Secrets

Helpless

Her head was pounding. All her attempts to move convinced the young queen to stay where she was - laid on the ground. Elsa could still feel Regina's magic choking her life away.

It hadn't been the greatest of feelings.

Her vision was still blurry, and her back was slightly soared where she had hit the wall. Slowly, the Snow Queen turned her head slightly, trying to understand why there was so many voices in the room. When she had been knocked out there were only her, the two Merry Men's numb bodies on the ground, the outlaw and the queen.

Elsa blinked a couple of times, now being completely awake. Even if she wasn't concerned about Regina's wellbeing, the scene in front of her was quite disturbing.

Why in hell was the queen chained up?

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Was she dreaming? Was this all a sickening dream? Regina didn't know. All she could hear was a voice inside her head screaming it was a bad idea, and for the first time in a long time, she wouldn't even try to fight it.

There was no way in hell she would let Rumplestilskin control her again.

Never.

The voices were quite clear. All of them whispering at once: NO! Regina had a well-formed image of her mother's strong and severe feature looking at her with a warning look. She couldn't do this. She wouldn't do this.

"You are brave for coming to me with this proposal." The queen responded, her voice low and dangerous.

"Well, dearie. It is a price I'm sure you're willing to pay. You were the one who started it all, and believe me, I'm doing you a favor. If you were in your right mind, you'd never have done all this." Rumple commented, smirking.

"Don't take me as a fool! If you think I'll let you have any kind of control over me, you lost your mind. The only thing you're interested at is having more power to yourself." Regina bitted out, stepping forward, ignoring the pain in her wrist.

With the corner of her eye, she saw Robin smiling slightly, what only gave her even more insurance that accepting this deal was madness, especially because it was the Unbreakable Vow. This magic was old, and she had never experienced it.

Regina wasn't in the mood for experiments - not when her life was on stake.

"Power. Like it, hate it, want it, have it. Feel however you want about it. Power is the fuel that runs this great pointless life we all help move forward. And that fuel is made of only one thing: magic. In this case: your magic, dearie. You have the power to stop all this." The Dark One stated, his expression emotionless.

"There's no way in hell I'll agree to this." Regina bitted out, indignantly.

"I don't think you understood, dearie. I'll make you accept this deal in a way or another. How I'm going to make you take it, though, is entirely up to you." Rumple responded menacingly, turning around to face the others.

David and Hook held distrustful expressions. Regina could see the conflict in their eyes and the queen didn't know how she felt about this. They had had hours to stop the Dark One and now they were switching sides? After everything they made her pass through?

"Don't tell me what I can or cannot do!" Regina yelled, feeling her veins pulse with anger.

"Rumplestiltiskin, I said that's enough." Emma exclaimed firmly, giving him a steely glare.

"Miss Swan, you're not the one giving the shots right now." The Dark One replied with an amused smile, still using his magic to hold back the savior. "I can assure you, Regina, you won't get out of this chains without my help, dearie. And the price of getting out is the deal." He added, turning to face the queen once again.