A/N - I'm sorry this is so late! It was a bank holiday on my usual update day and long story short, I ended up in London where I can't get online, but, late or not, we are finally here! The chapter I have been waiting to write since day one. The final time skip (for a while). THE PROPER PLOT. Hallelujah.
14.
Emma stood on the cobblestones of the inner yard, wind tossing handfuls of blonde hair around her face. She just had to breathe.
Though the sky was endless and faded of any colour at all, the air dancing over her skin was crisp and clean and pleasantly cool. The air in her lungs was a different matter. Shaky and hot, clinging to her throat. Emma focused on breathing in and out, squinting through the breeze at the great iron gate. Usually – since the war started, six years ago – there was a whole legion of armed guards in mail questioning anybody going in or out of the White Palace without a warrant, but today was different. Today she, the Ruling Princess of Callendor, was waiting with all her advisers and retainers. Today, maybe, would mark the beginning of the end of the fighting. Emma's fingers brushed anxiously over the pommel of the sword at her hip.
She'd been trying to explain it to Henry earlier, when he helped her with her sword belt and ceremonial clothes. "It's like a big version of a small council meeting," Emma had told him, wincing as she fussed with the fastenings of her fur-lined cloak. "Except instead of the lords here, it's with everyone we're fighting."
"I don't understand," Henry told her hopelessly. Now nearly twelve years old and smarter than he had a right to be, Emma wasn't afraid to say her squire of three years was quite possibly her best friend. And maybe her only one. "Won't you all just try and kill each other?"
"We're under a truce vow," She'd explained. "It basically means we're not allowed to harm each other. So we can try and move forward." Emma sighed then.
"Because when you fight a war, everyone loses."
So there she stood, waiting. Though hair and cloak stirred in the breeze, Emma kept her stance solid and her expression unreadable. With her mother off fighting in the south again, and her father bedridden after taking a stomach wound in battle, she was the primary leader of her country. Regent. Queen in all but name.
She was scared shitless.
But it didn't matter. If war taught her anything it was that no matter what you thought, no matter what you felt, you just had to get on and do it. You'd want to cry or sleep or die or run away but you couldn't, because the whole world was yours to protect. So you pushed on. And push on she did.
Emma shifted on the stones, frowning at the gates. Her breath was cold and scraped her throat. Few had accepted the invitation, but it was the few who mattered. The king and queen of Ethervale. Prince Desmond of Seafort. And the one whose name still turned Emma's bones to dust after all this time.
The one that was making her insides writhe and her blood burn, the one that the very thought of reopened the ever dully-aching wound she'd spent three years trying to close. So Emma had been trying not to think.
Her heart leapt at the sudden rumble of a distant carriage. She shot a glance over at the gates, now creaking open for the carriage, trimmed in the gold and black of Ironhaven. She was in that carriage, so close now. I don't have the strength for this. Emma's tongue darted out to wet her cracked lips. Despite the cool breeze, her cloak was suddenly to heavy on her bruised shoulders, prickling heat crawled across her cheeks and neck and the inside of her chest. Anxious fingers danced on the pommel of her sword. She watched, heart speeding up against her ribs, as the carriage drew to a stop. A groom hurried to stable the horses, four whickering black mares that Emma only registered not Rocinante. Her mouth was dry as her mind. There was nothing she could do as the thing halted, and a valet went to open the door. She just had to stand there, watching helplessly, flotsam on the tide of fate. She hoped she didn't look too gormless.
The valet's gloved hand closed around the handle of the carriage. The door swung open. And there she was.
Emma's heart stopped beating.
Ducking out into the bright grey light and stepping to the ground with an elegance Emma had not quite forgotten, was Regina Mills. She muttered something to the valet before turning to face Emma, and she wondered briefly if this felt the same for her. Regina stepped forward slowly, brown eyes meeting Emma's at last. Four years. Twenty, actually, and her heart still disintegrated into dust in her chest, her breath was still lost in her ribs. Emma had lost everything – all she could do was stare. She was here. This woman who she hadn't been able to save. The woman who was currently ruling the country she was at war with. And she was real.
How'd we end up here?
Regina had not grown in the last four years, but she seemed taller somehow. Her presence was bigger. Emma's gaze trailed over her, mouth dry. Less than a metre of bright grey air crackling between them. She looked different and exactly the same and for the first time Emma couldn't read what she was thinking. That made her feel strange. A few thin dark strands had escaped the demure sweep of her soft hair, and lifted in the wind around her face and the fur of her stole. Emma made herself meet Regina's level gaze. Something had changed in her eyes, and it wasn't the black kohl. They shined the way she remembered.
Regina was staring at her, vein pulsing in her forehead, posture rigid, lips tight and painted red. Emma swallowed hard. How many times had she kissed those lips? Felt that skin under her own? How many times had she stared into those same eyes and forgotten the rest of the world? All that seemed a thousand years ago now. Some distant dream. Emma made herself step forward, holding her stare. "My lady," she managed.
The dozens of people standing in the yard faded away. Her mind was blank, so she did the only thing she could think of. She reached for Regina's hand as if in a dream, wrapping her fingers lightly around hers, as she had done so many times before. She brought it to her lips with the cold air bright around them, and she let go when her heart broke. Emma was heir to Callendor, after all. And Callendor was nothing if not traditional.
But it also didn't waste time.
The next morning, when everybody had arrived, Emma sent the summons for the meeting and waited. She was doing okay, all things considered. She hadn't slept at all, but the endless night had given her time to organize her thoughts. She couldn't let her feelings take over. Not now, when there was so much at stake. When the bloodshed had gone on so long. Emma wondered if she'd hurt Regina by wordlessly putting her in the old bedchambers with the blue silk drapes.
Despite all that, she wasn't tired. The tense crackling energy in her tingling veins saw to that.
Slowly, as she sat shifting anxiously in her hard wooden chair in the council chamber, they began to filter in. Ethervale's king and queen, exchanging heavy glances as they took their seats beside one another; the Seafort prince Emma could never stand. And Ironhaven's Queen Regent, who had been the little girl she'd loved, once upon a dream.
She rose to her feet immediately when Regina entered, for some reason. Emma stood there, fingertips still resting on the table, staring as Ironhaven's regent took her seat. She swallowed, suddenly aware of everyone else's eyes on her. Tight heat prickled across her face and she tried to ignore it, wondering what the hell she was doing. Pass it off. Emma cleared her throat, managing somehow to find words. "Welcome, honoured guests." She tore her gaze from Regina for a moment to address the whole room. "I've invited you here today to discuss the conflict ravaging our lands, the eastern threat, and what might be done for the good of the realm."
Emma sat down awkwardly. Her bones felt strange, like kindling about to catch alight. Regina was looking at her, with dark eyes full of things she'd forgotten how to read. How could they act like strangers after all that they had? Emma was forgetting why. "I know we're at war. I know we have our differences, our grievances. But right now every one of us has one thing in common." She breathed in. "We're losing. Supplies are down so we steal each others, crops are failing so we burn each others, and we send our young men off to kill each other. At this rate we'll destroy ourselves, every one of us. We've all heard the rumours. To the east, Salmere and Aurumford are united in their Eastern Alliance once again. Their kings gather supplies, assemble armies. In this state, they'll destroy us. Together, maybe we'd stand a chance. "
"And what would you propose we do?" Prince Desmond asked, slouched back in his chair with hard eyes behind his uninterested expression. Emma could see why his father sent him; she'd want to get rid of him too. He was sitting beside Regina, and kept glancing to her. Seafort had allied with Ironhaven as Ethervale had Callendor, but Emma knew it was an unstable bond. "Throw down our swords and hold hands while they kill us all?"
"That's not helping." Regina told him bluntly, sighing. Emma's heart jumped. Even her voice had changed, matured, almost. There was more of an air of nobility, of natural command there now. She nearly smiled. That voice had been her tether. It had built her up and torn her down and made everything alright. Finally, Regina looked to Emma. "Go on."
"Look, every one of us here has lost too much. If we don't rebuild before this alliance attacks, we will lose everything." Emma tried to quash her feelings down, although none of what she was saying seemed important. The heavy turning in her stomach was rippling her blood. "King Edric, you have Seafort hostages. Desmond, you hold miles of Ethervale farmland. Couldn't some trade be in order? You're at a stalemate, we all are."
"I'm not discussing our hostages with him sitting there." King Edric snapped, with a venomous glance. His wife laid a hand on his arm but it did little to calm him.
"It doesn't matter, we know you let Prince Cedric slip through your fingers." Prince Desmond responded airily, apparently pleased with causing the Ethervale nobility discomfort. A smug smile curled his features. "He's home now, good as new."
Regina sighed, shifting back exasperatedly in her seat. The slant of light from the window fell across her face and shoulders, lighting her up. Her eyes were hard and cautious as they darted between the men, but there was something deeper she couldn't name. God. Emma had started to think the golden lens of memory had made her more beautiful than she was, but now she saw her again she realised that was stupid. Regina held herself so differently now, regal and almost comfortable with herself. The curve-hugging velvet helped, Emma supposed, heat rising to her neck. It was... It was intriguing, to say the least. Emma had always seen her beauty, but now it seemed that she saw it herself, and that made all the difference in the world.
She shook her thoughts away, focusing back on the situation at hand. Emma cleared her throat, about to speak. Ethervale's queen beat her to it, with a tight glare at her seething husband. "We can squabble over fields and wards all we like, but neither of us started this. King George, may he rest in peace, and Queen Snow, gods be with her - that was how this begun." She drew in a breath, glancing between Emma and Regina. "Of course, neither of them are here to finish it."
"You're right, this is our war now." Regina allowed, frowning.
"Leave us." Emma commanded suddenly, rising from the her seat. She heard the rest of them hurry to obey, but she couldn't seem to tear her gaze from Regina. She heard the heavy oak door swing shut behind the last of them, but it didn't matter because her mind was already taken up.
Immediately, the air trapped in the small chamber seemed heavier, thickening and congealing. Sound dropped from the world. There was only the uneven rhythm of her breathing, and her pulse in her temples. Emma stared. Regina's gaze was fixed on her now, all the measured caution and cold intelligence of the meeting surrendered to shining, stripped something. She stood up slowly, and Emma drank in the afforded sight, the dark blue fabric that clung to her skin, the thick dark hair swept half up away from her face, the intensity of her dark stare. She wasn't sure who moved first but suddenly they were there, at the side of the table, and so close.
She could see Regina's chest rise and fall with her breath, full red lips parted slightly. Emma's mind was emptying. The inches between them seemed to be heavy with the weight of them, crackling and sparkling with some energy like stars, like magic, like fire. The inches between them were so fucking fragile, Emma was frozen and burning all at once. "You grew up." Regina said, words falling softly from her lips to hang like bubbles in the thick air.
Emma would have smiled, but it didn't feel like a laughing moment. "I could say the same for you." Her heart wasn't wild, it was heavy, slow, saturated with the past. It didn't make sense with her quickening blood, but she didn't care about sense. Regina's eyes never left hers, a thousand shades of the earth, flecked with black and amber. It might have been a second or a century they stood there, staring. The air between them was ripe with crackling energy and dust motes.
Emma didn't know who moved first, but suddenly Regina's hands were tangled in her hair and Emma was grabbing her hips and everything was heat and heartbeats and lips crashing together.
Her stomach flipped, blood surging, thoughts tangling up. This was nothing like the way they'd been. This was something else entirely, clumsy, messy, almost frantic. Like they were trying to get everything they'd been denied the last four years. Regina's mouth moved against hers, frenetic and soft and out of time, noses bumping and teeth clashing. Emma's hands kept moving, sliding from hip to waist to back to neck, grasping, desperate for everything. She'd been starving for years and she hadn't realized until she was fed again. When she slid her tongue along Regina's her heavy stomach roiled and crashed like a living thing. Now her heart was wild, hot and slippery and throwing itself at her ribs. It was nothing like it was before, but it was the closest they could get.
Regina's skin was warm against hers, hands caught up in Emma's hair, nails against her scalp, pressing herself against her. Emma's grasp rose from her waist to slide tight around her back, tugging her closer, closer. Her hair smelled of apples, one of her warm hands dropped to curl against Emma's face. Her skin was waking up again, long forgotten nerve endings crackling back to life. Emma didn't remember when she last breathed but she didn't care, her lungs were full of Regina. Emma's mind flashed white hot when Regina sucked her bottom lip between hers, and she didn't even care where she'd learned to do that as long as she didn't stop.
The ocean in her veins took over. Emma moved forward, pushing with her body until Regina's breath hitched into her mouth when she met the edge of the table. It spurred her on, her whole body was fire, there had never been anything else. Regina's arms slid around her neck, pulling, mouth moving frantically as she pushed herself up onto the edge of the table without ever breaking the kiss. Emma stayed close, hovering over the table, determined not to lose any contact.
With a sharp gasp of breath, Regina pulled an inch away, arms still draped around Emma's shoulders. Her wide, meaningful stare found Emma's, breath ragged. She swallowed. Escaped strands of dark hair were falling in her flushed face. Her eyes seemed a darker brown now, deeper. Regina shook her head slightly, stare never moving. "This can't mean anything," she warned, voice low and unsteady.
"I know," Emma nodded, her own voice ragged and breathless in her ears. The bright grey light from the window fell across them. Their noses still touched. Her breath came out of time. Her messy hair was falling around them like a bracket, curtaining them off from the rest of the world.
Regina lay back against the map-strewn wood, hands finding the back of Emma's neck to pull her down on top of her. When their lips met again, the fire seared the rest of the world away.
-0-
Sunlight streamed in through the window as dawn eased into day, fanning out over the stone sill and lying across the familiar bedchambers. It glinted off the floor, settled like dust over the tangled covers of the bed, and the steadily breathing lump beneath them. Regina faced the window as she stood where she had a hundred times before, head bowed and brow furrowed as she laced up her dress. Her breath was heavy and reluctant in her lungs.
Emma Swan's bedchambers hadn't changed much in the six years she'd been away.
"Where are you going?" A muffled voice called, somewhere beneath the furs strewn across the bed.
Regina cleared her throat and summoned the strength, fingers tugging at the ties. "You once told me I couldn't be seen leaving your bedchambers half dressed and that was before we were at war with each other." She paused, listening to the screaming silence all around, and her breath sticky in her lungs. "I need to inform my people of our plans."
"So we're agreed?" Emma pressed, sitting up with a strained huff and swinging her legs over the edge of the bed. Regina glanced over at her. Hair tangled around her head in a mad blonde halo, elbows resting on her knees, nightshirt rumpled – her green eyes were sharp and focused, wide awake.
"We're agreed." Regina nodded. "For the time being. We put aside our countries differences and work together to defeat the Eastern Alliance." She watched as Emma stretched, absently rubbing the back of her neck. They needed to stay professional now. Their alliance had to be just that – an alliance formed for the greater good. She focused on breathing in a normal rhythm, mouth tightening.
"And what comes afterwards?" Emma asked, with a hard sideways stare.
Regina brushed her dress down, breathed in, rolled her shoulders back and down. "We'll deal with that when we come to it." She didn't want to look back at her again. Looking back made everything complicated, which was why she'd been trying not to for the last four years. Looking back just reminded her of everything they wouldn't get back. It was pointless trying.
She knew she'd grown up since the last time but Emma had changed too. A blind man could see it. Instead of struggling under the weight of her kingdom, draped over her shoulders like a shackle, Emma wore it now like a suit of armour. It gave her a strength, an aura of power and an intensity that hadn't been there before. She'd grown into herself.
She looked different now, too. Her hair was longer, thicker than it had been. Her arms and torso were corded with new muscle, but that wasn't all she had to show for the war. Emma had been fighting. In real battles, the way her parents did, the way Regina never wanted her to. There had been scars, bites left by sword and axe, snaking red and accusatory across her skin, and however lost she'd been in the moment Regina's insides had stiffened at the sight of them. My men did that, she'd thought, the men I sent. I did that.
It was all wrong. This shouldn't be how they turned out. But if this was her lot in life, so be it. Regina had to do right by the country she never wanted, now. Her own life didn't matter. Winning this war, that was what mattered. And Callendor was the way to do that. She lingered in the doorway, and glanced back.
"And Emma?" Regina said, bones heavy. Emma stared up at her. "We probably shouldn't let this happen again."
But it was an old habit, and they'd never cared for shouldn'ts.