Chapter Five
Ivan’s mind had gone so blank, the first thought that arose in it sped out of his mouth wholly without impediment. “How did all that name get stuck on one girl?” And how the devil did she spell it?
Tej—Ivan could see why the nickname, now—tossed her clouds of curls in impatience. She made a truncated gesture, as if to deny—what? “When we kids started to come along, my father found this book—I don’t know from where—Ten Thousand Authentic Ethnic Baby Names From Old Earth, Their Meanings and Geographical Origins. He had trouble choosing. I have a sister named Stella Antonia Dolce Ginevra Lucia, but by the time I arrived, he’d reined back a little.” She added after a moment, “We called her Star.”
“You’re…not an only child, then?” asked By. “Not the heiress of your House?”
Oh, there was a good question. And an appalling thought.
Tej gave By a cold stare. Waiting for a trade?
“I’m an only child, myself,” Ivan offered.
“I know that.”
“How?”
“I looked you up on the comconsole. You’re really you, too.” She frowned at Byerly. “I wonder what I’d find if I looked you up?”
“Not much. I am a scion of an undistinguished cadet branch of my family.” By’s glance flickered to Rish, listening with those pointed turquoise elf-ears. “Disinherited, technically, but since my branch possesses nothing to inherit, that was something of an empty gesture on my father’s part.”
“He has a younger sister, I think,” said Ivan. “Haven’t ever met her. Married and living on South Continent, isn’t she, By?”
By’s smile, already thin, flattened further. “That’s right.”
“There’s no point in withholding anything Captain Morozov could tell us,” Ivan pointed out helpfully to Tej. This whole deal thing was alarming, really, all too Jacksonian and adversarial. “That’ll include anything that’s public knowledge, or that’s hit the Nexus news feeds.” And likely a good bit more than that, and Ivan was now sorry that he hadn’t lingered to learn more. But it would have been bound to lead in turn to questions he hadn’t wanted to answer just then, such as, How many mysterious women are you hiding in your rental flat, Ivan?
Tej rubbed her eyes with one slim brown hand. “I’m the second-youngest. My oldest brother was the heir, but he was reported killed in the takeover, too. I’m pretty sure my two older sisters made it out of Jacksonian local space through other jump points, but I don’t know what happened to them after that. My other brother…got out a long time ago.”
“How did that work? Your escape?” asked By.
Tej shrugged. “It’s been set up for ages, for all us kids in case of a House emergency. There was a drill. When we were given the code word, we weren’t supposed to ask questions or argue or delay, we were just supposed to follow our assigned handlers. I’d been through it once before, a few years back—we made it to Fell Station before the turnaround order caught up with us. I thought that’s what would happen again.”
“So you weren’t an eyewitness to the Cordonah Station’s, er, forcible change of management?”
“I think Star got out just as the station was being boarded, but the rest of us were hours gone by then. The evacuation drill was never something my parents took chances with.” She swallowed, her throat obviously tight with some upsetting memory. “Everything we learned, we learned later through the news feeds, though of course you can’t trust them.”
“Twice,” said Rish, unexpectedly. “Surely you weren’t too young to remember?”
“Was that the trip we took when I was six? Oh! No one ever told me what that was all about. Just that we were going on a ride, and a visit.”
“We wanted to keep you calm.”
“What, you couldn’t have been older than fifteen.” Tej turned to Ivan, though not to Byerly, and said, “Rish used to baby-sit me a lot when I was younger, in between dance practice and other chores the Baronne assigned.”
You call your mother the Baronne? Well, the tall woman in Morozov’s scan had looked formidable, more beautiful than warm. The man…had been harder to gauge.
“Is Rish your assigned handler?” asked By.
Tej shook her head. “We had a real bodyguard, a courier. I’m afraid he may be dead, now. That happened on Fell Station. We almost didn’t get away.”
Had the man bought their escape with his life? Seemed like it, from the quiver in her voice, and the chilled look in Rish’s eyes. But if Rish wasn’t the official bodyguard, what was she? Ivan looked at her and asked, “So are you really a jeeves?”
Those spun-gold eyebrows rose. “What would you trade for that information?”
“I…” Ivan glanced aside. “I think it’s Byerly’s turn, now.”
By shot him a look of annoyance, which left Ivan unmoved.
“Actually,” Ivan went on to him, “I think you owe me a bucket of information, By. Before I put my foot in it by accident, again, and I’m not taking any more Ivan, you idiots off of you when you can’t be troubled to give me a decent briefing!” This ringing declaration left him a little winded, and By edging slightly away, good. If Ivan had to shout to be heard, maybe it was time to bellow a bit. “Name names, Byerly!”
Byerly looked as if he’d rather knock out several teeth and hand them across. Nevertheless, after a narrow frown at the two women, he rubbed his forehead and began, “All right, then. Ivan, d’you know Theo Vormercier?”
“Barely. Not my crowd.”
“Quite. Lately, he was cut out of a long-expected inheritance when his aging uncle, Count Vormercier, remarried and began springing offspring.”
“Really? I mean, I’d heard about the marriage, from m’mother y’know, but I didn’t think the new wife was that much younger than him.”
“Technology, of course. They used genetic assembly and a uterine replicator. I understand they now have a brand-new gene-cleaned bouncing baby boy and another on the way.” Byerly smirked. “Say, any chance that your mother and old Illyan would—”
“No,” said Ivan firmly. Not that a certain formidable auntly person hadn’t actually suggested it, Betan that she was. He glanced at Tej, listening intently if with a somewhat baffled expression. “You were saying about Vormercier.”
By’s eyes glinted with fleeting amusement; he nodded and went on, “Theo had been living on his expectations for quite a long time, and not frugally. To say that this development took him aback would be understating the case. In the meanwhile, he had a younger brother in the Service—a quartermaster officer in the Sergyar Fleet’s orbital depot. Brother Roger’s expectations, while considerably more modest, were equally thwarted. About a year ago, Theo went out to visit him. And, evidently, they talked.”
“Sergyar Fleet is Commodore Jole’s patch,” said Ivan. “Not to mention…Huh. Not a good place to play games.”
“Doubtless that had something to do with the extreme caution and cleverness with which they went about it. Roger’s embezzlements began small, with theft of a load of outdated military equipment and supplies that had been slated to be destroyed. Perfectly understandable temptation, almost an admirable frugality when you think about it. The receiver contacts they’d made with that scam led to bigger and better contacts, and the next effort was much more ambitious.”
“How’d you get all this from Vormercier? You fast-penta him when he wasn’t looking?”
“Alcohol and braggadocio, Ivan. And stretched patience and a strong stomach on my part, if I do say so.” By sighed. “The conspirators divided the task. Roger takes care of the heavy lifting. Theo launders the money. There is no money trail back to the actual military thieves. The loads go as opportunity permits from Sergyar orbit to Pol Station, where they are slipped to their non-Barrayaran receivers and into a void. Money comes out of a void into the hands of a contact on Komarr, who finds various apparently-legal ways to hand it on to Theo, who takes it back to Barrayar and invests it. At a much later date, the military minions stop by and collect, under an inventive variety of pretexts. But like many another gambler before them, the brothers Vormercier appear never to have heard of the dictum, Quit while you’re ahead.”
“My Dada used to say that,” said Tej. Rish nodded.
Byerly, after a bemused pause, cast them a small salute and continued. “The old phrase, No honor among thieves also seems apropos. I have reason to think Theo has been embezzling from the funds entrusted to him. In any case, he was quite on-edge when it became time to take his yacht, his entourage, and his trusted hanger-on—that would be me—to Komarr for a soletta-viewing party. And gather in his next payout for goods delivered from his Komarran contact. Unfortunately for Theo, the goods have not been delivered. The ship was unexpectedly delayed in Komarr orbit, and has missed its Pol Station rendezvous. I believe your people had something to do with that, Ivan?”
Ivan pursed his lips and whistled. “So it’s gotta be the Kanzian. Only Sergyar Fleet vessel in-system right now. The Vor Horsemen snagged it for the fleet inspection. Desplains likes springing little surprises like that, though I bet it wasn’t a surprise to Jole. He’ll likely reciprocate, next chance.”
Byerly nodded, as if satisfied to have another stray piece of his puzzle slot into place. “While Theo’s contacts appear to be relatively unruffled by the development, Theo is in a lather. The contacts have declined to advance him moneys on a cargo as yet in limbo, but offered as a sop a surprisingly substantial bounty on your two guests.” Byerly nodded across at the women. “Beggars not being choosey, Theo promptly seized the sop and set me on the task, and here we are.”
By paused as if for a round of applause, and appeared disappointed to only receive three long stares. “Collecting the identity of Theo’s Komarr contact was a bit of a coup for me, but hardly enough to justify my expense reports. But, as Ivan could no doubt explain in his exemplary military manner, the best way to capture a wormhole is from both ends at once.” He spread his arms wide then brought his hands slowly together, caging air, or something only he could see. “If one could get a handle on those people in the void beyond Pol Station, one might well work backward to trap everything that lies between them and Komarr.” He looked up with undisguised interest at Tej and Rish. “Do you figure the people who bid for you are from the syndicate that seized your House?”
Tej’s fists clenched, opened. “Prestene? I…don’t know. Maybe. Or they might be anybody, looking to collect the arrest order fee.”
“Said fee posted ultimately by the syndicate? Why do they want you? The size of the prize suggests quite a special interest.”
Tej’s lips tightened; then she shrugged. “Rish, as one of the Jewels, would be an outward sign of Prestene’s triumph over House Cordonah, if they could capture and display her. Even more brag if they can collect the set. I suppose they think I’m a loose end, wild to come back and destroy them if I could, and take back my parents’ House. Maybe they watch too many holovids, I don’t know.”
“And are you? Wild for revenge?”
“I never wanted to be a baronne. The only thing I want is my parents back, and my brother.” She bit her lip. “Won’t happen in this life.”
Byerly turned to Rish. “So—are you a jeeves?”
She eyed him, then gave a short nod as if to say, fair trade. “I was one of the Baronne’s created children, and will always remain so. All further loyalty treatments were discontinued after that scare years back. The Baronne said she didn’t want her Jewels to be damaged or suffer if she died unexpectedly.”
“I didn’t know that,” said Tej, sounding surprised.
Rish made a graceful turn of one blue hand, though what she meant by it, Ivan could not guess. “You were six.”
“So what kept you from running off?” asked By.
She raised her chin and looked down her nose at him, a neat trick given that she was shorter. “Didn’t you claim you were disinherited? What keeps you from betraying your Imperium?”
By opened his hands as if to surrender the point. “So what other tasks did you perform for Baronne Cordonah? Besides babysitting.”
Rish touched her lips and gave him a peculiar smile. “Living sculptures.”
“Ah?”
“At receptions, the Baronne would position us Jewels around the chamber, and we would maintain various poses, as still as marble for minutes at a time, then shift to new poses. After a while, the guests invariably began to behave as if we were real statues. None of them seemed to realize how very keen our hearing was. Or how good our memories. We would compete with each other, to see who could get the best tidbits to report to her at the end of an evening.” Her gaze at By grew speculative. “But I think you know exactly how that works. How freely people will talk, when they take you for a block. Not so?”
He returned her a reluctantly appreciative nod.
“So what does it all mean?” asked Ivan plaintively.
By cocked an eyebrow at him. “That seems a rather philosophical question, to be coming from you.”
“No, the name thing.” Ivan gestured somewhat inarticulately at Tej. “Aj-Tejas-whatever. From your da’s book.” He added conscientiously, “Ivan in old Russian means John in English. Dunno what John means, come to think.”
Tej got a strange look on her face, but answered—was the deal still on?—“Akuti, princess, Tejaswini, radiant—or maybe intelligent, I’m not sure which—Jyoti, flame. Or light.”
“Princess Radiant Flame,” Ivan tested this on his tongue. He’d attempt the other pronunciation later. Or Princess Bright Light, whichever. Princess, in either case. “Sounds like your da thought the world of you, huh?”
Tej swallowed and looked away, as if the far end of the room had suddenly grown riveting. She answered in a would-be-pedantic quaver, “The geographical origin was supposed to be South Asian. Star’s was South European, or South American, or south something, anyway. Or maybe it was the other way around. We never spent much time on Old Earth history.”
“So what kind of a name is Vorrutyer?” Rish asked Byerly, possibly to give Tej a moment to regain her composure.
He sat back looking surprised at the question, or maybe just at its coming from her, but answered readily: “The origin of the prefix Vor is much debated, except that it arose during the Time of Isolation and came to refer exclusively to members of the then-warrior caste. We are fairly certain that the Rutyer was a mishearing or misspelling of the Old Earth German Rutger.”
Tej, back in control of her voice, asked, “So what about Vorpatril?”
Ivan cleared his throat. “Not sure. Some say it’s British, some claim it came from the Greek or French, maybe as a corruption of patros or some word like it. A lot of Barrayaran names got twisted around during the centuries after the Firsters were cut off. Or shortened—Serg from Sergei, Padma from Padmakar, and Xav’s a contraction of Xavier.”
“Mutated over time, makes sense,” said Tej, then paused to take in matching glares from both By and Ivan. “Why do you look like you just swallowed a bug? The usage is precise. A mutation is a copying error. Everyone knows that.”
“Do not,” said Ivan firmly, “use that term to a Barrayaran. It’s a pretty deadly insult to imply that someone’s a mutant. Even if you’re just spelling their names.”
“Oh.” Tej looked baffled, but said amiably, “All right. If you say so.”
By glanced at the time on his wristcom and muttered a curse. “I have to be somewhere else. Several minutes ago.” He dragged his hands through his hair and stood up. His gaze swept Ivan, Tej, and Rish, all three. “I guess this is as good a bolt-hole for you as any other, for now.”
“For how much longer?” asked Ivan.
“I don’t know. A day, two days, three? I meant to play this out as long as I could, in hopes of getting in beyond Theo’s contact. I’m making progress, but we’re close to pulling the plug. At which point I’ll need to vanish, if I want to maintain my cover and my livelihood. And my skin. So until we meet again, dear friends, adieu.”
With a wave that did not quite mimic an ImpSec salute, By made for the door; Ivan accompanied him out.
In the corridor, By lowered his voice. “If things go sideways, Ivan, you should probably take those women to Morozov.”
“They won’t want to go. They don’t trust ImpSec.”
By shrugged. “Morozov could cut them a deal, I’ll bet. ImpSec Galactic Affairs would be happy to lap up whatever they wanted to spill about this syndicate of theirs.”
“Or maybe more than they wanted.”
“We can discuss that. Later.” By strode off, a tired man hurrying.
Ivan sealed the door, made sure it was locked, and returned to his living room to find Tej and Rish deciding who was to have the first turn in the bathroom before bed. Ivan glanced at his wristcom and cringed to count the scant hours till Komarran dawn. I hate this strangled day length.
“That is a strange man,” commented Rish, looking toward the door after Byerly.
“You’re not the first to note that,” said Ivan ruefully.
“How did he get into his line of work?”
Ivan squinted, wondering why that question had never before occurred to him. “I have no idea. It’s not the sort of thing you ask these ImpSec fellows. I think he was around twenty-standard when he moved to Vorbarr Sultana—his parents lived out on the west coast, t’other side of the continent, see. He hung around on the edges of things for years before I ever found out about his ImpSec moonlighting. The fact that he was estranged from his family never seemed to need an explanation—that is, if you knew many Vorrutyers. The whole clan is, um…either on the vivid side, or downright antisocial.”
“Ah,” said Rish elliptically, and went off to claim the bath.
Ivan sat back down, watching Tej watch her friend pad silently away. This couch would do for his bed, if only people would let him lie here in peace for enough hours…“Babysitter?”
Tej’s laugh was no more than a puff of air through her nose. “I don’t know that she exactly volunteered for the job. I used to follow her around like a kitten chasing a string. I was just fascinated by all the Jewels, when I was younger. I would watch them at their dance practice, and make them try to teach me, too.”
“What kind of dance?”
“Oh, every kind. They collected skills and styles from all over, and were always trying to put them together in new combinations. I wanted to be one of them, to be allowed to really dance—you know, in their performances. But puberty was cruel to me.”
On the contrary, Ivan thought puberty had been very generous to her. He just managed to stop himself from saying so out loud, converting it to, “How so?”
“The best dancers are all thin and small and strong, very whippy. Like Rish. By age fourteen, it was plain I was going to be built more like my Dada—my other sisters all took after my mother, willowy. I just grew too tall, too big, too heavy. Too top-heavy.” She sniffed as if in some weird—in Ivan’s view, anyway—female self-disapproval. “By age fifteen it was obvious that no matter how hard I worked, I could never be as good as the Jewels. So I stopped.”
“Gave it up?” said Ivan. “That’s no good. Just because someone else is some sort of natural flaming genius, doesn’t mean that you’re an idi…um.” Um. “Doesn’t mean that you should…” He tried rushing the notion. “Should hide your light under the covers.”
Her smile grew wan. “My sister Star said the only reason I wanted to perform with the Jewels was to make myself the center of attention. I expect she was right.” She hoisted herself wearily to her feet and went off to change places with Rish.
She’d forgotten to demand a trade. Watching her vanish into the shadows of the next room, all Ivan could think was: Actually, y’know…I expect you wanted to dance because you wanted to dance.
* * *
Tej dreamed.
She was running through writhing space station corridors, pursued by a nameless menace. Ahead of her, the Jewels scattered right and left, leaping in grand jetés down cross-corridors, flashes of red and green, blue and obsidian, gold and pearl-white somersaulting in fantastical triple turns in the air, but by the time she caught up, the corridors were silent and echoing, empty. She ran on.
A side door slid open; a voice hissed, “Quick! Hide in here!”
It was Captain Vorpatril. He was wearing his green military officer’s uniform over a bear suit. His chest was crisscrossed with bandoliers of power charge packs, and he held a very large weapon, perhaps a plasma rifle. Or was that a water gun? He grinned at her from the round, furry frame of the bear hood. The gun went away, and then they were kissing, and for a moment or two, the dream went good. His kisses were expert: neither too shy, tickling annoyingly, nor too invasive, like someone trying to shove a slug down her throat, but just right, firm and exploratory. Tej noted this, thinking, I’ll have to try very hard to remember this part when I wake up…
“I want to touch your skin,” she told him, when they broke for breath. “It’s very pale, isn’t it? Is it smooth, or hairy? Are you that pale all over? Do you have silver veins like Pearl?” Where was Pearl…?
“Here, let me show you.” He grinned again and zipped the bear suit down from neck to crotch. Both fur and skin peeled away, revealing glistening red muscle, white fascia, and the thin blue lines of veins.
“No, no, just the fur!” Tej cried in horror, backing up. “Not the skin too!”
“Oh, what?” said Vorpatril, in a tone of some bewilderment. He stared down, the bewilderment changing to dismay as the blackening crackle of a plasma arc burn spread out in a widening circle on his chest. Smoke and the smell of burning meat filled the air, and then it wasn’t Vorpatril anymore, but their ill-fated courier, Seppe, back on Fell Station….
Tej gasped and awoke. She was in bed in the dark of Vorpatril’s flat; Rish lay in silence beside her, unmoving, unaware, yet elegant even in sleep. Tej wanted to ask her where the Jewels had been flying to, but of course, people didn’t share each others’ dreams reciprocally. Tej wouldn’t wish hers on anyone else, certainly.
I’m glad to be out of that dream…Most of it. The beginning and the end were just like most of her dreams lately, altogether too much like her real life. The kiss, though, had warmed her right down to her loins. Hi there, loins. Haven’t heard from you for a while…
The strange rushing noise at the edge of her hearing resolved itself at last as the shower. It turned off, and then she could hear rustlings from the bathroom and its attendant dressing room/closet. In a while, a faint hiss sounded as the door slid aside, but the captain had evidently turned off the lights before he’d opened it. So as not to disturb his sleeping guests? Or, she wondered as his unshod footsteps wandered nearer to the bed, something more sinister?
She opened her eyes, turned, and stared up at his shadowed shape. He seemed to be fully dressed in his uniform again. No bear suit. His skin was firmly in place, good. Masked by fresh soap and depilatory cream, his scent was mildly aroused; as was her own, she supposed, but fortunately Rish was not awake to razz her on it.
“What?” she breathed.
“Oh,” he whispered back, “sorry to wake you. I’m just on my way out to HQ.”
“But it’s still dark.”
“Yeah, I know. Damn nineteen-hour days. Anything special you’d like me to bring back tonight?”
“Whatever you pick will be fine,” she said, with some confidence.
“All right. I’ll try not to be so late this time, but I never know what’ll come up, so don’t panic if I’m delayed. I’ll lock up behind me.” He made to tiptoe away.
“Captain Vorpatril!” She hardly knew what she wanted to say to him, but the dream-scent of burning flesh still unnerved her. She settled on a vague, “Be careful.”
He returned a nonplussed, “Uh…sure.”
The bedroom door closed behind him; she heard him rattling in the kitchenette, and then the sigh of the outer door, and then…then the flat sounded very empty.
Tej rolled back over, hoping for a sleep without dreams.
* * *
Despite everything, Ivan managed to arrive at Komarr downside HQ right on time that morning, half an hour before his boss was due—though more often than not Desplains managed to bollix that schedule by arriving early. Ivan started the coffee, sat at his secured comconsole, grimaced, and fired it up to find out what all had arrived in the admiral’s inbox since last shift.
Ivan had developed a personal metaphor for this first task (after the coffee) of the day. It was like opening one’s door to find that an overnight delivery service had left a large pile of boxes on one’s porch, all marked “miscellaneous.” In reality, they were all marked “Urgent!” but if everything was urgent, in Ivan’s view they might as well all be labeled miscellaneous.
Each box contained one of the following: live, venomous, agitated snakes on the verge of escape; quiescent venomous snakes; non-venomous garden snakes; dead snakes; or things that looked like snakes but weren’t, such as large, sluggish worms. It was Ivan’s morning duty to open each box, identify the species, vigor, mood, and fang-count of the writhing things inside, and sort them by genuine urgency.
The venomous, agitated snakes went straight to Desplains. The garden snakes were arranged in an orderly manner for his later attention. The dead snakes and the sluggish worms were returned to their senders with a variety of canned notes attached, with the heading From The Office of Admiral Desplains, ranging from patiently explanatory to brief and bitter, depending on how long it seemed to be taking the sender in question to learn to deal with his own damned wildlife. Ivan had a menu of Desplains’s notes, and it was his responsibility—and occasionally pleasure, because every job should have a few perks—to match the note to the recipient.
As he had both expected and feared, an urgent—of course—note from ImpSec Komarr with his full police interview of yesterday attached was nestled among this morning’s boxes. And the supply of venomous, agitated snakes in today’s delivery was disappointingly low.
After a brief struggle with his conscience, Ivan set the note in the garden-snakes file, although he did put it at the very bottom of the list. Desplains was possibly the sanest boss Ivan had ever worked for, and the least given to dramatics, and Ivan wished to preserve those qualities for as long as he could. Forever, by preference. So every once in a while, Ivan let something trivial but amusing filter through to the admiral, just to keep up his morale, and today seemed a good day to stick in a couple of those, as well. Ivan was still looking for a few more things he could legitimately enter when Desplains blew in, collected his coffee, and murmured, “Ophidian census today, Ivan?”
“All garden variety, sir.”
“Wonderful.” Desplains took a revivifying sip of fresh-brewed. Ivan wished he could remember which famous officer had once said, The Imperial Service could win a war without coffee, but would prefer not to have to. “What ever came of your interview with the dome cops yesterday?”
“I put the ImpSec note in File Three, sir.” File Three was the official designation of the garden-snakes crate, because, after all, sometimes Desplains did suffer a substitute aide, if Ivan was on leave or out ill or requisitioned for other, less routine duties, and some shorthands took too long to explain. “I expect you will want to look at it eventually.” Ivan made his tone very unpressing.
“Right-oh.”
“Meeting with Commodore Blanc and staff in thirty minutes,” Ivan reminded him. “I have the agenda ready.”
“Very well. Snakes aweigh.”
Ivan hit the send pad. “On your desk now.”
Desplains raised his coffee cup in salute and passed into his inner office.
He would never, Ivan reflected, ever want to be promoted to admiral, to be greeted the first thing every working day by a desk populated entirely by live, hissing snakes. Perhaps he could resign his commission if such a threat ever became imminent. Assuming he made it to that stately age without being court-martialed, a consummation depending closely in turn on his doubtful ability to avoid relatives associated with ImpSec bearing…gift pythons. Gift pythons with snazzy reticulated blue-and-gold skins this time, it seemed.
He bent to his comconsole and returned a crisp note to ImpSec Komarr: From the Office of Admiral Desplains: Urgent memo received and the date stamp. Hold pending review.