"Captain, captain!"

Hearing his title, Killian Jones slowly lifted his head away from the crystal blue waters to let his gaze rest upon one of his crew running towards him.

"Yes Smee?"

"Captain," he wheezed, practically keeling over from running all the way to the docks from the town square after finding the announcement.

"Yes," Captain Hook repeated, slowly this time. "Smee."

"This, you, Cinderella's," Smee managed still wheezing.

Arching a dark brow, Captain Hook took the proffered scroll from his crewman's sweaty and clammy hands. He slowly unrolled it, feeling no hurry before the whole crème parchment was unfurled, thus his reading began. But the first sentence was already enough to alarm Captain Hook enough for his normally easy going stance to go rigid.

~!~!~Past~!~!~

"Princess!"

Emma didn't even glance up from putting her sword back into the wooden chest at the foot of her bed.

"Ahhh," Johanna cried in horror at her dirt covered, only a few places but still, and sweat drenched Princess. "Princess Emma! Tonight is your coming out ball!"

Emma slowly turned around guiltily at Johanna. "Hi Johanna,"

"Princess," The older maid in waiting said again, distress coloring her facial features. "Must you practice with the soldiers today of all days? Your cuts!" She said in horror, finally spotting the cut that went several inches up her forearm. "Princess Emma you just live to slowly kill me."

"Johanna, please not so dramatic. I didn't even want this-" She wasn't able to finish as Johanna none too gently pulled her tunic over her braided head.

"Johanna!" Emma cried as she crossed her arms over her exposed bandaged chest.

"Bath now princess, we have our work cut out for us if you are to be presentable for tonight!" Johanna fussed, ignoring her charge as she pushed the princess she had known since said princess was a mere babe closer to the tub. "Lilac oils!" She called out to the other maids whom had been silently waiting for their cue while Johanna maneuvered the princess into the bath tub. An hour later, Johanna was finally satisfied when her princess no longer smelt of sweat, dirt, nor horses.

"I am almost eighteen Johanna, this is demeaning." Emma scowled at the maid in waiting that was more like family as she held a cloth against her dripping nude body.

"Yes, which is why," Johanna smiled fondly as she pushed Emma down to sit on a small bench. Gently she grabbed Emma's water drenched blonde locks, almost as long as her mother's, Snow White, and squeezed them with another cloth. "You must have all eyes on you tonight. You will be the most beautiful woman at the ball when we present you to your kingdom. I must work all the magic" She gave a small laugh because she was quite magicless but it was the perfect word for the moment. "I can. After all your mother is Snow White, fairest of them all and that will be a magical feat in itself."

"Johanna," Emma cried. "I will never be more beautiful than mother!" She exclaimed, turning her head to face Johanna. "Nor do I want to be." She shuddered at the thought. The trials her mother went through, sometimes still had to endure because of the renowned title, the jealous women, the curses, even the men who wanted to claim her mother as theirs, butterfly wings clipped on the wall. None of that she wanted, thus she was fine without ever being the most beautiful at the ball. She loved her mother but Snow White could keep the title of fairest of them all.

"Now dry off and put on the gown I have laid out on your bed while I go to get your jewels for tonight Princess Emma."

-!-!-

"Oh hello your majesty." Johanna said shocked as she entered the royal jewels chamber to find the king leaving.

"Johanna," He said kindly, a warm smile on his lips. "Here for Emma?" He asked in which Johanna nodded furiously. "Great, I will follow you then." He said gesturing for her to go past him.

After finding the jewelry that both had been seeking, King David escorted Johanna back to his daughter's chambers.

"Can you believe our princess will be a woman tonight?" Johanna gushed as King David strode beside her.

"Yes," The king sighed, not nearly as excited as Johanna over the idea of his only daughter becoming a woman.

"She is your daughter though. Day of her birthday and coming out ball, she comes in covered in dirt and grime, smelling of horses and sweat with a cut on her beautiful skin." Johanna dramatically sighed in near defeat.

Despite himself, the king chuckled. Yes she was most certainly his and Snow's daughter.

"And- black! Princess Emma that is not the gown I laid out for you!"

Once again chuckling, the king took the first few steps to his daughter while Johanna chastised her on the fact that black was for mourning! Emma was unable to argue back before Johanna went to Emma's oak chest and got out the gown, the one specifically made for tonight.

"Don't make more work for Johanna." He said though the grin on his lips quirked, growing just a little more.

Emma winced, not meaning to trouble the lady in waiting but the gown Johanna had laid out was too extravagant for her tastes. Hues of white, snow flake blues and the fadest lavenders made up the gown as tiny minute jewels decorated the dress like small snowflakes of winter's first snow fall. Quite befitting of Snow White's daughter.

Distracting Emma temporarily from Joanna's fussing; King David came to stand in front of her. "Every day," He began softly. "You grow before my eyes and I don't really know what to do but wish I could freeze the moments forever..."

"Father,"

"Just...you're no longer the little girl that used to sit on my knee and listen to the tales of your mother, but a woman and I think this is the perfect time if any for me to give you this." He held up a necklace made with a single sapphire that had just a hint of purple. "Your grandma wasn't the richest but she had treasures she coveted and she always told me that she wanted me to pass them on in her memory, especially to her first granddaughter. This was your grandmother's gift from my father a long time ago... and I would be honored if you would accept it."

Emma blinked as she looked up before gulping as she gingerly took the tear drop shaped sapphire. "I love it," She said breathlessly.

"Happy Birthday... my princess." He said softly as he kissed her forehead whilst she closed her eyes, trying to imagine what her grandmother would look like if she were there to give it to Emma, herself.

-!-!-

When the princess entered the ball at last, it seemed that a silence descended the hall as all whispers hushed. Blonde tendrils draped delicately over bare shoulders while the snow drops, the flower, that were tweezed delicately into her curls, glimmered. A delicate white lace mask rested above her full cheekbones, hints of tiny blue stones emphasizing the blue hues of her eyes and dress.

While many looked on in awe, one man in a silver and black suit glanced up at the princess descending, a small smirk like grin on his lips. His own blue eyes, deep and clear as the ocean, memorized her every feature, from the golden yellow of her hair, to the sapphires in her eyes, every detail of her dress and the way she smiled. A smile too tight, too emotionless, too fake, never reaching those beautiful blue eyes.

Throughout the night he never danced, declining each invitation, flirt of the fan, and teasing glint in every woman's eyes who dared to approach him. At last, a little over two hours in, the princess had danced with every available single suitor it seemed, save him. With that, he stood up from his position of leaning against a marble column just near the orchestra, where he was able to watch the princess all night without anyone blocking his view.

Silently the dark haired man with a whisper of a five o'clock shadow approached the princess as she stood at the edge of the dance floor, near the harpist. He lightly tapped the enticing warm skin of the Princess' bare shoulder. "Happy Birthday my Princess," He said, his eyes lighting up with mischief and something else, when the princess whirled around to find him standing before her.

Emma's eyes widened as the man before her said the exact same thing her father had told her mere hours ago before he gifted her with her grandmother's necklace, just in a very very different manner. Unconsciously she brought her hand up to rest it on said necklace, diverting the man's gaze before her to the long of her neck. His grin grew at the knee jerk reaction he had caused the princess, more of a reaction than any of her previous suitors had been able to evoke from her all night.

"A dance" He asked as he leant closer to her, before whispering in her ear. "Princess?" He finished, his single word, her title, lingering in the air between them, like an electric shock.

Before Emma could respond with an acceptance or a decline, the man lead her into the waltz along with the rest of the room.

Hands touching, eyes connecting, neither said a word as they moved with the music. Before they knew it, the dance had finished and they had wandered from the edge of the dance floor to the balcony.

It was only when Emma felt the back of her dress lightly brush the rail of the balcony did they stop their dance. "You smell of the sea." Emma said, finally saying her first words to the stranger who she still hadn't averted her gaze from.

"We are standing on the balcony," He said eyeing the princess.

"No, in there too." She said firmly only making the man before her smile, the right side of his lips higher than the other. "And you've only used one arm all night even when dancing the Waltz, you did so with your one arm... hiding your other hand."

"Beauty and brains, what a treasure." The man said a laugh in his voce. "Unless." He trailed off. "Princess... I must digress; you must have been watching me as much as I have been enjoying the sight of you... Question princess." He said leaning so close now that just another inch and their lips would be touching.

"Me first," Emma tried to say evenly, even though her heart was pounding at their proximity. "What are you doing here Captain Hook?" She asked as she pulled the small dagger from her dress to press it against the infamous pirate's jugular.

Instead of wiping the smile off his face as Emma had expected, her action seemed to only make the irksome smile on the pirate's too handsome face grow.

"I see, my reputation, proceeds me. But I would prefer Killian Jones from your lovely lips Princess." He whispered leaning in that much closer so the blade was now grazing his skin, a small prickle of blood on the edge of the knife, causing the Princess to jerk it away.

"Princess!" One of the armed guards cried out just as the clock struck midnight.

"And that," Captain Hook said. "Is my cue to go," His eyes gleamed before leaning down to place his lips against the Princess'.

"Princess!"

With that one more yell, Captain Hook fell back but not without grazing his hand over the Princess' neck and grabbing the tear drop sapphire necklace then jumping off the balcony of Snow White's castle.

"No!" Emma cried as she turned around to watch the pirate expose his hook, using it to cling onto the smaller sail of a large ship, sliding down. "Killian Jones, my necklace you bastard!" She screamed after the ship that was already sailing away with the pirate who had stolen both her first kiss and her grandmother's necklace. "HOOOOOOK!"

-!-!-

"Sir must you do that?" Smee asked when his Captain jumped on the deck of the ship after destroying the jib of the ship.

"We can just get Olina to fix it again. She is sweet on me." Captain Hook simply said, brushing it off.

"One day sir you will find that it will not they but you who-"

Laughing to interrupt his crewman's words."I think dear Smee, it may have just happened..." He said as he watched the shore grow smaller with distance yet he could still see the princess in her gown, a gown that reflected the shine of the moon making her luminescent and dare he say iridescent. Like a jewel in the night and what were pirates for but to come back one day to steal the precious jewel of the kingdom?

"Sir what is that in your hand?"

"A pirate always keeps a souvenir of his conquests." He simply grinned before turning around to head to the captain's quarters leaving Smee sputtering behind him.

~!~!~Present~!~!~

"We have a wedding to crash my dear lads." Captain Hook bellowed to his crew as he stood at the helm, ready to steer the Jolly Roger from Cinderella's to Snow White's castle.

~!~!~!~!~!~!~!~

This was pure fun and I will try to have part two up before next week. For some reason I keep trying to write the stories I already have and yet am unable to, instead plagued with this couple!

Hope that you all liked it and enjoy reading as much as I did writing it!

And I did try to use some of the dialogue from the show to connect the Au