Lois Bujold: Irresistible Forces

"Hospitals, yes, of course! I should have thought of them at once."

"Why do you want one?" he asked again.

She hesitated. "I'm not sure that I do. It was just a train of thought I had earlier this evening, when that aunt-lady called Mles. Not sure I like its destination, though…" She turned away and swung up the stairs, taking them two at a time without effort. Roic frowned, then went off to scare up a vehicle from whatever remained in the sub-basement garage. With so many signed out to transport the household and its guests already, this might take some rapid extemporizing.

But Taura had spoken to him, almost normally. Maybe… maybe there were such things as second chances. If a fellow was brave enough to take them.

Lord Auditor and Professora Vorthys's home was a tall, old, colorfully tiled structure close to the District University. The street was quiet when Roic pulled the car — borrowed without notification, ultimately, from one of the armsmen off with the count at the Residence — up to the front. From a distance, mainly in the direction of the university, drifted the sharp crackle of fireworks, harmonious singing, and blurred drunken singing. A rich, heady scent of wood smoke and black powder permeated the frosty night air.

The porch light was on. The Professora, an aging, smiling, neat Vor lady who intimidated Roic only slightly less than did Lady Alys, let them in herself. Her soft round face was tense with worry.

"Did you tell her I was coming?" m'lord asked in a low tone as he shed his coat. He stared anxiously up the stairs leading from the narrow, wood-paneled hallway.

"I didn't dare."

"Helen… what should I do?" M'lord looked suddenly smaller, and scared, and younger and older all at the same time.

"Just go up, I think. This isn't something that's about talking, or words, or reason. I've run through all those."

He buttoned then unbuttoned the gray tunic he'd thrown on over an old white shirt, pulled down his sleeves, took a deep breath, mounted the stairs, and turned out of sight. After a minute or two, the Professora stopped picking nervously at her hands, gestured Roic to a straight chair beside a small table piled with books and flimsies, and tiptoed up after him.

Roic sat in the hall and listened to the old house creak. From the sitting room, visible through one archway, a glow from a fireplace gilded the air. Through the opposite archway, the Professora's study lay, lined with books; the light from the hall picked out an occasional bit of gold lettering on an ancient spine in the gloom. Roic wasn't bookish himself, but he liked the comfortable academic smell of this place. It occurred to him that back when he was a Hassadar guard, he'd never once gone into a house to clean up a bad scene, blood on the walls and evil smells in the air, where there were books like this.

After a long time, the Professora came back down to the hall.

Roic ducked his head respectfully. "Is she sick, ma'am?"

The tired-looking woman pursed her lips and let her breath run out. "She certainly was last night. Terrible headache, so bad she was crying and almost vomiting. But she thought she was much better this morning. Or she said she was. She wanted to be better. Maybe she was trying too hard."

Roic peered anxiously up the staircase. "Would she see him?"

The tension in her face eased a little. "Yes."

"Is it going to be all right?"

"I think so, now." Her lips sought a smile. "Anyway, Mles says you are to go on home. That he expects to be a while, and that he'll call if he needs anything."

"Yes, ma'am." He rose, gave her a kind of vague salute copied from m'lord's own style, and let himself out.

The night duty guard at the gate kiosk reported no entries since Roic had left. The festivities at the Imperial Residence would go on till dawn, although Roic didn't expect Vorkosigan House's attendees to stay that late, not with the grand party planned here for tomorrow afternoon and evening. He put the borrowed car away in the sub-basement garage, relieved that it hadn't acquired any hard-to-explain dings in its passage back through some of the rowdier crowds between here and the university.

He made his way softly up through the mostly darkened great house. All was quiet now. The kitchen crew had at last retreated till tomorrow's onslaught. The maids and menservants had gone to roost. For all that he complained about missing the daytime excitements, Roic usually enjoyed these quiet night hours when the whole world seemed his personal property. Granted, by three hours before dawn, coffee would be a necessity little less urgent than oxygen. But by two hours before dawn, life would start trickling back, as those with early duties roused themselves and padded down to start work. He checked the security monitors in the basement HQ and started his physical rounds. Floor by floor, window and door, never in quite the same order or at quite the same hour.

As he crossed the great entry hall, a creak and a clink sounded from the half-lit antechamber to the library. He paused for a moment, frowned, and rose on his toes, moving his feet as gently as possible across the marble pavement, breathing through his open mouth for silence. His shadow wavered, passed along from dim wall sconce to dim wall sconce. He made sure it was not thrown before him as he moved to the archway. Easing up beside the door frame, he stared into the half-gloom.

Taura stood with her back to him, sorting through the gifts displayed upon the long table by the far wall. Her head bent over something in her hands. She shook out a cloth and upended a small box. The elegant triple strand of pearls slithered from their velvet backing into the cloth, which she wrapped around them. She clicked the box closed, set it back on the table, and slipped the folded cloth into a side pocket of her russet jacket.

Shock held Roic paralyzed for a moment longer, M'lord's honored guest, rifling the gifts?

But I liked her. I really liked her.

Only now, in this moment of hideous revelation, did he realize just how much he'd come to… to admire her in their brief time together. Brief, but so damned awkward. She was really beautiful in her own unique way, if only you looked at her right. For a moment it had seemed as though far suns and strange adventures had beckoned to him from her gold eyes; just possibly, more intimate and exotic adventures than a shy backcountry boy from Hassadar had ever dared to imagine. If only he were a braver man. A handsome prince. Not a fool. But Cinderella was a thief, and the fairy tale was gone suddenly sour.

Sick dismay flooded him as he imagined the altercation, the shame, the wounded friendship and shattered trust that must follow this discovery — he almost turned away. He didn't know the value of the pearls, but even if it were a city's ransom he was certain m'lord would trade them in a heartbeat for the ease of spirit he'd had with his old followers.

It was no good. They'd be missed first thing tomorrow in any case. He drew a breath and touched the light pad.

Taura spun like a huge cat at the flare of the overhead lights. After a moment, she let out her breath in a huff, visibly powering down. "Oh. It's you. You startled me."

Roic moistened his lips. Could he patch up this shattered fantasy? "Put them back, Taura. Please."

She stood still, looking back at him, tawny eyes wide; a grimace crossed her odd features. She seemed to coil, tension flowing back into her long body.

"Put them back now," Roic tried again, "and I won't tell." He bore a stunner. Could he draw it in time? He'd seen how fast she moved…

"I can't."

He stared at her without comprehension.

"I don't dare ." Her voice grew edgy. "Please, Roic. Let me go now, and I promise I'll bring them back again tomorrow."