is there something you want to tell me? (no)
Summary:
“Just what are you doing here, Miss Swan?” Regina had to know. “I was under the impression I wasn’t your favorite person.” “Yeah, well.” Emma jammed both hands into her jeans pockets. “You don’t have to be a favorite to be important. Henry needs both his moms.” Or, Regina falls into the portal with the wraith from S2 and has a little trouble (and a little help!) getting home
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1,967 words
@whumpay 2026, day 15: Forced To Watch / “No one is coming to save you.” / Waterboarding
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@magical-may 2026, daily prompt 15: Enchanted Forest
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Helpful link to AO3
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Regina yanked ineffectually at the magic-suppressing cuff on her wrist. It was awkward, what with her hands being looped around the back of a chair, but it wouldn’t have made a difference either way. She huffed in frustration and stared hatefully at the woman in front of her.
“I need you to stay here while I keep up appearances as Lancelot, but worry not,” Cora was saying, smiling beatifically. “Soon enough, you shall be back where you belong. By my side.” She stepped forward and cupped Regina’s cheek in her hand. Regina recoiled violently. “My daughter,” Cora murmured gently, brushing her defiance aside with no hint of acknowledgement. As always. “I’ve missed you so.”
Cora swept out of the dilapidated cottage that she had imprisoned her daughter in. Regina sighed, the fight suddenly deserting her. She glanced around the room, half-rotted tables and chairs illuminated poorly by the dim light pushing through the murky windows. It was practically in ruins … like the rest of her homeland, she assumed, if what she saw today was anything to go by. Not that she had had the chance to see much since she had been sucked back into the Enchanted Forest.
Her powers had come rushing back to her the moment she came through, and she had been able to contain the wraith. She pitied whatever poor soul came across its unstable prison, though. Her mother had found her not long after that, and they had fought a mighty battle.
There was just something about the exhilaration of whipping fireballs around, transforming her desires into reality, enforcing her will upon another person that felt like nothing else in either world she had lived in. Her childhood had been an endless series of tests and threats, and the sensation of magic rushing through her body felt like a reassurance that she would never be that powerless again.
Feelings weren’t reality, though.
She had only regained her magic for a few short hours before her mother had defeated her and bound it away from her with this detestable cuff. Instead of repaying her for her attempted matricide, her mother instead prattled away about how she knew her daughter loved her and they could conquer the cursed land together and be a happy family there.
Regina would only allow for one person to be her family, and she wouldn’t let her mother get anywhere near him.
If she had to stay in the Enchanted Forest and destroy every portal her mother raised until the end of time, she would do it. No one in that world would miss her for one second, except her sweet darling Henry.
She was certain he would miss her. The past few months have just been … pre-teenage rebellion. She grew less certain the more she thought about it, so she stopped thinking about it.
The door to the cottage crashed open suddenly, admitting two women from the torrential downpour. One was wearing heavy armor, and the other a sodden dress. A Royal, from the look of it.
“Please, misses, I’m so scared,” Regina hunched over to make herself look less threatening. “There was this scary man, and he tied me up here, and he could be back any minute, and I’m so scared of what he’s going to do. Please, help me get free.”
The women inched closer, looking over her carefully. “Please-” she repeated.
“Wait, Mulan,” said the one in a princess dress. She looked almost familiar. She clearly thought Regina looked familiar to her, if her look of horror was any indication. “It’s her. She was with Maleficent when she- when I-”
The armored one, Mulan apparently, protectively stepped between Regina and the other one. Aurora, Regina realized. The daughter of Maleficent’s mortal enemy, Briar Rose. Regina had a feeling she might not be feeling too merciful towards witches these days.
“How dare you ask us to rescue you!” The girl was becoming hysterical. “You’re a monster! Who would come to save you?!”
“Aurora,” Mulan pulled her back.
“No one’s coming to save you!” Aurora shouted. “I hope you get what you deserve!”
“We should go.” Mulan shepherded Aurora back toward the heavy deluge, and as she turned, Regina noticed a very familiar pouch.
“How did you get that pouch?” Regina demanded. The spell ensnaring the wraith had been very delicate. If anyone had disturbed that pouch…
“What do you care?” Aurora stared at her in suspicion from behind Mulan.
“I think it might be housing a very dangerous monster,” Regina answered cryptically. “You should be very careful with that.”
“What did you do to him!” Aurora tried to shove past Mulan to get to Regina.
“Um, nothing, obviously. I’ve been tied up here?” Regina replied, motioning toward her bonds with her head. They didn’t need to know exactly how long she had been tied up.
“Aurora!” The warrior reprimanded once again.
“She did something. She- she had to do something to Philip. I just know she did. She set a trap for him or something so he would pick it up and get Marked,” she babbled frantically.
“If he was foolish enough to pick it up and get marked, that’s kind of on him,” Regina remarked snidely.
“You don’t know anything about him!” Mulan snapped.
Regina smiled. “But I do know of a way you could get him back. How bad do you miss him?”
The two women looked at each other, clearly upset, but also desperate.
Regina didn’t bother to hide her smirk.
~~~
Regina stumbled along in the mud behind their horses and tried to calm her fury at the indignity. She had convinced them to take her with them on their journey, though they were too smart to remove her Enchanted Cuff. Going on a dayslong fetchquest to help these two fools rescue their lover was hardly Regina’s choice of activity, but once they got to where they’re going, they would need her help and remove the cuff. Then she would be free to repay them for their … generosity.
Despite the pouring rain, Regina felt a warm spot on her hip, like a sunburn. She patted the spot with her bound hands, trying to decipher what was happening. The warm spot moved, jumping up her ribs, around her shoulder, and down to her wrists. She looked around warily, wondering who was following them.
“Did you hear that?” Mulan halted the horses suddenly, surveying the surrounding woods.
“I can’t hear anything over the rain,” Aurora began, but Mulan shushed her.
Regina tried to hide her grimace. Her wrists were starting to burn.
“Over there!” Mulan started to steer her horse around, but at that moment, Regina’s cuffs exploded. The women had only a moment to look shocked and horrified, before she knocked them both out.
“Are you alright?”
Regina turned to see Emma, of all people, materializing from the woods. Even in the pouring rain, she looked luminous. Regina turned her attention to her burned wrists before she had to squint or something.
“I’ve been better,” Regina replied sardonically. “And since when did you have magic?” She concentrated on healing so she didn’t have to think too hard about what the interloper was doing here.
“Since uh landing here, I guess.” Regina could hear her shrugging. “I didn’t really know what I was doing, just figured I should get those cuffs off you.”
“A good choice,” Regina noted, in a way that suggested that was a rare occasion. “And I assumed you didn’t know what you were doing when you nearly set me on fire. You didn’t want to experiment with telekinesis before you tried explosions?” She had finished healing her wrists. It would be weird not to look up now.
Emma was blushing, though she acted like she didn’t notice. “I don’t know, maybe I was just asking myself what would Miss Fireballs do?” She retorted.
Regina didn’t know she had made that big of an impression. Her mouth settled into a satisfied little smile before Regina realized it and wiped it off.
“And just what are you doing here, Miss Swan?” She had to know. “I was under the impression I wasn’t your favorite person.”
“Yeah, well.” Emma jammed both hands into her jeans pockets. “You don’t have to be a favorite to be important. Henry needs both his moms.”
Aw, isn’t she just the picture of benevolence? So sweet that Regina could practically feel her teeth rotting inside her mouth.
“I thought I was evil and couldn’t be trusted with children,” she countered.
“I know you’d never do anything to hurt Henry,” Emma responded, sincere belief shining from her eyes. Regina found herself taken aback, being on the other side of such faith.
“You’re right, I won’t,” Regina affirmed, voice low with sincerity. “Let’s get ourselves back to our son.” She mounted one of the horses and steered him to start walking back the way they came.
“Wait!”
Regina turned to find Emma holding up her sheriff’s notebook and a pen. She sighed. “What?”
“We should leave them a message so they can save their prince.” Emma waved the items at her.
Regina rolled her eyes and magicked up a parchment with detailed instructions into Mulan’s hand. She doubted they could succeed in such a daunting task, but they did seem rather determined.
“Are you happy now, Miss Swan?” Regina waved a hand toward the road.
“Immensely,” Emma snarked back, mounting the other horse and passing her on the road.
Regina rolled her eyes again and followed her.
~~~
“You think this will work?” Emma shouted across the road. She wasn’t skilled enough with horseback riding to sustain a gallop, but they had managed a slow canter.
“Do you have a better idea?” Regina shouted back.
Vines whipped out of the forest and grabbed them off their horses, holding them suspended in the air. “Yes, in fact, I do.” Cora glided toward them.
She tsked. “My foolish daughter. I was so hoping we could go to Storybrooke together, but if you keep misbehaving, I’ll have to leave you here.”
“I won’t let you anywhere near Storybrooke!” Regina snarled, and the vines tightened around her in response.
“Oh my, is that a protective instinct I hear?” Cora laughed. “You’re a failure. You can’t protect anybody. That Dark Curse you sacrificed so much for?" She smiled cruelly. "Failed! Exactly as the Dark One intended. You were a mere puppet to him, and yet, all of the riffraff in Storybrooke hate you. Nobody wants you over there. You’re weak, patheti-”
“I do, I want her over there,” Emma rasped out. “So does our son.” Emma caught Regina’s eye, clearly expecting her to do something.
“Oh, ‘our son’ ?” Cora gasped dramatically. “Regina, is there something you want to tell me?”
“Yes, Mother,” Regina hissed, wresting back control of the conversation before Cora could actually begin an earnest interrogation of exactly what Emma was to Regina. “Go to hell!”
Regina reduced the vines to dust, releasing her and Emma onto the wet road. She and Cora circled each other.
Regina was careful not to repeat the mistakes she made in their earlier fight, but it didn’t matter. Everything stopped when Cora reached inside her chest and clutched her heart. Regina vaguely registered Emma shouting, “No!”
Suddenly, a shockwave of light rumbled across the Forest, and Regina collapsed to the ground.
~~~
Regina felt the faint sensation of being carried. “C’mon, Regina, you gotta wake up,” Emma whispered in her ear. “For Henry. For our son.”
“For our son,” she croaked.
“Oh, good, you’re okay.” Emma sighed in relief.
“Okay is a relative term, Miss Swan.” Regina left her head on Emma’s shoulder because she was too tired to lift it. Yeah, tired. “Let’s just get home.”
“Yes. Home.” Emma smiled, and it was like light was radiating from her entire face.
Or maybe Regina was just passing out. She closed her eyes just in case.
Maybe she could allow for two people to be her family. Maybe.
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I hope you enjoyed this! Please let me know what you thought! (pls be kind T.T)