diff --git a/spacy/gold/example.pyx b/spacy/gold/example.pyx
index 24778ff77..a7a26b6b3 100644
--- a/spacy/gold/example.pyx
+++ b/spacy/gold/example.pyx
@@ -23,7 +23,6 @@ cpdef Doc annotations2doc(vocab, tok_annot, doc_annot):
 cdef class Example:
     def __init__(self, Doc predicted, Doc reference, *, Alignment alignment=None):
         """ Doc can either be text, or an actual Doc """
-        assert predicted.vocab is reference.vocab
         msg = "Example.__init__ got None for '{arg}'. Requires Doc."
         if predicted is None:
             raise TypeError(msg.format(arg="predicted"))
@@ -89,11 +88,12 @@ cdef class Example:
                 output.append(None)
             elif gold_i is None:
                 if i in i2j_multi:
-                    output.append(vocab.strings[gold_values[i2j_multi[i]]])
+                    output.append(gold_values[i2j_multi[i]])
                 else:
                     output.append(None)
             else:
-                output.append(vocab.strings[gold_values[gold_i]])
+                output.append([gold_values[gold_i]])
+        output = [vocab.strings[o] for o in output]
         return output
 
     def to_dict(self):
diff --git a/spacy/tests/test_new_example.py b/spacy/tests/test_new_example.py
index 517329dba..b7af77149 100644
--- a/spacy/tests/test_new_example.py
+++ b/spacy/tests/test_new_example.py
@@ -32,11 +32,11 @@ def test_Example_from_dict_invalid(annots):
         Example.from_dict(predicted, annots)
 
 
-@pytest.mark.parametrize("gold_words", [["ice", "cream"], ["icecream"], ["i", "ce", "cream"]])
+@pytest.mark.parametrize("pred_words", [["ice", "cream"], ["icecream"], ["i", "ce", "cream"]])
 @pytest.mark.parametrize("annots", [{"words": ["icecream"], "tags": ["NN"]}])
-def test_Example_from_dict_with_tags(gold_words, annots):
+def test_Example_from_dict_with_tags(pred_words, annots):
     vocab = Vocab()
-    predicted = Doc(vocab, words=gold_words)
+    predicted = Doc(vocab, words=pred_words)
     example = Example.from_dict(predicted, annots)
     for i, token in enumerate(example.reference):
         assert token.tag_ == annots["tags"][i]
@@ -44,6 +44,30 @@ def test_Example_from_dict_with_tags(gold_words, annots):
     assert aligned_tags == ["NN" for _ in predicted]
 
 
+def test_aligned_tags():
+    pred_words = ["Apply", "some", "sunscreen", "unless", "you", "can", "not"]
+    gold_words = ["Apply", "some", "sun", "screen", "unless", "you", "cannot"]
+    gold_tags = ["VERB", "DET", "NOUN", "NOUN", "SCONJ", "PRON", "VERB"]
+    annots = {"words": gold_words, "tags": gold_tags}
+    vocab = Vocab()
+    predicted = Doc(vocab, words=pred_words)
+    example = Example.from_dict(predicted, annots)
+    aligned_tags = example.get_aligned("tag")
+    assert aligned_tags == ["VERB", "DET", None, "SCONJ", "PRON", "VERB", "VERB"]
+
+
+def test_aligned_tags_multi():
+    pred_words = ["Applysome", "sunscreen", "unless", "you", "can", "not"]
+    gold_words = ["Apply", "somesun", "screen", "unless", "you", "cannot"]
+    gold_tags = ["VERB", "DET", "NOUN", "SCONJ", "PRON", "VERB"]
+    annots = {"words": gold_words, "tags": gold_tags}
+    vocab = Vocab()
+    predicted = Doc(vocab, words=pred_words)
+    example = Example.from_dict(predicted, annots)
+    aligned_tags = example.get_aligned("tag")
+    assert aligned_tags == [None, None, "SCONJ", "PRON", "VERB", "VERB"]
+
+
 @pytest.mark.parametrize(
     "annots",
     [