Trigger warning: description of attempted rape. Violence. I'll confine it to this chapter, so you can skip it if you prefer.
Emma bought some cheese and fruit from a woman at a stall at the very back of the market. They had laughed and joked together, and Emma was allowing herself to think cheery thoughts, that she would try to come to this stall every week, build up a relationship with the woman. Maybe she could make a friend. She wanted to learn something of this place that Killian had been a part of, that had somehow helped to shape him. She was swinging the basket from her arm, smiling to herself and searching vaguely for Killian, when she felt the pinprick of a blade against her throat and a filthy hand across her mouth.
The man shoved and dragged her into a small alleyway off the market. She could hear loud conversations at the market stalls, the safety of the townfolk only a few short metres away. But here, in the alley, he had her isolated and afraid. She couldn't see Killian. She couldn't see anyone but this stranger, filling her vision and invading her space. He was pressing against her, one of his large hands was pulling at her dress and shoving aside her cloak. His fingernails dug into her arm.
"Don't you look an exotic little surprise?" he hissed. "I might take you home afters, have you a few more times."
"Keep that knife on 'er," she heard a second voice, also a man, and tried to turn towards it. The knife pressed more sharply into her neck. "Arthur said she's got magic, but she can't use it if we get some of that potion into her blood."
Emma's heart beat faster and she fought the icy feeling in her veins that tamped down her magic with panic and haze. She tried to think clearly, to muster her force, to summon her magic. But as the knife bit into her neck a bit more, she felt it fade away, draining out with the trickle of blood that ran down her throat. The knife had some sort of poison on it, and it was causing her vision to blur. She fought to keep herself alert and calm. If she could get rid of the man with the knife, she might have a chance.
One of the men was pulling up her skirt, gripping her thighs so tightly that she could feel bruises forming. She tried to kick him away. She kneed him once beneath his chin, but that only made him grip her more harshly. The other man brought the knife down to the tops of her breasts, above the line of her dress, leaving a few small cuts there to soak the potion into her bloodstream.
"We need to get her to Arthur. It's a long ride," said the man with the knife. "Come on with you. You can tie her down later, when we break for camp."
"A moment, lad. I just want a little taste of 'er…"
Emma didn't hear the rest. She felt the knife fall away and clatter to the ground. The man who had held it stuttered and choked. She saw blood well up in his mouth and he stumbled a step back from her, yanked away by the dagger that was buried in the muscle and sinew of his thick neck. She recognised the carved handle of the dagger as Killian's.
Emma felt the stranger's hands slide off her, dragging down across her breasts, across her hips, as he slid to the littered ground of the alley. Killian hauled him backwards, keeping the blood off Emma. Killian stepped to the side before he pulled out the dagger, the practiced move of a man aware that removing the blade would let blood shoot out to the side. Emma tried to hold herself up against the alley wall, tried to kick again at the man kneeling in front of her, but the poison was pulling her downwards. Her vision started to blacken, and her last thought as she lost consciousness was that Hook would destroy these men for what they had done and what they had intended doing.
…
One minute to lose track of her, and another six before he located her: adrenaline sped him past panic and straight into hunting mode. Anything could happen in 7 minutes. He did not run frantically around the market; he did not draw attention to himself. He found a pile of boxes that afforded a clear view of the entire market square. He spent the first minute scanning for Emma; she was gone. He spent the next minute locating every possible exit and alleyway. Then he began a systematic search of each possibility.
He found her in a dark, narrow passageway behind the furthermost part of the market. He saw the blade against her throat and a man's hands under skirt. He saw blatant fear and he saw tears. One man, the one with the knife to her jugular, had his back to Killian. With no hesitation, he drove his dagger deep into the man's body, just inside the collarbone. He sliced his blade along, making sure to sever the major arteries so that there was no chance of survival. As Killian cut in, he dragged the man's body away from Emma with the blade, to avoid the man collapsing on her and spilling his blood across her.
The second man was on one knee in front of Emma, his hands high up her skirt. Killian put his boot into the man's chest with full force. The man's head hit the stone wall of the passageway with a sickening crack. Killian grabbed the head by both ears and twisted until he heard the spine snap.
Killian ran his blade across the man's trousers to clean it, then slipped it back into his boot. He cleaned the blood off his hands the same way. Emma had collapsed against the wall. He scooped her up in his arms and swept her out of the alley, through the back streets and away from the town centre. A few streets safe away, he set her back down, and revived her enough that with his arm around her waist to support her, he could guide her back up the road to the clifftop.
He said nothing to her until they were back inside the villa, the door locked securely behind them, and he was assured that no one was following him. He took off her cloak and checked her for serious injury. The rivulet of blood on her neck had begun to dry, as had the cuts on her breasts. He sat her in one of the armchairs near the fire. He took off his jacket and saw some blood had seeped into the edges of his shirt sleeve. He pulled the shirt over his head and tossed it on the fire. Killian washed his hands at the pump in the bathroom, then pulled on a clean shirt. He brought out some clean linen, soap and water to wash out her cuts.
Emma was breathing heavily when he returned, panting slightly with delayed panic. He picked her up, slid into the armchair himself and then pulled her into his lap. She curled up against him and finally let the dam of her fear and revulsion burst, and she began sobbing into his chest. Killian held her close and stroked her hair and back until she cried out the fright and anger.
"Are they dead?" she managed, at last.
"Yes," Killian said softly. He breathed in and then out again, waiting for that to sink in. Then he asked, as directly and unemotionally as possible, "What did they do? Tell me now; it will be harder for you to talk about this later if we don't talk now."
Emma shuddered in his arms, and tears started welling up in her eyes again. "He had a knife to my throat; they knew about my magic. They said Arthur told them. The knife was dipped in some sort of potion or poison that blocked my magic."
Killian's jaw twitched involuntarily. The anger that he had been holding back for her sake felt ready to explode; he wanted to kill the men all over again. But this was not about him; he was not the target of the aggression. He shoved his reaction down so deep that all that was left on his face was concern for her.
"You did the right thing," Killian soothed. "You're still here, so you made the right choices."
Emma exhaled and nodded, she cuddled a bit more snugly into his arms. He willed himself not to stiffen, not to react, no matter what she said next.
"He was grabbing at me, digging into my thighs, but you … you killed him before anything much could happen," she said quietly.
Killian nodded. "Are you hurt? Did he hurt you?"
"Only a bit. The cuts, and there will be bruises," she said, her voice nearly whisper by now. "He knew of Arthur. He knew Arthur wanted me. He said he was going to hand me over, after he was done with me."
Killian blew out the breath he had been holding and he couldn't help it, he sat her back a bit and took her face in his hands. "I am so sorry, Emma. I am so sorry that I lost track of you. I am so sorry that this happened and that he touched you and that you were frightened." He drew another breath. "I underestimated the danger… again. First the portal and now this."
Emma shook her head. "Please don't blame yourself for this," she settled her hand over his heart. "I'd like a bath. I want to get his residue off of me. Just run some cold water; I'll try to use magic to heat it. See if it's working."
Killian kissed her, pressed his forehead to hers and then got up and did as she asked. She followed him to the bathroom, now stripped of mod cons but still in possession of a water pump and a tub. He filled the tub and then helped her out of her dress. He could see finger-shaped bruise marks on her thighs, and it made him want to punch through the wall. Not about me, he repeated to himself in his head.
Holding his hand, she willed back enough magic to heat the water warm enough for a soak. She climbed in, sank back and let him run soap over her hair and her cuts, removing the blood and dirt. She tried to square the image of Killian in Storybrooke, laughing with her parents over dinner, taking Henry sailing and walking her down the street, with Hook killing those two men brutally and without question. If the situation had been reversed, she would have done the same, she knew. It's not like his moral compass was pointing a different direction than hers. If those men had escaped with their lives, they would have brought Arthur to their doorstep in hours or days.
She coaxed Killian into the bath with her. She could see droplets of blood on his face, blood on his trousers. They washed each other down, until all the blood and sweat and dirt were gone. Then they curled up under the covers of their big bed. They were both still processing what had happened, what they should do now, what this meant for them. Emma didn't want their thoughts to take them in different directions, so she started talking.
"What are we going to do about Arthur?" Emma asked.
"Arthur sent those two rapists after you," Killian said. "We are going to find him and destroy him."
It was Captain Hook's answer. She hesitated. Hook and Killian aren't different people, she told herself. Killian is Hook; Hook is Killian. "We don't know what Arthur wants. We don't know that those two were following his orders as he issued them."
"If I gave an order to attack another ship, my men would know that any attempt to force themselves on a woman they found on it – it would be death. I would eviscerate rapists on the deck of my ship, to set that rule in stone and fear. That one rule, they would never disobey. Arthur should control his agents in the same way. If he doesn't, then he is to blame for their actions."
"I need to think that over tonight," Emma answered cautiously. Killing still bothered her, made her think they should find another way.
"All right, love. We can continue that discussion tomorrow. We'll form a plan together," he agreed. "I still have some old family connections here. We need to establish a network, people we trust, who can look out for us, inform for us."
Now, that was a Killian answer. Emma knew she had to stop thinking in a dichotomy. She would work on that tomorrow as well.