A/N: This takes place just before, and during the Missing Year flashbacks in 3.19 A Curious thing. Snow is Pregnant.


The castle was huge, and no one knew it better than Snow and Regina. They knew when they were safe from potential prying eyes. Like this afternoon. Dappled sun was streaming through the window and Snow had Regina pinned against a wall, kissing the queen in a way that would be impossible to explain as platonic.

"Enthusiastic today, are we?"

"I've been wanting to do that since you started flirting with Robin Hood." Snow looked at her a bit possessively. "You are doing it to make me jealous."

"I am not flirting with that man." She said indignantly. "Besides, you insist on having your prince, why should I not have a man to fiddle with."

"Fiddling with him is what you want?" Snow smiled. "I see."

Her hand moved past Regina's divided skirt to squeeze her ass. Regina smiled. "You are possessive Snow." Not that she objected. In the past year the affair that had started as a way of corrupting the princess back in Storybrooke had entangled both of them.

"Once I had my Queen, why should I ever let go?"

"Because you have a Prince? Well, a shepherd making a passable impression of a prince."

Snow smiled, "Was that a compliment Regina?"

"You know I want you to leave him."

"And you know I won't leave my husband for a woman who can't even say 'I love you' despite the fact that I know she does."

"You over estimate your place in my life, Snow."

Snow didn't seem insulted. Instead she leaned down and buried her face in the queen's ample cleavage. She took hold of her hands and started walking her towards the bed. Had it been any other time in their relationship this would have been physical. Maybe even violent. Snow was surprisingly strong after all. But heavily pregnant she couldn't, and Regina wouldn't force her to.

The queen stepped backwards as Snow stepped forwards, and Snow pushed her over into the bed and pulled down at the leather pants exposed as the queen's skirts parted.

"What are you doing Snow?"

"Testing what my place might be." There was a slight glint in Snow's eyes. One that was neither innocent nor nice. "Be a good girl Regina, you know what you have to say."

Snow's fingers stroked gently along her clit, not enough to get her off, but enough to build her up.

"I have never been a good girl, Snow."

"No, but with you Regina, everything is relative. You are an ass... but you are my ass." She punctuated it by pushing two fingers into her. "Now... you know what you need to say."

Regina was stubbornly silent. Snow pushed a third finger in, starting to move her hand, rotating and curing her fingers inside her. Regina inhaled sharply, but looked up into Snow's eyes.

"You know I've been tortured to get information out of me."

"I know. I was there remember?"

"What makes you..." The sentence was lost as Snow found just the right spot.

"I've said it a dozen times over the last year Regina."

"What happened to I don't have to say it back?"

"I lied."

"Like you always do, Snow." There might have been bitterness there, but there wasn't.

"Please Regina, I need to hear you say it." She leaned down and kissed her on the forehead before continuing the slow fucking.

"And I need you to leave your husband, but that's never going to happen."

There was bitterness in Regina's voice. She'd always play second fiddle to David in Snow's heart. But Snow didn't stop or seem offended.

"I need it Regina."

The queen inhaled, and closed her eyes, enjoying the feelings building in her body. Finally she opened her eyes and looked deeply into Snows. "I love you."

Snow's smile was so radiant it lit up the room. She leaned down and kissed again. "And I love you too, my Queen."

"I hate you, Snow."

"There is a fine line between love and hate."

"Are you so sure you want to be flirting with that line?"

She leaned down and kissed her. "I live on that line and so do you."


The three of them came back to the castle solemnly after the visit to Glinda. What must be done was clear. But Regina understood it better than either Snow or David, and neither seemed willing to listen to her when she told them they were out of their minds.

The Dark Curse. The Dark Curse was the only answer, but it was also the thing that had destroyed her soul. How could they imagine that they could simply cast it and survive. Well, David knew he wasn't, but... there was the other question. The one she didn't want to speak aloud.

David and Snow had disappeared off to their chambers to be together in the hours before they could actually cast the curse. Regina began working on the foundations of the giant potion in the court yard. She wondered if Snow had thought about the irony. This was the place her father had been laid out. This was the place where the kings of her line had been mourned for hundreds of years.

This is the place where Snow would murder her love.

"I somehow didn't expect it to require so much... work."

"Because casting the most difficult and costly spell in the history of magic should be easy. Rumplestiltskin invested so much time in my training when he could simply have made me a monster and ignored making me powerful sorceress." Regina answered testily.

"You are mad."

"You and your husband are casually throwing away something ..." She shook her head, "You really have no idea what you are doing."

"It's what he wants."

"He's an idiot."

"You've said that before." Snow moved up on the opposite side of the giant boiling brass cauldron. "Regina, talk to me."

"The thing you love the most."

"Yes."

"You realize if this works what that means?"

"That David will be dead."

"David will die in the attempt, if it works or not, what I'm standing here hoping is that my lover loves her husband more than me. Because I want it to work. To get back to Henry. Do you realize what kind of horrible person that makes me?"

"It makes you complicated, Regina."

"That I'm hoping you love him more than me so that you can kill him and destroy yourself?" She shook her head. "You know what killing the love of my life did to me."

"You didn't have anyone to help you pick up the pieces. I'll have you."

"If this works."

"And part of you, maybe smaller than the part that wants to see Henry again, is hoping it doesn't." Snow put her hand on Regina's arm. "Because that means I will love you more than him."

"I hate him. I want you to myself."

Snow smiled. "You don't share well." Snow looked off into the distance across the valley. "After tonight you won't have to."

Regina shook her head.

"What?"

"You don't understand. I'd do everything in my power, move haven and heart, not to have you have to do this. I don't want you with David. I want you. But in no world do I want you responsible for his death."

She turned and touched Snow's cheek. "I like my hopeful, happy hero. She will die tonight."

Snow nodded solemnly. "Just as mine died the moment your mother crushed Daniel's heart."

"I would do anything to save you from that."

"David's decision is his."

"Murdering him will destroy you." Regina shook her head. "And I can't seem to get that through your head. This curse is evil and terrible, and it destroyed me. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy."

"Or the woman you love?" Snow asked, perhaps teasing a bit.

"Aren't you always both of those things to me."

"Is it ready?" David called from the entrance to the court yard. Regina beckoned him to come up to the caldron and they all looked at the boiling mass together.

"It's ready."