Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
Summary: AU, Belle is Rumpelstiltskin and Baelfire's maid from The Return.
Prompt: ... and Thou a Lamb; Rumpelstiltskin gets a glimpse; Met up at midnight at the hanging tree
"Belle," he says, "Belle of the Southlands."
The maid's hands freeze, fingers curling around the boar's bristle brush she'd been using to scrub the wood floor, and in that silent moment, the room shrinks and grows hot instantaneously. Belle had yet to break a sweat from her efforts at scrubbing his fine floors, but she can feel the heat, just bellow her skin, in her veins and her blood, still dry and hot, not yet water dripping out her skin. It will change at any moment, and her head throbs with it, the dry sweat and pounding blood.
"Quite a name you made for yourself, in so short a time, hm?" He strides over, hands in the heavy pockets of his traveling cloak. His boots clank, and vaguely she thinks to scowl at him for tracking dirt where she's already cleaned. Silly thought, that. "How many died?" he asks.
"I don't know," Belle says, quietly, hands still frozen, and she can feel the wiry hairs from the wild pig, a few bent and poking out at odd angles from the base of the scrubbing brush.
"Scores?"
"Scores," she shrugs, "hundreds? I know not."
He bends at the waist and examines her, when Belle neither accepts his eye, nor moves at all, he straightens, "Shame what happens when war machines go awry. Killed the world famous inventor and his daughter they say," he walks slowly to his writing desk and leans against it, "strange then that I should find myself employing one such who fits that very description." Rumpelstiltskin makes a tsk-ing noise, shaking his head, "So, out with it, what have you to say for yourself? Just exactly how were you so fortunate as to escape that untimely end?"
"It was my fault," she says, and there's a release to it—someone finally knowing. "I was a coward," Belle says, staring straight ahead. "I was a coward, and I ran."
In her youth, Belle had watched the clerics and maunts transcribe their holy scriptures, one harvest's time, long, long ago. Her father had been sent a summons to service the support beams of a monastery deep in the mountains, leagues below the ground, below even where the dwarves dwelt. She'd been lucky enough to travel with him, after much begging and pleading with her mother.
She'd watched them write, the saintly scribes, not sentence by sentence, nor word by word, but rather by the letter. Letter by single letter, to ensure that the pages remained exactly the same, the meaning never changing, transcending time out of mind and followers innumerable.
That's how she speaks now: the words pouring out, without emotion, without emphasis, simply words, meticulous, completely focused and without pause. Like the novitiate authors: look up, note the letter, dip the quill, write it, check it, pause, breath, do it all again.
Look, dip, write, check. Again. And again.
And again.
And again.
And again.
She tells him of her father's machine, (their machine, really), their magnificent machine. She tells him of when her father had still been the world famous inventor, and she, his assistant.
She tells him of the arrival of the Duke of the Frontlands, come to help the Duke of the Southlands with his war campaign, and more so, interested in their magnificent and silent machine of war—what was to be the undoing of the ogres.
She tells him of the malfunction, the explosion in their workshop, down in the gutted wine cellars below the castle walls, how it blew a large chunk from the castle wall. She tells him of the Dukes' anger at the mishap and of their loss of faith in her father's abilities.
That's when the Duke of the Frontlands—Hordor was his name, Belle recalls—though up a solution to the problem. She tells him of the Duke's plan.
They could never place so much stock in the machine, when they had so much to risk in the war, when the thing had already backfired once. Maurice had assured both Dukes that machine would be sound, would be the factor that would turn the tide of the war to their favor in fact.
She tells him what Hordor says next. Then, the Duke of the Frontlands asked how sure.
The inventor said he'd bet his life on it.
The Duke had smirked: "Your life perhaps," he turned to Belle and added, "but what of your daughters?"
She tells him of the Duke's plan, to send the daughter of the world famous inventor to assemble and test the first device, while the father stayed behind to finish the rest. She would see how well it performed in actual battle, how well it ran when what the inventor loved most lay on the line.
She tells him how she left (though not who she rode behind, and of the heartfelt farewell Gaston bid her when he helped her down from his mount), how she came to the battlefields, how she watched on the transplanted crow's nest serving as the runner's outcropping. She tells him how she'd climbed up and watched as ogres worked to acquire a taste for table manners—that they did not simply kill their captives, rather they feasted on them, made an art of ripping limb from torso, sucking down blood and entrails, cooking over open flame the more tender cuts.
She tells him then of her fear: Belle did not want to die this slow, torturous death.
She tells him how she built. Slow going work, every day, she assembled the machine, the silent din of metal buffeted by strong arms (sometimes arms that frightened her).
It took a month.
She tells him of the water, how they added brimstone to fill the soldier's stomachs, to better keep down the rations. She tells him that she was spared these actions, that she had access to a supply of clean water.
"How?" Rumpelstiltskin asks, breaking her from her trance.
Look, dip—freeze.
Drip-Page ruined. Start over.
Belle looks up sharply at the Dark One, "A deal." She scoffs, "not that I understood it at the time."
Fresh parchment. Write, dip, check. Again. And again.
And again.
(And again, and again, and again. Every night. Again. Except that one night, when they'd brought the amputee to the doctor's tent in the middle of the night, a cloth in the injured man's mouth to stop the screams—mustn't wake the ogres—and he'd scurried from bed. As a last thought, he turned back, "Well don't just lie there. Get up and help me." She'd held the man down, as the blood dripped from where his leg used to be, bite marks the size of her fist visible, as visible as the red on white bone. She'd held him until he'd gone unconscious from the pain of the hot metal: the cauterizing. Afterward, exhausted, the man sleeping fitfully on the cot on the ground, she'd made to leave, but the doctor had grabbed her wrist with the same disinterest at which he'd remembered to beckon her help. He'd led her unfighting to bed, and they'd slept in a sweaty, dirty heap, the sleep of the dead—the only night she ever passed in his bed where they only slept.
The doctor had known the horrors of the slow death as the ogres pick you apart, looking for the juiciest morsels. A deal he'd offered—a death, at the time of Belle's choosing, by her own hand—and a deal she'd taken.
She tells none of this).
And again.
She tells him of the testing on her war machine, how it had worked, silent and far-reaching. How they had sent word, with the aide-de-camp (the self same boy she'd seen when she'd neglected to knock at the entrance to the captain's tent and the doctor had laughed at her naïveté, oh, how he had laughed at her mistake) back to Avonlea, to the Dukes and her father.
She tells him how another month or two passed and the wagons finally arrived, with her father's armada of finished war machines, twins to hers, already assembled for the most. It had been a cavalry of sorts, and it had only taken a day to line them all up, on the front lines, quiet as nursemaids, and Belle, Belle exhausted from the assembly, exhausted from sleepless nights, had near on feinted in the evening. Her father, when the finishing touches were almost ready, sent her to sleep in the wee hours. "Dawn'll be here soon, my girl, and then we'll have a real show. Can't have you falling asleep for that."
She'd agreed, because he was her father, and she could be a child again, in a place where she'd been full grown, a woman and a spent one at that, so she slept the sleep of the dead, alone in her own tent, and woken to the dawn, bright and cold. After stretching, she'd rolled over, grabbed the ladle from her water bucket, from the doctor's clean supply, just another part of their dealings, put it to her parched lips—
She remembered.
She tells him, how she'd dropped the ladle, (tripped over it) as she'd raced from the tent, making noise, and not caring, not caring at all, that sound carried far to sensitive ogre's ears.
She tells him how she'd seen her father, balancing the ladder the aide-de-camp stood upon, pouring water into the radiator, and from there, still far out and running, she could see her father smiling. She'd screamed to stop, for all of the them to stop pouring the bad water, the brimstone-tainted water, into the twins, triplets, veritable multitude of machines.
Only they can't hear her. Only the ogres can hear her.
Her father had raised his arm, when he finally had noticed her, to wave, and then the explosions began.
All along and down the line. Fire Chaos, blood. Destruction.
She tells him of the aide-de-camp, head smashed upon a rock, beside her father's arm. She tells him of her father's delirium, and of the cauterizing, deep in the woods, of how she'd stolen goods in the midst of a camp in disarray, fighting ogres from miles and miles around, while fighting each other over whether to bury or simply burn the dead.
All so loud, none could hear the silent disappearance of the Inventor and his daughter.
Check. Close book.
"Every machine?" he asks, finally breaking the silence that has fallen between them since the woman had finished her tale. She nods once. He makes a shocked noise in the back of his throat and her head shoots toward him. He opens his mouth to explain himself, but closes it again—there's nothing to be said.
"All of them—and their men with them." She looks him straight in the eye for the next part, and does not stop until she's spoken her peace, "Because of that, they began to use children—I wouldn't learn that for months, but it happened. Because of me."
They stare, and then, in a flurry of movement, she tosses the brush into the bucket of soapy water. It splashes out onto the floor. "So what are you going to do to me?" Belle asks, and her face appears like stone, but like those he took shelter beneath while on the run, supple and beautiful, despite their lack of warmth. He doesn't answer her right away, and she rubs her fingers against one another. They've wrinkled from the water.
"Do?" Rumpelstiltskin replies, all sarcasm and mock surprise. "Why I'll keep you well away from explosives, for one."
She turns to look at him, out from under her little bonnet that he'd magic-ed for her that first day she began serving him—that seems so long ago, and longer ago than the war (for that seemed forever near, only a day, an hour, a moment past), and the girl looks completely confused, not understanding him in the least, "I don't understand. Aren't you angry?"
He shrugs, "A bit, but then," he adds lightly, "I'm always a bit angry."
"You're letting me stay," Belle says, finally comprehending his meaning, "but why?"
He shakes his head at her and says in exasperation, "It's a done deal, dearie, you killed children, but not mine, and those that did die were hardly your fault at that," he says, and it's true enough. "You work hard, and I'm in need, beside, now that I know your secret, it seems you rather owe me a debt to the keeping of it. A wise thing, that, to have one's hired help indebted—makes disloyalty, shall we say, out of the question," the last he says with a certain flair of theatricality, and it's that last that reassures her she's in no danger today, from the wrath of the Dark One.
It shocks her, this sudden kindness.
His kindness always shocks her, for it comes completely out of nowhere, unwarranted, and often unearned—there's an absolution to it, a catharsis, and what's more, from the least likely to parcel it out.
"How did you know?" she asks, rubbing each sore wrist, from the afternoon's scrubbing, and before that a morning's work in the garden (her mind's in a tangle, and she knows not what to do but rub her wrists).
"You came in from the south," He says, as he slips off his traveling cloak, hangs it on the wall, and takes a seat, to pull off his boots, one by one. "Wasn't too hard to follow your past stops. You're new at running," the spinner looks up at his maid as he explains, "but for me, well, it's been my life's work, you could say." He watches her, watching him, before finally biting out, "Don't just sit there, haven't you work to do?"
She gets to her feet, wiping her pruny hands on her apron. "The laundry needs doing," she says, and walking over toward the door, she pauses near him. "You wear that the whole time?" she asks, inclining her head toward his garments.
Rumpelstiltskin gives her a frown, and exhaling a half-hearted growl, waves her off, "You can see to it next time."
Belle nods and with the laundry basket hitched up on her hip, leaves for the river, grabbing his traveling cloak as she goes.
In her absence, the old spinner sits at his desk for a few moments before the restlessness begins. He thinks over the story, nothing shocking—nothing he'd not already known.
It had been simple enough to follow her trail backward, find those who recalled the strange description of a man missing an arm and out of his wits, accompanied by his beautiful daughter with the sad, striking eyes. He'd followed the trail to the edges of the Southlands, and by that time he'd heard the tale of the two lost souls: Belle and Maurice of the Southlands.
Angry, she'd asked.
Aye, at first—livid, in fact, but the more he learned, the more her past became clear, the more he realized she'd not been at fault for the deaths of all those children who came after, who almost included his own Baelfire, but rather, she'd been the first. The very first child whose innocence and blood came to rest at Hordor's feet.
If only he could bring the man back to kill him a second time.
While he changes out of his dusty travel clothes, he thinks over the other reason for his journey, his other search for answers. That, unfortunately (but not unexpectedly) had revealed no new information. Sitting down again, he wonders what he'll do about that—perhaps to the waters of the west? Yes, that would be his next destination.
Rumpelstiltskin opens one of his worn maps, and marks the dead ends and circles his new targets. As he looks at the map, however, his eyes stray to the south, and he wonders just where exactly the battle had been waged. He finds Avonlea (not easy, considering the large amount of cities and towns with names that begin with "A" but his reading's steadily improving and he finally spots it). He wonders, scanning the areas surrounding the city kingdom, where about her little farm lay.
Drumming his fingers absently, he decides that she'd been right, his clothes did need a wash after all, and best not left until the day next, very unwise that. He hastily rolls up the scroll and gathering up the clothing, he heads down to the river.
However, when Rumpelstiltstkin arrives at the usual spot in the river, where they wash, he finds no one. Frowning, he assumes she's gone downstream, for up, he'd likely have seen her while walking—though as to why, he can hardly imagine.
He follows the hillside which borders the river, taking his time, trying to think of the best way to give over the clothes and ask for her to point out her home on the map without either appearing to be a request, when something catches his eye.
He looks up and freezes instantly, where he stands.
A line of clean linens separates them, she and the river still a good distance off, but even where he stands—stock still—he can see that Belle of the Southlands, his little maid, stands in the river completely naked as the day she was born.
Rumpelstiltskin watches as she bathes, washing her face, legs and arms. He watches—can hardly look away—as she stretches her arms and back. She must be sore, he thinks, from the scrubbing.
The warm wind blows, every so often catching one of the cloths on the line, hiding her again from his view. The wind is warm now, and he realizes it's well into summer now. Belle's been with them a season.
Despite the line of clothing, he sees all of her: her back, her breasts, her flat stomach, her calves that he truly does enjoy watching when she climbs and descends the ladder rungs, her knees, thighs, torso, and neck, and when she bends at the waist to wash her hair, he's struck by the appeal to it, as he always is, when he sees her without her usual cap.
Once finished, she sits on the river's edge. Her hair curls as it begins to dry, and still he watches her, appraises her, like he would a batch of sheep's wool to be woven, or a strip of Bae's thread, now that he's begun to learn the art of the spinning wheel.
Her skin hangs off her bones, he notes, in a tired manner, tired as the rest of her, he imagines, as tired as her keen mind (for he's learned that much about her in their time together and from his investigations—she's no fool, his maid). Her shoulder bone juts out at a sharp angle, and that's it, Rumpelstiltskin realizes: she's sharp and angular, skinny to the point of unhealthy (a point he well-knew, though only he, never Milha, and certainly never Baelfire).
In that moment, watching her in the sun, feet in the water, naked and glorious, he wants to feed her, to fill her.
He wants to fill her skin, fill it with fat, fill it with life, the life that positively flowed from her (flowed out her so fast she hardly knew it, too busy feeling death and debt that remained behind in her loose skin), and of course, she's scarred (he wants to run his fingers over them, but imagines she'd not appreciate the calluses).
She's scars all over her beautiful body—aye, she's beautiful, there's no denying—and though it's the first he's seen her (not that he hasn't wondered. He is a man after all), he knows it's a sight he'll not soon forget.
Yes, he wants to fill her, though he still looks for another, going on search after search since killing Zoso and taking the dagger.
He'll not stop searching, chasing after a boat, a bastard, and a lost dream. It's a coward's penance, Rumpelstiltskin knows, a coward's effort, but oh, here and now, how he wants to fill her. He wants to fill her with himself, and she fill the spaces of him, so that perhaps together, two cowards could discover enough forgotten courage between them, and he wonders if—
Belle stands suddenly, wiping her tired eyes, and begins to turn round, to reach for her own garments lying on the riverfront. Rumpelstiltskin vanishes dirty clothes and all (and that night avoids her eye entirely).
In the days that follow her employer's return, Belle breathes a little easier for the confession, surprisingly enough. There's a release to it, his knowing, and of course, there's the fact that he didn't turn her into a snail.
She even goes so far as to wonder if she need fear Rumpelstiltskin quite so much as before, and why, when searching for the lighter, summer quilts, she stumbles upon the wedding wreath at the bottom of a trunk, she does not hesitate to pull it out to take a better look.
Belle pulls the ring of dried flowers from the bottom of the trunk, and though she handles them with care, a few petals still fall off. The festive symbol brings a smile to her face, as she recalls playing as a child with her mother's own floral crown, whilst pairing the over-large wreath with a tablecloth to completely her bridal play-set. The remembrance warms her, and without thought, removes her white cap, setting it on the ground. She walks to the hearth and pulls from the shelves a metal tray that she knows will do well enough for a looking glass.
Gripping the circlet daintily with one hand, she uses the other to unwind the ribbons wrapped around it, allowing them to dangle free, as they're meant to do. After balancing the tray upright, leaning back against the fireplace, she slips on the headpiece, laying it over her loose curls.
Belle smiles at her blurry reflection and toys with the ribbon ends. They're frayed and yellowed with age, but still a pretty token, all the same. She takes another look before slipping the wedding wreath it off. It's one of her regrets, not having taken her mother's wreath with her when she and Papa left for Avonlea. Although, Belle imagines it highly unlike that she will ever be in need of such a crown. She turns to return the heirloom to it's hiding place, when the spinner walks inside with another box of wool to be spun.
He gives her a cursory glance, before walking past her to his spinning wheel, but turns back when he realizes what she holds. He stops immediately, box still in his arms, "Where did you get that?"
"I—" she points to the trunk, "I found it, in the trunk."
Rumpelstiltskin, the Dark One, looks from the item in her hands to the mantle, where the tray still stands upright, and the man's uneducated, but he's no fool, he realizes what she's done. He frowns and continues to his spinning wheel, "Having a bit of fun, were we?"
"I meant no harm," she says.
He scoffs, "Of course you didn't."
Belle looks at him, back facing her, already begun at his task, spinning away. The words slip out, before she can stop them, "Your wife's?"
Rumpelstiltskin's foot stops, as does the wheel. After a moment, he continues, "Aye, my wife's."
"And Bae's mother?"
"Yes, that as well."
"What—what happened to her?"
The man cringes, for the girl just kept prodding and pushing, be it teeth or townsfolk turned mollusk; she never stopped, his Belle.
He crosses his arms over his chest, letting go his thread for the moment, "I—" he begins, but then, turns a little in his chair, "I lost her, nothing more to tell, really."
She watches the spinner speak about the unknown woman. He plays with the skin on his elbows as he does so, without realizing, and Belle thinks it a very human action.
He sighs, slumping down in his chair, "She was never really mine."
Belle frowns at that. "Did you love her?" she asks on impulse, upon hearing the sadness in his voice.
Rumpelstiltskin stares at her, stricken, and she wants to apologize, to take it back, because of the look on his face, but she doesn't (because speaking the truth is healing in an excruciating way—like the salt rubs the maunts used to make and sell to support their monastery). Just when she thinks he won't answer her, he speaks up, "I—I thought I did, but now, I don't know. Hardly know what love is."
Belle nods, because likewise, she wonders what the word means, wonders if she's even capable of it.
"And what of your betrothed?"
"My what?"
He rolls his eyes at her, at the idea that the bit of Avonlea gossip would have escaped him, "Southland's son? You think me ignorant of your little romance with the Duke's son?"
Belle blushes, embarrassed to have her youthful dalliance with Gaston not only known to her employer, but clearly embellished, "We were never betrothed."
"Close enough," he brushes her off. "That's beside the point. Did you love him?"
After a moment's decision, Belle speaks to him with an honesty transparency, "Women always love the first to notice them-haven't men learned that by now?"
"They do?"
"Yes, in a simple way," She nods, "Gaston imagined he loved me, I suppose, but then I was pretty enough, and we were both young-it's easy to imagine yourself in love when it's like that, between children."
You still are, Rumpelstiltskin thinks, smith's son can hardly keep his eyes in his head—
And if he doesn't we can always teach him, Zoso adds.
"But that's not really love," Belle says, drawing him back outside himself.
"It's not?"
"No," she shakes her head, "Love needs," she looks to the ceilings, looking for the right word for what she means to say, "layers, some kind of connection, something small even, like, oh I don't know, how you take your tea, for example—just something to stave off the monotony-the pain-of it all, of life, of age, I guess."
"And you didn't have that, with the Duke's on?"
She shakes her head, "No, we didn't have that."
Rumpelstiltskin nods, and wonders what they were like together, her and this boy—Gaston.
"What about you? Did you have that with her," she asks, quiet, "your wife?"
"No," he scoffs, sadly, "no there was nothing like that, no mystery. She was wild and I was her only option.
"But you have Bae."
"Aye," he agrees, "I've got Bae." The somber conversation ends, and he turns back to his spinning and forgetting.
"Oh that reminds me: Mercer Barclay wants to know when you'll be bringing your thread to him."
Rumpelstitlskin sneers, "I bet he does." The spinner sighs, "I've half a mind to sell to one outside the village, but I'll decide soon enough. The cheat'll have to wait until then."
Yes, Rumpelstiltskin thought, he planned to sell to one much closer to the sea, this year.
Rumpelstiltskin married.
It's a strange and funny thought, one Belle can't quite wrap her mind around. The notion of course had occurred to her before—he'd have to of been married in the past, to have a son. She'd always known this as fact, but when faced with the very real memory of a wife lost, well, it's something she's a bit of trouble digesting.
As she waits Eoghain to return, so she can buy eggs, the last thing she needs from market, she leans against the wooden beams of his chicken coop, wondering what the woman had been like, Baelfire's mother, this wife of Rumpelstitlskin's.
"Good morrow, stranger," a voice calls.
Belle jumps, surprised by the sound, and turns. She shakes her head, but replies, "Well met, Marcas."
The apothecary chuckles at her, "Startled you, did I?"
"'Tis no matter."
A large smile fills the man's face and he comes to lean against the wooden fence beside her, "There now, sounding a bit more like us, everyday now, aye?"
Belle frowns and realizes the slip of the tongue: she'd answered him with a touch of the local accent.
"Oh, no need to look so put out," he pats her on the back a bit rough, "'tis not so bad, as all that."
She sighs and turns back to the watching Eoghain's chickens, preferring not to answer with her true feelings on the subject of the locals and their accent.
"How's your father, girl?"
She shrugs, "Well enough. Do you have my medicine yet?"
Marcas shakes his head, "Soon, I promise it."
She frowns and opens her mouth to tell him how long his promises would last, when a commotion in the coop draws her eye. Belle turns and spots one of the cocks fighting another. They peck and holler, until Marcas waves a hand at them. "Shoo—g'on you."
They two separate, but Belle keeps watching the instigator. Though clearly the smaller of the two, no one would ever guess from watching the way the rooster strutted about. He liked everyone to know who held the power in the chicken pen, clearly.
Lightly, she scoffs at the show off.
"What?" the apothecary asks.
"See that small one, who likes to throw his weight around?" She points out the rooster in question.
He nods, "Aye, likes 'em to know he can defend himself."
"Remind you of anyone?"
The man laughs, "Aye, I suppose the resemblance be a little striking, but if we are talking about resemblance," he pauses and points to a loan hen, near to the bushes in the center of the pen, "then I can't help but notice her."
Belle frowns, rolling her eyes.
The man scowls at her, "Now, no need to be like that. Hear me out," he says pointing back to the rooster, "look, he keeps watching her, that one."
"I don't think so," she says, and truly, the two stand not even remotely close.
"Aye, but watch, he circles her, keeping his distance, true, but he likes that one."
She takes a moment, watches the chickens (whishes Eoghain would arrive), but unfortunately notes some truth to the shopkeeper's words. "Why, you think?"
"Because he can't unsettle her's what I think," he answers, not bothering to look at Belle, focused on the coop, "it peaks his interest."
Belle returns to Old Saorla's place before the noon hour. She's made a habit of trying to be home as much as possible, for she finds it best not to leave her father too long unattended.
She smiles at the fine weather, and as she reaches their little hovel, she thinks it highly unlikely that Rumpelstiltskin followed her today, and she's glad of it (can hardly imagine if he had heard what Marcas had said about the chickens). Truly having a day to of her own gives her a comfort that pleases her, and yet, she wonders why the change—if anything, the discovery of her involvement with the Ogre Wars should have added to his suspicions of her, not mitigated it.
She shrugs off the curiosity, for she was not like to find answers, and instead, unlocks the door.
"Belles," her father hollers out the window.
She jumps, clutching her chest, "Papa? You startled me. What is it?"
"Hurry, Belles, we've company."
"Oh papa," she says, not bothering to hide the pitiful tone to her voice. Sighing she opens the door.
"Apologies for calling on you unannounced," the voice calls from one of the two worn-down chairs.
Belle's eyes widen as she takes in the woman sitting in their home. "You're real," she says, shocked that, true to his words days prior, the blonde woman has come to call again, as her crazed father had said. She sputters out, "I'm sorry, but I thought—"
"That I wasn't coming back?" she asks, side-stepping Belle's reference to her father's bouts with insanity, and the inventor's daughter suddenly recognizes her.
"I know you," Belle says, squinting at the older, middle-aged woman—though still very pretty, with her yellow curls bound up off her neck, and a not-entirely tattered shawl about her shoulders.
"Indeed," the woman says with a smirk, "We've met before, at the old witch's place."
Belle's mouth opens with the realization. Yes, she knew this woman: Carlotta, the prostitute from Hangman's Tree crossing. They'd met sometime back at Agnes' hut. Belle had gone there in search of medicine for her father. The other woman had been buying the local Bitter Buttons.
"Carlotta," Belle says, entering the place fully. Sellslove the old hedge witch had called her, but Belle knew all too well just how bitter those transactions could be.
The woman smiles with full lips—painted a light red. "You remember after all," the whore says, pleased, "and you're Belle—or do you prefer Belles?" the last she asks in a condescending tone.
The daughter frowns, as she makes her way to the fireplace and tells her, "I'd prefer to know why you're here."
"Oh, the little maid's a suspicious one, but I wonder," the woman stands and walks over to Belle, examining her, as she arranges what she's brought back from the market. She does her best to withstand the scrutiny, and luckily drops nothing. "Is that the fault of your employer, or where you like this before?" She watches the younger girl for a few beats, but then turns on her heel, "Not that it's anything to me. You'll forgive the questions, but we don't get many strangers in this town, so when we do it's gossip fodder for some time."
The lovely woman shrugs, and her shawl sways in such a way that Belle's eyes are drawn to her chest. She wonders if it's a practiced movement, "Anyway, I've heard tell about the town that you make and sell hair dye. Is that true?"
Belle blinks, "Yes, but—well, I make it, but-"
"Hand it over to Marcas to sell. Yes, I know."
Mercer Barclay's comments in the tavern return to Belle—the apothecary and the prostitute are lovers. "Then what do you want with me, when you could go to Marcas?"
The woman scoffs, "Oh, dear, now don't tell me you're completely ignorant to the wiles of women—what would my lover think if he knew I bought hair dye to cover my gray hairs?" Carlotta exclaims, gesturing with an elegant (though dirty) hand to the roots of her hair. "Rather take away some of the romance, don't you think?"
The woman wishes to remain young in the eyes of her lover. The idea makes sense enough to Belle, but that still leaves a problem, "But I—" and her eyes dart to her father, who sits, tinkering with his tool set, trying (and failing) to look uninterested in the women's chatter, "I gave my word I wouldn't sell it myself."
The woman makes a mocking gasp and then throws her hands toward the younger girl, "Well I'm not like to tell, if you're not, and besides what harm will it do to sell to little old me? None." The woman strides over to Belle, "And I'll pay you twice what I'd have paid Marcas."
The amount seizes Belle's interest—a heavy weight in her apron pocket it would be. Carlotta smiles, "You like the sound of that, methinks." The woman wraps the shawl more tightly about her, and walks to the door. "Think on it, child," she says, "I must be on my way—noon traffic, you must understand." She gestures for Belle to follow her outside. Once a fair distance from the house, she continues, "You know Hangman's Tree, girl?"
She nods, "Aye, I know it."
"That's my place, have you leave to come after dark."
Belle's eyes narrow, "Yes, why?"
"After supper and before the wee hours, 'tis when I'm least called upon. You'd do well to get your pay then, after I've made another day's wages." Her eyes flit back to the house, "I thought your father'd not like the idea of his little Belles out and about with the highwaymen and whores."
Carlotta smirks, but Belle makes no expression to the milk name, nor the coarse speech, "I'll come to you then, before the midnight hour."
"Good," the woman says with a nod, "I must be off—business never sleeps, as they say." She disappears into the woods, leaving Belle alone.
Belle waits on pins and needles, more anxious than she's been in days—since the Dark One's discovery of her past—for night to fall and her father to retire to bed. Finally, after eating, Maurice lies down to bed, and his daughter slips quietly from the hut, locking the door behind her.
She navigates the forest with an ease she'd never have imagined when first she came to the village. She arrives at Hangman's Tree sooner than she'd expected—so it comes as no surprise, when she hears noises of the night, that Carlotta still hosts a costumer. Doing her best to stay silent, Belle hides a good distance off, behind a tree to wait.
It's not the first that she's walked in on an intimate couple. She remembers back, to the Captain and the young aide-de-camp.
She'd worried that night that she'd be late to the strategy meeting, held in the captain's tent. It's her first night in the army camp, and she's nervous enough, without making a name for herself as tardy or incompetent. When she arrives, she opens the tent flap without thought, and the sight shocks her.
On the cot, facing away from the door, the Captain kneels, holding the hips of the aide-de-camp, their fast movements and breathy sounds making it obvious that she's walked in on a moment of passion.
Blushing beat red and feeling the pulse on her brow and in her neck she stumbles out of the tent, panting. She stalks away, away from the human sounds—the most human of sounds that so strangely sound so much more like animals—when a rowdy laughter startles her for the second time.
Belle jumps, her head turning to find the source. She spots three men sitting around a nearby campfire. She recognizes one as the Lieutenant who had escorted her and the machine pieces from Avonlea to the battlefront, as well as the Field Marshal, whom she had met upon her arrival. The third man, his face appears familiar, but she knows him not. He's handsome, older than she, but less than most of those in High Command. His features are light, and his hair, she thinks a dirty sort of yellow, like a washcloth in need of changing—it's not an ugly color, but that's simply what it looks like. With half a smile, he says to her, "We generally wait for the Captain to call for us."
This brings a fresh round of chuckles, and she walks closer to the light. "He said to be at the meeting at nightfall," she speaks evenly, as she'd been told earlier that day.
The man leans up toward her, "Yes, and as you see, he's a bit preoccupied at the moment." Looking to the other two men, "Or perhaps he's something of a voyeur." They chuckle loudly, and the unknown man takes in Belle's drawn line of a mouth. He then chuckles out, "So, you're an innocent after all."
"Why wouldn't I be?"
The man shrugs, "One hears thing, and beside Southland's son looked rather devastated." He makes a pained expression, and Belle realizes he's mocking her.
"We were friends, as children," she explains, her tone cold.
"Of course, your pardon for any offense, madam." He gives her a half bow, but the joking smile betrays him.
"Pay him no mind," the Lieutenant says, waving the other man off, "The only thing faster than the doctor's hand is his mouth."
The men all take delight in that, and the Field Marshall raises his ale mug to clank it against the Lieutenant's, "Too true, too true."
The camp doctor, she remembers then. She'd been told that there was only one, in the whole of the camp, and apparently this was he. Still, physician of no, the quip sits ill with her. Belle doesn't like to be at the wrong end of a joke. It reminded her too much of her noble cousins and too many summers of teasing.
She opens her mouth to ask him just exactly why he thinks himself free to such allowances, but at that moment the tent flap swings open and the aide-de-camp, a young boy, scrambles out and into the dark, followed by the captain, looking cold as ever, who calls to them. "The devil are you fools waiting on? Rather be up the whole of the night talking strategy or do you want to sleep? Make haste, now."
The three men amble to their feet and walk to the tent, Belle along with them, but a hand on her elbow stops her. The man leans close, so no other hears, "Truly, I was only speaking in jest. I meant no harm."
She looks from his face to his hand at her arm. He doesn't remove it, though the hold is feather-light, "We have so little these days, you see, to smile about," he tells her and the boyish nature of the expression softens her, if only a small measure.
"It's fine."
The smile deepens, "Good." He releases her and together they walk to the tent. He holds the flap back for her, and allows her to enter first.
She waits, awkwardly forcing herself to stand still. She'd not move out of discomfort and anxiety, only to have the clandestine couple hear.
After a few moments more, she hears the rummaging of clothing being righted, and coins changing hands (though no kiss farewell). She waits, peeking out at the crossroads from her hiding place, and at last sees a lone man emerge. He looks from side to side, in a lazy way and begins the slow walk back to the village. Once he's out of sight, Belle wonders best how to make her presence known.
"You're early," the unseen Carlotta calls.
She frowns, and stepping into the open of the street, she walks closer to Hangman's Tree. "Not on purpose."
The woman steps farther into the street, running a hand through her tousled (graying) curls. Belle notes the darkness that collects on her fingertips and realizes her nails are painted now, like the traders from the distant shores, the ones she met when she'd traveled around the summer fairs with her father. "'Tis no matter to me," the woman smirks, "Did you learn something?"
Belle frowns, "I need no lessons in love-making."
"Is that so," Carlotta says, but then turns serious. She turns back to the brush, "Come away from the road, lest someone take the wrong idea."
As she and Belle tramp through the underbrush, the sellslove says, "So, you serve the old spinner." It's no question.
"Aye, I do."
"And?"
"And what?"
"'And what,'" the woman says with a scoff, "I mean to ask, do you lie with him?"
"No," she says, firmly, "no, I'm only his maid."
"Only?" the woman laughs, "oh, you are young, aren't you."
Belle bristles at the woman speaking down to her, "Speak plainly, madam."
Carlotta chuckles, "Just listen to that high speech." The woman's lip curls and tilting her head, she observes in an objective way, "You're young and pretty, very." She leans against a tree, looking no more pressured to explain herself to Belle than before, "I rather thought I might have a bit of competition in you."
"Me?"
"Aye, you—young, pretty and poor," she ticks off on her painted fingers. "All the key ingredients to turn a woman into a whore, but you've your spinner, now, I suppose. My costumers are safe, for a few more years yet."
"What's this to do with hair potion?" she asks, in a rude tone.
Carlotta chuckles and it's a sweet sound, in the dark night below Hangman's Tree, "Nothing, but in my line of work, I hear things." She pauses and appraises Belle, both their heads uncovered, "You say you only serve your spinner, but I know better. You play with his son; he watches over your lunatic father."
"There's misdeed in that?" Belle counters.
"No, 'course not, but child, well it looks to me that you play house."
Her eyes go wide, "I what?"
"Play house," Carlotta twitters, "pretend you're wife and mother."
Belle moves to shake her head, but stops herself, seeing that perhaps the older woman makes a point. "I'm just his maid."
"I know, but keep playing and eventually, mark my words, I'll be not the only one to come to the same ideas."
"The village?"
She shrugs, "the village, but more importantly your spinner." Carlotta looks thoughtful for a moment, and Belle wonders what she mulls over, in her head, "You know, he'll ask to lie with you. Only a matter of time, really." She pauses, and then adds, "they all do."
Belle weighs her words, weighs her memories, and she of all people knows the truth to the statement: they all do. "Yes, I know."
"How will you answer?"
Belle scoffs, "No idea."
"You'd best decide, and soon at that." Carlotta smiles, perhaps the most unguarded, the most kind, she's been all evening, "Would you want to?"
It's a question without malice, but it still catches Belle off guard. The girl's mouth gapes open, and after a moment, the other shrugs her shoulders, "Tell me or not, I don't care."
"I—I might." Belle speaks out, "We talk, at times, and I forget the rest of it."
"The rest?"
She frowns, "He's petty and short-tempered. Powers gone straight to his head, but," Belle sighs, "he's not a bad man." Belle knows bad men and Rumpelstiltskin's not one of them.
The older woman toys with her bosom, and says, almost to herself, "Aye, true enough even if he did kill Hordor and all his men besides."
"He's the bad man," she says, remembering the sheer happiness he felt upon condemning a widower's only child to potentially die on the battlefield—the first of many, as it were.
"Oh, child, I know," Carlotta assures, but then notes the question in Belle's expression and shakes her head, "No, not like that. 'Twas my luck that I'm a bit old for his tastes." Carlotta then asks, "Where you there the day the spinner brought the children back?"
The stranger shakes her head, "No, I wasn't."
"Well, it was a sight, I'll give you that."
The maid nods, and after a moment of listening to the wind, the prostitute says, "I've a man coming soon. Let's be done."
She and Belle trade coin for color, and quickly enough she's on her way through the wood, but like the new weight in her pocket, her thoughts weigh heavy on her tired feet. The sellslove's put thoughts in her head, and fears, what's more. She walks home wondering about desires and decisions (and if she even has either of those anymore).
Sometimes, the girl arrives before he awakens. For instance, on the nights where he's sat at his desk working away, more than once burning through an entire candle, on those morrows, he lays in bed as she moves about in his house, on his floors. She tries to be quiet (doesn't always succeed—he knows her to be rather clumsy from time to time).
This morning, she's quiet.
She's earlier than usual, for very little light streams in through the windows. He lies there, in his bed, separated from her sight by a closed curtain, made from a thick burgundy fabric. When closed, it leaves only room for his bed, the trunk at the footboard, and the shelves to its side.
Rumpelstiltskin imagines what she does, his little maid, as she skitters about, pots clanking lightly, the fire crackling, as she builds it back up. He listens, and imagines how she looks.
He imagines, and hardly realizes when the rustling occurs just the other side of the partition. He holds his breath and listens.
Her hand creates a slightly rustling noise, as it draws back the fabric—his ears ring with it. He waits, eyes squeezed shut, and he knows her to stand in the opening, checking to see if he's awake, he presumes.
After a moment, she steps fully into his makeshift bedchamber.
He listens as Belle gingerly steps away from the bed, to the trunk, and slowly, carefully, he peeks at her, watches as she lifts the trunk and puts away a few folded and mended linens, returns a book to the shelf, picks up a stray sock from the floor. Before she turns back, he shuts his eyes again. Now, in the dark, he waits to hear the curtain rustle, signaling her exit.
The sound never comes.
Instead, he hears another rustling of cloth—she's put a hand to his blanket, just to the side of his foot. He waits, and finally the rustling happens again: she takes a step closer, her hand moving forward.
She does this thrice more, and Rumpelstiltskin hardly hears the sound for the pounding in his ears, but as her hand arrives at the side of his leg, just above his knee, he realizes her aim and almost groans for it: she's after the dagger, at last. Internally he notes a sudden pain, for he'd always known it would come to this, but had wished it otherwise.
He'd have to kill her now.
The rustling occurs again, and suddenly, he feels her fingers skirting his thigh. She's touching him, and her hand doesn't stop. She keeps dragging it ever upward. Clever thief, but no matter, he'd not fall for her wiles.
The maid drags her hand torturously slow up the outside of his thigh, over his hip bone, across his flank (and it's all he can do not to jump and laugh, for the flesh there's sensitive to such a caress), but as she grips the blanket to pull it back, to find the dagger hidden at the sheath tied round his waist, he grips her wrist.
The girl gasps, but he doesn't let her go, instead tightening his hold. He keeps her close, as he leans up on his other elbow. "Don't look so surprised: You didn't think I'd just let you have what you're after."
Belle frowns (and she's without her cap, he notes) and then smiles. "You mean you don't want me, Rumpelsitltskin?" she asks.
He blinks up at her, dumbfounded at the question, "What did you say?"
With her other hand she points to his hidden manhood. They both can see it tents the covers, an overt answer to the question. "I think you want me," she says it like she's accomplished something, and rather pleased about it at that. She bites her bottom lip after she says it.
"I—" he begins, mouth dry, completely dry. He stops because he has to tell her no, because of dagger and Bae and a million other reasons. He nods instead, "Aye, I want you."
She giggles and leans down, the hand captured in his wrist touching his cheek, balancing him, as she kisses his jaw, followed by his neck.
Gasping, in reflex, he releases her hand—forgets she has a hand—until it lands on his stomach, and then-as he gulps, wondering doubting, hoping—she touches him, her little hand warm beneath his blankets and trousers. "Rumpelstiltskin," she says.
His head falls back with a groan, as he closes his eyes, completely lost to her, her hand, to Belle—
Rumpelstiltskin yells out, as he kicks himself awake.
Looking around frantically, trying to catch his breath, he realizes with relief (and disappointment) that he's alone.
He throws back the covers, sitting at the edge of the bed. Gasping, he runs a hand over his sweaty brow and through his wild hair. It's not yet dawn, just before, rather, and he's alone in his bed, alone in his house, except for Baelfire.
It was just a dream, he realizes, his head falling, chin to his chest. Though, when he looks down, he curses under his breath. He's still hard, it would seem. Not unknown to the problems of the mornings, Rumpelstiltskin frowns. It's a minor inconvenience, but not a terrible problem.
Truly, the mornings are the least of his problems, it would seem.
The days pass by in gentle repetition, and strangely, Belle cannot call herself unhappy. It's the first time, in some time, that she can't call herself such, that things are somewhat good.
So Belle knows that trouble stands not a stone's throw away.
She waits for it, the unknown trouble. It simmers in the back of her mind, not exactly present, but never quite absent, either. It lingers, waiting, and as she knows it's been want to do before, it waits for that unexpected moment to strike.
It sits idly in the back of her mind as she sits on a short stool, with a bucket between her legs, peeling potatoes one afternoon. Her fingers sport the wet grit from the peelings, and she remembers why exactly she hates peeling potatoes. As she takes a moment to push the piece of hair that's escaped her white cap back with her forearm, she looks across the room to where Baelfire works at her father's spinning wheel.
He's learning the art of spinning this season, and she can't help but smile at the quickstudy he's proving to be.
She wipes her hands on her apron, and dropping knife and half-peeled potato into the bucket Belle decides to take a break. She walks over to watch him labor. It fascinates her, the movement of the wheel, and she can see how he aims for his father's deft, memorized actions.
Of course, he's only a boy and still learning; she spots the knot before he notes it himself.
"Careful, Bae," she warns.
Baelfire dashes forward tugging at the knots, but in his haste, he knocks the bobbin loose. In the a flurry, rushing forward to catch the falling part (which he does, but Belle gasps, seeing what's going to happen before it actually occurs, unable to do a thing to prevent it—a common problem for her) he stabs his finger on the sharp spindle.
"Ah!" the little boy cries out, sticking his bleeding finger in his mouth, dropping the bobbin a second time.
The bobbin and dirtied spindle roll about on the wood floor, Belle picks them up and after wiping the needle, puts them back into place on the wheel. "Bae, are you alright?" she asks, taking the boy's wrist, to see how deep the wound goes.
He hisses as the air hits his finger—but she can see that it's not terribly deep, not even enough to merit a bandage, though, sometimes, it's the little cuts that hurt the most—and under his breath curses, "Fucking quim."
Without thought, Belle drops his hand and slaps his cheek.
The movement's largely instinctual, and more sound than sensation at that. In the silence following the bellowing snap, it takes a moment for Belle to realize what she's just done. She gasps, eyes wide and a hand (the hand) covers her mouth.
She's just struck the son of the Dark One.
Baelfire's eyes too, widen as his hand rubs at his blushed cheek, mouth gaping, as he looks up at her, completely shocked. When he turns to look at her, with his dark eyes, she forces her shoulders back (she won't apologize, for the mild correction, no matter whose son he is). However, in the boy's eyes she see remorse—and worry.
"We won't tell Papa," he says instantly, the smart lad, well-knowing, like Belle what his father's response would be to such actions.
"Won't tell me what?" Rumpelstiltskin's voice calls from the doorway.
Belle's eyes go wide, and she tries to shut him out, but everything is Rumpelstiltskin (not the spinner, the Dark One), and she can just see it now, feel the coming magic, the smashing of her bones.
"It's just, I think you'll be angry," the boy says, haltingly, and Belle thinks, damn, the prick's taking payback. That's her first thought, followed quickly by, I see his father in him.
Then she relaxes. Well, if I'm to die, she thinks, at least I'll know it was in the efforts at raising the child up right.
"Angry about what, son?" the father asks, intrigued and more than a little excited.
Bae's eyes flit between servant and master.
"Go on," the Dark One urges.
Belle sighs, "It's fine, Bae. Tell him." She won't beg. She didn't beg the Dukes of the Southlands and Frontlands, and she certainly isn't going to beg her life from the son of a spinner.
But then, Baelfire's a quick boy and learned a long time ago that apologies, excuses and pleas make no difference to his father, or to the Dark One, rather. Instead, he chooses a medium his father excels at: deception.
"Bae?" the father says, taking a few steps into the house.
"It's my reading lessons." Bae looks sheepish, but proud too. "She says I'm better than you at my letters now." The boy positively beams.
Gods above. Belle thinks, but has enough sense to feign embarrassment.
"Is this true?" he asks her.
She shrugs her shoulders, but then looks over at Rumpelstiltskin, pulling her head down between her shoulders, like the snapping tortoise hidden inside its shell, "Well, he does practice a lot more than you."
The imp falls for it, or perhaps, the one who falls is the doting, proud father. "He should be better. He's my son, after all." Then he smiles; he dares to look positively human—except of course those teeth. Try as she might, she can't get him to use the branch.
"That makes him smarter." He grabs his son about the shoulders and rubs his hair encouragingly. "Keep up the good work, Bae." He gives his son another pat on the back, before turning to the maid, "And you as well, Belle."
She blinks, still a bit stunned.
"Keep up. The good work, that is," he adds.
"Yes sir," she says, and Belle smiles at them, for an instance, imaging they are just a simple well-to-do village father and son for whom she works.
She imagines she didn't almost die today, imagines that there aren't problems on the horizon, that her father isn't ill more often than not, that there's no magic, no Dark One, no war, just a family and a job with the whole of summer before them.