I’ve heard two scenarios here that I can get comfortable with if they end up taking Henry away from Regina. First, I like Phee’s idea that perhaps the adoption wasn’t even legal which would mean that technically Emma is still Henry’s mother. Second, I like weedith’s suggestion that as part of Regina’s redemption she could realize that she is not capable of loving Henry the way he deserves to be loved and she could choose to give Henry back to Emma – which in itself would be a gesture of her love for him. Or you could end up with a combination of both.
Now, obviously if Regina ends up doing something truely horrific in SB and is caught and ends up having Henry taken away from her because she is deemed not to be a fit parent that also makes it possible for Henry to end up with Emma.
I wonder what is really going to happen if that comes to pass though. Henry complains that Regina just pretends to love him but at the end of the day he is still just a kid. I can’t imagine that being taken away from the woman who has raised him from infancy isn’t going to be traumtic for the kid in at least some kind of way. Regina was raised by a psychopath, yet right up to the point that Cora ripped Daniel’s heart out she still seemed to want her mother’s love and approval – and she was an adult at that point.