Author's Note: I apologize that this chapter is so short. Let's say it's a holiday problem (time and a half has dragged me to work). Don't worry: none of the other chapters are nearly as small. These next three chapters follow the pattern set by the previous three, then will change after that as more POVs come in. Have a happy Labor Day!
Guest Comments
BossLady: you're still the only guest! Sometimes your question make me want to have a dialogue with you, but at least I can answer some things here! First, thank you! About Gold knowing everything … well, that's not entirely true of his powers, is it? He definitely knows more than he lets on, but certainly not everything (especially that which concerns him).
Thank you everyone that has favorited, put on alerts, and all my lurkers!
Three weeks after she had become aware of it, she tells him determinedly that she needs some time to herself.
It isn't the first time she's asked. Every few months or so, she'll go off on her own to collect her independence and feed her soul for something other than monotony. Even though she is content onboard, sometimes she needs something different. She has spent time in lands all across the Enchanted Forest in the two and a half years that she's known him.
He grins at her, that wide beautiful grin that made her love him in the first place. He pulls her close with one heavily jeweled hand and has her eyes follow his outstretched finger to a spot of land on the horizon.
Her eyes touch it and soften in wonder. It is lush and green, seemingly untouched by civilization. Tall trees, thick grasses, and unchiseled boulders are all that she can see, save the occasional rustle of wildlife. She is aware that the Enchanted Forest stretches for miles upon miles upon miles, but such uncultivated land is foreign. No people, no questions, no worries – it seems utopian.
"I can leave you there. Send word when you are ready to rejoin us, love," he says in that buttery accent. Her heart swells. He loves her so much that the request is not questioned or taken to heart; he understands her need to stretch and explore and is willing to give her all of it.
What would he say if he knew she is leaving so that she could abandon something they created from that love?
She presses her face into his chest and inhales deeply. He smells like wind and spices and independence. "I love you," she whispers.
He smirks. "Of course you do, love," he teases. But she can see the reciprocation in his gaze. His hand encircles her wrist and a rough thumb glides against the pulse, stirring a heat deep within her. She knows she will miss it while she's gone.
The crew seem delighted to see her off. They hide it under false wishes for her safety on her trip and grin behind their hands. The one in the red cap pushes her roughly onto the rowboat and smiles a rotten-toothed smile as he says goodbye.
The forest is wide and wondrous; she thinks that it will be the perfect place to stay while she gestates. As expected, it is empty of people, wild things roaming about and the air heavy with nature. Magic vibrates and although she cannot brandish it, she can feel the untapped resource pulsating with the desire to create. There is a stream with clean water, thick with fish, and a lake further down to swim in. Deer, rabbit, and squirrel run from her feet if she is too loud in her exploration. Sometimes the wolves will growl at her when she gets too close to their den and that excites her, too.
She has a tent, a bow and quiver, a dagger, and a few blankets. It is all she needs, even though she suffers the first few nights. Her archery skill is a little uneven from disuse, but she picks it up again in a few days. Careful, learned hands remember how to skin a rabbit and build a fire. She finds a routine early and then grows frustrated; she reorganizes her whole life and starts again. Her belly rounds and the forest provides; these are the only things she wants to persist. Routine scares her in a way she cannot express.
At some point, the largest wolf begins to study her from afar. The female doesn't approach, but seems acutely interested in the pregnancy and watches her with keen black eyes. She can feel the presence of magic in it.
When the hottest night in summer hits, she ties back her thick hair with a rope made from the weeds that grow beneath the cover of trees and floats on her back in the cool blue-black lake. She is clothed in starlight and the water and air are utterly still. Crickets chirp and an owl calls, the only noise covering the landscape. She stares at the moon, a harvest moon that is almost golden, and feels something in her chest dislodge. She reaches tense fingers toward the sky and then cradles her belly and cries for hours.
She tries not to get attached. Tries not to feel connected when the fetus jumps eagerly whenever her heart races in exhilaration. Tries not to smile when it dances in her womb as she settles to sleep. Tries to forget the images she conjured aboard the ship, of a boy that looks so much like his father. Tries not to picture how she could teach him to love what she loved and how to survive in this world. Tries not to feel the love well up inside her for him.
Such feelings are squashed down each time they arise. It cannot be, she reminds herself. It cannot be.
It is on a cold day in fall that her waters break. She has been experiencing contractions for the past few days, so it is not altogether surprising. Labor is simple and predictable the second time around. She had a midwife with her first, but now such a person would seem superfluous. She knows how to birth a child and had been prepared to do so alone. What does surprise her is the return of the grey wolf, head down and examining her progress, leaving when the child is born alive.
Her son comes into the world with barely a squawk. He looks at her with milk-blue eyes that peer into her soul. She imagines they will be more like Killian's eventually. His hair is a mop of dark wet curls. Her cheekbones, his lips. She drags a finger down his nose, the same as her lover's, watching the large eyes flutter closed then open again. He is lovely to look at. Something whispers over them, but it is gone before she can identify it.
As she inventories and memorizes him, his face crumples and he begins to squall and she knows he is truly seeing her. As if he knows what she is planning to do.
She has a moment, barely a true one, where she considers bringing him back to the Jolly Roger. "Here," she would say to Killian. "Here is your son. See how his eyes are like yours? See how his chin is? He is our freedom, our life in flesh and blood."
In the end, she doesn't name him. She tucks a blanket around him and brings him to the edge of the den. The dark grey wolf bares its teeth at her, but comes to the baby and only curls itself around him in protection. He belongs there, she realizes; he is a child of the trees and the earth and the animals. She was never meant to have him.
She doesn't admit to the tears that course down her cheeks for the first hour, lungs fighting to shudder, but then grieves the loss with tears as potent as the ones she shed for Bae. She decides to allow herself this and only this. She cannot think on this child again.
She leaves soon after drinking the bitter bark that will stop the flow of her milk. It seems to sever the last tie. She imagines she can hear his cry from the wolves' den, but it is covered by the howls of the brethren.
The untapped magic wriggles its way around her and she can feel it fight to speed up her healing, too soon, much too soon. A visceral scream escapes from her throat and she shrieks until her throat is raw and the rage has been swallowed up. It is still there, with the pain and sadness, but it is covered and bandaged so that she will never again have to look at it.
The sails are spotted along the horizon early after she sends the carrier bird with the message that she is ready. They anchor shallowly and a single dingy is rowed ashore. He steps onto the land with swagger and his eyes twinkle with delight. Her love wraps an arm around her and leads her back to the ship with pride.
She only looks back once, briefly.
He never once mentions her time away. But he keeps her closer, kisses her deeper and perhaps more gently. He stares at her in the daytime, now, and sometimes she catches expressions of worry and fear. She wonders if he had truly been frightened that she would never return, since she had spent so long away from him.
For this reason, she doesn't take another excursion. She stays by his side and drinks in his spirit; it is enough.
It is enough up to the moment Rumple tears the heart from her chest, the one meant for Killian, and crushes it in his fist in fury. They only had one month together again, not nearly enough. As a glare flares across her vision, she sees Bae and the nameless child pass through her mind with white-hot feelings of regret. But she has her love holding her close, so it is not all for naught. He loves her wildly and she loves him back. She reaches a finger to weakly stroke his jaw, whispering that she loves him one final time.
Their love was worth it all.
She will take it with her.
TBC