Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen Read online

  A server paused to offer Jole a drink on a tray. “Your usual, sir?”

  “Thank you, Frieda.” Jole took a sip. Fizzy water, ice, and whatever mixer was available in the bar to give it a camouflaging color—he had been trained not to drink alcohol in any place that might offer diplomatic ambush back in his days as aide to the Prime Minister, and the habit had stuck.

  “Ah, your Vorinnis girl is around here somewhere—there she is.” General Haines nodded to a short figure in ISWA dress greens, which entailed skirts which were, Jole understood, not as uncomfortable in this heat as trousers and boots. She stood awkwardly on the other side of the garden gripping an untasted drink. “I had to explain to her that a last-minute personal invitation from the Vicereine did, actually, outrank her afternoon’s filing.”

  “Good. They only met in passing the other day. Did you present her yet?”

  “A while ago. She seemed a tad tongue-tied.”

  “Well, Cordelia will get her over that in due course. See she gets home to base as well, please; I have an, uh…unscheduled conference scheduled with the Vicereine after this.”

  Haines nodded, giving the girl a calculating glance. “How’s she working out for you?”

  Jole shrugged. “All right so far. She’s keen, and it’s clear she picked up a little Vorbarr Sultana polish on her last rotation—or maybe that’s her Vor blood talking, there.” He hesitated, considering. “When it comes to divvying up resources and personnel, Sergyar command has always been third in line for everything.”

  Haines sighed. “I’ve figured that out.”

  “Komarr command always gets first pick, on the theory that they’ll be the hot seat if there is one, and Home Fleet is a close second. They arm-wrestle all the time over the best men. We get what’s left. What’s left, it turns out, are a lot of the best women. Send us more, I’d say.” He added after a prudent moment, “No, you can’t filch this one.”

  Haines snorted, but gave up mentally filling his vacant org chart. Jole gave him a cordial nod and moved off, stalking-horse fashion, to give anyone who wanted a shot at him their chance. It was frequently the fastest way to find what he was looking for, provided that he was looking for trouble.

  “Ah, Admiral Jole!” a voice hailed him. Jole fixed an affable smile on his face and turned.

  The incumbent civilian mayor of Kareenburg and one of his councilman stirrup-riders approached him. Observing this, his two front-running opponents in the upcoming civic elections also closed in. They all gave each other wary, familiar nods.

  “So glad to have caught you,” said Mayor Yerkes. “Tell me, is the rumor true that you plan to close the base next year?”

  “Certainly not, sir,” said Jole. “I don’t know how these stories get started—do you?”

  Yerkes ignored this slight conversational speed bump. “The activity among the civilian contractors must indicate something.”

  “It’s no secret that His Imperial Majesty has granted permission to open a second base,” said Jole smoothly, thinking, Now that the General Staff has finally fought the appropriation through the Council of Counts. Possibly the closest most of them had come to a shooting war in Vorbarr Sultana for some years. “A single downside base has always been insufficient for defensive depth, not only in case of attack, but in the event of a natural disaster. The late Viceroy Vorkosigan had urged this expansion practically from the moment he set foot on Sergyar. You may be certain his widow will see his vision realized.”

  “Yes, but where?” put in Madame Moreau.

  “That issue is still being discussed.” Actually, it was down to a coin toss between Gridgrad or New Hassadar. Personally, Jole hankered for both, but he wasn’t going to get them—certainly not simultaneously. The choice of final site was still a secret closely held, to limit the burst of financial speculation that would inevitably follow its disclosure.

  “You must know more.”

  “I wouldn’t say that, ma’am.”

  Mayor Yerkes gave him a look of amused frustration. Moreau and her co-challenger, Kuznetsov, just looked frustrated. In assorted ways, Kareenburg’s downside military base was still the largest economic entity in the area, though now being edged out by the expanding government offices and the busy civilian shuttleport acting as entrepôt for the steady stream of new colonists. In any case, after a few more probing questions, the trio coasted off to test their luck with Haines. A futile effort, but Jole couldn’t blame them for trying.

  Lieutenant Vorinnis, who had spotted him just before he’d been surrounded by the anxious mayoral candidates, angled over to him. “Sir. General Haines said I should accompany him, sir…?”

  “Quite right, Lieutenant.”

  The girl visibly relaxed. Jole inquired lightly, “So, what did you think of the Vicereine, now you’ve had a chance to exchange a few more words?”

  “She wasn’t as scary as I thought.” Though Vorinnis said this as if she were still unsure. “I know she’s a grandmother, but she doesn’t seem very…grandmotherish. As if she’s ignoring the categories.”

  Jole smiled. “She’s always done that,” he conceded. “But you should have met her before…” Before half her light was extinguished.

  “Not much chance of that, sir.”

  “No, I suppose not.” He glanced out over the top of her dress beret. “Heads-up; we’re about to get Cetagandans.” She wheeled to follow his nod.

  Despite his ghem-lord status, the Cetagandan consul in Kareenburg conformed to local, casual styles—shirt and trousers which, while doubtless comfortable, somehow managed to look about five times more expensive than what anyone else wore. His cultural attaché was unfortunately stuck, like Haines, in dress unsuitable for the sunny afternoon, dark with a heavy over-robe. Also ghem, he came complete with his clan’s formal face paint: blue and green swirls slashed with gold in an ornate pattern, giving him a vaguely subaqueous air. A lesser ghem in a lesser venue would usually make do these days with a small colored decal on the cheekbone, as, indeed, the consul himself had, appropriately to his garb. The overdressed attaché was either a nervous novice, or had been oddly unadvised by his superiors. The consul, who’d finally noted Jole’s arrival, spoke a word in his subordinate’s ear and guided him in Jole’s direction.

  As the two ghem lords sidled around the other guests toward him, Jole ran a mental review of the current disposition of everything moving upside, but as of the morning report all was quiet and routine. The multi-jump wormhole link to the nearest of the Cetagandan Empire’s eight primary worlds, Rho Ceta, had its terminus on the route between Komarr and Sergyar, closer to the former; therefore in a position to cut the route and the Barrayaran Empire off from Sergyar and everything that lay beyond it on that side. Which was why Komarr command held the jump-points militarily for several empty systems in, handing off about three-fourths of the way to the Rho Cetan command doing the same for their side.

  The last overtly hostile move in force that the Cetagandans had made in that quarter had been over forty years ago, in the second year of Aral’s regency for the young Emperor Gregor. On the heels of Vordarian’s Pretendership—an attempted palace coup on Barrayar that had nearly brought down Aral’s shaky new government—Cetaganda had sought to wrest away conquered Komarr and newly discovered Sergyar from Barrayaran hands. The attack force never made it through the chain of jump-points doggedly held by the Barrayaran Admiral Kanzian, soon backed in turn by reinforcements led by Aral himself. Aral had then returned home to an awkward combination of a hero’s welcome and a local uprising on Komarr.

  According to Aral, it had been the Cetagandan plan for all three events to occur simultaneously. Such a pile-up might have overwhelmed even him, but the Pretendership had ended abruptly many months before anyone could have predicted, and the restive Komarrans, whose agenda hadn’t actually included exchanging a Barrayaran occupation for a Cetagandan one despite their willingness to accept aid, had been divided and laggard. So Aral had been able to take on his crises
one at a time instead of all together. It had made for a hellish few years, Jole gathered. But Cetaganda hadn’t tried again through that route.

  And Aral and Cordelia’s private tragedy of their soltoxin-crippled young son Miles had been running along in constant counterpoint with all of that, Jole realized anew. His own prospect of parenthood made this a less distanced and more disturbing thought.

  “Ah, Admiral Jole, how good to see you here,” said the Cetagandan consul, a minor lord by the name of ghem Navitt. “May I take this opportunity to present to you our new cultural attaché, Mikos ghem Soren?”

  Jole exchanged greetings with the young consulate officer, who eyed his casual civilian dress in faint doubt, delicately conveyed by some slant of posture. Jole introduced Lieutenant Vorinnis in turn, who regarded the tall ghem lord with the stiff dubiousness of a cat told off to make friends with a dog. Ghem Soren’s precisely gradated half-bow in return was almost as dubious. The Cetagandan military service also had a women’s auxiliary, with long-running traditions of its own, but they were almost all commoners, un-gene-modified Cetagandans.

  The Vor were a warrior caste, historically. The ghem were that as well, but had a more complex social genesis, as half-commoner half-haut in-betweeners—better than the one but never good enough to be the other. This endogenous inferiority complex tended to make the ghem touchingly twitchy about status. The Vor as a class had their own traumas, in Jole’s opinion mostly self-inflicted, but covert fears of genetic mediocrity were not usually among them.

  The face paint and Cetagandan gene-mods would have made ghem Soren’s age hard for a Barrayaran eye to judge, but Jole had the advantage of an ImpSec dossier forwarded last week, standard evaluation for all such postings. The attaché was thirty, young for his position among the long-lived Cetagandans. On the make? Silly question. If he was a ghem lord and breathing, he was ambitious.

  “Welcome to Sergyar, Lord ghem Soren. I trust you will find it an enjoyable posting.”

  “Thank you, sir. My only regret is that I was assigned too late to meet the legendary Admiral Vorkosigan.”

  Jole nodded shortly. “It was a privilege to know him.”

  “Your Emperor must sorely miss him, and his strategic expertise.”

  And hadn’t Jole had this probing conversation a hundred times before, with assorted galactic observers in the wake of Aral’s death. “Missing him, truly, but not his expertise. He was a great teacher as well as a great man, and fostered many younger Barrayarans in his vision and skills. He was my professional mentor for over twenty years, so I can testify to this from personal experience.” Decode that, you Cetagandan puppy. There are damn few officers in the Service more steeped in Aral’s training than me, and I’m sitting guard on your wormhole outlet, right. Don’t even think of trying anything. Jole went on smoothly, “And, of course, I still enjoy the benefit of Vicereine Vorkosigan’s wide experience and wisdom. We work together very closely. You may find your tour here on Sergyar under her aegis to be edifying in many unexpected ways.”

  “I shall hope so, sir.” Ghem Soren glanced around. “Her garden is nearly worthy of the work of our ghem ladies.”

  It’s better, ghem-boy, and you know it. The Cetagandans made art as much an arena of genetic competition as sport—or war. “So kind of you to say so. It is certainly one of her delights. By all means, tell her just that. It will amuse her no end.” Jole extended a faux-helpful finger. “Ah—I’m afraid your face paint is running, my lord. The heat here is not kind to formal attire. You may wish to duck into the lav and adjust it before she sees it, though of course the Vicereine would never say a word…”

  The young ghem, to Jole’s amusement, flinched and raised a hand to his gaudy face. Vorinnis’s eyes widened just slightly, though she suppressed any other expression. The consul, spying the Vicereine across the garden temporarily unsurrounded, more adroitly closed out the conversation with a few stock diplomatic phrases, and towed his newbie subordinate away.

  Vorinnis remarked, “I’d never met a ghem-lord face-to-face before, not in full colors. Though I saw a few on the streets in Vorbarr Sultana, around the embassy quarter.”

  Jole smiled. “Small, helpful criticisms delivered in a tone of sweet concern usually serve to counter the worst of their inbred obnoxiousness.”

  “Saw that, sir.”

  He added, after a moment’s reflection, “If no such happy opportunity presents itself, praising the superiority of the haut, which no ghem will ever be, can be made to serve almost as well.”

  They both watched obliquely as ghem Soren sidled discreetly into the garden’s guest lav, a kiosk whose mundane function was camouflaged by a well-placed riot of plants and vines. Vorinnis’s lip curled slightly. “Would mentioning Barrayaran victories over the ghem also work?”

  “If done subtly. Subtlety counts. In Admiral Vorkosigan’s train, of course, we never had to say it out loud.”

  “Can’t get much more subtle than that, I guess.”

  “It certainly worked, in its day.” Though we’ll have to find something else from now on.

  Vor women were not historically warriors, despite a thousand songs and tales of young women disguising themselves as boys and following their brothers/lovers/husbands/vengeful hearts into battle. Some of the stories were even true, uncovered in the hospital or morgue tents of the day. The end of the Time of Isolation and the introduction of galactic-style induction physicals had put paid to that era. But Vor women were more usually praised as the mothers of warriors.

  Not that this didn’t sometimes entail war as well, as left-at-home Vor ladies were compelled to heroically defend the keep, or tragically fail to. There had been a famous Countess Vorinnis from the heart of the Bloody Centuries who’d mocked her besiegers, who were holding her children hostage, by standing on the battlements, flipping up her skirts, and bending over to shout down through her spread knees for them to do their worst, as they could see she could get more children where those had come from! The siege had failed and the children had survived, but Jole couldn’t help reflecting that the family dynamics of that generation must have been boggling to witness, from a safe distance. One of these days, he would have to ask the present Vorinnis if she was a direct descendant.

  The party herd was finally thinning out. Yes! Everyone leave, dammit! I want the Vicereine now! Jole sent Vorinnis back to Haines, sipped another fake cocktail, and tried not to jitter while waiting for his chance.

  Chapter Three

  The diplomatic reception seemed to drag on unduly, but at last Cordelia was able to hand over the task of gently expelling the more inebriated lesser guests to her personal assistants, and the cleanup to her very competent house staff, and motion Oliver after her. When he’d appeared so unexpectedly, hesitating on the walkway, he’d looked as tall and cool as ever, but a faint panicked light in his blue eyes had put her oddly in mind of a cat that had just had an inadvertent ride in a dryer. She led off into the garden to her favorite private nook, made a visual check for displaced diplomats, and flung herself down on the comfortable chaise, kicking off her shoes and letting out her breath with a whoosh. “Glad that’s over. Oh, my feet.”

  Smiling, Oliver seated himself in the nearby wicker chair. “I remember how Aral used to rub them for you, after these ordeals.”

  “Yeah,” she sighed, resting for a moment in a memory that didn’t hurt too much. She looked up in sudden hope, but he didn’t follow this observation with, say, an offer to do the same. She sat up, crossed her legs, and rubbed her own feet, instead.

  She continued, “I saw you making the rounds—thanks. How was your hit count, this party? Should we search your pockets for hotel room keys, love notes on napkins, or ladies’ underwear?” In his days as Aral’s handsome aide, the receptacles of his uniform had been a source of several interesting surprises after similar events, even when he’d sworn that no one had come close enough to touch him.

  “It was only mystery lingerie the once,” he protested in amus
ed indignation. But added after a moment’s reflection, “All right, twice, but it was in a bar on Tau Ceti and we were all drunk. Both a permanent puzzle—you’d think they’d at least have thought to write their comcode on the crotch or something. Did they expect me to search for them like Cinderella?” He mimed holding up a pair of slender undies, with a look of canine hope.

  Cordelia emitted a peal of laughter. It felt good. “Or send ImpSec to do it for you.”

  “ImpSec actually did get handed anything I couldn’t certainly identify. I sometimes imagined I might uncover a glamorous Cetagandan spy hatching a dastardly plot, but it never turned out to be that interesting.”

  Cordelia rubbed the grin from her mouth. “Oh, well.” She sat back again. “So, how did you get along with Dr. Tan?”

  He shrugged. “He was very civil. And enthusiastic. And appallingly Betan.”

  “Was that a good point or a bad point?”

  “Just a point, I think. It was…a stranger experience than I’d expected.” He seemed about to say more, but then shook his head and visibly changed tacks. “I left him with what he persisted in calling my sample. As if my gonads were a bakery case. The next step, if my gametes don’t all turn out to be croakers…well, the next step is coming up very quickly.”

  “Do you know what it will be?”

  “More or less. That is, I know the question, but not the answer. I have to decide whether to freeze my sample now, and push everything off for later, or go ahead with the fertilizations. Which leads to the next decision in turn, which is whether to freeze all the zygotes—embryos?—whichever, or start one of them. Or more than one, I suppose.”

  “Miles, when he was contemplating this technology for my future grandchildren, wanted to start twelve at once and do them all in one efficient batch. Like growing his own platoon, I gather. I offered to take turns with Ekaterin holding his head under water till he had a better idea, but as it turned out, she didn’t need my help. Wonderful girl, my daughter-in-law. I still don’t know what he did to deserve her.”