Belle spent most of the morning in the backroom. After she'd reluctantly placed the fake dagger back into her bag, she'd told him that her stomach wasn't settled yet, and so he'd suggested she lay down. She didn't sleep, her heartbeat never slowed, and her breath never evened out long enough for that. But she did close her eyes and stay still while he moved around the backroom, simultaneously keeping an eye on her and going through his various vials and beakers, trying to curb his itching curiosity by figuring out how best to contain the magic-infused dirt he'd picked up.

The vial it was in was fine for the time being, but eventually, the magic inside would begin to seek out the grains of sand in the glass and affect them as well. Ordinarily, he'd simply cast a spell to keep the vial safe, but given the fact that the magic inside would neutralize even the most powerful magic, there was a strong likelihood that wouldn't work long-term.

Storing it in something metal might be an answer, but metal was known to affect certain kinds of magic, and he very much wanted to allow this one to do as it wanted, reproducing itself so that he had an endless supply of this dust.

Nickel.

Nickel might be the answer. Magic tended to interact with iron, copper, silver, and aluminum most of all. Brass was also occasionally a problem. But he couldn't think of a single spell he'd ever heard of that interacted with nickel. That wasn't a guarantee there wouldn't be issues, but it was his best shot. Unfortunately, nickel wasn't a common storage container; he might have to fashion his own. But if he could shape a flask or vial out of nickel, it might do the trick and give him the opportunity to see just how much he could make that dust grow so-

Across the room, Belle suddenly sat up. She brushed her hair back from her face and swung her legs over the side of the cot.

"Are you okay?"

She glanced up at him only once before nodding and slipping her shoes on. "I want a bit of soup for lunch. Stay here with your dust, I'll bring it over when it's finished."

And just like that, an opportunity presented itself. Not a long one, not by any means, but ever since he'd begun to put two and two together, he'd been waiting for a moment alone to go and do some investigating on his own. The chill in the air, the wall of ice, Elsa in his shop, transported from his urn, and now what he'd learned in Henry's file…he didn't like not knowing what was going on. He had plans that he intended to enact, and he wasn't about to let a former thorn in his side become a present thorn in his side. It was time to talk to the Ice Queen.

Belle making soup next door gave him perhaps twenty minutes, certainly no more than thirty, but that was fine with him. He may not know what was going on in this town, but he knew not to let on to his lack of knowledge. He knew how to play his cards close to his chest, and he knew that meant keeping interactions for fact-finding missions short and sweet. In the case of Ingrid, that might be literal.

He used magic to sneak out of the pawn shop, lest Belle happen to glance out the window and see him leaving. He appeared just outside the ice cream store, Any Given Sundae, where he watched through the window as Ingrid moved behind the counter, rearranging large tubs of what he could only assume was ice cream.

"Mr. Gold!" Ingrid greeted with a friendly smile when he walked in. A smile that suggested nothing at odds between them despite the final encounter they'd had in Arendelle. "To what do I owe this surprise? I've never taken you for an ice cream lover and that lovely young man who always collects the rent collected my last check for the loan you gave me right on time…"

He really did need to give Dove a raise.

"The loan I gave you…after the Curse was cast on this land," he specified, letting a smile curl on his lips. It wasn't a façade; she had walked into an open door for questioning all on her own. And oh, how quickly the smile on Ingrid's face faded away! Her heart began racing, and her eyes widened ever so slightly. She portrayed all the hallmark signs of a villain caught in the middle of their secret plans.

"In 1999, Emma Swan found herself in a group home in Minnesota. The name of the woman charged with her care was one Ingrid Sarah Fisher," he stated. "Now, Emma ran away from that home shortly after arriving. Oddly enough, it was not long after that Sarah Fisher suddenly began showing up in the Storybrooke registries and came to me looking for a loan. Ingrid Sarah Fisher…that's you."

The former Queen visibly swallowed. "Did Emma tell you?"

"No," he chuckled, summoning the file into his hands and placing it on the counter between them. This is Henry's file from his adoption. It contains information on his birthmother, including the places she lived in. The file told me. You just confirmed it."

And yet, if he didn't know any better, that was a look of relief on Ingrid's face. She'd been found out but was relieved? She was relieved because being found out was second to the fear that Emma had been the one to tell him?

"Which does seem irrelevant, given Emma didn't tell me," he pushed. "I've seen her bring Henry into your shop. In a time where no one was familiar, and few could be trusted, one would think a familiar face would warrant a comment."

He was taking a risk, making a guess. He'd never seen Emma go into the shop with Henry, but he knew that Emma had taken him for ice cream in the past. That was how Regina had bought time alone with him when he'd been in jail. It was a risky guess but one he felt comfortable making. One he felt even more comfortable making, given the look on Ingrid's face again. She was surprised by his answer but quiet. He understood why. There was nothing for him to discover. At least nothing new. In the vision that he'd harvested last night he suddenly remembered an important detail, one that Elsa herself had been sporting when she'd come into the shop that morning.

"Troll magic…memory magic…you took away Emma's memories of you just as you did your niece's. Why?"

Something shifted in the woman before him. It was slight but noticeable: the way she rolled her shoulders so they were square and removed her fingertips from the counter so her hands could hang at her side, the way her expression became cold and defensive, dropping every pretense. It was practiced. It was taught. It was the look of a Queen.

"Because my goals haven't changed. When Emma discovered me, it wasn't the right time. I needed more anonymity and more time, and I knew I wouldn't have it if she remembered. When the time is right, all we'll need is a fresh start, so…I gave it to her."

A riddle. A villainous answer if there ever was one.

"I see. And now is the right time to…what exactly, build a wall around the town and trap her inside-"

"I'm not the one responsible for that."

"But you are taking advantage of that. For what? Your niece is out and running about with Emma, and you are hoping, what? That they'll figure out what you are before they figure out who you are, and they'll come running to you as a mother?"

"Emma already has a mother. One who will never understand who she is because she will never truly understand what she's capable of."

"Arguable." But helpful. She didn't want to be a mother to Emma. He'd walked into that one; the Seer had told him herself in that vision. Ingrid would appear as a mother, but she'd long for…

"A sister," he remembered. Elsa and Emma, two women of extraordinary power just as Ingrid was, just as many Elementals were. Power that very few who did not possess it would ever be able to fathom. Like Gerda and Helga…

"Elsa and Emma…you want to replace Greda and Helga with Elsa and Emma."

Ingrid was silent but he didn't need words, it was all coming together. The girl who had once cherished her sisterly bond beyond all had been betrayed by her own sisters when their minds and bodies could not withstand the power she contained. And now she longed for two replacements. Who better than another Elemental who would never feel the chilly blast of her anger and a formerly abandoned girl who would never dare cast someone out as she had been?

But…why? What was the point of the ice wall? She had their memories. If she wanted to make friends, why wasn't she inserting herself, introducing herself to them? Now was the perfect time to infiltrate, as long as she had their memories!

"Come now, Ingrid, what's the point? You make them your sisters, and then what? It won't bring your other sisters back."

"I don't want to bring them back," she scoffed. I loved them both, but…they didn't understand me. Emma and Elsa will; they're like me. They'll understand, and we'll be sisters—real sisters—like what Gerda and Helga and I should have been—equals."

"They would have to know who you are first to come to you. That's the problem with stealing memories, dearie. As far as they're concerned, you're just the maker of Storybrooke's best ice cream."

"For now…but eventually, the world will turn on them, perhaps sooner than you think. They'll come looking for something more, and when they do…they'll discover me. It's destiny, they'll find me."

"You haven't thought this through. They have families. Emma may not have a sister, but she is a sister. And Elsa has one of her own that is consuming most of her concentration at the moment—a sister you helped take away from her if I might add."

"It won't matter."

"What makes you so sure?"

"Because I know how this story goes. My goals haven't changed; I just need a second chance. I will get my sisters, and we will be happy together. They'll see what they should have seen from the beginning."

"And what might that be, pray tell."

"That magic goes deeper than blood. That we're the only ones who can trust each other, the only ones who can truly understand each other. By the time I've worked my magic…they'll see that. Their families won't accept them as I do."

Well, now…this was proving to be an interesting conversation. Ingrid was quiet, at least he'd always known her to be a quiet and thoughtful person. He'd expected to have to pry a little bit more, and yet here, right before him, she gave him her entire plan, or at least most of it, with very little effort. That was good for him; he still had another ten minutes before he had to worry about Belle finding him missing, but the question persisted…why would she disclose this as willingly as she had?

She needed something. That was the only explanation. This plan of hers to accomplish this goal…he was part of it, a part that she'd left out. Or perhaps it might just be that a part of it she needed was in his shop. Either way, there was something she wasn't telling him. And when it came to telling…he was the wrong person to confess to every time.

"And what's to keep me from stopping you? Troll magic can be powerful when wielded by a troll, but a sorcerer with anything less than a legitimate memory potion is laughable. What's to stop me from going to Elsa and Emma right now and telling them what they're missing?"

Not that he cared to stop her. This plan of hers obviously must have felt sinister to her; otherwise, it wouldn't have been a plan, but to him, it was simply…simple. It was dumb. It was a dream of friendship that was easier achieved with a conversation than some magical plan like she had in mind. But it seemed important to her. And sometimes, the best way to get the answers he sought was simply to threaten to bring the entire house down on him.

But Ingrid didn't behave as though he'd threatened her. She didn't bat an eye at his words actually. Instead, she stared confidently at him, her mouth curling up in a sinister smile. "I have information I believe would be of value to you."

He resisted his own urge to smile as she paused dramatically as if expecting he would beg for whatever she wished to tell him. Oh, how he loved when people put bait in front of him like that. "Careful, dearie, a deal for untold information is difficult to strike. I can't judge the value of the information until I know it, and I can't make a deal for anything until I know I'm getting something of equal value."

Ingrid sighed and began to walk to the back of the counter. "I already know you want this information. After all, you were once willing to trade me Elsa for it."

Once willing to trade Elsa for…

"The hat, the one Anna took from me…" he assumed, playing along as though it wasn't in his own possession. One of the reasons he'd come over here was because he couldn't believe it was a coincidence that it would come back into his possession when Elsa was freed. And now she appeared to be willing to offer information on it as collateral, which could only mean that she didn't know it was in his possession. But seeing as how he was interested in filling in some of the blanks... "You know where it is?"

"I know who is in possession of it."

"I won't be falling for that, Your Majesty. Anna is missing, has been since the beginning, I've no reason to believe she's even in Storybrooke."

"Anna doesn't have it, not anymore," Ingrid corrected, taking a small cone from the top shelf and eying the flavors in front of her. "You were right all those years ago, she did have it, but it was in my possession by the time you arrived. See, Anna was suspicious of me from the day I came out of that urn. The fact that no one in the Kingdom remembered me sent her straight to the Rock Trolls, and after a little a little bit of interference on my behalf, I intercepted her and found her with the hat. I did a little digging. I discovered what it was, how it worked, who it belonged to…and I went to see the old man myself."

What well-placed bait she would have had...

"The Apprentice? You went to the Apprentice?"

"Wasn't difficult to find. And after I learned all that he could do I made a deal with him to return the hat in exchange for another sister. Elsa, I'd already realized, was perfect, but Anna was nothing special. I wanted another. He told me it might take a while, but he agreed to my terms, and I went back to Arendelle. That was when I first became aware of just how difficult the bonds of blood are to break. Elsa and Anna were already so close, I knew I needed drastic measures to get Elsa to see the wickedness in her sister's heart, the wickedness I saw in my own sisters' hearts too late."

"You cast a spell…"

"A curse, actually."

The magic he'd smelled in the room that day.

"The Spell of Shattered Sight, just a bit of it on Anna brought out the real her."

Anna's necklace in the fire and Elsa in the urn…

"She's the one who trapped her sister."

Ingrid nodded sadly. "It went farther than I'd wanted it to..."

"So why take her sister's memories unless…unless it failed…unless even that didn't turn Elsa on her sister."

Ingrid was quiet, not in an ignorant way, but in a way that made him feel like she was irritated by the outcome. Still, with a chilling sort of serenity, she grabbed a scooper, opened the freezer, and began to pull ice cream into the cone.

"I had the hat when you arrived. It was hidden away safely, but I'd already promised it in exchange for a third sister."

"So you let me keep the second safe and sound for you. For the 'a while' it might take for the timing to be perfect."

"And on the day that the Apprentice told me he'd found my third sister, that one day she'd be in another world, I gave it away to earn my passage to this new world to wait for her. He crafted me a doorway to this realm and handed me a scroll, a prophecy, and when I read it at the border, Storybrooke appeared before me."

And years later, just as predicted, Emma had driven into town. The Apprentice had sent her ahead of the curse to wait for Emma. She'd failed at her first encounter, but Storybrooke, this prophetic scroll had given her a second chance, one she planned on fulfilling now. All of which was inconsequential to him save for one small detail. The information Ingrid thought she was offering.

"The Apprentice has the hat again," he stated, trying to sound impressed at the reveal.

Ingrid smiled as she closed the freezer door and moved closer to him to offer him the cone. "It's butterscotch."

"I have lunch on the way," he refused.

"Not for you…for your young man. Mr. Dove, is it? He's a fan of butterscotch, just as a certain Apprentice is. A certain Apprentice who tends to stop by every week in about an hour for a sweet treat."

And here would be yet another surprise! I was sort of fascinated with this chapter. When Rumple and Ingrid interact with each other for the first time this season, I believe it's at the end of 4x03, the comments that he makes to her make absolutely no sense unless the pair of them had an encounter like this, where's it's all laid out on the table. And, at first, when I wrote it, I intended only to give a few basics, for Ingrid to be a bit more cagey and desperate for him to believe her, for Rumple to be more of an interrogator, but the more I wrote it, the more I wrote the rest of the fiction and realized there was really very little sense in the two of them connecting much more than they needed too, the more I liked the idea of this chapter being the encounter you are reading today. Usually, we spend an entire fiction figuring out an evil villain's plan, but I liked the idea that barely a quarter of a way through this fiction, the villain lays it all out on the table, everything as they know it so that nothing will ever come as a surprise to our Rumple.

There are a lot of implications within this chapter, a lot of really important details that get dropped that you probably won't notice until later, but I think the most important one is the Apprentice. Given how much Nimue and Rumple hate the man, I found it really hard to believe that Rumple hadn't already found and killed him in Storybrooke. Which, in my mind, could only mean that he had no idea who the man was. This chapter is going to lead Rumple on the journey to finding him. And why would Ingrid want that? Well, I guess you'll just have to keep reading! Thank you, Rsbeall12, for your review of the previous chapter; I'm really eager to hear what y'all have to say about this one. Out of all the chapters in this fiction, this one has been touched up a number of times, so I'm really interested in your opinions. Peace and Happy Reading!