of notable events without wasting ink on her feelings, but Rapunzel illustrated everything so that she would never forget exactly how she’d experienced a certain day.

Cassandra didn’t read the words on the page when she snuck glances, but she could usually recognize what a painting was depicting. There was a page showing Rapunzel turning away from Varian, her face pinched in sorrow as she grasped her elbows and ducked her head, while the boy’s rage manifested as dark violet strokes that seemed to be closing him in. Another page was simply a portrait of Eugene, but instead of a placid or neutral expression his face was crumpled in a frown. She also portrayed happy scenes, like coming to terms with Monty during the Gopher Grab and watching the stars with her mother and aunt. When Rapunzel turned the page to a painting of her, Cassandra swiftly averted her eyes with the instinct that knowing Rapunzel’s personal thoughts of her would only make things awkward. But Rapunzel noticed her posture stiffen and turned to show the page to her with an open smile.

It was from an entry recounting the Day of Hearts, when they rented that boat together and talked while floating on the water. But instead of a scenic depiction of the two of them sitting across from each other, it was a drawing of Cassandra from how Rapunzel would have seen her. She had painted her with a soft smile and softer eyes, her hair free of its servant’s covering, and the background was effused with the warm tones of the sunset. The words that accompanied it, which Cassandra read despite reminding herself that she shouldn’t, said, “Cassandra is there for me when it feels like nobody else is.”

—

Vardaros was...interesting. Four days into their journey, Cassandra had noted that their food supplies were dwindling and they made a stop at the next bastion of civilization along the path of rocks to restock. Calling Vardaros “civilization,” however, was incredibly generous. The stench of rotten fish and gull droppings hit them like a crate of bricks as soon as they dismounted from the camper at the town’s entrance, and Cassandra’s stomach urged her not to spend more time there than necessary. But rather than revulsion at the place’s complete lack of charm, Rapunzel found purpose in it.

They spent a total of three days restoring Vardaros, and Cassandra dragged her heels in resistance to Rapunzel’s path of redemption the whole time. But by the end of it, she couldn’t deny that the sun seemed to shine a little brighter on that dingy town, or at least now it just seemed reflected in the faces of its residents.

As much as Cassandra dreaded the setback, it reminded her of why she admired Rapunzel. She saw the worth within even the most hideous people and coaxed it to the outside. Just over two years ago, the princess had met a prickly knot of thorns that had conceded herself to living in the shadow and shined enough sun on her to bring out a hesitant bloom. Cassandra still cupped that bloom close to her heart, where it continued to grow and seek the light.

Just as Cassandra was getting settled in to sleep a few hours into their journey away from Vardaros, the hatch on the ceiling of the camper popped open and Rapunzel peeked down, her long braid sliding off her back and hanging inside. “Uhh, Cass? I think we might have a problem,” she said.

Words that no traveler ever wants to hear. Cassandra sighed loudly in mourning of the sleep she was about to get and tugged on her boots before pulling herself up through the hatch to join Rapunzel. The air outside was cool and hung with mist that dampened her skin. “What problem?” she asked.

Rapunzel pointed straight ahead. “Look where the rocks are leading us.”

Cassandra squinted through the mist in the direction she pointed, and about three hundred meters away she could see a dense treeline standing in their path like a battalion of soldiers. Sure enough, the path of black rocks marched straight toward it and disappeared beyond the dark brush.

“Should we go around?” Cassandra suggested.

Rapunzel scrunched her lips to one side, considering. “I don’t think so. It could cost us days if we lose track of the trail, and I don’t know when we’ll be able to restock on food again.”

“I guess you’re right, but...I just don’t like the look of that place. It doesn’t seem like a normal forest,” Cassandra said, noting how the moonlight from the outside seemed to get sucked in at the borders of the trees.

“I don’t either,” Rapunzel agreed. “But as long as we’re together we can make it through! Just stay close and be careful, okay?”

Cassandra nodded. “I promise.”

There was no point at which the camper definitively entered the forest. Their surroundings became gradually denser and darker, until there was no denying they had entered the maw of the beast. Creatures croaked, cawed, and chirped from all around in a deafening cacophony, but not a single animal nor insect could be seen by either of the two travelers from their perch, which suddenly felt as vulnerable as a rickety boat swarmed by sharks. The clopping of hooves and creaking of wheels beneath them ticked away the seconds and dragged them further along the path into the fog.

Rapunzel scooted closer to Cassandra and clutched her arm like it was a rope suspending her above a pit of vipers. Cassandra found herself suddenly very engrossed in the scenery, looking anywhere and everywhere but at the girl beside her. There was no way she was blushing over something so trivial, but she wasn’t about to take the chance of letting Rapunzel see in the unlikely case that she was. While she scanned the landscape, something caught her eye. She leaned forward and made out a sign lying among tangled vines and...was that a human skull?

“Did the black rocks really lead us to a place called ‘The Forest of No Return?’” Cassandra said. “I’m starting to feel like maybe we should have gone around.”

Rapunzel laughed nervously. “I’m sure that sign’s just a prank to scare people.”

“No, that’s really what it’s called,” said a third voice from behind them. Cassandra whipped around and her sword flew out of its scabbard, echoing with the bright sing of steel. She leapt to the roof of the camper and leveled the tip of her blade at the throat of a strange woman sitting cross legged like she’d been there for hours without being noticed. Her face, which was painted red on one half, didn’t even flinch at the bladed threat. Her eyes remained closed, her eyebrows raised slightly in a show of untroubled boredom.

“Who are you?” Cassandra demanded. The woman responded only by pointing the corners of her lips downward a small degree.

“Cass, please put your weapon away,” Rapunzel said once she’d climbed onto the roof with them. Cassandra glowered at the stranger for a moment before withdrawing her sword and placing it back in its sheath. Rapunzel gave her a smile that was somewhere between gratitude and reassurance, then turned to the woman. “Um, greetings,” she said.

The woman opened her eyes and looked Rapunzel up and down, as though evaluating her. “Greetings, Sun Drop. What a pleasure it is to finally meet you in person.”

Rapunzel and Cassandra exchanged a glance at the title. The pit of suspicion in Cassandra’s gut grew heavier, and she placed a hand on the hilt of her sword, just in case. The princess stepped closer to the stranger. “Have you been...following us?” she asked.

The woman shrugged. “Only a little bit. You got my attention with your stunt back in Old Corona. Long has it been prophesied that the rocks will only respond to the Sun Drop, and it seems now they’ve found it.” She stood up and pulled a tendril of Rapunzel’s hair loose from its braid, examining it up close. Cassandra’s grip on her hilt tightened. “Seems like there’s quite a story behind this.”

Rapunzel gently tugged her hair away. “Oh, y’know...nothing too interesting,” she said with an unconvincing chuckle. “Um, what did you say your name was?”

The woman drew back the hand that Rapunzel left hanging in the air and hummed. “It’s Adira,” she said.

“It’s nice to meet you, Adira. I’m Rapunzel.”

“No, you’re lost,” said Adira, nimbly leaping down into the driver’s seat. “You didn’t even know where you were going when you casually sauntered into the Forest of No Return. I thought it was about time I lent a hand.”

Cassandra scoffed and landed on the seat beside her with a thud. “Wait a minute. Just who do you think you are?” she barked.

“I thought we just went through this,” said Adira, holding her chin in mock confusion.

Cassandra considered herself a relatively tolerant person, but nothing cleaved through her patience quite as swiftly as a condescending stranger. “We don’t need charity from any random weirdos,” she said, scowling. “Buzz off, lady.”

“‘Weirdo?’ That seems a little unfair. Eccentric, maybe. But ‘weirdo?’” Adira pouted. “You’ve hurt my feelings.”

Cassandra scowled and opened her mouth to challenge her, but Rapunzel interrupted. “Cass, it sounds like she just wants to help. Maybe we should hear her out?”

Cassandra looked back to glare at the princess, and the apologetic look Rapunzel gave her helped soothe the sting of humiliation. She slumped down in her seat and crossed her arms. “Fine.”

Rapunzel turned to Adira. “Have you crossed this forest before?”

“Oh yes, many times. All by myself, too. Once I even made it through while I had bronchitis. A little tip from me to you: try to suppress your coughs while crossing the swamp of giant man-eating flytraps.” She turned over her shoulder and whispered, “They can sense vibrations.”

Rapunzel swallowed. “We’ll...make a note of that. But I’m not sure we need a guide, we’re just following the path of black rocks. I’m sure we can’t get lost as long as we stay on the track!”

“Famous last words,” tutted Adira. “Do you think it got the name ‘Forest of No Return’ for being straightforward and navigable, safer than a baby’s playpen?”

Rapunzel frowned. “Really, thank you for offering but we —”

“Rapunzel, get down!” Cassandra shouted, heart stopping dead in its tracks when she saw what looked like a massive vulture, but with a snake’s body in place of a leathery neck, swooping down with its razor-like talons stretched out toward the princess. Cassandra ripped out her sword and lunged to pull Rapunzel out of the way, but she was barely too slow and watched in horror as her gloved fingertips grasped at the air where Rapunzel’s braid was a moment prior.

The beast’s enormous wings ripped leaves from nearby trees and stirred them into a whirlwind as it began to carry Rapunzel away by the arm. Cassandra searched around frantically for some way of climbing upwards so she could reach them, but while she scrambled toward the nearest tree branch, Adira calmly launched her gleaming black sword through the air like a javelin and brought down the creature like she was hunting duck for dinner. The monster’s grip on Rapunzel broke as it plummeted to the ground, and Cassandra barely had time to drop from her branch before Adira caught the falling princess neatly in her arms.

Rapunzel stared wide-eyed at her rescuer, panting for breath and pushing her loosened hair aside. Adira set her down, strode over to the fallen beast, and plucked her sword from its stilled breast. She raised an eyebrow at Cassandra as she rushed over with dirt on her knees and leaves in her hair, reaching for Rapunzel to make sure she was alright. The creature’s claws had left three bleeding gashes in her upper arm, but she was otherwise unharmed.

“Well, now that that matter’s settled,” Adira said, brushing the dust from her shoulders. “Let’s get a move on, shall we?”

—

Cassandra was not jealous. She was a knight in training, a loyal servant, and more than that she was a self-assured individual. Adira had been helpful in the forest, and she was grateful for her assistance. Really, she was. Maybe the way she’d beaten Cassandra to the punch at every corner in a far more ostentatious show of strength than necessary rubbed her the wrong way, and maybe the woman’s smug attitude pricked at Cassandra’s nerves just enough to ignite her temper a few times before Adira decided to relieve them of her presence as soon as they’d made it safely out of the forest. But she was not jealous.

She had been jealous of Eugene. Adira upstaged and belittled Cassandra in nearly every way that mattered to her, but she didn’t have Rapunzel’s affection the way Cassandra craved. That wasn’t jealousy, that was...healthy competition.

Regardless, Adira was only helpful insofar as she judged a precarious situation worthy of her assistance. Conveniently, she was nowhere to be found when the black rock path wandered down the coast and into the sea like an ill-fated toddler. Rapunzel and Cassandra had burned both funds and days on the princess’s idea of converting the camper into a boat so that they could chase the dark, jutting spikes that towered out of the waves every hundred meters.

Adira’s boundless competence would have been welcome then, and more than welcome when a storm ambushed their makeshift vessel, chewing it up and spitting it out on the shores of an uninhabited island. But their dichromatic savior wasn’t about to drop out of the sky and pluck them out of this emergency. Nobody was. Their priorities had been abruptly steered from adventure to survival, and they had only each other to rely on now. Even Pascal had spent a day abandoning the two of them to engage with the strange miniature locals.

To make matters worse, Rapunzel started to act weird after a couple of days. Once while she was knee-deep in the surf skewering fish with a sharpened branch to roast for dinner,, Cassandra looked back at the beach and caught Rapunzel staring at her. She had her journal, which had miraculously survived the shipwreck, open on her lap and a paintbrush in hand, but she was leaning her cheek on one fist and looking out instead of down. She had averted her gaze instantly when Cassandra noticed, which seemed even more suspicious. Since that incident, Cassandra had looked up to find Rapunzel’s eyes on her several times, only for her to look away without saying anything to her. And aside from that, the princess had been combing the beach to find interesting shells and smoothed glass to make into jewelry for Cassandra, and even tucking island flowers into Cassandra’s hair. Rapunzel always had an eye for accessorizing, but it seemed out of place to spend energy on such things while they were stranded.

One night while they sat side-by-side on a palm tree Cassandra had felled with her sword, roasting fish and foraged greens over a campfire, Cassandra decided to ask her about it. “Raps, have you been drinking enough water?” she said, poking the fire with a stick.

Rapunzel blinked. “Huh? I...think so. Why?”

“You’ve just seemed...I dunno, out of it lately,” Cassandra shrugged. “You keep staring blankly and losing focus. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“S-Staring?” Rapunzel stammered, hands going to her braid. “I haven’t been staring. I don’t know what you mean. I’m fine! I’m great, actually. Um, how are you?”

Cassandra eyed her. “You don’t seem fine. Are you worried about being stranded here? Because you don’t need to be. I’ll make sure we get off this island no matter what.”

“Oh, no, that’s not...Actually, I’m kind of enjoying it here,” Rapunzel admitted.

This only deepened Cassandra’s concern. Was she losing sight of their goal? She raised an eyebrow. “You enjoy wearing plants for clothes and eating unseasoned fish every day?”

Rapunzel laughed. “Not that part, silly! It’s just...isn’t it kind of nice that it’s just the two of us for once? The black rocks, Eugene, Varian, Adira...they’re all so far away. The weight of my destiny, of the people I’ve hurt, is just a feather on the breeze here. Now it’s just you and me,” she said, and a tiny smile played on her lips as she removed her hand from her hair and placed it on top of Cassandra’s on the makeshift bench.

Cassandra’s heart pounded in her chest and she couldn’t hide her rising blush. She furrowed her brow and looked down at their hands. “Your destiny is still waiting for you, princess. We can’t hide from it here forever.”

“I know,” Rapunzel said, her voice dropping to a murmur. She leaned a little closer and intertwined their fingers. “But can’t we enjoy it while it lasts?”

Cassandra looked at her and saw the reflection of firelight sparking in her dark, lidded eyes. She had ached for so long to be close to Rapunzel, and this island could be her chance. Rapunzel...was happy here, with her. Maybe...they could just…

She didn’t notice how close she leaned in, didn’t register the parting of Rapunzel’s pink lips, didn’t realize that she’d closed her eyes, until a the sound of a log popping on the campfire snapped Cassandra’s senses back like a bowstring and she leapt to her feet as though she’d been burned. She held her breath and glanced down at Rapunzel’s hand, which was still resting at the spot where it had just been joined with hers.

Rapunzel found her voice first. “Cass...I--”

“I’m going to sleep,” Cassandra blurted out with all the subtlety of a glass vase tipping over. “Wake me up when it’s my turn to keep watch.”

Rapunzel blinked at her for a moment, then exhaled and turned away to face the fire. “Okay. Um, goodnight.”

A moment stretched between them when Cassandra hovered, but she wrenched herself away and marched to the shelter. She laid down on the sand-dusted mat of roped-together branches that she used as a bed and stared blindly into the pitch darkness, trying to force her heart rate down. That, whatever it was, did not just happen. The sun was finally scrambling her brain, or Rapunzel was severely dehydrated, or those little leafy creeps had laid some curse upon them in an effort to drive them away. Cassandra concluded that the situation was getting dire, and resolved to redouble her efforts to get off this maddening patch of land in the morning. She needed to get them back to the world that made sense, where her longing went safely unacknowledged and Rapunzel never thought twice about the nature of their friendship.

--

They hadn’t been off the island for a week before Adira showed up again. Although this time, Cassandra might secretly admit that her assistance was sorely needed. There was no way Rapunzel and Cassandra could have prepared for a crazy rhino-mounted warrior hounding them through a narrow canyon pass, and if Adira and her indestructible sword hadn’t come to their defense, they might really have been goners.

It didn’t mean Cassandra was happy about seeing her stupid painted face again, though. She quietly sulked along as Adira led them to the Great Tree, but when Adira casually mentioned that she was once in league with crazy-rhino-guy and was leading them straight into his lair, she put her foot down. She warned Rapunzel that something was off, and they could easily be playing into a trap, but the princess trusted Adira’s judgment instead. Cassandra tried not to let that sting. Sure, Adira had come in handy once or twice, but Cassandra had been by Rapunzel’s side, protecting and supporting her for years. But apparently unwavering loyalty was easily overshadowed by a big shiny sword and a little bit of cryptic wisdom.

The beauty within the hollow of the Great Tree might have left Cassandra breathless if she hadn’t sunken so deep into a foul mood, skulking over lush foliage and filtered sunlight with her shoulders hunched and brows lowered. It made her irrationally furious to watch Rapunzel hanging on Adira’s every word, her moon-wide eyes soaking in the gleam of her blade as she sliced through ancient vines. How could she not be at least a little suspicious?

Cassandra decided to take it upon herself to put Adira in her place. While the princess was off identifying unfamiliar flower breeds with Pascal, Cassandra gripped the warrior’s sleeve and pulled her aside. “Look, Adira, you may have sold my friend on your ‘wise, kooky old mentor’ schtick, but I’m not buying it,” she whispered fiercely, pointing her finger in Adira’s face for emphasis.

“‘Old?’” Adira repeated, cocking her head. “I’m not sure I appreciate your tone.”

Cassandra barked a sarcastic laugh. “Oh, oh! I’m sorry I gave you the impression that I care about what you appreciate!”

Adira narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips. “Just say what it is you want to say to me.”

Cassandra balled her fists. What she wanted to say was that her very existence was like a stubborn pebble in the sole of her boot and if it wouldn’t have made Rapunzel upset, she would run her off with her sword right here and now. She took a deep breath to steady herself. “Just -- I’m watching you,” she said.

“Well, if that’s what you want, be my guest,” Adira shrugged, turning to go as though bored by this conversation. “But as a servant of the princess, isn’t it your job to watch her?”

“I’m not a servant,” Cassandra spat.

Adira looked over her shoulder and cocked an eyebrow. “Oh? I thought that’s what a lady-in-waiting was,” she said, and walked away.

While she glared at her retreating back, Cassandra mentally revised what she’d thought earlier. It wasn’t healthy competition, nor was it jealousy. What she felt for Adira had descended fully into loathing.

--

Cassandra had never been overcome with true terror until Rapunzel recited the moon stone’s incantation, and oily darkness spread through her hair like rot through a dying limb. There had been close calls, heart-racing disasters, and the threat of pain so absolute she thought she would never feel anything else again. But nothing had scared her like the sheer crushing helplessness of lying collapsed and breathless, forced to watch Rapunzel become consumed by decay as she recited those evil words over and over as though possessed.

“Rapunzel, please…” she reached out and wheezed with what felt like the last of her willpower. “Stop...this…”

A determined growl ripped through Adira beside her, and she somehow broke through the smothering grip of the incantation’s power, charging toward Rapunzel’s frozen form like one of those rhinos. The instant Rapunzel was knocked over into the shallow water, air returned to Cassandra’s lungs and she scrambled desperately to where she lay, wrapping her up in her arms. Rapunzel’s body was limp in her grasp, her face motionless as her hair gradually returned to its normal color.

“Raps?” Cassandra gasped, dread tightening like a fist in her chest. She brushed Rapunzel’s hair out of her face, the arm around her waist trembling. “Raps! No, no, no, no, please!”

Rapunzel’s eyes opened slowly, and the smile that bloomed on her face caused the fist in Cassandra’s chest to release. “Well, that was...unexpected,” she said, as though what had just happened was a surprise party and not a summoning of unspeakable horrors.

“Oh, you’re okay,” Cassandra breathed, hoping the reality of that statement would hit her soon. She tightened her arms around Rapunzel in a hug, burying her face in her shoulder so she could smother the heat behind her eyes. “I’m sorry, Raps. I’m supposed to protect you.”

“Cass, it’s okay,” Rapunzel soothed, placing a hand on the back of Cassandra’s head. Cassandra released a shuddering breath and pulled away from her. She heard Adira’s splashing footsteps behind her as she approached, and sat back, biting her tongue, as Rapunzel turned to look up at her. “Thank you, Adira,” she said.

Cassandra looked away.

--

After such a panic-inducing display of life-threatening terror, Cassandra thought there would be no more resistance to her urgent desire to get the hell out of this place. Their path had been cleared for them: the Great Tree held secrets that could kill them where they stood, and only a fool would remain there any longer.

And they were only there because of Adira. Adira, who had insisted the only way out was through. Adira, who brushed off Cassandra’s suspicion and commanded Rapunzel’s trust, despite offering no details about her background or motives and leading them straight to the edge of their doom. Adira, who had performed Cassandra’s duty where she herself had failed.

Cassandra had thought wrong. Whatever had caused Rapunzel to lose faith in her, it had induced her to give it over to a near stranger instead. They would stay at the Great Tree another night and Cassandra volunteered for first watch, because she knew the resentment and indignity burning within her would have kept her up anyway. Rapunzel had tried to talk to her, reassure her that she still valued her judgment even though she had grown out of relying on it, but it did little to douse the fire that was consuming her heart.

There would always be someone else whose song reached Rapunzel, whose voice lifted her up and swayed her, whose performance won her over. Cassandra could wait for another two, five, ten years, steadily reciting the same familiar melody, but she would never take the stage in Rapunzel’s heart. The sooner she accepted that, the sooner it would stop hurting so much.

Something seemed shifted after they made it out of the Great Tree; Adira disappeared again and things should have gone back to normal, but Cassandra felt weighed down by her shame and her withered hand alike. It reminded her of one of Varian’s catastrophic experiments she’d once supervised -- he had been trying to separate imperceptibly small particles out of a tube of fluid and had the idea of spinning them on the edge of a wheel at high speeds to push them to the bottom. He’d found out the hard way that the wheel had to be balanced perfectly, or the whole thing would fly off its fulcrum and smash into the wall like it had been fired by a ballista once it started spinning fast enough.

Cassandra and Rapunzel had been rotating around one another in harmony before now, but the weight Cassandra now bore had shook their balance, and she was worried she would lose her grip and shatter too if things got intense.

When they arrived on the doorstep of the House of Yesterday’s Tomorrows, Cassandra offered little resistance to staying, partly because of the thrashing storm posing as an alternative and partly because she still felt the sting of having her judgment discarded repeatedly. She took little solace in it when her gut instinct turned out to be right again and murderous doppelgangers nearly trapped them there forever, and upon their narrow escape they found that the front door to the inn was completely gone as though it had never been built. It seemed escape would be impossible for the foreseeable future, but Rapunzel at least conceded to her suggestion that they stay out of the bedrooms and sleep in the front foyer.

They had lied down on backpacks and spare clothes, and shared the one large blanket they had acquired when that merchant vessel had rescued them from the island. The foyer was silent aside from the fire crackling softly in the cavernous fireplace and the unrelenting sound of rain outside, and Cassandra turned on her side, away from Rapunzel, and tried to trick her mind into sleeping.

Rapunzel spoke up suddenly from behind her back, her timid voice venturing into the empty silence like a mouse from its burrow. “Cass?”

“Hm?” Cassandra grunted, knowing she couldn’t fake sleep.

The blanket shifted and Cassandra heard Rapunzel turn toward her. “Do you...regret coming along with me?” she asked.

The question caught Cassandra off guard, and she felt a small drop in her stomach. “Why do you say that?”

“You got hurt because of me,” Rapunzel said, her voice wavering. “You’ve almost died because of me. This was never your fight.”

Cassandra finally turned around, lying on her side with her head propped up on her fist. She looked at Rapunzel and said seriously, “It’s my job to protect you, Raps. I expect to get hurt now and then.”

“I should never have asked you to take that risk for me,” Rapunzel said, eyes darting away from Cassandra’s face and toward her charred forearm.

“You didn’t ask me to do anything. I’m here because I chose to be,” Cassandra said, and despite everything that had happened it was still true. “What kind of friend would I be if I sent you off alone on this quest?”

Rapunzel tried to chuckle, but it came out sounding more like a sob. “No one would blame you if you turned back now.”

“And miss out on my chance to throw Hector off his stupid rhino for good? I don’t think so,” Cassandra said.

Rapunzel finally smiled, her eyes warm in the fireplace’s dim glow. “I’m glad you’re here, Cass.”

These words were like a cool rain over the fires in Cassandra’s heart. “I’m glad too. Now get some sleep, princess.”

The two of them snuggled up under the blanket, and they fell asleep that way, curled toward each other with their fingers barely brushing.

--

Rapunzel was gone in the morning.

The realization that the foyer was empty threw Cassandra into a panic as soon as she woke up. How could something have happened to her when Cassandra was sleeping next to her all night? She shouldn’t have overlooked the need for a nighttime watch just because they were inside when the place had tried to kill or trap them multiple times already. She had failed to keep Rapunzel safe, again, and she had no one to blame but herself. At this rate they’d both be dead long before reaching the Dark Kingdom.

Cassandra shoved down her self-loathing and tore up the stairs, yelling for Rapunzel. The inn was like a maze of hallways lined with looming doors and Cassandra kicked herself again for not realizing immediately that the place was designed to trap them. She busted down door after door, only to find empty room after empty room, each one devoid of furniture, lighting, or anything else that would suggest it wasn’t just a hollow ruse. Cassandra raged through the halls, telling herself that magic or no, this building was finite and Rapunzel had to be behind one of these doors.

She stopped when she heard her name called from one of them, so soft she was sure she’d imagined it until she heard it again. She turned toward it and saw a white door that was rounded at the top with iron hinges, and from behind it a light so bright peeked out that Cassandra was certain it had to be sunlight. Had Rapunzel found a way to get outside?

She turned the curved handle and stepped out onto grass. “Rapunzel?” she shouted. “Are you here?”

Cassandra’s calls for Rapunzel dwindled as she ventured further through the wooded area, becoming increasingly distracted by the spotted toadstools and hanging moss surrounding her. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she recognized this place, though she was sure she hadn’t come across it since setting out from Corona. A bird called in the trees, a sound like the twang of a violin string snapping, and it struck Cassandra as something she’d heard hundreds of times before, though she couldn’t quite remember when.

“Welcome back, Cassandra.”

Birds scattered from the branches above as Cassandra instinctively drew her sword and whipped around in search of what sounded like a young girl. It was the same voice that she’d heard speaking her name from behind the door.

“There’s no need for that, I assure you,” the voice said again, and a wispy spectre appeared before Cassandra: a girl that could be no older than ten, hair wrapped up in buns on either side of her head and a gleaming circlet hanging over her broad forehead. Her bulging eyes and wide mouth struck Cassandra as strangely frog-like, though she shook her head to dispel the rude thought.

Cassandra sheathed her sword. “Where am I?”

The girl closed her eyes and whirled around her. “I suspect you already know, Cassandra.”

Cassandra followed the spectre as it glided along a dirt path, and the feeling of familiarity gradually intensified like a hum that was getting hard to ignore. And then she saw it -- a cottage in a state disrepair on the other side of a ravine, the bridge that once stretched over the gap hanging down along one cliff like a fallen banner.

“This was...my…” Cassandra gasped, staring at the gaping windows as though she could envision the life that had gone on behind them.

“Yes, your home, wasn’t it?” the spectre said. “Where you lived with your--”

“Mother,” Cassandra finished. A cold tear raced down her cheek. She could see it now; the little broom she’d clutched during her morning chores, the mirrors lining the walls so she would always know where her mother was. The handle of the tinkling music box she’d turned dutifully like a prayer during the hours every day she spent alone. The chipped doorway that had steadied her when the bridge was cut away, the night that --

“Rapunzel stole her from you,” the spectre hissed in her ear. “Long before she’d stolen all the rest.”

Silent tears streaked Cassandra’s face, the memories hitting her like a train. She ripped her gaze from the house and turned toward the spectre, narrowing her eyes. “What? Rapunzel was...she was a baby.”

The spectre tutted. “And yet it is because of her that you were abandoned. It’s her fault that you ended up second-best.”

These words cut a gash in Cassandra’s mental ward, and she couldn’t help but gasp. “What did you mean, ‘stolen all the rest?’”

“Well, first it was your mother,” the spectre began, circling around her like a snake. “Then it was your dreams. Think of what you had to sacrifice to take that position for her.”

Cassandra thought of the helmet shelved in the corner of her bureau behind stacks of servant’s uniforms. She grit her teeth. “That was my choice.”

“Was it your choice when she stole your heart, too?” the girl continued, and Cassandra closed up like a flower removed from the sun. “All that pain you endured, because she had taken that from you too and never even noticed that she had it. And that’s not the least of it. There’s more that Rapunzel will siphon from you soon, something that will leave you so discarded that everything else she stole will seem like trifles in comparison. Are you ready to give that up to her, Cassandra?”

“What are you talking about?” Cassandra said.

“Your destiny,” the spectre said, bringing her face close to Cassandra’s so that her enormous eyes trapped her gaze. “You and I both know you’re meant for glory, don’t we, Cassandra? Do you really think that lying down for Rapunzel to step over is the way that you achieve it?”

Cassandra’s pulse pounded throughout her body, and she started to feel dizzy. Her breathing became heavy, like she was inhaling a thick fog, and she felt the weight she had been carrying since the Great Tree suddenly become unbearable. “The Moonstone,” she whispered.

The spectre’s frog-like lips stretched into a grin. “Precisely,” she said. “It’s yours, Cassandra. All you have to do is take it.”

The twisting path Cassandra had tread all her life opened up with overwhelming clarity, the Moonstone shining steadily at the end of it. “I know what to do,” she resolved, her eyes set like steel.

The scenery around her folded up like a crumpled page, the cottage blinking out of existence and the birds choking on their calls. Before Cassandra could remember to breathe she was abruptly standing among the rubble of the House of Yesterday’s Tomorrows, looking up at Rapunzel reunited with the camper.

Rapunzel nearly tripped over the crumbled pieces of edifice three times as she rushed over to Cassandra, wrapping her up in a crushing hug. “Oh thank goodness, I was so worried I’d lost you. Are you okay?” she said into Cassandra’s chest.

Cassandra felt her lips curl into a smile that she didn’t feel as she looked down at Rapunzel. “Yes,” she said. “I’m going to be just fine.”

Chapter Text

The Moonstone was starting to hurt less.

Cassandra had been warned that anyone who had touched the almond-sized opal in the past had either died instantly in the forceful explosion or gone mad. She hadn’t died, but she’d come pretty close. The moment she’d enclosed her fist around it, it felt as though her flesh and bone were being torn and splintered as the untamed power ripped through her body. She had told herself that she would not scream in front of Rapunzel, but it was a matter of milliseconds before she abandoned all willpower and buckled under the agony. Her throat was still raw from the animalistic shrieks that had torn from it that day.

Now the Moonstone had been fused with her for several days, a good portion of which Cassandra had simply spent lying down because it was impossible to focus on anything else while her body throbbed incessantly with pain. It had felt like her limbs had been stretched past their limit, as though the long fibers of her muscles were frayed twine and her skin was a split sleeve that was sewn too tight. But she finally felt like her body was recovering, like she wouldn’t succumb to the burden of the Moonstone like all the others after all.

Although the look in Rapunzel’s eyes when Cassandra had trapped her behind a lattice of black rocks and walked away would take much, much longer to recover from.

Deep down Cassandra knew that Rapunzel didn’t deserve that betrayal, and if pressed she would even admit that some of the vicious things she’d said to her were unwarranted, even petulant. She had been desperate to justify the step she was taking in the face of Rapunzel’s hurt; she had been so assured of the righteousness of what she had to do up until the moment she’d grasped the Moonstone, but keeping course while staring into Rapunzel’s pleading face took far more resolve than anticipated. She’d felt cornered, knowing she couldn’t last under that gaze, and lashed out with whatever she had to get away.

It wasn’t right, there was no denying that, but turning back was not an option. Cassandra had literally shattered the bridge between them and gotten as far from the Dark Kingdom as she could, leaving Rapunzel to figure out how to get back to Corona on her own. She had no idea where she was now, and she didn’t care. She didn’t.

Her destiny was finally in her grasp and she had better things to worry about than Rapunzel’s feelings for once.

The spectre, who remained stubbornly secretive regarding her name or any other details about herself, glanced up at Cassandra as she strode into the sparse field of spikes they were using as camp. “Oh, up already, are you?”

Cassandra laid her hand upon the smooth, cold surface of one of the rocks and took a steadying breath. “I’m ready to begin,” she said.

The spectre twirled into the air, a wide grin splitting her face. “This is what you’ve been waiting for your entire life, Cassandra,” she said, and something about her voice made Cassandra believe it. “Once you learn how to bend the rocks to your will, you will be unstoppable. You can have everything you’ve ever wanted.”

“Not everything,” Cassandra corrected before she could stop herself.

The girl scoffed. “You don’t mean Rapunzel, do you?” she sneered, saying Rapunzel’s name as though it were the source of some foul odor. “That princess isn’t what you desire, she’s simply in the way of it. Once you’ve subdued her and illustrated your power, many others will trip over themselves for the chance to have you. You will have your pick of them all. You will have the love that you deserve.”

Cassandra tried to imagine herself sitting on a throne with women throwing themselves at her feet while Rapunzel rotted away in a dungeon, and it didn’t exactly give her the impression of fulfillment. She knew she had to come to terms with the fact that Rapunzel was her enemy now, and that even with all the power in the world nothing would bring her back to her side. But the prospect of having her choice of anyone in Corona except the only person she’s ever truly wanted still seemed hollow. “I’m not doing this to be loved,” she retorted. “I only want to take what’s rightfully mine.”

“Ah, that’s just as well,” the spectre mused, floating over to Cassandra’s elbow. “The rocks will respond to such a wish, as long as you imbue it with the spirit of darkness.”

“The spirit of what?”

“Come now, Cassandra, keep up. The Sun Drop is the embodiment of warmth and positivity and its power is unleashed in response to desires to heal and protect. The Moonstone is its natural opposite, which means it responds to…?”

“Darkness and negativity,” Cassandra finished, touching the stone set in her chest with one finger. “The urge to destroy and conquer.”

“Precisely. Now, yours is a noble goal: to reclaim your lost past and gain recognition of your true worth. But to command the Moonstone, you must tap into your less noble thoughts. Search your heart for its darkest corners, drag up the feelings of rage and resentment that drive you, even if you’re ashamed of them. That is the only way that you can control them.”

Cassandra closed her eyes, brows drawn in focus. Memories flashed in her mind, reminding her of all the times she’d felt discarded, humiliated, powerless. “Adira,” she muttered under her breath, starting with something that was relatively easy to admit. “She tried to take my place and Rapunzel let her. It made me angry.”

As she announced the last few words with the authoritative tone of a command, she spread her palms downward and tried to summon spikes from the earth. She clenched her jaw and tried to channel her anger through the Moonstone, but after a moment she peeked out of one eye and realized nothing was happening. She looked at the spectre, bewilderment plain on her face.

“Keep going,” the girl encouraged with a shooing motion of her hand.

Cassandra breathed deeply through her nose and closed her eyes again. “Um...I-I’ve always been jealous and resentful of Eugene. He took for granted Rapunzel’s affections, something I’ve always wanted but will never have. He constantly taunted me and talked down to me and I had to pretend I was fine with it.”

This time she felt something stirring beneath her feet, a dull rumble like the shaking of the ground during a thunderclap, but nothing broke through the surface. Her heart started picking up, and it felt like it was pumping pure electricity through her veins.

Her resolve strengthened, Cassandra returned her attention to the depths of her emotions. She dragged up something that had been lying latent within her until very recently. “My...my mother,” she choked, her shoulders sagging. “She just...left me. How could she do that to her own child?”

A tear dripped from Cassandra’s chin and soaked the dirt, and in its place a spike the length of her arm shot out towards the sky. She gasped, but held onto her momentum and dived into deeper pain as it welled up in her chest. “And I tried so hard to be what Rapunzel needed, and she never gave me a second glance! I waited and waited and waited for her, I gave up my dreams and years of my life for her, and she -- and she --” Cassandra roared with indignation, hot tears streaming down her cheeks and fists clenched tight. “She ruined them! She ruined my whole life!”

She flung her fist outward and a whole line of black rocks jutted out, reaching above her head with a deafening crack. She threw half a dozen more rows of spikes out of the earth, screaming with pain and effort both, before she collapsed in a heap, sinking her face in her hands.

The spectre appeared before her and hummed. “Do you see how much power that hatred enables you to wield? You’re on your way, Cassandra. You must purge yourself of weakness, and then nothing will ever be denied to you again.”

--

The look on Rapunzel’s face when Cassandra turned up in the middle of her little party almost made the shock of seeing Eugene there worth it.

Cassandra had been planning for weeks to infiltrate the palace. She had perfected her command of the black rocks as much as possible and decided that the next step was to recover the Demanitus scroll that she’d once helped Rapunzel complete. The spectre had assured her that only by learning the necessary incantation could she unlock the true potential of the Moonstone.

She knew exactly where she could find the scroll, but getting there required both planning and patience. When she caught wind of a grand surprise party Rapunzel was planning, she couldn’t resist the opportunity to show the princess a real surprise.

Her confidence faltered moments after she burst through the door of the reception hall, when she was confronted with the sight of Rapunzel with her arms around Eugene’s neck. She withdrew from him immediately and tried to approach Cassandra, but Cassandra drew her obsidian blade and dragged it along the stone tile with an alarming screeching sound, and Rapunzel backed off.

Judging by the banners and paintings of the man surrounding the hall, the party was for Eugene. Cassandra pointedly avoided the wary gazes of the gathered townspeople, people she once lived alongside who now only stared with reproach. They didn’t matter, she reminded herself. She didn’t need friends or other people anymore. If others hated her for finally taking a stand for herself, then let them. She knew what was right.

“Well, well,” she purred as she circled Rapunzel. “I’ve gotta say, princess, you really had me going with the whole ‘we’re not right for each other anymore’ yarn. Changed your mind already, hm?”

“Cass, it’s not like that,” Rapunzel pleaded, reaching a hand out toward her but stopping before she could make contact. “We just -- He’s -- Look, it doesn’t matter. What are you doing here?”

Cassandra pouted. “You mean my invite wasn’t simply lost in the mail? Ouch.” She slouched over to the castle-shaped cake and sliced off a turret. “I’m here to help myself. About time, don’t you think? You know, I was thinking about how we left things with each other, and it just makes me sad.”

Something sparked behind Rapunzel’s eyes and she clasped her hands in front of her chest. “Oh, it makes me sad too. I miss you, Cassandra. I want us to be together again.”

The sincerity in her tone pulled at something within Cassandra. Something she had worked to smoke out of her heart, that she thought must be dead by now, but which stubbornly survived. She clenched her eyes shut to drown the feeling. Rapunzel was dead to her, she reminded herself. If not literally, she would have to be soon. She had forced herself to make peace with that fact, that striking down Rapunzel was the only way forward, and something as pathetic as lingering affection was powerless to overturn her resolve.

“Enough about what you want, princess,” Cassandra said, turning around to face her. “I’m here for what I want. I want you to give me the scroll.”

Eugene spoke up for the first time, leaning close to Rapunzel’s ear with a hand on her shoulder and murmuring, “I wouldn’t do that…”

Cassandra’s temper flared at his interference. He wasn’t even supposed to be here, much less standing so close to Rapunzel. “Stay out of this, Fitzherbert!” she snapped, relishing in the wide-eyed look of alarm he gave her as he backed away. “‘Blondie’ can think for herself, hm? Give me the scroll, and I’ll leave Corona in peace.”

“Cass, I don’t know--”

“I’ll give you some time to decide,” Cassandra said. “Enjoy your party, Fitzherbert.” She couldn’t resist throwing the plate of cake at him before she turned on her heel to go.

--

Her plans went a little awry from there, but ultimately she got what she came for. With the Demanitus scroll and an unconscious alchemist in tow, Cassandra made her way back to the rubble of the infamous tower from Rapunzel’s childhood where she decided to make her base. With surprising ease, she’d gotten the translation out of Varian and constructed an entire spire of black rocks in minutes with her new abilities. Things were falling into place, and all that remained was to hone her power while she waited for Rapunzel to come rescue her hostage, when she could subdue her once and for all.

Varian was proving to be a nuisance, however. He was annoying at the best of times, with his insistence on deploying unfinished inventions that consistently caused trouble that Cassandra was usually roped into repairing. And Cassandra wasn’t exactly feeling warm towards him now, not after he tried to crush her to death for a personal vendetta. She wasn’t clear on when he had wormed his way back into Rapunzel’s favor, or when she had regained his, considering the last time she saw him he’d been swearing revenge on her head. But it hardly mattered. He was a tool, a means to an end, and Cassandra had no interest in his path of redemption.

Whether or not she was interested in it, though, he was determined to share it with her. He cornered her while she was sharpening her blade, arms out in front of him as though that could keep Cassandra contained. “Cassandra, we need to talk,” he said.

Cassandra scoffed, standing and slapping his hand aside to walk away. “You have no role to play here, so just stay put and be quiet.”

“No!” he said, jumping in front of her path. “Look, I get that you’re angry, but you’re making a mistake!”

Cassandra frowned down at him. “Who are you to judge me, boy? You almost killed me, and now you’re going to lecture me on the right thing to do?”

Varian groaned, passing a hand over his face. “You’re right, you’re right. I guess I should...apologize for that.”

“Don’t bother. It’s a little late for apologies,” Cassandra hissed.

“No, it’s not. It’s never too late to apologize and make amends for hurting the people you care about. I thought Rapunzel would have me thrown out of Corona, but instead she gave me my own lab and trusted me with the scroll. It’s not too late for you, Cass.”

Cassandra narrowed her eyes at him. “Rapunzel is weak,” she said.

“No, Cassandra, listen to me. It’s easy to hate and blame others for your pain, and it’s hard to turn back once you start. But forgiveness is different. Forgiveness takes strength. I know it’s true because I’ve lived it.”

Cassandra looked down and saw the raw earnestness in the boy’s expression, and it made her stomach turn. “Just because you lost your nerve and went crawling back to your enemy does not mean that my path is wrong. I’ve bent to Rapunzel’s will since I met her, and the last thing I want to do now is beg her forgiveness for taking what’s rightfully mine.”

Varian hung his head. “You’re so caught up in taking, you don’t even realize what you already have.”

“And what’s that?” Cassandra snapped. “Do enlighten me.”

“You still have Rapunzel!” he shouted, voice cracking. “How can you not see how much she cares about you?”

“You shut up!” Cassandra bellowed, throwing out her hand and striking him backward with a blunt rock. She strode over to where he lay wincing with pain and twisted a cage of stone around him. She didn’t notice how hard she was breathing until she staggered sideways, but she quickly steadied herself and smoothed her hair back. She looked down at Varian from the corner of her eye and scowled. “You have no idea what you’re talking about, so you’d better hold your tongue before I cut it out. I’m not interested in any more of your pointless moralizing, so I’m afraid you’ll have to wait outside until this is over.”

With a stretch of her fingers, she sent his cage teetering on a needle of a ledge, sticking out a good ten meters from the body of the tower. The wind should drown out his irritating voice, and maybe the view would discourage him from using it.

Fuming, Cassandra retreated to the throne she’d fashioned for herself and sat with her head in her hands. She had come this far, but there was still one weakness that stubbornly survived no matter how many times she’d tried to crush it. But once she was through with Rapunzel, she would finally be free of it.

--

When Rapunzel finally came for Varian, Eugene came with her. The sight of them together stoked the broiling indignity within Cassandra, and she was practically itching to demonstrate her new power on them as soon as they crossed into her throne room. But before she got the chance, Rapunzel sent Eugene away out of her reach so he could attend to Varian, turning to face Cassandra with lowered brows and a solemn jaw that were a far cry from the guarded hope she’d shown her at the party.

“Taking me on alone? I’ll tell you now so you won’t be surprised later: you won’t win that way,” Cassandra said, her voice echoing off the vaulted ceiling.

“I have no intention of fighting you,” Rapunzel retorted. “I have some things to say to you, and you’re going to hear me out or I’m not leaving.”

Cassandra laughed coldly. “I thought I made it clear that I’m not taking orders from you anymore,” she shouted, and to demonstrate her point, she hurtled the stone under Rapunzel’s feet toward the roof with a swift uppercut. She had a feeling it wouldn’t be that easy, and she wasn’t disappointed; Rapunzel’s hair unfolded from the protective shield it had formed around her like a lotus flower blooming, and she stepped out with her fists clenched.

“I’m not ordering you,” she said, speaking each word with intention. “I’m here as a friend, Cassandra. Please, I just want to talk.”

“You picked a bad location to negotiate, princess,” Cassandra said, narrowing her eyes. “You know I can control the rocks now, and you know what this place is made of, right?”

Before Rapunzel could respond, Cassandra punched a hole through the floor below her and watched as she started to fall with a scream of surprise and terror. Cassandra felt an involuntary rush of relief when she saw that Rapunzel had saved herself with her hair as a lifeline, but shoved the feeling out of her mind with a growl of frustration.

Rapunzel pulled herself up and struggled to her knees, heaving with exertion. “Cass, please. Why are you doing this? This isn’t you!”

Cassandra stepped over her and dragged her to eye level by the front of her shirt. “That’s just it, Rapunzel. I guess you just didn’t know me as well as you thought.”

“I know you,” Rapunzel insisted, and her unwavering gaze took considerable resolution to maintain. She looked into Cassandra’s eyes like she was searching for something in them, intent and undeterred. “And I know you couldn’t have just faked all the time we spent together, the memories we shared. That was you, the real you. And there’s something broken inside you that’s driving you to make others hurt the way you do, but it doesn’t have to go like this. I can help you, Cass. Please, just let me in.”

Cassandra’s voice was stuck in her throat for a moment, and she felt like something frail and starved in her heart was acting up and trying to wrench control from her practiced indifference. Her eyes felt trapped by Rapunzel’s, like she couldn’t look away even if she tried, and for a fleeting heartbeat it seemed easier to just give in to her. She could go back right now, give up the power she’d lost a part of herself to obtain, and settle back into the comfortably familiar but unfulfilling fate of waiting in the wings.

Rapunzel saw the battle on her face and dared to reach for the fist twisted in her shirt, and as Cassandra stood frozen she closed her eyes and leaned down to press her cheek into it. “I won’t give up on you,” she whispered, her breath warm on Cassandra’s fingers.

When the first tear broke through Cassandra’s hardened resolve and raced down her cheek, she felt like she might have been slapped. No, she’d come too far to surrender now. She threw Rapunzel backward, pinning her to the wall by her hair with black spikes before she even hit the ground. She turned away to beckon Varian’s cage, with Eugene accompanying it, back into the throne room.

“What...what are you doing?” Rapunzel breathed, struggling to her feet.

“You think I can’t see right through your little plan?” Cassandra seethed, slowly stepping toward the cage. “If you were going to prey on my one weakness, you should’ve thought better than to bring him here.” She clenched her fist and a coffin of rocks rose from the floor to restrain Eugene, and she reached out and snatched his chin with one clawed hand.

“Cassandra, I don’t understand...what weakness? Let Eugene go, he has nothing to do with this!” Rapunzel pleaded.

Cassandra laughed bitterly. “Oh, doesn’t he? The moment my back was turned you went crawling right back to him. And now you think you can hit me where it hurts by coming here together, but it’s not going to work like that anymore.”

“I told you it wasn’t like that!” Rapunzel shouted, her voice cracking. “When you left, I was alone, and Eugene just wanted to help. Please believe me, I would never try to hurt you!”

“She’s telling the truth,” Eugene gritted out between quick breaths. “You didn’t see...how heartbroken she was. She needed a friend...and you weren’t there.”

Growling, Cassandra twisted the rocks tighter around Eugene, and the man wheezed and grunted in pain. “I’d suggest you keep your thoughts to yourself in the future, Fitzherbert,” she hissed.

“Cass, please just let him go! Take it out on me if you need to, but don’t hurt him!” Rapunzel begged, and tears were burning from her eyes.

“Rapunzel, maybe it’s time to use the fourth incantation,” Varian suggested from below.

“What fourth incantation?” Cassandra demanded, snapping her gaze to the boy.

“It doesn’t matter,” said the spectre circling Cassandra, and she sounded neither surprised nor concerned. “Nothing they can do will overpower you now.”

Cassandra could do nothing but stand ready as Rapunzel recited the words given to her by Varian, watching as her hair lit up and spread like a sacred flame and crumbled the rocks that had pinned her as though they were made of wet sand. She floated to the ground but her feet still hovered above it, and when she opened her eyes to look at Cassandra they burned with pure sunlight.

“Let him go,” she repeated, and her voice reverberated with commanding intensity. The tears had dried and she wasn’t asking anymore.

Screaming as though wounded, Cassandra punched row after row of pointed rocks at her, each strike imbued with so much rage and resentment she thought it would ignite every last nerve in her body like a bolt of lightning. Rapunzel simply held out a hand and the rocks halted obediently before her, disintegrating before they could come near her. Cassandra bore down and tried to raise a prison of rocks around her, but as soon as they came into contact with one of Rapunzel’s glowing tendrils they fell apart uselessly.

“I said, let him go!” Rapunzel shouted, and with the last syllable a blinding wave of light shot out from her center, reacting with the rocks like fire with gas, and the resulting explosion threw Cassandra hurtling out the side of the tower with chunks of stone chasing after her. Flailing in freefall, she was barely able to summon a ledge out from the wall to catch her, where she landed with a bruising thud.

Aching with pain and stinging with fury, Cassandra glared back at the top of the tower, where the golden light flickered and died like a snuffed candle. She pulled her gaze away and curled in on herself where she lay, and finally succumbed to her tears.

--

Cassandra wondered how long it would take before Rapunzel stopped being pleased to see her. Even though she had been on guard when they had grappled at the Spire, there was no mistaking the fleeting look of relief that crossed her features. Was she happy to see that she’d survived their fight? The thought made Cassandra shiver; this was why Rapunzel would never beat her, no matter how much power she obtained. Her heart always got in the way, and it was that precise weakness that Cassandra was so bent on whittling down in herself.

Cassandra had snatched victory at the Spire, but she soon saw her chance to pounce on Rapunzel when she was alone and unguarded. When she found her opportunity to put an end to the princess, it was at the place where their fates had crossed for the first time, where Rapunzel’s shadow was first cast on Cassandra. The cottage was musty and decrepit, the roof caved in and the floorboards eaten with mildew, and Cassandra had the strange impression that such a fate for the miserable place was appropriate.

Striking a truce with Rapunzel out of necessity was not in her plans. She knew she had to stay as far from Rapunzel as she could to convince herself that she was unsalvageable, an obstacle destined for destruction, that her former feelings for her were nothing more than a twisted manifestation of inferiority. She knew this because the moment she conceded an inch of her hatred, it was perilously simple to relinquish it all. She even called her “Raps” again before she could catch herself. She realized that she wanted desperately to trust her, that that withered blossom inside her ached to be back in the sun. And that was far more dangerous than any Sun Drop magic Rapunzel could unleash on her.

In the end she overcame it, intact except for a splinter of doubt. Rapunzel’s accusation that the girl who was guiding Cassandra was Zahn Tiri in an unassuming form was probably a ploy to destabilize her by sowing mistrust of her allies, but for some reason Cassandra was incapable of discarding it. It couldn’t be true, but it would explain a lot of unanswered questions. The girl had mysteriously assumed a corporeal form after the fight at the tower and offered no reasoning as to why, nor had she opened up a single detail about her identity or past. There had to be some other explanation, but if what Rapunzel said was true...well, Cassandra didn’t want to dwell on the implications.

The splinter remained firmly lodged in her mind for the next several weeks, and despite Cassandra’s efforts to ignore it it still caused a pang of uncertainty in every step she took. When she had first met the enchanted girl in the House of Yesterday’s Tomorrow, she held a sway over her so inevitable that it was like Cassandra had been swept up in a riptide, and that she would sooner drown than return to the shores of her life the way it had been. All this time she’d been keeping her head above the tide, believing that swimming along the vicious current was the only way to survive, but now she felt the strength of the girl’s pull starting to ebb. Suddenly the shore no longer seemed impossible to reach.

It wasn’t until she’d stumbled across the missing shard of her mother’s mirror that she finally broke free. Her path, which once seemed so clear, became exposed for what it really was: a predetermined labyrinth with the illusion of choice, and at the center of it was not the Moonstone as she thought. What she had been striving toward was servitude, yet again, and Cassandra realized that she had never been seeking out her own destiny. She had been manipulated into sabotaging those who actually cared about her in order to pave the way for someone who had just been using her.

She fled. She could do nothing else. Cut loose from the puppet strings of Zahn Tiri, Cassandra fell straight back to Rapunzel. She knew she had no right to her forgiveness, but she had to at least try to make things right by her. She disguised herself as Rapunzel’s new handmaiden, because the people of Corona would chase her out with torches and pitchforks the moment someone spotted her and she knew that she couldn’t blame them. But she had to get to Rapunzel somehow, to the only person who still had hope for her.

--

The night that Rapunzel’s hair grew back, the first time that Cassandra was threatened with dismissal from the princess’s service, she could think of nothing more demoralizing than being replaced in Rapunzel’s life. That fear had been pushed into reality by Cassandra’s own hand and now she had the chance to turn it on its head; she would replace the new handmaiden and directly gauge what her relationship with Rapunzel was like in her absence.

She was instantly validated by Rapunzel’s lackluster demeanor when she first made it to her side. When Cassandra was her lady-in-waiting, Rapunzel was constantly holding onto her, dragging her along so they could do everything together, greeting her with brilliant smiles and enthusiastic hugs. She had braced herself for the possibility of seeing Rapunzel transplant her affection onto someone else, but she greeted Faith with nothing more than a halfhearted grin and a wave. Evidently if Cassandra hoped for a hug, she would have to get it the hard way.

Following Rapunzel around without giving away her identity became hard quickly. It was the day of the Gopher Grab, one of the princess’s favorite celebrations, but she was...sad. It was nothing like her distress in the few days following her breakup with Eugene; instead of wearing an untroubled mask and acting like nothing was wrong, she seemed drained and colorless, seeing loss everywhere she looked.

“You seem, uh, a little out of sorts today, your highness,” Cassandra tried, unable to hold her tongue after seeing Rapunzel shrug and pass on helping design the banner.

Rapunzel sighed. “Yeah, you could say that. It’s just that I’m used to spending this day with -- with someone else. It’s hard not to miss her today.”

Cassandra bit her lip, knowing she should just nod and move on, but the guilt ate at her. “You don’t mean...Cassandra, do you?”

Rapunzel blinked and looked over at her. “Is it that obvious?” she said with a soft chuckle. “Yeah, I kinda messed things up with her. And now she’s gone and I don’t think she’s coming back.”

“It sounded to me like maybe she messed things up with you,” Cassandra said, trying not to look guilty as she rubbed her arm.

Rapunzel sighed and shook her head. “I know nobody else trusts her anymore, but she’s not a bad person. No one wants to blame me for what happened, but the truth is that it is partially my fault.”

Cassandra almost didn’t know what to say to this. All that time she’d spent resenting Rapunzel and still she never thought of what had happened as anything but her choice alone. “Your highness, you couldn’t have known that she was going to take the Moonstone. It’s not a bad thing that you trusted her.”

“Maybe not, but I should’ve known that she was suffering enough to do something like that. She was always there for me when I needed her, and yet she couldn’t trust me with her pain.” Rapunzel sat down on a nearby bench and wrung her hands.

Cassandra faltered, then sat down beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. “Maybe there were some things she was afraid to tell you.”

“There was nothing she could tell me that would make me let her go,” Rapunzel said weakly, and a chill raced down Cassandra’s neck. “Nothing could be worse than losing her.”

They were silent for a moment, and Cassandra struggled not to rip off her disguise and beg Rapunzel for forgiveness. But after a minute of chewing her lip she ventured, “You...still want her back, then?”

Rapunzel took a shuddering breath. “I would do anything to have her back. I’d give any sacrifice.”

“Raps,” Cassandra breathed, and just like at her mother’s old cottage it was instinctive. Rapunzel met her gaze with wide eyes, and Cassandra held her breath so she wouldn’t break it. “I have something I need to tell you, in private.”

“Oh...okay, Faith, lead the way” she said, standing up and allowing Cassandra to take her toward the palace. It would be over soon, the wounds that Cassandra had opened between them would be covered once they could find a place to talk and make amends. A few more minutes and Cassandra could tell her everything, and she could claw her way the last few inches out of the dark water and onto the warm shore.

But of course it wouldn’t be that easy. Her cloak must have caught on a corner as she passed it, because she heard Rapunzel gasp like she’d been doused in ice-cold water behind her. Turning around, she saw her own blue curls and black gloves, and saw the terror in Rapunzel’s eyes as she gaped at her.

Everything fell apart so quickly. Cassandra barely had time to open her mouth to explain before the royal guard surrounded her. She vaguely heard Rapunzel ordering them to stand down, but Cassandra used the black rocks to defend herself and that was all the guards needed to escalate their defensive response. Eugene and Varian rushed into the plaza, and the kid was wielding some sort of cannon that was aimed straight at her. A blast fired from its muzzle and struck Cassandra with devastating force, and amber raced up her body until it fully encased her.

She saw Rapunzel shouting something to Varian, and he put the weapon down. Rage coursed through Cassandra’s veins, and the Moonstone responded to the intense flare of hatred. Black rocks exploded from the ground and shattered her prison, and she gripped Rapunzel’s wrist with punishing force.

“You were ready for me,” she accused.

“Cass, please, I told them to stand down. I don’t want us to fight again,” Rapunzel pleaded, clutching her hands.

“I was a fool to think this could have gone any differently,” Cassandra said. “You only want me to come back so you can put me in my place. Well, sorry princess, but you won’t get the chance.”

“Cassandra, no!”

A black rock shot out from below and struck the side of Rapunzel’s head, and she collapsed to the ground.

--

The eclipse gave Cassandra the purest sense of satisfaction. With every second that the moon edged closer to casting a shadow before the sun, Cassandra could feel her power rising as Rapunzel’s began to dwindle and she couldn’t help but relish in the justice of it. She had always lived in Rapunzel’s shadow, but now it was her turn.

She didn’t need Rapunzel. She didn’t need Zahn Tiri anymore, either. The only person who would ever have her interests at heart would be herself, and so she was the only one she needed to rely on. And when she finally managed to encase Rapunzel in rock and drag her into her ruined bedroom, the future where she would no longer be tempted to return to her started to come into view. Once she grasped the Sun Drop, no one could force her to wait for anything ever again.

She had it for all of three seconds before Zahn Tiri ripped both it and the Moonstone from her clutches, and that future came crashing down as the power leached from Cassandra’s body and she was hurled at the wall like discarded bones. Rapunzel rushed to her side and they both became imprisoned in a cage of rocks as Zahn Tiri, now fully reformed, abandoned them to wreak havoc on everything Cassandra had once loved.

Rapunzel could never accept defeat. She fretted around the walls of the cage, looking for some weakness or opening, while Cassandra sat with her head in her hands. After several minutes of fruitless searching, Rapunzel turned to her and urged her, “Come on, Cass, what are you doing? We’ve got to get out of here!”

“What’s the point? We’ve lost, Rapunzel,” Cassandra muttered without looking at her.

“No, there’s still hope. It’s not too late!”

Cassandra scoffed. “That’s what you said when I took the Moonstone back in the Dark Kingdom.”

“Was it?” Rapunzel said, and moved to sit down next to her, tucking her hair, which was back to brown after losing the power of the Sun Drop, against her neck. “Well, I was right then, too.”

“No, you were naive!” Cassandra snapped, throwing her hands up. “When will you just give up on me? Look around you, can’t you see what I’ve done? I betrayed you, I attacked your kingdom. I did it to hurt you! Why won’t you just hate me?”

Rapunzel looked down at her hands, and was silent for a moment as Cassandra began to sob. “I tried,” she whispered at length. “People kept telling me I had every right to resent you. Eugene told me I had to let you go to be happy. But I...I couldn’t. No matter how angry or hurt I was because of you, there was never any hatred in my heart. I don’t know what that says about me.”

Cassandra looked up at her, tears falling from her wide eyes. “Did you...did you tell yourself it made you weak?”

Rapunzel met her eyes and then looked away. “I think that might be what the people around me thought.”

“I...felt the same way,” Cassandra admitted.

“What do you mean?”

Cassandra wiped her tears with the heel of her hand. “The Moonstone gets its power from negative emotions. Hatred and rage and pain fuel it. Zahn Tiri told me that if I could get myself to feel pure hatred for you, it would make me unspeakably strong. I tried so hard, but I...could never do it. There was always some part of me that held on.”

Rapunzel smiled at her. “I think that must be the strongest part of you.”

Cassandra threw her arms around Rapunzel’s neck and buried her face in her shoulder, and more tears escaped her when she felt Rapunzel wrap her arms around her. “I am so, so sorry, Raps,” she sobbed. “For everything I did. I was trying to prove that I was worth more than everyone thought, but they were right.”

“No, Cassandra,” Rapunzel spoke into her hair. “You were hurt and it made you vulnerable so that Zahn Tiri could take your willpower from you, but now you can take it back. You are stronger and freer now than you have ever been, and I am so proud of you.”

“How can you still believe in me after all the terrible things I’ve done?” Cassandra said, releasing her and sitting back to look at her.

Rapunzel gave her a soft smile. “Because you’re still the beautiful person I met all those years ago.” She took a deep breath and bit her lips. “Cassandra, there’s something I kept from you for a long time, and after what happened I couldn’t stop thinking that it could have been avoided if I had been brave enough to tell you when I had the chance.”

Cassandra looked at her with furrowed brows. “Well, you can tell me now. It couldn’t hurt.”

When Rapunzel reached for her hand, Cassandra could feel that it was trembling. “Do you remember on the Day of Hearts, when you took me on that boat and I told you all the reasons I broke up with Eugene? Well, I...may not have actually told you all of them.”

Cassandra narrowed her eyes, at a loss to predict where this was going. “Yeah?”

“I mean, all the things I talked about were also true. We definitely weren’t compatible for the long term and now that some time has passed I can see that we’re both better off this way, I mean Eugene has his own place now and it’s really become a home for him, you should see it sometime, and he and Lance have become really close and I can’t help wondering if there might be something there, but Eugene and I are friends again so he would probably tell me if there was, but then again maybe he’s embarrassed and doesn’t want to tell me--”

“Raps, focus.”

“R-Right!” Rapunzel peeped, and her freckled cheeks grew red with blush. She took another steadying breath and squeezed her hand. “The other reason that I didn’t want to tell you is that...well, I also broke up with him because of you.”

“Me?!” Cassandra said, eyebrows flying toward her hairline. “What did I do? You mean because I don’t like him?”

“No, no, no! That’s not it!” Rapunzel laughed nervously. She looked to the side and put a hand on her forehead, muttering, “Ugh, why is this so hard?”

“Just spit it out!”

“It was because I’m in love with you!” Rapunzel announced, and she froze like a statue and squeezed her eyes shut as the confession seemed to echo between them. Cassandra’s jaw hung open, staring in disbelief, and her mind had skidded to a halt as though she had never learned how to speak.

Finally, she figured out how to close her mouth and use it to make sounds. “Um,” she said. “What?”

The color of Rapunzel’s face resembled the shade it had turned when she’d eaten those spicy peppers on the island and she seemed incapable of looking Cassandra in the eye. “Part of the reason I broke up with Eugene was that I have such strong feelings for you and I couldn’t stop thinking about...being with you instead. I was afraid to tell you because I didn’t want to lose you, but, well...maybe I could’ve kept you if I had told you how much you mattered to me sooner.”

“Rapunzel that’s…” Cassandra stammered. “That changes a lot of things.”

“I know,” she said quietly. Her eyes were still averted as though she was bracing herself for rejection.

“It’s...I have feelings for you too, Raps,” she said, and saying it out loud felt like shaking off fetters that had been digging into her heels for years.

Rapunzel finally met her eyes. “You do?”

Cassandra nodded. “They’re the strongest part of me,” and as she said it she finally realized it was true.

Tears welled up in Rapunzel’s eyes and she laughed with pure mirth. “Cass…”

Cassandra reached over and swept a chestnut lock of hair behind Rapunzel’s ear. “I want to be with you, too, but first...let’s take care of the rampaging demon destroying our home.”

Rapunzel leapt to her feet and cheered. “Now that’s the Cassandra I know!”

--

Fighting alongside Rapunzel after so much time spent fighting against her felt like the resolution of a dissonant song. Whatever Zahn Tiri had tried to instill in Cassandra about hatred being the source of power was built on fabrication; Cassandra felt like she could do anything with the knowledge that her love for Rapunzel was not only welcomed, but returned. It was easy to give up the last shard of the Moonstone, and it felt so good to trust Rapunzel again. Despite the whole fighting an omnipotent demon for the fate of the world aspect, Cassandra had never felt more at peace.

She remembered kicking up a shard of stone to Rapunzel, and she remembered the sharp sound as it sliced through her hair. She remembered the thunderclap of Zahn Tiri’s hands coming together, and being thrown backward from the resulting shockwave. Then, she remembered nothing at all.

She opened her eyes, and the sky was blue. Tendrils of blue and golden light swirled across the balcony, and her eyes followed them down to see Rapunzel clutching the brilliantly glowing source to her heart, chanting the healing incantation. She propped herself up on an elbow and called to her, and Rapunzel looked at her with a smile so bright she could feel it.

When the stone was gone, ascended into the heavens where it couldn’t cause any more strife, Rapunzel rushed to where Cassandra lay and scooped her up in her arms. Cassandra could feel Rapunzel’s tears dripping onto her face and she loosened her embrace so she could put a hand on her cheek and look into her eyes.

“Thank you, Raps,” she whispered.

Rapunzel laughed through her tears and rushed forward to press her lips to Cassandra’s. The kiss was full of everything she loved about Rapunzel, from its clumsy enthusiasm to its earnest warmth, and Cassandra took it all and gave it back. They held onto each other for a long time, gasping between kisses and entangling their fingers into each other’s hair, and when they finally parted they looked around to see the king and queen and Eugene and the entire kingdom clapping and cheering for the day they had saved together.

--

When things had settled, Cassandra knocked on the door to Rapunzel’s room like she had so many times in the life where she had been her handmaiden. It had been a trial of will to refrain from bringing up what had happened between them while the kingdom was in desperate need of repair, but after a week of nonstop audiences and construction strategy meetings, Rapunzel finally had a moment to herself.

“Come in,” Rapunzel called from the other side of the door, and Cassandra pushed it open to see the princess standing by the gaping hole in the wall of her bedroom where Zahn Tiri had broken through. She crossed the room and stood beside her, looking out at Corona and the sun rising over the water.

“What are you going to do now?” Cassandra said.

Rapunzel breathed in deep. “Well, I finally got to see the world. It’s time for me to prepare for the day I become queen.”

Cassandra smiled. “That day’s still a long way off.”

“Yes,” Rapunzel said, and she turned toward Cassandra and held her hands. “And I seem to recall a certain someone promising to be by my side when it does.”

“After everything that’s happened, you would still have me there?” Cassandra asked. “Your people might not trust me ever again.”

Rapunzel stepped a little closer. “Over time, I know they’ll forgive you if you work hard to make things right. But...I wouldn’t ask you to stay here if you didn’t want to.”

“I left your side once, and it only made me realize how much happier I would have been if I had stayed. I want to make things right, and I want to be with you when I do.” Cassandra reached a hand to her cheek. “I love you, Raps.”

“I love you too, Cass.” Rapunzel leaned up and smiled into their kiss, and they held each other close with the setting moon and the rising sun caressing them in their shared glow.