Chapter Twenty One: A Glass of Wine Is Best With...

The shop was closed the next day, black curtains falling down the windows, as Sebastian and I stayed inside, curled up in each other's arms, sharing stories, watching classic movies, crying over the loss of our other third gone missing.

-/TeaShop/-

Red brought us some food-food from Granny's. "Dankyou," we cooed in synch. Red laughed.

"If I didn't know any better…" she mumbled. I raised my eyebrow.

"What? If I didn't know any better then what?"

"I'd think you we're a couple."

Seb was startled.

Red laughed before growing silent when we didn't laugh with her. "What? Seriously?"

"Wwweeeiiillll," I mumbled. I sat up and Sebastian's head was repositioned on my lap. "There was this one time-"

"It didn't mean anything!" Seb cried.

"There was this one time," I continued; Red sat forward in her seat, eager, "sometime early in our relationship, where anything could happen. We both knew that I was to be mated with Peter, but Sebastian and I were extremely close."

"Who made the first move?" Red's lips were wide, "Was it you?"

"Surprisingly," I laughed, "it was Sebastian." Red guffawed.

"What? How!"

"He got me a present, a pastry, one day and then he lunged for my lips."

Red erupted into giggles. "Oh my god…"

"But I moved before he could kiss me." If anything, Red laughed harder. Seb's face was turning a deep red. "And that was that. Sebastian avoided me for weeks in embarrassment before he could look me in the eye."

Sebastian hid his face in my lap and I felt just a little bit better.

-/TeaShop/-

The next day I hung out with Henry. But he wanted to help Emma trail Tamara and I couldn't handle any thought of August-I just didn't operate that way-so I snuck out of that activity. Henry pouted but I kissed his forehead and went on my way.

-/TeaShop/-

"Do you often wander around alone?" a familiar voice asked.

I looked up. "I, uh, yeah. What are you doing here? I didn't…I didn't summon you."

The shadow's brows quirked. "So I just can't come of my own free will?"

"You're a curse, meant to destroy everything I love, but you're a Shadow that only comes when I summon it, so…yeah, why are you here?"

"Just wanted to haaaannnggg," his face cleared of shadow, body becoming more solid.

"Which Shadow are you?" I asked.

"Definitely not the evil one."

"Or the sweet one."

"Or angsty, conceited, or suave one."

"Oh god, if the suave one appeared-"

"You called?" Something nipped at my ear. I gasped, startled. I turned around to look at the other Shadow who was fingering a lock of my ear. "You look so…" He leered. "Delicious."

The other shadow laughed and pushed Suave Shadow away, making it disappear. "Now that he's went," he grinned, "You should call me Cool Shadow. Or Awesome Shadow. Or-"

"Or I should call you Pan Shadow, you're the only one that acts like him the most."

"Oh," Pan Shadow frowned, "I guess you're right."

We kept walking, his arm looped in mine.

"Why are you here?"

"You wanted your friend. You wanted someone to hug you." My eyes teared up and I nodded.

"Of course, of course." My voice trembled. "Of course I did."

-/TeaShop/-

The next day I found out that secretly everyone was growing magic beans AKA everyone was planning to go back to the EF (without telling me, I might add) but that also all of the beans were missing (everyone was an idiot) and that so was Regina, probably.

And as we stormed into the Mayor's office, guns and fireballs drawn, we found out that she really wasn't there. "Huh."

"It's okay! She's not here." Henry and Snow came inside.

"When you find her," Henry began warily, "you're not gonna hurt her, are you?"

"Course not."

"No, we just want the beans she stole from us." I went over to Henry, taking his hand.

"I don't get it. Why would Regina leave her office unlocked?" We trailed over to the case with the beans in it.

"Especially when she's keeping the beans here."

"Was keeping them here. They're gone."

I sighed. "Pretty plant," I cooed.

"Something's not right," we looked over at Emma, "Regina would never leave evidence like this behind."

"Maybe she already used them to portal out of StoryBrooke."

"Without Henry? I don't think so."

Henry turned to his mother. "What if something bad happened to her?"

"Security system says the last time someone was in the office was around six this morning." She pressed a button. "They used an override code to get in."

"Why would Regina need an override code on her own alarm?"

"Good question Sherlock!" Henry elbowed me.

"She wouldn't."

"You think someone else broke in and took the beans?"

"Well, we haven't found Regina anywhere and haven't heard from her."

"So something bad did happen to her."

"We're gonna find her, Henry. I promise."

"There's only one person who could overpower Regina," Snow spoke, slightly ominous.

I said, "Sebastian." Just as Charming said,

"Gold."

They looked at me and I shrugged. "It's not Seb, I swear, he's too busy with Red to be evil."

"Yeah, and Gold's too busy with his new slash old girlfriend. No, this wasn't Gold." I nodded.

"True dat."

"This was Tamara."

I made a noise of protest, "I knew I shouldn't have trusted her. Her taste in bagels? Awful, she didn't even bring cinnamon ones." Everyone gave me a look.

Emma's parents got uncomfortable, shifting slightly where they stood. "Haven't you already went down that road?"

"Like yesterday?"

"Maybe not far enough."

"Or maybe it's time for you to let it go?"

"August," Emma paused when I made a noise, "was attacked the day Tamara came to town. I don't think that was a coincidence."

"What if you're wrong? If Regina's in trouble we can't just drop everything else because of a hunch," Charming reasoned.

"Which is why we're not gonna drop everything else. Go to Gold. I'm sure he has some kind of magic that can help locate Regina."

"Where are you going?"

"Back to Tamara's room."

-/TeaShop/-

I got back to the shop, deciding to go get some drinks for our fun little search party. I walked through the doors and…found…everything…utterly destroyed. Tables were on their sides, chairs were broken, books spilling out of their shelves, tea cups broken, tea spilled across the tiles, glass everywhere-everything was just a mess. I looked around and found some of the wall destroyed.

"Oh my…"

There, in thick black letters, graffitied across the walls was written: HE WILL DESTROY EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE YOU LOVE AND HE WILL NOT FAIL SO STOP, BACK OFF. And down below was: HE DOESN'T LOVE YOU. I sank to my knees, glass shards digging into my flesh. "My…my shop."

I looked around at the mess, anger swelling up in me. My eyes blazed red. Some idiot destroyed my shop. My shop. I loved this shop-fudging love it. "I'm." I stood up, fists clenching. "Going. To. Kill. Whoever did this."

-/TeaShop/-

When I told Sebastian he was as furious and outraged as I was. We planned on destroying (read: obliterating) whoever did this. They were going to pay.

My precious baby: destroyed.

Henry and I hung out for the rest of the day, scheming on how to catch/find/obliterate whoever did this.

-/TeaShop/-

"I'm going to open a up a tea shop, you hear?" I announced one day. Pan's eyebrows quirked.

"Why a tea shop?"

"Tea," I announced, "is the most amazing thing in the universe. When I open this, and believe me, I will, it will be the most beautiful thing in the universe!"

"Like tea?"

"Like tea, it will be better than tea-it'll be that amazing. And destroying it would be destroying me!" I gasped, floundering, sprawling across the ground. Pan chuckled and Felix snickered.

"Okay, Kendra."

"Believvvvvvvveeee Pan, it will be aaaaammmmmaazzziing! Better than tea!"

"Now you're repeating yourself."

I sat up, "This idea is worthy of loops and repeating ideas."

"Okay, Kendra," their voices were disbelieving. I flipped them off.

-/TeaShop/-

I was messing in the Charmings kitchen with Henry when I felt the shadow appear. "I-I just wanted to let-let you know that-that others are cah-coming." Sweet Shadow stuttered.

I looked up. "What?"

"Kendra?"

"Hello, bitch." My eyes snapped over to the sink.

"Kendra!" Henry kept calling when I didn't reply.

"My love," Suave Shadowed cooed, leaning up against me.

"Kendra, what's that?" My eyes shot over to Henry.

"What?"

"Why-why are there shadows everywhere?"

"Y-you can see them?"

"Yeah! Wait, wait, what are they?" The room began to fill with the many versions of Pan and Henry lunged for me, searching for protection. "W-what's going on?"

"They're Shadows-a piece of my Curse that plagues me with hallucinations. They're-they're not real, how-how can you see them?"

"I-I don't know."

"We've come for her," one of the Shadows spoke up. I decided to call him Leader Pan.

"What? Why?"

"It's time."

Henry looked over at them. "Time? Time for what?"

"It's time."

"For?"

"It's time."

"FOR WHAT?"

"It's time."

Realization dawned on my face. "It's time?"

"It's time," he nodded and then they disappeared. I looked at Henry and grinned sadly.

"Let's go to the park, yeah? With Granny? We'll get hot chocolate."

"What's it time for?" Henry asked, pulling on his jacket.

"It's time for something I've been waiting centuries for to have happen."

"Which is?"

"I…" I swallowed, "I'll tell you when it's time."