• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 2541 0

away to pose with the rest of the wedding party for vids. Ekaterin tried not to be too nervous, left in Kareen and Mark's good company, but she felt a twinge of relief when she saw Miles again making his way down the steps from the Residence's north promenade toward her. The Imperial Residence was vast and old and beautiful and intimidating and crammed with history, and she doubted she'd ever emulate the way Miles seemed to pop in and out of side doors as though he owned the place. And yet . . . moving in this amazing space was easier this time, and she had no doubt would be still easier the next visit. Either the world was not so huge and frightening a place as she'd once been led to believe, or else . . . she was not so small and helpless as she'd once been encouraged to imagine herself. If power was an illusion, wasn't weakness necessarily one also?

Miles was grinning. As he took her hand and gripped it to his arm again, he vented a sinister chuckle.

"That is the most villainous laugh, love . . ."

"It's too good, it's just too good. I had to find you and share it at once." He led her a little away from the Vorkosigans' wine kiosk, crowded with revelers, around some trees to where a wide brick path climbed up out of Old Emperor Ezar's north garden. "I just found out what Alexi Vormoncrief's new posting is."

"I hope it's the ninth circle of hell!" she said vengefully. "That nitwit very nearly succeeded in having Nikki taken from me."

"Just as good. Almost the same thing, actually. He's been sent to Kyril Island. I was hoping they'd make him weather officer, but he's only the new laundry officer. Well, one can't have everything." He rocked on his heels with incomprehensible glee.

Ekaterin frowned in doubt. "That hardly seems punishment enough . . ."

"You don't understand. Kyril Island—they call it Camp Permafrost—is the worst military post in the Empire. Winter training base. It's an arctic island, five hundred kilometers from anywhere and anyone, including the nearest women. You can't even swim to escape, because the water would freeze you in minutes. The bogs will eat you alive. Blizzards. Freezing fog. Winds that can blow away groundcars. Cold, dark, drunken, deadly . . . I spent an eternity there, a few months once. The trainees, they come and go, but the permanent staff is stuck. Oh. Oh. Justice is good . . . ."

Impressed by his evident enthusiasm, she said, "Is it really that bad?"

"Yes, oh, yes. Ha! I'll have to send him a case of good brandy, in honor of the Emperor's wedding, just to start him off right. Or—no, better. I'll send him a case of bad brandy. After a while, no one there can tell the difference anyway."

Accepting his assurances for the present and future discomfort of her recent nemesis, she sauntered contentedly with him along the edge of the sunken garden. All the principal guests, including Miles, would be called in for the formal dinner soon, and they would be separated for a time, he to the high table to sit between Empress Laisa and her Komarran Second, she to join Lord Auditor Vorthys and her aunt again. There would be tedious speeches, but Miles laid firm plans for reconnecting with her right after dessert.

"So what do you think?" he asked, staring speculatively around at the party, which seemed to be gaining momentum in the dusk. "Would you like a big wedding?"

She now recognized the incipient theatrical gleam in his eye. But Countess Cordelia had primed her on how to handle this one. She swept her lashes down. "It just wouldn't feel appropriate in my mourning year. But if you didn't mind waiting till next spring, it could be as large as you like."

"Ah," he said, "ah. Fall is a nice time for weddings, too . . ."

"A quiet family wedding in the fall? I would like that."

He would find some way to make it memorable, she had no fear. And, she suspected, it might be better not to leave him time for over-planning.

"Maybe in the garden at Vorkosigan Surleau?" he said. "You haven't seen that yet. Or else the garden at Vorkosigan House." He eyed her sidelong.

"Certainly," she said amiably.