Chapter 16
Demanitus


"Raps!"
"Princess!"
The two called the blondie's name as they ran towards her.
Rapunzel turned around with a confused look on her face, until she saw Cassandra.

"Cass! There you are!" Rapunzel giggled, "And, oh, friend of Cass. Nice to meet you, my name's Rapunzel, so you can just call me that, instead of Princess." Rapunzel glanced at Varian.

"Uh, hi. I'm Varian." He waved back.

"Raps, you gotta let me know when you're going to wander around without any supervision." Cassandra put her hand on Rapunzel's shoulder. "Oh but I didn't! I have Nigel as supervision, isn't that right, Nigel?" Rapunzel looked at the black-haired. "Unfortunately, Yes. It's cold." Nigel sighed, forcing a warm smile despite how cold he was. "Hey Nigel." Cassandra rolled her eyes.

"Still. You had me worried." Cassandra looked back at Rapunzel.
"Look, Cass... I think this blizzard might be..." Rapunzel shifted her eyes, "Evil." She whispered.

"What?" Cassandra looked at her with a look. "Shhhh! Lower your voice, Cass!" Rapunzel said, loudly; ironically. "Sorry, Raps... What?" Cassandra whispered and repeated what she had said.

"The blizzard... According to Xaiver, long ago, there was a evil, demon warlock that took form of a blizzard to try and destroy Corona, and there was this engineer called-" "Demanitus!" Varian interrupted her; "Yeah! How'd you know? Wait, am I not whispering quiet enough?" Rapunzel had a handful of thoughts run through her head at once that caused her to ask two questions.

"No, you're very loud." Varian giggled, "I read books about Demanitus, which is ironic because that's what I was just talking to Cassie about before we looked for you, Princess- er... Rapunzel." Varian explained. "Oh, so you're familiar with Demanitus? That's good... You should talk to Xaiver, he knows a lot of legends and Demanitus and-"

Cassandra cleared her throat to stop Rapunzel's rambling.

"-ahem, Sorry. Back to the legend..." Rapunzel blushed embarrassed.
"There was this engineer called Demanitus who created a machine that is located within the secret tunnel system in the castle that sealed the warlock, Zhan Tiri, away." Rapunzel continued.

"And you believe this?" Cassandra crossed her arms and moved her hip slightly. "Yeeeesssss?" Rapunzel said, though she didn't know the right answer to say to Cassandra.

Cassandra shook her head in what appeared to be shame. "Raps, you seriously don't believe that this could be possible. Evil demon warlock blizzards? Really?" She snapped, (luckily) calmly.

"Cass... My mother is stuck in the snow thanks to this blizzard, and there is reports of damage caused by the winds and amounts of snow all around the Kingdom. I'm not going to refuse this possible solution." Rapunzel said with a passionate, yet sad, voice.

Cassandra looked at her with glassy eyes...
"Fine. But if it doesn't work, please don't get upset Raps, okay? I don't like seeing you that way."

Rapunzel nodded in agreement, "Okay..."
"Will you two come with me and Nigel to try and stop the blizzard with Demanitus' machine?"

Varian and Cassandra exchanged looks, and to Cassandra; Varian's face was priceless. He looked like a dork, and that's why it was so priceless. "Idiot." Cassandra refused to smirk, and mumbled underneath her breath. "Let's go." Cassandra nodded. Varian giggled, as he was excited to be able to see Demanitus' work in-person. So, Rapunzel, Nigel, Cassandra and Varian headed there...


Nigel insisted that he lead the way, but Cassandra clashed with him; which caused both of them to be in front, and then Varian wanted to be beside Cassandra, so all three of them were now in front; but then Rapunzel wanted to be beside Cassandra too, so she squeezed in between Nigel and made it where all four of them were in front. Needless to say, it was cramped in the tunnels.

"Raps-" Cassandra squeaked, "Your Majesty-" Nigel stuttered. "What?" Rapunzel warmly smiled, "I want to be a part of this too! After all, I'm the one who convinced you three to follow me here." She giggled gracefully. "She has a point." Varian noted. "Shut up." Cassandra hissed.

Varian wasn't sure how to react to that, so he just kept words to himself until they had finally reached the door to the chamber (called the Demanitus Chamber) that held the machine.

"Here we are." Rapunzel brushed her hand against the engravements on the door. They were very elaborate and she couldn't believe her eyes, though she did think that it could have used more painting rather than engravings; but that was just her.

"Careful Raps, they're might be more booby traps." Cassandra stopped her from opening the door. "Yeah, there is like, five-thousand traps down here!" Varian said, grumpily. "Look, you only got pricked by an arrow once, and you know it." Cassandra looked at Varian.

"Yeah, but it still hurt!" Varian pouted and whined, rubbing his arm.
"Focus, please! My word." Nigel sighed loudly.

Cassandra took this moment to slowly open the door, revealing a dark room that had something shining in the distance. She took the torch from Nigel and gave it to Rapunzel.

Rapunzel looked around until she saw a spiral-like structure that was supposed to be used to light up the chamber, so she tapped the torch down on the structure and tipped the fire into it, causing the spiral to quickly light up with fire, which revealed the machine in the room.

Varian was almost shaking with visible excitement at this discovery. The engineering, the science, the Demanitus, the secret chamber named after Demanitus himself! Varian would have never guessed he'd be here, especially the life he dealt with on a daily-day basis.

Rapunzel, Nigel, Cassandra and Varian headed down the staircase to approach the machine. "Wow, this is... amazing." Varian was the first one to try and touch it. "Careful." Nigel sniffed. "I'm an alchemist, thank you, I know how to deal with this type of- Oh-" Varian stopped himself when he looked at Nigel's facial expression. "An alchemist? Such a troublemaker you are then! Back away from the machine, let the professionals deal with this matter." Nigel snapped at him.

Varian felt stinging in his eyes from tears building up inside them, because in retrospect; that hurt his feelings! "O...Okay..." Varian backed up and then kind of hid behind Cassandra.

Cassandra leaned down and whispered, "Hey, between you and me; Nigel's a jerk."
Varian looked at her and smiled with a soft laughter as a single tear rolled down his face.

She looked back at Rapunzel who was investigating the machine, "According to Xaiver... All it takes is the pull of this lever here, but the question is... Does it still work?" Rapunzel said with concern. "There's only one way to find out, Raps." Cassandra walked up to her, grabbing Varian's hand gently when she walked over so Varian could still hide behind her for comfort, (which, by the way, made Varian feel really special between the fact that he had a crush on Cassandra and the fact that he had never had anyone to actually hide behind in his entire life, only hide from.) and putting her other hand on Rapunzel's shoulder again.

"To pull the lever." Rapunzel and Cassandra said at the same time.

Rapunzel reached for the lever as Cassandra took her hand off of Rapunzel's shoulder; she gave it a tug and she could hear all the gears slowly crank. She finally pushed it down completely and electricity began to zap out of the top of the machine, startling Rapunzel backwards.

Which also scared Pascal out of Rapunzel's hair, surprising Varian. "You have a chameleon!" Varian pointed out. "Mhm! His name's Pascal!" Rapunzel giggled, "And you have a raccoon."

He laughed, "His name's Ruddiger. Say 'hi' buddy."
Ruddiger chirped and chattered at Rapunzel and Pascal.

Pascal squeaked and tittered back at Ruddiger, while Rapunzel waved at him.

The gears began to turn quicker and more electricity zapped out of the machine until it began to open a sunroof-like system at the top of the chamber room, then the glowing ball of electricity at the top shot out a beam of bright, light that flashed throughout the sky.

Everyone hoped this stopped the blizzard...
...And luckily... It did.

The snow stopped falling and everything turned back to normal.
(Well, aside from the piles of snow outside, but that's just because it takes time for it to melt.)

Rapunzel clapped, "We did it!" She exclaimed happily.
Everyone cheered, except for Nigel who just gave a simple flash of a smile.

...Nigel wasn't much of a excitable person, or a fun person at all for that matter. He was even worse than Cassandra, or Angry. Heck, even Lady Caine was more fun than this guy.

Varian would now have a story to tell, he didn't know to who; because his only friends were actually right here, Ruddiger and Cassandra... Maybe he could tell Angry and Red if he ever saw them two girls again? Either way, he felt...needed, and helpful, for once.

He always saw himself as a no-good, terrible thief; even if that was just how he had to live life.

Varian just felt...happy.
Genuinely...Happy.