Author's Notes: Okay, I have no idea what's going on in this, but I watched Tangled the other day and this plot bunny will. not. leave. Therefore, I'm writing it. Very AU and abuse tw.
Mother Gothel wasn't a very nice person.
She could admit it, even if only to herself. She was a witch, and she cast spells on people she didn't like, and she was vain and probably overly preoccupied with her own looks. And when the king's men took away her golden flower, of course she followed them to the palace because what if there was a way to get it back. Anyone would have done the same.
And was it normal to hang around the palace for the next year? Probably not, but how else could she watch out for the princess? Rapunzel, Rapunzel, with her shining blonde hair. It called out to Gothel and made her stuff her slowly-withering fingers into her cape lest she reach out and snatch it for her own.
And should she have slipped into the palace one hazy summer night, when the princess was nearing two years of age? Of course not, but as the witch crept closer to Rapunzel's nursery, she was more than a bit startled to hear a loud slap come from inside the room, and the Queen's hissing invective to "keep your mouth shut if you know what's good for you, little one."
Gothel melted into the shadows as the Queen swept past before slipping into the nursery, lit by only the light of the moon. Rapunzel was curled up under her blanket, tears brimming over and a red hand print glowing on her cheek.
And for a moment, if only a small one, Gothel forgot about the flower and saw simply a tiny, traumatized girl. And she swept her up in her cloak and slipped out into the garden and it was another three hours before the search was drummed up, and by then, Mother Gothel and her stolen baby were gone.
By the end of the week, they were safe, back in Gothel's slightly musty old tower, and while she couldn't help but appreciate the warmth and vitality that flowed through her tired limbs as she brushed out Rapunzel's shining hair, and sang to herself (reminding herself she must teach her new daughter the song as well), she knew it was a good deed she had done. She had rescued the princess.
The hand print that had marred the child's face had vanished quickly, but the memory was not soon forgotten, and more than once in the first few months, Rapunzel woke fussing and tear-stained, crying weakly about her "Mama," who'd reacted so cruelly to a request for another story.
But children's memories fade and as Rapunzel grew up, safe and sound in her ivory tower, she forgot all about the King and Queen, and her other life in Arendelle. Mother Gothel was all she knew, and all she cared to know.
Until that is, she saw the floating lights in the sky.