Sorry this took so long! There were some potentially life-altering medical issues, but thankfully, everything turned out okay, and I'm still a little sore from surgery, but recovering nicely. Also, this chapter was harder than most, simply because I did not see this coming... I'll explain more after you've read the new installment.
Hope you enjoy!
~~Previously on "To Carry On"~~
~In the Enchanted Forest, Eliza throws an elaborate masquerade party on her 21st birthday. When she gets up the next morning, her father has gone off to hunt, to distract himself from memories of his wife, Aenor. The queen had died on Eliza's birthday some years before, giving birth to her seventh child.
When Aenor died, a paper was discovered among her things, detailing a prophecy that had been made when Aenor was a very young child. This prophecy included Aenor's death, and said that her children would be in danger. So Aenor found a way to hide and protect the children, by using her small amount of magic to hide a lonely manor house so that only one who knew the secret could find it.
Owen sends a letter to his daughter, telling her that he has accidentally gone into the Swamp of No Return. But, he writes, a young woman, not much older than Eliza, offered to show him the way out – as long as he agrees to marry her, making her the new queen. Owen writes that he does not wish to marry this girl, whose name is Lilura, and in fact suspects that she wishes to harm his children, but he made the agreement anyway, hoping to trick her into revealing her true intentions before he actually has to go through with the marriage. But because of the danger he fears, he takes precautions, sending Eliza back to the hidden manor house and instructing the castle staff to never reveal how many children Owen has, or what their genders are.
Many years ago, a hag named Miranda cast a spell that backfired, causing a witch-hunter to become obsessed with her. She eventually gave in to his desire for her, but the hunter, known as Fire Sword, sensed that the child conceived would have the potential to use dark magic. He wanted to destroy the child, so Miranda fled to the Swamp of No Return, created by an ancestor of hers. There, mere hours after her daughter Lilura was born, she made a deal with Rumpelstiltskin to ensure that the witch-hunter could never find her there.
On the same night as Eliza's held masquerade ball, Lilura makes a deal with Rumpelstiltskin, which enables her to meet Owen and try to force him to marry her. But the impish man warns that if she fails to put all of Owen's children under the spell, she will be caught…
~In Storybrooke, Paige is shocked to discover that Archie is actually alive. Regina was framed for his murder, and Archie was even given a funeral before they discovered that he was held captive, not killed.
And as a result of the Curse, Marsha, known as Lilura in the Enchanted Forest, is now freed from her "prison" in the Swamp of No Return. This was discovered the moment the Curse was broken, but so far, Marsha has been held in Dr. Horne's assisted living facility, until Paige and Horne can decide what to do with her.
Dr. Horne was Doctor Nerean, the faun, in the Enchanted Forest. His abilities with the mind are harder to use in this world, but he can still do so, as he proves when he delves Mike's mind to learn sign language so he can better communicate with Paige.
Both Mike and Ed Grove, who was Sir Elrick in the Enchanted Forest, have not been seen since the night Archie was supposedly killed…
Lilura stretched, reveling in the soft linens on the bed. The life of a royal was certainly full of luxury! Now if only she could secure her place here. Owen kept talking of propriety, but it had been two months already. Surely that was long enough! She hoped he wasn't suspicious about her interest in his children.
No matter what she tried, no one here could be bribed to tell her how old any of his children were – or how many he even had. She had tried asking the king himself, playing sweet and innocent, saying that she knew she could never replace their mother, and claiming that it made her nervous to think about it. She had then put on a sickeningly sweet, innocent face, asking if he thought his children would like her. But he had only smiled, and told her not to worry about his children.
It didn't really matter if he ever loved her or not, so long as he fathered a child on her. Then her child, whether a son or a daughter, would be next in line for the throne, and she would be set for a life of luxury, not to mention being the first user of dark magic whose child would legitimately take the throne of a kingdom. And unlike her own mother, she would give her child the best of everything!
Life in the Swamp had been miserable, and by the time any news made its way to her mother's pitiful shack, it was at least several months old. Sometimes, it took years! It was nearly three years after the fact when Lilura had finally discovered that Owen's queen was dead. Her fanciful daydreams of becoming a queen herself had begun then.
She decided to begin spying on the servants. She could use her powers to cloak herself, to an extent, which might help her overhear something. Even if it were only servant gossip, she might be able to use that against someone to get the information she sought.
And as she continued to observe the king's departures, she would eventually learn a pattern. He claimed they were all visits of state, and some of them might have been, but she knew most of his absences were really just visits to his hidden children. Briefly, she wondered how anyone had known they would need to be hidden, but that was unimportant in the long run. She reached over to her bedside table and picked up the golden bracelet Rumpelstiltskin had given her. The only times she removed it were to sleep and to bathe, and in both circumstances, she kept it close by. It glinted in the first ray of sunlight, making her smile. It was not a very nice smile.
She knew it would be best to begin preparing today. If the king thought she liked early morning rides in the nearby wood, which was actually more of a well-cultivated park, he might let his guard down somewhat. Then, once she knew when he was preparing for a family visit, it would be an easy matter to leave before him for a ride, but circle around and let him unwittingly lead her straight to his hidden children.
Paige ran her hands over her belly, massaging a spot where the baby had been kicking for what felt like an hour or so. She wondered what this little girl would be like. Would she have her father's eyes? His nose? Or would she look like Paige? What color would her hair be? Paige gave a gentle push on that sore spot, and suddenly, the baby stopped kicking. Paige gave a nearly-silent sigh of relief.
She blinked suddenly, wondering about the baby's magical abilities. Paige knew that she herself had almost no magical talent whatsoever, aside from her empathy, which was much keener than that of most people. But this was the child of the Dark One. Could that affect her abilities? But she didn't know of any way to find that out before her child was born.
Suddenly, her hands, still massaging her belly, froze. She pulled up her shirt, and saw that her belly button had popped. She stared at it, blinking. When had that happened? It looked awful! She pushed her shirt back down, but she was sure she could still see the shape of her protruding belly button pressing against the shirt. She frowned, trying not to think about it. Instead, she tried to think about what she wanted to do today.
Even though she knew she should go to the Blueberry Farm, to see how things were progressing, the thought of going there made her uncomfortable. All she could think about was Ed, who had been Sir Elrick in the world that was. She hadn't heard from his sister, so she assumed he was still missing. Would the Blues blame her for his disappearance? But more than that, she worried that he would suddenly reappear at the Farm to help with the renovations, as if nothing had happened. She didn't know what she could possibly say to make up for being so harsh. Anything she thought of seemed like it would be too easily taken as a retraction, and she didn't want to give him false hope again.
But she felt the need to do something, so she texted Doctor Horne to make sure he was at Greensmountain Heights.
Hidden by her cloaking spell, Lilura smirked at the servant girl's screams. She was being switched, it sounded like. The wretched thing had dared to mention the Crown Prince where Lilura could hear. Knowing the girl would be punished, Lilura had followed her, risking discovery. The cloaking spell worked best in dim light, gathering shadows around her like a shroud. That much shadow could draw unwanted attention when a space was well-lit, but there was a chance that something more might be revealed while the girl was being punished, and Lilura did not mean to miss that.
The sound of the switch stopped, but the girl was still sniffling and whimpering. She apologized to the stewardess of the household, a woman whose iron-gray hair was always pulled into a neat, severe bun, no matter the hour. The scrawny old battle-axe was in charge of the domestic affairs of the castle, and despite being a guest, and supposedly the future queen, Lilura didn't want to get on this woman's bad side.
But though she listened hard, Lilura didn't learn anything else from their exchange. Disappointed, she made her way back to her own chambers. Perhaps in a day or so, she could offer that servant something nice. A treat, or some kind of trinket. And she could act concerned, and claim that she had noticed the girl seemed upset, and perhaps through feigned kindness, get some of the information she sought.
If she struck up a friendship with the girl, made the girl care about her, she could eventually "confide" in the girl, claiming how nervous she was about getting to know Owen's children, and how it hurt her that no one would speak of his children to her. It wasn't a method she was familiar with, but she had heard somewhere that it was easier to catch flies with honey than with vinegar, although she couldn't remember where she had heard that. It certainly wasn't the kind of thing her mother would ever say.
After nearly three weeks, the servant girl still wasn't taking the bait. She only spoke to Lilura when asked a direct question, and then gave the shortest reply possible. Lilura's attempt at bribing her with a gift had been met with a demure insistence that no gifts were necessary. The foolish girl even claimed that she was not permitted to accept any gifts!
It was a good thing Lilura had other plans in motion. She would also continue to creep through the hallways at night, particularly in the servants' quarters. They would surely speak more freely when they thought she was asleep. She knew she would have to be careful, though. If she consistently slept late, they would wonder why, and someone might realize that she was staying up quite late. But those early-morning rides she had begun would solve that problem. She could easily take a nap in the well-cultivated wood. A simple spell would alert her if anyone came toward her, so she could waken. And surely she could find other times to take little naps. Besides, it wasn't as if this would be a permanent situation. Once she was ready to put her spell on Owen's brats, she could sleep as she chose.
"But Paige," Horne said, blinking up at her in surprise. "I was not meaning to imply that this must be done so immediately. I only was wishing to remind you that it is a thing needing to be done eventually."
Well, as they say, there's no time like the present, Paige signed. Besides, it would be better to deal with it now. I don't want it hanging over my head, especially not as I move into my third trimester, she added. And anyway, this is something I can do without everyone treating me like I'm made of glass.
"Very well, sweet girl," Horne said. "I will have Marsha brought out of her room."
They had tied Marsha's arms and legs to the chair, and it made Paige slightly uncomfortable. It felt like a scene out of a movie, where the bad guys have kidnapped someone and are about to torture that person. She didn't like thinking of herself and Dr. Horne as the bad guys, but she knew that Marsha probably saw it that way.
Ask her why she was so determined to marry my father and remove his children from the picture, she signed to Horne. He repeated the question to their captive.
Her expression bitter and sullen, Marsha said, "Because I had to get out of that wretched swamp! And… and I wanted to be the first witch whose child would hold a throne."
"Why would you be wanting a thing like that?" Horne inquired.
Marsha glared. "Because then everyone involved with dark magic would have to like me! They would come to me for favors, and say nice things to me, and make me feel – " Clearly feeling she had said too much, she stopped abruptly.
Feel what? Paige signed, and Horne translated. Marsha didn't respond.
"Perhaps you were just wanting to feel that someone could be caring about you?" Horne suggested, his voice gentle. After all, he had once probed the witch's mind, and he knew how lonely she had found the swamp.
"That's not it at all," she spat, but Paige could sense that she was lying. Suddenly, inexplicably, Paige wanted to cry for this girl, raised in a swamp with no company other than her mother. According to what Dr. Nerean had told her, back in the world that was, Lilura's mother had been downright cruel. The hag had even stolen her daughter's shadow, in an attempt to control the girl.
Why my father?
After Horne translated, Marsha snorted. "I don't know. Because we heard that his wife had died in childbirth. I never knew how Mother got her news, but she told me, and it just… came to me. I could be free of the swamp, meet other people. I could be important." Once again, she stopped suddenly, not wanting to look weak in front of her enemies. Rumpelstiltskin had warned her, but she hadn't realized that his warning was actually a prophecy. She was sure that he had intended her to fail all along, perhaps needed her to fail for some foul purpose of his own. She should have known better than to trust that foul imp!
Horne was watching Marsha sympathetically. When he looked at Paige, he smoothed his features so she would not see. He knew that Eliza hated this woman for what she'd done to the princes. But to his surprise, Paige seemed near tears!
She just wanted someone to care, she signed to Horne. Good Doctor, you were right. She's little more than a child, and she just wants affection. But she doesn't know how to earn it.
"Indeed," Dr. Horne replied. He wondered if it was Paige's maternal instincts kicking in, or pregnancy hormones, or if she was just growing as a person. He made a decision. "Would you please be stepping out into the hallway for a moment?"
Paige nodded, and followed him out the door. A rather burly male nurse, standing outside the door to take Marsha back to her room when they were finished, went inside to watch her while they talked in private.
"I am thinking, sweet girl, that perhaps we should be giving her a second chance, as it were," Horne said.
There's still a part of me that wants her to suffer, Paige replied, but it seems that she has already suffered enough. She looked thoughtful for a moment. Before we decide, we need to know more. I want to know what happened after we sent her back to that Swamp, with no way out.
"Very well, Paige. We shall be finding this out, and anything else you are needing to hear."
Lilura had actually ridden into the park-like wood, because she felt sure that Owen must have someone spying on her. Today, more than four months after coming to live at the castle, she would come one step closer to her goal. She had noticed that many of Owen's "visits of state" had begun with secretive activity by Sir Ryan and that faun, Nerean. She felt sure that their furtiveness was meant to cover up the king's visits to his children. The knight and the faun had been at it again for the past few days.
Everyone knew that there were only two ways in and out of this wood. Those paths would undoubtedly be watched. But Lilura had prepared for this. She had secretly cleared a new path, leaving only a few drooping pine boughs to cover it. Behind those living boughs, she had piled up all the branches and brush she had cut from her hidden path. With the green pine branches in the front like that, it was nearly impossible to tell that anything was different.
By the time the king left the castle, Lilura was watching. She was also using the spell to cloak herself. The spell didn't work as well in the daytime, but she was just inside the edge of the forest, where the light was dim and dappled. It would do for now.
She knew she couldn't expect to keep to the shadows if she was to follow the king, so her horse was disguised with magic. So was she, but the poor farm-wife dress she now wore was real. The way fabric moved made it difficult to mask every inch of the sort of gown she had grown accustomed to wearing. She had also rubbed dirt on her hands, and a little on her face as well, to help complete the disguise. She may cherish the luxury that royalty afforded, but she wasn't afraid to get her hands dirty. She grimaced down at her filthy hands on the reins. Literally, she thought wryly to herself. But there was one worthwhile thing her mother had taught her – what must be endured can be.
She wasn't sure why they had stopped in this rural town. It was so common, so beneath a king's notice! Then again, Lilura had observed that she was not the only one in disguise. Owen was dressed as a traveling merchant – a rather successful one, at that. He had even met up with some supply wagons! Until that had happened, Lilura had wondered if she had been a little over-paranoid in disguising her true identity.
Suddenly, she took notice – the "merchant" had emerged from the inn, and a youth was with him! Though she strained her eyes, all she could see was that the young man was solidly built, actually rather hefty, and clean-shaven. Though the boy wore a floppy, shapeless hat like so many of the common youths around here, he still put up the hood of his cloak, but it was rather breezy. Perhaps he feared to lose that silly hat, although Lilura suspected he could easily afford a dozen more, just like it. This must be Owen's eldest, the boy who would one day take the throne. But this inn, this whole village, just didn't seem like a good hiding place for the five or six children Owen had. If they were all hidden in separate places, it could take her months, maybe even years, to find them all! She swallowed hard, wondering what she could do if that were the case.
Then she steeled herself. If months, or years, were required, she would find them all. Her dreams, and her future comfort, depended on her resolve, and she would not break. When the boy climbed onto the seat of the lead wagon, Lilura smiled wickedly. This might not be as hard as she feared. There was every chance that the boy had been out studying under some tutor, learning whatever sorts of things kings were required to know. The boy could have left his tutor to meet his father here, from whence they would travel together to where the other children were hidden.
The only thing that still worried Lilura was Rumpelstiltskin's instruction about the bracelet, which she had hidden in her belt pouch for now. She was to find the exact place from which the king "started out" before the bracelet could show her the correct path. But what did that mean? Did she have to discover which gate he left the palace by? Or perhaps it meant the door of that inn where Owen met his son? But as she soon discovered, it meant something else entirely.
"My mother gloated. She told me how to get out of the Swamp, over and over, just to torment me." Marsha's voice was thick with emotion. "Then one day, a boat floated into the Swamp. There was a dead man on it – or that's what we thought. I refused to touch a dead body, so she started picking through the clothes. I don't even know what she hoped to find. Anyway, she jumped like a startled cat when the man moved!" She smirked unkindly, remembering the ridiculous look on her mother's face.
She continued her story. "Then he spoke. At first, I didn't understand what he said, because he was almost dead. But he said… Miranda. Mother's name. She looked shocked, and backed away. She called him… Brock, I think, and Fire Sword. But he didn't answer, so she checked for a pulse. When she decided he was dead, she cackled, and told me she was leaving, and never coming back. She just rowed out of the Swamp and left me there, alone." A slow tear trickled down Marsha's face. "She left my shadow behind. Said she didn't need it anymore." She couldn't bear to tell them what else her mother had said. It was strange to Marsha, how the cruel comment that should hurt the most would be easier to confess.
After taking a deep, shaking breath, Marsha looked up at Paige and Horne. "Please," she begged, "don't make me be alone anymore! I can't stand it! If you have to punish me for what I've done, just kill me. It would be kinder." She stopped, gasping for breath and trying hard not to sob. But she couldn't keep the tears from running down her cheeks.
Stepping close to Paige, Dr. Horne murmured into her ear. "I could be delving her mind again, Princess. Perhaps if I were placing a restriction upon her, that she could only use her magic for the defending of herself or others, we could be trusting her."
But does she really have powers? Didn't you tell me that she was the kind of witch who had made some kind of unholy deal for her powers?
"That is being quite true, Paige. Quite true," Horne mused. "Thank you for the pointing out of this fact." He turned back to Marsha and spoke louder, so she could hear him. "What about those from whom you are receiving your powers? What is being the nature of your agreement with them?"
Marsha looked startled for a moment, but then she shook her head ruefully. "I should have known a faun would understand the difference," she said softly. "My… arrangement, was that they would provide me with the magic I sought in exchange for my mortal soul."
"Were there being… specific wordings, perhaps limitations or parameters, for the providing of this magic?" Horne tried very hard not to run his hand through his hair, as he often did when thinking. He hated not having his horns.
"Well, yes," Marsha said, clearly wondering why it mattered. "They would give me the power I needed to use the spells from my mother's spell book."
"And the means of leaving the Swamp," Horne mused. "Was this in your mother's book of spells?"
Marsha blinked, surprised. "Yes. An ancestor of hers – ours, I guess – had created the Swamp of No Return, as a safe place to hide if it was ever needed."
"Then your… benefactors, if you will, have been failing you. They were not granting you magic enough to break the binding I put into your mind," Horne said.
What are you getting at, good Doctor? Paige signed.
"What I am trying to say is this – the contract she made is likely now being null and void, and through no fault of Marsha's." He was talking to Paige, but then he addressed Marsha herself. "Would you be willing to try your magic? Something you were doing many times before, something that always was working for you."
After staring at Horne for a long moment, trying to decide whether or not he was trying to trick her, Marsha concentrated. A look of confusion came onto her face, followed by renewed concentration. "I can't!" She looked terrified.
Lilura followed Owen's party toward the forest, but she took care to turn down a side road that quickly went out of sight around a hill. She didn't want anyone to look back and realize they were being followed. She had altered the spell so that her mare would seem to be a different color than the horse that had followed the "merchants" into town, and had risked disguising the color of her dress, as well. She hoped that if the fabric had moved too much and spoiled the illusion, they had not noticed, although they would have to be quite sharp-eyed to notice it from that distance.
Once out of sight around the hill, Lilura urged her mare into a gallop. The edge of the woods was closer here, but she feared that if she moved too slowly, she might be seen by Owen's party. A woman on horseback, headed into the woods, would raise suspicions if they caught sight of her, especially since she was not on any road.
Just inside the tree-line, she dismounted and tied her horse to a tree. To keep the horse quiet, she buckled a bag of feed onto its head, then used the cloaking spell again. She moved as quickly as she dared, trying to remain silent as she headed for the road.
When she could see it, she froze. Were they still outside the forest? Or had she missed them? She listened carefully, and heard the creak of a wagon wheel further in. She didn't dare walk on the road; not enough shadows. So she kept the road in sight and tried to move quickly, but it wouldn't have mattered. She soon came upon the supposed merchant caravan, stopped in a convenient clearing while two of the horses were unhitched from the wagons and saddled. It seemed that only the king and his heir would continue on from here.
Once the pair had ridden off, Lilura resumed her tedious journey. There were times when she had to go out of sight of the road to get around an impassable tangle of brambles, and twice she thought she had lost the king entirely. The second time, she just happened to catch sight of a buckle flashing in a shaft of sunlight. The king and his son had taken a side road, which looked like it was very seldom used.
Lilura approached the road carefully, listening and watching to be sure that no one was near enough to see her. Then she crossed the road, easing back into the forest alongside the overgrown track. She needed to be even more careful, now. Were there more side roads, more twists and turns?
But no; before long she came to a spot where she could see Owen and his plump son, dismounted beside an old stone footbridge over a creek that seemed not to need a bridge. However, she could tell by the marks on the bank that the creek could rise quite a lot in a rainstorm. The bridge was in poor repair, and Lilura was quite surprised that Owen hadn't mended it. Of course, many would wonder why a bridge on a road that seemed abandoned should be kept up; it would be a dead giveaway that something important lay out here. Surely the king wasn't that intelligent, but then again, his closest advisor was a faun, and they were renowned for their cleverness.
When Owen pulled out a ball of yarn and dropped it on the ground, Lilura leaned forward, holding her breath as she watched intently. The ball, obviously magical, bounced away into the forest, and the king and the well-cloaked youth followed it. This was what Rumpelstiltskin had meant! The king had hidden his children with magical means, and from that stone bridge, the bracelet the imp had given her would lead her to those little brats.
As she carefully, quietly, made her way back to her horse, Lilura couldn't keep the triumphant smile from her face.
Horne put a hand on Marsha's shoulder in a reassuring gesture. "I was very much beginning to suspect such a thing," he said. Both Marsha and Paige looked at him, confused. He cleared his throat in a manner Paige knew well – he had done it often enough before giving explanations that he knew humans would find to be profound. When she asked him about it, many years ago, he admitted that it made him uncomfortable. It was only natural for a faun to understand far more than a human, and he felt somewhat embarrassed by the often-reverential reactions of the humans around him.
"Your agreement, it was being for the use of their power, was it not?" Marsha nodded in response, and Horne continued. "And it was very clearly specified that you should be having the ability for to perform all spells in your mother's book?" She nodded again. "Lastly, is it not being true that the knowledge of leaving the Swamp was being a part of one of those very spells?"
Marsha's eyes were wide. "Yes," she breathed. She knew that Horne was getting at something, something important. But if he meant what she thought, it could be very bad news.
"Then your deal, it is being now broken," Horne said simply.
"But… my soul," Marsha started, but she was too terrified to finish.
However, Horne understood what she meant. "It was being broken by them, not by you, young lady. As I was mentioning earlier, they did not exert the power to overcome the barrier I was setting upon your mind – perhaps they could not. Either way, they have, by this lack, not upheld their end of this bargain, which is meaning that they have forfeited their rights to your soul."
For a moment, Marsha just stared. Tears started to form in her eyes. "So… does that mean… I'm free? Free of Mother, and now, free of… them?"
"Since you are being quite unable to draw upon the magic that was brought into this land, I am very much believing that they no longer are having a hold upon you," Horne replied. "However," he added, "it is being entirely possible that they are of a jealous sort, and could, perhaps, be sending others under their influence after you, with the intention of bringing harm or misfortune upon you."
"I'm free!" Marsha whispered, as if testing out the thought. She smiled then, the first truly happy smile she had ever known.
Suddenly, Paige made a decision. Doctor Horne, please translate directly for me. He nodded, and explained the process to Marsha. Then Paige met Marsha's eyes. This is your sentence. You must work for our kingdom to earn pardon for your crimes. You will be paid a fair wage, the same as any other citizen. You can work at the Blueberry Farm, or here at Greensmountain Heights – or both, if you wish. You must learn to make friends – real friends, not people who are only nice to you because they want something from you. That's not how friendship works.
A hint of a blush came over Paige's cheeks as she realized that some people could describe her early relationship with Gold that way – she let him have his way with her, so he gave her gifts in return. But she knew, deep down, that the attraction had been mutual from the start, so her situation was very different from what Marsha had been trying to create for herself.
Paige continued. You've never learned how to interact with other people, and that's going to make this difficult for you. But until you manage to make friends, until you learn how to get along with people, you will be considered a criminal among my people. And that's also going to make your task harder, because you'll have a long way to go to earn their respect. But as long as you work diligently at whatever duties you are given, and as long as you are genuinely trying to develop your social skills, you will be treated well, I give you my word.
She signed something specifically to Horne, and he untied Marsha's bonds. The former witch immediately knelt at Paige's feet. "Thank you, Princess," she wept. "You will be a wonderful queen. I'm… I'm so sorry for what I did to your brothers. If I knew the counter-spell… but that was written in Mother's book, and I don't know if that was even brought into this world."
Horne could see that Paige had never even thought of asking Marsha for the counter-spell. "Fret not, Marsha," he said. "Eliza and her father were… consulting, you could be saying, with one powerful enough to be revealing the counter-spell. It is being a fact that Paige's muteness is a part of that same counter-spell."
Marsha didn't respond, but she looked relieved. She was fairly sure that Horne meant Rumpelstiltskin, but if the princess had chosen to pay whatever price the imp exacted, Marsha knew it was no one's business but Paige's.
Lilura had ridden her horse hard to get back to the castle. She was glad she had taken a lunch with her; this was a very long way to ride in one day. The only thing that worried her now was that whoever was sent to watch the paths out of the cultivated wood might have decided to go in looking for her. The sun would be well past its noonday peak by the time she reached that wood. She had never stayed in the wood quite so long before.
But she snuck back in through her makeshift path, putting all the cut boughs back behind the drooping ones. She heard a distant voice calling her name, and went pale. She put a quick spell on the horse so it wouldn't look so exhausted, and rushed a little further down the path to a nice, cleared area, where she hurriedly spread the blanket from her picnic lunch. She lay down and focused on her breathing, slowing it until it could seem that she was asleep. This trick would never have worked on her mother, blind though the woman was, but these palace fools would never know the difference.
As a mounted knight rushed up the path, she jerked, as if waking, and blinked up at him. "Oh, my," she said, pretending to stifle a yawn. "Did I fall asleep out here?"
Looking relieved, the knight replied, "So it would seem. M'lady."
Lilura turned to collect her blanket so he wouldn't see the anger on her face. He had hesitated before showing the respect that was due her. He did not believe that she was a true lady, and probably did not believe his king would marry her, either. Despite their claims of preparations being made at the summer palace, no one here seemed to believe the wedding would really happen. No one had actually said anything, of course, but their attitudes made it clear.
But then she gave a soft sigh of relief. It seemed her absence, much longer than she had thought would be necessary, had gone unnoticed.
A few weeks later, Lilura watched for the return of the king's party. She knew he had only left just this morning, and usually he chose to spend the night somewhere, either at the hidden manor or at an inn along the way. She didn't know where, and it really didn't matter. But now his precious sons were all missing, since the swans would have to seek open water. She was sure that he would come straight home.
In fact, she expected him to come to her for comfort. She had taken special care in preparing herself for Owen's return. After all, he would be grieving the loss of his children, and she knew he was tempted by the glimpses of flesh she had allowed him to see. They would likely be married by the end of the week. If things went as well as she hoped today, she could be carrying his new heir sooner than that.
When Owen and his escort rode into the courtyard, they seemed agitated. Lilura practiced her concerned, caring expression in the mirror.
It surprised her when the king's entire party entered her room. She had expected Owen to be alone. A female knight with red hair threw back her hood. The young woman was rather hefty for a knight, but this kingdom did not judge by a person's weight. As long as she could carry out her duties, it was her own business.
Lilura gasped when the knight said, "It was her, Father! She turned my brothers to swans!" This was impossible! There was no daughter! Her spying had caught the names of all six of Owen's children, including the one that might have died at birth! But it seemed that there was a seventh child, for the other knights were calling her the Crown Princess.
Disheartened, Lilura didn't even struggle as they arrested her. As Rumpelstiltskin had warned, she had missed one of Owen's children, and now her plot was discovered. But this explained why that maid had been so difficult to bribe. Though she had nearly slipped up, she'd caught herself in time to drop the end of the princess' title. So she had been punished, just in case Lilura had overheard. These people were far craftier than she would ever have given them credit for.
Paige sat at Fawn and Noah's kitchen table, staring out the window. How had she come to feel sorry for the witch who had destroyed her life? Was it pregnancy hormones? Or was the girl's story really that moving? Also, she felt like there was something important she should have realized, and she was fairly sure it had nothing to do with the former witch.
She tried to focus her thoughts, but the doorbell rang. Fawn was preparing some nettle leaf tea. It didn't come from Paige's nettle plants, but from that Johnson fellow's shop. Fawn had gone out specifically to purchase some when Paige started spending more time with them. When Paige had asked if the Golden Hinds knew of nettle leaf tea's benefits, she admitted she hadn't learned about it in the forest, but in Tristan's castle, once she had finally conceived a child.
"I'll be right back," Fawn said, heading for the door. A few moments later, she returned, followed by Lydia, Ed's sister. She looked happy, but not as joyful as Paige would expect if Ed had come home.
At Paige's questioning glance, Lydia burst out, "Wherever he is, he's safe. He took supplies from our fishing boat – blankets, matches, drinking water, canned food – he's just gone out to live in the woods for awhile, I guess until he figures things out. Or runs out of food." From her tone of voice, Paige didn't think Lydia was intentionally making a joke. "I'm sure no one else would have known where to find our supplies, and besides, why would anyone else take them?" Her relief was clear. "Anyway, Princess, I just wanted to let you know, so you wouldn't worry. There was enough food to last one person at least a month, maybe more, so he could be out there awhile, but he'll be back. I just know it!"
Before Paige could respond, Lydia made her farewells and practically rushed out of the house. Fawn chuckled. "I only met her that once, when she came here to ask if you knew where Ed was, but I wouldn't have thought her quite so excitable."
Me, neither, Paige replied. But then again, she was very worried about her brother.
Fawn made an inarticulate noise of agreement as she sipped her own tea. She had made mint tea for herself, never having cared for the taste of nettle leaf tea. At the court physician's urgings, she drank it back in the Enchanted Forest, while pregnant with her son, but only because she didn't want to seem rude. As a Golden Hind, she had never drunk anything but water. Her time with the humans had given her an appreciation of certain teas, like the mint she was drinking now.
Will came barreling into the kitchen. "I'm a plane!" he shouted, holding his arms out stiffly and careening around the table. Paige smiled, and so did Fawn.
"Just be careful, now, Will," Fawn admonished him gently. "Even though Paige is no longer on bed rest, you could still hurt her if you ran into her by accident."
Pretending to come in for a landing, Will looked at his mother very seriously. "I know. Paige is gonna have a baby, and babies is… is… del-kit."
"Yes," Fawn agreed, chuckling. "Babies are delicate."
"I won't hurt her, Mama, I promise," Will added, crossing his heart. Then he beckoned his mother closer so he could whisper in her ear, but Paige could still hear him. "Can I take her out to see my new fort?"
Fawn drew back. "Oh, I don't know," she said, eying Paige contemplatively.
You have a fort? Paige signed to Will. Even though he was a child, Horne had also given him the knowledge of sign language, and so far, Paige hadn't found any gaps in his knowledge. She wondered if it was because she kept things rather simple when she signed to him, or if it had to do with the fact that a child's mind is more geared toward learning than an adult's mind. It would be an interesting question to ask Horne someday.
"Yup!" he exclaimed, beaming. "And it's gots woods all around it! You can't even see no houses!"
At Paige's questioning glance, Fawn said, "His fort is out in the woods behind the house. It's not quite a quarter of a mile away from here." She turned to her son. "We have to check with your Uncle Braden before Paige can walk that far. I think he'll probably say yes, but until we're sure, why don't you go out there and make sure everything is just perfect, in case you can take Paige out to see it?"
Will, who had looked crestfallen at first, brightened up at this idea. "Mmm-kay!" he said. Then he glanced at Paige before putting his hand beside his mouth to keep her from reading his lips, but when he whispered, it was still loud enough for Paige to hear clearly. "Mama, I need a ace."
"A what?" Fawn asked.
"So I can put flowers in it to make things all nice," he explained impatiently.
"Oh," Fawn replied. "A vase, of course. I'll go get one."
"Shhhh!" Will said. "Not so loud!"
Smiling, Fawn said, "Right, of course." Sneaking a furtive glance at Paige, she added, "She'll never know!" Then she walked out of the room, still chuckling softly to herself. When she came back in, she held the vase behind her and passed it over to her son while pretending to shield it from Paige's view. Leaning down, she whispered, "Don't forget to put water in it so the you-know-whats will survive!"
Will gave her an impatient look. "I know, Mama," he said, edging toward the door. "Bye, Paige!" he called as he tried to open the door without letting her see the vase.
Paige waved at him, and he was out the door, running across the back yard.
"I hope Braden will let you go. Will would love it," Fawn remarked.
I can see that, signed Paige. But… a quarter of a mile? Isn't he a little young to go so far by himself?
Fawn smiled. "It's a smooth, easy path there, and even though I wasn't aware of my origins for most of the time we were here, I know those woods pretty well by now. Technically speaking, his fort is still on our property, although it's pretty close to the edge. But as a Golden Hind, I can sense… well, I guess you could call it the mood of the forest. And if there's any danger to him, or even if he just gets scared for some reason, I'll sense it right away, and a quarter of a mile isn't far to run. You see, Hinds are more in tune with other creatures than humans are. My sisters and I could never have played hide-and-go-seek, because we would simply know where each other was."
Paige nodded, but signed, I just don't know if I'd feel comfortable letting my child go so far by herself, not at Will's age.
"And I imagine you would be right not to," Fawn agreed. "But Will is only half human. Not only is he also sensitive to the mood of the forest, as I am, but the animals will not harm him. He can sense them, and they, in turn, can sense him, and know him to be a friend. Most animals that attack only do so because they are startled, or to protect their offspring or their territory. But as the son of a Golden Hind, the animals know that he is no enemy to them."
Still not sure she agreed with the situation, Paige shrugged, signing, Well, he's your child, I'm sure you know what's best for him.
But Fawn smiled gently at Paige, knowing that the mute girl still questioned the decision. She chose not to pursue that topic, though. "Noah says that Mike should come back soon, if previous experience serves as a guide. The longest he's ever been gone like this was two weeks, and we're coming up on that soon."
I think this may be a harder decision than he's ever had to make before, Paige signed, looking sad. Then something finally clicked in her mind, something that had been nagging at her all day. She looked shocked and dismayed. Oh, no! Mike! What if… I mean, Archie's not really dead, but there was… a body. What if… what if it was… But she couldn't finish that thought. It hurt too much. Pushing the nearly-empty mug aside, she folded her arms on the table and hid her face. As always, she cried with very little sound.
Fawn rushed around to sit beside her, rubbing gently at Paige's back and stroking her hair. As before, Fawn didn't shush Paige or speak at all. She knew she would have to ask her husband to go out looking for his brother. Paige shouldn't be under this kind of emotional stress, especially not after the accident almost two weeks ago. But what if Paige was right? What if Regina's mother had killed Mike, disguising his body in order to frame Regina for murder?
"I won't," Lilura said spitefully, turning away.
"Coward," the blind hag cackled. "Afraid to touch a dead body?" The fact that she had once been equally young and innocent only made her more determined to shame her daughter. After all, it was a similar weakness that had landed her in this abysmal Swamp.
Miranda reached out, barely having to grope before she found the edges of the boat. She was blind, but she remembered where it was from having her hands on it a moment ago. She gingerly patted at the interior until she touched the body. A half-smothered sound of revulsion came from her wretched daughter, and Miranda grinned derisively and muttered to herself about the girl's weaknesses. While she did so, she began rifling through the corpse's clothes.
But before she could make a snide comment out loud, the body groaned! She jumped, startled. Whoever this man was, he was very near death, and trying desperately to speak. "Mir… Mir… an," he said, but his voice failed. In the sighing breath that followed, Miranda heard the last syllable of her name. But… it couldn't be. Could it? She scrambled away from the boat, but no further sound came from the man.
"Brock?" Miranda queried, gingerly easing back to the side of the boat. When he didn't respond, she pushed at him. "Fire Sword?" Still no reply, so she felt for his neck. After a long moment, she decided that his heart was no longer beating. She cackled triumphantly. "Now it's my turn to leave you to rot in this terrible Swamp!" she cried to Lilura. She reached into her pocket and withdrew a dark, shapeless thing. She flung it to the ground, where it quivered and seemed to ooze toward her daughter's feet. At first, Lilura scurried backward, trying to get away from it, but her mother gleefully announced, "I won't be needing that any longer!"
Then Lilura realized that this was her shadow, which her mother had taken when she was little more than an infant. It hadn't kept her from leaving the Swamp, but the Dark One himself had influenced that event, and she sincerely doubted her mother's powers could stand against his for even an instant. She stood still, letting the shadow creep forward and reattach itself to her feet. It felt strange, almost slimy somehow.
Meanwhile, Miranda had gone inside to gather her meager belongings, which she had tied up in a blanket. She strode confidently over to the boat and into the water's edge on the far side of it. Then she moved more cautiously, her hands searching for a moment before finding the side of the boat. She heaved, displaying more strength than Lilura would have guessed she had, and dumped the body onto the bank. When the boat was once again settled on the surface of the water, Miranda climbed in.
Before rowing away, Miranda said, "Say hello to your father, you worthless little brat!" Cackling, she rowed away, her course never erring in spite of her blindness.
Mr. Gold was lying awake in his hotel room. When he had so cavalierly announced that he would kill the boy that led him to Bae, he had never dreamed that the boy would turn out to be his own grandson. Had the red-headed seer known, or was that something her power hadn't revealed to her? He had learned long ago just how murky a vision of the future could be.
Henry. Baelfire's son. For years, he had thought of Bae as a boy, even though he knew that all boys grow up. Even… that one so-called boy, who was – but Gold didn't want to dwell on that. He had enough to worry about with Bae and Henry.
He picked up his phone and opened a new text message to Paige. But every time he started to key something in, he gave an exasperated sigh and deleted it. He couldn't decide what to say. Some things he didn't want to admit to himself, let alone to Paige. How could he tell her that a part of him was wondering if he could do it? If he could kill his own grandson?
Finally, after several discarded drafts, he gave up. Perhaps in the morning his mind would be clearer. But right now, he wished he could feel Paige's arms around him.
A Few Notes:
This chapter takes place during the episode "Manhattan."
It is not always easy to be sure of ABC's timelines, but for the purposes of my story, I am assuming that the Storybrooke events take place on the "next day" from the previous episode. Gold seems to have known exactly where to go, so they didn't really have to spend much time searching for Neal/Baelfire. Also, at the end of the episode "Tiny," when we see Mr. Gold, Emma, and Henry on the plane, you can clearly see that it is night-time outside the window. And then the voice over the intercom states that the flight time "tonight" will be 22 minutes. So while it is a short flight, it clearly marks the end of the day on which they left Storybrooke. I see no reason why they would wait beyond the following morning to go out and find Neal's apartment building.
Now, as for the difficulty I mentioned earlier - when I set out to have Paige and Horne give Marsha a hearing, I had never intended for her to become a sympathetic character. So I envisioned this chapter going very differently. In fact, her hearing wasn't supposed to take up quite so much of the chapter. I wasn't sure what her exact sentence would be, but I sometimes write without knowing how something ends and find that, in the process of creating the chapter, things just fall in line naturally. Many times, I have begun a chapter containing a deal with Rumple, and I'm thinking to myself, "Now what on earth could Rumple possibly want from this person?" But by the time I write the scene, or sometimes even while I am writing that scene, I get an inspiration. But in this case, I was thinking along the lines of, "Where will they exile Marsha to, here in Storybrooke? Will they keep her locked in her room at Greensmountain Heights? Is there someplace that exists here that we haven't seen yet, where they could shut her away?" And I just couldn't decide. Then, as I was writing, I suddenly saw more of her character than I ever had before, and so she ended up getting her chance at redemption.
All in all, that made this a rather difficult chapter to write. I ended up having to postpone this chapter's original Fairy Tale plot so we could all gain a better understanding of where she was coming from.
That being said, did you enjoy it? How do you feel about seeing Lilura/Marsha as a sympathetic character? PLEASE review!