Author's Notes for after Chapter Two
Bae's Backstory
Hi. I just wanted to clarify some important backstory for all you non-fans.
When Rumple asks Morraine to leave his “personal grief” out of her story, he is referring to his son, Baelfire. Morraine also makes an oblique reference to Baelfire when she talks about “my best friend just under the draft age.” To catch up on Baelfire’s story, you can watch the video montage below until 02:30, but I’ll summarize here, also.
Rumple took on the Dark Power in order to save his son from the draft. He succeeded, but all magic comes with a price. The Dark Power warped Rumple’s personality so badly, it alienated Bae. Hoping to restore his father back to normal, Bae learns about the Land Without Magic (ie our world.) The Blue Fairy gives him a magical bean that will create a portal leading there, but as you’ll see in the video, Rumple got cold feet and let Bae slip through the vortex all alone. He saved Bae’s life only to lose him in a different way.
Rumple spends the centuries of his immortal life (and the first two seasons of the TV show) working on the magic that will deliver all of Fairy Land into our world so that he can reunite with his son. Morraine doesn’t know anything about Rumple’s plans, but she knows all about Bae, and does not mention him, as promised. This is why Belle, who is reading Morraine’s Tale a century or so later, will learn many things about Rumpelstiltskin’s history, but nothing about his son.