Huffs of impatience, slamming doors, glares at everyone who looked at her the wrong way (which essentially was everyone)… the tell-tale signs of one throwing a tantrum. Snow White knew she was not exactly behaving like a proper princess. She could just hear her mother's voice reprimanding her now. "Snow, we have been blessed with the life of royalty. We have certain privileges not afforded to the rest of the kingdom, but we also have some restrictions that they do not have, especially in our conduct. We must never allow others to know of our distress."
But Snow did not care for propriety when her husband was nowhere to be found. She checked all over the castle, which was far too large for her liking. There were rooms she never even knew existed. There was an entire wing, she had never seen before! She felt more exhausted merely walking about her new home than she ever did when she was living on the run.
She searched their bedroom, his study, the window by the old beech tree he loved so much, the kitchens, the stable, even all the way up to the North tower she noticed he spent time in, gazing at the mountains in the distance. She figured it was because it was the direction of where his old farm was, where his old life and memories of his mother were.
But he was not there. He was not in any of his usual spots. And Snow White was not pleased.
"'I will always find you' indeed! Guess that does not bloody apply to your own home! If he went off to go hunting with Thomas and Grumpy again without telling me so help me I will…" but she cut off her grumblings when she heard the sound of laughter coming from one of the nearby rooms.
One she determined to be that of a child. The other was most definitely the laugh of her Prince Charming. Though he was the source of her previous agitation, it was almost immediately forgotten as curiosity got the better of her.
She peeked into the room and finally found her husband. He was on the floor of Geppetto's workshop, with young Pinocchio laughing uncontrollably at his side.
"Are you saying that I did that wrong?"
"Yes!" Pinocchio replied, before succumbing to a fit of giggles.
"But how in heaven's name are you supposed to use this contraption?" Charming exclaimed, wearing the most adorable pout Snow had ever seen on an adult.
She looked to see the object he was pouting at, and saw that it was a hammer. Prince Charming, slayer of dragons, savior of damsels in distress, battle hero, did not know how to use a hammer. Or at least was pretending not to. She hoped.
"You're holding it wrong, your highness!"
"Oh! Is it like this?"
Charming then proceeded to grasp the tool by the metal end and started smashing a nail using the other end of the handle.
"No no no!" Pinocchio exclaimed before giggling madly again.
"I'm hopeless!" Charming declared before sprawling out completely on the floor. "I'm completely hopeless, Pinocchio! You have to help me! You must teach me your skills!"
"Okay, okay! I'll help you!"
The young boy then pulled the slumped prince back to his original sitting position.
"You have to hold it like this. But take care that you do not smash your finger on accident. It can be very painful and you'll need all your fingers to protect the kingdom."
Pinocchio then handed the hammer back to the prince, who accepted it and proceeded to hammer a nail perfectly.
The young boy clapped his hands happily while Charming set his tool down to hoist Pinocchio onto his shoulders.
"You, sir, are a hero! A hero, I say. You have saved the kingdom from clueless princes! Hurrah for Pinocchio!" Charming chanted while carrying said-hero atop his shoulders around the room whilst Pinocchio waved at imaginary cheering crowds.
"He's wonderful with children, is he not?" a voice startled Snow from her spying. Startled, she turned to address her intruder.
Geppetto smiled at Snow White, who looked like she had just been caught stealing cookies from the cookie jar.
"I…uh…what?" Snow cringed at how unladylike she just sounded, but she was so engrossed in the scene she had just witnessed that she did not even hear what Geppetto had said.
"The Prince. He's good with children, no?"
Snow turned back to her husband who was now knighting a delighted Pinocchio with a wooden rod.
"Yes. Yes he is."
"Ah, you picked a good one, princess. He'll be a good father someday."
Snow smiled brightly, her frustrations from only five minutes ago forgotten.
"Yes, he will be."
Snow awoke in the middle of the night from a horrible nightmare. She dreamed that Regina had won. The fire that so often plagued her dreams returned, but it was not confined to the red room this time. It's flames were licking the walls of their castle. It's light illuminated the chained forms of their dearest friends. It was burning her mother's tiara and her father's precious books. It was burning the dwarves' cottage, the forest. It was burning. Everything was burning.
As terrifying as these images were, none stopped Snow's heart as the vision of her stepmother did. It was not so much Regina herself that horrified Snow. It was that she had a baby in her arms. A beautiful baby with ebony black hair and familiar baby blue eyes.
Snow thrashed against invisible bonds that prevented her from saving her precious baby, but to no avail. She sobbed and screamed so loudly…so uselessly.
Her screams intensified when Regina, cackling evilly, lifted her large cloak to reveal the body, bloody and lifeless, of Snow White's true love.
With that last image still fresh in her mind, she woke with a start. Blinking back tears, she placed a hand on her growing belly.
You are safe, little girl. I will never let her get to you.
She then reached out for her husband, but panicked when all she felt were cold sheets.
No. She cannot have gotten him. He's safe. He's probably gone to the kitchens.
But after ten minutes of waiting and still no Prince Charming, she got out of bed, slipped on a robe and slippers, and left the bedroom.
Snow White had no desire to scour the entire castle at this hour, but was saved by a guard who informed her of her husband's whereabouts.
Pleased that she was spared all that walking, she took off in the direction of her husband. She needed to see him. She needed to see him alive. And she needed him to tell her that their family was going to be safe.
After a few short minutes, she made it to the door of the nursery, for that is where Prince Charming was in those late hours of the night.
Snow was prepared to slam open the door and wrap her arms around her husband, but restrained herself when she heard his muttering.
"Uneven! It's bloody uneven! You rebuild an entire cabin, but cannot even make your own child's crib even!"
Snow quietly pushed the door open a bit wider to reveal her husband, crouching beside a beautiful crib, meticulously sanding down one of the legs. She watched for hours as he finally evened out the crib to his satisfaction, started carving intricate designs, smoothed out his carvings, and added a coat of white paint. When he noticed sunlight creeping through the windows, he started putting away his tools whilst Snow stole away back to their bedroom. The reality of her husband's pure love completely washed away the memory of her nightmares.
Snow White was in pain. The most excruciating pain she had ever felt and it was not the result of having given birth not even an hour ago. It was what she had to do after only two minutes of holding her daughter in her arms. She had to let her go.
The sobs still racked her body as she struggled toward the nursery. On her way she saw dozens of fallen soldiers, both in black liveries and their castle's silver ones.
She was grateful that she did not see her husband among the corpses strewn about the hallway.
Snow let out another heart wrenching sob. This hallway, which connected Snow and Charming's bedroom to their daughter's, was not supposed to be littered with bodies. She and Charming were supposed to tiptoe through this hallway to watch their little girl sleep at night. Emma was supposed to run through this hallway every time she got a nightmare to sleep in her parents' bed. She was supposed to prance through this hallway every time she got a new dress or new sword, whichever she grew up to be more excited about. She was supposed play-fight with fake swords against her father here. She was supposed to storm through here back to her room every time she thought her parents were being unreasonable.
But Emma would not get to do those things. Snow and Charming would not get to be parents, and that broke Snow's heart because she knew that they would have been a damn good ones. Or at least she knew Charming would have been. The nursery Snow was painfully trying to get to was full of toys, stuffed animals, and books that Charming kept bringing back to the castle. Each time he went to the village during Snow's pregnancy, he brought back something for their child. Not to mention the eight magnificent cribs he built himself, insisting that each one was not safe enough. Leave it to her stubborn husband to settle for nothing less than wood impervious to vast amounts of pressure, water, age, even fire. Yes, her husband found inflammable wood.
But Emma would never use it or any of the things her husband thoughtfully picked out. And as much as this broke Snow's heart, she just wanted her daughter to live. To escape this wretched curse, even if she grew up without her parents.
When she found her husband's body, she did not need to look into the wardrobe to see if he succeeded. The smile on his face was all the confirmation she needed to know that he had done it. He protected his daughter from the curse, at the cost of his own life. He was a good father after all.
Snow White's eyes fluttered open due to a chill in night air. She ran her hands through her now very short hair, before reaching out for her husband. She found nothing but cold sheets and now understood the reason for her coldness.
Glad that there were only a few places to look for her husband in their cramped apartment, she got out of bed, wrapping a blanket around herself.
He wasn't in the kitchen or sitting room, and she noticed that his shoes and coat were still by the front door, so she knew he didn't go out. As silently as she could, she climbed the steps to her daughter and grandson's room, certain her husband would be there too.
Sure enough, her husband was sitting in an armchair next to the bed, just gazing at his daughter and grandson. Occasionally, he would brush her hair out of her face or cover up Henry's feet that always managed to get out from under the blankets.
When the clock on the bedside table read 5:30 AM, Charming placed a kiss on both Emma's and Henry's foreheads, before heading down to join his wife who had already gone back to their bed.
When Charming finally fell asleep, Snow grabbed his hand and placed it over her belly.
Don't worry, little one. Your daddy's a good one.
Author's Note: Well there's my second attempt at fanfiction. Do be kind to me. First off, yes Prince Charming does indeed know how to use a hammer. He may be kind of dim on the show sometimes, but he's not that stupid. Teehee.
Secondly, I didn't mean for Snow to wind up pregnant again when I started writing this. It just sort of happened. As if their family isn't complicated enough, let's make Henry older than his aunt or uncle.
Lastly, in Lady of the Lake we saw that Emma's crib was pretty much unscathed, despite the room literally being torn apart. I'm sure there were plenty of other things that weren't damaged, but I'd like to think Charming would have built an indestructible crib for his baby.