Nightshade - Laurell K. Hamilton [13]
‘You know no one is to enter this place on the night of a birth. You know that.”
The second guard, Breck, went down on one knee beside the first.
‘Dr. Zhir, Colonel Talanne gave orders that the ambassador is to be denied nothing. He is to have full access.”
‘I am sure she did not mean for you to bring strangers into our holy places.”
Picard stepped forward. “Dr. Zhir, we meant no harm. My counselor was awakened by the pain of one of your patients. We want only to help.”
Doctor Zhir laughed, an abrupt, bitter sound. “Help? You cannot help us. No one can help us, Federation Ambassador. Our sins are too great.” She hugged the tiny orange bundle to her chest. it made a small protesting sound, almost a cry.
‘We are here to stop the war, Doctor. Surely that will help.”
‘Stop the war if you can, but it is too late for our race.”
‘I do not understand, Doctor,” Picard said.
‘What sort of healer are you?”
‘I would be called a mind-healer,” Troi said.
Zhir nodded, slowly. “Then you know what is in this room. You know what our greed and hatred have done to the children.”
Troi shook her head. “The guards say the babies in the tanks are dead.” She glanced at Picard. “We don’t understand.”
‘I think it is too late, Ambassador. I think that even if peace happens tomorrow that race is doomed, but you don’t believe that, do you?”
‘No, Doctor, I don’t. You will find most humans believe a great deal in hope,” Picard said.
Zhir stood a little straighter. Her thin face became smooth and calm. She had made some sort of decision, and with it came a moment of peace. “Come, Ambassador, let me show you why I have given up on hope. Look upon the sins of Oriana.”
‘Doctor, it is forbidden,” the first guard said.
‘I am a doctor, I am allowed, and they are strangers. Our laws do not hold them.”
‘Are you sure, Doctor?”
‘Colonel Talanne said to show them everything. Well, by the withered leaf, I shall.”
The two guards still kneeling on the floor laid their foreheads on their bent knees. They covered their faces with their gloved hands.
Zhir stepped around the kneeling guards to stand next to Picard.
Worf started to move between them, but Picard waved him back. “It’s all right, Lieutenant, I trust her.”
Doctor Zhir stared at him for a moment, a puzzled expression on her face. “You are either a fool or a wise man to be able to decide who to trust.”
‘We come to make peace for your people, Doctor. Trust must begin somewhere.”
She nodded. “Yes.” She stared at Troi. “The guard said you were a healer. Is that true?”
‘I am a healer of the mind, yes.”
The doctor laughed, that same abrupt and almost ugly sound. “Oh, we need such healers as yourself. There is so much I cannot heal. Perhaps you could alter their minds so they do not care if they are healed or not.”
‘I would be glad to help in any way I can.”
‘Do not promise until you see the task I set you, Healer,” Zhir said. “Come closer, you and the Federation ambassador, come and see what I hold in my arms.”
Troi moved forward to stand shoulder to shoulder with the captain. She felt Zhir’s fear, disgust, anticipation.
Doctor Zhir balanced the orange bundle in the crook of her right arm. With the left hand she began pushing back the cloth. A tiny fist thrust into the air. Tiny feet kicked free of the bundling. Troi leaned forward to touch the smooth reddish skin. Soft, almost furlike in its texture, like that of all newborns.
The cloth fell away from the face. A tiny mouth opened wide with a high-pitched and keening scream. The rest of the face was smooth skin, blank as if all the parts hadn’t been put together yet. No eyes, no nose, only a thin red slit of a mouth.
Picard took a sharp breath. He steadied himself; Troi felt the effort it cost him. “Is this typical?”
‘Typical?” the doctor repeated, “yes and no. We have many deformities. The pollution has contaminated our water, air, the ground. All our food, our world, is poisonous to us. And it does this.” She began to