"What do you want for your birthday, dear? Anything you want, mother will absolutely do her best to fetch it for you!" After another session of hair combing and singing, Mother Gothel grabbed her satchel and prepared to leave.
Meanwhile, Rapunzel's lips thinned. She wanted to say what she truly wanted, but the last time she did, it angered her mother.
But when her eyes met with her mother, filled with warmth and love, Rapunzel mustered the courage to speak, "Can I…go outside? See what the outside world looks like? I-It wouldn't be that dangerous if I stick to you, right? I-I swear I'll be obedient, I just want to know what it feels like to be outside…"
Hearing her daughter's eager yet borderline desperation in her voice, Mother Gothel's eyes turned sharp like a hawk, "Rapunzel, we've talked about this."
Rapunzel's look of yearning crumbled within moments as she tried to reason, "B-But I just wa—"
"No means no, Rapunzel. The world outside is dangerous for you. All the bad men will come for you the moment you set foot out of this tower, do you understand what I'm trying to tell you?" Mother Gothel's tone contained exasperation.
Seeing the solemn look on Rapunzel's face, she sighed while stepping forward and pulling her in a hug, her porcelain-like hand caressing Rapunzel's long golden hair, "You know mother just wants what's best for you, you understand that right?"
Although hesitant, Rapunzel still nodded her head in understanding.
Seeing this made Mother Gothel smile, "Then I'm glad we have come to an understanding. Don't be so sad, Rapunzel. How about this, I'll get you a new set of color pastels, I'll even throw in your favorite canvas. How about that hmm?"
When Rapunzel lifted her head, she forced up a strained smile on her face, "Yes mother. I'd love that. Thank you." Although her voice was devoid of any emotion, Mother Gothel didn't seem to notice it, or perhaps rather she didn't care.
"Good girl…"
———
"You're leaving again?" After the disastrous dinner was settled with the concubines losing their ground and forced by their King to retreat to their respective rooms, the only people left on dining room were Maximus, Henry, Olivia, and Lily. Along with Timothy who was still on the ground eating.
Everyone's ears perked up at the mention of Henry's planned departure, especially Timothy whose eyes gleamed at it.
Of course, when Henry noticed this, he allowed a small smirk to creep up to his face before disappearing just as fast as it arrived.
Timothy might think this is an opportunity but Henry has already made plans for this. By announcing his departure today, the case regarding Timothy's attempt on Lily's life would be postponed, and being postponed doesn't mean he'll be set free temporarily.
Quite the opposite in fact. Timothy will remain under the Queen's care until the day he returns. And Henry intended to take as much time as he needed for two main reasons.
First of all, Timothy's mental being would slowly crumble along with his influence. With the power of rumors of him attacking the Kingdom's beloved little princess and being unable to dismiss these rumors because of his current situation, his well-carved reputation would surely take a big hit.
Not like he has any good reputation to care about anyway.
The second and the last reason is the final nail in the coffin—Samantha's diary. Although the previous factors are already enough to dismiss Timothy from the throne competition and even exile him from the Kingdom, there's still the matter of Alexander.
With the help of Samantha's diary, combined with a well-reputed handwriting analytic, the diary would serve as hard solid evidence against Alexander and Timothy, maybe even against Samantha herself considering she knew about their plan to conspire against Henry by sabotaging his ship.
However, according to Flynn, he needed a day or two to successfully steal the diary without any suspicion falling on him or Henry. After all, if her diary disappeared under her nose, there is one man who will benefit out of it, Henry himself.
So, Flynn wanted to create a flawless plan in which he would come up with a scenario that would serve as a valid reason for the disappearance of Samantha's diary.
And with Henry departing the Kingdom today would immediately eliminate him from any possible suspicions. Not only that, but he'll also be buying Flynn enough time to formulate and execute his plan.
Henry doesn't just want to remove Timothy from the competition, he wants to strike three birds with one stone. By the time his well-crafted plan is executed, not just Timothy, but also Alexander and Samantha would find themselves no longer able to fight for the throne. A much better outcome is to exile all of them along with their wicked concubine mothers.
'By the time Alexander comes back, he'll find no throne to compete, but instead the gates of Lioncrest barring him from entering the Kingdom ever again.'
"It wouldn't take a while and besides, I promise there's nothing bad happening this time." After seeing the worried look on his parents' faces, he knew he needed to reassure them. With Timothy behind 'bars' and Alexander out of the Kingdom to god knows where, there's only Samantha left to conspire against him but from what he knows, based on the reports recently submitted to him, Samantha barely makes a move to compete for the throne.
The eldest princess simply doesn't care whether she gets the throne or not. Not only because she barely has any allies backing her, but her reputation also isn't exactly good or bad either—she's more known as a neutral party. Not to mention, it was only her mother who sought the throne, for both power and influence.
At this moment, it wouldn't be wrong to say she's the weakest party to fight for the throne. Even Princess Lily has more support and a better reputation than her.
"Just…Just be very careful, Henry. Okay?" It was his mom, Olivia who just spoke, her tone tense and on the edge.
"Of course, I'll take care of myself just fine. Oh, by the way, where's Ariel? I haven't seen her since last night."
"Hmm…I don't know, I did see her before evening yesterday, I think she was wandering around the back garden."
Henry frowned at first before realizing something, 'Right, of course she'll be at the back gardens. Probably to visit OUR ocean friend.'
———
"Okay, Rapunzel, you can do this…" Rapunzel paced around her room. It's been an hour since her mother left and she's expected back at late afternoon, so she has hours to contemplate the reckless decision she just came up with.
Since her mother didn't agree to take her outside, Rapunzel wanted to take it upon herself to do it instead. However, years of being in seclusion and endlessly getting indoctrinated that it's forbidden for her to step foot out of the tower made her unable to fully execute this decision.
Her mind kept telling her to go out and explore but her body kept getting frozen just when she was about to approach the window.
While she walked back and forth, much to her chameleon friend, Pascal's disgruntled look on his face, she unknowingly found herself in front of the huge wall covered with a large red curtain while behind it was a certain painting that she had painted herself, the night lights floating every night of her birthday.
She doesn't know what they're called but they're the main reason why she wanted to go out in the first place. She sees them up close, touches them, sees what they truly look like, asks why they're being lit up every night of her birhtday and all those things. When she looked around her room, she was greeted by her own paintings, the various symbols that had their own similarities to each other.
She painted these not out of imagination but from the recurring dreams she would have every once in a while. Whenever she had those dreams, she would be afraid to forget them, so she started painting them around her room, so she would always remember them whenever she looked at them.
Before she knew it, the confused and hesitant look in her eyes disappeared, replaced with determination.
Without saying a single word, she turned to the open window, where the sun was bringing down its light inside, as if to provoke her to enter the outside world or perhaps it was highlighting the first step she had to take to see the night lights.
Behind her, Pascal watched with a proud look on his face as Rapunzel took a single step, then another, and then another one—she was marching towards the open window, but this time, there was no hesitation in her steps, or fear of disobeying her mother plastered on her face.
When she was finally at the window, the wind picked up all of a sudden, blowing her hair away as she looked down. There, the ground seemed to stretch endlessly, one mistep and she could fall to her death.
However, while others might shiver in fear at the sight of this, Rapunzel doesn't. She's been vying to feel the grassy ground below with the soles of her feet for years. She would even gladly fall to her death just to know what the ground feels like.
She took a deep breath, closing her eyes for a brief moment and opening them back up again, "Fooo…You can do this, Rapunzel. All it takes is a single step."
After saying those words of encouragement to herself, she quickly moved. With a smooth movement of throwing her hair to the metal hook above her head, and a well-practiced skill of intertwining her hair with the hook so she would easily glide down without any accidents, she crouched and turned around, "Pascal!" She called out to her friend.
The chameleon immediately jumped forward and landed in Rapunzel's hands, who then brought him near to her left shoulder. Pascal leaped and landed on the smooth fabric.
"Woooo…Alright, let's do this! You ready?" She once again took another deep breath and asked the little friend on her shoulder.
Pascal nodded his head, sharing the same resolute look in her face.
Without delaying any further, she jumped. The hair on the hook smoothly supported her weight, decreasing the speed of her fall while her hands gripping the hair didn't even burn her palms from friction. Though Rapunzel doesn't know it yet.
While in the middle of her fall, Rapunzel couldn't help but stare at the wide green scenery in the distance. The entire place surrounding the tower was filled with nothing but lush trees and grass. This is her first time seeing the entire area surrounding the tower, mostly because she only sees one angle from the single window on the top of the tower.
Her face was full of smiles, "Pascal, are you seeing this?!"
On her shoulder, Pascal faked a happy smile. Unlike her, he has already seen everything this forest has to offer since he's not technically banned from leaving the tower. Heck, Mother Gothel probably doesn't even know of his existence yet.
Finally, when she looked down and saw the approaching ground, she tightened her grip on her hair, putting her descent into a complete halt, her toes just a few inches away from the grass.
She was hesitant at first, but slowly regained her courage and stretched her right leg downward.
When the tip of her toes touched the grass, there was an inexplicable feeling inside her chest. Was it relief? Confusion? Euphoria?
She doesn't know, rather she doesn't know a specific word to describe it.
When she let down both of her feet until the entire soles are fully planted on the ground, she curiously wiggled her toes, giggling slightly as the blades of grass slipped through the gaps between her toes, which tickles her.
Meanwhile, Pascal casually jumped off her shoulder and landed on the grass, stretching his limbs as if he were just about to take a stroll.
Only for the chameleon to get startled when Rapunzel burst into a full-blown sprint all over the place, the end of her long golden hair that is still locked on the metal hook above the window disentangling in a swift motion.
She circled the tower with a loud laugh, "Hahahahaha! This is so fun!" The sight of her running figure was nothing short of a blessing to one's eyes.
Her petite body combined with her smooth porcelain-like face that portrays a pale, flawless complexion would make anyone who saw her fall into something akin to being bewitched.
Her knees bent and with a loud heave, she took off the ground, jumping high up in the air while her arms were raised wide open above her, "I'M FREE!"