AN: Edited 3/17/17 to retcon a mistake. There aren't any native wolves left in Maine, so I had them imported by the curse. =(
Chapter 1 – A Dying Pack
It was nearing one in the morning when Regina sluggishly dragged herself through the front door. Absolute exhaustion seemed steeped into every pore from a combination of another full day of tedious planning sessions with the city council followed by an impulsive round of drinks with Katherine, Ursula, Tinkerbelle, Sherri Khan, and a surprisingly rambunctious Mary Margaret.
Her friends had been on her case of late for a long overdue night on the town, so Regina finally caved and agreed to meet at them at the Rabbit Hole after work. That it just so happened to be Jazz Night was a pleasant bonus that meant there were only two details standing in the way of an otherwise perfectly fun night shooting the breeze with her friends. One was that Ruby was not scheduled to sing for another three weeks because of conflicts with her schedule at the Sheriff's Station and the second being Maleficent's absence, who had recently departed Storybrooke with her daughter, Lilly, so they could gallivant together about the wider world outside.
"It was high time for some belated mother-daughter bonding," Mal had insisted before kissing both of Regina's cheeks to bid adieu as per their old custom.
They were loitering outside Town Hall at lunch time and the mill of people around them had the air pleasantly buzzing with activity.
"Just try to keep yourself confined to arms and legs." Regina smirked in amusement at her friend's propensity to get both large and either rowdy or randy when inebriated. "For that matter, stay away from the vodka. The last thing this world needs is to be rudely informed that dragons are real because you got too much in you."
When Mal winked devilishly back at her, Regina could tell what kind of response she'd set up before it even hit. "Oh, I'll get too much in me," said Maleficent, not bothering to conceal the innuendo even in public. "Just not vodka. I was thinking something tall, dark, and handsome...whatever gender that description may take."
When Lilly, who was hovering nearby, protested loudly that she, "heard that, Mom, and just...ewww," Maleficent gave Regina this little grin that said her daughter was about to get indoctrinated in living life to the fullest Maleficent style – a.k.a. indulging in debauchery on a scale not appropriate for frequent consumption. The last time Regina got dragged along on one of Mal's benders was back in the Old World when she still had a shred of decency left, and even though she'd only taken a lover to bed on one those four days and nights, the revolving door of men and women, sometimes more than one at a time, Maleficent entertained to varying degrees of...enthusiasm all but obliterated it by the time the trip was over. For that reason alone, Regina was glad her oldest friend had decided to take her partying elsewhere, if for no other reason than she didn't want to have to clean up after two drunken dragons who decided to torch the clock tower for a laugh or carouse with their respective partners rather shamelessly against the nearest available solid surface.
Regina did miss that devious mind, though. Outings of their little Villain's Club were just not the same without Mal to guide conversations to risque territories, such as their fondest memories of past villainy or the favorite sexual kinks of their lovers. The latter topic in particular once landed Regina in hot water when she'd let something slip about Ruby that she shouldn't have and the next day Ruby, while walking to the diner to get lunch, received a chorus of catcalls from a darkened alleyway referencing said act. It was bad enough that Ruby withheld sex for a week afterward but what made it worse was that she wouldn't allow Regina to do that...thing...to her for two whole months. It was terrible having to endure being deprived of something she enjoyed probably far more than she should when just thinking about it made her blush to the roots of her hair. Damn Maleficent.
Anyway, Girl's Night certainly wasn't as interesting without Mal there to stoke the fires of the inappropriate, but thankfully another form of entertainment made itself available. It came in the oh-so-unexpected form of Snow White, whose painfully routine home life prompted condescension to commiserate with a handful of reformed villains – aside from Katherine, of course, who had been a princess back in the old world, after all, just one whose head was firmly removed from her posterior and was able to cut loose when warranted.
"Snow? What the hell are you doing here?" Regina's eyes had bulged wide as saucers at seeing the pure as driven...well, snow…woman seated at the usual booth reserved for Regina and her morally ambiguous compatriots and already nursing a bottle of rather potent, mid-range scotch.
"I told David it's Mom's night to have some fun for a change and I meant it dammit!" The former bandit princess slammed her shot glass down to punctuate her greeting and then beckoned Regina to sit.
Come to find out the diminutive schoolteacher was already three drinks in and rosy cheeked from a low buzz. Aside from the surprise of seeing her former step-daughter haunting an establishment more the speed of non-soccer moms, Regina thought it was the most Snow-like she had seen the woman in years, which was disconcerting for all of five seconds before Snow was chirping merrily away about how much fun they were going to have. And though Regina raised her brow dubiously at the minutely-slurred assertion, it proved to be accurate enough. When the rest of the crew arrived, drinks were downed, stories were told, laughs were shared, and much fun was, indeed, had. Regina hadn't realized how much she needed to unwind until the night was over and she was headed home, loose-limbed but far from drunk because, as Ruby would say, she was a woman "who can hold her liquor thank-you-very-much."
With spring just around the corner and a glut of upcoming warm weather endeavors looming, her days as mayor had become hectic to say the least. There were project details to finalize and contracts to fastidiously scour so that the work could be done correctly and on time, all of which demanded her attention since her final approval was required for any such public work to commence. Being a control-oriented person meant that she wasn't the type to delegate what could be done herself, so she tended to be a very hands on type of manager. Unfortunately that meant she had her nose in nearly every upcoming development, which resulted in her pretty much being run ragged making sure every "i" was dotted and every "t" was crossed. It was time consuming and tedious work to be sure, requiring more twelve hour days the past two weeks than she had pulled in years. But that was the price of being mayor of a booming town that was growing at a more accelerated rate than could have been anticipated when she created it.
That's not to say that she was unhappy, though, when on the contrary she derived great satisfaction to see Storybrooke thriving. It was just that putting so much time in at the office was beginning to tax her beyond just her mental and physical state. Her duties were beginning to intrude upon her private life in a way they hadn't since well before she started dating Ruby, which was endlessly frustrating for a woman who'd become accustomed to a fulfilling home life.
Speaking of Ruby, it was near torturous spending so much time away from her wife. In some ways it felt as if karma were having a laugh at her expense, forcing her to walk a metaphorical mile in Ruby's shoes. Regina never had developed a taste for crow and she wasn't about to start, but she was at the very least beginning to sympathize with what Ruby went through while working herself to the bone to afford the gorgeous engagement ring that Regina still treasured to this day.
Remembering how hard it had been to endure the separation those five plus years ago also brought back feelings of guilt. At the tail end of that unfortunate episode she had been less than kind to her then-girlfriend, mostly because she had convinced herself that Ruby was cheating on her. While her behavior hadn't been malicious, it was cringe-worthy enough in retrospect that her irrational insecurities seemed exceedingly shameful. And although she couldn't have known why Ruby was working all the time and never home, she still felt regret for how she had acted. Hindsight was 20/20 in that way.
Thankfully, Ruby seemed to be doing a much better job handling an overworked wife than Regina had dealing with an overworked girlfriend. The inordinate amount of understanding Ruby was extending her way was undeserved but Regina was ever grateful for it. Yet despite her wife's grace in the situation, Regina was more than ready for these hectic days to be over so that she could get back to a sense of normalcy.
Having finally stepped through the front door, Regina pushed it closed behind her and sighed in welcome relief. Home at last. There really was no place like it, though she would never repeat such a phrase aloud for fear her sister might somehow overhear. As Regina carefully secured the front door and then locked it, she snickered at the thought of Zelena's colorful tirades regarding this world's most famous adaptation of Baum's hilariously inaccurate rendition of Oz. Oh, how Zelena hated that movie.
After pushing herself away from the door, Regina made her way up the short flight of stairs up to the landing and then on into the living room. She found it to be abandoned with no evident signs of recent activity, which was an uncommon occurrence. Since Ruby was a times a pushover-slash-enabler type of parent, there were typically at least a half a dozen dolls strewn about the room when she got home, mostly centered around the couch which served as a cushioned castle from which various Queens ruled. And if not those, then coloring books would line the coffee table along with a heaping pile of crayons of every color under the sun. The dolls could be an annoyance outside of the mess, as it wasn't all that fun to come home after a long day at work and kick off one's heels just to step on a sharp piece of plastic that could skewer a rabid boar. The coloring books, though, Regina honestly did not mind as she knew they meant she would be receiving a special present in the near future.
One of the things that the girls loved to do for her when she got home late from work was to present their Mommy with pictures they had colored just for her. And while it was always evident that there was a guiding hand behind the gestures, they were just so sweet that she couldn't help but feel like all of her daily travails were trivial in contrast the bubbling happiness that always accompanied those priceless drawings. In the light of crudely depicted representations of their home, stick figure mommies and daughters holding hands, big pink hearts, and "I love you, Mommy!" banners, it didn't matter all that much anymore that she was a person who prided herself on keeping an immaculate home. For her daughters, Regina was willing to endure almost anything, especially if it meant getting more material to display on the refrigerator or if accepting the gifts with a radiant smile would lead to being asked to play before bedtime by two cherubic faces simultaneously chiming, "pretty please, Mommy." If that was the prize for cleaning up the most God-awful messes on earth, she felt comfortable asserting her willingness to do so in rags à la the twins' aunt Ella.
Of course, things would be much different if she were the Regina of old. That woman would not have tolerated finding toys and coloring books on her living room floor after a hard day's work – a fact Henry could attest to. But she was not that person anymore and hadn't been for what seemed like ages. Now, instead of finding the messes a nuisance, she thought of them as evidence of the privileged life she was currently living. A cluttered living room floor not only provided proof of the sometimes constructive and always fun activities her wife and daughters enjoyed that evening, but also served as a reminder that she had a family to come home to she loved more than life itself. As silly as it might be, Lego blocks and princess dolls and crayons had come to symbolize happiness.
However, there were no such messes tonight, which made Regina a trifle anxious. Almost instantly, her mind began to flit back to the events of a little over five years ago, which was an all too common occurrence whenever she became worried about her family. That dreadful day still haunted her, provoking random nightmares that wrenched her from the soundest of sleeps, gasping out breaths and drenched in a cold sweat due to the grotesque images she'd relived of Ruby's mutilated body. As much as she was loathe to admit it, she would probably always be affected by those memories; the trauma that inscribed them etched too deeply into her brain to ever be fully expunged.
Shaking her head, she cleared those thoughts away. She was too tired and on edge as it was to be dredging up things she'd much rather forget.
With a deep breath, Regina deposited her overcoat on its hanger and then departed the living room to head upstairs. Although it was well past bed time, she needed to check on her children in their bedroom before retiring to her own for a restful night of sleep.
Still connected at the hip, the girls refused to sleep in separate rooms and had yet to concede to the suggestion that they sleep in separate beds. It was very sweet that they were so attached, and though some people quietly frowned upon the girls' mutual reliance, their unusual closeness was something both of their mothers were active in supporting. Their attachment didn't seem like an unhealthy co-dependence and what's more, neither she nor Ruby really cared about outside opinions when they had legitimate reasons for their acceptance.
Just as Ruby, Regina was raised as an only child, which was one of the things in her life that she most wished she could change. In the days after Zelena's ostensible death, she had spent a small but not insignificant amount of time contemplating how different things might have been if only her mother had made different choices. It would have been nice, she thought, to have a sibling to grow up with, to bicker with, to commiserate with and cuddle up with next to fire, if only so she wouldn't have felt so lonely.
As a child, Regina had no one to run to for support save her father and his efforts were woefully lacking due to a healthy fear of his wife. Her life could have been so much better if she'd had her older sister to lean on, a belief only reinforced when a trip to the Underworld lead to both sisters recovering the memories Cora had stolen of their brief connection as adolescents. Although Zelena was flawed in many ways, Regina was convinced her sister would have proven a much better confidante and defender than most could give her credit for. The proof was in the way Zelena acted at present, always looking out for Regina whether asked for or not, and always ready and willing to defend her baby sister from those who still held a grudge for offenses that were nearing four decades in the past. But the sad fact of the matter was that Cora's selfishness had kept them apart and both of them suffered for of it.
Having spoken to her sister many times about their woeful upbringings since Zelena's return from the dead, Regina learned that her sister's childhood was as bad as her own, not quite as awful in some ways while maybe even worse in others. Uncovering what happened to Zelena to turn her into the bitter and envious woman she became was a step in helping Regina to forgive her elder sibling, and even though their relationship had gotten off to a most inauspicious start, they have since grown much closer. But however much progress they have made toward establishing a solid relationship, the what-could-have-beens would always haunt them.
Even as a child, Regina had always felt like there was something missing in her life, despite growing up as a privileged noble. There were those less fortunate than her, after all, who could not even go so far as to claim a father who loved her dearly and whom she loved just as much despite some notable deficiencies, and although her mother was cold and domineering, everything she had done – warped though it was – was ultimately to benefit her daughter. As far as materialistic provision went, Regina had never wanted for anything. Her belly was always full, she'd slept in an enormous and very soft bed, laid her head down upon downy pillows, and had silken sheets to cover her body. Luxuries most could only dream of were hers to enjoy at a whim. But even so that empty spot in her heart remained vacant.
It took letting Zelena into her life to fill that void of familial companionship that she had been lacking, and without being told, Regina knew that she did the same for her sister. That was why she sneered at even the slightest hints of disapproval from others about how close her girls were. Sisters needed each other and always would – even more so when they were twins, however unconventional their simultaneous conceptions were.
Her thoughts still ruminating upon the complex subject of sisterhood, Regina approached the girls bedroom. Upon reaching the door, she found it closed, so she turned the knob as quietly as she could then gingerly pushed it open. When there was a big enough gap for her to fit her head through, she peeked her head in.
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Once they did, they fell to the bed upon which both of the children were curled around each other and so soundly asleep that the covers were still neatly tucked around their shoulders. From her position at the door, Regina could hear their soft breathing, particularly from Sophia, whose exhales were accompanied by an adorable little whistle which meant Sophie was sleeping with her mouth open again. Regina rolled her eyes in tender affection. Amelia would be griping in the morning about the wet spot next to her head, and it was going to be very difficult for Mom to maintain a serious parental demeanor due to how much their comical bickering would invariably have her smothering laughter and trying not to look at Ruby so that Ruby's own muted laughter wouldn't set them both off.
For a moment she stood still and contented herself to listen to the peaceful, reassuring sound of her babies breathing. Ruby would joke about such behavior, saying that it was creepy (which was hypocritical considering how fond Ruby was of watching Regina sleep along with the fact that Ruby did the very same thing), but this was something she couldn't help. The undeniable force of her love for her children compelled her to just watch them in awe, so that if it were possible she would stand in their doorway forever and soak in the picture of innocent trust presented by two perfect children resting in such glorious peace simply because they believed with all their hearts that they were safe, protected, and loved.
Unable to restrain herself any longer, Regina kicked off her heels and padded barefoot over to the bedside nearest the door, which was the direction the girls were facing. Gingerly, she crouched down upon her haunches, wincing as her ankles popped with the settling of her weight. She held her breath for a moment, waiting to see if the noise penetrated their slumber. When they remained blissfully unaware of her presence, she breathed a sigh of relief before settling down onto her knees.
Leaning over the bed, she took a moment to study their faces, so relaxed and serene that they appeared angelic under the soft light of the moon. She smiled affectionately. Though only one of them had inherited Ruby's physical traits, both seemed to possess her wife's startling ability to transform under the light of the moon into a being of otherworldly beauty. If Regina hadn't believed Ruby at first when she informed her that both girls would be born werewolves, she certainly would have the first time she saw the change in them when bathed in the pale white hues of a full moon.
One warm summer night almost a year ago, Sophia had asked out of the blue to go outside to stargaze while the moon was at its peak. Figuring it to be childish curiosity, Regina hadn't thought twice about the request. But as they stood on the patio out back, she'd watched something astonishing happen. As the moonlight hit their skin, both girls began to shimmer as if they were absorbing the light and then refracting it back in a softened glistening aura. Dumbstruck, Regina could only stare as seconds turned into minutes, until she then noticed that their eyes began to glow a very faint yellow. Startled, she forced herself to remain calm until after the kids were in bed but as soon as she closed the door to their room, she took off to confront Ruby.
After giving her supernatural wife quite the earful, Ruby was able to soothe her fears by explaining that Granny had warned her to expect little things like that when the girls were under the light of the full moon, that it was perfectly natural because she'd done the same when she was young. However, the effects were only seeming to grow more pronounced with time, so Regina was not quite so convinced. Her trust in the Granny with regards to lycanthropy was as close to definite as possible, yet she also knew that the girls were not ordinary werewolves by any stretch of the imagination. Not only were they born to two extraordinarily powerful women in their own rights, one of them a sorceress of inherent talent, but they were also products of True Love just as Emma was. Because of that, there was really no predicting how their alter egos would begin to manifest as they reached puberty, which in itself was a whole other can of worms Regina did not want to think about.
There was at least one thing she was sure of regarding her daughters coming of age, and that is if either of her them were anything like their brunette mother, she was going to have a problem on her hands of the boy kind. One night, when she and Ruby had been discussing what might happen once the girls reached puberty, the subject of boys had somehow cropped up. Not wanting to withhold relevant information, Regina confided that Daniel had been her first serious romantic interest due to having been somewhat cloistered for the majority of her childhood. She was seventeen years old when she met him, so she couldn't speak for herself concerning such experiences. The look on Ruby's face had spoken volumes, though.
"Yeah, I was a little boy crazy," Ruby said, shrugging her shoulders. "Peter might have been my first love but he wasn't my first boyfriend and he wasn't even my first kiss. Granny tried to keep me away from other kids my age, but especially boys on account of my turning into a ravenous beast and all. She never could, though. I was headstrong and curious and a risk taker. Still am to some degree."
"I can't argue with that," Regina said, externally smiling not only because she agreed but because she loved those traits in her spouse.
Internally, however, she was freaking out. The thought of her girls running around after boys at any time in the future made her want to panic in much the same way as it had when Henry started to develop an interest in girls. The only saving grace was that since she'd been through that first opposite-sex-craze with her elder child, she knew how to deal with it in the lives of her youngest children. Hopefully the crossing of that particular bridge yet lay many years in the future, though, so that for the foreseeable future she could just enjoy being their Mommy.
As gently as she could, Regina reached out to brush a raven curl of hair away from Amelia's forehead, smiling as her daughter's little nose wrinkled in response. With a gentle sigh, the sleeping child readjusted herself against her sister and fell still again.
It was little things like this that made Regina feel like her life was a success in spite of all that had happened to her. Her children were happy, content, safe, and secure with both of their parents and with each other, and that's more than she or Ruby ever had themselves. And wasn't that the goal of every parent after all? To make sure their child had what their parents had lacked in the hopes that they would have a better life? That was certainly what Regina wanted for her children, so it made her happy to know that she and Ruby were achieving that goal together.
Her thoughts straying to her wife, who was likely still waiting up for her, Regina very carefully leaned in to press a kiss against each of her daughters' heads, her lips making the barest of contact so as to not disturb their slumber.
"I love you, my sweet girls," she whispered, repeating her nightly ritual. She looked down at the children with a reverential smile. "May dreams of dancing in the moonlight guide you toward the morning."
After straightening up to stand, Regina backed away a pace and then turned softly toward the door so as to not disturb her sleeping children. Once she left the room, she eased the door shut behind her. Retrieving her discarded shoes from beside the door, she then made her way down the hallway to her bedroom. When she arrived, the door was propped open and a soft light was emanating from the far corner of the room, casting a pale shadow over the bedroom and into the darkened hallway. Upon stepping through the threshold her eyes sought out her wife.
She found Ruby on her side of the bed dressed in her typical night wear consisting of nothing more than an old, faded t-shirt only just long enough to cover a skimpy pair of panties. She was sitting silently with her bare legs crossed, staring into nothing and clutching a pillow tightly to her chest as tears leaked from her eyes in fat droplets that fell from her chin onto the pillow, staining the fabric dark. The sight set Regina immediately on edge.
As her heart plummeted into her stomach, she rushed over to Ruby's side of the bed and sat down directly in front of her obviously distraught wife. "What's wrong?" she asked as she rested her right hand on a smooth thigh and began to gently rub it.
Positively swimming with hurt, Ruby's green eyes turned up, and at seeing Regina her face twisted in distress.
"I went out tonight to check on the pack," she began, her voice already rough from the strain of her distress.
Regina sat back, both startled and angry. "You left the girls here alone? Ruby! Why the hell would you do such an irresponsible thing?"
Eyes widening at the unexpectedly harsh tone, Ruby backtracked, stuttering out a weak protestation as her tears began to fall even faster. "I...I d-didn't!"
All of Ruby's earlier distress was suddenly replaced by fear, which visibly exacerbated her already emotional state. Regina knew her anger was disconcerting at the best of times, but when the kids were involved, she could be absolutely terrifying. Having lived together for over ten years now, one would think Ruby should be more accustomed to dealing with her volatile temper but Ruby still dreaded being the object upon which it was fixated. Part of it, Regina thought, was survival instinct; after all, many who had landed wrong end of her anger did not live to tell the tale. But Ruby also could take being criticized far too personally because of either insecurity issues rooted in her checkered past or her general sensitivity. Ruby was a people-pleaser, someone who prided herself on making the lives of those she loved easier and better and happier, so when she did something wrong that required chastening it was rather like she reverted into a puppy who'd been kicked for overzealously licking her human's face. Which made it hard for Regina to stay mad. Those wounded eyes and pouty lips were her kryptonite.
"I didn't leave them alone, I swear!" Ruby then insisted, shaking her head as she sniffled. "I would never do that! I asked Emma earlier if she could come over to watch them while I went out, and even then I was only gone for about half an hour."
Feeling herself blushing from shame due to her false assumption as well as the effect it had on Ruby, Regina bit her lip. "Well, I suppose I owe you an apology, then." Looking recalcitrant, she moved her hand from Ruby's leg to rest it against a warm, tear stained cheek where she began wiping away the residual moisture tears had left behind. "I'm sorry, darling, I overreacted. It's just been a very long and difficult day. But that's not an excuse. I shouldn't have been so accusatory."
At the earnestness of the apology, Ruby allowed her head to loll to the side in order to press more fully into Regina's hand. Her eyes slid closed as Regina's fingers spread out over the left side of her face.
"It's okay," she mumbled understandingly. "I know you're just stressed out over work."
"That I am," nodded Regina, whose thumb had begun tracing the outline of Ruby's lower lip, "but that doesn't excuse my tone. I hurt you."
Shaking her head against Regina's hand, Ruby sniffled. "Nah, I'm okay, I promise. I just don't like it when you get upset with me."
"I know," Regina sighed, hanging her head for a brief moment. "And I know you would never put the girls in such needless danger. I let my exhaustion do the talking. So once again, I'm sorry. Hopefully this work situation will all be over soon and life can get back to normal around here."
Humming appreciatively, Ruby looked up at Regina with hooded eyes, very much enjoying the sensation of her lips being so tenderly caressed. "I like normal. Normal is nice. Very nice. I'd like some normal right now, in fact."
Chuckling at the suggestive tone in Ruby's voice, Regina grinned. "I bet you would and so would I," she said and then allowed her grin to fade into a more serious expression. "But for now let's set that aside. I want to know why you were crying when I came in."
As if the reminder of the subject had shattered a pleasant mirage, Ruby's face became anguished again.
"Like I said, I went out to check on the pack," she explained, her voice heavy with emotion. "They lost another litter. This is the third already this year and I don't know how much more of this they can take. I'm afraid that we're going to lose them all if things don't change soon."
This news deeply troubled Regina far beyond how it was effecting Ruby. After being decimated by Joshua Woods in his maniacal pursuit of revenge, the wolves imported to Storybrooke by the first curse had for some unknown reason been further reduced down to a single pack, which was an obviously unsustainable population. Regina reacted swiftly, unilaterally banning the hunting of wolves and placing them under her personal protection. She'd drawn the policy up based on measures that proved effective back in the Enchanted Forest when fascination with Snow's little wolf prompted Regina to attempt currying favor with the what few pockets of werewolves remained native to her lands. But in Storybrooke the efforts proved woefully insufficient, not that hunting continued but that the malady afflicting the wolves continued unimpeded.
To the credit of the council, however, no one fought the initiative, nor did anyone oppose it counted among the heroic alignment. Instead, they seemed to form an unspoken agreement to rally in support of Ruby by lending their aid. Even the fairies pitched in to help Regina cast protective wards around the pack's den and their hunting area, which was made into a restricted and heavily regulated reserve with the help of the council.
But the reaction went beyond what even Regina had expected. It hadn't been a week after she brought Ruby home from the hospital that she received a visitor one afternoon while her tired fiancée was napping. To her great surprise, it was Robin. Seeing him was always hard, especially with the whole Soul Mate thing Tinkerbelle kept on insisting she hadn't got wrong leading Regina's mind down brief paths of what might have been had fate not intervened. Things could have turned out very differently were it not for Zelena's meddling. But she had long since moved on from losing him and when she really stopped to consider how life panned out for her in his absence, the alternative seemed infinitely less desirable. Soul mates and pixie dust be damned, she decided, Robin was the past and Ruby was her True Love, a sentiment Robin surprisingly shared.
Upon moving back to Storybrooke unexpectedly, he paid Regina a visit to express his willingness to move past what she had done. Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, Regina accepted tacit forgiveness, though both she and her former lover mutually agreed to keep their distance for a while. Not only was he happy with his new wife, a woman he'd met in New York, but Regina had since moved on. Considering that agreement, she had not been expecting Robin's approach, especially since there was a subtle but detectable tension between him and Ruby whenever they occupied the same room (though the animosity was mostly on Ruby's part and tended only to surface when the wolf was at her most territorial).
The purpose of Robin's visit, he informed her, was to lend his aid in tending to the wolves. After he learned about what had happened, he said he felt honor bound to act. Good man that he was, he still felt a sense of responsibility where Regina was concerned, because he still cared about her, and though that was ample motivation, he confessed he had also felt guilty about what had happened to the wolf population of his adopted home. He and his Merry Men were often out and about in the forest yet were unable to help Ruby apprehend the culprit preying on them. That failure haunted Robin, Regina could see it in his eyes, and so when he had volunteered his services and that of his men as permanent stewards of the area, Regina had quickly agreed.
And so on her first official day back as Mayor post-sabbatical to care for a convalescing Ruby, Regina drafted a motion to establish a new department of the city government: the Storybrooke Department of Wildlife and Forestry. The motion passed unanimously and it was with great satisfaction that she appointed Robin as the first director of the new division. As she pinned the newly minted badge on his chest, she couldn't help but be overjoyed, because out of all they had been through and all they had lost, and out of the tragedy of what had happened to her and Ruby, something wonderful was born: a real friendship. Since that day, Regina had come to rely on Robin as a loyal friend and trusted adviser, and he went on to prove that her faith in him was well placed.
However, even though so many people had pitched in to secure the future welfare of the wolves, Ruby was not satisfied. She, more than anyone else, felt responsible for their plight, and thus as part of her recovery vowed to personally see to the restoration of a healthy wolf population to Storybrooke's forests. To that end, she had been spending much more of her time during the full moons with the pack. She poured herself and her energy into them, overseeing birthing seasons and helping to rear the pups that survived as best she could, few though they were. Such close interaction made the staggering losses they were enduring all the more hard for Ruby to cope with, and each birthing season wore increasingly on her mind.
Regina had spent many days and nights worrying about her wife's mental state, stressing herself over the perplexing mortality rate and the toll it was taking on the woman with whom she shared her heart in the most literal sense. The only reassurance she had was that after the first few seasons of total losses, the population seemed to settle into a fragile balance, neither growing nor shrinking but hovering dangerously at a stalemate between an optimistic recovery and plunging headlong into oblivion. Many litters were lost but enough pups survived into adulthood to replace the aging members of the pack that were dying of natural causes.
Over the years they tried everything they could think of to improve the survival rate, up to and including magical means and introducing wolves from the outside world into the pack. Nothing helped. Despite the best efforts of the brightest minds both Storybrooke and this world had to offer, the wolf population remained precariously perched up on the razor's edge.
This past year, though, things ominously precipitated. Not a single pup birthed during the year had lived more than a week and it felt almost as if the clock were turning back to those dark days after Ruby's abduction and recovery. If it felt that way for Regina, she couldn't begin to imagine how it felt for Ruby. Having endured heavy losses already this year, losing yet another whole litter in the most fertile season of the year was devastating for the future outlook of the wolves, and as such there was little wonder why Ruby was so distraught.
If the mortality rate of the litters did not improve dramatically, and soon, there would be no more wolves left in Storybrooke, and as unthinkable as that was for Regina, she was not a werewolf. She couldn't even begin to comprehend the bond that Ruby had formed with the pack that was fighting for its very existence in this world. In fact, no one could adequately relate aside from Granny, and even her experiences with wild wolves paled in comparison to Ruby's, because unlike her grandmother who saw being a werewolf as a something she settled for to be with the man she loved, Ruby had learned to embrace it as a part of herself. To Ruby, the wolf packs were part of her family, and though she hid it well, a near constant state of grief persisted over what seemed to be their doggedly imminent demise.
Unfortunately, if current trends held, there was no denying or avoiding the tragedy that was soon to follow. There would soon be no comrades left for Ruby to run with during Wolf's Time, and at least until the girls came of age, she would be a lone wolf and an alpha without a pack. The isolation and pain of such a state would be excruciating to observe, so needless to say, if there was anything at all that she could do, it would have been done long ago.
Sadly Regina had long since exhausted her options, meaning this was one of those desperate situations in which she was powerless to help. She hated it. She wanted to fix what was hurting her wife so badly that it made her wish – and not for the first time – that she could bring Joshua back from the dead just to kill him again. But even if she couldn't fix the problem, she could at least provide an ameliorating influence of steadfast comfort and support as she helped Ruby pick up the pieces of her broken heart.
Drawing her hurting spouse gently into her arms, Regina nestled Ruby's head onto her shoulder, guiding it into the crook of her neck. As Ruby settled into the embrace, Regina felt rather than heard the resumption of her wife's crying. Her chest constricted with emotion, tears biting at her lids.
"I'm so very sorry, my darling," she cooed, brushing her fingers through her wife's thick brown locks. "I wish there was something I could do to help. You know that if I could, I would."
"I know," Ruby replied miserably, nodding against Regina's shoulder and trembling as her sorrow intensified.
For a long time, Regina sat motionless, allowing Ruby to cry out her pain in the safety of her embrace. When at last Ruby's distress seemed to be expended, she pulled back and cradled Ruby's face between her hands.
"I love you," she offered, wiping Ruby's tears away with the pads of her thumbs. Leaning forward, she then pressed a lingering kiss to her wife's forehead, then to the tip of her nose, and then to each cheek before lastly capturing her lips in a gentle but firm kiss. They melted together as that familiar stirring pulled at Regina's heart, and when warm mouths opening up to taste one another, she allowed the present distress to be smoothed away and willed the same relief to Ruby via deep, leisurely kisses that left her wondering where she ended and where Ruby began.
When at last they parted, Ruby leaned her forehead against Regina's and sighed, her breath leaving her in shaky waves. She sniffled and then smiled crookedly. "How is it possible after all these years that kissing you still turns me to mush? If I didn't love those perfect lips of yours so damn much, I'd hate them."
Chuckling, Regina replied, "Well, I'd apologize for my perfect lips but they do seem to get me what I want." At that, she purposefully pursed her lips and then deliberately licked them, careful to linger over her scar, an action that she knew drove Ruby wild. She wasn't disappointed.
"Oh? And what's that?" Ruby asked, playing coy with a mostly composed voice. Only her blown pupils betrayed the true magnitude of her vested interest in taking things further.
Looking at Ruby through hooded eyes, Regina smirked. "I shouldn't need to spell it out to you after all these years."
Her eyes flitting down to Ruby's neck, Regina could see the pronounced veins there pulsing with desire and she knew it wouldn't be long until her hot-blooded werewolf pounced. A thrill shot through her body, settling low in her belly as her body began to thrum with hot arousal. Inches away, she could both hear the sounds of Ruby's increasingly heavy breathing and see the tensing of powerful muscles, indicating her entire body was coiled up as if ready to spring. Nostrils flaring, Regina closed her eyes when the barely veiled smell of mutual lust registered, and as the deliciously familiar scent engulfed her senses, she groaned wantonly. That singular sound was all it took.
In one swift motion, Ruby disentangled herself from Regina and hopped off the bed. Once upright, she held out her hands for Regina to take. Sliding her hands into her wife's, Regina allowed Ruby to guide her up until she was standing as well, and then without a word, Ruby let go of her hands and began unbuttoning Regina's blouse, making quick work of it with dexterous fingers. She then deliberately slid the blouse off of Regina's shoulders and pushed it down her arms until it fell to the floor. Knowing what was next, and due to the rather impatient look on Ruby's face, Regina brought her hands to the front of her slacks to divest herself of the garment only to have them quickly batted away.
"No, let me," Ruby instructed, her eyes hooded and heavy.
Regina let her hands fall back to her side and nodded, taking in a deep, preparatory breath, which she then let out with a whoosh. "By all means."
Smiling gently, Ruby lowered herself to her knees. Once settled, she placed her hands on the belt looped through Regina's slacks. With deft fingers, she unfastened it and slid it from the loops, tossing it to the floor once she worked it free. She then lifted her hands to the button and as her fingers made contact with the bare skin just above the panty line, Regina sucked her bottom lip between her teeth.
Through heavy eyes, she watched as Ruby carefully popped the button out and began to unzip the front fly of the slacks. As Ruby methodically pulled down the zipper, she turned her head up to look at Regina and when she did, the moonlight caught in her eyes, making them shimmer a brilliant jade. The mesmerizing beauty of her wife and the intensity of Ruby's arousal only magnified the passion that was simmering in Regina's belly. Not once thereafter did she break eye contact until Ruby had successfully pulled the slacks down Regina's legs, leaving them puddled on the floor. Bracing her hands on Ruby's shoulders, Regina stepped out of them.
Turning her head back down, Ruby took a long, deep breath and then let it out with an appreciative sigh. "Mmmm. You smell so good."
Groaning again, Regina worked her fingers into the hair at Ruby's temples. "Not half so good as you."
Smiling lazily, Ruby gracefully stood. "Debatable," was her succinct response as she worked herself upright in front of Regina and then proceeded to guide her back to the bed. Grinning wolfishly, she tilted her head toward the bedroom door. "You might wanna take care of the room, 'cause it's gonna get loud in here tonight."
"Jesus, Ruby," Regina replied, her levels of anticipation rising dangerously high. Having done so countless times before, she made quick work of spelling the room for silence, but before she could even recover from casting the simple spell, Ruby was effortlessly picking her up and tossing her down on the bed. She landed neatly in the center with an audible "oof", her head resting against the pillows. As usual, her wife had perfect aim.
Giving Regina no chance to recover from the surprise move, Ruby climbed on top of her and immediately devoured her mouth in a frenzied kiss that made her toes curl. With a deep moan into Ruby's mouth, she grasped and tugged at her wife's shirt until compliance was given and Ruby separated long enough to hastily remove the offending garment, happy to find that as per usual Ruby was sans bra. Once it was flung haphazardly out of the way, Regina wrapped her arms around her wife's slim waist and then pulled Ruby back down on top of her so that their breasts, one set bare and another covered in lace, were pressed together.
Dipping her head back down, Ruby initiated another kiss, this one intimate, gentle, and slowly probing, the kind Regina hadn't permitted before a stubborn werewolf broke down what remained of her walls and made her want the kind of connection with another soul that could only be conveyed through countless hours spent breathing each others air and speaking words of love and devotion solely through the embraces of lips through which no sound passed. Minutes passed languidly floating upon that fluent, smoldering river of passion that only Ruby could transport her to. It was a place where only they existed and where their love reigned supreme. It was a place Regina never, ever wanted to leave.
After pulling away, overwhelmed by the smell and taste of the woman whose love made life inside her heart as well as her body, she gave a playful smile and then nudged herself up. Without breaking eye contact, she smoothed her hands down silken skin to the line of Ruby's panties. Lifting her head, she brushed her lips against her wife's plump, thoroughly kissed ones and then dipped her fingers beneath the silken fabric, allowing her hands to roam downward along the shapely curve of her wife's ass to cup it and then give it a forceful squeeze.
"Oh, God," Ruby moaned in response, her mouth slack against Regina's smiling lips.
"Mmmmm, referring to me as God again," she quipped, her voice husky. Teasing Ruby in such a way was an old standby of theirs. "While I'm flattered, how many times must I remind you?" As she spoke between taunting kisses of Ruby's bottom lip, Regina began slowly massaging the shapely muscles of her spouse's rump. The actions prompted Ruby to buck roughly against her, and the sensation produced by contact caused Regina's eyes roll briefly up into their sockets. "My name...is...Regina. I can tell you again...if you didn't get that...the first time." As the last words slipped out against the warmth of Ruby's mouth, Regina seized her wife's plump bottom lip with her teeth and then bit down hard enough to cause Ruby to flinch.
Her arms straining under her weight in their position on either side of Regina's head, Ruby growled; it was a low and rumbling sound that Regina could feel reverberate through the length of her body. Again, the moonlight caught her eyes, though this time, they began to glow in that mystical shade of yellow that belonged to the wolf. Regina had awakened the beast. If she had not been thoroughly turned on before, she certainly was now.
"If you're not careful," Ruby said, her voice low in timbre but laced with unspeakable power, "I'll claw your real name into your back while I make you scream."
With those loaded words, all of the air left Regina's body and she felt her legs begin to quiver. Heat and moisture pooled in tandem at the apex of her thighs. The words, though spoken in a more metaphorical sense, had awakened the darker parts of her psyche, which wanted nothing more than to bait Ruby into making good on her promise and to hell with the consequences.
So what if she wouldn't be able to sit straight the next day and so what if her co-workers blushed with indignation by just gazing upon her well-sexed expression and posture? It wasn't as if it would be the first time she dealt with the repercussions of her wife's impressive love bites at work, and if she had her druthers, it wouldn't be the last. Mixing sex with violence was one of her specialties that Ruby both understood and delightedly participated in. So to hell with what others thought: she was feeling dark tonight and she was going to indulge herself.
Looking up at Ruby, she bit her lip in a tauntingly coquettish manner. "Is that so?" She spoke in a low tone, panting and clawing at Ruby's derriere while she rocked their hips together. Straining forward, she touched her lips against Ruby's once more. "Tell me then, my darling: what's my name?"
A long, almost feral growl echoed through the room from somewhere deep inside of Ruby's slim frame, and as it echoed through the darkness of the bedroom, she lowered herself on top of Regina until they were flush from head to toe. When their eyes met, Regina noticed that Ruby's eyes were now wholly overtaken by the wolf and were glowing a vibrant, pulsating yellow.
Opening her mouth, Ruby exhaled, her breath washing over Regina's face like a warm summer breeze. Although she spoke only one word, it was uttered with such absolute authority that it made Regina's entire body shudder. "Mine."
As the dark warmth of her passion overwhelmed her, Regina grinned wickedly. "Yes, I am. The question is: what are you going to do about it?"
"This," Ruby said, finding Regina's fingers and linking her hands together. She then brought them up over Regina's head, pressing their hands into the pillow. "And this," she continued, dipping her head down to plunder Regina's waiting mouth in wet, open mouthed kisses. Ripping herself away after a handful of heated exchanges, Ruby lowered her mouth to the base of Regina's throat and gently nipped the skin there. "And this." She then proceeded to alternate between gentle bites with her teeth and suckling the skin with lips and tongue.
Mewling, Regina squeezed her eyes shut and tilted her head to give Ruby better access, which her suddenly and hotly aggressive wife used to great effect. Kissing, biting, and licking her way up Regina's neck, Ruby made her way to Regina's earlobe and after paying careful attention to that sensitive piece of flesh, she made her way down a strong jawline before pausing at lushly swollen lips.
Lost in a haze of passion and desperately needing the warmth of Ruby's mouth back on her skin, Regina gazed up into her wife's hypnotic eyes, seeing the same intense desire reflected in them. This was going to be a night to remember. Whoever said marriage was boring was an idiot because Regina was about to have the time of her life.
"Enough talk, Ruby. I need you now. Show me how much you love me. And don't hold back."
A feral grin spread across Ruby's lips. "With pleasure." Eyes almost wholly given over to the aggression of the wolf, Ruby ground her thigh against Regina's aching core, eliciting a prolonged groan that was soon swallowed up by a greedy mouth. Regina was suddenly glad of her domineering nature because Ruby went on to most dutifully and thoroughly perform her command.