A/N: Although free elementary education began in Britain in 1833 with 'schools for poor children' and fee exemptions for parents unable to afford school fees at board schools where no other institutions existed, schooling was not compulsory until 1880.

Andrew Lang's Blue Fairy Book contains (among others) versions of "Little Red Riding Hood," "Sleeping Beauty," "Cinderella," "Aladdin," "Rumpelstiltskin," "Beauty and the Beast," and "Hansel and Gretel". But although "Snow White and Rose Red" is in there, the "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" story—or "Snowdrop" as it's called in Lang's compilation, only appears in the Red Fairy Book. Although the novel Peter Pan and Wendy was published in 1911, the original play came out in 1904 and was revived annually for some time thereafter. I'm being vague on the theatre, because I couldn't confirm where it would have played in 1906, but the 1904 premiere was at the Duke of York's in Charing Cross, so I can confirm that there was at least one theater in that part of London at the time!

Chapter 28

Rumple looked at his handkerchief again, hoping that this time, it would prove to be some trick of the light. He couldn't truly say he was surprised. He'd been more tired lately, less hungry, and of course, last winter's cough had never truly gone away. Another winter was nearly here now and Rumple suspected his health would fare all the worse for it. Until today, he'd tried blaming his troubles on air pollution. While the smoke from coal-burning furnaces and the odors from the wares of butchers and fishmongers did add a noxious brew to the atmosphere, Rumple supposed that deep down, he'd suspected the true cause of his affliction.

And now, a bit of bloody phlegm had confirmed it.

Consumption. In this time and place, it was a death sentence. Rumple closed his eyes. The seer had spoken truly. Bae—sometimes Rumple still couldn't believe the lad was already fifteen, but still only fifteen—would grow up without a father. He'd never see his boy grow up. Never see him raise a family. Never—well, actually, Rumple reflected, he would know his grandchild, but he'd learn about the relationship far too late and by the time he did, there would be so little time and he'd make such a mess of things. As usual.

And if Bae never went to Neverland, Henry would never exist in the first place.

Rumple set his elbow down on the table and rested his chin in his palm. He had to decide. He could try to let things unfold now as they must have the first time. Bae was still friendly with the Darling children and Rumple knew that they had played some role in getting his son to Neverland in the first place, although he was hazy on the details. Or he could choose to ignore what he knew of the future. They could leave London, perhaps go to someplace by the sea. It might buy him a few more months. Bae would be away from the Darlings. As to how they would live, well, he hadn't known the answer to that when he'd followed Bae here through the portal. Something would materialize. Somehow, they would manage.

Of one thing he was certain. He wasn't about to squander his remaining time wrestling with indecision as he had back in the Enchanted Forest. He needed to make up his mind on which course to follow and he needed to do it quickly.

He didn't have much time left to him, after all…

In Kensington Gardens, Bae sat on a bench and sketched the scene before him, wishing that Papa had come with him. Then again, he knew that his father seemed to tire more easily these days, and perhaps it was a bit dull for him to just sit here for hours and wait until his son was done with his sketching.

"Hello, Baelfire," a sweet voice greeted him, and he looked up to see Wendy Darling and her brothers heading toward him, Nana at their side. He smiled a greeting in return.

"Sketching again, I see," John said a bit pompously, but his grin was friendly and Bae took no offense.

"May I have a look?" Wendy asked. "Or is it a private affair?"

Bae fought not to laugh. Sometimes, Wendy sounded so stilted. Rather like a character in an old book, he thought, wondering why she couldn't just talk plainly like Robertson Ay or his brother. Without the rhyming slang, though; he really thought he would laugh if she tried her hand at that! "You can look," he said, handing over the sketchpad.

"Thank you," Wendy said, sitting down on the bench beside him and smiling as her younger brothers ran a short distance away. Bae chuckled a bit when Michael picked up a longish stick from off the ground and struck what had to be his idea of a dueling pose. John parried the thrust with the umbrella he always carried with him, rain or shine, and the two began their mock battle in earnest.

Wendy laughed too. "They're always playing pirate these days," she sighed indulgently. "I'm just curious," she added. "Every time we come here, you're always drawing. Papa has engaged a tutor for John and me to give us art lessons, but I don't think we practice nearly as much as you must and…" Her voice trailed off. "Baelfire," she said in a rather different tone of voice, as she turned through his earlier sketches, "these are really quite good."

"Thanks," Bae said, ducking his head a bit.

"Who's your instructor?" the girl continued. "How long have you been learning? I think Papa might consider hiring him instead if he could teach you to draw this well."

Bae shook his head. "I don't have an instructor," he said. "I mean, Mr. Banks was tutoring me in history and literature last year for the scholarship exam…" His voice trailed off as he felt a pang. Papa had been so disappointed, but there had been no help for— "I've just… always drawn," he finished, pulling his thoughts back to the present.

Wendy pursed her lips for a moment. "Could you… Could you let me borrow one of these? Please? I think I'd like to show it to my tutor. He might be able to, well, you know, analyze it for you."

"I couldn't pay him," Bae said quickly.

"I shouldn't think you'd have to, just to analyze. Why he didn't ask Papa to pay for John or me before he agreed to take us on. I think the fees are only for lessons, though Papa won't discuss such things with me," she added with a slight pout.

Bae smiled. "Well, okay, then," he said, flipping the pages back and carefully tearing out one heavy cream sheet where he'd drawn two children rolling hoops before the Albert Memorial. "You can give him this one. Actually," he grinned, "you can keep it."

"Thank you, Baelfire," Wendy said formally, taking the page and rolling it carefully, before putting it in the cloth bag that Nana wore on one side of her furry back. Then, flushing a bit, she added, "If you should ever care to…" her voice dropped to a whisper, "kiss me, I don't think I'd mind."

Bae's eyes widened. And then, almost unconsciously, he bent toward her and she toward him. Their lips were mere inches apart…

WOOF!

Startled, the two teens jerked apart, just as Nana hurried forward inserting herself between her young female charge and the slightly-older object of her affections.

"Uh… maybe today's not so good for that," Bae managed, as Nana nudged Wendy further away from him. A low growl pulsed in the dog's throat. "I… think maybe I'd like to draw this from a different angle," he said hastily, getting to his feet. "Another time?"

Wendy, still being herded away by her guardian canine, glanced back over her shoulder at the retreating youth. "Goodbye, Baelfire!" she called after him. Then, again more softly, "Goodbye…"

As he had in the Enchanted Forest, Bae rose with the dawn the next morning, without the need for an alarm clock. After he'd used the basin on the nightstand to wash and got dressed, he spared a worried glance for the bed on the opposite side. Papa was still asleep. That was fine; Papa didn't need to be awake at this hour, but he was usually stirring by now. Bae chewed on the inside of his lower lip. Papa's health had never quite got back to what it had been before that day in Kensington Gardens, but there were days when he seemed to be closer to it. There hadn't been many of those lately.

Bae went quietly downstairs to the scullery. Breakfast wasn't ready yet, but Emily was already poking at the fire. Mrs. Robertson was 'in a delicate condition' again and she'd recently hired a maid of all work to 'help with the lodgers and whatever else as needs doing when I can't get to it'. She greeted Bae cheerfully. "There's a bit o' cold roast left from last night," she said, setting down the poker and striding into the larder. "You'll want something heartier than bread to tide you till lunch."

"Thanks, Emmie," Bae said. "I mean, I could get something on the way—"

"Begging your pardon, Mr. Cassidy," Emily said with some asperity, "but you lodging here entitles you to bed and board. I rather think the missus'd take a dim view of me not giving you your money's worth. And I don't imagine we'll be seeing you at tea neither, will we?"

Bae shook his head. "No," he agreed. "You won't. Uh, say, in about an hour, could you knock on my door and make sure Papa's awake?"

"That gennulman?" Emily smiled, wrapping the food in a clean cloth napkin. "No trouble at all."

Bae grinned. "Thanks, Emmie, you're a brick!" He grabbed up the napkin, slid it into his bag and headed out into the city.

There weren't many jobs to be had in London outside of regular working hours, but Bae was looking. At the moment, he picked up an extra two shillings a week, one for reading aloud to an elderly man with failing eyesight for an hour in the morning and another for reading aloud in the evenings to a somewhat younger man who'd 'been a year too old to get schooling for gratis in 1880'. He'd never have discovered that there was work to be had that way, had he not decided several months ago to save money by walking the half-hour from their Bethnal Green lodgings to the bank on Lombard Street, instead of taking the tube. He'd had enough time to stop and get his shoes shined—something he never would have thought to bother with, had Mr. Lorry not delivered a scathing lecture early on, on the need for all bank employees, from the lowliest messenger boy (here, Mr. Lorry had put a bit of extra emphasis on the word 'lowliest,' while fixing Bae with a steely gaze that made it clear he had in mind one messenger boy in particular) to the partners themselves. Since that day, Bae had always made certain that his shoes were unscuffed and his clothing stainless and dust-free. It was worth paying a penny for a shine.

On this day, there had been a customer ahead of him.

"Sorry, guv," the shoeshine boy was saying. "In an hour, I earn more from shines and tips than you're offering me to read you the papers. If you want my advice, you'll run an advertisement in the Times or Daily."

The elderly man nodded sadly. "I was hoping to save the notice fee, but perhaps you're right."

Impulsively, Bae spoke up. "You need someone to read to you?" Both the gentleman and the shine boy turned to him. "I'm sorry," Bae said at once. "I-I couldn't help overhearing."

The man smiled. "The curse of aging, lad," he said. "When one's hearing starts to go, one oftentimes finds oneself speaking louder as though it were everyone else having trouble understanding you. I'd thought that, at least, I could still read, but the print in these papers is so infernally small."

Bae nodded sympathetically, but he felt his hopes rising. "How much were you offering?"

"Well," the man said, "I thought I could do with a shilling a week for an hour of your time, daily. I don't expect you'll finish the paper in that amount of time, but it'd be a dashed sight better than nothing."

And the best offer he'd had yet. "It's a deal," he grinned, holding out his hand. The man shook it.

Now, Bae turned onto a side street and walked past a number of narrow, attached dwellings, before pausing some three quarters of the way down the block, mounting the front steps, and lifting the cast-iron door knocker. He rapped smartly twice and waited. After a moment, the door opened.

"Good morning, Cassidy," his employer greeted him.

Bae smiled. "Good morning, Mr. Winterwood."

This was it, Bae thought with a sinking feeling. He was about to lose his job. The words, "Cassidy, my office, now," didn't bode well. Not when the person uttering them was George Darling, whose daughter Bae had nearly kissed yesterday. He might have only lived in this land for a year or so, but that had been long enough to recognize that a bank messenger boy was nearly as unsuitable for a bank officer's daughter as a peasant boy for a princess! He knew that he and Wendy were just friends—or at least, he thought he had before Sunday in the park—but maybe even friendship was too risky. His hands sweating, he walked into the dark-paneled office.

"Close the door, Cassidy," Mr. Darling ordered, and Bae did so, taking care not to slam it.

Mr. Darling laid a paper on his desk. "I believe this is yours," he said. It was a statement, not a question, but Bae nodded all the same when he beheld the sketch he'd given Wendy.

"Yes, sir," he said, jamming his sweaty hands in his pockets.

"Take your hands out of your pockets, boy," Mr. Darling snapped, and Bae swallowed hard and obeyed, fighting hard not to wipe his hands on his trousers. Mr. Darling sniffed a bit. "I must say, I think it's a waste of time. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to make any sort of livelihood with this foolishness?"

Bae winced. "I-it's just a hobby, sir," he said.

"Do you imagine you've time for hobbies? Do you need more hours; is that it?"

Bae blinked. Mr. Darling sounded as though he was delivering a reprimand, but something about the man's tone suddenly gave Bae the impression that his disapproval was, at least partly, feigned. And the truth was that at this point, more hours—if it meant more pay—would be a godsend. But if he admitted as much and he'd misread his employers tone, an affirmative answer might be taken for cheek. He fell back on the safest response he could make. "Sir?"

Mr. Darling peered down his nose at the youth. "There's a position opening in the post room. It means another six shillings a week and you'd start an hour earlier. I had meant to recommend you for it, but if you'd rather indulge your hobby…"

Bae had a feeling that the wise response was to assure his employer that he'd give up the sketching immediately, but he knew it would be a lie. "I can do both, Mr. Darling," he said firmly. "I really only have time to draw now on the weekend. The extra hours won't interfere."

"Just see that they don't," Mr. Darling sniffed. "It's my reputation on the line as well if I put you forward."

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."

"Oh, and Cassidy," Mr. Darling added, almost as an afterthought, "I engage a private art tutor for my two elder children, as I believe my daughter told you. I never considered it a subject worth cultivating in a boy; it certainly wasn't done in my day, but times are changing. At any rate," he continued with a faint smile, "I'm informed that this work shows a certain degree of talent. At least, enough for the instructor I've engaged to consider taking you on as well." The answering smile that began to dawn on Bae's face froze with Mr. Darling's next words. "I imagine that for a young man of your background, such cultivation might be expected, despite your current circumstances."

"My… background?" Bae repeated. His hands were still sweating and the office suddenly seemed a lot stuffier.

Mr. Darling smiled. "I know your secret."

Typing, Rumple reflected, as his fingers hammered away on the keys of an Underwood No 5, had one thing in common with spinning: it occupied the hands, while letting the mind wander. And wander it did. He was dying. He needed to accept that. In this Land without Magic, in this time before antibiotics, well, there was always room to hope for a miracle, but he was no Hero who might reasonably expect such providence.

He had to tell Bae. Not just about his condition, though if he didn't, Bae would suspect soon enough. He wouldn't be able to hide bloody handkerchiefs for long. No, he'd been weighing out his options most of last night and all of this morning. He didn't know whether Bae's future could be changed. He did know that if Bae lived out his life in this time, there would be no Henry taking a bus to Boston to locate his birth mother. Oh, he knew his younger self would eventually cast the Dark Curse, and one might expect Snow White and her charming husband to send their daughter off ahead, just as they had in his past. But as to how Emma would find Storybrooke then…

He frowned. If Bae never went to Neverland, then when the curse came, Bae would be over ninety. Twenty-eight years later, he'd be…

Rumple typed furiously, trying to drown his thoughts in the clacking keys and ringing bells prompting him to hit the carriage return. The seer had told him that he'd be reunited with his son. He had to trust that whatever changes he'd made when he'd gone through the witch's time portal, he hadn't altered that. Bae would still be alive when the curse broke; he didn't need to worry about how. It would happen! It had to!

Otherwise, who was going to resurrect him so he could go through that portal in the first place? Second place?

His head was beginning to ache and it had nothing to do with his medical condition, for once. His fingers still flew over the keys. He came to the end of the sheet, pulled it out and set it face-up for the ink to fully dry, and fed in a new sheet of foolscap mechanically.

He knew what he had to do.

He only hoped that he could be brave enough to do it.

Bae swore he could feel every drop of blood drain from his face. "M-my secret?" he stammered stupidly.

Mr. Darling smiled. "When I interviewed your father for his position, he told me the truth about your background."

"What?" Papa wouldn't have—he couldn't have—not to a stranger, not after he'd impressed on Bae the need for secrecy, not—!

"Tragic," Mr. Darling continued. "Your family fortune swallowed up by debts and obligations and the two of you having no choice but to earn your way. But," he went on, "you were born a gentleman and blood will out. While art lessons would be wasted on most of the working class—allowing for the rare exception, of course—the man I engaged for my daughter claims to detect a fair amount of potential in your drawing." He wrote a number and street name on the top sheet of a pad, tore it off, and handed it to Bae. "You'll come around on Wednesday evening at seven sharp," he ordered. "Mr. Carstone will be waiting. He hasn't informed me of the fee he means to charge you; it's not my affair, I but furnish a venue where you can discuss the matter. Assuming that you and he agree on terms, I presume your current lodgings to be less suitable than you'd like for entertaining such company?"

Bae winced. "There's… there's nothing wrong with where we live," he said, feeling almost as though saying otherwise would be insulting both to Papa and Robertson Gee. "But it's just the one room and Papa might need to rest." Papa seemed to need to rest far more, these days.

"Quite. Well. I suppose if Mr. Carstone is willing to teach two pupils in the same hour, you'll take lessons with my children."

A broad smile spread across Bae's face. "Thank you, sir!" he exclaimed.

"Don't thank me yet, Cassidy," Darling harrumphed. "As I said, I have no notion of the terms Mr. Carstone means to set before you. And," he coughed, "I appreciate your… silence about my children's, ahem, unconventional nursemaid. It's not something I like getting out. This arrangement, an unrelated boy and girl taking lessons together, even with another boy in the room... Well, I don't see the harm of it with an instructor present at all times. After all, even some day schools are mixed these days. All the same, I trust I can rely on your continued discretion in both matters?"

It had never occurred to Bae that there might be anything odd about a dog for a nursemaid; he hadn't lived in this land long enough to remark on what might be out of the ordinary here. Coming from a land where magic existed (even if there hadn't been much of it in the peasant village of Pen Marmor), even that which might have been termed 'unusual' was likely to be accepted relatively quickly. Not like this land, where tradition and convention felt so stifling and everyone seemed so preoccupied with what the others of their 'set' might think of them. Sure, there'd been an 'order' to things back home, but everyone knew that even the poorest peasant had the chance to marry a princess if their heart was pure and they succeeded in some heroic quest (usually with the aid of a fairy or talking beast, but not always). Here, things felt so much more rigid most of the time. But Mr. Darling seemed willing to flout convention in more ways than one and Bae would have to be seven kinds of fool not to recognize the opportunity being handed to him. "Of course you can, sir," he said quickly, bobbing his head a bit. "A-and thank you!"

"Good lad," George Darling said approvingly. "Now, off to the post room with you. Two weeks' trial period. If Mr. Wallace is satisfied with your work at the end of that time, the position's yours."

Bae thanked him again and beat a hasty retreat from the office, his heart soaring higher than it had in a long time.

While Rumple missed going home with Bae, for once, he was glad that the lad had that other job to get to. He'd had time to think now, and he believed he knew how to prepare Bae for what lay ahead. About his own health, he likely didn't need to say anything. Bae could see for himself that he wasn't doing so well these days. If he didn't suspect the truth, he'd know it soon enough. But there were other truths Bae had to learn, and Rumple knew that broaching them was going to be the hardest part.

It wasn't so much because of the timeline. If destiny was destiny, then Rumple had faith that things would work themselves out, even if he was unlikely to see it happen. Whatever changes he made here, it would be his younger self who would live them—and when the Dark Curse created Storybrooke in just under eighty years, nobody would have any idea that the timeline had once gone differently, not when the only person who would remember the original would be long gone and likely forgotten. No, the trouble was that Rumple knew too much of what was to come and how intertwined and convoluted the stories would be. He'd get off on some tangent somewhere, and quite likely leave out some key detail that Bae would need to know before they both ran out of time.

He had to make sure Bae had all the key elements laid out before him at the very least. Then, Rumple reflected, if he wasn't around anymore to help Bae put it all together, at least, Bae would have some foundation to finish the job himself.

First, though, he needed to show Bae those elements. And this realm did, at least, furnish some basic texts that would serve to open the discussion, even rife with exaggerations, embellishments, and historical inaccuracies as they were.

Rumple made his way laboriously to the second-hand bookshop. Bae's extra two shillings a week, painstakingly saved for several months now, would make today's purchases a bit of a treat, but not an extravagance.

When he left the shop a half hour later, he carried with him a copy of Andrew Lang's (rather unfortunately named, in his opinion) Blue Fairy Book, with a broomstick-mounted witch in a field of stars emblazoned in gold upon a deep blue cloth binding, and a copy of his Red Fairy Book—this one depicting a dagger-wielding giant pursuing a boy clutching a harp, also in gold on a binding of red. He'd meant to only purchase the first; it had nearly all the stories he needed in it. Nearly. Of course one of the ones it had lacked had been one of the most important, even if it had misnamed the main character!

A handbill affixed to the side of a building caught his eye on the walk back and he shook his head slightly. The bill was advertising a play with an all-too-familiar title, currently running in some theatre in Charing Cross, but even if the price of tickets could be had, Rumple didn't think he could bring Bae to see that! Yes, the stories in the books he carried were badly distorted, but at least, for the most part, heroes were still heroes and villains, villains. To turn around and make the villain a hero, no, to keep all the carelessness, callousness, and irresponsibility but make those qualities seem admirable… and then, to expect him to suffer through three acts of that drivel—no. No, he'd have to discuss his father with Bae, of course—and he would. But here, his own experiences, painful though they were, would be more than enough—if he could but bear to revisit them.

For now, he decided, it would be best to begin by telling someone else's story. And thanks to the books he carried, he currently had a number to choose from...

The longer Rumple waited, the more he dreaded what was to come. It was all well and good to plan. The hard part was going to be doing. Finally, he heard Bae's step on the stairs and a moment later, his boy was greeting him with a smile. "Mrs. Martin made treacle tarts," Bae said, setting a small bag down on the table. "She insisted I take two back with me. And Papa, Mr. Darling called me into his office today and…"

On any other day, Rumple would have shared his son's enthusiasm at what was truly fine news. Instead, he had to force himself to smile and nod and think that, perhaps, he could let his son have this one happy evening before he—

"Papa?" Bae asked. "What's wrong?" A hard note crept into his voice. "And please don't start up about the scholarship exam again; I'm sorry I didn't get it, but it's okay. We're okay. I thought you'd be happy about the promotion."

"I am," Rumple said quickly. "I am, Bae, truly."

"Then…?"

Rumple debated with himself a moment longer. Like so many other elements of his plan, he'd gone back and forth, vacillating and second-guessing and debating how much needed to be said or unsaid. Bae had to know. Otherwise, he likely wouldn't take any of this seriously. Still, Rumple hesitated for one moment more. Then, slowly, he drew out the cloth handkerchief he'd soiled the day before, and laid it on the table, where Bae could see the stain. "Papa!" the boy exclaimed in hushed horror.

Rumple nodded. "I'm dying, Bae. Oh, not tonight, of course. Probably not for months. Perhaps, not for a year or more, but," he swallowed hard and forced himself to look in his son's eyes and continue, "a long time ago, when I was called to the front in the Ogre War, a seer told me that through my actions, my son would grow up fatherless. And I've done everything in my power to avert that fate for you. But this…" He gestured toward the handkerchief with one hand and swiped angrily at the tears forming in his eyes with the other. "I'm so sorry, Bae. Fate appears to have other plans."

"No," Bae whispered. "No! If we went to the seaside, o-or maybe the mountains—there are mountains in the north; I remember that from my geography lessons. Cumbria! Or Wales—you'll breathe better when we're out of the city, Papa. We started over in a new land; we can do it in a new area—"

"Bae," Rumple shook his head. "It won't help. It might buy me a bit more time, but this," he swallowed again. "There's no cure for it, son. I'm sorry." He took another breath, grateful that, at least today, he wasn't coughing.

"There are things," he said slowly, "things I think you'll need to know. I wasn't sure if I should tell you. Knowing the future, or the future I came from, at any rate, there are bits of it you'll want to change and perhaps some of it ought to be. But if you start unraveling one part, you can't know where that thread will lead." He closed his eyes. "When I travelled back to the Enchanted Forest, I thought I could fix everything I did wrong the first time, but I was so afraid of making things worse that I didn't act until it was too late to do anything more than follow you here."

"That was enough," Bae said firmly. "More than enough."

Rumple nodded, his lips tugging upwards in a watery smile. "Perhaps it was," he admitted. "But now, I-I'm in a similar circumstance. I don't know everything that lies in store for you. In my memories, you came to this land on your own and I spent two centuries trying to find you. What happened in-between, well, I know bits and pieces, but not how they fit together. And there are gaps," he added. "Many of them. So," he said, "since this is your life and your future, I think I must tell you what I can, and then," he met his son's eyes again a bit nervously, not at all sure whether what he was proposing now was the right thing to do, "well, you can decide how you mean to proceed with the knowledge."