Lois Bujold - Komarr

“I didn’t mean to burden you. Will it be awkward, to carry home on the jumpship?”

“I’ll put it in a sealed container. By the time I reach my destination, it should be just about ready to replant.” She washed and dried her hands; Miles followed suit.

Damn Tuomonen anyway, for forcing to Miles’s consciousness a desire his back-brain had known very well was too unripe and out of season for any fruitful result. Time is out of joint, she’d said. Now he was going to have to deal with it. Now he was going to have to wait. How long? How about until after Tien is buried, for starters? His intentions were honorable enough, at least some of them were, but his timing was lousy. He shoved his hands deep into his pockets and rocked on his heels.

Ekaterin folded her arms, leaned against the counter, and stared at the floor. “I wish to apologize, Lord Vorkosigan, for anything I might have said under fast-penta that was not appropriate.”

Miles shrugged. “I invited myself along. But I thought you could use a spotter. You did as much for me, after all.”

“A spotter.” She looked up, her expression lightening. “I had not thought of it like that.”

He opened his hand and smiled hopefully.

She smiled briefly in return, but then sighed. “I’d been so frantic, all day, for ImpSec to be done so I could go get Nikki. Now I think they were doing me a favor. I dread this part. I don’t know what to tell him. I don’t know how much I should tell him about Tien’s mess. As little as possible? The whole truth? Neither feels right.”

Miles said slowly, “We’re still in the middle of a classified case, here. You can’t burden a nine-year-old boy with government secrets, or that kind of judgment call. I don’t even know yet how much of this will eventually become public knowledge.”

“Things not done right away get harder.” She sighed. “As I’m finding now.”

Miles drew up the comconsole chair for her, and motioned her into it, and pulled out the stool from under the work bench. He perched on it, and asked, “Had you told him you were leaving Tien?”

“Not even that, yet.”

“I think… that for today, you should only tell him that his father suffered an accident with his breath mask. Leave the Komarrans out of it. If he asks for more details than you know how to deal with, send him to me, and I’ll take the job of telling him he can’t know, or can’t know yet.”

Her level look asked, Can I trust you? “Take care you don’t stir up more curiosity than you quell.”

“I understand. The problem of the whole truth is as much a question of when as what. But after we both get back to Vorbarr Sultana, I would like, with your permission, to take you to talk with Gr-with a close friend of mine. He’s Vor, too. He had the experience of being in something like Nikki’s position. His father died under, ah, grievous circumstances, when he was much too young to be told the details. When he stumbled across some of the uglier facts, in his early twenties, it was pretty traumatic. I’ll bet he’ll have a better feel than either of us for what to tell Nikki and when. He has a fine judgment.”

She gave him a provisional nod. “That sounds right. I would like that very much. Thank you.”

He returned her a half-bow, from his perch. “Glad to be of service, Madame.” He’d wanted to introduce her to Gregor the man, his foster-brother, not Emperor Gregor the Imperial Icon, anyway. This might serve more than one purpose.

“I also have to tell Nikki about his Vorzohn’s Dystrophy, and I can’t put that off. I made an appointment for him at a clinic in Solstice for the day after tomorrow.”

“He does not know he carries it?”

She shook her head. “Tien would never let me tell him.” She studied him gravely. “I think you were in something like Nikki’s position, too, when you were a child. Did you have to undergo a great many medical procedures then?”

“God, yes, years of ’em. What can I say that’s useful? Don’t lie about whether it’s going to hurt. Don’t leave him alone for long periods.” Or you, either… There was finally something he could do for her. “Events permitting, may I ride along with you to Solstice and render what assistance I can? I can’t spare your uncle to you-he’s going to be buried in technical problems by day after tomorrow, if my parts list takes shape.”

“I can’t take you away from your duties!”

“My experience suggests to me that if Soudha hasn’t been arrested by then, what I will be doing by day after tomorrow is spinning my mental wheels. A day away from the problems may be just what I will need to give me a fresh approach. You would be doing me a service, I assure you.”

She pursed her lips doubtfully. “I admit… I would be grateful for the company.”

Did she mean any company, generally, or his company particularly? Down, boy. Don’t even think about it. “Good.”

Voices drifted in from the vestibule: one of the guards, and a familiar rumble. Ekaterin jumped up. “My uncle is here!”

“He made very good time.” Miles followed her into the hallway.

Professor Vorthys, his broad face wrinkled with concern, gave his valise over to the guard and folded his niece in his arms, murmuring condolences. Miles watched in exquisite envy. Her uncle’s warm sympathy almost broke her down, as all of ImpSec’s cool professionalism had not; Miles made a mental note. Cool and practical, that was the ticket. She dashed tears from her eyes, dispatched the guard with his case to Tien’s old office as before, and led her uncle to the living room.

After a very brief conference, it was decided the Professor would accompany her to go collect Nikolai. Miles seconded this despite what he ironically recognized as his present lovesick mania for volunteerism. Vorthys had a family right, and Miles himself was too close to Tien’s death. He was also swaying on his feet as the set of painkillers and stimulants he’d taken before lunch wore off. Taking a third dose today would be a bad mistake. Instead he saw the Professor and Ekaterin out, then checked in with ImpSec HQ in Solstice on the secured comconsole.

No new news. He wandered back toward the living room. Ekaterin’s uncle was here; Miles should go, now. Collect his things and decamp to that mythical hotel he’d been gassing about for the last week. There was no room for him in this little apartment, with Vorthys reinstalled in the guest room. Nikki would need his own bed back, and he was damned if he was going to trouble Ekaterin to rustle up another grav-bed, or worse, for his Vor lordly use. What had she been expecting, when she’d ordered in that thing? He should definitely go. He was obviously not being as civilly neutral toward his hostess as he’d imagined, if that blasted guard could make whatever comment it had been that had set off Tuomonen on that list of embarrassing questions about the suitcases.

“Do you need anything, my lord?” The door guard’s voice at Miles’s elbow startled him awake.

“Um… yeah. Next time one of your boys comes over from Solstice HQ, have him bring me a standard military-issue bedroll.”

In the meanwhile, Miles staggered over and curled up on the couch after all. He was asleep in minutes.

Miles awoke when the little party returned with Nikki. He sat up and managed to be reasonably composed by the time he had to face the boy. Nikki looked subdued and scared, but was not weeping or hysterical; he evidently turned his reactions inward rather than outward. Like his mother.

In the absence of female friends of Ekaterin’s bearing casseroles and cakes in the Barrayaran manner, Miles caused ImpSec to supply dinner. The three adults kept the conversation neutral in front of Nikki, after which he went off to play by himself in his room, and Miles and the Professor retired to the study for a data-exchange. The new equipment found topside was indeed peculiar, including some power-transfer equipment heavy-duty enough for a small jumpship, parts of which had ripped apart, melted, and apparently exploded in a shower of plasma. The Professor called it, “Truly interesting,” an engineering code-phrase that caught Miles’s full attention.