Author's Note: Much thanks to all you continued to follow and favorite this story. Here's the next part where things start getting kind of messy. Much thanks to ParadoxalPoised for beta services here.

Taking the Reins Part 2

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The women's strides were quick and furtive as they snuck from the estate, taking the same path Regina had as a young woman to her hilltop rendez-vous. They constantly looked around them for signs of Cora, still searching for her wayward daughter to drag her to afternoon tea. Without horses the trek out to the hilltop was slower. Regina fretted more the longer they were on the move in the open like this.

"Just focus," Emma said, running alongside her lover, watching the emotions play havoc with her features.

Regina hesitated at the sound of a young girl's screams. She pulled Emma aside just in time to fall aside from Rocinante's thundering hooves pounding the ground at their feet. The brunette on the horse's back did not appear to have seen them, her attention riveted on something in the distance.

Emma rolled onto her stomach, staring after the younger Regina. She witnessed the moment the brunette reached young Snow's horse, grabbing for reins, then child, just before both horses careened into thick forest.

"No!" Regina's gasp beside her made Emma's head turn away from the sight of the flushed and terrified royal child meeting her beautiful savior.

"That was amazing, Regina," Emma said. "Just like the other day."

Regina rolled over, sitting up, plucking grass nearby. "Damn it," she muttered.

"What's wrong?"

"That was our best chance. Now I'll come to the attention of the king. Nothing will change. Nothing." Regina pushed angrily away from the ground, and Emma had to scramble to her feet to follow the brunette storming off away from the estate, away from the hillside, away from her failure.

While Emma had agreed to stop Cora, they hadn't discussed how that might be done. Regina had started running for the hill and Emma had simply followed.

"Regina, stop!" Emma stumbled in a divot in the ground and grabbed for Regina's swinging arms, her off-balance weight bringing both of them down onto the grass. Though she said nothing, Regina resisted Emma's efforts to pull her into a comforting embrace.

"Stop!" Both women froze, eyes wide as they looked up at the sound of the demanding male voice.

Emma was speechless, staring up at the young dark-haired male towering over them. Regina's throat started closing as numerous emotions assaulted her.

"Daniel!" she gasped.

"Regina!" A dark lock of hair falling over his right eye, Daniel bent down and pulled Regina away from Emma. "Are you all right?" He pressed her to him and cradled her head against his throat. "Did Rocinante throw you? What was that scream?"

"Dan...Daniel," Regina gasped his name, assailed and absorbed by his earthy scent, the fresh summer breeze that seemed to live in his hair and the salt-sweet scent of sweat and honest work clinging to his tanned skin. His blue eyes caressed her face, shining with the belief that she was the center of his universe. All the things she loved about him. "Daniel, oh my god, Daniel."

Daniel stiffened at some movement nearby, and Regina turned to see Emma rising to her feet. She stiffened against him, wondering what would happen next.

"You attacked a lady," he scolded.

"I didn't," Emma protested. "We were..." She looked to Regina for guidance.

"You tackled her as a farmer might a pig," he accused.

Regina eased back from Daniel. "It was a misunderstanding," she offered gently, looking up to his face. She couldn't help cupping his chin and cheek, nor the strokes she made over his eyes and across his lips with her fingers. Daniel. Here. Holding her.

It was a taste of heaven she'd never thought to have again.

"Were you also rushing to the aid of the child on the runaway horse?" Daniel asked Emma.

Emma fidgeted. Regina worried her teeth at her bottom lip then accepted the scenario for both of them. "Yes, Daniel, we both were trying to rescue the child."

"So, the child is safe?"

Regina looked at Emma. "Yes," she sighed, "the child is safe." She looked back up at Daniel. "It's getting late. I... I have to meet Mother for tea. You should go to the village."

Daniel kissed her, and Regina sighed into the kiss, her heart and mind briefly captive to the sweet memory of all their kisses. His hands cupped her head, his fingers threading through her hair. His hands hesitated in stroking the back of her neck. "Regina?" he began in confusion.

"Just go, Daniel. Now, before my mother sends someone looking for me."

Daniel scrutinized Emma who crossed her arms over her chest, then he blinked.

"You're a woman." Daniel stepped back. "Did Lady Mills hire you to guard Lady Regina's innocence?"

"She's not a chaperone, Daniel. She's... a friend." Regina winced as she told the lie. "Go. Be safe."

He looked at her in confusion. With a sad, small smile, Regina brushed her lips against Daniel's cheek, and then she dropped his hand reluctantly, not taking her eyes from his as she backed away. Emma didn't move.

Daniel stared at Emma who crossed her arms over her chest, watching them. "Whoever you are, you must see the Lady Regina safely home." He turned his gaze to Regina. "You'll tell me more tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow," Regina replied dazedly, a heaviness gathering in her heart. She knew tomorrow all too well.

Emma said nothing, only falling into step slightly behind her, as she made her way down the hillside.

Emma pulled Regina into the shadow of the stable when she spied younger Regina entering a stall with Rocinante. "There you go, boy," the younger version of her lover whispered, her tone cheerful and excited. Emma heard the sounds of tack being removed and then saw the leather items hung on wooden pegs outside the stall.

Young Regina re-entered the stall now carrying a curry comb and brush. "You did so well," the girl cooed to her horse as she worked to groom him. "You were so good, Rocinante. Thanks to you I saved that little girl." Young Regina lost herself in the stroking of the brush over the glistening bay coat. "We saved her," she added proudly. "Mother will be so angry," she said, fingering a tear in her riding jacket. "But I don't care. I was a hero." The young voice held qualities Emma had never heard in Regina's adult voice: pride in self and joyful wonder.

To think Regina's mother would kill that spirit in less than a day from now. Emma frowned. Her mother was safe; the child that would grow up to be her mother was safe from death. But could Regina's path still be saved? Emma pondered these as she sat next to present-Regina hugging herself in the shadows of the barn. They didn't move until the younger Regina had left the barn, patting nervously at her torn riding outfit, eyes flitting as she clearly fretted her mother's judgment on her appearance.

It was Emma who pulled Regina to a window to watch over the younger brunette as she met her mother in a small parlor. The regal elder Mills woman said nothing when Regina walked in, allowing the silence to grow, like an invisible hammer, over the girl's head. Gradually Regina's head dropped under that unseen weight, and Cora Mills decided to speak.

Regina picked at the torn edge of her riding outfit, and nodded her head at whatever her mother was saying. The older woman's face was darkening the longer Regina stood unspeaking. Emma fully, intimately, knew that damned-if-you-do and damned-if-you-don't emotional whirlpool the young woman obviously felt herself trapped in. This, she knew now, was why she understood Regina more than she had understood anyone else in her drifter's life. Wanting, always, to do the right thing, Emma, too, had been frequently backhanded by those who, she thought, would have offered praise.

Cora said something. Young Regina dipped her head, curtsied, and retreated, walking backward from her mother's presence for several steps before turning and hastily quitting the obviously stifling room.

Emma started around toward the window, looking into Regina's room. A firm hand clutching her arm stopped her. She looked over her shoulder to see her Regina shaking her head.

"She..." Regina faltered. "I need you to leave it alone." She sounded beaten. While Emma's anger had been growing, Regina obviously had been sinking into a morass of helplessness.

"Regina, you did nothing wrong."

She grasped Regina's hand and walked around to where they could watch the young Regina clutching her riding outfit to her breasts, studying herself in the full length mirror in her room. Both of them saw the dark eyes reflected in the glass shimmering with tears.

Just in time they ducked out of sight when young woman spun upon seeing their reflections in the shadowed glass behind her.

"We can't stay here," Regina paced the corner of the stable stall where she and Emma had hidden after almost being spied by her younger self. "I can't watch it all happen again," she breathed. "I won't," she said more firmly.

Emma watched her lover pace around her as she reclined against a hay pile, pulling one of the brittle stalks through her fingers. "All right. C'mere," she reached up and pulled the woman down onto her splayed legs. Regina let out a yelp of surprise.

"Emma!"

"We got here by making love magic, so let's do it again." As she looked into Regina's sad gaze, before she lifted the proud chin to press their lips together, Emma thought whether it worked or not, she might be able to wipe that look of defeat - from both Regina's - out of her own memory.

Regina's lips moved against hers and Emma skimmed her hands from cheek to throat to breast, parting the red and black riding habit with deft fingers. Regina's grateful, luscious moan in response to Emma lowering her mouth to her breast shut out the troubled world around them for a little while.

Regina awoke to the sensations of Emma's arms around her. Their warm skin almost blended together under the horse blanket Emma had obviously retrieved following their lovemaking before falling asleep herself. Drowsing in pre-dawn light from the open stall door high above their heads, Regina could almost imagine they were in their favorite glade in the Enchanted Forest save for the whickering of nearby horses in their stalls, and the smells reminding her of exactly where and when they were. The idyll was broken completely by the sound of boots crunching the crisp dew-draped ground outside. She realized quickly it must be Daniel arriving for his day of working with the horses.

"Emma," she whispered into the blonde's ear. "Emma, we have to go. Now."

Emma, difficult riser that she was, only murmured in her sleep and wrapped herself more closely around Regina's still reclining figure. "Not now. Just a few more minutes."

"We can't," Regina's whisper became a hiss. "Miss Swan." She'd tried for strident, but Emma's mouth trailing along the tendon of her throat raised her voice in desire at the end of the admonition.

"See.. I told you. I know when I've gotten under your skin -"

"Daniel," Regina hissed.

Emma's brain engaged and she stood quickly, dropping the blanket back on Regina who made an indignant sound albeit muffled. She pulled on her trousers and shirt quickly, dusting her hair free of hay. The noise was minimal but it drew the intelligent young man's attention.

Thinking quickly, she asked herself - homeless or hungover? Deciding on the former, Emma stumbled out of the stall, shutting it behind her and stumbling into Daniel, turning him as she grappled with him, so he could not see Regina still within the stall.

"Who!? You!" Daniel frowned. "What are you doing here?"

"I... uh, didn't have a place to sleep." Emma walked backward.

"You can't stay here!" Daniel protested. "Lady Mills would never allow it."

"Please don't turn me in," Emma appealed to his kindness. "I'll move on. I promise."

"Did you come here with Regina?" he asked suddenly. "Does she know you stayed here?"

"She, uh..."

Daniel fretted his hands through his hair, "Regina's mother will not like this. Not like this one bit."

"Your Regina doesn't know," Emma interjected truthfully. "She's inside the house."

"Oh, thank god." Daniel took a deep breath. "I want to take her away from here. But it isn't the right time yet. I need a little more -"

"Money isn't what Regina needs, Daniel."

His head snapped up suspiciously at her familiar address. "I mean, you ... you love her. Lots of people marry with only that to offer. And they do just fine."

"But she's... a lady."

Behind Daniel, Emma caught sight of Regina, now dressed though her riding habit was askew. The brunette was slipping silently out of the stall and tiptoeing around the corner out of sight.

"You know she has never cared about status, Daniel."

Regina paused and looked back at Emma. Emma kept her gaze riveted to Daniel's face as his expression slowly transformed to one of contemplation.

Emma closed her eyes briefly, shutting out the brunette and the stablehand before her. Her mind filled with images from the afternoon before. Regina finding comfort and calm in Daniel's arms.

"She loves you," Emma said finally. "She'll go with you, if you ask."

"But I'd need her parents' permission."

"You already know her mother will never say yes. What will make Regina happy, Daniel? That's what you have to do."

Emma turned on her heel and strode out of the barn in the opposite direction. Regina leaned hard on the side of the stable. Daniel, in front of her, and unaware of her presence, stood in silence as well. Neither moved, only watching the blonde woman striding away.

Emma walked away from the stable, heading away from the main house, head down, melancholic. She didn't want to run into Cora Mills. Heavy as her heart was, she didn't want to run into anyone. Daniel was Regina's true love. She knew that now. Cora Mills had ended Regina's happiness once. Emma would restore it to her now.

"What ho, who goes there?" came a deep male voice.

Emma's head jerked up. She stared at a slightly heavyset man in a brocaded jacket and dark breeches. He'd spoken to her. His face was genial, a bit weak-chinned, but there was a smile playing on his lips. This was a man generally happy with his life.

"I'm sorry. Just passing through."

"Passing through? Without a horse?" He searched Emma's face and his brown eyes narrowed perceptibly. "Did you come from town? Do you have business to discuss?"

She turned and it was then he noticed her ponytail.

"Are you one of my daughter's friends?"

Emma nodded easily at that. "A friend." Regina had called her that to Daniel, so it must be true.

"Well, you must come inside and greet her. She doesn't go into town very often, but you must have met her on market day? Or perhaps when the puppet show came through?"

"She and I crossed paths many times," Emma said, again opting for a simple truth.

"Regina's inside breaking her fast." Emma heard deep love in the man's mention of Regina's name. "I know she will want to ride afterward. Perhaps you should just wait here." Now his face took on an edge of concern.

"I shouldn't," Emma said. "Please just... forget I came by."

"You came all this way. Now you do not wish to stay?"

"I am just a friend."

"And I am just her father," he said. Now he held out his hand. "Henry Mills."

Dumbstruck, Emma's hand came up automatically. He held it as a gentleman would hold a lady's hand before kissing it in greeting, but then he paused. "You are not a typical young woman," he said, cocking his head to the side and looking her up and down as if considering the whole of her for the first time.

She wondered what about her hands had clued him in that her attire had not. Emma could not think of anything to say.

"My daughter is also not a typical lady, as her mother, my wife, would have her be, but she is special. I love her very much. Please stay. To see you will undoubtedly make her very happy."

"You flatter me, yet you do not know me," Emma stumbled over her words.

"My daughter does, and I consider her to be a generous judge of character."

Emma needed to get away. Face to face with the younger Regina was certain to be a field of emotional landmines. She tried another tactic. "Why don't you go inside, let her know I'm here. I'll wait."

Henry Mills - senior, Emma added in her mind - decided that was a proper course of action and strode for the manor house. As soon as he had entered, Emma ran for the forest.

She nearly bowled over Regina coming out of the stable, not looking up where she was going.

Regina caught Emma's arms as they stumbled. "What?"

"We have to go. Now!" Regina found herself half-dragged into the forest where Emma didn't stop until she couldn't see the stables or manor house when she glanced back over her shoulder.

Panting, she finally fell to the ground, leaning against a tree, her head tipping back to rap against the wood. "Dumb, dumb, dumb," she muttered to herself.

Regina crouched beside her. "What did you do?" The stern formal tone was evident.

Emma shook her head. She shut her eyes to hide from Regina's searching of her face.

"Emma Swan."

"I..." Emma paused for a second realizing the impact of what she had done. "I just met your father."

"You met Daddy?" Regina started to look around eagerly. "Where?"

Emma pulled her down so they were together on the grass. "Back at the estate. When I left the stable. He... he thinks, or thought, I am a friend of yours from town. I ran away after sending him into the house. Hopefully he'll forget about it."

"You can make quite the impression, Miss Swan." Regina reminded her. A dark brow lifted and a slight smirk played at the corner of ruby lips.

"I was just a face passing through. We spoke for barely five minutes. I'm sure something else will come along to fill his mind and he'll forget all about me." Emma held Regina. "So, where to next?"

Regina studied Emma's face. The lengthy perusal began to unnerve Emma. She almost jumped when Regina asked, "Why did you say those things about me to Daniel?"

Emma sighed. She had hoped Regina had forgotten her words and quick departure from the stables with the story of her father. "Because what I said is true. He should take you away. Now, before Cora comes with the king. You deserve happiness, Regina."

Doe brown eyes narrowed. "But you almost left me with Daniel in that stable, Emma."

Emma pursed her lips and stiffened. "Yeah, well. I..."

Regina kissed her. "I know watching myself go through this all over again has me on edge," she said. "And if I could change it, I would. But," she paused, kissing Emma again. "I think too many things would change that would lead me to places just as lonely."

"Why?" Emma's eyes shined with tears. Watching her Regina and young Regina suffering through these events had overwhelmed her typical stoicism.

Regina smiled, her eyes alight with tenderness. "Because they wouldn't have you."

TBC