She'd entertained the idea, yes, for a moment. Partly for her father's sake – her daddy, the only person left in this world whom she loved, the only thing she cared about almost as much as revenge – and partly for her own, of course, because really, what's another little lie in the name of self-interest.
It could have been moving and flamboyant and grand in a way that would almost have made up for her lackluster attire, and might even have moved some of the more gutless members of the audience to tears (Snow White among them, obviously). It could have been just clever and false enough to not be humiliating, and anyway she'd found and lost and regained her pride so many times already that a little humiliation wouldn't have been much of a bother.
It could have been all that, probably, and it certainly would have worked.
So she'd considered, for a moment, repenting and renouncing and refusing to beg for forgiveness just pointedly enough, and looking Snow right in the eye with a telltale tear she's determined not to shed and a set to her jaw that speaks of quiet dignity. She'd pictured Snow's lips quivering as she commands the archers in her breathy, earnest voice to stand down and the guards to untie the restraints. She'd imagined the conflicted but trusting look on Charming's puffy-lipped face as he'd ask his wife if she's sure, and the scrunch of Snow's eyebrows as she'd reply a little too dramatically that she is.
She'd thought about the watery, grateful little smile she'd direct not only at Snow but at the entire kind, generous world that deemed her worthy of a second chance – not out of old guilt, of course, but out of the goodness of its own collective heart. She'd thought about walking away, seemingly newly reformed and deeply inspired, and spending the rest of her life doing exactly what she'd always done, pillaging and plotting and perpetrating and perfecting her self-satisfied smirk and destroying herself at a comfortable pace. She'd thought about having a new gown made. With black velvet and shoulder pads, yes.
And then the moment passed, and she knew she would not be doing any of that insipid nonsense.
She glanced at her audience (a bunch of eager, frothing-mouthed dogs who are, of course, justified in their bloodlust this time); at her executioners (four blank-faced pawns buzzing with barely-contained righteousness); at her judges (one with pigheaded hopefulness dripping out of her ears, the other trying very hard to hide his discomfort at his own pragmatism). She couldn't spot any perpetually-apologetic, small, balding men with impressive sideburns, or any greasy-haired, sparkling reptiles with terrible oral hygiene, but she had no doubt at least one of each category were present. Being two of the people who shaped her existence the most, they wouldn't want to miss its grand finale – and for her part, she wouldn't want to disappoint them.
If she had her magic, she might have turned her roars to fire and burnt herself and everything up in a last tribute to the witches of old; or she might have torn the ground apart and summoned up the deliciously gooey center of the world to do the work for her and make the court into a fittingly hideous monument; or maybe she'd have simply willed herself to explode so she could die with the rare satisfaction of knowing a peasant or two perished of massive head trauma caused by a flying foot.
But she didn't have her magic – or quite that much of a penchant for the patently absurd, really – so, instead, she simply settled for delivering the biggest fuck you she could improvise at such short notice, and slurped up the delicious disappointment written so clearly in Snow's every muscle, the pure outrage shining in Charming's eyes. She wished them both prominent frown lines.
As she'd expected, once the order was given and the arrows were cocked, it felt a little bit like falling; the unreality of it, the muted anticipation, the odd timelessness. She could almost feel the air parting to make way for the four shafts of wood competing for her last breath, and idly wondered if the archers had placed bets on whose shot would be the one to do the job. Yes, she had no doubt gambling was involved in some manner. There would probably also be beer.
The taste of bile and the memory of beer in the back of her throat and her mind, and the struggle to keep her eyes from snapping shut like a coward's, and the noise of her heart and the ache of her breath and the rigidness of her spine were all she had and all she was for a moment that was, ultimately, very significant and very inconsequential, because then the arrows stopped and, well, everything else continued.
It can't be a common occurrence, she was certain, for a person's continued existence to be their own story's most magnificent anticlimax. Then again, she'd already learned long ago that there aren't many things as utterly underwhelming as being remarkable.
In the end, she simply underestimated the cruelty of Snow's mercy, she supposes. But really, she should have expected that; after all, an Evil Queen's plans must always be thwarted, even (or maybe particularly) those that are likely to make everyone happy.