The dead souls

Chapter 2: death did us part, and back together

       Somehow Regina found herself in a room that was both very familiar yet very different. The room glowed with a pale blue light, but over all her surroundings stayed mostly the same, except for one very important piece: Robin. On top of her hand which was still grasping the crystal was another familiar surface: the hand of her one true love.
    "Robin?" She stared deep into his crystal eyes.
    "Regina!" He lifts his hands and wraps her in a hug but she remains as stiff as a board. Is this him? Should I trust him? Robin was not only dead but his soul had been obliterated, how was he here?
    "How?"
    "It's a long story and I need you to trust me, we have to go and I'll explain everything when we get there," Robin grabbed her hand a tried to pull her towards the door.
    "Wait!" She shouts, "How do I know I can trust you? You look like him, and sound like him, but Robin's dead."
    "I'm not dead Regina, I'm right here."
"How do I know that it's really you, you didn't just die, your soul was obliterated."
"I'm right here, trust me. I can't say any more now."
     Reluctantly Regina followed him, worried she was going to regret her decision. She ran down the stairs with his fingers intertwined in her own magic hands. They took the stairs two steps at a time and Regina almost tripped when her heel slipped off the step too soon. Before she knew it they were out of the mayor's office and on the streets of Storybrooke, but the people were like shadows, appearing for a moment then vanishing again. Robin kept running and Regina kept running with him, and she found that running was easier here, like her feet were almost floating on the ground.
There journey continued as Robin found an old car sitting on the side of the street, and it had been sitting there for years after it's owner left after the last curse. That's when things got really strange. The moment the car started moving a shadow of itself stayed in place. 
"That's where the car is in the real world, here I have the power to move things but they stay in their place in the real world."
"Are you going to tell me what's going on?"
"I can't right now he might be listening."
"Who?"
"Hades."
The rest of the ride is silent, no one wants to risk Hades hearing their plan. It had been years, Hades had time to gather the kind of power he had in the underworld in whatever dimension this is. They drove along a stretch of road that Regina had only ever driven on a few times. Sometimes she had to come the most remote areas of Storybrooke in order to perform her mayoral duties, this was one of those areas.
When Robin stops the car it looks like they're nowhere, just a patch of trees. He grabs her by the hand a pulls her forward. She seems to resist at first, but eventually follows him into the woods. She feels the blow of a magic barrier on her skin and the hairs on her arms stand straight up. There's a small cabin nothing big or fancy, something Robin may have built himself.
"Did you..."
"Yes, c'mon let's go inside and we can talk."
They walk into the cozy cabin and Regina takes a look around while Robin puts some water on for tea. There was a large bed in one part of the room, that wasn't homemade but most likely taken from the local furniture store. The house was scarcely decorated, except a picture frame on the mantle of the fireplace. Regina walked up to it in order to examine it more closely and what she found was both shocking and not surprising at all. It was the same picture she had on her mantal at home, a picture of her, Robin, Henry and Roland, and that was when she knew that this was really him, this was the man she knew a loved, but he had died.
When the tea is made and they sit at the table together Regina can't take the suspencense anymore, "What the hell is going on?!" She shouts at him. Immediately regretting her decision to shout, she remains quiet but unwilling to apologize.
"I'm sorry I had to drag you into this, I was hoping to get back on my own, but after Hades tampered with the trials there was no other way to do it."
Come back? Hades? Trials? What on earth is he talking about.
    "Ok, so the beginning. Hades and I came over here at the same time, which obviously you know. While your here, you can't die so when he tried to kill me he realized what had happened. Over the next few days I was forced to hide out and find cover. I would go from place to place through Storybrooke. After the magic was released back into the town a bubble formed, one part of the town where magic would not reach. Hades has no power here, and the house is not visible from outside of the bubble, that's why this is the only safe place to speak freely."
    "What were you saying about trials?"
    "When Hades killed me Zeus wanted to make a realm so that the soul would no longer be obliterated, in order to commend me for my assistance with killing Hades. He created a loophole that would allow only the pure of heart to escape but leave Hades and other wicked people trapped for all of eternity."
    "Where do I fit into this?"
    "The trials were supposed to be easy for anyone with a pure heart to complete, trials of only morals and not strength, but Hades wanted to seperate us, he thought that was his only way to get his revenge on you. He made the trials so that they could only be completed with magic."
    "Well, what are they?"
    "See the trials were magic to begin with, they were measures of love, selflessness and courage, and magic was involved but you didn't need to possess the gift of magic in order to complete them, does that make sense?"
    "Sort of, but I'm still confused on where I fit into all this." Regina stared deep into his eyes, just wishing it could stay like this forever.
    "Ii need you to pass the trials for me, since you possess magic, and when you go back, pull me back with you."
    "What if I don't pass," Her heart rose into her throat, "my heart is far from pure."
    "Regina," he caressed her cheek in his palm, "you left the evil queen behind, both figuratively and literally. All that darkness in you heart makes the light shine that much brighter."
    "Wait, how did you get me here?"
    "I had to lead you to the crystal, and for the first 5 years after I died, I waited until Henry grew up. It would be cruel to tear his mother away from him. Then you disappeared for a while,"
    "I left with Henry,"
    "Years went by, and I waited and waited and then one day I saw you. Just a glimpse, you've seen how it is, you can only see real people for a brief moment. But when I saw you I knew you were going to work, so I followed you to the office. It took a few weeks of just watching you before I had the courage to do it. I was able to almost reach through a influence your movements and guide you to the second part of the crystal."
    "That's why I went to the attic."
    "Yes."
    Regina found her mind swarming with questions, but her lips settled on one, "How do we complete the trials?"
    "That's part of the problem, I have no idea where they are."
Author's note: Thank you to all who are reading, I hope you are enjoying the story. I know my chapter have been short but my plan is to do shorter chapters with more of them in total. Feel free to comment where you think that the trials are going to be hidden and what they are going to be. I know the timeline is a bit confusing and I will explain further in future chapters.