A/N: Finally, the sequel to Velvet Paws, Moonlight Claws is being written! I'm so glad people are showing an interest in reading this, as I'm really enjoying writing it. I'll try to keep updates coming weekly, but I have lots of writing to do for school, so bear with me if I start to slack a little.
I'm not sure about the rating just yet – do we want it higher? – and I'm literally taking this fic as my 'procrastination from school work' happy place, the quality isn't going to be amazing. I'll ask you all now to sit in the sun and maybe squint at your screen a little as your read it, thank you.
Your reviews/favourites/etc. mean so much to me, and keep me motivated to write even when I'm not really feeling it, so please take a moment to express what you like/don't like at the end of the chapters. I'm always open to ideas, but don't be surprised if I can't do a little something for all of them (I'm planning to stay two-three chapters ahead of what has already been posted and, of course, I have my plot already).
Disclaimer: I don't own Once/these character, and the title is inspired by V. C. Andrews' novel, Flowers in the Attic, though the contents of the stories, you will be glad to know, are quite dissimilar.
Butterflies in the Attic
Regina Mills has just about enough time to realise that she is awake before she is being dragged from the bed she had fallen asleep in, and pushed into a lavatory. Her eyes are bleary, and her body is cold, but when she opens her mouth in protest, a hand clamps over it to keep her quiet.
Emma's face appears next, her expression somewhere between glaring and incredulous, as she pushes Regina back against a cold, stone wall. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" she hisses, casting several quick glances towards the doorway.
Regina glares right back, but then suddenly realises where she is – and in whose body. She stares down at herself in alarm, seeing only the simple dress she had been wearing while she had transported her spirit into Tsuki's body, and tries to shake her head when she looks back up to Emma. The hand around her mouth is a little too hard, and she lifts her own hand to it, gently, to show Emma that she's just as concerned with keeping quiet as she is.
Slowly, Emma releases her, and then turns, pacing the room with a hand to her forehead, like she's hoping to wear a groove in the floor. She's dressed in her night shirt and a pair of knee-length linen shorts, and despite the cold that dusts her body with goosebumps, her state of dress is the last thing on her mind.
"Henry's going to wake up any minute," she's mumbling to herself, and Regina just stands and watches her, distraught. "He's going to wake up and come in here, and you're going to be here." She spins around to face Regina, pointing a finger. "What are you doing here?"
"I didn't—" Regina tries, just a trifle too loudly, for Emma's eyes bulge insanely. "I didn't plan on it," she finishes in a hiss. "I did nothing differently; the spell was exactly the same."
"You know, the only reason I didn't tell anyone about you coming here was because I thought it was good that you saw Henry," Emma glared. "I thought, oh, she's not going to do anything stupid if I'm letting her sneak in to see our son. But it's never enough for you, is it? You always need more." She slaps a hand to her face, groaning quietly, and picks up her pacing again.
Regina steps after her, getting in her way when Emma next turns around to complete her figure-eight. "You think I planned this?" she hisses, just about refraining from slapping Emma in the arm when the other woman attempts to walk around her. "I shouldn't have fallen asleep," she adds, looking somewhat guilty. "But the spell I cast – my spirit should have just left the cat's body. Tsuki should still be here—"
Her face distorts somewhat, wondering, horrified, just what has happened to her little cat. During the time she's had her, Regina's become somewhat attached to her familiar, but now isn't the time to be worrying about that.
"Whatever happened," Emma says, stepping further into her, "you can't be here."
Regina sighs, momentarily closing her eyes. "I know. But what do you suggest? If I leave now, I'll be seen. Even if I could get back to the border, I wouldn't be able to cross it."
"Not while you're in your body," Emma realises, horrified, and then groans again.
They're both stopped from further argument when a noise sounds from the bedroom. The shuffling of blankets gives way to the sound of bare feet on tile, and then Henry's loud yawning. "Emma? My cat's gone again," he grumbles, and the sound of him checking the sheets filters in from the bedroom.
Before Regina can fathom that her son is on the other side of the wall, and she is not disguised in cat-form, Emma is shoving her towards the bathtub. There's a screen shade that Emma uses while bathing to hide the bath from the door and the toilet, should anyone walk in (there are no locks on these doors, and you can't be too careful, especially with Henry's habit of dropping in on her, unexpected). She pushes Regina into the tub with a stern look and pulls the shade further out so that it conceals her.
For her part, Regina crouches behind it and holds a hand to her mouth as Emma leaves her. Her heart is drumming away in her chest, and she closes her eyes, feeling dizzy, as she listens to Henry calling for Emma, again.
"Yeah, I'm just in here," Emma says, exiting the lavatory. She pushes a hand through her hair and tries to remember how to act normal, but when Henry goes to enter the room she'd just stashed his adoptive mother in, she can't stop herself from asking, "What are you doing?"
Henry turns to frown at her, not quite stopping. "Uh, peeing?" He pays little attention to the screen that hides the majority of the bath from view, or the way Emma seems to be lingering by the door once he's exited.
"Wash your hands," she says, after a beat, and moves to tidy the bed up a little. The cold is finally taking hold of her feet, and she ushers Henry out of the room with the pretence of wanting to dress. For her part, she does actually pull on a new pair of breeches and a tunic once he leaves.
"He's gone," she says, finally, poking her head into the lavatory to see Regina emerge from behind the screen. She looks disgruntled and fretful, but soon plasters a sneer on her face when she realises that Emma's watching her.
"What do you suppose we do now?"
"Woah, we?" Emma shakes her head, following Regina into the bedroom. "I'm going to breakfast. You're gonna have to stay here."
"What a fantastic idea; I'll just hide out in your bathtub for the rest of my life, shall I?"
"I didn't force you to come here."
"And I didn't purposefully teleport my body to your bed."
"Yet here you are." Emma narrows her eyes. "It's awfully coincidental, isn't it? You turning up here, just after I find out what you've been doing."
Regina represses a sigh, but can't quite stop her eye roll. "Really? Because I'm benefiting from being trapped inside Snow White's goddamn Palace, how?"
Emma's frown deepens. She hadn't thought that far ahead. "Henry's here," she tries. "If you can get in, unharmed, you're probably thinking of doing the same, but with my son in your grip."
"Our son, dear. And I don't know how I ended up here, unscathed." She releases a huff of air and turns around, studying the bed she'd woken up in. Perhaps it's a side effect of the spell she was using, or else something was different this time. But she's always so careful, she doesn't understand how she could have messed it up so brutally.
"Either way," Emma says, finally, "you can't stay here. If they know you're here—"
"I know," Regina glares, turning back around to face Emma. "But what do you want me to do? I can't teleport out of here, the wards around the Kingdom won't allow it. Whether you like it or not, I'm trapped in here with you. You're going to have to just live with it until I can find a solution."
# # # #
Emma's tense at breakfast, and all but Henry are starting to see it.
"…she was gone again this morning," he's saying, frowning into his oatmeal. "She only ever stays for one night, and then she disappears forever. Cats are weird."
"She's probably had to fend for herself all her life," David offers, buttering a slice of bread. "Animals like that, they're not used to being helped out. And when they become domesticated, they can't return to the wild again; they forget how to hunt, how to keep themselves alive. It's a big danger for them." Henry's face looks stricken at the idea of anything happening to Blacky, and so David quickly adds, "So it's a good thing, really, that she doesn't stay for too long."
"I guess," Henry mumbles, and leaves his spoon in the middle of his soggy breakfast in favour of grabbing a piece of fruit.
Eyeing her daughter over the rim of her glass, Snow sets the water down again and tilts her head towards Emma. "What are your plans for the day?"
Emma looks up quickly, and, if Snow hadn't been an elementary school teacher for twenty eight years, she might have missed the guilt that crosses her features. "What? Uh, I don't know. No plans." She bites into a piece of unbuttered bread, hoping to end the conversation.
Snow's eyes narrow. "Well, seeing as you're free, you can aid your father and I in the throne room, there are—"
"Actually, I was thinking of just sticking to my room for a bit. I mean, there are some books I want to get through, you know? History things, and stuff." Even Henry looks at her weirdly, and Emma dips her head.
She clears her throat, having swallowed what was in her mouth far too quickly to cut her mother off, and takes a sip of water. When she returns the glass to the table, Snow's hand covers hers. "Are you feeling okay?"
"Yeah, I'm absolutely fine."
"Maybe she slept funny," Henry offers, smirking, while David pokes him in the ribs.
Emma's gaze flashes to him. "There was nothing funny about the way I slept. It was perfectly normal – everything is perfectly normal." She's aware that she has all of their attention, now, and shifts uncomfortably in her seat. "Can I just eat breakfast in peace?"
No one answers her, but no one really refuses, falling into silence as they continue to eat. When Emma looks up, again, Snow's giving her one of those familiar looks – sadness and guilt – and Emma can just about keep herself from marching right on out of there before her mother starts rattling off her 'it will start to feel like home, just give it some time' spiel.
She wets her lips and sighs, staring out towards the door. There are two guards stationed there, their backs to them, but Emma can see them past the door frame. Trying not to listen in. "I think I'm gonna start on that reading early," she says, turning back to the table, and fills her plate with a few more bread rolls and fruit before standing.
She manages a short, "have a good day," to the table, and leaves.
Staring after her, the trio quietly return to their breakfast. "She really misses it," Henry says, pushing his lips to one corner of his mouth and looking between his grandparents.
"She'll settle in," David offers, dropping his hand on the boy's shoulder. He jostles it until Henry manages a small smile, and tries not to notice how his grandson looks so fearful to admit that he might miss some aspects of Storybrooke, too.
Emma's still frowning by the time she returns to her bedroom. She sets the breakfast plate down on the table, but has little stomach for bread or fruit. Instead, she grabs her toothbrush – a real one, or as real as they get in the Fairytale Land, because she'd downright refused to chew on some sticks twice a day – and rinses it off before beginning to clean her mouth.
For a blissful few minutes after, while she's lying on her bed with her arms over her face, there's silence in her bedchamber. And then a disgruntled huff sounds from her right, and she moves her hands just in time to see Regina storming over. She grabs a bread roll from the plate on her way, and throws herself down to sit next to Emma.
"You could have told me it was you," she frowns, taking a bite out of the roll.
"Maybe I wanted some peace and quiet," Emma grumbles, covering her face again. After a moment's thought, she adds, "Someone might come up here, soon." Even though she severely doubts they will, after her little outburst at breakfast.
"What do you want me to do, get back in the bathtub?" The tone she uses suggests that Regina isn't going to do that. Emma groans and rolls away from her, onto her side. "This bread is stale."
"It's fresh. They wouldn't serve it if it wasn't."
"I have no butter, it's dry. You couldn't have brought a glass of water up here, as well?"
"Sorry, Regina, I didn't want to make it obvious that I had a fugitive hiding in my bathtub."
"I wouldn't exactly call myself a fugitive," Regina huffs. "And don't make this all about you; I'm the one trapped here, I'm the one who's going to be thrown in a cell if your precious parents discover I'm here."
"At least you'd get your own room. Want me to call them up now?" She doesn't look around to Regina, but feels the other woman's glare on the back of her head. "Besides, I'll get in trouble for keeping you here without saying anything, too."
Regina guffaws and rolls her eyes. "Yes, you'll be sent to your room to think about your decisions, and have supper brought up to your door. Terrifying."
Emma frowns and rolls onto her back, glaring up at Regina. "I could just hand you in, you know? You could be a little nicer to me."
Regina adopts a caring expression so suddenly, Emma has to remind her fluttering stomach that it isn't real. "Oh, I'm sorry. Would you like me to rub your feet? Exchange favours for letting me crouch in your bathtub for hours while you're away?"
Just like that, Emma is glaring again. "Get used to it; I've slept in worse places."
She pushes herself up and stalks towards the window, staring out at the barely-trampled snow. She remembers a time when the sight would have excited her, but it was quickly replaced by the fear of freezing to death, and that's the feeling that sticks with her now. If not for that, she'd probably consider throwing Regina out into the cold, just to see the indignation on the other woman's face.
"We'll figure this out," she says to the glass in her window, seeing it fog with her breath. "But you need to solve this." She turns around, seeing Regina staring dismally at the small roll in her hand. "Sooner or later, they'll find out, and I don't think I'm going to be able to stop them from doing anything drastic when they do."
They both know who the 'them' are, but Emma doesn't want to outright admit that her parents would probably think about murdering Regina as quickly as she has them.
"I'll do my best," Regina says, but her voice falters in a way that lets Emma know that she has no idea how she's going to get out of the Kingdom.
Not wanting to see that near-nervous expression on her face, Emma simply nods and goes to grab her cloak. Maybe a walk will make her feel better; she really doesn't like the cold, but suddenly craves the sound of fresh snow crunching beneath her boots.
"Eat your bread," she mutters to Regina, not quite catching her eye, before exiting the room.
I'd love, love, love to hear your thoughts on this. Does this piece feel too different to the last? (I think I'm just paranoid because I switched tenses.) Anyway, feedback is always greatly appreciated; I'll try to get back to everyone who leaves me a line.
Thanks for reading!
