Chapter 13

The sun had set long ago and the evening was well advanced one evening when Kira and Rathaus sat down to dinner. Dinnertime was important to Rathaus. He ate at exactly the same time every night. Dinner was always served in Pirovania's cavernous dining room, on fine china and crystal collected throughout the known universe. Kira found these formal rituals unnecessary. Her husband ignored her misgivings and required her to dress formally for the occasion. He especially liked her to wear the ruby choker he had given her as a wedding gift.

This evening, Kira was nearly late, having been out walking in one of the gardens. Her gown of ivory brushed Teralian silk glowed fell gracefully around her growing belly. Rathaus was at the sidebar, pouring himself his usual drink. He handed Kira a drink sitting beside him.

"Have a drink, my dear," he offered as she sat down. "You look lovely tonight."

Kira's eyes narrowed at the flattery, but she accepted the drink. Sitting down at the enormous table, she was surprised to see that dinner consisted of Bajoran cuisine. Rathaus dined each night on the food of a different world, but he had yet to order anything from Bajor.

"I thought you would enjoy something from home for a change," he said in response to her unvoiced surprise.

Kira took a sip of her drink, forced a small smile to her lips, and thanked him, whereupon he took her arms and led her to the table.

She was about halfway through her meal when she started to feel queasy. Her interest in the meal vanished as the sickness became more pronounced, eventually forcing her to flee the table.

As she huddled on the floor of her elaborate bathroom the nausea continued to grow even after she had emptied the contents of her stomach. Cramps shot through her mid-section and back. Within the hour she began bleeding profusely and soon the floor was soaked in blood. Oddly, no one came to assist her.

For what seemed like hours, she lay there, alternately moaning in pain and losing consciousness. By this time she knew with certainty that she was having a miscarriage and, furthermore, was powerless to stop it. She also knew that Rathaus had poisoned her. He would not come to her aid, nor would he be sending for help.

An unknown time later, Kira noticed the miniature fetus, too small, even, to see the ridges on its nose. Tears burst from her as she realized that the fight was over. Her hopes and dreams for an end mourning and lost had died along with her child. She was now completely alone, trapped on the magnificent estate.

Eventually, the cramps died down and the nausea faded away. Nerys was able to stand up with difficulty. She hobbled to the sink and washed the blood off herself. The mass of fetal tissue was disposed of in the recycler. She left the pool of blood on the floor, however; she was too tired to clean it up. The Bajoran Colonel just managed to hobble to her bed where she promptly fell asleep, too exhausted even to cry.

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Nerys awoke the next afternoon to the sunlight streaming onto her body through the windows. Before she was fully conscious, Alsasia bustled in.

"Oh, I'm so happy to see that you're finally awake," the older woman commented. "You gave us quite a scare at first. When the maid saw all that blood, she nearly gave you up for dead."

Nerys moaned and hid her face in the pillow as the effects of the previous night grew perfectly clear.

"Now don't worry, you're healthy; you can always have another. This one just wasn't meant to be."

The housekeeper called a maid for Nerys' breakfast. She stopped and looked long at the woman in the bed.

"We're lucky we didn't lose you. If you'd just called one of us, we could have called a doctor. I couldn't imagine going through that kind of trauma alone," she sighed. Then Alsasia seemed to come to herself. "Nevertheless, it's done and you've survived it."

At that point the maid came in with a tray of food and placed it by Nerys' bed. The housekeeper finished her bustling and left the room soon after the maid. Nerys was left alone again to face her demons.