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In the end, the Queen’s downfall lies in threatening Henry. At first, it looks like Emma is going to be the only one willing to hear Regina out when she breaks in on their war counsel in her singed dress, her lip bloodied but her head held high even in supplication. Grumpy and a few others call audibly for her expulsion; Snow, James, and most of the rest of those present simply watch her with set jaws and distrustful eyes. Regina ignores them all, focusing her gaze and her attention on Emma and Emma alone. “Whatever you may think of me personally,” Regina says, grinning through her dripping red lips, “you must admit that no one possesses a more thorough knowledge of her strengths—and her weaknesses—than I.”
A moment of silence stretches between them, punctuated only by Grumpy’s grumbling. Everyone’s eyes flick back and forth between Emma on the stage and Regina at the other end of the half-demolished hall like spectators at an unusually tense tennis match. They can all see that Emma is studying the former mayor carefully: maybe mentally measuring Regina, the devil she knows, against the spectre of the Queen—who, despite appearances, has already proven herself different enough to be the devil she doesn’t. But it’s impossible to guess what she’s unearthing.
Then her chin dips: a firm, fast nod. “All right, let’s hear it,” Emma says.
“Ooh, a twist,” says Rumpelstiltskin with a giggle, dark eyes following Regina as she brushes Red and Frederick’s restraining grasp away and sweeps up the aisle toward the stage. Mr. Gold’s hand tightens on his cane; he clearly doesn’t want to give his other self the satisfaction of earning a glare. Belle, between them, feels a pang of empathy: it had been frightening and confusing enough to have the memories of a whole other life come rushing back when the curse broke. She was handling it better than some people, not as well as others—but everyone in town was dealing with it in one way or another. Every surviving, original resident of Storybrooke—save two.
The two who, the rest of them belatedly discovered, had built and cast the curse, and who had subsequently remembered all along. So when the curse’s explosive end had given everyone else in town back their memories, those two it had gifted with a little something extra.
“Magic,” as Rumpelstiltskin had gleefully reminded his stunned alter ego, “always comes with a price.”
But after that, the most basic of truths, things had gotten vastly more complicated. The Queen had taken one look at the mess Regina had made of her supposedly perfect revenge and expressed her displeasure. Vehemently. With fire and lightning and a storm of choking black dust that had taken out the hospital (personally, Belle wasn’t entirely sad to see it go) and a third of downtown. After that, the Queen’s anger had attained a tighter focus (Snow and Emma) and a more “subtle” tenor—culminating in her capture of Henry the night before.
And now, in Regina’s apparent defection.
Belle’s of two minds about the whole thing. And sitting on either side of her, Rumpelstiltskin and Mr. Gold are like the proverbial angel and devil perched on her shoulders. Belle can’t truly see Rumpelstiltskin as an angel any more than she believes him a beast, but from his snickers and whispered commentary, she can tell that he’s currently the more magnanimous of her men. Of course, he barely knows Regina—not like Mr. Gold, who is still and steady-eyed on Belle’s other side. Belle attempts to provide comfort with a warm hand on his thigh, but he shakes her away, his gaze remaining fixedly forward. Belle straightens her shoulders to hide her sigh, then deliberately places her other hand even higher up Rumpelstiltskin’s leather-clad leg. He jumps in his chair, then spends the next five minutes assiduously rearranging himself—equally hopeless. But at least Belle feels Gold’s eyes flicker toward her.
She tries not to look smug. Smug’s not really appropriate right now.
The same cannot be said a few days later. Emma and Regina’s plan goes off with only a few minor hitches…well, more like fifteen to twenty, but who’s counting? The point is, they won. Belle sheathes her sword and wipes a trail of dragon guts off her forehead, trying to stop what feels like a Rumpelstiltskin-worthy laugh from bubbling out of her. Then she stops trying. The street is filled with rubble and the air with smoke, but above it all the sun is shining.
Rumpelstiltskin comes up beside her with something tucked under his arm. Specifically, a gigantic severed snake’s head, the cut end still leaking viscous fluid, the mouth frozen open in a fanged snarl. Belle’s brain performs something like a shrug: this makes about as much sense as anything else. It’s certainly easier for her to deal with than the look Rumpelstiltskin briefly gives her, in the few seconds before he’s realized she’s seen him: a look of such shattered, tremulous longing, the black pits of his eyes filling with emotion they shouldn’t be capable of conveying. He’d looked at her like that when he’d first “arrived” in Storybrooke, when he’d belatedly registered her presence at Mr. Gold’s side. Gold had looked at her like that, too, once upon a time: and her glimpses of that look in the months after her release only added to her confusion in her growing attachment to him—and his firm, consistent rejection of her advances. That had made some sense once the return of her memories put them back on more equal ground, though of course, he still outnumbered her two to one. Nevertheless, Belle couldn’t help feeling that the advantage was, rather unfairly, hers.
You wouldn’t guess it from looking at Rumpelstiltskin’s expression now, though. He looks like he ate the cat, the canary, and the cream. He balances the snake head on his cocked hip and blatantly rakes his eyes up and down her body. Belle turns up her chin and stares back, unblinking. He lets out a laugh that only her well-trained ear would recognize has a sudden hint of nervousness in it. Still, he covers well.
“That’s quite the hero pose you’ve got going there, dearie.”
Belle caresses her sword hilt and doesn’t deny it.
“And what’s your next trick to be?” he asks, head canting to the side.
“What do you mean?”
He circles her like he’s performing the steps to a complicated dance only he understands. “Why, now that you’ve proven your bravery on the battlefield, slayed one beast and enslaved a couple of others...” His fingers curl and uncurl, nails tapping together. “One can’t be faulted for wondering, what are you going to do next?”
“No one’s going to Disney World until they help me clean up this mess,” Emma says, coming up beside them with Gold watchful and silent behind her. The end of his cane is black with blood and matted wolf fur. The sleeve of Emma’s red leather jacket is torn and her gaze keeps returning to the tear with a distracted frown. “And really, if you’re going to finally experience the outside world, that is not the place I’d start.”
“Noted,” Gold says, looking at Belle. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Rumpelstiltskin’s mouth spread into a wider grin.
Then a beat, and he’s on to his next game. He flourishes the snake head at Emma. “Sheriff Swan,” he says, clearly relishing his alliterative opportunities, “a gift for your boy, to commemorate the clear and final triumph of Operation Cobra.”
“Wow, no,” says Emma, eyes widening, though her feet remain firmly rooted. “That’s inappropriate.”
“You’re right,” agrees Belle. “It doesn’t really match Regina’s décor, does it?”
Emma starts to answer, then stops, clearly mulling this over. “I could have it handsomely mounted,” Mr. Gold says into the silence: the coup de grace.
Without looking, Rumpelstiltskin tosses the snake head at Gold’s face, then claps his hands in glee. Gold manages the catch, but fumbles a little with his cane; Belle reaches out a steadying hand. It isn’t accepted; nevertheless, the clapping abruptly ceases.
Belle sees Emma’s eyebrow arch. Then she turns and glances back toward where almost everyone else is gathered—they’ve all been giving Belle and her companions a rather wide berth. “I actually should go make sure Regina’s okay,” Emma admits. Another small, reflective pause: “There’s a sentence I never thought I’d say.”
She starts to turn back toward the crowd, then hesitates, rotating on the heel of her brown leather boot. She gives them a small steady nod: gratitude, acknowledgement. “Keep an eye on him,” she can’t seem to help but add, directing her chin toward Rumpelstiltskin. Belle isn’t sure whether she’s asking Mr. Gold or Belle herself.
Either way, Rumpelstiltskin makes a moue of mock-hurt at them both. He rubs his palms together. “I was planning to go home and have a shower. Which one of you wants to keep an eye on me in the bath?”
Belle hasn’t decided that she’s had enough; she knew quite some time ago. She raises her hand in a clear volunteer effort, waggling her fingers when both men start. “It’s only fair,” she says, widening her eyes and batting her lashes at Gold. “You’ve seen it all before. Although…” She chews on her lip. “I suppose it might be a better idea to compare and contrast?”
“Just what exactly are you suggesting?” Mr. Gold asks, tightly.
Belle shrugs her shoulders, casual, though in truth her heart has begun to pound. “You asked me what I was going to do next,” she tells Rumpelstiltskin. “I propose we keep doing what we’ve done today.” She looks at them both. “Be brave. Be bold.”
This is incredibly ripe, low-hanging fruit, but still, neither of them reaches out to pluck it. Fine, Belle thinks. She turns on her heel. “I guess I get first dibs on that shower.”
After a few strides she can hear them following her home like naughty, naughty schoolchildren.
She waits for them beside the front door. Rumpelstiltskin bounds up the steps to her side, cackling and beaming at her as he watches Gold, by necessity, take them at a much slower pace. Belle offers Rumpelstiltskin a scolding look, to which he is initially unrepentant; everything changes, however, when she grabs a newly arrived Gold by the lapels and lifts her mouth up to meet him.
Everything changes. For a moment he freezes against her, his lips unyielding and still. Then in a rush, he responds, opening to her so sweetly, clutching at her arms. He’s smiling when they break apart. Belle smiles, too—then turns to a limp-jawed Rumpelstiltskin with a shrug. What can you do, her shrug says. They both—they all know that he won’t, can’t, accept her kiss.
For a second he looks stuttery, fluttery; then his dark eyes narrow. He stomps forward, and again Mr. Gold finds himself tugged mouth to mouth. This time he appears to take it much more calmly: it’s a power play, and he’s used to those, good at those. They fit together so very neatly, her men, thinks Belle through a sudden hot fog; they play each other expertly. If only she didn’t know how little they each wished the other well, she wouldn’t want it to end.
But it does end: point Gold, sliding a hand down his other self’s back, grabbing a handful of leather-clad bottom and giving a squeeze. Rumpelstiltskin jumps; Gold pulls back, smirking. “My, aren’t I popular today.”
Rumpelstiltskin returns the grin, all teeth. “I can still taste her on you, dearie.”
Belle is finding this style of showdown rather less enchanting. She pushes open the door and steps over the threshold. “I’m starting to feel left out,” she says, manufacturing a pout. Slow, steady, she starts for the stairs, divesting herself of various dragon-stained clothing items as she goes. She trusts them to follow her. In that, at least, they are equally predictable.
It’s only when she reaches the master bedroom and sees the vast expanse of the bed—neatly pressed comforter, clean white sheets—that the reality of what she is doing begins to catch up with her. She can’t really go through with this. Can she? She thinks about their first kiss—her and both of the men downstairs, back when they were one man and no man at all. It was so innocent: that is the odd, sad thing. Their lips had barely brushed but it was True Love, a powerful, remaking love, that she’d held so briefly before it slipped through her fingers. It’s hard to imagine what could lead them from that sweet, chaste kiss to this…whatever this is she is truly proposing. It worries her that she might be sullying it somehow.
But no. That’s her father talking. That’s Nurse Ingrid scolding. That’s the voice of the Queen, whispering in her ear. The Queen is dead, though. Long live Emma and Henry and Snow and Red and Grumpy and James and Archie and even Regina and everyone else. Long live love.
Belle kicks off her boots and lies back on the bed.
They leave her waiting so long her arms start to ache from propping herself up; the challenging-sexy stare fades from her face and is replaced by an expression that’s half annoyance, half nervous worry. When they finally do appear together in the doorway, though, Belle sees that something has changed between them. An accord has been reached, a deal struck.
Belle slips off the bed and stands before them. “I’ve changed my mind,” she says, not entirely succeeding in hiding her smile. “I think we should have a long discussion about our fee—ooh!”
The sound she emits when Rumpelstiltskin sweeps her into his arms is perhaps not the legendary battle cry of the dragon slayer, but if there’s anyone she can trust to keep her secrets, they’re both here with her in this room. Laughing, she lets Rumpelstiltskin toss her onto the wide expanse of mattress; Gold has climbed up onto the bed and is there to steady her. The line of his mouth is still flat with reserve and doubt; his eyes ask her the same anxious questions they have always asked. Belle frames her answer in the form of another kiss. Yes. Forgiven. Yes. Loved.
A sharp nail scrapes across the skin of her shoulder and down over the ridge of her collarbone; Belle gasps into Gold’s mouth. Rumpelstiltskin’s hands are cool and rough even when they are being gentle. His fingers coax her buttons from their holes. Belle moves her own hands down past Gold’s throat and works a nail into the knot of his tie. (Yes, he wore a tie into battle. No matter his form, Belle thinks with a grin, her love holds strong sartorial convictions.) The fabric slips silkily between her fingers and Belle releases a sigh as she lets it fall at the same time her own blouse slides off her shoulders and pools down around her waist. The slightly chilly Maine air kisses her bare skin. Rumpelstiltskin kisses her too—not her mouth, never her mouth, but her neck, her shoulders, teeth teasing at her bra strap until that, too, falls away.
Belle feels almost as if they are one creature, a many-armed Hindu god or goddess. Their arms circle, hands seeking out new pieces of fabric to push aside, new stretches of skin to unveil and explore. Belle hitches up her hips so that Gold can slide her jeans down her thighs. His shirt is open to the waist, revealing wiry muscles and smooth, pale skin. Belle kneels above him and puts a hand to his heart, feels it racing. The chest behind her is, in contrast, utterly still: cool and scaly and suddenly bare. Belle glances over her shoulder and catches Rumpelstiltskin’s grin. “I got impatient,” he says. He makes another gesture and Gold’s trousers join Rumpelstiltskin’s clothes wherever they were magicked off to. Gold looks annoyed, his cheeks slightly flushed, but Belle can catch the kindness in this particular piece of mischief. His legs freed, Gold leans back against the high headboard, bringing Belle with him. The…advantage, she supposes, is hers again: her plain blue cotton panties the only piece of clothing that remains between them. Gold holds her by the hips, but loosely; he doesn’t stop her when she slowly lowers herself down and kisses the head of his cock with the thin stretch of fabric at the V of her legs. They both shudder, Gold’s jaw clenched almost as if he’s in pain. Their wetness combines, leaving her soaked.
Rumpelstiltskin pinches her nipple. Belle keens, held suspended between them, stretched like taffy. Those long wicked nails play over her skin, teasing her flesh and tweaking her nipples, holding her somewhere between pleasure and pain. Just when she thinks they might be straying too far toward the latter—she’s shaking, her legs can scarcely hold her—Rumpelstiltskin cups her left breast and offers it up to Gold, who sucks her nipple into his mouth, warm and wet and soothing. Nails and teeth and firm, leathery tongue make their way down the ridges of her spine, then over the soft rise of her ass, fabric tearing in their wake. Belle’s nipple slips from Gold’s mouth as Rumpelstiltskin lifts her up. She gasps as his tongue slides between her cheeks. She finds reassurance in Gold’s heavy-lidded gaze, in the squeeze of his hand; then he, too, lowers his head, and she loses herself completely.
Gold’s wide mouth is slick and shiny. She rubs wetness across his cheek, then takes the taste of herself off his tongue. She feels like she’s floating between them, Rumpelstiltskin’s nails trailing lazily down her damp and trembling thighs. But she can feel a staccato of need there, too; not quite impatience—though, she notes with a new curiosity, twisting her head, they are both still hard.
“Oh dear,” says Rumpelstiltskin, exchanging a surprisingly sympathetic look with Gold.
“Comparison shopping,” agrees Gold with a mock-shudder.
“Hush,” says Belle, leaning her head back against Rumpelstiltskin’s shoulder. For a second she almost forgets herself, claims a casual kiss. She wonders if he catches it: his eyes are wide and dark, his skin glistening but free of sweat. She places her own well-sheened palm on his thigh, then moves it up and back, her eyes locked with Gold as she takes Rumpelstiltskin’s cock in her hand. It’s rougher, darker than the one in front of her, but equally engorged. Her breath hitches as she coaxes it toward her opening. Then Rumpelstiltskin’s hands are on her hips, canting her forward. She takes Gold’s mouth in a sloppy, eager kiss as Rumpelstiltskin pushes inside her.
Gold swallows down her moans as Rumpelstiltskin starts to pump. She rocks back against the wonderful fullness, nearly overwhelmed with sensation when Gold twists a hand between her legs and starts to stroke her swollen clit. When she feels she’s about to break apart, Rumpelstiltskin pulls out almost all the way, so that only the head of his cock is still inside her. Then with a grunt he slams home again, the slightly scaled skin of his dick catching every sensitive place inside her, making her nerve endings sing. Belle screams. She falls forward against Gold, who presses soothing kisses to her hair, her jaw, her throat. Rumpelstiltskin’s hands are on her shoulders, steadying her, coaxing her back down. Belatedly, she realizes that he’s pulled free; her back and buttocks are wet and dripping. Before she can mourn the loss, however, she feels the head of Gold’s cock eager to take its place. With a happy sigh she slides down onto him, gentle and easy. She writhes atop him, sensuous and serpentine, Rumpelstiltskin’s cool hands spread across her shoulder blades and Gold’s warm on her belly.
When he comes inside her, she squeezes tight, holds him there until the shudders pass.
They fall to the side, one by one by one, on magically fresh sheets. Gold’s eyes don’t want to let her go, and Belle doesn’t want to look away either—wants to stare until she has everything memorized, knowing as she does how delicate a thing memory can be. She feels guilty, though, with Rumpelstiltskin cold at her back. She rolls, then, so that her back faces nothing but the mattress. She reaches out on both
sides with a pleasantly aching arm, caressing cheeks stubbled and scaled. She falls asleep perfectly placed between them.
***
Belle wakes because she can’t breathe. A cold hand is clamped over her mouth. Belle struggles and Rumpelstiltskin releases her, lifting a long-nailed finger to his lips. Belle swats at him—but quietly.
He lowers himself back down beside her, mouth to her ear. “Sorry, dearie. Can’t have you waking him.”
Belle glances over at Gold, who is miraculously—or magically?—still out, frowning slightly even in his sleep. She turns back to Rumpelstiltskin. “I’m quieter when I can breathe,” she hisses.
Rumpelstiltskin manages to look prideful even when abashed. “I forget myself sometimes.”
He’s staring at her expectantly. Belle flushes. She’s not embarrassed at what they did—farthest from—but it’s suddenly dawning on her that they’ll get to do it again. Again she glances back and forth between them and feels a delicious rush of greed: there are still so many things she wants to do and try—
Slowly, all the odd things about the look Rumpelstiltskin is giving her add up in her brain. He’s holding himself so still, watching her. “Belle,” he says—carefully, finally.
A lump forms in her throat. “What’s wrong?”
He laughs—a small laugh, for him, a nervous titter. “Nothing’s wrong, dearie, nothing at all.”
She swallows hard. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Headshake. “I want to ask you a favor,” he says, as if in exchange for not answering her question.
Her heart’s pounding, but she forces her voice steady. “What will I get in return?”
He smiles, fast and wide and strangely heartbreaking. “I’ll have to owe you one.”
She likes that idea. He would never reneg, and he can’t be planning anything too stupid if it means he’ll be around to pay her back. “What do you want?”
He leans in closer than ever. They are eye to eye, mouth to mouth. “A kiss,” he whispers. “One kiss.”
She pulls back, shocked, but he’s already shaking his head. “Not to worry. That won’t happen now.”
She’s frightened again: unbearably frightened, for all she’s trying to be brave. “Why not?”
He hesitates, wetting his lips, and for a second, Belle thinks he’s going to tell her. Then his eye closes in a wink. “Now, now. Questions later. I believe I was promised my lady’s favor.”
Belle feels like she’s about to cry without fully knowing why, but she wants to give him what he asked for. She forces a smile onto her face, and as it lingers there, it becomes more genuine. She runs a hand over the rough skin of his shoulder and curls it around the back of his neck.
“You really are a beast,” she says.
Their lips touch. Soft and gentle, just like long ago. Belle tries to hold on, to draw him tighter toward her with every movement of her lips and tongue, but eventually, with a final brush of his mouth against the corner of her lips, he draws back, leaving her breathing ragged and her eyes wet with tears.
“No,” he says, his head cocked to the side as if in surprise. “Don’t cry for me, dearie. No one should cry for me.”
But she is. She does. She shakes her head, annoyed at herself, at him. “Then don’t leave.”
“Leave?” he says with another titter. “I would hardly call it leaving, dearie. I’m barely going anywhere. Just…a little bit to the right.”
She follows his gaze to where Gold is stretched out on her right side, his sleeping face clenched in concentration. Then her eyes fly back to Rumpelstiltskin, part of her afraid that he’ll already be gone.
“Hush now,” he says, taking her hand. He looks at their intertwined fingers, then raises them to his lips, pressing a firm kiss to her knuckles. “I’m no expert,” he says, “but I’m pretty sure this is a happy ending.”
She starts to shake her head, but his hand is in her hair, his mouth is moving up to her forehead, and before she can stop him, he says, “Goodnight, Belle,” and then his lips ghost against her brow and she’s gone.
***
When Belle wakes again the bed is empty. Belle lurches upright, her bare shoulder thumping painfully against the headboard. Sunlight is pouring in through the eastern window, soft and warm, but Belle’s whole body feels cold.
Then: footsteps on the stairs. A hand on the door, and then Gold steps into the room, a tea tray in his hands and his cane tucked into the crook of his elbow. Belle feels relief flood her, a smile break over her face. Gold smiles back, then shifts his grip on the tea tray so he’s balancing it on one hand. With the other, he picks up the cane, twirls it, then does a little soft shoe number, there in the doorway, dapper and surefooted as Fred Astaire. Belle lets out a shocked, delighted laugh. He counters with a rich, warm chuckle, tossing the cane aside before climbing silkily up onto the bed. He starts to position the tea tray between them, but Belle shoves it down toward their feet. She grabs him by the collar of his dressing gown and properly says good morning.
“You know,” he says later, taking a sip of rather cold tea, “despite Sheriff Swan’s protestations, I think she could be persuaded that our personal skills would be much better suited toward, say, a fact-finding mission regarding the state of the wider…what?” he asks, noticing that Belle has abruptly encountered some difficulty with her biscuit.
Belle chokes out the rest of her laugh and wipes the crumbs away from her mouth as daintily as possible. “Nothing.”
He looks at her. She smiles back, then reaches out and brushes a strand of curling hair away from his face.
“You’re a very bad man,” she says, then shows him again how much she loves it.