Once Upon a Time...
New Enchanted Forest, four years ago...
It was just like a painting. A mother mourning for the loss of her only loved child. Lady Tremaine's nose wasn't held high in that moment of grief, her eyes were rather drowned in sad tears, heart was broken in tiny pieces. That woman only remembered she had a heart when thinking of Anastasia. The blonde girl with beautiful blue eyes which she stole from her mother, now lying in a coffin, preserved by strong magic...forever asleep until stronger magic could bring back the shine of her marble like face, the glitter of her smile.
"Isn't it tragic, dearie? To only love one daughter...while planning to make the other suffer!" Rumpelstiltskin didn't spare kindness in his words, especially if he knew they could hurt Tremaine like knives dripped in poison.
"Maybe because the only daughter who ever loved me was her." Tremaine mumbled, looking at the coffin one last time. The old classy casket was opened, her daughter's deceased body was covered by a small black rag hiding her true figure in shadiness.
"Are you sure that this is the way to get what we both want?" The dark one asked, one last time, growing closer to Lady Tremaine's intimate space, while she mourned for her daughter one more time for what it felt like a lifetime.
"Yes, Henry Mills made his choice...He chose Cinderella over my Drizella, they had a child but Lucy doesn't have the blood of the guardian's lineage. We need to make sure that my youngest daughter has a child with your grandson, he is, after all, the truest believer, the descendant of the greatest villains and heroes in History."
"He is indeed..." Rumpel mumbled, remembering how special his grandson was, but knowing how his son would be mad if he knew what was going on, if only he was alive...Baelfire, lost, just like everyone Rumpel has ever loved. Minus, Gideon, his other son...What would he think of his papa now? If he knew he was about to revert to the Beast just to get back to his Beauty, Belle, the long lost wife.
"Don't think about trying to sabotage our plan, dark one. That of course, if you want to be reunited with your Belle." Lady Tremaine recovered her sassiness and invaded Rumpel's safety bubble, as he held his hands high and produced childish defensive gestures with them, as always.
Once taken away from the shadows of darkness, turned into the man he always had inside waiting to come out, the dark one lost Belle, his beloved wife and the only one who saw good in him. When the tragic event occurred, it was just like being drowned in the endless ocean of night, his eyes were big and green again, beastly was the term! His skin was gold like, with hints of gray, he looked like an old crocodile. A beast corrupted by power and shadows.
"Don't forget, though, that for the child born out of Henry and Drizella to be the guardian, must be born out of true love."
"Do you honestly believe Henry is in love with Cinderella?"
"Well...they did get married." Rumpel reminded the silver haired woman.
"I thought that by now you'd know the things we do to protect our loved ones. Henry discovered what a child born out of his love with Drizella's could be. I had that theory a few years ago, but now I'm sure it's not just mere speculation."
"You think he knew about the prophecy saying they'd give birth to the guardian?"
"Indeed...that when the child is old enough, will cleave you from the dark one powers, joining you with Belle in the afterlife. But more than that, the guardian's pure heart will be strong enough to wake up Anastasia."
Rumpel looked down, ashamed of his own dark desperate deeds, for he knew what Tremaine was planning to do with his great-grandchild but was too selfish to stop it. Belle wouldn't want this, she'd rather be happy knowing her loved one was selfless and decided to live forever without her if it meant he wouldn't hurt his own family!
"I'm sure Henry would rather live a life with Cinderella, leading us to think that he didn't have true feelings for Drizella, that just like his ten year old self wanted to be Prince Charming Jr. and follow his other grandfather's footsteps, he got the life of his dreams being part of a legend as old as Time."
"That way he wouldn't have the baby with Drizella, putting his family at the mercy of our dark desires..."
"Exactly. But this dark curse will change everything." The Evil Stepmother showed a small black scroll with scribbling letters dripping in dark magic. "I took it from Drizella. It seems that my girl's affection for Henry is so big that she spent the last years making a spell strong enough to rewrite her history with him, taking them to a far way land where they can live their love without Ella's interference."
"Yet your girl didn't cast the curse. What stopped her?"
"Her selflessness!" Lady Tremaine pointed out, as her nose held itself a little bit higher. The obnoxious woman spoke mockingly, cruelty was her second language if not the first.
"I don't remember you raising the girl to be selfless."
"You're right, but true love is the only thing strong enough to inspire the power of sacrifice, even in the darkest of souls. Drizella loves Henry so much, that she doesn't even have the strength to change his History with Cinderella, she thinks he loves her stepsister. It's quite a poetic tale if you ask me, and when we cast the curse, we'll make sure that the two love birds procreate. The child born of their love will be the guardian, the one capable of giving us what we want." The blue piercing eyed woman went along her plan one more time, her lips drew an evil smile without even thinking, bragging for being so devilishly clever.
Rumple didn't like that plan, not even a little bit. He thought he could trick light and darkness, doing all those nasty things for a bright goal, but if three hundred years of existence taught him something was that he wasn't the universe's player, rather a mere pawn played by forces greater than anyone else's understanding.
There must be a way for the guardian to separate him from the dark one's immortal magic, and in doing so take him to Belle who was waiting on the other side, but also a way for him to stop Lady Tremaine from sacrificing her own grandchild in the sake of saving a long lost daughter.
The woman's despise for Drizella and every other human being was astounding! How the hell did she get like that?! Rumpel didn't have the answers for it, but he did know what his wife would want him to do, be selfless no matter what, and although he never truly surrendered to Light's grasp, he was far from being the Beast he once was. When the guardian separated him from his powers, the dark one had a plan! He would hide Anastasia's body so Lady Tremaine couldn't sacrifice her great-grandchild's pure heart for the sake of breaking the laws of Life and Death, of magic itself!
"So it's settled, let's cast the curse, we shall bring everyone to a new realm where only we will have our memories, Henry and Drizella will meet, hopefully fall in love and bring the guardian to birth."
"That's right, it's a flawless plan, and all of this will be but a mere fairytale, say goodbye to all the pain this life brought us, because we're going to a land where we'll find our happy endings."
"I hope you're right, Lady Tremaine, I really hope so..." The dark one sighed, as his eyes melted with the silver haired woman's and they prepared to put their genius villainous plan in motion.
YOU ARE READING
After Henry (Once Upon a Time)
Romance"Happy endings aren't always what we think they will be, but that's exactly what makes them special." A book filled with hope and fairytales, Once Upon a Time, fell on Ivy Belfrey's lap, giving her hope that both heroes and villains can have a happ...
