Miles in Love - Lois McMaster Bujold [67]
She walked through the apartment, staring at the objects of her life. They were few enough; the major furnishings had all come with the place and would stay with the place. Her spasmodic efforts at decoration, at creating some semblance of a Barrayaran home, the hours of work—it was like deciding what to grab in a fire, only slower. Nothing. Let it all burn.
The sole awkward exception was her great-aunt's bonsai'd skellytum. It was her one memento of her life before Tien, and it was in the nature of a sacred trust to the dead. Keeping something that foolish and ugly alive for seventy and more years . . . well, it was a typical Vor woman's job. She smiled bitterly, and brought it off the balcony into the kitchen, and began to look around for some way to transport it. At the sound of the hall door opening, she caught her breath, and schooled her features to as little expression as possible.
"Kat?" Tien ducked into the kitchen and stared around. "Where's dinner?"
My first question would have been, Where's Nikolai? I wonder how long it will take that thought to come to him. "Where is Lord Vorkosigan?"
"He stayed on at the office. He'll be along later, he said, to take his things away."
"Oh." She realized then that some tiny part of her had been hoping to conduct the impending conversation while Vorkosigan was still finishing up in her workroom or something; his presence providing some margin of safety, of social restraint upon Tien. Maybe it was better this way. "Sit down, Tien. I have to talk with you."
He raised dubious brows, but sat at the head of the table, around to her left. She would have preferred to have him opposite her.
"I am leaving you tonight."
"What?" His astonishment appeared genuine. "Why?"
She hesitated, reluctant to be drawn into argument. "I suppose . . . because I have come to the end of myself." Only now, looking back over the long draining years, did she become aware of how much of her there had been to use up. No wonder it had taken so long. All gone now.
"Why . . . why now?" At least he didn't say, You must be joking. "I don't understand, Kat." She could see him begin to grope, not toward understanding, but away from it, as far away as possible. "Is it the Vorzohn's Dystrophy? Damn, I knew—"
"Don't be stupid, Tien. If that was the issue, I'd have left years ago. I took oath to you in sickness and health."
He frowned and sat back, his brows lowering. "Is there someone else? There's someone else, isn't there!"
"I'm sure you wish there were. Because then it would be because of them, and not because of you." Her voice was level, utterly flat. Her stomach churned.
He was obviously shocked, and beginning to shake a little. "This is madness. I don't understand."
"I have nothing more to say." She began to rise, wishing nothing more than to be gone at once, away from him. You could have done this over the comconsole, you know.
No. I took my oath in the flesh. I will break it to pieces in the same way.
He rose with her, and his hand closed over hers, gripping it, stopping her. "There's more to it."
"You would know more about that than I would, Tien."
He hesitated now, beginning, she thought, to be really afraid. This might not be any safer for her. He's never hit me yet, I'll give him that much credit. Part of her almost wished he had. Then there would have been clarity, not this endless muddle. "What do you mean?"
"Let go of me."
"No."
She considered his hand on hers, tight but not grinding. But still much stronger than her own. He was half a head taller and outweighed her by thirty kilos. She did not feel as much physical fear as she had thought she would. She was too numb, perhaps. She raised her face to his. Her voice grew edged. "Let go of me."
A little to her surprise,