Thank you! Thank you, thank you! All of you! :)
Now I just have to live up to your expectations. :)
When she opened her eyes, she barely saw anything. All she could register was that she was lying in a bed.
There were people around her, speaking, though she couldn't understand what they were talking about. Everything was so blurry, and the room was moving around her. It was quite dark, but after a little time she realised, that she was in her chambers. Robin must have carried her all the way here from his bedchambers after she collapsed.
She blinked a few times and tried to lift her head up a bit from the pillow. She could make out two man standing in the far corner of the room, facing each other. Than her sight travelled to the foot of the bed, where a woman was doing something with great struggle between her parted knees.
The middle-aged woman -wearing dark clothes, her fuzzy face unrecognisable, grey hair in a thight bun - was lifting a red sheet from under the thin blanket -the only thing covering Regina's nudity, then tossed the soaked material to the floor.
"There is too much blood." Regina heared her say, and her tears made her vision even more blurry.
She felt the pain, she knew well what was happening to her, and a sob escaped through her parted lips at the realisation. After she saw another deep red rug risen from between her thighs, she had to look away from the woman, not being able to watch any more the nasty job she was doing.
After she let her sight -dimmed from tears- roam around the ceiling for some time -all the while trying to calm her breathing, her eyes found themselfs back on the two man in the corner.
She still couldn't see clearly who they were. But she did hear the worry in the taller one's voice, and she immediately persumed that he was Robin. From what she was able to see and hear in her shaken state, he could as well be Charming, too. Though her hope was strong for him to be no one else, but Robin Hood, who other would be worried about her? And he was the one there when she collapsed, after all.
"Your majesty, it seems worse this time." The woman stopped her movements as she looked sideways to the men.
"Send for Rumpelstiltskin." Robin ordered the other man.
"And the faries?" The smaller man asked, concerned.
"They wouldn't come." Robin explained, disappointment evident in his tone. "Go now! Hurry!" He commanded.
Regina found something confusing in what he said, but she couldn't figure out what it was. She was simply too tired to think. And she would trust Robin to do what was best for her. He was that kind of a man. Not like ..., not like the ... No, she won't think of him, not now, not ever. He was dead, he had been dead for decades. He can't ever hurt her again.
She tried to smile at Robin, reach for him with one of her hands, but she was just too weak to move. Somehow she was grateful for him to be there for her, to care for her. It warmed her already too cold heart. She wanted him to tell her that everything is going to be okay.
It was a rather strange feeling, they must have given her some herbs to make her feel this much at ease, for her walls to be crumbled down complately. She felt free of her burden, like she was floating, and Robin always made her feel like floating.
She could even let him love her, she thought. She could let herself be weak in his arms. He would give her comfort, that of she was sure. He would make her agony bearable, her heart lighter, her mind calmer and her body whole again.
He came so close, though she still coudn't see his precious face, nor his kind eyes.
She wanted to see him, to touch him, but her vision remained unclear, and her body drained.
But why doesn't he come closer to her?
It must be her mistake. She hadn't let him close to her before, she hadn't let him care for her, tend to her.
She should have, she knew it now. Was it too late? She hoped it wasn't. She hoped there still was something good waiting for her.
The other man -or rather boy, according to his quite thin voice- came back, accompanied by someone. Someone with magic, Regina felt it in her bones, though she couldn't see who it was, yet.
She figured it wasn't really important. She will be healed with magic like before. It didn't really matter from who's hands will her misery finally end.
She remembered the only other time she needed magic to stay alive after a severe miscarrige. The only other time, when her baby didn't die from her own hands, from her drinking that potion of death, pain and emptyness.
It happened when she had enough of her constant suffering, both physical and emotional, when she felt strong enough to act against Rumpelstiltskin's whishes. Or more like, when she got devastated enough to do so.
After all the pain she endured between these castle walls, after her loneliness -which only grew with every little life she lost- became unbearable, she finally decided to keep her baby. And she was waiting for it's arrival with all the love she had kept locked in herself during the years with Snow and her father.
She felt the hope getting stronger, becoming almost as real as it was when she and Daniel planned to run away. It seemed like love was a possibility for her after all. No, of course not with the King, but with her unborn child. Hope and love. The baby will bring her both, she thought naively, and she waited to be happy finally.
Everything looked better than she thought it would ever become. The King got nicer to her with every passing month, Regina could even see the slightly suppressed expectation on him. And as her bump grew, Snow also got more and more excited about having a little brother or sister. It really seemed she could be happy in this castle after all.
Rumple, on the other hand, wasn't so pleased with her act of rebellion at all. He was angry with her, refused to teach her, which she didn't mind at all. He waited for her to change her mind, to drink the potion in the end. The potion, which he taught her how to make. Because he needed his monster to cast the curse, and a baby would only distract her. But her pain, her suffering made him happier, brought him closer to his goal. That bastard imp.
Her past was so painful, she didn't want to think about it any longer. So she forced her brain to focus on the present. She tried to concentrate harder on what was happening around her, because she found some things confusing, but just couldn't figure out what. She considered her confusions to be due to the loss of blood.
But soon she will be as good as before.
Suddenly she felt a hand on her belly. It made her wake from her momentary doze, which she just realised to be in. She narrowed her eyes to see who it was. She expected it to be Robin. She wanted it to be him. For him to touch her finally. But it wasn't him.
'I'm sorry, deary.' That high-pitched voice always made her uneasy, this time it wasn't any different. But how?
She was able to see now those ugly fingers, ending in sharped nails, resting on her belly. It was definitely him, but how?
He couldn't be here, he was dead.
She was so confused. Body heavy and shaking.
His hand was on her bump, on her huge bump.
What? No, please don't!
This was the past. This was her past, which she didn't want to relive.
It was a nightmare, a memory of that only time when she whished her baby to live, but she failed again.
Her breathig increased drastically. She wanted to wake up, but she couldn't, no matter how hard she tried to.
She squeezed her eyes shut, and whished to be with Robin. Wake up. Wake up. Wakeup.
'You are not meant to be happy, Regina, you should know that by now.' Rumpelstiltskin continued with a smug face.
'How is she? Can you help her?' It was the King's voice, and Regina already knew it would be his. After she became aware of Rumple's presence, she wasn't surprised that it wasn't Robin's face that greated her, as she previously thought it would. As she hoped him to be. No, he was the King, and his worry was not ment for her, but the baby. Never for her.
'Look at me!' The imp's greasy face came too close, as he grabbed Regina's jaw between his fingers forcefully, and looked siriously into her big, frightened eyes. 'Ignore him! You have to listen to me, deary.'
She didn't understand what was he talking about, she was barely conscious, and beside that, an unpleasant feeling started to invade her heart. Fear. Fear of the unknown.
'I am not in your past, I am here in the present, alive, only not completely myself.' He giggled in the end disturbingly.
'It's funny, that when I finally gave up hurting you, your sister appeares from nowhere to take my place.' He told her in his sing-song voice. 'She will make me do things to you, deary, things, that won't be pleasant.' He thought for a moment, as he made a serious face. 'She will use you against the others. Not like she does it with me, no,' and he giggles again, like real psychotic, 'she will hurt you, and everyone you hold dear. And yes, she knows of him, though she doesn't know everything.' He grabbed her face stronger to bring her averting eyes back to meet his yellow ones. 'This is the only way I could speak to you, though I can't tell you what to do. If you could get my dagger, though, that would help a lot. But that's nearly impossible. Anyway, good luck, deary!'
Then he disappeared -while still giggling, along with the King, the neglectful woman and her sad bedchamber.
'Welcome back.' Granny greeted her gently, with light voice, like she was talking to a frightened child. And that was how Regina really felt herself when she woke up from her nightmare -which was an unplesant memory, truly. One of those awful ones from her time as Leopold's Queen.
She was still shaky and a bit confused. She expected to see Robin in the room, but he wasn't there. Because he knew she wouldn't let him stay. It was her fault.
The tears slid freely from her eyes to her pale cheeks. It would be so easy to just bury her face in his chest and let him hold her.
But he wasn't there. And maybe it was better this way.
She felt weak and tired, closing her eyes seemed so tempting. She saw Granny trying to hide the pity from her face, with not much succes.
'Your bleeding stopped a little while ago.' Regina's ears started to ring at the older woman's words.
She muffled a sob with one hand while her other grabber her still tight middle. The tears clouding her vision for real now.
It is over then, she thought.
...
Some new ideas came to me with this story, so maybe it will be a bit longer, than I fist thought. Do you mind it? :)
Thank you, Kris Morene, for the constructive criticism, I used quotation marks instead of hyphens in this chapter. Sorry, in my country, we usually use hyphens. :)