"You couldn't have untied his hands on the ride over!" Hook overheard someone ask grumpily in a muffled voice through the bag over his head. He thought the voice sounded vaguely familiar.

"I needed to make the whole thing convincing, didn't I?" a female voice retorted. Hook definitely recognized Regina, despite that she too was muffled. "What if George had spies in the woods following me?"

Hook tensed as he heard the two coming closer and closer. Then the bag was pulled from over his head. Blinking down at him were two faces he was genuinely stunned to see, and more surprised to feel such happiness at seeing: Neal and Charming.

"Wha-?" he blubbered, utterly confused as Charming sliced through the ropes around his wrists with a knife.

"Welcome back, pirate," Neal smirked as Hook rubbed his wrists. He blinked around. He found himself in a large room in a chair beside a large roundtable. Spread on the table were a number of maps and charts. He spotted Red on the other side, leaning over some of the documents, reading intently, and Henry sitting in a chair too big for him, watching, him closely. Then he spotted Regina standing beside him.

"You're welcome," she spat at him.

"You!" he growled, shooting from his seat and advancing on her, his hook raised. "You just left her there to die…"

With a flick of her wrist, Hook found himself pinned against the wall by an invisible hand at his throat.

"Regina," Charming interjected in a warning tone.

"I'm trying to help save her," Regina hissed, something dangerous sparking in her eye as Hook gasped for air.

"Mom, stop!" Henry's small voice rang through, the voice of reason. Regina held her spell for a moment longer before allowing Hook to drop to the floor, sputtering air back into his lungs.

"I couldn't just go in and bring her out, I'd be dead before I reached the doorway," Regina explained sourly. "I came to get you as an excuse to survey the castle and enchantments projecting you, and so that you can help us to break her out with your knowledge of the dungeons."

"We're trying to find someway to break her out, but we'll need your help since you've been in there," Neal explained.

"How did you even know I was there with her in the first place?" Hook asked, flabbergasted. For a moment, the eyes of everyone in the room glanced uniformly towards the same door at the corner of the room. Hook turned to look.

"The answer is in there," Charming said cryptically, his voice low. He cast a quick look at Henry, who's attention had been subverted by Red. "Henry's not allowed to go in there. When you enter, you'll see why."

Hook's glance bounced from Charming to Regina to Neal, who nodded, watching him intently. He approached the door cautiously, wondering what he would find on the other side. As he pressed it open, he saw there was only one person in it. Snow sat, her legs folded beneath her, on the ground in the middle of the room, looking at herself in the mirror on the wall. When she turned to face him as he entered, he saw her eyes were moist and her nose red and puffy from crying.

"What are you doing?" Hook asked her, surprised at how gentle his voice sounded. He supposed those days in the dungeon nursing Emma had softened his edge.

"Come over here and see for yourself," she said, turning her attention back to the mirror. As Hook stepped closer, the door clicking shut behind him, what he saw in the mirror shifted. Instead of his own reflection, and Snow's beside him, he saw the woman he had just left, her blonde hair fanned out around her where she lay, huddled and shivering in her cell miles away.

"You've been watching her," Hook surmised, his voice quiet. He looked at Snow. "Watching us?"

Snow nodded.

"What have you seen?" Hook asked, his voice dry and husky as his ears burned.

"Not much that will help us break her out," Snow sniffed. "But we've seen enough."

She tilted her head to look at him then, and he deduced that to mean they, or at least she, had seen everything. He looked down at the floor, feeling slightly nauseous. But Snow's kind voice encouraged him to look back up into her blue eyes as she spoke.

"You won't get much thanks from them," she said sadly, nodding towards the door that led to the room where Charming and Neal were. "They're grateful, of course, but they're just too thick headed to admit it." Her eyes found their way back to his. "But thank you," she said, her voice just above a whisper as warm tears brimmed in her eyes. "Thank you for what you did for her in there."

Hook swallowed hard and attempted to say something, but nothing came out. Snow seemed not to need a response anyway. She turned her attention back to the mirror, where Emma had dissolved into a violent fit of coughing. Snow winced, but did not look away.

"How is she?" Hook asked, his voice low and vulnerable. Snow just shook her head.

"She's running out of time."

As the queen had announced Emma's name into her mirror, Emma's face had appeared looking worn, beaten and defiant. Snow had gasped to see her, and in such a state. At first they could only see her, bound at the wrists to the chair in which she sat, but soon the shadow of someone else in the room had swept across the mirror, Emma's eyes following it, and moments later they could make out King George towering over their daughter.

Charming had taken his wife's hand, tightly applying the pressure of his fear into her palm. Her face flushed red in fury as she made to step forward, a protective maternal instinct shooting through her. She stopped herself in despair. This was just a glimpse of what was happening miles away. She could not do anything to comfort her daughter, or shield her from the man standing over her.

George took out a knife. Snow took in an acute breath, Charming squeezing her hand still tighter.

"What's he doing?" Neal asked shakily, his face pale.

"I really don't know," Regina said, narrowing her eyes as she watched.

Snow watched as George sliced her daughter's arm, watched as she struggled against the ropes and the pain. Even before she had known her true identity, Mary Margaret had lived with Emma for almost a year. She knew her expressions. She knew when she was trying to hold back real pain, and as she recognized the expression now, dark blood beginning to ooze from the wound in her arm, she just barely held back her hysterics.

But when he began to collect the blood from her, Emma could not hold her reaction back. The outcry that escaped her nearly melted Snow to a puddle. She pressed herself into her husband for lack of anything else to do, and felt him raise a shaking hand to cup the back of her head soothingly. Beside them, Neal's face showed pure horror, his fist clenched tightly, knuckles turning white. He wanted to look away and at the same time found he could not wrench his eyes from the terrible sight.

"He's using her magic," Regina whispered as they watched King George swing the vile he'd filled with her blood back around his neck.

Emma's small whimper before was nothing compared to the scream she elicited as the King pulled a ball of fire from thin air. It seemed to reach all the way from her lips down to the core of Snow's heart.

"What's happening?!" Charming said, trying to sound angry but the crack in his voice betrayed his true fear.

"He's using her magic," Regina repeated, still facing the mirror and watching the scene unfold. "Magic forcibly taken is extremely painful on the person it's stolen from when it is used."

Mercifully the flaming ball diminished and Emma's screams stopped, her ragged breathing continuing as sweat trickled down her exhausted face. But it was only for a moment before it sparked again, this time ten times stronger than the last. They saw the shadows of flames dancing all around the pair as Emma began to scream again in agony.

"Enough."

The word had come from Neal's lips, but they were all thinking it, and Regina, with a slow wave of her hand, dissolved the image in the mirror so that all that faced them again were their own pallid, furious faces in the glass.

"Could you tell where she is?" Neal asked. It had been such a while since he'd lived in this world, hundreds of years. His geography was not exactly up to par.

"A castle, clearly," Regina muttered, turning to them all.

"Which one?" Charming asked. "It can't be the one we took from him, that one was destroyed."

"No, it's another palace. The windows were completely shut with drapes. Of course, he knew it'd be vacant. It's former master is an entire world away." She caught Neal's eye. "Your father."

"The Dark Castle," Charming hissed knowingly as Neal blinked.

"My father had a castle?" he asked, surprised.

"You can't expect someone who can spin straw into gold to live in a cottage, now, can you?" Regina sneered.

It was not long before Snow was back in front of the mirror. She found the atrocities her mind concocted from just the small glimpse she had seen worse than the reality. Well perhaps not worse, but at least if she was watching her daughter, her imagination wouldn't get carried away. Although the reality was enough to be getting on with.

She had winced as Emma was thrown roughly into her dank cell, grinding her teeth and hugging her knees to her as she wished she could hug her daughter and friend. When Snow saw that Hook was imprisoned next to her, at first she was apprehensive. But it didn't take long to see how concerned he was for his inmate's health, how gently he spoke to her, how his worry grew as he watched her fading beside him.

Tears came in a constant, steady, silent stream down her cheeks as she watched, until she forgot what it was like to not be crying. Sometimes Charming or Neal would join her, but they could not watch for very long. Their red faced anger, pent up for lack of anything to do about it, drove them away in a hurry. Sometimes Snow wanted to go with them, but somehow she couldn't seem to wrench her glare from the devastating sights she saw in the mirror. She watched her breathing become shallower, more and more pained. She watched the bruises and cuts on her skin multiply.

"You should really get some sleep," Charming had attempted half heartedly as the moon began to rise in the night sky, hours after dusk, but Snow did not move and he didn't seem to expect her to.

"I want to be with her," she had sniffed. "I don't want to leave her alone. I mean, I know I'm not… I know I can't be… I know she can't feel that I'm watching over her right now…"

"Maybe she can," he had suggested kindly. She appreciated the gesture, despite the fact that it most likely wasn't true.

"I don't think I've ever felt so helpless," she said in a watery voice, leaning to rest her head on her husband's shoulder.

"I know," he agreed, wrapping his arm around her. She looked up into his face.

"How could we have failed her so utterly?" she asked, shame seeping into her voice.

"Sh," he cooed. "Don't think like that."

"I keep going over it again and again in my head. Everything we've done. Every decision we made since she was born. Every moment, and what could have been done differently. If there was ever any path that spared her the pain she's known her whole life. What else could we have done?"

"Nothing," Charming had assured her. "There's nothing else we could have done."

Snow had looked up as Emma was tossed back into her cell after another grueling session with King George, her emaciated body wracked with coughs.

"Somehow, that answer just makes me feel worse."

Hook wished his dim knowledge of the dungeons proved to be more helpful as he sat at the table, wracking his brain for any scraps of information he had left out.

"Is there any malleability in the construction of the cells?" Neal prodded.

"I checked them as thoroughly as I could," he said. "They wouldn't budge. They're built well, probably with magic. I could find no point of leverage to break them open. They can only be opened with the key."

"And the guards?" Charming continued. "How many of them were there, how well armed?"

"There were always at least two to take her to and from the cell. I don't know if there were more outside the dungeons."

"There were upwards of thirty manning the walls of the main gate when I entered," Regina added. "Perhaps the first step is figuring out how to get past those before we worry about the two outside the dungeon door."

"You said you have fifty men at your disposal here," Charming reminded her.

"Fifty men who will be slaughtered if they just charge the gate," Regina said, exasperated. "We'll be on the offense, which means they will have the higher ground, the watch towers to see us coming, the stone walls to hide behind while they shoot their own arrows down at us like sitting ducks. And say we do breech the gate, then what? There will be at least as many men waiting to attack us inside the castle, not to mention George and his new-found powers."

"Can't you just curse him to hell?" Neal asked, turning expectantly to Regina.

"Any magic I use he will deflect. He'll fight me with Emma's magic, and she'll be the one to pay the price. If I pick a fight with George, I'll only be waging a war on Emma. He can't know I'm involved until the last possible moment, or any magic I bring to the table will be completely useless. You're the thief, I don't see you suggesting any brilliant schemes to steal her back."

"I'm used to dodging security cameras and drowsy nighttime security guards, not legions of armed soldiers and magic," he retorted. "And to be perfectly honest, she was the one who did most of the planning and I followed along."

He shot an apologetic glance at Charming whose annoyance showed briefly but did not linger.

"Well, she won't be helping with the planning this time," Snow said, her arms folded, unable to sit. "If we wait much longer, we'll be stealing a corpse."

"Careful, Snow," Charming cautioned. "Remember, Henry."

They'd been trying to keep Henry out of the planning as much as possible for his own sake. He had not been allowed in the room with the mirror, although at this point he had guessed that somehow they were able to catch glimpses of his mother while in there. The fact that they refused to let him see her did nothing to brighten his spirits. His exclusion had been extremely frustrating on him, and while everyone seemed on the same page agreeing to keep him out of it, his frustration at being excluded made all of them very sad.

"Henry went to bed hours ago," Regina said, waving her hand absent-mindedly.

"No he didn't, he's listening at the door," Neal told them. The whole group looked up at him. He strode over to the door and wrenched it open. Sure enough, the small boy stood there, blinking up at them all.

"I told you to go to bed!" Regina said harshly, standing from where she sat.

"Don't yell at him!" Snow barked.

"Come on, kid, I'll walk you to your room," Charming offered in a kind, tired voice, pushing his chair back. At the door, he took a dejected Henry by the shoulder and led him down the hallway. Regina glanced at Neal curiously.

"How did you know he was there?"

Neal merely shrugged.

"He's her son," he said. "He's a lot like her. A lot like both of us. I just knew."

He held Regina's eye contact for a moment before return to the table and sitting down. She watched him go over her shoulder, remaining still, a certain grief in her features. Sometimes it seemed to hit her in the face, that Henry was not, and could never truly be, hers.

Snow had left the conversation not long after, as they began to argue in circles. It was late and they were getting nowhere. She left the room and started down the hallway to a room in which she had been sleeping, but eventually just found herself in front of the mirror again, begging it to show her her daughter. She did not know how long she watched her feverish wheezing before she felt someone enter the room behind her and sit next to her.

"Your oaf of a husband is still trying to plan a siege of the castle," Regina sighed discouragingly. "As if that could ever work. Are wartime tactics all he knows? This will need to be a heist, not a battle."

"He was the son of a shepherd, he was raised in the fields," Snow said, not rising to the humor Regina was suggesting with her tone. "He never needed to learn the intricacies of 'heisting'."

"Until you fell into his life," Regina said. "Then it was all about packing bags to slip away in the dead of night and finding secret lakes with magical powers…"

"What do you want, Regina?" Snow asked stiffly.

"Nothing," Regina started bitterly, rolling her eyes, but after a pause she changed her answer. "I want to see him smile again. Henry. I just – I honestly just want him to be happy."

Snow thought of so many vicious retorts that came to the tip of her tongue, but as she turned and saw Regina's anguish, the melted in her mouth. She did not feel sympathy for her. After the events of the last few months, she doubted she would ever be able to feel that. But she did feel perplexed at the genuine emotion she saw in that face.

"You made this bed, Regina," Snow said, though her voice was not accusatory. It was light, like a teacher talking to a pupil. "You know that, right?"

Regina blinked darkly.

"I'd probably be much more open to hearing it if it weren't coming from you mouth," she said with sour honesty. Snow shrugged.

"I can find someone else to say it," she said, not really paying Regina much attention.

"Of course I know," Regina said, admitting the censure she knew she deserved. "Of course I know this is all my fault. All of it. My entire life has just been trying to get back to a place of happiness, the only shred of happiness having been stolen from me long ago. But the harder I try to get back there, the farther from happiness I end up. It's not just a cycle you break."

"Happiness is an emotion, Regina," Snow said. "It's fleeting. Sometimes you feel happy, and sometimes you don't. Sometimes you won't feel happy, even though you know you should. And sometimes you'll feel happy, even if you think you shouldn't. It comes in waves – that the nature of an emotion. It's not an end in of itself, it's not a goal. It can't be. You've been happy. Not just once, but a number of times. I'm sure you can roll back through your memories raising Henry and fill a whole photo album with happy moments. And you've been sad sometimes too. You've been hurt or angry. Probably most of those memories involve me. And you'll be happy again, at some point. But it can't be the end goal, Regina. Happiness can't be what you're fighting for. You have to fight for something bigger. Something more stable than an emotion that comes and goes."

Regina sat silently, allowing Snow's words to seep into her, in spite of her instinct to block them out.

"What are you fighting for?" Regina asked, her throat dry and raw.

"Her," she said after taking a breath, her eyes on her daughter's face. "Everything I do, I do for her."

A long, deep silence stretched between the two women sitting side by side.

"You know I will always hate you, right?" she said finally. It was not an accusation, not a threat. There was even very little anger as she said it. It was almost a plea. A plea for some kind of understanding and recognition of the truth of the antagonism between them. Snow did not look at her at first. She blinked and considered the statement. Then she nodded.

"Yes," she replied. "And you know I will always hate you?"

She looked at Regina then, and after catching her eye, Regina also nodded.

"Can't that be enough?" Snow asked desperately. "Can we stop trying to prove it to each other now? Can't it be enough to just say it and live with it and move on?"

It was Regina's turn to consider for a moment.

"I suppose it can," she admitted, and it felt like such a relief to say it. She brought her attention back towards the mirror. "Still doesn't change the fact that the only plan we've got involves marching on an impenetrable castle with an army half the size of its defense."

"No," Snow teased with a scowl. Regina glanced at her questioningly, but her eyes did not waver from their view of her shivering daughter through the looking glass. "That's not the only plan we've got."

Up next, some Snow/Emma feels as Snow surrenders herself to King George as a prisoner in order to be with her daughter. Is this part of the grand plan, or is Snow going off book from her motherly hormones?