He feeds on fear

He feeds on pain

He rules again

With growing hate

He will guide

Their faith again

No light in the darkness

Is too small to see

There's always a sparkle of hope

If you just believe

Within Temptation - Deciever of Fools

From that day on things were different between them. She banished him from their bed, forcing him to sleep on a cold pallet on the floor and barely spoke to him except in anger or to taunt him for running away yet he still loved her and he loved their son. He still went to the marketplace to sell his wool and weaving projects but did not earn as much money as he used to now that word got around that he fled the battlefield. He wanted to believe that another man in the same situation he'd faced would have done the same thing.

Milah's ill treatment of him hurt but not as much as her neglecting her duties as a mother. There were far too many days when he returned home from the marketplace to find his boy alone. He heard rumors that she was spending far too much time in the tavern like his father did, only she wasn't cheating at cards but drinking and talking with other men.

"Milah? Bae? I'm home," he called out, limping into the shack to find his son once again alone. "Where's mum? Well, she probably just lost track of time. Grab your cloak. We'll find her," he said when his son didn't answer his question. They found her down at the tavern playing cards with several men and drinking.

"Milah, it's time to go," he said gently.

"Good. So go," she said while the men around her laughed.

"Who's this?" one of them asked.

"Ah, it's no one. Just my husband."

The other man studied him, smirking. "Oh. Well he's a tad taller than you described."

Rumple was shocked. She'd been poking fun at him with these strangers? He would endure every insult she had to dish out...as long as she stayed and was a real mother to their boy. "Please. You have responsibilities," he reminded her.

"You mean like being a man and fighting in the ogre wars? Other wives became honored widows while I became lashed to the village coward. I need a break. Run home, Rumple. It's what you're good at," she said bitterly.

"Mama?" Rumple heard his son call out behind him, his heart sinking. The last thing he wanted his boy to see was his mother carousing in a tavern.

"Bae. You were supposed to wait outside, son," he said gently. Milah glared at her husband, rose from the stool and walked over to their son, taking him by the hand and leading him out of the tavern, glaring at her husband during the rest of the walk home.

"You enjoyed embarassing me like that, didn't you?" she snapped at him as she lay on her cot while he handed her a cup of tea. He shook his head vehemently.

"You don't really wish I'd died... during the ogre wars, do you?" he asked sadly.

She sighed. " I wish you'd fought. Don't you?"

"I would have, Milah...but I couldn't leave my boy without a father and well...I'm alive, and I'm here with you, with Bae."

"This isn't a life. Not for me. Why can't we just leave?" she suggested hopefully.

"We've talked about that."

"You don't have to be the village coward. We could start again, go somewhere no one knows us, see... the whole world beyond this village."

"I know this wasn't the life you wanted, but it.. it can be good here. At least try, if not for me, then... for Bae." Rumple said softly. They didn't have much where they were but starting over in a new place would be just as difficult.

"Okay. I'll try," she whispered.

The next day someone knocked on his door with news that terrified him. The same men who'd been in the tavern the night before had taken his wife. He made his way down to the docks as quick as he could with his injured leg and fell while trying to climb aboard a pirate ship named the Jolly Roger.

"On your feet for the captain!" one of the men barked and pulled Rumple to his feet in front of a man he recognized immediately. It was the same one Milah had been drinking with at the bar the night before.

"I...I remember you, fr...from the bar," Rumple said nervously.

"It's always nice to make an impression. Where are my manners? We haven't been formally introduced. Killian Jones. Now what are you doing aboard my ship?" the captain asked.

"W- well you have my wife," Rumple stammered.

"I've had many a man's wife."

"No, you... you see, we... we have a son, and he needs his mother."

"And see, I have a ship full of men who need... companionship," Jones said and smiled laciviously.

"I- I'm begging you. Please let her go."

"I'm not much for bartering. That said, I do consider myself an honorable man, a man with a code. So... if you truly want your wife back, all you have to do is take her. Never been in a duel before, I take it?" Jones asked after he'd tossed a sword at the frightened Rumple. Part of him wanted to pick it up and fight while the other that reminded him he had a child at home spoke louder. He did nothing. "Well, it's quite simple, really. The pointy end goes in the other guy. Go on. Pick it up," Jones challenged. "A man unwilling to fight for what he wants deserves what he gets," he said coldly.

"Please, sir. What am I gonna tell my boy?" Rumple asked sadly.

"Try the truth. His father's a coward. Get this coward off my ship!" he instructed his crew members. They tossed the spinner onto the docks and released the lines securing their ship. Rumple watched it sail away, sobbing quietly then picked up his fallen walking stick and started back home.

"Papa? Where's Mama?" Bae asked him when he returned home.

"Mama's gone," he croaked. "Oh Bae..."

"You mean...she's not coming back?" the child inquired.

"No...it's just...just you and me now..." his father sobbed, drawing his son into his embrace. "And I will never, ever, leave you."

Little changed in their lives with Milah's absence. Rumple still went to the marketplace to sell his spinning and weaving projects and saw to it that his son was fed, clothed and had all the love he needed. The boy loved him, just as he loved his own father only unlike Malcolm, Rumple was determined to be the best father to the child he could possibly be. The Ogre Wars still raged and the villagers were more fearful than ever because the drafting age was being lowered every year. Now it was fourteen and in three days time Baelfire would be fourteen and once again, Rumple was forced to go on the run to save his child.

"Bae. Bae. Wake up, son. Come on. Wake up, son. We're going now. We're going now. Come on. Come on," Rumple cried ungently as he rosed his son from his sleep and they fled the shack in the dead of night.

"It feels wrong to run away," Bae said.

"It's worse to die, son. I'm not having you taken away to the Ogre wars."

While they were walking, they spotted a beggar on the road.

"Alms for the poor? Alms for the poor?"

Yes," Rumple said and handed him a few of the coins from the pouch he'd been carrying. It wasn't a fortune but he hoped it would last them until they reached a safe place.

Zozo lowered the hood of his cloak and grinned wickedly. It was too much to hope for. His salvation would come at the hands of the last of the Strogoff bloodline just as the prophecy stated. Although the man looked little like Berenika Strogoff and she'd removed most of his powers with Aramon's Talisman, some of them remained, lying dormant until they could be reactivated but they never would, not if he carried the curse of the Dark One.

You'll never sacrifice yourself in the name of true love, will you fool? No, you'll fall just as Zorinda and I will...when another of your blood turn your blade on you in desperation to want what you have.

'Are you sure there's no other way?" Bae was asking his father.

"Oh, I can't lose you, Bae. You're all I've got left, son. You don't understand what war is like - what they do to you." Hearing horses in the distance, Rumple attempts to move his son out of their sight. "Quick, hide! In the ditch - hide. Go, go! Go!"

Lord Hordor, the man who had been taking children from the villages pulled his horse to a stop "Stop right there!" he commanded while they surrounded the father and son. "What are you doing on the king's realm?"

"We have some wool to sell at the fair at Longbourne." Rumple lied.

"I know you, don't I?"

"What was your name? Hmmmm? Spindlehanks? Threadwhistle? Hobblefoot?" Hordor asked after his dismounted his horse, his men chuckling.

"His name's Rumplestiltskin." Bae declared proudly.

"Hush, boy!" Rumple ordered.

"Rumple...ah, the man who ran. Is this your boy? How old is he? What's your name?"

"I'm Baelfire and I'm thirteen."

"When's your birthday?"

"In two days time."

"Hush, boy!"

"Did you teach him how to run as well, Rumplestiltskin? Did he tell you? Did he tell you how he ran and the ogres turned the tide of the battle, and all the others were killed, and he returned home to a wife who could not bear the sight of him?"

"Please…" Rumple moaned, not wanting his son to feel about him the way the others had. He couldn't bear it.

You see, women do not like to be married to cowards," Hordor went on not caring how wounded the other man was by his words.

"Please don't speak to my boy like that," Rumple pleaded softly.

"It's treason to avoid service. Take the boy now."

"No, no, no, no! What do you want?" Rumple asked frantically.

"What do I want? You have no money, no influence, no land, no title, no power. The truth is, all you really have is fealty. Kiss my boot," Hordor instructed maliciously.

"I don't understand..."

"You asked my price. Kiss my boot."

"Not in front of my boy," he begged.

"Kiss my boot!"

It's for Bae...he thought sadly as he fell to his knees and kissed the lord's boot, trying to block out the laughter but his humiliation was not yet over. The lord delivered a sharp kick to Rumple's stomach making him fall to the ground,

"Papa!" Bae cried, coming to his father's side when the men rode away. They both froze in fear when they heard someone else approaching. Rumple's mind was at bit more at ease when he recognized the beggar from the road.

"No, no, no! No! It's okay. Let me help you. Let me help you home," he said.

"Thank you, old man," Bae said politely.

"I don't have any money to pay you," Rumple confessed as the man helped him to his feet.

"I can think of another way. You just leave me whatever you can spare, and I'll find a way to be your benefactor. Come," he said, following the pair down the road.

Foolish boy. You have too much of Lilliana's goodness in you, Zozo mused. And the boy is your weakness. To have absolute power you must learn the lesson that Zorinda and I did...you can have no weaknesses that can be used against you.

His predecessor's first victims had been her own parents. She'd had Zozo and his men slaughter them in their beds while they slept then traveled to the famed Emerald City and eliminated their Ozopov cousins in the same manner. Demeter's curse was playing itself out nicely. It was just a matter of time before their bloodlines died out by each other's hands. .

They returned to the shack. Rumple tucked his son into bed and set a pot of stew on the fire. He didn't think he was much of a cook but his son never complained and neither was the beggar, then again, Rumple thought the poor man probably hadn't had a home cooked meal in a long time.

"Another day gone. There'll be no fleeing, now," Rumple said despondently,

"No. You need to find another way. You need to choose a different path," Zozo insisted. And you will...it just won't be by choice.

"Choose? What choice do I have?"

"Everyone has a choice."

"I'm the town coward. The only choice I have is which corner to hide in. I'm lame, friendless… The only thing I've got is my boy. And they're going to take him away from me. If they take him away, I would truly, truly become dust," Rumple wept.

"Not if you have power."

"You may as well say diamonds."

"Get a hold of yourself! Think. Why do you think that someone as powerful as the Dark One would work for a useless fool like the Duke of the Frontlands?" Zozo hissed.

"Tell me."

"The Duke has the Dark One in thrall. He's enslaved him with the power of a mystical dagger and on the blade is written a name – the true name of the Dark One. If you steal the dagger, then you would control the Dark One yourself. And then no one would be able to take your son away from you."

"To keep a man like the Dark One as a slave? No, I… I-I can't. I'd be terrified."

"Then, perhaps, instead of controlling the power, you need to take it. In the Duke's castle is a dagger with the name of the Dark One engraved on it. Take the dagger and you control the Dark One. Or if you kill the Dark One with that dagger, you take his powers for your own."

"Then nothing would be able to hurt my boy..or take him from me?"

Zozo grinned. "Nothing."

The next morning Rumple set his son to work soaking wool that he wrapped around sticks to make torches.

"Keep that fire good and stoked, Bae. The sheep's fat needs to be liquid and get that wool good and soaked."

"Why are we doing this, Papa? This is good wool. We can spin and sell.."

"These are our keys to the castle, son. And once I'm inside there's something I have to take."

"What do you need to take?

"That old beggar? He told me a fine tale – about the Duke and his magical dagger."

"What does it do?"

"If I own that dagger, I control the Dark I kill the Dark One with the dagger, I take his powers."

"By god's name," Baelfire whispered fearfully.

"Imagine me with those powers. Can you imagine me with those powers, Bae? I could get to redeem myself. I could turn it towards good. I'll save all the children of the Frontlands – not just you, my boy," Rumple said excitedly.

"I'd love to see that, but if the law says I'm to fight, I… I can fight."

"No, no, no! The law doesn't want you to fight, son. The law wants you to die. That's not battle – that's sacrifice, son. You look at that red in the sky. That's not the… The fires of the battlefields – that's the blood of our people, son. It's the blood of children. The blood of children like you. I mean, what sane person would want to get involved with that?"

"So, it's true."

"What?"

"It's true. It's true you ran," Bae accused.

"I had no choice, son.

"And Mother? Did she leave you like the knight said? You told me she was dead."

"She is dead."

"So, what do we need to do?" Bae asked, sitting down.

Rumple kneeled next to his son as he worked.

"The Duke's castle is made of stone, but the floors and the rafters are made of wood."

"Why does that matter?"

"Because wood burns and that's were these will come in handy," he said holding up a torch.

Later that night the two of them made their way to the Duke's castle. Using the lantern, they lit one of the torches, setting a bale of hay ablaze. As the fire spread through the wood in the floors and rafters, Rumple entered the castle in search of his prize, concealed behind a tapestry. He took it from its compartment and limped out of the castle, into the woods where his son waited.

"Papa!" Bae cried, jumping to his feet.

"Oh, Bae."

"I was so worried for you. Are… Are you burned? The castle..."

"I'm fine, son. I'm fine. I need you to go home and wait for me there."

"Come with me – please. I have a bad feeling."

Rumple removed the dagger and held it up into the light so that he could read the name engraved. Zoso! Zoso! I summon thee!" He was disheartened when nothing appeared and lowered the dagger. As he turned around he saw a hideous creature in a dark cloak behind him. He gasped in fright and dropped his torch, backing away.

"You were asking for me?" The Dark One inquired.

"Submit, oh Dark One! I control you," Rumple comanded, clutching the dagger tightly in his hand.

"Yes, you do. Wield the power wisely. You can wield it anytime now. It's almost dawn. That means it's your son's birthday. I bet Hordor and his men are already on their way to your house."

"No, they can't take him!"

"You don't control them. You control me. Have you ever wondered was he really your child at all. Unlike you, he's not a coward and yearns to fight and die in glory."

"No..."

"What a poor bargain that would be to lay down your soul to have your bastard son. So, I ask you, what would you have me to do?" Zozo taunted.

"Die!" Rumple snarled as he stabbed the Dark One with his own dagger, gasping in horror as he recognized the beggar he'd been with earlier. "It's you. You are the beggar."

"Looks like you made a deal you didn't understand. I don't think you're gonna do that again," He laughed. "Just like her. Just like me."

"You told me to kill you!" Rumple cried.

"My life was such a burden. You'll see. Magic always comes with a price. And now, it's yours to pay."

"Why me? Why me?"

"I know how to recognize a desperate soul...and it was your destiny...the darkest of curses by a Strogoff shall be taken and through a sacrifice in the name of true love the curse by a Strogoff shall be broken..." Zozo mumbled.

"No! No! Stay! You have to tell me what to do! Tell me what to do!" Rumple cried frantically, seeing his skin changing colors as his name appeared on the dagger's blade, still soaked with Zozo's blood. Memories that weren't his begin to play through his mind along with knowledge, knowledge that he never had before...and power. That power would make sure that no one ever harmed him or his son again. He kept those thoughts in his mind as he walked back home, never giving a second thought to his dying predecessor's final words.

The dagger in his hand, the new Dark One walked back to his village, determined to protect what was his, his son...and gods help anyone who got in his way. As he suspected that bastard Hordor was already at his house trying to take his son away. He raised the dagger and plunged it into the soldier holding the bastard's horse.

"Dark One," Hordor said and kneeled then looked up, not recognizing the grey skinned man approaching him. "No...who are you?"

Perfect. Just where you need to be...on your knees...all of you!

"Have you forgotten me already?" Rumple asked in a high pitched voice as the curse surged through him. "What was it you used to call me again? Spiddleshanks..." He snapped his fingers. "Hobblefoot!"

Not hobbling now, am I you bastard?

"Papa?" Bae asked fearfully.

"Rumplestiltskin," Hordor answered, now terrified himself. There was nothing more dangerous than a Dark One that had control of his own dagger. And there was nothing he couldn't do without a master either.

"Wonderful. And now you shall know me as the new Dark One. How about a little fealty. Kiss my boot," he hissed. As Hordor bent over to obey, Rumple grabbed his neck and snapped it.

"Papa, no!" Bae screamed as his father went about dispatching the rest of the knights with his dagger. "What's happened to you?" he asked as he stared down at the dead bodies around them.

"You're safe Bae. Do you feel safe, son?" Rumple asked. The boy backed away.

"No, I'm frightened."

"I'm not," Rumple said calmly. "I protected what's mine and I'm not afraid of anything."

"Papa...what did you do? You took the power of the Dark One!"

"I had to!" Rumple insisted. "I did it for you, Bae! I couldn't let them take you from me too. You're all I have!"

"Why did you kill them?"

"What do you think would have happened if I didn't? I'll tell you, Bae. They would've found a way to take you from me to fight in those damned wars and I will not have it!"

"You said you would end the war. You said you'd free all the children!"

"And I will," Rumple vowed. "Even if I have to kill every ogre that breathes to do it," he said under his breath.

Years before he fled from the Ogre Wars to make certain that his son had a father. Now he returned to put an end to them. Some of the soldiers who had been in the same training camp with him watched in amazement as he walked out into the middle of the battlefield to call to an end of the wars and the release of all the children. Several of the giants made the mistake of thinking they could simply crush the little human under their boots. A few flicks of the wrist was all it took to convince them this one was more than he appeared, changing them all into snails and crushing them under his boots. Now it was the ogres turn to flee in fear.

It was a glorious day for the people of the Frontlands when the Dark One appeared in every village with a large group of children walking behind him. For those who had been injured, he healed what wounds he could with his magic and provided them with a comfortable carriage to ride home in and others brought home those who had fallen so that they could be buried with honors. All the insults given to the formerly crippled spinner gave way to expressions of gratitude as mothers and fathers welcomed their children back into their arms.

Rumple soon found himself in high demand. All hours of the day people were calling on him wanting to make deals in exchange for easing their burdens no matter how silly they may have seemed to him. Sometimes they didn't even have to summon him. Like his predecessor, he gained the ability to recognize a desperate soul and it wasn't always through their facial expressions, body language or how they spoke. They gave off their own aura that breached time and space.

He knew he was changing and his son would tell him often that it was not for the better. The boy confronted him about it after an incident where Bae had been injured by falling into the middle of the road where a man and a donkey were travellling. As soon as Rumple saw the bruise on his son's knee, he reacted in anger, turning the man into a snail and crushing him under his boot over Bae's protests. The people that once hailed the former Dark One as a hero for saving all the children now drew back in fear and warned their children not to play with Bae for fear they would invoke the sorcerer's wrath if he were harmed in any way. The only exception was Morraine although she tried to keep out Rumple's sight at times as well.

Still Rumple had his doubts that he wasn't yet powerful enough to keep his boy protected, those doubts fueled by the jumbled pieces of memories he now possessed from his predecessors...the first Dark One Zorinda and Zozo. There was one other weapon that could be used against him besides his own dagger and it was a ruby pendant that was called Aramon's Talisman. It had the ability to remove his powers forever if the bearer held it over his heart or temporarily. Fortunately both items were in Oz and he would make certain they and the last Strogoff would never enter the Enchanted Forest. His only option left was to keep his son safe at home.

He knew his son was not happy and thought that moving them into a larger home would be the solution to the problem, not seeing that the real solution was the same one he'd longed for as a boy...he needed friends. One day when he returned home, his son was missing. Furious that he'd been taken, he cast a tracing spell that led him to a nearby village where he was told that a pied piper was leading all the boys away with a flute made of magic that only they seemed to hear. Later that night Rumple perched himself on a rooftop and waited. Then he heard it...a song of loneliness and suddenly windows opened all over the village and boys climbed out, walking into the forest. He saw them dancing around a fire, their faces concealed by masks. He grabbed several boys but could not recognize his precious Bae emong them. Finally he spotted the piper. He grabbed hold of the man and snapped his flute in half.

"Where's my son, piper?" he growled.

"Is that what they're calling me," he heard a familiar voice ask and the piper lowered his hood. "We both know who I really am."

No...no...no...not you, Rumple thought sadly as he came face to face with his now youthful father now using the name Peter Pan...for the doll.

"Been a long time, laddie. Glad you could make the show."

Not long enough.

In spite of all the power he now possessed Rumple felt like the frightened child he'd been when he tossed that damned bean that sent both of them into Neverland and destroyed any chance they would've had of being a normal family, if that had even been possible.

"Surprised to see me Rumple? I'm a bit surprised myself. Look who's all grown up and become the Dark One. Good for you."

"What are you doing here?" Rumple asked fearfully.

"It's lonely in Neverland. The only friends I have are the children who visit in their dreams. They can't stay. The boys I take back with me will."

"You're here for my son!"

"I am."

"It's gonna take a lot more than a magic pipe to take my son!"

"The only thing magic about this pipe is that only certain boys can hear it. Boys who feel unloved, boys who feel lost. I guess that's why you can hear it Rumple. Isn't it?"

"Don't pretend you know me. You don't. Not anymore!" Rumple said angrily.

"Oh I think I do," Malcolm taunted. "Beneath all that power you're nothing more than an unloved, lonely lost boy! Hey, I like the sound of that. It's what I'll call my new group of friends. The Lost Boys! It has a nice ring, don't you think?"

You're the one who made me feel as I did, you bastard and now you want to forget about me and take my son! It will never happen. I'll see you die first!

"You can call them whatever you like. Baelfire will not be part of it!"

"Oh, he's already a part of it. The question is: what are you willing to do to get him back?"

Everything. He's mine and I will not let you take him from me and make him into what you are!

"I'm gonna make you regret ever asking that question," Rumple sneered.

"Oh, I understand you're upset. Most parents' worst fear is that their child will be taken away from them but that's not yours is it, Rumple? No, you're not afraid Baelfire will be taken from you. You're afraid he'll leave. After all, being abandoned is what your good at, isn't it? Everyone you've ever known has left, haven't they? Like Bae's mother, Milah...your mother, not to mention your own father. Why should Baelfire be any different?"

"You're wrong!"

"Am I? Well, let's find out, shall we? You ask Baelfire if he wants to come to Neverland with me or stay here with you," Pan challenged. "if he wants to stay I'll leave and never return. Deal?"

"I don't have to make any deals with you!"

"But why wouldn't you if you're so sure he'll stay."

The truth was he did have his doubts based on his son's behavior as of late. He walked among the dancing boys, still unable to find his son.

"You don't even recognize him, do you Rumple?"

"Well how could I when he's wearing a mask!"

"Well he might but wearing a mask but that's not the reason. Look at him. Playing with other boys out in the world. He's happy Rumple. That's why you don't recognize him."

Rumple approached his son and pulled the mask off his face. "Bae...Baelfire. Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Bae insisted coldly. "Why are you are."

"I know you don't think I care about you son but I do! And I'm here to prove it."

"How?" Bae demanded.

"Go ahead Rumple," Malcolm urged.

Rumple embraced his son. "Papa, what are you doing?" Bae cried.

"I'm protecting you," he declared, making the boy vanish in a cloud of smoke.

"You're gonna regret not taking my deal, Rumple!" Malcolm yelled as Rumple vanished.

"Don't touch me!" Bae yelled, shoving his father away from him. "Get away!"

"It's all right Bae.. You're safe."

"Safe? I was never in any danger. The piper was my friend!' he insisted.

"He may have wanted you to think that but believe me..he would hurt you."

"Why? Who is he? Another person that you abused with your power?"

"His name is Peter Pan. I've known him since I was a boy," he began, unable to find the courage to tell the boy the actual truth. He wouldn't have believed it anyway since it seemed that Pan had most likely told him terrible things to turn him against him. "Growing up, we were incredibly close." As close as the naive child I once was believed.

"So you're saying he's immortal too."

"He wasn't always. He went to a place called Neverland. He betrayed me, Bae. He can't be trusted."

"What happened?"

He traded me to be young forever. "All that matters is that I was fooled by him for a long time before I finally saw his true nature and it is darker and far more repulsive than you should ever be exposed to!"

"He can't be any worse than you."

He can't be any worse than you. Rumple felt as if the boy had taken his dagger and plunged it into his heart. "I had to protect you, Bae! I didn't have a choice!"

"Stop lying because I know that you did!" Bae hissed as he approached him. "I know about the deal Pan offered you! He said all you had to do was ask me if I wanted to come home," he went on, close to tears.

"He told you," Rumple whispered, cursing the bastard in his mind.

"He said that way I would know if you really trusted me. If you really cared."

"No, please Bae," Rumple begged.

"You didn't need to! I would've chosen to come home. I would've chosen you! If only you'd asked. Maybe we would've found a way to be a family," Bae went on, stepping away again and driving the invisible knife in deeper.

"We can be!" Rumple insisted. "Bae! Bae!" he cried. The boy ignored him and walked out the door.

Rumple sank down in a chair and buried his face in his hands. Oh, his father had set him up nicely by preying on his greatest weakness...the fear of losing the only person left in the world who loved him leaving him no other option but to strike the most important deal he could ever make. If his son found a way for him to be rid of his powers and go back to the man the boy once knew and loved, he would follow through.

One night while he was at his spinning wheel Bae returned home and announced that he'd at last found a way. With the assistance of the Blue Fairy the boy obtained a bean...a bean like the one that had been the source of his own misery years before...a bean that would take them to a land where magic didn't exist.

"A place without magic," he scoffed. "I'd be powerless. Weak."

"Like everyone else. It wouldn't matter," Bae pointed out. "We'd be happy."

"We could be happy here."

"Father, please. You're getting worse. And you promised! This can work. It can. You made a deal with me. Are you backing out?"

He thought for a moment. "No."

Later on that night they walked deep into the woods.

"Where are we going, boy? What kind of world is this we're going to? What kind of world is without magic?" Rumple demanded, unable to mask the fear in his voice.

"A better one," Bae declared, holding up the bean and throwing it on the ground, a portal opening.

"My gods boy, like a tornado!" Rumple cried, backing away.

"Papa, we have to go through!"

"No, no, I don't think I can!"

"You must. It's the only way!" Bae insisted, grabbing his hand.

"No, no, no! It's a trick. It'll tear us apart!" Just like my father and I were, he thought fearfully.

"No, it's not. I'll be okay," Bae insisted, having never seen his father so terrified in all his life. What was he truly afraid of? Losing his power or losing him? "I promise!"

The portal expanded, dragging his son into the glowing emerald hole and they started sinking. Rumple removed his dagger and thrust it into the ground, gripping it's handle with one hand and his son''s hand with the other.

"We have to go through! What are you doing? Papa, it won't stay open for long, let's go!"

"I can't. I can't..."

"Papa, please, it's the only way we can be together."

"No, Bae. I can't!"

"You coward. You promised. Don't break our deal!" Bae yelled.

"I have to!" The boy's hand slipped out of his and he fell into the hole, screaming for him. Once the portal vanished and only a hole filled with dirt remained, Rumple gazed down at it, his heart breaking. What had he done?

"Bae! Bae!" he screamed, digging frantically in the dirt. " I want to come with you!"

But it was too late. His son was gone and it seemed that there was only one person who could help him. The Blue Fairy.

"You will never make it to that world," she said after she appeared and saw for herself that he'd stayed behind.

"I will find a way. There must be other paths." He started naming off other methods of portal making until he heard her gasp when he mentioned a curse.

"So it is a curse!"

"Of course you would think of a curse instead of a blessing," she said bitterly. "Your magic is only limited by its rotten core Rumplestiltskin. Anyway, it can't be done. Not without a great price."

"I've already paid a great price."

"So you'd be willing to sacrifice this world for the next because that's how great the price is."

"Well, what do you think?"

"Then I'll comfort myself knowing the such a curse is beyond your abilities."

"Oh, for now. But I've got all the time in the world. I will do nothing else. I will love nothing else! I will find a way. You took my son but I will get him back!" Rumple vowed.

"I didn't take your son!"

"You took my son!" he cried brokenly. "And I will get him back!"

"You drove him away," Blue hissed. Rumple lashed out at her with his dagger. She flew away.

"I will find him!" Rumple yelled at her retreating form. "I will find him! I will find him!" he chanted as he walked back to the shack that no longer felt like a home to him anymore.