When they brought him to the cell that would become his home for an indeterminate amount of time, the candelabrum and clock introduced themselves as Baelfire and Killian. They explained that their current forms reflected their personalities- Baelfire's name suggested a candelabrum, and Killian's love of the sea and using the sun to determine navigation and time justified his clock form.
Robin paced in his cell, mulling over the queen's final revelations, and his decision to accept being the queen's prisoner for as long as that lasted. Although he wanted to leave due to feeling betrayed because he thought that the queen would do something besides take his memories, his honor wouldn't allow him to set even one foot out the door, and he'd absolutely prefer that he be here in place of his mother or son, but a part of him regretted his hasty decision-making.
After about five hours, the door opened, and the candelabrum and clock that had brought him to the dungeon entered.
"We're here to take you to Her Majesty," Baelfire told him. "Follow us, please."
Reluctantly, Robin followed them to the throne room, a dark room with a tall ceiling. At the far end of the room sat a pair of thrones, only one of which was occupied.
"How are you liking your accommodations, thief?" the queen asked.
"Far preferable to my future accommodations, milady," he answered. "I am a man of my word, but if I'd known you planned to take my memories of the people I love, I wouldn't have agreed to take my mother's place, and found another way to save her from the fate you've sentenced me to in her stead. Nothing is worth losing my memories of her or Roland, or my late wife. To tell you the truth, I had expected to be beheaded or eaten; I feel a little betrayed that that isn't the case."
"The fate I sentenced you to is far kinder than remembering those you've lost, I did you a favor," she shot back. "If you're so eager to get back to them, why don't you just leave?"
"Wh-What?" Robin stuttered, shocked. Was she serious?
"Leave. Don't darken my doorway again," the queen commanded.
Hardly daring to believe his good fortune, Robin did as she bade him, never glancing back as he hastened from her presence to find a horse and make his way home.
Regina sat in a stunned silence after the thief's son left. She turned and fled to her chambers, snatching up the mirror to watch as he fled the castle so quickly it seemed he thought the hounds of Hell were dogging his every step.
He traipsed into the forest, an unwise decision so soon after nightfall. And shouldn't he know that? She had watched him and his son after his mother's arrival at her castle, he frequented the forest with a regularity that other townsfolk meandered through their respective villages. It seemed that his desperation to get away from her and back to his mother and son were so great that he had thrown caution to the wind.
And truth be told, if she had been in his same situation, wouldn't she have done the same for the two people she loved most? Although she and Daniel had never had the chance to make their bond official, and Henry was not her biological son, but Emma's and Baelfire's, she loved the child as if he was her own. She always had, and always would, and would do anything she could to ensure the boy and man's safety. Both were so innocent, so pure, that someone wronging them was unthinkable. And while she couldn't say the same of the woman who had stolen Henry's ball, she couldn't fault a blameless child any more than she could bring Daniel and Henry back into her life.
So, her heart softened toward him and she let him go for the sake of his son, and watched as he traversed the forest, pausing now and then, whether to make sure he was walking in the right direction or to listen for predators, she wasn't sure.
An hour into his journey, he encountered a pack of wolves, the drool salivating from their mouths a sure sign that they were hungry, and her former prisoner was the intended main course for their next meal.
While she had no love for the father, the thought of his son being fatherless after the father in question defied his honor and her decree just so he could retain his memories of him had her sprinting from the room on all floors, thankful for the first time in a decade for the four paws that lent more speed to her pursuit than two hands and feet would have. She was going to find him, and make sure that sweet child was not left an orphan if it was the last thing she did.
Robin had been traveling for an hour when he heard howling not far from his location. He prayed that the wolves wouldn't approach him, but all too soon, their howls were too close for comfort.
He looked for a tree he could climb, but there were no trees with branches that were low enough, even if he stood on Phillippe's back. And even then, what about Phillippe? He didn't want to leave the family's trusted steed behind, so he nudged Phillippe into a gallop in the hopes that he would outrun the wolves.
But it was no use. A few minutes later he could see a pack of ten wolves approaching, and he still urged his chestnut mare on, drawing his bow and an arrow from his back.
If he said so himself, he thought he was using his arrows rather effectively- up until the point when one of the wolves managed to snatch his bow away with its teeth.
Robin glanced around frantically, wondering what to do. The wolves were advancing, and he had nowhere to run- and even if he did, he was sure that the wolves would only come after him, and there would be no hope for his survival.
At that moment, his captor appeared, sprinting on all fours to dive into the pack of wolves, claws lashing out left and right to ward them off, fighting them like her life depended on it.
Robin took advantage of the burst of energy that her sudden appearance had given him to snatch his bow back from the clutches of the wolf's jaws.
He was letting arrows fly into the pack when suddenly Phillippe let out a whinny of alarm, rearing up on his hind legs and throwing Robin off.
He landed with a hard thud on the ground, a sound that likely wasn't heard by any other being around him, as the others were still immersed in their fight.
But he was wrong. Suddenly, he saw a paw reaching out to him, and the face of the queen as she growled, "Come on!"
He took her clawed hand, jumping up, but in the next second, he saw that helping him had cost them both dearly.
One of the wolves had sunk its teeth into his arm. Blood flowed profusely from the deep gash, filling Robin with dread- they weren't out of the woods yet, and he worried that if he obtained more wounds, he would lose too much blood. He was starting to become dizzy from blood loss as it was.
But the queen had seen what had befallen him. She quickly tore a portion of her sleeve to wrap around the wound, tying it securely. She wrapped her arm, now exposed enough to see the tattoo of a feather on her burned flesh, around his waist and hauled him up with her onto Phillipe with a strength that likely came from the beast parts of her. He felt their velocity increase as she urged the stallion into a gallop, and they sped away from the wolves toward the safety of the castle.
Once her castle came into view, Regina immediately dismounted and picked up her prisoner, thankful twice in one night for the beastly tendencies that the fairy's curse had bestowed upon her. Without them, it was unlikely she would have been able to drag the man, let alone pluck him off of his horse and carry him inside like a rag doll.
Baelfire and Killian saw her coming and rushed off, presumably to fetch medical supplies. "Bring everything to my chambers," she called after them.
"Are you sure, Your Majesty?" Baelfire checked, flames flickering as he turned toward her. The staff were barely allowed into her room to clean, so she could understand his astonishment that she was asking them to be there now.
"That's where the largest fireplace in the castle is located- therefore, it's the warmest room," Regina pointed out. "But I shouldn't be explaining my decisions to a servant. Go, do as I say. Now, or you'll pay the price."
"Y-Yes, Your Majesty, right away," Baelfire stumbled over his words and his feet as he hurried off to follow her orders.
Once in her chambers, she laid the prisoner on the chaise lounge by the fire. She wanted to get a closer look at his wound, but she didn't dare remove the makeshift tourniquet until she had the supplies necessary to properly address his wound.
At that moment Baelfire and Emma appeared in the doorway, hurrying toward her with a basin filled with hot water from Emma's spout and numerous cloths. Regina thanked them, an act that made their eyes widen with surprise. She hadn't done something so humane as have proper manners since the sequence of events that had turned her into her current grotesque form.
After telling her to call if she needed further assistance, they left, leaving Regina alone with her prisoner and her own restless thoughts.
She prepared a cloth with the water Emma had provided, then slowly untied the makeshift tourniquet, instantaneously pressing the warm cloth to the wound to soak up and repress any blood that may try to flow from the opening.
Suddenly, her eye caught something dark just below where she had tied the tourniquet, on the thief's forearm. It was the lion tattoo, the sign she had dreaded for years, the mark that that fairy, Tinkerbelle, the one who had the audacity to curse her to this fate, had told her was the distinguishing characteristic of the one man who had any chance of falling in love with her and breaking the curse placed upon the castle and its inhabitants.
Oh, how she so desperately wanted to walk away! To leave this room, and his life, and never look upon his face again! She had no need of a man who stalked her castle and whose mother stole from her. He didn't treat her with respect either, always having the nerve to challenge her instead of treating her like the royalty she was. She didn't need any man, but she especially didn't need a man like that.
At the same time though, he was father to a little boy who would be orphaned without his father, not to mention devastated at the news of his passing. So with that in mind, she continued to treat him, using the magic she had harnessed during her decade of confinement to heal the worst of his injury. At the same moment that she was confident that the worst of the bleeding had ebbed away, the stalker (she refused to stop calling him that or "thief", he stalked her castle for days, after all) regained consciousness.
"Where are we?" he queried.
"My chambers," Regina told him, slightly annoyed at having to explain this again. "It was the best option, it has the largest fire, and therefore, will warm you up the fastest. I'm sure you need it, you lost a lot of blood."
The thief attempted to prop himself up on his elbows, then collapsed back on the chaise lounge in the position he had started with. He gazed at her, sapphire blue eyes filled with even more sincerity than they had contained when he was pleading with her to spare his mother. "Thank you- I don't know your name, milady."
Regina hesitated. To give him her name was to give him power over her, to build a familiarity she knew she didn't want him to feel that he had with her. At the same time, though, the deep recesses of his eyes told her that for the moment, at least, his desire to know her name was innocent- he genuinely wanted to give her his thanks.
"Regina," she supplied. "I'm… Regina. And I don't remember you telling me yours, thief."
A fire that she couldn't explain fueled his gaze as he looked up at her. "It's Robin," he responded. "Thank you, Regina, for saving my life tonight. Your name suits you- the bold and audacious queen. Did your parents specifically name you that because they knew that one day, you would be queen?"
Her emotions, and by extension her expression, immediately soured. "That's what she hoped, and people came up with less flattering monikers for me, but that didn't come until later" she replied curtly.
His gaze softened even more as he pointed out, "That response makes it sound like that's not what you wanted. What happened?"
The walls he had managed to chip away at with the chisel of his kindness immediately fortified themselves. "That's none of your concern."
His hands went up, the picture of surrender. "All right, I won't ask. Just know that if you ever want to talk about that, or anything else, I'm always willing to listen. And if people saw you now, as I do, those monikers wouldn't exist. They don't for me, and I've only known you a day."
"I doubt it- and even if they didn't, for how long would it last?" she shot back skeptically. "I thought you were leaving."
"That depends, milady," he answered. "Are you still planning on taking my memories of my mother and son? My wife?" Through his voice she could hear the devastation that that act would cause him, and she relented, tired of assuming this persona.
"No," she murmured. "No, I'm actually not."
Apprehension clouded his eyes as he scrutinized her. "Are you certain? Because just this afternoon, you were willing to erase the very essence of who I am with one swipe of your hand. Or whatever method of magic you planned on using."
"Yes, I'm certain!" she snapped, irritation making her voice rise several decibels. "I may not be the nicest creature- being- thing- you'll ever meet, but I do keep my word, as much as possible, at any rate. And if you must know, before you so recklessly declared you didn't want to be here, I had called you to my presence to tell you that instead of erasing your memories, as I do with all other trespassers, my plan is to force you to live with them- as a prisoner here, for the rest of your days."
Instead of protesting her sentence, he simply nodded. "I expected that to be the alternative. If I'd known then what I know now, I wouldn't have left. And to tell you the truth, I would much rather that be the punishment than your original castigation."
"A fact that I still find puzzling," Regina admitted. "What exactly can you gain by holding on to painful memories?"
He paused at that, his brow furrowed as he pondered. "If the tragedy also contained a happy ending, I'd think that would be worth remembering despite the pain."
As she stood, she shook her head, baffled. "We'll have to agree to disagree on that, outlaw."
"As I told you, milady, it's Robin."
He grabbed her hand, she assumed to help himself stand, and as he utilized it to pull himself up, his lips brushed the back of her hand.
The glare she gave him could have scorched an entire village. "What was that?" she asked suspiciously.
"Apologies, milady, I was simply trying to stand." But the look in his eyes was anything but apologetic, full of an emotion she couldn't define.
"Maybe you should stay still then. I didn't heal you for nothing, you know," she informed him.
"Then why did you?"
She paused briefly, wondering how much of the truth she should reveal. "You'll see," she called over her shoulder as she walked out of the room.
This chapter contains prompts 196, 29, 9, 48, 34, and 83 for OQ Prompt Party 2019. Enjoy, and let me know what you think!
