Irresistible Forces Read online

  “Oh, my,” said Taura as they turned down the winding walk descending between curving snow hillocks. The chilly brook, its water running black and silky between feathery fingers of ice, snaked gracefully from one corner to the other. The peach-colored dawn light glimmered off the ice on the young trees and shrubs in the blue shadows. “Why, it’s beautiful. I didn’t expect a garden to be so pretty in winter. What are those men doing?”

  A crew was unloading some float pallets piled high with boxes of all sizes, marked FRAGILE. Another pair was going around with water hoses, misting selected branches marked with yellow tags to create yet more delicate, shimmering icicles. The shapes of the native Barrayaran vegetation grew luminous and exotic with this silver-gilding.

  “They’re putting out all the ice sculptures. M’lord ordered ice flowers and sculptured creatures and things to fill up the garden, since all the real plants are under the snow, pretty much. And fresh snow to be added, too, if there isn’t enough. They can’t put out t’ real live flowers for the ceremony till the very last gasp, late tomorrow morning.”

  “Good grief, he’s having an outdoor garden wedding in this weather? Is that—a Barrayaran thing, is it?”

  “Um, no. Not exactly. I believe m’lord originally was shooting for fall, but Madame Vorsoisson wasn’t ready yet. But he’d got his heart set on getting married in the garden, because it was hers, y’see. So he is, by damn, going to have the wedding in the garden. The idea is people will assemble in Vorkosigan House, then troop out here for the vows, then scurry back into the ballroom for the reception and the food and dancing and all.” And the frostbite and hypothermia treatments. “It’ll be all right if the weather stays clear, I guess.” The backstairs commentary on the potential disasters inherent in this scenario, Roic decided to keep to himself. Vorkosigan House’s staff seemed united in their determination to make the eccentric scheme work for m’lord, anyway.

  Taura’s eyes glinted in the level dawn light now filtering between the buildings of the surrounding cityscape. “I can hardly wait to try out the dress Lady Alys got up for me to wear to the ceremony. Barrayaran ladies’ clothes are so interesting. But complicated. In a way, I suppose they’re another kind of uniform, but I don’t know whether I feel like a recruit or an enemy spy in them. Well, I don’t suppose the real ladies will shoot me in any case. So much to learn about how to go on—though I suppose it all seems ridiculously easy to you. You grew up with it.”

  “I didn’t grow up with this.” Roic waved a hand toward the imposing stone pile of Vorkosigan House rising above the high, bare trees on its grounds. “My father is just a construction hand in Hassadar—that’s the Vorkosigan’s District capital city, just this side of the Dendarii Mountains, a few hundred kilometers south of here. Lots of building going on there. He offered to apprentice me to the trade, but I got the chance to become a street guard, and I took it—sort of an impulse, truth to tell. I was eighteen, didn’t know up from down. Sure learned a lot after that.”

  “What does a street guard guard? Streets?”

  “Among other things. The whole city, really. You do what needs done. Sort out traffic, before or after it’s a big bent pile. Deal with upset people’s problems, try to keep ’em from murdering their relatives, or clean up the mess after if you can’t. Trace stolen property, if you get lucky. I did a lot of night foot patrol. You learn a lot about a place on foot, up close. I learned how to handle stunners and shock-sticks and big, hostile drunks. I was getting pretty good at it, I thought, after a few years.”

  “How did you end up here?”

  “Oh…there was a little incident…” He gave an embarrassed shrug. “Some crazed loon tried to shoot up Hassadar Square at rush hour with an auto-needler. I, um, took it away from him.”

  Her brows went up. “With a stunner?”

  “No, unfortunately, I was off duty at the time. Had to do it by hand.”

  “A little hard to get up close and personal with someone firing a needler.”

  “That was a problem, yeah.”

  Her lips curved up, or at least the ivory hooks lengthened.

  “It seemed to make perfect sense at the moment, though later I wondered what t’ hell I’d been thinking. I don’t think I was thinking. At any rate, he only killed five and not fifty-five. People seemed to think it was a big deal, but I’m sure it’s nothing compared to what you’ve seen out there.” His glance upward was meant to indicate the distant stars, though the sky was now a paling blue.

  “Hey, I may be big, but I’m not needler-proof. I hate the shrieky sound when the razor-strands unwind and whiz around, even though I know in my head that those are the ones that missed.”

  “Yeah,” Roic said in heartfelt agreement. “Anyways, after that there was a stupid fuss, and someone recommended me to m’lord’s own armsman commander, Pym, and here I am.” He glanced around the sparkling fairy garden. “I think I was a better fit in the Hassadar alleys.”

  “Naw, Miles always did like having big backup. Saves a lot of small-scale grief. Though the large-scale grief we still had to take as it came.”

  He asked after a moment, “How did you bodyguard, um, m’lord?”

  “Such a funny way of thinking of him. To me, he’ll always be the little admiral. Mostly, I just loomed at people. If I had to, I smiled.”

  “But your smile’s really kind of nice,” he protested, and managed not to add the once you get used to it out loud. He’d get the hang of this savoir faire thing yet.

  “Oh, no. The other smile.” She demonstrated, her lips wrinkling back, her jaw thrusting out. Roic had to admit, it was a much wider smile. And, um, sharper. They were just treading past a workman on the rising path; he gasped and fell backward into a snowbank. With lightning reflexes, Taura reached past Roic and caught the heavy, life-size ice sculpture of a crouching fox before it hit the pavement and shattered into shards. Roic lifted the gibbering man to his feet and dusted snow off his parka, and Taura handed back the elegant ornament with a compliment upon its artistry.

  Roic managed not to choke with muffled laughter till they both had their backs to the fellow, heading away. “See what you mean. Did it ever not work?”

  “Occasionally. Next step was to pick up the recalcitrant one by the neck. Since my arms were invariably longer than theirs, they’d swing like mad but couldn’t connect. Very frustrating for them.”

  “And after that?”

  She grinned. “Stunner, by preference.”

  “Heh. Yep.”

  They’d fallen unconsciously into an easy side-by-side pace, tracing loops around the garden paths. Talking shop, Roic thought. “What mass d’you lift?”

  “With or without adrenaline?”

  “Oh, without, say.”

  “Two hundred fifty kilos, with a good grip and a good angle.”

  He emitted a respectful whistle. “If you ever want to give up mercenary-ing, I can think of a fire fighting cadre might could welcome you. M’brother’s in one, down Hassadar way. Though come to think of it, m’lord’d be a more powerful reference.”

  “Now, there’s an idea I’d never thought of.” She pursed her long lips, and her brows bent in a quizzical curve. “But, no. I expect I’ll be, as you say, mercenary-ing till…for the rest of my life. I like seeing new planets. I like seeing this one. I could never have imagined it.”

  “How many have you seen?”

  “I think I’ve lost count. I used to know. Dozens. How many have you seen?”

  “Just t’ one,” he admitted. “Though hanging around m’lord, this one keeps getting wider till I’m almost dizzy. More complicated. Does that make sense?”

  She threw back her head and laughed. “That’s our Miles. Admiral Quinn always said she’d follow him halfway to hell just to find out what happened next.”

  “Wait—this Quinn you all keep talking about is a lady admiral?”

  “She was a lady commander when I first met her. Second-sharpest tactical brain it’s ever been my privilege
to know. Things may get tight, following Elli Quinn, but you know they won’t get stupid. She didn’t sleep her way to the top by a long shot, and they’re half-wits who say so.” She grinned briefly. “That was just a perk. Some might say his, but I’d say hers.”

  Roic’s eyes crossed, trying to unravel this. “Y’mean m’lord was lovers with her, t—” He cut off the too not quite in time, and flushed. It seemed m’lord’s covert ops career was even more…complicated than he’d ever imagined.

  Taura cocked her head and regarded him with crinkling eyes. “That’s my favorite shade of pink, Roic. You are a country boy, aren’t you? Life’s uncertain out there. Things can go down bad, fast, anytime. People learn to grab what they can, when they can. For a time. We all just get a time, in our different ways.” She sighed. “Their ways diverged when he took those horrible injuries that bounced him out of ImpSec. He couldn’t go back up, and she wouldn’t come down here. Elli Quinn’s got no one but herself to blame for any chances she threw away. Though some people are born with more chances to waste than others, I’ll admit. I say, grab the ones you’re issued, run with them, and don’t look back.”

  “Something might be gaining on you?”

  “I know perfectly well what’s gaining on me.” Her grin flashed, oddly tilted this time. “Anyway, Quinn might be more beautiful, but I was always taller.” She gave a satisfied nod. Glancing at him, she added, “I guarantee Miles likes your height. It’s sort of an issue with him. I know recruiting officers in three genders who would swoon for your shoulders, as well.”

  He hadn’t the least idea how to respond to that. He hoped she was enjoying the pink. “M’lord thinks I’m a fool,” he said glumly.

  Her brows shot up. “Surely not.”

  “Oh, yeah. You have no idea how I screwed up.”

  “I’ve seen him forgive screwups that put his guts on the bloody ceiling. Literally. You’d have to go some to top that. How many people died?”

  If you put it in that perspective…“No one,” he admitted. “I just wished I could have.”

  She grinned in sympathy. “Ah, one of those kinds of screwups. Oh, c’mon, tell.”

  He hesitated. “Y’know those nightmares where you find yourself walking around naked in the town square, or in front of your schoolteachers, or something?”

  “My nightmares tend to be a bit more exotic, but yeah?”

  “So, no lie, there I was…Last summer, m’lord’s brother Mark brought home this damned Escobaran biologist, Dr. Borgos, that he’d picked up somewheres, and put him up in the basement of Vorkosigan House. An investment scheme. The biologist made bugs. And the bugs made bug butter. Tons of it. Slimy white stuff, edible, sort of. We found out the biologist had jumped bail back on Escobar—for fraud, no surprise—when t’ skip-tracers they’d sent to arrest him showed up and talked their way into Vorkosigan House. Naturally, they picked a time when almost everyone had gone out. Lord Mark and the Koudelka sisters, who were in on the bug butter scheme, got in a fight with them when they tried to carry off Borgos, and the house staff waked me up to go sort it out. All in a tearing panic—wouldn’t even let me grab my uniform trousers. I’d just got to sleep…Martya Koudelka claims it was friendly fire, but I dunno. I’d just about pushed the whole mess of ’em out the front door when in walks m’lord with Madame Vorsoisson and all her relatives. He’d just got engaged and wanted to make a good impression on ’em all…It was an unforgettable one, I guarantee. I was wearing briefs, boots, and about five kilos of bug butter, trying to deal wit’ all these screaming, sticky maniacs…”

  A muffled sound escaped from Taura. She had her hand over her mouth, but it wasn’t helping; little squeaks still leaked out. Her eyes were alight.

  “I swear it wouldn’t a’ been half so bad if I’d not had my briefs on backwards and my stunner holster on frontways. I can still hear Pym’s voice…” He mimicked the senior armsman’s driest tones: “‘Your weapon is worn on the right, Armsman.’”

  She laughed out loud then, and looked him up and down in somewhat unsettling appreciation. “That’s a pretty amazing word picture, Roic.”

  Despite himself, he smiled a little. “I guess so. I dunno if m’lord’s forgiven me, but I’m right sure Pym hasn’t.” He sighed. “If you see one of those damned vomit bugs still around, squash it on sight. Hideous bioengineered mutant things, kill ’em all before they multiply.”

  Her laughter stopped cold.

  Roic reran his last sentence in his head and made the unpleasant discovery that one could do far worse things to oneself with words than with dubious food products, or possibly even with needlers. He hardly dared look up to see her face. He forced his eyes right.

  Her face was perfectly still, perfectly pale, perfectly blank. Perfectly appalling.

  I meant those devil-bugs, not you! He managed to stop that idiocy on his lips before it escaped to do even more damage, but only just. He couldn’t think of any way to apologize that wouldn’t make it worse.

  “Ah, yes,” she said at last. “Miles did warn me that Barrayarans had some pretty ugly issues about gene manipulation. I just forgot.”

  And I reminded you. “We’re getting better,” he tried.

  “Good for you.” She inhaled, a long breath. “Let’s go in. I’m getting cold.”

  Roic was frozen straight through. “Um. Yeah.”

  They walked back to the gate in silence

  Roic slept the day around, trying to force his body back onto the boring night shift cycle that by the duty roster was to be his junior armsman’s fate this Winterfair. He was quite sorry to thus miss seeing m’lord take his galactic guests and a selection of his in-laws-to-be on a tour of Vorbarr Sultana. He’d have been fascinated by what the two disparate parties made of each other. Madame Vorsoisson’s family, the Vorvaynes, were solid provincial Vor types of the sort Roic had always regarded as normal to the class, before he’d taken up his duties in Vorkosigan House’s high Vor milieu. M’lord, well…m’lord wasn’t standard by anybody’s standard. The four Vorvayne brothers, though dutifully pleased with their widowed sister’s upward social leap, plainly found m’lord an unnerving catch. Roic wished he could see what they would make of Taura. He melted into sleep with a vague scenario drifting through his reeling brain of somehow imposing his body between her and some undefined social insult. Maybe then she would see that he hadn’t meant anything by his awful gaffe…

  He woke at sunset and made a foray down to Vorkosigan House’s huge kitchen, belowstairs. Usually m’lord’s genius cook, Ma Kosti, left delectable surprises in the staff refrigerator and was always looking for a good gossip, but tonight the pickings were slim and the personal attention nonexistent. The place was plunged into final preparations for tomorrow’s great event, and Ma Kosti, driving her harried scullions before her, made it plain that anyone below the rank of count, or perhaps emperor, was very much in the way just now. Roic fueled up and retreated.

  At least the kitchen did not have to deal with a formal dinner atop all the rest. M’lord, the count and countess, and all the guests were off to the Imperial Residence for the Winterfair Ball and midnight bonfire, the heart of the festivities marking solstice night and the turning of the season. When they all decamped from Vorkosigan House, Roic had the vast place to himself, but for the rumble from the kitchen and the servants rushing about completing the last-minute decorations and arrangements in the public rooms, the great dining room, and the seldom-used ballroom.

  He was therefore surprised, about an hour before midnight, when the gate guard called him to code open the front door. He was even more surprised when a small car with government markings pulled up under the porte cochere and m’lord and Sergeant Taura climbed out. The car buzzed off, and its passengers entered the hall, shaking the cold air out of their outer garments and handing them off to Roic.

  M’lord was dressed in the most elaborate version of the brown and silver Vorkosigan House uniform, befitting a count’s heir attending upon the emperor, com
plete with custom-fitted polished riding boots to his knees. Taura wore a close-fitting, embroidered russet jacket, made high to the neck where a bit of lace showed, and a matching skirt sweeping to ankles clad in soft, russet-colored leather boots. A graceful spray of cream-and-rust colored orchids was wound into her braided-up hair. Roic wished he could have seen her entrance into the Imperial Winterfair Ball, and heard what the emperor and empress had said upon meeting her…

  “No, I’m all right,” Taura was saying to m’lord. “I saw the palace and the ball—they were beautiful—but I’ve had enough. It’s just that I was up at dawn, and to tell the truth, I think I’m still a little jump-lagged. Go see to your bride. Is she still sick?”

  “I wish I knew.” M’lord paused on the steps, three up, and leaned on the banister to speak face-to-face with Taura, who was watching him in concern. “She wasn’t sure even last week about attending the emperor’s bonfire tonight, though I thought it would be a valuable distraction. She insisted she was all right when I talked to her earlier. But her aunt Helen says she’s all to pieces, hiding in her room and crying. This is just not like her. I thought she was tough as anything. Oh, God, Taura. I think I’ve screwed up this whole wedding thing so badly…I rushed her into it, and now it’s all coming apart. I can’t imagine how bad the stress must be to make her physically ill.”

  “Slow down, dammit, Miles. Look. You said her first marriage was dire, yes?”

  “Not bruises and black eyes bad, no. Draining the blood of your spirit out drop by drop for years bad, maybe. I only saw the very end of it. It was pretty gruesome by then.”

  “Words can cut worse than knives. The wounds take longer to heal, too.”

  She didn’t look at Roic. Roic didn’t look back.

  “Isn’t that the truth,” said m’lord, who wasn’t looking at either of them. “Damn! Should I go over there or not? They say it’s bad luck to see the bride before the wedding. Or was that the wedding dress? I can’t remember.”