Chapter Text
Regina Turns Robin Into a Squirrel. Hereby known as Squirrel Verse.
The feast was endless. Endless platters, endless toasts, endless noise. The kind of noise that rattled inside her skull until every word from Arthur’s mouth felt like a hammer-strike. Regina had been enduring it with her usual grace, chin high, smile sharp enough to cut glass, but there was no denying it: her skin prickled with fever, her throat ached, and each swallow of wine scraped like fire.
She had the distinct impression the room was spinning, though perhaps that was only Lancelot attempting to regale Robin with yet another hunting tale. Either way, she excused herself before someone noticed she was weaving like a drunkard.
The chamber they’d given her in Camelot was too large and too drafty. She hated it. The tapestries were garish, the fire smoked, and the bed felt as though it had been stuffed with rocks. Still, she collapsed onto it, muttering under her breath that she was fine, perfectly fine. Just a little tired.
By morning, she was not fine. She was wrapped in furs, shivering despite the fire, nose raw from a handkerchief she refused to admit she needed. Robin was at her side with soup he’d sweet-talked out of the kitchens.
“Eat,” he said, in that infuriatingly gentle voice of his.
“I don’t want soup.”
“You’ll eat it anyway.” He offered her a spoonful, stubborn as ever.
She rolled her eyes, opened her mouth grudgingly and barely had time to swallow before it hit: a sneeze.
But not just just a sneeze. Magic surged through her like lightning, bursting out in a violent puff of purple and silver. It filled the room, thick, choking, shimmering. Robin coughed, waving his hand, eyes wide. “What the hell was—”
The smoke cleared. The bed was empty except for her.
“Robin?” Her voice cracked. She shoved the furs back, panic spiking through the fever haze. “Robin!”
A sound answered her... not a voice, not words. Chittering. Sharp, insistent. She looked down.
On the rug beside her bed, nose twitching, tail flicking in agitation, stood a squirrel. A very brown, very furry, very outraged squirrel.
“...Oh, no.”
The squirrel squeaked at her, loudly. Regina pressed a hand to her temple. “This is not my fault.”
The squirrel—Robin—folded his tiny arms across his chest. The squirrel squeaked again, louder this time, as if to remind her that yes, this was real. Yes, he was chittering at her from the rug like some woodland menace. Regina pinched the bridge of her nose. “Of course. Of course this would happen.”
The squirrel darted forward a step and stomped one tiny paw.
“Don’t you take that tone with me,” she snapped, clutching the blanket tighter around her shoulders. Her skin was clammy, fever licking hot and cold in waves, but her mind was a whirl of questions. What spell had gone off? Could it even be reversed? The squirrel leapt up onto the bed in a flash of claws and fur. She yelped, scrambling back against the pillows. “Stay there. Do not come any closer.”
He ignored her entirely, of course. With a flick of his tail, he climbed over the blanket and plopped himself squarely against her hip, looking up with those sharp green eyes that were unmistakably Robin’s.
Regina exhaled through her teeth. “This is ridiculous.”
The squirrel chittered softly and curled up as if that settled the matter. She wanted to shove him away, wanted to insist that this was temporary, fixable, nothing to get sentimental over. But she was so very tired, and the heat in her body made her bones ache. He was warm against her side, and her eyes were already sliding closed despite herself.