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Rage – he was supposed to feel rage at his entrapment. Rage at his own stupidity and gullibility, rage at his inability to act at once when action was required and he hesitated, hindered by his naïve hope to make his father see reason, rage at his father's unrelenting malevolence. Impotence, too, and violent wish to break free, frustrated effort that couldn't come to anything. Regret, loss, humiliation – tricked by the oldest of tricks, a king of loopholes, indeed! Heart-wrenching fear for his family, abandoned by him involuntarily at the moment of peril and now bound to fail in their task.
Does he feel them, those emotions, as he remains trapped in the charmed ancient box, which he intended as an eternal prison for his father and in which he ended up imprisoned himself? He does, probably – he cannot really tell, because he cannot really feel much. How does a man feel anything if he has no physical body – if he is reduced to mind alone? We live our lives believing that our brain rules over our bodies – it tells the heart to beat and pump blood through our veins, the nerves to feel, the eyes to see; our brain interprets things that happen to our bodies and turns basic chemical reactions into emotions we call 'love', or 'hate', or 'pain', or 'longing'. Without a brain to rule it, our body becomes a meaningless bundle of meat and bones. Yet mind divided from flesh is powerless, closed on itself, imprisoned. Active, but lacking the matter to command – like a general left without an army, or a mad king who, having lost his kingdom, wanders alone across a solitary desert, howling at the wind, trying to command the tempest, unaware of the futility of his efforts. They say death comes only when the brain dies; yet a brain alive in a paralyzed body is the worst torture. And a brain alive without a body at all is the ultimate prison: no fist to knock at the wall, no tongue to curse your fate, no teeth to grind in frustration, no lungs to sigh, no eyes to shed tears. Just darkness, and isolation, and silence, and eternity of hopelessness, and constant brooding. And pain – at realization that things that mattered to you when you existed, when you were a human body, weak and faulty and alive, still, somehow, matter to you. Not just chemical reactions then, all these things we call love, and hate, and pain, and longing. They stay with you even when your body is gone – when nothing of you remains but your soul.
What a cruel twist of nature, that – your suffering and your hopes don't die with you, and you have an eternity to look back in anger and love, to regret, to remember. Remember your hopes, your dreams, your good intentions. Remember the surge of gladness in your heart when your son conceded to trust you, to some extent, and admitted needing your help. Remember the light of love that you felt as you planned your naïve trickery. To feel this love, absurdly; to know now, with absolute certainty, that passion, which seemed so strong once as to blind you, was not the main thing about your love. You have no body to desire and touch, but your longing is undiminished. Your spirit, pure and unsoiled by flesh, still holds on to the bond with that other, beloved soul living far away from you somewhere across realms.
Yet your spirit is trapped, unable to fly to its' kindred spirit, and the frustration of that is worst of all. It would make your heart break and bleed, but you have no heart.
When your self is reduced to mind alone, you cannot suffer in full; you need a body to hurt and struggle.
When your self is reduced to mind alone, you cannot do magic; for magic is emotion, and you need a body to feel rage and hope.
When your self is reduced to mind alone, you cannot fight the darkness. Yet, strangely, you don't need to: without a body to fear and fail you, darkness cannot invade your soul. Closed on itself, it is a fortress no one can conquer. So, strangely, even being submerged in total darkness you are immune to it – you are locked in the cell with your love.
Not the worst prison mate, that – love.
His father certainly didn't count on that; he is cunning and treacherous, but he never had a steady hand; even when he made a living as a gambler, he tended to rush into things, overplay his hand, overestimate himself and underestimate his counterparts. His father probably thought that he'd collapse in his dark prison; he did not. His father was sure his family would fail, discouraged; they did not.
Regina, his adopted daughter, prevailed upon Pan's tricks. Bae, his long-lost son, put all his love, not yet admitted but powerful, into the effort required to enact blood magic, and free him.
He emerged from his prison into the world changed – into a weird reality in which all wrongs suddenly righted themselves. His grandson saved, his son all-forgiving, the good people around him embracing him as family should; his love waiting for him with open heart, just a flight – just a night – away.
A happy ending. A magical change of his fate. All too good to be true, and somewhere at the back of his mind he knows it. A tiny, whining voice whispers, somewhere inside him: 'There has to be a price to this'. Yet he doesn't listen; his mind, reunited with his body and overwhelmed by the joy of physical being, pushes all forebodings aside. And who could blame him? It could be that all his life, full of suffering and guilt, was the price for this sudden happiness. It could well be that he already paid for it – that his bargaining with fate came to an end. They are even, now, and he can just live his life. So what if it took him nearly two hundred years to arrive to normality most people have by rights? His was a difficult journey.
He could not sit among others as they traveled towards his father's island a week ago – God, was it really so recent? The time spent there seemed an eternity. He needed time and space to himself to collect his thoughts before facing death. He cannot sit with them now, as they travel back; he needs to be by himself, because, old and wise as he is, he can barely contain his excitement. He is coming back to her – he will see her again, soon; he will hold her in his arms, and kiss her lips – her, his Belle, his real Belle, so beautiful, so his. She wasn't herself for so long – he hadn't been with her, with Her, for so long – touching Her again would be a miracle in itself. And there is nothing to stand between them now – no obstacles, no obligations. He did what he swore to do a long time ago, as he made a deal with fate to 'never love anyone until I find him'; that deal is concluded – he found his son; now he can love.
Yes, he wants to be alone to wallow in that happiness – he feels almost as light at heart as he felt once upon a time in his castle, when he first realized his love for her, and lay on his bed naked, released, slightly ashamed and boyishly happy, laughing aloud, smiling at the bright world, ready to embrace it.
Yet, being a father, painfully reminded just recently how bad a father one could be, he comes to sit with his son. Silently, at first, just clasping his hand, feeling the answering squeeze of his son's fingers. Talking, later; hesitantly, at first, unused to being open, unused to talking to him; unstoppable, later, rapidly searching for words, needing to tell him so many things – of his quest, of his regret, of his love. Telling him about Belle; he is unable to stop himself, he needs to talk about her. Catching his son's quizzical, amused look at his banter; blushing, knowing how it looks: an old man, face wrinkled and hair gray, gushing about his love like a schoolboy. Smiling, and getting a smile in return.
And then, suddenly, as all things for which we were waiting for impatiently usually come upon us, they are back – the flying ship bursts through the protection spell that his girl so capably cast around town, and everything is sunlit, and bright, and fresh and shining.
But nothing – not the sun, not the clearest blue sky – compares to her eyes, as he meets their gaze. They shine the brightest.
She is taking him in, her eyes are searching, probing; without asking, she is aware that some change has come upon him, and she wonders at its' nature, and smiles broader as he walks towards her without his familiar limp. He is a changed man, indeed, the self-imposed punishment no longer needed; he needs no reminders of his guilt now that it is atoned.
And them she comes into his arms, and the world stops, complete and perfect, as they are.
A happy ending. A new beginning. A miracle – their own, personal miracle; the one they suffered for, and fought for – the one they earned; the one they, surely, paid for.
But, really, he has no mind, no heart and no time to analyze magical bargains now. The physical reality of being near her, touching her again, is overwhelming – he knew it would be so, but, as it always is between them, the reality is so much stronger. As happy families are reunited around them, as people smile and hug, they slip, quietly, away; Bae sees them go, smiles and actually winks at his father. He raises an eyebrow at him: cheeky boy!
They walk the town together, she at his arm, as they used to; she cuddles closer, pressing herself to his side, and smiles up at him. He squeezes her fingers, resting on his arm, and his heart melts.
Her fingers. Her small, warm hand. Her soft, soft skin.
Without discussing it, they go to his shop – it is so much more home to him then his house, and she knows it well. She smiles proudly as he opens the door to the familiar sweet tingle of a bell and, as he takes in the room, he smiles back, understanding her pride: she kept everything in perfect order. The place looks as if he never left it – as if he just stepped out for a minute and would be back very soon.
It must have been a conscious effort on her part, to keep it so, knowing, as she knew then, that he wasn't coming back.
He looks closer at her face and sees things that he first overlooked in his blinding joy of finding her again. There are shadows beneath her eyes, she is pale; her hands tremble a little as she places them on his shoulders, fingering leathery surface of the coat he donned on the island.
She must have suffered so.
His fingers reach to touch her cheek, as they did a long time ago in the woods by the wishing well, when he first found her after the breaking of the curse. 'Belle', he whispers, voice husky. 'Belle'.
Her eyes fly up to meet his. 'Promise me', she says, forcefully. 'Promise that we shall be together forever, now – that nothing will tear as apart. No magic, no curses, no nothing. Promise me that nothing will be more important to you then I am, ever. Promise'.
His heart constricts at the searing pain in her eyes.
'Yes, sweetheart', he says, barely audibly. 'I promise'.
Her face crumples, as if she were a crying child, and, with a sob, she buries her face on his chest, pressing him to her, clutching his shoulders, kissing his neck in the opened shirt-collar, her tears falling on his skin. And her wet, sad, passionate assault is heartbreaking and painfully exiting all at once. She is all over him – her touch, her tears, her sobbing reproofs, her slightly hysterical smiles, her kisses, the smell of her hair, the warmth of her skin, the curves of her body. He finds himself crying with her, and muttering mad sweet rubbish, and kissing her lips, finally, kissing them with almost ravage force, pressing her face between his hands, fingers tangled in her hair, tracing her wet cheeks; his lips leave her lips, only to trace the length of her neck, down to her shoulders and lower, to her cleavage. His hands leave her face, only to tear at her dress, wishing to remove all barriers between his fingers and her skin. She is tugging at his coat, too; he slips out of it, this strange garment in which he faced his demons – it has no place here, in their own closed, wonderful world. Suddenly all these things – shoes, boots, trousers, stockings, underwear – become too much for him; he cannot be hindered buy such trivialities when all he wants is to be with her, now. With a flick of the wrist, with a whiff of purple smoke their clothes are gone, and she gives a harsh laugh: 'You should do this more often!..' And then they stand naked in the middle of his shop, breathing ruggedly, eyes on each other, hands momentarily relaxed on their sides; they stand naked in a sunlit room full of magical things, and the weirdness of the scene doesn't bother them in the least.
Together, naked in a strange world, like Adam and Eve.
A new beginning.
She stopped crying. She looks at him with deep, solemn eyes, strangely much like she looked at him when they first met, and she promised him forever.
She takes a step forward, and presses herself to him, bodies fitting together like parts of the whole. Her lips touch his collarbone, her hands are resting at the small of his back, her breasts are pressed to his chest. His hands come around her waist, and he rests his face on top of her head; closes his eyes, inhales her smell. His body sings with her closeness, his skin is alight, tingling with excitement, all over; his arousal is hard against her abdomen, throbbing every time her breath warms his skin. He presses her a little bit closer to him, pushing his pelvis forward, and she shivers, and draws a sharp breath, and throws her head back, exposing her throat to his hungry lips. Her eyes are closed, mouth slightly agape, and he is torn between desire to suck her tongue, or to lick her nipples. He goes for her mouth, and cups her breast with one hand, and her knees buckle; she slips down along his body, comes to rest on the floor, on her knees, hands on his buttocks, lips on his arousal, taking it in, eyes closed, and it is his turn to shudder and feel his legs go weak; clasping her by the hair, he draws her face away from his erection – he doesn't want all this to be over, not so soon. She looks up at him, her eyes dreamy, mellow, lips dark and swollen, looks at him just as she looked at him many years ago in his castle as she tried to break his curse, and his heart rushes out to her, threatening to break his ribcage, just as it did then. He sinks on the floor in front of her, kneeling between her spread legs; she opens for him, shamelessly, and he touches her between the thighs, and his hand is all sticky and wet at once – she is so ready for him, and suddenly he cannot wait anymore – he pulls her towards him, and she falls on her back, opening her legs wider for him, and he rushes in, buries himself in her, up to the hilt, in one swift movement, and feels instant shudder of her release, at once, as she digs her fingernails into his back, forcing him closer, even closer to her, and deeper. He starts moving inside her, his head swaying, vision blurred, breath coming out is gasps; they made love so many times, and he never felt her so intensely. She moans and twists under him, she trusts forward, her hands beat against the floorboards in strange frenzy, she bites her lower lip, and her insides tremble and shudder, once more and, as she comes, he comes too, momentarily blind, momentarily dead, gone inside her – turned into her, basking in light.
They stay by each other on the floor, entwined, silent, content, for the moment, for a long time. His mind drifts as he embraces her, gently stroking her naked back.
So that's how it feels to be fully loved by her.
So that's what forever is like.
He never felt so close to anybody. He never felt such peace.
When they eventually get up, the light has changed; it is twilight. He glances at the door, still unlocked, still with the sign 'Open' turned towards the street. She blushes, then shrugs her shoulders, and he watches, delighted, the ensuing movement of her breasts.
Laughing, they stumble to the back room – they need new clothes instead of ones he charmed away. There are some of her dresses in the wardrobe, and his suit. He gives her a questioning look, and she says, echoing his words from the past: 'I kept them… in case you came back'. He nods, speechless.
They dress up, assuming their civilized looks, she brushes her hair, and knots his tie – something she didn't know how to do, before.
'I practiced', she says, not looking him in the eye.
That's how she believed in his return – in him – in them.
He is hesitant, suddenly lost for words. He knows what he wants to say, what he wants to do now that they are normal, happy people. He wants to be sure that she is happy and secure, always by his side. There are simple words to achieve this end – no magic is required: 'Marry me' – it is not a spell, everyone can say that. But it is somehow impossible to say them, these words. Two hundred years old dark wizards don't do weddings; it is plainly odd.
Suddenly shy, he manages a close approximation of the proposal that so potently needs to be made; he promises her a future together. She smiles. She is happy with that.
Hand in hand, they walk to his – their – house, and spend enchanted, wondrous night there, a night peaceful and exited all at once; wrapped in each other, making love, drinking a little wine, eating cheese and grapes that he charmed on the spot, talking, laughing, just smiling, kissing endlessly, drifting to sleep in each other's arms, finally. A night apart from the world, a night stolen from fate. The happiest night in his life. Blissful. Untainted.
And the next day, when a new crisis erupts in the town, when it becomes clear that his father is by no means defeated, and he rushes to help fighting him, feeling the dread of doom slowly creeping up his spine to enclose his heart, he wonders: would he have been able to stand it, to rise up to new dangers, if not for that night? It has given him a taste of so many things that it would be unbearable to lose. Yet it has given him the strength to struggle.
It has been a life, albeit a brief one.
As he goes around town chasing his elusive imp of a father, his mind is only partly on the tasks immediately at hand. The thought about the price, the knowledge that fate can't be fooled that he forced from his mind when he was faced with his happy ending – it comes back; it is now foremost for him. He was a fool to think the fight was over. He was a fool to think he won, so easily. But then, he wanted to believe – he wanted it so much. A fool, a romantic fool, who still believes in love, after so many years.
And when his father tricks him, yet again, with humiliating ease, with the simple sleight of hand, he tricks him exactly because he is a fool who believes in love. He thought, he still thought that his father could be talked to – that he could see the light, so to speak.
He was wrong and, as could be expected, he ended up on the floor, crying, defeated, faced with the same choice that he had before him all along: to die, or to see the death of people he loves. Not a choice at all, really; he'd die either way.
His mind raced, centuries of tricks and twists closing up on him, refusing to believe that this time no tricks will do – there will be no loopholes. Yet he is not only a king of loopholes – he is a master of deals, too, and he knows a deal you can't wiggle out of when he sees one.
He made a promise to Belle, just yesterday. He promised that nothing would ever be more important to him than her. He has to fulfill this promise.
If he will not stop his father, she'll die.
There is nothing more important to him than her life.
Her life has a price, and he has to pay it.
A straightforward deal, really.
As he walks up the main street to meet his sneering, smiling father, this abomination of nature, a child with an old and dead heart, he feels strange calm descend upon him. He always thought himself a coward, he always clung to his life and safety; he would have thought he'd be more frightened to die. It is so strange, so unbelievable that this simple thing – loving someone, giving yourself to someone – can make one so free of fear.
Freedom of the right choice made with an easy mind. What a wonderful thing.
He confronts his father, distracts him from his captive victims, standing there in the middle of the street, frozen by dark magic. He tries not to look at them, up till the very last moment.
She'd know what is happening – she'd feel what he is about to do.
He cannot go on watching the screaming silent pain in her eyes.
When he looks at his son, finally, and looks at her, he knows he was right. They know. They feel. They suffer.
They love him.
What a powerful thing, love, able to give you strength and to kill you in one move.
He tells them what he needed to tell them.
He looks into her stricken eyes, pleading. 'Don't be angry with me. Do not blame me for abandoning you, yet again. I am doing it because I love you. And please, please don't be destroyed by this. Don't die, inside. Don't die, ever. Go on. Live your life. Live for me'.
He wonders if she understands, or if pain made her temporary blind.
He summons his shadow with his dagger, summons it easily, despite having no magic; it is a symbol of his soul, and a man about to die needs no magic to reunite with his soul, for one needs his soul to be able to die.
His father is so surprised by his sudden stroke – he never expected it. Underestimating his counterpart, as ever. 'I pulled one over you, papa', he wants to say. But this is not the time for cheap quips.
As his dagger goes through his father's flesh, as he hears the horrid sucking sound, he quivers – he is momentarily terrified of his action. He is stabbing a child, for goodness sake!.. But, as the cloud of black smoke envelops them and his father's familiar old face emerges, the calm returns. He looks into this lined, wasted face and suddenly remembers how it was – how he laughed, how they played, how he tossed him up in the air, tickling him, and the wonderful joy and fear of this flight; he was sure his father would catch him, then – and he did. Something, somewhere went wrong for this man, his father – something robbed him of love. What a sorrow it is that he has to die to feel this love again.
Yes, that is what he feels – what he knows as he stands embracing his father, pinning him with the dagger: he is doing this out of love. Not out of fear or revenge; he is doing it so that his father could once again become a man he has been.
He looks into this old face, and sees so many faces along with it. Bae, a baby and a boy and a teenager and a grown man: happy, sad, angry, hopeful – always loved, always loving. Milah, when she was a young girl, kissing him with smiling lips. Cora, proud and defiant, challenging him, loving him, struggling with him. Regina, proud and surprised at her awakened powers, grateful to him – looking at him with awe, loving him. Henry, eating his snack, chatting to him happily – intrigued, fascinated. Loving him. And in all of them, the faces of the people he loved and people who loved him, he sees Her face – her smile, her eyes, her courage, her innocence, her light. Her love.
She has been present in all the loves he ever knew – she encompassed them, eclipsed them, they were all part of her, even before they met – even before she was born.
And he found her, and loved her – she had been his.
He was blessed.
As he twists the dagger, and trusts it deeper, slashing his own skin and flesh, reaching for his own heart, there is pain, and strange coldness as the air fights to rush into the wound. He doesn't mind the pain; it is just a sign that he is alive, and it will pass soon.
He feels his own blood, hot and sticky, soaking his shirt, chilling his skin. He feels his feet and hands grow stiff and cold as the beating of his pierced heart slows. The peace, the calm are still upon him and, as his eyelids grow heavy and his vision blurs, he sees, absurdly and sweetly, her face – her happy, youthful face, as she looked at him over her shoulder standing on the ladder, smiling indulgently at some silly quip of his.
Why do you spin so much?.. There is love in your heart, and for something more than your power… And since then, you loved no one, and no one has loved you…Why did you come back?.. An empty heart, and a chipped cup… Excuse me, do I know you?.. I remember, and I love you… This is exactly the reason I have to stay… When you find something worth fighting for, you never give up… That's who you are… Like a date? Yes, a date… I will see you again…
Her voice. Her face. Her smiling eyes, her lower lip that she bites when she is shy or exited. The silk of her hair, the warmth of her skin. The love in her heart.
The light.
So much love, there was so much love in his life, just waiting to be let in. He lets it in, now. It floods him, now – every drop of blood is a drop of love. He sees nothing of the real world now – only her face, her eyes, her light. Their bond, stronger then ever. Blindingly bright, all around him, engulfing him. No place for darkness.
No darkness can stand such light as the one he steps into now.
Sweetheart, I am dying.
So much love.
The pain passes, finally. It is gone, and he never noticed.
