OH MY GOODNESS I LOVE HIM!!! Both his back story and his picture, you really did find the perfect picture for him. So he was actually born into power, very nice twist! I can't remember if you had told me about that, though I still loved it. He is so much more exciting than I pictured that he would be.

As for Gaston, I thought we would share him and the other fairy tale characters in the story as we need them. So go ahead and use him in your intro :) and have Rumpel appear in front of Belle if you want. Yes Gaston would know that Belle is a thief, and likely that she is a popular one, seeing how he was the first one to catch her. That was why she was being forced to marry him, and ran away. Does everyone know about who Rumpel is? Because that could have a lot to do with how Belle reacts to him.