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“Rapunzel! Rapunzel, let down your hair.” It was Flynn Rider. He was calling from outside.
“How…Never mind,” said Gothel. “Now listen to me, my little flower, do as I say or I will gut that dreamboat of yours, do you understand?” She tossed Rapunzel’s hair out the window for Flynn Rider to climb up.
“Do you understand?” asked Gothel.
“Yes,” said Rapunzel.
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, Mother.”
“That’s right,” Gothel said as she gagged the lost princess.
Gothel stood at the window, waiting for Flynn Rider to come in. Rapunzel was frozen in fear. She didn’t know what her mother—what Gothel—would do next.
“Rapunzel, I never thought I would see you again!”
Before he could say anything else, Gothel stabbed him. She had killed before but nothing so intimate as this, and she had a keen sense of satisfaction, feeling the blade slip into his flesh and his warm blood pouring onto her hand. Rapunzel screamed through her gag, trying to reach Eugene, but the ropes kept her in place.
“Now look what you’ve done, Rapunzel!” Gothel said. “Oh, don’t worry, dear. Our secret will die with him.”
Rapunzel was terrified. Eugene was bleeding to death.
“And as for us…we are going where no one will ever find you again!” We will go to the dead woods, and I will claim my place as queen once again, and I will have my sisters at my side!
Rapunzel was struggling against her mother as Gothel tried to drag her down the secret passageway.
“Rapunzel, really! Stop already! Stop fighting me!”
“No! I won’t stop! For every minute for the rest of my life, I will fight. I will never stop trying to get away from you, but if you let me save him, I will go with you.”
“No, no, Rapunzel,” Eugene said.
“I will never run, I will never try to escape. Just let me heal him. And you and I will be together forever. Like you want. Everything will be the way it was. I promise. Just like you want. Just let me heal him.”
Together. Forever. The words were like knives in Gothel’s heart. Sisters. Together. Forever.
Gothel agreed. She finally had her flower. Rapunzel would go without a struggle. Gothel would take her to the dead woods, and they would be together, along with her sisters. They would never grow old and they would never die. They would never turn to dust like their mother. She would never suffer the indignity of death—of the horrible death she had given her mother. She was finally going to have the life she wanted.
“Eugene! Oh, I’m so sorry! Everything is going to be okay, though. I promise. You have to trust me, come on.”
“I can’t let you do this!”
He was dying, and Rapunzel’s heart was breaking as she watched him slipping away from her. “And I can’t let you die,” Rapunzel told him.
“But if you do this, then you will die.” She knew Eugene was right, but there was no choice. “Hey, it’s going to be all right.” She didn’t know who she was trying to convince—Eugene or herself.
“Rapunzel, wait,” he said as he touched the side of her face. And before she could stop him, he sliced off her hair with a piece of broken mirror.
“Eugene, what—?” She held her hair in her hands as she watched it die and turn brown. It looked like dead leaves.
“No!” Gothel screamed as she tried to gather the dying hair to her. “No, no, no! What have you done?” And then it was happening. She was suffering the same fate as her mother. She started to wither. She started to age. It was horrific. And the pain, it was worse than she had imagined. It consumed her. It devoured her from within. “What have you done?” She ran to the mirror, trying to find the odd sisters, trying to find someone who could help her. She couldn’t leave her sisters alone. What would become of them? She had failed them. She had failed her sisters. She was going to die. I can’t leave my sisters! I can’t! She screamed as the pain filled her body. There was no escaping it. Had her mother felt that way when she died? Had it been that horrendous for her? Gothel was turning to dust. She could feel herself falling away. And she saw Rapunzel’s horrified face as Gothel tripped and fell out the window. The last thing she saw was the last thing her mother had seen.
A look of utter revulsion and horror.
Circe put down the book of fairy tales and sighed. “He died.”
Snow dropped the teacup she had been holding. Her sweet face crumpled into tears. She didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry I broke your teacup,” she said, looking down at the pieces.
