Disclaimer - I do not own Twilight, Once Upon a Time, or any of its characters.

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Once Upon a Time

Part 2

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Previously...

Aware of her family looking on, Rosalie took a tentative step forward, crossing the space where the glass wall had been. She walked into the room, past a frozen Bella and Lily. She bent down, gingerly taking a necklace from its box into her hands. She cradled it like she would a baby, standing to reveal what she had found to her family. "Why would we give this to her if we intended to leave?"

In Rose's hands was a silver chain, and hanging from it was the Cullen's crest.

"We wouldn't," Edward said strongly. He remembered the necklace he had made before he left tucked safely in a box in his closet. It was a sign of forever, created when his desires had won out over his mind. If he had given this to Bella, he never would've left the second time around. Something had happened to them. Relief washed over him, knowing he didn't leave her again. Now it was just a matter of finding out what exactly happened. So they could prevent it. "There's a reason why we're not with her."

"You know what, Edward?" Alice said as she stared at the pendant. "I'm starting to think you're right."

Present...

"Thank you, Calista, could you unpause it now?" asked Rose after setting the necklace back in its box and walking back to where she had been standing. The two girls resumed moving and Rosalie put a hand on the glass wall that had suddenly reappeared.

"A gift?" Lily repeated, snorting. "From who, the Queen?"

Bella really didn't want to answer that. "You have a story to tell me, remember?" she redirected.

"I guess I do." Lily nodded and sat down on the couch, unscrewing the cap on the water bottle. "You're not gonna believe me, so try to keep an open mind." She drew in a deep breath, exhaling slowly. "Fairytales are real."

If she was being honest, Bella wasn't surprised. If Vampires and Werewolves and Shapeshifters exist, who's to say they weren't the only creatures of legend? "Okay," she said.

Lily balked. "Okay?" she repeated incredulously.

Bella nodded and gestured with her hands for Lily to continue. "Who are our parents?"

The taller of the two decided to rip off the bandaid. "The Evil Queen and Maleficent." She saw Bella's doubtful face and hurried to explain. "If you believe fairytales exist, why wouldn't you believe two women can have children?" Lily shook her head, remembering how confused she had been when Merlin's apprentice had talked to her on that bus.

"I'm going to need a bit of context," Bella said rigidly. She wasn't going to mention the numerous dreams she had throughout her life featuring the smiling faces of two young women.

"The storybooks got it all wrong. No one got their happily ever after because the Evil Queen cursed the land where they all resided, called the Enchanted Forest. She brought them to this world, and everyone's memories had been changed. They didn't know their pasts or their connection to each other, anything. They only knew the lives Regina had given them."

Bella raised an eyebrow. "Regina?"

"The Evil Queen," Lily answered quickly, her cheeks reddening. "Anyways, all curses are meant to be broken, and that's exactly what happened. No one aged, no died, and no one knew who they were. Enter Emma Swan, stage left."

A sense of familiarity grew at the sound of the name, confusing Bella.

"Emma is the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming. She was born moments before the curse hit and she was sent through a magical wardrobe that sent her here. She grew up pretty much a normal kid, and a lot of stuff happened that she can tell you later on, but basically, she had a baby when she was eighteen and gave him up for adoption.

"Thanks to Rumpelstiltskin, the baby, Henry, ended up being adopted by Regina. Long story short, ten years later, Henry ran off to find Emma and brought her to Stroybrooke to break the curse."

Bella smirked at the summary. "This is a nice story and all, but how do we play into it? If I calculated right, then Regina cast the curse twenty-eight years ago. Newsflash, I'm only twenty."

"That's the tricky part," Lily said, putting her elbows on her knees as she leaned forward. "I told you that the books got it wrong, so the Charmings weren't as Charming as it might've had you believe. Emma was born with the potential for great light, but also great darkness. Dear old Snow didn't want to risk having an evil daughter, so she stole our egg from Maleficent and transferred Emma's darkness into us. They didn't know there were two of us, so the darkness was split equally.

"Their plan was to send us through a portal that would bring us here, but I guess I decided I wanted to see the world early. Snow realized we were literally just babies too late and we fell through. Now in this world, we landed in Montana. You were adopted and I was adopted, but for some reason, you age slower. I don't. I think it has something to do with the whole premature hatching thing."

Bella nodded slowly, taking it in. "So how long have you known? I have a feeling it would've taken a while for you to wrap your mind around it."

Lily's shoes were suddenly interesting to her as she spoke to the floor. "Oh, uh…not long?"

"Are you asking or telling?"

"Telling?"

Bella frowned. "Lily."

The 'older' of the pair huffed. "Alright, fine. I've known since I was fifteen."

"So why now?" asked Bella. "Why, after all this time, have you decided to come find me now?"

Lily sat back on the couch and looked up at the ceiling. "I tried. But everything in my life kept going wrong and I didn't know what to do. As a child, I knew Emma Swan. She was the only thing that kept bad things from happening. But I screwed up, as usual, and everything went to hell."

"I know what you mean," Bella sighed as she collapsed on the couch. She took two gulps of her water before she sat it on the floor, just next to her feet.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," she reiterated. "Tell me about them."

Lily didn't need to be told who Bella was asking about. "Mal started searching for me the minute she got free. Regina trapped her in a large cavern under the clocktower in Storybrooke right after the curse, since she did technically steal it from her. I think it's safe to say Regina's focus would've been on finding us if she'd known of our existence. Instead, she plotted to make every day of Snow's life miserable." She snorted. "Now that, I can agree with."

"Am I crazy for forgetting that this isn't actually happening?" muttered Emmett.

"I'm right there with ya," Jasper said and clapped him on the back.

"No wonder I never liked Snow White growing up. I always thought she was annoying."

"That's one of the few things the books and movies did get right," Lily laughed.

After a silence, Bella opened her mouth. "So, you've met them?"

Lily nodded. "Yeah. Definitely not parents of the year, but they're so much better than my adoptive dad." She sat up when a thought came to her. "I can't believe I almost forgot!" she exclaimed, turning to Bella. "Because of the whole 'frozen in time thing' during the curse, they're almost the same age as us. That's why it's not horrible for Regina to be dating Emma, who is technically her step-granddaughter."

"Huh?"

"I know," Lily said, rolling her eyes at how quickly things can get confusing. "I think everyone in Storybrooke is related to each other in some way, shape, or form."

"Where is Storybrooke, anyway?"

Lily stood and brushed off her jeans. "Maine."

"Damn." Bella sighed and stood as well. "We better get going, then."

"Wait, really?"

She smiled. "Yeah. There's no way I'm not going to meet my fairytale parents after all you've just said." Bella walked over to the door and pulled it open. After Lily walked through, she followed. "You can explain how that's possible in the car."

A hop, skip, and a boat ride later, Bella slammed the car door shut as she squinted her eyes at the empty road ahead. She turned to Lily, who left the keys in the car and the engine running. "There's nothing here," Bella said, to which Lily smirked.

"Just wait."

And she did. She waited for what felt like eons before something seemingly came from nowhere and landed in the middle of the road. She took a hesitant step forward and picked up what she could now see was a scroll. Her questioning eyes landed on Lily, who was still smirking.

Her sister nodded her head to the car and Bella climbed back inside while Lily pressed forward before her door was even shut. The car shook slightly and Bella looked through the front windshield, dumbstruck. Where there used to be trees and a desolate road, there was a car. Standing just in front of the car was a woman with long blonde hair and a kind face. Tears were in her eyes.

Bella eagerly re-opened her door and hopped out of the car. Before she could make it two steps, she keeled over. Not in pain, though. It was as if a part of her she didn't know was missing had been returned to her. She felt whole.

When she opened her eyes, Lily and the woman she knew to be Maleficent, her mother, were significantly smaller. She frowned and that was when she felt the added weight on her back. Bella flailed her arms, only to find they were no longer arms, but wings. Literal wings!

"Daaaaaaaaaamn," Emmett said.

"There's no way this is a possibility!" Alice exclaimed. "Bella's not a dragon!"

"I've already said everything you see is feasible," came Calista's voice.

"It's just not possible!" insisted Alice.

She looked at the two people before her, worried and frightful of her suddenly enlarged body and the lack of control she currently held over herself. Bella took to the sky, flapping her wings wildly as she tried to figure out how to use them.

She circled the trees until, finally, she could coast above the town of Storybrooke. It wasn't long before the vast expanse of trees was replaced by the outskirts of roads and what looked to be the town center. She caught sight of the clocktower, realizing that it was the place where her mother had been held captive for decades on end.

Not a second later was Bella struck in her side by a blinding, painful flash of white. She lost her focus, flapping to regain control to no avail, spiraling to the ground until she landed with a resounding thud that created a crater where she lay.

Though her mind was clouded with pain, her ears detected the near-imperceivable sound of movement and she snapped her head in its direction. There stood a woman with hair as pure as snow and clothes as black as night.

But, rather than focusing on the threat the woman so obviously presented, Bella's eyes fell on the other woman standing far behind her. So far she looked a speck in the distance. Her hair was dark and curly, much like her own. What struck Bella the most was the fireball in her hand, poised to be released on the leather-clad woman.

Bella was too far away to see the tears on her cheeks.

The vision temporarily blinked out of existence as it switched from past to present times.

"Are you sure about this?"

Bella looked up into the eyes of the raven-haired woman who had so quickly become the mother she needed. But twenty years couldn't be made up in a week.

Regina stood behind her, worry etched onto her perfectly regal features. Bella knew she was trying to be strong, but nearly three-decades worth of repressed maternal instincts had broken through the dam. The reformed Evil Queen unable to hide her concern. A day no resident of Storybrooke ever thought they'd live to see.

"Yeah," Bella nodded.

The older woman scowled. "If you're trying to instill confidence, 'yeah' isn't going to cut it."

Bella squared her shoulders and sat up straighter, looking at her mother who stood behind her through the mirror. "I'm sure."

Regina nodded in satisfaction. "Much better."

Lily, who paced worriedly in the corner, made her piece known, "You're not ready."

It was not the greatest thing to say to an anxious mother, who snapped her attention to her eldest. "Lily!"

"It's what you brought me here for, right?"

Now, Regina turned to the younger twin. "Bella!"

A snicker from the stairs caught their attention. Huddled at the bottom, trying his hardest not to be seen, was her youngest. "Henry?!" she exclaimed in exasperation.

Regina sighed before addressing her three children at once. "Henry, you know it's not right to eavesdrop. Lily, I can assure you that Bella's ready if she says she is. Bella, why would you think that?"

With two of three sufficiently chastised, the third looked down at her hands. All of the insecurities she thought she'd buried rose to the surface. Her first set of parents hadn't been there for her, the second had abandoned her, and the two combined didn't bode well for the third. She couldn't help but wait for the other shoe to drop, for Mal and Regina to do something to hurt her as the others had.

Carlisle looked down, ashamed that he'd never once thought of the impact his leaving would've affected Bella. Whether he was aware of her feelings about him, he never should've left her the way he did.

Esme's thoughts mirrored his and her heart ached at the reminder of what she'd done to the newest member of her family.

"I'm ready," Bella said again, ignoring her mother's question and instead focusing on building her resolve and determination. She pushed back her stool and stood, her palms lying flat on the vanity.

The others made to follow her as she began her exit but she stopped and turned to them. "I have to do it alone," she said and left them in a flurry of confusion and anxiety.

Bella took a deep breath in once she stepped outside, relishing the clean air. But she quickly honed her thoughts and stilled, focusing on calling forth the magic inside her. It was the first, and so far the only, thing Regina had taught her that was of use.

The world around her became nothing but darkness for the briefest of moments before it reappeared just as she did. Only this time, she was outside a lonely house. She wasted no time in knocking on the door.

It creaked open and Bella swallowed a bout of fear, stepping through the threshold. She bent down and removed the dagger from her knee-high boots and held it firmly in her hand.

Standing in the Dark One's house, seconds from enacting the Dark One's plan, with the Dark One dagger… It was all a bit much. She had to pause and take several deep breaths in, attempting to calm herself. She had to be ready to do whatever was necessary to save Emma Swan.

And ready she was.

But she was worried about a lack in opportunity.

Bella remembered when she caught Emma in a rare moment of lucidity. That was when they collaborated to create a plan. And the plan was so bold that it all but summoned disaster.

She stood in the silent house, the still air suffocating her as she waited in anticipation.

Moments later, her adversary appeared. Black leather and a bun as tight as a knot, her face was stone cold.

But Emma was hiding somewhere behind the face of the darkness. She had seen a glimpse of that herself. She was a kind woman. She was a mother. These facts made Bella all the more certain of her decision.

"Come on!"

"Oh no."

"Not again!"

She withdrew the dagger from behind her back and revealed it to Emma. Before she had a chance to react, Bella raised the weapon and-

Darkness.

The Cullens were shrouded in it.

The vision had been cut short.

"Why do you suppose-" Jasper began but his question was interrupted as the lights came on.

The house was gone as if it was a set struck down in a matter of hours, and in its place was a void of white. Standing in the center, staring directly at them with murder written on her face, was Bella.

15 - Written: 10/10/21-5/16/22

Posted - 5/20/22

:)