Disclaimer: Tangled belongs to Disney.

Story Note: Though it ended up sweeter than I'd planned (not that I mind!), this story is rather poignant in several ways and pretty cynical to boot, but it was written in a somewhat dark mood. Writing it helped the mood, however, so it ended on a relatively high note. The characters and setting are the same, but it is very much an alternate timeline. It should be clear from the story what events happened differently here.

Edited (4/29/2012) for additional details in two spots (Gothel's dress, which I've taken to be as old as she is due to its medieval style, and more anecdotes of "important things" in the next-to-last section).

Everything She Dreamed It Would Be

Rapunzel turned over on her side and looked at the clock. Three in the morning. She was the only one still awake. Pascal was curled up on top of the dresser; he had tentatively reemerged into the bedroom when he stopped hearing noises. Next to her in bed, Flynn slept soundly, his chest heaving in a regular rhythm. Although he was usually a light sleeper from years of necessity, this time she figured he was out till morning. A long night of drinks would do that to anyone. He had celebrated her nineteenth birthday, and their one-year anniversary, very enthusiastically both before and after they returned to their flat, she thought wickedly. Drinks would do that to most people too.

"I've got one more present for you, birthday girl," he had hissed, picking her up suddenly as they stumbled into their room, hoisting her over his shoulder, and tossing her on the bed. He had immediately mounted it and started suavely peeling off her clothes, touching and kissing her bare skin as it became exposed. She had grabbed hungrily at him, surprised but pleased at his passion, and proceeded to do the same. Pascal had woken up with a start, let out a yelp of mortification and terror, and dashed out of the bedroom as fast as his little four legs could carry him. The chameleon who turned red and covered his eyes when they kissed chastely would have a permanent nervous breakdown at the sight of their normal nightly activities. Pascal had keen senses, and usually he did not even approach their bedroom until everything was quiet, but tonight he had been dozing on her shoulder. Rapunzel felt a little sorry for him; in the heat of the moment, they had both forgotten that the chameleon was there at all.

Of course, it had been a nice way to end a pleasant birthday. They had spent the whole day in the countryside, getting away from the dirt and grime of town, the sordidness of the neighborhood, the stress of daily life, and even the careful accounting of their funds in anticipation of better circumstances. Today was just a day to reflect and be happy about simple things: a picnic in the woods, splashing in the creek, playing hide-and-seek with each other and Pascal (who, sadly for him, usually lost quickly, since he still thought that all he had to do was change his color). Earlier that evening, before they had gone out for drinks, they had gone outside their little apartment to watch the sun set and the stars come out.

"This is the first birthday I remember that I'm not looking for them," she remarked to him, leaning against the balcony. "It feels kind of weird."

He turned to her apologetically. "We could've gone there. Well, probably not all the way, but closer, so you could've had a glimpse. I didn't know you wanted to."

"No, that's what's weird," she said. "I don't care anymore. I'd actually rather not see them again at all."

He quirked an eyebrow. "Why?"

"I've seen all there is to see, and it seems like such a pointless thing anyway. I mean, really. They expect someone who disappeared—how young?"

"I don't know the details. I didn't do any jobs in Corona until I was twenty-three, and I couldn't exactly dally around after one and research local history, sweetie," he said with a grin. "But pretty young, I think."

"But old enough to remember seeing them from the castle as a little child, I guess."

"I'd assume so." He honestly didn't care. That kingdom was in their past, and they couldn't go back. If the lanterns were nothing to her anymore, then he would rather talk with her about the present—or the future.

She was apparently not picking up on his lack of interest. "It all seems very unlikely. The child... well, there are a lot of wild animals and evil people out there." She grimaced. This was getting very close to a distressing subject. She wanted to have children with him, but their circumstances were far too dicey and children were far too vulnerable. Maybe in a year or two, when they expected to be better off and could afford to move somewhere far away.

"I do think it's basically a memorial ceremony now," he agreed.

"And that just... dims them somehow, even if everything bad last year hadn't happened. Whether it's intended now to be a memorial, or whether they still honestly believe that it will work, it's just a sad sight. And now they're associated with my mother betraying me... with you being captured..." She paused, shuddering at the bad memories.

He put an arm gently around her. "It's your birthday. Don't think of things like that."

She nodded, swallowing hard. "You're right. There was more good than bad that came out of them. They drew me out of the tower." She took his hand in hers, making him smile warmly. "But it was a young girl's dream, and it changed a long time ago. I've had another one for a year." She gazed into his brown eyes with her green ones. He leaned in and cupped her cheek. Their lips met.

A year. It had been a year since her life changed forever. Rapunzel glanced at the sleeping man next to her and smiled tenderly at him. Memories flashed through her mind of the past twelve months with him. It was incredible now to recall how badly their first meeting had gone.

In her mind, he was tied up in a chair with her old hair. She was clutching a frying pan and glaring at him.

"Something brought you here, Flynn Rider," she said. "Call it what you will—fate, destiny—"

"A horse?" he said cynically.

Fate and destiny in the shape of a horse, she had thought. She'd had such bright certainty that their fates and destinies were tied up together, and a year later, she was even more certain of that, though nothing else was quite as bright and vivid as it had once been. –Not that the darkness had anything to do with their own relationship. That was a wonderful, shining light. The darkness was cynicism about the world itself, learned painfully from bitter experiences that a sheltered young woman could not have had.

The experiences had even involved her own hazy memories. Another image flitted into Rapunzel's sleep-deprived mind: a girl, two days later, staring at the designs she had painted all over her bedroom. The sun motif that appeared over and over. A foggy memory of that symbol filled her mind. There were blurry people around her, perhaps other members of her family, and she had tearfully asked her mother about it.

"Flower," her mother said in a pitying tone, "we have no other family. Your father died before you were born. It must be a memory from town, before I fled into the forest with you. People in that kingdom had just found out what happened to your hair when it was cut, and they were going to take you away from me and force you to use your hair for them. You would have had no life, held prisoner and ordered to use your hair for their every whim."

Something occurred to Rapunzel as her mother uttered these words. "That's exactly what you've always done," she said. She pushed her mother away and stared in horror at her. Her mother was no different, no better, than the selfish people that she had always warned her about.

Within minutes, they had fought, a terrible fight that ended with Rapunzel being physically subdued and chained. Then she had tried to murder Flynn when he showed up. And at last, she had been revealed to have been using Rapunzel's hair for nothing more than selfish vanity, as her gray hair and wrinkles proved when Flynn cut it off. She was more upset about losing her good looks than anything else, tripping and falling to her death in her hysteria. Rapunzel could not stand the thought of recovering and burying a corpse that was surely broken after a 70-foot fall. Besides, she wanted to remain with him—to talk to him, to learn what had really happened the night before, and to cry in his arms.

The next morning, when they finally descended to do the grim deed, the body was gone. All they could find were her cloak and pieces of her dress, torn and full of holes. Flynn said, in a low, uncomfortable voice, that an animal had probably found her body overnight. Maximus had run off behind the curtain of vines that hid the tower glade, suggesting that something had disturbed him, and then there was the dress. The idea had upset Rapunzel, but she could not find any other explanation. It was just a body anyway, she told herself. Her mother was not there.

So much for vague, fuzzy memories. After a year of seeing exactly how selfish, grasping, and dishonorable that people could be, she did not doubt her mother's explanation. She had made some valid points about human nature. Truths from the mouth of a hypocritical liar were still truths. It had been horrible when Flynn cut her hair and barely survived his injuries, but she realized now that the hair had to go. Rapunzel turned again in her bed, shuddering to think what might have happened if she had still had magic hair and some of the people she had met over the year had known.

For the first two months, they had not encountered any of those especially dangerous people, because he had not thieved. They had lived in the tower, not because they wanted to, but because it was safe, free, and there. She had sold baked goods at street markets in town, but it was not nearly enough to support them. Meanwhile, he had taken up hunting and quickly discovered a talent for making bows and arrows. He had gone into town with her to sell his handiwork, taking customers' orders from behind a hooded cloak in a dark booth, but inevitably, people had identified him and decided that they wanted the nice fat reward. That did it; there was no longer any point in living in a place full of terrible memories for both of them. Saying goodbye to the horse was the hardest part. Maximus had remained with them that whole time, and after they had decided to leave, he had let Rapunzel hitch a wagon to him to haul furniture into town to sell, but he could not come along. Where Flynn was going, a fine horse would be at grave risk of being stolen. They brought along only what they could pack into two large traveling bags and his satchel. (The pub thugs who had engineered his escape—and then had to flee themselves—had retrieved it when they stole the captain of the guard's keys.) They picked a cool, drizzly day to leave, so that they could wear concealing hooded cloaks in their hired cart. The driver apparently thought they were eloping, because he had treated them sympathetically and asked no questions.

Something had bothered Flynn during those early months before and just after their move. He never mentioned it, but she could tell that something was wrong by his reactions to certain situations and topics. Rapunzel looked at his sleeping form, now peaceful and content, and thought about the first time she had noticed the shadow of conflict pass over him. The two of them were drenched, sitting in a cave filling up with water. She was distraught, apologizing tearfully to him for leading him to his death. He gave her a pained, miserable look, gazing at her as if he needed to say something incredibly important, but hesitating. The moment passed. It had not come up again, because at that point she had remembered that her hair would illuminate the cave underwater, revealing the way out.

Rapunzel thought it might have happened again that night, but she wasn't sure. They were talking in front of a campfire, a conversation that would go on for hours. He was reminiscing about life in the orphanage and how he had read to the other kids. Though she knew a lot about the sciences, crafts, housekeeping, and chess, her mother had never brought her anything imaginative or fictional. She asked what books he had liked, and he had said, somewhat evasively, that he couldn't really remember. In retrospect, she guessed they were probably inappropriate for children and he was reluctant to admit it, but it might have been the shadow, as she called it.

Then, in her mind, he was lying against a staircase in the tower. The warmth of life returned to his body and his eyelids fluttered open. He smiled as he said he had a "thing for brunettes," but that flash of conflict passed quickly, almost imperceptibly, over him as she cried "Flynn!" and threw herself into his embrace. That was definitely the shadow.

It continued to appear for a short time after they moved. Rapunzel recalled one time when they had just settled into the little flat he'd rented in Verbergena, a principality over a hundred miles south of Corona and the areas where he was most wanted. The sitting room was filled with canvases and paints he had bought for her. She had felt such joy when he urged her to get busy painting to her heart's content, but it had not lasted. The shadow crossed his face when she thanked him and flung her arms around him.

The next clear memory of it was from the third night after they had moved into their flat. She arched herself against his sweat-drenched body, took him in as deep as she could, grabbed desperately at her own ankles, and, in blissful abandon, screamed out his name between gasps and heaving breaths. He had been gripping her shoulders as he moved above her, staring intensely at her, but he glanced away as something rather like guilt flickered over his face. She had wondered if he feared that it was a scream of pain, and that since it was her first time, he had really hurt her; but that unaccountable guilt showed up again when they were intimate—usually at critical moments.

Then, suddenly, it disappeared. One day about a week later, he came back home, his handsome face and brown eyes set in grim resolution, and dropped his satchel on the table with a loud, final-sounding clunk. He opened the flap and brought out the jewelry that he had just stolen from a nobleman in a neighboring city-state. Gold chains fell carelessly from his hands.

"Oh, Flynn," she cried.

He gazed at her resignedly. "I have no choice. It's inevitable that I'll be turned in if I try to live by the book and mix with the law-abiding public. We're all right here; this state is rather cavalier about harboring outlaws as long as we don't cause trouble inside the borders." He grinned, but it was forced. "So I'm only going to steal luxury items, and only from people outside this country who can spare it. We'll save up until we can get that island," he said with a small wry smile. Despite the justifications and attempted frivolity, his voice spoke surrender and resignation, filling her with a surge of compassion for him.

That action resolved whatever it was that had troubled him for so long. Never again did that conflicted, pained expression cross his face at her use of his name. He had apparently come to a decision about something very important related to his sense of identity. She was glad that he had found peace, though she hated so much for his sake that it was most likely peace with some sort of darkness. And she wished that he had told her specifically what it was. However, now that it no longer distressed him, she did not want to dredge it back up just to sate her own curiosity if it might cause pain to him again. She cared for him too much to do that to him.

And he cared too much for her to let her suffer.

Another memory flooded her mind at this thought, this one from a sleety night some months later. A sinister-looking man dressed all in black, with gold buttons and chains visible here and there, was standing in a shadowy corner in a disreputable tavern. Flynn stood across from him, glaring at him with undisguised distrust. They completed their transaction, the stranger taking away a little ruby-and-gold decorative box meant for a display shelf or side table. It had come from a locked chest in the home of a womanizing Bavarian viscount. The nobleman had so many ornaments that he hadn't even displayed some. With a sour expression on his face, the customer reluctantly handed Flynn a large sack of coins, which he immediately shoved into his satchel.

"Rider, you have some damn nerve charging a price like this. This is highway robbery," the stranger complained.

Flynn regarded him impassively. "There's nobody else who can get pieces like that, Sir Vacek," he said, "and you know it. Also, the lock was very hard to pick, and that's included in my commission." He smirked arrogantly.

The baronet's lip curled in resentment. "You bloodsucker." He then turned to sneer at Rapunzel, who—in accordance with Flynn's plea not to have any part in his business dealings—had remained at a little table for two in the common area. "Does it really cost that much to keep your whore, Rider?" he snarled. "She doesn't look worth it."

In less than a second, Flynn drew a dagger from his belt and stuck the point right under the baronet's chin. "You'd better take that back," he said dangerously, pressing the tip against the other's skin.

Sir Vacek swallowed nervously. A drop of sweat rolled down his face as he tilted his head to avoid the knife. "All right!" he exclaimed. "She's a fine woman, I'm sure!"

"She is," Flynn said.

Whore. Slut. Mistress. Kept woman. Terms that would have shocked Rapunzel to hear applied to anyone a year ago were being regularly spoken of her by the people he dealt with.

The problem was that some of the insults had seemed all too accurate to her. Flynn would not let her help him directly. Most of the time he was home, but when he had a job to do, he could be gone for days. The first time he was away, she had worried herself sick, so she had pleaded to go with him from then on. He had insisted that she arm herself and stay safely on the sidelines unless he was in trouble. He didn't want her involved. He didn't even really approve of her selling candles, cakes, and pottery at Hob's, the trading post where bootleg liquor and assorted goods were sold tax-free. It was safe enough; Hob could not let it become dangerous to trade at his dilapidated building, but Flynn hated the idea of her doing business with shady people. He was the one who was supposed to do that so that she did not have to, but she wanted to fund her hobbies without asking him for money. She still wanted to help out somehow, so she sewed, kept house, cooked, and, yes, pleased him, though that was certainly not one-way. He often remarked, while embracing her and nuzzling her dark hair affectionately, that it was amazingly pleasant to have a domestic life and a well-maintained home, things he had never had. She was happy too when they were at home, but her lack of gainful employment was why the people with whom he had to associate held her in such contempt. She would not get the twisted respect that they gave to thieves because she wasn't one herself; she just lived with one.

And slept with one.

And was maintained by one.

Some of those slurs had really hurt.

With this turn of her thoughts, another image came to mind from four months ago. She was collapsed on a chair, devastated, eyes staring straight ahead blankly. Pascal was curled up against her, turned a deep shade of blue to reflect her mood.

"What's wrong?" he asked as he walked in from making a sale and saw her.

She met his eyes, misery in hers. "I was at Hob's," she began.

He instantly realized what had happened. "Oh, Rapunzel, why do you keep going there when someone insults you almost every time?" he said, going over to take her hands in his. "You know I'll give you money for anything you need."

"I want to earn some money myself," she said defensively. "Besides, I just want to look around sometimes. I'm not going to stay indoors my whole life."

He did not miss the allusion. "Rapunzel, I would never do that to you," he said, somewhat offended. "I was willing to die to keep you from being imprisoned."

Her eyes filled with tears. "I know," she whispered, her voice breaking. "I'm sorry."

He felt terrible. "No, I'm sorry. Don't cry," he said. "You're right. It's good to get a change of scenery. I just hate seeing you in pain."

She got up and hugged him. "I know you wouldn't imprison me anywhere. I am upset, but I shouldn't take it out on you."

He wrapped his arms around her. "It's all right. Who was it today?"

"Novitch," she said, barely getting the name out.

His eyes narrowed at the mention of the misogynistic liquor blockader. "What did the bastard say to you?" he growled.

"He said"—she flinched and spoke in a hush, not wanting to repeat it—"He said, 'You're modest. I thought Rider's concubine would want to flaunt herself.'"

"All right, that's it," Flynn snarled furiously, gripping her. "I'll sell the things you make for you if you want your own money. I can't stand it when these people insult you."

"But I realized that it's kind of true. You support me in exchange for..." She could not look at him.

He felt sick to his stomach. "Rapunzel, is that what you think we have?" he exclaimed.

She bit her lip. "It just bothers me," she whispered. "I've also been called a kept woman, and that is definitely true."

He sat down with her and sighed, trying to calm himself. "Please don't think of yourself that way. I regard this the same as a marriage."

"I just wish..." She trailed off and shook her head. "Never mind. You're an outlaw, and I have no surname, record of christening, or even any knowledge of who my father was. It's not possible. I'll just... try not to think of myself that way, as you said." She smiled weakly at him.

His eyes suddenly glittered. "Actually, I think it is possible. You know I don't take any jobs in this country. I'm not going to spoil a safe haven. And Wahlberg, the justice of the peace for our township, will look the other way on anything if he's paid enough."

"Flynn!" she scolded. "I didn't mean that you had to bribe some corrupt magistrate. We're saving our money."

"This shouldn't set us back that much."

"Flynn," she protested again.

"Rapunzel, I'm not going to let this continue if the slurs are getting into your mind now. I'm doing this for us, and I'm covering the cost. End of discussion."

She sighed; she knew not to argue with him when he was being stubborn, and she did want it. "What am I supposed to give as my surname?" she asked.

"You could always use Forest or Tower," he said with a wicked grin.

"I'm not using Tower," she said, shuddering. "Forest is all right, I guess." She smiled at him, her eyes suddenly blazing. "So this is really what you want? I don't want to push you—"

He put a finger to her lips, hushing her. "What did I just say about our relationship?" He gave her a crooked smile, kissed her hand, and headed for the front door, grabbing his satchel off the hook.

"Where are you going? You mean to do this now?"

"Why wait? Want to invite all our fine friends? I'm sure they'd love to come."

"Well, at least let me tidy up," she said, scurrying into the bedroom to put on her best dress, wash her face, and comb her hair.

When she emerged, she was beaming. No, glowing. He had cleaned himself up a bit too, and he could not help but admire their looks in the mirror. "I have to say, we're a very good-looking couple," he remarked with a grin as they left their flat and headed down the dark staircase, holding hands.

Wahlberg's office was very rustic, bearing only a worn flag and the seal of the principality of Verbergena as indications of its being a governmental office. A taxidermied buck's head was mounted on one clapboard wall, a dartboard on another, and a keg of ale was propped up behind the desk. "What're you doing here?" the magistrate said scornfully.

"I want a marriage license."

"Oh?" The square-chinned man took his feet off his desk and regarded the pair through beady eyes. A mean-spirited chuckle escaped his mouth. "Hilarious that it ain't foreign law enforcement or even your own pals who finally caught you. How far along is she?"

Flynn glared. "She's not pregnant. We just want to get married."

"How sweet," the justice drawled. "But you show up here with no witnesses, no records of birth or christening, expecting me to do it today, and you're wanted in every principality surrounding us. I'll do it, but I'm tripling your fee."

"I'm not wanted here and you know it." He paused contemplatively before breaking into a smirk. "Besides, suppose the government found out about how you release people who are arrested, as long as they offer you enough gold."

Wahlberg sighed, groaned, and pushed a form at them. "Fine. It's not worth fighting over. But this is against procedure, which means more work for me, so it's still going to cost you double. Pay up."

Flynn smirked in satisfaction. He counted out some money from a coin purse in his satchel, pushed the pile across the desk, and took the form. Ignoring the crooked judge now, he smiled at Rapunzel. She smiled back and kissed him enthusiastically. "Not yet, Blondie," he said, laughing, as he dipped a pen in the inkwell and handed it to her.

She read over the form quickly but intensely, taking in every word. Agree to live as husband and wife... All the legal rights and privileges thereof... She reached the bottom of the document, where there were two lines for signatures. Beaming, she quickly signed her name in the flamboyant, energetic, happy script that she used. She gave him the pen.

He clenched it in his fist, breathing heavily all of a sudden. That didn't surprise her; this was a momentous decision, and until she had indicated how important this was to her, he had seemed perfectly all right with things continuing as they had been. She watched as he fumbled with the pen, holding it properly now, and positioned it over the blank line. His eyebrows knitted, and his gaze wandered down to his satchel. A tiny sigh of acceptance escaped his nostrils at this sight. He looked back to Rapunzel and smiled gently. Taking a deep breath, he pressed the tip of the pen to the paper and signed in a bold, firm hand, Flynn Rider.

Rapunzel sighed and turned in bed again. A year ago, she had really felt that she was meant to leave the tower. She felt as if there was something she was born to do or to be, and that it was not to have a life of sordid accommodations and corrupt associates. It was not to watch the man she loved deal with contemptible people in order to provide for her and save up for something nicer, even though he did his best to keep business out of the rest of their life. She believed they were meant for something greater than this. Now, she supposed that it was just girlish naïveté, the uninformed dreams of somebody who knew nothing about the world, either its light side or its dark, and to whom everything seemed more wonderful than her confining tower. Anyway, what mattered was not the amount of worldly sparkle surrounding her. When they were alone, curled up safely together after a long, heartfelt, loving conversation... when she tried to paint him realistically and he kept making a smolder at her until she finally put the ridiculous expression in the painting... when she returned from the town and he burst into a smile at her appearance, got up to embrace her, and danced them joyfully around the parlor, showing a side that only she was allowed to see... little moments like that were important. Surroundings were not.

Another memory flooded her sleep-deprived mind. Two months ago, he came in from a business dealing and heaved a miserable sigh as he placed his satchel on a hook on the wall and took off his boots.

"Rapunzel," he began in defeated tones, "there are times, like today, when I don't know if I can even come back here and look you in the eye."

"What do you mean by that?" she asked, looking up from her book. The simple gold band he had bought for her gleamed on her slim finger. He had refused to steal their rings.

He ran his fingers through his hair, his own ring shining in the lamplight. "I sold to Osvald Hoffmann," he said. "He makes the Stabbingtons look like angels."

"Really, Flynn?" she said skeptically, one corner of her mouth turning upward in a smile.

"He's a murderer, a rapist, and he just got a job for some Spanish merchant enslaving natives in the New World," Flynn said desolately. "He wanted a diamond-studded gold pocket watch to show off and was ignorant enough to pay three times what it was worth." He sank down on the sofa and put his head in his hands. "Rapunzel, you deserve so much better than this. You can do all sorts of things. You always bring back money from Hob's. You could do better for yourself than I can do for you."

It was probably true. She could bake, sew, make candles, make pottery, paint... and if she wanted, she could learn how to make real money as a shop owner in the public marketplace instead of settling for pocket money at a clandestine trading post. But then what? She would live in a nicer place and be surrounded by seemingly nicer people, but she could not have him with her, because those nice people would turn on them once they learned about him. At least the people they dealt with now were upfront about their nature and did not hide it under a façade of politeness. Now that she was no longer fresh out of the tower, she had learned from experience that most company was dull and pointless, that real friends were rare, and that a connection like they had was one of a kind, an irreplaceable treasure. Whatever their circumstances might be, she knew that she would stick with him.

"Flynn," she said, getting up and sitting next to him. She put her arms around his neck. "Tell me again; why exactly did you sell to Hoffmann today?"

"For the filthy lucre."

"And that money is for...?"

"For us," he said, comprehension dawning.

"Exactly. I would do the same for you."

"Rapunzel, that doesn't make me feel good," he protested. "There are some things I wouldn't want you to do."

She leaned her forehead against his. "And there are some things I wouldn't want you to do. But what you do, and the way that you do it, is not a betrayal of anything. Hoffmann would still be a violent thug with a despicable job even if you hadn't sold to him, but because you did, he's poorer and we're richer." She smirked at him.

"Well, that's a valid point... but I have corrupted your conscience," Flynn muttered.

She actually laughed. "Flynn, I hid your stolen goods in my house, coerced you into escorting me around, and returned the stolen item to you rather than turning it in. You didn't corrupt anything." She leaned in and gave him a deep kiss. "You're not a bad person. I couldn't keep loving someone who was. Believe me," she said in a pained voice.

He couldn't say anything to that. It was obvious what she was alluding to, and he couldn't bear to think of it. Instead of talking, he stroked her soft dark hair and kissed her in return.

"Besides," she said huskily, "you were willing to give your life for me. And since then, you have proven over and over that you will pursue a profession you wanted to give up and deal with all kinds of dishonorable people in order to keep me from putting myself in danger." She buried her face on his shoulder and murmured, "You take these things on yourself so that I don't have to. I deserve better? What could possibly be better than someone who will do that for me?"

He wrapped his arms around her. "I like it when you put it that way," he said with a chuckle. "It makes me sound like a hero."

"Well, now that you mention it..." She ran a finger up his back. "I do recall something about you making a bold escape and dashing out to rescue me from a tower where I was held captive. That's pretty heroic."

"Keep saying things like that," he said, laughing now and giving her another kiss. "It makes me remember how fantastic I actually am." He smirked and winked at her.

"Oh, I see you're back to normal," she teased, running her fingers through his hair.

He grinned, but it quickly faded to a more serious expression. "You meant it, though?"

"I meant it all. I love you, it means so much to me that you're willing to do these things for me, and I'm not going anywhere."

He pulled her close again. "I love you too, and you're right—this makes it worth it."

And it was worth it, she decided. Everything was worth it. She turned again in bed, facing him now. His hair fell over his eyes, reminding her once again of the day they met, when he lay on the floor with his hair covering his eyes just like that. This time he was sleeping peacefully in their bed, trusted rather than feared. She smiled and tucked the lock of hair back tenderly.

He moved.

She froze. She had not meant to wake him up. She really thought he was in a deep sleep from the long day and the drinks and the intense lovemaking.

"Rapunzel, are you awake?" he mumbled as he stirred. Feeling really bad now, she instantly closed her eyes and lay still on her side, but it did not fool him. "Rapunzel, please, your phony sleep pose is pitiable," he said in exasperation, nudging her.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to wake you up."

He let out a long-suffering sigh as he regarded her. "You haven't slept at all, have you? I can't believe you're not exhausted after what I did earlier."

"Oh?" she said, raising an eyebrow at that comment. "So it hurts your ego that I'm awake still?"

"I just think you need some rest, but if you're not tired yet, I can always try harder." He smirked, but it quickly turned into a yawn.

She snorted. "You don't have the energy."

"No," he agreed reluctantly, "but you do need to get to sleep. What've you been doing?"

"Reminiscing."

"Oh. I wish your memories could be better," he said remorsefully.

"The ones with you are really nice," she said.

"Just like the ones I have with you, I'd guess." He smiled at her.

All of a sudden she wanted to be close to him. "Hold me," she said. "I think I can get to sleep that way."

He rolled her over so that her back was facing him and pulled her very close, wrapping his left arm possessively around her. "That better?" he said softly.

She sighed in bliss. "Much better."

He took her hand in his own and caressed her ring. She turned her head and smiled at him. He smiled back, keeping her soft slender hand firmly in his. "Sweet dreams," he said.

End notes: Thanks for reading! :)

Yes, Hob's illicit trading post is a Hunger Games reference... nerds. Though I suppose I put the reference in there in the first place, making me one too. "Verbergena" was not, to my knowledge, a real Germanic city-state, but according to my translation, the German word "verbergen" means "hide." I envisioned it as this utterly corrupt, mostly urban place where the government doesn't have a problem with outlaws using it for safe harbor as long as they don't focus their crimes inside the borders, undermine neighborhood peace, or target the government itself.