"Nothing, nothing's wrong." I trekked to escape her but Emma was having none of it.

"I'm just. I was thinking about Regina, she destroyed your childhood. What's going to happen when she finds out about your brother." I lied and walked quickly away. Emma would know that I'd just told her yet another lie but I didn't care.

Charming and Henry were sitting at the table together. Grandson fully engaged in what his grandfather was explaining. Charming was pointing his way through the photo, showing off our son's head and his chest, his feet and tiny little toes.

I wondered how he could do it, put on a smile and pretend there was nothing happening. Pretend we hadn't been given yet another reminder that the baby hadn't been fathered by him. How could he pretend we hadn't been given a time bomb.

"Mary Margaret, come on. If it were nothing we wouldn't be talking about it." I smiled at her quoting me, it was so long ago we had been speaking about Graham. It was funny how all our conversations seemed to be based around boys. I knew Emma was right, she really cared and she was this child's sister. I turned and nodded to my firstborn, allowing her to lead me to my bedroom.

Emma thumped down onto the bed, leaving a space for me next to her which I sat in. She then waited, frozen totally, until I began to talk.

"Dr Whale asked for some extra tests to be done. He wanted an Alef8, which tests for genetic diseases. It turns out he was a carrier for Canavan's disease." I had to stop for breath, it was as if someone had just opened the floodgates and every drop of water was determined to flow out.

"That means your baby brother is unlikely to live beyond ten. It means that his brain is slowly shutting down from his birth onwards, he will probably never walk or talk. He might be totally paralysed by the end. I've waited so long for a family, I didn't want to have to wait any longer and now, now we only have ten precious years.

"And what more of a reminder does David need that I'm not having his baby? Now it has a condition that he doesn't carry, a condition you don't have because he doesn't carry it. I'm scared, Emma. Scared of what he might do, I want to think he wouldn't hurt the doctor but after this? After him giving the baby a death sentence? I am no longer sure." The water escaping slowly went from a tsunami to a trickle and I felt like I could breath again.

Emma was looking down at her lap, trying to hide the shock on her face.

"He wouldn't."

"What?"

Emma looked up at me sincerity in her eyes,

"He won't hurt Whale, that would hurt you. Whenever he's angry at someone he asks himself what you would think, what you would do. He won't do anything."

Tears sprung from my eyes, racing each other off my cheeks. It felt like all I'd done recently was cry, it wasn't like me to cry so often.

"Hormones right?" Emma joked. She cautiously wrapped her arm around my shoulders in a half-hug. The closest to a hug she'd ever voluntarily engaged in. That thought had more tears flowing from my eyes, Emma sat patiently and rubbed my back, letting me get everything out.

I heard footsteps and noticed the shadow over the door, Charming's worried sigh, heard him whisper my name before he came to sit beside me.

I felt the weight move and the springs complain as he sat down and then he pulled me over to him, resting my head against his shoulder. His hand moulded to the back of my head, the other arm wrapping around my body as much as he could manage.

"I know, I know," he whispered, slowly rocking me back and forward in his arms.

At some point Emma left us alone but the tears and the pain took over all my senses, making it impossible to notice my surroundings. It must have been almost an hour before the water stopped gushing from my eyes, I heard the door open and shut. Emma and Henry going out, my baby girl giving a muffled excuse leaving us some privacy.

Once my eyes seemed to run dry and the pain in my heart grew numb David pulled back from me. He gently, cautiously slid his arm under my legs and lifted me into his lap, tightening his grip once more. My arms wound around his neck, gripping and scoring his back with a need to be close to him, for him to make everything better.

Except true love's kiss couldn't break this curse.

He stayed silent, he knew me well enough to understand I didn't want words. I just wanted to be held, to be rocked, pampered and loved. All too soon however he pulled away, gave me one soft, sincere, kiss and a sweet smile before he stood me on my feet, getting up behind me.

"Now, I know this is hard. I know that deep in there," he paused to press his fingertips to my heart, "You feel awful. You wish you could stop this from happening, but nature has taken it's course and we must make sure we give him all we can in the years he's got. Our son will live like the prince he is."

"Our son?" He'd never referred to the baby as ours before.

"Yes, your right. I love you and I love him. I don't care that I didn't make him, just like I'm trying not to care about what Whale did to you. He's my son just as much as you're my wife."

I couldn't speak. It was so torturing on the heart, I was filled with so much love for Charming and so much pain for our son. The mix was causing so much pressure I began to feel sick and fuzzy.

I turned on my heel and rushed to the bathroom without even a thought of warning to my beloved who came straight after me, calling in alarm. I reached the toilet just seconds before I threw up, bringing up only water since there was nothing in my stomach. Still I continued to retch and cough for another few minutes until I felt tears slopping down my cheeks from the awful feeling.

"You've gone white." Charming spoke, his eyes set like sapphires on a ring in their sockets.

"I'm always white," I tried to joke but it didn't make any change to his fierce gaze. He helped me up from where I'd sprawled on ceramic tiles, being very cautious and looking very scared even though I'd only been sick. He held onto me, gripping my waist once I was on my feet and led me through to the kitchen, his eyes never losing their focus as he pulled out a chair for me.

"Sit," he commanded and disappeared into the cupboards behind the island for a glass of water.

At that moment Henry came running through the door, scarf flying and a face full of excitement.

"I saw Mom, she says congratulations!"

So Regina knew. Regina was aware there was another baby on the way.

"What's up?" Emma asked following him through and locking the door behind her.

She eyed me and her father suspiciously in turn, waiting for an explanation.

I raised my hand a little, admitting I was the cause of everything that was going on.

"I was sick, your father took it a little too far," I rolled my eyes but couldn't stop the smile on my cheeks. I still loved him even though sometimes he forgot I could look after myself.

Emma nodded, clearly not able to think of anything else appropriate to say. David broke the stoney silence that fell, placing the glass of water down in front of me with a conversational 'So, Regina knows,' before back peddling a few paces to lean against a beam.

Henry had sat down across the table from me and he frowned. He never knew where to turn when we talked about his mother. I could understand a little of what he felt, having spent some of my childhood with the woman who became incapable of love. He wanted to love Regina but he knew deep down that she would never be good, she had suffered too much.

"She was happy! She won't hurt him, she wants to be good." My grandson's eyes flashed between the adults in his eye line.

Charming sighed, gaining Henry's attention,

"I know kid, but it's knowledge she could slip to the wrong people. Like Spencer."

"Who's Spencer?" I asked, pretty sure I hadn't heard this story.

"King George."

"But I thought he was-,"

"Dead? So did I, unfortunately not." This was new to me, however there were probably quite a few stories I was yet to hear. With Emma and I being stuck back in the Enchanted Forest for a while we'd missed a lot.

"To be honest they were going to find out anyway, how was I going to hide this?" My hands went to my little bump, indicating perfectly what I meant. Emma nodded,

"You're not gonna keep him hidden for much longer."

It felt good to get back to school the following day, good to be back to normal. It took my mind away from the horrors of Canavan's and King George. It didn't make all my problems disappear but it did make them easier to forget.

Unfortunately for me, and the others within hearing distance of the bathroom, my sickness continued. I was still feeling queasy when the children began to trail into the classroom at the beginning of the day. Henry already sat at his desk, arms folded and a grin firmly placed on his face. The children filed methodically from their coat pegs to their seats each carrying an object or a photograph, one- my little artist- had even drawn her events.

There was a room filled with old fashioned toys, the simple kind made of wood that I myself had grown up with. I noticed one child, a little boy named Tyler in the past but I wasn't aware who he really was, who clutched a very tatty teddy bear with one ear. He must have had the bear since babyhood, and only reacquainted with it in the past few weeks. Another girl, Angelina, carried a small cardboard box which she was very careful not to drop. It was intriguing to imagine the stories that hid in these little hands. Henry didn't carry anything in his hands. I knew he planed to talk about his time with his grandfather when I'd been cast away with his Mom.

The classroom was abuzz with excitement from the fifteen little kids the chatter never ending until I called their attention.

"Right, everyone! I want you to help me push the desks to the side and then we'll all sit on the floor to share our stories, yeah?" The children all nodded profusely and began to rush from their desks not caring that sitting on the floor was a bit childish.

Henry came up to me, his gaze suspicious.

"Would Grandpa let you move the tables?" Charming certainly had him well trained,

"Yes, Henry it's only lifting things I'm not allowed to do."

My grandson didn't look very convinced but he went back to rearranging the classroom. I'd barely put my hands on the edge of a desk to slide it into the side when another student sidled up to me.

"Excuse me your majesty," I smiled at the little girl's sincerity, as her little dark head popped up beside me,

"Oh honey, you don't to call me that. Just call me miss Blanchard like you used to."

"But shouldn't I call you Mrs Nolan, you are married to the Prince after all." I smiled at the girl but I knew she was right. It was strange to think we'd not discussed it, but things were a little mad at the moment. I glanced down at my hands and the shining peridot caught my eye. My ring still remained on the wrong finger. It hadn't been moved back in all the time since the curse.

I shook it off, turning my mind back to the small gathering of children sitting cross legged on the floor. It was a thought for another time.

We started with Heidi, who was delighted that she'd been reunited with her grandfather. The dark haired girl had brought a quilt that her Grandfather made when she was young. As we worked around the disorderly lump of children we discovered a brand new toy Giraffe, a photo of a family picnic and a chick appeared from Angelina's little box. It was almost time for recess when Henry sat down in his space and returned his bright smile to me.

It was my turn to talk.

I already held the small lilac envelope that held the photo in my hand, I'd thought constantly about how to do this, how to play around with what I was trying to say to my surrogate children.

I pulled the picture from its envelope and handed the photo to Henry,

"Now, I wonder if any of you can tell me what this picture is of." Henry passed the print around, smiling since he could see every part of his uncle amongst the dark. Charming had done a good job of explaining everything to him- even taking him aside and giving him a man to man chat when Henry asked him how exactly his Grandfather's seed had got inside me. Something that really should have been done by Henry's father but because he didn't have one in the picture Charming had decided all jobs on that front came down to him.

At least now that Henry understood the full mechanics of sex we wouldn't have to worry about any other awful questions.

The photo worked it's way around the puzzled children, one suggested the computer had printed it wrong another, a boy named Finn, suggested it was an alien. Eventually it found it's way back to me, much to my relief it was still in perfect condition since we only had one and this was going in the photo album.

"Now, you all had some good guesses, and yes he does look a little bit like an alien Finn. In fact this is a very special photograph. This is a picture inside my body and the alien you can see, is a baby."

Those words were met with equal amounts of delight, shock and not very much at all, in the child.

"This means that when it comes time for you to move on to fifth grade I won't be here any more, I'll need to leave to have my baby." That sentence was met with more understanding from the children who had spent twenty eight years seeing only one pregnancy.

"I don't want you to go Miss Blanchard," Heidi piped up, her tone showing she really was upset.

"I know, but I need to look after the baby now, I will see you all around town and I'll maybe bring the baby to see you once it's born." This brought a more positive attitude to the room and some more smiles were spread. That sentence seemed to be enough to settle their minds and soon a forest of beanstalk like hands were being thrust up into the air with a multitude of questions. Questions on the baby's gender, and what he ate came to life as well as where they lived and the more tentative why could only ladies have babies and not little girls. The questions kept on coming and coming till the bell rang for recess. Even then some of them were reluctant to leave.

Once I'd shoved them all out the classroom door I turned and made a beeline for my bag. I'd brought myself a cereal bar, anticipating after spending the morning throwing up I would be starving later. I had been proved right and had struggled to keep my stomach from growling all morning. Snatching the bar out of my bag I began to muse over how I'd managed to get morning sickness so late, perhaps Emma's theory was right and it was actually some sort of virus I'd picked up.

That's when I noticed the screen of my mobile was lit up, lifting it up I saw two missed calls and a text message were waiting for me.

The text was from Emma, the two calls also hers, one from the station and one her mobile. I opened the text and read:

Hey, don't worry or anything, du u know where David is, he meant 2 b taking Henry 2 the dentist remember? Thks X

The kiss was a new addition, I'd never been sent one of them from my daughter before and it shouldn't have but it got me instantly worried out of my mind. That one text and the phone calls had a bad feeling flowing through me, waves of worry slapping the walls of every single vein in me. I just knew this wasn't good.

I didn't bother listening to my voice mails, dialling Emma straight away, getting the number wrong twice before it rang. She picked up straight away.

"Hey, heard from him yet?" She asked first,

"No, I was hoping you had. Emma I've got a bad feeling."

"Look, I don't want to worry you. So do I. I've been phoning round Leroy, Marco, Granny, none of them have seen him and his truck hasn't moved since this morning. I want to try Ruby, see if she can help." Memories of David in the woods back before the curse was broken. He had disappeared without a clue what he was doing. I'd came face to face with the ravine out there and now images were staining my thoughts, images of my husband lying, bleeding at the bottom.

"She'll need his scent. I'm coming with you. I can't just sit here and wait for news. I'll meet you at Granny's in ten."

(A/N) bet you didn't expect that! Well actually neither did I, I just suddenly knew where to take this bit of the story! Hope you enjoy, what you liked, what you didn't is appreciated. Please review! Thanks again