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“We have no other choice. We must call him.”
“You know the price that he will extract, My Lord. No-one ever breaks a deal with him. He will always get them in the end.”
“We have no other choice.”
Her father sounds resigned. The ogres are coming ever closer. Avonlea is the latest place to fall and the Marchlands will be next. Their army is depleted; their resources are running low. They cannot harbour any more refugees in their castle, but every day more people come from the ravaged frontlines, seeking shelter from the marauding ogres. They have been left with nothing, but the Marchlands have little more to offer, and soon they too will perish.
Belle knows who they are talking about, holed up in her father’s chambers, as she listens at the keyhole. When her father had given his chief advisor, Sir Cogsworth, a worried look and beckoned for him to follow him from the war room, she knew that a difficult decision was about to be made. Naturally, she wants to know what it is. They will never tell her in the war room, where she is just a maiden, there for her own protection and to serve no real purpose. They try to hide the extent of the war and the terror from her, but Belle knows better. She lives amongst the people who take shelter in her halls; she tends to the sick and the injured. She knows exactly how dire their circumstances are. So dire that her father can think of no alternative but to call the Dark One.
Cogsworth’s words intrigue her though. No-one ever breaks a deal with him.Has her father had dealings with Rumpelstiltskin before? Has he, of all things, tried to cheat the imp? Belle shudders at the thought. She knows the consequences of a broken deal as well as anyone, and for a moment she wonders if facing the ogres might be better than facing the Dark One’s wrath.
“My Lord, you would really let him take her?”
Belle’s brow furrows. Are they talking about her?
“I must call him, I have no other choice or our people will perish. Perhaps he can be reasoned with.”
“He’s a trickster and a demon, My Lord, neither of which can be reasoned with.”
“I know.” Her father sighs, and Belle knows that he is standing at the window, looking out over the blood red horizon. “Ever since these wars came to our lands I have been wondering. Perhaps this is the penance that we must pay for breaking the deal.”
“It was not your fault, My Lord. Your forefathers made that deal, not you.”
“But I was the one to break it, and our family has never suffered misfortune until this generation. But the look in Collette’s eyes… I couldn’t bear to part them.”
Belle feels slightly sick. It is true that her life has had more than its fair share of heartaches, her mother’s death and this seemingly interminable war chief among them. Are they really the magical consequences of defaulting on an agreement? All magic comes at a price. It’s a foreboding phrase drilled into children’s heads in these parts, to put them off wishing their lives away. If you do not pay the price willingly, then the magic will take it as it sees fit. Belle shivers again at the idea that this war is some kind of karma for past wrongs.
She goes even colder at the idea that this deal somehow involves her.
“You will have to tell her, My Lord,” Cogsworth says.
There is a long silence, and Belle is almost on the verge of entering the chamber and demanding ‘tell me what’, then her father speaks.
“I know. Let me call him first and perhaps a new deal can be struck, without the need for Belle to ever know. After all, she is no longer an infant, perhaps this negates the arrangement.”
“My Lord, he cannot be reasoned with,” the advisor repeats.
“I can only try.” Her father’s voice is sad and fearful in equal measure. “Belle is all I have left. I cannot lose her as well.”
Then Belle hears the fateful words: “Dark One, I summon thee.”
Nothing happens. She isn’t quite sure what she was expecting, but blank silence was not it. A rumble of thunder and a flash of lightning perhaps? Some evil cackle from beyond the depths of hell? A poof of purple smoke and a whiff of sulphur? There is nothing. Inside the chamber, Belle hears her father sigh.
“He must know,” he says, “and this is the price we pay.”
Then, suddenly, another voice, whispered but still high and snickering, hisses in Belle’s ear, and she has to clamp her hand over her mouth to prevent her crying out in alarm.
“Eavesdropping are we, dearie? Tut tut.”
Belle turns to see the Dark One crouching on the ground beside her, leaning in with unnerving grey eyes, and Belle shuffles back on instinct. Rumpelstiltskin gives a nasal giggle and sits back on his haunches, waggling a forefinger at her. “It never does to listen in on private conversations, dearie. You might hear something you didn’t want to.”
It’s too late for that now, Belle thinks dryly. She’s already heard plenty that she did not want to hear. But there is a difference between wanting to hear something and needing to hear it.
“Still, since you’re here, and I’m here, we may as well enter.” He jumps off the floor and offers his hand to help her up with an absurd little bow. Belle thinks that it would be better to comply and takes the offered hand. Rumpelstiltskin raps on the door and Sir Cogsworth comes to open it. His face pales. Further into the room, so does her father’s.
“Belle…” he begins, rushing over.
“I caught a little fly on the wall outside,” Rumpelstiltskin says. “I do hope that whatever you were doing in here wasn’t private.”
“Belle, I…” Her father is wringing his hands but Rumpelstiltskin doesn’t let him finish.
“Yes, yes, you can deal with that later. Now, where’s the child?”
No-one moves. No-one speaks. Belle begins to see the pieces drop into terrifying place. Rumpelstiltskin has come expecting a first-born babe, and Belle has a horrible suspicion that she is that first-born babe.
“Where is the child?” Rumpelstiltskin repeats, and his fluting voice has taken on a harder edge. “I need not remind you, Lord Maurice, that this is the second time I have come to collect and been disappointed. Although, I must say, the timing of this one is truly excellent, with the ogres baying at the door, which does indeed make me wonder. Where is the child?”
For all his showmanship, there is a very dangerous man behind that façade.
“We were hoping to make a different deal,” Belle’s father says.
Rumpelstiltskin shakes his head. “No can do, I’m afraid, dearie. The deal was set in stone by your ancestors two hundred years ago. The first born of every generation in return for assured peace and prosperity. It cannot be changed.”
“Surely a new deal can be struck,” Belle’s father says, and she can hear the panic in his voice as he moves between her and Rumpelstiltskin, trying desperately to shield her from view. “In light of the recent events and changing times.”
“You don’t understand, Lord Maurice. The deal is quite literally set in stone. It cannot under any circumstances be changed.”
He points to the floor beneath the rug that Sir Cogsworth is standing on, and the advisor quickly moves and rolls it up to show one flag of the stone floor etched with writing. From where she stands, Belle can just make it out.
Hereby decreed in return for lasting peace and prosperity in the Marchlands, the first born of every generation of this family to be surrendered without worldly possession to the Dark One within one week of birth.
“So until you get yourself an heir, Lord Maurice, there’s no deal.”
Rumpelstiltskin turns on his heel and makes to leave the room, but as he reaches the door, he turns back.
“I must say though that I am intrigued as to how come this misfortune regarding the ogres has befallen you,” he muses. “The enchantment is renewed with every generation and lasts until the next exchange. It should theoretically still be in place. Unless, of course…” His eyes alight on Belle and she feels the depth of his gaze boring into her. “Unless, of course, a child was missed, and a babe you told me was stillborn did in fact thrive and become a young woman.” He turns his head on one side. “You look to be the right age, dearie.”
Belle turns to her father with dread coursing through her veins.
“Papa, what did you do?”
“You’ve got to understand!” her father pleads with Rumpelstiltskin. “It would have broken my wife’s heart to give her up, I couldn’t do that to her! I couldn’t see her suffer because of a deal my family made centuries ago!”
“Your family were greedy,” Rumpelstiltskin says sharply, “and so desperate to keep their lands and their power that they chose to set a deal in stone, taking it out of their hands and mine and rendering it unable to be changed or voided. I warned them against it, warned them of the wrath of future generations to come, warned them that all magic, even when set in stone and out of my control, has a price. They did not listen. I understand you perfectly, dearie, but I cannot change the deal and I am not the one you should take issue with.” He looks again at Belle and for the first time he looks discomfited himself. “It appears I will require a larger blanket.”
Belle sees for the first time the small soft blanket draped over his forearm, just the right size for a newborn babe. Surrendered without worldly possession. That will include her clothes.
Belle steels herself.
“If I go with you,” she asks Rumpelstiltskin, “and the deal is fulfilled, what will become of me?”
“Well, I can hardly give you to a barren couple who’ve dealt with me for a child,” Rumpelstiltskin says with a snort of almost laughter. “As it happens I am in need of a caretaker, for my rather large estate.”
Belle nods her understanding. “And if I go with you, can you guarantee our safety here? Can you guarantee that my family and friends will live?”
Rumpelstiltskin gives a slow nod.
“You have my word of it,” he says.
“Then you have mine. The deal will be fulfilled.”
“No, Belle, you can’t!” he father exclaims. “I cannot let you go with this… beast! I couldn’t let you go when you were a babe, do you think I can now?”
“Papa, this is my decision,” Belle says. “No-one decides my fate but me.”
“Belle please.” Her father’s voice is choked. Belle goes over to him, takes his hands in hers.
“I don’t blame you, Papa,” she says. “I know this was not your deal, and you only did what you had to for Mama’s sake. But this is the only way. I’ll always love you.”
“I love you too, Bluebell.” Her father’s arms crush her in a bear hug, and Belle tries to absorb as much of him as she can, knowing that this is the last time she will ever embrace him.
“As loathe as I am to interrupt,” Rumpelstiltskin’s voice says, “time is running on and the ogres are approaching.”
Belle knows that it is time to go.
“Could you fetch Mrs Potts please, Sir Cogsworth? I will need help with my lacing.”
“Surely that can be waived?” her father says in alarm as his advisor leaves the room in search of Belle’s maid.
“It’s set in stone,” Belle and Rumpelstiltskin intone together.
Her father sighs as Mrs Potts enters and startles on seeing Rumpelstiltskin there, but, ever the practical and forthright person, she shakes off her fear and sets her expression.
“Then I will say my goodbyes now and spare your blushes.” He kisses her forehead in farewell. “Goodbye, Bluebell.”
“Goodbye, Papa.”
He leaves the room with a final fond look over his shoulder, and Belle gives him an encouraging smile that she wishes she felt herself.
Left alone with the two ladies, Rumpelstiltskin’s manner is suddenly akin to that of a cornered cat.
“I, erm, right. Larger blanket.”
He turns his back on Belle to give her some privacy and fiddles with the fabric in his arms.
Mrs Potts does not say anything as she unlaces Belle’s dress and helps her with the corset fastenings and other underthings beneath, but once she is undressed completely, the older woman gives Belle a worried look.
“You don’t have to do this, Lady Belle,” she says.
“The deal is struck, and set in stone, Mrs Potts,” Belle replies. “It is too late to turn back now.”
It’s time. Belle keeps her chin up and her stride purposeful as she crosses the room to Rumpelstiltskin. She will not be afraid and she will not be embarrassed by her bareness. If this is the deal he made those many years ago then this is the deal he will have.
She taps his leather-clad shoulder firmly and he whirls round to face her, his eyes darting from top to toe and very quickly back again, then down at her chest and very quickly back to her eyes, then focussing on a point somewhere behind her left ear.
“Your necklace, dearie,” he says, slightly distractedly. “It’ll have to go too.”
Belle’s hand comes up to her throat and the locket that sits there. She has never taken it off and it is so much a part of her, like a second skin, that she has forgotten its presence. She shakes her head, for the first time afraid and ready to barter with the Dark One.
“Please, it was my mother’s, it’s all I have left of her.”
“It’s set in stone, dearie,” Rumpelstiltskin says, still not looking at her.
She said to herself that she would not cry, but Belle feels the sting of tears behind her eyes as she unclips the pendant and passes it to Mrs Potts.
“I’m ready,” she says.
Rumpelstiltskin sweeps the blanket round her shoulders and it covers her from neck to ankle, and he finally looks back at her, placing an arm around her and indicating the door with a grandiose gesture. “Shall we?”
X
Belle’s been at the Dark Castle for about two months when she sees it
Life at the Dark Castle has been… interesting, for want of a better word. Certainly, she is expected to clean and cook and do the laundry, but all in all Rumpelstiltskin is not a bad master. His first act on her arrival in his home was to furnish her with clothing and a room of her own. He had passed it off with a wave of his hand, saying that a blanket was hardly suitable wear for dusting in and a maid with nowhere to sleep was of no use to him whatsoever, but every so often she will find a new dress in her closet, and she thinks that her workload is mysteriously getting lighter.
She’s not quite sure of the occasion, but there is a small box with a ribbon round it on her bedside table. Belle has learned not to touch things that might be dangerous in this castle so steeped with magic, but this is in her room, in her domain, and she doubts that Rumpelstiltskin would put something in her path like this to spite her, so she opens the box.
Her mother’s necklace is inside.
Belle smiles and fastens it around her neck before returning to the main hall. Rumpelstiltskin is spinning there.
“Thank you,” she says, and because she is feeling particularly bold with her mother’s courage returned to her, she kisses his cheek. The action seems to shock him into stillness for a moment.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he manages to say eventually, although the words come out as more of a squeak.
“You got Mama’s necklace back for me,” Belle says, touching the drop.
“I did nothing of the sort,” Rumpelstiltskin says quickly. “Don’t you have dusting to do?”
Belle leaves him to his spinning with a wry smile and returns to her duties. Perhaps this deal is not so bad after all.