"So, Henry, what do you want to do for your birthday tomorrow?" Neal asked his son as they sat down to breakfast.
Henry put on an act of thinking about it, then declared, "It's Fleet Week! Let's go see the ships!" Then, he smiled at his father. "And you can tell me about your times on the high seas."
Emma quirked an eyebrow at Neal as her husband nodded. "Yeah, I think we can do that. I haven't been on a ship in, woah, a long time," he told Henry. If only his son knew just how long it had been. He hadn't set foot on a ship since he and Killian had rescued a certain princess from a far away land. "You know, that's where I met you mom."
Henry's eyes widened. "Really?" he asked in wonderment.
"Yep, had to rescue her from pirates," Neal added.
Henry turned to look at his mother. "You were kidnapped by pirates? That is so cool!" Her son looked to her with incredible enthusiasm. "You have to tell me that story."
Emma got up from the table, taking the dishes with her. "Another time, kid. You have to get to school." Henry's eyes dimmed as he got off the chair, begrudgingly heading to his room to retrieve his backpack. When he was out of the room, Emma smacked Neal on the arm. "I was not rescued from pirates!"
"Well, what did you want me to say? You ran away from you parents the king and queen and got yourself taken hostage?" he asked with a laugh. "And don't give me that 'I didn't need rescuing' BS. I remember quite clearly seeing King George's soldiers tossing you in the coach. It was magically sealed, just to make sure you didn't escape."
"And we both know who helped him there," she nearly admitted. "The first time we had to deal with my wicked step-great-grandmother." She looked like she was reassuring herself she had gotten the relationship correct, then leaned her head against his chest. "But once we got to the castle, I really did have it under control."
Neal snorted. "That was what you called 'under control? I still have the scar from the sword that got me," he said as he pointed to his back, half accusingly, angling her head up towards him, as he leaned in for a kiss..
Before they could make the connection, Henry was calling for them. "Are you going two make kissy faces again? I'd rather be in school," he called as he opened the door.
Emma gave her husband a quick peck on the cheek instead. "You'll pick him up?"
Neal nodded. "Yeah, I have a few consultations uptown but I should be done by then." Any other thing he was going to say when stopped when Henry re-entered the room. "I got an early present! Can I open it before we go?" Neal and Emma moved over to him to see the package he was holding. It was big, almost as wide as his arm span and wrapped in brown paper. It was addressed to Henry Cassidy and had a return address of Storybrooke, Maine, but no name. "Do we know anyone in Maine?" he asked.
Emma glanced at Neal, concern etched on her face. She could see Neal searching his brain, trying to come up with something, at least a cover story. To help her husband, she told him, "Why don't we wait until you get home from school to open it? That way, you have more time with it then."
Henry was about to protest, but saw the warning look on his mother's face. He knew not to mess with her so he put the package back on the table, then turned to head for the front door. She could tell it wasn't what he wanted to do, but she didn't fight him on it. "See you later, Dad," he called back.
"Have fun today," Neal replied, as Emma followed their son. She stole a backwards glance at him, her eyes darting to the package for a second. He got the meaning. Once they left, he picked up the package, feeling for a shape. The paper was thick, but he felt a binding at one end. Moving his fingers to the other side, he thought he recognized the slight overhang of a cover. If Neal were to guess, he was thinking it was a book. But why from Storybrooke, Maine?
He was pondering those questions as he headed into his office that day. In the days leading up to the curse being enacted, his father had told him many things that were to come. Rumplestilskin wanted his son to be as prepared as possible for the new realm they would be sent to. His father had seemed to have acquired the powers of a Seer and it helped a great deal. The visions he had seen readied them for when they needed to leave.
The day mercifully passed quickly and at three o'clock, Neal as at the school to pick up his son. On the walk home, Henry would stop talking about the present. "Come on, admit it Dad. You got me a train set, right?" his son asked eagerly. When his father didn't answer him, he tried again. "A model kit? A chemistry kit? Come on, a little help here!"
Neal did his best to dodge the questions. The truth was Neal was as anxious to see what the package was as Henry. But when they got to the door of their apartment, Henry was nearly jumping out of his skin waiting for the door to be unlocked. Once inside, Henry ran right past his mother to the table where he had left the present in the morning.
Neal gave Emma a kiss on the cheek. "Any thoughts on what the package could be? Do you remember anything your father told would happen when the time came?" Neal shook his head silently as they both made their way to their son, who by then had torn the paper off the gift and was looking at it rather glumly. "So, what is the mystery gift?" Emma asked.
Henry looked at his mom and handed her a large book. It was leather-bound, and it looked to be handmade. Embossed across the cover was the title "Once Upon A Time." "Nice book!" Neal said, sitting on one side of Henry while Emma sat on the other as she handed the book back.
Henry didn't look impressed. "It's a book of fairy tales. I'm a little too old for them," he said as he leafed through the pages.
"No one is too old for fairy tales, kiddo. Even your mom likes a good fairy tale now and again," Neal tried to assuage him as he looked over Henry at his wife. He moved the book to his lap as the book opened to the story of Pinocchio. "And we can learn a lot from fairy tales, like never to lie," he next found the tale of Cinderella, "being kind to our family, or even…" The words died in his mouth as he flipped to a picture that looked an awful lot like him and Emma.
He tried to turn the page, but Henry was faster than that. "Hey that looks a lot like you and Mom," he commented, looking from one parent to the other. The next page was another picture of Neal, Emma and a newborn wrapped in a blanket stitched with the name Henry on it. "I'm in the book?"
The time had come at last it seemed, but neither one of them knew what to say. Any answer would sound crazy, even to a kid. But here was their son, waiting for an explanation as to why he and his parents were in the mysterious book he had gotten as a gift.
They were all waiting for an answer and in truth, Baelfire didn't want to admit it to himself. It was a few hours after the wedding ended and Bae had gathered his family and friends in the War Council room. Emma was standing beside him, holding his hand as he began to tell his tale.
"I didn't grow up with much," he began. It was the truth and something everyone in the room knew. "I had no mother-I was told that she had died when I was little-and my father was a poor spinner. He had fought in the first Ogre War, but had returned from battle a cripple. Word had reached the village before he arrived that he had caused the injury himself and was a coward."
"The Ogre Wars were over two hundred years ago," Regina had said, her eyes narrowed.
Baelfire nodded. "When the second Ogre War began, the local nobleman was conscripting children fourteen and older to fight. My father feared losing me and was desperate for a way for me to not be sent. He met a man who offered him riches if he could retrieve a dagger from the nobleman. My father didn't know why the man had asked him, as he was lame, but he went ahead and managed to break into the castle and steal the dagger." Baelfire let out a breath as he continued. "When Papa tried to return the dagger, the man grabbed his wrist that was holding the dagger and made my father stab him with it. As he lay dying, the man said my father now had the power to save me from the fight."
"The Curse of the Dark One," Regina said quietly.
"You know about this curse?" Snow White asked her stepmother.
"The Dark One is a power sorcerer, maybe the most powerful in the land. This dagger that Sir Baelfire talks about, it was the only way to control the demon that took over a person's body when they acquired the power." Without another word, Regina turned and headed out of the room. Robin looked from Regina's back to David and Snow, who gave him a nod and to follow her. Experience told them that Regina was going to go look for answers and that could cause trouble. Regina's methods had a habit of not being very gentle.
Then a guard appeared at David's side, and handed him something wrapped in a cloth. The guard whispered something to the king and, when he was done, David walked over to Bae, holding what he had been given. "The man we have in the cells, he had this on him." Bae took the item and unwrapped it. Sure enough, it was the dagger, his father's name still engraved on the blade. "He wanted you to have."
"Rumplestilskin," Emma read the name. She looked up at him, waiting for an answer. She could tell the knife was distressing him and from what her husband had just explained, there was more to the story.
Bae sensed his wife's thought and took in a deep breath, as if the memories were a physical pain he was reliving. "He did what he wanted. He ended the wars and save a generation of children. But it wasn't enough for him. He changed...and not in any good way," he continued. "I wanted him to stop, to go back to the good man that he had been before, but he couldn't or wouldn't. I began to look for ways to change him back, and we struck a deal that if I found a way, he would agree to it. One night the Blue Fairy appeared to me. She had heard my wishes and gave me a magic bean. It was supposed to take us to a land without magic, and my father would become human again."
Snow White interrupted him at that point. "Blue knows about all this?" That seemed strange to the queen. The Blue Fairy had aided them in the fight to win back the kingdom from the Black Fairy until Regina had turned her back on her mother and joined their side. After that, though, the Blue Fairy began to pull back from the court, with little explanation. It had culminated in her not showing up for Emma and Baelfire's wedding and Snow had taken her absence as at least a minor insult.
Bae nodded. "We used the bean and a portal opened. All we had to do was go through it, but my father became afraid...afraid of the new land and what he would become if he went there. Blue told me that it would be a land without magic and Papa feared losing his powers and returning to the coward he once was. I begged him to go through with me, but he would not move. Then as suddenly as the door opened for us it snapped shut. We lost our chance to leave. He had chosen to remain the Dark One. And I ran from him, leaving him there in the forest. I ran so fast, just wanting to get away from him. When I got back to our cottage, I took all my things and was preparing to leave. But I knew that he would use magic to find me, so I grabbed a few bottles that I hoped had spells that would protect me from him." He looked down at the floor. "That was the last night I saw him."
"How were you able to remain young? When you came here, you were just a boy, Emma's age," the queen asked him.
"I think one of them was the curse that did that," Baelfire admitted. He had viewed his near-eternal youth as one after a hundred years. "My father did try to teach me magic, but after seeing what he had become I refused to learn. And I did stay young, until…"
"Until you kissed me," Emma said, a smile on her face.
"Papa said that True Love's kiss could break any curse. I guess that means we were always meant to be together," Bae responded, placing a soft kiss on her forehead.
"Well, at least I know now why I lost her to you. Turns out, I never had a chance," Killian said, a wry smile on his face.
David took a step forward. "I am not one to look down upon the humble origins of anyone," said the former shepherd-turned-king. "You have proven yourself time and time again. But I am a little upset we are all learning of this now, especially after the wedding."
"I have been running from this for so long, I didn't want to think about it. And after you took me in, I was afraid you would turn on me if you learned my father had been Darkness, Itself," Bae apologized.
"It's neither here nor there anymore. What matters now is dealing with this curse Cora seems to have placed on us," Snow proclaimed. Then she smiled at the young couple. "And there is the matter of your honeymoon."
Emma blushed. "I think we can wait for that. We need to find a way to stop Cora. She was powerful enough to kill the original Black Fairy and take her powers, so we know she can do it."
Snow shook her head as she tried to smile as brightly as possible. "No, you two go on your honeymoon. I've had the Summer Palace opened for you to use." Her daughter tried to protest, but she silenced her with a look. "We will begin to look for ways to stop her while you're away."
David nodded in agreement. "I'm sure Regina went down to the dungeon to get answers from Rumplestiltskin. She will probably get them fairly quickly, I'd say." He saw the look on his daughter's face. "Go. Enjoy your happiness now. There will be battles to fight, by time you get back, I'm sure."
Emma was still reluctant to go, but Baelfire spoke up. "Thank you, your majesty. We'll leave at once." With that, he took his wife's arm and escorted her from the room.
"We will be discussing this after we leave," Emma told him. He could see it was half a request, half a demand. It wasn't surprising, because his bride was a fighter herself and he was sure she was raring to go after the visit at the wedding.
"Yes, we will," he answered, making a silent vow to his wife, his family, his land, that they would be protected.