Mother Knows Best: A Tale of the Old Witch

by Serena Valentino

  “There, there, Mrs. Tiddlebottom. Look at all these gifts my sisters brought for me for my birthday!”

  “Very nice of them, lady.”

  “Yes, now go upstairs, and I will be there soon with some tea.”

  After Gothel saw Mrs. Tiddlebottom disappear up the stairs, she gave the odd sisters a wrathful look.

  “What in Hades are you doing to that cake?”

  The odd sisters all stopped eating at once and looked at Gothel with the most confused and surprised expressions on their faces.

  “What?”

  “We have to conduct ourselves as normally as possible! And we have to make that woman up there believe we like her.”

  “That’s stupid. Let’s just kill her,” said Ruby.

  “No! I need her. I’m taking Rapunzel somewhere safe. Somewhere no one can find her. It was stupid of me to think I could keep her here. She’s always running about in those fields. Someone is going to happen by one day, and they will put it together and guess she is the missing princess. I’ve been very sloppy to let this go on so long. No, we need to hide my precious flower away, so no one ever gets their hands on her.”

  “Then why do you need the old woman?” asked all three of the sisters at once.

  “I need someone to watch over my sisters while I’m with Rapunzel,” said Gothel, looking at them like they were idiots for not realizing that themselves.

  “Oh, and, Lucinda, I will need you to do a memory charm on Rapunzel. Wipe her memory of this place. I want her to think she’s always lived in her tower, with me as her doting mother. The only person in the world who loves her.”

  “And what about her aunties?”

  “Best we don’t introduce you just yet. I’ll have a hard enough time convincing the little brat that I love her.”

  “Why bother with the pretense at all? Why not just wipe her memory and keep her asleep?” asked Lucinda.

  “Oh yes! I love that idea! Yes. Let’s keep her asleep! I can’t stand the idea of having to spend my days entertaining the little brat!”

  “Yes, then it’s all set. We’ll keep Rapunzel asleep in her tower!” said Ruby, clapping her hands and then stuffing more cake into her mouth.

  “And her hair will grow and grow!” said Martha.

  “Yes! It will grow so long we will wrap it around your sisters and heal them!” said Lucinda.

  “Do you think that will work?” asked Gothel, her eyes wide.

  “We do!” the odd sisters said together. It sounded like the clamor of freakish blackbirds.

  “Imagine how long her hair will be in ten years!”

  Gothel and the odd sisters laughed and laughed. Their cackling rang out into the many kingdoms. They didn’t care who or what heard them. As far as anyone knew, they were just four happy sisters eating cake.

  The tower was hidden away in a valley with a lovely waterfall and surrounded by mountains and a river on three sides. Though low in the valley, it was often drenched in sunlight, and the lands were bursting with greenery. It was a happy tranquil place, an unlikely hiding spot for the queen of the dead, but that was exactly what it had been very long ago. Gothel had learned about the tower in one of her mother’s journals. It wasn’t far from the dead woods, which now stood in ruins and were completely deserted, considered to be haunted. Haunted by the old queen of the dead and her many minions. Wild tales spread throughout the surrounding lands and became more elaborate as the years passed. It was still a mystery how the soldiers had been able to breach the enchanted thicket all those years ago. It was rumored that the King had employed a very powerful witch to break the enchantment, but to that day the sordid tale was still veiled in mystery and speculation. Gothel hadn’t even thought of the enchantment at the time. She just took Jacob’s advice and fled. She wondered what would have happened to her and her sisters if she had insisted the soldiers wouldn’t be able to enter. She wondered a lot of things.

  But that was another lifetime ago, she thought.

  Gothel sighed. This was her life now. Traveling between the tower and her country house. Checking on the sleeping Rapunzel and then going back home to check on her sisters. Back and forth. Hither and thither, never staying in either place for long. If she had, she would have had time to think about the ruins of her life and how she’d failed her sisters. Now her entire focus was on bringing them back to life—and keeping herself young so she could.

  Even though the odd sisters had given Gothel an enchanted mirror for the tower and one for her pocket, she still made the trip to see that her flower was safe and to use the healing powers to keep herself young. She still resented the Queen for having eaten the flower when she was ill and doing the same when she feared for the life of her unborn child. Stupid woman. Gothel wouldn’t have had to take their child if the Queen had just used the flower properly, but now the child was infused with the flower’s magic and was the only living source of its power. It had been almost ten years since Gothel and the odd sisters brought Rapunzel and her pet, Pascal, to the tower. These days Gothel couldn’t go for long without using the flower. Within a day, she would start to age dramatically. She had no idea how the odd sisters stayed so young without the help of the flower, and wondered if they had actually taken her mother’s blood, like she had suspected so many years ago.

  Rapunzel and Pascal were living in a dreamworld created by the odd sisters, in which the Princess spent her days painting a beautiful mural with paints, made from white seashells, that her mother thoughtfully procured for her from far-off places. She played hide-and-seek with Pascal, did her chores like a good daughter, read stories, played music, baked pies, brushed her exceedingly long hair, did puzzles, and baked even more pies. She filled her days with frivolity and distractions. It was a happy sort of life.

  For the most part.

  As the years passed in the real world, Gothel saw the mural on the wall growing, becoming more elaborate. As Rapunzel painted it in her dream, it appeared in reality on the walls, filling the tower with Rapunzel’s hopes and aspirations. The odd sisters’ enchantments made her dreams a reality, and the odd sisters gave Rapunzel free will within her dreams to do and feel and think as she pleased—including a desire to see the lights that appeared in the sky on her birthday.

  Which concerned Gothel.

  If the dream isn’t real, the dreamer finds a way out, Lucinda had said when Gothel asked why Rapunzel should know about the lanterns that were released every year on her birthday. Gothel took Lucinda’s word. She was, after all, a very powerful witch and knew more about those things than Gothel did. The years dragged on as Rapunzel slept, and Rapunzel’s mural took up more space until there was no room left in which to paint. There wasn’t a wall that wasn’t splashed with color, with the young girl’s wish for a life of her own. And every time Gothel went back to the tower and saw a new addition to the mural, it sent terror through her soul.

  This day was no different. Gothel tethered her horse on the edge of the dead woods. No one dared to go to the dead woods; even now, after all those years, the ruins stood undisturbed. For all she knew, she might be one of its many specters. And in a sense, she was. As she made her way to the tower, one thought consumed her mind.

  Tomorrow is Rapunzel’s birthday. It’s almost been ten years!

  And during those years her hair had grown longer and longer.

  Long enough to bring Gothel’s sisters back from the dead.

  Gothel intended to go in through her secret entrance at the tower. This visit wouldn’t be like the others—a quick song for Rapunzel to make herself young again and right back to her sisters. This time she’d stay and make the preparations for the ceremony while she waited for the odd sisters to take Primrose’s and Hazel’s bodies in their flying house to the tower.

  Gothel stopped on the path leading to the cave entrance that took her to the valley where the tower was located. She took her hand mirror out of her pocket.

  “Show me the sisters!” she said while looking into the mi
rror. Her face was worn and her hair was starting to gray. Within a few hours, she would be withered.

  “Yes, Gothel?” said Lucinda from the mirror.

  “Tomorrow is the flower’s birthday,” said Gothel, almost giddy.

  “Yes, we know, Gothel,” said Lucinda. Gothel didn’t understand why Lucinda seemed so unaffected by something they’d all been waiting for.

  “We agreed to do the ceremony again in ten years’ time! I need your help!”

  “Gothel, we can’t help you. We’re trapped in the dreamscape!”

  “What? Why? How did it happen?” asked Gothel, panicked. She didn’t even fully understand how the dreamscape worked. “You can’t get out?”

  “No. Not even Circe can break the evil fairy’s spell!”

  “What am I going to do?” Gothel said over and over, paying little mind to Lucinda’s confused look and not even bothering to ask how they were.

  “What is she going to do?” “What is she going to do?” Gothel could hear Ruby and Martha in the background before Lucinda answered. “Sisters, quiet! I have something very important to tell Gothel.”

  All the sisters laughed. “Yes, Lucinda! Tell her! Tell her!”

  “What is it?” snapped Gothel, already annoyed with the odd sisters.

  “Well, Gothel, you should know, the sleeping spell we put on Rapunzel is broken. She is awake,” Lucinda said from her magic mirror with a wicked look of satisfaction on her face.

  “Awake? How? How do you know?” Gothel said, straining to see her up in the tower through the cave.

  “We see everything, Gothel. She thinks it’s just like any other day. The day her mother comes home with the shopping. But today she plans to ask you if she can finally go see the lights that appear in the sky every year on her birthday.”

  “I told you we shouldn’t have included that in her dream, you stupid witch!” snapped Gothel.

  “Don’t you snap at me, old woman!” screeched Lucinda.

  “How dare you!” screamed Gothel.

  “How dare us? How dare us? Did you let us use your little flower to heal our friend? No! You hoarded it! You threw us out of your house!”

  “But I promised to give the girl to you once I was finished with her! I promised you could do with her what you would as soon as my sisters were brought back! Don’t do this! What will Circe think of your meddling with another princess?”

  “Well, it’s too late for all that now, Gothel. Maleficent is dead, and we may be trapped in the dreamscape forever if Circe doesn’t stop being angry with us. So now you can deal with this on your own!”

  You are destined to be alone, Gothel! Her mother’s words rang in her ears.

  Gothel took a deep breath. “I will! I will deal with Rapunzel and wake my sisters on my own! Watch from your mirror if you’d like, and see for yourself.” Gothel almost chucked the mirror in anger.

  “Yeah, good luck with that. And by the way, I don’t think Circe will mind if my sisters and I help the missing princess,” said Lucinda, cackling before the mirror turned black.

  Gothel grumbled as she made her way to the tower. “Gods! I’m going to have to actually talk to this girl! What are we going to talk about?”

  She heard the odd sisters laughing from the mirror in her pocket. “So this is how I’m to spend my days. In torment of these impossible witches and making a pretense of being this girl’s mother?”

  Gothel ignored the sisters and kept grumbling to herself. “Okay, okay. Rapunzel thinks this is just any other day. You can do this, Gothel. You can make this brat believe you’re her mother. Just pretend you like her. After all, you are her mother. The only mother she has ever known.”

  Finally, she reached the tower. She stood beneath the open window and called up to her flower, trying her best to sound sweet. Trying to act like this was any other day in Rapunzel’s dream life. She needed to sound like a mother. She needed to sound convincing. She needed to sound real.

  “Rapunzel! Let down your hair!” She hated the way her voice sounded even as she was saying the words.

  “Rapunzel, I’m not getting any younger down here!” she sang out.

  “Coming, Mother!” called Rapunzel from the tower. Gothel could hear the odd sisters laughing again from the mirror in her pocket.

  “Shut up, you stupid witches! She’s coming!” Gothel gasped when she saw Rapunzel’s hair cascade down the tower. It was longer than she’d thought, longer than it had looked when it was gathered around her while she slept.

  Long enough to wrap around my sisters and bring them back to life!

  In the land of dreams, things were chaotic and unpredictable, yet there was a rhythm to the place if you were cunning enough to find it. And for those who found it and learned to harness the magic, almost anything was possible in the dreamscape. Each inhabitant of the dreamscape lived within his or her own chamber composed of tall mirrors, each of them reflecting different images showing the dreamer events from the outside world connected to the dreamer. Some dreamers simply sat and watched the events pass by, while others learned how to control the mirrors and command what they saw in the mirrors. The odd sisters, who were already well versed in mirror magic, had no problem mastering the mirrors in the dreamworld. They found the rhythm. They harnessed the magic. For them almost anything was possible. And that was how they were able to watch Gothel.

  They saw Gothel and Rapunzel standing in front of a large mirror in their tower. “Oh, look, Sisters. She’s there!” said Lucinda.

  Ruby and Martha clapped their hands, stomping their feet. “Oh, let’s see what kind of mother she makes!”

  “Shhh! Look! I think she’s saying something to us in the mirror!” said Lucinda, pointing at the image of Gothel and Rapunzel reflected at them in the dreamscape.

  “Rapunzel, look in that mirror. You know what I see? I see a strong, confident, beautiful young lady!” Gothel was smiling at her own reflection and then said, “Oh, look! You’re there, too!”

  The odd sisters shook their heads. “She isn’t acting at all like the mother Rapunzel knew from her dream,” said Martha.

  “We didn’t tell her to,” Lucinda said, laughing.

  “Shhh! Listen! They’re talking!”

  “No, no, no, can’t be. I distinctly remember, your birthday was last year.” The odd sisters laughed as Gothel tried to pretend it wasn’t Rapunzel’s birthday.

  “That’s the funny thing about birthdays, they’re kind of an annual thing.” Rapunzel sighed and went on. “Mother, I’m turning eighteen, and I wanted to ask, uh, what I really want for this birthday…Actually, what I’ve wanted for quite a few birthdays…”

  “Spit it out, dear!” yelled Ruby at the mirror as she watched the poor girl struggling to find the words.

  “Okay, Rapunzel, please stop with the mumbling. Blah-blah-blah-blah, it’s very annoying,” said Gothel.

  “She couldn’t act like a mother if she tried!” said Martha.

  “This is even better than I thought it would be!” said Ruby, laughing so hard she fell to the floor and rolled around in fits. Soon Martha joined her, and the two were laughing so hard they were crying, causing their makeup to drip down their hysterical faces.

  “Sisters! Sisters, please! Stop this!” screamed Lucinda. But her sisters couldn’t stop laughing at Gothel’s ridiculous mother act.

  “You’re missing the entire thing, Sisters!” yelled Lucinda. “She’s singing a song, for goodness’ sake!” But her sisters couldn’t stop rolling around on the floor, laughing so hard the mirrors in their chamber were shaking.

  “What would Circe think if she saw you now? Ruby! Martha! Stop this at once!” Immediately the sisters stopped.

  “No fair conjuring Circe!” said Ruby, tears still running down her face.

  “I didn’t summon her. I’m just reminding you that we need to conduct ourselves properly if we want to ever be let out of this place!”

  “Did I hear you say Gothel sang a song?” asked Ruby, trying to m
uffle her laughter.

  “You missed it. The girl asked to see the lights, and Gothel pranced around the tower like a chicken, singing of the terrors and dangers outside the tower.” Lucinda couldn’t even keep a straight face while she tried to recount the story. “Just shut up and listen,” she said, trying to keep herself from laughing. “Gothel is saying something else.”

  “Don’t ever ask to leave this tower again.”

  The sisters fell into peals of laughter again. “Don’t ever ask to leave the tower again!” Ruby screamed. “Does Gothel really think that is going to work?”

  “She’s an eighteen-year-old girl!” said Martha. “Of course it won’t work!”

  “Oh, Rapunzel, I love you more!” mocked Martha.

  “I love you most?” Lucinda laughed. “Princesses may be stupid, but I don’t think Rapunzel is stupid enough to believe that!”

  “Where do you think Gothel is going?” screeched Ruby. “She’s leaving the girl alone!”

  “Follow her in the mirrors,” said Lucinda. “I will keep an eye on the girl.”

  Ruby went to one of the other mirrors and watched Gothel wander the forest. Lucinda kept an eye on Rapunzel. She almost preferred the dreamscape to the real world, with so many mirrors at her disposal. Sometimes you saw things within the mirrors of the dreamscape you didn’t even know you wanted to see until they appeared before you.

  The sisters saw Gothel taking the path that led to the dead forest. “The queen of nothing is headed to her ruined lands.”

  “Tragic!” screamed Martha.

  “She’s searching for something,” said Lucinda, taking her eyes off Rapunzel for a moment, noticing something in one of the other mirrors. “Sisters, look! It’s him!” Lucinda pointed to a mirror that showed a young man going into the cave entrance to the valley. “It’s Flynn Rider! He has the crown!”

  “Who?” asked Ruby.

  “Flynn Rider!” snapped Lucinda.

  “What kind of name is that? Flynn Rider?” asked Martha.

  “Sisters! Please. He’s the young man I told you about,” said Lucinda. “Shhh!”

  “Ah yes, the one you compelled to take the crown and bring it to Rapunzel!” said Martha.