robin/regina forced to work together alone to tackle the next Big Bad (tracking in the forest, stakeout, whatever you want), cue longing, angst and thinking of their days in the Enchanted Forest.
This is an angst fest. You've been warned.
"Regina, you're not going alone."
"I'm not?" She challenges, her voice flat and unyielding.
"No, you're not. You're being self-destructive right now."
She rounds on him, her hair whipping behind her. "And why do you suppose that is?" she snarls.
Hurt flits through his eyes, but she can't regret it. She'd needed to say that, and anyway, from where does he think he gets the right to act like he still cares about her?
Her face darkens from frustration to outright contempt when he lifts his bow onto his shoulder, anyway.
"Just…don't get in my way," she bites out, and she hadn't meant to say it exactly like that, but she has, and the words are floating between them with two deafening echoes.
She looks into his stunned face, and he's caught the turn of phrase, too. Of course he has.
His eyes lock with hers. "I wouldn't dream of it," he returns, because he has to.
Her mouth opens. And shuts. This man is the only person she's ever known who could leave her speechless.
Letting him get away with that excuse hasn't brought her anything good, but, as she's proven twice before, she's helpless to turn him away.
So she doesn't.
...
"Stay back," the woman cautions, backing into the tree behind her.
Robin decides to try. "We mean you no harm. You've made it cold here; we just want you to turn it back to spring."
"I can't." Her hands become fists, and her whole body curls in on itself.
"You will." Regina challenges.
"Regina," Robin warns. But he's got his bow out, an arrow pointed straight at the woman's chest.
Regina takes a step towards her.
Ice explodes from the girl's hands, snapping Robin's arrow in half. And she runs.
Robin makes to run after her when hears a moan beside him.
"Regina!" He looks down, and there's a trail of blood on her ankle, a shard of quickly melting ice shining grotesquely against her skin. He lunges for her just as she begins to stumble, and lowers her to the ground.
She realizes she's wrapped a hand around his wrist, and drops it like it's fire.
"We should get back," Regina says, trying to stand. She fails. The wound is not large, but it is deep, and it is bleeding enough to worry him.
"Milady, let me dress your wound first. Please. You'll be no use to anyone until I do."
She can't decide whether to be grateful for his use of the title, or hurt. "Am I of any use to anyone right now?" she demands.
Robin flinches but ignores her, instead dropping his bow on to the ground and pulling out salve, cleaning solution, and bandages from his pack.
"No." She shakes her head. "You don't need to."
He ignores her protestations, and gently slides her shoe off.
She hisses in pain, and hates herself a little for not explaining that she could just heal it with magic. If he knew, he would probably say she was being reckless in not trying to help herself. Maybe he'd be right. She puts her hands on the ground behind her and shifts her weight to them, biting her lip to keep quiet.
He takes a knife out of his pocket and cuts the fabric of the wool socks she'd worn to protect herself against the unexpected winter until it falls off her skin. The cool air soothes the wound, but she can't help herself from thinking about the last time he'd trailed his palm along her calves to remove clothes. Her cheeks burn and she knows she needs to talk about something else.
"She's scared. She feels trapped, but not by us."
"The Ice Queen?" he asks, setting to work with the cleaning solution.
"Yes." Her fingers clench into the dirt at the liquid's sting, but she stays silent.
He glances at her face. "How do you know?"
"Because I was her, once. When I was young." Robin's eyes search hers for an infinite moment before he lowers them back to his task. She doesn't know if she wants him to look back at her or not.
He opens the jar of salve and starts to dab it onto the wound, and notes with relief that it looks much better now that the blood's been cleaned off. Without thinking it through, he eases his hand onto her leg, above the wound, and runs his fingers gently back and forth in a gesture of comfort.
When he looks up, her gaze is inscrutable.
"Some days, I wish I had never met you," she confesses in a whisper.
"I wish you wouldn't," he sighs.
She tilts her head to the side, and he can see her fight to look unaffected. "Why?"
He looks back at her ankle before the eye contact drags away all of his self-control, and busies himself with wrapping a bandage around her ankle. "Because I don't."
She bristles. "You have no right," she cries, and she hates how wonderful it feels that he's touching her, how the fact that he's not done bandaging isn't the real reason she won't push him away.
"I know," he whispers, so softly she can barely make it out. He ties the bandage, his work complete, but his thumb lingers against her ankle. "My heart doesn't seem to care about that very much." He knows it's a selfish thing to say.
She gapes at him. "Don't you dare."
It's as though he can see the layers of hostility she'd built around her battered heart stitch themselves back together, and it's that armor, not her heart, that's stronger than ever. She's not letting anything through, and it's his fault.
He grits his teeth in anger at himself, at her past, at everything that's beat this woman down every day of her life, and it isn't until he hears a gasp of pain that he realizes his hand had tightened around her ankle.
"You're hurting me," she grits out. He loosens his hold immediately, horrified.
Impulsively, he lowers his lips to the bandage, and gently presses his lips against it.
She flinches back.
"I'm sorry." He meets her terrified eyes, and shifts away from her. "That was unpardonably wrong of me." But he looks into her face, and secretly hopes it wasn't.
"Let's…" she sucks in a breath. "Let's go back."
"Do you need—?"
"I'm fine," she snaps back, and he thinks that if he could put his hand against her chest, he would feel the iron that's formed around her heart.
He wants to help her, wants to offer an arm around her waist or a shoulder to lean on, but he's done enough damage, so he lets her push herself off the ground, pick up her discarded shoe, and begin to limp back through the forest ahead of him.
His hand still burns with warmth where he'd touched her.