A/N This is my first attempt at Rumbelle. I noticed most fics deconstruct Rumple, and I wanted to give Belle a voice. Gold Dust Woman is AU of S4, starting at the scene where Belle sends Rumple into exile. It's my intention to post in drabbles. Big love to Wordslinger for pre-reading.
Blue sparks. I see so much blue that I nearly miss him, dark and angry, squeezing a beating heart in his hand, fingers like talons. A tree casts a shadow, sinewy branches, inside the clock tower and I can't stop looking at his hands; I'm transfixed by the way they clutch.
Dropping to my knees I crawl, vaguely aware of the elevator doors closing behind me, of Emma's voice, of Hook's strangled cries.
I can't stop to think. I can only move, crawl like a deranged quadruped. The rough wood scrapes my knees, and I crawl, crawl, crawl, silent and burning. My legs ache.
"Stop," I whisper but the words never leave my lips.
"Why can't I-" Rumple struggles with the heart, his hands tensing and releasing. "Why can't I crush it?"
I find my voice. "Because I commanded you not to."
For an instant, Rumple's eyes flash pure anger. Betrayal.
"Drop the heart." Somewhere from deep within, I command him. My voice doesn't break, and it should as the dagger quavers in my hand. "Drop the heart. Release everyone."
He exhales. Resignation curving his shoulders, I watch him wither before me.
"Now you can take us to the town line," I say, "because we need to be alone for what comes next."
"Belle...sweetheart?" His voice is a whisper, timid like water dripping from a faucet. He is just as relentless. "What are you doing?"
"No, Rumple." The dagger is still in my hand. He reaches toward me as if in supplication, but his eyes, reflecting silver, betray him. "I'm finally facing the truth."
How easily he could kill. Life means nothing to him; years of power have gnarled and perverted his heart. He is black coal.
"Your true love is your power." My back is straight but I'm crumbling. The illusion he'd created of love and security and happiness is purple smoke now, cloying.
"I- I like the power. I do. But I love you," he says, the lines around his eyes deepening as his forehead crinkles. "The power means that I can-that we can have everything."
Those eyes. They kill me; I can't look at them. Desire, greed, love, he wears his emotions in his eyes. But mine live in my belly, roiling and churning acid, shooting bile into my throat. My heart burns. "I only wanted you," I say, choking a sob. "I wanted to be chosen. I tried to be everything for you, Rumple...but I lost my way."
The sharp end of the dagger cuts through the moonlight, refracting a beam onto Rumple's chest. For a terrible instant, I imagine lunging forward, cutting out his heart the way mine's been sliced open. I want his chest to feel just as hollow, his lungs to constrict with every breath.
All this pain can't be mine alone to bear.
"Rumplestiltskin, I command you…" The words catch. He follows my gaze to the town line and back to the dagger. "I command you to…"
"Please, Belle," he whispers. "I love you. Please?"
"No!" I wail.
"I do, Belle. I love you; I swear it." Sobs muffle his words, and he drops to his knees, the phantom injury he'd suffered so long ago seeming to afflict him as his right leg teeters and then rests at an odd angle. "I do, Belle. Please don't send me away. I can't lose you."
I want to tell him that he already has. "You're a coward," I say instead.
He nods. "I know...but Belle, I can't lose you. I won't."
"Ah, but I have the dagger. The real one. There's nothing you can do to me."
His dark eyes blaze. "I'd never hurt you, Belle. Never."
"It hurts. Just breathing burns, Rumple. You've hurt me more than any spell could ever do. I'm a snail under your foot. Why can't you see it?"
He exhales sharply. "Sweetheart, please. I'll do anything. Tell me what you need, and I'll do it."
I shake my head. "This pain...I can't, Rumple. I need it to stop."
Somehow I'm beside him on the road. I don't even remember falling down, but I've curled myself into a tight ball as if to protect my most vulnerable places. I drop the dagger and it clangs, the chime reverberating through the silence.
"Take it," I spit. "Take what you want most." I'd always wanted to be a hero, but Regina was right after all: love is weakness. Rumplestiltskin needs to be sent away, punished, and I can't do it. I'd never been able to slay the beast. I couldn't even stomach hurting an ogre during the war-the very beast that robbed me of my mother. "Take it. Take your power."
"Belle?" Very slowly he rises and wraps his hand around the sharp end of the proffered dagger. Limply, I clutch the handle until I feel a tug. Once it's firmly in his grasp, I roll onto my back.
"Your true love." I'm laughing. There's a sense of sweet relief, almost cathartic, to see him as he is: a monster.
He turns it over and over again in his hand, his eyes wide and maniacal but his body wilting. I expect him to secret it away into the inside pocket of his overcoat. He doesn't, though. He pushes his long hair out of his eyes then lowers his arm, still clutching the hateful steel.
"My heart is full of love, Belle. But not for this dagger. It controls me, and I can't trust myself with it." He bends beside me and places it back in my hand. "Help me."
I can almost feel the steel buzzing beneath my fingers.
"This is a trick," I say, closing my eyes. "I won't fall for it. Not again."
His hand brushes my damp cheek. Trembling, his fingers hot, he whispers, "tell me what you need?"
"Take us home, Rumple. I just want to go home."
