Belle musings. Either before or after 01x12 Skin Deep. It doesn't really matter too much.
Disclaimer: I own nothing related to Once Upon A Time.
She used to be a princess, her mind murmurs to her on nights when she can't sleep. Rustling ball gowns and courtiers, lavish castles and glittering jewels. Faint music plays in the dead air around her, strings and keys and melodies.
Sometimes she waltzes around her cell with an invisible partner, just to frighten the nurse.
Her memories remain clear when her vision clouds and her stomach rolls and she feels entirely too weary by knowledge that gets people like herself locked up. Insane, some call her. Tragic, by others. Shame about that poor girl, she had such promise.
But a demon took her heart, an unloved monster only desperate souls would turn to.
Her tower looks different in this world, made of concrete blocks and thick metal instead of the mortar and brick and sturdy wooden door. It still feels like death and betrayal.
(You poor dear, the kiss didn't turn out the way you wished? He sent you away? Well, I shall take you back home myself.)
People presume her dead. Her father forced to bury an empty coffin full of lies and gritty sand. She always wanted to see the ocean.
Locked in one prison and then another, she wonders if this is the life she is destined, to never truly be free. Thoughts of magic and curses weigh her down, making her head droop in defeat.
She once played in the courtyard with wooden blocks, building a castle even greater than the one she had been born in. She was the master of its fate. With one hand she smote the make-believe thing into ruins. Then, with a careful hand she rebuilt it, better than before.
She claws at her prison, pushing and pounding and kicking and trying to make it crumble to pieces. This place filled with black magic cannot contain her for long. She can feel the pull of her world, of the people she loves.
She knows he lives out there, outside of this lonely tower, and she tires of waiting to be saved.
A fierce knock and the small door window opens onto a dragon's face. She snarls, hackles raised, and demands utter silence.
She turns, hair hanging in her face, a sharp grin splitting her mouth. Dragons do not scare her; she knows what true demons look like.
(This is for your own safety, Belle. You haven't been yourself since you returned from the beast's lair. The Queen and I only seek to help you.)
She stretches her back straight as an arrow, hands curled into tiny, imperfect fists. Her only weapons are words, but this does not frighten her. She still has her voice.
"Your Majesty," she curtsies. "Is there something you wish to say to me?" She grins, all jagged edges, sword pointed at the dragon's heart. This one has plagued the world long enough.
"Miss French, you're mistaken. I am no Queen."
Belle cants her head to the side, blue eyes bright with fire and fight. "No, I suppose not. You're more of a dragon, hoarding the town as your treasure."
"Your mind is unstable, miss French-"
She laughs at this, a broken sound of butterfly wings and summer nights. "I wonder which knight will be the one to slay you at last." She turns and hums an offbeat tune, twirling as if dancing across a ballroom.
This prison is only a tabletop tower made of wooden blocks. One firm hit and it will tumble to pieces on the ground. She will escape. She knows this, just as she knows the dragon leaves with smoke curling around her lips and fire on her breath.
For Belle is a warrior princess who has read fairy tales and knows how the tyrant Queen's story ends.
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