We walked through the night. It wasn't safe to set up camp when we were so close to the ogres. The moon's light shed a pathway through the entire forest bright enough for us to see. I remembered that the Northern Star was a compass and was able to navigate our way to the lake by that. Emma was still shaking from her run-in with the ogre. She hadn't said a word since. It's never easy killing anything, and I wasn't about to rush her into thinking that what she did has no consequences. But I wanted her to know that protecting your family goes beyond sympathy for a monster. She did what I would have done, and what Charming would have done. Her eyes were still full of fear. It was just the beginning of something for her. Her feet dragged on the ground. Her whole existence had been drained.
Without saying anything, I placed my arm over her shoulders and walked beside her. After a few moments she placed her hands over her face and started sobbing. Her head lay in the crook of my shoulder. Her tears were soaking through my sweater. My hand gently rubbed her back and I tried calming her down.
"I just want to go home." She was crying so hard she could barely catch her breath. "I want to sleep in my own bed. I want to eat real food and take a hot shower."
"I know…" I said softly, kissing the top of her head. Instead of telling her how frivolous her worries are, I reassured her that she would have these all again soon. It was just a matter of patience.
When I was sixteen I was running through these woods looking for a moment's peace. All I wanted was to make it another day. I didn't worry about showering or eating a warm cooked meal, I just worried about survival. We came from two very different worlds. Hers wasn't worse or better than mine, but different. What is so important to her was never as important to me. But I have also never gone through the life she has. Understanding her conflicted heart wasn't so difficult, because my heart has been conflicted before.
"What's going to happen to me after this?" Her tears settled, but now she was catching her breath.
"Well….What do you want to happen?" Her eyes looked up into mine.
"I don't know. I just- I want my mom to be happy. And I want you and David to be happy. But I feel like whatever I decide to do someone's going to be hurt. And I don't want to hurt anybody!"
This had been plaguing her thoughts for a while. She must have been wracking her brain the whole time we've been here. Her entire life was about to change. Just a few days ago she was living with Regina in that gorgeous house, and going to school every day thinking that she was Emma Mills, the daughter of the Mayor. Then she breaks a curse and finds her biological parents, who just happen to be Snow White and Prince Charming. Everything she once knew to be her normal has shifted, and now nothing is normal. Everything is extremely different. Now she had choices. She had two sets of parents to choose from. She has two very different lives to choose from, too. She could go back to being Emma Mills, the Mayor's daughter. She could live with Regina and continue being who she has always known to be. Or she could follow her destiny and fulfill her role as The Savior. A life that meant she was born in the Enchanted Forest, and was the product of true love. Either choice she made Charming and I will fight like hell to be a part of her life. If that meant having to bring her to school every morning just to see her that day, then that is what we'll have to do. We have spent enough time away from her that neither of us will be willing to sacrifice any more time.
"Listen to me, okay? I need you to really hear me…" She nodded. "It is not one or the other. When we get back to Storybrooke and you decide you want to live with David and me, and see Regina whenever you want, then we will support that. If you want to live with Regina and see David and me whenever you want, then we'll support that too. We are the parents here. While I know that Regina and I don't agree on many things…or anything… I hope I can speak for everyone when I say that your happiness takes all precedence. You are our number one priority."
She soaked it in and nodded softly. We started to walk, in silence. My arm was still draped over her shoulders. She put her fingers in between mine and leaned her head against my shoulder. My head fell on hers. We continued through the forest in this way until our legs grew too weak. The water was so close that I couldn't stop now. I could see it from here. As we neared the sand Emma threw down her bags, kicked off her shoes and she ran in. Watching her jump in the water elicited a small giggle. Sometimes I forgot how young she still is. Like a little girl, she laughed as kicking the water and splashing it on her face. I pulled out the canteens and began to fill them. The sun had just begun to peak over the mountains and its rays began to fill the land.
"Come in! It's really warm!" She yelled to me. I shook my head no and screwed the caps back on. "Wait, seriously?"
"I am fine here…" I sat in the sand with my feet in front of me.
There was devilish glint in her eyes. Her hands cut through the water and drenched me from head to toe. In shock , I wiped the water from my eyes. Emma's smile faded to a grimace. She wasn't sure what I was going to do. I think I took both of us by surprise when I lunged into the water knocking us both under. I'm not even sure how long we spent swimming. It felt like hours. It was the first time since being here that I didn't feel this constant nagging in my stomach to protect us and find a way out. Spending this time with her made me really feel like I've missed out. More than anything I wish I could have spent the past sixteen years falling more in love with our child than I already am. David would love this too.
Together we packed everything back up and carried our filled canteens back through the forest. It was a day's time when we saw the castle. It was all adrenaline. We raced inside, giddy to finally have answers. We skipped the stairs two at a time and burst into her nursery. She was laughing when we stumbled into her room and found someone standing in front of the wardrobe. Emma and I stopped in our tracks. He rose to his feet and turned swiftly, his sword held in his hand.
"David!" I ran into his bruised arms.
His shirt was torn and his jeans were covered in mud. There was a little cut on his cheek. But none of that mattered. All that mattered was he found us. Our lips blended together that I couldn't feel anything else in my body but his warmth. He pressed his forehead against mine and cupped my face, smiling from ear-to-ear.
"You found us!" Tears rushed along my cheeks.
"Did you ever doubt I would?" He whispered against my lips.
"How did you know we would be here?!" I kissed his lips over and over again. He chuckled, just trying to catch a moment to speak.
"I found a portal. I knew you would come back here."
"Emma!" I shouted, remembering our daughter was standing behind us. She came walking towards us, smiling. David and I opened our arms to her and the three of us hugged. He kissed the top of her head and smiled down at me. Our hearts reveled in the moment we had been waiting for since the day he placed Emma in that wardrobe.
There was one day, sixteen years and two months ago, when I was standing on Emma's nursery's balcony, memorizing the rise and fall of the mountains beyond the forest. David came behind me, and placed his hands on the baby. It was the last time the three of us were together in this room, as a family. That day was one of the greatest moments of my life. It was the last time I felt truly complete. An air of reminiscence stung my heart as David and I stood here with our sixteen-year-old daughter, both of our arms wrapped around her.
"Are you okay?!" He checked every inch of Emma. She nodded and shrugged off his worries. "I was you worried about you two."
"We're fine! We took care of each other." She looked at me with a smile of pride.
The three of us spent hours catching up on the past few days. He raised his eyebrow when I told him about Emma defeating the ogre. Emma demonstrated her new bow and arrow skills. She told her animated version of our trek through the woods, hearing all of the animals at night and having to kill our food. We shared stories like real family does. David told Emma how he has never seen the Forest in this state of disaster before. In our time it used to be the most beautiful land. We took pride in harvesting and maintaining this kingdom. She was quick to remind him that she remembers what it used to look like, after all she has been reading about us for years.
Emma left us to figure out the wardrobe. She stepped out on the balcony and was looking out at all of the land. I explained to David why we gathered the water from Lake Nostos, and he thought it brilliant. We kneeled down, unscrewing the cap from the canteen and poured the water generously over the top. A wave of purple and blue emanated. David and I stood back, hoping and praying that this would be the final trick we needed. I, quickly, grabbed whatever stuffed animal was closest. We looked at each other reluctantly before shutting the doll in the cupboard. Moments later, we swung the doors opened and we were overjoyed to see it was missing. I called to Emma, but she didn't respond. We both spun on our heels to not see her standing on the balcony where she was last.
"Emma?" David called.
We turned around to find Emma missing, but in her place stood Regina. She was dressed in the clothes she was in last. However, there was no dirt or dust on her blouse. Her hair looked freshly washed, and her makeup untouched. It looks as though she found shelter these past few days. David grabbed the sword off the ground and I pulled an arrow from my bag.
"Where's Emma?!" David shouted.
All Regina did was smile. She moved through the room swiftly, she looked at David with half a smirk. We aimed our weapons directly at her head, but it didn't stop her. She ran her finger over the wardrobe.
"It's funny how it worked out, isn't it? You put your baby in this wardrobe to protect her from me. But this very wardrobe led her directly into my arms." David and I both stiffened.
"Give me my daughter!" I yelled through gritted teeth.
"No. She is my daughter! I'm giving you two the opportunity for your happily-ever-after. You can go back to Storybrooke right now and have an uninterrupted life together."
Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine Regina would ever give David and I the chance at a real life together. She has spent every waking hour making our lives miserable. It was a dream of ours to live in a world where she didn't exist. It really would be our happily-ever-after. But that was before Emma. Our happily-ever-after is now being together as a family, not as a couple. No matter how sweet of a deal she offers, it would be nothing without our daughter.
"And then what? You'll live here with Emma? Do you honestly think she's going to be happy here? With you?"
"She has been for the past sixteen years. If you think for one second that I will lose my child to the two of you, then you are sadly mistaken." She turned towards me. Our noses were nearly touching.
"We will find her. That is what this family does. We always find each other."
David and I exchanged an all-knowing look: we would find her. There was no other option. We were not going to leave our child with Regina, not again. We made that mistake once before, and I wasn't about to do it again. He reached for my hand and squeezed gently. Regina rolled her eyes and scoffed. She broke our arms apart by rushing through them, and running her fingers now along Emma's baby crib. She picked up a stuffed animal and played with it softly. There was some kind redeeming quality in this woman. It was obvious that she cared about Emma, whether or not those feelings were genuine or truthful they were feelings. While she was turned around David grabbed the back of her head and placed his blade along her throat.
"Don't do this, Regina. If you love Emma like you say you do, then you wouldn't force her to choose between us. Just let all of us go back together."
With a snap of her fingers David's sword was thrown to the side of the room. She turned around with an evil glare and laughed directly in David's face.
"Why would I go back to that insufferable place? I have all I need here. I have my child, my kingdom, and my magic. What else is there for me, exactly?"
"You cannot take her away from everything she's ever known! She needs her family and whether you like it or not, that is us!" I said.
Regina disintegrated the teddy bear into ashes. Her anger ignited balls of fire in each of her palms. She used her magic to push David against a wall and vines appeared from the walls to tie him so tightly he could barely breathe. Every arrow I tried to shoot at her was quickly snapped in half with the just a wave of her hand. She threw me against the wall as well, as my back slid against the stones she towered over me. We had been in this position many times before. She thought that she had bested me, and my faith was telling me I had lost the battle but I was about to win the war.
"Why are you doing this to us? To Emma?"
"Because I have spent my entire life trying to make you feel the pain I felt when you killed the love of my life. And now you will. You will spend every second, of every single day longing after your child. That will be enough pain to kill someone."
The doors of the wardrobe were thrown open, and David and I were pulled into it. With one last look, the doors slammed shut and we were being sucked in like a vacuum into a dark abyss. He clutched my fingers as we spun, and shook. Suddenly we fell, and we fell hard. A bright light shot at us, and suddenly everything had stopped. Charming stepped his foot out of the tree we were in, and offered to help me out. Sitting on the ground was the very stuffed animal we had sent through. It only took us a moment to realize where exactly we had landed. Storybrooke. My body gave out. I sank to my knees and sobbed. I pulled her doll close to my heart and screamed all of my pain and agony into it. I had just found her. And within the blink of an eye, I lost her.