Deep in the vault grew a jungle that seemed a world unto itself. One moment they were deep underground in a dark tunnel, then a step across a threshold brought them to a clearing under open sky and bright light.

Belle stopped and turned back to see a large wooden door frame standing by itself in the grass, filled with a shimmering sheet of magical energy. It reminded her of the portals in the Sorcerer's mansion. Time here felt stagnant, trapped. "What is this place? It wasn't mentioned in any of the books..."

Rumple had already gone on ahead a few steps to examine an empty pedestal that rose from the grass. It was made of intertwining branches of twisting ebony, enclosing a flat disk engraved with the same symbols as the outer door of the vault. "No, it wouldn't be. This is Our Grandmother's garden. A hint of her origin, I suspect, though she isn't too forthcoming about that."

"Some kind of tropical snake spirit?" guessed Belle.

"It hardly matters now." Rumple touched the strangely-shaped stand. "I used to keep the dagger here."

"Seems safe enough." Belle caught up to his side and looked down. "There's still some traces of your security spell on here."

"Ah, well. You know heroes. There's no keeping them out." Rumple nudged her back towards the door. "There's only one door, but many destinations. It's Camelot we want."

The vault they re-entered was almost identical to the one they had left, but this time the spiral staircase led them to another forest clearing rather than a witch's palace. The air was dry and warm, the leaves beginning to yellow in the tail end of summer.

"How long do you think it's been since you were there?" wondered Belle. Camelot existed in its own time, separate from the Enchanted Forest.

Rumple licked a finger, then held it up to the breeze. "For them, ten years, give or take a year." He dropped his hand. "This way."

Belle nodded. She looked at his hand, then at her own. "How do they feel about monsters and demons in Camelot?"

Rumple grasped her hand and caressed her newly squamous skin lightly. All his expressions and movements were those of his Storybrooke self, a disorienting incongruity while he wore the imp's inhuman face. "Oh, sweetheart... you're not any of that."

Belle forced a weak smile. She was ashamed to know exactly how the people of Avonlea would look at her now — the same way they had always looked at the Dark One. Were people in Camelot any different? "It's what they will think. Isn't it?"

Rumple lowered his gaze. "I do have a certain reputation, that's true." He gestured, drawing on his magic to change their appearances to something bland and inoffensive. "But you're right. They may be more willing to chat with a couple of petty bourgeoisie on pilgrimage."

Belle nodded. Pilgrimage to various holy sites had been a popular excuse for a travel holiday back in the old world, war and money permitting. "And our destination?"

"I have corrupted you." Rumple grinned shyly at her. "But there's no need to lie. We're here to see Merlin, of course. He's famous round these parts!"

Camelot was a day's hike away. Rumple didn't want to draw attention before they had a chance to see the lay of the land, hence the walk. Belle didn't mind. The weather was perfect, and she appreciated the chance to catch her breath before another crisis hit them.

The forest opened out into fields, pastures, and orchards. The trail they had been following joined up with a dirt ox-road. Buildings clustered along the road, forming a village. A huge castle rose above the village, dramatic in the slanting rays of the setting sun.

It was beautiful. It was wrong.

Belle stopped, staring up at the tall towers. The light hit shining white walls and seemed to wobble. A mirage?

"It's illusion," murmured Rumple at her side. He steadied her with a palm against her back.

Belle squinted, trying to see through the magic. "Is it because of the Author?"

Rumple chuckled, but it was an unhappy sound. "Oh, no, no, no. This goes back to the deal I made the last time I was here."

Belle drew in her breath sharply. "You said... you said it had gone well for you, but badly for Camelot. What happened?"

"It's a long story." He sat down next to her on a chiseled stone road marker. "It seems Merlin had the bad taste to send one of his prophecies to an impressionable young lad named Arthur..."

King Arthur was a distant rumor in the Enchanted Forest and a legend in the Land Without Magic, but the story Rumple told her was far less glorious or noble. The sword Arthur pulled from the stone was not whole. It was enough to prove his right to the throne in the eyes of Camelot, but it wasn't enough for the new king.

Rumple nodded at the castle. "Beneath that illusion lies Merlin's old tower. Arthur holed himself up there looking for the missing fragment of Excalibur..."

Finally, his wife, fed up with his obsession, took it upon herself (with the help of their friend Lancelot) to find it for him. She had the intelligence to use the Sorcerer's gauntlet.

"And that led them to...?"

"The Vault of the Dark One. To the garden." He gave her a look. "Three guesses why..."

Belle thought about it for a moment. Then, "The dagger! That's the missing bit of Excalibur?"

Rumple nodded. "So you understand why I wasn't about to let them take it. I offered them the next best thing in exchange for the gauntlet."

"The next best thing?"

"Well, did they really need the sword to be whole, or did they only need everyone to think it was whole?"

Belle frowned. "It depends on what they needed Excalibur for. I mean, it's not just any old sword, is it?"

Rumple scoffed. "Merlin's prophecy never specified. Apparently just holding it and waving it about was supposed to be enough. It worked for Snow and Charming!"

Belle was sure there had to be more to it than a morale boost, but done was done. "So you sold them some kind of, what, illusion charm?"

Rumple held up a finger. "The Sands of Avalon. Capable of casting an enchantment strong enough to fool even the Dark One!"

"And you just happened to have some in your possession," Belle said slowly. And strong enough to work on the Dark One? "Wait, why would you...?"

"Ah. Well." He crumpled under her scrutiny. "In my darker moments, my plans seemed so improbable, and the years so long, that every prophecy felt like self-delusion. That an illusion of happiness was the best I could hope for."

"Oh, Rumple." Belle pulled him into a gentle hug. "You deserve better than a lie. I'm glad you didn't use it."

He cleared his throat. "But I did trade it to Guinevere. Too bad it wasn't applied as intended..." He glanced at the castle again. "Arthur used it on Guinevere to 'fix' their broken marriage..."

"He used it on his wife?" Belle sat back, appalled.

"And the whole kingdom. With spectacular results. The glorious legend of Camelot spread far and wide." He shrugged. "An illusion, but if you live in an illusion long enough, you forget it's not real."

Belle sighed. Wasn't that the kind of thinking that had led Rumple to give her a false dagger? She gave his arm a shake, as if to wake him up from such a misguided notion. "Until it all collapses on your head!"

He grimaced, rubbing at his arm. "They seem happy enough."

"Only on the surface." She looked at him sternly. "Underneath, the truth must be gnawing at them... It's not a good feeling to suspect that your husband is lying to you."

He winced. "Only one of them is actually married to Arthur, but I take your point."

"You started this whole mess, giving them the magic sand. You have to fix it!" She knew it would take more than a confession or two to sort it out, but this was their responsibility.

"No, Merlin started this, giving that child that prophecy," he argued. "And then it was Arthur and his obsession with fixing the damn sword..."

"Yes, well, life is imperfect. He'll have to come to terms with that, as we all must, but first they need to know the truth. You can undo the effects of the sand, can't you?"

Rumplestiltskin eyed the castle. "It must have been spread very thin. Perhaps..." He fingered the ribbons at his neck, hidden under a glamour but visible to Belle as thin streaks of magical energy. "Perhaps I can drain the power from the sand."

"We can start with one person," Belle encouraged him. "Figure out the best way to lift the enchantment."

He nodded meekly. She could tell he was still feeling guilty from her earlier reproof. He stood up from the road marker, brushing dirt off his clothes and looking as if he didn't know what to say.

Belle threaded an arm through the crook of his elbow. "The truth is, I've done it, too. I wanted so much to be a hero that I ended up thinking that I needed everyone to see me as a hero and forgetting to actually be heroic that I almost tried to use the dagger to force you to support my illusion."

Rumple stopped and looked at her. "Sweetheart, no..."

She shook her head. "I'm just saying, I guess I can understand why..."

He sighed. In a low voice, he said, "But it's still not right." He let her nudge him back into motion.

They stopped to rent a room at an inn on the outskirts of Camelot, where they could blend in among the other travelers and get a feel for the current situation. They sat at a table in the corner of the common room and listened to the talk around them.

"Interesting," Rumple murmured after a while. "Camelot, enchantment or no, seems much less changed in this iteration than the Enchanted Forest."

"Do you think that's Merlin's doing?" Belle wondered.

He shrugged. "Or Excalibur. That sword is a force to be reckoned with."

Belle's eyes went to his collar. "But the dagger was changed, even though you say it was once part of the sword..."

"But it was bound to me, to us. And apparently we are more... malleable."

That was a disturbing thought, that they had been so easily forced into other fates. They would still be trapped if not for the intervention of outside forces. It was the same for the people of Camelot. Now she and Rumple would have to be the outside forces intervening.

Later that evening, they abducted one of the inn's three maids and brought her to their room. Belle told herself it was kidnapping in a good cause, that they meant to help the poor girl. A sleeping spell kept her unaware of their efforts to disenchant her.

"The magic is everywhere. I don't see any weak spots at all!" Belle said in dismay. She had no idea where to start unravelling the spell.

Rumple nodded, but didn't look surprised. No wonder he had suggested draining the magic rather than undoing the enchantment. "It's been years."

At least there's some good to come out of our finding that damned hat, she thought. She stood by the door, keeping an eye out for intruders, while her husband set to work on the magic.

Rumple sat down on a stool by the bed. He extended his hands over the unconscious maid, palms down, and frowned in concentration. The ribbons that had been the hat began glowing again. Ethereal wisps of power rose from the maid, rushing away faster and faster to be absorbed into Rumple's palms. His eyes took on a glazed look and his hands trembled.

The maid turned transparent.

Belle expected Rumple to stop, but he continued draining the magic. No, draining her — it was the maid's life that was dissolving before their eyes. Belle cried out in alarm, "Rumple, stop!"

He continued as if in a trance. Belle had to physically tackle him to break the spell. He blinked, focus returning to her. "What... what happened?"

"You were killing her," Belle told him. "The magic was too deeply embedded."

"She..." Rumple turned back to the maid. Belle had already cast a stabilizing spell on her. "She'll live, thanks to you."

"But she's still under the effects of the sand."

"It's been years," he repeated quietly. "Years of eating dreams and drinking lies. I'm afraid their substance is more magic than not."

Belle shivered. "I had no idea that could happen." The Sands of Avalon must be incredibly powerful, to turn ordinary people into magical beings. Beings like Maleficent, who could barely exist in the Land Without Magic.

Rumple seemed to guess the direction of her thoughts. "The isle of Avalon is said to lie halfway between the mortal and divine realms."

"There must be something we can do." Belle refused to give up. "If we need a god, we can find a god..." Hadn't they done as much already? The people of Camelot deserved help, didn't they?

"Let's try Merlin first, hmm?" Rumple smiled wryly. "As the Dark One, no doubt I'm on many a god's top ten smite-on-sight lists, and now I'm afraid you've joined me there."

"Oh." Belle deflated. He was right. Their association with Our Grandmother, she who was not named in any orthodox scripture, but only in the histories of forbidden cults, would only be counted against them. As for the old darkness itself, that magic came at a steep price, and Belle didn't want to put a whole population under such a debt.

They didn't release their captive until morning, after they were sure she wouldn't disintegrate into thin air. A little bit of magical nudging eased her back into her life with minimal disruption.

"You're getting good at that," Rumple remarked as they finally left the inn.

Belle had them hidden behind the same spell Our Grandmother had used to keep Zelena from noticing Belle in the vault. With the magic still active, they were able to approach Merlin's tree without being interrupted by the castle guards or anyone else passing through.

The massive, spreading crown of the giant willow dominated the courtyard, surrounded on three sides by the illusory castle and separated by a low stone wall from the king's wood, a remnant of the forest that had grown up around Merlin's tower.

Rumple walked up to the gnarled trunk and knocked casually against the wood. "Anyone home?"

Belle saw a spike of darkness shoot through the bark. A white mist rose in answer, emanating from the heart of the tree. She reached out, touching the mist with her index finger. "I think that's a yes." The mist flowed out along the trunk, pooling in the channels formed by the ridged surface until it shaped the flowing outline of a door frame. "An invitation?"

Rumple chuckled. "I doubt he wants to talk to me, but perhaps he'll look more kindly on you, my dear."

"Well, it's both of us or neither, and if he's as wise as they say, he should know that." Belle clasped her husband's hand firmly and drew him with her into the light.

Reality dissolved and reformed into a barren desert landscape. Hills of sand and bare dirt rose all around them. In the midst of the desert, a man in a black and gold robe sat on a small, round boulder. He looked up at their approach. "Dark One..."

"Rumplestiltskin. He has a name," said Belle sharply. Was this the Sorcerer? He looked younger than his apprentice!

Rumple squeezed her hand, then bowed ironically. He gestured at Belle. "And of course, this is my lovely wife, Belle of Avonlea."

"Don't bother. Merlin can't see past his own narrow conception of light and dark." A woman in a cruel-faced metal mask materialized behind the man in the robe.

Merlin leaped to his feet and backed away. "I see you well enough. What are you but the dregs of a soul destroyed long ago?"

"Are you Nimue?" Belle studied the apparition curiously. Traces of Nimue's memories lingered in the back of Belle's mind, but only in blurred and distant form. The magic here had allowed her to manifest. If that was Merlin's magic, that meant he must subconsciously have wanted to see her. Belle turned to the sorcerer. "You miss her, don't you?"

Merlin glanced at Belle, his eyes radiating unhappiness. "That creature over there is the first Dark One. It's not the woman I loved."

Rumple scoffed. "A pity you didn't go through with killing her, or you'd know better."

"Wait, what?" Belle looked from Merlin to Nimue, trying to imagine holding the dagger in her hand and stabbing Rumple. If Merlin loved her, why...?

Nimue ripped off her mask and pinned Merlin with her gaze. "He held the blade to my throat and wept."

Merlin sighed. "I thought at the time that her death would lay the darkness to rest. I was wrong."

"No matter. The true Nimue is gone..." The image of Nimue lifted the mask and let it turn to dust in her hand. She blew it away with a soft puff. "...to ashes. But her shade may face her dead in the underworld without shame, knowing they are avenged."

Belle frowned at Merlin. "If you had the blade, surely you could have stopped Nimue without killing her?"

"Apparently our esteemed Sorcerer is not a fan of half-measures," said Rumple. "Or cleaning up his own mess. Even after he knew Vortigan was slaughtering his way through Camelot in search of the grail he kept in secret, Merlin didn't lift a finger to contain the threat in any way."

"By the grace of Our Grandmother, I stopped Vortigan," said Nimue with vicious satisfaction. "Permanently."

"You let the darkness consume you!" said Merlin, seeming to forget that this was not the real Nimue, but only a simulacrum summoned from their collective memories. "You opened your heart to that alien parasite you call a god!"

"That's... that's rather harsh," muttered Belle. She couldn't help but feel that Nimue had a point. She remembered how the powers of light had done nothing to stop the ogres, which was why Avonlea had resorted to dealing with the Dark One to save them. Would Merlin have condemned that, too? "Our Grandmother may not be native to these lands, but that's no reason to condemn her, especially if she's willing to help us."

Merlin looked ill. "What you call 'help' is nothing of the sort. Nimue let a demon into her soul, a darkness that feasts off mortal pain and suffering."

Rumple laughed, not quite the imp's giggle, but with the same mocking edge. "All magic comes at a price, dearie. One worth paying, if you ask me."

"All she took was the pain that would have driven him mad!" Belle felt a surge of resentment at the judgement in Merlin's eyes (and how much of that came from Nimue?) and fought to remain calm. "It wasn't Our Grandmother who hurt him. Whatever horrors Zelena planted in his mind, he's well rid of."

Merlin shook his head. "That's your humanity you offered up to the darkness..."

"What, do we get points for suffering?" Rumple quipped. "Does it make us more holy, as the clerics in Avonlea would have us believe?"

"Merlin considers it akin to death," said Nimue. "To be swallowed by the darkness is to lose ourselves."

Rumple snorted. "Between multiple curses, time travel, and the Author, we're not short of memories, especially unpleasant ones. We can stand to lose a few."

"Life is made of moments," Merlin said. "The darkness will devour them and leave you with nothing. Dark One, you must know this. It cannot ever give you happiness!"

"But with power, happiness became possible," Rumple countered. "Because my son was alive, at least a little longer. It gave me family I would not otherwise have found."

"Life is all about give and take," Belle added. She knew it wasn't that simple, that the power came with a darkness that hungered for destruction. It took its host's anger at an unjust world and turned it into a boundless rage. She could feel it burning beneath her own thoughts. It had overwhelmed Rumple at first, but he had shielded her from the worst. Because it was possible to contain. The restraint of a human heart imposed on an inhuman entity could transform it into something more. "Whatever we lost, call it humanity, call it the wisdom of painful experience — if she learns something of what makes us human from it, that's not a bad thing, as I see it..."

Merlin gave her a long look. "You stand on precarious ground yourself, who are the grandchild of something far from human or mortal."

Belle flinched. So he knows who I am. Did he also know that the price the darkness had asked from her had been a token of true love? Perhaps pain and suffering were not what it preferred, but only what the desperate so eagerly offered up. She could imagine what Merlin would say to that. But was their love diminished after Belle had given the leaf away? Do I love him less? she asked her heart. She didn't ask Merlin, fearing that the question would push her over the edge in his eyes.

Rumple stepped between them, an aggressive slant to his posture as he went on the offense (for her sake, she knew). "But if you're so concerned about humanity, why haven't you done anything to free the people of Camelot from the Sands of Avalon? And sat in your tree, twiddling your thumbs while your hand-picked Author rewrote the story around you?"

"I have very little power here," Merlin began. "Nimue..."

"I did nothing to stop your powers of sight or speech," Nimue retorted. "Don't use me as an excuse."

Merlin fell silent for a long moment. Then he shook his head. "Look around you. Our world was crumbling, becoming a wasteland. The Holy Grail was the last hope of renewal. It was entrusted to me to fulfill its vision... a vision of kingdoms shining in the light, of heroes and villains, of stories that inspire..."

"A 'sacred duty' you were quick to give up on when you reforged the grail into a sword to sever you from your immortality — from your fate!" Nimue said, a centuries-old anger still simmering in her eyes.

Merlin sighed. He lifted a hand as if to reach out to her, then dropped it again. "A mistake I paid for, again and again..."

"You forced her under the control of a magical dagger," said Belle. She looked at the collar nailed into Rumple's neck. "Did you have any idea how much suffering would result from that?"

"I regret your pain," Merlin said softly.

"And then there's Ingrid. You nearly destroyed her with your prophecies!"

"So it has ever been," Nimue noted, a nasty smirk twisting her lips.

Merlin lowered his gaze. "Everything I've done is to save these realms..."

Rumple snorted. "Ah, yes, that has a familiar ring to it. I used to tell myself everything I did was to protect my son."

And I failed. The unspoken coda reverberated through Belle's heart. She held his hand tightly, reminding him in turn, It's not your fault. You found him, and he forgave you. He would want you to live, to find happiness, just as you wished it for him.

Rumple ducked his head in acknowledgement. Then he took a breath and said to Merlin, "But then I met Belle. One thing she's taught me is to look beyond the obvious solutions..."

"You can't let visions blind you to evil," Belle said. "Maybe if you explained things more, we could help. There's a book about it in the Land Without Magic. 'The Wisdom of Crowds' they call it."

"Or the stupidity of the mob," Rumple muttered.

Belle rolled her eyes. "We're hardly a mob. Look, we have to start somewhere. So, the Sands of Avalon..."

"It brought Camelot closer to what it should be," Merlin admitted. "Arthur is... not the leader I hoped for. The sands make up for his deficiencies as king."

"But it's all an illusion! You let Arthur brainwash everyone into compliance with your 'vision'." Belle was beginning to think that Arthur wasn't the only disappointment in Camelot.

Merlin shook his head. "He cast the sands into the air. People saw the kingdom they had always wanted."

Rumple pointed an accusing finger at him. "Except for the queen. Guinevere caught a pinch of dust straight to the face, and you know it. Meanwhile, your boy king remained unaffected."

Merlin opened his mouth, then closed it again, unable to refute the facts laid out before him.

"Then we free her, first," Belle insisted. "Do you know how to unweave the enchantment? Rumple tried to drain the magic with the hat, but it turns out we can't do that without killing the victim."

"After so many years, there's no undoing the spell," Merlin said at last. "All we can do is to remind them of what they have forgotten."

"Sounds a bit like when the Dark Curse was broken and people had two sets of memories..." Lacey's memories had felt real despite being invented by Regina (or the Dark Curse), but Belle could distinguish which moments she had lived through and which she had not. "At least they'll have their freedom back, to decide what kind of people they want to be. A kingdom is made up of its people, isn't it?"

"That's one way of looking at it," agreed Rumple, but he was looking at Merlin. "But someone who sees everything through prophetic visions may have a different view."

Merlin rubbed his face wearily. "Free will is important. It's just that, for the sake of the greater good, sometimes..."

"People make the wrong choice and you have to force them to do the right thing," finished Rumple. He didn't look at Belle, but her own guilty memories were reminder enough.

"But it's still wrong," Belle said firmly, as much to herself as to Merlin. Even before the dagger, she had gone beyond persuasion to holding their love over his head as a means of control. Thinking about it now, it betrayed the weakness of her moral arguments if she felt they couldn't stand on their own ground. Or had she secretly considered Rumple an unreasoning beast with herself the only one qualified to judge right and wrong? "Sometimes you need the courage to trust people to decide for themselves, or else you're just setting yourself up as another tyrant."

"You're wasting your breath." Nimue circled behind Merlin, but he didn't turn his head. "Five hundred years as a tree has taught him nothing..."

He made her a slave to his will, thought Belle. Even at his worst, Rumple never did that to me. Even when he had disagreed with her or acted in ways she couldn't condone, he had never tried to force her to stay with him or magically control her thoughts. His lies might have driven her away eventually, but she didn't think he would have tried to stop her.

"Belle's always worth listening to," Rumple said to the sorcerer and his shadow. "You fell in love with a woman who became the Dark One, but my wife fell in love with a Dark One who... hopes to be the man she deserves."

Merlin and Nimue both looked at Belle, as if trying to see what the Dark One saw in her.

"None of it would have mattered if he hadn't fallen in love, too," said Belle. No one else ever looked at her the way Rumple did. And even then, it was a miracle they had come as far as they had. A few different choices, and they could be where Merlin and Nimue stood now. The surprising thing was that Nimue had not killed Merlin when she had had the chance. Their love was not completely gone. There was still hope. They could, all four of them as well as the folk of Camelot, be free.

Merlin nodded slowly. "Maybe you're right. Maybe it's time I tried something different."

Author's notes: I don't know what kind of tree Merlin was turned into (I think it was CGI in the show, anyhow) but I thought it looked a bit like a weeping willow, so I'm just making something up.

Also, after 17 chapters, I finally filled the "squamous" HPL/Mythos bingo square. Go me! (I used "blasphemous" in chapter 13. Now to work in a "cyclopean"...)