"What do you think, honey?" Nadri was spun around on the chair, struggling to contain her excitable grin, flashing her bright pearly whites to the hairdresser that stood in the mirror that unveiled her new style. Nadri leaned forward slightly, stunned that it was her that was looking back in the reflection. Nadri had been long overdue for her hair to be cut and she had come across Rapunzel's, a salon that had opened up the week prior. Nadri didn't move an inch, she was frozen to the seat when the woman unknown to her held scissors close to her neck as she went through cutting and thinning out the obnoxious curls.
"What did you do to it?" Nadri brought a hand up, her fingers brushing through her hair cautiously and didn't feel a single hair out of place. Her hair had been cut to the bottom of her shoulder blades and tamed enough that they were now very loose waves instead of ringlets. It completely changed her face, framing it like a royal painting. She was almost scared to continue touching it, it was like magic had been worked on her hair and Nadri was expecting it to suddenly undo in front of her.
"Magic, hon." The hairdresser giggled, her Boston accent thick. "Do you like it? It looks hot. And it'll last a few days before your curls come back."
"I think I agree." A bashful smile emerged from her face. "It is lu." Nadri thanked her as much as she could as the hairdresser took the cape off her and let her stand up from the chair.
In the last four weeks, Nadri had been slowly introduced to working at a receptionist at the town hall as a favour from Regina. It was the first time that Nadri had seen her own, earned currency in this realm instead of jewels and gold that had been accumulated through fallen travellers.
This was the first treat she made to herself.
Nadri paid for her haircut, still obsessively running her hand through her smooth, silky black hair as she left the hairdressers. She stepped out onto the path, narrowly missing Grumpy as he stormed past. Nadri rolled her eyes before pulling her phone from the fitting, deep purple jacket that she had wrapped around her. It was something that Nadri was slowly picking up, David had gone out of his way to make sure that Nadri had a way of contacting everyone of importance. At first she was completely stumped, it took a week of playing around with the device and she picked it up faster than Killian had, and he had owned his for almost a year.
She opened it and found Killian's contact in her phone, trying to write him a text message. It was hard getting used to a language that she had no experience typing in, it was something that she was becoming more fluent with now she had a job at the mayor's office.
'Finished. Meet for –ice cream emoji-?'
She sent it off and already began to walk in the direction of her favourite ice cream parlour. Instead of a text back, Nadri received the ringing chime of her IPhone. She swiped it open and could hear Killian on the other end of the phone and the wind rushing against his ear.
"You couldn't call like a normal person, love."
"I'm the furthest thing from normal, Ruveyzun." Nadri teased over the phone, looking around the street and she saw Archie walking Pongo, waving to her with a chipper grin. Nadri gave him a wave and smile back, continuing on her way. "Are you meeting me then?"
"I'm already on my way. I'll race you." She giggled against the phone.
"I'm not racing you! I have the biggest craving for honeycomb ice cream with that dribble-"
"-Drizzle-"
"-Stuff on top. Do you think they do the big tubs of it? I think I could eat a big tub of it." Nadri trailed off to herself, hearing her partner tittering down the phone.
"I'm already here, I can't wait to see you."
"I saw you two hours ago."
"I still like seeing your beautiful face, love."
Nadri beamed down the phone before saying her goodbyes, seeing that the turning on the road was coming up and the parlour was only on the corner.
She continued walking on, content that she would see Killian and cheerful that she was going to satisfy this craving that she had been experiencing for the last few days. Killian was sure that Nadri would end up spending her wages on the entire ice cream shop at this rate.
Nadri was met with the pirate who was relaxing against the brick wall of the building, tapping his invisible watch to Nadri with a dopey smile and she rolled her eyes. Killian brought her in for a half hug and a quick on her lips before he took a moment to take her in, stunned by the massive change to her hair. He had only ever seen her with the deep curls within her hair and was shocked by how straight it was compared to what it used to be.
"Do you like it?" Nadri questioned him shyly, still playing with her hair.
"I love it. It brings out your eyes, love." Killian admired, bringing his hand up to caress her face but Nadri flinched away at the freezing touch.
"You're ice!"
"Well I've been waiting for you." Killian heartily laughed, wrapping his arm around the back of her neck so they could make their way inside. Nadri reached forward for the door and felt a strange sensation juddering through the metal. The woman looked back to Killian, worried, and then down at the ground where that was too quaking. "What the bloody hell?"
"Killy. Look." Nadri caught the cloudy skies. The sight above them drew the couple in straight away. It was a flying hot air balloon, what Nadri could describe as looking like a dirigible from the Land of Untold Stories crashing through the air in the direction of the cemetery, weaving around through its skyward path. Nadri pointed towards the direction of the forest where the ship was heading, Killian on the same wave length as Nadri and took her hand tightly, both of them heading in the direction of the dirigible with a quick step.
They traced it down through the forest and out onto the cemetery road where they didn't seem to be the first ones to find it either. They were met with many of the town's residents, including newcomer Henry Jekyll, ogling the ship as it flew through the sky, David, Emma, Snow and Regina at the front lines to see what was actually going on and what had caused the sudden adventure.
"It's a dirigible... from The Land of Untold Stories." Jekyll's eyes were glued to the ship as it flew over, completely baffled as to why it was even present in Storybrooke.
"What's it doing in our town?" Snow interrogated, suited with her bow and arrow strapped across her back.
"I believe you mean my town."
Nadri immediately recognised the skin crawling tone that she had heard before. She turned towards the forest behind her where the figure had emerged from and saw the sickly pale monster that stood proudly as he watched the dirigible crash through the air.
"It's nice to see that this beautiful creature is still here." Nadri's nose flared as her crystal eyes met with his black, bloodshot beady ones. He was admiring her in his perverse gaze.
"Do I need to cut the eyes from your head, riil?" Nadri spat towards Hyde.
How was it even possible he was here? The last time she had seen him Nimue was prepared to lay down her life for Nadri and her friends to get to safety. She only hoped that Nimue had escaped but her hopes for that weren't very high.
"This isn't your town. Not even close."
"Oh, tell that to the Dark One. He gave it to me." Hyde turned to the group of Storybrooke residents with a cold and calm demeanour, almost too normal for this situation. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I must prepare for my friends' arrival." Nadri's instinct was Nimue. What if Nimue had been captured when she had left her behind? What if she was forced to come here with Hyde?
Emma and Regina instinct was to put their forces together straight away, ready to take down Hyde as they watched the dirigible crash down into the forest. Nadri slipped between the crowd, Killian following closely behind her as well as David and they escaped from the crowd to follow where it had landed.
Nadri sped off with the crunching leaves of the forest being trod on by her knee high boots, almost losing her footing with the chunky heel. The turning months had come quickly, the last few weeks had begun to see the summer out and Last Seed had arrived. Nadri was already struggling with the weather turning colder, underneath her long coat she had a thick, knitted grey turtle-neck dress on and thermal leggings.
"Nadri, slow down! We don't even know if these people are on our side!" David called to her as she continued up front, holding his sword tightly in his hand ready to defend himself if he needed to.
"Nimue could be on that contraption!" Nadri shouted back over her shoulder, Killian trying his hardest to keep up with her but she was giving him a run for his money, no pun intended. She was in between the tall trunks of the trees, looking around through the bushes as they continued on and began to found stray bits and pieces of the dirigible laying around on the forest floor.
She slowed herself down, coming to a halt when she saw more lumps of metal and other mechanical pieces that belonged to the ship.
"Nimue!" Nadri yelled out into the forest, birds leaving the trees from the sudden noise of her voice. "Vesryn!" She called out the name of Nimue's most trusted servant, hoping to hear some sort of answer from the forest. "Please, Gods, bless this day." Nadri whispered hopefully as she looked around at the intimidating trees.
They finally came to the wreckage of the ship and there wasn't a single soul in sight. There wasn't a single trace of anyone in the ship. Nadri kicked at the ship that was laying against crushed, splintered trees out of frustration. She just wanted that tiny shred of hope to come true, she hoped that if Nimue did come into this realm then she would have escaped somewhere safely and not back into the hands of Hyde.
"Where the hell is everyone?" David finally caught up with Nadri, Killian just in front of him. "Did you find her?"
"They're all gone. There's no one." Nadri answered, baffled.
"They're somewhere out in the forest." David suspected, looking around for any travellers that may have been hiding close by.
"There's a lot." Nadri pointed down to the ground. She wasn't an expert on tracking, that was more of Snow's expertise, but she could see the amount of shoe prints that were dug into the mud out of sheer fear to escape. "What does Hyde want with them? These zuruniik?"
"Depending on who he brought with him, these stories playing out could create chaos."
"Well, that's helpful, mate."
"We need to get Jekyll, maybe he can give us some answers. He did share a mind with Hyde once." Nadri crouched down, looking along the sides of the ship and saw something winking at her beneath a broken open suitcase, sheets and clothes littered surrounding it. She reached down, pulling out the shiny object that caught her dragon eyes and she held it up, eyeing it closely.
'Pale grey eyes set handsomely on a thin, charming face. Elf ears poked through her hair and a glistening tiara sat gracefully on her head.'
It was Nimue's tiara, a piece was broken off the end and had smashed the small diamonds that had once sat securely inside of it.
Nadri could swear she feel a strong, thrumming coming from the silver material.
"The Hweal is here." Nadri brought the broken piece of tiara up to Killian and David's eyesight.
"How do you know it's hers, love?"
"The diamonds are from my mountain. At least before it had become my mountain." Nadri answered their queries, pocketing the tiara in her coat pocket securely. "She'd be destroyed if she couldn't fix it. It's the only thing left of her family."
"We'll find her, Nadri. Don't worry. We'll get the others and try to organise a search for everyone." David explained, resting a hand on her shoulder when he could see the worry wash through her face. "We're the heroes remember?"
"You may be, naaggein. Nimue is a powerful being just as I was. I need to be a part of this." Nadri was determined and both men could see the look in her eyes. Nimue was the last thing that was connected to her homeland and to everything that she was, even if their friendship was a very unusual and awkward one, she still considered Nimue a fellow shield to the cause.
"Alright." David put his hands on his hips, nodding. "But we come with you. I need to call Snow and tell her what's going on. I like your hair by the way." The prince informed them and stepped away from the couple, pulling the phone out of his jean pocket and beginning to dial Snow's number. Nadri gave him a soft smile, brushing a wavy strand away from her cheek.
"Do I look like I need a royal guard?" Nadri arched her eyebrow and Killian put his hands on her shoulders, his touch making her ease up straight away.
"We're helping you, love." Killian informed her firmly, rubbing her shoulders. "You're not going to find her alone."
"I'm sorry…I just worry for Nimue, raaviir. She's a part of home." Nadri snuggled into his embrace, Killian wrapping his arms around her tightly, able to smell the powerful scent of blueberries that had been lathered into her hair while she was at the hairdressers. "We're going to have to saraan for ice cream, aren't we?" Killian chuckled into her shoulder as he heard her disappointed whine.
"I'll grab you a big tub later. You keep going the way you're going darling I'll just have to let you live there." Killian smirked, pulling away from her but not before giving her a long, content kiss. "C'mon, love. We've got some searching to do."
It had grown dark in the forest throughout the heavy searching that the group had been doing whilst Hyde had been captured by Regina and Emma, combining their powers together for him to now by sitting in the station restrained in enchanted cuffs. Killian and Nadri had been walking along the forest together with torches while Snow and David worked together to cover the other side of the forest.
Nadri was determined. She knew this forest like the back of her hand now, she had been hundreds of years in the Underworld hiding in different places when she had escaped Hades the first time, the forest was somewhere that she would often run to when she needed to meet Hercules for advice. The shipwreck survivors were here somewhere, she knew it. She knew their leader would be here too.
Nadri knew their fear, to escape a fate to be thrown into a worse one. They got their second chance, just like she did, now she just needed to convince them that they weren't the enemy like Hyde was.
"Nadri, look." Killian caught her arm swiftly, Nadri stopped to glance at Killian before snapping back into the forest and saw shadows shifting around the bushes and low light of orange emerging on several branches being used as torches. Killian rested a hand on the hilt of his sword, something that David had brought back to the wreckage for when their search had begun, in case one decided to step forward threateningly. "I don't like this."
"It's okay." Nadri raised her hand to Killian, shaking her head as she indicated towards the weapon that he was ready to unsheathe. "Hyde has been captured. He is no longer a rut…a threat… to you. We want to help you." Nadri called out to the survivors that were hidden around them, Nadri's eyes flickering around in the darkness with an impending sense of terror. "My name is Nadri Coin. You can trust me."
Nadri's new name felt strange saying aloud to others, now that it had been written on her identification it was something that she had to implement every day.
"Nadri?"
A voice came from the background of the crowd. Nadri recognised its royal elegance and she moved closer, despite Killian's hand reaching for her forearm, her eyes latched onto stark-white hair that appeared underneath the twinkling moonlight that had come through the crowd.
"By the Gods, omthel soul." Nimue greeted Nadri, gasping with shock when she saw the woman. "It is okay quessir, Nadri is a friend." Nimue said to the others before coming forward, picking up the front of her dress as she picked up her pace and wrapped her arms around the shorter woman with gratefulness. She was thankful to the Gods that they had both been brought together.
"I'm glad you're okay, Hweal." Nadri pulled away from the royal elf. Killian stood beside his partner, his eyes glancing between her and Nimue awkwardly, just on the outside watching the conversation unfold. "Is this-"
"The remainder of our realm? Yes." Nadri observed the crowd behind Nimue as they came closer, curiosity peaking them as their leader spoke to the sudden strangers. She could see other elves, Nadri identifying several guards and others were mere village folk that had followed Nimue out of the Asari lands. "We separated from the oou as quickly as we could, Hyde captured us." Her strong structural expression quickly turned into a mournful one, digesting her words with sadness. "Not all of us made it. I have to make sure Vesryn is buried with the rest of our people."
Nadri rested a hand on Nimue's shoulder, squeezing it comfortingly.
"We can arrange that, Hweal." Nadri picked up on Killian's uncomfortable demeanour as he continued to stand there like a statue letting the grass grow over him. She gave him an apologetic smile and gestured in Killian's direction and her other hand clasping on his hook. "This is Ruveyzun Killian Jones. He is a raaviir from the Enchanted Forest." Nadri introduced them and immediately Nimue handed Killian a disapproving look.
"Pirate, hm? An oou?" Nimue tasted the words on her tongue, knowing full well that most pirates from their realm were often mortal men. It was very rare to see an elf or a dwarf accompany their presence. Killian recognised the word straight away, it was one that the male elf had said to him in disgust when they had met in the middle of the market. "Well, I wasn't expecting an oou to be at our rescue."
"I am standing right here." Killian bit back to Nimue's evaluation, knitting his eyebrows together.
"This is Hweal Nimue, she's-"
"-We've been out all night trying to find you, Nadri has been dragging me around the forest and you insult me." Nadri mentally face palmed, knowing Nimue well enough that he wouldn't be able to talk to her without receiving some kind of insult back.
Nimue's felt a strong hatred towards the humans and that didn't plan on changing.
Especially to those who cut her off midsentence.
Nimue's eyes went to Nadri instead and ghosted Killian's presence.
"Does this one wish his tongue be cut from his head?" Killian's eyes went to the size of saucers, gawping at the elf woman.
"Hweal-" Nadri started but was swiftly cut off, Nimue waving her fingers in the air before snake-like greys went back to burning through Killian.
"Don't be offended, young one. Oou don't offer anything valuable to this world apart from war." Nimue snorted, making Killian's mouth drop slightly a gap at the continuation of blatant racism towards him. "They are nothing but mortal creatures that take up valuable air for their superiors."
"Nimue." Nadri stopped her, her voice firm towards the elf. They weren't getting anywhere, just making insults towards one another when the whole point of being out in the middle of the deep forest, mist thickening and owls hooting in the trees was to bring survivors back to Storybrooke. "You need to bring everyone back to the town, you can't be out here all night. It's not safe, Hweal."
"Do you expect us to follow you, greet this oou like they are friends?" Nimue's tone turned to ice, agitated. "Our people have died. Vesryn…he was a young fahliil." Nadri could hear Nimue's heartbreak, placing her hands on the hips of her dress. It was the same one she had worn they first met, only now it was slick with wet mud from traipsing through the forest and torn in places where she must have tripped on it. "He did not deserve the fate gave to him by that monstrous oou. Did you think that would gain the trust among us when it concerns mortals?"
Nadri sighed, understanding the elf's distrust and weariness. She was once that person where she could not trust a single person she came across. She couldn't even trust herself sometimes of what Hades would make her do. Killian was someone she didn't expect to trust and here they were, they were bound together for life. It was fated for them. Nadri just had to gain Nimue's trust for the strangers in Storybrooke, just like she had to.
"Ruveyzun?" Nadri looked up at the pirate watching the exchange, briefly leaving Nimue's side and bringing Killian backwards so they could talk privately. "Go back to the others. I have some things to do here." She asked him sweetly, giving him a small smile. Killian's face turned, staring at her like he had been met with a slap in the face.
"There's no way I'm leaving you in the forest alone, love." Killian refused instantly and looked at her as if she was crazy. "What do you plan on achieving? They don't want to come with us, they can stay here for all I care." He dismissed nonchalantly, still feeling the insult Nimue's words. "I have heard a lot of things but that…that elf is a piece of work."
"I need to get Nimue on our side. I can't let my people-"
"Your people?" Killian repeated, bewildered with insult. "Nadri, you don't know these people. They are strangers."
"They followed me into battle, I led them with blazing fire and they followed. They trusted me then and they can trust me again, I just need to speak with the fahliil without-"
"Me?" Killian put his hands on his hips, waiting for an answer.
"Yes, raaviir." Killian scoffed, waving her off as he turned away from Nadri and gave her his back.
"Leave them here. They can fend for themselves." Killian continued treading through the leaves on the ground, heading out into the darkness with his torch leading the way. Nadri heavily sighed, running a hand over her face in frustration. She felt like she had been kicked in the gut from Killian's nasty words. The last thing she expected was for him to be so heated and didn't quite understand it.
It was the last thing she needed piled on top of her right now. She just needed to get the most important things out of the way first.