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Chapter Text

The town hall was dark except for a few lamps on low, their light pooling over the long table. This wasn’t an official meeting. There was no sheriff’s notice, no agenda, nothing recorded. Technically, they weren’t supposed to be here at all. But when Snow asked, people came.

The dwarves arrived first, their boots loud on the wooden floor, chairs scraping as they settled in. Geppetto followed, the smell of sawdust still clinging to his jacket. Ruby leaned in the doorway, her arms folded tight across her chest. Granny couldn’t come, the diner couldn’t close without raising questions, but with Ruby standing watch, the room felt almost like Snow’s old war council again.

Snow stood at the head of the table, hands clasped tightly in front of her. For a moment, she looked less like a schoolteacher and more like the queen she once had been.

“I know some of you have heard,” she began softly, her voice pitched as if confiding in friends rather than commanding allies. “Regina has taken in a child. A baby.”

The word landed heavily. Grumpy muttered something under his breath. Bashful shifted, uneasy. Doc tugged at his collar. Even Happy didn’t smile.

Snow pressed on. “You all remember what she’s capable of. We fought too hard to break her curse, to free this town, to put an end to her reign. I can’t in good conscience stand by while she raises a helpless toddler under her roof. It’s too great a risk.”

“She says the child was abandoned,” Geppetto said, frowning, “but how do we know that’s true? How do we know this isn’t… another scheme?”

Grumpy grunted. “Wouldn’t put it past her. People don’t change.”

Snow’s chest tightened at the old refrain, but she nodded. “Exactly. A child isn’t a second chance. A child isn’t proof she’s better. That little girl’s safety has to come first.”

Her eyes swept the table. “Emma may be sheriff, but she’s still my daughter. She wants to believe in people. She wants to believe Regina can change. I love her for that, but it blinds her. We can’t gamble a child’s life on hope.”

One by one, the dwarves muttered their agreement. Geppetto gave a small nod. Ruby still hadn’t spoken.

Snow looked at her, just for a heartbeat, and then away again.

“I need your support,” Snow said, her voice gathering strength. “If enough of us speak up, Emma will have to see reason. This town needs to trust one another; we can rebuild it that way, by protecting each other. And Regina cannot be trusted with something this important.”

The others murmured assent. Chairs scraped. Boots thudded as they filed out into the night, voices low but firm with their decision.

Snow lingered behind, straightening papers that didn’t need straightening. Ruby stayed in the doorway, silent.

“You were quiet,” Snow said softly.

Ruby’s throat tightened. “Guess I didn’t know what to say.”

Snow lifted her eyes, earnest. “Ruby… you’ve always had a good heart. I know you want what’s best for everyone. But you saw what Regina’s done. You know how dangerous she can be. We can’t gamble a child’s life on her.”

Ruby bit the inside of her cheek. The words should have come easily: You’re right, Snow. But instead she found herself saying, “She’s… different, though. Since the curse broke.”

“Different?” Snow’s voice sharpened, then softened again. “Like when she used magic to take Henry from us? Please, Ruby. She hasn’t changed. Not where it counts.”

Ruby nodded slowly, but her chest ached. Snow had been her anchor, her friend, the one who had given her a place when she had none. But it was also true: this town was the first place she hadn’t woken each morning afraid of herself — and that had been Regina’s doing.

By the time Snow turned back to her papers, Ruby still hadn’t given an answer. Just silence.

~~~~

The bell on the counter of the sheriff’s station dinged for the third time that morning.

Emma didn’t even look up right away. She’d already learned the rhythm: one at a time, never in a crowd, always framed as “concern.”

A grey-haired dwarf shuffled forward; she wasn’t sure of this one's name, cap twisting in his hands. “Sheriff, children need stability. We’ve all seen what happens when Regina doesn’t get her way.”

Emma leaned back in her chair, arms crossed. Her voice was flat, tired but steady. “And I’ve seen what happens when kids get abandoned. You wanna talk stability? That kid’s found it.”

 Ding! 

The Blue Fairy had been the most insistent and long-winded; she had intoned in a voice as solemn as a judge, “This is about safety, not sentiment. If something dark should awaken in Regina, the child will be at risk.”

Emma slammed her pen down. “Lady, I’ve been in actual unsafe homes. You wanna talk about dark? Try being locked in a cupboard because you ate your dinner too fast, or too slow.”

The fairy faltered, then vanished in a puff of light, disapproval lingering like a cloud of incense.

Ding! 

“My boy says Henry’s already calling her his sister. That’s confusing. Kids shouldn’t be around liars—” Emma had no clue who this one was, but her purpose here was clear. 

Emma cut her off with a glare sharp enough to silence. “Regina tells that girl she’s loved. That’s not a lie. That’s parenting.”

Ding! 

Grumpy had walked in, bristling like he wanted an argument. “You really gonna trust the Evil Queen with a baby?”

Emma leaned forward, voice low. “I trust what I see. And what I see is a kid with full cheeks, clean clothes, and a mom who won’t let her out of arm’s reach. If that’s evil, maybe we need more of it.”

Grumpy had no comeback.

By late afternoon, Emma was rubbing her eyes, a stack of paperwork untouched beside her. Pongo gave a low whine from his place at Archie’s side. Archie, lingering by the door, quickly raised his arms in surrender when he saw Emma’s ‘Not you too’ look.

“You know what they’re doing, don’t you? It’s not about Regina. It’s about Snow.”

Emma huffed out a laugh, bitter and tired, and just the tiniest bit relieved that Archie isn’t speaking against this too. “Yeah. I know. But they picked the wrong person to wear down. I know what an unloved child looks like — and that’s not what’s in Regina’s house.”

The bell dinged again. Emma groaned. “Next,” she muttered sardonically 

Emma didn’t even look away from Archie. “Let me guess. Concerned citizen?”

The older man cleared his throat and shuffled in front of her desk. “It just seems… irresponsible. Giving a child to Regina. After everything.”

Emma pressed her lips together. She’d heard the same opening line five times in the last two days. First from the fairies, then another dwarf, then one of the townsfolk whom Emma recognised only as someone who still bowed when Snow walked past. Now this one.

A slow drip, wearing at her patience.

She leaned back in her chair, fixing him with that Sheriff Swan look she’d perfected. “Do you see bruises? Neglect? Malnourishment?”

He faltered. “Well, no, but—”

“But nothing,” Emma cut in. “You know what I see? A baby who’s clean, fed, and glued to Regina’s hip like she’s afraid someone’s gonna take her away.”

She didn’t add that she knew the look in Dayana’s eyes. Emma had worn it herself as a kid, the wide, wary stare of a child always bracing for the rug to be pulled out. Except with Regina, it wasn’t fear she saw blooming now. It was trust.

The man muttered something under his breath about “Snow knows best” before leaving.

Emma rubbed at her temples. She wasn’t naïve. She knew exactly where this parade was coming from. Snow didn’t need to be the one filing complaints — she had half the town willing to do it for her.

But Emma had lived in unsafe homes. She knew what they felt like in her bones. And Regina’s house, with its neatly folded blankets and a baby’s laughter echoing through the halls, wasn’t one of them.

~~~~

Henry sat at the counter in Granny’s, his notebook open but untouched. Red and Snow were whispering nearby, not exactly hiding their conversation.

“I just think she’s trying,” Red said. “You can see it.”

Snow’s voice cut back, firm, sharp enough that it carried across the diner: “Trying doesn’t erase the past. A child’s life isn’t something we risk on a maybe. And if you can’t see that, Ruby, then maybe you’re too close to the situation.”

Henry froze. He had never heard Snow talk like that before. Not to Red. Not to anyone.

He thought back to Mary Margaret’s smile in the classroom, her voice soft as she’d leaned across a desk once and told him, ‘It’s okay to be wrong, Henry. Being wrong just means you don’t have all the information yet.’

That had made sense to him. That had sounded fair.

But this wasn’t that. Snow wasn’t listening. Snow wasn’t leaving room for anyone else to be right. She was… shutting people down.

And the worst part, she didn’t even notice she was doing it.

Henry’s stomach twisted. For the first time, it wasn’t just that Snow was wrong. It was that she was blind to it. And the way she spoke to Red, like Red was foolish or disloyal, it wasn’t kind. It wasn’t even fair.

It was cruel.

Chapter Text

Ding!

An older woman at the counter stood stiff-backed, her voice clipped.
“Children need stability. You really think Regina can provide that?”

Emma leaned forward, voice low but steady.
“I think Dayana looks more stable now than she did on the station steps.”

Flashback to the mansion
Dayana’s giggles echoed as Henry draped a blanket over a chair. Emma crawled inside the growing fort beside them. Regina prowled around outside, pretending to be a villain trying to get in, hands clawed dramatically. Dayana shrieked with laughter, Henry pelted his mom with a stuffed toy, and Emma couldn’t help the grin that broke across her face.

Inside the fort, Dayana pressed her cheek against Emma’s arm, utterly certain she belonged there. No one asked her to earn it. No one kept score. She was wanted, simply because she was.

Flashback to Fostercare

Emma was eight the night the social worker dropped her off. A plastic grocery bag dug into her wrist, filled with clothes that didn’t quite fit. The woman barely walked her to the door before driving away.

Inside, the house smelled like spaghetti sauce gone sour. She was shown to a room with four beds. Each one had a girl already sprawled across it, headphones in, gum snapping, eyes that flicked up and then away again. Claimed territory.

Only one bed was empty. A bare mattress, no sheet, no cover. A thin blanket and pillow folded at the foot like an afterthought.

Emma dropped her bag beside it, staring at the springs poking through the fabric.
No one said hello. No one made space. This wasn’t hers. It was just where she was supposed to disappear for the night.

Ding!

Leroy slammed a palm against the counter. “You trust her with a baby? She cursed whole kingdoms!”

Emma snapped her gaze up at him, her jaw tightening. It was almost exactly what he had said yesterday and the day before. She might have admired his consistency if it wasn’t driving her mad. “And now she’s feeding a toddler peas and carrots instead of poison apples. So yeah, I do trust her.”

Flashback to the mansion
Dayana toddled unevenly across the rug, curls bouncing, clutching a bright blue block. She plopped right into Emma’s lap without hesitation, green eyes shining like she already knew she belonged there. Emma froze, waiting for the instinctive recoil that had shadowed every other home she’d known. But it never came. No rules to learn. No hoops to jump through. Just a little girl who trusted her without conditions.

Flashback to Fostercare

The first night in a new home, dinner was hot dogs and boxed mac and cheese. Everyone else had plates already full when she sat down. She reached for the ketchup.

The man of the house barked her name wrong, “Emily!”  and slapped her hand away. “Not until you earn it. You don’t just take things here.”

Emma pulled her hand back, cheeks burning, while the other kids snickered. Her plate was plain noodles, dry, and a hot dog split in half.

She ate in silence, stomach growling, wondering how long it would take to learn the rules here.

Ding!

The Blue Fairy appeared in a shimmer of light, arms crossed, face like stone. “This isn’t about affection, Sheriff. It’s about danger. If Regina falters—”

Emma cut her off, sharp as a blade. “Then we’ll deal with it. Until then, stop wasting my time with maybes.”

Flashback to the mansion
Golden light spilled through the window. Regina sat in an armchair, brushing out Dayana’s curls, soft and patient. Henry lounged on the couch with a comic, feet kicked up. Emma leaned in the doorway, arms crossed, watching it all unfold. It was quiet. It was ordinary. It was everything Emma had never had as a child.

Dayana squirmed, tugged at her brush, and Regina only laughed, smoothing her curls with infinite patience. No punishment, no withdrawal of affection. Nothing to lose. Just love that didn’t vanish the second she faltered.

Flashback to Fostercare

She was twelve when the women in a new house told her not to get “too comfortable.”
“You’re not family,” the woman said, folding laundry with brisk, practised hands. “You’re temporary. Remember that.”

Emma nodded, face blank, but inside her chest, it felt like a trapdoor opened.

That night, she stared at the ceiling of a room plastered with old, flowered wallpaper. Every creak of the house reminded her: don’t attach, don’t believe, don’t hope.

Temporary. Always temporary.

Ding!

Emma was seriously tempted to throw that bell at the next person to ring it. She didn’t even glance up from her paperwork.

“Save it,” she said flatly, the pen scratching across the page. “My answer’s not changing.”

The office was silent but heavy, her defiance ringing louder than the bell ever could.

The desk bell dinged. Again. Emma didn’t even look up before some “concerned citizen” started in about Regina. She forced a smile, wrote down the “report,” and thought, They don’t want to protect the kid. They just want to punish Regina.

David lingered after the man left. “You can’t ignore the risk, Emma. Regina’s history…”

Emma snapped her folder shut. “I’m not ignoring it. I’m watching. There’s a difference.” Inside, she thought, ‘and you’re not watching me at all. You’re just pushing.’

Flashback to Fostercare

Emma remembered being nearly fourteen, sitting on the porch with a black trash bag of her clothes at her feet. The family she’d stayed with for six months didn’t come out to say goodbye.

The caseworker was late. An hour stretched into two. She sat on the steps, arms wrapped around herself, trying not to cry where the neighbours might see.

When the car finally pulled up, she climbed in without a word.
Not the first time. Not the last.

She pressed her forehead to the glass as the house slid out of sight. Nobody waved.

~~~~

Later that night, when Emma stopped by the mansion, Dayana reached for her before she could even take her jacket off, fat little hands outstretched. Emma lifted her without thinking, Dayana’s cheek tucking against her shoulder as if she’d been waiting all day for her.

Emma stood there, frozen, holding her. The memory of porches and trash bags and waiting alone pressed sharp against her ribs. But Dayana didn’t care about any of that. She had no conditions. She just wanted Emma, and that was enough.

~~~~

Mary Margaret set down a plate in front of her, smiling too hard.
“She may be doing well now, but parenting isn’t a temporary thing. What happens when she slips?”

Emma’s fork hovered above her plate. The word snagged. Temporary.
Her entire childhood had been temporary, temporary beds, temporary families, temporary love.

And here they were, the people who had gambled her entire life on a hollow tree and a swirl of magic, talking about how you couldn’t risk a child.

She wanted to laugh. Or maybe scream.

‘Isn’t that what you did? You hoped. You gambled. You sent me alone into a world you didn’t understand, prayed it would be fine — and you call Regina the risk?’

The words pressed against her teeth, bitter and burning. She swallowed them down with water that tasted too cold, her jaw aching from the effort.

Snow kept talking, David fussed with his food, and the table looked so normal. Domestic. Safe.
But Emma felt her chest tighten, her throat close. Every bite turned heavy, impossible to swallow.

This wasn’t safety. This was just another version of temporary, one where love only lasted if she stayed inside their rules.

~~~~

Snow fussed over her plate, smiling too tightly. “You’re running yourself ragged, Emma.”

David slid in with his familiar refrain. “And about Regina—”

Emma forced a smile, but the knot in her stomach pulled tighter. The light over the table was too bright, their voices too close. She nodded, chewed, swallowed. The eggs turned heavy in her throat.

It wasn’t just the repetition. It was the way every word carried a weight: If you agree with us. If you listen. If you change your mind.

Conditional. That was the word her chest supplied.

Foster homes had taught her the difference from an early age. Families who said they cared, but only if she didn’t break anything, only if she wasn’t too loud, only if she earned her keep. And here, with the parents she’d searched for her whole life, it felt uncomfortably the same.

She set down her fork, appetite gone. Love, here, came with conditions. Belonging came with strings. And safety, real safety, didn’t live at this table.

~~~~

The phone call came midmorning.

“Sheriff Swan?” Mr. Clark from the market sounded frazzled. “A couple of kids snatched candy bars and bolted. Store policy says I had to report it.”

Emma almost smiled. Finally, something straightforward. Real sheriff work. Not whispers, not gossip. Just kids being kids, and a parent who would need to be embarrassed into paying for a Snickers.

“I’ll be right there,” she said, maybe a little too much pleasure in her tone, grabbing her keys.

By the time she pulled up to the market, her whole body felt lighter. She was ready to track down the kids, get their names, knock on a door, and hand them back to their parents with a stern warning. Nothing magical, nothing political. Just her job.

Clark met her at the entrance, wringing his hands.
“Two of ’em. Middle schoolers, I think. Ran toward the park. Probably thought they were slick.”

Emma nodded. “Don’t worry, I’ll handle it.” She started forward, but Clark cleared his throat.

“There’s, uh… one more thing.”

Her shoulders tensed. ‘Of course there was.’

He hesitated, then leaned in a little. “It’s about the mayor. And that baby she’s got.”

Emma closed her eyes briefly, swallowing a curse. “Mr. Clark,” she said tightly, “are you telling me about shoplifters or about Regina Mills?”

He flinched. “Both, I guess. The kids matter, sure. But… people are worried. A baby in that house? After everything she’s done?”

Emma pinched the bridge of her nose. Even here. Even now.

“Here’s how it works,” she said, voice sharp. “Shoplifters, I tracked down. I talked to parents. That’s my job. Regina taking care of a baby? Not a crime. Not my job. You want to talk about that, you can take it to the town hall. But if you’ve got actual information about the shoplifting, now’s the time.”

Clark reddened, muttered about “just looking out for the town,” but gave her the kids’ descriptions anyway.

Emma strode out toward the park, jaw tight, the brief relief she had felt already slipping through her fingers. Even real crimes weren’t safe from the campaign Snow had set in motion.

It didn’t take long to find them, two boys, maybe twelve or thirteen, hunched on the swings at the edge of the park. One was chewing a candy bar, wrapper crumpled in his fist. The other kept glancing around like a guilty rabbit.

Emma leaned against the swing set’s frame, arms crossed, badge catching the weak sunlight.
“Afternoon, gentlemen.”

Both froze.

“Enjoying your snacks?”

The boy with the wrapper stuffed it into his pocket so fast it might as well have been sleight of hand. “I, Uh… bought ’em.”

Emma raised an eyebrow. These kids have no game.  “Funny. Mr. Clark said he didn’t see you at the register.”

The other one piped up, too fast. “We were gonna pay later.”

Emma snorted.
“Classic. That’s what I used to say, too. Problem is, once you eat the evidence, there’s not a lot left to pay for.”

Their faces fell, wide-eyed.

She stepped closer, crouching so she was eye-level. “Look, I know what it’s like to think nobody notices, that it doesn’t matter if you slip something in your pocket. But it does matter. And right now, you’ve got two choices: I walk you back to Clark, and you apologise like men. Or I call your parents, and we all have a much longer, much uglier conversation.”

They exchanged a panicked glance.

“Option one,” the braver boy muttered.

“Good call,” Emma said, standing. “Let’s go.”

They trudged beside her, shoulders hunched, mumbling excuses about being hungry, about not having money. Emma didn’t bite. She had heard every version before; hell, she had lived every version before.

“Trust me,” she said as they crossed the street. “It’s not worth it. Stealing gets you candy today, but it’ll get you bars on your windows and doors tomorrow.”

Neither argued.

As they stepped back into the market, Mr. Clark looked up from the counter, relief warring with something else in his eyes. Emma braced herself, already knowing.

Sure enough, as soon as the boys muttered their apologies, Clark leaned toward her. “Sheriff… about Regina and that baby—”

Emma’s jaw clenched so tight it hurt. Even this. Even now.

“Mr. Clark,” she said, voice low, “this is the part where you thank me for bringing your shoplifters back, and then we all move on with our day. Unless you’ve got another actual crime for me to deal with, I’m done here.”

His mouth opened, closed. The boys shuffled their feet.

Emma straightened and flicked her badge into place. “That’s what I thought.”

She paid for the stolen candy from her own pocket and herded the kids toward the door, her pulse pounding. For ten blessed minutes, she had felt like a real sheriff again. And then, right back into the campaign against Regina.

She stepped outside, the autumn air cool against her face, and let out a long, steadying breath.

Chapter Text

The loft was too quiet. Too sharp. Every board creak made Emma’s chest tighten, every breath felt like she was intruding in someone else’s space. She’d left before the walls could close in on her again. By the time she reached the mansion, the streetlights buzzed overhead, and her lungs ached with the cool night air.

She hesitated at the iron gates. It wasn’t her home. She didn’t have the right to just walk up, not really. But the glow from the windows pulled at her like gravity. She pushed through the gate and up the steps before she could talk herself out of it.

When Regina opened the door, she didn’t look surprised. Just quietly resigned, like she’d been expecting Emma all along.

“Miss Swan,” Regina said softly. No edge, no sarcasm. Just her name.

Emma offered a half-smile, the kind you give when you’re trying not to fall apart. “Hey. I… couldn’t sleep.”

Regina studied her for a long moment, then stepped aside without a word. Emma slipped past her, into the warm quiet.

The house smelled faintly of wood polish and baby lotion. A blanket lay folded neatly on the back of the couch, a small stack of children’s books on the coffee table beside it. Dayana’s tiny socks had been abandoned near the rug, Henry’s school papers scattered on the armchair. It was messy in a lived-in way, not the sterile order Emma had always imagined Regina kept.

“Henry’s asleep,” Regina said from behind her. “Dayana too.”

Emma nodded, throat tight. “That’s good.”

They settled in the living room without ceremony. Regina poured herself a glass of water and set it on the table, then sat in the armchair with her own cup of tea. Conversation came in fits and starts: Henry’s latest school project, Dayana’s favourite storybook, and how a neighbour had brought over some fresh bread earlier in the week. Nothing weighty. Nothing sharp. Regina carried the conversation with practised ease, and Emma let herself be pulled along, grateful not to be pressed.

At some point, the television flicked on. An old black-and-white movie, already halfway through. Emma stretched out on the couch, her boots kicked off, the blanket drawn over her legs. Regina didn’t comment. She just sipped her tea, the soft light from the lamp painting her features in warm shadows.

Emma watched the movie without really seeing it. She let the hum of dialogue and faint crackle of the old recording lull her. She let her shoulders sink into the cushions.

Safe. The word rose unbidden. She hadn’t felt it in the loft. Not in days maybe weeks.

Her eyelids grew heavy. She fought it at first, out of stubbornness, out of fear that Regina would see her slip and judge her for it. But when the blanket was gently tugged higher over her chest, Regina’s doing, she realised dimly,  Emma let go.

She slept.

It wasn’t merciful sleep. Dreams tugged her back to old doorways, old porches. She was small again, maybe seven or eight, standing in the entryway of a stranger’s house with a black trash bag digging into her wrist. The social worker was already halfway back to the car. “You’ll be fine,” she’d tossed over her shoulder. Then the engine roared, and Emma was alone.

The house smelled faintly of mildew and tomato sauce left too long on the stove. Upstairs, the bedroom had four beds. All of them already taken. One girl snapped her gum and turned up her headphones. Another yanked her blanket higher, rolling away. Their eyes flicked toward her, then back again. Claimed territory.

Only one bed was empty. A bare mattress shoved against the wall, no sheet, no comforter. A pillow folded on top, thin as paper. Emma dropped her bag beside it, staring at the springs pressing through the fabric.

“You’re temporary,” one of the girls said. Not cruel, not mocking. Just flat fact. In the manner of dreams the girl transformed and she was now Snow “Don’t get used to it.”

The words echoed through the dream until they pressed against Emma’s ribs like iron bands.

She startled awake, heart hammering. The mansion living room glowed softly with lamplight. No mildew. No bare mattress. Just the couch, the blanket tucked around her, the faint perfume of Regina clinging to the cushions. She pressed her palm to her chest, breathing until the dream slipped back into shadows.

Safe, she told herself. You’re safe here.

Sometime later, a thin wail cut through the house. Dayana. Emma jerked upright before her brain caught up, but Regina was already moving, her robe whispering around her ankles as she ascended the stairs.

Emma sagged back against the cushions, listening. For a moment, the cry sliced straight into old memory: another foster house, another baby crying in the dark for hours while no one came. Emma, twelve, creeping into the room at night, awkward hands rocking the crib, whispering, “Shh, it’s okay, somebody’s here.” Nobody had thanked her. She’d only been scolded the next morning for “interfering.”

But here, in this house, the crying never stretched on. Within minutes, the sound softened. Emma heard low words she couldn’t make out, then the faint hum of a lullaby. Regina’s voice.

When she returned, Dayana was draped over her shoulder, half-asleep again, tiny fingers tangled in Regina’s hair. Regina eased into the armchair, rocking absently, her lips still moving in the quiet rhythm of song.

Emma’s throat tightened. Not envy, not exactly, but something raw. A jagged mix of longing and awe.

Dayana’s breath evened out. Regina pressed a kiss to her curls, her eyes softened in a way Emma had almost never seen before. Tender. Steady.

Emma couldn’t look away. The dream still lingered in her chest, a baby crying in the dark, unheard. And here was this baby, answered, held, loved without hesitation.

The contrast was so sharp it almost hurt. But the hurt was warm. Healing.

Regina’s eyes flicked up, catching Emma watching. Neither spoke.

Emma tugged the blanket higher, curling onto her side. The sound of rocking, the faint hum of a lullaby, the warmth of the room, they carried her back down into sleep. This time, she dreamed of nothing at all.

The light was grey when she woke again, the first streaks of dawn slipping past the curtains. The blanket was still tucked snug around her, and the house was quiet. For one long, fragile moment, she forgot everything outside these walls — the loft, the slow drip of judgment wearing her raw.

For one long moment, it was just a couch, a blanket, and the steady beat of safety.

Emma sat up slowly, rubbing her eyes, and whispered into the empty room, “Maybe I should just stay.”

The thought startled her. But she didn’t take it back.

Emma had meant to leave. Truly. She’d only come because the loft felt too sharp, too tense, every board creak a reminder that she didn’t belong there. But somehow she ended up on Regina’s couch, blanket tucked around her shoulders, an old movie flickering across the screen.

The couch wasn’t the most comfortable bed, but it was warm, and the blanket smelled faintly of Regina’s perfume. She slept more deeply than she had in weeks.

Emma woke to quiet and sun, the soft spill of morning light through the tall windows.

For a moment, she blinked in confusion. She had drifted off again; she should have left in the grey light of dawn. Crept out like a one-night stand, no one the wiser, it had to be what Regina expected of her. It is what she would expect if their roles were reversed. 

The truth settled into her chest. She pushed herself upright just as Regina came in, Dayana perched on her hip, curls still damp from her bath, green eyes bright.

“You stayed,” Regina observed, voice even but softer than usual.

“Yeah.” Emma rubbed at the back of her neck, sheepishly. “Guess I did. Thanks for… not kicking me out.”

Regina arched a brow. “You looked comfortable.”

Emma smirked faintly, though her chest tightened with something unnamed. She stood, leaned in, and pressed a quick kiss to Dayana’s cheek. The toddler giggled, wriggling happily against her mother.

And then, without thinking, Emma reached out, caught a loose strand of Regina’s hair, and tucked it behind her ear.

The gesture hung between them, ordinary and intimate all at once.

Regina’s eyes flicked to hers, startled but unreadable. Emma dropped her hand quickly, clearing her throat. “I should go,” she said, though she didn’t step toward the door.

Emma’s hand was already gone, but the brush of fingers lingered, a whisper Regina didn’t dare acknowledge directly. Instead, she shifted Dayana and said evenly, “Henry has a late start today. He’ll be here for another hour if you’d like to wait and take him to school.”

Emma paused, half into her jacket. “Oh. Uh… yeah. Sure. If that’s okay.”

“Of course.” Regina’s voice was casual, but her gaze held Emma’s for a fraction longer than necessary.

Emma settled back on the sofa’s arm, fiddling with her keys. The house was warm, quiet except for Dayana’s babble and the faint tick of the grandfather clock.

Regina set Dayana down on a blanket with her toys. She lingered, kneeling there, but her eyes slid sideways just once — to Emma, still present, still watching.

She could have said thank you. Could have quipped. Instead, she smoothed a curl from Dayana’s forehead and let the silence stretch, soft and unthreatening.

An invitation. Unspoken.

Emma stayed.

She told herself it was practical; Henry had a late start, so she’d save Regina the trip. But really, she didn’t want to leave. Not yet.

The kitchen smelled of coffee and toast. Regina moved with quiet precision, pulling cups from the cabinet, warming milk on the stove. Dayana gurgled happily on the blanket, gumming a toy duck. Henry sprawled beside her with a spelling list, muttering words under his breath.

Emma leaned against the counter, watching. It was painfully ordinary, the kind of morning she’d only imagined, never lived.

Regina handed her a mug. Their fingers brushed, neither commenting on it. Emma took a sip, sighing into the steam.

Henry groaned, dropping his head forward onto his spelling list. “Spelling is the worst.”

Regina arched a brow, not looking up from the stove. “It’s not the worst. Ogres are the worst. Spelling is… mildly inconvenient.”

Henry snorted, Emma laughed into her coffee, and for one fleeting moment, it felt like this had always been home.

The sound of it filled the kitchen, loud, unguarded. Emma felt her chest ache in that good way, the way it only did here.

She glanced toward the door. The loft waited, sharp words and wary looks ready to meet her. The station, too, another bell, another “concerned” voice demanding she see what they saw.

But here, in this sunlit kitchen, there was no static, no weight pressing her into silence. Just warmth. Just noise that wasn’t dangerous.

Emma took another sip of coffee and leaned her hip against the counter, settling in.

An hour, she told herself. Just one more hour.

Henry shuffled his papers and looked up with transparent hope. “If you’re taking me, can I play ‘one song’ in the car?”

“No,” Emma and Regina said in unison.

Henry grinned. “Two songs?”

Emma pointed at him, faux stern. “Don’t push your luck, kid.”

Regina handed over a lunch bag. Their fingers brushed—neither commented. Henry rolled to his feet, muttered something about ogres, and went to wrestle on his sneakers. Dayana banged the duck against the floor and crowed like she’d invented sound.

Emma didn’t want to leave. She wanted this kitchen to freeze around her in the late-morning light and keep breathing.

But hours end. They always do.

She dropped Henry at school, one song, of course, and circled back toward town. The cruiser idled at the curb outside the loft while she stared at her reflection in the windshield: leather jacket, tired eyes, jaw set. Armour. She climbed the steps.

Back in the loft, Snow sat at the table with her tea, and David fussed with the coffee pot. Both of them looked up. Both of them smiled, too carefully.

Emma mumbled a greeting, already moving past them toward the stairs. She could feel their eyes on her back, heavy as judgment.

Her room greeted her with the same four walls, unchanged. She set her jacket down, fingers tight on the leather. Not home. Not safe.

She turned on the shower, letting the water drown out the silence of the loft. Steam rose, and for a few minutes, she let the heat scour away the static their presence always brought.

When she stepped out, hair damp and clinging, she didn’t linger. She tugged on clean jeans, a plain shirt, and her leather jacket. Clipped her badge to her belt. That was all the uniform she ever needed.

In the mirror, she caught her own reflection, eyes tired but sharp. The jacket wasn’t just for patrols anymore. It was armour.

Downstairs, her parents were waiting — waiting to ask, to press, to weigh her down with more words about Regina.

Emma slipped her keys into her pocket, boots thudding against the steps. She didn’t stop for breakfast.

Work was an excuse. Patrol was an escape.

And she already knew where she’d end up.

Chapter Text

She dropped into the driver’s seat of the cruiser, gripping the wheel tighter than she meant to.
Her jaw ached. Her shoulders burned with tension.

It’s not going to change my mind, she thought. Dayana deserves better than to be abandoned twice. And Regina’s giving her that. End of story.

But God, the drip, drip, drip was relentless. Snow’s voice at the loft, David’s in the office, the townies at her desk. Always the same accusation, dressed up in new words.

Emma started the engine. The cruiser purred to life.

She pulled out and let the roads carry her past storefronts, past Granny’s, past the schoolyard. Each turn felt automatic, muscle memory steering her along patrol routes she didn’t think about anymore.

Except she knew where she would end up. She always did.

Her hands tightened on the wheel. If one more of Snow’s self-appointed messengers cornered her, she wasn’t sure she would hold her tongue. She could feel the blow-up brewing in her chest, waiting for the wrong person, the wrong moment.

Out the windshield, the streets stretched quiet and familiar. And somewhere up ahead lay the only place where the static in her chest finally eased.

The mansion.

By the time she turned onto Mifflin Street, the tension in her shoulders was coiled so tight it hurt to move. But the moment the white trim came into view, tall windows gleaming in the afternoon light, Henry’s bike leaning crooked against the porch rail, something inside her loosened.

She parked, shut the car door, and crossed the walk.

The door opened before she even knocked. Regina stood there, Dayana on her hip, curls wild from play. Henry’s voice called from deeper in the house.

Emma exhaled, the static in her chest ebbing at last.

Inside, the air smelled faintly of coffee and the polished vanilla of Regina’s furniture wax. Dayana squealed, reaching for her with outstretched arms, and Emma laughed despite herself, lifting the girl without hesitation. Henry appeared in the hall a second later, grinning and already asking if she would read comics with him. The station melted away. The loft melted away. The weight of the town, of Snow’s campaign, of the endless desk-bell, and complaints, gone.

Here, there was noise that didn’t hurt. Laughter that didn’t sting.

Peace.

Emma leaned against the doorframe and thought: This is the only place I still know how to breathe.

They didn’t make a big deal of it. Regina handed Emma a glass of water; Henry tugged her toward the couch. An hour slipped by in ordinary pieces: a comic shared, a snack cut into toddler-sized bites, a soft correction from Regina when Henry skipped a page, Dayana banged two blocks together and shouted like she had discovered thunder. When Emma finally stood, promising to come by tomorrow, it felt like leaving a warm room for weather she wasn’t dressed for.

She carried that warmth with her all the way back to the cruiser.

By the time she trudged up the stairs of the loft, the silence had returned. Not the easy kind—the heavy kind, full of watchful eyes.

Snow sat at the table with papers spread out in careful stacks. David polished his badge like it needed the shine.

“You were gone late,” Snow remarked without looking up.

“On patrol,” Emma said, shrugging out of her jacket.

David lifted his head, tone careful but probing. “You’re spending a lot of time around Regina lately.”

Emma froze, keys clutched too tight in her fist. The air felt stale; the light felt too bright. She wanted to tell them exactly what Regina was doing, building forts, brushing curls, reading comics—all the things parents were supposed to do. Instead, she said, evenly, “She’s got a baby. She needs backup.”

Snow’s mouth pressed thin. “That child needs stability.”

Emma dropped her keys on the counter. The clatter sounded like a dare. “And she has it. More than she had before, at least.”

Silence spread in the space between them, thin as ice and just as breakable.

Emma nodded toward the stairs. “I’ve got paperwork.” She climbed without waiting for a reply and closed her bedroom door softly.

She sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the wall that used to feel like a shelter. It didn’t feel like anything now. She listened to the muted murmur of her parents’ voices, low, careful, deciding things about her as if she weren’t there, and felt the warmth she had carried from the mansion cool against her ribs.

Tomorrow, she promised the empty room. I’ll go again tomorrow.

The Next Day 

Emma’s cruiser rolled to a stop at the curb. No school drop-off, no case files, no “patrol” that needed checking. Just the house. Just the feeling she had been chasing all morning.

She sat a moment, fingers drumming the wheel, trying to come up with a reason to knock.

None came. Maybe that was the reason.

When she climbed the steps, Regina was already at the door, Dayana perched on her hip, a tea towel in her hand like she had been interrupted mid-task.

“You again,” Regina said, dry but not unkind.

Emma offered a half-smile, sheepish. “Guess so.”

For a beat, they stood in the doorway, sunlight cutting between them. Neither asked why. Neither explained.

Regina shifted her Dayana, who squealed at the sight of Emma and reached with chubby hands. “Well, you might as well come in,” Regina said, stepping aside.

Emma did.

The house was quiet, neither heavy nor suffocating, alive in small ways. The faint tick of the grandfather clock. The clean curl of tea in the air. Dayana’s babble as she twisted in her mother’s arms.

Emma slipped off her jacket, draping it over the back of a chair as though it already belonged there. She held out her arms, and Dayana happily launched into her arms, pressing her face against Emma’s collar with a little sigh.

Regina watched, head tilted, expression unreadable. She didn’t ask for a reason. Didn’t demand an explanation. She only said, gently, “I was about to make more tea.”

Emma nodded. “Sounds perfect,” she said. She didn’t drink tea; she couldn’t stand the taste, but it was still perfect.

And that was enough.

They settled in the dining room that looked into the sitting room. Dayana sat on a blanket, babbling cheerfully as she knocked two blocks together. Emma sat cross-legged beside her, amused, while Regina folded tea towels at the table.

“She’s getting louder every day,” Emma said, smiling as Dayana squealed at her own noise. “You’re going to have a little chatterbox on your hands soon.”

Regina’s hands stilled on the fabric. She glanced at the toddler, then back to Emma. “That does concern me.”

Emma frowned. “What do you mean?”

“At her age,” Regina said carefully, “Henry was already forming sentences. Short, declarative things. I want. More please. I play. It wasn’t elegant, but it was there.” Her gaze softened as it rested on Dayana. “She’s eighteen, maybe twenty months. And she hasn’t produced a single real word. Just babble.”

Emma’s smile faltered. She looked at Dayana again, suddenly uncertain. “I… I thought this was normal. I mean, she sounds happy.” She shifted, frowning. “So you’re saying she should be talking by now?”

“She is happy,” Regina agreed quickly, kneeling to smooth a curl from the little girl’s forehead. “But happiness and development aren’t the same. It doesn’t mean something is wrong, but…” She trailed off, unwilling to name the fear.

Emma chewed her lip. She had never been around babies, not long enough to notice what they should or shouldn’t be doing. But the weight in Regina’s voice made her chest tighten.

“So what do we do?” she asked softly.

Regina looked up. “We keep watch. We encourage her. We give her every chance. And if she needs more than we can give, then we find it.”

Emma nodded slowly. Dayana giggled and smacked her blocks together again, delighted by the sound.

Emma moved over to her and reached out and caught one tiny hand in hers. “Hey, kiddo,” she said, gently, “you’ll tell us when you’re ready, huh?”

Dayana only squealed and wriggled, but Emma thought she caught the faintest flicker of relief in Regina’s eyes.

The thought dropped into Emma’s chest like a stone. “She was unwanted,” Emma murmured, the words tasting bitter. “Her mom probably never talked to her. Not really.”

Regina’s brows drew together. “What makes you say that?”

Emma watched the little girl tap blocks together, laughing at the noise. “Because I know what that’s like. I know how it feels when nobody looks at you, nobody talks to you, like you’re just… there. Not a kid. Not a person. Just a responsibility somebody wishes they didn’t have.”

Her throat closed around the last word.

Regina watched her, something shifting in her expression, not pity, but understanding. Recognition.

“That’s why she’s behind, isn’t it?” Emma said, forcing the words through the tightness. “No one was talking to her. No one told her she mattered.”

Dayana crawled into Emma’s lap just then, pressing a small hand against the sheriff’s badge. Emma curled her arm around the toddler automatically, holding her steady.

“She’s got that now,” Emma said, softer. “You talk to her. Henry does. I… I try. She’ll catch up.”

Regina’s lips curved faintly, something fragile in her eyes. “Yes. She will.”

Between them, the unspoken truth: Dayana wasn’t the only child in the room who had once been silent because no one thought she mattered.

Regina smoothed the folds of her skirt and sat back slowly. When she spoke again, her voice was softer than Emma had ever heard it. “I know that silence,” Regina said.

Emma glanced up, startled.

“When I was very small, before I was old enough for my mother to shape me into her image, I lived in the nursery. Nannies, nurses, governesses… they tended me. I saw my father every day. He would come and read, or bring me a sweet from the kitchens.” Her lips curved faintly at the memory, though her eyes shone. “But Cora, my mother, I saw her twice a day. Once to say good morning. Once to say good night. A ritual. A display. Nothing more.”

Emma blinked, stunned.

“She never spoke to me beyond those words,” Regina continued, tone calm but the edges fragile. “She didn’t think children were worth her effort until they could be moulded into something useful. Someone useful.”

Her eyes flicked to Dayana, then to Emma. “I think silence speaks many languages: the language of the unwanted, of apathy, envy, even grief.”

Emma swallowed hard, holding Dayana closer.

Regina’s voice gentled further. “But she won’t live in that silence anymore. Not in this house. Not while I draw breath.”

For a moment, their eyes held, Emma’s raw with recognition, Regina’s steady with a vow.

Between them, Dayana babbled again, bright and loud, as if filling the space with the sound they had both been denied.

The air settled. The only noises were Dayana’s sing-song syllables and the steady tick of the grandfather clock.

Emma eased the little girl back onto her blanket. The weight of what they had said, and what they hadn’t, pressed gently on her chest. Any more, and it would break her open. She wasn’t ready for that. Not yet.

Regina seemed to know it, too. She didn’t push. She rose and gathered the tea things with her usual composure.

Emma cleared her throat and reached for her jacket. “I should get back to work. The station won’t run itself.”

“Of course.” Regina inclined her head, the picture of poise, though her eyes lingered on Emma for a beat longer than the words required.

Emma tugged on her jacket and clipped her badge to her belt. Dayana had pulled it free earlier and abandoned it with toddler disregard. The armour slid back into place. She bent and kissed Dayana’s curls; the toddler giggled, oblivious. Emma straightened, a half-smile tugging at her mouth.

“Thanks for the tea,” she said.

“Anytime,” Regina replied smoothly. Something in her tone suggested she meant it.

Emma stepped into the crisp air and pulled the door closed behind her. She didn’t look back.

She didn’t have to.

The peace of the mansion clung to her as she walked to the cruiser—through whispers, through Snow’s shadow, through the thought of the bell at her desk. And for once, she knew she had a place she could go when it all got too heavy.

A place where she could breathe.

Chapter Text

The front door had barely clicked shut behind Emma when Dayana wriggled free of her blanket and crawled toward Regina with determined little grunts.

Regina bent, scooping her up, settling her on her hip. “Yes, darling, she’s gone,” she murmured, pressing a kiss to the crown of those dark curls. “But you still have me.”

Dayana babbled, smacking her hands against Regina’s shoulder.

“Oh? You’re quite pleased with yourself, aren’t you?” Regina teased, carrying her into the nursery. She lowered her onto the rug, where toys were scattered like jewels. Dayana grabbed the wooden duck, gnawed its tail, then tossed it down with a proud squeal.

Regina laughed, genuinely, softly. “Oh, destructive and dramatic. You’ll fit in beautifully here.”

Dayana looked up, wide-eyed, and clapped her hands.

Regina sat cross-legged on the rug beside her, smoothing the baby’s curls back from her face. “You don’t need to rush,” she said quietly. “Words will come. For now, I’ll speak enough for both of us.”

She picked up the duck, waggling it as though it could fly, making Dayana giggle so loudly the sound bounced off the walls.

And though she’d never admit it aloud, Regina thought the laughter was the best kind of magic she’d ever known.

Regina was still on the rug, Dayana balanced between her knees, clapping and babbling as the wooden duck took another dramatic “flight.” Her laughter rang so loudly through the room that she didn’t hear the footsteps at first.

Henry leaned against the doorframe, backpack slung carelessly off one shoulder. He’d just come in from school, hair mussed, cheeks flushed. He watched for a moment, silent, eyes wide at how different his mother looked in that moment, laughing, playful, gentle.

Finally, he cleared his throat.

Regina glanced up. “Oh, Henry. I didn’t hear you.”

He stepped into the room, crouching down beside Dayana, who squealed at the new arrival and reached for his sleeve.

Henry let her grab hold, smiling despite himself. “Hey, pequeña cazadora.”

The words slipped out naturally, like he’d been practising them in his head and finally decided to try them aloud.

Regina’s chest tightened, just slightly. She hadn’t expected him to use it — the private endearment she’d whispered only when Dayana’s head was tucked under her chin, when she thought no one else was listening.

But now Henry had chosen it for himself.

Dayana babbled happily, tugging at Henry’s sleeve as if she recognised the sound already belonged to her.

Henry grinned at her. “Guess that means you’re stuck with us now.”

Regina didn’t correct him. She only reached out, smoothing her son’s hair in one of those rare, wordless gestures of approval.

Regina couldn’t help the warmth that bloomed in her chest when Henry used the words, pequeña cazadora. She hadn’t expected him to pick it up so soon, and certainly not with such easy affection.

“Henry,” she said softly, “you’ve made me very proud today. I’ll make anything you want for dinner. Whatever you choose.”

Henry grinned, shoulders squaring a little with the rare approval. “Anything?”

“Anything,” Regina promised.

He hesitated, eyes darting toward Dayana as she gnawed happily on a block. Then he blurted, “Granny’s?”

Regina’s smile faltered. For a moment, silence hung in the nursery. Of all the choices… But she forced her expression smooth again, lifting her chin. “If that’s what you want.”

Henry brightened immediately, oblivious to her pause. Dayana squealed as if she, too, approved.

Regina rose to her feet, brushing invisible dust from her skirt. She had promised. And she wouldn’t go back on it.

Still, as she lifted Dayana into her arms, she couldn’t ignore the faint dread curling in her stomach. Granny’s meant to leave the sanctuary of the mansion. It meant stepping into the town, into watchful eyes and hushed whispers.

And she knew exactly who those whispers would be about.

he bell over Granny’s Diner gave its familiar chime as Regina stepped inside with Dayana on her hip and Henry close at her side. The smell of frying bacon and fresh coffee clung to the air, warm and heavy.

But the warmth didn’t last.

At the nearest booth, two of Snow’s staunchest supporters — Mrs. Masters from the post office and Walter from the hardware store — stood as if on cue. Their voices carried, too sharp to be mistaken for anything but deliberate.

“Brave of you to bring a baby in here, Madam Mayor,” Mrs. Masters said, her smile brittle. “After everything you’ve done.”

Walter’s arms folded across his chest. “Some of us don’t think a child belongs in your house at all.”

Henry stiffened at her side, eyes snapping up to hers. Dayana whimpered, sensing the tension, and Regina adjusted her more firmly against her shoulder.

Her voice came out smooth, calm, but icy at the edges. “Then it’s fortunate, isn’t it, that the welfare of my daughter is not yours to decide.”

Murmurs rippled through the diner. A few heads turned, whispers swelling just loud enough for Henry to hear.

Behind the counter, Ruby froze, her hand tightening around the coffee pot. For a moment she said nothing — her best friend’s crusade and her own conscience at war in her chest. Then, almost against her better judgment, she slipped her phone from her apron pocket and tapped out a quick message beneath the counter:

[Red → Emma]: She’s here. Trouble brewing. Better get down here.

She shoved the phone away before she could second-guess herself. This wasn’t about picking sides, she told herself. It was about keeping things from boiling over in her diner.

Regina’s chin lifted, eyes scanning the room. “If anyone here has further concerns,” she said, voice cutting clear through the whispers, “I suggest you take them to the sheriff. Otherwise, you’ll let my children eat their dinner in peace.”

The silence that followed was brittle. Then Ruby hurried forward with menus, smiling too brightly. “Table for three?” she asked, breaking the tension.

Regina inclined her head, regal even under scrutiny. She guided Henry and Dayana toward a booth, ignoring the lingering stares.

The door chimed again behind them, and Emma’s voice cut through the hush like a blade:

“Make that four.” 

She strode inside with all the confidence of the badge at her hip, caught the room’s eyes — the dwarves, the fairies, the gossips who’d been whispering for weeks — and gave them a look sharp enough to cut. The one that promised trouble if they pressed their luck.

Then she crossed to Regina’s side without hesitation. “Table for four,” she repeated to Ruby, her voice steady and casual, but her hand brushed Regina’s back, a grounding touch. I see them too. You’re not alone in this.

Ruby nodded quickly, ushering them toward a booth. Dayana babbled, oblivious, reaching for the salt shaker, while Henry slid in beside Emma with a muttered, “Thanks.”

Emma leaned back in the booth, eyes sweeping the room once more. “Let them look,” she said under her breath, only for Regina. “They can stare all day. You and the kids  will eat in peace.”

Regina exhaled, a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding, and met Emma’s eyes across the table. For once, she didn’t argue, didn’t retort. She only inclined her head, regal even in her silence.

And the four of them settled in together, a fragile island of calm in the middle of hostile waters.

Ruby came over with menus, eyes lighting up at the sight of Dayana. She leaned across the booth with a grin that was all wolf.

“Well, hello there, little cub,” she said warmly, tickling Dayana’s palm until the toddler squealed. 

Dayana giggled, reaching clumsily for Ruby’s necklace, and Ruby laughed outright. “You’ve got good instincts, I’ll give you that.” The sound was bright, unforced, a relief against the heavy hush of the diner.

Emma caught the way heads turned, how eyes lingered. The room was waiting for Regina to falter, for the child to cry, for something to break the fragile picture.

But all Emma saw was Ruby’s easy affection, Dayana’s delighted squeal, Henry trying to hide his smile, and Regina’s lips pressing into the faintest curve of pride.

Emma leaned back, gaze sweeping the diners who were still staring. Let them look, she thought fiercely. Let them see what I see. The truth. A family.

Ruby straightened, meeting Emma’s eyes briefly, and gave her a small, conspiratorial nod before heading back behind the counter.

Regina shifted Dayana more securely on her hip, chin lifted high. Emma met her gaze across the table, silent but certain: this was worth defending.

Ruby balanced her notepad against her hip, pen poised, the brightness in her smile deliberately at odds with the low murmur spreading through the diner.

“What’ll it be tonight?” she asked, as if half the room wasn’t holding its breath to see what Regina would do.

Henry perked up immediately. “Burger. With fries.” He grinned, already sliding the menu back across the table like the decision had been made hours ago.

Emma smirked. “Make that two.” She tipped her chin toward her son. “Guess I’m not feeling adventurous.”

Ruby scribbled quickly, her eyes soft when she turned to Regina.

Regina’s back was perfectly straight, her voice cool and even. “Grilled chicken. Salad on the side.”

Ruby nodded, then crouched slightly, angling her notepad toward Dayana in her highchair. “And for the little pup?”

Dayana banged her spoon against the table.

Regina’s expression softened, just a fraction. “She’ll have something simple. Applesauce, mashed potato, and some of my grilled chicken, cut small, please.”

“Got it.” Ruby winked at the toddler, who squealed in triumph at being included.

The scratch of a pen on paper was loud in the hush. Around them, the whispers swelled again, the Evil Queen in a booth, the Saviour a cross from her, a baby laughing on her lap.

Emma leaned back, letting the noise wash over her. Let them stare, she thought. Let them see what I see.

The plates came steaming from the kitchen. Ruby set them down with brisk efficiency, but her grin softened as she leaned over to place Dayana’s plate. “Here we are, applesauce, mashed potatoes, a bit of chicken. Just right for a little pup.”

Dayana shrieked happily, slapping her spoon into the applesauce and smearing it across the tray and her hand. Regina, unbothered, wiped the toddler clean neatly with a napkin.

Emma dug into her burger, shooting Henry a grin when he immediately stole a fry from her plate. Regina gave Henry the Look when he slid one of his own onto Dayana’s tray, but the toddler’s triumphant giggle melted any sting.

The four of them ate together: Regina with her grilled chicken, composed as ever; Emma leaning back, burger in hand, laughing when Dayana tried to feed Regina some of her mashed potatoes; Henry grinned around a mouthful of fries.

It was loud, it was messy, and it was theirs.

Around them, the diner murmured. Forks paused in midair. A hissed whisper carried too far from the dwarves’ booth:

“Queens don’t change. Leopards don’t change their spots.”

Henry’s head snapped up, eyes narrowing. His shoulders hunched the way they always did when whispers found their mark.

Emma set her burger down. Her chair scraped back just enough that the sound cut through the hush of the diner. She turned, gaze locking on the dwarves’ booth, her voice low but carrying.

“You’ve got something to say,” she said evenly, “you say it to me but not loud enough for my kid to hear.”

The dwarf stiffened, muttered something about “just saying,” but didn’t meet her eyes again.

Emma sat back down slowly, jaw tight, heartbeat thrumming. She glanced at Henry — saw the flicker of relief, then at Regina, who was silent but regal, chin lifted high.

Dayana babbled loudly, smearing applesauce onto her sleeve like nothing had happened. Emma smiled at her, fierce pride burning in her chest.

Let them look, she thought again. Let them see it. Just two women and the children between them, eating dinner like a family

The night air outside Granny’s was crisp, cooler than it had been all week. The four of them stepped out together, Regina with Dayana tucked against her shoulder, Henry close at her side. Emma lingered half a step behind, scanning the street.

Henry kicked at a crack in the sidewalk. His voice was low, sharp. “They’re never gonna stop talking, are they?”

Regina glanced down at him, her tone calm but not dismissive. “People talk, Henry. They always have. Since the dawn of language, it’s been their favourite pastime. In every realm I’ve ever walked, gossip moves faster than any horse or spell.”

Henry frowned, his shoulders hunching. “But it’s not fair.”

“No,” Regina agreed, smoothing Dayana’s blanket as the baby yawned against her shoulder. “It isn’t. And you can’t stop it, no matter how right you are or how loudly you shout. People will talk until the end of time. What matters is whether you let their words shape who you are… You choose who you’ll be, despite them.”

Emma caught the look Henry gave his mother, half-doubtful, half-thoughtful, and felt something stir in her chest. It wasn’t just a lesson. It was the kind of armour she wished someone had given her when she was his age.

The mansion came into view, its windows glowing warm against the dark. And for Emma, that glow was more than light; it was the promise of peace.

They reached the mansion, its windows glowing warm against the dark. Regina paused on the steps, adjusting Dayana’s blanket, while Henry bounded ahead to unlock the door.

Emma hesitated. The loft was waiting. So was the silence, the scrutiny, the static that never seemed to fade anymore.

“Thank you,” Regina said suddenly, her eyes steady on Emma. “For what you did in there.”

Emma shrugged, though her throat felt tight. “Didn’t do anything.”

“You did more than you think.”

Emma looked at her, at the baby dozing on her shoulder, at Henry clattering inside, already talking about dessert. The warmth spilling from the doorway tugged at her like a gravitational force.

She should go back. She knew she should.

Instead, she heard herself say, “Mind if I… stay a while?”

Regina’s answer came with the faintest smile. “Of course not.”

And Emma followed her inside, closing the door on the whispers behind them.

Chapter Text

The clang of the front gate rattled through the late afternoon air. Regina, kneeling beside the playpen to adjust Dayana’s blanket, stiffened. The baby stirred, then settled again, clutching her stuffed rabbit tight.

Henry looked up from where he was kicking a ball across the lawn. “Who’s banging like that?”

Regina rose, smoothing her skirt, and crossed to the gate. Three dwarves stood outside: Grumpy, Bashful, and Doc, their arms crossed, their faces set.

“We’re here to check on the child,” Grumpy said without preamble. His voice was loud enough to carry down the street. A neighbour across the way paused mid-sweep of her porch. Curtains twitched in nearby windows.

Regina’s lips curved into a cool smile. “The sheriff has not dispatched you. And last I checked, ‘child welfare’ was not a dwarvish vocation.”

Bashful shuffled, muttering something about “just making sure she’s safe.” Doc pushed his glasses up nervously. “We all know your history, Regina. It’s only natural people would be concerned.”

Dayana, unsettled by the rising voices, began to whimper. Henry hurried over, scooping her up and pressing her close, glaring at the men through the bars of the gate. “She’s fine. Leave us alone!”

The baby’s soft cries grew louder, carrying across the street. Neighbours stepped out onto porches, some whispering, some simply watching.

Regina’s smile vanished. Her voice sharpened, but she did not raise it. “You are upsetting the child. That is harassment, gentlemen. I will only warn you once, leave.”

Grumpy folded his arms tighter, about to retort, but the sound of Dayana’s sobs shifted the air. For anyone watching, the picture was stark: three grown men looming at a gate, shouting at a mother holding a crying toddler, another child standing protectively at her side.

Across the street, Mrs. Parker muttered to her husband, “Doesn’t look like an Evil Queen to me. Looks like a mom.”

Another voice called, “Enough, Leroy! Go home!”

Grumpy’s scowl faltered under the weight of staring eyes. He grunted, waved for the others to follow, and the dwarves stomped away, muttering under their breath.

Regina drew the gate shut with deliberate calm. She turned back, taking Dayana gently from Henry’s arms. The toddler buried her face in Regina’s shoulder, hiccupping softly.

Henry looked up at her, cheeks flushed with fury. “They had no right.”

“No,” Regina said softly, smoothing a hand over his hair. “They did not.”

Behind them, a handful of neighbours lingered, still watching. Some with unease. But some with something else in their eyes — a recognition, quiet and growing: this wasn’t about evil queens and curses. This was about a mother and her children, harassed in her own yard.

And for the first time, the tide had shifted, if only by an inch

Emma barely had time to shrug off her jacket at the station when Mrs. Parker called in. The woman’s voice crackled through the line, high with indignation:
“Sheriff, you ought to know, those dwarves were out here at the Mayor’s, former Mayor’s today, pounding on her gate. Loud enough to wake the dead, and that baby of hers was howling. It’s not right.”

Emma was already on her feet before the call ended.

By the time she reached the mansion, the street had gone quiet again; the neighbours were back inside their houses. The iron gate stood shut, the garden tidy, but the tension clung to the air like smoke.

Regina opened the door at her knock. Dayana balanced on her hip. The little girl’s eyes were puffy from crying, her thumb tucked firmly in her mouth. Henry hovered at Regina’s side, chin jutting out in a mix of defiance and unease.

“Miss Swan,” Regina said smoothly, but her eyes betrayed a flicker of surprise. “I didn’t expect company.”

Emma glanced at the toddler, then back at Regina. “I heard what happened. A neighbour called it in.”

“Did they?” Regina murmured. She turned, carrying Dayana into the living room. Emma followed.

Once Dayana was settled with her blanket, Emma faced Regina squarely. “I need you to file a report. Officially. If they harass you like that again, I’ll have grounds to—”

“No.” The answer was immediate, crisp.

Emma blinked. “Regina—”

“They never stepped onto my property,” Regina cut in, her voice tight but steady. “They shouted at my gate. If I make it official, if I put it in writing, all it does is give them more fuel to use against me. It makes it a battle, and that is precisely what Snow wants.”

Henry bristled. “But it’s not fair! They upset Dayana!”

Regina smoothed a hand over his hair. “I know, my little Prince. But we don’t hand our enemies weapons, no matter how righteous the fight.”

Emma’s fists curled at her sides. Every instinct screamed at her to protect, to do something. But looking at Regina, standing tall, one hand on Henry’s shoulder, the other brushing a curl back from Dayana’s temple, she knew pressing the issue would only make things worse.

“Alright,” Emma said finally, voice low. “No report. But next time, you call me first. Not after. Not when it’s already over.”

Regina’s eyes softened, just a fraction. “Next time, then.” Neither of them doubted that there would be a next time.

Henry shot Emma a grateful look, and Emma let out a slow breath. For now, that was enough.

~~~~~

The elementary school classroom was dim, the late sun throwing slanted shadows across the chalkboard. Desks had been pushed aside to make room for a ring of folding chairs. Snow stood at the front, her posture calm, her expression grave.

Around her, the dwarves settled noisily. Geppetto folded his hands in his lap. A couple of parents from the PTA had come at her request. Ruby leaned against the back wall, arms crossed, silent.

“We all know what’s happening,” Snow began, her voice quiet but carrying. “Regina has taken in a child. And Emma—” she hesitated, her tone softening just enough to sound maternal—“Emma is too close to see the danger.”

There were murmurs, shifting in seats.

Snow’s hands clasped tighter. “But this isn’t only about… the child in Regina’s house. It’s about every child in Storybrooke. We live in a town with no social services, no foster system, no agencies to call if something goes wrong. If a child is neglected, abandoned, or at risk, who will act? Who will protect them?”

She looked from face to face, her eyes catching Geppetto’s, then Doc’s. “We can’t wait until something terrible happens. We have to be proactive.”

Grumpy muttered his agreement. Doc nodded reluctantly.

“That’s why I’m proposing a child welfare committee,” Snow continued. “A group of us, parents and community members, who can check in, make visits, and ask questions. If we see something concerning, we bring it forward. Emma may wear the badge, but she’s only one person. Together, we can do more.”

The words were polished, reasonable, and cloaked in care. Heads bobbed. One mother whispered that it was “long overdue.”

At the back of the room, Ruby’s brow furrowed. She realised with a jolt that Snow hadn’t said the little girl’s name once. Not once. Just the child, the baby, the girl. Always abstract, never personal.

Did Snow even know her name?

Ruby glanced down, pressing her lips together. She could picture it clearly: Regina holding the toddler against her shoulder, whispering softly in Spanish or Southern, pequeña cazadora. She didn’t speak either language, but Regina had smiled when she said it. She was a baby, a person, not a symbol.

But Ruby said nothing. Snow’s voice carried too much authority, too much weight. And Ruby, torn between her best friend and what she knew in her gut, could only keep silent, the question burning in her chest. 

~~~~

The breakfast rush hummed with the usual clatter of plates and the smell of frying bacon. But the real buzz wasn’t about the menu, it was about last night’s meeting.

At one corner booth, two mothers leaned close, voices low but sharp. “Snow’s right,” one whispered. “We can’t just trust her with a baby. We all remember the curse. That poor child—”

“She never even says her name,” the other pointed out, but her voice lacked conviction. “Just ‘the child,’ like she’s a problem to be solved.”

At the counter, Leroy (Grumpy) was louder, never one to keep things subtle. “About time someone took charge. This committee’ll keep things in line.”

A few nodded along, more out of habit than belief.

But from the booth by the window, Ms. Taylor, who owned the clothing store where Emma had taken the former Queen and toddler shopping, shook her head. “I saw Regina with that little girl. She was holding her as if she were the whole world. Doesn’t look like danger to me. Looks like a mother.”

A hush rippled, the words heavier than expected.

Behind the counter, Ruby poured coffee, lips pressed thin. She said nothing, though the question she’d carried all night gnawed at her: did Snow even know Dayana’s name?

Because Regina did, Henry did. And more and more, other people were starting to see her not as the child, but as a little girl with green eyes and dark curls who laughed when Henry tickled her

Snow’s campaign was spreading, yes, but so was doubt.

~~~~~

Regina’s voice on the phone had been clipped, each word honed to a razor edge:
“Miss Swan. The dwarves are at my gate again. This time, they’ve come armed with paper.”

By the time Emma arrived, her boots crunching up the path, the three dwarves were still posted at the gate, Grumpy loud as ever, Bashful shifting uncomfortably, and Doc holding out a single sheet of paper like it was gospel.

Emma strode up, jaw tight. “What’s going on here?”

Grumpy waved the paper. “We’re here on behalf of the Child Welfare Committee.”

Emma blinked. “The what?”

Doc cleared his throat nervously. “It’s… a committee we’ve formed. To look out for children in Storybrooke. We have authority to—”

“No, you don’t,” Emma cut in, snatching the paper. It was nothing more than a typed sheet, no letterhead, no seal, just a title at the top and a list of names scribbled at the bottom.

She let it dangle between two fingers. “This isn’t authority. This is homework.”

Grumpy bristled. “We have a duty to protect that baby.”

Emma’s voice dropped, sharp as a blade. “Her name is Dayana. And unless you’ve forgotten, I’m the sheriff here. If you’ve got concerns, you bring them to me. You don’t storm someone’s home waving a piece of paper and scaring children.”

Henry appeared at Regina’s side inside the gate, eyes flashing. “They tried to make Mom let them in.”

Dayana whimpered softly against Regina’s shoulder, sensing the tension. Regina smoothed her back, her gaze cool as ice. “I explained, as patiently as I could, that a self-appointed committee does not grant them access to my home. They disagreed.”

Emma’s grip on the paper tightened until it crumpled. She shoved it back at Grumpy. “Here’s my ruling: this committee has no authority, no standing, and no business harassing people at their homes. If you try it again, I’ll arrest you for trespassing. Clear?”

The dwarves muttered, backing down under her glare. Grumpy shot one last scowl at Regina before stalking off, the others trailing after him.

Silence settled heavy in their wake. Emma exhaled, forcing the tension out of her shoulders.

Regina met her eyes over Dayana’s curls. “This is what Snow has built,” she said quietly. “A weapon wrapped in the language of concern.”

Emma’s jaw clenched. “Not anymore. Not if I can help it.”

Henry looked between them, chest puffed with a mix of pride and relief. Dayana cooed softly now, soothed by Regina’s steady heartbeat.

And in that moment, with the dwarves retreating down the street, Emma couldn’t help thinking the same thing as the neighbours who peeked from their curtains: this didn’t look like an Evil Queen with something to hide. This looked like a family under siege. 

Chapter Text

Snow was waiting when Emma walked into the loft, arms crossed, every line of her posture radiating disapproval.

“I heard you stopped the dwarves,” Snow said, voice low and tight. “Emma, this committee exists for a reason. We can’t just let Regina—”

Emma cut her off, tossing her keys onto the counter with a sharp clatter.
“Stop calling it a committee. It’s not. It’s a group of you scribbling names on a piece of paper.”

Snow flinched at the bite in her daughter’s voice, but her chin lifted stubbornly.“I have every right to form this committee,” she insisted, the note of queenly authority creeping back. “If there are children in danger, someone has to step in.”

Emma’s eyes hardened. “No, Mom.” Her voice cracked, fierce and tired all at once. “You have neither the right nor the authority. I’m the sheriff. We have a council. We have a process. You don’t get to invent new laws just because someone you don’t like isn’t breaking any.”

Snow blinked, stunned by the bluntness.

Emma leaned across the counter, eyes blazing. “If you want a committee? Fine. Draft it in writing. Put it before the town council for a vote. Spell out the powers, the limits, the scope, in public. Until then, it’s nothing. And if you keep sending people to Regina’s home with your fake paperwork, I will treat it for what it is: harassment.”

Snow’s lips parted as if to argue, but no words came.

Emma straightened, the badge on her belt glinting in the light. “And one more thing. If you actually cared about that little girl, you’d start by using her name. Dayana. Not ‘the child.’ Not ‘the baby.’ She’s a person. And she deserves better than this.”

The silence that followed was heavier than any shouting match could have been.

~~~~~

The door to the loft shut hard behind Emma. The sound echoed in the quiet that followed, leaving Snow and David alone in the living room.

Snow’s arms were still crossed, her jaw tight. For a long moment, she didn’t move, didn’t breathe, the sting of Emma’s words burning hot in her chest.

Finally, she let out a sharp breath. “She’s blind.”

David looked at her carefully. “Snow…”

“No,” she snapped, then softened her tone, but the anger was still there, simmering. “She’s been fooled. Again. Regina knows exactly how to play her. And now she’s throwing the law in my face like it means something in this town.”

David frowned. “Emma wasn’t wrong. We do have a council.”

Snow turned on him, eyes flashing. “Council? What council? This isn’t the Enchanted Forest, where structure and ceremony kept order. Storybrooke runs on trust. On vigilance. And if Emma won’t protect that baby, then someone else has to.”

She began pacing, words spilling faster. “She kept saying her name, like that makes it real. Dayana. Like, Regina calling her daughter means she’s suddenly a mother. We’ve seen this before, David. She uses people. She used Henry. And now—”

“Snow,” David cut in gently. “Regina did raise Henry.”

Snow stopped, staring at him. For a heartbeat, she looked stricken, like the words had knocked the wind from her. Then her chin lifted, stubborn as ever. “She twisted him. That’s what villains do.”

David sighed,relenting and rubbing the back of his neck. “So what do you want me to do?”

Her voice softened, pleading now. “Just check on them. You’re the deputy. Emma might refuse, but you can make sure that baby’s safe. Not officially, just… go. See.”

David hesitated. He hated the idea of crossing Emma. But he also saw the fear in Snow’s eyes, the conviction that she was right. And he had always followed her lead.

Finally, he nodded. “Alright. I’ll go.”

Snow exhaled, relief and determination mixing in her gaze. “Thank you. Someone has to protect that child. Even if Emma won’t.”

~~~~

The knock rattled the foyer. Too hard. Too official. And very much not Emma.

Regina adjusted Dayana against her shoulder and opened the door. David stood in his deputy’s jacket, posture stiff as a soldier. 

“Regina,” he said. “I need to check on the child.”

Her smile was thin. “Her name is Dayana. And she is safe.” The man really was the most dull-witted, pompous fool; all the worlds would be a better place if the man had stayed a shepherd.  

Henry stomped up beside her, fists clenched. “You can’t just show up like this!”

David’s jaw tightened, but he quickly relaxed and turned a smile on Henry “This is about her safety. That’s all.” Did the fool really think that her son was so easy to manipulate?

Dayana whimpered, pressing her face into Regina’s neck.

Regina’s mind spun. Refuse, and risk the dwarves back at her gates with louder voices, more neighbours watching, the situation twisting out of her control. Accept, and at least control the narrative inside her own walls.

She shifted her weight, stepping aside with deliberate grace. “Fine. But you’ll make it quick.”

As David moved to step in, Regina lowered her head just enough to whisper into Henry’s ear, her voice calm but commanding: “Call your mother.”

Henry’s eyes went wide, then he nodded sharply and darted away, already reaching for the phone.

Regina straightened, her mask of composure back in place. “Come in, Deputy. Let’s not keep the child in the night air. You will conduct your… inspection quickly. And you will do nothing to frighten her.”

David’s eyes swept the room: toys neatly stacked in a basket, Henry’s schoolbag by the stairs, a high chair tucked against the table. Regina stood calmly and composed, though her grip on Dayana was protective and unyielding.

After a long silence, David exhaled. “She seems… well cared for.”

“Of course she does,” Regina said coldly. “Because she is.”

Henry’s voice cracked sharply. “Are you happy now?”

“I need to see where she sleeps”

David stepped over the threshold into the nursery, boots sounding too heavy against the polished wood. The air smelled faintly of baby powder and lavender detergent.

Dayana’s crib stood against the far wall, Henry’s old toy chest tucked neatly in the corner, and at its centre, catching the lamplight, hung a crescent moon mobile with rabbits and deer hanging from it, a quiet nod to the goddess whose name Dayana carried.

Henry trailed his grandfather like a shadow, arms crossed, lips pressed thin. Every time David paused to glance at something, the folded stack of Henry’s old clothes in a basket, the neat shelf of picture books, Henry shifted closer, practically glaring holes through him.

“You don’t have to do this,” Henry muttered fiercely. “She’s fine here.”

David kept his eyes on the crib. “It’s my job to make sure.”

Henry’s voice cracked louder. “Your job is supposed to be protecting us. Not spying for Grandma.”

Before David could answer, another voice cut sharply from the doorway:

“Exactly what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

David turned, startled. Emma stood in the doorway, jacket still on, badge gleaming on her belt. Her eyes took in the scene: her father standing in a child’s bedroom, her son’s arms crossed like a barricade, and Regina by the doorframe, Dayana resting uneasily against her shoulder.

Emma’s voice shook with fury. “You’re inspecting a baby’s room now? With no warrant, no authority, nothing?”

David lifted his chin. “Emma, this is about her safety—”

“No, it’s not.” Emma stepped in, every line of her body taut. “This is about you and Mom deciding I’m not doing my job. Deciding you can go behind my back.”

Henry glared at his grandfather. “Told you.”

David faltered, but Emma pressed on, voice cracking with anger and betrayal. “You don’t get to break into people’s lives because you don’t like who they are. That’s not protecting anyone. That’s harassment.”

The room went silent, save for Dayana’s soft fussing. Regina smoothed her back gently, gaze fixed on David, her expression unreadable but her stance protective, almost regal.

 “You came into this home. Into this bedroom. With no authority. No warrant. No right.”

David tried to stand his ground. “It’s about safety. Snow’s committee—”

Emma’s voice cracked, loud enough to startle even him. “Snow’s committee isn’t real, Dad. You know it, I know it. And if you abuse your badge like this again, I’ll take it from you myself.”

The room went silent. Even Dayana’s small fussing stilled, as though the weight of Emma’s words had pressed the air flat.

David’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t argue. Not this time. He brushed past her, boots thudding heavily down the hall, and left without another word.

Emma stood there for a long moment, breath shaking, before turning back. Henry glared at the closed door, and Regina, calm, collected, but her grip on Dayana protective — watched Emma with steady eyes.

Emma swallowed hard. “He won’t do it again.”

Emma stood rooted in the nursery, breath coming fast, eyes fixed on the space David had just occupied. Her hands trembled faintly at her sides, but she forced them still.

Regina shifted Dayana on her hip, soothing the girl with a gentle sway. Her expression was calm, but Emma didn’t miss the steel in her eyes, the way she’d stood steady, unflinching, even with a deputy prowling her child’s room.

Henry stayed close to Emma, his little arms still crossed tight, anger burning behind his eyes. “I told him,” he muttered. “I told him he wasn’t allowed in here.”

Emma exhaled, her voice softening. “You did good, kid.” She brushed a hand across his shoulder before her gaze flicked back to Regina.

Regina tilted her head slightly, studying her. “He won’t stop, you know. Not as long as Snow pushes.”

Emma swallowed, the lump in her throat sharp. “Then I’ll stop them. All of them. You won’t go through this alone.”

Regina didn’t answer right away. She just pressed a kiss to Dayana’s curls, then met Emma’s eyes, a silent acknowledgment, a flicker of gratitude that didn’t need words.

The tension ebbed slowly, replaced by the soft creak of the mobile above the crib. The felt bunnies swayed, the crescent moon catching faint light. It was such a gentle space, such a safe space — and Emma felt something loosen inside her chest just standing in it.

Safe.

Safer than the loft.

Her jaw tightened, but the thought came anyway, clear and unrelenting: Maybe I should get a room at the B&B. Stop pretending the loft is home when it feels like anything but.

Her eyes lingered on the crib, on Regina’s steady stance, on Henry leaning against her side like he trusted her to hold the whole world together.

Maybe the B&B. Or maybe…

Emma drew in a steadying breath. “Thank you,” she said quietly. She wasn’t even sure which of them she meant, Regina for holding steady, Henry for standing his ground, or Dayana simply for existing.

Regina inclined her head; she didn’t question why, just accepted the thanks as her due, regal and composed. “You’re welcome.”  

Chapter Text

The loft was quiet when Emma returned, the kind of silence that wasn’t peace but pressure. Snow sat at the table with papers in front of her, David by the window, arms folded like he’d been waiting.

Emma didn’t say a word. She crossed the room, grabbed a duffel from under the couch, and headed up the stairs. The sound of the zipper tearing open broke the tension below.

Snow finally called up, voice thin with alarm. “Emma? What are you doing?”

“Packing.”

Her answer was flat, unshaken.

David moved to the bottom of the stairs. “Emma, listen—”

“No.” She stuffed shirts into the bag, her movements sharp, deliberate. “I can’t be here right now. Not after what you did.”

Snow climbed halfway up, her face pale. “We were just trying to—”

Emma spun on the landing, bag slung over her shoulder. “No. You weren’t trying to help Dayana. You were trying to control me. And if I stay here one more night, I’m going to say things I can’t take back.”

The words hit harder than yelling.

“I’ll be at Granny’s B&B until…” she swallowed, “until I can look at you both without wanting to shake some sense into you.”

Snow’s hand gripped the railing like she needed it to steady herself. David’s jaw tightened, but neither of them argued.

Emma moved past them, boots striking the floor with finality. She didn’t slam the door — just shut it firmly behind her, the sound echoing in the empty loft like a verdict.

The bell above the inn’s door jingled faintly as Emma stepped in, duffel slung over her shoulder. The lobby smelled of coffee and lemon polish, the kind of clean warmth that felt foreign after the heavy silence of the loft.

Ruby was behind the counter, flipping through the reservation book. She looked up, surprise flickering into something softer when she saw Emma.

“Rough night?” Ruby asked, though the answer was written all over Emma’s face.

Emma didn’t bother to lie. “I need a room. Just for a while.”

Ruby hesitated, her fingers brushing the keys on the board. “You know you don’t have to—”

“Yes, I do,” Emma cut in, her voice low but steady. “It’s this, or I say something to my parents I can’t take back.”

Ruby nodded, no more questions. She plucked a key from the board and set it on the counter between them. “Second floor, end of the hall. It’s quiet.”

Emma picked it up, her hand brushing Ruby’s. She caught the faint shadow of guilt in the younger woman’s eyes, the hesitation of someone who had been in Snow’s corner too many times, who was still caught between her best friend and the woman raising a little girl.

“Thanks,” Emma said, meaning more than the key.

Ruby gave a small, wry smile. “Just… don’t tell Granny I let you have the room without paperwork.”

For the first time that night, Emma almost smiled back.

She turned toward the stairs, duffel weighing heavily on her shoulder, but lighter than the silence she’d left behind.

The room smelled faintly of clean sheets and wood polish. Neutral. Empty. For the first time in years, emptiness felt like relief.

She dropped her duffel by the dresser and sat on the bed, the mattress dipping under her weight. The sheets were crisp, the room quiet, the kind of quiet that wasn’t sharp like the loft but flat, steady. Safe enough.

She stretched out, boots still on, and let her eyes fall closed. Sleep came easier than it had in weeks, without the constant press of questions or the static of judgment waiting around every corner.

But it wasn’t the same.

The quiet here was empty, not full. No soft baby babble drifting down the hall, no faint hum of a lullaby, no smell of coffee or toast sneaking in from the kitchen. No warmth that made her chest ache in that strange, good way.

Snow’s hands shook as the door to the loft closed behind Emma. The quiet left in her wake was unbearable, like a wound that had been stretched open.

David shifted uncomfortably, jaw tight. “Give her space, Snow. She’s angry.”

“She’s not just angry,” Snow snapped, turning on him. Her eyes burned with conviction, brittle and desperate. “She’s gone. She walked out on us, and where else would she go but back to her? Regina’s already sunk her claws in, and now Emma’s…” She broke off, swallowing a sharp breath. “She’s my daughter, David. Regina doesn’t get to take her away from me. Not again.”

“Snow?”

But she was already reaching for her coat. “I’m not waiting for her to come home. I’m getting her back.”

The drive across town blurred past in a smear of headlights and shadows. Snow’s grip on the steering wheel was white-knuckled, her chest heaving with each turn. By the time she pulled up at the mansion, the sight of its glowing windows, that false warmth, only fueled her rage.

She barely remembered crossing the walk, only the sharp rap of her knuckles against the front door.

It opened to Regina.

Regina’s expression was unreadable, her back straight, one hand braced lightly against the doorframe. But her other hand, Snow noticed immediately, was tucked behind her, as if shielding something, or signalling someone, ‘She’s telling Emma to hide’

“Snow,” Regina said, voice even. “It’s late.”

Snow pushed past the civility. “Where is she?”

Regina’s brows arched, but her tone remained cool. “If you mean Emma, she isn’t here.”

Snow’s heart thudded, too loud in her ears. She didn’t believe it. Couldn’t. “Don’t lie to me. She left the loft with a bag in hand. That means she’s here. With you. Where you’ve always wanted her.”

Regina’s jaw tightened, but she did not move from the doorway. “I don’t have to lie to you. And I don’t have to justify who enters my home.”

Snow stepped forward, the desperation in her chest curdling into fury. “She’s my daughter. You don’t get to say that. You don’t get to take her from me. Not again.”

For the first time, something flickered in Regina’s expression, not guilt, but incredulity. “Take her? Snow, she’s not yours to take back. Emma is a grown woman who makes her own choices. If she doesn’t wish to be under your roof, that is no doing of mine.”

But Snow barely heard her. Her voice rose, carrying across the quiet street. “You cursed us. You tore my family apart once before, and now you’ve found another way. You think if you play house with a baby and worm your way into Emma’s trust, she’ll forget who her real mother is? I won’t let that happen. I won’t let you have her.”

Regina inhaled slowly through her nose, a queenly patience clamping down over her face. She stepped back then, just slightly, but it was not surrender; it was strategy. Behind her, in the lamplight of the hall, Snow caught the small shape of Henry at the top of the stairs, his eyes wide, watching. Somewhere deeper in the house came the faint babble of the baby.

And Regina… Regina shifted subtly, keeping herself between Snow and those sounds.

“You’ve had your say,” Regina said quietly, each word edged with iron. “Now you will leave my home. Whatever grievances you have with me, leave my children out of it.”

“Children,” Snow spat, incredulous. “Henry isn’t even yours, and that baby…”

“Don’t you dare,” Regina snapped, the mask slipping for a heartbeat, her voice suddenly sharp as glass. Her shoulders squared, and the hall seemed to draw tighter around her. “Don’t you dare stand in my home and diminish them. Henry is my son in every way that matters, and Dayana,” her voice softened just slightly, “Dayana is safe here, which is more than can be said for the station steps where she was abandoned.”

Snow faltered, her fury colliding with the sudden sting of shame. But the grief under her ribs only twisted sharper. “Safe with you? Or convenient for you? You’ve never done anything without an angle, Regina. I won’t stand by while you use Emma’s goodness to dress yourself up as something you’re not.”

Regina’s lips curved into a smile, not cruel, not mocking, but tired. “Believe what you like. It changes nothing. Emma will go where she wishes. And as much as it pains you, Snow, you cannot command her as you once commanded your armies. She is not yours to order, or to guard, or to keep. She is her own.”

The words hit like a slap.

Snow’s throat closed. For a moment, she couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe past the ache in her chest. She had led an army against Regina once, had faced ogres and witches and impossible odds, but this, standing on Regina’s doorstep with the shape of her daughter slipping further and further away, felt like defeat.

“You’ll regret this,” she whispered, her voice raw. “I won’t let you twist her against us.”

Regina’s eyes softened, though her stance did not. “If she turns from you, Snow, it won’t be because of me. It will be because you cannot stop fighting battles that no longer exist.”

Snow flinched as though struck.

She turned sharply, the hem of her coat catching in the doorframe as she stormed down the steps. David’s truck headlights lit up the street where it sat idling as he ran toward it, worry etched across his face. Snow yanked open the passenger door without a word, slamming it behind her. Charming climbed in beside her. 

From the doorway, Regina watched them go, her back still straight, her figure framed in the golden light of the hall. She did not relax until the taillights vanished down the road.

Only then did she exhale, turning to find Henry still at the top of the stairs, pale and silent.

“Go back to bed, Henry,” she said softly, steadying her voice. “Everything’s fine.”

He didn’t look convinced. But he went.

Regina stood alone in the quiet entryway, the echoes of Snow’s accusations still ringing. Slowly, she closed the door, sliding the lock into place.

Her hand lingered there, steady against the wood, as the silence settled again.

She would not let Snow bring her battles into this house. Not while her children slept upstairs.

Not while Emma’s absence weighed like a ghost between them all.

~~~~***~~~~

When she woke in the morning, the sheets were cool and smooth, the silence undisturbed. She’d slept well, better than she had at the loft in months. But it wasn’t the same. Not like the night on Regina’s couch, when every breath had felt steady, like her bones had finally learned what safety was supposed to feel like.

Emma sat up slowly, rubbing her eyes. The B&B had given her rest. But rest wasn’t home.

Her stomach growled, reminding her that dinner had been many hours ago. With a sigh, she pulled on her jacket, clipped her badge to her belt, and followed the smell of frying bacon down to the diner.

The bell over Granny’s door jingled as she stepped inside. The morning crowd was already there: construction workers with steaming mugs, teachers with quick breakfasts before class, and parents wrangling kids in backpacks. But as Emma crossed the threshold, conversations faltered. Heads turned.

She froze for a beat, scanning the room. It wasn’t the usual kind of stare, the sidelong glances she got as sheriff. This was sharper. Expectant.

Behind the counter, Ruby looked stricken. She gave Emma a look that was half warning, half apology.

Emma’s shoulders tensed. “What now?” she muttered under her breath, making her way to the counter.

She didn’t have to wait for the answer. A woman at a nearby booth — Mrs. Marcom, who Emma only half-recognised from PTA chatter, leaned toward her, voice pitched too loud.

“There you are. Your mother’s been calling everyone since last night.”

Emma blinked. “What?”

“She said you ran off,” another voice chimed in, a man clutching his coffee. “Told us all to keep an eye out, let her know the second we saw you. We were about to send someone up to the B&B.”

Emma’s mouth fell open. For a second, she couldn’t even find words. Then she laughed, a short, incredulous sound. “You’ve got to be kidding me. I’m not sixteen. I didn’t sneak out the window with a backpack. I booked a room at a perfectly legal business in town. I even told them where I was going.”

But the whispers were already swelling. Words like “worry” and “family” and “trouble” circled the room, heavy as judgment.

Ruby slid a plate onto the counter, her voice low but firm. “Here. On the house.”

Emma glanced at the stack of pancakes, steam curling up, then back at Ruby. “She really called around town?”

Ruby winced. “Half the town, more like. Said you were upset, might not be thinking clearly. You know how she is when she’s in one of her crusades.”

Emma pressed her palms flat on the counter, grounding herself. Upset. Not thinking clearly. God, the phrasing stung as if she were unstable, irrational, a problem to be handled.

She’d heard those words before. Caseworkers whispered to her on the porch while she clutched a trash bag of clothes. Foster parents muttering them after she’d mouthed off. “She’s upset. Not thinking clearly.” The prelude to being moved along. Again.

Her throat tightened.

“Emma?” Ruby asked softly.

Emma forced herself to shake it off. She grabbed the fork, stabbed a bite of pancake, and muttered around the mouthful, “She doesn’t get to do this. I’m not a kid she can ground.”

A few heads turned again at the edge in her voice, but Emma didn’t care. She swallowed hard, dropped the fork, and turned on the nearest table.

“For the record,” she said, voice carrying, “I’m twenty-nine years old. I didn’t run away from home. I left my parents’ house because I needed space. That’s not a crime. That’s called being an adult.”

Silence followed. Thick. Embarrassed.

No one quite met her eyes. A couple of people ducked their heads over their plates.

Emma nodded sharply. “Good. Glad we’re clear.”

She turned back to Ruby, softer now. “Thanks for the pancakes. I’ll pay for them, though.”

Ruby slid the bill toward her but hesitated. “You know she’s not gonna stop, right?”

Emma’s jaw tightened. “Yeah. I know.”

She dropped some bills on the counter, more than enough, and picked up the plate to carry it to a corner booth. She needed the quiet, the distance, even if the whispers would keep following her.

As she ate, the tension in her chest eased only slightly. Every bite tasted like grit. But she forced it down, because she refused to let Snow win twice, first by driving her out, and now by making her feel like a runaway again.

Snow could call every house in town. She could paint Emma like a teenager sneaking off with a duffel bag. She could send whispers into every corner of Storybrooke.

But Emma knew the truth. She hadn’t run away. She had walked away.

And she wasn’t going back.

Emma scraped the last of the pancakes into the trash and carried her plate back to the counter. Ruby gave her a look that was part solidarity, part warning. Emma just nodded, tugged her jacket tight, and stepped out into the cool morning air.

The bell over the door jingled behind her, but the silence outside was no easier.

The bug sat at the curb, familiar and solid, but Emma’s steps slowed before she reached it. She could feel it, eyes on her. The same way she had felt them as a kid, walking back to foster homes after bolting for a night. Neighbours peeking from the curtains. Adults whispering on porches. Always the same words: She ran away. Troubled girl. Doesn’t know what’s good for her.

She turned her head just enough to catch it: two women at the diner window, heads bent together, their eyes cutting toward her before darting away. Another man leaned in the doorway of the hardware store across the street, his arms folded, pretending to be casual but very obviously watching.

Emma clenched her jaw, boots loud against the pavement as she forced herself forward. She wasn’t sneaking. She wasn’t ashamed. She’d walked out openly, duffel on her shoulder, and booked a room like an adult who could make her own damn choices.

But God, it felt the same. The whispers followed her like smoke.

She reached the bug, fingers tightening on the handle. For a moment, she just stood there, jaw set, staring at her own reflection in the window. The leather jacket, the badge clipped to her belt armour, she had built for herself. Proof she wasn’t some teenager caught climbing out a window.

She yanked the door open, slid behind the wheel, and slammed it shut. The thunk echoed like a verdict, shutting the town out.

Her chest heaved. She leaned forward, pressing her forehead against the steering wheel.

Snow had called half the town, told them to watch for her, to send her “home.” Like she didn’t have the right to leave.

Emma laughed, sharp and bitter. “Guess some things don’t change.”

Snow didn’t understand. Not really. She thought she was protecting Emma, pulling her back into the fold, keeping her safe. But all she was doing was proving she still didn’t see her daughter not as a woman, not as the sheriff, not as someone who had spent her whole damn life building herself up from nothing.

To Snow, she was still the baby she had ordered put in a wardrobe, still the girl she imagined when she pictured a lost child in the woods. Never mind that twenty-nine years had passed. Never mind that Emma had survived, grown, and fought tooth and nail for every scrap of belonging she’d ever had.

Snow had gambled her newborn daughter’s life once on the hope that the world would be kind. Now she was gambling again, gambling that control was the same as love, that dragging Emma back under her roof could heal what she herself had broken.

Emma lifted her head, started the cruiser, and pulled away from the curb. The whispers trailed in her wake, but she didn’t look back.

If Snow wanted her to come “home,” she was going to have to face a truth she’d been avoiding since the day Emma walked back into her life:

Home wasn’t the loft.

And Emma wasn’t the child she’d lost.

Chapter Text

The diner was busier by noon, a low hum of conversation and the scent of frying onions filling the air. Emma slipped into a booth near the window, nursing her second cup of coffee. She’d managed a few hours of quiet work at the station, enough to convince herself the morning might stay calm.

Ruby was working the counter, moving fast enough to avoid talking. When she finally passed by with a fresh pot, she leaned in just enough to murmur, “You might want to brace yourself.”

Emma looked up. “For what?”

Ruby hesitated. “She’s been calling around. Since sunrise.”

“She?”

Ruby gave her a pointed look.

Emma groaned softly and rubbed her temples. “Of course she has.”

Before Ruby could answer, the kitchen door swung open. Granny emerged, her expression firm and set, not angry, just resolved in that way Emma had seen before, when the older woman thought she was doing the right thing even if it hurt.

“Emma,” she said, wiping her hands on a towel as she approached the booth. “We need to talk.”

Emma straightened, tension already building in her shoulders. “If this is about Snow—”

“It’s about the inn.”

Emma frowned. “What about it?”

Granny sighed, folding her arms. “I got a call this morning. Several, actually. Some from Snow, some from townsfolk. They reminded me of a policy that was put in place by ‘Mayor Mills’.” Granny’s tone dipped on mayor, letting her distaste show.

Emma felt the cold weight of recognition before the words even came. “Don’t.”

Granny’s eyes softened with regret. “You know the one. The ‘No convicted felons’ clause. You remember.”

“Oh, I remember,” Emma said, voice low. “I remember being told I couldn’t stay when I first got here.”

Granny winced. “I didn’t agree with it then, and I don’t now. But technically, it’s still policy. And with people talking…”

Emma leaned back, crossing her arms. “So let me guess, Snow called in a reminder, and suddenly you’re a stickler for the rules again.”

Granny’s jaw tightened. “Don’t make this harder than it has to be, Emma. You know I respect you. You’ve done good for this town. But you also know how fast things spiral when Snow gets the community behind her. I can’t risk it. Not for you, not for me, not for the inn.”

Emma laughed, but it came out hollow. “Right. Wouldn’t want to upset the Queen.”

“Emma—”

“No, it’s fine.” She slid out of the booth, tossing a few crumpled bills onto the table. “I get it. You’ve got to keep your head down. You’ve all got to.”

Granny hesitated, then said softly, “You don’t have to leave right this second. I’ll give you until tonight.”

Emma met her eyes. “I won’t need that long.”

She picked up her jacket, shrugging it on like armour. The diner had gone quieter around them, heads turned but pretending not to listen. Emma caught sight of one of the old-timers whispering behind a napkin. Another table went still when she walked past.

Emma didn’t go straight to the car. Not yet.

She climbed the stairs two at a time, key cold in her fist. The hallway felt smaller now—the walls closing in, the light too dim. In her room, the bed was still made, sheets neat and tucked, like she’d never slept there at all.

She dragged her duffel from under the frame and threw it open on the bed. The sound of the zipper tearing back was sharp, final.

It didn’t take long to pack. A few shirts, jeans, her toothbrush. She’d learned a lifetime ago how to leave fast, how to never make herself too comfortable.

When she was done, she sat on the edge of the bed for a moment, hands resting on the duffel. Her chest felt tight, not from the argument, not even from the loss, just the exhaustion of watching the same story play out again.

Different faces. Same ending.

Downstairs, the diner’s lunch crowd had thickened. Conversations cut off when she walked in, the usual murmur replaced by a hush that spread like spilled water.

Granny was back behind the counter, pretending to rearrange plates. She froze when Emma stepped up and dropped the brass key onto the counter hard enough to make the bell jump.

The sound rang through the diner.

“Here,” Emma said. Her voice was calm, but the words were edged. “Room’s yours again. You can tell Snow you did your civic duty.”

A few heads turned. Nobody spoke.

Granny’s mouth tightened. “Emma—”

“No.” Emma’s voice carried, low but steady. “Let’s not pretend this is about rules. It’s about control. Snow wants a version of this town that fits her fairytale, and I don’t. So she’s calling in old debts and old laws to make everyone fall in line.”

She looked around at the staring faces, landing on one table after another. “You all think she’s doing this to protect you. But she’s not. She’s scared, scared of change, scared of what she can’t fix—and right now, that’s me. And Regina. And that little girl who’s finally got a home that isn’t going to vanish because someone says she doesn’t deserve it.”

No one breathed. Even the clock behind the counter seemed to hesitate between ticks.

Emma exhaled through her nose, the faintest tremor of grief in her chest. “This isn’t going to end how Snow thinks it will.”

She slung the duffel over her shoulder and turned for the door.

“Emma—” Granny started again, then stopped when she saw the look in the younger woman’s eyes.

It wasn’t anger anymore. It was resolve, quiet, carved out of too many years of being told where she didn’t belong.

The bell above the door jingled as she left, the sound almost delicate after the weight of her words.

Outside, the air was bright and brittle, sunlight cutting sharply through the autumn haze. The Bug sat as it always had, waiting, faithful in a way few things in her life had ever been.

Emma brushed a hand across the roof before she slid in. The vinyl seat creaked, familiar and grounding. She gripped the steering wheel, resting her forehead against it for a long breath.

“Guess it’s just us again,” she murmured.

The keys jingled softly as she turned the ignition. The engine coughed once, then caught, steady as a heartbeat.

The curtain shifting just enough to catch a glimpse of Granny watching from inside, worry written all over her face.

Emma looked away.

Emma sat in the Bug for a long while after leaving the diner, engine idling, radio off. The town went on around her, cars rolling past, mothers pushing strollers, someone’s dog barking two streets over—and it all felt like static. Familiar. Suffocating.

She’d been here before. Not in Storybrooke, but in that exact in-between space: too angry to cry, too proud to beg, too tired to keep explaining why she didn’t deserve the things people thought she did.

Her fingers drummed once against the steering wheel. The motion sparked something old, a memory she hadn’t meant to touch.

Flashback  Age 19

The parole officer had called it a “fresh start.”

Emma had called it “bullshit.”

They handed her a sealed envelope with her paperwork, the name of a halfway-friendly motel scrawled across the front. A bus voucher sat on top, one ride, one chance. The woman at the desk said, “You’ve got to want better for yourself, Miss Swan,” like the wanting had ever been the problem.

By the time Emma stepped off the bus, the sun was already low. She wore her only decent shirt, clean, too big, taken from a donation bin, and clutched the manila envelope like it was worth something. The motel clerk didn’t look up when she checked in. “Cash only,” he said. “No trouble.”

She nodded, even though trouble was all she seemed to carry.

The next morning, she walked to a diner that advertised Help Wanted. The manager was a big guy with tired eyes and a coffee stain on his tie. He looked her over when she asked for an application.

“You got experience?”

“A little,” she lied. “I waitressed before.”

He scanned the form, eyes catching on the blank spaces, no references, no last address, no diploma. Then he hit the question she couldn’t lie around: Have you ever been convicted of a crime?

She checked the box. The parole office said employers respected honesty. The parole office lied.

The manager sighed. “Look, kid, it’s nothing personal. But my insurance doesn’t cover that kind of liability.”

That kind of liability.

He handed the form back, already turning away. “Try the fast-food place on Elm. They don’t run checks.”

She tried three more places that day. A grocery, a laundry, a car wash. Each one turned her away with the same soft tone, the same sorry that didn’t mean sorry at all.

By evening, she was sitting on the curb outside the motel, her envelope of “fresh start” paperwork creased and useless in her lap. Her stomach hurt from hunger, but worse was the ache under her ribs, the familiar one, the not welcome one.

When the streetlights came on, she told herself she’d keep trying tomorrow. But some part of her already knew: the system didn’t want her to get better. It wanted her to stay gone.

Present

The Bug’s heater rattled softly, dragging her back. Emma let out a breath she hadn’t realised she’d been holding.

It was almost funny, in a sick kind of way, the same rulebook, different town. Once, she’d been too criminal to rent a room. Now she was too inconvenient to deserve one. Different people enforcing it, same blind obedience to a line in a book written by someone who never thought it would land on her.

Her reflection in the windshield looked older than she felt, tired eyes, a small scar she didn’t remember earning, hair escaping the tie at her neck. She could almost see nineteen-year-old Emma beneath it, sitting on that curb with her envelope of empty promises.

“Guess we didn’t get that fresh start after all,” she muttered.

A gust of wind shook brittle leaves across the hood. Storybrooke was supposed to be a place of second chances. That was what Snow always said. Redemption. Forgiveness. Family.

But redemption, Emma was realising, only applied to the people Snow approved of. The others, the Reginas, the broken ones, the inconvenient ones, had to keep earning what should have already been theirs.

She shut off the engine and sat there in the quiet, fingers tracing the rim of the steering wheel. The car smelled like coffee and gun oil and the faint hint of old fast food, her life, distilled.

Her phone buzzed once. A message from David: Come home. We can talk.

She stared at it until the screen went dark again. Then she flipped the phone face down on the seat.

“Not this time,” she whispered.

Outside, the air bit sharp against her skin when she stepped out. The autumn wind tugged her hair loose, the streets around her already whispering about the sheriff who’d just been evicted from a bed she paid for. She didn’t look back at the diner.

The car door shut behind her like punctuation.

The choice had already been made.

She turned the key and drove, not fast, not reckless, just steady. The town fell away behind her in a blur of white fences and gossip. Ahead, the road curved toward the woods, and beyond that, toward the mansion.

Toward the only place that had felt real in months.

The drive out to the mansion felt longer than usual, though Emma barely registered the turns. The trees blurred by, orange and gold against a grey sky. Her hands stayed tight on the wheel, her thoughts looping the same old refrain: you’re too much, too loud, too complicated, too wrong to fit.

By the time she pulled through the gates, the air was heavy with the smell of rain. The mansion stood steady and warm against the darkening sky, light spilling softly from the tall front windows. She sat for a moment in the drive, engine still running, watching the faint silhouette of movement through the curtains.

Finally, she cut the ignition and climbed out. Gravel crunched under her boots. The duffel felt heavier now than it had when she packed it.

Regina opened the door before Emma could knock. For a heartbeat, neither spoke; the older woman’s expression flickered between surprise and something gentler.

“Miss Swan,” she said quietly. No sarcasm, no distance. Just her name.

Emma huffed out a breath that might have been a laugh if it hadn’t sounded so tired. “Yeah, well… it’s been a hell of a day.”

Regina’s gaze flicked to the duffel. “I see that.” She stepped back, opening the door wider. “Come in before you start dripping on the rug.”

Emma obeyed, brushing rain from her jacket as she crossed the threshold. The warmth of the house hit her immediately: polished wood, faint smoke from the fireplace, and something soft and floral beneath it. Home. Not hers, but home all the same.

Regina closed the door with a soft click. “Did something happen?”

Emma hesitated, jaw tight. “Snow happened. Again.”

Regina’s eyes darkened, a subtle tightening at her mouth. “I see.”

“She’s been calling around town since sunrise, trying to find me, like I’m a runaway teenager, as if I hadn’t told her exactly where I’d be. Guess she decided I’m safer under supervision.”

Regina’s lips pressed into a thin line. For a fleeting moment, she looked like she might laugh at the absurdity, but didn’t. “She came here last night,” she said quietly.

Emma froze. “What?”

Regina nodded once, hands clasped neatly. “Around midnight, or a little before. Demanded to see you. Claimed you must be here, that I’d ‘stolen you away’ again.” Her tone was even, but the memory flickered in her eyes: the pounding on the door, the sharp exchange of words she’d barely contained.

Emma exhaled sharply, shoulders sagging. “Of course she did.”

“I didn’t let her inside,” Regina continued. “But I had to be careful. The children were asleep, and I couldn’t risk waking them or giving the town another story to whisper about.” She looked at Emma then, something steely and protective beneath the calm. “She’s becoming reckless.”

Emma scrubbed a hand over her face. “Yeah. She showed up at Granny’s too, not in person, but close enough. Called in that old ‘no felons’ rule. I’m sure you remember that one.”

Regina’s composure faltered, guilt flickering across her expression. “Yes,” she admitted.

“It’s come back around. Granny said she couldn’t keep me there, not with Snow stirring people up. So here I am.” She shrugged, trying for nonchalance and failing. “I’ll find a place to rent tomorrow. I just need somewhere to crash tonight.”

Regina didn’t hesitate. “You can stay here.”

Emma blinked, caught off guard. “Just like that?”

Regina met her gaze evenly. “Just like that.”

“You don’t even want to think about it?”

“I already have,” Regina said simply. “You’re tired. You’ve been fighting battles you shouldn’t have to fight. And whatever war Snow thinks she’s waging, it ends at this door. You and the children are safe here.”

Emma’s throat tightened. “Regina…”

“Don’t thank me,” Regina interrupted softly. “Just rest.”

Something in her voice, quiet, certain, unguarded, slid under Emma’s ribs like warmth after too long in the cold.

“I’ll make up the guest room,” Regina said, already turning toward the stairs.

Emma caught her sleeve before she could move away. “You don’t have to—”

“I know.” Regina’s hand came to rest briefly over Emma’s. “But I want to.”

The touch lingered, not hesitant, not quite deliberate, before Regina drew away.

“End of the hall,” she said, her voice smoothing back into calm. “Fresh linens, spare towels.” Her look was soft but unreadable. “You are welcome here, Emma.”

Emma watched her disappear up the stairs before turning toward the living room. The quiet of the house folded around her like a blanket, steady, unbroken, safe.

She didn’t know what tomorrow would bring, but for the first time in a long time, she didn’t dread it.

Emma followed Regina up the stairs, duffel strap digging into her shoulder. The mansion was bright in the afternoon light, the kind of warmth Storybrooke’s autumn didn’t usually allow. Dayana’s laughter floated faintly from somewhere down the hall, a small reminder that this house had life in it, real life, not the kind that vanished when the door shut.

Regina stood beside the door she had indicated, the one at the end of the hall. The room was simple but beautiful, soft cream walls, sunlight spilling through gauzy curtains, a vase of wildflowers on the nightstand. Everything was deliberate, cared for.

Emma set the duffel on the bench at the foot of the bed. “You really didn’t have to make space,” she said, awkward but sincere.

“I told you,” Regina replied, arms folded, but her voice gentle. “You’re welcome here as long as you need. That’s not charity, Sheriff. It’s choice.”

Emma’s mouth twitched into something between a smile and disbelief. “I’m starting to forget what that feels like.”

Regina studied her for a moment, then said softly, “Then perhaps it’s time you remembered.”

Emma looked down, blinking hard. “I’ll be out of your way soon. I’ve got to head back to the station after this, just needed somewhere to drop my things.”

“Take your time,” Regina said. “You’re not a guest. You’re safe.”

It was such a simple phrase, You’re safe, but it landed like a stone in still water. For a moment, Emma didn’t move. Didn’t breathe.

When Regina left her to settle in, the room felt suddenly too quiet. Not empty, just unfamiliar. Emma ran her fingers over the smooth linen of the bedspread, over the polished edge of the nightstand. Everything here spoke of permanence; even the sunlight seemed content to linger.

She sat on the bed, exhaling slowly.

When she was nineteen, fresh out of prison, she’d rented a room that smelled like mildew and fear. The landlady met her at the door with a tight smile and a clipboard full of questions.

“Any priors?”
“Employment history?”
“Family?”

Each answer made the woman’s eyes harder.

She’d paid two weeks’ rent up front, cash, and still been told not to touch the stove or the “good” towels. “Until I can trust you,” the woman had said.

That room had been survival. Bare mattress, one window that didn’t open, the sound of traffic that never stopped.

This room was different. Warm. Waiting. Not probation, invitation.

Emma dropped back onto the bed, staring at the ceiling. She wasn’t used to softness without suspicion attached to it. Her throat tightened.

She sat up again quickly, pushing her hair back and forcing a breath. No use getting sentimental now.

On the nightstand sat a small glass of water, already there, like Regina had anticipated her. Emma smiled faintly and set her fingertips to the cool rim, a tangible reminder that someone had considered her.

“I’ll just crash here for a bit,” she muttered, setting her phone alarm for twenty minutes. “Then back to work.”

But when she lay back, the smell of polished wood and faint perfume wrapped around her. The mattress dipped just enough to feel like a real bed, not a borrowed one.

Her eyes fluttered closed.

When the alarm buzzed, she startled awake, blinking at the sunlight still spilling through the curtains. She felt lighter, not rested exactly, but unknotted.

She swung her legs off the bed, stretched, and grabbed her jacket. Time to face the world again. But as she glanced once more at the doorway, at the quiet space she’d been given without question, she caught herself smiling.

Chapter Text

The station drifted through a quiet afternoon that felt almost like a dare. Emma kept her head down, finished the stack of reports she’d been avoiding, and filed three separate complaints about raccoons as if the town weren’t fraying at its seams. The desk bell stayed mercifully silent. David came and went, hovering with the awkwardness of a man who thought proximity counted as apology.

“You know your mom didn’t mean for it to get this far,” he offered at one point, leaning against the doorframe like they were teammates again.

“Yeah,” Emma said without looking up. “She never does.”

He shifted, chastened, then took the hint and wandered back out to patrol the same five blocks he always did.
The clock slid toward five with the stubbornness of a mule. When the minute hand finally tipped past, Emma capped her pen, straightened the stapler, and locked the station with a neat turn of the key. She didn’t check her phone. She didn’t have to; she already knew it would hold messages shaped like obligations.

The late light lay thin over Storybrooke as she crossed Main Street. The breeze smelled like wet leaves and distant woodsmoke. The cruiser would get her there faster, but the Bug was what she wanted beneath her hands; she slid into its familiar seat and let the engine thrum steady under her ribs.
She didn’t point the nose toward the loft. She didn’t even think about it. Her hands did the remembering for her.

By the time she pulled up to the mansion, the windows glowed warm, and the front steps had collected a trace of damp from an almost-rain. She could hear, even from outside, a thread of laughter woven through the house, Henry’s voice rising in triumph over something, a smaller gurgle answering him.
The sound cracked something open in her chest that she hadn’t noticed had sealed itself shut during the day.

Regina opened the door before Emma could knock. She wore softness in the way she held herself, still precise, still composed, but gentled by evening.
“Rough day?” she asked, and the sympathy in it didn’t come with a lecture attached.

Emma breathed out a small laugh. “You could say that.”

“Come in before you catch a chill,” Regina said, stepping aside. The smell of garlic and butter slipped past them into the night.

The house was alive in that quiet, domestic way Emma still wasn’t used to. The scent of dinner lingered, faint but warm. Dayana was babbling from her playpen, tiny hands clapping at the sight of Emma, while Henry sat at the dining table surrounded by open books.

Regina opened the oven and drew out a plate wrapped in foil, the faint aroma of roasted vegetables and herbs filling the kitchen.
“I assumed you hadn’t eaten,” she said, setting it on the counter.

Emma blinked, caught off guard. “You made me a plate?”

“I saved you one,” Regina corrected smoothly. “Given your record, I suspected dinner was an afterthought.”

Emma huffed a laugh, peeling back the foil. “You’re not wrong.”

“Go sit,” Regina said, waving her toward the table. “Eat. Henry could use the company; he’s been arguing with his homework for half an hour.”

Henry groaned, slumping forward. “Social studies and math. Mom tried, but she keeps comparing the American colonies to feudal provinces. She called the Continental Congress a coup.”

Regina shot him a look, though amusement flickered at the corners of her mouth. “I was merely providing historical context.”

Emma grinned around a mouthful of dinner. “Yeah, well, maybe leave the monarchist commentary for your own memoirs. I got this one.”

Henry brightened as Emma slid into the chair beside him, flipping his book around. “Okay, show me what you’ve got. I can handle this part.”

For the next half hour, the two of them worked quietly, Emma explaining the Boston Tea Party with hand gestures too big for the table, Henry jotting notes and asking sharp questions.
When he got stuck on math next, she helped him rework the fractions, walking him through the process the way no one had ever done for her when she was his age.

“Okay,” Emma said, chewing thoughtfully. “Fractions are like people; they only get along if you make them share something in common.”

Henry squinted. “That sounds like cheating.”

“Trust me, it’s diplomacy,” Emma said, smiling. “Find a common denominator, and they stop fighting.”

Henry blinked, then laughed. “That’s actually kind of genius.”

Regina, leaning against the counter, hid her smile behind a sip of tea. Watching them, Emma eating slowly between explanations, Henry leaning in to follow, her hair falling into her face as she wrote out an example, the scene felt ordinary. Miraculous in its ordinariness.

When Emma finally pushed the empty plate away, she said, “Okay, problem set: conquered. You survived.”

Henry grinned. “You make it sound easy.”

“That’s because I used to be terrible at it,” Emma said. “Now I just fake confidence until the numbers believe me.”

Regina chuckled softly. “A surprisingly effective life strategy, Miss Swan.”

Emma met her eyes across the room. “It’s worked out okay so far.”

After dinner came the natural procession of the evening: Henry lugging his backpack upstairs with theatrical suffering, a bath for Dayana that involved more water on Emma’s shirt than in the basin, Regina’s amused tsk and the hand she pressed to Emma’s shoulder when the toddler lobbed a washcloth directly at her face.
The house felt like a stone warmed in the sun, heat that soaked in slowly and stayed.

Once Dayana was dry and pajama’d, Emma carried her down the hall, the baby’s weight settling into the notch of her collarbone. Regina walked beside them, fingers trailing over the nursery doorframe, a gesture so small Emma almost missed it, like checking a charm, or counting something that meant safety.

When the baby was tucked into her crib with her rabbit under one arm and her blanket under the other, Regina turned to Emma in the doorway. In her hand was a small brass key, warm from her palm. She held it out without ceremony.

“You should have this,” she said.

Emma blinked. “Regina, you don’t—”

“You work late,” Regina said smoothly. “You’ll be in and out. It’s impractical for you to knock, and I’d rather you not wake Dayana if you can avoid it.” She shrugged, a precise lift of the shoulder that somehow felt like an embrace.

Emma looked down at the sliver of brass glowing soft in the lamplight. “You’re… giving a lot,” she said, words clumsy beside what she meant. “You haven’t asked for anything. Not rent. Not groceries. Not even that I replace the shampoo I use.”

Regina’s mouth curved. “I assumed you would, at some point.”

“I will,” Emma said quickly. “I just… this is a lot of trust.”

Regina’s gaze held hers, steady and unflinching. “It’s not trust I expect you to earn,” she said quietly. “It’s trust I’m choosing to give.”

Emma had to swallow twice before she could speak. “Okay,” she said softly. “Okay.”

She reached into her jacket pocket, pulled out her key ring, and there in the hallway between nightlight glow and the soft tick of the house, eased the loft key off the ring. She didn’t throw it away, didn’t even make a gesture of it. She just set it in a small dish on the side table where forgotten coins lived, and slid Regina’s key into its place.
The tiny click sounded louder than it should have.

Regina noticed. Of course she did. She said nothing.

Across town, the loft was a lighthouse with no ship to save.
Snow sat at the kitchen table with a mug gone cold in her hands. David checked his phone, the second hand of the clock above him chewing through minutes until they tasted like metal.

“She’ll come home,” Snow said, gentle and sure. “She always does.”

David drifted to the window. The street below was dark, the curve of the sidewalk empty. “Maybe we should give her time.”

Time was exactly what Snow didn’t want. Time was an empty room where worry got loud.
“She made her point,” Snow said. “She’ll apologise. I’ll be generous.”

By nine, Snow glanced at the door each time the building sighed.
By ten, her words sharpened: “It’s childish to run off. She knows better.”
By ten-thirty, she sent David to drive past the inn “just in case.”
He returned with his jaw set the way it always did when he’d found exactly what she didn’t want him to.

“She’s not there,” he said.

“Then where is she?” Snow demanded, though she knew. She knew.

“Maybe at Regina’s,” David said, and watched the truth lodge in his wife like a bone.

Snow laughed, bright and brittle. “She wouldn’t.”
But the picture was already forming behind her eyes: that door, that house, that woman opening it.

“She wouldn’t,” she said again, and this time it sounded like a plea.

Back at the mansion, bedtime had thinned the house into comfortable quiet. Regina carried the baby monitor downstairs and set it on the mantel; the little green light winked steadily, a heartbeat she could keep an eye on.
Henry, scrubbed and yawning, sprawled on the rug with a comic. Emma sat cross-legged beside him, helping him quiz himself on capitals.

When he finally dragged himself upstairs with promises of brushing his teeth for real this time, Emma collected the scatter of laundry Regina hadn’t finished and settled onto the couch with the basket. The clothes were all tiny, Dayana’s shirts, Henry’s socks that always escaped into far-flung corners.
Emma folded as she’d been taught: awkward, imprecise, a little crooked. Regina reached for one and quietly put it to rights without comment.

“You can say it,” Emma said.

“I would never wound your pride,” Regina replied, then added after a beat, “You are dreadful at folding.”

Emma barked a laugh. “You should’ve seen me at twelve. One couple refused to let me use the dryer because I ‘wasted electricity.’ I was only allowed to touch the drying rack if I proved I could fold a fitted sheet correctly.”

“And did you?” Regina asked, arching a brow.

“No one in the history of humanity has folded a fitted sheet correctly,” Emma said gravely.

Regina’s mouth softened. “I could teach you.”

Emma glanced up. The moment slotted neatly into place, like a book finding its proper shelf. “Okay,” she said.

They worked in easy silence. The basket emptied; the living room breathed. When they were done, Regina set the last neat stack aside and tipped her head toward the hall. “I should check on Dayana.”

“I don’t know much about toddlers. Is she supposed to sleep through the night yet?”

“Transitional,” Regina said. “New routines. New sounds.”

“New person,” Emma murmured, maybe apologetically.

Regina’s eyes flicked to her. “Yes.”

They found the toddler half-turned in her crib, a little frown between her brows. Not crying, just restless. Emma reached for the soft rabbit by instinct and tucked it closer to Dayana’s chest. Regina smoothed a hand over dark curls and hummed something that sounded like a lullaby anyone would want to sleep to.

“Hey, pequeña cazadora,” Emma whispered, surprising Regina, not just with the phrase, but with her perfect accent. Dayana’s brow unknotted at once, the nickname tugging her gently into sleep.

In the glow of the nightlight, Regina’s face looked both younger and older, softened where grief had lived, strengthened where love had learned to stay. She glanced at Emma over the crib rail, and the look said: This is ordinary. Thank you. And also, in some unguarded place, stay.

Emma nodded, very small.

They left the door cracked, enough to hear, not enough to wake, and padded back down the hall.

 At the top of the stairs, their shoulders brushed. It should have been nothing. It wasn’t.

“You’re sure about the key?” Emma asked, voice low as if the walls would tattle.

Regina’s hand touched the banister. “I am.”

“Because I’ll be in and out. Late. Early. I eat like a teenager. I leave mugs everywhere.” A smile ghosted her mouth. “I’m not easy.”

Regina looked at her the way light sees a room. “You are not difficult,” she said. “You are careful where you’ve been hurt. There is a difference.” Regina spoke with the authority of experience.

The words landed like warm water. Emma’s throat stung. “Thanks,” she managed.

“Don’t thank me,” Regina said, gentler still. “Just… live here while you need to.”

Emma nodded. “I’ll be out of your hair in the mornings. Promise. Work first, then I’ll stop by, if that’s okay, to help with school drop-off, or whatever you need.”

Regina’s smile appeared, and tried very hard to pretend it hadn’t. “That would be… helpful,” she said, which was Regina for that would be lovely and I would like it very much.

They drifted back to the living room. The house had that hush old homes get when they’re content — wood settling, pipes sighing, warmth pulsing faintly through the vents.
Emma picked up her jacket and patted the pocket where the key rested, a small, solid weight.

“Get some sleep,” Regina said, and there was no order in it. Only care. “You’ll be impossible if you don’t.”

“Already am,” Emma said, and earned a soft laugh. “I’ll be quiet when I come in late. Or,” she lifted the key, let it glint, “I’ll try.”

Regina’s gaze followed the arc of brass. “You won’t wake anyone,” she said. “You belong here.”

The words hit with more force than Emma was prepared for. She bit the inside of her cheek easier than making a sound.

“Good night, Regina.”

“Good night, Emma.”

She climbed the stairs to the guest room that wasn’t a stopgap anymore, set her keyring with its new addition on the nightstand where the lamplight gathered everything close, and sat at the edge of the bed just to breathe. The room smelled faintly of lavender and polish. The sheets were turned down as if someone had anticipated her, not tolerated her.

Across town, the loft clock ticked past midnight.
Snow hadn’t moved from the couch. The mug beside her had gone cold. David had dozed off in the chair, one hand still around his phone, the other slack over the armrest.

“She’s under Regina’s influence,” Snow said into the empty room, the words crisp and certain, sharpened by fear pretending to be righteousness.
The clock ticked again.
And again.