A/N: This takes place the night after the 5.02 Camelot flashbacks. Written as a tumblr prompt for dorabellatrix.


Regina sat beside Robin's bed while he rested. Emma's dark magic had healed the sword wound-a topic and problem for tomorrow she knew-but he still needed to rest. And so she did the only thing she knew how to do when her loved ones were sick. She sat by their bedside. David and Mary Margaret had taken Roland so that he wouldn't see his father pale or how scared Regina was, and Belle and Granny were looking after Henry.

She was playing with a ring in her hand when he woke long past midnight, and turned to her, "Hey."

She smiled relieved, "Hey."

"I could be more articulate but I was stabbed tonight and I think I get a pass."

She nodded, "You do."

He gestured to the ring, "What's that? You wear it all the time."

"It's ... something that will sound creepy."

He smiled, "The day we met you grinned like a mad woman and promised to destroy someone. I have a warped value of creepy with you."

She tilted her head, "Point."

"So what's the story?"

"When the King died I had one of the rings he wore cut off his finger before he was buried. I have a scar... just below my ear..." He reached up and touched it without looking, he knew where it was. "I had the stone taken from the ring and placed in a new setting. To take his power and make it mine."

Robin nodded and Regina continued, "And I was thinking about a young man who died tonight because he wanted to kill a demon of his. Just as I had once killed a demon of mine."

He reached over and took the ring from her. "It seems to me that perhaps it is time that you stop wearing your demons and let them fade." He closed his hand around the ring.

"Robin my demons almost cost you your life tonight. Roland his father. What right do i have..."

"It's not your right. It's mine. And loving you means loving a woman whose demons are in the past."

He cupped her face and leaned his forehead against hers.

"And when they appear again?" She said quietly.

"You'll face them. And I'll be there to help you."

He pulled her into a hug and she wrapped her arms around him, finally crying tears of relief that he was alive.