Rapunzel
Rapunzel first saw the floating lanterns on her fifth birthday.
In retrospect, if Gothel had known about the lanterns, Rapunzel has no doubt she would have lied and claimed Rapunzel’s birthday was a week earlier, or locked all the windows before bedtime, or slipped something into her dinner so she’d sleep through the night. But Rapunzel had already been sneaking around to look at the stars for months at that point, and so the distant lights were one last birthday surprise.
When she saw them on her sixth birthday, she thought they might be meant for her.
By her tenth, she knew they were.
She couldn’t explain it—what they were, why she was so certain, how she knew in her bones that everything would change if only she could reach the lights. How she believed they would lead her to where she really belonged.
It was easier to be certain from the window of a tower she never thought she’d leave. And it was easier to stay with Mother—no, Gothel—telling her she’d only ever be wanted for her hair.
The problem wasn’t believing that those lights were meant for her.
The problem is that she followed them to where she should belong, and now, as a princess, with a home she can leave and parents who love her…there are no clear answers in her windows. She feels like she keeps looking for what she’s meant to do but finding nothing in reach, only distant, scattered stars.
Like now, with Eugene telling her he has to choose between the truth about his past…and her.
“I didn’t agree to anything,” Eugene is saying as he paces at the foot of Cressien’s bed. “In fact, I told them to get stuffed, more or less. They seemed very convinced I would change my mind.”
Minister Cressien looks like he’s thinking fondly of Duke Louis’s five barrels of rosé, perched stiff as a board on the edge of the mattress. Rapunzel can’t tell if he’s more distraught by the invasion of his personal space or the burgeoning political crisis. To her surprise, though, when he speaks, it’s not nearlyas prickly as she was bracing for. “Master Fitzherbert, I would not typically pry, but…do you recallanythingfrom your childhood that might be related? Any time spent on a ship? Any unusual visitors?”
“Nothing,” Eugene answers bluntly, rearranging decorative knickknacks on one of the guest room’s shelves. Rapunzel’s clocked by now that his anxiety tends to be stored in his hands. “All my earliest memories are in the orphanage. Andpleasecall me Eugene. ‘Master Fitzherbert’ sounds like a mean teacher in a kiddie book.”
Cressien ignores that. “What about this Solena?”
“Part of the orphanage staff. She never said anything about knowing my parents or having a connection with Astera, and when she left, she said it was because she was settling here. But she’s not in the Asteran immigration records.”
“Maybe her real name isn’t Solena,” Rapunzel suggests from her post in the desk chair. “Or she snuck into Astera. Or both.”
Cressien pinches the bridge of his nose. “Master Fitzherbert’s profile has certainly become more prominent in the last month.…It is possible that this invitation was issued with the intention to bring him here.”
“Mm,” Rapunzel hedges. Cressien looks up at her in a way that implies a gaze over nonexistent spectacles. “Well, Verette said her father invited me, and she doesn’t seem happy we’re here. But if King Enver expected me to bring Eugene, he wouldn’t have been so shocked when he saw him, right?”
Cressien’s brows rise. “Fair point.”
“I do think this is something, well, big,” she says, fumbling for the right words. “This organization wants Eugene to spy on me and Enver, they have at least one operative here as the stable master, and…I felt like they were acting strange on the tour.”
“How so?” Cressien asks.
“It was like they didn’t want me looking too closely at anything. I—I wasn’t trying to pry or be rude—” Rapunzel catches herself fiddling with a sleeve. There’s no reason to be nervous. She knows what she’s talking about. “They kept changing the subject or moving us along. And alotof the stonework in the palace has been repaired. You can tell because the patch material has a different luster. The damage it’s covering would have been huge. I think the palace was attacked at one point.”
“Perhaps natural causes…” Cressien starts, then shakes his head. “No, I concur, we were being handled on the tour, but we would have noticed repairs to other major structures. An attack on the palace suggests Astera may not be as united as it seems.”
“Moon Eye was asking about Verette’s coming of age ceremony, like they suspect something might happen,” Eugene pitches in, moving from the shelf to fuss with the dried flowers in a decorative urn. “I said I didn’t know about the plans.”
“I don’t think any of us do,” Cressien says slowly. “She seems to be popular among the citizens of Astera, and they referred to her as the ‘queen to come,’ but when I asked CouncilorTeophine if Verette would be ascending the throne at this ceremony, she just said, ‘We’ll see.’ Traditionally, many more royal families would be invited to attend such a coronation.”
Rapunzel rubs the back of her neck. “Does…does anyone know how old Verette actually is? I’m not really good at guessing.”
Eugene and Cressien trade looks. “Beats me,” Eugene says, and drifts over to stand near her at the desk.
Cressien’s gaze narrows. “So to summarize: There are signs of previous violence within the palace. Master Fitzherbert has connections to Astera that were concealed from him with, it seems, great effort. It seems increasingly likely that the princess’s coming of age is a smoke screen, though we’re not certain to what end. And an underground organization is attempting to extort Master Fitzherbert into spying on the king and Princess Rapunzel in exchange for information they hypothetically have about his parents.”
“Aaaand you’ve been holding out on us,” Eugene says with a sudden jolt of delight, gawking at the contents of a desk drawer he’d idly pulled open. Rapunzel glances down, bewildered. Inside is a skein of coral yarn, a crochet hook, and…
“Is that a crab?” Rapunzel asks.
