WARNING: Contains Spoilers

The Miller's Daughter

Neal and Henry laughed above deck with Emma as Gold and Cecilia took care of Orabella below. Cecilia crossed her arms and eyed the older man. "So who are you?" Gold looked away from his unconscious lover to her daughter. "I get that your Neal's father and all that, but who are you to my mother?"

Gold sighed. "I suppose it is your business, being her daughter and all. I am Orabella's true love."

Cecilia's eyebrows shot up as she asked the first question that came to her mind. "Does Neal know?"

"No, not yet," he admitted.

She bit her lip and nodded slowly. "Do you want me to tell him?"

"No, don't do that, dearie," he said standing. "Your mother and I will do that ourselves. After we have this whole thing settled."

She nodded again before sighing and sitting on the bench next to the invalid. "So how did you two meet?"

"She technically was a payment from a pupil of mine. She became my 'housecarl' as she called it. She was very skilled. She cooked my meals, cleaned my linen and protected my house. And then she told me about my son being hers. I was angry at first. Then I couldn't help but be grateful that she had taken care of my boy out of the goodness of her heart. I promised her I'd find a way to find him. I found myself falling in love with her. Then she told me of her previous life..." he trailed off in thought.

"About her being from this world, kind of," Cecilia asked, looking up at him. She saw his apprehensiveness and continued. "It's okay, you can say it. Neal told me about what he read in mom's journals. How she worked for a TV studio that had a show molded after his old life."

"Yes, she told me all about that," he said as he sat next to her. "I know you don't know me. All of your knowledge of me comes from your brother. I admit that he probably doesn't paint a pretty picture. But I love your mother with everything I have. And I wonder everyday how she can love me with all the darkness that I carry."

Cecilia nodded in surprise. "Wow, okay then, I guess." She leaned down close to his ear. "But I'm her daughter. You hurt her, I don't care what your powers you have, I'll kill you." She stood up and walked out.


She was taking the laundry down from the drying lines thinking about her predicament. 'Absolutely not,' she thought to herself. 'He'll trade for Belle in a few years and then things will be fine," she thought with a nod of finality. She could feel her heart tearing at the thought.

'Though, Emilie even hates her, so what's the harm?'

'No, don't even...'

'Why not do two favors at once? More if you use her to bring him back after Neverland.'

'She gets pregnant!'

'You don't even know if she gets out of the box! She doesn't really love him, she said it herself!'

"You seem to be thinking rather hard on something, Lovely." Her master's voice sounded beside her. She jumped and looked at him. "You've been standing here for half an hour. What's on your mind?"

"The future," she said honestly. He always knew when she was lying now that he had taken and hidden all of her face masks.

"You have a problem?"

"I have several," she sighed as she continued with the laundry.

"Anything I can do to ease your mind?" He grabbed the basket of dried linen before she could and held an elbow out for her.

She hesitantly took it. "I'm unsure of what comfort you could bring." They headed back to the castle. "A man I care for is destined for another who only loves a shadow of a thought of him. If I intervene, I do two favors. If not the story will go unchanged and bring pain to all parties."

He stopped and turned to stare into her eyes. "Which will bring you more happiness?"

"It's not a question of my happiness. The story-"

"Damn the story!" He poofed them into the main hall. "If you knew nothing of the future, what would you do?"

She took the basket, placed it on the table, and began folding things. "I don't have the luxury of not knowing. I want to save him of his heartache, but I don't know how the story ends."

"Then you know what you want to do," he said as he slipped up behind her. "The question is... can you do it?"

"I'm not strong enough," she admitted with a defeated sigh. "I cant just break the time line to fit my fancy."

"Of course you can." He stilled her hands and brought his lips to the shell of her ear. "Your presence already has."

She pushed him back and twirled around the table. "Stop this, Stiltskin," she commanded, grabbing the partially folded basket.

"Why?" He stalked her as she fled the room, his anger flaring. "Are you so afraid of me? I love you! That's not going to change! No matter what you do-"

She whirled around on the steps to face him. "I don't want it to," she yelled at him, her own anger matching his. She took a deep breath and continued. "I don't want it to. But I'm not smart enough to re-write what has been written. I can't imagine such a thing, as much as I want to."

"Well, you don't have much of a choice anymore, do you, Lovely?" He held up a few strands of her hair.

"What are you doing?" She took a few steps down to get closer to him.

"Giving you proof," he shrugged before he disappeared.

"Stiltskin!" She dropped the basket to grab her skirts as she ran up the stairs to his laboratory.

She found him with her hair and a vial in his hands. As she cautiously entered, he threaded her hair into the vial and ran his hand through his own hair. A few strands broke free and were added to the vial with her own. The hairs entwined themselves together and began to glow: A dark green for her, a brilliant gold for him.

"Do you know what this is, Lovely," he asked shaking the vial at her.

She swallowed as she nodded, taking tentative steps towards him. "I do," she said taking the vial gently from his hands. "And I know what it means, but I don't understand." She thought to herself for a minute. "Did you foresee this happening?"

He laughed manically and wrapped himself around her and the vial. "I've known since Cora came to me before her wedding."

Certainty gasped. "That was nearly thirty years ago!"

"And you've not aged a day," he said as he caressed the side of her face.

She snorted. "I blame the dragon souls. They're surprisingly good for the skin."

The pair shared a chuckle as the hairs dissolved into liquid magic.


They transferred Orabella back to land with magic. Gold moved her so she was resting against her daughter in the bed of David's truck. Devon pulled out a bottle of cure poison. "I don't know if it'll work, but it should at least slow down the effects."

"Ora, where's the dagger now?" David threw a blanket over her as Mary Margret helped clean the wound.

"I have it," she gasped. "It's where she can't get it."

"But she can control you," Mary Margret said.

"Only her actions, not her words," Devon corrected. "Cora would need her heart for that.

"Well, she can't have it," Gold said popping up at the foot of the truck. "Now, let's take her back to the shop. There's magic there that can protect us."

They sent Henry off with Devon, who was too much of an added liability to stay with them. They brought her to the cot in the back of the shop. Gold gave out instructions to the gathered group, sending them all out of the room until only Mary Margret remained. "Can you grab a warmer blanket from the cupboard," he asked her, pointing to the specific one as he helped Orabella become more comfortable on the cot.

She found the candle and reluctantly took it with her. Now only time would tell if she would use it. He had made his most convincing argument, saying how her family would die, how Orabella's children and their shared grandchild would never forgive her if she didn't.

He gave Emma another quick lesson in magic like he had done when they had come to ask about Dr. Hopper's 'death'. This time about emotional intent.

Then the battle began. Out in the front of the shop, he heard things breaking, people moving, and both doors closing. Emma, Cecilia, and Neal were forced to fall back to the back room.

That was when she reached for him. "Stiltskin," she called weakly.

He sat beside her on the bed and wiped away some of the sweat that had accumulated on her brow from the fever. Devon's cure apparently did not work on all poisons. "What is it, Lovely?"

"Your dagger," she whispered as she shakily pulled out the grip from her palm. "I may not survive this, so you gotta take it now."

He looked at it in her palm and then back to her. "You will survive, Lovely. We'll find something."

"Don't try to pull that shit with me, Stiltskin. There's only one thing that's gonna help me and it's too late now."

"I've already got it under control," he said as he brushed some hair from her face.

She looked at him. "I'm not important enough for it to work anyway."

"You're important enough to me," he said quickly.

"To you?" Neal walked up to his father and looked between him and his mother. "What do you mean? What's going on?"

Orabella sighed as best as she could and looked up at her son. "We were planning on having this conversation after the imminent danger had passed, but if you insist on ripping the bandage off now..."

"Your mother and I are bound," Gold said, taking one of her hands in his and also looking up to Neal. "Your mother is my true love."

"No. That can't be," Neal shook his head. "You're not capable of that anymore."

Gold sighed. "I know it's hard to accept-."

"Accept? Hard to accept? This is crazy!"

Orabella gave a weak chuckle. "Perhaps he needs to be convinced of the truth like I was," she offered.

Gold gave his own small chuckle and stood up. "I remember, it was the end of spring. You had finally stopped wearing that ghastly face mask while you were working." He grabbed a vial from the work bench.

"Because you took all of them," she chided.

"I thought you were too beautiful to hide your face," he said as he returned to her side. "You said you weren't strong enough."

"You said I didn't have much of a choice."

He ran his hand through their hairs, collecting a strand and adding it to the vial. "And then I proved it," he said as the hair entwined and began to glow. He swirled the hairs around before they became liquid magic. He handed the vial to their son. "There you are, my boy. Like mother, like son." Neal took the vial in shock. "We've spent a lifetime looking for you... Both of you," he said looking to Cecilia as well. "For a chance to say 'I love you'." He looked back to Neal. "And 'I'm sorry'."

Neal looked from the vial to his father. "I didn't think you'd go back on our deal," he said choking on his emotions.

"I made the wrong choice," Gold said softly as he held out his hand to his son.

"I'm still angry," Neal pouted as he turned toward the table and set the vial down.

"I know." Gold stood up and placed his hand on his son's shoulder. It was a moment before he turned around and embraced his father.

Emma sniffled at the sight and turned to look at the protection spell in the doorway. "They're comming!"

They lined up around Gold and Orabella. Neal and Cecilia stood at the ready with swords in their hands. Cora entered and vanished the three of them. They appeared in the forest outside of town.

"Where are we?" Cecilia whirled around looking for danger.

"Outside of town," Emma said as the siblings lowered their weapons.

"We've gotta get back," Neal said as he slipped the sword into his belt.

"Come on," Emma said as she led the way down the trail back to town.


Orabella stood with Gold over a weeping Regina, who held her dying mother in her arms. "I didn't want this, Regina," she said to her cursed sister.

"Shut up! You've been waiting for this."

Orabella said nothing. Cora closed her eyes and let go her final breath. Blue smoke surrounded Orabella in an instant. She felt something being pulled out of the pits of her soul, something she'd longed to be rid of since she'd received it. It gathered in her chest and burst through it in a ball of blue light. It flew back to Cora from whence it had come and was joined by another shortly after.

"And it's finally done," Orabella sighed as she sat back onto the cot. "From here on out, Regina, you're on your own. From here on out, you have no one bound to watch you. Absolute and I are done, and free to live our own lives as we will." She paused to let her words sink in. "Good luck."