Sorry for the delay, my doves! Finally saw my niece for the first time since Christmas (7 months). Oh my goodness! *puppy face*
Thank you for the reviews and enjoy!
Songs: Break In by Halestorm, John's Walk by Jamin Winans
"You okay?" Emma whispered, forehead pressed to Regina's.
The sorceress nodded, bumping their heads lightly, and Emma pushed her shirt over her shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. Regina's hands hung limply at her sides, but her shoulders coiled with tension. Her breath came in shallow gasps that moved her chest in a continuous rhythm as she waited for Emma to initiate the next step. She touched her waist lightly.
"Are you there?" She asked, eyes closing as she called on her darker half. Emma's forehead furrowed. She wanted to know more but refrained from asking. If Regina wanted to tell her, she would have.
As if I have any other option, Princess. Regina smiled at the snappy remark and opened her eyes to find Emma studying her curiously. Instead of explaining, she squeezed her hips and then slipped her fingers beneath Emma's damp shirt, hooking the hem on her thumbs. Gooseflesh followed the trail her palms made up Emma's lean waist, her ribs, the sides of her breasts, her shoulders and arms. Green eyes explored hers as the fabric freed from her hair and fingertips.
Their lips met mutually, calculated and savoring each precious moment. No desperate hands grabbed at flushed bodies, no ear-splitting cries echoed on the walls. Callused palms glided over soft skin, a gentle mouth caught wanting sighs. Feathery fingertips traced the contours of Regina's shoulders, baring her beautiful breasts in the pale light of the moon. Eight roughened pads dipped into the hollows of her collarbones, memorized the smoothness of her skin, climbed and descended the swell of her chest. A light gasp broke the kiss, pushing flesh into Emma's palms.
The Savior smiled, holding Regina's terrified gaze. She reached behind and undid her own bra and dropped it to the floor, maintaining an equal level of exposure, and then went a step farther by removing her boots, pants, and underwear. Regina relaxed in the comfort that Emma wouldn't simply leave her twisting in panic. She stood before her, with her, wanting her touch as much as she desired to give her own – as bare and broken as Regina.
"Touch me, Regina," Emma breathed. She sounded as scared as Regina felt, and they both knew that this was different. This wasn't jealousy fucks from Regina who wanted to keep up with The Queen or hardcore romps designed to unleash Emma's innermost fantasies.
Regina's hands trembled as her palms covered Emma's smaller breasts. Green eyes fluttered, and Regina allowed her skirt to fall to the floor. Emma would not abandon her. Their lips met in another indulgent dance, cherishing the unique flavors and textures unobtainable anywhere else in any realm. Fingers beneath satin, Emma knelt slightly, stripping Regina of the last shield of her physical defenses. Regina shivered, her body searching out Emma's instead of shying away from the sensation of their bare skin sliding easily.
Fingers buried into black hair at the base of her scalp. A hand massaged a feminine waist as lips touched the curve of muscle between Regina's shoulder and neck. She wrapped both arms around blonde hair and strong shoulders, strong enough to carry the weight of their world, strong enough to save her. Her cheek brushed Emma's temple, loving her, appreciating the tenderness in kind. Insecurity faded with the first step towards the bed in the familiar embrace. Fear swelled when Emma gazed upon her prostrated body.
"Emma," she called to her, needing her body to quell the rising terror.
"I'm here," The Savior vowed, understanding the plea without further explanation.
She followed Regina to the pillows and lowered her body flush against her lover's. The sorceress spread her thighs wider, accommodating the hips between them. Two sighs mingled as their combined heat climbed from their bellies to flush chests and necks. Emma rolled into her gently, testing the tension and fear in her lover. Regina surged upward, circling her neck and shoulders with both arms and pulled her into another kiss. Her hips never stopped that gentle rocking while their bodies reacquainted to the soul-touching intimacy that Regina remembered and Emma yearned for since her accident.
The kiss broke slowly with a slight linger of Emma's lips before she tentatively moved them to her jawline. Regina pushed her hips upward, telling her lover silently that she approved the progression. Nuzzling beneath her chin, Emma tipped her head to the side and exposed her neck. Lips and tongue cherished the slight bump of muscle beneath the tender flesh. Fingertips pressed into her shoulder blades as a tongue swirled the frenzied tempo of blood. Regina pushed on her shoulders instinctively, expressing her desire for more, her body's desire. Her brain inspired her to grab frantically at Emma's shoulders to keep her in place a moment longer.
"It's okay," Emma murmured against her throat. "Just tell me what you want, Baby."
"Stay with me," Regina said a bit nonsensically. Where would Emma go?
Emma rolled onto her left side, taking her weight on her elbow and forearm as her right slid over Regina's belly and rested against her ribs. "Like this?" Regina nodded, settling slightly now that Emma reassured her that she'd not abandon her to this experience.
Their lips came together almost roughly, unable to get close enough. Tongues touched, eliciting shivers from both bodies striving to become one. This dance felt familiar to Emma, like a memory of it skirted the edge of her thoughts, like the dance they'd shared that brought them back together. She'd done this before. They'd been here before in this very room, in this very position, with the same emotion and need surging through their veins. Silhouettes of memories danced behind frosted glass, visible and present but elusive, untouchable. Though she felt inexperienced in the art of loving another woman, Emma knew exactly what Regina desired.
She caressed her breasts firmly, rolling one nipple in her fingers and sucking at the other. Regina's hips raised, seeking friction in a more sensitive area. The Queen slipped closer to the surface as Regina retreated from the heady sensations of slowly losing control of her senses. Emma's lips upon hers soothed the fear. After everything she'd done in her past, to Emma, to their family and friends, The Savior had never once abandoned her, not even when she'd discovered the irrevocable betrayal of erasing her memories or the insufferable knowledge that she'd intended to leave her forever, to run back to The Enchanted Forest and never return. Emma feared abandonment above all else, even death, and she'd opened her heart once more to find the love she'd always believed existed on some level even if their relationship failed.
"Emma," she whispered, her voice wet and deep with the hint of tears.
Green eyes met hers, shimmering and blurred with the same tears. "I know, Regina. I feel it, too," she returned just as softly.
"I can't," came the breathy gasp as tears spilled onto Regina's cheeks. Emma's hand moved from her breast to her ribs, respectful of her lover's wishes immediately. They were both shattered women, collecting tiny pieces of their souls and clutching them closely to their chests like children with a broken toy.
"It's okay," Emma assured and kissed her forehead, holding her mouth there while tears trickled down her cheeks. One dripped onto Regina's nose, and she pushed The Savior back with unsteady hands on her shoulders. Gazes connected, open and honest and wanting despite the new mountain to scale.
Her back hit the bed softly, Regina's heat staying with her. Emma allowed lips to suck her nipples, hands to touch every surface of her skin. A fingertip slipped through wetness, circled sensitive nerves, and green eyes flew open to find caramel in the darkness. The pressure disappeared, and then a wet hand touched the back of her own, lifting and guiding it to Regina's own liquid heat. Emma exhaled audibly through her nose, venerable of the moment in a way she'd never been before.
"You sure?" She checked, aware of how quickly Regina had changed her mind.
"You'll stop if I ask," Regina stated as if it explained everything.
"Regina, that's not even a question, Baby. You know I will," Emma reminded her, firm but sensitive. She knew a bit of Regina's past but had been stripped of most of it. This felt like more than that.
This was healing sex but not in the sense of abuse. She stitched and seared the fractured bits of Regina's mind with her gentle touches. The jagged edges and ugly red scars remained, fresh and raw and incomplete – too sensitive to touch but too fragile to stand without support. In order to heal, she needed to hurt. Tears flowed freely as a solitary finger slipped inside, and she allowed her back to rest upon the mattress at an angle. Emma's breasts hid her face and caught the tiny sighs and sounds that came with pleasure. One arm wrapped her neck, the other beneath Emma's and anchored around her back. Nothing but that one limb and Regina's hips found enough freedom to move.
A second finger penetrated her easily, the arousal betraying her fears and reservations. It whispered to Emma how much she yearned for her touch. It rushed out to meet The Savior a little more with each meticulous movement of fingers, each brief massage of the ribbed nerves that sent pulses of heat into her belly. The ebb and flow of stimulation hummed in her body, laboriously dragging her towards that precipice of oblivion in tiny tugs and jolts. As her body gave in, her mind quieted. The only thought it capable of producing was calculating the seconds between the throbs of energy. She sighed harshly, frustrated with the pace but too afraid for anything faster or harder lest The Queen inadvertently take over. They weren't given a choice sometimes, and fear triggered her counterpart's control.
"You okay?" Emma checked in without changing the movement between her thighs. "Do you need more?" Regina nodded. "Faster, harder, or more fingers?" Emma clarified. She needed to get this right and hadn't honed the ability to read minds yet.
"I…fingers," Regina decided quickly.
The stimulation disappeared for a moment and then three long, slim fingers stretched her slightly, challenging the clenching muscles. Regina gasped and turned her head to press a cheek to Emma's breast as she required more oxygen than the humid air between her mouth and her lover's chest. Emma maintained that painstakingly patient rhythm, not asking for more than Regina gave. Light kisses touched her hair, telling her that her lover remained involved and present despite the lack of movements either of them made. This moment wasn't only about pleasure or sex. They needed this purge of emotion with each tear drop, each sigh, each quiver of a chin. They needed a reunion of their souls.
Fingertips dug into Emma's spine painfully. The pace quickened, only a notch, only enough to notice. Regina nodded into her chest. Somewhere between Emma's silent understanding of her body and Regina's acknowledgement of what was about to occur, the fear slipped away, replaced by the need of what this moment signified. Lips came together, hands grabbed and ached. Sighs glided over tongue and teeth, filling the other with breath, with life, with love.
"I love you." Regina arched, hips dipping and raising frantically as they sought to bring her to that most desired sensation. "Emma, I love you."
She came undone upon her lover's gentle hand. A flash of light expanded around them slowly, pink and blue and violet and gold. It grew slowly, expanding with each ripple and surge of climax within her body. The brilliance of it blinded them in the darkness as it undulated upon their bodies and swirled around their hearts. Emma's fingers jumped against the ribbed flesh within her. Regina rolled against the penetration.
"Emma, I love you," she cried into the orbs of magic skittering over the sheen of sweat on her skin. She pulled at her lover with jerking, uncoordinated pleas until their lips touched again.
Upon her second climax, the magic exploded outward with a thundering crack that shook the room, the house, and rumbled through their home, waking those who slumbered, slamming into those who stood or sat. For that brief moment of perfection, everyone experienced the power of True Love, a love capable of withstanding time and torture and distance and unspeakable grief. The Savior released an emotional sob of her own as that power surged in her own chest. Regina clutched her tightly.
The high crashed.
Salem.
"You fucking bitch," Emma seethed darkly and grabbed her head, tripping in the haste to remove herself from Regina's touch.
Love poems from an anonymous stranger who knew her heart so well.
She scrambled to the wall on her butt and hands and grabbed her head again. "You fucking bitch!"
Falling to her knees as she promised to love her forever.
"Emma," Regina started, her high slamming into the ground with her lover's. She followed Emma to the floor, standing by the bed unsure of what just happened.
Bringing her back from the dead after Annabel's birth.
"Get out," Emma rasped. The words paralyzed the sorceress. "Get out!"
Regina jumped and gathered her clothes quickly, bumping into Belle at the door when she looked back at her broken lover once more. "I broke the potion curse," she explained, and even in the darkness the blood draining from Belle's face registered.
"I felt it. Are you whole?" Belle asked, her eyes on The Savior hugging her knees and rocking in a crazed display of pain. Regina shook her head and pushed past Belle. Her pure love for Emma broke the curse, but Emma couldn't fully love her in return without her memories apparently, if True Love even held the capabilities to merge her split mind.
Belle ignored her sister witch and rounded the bed quickly, snagging the comforter as she went. Emma never resisted her presence when she covered her or fell to her knees and touched her shoulders. Emma leaned against the wall, and Belle gasped at what she reveal.
"My magic is gone," she explained the bloody claw marks upon her chest with dead eyes. Her magic originated in unselfish desires, love, the essence of The Savior. "Get it out me," she whispered. Belle shook her head. Emma slammed the sides of her fists on her shoulders. "Belle, get it out of me!"
Belle used her new strength to trap Emma's arms between their chests. "Get it out!" Emma jerked and struggled. Belle held tightly, closing her eyes against the tears already falling onto her cheeks. "Belle, please. Get it out of me! Belle, please." She collapsed against the librarian's chest in a fit of unspeakable grief that alternated between wet, hollow wails of anguish to quiet pleading to remove her heart. Belle held her tight and rocked her as she might have Alex after falling and scraping her knee.
Belle thought it might have stopped at some point, but several times she found herself torn from the cusp of sleep by a renewed howl from Emma's throat. Her back throbbed, and her arms shook with the effort of holding onto the destroyed woman using her as an anchor to reality. She eventually ended up against the wall with Emma's torso in her lap, facing her, clinging to her, unable to feel the quiver in her muscles from the insurmountable grief in her heart. Blood from her chest dried on one of Ruby's old shirts. Belle ignored it and kept the woman close until the dim, grey light of day slowly filled the room.
Still, Emma cried quietly, soaking her chest and shoulder with the tears of The Savior. Who saved the one who had saved them all? Who saved the one with the strength to give her heart to The Evil Queen in order to change her own? Ruby's presence was a welcome comfort as her dirt-covered hand pushed the door open slowly where it had stood cracked all night, thankfully not waking Alex or Annabel.
"Emma recovered her memories," she said simply, her own throat tight and constricted with the amount of tears she'd shed that night. She'd almost taken Emma's heart a few times, almost given in to her desperate pleas.
Without comment, Ruby scooped Emma into her arms and carried her to the bed. Emma switched bodies easily, not actually caring who held her. The wolf slipped into the bed, kicking off her shoes but nothing else. Dirt and grime and sweat from her run mattered very little in that moment. Emma burrowed into her chest, practically lying on top of her in the need to be close to something warm and living. Belle opened her mouth to speak, closed it, met her lover's eyes, and then left the room with a hand over her mouth to stifle her own sobs that threatened to break loose.
"No one wants me, Ruby," she cried, tears falling anew. "Everyone loves me, but no one wants me. My parents. Regina. I'm not enough for my kids. They want everyone but me, to talk, to walk them to school, to make them dinner. They want their new babies and Regina and Amelia and you and Belle, but they don't want me."
"Shh, Emma, this is grief talking. You know that's not true," she whispered lovingly. "I want you." Emma raised her head without warning and kissed her with a crazed desperation. Ruby touched her cheeks, allowing it to linger for a moment before easing Emma away from her mouth and guiding her head back to her chest. "Not like that, babe," she murmured as she cocooned Emma in her arms. Emma cried again, hiding her face in Ruby's shirt where she stayed until she fell asleep from exhaustion… because why not?
Nothing mattered anymore.
