Chapter 9

"What is it, Audrey?" Mal had noticed Audrey staring at her from the corner of her eye while they were cleaning up the mess in the kitchen from Emma's magical temper.

"I'm sorry, Mal. I'm still getting used to this magic stuff. I'm also so sorry about your True Love and Lily. I still can't believe it. Snow White of all people. I just… you're so strong. I had no idea."

Mal just smiled sadly, "I don't know about that, but thank you, Dear. It truly means a lot."

"I want to help Emma find your daughter. There's gotta be something that I can do to help so count me in." Audrey then wrapped her arms around Mal and gave her a hug.

Mal's eyes began to glisten with unshed tears as she nodded in Audrey's hold. She choked out a "Thank you.", and then went back to her magical clean up.

Upstairs, Emma had finally calmed Tristan down and decided to get her mind off of things by showing her some magic. The little girl wasn't aware of her magical roots. "Hey, Sweetie. You wanna help Mommy clean up the mess she made?"

"Yes!" She grabbed her mother's hand and walked into bathroom where several bulbs had shattered and a mirror was destroyed. Emma picked her up so that she wouldn't step on the glass.

"Ok, Pumpkin, watch this." Emma raised her hand and white magic began streaming from her finger tips and wrapping around the fragments of the shattered mirror. They slowly levitated and began molding themselves back together and onto the wall. Within a couple of minutes, the mirror was intact with no hint of previous trauma. Tristan's eyes sparkled in awe.

Tristan stared at her mother's hand and pulled her fingers into her tiny hands, studying them. She touched each of Emma's finger tips waiting for something to happen and working through what she had just witnessed. "Again!"

Emma then held her hand out and this time her magic pieced the light bulbs back together and placed them back into their sockets. "There! All done! What room should we fix next, Tris?"

"My room!" Tristan pointed and Emma carried her into her bedroom. Tristan stared at the mess of glass and held out her hand like her mother and stared. Emma grinned while watching her little princess squint and hold her breath, willing the bulbs to fix themselves, but nothing happened. Tristan then looked at her hand and compared it to Emma's, still working through the magical puzzle in her head.

Emma held out her hand and allowed her magic to flow more slowly this time so that Tristan could watch closely as it mended the light fixtures. When completed, Emma then asked, "How about we do my room next?" Tristan simply nodded, obviously still thinking.

After entering Emma's room, Emma quickly repaired the light fixtures and then moved to the en suite bathroom. It was then that Tristan held out her hand and swirls of white magic left her finger tips and began repairing the shattered bathroom mirror. As she attempted to use her magic to move the mirror back to the wall once it was repaired, Emma noticed that her little body was struggling with such a heavy object so Emma held out her hand to assist her daughter in placing the mirror onto its hinges.

Once completed, Emma hugged her daughter, "I'm so proud of you, Sweetheart! You did it!" She then leaned back, "High five!" Tristan smacked her hand and then Emma sat her down so she could run and tell Mal and Audrey what she had done.

Henry had stood in the background watching in awe of his little sister. "Wow. She's definitely got Mom's talent with magic. She did that without any lessons!"

Emma smiled, "Yeah, I guess she does." She then grew serious. The topic of Regina being the other parent was still quite new to her and she wasn't sure how she'd handle it. She had tried to get Regina to stay so that they could talk, but Regina became aloof and tore out of there too quickly.

Henry eventually pulled her out of her thoughts, "Hey, Ma?"

Emma looked up, still a little dazed.

"Did Grandma and Grandpa really do those things to Mal? I mean, did they really kill her True Love and steal her baby?"

Emma could tell Henry was gut-punched. He had always looked up to the Charmings as the heroes. They could do no wrong in his eyes, but now everything he knew was a lie.

"Seems that way, Kid. I just can't believe what Mal has had to deal with. She's survived hundreds of years just to try and find Lily."

"What do you mean, Ma?"

Emma sighed and motioned for Henry to take a seat on the edge of her bed, "After they took Mal's egg, she tried to get it back, but they had sent it to the world without magic. So Mal tried to find a way to get to that world and be with her daughter. She approached the Blue Fairy asking her to send her to that world because she couldn't live without her child. She begged Blue to do it. Apparently Blue thought as lowly of dragons as Snow and David so she made a deal with Mal, a magical contract. The contract stated that Mal would never return to the enchanted forest even after finding her child. Mal was desperate and agreed to the deal."

Henry nodded and swallowed. He was on the edge of his seat.

"As you know, magical contracts can't be broken or the person dies. So Mal signed and Blue created a spell circle to send Mal to this realm. What she failed to tell Mal is that the circle also included a curse that would remove her dragon powers. When the circle was activated, Mal felt her dragon being removed and she panicked so she released a large force of magic towards Blue. The force caused the lines of the spell circle to become distorted as they were created with Fairy Dust. When she arrived in this realm, it was in the year 1798."

Henry gasped, "But…how is she still living?!"

Emma chuckled at his reaction. It was similar to her reaction when Mal told her this story. "Two years after she arrived, she was attacked by a vampire and was turned. That's how she is considered an elder of the vampires. She's survived all this time hoping that she'd find her daughter when the year finally came, but she couldn't venture out during the day. She was a vampire and limited to the laws of one."

"Until she met you, right?", Henry pieced together.

"Correct. I couldn't help her in her search right away because I'd been taking care of Audrey and keeping the business afloat. Now that those two things are taken care of, I can focus my efforts on finding Lily."

"Wait a sec, Ma. In my storybook, Maleficent has blonde hair, blue eyes and fair skin. How does she have brown eyes, brown hair and olive skin?"

"It's because she lost her dragon. Her father was a dragon with fair features while in human form. Her mother was a human with darker features." Emma grew more serious. "She feels incomplete without her other half. The only thing that will break her curse is True Love's kiss from a romantic True Love or familial True Love."

Henry's eyes grew wide, "Then we can cure her! She's our family!"

Emma's eyes filled with happy tears at her son's words, "She is, but it requires a blood bond. She has no blood family except for her missing daughter."

"Oh." Henry looked won disappointed. He thought he had a solution. He then looked at his mother, "You know what's kind of funny? She looks more like Tris' mom than you do!" He then laughed out loud at Emma's big eyes.

"Hey! Not cool! I'm already in shock over Tris' other mother." Emma rolled her eyes.

"Speaking of, when are you gonna tell Mom she has a daughter?"

Emma took a deep, exaggerated breath through her nose and held it for a few seconds before releasing it, "I asked her to stay this morning and told her it was about what I discovered in Rumple's letters, but she bolted and didn't want hear it. I have no idea why."

Henry just rolled his eyes and threw up his hands, "Sheesh, do I have to do everything?! I swear you adults make things far more complicated than they have to be." He then stood up and walked out of the room and downstairs to meet up with the others. Emma was left with her mouth open in shock at his bluntness.

"Why did you text me to meet up, Robin?", Blue put her hand on her hip already annoyed that she was wasting part of her day meeting up with him in the forest.

"I'm losing Regina!" Robin explained as if she should've known.

Blue rolled her eyes, "That's not my problem. I directed her to you all those years ago as part of our deal. What you did after that has nothing to do with me. I held up my end."

"You need to use fairy dust on her again then! Make her see that we're meant to be."

Blue glared at the rugged man, "It's not my fault that you aren't really meant for her. I sent her your way, it was your job to woo her and keep her happy. Maybe you need to work harder at keeping her!"

"How can I when Emma is back in town and has brought Maleficent with her!"

Blue's heart stopped at that, "What? Did you say Maleficent?"

Robin rolled his eyes annoyed that he was having repeat himself. "Yes!"

"Damn her. How is she still alive?" Blue began to pace in front of Robin. "What did you mean you can't woo her since Emma is here?"

Robin tried to calm down, "When Emma is around, Regina only sees her. She claims she's never been intimate with Emma, but have you seen Emma's daughter? She's the spitting image of Regina!"

Blue's lips pursed together and her expression grew dark, 'Well that explains why the fairy dust couldn't find her True Love back then. She hadn't been born yet.' Blue began to pace again, 'Snow would die if she knew they were True Loves. I need to do something about this. And then there's Maleficent to deal with.' She stopped pacing and then turned to Robin, "Give me a couple of days to think of something. I will help you with this."

Robin began to smile, but Blue raised her hand, "It's not for you. I'm doing this for Snow."

Robin grew confused, "Snow? I don't understand."

"And you don't need to. I will meet you here at the same time two days from now.", and then Blue disappeared.

"Well I think that does it.", Audrey commented to Mal as she looked around the backyard and the repairs. "Nice work, Mal!"

Maleficent smiled at her friend, "Thank you."

"I'm still amazed by the magic here. I'm so envious.", Audrey somewhat whined jovially.

"Trust me, Dear, it isn't always a good thing. I've seen it do horrible things to people.", Mal looked down pensively.

"You wouldn't be referring to me, would you?", a low, smoky voice said.

The two ladies looked around and found the source, revealing herself in a mist of purple magic.

Mal just closed her lips and smiled devilishly, "Hello, old friend", she drawled out sarcastically.

"I didn't believe it when I heard. I had to see it for myself.", Regina grinned right back.

"Well, I see Snow White's propensity for being a big mouth is still intact.", Mal retorted.

Audrey watched the standoff between these two ladies who stared at each other waiting for the other to make a move. As she studied them, she couldn't get over the similarities. 'Man, Emma definitely has a type.' She slowly walked backwards to get further away from whatever the two witches were about to do.

Regina was the first to draw. She quickly formed a large fireball in her hand and immediately threw it towards Maleficent. From there, everything seemed to happen in slow motion before the ladies.

Tristan had run out of the back-sliding door to tell Mal about her magic, "LiLi! LiLi! Guess what I did?" She ran right in the middle of the two ladies and was in the line of Regina's fireball. There would be no avoiding the hit.

Regina's blood ran cold and her entire body grew numb when she saw the little girl run between her attack and Mal. Maleficent tried to move forward and summon her magic to provide some sort of defense, but her magic was waning after overuse. Without her dragon, her magical half struggled. Audrey had screamed and Tristan stopped in front of the fireball and turned around to see it coming at her.

At the precise moment the fireball was about to make impact, Emma had used her super speed to jump in front of the fire and use her back as shield to protect her daughter. Her arms wrapped around Tristan and she folded into a ball as she dropped to the ground from the magical hit.

Everyone was yelling "Emma", "Mommy" and "Ma" at the same time and running towards her.

Maleficent was the closest and dropped to her knees, taking Tristan into her arms and inspecting her first for injuries. Tristan was crying and screaming for her mother. "Tris, it's okay, baby girl. We'll take care of Mommy. Are you alright, Honey?" Audrey had run up and was checking Tristan as well while Henry had reached Emma.

Mal then stood up with Tristan in her arms and glared at Regina who was still frozen in place from shock, "How. Dare. You!?"

Regina had tears in her eyes and was walking towards Emma, "I'm sorry. I didn't think…I didn't mean to…I would never…"

Tristan had turned towards Regina with tears in her eyes which began to glow red. White magic began rising from her body and her breathing became more rapid. "You hurt Mommy."

Regina finally allowed her tears to stream down her face, "I'm so sorry, Honey. I didn't mean to. It was accident, Darling."

Tristan looked down at her unconscious mother whose shirt was burned off her back exposing her severally injured skin. She then looked back up at Regina and the next thing anyone saw was Regina being thrown back several feet and slamming into the side of the house. Her body fell to the ground in a crumpled heap and didn't move after that. She had lost consciousness from the impact to her head. The little girl's eyes then turned back to their vibrant green color and she buried herself in Mal's neck.

Henry was afraid to move Emma due to her severe injuries, "What do we do? I don't want to hurt her." He ran his fingers through his hair.

Audrey stepped in, "We can't take her to the hospital. Her healing properties should help the physical injuries, but I'm not sure about any magical stuff." She turned to her friend for help, "Mal?"

Maleficent stared at Emma, "Let's get them into a bed first. We will treat the physical injuries to help her body heal faster. It's probably best that she's unconscious because this will hurt like a bitch."

Tristan chose that moment to lean back in Mal's arms, "What is a bitch?"

Mal looked at Audrey with an 'oh shit' expression and then back at her goddaughter, "Snow White, Sweetie. Snow White is a bitch."

"MAL!", both Henry and Audrey yelled.

"What? It's true.", Mal rolled her eyes. "Let's get them upstairs.

Now that Henry was a young man, he was able to lift his blonde mother and carry her into the house and up to her room. He struggled, but weight training had definitely come in handy. He then did the same for his adoptive mother and both were placed on the king-sized bed in the master bedroom; Emma on her stomach so that they could treat her wounds.

Audrey placed wet-to-dry bandages along Emma's back while Henry placed an ice pack on Regina's head.

"Will she wake up, Mal? I mean, was that fireball just fire or was there something else in it?"

Maleficent stared at Emma and then looked at Regina, "Knowing Regina, she put a little something extra in that fireball. If I know her, she wouldn't use it to kill, only to make me suffer."

While they talked, Regina was slowly coming to. Her eyes remained closed while she tried to figure out where she was. She could hear the voices in the room, but couldn't open her eyes yet. 'Am I in the hospital? How did I get here?'

"Mom didn't mean it, Guys! She would never hurt a child.", Henry defended in Regina's place.

"Henry, she almost killed Tris!", Audrey yelled.

Regina definitely heard that part, 'I would never hurt her! What happened?...Wait. She used magic. True Love magic. Oh God. Killian and Emma are True Loves?'

"And look what she did to Emma. Who does that? I can't believe how irresponsible she was. There were other people in that house. She had to have known that." Audrey wasn't letting this go. She wasn't used to this stuff.

Mal put her hand on Audrey's arm, "Calm down, Aud. I know. She shouldn't have done that, but we all get caught up in the moment sometimes. Regina and I have a fiery history so fireworks were bound to happen. Let's just be grateful that everyone is alive and Tristan is okay."

'Was that Mal? She sounds so…different. Calm.' Regina continued to try and open her eyes.

"Why did she attack you, Mal?" Audrey was glaring at the unconscious queen as she asked.

Maleficent looked at Regina and then back to Audrey, "Back in the Enchanted Forest, Regina had stolen the Dark Curse from me after she had given it to me. I didn't want her to get it back because I was pregnant at the time and worried for my unborn child." Mal swallowed the lump in her throat, trying to keep the tears at bay and then continued, "I decided to try and get it back from her so I attacked are castle. We were pretty evenly matched. My mother was human, but she was also a witch so I had used my abilities to search for the curse in her castle. I couldn't find it so I tried capturing her father and using him as leverage. You can imagine how well that went over."

Audrey winced knowing Regina's history and her love for her father.

"Exactly. I was never able to find the curse and her father was injured in the magical battle. I didn't mean for it to happen, but the damage had been done to our friendship. I knew she'd never forgive me."

Audrey nodded and then her hard features relaxed in understanding. "What a shame. And in the end, Blue was the cause of your separation from Lily."

Henry piped up, "Speaking of, Ma told me the story, Mal, and I'd like to do some recon to see what else Blue knows. There are now two things the fairies have done to mess with my loved ones lives and I'm convinced there's got to be a connection."

Regina was absorbing all the information. 'Mal was with child? What does Blue have to do with this? Is Emma alright?' Regina then felt movement on the bed next to her, but still couldn't open her eyes or move just yet.

Tristan had crawled into bed and wedged herself between the two ladies. Tristan stared at her blonde mother's back and then held up her little hands and stared at them. Henry, Mal and Audrey watched to see what she would do next. After a few minutes, white magic rose from the little girl's hands and a children's violin materialized in her hands. She began playing a soft, mellow tune to soothe her mother. The Sonata by Brahms permeated through the room and relaxed her audience further into their chairs. Tristan knew music was a salve to her mother and hoped it would make her feel better.

Regina heard the music begin and was confused, 'Who is playing next to me? It's beautiful? Is this the person I heard when I dropped off Henry?' Regina was more determined than ever to at least open her eyes. She struggled and used all of her willpower, but she managed a small squint. It would just enough to see her little mini-me seated next to her with violin in hand and eyes closed while she gracefully maneuvered her bow with her right hand while the fingers on her left hand worked the strings on the fingerboard. Her tiny little chin rested on the chinrest as her body gently swayed back and forth. 'Tristan?'