It's midnight but I have to stay awake so here is another chapter! Keep me awak with reviews please ;) I'm off to the Calgary Stampede tomorrow! Love the fact everyone pulled together to get the major flood cleaned up in time for it to still happen! The chapter after this one is my favorite so far! I'll post it in a couple days :)

"So what are your thoughts on getting back?"

"You are familiar with Lake Nostos yes?"

"Yes...but what does that have to do with getting back?"

"It returns the things that were once lost to you."

"Well yeah I know that but what does that have to do with getting back?" He received an unimpressed look from her over her shoulder as she continued on their way through the forest, "what?!"

"Now look who's snappy," she retorted and smirked to herself at the quiet frustrated huff coming from the prince behind her, "if I recall correctly there is a particular enchanted tree sitting in your daughter's nursery with the capability of sending two people back to the land where Storybrooke awaits."

"Oh," David nodded and raised his eyebrows as he thought it through, "that is actually a lot simpler than I thought it would be."

Regina laughed quietly and shook her head, "slow down there I'm not done yet."

"Great. I thought that sounded too good to be true."

"Ever climb a beanstalk before?"

"...for fuck sake! Are you serious?!"

"Yes dear."

"Why are we climbing a beanstalk?"

"We?"

"Regina!"

"What?" She laughed, thoroughly enjoying herself.

"Elaborate!"

"If I was going by myself I would not need to go to the beanstalk but seeing as how I am supposed to be proving myself to you I suppose I have to bring you along. As you know the wardrobe did not send Emma to Storybrooke but an area quite a ways away from the little town. If we were to simply use the tree again it would send us to the same place she landed. Outside the town line. Now I could come and go from Storybrooke as I pleased but there were consequences for anyone else who tried. Just because the curse is broken I do not think it is safe to assume that that line has simply disappeared. I know that there is a very small chance I would come to any misfortune or injury if I were to end up outside of Storybrooke but I cannot say the same for you."

David sighed and placed his finger and thumb of one hand on either temple and closed his eyes, "alright so how are we avoiding landing outside of Storybrooke by climbing a beanstalk?"

"We need to make a small adjustment to our destination and in order to do that we need a compass."

"Mhm and not just any compass no we need the sparkly magical compass of wonder hidden somewhere at the top of a beanstalk guarded by and angry giant."

Regina chuckled and looked over her shoulder, "I am starting to think you're scared of heights Charming."

"Scared of heights and scared of falling off of heights are two completely different things."

Regina shrugged her shoulders and looked ahead of her once again with a smile, "I suppose. I could always go fetch it myself."

"No," he breathed out and shook his head, "no I'll come with you. I need you remember? Can't be careless with the things I need now can I?"

"Awe," she pursed her lips and smiled playfully over her shoulder, "how sweet."

David smiled a very sarcastic smile in return and she laughed quietly as she held back a large branch and allowed him to go past her and jump down the good sized drop first. Once he was steady he turned around and lifted his hands and waited for her to come to him. "So," he watched as she tried to figure out how to get down without his aid but he beckoned her forward with his fingers and her lips formed a thin line, "do you know where we are?"

She lowered herself down so she steadied herself with one hand on the forest floor at the edge of the drop and swung her legs off the edge. He caught her by her waist and her hands found their way to his chest when he held her against him. He was supposed to let go but he found he couldn't. Instead his eyes wandered over her mouth, her jaw, her neck, her collar bone, her breasts, and then slowly back up to her eyes to find her watching him with her eyebrows raised in a silent request for an answer as to why he was still holding her. He took a step back and let go of her waist with an innocent and apologetic smile, "sorry."

Regina shook it off and ignored the small flicker of warmth growing in the pit of her stomach and walked past him instead, "of course I know where we are. I know you weren't in the throne for very long but I would imagine you would have recognized your own property."

David looked around with new eyes but did not find he recognized anything at all. Not until Regina cautiously stepped out in to the open and he followed suit and found themselves walking down the overgrown road toward the ruined castle he used to call home.

...

"It's been practically destroyed," he spoke quietly as he looked around the castle lit up by only the fading colours of the setting sun.

Regina raised her eyebrows for a moment and responded indifferently, "good riddance."

David looked down at her quizzically as she walked beside him, "what do you mean?"

She shook her head and kept her voice neutral, "nothing. I don't want to be here very long can we please hurry and quit with the sightseeing?"

He heard her but his attention was refocused when they came upon the door that led to his and Snow's bedchamber. He made it to the threshold of the door when he noticed Regina had remained standing in the middle of the hallway, "are you coming?"

"I have not stepped foot in that room since a week before Leopold's death and I most certainly will not step foot in it now."

David furrowed his brow at her and he noticed her to seem more tense and flighty, "why not?"

"I have my reasons!" She snapped louder than she had intended and he cocked his head and opened his mouth to likely delve deeper but she cut him short, "I will meet you in the nursery when you have finished your gander," her heart was frantically racing enough as it was in the distance she was from the door. She did not need to get any closer.

He watched her leave with steps quicker than normal and he thought about following her but decided against it. She was not big on talking about what she buried deep within her and he saw no reason to set her off when she was still trying to dull the rest of her sharp edges. So he stepped over the crack in the stone floor and walked in to the room that once belonged to Leopold.

...

David walked in to the nursery to find Regina finishing a lap around the wardrobe with one hand on her hip and the other up so a finger was held between white teeth. She stopped in front of the wardrobe with her back to him and rested her weight on to one foot as she continued to think. He imagined her thoughts were on how to lug half an enchanted tree around behind them but when she waved her hand and set the entire thing on fire he was caught completely off guard.

"Regina!" She didn't turn around or move at all, she simply stood there and watched their way home burn to the ground as he ran up beside her, "what the hell are you doing?!"

Regina shrugged as though it was common knowledge, "making it portable."

"What?!"

Regina motioned to the burning wardrobe in front of them, "do you want to drag a tree around or would you rather a small vial of it's ashes?" She was met with silence and a smirk played on her lips when he lowered himself to the floor with a long sigh.

"You know you should probably run these things through with me before you do it so that I don't have an aneurism and die."

"Hmmm that sounds pleasing."

David laughed quietly and shook his head as he leaned backward and braced himself with his hands on the floor, "you like having me around and you know it."

"You have me using an unnecessary amount of time and energy."

"Didn't hear a 'no' in that sentence," he smirked and she looked down at him sideways without turning her head.

With a quiet breath she focused her eyes back on the fire, "you are much more tolerable than your wife."

"Well I'm going to take that as a 'yes David I do enjoy having you around' because I'm pretty sure that that's as close as I'm going to get," he smiled up at her and he could see the beginnings of a well hidden smile lifting the corner of her mouth.

"That is the most correct statement I've heard from you so far."

David chuckled quietly and shook his head in amusement, "you know what?"

"Hmm?"

"I quite enjoy your company."

Regina couldn't help the smile that curled her mouth and it was a truly genuine smile, "never thought you would say that now did you?"

David laughed a little louder and shook his head, "no, no I certainly did not!"

...

"How can you not see it?!"

"I can't see anything," she shook her head and laughed, the sound coming easier now than it had in a very long time, "I know the constellations used for travel but I do not see this dragon that you speak of."

"You don't know of it because I found it myself," he laughed as did she, the burning fire of the wardrobe slowly dying. The ceiling of the nursery had been torn away leaving the stars to be seen in the night sky. The pair of them had grown considerably more relaxed and comfortable in one another's presence in the time they had spent waiting for the wardrobe to stop burning and he found himself very much enjoying her, "right there! That star is-"

"Alright you do realize that when you point at something I do not see the same thing as you because you're at a different angle," she interrupted with a quiet laugh and a bright smile and he lowered his arm with a shrug and a smile.

"Okay so," without thinking he spun in place and laid back so his head was laying in her lap, both her legs outstretched in front of her and one slightly bent at the knee for comfort as she leaned back on her hands, "it starts there with that star," he pointed and she ducked her head down a little with a wonderful smile so her gaze was in line with his, "and then it goes over his back," he smiled a little wider as she laughed quietly with the satisfaction of finally seeing what he was seeing, "then his tail and his legs and back to his head..."

"And then those," she pointed up at the sky, "are his wings I would imagine?"

"Indeed they are," he grinned in approval and her smile grew all the wider, "have you not ever tried to make pictures in the stars?"

Regina shook her head and kept her eyes up, "no. I was too busy galloping under them to stop to try and make pictures," she smiled with barely closed lips and looked down at him without dropping her head too much.

"Fair enough," he chuckled and as she focused her gaze back on the sky he fully came to realize that he was laying in her lap. He was laying in her lap and like himself she had not thought much of it. If not for the fact that he was comfortable and she was completely relaxed and seemingly enjoying their current position as was he, he would have sat up. But he didn't.

He was truly surprised by how social Regina was. She enjoyed talking and she was surprisingly easy to talk to neither of which were things he had assumed given her tendency to remain isolate and constantly push people away from her. Another thing that surprised him was how much she enjoyed physical contact. It didn't have to be huge, in fact he believed that any big gestures such as a hug would be too much. She enjoyed the subtle touches such as the touch of his hand and fingers on her arm or leg as they spoke.

It made sense when he thought on it though. She had been alone and unloved for so long and being such a social person as he had now discovered, she would have missed speaking and missed being touched. She had a reputation to uphold though.

After a long while of sitting and laying in comfortable silence David sat up and pulled himself backward so his lower back rested lightly against Regina's thigh and his hands braced his weight on the floor across her legs on the other side of her. Their faces were closer now but it didn't seem to phase her in the slightest while he found his heart to suddenly begin to race in his chest and his stomach start to flip with a growing warmth. Her eyes were dark and friendly, no cold harsh appearance and her mouth was set in a content smile rather than a snarl or a scowl. Gentleness suited her well.

Regina saw him start to lean closer, his eyes focused on her mouth and she couldn't help but smile a little wider at how much easier it was to have the prince slip up than it was to have his Storybrooke persona. Under any other circumstances she would have allowed him to, urged him to but she had made a deal with him to be good, "the fire has stopped burning," she whispered and watched as he stopped in his tracks and his eyes snapped up to hers once again.

His blue had a very startled appearance, like he had just come to the realization as to what he had been doing. She remained unmoving and her smile remained on her mouth for she did not at all mind the gesture. She was flattered and slightly amused. There was also a hint of worthlessness, "you don't want me anyway."

With a smile running just a little sad she slid out from him and pushed herself to her feet before he could put a word in edgewise.