The Magi's Gift
A Once Christmas fic
Snapegirlkmf
Once upon a time, in a realm like and unlike our own world long ago, in a place called the Enchanted Forest, there lived a poor journeyman spinner called Rumplestiltskin and his lovely young wife Belle. Belle was the daughter of a knight, and some said she had married down when she chose Rumple for her husband. Rumple was a commoner, without even a knight in his ancestry, and owning only his spinning wheel, personal effects, and the small cottage inherited from his dead parents. He was a slender fellow with straight soft brown hair and large brown eyes and a sweet handsome face. But he had a kind heart and a generous spirit, and was able to spin the finest thread in seven kingdoms. His thread was fine as cobwebs and soft as silk and yet durable as twine. He also knew the secrets of dying the thread with special plants and could weave cloth that held the dye and the color stayed fast and didn't run, using a technique perfected by his weaver grandfather, who had won a special golden medallion for the best weaver in the entire kingdom.
Such an invention should have made the family rich, but Rumple's father, Malcolm, was a spendthrift and a gambler, and took the fortune his father Colin had made and wasted it away on cards, dice, drink, and loose women. Within six years, the fortune Colin had won from the king was gone, and Malcolm and his wife, Rose, and small son were destitute, and relied upon his wife's spinning to put food on the table.
Malcolm contracted a disease from one of his tavern wenches that eventually killed him when Rumple was nine, and then his hardworking yet loving mother died as well, of exhaustion and poverty. Rumple was taken in by the Spinner sisters, three spinsters who spun wonderful thread and cloth, and so he grew up with them, and they taught him all their wisdom and techniques, until he became an incredible spinner and weaver, yet still a poor man by some standards.
That was how he met his wife, Belle, when she came with her knight father, Sir Maurice, one day to market in Rumple's village. Belle was a beauty with long dark auburn hair and brilliant blue eyes, with a heart-shaped face and lips like the first blushing petals of a rose. She had stopped at his stall to see some deep ocean blue thread, and stayed to chat with its maker . . . and ended up returning again and again, not just for more thread to embellish her embroidery and dresses, but to see the young spinner. Within a year and a half, they had pledged their troth to each other and were married, despite Maurice's objections.
Maurice was a proud man and he wanted his daughter to marry Gaston, the son of a fellow knight. But Belle couldn't stand the arrogant snipe, handsome though he was, and she rejected his suit in the strongest terms. Instead she preferred the poor spinner, who was able to smile and joke with her, who had a quick lively mind and didn't mind bookish females who enjoyed reading and tending roses. Maurice forbade Belle to see the young spinner any more, but Belle told him, "No one decides my fate but me, Papa!" and she defied him and continued to see Rumple.
Gaston challenged Rumple to a duel, stating he was a knave who was trying to steal his woman. Rumple, however, refused to fight him, because he had no formal training in swordplay, and thus Gaston labeled him a coward, denouncing him before most of the village. "You're nothing but a coward, Rumplestiltskin, good for nothing save ridicule! Go back to your spinning, and pray your townspeople take pity on you!"
Those watching jeered and sneered at the gentle spinner, and soon his reputation was in tatters, but despite that Belle stood by him, saying stoutly that, "A true coward challenges those he knows he can bully, and a wise man knows better than to fight when he cannot win. And I would rather marry a poor magi than a cowardly bully any day of the week!"
"If you marry him, Belle, then you go to him without a dowry," Maurice told her. "For I refuse to have a coward for a son-in-law."
"Then I shall go with him forever," Belle informed him. "For there is more to life than fine silk, jewels, and gold, Papa. I learned a long time ago, that when you find something worth fighting for, you never give up. And I shall never stop fighting for him! He's a good man, better than any pompous knight, and I'll be happier in his cottage than I would in Gaston's castle."
"Then go . . . and may you and your spinner have the life you've earned, in that hovel in the hole and corner of the woods," Maurice shouted, and he disowned his child for her disobedience and willfulness.
So Belle married Rumple, and her dowry was only what she could carry in two packs, which were her clothes, her precious books, the cuttings of her mother's roses, a perfumer's kit, and a blue willow porcelain tea set. She had given up her fine dresses and shoes and her banquets, balls, and soirees to live in a spinner's tiny cottage and grow roses and make perfume and be a spinner's wife.
But what the couple lacked in the way of material possessions, they more than made up for with the love they bore each other. For they loved each other deeply and completely, and showed their affection openly, with smiles, and hugs, and special looks sent across spinning wheel and perfumer's distillery.
And if Belle ever regretted following her heart and giving up her comfortable life, she never said so to Rumple, instead going about her work with a merry heart, despite the fact that she now scrimped and saved to make ends meet and pay the rent on their cottage, with barely enough left over to buy certain necessities, like wood for their small stove and meat on Sundays.
Rumple worked hard spinning and selling his cloth and thread at the market, while Belle also worked equally hard grafting roses in her small backyard arbor and making perfume in small batches to sell, as well as rosepetal jam and tea. They didn't starve, but they were just barely keeping the wolf from the door some years, especially when the winter was particularly harsh and a blight struck the village crops and they failed.
Belle sold her blue willow tea set that winter so they could still have wood and food, all except for one chipped cup, which she had dropped one day when Rumple had startled her, chipping the rim slightly.
"I'm so sorry, dearie," he'd apologized. "Perhaps I can mend it . . . somehow."
"It's just a cup," she murmured, picking it up. "See, you can barely see the chip."
It went on the little shelf above the stove, where Belle could see it when she cooked, and sometimes Rumple used it when she made tea and they drank it in front of the fire after supper on cold evenings.
About three years after they were married, there came one of the harshest winters ever, with freezing cold temperatures, and snow piled in drifts against the tiny cottage. Rumple spun day and night, his slender fingers bleeding from constantly twisting the woolen fibers on the wheel for hours. But despite his industriousness, he sold very little of his thread in the month leading up to Christmas, for people were saving what little they had for wood and food for the holiday and to keep warm in the dead of winter.
Belle made plenty of tea and sold it alongside him in their booth at the market, but tea did not fetch the prices that some of her attar of roses perfume did. But no one was buying scents either, since such luxuries wee not needed by the villagers and the snow was so deep that it made the forest and passes down the mountain impassable for strangers to come through.
Belle shivered in their booth, clutching her blue woolen shawl to her, and blowing on her hands, which were encased in fingerless matching gloves, so she could handle the sachets and coins for the cashbox. "Rumple, how much thread have we sold today?"
The spinner shook his head. "Not enough, dearie, to make the rent for the month, I'm afraid." He had a soft woolen scarf in undyed ivory wrapped about his neck and mouth, but the wind's bitter chill still knifed through his tunic and threadbare cloak, patched and mended many times over, like his boots. He trembled a little, then rubbed his hands together and called out, "Get your thread and cloth here! The finest thread to be had east of the sun and west of the moon! Sure to brighten up any cloth or dress! Fine thread and cloth here!"
To his singsong chant, Belle added her own. "Sachets of rose petal tea here! Get some tea and enjoy a hot cup this evening! Good for colds and congested lungs! Get your rose petal tea here! Along with a free sample of attar of roses!"
A few people paused and went to look at their wares, exclaiming over the fine thread in all the various hues of the rainbow as well as the bolts of cloth Rumple had woven. But only two or three people dickered with him and bought something. It was the same with Belle, who sold a handful of sachets and gave away three small vials of her attar of roses in hope that the recipients would return and buy her perfume next time.
Finally, after hours of standing there and shivering every time the wind blew, Rumple said, "Why don't we call a halt, dearie, and take a break for lunch? We can walk about for a bit and look around, okay?"
"All right, Rumple," Belle agreed. "Walking will keep us warm, and I made enough to buy us two warm rolls with butter and some cinnamon hot cocoa."
Rumple put his arm through his wife's, and the two closed down the booth and walked through the stalls of their fellow villagers, chatting to some of them and admiring those things that caught their fancy.
Now there happened to be a travelling peddler there at the market that day, having just made it through the upper pass before it froze. On a cloth in his booth were spread out some pretty ribbons and brooches, chains, and combs. "See anything you like?" he queried.
Belle looked at everything, then she spotted a pair of ivory hair combs, carved cunningly in the shape of roses, with a tiny blue crystal in the middle of the flower. "Oh! Those are simply lovely!"
Rumple came to peer at them also, and admired the fine craftsmenship. "Yes, dearie, they are. How much?"
"Those? I couldn't take more than ten silvers," the peddler told him.
Rumple frowned. "Ten silvers! That's highway robbery, man! How about we make a deal?"
"No. No deals. Not for these," the peddler refused. "Ten silvers or nothing."
Rumple scowled. Ten silvers might well be the moon for someone like him, who made barely half that in a week and a half.
Belle touched his shoulder. "It's okay, Rumple. They're beautiful and I do like them a lot, but . . . we need food more than I need fancy combs."
Rumple smiled lovingly at his wife, then said regretfully, "I wish I could buy them for you, dearie. They'd look beautiful in your hair." He ran a hand gently through his wife's tresses, which were caught up in a tail by a simple blue string. He felt bad that he couldn't even afford these combs, and thought that if he were someone other than the cowardly spinner, Belle could have anything she desired . . . especially since Christmas was coming soon.
"They would . . . but what would a mere perfumer do with ivory combs?" Belle said, trying to make him feel better. "Wear them while I milked the goat? Or swept the hearth?" But she cast a longing glance at the pretty combs even as she spoke, unable to help wishing for them, just a little.
Once you would have worn them to a Christmas ball, dearie, Rumple thought sadly. Back when you were a knight's daughter and could look forward to such festivities. Before you became a poor spinner's wife. Then his eye was caught by a fine silver chain, such as a man would wear on feast days. He thought longingly of his grandfather's golden medallion, the gift from the king for his brilliant dye process, and how he wished he had a chain to string the medallion on and wear it. "Look, Belle! That chain . . . wouldn't it look fine with my medallion on it?"
"It would, Rumple!" agreed his wife. "Then you could wear it proudly and honor your grandfather." She turned to the peddler. "How much would you like for it?"
The peddler grinned and said, "Ten silvers and not a penny less, mistress. That's first grade silver, mined by the wee folk in Avalon."
Belle gasped in dismay. It would take her weeks to earn that much! "Sir, can't you—"
"Sorry, no deals. It is what it is."
"How . . . how long will you be here?" Belle queried.
"Oh through the Christmas season," the peddler said breezily.
"Belle, never mind him," Rumple said dismissively. "That's fine craftsmanship, but my medallion doesn't need a chain half as much as we need to pay the rent. Come on, dearie, let's get something to eat."
And he led her away down the row, though not without a longing glance back at the peddler's booth, and a wistful smile when he thought of how fine he'd look with the medallion around his neck instead of in his pocket.
Belle saw and thought how much she would like to surprise Rumple on Christmas morning with the chain, but she didn't know how she was going to be able to afford that price the peddler was asking. Christmas was barely a month away. But she had to try. She wanted Rumple to have something special for once, he worked so hard and never complained when people snubbed him and sneered at him behind his back.
I'll just have to work extra hard and make more tea and perhaps some potpourri as well to sell. Rumple deserves that chain, so he can wear his medallion, and I mean to see he has it! she thought determinedly.
Next to her, Rumple rubbed his medallion inside his pocket and calculated how much thread he'd need to spin and weave in order to purchase those hair combs for Belle. For he adored his wife and considered it a shame she had to go without something she really wanted. A husband should be able to provide something pretty for his wife, especially on Christmas. I'll just have to work longer hours and spin more thread, but I can't wait to see Belle with those ivory roses in her hair Christmas morning! Then she'll see that I can provide for her just as well as any knight.
They stopped at the baker's booth and bought a buttered roll each and a small cup of cocoa with cinnamon and a dollop of whipped cream on top, each imagining the other's face on Christmas morning when they opened their gift from one another.
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Rumple spun his fingers off all through the weeks before Christmas, spinning late at night when Belle thought he was asleep in bed beside her, making extra thread to sell on odd days at the market, when she didn't accompany him, so she wouldn't see what he was doing. And he rubbed his chapped sore fingers in glee as he put his extra coins in a small pouch and hid it beneath his mattress. Slowly but surely, it was growing.
Belle crushed rose petals in her mortar with her pestle until her fingers were raw and throbbing, making enough ground roses to use in small sachets for tea and little linen bags for potpourri. She did this while Rumple was out at the market, and sold her wares early in the morning, going from house to house in dawn's early light, and selling her sachets and potpourri bags to all the wives in the village and even the ladies up at the great manor house beyond.
And she giggled like a little girl when she counted her pennies and hid them in an old tea tin next to the chipped cup. Slowly but surely her horde was increasing.
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A day before Christmas came a cold snap that froze everything solid. Belle's roses, hardy and used to the weather, of a variety called Frost Blush, withered and died, leaving her with no way to make more tea or potpourri. She went and found them dead, and wept over them as the frost silvered the ground, for she was short three silvers of the asking price for the chain.
Now she would never have the gift for Rumple, and all her hard work had been wasted. Frustrated, she grabbed handfuls of her hair and ran her fingers through it agitatedly.
It was so unfair! She had been looking forward to surprising Rumple so much! And now . . . now she would have to find something else to give him. Angrily, she raked her fingers through her hair again, wanting to scream.
Then she heard a voice calling, "Henny Millner here! It's all the rage among the fine ladies these days . . . wigs made from real hair, to wear with their fancy dresses, dyed to match! A silver for a foot of hair! Make money right off the top of your head . . ."
Belle fingered her thick tresses again, thinking at how long her hair was, it fell almost to her waist. It was her one vanity, her shining dark auburn hair, like the last embers of a fire. Rumple loved to brush and braid her hair before they went to sleep, saying her hair was worth its weight in gold.
"A silver for a foot of hair!"
Belle stared at the thick strand of hair wound around her finger. Then she got an idea, and she rose and ran out the front gate, unmindful of the frost and the chill.
Page~*~*~*~Break
Rumple brought the pouch with all his extra earnings to market that morning. During his lunch break he would stop by the peddler's booth and buy the combs for Belle, since he'd asked the man to hold them for him that morning.
He bartered cheerfully for his thread all morning, unmindful of the cold weather and how it made his teeth chatter and his fingers stiff. None of that would matter once he had those combs and wrapped them and put them beneath the tree on Christmas morning.
At last he turned his sign around and went to find the peddler. As he walked through the crowded street towards the booth, two rowdy boys shoved him, almost knocking him down. As he went to one knee, struggling not to measure his length in the dirt, he cried, "Hey! Watch where you're going, lads!"
One boy snorted and cried, "Why don't you, you coward? Chicken Rumple! Bock bock!"
His companion laughed and then they ran away, leaving Rumple to get to his feet awkwardly.
Finally, he reached the peddler's booth and asked, "The ivory combs, you still have them, right?"
"Of course. Now do you have ten silvers, spinner?" The peddler's long nose twitched greedily.
"Right here," Rumple said, and went to reach into his breeches pocket for the pouch.
Only to find it was gone!
Horrified, he checked his other pockets, hoping that perhaps he'd misremembered and put it in another pocket.
But they were empty of everything save lint.
His money was gone.
"I . . . I've been robbed!" he stammered.
"You don't have the money?"
"I . . . I did . . . but now . . . it's been stolen."
"No silvers, no combs."
Rumple despaired. He'd so wanted to see Belle with her hair tucked up wearing those lovely rose combs, so fitting for her, who was as beautiful as her name and who loved roses.
His hand thrust into his vest pocket, where he always carried his grandfather's medallion. At least that hadn't been stolen. As his fingers clasped it, he thought suddenly that perhaps all was not lost.
"Wait. Let's make a deal. For this." Then he pulled the medallion out of his pocket.
Page~*~*~*~*~Break
Rumple arrived home and found a note on the table saying that Belle had a headache and was resting, so to please eat the pea soup with ham simmering on the stove for dinner and then come to bed.
Concerned, Rumple climbed the ladder to their loft bedroom and found Belle asleep with a kerchief over head. "Belle? Dearie, are you sick?" he asked tenderly.
But she was sleeping soundly and didn't even wake when he kissed her softly.
Smiling, he left her there and went downstairs to eat and wrap his gift. It would go under the little pine tree in the corner by the fireplace, which they had decorated with paper chains and strung popcorn, cranberries, and yarn stars.
He wrapped the combs in a bit of silvery cloth he'd saved from a larger bolt he'd woven and tucked it under the tree, noticing there was a package in brown paper already there.
He could hardly wait until morning, imagining Belle's face glowing with joy when she saw what he'd gotten her and how gorgeous the combs would look in her lush deep auburn hair.
Page~*~*~*~*~Break
Christmas morning:
Belle woke and stretched, reluctant to get up and leave her cozy nest of blankets beside her husband. But she wanted to get the fire started in the stove, so the room was warm when Rumple got up, and bake some sticky buns for his Christmas breakfast with their precious store of flour and sugar and crunchy pecans.
She kissed her sleeping husband lightly and then slipped from the bed, pulling on her thick woolen stockings and climbing downstairs to start the fire and get cooking.
Two hours later the little cottage was toasty and the heavenly smells of cinnamon and sugar and syrup and tea wafted up into the loft, waking up Rumple.
"Mmm! What smells so good?" he wondered, salivating.
He rose and pulled on his own pair of stockings and then climbed down the ladder to find Belle pulling a pan of sticky buns out of the oven, still wearing the kerchief over her head. He crept up behind her and grabbed her about the waist, planting a kiss on her cheek and calling, "Merry Christmas, Belle! And what a divine aroma to wake up to, dearie!"
"Rumple!" she squealed. "You sly sneaky beast! You almost made me drop my sticky buns!"
He chuckled wickedly. "I'd have still eaten them."
"Off the floor?"
"Why not? You clean so much you can eat off of it," he smirked, and kissed her again.
"Merry Christmas, Rumple!" his wife said, and then she kissed him back. "I've made tea and now let's eat while they're still hot."
"And after we'll open presents," he said, sounding as eager as a child.
Belle giggled and then began putting a bun on a plate for each of them, then filling up the chipped cup and her own stoneware mug with holiday spice tea she had made.
Their Christmas breakfast was delicious, sweet and satisfying, and they both couldn't resist having seconds and those they fed to each other, laughing like children as they licked sticky honey and sugar off each other's fingers.
Then after they'd washed their hands at the washbasin, Rumple went and said, "Now, Belle. Close your eyes and we'll see what Santa brought you this year."
Belle laughed and obediently shut her eyes. "Does Santa spin the finest wool in seven kingdoms?"
"Of course, dearie. Or rather, his elves do," Rumple chuckled, and then picked up his gift and brought it to her.
Belle opened her eyes and said, "But first I want to see you open your gift, Rumple." She went and grabbed the brown package from under the tree. "Here. We'll open them together."
"Okay, dearie. On three. One . . . two . . . three!" Then he unwrapped his gift, tearing the paper to shreds like a little boy.
He stared at the object in his hands. "It's . . . a chain."
"It's the one you were admiring that day at the peddler's booth, remember?" Belle smiled at him as she unwrapped her own gift. "Now you can put your medallion on it and wear it like you've always wanted." As her fingers undid the last of the paper, she gasped at what was revealed. "Oh, Rumple!"
For winking up at her were the ivory rose combs, with their sparkling blue jeweled centers.
"Do you like them, dearie? I think they'll look extraordinary in your hair, don't you?"
Belle bit her lip. Then she blurted, "They would . . . if I had hair left to put them in."
"What? What do you mean?"
Belle reached up and tugged off the kerchief. Her beautiful auburn tresses were gone, shorn off and her remaining hair was cropped down to her shoulders.
"Belle! Your hair!" Rumple gaped.
"I know. I sold it so I could buy you the chain, Rumple. I had to, since I didn't have enough money once the cold snap hit," Belle murmured. "So you see . . . I do love the combs, but . . ."
"Oh, Belle! And I love the chain, but . . . I sold my medallion to pay for the combs, since I was robbed on my way to pick them up," Rumple lamented. He held the chain in his palm, shaking his head.
Abruptly Belle burst out laughing.
"We're a piece of work aren't we? Me with my shorn head and you with no medallion. But hey, at least we still have each other, and that's what's really important."
"You're right," he agreed tenderly. "I thought that this Christmas would be memorable because we'd finally gotten each other they thing they loved most. But you know something . . . the thing I love most isn't a chain . . . it's you, Belle. And that's the best present ever."
Then he pulled her to him and kissed her until she felt her toes curl and her heart flutter like a thousand butterflies in her chest.
"And my best gift is you, Rumple. Now, forever, and always. I love you." Then she pulled his head down and kissed him back, reaffirming that her love for him was as strong now as it had been that first time they'd met at the market.
When she could talk again, Belle said, "Oh . . . and I do have one more surprise for you, Rumple."
"What, dearie?" he asked, playing with a small springy curl of hers.
She took his hand and put it on her stomach. "You're going to be a papa."
Rumple's eyes widened. Then he grabbed his wife and spun her around, laughing. The chain fell to the floor, unnoticed, as the two celebrated their very special Christmas in a rather unconventional manner before the crackling fire on a thick woolen blanket, each knowing that the best Christmas present they'd ever received wasn't a chain or ivory combs, but a wise and loving heart, and joy in each other . . . and the new life they'd created.
For such was the gift of the magi, a gift which they would in turn pass down to their children for generations to come, along with the true spirit of Christmas.
A/N: I've always loved O Henry's The Gift of the Magi, and so thought it was an appropriate little tale to retell with Rumple and Belle. Hope you all enjoyed it, and have a safe and blessed holiday season!
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