Forward Momentum -- Chapter 15 (a)

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Chapter Fifteen

The tide of events slowed again following the Birthday extravaganzas, and after the emotional intensity of the ceremonies in Vorbarr Sultana the pilgrims’ visit to Vorkosigan Surleau was quiet and restrained.

With Coram’s strong support and Speaker Penderecki’s reluctant agreement Miles solved the accommod­ation problem by billeting pilgrims on willing villagers, with the distinct bonus of generating, in place of the banquet that would otherwise have been necessary, forty or so individual family meals with guests who agreed to leave off their face-paint and dress down after a tiring day. The impromptu ceremonies themselves went well, in the Gorge, where precision flying of ImpSec aircars supplied by Gregor made access possible for older pilgrims, and in the village square, where Sergeant Barnev was given the bound scroll of his Celestial Warrant by Coram, to warm applause and sly village grins. Coram himself, not obviously emotionally affected, had eyed the terrain with a military wince and clear respect for anyone who fought in it. Miles and Ekaterin left him and Barnev amid a knot of pilgrims and cheerful villagers outside the inn, collected Nikki, left Helen, who had come to observe, and headed back for a pleasantly quiet evening of their own.

The next day Cetagandan-speaking ImpSec diplomatic officers took over guidance of pilgrims who wished to visit other death-sites, liaising with appropriate Counts and authorities. Some ghem returned to Vorbarr Sultana; the rest accepted invitations to stay in Vorkosigan Surleau for a few days-an excellent sign, Miles thought. Barnev might yet have more company than he expected on his promised visit to Eta Ceta, if transport could be subsidised. Then he remembered he could do more than that, for the reason Gregor had told him to contact Master Tsipis was that he had assigned two points of the gross revenue-stream from Chandler’s technologies to the Vorkosigan Countship in perpetuity. There wasn’t yet much on tap, but there would soon be a very great deal. Tsipis had been beside himself, and Miles had been very grateful for his District while wondering what his Da would say at this access of profit. But he also found himself possessed of a great desire to talk about Gregor’s largesse with Mark, to whom money and its possibilities made instinctive sense.

After lunch Miles had just managed to divert Helen from his own biography with his Gran’da’s old muster-rolls, upon which Coram fell with a military historian’s interest, when the Cetagandan’s wrist-com lit up. After a brief conversation in very formal mode, Coram turned to him with a look of deep surprise. “Miles, did you know the haut Palma wishes to visit you here tomorrow?”

Palma had contacted him on the day after their conversation at the Residence to agree a date. Miles had taken advantage of her still evident discomfort to slip in a further request, and had yet another pending if the opportunity were to arise. “Ah, yes, Ferrant. There are some genetic matters on which we are consulting. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to warn you before but I was asked to wait on your own embassy.”

Coram nodded politely, and though clearly curious was not in the habit of questioning what a planetary consort decided to do. He did, however, take unobtrusive but Miles had no doubt very careful note the next day, after politely greeting haut Palma, when unmarked ImpSec lightflyers brought Harra Csurik and Enrique Burgos to discreet meetings with the geneticist. Harra emerged after an hour to look at Miles with a mixture of respect, wonder, and love that was like the heat of a fire.

“Not just my head in the stars, little man, but my womb with it.” Then she frowned. “She said the Emperor knows who I am.”

“He does, Harra. You are His pride, as you are mine. Will you and Lem do this? Do you see what it will mean, if you do?”

“Oh yes, we see, and we will do. And every child in the mountains will know and tell their mothers.”

After that there was Enrique Burgos to deal with, who emerged after rather longer spent with a very embubbled Palma to stare with bulging eyes, so astonished his awe of Miles was temporarily banished. “How did you do that, Miles? Who is she really? Why is she in that bubble? She’s amazing. She said the Sigma Cetan bacteria can be adapted as we need, using techniques I can’t begin to understand and she’ll send someone to do the sequencing work. And she said my equations were nearly right and she can correct them and my girls can grow their own internal frames if they’re given an iron source in ovo, but will then need tuning, which I don’t understand at all either. And she said-”

Ekaterin, amused at her vision of Enrique meeting a haut bubble on his doorstep coming so nearly true, gently guided him, still babbling, to a waiting Martya Koudelka. Miles went into Palma, who snapped her bubble off as he closed the door and looked at him with unreadable eyes.

“Thank you, haut Palma. Is all well?”

“Well enough. That man is a very intelligent geneticist for one with only Escobaran training.” Suddenly she smiled, face transfigured into the vivacity Miles remembered from a decade ago. “His whole bug idea is as peculiar a combination as your tractor-bubbles, but it’s clever and can be made to work. It will also, I suspect, prove very efficient, as living organisms tend to be. We of the Star Crèche must consider bio-cleanup of radioactivity more closely and direct ghem research. There are other places that could use a version of this, particularly with frame technology to absorb particle energies, which he said was your idea.”

Miles bowed. When he straightened Palma had lost her smile. “But Harra Csurik is astonishing to me, in strength and focus. She has little technical vocabulary but her memory is exact and her turns of phrase vividly clear. If she is a fair sample of your mountain-people, no wonder the ghem lost so badly here. And her personal story … forgive me, I did not altogether believe what you had said, but it was so. The first-born child had a common morpho-”

“Raina. Her name was Raina.”

Palma stared at him, unused to interruption, then nodded. “Yes, you are right, she was human life. Raina had a common morphogenetic error, as I believe you understand. I would guess Harra’s childhood and gravid malnutrition were factors. The nameless embryo she miscarried last year, however, plainly had far more serious spinal morphogenetic failure, and with what is known of two of her murdered siblings confirms deeper genomic damage affecting her gametes. I will do the work for her myself, as soon as possible, but I will have to check both gametes separately. I have told her what is needed. Will you arrange transport of the cryopackage to Rho Ceta through the embassy?”

“With all my heart.”

“That, I begin to realise, Lord Vorkosigan, is in your case an unusally large organ.” Miles blinked and Palma smiled again. “There was, you know, much dismay at your appearance in the Celestial Garden ten years ago, amid the wreckage of the Celestial Lady Lisbet’s plan.” Her voice lightly mocked herself. “An outlander male, and, forgive me, a damaged one at that, forcing us to face political facts in our innermost sanctum, and to be thankful first for his intrusion, then his help. Since that day more of us than the Handmaiden have studied your file attentively, as it has grown ever thicker.”

Miles wasn’t at all sure what to say to that, so he bowed slightly, and when the silence continued shrugged. “That was then, haut Palma, and Admiral Naismith another man, suited only to past occasions. My file can now gather more dust and less weight.”

She laughed aloud, shocking him. “Hardly. After these last months it will exceed your father’s, I should think, and that is enormous. No out­lander genome in the Nexus will be considered more thoroughly. And I should not be surprised, Lord Vorkosigan-Miles-if one of these days you find the Star Crèche has called you up. A human line than can do in only three generations what Vorkosigans have done is not to be ignored.”

He would not gape. To be called up for possible inclusion in the genome of the next haut generation was the highest honour possible for a Cetagandan, and that Miles had borne the force of emotions Palma obviously felt for Harra Csurik and the lives in his and his father’s care she represented.

“Speechless, for once? I must tell Fletchir.”

He recovered his wits and made a snap decision. “Surprised, certainly. You will know, I think, about my conversation with Vanos Kariam some weeks ago.”

“Yes.”

“I spoke of my brother, and spoke truly. But my deepest personal motives in this have far more to do with my father. And with Harra. It is because she kept my feet on the ground when I tried to float away that I have been able to look steadily at the stars. And there is another woman, also.” He produced a data-file and cryosample, and handed them to her. “Given her presence at my wedding, if nothing else, I would imagine your file on me contains information on Sergeant Taura?”

“The … large Jacksonian woman you collected eight years ago?”

Miles smiled mirthessly. “It must be a good file. Yes. Taura was designed by Hugh Canaba for House Bharaputra in 2780 as a super soldier. To give her speed they set her metabolism astonishingly high but did not bother to correct for cellular effects. Dendarii surgeons and the Durona group have adjusted her bio­chemistry as best they can and bought her some years, but they are already beyond their limits, and she is close to hers. Is there anything you could do?”

“Ah. Maybe not. Such an altered genome is usually very fragile. But I will look for you.”

This time he bowed to her deeply, and then met her gaze. “Thank you, haut lady. Palma.”

The silence returned, more easily. At last Palma nodded slowly, her eyes smiling. “Damsels in distress. I mind me the Handmaiden said you once defended her to Fletchir himself, and flatly corrected him when he rebuked you. That was … bolder than you know. And though you speak of serving your father in all this, in doing so you serve your mother also, I think, perhaps even before him. I understand, by the way, that you will find Count Vorkosigan’s health much improved, though there are limits to what we can do.”

They parted on better terms than Miles would have thought possible after her sharpness at the summit. After seeing Palma’s unmarked Cetagandan embassy aircar leave trailing its equally unmarked ImpSec escorts, he returned well content to the animated historical discussion of his Gran’da’s irregular mountain cavalry that Coram and Helen had resumed in the library, with an intrigued Nikki and more politely attentive Ekaterin as audience.

The pilgrims left next day, and would return to Eta Ceta within the week. Slowly late summer routines returned as his neglected genetics committee reclaimed his time in tedious capital meetings and hearings on fine points during the weeks. Ekaterin grew absorbed in Vorkosigan Surleau with summer schoolwork and plans for the gardens there. Nikki’s pairing with Roic worked out well, the Armsman giving village children classes borrowed from his training in Hassadar, while himself learning field- and woodcraft with them. Initially isolated in the village by his urban childhood and street-police background, he was now a favourite of children and parents alike, boosting self-confidence.

Haut Palma’s mission departed, to be replaced by a much larger, lower-ranking group to pursue with all and sundry the monstrous trades and tariffs treaty. At the same time his parents returned from Eta Ceta to Sergyar, to what his Ma, using her new frame-link from the Viceregal residence, dryly called a noisy frontier reception, adding that Chaos Colony was living up to its nickname and would he please refrain from dragging his parents away from it again in the near future? Both she and his Da were exhausted from the diplomatic strains of their long stint amid the alien corn; once news broke the curiosity of respectful ghem-officers wanting to meet Viceroy Count Vorkosigan had been sufficiently intense to become a burden. But his Da’s health was vastly better, beneath tiredness, and he admitted to feeling ten years younger. What exactly Rian had done not even his Ma was quite sure, but while the Empress had warned her miracles could not be expected it was clear that beyond powerful retrogenetic treatment of some kind cellular damage from long space service had been repaired, and there had been a resetting of Aral’s metabolic clock. Within a few weeks he looked better still and turned animated attention to interfer­ing by frame in the military planning and construction formal announce­ment of the joint fleet had kicked into overdrive in Barrayaran and Komarran shipyards, as well as working quietly on inner plans for the invasion he would command.

University and school years restarted, drawing them back to Vorbarr Sultana. Nikki and his Cetagandan friend found themselves more popular in school than they would ever have believed possible, while Helen began to have what sounded like a very good time convening and chairing a committee to supervise setting up the new institute. Ekaterin, however, had a less joyful return, finding to her dismay that with few exceptions her classmates did not cope well with the fame summer had given her, nor the precise shaping of psyches and power they had seen in the dawn broadcast from the Occupation Memorial, now emotionally valued by both Barrayarans and galactics and fast becoming one of the most visited sites in the capital. After a few weeks her discontent spilled over one night, after Nikki’s departure for bed left her alone with Miles and a purring, almost full-grown ImpSec curled on his lap.

“It’s as if I’m not me anymore. They don’t even hear what I say, like that nincompoop Vassily Vorsoisson.”

Miles regarded her steadily. “Not quite. They have no power over you or Nikki.”

Ekaterin blinked. “Well, no. But-”

“And I don’t think it is the same, love. Vassily is a self-important young idiot, but nice enough when not having poison poured in his ears. When he looked at you he saw nothing, because he had no eyes to see. Your classmates are dazzled because they have seen you, and your power. They’ll settle. The important thing is not to change yourself one jot on their behalf. Just go on as you were.”

“Alright, that makes sense. But really, love-one of them has asked me for a job already.”

“And was it someone you would wish to hire?”

“What? No, not at all.”

“But it could have been. In which case you could have done. If you wanted. This particular person sounds crass, but the question is not necessarily impertinent.”

“Oh. Well, perhaps not, but I don’t want to hire any of them right now.”

Miles grinned, hands gently stroking ImpSec’s mottled head. “I’m not sure you can blame them for trying, though they score for tactlessness. But if you’ve gone off your classmates slightly this is probably a good time to tell you that as well as Dag and the Cetagandan ambassador, Gregor and Laisa are coming to your graduation. They insist.” She looked aghast. He ploughed on. “And Ma and Da, who are coming for Winterfair. Mark and Kareen will be back from Beta. Georg will be on the platform, of course, because it’s a science class graduating, but Helen will be with us. Simon and Alys couldn’t be kept away with stunners. Whom else would you like to invite?”

Ekaterin’s face was frozen. “I thought I was only allowed two guests.”

He looked at her lovingly. “Not any more. And it’s not unearned privilege, love. It’s not even privilege earned twice over. It’s a function of revealed power. You once said people constellated around me. But they are constellating around you now. You can’t stop it any more than you can stop plants seeking the sun. So use it.”

“How?”

“Up to you. Do you want to invite your Da and Stepma and brothers? Vassily? Tien’s mother? Enrique?” He fluttered eyelashes at her and drew a laugh.

“It’s all very well, Miles, but my poor Da would be-”

“Delighted?” He watched her as she struggled to accept that, how­ever surprised and embarrassed, her Da, a most unimaginative and loyal rural Vor, would be delighted. Profoundly uncomprehending, and probably reduced to an even smaller conversational repertoire than usual, but delighted all the same. What parent would not be? He offered her the final straw, or last solace. “Do you know who, quite accidentally, fixed this notion in Gregor’s mind even before your coups of the summer?”

She gestured at him with an ImpSec-style bat of the hand, echoed from Miles’s lap, but suddenly looked thoughtful. “You mean Nikki.”

“Yes. He finds it hard to show you, but he is so proud of you it bubbles out all over when you’re not there. His Cetagandan friend is also very admiring, he says. From whose da, by the way, we can expect an invitation for some face-painting any day now.”

Maternal priorities kicked in, and Ekaterin slowly acquiesced. If she were honest with herself recognition wasn’t unwelcome, only flustering; residual vertigo from apogee, she decided, and let it go. She also had an upcoming space travel and survival course to consider, then survive in exhausted triumph. Her guest-list, though, once finally cooked-up, was unusual, including not only all those Miles had suggested but Ma Kosti, Armsman Roic and Sergeant Taura, Master Tsipis, the Koudelka Commando with partners and parents, Estelle, and Lady Vorob’yev (whose husband, urgently recalled from retirement, was on Eta Ceta). At Nikki’s insistence she added, for the party afterwards, his Cetagandan friend and the boy’s parents. Miles raised an eyebrow but asked no questions. The mixture appealed to him and one at least of her choices suited him well, he thought, as he made necessary arrange­ments with the Dendarii through Allegre Otherwise, outside family, running checks on the progress of various plans, and such happy obligations as his seizure stimulator, his time was spent hog-wrestling the genetics committee towards conclusion, until two weeks before Winter­fair and one before the end of the semester with its graduation cere­monies he made an appointment and staggered dramatically into the Imperial Residence to deposit five fat data-discs on Gregor’s desk.

“There you go, Sire. A 143-page law with more than 44,000 pages of citations, agreed in precise detail by every last one of the gurning lunatics you put on that committee, including me. It’s wordily dull and in spite of everything reliably sane. My mother will say Barrayarans loudly, but secretly she’ll be quite pleased. In its provisions everyone is granted full ownership and control of their own genome, which means women’s legal standing is massively enhanced and you will have to deal with the implicit over­turning of automatic paternal custody of sons and maternal custody of daughters in favour of individual assessment. Additionally, Vormuir is cooked several times over, René Vorbretten could not have been impeached without your permission, and Dono Vorrutyer would have had a much easier time of it. The new haut institute at ImpMil is not mentioned, anywhere. Don’t ever do this to me again.”

Gregor looked at him with little sympathy but much respect. “Thank you, my Lord Auditor. It shall be enacted as fast as We can sign it in Council. On the other hand, Miles, what exactly are you grumbling about? Do you realise you had the same effect on that committee as Vorhalas has had on everyone for the last thirty years when it comes to morals in politics?”

“I do, and used it shamelessly, not to mention illogically, especially with Counts Vorkalloner and Vorpatril, or we should all still be arguing about something on page two. Falco in particular cannot quite bring himself to address the finer points of embryonic biochemistry. Using myself in that way is exactly what I don’t want to do again. Ever.”

“Well, that’s pretty much what you have to do with the Marilacans, isn’t it?”

“Oh, fiddlesticks.”

Gregor grinned. “Naismith Rides Again. Does Ekaterin know it’s a busman’s galactic honeymoon you’re offering her?”

“More or less.”

“Meaning not at all.”

“Meaning more or less. She knows I have political business on Marilac, and that she’s getting a very personal tour of the Celestial Garden, followed by a nice long visit to Terra. She understands we’re taking a riverboat with Tung up something surprisingly long called the Amazon, and”-Miles found his sweet smile-“that on the way back, if the timing works, we shall be collecting passengers. Including Elena, Elli, Rowan Durona, and Taura, all of whom Ekaterin looks forward to meeting or seeing again. While Rian, of course, will be meeting us there. Beat that, Gregor the Great.”

Gregor actually doubled up laughing for a few seconds, and sobered only with difficulty. “Miles, I don’t have that many ex-girlfriends to try Laisa with. I wish. Though actually, come to think of it, rather you than me. When they all gang up on you, you’ll be toast.”

“A fate to which I look forward. In any case, there’s going to be a mighty show to distract them.”

“Heh. And I hadn’t forgotten you had improbably redeemed your promise of twenty-…six years ago. I believe I owe you, what was it? a shield with your choice of arms.”

“Yes. But I already have one. Several, in fact.”

“So what do you want?”

“Do you know, not much of anything more anyone can give.” Miles reflected a moment. “Though I have been wondering whether to ask you for permission to swear an Armswoman rather than Armsman for the next vacancy. Banharov wants to retire, I’m told, and Ekaterin deserves her own Drou, don’t you think? Most Progressives would acquiesce, and perhaps a few others. A bare majority, anyway.”

“Miles, if any Progressive didn’t agree to vote for Fat Ninny when you recommended it I’d be seriously surprised. And that’s a permission I’m happy to give.” He frowned. “Do you think it needs a Council vote?”

“Depends how you read the preamble to Vorloupulous’s Law. Check with the lawyers. You could get away with it just now, I fancy, but a vote might be better all the same.”

“Mmm. I’ll certainly put the question to the lawyers. Do you have someone in mind?”

“Sort of. But … it’s uncertain. Off all records?”

“Of course.”

“Taura. Palma Robine says even the haut can’t fix her as such, but they can give her a choice of sorts. If they slow her metabolism and disconnect it from physical speed, they can give her maybe three decades. She’d be a lot less voracious and would have to work hard to keep muscle mass in shape. She’d still be fast by ordinary standards but too slow for combat work, given what she’s been. But not too slow for this, if it was something she wanted. The problem, of course, is she’s not District-born, but then she wasn’t really born at all.”

Gregor absorbed this. “Would she want? And have you asked your Da?”

“Yes. He’s willing to stretch a point, and not just in gratitude for saving Ekaterin-he can see what a potent figure she’d be, in livery or out. What Taura will want, I really don’t know. But I owe her the choice, now I can offer it. And Armsman Roic might be an attraction for her.”

“Really?”

“Yes. They became lovers after saving Ekaterin, I think. They surely spent the days together, he certainly dotes on her, and it isn’t only wistful yearning I hear in his voice. Palma also tells me, which I was horrified to realise I’d never checked, thatTaura would not pass on most of her problems to any children.”

Gregor whistled. “Brave man, Roic. And lucky man. Well, if she wants to become a Barrayaran she has my permission to swear allegiance to you in any capacity you think of, and bother the Council. Please tell her also, Miles, if she just wants a pension and a house they are hers for the asking. If ImpSec doesn’t pay, I will.”

Miles smiled love, gratitude, and uncertain, half-hoping sadness for Taura’s created fate. “That’s a deal.”

* * * * *