Rapunzel

She didn’t know her father. Her mother never let her see him. He was dangerous, Yako had told her many times, dangerous and more than willing to hurt her to keep them both in line. So whenever her father came to see them, Rapunzel would be hidden away in a special room in their lair. A special room with food and toys and her familiar and best friend, Pascal. There, she would spend however long she had to, playing and talking and keeping herself occupied.

She never heard anything- the walls were too thick. But, eventually, she would hear her mother knocking on the door, telling her it was safe to come out. Yako would be exhausted, worse for the wear of whatever her father had put her through, but she would smile and hold out her arms to her child, and pretend it was all ok.

But Rapunzel knew. She always noticed. Noticed when Yako flinched away from a touch, because to feel it would have hurt too much. Noticed when there was a haunted look in her eyes. Noticed when she wasn’t quite right, in those first few days after her father left to wherever it was he went. She knew, and she did her best to help.

She learned about herbs- whenever there was treasure to spend and Yako asked her if she wanted a gift, she asked for books about the world. About animals and plants and rocks and, most importantly, medicines. She learned how to brew teas, teas she would give to her mother to help her sleep. Salves for wounds, how to soak bandages to help keep away infection, everything she needed to know.

She had to leave most of them behind when they finally ran. She could only take what they could carry, and since most of their bags were packed with supplies, she barely had room for anything else. Pascal, of course, since he could wrap himself around her neck, and only two books. So she took the most important, her book of plants and her book of animals, because they would help the most. Help them stay as alive as they could.

It was hard, running. Not knowing where they would sleep, not knowing where they would eventually call home. But she had her mother and her best friend, and for that, Rapunzel was happy.

And eventually they did find a home. A clan that took them in, that kept them safe from her father when he and the siblings she didn’t know she had came to try and find them, despite the losses the clan took. A clan she and her mother could call home.

She was just a child, a hatchling, when this took place. She grew up in the clan after the war, and she had seen what a healer could truly do. She watched as Sophie and Howl treated the wounds the war had left, both on the mind and the bodies of those who had survived. Saw how their treatments helped her mother when she finally went to them, helped her heal old wounds that had taken so long to do so on their own. Helped the entire clan get better and stronger.

When she was old enough, she asked them to train her. And when she showed just how good she already was, they took her on as their apprentice and taught her all she needed to know.

And, in turn, helped her find her love.

He had been a thief, trying to seal one of the rare herbs she had managed to gather the day before. Properly dried, a single plant could last them for years. And a single plant went for millions of treasure, drawing Eugene to their lair.

And the moment he saw her, something strange happened. Something she couldn’t understand at the time. The moment he saw her, he changed. He put back the plant he had been about to steal, kneeled before her, and begged her to be his.

Love at first sight, it seemed. Or, as she later found out, a Guardian’s instinct when they finally found their charge.

He begged the Queen to be allowed to stay- she accepted, so long as he gave up his thieving ways (which he did, quickly, though he kept the clothes). He begged Yako for permission to woo her, and got it, though not without much hesitation and promises that he would be nothing like her father. And he wooed her, to the best of his abilities. Followed her as she gathered herbs for the clan’s potions and medicines, learned about her life and shared his own, the stars bright in his eyes as he spoke about her beauty and her soul.

He was in love, and she fell in love as well.

And then one day, one day after they had accidently fallen asleep in Elena’s flower garden, she woke up to a stranger watching her. A strange wildclaw male who looked at her with the stars in his eyes, because he loved her so.

She was worried, at first, that his love for her would fade- what if it had just been Eugene’s Guardian instinct that had attracted him to her, not some real love? Now that he was a wildclaw, having begged the Queen for a scroll and been gifted it at his request, that instinct was no longer there. Would he leave her, now that she truly did love him in turn?

The answer was no, for no matter what species he could have been, Eugene loved her. He saw the stars and moon and everything good within her, and he loved her. And he always would.

She eventually graduated to full Healer, taking her place besides Sophie and Howl and Yuko and Felix, caring for her people as best as she could. And she was happy, because she could wash away her father’s legacy just as easily as she washed away the herbal juice each night before going to sleep with her love, leaving her clean to heal again on the marrow.