Emma lets me into Regina's front door with a spare key, her face still grim as I continue my rant.
"But Emma, think about it, you can't cut just them down. I mean, there are people who want to go back and that's their choice, the same way not wanting to go back would be our choice. I don't know if they're entirely informed about the ogres …But we can't take away the choice of going back for them. If we could just get in a room with Snow and talk about what would be the right way to proceed, we don't need to…" my voice trails off at the sight of Regina, in a t-shirt and tailored jeans chasing Henry through the hall.
"I got you!" she cries, bundling him up in her arms and covering the top of his head with kisses as they collapse to the carpeted floor. He's giggling uncontrollably, he grabs her wrist and goes "You're it! You're it! You're it!" when she looks up and sees Emma she sort of melts. Henry stumbles forward and approaches his birth mom with his hand upraised, they slap a quick high five and Emma beams at him. Regina pulls some of her hair out of her eyes. It's incredible to see her there, sitting in the hall, completely relaxed, uncharacteristically joyful.
"We decided to allow a game of tag inside the house to celebrate Henry's homecoming. Also don't go in the kitchen." Regina's voice, which is bubbling over with happiness, takes on a little bit of her usual sternness at the end of the sentence. She gives Emma a "Don't question me" sort of look that fairly zaps little old bystander me with its electricity.
"Don't go in the kitchen, Emma!" Henry squeals, jumping a little as kids will do when they're super excited and have forgotten to be cool.
"Can I run in and just get some water?" I ask Henry, and he nods before turning to talk excitedly to his moms, flopping into Regina's lap. Regina looks up at Emma and in my peripheral vision I can see Emma sink to her knees next to her, tussling Henry's hair with one hand while staring, awestruck at Regina.
"Hey you." I hear her murmur, and I wind my way into Regina's huge, immaculate kitchen. There's a curtain of ribbons just inside the door to the kitchen, I look up and realize there's at least two dozen balloons bopping around the ceiling. There's a rented helium tank and a packet of balloons are strewn on the counter, alongside a cake still cooling on a baker's rack. In colorful letters hanging from one side of the room to the other is a banner that reads "Welcome Home Emma!" and the sight of it tugs the corner of my mouth until I smile. My phone rings and I see Snow's name on the display.
"Hey Ruby…" she sounds a little shy. Whenever we fight she gets really weird about talking about it later. Sometimes she'll do this- try to skip the part where she apologizes or tries to make some resolution. "I heard from Grumpy that you and Emma came by the beanstalks earlier today. You didn't…" she's not sure how to ask. "You didn't tell Emma about…"
"Yeah." I say with finality. "Yeah, I did."
I can feel the chill on the other end of the line. "I can't believe you would do that. Red, I trusted you. I trusted you more than anyone."
"I told you if you didn't tell her, I would."
"You realize you may have cost me my daughter and her grandson?"
"Or saved them from being killed by ogres, Snow."
"Mr. Gold took care of the ogres the first time they came to our land." Snow's voice is furious. "As soon as he's back all that will be handled."
"You're going to entrust the enchanted forest to the protection of the Dark One?!" I clutch the counter. "Snow, listen to yourself. You're putting everything in Mr. Gold's hands. This is probably what he's been planning all along. His grandson is the heir to the throne and you're trying to get Emma, the Princess, partnered with his son. Don't you see what's happening? You're handing him your kingdom on a silver platter."
"Blame Regina for that. She put us in a position where we'd need Gold to take us home. To undo the damage she's caused to our land. And now Emma wants to be with her? Instead of a Prince? Instead of her child's father?"
"Her child's father? You mean Neal? Neal barely knows Henry. That's sort of a reach."
"Fine." Snow snapped. "If you want to stay here, then that's your choice Red. That's your precious, precious freedom to live here. I just really hope when you wake up and everyone but you and Regina are gone, you don't regret it."
She hung up on me and I almost shouted a response into the empty kitchen. I could barely reel my anger in. I strode out to the hall, where Regina and Emma were talking, their faces so close Emma's long hair was practically brushing Regina. I could just pick up the end of their conversation.
"…Mr. Gold. Who, I guess, is now in league with Snow because he's keeping them 'cloaked' according to Grumpy…" Emma was saying.
"Because she was worried I'd follow her back there?" Regina interrupted, cocking her head, one hand on her hip, looking on the brink of a fit of sardonic laughter. "Are you kidding me? Back to the middle ages? I'm hoping to live past forty, thanks very much."
"Emma." I said "Sorry to interrupt, but can you take me into town? I need to go to Granny's. Now."
The Saturday evening late lunch rush. There were people waiting outside to be seated for an early dinner and diners still enjoying lunch specials inside. Every stool at the counter was taken and the booths were filled to bursting. Granny saw me come in the door and sighed dramatically with relief. "Bless you child, you read my mind!" she said. "I need all hands on deck."
"Sure thing, I just need to do something real quick." I grabbed the white board markers for the sandwich board outside, stepping out into the afternoon sunshine and hunching in front of it, erasing "Chicken Pot Pie Today!" with my sleeve and replacing it with three words that sent the crowd out front completely quiet. Then I went into the diner, straight back to the chalkboard that hung over the bar and wiped out the price of our various glasses of wine. Drawing with the biggest chalk pen we have I wrote:
"OGRES ARE BACK"
In foot-tall letters. The bustling diner became quiet as I turned around. No more forks hitting plates or laughing conversation. Instead, about half of Storybrooke looked up at me and the chalkboard in wordless horror.
"In the Enchanted Forest." I said, my voice wavering but carrying over the crowd. "Just thought everyone should know, in case anyone is planning a trip back anytime soon. Might want to wear a helmet." I turned to Gran. "I'll take over orders for the booths if you want, or I can run the counter." Granny just looked at me, her face stricken. I heard a cup clatter to the floor and James rose to his feet, his face pale. The crowd turned toward him as he stood and walked over to me.
"Can I talk to you outside?" James said under his breath. I bristled, but allowed him to lead me by the arm out to the sidewalk. Another group of people were gathered around the sandwich board I'd just marked up. He lead me past them, they stared after us. I noticed a couple people waiting had gotten up and were running across the street, probably to announce the news at other stores on main street's busiest market day. I felt a surge of triumph that the news was spreading.
"Red, what's gotten in to you? I thought you were on our side." His piercing blue eyes cut right through me. "Snow called me crying saying you were coming back to the Enchanted Forest with us and now, what, you're trying to dissuade other people too?"
"I'm not trying to dissuade anyone. I'm just trying to help people make informed choices. If you and Snow are going to take people back to the Enchanted Forest, then you should let them know they're walking into danger."
"Mr Gold-" James started, but I put a hand up, unable to hear the man's name again.
"I don't want to know what Mr. Gold is going to do about it. I want to know what you're going to do about it. Because I signed up to fight on the side of the good guys. Which is who I thought you and Snow were. Not to team up with the freaking Dark One."
James has nothing to say to this. I turn around and walk back towards Granny's, confident I can serve out some good dinners and objective information to the crowd that's gathering around the front of our diner.
"They say Mr. Gold is going to do something about it, but you know him- his help doesn't come cheap." I find myself saying for perhaps the hundredth time. The sun is starting to set, my legs and feet are killing me from running from table to table, but I couldn't just throw out the news the ogres were back without explanation.
"Well this is shocking. We had planned to return to the Forest once the Prince and Princess had the beanstalks ready for travel. But now…" the young couple in front of me looked at each other and intertwined fingers. The girl- I'm pretty sure she was one of Cinderella's waiting women in a former time, but those memories are hazy- placed her hand on her tummy. "We're expecting."
"We want to go back someday but-" the guy beside her clenches his jaw. "Just walking unprepared into a world with the ogres? Even if Mr. Gold could eventually take care of them, as you say he's promised- there's just no way I'll risk bringing our baby into that."
The ogre wars ended before I was born, but everyone in the Enchanted Forest knows the cost they took in lives on the land. A generation of knights and soldiers fell trying to keep them under control, and eventually things became so desperate the old great Kings- Snow's grandfather, included- sent legions of children off to keep the ogres busy on the battlefields, buying time while they fortified city gates. Rumplestiltskin stopped all that when he became the Dark One, and since his protection was withdrawn from our world the ogres had returned from whatever dark places in the forest and mountains they had scattered. It was like learning dinosaurs had come back to Earth, if dinosaurs had killed all your ancestors and you heard horror stories about them every night as a kid.
Emma and Regina are at their back booth with Henry. The thing about the falling out with Snow means no more endless free babysitting, I guess, but they look pretty happy hanging out as a trio. Henry is working on a macaroni and cheese and Emma and Regina are sharing a piece of apple pie when I walk over to their table.
"Hey." Emma gives my hand a squeeze. "you've been amazing today. This was a heroic thing to it kept me from having to chainsaw a lot of beanstalks."
"Thanks." I smile back at her. "Look, the moon is coming up soon, I have to take off-" I glimpse over my shoulder at the darkening street. "Do you mind just…if anyone starts asking Granny about the ogres-"
"I'll fill them in. I don't have the grasp on the history lesson but I'm one of the few people in town who's seen them firsthand." Emma nods confidently.
"I can tell you all about ogre history." Regina says to Emma, and turns to me. "You go on ahead and enjoy your…night hike in the woods." Regina smiles a wicked smile. My bones tremble in response to the thought of the woods. Running. The metallic ring of rabbit's blood in my mouth. The wolf in me can barely be contained at the thought, and the moon hasn't even risen yet.
Before I go the woods though, I go upstairs to my room, change into a black dress (it'll be easier to slip out of than my jeans and leather jacket) and send Belle a text:
Thinking about you all day today 3 your animal