Miles in Love - Lois McMaster Bujold [19]
And yours is? She blinked that thought away.
"Your aunt was not sure if things were working out happily for you. Do you dislike Komarr?"
"Oh, I like Komarr just fine," she said quickly. "I admit, I've been a little homesick, but that's not the same thing as not liking being here."
"She did think you would seize the opportunity to place Nikki in a Komarran school, for the, as she would say, cultural experience. Not that his school we saw this morning isn't very nice, of course, which I shall report back for her reassurance, I promise."
"I was tempted. But being a Barrayaran, an off-worlder, in a Komarran classroom might have been difficult for Nikki. You know how kids can gang up on anyone who's different, at that age. Tien thought this private school would be much better. A lot of the high Vor families in the sector send their children there. He thought Nikki could make good connections."
"I did not have the impression that Nikki was socially ambitious." His dryness was mitigated by a slight twinkle.
How was she to respond to that? Defend a choice she did not herself agree with? Admit she thought Tien wrong? If she once began complaining about Tien, she wasn't sure she could stop before her most fearful worries began to pour out. And people complaining about their spouses always looked and sounded so ugly. "Well, connections for me, at least." Not that she had been able to muster the energy to pursue them as assiduously as Tien thought she ought.
"Ah. It's good you're making friends."
"Yes, well . . . yes." She scraped at the last of the apple syrup on her plate.
When she looked up, she noticed a good-looking young Komarran man who had stopped by the outer gate to the restaurant's patio and was staring at her. After a moment, he entered and approached their table. "Madame Vorsoisson?" he said uncertainly.
"Yes?" she said warily.
"Oh, good, I thought I recognized you. My name is Andro Farr. We met at the Winterfair reception for the Serifosa terraforming employees a few months ago, do you remember?"
Dimly. "Oh, yes. You were somebody's guest . . . ?"
"Yes. Marie Trogir. She's an engineering tech in the Waste Heat Management department. Or she was . . . . Do you know her? I mean, has she ever talked with you?"
"No, not really." Ekaterin had met the young Komarran woman perhaps three times, at carefully choreographed Project events. She had usually been too conscious of herself as a representative of Tien, of the need to cordially meet and greet everyone, to get into any very intimate conversations. "Had she intended to talk to me?"
The young man slumped in disappointment. "I don't know. I thought you might have been friends, or at least acquaintances. I've talked to all her friends I can find."
"Um . . . oh?" Ekaterin was not at all sure she wished to encourage this conversation.
Farr seemed to sense her wariness; he flushed slightly. "Excuse me. I seem to have found myself in a rather painful domestic situation, and I don't know why. It took me by surprise. But . . . but you see . . . about six weeks ago, Marie told me she was going out of town on a field project for her department, and would be back in about five weeks, but she wasn't sure exactly. She didn't give me any comconsole codes to reach her, she said she'd probably not be able to call, and not to worry."
"Do you, um, live with her?"
"Yes. Anyway, time went by, and time went by, and I didn't hear . . . I finally called her department head, Administrator Soudha. He was vague. In fact, I think he gave me a run-around. So I went down there in person and asked around.