AN: I suck at writing action, so bear with me. Also, this chapter will really make much more sense if you've already read 'Burnt Offerings'…
IV: Kindness
I:
For the first time, Emma felt truly lost. It was the first time she had felt really alone in this world. Not knowing where the man had gone distressed her. He was her only real link to Storybrooke, to where she belonged. She had known exactly where he was at any given moment in the days she'd been here, and she did not know what to do now.
The marketplace unfolded in a riot of colours, sounds, scents, and bodies. She craned her neck, hugging her packages close to her as she looked around, trying to spot him. She tried to catch people's eyes, asking if they'd seen a limping man with a staff, but most shrugged or walked on by.
Finally, a young woman struggling with a small sheep on a red ribbon pointed her in the direction of the livestock booths, clumped on the far side of the plaza. She thanked her and hurried off, shouldered about by the crowds.
It made sense for him to head in this direction, she realized, since he planned on buying eggs and meat. She jumped, startled, when a chicken suddenly fluttered up into her face, clucking and flapping its wings. A man lunged out and snatched it by the legs, glaring at her as though she were responsible. She gave him a look and moved on.
A woman nearby shouted at another vendor, clutching two dirty children by their wrists, a third and forth clinging to the backs of her skirts. Beyond, a man cut fish into strips, waving pieces over his head, his words completely unintelligible.
The air was rank with sweat, animals, and meat, and Emma fought a brief moment of panic as she gagged. This place was not like the quiet hamlet where the spinner lived. It was noisy and overcrowded, almost violently so.
She stepped out of the way of a young boy leading a skinny donkey through the mess of people, heading towards a booth near the back wall. Watching him go, she saw a dark doorway opened up just beyond the animal market, revealing a shaded alleyway that wound behind the houses lining the plaza.
Her senses told her this would be a good place to step out of the bustle for one reason or another, so she shouldered her way towards it, hoping the man might have had the same idea.
The alley was dark, the area overhead lined with thick wooden slats, creating another level of housing above her head. She blinked repeatedly, adjusting her eyes to the dimness and her ears to the relative quiet away from the crowds. Ahead, she heard a man cry out, a voice she recognized, and she broke into a run.
There were three of them; two middle-aged men and one not much more than a boy. The boy held a walking stick uncertainly in one hand, staring at the other two with trepidation. The men crowded around a body on the ground, their posture menacing.
Rumpelstiltskin lay on his side, curled against the wall, shaking his head as one of the men kicked at him with his boot. "I haven't done anything, please..." He pleaded, wringing his hands together at his collarbone.
"You've got a lot of nerve showing up around here again," The man said, pressing his foot against his stomach, applying pressure. His companion laughed darkly at that, and he continued, "I thought I told you I didn't want to see your face anymore."
"I have to work," He protested, pushing weakly at the man's boot with his trembling hands. "Madam Grenelda expects me..."
"Madam Grenelda can find plenty of spinners. Women doing women's work."
"It's all I can do..." He whispered, going still.
"Aye, that's true now, isn't it? And whose fault is that?" He aimed a kick then at his bad leg, making the man cry out, voice high and reedy with pain.
Having seen enough of this, Emma dropped her parcels and strode up to the boy. Without saying a word, she grabbed him by the shoulder, pulling him around as she raised her fist, punching him in the face.
He fell to his knees and she scooped up the walking stick, turning just in time to raise it against one of the men when he came at her. She swung the stick like a bat and it connected with his ribs, making him stumble. A well-placed kick sent him spinning to the side.
She ducked the other man when he charged at her, abandoning his victim on the cobblestones. She went for his head with the stick this time, catching him in the neck with limited success. Spinning, she put herself between Rumpelstiltskin and the men, her back safe from an attack.
The leader came at her again, and Emma caught her breath as he grabbed hold of the collar of her dress. Jerking her shoulders, she pulled free, feeling the fabric pull and rip at the seam. Bringing her knee up, she forced it between his legs, making him stagger back with a howl.
His companion was checking on the boy, who was now sitting up clutching his broken, bleeding nose.
"Get the hell out of here," She snarled at them, brandishing the staff again.
At the mouth of the alley, the commotion had attracted a few onlookers, including the man with the chickens, his beefy arms folded across his leather apron, expression heavy, and the boy with the donkey. The men looked at Emma and back at the crowd.
Eventually, they turned away, muttering and limping towards the plaza.
Once she was satisfied they were gone, she knelt beside Rumpelstiltskin, helping him sit up. "Are you all right?" She demanded urgently, combing his hair out of his face.
His lip was bleeding where he had bitten it, and she could see a bruise darkening around his throat. He took several quick, shallow breaths, balling his hands into fists and releasing them rapidly, fingers trembling.
"Hey..." She said more gently, tucking a bit of hair behind his ear. "It's okay. You're okay. Can you stand? Do you think you can walk?"
He nodded, licking his lips, frowning reflexively when he tasted the blood. She stood up and held out her arm to him. He shifted his weight against her, taking the staff in his right hand as he gripped her arm with his left.
For a moment, he managed, but then his knees buckled and she caught him against the wall, wrapping her arms around his middle as she lowered him back down. "Okay... Okay, so that's not going to work..."
Emma turned when she heard hooves clopping on the cobblestones nearby. Looking up, she saw the boy with the donkey standing there, his expression sad. "Is he all right?" He asked quietly.
She shook her head, "I don't know. He's hurt."
"...I live in the village. I can take him home," He replied finally.
Rumpelstiltskin looked up then, expression incredulous then, eyes shining with unshed tears. He seemed stunned by the boy's generosity.
"That'd be great, thanks," Emma answered, smiling.
II:
It took less work than she would have liked to lift the man onto the beast's back, and she walked alongside him, one hand on his back to steady him as he leaned over the animal's neck, arms wrapped around it.
She'd tied their various bags to the basket filled with the boy's own purchases, having recovered most of the food the man had bought before being set upon in the alley. He said nothing during their journey, concentrating on staying on the donkey. The boy walked silently ahead of them, pulling the rope tied to the animal's bridle gently, taking his time.
The sun was low in the multi-coloured sky as they broke the tree line and Emma realized they had been gone the entire day. People looked up as they came into the hamlet, lowering their heads together and pointing in their direction. The boy squared his shoulders and continued, looking back at Emma with a faint smile.
When they reached the spinner's house, Emma took their bags, running them inside before returning to help the man down.
To her surprise, when she returned, another man, clearly the boy's father, stood there, holding out a hand to Rumpelstiltskin, offering to brace him as he stepped down.
Shakily, he did so, leaning heavily on the man, nearly falling again before he could get his staff under him. The man caught him, big hands almost gentle as he helped set him back onto his feet.
"...Thank you," He whispered, looking at the man and boy through his hair, shoulders hunched fearfully.
The man nodded silently, taking the donkey's bridle and turning away. His son followed him, only to turn back and call, "...I'm sorry. ...About the rock."
Rumpelstiltskin's mouth opened into a silent exhalation of surprise. Finally, he shook his head, "...Don't worry about it."
The boy nodded as well, looking even more like his father for a moment, before turning and running down the path the way the other man had gone.
Emma ducked her shoulder under his, tugging his left arm to lean across her shoulders, taking his weight, dismayed again at how fragile he seemed. "Okay, so let's get you inside..."
III:
He lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling, a faint flush in his cheeks as he tried not to look at her. She had helped him remove his tunic and his trousers, leaving him in his undershirt and bloomer-like undergarments. Pushing his undershirt up to his shoulders, she gently felt his ribs, checking for any broken bones. His stomach was bruised, but nothing seemed to be broken, a great relief considering what the medical circumstances in this place were likely to be.
His left leg was badly swollen behind the knee, a dark lump that spread up into his thigh, and his skin was scraped on his legs and arms. She sucked in a breath when she looked at his right leg, covered in scaly scar tissue that looked more like a burn than a wound. The muscle twisted as it moved behind his knee, thick and coiled under his skin, taunt and hard. Gently, she pulled his blanket up over his legs, tugging his shirt back down.
"I'll heat up what's left of the stew, okay?" She said, moving through the room to the hearth.
He didn't respond, still staring at the roof, his expression desolate.
She finally coaxed him to talking as she put away the purchases from the market, getting him to explain in short, clipped sentences where everything went. Some of the wool was dirty now, where it had been kicked away from him in the alley, but he assured her it would wash. Excusing herself, she went out to the well, carrying the bucket.
The woman who had spoken to her the first night sat on the well alone, her companion nowhere in sight. When she saw Emma, she stood up, hand dipping into her shawl. "Here..." She said, offering Emma a wrapped parcel.
Eyebrows rising in a question, Emma took it, folding back the corner to reveal a loaf of bread. "...Thanks..."
The woman smiled, taking her bucket from her hand and turning to the well, looping the rope around it with a practiced twist, lowering it down. Emma leaned against the stone wall, biting her lip in confusion.
"I heard he was hurt earlier." The woman said softly, looking down into the well. "That some men beat him and robbed him."
"Yeah."
"He's not..."
"...Well-liked. Yeah, I got that. I don't get why, though."
The woman smiled at her faintly before drawing up the bucket. "I was going to say he's not a bad man. He didn't deserve that, no matter what they say."
Emma took the offered bucket, clutching the bread to her chest. When the woman didn't say anything else, she turned and started back towards the house.
"My brother died on that wall," She called after her suddenly. Emma looked back and watched her arrange her shawl deliberately around her shoulders multiple times. "I used to hate him for that. But... Once you go, I think you begin to understand. That's why some get so angry. They understand exactly why he did it. And they're scared they could have been the same."
Emma nodded solemnly, turning the woman's words over in her mind. She stopped before she entered the house, looking out over the hamlet. To the east, the sky was growing a dark blue, fading into black as the stars came out. To the west, the sun set into a sky that was already the colour of blood. Shaking her head, she ducked under the sheet of skins and went inside.
IV:
When she returned, she found him struggling to stand up, leaning heavily on his staff, trying to force his legs to take his weight enough to stand. He fell back against the bed again, slamming the stick against the wall in the first display of anger she had ever seen from him.
For a moment, with his lips curled into a snarl, hair in his face, she recognized the man she knew, but, just as suddenly, it was gone, replaced by the shuttered grimace of despair she was beginning to associate with this man instead. When he realized she was standing there frozen, staring at him, his shoulders slumped and he turned his face away in shame.
"...I'm sorry." He whispered finally.
"What for? For being mad? I'd be mad, too. But you shouldn't be trying to get up yet. You're going to have to wait for the swelling to go down," She admonished, bringing the bucket and bread to where he sat. "...Those guys banged you up pretty hard."
He shrugged minutely, wincing as this pulled something in his bruised chest, before reaching down to manually lift his legs into the bed. Face flushing, he tucked the blanket around himself again, mindful of his half-bare legs.
"A lady at the well gave me this," She said, holding out the bread.
He took it in both hands as though he had never seen such a thing in his life. "...Why?" He asked finally, voice choked again.
"She said you're not a bad man," She answered gently. "She said you didn't deserve what those men did to you."
Emma turned away to give him a moment of privacy when she heard a sob break free of his chest. He crumpled in on himself, hugging the loaf of bread to his chest, crying bitterly for a few moments, terrible, throat-wrenching sobs as tears slid down his face and throat. She busied herself with the stew, preparing two bowls of it, and when she returned, he was more composed, staring at the bread in his lap with a bewildered expression.
They ate in silence, him sitting against the wall, her at the foot of the bed beside his curled-up legs.
When they had finished their stew, she unwrapped the bread, breaking a piece off for each of them. It was thick and doughy, more like a pastry than the bread she was used to. It peeled apart in layers and she used it to soak up the broth from her bowl.
Finally, he leaned over to set the bowl in the floor, before leaning back again, eyes on the ceiling. "I suppose you'll want to know what it is I've done," He said softly, voice surprisingly even.
She looked at him, surprised, holding her own bowl in both hands. "...I know you were in the war," She offered quietly.
"We all fight in the war. It's our duty, they tell us." He snorted bitterly, shaking his head. "Our duty... I was sixteen. Our task was to hold the wall. But we... we couldn't... They broke through, and they were..." His voice choked then with an old fear, his eyes widening with a boy's memory, a boy's horror. "They were not men. I... I ran." He said finally.
"You ran from the wall?" She prompted gently.
He drew his knees up to his chin, looking strangely young as he wrapped his arms around them, letting his head rest sideways against his knees. "I ran from the wall. ...The others... they panicked, and they followed. We lost the land. We'd held it for a hundred years."
"That couldn't be your fault," She protested.
He shook his head. "But it was. My fault. I demoralized them. I made them afraid. I was a coward and... and those people died, because of me."
"You were just one man - a kid, even. That's ridiculous," She insisted, feeling the horror in her chest changing swiftly to anger. "A kid can't make or break a war!"
Pursing his lips, he shook his head again, closing his eyes.
"...Is that what happened to your leg?" She asked finally, setting her bowl in the floor at last.
"Not exactly..." He murmured.
Emma reached out and put her hand on his knee suddenly. He lifted his head, turning to look at her, mouth inches from her fingertips.
"What happened to you?" She whispered.
"I was punished..." He replied, eyes sliding away. "I'll never run from anything again."
"Jesus," She hissed, her hand clenching on his kneecap for a moment before she controlled herself. "That's inhumane."
She knew what he would say before he said it, feeling that strange guilt clawing at her again as he simply whispered, "...Fairy tales."
Emma reached out then, one hand on the side of his head for a brief moment. He looked up, surprised, his legs falling away as he released them. She climbed up on her knees, crawling over to sit beside him. "Move over," she muttered, pushing against him until he shifted enough to make room for her.
Settling under the covers, she wrapped an arm around him in a loose, half-hug. He looked at her for a long moment, confused, and then relaxed against her, closing his eyes.
They sat there, side-by-side in a comfortable silence. Emma watched the fire burn lower and lower in the hearth as sounds of night settled all around them. He slept, mouth slightly open, leaning against her shoulder. She didn't move away.