Golden Vines
is a Fusion Fic of The Owl House and Tangled.
In which two human brothers stumble upon a strange flower in another dimension. Where the eldest ultimately finds love and family only to lose everything far too soon, the youngest never stops wanting to hoard the flower's magic for himself, even if he has to steal the newborn prince away.
Sixteen years later, young unlucky thief Willow Park desperately tries to escape the Kingdom's guards after stealing the lost prince's golden prince, leading her to a tower in the woods in which lives this weird boy with far too long hair.
Contains the following tropes
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade:
- Not only Willow's dads pressured her to study Abominations because of her Power Incontinence, she was so depressed by their demise that she turned thief and cut herself off her friends to fell under Boscha's sway.
- Darius had to watch his best friend die from illness and fruitlessly search his friend's Missing Child for sixteen years.
- Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: Zigzagged since Hunter is deeply traumatized by sixteen years of relentless child abuse while Willow is pretty cheery, but she nonetheless hides trauma of her own and he can be rather innocent and childish.
- Cincinnatus: Darius really doesn't want to be crowned the new king, for the rather sad justification that it would mean he has to accept the lost prince, his late best friend's only child, is never going back home.
- Composite Character: As Darius' late best friend who left a major impact on his personality, Caleb shares some points with the previous Golden Guard.
- Dating Catwoman: Steve the royal guard and Skara the criminal bard. Apparently, she tends to get flirty when she's about to be arrested and it worked very well on Steve.
- Evil Uncle: Belos only views Hunter as a mean to relieve his curse and has no qualms physically abusing him, without even bothering to put a facade of love.
- Family Eye Resemblance: Flapjack pointing at Hunter having the same shade of magenta as the late Queen's eye-colour helps him to understand he's her son.
- Fatal Flaw: Belos could be free of his curse if only he stopped carving the glyph array in his flesh every time Hunter heals it, but he's just too greedy for power.
- Hero of Another Story: The prologue briefly mentions Caleb led many adventures until he was noticed by the Queen of the Boiling Isles and became her prince-consort.
- I Need to Go Iron My Dog: When the royal guards are on the hunt for criminals, Steve discreetly warns Skara under the guise of "bathroom breaks". He ruefully admits he will soon need a better excuse as his boss Lilith is worrying for his bladder.
- Power Incontinence: Willow wouldn't stop summoning vines when she couldn't control her emotions, so her dads pressured her to study Abominations in the hopes that her plant-magic would atrophy after years of disuse. Not only it failed to work, it did a major number on her self-esteem.
- Race Lift: As Caleb and Evelyn's biological son, Hunter isn't a grimwalker but a genuine Half-Human Hybrid.
- Related in the Adaptation: In The Owl House, Hunter's degree of familial relationship with Caleb and Belos was iffy courtesy of him being a grimwalker, and he was entirely unrelated to Caleb's wife Evelyn. Here, he's unambiguously Caleb and Evelyn's child.
- Strong Family Resemblance: Except for the magenta eyes and pointy ears, Hunter is very much a younger Caleb. Seeing a mural of the late Queen and prince-consort helps him to understand he's actually their son.
- Take Care of the Kids: As he was dying from illness, Caleb's last words for Darius was to point his friend towards the Titan's Blossom in order to cure the newborn Hunter and to watch over the boy. This promise drives Darius to keep looking for the lost prince years after his kidnapping.
- Too Happy to Live: Caleb and Evelyn were beloved by the kingdom, they just had a wonderful baby boy, only to get sick and perish in a week.
- Yank the Dog's Chain: Poor Darius helplessly watched his best friend sicken and die, and thought said friend's child would follow his parents to the grave — but wait, a cure has been found! Then Belos abducts the little prince, and Darius is left hopelessly searching for Hunter and painfully aware that the more time is passing by, the less likely it is for the lost prince to be found safe and sound.
