Miles in Love - Lois McMaster Bujold [283]
The Countess tilted her head, taking this in. "She may be wiser than she knows."
He brooded. "On the other hand, maybe I was her secret vice, back on Beta. And here I'm a horrible embarrassment to her. Maybe she'd like me to just shove off and leave her alone."
The Countess raised a brow. "Didn't sound like it last night. Kou and Drou practically had to pry her nails out of our door jamb."
Mark brightened slightly. "There is that."
"And how have your goals changed, in your year on Beta? In addition to adding Kareen's heart's desire to your own, that is."
"Not changed, exactly," he responded slowly. "Honed, maybe. Focused. Modified . . . I achieved some things in my therapy I'd despaired of, of ever making come right in my life. It made me think maybe the rest isn't so impossible after all."
She nodded encouragement.
"School . . . economics school was good. I'm getting quite a tool-kit of skills and knowledge, you know. I'm really starting to know what I'm doing, not just faking it all the time." He glanced sideways at her. "I haven't forgotten Jackson's Whole. I've been thinking about indirect ways to shut down the damned butcher cloning lords there. Lilly Durona has some ideas for life-extension therapies that might be able to compete with their clone-brain transplants. Safer, nearly as effective, and cheaper. Draw off their customers, disrupt them economically even if I can't touch them physically. Every scrap of spare cash I've been able to amass, I've been dumping into the Durona Group, to support their R and D. I'm going to own a controlling share of them, if this goes on." He smiled wryly. "And I still want enough money left that no one has power over me. I'm beginning to see how I can get it, not overnight, but steadily, bit by bit. I, um . . . wouldn't mind starting a new agribusiness here on Barrayar."
"And Sergyar, too. Aral was very interested in possible applications for your bugs among our colonists and homesteaders."
"Was he?" Mark's lips parted in astonishment. "Even with the Vorkosigan crest on them?"
"Mm, it would perhaps be wise to lose the House livery before pitching them seriously to Aral," the Countess said, suppressing a smile.
"I didn't know Enrique was going to do that," Mark offered by way of apology. "Though you should have seen the look on Miles's face, when Enrique presented them to him. It almost made it worth it . . . ." He sighed at the memory, but then shook his head in renewed despair. "But what good is it all, if Kareen and I can't get back to Beta Colony? She's stuck for money, if her parents won't support her. I could offer to pay her way, but . . . but I don't know if that's a good idea."
"Ah," said the Countess. "Interesting. Are you afraid Kareen would feel you had purchased her loyalty?"
"I'm . . . not sure. She's very conscientious about obligations. I want a lover. Not a debtor. I think it would be a bad mistake to accidentally . . . put her in another kind of box. I want to give her everything. But I don't know how!"
An odd smile turned the Countess's lip. "When you give each other everything, it becomes an even trade. Each wins all."
Mark shook his head, baffled. "An odd sort of Deal."
"The best." The Countess finished her tea and put down her cup, "Well. I don't wish to invade your privacy. But do remember, you're allowed to ask for help. It's part of what families are all about."
"I owe you too much already, milady."
Her smile tilted. "Mark, you don't pay back your parents. You can't. The debt you owe them gets collected by your children, who hand it down in turn. It's a sort of entailment. Or if you don't have children of the body, it's left as a debt to your common humanity. Or to your God, if you possess or are possessed by one."
"I'm not sure that seems fair."
"The family economy evades