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The Enchanted Forest
Screams split the once peaceful air of Snow White and Prince Charming's bedroom. Snow lied on the bed, held partially upright by her husband, her chest heaving with each breath she took.
"I... can't... have this baby now." She gasped out.
"Doc, do something." Charming pleaded as the trusted dwarf dabbed at the queen's forehead with a cool cloth. Without waiting for a response from the dwarf, Charming turned his attention to back to his wife. "It's going to be okay. The wardrobe's almost finished. Just... hold on." He begged quietly. He agreed wholeheartedly with her: she couldn't have their baby so soon.
As Snow threw her head back and let out another scream, the door flew open and Geppetto appeared with his son at his side.
"It's ready. It will take two." The old man announced. Charming opened his mouth to protest; it had been made very clear that the wardrobe would only take one. Their entire plan rested on that fact. But then his eyes trailed down to the man's son, who stood against him, holding his hand, and Charming understood immediately. As much as he wanted to be angry with the old man for lying to them in the first place, he understood. He wanted to save his child. If anyone could understand that, it was Charming. Yet, inexplicably, he was choosing a different course of action.
"Thank you." Charming whispered, barely sure the man could hear him. But Geppetto nodded in response and and he and his son hurried away again. Charming turned to Snow. "Did you hear that? It's ready." He started to pick her up, but Doc rushed over.
"It's too late. We can't move her!"
The next few moments were a blur for Charming. He was vaguely aware of Doc coaching Snow through the contractions and much more acutely aware of the thunder and lightning approaching, signaling the curse that was causing the storm. He held Snow up, letting her brace herself against him as she screamed bloody murder over and over. His thoughts were chaotic and he felt powerlessness to help her, or his kingdom as a whole. He had had more control herding sheep and chickens than he did over this situation and he hated it more than anything.
A baby's cries cut though his thoughts like a sword. His head snapped up as Doc handed a baby over to Snow. Emma was already wrapped up in her blanket with her name on it and Snow held their daughter to her chest for warmth. Charming couldn't help but let out a relieved laugh; their daughter was there, safe and healthy. In that moment, he forgot about everything else going on around them.
That moment ended abruptly when Snow's smiling expression contorted into one of pain again.
"Take the baby." She gasped, shoving Emma into Charming's arms. "There's another baby." She panted through another contraction.
Doc was back beside her in an instant and Charming watched as Snow pushed through more contractions. He held a squirming Emma in his arms, as aware of her cries as he was of his wife's. Another couple of panicked filled minutes passed before he heard another baby crying and Snow collapsed against his shoulder in exhaustion.
Their second baby, another girl, was wrapped up in a warm blanket and handed to Snow. She held her second daughter close and kissed her head even as her eyes drooped with exhaustion. Some part of he was filled with happiness she couldn't even begin to describe. Another part of her felt awful she hadn't known she was having twins. Twins, she'd heard, ran in a family. Her husband had been a twin. More to the point, she'd carried them inside her for nine months. She couldn't believe she had never felt it. Or, perhaps she had. She remembered moments where she felt like she was being kicked in two places at once. Moments where she'd sensed something she couldn't explain. She didn't have her mother there to tell her how everything should feel, but now she wished she'd gotten up the courage to ask Granny, or one of the other many mothers around the castle.
She snapped out of her guilty thoughts enough to realize Charming was leaning against her, providing her with a better look at Emma while giving himself a better look at their second daughter. She couldn't keep her eyes on one of them for long; she always looked over at the other, trying to memorize everything about them. Emma's tiny nose and dark peach fuzz hair. Alexia's dark green eyes and tiny little mouth.
"What should we name her?" Snow asked quietly, not wanting to disturb their daughters as they were finally settling down in their arms.
"Alexia." Charming suggested, keeping his voice low as well.
"Emma and Alexia." The names rolled off her tongue as easily as if she'd been saying them her whole life and she couldn't help but smile and nod in agreement.
As she held her daughter on her arms, her husband and first born daughter against her shoulder, a horrible thought occurred to her. Slowly, she looked up, tearing her eyes away from her daughters, and sucked in a breath.
"The wardrobe... It only takes two." She spoke her horrible thought and Charming raised his eyes to meet hers, his smile fading.
The sounds of swords clanging against each other sounded in the hall outside and both of them turned instinctively towards the door. The Evil Queen's men were already in the castle... Snow held Alexia closer, as weak form of protection from the black knights just outside their door.
"Then our plan has failed." Charming's voice sounded shaky; Snow kept her eyes on her daughters to avoid seeing what she could only imagine was a horrified look on his face. "At least we're together." His voice sounded stronger then, as if he'd accepted their fate just like that.
"No." Snow's voice came out stronger than she'd expected and she caught Charming's attention immediately. "You have to take them. Take the babies to the wardrobe."
"Are you out of your mind?"
"No. It's the only way. You have to send them through." She raised her voice, hoping to be heard over him repeating 'no' over and over again.
"You don't know what you're saying." He tried to insist.
"No, I do! We have to believe that they will come back for us! We have to give them their best chance." Those words seemed to resonate deep within for Charming, as his shoulders sagged, the argument over with just that motion. Snow looked away from his heartbroken expression, reaching past him for the parchment and writing quill on her desk. Watching her husband kiss both their children out of the corner of her eye, she wrote down Alexia's name in the neatest font she could manage with a shaking hand. Then she ripped the parchment into a small piece and busied herself pinning it to Alexia's blanket, the only form of identification she could manage in such a short time.
Trying to stop the tears streaming down her face, he bent over to kiss Alexia's head and then Emma's.
"Goodbye." She whispered, knowing and hating that they didn't understand her or know what was happening to them. She placed Alexia in the crook of Charming's arm, pressed against Emma who was in turn pressed against Charming's shoulder. It kept his sword hand free. And Snow knew he would need it.
Charming had tears in his eyes as he looked at her and Snow fought back the sob in her chest. There was no time for crying when their children were in danger of a horrible curse. They just had to trust that their daughters would find them. Through magic, destiny or whatever it had to be. They had to find them.
Charming leaned over and kissed Snow. She pulled him closer, trying to make the kiss last as long as possible, a sinking feeling in her chest as she realized it might be the last they shared for years, but then they both pulled away. With one last look back, Charming took his sword and vanished into the hall, taking with him the last view Snow had of her daughters. As his footsteps faded and disappeared, Snow let the sobs she'd been holding in rip through her, pain slicing into her heart like she had never imagined pain could.
Hurrying through the halls, Charming could hear the sounds of fights all around him. He kept moving towards the nursery, trying to stay alert but not think about the death around him at the same time. He rounded a corner and stopped in his tracks as one of his men fell to the ground with a sword wound through his chest. Two black knights stood between him and the nursery. Charming glanced down at the precious bundles in his arms and then charged.
Few things had come naturally to Charming. At one time in his life, he thought the only thing he'd ever be good at was herding sheep. But sword fighting was natural to him, he'd learned. With one hand, he blocked and parried strikes, slashing out with a few vicious attacks of his own. It was like muscle memory for him by that point; no extra thought needed. Then, as if in slow motion, he saw a sword swinging down towards his daughters. He blocked it and kicked the knight away, but that one fearful second had thrown him off. He slashed at one of the knights but, by the time he'd turned again, he was greeted by a sword slicing through his shoulder, barely missing Emma and Alexia in the process. He yelled in pain but managed to stab his sword into the knight and kill him.
Stumbling, with his sword hand pressed against the fresh wound, he kicked open the door to the nursery and ran in. The wardrobe was sitting across from the crib and he rushed over. He used his foot to open the doors and then kneeled down on the cold floor, dropping his sword in favor of being able to gently put his daughters down in the wardrobe. Charming leaned down and pressed a kiss to each of their foreheads and leaned back against his heels.
"Find us." He whispered. Then he shut the doors and scrambled to lock it behind them.
Footsteps thundered towards him and he grabbed his sword, scrambling to his feet. Fighting with an injured shoulder against the two black knights in front of him didn't help him, natural talent or not. Within seconds, pain shot through his stomach. He looked down at the sword blade sticking out from his rib-cage in shock. The room spun and he found himself lying on the floor with no memory of the impact. He turned his head with the last of his strength and saw one of the black knights hammering on the lock to the wardrobe, trying to force it open.
As the lock broke and the doors swung open. The wardrobe was empty.
With a ghost of a smile on his face, Charming let his eyes close and the darkness take him...
A/N I'm so glad you've decided to click on my story and read the first chapter. Thank you! If you could take a few seconds to drop a review, that would make my day!
As you can probably tell, this is an AU story. Some things will be changed directly because of Alexia's actions in the future, some will be changed merely because I, as the writer, want them to be and it has little to do with what Alexia herself does. I hope you'll continue reading each new chapter to see what changes are made and explore this new story.
I can't promise regular updates on this but, as its my current writing project, they will come fairly quickly. I intend to go through all the seasons (because I never do anything halfway) and I hope that you'll stick around to read all of those episodes that I rewrite.
Thank you in advance for any following, favoriting or reviewing that I sincerely hope you do!
~ RoniMikaelson
