Sorry it's been taking me so long to update recently, but here we are! Also, most of my story picks up exactly where Season two starts, but pretend for the sake of my writing that Belle was never returned to Rumplestiltskin. He sent the wraith after her because he can, not because he discovered Belle. Thanks!
I sat up slowly, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. Emma would do everything she could to get back from Fairy Tale Land and I needed to do whatever I could to help her. Doing that would take some kind of leverage. And to gain that kind of leverage I would have to "right" something that had been wrong for a long time. I dressed slowly, dreading what was coming. I rubbed my throat a few times which was still sore and bruised from Daniel's unforgiving hands. The thought of Daniel was enough to solidify my resolve. I made a quick trip to the hospital before traveling to Rumplestiltskin's shop. Outside the door I gathered myself, taking a moment or two before entering.
"What do you want?" He demanded harshly. "I am doing no dealing today."
I replied back quietly. "I am not here to deal."
"Oh? I heard about your reunion with Daniel, dearie. Tragic. If you're looking for me to bring him back, let me quickly remind you that I cannot do that. That takes science." He mumbled, almost to himself. "Apparently though, only magic could restore Viktor's arm." He chuckled. "So what are you here for?"
"I am here for you." I said simply.
"For me? What could you possibly offer me?"
"Long ago, in our land, I took something from you, and after recent events, "I thought of losing both Daniel and Emma in the past two days, "I now regret the decision I made years ago. I am sorry for taking it and I wish to return it."
He eyed me suspiciously. "What could you have possibly taken that would make you feel any kind of remorse? I was unaware that you even had a heart, dearie. I thought maybe your mother had claimed your heart as her own." He laughed at his own joke.
I sighed and gritted my teeth, ignoring his jibe. I then leaned out the door of the shop and called out. "Come here my dear. I won't hurt you." The girl hesitated before stepping shyly into the shop. I hadn't told her where we were going, just that she needed to trust me. No wonder she was hesitant.
"Belle?" Rumple gasped, stepping towards her as quickly as he could with his cane. He grabbed her shoulder, almost as if he wasn't sure she was actually real.
"Rumplestiltskin." Belle breathed as she threw her arms around his shoulders.
"I am so sorry Belle." Rumple stumbled as he spoke quickly. "For pushing you away. For not knowing you were here. I am so sorry." His eyes welled with tears, and I looked away, realizing that I was intruding on a private moment. I quietly backed out of the shop, making my way to the car. Before I could get in I heard the shop door quickly open again. "Regina!" Rumplestiltskin called, drawing my attention. "Do not think I owe you anything for this. You have done me no favors." His voice was cold, and I could only imagine the feelings of hatred he was trying to contain for Belle's sake, as she was standing behind him with her hand on his shoulder.
"I know." I replied simply, getting in my car as I prepared to leave the two of them alone. "I know." I repeated to myself in the car as I drove away.
"Emma, get up." Snow shook me. "Come on. It's time to go." I sat up, groggy, and tried my best not to snap back at her. She couldn't possibly know that she had ripped me from Regina's arms, and something told me she wouldn't want to know that either. The 'Mom, Dad, I'm in love with the evil queen who tried to kill you and destroyed your happiness' conversation would have to wait for some time in the future. Hopefully, much, much, later. I tried to hide the smirk that came to my face. I finally find my parents, who are Prince Charming and Snow White, and I fall in love with their Evil Queen. Shit. In love? I questioned myself. There had been no love in my life since my disastrous relationship with Neal. My palms began to sweat. Snow shook me from me from my reverie. "Emma, we need to go." I followed her from the shack to where Mulan and Aurora were waiting for us.
"Aurora will be traveling with us. She is my responsibility, so she will be with me at all times." Mulan's tone made it clear that we were not to argue about this. She then opened a large trunk next to her. "From here you may take anything. I may be a warrior, but if we are attacked I cannot protect all of you alone."
Snow looked into the trunk and grabbed a bow and a quiver full of arrows. I looked in the trunk after her and grabbed a leather scabbard with a handle sticking out of it. I grabbed the handle, drawing a sword from it. The handle itself was ornately carved and decorated, as if it'd been created for royalty. The blade was golden. I looked at myself in the reflection, wondering who would waste so much gold on a sword. I then put it back into the scabbard and looked back inside the trunk once more. Inside the trunk was a thick, leather shirt. I pulled it on over my tank top, sliding my arms through the arm holes. It was sleeveless, with three cinches down the front and a collar which made it look like a button down shirt. I did the ties and looped the belt to the leather scabbard around my waist. I looked up and saw Snow staring at me. "What?" I asked defensively.
"It's just..." She paused and then smiled at me. "You remind me of your father." She wiped away a stray tear while I looked away, embarrassed. It was just too strange for me to accept having a mother and father who actually care.
"If you are ready, we must begin. It is a full day's journey." Mulan stated, again, all business. We followed her to the outside of camp, past guard towers and past groups of men who bowed their heads with respect to Mulan. She must truly be quite the warrior if all these men could respect her so. We walked to a paddock on the edge of the camp. Mulan turned toward us and explained - "We can only take two horses. The camp can spare no more. Aurora will ride with me. Snow White and Emma, you can share one." She then slipped a bridle over the head of a white horse and handed the reins to Aurora. She handed another bridle to Snow. Snow slipped the bridle over the head of a brown horse as he whinnied softly.
"What do you expect me to do with this?" I looked the animal up and down fearfully. "If it doesn't have an engine, I don't ride it."
"What is an engine?" Aurora asked.
"It's a kind of…machine. It runs cars." Snow responded.
"What is a car?" Mulan asked.
"It doesn't matter. Emma, you are riding this horse." Snow demanded.
"Thanks, Mom." I laid on the sarcasm. "But no thanks. I am walking. And where the hell is the saddle for this beast anyway?"
Mulan rolled her eyes. "We have very limited supplies. We can't spare saddles for everyone. Aurora and I are not using a saddle either."
"You had saddles yesterday!"
"And they've been taken out by a hunting party today!" Mulan explained, exasperated. "We are taking horses. We are not taking saddles. This is your quest. If you are afraid to ride, we simply will not go." Mulan hoisted herself up onto her horse and then reached behind her to give Aurora a hand.
"I am not afraid." I answered indignantly. Snow jumped easily onto the horse, settling herself onto its broad back.
"Come on Emma," she coaxed me, reaching a hand towards me.
"Come on." I groaned. "Do I really have to ride you bitch?"
"Emma!" She reproached me. "Do you really have to use that language?"
"If I have to ride bitch, then yes." I reached for her hand, hoisting myself up ungracefully and struggled to find a comfortable position on the horse. None of the positions were comfortable. I wasn't used to having things between my legs and I already knew by the end of the day that I would be very sore. I tentatively put my arm around Snow's waist as the beast began to move. "Are you absolutely sure that there is no way to avoid riding on this?"
"I'm sure," she shouted back over the commotion of the men around us. They opened the gate to allow us out of the paddock. As soon as she was free from the gate Mulan brought her horse into a full speed run. I had barely a second to tighten my grip on Mary Margaret before she urged our horse to catch up with Mulan's horse. As the horse moved and rocked under me I became more and more uncomfortable. It's going to be a long day, I thought miserably to myself.
When I got home it was still early in the morning, but I knew Henry would already be awake. "Henry?" I called, wondering where he was. Then I realized that I heard voices in the kitchen. "Henry, are you all right?" I dropped my coat on the table in the foyer and hurried into the kitchen, where I found Henry and David sitting at the kitchen table with cups of cocoa. "Charming." I greeted him coolly with a nod of the head. I refrained from sneering at him, remembering that right now he was in charge of Henry and could take him away from me at any time.
"Regina." David greeted me in kind.
"What are you doing here?" I asked him.
"You said we could talk tomorrow, and its tomorrow. I was hoping we could have that chat now."
I sighed. "I suppose that I have some free time now." I said coolly, my mind already racing for an explanation that would solve David's curiosity. "Henry, why don't you go up to your room and play while your grandfather and I talk?" David looked taken aback at the word 'grandfather' and I relished in his surprise for a moment.
"What about my hot chocolate?" Henry looked sadly at his almost full cup.
"You can take it up to your room."
"Really?"
"Yes, but if you spill it, I will lock you up there like Rapunzel in her tower." I threatened. Henry looked shocked, and I quickly backtracked. "Don't look at me like that Henry; I never locked Rapunzel in a tower. Her father did it." He still looked scared. "I was only kidding! I will not lock you in your room, I promise."
He quickly picked up his drink and ran up the stairs with a look on his face I couldn't quite place. "Good job with that one, Your Majesty."
"Oh please. You are the one that put your daughter in a box and shipped her to Maine."
"You know," he looked at me with a thin smile on his face, "You keep using that line, and it gets less effective each time." He laughed as I sat down on the chair across from him. There was a moment of awkward silence as we looked at each other.
"So…" I began and then paused.
"So..." He added, waiting for me to continue.
"What exactly do you want to know?" I asked wearily.
"What happened to Daniel?"
"He was turned to dust."
"I am aware of that Regina. What I want to know is how. I thought you weren't using magic."
"I'm not." I turned my head and looked out the window, away from him. "What happened yesterday…I didn't really do it."
"Regina." He said shortly, drawing my attention back to him. "If you didn't do it, who did?"
I looked deep into his eyes and tried to imagine the trust he implicitly gave to other people. The love he had for Snow White, and even for Emma, his daughter. I sighed again, admitting defeat. He would have to know some of the truth, if not all of it. "Emma did."
"What?" He leapt from his chair, looking around as if he expected to find that I was hiding her in the cupboards. "What do you mean?" He suddenly reclaimed his chair as he realized she couldn't possibly be here.
"Emma has magic. It's the kind of magic that I don't really understand and I know she doesn't understand it either."
"How do you know she doesn't? Have you spoken to her?"
"In a manner of speaking. Using her powers Emma can send her consciousness and her magic across realms. She can speak with me here."
"Why does she talk with you? And why doesn't she speak with me? I'm her father!"
I laughed quietly, partially because he was taking this better than I had expected and partially because I really needed a moment to cover up the awkwardness of the situation. "I don't really know." I paused with my explanation and tried to come up with an excuse. "Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I enacted the curse and she was the one to break it. Magic has powerful rules and laws that we don't always understand. Magic that powerful is bound to have effects I could not have simply predicted. Emma's magic may have been one of them."
"Maybe… but I still don't understand what Emma has to do with Daniel."
"Yesterday when Daniel was choking me, I was terrified. I thought I was going to die. And so, in my mind, I called for Emma. It was an errant thought, really, but she entered my consciousness and then turned Daniel to dust. She used her magic but it went through my hands. On my own, right now, I have no magic." I opened my hands in a placating gesture, as if to emphasize the truth in what I was saying.
"You called to her…" He seemed to be trying to connect the two thoughts and he still could not grasp the situation. "How did you know you could call her name and she would answer?"
"Over the past few days Emma and I have had odd…moments where we've been truly connected. It appears that whenever one of us is truly afraid, the other can feel it. I first became aware of this situation two days ago…when Emma met Cora for the first time." I then braced myself for his explosion, and sure enough, he did not disappoint.
"Cora!?" He burst up from his chair and knocked it across the floor. "Emma and Snow are with your mother?" He then froze for a moment. "How is Snow?" He asked warily.
"From what I gather through Emma, they are both fine." I pursed my lips, staring pointedly down at the chair on its side on the floor. He followed my line of sight and sheepishly picked up the chair and righted it. He didn't sit back down in it, though.
"Are you sure?" He asked, suddenly pacing back and forth. "Did Emma say anything about them being in danger? Would you even know if they were in danger?"
"Yes, I believe I would. When Emma is afraid, I can feel it. And I have felt nothing from her since her meeting my mother."
He froze in his pacing. "I thought Cora was supposed to be dead."
"As did I. It appears that my mother is much more cunning then I ever gave her credit for." I paused. "She will stop at nothing to destroy everything I love."
"And what do you love?" He scoffed. "Surely you do not love this town."
"I love-" I suddenly froze, stopping myself before saying something foolish. "Henry. I love Henry. He may be your grandson, but he is still my son."
He sat in the chair again, trying to calm down. "Of course you do. I am sorry Regina. No matter what has happened, I do know you love Henry." He put his head in his hands. "And my wife and my daughter…I love them. I have to get them back."
"They're really working on it, Charming." I felt obligated to put my hand on his arm as a show of sympathy. "Do not worry. If there is one thing I have learned through all of this, it is that you and Snow will always find each other." He looked up at me, half smiling. "When Emma and I are sleeping, for some unknown reason, we can communicate. Emma told me last night that she and Snow are traveling to your castle to see if the old wardrobe is there. If it is, they hope to reactivate it. So there is some hope."
He reached out and patted my hand. "Thank you Regina."
I quickly straightened, therefore, ending the moment. "Well, I have told you everything you wanted to know." He looked from the kitchen and then back to the dining room, to where the two of us had eaten dinner just a few weeks before. The blush appearing on his cheeks told me where his mind had gone. "That was a mistake Charming, I stated quietly. One that I would appreciate not being mentioned to anyone."
"Never." He returned his attention back to me. "My daughter is the savior. She works magic that transverses realms." He shook his head, smiling softly. "My daughter." He repeated again, as if he were trying out the words on for size. "I have a daughter." He smiled again and tears began to well up in his eyes. "I need to get them back Regina. I will do whatever it takes."
"As will I." I replied. "I too, will do anything it takes to bring them back."
"You will?" He looked at me, the gleaming tears still in his eyes. I tried to suppress the anger that was threatening to boil over. "Why?" He questioned me.
"I made a promise to Henry." I paused, wondering how he would take the words, 'I love your daughter.' What came out instead was, "I wish to redeem myself."
David stood up and rinsed his cup out in the sink and removed his jacket from the back of the chair. "Good. Because I lost my daughter and my wife while they were saving you." He didn't say this cruelly, just as a statement of fact. "I just want them back." He walked to the door slowly and I followed him from the kitchen. He stopped at the front door and turned back to me. "Henry and I agreed that he will stay with you. Just don't go around trying to choke anyone with wallpaper."
"As long as you promise not to agree to letting anymore wraiths come after me."
"Deal." He offered me a genuine smile before shutting the front door behind him.
I turned from the door to see Henry standing at the top of stairs. He had an abashed look on his face, as if he'd been caught in the act. I put my hands in the pockets of my blazer. "How long have you been standing there?" I asked him quietly.
"The entire time." He admitted, looking ashamed. "I heard everything." He came down the stairs, stopping two or three steps from the bottom so that he was standing eye level with me. "Can you really talk to Emma?"
I sighed loudly. This was most certainly not a conversation I wanted to have with Henry. "It is complicated, but yes, I can speak with her."
"Why?"
"Henry, you of all people should know magic is unpredictable."
"Like when you put me under the sleeping curse after I was the one to eat the apple tart?"
"Yes, and I am very sorry for that. You do know that don't you?"
"You're only sorry because it was really meant for Emma." The sullen tone he now took with me was one I well deserved, but I struggled to control the anger that rose within me. I took a deep breath before answering him.
"Henry, I know it is very difficult for you to believe me, but a lot has changed since then. I know that it has only been a few days since I made that big mistake, but I do love you. I love you more than anything and I will do everything I can to get your mom back."
He looked taken back at my words, almost as if he doubted my sincerity. "But, you're my mom too." It wasn't an argument with what I had said, just a simple statement to add to my words.
"I know that Emma is your mom as well," I replied quietly, "and that you want us both. I have spent the past year being angry, hateful and deceitful. I promise you though Henry, I will get Snow and Emma back."
"You promise?" He asked as the innocence in his voice shone through; the true innocence that comes with childhood and leaves with maturity.
"I promise. I may have once been the Evil Queen, but I do not wish to be her any longer." I replied
Henry jumped down the last few stairs and threw his arms around my waist. "Thank you Mom." He sighed happily.
"Anything for you Henry," I replied, while at the same time racking my brain for ways to convince this town that I was indeed changing. "I would do anything for you." I once again murmured.
I quickly jumped off the horse as we stopped in front of the castle and began to walk bow-legged. "I haven't felt this sore since that night I spent with -" I choked off the rest of that sentence and reminded myself that I was no longer with my friend Mary Margaret, but my mother, Snow White. "In the gym. Since I spent that night in the gym." I recovered most ungracefully as the three women continued to stare at me.
"What exactly is a gym?" Aurora asked, confused.
"I'll explain later. Should we begin to do something? It's getting dark outside." Snow White continued to eye me warily, as if she was considering questioning me. Please, someone else answer my question. Please. I thought to myself.
Mulan answered my silent prayer. "We will gather torches and enter the castle. We are already here so it would not be wise to wait until tomorrow." She pulled two stones out of one of her saddle bags, along with some kind of liquid. "Find something we can use for the torches." She advised us.
Snow, Aurora and I scoured the large area in front of the castle. I tried to imagine the castle in all its glory, with knights walking around and preparing themselves for battle. Or simply the day to day business of a kingdom; as in meeting with the citizens of a nearby town. There were old torches hanging on the walls by the gate. Aurora grabbed two and Snow and I each grabbed one, taking them to where Mulan was waiting. She had tied the horses to an old metal fixture in front of the castle. It reminded me of a bike rack, though I could only imagine it had been invented for horses. Mulan poured the liquid she held into each of the torches, then took the two rocks, which I assumed were flint and hit them together until the sparks ignited one of Aurora's torches. Mulan used this torch to light the rest. When we all had a lit torch in our hands Mulan turned back towards us. "Are you ready?" She inquired.
"Of course I am. This is my home." Snow replied. She fell in step with Mulan. Together the two of them led the way through the castle, Mulan with her sword drawn, making sure each hallway was clear, and Snow directing her as to where to go. Aurora and I followed the two of them, remaining silent. She kept giving me sidelong glances. Just as I was about to shout at her to stop, Snow turned around with a huge smile on her face. "We're here."
She pushed open a large door, which opened very quietly, especially considering how long it had been since it had last been opened. Snow stepped in quietly, almost reverently, while reaching back to take my hand as she led me into the room. "Wow," was all I could manage to say. The room we had entered was huge. There was a large circular portion of the room with the remains of a crib at the center of it. The wood almost looked blue but it was difficult to tell the true color with the toll time had taken on it. There were bookshelves all around the room, full of old and rotting books. I stepped closer to one of the bookshelves, attempting to see the words on the books. The titles had simply worn off all of them, though I could see some leftover letters and small paintings of animals on the sides. There was a large bucket of toys. The toys were all the things a baby would appreciate, like small stuffed animals and little blocks. On shelves around the room were wooden animals. They appeared to be hand carved. "Wow." I said for a second time. There wasn't much more that I could say. This room, now a complete wreckage of time had once been truly grand twenty eight years ago.
"Your father and I spent months preparing this room for you. Even after we knew you would not grow up here we continued to decorate it. We hoped that maybe, somehow, you would return and still grow up here."
I moved towards the second, smaller part of the grand room, where a large tree appeared to be growing in the center of the room. Upon closer inspection, I realized that the tree was actually a carved wardrobe, complete with a door in the front. I opened it and looked inside to where it had been hollowed out. "So this is it?" I asked. "This is the magic wardrobe?"
"Yes. Emma, it is. We had never intended for you to be all alone in it, though." Snow's eyes began to tear up, the wetness glistening in the flames from our torches. "When the wardrobe was completed I was scheduled to travel in it, still pregnant with you, to the new world. But you were born too early. You were born just before Geppetto finished carving it." She wiped a lone tear from her cheek. "There was only enough magic available in the wardrobe to send one person through. And after you were born, we were then two people. I wanted to go with you so badly but we couldn't risk your safety. Your father and I wanted so much more for you. You were to take your first steps in this room. You would have prepared for your first ball in here. Your many suitors would have come calling to this castle where your father would have intimidated them and I would have had to talk him down. You would have married for love, no matter what the other kingdoms made their princes and princesses do." Another tear spilled over and she quickly wiped this one away too. I then let go of her hand and looked around the room. "Emma?" Snow said softly. "Please say something."
I looked over to where Aurora and Mulan were standing by the door, obviously feeling like they were intruding on a private moment. I looked down at my feet which were blurring under the weight of my own tears. "I never understood." I started to utter quietly. "In twenty eight years, I never really understood. How could my parents have been so selfish? How could they have cared for me, actually knit me a blanket with such care, and then abandoned me?" Some of my old anger began to seep into my voice.
"Emma-" Snow started.
I immediately held up my hand and Snow stopped talking. "I never really understood what you had lost too. You both gave up…" And I choked on the words, threatening to become overwhelmed by my tears. "Everything. You gave up everything for me." I tried to take a deep breath. "So I need some time. I just need a little time to accept that I wasn't truly abandoned. No one in my life has ever put me first."
Snow stepped over me and placed her arm around my shoulders and pulled me close. "Emma, we will always put you first." She replied. "And when we get back to Storybrooke, we will all be a family."
I breathed a sigh of relief and smiled at Snow. All I had ever wanted was to be loved; and to have a family. And now, here was my mother, promising me exactly that. If I hadn't already been motivated to return to Storybrooke, I certainly would be now. A small voice in the back of my mind muttered, 'And what about Regina?' I pushed that thought away quickly, storing it in a place for things I would think about later. "So…Mom…" I tried that word seriously for the first time. "How do we get this thing to work again?"
Snow continued to smile at me. "That, Emma, is the question we must find an answer for."
Mulan immediately cut in. "If we don't have a plan to operate this wardrobe immediately, I suggest that we attempt it tomorrow then. It is well past dark and I wish to set up camp before the torches go out. We know the wardrobe is still here. We have all the time in the world to figure out how to operate it."
I was very eager to get home to Storybrooke, but arguing with Mulan was not something I wished to engage in just yet. Snow agreed with Mulan so we followed Mulan and Aurora back into the entry hall, where we laid out all the furs we could gather to build small beds for all of us. Mulan and Aurora built one large bed, where Aurora laid down and Mulan sat up to watch over her. I lay down on my back on top of my pile of furs right next to Mary Margaret, who reached out and grabbed my hand. "We will get back to Charming and Henry as soon as possible." With that reassurance, I soon fell asleep.
I stood in Rumplestiltskin's shop and held my mother's book in my hands. "I know I am the last person you wish to see right now, but I require your help. Please." I began.
"I am still not making any deals today." The coldness in his voice told me this was likely a lost cause, but I had to try.
"Rumplestiltskin, please." I implored. I do not ever beg but today I was prepared to. "I can understand why you are angry with me." I stated quietly.
"Can you dearie? Can you really now?" He sneered back at me. "Have you had someone you loved ripped away from you? Have you ever been unable to get to the one person that you would ultimately change for?"
I lowered my head. "Yes." I replied quietly. He faltered for a moment. "I know you have no reason to care about me." I began to speak again. "In fact, you'd love to see me suffer. But Henry…"
"What about Henry?" He demanded.
"Henry should not have to suffer for my mistakes. His mother and grandmother are trapped in Fairy Tale Land. He loves and misses Emma. I must return her to him."
Rumplestiltskin stalked around the counter, getting as close to me as humanly possible. "Are you trying to play upon my sympathies, dearie? As if my pity for Henry will change my hatred for you? Vengeance is coming, and you would do well to prepare for it."
The curtain in the back suddenly opened. "Rumplestiltskin." The strong accent drew the attention of both Rumple and I. "Help her."
"But Belle." The tone he took with her was definitely unfamiliar to me. Never before had I heard him speak to anyone with such tenderness. "She had you locked away for twenty eight years. I thought you were dead."
"But I'm not." Belle replied. "And revenge only makes the heart grow cold. Do not allow me to just get you back to you, only to lose you again. Don't be the same cold man you've been. Please." She then walked over to him and wrapped her arms around his waist and stood on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. "Please do it for me."
Rumplestiltskin sighed. "Do not be fooled Regina. He addressed me angrily. I do nothing for you. I owe you nothing. I wish, more than anything, to be able to deny you your soul mate." He spit the words at me and I was reminded that he knew what was really between Emma and me. "I will help Henry, Emma, and Snow. But in the future, you owe me a favor." I nodded. "Ok then, let me see that book and I will show you your best shot in getting them back."
So how's that? I'm already beginning the next chapter, so I hope to have this next update to you soon! Reviews?