He hated the way she'd looked at him. Not a single hint of a smile in her eyes or along her mouth...it gutted him.

He hated this. He hated all of this. He hated taking a child from his parents, so much so that he couldn't even bring himself to look through the cauldron to see if they'd tried to find help. He couldn't bear it. As a father he knew how painful it was to have a child taken away, that he had to do it for this nearly killed him.

He hated his mother. He hated what he'd discovered and that it had taken him so long to discover it. He hated that she'd abandoned him to be raised by a man that only longed to be a child and be rid of him. And the pain of it! The pain of confronting it after all these years and being faced with it all over again! He felt like these last few days had ripped a seam in him, one that he tried to keep tightly closed. It made him feel like he was five again, staring out the window, looking at the skies, wondering if he was an alien. He had only one image in his mind of his mother, and it was a poorly done charcoal drawing on a piece of cloth done by his father. Fiona. Her name was a Fiona. He could remember finding that cloth as a child and looking down at those symbols with confusion because he couldn't read. Now that he was older, he could read, he could read the symbols in his memory and knew her name was Fiona.

He wondered how Fiona had become a fairy. It wasn't possible for fairies to become parents, they weren't capable of producing children, that's why they adopted the children and called themselves fairy godmothers. All that meant was that at some point, Fiona was human, she'd met Malcolm, married, and had a child-him. From there…he was clueless as to what had happened. More than once in his life he'd wondered what happened. More than once he'd wished he'd known before remembering that he didn't care. It was the present that mattered, not the past. What a strange feeling now. Here he was years later, and it wasn't the present that he was concerned with, but rather the past, simply because it could protect his future.

He took a deep breath as he lounged in his tower for the appropriate amount of time, working himself up, preparing for the last thing he needed to ensure the plan went the way he wanted. He was going to give Belle her opportunity to play the hero, to translate the passage…to potentially discover what she would perceive as plans for the baby. It was a good thing they weren't "involved" as he fantasized about because she would kill him if they were. In a perfect world, he would have liked to keep her out of this plan, but with the baby, she was already a part of it. And anyway, Belle or her smile or what she thought of him or how they shared their time...it wasn't his concern.

Baelfire was his concern. His only concern.

Belle was just…collateral damage. Besides, she wasn't a child, she was a grown woman. Despite the kidnapping, he knew she could take care of herself, even if this forced her to hate him once more.

He just had to lay the trap.

"Belle!" he cried just before sunset.

The baby erupted into tears when he'd yelled. He overreacted and backed away at the noise before taking in the site before him. She'd been trying to feed the child it appeared and in order to do so she'd invented some kind of cup with a spout that would allow her to pour the milk into his mouth. It was odd, even for someone like Belle, but, he acknowledged, clever as well.

"Well, it's not like I'm a wet nurse!" she snapped at his expression. "He has to eat!"

"Of course he does, and I need to rest before tonight. See to it that he keeps quiet," he ordered, turning to leave the room.

"And I don't suppose you're going to tell me what you intend to do to him!" she shouted after him as he left. He was tempted, so tempted to do something to say something to her, but her curiosity was what he needed. She thought he was retiring, with any luck she would go to the tower and do what he needed her to do.

He went to his room, just in case she was listening for the door, but then he allowed his magic to take him back up to the tower where he cast a spell of invisibility over himself. He'd strategically placed the scroll in the little side room of his tower, the room that had a door he could lock. It wouldn't have been his first choice, but it wasn't as though he hadn't locked her in a room before. And it wasn't done just to be cruel this time, it was something he was doing for her, to keep her safe. He knew Belle. And he knew that just as she'd be unable to resist translating the summoning for him, she wouldn't be able to resist trying to stop him from giving the child to the Black Fairy. Accident-prone as she was, he just wanted to keep her safe. He'd lock her safely in the tower and after he had his information and had returned the child to his parents, then he'd release her. He'd promise her that the child was safely back with its parents, right where he belonged, whether or not she'd believe him…it didn't matter. He'd have his answers, he'd get back to Baelfire-no surprises.

She wasn't as quick as he would have guessed she'd be. He expected some delay in her arrival, but she'd cut it close, close enough that he wondered if he didn't know her as well as he thought he did. But then, just before sunset, just before the deadline, he'd finally heard steps on the stairs. His spell kept him invisible to the naked eye, but it couldn't take away sound. So he stilled himself, taking care to regulate his breathing, then watched as she came up into the tower with the baby basket slung over her shoulder. Watching her search the tower for the scroll was almost painful. He thought he'd placed it out rather obviously, but she was a thorough individual. She searched every table, the mantle, the couch, even the window before her gaze finally drifted to the inner chamber. After giving the room a last look, she went to the door and yanked it open.

There was the slightest squeak from the hinges that made her go still, at first he thought it was him she was afraid of, but when he saw her glance down at the baby, he realized she was afraid the noise would wake him.

"Our lucky day," she muttered before opening the door and stepping inside.

She was quick with her steps, a good thing because it allowed him to follow after her without his own footsteps being heard. Like a moth to the flame, she went right to the table where he'd laid the scroll. She set the basket on the table and quietly cooed the child when he moved at the motion, as if he could sense being away from her. But she kept her eyes on the table, firmly fixed on the scroll before her.

"This is fairy language!" she exclaimed. His heart raced as she reached for some paper and a quill. Perfect, better than ever! He'd, of course, hoped that she might write her findings down, that was why he'd left the ink and quill there. But he'd also been prepared for the fact that she might just speak the summoning out loud, and that was why he had come up here to watch to begin with. But her hand was nearly as quick as her mind. He watched as she worked, as she read a line and then began to scribble on the paper.

"It's an incantation," she muttered to the sleeping baby after a while. "For someone called…Black Fairy."

Someone called the Black Fairy. It almost made him feel better that she had no idea who it was. Lucky her.

"But what would Rumpelstiltskin want from her, and what does that have to do with why he took you?"

There was no more point in hiding. The sun was going to be down any second. Now he had the translation. And Belle was right where he wanted her to be, safely tucked away. There was no point in trying to be pretty about it all.

"That's for me to know…and you never to find out."

She jumped at the sound of his voice, but it was already too late. The scroll and the paper that she'd written her notes on were already in his hands. A quick glance down at the paper revealed a simple translation, just a couple of sentences below all the scratch work that revealed her final answer to him. That was all he needed.

"No!" she cried. "You knew I was going to do this!"

"Not only did I know, I was planning on it," he admitted. If she was going to hate him, then she may as well hate him. There was no relationship between them that required him to be delicate. In fact, if she came out of this never wanting to see him again, it would only serve to prove just how wrong the Seer's prophecies were. "You really think I left the tower door open by accident? I don't speak fairy, but why do I need to when I have you?"

"No!" she shouted. "I will not let you hurt this baby!"

She turned to collect him, but his magic was faster. In an instant, the basket and the boy were in his hands. She was stunned for a minute, much too stunned to move but then looked back so that he could present the child. He pointed the scroll at her and tried to ignore the hurt he saw in her eyes.

"This child is no longer your concern," he informed her, doubting seriously that it would relieve her of the emotions she was feeling. And his next words would especially not be any help for what he was about to do. "I think you should stay here for a while. Don't want you getting any ideas about trying to stop me."

I'm not going to lie, I'm not really a fan of how a lot of the 6x09 chapters divided out. There was a lot going on here but not a lot of conversation and action. There's a lot of internal conflict for Rumple, and for Belle, well...the writing for this episode tends to follow her, favor her, over Rumple. And the way it's been set up here he can feel some of what is about to happen with her, but not all of it.

Big, big, huge thank yous to my reviewers yesterday Jennifer Baratta, Spunkymouse, and Grace5231973. I hope you'll like this chapter. I really wanted to emphasize the fact that he's losing a bit of his control on the situation. It started innocently enough, he wanted to talk to his mother about the Curse. But as we progress you should be able to see more issues coming up. He's getting angry with her. He's filling up with hatred. He continues to say he has questions to ask her, but more and more the idea of other questions are sneaking in on him. It's all building up to the moment he summons his mother. But first...some really poorly timed chapters!Peace and Happy Reading!