Note: Geez, what a cliffhanger, right? Joke's on you: All of our chapters end in cliffhangers. You will experience this forever until the end of time...or until you quit reading. Either or. Anyway, we won't delay you any longer. Enjoy.

The illusion finished with a whimper, and when it was snuffed out, all that remained was the awful silence. Rapunzel was stuck there, fixated on the spot in the floor where the vision of her and Cassandra's affair once called to her, just beyond the very woman who had inadvertently summoned it upon them. She was shivering, overcome with some gross feeling that caked between her ribs and trapped the air within her throat. Her sprawling thoughts had coalesced and turned to the only question she could ask herself in the damp and darkness.

Why?

The singular question took a hundred different forms, none of which had a simple answer. She tried to make herself speak. She didn't have an intended phrase or audience; she didn't mean to call out to Cassandra to comfort her or scream at the Void for forcing those visions onto them. She wanted to say something just to prove that she was still able to, that she had the capacity for rational thought anymore. Yet, parting her lips and summoning all the strength she could, she realized that she was unable to muster a single syllable. She was, maybe for the first time in her life, speechless. How could she not be? Honestly, how was she supposed to say anything after that?

It was obvious now. She had suspected before, though never before that morning. Even as of yesterday, she was convinced she understood Cassandra as well as anyone. Her best friend, the noble warrior with dreams of glory and a heart of gold beneath her metal exterior. She thought she had found happiness, or at least was close to it. She thought they were on good terms. But this—all of this—she didn't know how to process any of it. The dreams were vivid. The Void ensured the fantasy was dragged out, and it wasn't lost on her either that if the otherworldly being was to be believed, then every detail—every kiss and caressing touch and soft moan—was all of Cass's own imagination. Rapunzel thought back on every time they had been close to one another, whether it be fighting or riding or hell, even the bathing that happened just the other day and an hour earlier. During how many of those moments were those fantasies lying just beneath the surface, so close to her yet out of reach behind the impenetrable wall of Cassandra's willpower? She had to second-guess every moment the two of them ever had together. Was there anything there that would have given it away?

That was maybe the craziest thing of all: She hadn't noticed until today. Her best friend had feelings for her, and she didn't notice once until the two of them were married to each other. She…she wasn't stupid. She knew that something was there, right? She had to. She couldn't be that obtuse. Maybe the girl who spent most of her life locked in a tower and married the first man she ever met didn't understand love as well as she thought.

That was just the most recent vision. It stood out the most, rattling around in Rapunzel's consciousness—but underneath, the rest of the visions stirred, rumbling and calling out to something even darker. Those other fantasies of hers. Bloodlust. Sadism. Hopelessness. Emptiness. Those were the thoughts that truly horrified her: the truth of what kind of person Cassandra may have been all along.

Cassandra refused to move, lying there instead on her hands and knees, clutching her head and burying her face into the ground as if the world might just swallow her whole. She couldn't bear to look up or turn around. She didn't want to see what terrible expression had managed to worm its way onto Rapunzel's face. She could only guess, and just picturing Rapunzel's green eyes staring at her made her want to scream. She had tried for so damn long to keep those things from her, and in just a few moments, the Void had ripped them out of her with the kindness of gutting a fish. There was nothing sacred it wouldn't violate for its own sick pleasure, and she feared what else could be lurking within her memories that she had managed to bury but never forget. She still felt it lingering within her mind, the temptation, the pull, ever-searching for something more monstrous or humiliating to gather and reveal as part of its grand ambitions.

And still, despite its presence in her mind and Rapunzel just behind her…she never felt more alone.

The Void gave them maybe a few seconds of silence to let the emotions stew, but it must have grown impatient. It didn't take much longer for its cruel whisper to return to haunt the hallowed dining hall.

"And there it is," it taunted them from afar. "A handmaiden lusting after a Princess. A former friend-turned-enemy caught in the throes of love. How sickeningly sweet…and pathetic."

The Void's mocking words were enough to bring Rapunzel out of her stupor. All of her doubts and questions went to the wayside as she became aware of the pain in the room that wasn't her own.

"Leave…leave her alone," Rapunzel said shakily. She noticed a little too late that she couldn't even say Cassandra's name.

"Her? The murderer? The whore?" The Void laughed. Rapunzel pulled at her restraints as if it would do her any good.

"Don't you talk about her like that," Rapunzel sputtered weakly, barely mustering a defense. Her cries were met with condescension.

"You're still defending her after all of that?" The Void asked, amused at the strange human. "Don't you get it? She isn't the innocent thing you want her to be. She's filthy, depraved…caught in the middle between whether she wants to kill you or fuck you. There's nothing redeeming in there, nothing pure and worthy of someone like you."

"Like you."

"Like you."

"You deserve much better friends than her."

"Sweet, innocent Rapunzel."

The voice darkened, sharpening and sticking straight into the back of Rapunzel's head. She seized up in fear as its voice clicked with satisfaction.

"And we only showed you the tamest parts."

The fear ran through her—as well as a devious, curious shudder that she did her hardest to ignore.

Rapunzel closed her eyes tightly, fighting back through strained, gritted teeth. "You got what you wanted. Let us go."

"No, no, no."

"You're running from this."

"Don't run."

"We want to feel it. Embrace it."

She felt the Void piercing her thoughts. It wanted to feast on her shock and fear, and she refused to let it. It would suck the doubt dry from her scalp and leave her wandering amidst her own subconscious, devoid of any thought and feeling. She knew that even the slightest hint of genuine emotion would send its full force crashing down on her, and so with all of her might, Rapunzel tried to take every thought she ever had about Cassandra and push it out of her head. She couldn't let herself get distracted, and the irony wasn't lost on her that only now, at the absolute brink, was she finally doing what Cass had wanted her to do all along. She was going to leave her alone.

As if the Void would let her off that easy. Cassandra suddenly reared back and screamed, her wail cutting through the darkness.

"Get out of my head!" Cassandra cried, whipping her head back and grabbing at her temples. Rapunzel's natural instincts took over, and all of her focus was once again brought back to the young woman with blue struggling in front of her eyes.

"Cassandra."

"Come on, Cassandra."

"There's something else, isn't there?"

Rapunzel felt her courage waver. Something else? How on earth could there be anything more?

"S-Shut up…" Cassandra growled. "Shut the hell up! Leave me alone!" She stood up and threw a fist, but fell back down when she connected with the air. She wasn't aiming for anything, as if there was even a target for her to strike. The Void was ethereal, existing more inside of her head than in any physical form. Nevertheless, she fought. She would do anything to make that damned voice shut up for just a single second. She would give anything just to erase what was already done. She was just a few moments away from cracking her head open against the floor if only so the probing voices would spill out with the rest of her brains.

"Tell her, Cassandra."

"Tell her everything."

"Look at how you're hurting her."

"Don't be a coward."

Cass was trembling so violently that Rapunzel could practically see the anguish radiating off her skin. How strong were those words within her mind that they could force something like that? Cass was the strongest woman Rapunzel knew. No matter what happened between them, Rapunzel always viewed her as immovable, stoic, incapable of failing even in the worst of times. It was what made her such a valuable companion…and a devastating foe. Seeing her reduced to such a state almost seemed like watching the magic drain away.

"I hate you…I hate you…"

Who exactly were those words meant for?

Rapunzel was running out of options. She hesitated to do or say anything in case the Void planned to twist it against her. It seemed like all she would be able to do is watch and lament as Cass's mind was torn inside out. It wouldn't be long before the Void grew tired of mental games and resorted to torturing them physically. How many sweet, horrible thoughts would be wrung out of Rapunzel's skull if she saw Cassandra in pain—or the other way around? It didn't matter what Rapunzel thought of Cass anymore. She hardly knew what to make of her best friend herself. The person she thought she knew, her rough but kind-hearted sister, maybe wasn't as pure and good as she thought. But again, it didn't matter. She would still risk everything to save her. She was still Cass. Whatever that now meant.

She had to escape.

She had to get out.

How? She looked at her restraints again, the gross tendrils that stuck to her flesh. She couldn't break free with strength. She doubted the Void would simply let her waltz out, either. Even if she broke free, where would she go? The entire world around them was alive, ready to close in on them like the jaws of a beast. She would have to do something that could break the tendrils, the voices, and defeat everything all at once. She needed something so powerful that it could destroy an entire world.

Rapunzel grimaced. As if she didn't already know what she was capable of.

She still hesitated when she called out to the voices one more time. "That's enough!"

The power behind her words finally seemed to draw the attention of the ethereal creature away from Cassandra. The whispers condensed and became sharp, piercing through the boundaries and hitting Rapunzel's ears like arrows.

"Oh? You want to be brave? For her?" Its voice dripped like poison. "Don't worry. She'll break any minute now. Then you'll see—"

"No!" Rapunzel cried. "You've done enough! If you don't let us go right now…"

Laughter. Echoing laughter. "You'll do what? Give us a scowl? Wiggle your fingers? Apologize?" Rapunzel remained unmoving as the voices circled her, trying to entice her reactions to the surface. "Face it, Rapunzel. You're powerless here. You can't fight back. You're just trying to ignore Cassandra. You want to pretend like it isn't real, but it is. It's all so real."

"That monster…"

"Wrathful…"

"Arrogant…"

"Slut…"

"Vixen…"

"Evil…"

"Evil…"

Rapunzel shut her eyes tightly and shook away her doubts. She had to focus, for both their sake. She had to stay calm. She buried the sights, the sounds, the heat, all of it…she just clenched her fist and ground her teeth, and spoke calmly.

"If you don't let us go now," she hissed at the Void, "I will decay this entire castle into dust."

All at once, the voices became silent, and the air became still. Cassandra straightened slightly, her shock giving her a brief respite from the torment. The pain seemed to vanish. She couldn't believe she was hearing such a thing, but she could tell by the tone in Rapunzel's voice.

She was serious.

Deadly serious.

The Void said that her powers wouldn't work there. It said that the curse had stopped. But how true was that?

The last time Rapunzel willingly unleashed the curse, she killed hundreds of oversized wasps. The last time she unwillingly unleashed the curse, she almost killed them all. The Void could surely see inside of her head. If she was bluffing, it would know about it. Rapunzel was truly willing to use the incantation and destroy the entire castle, casualties be damned. Hell, it could have destroyed the entire Void. That insane amount of power left unrestrained was the very thing they had been fearing since they set out on their journey. An old memory drifted back into Cassandra's mind: of a Great Tree, or black hair and glowing green eyes, of her hand being lit aflame from the slightest touch against the Princess's fair skin. And now, it was all happening again.

Or at least, Rapunzel thought it could. The Void, however, just resumed laughing after its brief silence.

"Oh no! Not the Decay Incantation!" it mocked. Rapunzel distinctly heard Cassandra's mannerisms within its many subtle whispers, standing out against the grey. Her courage collapsed.

"I'm serious!" Rapunzel threatened. "If you don't let us go—"

"Rapunzel, Rapunzel. Stupid Rapunzel," it taunted her. A heavy pain hit her in the head, and she gasped and recoiled, trying to fight it off as it burrowed into her thoughts. "That kind of magic doesn't work here. You don't have the actual Sundrop. This body of yours is just an illusion of ours. It has no magic within it."

She tried to hold firm. The Incantation was her only hope. She had to believe she could summon something from it. Yet, her thoughts became blurry with the Void's intrusion into her thoughts. Rapunzel gritted her teeth as the pain spread from the back of her neck up through her frontal lobe, worming its way across all corners of her brain. She had done her job in amusing the Void…now, it was interested in seeing her secrets.

"But there is plenty more within that we can use."

Cassandra could kneel there helplessly. Even as Rapunzel screamed, she couldn't turn to look.

"You aren't as innocent as you want everyone to think you are, Raps."

Rapunzel's eyes bulged. It was clawing for something specific. It was so close…

"Why don't we show Cass who you really are—"

A horrid sound cut through the air—a reality-shattering, stomach-turning noise like flesh and bone being ground and torn in two. The mulching came from everywhere at once, and with it, all the pain in Rapunzel's head went away suddenly, diminishing into nothingness. Her mind calmed. The intrusion ceased. She felt the tendrils on her arms quiver. The image of the castle floor wavered, bending like ocean waves. Something was different.

The voices had been silenced.

And another voice called out from above.

"Rapunzel, duck!"

Duck?

How the hell was she supposed to duck?

Rapunzel strained her neck and lowered her head the small amount her binds would let her. It was just enough as a massive gap opened fully in the sky above her head—and Adira fell through it into the castle, her sword pulled back over her head. With a tremendous amount of force, she swung the blade downward as she landed, slicing clean through the tendrils and setting Rapunzel free. She fell forward, her legs unable to hold her upright, but she was quickly caught and held within Adira's arms.

It all happened so fast that Rapunzel barely had time to process it. The first words that came out of her mouth were a shriek. "A-Adira!"

"Got you!"

Rapunzel was flabbergasted. Was this another one of the Void's illusions? There was no way Adira was actually here. It had to be a trick. She couldn't allow herself to have hope. It had to be fake.

Adira was immediately focused, spending no time to let Rapunzel question what was happening. They didn't have the time. In mere moments after her arrival, the tendrils that had been cut loose suddenly came to life, flying through the air toward the painted-faced warrior. Adira caught a glimpse of them coming out of the corner of her eye, and with no hesitation, she reached out with her free hand and sliced the tendrils away with her sword.

"No time to explain!" Adira shouted, pulling Rapunzel away from the tendrils as the flashing limbs continued to writhe and reach toward them. With her steel, she slashed through five, six, seven, eight, yet more kept coming.

"You explain?" Rapunzel shouted. "Shouldn't I be the one explaining this?"

"You'd be surprised!" Adira shrugged, battering away the tendrils.

The ground seemed to scream at them, and though the Void was briefly stifled, its fury was unrelenting. Adira pulled the Princess away from harm, but more tendrils burst out of the shimmering floor, morphing into desperate hands, rising up to consume them before they could gain any momentum. Rapunzel back up toward Adira, unable to do anything but cling to the warrior for safety. She looked out to Cassandra for support…but she was still unmoving, barely reacting to the rapidly changing world around them.

"Look out below!"

Another voice rang out from above, and from the blackened gap in the sky, a bright purple glow emerged. The glow strengthened as it plummeted from an infinite dark space above. Rapunzel tried to look up toward it, but Adira grabbed the back of her head and pulled it down for cover.

"Eyes shut, Princess!" she ordered. Rapunzel followed the warrior's command, cowering as the light crashed into the castle hall. The Psychopomp, adorned in her cloak of raven feathers and her golden, skull-carved mask, descended almost gracefully, floating down from the heavens like some monstrous angel. The bright purple glow emanated from a long staff in her hand, its bulbous end outshining the sun and ready to burst. The assassin smashed the end of the staff into the floor, and the light expanded, absorbing everything in its path. Bathed in the purple hue, Rapunzel heard another terrible sound; something she could only describe as the sound of dying sea life mixed with unusual, technological crackling. She felt the shockwave move through her, cleansing her of the Void's remnants. It was warm like a blanket.

When the light faded and the awful noises stopped, Rapunzel opened her eyes. She was still within the dining hall, but all of the impurities—the membranes, the sludge, the stenches of decay—had all been scrubbed away. The dining hall looked kind of normal. Strange. In the past ten minutes, she had forgotten what normal looked like.

All that remained were the four of them, the quiet only diluted by Delilah's heavy panting. She lifted her heavy staff off the ground, its light having turned dull, and she slung the oversized hunk of wood over her shoulder, examining her surroundings carefully.

"I…I think that did it," she sighed in relief. "For now, anyway."

"Then, let's not waste any time," Adira said. She helped Rapunzel stand up, only to be rewarded with a massive hug from the shocked Princess.

"Thank you so much!" Rapunzel cried, squeezing Adira hard. The warrior's frame was sturdy enough to survive such an onslaught, but mentally? A hug? No, that wasn't her thing, thank you. She politely—not with any of the malice she could have had—pushed Rapunzel away from her, getting enough distance to look the Princess in her face. Her smile was wide. It was even warm enough to melt her heart just a tiny bit.

"Just doing my job, Your Highness," Adira said calmly. "I swore I would bring you back safe. I intend to keep that promise."

"I just…sorry," Rapunzel said, taking a deep breath. "It's hard to believe this is really you. You wouldn't believe what we've been through."

"Let me guess," Adira said casually. "The Void is showing you traumatic experiences so that it can feast on your emotions?"

Rapunzel stared at Adira.

For a really long time.

"H-How did you—"

"A little birdie told me," Adira said bluntly, her gaze shifting toward the assassin. "A little birdie that should have mentioned this earlier."

The Psychopomp growled, taking off her mask to flash Adira her nasty scowl. "It. Didn't. Seem. Relevant!"

"Well, it's relevant now, isn't it?" Adira groaned. "Regardless, Delilah only put it to sleep for a little while. We have maybe a few minutes before it wakes back up and tries to eat us, so we need to get out of here."

"Great," Rapunzel stated. "Let's hurry up. You can open a portal, right, Delilah?"

The assassin shook her head. Rapunzel should have expected something like that. It was the assassin's advice that led them into this mess in the first place, however unintentional their journey was. They may have formed a temporary truce, but the tension was still there. Rapunzel didn't know how many more rescues she could get out of the young woman. She really didn't want to find out, either.

"I can, but we have a problem," Delilah said, pointing at Rapunzel's head. "That is not your real body. Unless you suddenly grew fifty feet of hair in the last hour."

"It's actually seventy feet," Rapunzel couldn't help but correct her.

"Who cares? My point is," Delilah explained, "that is a metaphysical construct. The Stomach likes shoving people into them so it can extract their emotions. It can't survive anywhere else but inside of here. It's part of this weird ultraphysical science that the Void operates on. If we try to take out into the real world just like this…you will literally disintegrate."

Rapunzel winced. That sounded…not good.

"Is there a way for us to get out of here that doesn't involve disintegrating?"

"We need to find your real bodies somewhere in this castle first," Delilah said, frustrated by the task ahead of them. "Once we get them, we can put you back inside them, open up a portal back to the main world, and leave this godforsaken place behind." She returned the mask to her face, clipping into place and groaning beneath its metal frame. "And we're going to have to do that in the next five minutes because we really do not want to still be here when this place wakes up again."

Rapunzel took a deep breath, knowing that it might be the last moment of calm she would have for a while. Of course, there was a time limit. It wouldn't be dramatic if there wasn't a time limit. She tried to mentally brace herself for the challenge ahead of her; not just the race against the clock, but also the foreknowledge that soon, she would be forced back inside her cursed body with all of the weaknesses that came with it. It was inevitable that she would have to give up this idyllic life at some point, even if the dream world had quickly turned hellish. Soon, though, she and Cassandra would be free from this. That was something to be happy about.

Cassandra…

Adira's arrival had distracted her, and it was only right then did she realize that Cass had been silent. Rapunzel turned quickly to find Cassandra, but she noticed that Cass hadn't moved from her spot on the floor.

She was just…lying there, on her hands and knees.

She was shaking badly.

An awful wave of guilt crashed over Rapunzel as she hurried to Cassandra's side, kneeling down beside her best friend and trying to stir her to action.

"Cassandra, come on," she said quickly. "We have to go."

Cass didn't respond. Her face was down, away from the Princess's sight. Her breaths were short and pained, staggered and rippling through her body.

"Cassandra. Hey, Cass…"

Rapunzel reached toward Cass's shoulder—but Cass instantly recoiled from her touch, shrinking against the floor. Rapunzel pulled her hand back in shock, burdened by fear. Adira crossed her arms, squinting at the quivering blue-haired thing on the ground.

"What's wrong with her?" she asked bluntly. "Tell her we need to get a move on."

Rapunzel understood, but she hesitated. Cassandra's fists were clenched so tightly that her nails threatened to break through her skin. Rapunzel could see her muscles rolling, tensing, almost ready to collapse. It was like all the life and power and strength that she had all her life had been peeled back, leaving her as a whimpering child. Except even that wasn't accurate. Rapunzel had seen Cassandra as a child. Even then, she was so much more than she was now. Rapunzel pulled back her hand, but she lowered her head down to Cassandra's level, trying to peer into her eyes but masked behind her hair.

"Cass, look." She tried to speak gently, but the urgency crept through her voice. "I…I know, okay? I know that was hard. That…that was all so much. You didn't deserve that, and I'm sorry. And we will talk about this, and I promise everything will be okay…but right now, we have to go. You have to get up now."

Cassandra didn't move. Rapunzel's voice started to break.

"Cass, please."

She didn't move. She did nothing at all.

Rapunzel felt her heart snap, but she didn't have time to mourn it. She suddenly grabbed onto Cassandra's shoulders and forced her upright. Cass put up no resistance, letting Rapunzel manipulate her so that she could finally see her face. Rapunzel expected the worst kind of anguish, but instead…Cass's face was pretty much blank. Her lips were thin. Her eyes were damp and stained red, but no tears fell from them. She swallowed something bitter down, but that was the end of it. Rapunzel didn't recognize it from her memories, but in her chest, she knew it. It was the face of a dead woman.

"Cass, look at me," Rapunzel said forcefully, trying not to let her own tears show. "We are going now. Do you understand me?"

She didn't look at her.

She was hellbent on doing anything else but that.

But somehow, Cassandra managed to nod, slowly and subtly.

"Y-Yeah," she mumbled. "I understand."

Rapunzel wanted to pull her in for a hug, but the visions of Cass's tormented mind repeated in her head and she restrained herself. She promised that they would be able to talk about it, that everything would be okay. She hoped that she wasn't lying to them both. For now, Cass's meager acceptance was all that she could ask for. They had more important concerns.

It was time to get their bodies back.