Miles in Love - Lois McMaster Bujold [286]
Nikki frowned in obvious disappointment. "I dunno about horses. But he said he might let me try his lightflyer, on the way down."
"Nikki, you're much too young to fly a lightflyer."
"Lord Vorkosigan said his father let him fly when he was younger than me. He said his da said he needed to know how to take over the controls in an emergency just as soon as he was physically able. He said he sat him on his lap, and let him take off and land all by himself and everything."
"You're much too big to sit on Lord Vorkosigan's lap!" So was she, she supposed. But if he and she were to—stop that.
"Well," Nikki considered this, and allowed, "anyway, he's too little. It'd look goofy. But his lightflyer seat's just right! Pym let me sit in it, when I was helping him polish the cars." Nikki bounced some more. "Can you ask Lord Vorkosigan when you go to work?"
"No. I don't think so."
"Why not?" He looked at her, his brow wrinkling slightly. "Why didn't you go today?"
"I'm . . . not feeling very well."
"Oh. Tomorrow, then? Come on, Mama, please?" He hung on her arm, and twisted himself up, and made big eyes at her, grinning.
She rested her throbbing forehead in her hand. "No, Nikki. I don't think so."
"Aw, why not? You said. Come on, it'll be so great. You don't have to come if you don't want, I s'pose. Why not, why not, why not? Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow?"
"I'm not going to work tomorrow, either."
"Are you that sick? You don't look that sick." He stared at her in startled worry.
"No." She hastened to address that worry, before he started making up dire medical theories in his head. He'd lost one parent this year. "It's just . . . I'm not going to be going back to Lord Vorkosigan's house. I quit."
"Huh?" Now his stare grew entirely bewildered. "Why? I thought you liked making that garden thing."
"I did."
"Then why'd you quit?"
"Lord Vorkosigan and I . . . had a falling-out. Over, over an ethical issue."
"What? What issue?" His voice was laced with confusion and disbelief. He twisted himself around the other way.
"I found he'd . . . lied to me about something." He promised he'd never lie to me. He'd feigned that he was very interested in gardens. He'd arranged her life by subterfuge—and then told everyone else in Vorbarr Sultana. He'd pretended he didn't love her. He'd as much as promised he'd never ask her to marry him. He'd lied. Try explaining that to a nine-year-old boy. Or to any other rational human being of any age or gender, her honesty added bitterly. Am I insane yet? Anyway, Miles hadn't actually said he wasn't in love with her, he'd just . . . implied it. Avoided saying much on the subject at all, in fact. Prevarication by misdirection.
"Oh," said Nikki, eyes wide, daunted at last.
The Professora's blessed voice interrupted from the archway. "Now, Nikki, don't be pestering your mother. She has a very bad hangover."
"A hangover?" Nikki clearly had trouble fitting the words mother and hangover into the same conceptual space. "She said she was sick."
"Wait till you're older, dear. You'll doubtless discover the distinction, or lack of it, for yourself. Run along now." His smiling great-aunt guided him firmly away. "Out, out. Go see what your Uncle Vorthys is up to downstairs. I heard some very odd noises a bit ago."
Nikki let himself be chivvied out, with a disturbed backward glance over his shoulder.
Ekaterin put her head back down on the comconsole, and shut her eyes.
A clink by her head made her open them again; her aunt was setting down a large glass of cool water and holding out two painkiller tablets.
"I had some of those this morning," said Ekaterin dully.
"They appear to have worn off. Drink all the water, now. You clearly need to rehydrate."
Dutifully, Ekaterin did so. She set the glass down, and squeezed her eyes open and shut a few times. "That really was the Count and Countess Vorkosigan last night, wasn't it." It wasn't really a question, more a plea for denial. After nearly stampeding over them in her desperate flight out the door, she'd been halfway home in the