fic:: the winter here is cold, and bitter 2/2 [Vorkosigan]
In two parts because of LJ's posting limits.
fic:: the winter here is cold, and bitter
by Raven
17,000w, Vorkosigan - for trigger warnings please see part one.
back to part one
"That," Simon said, slamming the viewer down on the table, "was rank amateurism."
She glanced at him. "In a minute, Simon. What would you like?"
He blinked for a second, then said, "Soup. With coriander."
She got up and went to the tiny counter to order it, leaving Simon at the table by the window. From where he was sitting, with his back to the wall and the whole space of the little café in front of him, he could take a broad view of his surroundings. It was quiet, but they weren't the only customers. On the other side of the plate glass, the snow was building up in drifts as the wind howled through the narrow lanes of the old caravanserai district. Even here on its gentrifying edge, it looked much further than ten minutes' walk from ImpSec HQ. It was lunchtime. Simon wasn't sure when had been the last time he'd taken an hour for lunch.
After five minutes she returned, setting down a bowl of hot vegetable soup with coriander leaves floating in it in front of him. He sipped it slowly, letting it warm him through. It was a quiet place, this, within and without, and he could feel something of that quiet begin to permeate through him. It was best to meet in public, but even without that concern, the time away from ImpSec surveillance was liberating.
She asked, "Where are your lovely agents today? A very decorative pair, those two."
Simon smiled. "I gave them the slip. Helps keep my faculties sharp, after all. Besides," he added reflectively, "even in my case, it's easier to believe I have a secret lover, than…"
She gave him a predatory smile in return. "Now, you were talking about amateurism."
"This." Simon turned around the viewer to show her. Komarr had a more active media than Barrayar, and the headline and article had landed in the hands of ImpSec intelligence gatherers approximately ten minutes after going to press. He read out, from memory: "'Pro-independence group Komarrans For A Free Komarr have published the image below, declaring it evidence that Imperial Regent Aral Vorkosigan, otherwise Butcher of Komarr, has been pursuing high-ranked members of Komarran society, pushing a pro-Barrayaran agenda in exchange for personal favours…' Personal, italicised. They might as well have replaced it with 'sexual' and be done with it."
She peered at it, then at him. "It's all in shadow. It could be anyone."
Simon glanced at the blurred shape in the image. "Believe me, it's him. What kind of arrant idiot sells their damn intelligence to the media?"
"How likely is it that this plan will succeed, now?" she asked flatly. "We did this your way, Simon. No disruptors, just stunners. So sentimental."
"Who wrings the neck of the golden goose?" he demanded, impatiently. "And I never thought the plan would work regardless. But, to just, to just run in like that…"
"You may have to get used to the fact" - her voice hardened - "that we don't do things like you're used to, Simon. And speaking of which…"
"Well?" He took another sip of his soup.
"That was our sweetener; thank you. Now what's it going to take to keep you?"
"Excuse me?'
"Every man has his price," she said, reflectively. "Money, sex, power."
"And elephants," Simon murmured, not sotto voce enough; she looked at him with gentle enquiry until he was forced to explain. "I once…" - he gestured, vaguely - "used one as a kind of lever. My point was, people are rarely that simple."
"Oh, but they are." She smiled at him sidelong; the effect was rather reptilian. "Men throw around their long words, their lofty ideas about themselves: revenge, justice, honour. Seven veils to cover all that has meaning, in the end. And what about you, then? What's your price?"
Simon shrugged, spreading his hands. "Like I said - people are more complicated than that."
"I don't believe it." She sat back in her seat, hands coming together in a gesture that was a conscious echo of his own. "What is it, then? Money? I doubt it. Rumour has it you froze your military rank at captain in echo of Captain Negri, and draw a commensurate pay. You live in the same apartment you lived in as a newly-minted lieutenant. It's not money. Power?"
Simon murmured, "I am Chief of Imperial Security."
"Yes," she said. "The power behind the power behind the throne. But that's less true than it used to be, these days, isn't it?"
The same gesture seemed to be all he was capable of, right then: the spread hands, the shrug of helplessness.
"And, finally," she said, amused, "the last."
"Sex," Simon said, somehow not stopping himself.
She smiled. "There, there, don't worry. It's clear to the dimmest eye what you like, Captain Illyan."
"Is it?" Simon asked, momentarily alarmed. His chip chose that moment to mass-dump images: surveillance tapes, obscenity-based contraband seizures, every dirty magazine he'd seen in the last ten years of Imperial service. He breathed in, and out, once, twice, then raised his hand to his mouth. There was a tiny wound on his index finger, still left from the rose thorn, and it stung.
"Oh, yes." She placed a hand on his shoulder, then took it away. "But most telling of all: you're still here, listening to me. All this is peripheral; we had you when you didn't pick up your shrimp canapé in that ballroom and walk away."
He nodded; it was inarguable. "I have to go. I won't call you."
"I'll call you. Think about it." She looked at him with interest. "Why the coriander? Some deep significance?"
Mutely, he shook his head, picking up his coat and pulling on his gloves, still damp from his earlier walk. "I like the smell."
The snow blew into his ears as he went out into the street.
*
"Information coming in, sir." The voice over the com was recognisable, although Aral couldn't quite at this moment recall the man's name: one of the local analyst staff at ImpSec Komarr, drafted swiftly into the investigation. "Shall I copy it through to you?"
"Give me the gist." Aral stifled a yawn; the day had stretched long, almost through to the following morning given the nineteen-hour Komarran day. Cordelia was awake, but lying on the bed in their cabin with weariness evident in the loose fall of her limbs. "Leave the detail work for the experts."
"Komarrans For A Free Komarr," the man said with distaste. "A pressure group with, ah, ambition. We've had agents pay visits to their local associates and known safehouses. Of course all the birds have flown. We're on it."
"We knew this, Lieutenant," Aral said briskly, making a quick - and from the lack of reaction, accurate - guess at the man's rank. "And I will be breaking orbit soon. Did you have anything fresh to impart? Because if not, then…"
"Yes, sir." The lieutenant sounded suddenly unsure of himself. "Although no one has been physically apprehended, two ImpSec agents took the time to review materials, papers, objects left behind when they went to ground. We've been letting them percolate, lately," he finished, still sounding uncertain. "Let them work up to whatever it is they're planning, without necessarily letting them know we're on to them…"
"All the better to hang them with." Aral was impatient. "And?"
"It's a matter of money." The lieutenant paused. "Since the last time we reviewed their threat status, they've somehow got either a great deal more followers, or… well, we're working on it. But the equipment left behind, the weapons caches… they all speak of some recent, significant cashflow injections. I don't believe we've underestimated them up until now, sir. But we certainly won't in the future."
"I understand," Aral said. "Thank you, Lieutenant."
The crackling connection dissipated. From her horizontal position on the bed, Cordelia said, "The plot thickens."
"I don't like it, Cordelia," Aral said, coming to sit beside her on the edge of the mattress. He rested his head on the pillows for a moment. "ImpSec haven't been saying, and I haven't been asking… but still. Who knew we were here tonight?"
"On Komarr?" Cordelia asked. "It's not an official visit, but it's not a state secret. Probably half of Vorbarr Sultana, in all honesty, not to mention everyone who works for ImpSec everywhere."
"Not that." Aral hesitated. "Here, Cordelia - here in Solstice dome, here on my private mission to suborn the higher echelons of the Komarran government."
"Suborn?" Cordelia raised her eyebrows. "You were telling me, earlier, that it's how the game is played."
"Which is not how the independence groups will put it." Aral took a deep breath, and admitted, "I'm worried. The money…"
Cordelia said nothing, but gripped his hand. "Home soon," she murmured. "Miles will be pleased to have us back."
"Miles," Aral repeated. He hadn't liked to leave Miles for any length of time, agreeing to the short visit to Komarr only after much persuasion and the revelation of Miles's own supreme lack of concern at his parents' temporary absence. "Did we get..."
Cordelia chuckled. "A robotic dog toy, a small set of toy soldiers in historical Komarran colours, and when we were in the ImpSec district office I saw a man go to throw away a mug with a crack in it. I rescued it." She picked it off the table as she spoke; it was a plain black ceramic mug with a heavy base and stylised text wrapping around the handle: we live to serve. Rumour had it that it was Negri's handwriting in the official watermark; Aral knew by sight it was Simon's. "Miles will like it. Maybe the soldiers can have it as a fort."
Aral chuckled. "Not quite six years old, and wants his parents to bring him back his own army."
But never doubts that they will come back, he was thinking, and wondered where and when he'd earned that trust.
*
He'd asked her up for coffee within the radio range of his personal security. The street outside was quiet.
"For a while I thought sex was the answer," she said reflectively, picking up things and putting them down. Kitchen implements, flimsies, his very little in the way of personal possessions: a red scarf draped over the back of a chair, which Cordelia had given him, he dimly recalled; a small icon that had belonged to his mother, an ancient holo next to it of his parents on their wedding day. Each item was placed back exactly in its right place. "'Sex' is inaccurate, perhaps. A certain kind of man - it's obvious, to all but the dimmest observer" - and he could tell by her tone that most Barrayarans would fall into that category - "what he likes. On Beta Colony, there are earrings you could wear to signify it, a mismatch in these terms is so awkward. In your case, however…"
She trailed off. He opened his refrigerator and pulled out a small bottle of milk, not taking his eyes off her reflection in the metal internal surfaces. Without looking round, he said, mildly, "If I'm inviting you up for coffee, then let's make coffee."
"Fine," she said.
"There are no bugs in this apartment," he said, still into the refrigerator. "Not that there should be, but I took my lunch hour and checked."
He heard her laugh. "So efficient, always."
Simon turned; she was still standing right where she had been, upright and straight-backed by the front door. There was nowhere in the place without an almost-direct sightline to the door.
"In my case?" Simon repeated, and sat down in one of his chairs.
She smiled, and placed a hand on his arm. He controlled the reflex to react, and she smiled again before she withdrew, looking brightly around the apartment as though she were appraising it for sale. "A nice little place, soundproof," she said. "And the Betans have catalogues full of props. I could tie you up. Not your hands together - tie you to, let me see, bedposts are classic for a reason. Cut off your clothes, make you scream. And you would, Simon, believe me."
He looked at her. "You could do nothing to me without my…"
She laughed, delightedly. "Consent, Simon? Is that what you were going to say? You catch on quickly. You Barrayarans are such purists, and therein lies the problem."
Simon took a deep breath and put the milk into the coffee.
"You don't want to be hurt. You don't want to be humiliated. You don't want to be fucked - at least, not necessarily." Her eyes lit for a moment. "You don't want to be dominated, at least not in the way the Betans and the rest of the civilised galaxy understand it. You want to be owned. And you have had - as you told me the other day - just two careful owners."
"Lord Vorkosigan and I…"
"I'm informed," she said, cutting smoothly over him, "that old Emperor Ezar sent you against your will to have that chip put in your head. What was the experiment attrition rate?"
"There's just me," he answered, almost automatically, looking down. "There were twenty of us. The rest are dead now, or - or severely delusional." He'd visited them, frequently soon after and more rarely in recent years. Their ramblings seemed random, unparsable to their carers, but he understood half-broken utterances about doubling, about worlds fracturing into real and not-real.
"That self-same chip has tormented you for almost a decade." She spread her hands. "But you returned to Barrayar after that. You have remained with Imperial Security, giving up yourself in service to the Imperial government that had already done you such damage. It's not even that you want to be owned, Simon Illyan; it's that you can't conceive of life without the artefacts and filaments of that whole, soul-deep, bodily ownership."
He tossed back his head and met her gaze. "Your point?"
"My point is this. Whatever love has been lost between you, in the past or just recently, I find it very difficult to believe that you don't remain in the palm of Aral Vorkosigan's hand."
Simon laid down the cup and took several careful steps across the apartment, turned on his heel, stepped back. The stretch of floor by the window bore the marks of frequent pacing, night after night - he'd always considered it an allowable nervous habit. The large window had a force-field sharing space with it, and was made of toughened, projectile-resistant glass, and despite all of those things, was his favourite thing about the tiny living-space: due to an odd depression and ridge in the land the city was built on, here, it commanded an unexpectedly good view of Vorbarr Sultana. The lights of the city were spread out below, under the darting lightflyers and shuttles climbing.
"I can't be responsible for what you choose to believe, or not," he said, his eyes on the moving patterns of light. "But for whatever it's worth to you, I will say this. I'm ready to be free."
*
"HQ, this is Captain Illyan." It wasn't that they wouldn't recognise his voice in an instant, but it was protocol - they were probably checking the incoming route of the call now, standard procedure before listening to a word he said. "I need to speak to whoever's in charge of my personal security detail." The chip would have told him the name, but sometimes it was better to pretend normality.
A moment passed, then: "Captain Illyan, sir, this is Captain Kaverin. How can I help?"
Simon paused to note the non-military niceties in the form of address. "Stand down, Captain. You and your men. You're relieved of duty until tomorrow morning."
"Excuse me, sir?"
Simon sighed. "I know you heard me the first time, Captain."
"Yes, sir. Understood, sir. Can I ask…"
"Call it a vacation," Simon breathed, and cut the link. He took off the wristcom and laid it down on the table, picked up his gloves and his coat and the red scarf, and set out into the cold. ImpSec moved quickly - when he made his usual checks, he wasn't being followed. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and walked on. There had been no fresh snow for a few days, but it was starting again, coming down white and perfect on top of the crunchy brown ice left on the streets. Simon kicked through it absent-mindedly, vaguely aware of the layer building up on his face and hair.
They met in a grubby prole café overlooking a small square of scrubland, towards the east of the city. Simon's own memory provided the fact he'd eaten in places like this many times before, as a schoolboy growing up in the northern provinces. He ordered soup again and knew what it would be like before it came, indistinguishable vegetables and meat but steaming hot and smelling of pepper.
"Good afternoon, Captain Illyan."
"Good afternoon." Simon studied the man, letting his chip take care of recording the fine detail. He noted a flash of familiarity and filed it away for later. "You have the advantage of me, I believe."
The man smiled, but didn't offer his name. "You don't appear surprised to see me."
"I'm not." Simon leaned back in the dirty plastic chair. "I believe I was being… groomed, would that be the term? And that I have not been, ah" - he paused to take in their surroundings, the quiet space of the café - "found wanting."
"Your handler was impressed by you." The man clasped his hands on the table. "I defer to that judgement. You may consider this meeting a gesture of trust."
Simon smiled wryly. "But that's not all there is to it, I suspect."
A pause. "Name your price, Captain Illyan."
The man's straightforwardness was refreshing, Simon decided. He took a moment to answer the question, giving straightforwardness for straightforwardness. "My freedom. From… this life."
He was looking out of the window as he spoke, and it seemed to him for a moment he saw that life, not in the icy clarity of the chip but in the stains and traces left on the snow-encrusted paving stones, in his own footprints bringing him to this winter afternoon, through his own choices and hobbled by his own bonds, step by step by step.
"Done." The man nodded. "Whatever path you choose to your freedom, Simon."
They let that hang for a moment. The snow drifted down past the window; Simon's soup was cooling.
"Now." The man rummaged under the table for something. "Down to business. The Lord Regent and his lady wife return to the capital tomorrow morning. I believe they're going straight to a Residence meeting on agricultural subsidies, of all things."
"That's right." Simon nodded.
The man took his hands out from under the table and laid a simple pen and paper in between them. "I'm not going to ask you to go through the tiresome details of it all. ImpSec shift changes, different routes, perimeter gaps, systematic weaknesses. I'm going to ask you this. If you were doing this, how would you do it?"
Silently, Simon picked up the pen and began to sketch, annotating as he went, occasionally going back over himself to improve small details. It took five minutes. He placed the pen back on the table and looked up.
The man pocketed it. "Thank you. I'll be in touch."
Simon nodded and got up, leaving half the soup behind him. He didn't look back as he went out into the street, the shop bell ringing dismally above him as the door closed.
He walked home through the snow, not covering his head, letting the stored maps on his chip guide him in the absence of his conscious mind. Inside his tiny apartment, he picked up a bottle of maple mead and a weapon.
*
"What's the delay?" Cordelia asked, idly gazing out of the window at the usual businesslike fervour of a city street being cleared for the Lord Regent and his associated hangers-on. "Not that I mind, I'm only curious."
Aral reached out and stroked her hair. "So impatient, dear Captain."
"Believe me, I'm not," Cordelia said, unsuccessfully hiding a yawn behind her other hand. "I'm not even awake yet."
Aral sighed. "I don't believe I am, either." It had been the middle of the night, ship's time, when they returned from Komarr, but the meeting with Vortala hadn't been able to wait: mid-morning in Vorbarr Sultana and representatives from nearly every Southern Continent District to talk about agriculture in the region of the Black Escarpment. Their livelihoods, Aral reminded himself sternly: and if not theirs, then the livelihoods of the millions of people living in those Districts. He yawned again and pulled himself together.
"Still," he said after a moment, "this is getting a little ridiculous. Armsman?"
The tap on the interior glass of the groundcar yielded nothing much; Armsman Esterhazy managed to communicate through a very expressive movement of his shoulders that the reasons for the delay, if there were any, were beyond him. "I heard tell," he said lugubriously, after a moment, "that it was something to do with ImpSec."
"Is there anything in the sight of God and His creation that doesn't, eventually, have something to do with ImpSec?" Aral muttered for Cordelia's ears; she smiled and squeezed his hand as he reached for his wristcom. "Kou, come in. Can you get someone from Illyan's office, please? We're stuck behind some sort of unaccountable traffic cordon about twelve blocks from the Residence, and I've got a meeting in - well, I've got a meeting now."
"I'm trying, sir," came Kou's voice, sounding frustrated. "It's all confusion - bear with me, sir."
"ImpSec, confused?" Cordelia said, quietly. "Obstructive and vastly aggravating, yes. Confused - no."
"Kou?" Aral said again. "Kou, answer me, please."
"Sir - Lord Vorkosigan, sir." It was Kou who was sounding confused now, Aral thought disjointedly: confused, or… shocked? "Captain Illyan - he's dead, sir."
Cordelia's hand unclasped by reflex, her fingers uncurling on his palm. The car had begun to move again, Aral registered dimly, as from a great distance - the hold-up, whatever it had been, seemed to have dissipated. They slid through the morning traffic. Aral said, very carefully, "Please let me have more details, Captain Koudelka."
A moment passed, and then Kou said: "Someone from ImpSec, sir."
"My lord Regent," came the new voice, "Captain Kaverin. When Captain Illyan didn't come to work this morning, I called his apartment a couple of times and got no answer. He doesn't tend to oversleep, sir." The man's voice lightened ironically on that. "After that I sent a team over to break down the door. They found - they found his body, sir."
Cordelia said, very quietly, "Are they trying to tell us Simon took his own life?"
"Cause of death, Captain?" Aral said, mustering up some briskness from the part of his brain that was operating this conversation without him.
"Ah - drugs, sir. Sleeptimer tablets, we think. And alcohol," Kaverin added, as an afterthought. "His body was taken to ImpMil for security before post mortem. There's a risk, his chip, you know…" Even over the com, it was clear the man was shrugging helplessly.
"Do nothing until I've attended personally," Aral said, still crisp, and cut the link. Without conscious effort, his hand had found Cordelia's again; they sat there for a few moments with the world around slipping smoothly past the windows, in a shared and awful stillness.
"Damn," Aral said after a minute. "Damn, damn, damn."
"He didn’t," Cordelia said, bleakly, "he didn't really - and how they can think of the chip, and its security risks, at a time like this…"
"Simon," Aral said slowly, "would have done exactly the same thing." With more strength in his voice, he added: "I won't see him buried with it."
"I didn't want to see him buried at all," Cordelia said, slowly. "Aral - why would he have done this? Why? This, this plan of yours…"
Aral said, very softly, "Simon came up with the plan in the first place. Simon suggested that we - Cordelia, I don't know, I don't know. Unless…"
He stopped. Cordelia looked at him steadily for a few moments, and then when he didn't speak, said, "Aral, I'm begging you to finish that thought."
"When I… came back, from Escobar," Aral said, with difficulty, "before you came - well, when you came you accused me of suicidal tendencies. So did Simon. He ought to know - he was spying on me for Ezar, which came to mean, scraping me out of the gutters and the wreckage of my own lightflyer. And then when he took Negri's place, I have no doubt he read Negri's reports. He must have known, or come to learn, why I was drinking myself to death…"
"Escobar," Cordelia repeated. "Aral, what are you trying to tell me? That Simon killed himself out of…"
She couldn't say it. And then the ground shook and metal of the car was smashed through with sonic aftershocks, and everything went black.
*
"Gregor!" Cordelia said, and made a sound like oof! as he thudded into her. "Gregor, darling, it's all right. Aral and I are fine. There was an attack, but it failed. We're perfectly all right. "
Gregor, who at ten already had some of the solemnity of office, stood back and looked very much like a young child who had been very frightened. "They said…"
"I know, dear, but it's all right now." She gave him a firm hug. "Listen, Gregor, Drou is going to stay with you tonight, is that all right? We have to go home to Miles, and you" - she didn't say, you are too valuable to risk out there tonight - "must stay here. But Drou is coming just as soon as she can."
Gregor frowned. "Won't Captain Koudelka, and the baby…"
"They'll do without her for one night."
He was still frowning, but he nodded, and consented to go with one of the Vorbarra Armsmen upstairs to wait for her.
"Thank goodness for Kou and Drou," Aral sighed, when he'd gone. "And you, dear Captain."
The people gathered in the hallways of the Residence all looked harassed, drawn and ferociously busy, but the hard-edged panic had blurred into a more sustained pace of activity. In the long hours since morning, security teams had scoured the area around the Residence and the point of the attack, arresting and questioning as they went. They had to go out sometime, Cordelia was thinking bleakly; they couldn't hole up in here forever, waiting for the inevitable. Gingerly, she touched the long gash on her arm, her only lasting souvenir of the jolt the car had received. Cuts and bruises only, she'd told them, over and over, while they were treated for shock, and then there had been the hours where they'd been kept to one room by layers and layers of ImpSec doing their job, re-securing the perimeter, "ascertaining the course of events", as the agent in charge had put it.
Our groundcar nearly blew up, Cordelia had said, flatly in reply. They missed, and now there's a gigantic hole in the road, and we have to go on.
And now it was early evening on a midwinter day, the air crisp and icy cold around them and they were all, remarkably, still alive. "We should go home," Cordelia said. "Miles…"
Aral nodded. "Lieutenant, are you sure that's all of them, and that no one…"
"There are reports coming in from various analysts as we speak, sir," the ImpSec lieutenant said, looking troubled. "Apparently the apprehension of the terrorist agents on the scene has caused some, ah, some jigsaw pieces to come tumbling into place."
"The Komarran group," Aral said, nodding. "An attack on a groundcar isn't very original, but it's effective. And with me publically assassinated, and a Komarran claim of responsibility…"
"Civil war," Cordelia supplied. "But I don't understand - if they had so much information, then why didn't the plan come off? Why did they - well, I suppose they missed. Why, and how…?"
"Simon will have theories about that," Aral said, and then smoothly, without missing a beat, put his fist into a door. "Damn."
Cordelia said, a little tearfully, "Don't beat up the Residence, love. ImpSec won't like it."
"You should go home," Aral said, quickly, "you should go home and rest, and I'll go to ImpMil and…"
"We'll both go," Cordelia told him, in a gentle tone that she hoped would brook no argument. "We'll go back to Vorkosigan House, and we'll look in on Miles and we'll have something to eat, and then we'll both go."
The winter sun was setting as they entered the house, dipping below the line of shrubs on the scrub ground opposite. Sergeant Bothari came to attention in the hallway, nodding at Cordelia and saluting Aral. "My lord, milady."
"Report, Sergeant," Aral said, tiredly.
"All quiet. Lord Miles is sleeping." Bothari looked uncertain for a moment. "Sir, we - the household, that is, we've heard some things…"
"We're fine, Sergeant," Aral said. "Lady Vorkosigan and I are fine. There was an attack on our groundcar on the way to the Residence, but it didn't come off - ImpSec have arrested the people responsible." He hesitated, then Cordelia saw the decision form on his face: if it must be done, it must begin now. "Bothari. We're fine, and Gregor is fine… but Simon Illyan is dead."
"Oh." Bothari looked confused. "If the attack failed…"
"He died… last night, we think." Aral sounded very calm. "We’re still trying to ascertain the details."
Bothari nodded. "He was a good man," he offered, quietly.
"Yes," Cordelia said, her eyes bright in her reflection on the polished tiles, "he was. That's all."
Bothari nodded again, and turned to climb the stairs, returning to his post outside Miles's room, standing guard. They were left standing there in the entrance hall of the mostly-silent house, looking at each other.
"You didn't say," Cordelia said, her voice strained, "how… how he died."
Aral said, "We don't yet know the exact circumstances surrounding Simon's death. Until we do…" He paused. "Until we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he committed suicide, I am reluctant to, ah, to." He shrugged, spreading his hands.
"In my experience," Cordelia said, hoping she sounded calm, like she was weighing her words very deliberately, "two types of people kill themselves: very unhappy people, or very ill people, or more likely than either, very unhappy ill people. To call that shame, or somehow blameworthy…"
"Cordelia," Aral said softly, "if Simon Illyan killed himself, I don't understand it. Simon is - he was - he had survived. Of the twenty experimental subjects who went to Illyrica, he survived. Of those thousands who were part of the Escobar invasion, he survived. The war, the Pretendership, this Regency, the daily battles, he had survived. I don't understand it."
"It was because," Simon said, quietly, "no one has ever passed on false information to their enemy, and then killed themselves from remorse."
*
Simon decided afterwards, and had it confirmed by the chip, that that was the only occasion in his life he had been punched and kissed by the same person in such quick succession.
*
Simon was still slightly built, thought not twenty-seven any more, with that oddly innocent puppyish cast to his features. Aral crushed him carefully, breathing in the living scent of the man, the warmth of him, before letting him go and passing him off to Cordelia, who pulled him to her with as much fervour if less outright violence.
"Well," said Simon's voice, slightly muffled, "there goes my deep cover."
Aral put a hand on his shoulder and held him at arm's length. "Explain."
"Yes, sir." Simon sank onto the edge of a chair, then moved tiredly back to standing. He was wearing surgical scrubs, at least two sizes too big for him - probably stolen, Aral decided. "Ah - I had to do it. I am so very sorry. It was all getting away from me, otherwise."
"Simon," Cordelia said quickly, "how did you do it?"
"I came across it at ImpSec HQ, oh, years ago." He was shivering, an unhealthy feverishness in his eyes. "It's a drug we confiscated from a Jacksonian agent a galactic squad had captured under directions from Ezar. It's…" He paused. "Once the subject is unconscious, It slows down heartbeat and vital functions, and it lowers body temperature. Not without any ill effects, but without killing you, hopefully."
Cordelia looked like she wanted to say something at 'hopefully', but closed her mouth firmly and gestured to him to go on.
"It doesn't stand up to long-term examination, of course," Simon said, "but I, ah, didn't think it would have to. I liberated one dose from HQ and took it last night, and then, ah" - he was visibly cringing - "stunned myself, hoping I'd be found in time this morning. Which… seems to have happened."
Aral took a deep breath. Before he could say anything, Cordelia said, "Simon - you smell absolutely vile. What is that?"
Simon gave her an apologetic smile. "Ah… the drug overdose. I thought it would need alcohol to make it seem realistic. I wasn't sure how the maple mead would react with the meds if I drank it, so, I, ah…" He grimaced. "I had to pour it into my hair."
"Oh," Cordelia said faintly.
"In which case it's a wonder you have any scalp left." Aral sighed. "Simon, I take it this means I have to call some of the finest doctors in the galaxy at ImpMil and explain to them why one of their corpses just walked off a slab?"
"Ah… yes, sir."
"Then why don't I do that, and you can go and wash that awful stuff out of your hair. Someone will find you some clothes, as well. And…" Aral gestured mutely. "All right, we'll get to that in a minute. Go."
Simon nodded, saluted - properly, not an analyst's salute - and walked off to the steps with distinct impression of having his tail between his legs. Cordelia followed, with her hand over her mouth in a manner very suggestive of hiding a smile.
When they came down to the library, fifteen minutes later, Simon was dressed neatly in undress greens and running a towel through over his head, and looked almost normal. The change went deeper, and it was the power of sense memory, Aral decided - the mixture of alcohol and the harsh tang of the mortuary had its own particular set of associations, now replaced with the clean scent of soap and hot water. He breathed out, slowly.
"Well," Simon said, awkward.
Aral opened his mouth to speak, but Cordelia raised her hand. "One moment, please, Aral. Simon, I'm going to ask you a question now, and I expect an honest answer. Is that understood?"
Simon looked a little alarmed, but he nodded. "Yes."
"When you took those drugs last night, were you trying to kill yourself? Even in part?"
Simon's expression didn't change. "No, milady. I wasn't."
"Thank you." Cordelia waved an expansive hand at Aral. "All right, you can interrogate him now."
Before Aral could, there was the sound of a commotion in the hallway below and then the irregular tapping sound of someone walking very fast with a stick. "Sir!" Kou yelled, coming headlong through the door, "I've a message for you from HQ, it's the people ImpSec arrested today, some of them had fast penta and some of them didn't and they're all saying the same things about Cetagandan plots, and…" His swordstick hit the floor with a loud clatter as Simon stood up. "Oh, oh my God."
Aral took a deep breath. "Simon, sit. Kou, you too. Now. Explain, please."
Simon was looking at his feet. He was shivering again, Aral noted, wondering what exactly had been in the drug. "Sir," Simon said, sounding tired, "you have a Cetagandan spy in your government."
*
Miles woke up in the middle of the night asking for water. Cordelia heard his tiny footsteps and went to get it for him, sitting by his bed as he fell back asleep. "Aral," she called very softly, as he passed by the doorway; he turned to come in, Bothari obligingly stepping back to let him in and then setting off for his own bed.
"Well?" Cordelia asked, when they were alone but for Miles, sleeping peacefully.
Aral passed a hand through his hair. "It's as we suspected. The Cetagandans are bankrolling at least some of the Komarran terrorist groups. And double-crossing them too, as far as we can tell. And…" He sighed. "Commodore Vorbohn has been indirectly passing information to the Cetagandans for at least a year."
Cordelia swore softly. "How?"
"Simon said it took him a while to sift through the chip data and figure it out. During his adventures, he met with a man that he was sure he'd seen before. Turns out he's one of Vorbohn's Armsmen, though I doubt he's taken any oath. Vorbohn knows what's happening, of course, but he's not an active participant. Imagine it. The man follows Vorbohn everywhere, into Ops, into ImpSec, into the Council of Ministers, takes his own notes, draws his own conclusions. He needs a good memory and the ability to remain present but largely unnoticed, and he's a perfect spy." Another long pause, and then Aral put his head in his hands. "Oh, God, Simon. He could hang for this."
Cordelia put a hand on his shoulder and asked, softly, "What have you done with him?"
Aral lifted his head. "Put him in one of the second-floor guest rooms with a guard on the door. He looked fairly done-in, and besides, I didn't think we should let him out tonight. I don’t want to start rumours of ghosts abroad in Vorbarr Sultana."
Cordelia smiled wryly. After a pause, she asked: "What were your orders, Aral, really?"
Aral snorted. "My orders. This was his idea."
"Tell me," Cordelia said gently.
"Firstly, the fight," Aral admitted. "The idea was… to attract attention. From anyone who might consider him a possible prospect for defection. From anyone, but the Cetagandans or the Komarrans in particular. In which noble objective he seems to have succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. Cetagandan plots to manouvre Komarran plots! Firstly the Komarran media sabotage my political plans for Komarr just as a mere hors d'oeuvre, then the Cetagandans pay to have me killed, and there he is in the middle of it. Simon… doesn't do anything by halves."
"But…" Cordelia prompted.
Aral hesitated. "The risk was beyond calculable. Beyond…" He paused. "Beyond," he said carefully, "the risk that Simon Illyan, the man I know, my careful cautious spy whom Ezar gave to me for my own, would have taken. In my estimation."
Cordelia shook her head. "What are you going to do?"
Aral shrugged. "I don't know. I'm having him write me a report. What else do I ever do?" He paused. "You know, he said, it was all getting away from me. I've known him a long time and I've never heard him say anything he didn't precisely mean. I wonder if that was his way of saying…"
Cordelia said, tartly, "You know, contrary to the opinions of you, him, all of ImpSec, Ops and most of Vorbarr Sultana, he is human. He's fallible, alongside with everything else that comes along with it. Even with that damned chip in his head, he is a human being."
"You're right." Aral sounded calmer. He stood up and yawned enormously. "We should go to bed."
"Yes," Cordelia said, yawning in her turn, "we should."
She turned to give Miles a kiss before they left the room. They walked silently, hand-in-hand, down through the darkened house.
*
Some innate sense of honour, or perhaps just some stern thought of what his mother would have said, made Simon feel duty-bound to go and apologise personally to everyone had genuinely believed him dead. He was grateful to the point of cowardice that there were no children on the list: Gregor would have learned of it the following morning, and Miles and Ivan had never been told either. After sending replies to messages of condolence and making the rounds of his own staff, he stopped by his own apartment to dump civvies for Imperial greens, and went to Vorkosigan House. Kou and Bothari took the apology with the measured calm always adopted by regular Service men when faced with ImpSec in all its glory; Simon was grateful for that amount of normality, at least.
And then he took a deep breath, ran his hands over his hair to push it down, and knocked on the door into the library.
"Come in, Captain Illyan."
Aral was seated at his desk, the comconsole buzzing gently, surrounded by reports. He looked up and pressed a panel to push the machine into hibernation. The silence had become a lot to bear by the time Aral said, "Sit down here, please."
"Yes, sir." Simon sat, clasped his hands in his lap and adopted a straight-backed posture.
"I've read your unexpurgated report, which I have no doubt is going to be classified to the highest levels. Thank you for providing it." Aral paused, looked straight at him. "On a careful reading, I don't believe that there was a point where you committed treason."
Simon inhaled sharply.
Aral went on, "And now I have to decide what to do with you. You… have caused me a great deal of trouble, Simon."
Simon noted the use of his given name and kept his expression entirely straight.
"I could start by discussing what happened on Komarr. I know your what your opinion of my plan therewas. I know what my own opinion of it was. And taken together, I understand the basis from which you acted." He didn't say, from which you passed on secrets of state, for which Simon was grateful.
"It wouldn't have worked," he said. "Either they're honest politicians, in which case they won't be bought, or they're not, in which case they won't stay bought. Give it five years."
"Which we are now compelled to do regardless." Aral stared at him. "You took that decision into your own hands, when you made the choices you made. And the attack on the car… if you had been wrong…"
"I apologise, sir." Simon breathed out. "I am very, very sorry. I was anxious to salvage it any way I could."
"Which you did." Aral leaned back, still with the usual intensity in his gaze. "And for which I'm grateful. I'm curious… why did you believe your death would resolve the crisis?"
Simon took a deep breath. "I believe my Cetagandan handler was under the impression I would somehow stop the Komarran plot to assassinate you."
Aral asked, "Why?"
"They don't want total destabilising chaos on Barrayar, after all, only a continued active resistance on Komarr." Simon paused. "But bankrolling the Komarrans to create constant internal political uproar isn't a bad idea - it keeps our attention firmly on the internal matters of the Barryaran Imperium, and not on, say, them. The Cetagandans, I mean."
He was incoherent through nervousness, he realised to his dismay.
Aral frowned at him and said, "So the attempted assasination creates political uproar, I understand that. But why does your death…"
"My alleged suicide." Simon breathed and tried to stay calm. "The Komarrans naturally assumed it was out of guilt, and thus the only reason the plan could have failed was double-crossing by their Cetagandan masters. Whom they proceeded to bring down with them under ImpSec questioning, thus bringing the whole thing into the open. Sir."
Aral sighed. "Clear as mud, Simon, thank you."
"Yes, sir."
Aral didn't speak for a moment, merely keeping his unwavering gaze fixed on Simon. When he went on, his tone was contemplative. "Which brings us to our real problem, which is this. I don't know what to do with you. I could reprimand you for this whole business, draft a document of censure and place it on your file."
"The security clearance," Simon murmured.
"Correct. I suspect only three or four people would ever see it. I could take a further step and remove you from your position. But that… would not be in keeping with my Imperial duties. I went along with this plan of yours originally because it was a good plan. You are, quite simply, the best man for the job. And such is the nature of your talents I would be fearful of you putting them to use… elsewhere."
Simon sat perfectly still.
"Of course…" Aral steepled his fingers, perhaps in echo of Simon's own habitual gesture. "I could have you assassinated."
Simon inclined his head. "You could. But such exercise of Imperial power would be… impolitic."
"Yes," Aral breathed, looking predatory, "that’s right. You could have an accident."
"I'd see it coming." Simon paused. "I am liege-sworn to you, sir. You could order me to kill myself in your service."
He didn't think he imagined the real flash of pain in Aral's eyes, though he didn't mentally replay it. "Simon, sometimes you are just…"
"This is my job, sir. This is what I do."
Aral held his gaze for several seconds before he nodded, relaxing suddenly. "That's right. Chief of Imperial Security, in whatever form or shape that may take." He paused another moment, tapping a fingernail on the table. "Right, enough, we're done here."
Simon rose, but paused as Aral tensed again. "One more thing."
"Yes, sir?"
"If you ever, ever fake your own death again, I will strip you of your silver eyes, bust you down to ensign, ship you out to Kyril Island and make you clean toilets with a toothbrush for the rest of your natural lifespan, is that understood?"
"Yes, sir. Perfectly, sir."
"Good." Aral gave him the hint of a smile. "Dismissed. And, Simon? Take the rest of the day off, for God's sake. I don't think I can deal with you any more today."
*
The interrogations were still going on. During a mid-afternoon break, Simon relieved the door guard and entered the tiny cell.
At the sound of the door opening, she looked up, curled on the bench at the far wall with her feet beneath her. Her hands were shackled behind her, gently but expertly tied to a metal loop set in the wall. "Oh. You."
He consulted his notes. "Kay Diaz, born and raised on Escobar, but you've lived other places since: Komarr, Beta Colony, Earth and - ah. Eta Ceta."
She scowled at him. "What of it?"
Simon shrugged. "Nothing in particular. I'll go on thinking of you as 'January', if I may."
She pulled at her bonds. "It's not like I can stop you. Why are you here, Simon? If you're here to interrogate me, your colleagues have been doing an excellent job. I told them all manner of interesting things and some of them might even have been true. And I have an allergy to fast-penta."
"I assumed as much, although I'm not here to interrogate you." Simon took in the details of the cell, the iron bars, the tiny hatch in the door. Conditions down here were spartan and chilly, and very secure, but without the brutalities of Ezar's day. It had been a quiet, long-term project.
"Really?" She looked up at him cynically. "You're here to make small talk? How… uncharacteristic."
Simon smiled. "I'm apologising to everyone who thought I was dead."
"Are you?" She laughed. "Apology accepted. Seems the least I can do for you, you poor son of a bitch."
Simon leaned against the wall and folded his arms. "What makes you say that?"
"You can lie to me all you like, but you lie to yourself. I've seen your life, Simon Illyan. Extradition to Escobaran secure custody is going to be a picnic in comparison. "
"Quite possible." Simon nodded. "And… I never lied to you. Not once."
She raised her eyebrows. "Really? Then why am I here" - she rattled her bonds again - "and you're over there?"
He smiled. "I told you, and your colleagues, exactly how I would have engineered an attack on the Lord Regent's groundcar, which is what I was asked. I neglected to mention I'd had the municipal authorities raise some rather well-timed roadblocks and traffic diversions. You might say it was my fault they were late for their appointment. Merely something I omitted to mention."
"Aral Vorkosigan's loyal dog," she said, and laughed. "I wasn't wrong about what you like."
"Perhaps not." Simon stood up. "It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"The feeling is not mutual. No, Simon, don't go" - she sounded truly fearful for a moment, and Simon remembered the interrogators he had displaced - "I still have one question."
"Go on," he said, turning.
She fixed him with an intense gaze. "What would your price have been?"
"Lime and sugar," he said, and went out.
*
The following morning, when grudgingly allowed to return to his desk by the Lord Regent, Simon found two roses in his in-tray.
*
"Carry on, ensign," Aral was saying, "you're doing fine" - when someone came running down the stairs and barrelled straight into him and then went on running, feet still cycling forwards as Aral pushed their owner gently against the wall. "At ease, soldier."
Simon looked at him, down at his own hands, and then up at the wall. "I have just," he began, then paused, taking a deep breath, visibly collecting himself. "I have just…"
"What's that you've got there?" Aral asked, curiously.
"A rose," Simon said, "a rose" - and looked up and down and then slumped against the wall. The ensign, currently playing the role of the outer cell guard, was watching this small drama with interest and a little alarm; Aral made a decision and led his Chief of ImpSec along the corridor. At the very end, it turned into a basement tunnel ending into a blank wall and another block of cells, disused.
Aral pushed open a heavy door. "Inside."
Simon complied, and Aral followed. Although the planning had been thorough, the script carefully drafted, they hadn't laid down the terms of the reconciliation, he supposed one might call it; as in amnesty and reconciliation, as in the laying down of arms after a bitter war. "Tell me," he said, "has ImpSec's institutional paranoia reached such a stage that it undertakes surveillance of cells with no one in them?"
Simon looked around the dank little room with interest. "Not more so than anywhere else," he pronounced. "And what there is goes through my office."
"Glad to hear it. Now. What is it?"
Rather than answering, Simon slumped down the wall until he was sitting on the floor. Obediently, he tucked his feet away under him as Aral stepped over, leaned against the wall himself and slid down to join him. The panicked expression was gone from his face; it had become calculating, and then calm. "You," he said, at last.
"Me." Aral spread his hands in quiet entreaty.
"I was coming to find you to start shouting that we'd got the wrong person. Or collection of persons."
"I read your final custody report, yes," Aral said, nodding. "It's over."
"You," Simon said again, and leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. And then looked up. "Yesterday you wanted to kill me."
Smiling, Aral picked up the rose. "I often do. I didn't want you to think you'd been forgotten. I've seen the kind of thing that happens, to people who think that."
"You are a stark raving lunatic," Simon informed him, closing his eyes again. "If it had been discovered - if it had become known…"
"Simon," Aral said, gently, "you have never understood the power of a gesture."
Simon laughed suddenly. "Apparently not. I thought I was being threatened, for God's sake. I even asked Lady Alys…"
"Alys no doubt gave you the right answer." Aral turned over the rose in his hands. "Red, and white. Did you know they tend to avoid it in Imperial flower arrangements?"
Simon glared at him. "There is a whole universe of things I've had to learn since I met you. Yes, I did know that. Blood, and bone. In other words, what would be left of me, if I reneged on my newfound allegiance."
"Blood and bone," Aral said, lightly, "what holds us together."
Simon nodded. "But you still wanted to kill me. Not to mention how you hit me in front of eleven witnesses in Vorkosigan House a little more than two weeks ago."
"I tend to have strong feelings about people generally." Aral touched his shoulder and asked, very quietly, "Did you mean what you said, then?"
"When?"
"Before I…" Aral said, quietly, and smacked Simon very lightly in the side of the head.
Simon let himself slip further down the dank and chilled wall, almost down to floor level, into the comforting murk. "There's something I tell my men," he said, after a moment, "and myself, sometimes. The best lie is the truth."
Aral nodded. "The truth. Let me have the truth, Simon. You said to me, it's all getting away from me."
Simon said, "Are you asking me if I'd meant to defect?"
Aral shook his head. "I would never ask you that, Simon." Very gently, he kissed the top of Simon's head. "By the time I ask you that, it's far, far too late."
Simon considered, then reached out. His palms came together above his head. "Forgive me, I don't remember the words of my oath just now," he whispered.
Aral took just a moment to understand, held Simon's hands between his own, and said, fondly, lovingly: "Liar."
end.
Notes and acknowledgements
-This story started out life as a remix of
philomytha's Aptitude, which is a sweetly nuanced boys' own adventure story. This is… not, and barely qualifies as any sort of remix - but it still owes a debt to philomytha's lovely writing, as so much of my Vorkosigan fic does. If that were not enough she then gave the whole thing a thoughtful and clarifying beta. And noted without laughing that the room was not glittering with candlelight and scones. (
forthwritten merely noted that you can take the girl out of the bakery AU…)
Shim noted that I had inadvertently come up with the plot of The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, for which observation I'm grateful; and speaking of
forthwritten, they listened to all kinds of inanities, made a minor plot tweak that made a massive thematic difference, named an ever-increasing parade of hapless redshirts passing ImpSec employees, and can now get on with their life in peace.
Thank you all.
raven is also at Dreamwidth: there is or are
comment(s). Comment there or here.
fic:: the winter here is cold, and bitter
by Raven
17,000w, Vorkosigan - for trigger warnings please see part one.
back to part one
"That," Simon said, slamming the viewer down on the table, "was rank amateurism."
She glanced at him. "In a minute, Simon. What would you like?"
He blinked for a second, then said, "Soup. With coriander."
She got up and went to the tiny counter to order it, leaving Simon at the table by the window. From where he was sitting, with his back to the wall and the whole space of the little café in front of him, he could take a broad view of his surroundings. It was quiet, but they weren't the only customers. On the other side of the plate glass, the snow was building up in drifts as the wind howled through the narrow lanes of the old caravanserai district. Even here on its gentrifying edge, it looked much further than ten minutes' walk from ImpSec HQ. It was lunchtime. Simon wasn't sure when had been the last time he'd taken an hour for lunch.
After five minutes she returned, setting down a bowl of hot vegetable soup with coriander leaves floating in it in front of him. He sipped it slowly, letting it warm him through. It was a quiet place, this, within and without, and he could feel something of that quiet begin to permeate through him. It was best to meet in public, but even without that concern, the time away from ImpSec surveillance was liberating.
She asked, "Where are your lovely agents today? A very decorative pair, those two."
Simon smiled. "I gave them the slip. Helps keep my faculties sharp, after all. Besides," he added reflectively, "even in my case, it's easier to believe I have a secret lover, than…"
She gave him a predatory smile in return. "Now, you were talking about amateurism."
"This." Simon turned around the viewer to show her. Komarr had a more active media than Barrayar, and the headline and article had landed in the hands of ImpSec intelligence gatherers approximately ten minutes after going to press. He read out, from memory: "'Pro-independence group Komarrans For A Free Komarr have published the image below, declaring it evidence that Imperial Regent Aral Vorkosigan, otherwise Butcher of Komarr, has been pursuing high-ranked members of Komarran society, pushing a pro-Barrayaran agenda in exchange for personal favours…' Personal, italicised. They might as well have replaced it with 'sexual' and be done with it."
She peered at it, then at him. "It's all in shadow. It could be anyone."
Simon glanced at the blurred shape in the image. "Believe me, it's him. What kind of arrant idiot sells their damn intelligence to the media?"
"How likely is it that this plan will succeed, now?" she asked flatly. "We did this your way, Simon. No disruptors, just stunners. So sentimental."
"Who wrings the neck of the golden goose?" he demanded, impatiently. "And I never thought the plan would work regardless. But, to just, to just run in like that…"
"You may have to get used to the fact" - her voice hardened - "that we don't do things like you're used to, Simon. And speaking of which…"
"Well?" He took another sip of his soup.
"That was our sweetener; thank you. Now what's it going to take to keep you?"
"Excuse me?'
"Every man has his price," she said, reflectively. "Money, sex, power."
"And elephants," Simon murmured, not sotto voce enough; she looked at him with gentle enquiry until he was forced to explain. "I once…" - he gestured, vaguely - "used one as a kind of lever. My point was, people are rarely that simple."
"Oh, but they are." She smiled at him sidelong; the effect was rather reptilian. "Men throw around their long words, their lofty ideas about themselves: revenge, justice, honour. Seven veils to cover all that has meaning, in the end. And what about you, then? What's your price?"
Simon shrugged, spreading his hands. "Like I said - people are more complicated than that."
"I don't believe it." She sat back in her seat, hands coming together in a gesture that was a conscious echo of his own. "What is it, then? Money? I doubt it. Rumour has it you froze your military rank at captain in echo of Captain Negri, and draw a commensurate pay. You live in the same apartment you lived in as a newly-minted lieutenant. It's not money. Power?"
Simon murmured, "I am Chief of Imperial Security."
"Yes," she said. "The power behind the power behind the throne. But that's less true than it used to be, these days, isn't it?"
The same gesture seemed to be all he was capable of, right then: the spread hands, the shrug of helplessness.
"And, finally," she said, amused, "the last."
"Sex," Simon said, somehow not stopping himself.
She smiled. "There, there, don't worry. It's clear to the dimmest eye what you like, Captain Illyan."
"Is it?" Simon asked, momentarily alarmed. His chip chose that moment to mass-dump images: surveillance tapes, obscenity-based contraband seizures, every dirty magazine he'd seen in the last ten years of Imperial service. He breathed in, and out, once, twice, then raised his hand to his mouth. There was a tiny wound on his index finger, still left from the rose thorn, and it stung.
"Oh, yes." She placed a hand on his shoulder, then took it away. "But most telling of all: you're still here, listening to me. All this is peripheral; we had you when you didn't pick up your shrimp canapé in that ballroom and walk away."
He nodded; it was inarguable. "I have to go. I won't call you."
"I'll call you. Think about it." She looked at him with interest. "Why the coriander? Some deep significance?"
Mutely, he shook his head, picking up his coat and pulling on his gloves, still damp from his earlier walk. "I like the smell."
The snow blew into his ears as he went out into the street.
*
"Information coming in, sir." The voice over the com was recognisable, although Aral couldn't quite at this moment recall the man's name: one of the local analyst staff at ImpSec Komarr, drafted swiftly into the investigation. "Shall I copy it through to you?"
"Give me the gist." Aral stifled a yawn; the day had stretched long, almost through to the following morning given the nineteen-hour Komarran day. Cordelia was awake, but lying on the bed in their cabin with weariness evident in the loose fall of her limbs. "Leave the detail work for the experts."
"Komarrans For A Free Komarr," the man said with distaste. "A pressure group with, ah, ambition. We've had agents pay visits to their local associates and known safehouses. Of course all the birds have flown. We're on it."
"We knew this, Lieutenant," Aral said briskly, making a quick - and from the lack of reaction, accurate - guess at the man's rank. "And I will be breaking orbit soon. Did you have anything fresh to impart? Because if not, then…"
"Yes, sir." The lieutenant sounded suddenly unsure of himself. "Although no one has been physically apprehended, two ImpSec agents took the time to review materials, papers, objects left behind when they went to ground. We've been letting them percolate, lately," he finished, still sounding uncertain. "Let them work up to whatever it is they're planning, without necessarily letting them know we're on to them…"
"All the better to hang them with." Aral was impatient. "And?"
"It's a matter of money." The lieutenant paused. "Since the last time we reviewed their threat status, they've somehow got either a great deal more followers, or… well, we're working on it. But the equipment left behind, the weapons caches… they all speak of some recent, significant cashflow injections. I don't believe we've underestimated them up until now, sir. But we certainly won't in the future."
"I understand," Aral said. "Thank you, Lieutenant."
The crackling connection dissipated. From her horizontal position on the bed, Cordelia said, "The plot thickens."
"I don't like it, Cordelia," Aral said, coming to sit beside her on the edge of the mattress. He rested his head on the pillows for a moment. "ImpSec haven't been saying, and I haven't been asking… but still. Who knew we were here tonight?"
"On Komarr?" Cordelia asked. "It's not an official visit, but it's not a state secret. Probably half of Vorbarr Sultana, in all honesty, not to mention everyone who works for ImpSec everywhere."
"Not that." Aral hesitated. "Here, Cordelia - here in Solstice dome, here on my private mission to suborn the higher echelons of the Komarran government."
"Suborn?" Cordelia raised her eyebrows. "You were telling me, earlier, that it's how the game is played."
"Which is not how the independence groups will put it." Aral took a deep breath, and admitted, "I'm worried. The money…"
Cordelia said nothing, but gripped his hand. "Home soon," she murmured. "Miles will be pleased to have us back."
"Miles," Aral repeated. He hadn't liked to leave Miles for any length of time, agreeing to the short visit to Komarr only after much persuasion and the revelation of Miles's own supreme lack of concern at his parents' temporary absence. "Did we get..."
Cordelia chuckled. "A robotic dog toy, a small set of toy soldiers in historical Komarran colours, and when we were in the ImpSec district office I saw a man go to throw away a mug with a crack in it. I rescued it." She picked it off the table as she spoke; it was a plain black ceramic mug with a heavy base and stylised text wrapping around the handle: we live to serve. Rumour had it that it was Negri's handwriting in the official watermark; Aral knew by sight it was Simon's. "Miles will like it. Maybe the soldiers can have it as a fort."
Aral chuckled. "Not quite six years old, and wants his parents to bring him back his own army."
But never doubts that they will come back, he was thinking, and wondered where and when he'd earned that trust.
*
He'd asked her up for coffee within the radio range of his personal security. The street outside was quiet.
"For a while I thought sex was the answer," she said reflectively, picking up things and putting them down. Kitchen implements, flimsies, his very little in the way of personal possessions: a red scarf draped over the back of a chair, which Cordelia had given him, he dimly recalled; a small icon that had belonged to his mother, an ancient holo next to it of his parents on their wedding day. Each item was placed back exactly in its right place. "'Sex' is inaccurate, perhaps. A certain kind of man - it's obvious, to all but the dimmest observer" - and he could tell by her tone that most Barrayarans would fall into that category - "what he likes. On Beta Colony, there are earrings you could wear to signify it, a mismatch in these terms is so awkward. In your case, however…"
She trailed off. He opened his refrigerator and pulled out a small bottle of milk, not taking his eyes off her reflection in the metal internal surfaces. Without looking round, he said, mildly, "If I'm inviting you up for coffee, then let's make coffee."
"Fine," she said.
"There are no bugs in this apartment," he said, still into the refrigerator. "Not that there should be, but I took my lunch hour and checked."
He heard her laugh. "So efficient, always."
Simon turned; she was still standing right where she had been, upright and straight-backed by the front door. There was nowhere in the place without an almost-direct sightline to the door.
"In my case?" Simon repeated, and sat down in one of his chairs.
She smiled, and placed a hand on his arm. He controlled the reflex to react, and she smiled again before she withdrew, looking brightly around the apartment as though she were appraising it for sale. "A nice little place, soundproof," she said. "And the Betans have catalogues full of props. I could tie you up. Not your hands together - tie you to, let me see, bedposts are classic for a reason. Cut off your clothes, make you scream. And you would, Simon, believe me."
He looked at her. "You could do nothing to me without my…"
She laughed, delightedly. "Consent, Simon? Is that what you were going to say? You catch on quickly. You Barrayarans are such purists, and therein lies the problem."
Simon took a deep breath and put the milk into the coffee.
"You don't want to be hurt. You don't want to be humiliated. You don't want to be fucked - at least, not necessarily." Her eyes lit for a moment. "You don't want to be dominated, at least not in the way the Betans and the rest of the civilised galaxy understand it. You want to be owned. And you have had - as you told me the other day - just two careful owners."
"Lord Vorkosigan and I…"
"I'm informed," she said, cutting smoothly over him, "that old Emperor Ezar sent you against your will to have that chip put in your head. What was the experiment attrition rate?"
"There's just me," he answered, almost automatically, looking down. "There were twenty of us. The rest are dead now, or - or severely delusional." He'd visited them, frequently soon after and more rarely in recent years. Their ramblings seemed random, unparsable to their carers, but he understood half-broken utterances about doubling, about worlds fracturing into real and not-real.
"That self-same chip has tormented you for almost a decade." She spread her hands. "But you returned to Barrayar after that. You have remained with Imperial Security, giving up yourself in service to the Imperial government that had already done you such damage. It's not even that you want to be owned, Simon Illyan; it's that you can't conceive of life without the artefacts and filaments of that whole, soul-deep, bodily ownership."
He tossed back his head and met her gaze. "Your point?"
"My point is this. Whatever love has been lost between you, in the past or just recently, I find it very difficult to believe that you don't remain in the palm of Aral Vorkosigan's hand."
Simon laid down the cup and took several careful steps across the apartment, turned on his heel, stepped back. The stretch of floor by the window bore the marks of frequent pacing, night after night - he'd always considered it an allowable nervous habit. The large window had a force-field sharing space with it, and was made of toughened, projectile-resistant glass, and despite all of those things, was his favourite thing about the tiny living-space: due to an odd depression and ridge in the land the city was built on, here, it commanded an unexpectedly good view of Vorbarr Sultana. The lights of the city were spread out below, under the darting lightflyers and shuttles climbing.
"I can't be responsible for what you choose to believe, or not," he said, his eyes on the moving patterns of light. "But for whatever it's worth to you, I will say this. I'm ready to be free."
*
"HQ, this is Captain Illyan." It wasn't that they wouldn't recognise his voice in an instant, but it was protocol - they were probably checking the incoming route of the call now, standard procedure before listening to a word he said. "I need to speak to whoever's in charge of my personal security detail." The chip would have told him the name, but sometimes it was better to pretend normality.
A moment passed, then: "Captain Illyan, sir, this is Captain Kaverin. How can I help?"
Simon paused to note the non-military niceties in the form of address. "Stand down, Captain. You and your men. You're relieved of duty until tomorrow morning."
"Excuse me, sir?"
Simon sighed. "I know you heard me the first time, Captain."
"Yes, sir. Understood, sir. Can I ask…"
"Call it a vacation," Simon breathed, and cut the link. He took off the wristcom and laid it down on the table, picked up his gloves and his coat and the red scarf, and set out into the cold. ImpSec moved quickly - when he made his usual checks, he wasn't being followed. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and walked on. There had been no fresh snow for a few days, but it was starting again, coming down white and perfect on top of the crunchy brown ice left on the streets. Simon kicked through it absent-mindedly, vaguely aware of the layer building up on his face and hair.
They met in a grubby prole café overlooking a small square of scrubland, towards the east of the city. Simon's own memory provided the fact he'd eaten in places like this many times before, as a schoolboy growing up in the northern provinces. He ordered soup again and knew what it would be like before it came, indistinguishable vegetables and meat but steaming hot and smelling of pepper.
"Good afternoon, Captain Illyan."
"Good afternoon." Simon studied the man, letting his chip take care of recording the fine detail. He noted a flash of familiarity and filed it away for later. "You have the advantage of me, I believe."
The man smiled, but didn't offer his name. "You don't appear surprised to see me."
"I'm not." Simon leaned back in the dirty plastic chair. "I believe I was being… groomed, would that be the term? And that I have not been, ah" - he paused to take in their surroundings, the quiet space of the café - "found wanting."
"Your handler was impressed by you." The man clasped his hands on the table. "I defer to that judgement. You may consider this meeting a gesture of trust."
Simon smiled wryly. "But that's not all there is to it, I suspect."
A pause. "Name your price, Captain Illyan."
The man's straightforwardness was refreshing, Simon decided. He took a moment to answer the question, giving straightforwardness for straightforwardness. "My freedom. From… this life."
He was looking out of the window as he spoke, and it seemed to him for a moment he saw that life, not in the icy clarity of the chip but in the stains and traces left on the snow-encrusted paving stones, in his own footprints bringing him to this winter afternoon, through his own choices and hobbled by his own bonds, step by step by step.
"Done." The man nodded. "Whatever path you choose to your freedom, Simon."
They let that hang for a moment. The snow drifted down past the window; Simon's soup was cooling.
"Now." The man rummaged under the table for something. "Down to business. The Lord Regent and his lady wife return to the capital tomorrow morning. I believe they're going straight to a Residence meeting on agricultural subsidies, of all things."
"That's right." Simon nodded.
The man took his hands out from under the table and laid a simple pen and paper in between them. "I'm not going to ask you to go through the tiresome details of it all. ImpSec shift changes, different routes, perimeter gaps, systematic weaknesses. I'm going to ask you this. If you were doing this, how would you do it?"
Silently, Simon picked up the pen and began to sketch, annotating as he went, occasionally going back over himself to improve small details. It took five minutes. He placed the pen back on the table and looked up.
The man pocketed it. "Thank you. I'll be in touch."
Simon nodded and got up, leaving half the soup behind him. He didn't look back as he went out into the street, the shop bell ringing dismally above him as the door closed.
He walked home through the snow, not covering his head, letting the stored maps on his chip guide him in the absence of his conscious mind. Inside his tiny apartment, he picked up a bottle of maple mead and a weapon.
*
"What's the delay?" Cordelia asked, idly gazing out of the window at the usual businesslike fervour of a city street being cleared for the Lord Regent and his associated hangers-on. "Not that I mind, I'm only curious."
Aral reached out and stroked her hair. "So impatient, dear Captain."
"Believe me, I'm not," Cordelia said, unsuccessfully hiding a yawn behind her other hand. "I'm not even awake yet."
Aral sighed. "I don't believe I am, either." It had been the middle of the night, ship's time, when they returned from Komarr, but the meeting with Vortala hadn't been able to wait: mid-morning in Vorbarr Sultana and representatives from nearly every Southern Continent District to talk about agriculture in the region of the Black Escarpment. Their livelihoods, Aral reminded himself sternly: and if not theirs, then the livelihoods of the millions of people living in those Districts. He yawned again and pulled himself together.
"Still," he said after a moment, "this is getting a little ridiculous. Armsman?"
The tap on the interior glass of the groundcar yielded nothing much; Armsman Esterhazy managed to communicate through a very expressive movement of his shoulders that the reasons for the delay, if there were any, were beyond him. "I heard tell," he said lugubriously, after a moment, "that it was something to do with ImpSec."
"Is there anything in the sight of God and His creation that doesn't, eventually, have something to do with ImpSec?" Aral muttered for Cordelia's ears; she smiled and squeezed his hand as he reached for his wristcom. "Kou, come in. Can you get someone from Illyan's office, please? We're stuck behind some sort of unaccountable traffic cordon about twelve blocks from the Residence, and I've got a meeting in - well, I've got a meeting now."
"I'm trying, sir," came Kou's voice, sounding frustrated. "It's all confusion - bear with me, sir."
"ImpSec, confused?" Cordelia said, quietly. "Obstructive and vastly aggravating, yes. Confused - no."
"Kou?" Aral said again. "Kou, answer me, please."
"Sir - Lord Vorkosigan, sir." It was Kou who was sounding confused now, Aral thought disjointedly: confused, or… shocked? "Captain Illyan - he's dead, sir."
Cordelia's hand unclasped by reflex, her fingers uncurling on his palm. The car had begun to move again, Aral registered dimly, as from a great distance - the hold-up, whatever it had been, seemed to have dissipated. They slid through the morning traffic. Aral said, very carefully, "Please let me have more details, Captain Koudelka."
A moment passed, and then Kou said: "Someone from ImpSec, sir."
"My lord Regent," came the new voice, "Captain Kaverin. When Captain Illyan didn't come to work this morning, I called his apartment a couple of times and got no answer. He doesn't tend to oversleep, sir." The man's voice lightened ironically on that. "After that I sent a team over to break down the door. They found - they found his body, sir."
Cordelia said, very quietly, "Are they trying to tell us Simon took his own life?"
"Cause of death, Captain?" Aral said, mustering up some briskness from the part of his brain that was operating this conversation without him.
"Ah - drugs, sir. Sleeptimer tablets, we think. And alcohol," Kaverin added, as an afterthought. "His body was taken to ImpMil for security before post mortem. There's a risk, his chip, you know…" Even over the com, it was clear the man was shrugging helplessly.
"Do nothing until I've attended personally," Aral said, still crisp, and cut the link. Without conscious effort, his hand had found Cordelia's again; they sat there for a few moments with the world around slipping smoothly past the windows, in a shared and awful stillness.
"Damn," Aral said after a minute. "Damn, damn, damn."
"He didn’t," Cordelia said, bleakly, "he didn't really - and how they can think of the chip, and its security risks, at a time like this…"
"Simon," Aral said slowly, "would have done exactly the same thing." With more strength in his voice, he added: "I won't see him buried with it."
"I didn't want to see him buried at all," Cordelia said, slowly. "Aral - why would he have done this? Why? This, this plan of yours…"
Aral said, very softly, "Simon came up with the plan in the first place. Simon suggested that we - Cordelia, I don't know, I don't know. Unless…"
He stopped. Cordelia looked at him steadily for a few moments, and then when he didn't speak, said, "Aral, I'm begging you to finish that thought."
"When I… came back, from Escobar," Aral said, with difficulty, "before you came - well, when you came you accused me of suicidal tendencies. So did Simon. He ought to know - he was spying on me for Ezar, which came to mean, scraping me out of the gutters and the wreckage of my own lightflyer. And then when he took Negri's place, I have no doubt he read Negri's reports. He must have known, or come to learn, why I was drinking myself to death…"
"Escobar," Cordelia repeated. "Aral, what are you trying to tell me? That Simon killed himself out of…"
She couldn't say it. And then the ground shook and metal of the car was smashed through with sonic aftershocks, and everything went black.
*
"Gregor!" Cordelia said, and made a sound like oof! as he thudded into her. "Gregor, darling, it's all right. Aral and I are fine. There was an attack, but it failed. We're perfectly all right. "
Gregor, who at ten already had some of the solemnity of office, stood back and looked very much like a young child who had been very frightened. "They said…"
"I know, dear, but it's all right now." She gave him a firm hug. "Listen, Gregor, Drou is going to stay with you tonight, is that all right? We have to go home to Miles, and you" - she didn't say, you are too valuable to risk out there tonight - "must stay here. But Drou is coming just as soon as she can."
Gregor frowned. "Won't Captain Koudelka, and the baby…"
"They'll do without her for one night."
He was still frowning, but he nodded, and consented to go with one of the Vorbarra Armsmen upstairs to wait for her.
"Thank goodness for Kou and Drou," Aral sighed, when he'd gone. "And you, dear Captain."
The people gathered in the hallways of the Residence all looked harassed, drawn and ferociously busy, but the hard-edged panic had blurred into a more sustained pace of activity. In the long hours since morning, security teams had scoured the area around the Residence and the point of the attack, arresting and questioning as they went. They had to go out sometime, Cordelia was thinking bleakly; they couldn't hole up in here forever, waiting for the inevitable. Gingerly, she touched the long gash on her arm, her only lasting souvenir of the jolt the car had received. Cuts and bruises only, she'd told them, over and over, while they were treated for shock, and then there had been the hours where they'd been kept to one room by layers and layers of ImpSec doing their job, re-securing the perimeter, "ascertaining the course of events", as the agent in charge had put it.
Our groundcar nearly blew up, Cordelia had said, flatly in reply. They missed, and now there's a gigantic hole in the road, and we have to go on.
And now it was early evening on a midwinter day, the air crisp and icy cold around them and they were all, remarkably, still alive. "We should go home," Cordelia said. "Miles…"
Aral nodded. "Lieutenant, are you sure that's all of them, and that no one…"
"There are reports coming in from various analysts as we speak, sir," the ImpSec lieutenant said, looking troubled. "Apparently the apprehension of the terrorist agents on the scene has caused some, ah, some jigsaw pieces to come tumbling into place."
"The Komarran group," Aral said, nodding. "An attack on a groundcar isn't very original, but it's effective. And with me publically assassinated, and a Komarran claim of responsibility…"
"Civil war," Cordelia supplied. "But I don't understand - if they had so much information, then why didn't the plan come off? Why did they - well, I suppose they missed. Why, and how…?"
"Simon will have theories about that," Aral said, and then smoothly, without missing a beat, put his fist into a door. "Damn."
Cordelia said, a little tearfully, "Don't beat up the Residence, love. ImpSec won't like it."
"You should go home," Aral said, quickly, "you should go home and rest, and I'll go to ImpMil and…"
"We'll both go," Cordelia told him, in a gentle tone that she hoped would brook no argument. "We'll go back to Vorkosigan House, and we'll look in on Miles and we'll have something to eat, and then we'll both go."
The winter sun was setting as they entered the house, dipping below the line of shrubs on the scrub ground opposite. Sergeant Bothari came to attention in the hallway, nodding at Cordelia and saluting Aral. "My lord, milady."
"Report, Sergeant," Aral said, tiredly.
"All quiet. Lord Miles is sleeping." Bothari looked uncertain for a moment. "Sir, we - the household, that is, we've heard some things…"
"We're fine, Sergeant," Aral said. "Lady Vorkosigan and I are fine. There was an attack on our groundcar on the way to the Residence, but it didn't come off - ImpSec have arrested the people responsible." He hesitated, then Cordelia saw the decision form on his face: if it must be done, it must begin now. "Bothari. We're fine, and Gregor is fine… but Simon Illyan is dead."
"Oh." Bothari looked confused. "If the attack failed…"
"He died… last night, we think." Aral sounded very calm. "We’re still trying to ascertain the details."
Bothari nodded. "He was a good man," he offered, quietly.
"Yes," Cordelia said, her eyes bright in her reflection on the polished tiles, "he was. That's all."
Bothari nodded again, and turned to climb the stairs, returning to his post outside Miles's room, standing guard. They were left standing there in the entrance hall of the mostly-silent house, looking at each other.
"You didn't say," Cordelia said, her voice strained, "how… how he died."
Aral said, "We don't yet know the exact circumstances surrounding Simon's death. Until we do…" He paused. "Until we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he committed suicide, I am reluctant to, ah, to." He shrugged, spreading his hands.
"In my experience," Cordelia said, hoping she sounded calm, like she was weighing her words very deliberately, "two types of people kill themselves: very unhappy people, or very ill people, or more likely than either, very unhappy ill people. To call that shame, or somehow blameworthy…"
"Cordelia," Aral said softly, "if Simon Illyan killed himself, I don't understand it. Simon is - he was - he had survived. Of the twenty experimental subjects who went to Illyrica, he survived. Of those thousands who were part of the Escobar invasion, he survived. The war, the Pretendership, this Regency, the daily battles, he had survived. I don't understand it."
"It was because," Simon said, quietly, "no one has ever passed on false information to their enemy, and then killed themselves from remorse."
*
Simon decided afterwards, and had it confirmed by the chip, that that was the only occasion in his life he had been punched and kissed by the same person in such quick succession.
*
Simon was still slightly built, thought not twenty-seven any more, with that oddly innocent puppyish cast to his features. Aral crushed him carefully, breathing in the living scent of the man, the warmth of him, before letting him go and passing him off to Cordelia, who pulled him to her with as much fervour if less outright violence.
"Well," said Simon's voice, slightly muffled, "there goes my deep cover."
Aral put a hand on his shoulder and held him at arm's length. "Explain."
"Yes, sir." Simon sank onto the edge of a chair, then moved tiredly back to standing. He was wearing surgical scrubs, at least two sizes too big for him - probably stolen, Aral decided. "Ah - I had to do it. I am so very sorry. It was all getting away from me, otherwise."
"Simon," Cordelia said quickly, "how did you do it?"
"I came across it at ImpSec HQ, oh, years ago." He was shivering, an unhealthy feverishness in his eyes. "It's a drug we confiscated from a Jacksonian agent a galactic squad had captured under directions from Ezar. It's…" He paused. "Once the subject is unconscious, It slows down heartbeat and vital functions, and it lowers body temperature. Not without any ill effects, but without killing you, hopefully."
Cordelia looked like she wanted to say something at 'hopefully', but closed her mouth firmly and gestured to him to go on.
"It doesn't stand up to long-term examination, of course," Simon said, "but I, ah, didn't think it would have to. I liberated one dose from HQ and took it last night, and then, ah" - he was visibly cringing - "stunned myself, hoping I'd be found in time this morning. Which… seems to have happened."
Aral took a deep breath. Before he could say anything, Cordelia said, "Simon - you smell absolutely vile. What is that?"
Simon gave her an apologetic smile. "Ah… the drug overdose. I thought it would need alcohol to make it seem realistic. I wasn't sure how the maple mead would react with the meds if I drank it, so, I, ah…" He grimaced. "I had to pour it into my hair."
"Oh," Cordelia said faintly.
"In which case it's a wonder you have any scalp left." Aral sighed. "Simon, I take it this means I have to call some of the finest doctors in the galaxy at ImpMil and explain to them why one of their corpses just walked off a slab?"
"Ah… yes, sir."
"Then why don't I do that, and you can go and wash that awful stuff out of your hair. Someone will find you some clothes, as well. And…" Aral gestured mutely. "All right, we'll get to that in a minute. Go."
Simon nodded, saluted - properly, not an analyst's salute - and walked off to the steps with distinct impression of having his tail between his legs. Cordelia followed, with her hand over her mouth in a manner very suggestive of hiding a smile.
When they came down to the library, fifteen minutes later, Simon was dressed neatly in undress greens and running a towel through over his head, and looked almost normal. The change went deeper, and it was the power of sense memory, Aral decided - the mixture of alcohol and the harsh tang of the mortuary had its own particular set of associations, now replaced with the clean scent of soap and hot water. He breathed out, slowly.
"Well," Simon said, awkward.
Aral opened his mouth to speak, but Cordelia raised her hand. "One moment, please, Aral. Simon, I'm going to ask you a question now, and I expect an honest answer. Is that understood?"
Simon looked a little alarmed, but he nodded. "Yes."
"When you took those drugs last night, were you trying to kill yourself? Even in part?"
Simon's expression didn't change. "No, milady. I wasn't."
"Thank you." Cordelia waved an expansive hand at Aral. "All right, you can interrogate him now."
Before Aral could, there was the sound of a commotion in the hallway below and then the irregular tapping sound of someone walking very fast with a stick. "Sir!" Kou yelled, coming headlong through the door, "I've a message for you from HQ, it's the people ImpSec arrested today, some of them had fast penta and some of them didn't and they're all saying the same things about Cetagandan plots, and…" His swordstick hit the floor with a loud clatter as Simon stood up. "Oh, oh my God."
Aral took a deep breath. "Simon, sit. Kou, you too. Now. Explain, please."
Simon was looking at his feet. He was shivering again, Aral noted, wondering what exactly had been in the drug. "Sir," Simon said, sounding tired, "you have a Cetagandan spy in your government."
*
Miles woke up in the middle of the night asking for water. Cordelia heard his tiny footsteps and went to get it for him, sitting by his bed as he fell back asleep. "Aral," she called very softly, as he passed by the doorway; he turned to come in, Bothari obligingly stepping back to let him in and then setting off for his own bed.
"Well?" Cordelia asked, when they were alone but for Miles, sleeping peacefully.
Aral passed a hand through his hair. "It's as we suspected. The Cetagandans are bankrolling at least some of the Komarran terrorist groups. And double-crossing them too, as far as we can tell. And…" He sighed. "Commodore Vorbohn has been indirectly passing information to the Cetagandans for at least a year."
Cordelia swore softly. "How?"
"Simon said it took him a while to sift through the chip data and figure it out. During his adventures, he met with a man that he was sure he'd seen before. Turns out he's one of Vorbohn's Armsmen, though I doubt he's taken any oath. Vorbohn knows what's happening, of course, but he's not an active participant. Imagine it. The man follows Vorbohn everywhere, into Ops, into ImpSec, into the Council of Ministers, takes his own notes, draws his own conclusions. He needs a good memory and the ability to remain present but largely unnoticed, and he's a perfect spy." Another long pause, and then Aral put his head in his hands. "Oh, God, Simon. He could hang for this."
Cordelia put a hand on his shoulder and asked, softly, "What have you done with him?"
Aral lifted his head. "Put him in one of the second-floor guest rooms with a guard on the door. He looked fairly done-in, and besides, I didn't think we should let him out tonight. I don’t want to start rumours of ghosts abroad in Vorbarr Sultana."
Cordelia smiled wryly. After a pause, she asked: "What were your orders, Aral, really?"
Aral snorted. "My orders. This was his idea."
"Tell me," Cordelia said gently.
"Firstly, the fight," Aral admitted. "The idea was… to attract attention. From anyone who might consider him a possible prospect for defection. From anyone, but the Cetagandans or the Komarrans in particular. In which noble objective he seems to have succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. Cetagandan plots to manouvre Komarran plots! Firstly the Komarran media sabotage my political plans for Komarr just as a mere hors d'oeuvre, then the Cetagandans pay to have me killed, and there he is in the middle of it. Simon… doesn't do anything by halves."
"But…" Cordelia prompted.
Aral hesitated. "The risk was beyond calculable. Beyond…" He paused. "Beyond," he said carefully, "the risk that Simon Illyan, the man I know, my careful cautious spy whom Ezar gave to me for my own, would have taken. In my estimation."
Cordelia shook her head. "What are you going to do?"
Aral shrugged. "I don't know. I'm having him write me a report. What else do I ever do?" He paused. "You know, he said, it was all getting away from me. I've known him a long time and I've never heard him say anything he didn't precisely mean. I wonder if that was his way of saying…"
Cordelia said, tartly, "You know, contrary to the opinions of you, him, all of ImpSec, Ops and most of Vorbarr Sultana, he is human. He's fallible, alongside with everything else that comes along with it. Even with that damned chip in his head, he is a human being."
"You're right." Aral sounded calmer. He stood up and yawned enormously. "We should go to bed."
"Yes," Cordelia said, yawning in her turn, "we should."
She turned to give Miles a kiss before they left the room. They walked silently, hand-in-hand, down through the darkened house.
*
Some innate sense of honour, or perhaps just some stern thought of what his mother would have said, made Simon feel duty-bound to go and apologise personally to everyone had genuinely believed him dead. He was grateful to the point of cowardice that there were no children on the list: Gregor would have learned of it the following morning, and Miles and Ivan had never been told either. After sending replies to messages of condolence and making the rounds of his own staff, he stopped by his own apartment to dump civvies for Imperial greens, and went to Vorkosigan House. Kou and Bothari took the apology with the measured calm always adopted by regular Service men when faced with ImpSec in all its glory; Simon was grateful for that amount of normality, at least.
And then he took a deep breath, ran his hands over his hair to push it down, and knocked on the door into the library.
"Come in, Captain Illyan."
Aral was seated at his desk, the comconsole buzzing gently, surrounded by reports. He looked up and pressed a panel to push the machine into hibernation. The silence had become a lot to bear by the time Aral said, "Sit down here, please."
"Yes, sir." Simon sat, clasped his hands in his lap and adopted a straight-backed posture.
"I've read your unexpurgated report, which I have no doubt is going to be classified to the highest levels. Thank you for providing it." Aral paused, looked straight at him. "On a careful reading, I don't believe that there was a point where you committed treason."
Simon inhaled sharply.
Aral went on, "And now I have to decide what to do with you. You… have caused me a great deal of trouble, Simon."
Simon noted the use of his given name and kept his expression entirely straight.
"I could start by discussing what happened on Komarr. I know your what your opinion of my plan therewas. I know what my own opinion of it was. And taken together, I understand the basis from which you acted." He didn't say, from which you passed on secrets of state, for which Simon was grateful.
"It wouldn't have worked," he said. "Either they're honest politicians, in which case they won't be bought, or they're not, in which case they won't stay bought. Give it five years."
"Which we are now compelled to do regardless." Aral stared at him. "You took that decision into your own hands, when you made the choices you made. And the attack on the car… if you had been wrong…"
"I apologise, sir." Simon breathed out. "I am very, very sorry. I was anxious to salvage it any way I could."
"Which you did." Aral leaned back, still with the usual intensity in his gaze. "And for which I'm grateful. I'm curious… why did you believe your death would resolve the crisis?"
Simon took a deep breath. "I believe my Cetagandan handler was under the impression I would somehow stop the Komarran plot to assassinate you."
Aral asked, "Why?"
"They don't want total destabilising chaos on Barrayar, after all, only a continued active resistance on Komarr." Simon paused. "But bankrolling the Komarrans to create constant internal political uproar isn't a bad idea - it keeps our attention firmly on the internal matters of the Barryaran Imperium, and not on, say, them. The Cetagandans, I mean."
He was incoherent through nervousness, he realised to his dismay.
Aral frowned at him and said, "So the attempted assasination creates political uproar, I understand that. But why does your death…"
"My alleged suicide." Simon breathed and tried to stay calm. "The Komarrans naturally assumed it was out of guilt, and thus the only reason the plan could have failed was double-crossing by their Cetagandan masters. Whom they proceeded to bring down with them under ImpSec questioning, thus bringing the whole thing into the open. Sir."
Aral sighed. "Clear as mud, Simon, thank you."
"Yes, sir."
Aral didn't speak for a moment, merely keeping his unwavering gaze fixed on Simon. When he went on, his tone was contemplative. "Which brings us to our real problem, which is this. I don't know what to do with you. I could reprimand you for this whole business, draft a document of censure and place it on your file."
"The security clearance," Simon murmured.
"Correct. I suspect only three or four people would ever see it. I could take a further step and remove you from your position. But that… would not be in keeping with my Imperial duties. I went along with this plan of yours originally because it was a good plan. You are, quite simply, the best man for the job. And such is the nature of your talents I would be fearful of you putting them to use… elsewhere."
Simon sat perfectly still.
"Of course…" Aral steepled his fingers, perhaps in echo of Simon's own habitual gesture. "I could have you assassinated."
Simon inclined his head. "You could. But such exercise of Imperial power would be… impolitic."
"Yes," Aral breathed, looking predatory, "that’s right. You could have an accident."
"I'd see it coming." Simon paused. "I am liege-sworn to you, sir. You could order me to kill myself in your service."
He didn't think he imagined the real flash of pain in Aral's eyes, though he didn't mentally replay it. "Simon, sometimes you are just…"
"This is my job, sir. This is what I do."
Aral held his gaze for several seconds before he nodded, relaxing suddenly. "That's right. Chief of Imperial Security, in whatever form or shape that may take." He paused another moment, tapping a fingernail on the table. "Right, enough, we're done here."
Simon rose, but paused as Aral tensed again. "One more thing."
"Yes, sir?"
"If you ever, ever fake your own death again, I will strip you of your silver eyes, bust you down to ensign, ship you out to Kyril Island and make you clean toilets with a toothbrush for the rest of your natural lifespan, is that understood?"
"Yes, sir. Perfectly, sir."
"Good." Aral gave him the hint of a smile. "Dismissed. And, Simon? Take the rest of the day off, for God's sake. I don't think I can deal with you any more today."
*
The interrogations were still going on. During a mid-afternoon break, Simon relieved the door guard and entered the tiny cell.
At the sound of the door opening, she looked up, curled on the bench at the far wall with her feet beneath her. Her hands were shackled behind her, gently but expertly tied to a metal loop set in the wall. "Oh. You."
He consulted his notes. "Kay Diaz, born and raised on Escobar, but you've lived other places since: Komarr, Beta Colony, Earth and - ah. Eta Ceta."
She scowled at him. "What of it?"
Simon shrugged. "Nothing in particular. I'll go on thinking of you as 'January', if I may."
She pulled at her bonds. "It's not like I can stop you. Why are you here, Simon? If you're here to interrogate me, your colleagues have been doing an excellent job. I told them all manner of interesting things and some of them might even have been true. And I have an allergy to fast-penta."
"I assumed as much, although I'm not here to interrogate you." Simon took in the details of the cell, the iron bars, the tiny hatch in the door. Conditions down here were spartan and chilly, and very secure, but without the brutalities of Ezar's day. It had been a quiet, long-term project.
"Really?" She looked up at him cynically. "You're here to make small talk? How… uncharacteristic."
Simon smiled. "I'm apologising to everyone who thought I was dead."
"Are you?" She laughed. "Apology accepted. Seems the least I can do for you, you poor son of a bitch."
Simon leaned against the wall and folded his arms. "What makes you say that?"
"You can lie to me all you like, but you lie to yourself. I've seen your life, Simon Illyan. Extradition to Escobaran secure custody is going to be a picnic in comparison. "
"Quite possible." Simon nodded. "And… I never lied to you. Not once."
She raised her eyebrows. "Really? Then why am I here" - she rattled her bonds again - "and you're over there?"
He smiled. "I told you, and your colleagues, exactly how I would have engineered an attack on the Lord Regent's groundcar, which is what I was asked. I neglected to mention I'd had the municipal authorities raise some rather well-timed roadblocks and traffic diversions. You might say it was my fault they were late for their appointment. Merely something I omitted to mention."
"Aral Vorkosigan's loyal dog," she said, and laughed. "I wasn't wrong about what you like."
"Perhaps not." Simon stood up. "It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"The feeling is not mutual. No, Simon, don't go" - she sounded truly fearful for a moment, and Simon remembered the interrogators he had displaced - "I still have one question."
"Go on," he said, turning.
She fixed him with an intense gaze. "What would your price have been?"
"Lime and sugar," he said, and went out.
*
The following morning, when grudgingly allowed to return to his desk by the Lord Regent, Simon found two roses in his in-tray.
*
"Carry on, ensign," Aral was saying, "you're doing fine" - when someone came running down the stairs and barrelled straight into him and then went on running, feet still cycling forwards as Aral pushed their owner gently against the wall. "At ease, soldier."
Simon looked at him, down at his own hands, and then up at the wall. "I have just," he began, then paused, taking a deep breath, visibly collecting himself. "I have just…"
"What's that you've got there?" Aral asked, curiously.
"A rose," Simon said, "a rose" - and looked up and down and then slumped against the wall. The ensign, currently playing the role of the outer cell guard, was watching this small drama with interest and a little alarm; Aral made a decision and led his Chief of ImpSec along the corridor. At the very end, it turned into a basement tunnel ending into a blank wall and another block of cells, disused.
Aral pushed open a heavy door. "Inside."
Simon complied, and Aral followed. Although the planning had been thorough, the script carefully drafted, they hadn't laid down the terms of the reconciliation, he supposed one might call it; as in amnesty and reconciliation, as in the laying down of arms after a bitter war. "Tell me," he said, "has ImpSec's institutional paranoia reached such a stage that it undertakes surveillance of cells with no one in them?"
Simon looked around the dank little room with interest. "Not more so than anywhere else," he pronounced. "And what there is goes through my office."
"Glad to hear it. Now. What is it?"
Rather than answering, Simon slumped down the wall until he was sitting on the floor. Obediently, he tucked his feet away under him as Aral stepped over, leaned against the wall himself and slid down to join him. The panicked expression was gone from his face; it had become calculating, and then calm. "You," he said, at last.
"Me." Aral spread his hands in quiet entreaty.
"I was coming to find you to start shouting that we'd got the wrong person. Or collection of persons."
"I read your final custody report, yes," Aral said, nodding. "It's over."
"You," Simon said again, and leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. And then looked up. "Yesterday you wanted to kill me."
Smiling, Aral picked up the rose. "I often do. I didn't want you to think you'd been forgotten. I've seen the kind of thing that happens, to people who think that."
"You are a stark raving lunatic," Simon informed him, closing his eyes again. "If it had been discovered - if it had become known…"
"Simon," Aral said, gently, "you have never understood the power of a gesture."
Simon laughed suddenly. "Apparently not. I thought I was being threatened, for God's sake. I even asked Lady Alys…"
"Alys no doubt gave you the right answer." Aral turned over the rose in his hands. "Red, and white. Did you know they tend to avoid it in Imperial flower arrangements?"
Simon glared at him. "There is a whole universe of things I've had to learn since I met you. Yes, I did know that. Blood, and bone. In other words, what would be left of me, if I reneged on my newfound allegiance."
"Blood and bone," Aral said, lightly, "what holds us together."
Simon nodded. "But you still wanted to kill me. Not to mention how you hit me in front of eleven witnesses in Vorkosigan House a little more than two weeks ago."
"I tend to have strong feelings about people generally." Aral touched his shoulder and asked, very quietly, "Did you mean what you said, then?"
"When?"
"Before I…" Aral said, quietly, and smacked Simon very lightly in the side of the head.
Simon let himself slip further down the dank and chilled wall, almost down to floor level, into the comforting murk. "There's something I tell my men," he said, after a moment, "and myself, sometimes. The best lie is the truth."
Aral nodded. "The truth. Let me have the truth, Simon. You said to me, it's all getting away from me."
Simon said, "Are you asking me if I'd meant to defect?"
Aral shook his head. "I would never ask you that, Simon." Very gently, he kissed the top of Simon's head. "By the time I ask you that, it's far, far too late."
Simon considered, then reached out. His palms came together above his head. "Forgive me, I don't remember the words of my oath just now," he whispered.
Aral took just a moment to understand, held Simon's hands between his own, and said, fondly, lovingly: "Liar."
end.
Notes and acknowledgements
-This story started out life as a remix of
philomytha's Aptitude, which is a sweetly nuanced boys' own adventure story. This is… not, and barely qualifies as any sort of remix - but it still owes a debt to philomytha's lovely writing, as so much of my Vorkosigan fic does. If that were not enough she then gave the whole thing a thoughtful and clarifying beta. And noted without laughing that the room was not glittering with candlelight and scones. (
forthwritten merely noted that you can take the girl out of the bakery AU…)
Shim noted that I had inadvertently come up with the plot of The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, for which observation I'm grateful; and speaking of
forthwritten, they listened to all kinds of inanities, made a minor plot tweak that made a massive thematic difference, named an ever-increasing parade of hapless redshirts passing ImpSec employees, and can now get on with their life in peace.
Thank you all.
raven is also at Dreamwidth: there is or are
comment(s). Comment there or here.