Lily sobbed for what seemed like a little while on the forest floor. When she became exhausted from crying she decided it was time to get going. She searched for the pocket-watch she tossed carelessly to the ground but couldn't find it. She kicked leaves and turned over rocks around her, but when nothing turned up she began to panic. She had lost the magical watch! She frantically looked around on the ground where she sulked when suddenly she heard someone cough to get her attention. Lily looked up and was surprised to see Mary holding the pocket-watch from the beak of her umbrella's unusual handle.

"Is this what you are looking for?" inquired Mary as she dangled the watch in front of Lily. Lily wasn't sure what she was more shocked over. Was it the watch that Mary was able to find? Was it the fact that Mary somehow found her in the middle of the woods? Or was it the fact that Mary looked much, much older than she remembered on their last encounter? Lily could have sworn that Mary was no older than her mother, but now… she looked as if she could have been her grandmother. "I knew the moment we arrived that we would be enjoying ourselves, but really… it's very irresponsible of us to lose track of the time."

"You're… you're old," observed Lily so callously, ignoring the watch that was still on the umbrella's handle.

"Age is a privilege that is denied to many," quoted Mary in response to Lily's blunt observation.

"No… no I mean… you look older," clarified Lily, thinking she misunderstood her.

"Well of course, understandably, from your perspective I am much older than you," retorted Mary in kind. It didn't really confirm Lily's suspicions. It only added more questions. "Let us not talk about age. In some social circles, the discussion of age can be perceived as rude. Come," said Mary as she condensed umbrella her and slid it through the handles of her carpet bag. When the umbrella was secure Mary extended her hand to the little girl. Lily gratefully took the old woman's hand and was assisted off the ground. It wasn't until the sun's light sparkled over the suspended pocket-watch that Lily finally took notice of the object.

"My watch!" exclaimed Lily. Mary's eyes widened over the excited clamor and lifted her carpet bag just out of reach of the excited young girl. Lily pleaded as she tried to reach for the item, "Please! I need that watch to show to my father."

"You can show it to your parents they arrive," redirected Mary.

Lily backed away from Mary with surprise and replied, "Wait… they know I'm here in Storybrooke? You told them! Didn't you?"

"I did no such thing. You don't give your parents very much credit, do you? They're a lot smarter than you think."

"So they're coming to Storybrooke for me?" asked Lily with astonishment.

"Yes and I think it's best for us to just stay together until they do. I had wanted to take you to this town's gorgeous flower shop, but then you disappeared on me. If I had known that you wanted to play hide-and-seek, I would have come better prepared. Believe it or not, I do enjoy games. Though…" began Mary with a mischievous look about her. She glanced at the watch and then squinted down at Lily as if measuring her ability to play along, "… I do suppose we have some time left to play one more game before your parents arrive."

"You… you want to play a game with me?" asked Lily with confusion.

Mary knelt down to Lily's eye-level and asked with a smirk, "How would like to go bury some treasure?"

"Where?" wondered Lily. Mary kept smirking as she stood up and turned around. By the time she completed her about-face a quick fog rolled in around them. The fog became more organized and shifted into the shape of a staircase which Mary confidently started climbing upon. Lily's jaw hung open with surprise. "You are magical! I knew it! You're-you're Mary Poppins."

"And you're Lily Gold. Now that we're officially done with introductions, shall we carry on?" retorted Mary impatiently as she continued to climb the cloud steps. Lily looked on with utter amazement and tentatively approached the cloud staircase. Her first step felt unusually sturdy and supportive for a cloud which gave way to another confident step until she was able to follow closely behind Mary.

"You're the person I read about in my book!"

Mary glanced back behind her on the cloud step and replied, "You enjoy reading books, do you? You know, you shouldn't believe everything you read."

The stair case eventually leveled off into a bridge, which they crossed until they found another staircase that brought them back down to the ground. When both her feet finally touched the ground, Lily turned around excitedly to see the epic cloud structure but to her disappointment discovered that the cloud bridge had completely evaporated behind her. When she turned to address Mary of her newfound melancholy, she discovered the elderly woman approaching the red line on the ground. As Lily followed suit she stared at the red line that extended for miles on both sides curiously. From where she stood she could see from afar the main road they had entered in from earlier and immediately recognized the welcome sign that was only just a stone's throw away.

"What are we doing here?" Lily asked as she followed Mary.

"I told you. We are here to bury treasure. This is all part of the game and this…," Mary said as she pointed to a hole by the root of a fallen tree trunk just beyond the red line, "is where we shall bury it."

"Why?"

Mary gave Lily a disgruntled look and replied, "Do you want to play the game, or do you want to continue asking me questions?"

Lily wanted to do both and hesitated, but based off of Mary's stern look she sensed the urgency. She didn't want to be on Mary's bad side, if there was a bad side at all, so she ran forward to the hole and watched as Mary dropped the pocket watch into it. It wasn't a very deep hole because it took no time at all for Lily to cover up the opening with dirt and spare leaves she could find from around the surrounding area. When the job was done, Lily stood up in place dusting the dirt from off her hands as she wondered, "So why are we burying the watch? Who are we hiding it from?"

"Who said that we were hiding it? If anything, we're burying the watch to protect it," reasoned Mary.

Lily was flabbergasted by Mary's logic and stood there baffled by the intentions of the game. Perhaps it wasn't a game. Perhaps there was some good reason for Mary to want to bury the treasure here. Mary hadn't led her astray so far. In fact, it was Lily who got herself into mischief. Lily stared at the freshly buried spot and figured that Mary was right. It wasn't like they were hiding it from anybody. They were protecting it. Lily reasoned that if she needed to retrieve the watch again she knew exactly where to find it. After a moment or two of heavy thinking, Lily grew tired of trying to understand and instead played along by asking, "So what are we doing next? Anything else you want to bury?"

"Now, we finally go to that flower shop I was telling you about earlier before you disappeared on me," said Mary as she took her umbrella and popped it open. Once it was open, she then took the carpet bag's handles and fed it to her umbrella's parrot-beak which opened and snapped promptly upon reception. The bag hung conveniently as Mary extended her free hand to Lily and asked, "Are you ready?"

Lily took Mary's hand again and figured that perhaps Mary didn't want to lose her again to the woods. With the open umbrella Lily assumed that Mary simply wanted shade from the sun as they walked… but she was dead wrong.

As soon as Mary had Lily's hand a huge draft lifted the two into the air. Lily couldn't believe what was happening as she watched her feet dangle below her. Higher and higher they went until they were well above the tree line. They moved fairly quickly in the sky making it to the town's main street in practically no time at all. As strange and frightening as their flying experience should have been, Lily embraced it. Not only did she welcome it, she found it exhilarating! She loved it. It was liberating, wonderful, magical and strangely natural. Lily was flying with Mary Poppins and it was unbelievable.

Seeing where they needed to go, Mary dropped them precisely in front of the Game of Thorns flower shop. Lily's small feet touched the ground first as she stared at Mary's landing who landed gracefully and perfectly beside her. With awe, Lily stared at Mary who appeared, surprisingly enough, completely unmoved by their thrilling flight to the shop. Mary turned to look at Lily and found her mouth ajar which she swiftly corrected, "Close your mouth Lily. We are not a codfish."

Lily promptly closed her mouth as Mary let go of her hand to adjust her umbrella. She sat her carpet bag down and condensed the umbrella that was still in her hand. After closing her flying apparatus she slipped it back through her carpet bag and walked quickly over to the closest parked car. While using the car's side mirror she lowered her body to view her reflection and proceeded to check herself for imperfections. There was only one lock of hair out of place so she quickly tucked it away behind her ear. Then she proceeded to straighten her outfit, dusting away whatever debris she might have picked up during her travels. With a sniff and then a nod of approval, she turned around with a smile and retrieved her carpet bag. With another nod of her head, the door to the Flower shop magically opened. Lily stood there amazed by Mary, wondering what magical thing she was going to do next. Seeing that Lily was stalling, Mary ordered, "Go on." While looking at Lily, Mary nodded again towards the door again gesturing for her to enter first. "Best foot forward. Spit spot."

Lily tentatively and slowly entered the establishment with great trepidation. When she entered the building there wasn't anything special about the flower shop except for the large elderly gentleman she presumed to be the shop's owner. As soon as the visitors entered the shop, the shop owner looked up. Upon recognizing Mary, his face rapidly transformed from surprise to shock to complete overwhelming joy.

"Maurice," called Mary lovingly to the shop owner as she entered the building. With great joy, Maurice came out from behind his register and replied similarly as he beamed, "Mary…"

Maurice rushed over to Mary who had dropped her belongings as they fell into a long-overdue loving embrace. With a slight but overjoyed sob Maurice said into Mary's ear, "I always knew you'd come back."

"I told you I wouldn't be long," she whispered back, grinning most enthusiastically. They hugged each other for only a few more moments when Mary stepped back and noticed Lily gawking awkwardly at them. With her hands, Mary gestured toward Lily to step forward. Confused about what she had witnessed or what was going to happen next, Lily did as she was commanded to and took Mary's hand.

"Maurice, this is your granddaughter… Lily Gold."

… …

Like they had planned, Rumple parked in front of the flower shop with the car still running. He turned to his wife to connect with her one last time before departing, but noticed that she was looking elsewhere. She stared at the Flower Shop's sign reluctantly and for a moment they sat in the car in silence. When she didn't speak or get out of the car right away he said, "You've barely said a word since we crossed the border. Aside from the obvious," he paused for moment to catch a glimpse of her face, but when he couldn't he asked, "what's wrong?"

She couldn't explain this feeling of foreboding she had; mostly with her separating from her husband, but partially because she was about to see her father whom she hadn't seen in seven years. Nothing about this plan sat well with her. "I just- I just have a bad feeling about all of this."

Rumple leaned in and kissed Belle on her cheek. "Don't worry. We're going to find Lily, and when we do, we'll head home," he said trying to reassure her.

"Really?" said Belle hopefully as she turned back around to face her husband. He looked beyond Belle's shoulder at the Flower Shop's door and then back at his wife and encouraged, "It's important for you to see your father again. I'm sure he'll forgive you, just as how you've forgiven him. Just explain our situation and I'm sure he'll help you find Mary."

She nodded understandably and took Rumple's hand, squeezing it one last time before stepping out of the car. As soon as she closed the door she glanced up at the shop's sign and with a nervous sigh she gazed down at the door's knob ominously. Rumple lowered the passenger window of his car and called to her, "I have my cell phone. Call me if you learn anything new. I'll do the same."

She nodded again and grimaced as she watched Rumple drive away from the shop and continue down the road toward the woods. No matter how many times she told herself that things were going to be ok, she knew deep down that they were not. She had to press on. They both strived for the same goal… to find their missing daughter.

Belle turned to approach her father's flower shop when suddenly she heard a familiar voice call out to her from the street, "Belle?! Is that you sister?" Belle swiveled where she stood and saw Leroy approach her. When they faced each other, he greeted her with open arms and they both fell into a congenial hug. "What are you doing here? I was told that you had moved," he wondered.

Surprised, Belle fumbled with her words as she spoke, "I did… my-my daughter is missing. She ran away from New York to here and now… now I'm just trying to find her."

"Well, let's rally the troops. I'm sure everyone at Granny's would be glad to help. I'm heading over there right now. Emma's called everyone to meet her there to help her out on some emergency."

"I know."

"You know?" said the baffled dwarf quizzically.

Belle nodded as she admitted, "The emergency was from me. I called her earlier on my way over to Storybrooke. It's to help find my daughter. I really should-" Belle began to say as she gestured over at her father's door, but Leroy cut her off by taking her hand and declared, "Well then you should be the one leading the charge. You know your daughter better than anyone. You should be the one explaining what happened and to tell us where to start looking."

Reluctantly, she allowed the dwarf to take her to the diner. She had to admit, if she wanted to find Lily quickly she was going to need all the help she could get; the more feet on the ground the better. "Alright, but wait," said Belle as she pulled back from Leroy and broke from his grasp. Things were happening way too fast. She needed to make one thing clear. "I can't talk for long. As soon as we're done at the diner, I must speak with my father. He doesn't even know I'm here!"

Leroy understood and nodded, "Fair enough."

After understanding each other, Belle followed after the dwarf and together they walked around the corner moving quickly into the diner. As soon as they arrived she was greeted by all of Leroy's brothers, Emma, Killian, Archie, David, Mary-Margaret, Ruby and Granny.

"Belle!" exclaimed Ruby, who was just as surprised as everyone else in the establishment to see her walking through the doors. Simultaneously, she heard people say to her as they greeted her with quick hugs and welcoming touches,

"You're here!"

"Welcome back!"

"Good to see you again!"

"You made it!"

"Hello stranger!"

"You came back!"

It was definitely strange to be coming back to this town after such a long time with open arms. Belle was so overwhelmed by the warm reception that it left her speechless. This was not what she had expected. And seeing the large crowd gathered together on her behalf moved her to tears. She honestly didn't expect so many people to come rally to her aid.

"Wow… I… I can't thank you all enough. I'm just so moved," thanked Belle as she wiped away a few tears from her eyes. "Thank you all for coming together like this to help out my family. It means so much to me. I'm just sorry that this wasn't under better circumstances."

"Sister," said Leroy as he came up to Belle and placed a supportive hand on her shoulder, "no matter where you go you'll always be one of us. And around here, we always help each other out, no matter if you're a hero or a villain. We've been through so much together…"

"…legendary curses," said Happy.

"…memory losses," chimed in Doc.

"…Not to mention, nightmarish monsters," added Sleepy with a yawn.

"Exactly! You're one of us, which means that you'll always be part of something special. We all share something that nothing, not even Rumplestiltskin, can take away from us," nodded Leroy encouragingly. He certainly had a point. There was something special about this place. Perhaps she misjudged everyone. Perhaps time had changed their feelings as well as their opinions about them. Perhaps the town wasn't as upset with them for moving away as she had originally thought. The warm reception was certainly heartening, but it made her wish that Rumple was there beside her. It was very convenient for the dwarf to say all these wonderful things to her, but if Rumple had been there beside her would they have been so welcoming? The very idea was enough to give her pause because there was no way to know for sure.

Everyone knew that Belle was married to Rumplestiltskin, but out of all the people in the room Emma was the only one who found it suspicious that Rumplestiltskin wasn't there with her. Emma knew Belle didn't come alone. If Belle was here and he wasn't, then he was probably planning or doing something he shouldn't be doing. With the possible duplicity running afoot, Emma asked forwardly, "Speaking of which, where is Gold?"

"He's-he's not here," Belle said regretfully. "He went to search for Henry. He thinks he may be in the woods."

"How will finding Henry help find his daughter?" asked David, not following the logic.

"He believes," started Belle, but then she quickly corrected herself, "We believe… that the reason why there isn't magic in Storybrooke is because Henry had removed it. It was how we were able to easily cross back into Storybrooke. Once he finds Henry, he'll restore this town's magic and he'll be able to find our daughter faster."

Despite Belle's response, Emma still felt wary. She furrowed her eyebrows with suspicion and said, "I thought you said you guys were planning on going to your father's shop to find Mary."

"I did and I was!" defended Belle, who felt affronted by the insinuation of deception. "I actually was just about to enter my father's shop when Leroy stopped me and said that I should be the one here explaining the situation to everyone. And he's right, none of you know my daughter or why she ran away to here." Seeing that she finally had everyone's attention she continued, "She's seven. She-she has dark brown hair and hazel eyes. For the past several weeks she had been suffering from these dreams these… nightmares. In these nightmares she envisions an alternate reality about all of us; about Storybrooke and this town's magic.

"We were happy living in New York. As a family we were done with magic. Our experiences alone had taught us that nothing good came from even learning about it, so when Lily confronted us about these dreams of magic we had to deny its existence. So she ran away here hoping to bring back proof of it. Coincidentally, just the day before Lily ran away, Mary Poppins came to visit us. Mary mentioned that she was returning to Storybrooke which was why I mentioned to you earlier about my wanting to find her first. Her deity magic could help us locate my daughter. But to find her I need to know where Mary is, which I don't. I know Mary's here though. She had expressed before leaving New York that she would be returning to Storybrooke and the only person I know she'd visit here would by my father. He knows her. So that's why I needed to speak with my father."

Just then the diner's doors flew open and a little boy about the same age as Lily ran forward. With his short crew-cut hair and bright blue eyes he looked like a miniature version of his father.

"Mom! Dad!" cried out the little boy as he ran towards his parents. Both David and Mary-Margaret looked utterly concerned and confused by their son's sudden intrusion.

"Neal!" exclaimed Mary-Margaret as Neal hugged and clung to his mother. "What are you doing here? Why aren't you at school? You're pale! What's wrong honey? What happened?"

"I-I-I was with Henry. In a cabin… in the woods," explained Neal who was completely out of breath.

"What were you two doing at a cabin in the woods?" wondered David to his son. Neal hesitantly looked up over at his father and then quickly at his sister. He knew about her lie detector. So he conveniently omitted by saying, "we-we were practicing… for my test… at school."

"Neal…," said Emma who raised an eyebrow at her brother. She knew he was lying. "Come on. What were you two really doing there?"

Neal hesitated and then sighed as he admitted, "Henry was showing me magic."

At the comment Emma could see that he was telling the truth, but it felt incomplete; a half-truth. It was something that warranted further investigation, but later. Neal's petrified look and seeking help was taking precedence at the moment. "There was this girl. She called herself Morgan," Neal explained as best he could. At the name, Belle jumped in place. Neal continued, "She came in thinking that Henry was hurting me. Henry felt Morgan's magic so he took Storybrooke's magic away. But she was still able to overpower Henry with her magic! Morgan has Cogsworth!"

"Cogsworth?!" everyone in the room seemed to say simultaneously.

"Are you sure?" Archie asked. Neal nodded.

"How?" asked Emma.

"Henry had it on him the entire time," said Neal.

"Henry had it the entire time?" repeated Mary-Margaret in disbelief.

"Why would Henry keep that from us?" Emma wondered.

"I don't know. All I know is that she took Cogsworth from Henry and that she tied him up to a chair using magic! She kept telling me that Henry wasn't Henry, that he was this person named… Arthur."

"How did you manage to escape?" asked Ruby.

"She used her magic and moved us away from the cabin. She said that she was trying to save me, but her eyes… they were gold when she used her magic… and it freaked me out! So I ran away from her as fast as I could," explained Neal haphazardly.

"We need to find Morgan right away," said Belle changing the plans on everyone suddenly. Everyone in the room turned to her for answers wanting to know why. Belle knew that it had to be Lily, but part of her didn't want to believe it to be so. She couldn't admit it until she knew for certain.

"Morgan? Are you sure? I thought you said you needed help finding your daughter?" Emma asked.

Belle nodded and grimaced, "I still do, but if I could just talk to my father first he'll know where to find Mary Poppins and then she'll be able to help me find my daughter. Look, in my daughter's dream there was this Sorcerer's hat and according to the dream it is the most dangerous and powerful object in all the realms. It was retrieved by means of Cogsworth and nobody should have either of these items."

It wasn't a lie, but then again it wasn't exactly the truth either. The last thing she needed was the search for her daughter to turn into a witch-hunt. She hated herself for not being so forthcoming, but if lying was what got her daughter back safe and sound then so be it. She couldn't believe that she had resorted to lying. Already the town was making her say and do things she wouldn't normally do and she hated how it made her feel.

"Honey, I'm no expert in magic or in dreams or what-not, but how do you know your child's dream so well?" observed Granny. It was a fair question, one that Belle answered promptly.

"A while ago, Lily wrote her dream down in a journal which Rumple and I read before coming here. What Rumple believes she saw was actually an alternate universe. What I'm afraid of is what happened in this other universe. According to the dream, Rumple wore the Sorcerer's hat and when he did he became possessed by the Author. The Sorcerer's hat is a mind controlling device for the Author to inhabit and control people with."

"Woah, woah, woah," blinked Emma in confusion, "An author? What author?"

"This author believes that he's the author to our lives and this hat is how he interacts with us. At least I think it's a he… Anyways, everything we've ever done, what we're doing right now, he believes was written by him or so he claims. All I know is that when the Author took over Rumple's body he ended up altering time, changing all of our stories including our happy endings."

"I am just having trouble accepting that there's this being out there that is writing what's happening, maybe even this conversation, right now," admitted Emma. "I mean, what about our fate, don't we have some control over it?"

"Fate is whatever it is you believe in therefore, it's whatever you make it out to be," answered Archie. "I don't know how much control we have over our own fates, but I do know this… the one person we should never stop believing in is ourselves. Whatever it is that you believe in, let your conscience be your guide."

"Well, whoever this author is, I'd like to thank him for making me into such a gorgeous specimen," joked Killian, hoping to alleviate the tension in the room. Recognizing the ill-timed joke, Emma looked over at Killian and rolled her eyes. Embarrassed, she said to her husband incredulously, "Really?"

"No! We don't want to meet the Author!" cautioned Belle quickly. "He or she-she… is the most dangerous and powerful person in all the realms. So long as it was an interesting story, with a snap of his fingers he could very well change your life's story to that of a disfigured man," pointed out Belle who looked at Killian with disgust over his superficial comment. It was evident by his remark that he didn't fully understand the gravity of their situation so she ignored him and continued, "In all my research on Dark Magic, nothing has been able to lift Rumple's curse except for this Author. In Lily's dream, the Author removes the Dark One curse from Rumple. He's that powerful! So whatever we do, we can't let Morgan get that hat! There's no telling what would happen if she tried it on." Belle turned to Neal and asked, "Where is Morgan now? Where was the last place you saw her?"

"The last place I saw her was deep in the woods over by the playgrounds at the end of town," said Neal as he pointed in the direction through the diner where he just came from.

"Then that's where we'll start searching for her," declared Emma determinedly. At her word, everyone got up in the diner and left. The search party filed out of the establishment and got into their respective vehicles. People began taking off towards the agreed meeting spot when Emma noticed Belle going in a completely different direction. "Hey!" Emma hollered after her, "Where are you going? The woods are this way!"

"I have to see my father. He doesn't know that I'm here."

"Oh yeah. Right," acknowledged Emma as she remembered Belle's original intentions.

"I'll catch up with everyone as soon as I can!" shouted Belle as she jogged back over to her father's flower shop and away from the search party.

Sorry guys. I've been in the process of moving out of my apartment so I've been struggling to edit the rest of these chapters. Ideally I'd like to post the rest before S5 premiere, but we'll see. We're nearing the end of the story! Can't you feel it? And man! These next few chapters are pretty darn exciting. Or at least, I'm excited to share them with you all.

I haven't overlooked your reviews and I thank you to those who did! Imusicluver23, ladybugsmomma, Grace5231973 and Montreat11. See you all next chapter!