Mirror dance (27 page)

"I disagree," said Countess Vorkosigan unexpectedly. "You were set up for it, Mark. But not by Galen."

The Count raised his brows in startled inquiry.

"By Miles, I'm afraid," she explained. "Quite inadvertently."

"I don't see it," said the Count.

Mark felt the same way. "I was only in contact with Miles for a few days, on Earth."

"I'm not sure you're ready for this, but here goes. You had exactly three role models to learn how to be a human being from. The Jacksonian body-slavers, the Komarran terrorists—and Miles. You were
steeped
in Miles. And I'm sorry, but Miles thinks he's a knight-errant. A rational government wouldn't allow him possession of a pocket-knife, let alone a space fleet. And so, Mark, when you were finally forced to choose between two palpable evils and a lunatic—you upped and ran after the lunatic."

"I think Miles does very well," objected the Count.

"Agh." The Countess buried her face in her hands, briefly. "Love, we are discussing a young man upon whom Barrayar laid so much unbearable stress, so much pain, he created an entire other personality to escape into. He then persuaded several thousand galactic mercenaries to support his psychosis, and on top of that conned the Barrayaran Imperium into paying for it all. Admiral Naismith is one hell of a lot more than just an ImpSec cover identity, and you know it. I grant you he's a genius, but don't you dare try to tell me he's sane." She paused. "No. That's not fair. Miles's safety valve works. I won't really begin to fear for his sanity till he's cut off from the little admiral. It's an extraordinary balancing act, in all." She glanced at Mark. "And a nearly impossible act to follow, I should think."

Mark had never thought of Miles as seriously crazed; he'd only thought of him as perfect. This was all highly unsettling.

"The Dendarii truly function as a covert operations arm of ImpSec," said the Count, looking a bit unsettled himself. "Spectacularly well, on occasion."

"Of course they do. You wouldn't let Miles keep them if they didn't, so he makes sure of it. I merely point out that their official function is not their only function. And—if Miles ever ceases to need them, it won't be a year before ImpSec finds reason to cut that tie. And you'll all earnestly believe you are acting perfectly logically."

Why weren't they blaming him . . . ? He mustered the courage to ask it aloud. "Why aren't you blaming me for killing Miles?"

With a glance, the Countess fielded the question to her husband, who nodded and answered. For them both? "Illyan's report stated Miles was shot by a Bharaputran security trooper."

"But he wouldn't have been in the line of fire if I hadn't—"

Count Vorkosigan held up an interrupting hand. "If he hadn't foolishly chosen to be. Don't attempt to camouflage your real blame by taking more than your share. I've made too many lethal errors myself to be fooled by that one." He glanced at his boots. "We have also considered the long view. While your personality and persona are clearly distinct from Miles's, any children you sire would be genetically indistinguishable. Not you, but your son, may be what Barrayar needs."

"Only to continue the Vor system," Countess Vorkosigan put in dryly. "A dubious goal, love. Or are you picturing yourself as a grandfatherly mentor to Mark's theoretical children, as your father was to Miles?"

"God forbid," muttered the Count fervently.

"Beware your own conditioning." She turned to Mark. "The trouble is . . ." she looked away, looked back, "if we fail to recover Miles, what you will be facing is not just a relationship. It's a job. At a minimum, you'd be responsible for the welfare of a couple of million people in your District; you would be their Voice in the Council of Counts. It's a job Miles was trained for literally from birth; I'm not sure it's possible to send in a last-minute substitute."

Surely not, oh, surely not.
 

"I don't know," said the Count thoughtfully. "
I
was such a substitute. Until I was eleven years old I was the spare, not the heir. I admit, after my older brother was murdered, the rush of events made the shift in destinies easy for me. We were all so intent on revenge, in Mad Yuri's War. By the time I looked up and drew breath again, I'd fully assimilated the fact I would be Count someday. Though I scarcely imagined that someday would be another fifty years. It's possible you too, Mark, could have many years to study and train. But it's also possible my Countship could land in your lap tomorrow."

The man was seventy-two standard years old, middle-aged for a galactic, old for harsh Barrayar. Count Aral had used himself hard; had he used himself nearly up? His father Count Piotr had lived twenty years more than that, a whole other lifetime. "Would Barrayar even accept a clone as your heir?" he asked doubtfully.

"Well, it's past time to start developing laws one way or the other. Yours would be a major test case. With enough concentrated will, I could probably ram it down their throats—"

Mark didn't doubt that.

"But starting a legal war is premature, till things sort themselves out with the missing cryo-chamber. For now, the public story is that Miles is away on duty, and you are visiting for the first time. All true enough. I need scarcely emphasize that the details are classified."

Mark shook his head and nodded in agreement, feeling dizzy. "But—is this necessary? Suppose I'd never been created, and Miles was killed in the line of duty somewhere. Ivan Vorpatril would be your heir."

"Yes," said the Count, "and House Vorkosigan would come to an end, after eleven generations of direct descent."

"What's the problem with that?"

"The problem is that it is not the case. You do exist. The problem is . . . that I have always wanted Cordelia's son to be my heir. Note, we're discussing rather a lot of property, by ordinary standards."

"I thought most of your ancestral lands glowed in the dark, after the destruction of Vorkosigan Vashnoi."

The Count shrugged. "Some remain. This residence, for example. But my estate is not just property; as Cordelia puts it, it comes with a full-time job. If we allow your claim upon it, you must allow its claim upon you."

"You can keep it all," said Mark sincerely. "I'll sign anything."

The Count winced.

"Consider it orientation, Mark," said the Countess. "Some of the people you may encounter will be thinking much about these questions. You simply need to be aware of the unspoken agendas."

The Count acquired an abstracted look; he let out his breath in a slow trickle. When he looked up again his face was frighteningly serious. "That's true. And there's one agenda that is not only unspoken, it's unspeakable. You must be warned."

So unspeakable Count Vorkosigan was having trouble spitting it out himself, apparently. "What now?" asked Mark warily.

"There is a . . . false theory of descent, one of six possible lines, that puts me next in line to inherit the Barrayaran Imperium, should Emperor Gregor die without issue."

"Yes," said Mark impatiently, "of course I knew. Galen's plot turned on exploiting that legal argument. You, then Miles, then Ivan."

"Yes, well now it's me, then Miles, then you, then Ivan. And Miles is—technically—dead at the moment. That leaves only me between you, and being targeted. Not as an imitation Miles, but in your own right."

"That's
rubbish
," exploded Mark. "That's even crazier than the idea of my becoming Count Vorkosigan!"

"Hold that thought," advised the Countess. "Hold it hard, and never even hint that you could think otherwise."

I am fallen among madmen.
 

"If anyone approaches you with a conversation on the subject, report it to me, Cordelia, or Simon Illyan as soon as possible," the Count added.

Mark had retreated as far back into his chair as he could go. "All right. . . ."

"You're scaring him, dear," the Countess remarked.

"On
that
topic, paranoia is the key to good health," said the Count ruefully. He watched Mark silently for a moment. "You look tired. We'll show you to your room. You can wash up and rest a bit."

They all rose. Mark followed them out to the paved hallway. The Countess nodded to an archway leading straight back under the curved stairway. "I'm going to take the lift tube up and see Elena."

"Right," the Count agreed. Mark perforce followed him up the stairs. Two flights let him know how out of shape he was. By the time they reached the second landing he was breathing as heavily as the old man. The Count turned down a third floor hallway.

Mark asked in some dread, "You're not putting me in Miles's room, are you?"

"No. Though the one you're getting was mine, once, when I was a child."

Before the death of his older brother, presumably. The second son's room. That was almost as unnerving.

"It's just a guest room, now." The Count swung open another blank wooden door on hinges. Beyond it lay a sunny chamber. Obviously hand-made wooden furniture of uncertain age and enormous value included a bed and chests; a domestic console to control lighting and the mechanized windows sat incongruously beside the carved headboard.

Mark glanced back, and collided with the Count's deeply questioning stare. It was a thousand times worse than even the Dendarii's I-love-Naismith look. He clenched his hands to his head, and grated, "Miles isn't in here!"

"I know," said the Count quietly. "I was looking for . . . myself, I suppose. And Cordelia. And you."

Uncomfortably compelled, Mark looked for himself in the Count, reciprocally. He wasn't sure. Hair color, formerly; he and Miles shared the same dark hair he had seen on vids of the younger Admiral Vorkosigan. Intellectually, he'd known Aral Vorkosigan was the old General Count Piotr Vorkosigan's younger son, but that lost older brother had been dead for sixty years. He was astonished the present Count remembered with such immediacy, or made of it a connection with himself. Strange, and frightening.
I was to kill this man. I still could. He's not guarding himself at all.
 

"Your ImpSec people didn't even fast-penta me. Aren't you at all worried that I might still be programmed to assassinate you?" Or did he seem so little threat?

"I thought you shot your father-figure once already. Catharsis enough." A bemused grimace curved the Count's mouth.

Mark remembered Galen's surprised look, when the nerve-disruptor beam had taken him full in the face. Whatever Aral Vorkosigan would look like, dying, Mark fancied it would not be surprised.

"You saved Miles's life then, according to his description of the affray," the Count said. "You chose your side two years ago, on Earth. Very effectively. I have many fears for you, Mark, but my death at your hand is not one of them. You're not as one-down with respect to your brother as you imagine. Even-all, by my count."

"Progenitor. Not brother," said Mark, stiff and congealed.

"Cordelia and I are your progenitors," said the Count firmly.

Denial flashed in Mark's face.

The Count shrugged. "Whatever Miles is, we made him. You are perhaps wise to approach us with caution. We may not be good for you, either."

His belly shivered with a terrible longing, restrained by a terrible fear. Progenitors.
Parents.
He was not sure he wanted parents, at this late date. They were such enormous figures. He felt obliterated in their shadow, shattered like glass, annihilated. He felt a sudden weird wish to have Miles back. Somebody his own size and age, somebody he could talk to.

The Count glanced again into the bedchamber. "Pym should have arranged your things."

"I don't have any things. Just the clothes I'm wearing . . . sir." It was impossible to keep his tongue from adding that honorific.

"You must have had something more to wear!"

"What I brought from Earth, I left in a storage locker on Escobar. The rent's up by now, it's probably confiscated."

The Count looked him over. "I'll send someone to take your measurements, and supply you with a kit. If you were visiting under more normal circumstances, we would be showing you around. Introducing you to friends and relatives. A tour of the city. Getting you aptitude tests, making arrangements for furthering your education. We'll do some of that, in any case."

A school? What kind? Assignment to a Barrayaran military academy was very close to Mark's idea of a descent into hell. Could they make him . . . ? There were ways to resist. He had successfully resisted being lent Miles's wardrobe.

"If you want anything, ring for Pym on your console," the Count instructed.

Human servants. So very strange. The physical fear that had turned him inside out was fading, to be replaced by a more formless general anxiety. "Can I get something to eat?"

"Ah. Please join Cordelia and me for lunch in one hour. Pym will show you to the Yellow Parlor."

"I can find it. Down one floor, one corridor south, third door on the right."

The Count raised an eyebrow. "Correct."

"I've studied you, you see."

"That's all right. We've studied you, too. We've all done our homework."

"So what's the test?"

"Ah, that's the trick of it. It's not a test. It's real life."

And real death.
"I'm sorry," Mark blurted. For Miles? For himself? He scarcely knew.

The Count looked like he was wondering too; a brief ironic smile twitched one corner of his mouth. "Well . . . in a strange way, it's almost a relief to know that it's as bad as it can be. Before, when Miles was missing, one didn't know where he was, what he might be doing to, er, magnify the chaos. At least this time we know he can't possibly get into any worse trouble."

With a brief wave, the Count walked away, not entering the room after Mark, not crowding him in any way. Three ways to kill him flashed through Mark's mind. But that training seemed ages stale. He was too out of shape now anyway. Climbing the stairs had exhausted him. He pulled the door shut and fell onto the carved bed, shivering with reaction.

Ostensibly to allow Mark to recover from jump-lag, the Count and Countess set no tasks for him the first two days. Indeed, except for the rather formal mealtimes, Mark did not see Count Vorkosigan at all. He wandered the house and grounds at will, with no apparent guard but the Countess's discreet observation of him. There were uniformed guards at the gates; he did not yet have the nerve to test and discover if they were charged to keep him in as well as unauthorized persons out.