She leaned down to kiss his forehead, promising that she will be there, that she will not let him go and proclaiming her love to him. She felt the ripple in the instance the played her lips on his skin. The energy surge that could mean only one thing.

She pulled back. Her eyes growing wide not only at the rush of memories but at the implications of showing such an undeniable manifestation of true love when her heart wasn't even in her body. She heard the gasps around her and saw, more than felt, her son, Henry, turn to look at the couple he could now identify as his grandparents talk with his other mother.

But a second wave of memories accosted her. And she remembered the first time she took Henry, a mere baby at the time, in her hands. Her discoveries, her fear, and the potion she had taken to banish them.

She barely heard the explanation of how both Snow and David were still alive and with them, since a third wave of memory struck her and she gasped silently as images banished so long ago came back to the surface.

Walks in the garden. Picnics. Horseback rides. Hours spent talking.

She brought her free hand to her chest.

Her eyes widened and her knees gave out.

"Mom!" "Regina!"

The voices were easy to identify – her... their son, Snow, and Emma.

She raised her head.

"Mom, what happened? What's wrong?" He was frantic. Kneeling quickly beside her. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Emma moving to so the same.

"I'm," she choked out, "I'm fine. I'm just..." She gasped again. "My heart."

Snow, David and Emma looked at her confused.

"Zelena has your heart..." Snow sounded confused. Regina shook her head.

"It's back. I can," she looked up at Henry, then at Emma, and finally at the rest of people in the room. "I can feel it beating again."

Her eyes returned to Emma.

"I remember now."

"We all do." David was confused.

"No." She took a deep breath and tried to stand, only to have both Henry and Emma take her hands. There was no need, but she smiled gratefully at the pair nonetheless. "When I kissed Henry, every memory spell that I have had in me broke."

"How many did you have?" Hook asked, still not having moved from his spot.

"Including Zelena's - three." David's eyebrows rose, Snow's eyes grew wide in shock, Henry's jaw dropped, and Emma's eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"Who placed them on you? What did they want you to forget?"

"I placed one on myself." She gave them a very short version of what happened after she had first discovered Henry's lineage when he was an infant. She kept an arm around Henry as she spoke, but removed her other arm from Emma's grasp, noticing the minute frown which flickered across the other woman's features.

"And the third one?" Emma pushed on, Regina gave a pained half smile.

"The first one, technically." She corrected, turning her eyes to Snow. "Rumple placed it on me when you were just entering your teen years. He was teaching me magic then."

"I had no idea..." Snow mumbled.

"You wouldn't have." She ran a hand through her dark hair. "Do you remember that we had a visitor at the castle for a few months? A traveler." Snow shook her head. "No? Well, you might have only met her once..." She paused as she tried to remember.

"Why would Rumple do that though? And how it this traveler related to all this?"

"Rumple needed me to enact the Dark Curse. That meant that I needed to walk on the path that I started with Daniel's death." Emma turned her eyes to somewhere between Snow and David. "This traveler was changing that. And so Rumple made sure that changed. And he did a very good job. I had no inclination that my memories have been tampered with in any way. He didn't block them, he altered them a bit. Changing events so delicately that I wouldn't even feel the touch of magic in all of this."

"Who was this traveler, Mom?"

She looked from the boy at her left to the woman at her right, and placed a hand on the blonde's forearm, causing the green eyes to meet her own once more. "It was you."

"But that means the time travel spell worked!" Snow exclaimed.

"Indeed. But not quite as Zelena wanted. Besides, the fact that it has happened likely means that it will happen again. We need to prepare for that." She removed her hand from Emma, bringing it back to her rapidly beating heart, and took a deep breath. "And I, for one, believe that we should do that someplace more comfortable."

They all agreed, and began walking out of the boathouse. Regina focused on her son. Trying not to pay attention to the people behind them as Hook pulled Emma's arm to get her to stay while they spoke a few words.

Henry was more important than that pirate. Making sense of the new memories and their meaning was more important than what the man was saying to Emma. But figuring out how she managed to get her heart back was practically at the top of her research list.

I dedicate this story to Lisa, who asked for an SQ story, and might even get one if this plot-line ever unvagues itself...

I'm in the middle of another story, so I'd love some feedback on if you'd like me to continue with this one as well, or if I should keep it as a one shot...