Rapunzel
My body started to wake at the sound of footsteps and the russling of trees and bushes nearby. I didn't move fast at first, assuming it was Cass walking about, but then I notice her fast asleep beside me...
Thats what made me shoot up.
I sat up straight, looking between Cass's sleeping figure and the trees and bushes around us, feeling my heart rate increasing as the noises got louder, got closer.
"Cass? Cass?" I gently shook her in hopes she'd wake up, but I got no response. I felt bad for trying to wake her and finally got up to investigate myself.
I grabbed my frying pan from beside me, creeped around to Cass and carefully tried to lift her head off of my hair, laying her carefully down onto the grass, and then approached the fire, that was still just about burning, with a decent sized stick I'd found and lit it, creating a torch so I could spot the culprit easier.
In my head, I was hoping for it to be another one of those bunnies, or really any kind of animal that I could fairly easily get rid off. But then I heard them laugh...
Animals can't laugh now can they?
I forcefully point my frying pan in front of me, aiming it at the sound, but it seems to keep moving around.
"Oh Rapunzel, now why would you ever point that thing at me?" A honeyed voice says from inside the darkness.
It's strange... I know who's there... But I don't quite recognise the voice anymore...
"M- Mother?"
She then steps out into my torches light, holding some kind of lantern of her own. I drop my stick, that had just about burnt out, and she races over and engulfs me in a tight hug.
"Oh rapunzel I'm so glad I found you!" She pratically cries into my hair, stroking through it with her fingers. "When I realised you weren't home I really started to panic! You had me worried sick!" I'm quick to hug her back, as some way of apoligising, but it feels different...
... I feel different...
Maybe it was what she said before I left, or the things I've learnt about the world today, or the way she speaks to me through my hair, or maybe it's because her voice just doesn't sound right...
But all I know that somethings off, something had changed.
"I'm- I'm sorry... But-"
"Right. now let's get you out of here right away." She barely took the time to look at me properly.
"But mother I-"
"Come on now Rapunzel, it's dark and dangerous out here for you."
"But I- please just listen a second-!"
"the tower is far child, we can make it there in no time if we-" She tugged on my arm, pulling me in the direction she came from, but I planted my feet into the earth, snapped and snatched away my arm.
"No!"
Ok so I can't exactly explain what made me act out, but it felt good when I did... For a minute... At least.
What did feel good was seeing her facial expression change the minute I refused an order from her. It twisted and turned into something that just didn't look right to me, morphing into something you'd expect to see in a nightmare. Her eyes started to bore into mine.
"What did you just say?"
"No..." my voice and posture fell weaker under her new look, as if it removed the confidence I once had all in a matter of seconds.
"No?" I hear some manic laugh follow her voice, everything glanced with disbelief.
YOU ARE READING
crossing the line AU
Fanfiction"I'm starting to question if we met... On purpose. Through Fate... Or whatever." Crossing the line - A story about two girls who were almost swapped at birth, you could say... Cassandra grew up in a castle, money and power galore. She was raised by...
