Twisted Destiny

Welcome Home

The balloon traveled through the air, heading back over the trail of rocks, passing over places they'd been. Rapunzel thought she spotted Hector down below and waved, but he wasn't looking up and didn't pay her any attention. She hoped that he and Adira would patch things up between them.

They continued on, passing over the island with the Lorbs, then the Spire, the Forest of No Return, Vadaros...and finally...

Corona was in front of them. Her Corona. Home.

"Huh, that's funny." Eugene commented.

"What?" Rapunzel looked at him.

"There's no guards in Old Corona. Weren't there supposed to be, to keep thieves away until they found a way to free Quirin?" Eugene looked at her.

"...Yeah." Rapunzel frowned. "But, I guess with the threat, they had to call them back."

"Speaking of threat, doesn't it seem...oddly peaceful?" Lance asked as they flew over the forest.

"I did expect more fire and screaming." Eugene agreed.

They set down in town and Rapunzel moved her hand to the frying pan at her side as they climbed out. "...There's no danger?"

"Uh...there's no people, either." Lance commented as they looked around.

"It's so quiet..." Rapunzel went to look in a shop window. "No one's working, at this hour?"

"We should look into this." Eugene said, frowning.

They heard the sound of something that sounded like glass breaking and Rapunzel went over to investigate, gasping as she saw Feldspar in front of his shop, anxiously picking up little green shards of something and putting them into a bucket.

"Feldspar?" She put her frying pan back on her belt and went over to kneel next to him, helping him pick them up.

He looked startled and looked up at her and she gasped, seeing he had a black eye. "Princess?" He asked slowly, as if he thought he was imagining her.

"Feldspar, what happened to you?" She reached up a hand to cup his cheek.

"I-I missed my quota last week...I can't miss it again, or they'll do worse." He said anxiously, pulling away go back to his work.

"'Quota'?" She asked.

He nodded, then looked around anxiously, as if he was afraid the wrong people would hear. "They've been having us mining these minerals for some unknown reason and taking them to the castle every week. And, if we don't make our quota...the Enforcers 'motivate' us to do better next time."

"Who are the Enforcers? Does my father know about this?" Rapunzel asked anxiously.

"Well, of course he does. He's the one who gave the order." Feldspar said bitterly. "Ever since he got that new advisor it's been, pardon my wordage but, hell."

"'New advisor'?" Rapunzel frowned. "What happened to Nigel?"

Feldspar tensed. "I have to get back to work." He put the shards all into the bucket and then hurried away with his bucket.

Rapunzel stood up, looking towards the castle. "...What is going on here?"

A shadowy figure moved away from where it had been watching her before they turned and dashed towards the castle, going through the backstreets until it reached the castle courtyard, where she came out into the sunlight and headed in with a grin. She threw open the castle doors and walked down the hall, humming to herself as she opened another door.