Regina's bruised and battered from the ride by the time Beetle carries her to the castle. Emma had opted to ride Rocinante, worried about what the faster horse might do without Regina conscious to keep him steady, and Beetle had been as solicitous as any horse would be with his master's…person…lashed to his back. Emma had ridden slowly, her heart in her throat, and paused only once along the way to send messages to the summer palace and the castle.

Blue is waiting in the main hall of the castle, looking miffed at the summons. "I'm not your personal fairy, Lady Swan–"

"Stop talking." Emma holds up a hand. Regina is being brought in on a stretcher, Mulan and Snow hovering behind it, and she takes a breath. "That potion you made. How do we undo it?"

"Undo it?" Blue looks puzzled for a moment. "I'm not aware that there is a cure. From what I know, it's designed to remove the darkness from the recipient. Darkness can't be poured into a receptacle without it coming from somewhere else." She frowns disapprovingly, fluttering up to glare down at Emma. "What happened to the witch?"

"Not Zelena. The potion somehow…Regina was hit by it," she says, nearly grudgingly. Of all the people she'd like to seek help from, Blue is at the very bottom of the list. But she has no choice, not when- short of Zelena- Blue is the only one in this world who has knowledge of it. Maybe there's some kind of magic convention where wizards and fairies and witches all exchange their newest brews. "It does more than just…take away darkness and you knew it all along," she says accusingly. "It's going to sentence her to a lifetime of infection."

But Blue is shaking her head and ignoring her accusations, hovering over Regina to inspect her as she's carried up the stairs. "That's impossible. That drop of blood meant that it would work on Zelena and Zelena alone, not the queen. Unless she had her own copy of it on her?" Blue suggests, and Emma freezes.

"She wouldn't have. She was…" Terrified of the poison, traumatized in her story about it. She wouldn't have been running around with her own version of it. "She didn't have Regina's blood."

"Are you sure?" Blue asks, and Emma thinks back for a moment to the first time she'd seen Regina in the Enchanted Forest again, remembers a streak of red on her wrist from the flying monkey's claws that she'd decided she didn't care about. Because she hadn't cared about Regina.

Her eyes cloud up and she watches the upward ascent of the stretcher to their quarters, her heart pounding so loudly that it's all she hears for a moment. She sucks in a breath. "You need to find a cure."

Blue smiles, sharp and tight, and says, "There is no cure. Once the poison has been absorbed into her heart, it's going to take away the dark magic she's so fond of and leave her an invalid. Perhaps if she'd been a bit less–"

"Her heart," Emma repeats, a sliver of hope lighting up in her chest. "But if she didn't have her heart in her chest when she was hit-"

"Why wouldn't she have her heart?" Blue tries and fails to conceal her disappointment there.

Emma feels her jaw clenching again, irritated when she really should know better. "So it can be undone." Blue looks reluctant and Emma feels her patience snap, the fear she's been bearing with her on the trip home finally unraveling into anger now that she has a direction for it. "Don't play games with me, fairy. I know you're glad to see Regina go- I know you've been trying to get rid of her for years–" Words are tumbling out, Regina and Henry and where were you, why should I ever trust you and she doesn't realize that she's grabbing at the fairy, seizing her by two tiny legs and shoving her against a wall while she squeals in outrage, until Snow is yanking her arm away.

"She's on our side, Emma," she says, and Emma quakes with fury and Snow's hands move to stroke her shoulders. "Regina needs you. Regina needs Blue, doesn't she?" She looks up pleadingly at the fairy and the fairy relents.

She says grudgingly, "If the magic hasn't touched her heart, when you do put it in it should counteract some of the longterm effects of the poison and she'll begin to heal herself."

"Some?" Snow asks. Her fingers are digging into Emma's shoulders now, painful and hard. Emma stares at the ground, fists clenched so she doesn't do something she'll regret to Blue.

"It's still in her skin," Blue points out. "Her body will still reject the dark magic within it. But it can't cleanse her heart, and a dark heart holds much more magic than a physical body. I can't say if it will work or if she'll ever be healed. I have no experience in this brand of magic."

"What can we do?" Snow is asking, eyes guileless and trusting as she raises them to Blue. Emma pulls away at last, stalks up the stairs toward their quarters where Mulan and the healers had vanished.

Regina is lying on her bed, eyes closed and hands folded together like a well-preserved corpse. Emma sucks in a breath and drops onto the bed, seizing a wet cloth proffered by the only healer still in the room and rubbing it against one of the raw bruises from her trip home.

"What did the fairy say? Can she be treated?" the healer murmurs, and Emma looks up and realizes that it's Kalla, her midwife with Henry. Regina had said that she'd been one of the few she'd trusted as queen, long before Henry, and new wrinkles at the corners of Kalla's eyes betray concern for her even now.

"I'm not sure. I need…" She catches Mulan's eye and Mulan retrieves a small silver box, a tiny heart-shaped window in the side where she can see the reddish glow. "Subtle."

"Regina doesn't do subtle," Mulan says, passing it to her.

Emma opens it. She hadn't seen the heart removed, had only been informed of this turn of events once they'd been on the road and Regina had been sure Emma couldn't object to it, and she stares at it now with fascination. She knows there's talk about hearts that are black and red and what darkening your heart truly means, and Regina's glows a healthy red. There are dark veins that stretch across it, dim beneath the surface, but they only dull the glow, don't change the color of it. And there's no purple.

She raises the heart and takes a deep breath, stroking it with her thumb. Regina shifts in the bed, nearly purring at the tough. "You just push it in," Mulan instructs her. "Put it over where her heart is and–"

"I need you to hold onto this a little longer," Emma interrupts. Mulan stares at her curiously. She bites her lip, unwilling to bring up her distrust of Blue. She'll get condescending smiles, she's sure, reminders of how stubborn she is, and even- in the worst case scenario- a casual mention to Blue or Snow about something that might risk Regina's recovery.

Emma isn't in the business of risking Regina's recovery, but she's pretty sure that putting her heart back in is riskier than keeping it out. "Don't tell anyone, okay? Just the Merry Men. No one but you and Lancelot and John and Will." She glances up to Kalla and sees fierceness in her eyes, the same protectiveness she'd expect from anyone who's known Regina this long, and she knows this room is safe.

She doesn't realize how antsy she's being until Mulan's hand closes over hers, plucking the heart from it reassuringly. "Okay," she murmurs. "We'll protect it." And Emma finally sags beside Regina on the bed.

The purple mark reappears two days into Regina's sleep, spreads like a nasty bruise in the places where the potion had touched her neck and fingers and doesn't move any further than that. It roils in a mass of nearly living disease, and Kalla proclaims that it goes too deep to be cut out.

This time it doesn't fade and Regina doesn't wake, but sometimes she gasps for breath in her sleep and her forehead is wet with sweat and she's shaking in place. She's been dressed into a simple white gown and her hair is spread around her face and she looks more like she had at nineteen than she has in years, and Emma curls up in bed next to her when she's suffering most and holds her tight until the thrashing subsides.

She falls asleep beside Regina when she does sleep and wakes up to healers busying themselves with her unconscious companion. "Zelena might attack the castle, if she's after Regina's heart," Snow says one day. She's in Emma's seat and Emma is curled up on the bed, her arm loose over Regina's waist. Regina's chest is rising and falling rapidly but it seems to still a little whenever Emma puts her hand against it. "She must have had a purpose in poisoning her."

"Vengeance," Emma says dully. "She blames Regina for Cora abandoning her. I guess she's trying to do all the things that had happened to her to Regina."

Snow shakes her head. "It's so long to hold onto a grudge- Yes, I know," she says when Emma's brow furrows at her. "Regina and I were…different. She lived with me for so many years, hated me all along, and I never understood it and that only made it worse. Not that I think murdering me over it was ever valid," she adds quickly and Emma almost laughs. "But Zelena had one incident and she's been dwelling for this long?"

"She had some…thing," Emma says, which really isn't an explanation at all. "With Glinda." She's been in homes where she'd been made to feel less than she is, where she'd been conditioned to hate herself through pretty words. Not often. Not like Regina had, and not like Zelena had. And Glinda sounds like a force as toxic as Cora. "I don't know how self-aware she really is when it comes to Regina now."

Snow lets out a huff of frustration that makes it clear that she doesn't understand any of this, and she sets aside the subject for the time being. "You should sleep," she says. "You're looking almost as bad as Regina is."

"I sleep."

"In your bed. Without nurses waking you up every few hours," Snow says reproachfully. "We don't know when Zelena comes, but you need to be alert and ready for– Emma!" She jumps and dodges the arrow just in time.

Emma says, "I learned how to shoot lying down," and puts it back on the shelf above Regina's bed that they'd built for it before the curse.

Snow sighs. "Emma, this isn't going to help Regina."

"These might." Today she has a pile of magical texts that Tinkerbell had found for her stacked up on the night table, and she's been scanning through incomprehensible elvish and squinting at text that she can read but barely understand for the answers she needs.

Snow stares at her for a long, exhausted moment- and Snow's a hypocrite, anyway, because she's here nearly as often as Emma and isn't physically capable of being here any more than that- before she pulls one down and opens it, too, leaving their argument for now.

It's been nearly a week. Regina is freshly bathed in the afternoons, but today it isn't enough to rid the pallor from her face. She's shivering under her blankets and the purple mark is nearly black and Emma squeezes her hand and whispers reassurances in her ear, stories about Henry as a baby and musings about what cure Zelena had found and anything, anything, just in case Regina might be able to hear her.

Mulan is the one to try to pry her away from Regina today. On their last occasion, she'd come with Lancelot and Lancelot had lifted her over his shoulder while she'd kicked him and tried to carry her out of the room. "How is he?" she asks, blinking blearily at Mulan.

Mulan passes her a plate of food. "He still has the bite marks on his shoulder. He's been telling everyone that you injured him in a night of passion."

"He has not."

Mulan laughs in peals that ring in this room of death and brighten it a tiny bit. "No one would believe it. You've been very…singleminded here."

Emma's hand tightens around Regina's. "Fine."

"Not fine," Mulan corrects her. "Emma, have you seen yourself recently?"

"I don't care." Emma doesn't want to argue this now, doesn't want to endure another list of demands for her to leave this room. She has seen herself, red-eyed and wan and thinner than she'd remembered, but she isn't going anywhere. "Look. I've spent…I've lost a lot of time with the people I love. Partially because of Regina, yeah. But I'm not going to go one room over and go to bed while she's suffering here. I'm not going to abandon her when it's convenient."

Regina had accused her of love contingent on ease, on whether Henry had been present or Snow had been an enemy and never as simple as unwavering adoration. Emma knows she's being stubborn now when there's no one to prove anything to- no one but herself, and her inability to be content when someone she loves is helpless and hurting near her.

"Okay," Mulan says simply.

"Okay?"

"Okay. You win." Mulan sits down in her chair and flips through the last spellbook Emma had read through. "You're right, and I'd probably do the same in your place."

Emma squints at her suspiciously. Mulan's face is serene. "Right."

"Did you know that Aurora propositioned me?" Mulan says suddenly. Emma raises an eyebrow. "At the summer palace. She told me she loved me, that Philip loved me, that we could all be a family together." She shakes her head. "It was… And then Lancelot kissed me earlier this week."

"Everyone loves Mulan," Emma murmurs, unsure where this is going. Maybe Mulan just wants to talk. "What did you do?"

Mulan shrugs. "I don't want to be chained to King Stefan's kingdom, looking after a child when I could be fighting instead. If I came back to them from time to time and we loved each other then, perhaps. I think we may have missed our time." She plays with her belt, fingers running along the sheath of her sword, and when she looks up, it's with uncertainty.

Emma says, "Sometimes that's just how love works. It changes with our heartbreak. It's good that you can still love each other after." She isn't really one to talk, with the eternity that is loving Regina her primary experience with love, but she thinks about Merry Men and crushes she'd had and they'd had and of being fourteen and sneaking kisses with a village girl. "But Lancelot…he's a good man." She's protective of him and protective of Mulan and she doesn't know quite how she'd react to one of them hurting the other.

"He is," Mulan hastens to agree. "And I do feel quite a bit of affection for him. I just…I don't know if I'm ready to be his right now, either."

"What do you want to be?"

Mulan looks up, lips pressed together for a moment as though she's afraid of what she'll say next. "I want to be a Merry Man. Person," she amends, running her fingers through her hair.

Emma gazes at her, lets Regina go for a moment to reach over the sleeping queen and take Mulan's hand. "I want you to be a Merry Person too," she whispers, grinning and a little teary-eyed over it. Not enough sleep.

Mulan's looking firm and uncertain at once. "I want to mean something. Something more than just lover or wife or mother. I want to fight with you as my leader and protect your queen."

Emma shakes her head. "I have two of those. Imagine what it was like when they were fighting each other."

"I know what you would have chosen," Mulan says, warming up to the distraction. Emma blinks down at Regina and Mulan says, "No. Not just…Not always Regina. You choose what you feel is right, don't you? It's what I've admired about you all this time, before I even knew you. You don't subscribe to whatever the fairies or rulers decide is good." There's a glint in her eye that suggests that she knows exactly what had happened with Blue, after all. "You make your decisions based on your code. And I like your code. I respect your code. It's why I follow you."

Maybe it's just exhaustion that has Emma flushing, maybe it's Mulan's eyes fixed on hers. "I don't know."

"I like and respect Regina, too," Mulan says. "You hear…you know all these stories about the Evil Queen and the nightmare she was in the kingdom. But then you meet her and she's still so human, so much more than some kind of dark executioner."

"She was like that, back before."

"I see why you love her," Mulan murmurs. "And I swear, all the Merry Men see it too. We're loyal to you, to your love, to–"

Emma groans, falling down onto the bed again. "Why do I suspect that this whole conversation was about you not letting this go?"

Mulan flashes a grin at her. "Well, it's all true." She lowers her voice. "Go. Sleep. I promise you that we'll watch over her until you return." As if they've been summoned, she sees the rest of them enter, John and Will and Lancelot hovering near the entrance to their quarters. Mulan nods to them and they move closer, surrounding the bed, and Little John guides her to sit.

She's too tired to argue with them now, and she curls into his arms and lets him carry her to her bed.

She wakes up in the night to the sound of heavy gasping noises in the next room and staggers over to where her men are congregated around Regina, Lancelot pressing a cool towel to her forehead and Will holding her hands down so she can't claw into her own skin.

Emma shoves past them and burrows into Regina's side, wrapping her arms around Regina until the gasping subsides, and she thinks she must have fallen asleep again around then because it's light out and Lancelot is the only Merry Man left in the room, talking in low tones to Snow.

"How long have I been out?" she asks. Her head is still aching but it isn't as bad as it's been, and Snow is smiling like she's finally satisfied when she says, "It's hours past lunch. I can't believe Mulan finally got you to sleep."

Emma bolts upright. "Regina didn't have any more attacks since the night?"

Lancelot shakes his head. "A few. You've been holding her in your sleep."

"Oh." She leans against the headboard. "Thank you." She strokes Regina's hair, pulling it back from where it's plastered against her forehead. "You go get some rest. I slept enough."

Lancelot looks ready to argue, but Snow nods to him, too, and he inclines his head and says, "There are others to protect," in quiet acknowledgement. It isn't reproof but Emma flushes like it is and stares down at Regina again in stubborn denial.

"You don't have to save everyone," Snow says once he's gone. "There are plenty of people who will fight in your stead- and some who are fighting because of you. We're all trying to feed and protect the kingdom. Don't feel as though you aren't doing enough when you're fighting for our greatest fighter."

"I'm not doing anything, though." It's her one constant doubt here, wrapped around Regina while Regina sleeps. "I can't read these fucking spellbooks and I can't make her stop hurting and all I'm doing is hovering. And I don't even know what use I am for her there."

"You're comforting her." Snow lays a hand down on Regina's. "I see how she hurts a little less when you're holding onto her. She needs you, Emma."

Emma stares down at Regina's closed eyes. "I don't know if she ever needed me."

"Bullshit," Snow scoffs, and it's the most crude thing Emma's ever heard from Snow's lips. Snow shrugs at her shocked amusement. "Well, it's true," she mutters. "Regina has always needed you."

"She's done just fine without me." Emma can feel the helplessness welling up again, this one vulnerability she can't seem to tamp down. "You left here and she was willing to destroy everything in her path for vengeance. And she came back a hero. It was never about me, Snow."

"It was always about you." Snow shakes her head. "We talked more about you in those years than we did even Henry. So much of who she became was because of her regrets with you, because she didn't want to let you down with Henry. That book that caused all the problems? It only worked because it was about you. You've been a constant presence in her life for the past decade without even being there."

Emma laughs, sharp and caustic. "Good to know that I'm exactly as good to her dead and alive." Snow opens her mouth and Emma says, "No. Stop. Don't pretend it was…I never made a difference until she thought I was gone. When we were here the first time, when I fought for her to stop with the curse or executions, it was always about Henry."

"Because it was, or because you made it that way?" Snow asks, and Emma stares at her with little comprehension. Snow's fingers are trailing across her skin now, soothing against her wrist as her knuckles brush Regina's face. "I know you, Emma. And I know it's our fault that you can't imagine coming first for anyone, that you never thought yourself valuable enough to Regina to force her hand–"

"I begged her." Emma's shaking against Regina and Regina shifts in her sleep, a hand reaching for Emma's. Emma squeezes it and feels sick. "I begged her not to kill you. I begged her to run away with us. It was never enough. I was never enough."

"She was angry and bitter and her hate was stronger than her love," Snow whispers. "I don't know if…I don't think she knew how to build by the end, only destroy. I don't think she would have trusted herself with you and Henry then, not until you were gone and she had no choice but to learn to nurture again."

"Good thing everyone thought I was dead, huh?" She tries for a creaky smile.

Snow gives her a pained look. "People change, Emma. Regina changed. Regina picked love over hate at last and I've never doubted how much she loved you. She tried to have it all and it backfired on all of us. I think…if you spoke to her about what she'd been planning for you during the curse…" Snow sucks on her lip. "It's none of my business."

"Since when do you care about that?" Emma points out crankily, and Snow laughs and kisses her cheek.

"I'm going to go get you something to eat. You're doing good here." She departs the room and Emma's alone with Regina for the first time in almost a day.

Unbidden, her fingers move gently across her face, tracing her features as they smooth under Emma's touch. Regina is very still right now, tiny on her big bed and fragile, and for a moment, Emma lets herself believe Snow.

She ducks her head, embarrassed at where her thoughts are leading, and she closes her eyes and mutters, "Dammit, Regina, don't you dare laugh at me." This is foolish and expects too much of something gone and buried, and still...

She bends down very slowly and presses her lips to Regina's in a chaste kiss. She doesn't know exactly what she's waiting for- some kind of pulsing magic, the realigning of the cosmos, Regina sitting up…but there's nothing at all, and she feels the hot tears slide out of her eyes onto Regina's cheeks and hates herself for caring so much about a fairytale legend she'd known would never work for her.

But there's a light whisper against her lips, and she hears the rasp before it sinks in that it's coming from Regina. "Not…a curse."

"Regina!" She pulls back, bright red and wide-eyed, and Regina looks up at her through fuzzy eyes. "You're…I didn't…"

Regina shakes her head. "True love's kiss can break any curse. But this is poison. That…it isn't how it works." She struggles to sit up and Emma helps her to the position, eyes still wide as she stares at Regina. "I've been…fading in and out all day…I think." She reaches to stroke Emma's cheek, brushing away the tears. "Hard to wake up. But didn't want you to cry."

"Regina," Emma breathes, and she crumples in relief against the headboard, still very humiliated but relieved regardless. Regina reaches for her and holds her tight as she sags, Regina's arms unsteady and weak around Emma but still firm. Emma moves to support her, too, arms winding around her waist to hold her close, and Regina rests her head against Emma's shoulder. "How are you doing?"

"Weak," Regina manages, hands bent against Emma's back. "I'm losing my magic already."

"Your heart…"

"That must be it." Regina pieces together in moments what Emma still hasn't been able to figure out. "Zelena's magic…she was still all right while her heart...absorbed the poison. It must have taken a long time. My body is a hollow shell right now."

"What happens if we put your heart back in?"

"I think…Zelena's still infected with the poison, even after stopping it. It's coming from her heart. I can't have my heart back while the poison is in me." Her eyes open and close, eyelashes tickling Emma's neck, and she's hit with another quaking attack at that moment. It's worse when she's awake. She shivers and whimpers- Regina, whimpering like a scared child- and her eyes are shut tight but tears of agony are still leaking from them. Emma holds her as best as she can, shakes with her and bites back her own tears.

"I'm sorry," Regina whispers when it's over. "It's…I'm so tired." She burrows her head into Emma's neck again and it's so unusual for Regina, Regina who's always been one for fleeting touches and soft kisses and never anything so needy. "I'm…I'm…"

"You're afraid," Emma guesses. Regina is strong and wild and desperate but she's rarely fearful. She's angry when she should be terrified, and Emma's generally the same way. She hates being afraid. She hates it right now, too.

Regina sighs, light and frustrated, and pulls away to catch Emma's gaze, her jaw tensing and relaxing in a motion. "I don't want to be helpless ever again," she says, a quiet admission.

Emma nods silently.

And then Regina's eyes glaze over and then clear as though she's only just realized something. "You thought…true love's kiss?"

Emma flushes, hot and ashamed, and she suddenly finds the pillows they're sitting against fascinating. "I was out of ideas, okay? I didn't…I don't want to put any pressure on you or…I know it's been a while since we were…"

"Emma." Gentle fingers lift up her chin and she sees that Regina's eyes are gleaming with affection. "You really thought that true love's kiss would…Emma," she breathes again, and leans in to kiss Emma on the forehead. She's trembling at the effort of the movement and Emma trembles at soft lips on her skin and when Regina's fingers finally go limp at her shoulders, she shifts away to guide her back onto the bed.

"You need to sleep," she says firmly. "I just need…one thing from you first."

Regina searches her face and then shakes her head. "It won't work."

"It's our only option," Emma points out, reaching for paper from the night table. "And I won't let you lie here and die when we still have another way."

Regina sags. "I won't let you put yourself in danger for me."

"I'd do anything for you," Emma blurts out, and immediately regrets it. It's too revealing, too much handed over to Regina too soon, and it's absolutely true in terrifying ways. She loves too hard, always has, and she doesn't know how to let it go with gracefulness.

But Regina's staring at her with glistening eyes and she looks just a tiny bit more vibrant at the admission, and Emma won't retract it now. "Please, Regina. Tell me. I swear, I'll be careful."

She is careful. She follows the instructions on Regina's paper, steals the vial that Blue had used for the poison and collects the other ingredients and sets them all out right in front of the cabin where she'd once lived. When it's all set up, she drops the vial into the circle she'd drawn in the mud in front of the doorway and grabs her knife.

Zelena appears at the center of the circle in a whirl of green smoke, eyes wide and turning her head around in furious confusion, and Emma shoves her into the cabin doorway before she gets her bearings. Zelena raises her hand as though to blast Emma and nothing happens.

"It's magic-proof in here," Emma says, holding up her knife. "I wanted you to listen to me."

Zelena glares hard at her. "Why the hell would I listen to you?"

With determination wrought from days of thinking of nothing else, Emma says, "Regina needs your help," and Zelena laughs in her face.