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Rumplestiltskin glared at the watch, clicked his tongue, and shoved it back in his pocket. “Quit wasting my time, Dearie. They’re just flowers.”
Belle laughed, a short, sharp sound. “Actually they’re Queen’s Cups, and they will look wonderful next to the daisies I picked while I was waiting for you back in town. I’d say that makes us equal.” She grinned at him as she stood, her face flushed and her eyes bright. Bouquet in one hand, she offered him the other, and he saw himself accepting it to help her back onto the path.
They continued deeper into the forest.
“Besides,” she added, “what kind of tavern doesn’t allow women?”
“Be glad you got to stay outside; it smelled worse than a Golgothan brothel.”
Belle laughed again, and Rumple looked at her sideways.
“I’ll be grateful, then. It shouldn’t be hard; I’m already grateful to you for bringing me out on this trip.”
He scoffed. “Thank me once we’re done. Assuming you don’t bungle the simple task I’ve given you… or die.”
“Simple!” The laugh again. “Right, I’ll just rob a sleeping Wyvern of no less than six scales from his monstrous, clawed feet, bring them back to you, and then drop to my knees in thanks for the opportunity.”
Rumplestiltskin smiled, and Belle beamed to have elicited it.
True to form, she spoke again. “Besides, you asked me to come.”
“Did not!”
“Practically begged for my help.”
“Oh pish! You were dying to get out of the castle!”
“You needed me for this.”
“No, I needed a maiden.”
“And how many would come with you willingly?”
He scoffed, as if to imply that any number of virginal girls would go traipsing through the woods with the Dark One on a whim.
“…Without being paid?”
Rumplestiltskin lost his smirk. “…Fine. You were… convenient. And you’re clever enough that I probably won’t have to scrape your charred bones off the cave wall.”
“Thank you,” she said, her lips curling into the small smile that indicated a deep, abiding pleasure, as she pulled his crimson cloak more tightly around her shoulders.
“It wasn’t a compliment,” he snapped.
She acted chided for a moment, letting him indulge in the silence of the deep wood. And then he heard it.
“…. ‘Course not.”
“You’re insufferable!” he shouted, his hands flailing in desperate theatricality. “If I’d known what a smug little thing you were, I’d never have agreed to bring you along!”
Belle opened her mouth to fight back, but then her eyes focused on something on the ground behind him, and she was off. “Oh Rumple, look! A baby bird.” She bent to pick up a smoke-colored ball of feathers, holding it in her hands like a diamond.
He checked his watch again, the sky darkening rapidly. “Belle, we need to go. The scales have to be plucked by sundown or you’ll wake the beast and ruin the spell besides.”
“Who’s this one for, anyway? Some noble princess with a dark secret?”
“…Something like that.”
“What does it do?” she asked, watching him with those saucer-eyes, thumbs stroking over the little bird in her hand.
“It will transform the user into the animal of their choosing. In this case, a wyvern.”
Belle’s eyebrow rose in the way they did before every impertinent question. “But why would someone want to be a wyvern? For power, I suppose. Or money.”
“Usually,” he said as his voice began to lilt. “But in this case, I believe it’s for your favorite charity case: love.”
He watched the confusion dawning and smiled churlishly.
“Love? But I don’t… How does growing wings and a tail help someone in love?”
“Perhaps I misspoke.” He leaned closer to her, until he could nearly feel the beating of the bird’s heart, and Belle’s too for good measure. He put every ounce of flair and malice into his rotting grin before speaking, letting the words drip from his fangs. “It’s a sex thing, Dearie.”
He watched the color rise in her cheeks. “Oh,” she said, with crisp understanding. “Oh,” with a bite of the lip, and “Oh!” with a lift in her posture. “That’s nice, isn’t it? Someone unwilling to give up on love, even if it means transforming into a wyvern and paying the price of magic.” She smiled at him, and Rumple wasn’t sure if he wanted to shake her or kiss her.
“…C-come on. We’ve wasted too much time already. The cave is close.”
She turned, lifting the bird into its nest above her head. “Farewell, my friend. Tomorrow will be kinder.”
Confronted with a stirring in his chest, Rumplestiltskin turned away and continued down the path. She caught up after a moment, her silly flowers tucked in the lining of his cloak, still swishing about her slight frame.
After a few minutes of thoughtful silence, they reached the rocky outcropping which hid the wyvern’s cave.
“Best not waste time. Off you go, Dearie.”
“Here,” Belle said, “I don’t want these to catch fire. They’ll look lovely in the tower window.”
Again Rumple’s hand operated without his consent, taking the bouquet. He stopped her as her fingers brushed the clasp over her chest.
“Leave it.”
“Why? It might get singed.”
Where another man might have shifted his weight, Rumple stood perfectly still. “There’s magic in the lining. It might… It might come in handy.”
Belle grinned. “You mean it might protect me.”
“Go. We’re running out of time.”
Her smile filled him with warmth, which made her exit all the more worrisome. Once she was around the corner, he was no longer in control.
For an eternity… nothing. And then suddenly too much: a scream, the stench of smoke, the roar of flames, and a thud like the collision of body and stone.
With a wave of his hand he was in the cave; with a flick of the wrist he was facing a sleeping wyvern. On the ground was his Belle. Clever, quick Belle! She had managed to block most of the damage with her borrowed cloak, but he could see that her clothes were smoldering, and her skin… Oh Gods.
The purple smoke enveloped them and they appeared in his tower, Belle hanging limp in the circle of his right arm. With his left he cleared the table, and it wasn’t until he heard the shattering of glass that he realized he could have simply used magic. He lifted her slender frame onto the wood. Were it not for the soft whimpers and the lolling of her head, she could have been a corpse.
“I’m sorry for this,” he said, his distinctive purple smoke stripping her down to her chemise. Even that was not enough; the pervasive magic of wyvern fire was still burrowing over her breast. Only by ripping the cloth could he stop it, and only then could he manage to think. He moved about the tower like a whirlwind, mixing together things old and new, rare and common, and once the salve was complete, he slathered it over his palm.
“Again, so sorry, dearest.” He started with her face, rubbing the salve into the puckered skin. It was hot to the touch and so very, very red. His hand followed the burn down her neck and shoulder before he had to reapply. Then the tender skin of her breast, her side, her arm.
Within moments she was waking. She coughed. “…Did… Did I get them?”
Rumple’s eyes seared across her face. “You must be joking. Forget the scales! Belle, that beast nearly gored you!”
“Trust me, I know.” She winced, and grinned – her humor was apparently unharmed.
“The salve will take care of the burns,” he said, fingers brushing the hair from her face. “…Tomorrow will be kinder,” he added, lips twitching.
She blushed, struggling to sit up. His arm shot around her, but he was still surprised when she pressed her face to his leather-covered shoulder, turning and raising her arms to wrap around his neck. “Thank you for saving me,” she whispered.
His hands fluttered, but after a moment they settled on her sides. He sighed, his breath stirring her hair. “Sweetheart, you don’t need saving.”
Belle lifted her face. Her eyes zeroed in on his mouth, and her arms tightened to draw him incrementally closer. Fear and passion gripped his heart in equal measure as her lips grew nearer and nearer to his own.
At the last minute she changed course, planting a lingering kiss on his cheek.
When she pulled back, he tried to school his features into a mask. If he didn’t know any better, he’d say she was doing the same.
“I’m… I’m very tired.”
“I imagine.”
“Could you send me to me room?”
“Of course.”
He started the movement, but her hand on his wrist made him pause.
“Thank you. Again.”
“….You’re welcome.”
She drew her hand back and he sent her off in a purple haze, refusing to allow any anguish into his heart.