Mills Mausoleum

"I have no idea. I took so many. It was impossible to keep track."

- Regina Mills to David Nolan

Regina's Vault is a Storybrooke location featured on ABC's Once Upon a Time. It first appears in the seventh episode of the first season.

History
Following the death of the Evil Queen's husband, King Leopold, she plans to assassinate her stepdaughter, Snow White. However, she risks losing the favor of the kingdom's citizens by staining her hands with blood, so the Evil Queen sends a Huntsman after Snow White to do the dirty work. In return, the Huntsman cares for nothing except the protection of the wolves, which she promises to grant. As proof of his kill, she wants him to cut out and bring back Snow White's heart. He disguises himself as one of the Queen's knights, but the princess sees through his lies. Snow White escapes deeper into the forest to prepare a farewell letter to her stepmother and finishes up just as the Huntsman catches up. He reads the letter and is moved to tears by her words. The Huntsman allows her to escape and takes the heart of a deer for the Queen instead. Arriving back to the castle, the Huntsman attempts to read the letter to the Queen, but she throws the paper into the fire after he has read half of it. After he finally gives her the heart, they go to the vault where the Queen tries to magically place it in one of the boxes. However, none of the boxes open, helping the Queen to recognize that the Huntsman did not kill Snow White. For his trickery, she takes his heart as a replacement and threatens him to never go against her again. As a demonstration of what will happen if he does, she squeezes his heart, causing him much pain. On her orders, the Huntsman is dragged away by the guards into the Queen's bedroom. After the casting of the Dark Curse, the Evil Queen has a new life in Storybrooke as the town mayor Regina. Her collection of hearts are brought along with the curse, and are stashed in a hidden room under her father's tomb in the cemetery.
 * -|Before the Curse=
 * -|During the Curse=

Eighteen years later, Regina attempts to gain more meaning in her life by adopting an infant son, with Mr. Gold's assistance, who she names Henry. She researches her child's birth parents in an effort to find out if he inherited any genetic illnesses. To her shock, Regina receives faxed information about Henry's birth mother, who was found in the woods eighteen years ago. She recognizes the woman as the savior of the curse, and goes to angrily confront Mr. Gold over his trickery. However, he remembers nothing from his former life. In frustration, Regina takes Henry back to the adoption agency, but at the last moment, cannot part with the child she has grown to love as her own. She becomes fretful and anxious over the future, as the savior won't just take away the curse one day, but also Henry. To rid herself of these worries, she takes Henry with her to the vault in a crib. Regina lulls him to sleep with a bedtime story while she creates a potion and later drinks it to help herself forget the identity of her son's birth mother.

In another ten years, the savior of the curse, Emma, arrives and stays in Storybrooke while Sheriff Graham begins regaining some of his memories in his former life as the Huntsman. He consults Henry's storybook for answers. Henry shows him a photo of the Evil Queen's vault where she keeps the Huntsman's heart. Graham intends to search for his heart there and persuades a skeptical Emma that he needs to follow a wolf to the vault. The wolf appears down the street and it leads them straight to the vault in the cemetery. After Emma kicks the door open, they find a coffin and urns, but no sign of his heart. Regina arrives and demands to know what they are doing. She explains the vault is her father's grave, and Graham admits to bringing Emma, but refuses to justify why he came. Regina offers to escort him home, but he stiffly rejects her offer. When she tries to change his mind, but Graham breaks things off between them for good. She blames Emma, who scoffs and declares the issue is Regina, not her. Emma points out both Henry and Graham are miserable, and vents that the madam mayor should think about why people are running away from her. Worked up, Regina punches her and Emma fights back. Graham pulls them apart as he and Emma leave together for the sheriff department. Recognizing that Graham is no longer her pawn, Regina goes into the vault and pushes aside her father's tomb to reveal a set of stairs leading down. She heads into the room to take out Graham's heart from a box. Concurrently, at the sheriff department, Graham tends to Emma's wounds from her earlier fight with Regina. They share a kiss, to which he receives a flood of all his memories as the Huntsman. He thanks her for helping him remember. Before she can ask what he means, he falls to the ground in extreme pain, due to Regina crushing his heart. When she pulverizes it to ash, Graham dies.

On a quest to rid herself of Emma, Regina calls on Jefferson to make his hat open a portal so she may retrieve something that will be of use to the cause. She takes him down into a cellar; saying that the only remaining magic is contained in the things that she brought from the Enchanted Forest. She places some of her items into the hat, but nothing happens. Regrettably, Regina parts with a sentimental ring and puts it in the hat. Fortunately, it starts to work, but it does not open a portal. Jefferson says that, although they cannot travel to the Enchanted Forest, he is able to bring a small object back for her. She guides the hat's magic to the right time and place to repossess a apple Snow White was once poisoned with. Though she bakes it into an apple turnover as a parting gift for Emma, who has decided to leave town for Henry's best interests, it is not the savior who eventually ingests it. As the price of magic, Henry takes a bite of it to prove to Emma the curse is real, and falls into a coma.

In Storybrooke, Emma and Mary Margaret are absorbed into a portal in a hat and unexpectedly transported to the Enchanted Forest. Henry wants to find a way to reach them, so he makes up an excuse to meet with his adoptive mother, Regina, for lunch at the diner. While she is away, he breaks into the vault intending to look for an item which may help his dilemma. He passes by shelves containing hearts, which thump loudly. Henry stumbles onto a box, but upon opening it, vipers spring out to attack. He is saved when David arrives in time to close the box. Henry gives his reason for being here because he wants Emma and Mary Margaret back. David understands, but persuades him to go to school for the time being.
 * -|After Broken Curse=

Regina begins therapy sessions with Archie to help her overcome the need for magic. During one session, Dr. Whale storms in demanding for her to send him back to his old world. She insists it's not possible, and Dr. Whale leaves in an angry huff. To get back at her, he breaks into the vault and steals an enchanted heart to operate and bring back to life Regina's deceased fiancé Daniel in the hospital. Meanwhile, Regina admits to Archie that she is unable to let go of Daniel, even though he is dead, and preserved his body in the hopes he can be revived one day. Archie gently remarks that she must let go of the past in order to move forward, but Regina is unwilling. After abruptly cutting the conversation short, she drives home in the rain; seemingly witnessing a hallucination of Daniel. Unsure, she goes to the vault and discovers Daniel's preserved body is gone. In a confrontation with Dr. Whale, she finds him with a ripped off arm, as the resurrection of Daniel was successful, but the man is now a rampaging monster. Ultimately, Regina is forced to make Daniel disappear for good because he is too dangerous.

After Cora arrives to Storybrooke, she turns the townspeople against Regina by framing her for the murder of Archie. This causes Regina, in a broken state, to retreat to the vault. Cora disguises herself as Henry and goes into the vault to trick Regina into believing her son has come looking for her. Regina lets him in and insists she had nothing to do with Archie's death. Surprisingly, he believes her, but it's too good to be true, as the mask of Henry melts off to reveal Cora. Her mother is genuinely sorry for forcing Regina, in the past, to marry against her will. Regina is too upset at the fact Cora made everyone believe she killed Archie. Cora wants to make it up to her daughter, so both of them go into town to explain to the townspeople that Regina did not kill Archie. On the way there, Cora convinces Regina that even clearing up the misunderstanding won't bring Henry to her as she'll still have David, Emma and Mary Margaret to deal with. The two team up to take Henry back by force.

Cora is quickly becoming a force to be reckoned with, and Mary Margaret is tired of playing it fair. She believes Cora must die or else no one will be safe, and is pushed into action when a dying Mr. Gold gives her an candle with the power to take away the life of one and give back life to another. Mr. Gold instructs how to perform the spell if she wishes to go through with it. First, she must find Cora's heart, and hold the lighted candle over it while saying the intended victim's name. Then, the heart must be placed back into Cora's chest for the spell to work. During the ensuing fight between Cora and Regina against David, Emma and Neal in the pawnshop, Mary Margaret sneaks away to the vault. She casts a curse with the candle on the woman's heart. On her way out, she puts the heart back in the box to carry away, but is stopped by Regina, who is upset at her intrusion in the vault. Mary Margaret tells Regina to take the heart, and place it in Cora's chest so her mother can truly love her; thus creating a family of love Henry will want to be part of. Regina accepts the heart, and leaves the vault with the intention of putting it in her mother's chest. Immediately after, Mary Margaret regrets her actions, but doesn't make it back in time to prevent Cora's death.

While Regina is mourning the loss of Cora, Mr. Gold makes an unanticipated arrival to pay his respects. He reveals to Regina that Cora will always have a place in his heart. Regina plans on killing Mary Margaret, and getting Henry's affections, too, out of revenge for the death of her mother, despite that Mr. Gold insists that holding onto vengeance will lead her down the same path as Cora. As she rummages through her mother's belongings, Regina finds a spell scroll for the curse of the empty-hearted, which will bring the demise of Mary Margaret and give her Henry's love. After she is gone, Mr. Gold and David search the premises. Mr. Gold keenly observes several particular ingredients are missing from the vault, and catches on to what curse Regina is going to set into motion. As a key ingredient for the spell, Regina will need the heart of the person she hates most--Mary Margaret. Regina's hatred for her is deep, but her love for Henry far more profound, to the point she later burns the spell scroll to placate him.

Following a journey to rescue Henry from the grip of Peter Pan in Neverland, they fly home on a ship. However, Pan secretly switched bodies with Henry. Once in Storybrooke, he sets his shadow free to kill another town resident and cause Regina to fear for her son's safety again. To protect him, she takes him to the vault. Pan slyly knocks her out with a powder and then runs off with the Dark Curse scroll with intentions of enacting it. David, Emma, Mary Margaret and Mr. Gold later awaken Regina and tell her the truth about Pan. Regina is extremely upset as she truly wanted to believe her son still needed her. Out of the shadows, Henry, in Pan's body, acknowledges he still does need her and they reconcile with a hug. However, everyone notices the missing Dark Curse scroll too late.