"We need a ball!" Snow declared as she speared a piece of egg.

Emma and Charming glanced at each other across the breakfast table, matching looks of apprehension on their faces.

"We do?" Charming said, with a passable display of interest and husbandly enthusiasm.

"We do," Snow said decisively. "Emma's never had a proper coming out in this realm."

"Um… a coming out?" Emma said. "I don't think…."

Snow rolled her eyes. "Not that kind of coming out. When a young girl of noble birth reaches maturity, a ball is held to present her to the kingdom and its subjects. You're the princess of The Enchanted Forest and you've never been properly presented as such."

Emma finished swallowing and slowly pushed away from her place at the table. "Look, Mary-Margaret… Mom…That's a really sweet thought, but I don't need to be presented to these people. I mean, I was their sheriff for three years. Everybody knows me already."

"They know you as the sheriff. But it's time to present you as what you are. A member of the royal family. The daughter of the King and Queen. A princess."

Emma tried very hard not to groan. She really did. But she was rapidly losing patience with Snow's attempts to craft her into her very own Royal Princess Barbie. Being some lovely, well-dressed figurehead just wasn't the way she saw her life panning out. Then again, she hadn't yet figured out what else she was supposed to do in this brave new world, so she kept stumbling along after her parents, hoping that eventually something here would begin to make sense.

"Mary-Margaret, don't you think it'll look a little ridiculous, having some debutante's coming out ball for a woman my age? I can't even dance!"

"I'll teach you," Charming piped up, an innocent, fatherly smile on his face. But it only reminded her of Hook dancing with her up on the parapets. That was the only kind of dancing she wanted to do and she suspected Captain Hook wouldn't be caught dead anywhere near a royal ball.

"It's really unnecessary, guys, and…."

"Emma, please." Snow's plea was soft and brought an immediate stop to Emma's protests. "I missed my chance to do everything for you. But this… it's the one thing I can still do. The one part of the life you should have had that I can still give you. Please let me do it for you."

Emma sighed, knowing she was beaten. "Okay. Just… I'm picking my own dress."

Killian was loitering again. There wasn't much else to do to fill the days as he kicked around Snow and Charming's castle. He'd never considered himself as particularly industrious until all his regular activities were taken away. Somehow he'd gotten quite accustomed to a busy schedule of pillaging and looting, and later, defeating evil. Peace was trying. He was bored senseless.

There was nothing to do but hang about and wait for moments alone with Emma. They were scarce, as she was nearly always with her parents or Henry, or some dwarves or fairies or bloody Baelfire.

Today he was making a slow circuit of the stableyard. Some days he circled the anything to see. Just a bunch of ordinary people going about their day, busily moving the kingdom forward. A kingdom with no place for an out-of work pirate.

It was in the stableyard that Smee found him. Smee had found his footing again. His sort generally did. He was working in the castle kitchen, but making a tidy profit under the table selling goods he stole from the royal larder.

"Ho there, Captain."

"It's just Hook these days, Smee. Not much of a captain without my ship."

"And see that's just what I was coming to tell you about."

"What's that?"

Smee leaned in closer. "A fisherman delivering to the kitchens claims he's seen the Killian went utterly still. He didn't think that name still had such power over him, but he was wrong. Three hundred years of living and breathing that ship meant she was in his blood. His heart began to beat faster just hearing her name uttered out loud.

"Where?"

Smee was a rat, even as a human. He might be lying. Or the fisherman was lying, or maybe mistaken. Or maybe his ship was still out there.

"He said he saw her docked at Miranta two weeks ago."

"That's only three days' ride from here."

His mouth began to water.

"I know it, Captain. When will you leave?"

"Leave?"

"To get her back. When are you going?"

Smee was so certain he would pack up and go. Was everyone certain? Was he certain?

"I have…plans to make," he stalled.

"Since when has Captain Hook planned anything?"

"That's quite enough, Smee."

Smee stepped back, chastised. "But you will go, Captain? You'll reclaim her?"

"I'm not…"

He glanced up just then, and Emma's bright gold hair caught his eye, far up on the battlements.

"Not just yet."

"But Captain…"

"Smee, I have to go."

He began to make his way across the stableyard. Perhaps it was time to give his princess a bit of a nudge.

"Emma!"

She turned to see Neal striding down the battlement towards her.

"What are you doing up here?"

"Your mother said I'd find you here."

"Oh…"

Of course Snow would point him towards her. Neal held up a thick parchment envelope and grinned. "She gave me my invite."

"For what?"

"Your big party."

"Oh, God…." Emma rolled her eyes. "Can we not talk about that, please?"

"C'mon, she's so excited. It's kind of cute."

"It's kind of ridiculous. I'm thirty and I'm having a coming out ball."

"Give her a break. She just wants to catch up on everything she missed. I get where she's coming from."

Emma sighed, knowing he was thinking of all his missed years with Henry. She had those same regrets, every day. "But you and I also know we can't turn back time."

He shrugged, tucking his invitation into his jacket and leaning on the wall next to her. "You can't go back. But you can decide how you're going to go forward, remember?"

Emma stared at her feet. Neal nudged her elbow with his.

"How are you going to go forward, Emma?"

She laughed and dragged a hand through her hair. "I have no idea."

Neal smiled at her. "Try this on for size."

Then he leaned in and kissed her. She saw the intent in his eyes a moment before he did it. She could have stopped him. She didn't. Instead, she held still and let him, mostly because she just wanted to know. After all these years, all that had happened, with everything… good and bad… that lay between them, was this still there, too?

So she let him kiss her. And it was nice. Good, even. But her heart had moved on from him long ago. She knew it the minute his lips touched hers. For one thing, she was thinking it through very carefully. A good kiss, with the right person, didn't leave room for reasoned consideration. The last time she'd been kissed, in a dark corridor with a hook pressing her into the wall, she'd barely remembered to breathe.

He pulled back.

"It's not gonna happen for us, is it?"

Emma reached for his hand and squeezed. "It did happen for us, Neal. A long time ago. It was good while it lasted. And we got Henry out of it. But I think it needs to stay back there."

He smiled, only a little wistful, and not particularly devastated. "I had to try, you know?"

"I had to let you try."

"It's him, isn't it?"

"Who?"

"Killian."

She shook her head. "I don't know. Everything is different here. There's a lot to think about."

"If it's him, Em, you don't have to think at all. Just do it."

"You make it sound so easy."

"It is. Isn't it?"

"Is it?"

Neal shrugged. "Only you can answer that."

"But my life is so much more complicated here. There's the kingdom and Mary Margaret and David and—"

Neal reached for her hand this time. "Em… you're still you. You gotta keep being you. Never mind all this." He waved his hand at the battlements around them. "Do what's right for you. The kingdom will sort itself out. The damn thing has lasted this long. I doubt you can do much damage."

"I'll think about it. So… what about you?"

"What about me?"

"What's your future looking like these days?"

Neal laughed. "You just shot me down. It's looking pretty lonely."

"I don't know about that. From what I've seen, it doesn't have to be."

"What are you talking about?"

"C'mon, Neal…. One of your houseguests seems to be nursing a pretty big crush on you. She's good at hiding behind that armor, but she can't hide everything."

His eyes went wide. "Are you talking about Mulan?"

"You really haven't seen it? God, guys are dense."

"Gimme a break. I've had a lot on my mind lately." He shifted his weight and looked at her closely. "You really think she's into me?"

"Yeah, I really think she is. But hey… she's been through the mill, so don't mess with her if you're not serious. I don't want to see her get hurt."

"Nah, I wouldn't do that to her. I just… Guess I have some thinking to do, huh?"

"Guess you do."

"We both do. You gonna go talk to Killian?"

"Geez, why is everybody so interested in my love life?"

"Because we all want to see you happy. And if he's the one who makes you happy—"

She held up a hand to shut him up. "Hush. Just let me get through this stupid ball and we'll see."

Neal pushed off the wall and tapped her chin with his knuckle. "Save me a dance, okay?"

With a last smile, he was gone.

Emma stayed up on the battlement, trying to sort out what she was feeling. It was hard. She'd spent her entire adult life repressing emotions. They just got in the way and hurt her. So now, when she really needed to decide what—who—she wanted, trying to tease apart the tangle of lust and like and maybe love that Killian sparked in her, all she made herself was confused.

Pressing her palms flat on the warm stone wall she leaned over as far as she could, looking out across the dense forests, the smattering of villages and the distant sea. Then she looked down into the stableyard. She caught a glimpse of black leather, the tail of Killian's frock coat, just as he strode through the stone archway leading out of the stableyard and away from the castle. He didn't look back.