Chapter Text
A dragon in chains is forced to sing.
There is glitter on her cheeks. There is a team of artists there to help her paint it on every night. It is beautiful, she must admit, the sparkling swirls of gold that they carefully draw from the corner of her eyes and down her cheek. Lovely is the black glimmer that they add to her cheeks. The glint of the faux gems they decorate her lashes with. The shimmer that they dust upon her pale skin.
They stuff her into skin tight gowns that never fit quite right. They don’t know how to sew for a woman taller than the best of them. Sometimes she is almost certain that the dresses are tight on purpose for the sake of showing more of her bosom than necessary. Tonight’s dress is that sort. It is a strapless dress, very low cut as it is with a V slit for her leg. Solid gold in color, it is threaded with thousands of sparkling sequins designed to catch and throw the spotlights back.
Alcina runs a gloved hand down the microphone stand. She can no longer feel the rhythm in her soul–she isn’t sure that she has a soul to feel it in—she can no longer find soothing and respite in the lyrics. They melodies are meaningless and the brass isn’t so shiny anymore. The music has lost its charm since she has lost her choice.
The shackles are heavy on her wrists and cruler yet are the ones that they have pierced through her skin. They drove the metal through her shoulder blades and let her skin knit over and around it. And then they tethered her to the floor. By her wrists, by her ankles, and there is a shackle around her neck for good measure.
They have their etchings and their runes to keep her from reaping any power from her mutation. She is a dragon beaten and bound. Larger than life but left to feel smaller than the children in the crowd that openly gawk at her.
And they make her sing. They whip her, lash at her, beat her until they hear those first strangled notes. And they can do it to their heart’s content because her body still has just enough power to mend itself after every abuse.
So she closes her eyes. She closes them and lets her voice fill the room. It is easier when she pretends that she is still in her castle. Easier when she pretends that the ears that hear her song belong to her daughters.
How she would give anything to go back to them again.
She wonders how they are faring without her. If they are still even alive. She dreads to think that they had been whisked away too and forced to perform for a different sort of crowd. Perhaps they are in some shadowy laboratory.
Perhaps they had managed to stay hidden and are enjoying supper.
Enjoying supper as she entertains a theater dinner. She loathes each and every one of them. Every person who has clicked glasses in this loathsome theater. Every idiot who has wandered in and ordered some ludicrously expensive meal. Every pompous fool who had dressed to the nines just to hear her suffering. She should like to tear their throats out.
She resents the regulars with the most feverence. Those who have seen her torment and enjoyed it enough to pay to see it over and over again. Like that woman in the front row with her elaborate coats and her fine dresses.
She leans back in her chair, always watching, always listening, one elegant leg crossed over the other. She never eats and when she does order food she never touches it. It is for show, a petty waste of money. A display of opulence—she can afford the place’s most expensive. She could afford to waste it.
Alcina resents her in double for reminding her of what used to be.
Of how things should be.
Tonight she sips her sparkling cider.
Tonight, Alcina breaks. She knows that she is going to get a good lashing but she can’t hold back anymore. Her singing falters and her voice cracks. And she screams. There is no coherency in what she is shouting. She is just screaming. A mighty, unrefined roar. And for just one moment she can feel the twitching of her wings, a tingle of power. She thinks that she will do it this time, that she will transform and ribbon the lot of these people starting with that vain woman in the front row.
And then comes the burning. That searing feeling that comes with the runes blocking her power. She thinks that she is dying.
Tonight, tears sparkle in the woman’s eyes.
.oOo.
Regina exits with a disgruntled crowd. With a group of disappointed theater guests who demand their money back. She lingers at the back of the crowd, watching the theater host and his team, subdue their performer.
She watches the woman fall, her dress sparkling, as it always has, under the chandeliers. Mascara runs down her cheeks and her body shudders. Regina shudders with her. Yes, she thinks indeed, that tonight is the night.
She would liked to have had one more night. Just one more, just to make sure that her plan is solid. But she is no longer sure that the woman will last another performance. It is no matter, she thinks that she has gotten a decent layout of the place. She has gotten friendly enough with the staff. Friendly enough that the only magic she will need is her newfound rune expertise and another magic bean to take her back to the Enchanted Forest.
She slips away from the crowd and slinks down the hall, making her way into that empty room. A foolish lot, this bunch is–big-headed and overly-confident; they are so certain that the woman will never be able to break those chains. Certain enough that they don’t bar the room’s windows. Certain enough that they don’t bother closing the door on most nights. They’d rather taunt her with its openness.
Regina tucks herself into the most shrouded, shadowy corner of the room and waits. Waits until they drag the woman’s body in. It takes a good six or seven of them. Several stocky, burly men and one woman to carry the tall woman back to her cell.
This time she is bruised and bloodied.
This time she isn’t awake. And for just a moment, Regina thinks that they may be carrying a corpse. That is until they lay her down and she hears that soft wince. She knows that they wouldn’t bother chaining a corpse to the floor.
She waits for them to walk down the hall to slip out from the shadows. She kneels down next to the woman, rests a hand on her cheek and strokes it with her thumb. She is so very cold. She wipes one of the woman’s tears away. Though her eyes are partially open they are hazy and Regina isn’t sure that the woman is aware that she is here.
She mumbles something soft and angry. Regina holds a pointer to her lips, “it’ll be alright.”
Her lips curl into a snarl and she gnashes at Regina who scrabbles back, suddenly second guessing her plans to free the woman. She presses her lips together, of course the woman is vicious; she has only been bound and beaten for months…
Her back is welted and bloody. The scarlet is stark against her pallor. Though her skin is knitting itself back together it is a slow process. Regina holds her hands to the runes, they glow a faint purple as she channels her own magical energy into them. She works with them until her purple drives the red magical imprint of the woman’s captors out. When purple fully overtakes red, the shackles unclasp. They leave an impression, raw and bloody, on the woman’s wrists. She moves on to the woman’s neck and then her ankles, and then those horrid rings looped into her shoulder blades. One by one they fall away and Regina catches them before they can clang loudly on the ground.
She takes the woman’s hand, it is huge in her own. She hears footsteps drawing near. It is no matter; they are outside of the theater in a cloud of purple smoke. She tosses the magic bean and watches the portal grow.
.oOo.
The bed she awakens in is rather cozy. The pillows are plush beneath her head and fantastically warm. Alcina nearly closes her eyes again. It has been so very long since she has laid upon a mattress and in clothes that actually fit her well. She furrows her brows and bolts up right, running her hands down the length of the night gown.
“I hope you don’t mind, I made you a little smaller…”
“I do mind!” Alcina snaps.
Unperturbed, the woman reclines in her chair. “...So that you could fit into my castle comfortably. The spell will wear off when you step outside.”
She opens her mouth.
“The clothes will too if you’re worried about that. My name is Regina Mills.” She extends an arm.
Reluctantly Alcina shakes her hand. “Alcina Dimitrescu.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you formally. I’ve been watching your performances. You have a lovely voice.”
“So you decided to take me all for yourself.” Alcina snarls.
Regina shakes her head. “I thought about it, yes. But no, you can leave whenever you’d like. I was just hoping for some company.”
“I need to get back to my daughters.”
She smiles a knowing smile. “I have a son.” She comments. “I would want to get back to him too if I had been captured.” She wanders over to small beanstalk. “We can go to them whenever you’re ready. I do recommend that you rest a little while longer though.”
“I need…”
“Tell me where they are and I can fetch them for you.”
“You would do that.” Alcina mumbles.
Regina nods. “As long as you give me a chance.”
Alcina supposes that her own castle had been getting a little gloomy lately. Maybe it would be nice to stay here. Stay here where she and her girls aren’t being hunted. Where she and her girls can be free. If Mills is willing to offer that, how terrible can she be. “I will give you a chance.” A chance and instructions to get to Castle Dimitrescu. “The flowers, did you bring my flowers?”
“The black roses that were pinned to your dress?”
Alcina nods.
“They’re on my dresser.”
“Take them with you. Show them to Cassandra, she will know.” Alcina nuzzles her head back against the pillow.
Regina presses a small kiss to her forehead. “I’ll be back before dinner and your daughters will be with me.”
The echo touch lingers on Alcina’s forehead long after she disappears into her portal. Alcina rolls onto her side and bunches up. God, she still feels so weak. So fragile. But for the first time in ages she isn’t in pain. She isn’t just some freak for the high class folk to gander at.
For the first time in ages she thinks that she will be alright.
And she owes it to that petty woman and her frivolous spending.