A/N: So much thanks for reading and reviewing, hombres! Hugs for all :3
~8~8~
"How so much changes in a year's time." Rumpelstiltskin murmured lowly in sheer, contemplative amazement to himself before taking a small sip of the blue drink in his grip. A year ago he would have hardly believed he would be standing as a welcomed guest of honor at the restored kingdom of Queen Snow and King Charming.
Many a time he often imagined himself three miles under the justly ruled citadel, caged in the magical prison that stripped away his powers and left him bereft of wily intimidation; a captive to not traipse around the world and cause mischief at a whim.
His onyx eyes furtively scanned the pleasant throngs of gaily dressed souls milling about the outer reaches of a grand ballroom or those upon the dance floor. Many took their time in jubilant celebration as they waltzed and curtseyed for petitioning dance partners and strode gracefully out upon the gold and blue marble. Their steps where light and their hearts full of happiness at the occasion.
Musician's dexterous fingers strummed and plucked their favored instruments in a light hearted jaunty tune that made the dancers whirl elegantly about in their menagerie of ermine and silks and wools like autumnal leaves swirling up in a zephyr. Those who chose not to partake in the dancing, stood to the side either fanning themselves or looking upon the dancers with a noble satisfaction upon their bright faces.
The ballroom was a masterpiece of legendary architecture itself. Each bit of stone and mortar to the very last monolithic pane had been carved and built by the sturdiest masons and users of magic in all the known realms to create a glorious hall for the nobles to fritter away special occasions especially dedicated to their emancipation from the magical fetters Regina had bound about their lives.
Columns of pure alabaster marble rose about the edges of the gilt room to support the vaulted ceiling emblazoned with gold and silver as a back drop to seem akin to some forest glade in late summer. Pictures of fairies and other wood land creatures, painstakingly painted, frolicked above them in some portrayed waltz of their own to mirror the learned cavorting of those below.
Golden candelabras and chandeliers guttered with flickering flames that swept and dipped to their own tune in providing the gathering light for the night's festivities.
The towering windows that allowed the bright sunlight or the calm blackness of a serene night to fill the room served to distinguish the light and dark of the outside battling with the multitude candles dipping flames from the inward.
To Rum, it was as though the velvet of night enwrapped them in its soft, silken folds so that the ballroom seemed the only monument in all the realms, and the stars nothing more than bright faced children staring at them through the monolithic panes in innocent wonderment.
Nestled in one of the slightly dimmed corners of the glorious ballroom, the magical fiend smoothed a wrinkle from his golden evening jacket to quell the trembling of his wiry talons and the nervousness brimming within akin to a witch's cauldron over boiling of its regents. He tried to contain his anxiousness, but that was as little more than futile endeavor.
Though his over all beastliness of gray-gold skin and soulless black eyes were impossible not to take note of, he was dressed rather finely in golden breech and a golden vest along with his golden jacket crafted of his finest magical thread. The only article of his raiment not shimmered in gold was the silver buckles upon his shoes.
By some miracle his straggly, dirty brown hair had seen a comb tortuously pulled through the matted, tangled mess to finish off what decorum that could be garnered for him.
A bitter frown pulled at his lips as he stared at the drink in his glass. The dark blue liquid reflected his features shimmering abhorrently in the candles light. No matter what he dressed in, there could be no hiding he was still a beast. Put a rabid wolf in noblemen's raiment and he would not be a gentleman.
But despite all that, he was still greatly astounded by how much he had improved in overcoming the beastliness that could not be seen by the outside of mortals men's eyes, and yet still greatly more impressed on how the realms had staggered back to their might in so little time.
In little more than a year's time, the realms had been set back into their orders of old. Snow and James ruled their realms and their land blossomed with happiness and prosperity and peace. Their daughter, Princess Emma was learning to govern justly and rule and become used to this strange new land that was as foreign to her as the curse born world that had been to them all.
Young prince Henry had become a squire to his father, Baelfire, who had been knighted one of kingdoms guardians. His son helped guard the land and keep it free of any wandering dragons, ravaging armies seeking spoils and blood, trying to steal their plenty, or threats encroaching upon them from other power hungry sources.
That was, of course, when Rumpelstiltskin and his boy were not patching their tumultuous relationship back together bit by agonizingly slow bit or when Bae and the prickly Emma were not wading through their morass of emotions towards one another.
Grumpy and Nova had gone into hiding after the treachery the desperate dwarf had wrought, but were also living their dream together somewhere upon the open waters of the realms where adventure awaited them.
No one could accept what he had done to sell them out to the vicious harpy for comfort and gain. But that night when he had provided the most critical distraction into saving their lives from being forever under Regina's iron heel of ruler ship and dominance had brought him a spec of clemency enough for mere banishment instead of other lethal punishments for treason.
The low hum of humans, and dwarfs and fairy's chatting and laughing rose in a dull murmur of warmth, and contentment to the vaulted ceiling. Everyone was in a high spirited, happy mood at the joyous occasion. Though a few untrustworthy looks had been cast in Rumpelstiltskin's direction, he had grown used to such flashes of hatred and despising that told the old tale of who he had been.
Two young lads, one young Henry and another known as Peter laughed as they darted between the legs of the nattily dressed adults in their childish antics of a game of tag to relieve the drudgery such balls bought to their young, irascible minds. Although they knew the important significance of the day, the boys couldn't quite yet fathom all that had been done and what powerful magic's had been in place and snapped asunder.
A thin, amused grin etched upon his gray-gold features as he took another appreciative sip of the heady blue beverage in his sharp nailed grip. The innocence of the thought that those new generations would never know the ravishing devastation that had once befallen their world brought a small chuckle to his lips.
On the other side of the room, his midnight onyx eyes spotted the curse breaker, with a large scowl upon her sharp face. Her fingers plucked and pulled at the ball gown sewn of bright ruby gossamer, which bedecked her feminine form, in rising unscrupulous agitation.
Such things had never been her style. She still much more coveted her old red leather jacket and beat up blue jeans to the woolen breeches and tunics of this world any day.
Shifting uncomfortably, her eyes scanned the crowd intently before she spotted him in the niche of the corner staring back at her. The flickering golden chandeliers above obscured most of his beastly features from the pulsing illumination, but it could not have been anyone else.
The look was almost one of a person who had experience the moment before; like a vision from a seer that had come to pass.
"Rumpelstiltskin." A steady voice greeted with a heavy modicum of respect, making the Dark One yank his attention away from the staring, Miss Swann.
Per his usual nature, the magical beast preformed a flourished, elaborate bow to the newly restored king of the realm. "Why king James, what do I owe the pleasure, hmm?"
A faint smirk of humor twitched upon his lips. "You know the deal, I and Snow keep tabs on your doings and in return you normally don't leave the confines of your land in the mountains."
Not that he actually wished to, the Dark One laconically reminded himself inwardly with a twitch of a smile. He had had more than enough of the sordid games of manipulation to achieve his own, somewhat noble ends. There was no more pleasure in seeing some one squirm in fear and terror at the sight of him or angrily do dealings for something they so coveted.
No, all he desired was to be left alone for the most part with his things and his darling Belle.
"I remember the deal, Dearie." He cackled introspectively so as to not make the humans about him nervous with his infamous high pitched giggle usually heralding trouble upon the horizon. "I can truthfully report no adumbrated, baby spiriting away deals that would doom our entire existence."
At that, the humble monarch let out a lurid laugh that bellowed pleasantly thought he filled antechamber. He inclined his head slightly to the Dark One, as he sobered. "That's all well and good, but I'd like to ask how you're holding up." Abruptly, he frowned dourly nay almost sympathetically to the devious magician. "A death is never something easy to get over with."
To see your own body dead before you must be a nightmare, many had, but never saw come to pass. What horrors could plague one with that image of their body cold and rotting before them ravage in their minds?
Rumpel nearly let forth a giggle at the truthful statement. While the thoughts and pictures of his body lying upon the forest floor was seared into his mind, he had the cure to supplant all his ills and fears.
He had Belle, and with her, nothing seemed too big to overcome. Hurdles shrunk to pebbles when she was in his arms, her kisses were wings to make him soar from all the remembrances of his vile deeds haunting the recesses of his ancient mind.
There was no better rock to keep him steady than the lovely beauty who graciously dubbed him her true love.
"Well, I haven't plunged off the edge of madness if that's what you mean." He quipped lightly, attempting to make nothing out of the inquiry but a joke.
James' light gray eyes twinkled slightly, seeming to read the words behind the retort so nonchalantly uttered. He opened his mouth to bandy a few more words with the Dark One when a golden specter of the herald rapped who announced the arrive nobles and well to-do's once upon the gold and azure floor.
Blood drained from Rumpelstiltskin's gray-gold, scaled face at the sound like the final peal of fate resounding through his entire world before nothingness engulfed them.
A respectful hush culminated over the ball goers who turned, almost as one entity, to the large golden stairwell at the front of the ball room.
The finely garbed herald quickly stepped aside so that no one could be viewed from the stairwell save the one descending from it marbled stairs.
James patted the paled, devious beast once upon the shoulder for encouragement. "Here's your big moment." He announced in a chuckle and slipped back into nearly obscure anonymousness of the pressing crowd.
Clearing his throat warily in hopes of banishing his anxiousness, the Dark One once again tried to straighten the stiff evening vest as his nerves reached their tremulous apex of tension.
Nothing felt right to him. He felt akin to a peasant once again in rags amongst all the wealthy and noblemen's waiting for the most precious, beautiful woman in all the realms to arrive and merely cast a fleeting glance over his scraggly figure.
He wanted with all his might to be calm and look assured as the Dark One of old, but he was just the opposite with anything concerning her.
Had it been another place and time, the irony would have made him break out into a series of giggles. Now it only made sticky sweat prick at the back of his neck, and his tongue to feel like a dry stretch of desert.
His gut churned in expectation and unbridled fear. Terror's icy talons clamped viciously over his sensibilities. No, he couldn't do this, not with everyone there looking at him stammer like a fool over her beauty. There was no-
And there she appeared at the top of the gilt stairwell, making all his insecurities flee from his mind like smoke ferried upon the winds gentle breath.
Dark amber hair cascaded simply down her bare shoulders. The flickering candle light caught in her coppery ringlets gave her almost a mystical presence to her already stunning beauty.
A golden gown sewn of the finest silk clung to her form elegantly; its small train trailing behind. Her only ornament was her mother's single pearl drop resting necklace upon her chest and the golden band about her finger.
Eyes of the purest sapphire hue sparkled like twin pools of tranquil waters placid and reflecting the light of the stars and the moon nested in the velvet firmament. Those eyes, how he adored them. He could have gazed into for all of eternity and never penetrated their intriguing mysteries locked behind the cerulean depths.
The crowd about the dumbstruck Rumpelstiltskin seemed to press away till it was only him standing upon the center of the marble gilded ballroom. He never gave their movements any thought, for his eternal ebony depths sat riveted upon the gorgeous woman he saw before him walking down majestically to stand in front of his lanky figure.
Standing in the radiance of her beauty, the magical fiend had a sudden urge to slink away out into the night with all the other horrid, hated monsters that stalked the realms and preyed upon the desperate.
What right did he have to pine for the woman only an arms length away; to offer her his entire, unworthy heart and pitiful affections that seemed so paltry and insufficient to him to give to one such as beautiful as she? She deserved far more than a beast who could never hope be a man again.
A shy smile bloomed upon her porcelain features as she flashed him a sanguine look that glimmered with as much nervousness as he felt stewing within. "I…uh…I wanted to wear something that reminded you of the first time we met." She explained to his stark blinking at her sheer beauty. She curtseyed deeply to her mate. "Do you like it?"
"You…I mean…there is…" Swallowing hard, he clamped a hand down upon his excitement and boiling trepidation. "Beautiful. That's what it is and that's what you are, wholly and completely."
Ruddy pink rose involuntarily to her cheeks as she stared down shyly. A small giggle that the Dark One absolutely adored passed her lips as she took a small step forward. "Shall we dance?" She queried mischievously, a brow arched inquiringly.
Rum offered a deep, solemn bow to his love, his wife, entire world. "Oh course, beloved. It is our anniversary."
A year ago to the date they had been wed under the forests green plumes in the evening sunlight. It had been a simple wedding with no fan fare and only a scant few souls and the cloudless sky above to witness the humble, rustic event taking place upon the world they had so long be banished from.
King James, once more being the monarch of his realm, had lorded over their ceremony and preformed the ancient rights. Though he hadn't known all the words to the ceremony that bound them as man and wife, what he adressed had been simple and kind to speak upon their nuptials.
Only Emma, Snow, Baelfire, and Henry had been there to view the simplistic exchanging of vows spoken from the heart at the impromptu wedding under the summer's canopy of the forest.
He could still recall the glistening sparkle of joyous tears in her eyes, as he took her hands solemnly in his own, and how she brushed a solitary tear away from his gray-gold cheek.
At the time he had no ring to slip upon her finger, nor had he desired to test the bounds of the magic he still felt burning through his veins and galloping with his black blood, but Belle cared not for such things. Just to know they were together, finally, bound by love and promise had been more than enough for her. His smile and devotion was worth more than a rounded piece of gold to signify their union.
Once James had uttered the last words for the ancient ceremony, they had both taken the plunge to see what would happen once they kissed. Despite fears and wariness and malignant darkness screaming to him from their strongholds in his mind, he was determined to kiss his wife no matter what came. He had already spent too much of his life ruled under the cruel lash of fear; a slave to the ever looming terror of losing his power and the thoughts of betrayal by everyone he loved. By heaven itself, he had sworn that he would kiss his wife despite the terror of the unknown.
Their lips met passionately in the bubbling eagerness of newly weds allowed to finalize the ritual of their love. The kiss was both tender and excited as though it was the first true kiss they had shared in eons. For long moments they remained locked in the eternal seal of their love, and no change had over taken him.
Perhaps it was due to the curse having no where to go, since the man Rumpelstiltskin was dead, or perhaps it was a new magic altogether. Whatever the reason, he remained the Dark One, the gray-gold scaled imp; caught with unimaginable powers and a temptation to wield them.
It was the Dark One that Belle had first found her true love with, and had grown to adore from the oddness of his discolored flesh and piercing onyx orbs. The beauty of flesh and features was irrelevant to her, she had whispered to him on their wedding night lying under the cowl of the satin firmament and its host of twinkling stars as their bed chamber.
He could still remember the tips of her fingers tracing the patterns of the gray-gold flesh and the rough texture of his skin as she peered at him in the darkness from their messy nest of cloaks and last season's leaves.
She saw the Rum beneath the scaled exterior, and no matter which skin he possessed it was he that she loved with all her being.
The road to a new life and redemption had been hard, and was harder still, but they worked side by side to vanquish the darkness and banish its foul hold that sought to clutch at his mind and control his passions. Not a day went by he did not have to fight the coaxing temptation of power, but she was there step by hard step to bolster him when he felt drained and defeated.
But tonight, none of that mattered. Tonight, there was no magic simmering in his veins to cull. Tonight they were celebrating what they had gained; what their lives had finally bloomed into after so many long years of separation and rejection and fear. Tonight, they danced.
Slowly, the Dark One lifted on hand whilst the other fell modestly to her hip as though she were some rare, fragile glass treasure he had to hold with the utmost delicacy.
She lay her hand tend tenderly in his upraised own, the other falling about his shoulder.
Soft music began to rise from the instruments of the troupe hidden in the balconies above the ballroom floor.
The sweet notes drifted down upon fragrant air alive with the aroma of blossoming roses as he took the first tremulous step.
Their fluid movement swayed in rhythm to the wondrous chords being plucked from the instruments. Left, right, back, right, forward, their steps in sync just as their rapidly thudding hearts drummed in steady tattoo to the music.
"Do you remember the first time we danced?" Rum smiled lovingly to his wife as he pulled her closer to his wiry form.
She looked down bashfully to hide another plume of scarlet mounting in her cheeks. A small laugh tumbled from her pink lips. "You uh, you caught me singing while I was dusting your collection."
Her mind fell back to that time as he appeared in the main hall right at the end of her bucolic tune. How utterly embarrassed she had been to having been caught in the throes of singing while she labored. Never before could she recall her cheeks feeling afire as his eyes radiated humor and searched inquisitively as though finding another layer to his dutiful slave he had never known existed. No one had ever made her seem so open and nervous about herself than her Rum.
"That's right." He nodded and twirled her so that she became a dazzling whirlwind of lace and gold in his sable eyes. Bringing her back into her arms he tenderly pecked a quick kiss upon the edge of her lips. "We got on the subject of dancing and I believe you struck the challenge."
"We were so awkward, in one another's grip, and yet so…comfortable all at the same instance." Belle chimed in as they swayed in time to the tune of the musician's slow rhythm.
His thin lips twisted into a mischievous, admitting grin. "When I pulled you close to avoid that sword pedestal and you stepped into me at the exact same moment I thought my heard would cease to beat."
No one had been so close to him in ages, and of all people she had sent his heart bashing wantonly against his chest as though it wanted to break free.
Belle could not repress a quiet chortle at the confession that matched her own she had kept tucked away in the corners of her heart when thinking about their days long ago as master and servant. "Looking back it seems so glaringly obvious we were falling in love." She sighed dreamily. "Why don't you think we saw it until the very last moment?"
"Who can say?" Rum heaved his shoulders slightly in a shrug. "Even the wisest of men are baffled by love. And in truth, I don't care why it never dawned upon us that we were slowly growing to cherish one another." Brushing away a rebellious tendril of her thick chestnut mane, he stared at her with voided onyx eyes filled with more love than could be expressed with mere words. "All I care for is that I am here with my love."
A smile stole upon the beauty's face at the declaration. Sighing contently she placed her head upon his shoulder as they twirled and spun slowly about the room. "So am I, my heart, so am I."
At the gesture his heart picked up its ancient tempo. She always made his heart somersault when she was near. Her touch could weaken him far more than magic in all the realms combined aimed at his power.
Burying his head into her russet mane, he inhaled a long, slow breath of her fragrant essence of honey suckle mingled with the scent of his sickly sweet magic.
As they danced with all eyes upon them, they both had no doubt all eyes were stapled upon them.
Be they looks of kind satisfaction or hateful disgust mattered not in the slightest to either of them whilst enwrapped in one another arms; so close their hearts seemed to beat as one.
No one could whisper or snarl anything to dissuade them from what they felt in their hearts, and what they felt for one another always and forever. Words could bite and sting and snap, to attempted to pry them apart, but all actions would be for naught. For in the end...well...
In the end the beast loved the beauty.
And the beauty loved the beast.
~8~8~
A/N: I simply had to give them a super sweet, gooey, fluff N' stuff happy ending. After how I ended the first story I really wanted some serious down right adorable ending. Call me a romantic, or just old fashioned, but some things just have to end happy. That being said, what a treat it has been to write about this couple! I never get tired of Rum/Belle. I feel deeply honored and humbled by everyone who took the time to read and review and as always I hope you had as much fun reading it as I did writing it! : 3