They'd fallen into silence after their last conversation. Silence suited him just fine. He was used to his thoughts, used to the voices in his head taking up space and creating conversations. He was accustomed to finding inner peace and solitude when he felt the crowd in his mind. But he knew it was only a matter of time until Mary Margaret broke that quiet. She was not accustomed to silence. Living in this small spit of an apartment with two other adults and a child would mean noise, working at a school would mean commotion, running a country meant pressure, and living with dwarves while on the run meant chatter. She would not be suited for silent thoughts; she would not be accustomed to letting those thoughts drift in her mind without threatening to destroy her.

So, he sat in the chair by her bed, listening to the ticking of the clock and enjoying the silence while he could, knowing all the while that it was never going to last. It was only a matter of time until Mary Margaret-

"What's the worst place you've ever been to?" she finally asked after nearly an hour of quiet meditation spent staring out her bedroom window again.

"Aside from New York?"

"Not like that…" she chided immediately. "What's the worst realm you've ever been to. I know you weren't able to get here, but I know you have also been to a few others."

That was a stupid question. With an especially stupid answer he didn't particularly feel like giving since the answer was Neverland. He didn't see the relevance of it, given what they'd been discussing before. He couldn't see any purpose in asking it, and he didn't see a reason to answer it aside from the possibility of filling the empty space between them and the time between now and the other's return with something besides silence.

"Each realm has its downsides just as they do the upsides," he conceded. "Wonderland is supposed to be particularly annoying, though the Land Without Color offered certain challenges. Planning a trip, dearie?"

She didn't answer, just shifted her weight and swallowed. Swallowed hard. She was nervous. Anxious about something, about the question he'd asked or the answer he'd given…or maybe both.

He wasn't one for religion. He believed in the gods and something greater than himself, but he'd long ago accepted that he'd be damned for all the terrible crimes he'd commit in his tenure as the Dark One. Lies, deceit, theft, forgery, impersonation, heaven knew he'd long since lost track of the number of murders on his head. The nice thing about accepting his fate in whatever hereafter there might be was that he didn't have to worry about doing good or bad in this life. His fate was sealed, so he may as well do as he liked now while he was still living.

But a person like Snow White turned Mary Margaret Blanchard…he didn't know her opinions on what came next. But watching her now, he suddenly had the feeling that she might fear where she ended up and was working on trying to accept it herself.

"No…just thinking about the realm you belong in after what happened to Cora."

"After what I did…" she swallowed hard again, losing her voice before she could ever truly get it back. Guilt. She was a woman completely and wholly consumed by it, and after so many years spent running from it, he didn't think it was possible to understand why she felt it, but he knew that it was a bad thing. She was a woman who was searching for an answer, searching for some way to even the scales. So was she thinking of what would happen to her soul if Regina killed her? Or…was she going to try and skip ahead? Punish herself if Regina didn't do the deed first?

"Even if such a feat as going to another realm were possible-"

"It's possible," she breathed, nodding her head with something that sent shivers down his spine.

Certainty. Not the kind of certainty that came from belief or hope, the kind that came from knowledge. How on earth-

"While you were away in New York, Cora set a giant on us. The Giant had a magic bean, one of the last. He planted it in a safe place to grow here in Storybrooke. David and I were hoping to use the beans to get everyone back to our realm, but…I could use them to go elsewhere. Somewhere I belong. Somewhere people like me deserve to be."

"I see…"

He was trying to stay calm, trying to keep himself stone-faced and even-tempered, but it was a feat. There were beans? Magic Beans here in Storybrooke?! Dove had failed to mention anything about a giant while he'd been away. He was angry that this could sneak up on him, angry at his lack of knowledge on something as valuable as magic beans finally coming to the surface again. He was angry enough that he could have killed Dove if he saw him!

But he was smart enough to know he couldn't do that. Dove was too valuable to kill off over something like this, especially if beans were back in the picture. Not knowing, finding out about this right now, that was irrelevant. What mattered was that the Giant had a magic bean. They were here in Storybrooke. And getting Belle through a portal in her current state…

He needed to know where they were.

"And…where is this field, exactly?" he asked quietly, attempting to sound casual, but for the first time since he'd entered the apartment, he saw a flash of something familiar in Mary Margaret's eyes. Her chin tilted upward as she examined him, narrowing her gaze.

"Somewhere safe," the former Queen offered.

He felt a smile tug at the corner of his mouth. Smart girl. Sick as the thought that she wasn't going to tell him anything about the magic beans made him, it was at least good to see that she had some sense of future preservation. A woman who had no plans other than to die because it was all useless wouldn't care who got their hands on those beans. A woman who at least cared about the world around her would. Still, if she didn't want him to know, then she probably should have told him at all to begin with. But now, so long as he didn't want her to worry that she'd obsess over it…

"To be quite frank, the realms that are said to be the worst are the ones you can't get to on your own or with a bean. The Netherworld, of which I'm sure you'll recall as you've already spent ample time there yourself. And the Underworld, which is-"

"Hell…" she breathed with wide eyes.

"Only in a figurative way if the texts I've read are to be believed."

Mary Margaret sighed and took her eyes off of him. She sank a little lower into the bed, curled her arms a little tighter around her torso so that she could stare at her hands laid in her lap. It was only when she took a deep breath, and he noticed this hitch in the once fluid action that he realized she was crying.

"Hell is what I deserve for what I've done."

He took a deep, steadying breath of his own. It was the only thing keeping him from rolling his eyes or doing anything else that suggested how ridiculous that statement was. Yes, for many in this world, "hell" was the destination for murderers. But Mary Margaret hadn't exactly committed murder, not in his eyes. She'd manipulated, and she'd defended. And yes, she'd done it in a way that the outcome benefitted her, but her actions had also helped the entire town, he was certain of that. And besides all that, aside from this one minor incident and one he could think of that involved Maleficent's kid, he could think of plenty of other actions that she had behind her that would justify her staying out of that place. He, Dark One for two hundred years and counting, more murders than he could count, more bad than good under his belt…hell was a place for him. But for Mary Margaret?!

"Perhaps, but only if it was the only thing you'd ever done."

Slowly, the girl turned her hung head in his direction again. Her voice was silent, but her eyes were inquisitive. There was an invitation to continue speaking, even if she didn't say the words.

"Our souls are never just one thing," he pointed out. "Our hearts are never just good or bad. My heart is black as they come, but I'm still here talking to you, and that means that if you were to remove it from my chest…you'd still find some trace of good in it. The gods or God, if you subscribe to such a thing, take that into account, and you, dearie…you've got a lot of good in your life to outweigh the bad."

"But David's right," she cried, shaking her head. "To take a life-"

"It's not always as simple as that," he insisted before she could begin this seemingly never-ending circle of thoughts all over again. "Cora was a wretched, evil woman. She wouldn't have stopped."

"Trying to kill you!"

"Trying to get power," he corrected quickly with certainty because he was optimistic that he knew Cora far better than Snow White, and even Regina Mills knew her. They may have believed that killing him was her endgame, but he knew it wasn't. "If you think my power would have satisfied Cora as she was, without her heart, you would have been sorely mistaken. She'd have kept going, seen all of you as a threat eventually, Emma, Regina…even Henry. She'd have built Storybrooke into her own realm of desolation, and that…that is what you saved everyone from. Not all evil is the same, dearie. I may be a villain, but Cora's thirst for power makes me look like a puppy dog. It's ironic you wish yourself to hell when it's what you saved everyone from."

Mary Margaret paused. She was stoic. The only movement in her face was the bobbing of her throat as he watched her swallow before she spoke. "That doesn't change what I did."

"No…no, it doesn't," he answered, looking into her eyes. It was the same circular thoughts she'd been expressing ever since he arrived. And he understood them, truly he did because there was truth to them. Ends could justify the means…but that didn't mean the means vanished. But, if she had any hope of getting up out of bed and out of this apartment and being capable of defending herself against Regina again, she had to understand that those sorts of thoughts had to stop.

"But the fact that those past actions don't change means that now, the real challenge for you begins…"

"What's that?"

She asked it just as he felt a buzzing start up again in his pocket. David.

"Now you learn to live with it," he growled in her direction before flipping the phone open and ordering David to talk.

"We think the worst of it's over," the man informed him on the other end of the line. Funny how optimistic he could sound when at least one of those words sounded less than certain.

"Think?" he questioned, getting to his feet and moving away from the bedroom.

"Yeah…we found Henry. He managed to get his hands on some explosives from the mines and was going to the well to blow it up, some kind of an attempt to get rid of magic. Regina got there about the same time as we did, and he convinced her to destroy the curse that she had. She seemed pretty resolute when she did it, so we're thinking that things are settled."

"For now…" he mumbled to himself, thinking over what he'd just heard. Henry tried to destroy the well to rid the world of magic. It was cute. But also childish. At the end of the day, something like that would never have worked. All the boy would have ended up with was a pile of rubble and some potentially severe injuries. As someone who had watched him grow from infant to child, he was rather grateful that the adults had stepped in and made sure to keep all his limbs intact. As his grandfather…

He glanced over at Mary Margaret, recalling their conversations.

As the father of Henry's father, he was simply happy to hear that everyone was safe and located.

And even better, Henry had gotten Regina to give up the curse. That wasn't a terrible surprise. If anyone was going to get through to her besides him, it would be Henry. She was still a threat, of course, but so long as that curse was destroyed, then she wasn't a threat today, at least not if she was smart and Regina was. Curse destroyed, she'd need time to regroup, consider her feelings for Henry and what he'd asked her for, and then she might try something new, but that day certainly wasn't today. And that meant that it didn't matter what his debt was or wasn't at the moment; with Regina stepping back, he no longer needed to guard the queen from her stepmother.

"Well then, it certainly seems as if everything's in order. Oh, and, for your information, I protected Mary Margaret when Regina came by earlier, which means our deal is fulfilled. It's a life for a life. You can protect your own family from now on, and I'll protect mine."

On the other end of the line, he heard David release a heavy sigh. "When are you going to see Gold that we are your family now?"

He rolled his eyes and looked back over at Mary Margaret, stilling unmoving on the bed. Fuck, some days it was as if they shared the same brain. Annoying royals…

"A love affair and some shared blood in one child does not a family make, Prince Charming. With your history, I'd think you'd know that better than anyone else. Any other arguments you'd like to make?"

"Not at this time, no."

"Okay," he muttered before he hung up on the Prince. There was nothing left to say. They were going to think what they wanted to think, and he would feel what he felt, simple as that.

He wandered back into Mary Margaret's room. "That was your husband. It seems that Henry convinced Regina to destroy the curse, which means my services are no longer required."

"How do you do it?" a small voice asked from behind him.

He paused but didn't bother turning back. He knew the gaze that he would find on her. It was the same one that had been staring at him all day. Desperation. "Do what?" he questioned.

"Live with yourself, knowing all the bad things you've done."

He took a deep breath. Wasn't that one hell of a loaded question. He could understand the reason that she'd asked him and part of him thought that he was the right person to ask, but another part of him knew he wasn't because, truth be told, he wasn't sure he'd ever really learned the answer. He'd done terrible things over the years, he understood that, but he never really stopped to consider them. He couldn't stop to consider them, not when everything he ever did drove him closer and closer to his son. The result of that, of course, was that he didn't think he'd ever really been "living," certainly not until Belle came along. And then? How did he "live with it," live with the bad decisions he'd made even where she was concerned?

"Well, you tell yourself you did the right thing," he answered in a whisper. "And if you say it often enough, one day, you might actually believe it."

A moment of vulnerability, and then those walls go right back up. Isn't it always two steps forward and one step back for our dear Rumple?

Thank you so much, rsbeall12 and Grace5231973, once again for your very kind comments on the previous chapter. I do hope that you've enjoyed these conversations that Rumple has had with Mary Margaret. I hope that you think they are in character for both of them and appropriate given the situations that they're in. They may not have been conversations that we were dying for, but in the end, I find they are some super meaningful conversations that even contain some foreshadowing for the future. (Yeah, no, Neverland's not relevant at all, Rumple!) Peace and Happy Reading!