Spell-working Seduction
"It's not working," Emma said in frustration, pushing the heavy, waxy candle aside before collapsing dramatically onto the couch next to Tink.
"Think of it as an extension of your will," Elsa suggested, "You have to visualise capturing my aunt with the flame before you try to manipulate it."
"Preferably without looking like you're going to explode from concentration. That forehead vein isn't very becoming," Regina added, the bite to her remark lost to the soft tone of the delivery. She paced the far side of the couch near Elsa, rocking Neal to sleep in arms. "Don't you agree Neal?"
Emma had enlisted the help of Elsa and Tink, hoping to master a spell to capture the Snow Queen before Regina dropped Henry off, but had failed disastrously so far. She lent her head against the soft leather and examined the ashy, palm-sized scorch mark on the ceiling. "You've all been helping me for hours and I still can't get this stupid candle to work."
"Because you're doing and not feeling," Regina said, making little effort to hide her growing annoyance. It was inconceivable that someone, whose power she could sometimes physically feel radiating off her, could be so artless.
Elsa nodded in agreement. "Maybe it's time to take a break."
"I think everyone's a bit tired and hungry," Tink said with a fleeting side glance at Regina, "How about we have dinner."
Thanks to the input of half a dozen hands, Emma's kitchen was soon filled with the sounds of chopping knives and clattering pans along with the tantalizing aromas of sautéing mushrooms in herbed garlic butter and a sweet, fruity, freshly uncorked bottle of Merlot. Regina laid a sleeping Neal atop a blanket on the floor, surrounded him with a fortress of pillows and then joined everyone at a small dining table that was not designed for more than three. Elbow to elbow with Henry and Tink, she ate, listening and laughing to old stories, not being able to remember the last time she felt so full. Or so content. The food was quickly consumed and Emma ushered Tink and Elsa into the living room shortly after, declaring that they relax. Despite Emma's frim insistence that she not help clean, Regina stayed to wash up.
"Try this." Emma held a spoonful of dark pudding in front of her.
Hands wrist deep in dish water, Regina automatically opened her mouth to accept the glistening cake.
"Disgusting isn't it?" Emma said, her face squelched in distaste as she ate the remaining portion from a small plastic container.
"I think it's supposed to be plum," said Henry, sniffing the empty Tupperware cautiously.
"You knew?" Regina said with her mouth full, straining to swallow the slimy yet solid cake. "It's awful, did you make this?"
Emma shook her head, wiping a wet plate Regina handed her. "My Mom, she's not so good with desserts."
"Well somebody needs to tell her, I feel like my mouth has been assaulted."
"I don't have the heart," Emma said, passing the dried plate to Henry.
"I'll do it." Regina smiled widely, "It would be my pleasure."
"Don't even think about it," Emma warned lightly.
Henry looked between his two mothers, noting the improvement in their respective moods. "Can I go play now? Elsa and Tink just started Zelda."
"Yes."
"No."
Emma and Henry both looked to Regina. "Okay, but only if you've finished your homework."
"I have," he replied happily, storing the last plate away. "I like it when you're both here," he added before rushing off to the living room.
"You don't think it's weird that he likes hanging out with adults all the time, do you?"
"I'd hardly call you an adult, dear," Regina simpered, draining the water from the sink.
"Hey!" Emma said in mild offense. She wound a dish towel loosely in mid-air and playfully flicked her wrist.
Regina gasped, feeling a soft lash to the side of her thigh. She turned, mouth parted in surprise. "You did not just towel whip me."
"So what if I did?" said Emma nonchalantly, placing a set of freshly dried utensils away and bumping the draw closed with her hip.
Regina sprang forward and flicked the excess water from her hands onto Emma's face before yanking the towel from her grasp. She countered with a light lash of her own to Emma's backside. "You're lucky I'm in a good mood."
Emma chuckled with mirth and wiped her wet cheek with her sleeve. "Lucky enough to get some more help with that spell?"
Regina followed Emma to the cleared dining table behind the couch, from which muffled shouts of excitement were being directed at the TV by Henry and Elsa while Tink frantically slashed a game controller through the air.
"Where do we start?" asked Emma, shuffling her chair closer to Regina.
"Since I can't throw you onto a collapsing bridge every time I teach you magic, let's start with the basics," Regina replied, placing the large candle in Emma's hands. "Now, close your eyes and think about the wick."
"Why do I have to close them?"
Regina sighed, "Would you like to learn or question my teaching methods?"
The corner of Emma's mouth quirked upwards as she closed her eyes. "Learn," she huffed.
"Anger, fear, the instinct to protect the people we love, these are all occasions when magic is conjured instantly and easily." Regina saw the wick spark and continued, "But when practicing like this, without any imminent threat, there are other emotions you can exploit."
Emma's eyebrows creased together, "Any chance you could be more specific?"
"There isn't just one way, you have to experiment." Regina inched closer and lowered her voice. "Performing magic is like seducing a new lover." She smirked, watching her words fuel a mild blush and ignite the wick. Daring to reach out and rest her fingers against soft hands, she resumed, throatily, "You can feel the tension build in your gut, a tingling anticipation that grows until you can feel it in every part of your body."
She glanced down to Emma's lips, narrowly parted into perfect O and observed her swallow, hard. She returned her attention her Emma's hand, tracing a finger along the outer edge, barely making contact with the smooth skin. "Let that feeling guide you until it is no longer a question of want. Until it becomes a need to consume."
The flame had multiplied in length and reared upwards from its natural state in intertwined, serpentine threads of brilliant yellow-orange, bursting forward with no semblance control.
"Slow down, take your time," Regina instructed calmly. For the briefest of seconds, she felt a set of eyes watching her from the couch, but she kept her gaze trained on the unruly flame. She wrapped her hand around Emma's and squeezed gently. "Play with the intensity."
Although Emma didn't move an inch, Regina could sense her squirm. It was in the goose bumps that covered her arms and the quickening of her pulse beneath her fingertips. For reasons that eluded her, Regina found the sight deliciously fascinating. Slithering its way towards her, as if riding an invisible current between them, the flame finally found a stable and constant rhythm. "Good, Emma."
"I did it?" Emma's eyes opened.
Wide pupils obscured the sliver of iris that remained. Their colour reminded Regina of the sprawling evergreen expanse of the Enchanted Forest viewed from the highest palace spire, of beauty she had never once appreciated. Perhaps it was due to their light deprivation, Regina reasoned, that she perceived them as almost black. She broke their gaze, scared that if she held it for a moment longer, another reason would surface. And if she acknowledged the alternate reason as true, she would also have to accept that the fluttering in her stomach wasn't just excitement for Emma's new found spell-working proficiency. "Yes. Well done, Miss Swan."
From the opposing desk, Emma watched David skilfully toss a balled up paper into the trash can positioned between them.
"I'm sorry about last night, Emma," said David repentantly.
"No, it's me who should be apologising. I shouldn't've had Neal so close to us while I was practicing."
"We know you would never hurt him."
"Mary Margret seems to think otherwise," Emma replied, somewhat gloomily, recalling the horrified look on her mother's face. She took her turn, bending her elbow in careful aim, she threw a paper ball into the basket. Swish, a clean shot.
"She overreacted, seeing those flames and the burn mark on your roof," he trailed off, "I'm sorry."
"Ok, ok, quit apologising. I'm fine." Emma swivelled in her desk chair, eager to switch topics. "How did you know Mom was your true love?"
David raised his brows at the question. "Well I didn't, not at first anyway. She almost knocked me unconscious at first sight."
"When did you know then?"
"Not long after we first met," David said, relaxing back into his seat. He grinned, looking out the station window as if it reflected his riviere. "Snow was leading me through a forest and somewhere along the way I stopped and said that we were lost. You see, I had seen this odd, pear shaped shrub twice. She continued walking, of course, and I followed her, arguing for half a mile that I had seen the same shrub twice, insisting we were going round in circles. And then suddenly she turned and gave me this stare I will never forget."
"How does this—," Emma interrupted, only to be cut off immediately.
"The point, Emma, is that your mother frustrates me. She is optimistic, but unrealistically so. She's fiercely independent, extremely argumentative, always asks for my advice but rarely takes it and is, by far, the most stubborn person I've ever met. And I love her to no end," he paused to smile, the type of smile reserved only for the beloved. "In that stare there was a look that said I was never going to win again and I was okay with that because that's what love is - it just is. And when you know…well, you'll just feel it."
Emma sat in silence. Love is love! She thought it was the most useless advice she'd ever received, and she was including a tip given by a former boss not to invest in Oracle stocks.
"Are you happy with him?" David asked, his tone more serious than she had ever recalled it being.
"I'm not unhappy," Emma sighed. "I've been so alone for so long. Maybe I just don't know how to be happy or what to do with his love."
David regarded her sadly. "I have missed so much of your life, Emma. If there is one thing I regret missing, it was the chance to impart the will to follow your heart, not out of obligation or reciprocity, but because it is true."
She looked at him thoughtfully, trying dissect the meaning from his words.
"I think you know what you want. And whatever your decision, I will support you. All I care about is your happiness."
Before Emma could respond, David's phone started buzzing. He rose from his chair after several yeses and a curt nod. "The Snow Queen is in the clock tower," he announced hurriedly, "Are you ready with the spell?"
If Davy Jones' Locker was a crocodile holding your heart captive while being forced to watch your love lured to her demise, then Killian was most definitely drowning. Just this morning, he had watched with pride as Emma captured the Snow Witch and then in disbelief as she single handily blasted through the walls of her own station in a complete loss of control over her own magic. Maybe it was the villain in him that sensed something was awry when Emma had called to say she had found a way to rid herself of her power, or maybe it was his immense disdain for the conspicuously suspicious Dark One that lead him to the lakeside mansion.
In any case, he had been correct on both counts but utterly powerless to intervene. Under the cloak of darkness, with a crushing grip on his heart, Gold made sure that his feet and lips were glued while Emma was on the verge of being sucked into a sorcerer's hat. Through a gleeful snigger, the devilish crocodile explained how adding Emma's powers to the hat would aid in unbinding himself from the dagger that he so resented.
To Killian's great relief and Gold's fuming displeasure, Emma's family, along with Regina and Elsa had arrived in time to dissuade her. Strung like an obedient marionette, Killian was marched into the house to unwillingly do Gold's bidding. Among the rounds of hugs, he observed a curious phenomenon - a pat to Emma's shoulder by Regina. The touch was so short-lived that he could've blinked and missed it, but it was the care in which the hand was laid that vexed him most, maybe even more so than being controlled by dark devil himself.