City of Starlight

Chapter 18 - The Lover's Bridge

(Regina's POV)

It had been a while since I last visited the Charmings' fortress but nothing much seemed to have changed and certainly not the attitude of the guards who lead me to the meeting room. Perhaps I should have taken my own knights with me just so that Snow's men wouldn't be relentlessly staring daggers into my back but I knew that teleporting multiple people with me would have been exhausting. Besides, I already had someone with me. 

When I entered the room, I did a quick scan and my heart dropped when I noticed that Henry was no where to be seen.

"Regina, you're early," Snow exclaimed before her eyes shifted to my side. "Belle, you're here too! What a surprise!"

After Belle gave everyone a quick word of greeting, I took a seat at the round table and snipped, "Yes hello hello, I'm early because I would like to know how your kingdom is going to make up for the reparations and work that must be done to restore the damaged parts of town."

David replied with a dignified voice, "We will get to that and I promise that we'll see what we can do, but firstly we have to know what Emma was doing there."

I sighed and replied in a clipped tone, "I understand." Brushing the pounding headache from my severe lack of sleep to one side, I began, "When I arrived in town, I found Belle, Rumple and a woman named Merida amidst the carnage."

"Merida?" David questioned. 

Belle explained, "She's from Camelot, but she had been brought over to our land by the curse. Emma had taken Merida's heart and commanded her to kill me so that Rumple would turn into a hero."

"Why would Emma want that?" Snow breathed in shock.

"Emma wants Excalibur, but the sword is stuck in a stone. She needed a hero of some kind to pull it out and as Rumple possessed powerful magic in the past, he was the only suitable candidate. However, because of his affiliations with the darkness in the past, he needed perform an incredible feat of some kind; like saving me. And unfortunately-"

"You and Rumple were oh so conveniently in my kingdom," I finished with my eyes slightly narrowed. Belle nodded apologetically and said with a small smile, "Your kingdom does have the best food and drink."

I smirked as Snow and David looked like they were about to make a comment but Hook steered us away from the impending rival barter and asked, "So how does that explain the fire and carnage that was reported to us by Regina's black knights?"

I rolled my eyes as if it wasn't obvious already. "Emma is a Dark One, in case you haven't realised. Wrecking havoc wherever she goes is something that motivates and fuels her magic. In fact, I wouldn't be entirely surprised if she threw a few fireballs here and there when she was unable to pull the sword out of the stone. But, what I know for sure is that she placed a spell on Merida's arrows so that they would shoot fire. Belle and Rumple were in a populated part of town, and the infrastructure on the rooves of the buildings does not mix well with fire, especially when it hasn't been raining recently. If you light a fire under dry thatched rooves, it will spread quickly to the other neighbouring buildings and if it happens in a particularly favourable location such as an oil reserve, a library full of books or a stable where there is a lot of hay, the whole area will be engulfed in flames in no time." 

After a moment of silence, Snow's friend and confidante, Ruby, breathed with a careful hiss in her voice, "How do you know all of this, Regina?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Did you forget? I used to be very efficient in the deed."

Though I knew I should be feeling guilty, a small tinge of satisfaction tickled my chest when I saw how everyone cringed and sported uncomfortable looks on their faces. Ultimately, the grumpy dwarf, Leroy, voiced the thought in everyone's mind. "Remind me why we forgave her?"