Chapter nine
Henry would usually be happy to be surrounded by books but it was still disconcerting to find that his room was exactly as he left it, other than the fact that he wasn't sure whether it was him that had made the bed.
It didn't seem like something he would do.
He was trying his best to focus on the piles of books he had pulled from his shelves.
For the first time it occurred to him just how much Regina had given him (at least in terms of material items) and that was precisely why he needed to focus here.
He wouldn't be able to carry all of the books in one trip (and he did not want to come back) so his goal was to compile the essential ones.
He could tell Emma to give the rest to the library, the problem was, he hadn't found a single one so far that he didn't want to keep.
This didn't even factor in all of the clothes and various nick-racks he'd accumulated over the years.
He moved another issue of Spider-Man over to the 'keep' pile, not that he had a 'donate' pile at this point and then reached over to grab another book.
The moment his hand came into contact with a book that definitely wasn't there before, he retracted it with an exasperated sigh.
Without looking around, he said, "I really don't have time for this right now."
"It will take a while to move all this stuff out of here, Henry. You could stand to take a break," Isaac replied.
Henry closed his eyes and asked, "can we do this tomorrow?"
"We could, but the thing about stories is that settings can be almost as important as the plot and I think this mansion is the perfect place to make today's point," Isaac replied.
Henry considered running away, but Isaac was almost certainly leaning against the door. He could call out to Emma but he still wanted to be Isaac's apprentice and she would probably veto that.
Unfortunately, he would need to get through whatever lesson he was trying to teach him before that could happen.
No matter the lessons he learned about the 'narrative structure' of Regina Mills's life it wouldn't change that it had already ended.
Finally, Henry turned to find Isaac was in fact leaning against the door and he figured that he could get this over and done with so that he could go back to trying to spend the least amount of time in the mayoral mansion.
"How will being here help with a lesson?" Henry asked with a sigh.
Isaac pushed himself from the door and spread his arms out for emphasis, as he explained, "this house is undoubtedly the place you spent the most time with Regina, even when you were estranged. Tell me, Henry, how would you describe her parenting style?"
Henry brought his bottom lip into his mouth, he was pretty sure that he knew where this was going.
Based on what Emma had told him about Cora Mills before she left her in the Enchanted Forest, he didn't want to see it.
"I guess…strict," Henry said.
Isaac hummed and asked, "always?"
Henry could think of a number of occasions when she wasn't as strict as she could have been.
In fact it was normally when there was a chance that the curse was at risk.
"She sent me to therapy when she knew I wasn't crazy," Henry replied instead of telling Isaac that he knew what he was trying to say.
"A misguided endeavour, certainly, but based on her post-curse lifestyle, was it really so unreasonable for her to want to protect the curse? Living in a town for decades with a town of people who hate her can't be a very pleasant experience."
"There is a reason they hate her," Henry retorted.
"Hated her," Isaac corrected.
Henry took in a deep breath through his nose.
The Author seemed to be trying his best to push him over the edge here and he was getting close.
"Yeah, hated her," Henry repeated, "either way, she deserves….deserved it."
"Deserved to be executed by the Mad Hatter? If so, the Storybrooke justice system is very specific, I have to say," Isaac replied.
Henry shot to his feet at the word 'executed' and balled his fists.
Isaac held up his hands to placate the boy.
He really needed to walk the delicate line between getting him to see the point and not going too far.
There was a certain memory that would get his point across easily but he really didn't want to go there if it wasn't needed.
"What is your point?" Henry asked.
Isaac pulled out his quill and asked, "may I show you?"
Henry grabbed the storybook and threw it to Isaac's feet without another word.
Isaac looked at him for a second but decided that his anger only proved that this needed to happen.
Wasn't it one of the stages of grief?
He reached down to pick up the book and stepped towards Henry as he found the correct age.
He didn't bother asking him if he was ready as he pressed at the page, light filled the room.
When Henry opened his eyes he was still in a room filled with books.
He actually spun around in awe.
This room was bigger than Storybrooke's entire library!
He stopped though when his eyes fell onto a girl sat upright at a table reading one of the many books.
She looked somewhere between the last two times he'd seen her, maybe eleven or twelve. It didn't escape Henry's attention that she was around the same age as him.
She didn't look in the least comfortable as if she was thinking that someone was watching her.
"Why didn't you tell me that it's your birthday?"
Both Henry's and Regina's eyes shot over to another little girl running into the study space.
Regina tensed for a second and Henry frowned? Why did she look afraid?
She relaxed a second later, though and reluctantly placed the book down to the table and replied, "how did you find out, Rose?"
Rose fell into the seat opposite her friend, placing her elbows onto it which made Regina cringe just a little.
"My mother told me, she said she's going to make you a cake!" Rose replied.
Regina scoffed, her fingers appeared to be itching to pick back up the book, but she managed to resist, and instead replied, "mother would never let me have cake."
"I'm pretty sure that queens eat cake, Regina."
Regina laughed just a little and shook her head, "I meant because I am still be punished for you distracting me from my studies."
"We picked apples, that can be very educational. Besides, you could have blamed me," Rose shot back.
"Then she would have fired your mother."
"But…it's your birthday, she can't just ignore that."
"She's done it before," Regina replied and reached to pick up her book but stopped when Rose slapped her hand onto hers, so Regina added, "my mother said that insubordination should not be rewarded no matter what the date."
Rose moved her hand back and said, "it's just cake, Regina."
Regina smiled and actually moved to push herself to her feet, but the moment she was standing, her smile fell.
For a second, Henry thought that she was looking straight at him but he turned around when Isaac cleared his throat and nodded towards a woman behind him.
The woman his eyes fell onto caused genuine fear to shoot through Henry's system and he'd only heard a couple stories about his heartless grandmother.
He looked over to Regina and he saw a much deeper fear on her face than he felt.
A fear born from experience.
Regina gripped the edge of the table and said, "mother? I thought you was planning to go into town?"
Cora didn't so much as glance at Rose as she stepped further into the space, staring daggers at her daughter.
"I feared you were being led astray again, it would appear I was right to worry," Cora replied.
The coldness in her voice made Henry want to run away, and he realised that when he was in trouble with Regina, he'd never felt this type of fear. A little scared that she might ground him, perhaps, but never fear that she might somehow hurt him.
"Mrs Mills, please. It was my fault…"
Regina's eyes widened when Rose addressed her mother directly and opened her own mouth to intervene.
"You may leave," Cora replied before Regina could say anything, again the older woman was not looking at Rose.
"But…" Rose began and Regina really wished that she could tell her to shut up based on the way her mother was currently looking at her.
Finally, Cora turned to look at the other girl and said, "tell your mother that I won't require her services after dinner this evening. You will have an hour to leave my estate once we have eaten."
Rose let out a breath.
Clearly, there were no words.
Plus, there was still the chance that she could make things worse.
Cora Mills did have a murderous expression on her face.
Rose gave Regina one last look before she finally ran away from Cora's gaze.
Regina watched her friend go and then looked back to her mother with obvious tears in her eyes.
"Sit down," Cora said sternly and Regina did so instantly as Cora stalked over to her daughter who clamped her mouth shut to stop herself from protesting.
"How many times do we have to go through this, Regina?" she growled.
Regina swallowed hard, obviously she couldn't resist opening her mouth, "please mother, Rose was just…"
She was physically stopped from trying to argue that Rose's mother deserved to keep her job by a sharp slap across her cheek.
Both Regina and the invisible Henry let out a loud gasp at the action.
Henry turned to Isaac while Regina cradled her cheek.
"I believe you have reading to do, dear," Cora said in an eerily calm voice.
"Yes mother."
Henry closed his eyes against the signs in Regina's voice that she was going to cry and when he opened them he saw Cora walking out with a satisfied grin on her face.
The scene slowly melted away and Henry was stood in the middle of his old room taking in deep ragged breaths.
Isaac was now on the other side of the room, leaving the door available to him.
Before Isaac could say anything Henry said, "Emma had a bad childhood and she didn't turn out evil. It doesn't excuse anything."
Isaac was about to make a counter point, but Henry already dashed out of the room.
Isaac's head fell into his hands with a heavy sigh.
Apparently there would be a need to show him the memory that he had considered off-limits when he had first started this endeavour.
Meanwhile, Henry finished running down the stairs to find Emma dusting a side table.
If he'd been paying attention, he would have heard her muttering something about a 'high maintenance queen'.
The appearance of her son forced her to abandon the task though and she asked, "Henry, are you okay?"
Henry was still taking in deep breaths and looked very close to tears but he replied, "I need to…do some homework. Can we come back another time?"
Emma knew that there was no possible way that the boy could have any homework left to do, she'd actually spoken with Mary Margaret who had assured her that she hadn't been assigning much to anyone since the 'school incident'.
Emma would have looked to Regina for help if she thought that she would actually say anything.
Instead, she just dropped the duster and said, "sure kid, we can come back anytime."
S
"I'm telling you, he looked really upset," Emma exclaimed as she pulled her PJ top down before she added, "I'm done."
Regina turned around to find the saviour was in fact ready for bed.
Turning around was one of the 'haunting ground rules' that Regina had rolled her eyes at.
"I'm sure that he just didn't enjoy being in the mansion again. It was never his favourite place," Regina replied with her arms crossed over her chest.
Emma grimaced as she slipped into her bed and said, "I'm sure it was at one point, before the storybook."
"Before your mother gave him the book you mean?"
The saviour rolled her eyes at the hint that it was Snow's fault and she was about to say that she couldn't blame her for everything until she realised that she had no idea what it was that had caused the rift between them.
It couldn't be because Snow was apparently prettier than her, though Emma was quite biased considering that she was sure that Regina was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen.
Even when Regina had ran from the mansion to hug Henry that first day in Storybrooke, it had been one of the first thoughts Emma had about her.
Not that she ever told her that though.
Was there any point telling a ghost that she thought she was hot?
She brushed the thought aside and asked, "what happened?"
Regina drew her eyebrows together and uncrossed her arms before she asked, "what are you talking about?"
Emma shifted a little under the blanket, feeling a little reluctant to ask more directly, but she still replied, "what did Snow do? Why do you hate her? It wasn't in Henry's storybook, but I figure that there must be a real reason for it…"
Regina quirked an eyebrow at the other woman wondering whether she could just remain silent until Emma gave up and went to sleep.
However, this seemed like a good chance to discuss her past with someone who apparently cares about her.
She was pretty sure that Archie cared at least a little but they were still patient and therapist.
There was no real reason for this to be a consideration, but the fact that she'd had feelings for Emma once or twice (she wouldn't admit to more than that) made it a little awkward to discuss Daniel.
Regina blew out a breath and said, "when I was seventeen, I agreed to marry Daniel…the stableboy, but…my mother was adamant that I should marry royalty, she was obsessed that I ```lh become queen. I didn't want that so I was going to run away with Daniel. Unfortunately that was the same day that I met Snow White. I saved her from a runaway horse and she overheard Daniel and I making our plans and my mother convinced her to tell her where we were planning to meet because it meant that I could be her mother. My mother crushed Daniel's heart in front of me and your mother got everything she wanted."
Emma listened to the story with her mouth hung open and replied, "wow, Snow was a…dick."
"Was?" Regina scoffed.
Emma actually laughed at this but became suddenly serious when it occurred to her the gravity of what Regina had told her.
Based on her meeting with the woman in the Enchanted Forest, it was very easy to believe that she would kill her daughter's fiancé but the thought that Regina would go through that and then be forced to marry Leopold made Emma both want go back and confront Cora and also hate her grandfather.
Seriously, he married a seventeen year old just to find his daughter a mother?!
"I'm sorry that happened to you, Regina," Emma said.
Regina tilted her head and inspected the other woman's face, she genuinely cared about her didn't she?
She particularly appreciated that she didn't try to justify it by saying that her mother was only ten.
If nothing else, the last six months had shown her that she had certainly overreacted to the mistake of a manipulated child.
It was probably why stepping in front of the gun had been such an easy decision, why she was willing to break the tether so that Emma could live her life.
The former queen couldn't think of a single thing to say in response to Emma, so she just went with an awkward, "thank you, Miss Swan."
Emma continued to smile at her for a second before she reached over to grab one of the vault books from her bedside table.
Clearly this conversation was over.
They were silent while Emma found the right page until she leaned back into the pillow with a loud exhale, and she looked up at the spirit and decided to finally bring up something that had been bothering her.
"Can you just like…lay down next to me or something…it's hard to sleep with a ghost standing in the corner of my room!"
Regina rolled her eyes but still came over to lay atop the duvet and Emma just took in the sight for a moment.
She kind of wished the woman was wearing night clothes and that she was physically able to get under the blanket.
Despite those limitations, Emma was still blushing a little so she cleared her throat and looked at the book only to turn it to Regina and asked, "what does this symbol mean?"
As hoped, Regina pushed herself a little closer to look at the page.
Considering the emotions of admitting what Cora had done to Daniel and the proximity, Emma had never wished so strongly that she could touch Regina Mills.