The Past

"On this day, the tenth of January of the year 1793, I speak to you as only an equal. On behalf of myself and my brother, I... fully consent... to give up any tenuous claim that our family is believed to have on this kingdom or any other. I... acknowledge that King Clayton, the first of his name, and his heirs are... the true and rightful monarchs. Believing what I do, I must beg you all to immediately cease all actions that could be seen as treason. If these actions are not stopped, I... agree that the death penalty is the only fitting punishment for such crimes, as outlined by our laws, and... support the king in all actions he sees fit to take."

Christine swallowed hard as she finished, fighting against the tears beginning to well up under her eyelids. She could barely hear herself think over the commotion in the packed square outside of the palace. At this point, she was fairly certain that the only thing keeping the crowds from ripping her apart was the considerable height of the stone balcony on which she stood. After this speech, she was clearly a traitor to their cause, wasn't she? Hating her would be a mild reaction under the circumstances.

That was why the words that she could make out from the roar of sound below were confusing her:

"How have they threatened you, princess?"

"Long may you live, my lady!"

"Down with the king!"

"Tyrant!"

With a sideways glance at Lord Alasdair, standing just behind her in the shadow of the doorway, Christine shook her head slightly.

Guards were beginning to arrest particularly vocal members of the crowd. Some of them were reacting violently and people were starting to scream as blood splattered the snow.

"Please, stop!" Christine begged.

"Enough," Lord Alasdair snapped, yanking Christine back into the shelter of the castle. He didn't let her go until he'd pulled her into an empty room, pushing her down roughly into a chair.

"I... I did what you asked of me," Christine began, ashamed of the slight pleading note in her voice. "I said exactly what you asked me to. My brother-"

"Your brother will pay the price of your failure," Lord Alasdair interrupted coolly. "That last outburst of yours made it clear whose side you were truly on, if it wasn't already clear from your actions. Considering the time you spend performing, one would think that you would be more capable of making a convincing speech."

"But I did make the speech," Christine argued frantically.

Lord Alasdair leaned forward until his face was inches away from her own. "Not good enough." Christine shivered as his breath blew across her face. As he turned and left without a word, a tear traced its way down Christine's face and fell to the floor.

That night, Christine was not invited to dine with the king. Instead of feeling frightened by this, she only felt a dull sort of relief. She didn't feel like getting out of bed, never mind making herself look presentable.

All she could think about was Connor: a toddler with messy blonde hair running towards her unsteadily and reaching up his hands in a wordless demand for her to pick him up, a little boy with wet blue eyes and a snot-covered face looking for her to soothe his tears, an older version of her brother screaming and begging her to not let him be taken away...

"'I hear a baboon on the Southern Isles is looking for his face back'?! Is that really the best insult you could come up with?"

Christine felt her entire body tense up.

Edward stopped mid-laugh. "Christine?"

"I think I need to be alone tonight," she said coldly, not even bothering to look in his direction.

Edward hovered by the door uncertainly. "Are you alright?"

"Please leave. I would find it morally reprehensible to spend any time with someone related to Lord Alasdair this evening." Christine knew that she was being unfair, but there was something hard knotted in her stomach that refused to let her be reasonable.

The foot of the bed sunk slightly as a very concerned Edward sat down on the edge. "What did he do?"

"He's going to kill my brother," she whispered, ashamed to hear her voice break.

"They wouldn't do that, surely. Don't they need him to threaten you?" Edward tried to reason after a pause.

Christine sat up, eyes sparkling with tears and anger. "It's hardly any better if they're going to torture him, Edward! Do you know what it's like having a loved one's blood on your hands?! Every time someone does something against the king supposedly in my name, my brother is getting hurt. Your father has kindly informed me of this, and there's nothing I can do to fix it! I say and do things that I don't believe in just to keep Connor alive, and for what? Nothing! Connor is still getting hurt and there's nothing I can do! You have no idea what that's like, and do you want to know why? Because your bloody family is responsible for it!"

Bright blue eyes met pale blue-grey, and Christine's shouts were replaced by a heavy silence.

"My family isn't me," Edward finally said.

Christine's lower lip started to quiver. "I know."

With a sigh, Edward pulled Christine towards him and Christine buried her face into his chest, sobs wracking her body.

Christine no longer snuck out to see Sari. She didn't dare put her sister at risk or herself under suspicion, and frankly, she was terrified of what they would do to her brother if she was caught. Her insides writhed with shame whenever she thought about having taken that risk before. Perhaps it was due to the thrill of young love or just stupidity, but, somehow, they had succeeded in lulling her into a false sense of security; she had begun to believe that she was untouchable, that she could get away with more and more without repercussions. Now, she had been pulled harshly back to reality.

Life fell into a routine that was even more unbearable than it had been initially. She still ate with the king most nights and performed almost every night, but now she would also have to spend several hours a week being threatened or manipulated by Edward's father or the king. The two men called them "political meetings", but the title was misleading, particularly since, as Christine repeatedly tried to tell them, she had no control over the political situation.

She was becoming certain that she was losing her mind, and the proof appeared one day as she was getting ready to sing.

There was a face in the mirror that wasn't her own.

Christine screamed and jumped away from the mirror, but when a servant ran into the room, the face was no longer there.

The next time she saw the figure was when she was waiting for Edward in her room. She was changing into her nightdress when the door creaked open only an inch. Christine paused, her dress half-off.

"Edward?" She called hesitantly.

There was no answer, only a glint of a grey eye through a hole in a black mask. Christine stared back, shaking slightly. The figure stayed there for at least ten minutes, before disappearing into the shadows. When Christine ran to the door, there was no one in the hallway.

Next, she was walking to dinner and she had the strangest sense that she was being watched. She whirled around and saw only a shadow from around the corner, but she recognized the shape of it.

A few days later in her room, she was brushing her long dark hair and singing softly to herself when she saw the figure appear behind her in the mirror. She froze as he walked towards her, reaching into a drawer for the knife Edward had given her on their adventure the year before.

"Who are you?" She snarled, whirling around to face the figure.

He didn't respond except to stare at her with his cold eyes. He began to walk towards her, slowly, like a cat might stalk a mouse.

"I will kill you if you come near me," Christine threatened, barely managing to keep the waver out of her voice.

The figure didn't even hesitate. He moved towards her and paused just out of arm's reach. Christine was almost panting in fear, but he wasn't moving. His eyes just bore into hers with the same unblinking, almost reptilian intensity as before.

Then, cautiously, he stepped forward again. Christine forgot about the knife as he moved so that his forehead was almost touching hers. Then, deliberately, he tilted his head to the side and lifted his mask slightly, running his tongue along her neck. Christine shuddered and tried to bring the knife up, but the strange specter had her hand in a death grip.

Footsteps sounded in the hallway, and the specter left as quickly as he had come, leaving Christine trembling and gasping for air. All he left behind was the sickly scent of dried flowers.

She was certain that she was losing her mind, but what figment of her imagination could touch her like that?

It wasn't until March, though, that disaster truly struck.

Christine was singing an aria when suddenly, something hit the candle beside her. It fell over neatly onto the curtains, which the fire began to devour with crackles and snaps of pleasure. Christine stared in the direction the object had come from and saw a black-clad figure just outside of the doors. Their eyes locked, and it was Edward who leapt up to pull her away from the flaming fabric before it fell down onto her.

Spurred into action, Christine pulled him after the people fleeing the hall. Instead of following them, though, she pulled him up a circular flight of stairs to the top of one of the castle's many inner walls. She slammed the door, searching with trembling hands for a lock or bolt but not finding one.

"What are you doing?" Asked Edward, baffled.

"Making sure no one can follow us," Christine said, before her eyes widened with a sudden realization. "Unless he's already here..."

She began sprinting across the wall, eyes darting around to anything that could hide the form of a man.

"Christine!" Edward grabbed her arm and pulled her to a stop. His tone suggested that this was definitely not the first time he'd called her name to get her attention.

"There's a man. He's following me, and tonight he tried to kill me." Christine's voice was low and frantic.

"What are you talking about?" Edward's brow furrowed.

"He's been everywhere, Edward, everywhere! He's been watching me. At least a dozen times I've seen him, but he's probably been there more than that. If I don't see him, I see his shadow... he's always dressed in black, with a mask and a hood. Tonight, I saw his shadow, he shot the arrow that hit the candle-"

"Nothing was shot at it," Edward interrupted, perplexed. "You must have bumped the table-"

"No, there was something that hit it. If not an arrow, a-a stone, or something. Perhaps he had a slingshot-"

"Christine, listen to yourself-"

"I know that it sounds insane, but he touched me, Edward. I know that he's real, and now he's trying to kill me. He must be working for the king or for your father, and since having me here isn't enough to solve their rebellion problem, they need to get rid of me-"

"Christine!" Edward interrupted, lifting her chin gently. "I know you've been terribly stressed lately, and stress can make your mind play tricks on you. I'm certain that it's natural to be paranoid in a situation like yours-"

Christine backed away, eyes suddenly hard. "You don't believe me."

"I didn't say that. I believe that you could have seen this, but that doesn't necessarily make it real. Surely someone else would've noticed him too," Edward attempted to reason with her.

"You don't believe me," she repeated softly, backing away from him and looking for all the world like a cornered animal.

Edward sighed, closing his eyes for a moment in frustration.

When he opened them, Christine had sunk to the floor, her shoulders shaking.

"Please don't cry," Edward said softly, moving towards her and pulling her up into his arms.

"Let go of me," she sobbed.

He did so reluctantly, and she suddenly felt incredibly lonely, even if they were only a step away from each other. She stared at him, vision blurred by the tears that wouldn't stop falling. Before she knew it, she was moving back into his embrace, relaxing into his warmth and safety.

"Shh," he whispered, running soothing fingers through the curls framing her face.

He held her for a while as she cried for longer than he'd ever heard her cry before. In his experience, Christine's tears were either very subtle or explosive. In either case, they were always brief. He'd figured out long ago that Christine preferred to keep tears to herself if at all possible, and that was why such a huge display of distress was causing him a distinct amount of unease.

"You know that I would never let anyone hurt you, right?" He murmured into her hair, once her sobbing had died down slightly.

"That's a ridiculous p-promise to make," Christine chided, face still buried in his shoulder.

"It's true, though," he promised, pulling her in more tightly. "If this ghost of yours does exist, I'll destroy him. If you don't first, of course."

Christine let out a soft, wet laugh at that.

"I think your shirt is wet," she said.

Edward's reply was to gently kiss her forehead before leaning his own head against hers.

"Even if it was against the king, or my father, or Julian, I would do whatever I could to keep you safe," he added almost reverently.

For a moment, the young couple just stayed like that. Alone on the wall, with a light dusting of late March snow falling onto them, they could almost pretend that they were somewhere else. It was a rare moment of peace that neither one was eager to break.

"Edward?" Christine murmured finally, looking him seriously in the eye. His breath caught at the sight of her. She was always beautiful to him, but somehow she looked even more beautiful at this moment. Her normally pale face was flushed from her tears, her eyes large, glistening, and reflecting the tapestry of stars above them.

"Mmm?"

"Do you love me?" She hesitated slightly.

"Yes, of course I do. You know that," he said with a small smile.

"Do you think... that you'll always feel this way?" She asked, eyes searching his.

"Yes, I do," he said seriously. "I would give you the world if I could."

She relaxed against him with a soft sigh. She looked exhausted.

"But, as giving you the world isn't very realistic and, from what I understand, you don't really want it anyway-" Christine laughed "-perhaps I could give you the next best thing?"

Christine raised an eyebrow in the mischievous way that he was now familiar with. "And what would that be?"

"Freedom?" He suggested, and the word sent a shiver down her spine that had nothing to do with the falling snow. "We could do it, you know. We could leave out the passage you've used before. There are never any guards, and, even if there were now, we both know how to hold our own in combat."

Christine's smile was pained. "Even if we could, Connor-"

"I've thought about it. I didn't want to tell you until I was sure that I could pull it off, but... what if I stole the king's royal seal? We could write a letter ordering his release, deliver it ourselves, and have him free before they even knew we were gone."

Her insides twisting with something that felt suspiciously hopeful, Christine bit her lip. "Do you actually think it could be possible?"

Edward laughed suddenly. "Yes, I do. I think we could do it. Then, who knows? We could live in the forest, or catch a ship to those islands you love so much."

Christine stepped onto her toes and kissed the man passionately. "I would have no objections to spending the rest of my life with you, regardless of where."

"And I will keep you safe from anyone who dares threaten you again-"

"You don't need to do that, Edward. Just love me and never leave me," she said earnestly, throwing her arms around his neck. "Besides, I may need to be the one protecting you," she added with a hint of a smirk.

Edward grinned right back. "I can't disagree with that, my love."

Then, as if a thought had suddenly occurred to him, he knelt down onto the snow.

"My darling Christine, so that we do not live together scandalously as an unmarried couple, perhaps this would be a prudent time to-"

He was cut off by a swift kiss.

"You're ruining my proposal," he protested.

"You knew the answer anyway," she said.

"Still, I'd like to say at least a few things, so behave," he replied sternly, gently pushing her back up. She sighed dramatically, but there was a smile teasing at the edges of her mouth.

"Christine, I swear to love you for as long as I live and to protect you to the best of my ability. I swear to never leave your side, to help you carry all of your burdens, and to make you smile as often as I can. If these terms are agreeable to you, will you do me the greatest honour of consenting to be my wife?"

"Yes," she whispered. "Nothing would make me happier."

With a smile, Edward pulled a plain silver band from his own finger and slipped it onto Christine's. "There. Now it's official."

The two returned to Christine's room, smiling rapturously at the other. Neither one noticed the dark figure in the shadows with the cold grey eyes as they left. The figure himself lingered for several minutes afterwards, face unreadable thanks to the mask, but with a body that radiated with fury. Finally, he disappeared down the staircase. The only thing that remained to show that he was ever there was the subtle, sickly scent of lavender.

The Present

Killian paused when Emma's jaw dropped.

"Wait... your mother's stalker was your grandfather?!"

"And you thought having Regina in your family was a nightmare," Killian teased.

The Past

The plan was to meet at midnight the next night in Christine's room and make their escape. Christine was nervous - so much could go wrong - but pushed it to the side and attempted to go about her day with some normalcy.

That normalcy was wrecked by mid-afternoon when guards swept into her room and arrested her.

By midnight, she was in a cell in a prison just outside of the city.

Please, God, let this not be because Edward was caught, Christine thought, huddled in a ball on the cold floor.

Meanwhile, Edward was sailing out with the next tide.