Author's Notes: I don't own Regina or anything else from OUAT. Yada yada yada.
This story is set before Neverland, so Regina doesn't know about Owen and Tamara and the effects the two of them would have on Storybrooke.
It's loosely Regina Mills in It's A Wonderful Life. Very loosely.
Death's Dark Shadows
~
Her house was barren.
For eighteen years, what seemed so long ago now, it had been like this – the emptiness creeping into her heart and freezing there. Sometimes, she could feel the hole in her heart whistling as the air blew past it. But she'd adopted a son – initially to fill that void, a void that for eighteen years only grew and grew until she reached out to the cricket – a therapist who might be able to help with the knowledge this new world had given him. When she'd found the son she'd adopted was the son of the savior, she'd kept him anyway because he believed in her, and throughout his life she'd done everything she could to raise him the way she'd wanted to be raised. Then, as expected, the savior returned, at her son's bidding, and she found herself lost to him.
Regina was familiar with loss, perhaps more than anyone else, and as she sat in front of her fireplace on this cold Christmas Eve, watching snow fall through her front window, presents still stacked under a Christmas tree only she'd really seen this year, she couldn't help but feel the hole once more. This time it brought a different yet familiar ache – loss was nothing new, but loss at someone else's choice other than her own – that Henry chose to leave her behind when she'd made him her world – it was worse than losing Daniel all over again because Daniel would never have left.
She brought a once steaming mug of apple cider to her lips, the liquid now quite cold, and contemplated the dark heart in her other hand. Whereas her son's heart would probably give off a gentle, golden glow, her own hardened and cracked heart gave off a fine ebony mist. Her thumb ran over the hole, big enough for it to fall in if she wasn't careful. The simple touch sent a shudder down her spine, sharpening the ache to a spike of pain.
Her dark eyes swept over the presents – each one wrapped in another brightly colored paper, most a gold or shade of red, Henry's favorite color; each with his name painstakingly written on the nametag in the fancy, swirling handwriting she'd learned from her mother and she'd found he loved; each presented under the tree in a systematic fashion, the smaller in front and the larger in back, so that when he arrived he could see them all and perhaps understand the depth of her love by all that she was willing to give him. Her gaze paused at the foot of the tree, on the white edge of the crimson tree skirt, where there was a dark brown stain. One Christmas, only a couple of years ago, Henry spilled his mug of hot chocolate on the skirt in his haste to reach the vast amount of presents left by a jolly fat man in a red suit. He'd apologized on the spot and rushed to get a towel, but she'd stopped him, kissing him lightly on his forehead, because this was Christmas and he never needed apologize for anything.
A few months later, he'd grown distant. She'd speak to him, comfort him, encourage him as she always did, and there would be no reply. None of her attempts to draw him out of his shell did anything, and she'd asked the cricket for help, as she had so many years ago before adopting her little prince. She couldn't risk losing him.
Yet here she was tonight, on Christmas Eve, completely alone.
She'd decorated the tree by herself, hanging up all the little ornaments she and Henry had collected throughout the years. Her hands had strayed on the periwinkle "Baby's First Christmas" boot, and she'd been unable to keep herself from crying. In the privacy of her empty home, it was acceptable to cry every now and again, she'd told herself, but that didn't stop her from making sure the windows and blinds were shut tight the next few days as she attempted to put more ornaments up, in case the sudden tears came again.
When Henry, in one of the calls mandated by his other mother, let her know that he would not be home for Christmas, she'd curled up on her long black couch, the mug of apple cider in her hand, and watched the snow fall and the blue and white lights on her Christmas tree go through the cycles – blinking, fading, racing – Henry had loved the racing lights when he was a toddler, always trying to catch up to them, reaching out his little hands for the light he could never quite catch, just like she never really could either.
She didn't know when she'd decided, but at some point, Regina had taken her own heart out. She'd done it before, examining how dark it was, looking for even the tiniest flicker of light, so that it didn't even hurt anymore. Even now, with the Christmas lights flickering, their glow illuminating the tree, her heart absorbed the light, repelled it, only the darkness misting out.
With a heart like this, how could she ever think that Henry would choose her?
Regina ran her thumb down her heart again, across the veins and contortions and hollow husk of it, and thought to herself that perhaps it would be better if she wasn't here at all. Her fingers tightened across the heart, and she knew that if she pushed further it would begin to turn to dust just like Daniel's had. And then...then she'd be free. And Henry would be free from the curse of having an evil queen as his mother, an evil queen who didn't know how to love well, an evil queen who had ten years to love him and somehow, despite everything she tried, never quite understood what it was he wanted from her.
Certainly Henry would be better off without her. The Charmings might coddle him, but no one could deny how much they loved him – or how much he loved them. There was something special about that family, something that she couldn't quite touch or destroy – that golden glow that she knew enveloped Henry's heart coated them, too. They were pure as Daniel was pure, and as much as she fought for her own happiness, tonight Regina had to admit that everything she'd worked for...wasn't worth it.
She took another sip of the cider, and her hand tightened on her heart. A shock ran through her body, and she imagined it was similar to the one that went through Daniel's when her mother first began to crush his heart. But, she reasoned, it would have hurt him more because his pure heart was whole, healthy, beautiful. Hers was already falling apart, so although the squeezing and pressure hurt, it was used to the pain.
Her heart crunched once in her grasp, and a spasm of pain ran through her again, spreading from her chest to her fingers, her toes, her mind. A smile, then, because maybe she was too weak to go through with this, too afraid of the pain. She started to close her hand into a little fist—
"Regina."
One hand, young yet frail, touched her own, and she paused. "What do you want, Daniel?" She didn't need to look up to know that it was him; she knew his voice better than her own, even though her memory seemed insistent on taking that away, too.
"I want you to put your heart back where you found it."
She shook her head, refusing to look at him. No matter what she did, this phantom always appeared. It was her way of consoling herself, of pushing herself to move on, to work harder, to believe. But there wasn't anything to believe anymore – or, worse, there wasn't any reason for it. "I would like to accept my death with peace, please."
Without moving his hand from hers, Daniel bent down until she had no choice but to look at him. The blue eyes she knew so well – the ones that spoke of oceans and eternity and death and a million other things she never quite understood – searched her face, trying to meet her eyes, and for a moment she let them, and the beating heart in her hand stopped. His hand tightened over hers, his thumb rubbing circles on the back of her hand. "You know you don't want to die."
Her throat caught, like she knew it would, like it did every time she imagined him standing before her, speaking to her. The hole in her heart was whistling again. She let her smile return then. "You're right, Daniel. I don't want to die. I wish I was never born. But while I can't change that, I can still change this." Her thumb dipped into the hole of her heart, her fingernail scraping along one edge.
Daniel moved his hand, tightening it around her wrist until her hand shook. A light flickered in his eyes, and she looked away, at the tree, but the blue lights there only mimicked what she saw in his eyes. Everywhere she looked, that same blue glow, eyes looking at her, hurting for her, hurting because of her. "You don't really want that."
"You don't know what I want."
With his free hand, Daniel reached out, stroking her short hair. "Do you know what it would be like? If you'd never been born, do you know what would have happened?"
She pulled back from his hand, that touch so familiar and yet unreal. "Better. There would be no sadness, no curse, no one stuck in a world they never wanted to be in." She sighed. "I've ruined so many lives."
"And Henry?"
Regina closed her eyes, barely able to speak. "His most of all."
She would not cry in the phantom's presence. It was different than crying when she was alone, even if she was only imagining Daniel was here now. Her imagination could still judge her weak and berate her for it later – as it often did when she allowed herself to relax around anyone else. It didn't matter that he wasn't real.
"Would you like to see it?" Daniel asked, but she said nothing. See what? No, best to keep her eyes closed because then, maybe, he would go away and she could continue crushing what was left of her heart. But despite her ignorance, Daniel remained. "Would you like to see how the world might be if you had never been born?"
Like that would make her feel any better. If anything, it would prove him wrong. Then, maybe, he would go away and she could die in peace.
Regina didn't speak, just nodded, and when she moved the hand holding her heart, Daniel let her go. For a vision like this, she might not want her heart out of her body. It went back through her skin and bone just like it came out, beat violently once as it reclaimed its home, then subdued its panic and returned to its normal, pulsing rhythm. All of this she did with her eyes closed because, after removing so many hearts, she didn't need to see. Then she rubbed her hands together, dusting off the crusty grime of her own heart, and opened her eyes.
Everywhere she looked, there was forest. She didn't even have to ask where she was. "Our world."
"Yes," Daniel said, taking her hand once more. "Many, many years ago, in a time before you would have been born."
She squeezed Daniel's hand, and it felt as real in her own as it always did. Then she raised one eyebrow. How could her birth have had an impact before it even happened?
Daniel took a step forward, and they were transported to a castle where a royal ball was being held. She glanced around the room, seeing no one in particular she recognized. One of the men looked a lot like her father might have, once, maybe. But he was dressed much more extravagantly than she had ever seen him – the clothes of a prince and not a butler as he had served both her mother and herself. "Why are we here, Daniel?"
He didn't speak, just led her to a room in the castle's highest tower, where a woman in a crimson dress sat in front of a spinning wheel, a black mask discarded onto a floor covered in straw. The woman ran her hands through the straw, picked up one slender piece, and began to thread it around the spinning wheel, but every time she tried to continue the weave, the wheel would get caught.
"Impossible!" the woman said, her voice hushed, raking her hands through auburn hair she'd piled and pinned on top of her head. "This is impossible."
Regina would know that voice anywhere, no matter how young it might be.
"Mother?" She stepped forward, away from Daniel, and closer to the frail young peasant desperately trying to spin straw into gold. One hand reached out to touch the woman who would be her mother, but it passed through her skin.
Cora shivered once and turned away from them, checking the window again for a jump she could never survive.
She had never seen her mother in such a state of panic before, so she turned to Daniel, confused. "What's going on?"
"Your mother spoke foolishly, and your grandfather expects her to follow through." Daniel nodded towards Cora, who sought once more for the straw to stay on the spindle. Her hands held the straw in place as her foot began to work the wheel, and, finally, a single strand of the straw made it through to the other side, wrapped tight around the bobbin. She let out a little sigh.
Regina crossed her arms across her chest and crouched down to watch, sitting in one of the heaps of straw. It hardly mattered when in the long night her mother learned the trick, so long as, eventually, she succeeded. But as she watched her mother thread strand after long strand of straw through the eye, each tightening together in loops around the bobbin and not one of them changing shape or color, while the sky outside of the window lightened to a bloody red, she realized that something was missing. There was no gold. Why was there no gold?
"He's not coming," Daniel said, finally, as the sun's golden rays appeared on the horizon, lighting the room. He stepped aside as the door to the little tower dungeon opened and a man in royal ivory robes with silver stitching walked in. The man – he must have been a king – took one look across the spinning wheel and smirked at her mother.
There were no words because there didn't have to be. The king gestured with one finger, and guards tore her mother away from the spinning wheel, their hands leaving dark red marks on her otherwise pale skin. Cora tried to keep her composure, to walk with her head tall, but when her eyes met the king's, he slapped her across the face, nails digging into her flesh. Still, she refused to look away until the guards dragged her out of the room.
"My mother...is going to die, isn't she?"
"Yes."
The embers of the night's fire grew low, yet she moved to stand in front of the fireplace, hoping for some semblance of warmth. Straw crunched under her heels. No matter whether she lived or died, her mother met a horrible fate. And yet—
"If my mother dies now, then she can't hurt anyone."
Regina looked at the embers' glow, little flickers of light in the darkness. "Daniel, if I'm not born, she can't kill you." The words fell so softly that they were barely more than a whisper, so quiet that she hoped he hadn't heard them. Only a few months ago, she'd agreed to let him go, but years of a passionate pursuit of one person and one person alone made it very hard to move on. Love again, he'd said, but other than Henry, she'd had no opportunity since then.
She brushed a lock of her hair back behind one ear. As she'd thought before, this trip into a world without her would only make her more certain of her decision, and she didn't even shudder when Daniel took her hand once more. There would be more than this one change, she knew, but saving Daniel's life alone – not being born would have been worth that. But there was nothing she could do now but go along and see what else this phantom had to show her.
Daniel squeezed her hand, and she took a short breath. Her imagination had never done that before. She looked to him with wide eyes, and he smiled at her – a sad smile, not like the joy always on Daniel's face when he was alive because no matter what he was doing, he loved it. No, in this smile there was pain. Her pain. And she wanted to ask but couldn't because she knew if the answer to her question was anything but sadness and misfortune, then she would feel nothing but agony.
So she waited.
This time, they did not teleport anywhere. Daniel simply led her out to the now finished ball, where the man who looked like her father but thinner and happier stood next to a woman in a delicately folded white dress, ebony hair – darker than her own, darker even than Snow's – pulled up into a tight little bun on the top of her pristine head. She whispered something to him and drew away to one of the windows. Regina didn't follow her, but a high-pitched whine filtered through the glass – the sound of an axe sharpened against an executioner's wheel. The whine disappeared in but a moment, and a few seconds later, she heard a blunt thunk.
Even in death, Cora never admitted weakness.
The woman in the white dress returned to the side of the man who must have been Regina's father, and a few moments later the king returned. He gave the woman a slight nod, and she nodded back to him. The other man must have understood the nod and, with a sullen look on his face, led the woman up to the front of the crowd. He waved one hand, and the crowd, tired from the night they'd spent dancing and awaiting the fate of the lying spinster, turned to him, following the gesture of royalty the way they always did.
"I have chosen."
So it was her father. Regina was not surprised at all by that. This must have been where her parents met, how her mother won the heart of a young prince. Or...not so much his heart, but his wallet. Small wonder, then, that she'd never seen them engage in any of the less than scrupulous acts the Charmings went through on a daily basis.
Prince Henry gazed at the woman in white, a bashful smile creeping across his face. "Or, rather, she has chosen me." He took her hand and raised it high before the crowd. "I give you my fiancée, Princess Eva of the Northern Kingdom."
Regina knew that name, knew it like the bones in her skin, like the feel of a heart beating in her open hand, the crunch right before it turned to dust. Her father turned to kiss the princess on her smooth cheek, and the princess smiled, but it was not a happy smile. There was no love there. No matter what the world, Henry was never allowed a loving marriage. But as Regina stepped forward, heels sharp yet soundless on the stone floor, she noticed the look of panic in the young girl's blue eyes. She reached up to cup the girl's cheek, to kiss her soft on her forehead, because she knew what it was to be young and married off like a slab of meat. Her hand passed through Eva's face, just as it had with her mother's arm, and the girl shivered once, the panic in her eyes rising until it glittered in the blue, an impossible jewel in a fathomless ocean.
Regina did not turn from the woman meant to be Snow White's mother, only examining how similar they were in this one moment, a taint of pity tightening her dark heart. "What happens to Leopold?" she whispered, and Eva, as though hearing her, stepped away, into Henry's strong arms. He led her back into the crowd, and they were welcomed with congratulations and cheers and joy.
"He never marries." Daniel stepped forward to meet her once more. Somehow he had been behind her this whole time, watching, never moving from a guardian's stance over the whole proceedings. He clasped his hands behind his back and nodded towards Eva. "In the world where you live, she becomes much more than the girl she is now, and he is able to fall in love. His realm has the wealth to let him marry for love, and he refuses to marry for anything else. Here, when he dies, the kingdom is taken over by George and his kin."
"So Snow is never born." Her words took a bitter turn, throat contorting them, twisting them. The semblance of a smile traces her face, the irony not lost to her. "If I'm not born, then neither is she. But if I'm alive, she's always there, ruining everything."
This, then, is another happiness. If she had never been born, then the world would never know that awful child who could not keep a secret. Another tally mark on her behalf. Perhaps, if she could find a spell, she should use that to erase her existence from ever beginning, instead of merely crushing her own heart. It seemed to be a much better way of destroying their lives than her own feeble Dark Curse.
Now she could ask and be unafraid because, maybe, the answer to this would save her instead of damning her. "And what happens to you, Daniel?"
This time, instead of taking her hand, Daniel simply kissed her forehead, and as Regina closed her eyes at the familiarity of it all, the world shifted beneath her feet once more, from stone to grass, hay, and dirt. The scent of horses – the dirt, dust, and sweat of it – breathed on her. She didn't need her eyes open to see where she was, she saw it all in her mind the way it always had been. The stalls to her left and her right, with no more than four horses – her mother's, rarely used; her father's, well loved; Daniel's Epona, brushed and caressed and the most gentle of them all; and her own Rocinante in the farthest stall, dark and brooding and aching to be wild and free. He would never let anyone other than her ride him because, in his own way, Rocinante knew they were two of the same spirit – trapped in a stall and only allowed out when someone else controlled their steps.
Footsteps in the distance – two pairs – one was Daniel's, she knew his so well. She'd needed to know, when she was alone in the stables and surprising him with a visit, that it was indeed him coming and not her father or her mother. Henry always accepted her presence, but Cora never wanted her there later than she needed to be. She often said the stink of the stables sank into her skin. If she had found her here—
Regina shook her head, listening. She didn't recognize the other pair of footsteps, and she had to realize that, other than Daniel and her father, she knew nothing about any of the people who lived here anymore. She opened her eyes, and Daniel was there – her Daniel, alive and breathing and just as she remembered him, in his brown tunic and pants with the woolen dark blue cape that was so worn it was beginning to unravel, the joy on his face, in his eyes, in his skin so that it glowed with just this unbridled love of being alive and of the girl next to him – the girl that had replaced her in this world.
When they reached the stables, Daniel cupped the girl's face, brushing away curly strands of her golden hair, and bent until his forehead touched hers. The girl – she didn't know her name, how could she know the name of a girl who never existed in the first place? – stepped up on her tippy toes until the two were the same height, then pecked Daniel on the lips, an impish smile lingering on her face – quite like the gold skinned imp she'd once known. Daniel let out a laugh – deep and bright – then took both of the girl's hands before his face sobered.
"Buttercup, I must leave."
Even in this world, the princess Eva had horrible naming skills.
Buttercup lifted one hand out of Daniel's grasp and stroked his cheek. "I know, boy." Her touch brought the saddest smile to his face, not quite the disappointed sadness he had when Regina explained again and again why she couldn't tell her mother anything about him, but something else – similar to how her son looked when he'd come from a day spent with Emma, when he knew that he had to suffer through one more hour with his mother before he could go back to live with his real mom.
She didn't want to watch when Daniel bent down to kiss this Buttercup woman, but she refused to tear her eyes away. His lips met Buttercup's, and it was the kind of kiss that Charming might have given to Snow before he took Emma to the wardrobe – full of love and desperation and parting and, above all, this sense of not knowing. Daniel stepped back when the girl's tiny fingers inched into his hair. "I will come back for you."
And again, the only thing this wisp of a girl could say was, "I know." Regina found herself at once annoyed and repulsed by her and this constant knowing. She watched as Daniel left her behind, torn as to whom she should follow. But, then, Daniel was her guide in this place, and she had no idea where he was going. If he loved this Buttercup person, then why would he leave? He'd never left before. He'd never been able to.
As Regina took a step to follow Daniel, the world shifted around her once more. Now the images flitted past quickly, like the movies she'd taken such interest in watching once she got to Storybrooke. (They were the only thing to fill her time, and sometimes they would give her such a heartwarming feeling – she understood the characters and, if she could meet them, they would understand her. Then she realized that she had met some of them in real life, and they were completely different than that in film. Eventually, she'd stopped watching the videos, too afraid of what she might see or whom she might offend.)
First, Daniel was on a ship. Then, the ship was attacked by Hook and his pirates, Daniel not the sole survivor, but the only one allowed to stay with the pirates. Daniel learned to be a pirate and returned to Henry and Eva, finally, with the money to make him respectable, but Buttercup was long gone, promised to a certain Charming. He chased after her, and Charming – David in this world, though George insisted on his replacing James – let her go to be with her true love. Even here, his heart ached for it, and that pain made Regina smile. He'd never meet her. She wasn't even alive.
And, in the end, Daniel and Buttercup got the marriage she'd always wanted, and Daniel was welcomed into their home. It seemed her father, Henry, loved him; it was only Eva who'd insisted on him making a name for himself or bringing the wealth necessary to support the lifestyle of a royal. Somehow it didn't matter where he got the wealth, only that he did have it and could get it again. Buttercup didn't seem to mind it at all, though. She and her husband were quite happy where they were.
When Regina turned away, refusing to see any more of their lives, Daniel appeared in front of her once more. He was not the Daniel she had seen with Buttercup, but he might have been. She pressed her lips together and finally said, "You live." She didn't look up, but Daniel watched her with such care that she might as well have. "You're happy." Even if it was with that golden-haired brat, it was more than nothing.
This made up her mind. When she returned, she wouldn't need to crush her heart, only find a potion that could erase her from ever being.
"For now."
Daniel's words gave her pause. Now she looked up, met his eyes, searched them for some knowledge. "What do you mean, 'For now'? Without me, my mother dies, Snow isn't born, and you live. These are all wonderful, good things. And not only do you live – you get to be with this...this person." She stepped forward, placing one hand on his cheek in a way the other girl did, his skin so cold beneath her palm. "You would have been happy."
"For now." Daniel took her hand once more. "There is still more you need to see." He led her away from the wedding, through double doors she'd once strode through, anger nicking at her heels, but she couldn't resist a backward glance. That should have been her. She should have been able to make Daniel happy the way this Buttercup did – not just for those few months they were in love, but forever happily after.
They stepped out of her old castle, and the world shifted around them once more, this time leading them to a dark castle both intimately familiar and horrifying. She glanced through the windows, at the hoard and collection – antiques and spells and potions littering the walls, each in a particular place, and she could almost name them all. Her hand reached out for the window, and when she found that it went through just as easily as it did through people's skin, she stepped through, shivering once. Everything was just as she remembered it, save for the one chipped cup. She turned to Daniel, one eyebrow raised. "Why would I care what happens to Rumplestiltskin?"
A smile remained on Daniel's face, but he kept his lips shut tight as he nodded behind her. Regina whirled around, only to see Rumplestiltskin standing there. She shook her head, kneading her forehead. This was getting out of hand.
Then Rumple reached over and touched her shoulder gently. "Because, dearie, I care very much what happens to you."
Regina shuddered once at Rumple's touch – familiar and ice cold. She removed her hand, only for the golden man's speckled eyes to stare intently at her. With a grimace, she stepped back out of his grasp. "And why would you care what happens to me?"
"Because, in another world, you're my monster." Rumplestiltskin raised one hand, a finger tracing the curve of her cheek. He smiled, soft, not harsh like she'd always seen him before. There was something there, something she couldn't quite touch, something she missed in those golden eyes. This wasn't the imp she knew so well, and an involuntary shiver ran down her spine.
Then he giggled and stepped back, hands flourishing, returning to the familiar. His golden eyes trailed to Daniel with the hint of a nod, and he turned away. "I get what I want either way, you know." Rumplestiltskin picked up a white orb and span it in one of his hands before tossing it back to Regina. She raised her hands up to catch it, but the orb passed through her, landing with a shatter onto the cold stone floor.
Her heart felt hollow.
"You can't even catch that, can you, dearie?" The golden, cursed jester of a man wrinkled one eyebrow. He stood far and away, tight leather boots scuffing together. But then the smile returned – soft and unfamiliar, almost calm. "It's Christmas in the real world, and you think it'd be better to just die on us."
Regina shuffled her feet together. The whole night was changing her mind as it continued on – not that she should die, although she was quite certain on that point, but that she should erase her entire existence. To do that, though, she'd need a spell, a potion of some sort, and she wasn't going to try and explain that to her old master and current foe. He wouldn't understand.
Her lack of an answer just caused him to giggle once more. "You're probably right, dearie." A twirl of one hand and a vial appeared in a plume of violet smoke. A clear liquid jostled inside. "Here. It'll make the pain easier." He didn't need to wink, his voice suddenly surprisingly serious.
"The pain of death?"
"The pain of not existing anymore."
Regina took the vial from his hands, holding it up to her eyes and examining it. Small silver flakes danced on the liquid's surface and a yellow-cream dust sat at the bottom. "What is it?"
"A tiny bit of your mother's heart and a few of the tears extracted from her eyes right before they shriveled with her death, among other things." The words seemed forced somehow, cut off. Nevertheless, he continued. "Drink that when you return, and this world – the one without you – will become real." He grinned.
"All magic comes with a price," Regina said, stepping back and hiding the vial in one of the jackets on her black coat. "What do you want for this one?"
Rumplestiltskin grinned again. "Call it a Christmas present for an evil queen."
As if the price wasn't obvious enough. Her birth, her life, her mother's life, Snow's life. Everything that was different about this world – that was the price of this vial. Daniel, alive and happy without her, that was the reward. She could bring him back. That alone was worth it. She looked up, letting her eyes meet the imp's, and she gave a nod of acknowledgment. "Thank you."
"No, thank you, dearie." Rumple looked over to Daniel once more, as if to ask if the guide was done with him. Daniel gave a short little nod in return, and Rumple reached over to pat Regina's shoulder. His hand slipped through her skin. "Good to be back where I belong."
It was the hunch of his shoulders when he turned to go further back in his castle that gave him away. In all honesty, Regina didn't much care, but something about the imp being kind to her made her curious. "Rumplestiltskin."
"Ah, you remember my name." But he didn't turn back.
"Where's Belle?"
Rumplestiltskin froze where he stood, and one hand seemed to reach for an ornate cane that did not exist in this world. His skin shuddered once. "Who's Belle?" His voice caught on the words and he slipped through the doorway, leaving Regina and Daniel alone.
This time she turned to Daniel, who alone seemed to know exactly what was going on. "Daniel, where's Belle?"
Daniel took Regina by the hand and led her out of the Dark One's castle. As they walked along the gravel road, the trees casting hunched over shadows across the rocks, he squeezed her palm gently. "Do you remember the story you told him once, when he let Belle leave?"
"Yes," Regina said, her voice hesitant. "But that was just a story."
"In your world." The ground beneath them began to shake, to twist, to change. "In this world, it came true because you weren't there to capture her or steal her away."
As everything shifted around them, Regina let one hand return to the vial. She gave it a sharp squeeze, as though to keep in mind that it was really there. If that was the case – if in this world, Belle was really dead – why would Rumplestiltskin give her the opportunity to make it reality? Unless she was missing something, unless he knew without a doubt that she would never actually go through with it. But, in that case, why give her the potion in the first place? She never could quite understand the imp's thought processes, and this was no different.
Her hand tightened on Daniel's as the world grew firm under her feet once more. Snow covered the ground and glistened under the light of a not-quite-full moon. The stars twinkled overhead merrily, illuminating the sharp, jagged rocks of a cliff face. She knew this spot. In a circle, the most evil people of her world gathered together, and at their head, a young girl – not even twenty yet – stood, a red-hooded cape tugged tight around her shoulders. Each handed her a single strand of hair from their heads – no more, no less – and she placed them into the fire, burning her hands as she did so.
Red didn't seem to mind the pain.
Regina refused to glance away because she understood what was happening even if she didn't know why. The Curse demanded an audience, even if it was just one woman and her honorary guard, and this child enacting something so dark – so uncharacteristic – owned her attention. She let go of Daniel's hand and stepped closer, until she was standing right beside the young werewolf.
There were tears in the girl's eyes as she grasped a heart in her two hands, cradling it. She bent her head until the heart touched her lips. "Granny, I'm so sorry." The words, a whisper, held nothing more than regret and pain. Red did not toss the heart in the fire but kneeled, her hand outstretched, until the tiniest flame touched the still warm heart. As the heart started to smoke, a violet plume arose, and the tiniest of smiles crept onto Red's face – broken and very aware. The girl closed her eyes, and a relaxed look came across her face – one that Regina certainly didn't have at this moment in time. She had no need to relax, only to crow and gloat in her victory. But the young Red did not look victorious, only broken and finally at peace.
As the Curse engulfed the inhabitants nearest it then worked its way into the rest of the woods, Regina whispered to Daniel, "What did she want to forget?" She nodded towards Red's still form, and even though Daniel was standing far away, she knew he heard her, just as she knew she would hear his response.
"Killing her true love."
Daniel whispered, too, but the knowledge itself was a dagger through the hole in her heart. She glanced to him, blinking once, twice, and before she could think to ask, he replied, "It happened in the real world, too, not just here." He wrapped the worn blue cape closer around him, as though to shield himself from the truth, then continued. "Snow helped her work through it."
He didn't have to continue. Regina glanced back to the girl again, the red hood falling back off of Red's head and showing the weary face beneath, eyes dark with shadows. She reached out one hand, and her thumb touched the soft skin along her cheekbones, gaunt and stretched thin. In her own world, she'd never thought to ask why, out of all Snow's friends, Ruby stuck the closest. When she cast the Curse, she hadn't had to know every intimate detail of her subjects' lives – the Curse filled most everything in for her – and Ruby had never seemed like one to be desperate for a man in any shape or form. It had never really mattered to her.
Still – this did not change her mind. Red's life did not matter to her, not then and certainly not now. At least this was one she had not ruined as she had the others – it was ruined enough to begin with. Besides, back in Storybrooke, she had that thing with the good doctor. If anything she had helped this one out, and they weren't even friends. So there.
As the Curse dragged the Enchanted Forest to Storybrooke, Regina felt herself and Daniel dragged right along with it. She glanced to him, and he gave a steady little smile. To her surprise, he did not take her hand this time, just let the world fall right out underneath them and let it right itself without his touch, and, when everything was said and done, Storybrooke looked as it always had – the clock tower standing in place, time frozen.
The funny thing was – even though the world itself hadn't changed, she expected everything else to change, too. Surely the people within would be miserable without their true love. It was only then that she realized that the people she knew of with someone like that – Snow, Abigail, and even Rumplestiltskin – wouldn't have been that way in the Enchanted Forest. Here, at least, they had forgotten. Charming never knew of his Snow, so when he and Abigail were transplanted here, she with no memories of a Frederick never rescued from his golden prison, their lives were actually better. And Rumplestiltskin – he, of course, knew of a way to get out of the Curse, even without the spawn of Snow and her Charming prince. He would have a way to get to Baelfire without her.
And Daniel?
He took her to the stables, and Ruby hadn't touched them. The Dark Curse, in retrospect, did not so much take away happy endings as it took away memories and cursed them to forget who they were. The desire to get rid of happy endings – the part of the Curse that forced that – depended entirely on the caster. Red had no intent to remove any of that, only to forget. Daniel and Buttercup would remain together here because Red didn't care what happened to them one way or the other. What did memories of a past life matter when they were still together? David Nolan and Mary-Margaret would have been happy, if they had been allowed. So, therefore, Daniel and Buttercup still were.
In fact – the Dark Curse, spun into place by a werewolf desiring an opportunity to forget, was quite tame.
A part of Regina wanted to take Daniel by the hand, as she once imagined herself doing, and show him every little crevice and wonder of the little town in Maine. She wanted to take him to Granny's – which didn't exist here – and feed him hamburgers and french fries and the wonderful deliciousness that was pancakes drenched in maple syrup. She wanted to watch his face gleam with delight as she showed him their boats and roads and even the forests that were here. She wanted to see his confusion as they drove in cars or used electric lights or even flushed a toilet. He would have loved all these things. But this town wasn't hers, and he was only here to show her what life would be like without her.
For now, life appeared to be doing pretty good.
There was only one thing that bothered her, and it wasn't until she was here in Storybrooke, looking around at everything, that she realized what was missing. She took a deep breath, surprised that she hadn't realized it earlier. If there was no Snow, then there could be no Emma. And without Emma, there could be no Henry.
The world might be a better place without her, but it would be worse without him, without the child who alone knew how to make her smile. She took Daniel's hand and squeezed it once. "Take me back, Daniel," she said, and without a word, he complied. The illusionary Storybrooke gave way to the real one, and in it all Daniel disappeared, giving her only the most cursory of smiles.
He knew that she would keep her existence because he knew that she wanted Henry to exist.
Henry was, after all, everything, and when she'd said that, she meant it.
She didn't even have to think about it.
The clock ticked overhead, each click a little slower, a little quieter, than the one before it. Snow fell outside of her window, coating the ground and her barren apple tree. Her front walk, freshly cleaned that morning, now froze beneath another blanket of frost and ice. And Regina sat, apple cider in a mug beside her, a dark heart in her hand and a vial with a clear liquid in the other.
Her thumbnail scratched the surface of the vial, and she closed her eyes. There was something of her mother here, something of the woman who once loved her, something of the girl who died in a universe that never quite existed but still could. It was funny how without her, they would all, at some point in time or another, feel absolutely miserable and unloved. Without her, they would be her. Without her – she would win.
It would be safer, she thought, to throw the vial in the fireplace and be done with it. Regina closed her eyes then tapped the vial against her forehead. The light of the dying fire flickered through the glass, causing the remnants of her mother's heart to sparkle like gold. They glistened in the bottom of the tear, and it became almost opaque. To make the potion come into effect, she had to drink it. But there were other ways to go about keeping it without drinking it.
The hand holding the vial glowed golden as she set a spell along the vial, making it both unbreakable and impossible to open. Then she very carefully placed the vial into the hole in her heart. This way, no matter what happened, she could keep her mother with her, always – and as her heart grew, it would only make her mother completely inseparable from who she was. Although, in retrospect, it wasn't really her mother at all, but the young girl who would, in another world, have died from an imp's refusal to save her.
How many others had died that way?
Regina gazed out the window once more, as the fire grew low. Across the street, Abigail and Frederick's house gleamed with ropes of lights. She could see their tree through the window, all gold and red and green and pine, each bough covered with intricately detailed ornaments, an angel perched on the top. When Abigail was Kathryn Nolan, she had often invited Regina over for tea or lunch – something to while away the lonely hours in their empty lives. They'd never been particularly close, though. Each had a hole – one because the Curse demanded it, and one that was now healed.
She remembered how, one night, she and Henry went outside and built a snowman. He'd been young at the time and exhausted by the time they were done. She'd cradled him in her arms, and he had rested his head against her chest, comforted by her warmth.
Her hand tightened on her heart again.
A sudden knocking came at the door, and Regina froze in her seat. She would have thought that, if someone walked up to her house, she would have noticed by now, looking out the front window as she was. But, lost in memories, it was impossible to pay attention to the outside world. She glanced down at the heart still beating, slow and methodical, in her hand and quickly replaced it back in her chest, the vial staying inside. Her chest felt cold with the vial – cold and sad and broken. Perhaps that wasn't the best place to hide it, but she didn't want to lose it either.
The knocking again, softer this time, less insistent – three steady knocks. Regina slipped off of her couch, her slippers shuffling across the hardwood floor to the front door. She took a deep breath and opened the door, not even taking the moment to look through the peep hole. Somehow she knew that, if she checked, she wouldn't open up at all.
There, in the haze of the still falling snow, stood Snow, her cream jacket tucked tight against her body. She smiled when she saw Regina, and one hand seemed to push through long hair that she kept forgetting she no longer had. Her breath fogged in the air, little white poofs of cloud that evaporated just as quickly as they appeared. She took a deep breath, as though remembering where she was, and opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Finally, she said, her voice soft and afraid, "You answered."
"Of course I answered." There was no reason for Snow to think that, in Storybrooke, she wouldn't. The last time Snow came knocking on her door, she'd answered and, against her most recent judgment, allowed the idiot to live. Regina didn't roll her eyes – her mother had always said it was most unladylike, so she'd learned other ways of expressing her disgust with others – but she crossed her arms across her chest. That was enough, and Snow appeared to get almost defensive, the smile on her face fading at once. But she didn't glance away, as she might have when she was a child, and Regina took the moment to look herself, to see if anyone else followed their perfect little princess to the evil queen's home, to make sure that she of all people would be safe.
There was no one.
"What do you want, Snow?"
In all normal occurrences, these words would come out bitter and full of hatred, but tonight, she couldn't gather the strength. As much as she loathed the girl in front of her – and she was still a little girl in her mind, playing with dresses and jewelry and love, things much bigger than she could ever really understand – tonight she'd been reminded that without Snow there would be no Henry. And so, tonight, she could not hate her.
For once in her life, Snow seemed to not know what to say, and it was as if she was that same child again, when they first met, trying so hard to please her new mother, a woman she didn't know never wanted to see her again. She tried to force a smile onto her face and shook her head, to herself, more than anything. Then she looked up, her eyes meeting Regina's, and the queen couldn't help but remember that, the first time she'd seen those hazel eyes, she hadn't felt hate but protective.
"Do you wanna build a snowman?"
Regina's eyes narrowed, and her eyes flicked to the expanse of white snow in front of her yard. Normally, she might wait for Henry for actions such as these, but right now she'd appreciate any person – enemy or not – who asked for a moment of her time. Perhaps it might remove some of this aching alone-ness.
So she slipped into dark leather boots that sat just by the door, waiting for her to put them on first thing in the morning, and stepped out into the frigid cold. Snow gave her a timid smile, as though waiting for her permission, clearly wanting to enjoy the night.
Regina just let out a sigh but did not move from her front porch. "Why did you come here?" It was Christmas Eve, a night meant to be spent with family, and all of the family Snow had left – her Charming, her Emma, and... – they were all at her house, surrounded by warmth and food and presents and joy such as Regina had only ever really felt with Daniel and Henry and – why? Why was she here? Why not stay there, loved, instead of coming here where her very request was almost a slap in her face?
Snow just shrugged once, shivering in the cold. "No one should have to be alone on Christmas. Not even you, Regina." She let out a sigh of her own and stepped out onto the front yard, examining it from all angles. "Now, how do we want to do this? Just one snowman, or hundreds – something that the townspeople will never forget?"
"One will do just fine, Snow."
Regina shook her head, but she couldn't help but feel warm. A smile tentatively crept onto her face. Maybe, just maybe, she would make it through the night.
Maybe.