A/N: You guys! The response to chapter 18 has been honestly overwhelming. I guess unsolicited cliffhangers really aren't that bad. Anyways, here's the aftermath - and, of course, a little bit of explanation. Enjoy!

CHAPTER 19 – Emma – Guarded

I had no idea what I was doing.

Fueled by adrenaline ad guided by instinct, I only worried about controlling my fear, whilst my body automatically took care of everything else.

As soon as my brain had processed what had happened, everything seemed to proceed in slow-motion: I found myself pressing my hands hard against the wound on Regina's back, my sole care being to reduce the bleeding as much as possible, using my magic to heal the injury and cursing myself for being so goddamn slow at doing so. All the while, I managed to teleport us to the hospital – once again, acting completely irrationally, relying on my guts and not thinking at all. The only working slice of consciousness left inside my mind, thankfully, had the common sense of poofing my mother there as well, and it quickly put together the pieces of information it had gathered during that mayhem, allowing me to explain to the doctors what exactly had occurred.

"Regina has been stabbed with that knife right beside Snow," I explained, registering one of the nurses' motion to grab the weapon and carefully seal it away, whilst another checked on my mother's state. "I believe it was cursed, because I'm having a really tough time stopping the bleeding, my magic doesn't seem to work as quickly as it should. I'll get in the operation room – don't you even dare tell me I can't! – and I sure hope one of you has the good sense of calling Dr. Whale and explaining him what happened. He should still be at Town Hall. If my son hears any of what happened, I'll take it out on every single one of you."

That said, I hopped onto the same stretcher as Regina and put all my effort and concentration into trying to mend the wound, faint white smoke swirling around my bloodstained hands, while some of the nurses and doctors prepped for the surgery and led us into the operation room.

I had even less an idea what I was doing next. I merely followed the instructions the surgeons calmly ordered me, only fleetingly knowing what was happening. I was glad that, over the few years after the first curse had been broken, they had gotten used to collaborating with magical users at performing their medical procedures. If they hadn't, Regina would've probably ended up in even worse conditions than she already was. I was less glad that, to operate, they had to tear Regina's dress, exposing way too much skin for my liking. Looking back at that moment, I do realize just how stupidly inappropriate it was for me to think that: her life was in danger, yet I worried about doctors seeing her underwear. Then again, better to focus on that than the now exposed, open wound.

After an hour and a half of being under the knife – Dr. Whale's appearance surely helped speed up the process – Regina had been dismissed, her injury finally sutured. My irrational thoughts disappeared as soon as the rush of adrenaline wore over, stress and distress flooding me like a tidal wave, accompanied by sudden realization and an incredible amount of weariness. It took great self-control not to puke all over the hospital floors and drag myself behind the nurses and the stretcher where Regina laid still, instead.

They gently lifted her up, moving her onto a hospital bed. They said something about her waking up in a few hours, the current sleeping state due to the shock of losing such a copious amount of blood and the anesthetics they had had to put her under; but I didn't pay attention. My eyes were fixed onto Regina's face: the remainders of her make-up still lingered around her eyes, evident despite the cleaning process she had been put through to wash away the blood. She looked young. Defenseless. It was my intention to keep watch until she woke up; no matter how exhausted I was.

I sat next to the bed, on a recliner that was all bumpy and, likely, the most uncomfortable piece of furniture of all the realms; but that was the last of my concerns, at the moment. Positioning the chair so that I would be facing Regina, I took a seat and started to carefully observe her features, taking in every detail – as if I hadn't already learned up to the smallest, beautiful one by heart – and hoping for a sign that she was waking up.

As I patiently waited, I tried to organize my mind and desperately make sense of why my mother would ever stab Regina. I was positive the knife she used had been cursed, but where would she ever get such a weapon? Besides Regina and I, the only people able to use magic were the fairies, Zelena and…

I froze.

Gold.

Of course he would be behind this. How did I not see it earlier? How could I have been so reckless?! That night, when he stopped by the mansion and tried to make a deal with me…

"What do you want, Gold?"

"Oh, by now you should know there's only one thing I could possibly want from you, Miss Swan."

"I have no intention of making a deal with you. Now, if you don't mind…"

"Yeah, but – see, you're going to want to hear my offer, dearie. That parcel you received? I need it."

"And what would you do for me?"

"I will leave our dear Mayor alone."

... Of course. At the time, I thought he was referring to Regina, and did my best to keep her safe… He wasn't, though. Our dear Mayor…

Mom.

Mom, who had been taking care of mayoral duties while Regina couldn't.

Gold had been, somehow, controlling her for the past six days or so. He couldn't have taken her heart: half of it was in my father's chest, and he hadn't been acting off lately. It must've been a potion or a spell…

I was so engrossed with my reflections and my worry for Regina that I hadn't noticed we weren't alone in the room until someone spoke up.

"She will be fine. You don't need to stay," Ruby said, startling me out of my thoughts. I didn't bother look at her, not wanting to risk missing the moment Regina would come out of sedation.

"Dorothy was going to be fine too, but you stayed with her anyway. How is this any different?" My words were blunt and devoid of emotions. I was drained, I was worried and I was desperately trying not to think – without, unsurprisingly, any success.

The accident had inevitably made me take into consideration the option of losing Regina again, this time in a more final, definitive way. That possibility had torn me apart; even more so than the first time, understandably. But it had also made me realize just how dependent of her I had grown, and how desperately I didn't want her to die. And not only because she was my son's other mother; not only because she had become family; not only because, for the second time, I hadn't had the chance to say goodbye. There was so much business still left unfinished – bringing back her memories was just the tip of the iceberg – so many words unspoken, so many thoughts unshared.

"I'm in love with Dorothy," Ruby explained matter-of-factly, as if it were the most obvious reason why she would do such thing; and, honestly, it was. It didn't surprise me in the slightest – it was so clear that they were in love. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the fond smile Dorothy, still compelled to rest, with an IV slowly dripping right beside her, was giving Ruby.

But my friend's words, despite innocent and harmless, hit me like a thousand pound anvil that landed right on my chest and violently thrust the air out of my lungs. I felt heavy, constricted, as if those three and a half years of utter repression had come crushing down, pinning me to the floor and to the mockingly grinning, wicked pillars of 'truth' – one I had ignored for way too long of a time.

My eyes glossed over as realization washed over me. Small droplets of water trailed down my face, melting my already-ruined make-up and getting lost between loose blond curls and blood-stained satin. They weren't solely due to sadness, nor happiness, nor fear; likely, a combination of the three, which resulted in a way-too-overwhelming flood of emotions, all at once.

Never would I have believed my next words to leave my mouth. In a breath, a whisper so quiet Ruby wouldn't have caught it, hadn't she had supernatural powers, I let out the pivotal sentence that, ultimately, was going to change my life forever.

"And I'm in love with Regina."

A heavy silence followed, only occasionally interrupted by one of the small sobs I couldn't manage to suppress. However, although Ruby's lack of snarky comments aroused my curiosity, I didn't dare taking my eyes off of Regina. Not that I needed to: I could sense the cocky, satisfied grin on Ruby's face, proof that she had known for far longer than myself what feelings I held for Regina. I bet she had started the whole discussion just in order to make me admit to them, the sneaky little shit.

As the silence dragged on, the need to fill it grew bigger and bigger inside me, as well as an intense will to move the subject onto something else – to realize there was a huge-ass elephant in the room was one thing; to openly discuss it, however, was a whole other story.

So I decided to distract her. "Rubes," I called her. I imagined she looked up at me, but I didn't reciprocate the stare. "Would you do me a favor?"

"Shoot," she replied then, helpful as always.

"My mother's here too. She passed out a few hours ago, but I've been with Regina the whole time and haven't heard from her. Would you please go check on her? See how she's doing, if they've sent her home or called my father…" My voice trailed off.

"Course. I'll be back in a sec." The second part of the sentence was quieter, the tone sweeter; I didn't need to see her, to know she was addressing Dorothy.

I heard her leave, and the room fell, once again, into complete silence. Dorothy didn't seem like the invasive or chatty type, and, to be honest, I was glad. I wasn't in the mood for making small talk, and at the moment, dealing with my feelings and finally allowing myself to embrace them was necessary.

I was in love with Regina Mills.

The irony of it was mockingly obvious: I had fallen for the woman who had spent most of her life on a mission to destroy my parents' happy ending; she was part of the reason why I had been an orphan for the past three decades; she was the adoptive mother of my son, and technically my step-grandmother. The odds of us 'finding each other' (as my parents would so schmaltzily put it) had been pretty much inexistent – what with her living in another world and being a good thirty years older than me. Yet, here we were… or at least, I was.

Another handful of panic settled inside my stomach, this time due to an entirely different reason than before: Regina didn't love me back.

I wasn't being coy, I wasn't trying to ready myself for the possibility of her not returning my emotions. I was simply stating a fact, real as the sun and the hair on Leroy's back. Because Regina and I had kissed somewhere around a thousand times, up to that moment; and if she had loved me back, at least one of those kisses would have broken her curse.

It was laughable, really.

Because of course I had to fall in love with the one person, in this town, that was not only just as emotionally fucked up as me, but also the most unlikely to reciprocate my feelings.

And if life wasn't the biggest bitch, then the pounding organ in my chest was definitely the biggest idiot.

But, honestly? I was kind of used to it. Used to being let down, used to people not loving me. As I said, I had been an orphan; from a very young age I had accepted that no one was ever going to care about me. It was the reason why falling in love with Neal had been so easy: for the first time in my life, I felt like someone finally gave a shit. And then, of course, he broke my heart, and I was back to square one – only, with double the amount of trust issues. After that, allowing people behind the walls I had put so much effort into building had not been an option: it took a lot of convincing, a lot of hugging and a lot of pushing before I finally accepted Henry, Snow and David, and especially Hook inside my life.

Regina, however… She wasn't bonded to me by blood, like my son or my parents, and she wasn't basically persecuting me to get in my pants like Hook. There was no material reason for me to love her, and yet there I was – there I had been, for the past three and a half years, slowly but surely falling… and now I had hit the bottom of the precipice, and it hurt like hell. At the beginning of our relationship, all those years ago, when fighting was the highlight of our day, I used to think that Regina was going to be the death of me.

Man, was I right.

But despite all of that, or maybe because of it, I was in love with her, and hurting had never felt so good.

I snorted a small, teary chortle, shaking my head at my heart's poor choices. Jeez, I was becoming a the main character of the lamest romantic comedy in the world.

Ruby chose that moment to re-enter the room, her silent footsteps revealing her identity even though I had my back at her, and another set of stealthy strides in tow. Initially I stiffened, afraid it might be my mother – and God knew I wasn't letting her anywhere near Regina until I was absolutely sure she wasn't under Gold's control anymore – but then my dad's voice broke the silence, and I quietly breathed out a sigh of relief.

"I brought you some coffee," he said as Ruby went back to her girlfriend. He walked around my chair so that he could see me. I didn't look up, keeping my gaze steady on Regina.

"Thanks," I muttered anyway, grateful for the caffeine. I tangled my fingers around the cup, reveling in its warmth and taking a soft sniff at its comforting smell. "How's mom?"

"She's doing okay. Well, at least physically – she's woken up, but she doesn't say a word and stares blankly ahead from her cocoon on her hospital bed. Kinda reminds me of when she killed Cora."

"This wasn't her fault. She was under a spell," I shot back immediately, revealing my intuitions. I knew my mom would react along those lines, once the enchantment on her had finally worn off, and I needed her to know I wasn't blaming her. "About five or six days ago, Gold paid us a visit at the mansion. He said that if I gave him what he wanted, he wouldn't do anything to 'the Mayor'. At the time I thought he was talking about Regina, and I had promised myself that I would do my best to keep the imp away from her… When he didn't do anything, I thought – and it was so stupid of me, so goddamn dumb! – that maybe he had just dropped it and let it go… It didn't even cross my mind that he might do something to mom, since she's the Mayor now. This is all my fault… again."

For the second time, tears welled up in my eyes, but I didn't allow them to fall. I clenched my jaw and gently held Regina's wrist in my hand, the reaction of our magic present as always, although fainter than usual, and the soft and rhythmic pulsating of her heart soothed my soul just like it did every time we slept together.

"I think the only person that should be blamed here is Gold," dad retorted, as he walked closer to me and started stroking my hair. "You didn't do this, baby girl. And I know that, if you're anything like your mother, these are all but empty words… But if you don't want to be strong for yourself, at least do it for Henry. He needs his moms, he can't lose one of them because of a coma, and the other one because she's wallowing in self-blame."

He was right, of course. At my son's name, my heart fluttered a little in my chest, and a warmth that had nothing to do with the coffee I had been sipping on spread throughout my entire body.

"Where is he?" I asked, already dreading the answer. If he was at the hospital and knew what had occurred, he had to be completely devastated – not to mention, just straight-up terrified.

"I asked Granny to keep an eye on him and Neal until I was back. I didn't want him to freak out just yet, so I didn't tell him that his mothers and his grandmother had disappeared and all I had managed to find was a room full of blood… Thank gods the hospital called me shortly after, because I was kind of about to flip out myself, you know, what with half of my family missing." He tittered. "Anyway, I was actually thinking about going to pick him and Neal up, it's getting pretty late."

"Will you bring Henry here?"

"Do you want me to?" he asked, caring.

"I don't want to lie to him. Whale said Regina's fine, she's just still knocked out from the anesthesia, and it won't be long till she'll wake up. I'm sure he can handle that."

"Alright. But honey, take it from your old man: you might want to change, first." He eloquently pointed at my clothes. I only now assimilated my conditions. It was probably a rather grim sight – a lady in a bloodstained evening gown, eyes red from both exhaustion and unshed tears, and makeup smeared all over her face. "I'll stop by the loft and grab you a pair of jeans and a hoodie."

"Thank you." I smiled softly, daring the quickest of glances up at him.

He stayed silent for a second, apparently deciding whether to tell me something or not. Eventually, he spoke. "You should go talk to your mother, you know? It might do her good."

"I'm not leaving Regina," I retorted immediately, my words leaving my mouth almost automatically. "I'll wait for her to wake up, and then I'll go."

Dad simply nodded apprehensively, and I was quite dumbfounded by him not putting up an argument. I had a feeling he had been just as aware about my feelings as Ruby had, although maybe not as openly. He turned away and walked out, the sound of his footsteps fading.

And so, I waited – for Regina to wake up, for Henry to arrive. God knew I needed them. I could hear Ruby and Dorothy's faint whispers, but I didn't pay attention to what they were saying. They did need some privacy, after all, and given the lack of walls to separate them from me, not being nosy was the least I could do.

I kept sipping on my coffee, zoning out and thinking about nothing. I didn't have the moral strength to plan my revenge against the Dark One, nor for another heart-to-heart convo with myself; after all, it wouldn't do me any good – especially the latter. Not thinking about my feelings was the best approach I could take, considering the circumstances: I wasn't going to tell Regina, of course. I didn't want to scare her away from our 'kinda-friends with benefits' relationship, in order to avoid any awkwardness; hence, there was no reason for me to address them at all.

Yeah, I was in love with Regina. Big deal. I could control myself! The fact that I had accepted my feelings didn't mean they were going to affect me, like, at all. I wasn't going to act differently just because of that.

Right?

Right.

I was so lost in my internal debate, my eyes out of focus and fixed on Regina's face, that I jumped in surprise when the softest of hands gently caressed my own, still wrapped around Regina's wrist.

I quickly snapped out of my reverie, and the amount of relief and joy – and fucking love, goddammit! – that invaded me at the sight of her own eyes fluttering open and blinking at the bright lights on the ceiling, had me smiling from ear to ear.

"Hey," I murmured, scooting forward on the chair until my butt was barely touching it to mindlessly stroke her cheek.

She reflectively leaned into my touch, the faintest of smiles creeping onto her own lips, her glassy eyes revealing she was still in a haze.

"Hey," she whispered back, her sight finally focusing, only to get lost in my own, before a confused frown distorted her expression. "What happened?"

"You… got injured," I hesitated, deciding it would be best to ease her into the occurrences of the night. "How are you feeling? Are you in pain?"

She carefully shook her head. "I feel…" She struggled to find the right word. "Heavy. Moving is hard. My back is completely numb."

I let out a relieved chuckle. "Yeah, it's the effects of the anesthesia. You're probably going to puke yellow stuff in a bit." I paused for a second to enjoy the horrified expression my words had provoked. I then made an overly-dramatic, disgusted grimace. "Ugh, and your breath smells like a dying rat!"

I knew I was going to regret it. Trust me, I knew. But her reaction was priceless, and it was so, completely worth it.

She dropped her jaw, and for a second a flash of insecurity – such an apparently foreign concept, when talking about the confident former Queen and Mayor – crossed her face, before shifting to an angry and offended glare.

"Take it back," she ordered, her nostrils flaring dangerously, even after surgery.

"And why would I do that?" I retorted, defiant. "I'm also quite interested in how big the vein on your forehead has gotten. You sure it doesn't have a mind of its own? Maybe we should name it. How about… Gertrude?"

My own grin faltered a bit, at the sight of the evil smirk she then sent my way.

"Very well, Miss Swan," she said, receding to formalities, "guess who's not getting laid for the next month?"

I distinctly felt my face fall at her words, any trace of my previous hilarity now completely erased.

I narrowed my eyes. "You wouldn't."

"On the contrary, dear: I very much would. I would say you had it coming, but that wouldn't be such an appropriate choice of words, now, would it?"

I kept gaping at her. I was left completely speechless. This woman!

A soft giggle from the other side of the room had me turn around to see the fool who had the courage of mocking me for my disgrace. I sent a death glare at Dorothy, who was raising a hand to her mouth as a futile attempt to hide her hilarity. Next to her, however, Ruby couldn't have been reacting more differently: she was displaying the same flabbergasted expression I had been, although due to an entirely different reason.

"You two have sex?!" she exclaimed, her eyes frantically darting back and forth between Regina and I.

"Actually, Miss Lucas, I imagine you could say we used to have sex," Regina retorted, a wicked grin slowly taking over her mouth.

"Why are you so smug about this?!" I found myself asking. "You're in this forced abstinence just as much as me!"

"Indeed. However, unlike you, I'm not going to miss out on much-" Regina's reply was interrupted by the door swinging open and Henry storming inside the room, my father following closely behind. Their intervention brought the heaviness of the situation back, erasing the easiness Regina's awakening – and our bickering – had encouraged.

"Hey kid," I said carefully. I shot a look at my father – Henry wasn't supposed to worry, still here he was – and he shrugged helplessly in response. "How 'bout you calm down a bit, huh?"

Henry gawked at me, mouth agape, and took in my appearance. I shut my eyes, impressed by just how forgetful I could be. Of course he wasn't going to chill out, when one of his mothers laid on a hospital bed and the other one looked like she came straight out of a horror movie.

"You want me to calm down? Really?"

"Kid, it's okay. We're both fine. I'm going to get changed in a bit and your mom is just tired…"

"And what the hell happened?!"

"Language!" three voices snapped at the same time. Henry looked helplessly between David, Regina and I, rolling his eyes in a very 'come-on-I'm-a-teenager-now' way.

"Anyway," I began, unsure how to explain everything that had occurred without traumatizing him. I moved my chair so that I could face him, my hand only now moving from Regina's wrist, detangling from her grip. I was surprised when I felt her fingers wrap around the back of my arm, and I assumed Regina needed the safety of that touch, the confirmation that I was there. I tried not to think about the warmth that spread through me, at that knowledge. "Tonight… your mom and I, we weren't exactly having a great time, at the ball… so we hid in a different room to stay away from all the celebration. You know, it really wasn't our thing.

"Then the lights went out, and when I went back to that room I didn't notice your grandma was there too… And, mind you, I'm sure she was under some sort of enchantment that Mr. Gold cast on her, because she… she had a knife… and stabbed your mother in the back – literally." I noticed his body stiffen at my words, but I didn't stop my narration. "Then she fainted, and I managed to poof us all here. I went into surgery with your mom to help with my magic, and she's just woken up from the anesthesia. Your grandma's fine, too – actually, I was going to get changed now and have a talk with her."

As I finished the explanation, I looked back at Regina, who was intensely returning my gaze, studying my face with a focused expression. She seemed lost in her own thoughts, so she didn't reply to my questioning stare, and I turned back to our son. I blamed it on the painkillers that probably hadn't completely worn off.

"Stay here with your mother while I'm gone, alright? I'll be back in a few minutes." I moved from my seat, and I was startled as I felt Regina's grip around my arm tighten, her face overtaken by fear as I glanced at her. I sat on the edge of the bed right next to her, leaning closer and talking softly, so that the moment would only be ours.

"I'm not going anywhere," I murmured, putting as much strength and truthfulness in that small sentence as I could, aware those words were the exact ones she had whispered to me the previous night. Our gazes were tangled, the bond that had formed between us almost tangible. She held her eyes on mine for a few seconds more, before lowering them with a small nod, an almost imperceptible sigh leaving her lips as I finally stood up.

I felt bad for leaving her already, but I would be back as quickly as I could: my mom needed me, and I couldn't just ignore that.

Once I had put on some clean clothes and washed my face, feeling instantly refreshed but still jaded, I made my way to mom's room.

I found her in the exact position dad had described earlier. She didn't notice my presence until I sat down on her bed.

"Mom?" I called, almost sheepishly. I hated how desperate I sounded, how vulnerable I felt and appeared: although I hadn't noticed earlier, during my time in the other room I had been too focused on Regina to realize just how distressed and upset I actually was. Now, seeing my mother in that state of utter alienation, I couldn't help the weaknesses that took over me.

She focused on me, brows furrowed as she took in the despair I knew I was showing. She slowly sat up, her motherly instincts overpowering her own problems. She brought a hand up to my hair, stroking them lovingly, before speaking up.

"I'm sorry, sweetheart," she confessed with an empty voice that troubled me even more than her words.

"Don't be," I retorted, meaning to interrupt her self-accusation before it got out of hand. "This wasn't your fault. It was Gold's, it was mine – I should've known better than to underestimate the imp. I'm the one who should apologize, not you. Now enough with the self-pity, there are too many people who need you to be strong."

She looked away, once again zoning out. "It was supposed to be you," she let out after a second.

"What do you mean?"

"He wanted me to hurt you. I was aiming at you, I was supposed to stab you, but Regina accidentally got in the way." Her voice cracked. "I was there, knife in hand, my mind completely blank, as I moved to stab my own daughter."

Tears were now freely falling down her face, tracing a pattern of makeup on her pale skin. My sympathy for her grew.

"You couldn't stop. You were controlled by magic, you couldn't have possibly done anything to free yourself. No one, in your position, could have. I don't blame you, mom, and I'm sure Regina doesn't either."

She finally looked up, searching for any trace of a lie in my eyes; but I couldn't have been more sincere. I tried to channel my certainty through my eyes, wanting it to reach her. A bit of warmth retook its place on my mother's demeanor as it eventually hit her.

"How did Gold do it?" I asked then, forcing my way through that crack that I had opened in her newly-built walls.

She didn't need further clarification to know exactly what I was referring to. "A few days ago I found a small box on my desk at Town Hall, with a beautiful necklace inside. I thought it was a surprise from your father, or maybe a present from my employees; but I knew something was off the moment I wore it. It was as if my soul had left my body and was now watching helplessly from a close distance while someone else controlled me. No matter how desperately I fought it, nothing seemed to work. He wanted me to gather as much information about that jewelry box you received as possible… He wanted it, he made me look for it. That's why your room was upside down, when you came over for dinner yesterday.

"I don't know much about why he- why he wanted me to hurt you, it's not like I knew his intentions; I simply followed his orders, that's it. I grabbed a kitchen knife, murmured an incantation I didn't know the meaning of, and waited for the right moment to hit you. As soon as the knife touched Regina, its power faded away and I was back, but I felt so drained that I guess I passed out. The necklace wasn't there anymore, when I woke up."

"Well, I guess that explains why you've been acting so off, recently… I should've noticed. I should've thought about it. Since you and dad share the same heart and Gold couldn't use that to control you, I just assumed you weren't in any real danger – not just now, but ever since Regina split your heart in half. I should have known better."

I dropped my head onto my hands, hiding my face from the sympathetic look that had now replaced mom's guilty one. I let out an unamused chortle as I realized just how alike we were – both ready to cradle in self-accusation, yet forgetting our own issues to comfort the ones we loved. Always putting others first, Charming as that may be.

She didn't question my sudden hilarity, knowing better than to push me to talk; so I just leaned into her hug and stayed there, silently revealing how much I needed my mom and hoping that her maternal instincts would be enough, at least for now, to repel the depression that was haunting her.

There still was an issue I didn't quite know how to face, afraid it would lead mom to another crisis; but her next words thankfully saved me from the burden of bringing it up myself.

"There's nothing more I would want, now, than to go and apologize to Regina," she said, continuing promptly as she felt me stiffen, "but I don't really trust myself, at the moment, and I'm sure you don't either. I don't want to risk losing control again. We've underestimated Gold once, we can't allow ourselves to think this is all over. Maybe his spell is still active, maybe he can still bend me to his will somehow… We can't take that risk."

I nodded, agreeing completely with her words. "I'll tell her you're sorry. Not that it would change anything, considering your history and her infamous commitment to holding a grudge… But it's a start."

A light chuckle erupted from her lips, and my chest suddenly stopped feeling quite so heavy. I found myself smiling in return, and after one last squeeze and a kiss on the cheek that surprised me just as much as her, I left my mother's room to go back to Regina's.

I found Henry engaged in a conversation with my father, clearly meant to fill the otherwise uncomfortable silence; Regina, however, wasn't participating in it, not even making an effort to act like she was listening to them. She seemed lost in her thoughts, but her head snapped up as soon as I entered the room and I read the most desperate of needs in her eyes. I was taking a seat on the mattress in the blink of an eye, my hand slipping protectively in the one she was offering me, and I could almost feel her relief as she cherished the familiar contact of our skin, the tingle we automatically created.

Her eyes never left mine, the shadow that had been over them before I made myself known already vanished. I knew we were drawing attention, but it was the last of my worries, at the moment. I only vaguely remember hearing my father and Henry say goodbye, my only priority now being the woman that had so effortlessly stolen my heart.