Hi so here is another chapter this one doesn't have much action in it but I promise the next one will.

There will probably be a brief lull In updating just due to work at Christmas but I promise you that I will do a mass update of two or three chapters before Christmas. I hope to have all of Season 4 done before 2018 but that might be a pipe dream at this point.

Disclaimer-Nothing is mine just Giselle.

Please Read and Review.

Paradise Lost

Chapter 37-A Mind With A Heart Of It's Own

As Gold consolidates his major plan Giselle realises that for once she has to put herself first. Killian on the other hand is sucked into a new danger that will change his and Emma relationship for good.

"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss the abyss gazes also into you" (Friedrich Nietzsche)

Storybrooke. Giselle's Perspective.

It was like being born anew.

For six weeks she had wallowed in misery, wondering how on earth she was going to manage when her father had been banished and then she remembered that she had managed once before. Ok so that had almost seen Killian…no her other Dad killed but she had pulled herself back from the brink many times before.

Only now things were different because Giselle by her own admission was a little older, a little wiser and a little more aware of what was going on.

The morning they were supposed to have coffee was ruined by the whole monster thing and then when Giselle had tried to meet her Dad for dinner she had ran into Will Scarlett in front of the library which was where she believed Belle had called her home now and that had spoiled the whole idea of pizza with the Charming's but as she sat in front of her bedroom mirror the next morning she realised something, something so potent it made her take pause and really look at herself.

She realised then…well if she was being honest with herself she realised somewhere around the third week that she had sat on the couch and finished the second vodka bottle that she needed to make her own way in the world. She was forced to consider what this new life would be like. A part of her knew that there was no real chance that her father was really gone, he might be in a Land Without Magic right now but she knew he would find his way back, weather it was today, tomorrow or in ten years she knew he would be back and then once again she would have to choose a side.

All her life she had taken her father's side. Even when Killian had become a steady factor in her life she had always taken the Dark One's side it was a given, so much so she was barely considered a player in the game. And this was a game. This was a game of chess or whatever and she was firmly in one place.

Moreover during the six weeks that she locked herself away she began to realise just what power was, what consolidating it behind you meant. Oh she didn't love it as much as her father did that was for sure but she loved the feeling of power when she walked into that room and dictated terms to the heroes.

She wasn't a hero. Giselle didn't think she was a villain but she knew enough about herself to know she wasn't a hero. Nor did she want to be. She was, she decided in the grey area and if there wasn't a grey area between hero and villain before now then she had just invented it.

She wasn't alone anymore she realised that day she decided to get her hair cut. She had people well really one that she could trust that would support her. The thing that had made the last time she had been totally and completely alone, not even Edmund had known her identity and she knew that she would have never told him.

There was a moment where she stared at herself and then she got dressed. She dressed with a newfound wardrobe that she had never really had before. She dressed in a tight fitting blue dress that came to her knees. It was backless and something that Regina would wear she supposed…well…If Regina was nearing seventeen that is.

She decided to keep her boots, she wasn't totally changing after all.

She had taken to keeping the dagger with her at all times, she hadn't really needed to keep it under lock and key but she had tugged it out of Regina's hands once before and she didn't really trust Regina not to sneak in and try to steal it. Magic would prevent her from taking it with her own magic but the heroes she knew from watching them both underestimated her and were not above a bit of breaking and entering to get what they wanted.

She opened up the shop which she did every weekend now and then sat on her father's stool checking the books and waited without fail for some poor disgruntled visitor desperate to see if Giselle Jones would lower his rent now her father was gone.

The doorbell rattled and her Dad came in. he still the customary sweep of the place with his eyes like he was afraid that her father was going to leap out of the shadows but he was carrying what looked like two coffees and a brown paper bag so she supposed impending death wasn't coming for them just yet.

"Hey" she said not looking up.

"Hello" he said with the slight nervous hitch to his voice. She couldn't blame him not really. They had been getting along really well and then in the space of one night the whole thing had gone up in the air and she had gone off the grid for six weeks.

"Look" she said deciding to get straight to the point. She was free to speak her mind though she supposed she had always done that-but this felt different and she was damn well gonna use it.

"I get that we were gonna meet up but I saw Will what's his face and the Bitch-Bookworm creating a disgusting display of affection in front of the library and I wasn't in the mood for it so I'm sorry"

"Fair enough" was the response.

Fuck.

Somehow she was beginning to think that her Dad was taking all she was giving and not pushing for more. For her Dad…her biological Dad that felt wrong, her father was the one she had come to take that attitude from.

Instead she took a deep breath and focused on the brown paper bag he was holding loosely in his hand.

"What's that?" she asked

"Grilled Cheese…err…somewhere down the line Emma converted me and…you said you wanted to talk over coffee"

Giselle smiled at his nerves.

"Cool" she said standing up. "Let me get you a chair"

She was three mouthfuls in when she decided to cut to the chase.

"Look I…I didn't know he had taken your heart. You know that right? I wouldn't have condoned it…I mean I really wouldn't have"

Her Dad's muscles all seemed to relax at once and with a horrible sense of shame almost Giselle realised that he hadn't known that, at least not for sure. He must have been so sure that she was loyal to the Dark One no matter what.

Had she been?

Really?

Oh god she was too sober to second guess herself right now. And she was trying to quit the booze because she had spent six weeks near as damn it self-medicating her pain and misery away and she knew that that was unhealthy. Plus there was the fact that she was…well…technically underage. Though she wasn't actually sure if that was a law here anymore when the average of most high school students was actually thirty.

"Well anyway" he said awkwardly as if he too didn't want to discuss that night where their lives had changed and not all for the better.

"I did not believe that you had…and…I would not have pushed for banishment had I been asked. Or death, while I personally would have liked it I know what the bastard meant to you"

Giselle nodded sitting back in her chair and looking at him.

"I'm not going to forgive Belle" she said finally.

Her Dad nodded. "I thought as much" he said honestly. "So I will not discuss it with you then"

She nodded because to be honest she did not have it in her to discuss Belle right now.

"He's going to come back" she decided going to the crux of the matter "Whether it's today, tomorrow or in ten years it doesn't matter. And when he does it's all in the air again so I don't want to think about it, I want to live in the here and now…I want a relationship with you because unlike the first time I was alone I know you now. I know you wouldn't hurt me. So" she ran a hand through her now shorter hair.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is do you wanna do this again? Start over, clean slate or whatever the saying is and see where it leaves us?"

Her Dad smiled at her then and with a pang Giselle realised that it was her smile smiling back at her, she did that thing with the corner of her mouth when she was happy. How much had she truly not looked for even when she had said she had been open for a relationship?

"Ok darling" he said finally. "But let's be honest with each other. And…and if he does come back…don't give him the dagger, come to me and if needs be we can give it to him together, I don't want you running off into the woods to deal with him because you think that you have a lifetime of experience and I don't want you locking yourself away anymore. Truth be told…I did not like it the last time"

Giselle thought that perhaps that was an understatement but she let it slide.

"Alright" she said conceding. The points were fair after all and she had made more than her fair share of mistakes over the years.

"But you have to be honest with me too. No more lies about Emma or your past or things you don't want to disclose to me, no more running off into the forest to confront Snow Queens. And if he does come back and you have a run in with him I expect you to come to me and I can tell you how to play him. I have a lifetime of knowledge more so than Belle on how to play the Dark One. That, calculation and a little bit of love on his part might be how I survived for all those years"

She had never admitted that until now though she supposed it must be true as well. Oh she still loved him, would still follow him, would still have his back when nobody else would but she could now see the differences between him and Killian. Her Dad had fought none stop to be worthy of her love and trust and her father on the other hand had always expected it to be there.

Now she was forging her path on this shitty road. If Rumple wanted her help then he was going to have to give her a reason other than blind faith. Really? What had he thought she was anyway? A charming?

"Deal" her Dad said gently and Giselle smiled and for once decided to be even bolder and hold out her hand. He took it and there in the cold and dank shop Giselle, could almost believe that they were trying and…dare she say it…should her father not come back to Storybrooke, or should he come back later rather than sooner…perhaps she could be happy without him.

Her Dad sighed and then grinned. "Well darling if we're going to be honest with each other I should tell you Cruella and Ursula entered town last night"

And just like that Giselle knew that if her father wasn't in town already he was plotting his return sooner rather than later.

However, Giselle hadn't been kidding when she said she wasn't going to give the dagger over without a bloody good reason.

Moreover she refused to admit defeat and hand it in to Emma.

Not until she had a very good reason to anyway.

Storybrooke. That Afternoon. Killian's Perspective.

He slipped into the booth feeling…lighter than he had done in weeks.

He and Giselle had, had a long talk and there was something in his daughter's eyes and the way she was now holding herself that made him think that there was a chance that they could have a proper father and daughter relationship. Oh what they had, had before had been nothing to turn his nose up at but she seemed serious this time and Killian was too desperate and too happy to take her at nothing but her word.

Her story about Cruella and Ursula matched up to the one Belle had given them and there was no way the Dark One would tell a fourteen year old any more than that, and also she had conceded to hand of the dagger as soon as she had proof that the Dark One was back which Killian supposed was more than fair and more than what they going to get yesterday.

"Hey" said a voice to his left and he turned to see Swan smiling at him. It had been a day of revelations all round and while he had not yet divulged his history with Ursula he had decided that if Giselle was willing to try then he should. Perhaps not with Emma not right now but certainly with his daughter.

"Hello" he said gently curving a hand around her waist. This relationship with Swan was so more dangerous to his heart than the one with Milah. He had survived losing Milah-alright he had lost himself along the way and through the skin of his teeth to boot, but he knew that he would not stand losing Emma Swan. That would cripple him.

And that was what on some nights frightened him.

"I take it your talk with Giselle went well?"

"Very" he smiled feeling warm, he decided to disclose the one thing that was keeping him feeling warm all over even on a cold night such as this one. "I think…I think she might be considering moving out of that house and in with me…I haven't asked her yet or looked for a place but…I feel confident in asking her and that is no small thing"

Emma beamed at him. "That's wonderful," she said and she kissed him once light on the lips. She pulled back before he could deepen the kiss and muttered something about two stiff rums to celebrate.

Killian smiled watching her go. Finally, things were looking up.

If he had turned around right there and then, he would have seen the shadowy figure of the Dark One watching with that half smile on his face that had never meant any good to anyone. However, he did not and Killian Jones had no idea that that night was the last golden night of peace he would have before the entirety of his life would be ripped apart, never to be the same.

This ending also leads us up to Season 5 as we know the events of Season 4 and how Gold's return plays into them.

Next Chapter-As Gold and Giselle battle it out, the former realises that absolute loyalty is perhaps not a given anymore and the latter realises that a bigger battle is at play. Meanwhile Giselle and Killian both learn a secret that the Charming's have been keeping, Regina and Giselle play a game that might have far lasting consequences and Operation Mongoose is shared between Aunt and Nephew.

And let me know what you think.