Ella and Thomas are still talking, alone in the library. Snow and David have walked away, there is no reason for them to witness the rest of the reunion, clearly Ella has forgiven Thomas for keeping secrets, and she no longer needs support.

Snow leans against the ledge of the reader water fountain, a lovely stone sculpture where the water is springing forth from the pages of a book, while a mermaid is reading it, with a look of concentration in her eyes; situated in the middle of a small private garden, in Belle's courtyard.

"That went well," Snow turns to David, her voice filled with relief. "I was so worried...-"

David pulls her into a bonecrushing hug, interrupting her, holding her so tight, she is hardly breathing.

"What was that for?" she asks quietly, once he's pulled back long enough for her to catch her breath.

"It's just, watching them be so lost...- I was thinking...-" David struggles to find the right words. "Six months ago, I lost a bet with Tink, and had to go on a blind date with a water nymph. I met her for dinner and she was lovely, funny and smart..." he continues and Snow finds herself not quite certain she wants to hear the rest of this particular story. "There was no reason why I shouldn't find myself at least a little interested in her," David continues "but there was nothing there. No spark. Like my heart had begun turning into stone... I didn't feel anything... And that's was when I realized that unless by some incredible stroke of luck, I managed to figure out my missing memories, and who it was that I lost, I was sentenced to spending the rest of my life alone. It was a sobering thought," he continues. "A memory spell is an incredibly cruel punishment..."

"Well, you are not alone," Snow says softly, lacing her fingers with his, stepping on her toes so she can kiss his cheek. "Not anymore..." and her voice sounds so much like a song. David turns to face her to find her eyes welling up. "Why, you have a wife, a daughter, a dog and a turtle to keep you company," she smirks, wiping her eyes quickly with the back of her hand.

"I do," he laughs, placing his arm around her shoulders, " though I'm not sure the turtle actually likes me..."

"I think he'd rather roam the back yard alone, free, than being with us day in and day out, but there is very little chance of Emma ever letting that happen," Snow laughs. "But the rest of us really like you," she adds playfully.

"I don't know if that's enough," David looks so serious, Snow raises her eyes in surprise. "I really need to befriend that turtle!"

Snow dips her hand in the water and flicks water right in his face. David cups his hands in the water and splashes water on her.

Snow gasps in surprise. "Hey!" she exclaims, shaking her head. "I know I already fell into the moat twice today, so I'm already drenched, but still, this is incredibly unprofessional behavior on your part, Sir Nolan!"

"You are not going to fire me, are you?" a mock look of dread in her eyes.

"Thinking about it," she frowns. "Though we are partners. It wouldn't be me firing you. It'd be me resolving our partnership... and do you know how much work it is, repainting our 'White and Nolan' sign, and getting new business cards? Besides, you are kind if cute..."

David laughs and pulls her closer. "Why, thank you Ma'am, I am incredibly grateful. I wouldn't want you to have to change business cards... Wait, wait! Kind of cute?"

The sound of approaching footsteps forces Snow and David to try their best to look like they are serious. Belle is walking up to them, and there is a wistful look in her eyes.

"Snow...-" she hesitates. "I... I feel like there are some things you should know..."

"Do you have information about the case?" Snow is all business, despite the wet clothes, and the small piece of algae stuck on her shirt.

"It's not actual information, just a general direction... some historical context..."

It feels like Belle might be trying to hide behind big words.

"Well, at the moment, the only thing that I have, the only thing I can do, is knock on the Dark One's door and beg, which we all know is a terrible risk, so anything, anything you can tell me..." Snow is practically pleading.

"He is not..." he is not all bad, is what Belle would like to say, but she is finding it increasingly difficult to make that statement under the circumstances. "He lost a child," she blurts out, then she closes her eyes.

"Rumpelstiltskin?" David frowns. "He has a child?"

Belle nods. "He did, another life time ago..." she explains. "If he's alive he'd be an adult now." She pauses briefly her eyes focusing on David's hand on Snow's shoulder. The moment Snow said knocking on the Dark One's door would be an incredible risk David placed his hand on her shoulder, and it's the fact that it's second nature, how they support and protect each other without it being a conscious effort, is making Belle wish for things that can never be.

"Anyway," she continues, trying to gather her thoughts. "Years ago, Rumple lost a child, under strange circumstances. He wouldn't admit it, but I think he drove his son away, to another realm... in a way that could not be reversed. And ever since that time, he has found numerous ways to challenge people, to test the love Enchanted Forest folk have for their children. Challenge family bonds. Under what circumstances would someone be willing to give up a child..."

"But Ella was tricked!" Snow argues. "She didn't chose anything!"

Belle looks at David. "He admitted to me being involved in placing you on the path for the Southern Kingdom crown. I didn't understand what he meant at the time, I didn't know about your twin brother and the adoption. But it's all making sense now. Your parents might have thought they were giving your brother a better life," she continues. "But Thomas... what he did... when he offered himself instead of the child... I have to think that his sacrifice counted somehow..."

"How?" David asks.

"The child can't be far away," Belle says quietly. "She must be around. And... I don't know, it's too cruel to even fathom, but maybe... maybe in all their grief and through the memory spell, they missed the signs..."

"Could you find out?" Snow asks. "Could you find out for us?"

"You are overestimating my influence," Belle looks away. And when neither David nor Snow say another word, still looking at Belle for assistance, Belle finally nods. "I can certainly try. Though I doubt it will do any good..."

Ella decides that it is time to go back to her castle. And after Belle's startling information Snow wants to be there, to look at the children that live in the homes around the castle, to see if she can find a resemblance, a connection, a thread. She knows she is grasping at straws, but that is all she has.

But, getting the triplets, and several servants and four carriages ready to travel back home is an incredibly complicated affair. And David is ready to do more, to dig deeper. Waiting for Ella and Thomas to get ready is incredibly frustrating.

"Why don't I go check on the nanny, find out how she is doing" David suggests. "You can call me when they are ready to go?"

Snow nods absentmindedly. The triplets are engaged in a complicated game of tag, that involves running and rolling around and using Bert, the chimera as a shield. Snow looks at their faces, happy, excited, giggling, and she thinks of how much Alexandra missed, growing away from this very noisy, very loving family.

Snow walks closer to the triplets, and sits on the ground so she can be at their eye level. Robbie and Celia continue their game, undisturbed by her presence. They are used to nanny and several servants being present while they play. Cedric stops, though, offers a small, very official bow and says "Hello!"

"Hi!" Snow smiles brightly. "I have some very important questions to ask you..."

"Are you a friend of mother's?" Cedric frowns.

"Yes, yes, I am. My name is Snow White. And I'm wondering if you could help me..."

Cedric looks very serious. "What can I do for you?"

And Snow has to resist the urge to kiss Cedric's adorable rosy cheeks, and maybe even give him a hug. "I'm wondering if you could tell me who your best friends are at the castle..."

David walks out of the magic bean portal right to the small medical facility where Noreen is kept. David walks into the reception, he asks for Noreen's room number and he is stunned to see Teal walk out of the nanny's room.

"Teal!" he exclaims, crossing his hands, looking both angry and incredibly suspicious.

Teal is looking like she'd like to shrink into the smallest fairy size possible, or puff into the void instantly.

"David? What are you doing here?" she asks, her voice incredibly small. The last time David talked to Teal he accused her of lying to him about his memory curse, and Teal admitted everything, there was no point in keeping secrets from him anymore. And David doesn't know that, but after their encounter, Teal went straight to the Hospital administrator's office and asked for reassignment, hoping to be placed somewhere far away, to put that part of her life behind her. That is how she ended up working here, in the Western kingdom in the small medical facility. Yet here she is; and David, the man she was forced to deceive, because of the oath of royalty her family had sworn to King George, is standing there, staring at her.

"Are you Noreen's healing fairy? Why am I not surprised?"

"How do you know Noreen?"

"How is she?" he asks because Teal is the last person he is going to trust with information about ongoing cases.

"I can't really tell you that," Teal frowns. "Unless you are somehow related, and still..."

David just glares. Really, he wants to say. Now, you are going to observe the rules?

Teal shakes her head looking away. "She is not well. She is stable, but she is in a coma, and I can't figure out what caused it, whether it's a sleeping curse, or a potion... I don't know...-"

And when he keeps on glaring at her, she drops her eyes to the ground.

"I am telling you the truth," she whispers.

David sighs, glancing at the woman who is laying perfectly still in the room, barely breathing. The sound of the heart monitors are making him feel ill.

"Why? David? Do you have any information on who caused this?" Teal asks. But David isn't going to tell her anything. He turns around and walks out without saying another word.

David is back in Belle's castle talking to Tink in his magic mirror. "The nanny is in a coma, Teal claims to not know what is wrong with her...Looks like we are going to be back in their castle in about an hour," he explains. "Are you joining us?"

"She is on her way," he says turning to Snow.

"Good," Snow replies. She is going through her notes, in the magic mirror. "So if Belle is right, and the girl leaves somewhere near in the castle we are looking for a child about Emma's age, that looks like Thomas and Ella?" She sounds incredibly unsure. "How would the Dark One convince someone to raise the royal child right next to her real parents, how would they not notice... David, that doesn't make any sense... "

"It's the Dark One, playing chess with us, mere mortals. Does it have to make sense?" David asks.

"What if whoever is raising her doesn't know who she is... what if they think she is their child..." Snow is looking doubtful. "If she thinks the people raising her are her real parents and then she finds out the truth, this could be so traumatic for her..." she closes her eyes. "David this could be a disaster..."

"No, not if we do this right. We can ask Tink to run a fairy DNA test, before we accuse anyone of anything, before we ever bring up our suspicions..."

"Right," Snow nods, "right..."

"Snow! This is already a horrible situation. We are just trying to figure what's going on. Ella is hurt, Thomas is hurt... this is going to be difficult. No matter how careful we are, this is going to be hard..."

Snow still nods. "If someone walked up to me and told me that I'd been tricked, and Emma didn't actually belong to me...-" she says and her eyes are welling up. She can't even continue with that thought.

"Yes," he replies, squeezing her hand. "Absolutely. But if someone had taken Emma away from you, right after she was born, wouldn't you want her found? Wouldn't you want to know where she was? Wouldn't you want her back?"

Snow's raises her eyes to look at him, all worried, because that is exactly what happened to him. And she really didn't mean to bring up all their pain in the midst of this mess. There are too many parallels to this story.

"Forgive me," she mumbles. "I wasn't thinking...-"

"No," he shakes his head in a hurry. "You are right. This is incredibly complicated and we need to handle it as carefully."

And then Tink appears right next to them, making them both jump. "Hello," she smiles brightly.

It would be a lot faster, getting back to Ella's palace using a magic bean, but there are age restrictions to magic bean travel and the triplets are certainly not old enough. Tink could do the job too, faster, but her teleportations are brutal. Snow wouldn't suggest she do that unless it was a life threatening emergency. That is why the all board four royal carriages, and that's why Snow is leaning against the window, staring at the forest trees passing her by. David is sitting next to her, listening patiently to Tink list the advantages of magical travel. A cook and a maid are in the same carriage as them but the maid seems nauseous and unwilling to participate in the conversation. The cook has fallen asleep and is snoring loudly.

It is nearly dark when they finally arrive in Ella's palace. Ella steps out of the carriage, holding a sleeping Robbie in her arms, Thomas is carrying Cedric and Celia, both of them asleep, laying their heads on his shoulders. Groomsmen and servants are offering help, but he waves them away. After fearing he was going to lose his family, Thomas is unwilling to share the burden. He points to Ella instead. "Please, assist the princess," he says and they all rush to take the Robbie from her arms.

"It's good to be home," Ella says and Thomas, turns to smile at her, when a whirlwind of hair and hugs crushes into her. A girl, with blond unruly locks, wearing her pajamas, her feet bare, hugs Ella tight.

"You didn't say goodbye," she says, pulling back to look at the princess' face then she hugs her closer again.

"I'm so sorry Lia," Ella hugs her back. "You are right. I don't know what I was thinking. I'll never do that again..."

Lia. This must be Rowan's daughter, Snow realizes. Even if she didn't know Rowan's daughter's name, she'd still realize who she was. Despite her light coloring, she looks so much like her father.

Lia says "Promise?" And that's when Rowan comes running. He looks so much larger than all the other officials. And since he is not in uniform, clearly not in duty, both him and his daughter look so out of place, so underdressed, compared to Ella's perfect little crew.

"Please forgive us, your royal highness," he bows, then he reaches for the girls hand. "Lia! The princess is probably exhausted form her journey, the babies are asleep. How about we say goodnight and we can see them tomorrow?"

Lia doesn't look willing to agree, but Snow barely notices. All she sees is the dark amulet, hanging on the girl's neck.

Her heart beats faster, her eyes open wide. Why is the little girl wearing the dark amulet? She sees Tink moving, from the corner of her eye, and she is not fast enough to stop her.

"No!" Snow cries out, but it's too late, because Tink has already materialized in front of the child and with a flick of her wrist, she's pulled the dark amulet off.

"Trust me, you don't want to be wearing that!" she says before the child gets a chance to react.

And then the strangest thing happens. It's not like the child's appearance changes, not quite. The girl still looks the same. If Snow was to describe her, she'd still say a beautiful blond blue eyed girl with hair that could use a good brushing. She is still the same. But she is not. All of a sudden the child doesn't look like Rowan anymore, she looks like a miniature Ella with Thomas' dimples on her cheeks.

And everyone gasps. The similarity is so obvious, it's impossible to miss.

Ella is breathing fast, she takes a step backwards, her eyes locked on the child's face, tearing up, covering her mouth with her hand. "Um... Alexandra?" her voice cracks.

Lia smiles back. She has no idea what's happening, but she is quite glad to have the princess' undivided attention.

Thomas just walks closer, looking at his daughter. And if his hands weren't full and he wasn't worried he'd hurt the children he would have dropped on his knees. Because there she is, his Alexandra, standing in front of him, and he doesn't understand what this means. He turns to the two servants next to him, he hands them Celia and Cedric; Celia opens her eyes long enough to protest but then she is fast asleep.

Thomas touches Lia's cheek, long enough to make sure she is real.

And then Rowan cries out "Who are you? What did you do to her?" staring at Tink. "What is going on?"

And Thomas snaps out of his revelry and openly glares at Rowan, his hand already on his dagger.

"Wait, we need to think this through," David tries to protest, because he can clearly see what is coming next. He turns to look at Snow, he is surprised she hasn't intervened yet. Snow is looking pale, she is not feeling well.

"Would you like to go to the house with the princess?" Thomas asks Lia softly. And Lia who hasn't quite understood what is taking place, she just nods and smiles brightly. A sleepover with the triplets at Ella's palace? Why, there is nothing she would love more!

"Take her inside," Thomas nods to Ella encouragingly.

"Wait, why, your highness, what's going on?" Rowan asks.

And as soon as Ella and the children are out of sight Thomas turns to his guards. "Arrest this man! Lock him up until I decide what's to be done with him!" he points to Rowan, who is completely lost.

"On what grounds?" the captain if the guard asks.

"What did I do?" Rowan yells, unaware of how his siren voice carries. "What's happening?"

The guards are on him instantly. And he is so tall and muscular compared to the royal guards, holding on to his arms, he looks like he could easily flick them off, or knock them out just by bumping their sculls together But he doesn't. He turns to Snow instead, eyes big, filled with horror. "Help me, Snow White!" he cries out. "What did I do? I didn't do anything wrong!"

And Snow wants to tell him that they will sort this all out, he just needs to be patient. She will talk to Thomas, everything will be okay, but she she is having a hard time forming sentences. Her whole body is shaking. Because it is a quarter to nine, and Rowan's song is already filling her mind.

"Help," she whispers to David, because every ounce of her body wants to beg Rowan for a song. "It's starting again!"

David looks at Snow worried, he can't believe it's already time and they are in Ella's castle, not safe at their home. He should have used the magic bean and taken her home an hour ago. He can' t believe he let himself get so distracted with this case. He needs to take Snow away now. He turns to Tink to ask for help.

And then he freezes. Because Lia, after listening to Rowan cry out in distress, has run back out again, just in time, to see him pulled away by three guards.

"Daddy!" Lia screams.

Both Rowan and Thomas turn to face her. Both of them responding to her call.

"Daddy, what' s going on!" Lia screams again, her eyes firmly fixed on Rowan.

And Thomas feels like someone has taken a stuck a knife to his chest and is now slowly twisting it.

"It's okay baby, I think there must be a mistake, let me sort this out" Rowan tries his best to sound reassuring. "Won't you go back inside, you will be safe with the princess..."

Thank you for reading, thank you for reviewing...

Alexa chapter 30 Awe! Thomas's reunion with his family was so sad and sweet at the same time! I having a feeling Belle might be helpful at reuniting them with their missing child.
Hope Snow & David are able to help the nanny recover from the siren song. Going to assume The Dark One gave Rowan's mother that amulet.

Yes, yes, and yes...:)

Jennifer Baratta chapter 30 Outstanding chapter and your welcome

:)

Bwayrox chapter 30 Life as a parent is full of unfortunate interruptions isn't it? ️
I'm so glad that Ella knows the truth know, and that she's not angry with Thomas. Their triplets were cute!

Yes! At this point, we are shocked when we do not get interrupted...

Bella1296 chapter 30 Great chapter!

:) Thank you!

Guest chapter 30 What a great follow up chapter to the chaoticness of the last one. I'm glad that David didn't take any of the words Snow said to heart and that everything is okay between the two. And if Tink was worried about it then things could have gone so much worse. The new info about Rowan's parents was interesting. Belles Castle is something out of the ordinary isn't it. Bert the head of security chimera with the head of a llama who has a dragon's body, covered up in white shimmering flair is amazing. I loved the twins appearance. And finally Thomas has come clean and we at last know the full story of Alexandra's disappearance. How do you solve an unsolvable case? How do they get Alexandra back? I'm happy that Thomas and Ella reunited and that they can work on their marriage again. Also what is happening to Noreen? I'm very curious to see what's gonna happen next?

Thank you!:)