Author's note: Happy "Skin Deep" day? Heh... maybe not the best chapter to post for the occasion, but that's how my posting schedule worked out! Warning for violence and implied rape.
He didn't want to wake the man. People called Rumplestiltskin a monster, but he had always done his best to protect his son. He couldn't forgive Maurice, couldn't understand how Belle and her mother could do it. That was why he had demanded such an outrageous price from them, hoping they would reconsider, but then the bloody High Archon had stepped in.
Well, it had caused Belle to smile at him, at Rumplestiltskin, and for a moment he had felt almost heroic, so he supposed he should be grateful.
What had happened in Belle's third trial? How could she look at him like that, as if she gave him her glances freely and without revulsion? His other self had threatened to kill her, and yet she was alive and he was gone, that darker echo of himself. She was too forgiving by far.
Rumplestiltskin sank into the shadows, finding the thread into the prison where Maurice's soul was trapped, a nightmare of ambiguous reality. Rumplestiltskin didn't have the reality-crossing power that his alternate self had displayed, but if he dug deeply enough into the darkness, he could summon a vision compelling enough to convince a lost soul of its truth. To free Maurice, he would have to start at the point where the nightmare began and follow him to the end, then drag him out.
The shadows solidified around him as he concentrated. They gained color and life. Light oozed through the cracks in the walls of the world, just enough to illuminate a single soul. Rumplestiltskin found him in a facsimile of the Church of Olympus in the capital of Avonlea, the one that the archbishop had fortified against dark magic. It didn't stop the Dark One now any more than it had before, this time because he was only here as a ghost who wasn't truly part of this world.
He floated inside and into a scene of a ceremony interrupted by brutal conflict. On one side — himself! Ranged against the Dark One were the archbishop and his followers, wielding sacred blades and blessed chains. One of them had his knee on Lumiere's neck, choking him with a collar. The collar was woven from leather lashes from a flagellant's scourge, coated with fairy dust, all designed to neutralize the Timer's magic. The griffon, Otulissa, lay lifeless on the floor in front of the altar. The smell of blood and smoke and incense filled the air.
In the far corner, Maurice and Gaston held between them a petite prisoner in an ornate white dress, face hidden under a veil.
"Stop!" The archbishop pounded the foot of his long staff onto the floor, the bronze incense burner swinging violently from the top where it was attached by a chain. The incense was infused with spells against the Dark One, and the Rumplestiltskin native to this reality was weakened by it, swaying slightly as he summoned another fireball to his hand. "Cease your sorcery or your demon dies now."
The prisoner in the dress surged forward, wrenching futilely at her captors. The veil was knocked askew, revealing the face underneath. Belle! She screamed out a despairing, "No! Don't! Lumiere!"
Rumplestiltskin clenched his fists, but was even more helpless than either of the captives in the room. He was no more than a ghostly shadow who had no substance in this world. He could only watch himself as he met Lumiere's eyes, watch the fire go out.
"Kill him and I'm killing all of you," the other Rumplestiltskin promised. "Release Lumiere and perhaps I'll let you live."
"The demon's life may be spared, but not cheaply," said the archbishop. "You must forfeit your claim upon this daughter of Avonlea. You will not defile her with your vile touch!"
The other Rumplestiltskin hissed, "You ask much. She is promised to me. We had a deal."
"No! Please. Don't let them kill Lumiere!" Belle pleaded, her voice choked with tears. Rumplestiltskin's heart twisted in pain at the sight, even knowing that this was not his reality and there was nothing he could do for her.
The other Rumplestiltskin ignored her. "No one breaks deals with me."
"Then the demon dies..." The archbishop gestured with the tip of his staff at his subordinate.
The collar glowed. Lumiere squealed in agony, rendered wordless and powerless by holy miracles. Then the collar tightened, and even that thin, gasping sound was cut off.
"Wait!" The other Rumplestiltskin broke at the last moment. He kept his face impassive, but everyone knew that he had lost. All that was left was to negotiate his surrender — Lumiere in exchange for his claim on Belle.
"Neither you nor any of your minions nor any demons of the Wood will ever set foot or wing in Avonlea again." The archbishop dictated his terms with a triumphant smile. "You and yours will take no revenge. Swear this on your name with all the gods and the fates as your witness."
"Agreed," the other replied in a low voice. "I, Rumplestiltskin, so swear it. We will take no revenge. But a broken deal carries its own price. Are you willing to pay?"
The archbishop flushed. "Your threats are meaningless! We have the favor of the gods."
"We shall see," snarled the other, and the Rumplestiltskin who watched knew that most of that was a bluff. He could do nothing except gather up Lumiere, who had been choked unconscious by then, and transport both of them away from Avonlea — never to return, by the terms of their new deal. He had given his word, swearing on his name.
The ghostly Rumplestiltskin remained. It was not himself he needed to follow, but Maurice. Maurice, who was all smiles and congratulatory babble now that the hated Dark One had been banished. Maurice, who was ready to hand his daughter over to the monster who had... who must have raped her at least once already in this nightmare. Rumplestiltskin's stomach lurched at the realization. His counterpart had failed completely to protect her.
You're just full of broken promises, you pathetic worm, whispered the darkness crawling inside his head.
Shut up! he retorted. This wasn't what had happened. The real Belle was safe.
It's only a matter of time, the darkness taunted.
Rumplestiltskin ground his ghostly teeth and watched as the mess was cleared up for the resumption of the ceremony. The overturned bowls on the altar were replaced with three new ones, with sacrifices carved from the griffon's carcass, the clerics ignoring the bride's distress at the desecration. Fresh offerings of meat, fat, and feathers dipped in blood were laid out on the blessed cloth covering the altar. New candles were lit, more incense burnt.
He could hardly bear to watch this obscenity of a wedding, but he had little choice. He couldn't fail the older Belle who was waiting in his castle for him to save her father from himself. This was Maurice's wish as much as it was the Dark One's, shadow magic turning his own hopes into a punishment. That boded ill for what lay ahead, thought Rumplestiltskin. He couldn't help but hope that it would improve for this Belle, real or not.
No.
No, it wouldn't. Rumplestiltskin followed, uselessly enraged, as Maurice handed Belle over to Gaston's custody.
"She'll stay with me now, won't you, darling?" Gaston grinned lecherously at his new bride. "We'll be seeing a lot of each other from now on."
Then they were gone, to what bridal suite Rumplestiltskin didn't want to think about. He followed Maurice back to his quarters in the royal castle, where he presented his daughter's enforced marriage as a fait accompli to Lady Colette. Colette didn't take the news well, but she had no power to change anything.
Rumplestiltskin was consoled by the archbishop's death a few days later, apparently of a heart ailment. So much for his bid to acquire even more power through Belle. Ha. Magic always had its due. The Dark One's deals were written in more than mortal words — they were marked by the fates.
Colette made at least one attempt to smuggle her daughter out of Gaston's house, but she was caught, and thereafter banned from ever visiting again, along with Belle's sister Sylvie. That was followed by another furious row between Maurice and his wife. The next time Maurice went to see Belle, Gaston was more insufferable than ever.
"She is with child. The start of my dynasty," gloated Gaston, and Maurice, the fool, nodded along, happy to be a grandfather.
A rumor reached Avonlea that Rumplestiltskin was dead, a new Dark One in his place. A whisper of a name circulated: Snow White. Queen Snow, who had finally taken her father's throne back from her stepmother.
How the hell had that happened? Maurice didn't know, so Rumplestiltskin didn't know either. He cursed the man's ignorance and lack of curiosity. Maurice was delighted at the news and didn't care to inquire further.
Belle herself was subdued, worn down by captivity. The hatred in her eyes had dimmed to a seething resentment. But Gaston had isolated her, beaten her down in ways Maurice turned his eyes from — and thus hidden from Rumplestiltskin — but the Dark One knew. The darkness had broken plenty of victims in its time, and it knew just how much fear had been instilled in Belle to keep her so docile. By the way she kept an arm protectively over her abdomen when Gaston brought her father to see her, she had poured all her life into her unborn child.
She wasn't showing her pregnancy yet, but to the Dark One's eye, her aura was richer, more intense, and tinged with something not quite mortal. He remembered the amulet the late archbishop had given Gaston. A divine seed. That seed had now been planted, but the implications were lost with Octavius.
They would all have to wait and see.
Came the time of the birth, and Maurice alone of her family was invited to attend, at least as far as the outer chambers, while only the midwife and serving maids attended Belle inside.
"A son," boasted Gaston as they waited. "The portents have foretold it."
Maurice slapped his son-in-law heartily on the back. "He'll be a fine, healthy lad, I'm sure. Thanks be to the gods that she won't be birthing the Dark One's get."
Gaston grinned. "Told you I could save her, old man."
They flinched when the screaming began, but reassured each other that it was only to be expected from a first birth.
"Delicate little thing," said Gaston almost fondly. "But they'll take care of her. I hired the best."
Rumplestiltskin wanted to strangle him. The best? He had hired someone cheap. And those screams were not normal. He glared at Maurice, willing the man to just go in and check on his daughter! At least that way Rumplestiltskin would be able to see what was going on, not that he could affect it in any way.
At last the screaming stopped.
"Any minute now," said Maurice.
But the woman who stepped out of the inner chamber to announce the birth was not the midwife. It was Belle. Belle, who should not even be upright so soon, staggered out, covered in blood and carrying a tiny bundle cradled against her chest.
"Belle!" Gaston's face went blank with shock. "What are you doing? You shouldn't be..."
Belle stared murderously at her husband, one eye hidden behind a messy fall of blood-splattered hair. She said hoarsely, "That... is the last time... you tell me that..." She took another unsteady step forward. "Husband. Meet... your son." She thrust the bundle towards Gaston. "His name... is Gideon."
Gaston instinctively caught the bundle and peered down at the contents.
"What... is that blood?" Maurice frowned in confusion. "Where's the midwife? Shouldn't someone be with you, love?"
Belle croaked out a laugh. "Do you know... what the name... Gideon... means?"
"What does... what does that have to do with anything?"
That was when Gaston shrieked, an animal's last terrified cry in the face of a predator. He fell to the ground, feebly trying to pry off the creature that had attached itself to his face. Even as Gaston weakened, the creature seemed to unfold, its aura blazing white to the Dark One's sight. It straightened, solidifying into a tall, human figure with the face of a handsome youth of an age with the one fallen at his feet.
He is my father. All that he is, I will take... The thought resonated through the ether, to anyone able to sense magic.
Belle stopped laughing. She looked at the youth, and concluded quietly, "It means... 'hewer'. Or perhaps... 'feller'... one who cuts down his enemies. Or his... mother's enemies."
The youth turned a terrifying smile on the dying Gaston. "Thank you, Father. Don't worry. I'll make you proud. A pity you won't be here to see it..."
Rumplestiltskin gaped in horror. So this was what happened when a god forced its way into existence through an unwilling mother.
A god full of fear and hatred learned in the womb.
A child of magic absorbed its mother's spiritual and mental state through the blood along with oxygen, nutrients, and more mundane influences. A divine child even more so. Belle in this reality had no magic of her own and no one else to help her to shield her son, and so he was forced into an intimate knowledge of darkness that destroyed his innocence long before he was born.
Even now, they were bound, mother and son. The life force Gideon had drained from his father, he shared with Belle, healing her despite herself. She was walking as easily now as a woman who hadn't just given birth minutes before.
Maurice was shocked into complete incomprehension. He had the look of a man hoping to wake up any minute from the nightmare. Something that wouldn't happen for another five years, thought Rumplestiltskin. This was only the beginning.
Gideon gave his father a brutal kick in the ribs. "Hmm. Guess he's gone the way of all flesh." He turned to Maurice with a cocky tilt of his head. "Well, well, well, so you're my grandfather."
"One of them," said Belle. "Technically speaking. Though Gaston's parents... are dead." Her eyes followed her son, as if she was afraid to look away, as if she was afraid of what she would see around him. "Gideon..."
Rumplestiltskin shuddered. He had seen a look like that before. Where? When?
"Oh, he won't die," sneered Gideon. "I think we can still make use of him. Besides, he deserves to see the glorious future he so lovingly helped bring into being."
"But my mother," Belle pleaded. "My mother."
Maurice roused at last from his stupor. "Colette? No! Don't you dare—"
Gideon waved a hand, transporting all three of them back to the royal castle, straight into Lady Colette's chambers, where they were greeted with cries of shock. "What a racket!" Gideon waved his hand again, and Colette's two ladies in waiting gasped, choked, and collapsed. "Hello, Grandmother."
Colette's eyes darted to Belle in shock. "Belle? What is this?" Her voice trembled only a little as she spoke, even as her fingers groped blindly for the dagger-like letter opener on her desk.
Belle tore her gaze away from Gideon just long enough to mumble to Colette, "I'm sorry."
Gideon chuckled. "I won't drag it out. As you so conveniently already have a suitable sharp object in your hand, let's go with that." He flicked his fingers at Colette. Lines of magic wrapped themselves around her hand and yanked.
Colette stabbed herself in the throat. Her eyes turned to her daughter in disbelief, gurgling inarticulately before she, too, collapsed.
Belle's face was frozen, bloodless, as she watched her son murder her mother. And as Rumplestiltskin watched Belle, he remembered. Bae had looked like that, the day his father had become the Dark One.
"Colette!" Maurice broke free of his own paralysis to drop to his knees at his wife's side, cradling her body in his lap. "Oh gods, Colette."
"It was the only way," said Belle tonelessly, her eyes on her son again. "The only way to spare her."
Rumplestiltskin's heart sank, knowing what must be in store for this Belle in the days ahead. As for her father...
Maurice roared in denial. Leaving his wife for dead on the floor, he leaped to his feet and grabbed for the largest heavy object to hand — a metal candelabra — and swung it at Gideon's head.
It bounced harmlessly off an invisible barrier, throwing Maurice off balance. Gideon swiveled neatly and caught his grandfather's wrist, forcing him to drop the candelabra. "None of that, now." He pressed the index finger of his other hand into Maurice's forehead. "Blood of my blood. Thy will be mine." Skin and flesh sizzled. When Gideon withdrew his hand, the mark of his finger remained imprinted on Maurice's skin like a fresh brand.
All the anger drained out of Maurice, leaving him empty-eyed and docile.
"That's better." Gideon smiled. "A good beginning, wouldn't you say, Mother?"
"Gideon, please..."
Gideon clapped his hands. "Yes, yes, you're right. So many relatives, so little time." With a flick of his wrist, a family tree unscrolled before him. He spent a few minutes studying the lists of names.
For the rest of the week, Rumplestiltskin followed Maurice and Belle as they followed Gideon as he hunted down every last legitimate member of the royal family, marking them with his blood brand and turning them into his thralls. He forced the old king to abdicate in Gideon's favor, giving him control of all Avonlea.
"These fools believe in blood right," he said to his mother.
Belle looked at him sadly. "They say they do, but in their hearts they know better."
"It matters not. It gives me a foot in the door, as the mortals say." Gideon smiled. "Once I am king, they will believe, both on their lips and in their hearts. In time, I will teach them to worship me as their god."
It was no empty boast.
Remy had become archbishop after the death of Octavius. He proved to have a flair for inspiring the crowds, lashing them into a frenzy of devotion. As long as he was useful to Gideon, he was permitted to fleece the faithful and enjoy a life of luxury. As long as his sermons exhorted the virtues of submission, as long as the people listened to him.
Through it all, Gideon forced Maurice to stand at his side, a witness to the monster he had helped create. Each month, he took a life to fuel his power. It was always someone young and healthy and beautiful, someone supplied by Maurice. The rest of the kingdom fell at his feet, grateful to be spared, grateful for Gideon's 'protection.' No one refused him anything, each more eager than the next to be of service to their new god. They were the luckiest kingdom in the Enchanted Forest, according to the clerics.
But at the end of the year, it was Belle who was sacrificed. Gideon had wrested the Dark Curse from the Mistress of All Evil, the dragon no match for his divine powers. Gideon had no interest in going to the Land Without Magic, only in the absolute control the curse gave him to shape the world to his whim.
"I love you, Mother. More than any other soul in this or any other realm," he said when he ripped the heart from her chest. "And I know you love me, which is why you understand why I have to do this."
It wasn't forgiveness that Rumplestiltskin read in her eyes at the end. A year of unrelenting horror had hammered any softness from her. All she had left was relief.
Relief that she would not live to suffer in Gideon's world under the Dark Curse. Maurice was not so lucky.
You wanted to torture him. Well done! cackled the darkness. A bit surprising that a woman so full of light would birth such a fiend, eh? One wonders how her child with YOU would turn out.
Rumplestiltskin dismissed the thought, knowing how unlikely it was for him to ever father a child again.
He let the years skim by, following Maurice through the nightmare. At the end of it, he found him locked behind a mask of bone. Under the curse, Gideon had made Maurice into his Grim Reaper, the cloaked figure with the skull's face who wielded an enchanted scythe. The fear and dread provoked by his presence, he harvested for his god, but every bit of it went through him, first — and through Rumplestiltskin as he shadowed Maurice. But he endured it as he had every other fear he had suffered in his long life. After four accelerated years, he was almost as much of a quivering wreck as Maurice.
Behold the wine bowl of the gods. The darkness in Rumplestiltskin appreciated the spellcraft of the enchantment on the bone mask. Maurice was a vessel stained by its contents, suffering the same horrors he was forced to inflict, thus intensifying the flavor for his master. Pull yourself together. It's just a spell. A tasty one, though. I like it.
"I'll have to remember it, then," Rumplestiltskin said through gritted teeth, resenting the enjoyment the darkness took in his weakness. He shook his head, trying to clear his mind of the spell-induced horrors. "This has been quite the educational opportunity!"
Maurice stared back at him dully through the eye holes. He didn't speak, but Rumplestiltskin could tell that he could see him, which meant that they existed in the same moment. Rumplestiltskin had finally caught up to Maurice's 'now'.
"Just a quip, dearie!" Rumplestiltskin grabbed the mask and wrenched it free with a disentanglement spell. Maurice's face underneath was chalk pale and sweaty, twisting with pain. "Oh yes, this may sting a bit."
Maurice groaned, listing heavily to one side, his grip loosening on the scythe. Rumplestiltskin caught the man, letting the scythe clatter to the ground. In this world, Maurice lived at the top of a stone tower, alone except for a servant who had a room lower down, so there was no one to witness the Dark One's visit, even if they were able to. It was only Maurice, half in one world and half in the other, who was real enough to notice the intruder.
"Wake up, Maurice." Rumplestiltskin could physically drag the man back with him, given the Dark One's unnatural strength, but he much preferred to have him walk back under his own power. "Maurice!"
"Huh?" Bleary eyes blinked back at him.
"Time to go. You don't want to miss your daughter's wedding, do you?" Rumplestiltskin grinned nastily. "The real one."
"My daughter is dead."
Rumplestiltskin twisted his fist into the front of Maurice's shirt and slammed him into a wall. "Wake up! It's not real."
"No, no, what are you, what is this?" mumbled Maurice.
Rumplestiltskin let go. He hissed in exasperation, "She wants you back, Maurice. Who knows why, but she does, you useless lump. Get moving."
Maurice's eyes widened. "Dark One!"
"Finally! Yes."
"But you're dead..."
Rumplestiltskin barely refrained from slapping him. "It's. Not. Real. You're under a curse."
"Your curse." Enlightment dawned at last. The nightmare reality loosened its grip as Rumplestiltskin pulled him free, inch by inch.
"Yes. But I'm calling it off. Come along, Maurice." He threaded a summoning through the name, but the man's hostility worked against it. "We don't have forever. Well, you don't."
"I'm not going anywhere with you."
"Then you'll have to stay here." Rumplestiltskin moved as if to force the bone mask back over Maurice's face.
"No!" Maurice cowered at the sight, fending it off with a trembling arm. "No..."
"What other choice do you have, dearie?"
Maurice slumped to the ground, back against the wall. His eyes closed and he bowed his head. "Just kill me. Let me die."
"Hmm." Rumplestiltskin pretended to consider it. Then he shook his head. "No. No, your daughter wouldn't like it."
"Daughter," mumbled Maurice. "Is it true? Is she...?"
"Belle is alive. She wants you back. So does your wife."
Maurice gasped. "Colette... she lives?"
Rumplestiltskin nodded. "Lady Colette and your daughter lugged your carcass all the way to my land and asked me to lift my curse..."
"They... did they make a deal with you? No, no, you can't!" Maurice scrambled upright, using the wall for support. "What price did you demand, you beast?"
Rumplestiltskin gave him an evil smile. "If you want to know that, you'll have to follow me and ask them for yourself."
At last, at last, he coaxed Maurice into motion. It was a long way to go, but faster now that Rumplestiltskin had already traversed it on the way in.
