Sorry for the wait you guys! I dropped my phone and the screen stopped working altogether aside from the touch screen part and almost aaaaaaall of my writing was on there! Needless to say I had a little bit of a melt down. But thanks to the muscle memory and screen shots, I got a lost chapter back and the perfectly amazing Grace de Gold got the rest of it back for me! Talk about panic though! And I am still without a properly working phone. I will try to get another chapter up before Christmas or on Christmas but I can't make any promises. So merry Christmas! Just in case I'm not back ;)

I left you all hanging when Regina made a video on her own for Henry and now you finally get to know what she said in it! Enjoy! And please let me know what you think!

David walked quietly in to the kitchen where he found Regina busying herself so she didn't have to focus on the fact that Cora just around the corner. "What do you want to do?" He asked gently and she shook her head frantically and answered no more than that. "Regina," he urged gently.

"I don't know!" She shouted and then shook her head and lowered her voice back down to its normal volume only to find it to be shaky, "I don't know." She closed her eyes and pushed hard against the countertop before she shook her head once again and pushed herself up straight and turned around to finish putting away the groceries, "I can't get rid of her. She'll just keep coming back."

"Well then why not give her another chance?" He asked carefully and she stayed silent and busy, "not that I think she deserves it. You already know my opinion of her."

"Then why should I bother?" Her question tense with disdain as she swung the fridge door closed.

"Because I know you want to give her another chance. You want her love more than almost anything else."

"I've already told you that she is incapable of it," she spat furiously as she stormed across the kitchen and violently tugged her apron from its hook and hung it around her neck before tying it tight around her waist.

"I thought the same of you once."

"Well I still have my heart in my chest so," she cocked her head and gave a bitter laugh while she pulled out a mixing bowl.

David frowned and stepped a little closer, turning a bit so he could lean back against the counter and watch Regina work next to him. "Do you know where it is?"

"Do I know where what is?!"

"Her heart."

Regina stumbled over her hands and stopped moving altogether when she dropped the metal measuring cups in to the ceramic bowl with a loud clatter. Silence filled the room and she simply could not bring herself to look at David. She hadn't ever looked for her mother's heart. To be honest she had never thought of giving it back. She had an idea though of where it could be. The thought scared the hell out of her. Yes she wanted her mother's love but she didn't know...what it would be like.

"Just a thought," he whispered and her flighty dark eyes shot up to look at him, her lips parted softly. "But for now I will show her the guest room?" He suggested and she nodded after a moment's hesitance and then went back to navigating around the kitchen.

...

David didn't speak a word when he left the kitchen and met Cora's eye when he stepped in to the foyer. He merely tilted his head for her to follow and she did. She followed him silently up the stairs and down the hall and then in to the guest room. "You can stay in here," he stated and stopped in the middle of he room and watched Cora as she looked around, "the bathroom is out the door and to your left. I'm sure you can figure out how to function in there on your own. Regina's making dinner now but it'll still be a little while until it's finished. You can come down for it or I can bring it up to you."

"That's not necessary. I will come down."

David nodded once and then caught her eye and held her stare in a threat, "tread lightly," he warned and when she gave a curt nod, he walked away out the door and back downstairs.

Cora waited until he was gone before she took a deep breath and sat down on the edge of the bed, running a hand through her hair to push the loose strands away from her face only to stop and pull her fingers back out when they hit the beginning of the french braid down the back of her head and over her shoulder. She didn't even know where to start.

...

"Henry, kid, put it away," Emma chuckled under her breath and Henry groaned in protest from his place on the floor, "it's time for bed."

"But they're in the Anton's treasure room," he whined and rolled over on his back to look up at Emma.

"Oh? And who's Anton?"

"The giant on top of the beanstalk," he whined again with a small laugh bouncing his words.

"Well it's time for bed. You can watch more in the morning."

"One more? Just one?"

With a long sigh, Emma nodded and sat down next to him on the floor with her back against the front of the couch, "one more."

"Yes!" He grinned and rolled back on to his stomach and placed the phone on Emma's thigh so they could both watch.

...

He had laid wide awake for hours and after Snow and Emma had gone to bed and fell asleep he snuck around through the flat and snatched the phone from the counter and a set of headphones from his backpack before quietly running back to bed. He bit back his laughter at videos of his mother and David taking turns flying down the piles of gold coins and jewels as they stood on what looked to be another coin. Like snowboarding down mountains of gold. Much to his amusement; not all attempts were successful.

Their farewell to the giant had him smiling quietly and he contemplated going to sleep as well but found he still wasn't tired. He knew he should at least try to go to sleep for it was after two o'clock in the morning but he couldn't settle his mind. When he flicked to the next video he found the picture to be black and he grinned a little in anticipation for perhaps an accidental video. But when he pushed play he was met with silence and his grin slowly faded and was replaced with a quiet curiosity.

Suddenly there was a soft blue glow and his mother's face came on his screen. At the tired expression she wore, Henry felt his stomach drop and the soft puffiness around her eyes that alerted him of previously shed tears was not making him feel any better.

"Hello Henry," she started quietly and tried a smile but it didn't really work and her voice came out small and shaky as she tried not to break down in to tears, "I've been having a bad day," quickly she bowed her head and sniffed back her tears before she made herself look back up, "I miss seeing you. And after the day I've had, not being able to see you at the end of it to make it just a little bit better makes it so much worse. I ran in to someone today, someone I had hoped and believed I would never have to see again and seeing her made me miss you all the more."

Henry watched carefully as she took a moment to pull herself together, a quick hand coming up to wipe away a fallen tear and then another sad smile at the camera. "I am not very good at...telling people what is going on in my head...or my heart. Therefore I have left a lot of things unsaid between us. Part of it was because of the curse, yes, and then of course this incident landing David and me here has unintentionally drawn out the wait even longer but there are still plenty of things I could have told you. The person I ran in to today was my mother..." She whispered and suddenly her face creased with confusion and pain as she moved only her eyes down and to the side.

With a shaky breath she began speaking again but did not look back in to the camera, "she was not kind to me, Henry, and after talking to her today I can only hope that you do not despise me as much as I do my mother," she was silent for a moment and then she clapped a hand over her mouth to keep herself from crying but her tears fell all the same, "I am not making excuses for myself, Henry, because I know I screwed up, I know I am not the perfect mother, but I am sitting here just hoping that I did not screw up as much as my mother. I tried so hard not to become her and while I did so in practically every other aspect in my life I hope I did not become her as a mother to you. If I have then I have failed you and I will never forgive myself for that."

Henry didn't notice the tears falling down his face nor did he notice he was holding his breath until his mother looked directly in to the camera shaking her head, the sight caused him to take a sharp and shaky breath. He wiped his tears away with the back of his hand and blinked quickly as he tried to steady his breathing but he found his efforts pointless when she continued talking with tears rolling now carelessly down her cheeks.

"When I decided to adopt I did so for many reasons. I've always wanted children but given the fact that time stayed still in Storybrooke I couldn't very well have one of my own. There also wasn't any magic to...well that is beside the point," she forced a smile and moved on, "the reason I was so keen on adopting was because I could offer something to someone like me something that I always wanted but never really received. I could want a child wanted by no one. I wanted to save a child like me from ever becoming me. Like me, Henry, you were alone and while you were just a baby you would have grown and you would have likely ended up in the foster system jumping from home to home, no one truly caring for you, no one truly loving you.

You may say that you would have been fine, that you would have preferred that life rather than the life of a son of an evil queen but a life without love, without even the smallest flicker, is a miserable life, Henry, and I like to think that I at least saved you from that. I know there are plenty of things I have done wrong, plenty of things that I would like to take back or change...but I tried. I tried my very hardest to love you properly but the thing is I don't know how to love very well. Love has always hurt me, Henry. Always. I have not had a single person in my life who I have loved and hasn't hurt me in the end. Not one," she whispered and bowed her head as her tears fell and she stayed silent.

He took her pause as an opportunity to gather his bearings and dropped his head in to his pillow, pushing his face in deep as he breathed out a shaky cry that he tried to hold back. When her voice came through his headphones again he didn't look up right away. Not until a certain fact stole his full attention.

"I am going to tell you something that no one else knows. I knew exactly who your mother was when I decided to keep you."

Henry shot his head up at her quiet whisper and opened his mouth to speak before remembering that it was just a video and he couldn't speak to her. Her moment of silence allowed for his mind to venture on its own and the weight of her words started to set in.

"It was a closed adoption but I snooped. I knew that at some point Emma would come in to Storybrooke and that the curse would break because of it. I knew it all too well. I panicked and I went to take you back to Boston but when I got there and tried to say goodbye...well there was no way in hell I was ever letting you out of my sight. We weren't at that agency for more than a couple of minutes before I was hurrying back out to the car with you.

"When we got home I was unable to rest knowing that you would eventually be taken from me. I called upon Doctor Hopper and he told me I should stop worrying about the future and what would or could happen and that I should relish in being a mother. So relish I did," she smiled and cocked her head, swallowing a cry as her tears rolled down her cheeks, "I took you with me down in to my mausoleum and I told you a story as a fixed myself a potion. A potion to forget. But not of you, no. It was to forget my worries, forget what I had to fear, so I could focus on you and you alone."

She wiped away her tears and tried a smile at the camera but she knew it was a miserable smile, "love scares me Henry. I want it so bad but it scares the hell out of me. I'm scared to find it and the odd time that I do find it I cling to it because I'm scared it will leave me once more. Funny thing about love though is that if you hold on too tight it will ultimately leave you alone," she whispered and shook her head subtly.

"My heart...it is broken, Henry. It has been for many many years and it has never healed. Every time I got close to putting it all back together it was shattered once more. When it got to be so every time I picked up two pieces to try and fit them together and they simply crumbled in to dust, I stopped trying to put them together. I gave up. I let myself fall and that is my biggest regret. I should never have given up on myself."

Henry watched as she furrowed her brow in thought and looked down at what was most likely her fidgeting hands as she tried to figure out what to say next. His breaths were silent shaky cries in to his pillow that he had bunched up around his chin and under his chest a little, hugging it as he watched his mother bear her heart out for him. He didn't know these things. They changed everything. She had risked everything to put him first. Everything.

"There are so many things I should have done and so many that I shouldn't have. I should have let Daniel go, I should have loved Snow properly, I shouldn't have let my jealously and hatred toward her get the better of me, I should have stopped Leopold sooner, I shouldn't have let myself learn magic, I should have and I shouldn't have, there are many but those are in the past and there is nothing I can do about the things I should and shouldn't have done.

"There is only now and I am telling you now that I will let you go. If you want me to leave your life then I will. I will miss you but I will not trap you any longer. It isn't fair to you and I am so sorry for treating you like I don't know who you are, like you were crazy for believing in the pages of a fairytale. I love you, Henry, and I will always love you. With all that is left of my broken heart I will love you no matter what you choose.

"I can only hope that you can forgive me and give me another chance so I can show you who I really am. I wanted to save a child like me from ever becoming me and I believe I have succeeded. If letting you leave me is the price for that then so be it. At least I've done one more good thing in my life."

Henry watched the saddest and most hopeful of smiles curl her tightly closed lips as her forehead creased with lines of pain and despair while her tears fell silently. Then the light was gone and the video ended, leaving Henry to drop his phone from his fingers and hug his pillow tight as he pushed his face in and cried.

...

Regina was drawing soft patterns on David's chest as it rose and fell with his breaths as he slept. The moonlight shone through the crack in the curtains and it caused her fingers to cast shadows on his skin. The house was silent as he held her close against his side and despite being completely warm and comfortable and relaxed; she could not sleep. Cora was just down the hall and that had her uneasy. There was no knowing what she would do. She almost believed that Cora was not there to cause harm to those she held dear but given past experiences...she couldn't accept her claims of peace.

Her fingertips stopped dead in their tracks over David's strong chest when a frantic knock on the door echoed through her home. She lifted her head from David's shoulder and looked at the clock with her face twisted in confusion. Who was at her door at two forty nine in the morning? At the second knock she crawled out of bed silently and David stirred.

"What is that knocking?" He asked groggily as he inhaled and furrowed his brow.

"Someone is at the door," she answered quietly as she tied her grey robe over her dark blue silk nightgown and he let out the breath he had taken in.

"At this hour? Who?"

"I don't know. Go back to sleep, dear," she whispered as the third knock sounded. She leaned down at his side and gave him a soft lingering kiss with a hand holding the side of his face, "I'll be right back," she assured and he gave a drowsy nod with closed eyes. She smiled at him for a moment as his tired self obeyed her request before she stood up tall and walked out of the room just as the fourth knock sounded off.

The knock was cut abruptly when she flicked on the lights and the windows let that light out. She walked down the stairs with silent bare feet and unlocked the front door so she could open it. She was at a loss for words when she laid eyes on him.

He was still fighting to catch his breath after running almost the entire way there. She stood in front of him with soft dark hair gently tousled by her pillow as equally dark eyes looked him over and flicked back and forth between the tears rolling down his face. Her lips were parted with concern for him but what he was focused on was the look of subtle guarded fear in her expression he saw almost all the time but never had a name for. He finally knew what it was and why he always saw it. She loved him and she didn't want to lose him.

After a few moments of silence save for his sniffling and panting, Henry leapt forward and wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in to her chest as he cried quietly, "don't leave me," after one more moment's pause he felt her entire body wrap around him and he also felt her begin to quiver with her own quiet cries as she pushed her hand slowly through his hair to hold his head against her chest.

"Okay."