You're sure Regina's going to tell Grams who her visitor was and you'll be in big trouble (You can't imagine Grams punishing you, not when she's so gentle, so instead you're left with the image of an apple on your head as your very pregnant grandmother aims an arrow at it), but there's no sign of Regina in the rest of the castle for the rest of the day and Grams doesn't say a word about it. Maybe she's giving you another chance, now that you've returned the picture and she knows you weren't a malicious spy.

Maybe she wants you to come back.

You're clinging to your own curiosity now in favor of the truth, you know that. You shouldn't go back. This entire world depends on you never meeting the sorceress in the east wing, and you're playing with fire. But you can't shake the thoughts of her from your mind, not when there's something between you both that you can't remember and when she might be more accessible than before.

And you need your sneakers back, right?

Her bedroom door is closed when you sneak back down there the next night, sealing her off from you, and you breathe a sigh of relief as you step out of the wall. Your sneakers are sitting on the desk, the laces neatly tucked in and the outer leather shinier than you remember. You almost laugh at the idea of Regina using magic to clean off the scuff marks and the dust. It suits her, you think. Ma would never- C'mon, Henry, you've gotta get the shine out of those shoes before you blind me- but it feels sort of comforting to have someone keep such attention to detail.

You take them from their place, hooking the laces over your fingers and swinging them from side to side, and only then do you notice the thick white sheet of paper that had been below them with your name written across the top.

You pick it up, your heart thumping against your chest at the careful cursive of your name. It changes things, somehow, knowing that Regina is talking back to you, that she knows that you're here now and she wants to communicate. The closed door of her bedroom might be your barrier, but you can receive a letter from her without any dire consequences, and you're not sure why you're so glad to know that but you smile at the paper nonetheless.

The message is curt and to the point, and if you hadn't seen the way Regina had wept yesterday, you might have misconstrued her reaction here as anger. You know the risks, Henry. There's nothing for you here, and coming into my quarters will only invite disaster. There's a line underneath it crossed out with savage force, blackening the whole paper, but all you can make out below the markings is You need to be strong because I can't– and nothing else.

There's a postscript halfway down the page, and you blink down at it, bemused. And stop scuffing your sneakers. You're a prince, not a peasant.

The fondness at her reproof is overwhelming and unexpected, leaving you grinning like she'd told you that you won the lottery. It feels comfortable, familiar, like coming home after a long day away. It feels like Ma had been, way back when you were little and she'd been much stricter with you than she is now, and it fills you with warmth even when it's from a stranger.

On impulse, you open the shallow drawer in the desk and peer around until you find an old-fashioned pen, and then you're scrawling questions on the paper before you can stop yourself. Did you know me in Storybrooke? Why was my mother the price for coming here? Were you the queen who cursed everyone into the town when my ma was a baby? How are you gonna fight the Wicked Witch? Is there some other way that I can see you? On and on you write until your hand is tired and your handwriting has shrunk to fit in the last bits of empty space on the page. Why don't you go out into the castle more? Is my ma good at magic? What if we just wrote back and forth like this? How can I tell when my fake memories started? Why won't anyone tell me about what happened in Storybrooke?

You don't stop until you're out of room and you're breathing hard, the weight of a million questions heavy on your mind and across the page. Grams is honest enough about the world around you but she doesn't talk about before, about the things you can't remember that everyone else knows. You're not a little kid anymore, and you're sure you can handle anything horrible that they're keeping from you, but instead you've gotten only stilted answers that tell you nothing at all.

Regina won't lie to you, you think, reading the stern words in her flowing writing across the top of the page one last time before you slip back into the wall and close the stone door behind you. In this quiet sanctuary where she remains alone, she hasn't actively tried to keep you away, to seal the walls with spells or lock you out. There's a part of her that must be okay with you being around, even with the danger contained in each of your interactions.

Maybe you're just fooling yourself, but you can't bring yourself to care very much.

You hear the creak of a door opening from your place in the wall, and Regina moves into your line of sight a few moments later. She's red-eyed and wary, her head cocked as she listens for noise, and she moves into the parlor only after a long minute of hesitation, heading for the desk. She takes the paper and sinks down onto the couch, reading your response silently, her lips moving to mouth the words as she reads them.

You can just barely see her from your angle, and you dart past her door in the hallway to enter the wall on the opposite side of the room and watch her better. Her forehead is buried in one palm, now, fingers massaging her temples as she continues to stare down at the letter, and you long to come out right now and demand to know what she's thinking.

Instead, you watch silently as she squeezes the page in her other hand, hard enough to tear holes through it with her nails, and she rises abruptly and makes her way into the study where she does her magic.

The next night there's a book lying open on the desk. The pages are blank, and you flip through it curiously until you see your name engraved on the cover and the brisk message spreading across the first page as you stare. You can't come here anymore, no matter how many questions you have. Take the book, Henry. I want your word.

You glance at Regina's bedroom door- closed again, shutting her off from you- and tuck the book under your arm, settling down in your space behind the wall. I promise, you write under her message, chewing on your lip. You don't want to give her that, but you know instinctively that she'll settle for nothing less.

The words appear beneath your response, letter by letter of elegant penmanship. That includes the passages behind my quarters.

You scowl at the page and write a question instead. The question. Did we know each other when I was in Storybrooke?

There's no response, and you tense, because if this is a battle of wills you're prepared to fight her with all you've got. She can keep you out of her quarters, but you won't promise to stay away from her, not when seeing her feels more right than anything else in this castle and there's a little thrill moving through your heart at just this tiny communication.

You hunker down onto the cool floor of the passageway and stare at the book in the light seeping in through the door. Regina feels close, closer than she's ever been, writing you messages in an enchanted book you can't put down. You won't let her go now, and you're nothing but obstinate when determined.

You expect silence stretching through the night and another evening spent asleep against a stone wall. Instead you're surprised to see a flicker of movement in the room beside you as Regina emerges, dressed in pajamas with an identical book in her arms and looking unaccountably tired as she turns to address the wall behind which you're waiting. "Go to your bed and get some sleep, Henry. We'll talk in the morning."

She says it gently but firmly, and your body reacts as though it's been conditioned to listen to her from birth and rises before you can think to protest the order.

In the morning, you get the closest thing you'll ever get to an answer from Regina while you're sitting at the breakfast table. We were acquainted, yes. The details of your time in Storybrooke are moot while you still lack your memories and they'll only confuse you. Patience, Henry.

You sigh and shut the book, aware of Grams's eyes on you. "That must be a good book," she comments. "You've been peeking inside all meal."

You shrug. "It's okay." You're positive that she won't approve of you talking to Regina even through a book, and so you stare back at your plate while her brow furrows and contemplate a change of topic. "When is Ma coming back?"

Grams smiles understandingly. "It shouldn't be much more time. We've received word that the Witch is on the move, her army attacking some of the smaller villages near the border, and your mother's party is helping with relief efforts there before they come home. Not much more than another week," she offers.

"Oh." You try not to let your disappointment bleed through, because Grams is really great and she's trying hard to keep you happy while you're stuck here waiting for Ma, but you think you might have failed when she reaches over to squeeze your shoulder.

"How about we get started on riding today?" she offers. "I was hoping that your grandfather could teach you, but some preliminary bonding with the horses here might help in the meantime."

"Bonding?" you repeat, because that doesn't sound like riding to you.

It isn't. It's brushing the horse and feeding him under the watchful gaze of the stable master, talking to the horse and building some form of trust between the two of you. "Talk to him," Grams encourages you, and the horse nuzzles your hand as though there's already some familiarity in those big dumb eyes. "Let him get to know you and you might be riding even before everyone gets back."

You nod and smile and wait until she leaves before you settle down on a bale of hay next to your horse's stall. "You don't mind if I write a little during our alone time, do you?"

The horse tilts his head from side to side, eyes half-closed as he regards you. You pat his snout and open your book again, retrieving the pen you'd slipped into your pocket earlier. I'm confused now, you write, rolling your eyes at Regina's reticence in her earlier message.

The response comes faster than you'd expected, less than a minute later. I don't have any answers for you. You'll have to trust me.

I don't even know you. You sound sulky, immature, and you flush and write some more before she can. Why don't you leave your quarters? Is it because I'm here? Do you ever have visitors?

I value my privacy, she writes simply. I am no beloved company in any party, and I have little interest in surrounding myself with fools.

You rememberher impatience at the council meeting, her contempt for the people around her, and you can't help but grin as you retort, You're talking to me, though. So I guess I'm not a fool.

I should hope not. A pause, then: Your mother raised you better than that.

"Yeah," you say aloud, and wonder at the sorrow that washes over you at the acknowledgement.

Maybe you just miss Ma.

I haven't told anyone about this book, you write later, when you're sitting behind the wall of her parlor again.

"Good." She leans back into the couch. "It was a foolish idea, and I was foolish to give it to you."

You narrow your eyes at the page challengingly. Then why did you?

She quirks her eyebrow where she knows you can see it. "You, Henry, are more tenacious than anyone I've ever met. Except perhaps your mother," she adds, and there's a secret smile on her face, almost nostalgic. "I've long since learned the folly of trying to stop you from…anything, really."

In Storybrooke?

She shakes her finger warningly in your general direction. "Don't."

She's more relaxed today than you've ever seen her, not raging or weeping or tense as she toys with the gold engraving on the edges of her book and the sadness in her eyes is held at bay. You think it'd probably be good for her to get out more and see more people, but she laughs when you suggest it.

"You don't know me, Henry." She says your name often and writes it even more, like it's as important as a magical spell. It makes you glow a little, to imagine that you matter so much to this stranger who isn't a stranger at all. "I am far better off isolated from those who loathe me."

But why? Didn't you save everyone?

She laughs at that, and the sadness is heavy in her eyes again. "I think I rather doomed them first, dear. I am the villain of this story, don't doubt that."

And you've gleaned enough from what Grams has said and what Regina hasn't to figure out that, yes, Regina is the queen who'd cursed them all into Storybrooke in the first place, but still. She'd saved everyone in the end, had paid some kind of price along with Ma, and now she's working with Grams and the good guys to fight the Wicked Witch. You're not a villain though.

She stares at the page for a moment and then shakes her head, turning away so you can't see her face. You charge forward. My grandma likes you. And she would never work with you if you were a bad guy.

Regina reads your response and then laughs again, so hard that there are tears forming at the edges of her eyes. "Oh, Henry, using my relationship with Snow as a benchmark of how evil I am is a poor idea indeed."

She asks you about the past year and you tell her as much as you can remember, feeling as though it's all kind of unimpressive to a magical queen who lives in a castle. But she keeps following with more questions, more genuine interest, and you oblige as best as you can. She wants to hear about your memories from the two years you know aren't real, too, and that's when you realize that she's the one who must have given you those memories.

"I wanted you both to be happy," she admits the next afternoon. You'd spent the morning in the stables but had gotten bored and found your way into the east wing after lunch instead, and now she's sitting cross-legged on the couch, her fingers running over the words on the page of the book as they appear. "The price we- you- paid, the loss of your family…I didn't want it to consume you after I cast the curse."

It hadn't, not exactly, you think. It's easier to remember the simplicity of the years before last, of the decade of good memories you'd had with Ma before Storybrooke and the two years of false memories that had been equally joyful. You'd been safe and loved and never lacked for anything, and you'd never dreamed of another life just beyond your fingertips.

Things had changed last year. You'd still been happy- nothing had been different, really, nothing that either of you had been aware of, anyway- but there had been emptiness where before you'd been complete. It had been in moments as simple as sitting down for breakfast and your meal feeling wrong, like the food wasn't cooked the way you liked it or the table was too small. It had been present when you hadn't realized, when you'd turned to talk to the person on the next couch and realized it was empty. You remember déjà vu, whispering words along with Ma and both of you frowning at the knowledge that you'd said them before, and you remember lying in bed and yearning, wanting something you could never put your finger on so badly that you'd cry with frustration and desire and helplessness.

You tell Regina about it all and when she murmurs very quietly, "And now that you're here with your family in this world, do you feel complete again?" you look down and notice the wet spots appearing on the text of the book, and only then do you realize that you've been crying all this time.

You don't, and that's the worst part, because finding out the truth about why hasn't felt like closure at all. There's still a void within you that Grams and horses and magic can't fill, still a missing piece in this puzzle that leaves you longing for something you don't understand, and something is squeezing your chest so hard that you can hardly breathe. You can't hear what Regina says next over the sound of your own sobs and gasping for breath, and you drop the book, furiously wiping away your tears and struggling to get a hold of yourself.

It's only when your sobbing subsides that you notice how dark it's gotten in the passageway. Something is blocking the light from shining through the door in the wall, and you blink away your tears and squint out.

It's Regina, leaning against the wall just beside you, and you can't see her face or her hands but you feel her presence all the same, comforting in its nearness even when she's further from you than anyone else in the universe. You press your hand against the wall, your tears returning in earnest, and for a moment you don't feel quite as hollow, quite as empty anymore.

You pick up the book and write in the dark, How can I miss something I don't even remember? and then you stumble to your feet, embarrassed, and flee swiftly from the east wing.

When I first cast the curse, its maker warned me that the price would be a hole in my heart that could never be filled. I don't think I ever succeeded in overcoming that until the curse was broken. I fear that this time, you've been suffering the price I was meant to pay as well.

You read the words over and over again when you find them written in the book in the morning, the ink darker over the dried tears on the page. They explain nothing at all, least of all the way your own heart reacts to Regina's presence.

You close the book and don't open it again until nighttime, when you're alone in the silence of your room and you miss Regina's voice more than ever.

Grams decides that you've been bonded sufficiently with your horse and today you're going to get to ride him for the first time, and you run to the stables right after breakfast with your book tucked under your arm. You write to Regina about it as you wait for the knight who's supposed to teach you, and in response, you get a full page of stern instructions from her "for your safety."

Thanks, Ma, you write back sarcastically, but you're grinning as you read through them and you don't even notice when she doesn't respond. Nothing can ruin your mood today, not when you're finally going to get to ride on horseback like a real knight and maybe soon you'll start learning to fight with a sword. You don't know if Ma plans on staying here after the Wicked Witch is defeated, but you think you might as well shore up your future as a knight just in case.

Or…a king, you correct yourself, frowning, because you haven't thought about that particular aspect of being royalty before. You don't know how the laws of birthright work here, anyway. You can't imagine Ma ever wanting to be a queen and if Grams has a baby boy it may be a moot point, but right now you're directly in line for the throne.

You'd better get started on riding soon or you'll be the laughingstock of the kingdom.

Regina's tips are actually helpful. You don't accidentally mount the horse backward and you try not to be too impatient and spook the horse, and you aren't thrown from his back even once. Your teacher- a knight named Bertrand, who's been assigned to Grams's personal guard- is duly impressed. "You're a natural, Highness," he compliments you at noontime, when you're riding slowly back toward the stables. "I don't think you'll need as much training as you will simple practice. Horsemanship runs in your family."

"Really?" you ask, because you remember Ma saying that she'd rather drive the Bug through a hurricane on a bad day than spend five minutes on a horse.

Bertrand's smile freezes on his face, as though he's said something he shouldn't have. "Never mind that, Highness. Hyah!" His horse quickens its pace and you squeeze your knees together against your mount, feeling muscles contract and expand beneath you as your own horse moves to catch up.

You're nearly there when something changes in the wind, when you can suddenly feel a new chill in the air and the sky seems to grow darker and heavier. "Bertrand?" you ask, but he's looking up, his eyes wide and worried, and you follow his gaze.

There are black, menacing-looking birds circling the sky just above you, more and more congregating until the horde of them is thick enough to partially obscure the sun's rays. They look like crows but they're bigger, nastier, and you tighten your grip on your horse's reins and duck your head down protectively.

"Get back to the stables," Bertrand orders, drawing his sword, but the birds are already diving at both of you, pecking at Bertrand as he slices them open and hovering around you as your horse moves even faster.

The first one seizes your shirt in its talons and you shout, batting at it, but then there's another and another and a fourth and fifth, flying around you in a flurry of black feathers, and two more latch onto your shirt and you're suddenly being lifted into the air by the too-large birds, your heart pounding and your fingers scrabbling at air as they screech around you in triumph and catch your limbs as you struggle.

You're being carried higher as Bertrand shouts threats from the ground and gallops toward the castle, and the horse you'd left behind is getting smaller and smaller when you glimpse it through the moving black shadows that surround you. "Help me!" you shout. "Bertrand! Regina! REGINA!"

It's too late. You're being dragged through the sky by a dozen birds, stolen away by what must be the Wicked Witch, and there's no one left to stop them, no one who could possibly save you now. Still, you're fighting until the end, slapping at the birds whenever you can yank your hands free and crying out for the one person who might still save you. "Regina! Regina!"

Then…a whoosh of purple energy around you, silencing the cawing of the crows, and they're dissolving into nothing but black feathers around you, fluttering toward the ground as the purple smoke seems to guide you downward as well. You squeeze your eyes shut, expecting to pick up the pace and begin to fall anytime soon, but the drop never comes, not while the purple-tinted wind surrounds you and slows your descent. "Regina," you whisper again, gratefully, because who else could it be?

You land on the ground and for a reckless moment, you try to follow the cloud of magic to its source in the shadows of the stable, to see Regina as she sees you, but then you hear Grams's voice, panicked and breathless. "Keep your head down, Henry. Whatever you do, don't look up."

You lie flat on the ground and bury your face in soft straw as you hear footsteps moving to stop beside Grams. "You're being overly reckless, Snow. Have you forgotten that you have a child to look after now?" Regina demands. "You can't be out here in this state."

Grams snorts. "Yes, Regina, I'm the reckless one. Henry's right here. And you might as well send a beacon out to the Witch letting her know that you're still alive and kicking."

"Was I supposed to let her crows take him?" Regina snaps. "Face down, Henry!" she adds when you lift your head without thinking. "If you think that I'd put your puerile little kingdom ahead of-" She stops abruptly, breathing hard.

There's silence for a moment, then a murmur from Grams. "They're coming back around."

"I'll have to repel them. You stay here with Henry." You tilt your head just enough to see black heels march off a few feet ahead of you, and when you peek a little more you can see Regina, dressed in a power suit with her hands outstretched toward the sky, more magic flowing from them and pointed toward the black throng of crows as they swoop down as one.

Feathers land all around you, black and ashy grey, and you can hear the angry screeching of the birds again as they hurl themselves toward Regina, clawing at her as she sweeps them away with her magic. There are so many, more than you can count, and no matter how many Regina magics away, it seems like more and more attack with every blow.

"It's too much!" Grams shouts over the noise. "Regina, we need to run!"

"Get...to the stables," Regina growls through gritted teeth. "Leave them to me."

And you're being herded into stables, dirt-faced and terrified, by your grandmother, but Regina is still surrounded by crows and every attack seems to make them even more aggressive. You're afraid to talk- is talking directly to Regina enough contact to break the countercurse?- but you squeeze Grams's elbow once you're safe in the shadows, your eyes conveying all your worries for the sorceress.

"She's going to be fine," Grams says, but there's a tremor in her voice and she looks more afraid than she ever has before. "She's stronger than you know."

A crow manages to get past Regina's defenses and claws at her neck and she whirls around, eyes flashing, and flings it at the wall of the barn. You duck behind Grams, glad that her stomach is protruding enough to hide you, and nearly trip over something gleaming on the floor.

It's your book. You wrap dirty arms around it, longing for whatever false comfort it can give you while its maker is fighting off an unending threat and your frustration at your own helplessness is mounting.

And then there's a flash of brown and gold as another horse comes racing past you, coming to a sharp halt just behind Regina; and the armored rider yanks off her helmet and climbs off the horse, standing unsteadily beside her. "You seem kind of busy. I hope you don't mind me interrupting," she says breathlessly, and your face splits into a wide grin as you tighten your grip on the book.

"It's been a while, Miss Swan," you can hear Regina respond over the crows. Her tone is contemptuous, but it's a different kind of contempt than you've seen her address Grams's council with, and you can hear the relief in her voice muting the harshness. "And you're woefully untrained."

Ma shakes her head and you can picture her rolling her eyes at Regina. "This can't be harder than a lunar eclipse, right?" And then she's lifting one arm, palm outstretched, and you'd be fascinated by the blue stream of energy that fires from her palm at the crows if your eyes weren't glued to her other hand and the fingers that curl around Regina's forearm.

Somehow, their magic together seems to be enough to ward off the crows, and now there are more feathers falling than birds diving and the sun is shining down on the fields again, illuminating your ma and Regina in the sea of black as they still stand, hands raised to the sky as columns of blue and purple magic still pour out and join into a steady stream of magic focused at their attackers.

Gradually, the birds begin to peel off from the flock and fly away, having decided that attacking two sorceresses is more than they can pull off, and when the sky is finally clear again, you can see both women sag against each other in relief.

And then Regina whispers something into Ma's ear and vanishes in a cloud of purple smoke and Ma spins around and runs to you unsteadily, her eyes bright even though her face is lined with exhaustion, and you're enfolded in her arms in an instant. "I missed you, kid," she says, and you let go of your book with one arm so you can hug her back.

"Me too," you say, and you spare one glance up to the tower of the east wing before you bury your face in her shoulder.