Cetaganda b-5 Read online

  "Huh."

  "If you like, I can try to look it up in my resource materials."

  "Would you? I'd like that very much." He folded the flimsy back up and handed it to her. "Uh … I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't show it to anyone else, though."

  "Oh?" She let the syllable hang there, Oh . . . ?

  "Excuse me. Professional paranoia. I, uh . . ." He was getting in deeper and deeper. "It's a habit."

  He was rescued from tripping further over his tongue by the return of Ivan. Ivan's practiced eye summed up the attractions of the Vervani woman instantly, and he smiled attentively at her, as sincerely delighted as he had been with the last girl, and would be with the next. And the next. The ghem-lord artiste was still glued to his elbow; Miles perforce introduced them both. Maz seemed not to have met Lord Yenaro before. In front of the Cetagandan, Maz did not repeat to Ivan her message of boundless Vervani gratitude to the Vorkosigan clan, but she was definitely friendly.

  "You really ought to let Lord Yenaro take you on the tour of his sculpture, Miles," Ivan said ruthlessly. "It's quite a thing. An opportunity not to be missed and all that."

  I found her first, dammit. "Yes, it's very fine."

  "Would you be interested, Lord Vorkosigan?" Yenaro looked earnest and hopeful.

  Ivan bent to Miles's ear to whisper, "It was Lord Yenaro's gift to the Marilacan embassy. Don't be a lout, Miles, you know how sensitive the Cetagandans are about their artsy, uh, things."

  Miles sighed, and mustered an interested smile for Yenaro. "Certainly. Now?"

  Miles excused himself with unfeigned regrets to Maz the Vervani. The ghem-lordling led him down the stairs to the lobby, and had him pause at the entrance of the walk-through sculpture to wait for the show-cycle to begin anew.

  "I'm not really qualified to judge aesthetics," Miles mentioned, hoping to head off any conversation in that direction.

  "So very few are," smiled Yenaro, "but that doesn't stop them."

  "It does seem to me to be a very considerable technical achievement. Do you drive the motion with antigrav, then?"

  "No, there's no antigrav in it at all. The generators would be bulky and wasteful of power. The same force drives the leaves' motion as drives their color changes—or so my technicians explained it to me."

  "Technicians? I somehow pictured you putting all this together with your own hands."

  Yenaro spread his hands—pale, long-fingered, and thin—and stared at them as if surprised to find them on the ends of his wrists. "Of course not. Hands are to be hired. Design is the test of the intellect."

  "I must disagree. In my experience, hands are integral with brains, almost another lobe for intelligence. What one does not know through one's hands, one does not truly know."

  "You are a man capable of true conversation, I perceive. You must meet my friends, if your schedule here permits. I'm hosting a reception at my home in two evenings' time—do you suppose—?"

  "Um, maybe . . ." That evening was a blank as far as the funeral formalities went. It could be quite interesting, a chance to observe how the ghem-lordlings of his own generation operated without the inhibitions of their elders; a glimpse into the future of Cetaganda. "Yes, why not?"

  "I'll send you directions. Oh." Yenaro nodded toward the fountain, which was starting up with its high-canopied summer greens again. "Now we can go in."

  Miles did not find the view from inside the fountain-maze all that much different from the outside. In fact, it seemed less interesting, as at close range the illusion of forms in the flitting leaves was reduced. The music was clearer, though. It rose to a crescendo, as the colors began to change.

  "Now you'll see something," said Yenaro, with evident satisfaction.

  It was all sufficiently distracting that it took another moment for Miles to realize that he was feeling something—tingling and heat, coming from his leg braces lying against his skin. He schooled himself not to react, till the heat began to rise.

  Yenaro was babbling on with artistic enthusiasm, pointing out effects, Now, watch this— Brilliant colors swirled before Miles's eyes. A distinct sensation of scalding flesh crept up his legs.

  Miles muffled his scream to a less-edged yell, and managed not to jump for the water. God knew, he might be electrocuted. The few seconds it took him to pelt out of the maze brought the steel of his braces to a temperature sufficient to boil water. He gave up dignity, dove for the floor, and yanked up his trouser legs. His first snatch at the clamps burned his hands, too. He swore, eyes watering, and tried again. He tore off his boots, snapped loose the braces, and flung them aside with a clatter, and curled up momentarily in overwhelming pain. The braces had left a pattern of rising white welts surrounded by an angry red border of flesh on shin, knees, and ankles.

  Yenaro was flapping about in distress, calling loudly for help. Miles looked up to find himself the center of an audience of about fifty or so shocked and bewildered people, witnessing his display. He stopped writhing and swearing, and sat panting, his breath hissing through clenched teeth.

  Ivan and Vorob'yev shouldered through the mob from different directions. "Lord Vorkosigan! What has happened?" asked Vorob'yev urgently.

  "I'm all right," said Miles. He was not all right, but this was not the time or place to go into details. He pulled his trouser legs quickly back down, concealing the burns.

  Yenaro was yammering on in dismay, "What happened? I had no idea—are you all right, Lord Vorkosigan? Oh dear . . ."

  Ivan bent and prodded at a cooling brace. "Yes, what the hell . . . ?"

  Miles considered the sequence of sensations, and their possible causes. Not antigrav, not noticeable to anyone else, and it had slid right past Marilacan embassy security. Hidden in plain sight? Right. "I think it was some sort of electro-hysteresis effect. The color-changes in the display are apparently driven by a reversing magnetic field at low level. No problem for most people. For me, well, it wasn't quite as bad as shoving my leg braces into a microwave, but—you get the idea." Grinning, he got to his feet. Ivan, looking very worried, had already collected his flung boots and the offending braces. Miles let him keep them. He didn't want to touch them just now. He blundered rather blindly closer to Ivan, and muttered under his breath, "Get me out of here. . . ." He was shivering and shocky, as Ivan's hand on his shoulder could sense. Ivan gave him a short, understanding nod, and swiftly withdrew through the crowd of finely dressed men and women, some of whom were already turning away.

  Ambassador Bernaux hurried up, and added his worried apologies to Yenaro's one-man chorus. "Do you wish to stop in to the embassy infirmary, Lord Vorkosigan?" Bernaux offered.

  "No. Thank you. I'll wait till we get home, thanks." Soon, please.

  Bernaux bit his lip, and regarded the still-apologizing Lord Yenaro. "Lord Yenaro, I'm afraid—"

  "Yes, yes, turn it off at once" said Yenaro. "I will send my servants to remove it immediately. I had no idea—everyone else seemed to be enjoying—it must be re-designed. Or destroyed, yes, destroyed at once. I am so sorry—this is so embarrassing—"

  Yes, isn't it? thought Miles. A show of his physical weakness, displayed to a maximum audience at the earliest possible moment . . .

  "No, no, don't destroy it," said Ambassador Bernaux, horrified. "But we certainly must have it examined by a safety engineer, and modified, or perhaps a warning posted. . . ."

  Ivan reappeared at the edge of the dispersing crowd, and gave Miles a thumbs-up signal. After a few more minutes of excruciating social niceties, Vorob'yev and Ivan managed to get him escorted back down the lift tube to the waiting Barrayaran embassy groundcar. Miles flung himself into the upholstery and sat, grinning in pain, breath shallow. Ivan eyed his shivering form, skinned out of his tunic, and tucked it around Miles's shoulders. Miles let him.

  "All right, let's see the damages," demanded Ivan. He propped one of Miles's heels on his knee and rolled back the trouser leg. "Damn, that's got to hurt."

  "Quite," agreed Miles thinly.


  "It could hardly have been an assassination attempt, though," said Vorob'yev, his lips compressed with calculation.

  "No," agreed Miles.

  "Bernaux told me he had his own security people examine the sculpture before they installed it. Looking for bombs and bugs, of course, but they cleared it."

  "I'm sure they did. This could not have hurt anyone . . . but me."

  Vorob'yev followed his reasoning without effort. "A trap?"

  "Awfully elaborate, if so," noted Ivan.

  "I'm . . . not sure," said Miles.I'm meant to be not-sure. That's the beauty of it. "It had to have taken days, maybe weeks, of preparation. We didn't even know we were coming here till two weeks ago. When did it arrive at the Marilacan embassy?"

  "Last night, according to Bernaux," Vorob'yev said.

  "Before we even arrived." Before our little encounter with the man with no eyebrows. It can't possibly be connected—can it? "How long have we been scheduled for that party?"

  "The embassies arranged the invitations about three days ago," said Vorob'yev.

  "The timing is awfully tight, for a conspiracy," Ivan observed.

  Vorob'yev thought it over. "I think I must agree with you, Lord Vorpatril. Shall we put it down as an unfortunate accident, then?"

  "Provisionally," said Miles. That was no accident. I was set up. Me, personally. You know there's a war on when the opening salvo arrives.

  Except that, usually, one knew why a war had been declared. It was all very well to swear not to be blindsided again, but who was the enemy here?

  Lord Yenaro, I bet you throw a fascinating party. I wouldn't miss it for worlds.

  CHAPTER THREE

  "The proper name for the Cetagandan imperial residence is the Celestial Garden," said Vorob'yev, "but all the galactics just call it Xanadu. You'll see why in a moment. Duvi, take the scenic approach."

  "Yes, my lord," returned the young sergeant who was driving. He altered the control program. The Barrayaran embassy aircar banked, and shot through a shining stalagmite array of city towers.

  "Gently, if you please, Duvi. My stomach, at this hour of the morning …"

  "Yes, my lord." Regretfully, the driver slowed them to a saner pace. They dipped, wove around a building that Miles estimated must have been a kilometer high, and rose again. The horizon dropped away.

  "Whoa," said Ivan. "That's the biggest force dome I've ever seen. I didn't know they could expand them to that size."

  "It absorbs the output of an entire generating plant," said Vorob'yev, "for the dome alone. Another for the interior."

  A flattened opalescent bubble six kilometers across reflected the late morning sun of Eta Ceta. It lay in the midst of the city like a vast egg in a bowl, a pearl beyond price. It was ringed first by a kilometer-wide park with trees, then by a street reflecting silver, then by another park, then by an ordinary street, thick with traffic. From this, eight wide boulevards fanned out like the spokes of a wheel, centering the city. Centering the universe, Miles gained the impression. The effect was doubtless intended.

  "The ceremony today is in some measure a dress rehearsal for the final one in a week and a half," Vorob'yev went on, "since absolutely everyone will be there, ghem-lords, haut-lords, galactics and all. There will likely be organizational delays. As long as they're not on our part. I spent a week of hard negotiating to get you your official rankings and place in this."

  "Which is?" said Miles.

  "You two will be placed equivalently to second-order ghem-lords." Vorob'yev shrugged. "It was the best I could do."

  In the mob, though toward the front of it. The better to watch without being much noticed himself, Miles supposed. Today, that seemed like a good idea. All three of them, Vorob'yev, Ivan, and himself, were wearing their respective House mourning uniforms, logos and decorations of rank stitched in black silk on black cloth. Maximum formal, since they were to be in the Imperial presence itself. Miles ordinarily liked his Vorkosigan House uniform, whether the original brown and silver or this somber and elegant version, because the tall boots not only allowed but required him to dispense with the leg braces. But getting the boots on over his swollen burns this morning had been . . . painful. He was going to be limping more noticeably than usual, even tanked as he was on painkillers. I'll remember this, Yenaro.

  They spiraled down to a landing by the southernmost dome entrance, fronted by a landing lot already crowded with other vehicles. Vorob'yev dismissed the driver and aircar.

  "We keep no escort, my lord?" Miles said doubtfully, watching it go, and awkwardly shifting the long polished maplewood box he carried.

  Vorob'yev shook his head. "Not for security purposes. No one but the Cetagandan emperor himself could arrange an assassination inside the Celestial Garden, and if he wished to have you eliminated here, a regiment of bodyguards would do you no good."

  Some very tall men in the dress uniforms of the Cetagandan Imperial Guard vetted them through the dome locks. The guardsmen shunted them toward a collection of float-pallets set up as open cars, with white silky upholstered seats, the color of Cetagandan Imperial mourning. Each ambassadorial party was bowed on board by what looked to be senior servants in white and gray. The robotically-routed float-cars set off at a sedate pace a hand-span above the white-jade-paved walkways winding through a vast arboretum and botanical garden. Here and there Miles saw the rooftops of scattered and hidden pavilions peeking through the trees. All the buildings were low and private, except for some elaborate towers poking up in the center of the magic circle, almost three kilometers away. Though the sun shone outside in an Eta Ceta spring day, the weather inside the dome was set to a gray, cloudy, and appropriately mournful dampness, promising, but doubtless not delivering, rain.

  At length they wafted to a sprawling pavilion just to the west of the central towers, where another servant bowed them out of the car and directed them inside, along with a dozen other delegations. Miles stared around, trying to identify them all.

  The Marilacans, yes, there was the silver-haired Bernaux, some green-clad people who might be Jacksonians, a delegation from Aslund which included their chief of state—even they had only two guards, disarmed—the Betan ambassadoress in a black-on-purple brocade jacket and matching sarong, all streaming in to honor this one dead woman who would never have met them face-to-face when alive. Surreal seemed an understatement. Miles felt like he'd crossed the border into Faerie, and when they emerged this afternoon, a hundred years would have passed outside. The galactics had to pause at the doorway to make way for the party of a haut-lord satrap governor. He had an escort of a dozen ghem-guards, Miles noted, in full formal face paint, orange, green, and white swirls.

  The decor inside was surprisingly simple—tasteful, Miles supposed—tending heavily to the organic, arrangements of live flowers and plants and little fountains, as if bringing the garden indoors. The connecting halls were hushed, not echoing, yet one's voice carried clearly. They'd done something extraordinary with acoustics. More palace servants circulated offering food and drinks to the guests.

  A pair of pearl-colored spheres drifted at a walking pace across the far end of one hall, and Miles blinked at his first glimpse of haut-ladies. Sort of.

  Outside their very private quarters haut-women all hid themselves behind personal force-shields, usually generated, Miles had been told, from a float-chair. The shields could be made any color, according to the mood or whim of the wearer, but today would all be white for the occasion. The haut-lady could see out with perfect clarity, but no one could see in. Or reach in, or penetrate the barrier with stunner, plasma, or nerve disrupter fire, or small projectile weapons or minor explosions. True, the force-screen also eliminated the opportunity to fire out, but that seemed not to be a haut-lady concern. The shield could be cut in half with a gravitic imploder lance, Miles supposed, but the imploders' bulky power packs, massing several hundred kilos, made them strictly field ordnance, not hand weapons.

  Inside their bubbles, t
he haut-women could be wearing anything. Did they ever cheat? Slop around in old clothes and comfy slippers when they were supposed to be dressed up? Go nude to garden parties? Who could tell?

  A tall elderly man in the pure white robes reserved for the haut– and ghem-lords approached the Barrayaran party. His features were austere, his skin finely wrinkled and almost transparent. He was the Cetagandan equivalent of an Imperial majordomo, apparently, though with a much more flowery title, for after collecting their credentials from Vorob'yev he provided them with exact instructions as to their place and timing in the upcoming procession. His attitude conveyed that outlanders might be hopelessly gauche, but if one repeated the directions in a firm tone and made them simple enough, there was a chance of getting through this ceremony without disgrace.

  He looked down his hawk-beak nose at the polished box. "And this is your gift, Lord Vorkosigan?"

  Miles managed to unlatch the box and open it for display without dropping it. Within, nestled on a black velvet bed, lay an old, nicked sword. "This is the gift selected from his collection by my Emperor, Gregor Vorbarra, in honor of your late Empress. It is the sword his Imperial ancestor Dorca Vorbarra the Just carried in the First Cetagandan War." One of several, but no need to go into that. "A priceless and irreplaceable historical artifact. Here is its documentation of provenance."

  "Oh," the majordomo's feathery white brows lifted almost despite themselves. He took the packet, sealed with Gregor s personal mark, with more respect. "Please convey my Imperial masters thanks to yours." He half-bowed, and withdrew.

  "That worked well," said Vorob'yev with satisfaction.

  "I should bloody think so," growled Miles. "Breaks my heart." He handed off the box to Ivan to juggle for a while.

  Nothing seemed to be happening just yet—organizational delays, Miles supposed. He drifted away from Ivan and Vorob'yev in search of a hot drink. He was on the point of capturing something steaming and, he hoped, non-sedating, from a passing tray when a quiet voice at his elbow intoned, "Lord Vorkosigan?"