Hearing Rapunzel tell him she can't help, even though she is supposed to keep her promises– is known for keeping her promises, to everyone except him apparently– Varian feels hysteria bubble up and spill out his throat into begs and pleas. Her face is too uncertain, she's supposed to look different. She's supposed to be the supernatural princess who moves mountains for her friends. He sinks his fingers into her arms and begs, stumbling over words in desperation to imbue her with his need so she can understand, but instead of steeling and coming to his aid, her eyes flinch back and shut.
Never had he wanted so fervently to flip the obedience inflicted on him and use it on someone else. He wants this so bad that the edges of his vision tunnel in on her as he's dragged away.
His brain compartmentalizes when a door shuts between him and the princess; she can't hear him anymore, he has to ask someone else.
"Please," he says, fisting his hand in the coat of one guard who guides him. "Please, sir, my dad, he- in Old Corona, he needs help–"
"Kid, have you seen what it looks like out there right now?" the man interrupts incredulously. "This isn't the time for road trips."
"You don't understand!"
"Yeah, not the time," the other guard agrees, huffing in distaste. "And I don't think I want to help a guy who just attacked our princess."
What? Varian trips on his feet, trying to dig in his heels as he realizes they're heading for the castle doors he had pushed through not long before. They're throwing him out in the snow.
"Eu-Eugene? H-he's here, right? Cassandra? Anyone–"
He tries to lock eyes with every passerby he can.
None turn off their paths.
He has the whole trip home to go numb both inside and out, to regroup and gather his wits, panic still thrumming through everything but at least he can try to reverse the effects his own alchemy caused, right? That has to be enough. It has to.
...
It's not.
...
Varian isn't sure how much time has passed when he manages to peel himself off the floor of his lab where he'd collapsed following experiment after failed experiment- but when he does, his vision swims with spots and he has to steady himself on the amber prison encasing his dad. He quickly yanks his hands away like he's been burned and stumbles to the side.
He stands there for a long moment, blank. Outside the window, he hears the chittering of birds. The sky is blue and sunny. Days must have passed since the storm. Rapunzel has not come.
Through the heavy blanket of stupor settled over him like so much snow that forgot to melt with the winter outside, there is something rising. As it rises, it burns. It curls his fists.
"They will pay," he whispers.
It comes out feeling wrong, like he's not the one who said it. But the longer the silence that follows his words, the more surely the universe seems to say back, That's right. Yes. They should know how it feels to feel as helpless as you. It feels like a dangerous imitation of hope.
He nods. "They will pay."
And this is how Varian finds himself in the precarious position of being the bad guy.
...
"What does it matter? It's just sitting here rotting anyway!" he yells, closing his hand tighter over the dry flower.
"I defied a direct order from my father, the king! We both broke the law!" She sighs, and Varian almost feels guilt gnaw at him for the distress on her face. Until, that is, he hears her begin authoritatively, "Okay, Varian, give–"
Varian shoves his hands over his ears to drown out the rest. His heart beats loudly in the self-imposed silence as he turns away, because he's made it this far and his plans will all be for nothing if his stupid obedience stops him from freeing his dad now.
The tricky bit comes after his original plan fails; the flower doesn't work and he needs Rapunzel herself, which means he needs leverage because he already knows that his need alone isn't enough to motivate her.
Queen Arianna continues to sleep soundly after Varian has carted her back to his home.
He knows his hours are numbered before the remaining royals with all of their power comes down upon him, so he barely pays her any attention in the rushing round to finish preparations. It's almost easy to forget his guest until eventually he hears her stirring on the floor of his lab and finds her looking around with frightened eyes. Even then she's gagged and chained so it's not like she can interfere.
He's in the middle of pouring glowing solutions into various colored balls when his eye catches on her fully. Her attention is not on him. He follows her gaze and sees the pitcher of water on his desk.
He almost goes back to work. But then her eyes shift to meet his and the way she's looking at him... nobody has looked at him like that before. Like he could be poisonous.
"Your Majesty," he greets coldly, turning and drawing himself up to his meager height. "We haven't properly met before. I'm Varian of Old Corona. What's left of it, anyway."
Her eyes narrow, and it's a bit easier to be mean to her when she's glaring.
"Come on, don't be rude," he says, rolling his eyes. "You want a drink, right? I don't see any reason not to give you one, as long as you're cooperative."
He fills a cup with water and sets it down before her. She flinches faintly when he kneels and reaches for the gag. He hardens himself and yanks it out, turning away quickly.
"Fear not, your Majesty," he says sarcastically, back to her as he strides away. "You are merely bait to lure the princess here. Only the magic of her unbreakable hair can shatter the amber and free my father."
He can hear the queen drink deeply from the glass, coughing slightly as she pulls it away. "I've met your father Quirin," she states, voice sounding brittle at the edges. "He is an old friend of ours."
It makes Varian's blood burn. He takes hold of the tarp cover and rips it off the surreal statue of his father's prison, taking cruel satisfaction in the way Ariana gasps in horror.
"This," he says scathingly, "is your friend? A person you and your kingdom refused to help?"
She doesn't rise to the bait. Her eyes drink in Quirin's frozen form before drifting to Varian with far too much pity. "And after you've freed your father?"
He laughs humorlessly. "After? Oh, well I'm afraid Corona will pay for turning their backs on me. That's when you should start worrying. Now if you don't mind, I have soldering to do. Any moment now, your High–"
"Varian, wait."
The words are quick; too quick. He stops dead in his tracks, twisting his eyes shut in a moment of loathing for himself, for her, for the whole stupid world. Slowly, he turns on his heel and glares at her tiredly. "What," he grinds out.
Arianna looks surprised, clearly having expected him to ignore her. "Thank you," she says carefully. "For the water. And please know this– I never wanted this for Quirin, or for you. I know Rapunzel didn't either."
Varian scoffs.
"She didn't," Arianna insists. "Please listen; I know what it is to grieve. With loss, even temporary loss, comes anger. It's irrational and it's going to pass, and then you're going to see that none of this is what your father would want you to be doing. I know you must know that, deep down. It doesn't have to be this way."
"Yeah well, Dad can't tell me what to do right now. Whose fault is that?" Varian snaps, using anger to cover the way her words strike something in him. "Neither can you for that matter, so be quiet or I'll gag you again!"
She bows her head sadly, allowing him to stomp away.
...
Varian's plan perfectly delivers the princess into his hands. He's almost impressed with himself in spite of the lens of hate obscuring everything. Just being around Rapunzel is making him angrier and angrier; how dare she seem so innocent and brave, like she's got any right to call herself the hero?
"I demand–" the king is sputtering self-righteously, simply making Varian cover his ears and wait until the man's mouth is done moving.
"Your Majesty," he says smugly, "I know it's hard for you, but for the first time in your life, you are not in a position to demand anything."
The princess is the next to make him cover his ears just a moment later, begging for her mother's freedom. He can't help but feel paranoia rise when he lowers his hands the second time, noticing Queen Arianna looking at him with a curious expression.
He hurries to reassert himself, but there's a growing sense like the ground is getting shaky beneath him, unrelated to his automatons attacking Coronan soldiers outside.
"I forgot, we're kind of on a time crunch here, so I'm gonna need to speed things along," he taunts, pouring amber-forming compound onto black stones closest to Queen Arianna. The queen cringes away from it as it begins to sprout sharp crystals in her direction.
His hands are busy with capping the vial and he has no warning when Rapunzel cries out, "Varian, stop!"
Varian's hands freeze, the glass slipping through his fingers and smashing at his feet. For a moment there's a computing error in his brain, the obedience spell almost not sure how to make him comply. It goes on for a beat too long. When he sorts himself and looks up, everyone is staring at him.
He shakes his head roughly.
"Sh-shall we get started?" he asks, meaning to sound intimidating and dangerous but sounding more like a kid who's asking permission. Rapunzel nods carefully, eying him.
And so he gets to wrapping her unbreakable hair around the tip of his drill and setting it before the unbreakable amber. He keeps his hands over his ears for as much of the process as he can, his legs getting shakier by the minute. He doesn't have any more energy to waste breath on snarky jabs at the royals. He wants the machine on, he wants the amber broken, he wants his dad back. Quirin always knows how to help him know what to do.
But as he pushes the drill forward, thrusts his whole heart into it the same way he begged Rapunzel to listen to him during the storm, he finds that he is once again denied. Things are yelled at him but the sound of the drill covers it up, and all he can hear is a rush of static even as he pounds the sculpture and denies frantically,
"Her hair, it- it should've cut through it! Why didn't it work?"
This isn't happening. This can't be happening.
"No...no... I wasn't wrong! It's not my fault!" he tells his father. His father does not respond. Behind him, Arianna has been freed and the whole royal family is united in a loving embrace on the floor. Warmth emanates from them like sunlight but Varian is frozen inside and he hates them.
"It's all your fault! " he yells, pushing haphazardly onto feet that no longer know how to stand properly.
Red hazes his vision. How dare they have a happy ending when he has nothing, he will make them pay, everyone ignores him but he has more. More automatons to crush them with. He can and he will–
"Don't move!"
It's the Queen who shouts this, her hand outstretched at him. She hasn't disentangled from the cuddle pile, but she's found Varian with her eyes and he knows all at once that he has underestimated her.
He has lost.
"Stop telling me what to do!" he screams. His knees wobble, pushing to disobey, his fingers spasming to reach for his ears but stalling like there are short-circuiting gears within. "You can't tell me what to–"
"Varian, calm down," the Queen says firmly.
A sudden overwhelming rush goes through him from scalp to toes like he's a molten metal sword being dunked underwater. It's violent enough to make him wobble and fall to his knees. He pants at the disorientation, but his breaths begin to even out, heart slowing.
The red clears from his vision. The ground stabilizes. A painful, ever-present squeeze in his chest that he'd forgotten he was carrying eases gradually like cooling balm across a burn. For the first time in several weeks of lonely anguish and spite-fueled restlessness, Varian feels totally and completely calm.
What's going on? What is he doing?
Thoughts spiral through his mind for review in chaotic succession– all that he's done since the amber encased his father, all the horrid decisions coming into painful clarity and the looming guilt and regret laying ready beneath the surface like an enormous iceberg suddenly made visible– and despite it all he feels like a bystander observing this happening to someone else. He feels calm.
He feels... uncertain. He was about to try to... hurt people. Why?
"What- what am I...?" he mutters, bringing a hand to his forehead and rubbing there, hard, like it might make things make sense again. Because suddenly nothing does. And even though he wants to, he can't bring himself to care.
He becomes aware suddenly that someone is kneeling in front of him, someone in lavender skirts, their gentle hand guiding his chin up up. He sees the brown eyes of the queen looking him over.
"Arianna, be careful–" King Frederick warns from somewhere behind her. Varian feels unable to look away from the Queen's eyes.
"I'm all right, Fred," she calls without looking. "His tantrum is over now." Lowering her voice, she whispers, "Isn't it, Varian?"
He finds himself learning into the hand on his cheek just slightly. It's the first kind touch he's had since...
He is calm, but he can feel a wetness spilling from his eyes.
The door to his lab slams open and everyone, Varian included, turns to see Cassandra and a handful of roughed-up, pissed-off looking Coronans standing behind her. She locks onto Varian with no small amount of disgust, and through the calm Varian is aware that he would like the earth to swallow him whole and keep him there forever with the dirt and worms and no eyes to look at him ever again.
Varian is led out of the house in chains.
Chaos of conversation surrounds him as the royals split off to discuss with their followers: Rapunzel surrounded instantly by Eugene and Cass, the King by his knights. Varian feels lost in the rejoicing, gaze wandering for something to hold on to.
It catches on the rocks.
They're everywhere of course; the abandoned village is in ruin. He doesn't know why his gaze catches on them at first, but then it hits him– after staring at these things and studying their behavior for months now, he has never seen them lay flat against the ground with all their tips pointing east, even continuing past a crumbled section of the Coronan border wall. They almost resemble...
"It's a path," he realizes softly. "To the dark kingdom."
Queen Ariana, still watching him, though from a safe distance now as he is flanked by two burly guards, perks up at the sound of his voice. "What did you say, Varian?" Over her shoulder, Rapunzel turns to look at her mother, then follows her gaze. Varian looks at them, then at Eugene, Cass and Lance who follow the princess' lead. He hesitates.
"Tell us," Ariana nudges gently.
Varian swallows dryly and gestures at the path, chains clinking. "The rocks are all pointing in the same direction; they're forming a path. For Rapunzel." He realizes the truth as he says it. All along, the rocks' growth were coming closer and closer to the island kingdom because they were seeking out the Sun Drop to lead her to her destiny.
When he looks up, he meets more eyes staring at him now, some with suspicion, but from Rapunzel he sees only amazement. "For me?" she says in wonder, staring into the horizon where the sun has begun to rise and cast a reflecting light across the path.
"The first thing I did," Varian says, "When my dad... I went through his things. Because he was keeping something from me about the rocks, and I thought it might help. That's how I found and translated the scroll fragment. It tells of an ancient darkness which is the counterpart to the Sun Drop. The rocks came here to find the princess and take her to it."
He hears Eugene speak up in the silence that follows this revelation, something snarky in his voice, probably asking why they should trust Varian at all. Cass chips in, and Rapunzel answers them back, an undercurrent of excitement in her tone confirming that she understands what he's saying. The other voices are lost to Varian, blurring in his ears as his forced spell of calm begins to ebb away.
The princess will seek out her next adventure, her loved ones at her side, and find what she is destined for because of the purpose and power that her magic bestows on her.
As for Varian, he is led to a prison cart and a barred door is slammed in his face. The supernatural force placed upon him is not useful or helpful or grand; it has no direction to guide him to greater purpose. He is cursed. And as his loathing returns– now pointing inward rather than out– he can't help but feel he deserves it.
...
Queen Arianna is more capable than most people give her credit for. It's probably because she carries herself with practiced regality and has an earnest nurturing spirit about her, but in addition to that she is strong– just as trained in the sword as her husband– and she is smart, as a good queen must be.
When she chooses to visit the most recent addition to their castle dungeons late one evening, of course she doesn't tell her husband about it. He would object, but she has a sense of curiosity almost as strong as her daughter's, and she needs to know if her hunch is correct.
The patrolling guards give her a twin expressions of shock when she enters and pulls back the black hood from her head. She nods at them, then points with her eyes to the door in a silent command for privacy. "I just need a few moments," she says, and they bow to her before leaving.
At the end of the block of solitary cells she finds him. He's so small that her maternal instincts ache to see him this way, though her experience warns her not to underestimate.
Sitting knees-to-chest on one wooden bed hung off the wall, swallowed by prison clothes and staring hollow-eyed into middle space, is Varian. A bowl of food sits on the floor by his cot, looking untouched since it was slid inside- likely hours ago.
Arianna stands before the bars to his cell and, getting no reaction from the boy, clears her throat. His eyes blink slowly as though waking up, and it takes a beat for them to shift in her direction. She can tell by moonlight through the window that his hair is mussed and dirty, the odd blue stripe in his fringe just barely visible where it hangs in his eyes. He could probably do with a haircut.
"Good evening, Varian," she greets, smiling sadly. "How are you?"
He stares at her for a long time, almost to the point that she is sure he won't answer. Then a pitiful croak: "How do you think."
She nods, looking down.
"If there's anything we can do to make you more comfortable," she says, "I'll have it done. Frederick may be known for his harshness with criminals, but we do not have a system in place for inmates who are... children."
This earns her a scowl, but it is still far more muted venom than she would have expected. He turns his head from her, resting it on his knees in the other direction so that the back of his head is to her. It's a clear dismissal, and Ariana almost wants to leave him to whatever self-soothing he can get during what is clearly a great deal of suffering, suffering she has no real way to alleviate.
And yet.
"Varian... There's something I need to be sure of. Would you stand up for me, please?"
His posture tenses but he doesn't move. She waits. Tries again.
"Stand up, Varian."
This time he flinches, rocking back and forth momentarily in clear sign of internal struggle. Finally, the boy uncurls from his ball and rolls forward onto his feet in a motion that is slow and stilted, yes, but ends with him standing to face her. There is more of a sour look on his face than before as he regards her, throwing his arms out to the sides palms-forward as if to say, now what?.
The queen studies him openly, one hand coming to brace her chin in thought. "Thank you," she offers. "Now be seated."
He wobbles on his feet before sinking to the ground.
"Touch your head."
"Stop," Varian growls lowly, even as his visibly shaking hands rise to rest in his hair.
"And clap."
This time Varian immediately brings his hands together in the most brief show of obedience possible before he rocks to his feet and drops them in fists at his sides, hackles raising. "I said stop!" he shouts. The sound echoes off the walls.
"I'm sorry," Arianna concedes, clasping and resting her hands before her. "I wanted to be sure that I wasn't imagining things the other night. It seems I wasn't."
Varian's breaths pick up, bare expression of panic attempting to conceal itself as he sits haughtily onto the bench and clenches his fists on his knees. If he was a barely living thing when she got here, he is now tense and coiled as prey before a predator.
"What do you want?" he asks shakily.
"Nothing," she tells him. "I won't ask anything else, though I won't lie and say I'm not incredibly curious."
"Yeah, well that makes two of us," he spits, shifting to stare at the far wall again.
There is a beat as the queen considers this information. Perhaps nothing else needs to be said; she means it, she has no intentions of telling anyone about this, not even her husband. Heaven knows what the king would want to do about it. For a boy who has so much interest in the reasons and workings of the world, Varian does not seem to do well with being studied himself.
"Your secret is safe with me," she offers gently.
"I don't want your solidarity, Highness," Varian hisses. "I want you to go away. "
Arianna sighs. "I will have them give you more blankets. It is too cold down here, and you're too thin." Saying this, she takes her leave before Varian can form a response.
...
Does Varian feel bad for how he spoke to the queen, whose influence was surely what got him moved to a better quality cell with better rations and accommodations within a week? Yes, yes he does. He adds it to the list. She doesn't visit again, so it's not like he can apologize, even if he knew what to say. How could anyone forgive him after what he'd done?
The best part of his new cell is that he actually gets a cellmate to talk to. Sure, Andrew is a Saporian brute and not the most intelligent one at that, but he is someone besides Varian's ruminating thoughts with whom to have conversation.
(If Varian brags about how he got put down here in order to seem tougher in the eyes of his new company, then at least he is feeling enough acceptance about the turn his life had taken to have that conversation. And, it works; Andrew looks very impressed.)
Apparently Rapunzel is gone on her destiny-seeking trip, that much news trickles down to them. He tries not to resent her for that; with time comes healing and with healing comes Varian returning to himself. He longs for a way to get out of here and start over.
And when one day, a group of Saporians break into the dungeon with a gnarled wand and news that they've used it to wipe the memories of the king and queen so they could free Andrew and take over Corona... well, it seems like as good an out as any.
"Hello there, young man!" the queen greets cheerfully when Varian steps into the royal court, new friends at his sides, the bruises of wrist shackles still fresh and hidden under his long sleeves. He feels caught in search lights, frozen with guilt for a long moment as the person he's wronged so terribly looks upon him with no trace of malice or disgust in her expression. "The king and I are having some trouble with our memory, but I'm told you are our most trusted advisor!"
Varian stares at her. "I-I...yes, that's r-right," he stutters after Andrew gives him a shove in the shoulder.
Arianna smiles, reaching out to rub his arm. The king laughs fondly.
Yes, this has to be how Varian turns over his new leaf. The fact that the queen no longer knows of his curse is just an added bonus.