The Councils of Despair

By

Parhelion

 

I

“So Imperial troops finally fired weapons to disburse the mobs in the capitol.”  Admiral Lord Aral Vorkosigan shook his head and then reached for his eighth drink.  As was usual by this point in the evening, his hand was no longer entirely steady although his deep voice was still firm.  “What was the exact toll of the dead, or can you tell me?”

“No, sir.”  In fact, Commander Simon Illyan of Imperial Security could tell, but he wouldn’t.  Thanks to the biochip that supplemented his biological memory, Illyan had a great many facts at his fingertips, including the civilian death toll during the recent riots.  But Illyan sensed the Admiral would only add some fraction of the toll to the mental roster of deaths for which he felt responsible. “The newssheets will have figures tomorrow if you really want them.”

Admiral Vorkosigan snorted.  “They’ll publicize the official numbers, as you well know.  Nothing close to the truth.”

Illyan shrugged.  The Admiral wasn’t bothering to lower his voice, not that he ever did when he was this drunk.  Following his recent custom, he’d begun his binge with a snifter of brandy and then worked his way through bourbon, wine, and assorted liqueurs before ending up drinking the rawest of maple meads.  As usual, the mead had burnt holes right through the layers of ex-planetary navy admiral and current Barrayaran Count’s heir to the would-be radical below.

Sure enough, the Admiral continued, “The government should pay compensation to the survivors, in my opinion.  After all, the rioters were doing public service by burning out that rat’s nest in the Bureau of Political Education.”

Illyan suppressed a wince.  He’d despised his small agency’s former rivals, but he’d also known enough not to speak such thoughts aloud.  As recently as a year ago, voicing such sentiments could make a man disappear.  Not that the Bureau’s best vanishing tricks had ever worked on Aral Vorkosigan.

“And serve the Bureau right.  They demanded the invasion of Escobar planet loudly, repeatedly, and publicly.”  Admiral Vorkosigan stared into his glass.  “They got the Escobar rout instead.  I’m not amazed our fellow Barrayaran citizens – and whoever was behind them – took offense.  I’m just amazed that, given my history, no one’s come after me.”  He sipped from his stoneware mug and grimaced. 

“Not your fault.  You protested the entire idea and then saved what you could from the debris.  Everyone knows that.”  Illyan realized, even as he spoke, that his words were useless.  True, Admiral Vorkosigan had successfully led a fighting retreat after the invasion force’s original commander had died.  But some secret knowledge rode the Admiral harder than the deaths demanded by that necessary battle ever could, something that made him pick up the bill for all the piles of bodies.  Sometimes Illyan thought he sensed the shape of the guilt that commanded the Admiral.  That half-knowledge roused a cold fear in Illyan that the Bureau of Political Education never had.

The Admiral smiled crookedly but his eyes were dark. Without another word, he lifted his mug and drained it dry.  Then, his expression suddenly slightly startled, he began to slide sideways off his chaise inside the wooden pavilion.  Illyan grabbed at him, and managed to keep him from ending up on the planked floor.

“Help me inside the house, please Simon,” the Admiral said, the words more a mild command than a request.  “The servants will take it from there.”  Illyan didn’t consider disobeying.  Real leaders don’t stop being leaders just because they’ve resigned, just because they’re now drunks.

***

Illyan understood this better than most Barrayarans.  He’d had weeks of lessons about alcohol and leadership while observing these drunken sprees.  Intoxicated, Admiral Vorkosigan lost all dignity but retained the inner force that kept the faces of his armsmen respectful even after he’d thrown up and passed out.  Illyan had watched the Admiral carried home several times, so he knew.

Illyan’s job was to watch.  Back when he’d been the military schoolboy dismissed as “Greeky,” he’d already been a good observer.  During vacations home, while he roamed across one of the most backward counties on a backward planet, he’d watched his age-mates act before they spoke and speak before they thought.  That wasn’t Illyan’s way.  Instead he’d chosen his few allies carefully, learned to fade into the scenery, avoiding trouble until he could escape into the navy.  Perhaps his talent for evasion was why, when he graduated from the Imperial Naval Academy, he’d been seconded to the Emperor’s security rather than given the shipboard assignment he’d desired.  To be able to leave Barrayar and all its presumptions light-years behind—

Instead ImpSec had refined him, teaching him to understand things about his fellows he’d rather not have known.  To finish the job, they’d installed a biochip in his brain so he could never forget what he’d learned.  In the years that followed, Illyan had quietly observed the deadly struggles that served Barrayar for politics.  He’d come to judge what he saw.  Then he’d followed Aral Vorkosigan to war, where the Admiral had taught him the bitter price of acting on judgment and why that price still had to be paid.   When Illyan had followed the Admiral back to Barrayar, ImpSec had promoted Illyan and returned him to watching.  Illyan would have predicted he’d be relieved.  He wasn’t.  He felt stifled.

At least Commander Illyan now had enough seniority to choose how to watch.  So about once a week, he left the company of the regular surveillance squads and went to join Aral Vorkosigan in his folly.

“Simon.”  That was the inevitable greeting.  Inevitable, too, was the question, “A drink?”  A wry smile would always pass over the blocky, harsh features as the Admiral anticipated Illyan’s reply.

“I’m on duty, sir.”

“Hmm.  Never mind, then.”  And the Admiral would drain the offered drink himself, taking another step down on what he seemed to believe was a one-man path into the mire.

Illyan, while sitting quietly across tables, or in a neighboring armchair, or sharing a sofa, had seen the Admiral cautiously drunk, staggeringly drunk, slurringly drunk, and drunk enough to recommend radical political reform to anyone who’d listen. But he’d never seen Vorkosigan drunk enough to stain his honor.  Perhaps that was only because the Admiral tended to black out before he could act on any evil intentions.

Or perhaps, after the recent war, the Admiral believed he had no evil acts left to commit. In fact, these days he seemed unwilling to tackle most new duties.  Understandable, given what Illyan had watched.  Since the Admiral returned planetside, he’d been marched through a series of trials and inquiries about his actions during the disastrous Escobar campaign where Illyan had been called to testify.  The Admiral had been alternately pilloried and praised in the press; Illyan had been assigned to evaluate the stories.  Rumors had run rampant about the Admiral, about his behavior, and about his honor.  Finally, after the Admiral had been awarded a medal he’d never worn since, by the Emperor Ezra himself, he’d resigned his commission.  An off-worlder might say that the Admiral was exhausted.  Illyan thought that Aral Vorkosigan despaired.

During ImpSec training, the stress psychology instructor had strongly maintained that all men had their breaking points.  Illyan believed he had learned his own limits.  After several interviews under the influence of fast-penta, Imperial Security probably knew them, too.  So Illyan had taught himself how to trace the sort of stresses fracturing the Admiral by practicing on himself first.  But he hadn’t been taught what to do about such fragmentation.  Not that his job was to fix Vorkosigan, of course.  His job was to watch.

II

The next week, fate and a mild summer night provided Illyan with confirmation of his notion about alcohol and leadership.  Admiral Vorkosigan was certainly drunk when he decided to lead troops into action again.

Now that the protestors had done the Emperor’s work for him, and Imperial troops had suppressed the riots that had destroyed the Bureau of Political Education, the capitol was calm.  So Vorkosigan’s father, General Count Piotr Vorkosigan, had sent the Admiral on a long-delayed errand into Vorbarr Sultana, accompanied by two of the Count’s armsmen.  Even the tough old Count worried about his son, but he had no better solutions than keeping the Admiral busy.  Under the circumstances, Illyan reckoned, the Count’s was as good a treatment as any and better than most.  To some extent, being busy did help the Admiral.  He hadn’t drunk at all the previous day while he’d been about his father’s business.  But this evening he’d wrapped up his chore at a dinner with one of the Count’s old military cronies, during which liquor cascaded in best Barrayaran style.  According to the agent-in-place seated two tables over, the old man had praised the Admiral’s good sense and courage at Escobar in detail.

Illyan, when he heard this news, winced.  Just as he’d expected, the Admiral didn’t react well.  Instead of taking his groundcar back to Vorkosigan House, he’d decided to walk.  That wasn’t a good idea for a politically controversial Count’s heir during the best of times, which these certainly were not.  And he’d picked an awful place to have his whim.

The crony’s household was stubbornly roosted within its aging Time-of-Isolation townhouse on the fringes of the caravanserai district, a scabrous slum.  There, the capitol’s streets of plascrete gave way first to asphalt and then to cobblestones.  The buildings of the caravanserai would have been a classic study in historic Barrayaran architecture if not for their dirt and dilapidation, and the accretion of out-of-period repairs and additions added by generations of impoverished squatters.  Even the local utilities failed:  the residents of the district’s core usually did without power or formal plumbing.  They still paid rent, though, to any of a hundred shadowy figures who exploited the district’s squalor and crime.  Imperial Security spent a fair amount of unpleasant time in and around the caravanserai.  God only knew what fugitive rioters or refugees from the Bureau of Political Education might lurk within its boundaries, harboring unknown grudges against Admiral Vorkosigan.

Even from where he stood, making faint pretense of waiting for an autocab, Illyan could watch Count Piotr’s armsmen remonstrate with the Admiral and then seemingly demur at an offer to send them away in the groundcar.  They’d all set out on foot, instead:  the Admiral, his father’s two armsmen, a squad of trailing Imperial Security men trying to blend into the battered and impoverished surroundings, and Illyan.  After a few minutes of ignoring the almost-beneath-their-breaths cursing of his men, and the alarmed and occasionally shifty expressions of such passing locals as were visible in the light of the few working oil lamps, Illyan picked up his pace to a military trot.  He quickly caught up with Admiral Vorkosigan.

“Good evening, Simon,” the Admiral said.  “Nice of you to join me.”  But he was smiling wolfishly as he spoke and the normally cold grey eyes seemed to twinkle in the dim, flickering light in front of a heavily barricaded pawn shop.

Illyan suppressed a scowl.  The evenings when the Admiral turned horribly fey were the worst.  The last time he’d been in this mood he’d piloted a lightflyer through the rugged wilderness of the Dendarii Gorge after dark.  While drunk.  With the autopilot disabled and the running lights off.  They’d had to pry the snoring Admiral out of his safety cage, the single intact fragment amidst the wreckage scattered for kilometers down the mountainsides.

“Will we be walking the entire distance back to Vorkosigan house, sir?”

“I’ve resigned my commission, Simon, so you can call me Aral.  We’ve been through enough together for that.” The Admiral added, “No, I only want a drink.”

Illyan would have sighed if he’d let himself.  He could imagine what sort of drinking establishment they’d find in the caravanserai if they actually made it inside a building.  The backup squad he’d called in had better show up soon.  “Someplace in particular?”

“Perhaps—” The Admiral frowned and seemed to change his mind.  “No.”

His memories relentlessly clear, Illyan quickly sieved through half-heard conversations and remarks in passing from other security agents.  “About six blocks from here, there’s a tavern that’s known to have a tolerable wine cellar, if one of dubious origins.”

“As good as anyplace else, I suppose.  Let’s go.”

A few steps later, the Admiral said conversationally, “I can’t remember my Captain’s lips.”

Illyan didn’t have to ask which military officer Aral Vorkosigan was referring to in such an incongruous way.  He’d witnessed part of the Admiral’s strange wooing of his official enemy, Captain Cordelia Naismith of the Betan Expeditionary Force, amidst circumstances even an Imperial Security Officer had to judge appalling.  “That’s probably the alcohol, sir.  Did you want to forget Captain Naismith’s features?”

“God, no.  The rest of it, but not those.”

“I can describe their exact physical appearance for you.  But since you have access to both flatpics and holos—”

“No.  It’s not their look I’m striving to remember.”  The Admiral heaved a great sigh.  “Given what the Betans are still saying about war crimes, I won’t have a chance to refresh my other sensory recollections.”  Suddenly seeming to realize exactly what he was chatting about, he cleared his throat.  “I’m sorry, Simon.  How’s the expansion of Imperial Security going along?”

Even the unclassified generalities were good enough to change the subject.  Two more blocks, and well into the caravanserai, they both fell silent.  The streets here were ancient; about four buildings ahead, this lane crooked.  Just audible, from past the bend, several angry voices could be heard.  One was noticeably higher and lighter than the rest.

In a neighborhood like this, the sensible thing to do would have been to retreat and take a different route.  But Aral Vorkosigan wasn’t a sensible man.  He was a drunken leader.  Stepping up his pace, he quickly led his squad of three to the corner and around it.

***

 

Just past the mouth of the next alley, a group of men surrounded a tall, cloaked woman.  From the melodramatically louche cut of her cloak and the wearily gaudy short skirts visible beneath it, she was a whore.   The most expensively dressed man of the group backhanded her hard enough that the crack was audible a block away, and she was thrown against a wall of the building behind her.  Then there was a glint below the lamp hanging from the second story:  an old-fashioned blade, drawn by one of the bully-boys on the periphery of the circle.  He stepped forward, answering some inaudible command, towards the whore.

The Admiral didn’t have to say a word.  He only ran, surprisingly silent in his ship boots.  Illyan and the armsmen ran with him, falling into formation as if they’d drilled with Aral Vorkosigan a hundred times.  Perhaps the armsmen had; Illyan’s chances to take part in the Admiral’s legendary unarmed combat sessions had been limited.  But he knew enough for this situation.  Seven men all together around the whore, none displaying powered weapons.  If the Admiral’s men moved fast enough—

They had.  The next minute was a small, violent slice of chaos.  Instinctively, Illyan had drawn his stunner, not his nerve disrupter.  The buzzes around him proved the armsmen had done the same.  By the time the Security Squad arrived, themselves all wielding disrupters, six men were out on the ground and the seventh, the leader, was clutched tight in Aral Vorkosigan’s grip.

“Do you even have an excuse?”  The Admiral’s tone was dryly curious, but his grip on the man’s collar was tight.  He shook the man like a wolf testing the heft of a mouthful of prey.

His captive gawped at him.

The Admiral condescended to explain.  “I don’t like men who abuse women.  Any sort of women.”  He released the man, waiting.

“You mean that one?”  The man’s tone was incredulous as he swept a hand towards the whore, who still stood pressed back against the wall, posture wary but resolute.  His tone turned ugly.  “The little thief stole from me.  Took my money, saying how much I’d like it, when all the time—” He stepped forward and shot out one meaty hand with surprising speed.  Seizing the hood of the cloak, he yanked hard and then twisted.  There was a flashing glimpse of a red mane of hair. The Admiral mouthed a word Illyan didn’t have to hear:  Cordelia.  Like the whore, Captain Cordelia Naismith had red hair.  Then the whore’s long hair tugged loose and flew, hitting a surprised security agent in the chest.  A wig.

“You see?”  The street thug’s tone was triumphant.  “Mud-packing filth.”

They did see.  The whore was a slim young man, hardly more than a youth, his own roan hair cut in an incongruous military buzz.  He whirled with the deftness of one well accustomed to skirts and slammed his recent client with a hard blow to the gut.  Then he was yanked abruptly back as one of the Vorkosigan armsmen grabbed him, growling, “You little piece of—”

“Lukan.  Enough.”  The Admiral hadn’t raised his voice, but Armsman Lukan let loose of the shoulder as if he’d grasped the wrong end of a vibroblade.  The dissatisfied client was huddled over retching into what should have been the gutter.  Otherwise, the scene was locked into stillness as everyone else, including the whore, waited for the expected order.

This was Barrayar.  The order should be to dispose of the he-whore as quickly as possible.  Since the Admiral was understood by his intimates to be a hidden progressive, that disposal would likely be courtesy of Security rather than via the informal methodologies used by old-fashioned Count’s armsmen with a dark alley to hand.

Even Illyan was a little surprised when what came from the Admiral was a question, not a command. “Did you steal from this man?”  The query was calm, cool, and only a fool would have lied in reply.

“No, not unless he thinks a man’s mouth is somehow different than a woman’s.”  Seemingly the whore wasn’t a fool.  Illyan heard a stifled laugh, a half-sick grunt, and an indignant snort from one of his own men.  He shifted his gaze briefly, raised a brow.  The man stilled into observant immobility.

The Admiral’s expression was distant.  “Then I think you’d be better off elsewhere.”

“All I need is a good head start.”  The young whore wiped one hand across his face, checked for blood, and scowled.

“You’ll have more than that.  These men disturbed the peace and resisted liveried armsmen.  Go.”

“My wig.”  The words weren’t a plea but a calm request.

Illyan realized he was smiling a little and straightened his lips.  He picked up the wig from the cobblestones and passed it over to the whore, who turned without another word and disappeared into the alley.  They could hear the sounds of receding footsteps fading away into silence.

Shaking his head, the Admiral turned and walked away, Illyan beside him.  Caught by surprise, the Count’s armsmen scrambled to keep up, leaving the Imperial Security squad behind to clean up the mess of stunned bravos.  Illyan didn’t demur.  He’d felt the pulse from his communicator that indicated that the back-up team was in place.

After about two blocks and a half, the Admiral said, “I’m surprised he hasn’t been killed for that wig.  It must have great value in an area this impoverished.”

“He usually has a protector to call upon in case of trouble, but the man’s ill tonight.”  Illyan’s com had been murmuring to him during the silence.

“Oh?”

“Our young acquaintance is helping to support a former soldier.  A medical discharge from the Komarr occupation.”

Aral Vorkosigan seemed to fold in on himself.  Before Escobar, he’d planned and led a previous, a successful planetary invasion. But he hadn’t planned on the massacre by the Office of Political Education that had earned him his off-planet nickname:  the Butcher of Komarr.  Komarran Terrorists still ambushed Barrayaran soldiers every now and then.  “Hell.  Tonight only needed that last touch to be perfect.”

“Come and visit historic, scenic Vorbarr Sultana, and enjoy the primitive Barrayaran folkways.”

Caught by surprise, Vorkosigan barked a laugh.  “Simon, that sounded like sarcasm.”

To the darkling plain with service.  “I’ve declared myself off-duty.  Do you still want your drink, Aral?”

“Yes.”  Vorkosigan turned, pausing in a small pool of lamplight.  Illyan could see his shoulders shift as he took a deep breath.  “But I’ve had enough fresh air.  Come back to Vorkosigan House with me.  There’s a mediocre brandy you can help me dispose of.”

“To be frank, I prefer ouzo.”

“That foul stuff?  We’ll need the brandy first, then.  Our stomachs will want warning of what’s coming next.”  Slowly, Vorkosigan grinned like a boy.  Illyan, seeing how the unfamiliar expression lit up the strong features, blinked.  “If you think ouzo is interesting, wait until you try maple mead.”

III

From a cloudy recollection of a line read in his youth, back before the biochip in his head carved every new memory into high relief, Commander Illyan had come to think of the weekly meetings with the Head of Imperial Security as his councils of despair.  As usual, he sat in the military-issue chair, hands folded neatly across his lap, waiting.  As usual, Captain Negri, head of Imperial Security, studied him before he spoke as if Illyan were a nerve disruptor in a ship’s armory that needed stripping.  Only the faint pounding between Illyan’s temples, a souvenir of the maple mead, was unusual.

“You couldn’t have stopped him?”  Negri’s voice was flat, giving away nothing.

“My orders are only to watch the Admiral, sir, to record and to report on his actions.”  Some weariness lingering from the previous night led Illyan to add, “I would welcome additional instructions.”

Negri grunted and then reached for the single datachip that marred the desert barrens of his plasteel desktop.  Instead of handing across the chip, he twisted it between his fingers, over and over.   “The personal addendum to your report about the incident on the General Vorkraft includes your conclusion that you must, on appropriate occasions, amend your official orders.”

Illyan had wondered when those months-ago words would come back to haunt him.  “Yes, sir.”

“Explain.”

Part of Illyan wanted to shift his gaze away from Negri’s features as he spoke.  But the calm observer within kept his eyes where they belonged, detecting the small movements of muscles and skin that indicated underlying reactions.  Negri was especially hard to read.  “Sir.  Admiral Lord Vorkosigan pointed out that a good military officer, like a good Count, first finds the money that he needs and then spends what he must on his duty.  When necessary he may spend all he has, or borrow, or tax others, and spend that money too.  But he may never steal.”  Now Illyan did look away.  “As military men, our currency is honor.  When we break the Emperor’s military code, even under orders, we steal the Emperor’s honor and through him the honor of all Barrayar.”  The words sounded so trite here in this stark office.  How could he convey their weight as they had slurred from Aral Vorkosigan’s lips?

“Enough.  You’ve been listening to the Admiral talk in his cups.”

Illyan nodded, once.

“Such preaching is a habit with him when he starts drinking, as you’ll discover when you review these restricted segments of his security file.”  Without warning, the chip skimmed through the air towards Illyan, who caught it without shifting his attention from Negri’s face.  “Use the spare reader in the outer office.  This chip will supposedly degenerate once read, but dispose of it anyhow.”  Negri snorted, and then indulged himself with a dour and dubious, “Technicians.”

“Yes, sir.”  Illyan didn’t bother to make clear if he affirmed his orders or his superior’s cynicism.

“Once you’ve reviewed the supplemental personal information, take such action as seems appropriate.”  Negri’s gaze met his own.  Those eyes appeared as dead as glass.  “I hope your own purse is deep and filled with coin, Commander.  Emperor Ezra has more work for Lord Vorkosigan.”

***

Commander Illyan hadn’t known Aral Vorkosigan was a bisexual, although of course he’d heard the rumors.  Perhaps he should have been appalled.  But his Greek-blooded county, in its backwardness, retained customs so ancient that even the rest of Barrayar averted gazes from their crudity.  At home, youths still occasionally and openly served their elders in apprenticeships more personal than the crafts or the military demanded.  So Illyan had learned long ago that what his comrades from Barrayar’s other counties believed about courage and homosexuality, and how those two traits could never intertwine, was far from the self-evident truth most Barrayarans thought it to be.

He hadn’t been surprised by the intelligence analyst’s theory that the Admiral had a predilection for soldiers, either.  Such inclinations were all too easy to develop on uniform-mad, ever-violent Barrayar.  And the Admiral’s personal history had been more problematic, more violent, than most.  Instead of finding himself surprised by Admiral Vorkosigan’s tastes, he’d found himself worrying as he disposed of the record chip.

He’d been right to worry, too.  A week and a half later, close to midnight, his com thrummed alert.

He waved his bedroom desk viewer off and tapped acknowledgment.

“Commander, he’s out without his armsmen.”

“Where?” Illyan murmured.

“In the caravanserai.”

“Contingency three, and don’t approach unless you have to. He knows you’re there, and the sight of you will just provoke him.  I’ll home in on your signal as soon as I can.”

By the time Illyan’s driver dropped him off, the squad was well into the depths of the caravanserai.  Illyan pushed his coat back over the butt of his nerve disruptor and left it in plain view.  This was neither a time nor place for subtlety.

“Well?” he greeted the sergeant who left the shadows.

“Inside, sir.”  Illyan kept his gaze level, and the man hastily continued, “A place called the Glass Countess.  Drinking, drugs, some fencing.  Whores.  No special gang associations.  Their protection’s always paid promptly.  The show’s supposed to be something special, though, if you like that kind of thing.  Every once in a while the middling sort drifts in, or a few Vor townies on a tear.  Some even leave unplucked.”

“I’ll call you if I need you.”  Illyan said, and started inside.  After the last expedition of this sort, he’d spent an afternoon scanning ImpSec’s records about the caravanserai.  This place was more unsavory than the sergeant had made it sound, but the Admiral could have chosen worse.  Much, much worse.

A faint whiff of urine and garbage hung around the stone passageway to the front entrance, but nothing too extreme.  He showed his I.D. to the bruiser at the door and said, “I’m seeking a patron, not you.  That is, unless you want me to change my mind.”

This neighborhood was too dangerous for a prosperous dive to hire stupid muscle.  The man’s eyes narrowed and he said, “No.  But you should talk, like, to Tailor at the bar.”  He turned and knocked a complicated tattoo, and there was a sound of grating metal turning, a rattle of chains being undone.

Illyan gave him the courtesy of a curt nod and went inside.

The lighting was dreadful, of course, and the air was smoky.  That was part of the local atmosphere.  But the furniture was mostly intact and mostly occupied, by a clientele that mostly seemed cheerful.  Although Illyan could tell he was being examined, there was no overt notice taken of his arrival.  He left matters at that and went to the bar.

“You Tailor?”

A small, wall-eyed man, thoughtfully running a rag around and around next to some spilled beer, nodded. “ ‘S me, yeah.”

Again, Illyan displayed his I.D.  He didn’t object when Tailor leaned in and looked hard.  Then the man glanced up and asked, “Yo?”

“Do I have to tell you who I’m after?”

“He in trouble?”

Illyan studied him thoughtfully.  Ah, a hulled-shuttle tattoo, just peeking out under the edge of the tunic sleeve.  Navy vet, probably discharged without prejudice.  That would explain the extraordinary, if feeble, swipe at protection.  “I served with him at Escobar.”  He let his gaze grow hard.  The man would still likely try blackmail if he could.  “So I keep his interests in mind.”

Pacifistically, Tailor held up both hands, along with the rag.  Whatever he’d been wiping up next to the beer looked a lot like blood.  “None o’ my business.  Upstairs, second door to the left.”

Illyan didn’t knock.  He wasn’t sure what he’d find, but he suspected.  However, he was half-wrong in his suspicions.

Aral Vorkosigan sat at ease across a battered wooden table from a huge man dressed in a patched silk robe with a gaudy embroidered starscape down its back.   The back of the man’s neck was a mass of scars on one side, but Illyan couldn’t see how far they extended on the other because the young he-whore was draped over the man’s shoulder.  This time, he had his red-haired wig on, as well as a cheap gown that fit him amazingly well.  All three men, Admiral, ex-soldier, and whore, had thick glass mugs in their hands.  From the smell, they were filled with maple mead.

The Admiral looked up at the sound of the door opening and said, tone sardonic, “Ah, I believe my ride is here.”

The soldier didn’t move his hand from where it had slipped into his robe.  He didn’t move at all, but the whore stepped quickly and gracefully away from him.  Simon was careful to keep his own hands well away from his nerve disruptor.  “No, I’m actually off-duty again.  But I’ll call for your groundcar if you want.”

“No.  However, if you’re off-duty, you might as well join us.”

Illyan was being examined by the ex-soldier.  The scars criss-crossed half the man’s face, too, but Illyan had seen worse.  He examined the man right back.

Reaching some conclusion, the ex-soldier said, “Jens, fetch the officer a drink.”  The whore gave Illyan a not-unfriendly assessing look, and complied.

With a silent sigh, Illyan stepped inside the small bedchamber and closed the door behind him.

He was glad that he only had to down a mug-and-a-half of the stuff before the Admiral decided to leave.  He didn’t have the stomach for much more.  He was even gladder that the Admiral could still walk.  That wasn’t a guarantee:  the legs went before the mouth, usually.  And the Admiral was heavy, dense with muscle, difficult to carry.  Illyan had already found that out.

The Admiral made it down the stairs and out the door under his own power, though.  Illyan ignored the fight that was breaking out in front of the raucous and unclad chorus line in favor of nodding acknowledgment to Tailor behind the bar.  The man paused and waved a probably unregistered shock-rod in return before he vaulted across the bar and headed for the melee.

When he reached the cooler, somewhat cleaner, air outside, the Admiral lurched a little.  Then he got his balance back, and started out through the streets at a brisk pace, towards the borders of the caravanserai, Illyan was relieved to observe.

In a bit the Admiral said, “You needn’t have bothered.”

“How would I know that?”  Illyan knew he sounded exasperated, but he didn’t care.

“True.”  A pause, and then, “I’d changed my mind already.”

“Not on my account, I hope.”

That blighted the conversation for about half a block more.  Then the Admiral cleared his throat.  “I’m sorry.  That was—shaming.”

“For God’s sake, why?”  Illyan was startled to find he’d grasped the Admiral’s upper arm, turned them face to face.  “Do you think you’re the first one ever to see his hopes reflected in a dirty mirror?  You’ve done your work.  You’re not in uniform.  Go back there, if that’s what you wish, and ask for what you want.  Be glad you have the chance.”

They were standing under a working streetlamp, either the first sign of civilization’s incursion into the caravanserai or the last sign of its retreat.  Illyan could see the Admiral’s face clearly as surprise gave way to comprehension and both yielded to wary calculation.

The Admiral’s eyebrows went down.  “Ask for what I want, or ask for what I need?”  The tone was sardonic, but the expression in the eyes was half-hungry and half-uncertain.  “Do you think you can offer me what I need, Simon?” 

Illyan’s mouth opened, but no words emerged.  His pulse was suddenly audible in his own ears, pounding hard, speeding up.  The maple mead seemed to be rising back onto his tongue.  Here it was, Illyan’s opportunity for action.  So speak, man:  this wasn’t the time for skulking and watching.  “Aral, you’re not the only one who has troubles he needs to forget.”  Illyan closed his eyes.  “So to say.”

When he’d opened them again, the Admiral’s expression had gone opaque.  Then he nodded abruptly, turned, and walked on.  Again they went for a while in silence.  At last the Admiral said, “Very well.  Specific suggestions?”

“A security safehouse.  They’re well stocked with supplies, including alcohol.”  That last was for the benefit of the undoubtedly eavesdropping security squadron.  Pretenses had to be maintained, even if only the pretense of a more familiar degeneracy, yet another private Vorish drinking party.

But, more central to Illyan’s calculations, the safehouses were swept regularly for surveillance devices, and there was a handful of them around the caravanserai he’d quietly double-checked.  It was towards one of these that he directed their steps.

***

The apartment wasn’t bad; security safehouses never were.  An agent in peril had enough problems without worrying about broken bedsprings or malfunctioning faucets.  Simon lit the oil lamp and looked around.  There was a leaf-patterned quilt on the bed.  The pottery on the washstand was sprigged with tully-flowers.  The print framed on the wall was the famous portrait of Emperor Dorca Vorbarra the Just signing the Charter of Reform before the Council of Counts.  The wallpaper was painted with a cascade of roses.  They might have been in a boarding house by the southern seaside.  Somebody in logistics/support was indulging his sense of humor.

The Admiral – no, Aral – seemed to have caught his second wind.  He looked around, raised his eyebrows, smiled, and asked, “The head?”

Illyan nodded at the small door. “You first.”  While Aral tested the plumbing, Illyan took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and quickly undressed.  Better to present a fait accompli in case of last-minute nerves.

He should have known better.  Aral came back out, stopped, and grunted in approval.  Given the basis for comparison any naval vessel provided, Illyan felt as flattered as he had been by his last security commendation.  In fact, he had to suppress a momentary impulse to brace to attention to receive his medal as Aral strode over to him, eyes sharp, warm, and attentive.

Aral didn’t insult Illyan by asking if he had qualms.  Instead he reached out and grasped.  Then he paused, waiting.  Illyan nodded, and felt a familiar hand roughly stroke where he’d never dared envision it.  He wanted to give everything over to this pleasure, but that one calm part of him still watched and drew conclusions.  For all that he could feel Aral’s hardness pressed against his naked hip, this wasn’t going to be a hasty matter of hot release and eyes that refused to observe what hands were doing.  That wasn’t what was needed, more unvoiced shame.  Illyan said, conversationally, “You’re still dressed.”

Aral drew back and considered him for a moment, then abruptly nodded.  Stepping back, he stripped, movements graceful and efficient.  Illyan sat down on the bed, made himself relax, and watched.

Naked, Aral was stocky, muscular, with a pelt of black fur going to gray that was laced by the faint scars of half a lifetime of battles.  His gaze met Illyan’s.  Illyan made sure what he was feeling showed on his face, and Aral seemed surprised.  Then he smiled.  He came to Illyan, obviously unaware that he was stalking.  He sat, and then his hands were abrupt but knowing, strong as he explored Illyan and made encouraging noises.

Illyan let loose his control then.  They grappled for the pleasure of the strength and the heat of skin against skin, ignoring the creaking protests of the bed.  When, through some miracle, Illyan momentarily seized the upper hand, he stole a kiss, and then lingered for something longer.  Aral’s breath tasted of brandy, but his tongue was dexterous, aggressively searching, and somehow friendly.  Their lips separated.  Illyan squeezed one hard shoulder and grinned.

Aral’s eyes seemed to light up.  “You won’t let this be ugly, will you?”

“Why?” Illyan asked, and then in deliberate provocation added, “Sir.”

“Bastard,” Aral breathed appreciatively.  “You know what I need tonight, don’t you?”

“Yes.”  Illyan reached over and dipped into a pocket.  He’d folded his trousers on the wickerwork chair so the contents were easy to reach.  Flipping the tube onto the bed, he next took the med thinpack between two fingers and displayed it, eyebrows raised in inquiry.

Aral snorted.  “Not unless you might carry some germs or constructs you don’t know about.  The tests they put me through after Escobar were comprehensive.”  He shook his head.

“I knew there was some advantage to being ImpSec,” Illyan said, and tossed the bioshield (personal, troops for use of) aside.  “Our own screenings are also formidable.  Now, if you’re feeling helpful, Aral—” In fact, Aral was already uncapping the tube.

God, Illyan hoped Emperor Ezra never asked for a detailed memory recall of this night.  Aral Vorkosigan on his hands and knees, ready to be mounted, would be the obscene depths of degradation to most Barrayaran eyes.  Illyan would never be able to explain the fluid strength the posture actually conveyed.  Even being penetrated by another man, his Admiral radiated more power than most men would have with a blaster pressed to your forehead.

Illyan wasn’t naïve enough to believe this was entirely about him, Simon Illyan.  No, he was a stand-in for all the soldiers who’d trained and cursed, laughed and gripped hands, and then gone out to hurt and bleed and die at Aral Vorkosigan’s command.  Like all great leaders, the Admiral was ruthless.  Like all good men, he knew the cost of what he did and paid it.  But like men of any nature, he wanted to be freed from his burdens.

This yielding might be only some strange symbol to Aral, a single coin paid against a crushing debt, but men live by their symbols.  Just now Aral wanted to feel another man driving into him in an act Barrayar considered taboo.  He needed to submit so he could remember why he had conquered.  And all subtle mind games aside, he needed a hard fuck to remind him he could still feel good.  Best that he bed with a friend, rather than a stranger who would harrow him with faint resemblances to Captain Naismith, the beloved comrade beyond his reach.

Deliberately Illyan took his pleasure and let Aral make of it what he would.  What he made of it, from the grunts and tremors Illyan felt beneath him, was more pleasure.  But after a release that was more joyous than triumphant, Illyan felt free to indulge his own need.  He rolled an unresisting Aral Vorkosigan beneath him and caressed, letting his mouth move downwards, tasting the salt of effort.   Then he reached his target.  Many years had passed, but Illyan didn’t need his biochip to remind him of what to do.

“Simon,” Aral said, his hand in Illyan’s hair, stroking.  The blunt fingers trembled slightly, which made Illyan smile around what he suckled.  Then Aral paid him the great compliment of sprawling back on the sheets and giving himself entirely over to his own delight.

Long after Aral dozed off, Illyan lay awake, thinking.  He could see no clear victory stemming from this engagement, only another redoubt established to guard a long retreat.  In his sleep, Aral stirred.  Illyan waited to make sure Aral settled again before he got up and went to the basin to wash as quietly as he could.  He dressed, hesitated, and then turned back to leave a security-issue stunner by Aral Vorkosigan in the bed.  There was peril in recalling the night past to Aral’s drink-fogged memory.  But an ancient tradition of Illyan’s home county commanded that you never leave your lover unarmed when you had to depart before him.  Better than flowers or such muck. 

Besides, politics being what they were, his Admiral really shouldn’t be left alone in Vorbarr Sultana without a weapon to hand.  This all had been dangerous enough without that.  Illyan would have to send in one of his own people to change the sheets tomorrow and to sweep, yet again, for surveillance devices.

More importantly, something had to be done about the drinking.

IV

“Lord Vorkosigan’s medical records are strictly confidential,” the Doctor stolidly repeated yet again.  He was a lathe-thin, middle-aged, graying man who eyed Illyan, in the new ImpSec uniform, with undisguised dislike.

“I’m not asking for the Admiral’s records.  I’ve seen those already.”  Illyan kept his face quite still.  He’d long known that a blank visage countered the unfortunate illusion of puppy-dog friendliness that the last remnants of his youth and his snub features combined to convey.  And all this past week he’d been fighting off alternating urges to smile brilliantly and to frown morosely.  Neither expression would help him with this interview.

“I’m sure you’ve reviewed them in detail.  Then there’s nothing you need to hear from me, is there?”

“Nothing I need to hear from you, true, but something you’re needed to say.”

The Doctor’s scowl deepened.

“Admiral Vorkosigan has had difficulties with his stomach in the past?”

“Yes, but I currently have him on a broad-spectrum antibiotic for his approaching leg reconstruction that is also suppressing his vulnerability to ulcer-inducing gastrointestinal viruses.  As you know from his records.”

“Your treatment is what I’d expect of a physician up to date in galactic medical knowledge.  That’s not a field in which Admiral Vorkosigan is deeply versed, though.”

“Spit it out, Commander.”  Disrespectful, but reasonably so under the circumstances.

“It would be helpful if, when Admiral Vorkosigan comes in for his next appointment in two days, he was informed that his ulcers have reappeared, necessitating medication and moderation in his consumption of alcohol.”  Now Illyan made himself smile, just a little.  “You’ll observe all the symptoms you need.  Maple mead’s brutal on the stomach lining.”

The Doctor’s lips pulled back from his teeth in something surprisingly close to a snarl.  “That would be telling a gross falsehood to my patient, a violation of medical ethics.  Disgraceful.  Dishonorable.”

“No, Doctor.”  Illyan had been careful to say the words quietly.  He wasn’t sure why the physician’s eyes swung back from the button that summoned assistance to meet his own, why the narrow face stilled.  “Dishonor would be failing to do anything that might keep Lord Vorkosigan alive and intact, which is your duty.  Dishonor would be avoiding anything that would help, no matter how you feel about your choices, or how dry regulations read, or what your colleagues, in their ignorance, might proclaim.”  Quietly, speak quietly.  “Anything at all.  Whatever it takes, however disgraceful, to preserve honor.”

The Doctor’s eyes narrowed.  Illyan kept his expression as bland as he could.  Finally, the man growled, “I’ve never liked his drinking.”  Another pause, and then, “All right.  I’ll tell Aral that if he doesn’t cut back on the alcohol, his non-existent ulcers will perforate.  Then he’ll end up back in hospital, where we control his intake, not him.  He’ll pay attention to that threat.”  He rotated on his swiveling stool to reach for a datachip.  Without looking at Illyan he added, “I suppose you’ll want to dose his stomach medicine with something.”

“No.”  At the Doctor’s snort, Illyan let himself smile wryly.  “I won’t claim ethical concerns.  Adulterated meds, he’d find out about.  Then he’d stop taking anything, including your advice.”

“You know Admiral Vorkosigan, I see.”

“Yes.  Rather well.”

“Then God have mercy on you.”  Shaking his head, expression sardonic, the Doctor began punching an entry into his desk console.  “God have mercy on all of us who serve him, honorably or no.”

Although the Doctor made no further protest, Illyan left his office feeling somehow, obscurely, that he’d lost their debate.

***

Commander Illyan sat watching Captain Negri review Illyan’s report of the previous week’s activities.  He’d learned enough in Imperial Security not to wonder if he’d be cashiered once his superior was done.  He wasn’t even surprised when Negri made the noise Illyan had learned to interpret as approval.

But he did feel he had to point out, “Admiral Vorkosigan is still drinking, sir.  And he starts earlier each day.”

“However he’s no longer varying the methodology of his self-destruction, or using the chance to provoke us as an excuse for additional suicide attempts.  Good enough, Commander.  You’ve held your wormhole nexus, and your reinforcements are on the sensors.”

Illyan kept still.  Metaphors from Negri meant trouble.

The Captain tapped his reader.  “A fast-courier report from Beta Colony.  Their Astronomical Survey has received an off-planet message, a resignation from one Captain Naismith, late of the Betan Expeditionary Force.  The message is from a source along the most direct route between Beta and here.”

Many years afterward, Illyan would still be consoled by the fact that his first reaction was of relief.  His third was pleasure:  he’d liked and been impressed by what he’d seen of Cordelia Naismith, the Admiral’s Captain.  His second reaction was his own problem.

“Good news.  The Captain’s arrival will be helpful, sir.”

“And will let me turn you back to other work full-time.  There’s much remaining to be done.”

Before Emperor Ezra died, Negri meant.  However the Emperor had been dying periodically for months, now.  A well-timed death had its political uses, as Illyan had come to realize.  He didn’t dwell on the thought.  Some of his memories of the late war were better left alone.  The chip in his brain was supposed to dissolve upon his death, but as Negri had succinctly observed, “Technicians”.  All men were mortal, even Socrates with a microcircuit fuser.  And mortal men made mistakes:  Illyan worried, at times, that the chip might somehow survive his death, be recovered and read.  No one else could ever be allowed to reach the conclusions Illyan was piecing together from his unflagging memories of the war as he stared up into the dark late at night.  If the wrong person put together Illyan’s puzzle all the blood, all the pain, all the deaths would have been for nothing.

“But make sure you keep seeing Vorkosigan.”  Negri’s voice was a welcome disruption of thoughts that shouldn’t finish forming.  “He’ll need to know that you bear no grudge.”  The pause that ensued was an unspoken question.

“The Admiral secured my loyalty long ago, sir.  All breeches of planetary mores aside.”

Negri nodded.  “It’s in his blood.  Emperor Dorca Vorbarra’s legacy to his true descendents:  they have odd ways of binding our wrists to their banners.”  Illyan was surprised by the apparent digression until he followed the direction of Negri’s gaze towards the one picture decorating the whitewashed wall, a full-length portrait of a younger, handsome Emperor Ezra Vorbarra.  “In my day, I also found out just how skilled they are at demanding a man’s service.”  Negri’s cold gaze shifted back to meet Illyan’s.  “Let us hope young Prince Gregor has inherited his fair share of Dorca’s legacy.  But when he succeeds Ezra on the throne, he’ll need the full-hearted support of Aral Vorkosigan to live long enough to find out.  We will make that possible.  Dismissed.”

Illyan felt himself sag minutely before he rose to his feet to go. A difficult interview, but he’d been right.  Seemingly, he didn’t need to worry about the effect of his latest choices on his career, exacting as this profession was turning out to be.  He reached for the door plate—

“Illyan.”

Startled, concealing the reaction, Illyan turned back to Captain Negri.

“Don’t forget.  If we do our jobs as we should in the darkness, our betters can do theirs in the light.”

Illyan thought and then nodded.  The consolation shouldn’t have been enough, but it was.  He offered a small smile.  “I can’t forget, sir.  Anything.  Ever.”

Negri grunted, but somehow the sound was sympathetic, comradely.  Then, ignoring Illyan, he opened a drawer, probably in search of another crisis report.

Outside of ImpSec headquarters, the sky was very blue, the sun exceedingly bright.  The citizens of Vorbarr Sultana bustled about their business in the uncertain peace that follows a storm.  On the steps of Security House, waiting for his ride, Illyan stood and watched them.  But the fresh, cold breeze from the direction of the starport made him shiver.

***

Two weeks later, Simon Illyan met Aral Vorkosigan again, after he’d hand-delivered some Imperial dispatches to the Count.  Having been briskly dismissed, he sought out Lord Vorkosigan’s personal office.  The Admiral looked much better.  Not entirely well, but healing.

He saw the Admiral before the Admiral saw him.  Vorkosigan, sensing that he was being watched, looked up from his personal comconsole in the library and smiled.  “Simon.”  The smile was the youthful one that made his features light up.  Illyan felt a pang of regret when the smile turned wry.  “You’ve heard the news?”

“Yes, sir.  Best wishes on your marriage.  I’m glad for you both.”

“Succinct and sincere, no more than I’d expect from you.”  To Illyan’s surprise, the Admiral held out one hand.  Illyan glanced around for possible observers before he took the blocky fingers.

That made the Admiral grin at him.  “For once, no forgetting, no regrets.”  With a strong squeeze, the Admiral let go, and then grimaced.  “Not that I could forget, now that I’ve stopped drinking again.  And I’m sure everything’s down in a security file somewhere.”

Illyan smiled in return.  It felt rather tentative; he’d been working hard to suppress the expression.   Perhaps he should reconsider in certain company?  “Captain Negri understood.”

“Yes, he would.”  The words were very dry.

Illyan felt a brow try to rise at this reinforcement of a suspicion he’d only begun to deploy.

The Admiral minutely shook his head before saying, “Stay and have dinner with us.  I wanted to ask you if there was anything to be done towards easing all this security coverage.”

If the Admiral accepted the regency Emperor Ezra wanted to bind onto his shoulders, the coverage would have to be tightened, not loosened.  But that news wasn’t Illyan’s to deliver.  “I’d like that very much.  How is Captain Naismith – excuse me, Lady Vorkosigan – doing?”

“Battered and bruised like the rest of us veterans, I’m afraid.  Better, she says, for our marriage.  Probably the relief of passing the jump-point of no return.”  The Admiral waved a dismissing hand.  “But come along and share your council.  She’ll be happy to see you.”  The grey eyes suddenly sparkled, and one last time Aral Vorkosigan looked dangerously fey.  “She was glad to hear, as part of my pre-marital confessions, that for once I’d been sensible about choosing my company.  Usually, or so I’m informed, my taste is dreadful when I drink.”

By Barrayaran standards, Betans were hopelessly corrupt in intimate matters.  By galactic standards, they were merely pragmatic.  Illyan felt an internal tension he hadn’t let himself recognize relax.  “I’ve read most of your security file now, sir.”

“Meaning you can’t quite disagree with my Captain?”  Standing, the Admiral took Illyan’s elbow.  “Don’t answer that.  Come along, instead.”

Sitting at the dining table that afternoon, talking to both the Vorkosigans with that special ease a veteran only feels with former comrades-at-arms, Illyan realized that this meeting, too, was a council of despair.  Never again would he be to his Admiral what he’d been on that one night.  In fact, he doubted he’d ever come to Aral’s bed again. 

But as he watched, and the calm part of his mind shuffled information and started planning for the future, he found that he had no regrets.  Now that Illyan had learned to act in despair, in the darkness, he thought he could learn to act in the light.  And then, perhaps, someday there would be no more reasons to hide.  For now, for Illyan, that hope would suffice.   

Author’s Note:

"And with this faith we will go out and adjourn the councils of despair and bring new light into the dark chambers of pessimism. And we will be able to rise from the fatigue of despair to the buoyancy of hope. And this will be a great America: we will be the participants in making it so."

—The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

 

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