Chapter XXXVII

Tainted Love

Italics indicate flashbacks

Author's Note: This chapter contains sexual situations.

It had only taken a few short weeks for their dull seaside hamlet to turn into a melodramatic mess. Storybrooke was a hotbed of political and magical intrigue. Royals plotting against Royals. Heroes speaking out against villains. Magical creatures asserting their rights to exist. For every joyous reunion, there was a painful parting. Old traditions were clashing with modern lives and it was not pretty. The town was a powder keg and it would only take one small spark to incite a war. Typical. Pedantic. Boring. Mortals were so predictable.

He did not care if people were princes or plumbers as long as they paid their rent on time. Beyond that, he didn't care if the citizens of Storybrooke lived or died. With a few notable exceptions, of course. He certainly didn't have the time nor interest to attend a school dance.

He scowled at the little people of Storybrooke as they flocked to the Elementary School. They were causing a traffic jam. Storybrooke's very first traffic jam and lucky for him, he was stuck in it. Lovely. He watched the young, old, nobles and serfs drive and walk across Main Street. They bounced towards their silly little ball. while he sat in small town gridlock.

It took twenty interminable minutes to get back across town to his house. It was just that, a house, not a home. It wouldn't be a home until Belle and Bae were there with him. His leg tweaked, a psychosomatic sensation, but it bothered him all the same. His magic prevented aches and pains, but it didn't stop his mind from playing with him.

Ah well. He was away from the idiots of town and he was going to have a quiet night in. He had hoped that Belle might join him. They could sip wine and relax. She could curl into his side and read to him. He would run his fingers through her beautiful hair and take in her scent. He had let her go, let her find herself, but he missed her. He missed the way that he had been her entire world once upon a time. She had seen beyond his darkness, beyond the magic and the show. She had seen him. She had loved him. Still loved him.

She was going to that damn dance with the foreign warrior woman. Rumple had entertained the idea of skinning and gutting Mulan but had decided against it. Belle would never come back to him if he did that. Besides, Mulan's little crush on Stephen and Leah's brat could prove useful to him later. He wasn't one to squander an opportunity. People all over town owed him favors and he would come to collect on them sooner rather than later.

He unlocked the front door and let himself inside. His house in Storybrooke was no castle, but he did like it. He had told Regina that he wanted to be rich and influential, and he was. The curse had made a once dirt poor spinner into the richest man in town. He had a large house, a manor, full of antiques and fine art. Without Belle and Bae, though, it would never be his home. Soon, though. They would all be together again soon.

The minute he stepped over the threshold Rumple knew that something was different. He was not alone, someone was in his house. Belle was the only other person with the key. She had changed her mind. She had finally come home. He hurried through the house to the library. That was where she would be. There was a fire crackling in the hearth. A sweet feminine silhouette enticed him forward.

"Belle, I- "

"Hello, Rumple."

That voice, smokey and low, was not the one he longed to hear.

The figure turned and it was not his beloved Belle welcoming him.

Cora Mills stood in front of his fireplace. She had a glass of his wine in her hand and a pensive look on her face. She had modernized her wardrobe. A burgundy dress covered her from neck to knee and her hair fell in waves around her face. It put him in mind of the ballgown she'd been wearing when he taught her magic for the very first time. Was that her intention or coincidence? With Cora one never knew for sure.

She was still beautiful. She was not the hungry and young ingenue from that night. No, Cora had a mature, self-assured and powerful aura now. She was effortlessly beautiful, unconcerned with the lines on her face. She had never lacked confidence, and even now she stood proud, unbowed and unbroken.

"Cora."

Her lips, burgundy, like her dress, quirked into an almost smile. "Or should I call you Robert now?"

That was the name the curse had given him. He'd rarely used it.

"Not a very imaginative name is it? Robert." She sniffed, "There are far too many dullards named Bob in the worlds. There is only one Rumplestiltskin."

The open bottle of wine on the side table and a second glass waited for him. It was a Cabernet Sauvignon from a California winery. His winery. He'd purchased it in the late nineties out of sheer boredom. It had been one of his best investments. The winery had produced some award-winning vintages. He enjoyed the wine, which was well worth the money he'd paid. He poured a glass and swirled it out of habit.

"What are you doing here, Dearie?"

Once, back in the very beginning, the rage that burnt in her eyes had captivated him. The fury and bloodlust were still there but chilled. The fire banked to only glowing embers by her missing heart.

"Can't I visit an old friend?"

Friend? They had been master and student. They had been lovers. They had been enemies. Never friends. People like them didn't have friends.

He sampled some wine, it was dry, full-bodied and heady with touches of currant, tobacco, and oak. It was exquisite. He took another sip and found that he didn't particularly want to fight.

Company, even Cora's, would be a welcome distraction. At least he wasn't alone. Rumple sat in his favorite chair, an overstuffed leather recliner. Oh, why not? He motioned for Cora to sit in the chair opposite of his own.

"Thank you, Dear." Cora sat and smiled at him. She seemed calmer than usual, relaxed. Was it the wine? Was it nostalgia? Was it an act? He didn't know. She was beautiful and the flickering firelight flattered her. It softened her. The fire cast dancing shadows on her creamy skin. It highlighted the auburns and reds that streaked through her hair. Her eyes, dark and luminous, had something in them that almost looked like fondness.

Her smile was soft and slow, "It has been a while since our last chat."

He stared into the fire and memories washed over him. It had been a long time, but that last chat was fresh in his mind.

"Indeed."

His castle was dark. He'd pulled every curtain and doused the candles.

"That tragedy"

That was what Regina called it.

"Scourges and flame"

She'd had no reason to lie, quite the opposite. His Little Monster had taken too much joy in delivering the news for it to be a lie. He'd known the girl her entire life, longer even. He would know if she was lying.

Belle, his Belle, was gone. Persecuted and murdered. And for what?

"association with you".

He sat at his wheel, in the dark, but he did not spin. He was paralyzed. It was like losing Baelfire all over again.

"I" he spoke aloud after some time. Had it been hours, days or weeks? He did not know. Time was meaningless to an immortal. He had all the time in the world to think of ways to destroy the ones who had hurt his Belle. Her father. The clerics. The whole despicable kingdom from whence she came. The people she had sacrificed herself to save had destroyed her.

"Shunned her. Cut her off. Shut her out. He was cruel to her."

"I" He would make them suffer. Squash them under his boot. Scourges and flames. Scourges and flames. Scourges and flames.

"She threw herself off the tower."

"I." He would throw them off the highest towers. He'd dance on the blood and brain splattered cobblestones. Mangey stray hounds would lick up the blood, nibble on the bones and desecrate the flesh. The people would leave the corpse to rot for his crimes. They would let Maurice rot where he lay or they would join him.

"She died."

"I can't do this." Rumpel couldn't do it. He couldn't stand to think about it anymore. He was-

"You need to stop thinking about it."

The voice made him go stiff and he looked up. The large ornamental mirror in the corner rippled and turned to quicksilver. The woman that stepped through wore a lavish red and white gown, complete with a tiara. The Miller's Daughter had finally become a queen. A queen and feared sorceress, powerful and cruel in equal measure. The Queen of Hearts.

"Hello, Cora."

It still wasn't a particularly pretty name. It lacked a certain musicality. It sounded like something breaking. Hadn't that been what he'd told her all those years ago?

She stepped, into the room, closer to his spinning wheel. Her smirk was poison and she had the devil's light shining in her eyes.

"Oh don't tell me" she sniffed, "that you're still mourning that girl." She tilted her head to the side, "Aren't you being a tad dramatic, Dear?"

Her words, delivered in a saccharine sweet voice, dragged across his skin like a dull dagger.

"I don't recall asking for your opinion, Dearie."

He ran his hand over the wheel out of mindless habit. She stopped the motion with her own hand. When had she moved so close?

"Pathetic. A girl has brought The Dark One to his knees." She pursed her lips, "I thought better of you, Rumple."

"I loved her."

He remembered another girl, one that he'd been foolish enough to think could love him. Cora could not love anybody, not without her heart. Even with her heart, he doubted she knew what love was. It wasn't her heart he had to worry about. It was her twisted mind. There was always something dangerous brewing there.

She rolled her eyes, "Love is weakness."

She leaned over the wheel so they were eye to eye. "I would expect this from Regina, but you?"

She had destroyed Regina when she had killed her stable boy. Cora had helped twist a sweet girl into an Evil Queen. Just as he had known she would. She thought she'd done that all by herself? Hardly. She was devious, cruel and manipulative, but he'd been the one who had taught her that.

He was not an impressionable child that Cora could toy with. Belle was not Daniel. The Stable Boy had been a tool, a means to an end. He had been born to die. Belle was not Daniel. She was not a tool, she was a miracle. She was astonishing, a ray of sunshine, a walking and talking blessing.

She was dead. Gone. All that purity and joy destroyed, driven from the world.

Cora leaned closer and trailed a single finger along his cheek. "You should come to Wonderland with me." She smiled, her lips full and red. "I have such sights to show you. I can make you" Her lips brushed against his "forget her."

She was gone. His Belle was gone.

Maybe a few years of mindless torture and heartless sex was exactly what he needed. Cora had always appealed to his dark side. Her ruthless ambition and her unquenchable bloodlust matched his own. They had both pulled themselves out of the dirt and straw with grit and magic. They had become rich, powerful and respected. Respected, feared a mix of the two.

Belle was the light. Cora was the dark. Both appealed to him. He enjoyed beauty and intelligence, and both women had those qualities in abundance. It was how they used their talents that intrigued him, drove him wild, kept him coming back for more.

Belle would not approve of his vengeance. She would say that he was better, that he could be more than The Dark One. Cora would happily help. She did so enjoy inflicting pain and terror on unsuspecting innocents.

Cora pressed closer to him. Her scent, roses and dark magic, trapped him. It teased him. It tempted him. She tempted him. Rumple let his eyes slide shut. He could see Bae, his beautiful boy, in the darkness behind his eyelids. He had allowed himself to imagine a life, with Belle and Bae. Bae would smile and laugh with Belle. She would be the mother to him that Milah had never wanted to be. He could not see Cora in that picture. He had watched her mold and abuse her daughter. He would never let her touch Bae.

"No." His eyes flew open and he shoved Cora away. "No."

Cora cocked a haughty brow and her crimson lips twitched. "No?"

He disappeared out of her grasp. He reappeared across the room. "Leave."

Cora's head rose, her jaw clenched tight and square. "Stop being so sullen, Rumple Dear." She tilted her head a little. "You need to get your mind off of it all. I am offering you some rest and recreation, a holiday if you want. That girl was a passing fancy. You need to move on."

A distraction? Never! Belle had not been a passing anything. He loved her.

"She was a silly little spoiled noble girl." Cora sneered, "A sweet little brunette with stars in her eyes. You've always had a type, Rumple. There will be another." She smirked, "I have a spry little vixen in Wonderland. Her name is Jacqueline and she has" Cora winked, "no inhibitions."

He was shaking with fury. "No." He forced the word through his clenched teeth. "I don't want you or your wench. You could never replace Belle."

Cora scowled, "She's just a-"

"She is so much more.'' He spat Cora's own words back at her.

"Brought to your knees by a little girl. You are disappointing. Pathetic. You're not The Dark One. You're a silly old man mourning a servant." She sighed, "It appears I have a type as well."

Maybe it was the sarcasm that dripped from every word. Maybe it was the glacier cold judgment in her eyes. Maybe it was the disparaging comparison to her spineless husband. Maybe it was because her cursed spawn had so gleefully shared the news. Maybe he was just a monster.

The reason didn't matter.

He lashed out. Dark magic tingled down his fingers. It ripped through the air and struck Cora hard across the chest. She flew back into the wall with a sickening crack. She didn't cry out, not a shout or a scream.

She rose up, head held high, regal as the queen she pretended to be. A trickle of blood marred her chin. She smiled and wiped it away with a negligent brush of her fingers.

A large crackling fireball appeared in her palm. The fire stretched out, expertly controlled, and flew at him. It arced through the air like a whip and Cora wielded it well. It cracked and reversed direction. He could feel the blistering heat against his cheek. It singed his hair and scorched his leathers.

He flicked his wrist and a few dozen spears appeared in the air, every one of them pointed at Cora's throat. She didn't look afraid. Quite the opposite, her lips twisted into a demented smile. She was enjoying herself. He let the spears fly, and wondered what pattern her blood spatter would make on the floor.

She raised her hands and the heavy iron weapons unfurled into gold thread. It fell in a pile at her feet, completely harmless. Her smirk was infuriating.

He clenched his fist. The thread slinked, shuddered, slithered. The glowing threads braided together to become a giant viper. It moved with lightning speed and wrapped around Cora three times. He giggled as it pulled itself tight around her. He wondered which was more venomous, the snake or the woman.

He clenched his fist, ready to crush her.

She pursed her lips in an air kiss, one last flirt for the Queen of Hearts before she died screaming.

The room exploded in a cloud of darkness. The oppressive dark blotted out the fire. He could feel feathers and smoke billowing and circling around. Birds. She'd turned into a vicious swarm of ravens. They swarmed around him, pecking and clawing. Their cries mocked him, it echoed and warped, like the ravings of a madman. The sweet metallic scent of blood filled the air. He could taste it, sweet and bitter on his tongue.

"Really, Dear" Cora reformed behind him. "You are losing your touch."

He'd lost nothing. He'd lost everything.

He whipped around and grabbed her with magic. It was not elegant or controlled. Rage. Loss. Pain. Desperation. Magic was emotion and this magic was brute force. It was powerful and strong enough to kill. He slammed her against the stone wall.

Her throat was in his hands. The facsimile of a pulse thundered under his fingers. A curl of hair, still dark and silky, fell over her face. Her eyes flashed with demented delight. It was the closest the great and powerful murderess had come to her own death. Did mortality taste bitter or sweet on her tongue?

Cora was not scared. She tilted her head up and to the side. Why wasn't she scared? This was some sort of cruel curiosity for her. She was not giving up, Cora never surrendered. Hers was an arrogant gesture, an invitation. It was a challenge. Only Cora would be so bold.

Cora was one of a kind, unmatched and unequaled. He could travel to a million realms and never see another like her. She was infuriating. She was intoxicating. She was ruthless, and honored no boundaries, took no quarter. She was an earth-borne she-demon, his own personal tormentor. Pleasure wrapped in pain. A pretty poison. She was the Queen of Hearts. She was his.

He lunged forward and gave in to his darkest desires. Their kiss was violent, a carnal battle of wills. This was not a gentle lover's kiss. It was teeth, tongue and fiendish chemistry. Cora's' hands clawed into his hair, nails nipping at his scalp. Cora pulled him closer. She was heat, want and glorious seduction.

He ripped her bodice open. His hard and dark nails carved red welts across her glorious chest. His hands were rough, reptilian gold and inhumanly strong. He could destroy her. She knew that, and it made her want him even more. He marked her milk-white skin with bruises and welts. She answered him with her nails and teeth.

"Yes" Her voice was rough, honey and whiskey, in his ear. She lowered her head and bit into his shoulder through the cloth of his shirt. When had she taken off his vest? He hissed at the sharp pleasure of her bite. It hardly mattered now. With a snap of his fingers, they were both bare and their night had only begun.

Their coupling was brutal, primal and unrestrained. It was a dark match made in Hell. They didn't make love, it wasn't even sex. It was a twisted mating ritual sealed with bloody bites, sharp claws and animalistic rutting.

They desecrated every room, every flat surface and few not so flat ones too. Only two rooms survived their destruction. The two bedchambers that were always locked and always empty. They collapsed, exhausted and reeking of sex and shame, after countless hours, in his bed.

For the first time since he'd lost Belle, Rumpelstiltskin slept. When he awoke Cora was gone, yet she lingered. He could still smell her and feel her touch on his skin. The memory of the night of debauchery was seared into his mind.

That, and the single blood red rose she'd left on her pillow were the only real proof that it had happened at all.

"You knew."

The firelight cast flickering shadows on Cora's face. The light made her glow, the most angelic of devils. She wasn't any older now than she had been then, but there was something different about her. She was still beauty and brutality given form but seemed softer at the moment. She seemed almost human. Maybe human enough to actually answer his questions without a brawl.

"Knew what, Dear?"

Her voice was warm and relaxed, friendly even. This situation, the familiarity, and intimacy of it could be normal anywhere else. He and Cora could be mistaken as old friends, colleagues. They could be lovers or even an affluent married couple. This was Storybrooke though, and they were The Dark One and The Queen of Hearts.

In an alternate world or distant reality, perhaps things were different. They could be different people leading different lives. They could be married in some Twilight Zone. Not here, not now, not in Storybrooke.

"Belle. My Belle."

Cora looked unimpressed.

"You knew that she was alive all those years ago, you knew that your wretched spawn had her locked away." He drew a breath through his clenched teeth. "Locked away from me."

He could feel the rage boiling in his blood. His harried heartbeat pounded in his jaw and temple. Black magic tingled in his fingers again. It ached to be released, to be used. He wanted to abuse, to destroy to cause pain. He wanted to take, to touch, to ravish.

"I suspected as much. Regina has always been too soft-hearted. That's her father's influence. She has these ridiculous notions of love, mercy, and fair play." She swirled the wine in her glass. "I tried to correct her, but it never stuck. She's so stubborn when she sets her mind to something." Cora took a sip, "Or when someone else sets it for her."

Cora frowned into her glass. "I still can't believe she actually did it. You were able to convince her to do the one thing I was never able to." She stared into the fire, "She betrayed Henry, the ultimate betrayal."

That would upset other women. Not Cora. She was proud of her daughter's darkest deed.

"Regina killed him to cast your curse." She had an inscrutable expression on her face. "And it worked. Your Baelfire is in this realm." She quirked her lips into a small smile. "But you already knew that." Cora ran her manicured nail around the rim of her wine glass. "Do you know exactly where?"

He didn't, but he was not going to tell her that. His silence, though, was all the answer Cora needed. "You don't." She finished her wine with a satisfied little sigh. "I do."

So that was her game. Rumple should have known. Cora always had an agenda. Just like him. They had their own plans and no mercy for anyone who stood in their ways. They were cut from the same bloodstained cloth and that was why they kept coming back together. His deals and strings, her ambitions and schemes, they were eternally tangled together. That idea was both a horror and a comfort.

"What do you want?"

She held out her empty glass. "Right now? More wine and some company." She shrugged a single shoulder. "Business has waited for twenty-eight years, it can wait a little longer. I'm feeling nostalgic tonight." The softness again, around her eyes and in the smallest twitches of her lips. It reminded him of the quiet moments they'd shared. The heartbeats between plotting and passion, between magic and machinations. Things between them hadn't always been terrible. There were good memories and sometimes he was nostalgic too.

He stood and refilled their glasses. She meant the dance and their time after it. The Ball had been lovely and exciting, but he'd preferred the after party. Their mingled scents mixing with straw and gold in a tiny tower. They'd made magic that night, in more ways than one.

"Nostalgia? Isn't that weakness, Dearie?"

She shrugged again, "Perhaps." She tilted her head. "For what it's worth, Regina did you a favor with that girl."

He almost choked on the merlot. Of course, Cora had to ruin his peaceful mood with her sharp tongue. "You're not nostalgic, you're insane. She took Belle from-"

Cora rolled her eyes, "Honestly, think for a moment. Your girl would have been cursed. She wouldn't have been the scullery maid you were infatuated with. As I understand it she would have been a mindless shell stuck in the same sad routine day in and day out. Never learning, growing or changing. You would have been driven to madness or murder in months."

Rumpel sat back down stared into the fire. Cora had a point, damn her. Regina had shielded Belle from the curse. She had been uniquely exempt from its effects. That was why she'd had possessed no memories, real or fake.

A cursed personality would not have been the real Belle. She would have been a faded portrait, stagnant and unmoving. Worse, her personality may have been something different, someone different. A stranger with Belle's sweet face. It would have been torture, and without his magic, he would have been helpless to change anything.

"Regrets are for the weak, Dear, and neither of us has that luxury." Cora shut her dark eyes for a moment as if she was tired or caught up in thought or memory. She almost looked vulnerable.

What, if anything, did Cora regret? Could she regret without a heart? He wasn't sure. The possibilities were endless. She had killed, maimed, conquered and laughed while doing it. He had watched her do all that and more and she had never shown anything resembling remorse or regret. The idea of Cora feeling guilt was ludicrous. He looked at her. The way she stared into the fire. The way her fingers wrapped around the stem of her glass, tight enough to blanch her knuckles. The way she didn't prod and tease, the way she seemed almost sad. Nostalgia? Unspoken regrets? Camaraderie? Did it matter? They were both alone, and now, they were alone together, if only for one night.

He nodded, "Perhaps, just tonight, we allow ourselves weakness. No business, no deals, no fighting. It has been twenty-eight years, after all. Any other old friends" He smirked when he said that. "Would enjoy some wine and catch up with each other."

He raised his glass, "To The Curse."

Cora smiled, it was a true and gentle smile, one he hadn't seen for ages. For a moment he saw that girl, the ambitious and angry miller's daughter who had wormed her way into his heart, again.

"So how are you finding Storybrooke, Dearie? It isn't anything like Wonderland, is it?"

Cora chuckled. "It is both disappointing and impressive, an odd but delightful dichotomy."

He nodded, "Oh it gets even better. Wealth can be built in lost in seconds. Its wagered on things that you can't even see or touch, on pieces of ideas or inventions that aren't even real yet. There are men powerful enough to buy and sell countries the size of kingdoms. They do it often and for entertainment. There is a city in the desert that is nothing but decadence and sin. They will bring you any vice you want on a silver platter, no questions asked. There are machines that fly in the air and dig deep into the ground. There is an invisible network of machines that hold all the knowledge in the world." He chuckled, "People use it to look at pictures of men and women copulating." He smirked at her raised brows. "And small animals doing silly things."

Cora stared at him, taken aback by everything he'd said. She took a long pull of wine, "Well at least the clothing is better."

That was very true.

"And the wine."

He inclined his glass, "You know I own the vineyard that made this. It is in a faraway part of the country, a land called California. I've never been there myself, of course, but trust me, it has a magic all its own."

Cora took another sip, and he could see curiosity written on her face, "Do tell."