Rapunzel glanced for the hundredth time at Din.

He sat next to her on a log. His armor still on and still damp, despite the fire he made to help dry it out.

It was necessary. The weather wouldn't allow their clothes to dry without the heat. Even in the tower, she often got warnings from Mother to change if her clothes got wet.

The clothes between his armor pieces darkened, still wet. It's not good for the skin. The humidity with the damp clothes could cause rot if worn like that too long. Or it does on humans. She didn't even know if he was human, maybe it didn't affect him the same. She cleared her throat and gestured at his form. "Your clothes won't dry out like that. I can turn away..."

Maybe he was just shy? It's what he did, when she stripped down to her slip and let her dress dry over the fire from a low hanging branch. He quickly spun away, fiddling with something on his arm. She ended up putting the dress back on before it was fully dry. Din just seemed so uncomfortable with her just in her underclothes. So in return she felt off and awkward. She tried not to think to much about that.

Din shrugged. He poked at the fire with a stick. His eyes flickered up to the sky, worried about the smoke. Not much filtered passed the canopy of tree tops, so he kept it rolling and hot to keep the smoke minimal. "It's fine." He paused. "I need to be alone to take my helmet off."

Rapunzel gave him a puzzled look. "Just the helmet? Then-"

He gazed at the woods beyond the fire. The shadows stretched toward them as dawn approached. "I don't want to be caught unprepared. There's no saying how many guards survived the flood. We're to close to the river still." He paused to consider what to say. "I'm a Mandalarian. We don't remove our helmets in front of other life forms."

Rapunzel's eyes roamed over his helmet. "So you can take off your gloves?" She motioned to his injured hand. "I can heal it."

Din formed a loose fist with said hand. He sighed and worked to take off his gloves with some difficulty. The blood, sweat, and water made the leather stiff and stuck to his skin.

Rapunzel winced at his rough handling. She grabbed his injured hand and worked the glove off herself. Her fingers brushed his palm. Soft skin against rough calluses. She gasped at his blood-stained hand. "One second." She rushed around for a moment and came back with a river damp cloth. She gently cleaned his hand.

Din didn't know why he let her. He could just wash off his hand in the river. He could take the damn cloth and do it himself. He could do a lot of things to put distance between them but didn't. Instead, he sat there, his injured hand laid limp in her lap. Enjoying the press of her thighs against the top of his hand. Her form bent over it. He watched as her eyelashes made shadows on her face and the setting sun gleamed off her skin. She looked like something...unreal. Sexy and almost painfully innocent. An oddity that didn't exist in his world.

Rapunzel pulled him out of his thoughts when she started to wrap hair around his hand. He began to pull away.

She tightened her grip and looked up at him under her lashes. "Trust me, please."

He stilled and gave a side-eyed glance to Pascal. Who looked strangely smug and pointed to his hand.

Rapunzel started to sing:

"Flower, gleam and glow

Let your power shine

Make the clock reverse

Bring back what once was mine

Heal what has been hurt

Change the fates' design

Save what has been lost,

Bring back what once was mine,

What once was mine."

Her voice was sweet and soft. And the strangeness of the day continued as her hair started to glow again. The bright light trailed like water from her roots down. It pulsed like a heartbeat, the light brightening with each beat.

His hand warmed when the light reached the hair around his hand. He tensed, then the song ended. She opened her eyes but wouldn't look up. Her hand, still gentle, as they unwrapped the hair around his hand. His suddenly uninjured hand.

Din jerked in surprise. His hand flexed. Good as new. The skin smooth, not even a scar.

She brushed her fingers across his, now, uninjured palm.

He closed his fingers around hers, relishing the contact of another.

Rapunzel stared at their intertwined hands. Unsure but happy. His hand felt so different then Mother's or her own. Tanned, where she was pale. Calloused and scarred too, marks of the life he's lived. She thought of her own hands. Soft and unscarred. She almost envied him in that moment. Envied the life of adventure and toil. She wanted that, she realized. She wanted that life.

A life well lived. A life of work and love and happiness.

"That's why you need protecting. The whole fight with your Mother..." Din trailed off. Feeling as if he was firmly stepping into shit that wasn't his business.

Rapunzel startled out of her thoughts with a jolt. She nodded. "Mother said, when I was a baby people tried to take my hair and cut it." She brushed aside her hair to show the one brown piece. "But when it's cut it turns brown and loses its power. So she hid me in the tower to protect it. And me."

Din can honestly say he didn't know what to think about the information she dropped on him. But it was the cherry on top of this day.

Rapunzel on the other hand just wished she could see his face and figure out what he thought. She gazed at the visor on his helmet. Even just his eyes... She fiddled with her hair with nervous fingers. "Is Mandalorian your race? I know there are a lot of different species..."

Din shook his head. "It's not a race, but a creed."

"And it says that no one can see you without your helmet?" Rapunzel asked. Curious as to the purpose of such a creed. She wondered if he had a book she could read about it.

"Yes. Once I took the oath." Din slipped his gloves back on and looked around. He quickly straightened. "You have got to be kidding me." He muttered. He shot up and held out a hand without thought.

"What is it?" She let him pull her to her feet.

Din laughed. He couldn't help it. "We're within feet of my bounty and my ship."

Apparently, February was a one update month. Real life interference, unfortunately. I'll try to keep on top of my normal two a month updates, but at the very very least I promise every month will have a new chapter.