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About a week after what Gregor had dubbed the Nautical Incident -- with a clear subtext of we shall never speak of this again -- Miles found himself taking those last inevitable steps up to the east entrance of the Imperial Residence. He tried not to limp.
Haft, Gregor's secretary, met him with a casual gesture of welcome, and led him through the familiar hallways. It was chance that the Emperor had... one couldn't really say 'decided to stay home today,' because Gregor was thoroughly at work, but had chosen this private office over the one at the Castle. Or perhaps not chance; he'd generally been opting for the office closer to his wife and children when politics did not absolutely require the other. Subtext, in this case, was not clear, and Miles would have to wait for evidence to deduce it. They'd run through these halls together, as children; that was one point of connection.
The office was in the north wing; they did not hurry to reach it. Haft, whose stride had shortened with perfect tact, unnoticeable to anyone who hadn't been watching others be tactful since his cane had become a regular accessory, and long before, delivered him to Gregor and vanished with a nod that betokened obeisance without actually illustrating it.
"Hello, Miles," said Gregor, waving him toward a chair. "Coffee? It's still hot."
Miles ignored both invitations. "Sire," he said, with a little nod much like Haft's, but less tactful. "Thank you for granting me an audience."
Gregor's gaze sharpened. "Yes," he said. "That is what you asked for. I didn't miss the form of the request. Well," he went on, with a palms-up gesture, "here we are. Is this a petition? An announcement?"
A confession. When he was in control of the situation, which was most of the time, Gregor could express deep concern with nonchalant good humor, while still making it clear that explanations were required in short order. The range of worrisome tidings that Miles could be bringing spanned star-distances; he thought the intent hazel eyes regarding him saw the whole panorama, and each pin-prick of fate, each black hole within it, without blinking.
Yet Gregor could still be blindsided. He had been, not very long ago. Miles hated the thought of doing it again, but he couldn't turn back now. Wild and wily methods of diversion darted through his brain: I am resigning to run off and join the navy; I found you an elephant after all, but there's a catch; another Vorkosigan clone turned up, and you're looking at him; oops, forgot my seizure stimulator this month, crash, shudder. None of them came close to plausible. Or possible.
"You remember what I said last week," he told Gregor, "about not letting things bottle up? Telling each other what we needed to, sooner rather than later?" Gregor nodded. "I figured something out, that day. Began to, anyway: one of those eruptions of awareness that starts with puffs of smoke and dribbles out lava for a while afterwards." Like a memory cascade, but far less welcome than that painful waterfall; the metaphor he'd unconsciously substituted was apt. This could burn them both, badly. "I couldn't tell you then; I had to be sure. I am, now. And I don't know how I could never have realized..."
He was liable to go on dribbling things out himself, for quite a while, if he didn't get on with this. Gregor was silent, poised but tense, waiting. Miles dropped his cane and walked forward, steady on his feet, until he had rounded Gregor's desk and was facing his friend, his Emperor, toe to toe; then he sank to his knees, as gracefully as possible: not very.
Head bowed -- he was not going to look up and see the shock in Gregor's eyes -- he gave himself over to the speech he hadn't needed to memorize, because he'd had nothing else in his mind for days.
"With the voice of my father, Aral Vorkosigan," he said, "and with my own heart's breath, I crave your forgiveness and submit myself to your justice. Our family has wronged yours, whom we serve and have served, body and blood, for time immemorial."
"Immemorial. Well, we've tried to forget most of it," Gregor said, thin and dry like smoke on the wind. "Miles... what are you saying?"
He kept his head bowed; he didn't quite know why, beyond a sense of subjection to someone toward whom he'd seldom bothered to act like a subject before. My hands are between yours. Plain truth.
"My father," he said, "killed your father."
A beat of silence, and then Gregor said, "My father was killed in battle. By his own ship's weaponry, ricocheted back by plasma mirrors, if I've got my facts straight. I do know that it was your mother who brought the devices to the Escobarans, to defend themselves against invasion. That was a legitimate act of war; Beta was an ally of Escobar. I have never blamed her for it."
"Oh. Right. But... not my mother." Although, beyond continually ambushing his expectations, she must bear some of the guilt for this as well. She was not in this office, however. Neither was his father, but...
"Aral Vorkosigan--" he began.
"Aral Vorkosigan," Gregor interrupted, "knelt to me in that very spot, more than a year ago, and told me I didn't have the guts to execute my son for his crimes. He was wrong, as it turned out. What are you offering, baring your neck to me thus?" The harsh Imperial tones gentled. "Do you expect me to slice your head off with a letter opener?"
"That sounds tedious and agonizing," Miles said, still not looking up, "and merciful in comparison to saying what I must." Gregor probably owned a regiment of letter openers, in varying degrees of decoration and functionality, and generally obsolete, but the keen-edged knife he'd briefly lent Miles last week was still at his belt, and had been for over a year. Time was, he hadn't bothered with a personal weapon; he still didn't carry a stunner.
"Sorry, Miles," Gregor said dryly. "Sworn not to execute without trial, you know. Damn it all, get up." He paused as Miles didn't stir, and added, "Make that an Imperial order, if you need to."
"Yes, Sire." Miles stood, using the desk edge as leverage. Gregor got up too, fetched a chair from a spot near the window, and placed it behind Miles, pointing with one ironic finger. Miles sat. It was the chair Gregor reserved for him; his feet touched the floor. Gregor's children probably used it too, come to think of it.
"Now," said Gregor, resuming his desk chair, like a throne, "your father killed my father, you say. Leaving out that my father well deserved to be killed... how, exactly?"
Miles could already tell, looking at Gregor's face, that he'd made a mistake. Gregor didn't look angry -- that quiet, terrifying stillness Miles had witnessed only a few times -- but he did look annoyed. Resentful, perhaps: resentment had simmered beneath much of their discussion last week. And the note of easy camaraderie they'd ended on was not chiming either. He didn't have a flask to pull out this time, and Gregor would not have partaken if he had. This was not a day off at -- and in -- the lake; this was business. The worst kind of business: the family kind. And from experience, Miles knew that Gregor's look of mild annoyance might mean anything from fly-swatting pique to I would rather shoot myself than listen to this, but it is clearly my duty to listen. Get on with it.
Miles took a breath. "I've been going through my father's old files, as I told you. I went backwards, chronologically. To give you some of the context I was immersed in, during his years as Regent he needed to suppress several claims lingering on from... things your father did while he was alive. I had to use my Auditor's seal to read those cases, and I kind of wish I hadn't."
"The claimants were given adequate compensation?" Gregor said. Miles nodded, then shrugged. "If there is such a thing," Gregor interpreted. He bit his lip, and added, "I hope you're not going to tell me I have any suppressed half-siblings."
Miles shook his head. "You wouldn't. You do... know that, right?"
"Yes. Unfortunately."
He hadn't come here to make Gregor shrink into himself like that. Get on with it. "So I had Prince Serg on my mind already," he said, "and then I went further back, and came to Escobar. Speaking of suppression, I'd heard my father tried to eliminate study of his retreat strategy from the Academy curriculum. I thought it was modesty, or embarrassment -- nothing like being renowned for handling a defeat well, especially after becoming notorious for a victory like Komarr -- but now I think it was an attempt to cover his ass. And, um, my mother's, though it wasn't as if we didn't all know she was on the other side."
"So you're saying there was something amiss with the retreat strategy?"
"No, it was perfect. A little too perfect. No, I'm saying... so you knew about the plasma mirrors?"
"As did you. That was in our Academy curriculum as well." Gregor's lip twisted; what it must have been like for him, hearing that lecture... well, perhaps worse, remembering hearing it, a few years later. "A glorious failure," he added. "And... thorough in its effect. I came to find it rather comforting that there was absolutely nothing left of Serg Vorbarra. Though I have occasionally had the nightmare where he escaped at the last moment."
"Shit," said Miles, taken aback. He'd had the dream where his father was still alive, but the heartache was on waking. He shook himself. "Yes. And you're right, I heard the lecture too. There's no doubt that your father and all his shipmates were killed by a reflected burst from a plasma mirror... so why did my father tell me it was a 'lucky shot' from an Escobaran ship? And not" -- he held up a hand -- "as an early cover story. This was not long before your wedding. Came up in the lecture you told me to ask him for, on honor and reputation. Ha." Heartache never to see his father again, yes; heartache to know he wouldn't be able to look him in the face if he returned from the dead.
"Shorthand?" suggested Gregor.
"Doesn't scan," said Miles. "And when he mentioned it before -- not like it was a regular topic of conversation, but after I heard the Academy lecture I had to get his perspective -- he called it what it was, an unavoidable error based on military instinct. The harder you hit them, the better chance you have of winning. Maybe... huh." His left hand moved to clasp his right forearm, almost without his noticing. "I learned pretty early on that wasn't true. But not everyone's used to hitting being that painful and useless. No, it wasn't shorthand. It was avoidance. Contextual. Honor and reputation," he added when Gregor, not unexpectedly, looked puzzled.
"Reputation is what others know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself," Gregor recited. "Did Aral know something about himself he didn't want you to find out?"
"I'm afraid so. He also said... it was along the lines of 'nothing more awful than to have your honor shattered at your feet while reputation wraps you in rewards.' I thought... well, I wasn't paying enough attention; too self-centered, trying too hard to avoid the opposite fate. But if I thought anything, it was that he meant Komarr."
"I wouldn't call what his reputation did for him then a reward, exactly," Gregor said.
"No. But when did he get rewarded?"
Gregor nodded slowly. "When he returned from Escobar. But that would mean... wait." He closed his eyes, evidently pulling it all together. Not a volcano, for Gregor; more like the ground crumbling under his feet. Again. "You're saying he knew about the plasma mirrors ahead of time -- from your mother? -- and didn't let on. Let my father get in their way. And... was rewarded by my grandfather. For..." Gregor's breath hissed in, and his eyes opened; he looked old and tired. "Oh, Aral. What did I make you do?"
Miles had anticipated this response; it was the parallel that had prompted the realization to begin with. A pair of emperors, killing their sons: sons with the same name. "You executed a criminal," he said. "Several people died who shouldn't have; you can blame yourself for that if you want, though I don't personally consider your guilt valid. It was all pretty horrible, but it was on a small scale. The Escobaran War..."
"Ten thousand dead," said Gregor. "To kill one." He got up abruptly, went to the window to stare out at the gardens.
Gregor's office walls were decorated with intriguing modern art, his own personal collection; never, at least while Miles was present, did he stare into one of the paintings while thinking. It was always the window, framed with the same heavy green silk curtains as the other windows in this wing; always Ezar's gardens. The curtains were not to Gregor's taste; presumably it was the uniformity of the view from outside that dictated their use, but they had seemed incongruous with the room, until Miles had finally realized that the incongruity was Gregor's taste, Gregor's desperate attempt at individuality. Smothered, as always, by the weight of tradition.
He stood looking out a moment longer, and then said, "If so, Aral can't be blamed. He must certainly have been following my grandfather's order."
"Or his unspoken wish."
"No." The syllable snapped out like the lash of a whip.
"Well, if an order, an illegal one. And carried out... I hate to think with a reward in mind, but--"
"No. Not Aral."
Why do you have more faith in my father than I do myself? "My father served your grandfather. Body and blood. And soul."
"The Vorkosigans have always given themselves wholeheartedly to service."
"Yes, but..." Miles pushed himself to his feet, followed his friend to the window, put a hand to his arm. "Gregor. If you'd asked me to pursue a war to kill off your Serg, I hope I wouldn't have done it. Killed him for you with my own hand, yes, but not made others suffer for it. Dying a traitor's death would have been preferable. And... I have never thought myself worthy to lick my father's boots. He was a great man; I'm just--"
"Miles, I'm sure if you'd been in charge, we would own Escobar now, and not a ship would have been lost, and my father would have died of an untraceable poison administered in his sleep."
"Don't be modest, hm?" The blistering slap of Gregor's praise flung him away; his feet moved of their own accord into a march across the office. Damn the limp; full speed ahead. Retreating. "In that era, I wouldn't have survived infancy, let alone ended up in charge of anything."
"Mm." Gregor said nothing else for a moment, then murmured, "Such a waste." He didn't mean Miles, who turned when he reached the far wall to see the Emperor staring out at the neat hedges and skeletal rose beds, waiting to wake from the long winter, as if they were platoons of soldiers, fallen en masse. Space battles meant less mess, fewer graves. The loss was not correspondingly easier to bear.
"Miles," Gregor said finally, "you're very convincing. You make me want to believe you, even when I hate the very thought of it. But... this is unproven. All of it. Ezar sent his son into battle, hoping he'd be killed; I can understand that. Your father -- a brilliant military strategist -- designed the retreat. Someone always has to. Aside from him, our leadership was inferior, and our intelligence poor. The Escobarans picked the right allies, fought cleverly, and won. And it worked out well for the Vorbarras and the Vorkosigans, if not for plenty of other families. I note that but for that war, you would never have been born."
"Neither would Elena have been." Miles started pacing again. "But other children would have; potential fathers and mothers were slaughtered. On our side, they might have lived on just to die in Serg's civil war the next year. Who would have been your Regent then? Vordarian? Would he have arranged an accident for you, and taken the throne, or was it my father's politics that pushed him over the edge? We can't know. We only know the history we get." Miles took a breath. "And all right, it's a circumstantial case. I wish I didn't believe what it was telling me."
Gregor was silent for a moment. "We do have a witness," he said at last.
Miles's hands clutched together. "I am not asking my mother about this," he said. "Not now. Maybe... in a few years."
"I didn't mean your mother. For one thing, by the time we got her here from Sergyar, you would have worn a trench in my floor."
Miles stopped pacing. "Then who do you... oh." We have a witness. But there's a catch. "We can't rely on Simon's memory."
"His evidence wouldn't hold up in court, no, but he's honest about his limitations; won't invent what he can't recall. And he's here. In the Residence at the moment, most likely." Miles quirked an eyebrow. "He's been spending mornings in the library," Gregor said. "Working on his memoirs, he says, very ironically. Shall I search him out?"
Miles felt inexplicably reluctant to involve Simon in this. He'd wanted to get at the truth, known he had a duty to do so, and had known also that his case wasn't strong enough, no matter how sure he was that his father was guilty. But Simon had been his father's liegeman and his friend; could he have served, or loved, the man who'd lent himself to this atrocity? And if he didn't know what Aral Vorkosigan had done, could Miles stand to tell him?
He sought for a reason to dissuade Gregor; found one quickly enough. "But he doesn't know about, uh--"
"My son? Yes, he does. I told him." Miles made a little "oh" noise, and Gregor added, "I told a few more people, in the past week. Do you require a list? You didn't want to be the last one I told, surely--"
"No. To both." Gregor's sarcasm was as sharp as the knife he wore; it could cut to the bone, and he used it sparingly and with intent. "All right. Let's call Simon in, then, if that's what you want."
Gregor touched a comm link. "Haft," he said, "please see if Captain Illyan is in the Residence, and if so ask him if he would attend on me. At his leisure, but give it a slight Imperial nudge. Thank you." He turned back to Miles. "The offer of coffee still stands. Unless you think I didn't mention untraceable poisons by chance."
"I take mine black." As you know.
Gregor poured for them both. The coffee was still hot, and Miles sipped at it gratefully; it had been a sleep-deprived night. Several threads of coffee-appropriate conversation occurred to him and were rejected as bearing too strongly on family matters; even the politics of the moment mostly hinged on inheritances. They were all tired of talking about the weather. It was really Gregor's job to introduce new topics, as the host and the highest-ranking person present, but he had always been comfortable with silence.
"We only know the history we get," he said finally, echoing Miles. "We don't even know that, do we? Each generation loses so much that the generation before took to the grave. I wonder if it isn't all for the best."
"Perhaps I shouldn't have said anything."
"Too late now, isn't it?" The knife in Gregor's voice hadn't been sheathed; Miles sensed that he was trying its edge, testing how much pressure was needed to draw blood. I was wounded when I got here, he wanted to say, but it wouldn't make any difference.
"Gregor--" he began, but his... apology? Remonstrance? Plea for forgiveness?... was halted with a raised hand.
"Please... don't say anything else. Not till we hear from Simon."
"If Simon knows what's good for him he'll duck out the back and run away," Miles said, "off to that secret hideaway he and Alys have on the south coast, which sounds really good right now. Warmer, more welcoming. Unlimited alcohol." Then he added, with a little bow, "Shutting up now, Sire."
Gregor glared at him, took a sip of coffee, swallowed it, and sat for a moment with his lips pressed together. Then he muttered, "On your knees to me."
It was a complaint, not a command. "Where else should I be?" said Miles.
"Vorkosigans" -- the name sounded like a curse -- "kneel pointedly. It's not protocol; it's commentary."
"I was trying to be abject," Miles said meekly. "I know I'm not very good at it."
Gregor made a sound in his throat, not entirely unlike a laugh. "No. You were trying to signify abjection; it's not the same thing." He took another sip of coffee. "I suppose there are less appropriate things you could have been signifying, kneeling down right in front of me."
It took Miles a few seconds, but he fairly smoothly returned, "I serve at your Majesty's pleasure."
"And don't you forget it," Gregor said with a twitch of his lip: more a snarl than a smile. "You know," he added, "I thought for a second, back there, that you were going to tell me your father slept with my father. I don't know why I should have been relieved when you accused him of murder. Perhaps because murder can't be incestuous."
"They weren't that closely related."
"No. Indeed. But nevertheless." Gregor's brows drew down. "They didn't. Did they?"
Miles shrugged. "Not that I know of. Do you want to ask Simon?"
"That, he would probably remember, if he knew about it. No, I think I'll pass. That's one thing I can avoid knowing."
Another little stab with the knife-voice, telling Miles plainly that he deserved his wounds, as he'd struck the first blow. He decided to shut up for good until Simon arrived, or until they both wasted into skeletons waiting for him, and then wondered if silence and coffee-sipping were pointed commentary, and if anything short of unconsciousness could make him less Vorkosiganly sinful in Gregor's eyes. He'd played the wordless waiting game before, with inferiors, superiors, enemies, friends, but it only worked when he had the upper hand; playing it with Gregor, or -- ha -- with his father, he would always break, babbling. Which was no doubt quite significant as well.
He was digging his nails into his palms, surreptitiously, by the time Haft returned and announced Captain Illyan. Miles rose to his feet, a reflex of respect to a no-longer-superior-officer, and watched Simon enter. He'd barely seen him since his father's funeral, a day when none of them had looked their best; Simon didn't look much better now. No seaside holiday this winter: his skin was pale, especially in contrast to the black suit -- they were all crows in a flock, today and for the rest of their mourning season -- and though his clothes were sharply tailored, testament to Alys's good taste, and fit well, he was a bit hunched inside them; the athletic trim of his working years had lapsed into an idle, pottering contentment. His muscles had slackened, his mind was still keen, but... damn. Simon was getting old. The inevitability of another painful loss seized Miles's heart with its iron grip. It would be years yet, though. He hoped.
"You wanted to see me, Gregor?" said Simon. "Oh, hello, Miles. How is the family?"
"Everyone's well, thank you." Miles made a careful gesture, submitting the conversational lead to Gregor; he would do all he could to signal to Simon that today was not the day to upend hierarchy.
Simon caught the hint and gave Gregor a nod: polite, nothing like servile. "You wanted to see me?" he repeated.
"Yes. I did." Yes, We did breathed underneath the utterance. "I... request and require that you tell me how my father died. And why. And what Aral Vorkosigan had to do with it."
Miles thought he could see the lines in Simon's face etch themselves deeper in the ashen pallor; aging, he realized suddenly, was not a matter of years, but of moments. He'd given Simon some of those creases and furrows, all by himself. Marks of character, his mother called them. Simon reached out a hand to grasp the back of the nearest chair, as if uncertain of his personal field of gravity.
"Sit, please," said Gregor belatedly, and Miles eased Simon into the chair, poured him some cooling coffee, then sat down himself, wishing he could frown at Gregor for being rough with an old man, wishing it weren't his fault that Simon had to do this.
"I thought this would come up eventually," Simon said, stiff-backed but in control of himself. "How much do you know?" Establishing the factual basis of the situation; limiting assumptions: good.
"Nothing that condemns Aral outright," said Gregor. "A chain of circumstance; perhaps I haven't heard all the links in it yet? Miles... summarize."
"Yes, Sire." He began with the files, went on to the epiphany he'd had talking with Gregor at Vorkosigan Surleau, and mentioned his father's slip of the tongue about the ship. "I could add a few more corroborating details, but..." He gestured toward Simon. "I'm sorry. You don't know how sorry I am. But I think we need to hear this."
Simon sighed. "I could tear your analysis to shreds, Miles. But you are occasionally good at... nosing out the truth, when you don't get the wrong scent and go haring off after it. Yes. You are right, in a general sense."
"And in a specific sense?" Miles asked, a cold knot in his stomach.
"You will forgive my faulty memory, I'm sure. A great many of the details have gone missing. I wasn't supposed to know, you see; I was sent along to record what occurred but not to understand it, and to keep Aral from... blowing himself up, in one way or another."
"That's a very apt expression," said Gregor. "Considering what happened to my father."
"I think if Aral could have put himself aboard that ship with Serg, and still have been assured that the fiasco wouldn't kill any more of Ezar's subjects than it was doing already, he would have preferred being blown up. I'm sure I did what I could to prevent that, and I am glad." Simon's face tensed further. "You two... I still want to call you young men, and you're not any longer. You, Gregor, are about the age Aral was at that time. You're both much older than I was. And you have manifestly more to live for than either of us did. Self-preservation is still a potent force. But you don't understand what it was like then. What Barrayar had become, what we were striving against."
"Perhaps you could educate us on the topic," Gregor said, very cool. Miles thought for a second that Simon would take him up on it, but he shook his head.
"Time was I could have quoted you statistics, names, dates, the lot of it. I remember... huh. The day we released the prisoners from PolEd's cells. One face... an old man, I thought; he turned out to be thirty-six. Thank you, but too late for me: I can still see that expression. If I ever knew what he was charged with, I've forgotten; the charges were usually vague. It all began quite idealistically, you realize. But... you wanted to know about Aral." Simon took a sip of lukewarm coffee and made a face; the implied criticism cheered Miles. But no: this was not a matter of tallying up points, not Vorkosigan versus Vorbarra with Illyan as scorekeeper.
"Yes. Honestly, please," he said.
Simon gave him a little smile. "Time was," he repeated, "when having been called in to report to the Emperor and his close advisor, I could not help but be honest. Or at least literal. Today, this is my truth to tell, inherently biased by loyalty and forgetfulness, yes, but I've watched enough people lie over my lifetime that I know what truth looks like. It doesn't look like words churned out by a recording device in the brain, and it doesn't look like the vacant-eyed drooling of fast-penta. To me--" He smiled. "It looks like Aral Vorkosigan. He lied to me a great deal, at Escobar. After that, I don't think he ever did again, except when he was in pain and told me it didn't hurt."
"We all lie," said Miles. "And I should know," he added before anyone else could.
"I said he didn't lie to me. Lies of omission, to those he meant to protect... that much, certainly. Political, professional lies of the same sort... you're thinking it's all one," Simon told Gregor. Gregor didn't react. Gregor had been alarmingly nonreactive since Simon entered the room. "Perhaps it was. His job was to produce a viable Emperor, whatever that took. I was the one obsessed with data, dominated by a need for truth; Aral cared about honor. We both... lost a lot we cared about." Simon shook himself. "Here are the facts, as clearly as I can recall them," he said. "Aral spent a good deal of time closeted with Ezar and Negri before leaving for Escobar. He was on the Staff, and sometimes on detached duties, but he spent most of his time on Admiral Vorrutyer's ship. By necessity I was with him at all times. There were considerable tensions between him and Vorrutyer--"
"We, uh, know about the relationship between him and my father," Miles said.
"It was long over by then," Simon said. "At least on Aral's side. Some very ugly things happened, involving Vorrutyer, Prince Serg, Bothari -- I have mercifully forgotten most of the details -- and... Vorrutyer's death is not directly relevant, but you do know it was Bothari who killed him? Saving your mother from, at the least, rape?"
Miles stole a glance at Gregor, who was still not reacting. "I didn't know for sure," he told Simon. "But it makes sense out of a lot I'd wondered about. Thank you."
"Well," said Simon, "there go my fantasies regarding Vorkosigan dinner table conversation. Lies of omission. Yes." He sighed. "Aral was confined to his cabin under suspicion of having dispatched Vorrutyer himself -- which he would have been justified in doing, and I was prepared to help him -- and so could not, even if he'd wanted to, accompany the Prince into battle. Admiral Vorhalas went. That, I know, your father regretted. Bitterly."
"He wrote letters to the families of officers killed," Miles said, "both those who came under his command during the retreat, and those who died earlier. I found copies among his files. The one to Count Vorhalas about his brother... I think he must have been drunk. He came remarkably close to saying shoot me now, this is all my fault. Except it came out in a flood of sorrys. I bemoan the loss, I can never recompense, never redeem, I am inadequate to express my grief, nay, unfit to share it."
"This was one of your corroborating details?" said Simon.
"Yes. Not just regret in that letter. Guilt."
"Mm. Did he write the Vorrutyers?"
"Yes. Very... properly."
"He was like a walking dead man during those days after. A very efficient corpse. Especially after your mother left for Beta." Simon seemed to realize, suddenly, that he'd been addressing all of his remarks to Miles. "Prince Serg," he said to Gregor, "did not require much goading to take his position aboard the flagship, ready to lead his troops to victory. But Aral did give him that additional push, just to make sure. And any indirect responsibility he bore for Vorrutyer's death made him a shade guiltier regarding Serg's unreasonable decisions. It would have been in Vorrutyer's interest to protect the Prince."
Simon didn't say "your father" to Gregor, as he had to Miles. To the rest of them, Serg could be a sort of... mythical beast, emphasis on the beast, called upon to represent corruption or insanity and then dismissed, or a memory of the sort Simon was glad to lose; to Gregor, he must be a looming ghost, too close, too related to dismiss, yet impossible to know. The dead began to change, remembered forms and faces turning to misty phantoms, remarkably soon after death; with time, they became caricatures. Miles had to struggle now to remember Count Piotr in anything but broad strokes, the clichés that had turned a complex man into pithy sayings and stories with good punchlines. Serg had been young when he died -- years younger than Miles was now -- and most of the stories about him had been suppressed. Ghosts needed bringing down to earth, didn't they?
"I know... some things about Prince Serg," he said, seized by a moment's impulse. "But there must have been... more, I mean, than... what was he like?" He knew how badly he'd erred the second the words left his mouth: as though he'd tried to help a starving man to his last crust of bread, only to be knifed for theft by hands he'd thought weak and helpless. Gregor's eyes bored into the side of Miles's skull, accusing. My father. My right to ask.
"Sorry, I really can't remember," said Simon, providing the coup de grâce. But then he relented. "Hm, tall. Handsome. A great deal of energy and intelligence, wasted in dissipation. Affable enough, popular with the men who hadn't been forced into knowing him too well." Simon frowned. "Why do I remember... it was not as though insulting the Emperor's son to his face was a popular pastime, but I can recall two instances when Serg, whose hearing was keen, picked up muttered epithets. The one man called him, excuse me, a cocksucker, and Serg merely laughed, told him he'd got it the wrong way around, and invited him to investigate firsthand." Miles shot a look at Gregor, caught the lip twitching again. "The other time," Simon went on, "the mutterer called him a son of a bitch, and Serg nearly took him apart."
Miles winced. "The bitch was not a figure of speech, I gather."
"I never knew my grandmother," Gregor said, "but from what I've heard, she was a solution to Ezar's dynastic problem, not a desirable life companion. And I suppose my father may have been overly sensible that his descent from Dorca was through the female line. Not that Dorca's claim to the throne was any better. Ezar might have been a more--" He waved a dismissive hand. "Crazy bunch of inbred scrabblers. Sons of bitches all," he said, and settled back into his passive slough of despond.
"We can all be sensitive to... certain words and phrases that cut a little close," Miles said. It had taken him long enough to embrace mutant, and he still didn't react well to short jokes. "My grandfather, hearing them chant Peter Peter pumpkin eater. And Sergeant Bothari let everything roll off his back but bastard; that one he wouldn't take, because it was true. Truth hurts; so do lies you can't disprove."
"Aral couldn't walk past a butcher shop without bristling," Simon reported blithely. "And I rather suspect there is one form of invective that Ivan has not resorted to in the last decade, at least regarding me." He waited two seconds for Miles and Gregor to choke on that, and then added, "To sum up, if someone besides Ges Vorrutyer had taken Serg under his wing, the Prince might have been... a good Emperor, even, someday. Not nearly as good as the one we have," he said with a little bow. "I can't say I liked him. He was brutal to your mother, and I... was a little in love with Princess Kareen, in my youth. A devotion I shared with half the Residence-based staff."
Miles tried to imagine Simon goggling at Gregor's mother pretty much the way he'd goggled at Rian Degtiar, at not much more than the same age, and then gave up. Gregor was nodding, slowly.
"Thank you," he said. "For all of that. I wish I had asked earlier."
"The version edited by senility is likely preferable," Simon told him. "Softer around the edges."
"You didn't provide your opinion of my grandfather."
"I wasn't asked." Gregor made a please go on gesture, and Simon complied. "Ezar... was not a complex man, I think, but he forced everyone around him into complexity. He had a tremendous will, to power and to survival, and when he found he wasn't immortal, his will turned to preserving his legacy and influence. He did well at that, as you know. His decisions were shrewd, ruthless, incisive... but, I gathered from Negri, he could be influenced. If that's what you want to know. I have only Aral's evidence for what went on in those conferences."
"And that was?" Gregor asked.
"They slowly wore him down, convinced him of what must be. Killing Serg was not the only point of this enterprise. We have ways of dealing with inconvenient princes," Simon said with a hint of the menace he'd once managed to project through utter blandness. "But entire political structures -- prying those up required a bigger lever. Or a larger explosion. Which" -- he was looking at Miles now -- "you should realize that Aral, on his own, could not have provided. He was a disgraced officer subordinate to Vorrutyer and Vorhalas, and of course to the Prince. And he might have ingratiated himself with Vorrutyer, easily; I assure you he did not. Quite the contrary. My memory may be fragmented," Simon said, "but my impressions in this regard are coherent. Are true," he added firmly.
"I believe you," said Gregor, and turned to look at Miles.
Miles nodded, a bluff acknowledgment. "But he did give himself to the plot. And he knew about the plasma mirrors--"
"From Negri." Simon's grimace was almost amused. "You aren't thinking of your mother as a sort of... Lady Macbeth, are you? Plotting to put her man on the throne?"
"God, no. That was the last thing she wanted. But... the Regency. That was power enough. How do I know my father wasn't promised... didn't anticipate..."
"You don't," said Simon. "You can only believe that it was or wasn't true. All I can swear to you was that I was not... a junior witch hovering around Negri's cauldron. Though I was rewarded too, you realize. Perhaps for holding my tongue. A Banquo who survived?"
"I should think," said Gregor, "given our dynastic complications, you might have to cede that role to Padma Vorpatril. Which opens up whole realms of conspiracy." He and Simon both looked intrigued; Miles decided that he'd better stop this before the hedges in Ezar's garden started marching toward the window.
"Yes, and I would have to be Macduff, I suppose, but let's get back to the point. Self-serving or not, my father followed a criminal order. And, I'm afraid, sacrificed his honor."
"Perhaps," said Simon. "I've never thought honor was as akin to virginity as you Vor types seem to want it to be. Or else," he added doubtfully, "I was more in a hurry to discard my own virginity than the average Vorling." Simon had likely known the date and place, if not all the details, of both Miles and Gregor's first sexual experiences, though he'd also likely been happy to lose that knowledge along with his chip. "But Aral certainly seemed to think he'd prostituted his honor, yes. By following his oath. Would you rather he'd broken it?"
As you did, he didn't add. Reset buttons. Hmph. "There must have been another way to... nullify Serg, without killing all those thousands. Desperate times don't always justify desperate measures."
"I'm sure there was another way," said Gregor. "But... your vision gets blinkered, when you're terrified. He was Ezar's son. Who'd tried to kill his father, along with... all the rest of it. To watch your child, your heir, for whom you had great hopes, turn into.... I wonder, if Xav went bad like that, wouldn't I want him to go out in a blaze of glory too?"
"You didn't, with your Serg," said Simon.
"I didn't have much choice," Gregor said, the knife-edge in his voice again; but this time Miles sensed it turning inward. "And I had it easy; I never knew him as a child."
"Easy, huh," said Miles. He'd heard a lot from Ekaterin about Gregor on the day of the kidnapping, some of which he didn't dare mention here. "From what I hear, he looked just like you."
"Good way to deal with that suicidal streak you've all been worrying I have." Gregor bit off his words so hard Miles could nearly see the blood. "I could have found another way too. I tried to, just stupidly. I let Serg go, after the kidnapping. He'd already killed four people, and he might have killed more in escaping. My luck that he didn't. And" -- Gregor held up a hand, forestalling Miles's objection as though warding off a blow -- "I apologize for working on a scale smaller than planetary warfare -- also by luck -- but I think the few who died were missed just as thoroughly. Maybe not Cavilo. The others, though. I wrote condolence letters too. You once told me" -- eyes drilling into Miles's -- "that there was no moral difference between killing ten thousand and killing one. Or four, I assume. What do you think now?"
"No moral difference," Miles said; it was the only thing he could say, with all the equivalences and perpetrators jumbling together in his mind. And shit, when had he said that, and had he really pulled that ten thousand out of his subconscious? "A practical one, though. Massive slaughters mean more ghosts and legacies to trip over. An entire new layer of my father's relations with Count Vorhalas has come clear, for example. And then there's politics: forty years on, we can finally stop holding our breath with Escobar and Beta, but who knows what might have happened without the war?"
"If Serg had inherited," said Simon, "or if your father had died with him at Escobar and not given us his firm leadership as Regent, or if we hadn't succeeded in uprooting the Ministry of Political Education, the resulting chaos would have opened the door to the Cetagandans. They are still, demonstrably" -- he nodded at Gregor -- "looking for opportunities."
Gregor scowled. "If they don't invest fully in them, it doesn't matter. Except to the few who die as a result, and those who mourn them. And I am not responsible for the Cetagandans and their... devices and desires" -- a phrase of his mother's, Miles recognized -- "all I can do is attempt to protect the Imperium from them, and from the wilder desires of her own subjects. Including mine. I don't believe I would resort to Ezar's methods, at least on such a scale, but I don't privilege myself above him for my restraint." He put his hands flat on his desk -- the tendons stood out like whipcord -- and rose to his feet. "Thank you, gentlemen. This has been quite illuminating, but I can't take any more of your time."
It was a clear dismissal in Imperial tones, and Miles was ready to stand, bow, and take his leave, uncertain if he'd be returning -- the thing about serving at the Emperor's pleasure was that if you didn't please him, you were out of a job; he could yet be the youngest Auditor Emeritus ever -- and then Simon, who might have lost a shitload of data points but still possessed his iron nerve, curled his fingers securely around the arms of his chair and spoke, in the oh-so-familiar tones he used to a subordinate whose self-reporting was in arrears.
"Gregor. You're not done yet. Sit down."
A long pause followed, and then Gregor... sat. Miles breathed; he'd thought he might not do that ever again either. "Now," said Simon. He shifted his gaze. "Miles."
"Sir?"
"No need to salute," said Simon, very dry. "Would you please do us the favor of explaining" -- oh shit oh shit said a permanently guilty part of Miles's psyche in response -- "why you came here today?"
"To apologize," Miles said, trying to address Simon and Gregor simultaneously.
"I see. On your father's behalf, I assume, since he can hardly do it himself. Have you, personally, wronged Gregor?"
You mean before today? Luckily, Gregor answered for him. "On the contrary," he said. "I am grateful for your service, for your friendship, and even for your hospitality last week, though I was two days recovering from it. We said no debts, and on a personal level I agree, but you and your family might draw forever on the account you have established with the Imperium, and not exhaust it."
"Thank you," Miles said. "Very generous of you. And that's the problem, isn't it? Because I've certainly paid my share into that account, but the deepest part belongs to my father and grandfather, and I need to know... that it's gold and not brass, I suppose. My father wronged your father; you don't need to cut my head off as a result, or fight a duel with me; it's got nothing to do with us--"
"But it does," said Gregor.
"Then... oh damn," Miles said, heart sinking. "Let me" -- he sought desperately for an answer -- "let me somehow make it up to you. Anything. I'll bankrupt myself; I'll leave the planet. I just need to know--"
"Miles," said Gregor, "shut up, would you?"
"Yes, Sire."
"Thank you. It has to do with us because we're the ones still here, still dealing with the crap our forebears left behind and didn't think it important to tell us about. But did it ever occur to you, for five seconds, that I don't care who wronged who? I was twenty-five when I found out what my father was, and since then I've been happy he's dead. I have about three actual memories of him alive, and none of them made me feel any affection for him even when I thought he was one of the planet's heroes. I don't think you've proved your case that your father was a murderer, but even if he'd shot my father at close range--"
"He nearly did," said Simon. "The agenda was, first Ges Vorrutyer, then Prince Serg, then I suppose suicide if the guards didn't kill him first. Cordelia and Sergeant Bothari got in the way. I... somehow didn't manage to. It would have been a very different world." He shrugged. "Consider your conjectures, is all I'm saying."
"Very well," said Gregor. "If Aral had... killed my father in his sleep with an untraceable poison--"
"That's more Miles's department," said Simon. Miles raised his hands in a what? Both of you? gesture; Gregor's mouth twitched. "Aral would have shot him," Simon went on. "He was a less subtle man then, than the one you knew."
"All I am saying," said Gregor patiently, "is that if he'd murdered my father, I would love him no less. Perhaps I'd love him more. And I did love him. Like... a father."
"Oh," said Miles, the utter and complete realization of his stupidity crashing down on him, like a waterfall, like a volcano. "Shit."
"I think you knew that, actually," Gregor said.
"Yes. I did."
"I wouldn't accuse you of selfishness. You were very good about acquiring a brother, after all. The occasional sense that Aral's affections were yours to be generous with, yes... but then I sometimes suspect you think you own me, as well..."
"God. No. Do I... is that what..."
Gregor sat back, arms crossed, regarding him with perfect equanimity, humor evident only in the gleam of his eyes. Damn. "You are my master in all things, Sire," said Miles.
"Yes. Thank you. And... he wasn't my father. He was a lot of things to me, but not that. Some of us simply grow up without one." Gregor nodded at Simon; Simon returned the nod. Oh. Something else I didn't know. "It needs to be drawn to my attention," Gregor went on, "at regular intervals, who my father really was. A psychological cross-check, unpleasant, but necessary. Like your seizure thing, I suppose. So I can't fault you for reminding me. It's just... I have been reminded. Not long ago. Not... nearly long enough ago, yet." He touched the sleeve of his black tunic. "Double duty," he said.
"I'm sorry," Miles said in a small voice.
Gregor's lip quirked into a smile, just for a second. "That's twice," he said.
"Twice?"
"That you've said that to me and meant it."
"I have bloody well meant it other times. I just wish I didn't have to keep saying it."
"Well, we live to learn," said Gregor. "Or is it 'serve'? I can never remember. Maybe it's both. Thank you."
"For the apology?"
"Mm. For last week, I was thinking. Getting me drunk and dunking me in the lake. A memorable day. Refreshingly atypical. I hate days like this. Though it's atypical as well, thank fortune."
"We could go on the lake again... in a couple of months? It'll be warmer. Uncle Simon, you're invited."
"Oh," said Simon, lifting his eyebrows as he and Miles both noticed the mode of address, "I wouldn't miss it for the world."
"See Haft for my calendar," Gregor said. "And Miles. Thank you, also, for telling me. Truth is important; my feelings, ultimately, are not. I imagine" -- he nodded at Simon -- "that my father was a slave to his feelings."
"Something like that," Simon said. "So was Aral, at times. No, not a slave. A servant? His feelings paid him wages," he said, trying out the analogy. "Gave him references. Recommended him to their friends."
"Cornered him in the boxroom and put their hands up his skirt," said Miles. Simon and Gregor looked at him. "What? Not me. Ivan. And you know you'll get gossiped about in the kitchens, when you do that. My father wasn't in the habit of talking about his feelings. Much. When did he give you that lecture about honor and reputation?" he asked Gregor.
"After Vordrozda. A while after, when I was ready to listen. Your father," Gregor said, a finger tapping his temple, "was a very wise man. I wouldn't be who I am without him. Or without your mother. Not in the same way that you are formed of their very flesh--"
"Yes, well, you avoided the soltoxin thing while you were at it. I do get the point, thank you. My father was wise, and honorable, and not perfect, but I owe him an apology too, for... slandering him? Misinterpreting him, at least. Remaking him in my image, possibly. But we do seem to have had a fair amount in common. Your father," he went on, looking Gregor in the eyes, "I shouldn't like to say the same, but... wit, I suspect. Wielded keenly and with confident aggression, tempered in your case with reason; that's my parents' influence, but I turned out a smartass and you're... maybe your father should have been a surgeon, instead of a prince playing soldier. Or" -- the details of those suppressed claims came back to him -- "maybe not. The past is the past; maybe we just need to let it rest and... go on."
"And see what happens?" said Gregor, the knife-edge glinting with amusement.
Simon snorted. "Did I ever tell you how much I dreaded hearing you say that? 'An Emperor with an experimental bent, what have I done to deserve this?' I used to mutter... in my prayers to Saint Negri, I suppose. Well," he added, hands flat on the arms of his chair, "I really should be going..."
Gregor gave him a little wave of dismissal. "We will discuss your invaluable service at another time--"
"Perhaps over beer," put in Miles.
"But be assured... yes, you know that. I'm glad you don't require as many reassurances as Miles. Thank you, Simon."
"Could I treat you to lunch?" said Miles. "There's more I'd like to ask you, about my father."
"Some other time?" said Simon. "Alys and I--"
"No, no; don't mean to interfere. Another time." Miles rose and gave him an analyst's salute, which Simon returned vaguely as he headed for the door... walking toward the future, with only lingering traces of the past clinging to his heels. They didn't seem to trip him up.
"So," said Gregor, a minute later as Miles realized he was still staring at the door, "are you leaving? Or is there more to the audience? You're not going to kneel again, are you?"
"Of course not, if it annoys you, Sire. I'll be sure to mention to Mark as well, before his next visit, how much you dislike it."
"Oh, dear God." Gregor got up, clutching his head, and went to the window again, apparently overwhelmed by the thought of twin Vorkosigans following him everywhere on their knees. Miles was pretty sure he was laughing.
"You know," he said, strolling up to examine the view again, "you could have these gardens redone. In a more modern style. If you wanted." Gregor gave him a sideways... look. "No, no... not soliciting commissions for Ekaterin. I mean, unless you--"
"I would hardly consider any other garden designer. That account has to be good for something, hm? But... it might not be quite the moment to raze the past and start over. After the mourning. Perhaps."
"Does it ever stop?"
Gregor put a hand on Miles's shoulder. "I hope so," he said.
"Good. Because it appears to be hell on judgment. Among other things."
"Temper, too." The hand squeezed for a second, then let go. "Are we all right with each other?"
"I think I'm supposed to ask that."
"Well, apparently yes, then. Good. I absolutely cannot afford to lose your good will."
"And the reverse. More obviously." Miles turned; they were close enough that he had to look straight up at Gregor. Dammit, he might as well be kneeling. On an impulse, he put his hands together and offered them.
"We've done that," Gregor said. "Fairly recently, if you recall."
"I said the words, but I'm not sure I was listening to myself. We don't have to do the oath again, I just thought the gesture... ha, all right, the reassurance. The magic touch, if you will. It's absurd, but it means something. And I think you're supposed to just accept this without arguing or making me babble about it uncomfortably; what kind of liege lord are you? These modern, gimcrack, flimsy emperors; they don't make them like they used to--"
"Shut up, Miles." Gregor's cool palms touched the backs of Miles's hands. "Count Vorkosigan. Are you... quite there, yet?"
"Yes," Miles said, nearly in a whisper. "I wish... oh, hell. Yes." It would do, for an oath. "I've been dreading it my whole life, after all."
"Very well." Gregor's hands lifted and he gave Miles a dismissive nod. Miles nodded back and turned for the door, retrieving his cane on the way.
The door opened before he could get to it, and a brown-haired seven-year-old boy walked in, holding in two careful hands a very young kitten. Haft was briefly visible, closing the door behind him. The boy glanced up, a look what I have! expression giving way to the duty of greeting his father's guest. "Uncle Miles!" he said. "I mean, Count Vorkosigan, good morning." He made a little bow, awkwardly full of kitten. "Look, this is your grandkitty. Blackie had her own litter. I'm going to keep this one, his name's Midnight, and give the others away."
"That's wonderful, Xav. I'll be sure to send any potential kitten adopters your way."
"There are five others. Two boys and three girls. Father, is Count Vorkosigan joining us for lunch?"
"No, he was just leaving," said Gregor, explaining to Miles, "This is our day for lunch and, um..."
"Emperor stuff," said Xav. "Lessons. We're tackling the Ministers today."
"Good; they need a little shaking up." Miles looked at Gregor. "My father used to--"
"I know." My father didn't went unsaid.
Miles nodded at them both, and went out to find Haft and discover when the Emperor had a free afternoon to take a boat out on the lake.