A fellow Cassarian shipper hosted a Cassarian Month in August 2023, and I decided to turn my entries for it into a month of different AUs! So here they are, along with short stories to go with the art!
Cassandra is a known thief in the kingdom of Corona. At the moment, she is on the run from Royal Guards... for she has stolen the guarded Crown of the Lost Prince.
Gotta hide, gotta hide... She thinks. Before the guards can see her, she ducks behind a curtain of ivy. They run directly past her, as she remains unseen.
"That worked out perfectly," she says aloud with a wide grin, pulling the crown out of her satchel and holding it up triumphantly. "The Prince was kidnapped years ago! They don't need this anymore."
It is now that she realizes there is a secret path behind this curtain of ivy. Curious, she places the crown back into her satchel and follows the path until it leads to a tall, hidden tower.
Who puts a tower in the middle of nowhere? She wonders. Eh, who cares? It looks like a perfect place to hide!
Pulling out two of her daggers, she uses them to climb the side of the stone tower. Finally, she reaches the window at the top and hops in.
"Yes! Alone at last," she says, planting a kiss on the bejeweled crown. But before she can make another move, a cloud of green dust and sparkles falls on her head. "What the...?"
She suddenly feels uncontrollably sleepy. Her eyes are heavy, and she is unable to keep herself awake. Losing consciousness, she falls to the floor.
Cassandra awakens, who-knows-how-much-time later. "Wha—Where am I?!" She tries to move, but she is tied to a chair. Tied tightly, with something strangely soft... and blue. Like, insanely bright blue. "Is this... hair?"
Her eyes follow the impossibly long flow of hair. It wraps around her, around the chair, across the floor, and then up into the dark rafters of the tower. Which is where she notices the silhouette of somebody standing on the wooden boards.
"Struggling... Struggling is pointless," a hesitant voice says.
"Hello? Who's there?" She asks.
"Who are you, and how did you find me?" The voice asks.
Cassandra squints her eyes, trying to see who this person is. "What...?"
"Who are you, and how did you find me?" The person repeats, with more intensity. Hopping down from the rafters and stepping into the light, a handsome young man is revealed. He is tall, slim, and the bright blue hair all over the room is definitely coming from his head.
Cassandra is in awe that someone would have hair like this. It's unnaturally blue color would be enough to mesmerize anybody, but this length? Who, exactly, is this guy?!
"I don't know who you are, or how you got here, but can I just ask... What is the deal with your hair?!" Cassandra says.
"Oh, like you don't know!" The man holds a glowing, pink orb in his hand threateningly. As if a glowing, pink orb is threatening... "I'll bet you want to cut it, to sell it!"
"What? Why in the world would I want your hair?!" Cassandra asks. "Look, I admit it's strange. But all I want with your hair is to get out of it. Literally!"
The man looks taken aback. "You... You really don't want my hair?"
Cassandra sighs exasperatedly. "I only came here to hide. I was being perused by guards, because—" It is now that she realizes she no longer has her satchel. "My satchel! Where is it?!"
"I've hidden it, somewhere you'll never find it!" The man folds his arms, smiling proudly.
Cassandra glances around. "It's in that vase over there, isn't it?"
The man bites his lower lip. "No," he replies, though it is clearly evident he is lying. He seems as if he is about to pull something out of his pocket, when Cassandra protests.
"Whoa whoa whoa! Please don't do to me whatever it was you did earlier. It gave me a splitting headache..." She has the desire to rub her aching temple, but her hands are still tied.
"Yeah, that's a side effect of my sleeping powder. Still have to work on it..."
"Sleeping powder?" Cassandra raises an eyebrow. Who makes their own sleeping powder?
"Yep, I'm an alchemist!" He tosses the pink sphere up like a ball, but he accidentally drops it and it rolls across the floor, then explodes on the other side of the room, turning everything pink within its range.
"Uhhh... I meant to do that," he insists, hands on his hips.
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"Uh-huh," Cassandra says, unimpressed. "Could you please just let me go?"
"Not until you agree to something," he says. "Tomorrow night, the sky will glow with strange, floating lights. Do you know about this annual occurrence?"
"You mean the lantern thing they do for the Lost Prince?"
"Lanterns? I knew they weren't stars!" His eyes light up excitedly for a moment. "Ahem... You will act as my guide, and take me to see these 'lanterns'."
"No-can-do," Cassandra says. "In case it wasn't obvious, I'm a thief. The kingdom is out to get me."
"I'll give you your satchel back, just please do this for me!" He begs. "You don't know what it's like, living here my whole life..."
"Your whole life?" Cassandra feels a man unexpected swell of sympathy for this guy. "You've never left this tower? You're, what, like seventeen?"
"Almost eighteen," he says. "Tomorrow is actually my birthday, as a matter of fact."
"Why haven't you left before?"
"Because... Because I'm too dangerous." He sighs, as if the words he is saying feel heavy. "My hair, it... It can do terrible things. It can destroy anything, and I mean anything, when I sing a certain incantation. My mother said that, when I was younger, people tried to cut it. They wanted that power for themselves. But when it's cut, it turns black and loses its power." He shows her a short strand of black hair underneath all the blue.
As insane as his story sounds, she believes him. And for some unknown reason, her heart goes out to him and she finds that she wants to help him. And not just to get her satchel back. "Okay, fine..." She says reluctantly. "I'll take you to see the lanterns."
"YES!" He pumps his fist in the air excitedly, but then catches himself embarrassedly. "I mean, uh, thank you." Carefully, he untangles her from his hair. "I'm Varian, by the way."
"Cassandra," she tells him, extending her hand. He takes it hesitantly, his cheeks glowing with a light blush as they shake to seal the deal. She has to admit, his grip feels... pleasantly warm.
Using Varian's hair and the pulley system installed in the window, the two of them climb out of the tower and head off together into the world Varian has never known. Plenty of surprises lay in store for them, and they will experience the greatest adventure of their lives... as their feelings for each other grow.
