Well, that was probably someone’s idea of a reward, yeah. Because there was no accounting for taste. “You’re classifying this stuff? After a hundred years? Isn’t that paranoid even for ImpSec?”
“We’ll be declassifying most of it as fast as we can get through it. But there are some things about the old ghem-junta…never mind.” His lips compressed. And opened again to release a, “But you know that history book I gave Lady Tej?”
“Yes…?”
“I think there may have to be a new edition.”
Ivan walked him out to the hallway; by the time Duv reached the lift tubes in the penthouse foyer, he was jogging, and fielding more calls from his wristcom. Eight billion marks, Ivan couldn’t help thinking, and he worries more about the papers…
Or the truth, perhaps. What price that?
Gregor was providing a courtesy military jump pilot and crew for Vormercier’s yacht for the run to the borders of the empire at Pol Station. This, Ivan gathered, was to make sure they arrived 1) there and 2) nowhere else. The ten days of travel time would be plenty to tightbeam ahead and arrange whatever commercial crew the Arquas wanted to hire on for the next leg. Vetted, Ivan trusted, for ingenious bounty hunters. Jet would be rejoining the Jewels, but Amiri was to travel with his family only as far as Komarr, then transfer to a government courier vessel for a free ride to Escobar, and a safe delivery back to the Durona Clinic. Any stray bounty hunter who made it that far would be Lily Durona and Mark Vorkosigan’s problem; or rather, vice versa. Definitely vice versa, Ivan reflected.
His life was simplifying nicely. But not, Ivan trusted, too much. A little uneasy, he took the lift tube down from his mother’s flat to find Tej.
Tej, when she’d had about as much as she could stand of listening to Amiri burble about how happy he was to be going back to Escobar, wandered into her parents’ temporary bedroom. The flat had been hastily furnished with rental beds and a few sofas and chairs, the night they’d all been dumped in here by the Barrayaran authorities; a lot of the meals had been taken upstairs at Lady Alys’s place. No one had urged anything more permanent.
The Baronne and Lady Alys, or rather, Lady Alys’s competent dresser under their joint supervision, was just finishing packing. The Baronne was remarking, “…not my plan at all, but it will certainly do. Flexibility, as Shiv says.”
She broke off and both mothers looked across at Tej as she entered, Lady Alys rather bemusedly, the Baronne…her lips tightened, but not in anger.
Lady Alys, tactful as always, murmured, “I should just see to a few things upstairs, Udine. I hope to speak with you later, Tej, dear.” Motioning her dresser to close the case and follow, she withdrew. Tej wasn’t sure if she was grateful or not. Spacious as the flat was, the Arquas had more than filled it; that, and all the disruptions of the past few days, had allowed Tej to dodge intimate tete-a-tetes pretty much since the rescue.
The Baronne plucked at her bangs, her new nervous gesture. Tej hoped her hair would grow out quickly.
“Have you packed?” the Baronne asked abruptly.
Tej swallowed. Straightened. “No. Nor am I going to.”
The Baronne eyed the set of her chin. “You know, when you father and I told you to go with your Barrayaran husband the other day, it was merely because we hoped you could thus avoid arrest, or whatever other retribution the Barrayarans had in mind.”
“Yes, I got that.”
“We certainly didn’t mean…”
“Mean it?” Tej suggested.
The Baronne cleared her throat. “It was a ploy, Tej. It was not possible, at that moment, to predict that events were going to turn out so favorably. We wanted to protect you. If not ourselves, then someone…”
Someone needed to baby-sit me? If Rish was going to be out of the job. “Yes. But when I said I would stay with Ivan Xav, I meant it.”
The Baronne made an abortive gesture. “The cars are coming to take us all to the shuttleport in another hour. Surely too short a time to make such a permanent life-bargain in.”
I made it in a minute, the first time… Well, provisionally.
“How long did it take you to decide you wanted Dada?” Tej asked, suddenly curious.
“That is neither here nor there,” said the Baronne. “Circumstances were very different.”
“I see,” said Tej, biting her lip to hide a smile.
“Also, wanting and arranging are two different things. The latter requires planning…action…sometimes, sometimes…
“Flexibility?”
“Yes.” The Baronne, realizing she was being diverted, tracked back. “Anyway, if you won’t-your Dada and I were thinking-perhaps you could ride along with us. At least as far as Pol Station. It would give us more time together.”
Tej controlled a shudder at the vision. Her and her entire family, packed into what Byerly had implied was a not-very-large spaceship, with less escape possible than from an underground bunker. We just had twenty-five years together, Baronne. Don’t you think it’s time for a break? “I thought I’d say my good-byes right here. The military shuttleport isn’t that much of a treat-I’ve seen it-and they’ll be wisking you all through, I expect.”
“I expect,” echoed the Baronne, only not-disagreeing because she couldn’t, at least about the shuttleport. “This all seems so rushed.”
“We’ve had the past four days. You must have guessed something like this was coming.”
“Or some Barrayaran incarceration. Which would have required an entirely novel plan. We’ve not been saying good-bye for the past four days!”
I was. No one noticed. Although they’d all had a lot else on their minds, to be fair. “Also, I get jump-sick, and that would be ten jumps. Five each way.”
“You…might decide not to go back. You could choose freely, once you reached Pol Station.”
Yes, I thought that might be your secret plan. “There would be more jumps, going on. And”-Tej took a deep breath, only partly for control-“I can choose freely right here. Right now. And I have.” Do I have to, like, yell?
Thankfully not; because the Baronne, after a silence, responded, “I suppose you will be safer here. At least for the immediate future.”
Her family, Tej was reminded, wasn’t exactly going directly home. Although Fell Station, as long as the old Baron was in charge, was going to make a reasonably secure initial base. “You’ll have Byerly,” she offered, then paused in doubt, in tandem with the Baronne. “And a war chest of, what was it, four hundred million Barrayaran marks?”
“That’s only one hundred million, in Betan dollars,” the Baronne was swift to point out. “A few serious bribes, some competent mercenaries, and it will dwindle in a hurry. Five percent, that tricky dealer Gregor got us down to!” This was not, Tej understood, a point against Gregor, personally.
“I’m sure you and Dada will be able to makes ends meet somehow,” Tej soothed her. “You’re both very clever.”
“It will be a challenge,” the Baronne…didn’t quite grumble. “But when I get my hands on those Prestenes, the retribution will be famous.”
“Yes, make them pay,” Tej agreed cordially, glad to give her mother’s thoughts this more positive direction. By her standards.
“What do you see in that Barrayaran boy, anyway?” the Baronne asked querulously, dodging back despite Tej’s best efforts. “He just doesn’t seem very ambitious.”
“Mm,” said Tej. One woman’s defect is another woman’s delight? “I suppose…it’s all the things he sees in me.” That you don’t.
The Baronne peered at her in doubt. “Which are what, Tej-love? Besides your figure, clearly.” She waved away this as a given, at least with respect-or lack of respect-to Ivan Xav.
Everything, Baronne. On the other hand…was it really necessary to bloody her forehead trying to solve a problem already going away on its own? Within the hour, at that. That seemed a very Ivan Xav approach. So restful. The great charm of her and the Baronne living on two different planets, Tej decided, was that they could both stop trying to fix each other. She grinned crookedly, leaned up, and gave her mother a peck on the cheek, instead. “An
