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dragonbat2011 · 4 years

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Reaching Out ‘Til We Reach the Circle’s End—Chapter 6

For earlier chapters: https://dragonbat2011.tumblr.com/post/621379453957865473/reaching-out-til-we-reach-the-circles-end-toc

(Or read it on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24326794?view_full_work=true)

Rumple had known that his cover wouldn't hold up for long, but he certainly hadn't been expecting a confrontation this soon. He knew exactly the kind of man he had been, the same man he still was, deep down. And that man had learned early to tamp down any show of spirit, any display of temper, any hint of anger or resentment. That man cringed and groveled and kissed boots, hating himself for it, but knowing that it kept him alive and it kept him and his son safe. At least, it had until now. "I'm here to help," Rumple said. "Truly." He reached into his pocket and pulled out the contract. "A pledge of good faith?"

His younger self was still frowning, but he reached out and gingerly accepted the rolled-up scroll. As he unfurled it and began to read, his eyes widened. "How did you…?" His voice trailed off and his eyes grew hard once more. "So, you do mean to take him."

Rumple blinked. "I beg your pardon?"

"Oh, no," his younger self said, his voice cracking a bit. "I saw the way you looked at him last night, for all you tried to hide it, and I wondered, but with this…." He shook the contract for emphasis. "Only three people knew that this document existed: myself, Fendrake, and my wife Milah. And she was lost to me years ago. I'd thought her dead, but if you've come here to—" Abruptly, he turned away. "We were happy together once," he said bleakly. "Before I was called to the front. Before I… Well, never mind that. I've heard tell that when a love dies, the lovers may well move on to another, but when they do, they often to gravitate toward those who remind them in some way of their first. Well, even I can see the resemblance, but you'll forgive me if I'm not flattered."

He could scarcely believe the turn this conversation was taking. "I-I'm not—"

"While things were never right between me and Milah after my return," his younger self continued as though Rumple hadn't spoken, "I know she loved our son. She'd never have left him if she hadn't been abducted. And I suppose, once she was free, she decided that she'd have a better life without me, so she never returned. And, I surmise that she's found h-happiness with you." Rumple tried to pretend that he didn't hear the sob in his younger self's voice. "Well, how can I blame her? For trying to do better and for wanting our son with her? But since she's been gone, Bae has been everything to me. And if you're thinking that now you've voided that contract, I'll just settle down with someone new and have another child to replace the one you mean to carry off, then you have no idea what it means to be a parent!"

It was a good thing that the band of ruffians who'd accosted her yesterday had been so unnerved by Rumple's little display (or so excited by the acquisition of her pendant) that they hadn't noticed her earrings. And an even better thing that she'd removed them before approaching the tavern last night and had the sense not to wear them in the open today. Unlike her pendant, the earrings weren't magical, but they were eleven carats worth of the finest emeralds Oz had ever produced. Zelena knew that if she needed to, she could sell them, but she'd need to find the right time and the right buyer.

With bandits about, it certainly wasn't going to be safe carrying large amounts of coin. And the sentry's reaction to her innocent queries had told her that a stranger looking to sell something as valuable as those gemstones was certain to arouse suspicion. She'd need to find someone who wouldn't ask too many questions. Or better yet, make the acquaintance of someone trustworthy who could handle the sale, perhaps in return for a cut of the proceeds. One thing was certain, though: she wasn't about to hand them over in exchange for tourist information or the privilege of looking up some information that ought to be common knowledge! Were there no schools in this Frontlands place? Were there no libraries—libraries open for any to peruse without having to petition some ducal flunkey for permission?

Well. Once she learned the way of things here, she had no doubt that her fortunes would take an upturn. She just needed to find her mother and show her that there were other ways to acquire power without becoming royalty!

Dismay rolled over her. She didn't have any sort of power right now, thanks to that Charlotte wench. But perhaps there was a way to get the pendant back. Or perhaps there was some other way to regain her magic. For pity's sake, she'd been using magic before she could walk; surely losing the pendant couldn't take that away from her permanently! Well. She could think about that after she'd found what she sought. Meanwhile, it was clear that she wasn't going to last long without some local currency; bartering hours of washing dishes for dinner and a room for the night was only a stop-gap.

She realized that she was fast approaching a market stall with a number of clearly serviceable-but-not-new garments dangling from its awning. Thoughtfully, she removed her cloak and approached. "I was wondering whether you'd be interested in buying this off me?" she asked with a hopeful smile when she caught the owner's eye.

In an earlier time—though later than this one—Rumple might have laughed aloud and at length at the sheer ludicrousness of his younger self's imaginings. As it was, he couldn't quite keep back a guffaw as he exclaimed, "What?"

"No," his younger self said, flushing a bit. "Please, don't play the fool. And don't think you can play me for one either. You've been a bit too familiar with things—and people—with which you've no reason to be. And what rich relation chooses to neither stay at lodgings befitting his status, nor make his presence known to those he seeks, but chooses instead to bed down with animals? And any fool can see you've a greater interest in Bae than you do in me. So, if you haven't come to take him from me, then why are you here?"

"To save him," Rumple replied, looking his younger self dead in the eyes. "And save you from losing him, I hope."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that if they haven't already lowered the draft age to fourteen, they'll do so in the next three months."

His younger self's eyes when wide and near-soundless cry escaped him as he half-doubled over. "You're certain?"

"I am. So, if you mean to flee with him or send him away, now's the time."

It was the wrong thing to say, and Rumple realized it the moment he saw his younger self's eyes narrow once more, and his face twist again in uncharacteristic rage.

"Send him away?" his younger self repeated. "With you, you mean? So, you are here to take him!"

"No," Rumple insisted. "I'm here to protect him! And you."

"Why? If you are my uncle, why magically appear now? You might have learned of my existence somehow, though how you could have known to make inquiries and track me down is puzzling, since you wouldn't have even had my name as a starting point. But if you're here to protect Bae, then that would mean you knew about him before you even came here. How? Who are you?"

"I told you," Rumple said, holding his hands up in a placating fashion, more than a little unnerved by the hysteria in his younger self's voice. "I'm—"

"No more lies! No evasions! I-want-the-truth! Tell me!"

"I'm you!" The words erupted from his throat and were past his lips before he even realized he'd answered. There was no way to call them back now.

For a moment, both men looked at one another, with near-identical stupefied expressions. Then, his younger self took a staggering step backward, stumbled, and nearly fell onto his stool. The look on his face could now best be described as stunned disbelief, as he tilted his head inquiringly toward his houseguest.

"I'm you," Rumple repeated more gently, nodding as though to confirm his words. "I'm you."

The cloak fetched two silver and Zelena strongly suspected she'd got the worse end of that deal. Still, one coin not only gained her access to the guild records, but even the services of a youth named Gragur who was presented to her as an apprentice clerk.

"I'm sorry, Goodwife," the teen said, coming to her table with an armload of scrolls. "There is no Princess Ava in the Northern Kingdom, presently. I even thought, well, not all spellings are standard, so I checked to see if maybe she spelled it with an 'E' or even an 'I'; pronunciations vary, too. But apart from the dowager queen Eva, daughter to Count Humboldt of the Eastern Escarpment Lands who married into their ruling house two generations ago, there's no Royal of that name there now."

"Dowager queen?" Zelena repeated. That couldn't be right. Ava… or Eva, no matter how one spelled it, had been a princess, but she'd become queen of Leopold's kingdom, not her own.

"Apparently, she's well-liked," Gragur said, unfurling another scroll. "At least, some of the minor nobility, them as hopes to curry favor with their higher-ups, have been naming some of their daughters after her. But as yet, no princess."

"Well… well, what about King Xavier of Eagle's Peak?" Zelena asked testily.

Gragur shook his head. "The king of Eagle's Peak is his Majesty Henry II, whom some call the Eagle's Talon." He frowned. "I believe…" He unrolled another scroll. "Yes, his third son is named Xavier, but he's unlikely to be crowned king with two brothers ahead of him and both with heirs of their own. Oh!" He pointed to another entry. "The crown prince, Francis does have a son by that name. Might he be who you mean? If so, it seems as though you're a bit early."

Zelena started to glower, but whatever retort she'd meant to snarl died on her lips. "A bit early," she repeated in an undertone. "A bit… Gragur?" She asked in a rather different tone of voice, "Do the merchants here treat with other realms? Might you have records from those lands as well?"

The youth nodded. "It's not as frequent, Goodwife. Finding passage between worlds is a costly affair and magic beans used to be far easier to procure. It does happen periodically, though."

"Could you show me any records you might possess here from Oz?"

Twenty minutes later, Zelena was stumbling out of the hall of records, her stomach churning as she felt as though she might faint. Although Gragur hadn't been able to provide detailed maps or genealogical tables, as he had for the kingdoms of the Enchanted Forest, he had shown her a trade agreement that had been signed between the Duke of Tower Cliffs and the Gillikins of Oz, just 'two years ago,' according to the young clerk. At first, Zelena had been annoyed. The Gillikin land was, ironically enough, Oz's 'northern kingdom'. And they had no business entering into trade agreements with anyone without clearing them with her first! She'd started reading the agreement to find out the names of the individuals who had brokered it, resolving that she would have quite a bit to say to them on her return—Oh. Of course. In this time, she wasn't yet the ruler of Oz. How could she have forgotten? She smiled a bit at her own folly, as she read on. But then, she'd come to the last paragraph, and the line, 'Signed and dated in the fifth year of His Majesty, King Pastoria of Oz,' and her smile dropped. The fifth year of... Pastoria? The name was vaguely familiar from the history lessons learned at her adoptive mother's knee. But his reign wasn't recent. He hadn't sat on Oz's throne since— Her blood suddenly ran cold. There had to be some other simple explanation for—

"Are you certain that this is only two years old?" she demanded. "It hasn't been misfiled?"

Gragur blinked. "I-I don't see how it could have been, but I'll inquire," he'd said. A few minutes later, he returned, escorting a woman some ten years Zelena's senior to her table.

"You're most fortunate, Goodwife," Gragur said, smiling. "I've the honor and fortune to present to you Mistress Ilona, one of the signatories to the agreement before you."

The richly-attired woman looked at her curiously. "I'm not sure why it's a concern to you, Goodwife, but yes, I was in Oz nearly twenty months ago and that trade agreement has been quite the boon to his Grace's armies. We may yet see the ogres routed by winter, if the shipments continue."

Zelena forced herself to smile, as she pushed back her chair. Then she bolted, pretending she didn't hear those two calling after her.

A bit early, Gragur had said. He'd spoken truer than he could have guessed! She was more than two hundred years early! She knew nothing about this period of history and nothing about her earlier antecedents. Her knowledge of her family tree began with Cora and she had no idea of the names of her grandmother or grandfather, let alone anyone who'd come before that.

She didn't even know her father's name; it had never been important before. But if she'd come this far back in time, then any chance encounter, any word she spoke, any action she undertook might somehow interfere with any one of the crucial meetings that needed to take place among all of the ancestors whose lineage she would bear. If she—even accidentally—killed one of her great-great grandfathers… If she paused to talk to her great-great-grandmother and inadvertently delayed her, so that she never met the man she should have wed… The slightest error, the slightest misstep, and she might erase herself from existence.

She'd gone back in time to change her past, but it had never occurred to her that in so doing, she might obliterate her future! And she couldn't very well ensure that her ancestors' lives continued unmolested when she had no clue who they even were!

She wanted to scream or sob or... she didn't even know what. But perhaps, she could figure it out on her long walk back to that inn. Because going by the way he'd reacted yesterday, it was very likely that she'd find Rumple in that area. And while she wasn't fool enough to confront him when he had his magic and she had none of her own, she knew that if she could discover his specific whereabouts, if she could discern what he was planning... Then she might yet be able to turn things to her advantage.

The temperature was beginning to drop, and she wished she still had her cloak, but she pressed her forearms to her sides and gripped her elbows as she turned to begin the long walk back to Pen Marmor.

#ouat #ouat fanfiction #char: rumpelstiltskin #char: zelena #char: fendrake #divergence au #papafire

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