The exhilarating ride lasted only a short amount of time, but it gave Regina's day a sort of happy ending. The start of her visit to the village had been promising and even though she'd had to lend a hand to solve a problem she was sure Leopold wasn't even aware of, it had been a good day. Then there had been that cute, lovely couple. The couple had been too strong of a reminder of her past so she ran, but then there was Emma.

"Whoa," the blonde interrupted her thoughts as though she could hear them and knew they were venturing toward her as the main subject.

Regina slowed Rocinante to a stop outside of the palace's grand entrance and looked back at Emma. The other woman's mouth was as wide open as her eyes, which were fixated on the immaculate palace.

"This is where you live," Emma asked, her eyes still set on the high walls and ornate arches.

"Yes, and you haven't even seen the inside yet," Regina flatly and dejectedly said as she loosened her hold on the reins and looked back and forth between Emma and the ground just to the left of Rocinante's head while her steed snorted and looked for his next instruction. "Shall we?"

When Regina looked back at Emma that time she had the peasant girl's attention and the blonde looked unsure.

"You'll need to get off first unless you'd like to risk getting hit by my leg if I attempt to swing over."

"Oh, right," Emma nervously chuckled then struggled to find even a decent way to dismount with someone in front of her.

The blonde tried to shimmy further back in the saddle, but every time she placed her hands on either side of the saddle she accidentally grazed Regina's hips and butt. She fidgeted a little more and lowered her hands again but swiftly pulled back before she could touch the saddle.

Regina impatiently sighed and shot Emma a half-hearted glare.

"Any day now, Swan," Regina teased with a hint of a smirk.

Emma dramatically rolled her eyes and let out an indignant sigh.

"My apologies, Princess," Emma teased back with a darker, wider smirk of her own.

The mysterious blonde slid her hands under Regina's thighs, and partially her backside, for balance and then dismounted with a lot more dignity than she'd so far displayed in the time the two women had known each other.

Regina gasped, but refused to move while Emma removed herself from atop Rocinante. Regina remained still because if there was too much movement, Rocinante would get confused and start to move around, which would make it difficult for the brunette to dismount. Once Emma was on the ground, Regina looked at the blonde who then smugly smiled up at her.

Regina shook her head, her expression less than amused, and effortlessly swung herself off Rocinante. She ran her hands over her thighs and straightened out her pants, which rode up and creased during their travel. Rocinante turned his head and tried to nudge her arm, but Regina smiled and instinctively lifted her hand to his nose before he had to physically urge her to do anything. She affectionately stroked his nose and he dipped his head then stepped closer to her before he brushed his nose against her stomach. She giggled, something she hardly ever did, and scratched behind his ears.

"We'll only be a moment, Rocinante," Regina calmly, soothingly, told him as she grabbed the reins again and started to lead him toward the guards she spotted at the front of the palace.

As she and Emma approached with Rocinante, the guards bowed in her presence before they addressed her.

"Your Highness," the one on her left spoke first. "There are some matters to be tended to."

"With whom?"

"A few of the other royals in the King's circle. They are already inside and waiting for you. Shall I tell them you'll be a moment," he asked as he gave Regina a once over as soon as he noticed her attire and companion.

"Yes, please," Regina flashed him a friendly smile. "Thank you."

The guard excused himself and slipped inside the palace while the other guard who had yet to speak walked up and offered to take Rocinante's reins.

"Shall I place him back in the stables?"

"Yes, thank you," she nodded her confirmation. "Be gentle with him, please."

"Uh, I thought the guards weren't supposed to do housework," Emma finally spoke up as she looked from where one guard had gone to the other as he walked Rocinante behind the palace and to the stables.

"They don't. I've become a little more than acquainted with some of these men, however, and they don't mind lending a hand every now and then. I at least know their names unlike the King," Regina explained. "I think that's why they allow me to venture off when I shouldn't."

"And don't say much when you look like…" Emma trailed off as she looked over Regina's choice of attire at that moment, "that?"

Regina sniffed and primly turned on her heels before she headed into the palace.

"Precisely," she answered. "Come along. I have some things to handle, but you can wait in my chamber while I attend the meeting."

Emma walked a few steps behind Regina to begin with, but when she saw the intricacy of the inner halls of the palace she slowed down even more and took it all in. Her eyes widened with a childlike kind of wonder and she gazed up at the ceilings just as much as she drank in the sight of the sculptures that rested on the end tables and the paintings that adorned the walls. She didn't even know how to feel about the pristine floors that, even though they weren't transparent or made of glass, were extremely reflective in nature. She looked down at her faint, washed out—because the floor was marble, not a mirror—reflection for a moment as she kept up just enough with Regina so she didn't miss a turn the brunette made and got lost.

The size, as well as the taste of the décor, was all she could honestly think about then. Everything was so classy and rich and definitely not a place she'd ever find herself in. Unless she decided to rob the place like an infamous thief she knew of who traveled throughout the land to steal from the rich and give to the poor, to people like her.

After what felt like another stroll through the woods due to their leisurely pace, Regina finally opened a door to a beautifully lavished chamber and motioned for her to enter first. Emma clenched and unclenched her fists at her side and flashed a nervous smile, though she'd attempted to make it look as warm, friendly and non-threatening as possible. She hoped it, at the very least, didn't make her look like the last creep a person would ever want to stumble upon in the forest and invite into their home. She walked into the room and stared at everything around her twice as long as she had inspected all she could of what else she'd seen in the palace.

"This is where you sleep," Emma stupidly asked as she spun around with her eyes focused on the canopy bed and the warm glow to the walls due to the sunset that streamed through the partially open curtains on the balcony doors. "Amazing."

"It's…fit for a princess, yes," Regina replied as she moved to the walk-in closet and cast her eyes on the floor as she wrung her hands in front of her.

Emma frowned at the behavior, but didn't draw attention to it. Instead, she looked around a little more and made her way to the vanity. She slid her index finger along the edges of the mirror's frame then spotted a journal and feather pen on the desk in front of her. She dropped her hand to feel the leather-bound cover for the journal and then the sturdy and finely made desk with designs skillfully carved into the sides.

"You're welcome to borrow sleepwear from me and there's a chaise lounge beside the bed that might not be as comfortable, but it's a lot better than the forest floor," Regina said from the closet between swishing noises of what sounded like fabric, though Emma couldn't see the brunette or what she was doing.

"Why would I need sleepwear or the chaise lounge," Emma asked as she slowly started to come back down from the cloud she'd been on while enjoying the view of how royalty lived.

"There is no way I'm letting a stranger I picked up in the forest out of my sight! You could steal jewels or the expensive decorations. The guards may be around, but there aren't many people here this weekend and I'm not a fool that will allow you to wander about whenever you want."

"What? I understand your concerns about us being strangers, but sleepwear? I don't plan on spending the night here. I want to leave as soon as possible."

"It is a two day journey to Brooke Village, Swan, and it's almost nightfall," Regina argued. "We should rest here then grab more supplies in the early morning before we leave."

"Have your meeting and get what you need for the trip, but we leave as soon as your business here is finished," Emma fought back with a stern expression to match her no-nonsense tone.

"What's the rush? If we leave as soon as my meeting is concluded, we'll be tired and it will be dark and the forest, as I've already told you, is not a friendly place once the sun goes down. Who knows what we might run into out there?"

"You have a sword. I'm sure there are more weapons where that one came from, so we'll prepare ourselves. But I don't want to waste any time getting to my little brother."

"If it means that much to you—"

"It does," Emma quickly confirmed, her words almost growled out with frustration.

Regina walked out of the closet slowly, her hair a little disheveled but cleaner—straighter—than it had been out in the forest, and the two of them locked eyes.

Emma's anger at Regina's attempts to slow them down vanished from her features as her widened eyes scanned over the princess from head to toe and back again.

"You…look…" Emma didn't finish her thought as she admired the light purple dress with a few small jewels embedded in the sheer sleeves, which were thinner than the rest of the dress and transparent enough to expose the curve of Regina's shoulder and her upper arm.

Regina's hair appeared to be combed through a little better than it had previously looked, though it still needed work if she wanted it to look like she hadn't spent any time in the forest that day. She still looked radiant, however, and made it almost impossible for Emma to utter another word in her presence. The tiny braids Regina had previously displayed around the crown of her head were undone and cascaded in loose curls, the color of the dress made her brunette hair and olive-toned complexion pop, and the cut of the dress was modest but revealed a hint of the curves the princess kept hidden beneath her outfits. The lilac heels that flawlessly matched the dress gave her calve muscles more definition and her lips were more pink than before, though they were a muted, pale pink color and didn't clash with the dress. She looked like a true lady and Emma suddenly realized her place in comparison.

The blonde thought no less of herself because of the obvious differences she then saw between them, but she understood with better clarity that Regina was royalty and she was not. She grew up in a different world than Regina even if both sections of land belonged to the same kingdom. Regina had the class that fit with that of the things that filled the palace they stood in while Emma had her wit and physical strength she sometimes had to use in desperate situations, ones that she was sure Regina knew nothing about considering her privileged life.

"If that was meant to be a compliment," Regina started to say with a small, somewhat timid smile, in response to Emma's earlier unspoken sentence. "Thank you."

"Yes. It was," Emma replied as her eyes slid up Regina's form and met the princess' gaze. "Uh…right. So about leaving tonight…"

"We'll gather what we need after my meeting and we'll leave right away," Regina agreed with a nod before she turned around and asked, "Would you mind tightening the dress a little more for me, please?"

Emma was then exposed to more of Regina's smooth, olive-toned skin when she noticed the back of the dress dipped down to reveal the woman's neck and shoulders as the material swept across the near middle of her back. Regina kept most of her skin covered in the still modest dress, but there was a moment when Emma questioned why she felt a strange, tingling sensation in response to the very little she had seen in that moment.

The blonde reached out and fumbled with the silky laces of the dress for a few seconds before she took a deep breath and collected herself. She untied the laces and gently pulled them back per Regina's request.

"A little more," Regina instructed.

Emma pulled back the laces further and stopped.

"Don't be dainty about it."

Emma shrugged and yanked the laces with some force. She watched Regina jump with the effort she'd made with the laces then the brunette settled again.

"There. Tie it now," Regina said, her tone surprisingly far from commanding.

Emma crossed the laces and pulled back when needed to keep them at just the right tightness Regina had confirmed for her. When the laces were better tied, Emma stepped back and rubbed her hands, sweaty by then, over the skirt of her own dress.

Regina turned around and smiled before she said, "Thank you. I'll only be a short while. Hopefully, at the very latest, we can leave in two hours' time. Is that alright?"

Emma's eyes darted from Regina's eyes to her chest, but she quickly locked them on Regina's gaze again before they could look any further south. She spastically bobbed her head up and down in nonverbal agreement before she hummed in verbal agreement.

Regina gave a nod in response, her brow furrowed for a moment due to Emma's odd behavior before her expression softened.

"Make yourself comfortable," Regina said. "Just not too comfortable."

With that, Regina left Emma to do as she pleased in her chamber and the blonde didn't pass up the opportunity to get a better look into the princess' life, or at least her things. Emma slowly circled around the room and took in the openness—near emptiness—of the room. The design on the walls were simple, but they reminded her of snowflakes, except for the fact that each one was exactly the same and snowflakes were not. The large arches in the room traveled up toward the ceiling with a generous width and the stone met at the top of the arch with a sharp point. Emma supposed if she looked at it with her head tilted to the side the arches looked like the outline of half of an eye, while the other half seemed to disappear past the floor underfoot. The design beyond the arches on every wall looked like pipes, darker than the stone that made up the arches and made of bolted down metal, and the lines—as skewed as their paths were—led the rest of the way to the ceiling along the snowflake-less walls. The designs ended where the arches met in a point closer to the ceiling that the floor.

There was a mirror at the vanity and another mirror in one of the corners. In another corner, between the bed and the balcony, there was the one and only white chaise longue Regina had offered up to her for the night and behind that was a large vase of beautiful and thriving white roses. Across from them, in the other corner beside the balcony entrance, was a smaller vase of wilting red roses that had barely begun to bud. The room's arrangement was interesting to say the least and Emma was actually riveted to see just how the other half lived. She wasn't sure Regina was a good example of the high life of wealth and royalty, however. Though the brunette's bedchamber was furnished and larger than any of the places Emma had ever lived in the space's entirety, Regina didn't seem have many personal touches on display. The white canopy that slung over Regina's four poster bed, her journal, the white roses, and the nice desk complete with the mirror to match seemed good and well, but it seemed void of spirit, of soul, of vibrancy. The entire bedchamber felt lacking.

Just then, there was a whirling sound that came from the vanity before a dark image swirled within the mirror. Emma's eyes widened at the unbelievable and momentarily unexplainable action preformed on the no longer ordinary mirror, but her shock was quickly replaced with curiosity and inquiry.

She crept closer to the mirror and squinted at the almost pitch black picture projected through it as if the more she furrowed her brow at the object the clearer the image would become, which wasn't the case as she found out when she stood behind the chair that sat directly in front of the vanity.

"Hello there, dear. How are things," a voice suddenly asked from the dark image in the mirror.

Emma jumped back a few paces, her eyes wide again.

"Have you set our little plan in motion," came the next question only seconds later.

Emma recognized the voice. She knew what plan the secretive woman somewhere in that mirror had referred to and knew what answer was expected.

"Yes," Emma replied and moved back toward the mirror.

"Have you secured your delivery?"

Emma sighed and answered through a clenched jaw, "I have."

"Good."

"I don't want to do this," Emma truthfully said with fierce and sharp, determined eyes.

"Oh, but you will. You have to. Unless…you care more about some princess than—" The darkness of the mirror had lightened just as it revealed a frightened boy with light brown hair and fair—though more on the pale side in that moment—skin, his brown eyes focused on her through the mirror, "your own brother."

"Henry," Emma breathed out with fear to match the amount she saw in his big, terrified eyes. "He's innocent. He's just a kid. Whatever you want from her shouldn't involve him."

"The only reason he's involved is because I need you to get her here. Now, you can either meet me at the agreed upon spot with the princess at your side in five days or you'll be trading his life for hers."

"Emma," the boy shouted, practically cried.

"Henry, it's okay. It's going to be okay," she tried her hardest to assure him with tears in her eyes before the image of her brother faded back to the darkness she'd originally seen at the start of the conversation.

"You know what to do and where to go," the woman spoke again. "Bring her to me or his blood will be on your hands."

"No, wait," Emma yelled and reached out to the mirror, but it was too late.

The darkness swirled in the mirror and within seconds the object returned to normal, her sad and immensely concerned reflection the only thing she saw in the glass.

With a sigh, Regina returned to her bedchamber and pressed her back against the door when she closed it behind herself upon entry. She closed her eyes and took a moment to collect herself after the meeting she'd had to bear about the staff. Apparently, her cook was well-regarded in the kingdom and another royal family wanted to relieve her of her service to the Whites so she could service their family instead. One of her soon-to-be stepdaughter's handmaidens had also been tied up in a scandal and there was a question as to whether she should be excused from the palace. Regina supposed the woman would better enjoy her time servicing Prince James since apparently that's what the woman did on her free time anyway, but King George refused Regina the option to send the handmaiden to his palace. His son had dragons to slay and as future King there was to be no future for him with the help.

Regina had relieved the handmaiden, though not to King George or his son James, but she kept the cook. She had to agree to better wages for the elder woman that had worked in the White's kitchen for several years, but she felt it was worth a few extra silvers a month because the cook was her closer to home version of Granny. Though the guards that occasionally made their rounds at the Winter Palace while the King and Snow White were away were nice to Regina, the cook was around more often than those men and had an entertainingly twisted sense of humor the princess reveled in whenever she waited on her food.

All in all, the tiring meeting had gone on longer than Regina felt was necessary and she was as relieved as she was exhausted by the end of it. Thankfully, the problems were resolved and she could get on with her plans for the evening, as much as she loathed the thought of further exhausting herself on a two day journey with a stranger to a village she didn't know much about and therefore didn't care much about.

She opened her eyes and looked for Emma within the chamber. She quickly spotted the blonde on the edge of her bed with the brunette's commandeered sword, which she had left in the closet when she'd changed into her dress before the meeting, across her lap. The other woman kept running a fingertip up and down the shiny metal and quietly sat alone in the room, seemingly unaware of Regina's presence. Though Regina hadn't known her long, Emma Swan didn't strike her as the silent type.

"Are you ready to go," Regina quietly asked, careful not to scare the girl in the overly quiet chamber.

Emma's head shot up and she immediately looked at Regina. She nodded in reply to Regina's question, but never voiced her readiness. Regina found it a little disconcerting.

"I'll only be a few more minutes. I need to change again. Then we'll collect a few things and be on our way."

"That's fine," Emma forced a smile. "Thank you."

"Are you tired," Regina asked with a curious and somewhat worried look.

"No," Emma shook her head. "Sorry, I was just… It was a little boring in here while you were gone."

"You're sure you want to leave tonight? I told you we could—"

"Tonight. I'd prefer to leave tonight. I promise I'm fine," Emma said with conviction, but not questionable force like she had earlier, like she had before Regina's meeting.

"Okay," Regina smiled then disappeared into the closet for the second time that night.

Dressed in a mostly leather outfit more appropriate for the forest, Regina emerged from the closet. She wore a brown leather vest and a white, long sleeved tunic with a few frills underneath it. She paired that with black leather pants and dark brown, almost black looking, leather boots. She brought a vial attached to a rustic, leather string up to her neck and tied together the two ends of the string at the base of her neck, underneath her hair. The vial had some type of white powder inside it and hung around her neck like a piece of jewelry, but a moment later Regina adjusted the position of the vial and it disappeared underneath her tunic and between her breasts.

With her more adequate attire, she directed Emma through the palace and packed a few more food items before they moved on to the weapons room. Along the way, Regina stuffed her satchel with four apples, a small velvet bag she filled with blueberries, and two canteens.

"There's a river that runs through the land between here and Brooke Village along the path we'll be taking," she informed Emma. "It intersects that path twice so we'll have a couple chances to refill the canteens when needed. Any food more sustaining than blueberries and apples will have be hunted and cooked over a fire. Since Brooke Village is a two day walk, we'll find a place to make camp and we can look for game nearby."

"Wait, walk? I need to see Henry as soon as possible. Why aren't we taking horses?"

"I only have Rocinante. He's the only horse in the stable that belongs to me and he's the only one not with the King on his current travels."

"We shared him on the way back here. What's the problem with taking him now?"

"I don't want to risk you scaring him off again," Regina quipped with a little sneer. "Besides, there's a particularly dicey part of the forest just beyond where we ran into each other. It would be best if the sound of hooves didn't attract attention to us while we pass through it."

Emma sighed and shook out her arm like she was shaking off her nerves, an arm that Regina noticed still had a sword in its possession.

She walked up to the blonde and pulled the sword from Emma's tense grip. It was one of the few weapons Regina had even a semblance of skill with and though she didn't have a favorite weapon, that particular sword was easiest for her to wield out of all the others available to her. It was just light enough in weight and long enough in length for her to better maneuver it in the chance she needed to defend herself.

Emma didn't seem too bothered to part with the sword, but she didn't exactly looked pleased to be suddenly weaponless.

"Come along. You can replace this sword with another one," Regina said and led Emma to the weapons room.

Once inside the room, Regina grabbed a knife and slipped it into one of her boots then turned to Emma, who had her eyes set on a bow. She watched Emma stare at the bow for several long seconds before the blonde lifted it from where it hung on the wall then chose one of three quivers available. She placed the bow in the quiver then picked a decent number of arrows before she slung the quiver over her shoulder and grabbed a hunting knife from where Regina had grabbed her own knife. Emma effortlessly slid it into one of her boots like Regina had previously done as well, though Emma's boots were shorter than Regina's and just barely concealed the hilt of the knife secured by the dark leather footwear.

Emma turned to her and for a moment the two stood in silence, face to face with a satchel of food and a few choice weapons. Regina took a deep breath and sheathed her sword against her hip before she spun on her heel toward the door and started to leave.

"Let's go," she said upon her exit and heard Emma follow close behind her.