She wanted to help. The first thing that hit the wall was a small glass vase he had no need of. It had come with the castle after all, just some relic left over from the people who abandoned it long ago. It made a delightful breaking noise.
She wanted to help. He couldn't even begin to understand this woman, this Belle. Her own father was willing to trade her to him in a deal. Oh yes he gave her the choice in the end, allowed her to say that she agreed to forever, that she would go with him to his castle, but he also knew she had no real choice. It was go with him or let her people die at the hands of the ogres.
The ones he himself had sent.
He had given her no choice, though he was sure she no doubt still felt she had some choice in the matter.
And now she wanted to help. The second thing that hit the wall was one of his teapots. It wasn't his favorite, but it was one he found at least aesthetically pleasing. It crashed against the wall in an explosion of deep red shards.
The teapot was followed by several cups, a plate or two, another vase he didn't particularly like.
How could she help?
Why would she want to help?
What could she possibly have to gain?
He slumped against the wall, shaking. The prophecy…He had tried not to think too hard on that since she had come into his life, since they had brought down what he thought was going to be a thing and instead ended up being a human being, the one who was fated to reunite him with his son.
She didn't even know that, did she? Was she aware of how she was connected to him? That she was supposed to reunite father and son somehow. He hadn't yet figured out how she was "more than what she seemed" and yet already she was asking about his son, about his son's mother, asking to help.
He hadn't given her the truth about his wife. She had died, long after he lost her to a pirate, to a life he couldn't give her. And she had died at his own hand, the result of his inability to control the magic when his temper took him. He had gained control over the centuries. The magic no longer controlled him as it had back then, giving action to his inner thoughts before he could even react. He didn't regret her death, not exactly. She had tormented him, had left their son, had left him having to explain where she had gone, had made him lie to the wee boy. He only regretted how it had come about and that he had ultimately been the one to do it.
He didn't know how to explain that to his son. He knew he would have to someday.
And so now he had this woman here, the young woman of the prophecy, and she wanted to help.
He was lost, completely and irrevocably lost.
Belle was alone in her library the afternoon that Rumplestiltskin came for her. After giving her free reign to explore the room some months ago, he had never set foot in it when she was there. He gave a dismissive explanation about magic being the only thing he wished to read about, but she was sure that was not the reality of the situation. The books she pulled off the shelves were well-loved with fingerprints on the leather bindings and the occasional spine broken.
The latter she shook her head over. Books were precious. Breaking the spines was just something one didn't do if they cared about the books. But one thing she had learned about Rumplestiltskin in her time there, he wasn't someone to think of such things when one of those black moods struck him.
So when he came into the library, disturbing her latest study of the long-lost island world of Atlantis, still likely buried beneath the sea somewhere, she was surprised.
"Come," he said and the word was spoken so solemnly, she didn't even consider not obeying. Placing a bookmark between the pages, she set the book down on the table and rose. Rumplestiltskin simply turned and started to walk away. She chose to follow, not questioning his strange actions.
He led her to the other tower room. She had never been in the room during the day, so it was odd to see light filtering in through windows that were in desperate need of cleaning. At night it had a mysterious air, the screams still echoing in her head when she curled up on the little settee that seemed to be reserved for her. During the day, the place looked both chaotic and sad. There was an air there, something intangible that made her eyes water just slightly. The sorcerer had spent a lot of time here and not all of it was happy hours spent creating potions.
"What do you wish of me?"
He turned to face her then and quickly covered up an odd look that flitted across his countenance for a moment. "Do you read other languages, Belle?"
She nodded and gave him a quick list. He seemed satisfied with that. There were, after all, advantages to being locked into a tower for your entire life. "Why does all this matter?"
"You wished to help," he answered simply. "Or were you not serious about that?" He met her eyes and she could feel the challenge within them.
"Help you find your son?"
He flinched slightly at her words. "Well, help me find a way to my son."
"Yes I wish to help. I was serious." So that is what this is about.
He raised his hand around him. "Then help."
She looked around her and waited for more of an explanation. He was often cryptic, but this was the most he had ever been.
Finally he sighed and looked at her. "My son fell through a portal to another land, a land without magic. Getting there has been…problematic to say the least." His eyes slid away and if Belle were going to attempt to describe the look she'd say it was almost one of embarrassment.
"What have you tried so far?"
He shook his head and waggled one finger at her. "Oh no, it's not going to be that easy. I need a new set of eyes, not ones that have been influenced by my centuries of looking. It's time to hit the books dearie!" He let out that high-pitched giggle she had come to associate with his being uncomfortable and then left her there.
She had lost track of the weeks somehow, spending most of them holed up in his library, reading books with titles such as The Ancient Magick of Our Peoples and Transmogrification. She didn't even know what the latter was, but it took her little time to figure out it wasn't what she was looking for.
They needed a way to his son, to this land that had no magic, and nothing else. So she set out to make a catalogue of ways to travel between realms.
Surely he had been through all these books before. If he were not joking about the centuries bit, then he had had more than enough time to read all the books at least twice. A new set of eyes was always nice but she still felt like she was simply treading water.
He stopped in one afternoon while she was skimming through yet another book, a piece of paper and a quill at her side. She had been through countless others, making her way systematically across the library, skipping any book in a language she did not understand and being especially careful with those books with dire warnings about their content.
"Find anything?"
She narrowed her eyes at him. "This is nothing but a wild goose chase, isn't it?"
His gleeful smile faded. "I was hoping otherwise, but yes, it likely is." The words were more serious than she (had) expected. She knew finding his way to his son was of utmost importance. "But perhaps you found something?" He gestured for her to take a seat on her settee and she did so, pulling out the sheets of paper she had tucked into the pockets of her dress.
"I found several ways one might cross realms," she began with. She had never imagined doing such a thing when she was younger. Crossing the barrier to the outside of the keep was all the adventure she could dream of. Living in Rumplestiltskin's castle, carrying on her life side by side with the great sorcerer, left her somewhat more aware of the outside world and what was beyond even that.
"Go ahead," he said with a small hand flourish.
"The easiest and most common is via magic bean," she read from her paper.
"Not so," he said and he sadly shook his head. "A bean took him from me. But since then the Giants have destroyed them all. I have been hunting my entire life for another."
Belle shook her head. "I'm…sorry. I knew it must be harder than that. Why would the Giants destroy their beans?" She had read about them before, the Giants who lived up beanstalks that extended far into the sky, rarely coming down from their castle high up in the clouds.
"Humans." And somehow it was all the explanation she needed.
They ran down the rest of her list and he shot down each one in turn. The silver slippers of a land called Oz? Couldn't track them down. The wing feathers of a Pegasus? They're all dead and gone dearie. The last sail created by them was burned to rubbish long ago. A dragon orb? No one had seen nor heard of them in centuries. There was doubt they still existed, though he had heard of some who had gone in search of them fairly recently.
"What about mermaids?" She had read, long ago, that mermaids could cross the realms through the sea, that the space between realms was thinner there and easily breached. There had been stories of mermaids playing the role of sirens in many lands, crossing over to tempt sailors to their deaths.
"Treacherous creatures." She was surprised at the slight shudder he gave. "And even if we could talk one into crossing realms for our purposes, they could never take me with them. I still need to breathe, dearie"
She sighed. "So nothing then."
"Indeed." He seemed almost disappointed, as if he thought she would stumble across something in his library that he himself had missed.
"I'm sorry." And she meant it. She had failed. She could only imagine how important this was to him. Her father had done so much to protect her and he had lost her anyway. Sometimes she wondered if he searched for her, if he thought about trying to get her back, if he was unhappy. Rumplestiltskin was unhappy, that much she did know, and she suspected much of that was due to the loss of his son. It explained so much about his mood swings, the darkness inside him.
She wondered where the boy could have gone, what realm he crossed into, how he could have survived for this many years in a land that had no magic. She didn't dare ask why he went to such a land, how he went alone, why his father was still here and still searching for him. She couldn't even fathom how long ago this must have been and she didn't want to ask.
He left her then, with a brisk nod. "I will not be coming down for dinner this evening." And he disappeared, leaving her alone in his magical tower room.
Such pain. She didn't even know how to act in the face of such pain. She found herself wanting to follow him, wanting to hold him and comfort him. It was a strange feeling, that.
He watched the wheel, watched it spin, creaking, around and around. He could feel the straw in hand, he could feel it become gold, but at this point in his long life he didn't even need to look at it to know that the straw was spinning properly, that the gold was spooling into the basket at his feet. He could watch the wheel, let the motion soothe, let him attempt to forget.
He never forgot, really. He was sometimes able to blank his mind out, shut out the world, and simply have an absence of thoughts. But that was becoming more and more rare over time. Now instead, his mind would go to that blank place and find it was not so empty anymore.
Instead there was Belle.
He was treading dangerous territory here, opening up and letting her into some bits of his life. That had not been his intention when he brought her there. He thought to ignore her, let her find her own way, let her lead him to his son as some sort of disinterested third party. An accident. He expected it to all be an accident. That one day she would simply stumble and find the way.
She is not what she seems…
The words haunted him, drove him out of his room to the wheel. The nightmare had taken him that night for the first time in a long time. Only this time it had altered. His son was still taken, the vortex opening up and swallowing him. He had still hung back by the tree, still not been able to go, still been the coward he always was.
But this time, a soft hand had reached out for him, touching his shoulder, drawing him away from the cratered ground where his son had disappeared. And when he looked back, followed the hand to arm to shoulder and neck and finally to the face, it had been Belle, a soft smile on her face.
We will find him…
He wasn't seated at the wheel long before she showed up, bleary-eyed and dragging the latest book she was reading with her, this time a slim leather-bound one. He was used to her showing up with large tomes about history and science. He knew she read the novels he had in the library, for he had seen ones laying around various places. But she had yet to bring one up to the tower with her.
She ducked her head in carefully this time, not quite walking into the room after the door opened. It was the first time she had shown any lack of being comfortable in his presence in a long while. He hadn't quite realized that. The first few times she had gone to the tower room she had been frightened out of her wits. Then she had been hesitant about invading his space. And then finally she had calmly walked into the room and settled on the settee without any question, any ceremony, without even looking frightened. It had happened so subtly that he hadn't really taken notice of it until she reverted back.
He gave her a look, a small nod. She was welcome. She was always welcome, even if he didn't want to talk that night, his hopes dashed again, his nerves too raw, his mind too confused.
They settled into the silence for a time, the creaking of the wheel and the rustling of her turning the pages of her book the only sounds in the room. It was peaceful. Or would be, if not for the horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach, the ache behind his eyes that he hadn't felt in a long time.
When he dared to glance up from his wheel, he found her watching him, a worried look in her eyes. He glanced quickly away.
"This is the first night I've heard the screams in over a week." Her voice was quiet, hesitant.
He looked up again, met her eyes and held the gaze. It seemed to be enough invitation for her to get up and approach him. She walked around behind the wheel, the first time she had been there with him, and watched it for a moment. He kept it spinning. He didn't know what else to do, where to put his hands, where to look.
"What do you think they are?" she asked.
"I…" He turned his gaze away from her. What were the screams? He had never heard them, not in all his long years in the castle. Yet she heard them the first night she was there, had heard them many nights since. They hadn't spoken of them since her very first night in the tower room. He had assumed she was hearing things and realized she had a safe spot to go to when she was scared alone in her room. "I don't know. I don't hear them."
"Never?"
"Never." He heard her sigh.
"They're quieter now."
He didn't know how to interpret that. "You hear them right now?"
"No." She placed one hand gently on his shoulder as she spoke. "Earlier. The screams end when I put my hand on the door to this room."
His eyebrows drew together. "Do they now?"
She nodded.
"Do they end on the nights I'm not here?" The door was barred to any who might enter when he was not in the room. On nights he was elsewhere, he could well imagine her coming up to the room, frustrated, finding the door barred to her entrance.
Her head cocked slightly to the side and she was just close enough that her hair brushed against the side of his face, an unwitting caress. "You are always here."
He didn't know what to say and so remained silent. She stayed with him for a time, her hand still on his shoulder, watching as the wheel spun before him, watching the straw alter itself into gold.
And then she finally moved off, back to her settee, where she fell asleep with book in hand once more.
He didn't rise from his wheel, allowing the sound of it to lull him into that place of nothingness he so desperately needed to go to, that sort of dreamlike state in which nothing existed. Not his son. Not Belle. Not even him. Where the world was just one big void that swallowed all that he was entirely.
With nary a thought, he sent Belle back to her room and guaranteed her a peaceful, dreamless sleep, something he himself never seemed to get.
