He's sure that he's hearing something. It's the middle of the night and perhaps the quiet of the room is getting to him. Rumplestiltskin tends to be a sound sleeper, his magic taking care of keeping himself and the castle safe.
But the tickle under his nose won't stop and the weird sound of…something he can't quite identify…pull him out of his sleep little by little. His eyes open and for a moment he sees nothing. Nothing at all. But the tickling stops.
"Rumplestiltskin." The voice startles him and he finally sits up in bed.
And groans.
"Stan?" The damned octopus…again. As if he hasn't been doing enough damage, slipping into bathtubs, leaving him with images in his head of Belle that he cannot seem to erase, throwing things at him and generally making a nuisance of himself.
Worst deal he's ever made.
"No," Stan replies and the voice is strangely reasonable.
"Really? So I've taken on yet another annoying octopus at some point in the past, what, two hours?" Stan is ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. Curious about human nature in a way no octopus should be. He really should be rid of him. And soon. For his sanity. And for Belle's.
Ok, really for his own. He's sure that Belle is mortified by their latest encounter. She's gone missing more than usual, holing herself up in her library and covering herself almost from head to toe, as if he'll ever quite forget the images of her dripping wet and naked in her bath.
"Don't you recognize me?" He waves his tentacles around and makes some sort of odd noise. Rumplestiltskin is not sure if it's supposed to be a howl or a gurgle. He sounds like a banshee with a head cold.
"You're Stan. The octopus." Rumplestiltskin speaks slowly, as if this will somehow get Stan to stop this strange game of his.
The octopus heaves a sigh and Rumplestiltskin wonders exactly how the creature can manage such a thing. "Belle told me you'd know who I was."
"You're Stan," Rumplestiltskin repeats. It seems the octopus must have been hit with a stupid curse sometime during the night. He hasn't heard of such a thing, but there are curses of all kinds and all sorts of oddball magical objects that the creature could have gotten into.
"I'm Jacob Marley." And there goes that banshee with a head cold wail again. He's sure it's supposed to be a howl, but there's something wet and phlegmy and downright gross about it.
"Stop doing that," he snaps at him.
"Oh," Stan replies with. He stops at least. It's more than Rumplestiltskin expected, frankly.
Everything is silent for a moment. "What do you want, Stan?"
"Jacob," he reminds him and Rumplestiltskin rolls his eyes, though he's not so sure the octopus can see in the dark.
"Jacob," Rumplestiltskin says through gritted teeth.
"Oh goodie!" Stan says and he claps his tentacles together. The resulting squish turns his stomach and he is splattered with water but at least the damned octopus is happy. "I'm here to tell you that you are really quite a grump, Rumplestiltskin. And tonight you'll be visited by three ghosts…"
"Ghosts." He scoffs at that. If he means ghosts like this, then…well… "I can hardly wait."
"You should listen to them Rumplestiltskin." Stan attempts that voice again and fails, rather miserably he might add. "If you don't, you'll have chains as long as mine."
"Chains."
"Yes."
"Like yours."
"Yes."
"You don't have any chains," Rumplestiltskin points out.
Stan waves his tentacles around, one smacking Rumplestiltskin hard across the face. "Chains!" he shouts and then he slithers out of the room.
"Damned octopus," Rumplestiltskin mutters and crawls back beneath the covers. He's not quite sure he'll get any sleep. The blasted thing is likely to come back at any moment.
She hears her name shouted before she can even open her eyes. And then the door is thrown open and the lights come on.
"Where's your pet?" Rumplestiltskin asks and he sounds annoyed. Really annoyed.
"I have no…"
"That squid," he growls.
"Stan? He's an octopus," she points out. "What did he do this time?" Rumplestiltskin seems to be all in order. He's dressed, at least in his nightclothes. It's an odd site to see, his bare ankles and feet, the same strange color as the rest of his skin peeping out of his white nightshirt. He seems vulnerable somehow, even more so than when he stood naked before her after the whole bath fiasco.
"What have you been reading to that creature?"
"Oh." What else can she say, really? Stan has taken it in his head to bring a bit of…well…something…to Rumplestiltskin's life. "I didn't know he'd…"
"So you have been reading him something."
"He enjoys a good story." Belle tries to reason with him but there's one thing she knows about Rumplestiltskin and that is that he is not always reasonable, especially when he gets into one of those moods.
"Well, stop doing it!" He's out the door before she gets a chance to respond.
"I suppose it's too late now," she murmurs to the now-silent room. Stan will do what Stan wants. She suspects sleep won't come easily that night. Rumplestiltskin is bound to reappear after his next visit.
He's been trying to sleep but that's next to impossible, really. The stupid octopus is going to show whether or not he wants him to. He's barred the door, even used magic to keep him out, but something about the creature…well, such things just slide right off his back. Or whatever he has that counts for a back.
So instead he conjures up the damned book that Belle has been reading to him. He recognizes the story. It's not one he's read before but there's enough lore about it for him to be aware of it.
Three. More. Damned. Visits.
He's sipping tea when Stan next appears, the door flying open and the creature making his way stealthily into the room.
"Ah yes, and here's the Ghost of Christmas Past," Rumplestiltskin mutters and Stan's eyes quickly turn to watch him.
"You're no fun," Stan grumbles.
Rumplestiltskin notices that he's been decorated in some sort of…"Are those my sheets?"
"I'm the Ghost of Christmas past!" The sheets around him undulate and Rumplestiltskin just rolls his eyes.
"Yes, yes get on with it." The sooner he got this mess done, the sooner he could be to sleep.
"You once loved Christmas," Stan says.
"No."
The octopus is drawn up short. "What?"
"I never loved Christmas."
"But the book…"
"I am not in the book," he points out and he's sure he hears a bit of an annoyed grumble coming from the ridiculous octopus.
"But…"
"No buts…"
"You really never loved Christmas?" Stan sounds confused at this and Rumplestiltskin wonders if the land he's come from actually celebrates the stupid holiday. Do they have Christmas in the water? What a ridiculous thought.
"My father was a drunken gambler who spent more nights away from home than not. Christmas for him was 'Hey kid, sorry I gambled away all the money' and he left me with my spinster aunts." He doesn't mean to say so much. Stan is infuriating, but somehow he gets the words out of him.
"Oh," the octopus responds with. "But the spinsters?" His voice is oddly gentle in that moment and Rumplestiltskin sighs.
"They had little," he responds after a moment. "But they did their best." He remembers fruitcake that was often a bit stale, a sprig of holly, an extra bit of wood on the fire to keep them warm that night. It wasn't much, but they did what they could.
"So it wasn't all bad," Stan says and Rumplestiltskin glares at him.
"I suppose not." His voice is tight.
"And your son?"
Rumplestiltskin's eyes snap to Stan's. "What do you know of my son?"
"Belle said..."
"Belle said, did she?" His voice has turned sharp, the anger settling somewhere in the pit of his stomach. "Get out."
"But…"
"Get. Out." He waves one hand and the octopus disappears. The sheet remains behind, falling at his feet. As it settles, he finds he has to fight against the choking feeling in his throat.
Bae…his beloved son had loved Christmas. They never had much, but just the cheer of the holiday was enough for him. Rumplestiltskin saved up all year to afford something for his boy and the anticipation just about killed him. A wooden soldier one year, a leather ball another. Each toy had been cherished and loved, played with until they were frayed or worn smooth.
They hadn't had much, but they had had each other.
That had been enough.
"He's not taking it well, is he?" Belle asks Stan when he reappears in the Great Room. The octopus looks dejected, if one can describe such a creature as that. The sheet he left with to make himself look like a ghost has disappeared and he was brought to the room by magic.
"No."
"Hmmm…Well, we'll just have to set the stage better for the next one." This was Stan's idea, certainly. She had read the book, one that was as much a part of her childhood as any other. But he had taken it into his head that Rumplestiltskin was Scrooge.
She tries not to think about the fact that in the original story, his lost love is named Belle. There's a strange reasoning behind Stan's wanting to put Rumplestiltskin through these paces and she suspects it stems around her as much as anything else.
Stan brightens up at her proclamation. "We will!"
While he's been gone, Belle has been decorating the tree that Stan helped bring in for her, using his long gangly tentacles to pull the tree from the ground and prop it up in the corner of the Dark Castle. It's not the best or the prettiest and it's a little lopsided and tilted, but Belle manages to find random objects to decorate it with.
She hopes none are too terribly magical. If the tree disappears or half the Dark Castle gets swallowed by a portal, she'll have much to answer to she's sure.
He retreats to his tower. It's the only thing he can think to do in the wake of this mess Stan is creating. He's chased the damned creature off but he just has a feeling that he'll be back.
But he'll be harder to find.
Or so he thinks.
When a metal teacup hits him in the head, the sound reverberating through his skull, he realizes he's been found.
"Stan," he mutters before looking up from the potion he damned near ruined.
"I'm the Ghost of Christmas present!" Stan shouts and the words are easily heard above the ringing still in his ears.
"I don't recall the Ghost of Christmas anything hitting Scrooge over the head with a teacup." He gives a slight sneer and looks back down at his potion.
"No I suppose not," Stan answers. "Belle told me not to…"
"Did she now?" At least his maid had a bit of intelligence. "But you went ahead and did it anyway."
"You were ignoring me." Stan's voice sounds almost forlorn.
"Of course I was," he snaps back.
"Well, you can't ignore me all night," Stan points out.
"Want to bet?" Rumplestiltskin gives him a wicked grin and turns back to his potion. He can ignore Stan all night if need be. Until he finally tires of this and goes back to his tank.
Stan stares at him.
Rumplestiltskin pours a bit of boiling water into the potion.
Stan slithers closer to him.
Now where did I put those fairy wings? He searches the table. They were just there.
Stan leans closer, one large eye nearly up against Rumplestiltskin's side.
Ah yes, there it is. Fairy wings always were so elusive. Thin and easy to overlook. But he's got it now.
Stan sighs.
Rumplestiltskin cringes at the smell of his breath as it fans out across him. But he is resolute. He drops the fairy wing into the potion and watches it spark for a moment before it settles down.
And then Stan lets out the most horrifying caterwauling he has ever heard in his life. His hands come up and clap over his ears without his even being aware of it. But it doesn't cut back on the sound much. It's simply in his ears and nothing he can do can stop it.
"What the bloody hell is that?" he shouts above the din.
Stan pauses for a moment to speak. "The songs of my people." And then he starts up again.
"What will make you stop?" Dear Gods, anything. The sound is so gut-wrenchingly awful that Rumplestiltskin will simply give his entire life away if the octopus stops his screeching.
Stan stops. "You have to come down to the Great Hall with me." He sounds eminently reasonable and Rumplestiltskin starts to grumble under his breath. When the octopus opens his Gods forsaken mouth and takes a deep breath, he simply waves his hand and they disappear in a puff of purple smoke.
He's not sure he's ever had a more real threat in his life.
"You have to play along," Stan says when they rematerialize.
"I…" He takes a deep breath. "Fine." But he won't be happy about it.
"This is Christmas as it is happening right now," Stan says and waves a tentacle around the room.
His Great Room has been decorated. Or at least, so far as he can tell. There's a tree in one corner and there's still dirt clinging to the roots from where it was ripped out of the soil. "Is that Cupid's bow?" he asks.
"Maybe," Stan says.
The decorations all come from his castle, that much he is certain of. And he knows exactly who the culprit is.
Right now she's sitting at the base of the tree and looking quite forlorn. She has a book clutched to her chest and she's watching lights as they play across the tree. "I miss you Papa," he hears her utter and there is such despair in her voice that he forgets everything for a moment.
"Belle," he whispers and he starts to go to her.
A tentacle comes out and holds him back. "She can't hear you."
Rumplestiltskin turns to him, eyebrows furrowed. "Of course she can."
"We're like ghosts," Stan points out and Rumplestiltskin rolls his eyes. "You promised to play along."
"I gave no such…"
The damned octopus lets out a horrible screech and even Belle covers her ears. He can see a smirk breaking out across her face, as if she simply knew that the blasted octopus was going to be on about this. She's breaking character little by little.
"Stop!" Rumplestiltskin shouts.
Belle giggles.
This is bloody ridiculous.
Stan stops. "This is what your actions have caused."
Belle attempts to go back to looking somber. "Rumplestiltskin, why won't you celebrate Christmas with me?" Her voice is overly dramatic and it's all he can do to not roll his eyes. Or laugh. He's not sure which he wants to do and so caught halfway in between he does a little bit of both.
"It's all she wants," Stan says. "A little Christmas cheer. You're her only friend."
He doesn't like the truth in that statement. It's not how it should be, after all. Belle is vibrant, all that is good in the world. All that is good in his world if he is entirely honest with himself and he doesn't want to be. Not at all. But there she sits, looking sad and forlorn.
Though he does see the little twinkle in her eyes.
She'll pay for that later.
Maybe with some extra cleaning. He does think his dragonhide coat is in need of some work and that is a tough one to clean. She hates that one. So much so that he usually just uses magic to keep it clean. He'll make it harder on her this time, he swears.
"Come," Stan finally says.
Rumplestiltskin rolls his eyes and glances at the octopus. "What now?"
"I need to show you one more thing!"
"No."
"I'll sing," Stan threatens.
"Fine." Stan does nothing. Just sits there staring at him, his great big eyes watching. Belle is still sitting in her little corner near the tree and as he glances over at her, notices she quickly looks away. Rumplestiltskin lets out an annoyed sigh. This octopus is going to be the death of him. "And so we're doing what now?"
"Back to your room!" Stan nearly shouts the words and Rumplestiltskin rolls his eyes. There's a pause and then Stan points out the obvious. "You have to take us there."
"Oh but I thought that the Ghost of Christmas Present was supposed to be dragging me all over the place."
"But I don't have magic," Stan points out, ever reasonable.
"That's not the way the story is supposed to go."
"You told me you didn't read it." There's a pout in Stan's voice.
"I never said that," Rumplestiltskin shoots back.
From across the room, Belle giggles.
"Fine," Rumplestiltskin mutters and with a wave of the hand, they're back in his room. He doesn't see Stan right away but then a tentacle comes up and over his shoulder and the creature slithers closer to him. He tries to step away but Stan is strong, much stronger than he expects and while he knows he can simply magic the creature out of his room, he'll return anyway and so what's the point.
"This is your Christmas, Rumplestiltskin." And his voice is oddly serious.
Rumplestiltskin looks around the room. It looks like his room any other night. Fire dying in the hearth, tea set out, his chipped cup. "I see nothing out of the ordinary," he points out.
Stan stays silent.
There's a coldness to the room, Rumplestiltskin realizes. One tea cup, the chipped one, sitting on a table all by itself. It speaks to a sort of quiet loneliness.
With another wave of his hand he sends Stan away from his room and sits down in front of the cold hearth, sipping his equally cold tea.
"I think I'm getting through to him," Stan says.
"Really?" Belle's not so sure of that. Stan has appeared in the room and looks rather startled to be there for a moment.
"He didn't yell at me this time!"
Ever the optimist, Belle realizes. She has a bit of that in her too. Well, maybe a bit more than a bit if she's to be honest. She still doesn't know what exactly Stan is after here. If it's simply another way to torment the sorcerer, since he's gotten a bit more savvy to his object-throwing ways. Or if he's honestly trying to do something for Rumplestiltskin.
Either way, the results are amusing. She's still giggling on and off over the look on Rumplestiltskin's face when Stan opened his mouth to sing. If only her own off-key singing could get the sorcerer to do anything she wanted.
Not that it was that hard, really. She always seems to get what she wants. He puts up a fuss, but he does it. And lately he does it more and more without her even having to ask. He's warming up to her. She's sure of it.
"So Christmas future?"
Stan's big eyes just blink at her. "That does seem to be where it's going."
Belle smiles at the big lug.
"He won't like this one," Stan says.
"Are you going to sing to him again?"
"Should I?" He sounds like he's contemplating it for a moment.
"No," finally says. "I think he's probably had just enough of that."
"I really don't understand why you humans don't like our songs," Stan grumbles and crawls off.
Belle doesn't dare tell him that it's because it's utter noise and it's awful, an overly loud caterwauling. She can't pretend to love it. She's not that good of an actress. "Good luck, Stan!" she calls after him, but there's no response from the octopus.
He has his work cut out for him this time around.
Rumplestiltskin is still sitting in the chair, holding his empty teacup, finger on the little chip in it. When he hides it, he can almost believe everything is normal. That nothing has changed.
But then comes that familiar squishing noise and the door is thrown open. Stan doesn't do things in halves, after all. It's all or nothing for the octopus. He is loud and boisterous and a gigantic pain in his rear. And he knows he won't let this alone. "The Ghost of Christmas Future, I presume?"
"I didn't even get to make grand entrance." Stan sounds rather put out at that.
Rumplestiltskin turns half toward him and waves a hand. "Carry on then."
"I am the Ghost of Christmas Future!" Stan announces.
"You don't say?" Rumplestiltskin finally turns to face him and his face screws up at the sight. "What are you wearing?"
"We ran out of sheets."
"Yes but...where did that come from?" That is fuzzy. That looks like a snake covered in some sort of animal fur. That looks like a knitted nightmare. "Belle made it, didn't she?"
"I think it's quite fetching."
"I think it's quite a disaster," Rumplestiltskin shoots back.
"She was making it for you."
He would have choked on his tea had he had been drinking any. He has no Christmas present for Belle. He wasn't planning on celebrating the ridiculous holiday anyway. But she had made him something. A hideous something. A scarf he supposes. Or a boa constrictor made of fuzzy bits of yarn and…was that a bit of his gold thread not quite so carefully worked in? "Well, then…" he finally manages to get out.
"I'm here to show you your future Rumplestiltskin."
"Of course you are."
"I am."
"Of course. You're the Ghost of Christmas something or other."
"Future. Christmas future." Stan sounds exasperated again and Rumplestiltskin smirks. "Have you forgotten I'm a magical fortune telling octopus?"
"Oh, not for a moment." And his voice is dark with amusement.
"Well, good." Stan produces a mirror. Rumplestiltskin isn't even sure where it came from really. One moment there was nothing there, the next, there was a small mirror held in one of his massive tentacles. "Look."
The mirror swirls and Rumplestiltskin's eyebrows rise. "I thought you said you had no magic."
"I am a magical fortune telling octopus." Frustration. Quite evident really.
"Yes yes so you say but…"
"Look," Stan cuts him off with and Rumplestiltskin does as he asks. He doesn't even know why. He stares into the mirror as if hypnotized. He cannot look away.
The swirling finally stops and he sees a house. Not his castle, a house. Pink in color and unlike anything he's ever seen before. Made of wood, not stone. There's a woman coming up the walk and into the house and then the image shifts to the inside. There is no tree there, just two small stockings hung over a fireplace.
The woman kneels and he realizes he knows her. Belle. She's wearing clothing that he has never seen her wear, skirt short and he tries not to stare at the legs it reveals. And she's thin. Too thin. "Rumple," she murmurs and places something small, something he cannot see, in one of the stockings. "I miss you," she murmurs and he suddenly realizes that one of the stockings is his.
"She's left you," Stan says and he sounds sad. "You drove her away."
"I would do no such thing."
"Your quest for power was too much for her." Rumplestiltskin's eyes finally snap away from the scene in the mirror.
"Lies," he hisses. He wants to banish the octopus forever, maybe send him out in the cold and snow. It can't be good for such a creature. He's half a second away from doing it when Stan responds.
"No. Look," he says again and Rumplestiltskin finds himself drawn back.
He sees himself. He's alone. Somewhere. He doesn't recognize the place or time. He's wearing an outfit that looks like it was once of fine quality, but now is worn down. He's human, a face he hasn't seen in longer than he'd like to admit. He walks with a limp, leaning heavily on a cane. His hair is lank and damp against the sides of his face. He's clearly seen better days.
He watches as his mirror self stops in front of a store, glancing down at one of his hands. He pulls a ring off and shudders as he does so. "Oh, Belle," his mirror self whispers before walking into the store.
When the door shuts behind him, Rumplestiltskin swipes the mirror onto the ground, leaving it shattered at his feet. "Enough," he growls. "I have seen quite enough."
Without a thought, without a gesture, he banishes the damned octopus to an unused part of his castle. He can't quite bring himself to hurt the creature for he is Belle's friend. The two had really become quite close, as odd as it was.
And she would hate him if any harm came to the octopus at his hands.
So off he goes and Belle can wonder what has become of him. No doubt she's still waiting down in the Great Hall, wondering how this latest little thing went.
He doesn't know if any of what Stan reveals was real. He knows he's supposed to tell the future but so far the damned creature has been far off in his random reveals about what their future holds. And yet at the same time there was a strange, sad truth to the images that passed him by. It was a new world he saw them in and his future does indeed hold a new world. He knows this much. He can see the future too, though only in a sort of patchwork quilt, the pieces never quite fitting together correctly. But a new world is on the horizon as they will be ripped from this world and transplanted somewhere else.
He hasn't though how Belle would fit into that world.
But there she's alone, sad, apparently missing him.
Him. He really doesn't know if Stan can tell the future or not. He won't deny that the octopus does have some sort of magic. But he doesn't know if it's of his own doing or if he's somehow stumbled across a mirror that does whatever he wants. Sometimes mirrors can show you want you want. Not what is or will be but what you want it to show. If Stan wants to show him something like that?
Ah hell.
Rumplestiltskin doesn't even know what he's doing in that moment. He finds himself treading lightly downstairs as if he simply cannot help himself. It's not magic. Not of Stan's making at any rate, but he needs to go downstairs and he needs to now.
He finds Belle still there in the Great Hall. She's curled up by the tree just where she was earlier in the night. Asleep, book laid out at her side. When he squats down and lightly flicks her across the nose she startles, sitting up suddenly and knocking her head hard against his.
She cries out and holds her hand to her head before her eyes manage to focus on him. "Where's Stan?"
"Somewhere else," is all he says.
Belle sits up further and narrows her eyes on him.
"He's safe," he adds. "He's just…not here right now."
He knows she doesn't like the vagueness of his response but she finally nods. If he says he's safe, he's safe. She knows that Rumplestiltskin is a man of his word, even if he twists them in ways that he knows Belle disapproves of.
She doesn't respond and so he leans over, picks up the book that's laying at her side. "How does it end?" He's not actually sure he wants to know.
"With a change of heart." She says no more, though he watches, waits. Finally she speaks again. "But you know that."
"I do," he confirms. He knows the story. He knows it all too well.
"And so why are you here?" The words are whispered and he finds a small smile on his face.
"Because I want to be." He doesn't realize that until just that moment. Damn that octopus. He wants to be here. He wants to be at Belle's side. He wants the damned Dark Castle to be cozy…with cheer.
He stands then and leans over Belle, offering his hand to her. She stares at it. It might just be the first time that he has reached out to her. She does, and often. A small hand on his shoulder, a light touch to his hand, a hug when she thinks he's done the right thing against the odds of its happening. But he never initiates contact, preferring instead to remain aloof, unconnected.
She finally places her hand in his and he likes the warm weight of it, the feeling of her trust in him. He's sure it's misplaced, probably horribly so, but he likes that for that moment he has it. He draws her to her feet and she comes easily, standing next to him.
With a wave of his hand the room transforms. He doesn't watch it though. He can see the tree grow off to their side, can see the lights fan out across it. He can see out of the corner of his eyes the boughs of holly creeping up the walls and across the ceiling. He can see the lighting change in the room, the reds and greens and whites leaving a multi-colored glow as the chandelier high above them dims.
No, he only watches Belle. Watches the way her face lights up, her mouth opens in surprise, the way she turns away from him to watch as it all happens and yet doesn't drop his hand. The room smells of pine, of cinnamon. Another flick of his wrist and the table is set, fine china and silverware, a roast in the middle, and still that chipped cup next to his plate.
Belle finally steps away, releasing his hand as she walks to the table, spreads her hands over the cloth that decorates it. "Did you do all of this for me?"
He starts to speak, but closes his mouth. He doesn't know what to say, so he steps closer to her. She steps backward and he gives her a quizzical look. He steps toward her again and she steps back yet again.
And then another step and another until he rushes forward and grabs her lower arm and she lets out a giggle. A giggle. He can't quite imagine anyone giggling over finding themselves trapped by the Dark One.
He starts to sneer, all sharp teeth, ready to strike with his words when he notices her eyes drift upward. He realizes she's looked up in the moments before he grabbed her too, her eyes flitting up for just a second before coming back to meet his own. But now she stares, and there's that grin on her face, and she bites her lower lip in an unconscious gesture he's noticed many times before.
Looking up he sees what she's watching. There's a bundle of greens hanging there. He's sure his magic didn't place it. Belle might have hung it from the chandelier, though he suspects Stan, with the greater reach of his tentacles had placed it there. "What…is that?" he manages to ask.
He knows though.
Of course he knows.
"Mistletoe," Belle says. And she giggles again.
Damn.
"Mistletoe," he repeats.
She nods. "You know what it is." It's a statement and he suddenly realizes she's led him here.
"I do. This was your doing?"
"It was," she confirms and adds another bite of her lip for good measure. As if that weren't going to go to places he'd rather not think about at that moment. When did those leather breeches get so tight anyway?
The hand holding her arm loosens a bit and is she wanting what he thinks she's wanting? His eyes move to her lips, plump and parted and her eyes are half closed and yes…yes she does seem to want what he thinks she's wanting.
He hesitates. It's mistletoe. It doesn't mean anything. He pulls back slightly.
Belle makes a noise in the back of her throat. Frustration. And then she places her hands on his shoulder, leans up and kisses him. It's quick, just a soft brushing of her lips against his but it's like fire and he realizes he wants more. Before she can back away, he's wrapped his arms around her and brought his mouth back to hers and it is glorious.
He can't stop kissing her.
Not even if he wanted to.
And he doesn't.
Because she's kissing him back and her hands are entangled in his hair and everything is somehow perfect.
"I knew it would work!" Stan's voice comes from behind them and Belle jumps back with a squeak.
"You," Rumplestiltskin hisses, turning on the octopus. He doesn't know how he escaped from where he stuck him but apparently Stan is more resourceful than he thought.
"Oh, go easy on him, Rumple," Belle says and her hand comes back out to touch his arm briefly.
"Rumple, is it?" he says and he tries to sneer at her, but he knows that he most look like a besotted fool. She just gives him that look, one eyebrow raised, head tilted slightly to the side. "Fine," he grumbles.
She leans up and kisses him on the cheek and he reaches over to squeeze her shoulder. "Merry Christmas, Rumplestitlskin." Her voice is soft, sweet, not something he's ever imagined coming from anyone when speaking to him.
He cannot help the smile. "Merry Christmas, Belle."
Suddenly they are both engulfed in tentacles, shoved together and squeezed to within an inch of their lives. "Merry Christmas, everyone!" Stan shouts and really Rumplestiltskin can do nothing more than laugh.
This might just be the first Christmas he truly enjoys.