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notalwayslate · 14 days ago

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The Shackles of Free Will

Hello @beeeinyourbonnet it is I your Secret Santa!

Prompt: Warm (or cozy drinks)

Title: The Shackles of Free Will

Summary: One is shackled to an arranged marriage, the other to a cursed dagger. Can these star-crossed lovers find a path to their happily ever after.

AO3 link: The Shackles of Free Will - notalwayslate - Once Upon a Time (TV) [Archive of Our Own]

There was something about the first snowfall that made him strangely sentimental. With his duties done for the day, he found himself strolling the unfamiliar snowy grounds of Avonlea. Memories long ago but not forgotten took root within his heart. Closing his eyes, he recalled the sound of Baelfire’s laughter with his tiny cheeks tinted red with winter air.

So lost in the past, the Dark One gasped as a cold and sudden impact hit the back of his head. He spun quick his magic pulsing ready to obliterate the threat but paused when his eyes landed upon the solitary figure of a young woman bent over forming another ball of snow in her gloved hands.

“Lefou, I told you what would happen if you came spying…” the words died on her lips as she stood. Her blue eyes went as big as saucers as they landed upon his cold stare. Her pert pink lips tugged down at the corners in a mortified frown, as the newly formed snowball fell from her hand.

“You’re not Lefou.”

“Indeed, I am not,” his voice was as clear and brisk as the air around them. He waited for her to either flee or grovel, but instead a giggle erupted from her.

“I’m sorry,” she held her hand to her mouth trying and failing to suppress her laughter. “The one thing my father was most insistent upon was to stay clear from the Dark One, and here I am declaring a snow war on him.”

He stared at the beauty in the green cloak before him. He had seen her once before, the day he and the duke arrived at the request of Sir Maurice two days prior.

“Please,” she spoke slowly taking a few steps towards him. “Let me make it up to you.” His feet stayed rooted, even as he had the sudden urge to flee as she moved closer. “How about a warm drink?”

He looked down as an ancient feeling of shyness overtook him. Lifting his gaze, he recognized a warm determination in her eyes, and it somehow excited him. Carefully as though she was afraid to scare him off, she reached up, brushing the remnants of the snow from his hair.

“This way,” she whispered and all too soon she was walking away from him. After a few steps, she turned back towards him, a glitter of hope in her eyes. “Aren’t you coming?”

He nodded dumbly knowing that if she kept looking at him like that, he would follow her to the underworld if she asked.

She leads him to a poorly constructed hovel on the outskirts of the grounds. He assumes it was once an outpost for patrolling guards but is utterly perplexed as to why she is taking him there. His confusion unravels as she opens the wooden door to reveal the warmth of a tiny fireplace, and an overstuffed reading chair. Gesturing for him to take a seat, she silently makes her way to the fire where a small kettle dangles above it.

For two hundred years, he has existed in this world with humans, he the infamous Dark One. He was feared, despised, and although he had been foolish enough to allow his dagger to fall into the hands of the Duke of the Front lands, he was still a deadly force to be reckoned with. And yet here he sat, his stomach full of nerves as she approached him with a cup.

He sniffed the tea his magic deeming it safe for consumption. Taking a small sip, he let the slightly sweet liquid swirl in his mouth before swallowing. He watched as she took a seat on the footstool near him, taking a drink from her own cup. Enthralled by the shape of her lips, he foolishly wondered what the pressure of them would feel like on his skin.

Trying to regain self-control he forced his eyes away from her and to a book lying on the floor next to the chair.

“Have you read it?” she asks, placing her cup down and lifting the book to her chest. “It’s one of my favorites.”

“Oh yes, I knew the author,” he said nonchalantly as her brows furrowed in confusion.

“Her Handsome Hero is over a hundred years old.”

He quirked an eyebrow at her, as she leaned in closer. “How old are you?” she asked before quickly sitting back realizing her blunder of social grace. “I’m sorry,” she spoke softly looking down at her skirt.

“Father says I have too curious of a mind.”

“Better a curious mind, than a closed one,” he countered trying to ease her worried eyes. When she smiled, he felt an undying desire to see that smile for the rest of his days.

Whether it was the warmth of their meager surroundings, or the company of another radiating such light and innocence, he smiled in remembrance of the life he led before the curse.

All too soon the sun gave way to the stars, and he felt a sudden concern for her safety, suggesting it was time for her to return to the castle. He tried to ignore the disappointment in her eyes, as she stood, escorting him out of her secret hideaway.

She spoke her voice etched in hope.

“I’m here almost every day, if you ever get lonely.” X

Lady Belle, daughter of Lord Maurice of Avonlea had grown up without a mother. Being the first and only child of her father, carried a heavy burden. She was well aware growing up if she had been a son, she would have been revered and accepted inexplicably, but since she was just a lowly daughter, she did not give much meaning in the daily life of her father, or the kingdom of Avonlea.

It was her duty as his obedient daughter to keep herself pure and prepare to be a good wife and mother one day. Her father voiced his disapproval of her constant reading, fearing she may scare off suitors with being too smart.

Although she pretended to be servile, on the inside she was bursting with a love for knowledge and ideas of a life where she decided her own fate. She loved the outdoors, as the freshness in the air always made her feel more alive. It was during one spring day, that she had stumbled upon the old guards’ post, and bribed the stable boy with treats from the kitchen to drag her favorite reading chair out to the abandoned hideout.

When she wasn’t occupied with her mundane duties, she found solace outside the palace lost in the adventures of a good book.

Her father had thought she was old enough on her last birthday for marriage. Belle wasn’t naïve enough to think that she may one day be given to a man whose ideals on women rivaled her fathers, but she still felt an immense disappointment with the choice, of Gaston Legume, a great hunter, known by the kingdom for his prowess in battle, as well as a salacious appetite for booze and women.

Belle wanted to feel something for her betrothed, but his arrogance and cruelty eclipsed all hope. It didn’t help that he often sent his lackey, Lefou, to spy and report back to him of any perceived misdoings of his future wife.

None the less her father, thought him worthy of her hand. It was a blessing and a curse when the first ogre attack on an allied kingdom halted all wedding plans, as every abled bodied man went to battle.

As the ogre attacks became more frequent and nearer to Avonlea, Belle could sense the fear growing in her father. She sat silently by his side, listening intently, as the strategists spoke of Avolnea’s impending doom.

A week later as news of sickness and starvation on the battlefields reached her father’s ears, she learned of his decision to call upon the Duke of the Front lands for help. It was not the Duke who would stop this war, but the powerful weapon that he wielded, The Dark One.

Silence echoed the great hall, as the Duke, and the cloaked dark figure arrived a few days later. Although she was excluded from attending the meeting, she heard through the whispers of the castle that a deal had been struck between the Duke and her father, the safety of the kingdoms in exchange for money and political power.

She was forced to keep to her own quarters, her father forbidding her from any contact with the Duke and Dark One. She felt like a prisoner in her own home, and after a full week of eating her meals in her room, she needed fresh air, and the first snowfall was too enticing to resist.

It was not her intent to disobey her father when she accidentally pelted the Dark One with a snowball. And it was not demure, she knew, to lay in bed that night, thinking of him as she sought her own pleasure.

The next morning, she quickly ate her breakfast alone, before sneaking off to her hidden oasis with a glimmer of hope that she would see him again. She tried distracting herself but for once in her life her books failed to capture her thoughts away from him. Her breath hitched when she heard the pacing of footsteps outside the door.

The footsteps stopped for a brief moment soon followed by a muttering, and then resumed once again. She took a deep breath, smoothing down the front of her dress, before starting her own pacing in the tiny room. It was entirely improper she knew for a promised woman to meet with another man alone, and if anyone found out it would incite a scandal above her wildest imagination, but she had never felt such a raw intense connection than she did towards him.

She shifted the cooling teapot, taking down two teacups and placing them on the small table, before sitting down on her cushioned chair that faced the door. Closing her eyes, she tried to calm her hummingbird heart, when the sudden knock on the door startled her.

With a rising flush and knots in her stomach, she opened the door, to find him humbly fidgeting before her.

Out of pure habitual instinct, she bobbed a small curtsy. She waited for him to speak, but it appeared that nerves had silenced his tongue. She suddenly knew that if she wanted this, truly wanted this, she would need to take the lead.

“Would you like a warm drink?” she asked with an assuring smile that his presence was most welcome.

He nodded seriously as if the invitation was of the utmost importance.

“I would like that very much.”

As he stepped over the threshold, Belle felt a sense of calm finality slide over her. A choice had been made at that moment, and she knew that her heart and life would never be the same. X

The Dark One was in love. He had lost his heart and soul to her the moment their eyes met those two months ago on the day of the first snowfall. She had given him hope, where previously he just felt despair, love where there was only emptiness, laughter where there had been sadness, and the promise of a future, where there had only been memories of a sad and lonely past.

They shared the duality of a life with no free will. Hers, by an arranged marriage, and his by a cursed dagger. Although she could speak freely of her own confinement, he had no such luxury. With such an inquisitive mind, it did not take her long to realize that all of her questions regarding the Duke’s power over him, could not be answered.

The Duke, much to his credit, had learned from the mistakes of previous predecessors. Once in possession, he commanded the Dark One to never speak of the dagger to another living soul and forbade the Dark One to hurt him in anyway.

But even with a word muttered, his brilliant, beautiful beauty, figured the Duke held something over him, when one too many times, he would unwillingly vanish in mid conversation with her, only to appear beside the Duke.

Although his time with her was precious, he still had to dedicate much of his magic and energy to ending the ogre wars. Although the Duke promised Lord Maurice to end them, the enemy never cooperates with defeat. The Dark One had supplied magic and weapons, but it was still up to the soldiers to take the fundamentals and win the war. Fortunately, it appeared that the majority of ogres had now been slaughtered, and the stragglers were retreating. As a celebration Lord Maurice announced a banquet in the honor of the Duke, the savior of the lands.

Rumpelstiltskin hated parties, or banquets, or whatever the rich called them these days. He hated them with passion. His antisocial tendencies were all in full display, as he stood alone against the backwall, a scowl upon his face. The attendees gave him a wide berth, with not a one daring to make eye contact with him…well except for one. Outwardly he seemed perfectly calm, bored even, but inwardly his desire was aflame.

As hard as he tried his treacherous eyes stared at his beauty in her green velvet dress that clung to every curve of her body. Gods, he wanted her. So entranced by her figure, he had failed to notice Lord Maurice and the Duke rising to make a toast.

He only half listened as the men fed their own egos about winning a war, that neither had fought, but when he heard Belle’s name mentioned, his back straightened at attention.

“There is no greater honor for me to announce the engagement of Lady Belle and the Duke of the Front lands.”

His eyes darted to Belle, her face white with shock as the cup she held fell from her fingers. He stood motionless, his anger beckoning him to strike the Duke down with the darkest of his magic, but the cursed submission placed on him kept him in place. X It was he who was awaiting her arrival the next morning at their hideout. His stomach lurched when he saw her approach, her eyes dried but rimmed in a swollen red. Without hesitation he lunged forward, twining the fingers of his hand around her waist as she tightly wrapped her arms around his neck, burying her head in his shoulder.

She drew in a shaky breath. “I can’t believe this is happening. He’s annulled the engagement to Gaston and has set my wedding to the Duke for three days’ time” He could feel her head shaking against his collarbone. “I have to leave tonight; I can’t go through with this.”

“You can’t go anywhere.”

The moment the order left his lips, she tore away from him, pinning him with a sharp blue gaze. He should have known, should have suspected that this beautiful brave creature before him would fight for her own fate. In spite of her hope, the Duke was just too strong with the dagger in his possession.

Her best laid plans would go awry the moment the Duke learned of her absence. He would be ordered to hunt her down or worse kill her. She couldn’t leave, and it was all his damn fault. Rumple choked on that thought, as an onset of tears blurred his vision. He had never cried before another.

“If you leave, he will make me hurt you,” Rumple choked out between sobs.

She brushed her thumb against the soft skin under his eyes, wiping away his tears. Biting her lip, she looked away for a moment, but only a moment, before her pleading teary eyes looked into his own.

“If I have to marry him, then let my first time be with someone I love.”

His heart stopped at her words. She loved him, and he loved her, Gods did he love her. Before he could think better of it, his hands traced down her ribs, settling on the curves of her waist. Slowly he moved, their bodies swaying to the music of his beating heart. He brought his lips to hers, plucking kisses from her mouth, as his fingers plucked at the ribbon tied on the back of her dress. Slowly carefully he turned her around as he unlaced the ribbon, peppering every new exposed inch of her bare back until the dress fell to the floor.

She reached her hand behind her and touched his green glittery skin, running her fingers down his side, across his hip to the top of his thigh. He shivered as her fingers brushed perilously close to his erection. She pressed herself backwards into him, and he was rocked hard against her. He buried his face into the side of her neck, kissing her, while caressing her breast gently with his hand. She let out a moan, and he wanted nothing more in life than to be buried inside of her. He started to edge his other hand down her waist, when his body went rigid. He was being summoned.

“I love…” he cried out before vanishing. X

Rumpelstiltskin was a coward. A heartbroken, weak foolish coward. Any other man would fight for the woman they loved, and here he was, standing in the shadows of her engagement party. They had not spoken since he had been summoned away earlier that morning, when he had her half naked in his arms. That moment between them was easily the most precious moment of his life, but to see her now was like a poison to his veins. How was he to live with her so near to him, but yet so far away?

Every look Belle cast his way during the dinner told him that her heart truly belonged to him, but he could never have it as long as the Duke was alive. Fate held them both prisoners to a man whose cruelty was far worse than his own.

Murmurs turned into shouting, and then screams. The Dark One turned his attention to a tall war-torn man in armor barging past the guards.

“It’s Gaston,” the dark one heard a nearby patron exclaim. So, this was the man Belle had been previously betrothed too.

Gaston hastily shoved his way forward, brandishing a sword.

“This is an outrage. Lady Belle belongs to me. How dare you do this to me why I have been fighting your war!”

The dagger summoned and, in a flash, he stood before Gaston, his hand wrapped tightly around his neck as the unfortunate fool dangled three feet above the ground. With one swift motion his head dangled like a snapped bud of rose, as screams of terror echoed through the hall. Rumple could taste the fear in the air as the darkness relished in it. Throwing the limp body to the ground, he willed his eyes to glance at Belle, whose stare was fixed not upon him, but on the Duke who smiled like a Cheshire cat.

“Does anyone else have any objections?” the Duke taunted, as the Dark One spun in a circle his glowing yellow irises scanning the silent crowd.

“Good,” the Duke quipped before lifting the turkey leg and continuing his dinner.

Rumpelstiltskin accompanied the Duke back to his bedchambers, ensuring his safe arrival. The Duke, in a tipsy state, was rattling on about some blonde server that he wanted sent to his bed chambers, when a knock came on the door.

“Answer it,” the Duke commanded, and Rumpelstiltskin breath hitched as a scantily clad Belle stood before him. He shook his head in disbelief, believing that he was dreaming, but as he reached out his trembling hand and placed it on her shoulder, he realized she was very real.

“What are you doing?” he asked merely above a whisper, but her eyes stayed locked on the ground.

“What I must,” she replied pushing past him and into the Duke’s room.

Rumpelstiltskin was enraged and jealous. Clearly her father had sent her here in this state of dress as a peace offering for the dinner’s unexpected visitor. His body shook with rage, as the Duke ordered him away.

The darkness fell as a hush upon him, as he transported himself to the grounds below the Duke’s tower. He took a breath, and then another, but the pain in his heart did not diminish. Flickers of light beckoned from the tower window above, as the thoughts of her being in the arms of the Duke suffocated his soul.

He hated the Duke, almost as much as he hated himself. Every muscle in his small frame burned urging him to burst in the chambers, and end the Duke once and for all, but the damned curse kept him at bay.

He remembered holding her in his arms, her flesh flushed and warm, and the taste of her mouth. He should have been her first…her only.

He had started to weep, when a sudden flash of release shot through his spine. In an instant he found himself back in the Duke’s bedchamber, as a bloodied Belle stood before him, with a familiar jagged dagger in her hand. X

She had seen it. While the crowd fixated on her betrothed in the claws of the Dark One, she had seen the silvery shine of a blade peaking out of the Duke’s cloak, as he laid his right hand over it. For months she had scoured every book, every story trying to decipher what caged Rumple, and now she knew.

The rest of the dinner was held in silence, but after that it was only a short sprint to her room, as she shut the door firmly behind her. Shedding her golden dress, she made a bee line to her closet, picking out the appropriate attire for a seduction, her summer nightgown cut low enough to show an immodest amount of cleavage. As night fell, she requested the mulled wine from the kitchen, the staff giving her looks of pity, no doubt believing she would be drowning her grief with the sweet connection.

She stopped before the ornate gold mirror that hung on the wall across from the Duke’s quarters. As she peered at the mirror, her throat tensed as she took a nervous swallow. This was not a fight she could afford to lose. Mustering all of her bravery, she held the jug in one hand, and knocked with the other.

When the door swung open, she had not expected to see Rumple before her, a surprised confusion laced in his eyes. The familiar voice of the Duke bounced off the walls behind him, as she made her way into the room.

She could feel the intensity of his stare, as the Duke roamed his eyes over her. No matter how sternly her heart wanted Rumple near, she knew he had to be far away from her, from them, for her to have any chance of success. Her worry that the Duke would so willingly fall prey to her feminine wilds was quickly extinguished as he wrapped both of his filthy hands around her waist, as she placed the jug of wine down on the table. She tried to ignore the rage in Rumple’s eyes as the Duke commanded him to leave.

“Now, Now, sire,” she playfully chided as his lips fell heavy onto the back of her neck. Turning, she placed a hand on his chest. “My lord, I’m afraid that I still must remain pure for our wedding night, but..” she cast her eyes down towards his groin. “There are other ways I can bring you pleasure tonight.”

Her skin crawled as his foul breath invaded her air. “Go make yourself comfortable on the bed my lord,” she commanded with a sultry tone. Her eyes stayed locked on the reflection of the balcony doors, as she watched him tuck an object under the mattress before taking his place on the bed.

She poured the wine, and sauntered towards the bed, cup in hand. She was only a few steps away, when his hand snatched out, tightly grasping her wrist, spilling the wine, and forcing her on the floor before him. He glared down with her with dark eyes and Gods did she hate him.

He laid back on the bed, as the room filled with the soft clang of his belt buckle being undone.

Unconsciously her fingers tightened in loose fists, as she took a calming breath. She had read the stories since a child, of the handsome knight swooping in to save the damsel in distress, but this, this was the real world. She had to be her own hero for herself and for Rumple. Darkness and light, good and evil were not as clear in these moments. He needed her, and for him she would fight and face their unknown destiny.

What she had learned over the last few months in falling in love with Rumple was that darkness was not all that bad. Darkness was everywhere, in everybody, and it needed only to be feared when it grew so strong that it obscured the light. She relaxed her hands, slipping one under the mattress until it felt the cool steel blade. The darkness within her would bring about salvation, while the Duke’s only brought destruction.

She prayed there was enough light in her heart, to make this dark action alright, as she quickly pulled the blade out from its hiding place. The Duke thrusted upright, his body lunging forward, as the cold steel of the dagger sliced through the flesh of his throat.

Warm splatches of liquid spurted on her face and in her hair, as his last breaths gurgled bloodily from his mouth. Stumbling to her feet, she had only a second alone with her thought, when she heard her name from afar.

Turning she laid her eyes upon her love, holding his captor in her bloody hands. Closing her eyes, she extended the dagger before him, feeling the dark tendrils uncurl from her heart.

“From this moment forward, you chose your own fate Rumpelstiltskin.”

He rushed towards her, but instead of his hand reaching for the dagger she was willingly offering, he bent his head and kissed her hard on the lips. He tugged at the shoulders of her nightgown, as she wriggled obliquely out of it, before he tossed it across the room, as their blood-stained bodies tumbled to the floor. Everything happened all at once, as his words of love, and kisses, and thrusts that made her cry out in pain and pleasure filled the room, all the while the Duke’s dead body lay in the bed above them. X

One year later

Rumpelstiltskin’s love for Belle was deep, intense, and unshakable. On that fateful night one year ago, after she was unashamedly his, and he unashamedly hers, he had proudly displayed the dead Duke’s body on the dining table of the great hall, letting the town assume that it was he that murdered him.

Belle’s father, clearly seeing that the Dark One was now in control, readily agreed that in exchange for the continued safety of Avonlea, the fearsome Dark One could have his daughter for whatever purposes he saw fit.

The young woman who the village of Avonlea mourned for when she left with him that day, stirred beside him, murmuring softly in her sleep. They had spent the last year traveling and exploring the realms of every land her heart desired. He slipped his arms around her, enjoying the feel of her soft bare skin against his hands. He nuzzled her dark hair, breathing in the scent of his lover, and their recent lovemaking.

She mumbled something he didn’t bother to decipher as she wriggled around to face him. Her blue eyes slit open as she sleepily slid her arms around his neck. He moved his lips to kiss her, but her attention drew to the window.

“It’s the first snowfall, Rumple,” she excitedly exclaimed as she moved her naked body to stand by the window frame. Rumple stayed in bed, simply folding his arms behind his head and letting his eyes slide over the gently curves of her body, reveling in the fact that everything he saw was his. When he saw she made no move to budge, he rose, and slipped his arms around her shoulders, and kissed her temple.

“Thinking of hitting me with another snowball dearest?” he teased.

She turned with a smug smile over her lips. “I was maybe considering it.”

Slowly he kissed a trail up her neck, nibbling at her earlobe. “There are better ways to spend our time,” he murmured backing her to the edge of the bed as they tumbled back. Later he would take her out in the snow, but for now he wanted to relish her in his arms.

There was something about the first snowfall that made him strangely sentimental.

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