A Civil Campaign

peculiar Betan sense of humor to her.

'My dinner party,' Miles grated. 'It's just breaking up.' And sinking. All souls feared lost. It was redundant to ask, What are you doing here? His parents' jumpship had obviously made orbit early, and they had left the bulk of their entourage to follow on tomorrow, while they came straight downside to sleep in their own bed. How had he rehearsed this vitally-important, utterly-critical meeting, again? 'Mother, Father, let me introduce—she's getting away !'

As a new distraction rose from the hallway at Miles's back, Ekaterin slipped through the shadows all the way to the gate. The Koudelkas, having perhaps intelligently concluded that this party was over, were decamping en masse, but the wait-till-we-get-home conversation had undergone a jump- start. Kareen's voice was protesting; the Commodore's overrode it, saying, 'You will come home now. You're not staying another minute in this house.'

'I have to come back. I work here.'

'Not any more, you don't—'

Mark's harried voice dogged along, 'Please, sir, Commodore, Madame Koudelka, you mustn't blame Kareen—'

'You can't stop me!' Kareen declaimed.

Commodore Koudelka's eye fell on the returnees as the rolling altercation piled up in the hallway. 'Ha—Aral!' he snarled. 'Do you realize what your son has been up to?'

The Count blinked. 'Which one?' he asked mildly.

The chance of the light caught Mark's face, as he heard this off-hand affirmation of his identity. Even in the chaos of his hopes pinwheeling to destruction, Miles was glad to have seen the brief awed look that passed over those fat-distorted features. Oh, Brother. Yeah. This is why men follow this man—

Olivia tugged her mother's sleeve. 'Mama,' she whispered urgently, 'can I go home with Tatya?'

'Yes, dear, I think that might be a good idea,' said Drou distractedly, clearly looking ahead; Miles wasn't sure if she was cutting down Kareen's potential allies in the brewing battle, or just the anticipated noise level.

Ren? and Tatya looked as though they would have been glad to sneak out quietly under the covering fire, but Lord Dono, who had somehow attached himself to their party, paused just long enough to say cheerily, 'Thank you, Lord Vorkosigan, for a most memorable evening.' He nodded cordially to Count and Countess Vorkosigan, as he followed the Vorbrettens to their groundcar. Well, the operation hadn't changed Donna/Dono's vile grip on irony, unfortunately . . .

'Who was that?' asked Count Vorkosigan. 'Looks familiar, somehow . . .'

A distracted-looking Enrique, his wiry hair half on-end, prowled into the great hall from the back entry. He had a jar in one hand, and what Miles could only dub Stink-on-a-Stick in the other: a wand with a wad of sickly-sweet scent-soaked fiber attached to its end, which he waved along the baseboards. 'Here, buggy, buggy,' he cooed plaintively. 'Come to Papa, that's the good girls . . .' He paused, and peered worriedly under a side-table. 'Buggy-buggy . . . ?'

'Now . . . that cries out for an explanation,' murmured the Count, watching him in arrested fascination.

Out by the front gate, an auto-cab's door slammed; its fans whirred as it pulled away into the night forever. Miles stood still, listening amid the uproar, till the last whisper of it was gone.

'Pym!' The Countess spotted a new victim, and her voice went a little dangerous. 'I seconded you to look after Miles. Would you care to explain this scene?'

There was a thoughtful pause. In a voice of simple honesty, Pym replied, 'No, Milady.'

'Ask Mark,' Miles said callously. 'He'll explain everything.' Head down, he started for the stairs.

'You rat-coward—!' Mark hissed at him in passing.

The rest of his guests were shuffling uncertainly into the hallway.

The Count asked cautiously, 'Miles, are you drunk?'

Miles paused on the third step. 'Not yet, sir,' he replied. He didn't look back. 'Not nearly enough yet. Pym, see me.'

He took the steps two at a time to his chambers, and oblivion.

CHAPTER TEN

'Good afternoon, Mark.' Countess Vorkosigan's bracing voice spiked Mark's last futile attempts to maintain unconsciousness. He groaned, pulled his pillow from his face, and opened one bleary eye.

He tested responses on his furry tongue. Countess. Vicereine. Mother. Strangely enough, Mother seemed to work best. 'G'fertn'n, M'thur.'

She studied him for a moment further, then nodded, and waved at the maid who'd followed in her wake. The girl set down a tea tray on the bedside table and stared curiously at Mark, who had an urge to pull his covers up over himself even though he was still wearing most of last night's clothing. The maid trundled obediently out of Mark's room again at the Countess's firm, 'Thank you, that will be all.'

Countess Vorkosigan opened the curtains, letting in blinding light, and pulled up a chair. 'Tea?' she inquired, pouring without waiting for an answer.

'Yeah, I guess.' Mark struggled upright, and rearranged his pillows enough to accept the mug without spilling it. The tea was strong and dark, with cream, the way he liked it, and it scalded the glue out of his mouth.

The Countess poked doubtfully at the empty butter bug tubs piled on the table. Counting them up, perhaps, because she winced. 'I didn't think you'd want breakfast yet.'

'No. Thank you.' Though his excruciating stomach-ache was calming down. The tea actually soothed it.

'Neither does your brother. Miles, possibly driven by his new-found need to uphold Vor tradition, sought his anesthetic in wine. Achieved it, too, according to Pym. At present, we're letting him enjoy his spectacular hangover without commentary.'

'Ah.' Fortunate son.

'Well, he'll have to come out of his rooms eventually. Though Aral advises not to look for him before tonight.' Countess Vorkosigan poured herself a mug of tea too, and stirred in cream. 'Lady Alys was very peeved at Miles for abandoning the field before his guests had all departed. She considered it a shameful lapse of manners on his part.'

'It was a shambles.' One that, it appeared, they were all going to live through. Unfortunately. Mark took another sluicing swallow. 'What happened after . . . after the Koudelkas left?' Miles had bailed out early; Mark's own courage had broken when the Commodore had lost his grip to the point of referring to the Countess's mother as a damned Betan pimp , and Kareen had flung out the door proclaiming that she would sooner walk home, or possibly to the other side of the continent, before riding