The door to the warehouse began to glow around the edges with a gold-tinged light as Merlin began to draw another portal. Rumple stepped away from Isaac and headed for the door, beckoning Belle to join him.
"No, wait." The words spilled out of her mouth without conscious volition. Wait for what? she asked herself. "There's one more thing, before we go."
Everyone looked at her impatiently. Now what? hung unspoken in the air.
Belle opened her mouth again, a question on the tip of her tongue. She glanced uncertainly at Rumple.
He sighed at her hesitation. "Look, you don't have to force yourself to go..."
She shook her head. "That's not it." She looked at Isaac. "This realm. It's your addition to the dream, isn't it?"
He shrugged.
"I mean, if this is your idea of a happy ending, it's literally your dream, right?" Belle pressed on. Another thought flashed through her mind. "And this is where you met Cruella de Vil."
That got a reaction. His eyebrows pinched, his mouth twisted, Isaac shrugged again.
Belle nodded, her guess confirmed.
She had seen the dedication page of his new book: Tu Cruella, who made me who I am. Given what they had learned, was it more accurate to say that it was the other way around? Was Cruella de Vil literally created out of Isaac Heller's dreams? Belle knew that Rumple still owed her something, the last of the Queens of Darkness to be granted her wish. Did that wish have something to do with Isaac Heller?
"Belle, we don't have time for this," Rumple interjected. "We can sort out the loose ends later..."
"No!" Belle didn't know where her certainty came from. If you don't hang onto this loose end, it will end up hanging you, and there will BE no later. The thought struck her with such force that Rumple gave her a startled look.
"What...?" Now he sounded worried. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine." It wasn't the voice of the darkness. Was this what it was like when Merlin made his prophecies? Belle touched the coin in her pocket. Was it you? When it didn't answer, she took a deep breath, then asked Isaac, "Tell me, what did you write about her? The exact words?"
"Why do you want to know?" Isaac had recovered his smarmy self-assurance in their moment of distraction.
"Because I do." Belle stared him down. "Anyway, the sooner you answer us, the sooner you'll get rid of us."
"Fine." Isaac extracted a copy of his book from under his jacket and flipped it open to reveal a handful of folded papers stuck inside. He handed them over to Belle. "You wanna know? Here. Read it for yourself. I'm better on the page."
Belle raised an eyebrow. "You carry her close to your heart, I see."
He chuckled. "Call it my good luck charm."
"Judging by your legions of adoring fans, it worked." She unfolded the papers and skimmed quickly. She could feel their authenticity through her fingers, the magic bound in what must be the original pages. Belle smiled. "So you won't need to hang onto this anymore." She handed the papers to Rumple.
"Hey!" protested Isaac. He grabbed futilely for the papers.
Rumple tsked and lifted them out of reach. A flick of his wrist vanished them in a plume of smoke. Belle could sense his confusion, but he played along as if they had planned it together. "My wife seems to think we need this bit of luck more than you do, Mr. Heller."
Isaac sighed and slumped back in defeat.
"Ready to go?" Merlin spoke up at last. He held the door open, light streaming in through the portal.
"Yeah, let's go." Belle gave Rumple a little nudge to indicate that she really was ready this time.
The air was cold and damp, the ground barren and muddy in the Avonlean winter. Though it was a cloudy, moonless night, the landscape shone with a silvery light to Belle's magically-enhanced sight. The portal had taken them to the countryside outside the capital, where Colcourt Abbey rose from Salvador Lake, a dark outgrowth of stone as forbidding as any fortress. This was the headquarters of the Inquisition. The monks of their order were soldiers devoted to their cause.
In both sets of memories, rumors circulated of the horrors hidden in the depths of the holy island. Belle had never set foot inside the place in either life. She braced herself to find out the truth of it. Was Henry a prisoner? A brainwashed minion? Written into the story as an acolyte? She glanced at Rumple, who was gazing towards the distant structure with narrowed eyes.
"Rumple, be careful," she whispered. "This may not be so simple."
"Oh, I know it won't," he murmured back. He held out a hand and sighed at the drops of water falling on his skin. Winters in Avonlea tended to be mild but wet.
As she had done in Camelot, Belle cast a concealment spell over them. They trudged through the paths that wound between the fields and meadows to the edge of the lake closest to the abbey. A fifty-yard-long causeway connected it to the shore. This late at night, there was no one else around. They stepped warily onto the causeway. Belle winced at the crunch of their boots on the gravel and checked to see if anyone had noticed them.
That was when she heard a soft thump of something heavy washing against the rocks that lined the sides of the causeway. A glimmer of motion caught her eye. "There's something in the water..."
There were multiple somethings in the water, as they discovered, tied to the wooden posts set periodically in the rocky embankment with thick ropes.
"Fish traps?" suggested Merlin, but Belle shook her head.
The water seemed to ripple with pain. The absence of magic here felt like a wound to her othersight.
Rumple was already tugging on the closest rope, hauling whatever it was up onto the rocks. "There's someone inside!"
Belle and Merlin came up on either side, just as Rumple broke open what seemed to be a large crate, scattering pieces of wood over the embankment and exposing the pale human shape that had been curled up inside. It seemed to be a woman, her clothes reduced to unidentifiable rags, feet bare. Her rotting skin crawled with the tiny mud shrimp native to Avonlea.
Belle gasped and stumbled back at the sight.
Rumple, less squeamish, reached out to her neck and checked for a pulse. "She's alive!"
Submersed in water for who knows how long? How is she not dead? wondered Belle. Either the woman wasn't human, or there was some kind of magic preserving her life. But she still sensed nothing, only the myriad small scavengers nibbling away at someone as unresisting as a corpse.
Rumple rolled the woman onto her back. But instead of a human face, there was a soft spread of muddy, moss-green slime. No, not slime. The way it moved — it was some kind of large, flattened worm. And when Rumple reached to try to pull it from the woman's face, Belle realized that it was attached, extending down through her mouth down her throat. There was a flash of light, something gleaming gold under the slime — a flare of magical energy that was absorbed almost instantly by the worm.
"Wait!" Merlin stopped Rumple from ripping the worm away. "Don't. It may be all that's keeping her alive."
Rumple shuddered and scrambled away from the waterline, rubbing his hands on the bottom of his tunic. "My hands are numb. Some kind of poison?"
Belle cast an uneasy glance down the causeway, mentally counting the number of posts. "Are they all like this?"
"We can check." Rumple moved on to the next.
"That may set off an alarm," warned Merlin. "If it hasn't already..."
Everyone looked at the abbey. Belle held her breath, but it remained dark and silent.
Merlin sighed. "I'll go first. There should be guards posted in that gatehouse. I'll make sure they don't raise an alarm."
"Fine," grunted Rumple, heaving another crate out of the water. This one, too, broke open to reveal another wretched near-corpse.
Merlin grimaced at the sight. Without another word, he strode off towards the abbey.
Belle lingered near the first victim while Rumple continued down the line. What was the use of having magic if she couldn't help people? If she could understand what this creature was, how it worked, maybe she could untangle it from its victim and figure out a way to heal her. Some kind of parasite, Belle thought, but the way it absorbed magic reminded her of the collar that Rumple had been forced to wear. That had been the power of the Sorcerer's hat. Could these worms have a similar nature?
Belle knelt by the woman's head, not daring to touch her directly. Who was she? Belle looked for her aura, but it was a feeble, flickering thing. This worm was slowly choking the life out of her, keeping her preserved to prolong the feast. Cruel as it seemed, it did give them time to try to save her. On an impulse, Belle took out the coin that bore her name. The coin marked with a pentacle: command over spirits. She concentrated, trying to awaken the spirit of the half-dead woman.
Hello? Can you hear me? Belle projected.
There was no response. Belle sighed and got up to see if Rumple was having better luck. He was bending over yet another waterlogged victim, his hand stretched down to the person's face. But instead of drawing back, he stabbed at it with the tip of a metal wand — his half of what had been Excalibur. There was a geyser of yellow-orange flames. Under it, Belle saw writhing movement — the parasitic worm, expelled and burning.
But won't that kill whoever it is? Belle watched in horror as the body of the victim disintegrated into dust. But then the dust swirled up, its darkness seeming to absorb the fire, and formed a vaguely humanoid cloud. Maleficent. It's Maleficent. Belle remembered with relief that the dragon was an immortal shapeshifter whose life or death did not depend on the physical state of her body.
Belle was about to head over to join her husband when she heard a voice in the ether.
Who's there?
Startled, Belle dropped back down into an awkward squat, balancing herself with one hand on a rock, while the other hand held her coin close to the woman's face. She focused her magic on connecting to the other's consciousness. Belle. I'm Belle. Do you know me?
Belle of Avonlea? came the weak response. I... I am...
It was a voice Belle had heard before. She looked at the woman more closely, overcoming her revulsion to peer beneath the coating of slime to view the tattered aura. This was someone who had magic, she realized. Someone whose magic was being sucked away by this giant parasitic worm.
Blue. I'm Blue...
The Blue Fairy? Belle nearly jumped up in shock.
No! Don't... please. Help me!
Belle forced herself to breathe calmly. She closed her eyes and concentrated. I don't know how. What happened to you? Who else is here besides you and Mal?
He betrayed us.
Who? The Inquisitor?
Tiberius, yes. The voice seemed to gain strength in its outrage. That treacherous ingrate. We should have known. He always... always obsessed with... darkness. Depraved knowledge.
Belle bit her lip. She remembered the Inquisitors from her memory, well-supplied with fairy dust and the blessings of the fairy order. So he turned on you, did this to you.
To anyone with magic. He had none. But would steal it through use of these, these foul creatures he found... found slithering in the outer reaches... of our realms.
Like leeches, thought Belle. But could you get blood back out of a leech? How does he control them?
Before Blue could answer, an explosion rocked the night. Belle stumbled back on her heels, concentration shattered. The sound had come from the abbey.
Rumple was suddenly at her side, grabbing her arm and pulling her to her feet. "That was Merlin! We have to go."
"Merlin? Is he all right?" Belle stumbled after Rumple, catching her balance with an effort.
"No. He's down and out." Rumple had his wand out. The tip glowed violet as he sketched the shape of a door in the air. A portal!
Belle pulled back. "But Henry! And all these poor people..."
"No time! Belle, we have to go now."
"We can't abandon—"
But Rumple had already stepped through. His hand, which had been holding hers, was suddenly gone.
"Wait! Come back!" Belle stared at the portal in disbelief. How could he run away like that? Should she follow? Surely he wouldn't leave her alone here, not after everything!
The portal closed, leaving only empty air, with no sign that anything had ever been there.
"Rumplestiltskin!" But it was too late. He was gone, and she was still here. She fought past the cold feeling of abandonment to try to think. "Damn it, Rumple!"
Hell. She was going to give him an earful — as soon as she caught up to him. She reached out to where the portal had been. It must be possible to be able to recreate the spell.
Then a flash of motion in the direction of the abbey caught her eye. Someone carrying a lantern, no, half a dozen people and two lanterns. Belle hissed a curse under her breath, her hand falling. She wouldn't have time to figure out the magic in time — it was too complicated and she lacked Rumple's years of experience. She could see now that the gatehouse was a broken shell after whatever had happened with Merlin. The small band, all on foot, picked their way through the rubble littering the ground outside the abbey.
Belle stared numbly. Was that the Inquisitor in their midst? Had they seen through her concealment spell? She instinctively redirected the magic in her hands into a protection spell.
As they came closer, Belle saw that the Inquisitor (no, the Archbishop Tiberius, her other memories informed her) had his hand on the shoulder of a shorter figure walking ahead and to his left. Someone in a robe, head bowed, a black cloth tied over his eyes — someone who struck Belle with a chilling sense of familiarity.
Is that Henry? thought Belle, and Why is he blindfolded? Before her mind could form a third thought, a wave of darkness crashed over her and she knew no more.
"So the prodigal returns." The Inquisitor's voice was the first thing Belle heard as she returned to consciousness.
She didn't have a chance to respond before she hit the ground hard. Her arms hurt with a sharp pain in her hasty attempt to cushion her fall, skin scraping against the gritty surface beneath her. Her nostrils filled with a damp, unpleasant stench — excrement and rotten blood and the gods knew what else. She opened her eyes to a world turned flat and colorless. She had been thrown into a dungeon cell. Dirty straw was scattered over the floor, prickling into her skin where she lay pressed against it. A wooden bucket in the back corner was the sole furnishing.
The iron gate slammed shut in her face, its clang sounding dull in her ears. That was when she felt the bite of metal on her forearm and saw the band locked above her wrist, etched with fairy glyphs to block magic. Belle gasped as the reality of her plight sank in.
The Inquisitor's lips twisted in a haggard smile, his eyes burning with the tired irritation of a man dragged out of sleep unexpectedly. "Rather worse for wear, but never mind, it's nothing that can't be undone."
Belle scrambled to her feet and glared at him. "You haven't won. You never will—"
"Hush, child." He had the gall to openly yawn. "I advise you to get some rest. Compose your mind with prayer. Perhaps it will improve your disposition. I shall deal with you later, at a more godly hour."
Belle fought to summon her magic, but nothing answered her call. She could do nothing but watch helplessly as the Inquisitor and his minions walked away and vanished up the stairs at the end of the corridor. Belle kicked and pulled at the bars of her prison, testing their strength, but it was futile.
"Any luck?" came the question from down the corridor.
"Does it sound like...!" Belle snarled in frustration, then cut herself off and took a breath. "No. No luck." She pressed up against the gate, turning her head to try to see who was there. The only light came from the oil lamp hanging from the opposite wall of the corridor. It was enough for her to see the pale hand reaching out through the bars of the cell two down from her own.
Then another voice spoke up. "Is that you, bookworm?" A scuffling noise came from the cell adjacent and another hand appeared.
"Regina!?" Belle stared at the hand. The fingers moved in what seemed to be an offer of comfort or fellowship from one prisoner to another. The tone of Regina's question was more conciliatory than Belle had ever expected to hear from the Evil Queen, almost defeated. Despite herself, she reached out gingerly to clasp the other woman's hand.
The hand stiffened suddenly. Regina pulled back abruptly. "You..."
Belle withdrew, confused. Why did Regina suddenly sound so aghast? "What?"
Regina choked out, "So. It finally happened. I told him love was weakness, but I never expected... you..."
Belle looked down at her hand, turning it this way and that in bewilderment. The dim light glimmered on the tiny scales. Oh. Oh, hell. She burst out hastily, "No, no, no! It's not like that."
"Like what?" The other prisoner spoke up warily, and Belle realized it was Emma. "What's going on? What is Regina talking about?"
"Belle's the Dark One," Regina said. "That curse is passed on through murder..."
"I didn't kill Rumple. How could you think that!"
Regina sighed. "So he's alive? Then how are you...?"
"It's complicated." Belle didn't want to talk about him. She hoped he was all right, wherever he was. Hoped he would find her and save her. But for all her hopes, part of her was still furious at him for deserting her. "But he's not here right now. What's going on? Do you... do you both have your real memories? How?"
"Because we're more useful to Tiberius that way," said Regina.
"He has Henry," growled Emma. "He made my son the Author, somehow."
"Our son," Regina corrected wearily.
Belle nodded, then remembered they couldn't see her, and added, "I saw. So Tiberius is forcing Henry to write things for him?"
"By threatening us." Regina paused, then said, "I don't know how much you know, bookworm, but there are worse fates in this story for us than being locked up in a dungeon..."
Belle fought back a hysterical giggle at that. Was this some roundabout way of saying the Evil Queen was not so bad, really? "So now you know how it feels, Regina — tossed in a dungeon and being held as leverage over someone you love."
"Enough with the schadenfreude," snapped Regina. "You're in here with us, in case you hadn't noticed."
"Right. Sorry." Belle tried to focus. "Worse fates... like those poor people in the lake?"
"You saw them?" Emma said. "Yeah, like that. The 'baptism of the damned', he calls it. Like, he's gonna 'save' you whether you like it or not."
"I would question the sanity of anyone who liked his form of 'salvation'," scoffed Regina. "It's a special fate he reserves for those who have magic, so that he can steal it and they can suffer."
"Suffering is considered cleansing for the soul, according to his faith." Emma didn't sound impressed. "I met people like that before, back in my world. Usually the same ones who told me I deserved whatever crappy situation I was trying to get away from."
"I don't care if he believes his own propaganda," countered Regina. "The point is, if he has no other use for you, he's likely to stuff an overgrown magical tapeworm down your throat, then drown you in an icy lake for the world's worst spa experience."
Belle shuddered at the understatement. "What are those things?"
"He calls them 'bholes'," said Emma. "I don't know where he found them."
"In his nightmares?" Belle suggested. It could be literal, given what Isaac had told them about the storytelling realms. "But how does he control them?"
"That would be Cruella," Regina explained. "They made some kind of deal. Tiberius is using her magic, and now she's living it up, married to King George."
"To be fair, I don't think she has her real memories," Emma put in. "Only us, and Henry, because he's the Author now. And you... how did you swing that?"
"That's a long story." Belle wanted to trust them, but without magic, she couldn't even tell if they were real. And what had happened to Merlin? She had half-expected him to speak up, but it seemed she, Regina, and Emma were the only prisoners here. She tried not to think that he was dead, or in the lake being drained by a, a bhole. "I'll tell you everything once we all get home."
"Right. Once we get home." Emma's tone lacked the unrelenting optimism of her parents, but she didn't argue the point.
Regina sighed. "We can't give up. Henry needs us."
"Right." Belle sat back down heavily. She thought about all the books she had read, how the heroes in them had tricked or overpowered their captors to escape from inescapable dungeons. But no brilliant plans sprang into her mind. She tried quietly calling for Rumplestiltskin. She might as well have wished upon a star, and she knew how useless that was now. No doubt Blue was back in a crate, being pickled from the inside out by that nightmarish parasite.
Was that to be her ultimate fate, as well?
Another hour went by, with no rescue, no escape. Then another. Then another.
And then the Inquisitor returned.
Author's note: About Cruella: I think we have to take the story as shown in canon with a grain of salt. Again, unreliable narrators, yadda yadda. Also, I loved the live-action 2021 Cruella movie, so that may be influencing me. With what's shown on screen, Cruella's mother's version of the story can't be taken at face value (look at the way she treated young Cruella!) so I'm filling in the blanks with wild head-canons.