Ravishing Rapunzel (Passion-Filled Fairy Tales, #6)(3)

Eldon climbed the gate again, found the rapunzel patch, and picked a few plants.

He was about to climb back over to return home when a woman in red cloak with glowing red eyes emerged from the house.

Eldon shrieked and jumped back, the hairs on his neck rising.

“What are you doing in my garden?” asked a dark female voice from beneath the cloak.

At first, he couldn’t find his voice, he was so frightened by the strange being before him. “I’m …” he sputtered. “My wife, she loves rapunzel from your garden, and I was trying to get her some.”

“Thief,” the woman beneath the cloak spat, as she raised a pointed bony finger at him.

“I tried to ask, but no one answered.”

The red cloaked enchantress didn’t speak. Finally, she said, “Go, and do not come back. Leave the rapunzel.”

“Please,” he said. “My wife needs it. Without it, she becomes wild with lust. I cannot go back to her without the rapunzel.”

The cloaked figure moved closer to him, but not in a walk, almost as if she floated. He looked down, unable to see any feet beneath the cloak. His body percolated with fear.

“If you want to take the rapunzel, you must give me something in return.”

“Anything,” Eldon blurted out, the fear overwhelming him as those glowing red eyes stared at him.

“I will take the baby when she comes.”

His instinct was to say no, but fear so overwhelmed him, he said nothing. The woman raised her arm and the gate behind him swung open. “Go,” she said.

With the rapunzel tightly wrapped in his arms, he ran for home. When he finally got there, he told his wife all. Rosalind said he was mad to promise their child, as she munched on the rapunzel. “We must leave, so she cannot collect,” Rosalind said.

“But where will we go?”

“My family is down in the south,” she said. “We shall pack up and go there in a few days.”



*

Eldon was a proud papa when his baby girl was born. She was fair and beautiful like her mother. Same emerald green eyes and same wispy blonde hair. He was glad the babe had gotten none of his looks. Not his thick black curly hair, or the awkward nose that had been bulbous and unpleasant even before it was broken by a mule kick.

Eldon hated to admit, but Rosalind was right to have suggested coming to her family. Now they’d be left alone by the enchantress.

The night after their babe was born, Eldon and Rosalind lay in their bed with the infant between them.

They were about to doze off when a flash of light scorched the air in the room, and the red-cloaked enchantress appeared. “I am here for the babe.”

“No,” Rosalind said. “I didn’t agree.”

“Nor did I agree to you taking my rapunzel,” the enchantress retorted.

“Please,” Eldon said. “I’ll give you anything else.”

“I don’t want anything else,” the enchantress said. “Besides, you can have more children and teach them what you wish. This one, this child Rapunzel, is mine, and I shall teach her not to steal.”

The enchantress disappeared in a puff of smoke, and for a moment, Eldon felt relieved. Then Rosalind let out a blood-curdling scream. He tried to calm her, but then he realized why she was screaming. The spot between them on the bed was now empty. Their babe was gone.





Chapter 1 – Into the Woods


Rapunzel ran through the woods to the little clearing. It wasn’t too far from their cottage deep inside the forest. That’s the only reason her mother let her come to play here — because it was so close by and there were no people who came here. Most days, Rapunzel had to stay inside. Rapunzel, unfortunately, was very ill, and exposure to air too polluted by people made her very sick. It was why Rapunzel rarely got to go out. And when she did, it was always some place far from people.

Today was a special day, the kind Rapunzel looked forward to that more than anything. It was one of the few that her mother let her roam free from their home and play nearby. Rapunzel loved being out and about with the sun on her face. She loved to have butterflies land on her and to see the lady bugs cling to flowers and then flutter away.

Oh, she loved everything about the outdoors. It was a pleasure to be here. She almost had a hard time believing her mother that the outdoors were bad for her. That anything about the fresh air and grasses and birds could make her ill. When she ran about, her heart sang with joy. But she’d stayed out too long before, and the next day, after one of her mother’s chastisements, sure enough, she was ill. So, Rapunzel had come to accept the reality of her illness and enjoy the rare occasions that she could go out.

She sighed as she sat in the grass, deciding to banish the thoughts of her little cottage and concentrate on her day of freedom. Well, more like a few hours. Mother let her go at midday, and she had to return before the sun set.

It was a long, luxurious amount of time, and Rapunzel adored it. Normally, mother would have come with her, but Auntie Giselle had come to visit, and auntie had insisted that Mother Gothel give Rapunzel space to play. So, today, she was on her own.

Rapunzel had only come this far once before, and mother had told her this was the absolute limit of how far she should travel from their cottage. “People occasionally come here, and we don’t want you with people.”