This part is pathetically short and boring and weird. It is NOT worth the wait, and I apologize for that, whole-heartedly in advance. I've just been having a bit of trouble making this story gel right now, and I've been very ill and also moving, so that's wrecked my writing schedule. I'm sorry, everyone. You're all so lovely and I… am not up to the task of sharing work deserving of such wonderful readers.

This chapter contains allusions to rape and violence.

VIII: Spirit

With an exhalation half-sigh, half-groan, Emma curled onto her side, burrowing her face into the pillow. The pillow felt harder than she remembered, and she opened her eyes to see she was pressed against Rumpelstiltskin's chest. Her limbs were messily entwined with his own, one leg thrown over his waist and her arms around his middle. His hands were slack across her back, his legs bent at the knees as he rolled into her at the hips.

Suddenly, Emma became aware of what had awoken her when she heard it again. Sitting up with a start, she slipped free of his body with a pang of regret. Outside, the woman screamed a third time.

Snatching up the closest clothes at hand, she was already ducking under the pile of skins when she realized she'd pulled on Rumpelstiltskin's tunic by mistake. The bright sun disoriented her for a moment, making her throw a hand up over her eyes. When she could see properly, she realized the sleepy hamlet had exploded into activity.

Knights, most on horseback, and a few on foot, crowded around a knot of villagers. Two men held a sobbing woman as she struggled to claw her way towards a small boy being lifted onto a horse.

"Please!" The woman cried, turning towards the largest of the men, a hatchet-faced man with a cruel expression, watching from the horse closest to the spinner's house. "They said the age had gone back up again! He's only 15!"

"That's practically a man now!" The commander roared, voice dripping with false cheer. "The age is whatever I say it is on the day the Duke needs more men. Be grateful we're only taking one. The village beyond the forest lost seven today."

"Please, he's all I have..." The woman begged, but the soldiers holding her threw her down into the dirt. One of them raised his sword hilt as though to strike her and pulled back at the last moment. She collapsed there, wrapping her arms around herself and sobbing.

"You peasants..." The commander spat, "It is an honor to serve his lordship! We shouldn't have to go through this every time."

"Maybe you should start leaving kids alone if it bothers you that much," Emma snapped, striding out of the shadows of the building now. Across the crowds, she saw the woman from the well, standing with her companion, anxiously shaking her head. The boy with the donkey and his father were nowhere to be seen.

The man's horse whinnied violently as he abruptly reined it around. His face looked furious now, the muscles on his throat cording and thickening. Just as abruptly, his expression shifted into surprise.

At that moment, a trembling hand closed over her wrist, making her wheel around. Rumpelstiltskin stood behind her, wearing only his loose pants, unbelted, and clutching his staff heavily in his other hand. She could see his thin chest rising and falling rapidly. His expression was unlike any she had seen on this man, one that would have been more fitting on Gold - eyes narrowed, brows drawn down, mouth twisted into a grimace.

"...Emma..." He said softly, but his eyes were on the man on horseback, "Please go back inside."

"Well, well, well..." The man's laugh boomed out again, making Emma whirl back to stare at him. He swung his leg easily over the side of his horse, dismounting and striding towards them. "...So little Spindleshanks has finally found a woman."

"His name is Rumpelstiltskin," Emma snapped, feeling her own face reddening with anger on the slight man's behalf.

The man looked her over appraisingly now, reaching out with one gloved hand, intending to touch her hair. She stepped back, keeping her head held high, glaring at him. "She's got spirit, little Spindleshanks..." The man said approvingly, turning his attentions to the spinner.

Emma's eyes widened as the man repeated his attempted gesture, reaching out to brush a bit of Rumpelstiltskin's hair behind his ear. "Now how did a coward like you end up with so fine a woman? Did you buy her?"

"Hey!" She snapped, grabbing his arm now, jerking it away from the smaller man.

The responding slap sent her tumbling back on her rear in the dirt and she sat there a moment, stunned by how much power the man had packed into the blow. He reached again for Rumpelstiltskin, pinching his chin between his fingers now to force his head up to meet his gaze. "Little Rumpelstiltskin..." He murmured voice oddly reflective as he gazed over the man's bared chest and thin arms before returning his attentions to his face. "You've almost become a man now..."

"...H...Hordor, please..." He whispered, voice shaking, and he squirmed backwards against his staff, clearly unnerved by the man's touch.

Emma rolled to her side and got back to her feet, coming up beside him to wrap her arm around his. She could feel him trembling against her side, his bad leg quaking as though it were spasming.

The man, Hordor, looked from the spinner to Emma, smiling broadly again. "...I don't have time for this today, sadly. Perhaps the next time I'm by this way, I'll pay you a visit. You'd like that, wouldn't you?"

"Go to hell," Emma advised flatly.

Hordor only laughed. "Such spirit." His eyes flickered to Rumpelstiltskin, where he still held his chin, "...But all spirit can be broken."

With that, he released him, and returned to his horse. Whistling a shrill call, he turned and spurred his horse towards the reddened sky, and the other men followed.

Rumpelstiltskin collapsed then, caving against her and she wrapped her arms around him. The knot of people began to move, some coming forward to console the poor mother. Sparing a glance at the woman still weeping in the dust, Emma led him back inside.

The room still smelled faintly of sex, much to her dismay, as she helped him back to the bed in the corner. "Who was that man? What's going on?"

He stared at the earthen floor for several minutes, his hair hanging in his face. She thought of the look the commander had given him, the odd catch in his voice and the way he'd touched his hair. The weight of it sat heavy and uneven in her stomach and she sat beside him with a sigh, leaning over so their knees brushed.

"He comes to take the children to the war?" She asked finally. He nodded, still staring, unseeing. Gently, Emma reached out and took his hand in hers. He looked up then, giving a smile that was surely meant to be reassuring. It only looked wan and sad. "...Is he the one who took you?"

He flinched then, jerking his hand out of her grasp and she realized the implication of her words.

"...Rumpelstiltskin..." She said softly, the name less unwieldy on her lips now, but still achingly strange. "Did that man... Did he hurt you?"

"...We served in the same unit as boys..." He whispered, voice hoarse and muted as though coming from a great distance. "...I thought he was my friend, but he... And when they found me... He was the one... They ordered him to hold me down..."

Emma cringed when he curled his hand protectively around his bad leg, drawing it up against his chest. Again, she thought of the curiously invasive way the man had touched him, the veiled threat of his words. She hadn't encountered these kinds of things as the sheriff of Storybrooke, but growing up in the system and working to catch criminals had given her a broad spectrum of the kinds of cruelties human beings would willingly visit on one another.

"So last night..." With a pang, she thought of the previous evening, the way he had trembled and curled his hands to his chest. The way he'd cried out as she grabbed his hips roughly, or when she'd raked her teeth across his collarbone. Her face flushed with shame and she wrapped her arms around herself.

His eyes lifted then, watching her. She could see the exact moment he drew precisely the wrong conclusion and crumpled in on himself.

"Hey! Hey, no..." Unfolding herself, she took both his hands in hers, leaning her forehead against his. Peering into his wet, brown eyes, she smiled gently. "I don't regret that we were together. I just... I should have been easier. I shouldn't... I should never have been so rough."

"...It was fine..." He murmured deferentially, his eyes lowering and sliding to the side.

"If you weren't comfortable with something, it wasn't fine." Emma insisted.

"...I don't know how to be comfortable with that ... sort of thing..." He murmured.

"I'm sorry."

He looked up then, eyes betraying his surprise. "No! Please! ...Don't be. I was... I was happy. I liked it. ...I like you."

She recalled his breathy voice, whispering a very different word than 'like' and the colour returned to her cheeks.

"...I like you, too." She said quietly. Shifting suddenly, she rolled onto her back, head in his lap. He rocked back with surprise, but a moment later, his hand tentatively crept up to her curls, petting across them gently. She smiled up at him and he returned the expression, so much warmth in his eyes that it made her chest ache.

Outside, a woman was probably still sobbing. In here, a broken man might well be taking the first steps towards healing. Emma closed her eyes.