Disclaimer: I don't own any of the OUAT characters, sadly.
It was late morning when Cora went to check on Regina. No sooner had she reached the doorway of the nursery, however, she froze. Standing over the crib was a familiar figure, clad all in leather, skin scaly and glittering. She felt her breath catch in her throat in fear, but she forced herself to swallow and demand, "What are you doing here?"
"Is that any way to greet a friend, dearie?" Rumplestiltskin responded, turning around to face her, a characteristically manic smile on his face.
Friends don't take away your children, Cora thought bitterly. "I wasn't expecting you," was all she said aloud.
"I like the element of surprise," he replied with a small gesture, the statement followed by one of his high pitched laughs.
She crossed the room quickly and in silence, bending over to pick Regina up. She cradled the infant close to her chest, kissing the top of her head, which was covered with a fine dark down. The infant gurgled in response, a tiny hand closing around the chain of Cora's necklace.
Rumplestiltskin was hovering over her shoulder in an instant, causing her to tense. "Such a pretty little babe," he said, reaching out to tap the infant's nose with one finger. "Care to let me hold her?"
Cora's hold on her daughter tightened and her first instinct was to tell him "no," but fear that he would do worse than whisk Regina away caused her to hand the infant over wordlessly.
He cradled the baby with a natural ease that surprised Cora, who knew nothing of his past. Had he been a father once? She quickly shook the question from her mind, however, not caring to actually ask it. "Ah, yes," he said, looking into the infant's eyes, "she has the magic in her veins. I can see it in her as clearly as I could see it in you."
Her expression tightened a little visibly and there was a flicker of fear in her brown eyes, her hands twitching as she suppressed the urge to snatch Regina out of his arms. "Is that why you want to take her away from me?" Cora asked. "So you can teach her for your own purposes?"
That made Rumplestiltskin laugh again, his eyes settling on Cora's face. "Whoever said anything about taking her, dearie?" He returned simply.
She frowned. "You said that the price for your help with spinning the straw into gold was my firstborn child," she reminded him.
"There are other ways to 'have' her that don't involve taking her away," he said, looking down at the baby in his arms.
"Such as?" Cora demanded, too wary of what he meant to be relieved that he wasn't intending to take Regina away from her.
"Let's just say that I have… plans for her," Rumplestltskin replied vaguely, his gaze returning to Regina.
Her instincts as a mother overpowering any fear that the Dark One's mere presence might have instilled in her, she snatched Regina out of his arms.
Rather than finding his offensive, he only seemed amused. "It's funny, dearie," he said, "I never would have pegged you for a mother lion."
"That goes to show how little you know about me," Cora shot back, holding Regina close to her and rubbing her back soothingly as the baby started to whimper a little. "For the supposedly all-knowing Dark One, you are surprisingly ignorant in regard to women."
Rumplestiltskin feigned shocked hurt, lifting a scaly hand to his chest. "You wound me."
She hoisted Regina a little higher in her arms, resting her chin on the top of her daughter's head. "If we're done here, I would appreciate it if you left," she told him. "I need to feed her."
He gave a mocking little bow in response, only saying, "As you wish, dearie." The manic smile returned to his face as he straightened up, however, and said, "Just remember: I'll be watching." Before Cora had a chance to respond, he was gone.
She released a breath she hadn't even realized she had been holding, lowering her arms a little so that she could look her daughter in the face. "Don't worry, Regina," she murmured, "mother isn't going to let him hurt you. Not ever."