"Hurry!" I'm awoken to cries and shouts. The men around me are jumping to their feet, packing up their things.
"What's going on?" I ask groggily, sitting up.
"The Queen." Robin Hood says breathlessly. "She's here. Hurry up, get up. We need to move."
He blows on his horn three times. Figures are jumping, moving everywhere. I stand back, slightly in awe as they move faster than lightning.
Suddenly, a bright light shines around the forest. A fireball comes out of nowhere, pinning one merry man against the tree. He cries as he's insinuated in seconds.
"Hurry!" Robin Hood pulls me to my feet. "Get running. She's coming." His men start departing. I take a step, then feel a sharp pain run up my whole body. I turn around to see a terrifying figure standing behind me.
"Hello, my dears." Someone says, and something shoots forward from her hands. I'm thrown into the air, and go flying back towards the ground, along with some of the merry men. I can't see Robin anywhere, so I assume he got away safely.
"Well well." This 'Queen' stands above me, looking down. "I never knew Robin had a merry woman." She waves her hand and an invisible force seems to lift me in the air. I look around me, terrified. How is this possible?
"What should I do? Kill you? Let you go? Let you go then kill you?" She laughs. "No, I think I'll just take you all. Guards!" She hurls me towards the ground again. The last thing I feel are the jolt of my body as I hit the ground, and the feeling of weightlessness as I'm flung over some sort of horse.
*************
"Your name?" My eyes snap open to a searing pain on my forehead. I must have hit my head on a rock when that evil queen threw me towards the ground.
"What?" I ask, still seeing stars.
"What is your name?" I gradually focus on a pair of brown eyes looking at me, from underneath a lock of brown hair. The room I'm in looks kind of like a castle - with stone walls, and a huge fireplace in the corner.
"It's Ruby. Ruby Parker."
She smiles, though somehow it doesn't look like a friendly smile. Maybe because she just tried to kill me... "My name is Cora."
"Pleased to meet you." I mumble, feeling the iron grip of the two guards beside me. "Where am I?"
"I assumed our charming mutual friend told you. You're in the Enchanted Forest, dear."
Enchanted forest? Evil Queens? Fairies? Robin Hood? Yep. I'm definitely going insane. I'm expecting any moment to wake up and go back to reality.
"You're not from around here, are you?" Cora asks, circling around me. I follow her path with my eyes.
"Uh... no. A fairy named Tinkerbell transported me here - and then took off." I look at her nervously. I'm not scared to die, but this woman looks capable of many dark things.
"I know what that fool fairy wants you for." Cora smiles. Her smile almost looks genuine.
"And what's that?" I ask, feeling tingly all of a sudden.
Cora nods down to my arm. I look down and yelp in surprise. There's a long, neat cut stretching from my elbow to my wrist, on the inside of my arm.
"What the...? What are you people?" I ask.
"Your blood tells me a lot about you." She says with a smile. Oh Lord, is she a vampire, too?
"You are special, Ruby. You have something not a lot of people do. You have the heart of the truest believer."
"What?" I ask weakly. I've just about seen everything I want to see today. None of this makes any sense.
"I'm going to do that little fairy a huge favour. I'm going to send you were you were meant to go in the first place." Cora says. Her look fades for a second. "And... I want you to do something for me in return. My daughter has gone to Neverland. We had a long argument, before we were separated. If you should happen to meet her, I'd like you to pass on a message. Her name is Regina." She tucks a letter in my jacket.
"Can I trust you to do this?"
Deliver a letter versus having her kill me? "Yes." I gulp. "I will. Wait... where are you sending me?" I ask. Not more travel.
"You'll see." She smiles. She grabs my hand, and concentrates.
YOU ARE READING
The Heart Of The Truest Believer (OUAT fan-fic)
FanfictionA tear falls down on my cheek. I look up as about as surprised as I could be. "Why the hell are you crying?" He bites his lip. "Because... as much as I want to deny it... I love you Ruby Parker." "I love you too... Peter Pan." My eyes close. I feel...
