over the years. You pick your loyalties, I’ll pick mine.”
“Who is capable of succeeding him?” asked Illyan plaintively.
“A number of men. Racozy, Vorhalas, or Sendorf, to name three. If not, there was something terribly wrong with Aral’s leadership. One mark of a great man is the legacy of men he leaves behind him, to whom he’s passed on his skills. If you think Aral so small as to have stifled all possible others around him, spreading smallness like a plague, then perhaps Barrayar is better off without him.”
“You know I don’t think that!”
“Good. Then your argument annihilates itself.”
“You tie me in knots.” Illyan rubbed his neck. “Milady,” he said at last, “I didn’t want to have to say this to you. But have you considered the possible
She leaned back in her chair, smiling, her fingers lightly drumming. “No, Simon. What dangers are you thinking of?”
“The temptation to promote himself,” Illyan bit out.
“Murder Miles. Say what you damn mean.” Her eyes glinted dangerously. “So you’ll just have to make sure your people get to Miles first. Won’t you. I’ve no objection.”
“Damn it, Cordelia,” he cried, harried, “
The Countess grinned. “You live to serve, I believe you fellows say in your oath. Don’t you?”
“We’ll see,” snapped Illyan, and cut the comm.
“What’s he going to do?” asked Mark anxiously.
“At a guess, go over my head. Since I’ve already cut him out with Aral, that leaves only one choice. I don’t think I’ll bother getting up. I expect I’ll get another call here shortly.”
Distracted, Mark and Bothari-Jesek attempted to carry on with the ship specs. Mark jumped when the comm chimed again.
An anonymous young man appeared, nodded to the Countess, stated, “Lady Vorkosigan. Emperor Gregor,” and vanished. Gregor’s face appeared in his place, looking bemused.
“Good morning, Lady Cordelia. You really ought not to stir up poor Simon that way, you know.”
“He deserved it,” she said equably. “I admit, he has far too much on his mind at the moment. Suppressed panic turns him into a prick every time, it’s what he does instead of running in circles screaming. A way of coping, I suppose.”
“While others of us cope by becoming over-analytical,” Gregor murmured. The Countess’s lip twitched, and Mark suddenly thought he knew who might shave the barber.
“His security concerns are legitimate,” Gregor continued. “Is this Jackson’s Whole venture
“A question that can only be answered by empirical testing. So to speak. I grant you, Simon argues sincerely. But—how do you consider
“I’m divided in mind.”
“Are you divided in heart?” Her question was a challenge. She opened her hands, half-placation, half- pleading. “One way or another, you’re going to be dealing with Lord Mark Vorkosigan for a long time to come. This excursion, if it does nothing else, will test the validity of all doubts. If they are not tested, they will always remain with you, an unanswered itch. And that’s not fair to Mark.”
“How very scientific,” he breathed. They regarded each other with equal dryness.
“I thought it might appeal to you.”
“Is Lord Mark with you?”
“Yes,” the Countess gestured him to her side.
Mark entered the range of the vid pick-up. “Sire.”
“So, Lord Mark.” Gregor studied him gravely. “It seems your mother wants me to give you enough rope to hang yourself.”
Mark swallowed. “Yes, Sire.”
“Or save yourself …” Gregor nodded. “So be it. Good luck and good hunting.”
“Thank you, Sire.”
Gregor smiled and cut the comm.
They did not hear from Illyan again.
In the afternoon, the Countess took Mark with her to the Imperial Military Hospital on her daily visit to her husband. Mark had made that journey in her company twice before, since the Count’s collapse. He didn’t much care for it. For one thing, the place smelled entirely too much like the clinics that had helped make a torment of his Jacksonian youth; he found himself remembering details of early surgeries and treatments that he thought he’d altogether forgotten. For another, the Count himself still terrified Mark. Even laid low, his personality was as powerful as his life was precarious, and Mark wasn’t sure which teetering aspect scared him more.
His feet slowed to a halt in the hospital corridor outside the Prime Minister’s guarded room, and he stood in indecisive misery. The Countess glanced back, and stopped. “Yes?”
“I … really don’t want to go in there.”
She frowned thoughtfully. “I won’t force you. But I’ll predict you a prediction.”
“Say on, oh seeress.”
“You will never regret having done so. But you may deeply regret not having done so.”
Mark digested that. “All right,” he said faintly, and followed her.
They tiptoed in quietly on the deep carpeting. The drapes were open on a wide view of the Vorbarr Sultana city-scape, sweeping down to the ancient buildings and the river that bisected the capital’s heart. It was a cloudy, chilly, rainy afternoon, and grey and white mists swirled around the tops of the highest modern towers. The Count’s face was turned to the silver light. He looked abstracted, bored, and ill, his face puffy and greenish, only partly a reflection of the light and the green uniform pajamas that reminded all forcibly of his patient-status. He was peppered with monitor pads, and had an oxygen tube to his nostrils.
“Ah.” His head turned at their entry, and he smiled. He keyed up a light at his bedside, which cast a warmer pool of illumination that nonetheless failed to improve his color. “Dear Captain. Mark.” The Countess bent to his bedside, and they exchanged a longer-than-formal kiss. The Countess swung herself up on the end of his bed and perched there cross-legged, arranging her long skirt. Casually, she began to rub his bare feet, and he sighed contentedly.
Mark advanced to about a meter distance. “Good afternoon, sir. How are you feeling?”
“Hell of a deal, when you can’t kiss your own wife without running out of breath,” he complained. He lay back, panting heavily.
“They let me into the lab to see your new heart,” the Countess commented. “It’s chicken-heart sized already, and beating away cheerfully in its little vat.”
The Count laughed weakly. “How grotesque.”
“I thought it was cute.”
“You would.”
“If you really want grotesque, consider what you want to do with the old one, after,” the Countess advised with a wicked grin. “The opportunities for tasteless jokes are almost irresistible.”
“The mind reels,” murmured the Count. He glanced up at Mark, still smiling.
Mark took a breath. “Lady Cordelia has explained to you what I intend to do, hasn’t she, sir?”
“Mm.” The Count’s smile faded. “Yes. Watch out for your back. Nasty place, Jackson’s Whole.”
“Yes, I … know.”
“So you do.” He turned his head to stare out the grey window. “I wish I could send Bothari with you.”
The Countess looked startled. Mark could read her thought right off her face,
“I’m taking Bothari-Jesek, sir.”
“History repeats itself.” He struggled to sit up on one elbow, and added sternly, “It had better not, boy, y’hear?” He relaxed back into his pillows before the Countess could respond and make him. Her face lost its tension;
