Okay, so second chapter. Finally! I forgot to put an author's note before but I remembered this time so here goes :) One: I do not own Once Upon a Time or any of the original fairy tale characters and Two: I don't think anyone would pay me to piss on this story let alone read it so you know I'm not making any money from this fanfiction. In the last chapter i really wanted Cinderella's scene to be rewritten because i thought it was pretty dumb how easily Prince Thomas just forgave her for essentially selling her kid. Anyway, here's chapter 2, Rumpelstiltskin's birth, feedback is greatly appreciated. It's a little longer than chapter one and I worked hard on it, but tell me if it sucks okay. I'd really like to improve where i can. I'm in nursing School so updates may be slow, for a little while longer but the semester's almost over, so then I'll be able to devote more time to you all. ;) Hugs and love! And Review please!

Golden boy

"This baby isn't going to wait for your husband to get here m' Lady, it's coming fast, you'll need to start pushing soon."

Hickory leaned over her cringing, sweaty, charge with concern, mopping her brow with a damp cloth.

"Please," Dora pleaded, through clenched teeth. "Can't you give me something? An Herb or Elixir to, slow the delivery? I don't want him to miss the birth of our eldest."

The short, round midwife shook her gray head.

"No, my dear, we cannot risk anything adversely affecting your child at this point," she tucked a lock of dark brown hair behind Dora's ear soothingly. "You had a difficult pregnancy my Lady, a long and arduous one, and it may be your natural instinct to try and regain some semblance of control over your body, but you have to let the child come at its own pace."

The red faced mother -to -be looked conflicted for a moment and then nodded stiffly.

"Whatever is best for my child, Edward will have to meet his son a little later than me."

"Oh? So sure it's a boy are we?" The Lady Isadora D'or and Hickory looked up to see the midwife's husband and son walk in carrying a case of instruments. Hickory brightened at the sound of his voice.

"Dickory, Husband. You have arrived, and with our eager son in tow."

"Yes my dear," Dickory set his tools on the table and leaned over to give his wife a kiss on her brow. "You know I can never keep him away from births; bringing children into the world is one of his favorite pass times." He gave the princess a wink and studied her briefly.

"Well, well, it looks like someone is finally ready to meet the world." He laid a soft chubby hand on her stomach as another contraction ripped through her.

"Aggghhhh!" she screamed and gnashed her teeth together.

"Shhh," he soothed. "Let it come, it's just your body's way of telling you it needs help delivering the child." He reached down and pulled a pair forceps and a stethoscope from his kit. "You need to push now, my Lady. Are you ready?"

"She'll have to be." Hickory said, answering for her. She lifted the sheet and looked down at the princess's swollen bottom half. "The child's head is crowning." She flipped the sheet up completely to expose the birth canal and urged the princess to sit up.

"Now, my beautiful princess, Lady without compare, I need you to sit up now, yes, yes that's it, and bear down when the next contraction comes. Do you understand?"

The princess nodded fearfully.

"Yes, yes I understand. I just, I wish that Edward were her right now. I need him."

Tears began to well in her eyes as she prepared to bear her child without her husband.

"There, there dearest, I know this is difficult, but there'll be plenty of time for a good cry later, right now, we need to concentrate on the task before us."

Dora sniffed and reached for Hickory's hand, "I feel another contraction coming." She turned towards the elderly dwarf. "I don't know if I can do this alone." She confessed softly.

"But you are not alone my dear," Said Dickory kindly. "There's me and Hickory, our eldest boy and that bundle of joy fighting to come out of you. Your husband will be here soon enough, but until then, you can make do with us for company." He patted her hand affectionately and moved to kneel at the foot of the bed. "Now get ready, here comes that contraction, and push!"

Dora squeezed Hickory's hand tightly and, gritted her teeth pushing with all her might.

"Yes, yes, very good. Again Dora. Push!"

"Unnggghh!" She pressed again and felt a shift below. "What happened?"

"You've cleared the child's head my dear, and a fine head it is, now another big push like that and we can get the shoulders."

"Yes, alright." She said determinedly, spurred on by this sudden burst of progress.

"My, boy come here and take the forceps, we may not need them after all, make sure the water isn't too hot and that the scissors are properly sterilized."

The bespectacled and demure young man nodded, took the instrument from his father and went to prepare the tools for the post birth.

"And again Lady Dora, Push!" He reached down and gently touched the child's neck, checking for the chord or obstructions. "Yes, you've almost got the shoulders now, push!"

She gave one final shove with her pelvis and felt her child slide smoothly out of her. The young man cut the cord immediately and expertly and set about cleaning the blood and vernix from the child's body.

"What is it? Is it a boy? Oh tell me please." Dora begged reaching desperately for her new born.

"My dear girl, your afterbirth is coming quickly too, let our Doc tend to the child's immediate needs and make him presentable for his father, while you take care of this last thing. Alright?"

She acquiesced reluctantly and craned her neck to see what Doc was doing to her child.

"Okay my Princess. One big push should do it, are you ready?"

A cry pierced the air suddenly, her child's paramount cry as it took its first gulps of air. She looked longingly over at the table where Doc was busy clearing the child's airways of any mucous and sprinkling fairy dust into his eyes.

"Now, now, just concentrate on this my dear, come on push." Hickory said from her place beside the bed. "Your child's lungs are well and strong, now push."

Dora tore her eyes away from her new baby and bore down for one last time. She heard a squish and a pop, like someone had burst a flagon of wine.

Hickory gasped next to her. "Oh, my Lady…"

"Now my dear don't be alarmed, but I must ask you to not look down, do you understand?" Doc cautioned.

"What?" She asked panic stricken. "Did I push out the entire placenta? Is there something wrong?" She sat up, against the advisement of her doctor and midwife and did the thing she was just asked not to. She looked down. And she saw. And she immediately fainted back into the down pillows.

The last thing she heard as the room darkened around her was Doc's muffled voice breaking through her haze of exhaustion and shock.

"Father, it's not just the after birth, you must come and look at this child…."

Warped and distant voices surrounded her, someone was whispering. They sounded familiar but odd, strained perhaps. Dora struggled to regain consciousness and open her eyes but sleep was like a dark blanket covering her. She couldn't lift it, but she could make out some of what the voices were saying.

"…well at least it's a boy and not a girl"

"….not natural…"

"I thought it was jaundice at first but then… when I saw…."

"I knew something was wrong…"

"What should I tell her?"

"….bless it anyway?"

"What gift….it's useless blue fairy."

"Give it something…"

"That skin…"

"And his eyes..."

"…monster…"

Dora struggled against the bonds of repose and forced her eyes to creak open to reveal a darkened room and its seven other occupants.

"My son," she croaked weakly. "Where is my son?"

Edward was at her side in moments and took her hand in his.

"My love, you're awake."

"Edward, our son, give me our son, he must be hungry. I need to feed him." She pushed herself up in the bed and looked around at the other persons in the birthing chamber.

Hickory, Dickory and Doc, were sitting by a bassinette that she had made from reeds and willow branches, the blue fairy was hovering by the door, her husband was looking at her worriedly and her father in law sat in a chair in the corner, looking quite grave and solemn.

"What is it?" She asked looking around at them all. She felt her heart constrict and her throat grow tight.

"Is he…dead?"

Edward looked up at her sharply.

"No." he said firmly. "No he's not dead."

She breathed a sigh of relief and reached towards the bassinette.

"Then for God's sake bring him to me, I want to look at him."

All of the others exchanged looks of trepidation.

"Perhaps," Doc said quietly. "We should prepare you first."

"Prepare me for what? Just give me my child, you said it earlier, that he was healthy and strong. Has that changed?" She looked at Hickory expectantly.

"No, no your highness." She said flustered. "But…"

"My son." She held her arms out to Dickory expectantly.

The old dwarf rose and lifted the squirming bundle out of the bassinette, gingerly handing him to his mother.

Her eyes lit up expectantly as she gently lifted the swaddling cloth obstructing her child's face, but what she saw, made her shriek in horror.

"What…what?"

She looked down at her son, too dumbstruck to speak, to ask the questions everyone knew she so desperately wanted to. What is this child? How did I give birth to such a son?

"My dear," Edward said gently, after a painful silence. "Say something, please."

"He's…yellow." A collective cringe rippled throughout the room.

"Not yellow," The fairy corrected gently. "Gold."

Dora reached trembling fingers towards her child's lips, and traced them slowly. His eyes cracked open a bit as he drooled on the offered digits.

"His eyes, they're gold too, and so large, like an animal's" Dora said hazily.

"It's alright Dora; everything is going to be alright." Edward said stroking her face.

"I know it is." She said firmly, and snapped her gaze toward the fairy godmother.

"Blue, if you haven't bestowed your gift yet, I would like you to cure my child of this hideous malady. Give him the skin he should have, and rid him of this dragon hide that covers his body."

The fairy shrunk back a little, and looked away.

"I thought that you might ask for that, so I already tried. But, it seems that his appearance is permanent."

Dora blinked and looked at her evenly.

"You mean that my son will look like this, for the rest of his life?"

"Yes," she said softly. "He will."

Dora stilled once again, and withdrew into herself saying nothing until she began to slowly mumble under her breath.

"We prayed every day for so long, for a child that would bring prosperity, and instead we are gifted this, this, thing."

"Dora dear try to get some rest, we can talk about this when you're well." Edward gently pushed her back down onto the mattress and reached for the boy. "Give me the child, dear."

She blinked and handed him the bundle rigidly.

"Yes," she whispered. "Yes take it away. I neither want to look upon it nor hold it to my breast."

The Blue fairy floated over to the bedside sheepishly.

"I know I could not give you the gift you wanted, but if you tell me the child's name, I shall bestow on him another fine bequest."

Dora stiffened and turned to fix Blue with a Hollow stare.

"That thing does not deserve a name." The room grew hushed once more.

"My dear," Edward said, voice pained and cracking. "You cannot mean that."

"Oh, but I do. We wanted a son, not this twisted creature, you may call it what you will, but I will have no part in the naming of that changeling babe that wormed its way out of me. I will not."

King Rumpold rose; his chair creaking.

"Edward, I must speak to you outside, now." He shuffled out as his son reached for his wife's hand only to grasp air as she yanked it back angrily.

"Your Royal Father summons you. Go."

He shot her a mournful look and trailed out after the king, leaving the uneasy atmosphere in the small house, to be enveloped in the cool evening air.

"Edward," his father said, not looking at him. "What I'm about to say is difficult."

"Father, just tell me plainly, I can take no more of this "gentle talk" and I need to return to my wife."

His father sighed and looked up into the darkening sky.

"That's just it my boy, she won't be your wife for much longer."

A beat, then.

"What do you mean she won't be my wife anymore? What knowledge do you possess that I do not? Is she dying?" He asked incredulously.

"No, no." the king shook his head firmly. "She will recover. Physically anyway." He played with a bit of loose thread on his doublet absently and spoke again.

"But very soon your marriage to that girl will be dissolved by royal decree."

The prince's face darkened with rage as he advanced on the king.

"You would annul my marriage? Abuse your power in this way? On what grounds, on what authority…."

The king cut him off.

"The child within is reason enough." The prince opened his mouth to speak again but the king continued. "That child, the way he is, cannot be an effective leader for our people, the duty of the future queen is to produce viable heirs to the throne, and your wife," he spat, harshly. "has just proven that she cannot perform the only royal duty she has."

The princes shoulders sagged and he shook his head in disbelief.

"Father, you wound me more than any sword ever could." And then. "I will not let you do this, I will find a way to love that boy and be the King this kingdom deserves"

"Oh?" the king scoffed, tugging at the offensive thread. "And just how will you do that."

"By taking responsibility." Edward said as he strode purposefully towards the carriage. He unhooked the lead horse and saddled it swiftly.

His father spun around as fast as his old bones could take and hobbled over to the prince.

"Just what the devil do you think you're doing Edward?"

Tight lipped and determined, he answered. "I'm going to the forbidden forest father."

The King sputtered in disbelief.

"Why in heaven's name would you want to willingly venture into such a dark and desolate place?"

The prince stroked the horse's mane thoughtfully.

"For my family."

The king looked at him stone faced, saying nothing

"If a good fairy can't fix my son, then maybe a dark fey can." He tightened the saddle and swung up onto the horse. "They live in that forest, and if I can trade with one, I can right all the wrongs done to this kingdom."

"My boy," his father said alarmed. "Do not be foolish, you can never truly know the price they ask of you, and if you take what is offered you may lose more than you were willing to give up."

Prince Edward looked down at his father from horseback and shook his head.

"I must make my own decisions now father, and as you leave me no choice when it comes to Dora, I must go." He nudged the stallion with his heel and moved into a slow trot.

He called back as he rode off.

"Tell my Isadora." He paused. "Tell her…that I will return when I have succeeded in my venture. Tell her that I love her, and our son. You can do that for me at least, father."

He watched his son gallop off into the night.

Yes, at the very least, he could relay this message, this promise from his boy, but he never did, and the Prince Edward, did not return.

Yay! Chapter two. BUM BUM BUM! Where is Prince Edward. *Sigh* Wouldn't you like to know? Next few chapters will be about Rumpy's childhood. So review to encourage me to update. :)