Many thanks to salamanderinspace for offering her services as a marvellous beta reader ;)
She was naked sitting on the marble bench and the cold of the sprawling examination room left her breasts pebbled and her skin covered in goosebumps instead of her usual finery. Behind her stood the gaggle of her interchangeable attendants, silent, as if in reverence before her sheer being. The only thing she could could hear was the whisper of silk sleeves and satin skirts. All was as it should be.
She might feel cold to her bones in the vast room, but under the eyes of her attendants she would rather freeze to death than show even the smallest inkling of her indisposition, so she smiled carelessly and lounged on her seat, as her lips turned blue under their red paint.
Her head had started to throb again, as well, but that was nothing new lately and neither this nor the cold was the reason she was here. She was not deluded enough by far to not recognise them to be born from the ache in her chest and the muddle in her thoughts that persisted despite all reason and she wouldn't ever speak about such things with another. She was an Abrasax and her weakness was hers to bear alone.
Even if he had somehow guessed at the underlying reason of her indisposition, the snake splice before her wouldn't have presumed to offer her an honest diagnose either way. He kept his head bowed, as he moved the detector from her head to her toes, following the curves of her body and barely touching her with his gloved hands when he motioned for her to lift her arms. The stark white light from the net of plain fluorescent tubes overhead cast the scales on his temple in a milky sheen.
Seraphi languidly let her gaze wander from the healer to the expanse of the examination room as the cool metal head of the detector first touched her abdomen and then lower. Her stomach cramped involuntarily upon the cold contact, but she forced herself not to shrink back and instead concentrated on her surroundings. In truth there was nothing in the room that would hold her eyes, nothing to see but unblemished white marble and shining chrome and if she turned her head just right the stoic faces of her retinue.
She allowed herself a sigh. She had never cared for medical examinations. The whole procedure felt tedious to her and while it might have been an occasion to show those closest to her that she didn't need her usual splendour to appear the queen she was, that she was enough to make the world tremble, armed only with her naked form and her pride, it still was an inconvenience, seeming all the more pointless when science – paired with the necessary means – meant that no illness could truly and permanently affect her. But alas even these means needed a time and place to operate and thusly she found herself back in the examination room of her main residence, bearing the healer's inspection with unaffected grace.
Still, she would have been grateful for a chance to cover herself at least a bit… But of course it could not be helped. While a superficial scan could be done form a distance and through layers of clothes, if one desired a more in depth-analysis of the body's condition, skin-contact simply could not be helped and even given the chance Seraphi wouldn't have considered insisting on baring only the immediately needed portions of her body one after another. The comfort gained through the manoeuvre could never be enough to compensate for the shame of revealing her vulnerability.
She turned her head and looked back to the healer in question who had taken a respectful distance again and was studying the results of the examination on his evaluation disc. Seraphi tilted her head to the side and smiled at him coolly. "What is it this time? Cancer cells again, or something more dire?" She motioned for one of her ever present attendants to step forward. The woman obeyed wordlessly and stepped next to the snake-splice. She towered over him by more than a head and the contrast of her warm bronze skin to the dim grey scales of the healer was almost obscene.
Seraphi leveled the healer with an even stare."If there is anything you haven't stocked here, I'd advise you to be better prepared next time and I'll send my dear attendant here down to Orous to bring it, so we can finally be done here."
The splice shook his head and put the disc away, before he looked up to her.
"Nothing of the sort, Your Majesty. Due to your graciousness, we are prepared for every eventuality on the estate." His voice was slippery soft, only catching the slightest bit on the sharp 's'es that escaped from between sharp teeth and forked tongue. "Your Majesty has caught a new case of beginning Multiple Sclerosis, but a concentrated dose of Regenex in your spinal cord will do away with it easily enough. As for the other matter – there is a foetus in you and if you so desire it will only take a moment for me to take care of it."
A… foetus.
For the longest moment the words refused to make sense. A foetus, a …child. She was with child. There was a living thing within her and she had not noticed this of her own body.
And it was his. Of course it had to be.
Seraphi tried to form words, but suddenly there was no air in her lungs anymore and her chest constricted with the sheer knowledge that he had managed to break through her defences again. Her throat hurt with the sob that threatened to finally spill from her lips, rising from the hard coil in her stomach she had suppressed it in for so long now. She closed her eyes and pressed her hands so hard against her face that stars exploded behind her eyelids and added to her nausea. Breathe in, breathe out… Her breaths came trembling, leaving her palms moist and hot, but the impending sobs slowly died away in her throat, unheard.
A soft hand touched her bare shoulder, but Seraphi only shook it away abruptly. She didn't need to look to see the concerned expression of her attendants, their forlorn eyes and hesitant postures. She truly didn't need to concern herself with them, when his face was swimming before her inner eyes, his laugh and his disbelieving expression, when she had finally confronted him with his duplicity, the hurt he had dared to show, the artificial confusion…!
"Out", she whispered from behind raised hands. Then louder, "out!"
There was a moment of silence, then the sound of rustling skirts and fast steps leaving the room. She waited until the door closed, before she finally forced herself to raise her head again. When she clasped her hands over her lap, they were clammy against her skin. She didn't bother to straighten up again. She had finally fallen apart and with the sharp splinters of her façade cutting her innards apart it would have been a truly pitiable try. There was no reason to pretend otherwise anymore; he had won, had broken her and all she could do now was to pull herself together as best as she could.
She didn't bother to straighten up again, but she did look the healer straight in the eye, daring him to speak up. It was one thing for her to recognise the truth, a completely other to let such a creature pity her.
His reptilian eyes held her gaze for a moment, then he nodded slightly to her unspoken command and his transparent eyelids flickered over his eyes in a nervous twitch.
"It is no great thing, your Majesty. If you so desire I shall only need a moment to get the appropriate gear and you won't have to think about this ever again." He bowed his head and Seraphi noted with satisfaction that he waited for her to speak. She might have born his guess at her decision with regard to the shot he implanted himself whenever she was on the estate after her blood had ceased, but anything else would have simply been too much, no matter if her decision was in accordance to his or not. And the words were already on her tongue, when she hesitated.
Because whatever he said, however usual this sort of thing was in their circles, she would still think about it, just as she still thought about the man who had planted his seed in her belly, when she was still happy and ignorant and before she had drowned in her grief, so much that she had forgotten the world around her – and the shot, the shot that would have been so important – until she had finally managed to pull herself together the barest bit.
She shook her head, first mutely, then, when she found her voice again, with a strength of voice that she would not have thought possible right then. "No. No, I shall keep it."
Because he might have broken her, but she was strong. She could be better again and this… this was her chance. A child, her child - always only hers- a creature that would have to love her unconditionally, an eventual chance to prove that she had risen above the betrayal, that she was strong after all.
The healer was wise enough not to look surprised. He only bowed his head and lowered his eyes. "Of course Your Majesty, forgive me for my outrageous presumptions." He raised his head a fraction and his split pupils focused on her again. "In that case I shall get the proper instruments to check his development, if it pleases you."
Seraphi nodded stiffly. "And not a word about my… initial reaction, are we understood?"
He bowed again. "Of course, Your Majesty."
Seraphi stroked softly over the still flat expanse of her stomach. A child was nestled there, something only hers – never his, even though he had given it to her. The thought cut her like razors but the pain sharpened her senses again. She had been such a miserable fool, wallowing in her self-pity like a little girl. That would end here and now and this would be the proof. She would turn his treason into a gift, something to make her stronger and she would be the one to have the last laugh.
"And Galen", she said as the snake splice was already halfway through the room opening a cabinet in the row of flawless steel chests. "Yes, Your Majesty?"
"Inform the guards to catch my attendants and everyone they could have told of this; I want to have them taken care of."
Again he only nodded. "Of course, Your Majesty."