I am so excited about this chapter and everything that comes after this. Last one was a bit of a filler, but it had some important stuff in it. This one, however, has so far been my favorite to write. I'm still finishing up the last part, but there will definitely be five chapters now instead of just four. Anywho, hope everyone enjoys reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it! Thanks so much to all my new followers and reviewers!
Chapter 3
The clearing that Emma had seen in her vision was familiar enough. David and Robin knew it even better than she, and once Regina returned with Belle, it took only a few hours before they had their strategies mapped out, signals established, and pieces of the spell in place. Whale extracted the vial of precious blood, and soon they had enough people gathered to put up a decent distraction and provide cover for the rescue part.
David and Robin were assigning positions to the gathered mob, and in the midst of the controlled chaos Emma's eye caught Regina's. The woman gestured towards the back of the house with a pointed look, and Emma followed her to the kitchen. The noise wasn't much muted in there, but the two were alone.
"What is it?" Emma asked, crossing her arms. She was impatient as ever, eager to get back out there to speed things along. It bothered her, too, that Regina obviously hadn't felt the others should hear what she was about to say.
"I told you about how we needed the baby's blood, right?"
"Yes. You said it was the ingredient necessary to complete the spell, and we got it. What's the issue?" Emma pressed, hands moving to her hips. She already didn't like where this was headed.
"It is, true enough, but what we are about to unleash is powerful and dark. David wasn't wrong to question what the price would be with something like this. It's steep. Very, very steep."
"I thought the price was Leo's blood?" she said. "The blood of 'true love's first born son' or whatever."
"Not exactly. It's more an ingredient than price, to be perfectly honest. I figured that would be hard enough for Charming to swallow, and I wasn't about to push it."
"Do you know what the price is, then?" Emma asked, trepidation sparking. "You plan on telling me?"
Regina took a breath, and tugged Emma closer. "You need to understand what we're doing, here. This isn't just some spell. We're summoning, however temporarily, the original creator of the Dark One's dagger. Magic can't bring him to us directly, but with this sort of blood magic we can come pretty damn close. We're summoning his shadow, and the shadow is going to want something in return."
Emma's mouth went cotton-dry. "Who is the original creator of the Dark One's dagger?"
"The Dark Fairy, of course. And his shadow, it's going to be powerful. We can only control it as far as commanding it to separate the magical pull the dagger has on Rumplestiltskin. That's as far as the bounds of the spell go."
"Shadow…like the shadow in Neverland?"
"Exactly. Belle found a great deal of information in one of Gold's book about them. Only creatures with the highest magical abilities can create a shadow-self without killing themselves in the process. The Dark Fairy was the first to ever manage it."
"And we have to use his shadow? We have to call something like that here? How could that possibly end well?" Emma asked, struggling to keep her voice under control.
"It won't. At least not for us."
"Regina – "
"The price, Emma, is our magic. Something as dark and powerful as that could only be tempted with something it wants, covets. The power of those who are strong enough to summon it."
Emma was quite for a moment, the final point of Regina's speech sinking in and leaving her insides cold. "So, once Hook is safe, you need me to go cast the spell while you distract Zelena."
"Belle could never cast it on her own, she doesn't have a magical bone in her body."
"And then once I do, it will free Gold from the dagger, before taking my magic and your magic," she continued, the pieces falling into place.
"Yes. And it could very well kill us both."
"How can it just…just take our magic out of us?" Emma asked, brain racing, heart thudding hard.
"Painfully. It absorbs the energy around us, in us. Your heart could stop before it does. The book only mentions a few of the people who have attempted this ritual, and most were killed. Only the stronger ones even have a chance of surviving it."
"But, it's possible?"
"It is. And, theoretically, if we survive, our magic would slowly begin to return to us, though likely never as it was before."
Emma mulled it over in her mind, the clamor behind her in the living room growing in volume. They only had a moment more before it all began. "Will we survive it? I can't…we can't just leave Henry alone. I know my parents would take care of him, but he's already lost Neal –"
"I believe that you will," Regina said after a measured moment. "And I have a chance. That's as far as I'm willing to bet. But the chance of death is there, Emma. Are you prepared to do this?"
"Are you?"
"I'd go to hell and back to kill the bitch," she said vehemently. "But I would do more than that to survive, if only for Henry's sake. I'm prepared. And, if I do die, then it would at least be to protect Henry…" she paused, glancing towards the front of the house, "…and the rest of these cretins, I suppose. Even if I fail to kill Zelena, Gold will finish her off for certain."
There really wasn't much more for Emma to consider. As much as she wanted to live for Henry, she'd never really wanted the Savior's power. She didn't want the magic. It was surprisingly easy to make her decision. Holding Regina's gaze, she gave a curt nod. "Let's do it then. But nothing we said goes beyond this room. I don't want them worrying about anything else but surviving. Deal?"
"Deal. Now, once Zelena appears, retreat to the woods and find Belle. She'll show you how to summon it. I've already given her the necessary ingredients and she knows how to read the incantation. The rest is up to you."
"Fine. Just, make sure you stay alive long enough for me to cast it," she said, looking the shorter woman up and down. Emma didn't doubt her abilities, but the thought that this might be the last time Henry saw either of them was weighing heavily on her. It wasn't fucking fair, none of it, and for a brief moment she pictured herself taking Henry and running the hell away from Storybrooke, Maine, the damn eastern seaboard. Hook's face, though, David and Mary Margaret, her brother…they bolted her down, tied her to the outcome of the battle. She was going to do her damndest to save everyone, and that's just the way things were.
"Don't worry about me," Regina answered, walking passed her and out of the kitchen. "Stay focused, and…" she stopped once, and Emma felt her nails grip her shoulder through her sweater, "Good luck."
Regina convinced Robin stay behind to protect Mary Margaret and the baby with Henry, Granny, and Whale. He'd argued at first, but relented after a short, whispered conversation. Emma imagined it likely went along the lines of her asking him to protect Henry, and she wasn't about to argue. Everyone was gathered, waiting, and she went to stand beside David.
"I know I've been the nay-sayer," he said to her, restless babble keeping them from being directly overheard, "but I want to save Hook too. We'll get him back, I promise."
"I know," she nodded, letting him wrap an arm around the back of her head as he pulled her close. It was brief, but enough for that weight to nearly double.
"Now," he started once he let go, "Henry." David placed a hand on his shoulder, squatting until he was eye-level. "I'm counting on you to protect everyone. Robin, Whale, and Granny will be right here with you, but they're really just back-up. "Watch out for Mary Margaret and the baby."
"Nothing will get passed me. I won't let you down," he promised.
Emma smiled at her son, her pride mirrored in Regina's face as well.
David ruffled his hair, and stood back for a handshake. Henry returned it, gripping his hand tightly.
"See ya soon, kid," Emma said next, pulling him in for a long, tight hug. "Take care of them, and take care of yourself. Love you."
She felt him nod before mumbling "I love you too," back, and after holding on for a moment longer, he let go.
Regina beamed at him when he turned to her, and hugged him tightly as well. "Once all this is over, Henry, your memories should come back. We can have a nice long talk, then. Okay?"
"I'd like that," he answered, before melting back towards where Mary Margaret stood, wrapping a supportive arm around her.
"Alright, let's go," Emma said, and the group around her quieted immediately. With a turn of the handle, they all filed out of the front door, Robin's men, Ruby, and Belle immediately disappearing into the woods around them, while David and Regina stayed close Emma. Everyone was as armed as possible, David with his gun and sword, Emma's own semi-automatic already drawn, and Regina hands clenching and unclenching as magic gathered around her.
"Are you ready for this?" Emma asked her, the house now long behind them as David trudged ahead of them.
"Oh I think so. It's time all this ended."
"Good luck to you too, by the way," she mumbled. "Don't die."
"Likewise, Ms. Swan. And as I said, don't worry about me. I'm not leaving him again," she replied, and the words were poignant in their sincerity.
Emma remembered them as the clearing came into sight.
The setting sun cast deep, seemingly impenetrable shadows across the field. A small house was just barely visible on the horizon, similar to the one that Zelena had occupied before. The cellar doors were a good hundred yards away from the building, closer to the edge of the woods. Emma took a shaky breath as they stood gathered under cover. She wasn't going to leave Henry either, not if she could help it, and the same went for the man that was hopefully still waiting for her.
But what if he isn't there? What if she moved him? What if this is all for nothing and he's already dead…
"Emma," David said, voice penetrating through her thoughts. "Don't start losing hope now. We're not leaving until we find him."
She nodded, gripping her gun tighter. After taking a moment to survey the clearing, they ran out together from the tree line and into the open space. Emma kept her eyes trained to the sky, and Regina kept her's on the ground around them, watching for signs of magic, Zelena, and collectively they watched David's back as he slammed his boot, and then his sword against the chains that snaked around the doors. After the second swing, he fell back from the force of his sword reverberating against the metal.
"I hit it with all I had," he panted, "but I didn't even nick it. Regina…"
"Out of my way," she barked, and Emma and David both cleared a path. She swept the currents of magic around her into an impossibly bright ball of light, and thrust it towards the doors.
They burst open with deafening force.
Emma centered her gun in front of her, eyes on the eerily familiar stairs leading down into that hellish pit. Her chest suddenly seized in a harsh, stinging cramp, taking her breath away. She was forced to pause a moment, hand over her pounding heart.
"You okay?" David asked, watching her carefully. She nodded, trying to shake the sensation off.
"Yeah, yeah let's go."
David was first to the entrance, still favoring his sword over the gun as he disappeared down. Emma followed close, putting both hands back on her gun. Her insides were a squirming, painful, horrid mess, and she tried to brace herself, shut her emotions off, senses searching for threats and odd sounds and totally not focused on anything they might find inside –
David froze on the bottom step, blocking Emma's view of the underground room.
The sting in her chest seemed to explode in that moment, and it felt like her heart was bursting, ripping, burning. She couldn't breathe, didn't want to breathe. David was quickly turning back around, and his eyes were glassy and sad and angry and no no no –
"Emma…please just listen to me." His voice was infuriatingly calm, and Emma's body began to shake. "You don't want to see this. Go back up, please. Please," David begged, hands grasping her arms, imploring. Begging that she let him protect her, that she at least let him save her from this, from seeing what the room held.
Everything she ever was, all the walls, the perpetual distrust, the fear, the scars and still-gaping wounds…all the smiles, the jokes, the scar on the palm of her hand and the memories, the unsaid words, the would-be touches and caresses, her hope…
"No," she whispered, the wicked witch forgotten, her gun hastily shoved back into its holster. "No, NO!" she screamed, throat ripping with her heart. David flinched back, and she took his surprise as an advantage and shoved passed him, nearly falling on her face as her feet tangled on the stairs. She ended up stumbling to her knees, the dirt cold and hard under her hands as she caught herself, hair blocking her vision as she reached a hand forwards to brace her weight and –
Her palm closed around a leg, fingers slipping on slick leather. She moved her hair back with her other hand, heart stopping altogether when she saw him.
"Emma…" David was beside her, tugging her back. She tore herself out of his grasp.
"Hook…Hook!" she yelled, scrambling until she knelt by his head, blanched skin made even whiter against his dark hair, from his head to his bare chest, plastered down and crusted with sweat and dirt and blood.
"Can you hear me? Hook?!" she shouted again, nearly jumping out of her skin when her hands touched his face, finding his skin unbearably cold and stiff. She choked back a sob, the wretched sound catching in her throat and burning, burning. She put her fingers to the pulse point in his neck, and when she couldn't sense any movement underneath her fingertips, she laid her cheek to his chest, uncaring that his blood from the gashes and wounds – too many, too many, too many – stuck to her skin and hair. She listened for a breath, a heartbeat, the rumbling sound of his laugh as he made some stupid joke about her touching him and holding him and –
"Please!" she cried, her face now wet with more than just his blood. She lifted herself off of him, hands pressing together over his heart as she braced herself above, before she began frantically pumping up and down. "David, call Whale, get him over here now," she said, counting out thirty compressions before closing her lips over his cold ones and blowing air into his lungs. She was now utterly and completely focused on the CPR, emotions gone, replaced with an empty buzz. "Call him now!" She was just trying to save a life. He was a good fighter…
"Emma, he's gone," David said quietly, though he didn't try to touch her again. She kept up the CPR regardless, her body now nothing more than a working machine, her heart and screaming soul locked tight in box and put away, far away. She pressed her lips against his unbearably cold ones more times than she cared to count, part of her withering away and shattering every time his lungs failed to do their job.
"It's too late," came Regina's voice a moment later, rational and clear. Emma could just barely hear it over the sound of her own labored breathing. "Stop this. It won't do any good to call Whale, and you're only weakening yourself. His heart has stopped, Emma. Emma!"
"What?" she gasped, arms stilling.
"Zelena is still out there, and we have a job to do. We can't…you can't let this stop you. It's what she wants."
Emma latched onto Regina's detached tone, her separateness, the fact that they still had things to worry about and do. She finally stopped her efforts completely, removing her slowly chilling hands from the cold, torn body beneath her. That's all he was now.
"You're right," she said, and David tensed beside her. "He's dead. Hook is dead."
She looked at his body now, really looked at it. His bare torso was covered in gashes that varied in depth and length, arms bruised and raw from what must have been ropes that held him. He was lying prone on the ground, arms and legs slightly spread, as if something had been holding him down. She noticed for the first time that the earth was dug-up around him, fissures and small mounds of dirt scattered about. It was as if the ground was already trying to swallow its due.
"Yeah. We have a job to do," she repeated Regina's words, rubbing the back of her hand along her lips. She stood, and felt as helpless as before when she'd seen him in her vision. He was done waiting, done looking after Henry, done making her laugh. He was done. Gone. She couldn't save him. They were too late. She was too late.
Emma was still rubbing her lips, harder, more fervently, and suddenly it was the only thing she could do.
God it was wrong. It was wrong wrong wrong. His lips were soft and warm, gentle and mocking. Not cold and hard, not dead and silent, they were wrong –
"It's wrong, it's all wrong," she said from behind her furiously moving hand, trying to wipe the cold from her mouth, the death, the wrongness…
"Emma, stop. Emma – "
"No!" she sidestepped David again, and her box broke. Her last thread of sanity snapped. "Don't you know how wrong it is? You're not supposed to be like this, you idiot!" she screamed, sinking back beside Hook on the ground, no longer rational, no longer caring that some witch wanted them all dead. Her right hand fisted in his damp hair and jerked his head up, holding his face – so cold, so cold – in her other hand.
"I'm sorry, okay? Is that what you wanted to hear?" She shook him. "I'm sorry I pushed you away, and I'm sorry I almost married a fucking flying monkey. I'm sorry I forgot about you for a whole year, and I'm sorry it really was only a one-time thing. I didn't want it to be, but I wasn't ready. I wasn't ready…and Henry was missing and…"
Her sobs overtook what voice she had left, and she was holding his face against hers. "I'm sorry I couldn't…I 'm so sorry I was too late. Everything is too late. I'm worthless and stupid and what is the point of me if I can't even save you? I'm sorry…I'm sorry I wasn't good enough."
Her last words were whispered, meant only for him. She was rocking now, his head and shoulders in her lap, her arms completely wrapped around him as she pet his hair, ran her fingers along his rough cheeks, wiped the blood and tears and dirt from his skin. "Please, please don't leave me," she whispered against his ear, her thumb running along his lips. She tried to warm them, because they just couldn't be that cold…so wrong, and she closed her eyes. She could warm them so much faster with her own.
She bent her head, determined to replace the coldness with warmth. She wouldn't remember his lips like that, she couldn't.
Emma pressed her mouth against his insistently, demanding. There was nothing gentle about it, nothing soft. She tasted blood and salt, but he was still there beneath it all, his taste. She'd missed it before when she had been mindlessly trying to revive him. God, she remembered their kiss in Neverland, even remembered the one he haphazardly inflicted upon her in New York. They were hers, these lips were hers, damnit. She couldn't stand that they wouldn't mold against her in that slick and pliant way, that warm way, his way. She just wanted him to do it again, she just wanted him to fucking breathe and hold her back and kiss her like his heavy gaze and parted lips had always promised.
But it was all taking too long, and he didn't. It wasn't until she had just begun to withdraw, her lips barely touching his, hope sinking like a fucking anchor in her stomach,when Emma felt her skin prickle. That was her only warning before something abruptly sparked inside her chest, before something washed over her and she began to burn, her lips began to blaze…
"That's impossible," she heard David's voice behind her, but it was a meaningless sound compared to the pounding in her chest, as if her heart was beating twice as fast and twice as loud. Breath left her open mouth quite forcefully, something sucking it out, and her lips were hot, pulsing, and moving. A hesitant wetness prodded the top of her bottom lip, before his lips were closing around it, tugging, encasing, cold fingers inching up her neck, warming with every beat of her double heart –
His heart.
Emma broke away, but only pulling back far enough so that her eyes could meet blue ones, black lashes fluttering blearily, flushed skin crinkling around them.
"Emma?" his voice rumbled, thick and scratchy, his nose just barely brushing hers.
She was afraid to move, afraid that he could be gone again if she blinked, if she stopped touching him. "Is this real?" she whispered, waiting with bated breath, just waiting for his skin to turn cold again and his eyes to close.
"You tell me, love," he answered, his fingers sliding through her hair now, his brow still pinched with confusion. She felt his other arm brush her side, before he circled her back with it, wincing at the movement.
"It was a fucking sleeping potion," Regina said from behind them, incredulous. "She must have used my sleeping potion. Our memories…"
"They're back…I can remember," David mumbled, voice distant. "The witch, she was there with us in the forest…" David was suddenly crouching across from her, his voice urgent. "Emma, help me get him to his feet. We're not safe out in the open like this."
"It is real," Emma breathed, gripping him tighter, ignoring David, unconcerned with the fact that she just broke another curse. "You're alive. You came back."
"I did, didn't I?" he said, hand moving to cup her cheek, eyes soft and still a bit bewildered. After a moment they sharpened, before he gingerly tilted his forehead against hers. "And you are the furthest thing from worthless possible. You're brilliant and amazing. How many times do I have to say it before you believe me?"
Something between a sob and a laugh escaped her, and she smiled as he brushed his lips against hers once, soft and warm.
"Emma," David said again, voice more insistent. "Hook's still injured and we have a ways to go before we're safe."
Killian tensed under her, his hand suddenly gripping her hair just shy of too hard. "That witch," he suddenly growled, eyes narrowed. "Where the hell is she? She was here just before you came."
"She's out there somewhere," Regina answered. "Though I'm surprised she wasn't waiting for us when we got here."
"She thought you weren't coming," Hook replied stiffly, grimacing and biting down on his lip hard as Emma and David finally brought him to his feet. "She'd given up on that and was trying to use some sort of enchanted mirror to find you."
Emma's stomach lurched, the thought that he had probably thought the same thing stabbing at her insides. "What kind of mirror?" she asked, deciding that this definitely wasn't the time or place to delve into that guilt trip.
She felt him tense beside her. "Does it matter? Now, if you don't mind, I'd rather like to get the hell out of here."
"Is the coast clear, Regina?" David asked as they walked forward. Regina climbed the stairs ahead of them and emerged onto the field.
"Yes, for now."
Killian stepped ahead and carefully mounted the stairs, and Emma couldn't help but cringe as his wounds trickled and stretched. He had to be in agony. She kept a careful hand on his back, sliding herself back under his arm as soon as she came up beside him.
"Don't look so worried, Swan. I've had worse than this. I can stand on my own two feet."
He wasn't looking at her, his eyes fixed on some point in the distance. His skin had gone from flushed with renewed life to a pale gray, and she realized he was shivering slightly.
"Oh yeah? How many times have you died before, exactly?" she said, refusing to budge. "David, give me your jacket."
"None," Killian answered, lips quirking. "But then I wasn't dead this time, either."
"Here," David said, shrugging out of his coat and handing it to Emma. He and Regina started ahead, and she slid the sleeves over his arms before he protest, carefully pulling it together in the front.
"And here I always imagined you un– " he winced when she tugged harder than necessary, though the smirk didn't fade. He glanced towards David's back and chuckled hoarsely. "Point taken. Perhaps I'll save that one for another time, then?"
"Let's go," she said, pulling the zipper up to his chin. His fingers brushed her cheek and she froze.
"That lovely blush wouldn't happen to be for me, would it?" His smile was practically tender, the gesture intimate, and while it really wasn't that much compared to everything that happened between them only moments before, Emma's eyes automatically darted away and she stepped back. She couldn't face him like this, not yet. She didn't even know for sure if she was going to survive the spell, and she absolutely could not lose focus. Emma felt something like hesitation now, with him beside her and so obviously in need of healing. The "kiss" apparently only worked with curses, and his injuries had obviously been inflicted with a knife rather than with a wand. She and Regina wouldn't be able to help him, even if the spell went perfectly and they both survived. She couldn't…Emma couldn't face what that kiss meant now.
She looked away when his smile faded into a tight line, and when she tried to lift his arm to go back over her shoulders, he wouldn't let her. "As I said, Swan, I can stand on my own two feet."
"Just let me help – "
"I think you've done all you can for one day," he mumbled, walking ahead of her, brushing passed. "David! Don't suppose you could spare a man a sword? I'm feeling a bit exposed without my hook."
Emma bit back the retort on her tongue, cringing as she followed. She couldn't do this now…she just couldn't…
"Regina – " she started, intending to demand they stop then and there to heal him, before their powers are stripped away, before they could possibly be killed.
She never got the chance.
"Not so fast, my lovelies," a terribly familiar voice chided from behind them. "We're just getting started."
