The first time Emma holds a sword is always with uncertainty. Princess Emma has one under her bed and drags it out like a buried secret. Emma Swan is told she has parents and asks what the hell that is.
People are going to tell you who you are your whole life.
She might not be Emma the Savior, but she is Emma the Princess. She's the girl who fell for a realm hopping runaway and chose duty over adventure. She has endured stares and whispers and watched her perfect parents knight her perfect son. And wonders what would've happened if she'd just kept running.
If she'd gone into the woods and hadn't turned back, hadn't run into Bae, hadn't stolen away with a piece of him inside of her.
Hadn't cried on her godmother's shoulder and let that piece grow inside of her. Had not let Snow White and Prince Charming coo over her son when a few months ago she'd been crying over a grave.
Her son learns to ride a stallion and wear armour, learns to lead regiments and hunt witches. Her little prince has become a proud and noble knight of the realm.
Princess Emma is perfect. She sings and dances and plucks delicate little flowers from the woods she used to run in.
She wears pink dresses, ermine coats, and red lipstick. And if Emma Swan is the product of True Love then so too is she.
Princess Emma might not be the saviour, but she is royalty. She stands before the Evil Queen—she's practising diplomacy (thank you mother)—and bows and scrapes and offers up the key to the kingdom. She feels the Queen's stare, as sharp as any in the court, and lets it glance off her as all the others have.
Her little prince, now her little knight, comes crashing to her rescue. He's cold and vicious and fully prepared to kill the woman who pleads with him with such soft eyes.
This Emma may not be the Savior, but in every life she is the girl who ran away, who loved a thief, who gave birth at 17. The woman who watches her son grow into something she never could have imagined.
You just gotta punch back and say, "No, this is who I am."
Emma is a protector, savior magic or not, and when knight Henry is prepared to kill this soft Regina, Emma has as of yet untapped magical potential.
The sword hangs in the air.
You want people to look at you differently? Make them.
Henry is her son. And Regina is his mother.
The second time Emma holds a sword. She grasps the hilt firmly, lifts the point upwards, and sees in the blade the power to make her own choices.