A/N: Since ABC has not yet introduced any characters from my all-time favorite Disney movie I took matters into my own hands. The last part of this chapter is actually a teaser of sorts for a shorter story that will be set in the Expectations universe.

Expectations: Long Live the King

A week after Vivienne's house arrest ends, and the girl is once again free to roam town provided she stays away from the Murphys, Dr. Hopper asks Rumple and Belle to join him in his office.

"Vivienne has something important she wants to ask you, but she was worried you might be upset so she wanted me here to mediate if necessary. Vivienne, go ahead. Tell them what you've told me."

Vivienne licks her lips, and looks from her mother to her father and back again. "I thought…I thought by the time I got allowed out of the house again, no one would be mad at me anymore and I'd get my friends back. But they're still not allowed to talk to me, and sometimes they get together and I see them laughing at me! And the adults just glare at me, or stare at me like I'm some kind of a bug. I've done everything Judge Bertram wanted me to do, but everyone still hates me. No one is ever going to let me forget what I did.

She takes a deep breath. "So I had an idea. I've had it a while but I couldn't do it while I was stuck in the house. I want to go away to boarding school."

"Boarding school?" Belle looks dumbfound. "You mean, leave town?"

"Yes." Vivienne nods. "No one there would know what I did, and I could make new friends, and this school I want to go to sounds really awesome. They even have horses there. It's in Portland."

"For what it's worth, I think this is a good idea." Archie offered. "Vivienne and I can continue our sessions over Skype so that we still comply with the judge's orders. She could have a chance to start over, and without her around the bad feelings toward her will probably start to fade."

Belle is shaking her head. "No. Vivienne, we fought so hard to be able to keep you with us! To keep you from being sent away, and now you want to leave?"

"No, Mum, I want friends again!" Vivienne's hand tightens on the arms of her chair. "I'm…lonely." The admission sounds hard for her.

"The school year has already started." Rumple tries. "How do you know they'd even let you into this school?"

"I don't know. But if they won't then maybe someone else will. Please let me do this. Please. I just can't take this any longer."

Please.

/

The Chatterwick School for Girls is set on a huge, sprawling campus dotted with dormitories, school buildings, and various fenced off fields for riding and sports. It's November now so they are empty, and there's a layer of frost over everything as Belle and Rumple walk with their daughter toward her assigned dormitory building. Rumple thinks she looks young in her blue wool overcoat, too young to go away to school, but Vivienne's face is stretched into the kind of smile he hasn't seen in a long time, and she's looking around her in awe and delight.

"It's so beautiful…" She whispers, almost to herself. They were here once before, to tour the campus, but Vivienne had tried not to let herself get too excited until she was sure she would be accepted. They even had private rooms for girls whose parents were willing to pay extra for that privilege, which Rumple had been. Next year, Vivienne thinks, next year if I make friends I'll see if one of them wants to be my roommate but right now this is probably better. I don't want to end up stuck with someone who is going to hate me. A porter, a real porter, had actually met them at the car and loaded Vivienne's things onto a trolley to take them to her room for her. She feels like a princess at last.

The school has strict rules: uniforms have to be worn to class, casual clothing only allowed afterward. All meals have to be attended, unless the girl happens to be ill. Grades are expected to be at B level or above. C is average, and we feel we are not the right environment for average girls. C students will be asked to seek their education somewhere better suited for toward their needs.

Unless physically unable, girls were required to sign up for at least one and no more than three after-class activities. Vivienne had chosen horse-back riding and fencing. Killian Jones had taught Liam, and Liam in turn had taught Haylan. No one has ever bothered to teach her, but she's been watching them spar for years with blunted fencing sabers.

Each of the rooms, either dual or private, has its own bathroom and bathtub and girls are required to bathe at least once a day. Vivienne had giggled at that one, wondering which girl had been so stinky that such a rule was required. Of course she was going to want to bathe or shower after riding a horse.

The school also, Belle has stressed repeatedly to Vivienne, has a zero-tolerance policy on bullying. If the accusation can be proven (and was found to be more than simply two girls who don't care for each other) the girl is immediately asked to leave. We pride ourselves on high standards and retaining girls who adhere to those standards. Not every girl who begins her school-year with us makes it to the end.

There are other things that can get you thrown out: stealing, smoking, drinking, drug-use, cheating, and leaving the campus without permission.

"So I can't bring my crack-pipe?" Vivienne had asked her mother, pretending to be upset.

"And no stealing cigarettes because you happened to be high and drunk." Rumple added.

Her room is smaller than her bedroom at home, but it is big enough for a twin bed, a desk, and a chest of drawers. There is a closet at one end for her uniforms. Her suitcases and belongings are already set inside of it, ready for her to unpack.

Another rule: when the girl arrives here, her parents can bring her to her room, but immediately have to leave afterward. It is part of the school's policy on acclamation. As long as a girl has her mother to hide behind, she feels no need to exert herself in adjusting to her new environment. With Mother and Father on their way back home, she is forced to rely on her own instincts and judgments and will become used to things far more rapidly.

"Vivienne, I want to stress again this is your choice." Rumple puts his hands on her shoulders. "I want you to have a fantastic time here, but if you ever want to come home, all it will take is a phone call."

Belle is crying. "We just went through this same thing with Faith a few months ago. I thought I'd at least have few more years before I'd have to say goodbye to you too. What am I going to do with both my girls gone?" She bends down and hugs Vivienne tightly. "I am going to miss you so much, baby."

When they're finally gone, Vivienne sits down on the edge of her bed and looks around herself in wonder. She knows she needs to unpack, but suddenly she feels very tiny and alone, and wishes she could call her father right now to turn around and come back to claim her. She opens the suitcase that has her uniform inside and quickly changes into it.

There's a knock on the door.

"It's…um…unlocked."

A girl about Vivienne's age, with long, dark red hair comes in, wearing the pleaded blue skirt and white blouse that made up the school uniform. "Hi. Are you Vivienne? I'm Sylvania. I've been asked to bring you down for lunch."

"Nice to meet you. Vivienne Gold."

"Oh, you got a private room. Lucky. I wanted one but my step-father said it was a waste of money. He's such a tight-ass." Sylvania looks over at the blue and purple dress Vivienne has just changed out of. "That's so beautiful, Vivienne. Who's the designer? I want one."

"Me. I want to be a fashion designer so I make a lot of my own clothes." Vivienne admits with a shrug.

"You're twelve like me and you made that?" Sylvania gasps. She pulls out her phone and takes a picture of the dress. "Everyone is going to love you. Come on. I'll introduce you to my friends. You're going to really like it here, Vivienne. They don't take just anyone: you have to really impress them. I think we're going to be really good friends."

Good friends, bad friends, in-between friends. I just don't care at this point. I just want friends. I'll take whatever I can get.

/

Henry Mills cannot imagine ever living anywhere but Storybrooke, even if he did spend that wonderful year in New York City. This is home. This will always be home. The town has been through so much, shared so much pain and laughter over the years, that there is a strong bond among the people who live here. He knows the name of almost everyone he sees, and if they are old enough to be from the Enchanted Forest, their old identities as well. He keeps track in a battered notebook, a relic from his boyhood. Because he knows what will someday happen. It is unavoidable.

The "old guard" will eventually die off, one by one, just as Granny had. A day will come when all those living in Storybrooke were born in this world, and Storybrooke will change. Children will listen to stories of Snow White and Cinderella and Peter Pan with skepticism, not awe and belief. And a day will come when no one will believe any longer, when the people he loves will be once again regulated to the realm of myth and legend. Their descendants will be blissfully ignorant of their true nature, and Storybook will simply become a place that's almost impossible to find, and no one will know why.

Henry knows he can't stop that from happening, that it is inevitable. All he can is keep as many records as he can for his daughter, for other children if he and Grace have them, to try and keep the truth alive for as long as he possibly can. There is one particular piece of information that he has never been able to confirm.

Who Leon Hamilton was in another realm.

Leon owns and operates the town's one and only funeral parlor. Unlike any other residents, he does actually own it and does not pay rent to Rumple. He's in late middle-age but not old yet, tall and thin and wiry, with thick black hair that has recently developed streaks of gray. A wicked-looking scar runs from his forehead down and over his left eye and down his cheek, and Henry wonders how he managed to avoid losing the eye all together when whatever it was happened to him.

It isn't the scar that has always made Henry's skin crawl, however. It's the man himself, his overly polite and solicitous attitude toward everyone. How he almost oozes sympathy over the loss of a "dear loved one". He's never said an unkind word to anyone, but his green eyes tell a different story. There's something lurking there, something Henry just doesn't like and never has, from the time he was a child.

Leon has always refused requests to reveal what his name was in the other world. He simply shrugs and replies softly "I was no one important. What does it matter? We're in this world now."

Henry has a theory about Leon's true identity, and if it's true then he feels his distrust of the man is well justified. He's spoken to his grandfather about it, and Rumple readily agrees with him that the man is worth watching. But it's Remy, Henry's daughter,who in her innocence confirms Henry's theory.

Henry and Grace try to keep what Remy watches age appropriate, but the child is clever. A few weeks earlier when spending the night at the Gold residence, Remy had crawled out of her bed, went down to the living room, popped in a DVD based on the "kitties" on the cover, and Belle discovered her just as the closing credits were rolling. Rather than being upset by the movie, Remy had loved it and since then has watched it multiple times at home.

Grace is at work and Henry has Remy with him at the grocery store picking up something for dinner. Remy is happily calling out the names of people she recognizes as she sees them and waving at them.

He adores this child, his little Remy, with her quick mind and quirky nature and her strange antipathy toward onions of all things. He wishes desperately sometimes that his father was here to see her: he had so little time with Neal before he died, and he believes his Dad would have loved being a grandfather. He's lost in his own memories as he pushes the cart along, and almost bumps into Leon Hamilton near the meat freezer. Leon is peering down at the wrapped packages of steaks, pork chops, and lame shanks with such a lot of longing that Henry wouldn't be surprised to see drool running down his face.

"Oh, sorry Mr. Hamilton. My mind was somewhere else." Henry apologizes.

"No trouble at all, my dear boy. None at all. I was simply trying to decide what to have for dinner. One of the advantages of living alone, you know. You only have to please yourself at meal-times. I'm simply not sure yet what pleases me. It all looks divine." His eyes move away from the meat and focus down on Remy. "Hello there, my dear."

Remy's face breaks into a huge grin. "SCAR! DADDY! IT'S SCAR! LION KING SCAR!" She cocks her head. "How come you not kitty no more?"

The look of utter and absolute shock on Leon's face is priceless, and from his expression there is no doubt at all in Henry's mind that his little girl is correct.

"My dear child…" Leon leans down.

"Remy." Henry's daughter corrects him.

"Remy. I have never, ever been a 'kitty'. Don't believe everything you see on television."

"But you are him." Henry can't help himself. "You're the one the story is based around."

"Perhaps." Leon shrugs indifferently. "People with limited intellect and little to do will spin all manner of mad stories to entertain themselves. They give little thought to how much truth is in them." He reaches down and grabs a pack of thick, red ribeyes and tosses them into his grocery basket. "Good day Mr. Mills. Remy." He tips his head toward them briskly and walks off.

/

How beautifully ironic. Two decades of people prying into his life and his business and his history, trying to find another name to call him by. When it was so bloody obvious, at least to him, that he was truly baffled why no one had ever been able to figure it out. And when someone does, it's a two-year-old child.

There are no funerals going on tonight, no bodies to prepare, no whimpering relatives to pretend to give a damn about. He's free to be along with his own thoughts. He reclines in his favorite chair, sips a glass of wine, and closes his eyes.

And he remembers.

"But Father, I don't understand." The boy is shaking his head in bewilderment and growing anger. "I'm the eldest. I'm your heir!"

"Leon, I have to think of what's best for this kingdom." His father, an older, greyer, and thinner version of Leon himself was leaning back in his wooden chair, looking up at Leon like he was a naughty child demanding sweets he had no right to. "You're not a ruler. You're brash, temperamental, too quick to fly off the handle and too slow to forgive grievances. You only spend time with our subjects when I force you to, and even then you treat them as if their presence taints you. Your brother goes out among them every day: they adore him, and there's talk of revolt if I don't declare him my new heir. You won't be cast out, Leon. You'll be well provided for the rest of your life, a life you can live at your own leisure and in pursuit of your own interests. You would be miserable as a king: you just don't have the right nature for it."

"And what about my betrothal contract, Father?" Leon demands. "Sara has lived her entire life expecting to be married to a king. How am I to tell her she's only getting a prince?"

The king casts his eyes down, and Leon suddenly knows. "You changed the contract…" Leon breathes, hardly believing the truth staring him in the face. "You're not just giving him my crown, are you? He's getting my wife as well."

"I'm in the process of trying to make another arrangement for you. The Duke of Kirkport, near Avonlea, has an exquisitely beautiful daughter, I'm told, almost of marital age…"

"I don't a bloody duke's daughter! I want Sara! I love her!" Leon roars, and his father draws back.

"You've only met her a handful of times. Asa will be good to her, son. He cares deeply for her…"

"Because he's a jealous prat and he's always wanted what was mine!" The boy's face is red, causing the stark white of his scar (a gift from Asa years ago) to stand out vividly against his skin. "You think he's so damn perfect, everyone does. You don't know him like I do. You don't know that he's sneaky and conniving! You wouldn't even believe he gave me this" Leon gestures at his scar, "on purpose. Well, long live the king, Father." He turned and stomped out of the study, slamming the door behind him. He heads for the front door of the great hall, and passes Asa along the way. Their eyes lock and there is smug victory in Asa's gaze. "You seem upset, brother. Is there something I can assist you with?" Asa asks politely.

Without a word, Leon walks out into the cold, rain-soaked courtyard, and pulls his jerkin tightly around him. He has to get out of here. He has to leave, go somewhere else, somewhere to plan, to think. He can't do it here.

This is his castle, earned by virtue of being here a full two years before Asa was pulled out of their mother's lifeless womb. That birthright earned him Sara as well, an impossibly lovely girl, cousin to the Queen of Avonlea. The girl he'd loved without reservation since he first set eyes upon her at the age of ten. Gone in the span of one conversation. Gone…

But not lost. Leon heads toward the stables, and his roan stallion Bixton neighs at him in greeting. He'll leave for now, because it's too painful to stay, but he'll come back one day.

You'll pay, Asa. You'll pay, damn you.

The empty wine glass falls from Leon's hand and onto his lap, and his memories fade away into dreams.