The Yarn
He had to admit when he first came to the palace, he adapted to the palace lifestyle pretty rapturously. After years of fighting for everything he had, running from the law, never being able to stay in one place for too long, he fell into his new fortune without restraint and with reckless abandon. Yet now as he looked at these fabrics so varied in size, quality and color, he remembered it had taken him months to steal enough as a thief to buy his first gentlemen's outfit, and a lower-class country gentry's outfit at that.
He knew stealing for it was wrong now, but still he remembered how scrupulous he had been about maintaining that outfit. As his reputation and infamy grew, he didn't know when he would be able to go to another tailor, since it risked him being recognized. A lot had happened since then. Rapunzel had happened to him for one. He had sacrificed himself for her, and then because she was his princess, he found himself sacrificing himself for her kingdom in unexpected ways. He helped save Rapunzel's kingdom from a coup, trained with the royal guard and during a freak snowstorm, saved her parents' lives. Trouble began to brew in Corona, compelling them and several other companions to go on a journey to save it.
He defended their friends and of course Rapunzel, although she was often able to handle herself. They in turn saved him. Especially Rapunzel. Eugene smiled inwardly. Because of his perseverance, travels and adventures on their journey to save Corona, people began to look at him differently. He didn't know what to make of it, except for maybe a begrudging respect which he felt was the only type of respect he would ever earn and deserve thanks to his past life. And then the unthinkable happened.
The old captain of the guards retired and asked Eugene to be appointed in his place! Eugene was so taken aback he didn't know whether to accept it. None the less, he sort of faced himself and with Rapunzel's encouragement, realized the role was being asked to play was a role he was already doing. Except for the leading the battalions thing. That was weird. Maximus had helped him with that. In the end, he and Corona's finest had almost lost their lives defending Corona from the new threat. Rapunzel and her former hand maiden Cassandra wound up saving the day.
"Hey Eugene!" Rapunzel wound up having a thought while they were sorting fabrics. "We don't know yet if the baby will be a boy or girl, but what about names? You have any ideas for names?"
"Rapunzel, I have too many names and am probably too traumatized by the whole name changing process to make up new ones."
"Eugene!" Rapunzel scoffed. She knew her husband's dead pan jests when she heard it. Alright, she'd take the helm. "Ok what about for boys, Everett, Silas, or Cyrus? Robin, David or Lief?"
"Uh Lief?" Eugene could barely register all the names she threw at him, but the Lief sounded a little strange.
"Ok that one is a bit left field, but oooh what about if it is a girl? We could name her Julia, Martina or Anneka? Or what about Rose, Vivian, Lola or Josephine?"
"Ok you've clearly thought this out!" Eugene exclaimed. "I'll have to think on that." He did notice however she had thought of one more girl name than boy name. Yes, except for this recent news that hit him like a lightning bolt, things had more or less returned to normal. He and Rapunzel had gotten married, twice actually! They decided to have a second wedding after the first, so his long lost father, King Edmund, could attend the second wedding. Oh yeah there was that! He learned he was a long lost prince of another kingdom on their journey! The kingdom was an ancient kingdom whose insignia alluded to the moon. That was a whole other story.
Despite the opportunity that opened to go help his father to rebuild this other kingdom, he was more than content to remain here, continuing his newfound place of Captain of the Royal Guard and prince-consort. He learned that being a prince-consort, meant more than just wealth, but also that others relied on him. It was still disorienting after a lifetime of hardened conviction that he alone could rely on himself. It was both a reversal, redemption and an expansion of responsibility so abrupt that he had a difficult time even confessing to Rapunzel that he felt at times inadequate. That and looking how he lived so lavishly now, like being able to choose from multiple cloths for his unborn child, was such a stark contrast to what he and other orphans had in the orphanage as a child. He was beginning to develop a conscience that wondered whether he and Rapunzel were doing enough to provide for others in the kingdom.
Rapunzel looked at Eugene strangely. She could tell in those rare times he was quiet that, that something was bothering him. Eugene had grown up in an orphanage and for most of his life had little of what he could...ahem, actually call his own. If that was what it was, Rapunzel understood. She didn't grow up as a princess. Growing up for almost eighteen years in a tower, what she and Gothel had, was always just enough, but she'd never experienced the opulence of the palace until now. A lot of her own dresses she had hand sewn. She missed that a little actually. Sewing was looked at as a past-time or used as needlework for pin cushions here at the castle, but making your own dresses was definitely frowned upon. She decided she would have to sneak past some her hand maids' watchful eye to make her own baby's night gown. It would be a project she'd look forward to. When they were done sorting and selecting, they had decided yellow and blue for the nursery, with a touch of green here and there. The yellow was for the kingdom of Corona and of course the Sun Drop that had been a big part of all their lives. Blue was for Eugene's long lost moon kingdom. And green was because that was the color of their two colors combined. It was going to look beautiful, full of vibrancy and promise. Rapunzel couldn't wait to meet her baby! She knew what her mother said about the possibility of falling ill, but she didn't feel anything right now, except tired here and there, and the doctor said that was normal. She wasn't going to let that fear steal her joy.
"Wow sunshine. You never fail to impress," Eugene sat, as he listened to her plan of what went where for the nursery, and how it would all balance out. "Oh Eugene, we'll have yellow curtains embroidered with little blue nightingales singing on flowering branches to the stars. The baby's bed will have a sun and moon intertwined on their blankets. The rug will be oval with deep royal blue rings and Corona's sun in between. The furniture will be white with thin green outlines, and golden handles. I am so excited!"
Eugene agreed. "Have you thought of what mural you'd like to paint in here? I know you want to." He pressed.
"Yes! You know me too well. I don't know yet. I thought of the sun and the moon, but I feel like that's too obvious. I'll have to think about that."
"You know, I hope this doesn't get you down Rapunzel, but the theme of suns, sans the moons of course, sounds a little like your old tower room."
She clucked her tongue, "That doesn't get me down Eugene. I loved decorating my old tower room, just not being stuck in it forever," she laughed.
She looked at Eugene and he seemed pensive. "Eugene are you alright?"
"Yes sunshine. Just thinking about how everything will look."
She hesitantly she asked, "How did your room look like growing up Eugene?" She knew Eugene didn't have his own room as a child per say, but instead a rather large communal room shared with all the other children. She was testing out if this is what was bothering him.
He shrugged, "It was rather drab actually." He was still reticent about his time at the orphanage and didn't say much about it to her. The whole kingdom knew him as a talker with a sharp wit that had a joke at the ready, even when death was at hand. Rapunzel even knew most of his excursions as a thief, which he told with a bittersweet tone since he was ashamed of the actual deeds, but still couldn't help but remember the thrill of his adventures. He hadn't realized he could still have so much adventure outside of being a thief, before he met Rapunzel, he often told her. However his childhood as an orphan he rarely delved into. Queen Arianna had already left the room to go see to King Frederick. Rapunzel had an idea. "Eugene would you come with me to go the seamstresses and weavers that will customize these fabrics for me?"
"An errand huh 'Punzel? Well ok, why not?" he shrugged.
"Well alright!" She gripped him and yanked him playfully to where he stumbled a bit.
They walked side by side in the town square. The path was cobblestone, with hatch-top roof shops lining either side. It was colorful and picturesque, a fountain peacefully bubbling in the center. Eugene had to shake his head, when just a few years ago they danced surreptitiously here as they avoided the royal guard.
"Captain everything seems to be in order." A young guard came to him. His helmet was strapped on too tight, but his uniform was freshly pressed and everything polished. "Ok..." Eugene searched his brain for a name.
"Armon, Armon Schmidt." The dark skinned young man looked barely 18. He was one of the new recruits. One of the soldiers that hadn't been chasing Eugene when he went by Flynn Rider and therefore really looked up to him. It was an odd feeling. "Well Armon, Armon Schmidt, don't feel like you need to report to me today, I am in my civilian clothes now see? I am running errands with my wife." Rapunzel came to view from the other side of Eugene with a wave and surprised the young man.
"Oh princess!" he said blushing and kneeling in a deep bow. "Your majesty, my apologies I didn't see you there!"
She laughed merrily, "It's alright. It's nice meeting you Armon."
Armon didn't seem to know what to say to such a friendly greeting from a princess. "Yes right, well," Eugene broke in, "you're dismissed. We'll do drills at 7 am the next morning."
"Yes sir," Armon heartily replied.
Rapunzel snorted "I can't believe you wake up before 7 am every day Eugene." She bumped him cheerfully. "You used to lounge around the palace and wake up around what? 10 am?"
"Yeah well, you can thank Maximus for that. He gets me up bright and early. He insists that drills have to be done that early."
Rapunzel smiled. "Oooh here's the first shop!"
"No need to grab me," Eugene laughed as he saw Rapunzel's hand enthusiastically outstretched. "I'm coming."
Rapunzel dashed inside, with Eugene following, only for Rapunzel to say "Ooopps! I almost forgot!" and darted right back out, beckoning Eugene to follow her. Back into the sunlight, he could see what she was pointing at outside the shop door. It was the royal stamp of their sun insignia, except Eugene had never seen one so large. It definitely couldn't be for an envelope. "What's this?" Eugene laughed. "I think everyone already knows that this shop is in Corona! It's in the town square."
"You'll see!" Rapunzel said being oddly discreet. She grabbed his hand and he didn't avoid her yanking him back inside this time. She was still so strong after so many years of lugging around 70 feet of hair! "I'm not sure I can get used to this way of travel," he complained jokingly, mock rubbing his shoulder.
Now that they were in the shop, Rapunzel and Eugene were treated to the sights of all different dresses, skirts and petticoats. Rapunzel saw that there were also shawls and quaint feathery hats. Some were lacy, some were silk, and all looked both inviting and eloquent. Rapunzel knew from her own experience in dressmaking that this was no easy feat. Busts stood in the windows and hats were propped up on makeshift stands. Yet one particular hat drew Rapunzel's attention. It did not have a broad brim, but it was more like a cap or bonnet made of fabric in the fashion of the day. "Eugene come take a look at this." Delicately embroidered on the dark red hat in black thread was an intricate thicket of roses in all stages of blooms, and looking closely enough, one could spot a butterfly resting on the top rose as if about to take off in fight. It was almost magical. Tucked into the side of the hat were two feathers, one black and one red to mark the plumage of the high born style of the day. "This, this is why I wanted to come here to get the curtains embroidered. She's so talented! This is also where the fabric came from."
"Your majesty! What a pleasant surprise!"
The seamstress stepped out of a back room with measuring tape around her wrist and a needle in her mouth. She had horned rims and dark thick tresses of hair that fell around her head in big waves. She wore a long flowing dress where the pastel blue translucent sleeves had cuffs that seemed perfectly tailored to her wrists, but the rest of the material extended and hung loosely from her arms, indicative of wings. A cream colored lacy scarf hung around her neck. She looked the part of seamstress. "Estrada!" Rapunzel exclaimed, "How are you?"
"Wonderful, just wonderful." Estrada replied, taking the pin out of her mouth. "And my darling, you look like you have a glow about you. You just got back didn't you? I trust your wedding dress worked out well for you?"
Madam Estrada Rigamorld had a low cultured voice that bespoke her worldliness. She had an ever-present subtle hint of an Italian accent in her speech, which would not be easy to hear if you weren't listening for it.
"It did! It was beautiful Estrada! Thank you so much, a thousand times again!" Rapunzel gleefully confirmed. "And you might know, this is my husband, Eugene Fitzherbert. You've seen him before I'm sure, at the wedding reception, but I don't think you two have ever formally met?"
The Madam sucked in her teeth, which in Eugene's experience was never a good thing. "Yes I've seen him, and no we've not met, not directly. Flynn Rider, which I believe was your alias, correct?" She didn't pause for them to affirm, "Rider once stole an entire caravan of fabrics out to delivery here for customers."
"No," Rapunzel breathed, before she could catch herself.
"Oh yes. They eventually recovered the caravan, but not before some unwitting innocents bought the stolen fabric from a man they described as young and dashing, and were not compensated for their losses when the fabric went back to its original owners. "
"Err, so sorry," Eugene stammered, scratching the back of head at the base of his hair line. "I've tried to turn around things since."
"Eh, no harm done," Madam Estrada replied, "I daresay they missed a few balls, but they recouped their losses after they became somewhat celebrities when it was revealed they were victims of the infamous Flynn Rider, debonair thief."
"Oh," Eugene replied, managing to sound relieved, but completely uncertain if that was how he should feel.
"Of course they still called for that head of yours." She abruptly clapped back, a wry smile on her face. "But I heard you paid your dues a different way. And here we are!" She clapped her hands as if done with the subject and moving on.
Eugene laughed nervously. He wasn't sure what she meant by "Paid your dues", but it reminded him of a knife and someone else.
"Do you have a sister by any chance?"
"Not that I know of? Why?"
"No reason," Eugene laughed mirthlessly again.
"Oooh-kay!" Rapunzel broke the tension. "Estrada, this time, we are here for some of your excellent embroidery work."
"Oh how wonderful!"
"Yes, I was telling Eugene what a genius you are."
"Oh my dear, you are too kind. What can I do for you?"
"Well do you remember the sheer yellow fabric we bought from you for curtains?"
"Yes, I do."
Rapunzel launched an explanation of what she wanted, to the delight of Madam Estrada.
"What a perfect project!"
"I knew you'd love it!"
"Of course dear and when should it be ready?"
"Oh, you know February, maybe early March at the latest. I know you are busy with a lot of customers. "
Madam Estrada looked as if she was doing math in head and a smile curved around her lips, but she said nothing. "Oh I can get it ready much sooner."
"Ok! Oh hey Madam Estrada- could I ask you one more thing?"
"Anything darling."
"Would you mind if I could I see your log?"
Madam Estrada took her glasses off and snapped with a smile. "I knew you were going to ask that."
"Here you are your majesty." Estrada got out a red leather book, with yellowed pages inside. There was an accounting of each customer and what they bought, but by some customers there was a check mark. In this particular log there was twenty check marks.
"Twenty?!" Rapunzel asked gleefully.
"Twenty." Estrada nodded.
"I guess I am the only one in the room who doesn't get why twenty check marks are so significant here?" Eugene butt in.
"So Eugene," Rapunzel began with a triumphant smile, which told Eugene this was the whole reason she brought him in the first place. "Remember that giant Corona stamp on the shop door?"
"Yeah," he nodded emphatically.
"That tells Estrada's patrons that the royal household shops here. Vendors in the plaza have found that if passerby know that we shop here they are more likely to purchase from their store as well."
Eugene had been to more than a few balls, either invited or uninvited. During those uninvited times, in the shadows unobserved, he often heard lady's gossip. "Did you see that dress?" One woman would utter. "Some of the fabric is cut from same cloth the queen wears. She'll snag a lord with that tonight."
It made sense.
"So you are drawing customers here with the stamp outside?"
"Yes!"
"So is that what the check marks are for? Every customer that comes in here because of the royal stamp?"
"Well sort of," Rapunzel answered taking on a bookish air. Eugene found it adorable. "Of course not every customer comes in and tells Madam Estrada that they specifically came to buy here because I've shopped here. But-" she said holding up a finger, "If they inquire about what materials I or other royal household members have bought," she dug into the little aqua purse she carried around to dish out a ball of red yarn, "Everything that I have purchased here has a little red yarn tied around it." Eugene looked around and sure enough, the little red yarn was tied around the translucent yellow curtain material Rapunzel had bought, some of the pink satin material he saw back at the palace, among others. It was simple enough to be noticed but not garish. "So when anyone buys material that I bought, as part of the agreement for the increased foot traffic due to the royal stamp outside, Madam Estrada and other shop owners have agreed to give 5 percent of the purchases with the red yarn to a local orphanage or other charity. It's completely voluntary to have the royal stamp on your door so that's why it works!" Madam Estrada nodded.
"I give most of the money from these purchases to the orphanage. Don't want to create any more Flynn Riders running around." She winked at him.
Maybe Eugene would give her a second chance with his trust after all. "So that is why twenty check marks are so great?"
"Yes!"
He kissed Rapunzel on the forehead. "I should have known you had something like this planned. When did you do all of this?"
"When you went to the Dark Kingdom to arrange our second wedding."
"Oh right." There was that. The second wedding at the Dark Kingdom. The Dark Kingdom was his long lost kingdom. It was crazy the way he had found out.
"So what is this I hear about Eugene being a lost prince? He was Flynn Rider famous thief now reformed right? What's this business about him being a dark prince, and a dark kingdom?" Madam Estrada couldn't help inquiring, bending her elbows as if she was about to sink into some juicy gossip. Eugene was back to not being sure if he trusted her.
"Well, remember the black rocks?" Rapunzel asked. "It was connected to those." Eugene and Rapunzel relayed the story to the seamstress again. After Rapunzel had been returned to her parents, a new evil began to literally crop up in the kingdom of Corona. Jagged indomitable black rocks began to jut out violently from the ground, causing minor tremors, and devastation of old Corona's farmland. Their first source seemed to sprout from the original place where Rapunzel's golden flower had been found. In curiosity, Rapunzel had touched one of the rocks and it set off a reaction. They sprouted everywhere, and Rapunzel's long seventy feet of golden hair magically returned!
Rapunzel and her handmaiden Cassandra tried to cut it, but her hair inexplicably seemed to be as impenetrable as the rocks. However, her hair no longer possessed its healing power. Before long it couldn't be ignored that the black rocks reacted to Rapunzel's presence whenever she neared or touched them. It could only be surmised that Rapunzel retained inside of her, some of the power of the Sun Drop that created the golden flower. A deeper, more powerful magic, which caused the birth of the strange monolithic stones, blossomed within her, and called her away to find answers before the dark oddities could swallow up all of Corona.
This is when Eugene, Rapunzel's friend and hand maiden, Cassandra, and a few other faithful companions travelled a long trek to save Corona. Following the mysterious black rocks, they found that along with the Sun Drop, there was also a Moonstone. The two powers, opposite in every way, sought to be joined together as they were two halves of a whole. Yet if the two powers were used together in sync, it would make for an unstoppable power that could devour armies and cause kingdoms to rise and fall.
That is where the Dark Kingdom came in. The Dark Kingdom was where the dark rocks led. The Dark Kingdom was an old albeit ruined kingdom that housed the moon stone, its long line of kings vowing to protect the world from its power. The Dark Kingdom was where Eugene found his father.
He was the near mad king of a bleak kingdom, brought to shambles by the black rocks, and housed in the haunted structures of a castle. When he told Eugene he was his father, Eugene had laughed out loud. He'd think he'd known by now if he had royal heritage. Yet his father had proof. Eugene hadn't known what to make of it at the time. His father, King Edmund had told him that in his fruitless quest to rid the world of the power of the Moonstone, the opal stone had sent off a destructive blast so devastating that it had killed Eugene's mother, and compelled King Edmund to tell anyone else left to evacuate the kingdom. Edmund even had sent him, his own son, off to a faraway kingdom to protect him from the stone's catastrophic power. Eugene wound up in an orphanage.
Then perhaps under the influence of madness and vengeance, the king continued on with his narrow-minded quest to destroy the stone, feeling that only when he destroyed it could he be reunited with his son. After years of an ill-wrought obsession that bordered on insanity, and miles of distance, Edmund lost track of his son. Then, thanks to the journey Eugene and Rapunzel had taken, he was suddenly returned to him. It seemed like fate, it seemed like destiny and to Eugene it seemed like their quest was lost. If the stone had killed Eugene's mother, what would it do to Rapunzel? Unexpectedly, circumstances intervened to save Rapunzel from a similar fate, but in the meanwhile an ancient demon named Zhan Tiri was unleashed.
After Rapunzel and her friends travelled back to Corona from the Dark Kingdom, the demon sought and was able to wrest away the power of both the Sun Drop and the Moonstone. Zhan Tiri set to destroy Rapunzel and all of Corona with her. That demon had a surprise coming though. This was Rapunzel. She couldn't let that happen! Corona had been saved, by the last remnants of power Rapunzel and her friend Cassandra had clung to, from a small forgotten bit of the Moonstone the demon hadn't taken. Ironically, in the process, Rapunzel had to cut her hair to the brunette bob cut she had before, emptying it of its power again. The demon and black rocks immaterialized, while Rapunzel sent the Sun Drop and Moonstone together, back to the stars. "And here we are!" Eugene finished the story. "Well take some credit," Rapunzel offered, "you did lead our friends, family and your father's warriors into an all-out attack against the demon."
"Yeah, we gave that thing a run for its money," he grinned, "But we were no match against that last 'wither and decay' spell it had for us." He admitted. It wasn't how what he said but his tone that worried Rapunzel. Ever since she had known him, he exuded confidence, even when he wasn't. She loved him, but at times even she could find his playful arrogance cloying. With an inward chuckle she remembered how she once told him, "A dose of humility every now and then wouldn't hurt." He took it well. If this was how humility looked like on her husband though, she wasn't sure if she liked it. It sounded somewhat depressed. She would have to remember to talk to him about it.
"I remember all that!" Madam Estrada broke Rapunzel's reverie. "I wasn't there on your journey, but I was here in Corona when you evacuated us all. Thank heavens everything turned out all right! But what happened to your father, Captain?" Madam Estrada pressed, suddenly calling Eugene, Captain, as if consciously deciding to remember this more recent stage of his life. "Well, he decided to go back to the Dark Kingdom to rebuild it. And we decided to stay here to get hitched!" Eugene made a fist and swung his elbow to the side to convey their excitement. Estrada laughed. "But you had a second wedding though, correct? That is what I made that blue wedding dress for?"
Eugene snapped his fingers. "You're a sharp one Madam Estrada!" Madam Estrada couldn't tell whether Eugene was teasing her or not. She laughed and pretended she didn't notice. "What I mean is why didn't your father go to the wedding here in Corona? Why have two weddings, two dresses and two of everything? But forgive me, I am being too bold!"
"Oh no, you're welcome to ask!" Rapunzel reassured the madam, consistent with her warm nature.
Madam Estrada had indeed made two wedding dresses for Rapunzel. One was the traditional white dress that Rapunzel had worn to the wedding in Corona. It was stunning, but Eugene remembered being besotted more by the beauty of its owner. The blue wedding dress was less traditional. A dark blue in color, with almost florescent blue seams, it had a low cut crescent neckline which fit just off the shoulders. Cut out down the sleeves and fitted in see through mesh-like material, was a pattern of crescent moons, one of the top of the other, one facing left and the next facing right, all the way down until just short of the hand. The sleeves were glove sleeves. It added to the mystery of the dress, and Eugene felt that it highlighted Rapunzel's delicate little fingers. Rapunzel wore a silver moon necklace, and a tiara with silver star flowers and dark blue purplish opal stones that had belonged to his late mother. The veil was silver and so sheer that it captured any light and seemed to reflect it, creating a glittering quality. Rapunzel looked every bit of a moon princess of the Dark Kingdom, and bride. Eugene did find Estrada's questions a bit pervasive, and still couldn't make out the woman, but decided that a lady who could make a dress like that for Rapunzel couldn't be all that bad. He decided to go for broke.
"My father, King Edmund, still hasn't fully recovered from all his ordeals in his quest to destroy the moon stone. He still gets well... fixated on things."
Rapunzel took over. "About a few months into sending him the invitation for the wedding here in Corona, it was pretty obvious that he wasn't dealing well with having to leave his kingdom in the midst of it being rebuilt to travel here. So my parents and we all decided it might just be easier to have two weddings! One in Corona and one there!"
"My father's carrier crows, his method of messaging, isn't exactly reliable," Eugene coughed, "so six months into planning the wedding, Rapunzel stayed here, while I went down to the Dark Kingdom to see what my dad thought of the plan, and he loved it."
"It was the first time we had been separated for that long since we met. It was a little weird. But I had the wedding to plan and you brought Varian on the trip too!" To the side she explained to Madam Estrada "Varian, you know, the boy who is Corona's inventor and genius alchemist, among other things." She turned back to her husband. "And Varian's father Quirin went with you too! So you weren't alone!"
"Yeah that's true. I brought Quirin because he was once one of knights, or warriors of my father's inner circle called the Brotherhood. He hoped he could be useful in helping my father rebuild during our visit. And Varian wanted to go with his father because he had a hunch about the black rocks."
"Black rocks? I thought those all disappeared when Rapunzel defeated Zhan Tiri?"
"Well they did, but their dust still remained. Since they cropped up in the Dark Kingdom first, the place was covered in the stuff."
It was here in Corona too, though mostly swept up from the palace and the town square. There was a ton of it in Old Corona where Varian lived. It had a refined shimmery, ebony quality, almost like sand, but with chunks of flint-like particles here and there. The boy insisted on hanging onto as much of it as he could. Eugene at first thought he was crazy, but realized there was always a method to that boy's madness. He was over the moon, no pun intended, when he found it in loads of it at the Dark Kingdom. He kept his intentions for it pretty close to the vest though at first.
"Eugene was gone for a few weeks during that trip. His friend Lance helped cover his guard duties. And that's when I cooked up this plan to help the shop owners and charities around Corona. It's also when I asked you, maybe a little last minute, for that moon wedding dress. That dress was SO lovely and inspired! I do not know how you managed it so fast!"
"Well I couldn't have managed without Faith!"
"Faith? Well I am glad faith helped you through! I am always telling Eugene to have faith!"
"Oh I don't, well I do mean that faith too, but I actually mean Faith! Faith would you come out? The princess and prince consort are here!"
A comely handmaiden came out and beamed at them.
"Faith! I wondered what happened to you! I know you were just fed up with old lady Crowley at the palace."
Faith had briefly been Rapunzel's handmaiden after Cassandra left to go on her own adventure. The two women had nothing against one another, but it hadn't been a good fit. Faith was timid and painfully shy in nature, and everything about Rapunzel spelled adventure and buoyancy. Old lady Crowley, the castle's domestic coordinator, had admittedly been extremely harsh on her as well. "I am overjoyed you found somewhere that you seem to enjoy, from the look on your face!"
"Yes." Faith replied simply smiling.
"She's a wonder with a needle!" Madam Estrada smiled back proudly. "She took over most of my other customers' orders while I made that dress of yours."
"Oooh are you the one responsible for that red hat with embroidered roses?"
Faith blushed. "She is!" Madam Estrada returned exuberantly.
"I may need my own hat with cross stitch work." Rapunzel commented coyly.
"You heard her Faith! You're the seamstress! What would you recommend?"
"Um maybe something green? With some butterflies?
"That sounds great!"
"Hey I could use a new outfit too!" Eugene chimed in. Everyone stopped talking and stared at him. "We don't specialize in men's clothing so much," said Madam Estrada clearing her throat. "That's more Antonio the tailor down the street."
"Oh right." He knew Antonio. The tall reedy man often insisted on coming to palace when Eugene needed to be fitted. He wasn't sure why. Maybe just part of the service he guessed.
Eugene knew girl talk when he heard it. He signaled to Rapunzel by pointing two fingers at the door. She nodded her approval and he walked out as clandestinely as he could while she finished up. Stepping out into the sun, he set out to find the tailor's shop to give the elderly man a visit. As he walked, he realized it felt so bright and different from the perpetually overcast skies of his father's kingdom. His father's kingdom. Hah! He laughed out loud. It still sounded unbelievable. It wasn't a private island, but he guessed in a way he had inherited some real estate!
The Secrets of the Dark Kingdom
He remembered the trip to the Dark Kingdom to discuss the second wedding. They had taken horses to take the week long trek. Corona had two ways of travelling now, horses and thanks to the neighboring kingdom, hot air balloons. Quirin was afraid of heights though, so horses it was! The journey could actually be made in 4 days without stopping, and 2 days by hot air balloon if everything went well, but they were in no hurry and stopped for the night and other things on the way. They went through the same cities, forests, valleys, meadows and rivers of his first trip with Rapunzel, Cassandra and their friends. With no ominous threat hovering over them, and no other curtails or distractions, the trip went a lot more smoothly. The beauty of the landscape made more of an impression on Eugene at this leisurely pace. He thought Rapunzel might think so too. A thought came to him then that she might enjoy travelling through here on their honeymoon.
If his father agreed with the idea of the second wedding there, they could make part of the journey to the second wedding, their honeymoon and finish up on the way back to Corona after the second festivities were completed. Maybe it would help redeem some of those more hazardous memories. He and Rapunzel had been so busy planning the wedding, restoring Corona and renovations that they really hadn't given much thought to a honeymoon. They did agree that whatever they did, they would have fun as long as they were together. They had their fair share of travel and adventure already. He missed her. He saw that even some the cities they had visited on their first trip had improved since, thanks to Rapunzel. She was born to rule, but he on the other hand?
"Your son is Flynn Rider?" Rung in his ears. He remembered the offending nobleman at the Dark Kingdom laughing uncontrollably. It didn't exactly sound amiable. He was getting really tired of his past alter ego following him around. The nobleman his father had just introduced him to was Egbert Lundar, Duke of Craterron, or at least what was left of it. He was apparently a far distant relative.
Moments before, at their first arrival to the Dark Kingdom, King Edmund received them outside his ruined fortress-like castle, greeting and hugging his son, the black dust crunching under his boots as he walked. King Edmund was an imposing figure, who somehow managed to obtain both a regal and wild look about him. He wore his long thinning brown hair untrimmed. He had a thick mustache and goatee, and dark eyebrows which always seemed to be troubled. His eyes were the same hazel brown as Eugene's, or, Eugene guessed his eyes were the same as his father's. A long brown cloak with Dark Kingdom's insignia of the moon with three slashes as its clasp draped over him. It hid well his lost arm, which he had lost during the blast when he last unsuccessfully tried to demolish the Moonstone, decades before he met Rapunzel. A stark black crown with a single purple gem fitted in its frontal piece, matched the purple gem he wore around his neck. Eugene would later learn that purple signified his late mother's family, which was why the king wore the stone close to his heart. There had been so much devastation, yet his father pushed on.
Looking at the place, he'd been busy. The first renovation he set about doing was building a long bridge that crossed the chasm that yawned open between the landscape and the sheer cliff that his castle rested upon. Before, travelers to the castle had to take a perilous ride on rickety wooden gondolas suspended on thin wires. With the ever random outbreak of black rocks piercing through, a bridge had been an impossibility until now. Still, considering the distance, this new bridge was a feat of engineering.
Except for the overcast skies, the kingdom looked completely different without the treacherous geographic staple of black rocks that had permeated through the whole countryside for decades. It might have had a raw beauty. Two gargantuan weathered statues of sentries pointed the way to the Dark Kingdom. Its canyons and valleys were vast. Yet, it was given to instability and minor landslides now that the rocks disintegrated. Determined citizens, who had fled the kingdom before, started to come back in small smatterings, testing the waters to see if it was truly safe to come back. His father had convinced
layman to come in greater numbers to help rebuild the palace and housing. They were doing what they could with a bit of strategic scaffolding, but they needed vegetation, and fast, to weigh the soil down. What was left instead, was mounds of black rock dust in its wake. Arriving at the Dark Kingdom for the first time, Varian didn't seem to notice the perils.
"Ahahaha! I can't believe it! Look it at all!" he cried in an outburst, observing the piles of black rock dust, acting as if he just struck gold. Varian, the kingdom of Corona's genius innovator and inventor, was a boy of about 17 now. He had mainly jet black hair, except for a mysterious blue stripe that jettisoned through it. His dark hair contrasted sharply with his eyes which were light blue and so fluently expressive, reflecting a rich inner thought life. He wore the most peculiar clothes. He donned a blue shirt with a single cross stitch holding it together on the top. Over that he wore a large industrial size brown apron, oversized black leather gloves, worn out brown pants and black boots. On top of his head he wore thick goggles, which he was using right now, along with some sort magnifying element that he swung down from a mechanical extending arm previously resting on top of the googles.
"Yes, yes, YES!" Varian gleefully proclaimed. At 17, he still had that boyish eagerness but coupled with an acute intellect far beyond his years. It made him both endearing and a bit odd. King Edmund cocked an eyebrow at him. "Edmund!" Varian's father, Quirin called, his arms outstretched. Quirin was a broad man, who seemed to share no features with his son except for his dark hair. He had a perpetual 5 'o clock shadow and square jaw. He wore blue pants and a burgundy shirt with a fur shawl over his shoulders. The black leather gloves and boots he wore were similar to Varian's but fit snuggly. King Edmund and Quirin grabbed each other's arms and then dove into an embrace. "How are you my old friend?" Edmund asked. They had decades of experience together, protecting the world from the dark Moonstone, before it was destroyed. Quirin shrugged. "As well as can be expected." Varian continued squealing with new discoveries. Both men turned to look at him. "You'll have to excuse my son. He gets pretty excited when he thinks he finds something useful."
"What can be useful about all this dust?" King Edmund asked curiously.
"Indeed how can anything in this scorched earth be useful?" Another voice called out. Everyone except Varian turned to see who it came from. A caravan of finely dressed men and some women had arrived some distance away. With workers coming in and out to assist Edmond with renovations, their party hadn't given them much heed until now. By their clothes and stance it was clear they were not the everyday laymen. As Edmund's face lit up with recognition it was obvious they were either close friends or family. "The Lundars!" he muttered under his breath.
He walked briskly to where a lanky nobleman had walked out first from the caravan, with the apparent purpose of greeting King Edmund. The two men clapped each other on the back and then embraced. Eugene had thought his father was tall, but this man towered at least 4 inches above his father. He had prematurely shock white hair that came out in short spikes to the right, but was fashioned in a long razor straight growth to the left that ended immediately below his left eye. His skin was dark tan, contrasting against his white hair and his dark eyes glinted. The man's travel companions, who Eugene guessed was the rest of his family, had the same height, white hair and dark tan skin. He was dressed in a dark blue outfit, with a buttoned down shirt, exaggerated cuffs and collar, and high black boots. His family trailing behind him had the same type of outfits with varying colors of blue, green, silver and even gold. The man himself was more striking than handsome, his features a little too elongated to be considered traditionally handsome. With a start though Eugene realized that except for the hair, the man's features were a stretched version of his own. The same cheekbones, chin and yes, nose. It was as if someone had taken his features and stretched them out to accommodate for the man's lengthy height. "Son!" Edmund beckoned him to come. Fitzherbert moved reluctantly forward. He wasn't sure why he felt that way. That is when Eugene's father introduced him to the Duke of Craterron, when the said nobleman recognized Eugene from his wanted posters, and when he burst into laughter. "The apple falls far from the tree here doesn't it?" The man went on and on, with barbs and insulting one-liners about Eugene's shady past. "It's really my fault Horace turned out that way." Edmund related in response, defending his son with the wrong nomenclature.
"Eugene!" Eugene was quick to correct to him. That was the other thing, evidently the Dark Kingdom was the apex origin to go to for bad names. Eugene had learned since meeting his father that his birth name had been 'Horace Moon', changed to Eugene Fitzherbert only when he got to the orphanage. They were both, in his opinion, terrible names, but Eugene found 'Horace' to be worse. He guessed at least his real name wasn't Horace Scope or something ridiculous like that. Regardless, he was sticking to Eugene Fitzherbert. "Oh sorry," Eugene's father murmured apologetically. "Horace goes by Eugene now."
"That's ok. Apparently I was the lucky one, when you have a name like Egbert heh?" Eugene elbowed the man with a smile, knowing fully, how well Egbert would take that joke. Egbert stopped laughing. "Egbert and you share a great grandfather, son." Edmund interjected. "Your grandfather and his grandmother were siblings. His grandmother was my aunt, and his father was my cousin. So you two are second cousins."
Suddenly Eugene looked at Egbert Lundar a little differently. He never knew outside of his father that he had any living family. That explained Lundar's features looking vaguely similar. He wondered dimly what it would have been like if they wound up growing up together. If the man still would have been a jerk to him. Or if he and Eugene would have both been privileged snots. "Adira is also his aunt." Edmund continued.
"Adira's is his aunt?"
Edmund nodded. Adira was the only female member of a small inner circle of knights surrounding his father called the Brotherhood. It was a name she always took issue with since she was a woman. It made so much sense that Egbert and Adira were related. Adira had the same shock white hair, dark tan orangey skin, although she dressed much more like the warrior she was. She also lacked the same snotty attitude that Egbert had. She had been instrumental in helping Rapunzel understand the Sun Drop's power within her and the power of the Moonstone. Adira seemed to be the first to understand that the two powers were connected, mysteriously separated when they fell to the earth centuries ago, yearning to be re- forged together into their original state. Adira also fought with Eugene against the demon that had warred against Corona.
A thought suddenly came to him. "So does that mean that Adira and I are related?"
"Yes son, she's your cousin once removed."
"What?" Eugene took a minute to digest that. "And here I let her get away with calling me fish skin!" He said almost to himself. Fish skin, had been Adira's nickname for him on their first journey here. "Do you have any more cousins or family you need to introduce me to?"
"No, just the Lundars, although they are not all here at the moment. The others will be arriving later. They're all your second cousins." In this party, there was about 5 men and 4 women behind Egbert. They didn't seem to share all the same disdain for him, as Egbert did. One by one they came up to him, smiled and said their names. For the first time Eugene felt part of a family other than Rapunzel's. He was beginning to feel he had something other to offer her than just himself. "I believe we were here to talk about succession?" Egbert commented impatiently, after the last Lundar introduced herself.
Eugene looked at his father in surprise. He was here to talk about a second wedding, Quirin and Varian were here to visit, and allow Varian to study the black rock dust. There had been no mention of discussing the succession to the throne of the Dark Kingdom. "Ah yes," Edmund turned to Eugene, "Eugene I know you came here to talk to me about something specifically regarding the wedding, but I took the opportunity of your visit to invite the Lundars down here to talk about something else important. Let's all go inside. I can make us some tea."
The castle itself, was built of black and dark shades of the toughest type of stone. It was built this way to precipitate the intrusion of black rocks that continually assaulted its structure when the Moonstone had still been housed within its bowels. The impenetrable black rocks had been the Moonstone's way of protecting itself from anyone who would seek to use or destroy it. Later, the spread of the black rocks out to Corona, was the Moonstone's way of reaching out to the Sun Drop to be rejoined. Now that both the Sun Drop and Moonstone had been reunited by Rapunzel and returned to the heavens, the castle looked dwarfed and haunted without the jagged black stones fanning out of it from all sides. It was a miracle that the castle hadn't collapsed! The castle was encircled by uneven skewed walls, meant as a fortress. Antiquated towers shot up from the dark palace like tendrils, at spontaneous angles and heights. The highest tower shot out from the center into the clouds, part watchtower, and part beacon. The main part of the castle's structure was in itself, the widest tower of them all, lifted in a precarious fashion to avoid touching the ground. It stood on an unwelcoming platform of what could be said functioned as a large cylindrical stilt. The breadth of it was so forbidding, even though Eugene had learned he had been born here, he didn't think he could ever call it home.
Once inside the cold castle, Eugene noticed Hector was guarding the door. Hector was the last of the three warriors of the Brotherhood who had been with them on their journey. He had first antagonized them, but then was won over and fought with them against the demon at Corona. "Hector my man!" Eugene greeted in surprise. "You still guarding my father?" The other knights of the inner circle had moved on since the destruction of the Moonstone. Hector only gave him a curt nod. Apparently still not completely forgetting the animosity that had initially stood between them. Eugene shrugged it off. So, of the brotherhood, Quirin was with him, Hector still guarded his father, he realized he hadn't seen Adira. She wasn't with the other Lundars. He would like to see her especially now that he knew that they were related. He asked his father out loud about her whereabouts. "She's a few miles west of here, with your fiancé's friend Cassandra. They are on their own quest together right now." That was interesting. Without getting into what that quest was at the moment, if they were only a few miles off perhaps they could attend the second wedding Eugene and Rapunzel hoped to have here. They sat down and there was few moments of awkward silence as Egbert and Eugene waited for Edmund to make the tea.
Inside the castle was the same as in his memory, except now giant holes loomed where rocks had once punctured through. Down the entryway hall, there were circular opaque stain glass skylights portraying artistic versions of the moon and stars. They poured light in cylindrical beams, in the otherwise dim stony castle. Crystals dangled from one of the skylights. From there, they had walked up a long stairway that led to yet another hall with more elaborate stain glass windows depicting the origin of the Moonstone, and the long line of kings that proceeded his father. They were all portrayed in fighting postures. Finally at their destination, Edmund had seated them in the main hall. The room looked too big for its single piece of furniture, which was a long wooden table with several ornate chairs, where figures of the past had met and conferenced. Encompassing the table, laid seamlessly into the floor, was the moon insignia of the Dark Kingdom, the black circle with three slashes going through the circumference. The slashes stopped high short of the center, crowding together at the top right. With gaping holes present throughout the castle fortress, here they lurked in the grand arched doorway, the stairs and the base of the stairway where black rocks had once been. The architects of the Dark Kingdom were experts of engineering. They built the outside and inside of the castle out of the toughest materials and anticipated the geological intrusions. It was they who had ingeniously built buttresses and supports everywhere in the castle, so it stood even when the black rocks were gone. It still made Eugene a little nervous about the longevity of the structure, adding to the ominous archaic feeling of the place. A fire crackled in the massive marbled room, and Egbert and Eugene sat opposite on the long rectangular table, facing each other, forced to stare at each other or flinch.
When Edmund came back in and saw the awkward seating arrangement he hurriedly shuffled to take a seat at the middle of the table to mollify the situation. "So, son," Edmund began, wasting no more time after he served them their beverages and then sat down. "Egbert here is the most direct heir to the throne outside of you. Since you have opted to stay in Corona and wed Rapunzel, which I completely support," Edmund held out a hand as if reassuring him, "Egbert has graciously accepted to be the next successor to the throne."
"And I graciously accept your gracious acceptation!" Eugene rejoined immediately. He had no ambition for his father's throne, and actually felt a weight lift off of him. Marrying Rapunzel, becoming captain of the royal guard, was already more than he ever dreamed. "Of course Eugene," his father asserted with a tone that said not to be so hasty, "there is a caveat."
"If you and Rapunzel have a child, of course, since you have refused the throne, that child will be heir to the throne in Corona. However if you have a second child, you can choose if the second child will be the heir to the throne here." Wow. He had never even considered something like that. At the time, he and Rapunzel hadn't even married yet, much less had children. Was this how royalty functioned, with their entire lives mapped out in front of them? Eugene was about to say as much until Egbert interrupted his thoughts. "Of course, I wouldn't mind, if you chose that. Children are malleable, so with a little guidance, it would be unlikely the child would turn out like you." A cruel smile played on his lips. Eugene only laughed dryly. He was baiting him, it was obvious, but Eugene wasn't going to bite. His father either didn't care or didn't notice. "So wait, are you saying if Rapunzel and I had a second child, and we chose for the second child to be the heir of this throne," it rattled Eugene's head to break it down that far, "would that child be raised here, in the Dark Kingdom?"
"No son, all he means is that if your second child chose to be an heir here, he or she would take regular trips to our kingdom during their childhood to learn our ways. Your child would not have to move here until the time of succession."
That was still a lot of planning for one unborn. Initially he thought the answer would be no, but on second thought it rankled him that the likes of Egbert Lundar could be ruling their recovering kingdom. He thought at the beginning that his second cousin's behavior was just sparked by a mere distaste of Eugene himself. He had that effect on people. Certainly Rapunzel's friend Cassandra had not been a fan of him until much later. He couldn't be sure enough though to attribute the man's attitude as unique in relation to him. What if he was like this with everybody?
"I'll have to ask Rapunzel." Eugene stated. He could almost feel the hair on the right side of his cousin's head spiking up more. "Very well." Edmund said. "Let us know what you both decide. Speaking of Rapunzel, I think you came to talk to me about the wedding?"
"Actually I came to talk to you about a second wedding!"
His father and he had to sort out the details, but it was a hit from the start. They would have friend Lance and his adopted girls attend this wedding, along with Varian, the Brotherhood, Cassandra and of course with the Duke sitting right here, he couldn't avoid inviting the Lundars. Safety precautions would have to be laid out with the present dangers of the landscape, but it wasn't anything they couldn't handle! "And we will have to get rid of all this black dust somehow before the wedding." Edmund commented.
"No!" A voice echoed through the hall. Everyone looked up. In the midst of their conversation, they had forgotten that Quirin and Varian had followed them up there. The protest came from Varian. "Forgive me your majesty, but you can't do that." Edmund cocked an eyebrow at him for the second time today. "And why can't I?"
"Well it's difficult to explain your majesty, but the black rock dust, it's, well it's a fertility agent, for the crops sir!"
"You mean it makes the ground more fertile? But boy, how would you even know that? We were going to shovel it and deposit it somewhere else. We figured it would suffocate anything we planted!" It was deep into autumn, right before the turn of winter. The ground was too cold to plant anything yet, but Edmund had been overwhelmed with the prospect of having clear so much ash like material away in order to provide his subjects with food in this attempted rebirth. "Well sir," Varian started slowly, eyeing his father, "I've already tested my theory out."
"Varian! Did you turn that black soot looking stuff into the soil before planting the crops after I asked you not to?" Quirin bowled over.
"I did sir," He stood more erect, not necessarily conveying rebellion, but not backing down. "But, only on one small square acre of land."
"One small acre? Son, do you realize after last year's crop was so meager, we couldn't afford to lose any acres?"
"I used the acre around the warehouse! With all due respect sir, you gave me that land!"
Quirin keyed back a little. He had given Varian that land. His warehouse was where his son conducted all his experiments, and coincidentally where by some modern miracle, he was able to serve all of Corona with hot water. He still didn't know how he did it. He asked his son a thousand times and still didn't understand the details of the processes. He gave his son some of the land around the warehouse as a safe zone against explosions that were sometimes prone to happen during Varian's experiments. The harvest had occurred just a month or two prior to their trip here. Now that he thought of it, the crops around Varian's warehouse had been stronger, taller and Quirin didn't think he'd ever use this word, but, luxurious. He had assumed it had something to do with being nearby the hot water source. "So the crops around your warehouse were grown in soil peppered with this stuff?" He asked his son, pointing to a film of it that had stuck to his boot.
"Yes."
Quirin frowned but this time due to consideration, rather than disapproval. "I thought those crops were so big due to the hot water machines."
"No sir, no hot water touched those plants. I made sure of that."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes sir. Hot water would only wilt them." Varian nodded by way of response.
"Wait a minute! What's this about hot water machines?" King Edmund spouted, suddenly getting animated. Eugene, Varian and Quirin all took turns explaining to the king, Varian's invention that allowed Corona to have hot water as a household commodity. "That's simply amazing! This boy's a genius!" And then almost to the side he said, "Quirin needs not to underestimate him so much. He's way too harsh on the boy." When they all turned to look at him, Edmund looked rattled. "Drat! Did I say that out loud?" They all nodded. "I thought I had mastered this inner thought skill." Eugene sighed. His father had still not fully recovered from some of his more mad qualities. "That's ok Edmund," Quirin placated, "You're right anyway. I am still learning to trust the boy's instincts."
"Well, while you all are here let's all grab a shovel and get to work! We can't plant right now but we sure as can prepare the soil."
"Fantastic!" Varian sputtered joyfully. "You see it all has to do with the chemical composition and minerals of the substance. That and the potency left behind from the moon rays in the degraded material I think expedites the growth process." Varian went on and on in great passionate detail about his theories about the inner workings of agriculture. Egbert, looked miffed that he was being asked to work, but to his credit, grabbed a shovel and joined everyone else. As Eugene was about to grab his own shovel, he felt a firm grip pull back his shoulder. "Son," Edmund began, pulling him to the side. "Don't think that I missed Egbert's comments to you."
Eugene sniffed with a wry smile. "Yeah, well don't know how you could."
"Well son," he continued unperturbed, "the thing is the Duke of Craterron's comments are my fault."
"Dad-" Eugene started to say. Edmund interrupted. "No listen, yes, of course I failed you. No discussion. But I also failed everyone in this kingdom, including the Lundars. The Lundars are an ancient family son, almost as ancient as our own. Piece by piece their ancestral lands, as everyone's lands in this kingdom, were torn up, invaded by those rocks. Unable to farm, unable to build, unable to rely on anything in their environment really, I made a promise to everyone, that if they would evacuate, I would try to annihilate the stone. I didn't think I would survive the attempt, but figured maybe at least the land would be restored and the world would be rid of that pernicious evil artifact. Well you know what happened. There was a huge blast, I survived and we lost your mother. But that's not all that happened. The blast scorched what viable parts were left to a lot of the kingdom's land including most of the Lundars holdings in Craterron. They lost a lot. Everyone did. I think they only reason they stand by me is because they could see how much I had personally lost, namely, your mother, I almost lost you, and then there is my arm." He cocked his head at the missing limb on his left side. He looked to be fighting himself to not delve into reflection. "My point is son, that the Lundars have a lot to be bitter about, not the least Egbert. So his comments are not so much targeted at you, as they are at me."
Eugene didn't know about that, but he deferred to his father. They stayed several days after that helping compound the ashy black like stuff into the soil. Varian said, perhaps because it was older than the same material in Corona, it was even richer in components, and earnestly looked forward to what the harvest would bring there. The work was hard, much harder than the kind of work Eugene was used to, but he wondered with all this manual labor if Rapunzel would notice his biceps more when he returned.
The trip came to end and Eugene was relieved when the time came to travel back to Corona. He thought he had enough of overcast skies, intermittent landslides, a well-intentioned but slightly insane father, and the occasional snide look or remark from his long lost cousin. He missed the sunshine and meant that in two different ways. He missed literal sunshine, and that was his nickname for Rapunzel. They said their good-byes, packed their caravan, took care of the horses and went off. Eugene thought the return trip would be largely uneventful, until he was coming back from a break to tend to a human necessity in the words. "Fitzherbert!" A gruff voice seemed to come from nowhere. Before Eugene had a chance to get his bearings, a huge hammy hand grabbed him on the shoulder. "Wha-?" He turned around to face Quirin's looming stocky figure. "Quirin!" He gasped. "Don't do that!" He shook the man's hand off. "Can't a man have a little privacy?"
"I'm sorry Eugene. It's just, well I've decided to talk to you about something."
"Talk to me about something? Quirin couldn't you have waited until I got back? I don't understand."
"I wanted to see if I could get you alone. I waited until you were coming back."
"Well alright, you have me. What were you wanting to talk to me about?"
"Eugene it is really my fault you became Flynn Rider."
Eugene blew a raspberry out his lips. "What is with everyone claiming responsibility for what I became? Those were my choices! I am ashamed of them now, but here we are. I am trying to move on. I really don't need another backstory!" He knew Quirin probably didn't deserve his exasperation. However between his father and Egbert this week, it had brought up stuff he had tried to forget.
"No Fitzherbert, I mean, your father didn't quite abandon you to that orphanage. He sent me to be your ward and I failed."
Eugene could tell this was going to be a long story. He decided to humor the man and listen. He found a log, brushed it off and sat down. He motioned to Quirin that he could do the same, but Quirin refused.
"Look, Adira told Rapunzel when you all first arrived in the Dark Kingdom, her theories about how the power of the Sun Drop and Moonstone were connected. Coming from the Dark Kingdom, she felt that in addition to the Moonstone, there must be an equally opposite power that neutralized it. That is when she searched for, and eventually found the Sun Drop's power within Rapunzel. However she was not the only one with that theory.
Long ago, your father and I also theorized about that in addition to the Moonstone there was an equivalent opposing power, but kept it under wraps. There were rumors of a faraway kingdom with an eternal healing golden flower. We heard that this kingdom was named Corona. We couldn't be sure if the flower was even real, much less that the flower was connected to the power we were searching for called the Sun Drop. We thought the chances were slim, so we kept our theories to ourselves until maybe we could one day find more information. Then you know the fallout that happened to our kingdom. In the aftermath, your father had a nurse take you faraway. What he didn't tell you is that he purposely told her to take you to Corona. He thought if there were any chance that the Sun Drop was real, maybe it would protect you from the effects of the Moonstone. The governess was supposed to raise you there until you came of age, or your father eliminated the threat. She did take care of you until you were a young toddler. Then she fell ill. So suddenly ill that she had no choice but to take you to the orphanage. Enemies were everywhere, so instead of telling the institution your real name, she told them your name was Eugene Fitzherbert, so they wouldn't take advantage of your princehood. Before she died, she wrote your father, but he was off on his own quest to try to find another way to salvage the land. That is when he was able to make the black sword called the shadow blade. The only sword that could cut through the rocks. By the time he returned and the message got to him, it was years later.
He had become weakened again, travel always takes a lot out of him since the explosion, so he knew he could not travel again until he fully recovered. He immediately tried discreetly to contact the Brotherhood, but we had scattered around the world. He sent you gifts to the orphanage, being careful to conceal your identity and his, while he waited for any word back. He finally contacted me. He asked me to be your guardian until he felt it was either safe to send for you or come for you himself. I was the closest to Corona at the time. I had even had contact with Corona's king at one point, before travelling somewhere else. I had gotten married and my wife had a baby son the year before.
We travelled to Old Corona and bought property to settle there. Everything was being to set to prepare to get you, when my wife fell very ill. Faced with taking care of young toddler, and tending to my wife, I just couldn't face taking care of a young boy as well. Her illness dragged on for months until my worst fear occurred. We buried her and I was left as the only parent to Varian, who was barely two. I grieved for a few months, until I finally realized I just couldn't abandon you. I went for you at the orphanage, but it was too late. You were already living on the streets and stealing under the false name of Flynn Rider, and they couldn't find you. I wrote your father and at first we were confident that we would find you, but you seemed adept at evading everyone. Your father claimed that his ravens had kept track of you ever since the orphanage, but he never saw how unreliable those things were. They lost track of you too." Eugene remembered that time. He had been twelve, nearing thirteen when he broke from the orphanage and stole his first item. It was right after the time in the orphanage that She died. He had other questions though. "So wait a minute, what about that time they caught me and were about to hang me?"
"I only heard about that, that morning and by the time I got to the palace, you had already escaped."
'"Huh, what'd you know about that?" Eugene thought aloud. It brought another question to his mind. "Why didn't you just write leaders, rulers that you know, a king's son was on the loose while they were writing all those 'wanted dead or alive' posters?"
"That would necessitate telling them or drawing attention to the Moonstone, and we were not ready to let the world know about that."
That made sense. "After a while," Quirin continued, "your father gave up on all quests to stop the black rocks. Adira travelled the world looking for the Sun Drop, and guarded the castle while he had taken his own quest, but in the end he gave the black sword to her. He took over guarding the palace himself, while she resumed her quest. We kept that you were Edmund's son from Adira and Hector though. They were going down paths, we were not sure if we could trust. Then, by the time you and princess Rapunzel found each other and you were accepted into the palace, we knew you were safe. So many years had passed, we figured the truth would only complicate things and add to the danger. We couldn't have known the princess still had the power of the Sun Drop within her."
"Well no one did really." Eugene noted. It became more startlingly obvious, when, pulled by the magic within her, the black rocks shockingly and literally made a path for Rapunzel to follow. Unknown to them at the time, it led to the Dark Kingdom's Moonstone. Where was Quirin then?
"You were trapped in that amber when we went on our journey to see where the black rocks led!" Eugene stated, realization dawning on him. Quirin nodded.
Eugene thought back how, right before their journey, as the plague of the dark rocks in Corona worsened, Varian had tried to stop them with a machine that created amber. The amber was supposed to crystallize around the black rocks, crushing them, and stopping them in their path. Unfortunately all that happened was an accident where Varian mistakenly trapped his own father in the golden element. Trapped in the amber, Quirin hadn't been able to warn Eugene's father, King Edmund, that Rapunzel, Eugene and their party were on their way to the Dark Kingdom or visa versa. King Edmund had never laid eyes on his son or Rapunzel. They had only been vaguely described to him, although King Edmund collected Eugene's "dead or alive" posters. Before Eugene had been pardoned by Corona's king, the posters had unsettled King Edmund, but he had still had no way to find his son. "That's why my father didn't know who we were when we arrived at the Dark Kingdom the first time, until he recognized me from those posters!" Eugene concluded.
Quirin nodded.
King Edmund had actually attacked them and almost killed Eugene, thinking they were just a common interlopers out for the Moonstone's power. In the nick of time, Edmund had recognized his son. Eugene whistled at the memory, "You should have told me."
Quirin's head hung, his voice thick with shame. "I tried." He confessed. Eugene remembered Quirin tried to write Varian a note before he was imprisoned in amber and unable to speak. The note, clenched in his hand, had disintegrated, when they finally were able to free him.
"That note?" Eugene asked.
"I told Varian it just said how proud of him I was, which was true, I did write that, but it also included the truth about your heritage within the Dark Kingdom. By the time Rapunzel returned from the Dark Kingdom and used her magic to free me however, you all knew all that, so I didn't think it was necessary to repeat."
'Or didn't want to.' Eugene thought. He didn't want to ask yet if Quirin had been forthright with his own son about all this, but he could imagine Varian, an inquisitive boy, would feel betrayed that Quirin had kept it from him. He shook his head. It was a lot of information to take in and a lot of secrets. If he resented the man for anything, it was for not telling him the truth sooner. However looking at him, Eugene decided the man had been through enough.
"So in short," Quirin finally took a seat next to Eugene, "You became a thief and I increased the danger everyone faced because I lacked the courage and fortitude to support you and tell my son the truth at a time when you both needed it the most." The man had made some grave decisions. Yet so had Eugene. He decided to extend the same grace to Quirin he had been given by others. He clapped Quirin on the back. "You know, it's not your fault Quirin. You had a lot of goings on. You were trying to protect your family and the world, and it's hard to know how to do that sometimes. Besides, if I had held on a little longer, and not taken that leap toward crime, who knows what would have happened?" He wouldn't even allow himself to think about the memory of the final trauma that pushed him there though. He continued. "And the truth came out, both kingdoms were eventually saved. Also, look at your son, he turned out ok, thanks to you!"
"Yes, he's got a good head on his shoulders."
"If you haven't already, you should tell him all this Quirin. He needs to know that you trust him."
"I know."
When they both travelled back to the caravan they found Varian neighing at the horses. "Varian what are you doing?" Quirin asked.
"Oh I am trying to keep a log of horse sounds. Maybe if I mimic enough of their sounds and record their reactions, I can see if they have language." He continued braying in different mannerisms and excitedly jotting down observations of the horses in a small notebook. Eugene and Quirin looked at each other, and Quirin shook his head, trying to take it in stride. They got back on the caravan to drive it away.
Eugene looked up in the present and saw he was in front of Antonio's tailor shop. It was the farthest shop in the plaza, near to the bridge over the natural moat that separated the town of Corona to its surrounding lands, which he thought was interesting. He also noticed two things. First, it was closed. He wasn't sure why it was closed late in the morning like this. Unless Antonio was taking a late breakfast or early lunch. Secondly, there was another one of Rapunzel's immense Royal Stamps of Corona on the door. She had implemented the purchasing program here too?
"Eugene! Eugene!" He heard his wife call. "There you are!"
"Hey sunshine!"
"Whew! I forgot the tailor's shop is way out here!"
"Yeah, I think because maybe there are more male travelers? Men with means are more likely to come from this direction?"
"Hmm, I mean to change that. More opportunities for women!" She replied, her face determined.
"I am sure you will."
"So Rapunzel, I couldn't help noticing?" he pointed to the colossal stamp. She laughed.
"Yup I did it here too! And Eugene?" She directed him to look at the plethora of shops surrounding them. He was astonished to see that most of them had the said royal stamp featured outside their doors. "Wow you were busy while I was gone!"
"Yup! And they all opted it for it! They all said it helped their businesses." He kissed her again feeling proud. It was so nice to hold her openly now.
"Actually, Eugene," a shadow crossed her face, "Corona has been doing more than fine with capital. It is not financial issues that worry me."
"What is it then?"
"The black rocks are gone now, but they really caused a problem with our food supply since they devastated parts of our farm land. We have never needed to go outside Corona for food, but now, I don't know. We have stores, but I am not sure if they will be enough. That is why Varian's plan with the black rock dust is so important. We need more than ever to have a successful harvest to ensure plenty for our citizens. Do you really think he's right? That the dust will make the soil more fertile and the crops hardier, more bountiful?"
When Eugene and Varian had returned from the Dark Kingdom, they told Rapunzel and her parents about Varian's plan to incorporate the rock dust into the soil. They detailed how Edmund agreed to do it in his kingdom, and how Varian had already had a successful test run. Rapunzel's parents had been a little skeptical, but noted how Varian's inventions had always worked on some level. They had merely misfired in the past here and there with kinks that unexpectedly manifested. With the current situation being what it was, they were willing to take the risk.
"I don't see why it wouldn't work princess. Hey why don't we see for ourselves? You know, go down to Old Corona and see how the fields are faring?"
"Ah Eugene that's a great idea! We haven't been able to see it since we had the wedding and then the honeymoon, and now this." She placed her hand on her belly and then smiled. "Maybe we should take Max!"
"Yeah that's a great idea princess!" Before he could say more she was off like a shot, Pascal clinging to her shoulder and all smiles. He thought back to what he was thinking about before. So many secrets. He had his things he hadn't divulged from the past too, but none of which directly involved Rapunzel. Upon returning from the Dark Kingdom, he had told Rapunzel everything about what had happened to him and the details of the trip. He had not told Rapunzel about Her though.
A figure from his past childhood at the orphanage, She hadn't factored into his everyday life now. He guessed if he vicariously learned anything through Quirin and his father, it couldn't hurt to tell Rapunzel about her. He walked towards his wife and the palace, and suddenly laughed. Rapunzel was his wife! He'd have his whole life to tell her about it. The fears from earlier were starting to dissipate.