I don't own any characters from Once Upon a Time.
Thank you so much to everyone who read/favorited/followed my story. If it wasn't obvious from chapter 7, this chapter should confirm that I am definitely a cat lover.
As always, I am keeping my fingers crossed for some more reviews. (-:)
Chapter 12
It wasn't until the next day that Cora, still wearing her blue dress, walked into Gold's shop.
She greeted him with a smile, presented the magic globe that would enable him to find his son, asked him to let her and Regina live, and sealed their deal with a kiss. He hoped that would be as much as he had to endure of the woman's presence but he was wrong.
"You know, I had a little accident when I first came to town. It seems that stepping out into the road with one of those carriages…cars…nearby is rather dangerous. Still, it was quite worth it. A very interesting woman got out of her car to help me."
"What are you talking about now, Cora?" His words were a growl that would have any other person cowering in fear.
"I asked Regina all about her. Lee Gold, my, my." The silky sweet voice continued to fill the shop.
"That's none of your business, Cora."
"Oh, I beg to differ. You see I have looked at a pencil sketch of that woman's face ever since my grandmother's diary came into my possession a few years ago."
"Why did you have a sketch…."
"Still have, Rumple dear, right here with me," Out of her pocket she pulled an old piece of parchment with a picture of a woman with dark hair arranged at the nape of a long swan-like neck, her shoulders left bare and surrounded by what looked like a rich, velvet gown. One look at Rumple's face was enough to confirm all Cora needed to know.
"Oh, I know that's not a picture of Leena. That's a picture of the famous Farini Queen, Alicia. What did they call her, Dragon-rider Queen, Fire in the Sky, something like that? You see, my grandmother met her once. It appears that my grandmother fell down in the courtyard carrying sacks of flour just like I did when that sniveling wench that was Snow White's mother tripped me. Alicia and her wizard happened to be passing by. She helped my grandmother, told Renik to put her flour back in the sacks, and asked if she wanted to come to a dance that was being hosted at the King's Palace that night. She gave her a gown, had a maid fix her hair, and looked after her all evening. The next day she left her a bag of gold coins with more money that my grandmother could hope to see in five years and went back to her realm. Years later, before my father drank all of it away, my grandmother used some of that money to pay a school teacher to write all of this down for her and to buy that pencil sketch from some Farini traders passing through her village. I think it's rather ironic that my grandmother got a beautiful Queen and I got, well, you. Oh, I am not complaining mind you, but imagine my surprise when the last entry in my grandmother's diary said that the beautiful queen married a wizard. For the longest time I thought it was Renik she married until I heard quite an interesting rumor to the contrary. Fascinating story, Rumple, a story of True Love, if you know whose minds to probe for memories."
"All of this was ancient history before you were born, Cora."
"Leena isn't so ancient, is she? I would say she is very much in the present, and, as Regina tells me, so is a young lady named Belle." Her sly tone of voice made Rumplestiltskin want to strangle Cora on the spot.
"What do you want Cora?"
"Oh, Rumple, don't be like that," she actually had the nerve to brush her hands over the lapels of his suit. "I am sure Renik will happily find a good use for Leena if you don't. But then of course from what I know of the Farini Wizard, I am sure he already has." And with that she snapped her fingers and winked out of sight.
As soon as Cora left he used the globe to pinpoint the location of his son in Boston. He then took out his cell phone, dialed Lee's number, and asked her to meet him at the shop to discuss something extremely important. He made sure his voice carried enough urgency to convince her to come without asking too many questions over the phone. A few minutes later, she walked in his shop.
"What's going on Rum? What is so urgent?" She wore black yoga pants with a blue short sleeved top and for a few seconds the urge to take her in his arms overwhelmed him. As soon as she came close enough, he settled for taking her hands in his.
"Lee, I know my son's location in Boston."
"That's wonderful. Now you and Emma can go find him."
"There goes Renik being a font of information again." But at this point he didn't allow himself to feel angry or frustrated and simply focused on what he had to say next. "Lee, I want to ask you to come with me and Emma to Boston. Call it intuition or foresight or whatever, but I don't think I can do this without you." He didn't know what he counted on more, that she knew how much this meant to him after standing by him through August's deception or the fact that a Farini royal had not been born who walked away from a cry for help. Still, he breathed a sigh of relief when she nodded her head in agreement.
"If you are sure you want me there, of course I will go with you."
"Thank you, Lee you don't know how much this means to me."
"Rum, I just want to make it clear. Maleficent is recovering from surgery but when we come back she will be able to start training with a rider."
"I know Lee, I know. Let's just take this one step at a time." Her smile gave him the strength to continue, "Now, I need you to go home and pick out an object you care about a great deal…what?" He didn't understand why this particular pronouncement would cause her to start laughing.
"Oh, no, Rum. Renik and Blue started working together on a potion to restore memory as soon as Mr. Clark stepped over the town line. They don't have a potion that does that quite yet but they did come up with something to keep someone from losing their memories. Marina and I drank it just to be on the safe side."
"I already have a spell to do that. He is wasting his time with Blue."
"Oh, Renik knows about your spell. He put one of his mirrors on a tree branch by the town line just in case someone got too close and saw you testing your potion on Mr. Smee. He said it was ridic…ah…somewhat impractical." When she saw the look on his face she quickly took a few steps toward the door. "Packing, I am going to go do some packing."
It was unfortunately at this moment that Marina walked through the door carrying a big grey and white, long haired cat in her arms.
"Look who I found wondering outside on the sidewalk," she placed the cat on top of the glass counter and when both women became completely oblivious to anything but the animal and commenced to pet, kiss, and talk nonsense at the beast, Rumplestiltskin knew it would do no good to try and get the cat away from them or his glass counter. He closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable cloud of white smoke to announce Renik's arrival. It took all of ten seconds for him to be proven right.
"Why is my wife handling an enchan..." His voice seemed to boom around the store even before he fully materialized in their midst.
After one look at Marina and Leena, who were so absorbed by the animal they did not even acknowledge his presence, Renik glared at Rumplestiltskin and pointed his finger at the back room. If the two women were inclined to listen to the conversation going on behind the curtain they would have heard words like
"accident…he tried to steal the shawl..."
"my house is practically a second animal shelter… stray cats sleeping in my bed…that's your great-granddaughter…what were you thinking…"
"supposed to be a rat, saw Marina walk out of the shop across the street…reminded me of your infernal panther-cats…."
"I will handle this," Renik came out from behind the curtain.
"Ladies, if I could ask you to please step away from the cat for just a moment?" With surprised looks Marina and Lee stepped away from the animal. Renik then proceeded to take the cat off the counter and the next moment they saw it transformed into a very frightened Smee who took off running at top speed out the door.
"Renik, why did you turn that beautiful cat into that man?" Marina spoke quietly to her husband.
"Yes, why did you do that, Renik?" Rumplestiltskin walked toward the group gathered in his shop.
"Marina, sweetheart, you do understand that the cat was originally a man and someone who shall remain nameless," he shot another glare in Rumplestiltskin's direction, "turned him into a cat." Renik gently spoke to his wife.
"I think I am going to be sick," Marina grabbed onto her husband's arm.
"I don't feel good," Lee actually grabbed onto Renik's other arm.
In the next moment they were seated on chairs in the back room of the shop with Renik waving a bottle of smelling salts under both women's noses.
"Now listen, Marina, Lee. Think about this logically." Renik now spoke slowly and calmly. "You didn't actually touch that man. When he was a cat, he was a real cat, a beautiful cat who no one could help picking up and fussing over."
Rumplestiltskin wanted to bang his head against the wall when this explanation elicited nods of agreement from both women.
"Now, I am going to transport you back to your room at Granny's, then Marina and I will go home, and we will all try to forget this ever happened." With a last angry glare in Rumplestiltskin's direction all three people winked out of his shop.
When Belle came in a few minutes later, he blamed his excitement about finally being close to finding his son, convincing Lee to come to Boston and the entire ridiculous cat/Smee incident, for making the mistake of asking her to come with him to the town line to test his memory spell.
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Reviews are very much appreciated!
And they are off to Boston and a little more serious turn to the story in the next few chapters.