"And what if he does? What, exactly, has he won?" Belle's voice rose as anger and desperation made her reckless. The shifting unreality of the island seemed to make nonsense of all their plans, and they lost ground with each step. Despite what she had told Bae, she had little hope that they would be able to hold the Shadow for long, any more than they had the first time.
"Everything." Pan smirked, and Belle just wanted to slap him — this smug, heartless boy who happened to be her father-in-law.
No one had warned her, when they told her she was contracted to marry the Dark One, that he came with parents. It wasn't mentioned in any of the books Belle had read, nor had Lumiere said anything about it. Legendary demons like the Dark One were eternal, solitary figures that sprang fully-formed from the mists of history. Life was messier. Marriage came with families attached. Baelfire had been a happy surprise for Belle. Peter Pan — was more difficult. But still, she felt she ought to make an effort.
"What's 'everything', then?" prodded Belle. "An eternity stuck on this island with the boys you kidnap for company? Don't they get tired of rigged games where you always win? Don't you get tired? Does it even count as a game if the outcome is not in question?"
"Those are the best kind," said Pan, but he sounded slightly taken aback.
"I suppose you have to believe that, or you'd have to admit this life isn't as perfect as you make it out to be."
"It's whatever I want it to be!"
"But what about family?"
"I have all my family with me now," retorted Pan. "My son — nice and safe inside his box, and my prodigal grandson..." He grinned at Bae. "There's always a place for you here, Baelfire."
"You can't keep us here!" shouted Bae. "We won't let you."
Pan's grin widened. "A regular firebrand, you are. You must take after your mother."
"Don't talk about my mother," Bae shot back, but in a much more subdued manner.
Belle edged forward to draw Pan's focus back to herself. "Never mind Bae's mother. What about Rumple's mother? What about your wife?"
Pan's face froze. "I have no wife."
"Fiona," Belle prompted him.
"She's dead." Pan scowled. "Something of a family tradition, apparently."
"Not necessarily," said Belle, ignoring the threat in his eyes. "You see, it turns out that Fiona isn't dead after all."
"Who told you that?" Pan's glare swung toward Tiger Lily. "That ill-omened crow-mouthed liar over there?"
Tiger Lily flinched, but didn't retreat. "I'm sorry we lied to you about what happened to Fiona—"
"Ha!" Pan rose up into the air, looming over the fairy. "And people think my little amusements are cruel? They're harmless fun next to the twisted mind games fairies play on poor gullible mortals!"
"That's not true—"
Pan cut off Tiger Lily's protest. "Found a new victim, have we?" He sneered at Belle. "I don't know what foolish wish led you to where I had her safely stashed away, but if family means anything at all to you, girl, know that this vicious gnat and her blue sister fluttered into our lives on the night Rumple was born and stole his mother's heart away with their lies!"
Belle's mouth opened, but no words came out.
"They weren't lies!" Tiger Lily insisted.
"No? All that nonsense about prophecies and light magic and saviors?" Pan produced Pandora's Box with a flourish and spun it about on the tip of a finger. "Because the lad had not a speck of magic, dark or light, until he seized it for himself. Self-made man, just like his dear old dad."
To Belle's surprise, the hint of pride in Pan's declaration seemed genuine.
"That was my fault! I gave Fiona the Shears of Destiny." Tiger Lily looked at Belle for support. "I didn't know she would use them on her own son."
"More lies," snarled Pan. "I don't know what she wants from you, girl, but if you married my son, you should know better than to trust a fairy."
"But Fiona's a fairy, too," argued Tiger Lily.
"She left the order," said Pan.
"And then she came back, to protect her son."
"And died for it! That's what you told me."
"We should have told you the truth. Then maybe you wouldn't have become..."
"What? Powerful enough to do this?" Pan raised a hand, aiming a finger like a crossbow straight at Tiger Lily's head. "Boom."
Arrows shot out from the Lost Boys arrayed all around them, who had been silent until now. The thud of the arrows striking Tiger Lily was almost lost under their wild whoops and cries.
"Tiger Lily!" Belle and Bae rushed to the fairy's side, catching her as she fell. Belle frantically cast a healing spell, grateful that the Lost Boys seemed satisfied with a single volley. She glared up at Pan once she had stabilized Tiger Lily's condition. "That wasn't necessary!"
Pan shrugged. "But it was fun. Serves her right for getting the love of my life killed."
"She's not dead!" panted Tiger Lily. "I keep telling you."
"And I keep not believing you. It's something of an impasse, but at least you'll do for target practice..." Pan blew on his finger tips, then slowly raised his hand again.
"No, wait!" Belle stood up in an attempt to shield Tiger Lily. "What if there's proof? What if we can find Fiona and save her?"
Tiger Lily caught Belle's sleeve in alarm. "I'm not sure we can..."
"Yes, we can," Belle said firmly. "You have half the wand, and I know how to get the other half. We can do it."
"More lies," sneered Pan. "Fairy mind games."
"But what if it's not? And even if it is, at least it's something new! Come on, you must be bored with playing the same games all the time. How many centuries have you been stuck on this little island?"
Pan snorted, but a wistful look crossed his face for a fleeting moment, and Belle knew she had him. "Tell me, then, where is my Fiona, and how can she be alive after all this time?"
He had abandoned his son once. Given the choice, Rumplestiltskin would never have left Bae on Neverland with Peter Pan. But as with so much else in his life, he wasn't given a choice.
Trapped inside Pandora's Box, he had only a vague impression of what was happening outside (nothing good, obviously). He returned to the world in a confused daze to find himself on the deck of the Jolly Roger, sailing back into the daylight world and away from Neverland.
Belle and Cogsworth did their best to explain the current situation to him. Apparently, Lumiere and the griffons had also stayed behind as Pan's guests (hostages). Rumplestiltskin's own shadow, on its return to his body, whispered its report as corroboration. It remembered things that Rumplestiltskin had forgotten. When he shut his eyes, he had a vague memory of flitting across Neverland, leading his family on a merry dance. Had this been its plan all along, some submerged wish to have his parents reunited? But at such a cost to his son!
"Bae insisted," Belle told Rumplestiltskin. "He said if his grandfather had really wanted him dead, he would have died centuries ago. Besides, he wanted the chance to talk to the Lost Boys."
Rumplestiltskin nodded numbly, not surprised that his son was once again willing to risk himself to help his friends. The revelations about his mother, on the other hand—
"Anyway it's just until we get back with Blue's piece of the wand. Pan says he'll supply enough pixie dust for us to mend it and recharge it..."
"So that we can find my mother," said Rumplestiltskin incredulously. "My mother. Who isn't dead after all? Who's actually a fairy?" He glowered at Cogsworth. "And you never thought to inform me of this minor detail?"
Cogsworth's wings flared in distress. "We didn't know, either. Contrary to popular opinion, our Queen is not actually omniscient."
Belle nudged Rumplestiltskin's arm in mild rebuke. "It's not his fault, Rumple. Apparently the fairies lied to everyone."
His eyes flicked over in accusation to the fairy who had joined their party on Neverland. Tiger Lily, was it? She looked suitably apologetic for a multitude of sins, but as she had apparently been locked up by Pan up until now, Rumplestiltskin let it go. Short of killing her, there wasn't much point to punishing her further.
Cogsworth bobbed his head. "Reul Ghorm told us Fiona had died in an accident. Not such a stretch to believe, with the Shears of Destiny in play. And with Fiona vanished from the world, who else was there to question? We suspected foul play, naturally, but had no proof."
"My father said she died when I was a baby," Rumplestiltskin said blankly. Malcolm had resented his son for it, but never elaborated on the circumstances, and Rumplestiltskin had made his own assumptions. It was an ordinary sort of misfortune, for a mother to die giving birth. But the truth was— "You're saying she's alive, but trapped in the dark fairy realm?"
"She became the Black Fairy," said Tiger Lily quietly.
"The Black Fairy!" Rumplestiltskin shuddered. How could his mother be a fairy?! He tried to get past that horrifying thought to consider what it meant for them. Bad enough that now the dwarf and his little fairy lover kept staring at him as if he was some kind of fascinating specimen. Worse, was that a hopeful gleam in Nova's eye? The Dark One should not inspire such insipid sentiments in anyone! He muttered, "I hate fairies."
"The Black Fairy has not been in evidence in the world for a long time, since long before Rumplestiltskin's birth," objected Cogsworth. "Reul Ghorm saw to that, did she not?"
"That was the previous Black Fairy," said Tiger Lily. "She had gone mad, so Blue wrested the wand from her, thus trapping her in the dark realm."
"That's the wand we're after?" Belle asked.
Tiger Lily shuddered. "That wand can only be used by the darkest of dark magic wielders."
"What about the Dark One?" Belle glanced speculatively at Rumplestiltskin.
He shrugged. He saw Tiger Lily's flinch out of the corner of his eye. So much for being her 'savior' godson!
"It's no use," said Tiger Lily. "Blue locked that wand away, no one knows where."
Belle frowned. "That sounds a little extreme. Why didn't she release the other Black Fairy, if she had gone mad? And appoint a replacement?"
Tiger Lily sighed. "Blue didn't want one. She said the children helped by the Black Fairy tended towards darkness. They were abandoned waifs from the streets or starving peasants — the dregs of society, not the children of noble blood like the ones Blue favored. Not even worthy commoners from loving families."
Rumplestiltskin scoffed. "Yes, the blue bug never cared for the peasantry, no matter how earnest our prayers." When she had extended a hand, it had been to gift Beowulf (whose father had been a renowned warleader and whose mother a king's daughter) an enchanted sword. But it struck him hard to know that there had once been a fairy who had cared. How different their lives could have been! But it was useless to consider might-have-beens at this late date. "Very convenient for her that the only fairy who might have made a difference 'went mad'."
Tiger Lily winced visibly. She could hardly deny that Blue had completely lost interest in Rumplestiltskin after he had been cut off from this supposed destiny as a Savior (more nonsense!), could she? "Blue's fear was that given their suffering, they harbored too much pain, anger, and hate. With the Black Fairy's help, instead of becoming proper heroes, they turned into rebels, revolutionaries, rabble-rousers..."
Rumplestiltskin scoffed again. "Heaven forbid they should oppose her blessed noble families!"
"Blue said they were a disruptive element we don't need." Tiger Lily gave Rumplestiltskin a troubled look. "The world is complicated enough without the Black Fairy's godchildren turning it upside down."
"According to the blue bug!" snorted Rumplestiltskin. "There's a rumor that the Black Fairy steals children. Another lie?"
"Not quite." Tiger Lily sighed, then elaborated, "She's taken children, but I suspect it was her own lost son she was looking for."
"Ah." Rumplestiltskin wasn't sure how to feel about that. What would his life have been like if she had found him? It was more than he could imagine. "You didn't think to tell her where I was? Even after my father abandoned me?"
"The magic that bound her didn't permit us to meet. That's why I needed the wand..."
"But Blue wouldn't let you use it," Rumplestiltskin finished. "And it's not as if she cared about the stolen children." She hadn't cared about the children his father had stolen, either. It had fallen to the Dark One to try (and fail) that time in Hamelin, and this time (he hoped with more success).
Tiger Lily didn't meet his eyes. "She said they wouldn't be missed, or else they wouldn't have been vulnerable to the Black Fairy's touch."
"That hardly seems fair," said Belle, her voice as cold as Rumplestiltskin had ever heard it, "to deny children help because of an accident of birth."
"And rather short-sighted of Reul Ghorm, I must say," added Cogsworth.
"She said it was fate that determined our place in the world, and it was wrong to go against fate."
"I suppose that explains why she had the Shears of Destiny in the fairy vault," said Rumplestiltskin dryly.
"To keep anyone from misusing them!" said Tiger Lily. "I — ah — borrowed them without permission."
"Well, I think it's high time we had a chat with her." Belle smiled sadly at Rumplestiltskin. "Thinking about it, you weren't born from a noble family. And it could be said that your mother went against fate when she left the fairy order to marry a human..."
"What... what are you suggesting? That Reul Ghorm engineered that neat little catastrophe on purpose?" Rumplestiltskin's heart sank. Maybe it had been true, then, that he had been born with some destiny of light, but had Blue been afraid that Fiona would teach her son to follow her footsteps in defying Blue?
"I don't know, but I think we should ask." Belle turned to Cogsworth. "Well?"
Cogsworth nodded. "I'll ask our Queen where to find Reul Ghorm, and we can all ask our questions."
Once the ship was clear of Neverland's waters, the Timer took off, bound for Nevethe.
The Jolly Roger made landfall in the port city of Halborg, on the north coast of Ulstead.
It was a strange fate Nevethe had condemned the Blue Fairy to, thought Rumplestiltskin as he studied the chunk of amber that Cogsworth had delivered to him, courtesy of the Queen of the Wood. The fairy was frozen, her face set in eternal indignation, trapped by the magic of the trees. But it was only her physical form, as Cogsworth explained, while her spirit had been sent out to minister to the unquiet ghosts of children.
"Children who should have been helped by the Black Fairy," guessed Belle with a leap of intuition that took Rumplestiltskin a few moments to catch up to.
"Ah." Rumplestiltskin nodded. "Ironic, after what she had done."
Tiger Lily looked troubled at the news. "So Nevethe knew."
Cogsworth hemmed and hawed. "Our Queen had her suspicions. She may not know all the ins and outs of the fairy order, but she felt an imbalance in the flow of souls and sought to redress it."
Rumplestiltskin snorted. "Well, we'll see how much success she had. Reul Ghorm is a contrary sack of old bones, with or without her corporeal form."
"Be nice." Belle poked him in the ribs.
He shot her a wounded look. "I am being nice. I could say much worse of that blue nuisance..."
"Please don't antagonize her. We need to talk to her."
Rumplestiltskin sighed and agreed. "Well, she should be somewhere in this city." The amber, like a compass, oriented itself towards the location of Blue's wandering spirit.
As they disembarked, Rumplestiltskin pulled his hood down, hiding his face. He didn't need the distraction of being recognized. Belle wore a veiled hat and Cogsworth a nondescript human form. Tiger Lily made no attempt to disguise her face, which no one had seen in centuries in any case.
Two of the city guard intercepted them before they could make their way into the city. "By order of the city master, all strangers to Halborg are to visit the temple and pay their respects to the gods before pursuing any business in the city."
Rumplestiltskin was too taken aback to protest. He had never heard of such a custom in Ulstead before. He exchanged a questioning glance with the others, but they looked no more enlightened.
"Is this some new rule of your city?" Belle asked, after their guards had directed them to the Olympian temple on the hillside near the docks, one commonly used by merchants and sailors. "And isn't that a temple, too?" She pointed at a building closer to the docks.
"That's for the fishermen," said one of the guards dismissively. "Not suitable for well-bred folk like you."
Rumplestiltskin snorted under his hood but didn't say anything.
"But it is as you say, a new rule," the other guard said. "The city master has decreed a period of purification for our souls."
"I see. Thank you." Belle smiled brightly at them, then took Rumplestiltskin by the arm — to make sure he behaved, he suppposed, given his known animosity towards the gods. He was sure she couldn't see him roll his eyes, but something in the way she dragged him along said she knew, anyway.
Cogsworth and Tiger Lily went inside first with no fuss, each of them picking up and lighting a candle.
Rumplestiltskin followed reluctantly, scowling under his hood and trying to keep his thoughts subdued. It wouldn't do for any of the gods or their servants to notice the Dark One setting foot inside a sacred space. The temple was a grand affair, tall arches and gleaming pillars, with fine painted statues of the gods. Obviously, the place had received more than its fair share of donations from rich nobles and merchants, and an exalted location above the thick stench and noise of the city streets.
Rumplestiltskin gritted his teeth and took his candle to the shrine of the one Olympian he could stomach — Hekate, goddess of magic and the spaces between realms. During the long years he had been desperately seeking a way to reach Bae, he had sent a few pleas her way. Not that it had done him any good, but nor had she ever harmed him, and he could respect her knowledge and power. If she didn't want to make a deal with him, that was her prerogative. Considered something of an outsider among the gods, possibly even a Titan, Rumplestiltskin could sympathize with her position. He bowed his head and set the candle before her altar.
How about this — you stay out of my way, and I'll stay out of yours. It wasn't much of a prayer, but he had stopped worshipping any gods the moment he had taken up the Dark One dagger. Hekate made no answer, no more than she or any other god ever had.
He stepped back, followed a moment later by Belle, who had laid her candle in honor of her family's ancestral goddess, Aphrodite. Cogsworth and Tiger Lily were waiting for them already at the exit, and Rumplestiltskin didn't ask what gods they had petitioned, if any.
Once out of sight of any nosy locals, he consulted the amber-encased fairy for a more precise direction. Naturally, it led them into the worst smelling sectors of Halborg, down by the tanneries. The houses were crowded and run-down, the streets dark and narrow.
"It's cold," whispered Belle, edging closer to Rumplestiltskin. "Should it be this cold?"
He paused. Was it cold? Heat and cold meant little to the Dark One, but now that he was aware of it, it did seem unnaturally chilly for high summer, even this far north. It hadn't been this cold at the temple. "Hmm."
Cold and getting colder.
Then they found the street blocked off by a wooden barricade. Cogsworth read out the sign nailed onto it: "Closed by order of the city master."
"Fond of giving orders, isn't he?" mused Rumplestiltskin. They tried to bypass the barrier, backtracking and finding another winding street that bent in towards where they wanted to go, and found another barrier and sign. They could break in easily enough, but Rumplestiltskin believed in learning all he could before walking into an unknown situation.
Coward, jeered the darkness. You're afraid, that's all.
It's good sense, he snarled back,
'Good sense' that lost you your son? Be careful or you'll lose your wife, too. Women don't like to be married to cowards...
Rumplestiltskin gritted his teeth and ignored the taunting voice of the darkness. Belle wasn't like that. Trying to believe himself, he turned to her and said hesitantly, "This bears further investigation... perhaps we can ask around at the local drinking hole..."
To his relief, she nodded, with a smile that didn't utterly despise him for his caution. She continued to smile even when the closest tavern was a cheap, filthy rat's lair, and managed to charm the relevant rumors out of a serving maid.
"It's haunted," said the girl in a low voice. Her expression was an odd combination of fear and eagerness to share her gossip with an impressionable audience.
"Haunted?" echoed Belle with an encouraging smile. "You mean, a ghost?"
The girl nodded. "For the past ten years or so, and it's only been getting worse lately." She shuddered. "It was just a chill in the air at first, a shadow out of the corner of your eye. Then it started whispering and... worse."
"Who is it? Do you know?"
"Oh, aye, we all know." The girl made the sign against evil, first and last fingers tilted down and away to ward off the attention of malign spirits. She lowered her voice. "There was a girl, see? They stumbled across her frozen stiff in an alleyway on New Year's morn. Now what was she doing out on the streets at night, with no shoes on, eh?"
"Perhaps she lost them," Belle suggested, looking troubled. "And got lost, herself, in the dark."
The serving maid shook her head. "The only thing lost about her was her soul! Her grandmother was a barbarian witch, and her mother died giving birth to her, so you see she was ill-omened from the start."
"What about her father?"
The serving girl snorted. "The man who called himself that was nothing of the sort, if you know what I mean."
Rumplestiltskin closed his eyes in sympathy, knowing all too well, and hoping Belle didn't. At least Malcolm had been better than that, leaving him with two kindly spinsters rather than selling him to a brothel.
Belle's soft "Oh!" came a breath later, as she must have caught on to the girl's meaning.
"No need to waste your pity on that misbegotten little bastard. She died with a curse in her mouth, I'm telling you. I bet she turned herself into a haunt on purpose. That man was the first to die..."
"People have died?" Tiger Lily spoke up for the first time. The fierceness of her frown dampened some of the serving maid's enthusiasm for her tale.
"Yeah," came the sullen confirmation. "A few. That's why the city master put up the barriers. To keep anyone else from stumbling into the haunt."
"But that's hardly a long-term solution," said Belle.
"With a problem outside the bounds of the natural, a solution beyond the mundane may be called for," Cogsworth put in. "Did your city master...?"
The serving maid shrugged. "Thoughts, prayers, and wishes, sure."
Rumplestiltskin raised an eyebrow under his hood. "With what result?"
"We're the second biggest port in Ulstead, not some backwater fishing village," boasted the serving maid. "The chief fairy herself came to see the city master."
"Flora Knotgrass?" Rumplestiltskin knew the name of the current head fairy, but had never met her. Unlike her predecessors, this Flora seemed to have sense enough to keep her nose out of the Dark One's business.
"That's the one," the serving maid said proudly.
"What did she say?" Tiger Lily's frown lingered, though it had lost some of its sharpness.
"That the haunting was the fruit of the city's own sins," the serving maid reported, lowering her voice to a reverent whisper. "And it was not her job to lay this ghost to rest."
Rumplestiltskin snorted. "Helpful as ever, I see."
Belle sighed and glanced at him. "I wonder if it's because..." She shut her mouth as he shot her a quelling glare.
"No need to spread idle speculation, dear," he said, hoping she understood. Probably. She must know by now not to reveal too much to people they didn't even know.
"Right." Belle gave a slight nod and turned back to the serving girl. "So what did he do, your city master?"
"He had her bones dug up from the pauper's grave — well, what the diviners said was her bones — and buried properly, with full ceremonies. And made laws against blasphemy and vice, and..."
"And made visitors go to the temple?" Belle guessed.
"Yeah."
"And how's it working out for you, all this holiness?" The sarcastic question broke free before Rumplestiltskin could think better of it.
The serving maid glared at him. "I'm sure it will work, once we all cleanse the sins from our hearts. And purge the unfaithful from our ranks..."
"You doubt my faith? Perish the thought!" Rumplestiltskin held a hand over his heart to demonstrate his piety.
Belle kicked him under the table to behave. "Ignore him. But in all seriousness, did you think to seek any other help?"
The serving maid shrugged. "It would be an insult to the fairies, wouldn't it?"
"But if people are dying, aren't lives more important than some perceived insult?" Belle protested. "There are other magic users in the world. What about... your city master didn't consider making a deal with the Dark One?"
"What? What do you take us for?" the serving maid gasped, making the sign against evil again. "We're good, godly folk here in Halborg!"
"I didn't say you weren't," began Belle, but the serving maid interrupted her.
"Why would you even suggest... wait. Where did you say you were from?" The girl's eyes narrowed. "You're from there, aren't you? The kingdom of the damned — Schlaraffenland."
"It's not... it's not like that!" Belle spluttered in indignation. "The Dark One isn't evil, no matter what the clerics say."
Rumplestiltskin couldn't help but be touched by her whole-hearted defense of the one who had stolen her away from her own homeland in such a cruel deal. He smiled sadly under his hood and kept silent.
Cogsworth cleared his throat, drawing the serving maid's attention when Belle looked liable to explode. "Technically, Schlaraffenland is not a kingdom. It is a commonwealth — that is to say, a sovereign state united for the well being of its citizens."
Rumplestiltskin noticed that the Timer didn't quibble with the 'damned' part of the description. Was it true? He had been so pre-occupied with finding Baelfire that he hadn't had the leisure to worry about their souls, but now they had a future to think of. There was no place for their shades in any god's paradise, of that he had no doubt, but... his son deserved better.
He thought of Morraine, drafted to the war a few days before Bae, one of the thousand children Rumplestiltskin had saved from the battlefield, now long dead with the passage of centuries. Had her shade found peace, or was she tainted, like all the people of their land, by association with the Dark One? She had been Bae's friend, a kind child who deserved better than whatever hell awaited them.
Before he could come to any conclusion, the serving maid was driving them out of the tavern.
"...get out! We don't need your sort in here, spreading your corruption to decent folk!"
"Well, I never!" snapped Belle. She turned to leave, head held high. "Come on. I'm sure we have better places to be."
Seeing Belle already halfway to the door, Rumplestiltskin shrugged and followed, resisting the temptation to turn the rude serving maid into a snail.
"Pathetic," Zelena decided, after looking into Rumple's crystal ball to spy on this realm's version of herself only to find the other Zelena spying in turn on her half-sister. "Well, we can't let your Mommy issues get in the way of my happiness, can we?"
It would only be a matter of time before the other Zelena's all-consuming envy led her to hunt down the Dark One. Her Dark One. Striking first was for the best.
Zelena turned away from the crystal to smile at said Dark One. "Come along, doll."
He glared at her, but knew better than to give her any cheek. Not when she held him heart and soul. Not only did she have the dagger that held his name, she had captured the sapling that had grown from the seed of his love for his little maid. Once the maid had been obliterated, Zelena had grafted her own magic into the tree, using the secret arts of Nevethe.
With its power, Oz was only a wish away. The other Zelena was no match for them.
The tree bled at her command, trapping the weak, pathetic version of herself in its sap, shrinking and hardening into a sticky coin-sized lump. Zelena consumed it with relish, chewing it up and swallowing it like a piece of candy, absorbing memories and power in the process.
Memories grumbled in her stomach, a severe case of envy giving her indigestion. It was enough to move her to fulfill her alternate self's last wishes.
"Fine. If it will shut up your whining, I'll take care of the bitch for you." Zelena smirked and glanced at her pet Dark One. "It's not as if Rumple dear has any more use for her, not now that he has me."
The Dark One stared at her icily.
Zelena threaded her arm through his merrily. "Time to tell Regina the good news."
But Zelena wasn't completely heartless. Ungrateful fool or not, Regina was still her blood, one way or another, and she decided on a whim to complete her vengeance for her.
A few busy weeks later, Zelena and Rumplestiltskin stood before a row of graves.
"Here you go, sis," said Zelena with manic glee, pouring out a vial of dust onto Regina's grave. "The heart of that spoiled brat who ruined your life. But now that you have the time to think it over, you'll see it it was actually Mother's fault. Well, you have all eternity to have it out with her."
She had made Rumple bury Cora next to Regina. Rumple hadn't looked as pleased as Zelena had thought he would be to kill Cora, but no matter, it was all over now. The step-daughter and her shepherd prince were laid to rest on Regina's other side, along with Regina's useless father.
"There. You can all play happy families together. No need to thank me." Zelena turned away and whisked Rumple back to his castle with her, where they were greeted with a wailing baby. "Ah! Speaking of happy families, go do something about that, Rumple dear."
Zelena didn't bother to specify what the 'something' should be, and to her mild surprise, the Dark One merely picked up the infant and rocked her gently until she quieted. "Hmph."
Zelena had saved her sister's step-grandchild on a whim, sensing something odd about the infant's dormant magic. She glanced at Rumple suspiciously. "Your doing?"
He shrugged. "I don't know what you mean."
"There's something... I can't put my finger on it. You had plans for this child?" When Rumple hesitated, Zelena brushed her fingers over the hilt of the dagger, a reminder of the standing command to answer her promptly and honestly. "Well?"
"She was to be the curse-breaker. The Savior," he said through his teeth.
A few further questions drew out the truth, the truth that the idiots in this realm had never guessed. Pathetic, Zelena sneered to herself. But when her gaze fell on the baby again, gurgling so sweetly in the Dark One's arms, Zelena's heart softened. How she wished it was her child there! But however many times she had taken Rumple to her bed (and anywhere else that struck her fancy), his magic was too powerful to allow for casual conception.
If it was true love... But Zelena knew it wasn't. At least, not yet. Even though she had grafted herself onto his true love tree, it took time for a graft to take. Meanwhile...
"And does our little darling have a name?"
"Emma. They named her Emma."
"Emma. What a lovely name." Zelena smiled her wickedest smile at Rumple, then reached out to tickle the baby's nose, cooing at the adorable creature. Yes, it would do for now. A test run for the real thing. "Cheer up, Rumple. No babies on the menu today. She's our daughter now. Won't that be lovely?"
Author's note: Yeah, everything's a bit random as I meander all over the place with the storyline, such as it is, occasionally hitting this or that scene from rumpelstiltskinrocks's list as I go. :-P Any thoughts? We'd love to hear from readers! Comments and reviews welcome.