@applecrowned liked for a starter!
🐾 ❝ Regina, I don’t know what you want me to say. ❞ Things were still rocky between the townsfolk and the ( former ) Evil Queen, their trust in her so fragile it might be severed with a passing gust ( and rightly so, considering her laundry list of vile transgressions ). Even Ruby, with all the kindness in her heart, found herself questioning Regina’s motives, innate faith in goodness and change tempered by a healthy ( and expected ) degree of doubt. ❝ You’re frustrated, I get it ... but you have to give everyone time. Yeah, it would be easier if gaining their trust was instantaneous, but ... it doesn’t work like that. People don’t work like that, and the more you push, the more reluctant they’ll be. ❞ The former sovereign and mayor was so used to others bowing to her whims, offering blind devotion in their fear, but after all she’d done ---- the atrocities committed during her reign, casting the dark curse ---- the townsfolk had no more to give, least of all the terror she’d once craved.














