WOW! I can't believe the response to this story from just one chapter!. You guys are AMAZING! I loved reading all the reviews! Surprisingly it's about 50/50 as to your guesses about who's going to be carrying the little dragon...with a few votes for both of them. Yikes! LOL-I will be just a little evil and tease the answer for a few more chapters, but I won't make you wait too long I promise. Thank you again for being such great readers and for being so supportive! I always try to respond to all the reviews so please feel free to let me know what you think! All mistakes are my own...

Chapter Two

Regina swirled the last sip of cider in her glass and watched the flames dance in the fire place, enjoying the quiet the house was offering her for the evening. They had only been back from their honeymoon for a week but they had quickly fallen back into their normal routine. Which was why she found herself alone for the evening with Henry and Emma over at the Charming's for dinner. She was always invited as well, and sometimes she even accepted, but tonight she felt that she needed some time alone with her thoughts. Her mind had been jumping back to Emma's assumption that she would be the one to carry their baby all week and she couldn't decide how that made her feel. She oscillated between flattered, terrified, and just a little bit of excitement at the possibility.

She was flattered because while she no longer sought validation from Emma about her feelings for her, it was amazing that the woman would trust her with such an enormous task. She felt proud in a way that Emma felt her genes were good enough to pass along to another human being. It was silly maybe to be proud of that, but there was a time in her life that she herself wouldn't have wanted to pass anything in her life along to anyone else. Which led her to being terrified. What if there was something in her that was innately prone to violence and vengeance? Would being raised in a house full of love be enough to overcome that? When she first held Henry in her arms she didn't have such fears. He didn't have her DNA and she knew she would read enough books, study enough material, to be able to raise him into a fine young man, despite how she was raised. She didn't realize at the time it all meant nothing if she didn't truly pour her whole heart into it. It had been the missing ingredient and once that fell into place it seemed that everything else did too.

Excitement fluttered in her stomach when she thought about how amazing it was going to be to actually start the next part of their lives together. She had tried to control everything in her life before and it never seemed to work out for her in the end. Learning to live life and not hang on too tightly to everything had been a hard lesson, but maybe that's why she was finding it easier to come to terms with such a big unknown. All the good things in her life had come to her when she stopped trying to control everyone and every detail. This was certainly one thing she wasn't going to have any control over. Either way it was going to work out exactly like it should and she was going to be ecstatic about which ever outcome came to pass.

There was a part of her though, that hoped Emma would be able to carry the child for them so she could experience a pregnancy without the baggage she'd had to carry with her the last time. To be able to enjoy the baby's first kick and hearing the heartbeat without a sense of impending doom behind them was something she wanted so badly for Emma, sort of re-do in life that she felt Emma deserved. She had saved so many and done so much good in her time in Storybrooke that hopefully the universe would deem it fair to let her re-experience the miracle of bringing a human being into the world. She knew Emma wouldn't see it the same way and would remind her that without giving Henry up they would have never have met and then tell her all the reasons that she herself deserved to experience it, but that was a great thing Regina had realized about relationships: how amazing it was that unbridled unselfishness came back to you in spades.

She smiled to herself when she heard the front door bang open and shut, knowing she would soon be joined in the study by the one who had occupied her thoughts all evening.

"Boo!" Emma yelled when she walked in the study.

"Nice try dear, but your inability to properly shut a door alerted me to your presence already." Regina answered as she stood to greet her wife.

"I know, one of these days though…" Emma gathered Regina in her arms and buried her head in the crook of her neck, soaking in the love and warmth radiating off of the brunette. "You okay?" She asked when she felt arms tighten around her.

"Yes, I'm really good actually. I love you." Regina answered simply.

"Mmm, I love you too." Emma leaned in and pressed her lips into waiting ones, lingering just a little bit before pulling back. "You finally work out everything that's been running through your head this week?"

Sighing, Regina let her head fall onto Emma's shoulder. "Yes. I can't hide anything from you anymore can I?"

"Lesbihonest, you never really could."

"Funny. I can't believe you're still using that phrase."

"It's hilarious! Anyway, no you can't hide anything from me. Especially when I feel everything you feel. I think my magic has made me even more sensitive to you." Emma rubbed at her stomach a little. "I kept getting all these jumping feelings…like butterflies but not really…I couldn't place them. I figured you'd talk when you were ready."

Releasing her hold on the blond, Regina turned and made her way to the bar to pour herself another glass of cider. "Would you like some?"

"No, I'm good. I think I ate too much tonight." Emma flopped herself onto the couch and waited for Regina to join her.

"You always eat too much." Regina took a seat beside Emma and curled her legs up underneath her, leaning heavily into Emma's side. "I was just thinking about the possibility of me actually carrying the baby. On one hand it scares me to death and on the other I would love to give you a gift like that…"

Emma didn't answer right away, she just put her arm around Regina and pulled her in closer. After a few moments she said, "The being scared to death thing is completely normal. It's just a part of it. The gift thing? It would be pretty amazing to be able to support you carrying our child."

"I feel the same way about it, the being amazing part, were it to be you pregnant. I think I'm just excited about it either way." Regina said, wanting Emma to know that she'd come to terms with the outcome being out of her hands.

"Yeah?" Emma looked towards Regina searching her eyes for confirmation. When she found it she continued, "I guess we better start trying the next new moon then, huh?"

"I guess so." Regina sipped her cider and smiled into the firelight, shaking her head a little at the domesticity of the situation. "I suppose we should tell Henry we're going to be trying…"

"Yeah, maybe tomorrow? By the way, you're loving son skipped out of dinner early to meet up with some friends and left me alone with my parents. Not that I don't love hanging out with them…but you'd think they'd catch a clue that maybe I didn't want to discuss the details of my honeymoon with them. I've never had to sidestep so many damn questions in my life."

"He may have mentioned something about that to me earlier. It must have slipped my mind." Regina confessed with a smirk.

"Regina!"

"What? Need I remind you you were late to our wedding? You should just expect more "punishments" like that for awhile and I'll be anything but traditional. Sending you to the couch for the night doesn't seem to cut it in a situation like this. Besides, I wouldn't have anyone to keep me warm."

"God, why do I find that so attractive?" Emma smiled, glad that for the time being Regina's emotions didn't seem to be jumping around as much and her stomach settled down for the first time all week.

"Because you love me." Regina answered simply.

SQSQSQSQSQSQSQSQSQ

"Henry, your mother and I have something to talk to you about." Regina said as she set down an enormous piece of chocolate cake in front of him. She ran her hand over the top of his head once before taking a seat at the table again.

Henry looked back and forth between the two women and then down again at the cake. Emma looked like she was going to pass out and fall right out of her chair and his other mother had her hands linked in front of her. She had the look she always got in meeting when she was trying to look unassuming and harmless. He took one more look at the cake and then it hit him. "Oh God! You're pregnant!" he screeched.

Regina's eyes went wide and Emma just started opening and closing her mouth. Regina was the first to recover. "No..no…we're not." She glanced at Emma for some help.

"Yet." Emma said.

"What?" Henry asked, his mouth full of cake. His mom always made the best cake when she was feeling guilty or sorry.

"Don't talk with your mouth full young man. What Emma is trying to say is that we are going to start trying to get pregnant. If you're okay with it that is."

"Um, yeah sure. I just kinda assumed it would happen. I think it'd be kinda cool to have a brother or a sister." Henry smiled at both his mom's, noticing how both of them seemed to be relieved at his answer. "Who's gonna get pregnant?"

"We don't know. We're going to try magically first and we won't really be able to control that process. If it doesn't work though, down the line we might have to look into other options." Regina answered.

"Okay."

"Okay? That's it kid? Nothing else? You're not going to throw a fit or anything?" Emma couldn't believe it was that easy.

"No, why would I? I'll have someone to blame stuff on and you two will be so busy taking care of a little baby that you'll hardly notice what I'm getting up to in my last years of high school." Henry grinned cheekily at the two of them.

"Need I remind you young man I ran an entire kingdom and had eyes everywhere? And that I run an entire town now and that I still have eyes everywhere?" Regina knew that he was just trying to wind them up, but I little reinforcement of her power never hurt anything.

"Everywhere?" He asked sheepishly.

"Everywhere. So if you think you're alone when you sneak a girl under the bleachers at the football stadium think again."

Henry didn't answer, his face just turned several shades of red and he bolted from the table as soon as he shoved the last piece of cake in his mouth. Emma managed to contain her laughter until they heard his door shut upstairs.

"Oh god! You are terrifying Regina! That was priceless." Emma said as she started to calm herself down.

Regina simply crossed her arms and looked at the blonde. "Yes, well you would do well to remember that I have eyes everywhere also. Don't think I didn't know about your attempt to buy q-tips at the pharmacy the other day."

"What?! I didn't try and buy any. Sneezy is a lying…I don't have to buy them when I know you have them in your underwear drawer…damn it…" Emma tapered off and looked up at her wife with the same sheepish look Henry had worn moments ago. "You are good. And so, so pretty…"

"You're still doing the dishes. I'm going to go get my shower done for the evening and apparently I have to find a new hiding place for your addiction." Regina started to make her way out of the room before turning back towards her wife at the doorway, "We told him…"

"We did. This just got real huh?"

"Very real."

When Regina didn't continue on her way upstairs, Emma crossed the room in a few quick steps and pulled her in for a hug. "We got this, Regina. In a few weeks we'll start our first try and we'll go from there. It'll be okay."

"Thank you. I may continue to have freak outs."

"It's fine. Just as long as we keep being honest with each other. That's all that matters. Emma turned Regina towards the stairs by her shoulders and gave her a little shove towards them, pushing her luck a little with a pat on the butt. "Now, go shower and hide my stash…"

Regina only shook her head, trying to keep her smile contained and she started up the stairs.