The fic can be found here
at Archive of Our Own.
This fanfic has examples of:
- Abusive Parents: While Prince Cassandra's mother, Queen Edith, is not outright physically abusive towards her daughter. She is shown to be cold and neglectful and not really caring about her daughter as more than her heir.
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Rapunzel is this due to existing in a Corona where magic is feared and hated suffers from a lot of self-loathing with the fact she is magical.
- Adaptational Sexuality: Both Rapunzel and Cassandra are in love in this fic, and Rapunzel shows no romantic interest in Eugene or any other man, while in canon Rapunzel was with Eugene and Cassandra is Ambiguously Gay.
- Adaptational Villainy: While King Frederic did have his questionable moments in the original series is much worse here being involved in persecuting mythics. After Rapunzel is revealed to be a mythic, he goes so crazy that he ends up deposed.
- Adaptation Name Change:
- The Dark Kingdom is called Diadem here. Some people in Corona call it the Dark Kingdom, but it's not its official name.
- Zhan Tiri is named Zahn Tiri in this fic.
- Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: Ends up going both ways. In this fic, Rapunzel and Eugene were never in love and are only close friends. While Rapunzel and Cassandra both end up falling in love with each other.
- Big Bad: Zahn Tiri is the Evil Chancellor to Diadem who wants to provoke a war between Diadem and Corona and break up Rapunzel and Cassandra.
- The Chessmaster: Zahn Tiri is a master at manipulating Cassandra the Queen as well as laying out her plans. She engineers events so Rapunzel will be blamed for the attempted assassination of Cassandra, further plays with her emotions to get her to attack Rapunzel and nearly wins.
- Crush Blush: Rapunzel gets quite a lot of these around Cassandra and vice versa.
- Demoted to Extra: Eugene plays a major role in the animated series and film. In this fic, he is a minor character.
- Evil Chancellor: Zahn Tiri fills this role. She is the top advisor to the Queen and Cassandra and plotting behind their back to start a war between Corona and Diadem.
- Fantastic Racism: Corona has fear and hatred for anything magical, which is a source of self-shame for Rapunzel.
- For Want Of A Nail: The change in this fic that influences everything is that the Sundrop and Moonstone never existed.
- Hypocrite: King Frederic is called out for this. With the fact he persecutes mythics and yet used one when his wife was sick and covered it up.
- I Kiss Your Hand: When Cassandra and Rapunzel first meat the former kisses the laters hand.
- In Spite of a Nail: Despite the Sundrop and Moonstone not existing, Rapunzel still manages to live and ends up kidnapped for 18 years.
- Love at First Sight: Rapunzel falls in love with Cassandra when she first lays eyes on her.
- Masculine–Feminine Gay Couple: Rapunzel and Cassandra fit this pretty clearly. Rapunzel is the Nice Girl who likes painting and wears dresses while Cassandra is the tough swordfighter with short hair, who even goes by the title Prince.
- One-Winged Angel: When Zahn Tiri is exposed for her crimes she gets so angry that she transforms into her demon form and plans to burn everything to the ground out of vengeance.
- Queer Romance: One of the major plots of the series is the relationship between Cassandra and Rapunzel. Though the issues don't come from the fact they are both women but that they are both princesses from separate kingdoms that don't like each other, it is called a "Romeo and Juliet AU" for a reason.
- You Can't Go Home Again: Rapunzel ends up having to flee from Corona after they find out that she is a mythic, and she can't return, at least until the end of the story.
