Cordelia's Honor

by Lois McMaster Bujold

  "Good." Bitter bile soured her mouth. "I'm glad Reg got one of you, before you murdered him too."

  "If you are referring to that misguided but admittedly courageous blond boy in the clearing, he couldn't have hit the side of a house. I don't know why you Betans put on soldiers' uniforms. You're no better trained than children on a picnic. If your ranks denote anything but pay scale, it's not apparent to me."

  "He was a geologist, not a hired killer," she snapped. "As for my 'children,' your soldiers couldn't even capture them."

  His brows drew together. Cordelia shut her mouth abruptly. Oh, great, she thought. He hasn't even started to wrench my arms off, and already I'm giving away free intelligence.

  "Didn't they now," Vorkosigan mused. He pointed upstream with the stunner to where the comm link lay cracked open in the brook. A little sputtering of steam rose from the ruin. "What orders did you give your ship when they informed you of their escape?"

  "I told them to use their initiative," she murmured vaguely, groping for inspiration in a throbbing fog.

  He snorted. "A safe order to give a Betan. At least you're sure to be obeyed."

  Oh, no. My turn. "Hey, I know why my people left me behind—why did yours leave you? Isn't one's commanding officer, even a Barrayaran one, too important to mislay?" She sat up straighter. "If Reg couldn't hit the side of a house, who shot you?"

  That's fetched him, she thought, as the stunner with which he had been absently gesturing was swiveled back to aim on her. But he said only, "That is not your concern. Have you another comm link?"

  Oh ho—was this stern Barrayaran commander dealing with a mutiny? Well, confusion to the enemy! "No. Your soldiers trashed everything."

  "No matter," muttered Vorkosigan. "I know where to get another. Are you able to walk yet?"

  "I'm not sure." She pushed herself to her feet, then pressed her hand to her head to contain the shooting pains.

  "It's only a concussion," Vorkosigan said unsympathetically. "A walk will do you good."

  "How far?" she gasped.

  "About two hundred kilometers."

  She fell back to her knees. "Have a nice trip."

  "By myself, two days. I suppose you will take longer, being a geologist, or whatever."

  "Astrocartographer."

  "Get up, please." He unbent so far as to help her with a hand under her elbow. He seemed curiously reluctant to touch her. She was chilled and stiff; she could feel the heat from his hand through the heavy cloth of her sleeve. Vorkosigan pushed her determinedly up the side of the ravine.

  "You're stone serious," she said. "What are you going to do with a prisoner on a forced march? Suppose I bash in your head with a rock while you sleep?"

  "I'll take my chances."

  They cleared the top. Cordelia draped herself around one of the little trees, winded. Vorkosigan wasn't even breathing hard, she noticed enviously. "Well, I'm not going anywhere till I've buried my officers."

  He looked irritated. "It's a waste of time and energy."

  "I won't leave them to the scavengers like dead animals. Your Barrayaran thugs may know more about killing, but not one of them could have died a more soldierly death."

  He stared at her a moment, face unreadable, then shrugged. "Very well."

  Cordelia began to make her way along the side of the ravine. "I thought it was here," she said, puzzled. "Did you move him?"

  "No. But he can't have crawled far, in his condition."

  "You said he was dead!"

  "So he is. His body, however, was still animate. The disruptor must have missed his cerebellum."

  Cordelia traced the trail of broken vegetation over a small rise, Vorkosigan following silently.

  "Dubauer!" She ran to the tan-clad figure curled up in the bracken. As she knelt beside him he turned and stretched out stiffly, then began to shake all over in slow waves, his lips drawn back in a strange grin. Cold? she thought wildly, then realized what she was seeing. She yanked her handkerchief from her pocket, folded it, and forced it between his teeth. His mouth was already bloody from a previous convulsion. After about three minutes he sighed and went limp.

  She blew out her breath in distress and examined him anxiously. He opened his eyes, and seemed to focus on her face. He clutched ineffectually at her arm and made noises, all moans and clotted vowels. She tried to soothe his animal agitation by gently stroking his head, and wiping the bloody spittle from his mouth; he quieted.

  She turned to Vorkosigan, tears of fury and pain blurring her vision. "Not dead! Liar! Only injured. He must have medical help."

  "You are being unrealistic, Commander Naismith. One does not recover from disruptor injuries."

  "So? You can't tell the extent of the damage your filthy weapon has done from the outside. He can still see and hear and feel—you can't demote him to the status of a corpse for your convenience!"

  His face seemed a mask. "If you wish," he said carefully. "I can put him out of his suffering. My combat knife is quite sharp. Used quickly, it would cut his throat almost painlessly. Or should you feel it is your duty as his commander, I'll lend you the knife and you may use it."

  "Is that what you'd do for one of your men?"

  "Certainly. And they'd do the same for me. No man could wish to live on like that."

  She stood and looked at him very steadily. "It must be like living among cannibals, to be a Barrayaran."

  A long silence fell between them. Dubauer broke it with a moan. Vorkosigan stirred. "What, then, do you propose to do with him?"

  She rubbed her temples tiredly, ransacking for an appeal that would penetrate that expressionless front. Her stomach undulated, her tongue was woolly, her legs trembled with exhaustion, low blood sugar, and reaction to pain. "Just where is it you're planning to go?" she asked finally.

  "There is a supply cache located—in a place I know. Hidden. It contains communications equipment, weapons, food—possession of it would put me in a position to, ah, correct the problems in my command."

  "Does it have medical supplies?"

  "Yes," he admitted reluctantly.

  "All right." Here goes nothing. "I will cooperate with you—give you my parole, as a prisoner—assist you in any way I can that does not actually endanger my ship—if I can take Ensign Dubauer with us."

  "That's impossible. He can't even walk."

  "I think he can, if he's helped."

  He stared at her in baffled irritation. "And if I refuse?"

  "Then you can either leave us both or kill us both." She glanced away from his knife, lifted her chin, and waited.

  "I do not kill prisoners."

  She was relieved to hear the plural. Dubauer was evidently promoted back to humanity in her strange captor's mind. She knelt down to try to help Dubauer to his feet, praying this Vorkosigan would not decide to end the argument by stunning her and killing her botanist outright.

  "Very well," he capitulated, giving her an odd intent look. "Bring him along. But we must travel quickly."

  She managed to get the ensign up. With his arm draped heavily over her shoulder, she guided him on a shambling walk. It seemed he could hear, but not decode meaning from the noises of speech. "You see," she defended him desperately, "he can walk. He just needs a little help."

  * * *

  They reached the edge of the glade as the last level light of early evening was striping it with long black shadows, like a tiger's skin. Vorkosigan paused.

  "If I were by myself," he said, "I'd travel to the cache on the emergency rations in my belt. With you two along, we'll have to risk scavenging your camp for more food. You can bury your other officer while I'm looking around."

  Cordelia nodded. "Look for something to dig with, too. I've got to tend to Dubauer first."

  He acknowledged this with a wave of his hand and started toward the wasted ring. Cordelia was able to excavate a couple of half-burned bedrolls from the remains of the women's tent, but no clothes, medicine, soap, or even a bucket to carry or heat w
ater. She finally coaxed the ensign over to the spring and washed him, his wounds, and his trousers as best she could in the plain cold water, dried him with one bedroll, put his undershirt and fatigue jacket back on him, and wrapped the other bedroll around him sarong style. He shivered and moaned, but did not resist her makeshift ministrations.

  Vorkosigan in the meanwhile had found two cases of ration packs, with the labels burned off but otherwise scarcely damaged. Cordelia tore open one silvery pouch, added spring water, and found that it was soya-fortified oatmeal.

  "That's lucky," she commented. "He's sure to be able to eat that. What's the other case?"

  Vorkosigan was conducting his own experiment. He added water to his pouch, mixed it by squeezing, and sniffed the result.

  "I'm not really sure," he said, handing it to her. "It smells rather strange. Could it be spoiled?"

  It was a white paste with a pungent aroma. "It's all right," Cordelia assured him. "It's artificial blue cheese salad dressing." She sat back and contemplated the menu. "At least it's high in calories," she encouraged herself. "We'll need calories. I don't suppose you have a spoon in that utility belt of yours?"

  Vorkosigan unhooked an object from his belt and handed it to her without comment. It turned out to be several small useful utensils folded into a handle, including a spoon.

  "Thanks," Cordelia said, absurdly pleased, as if granting her mumbled wish had been a conjuror's trick.

  Vorkosigan shrugged and wandered away to continue his search in the gathering darkness, and she began to feed Dubauer. He seemed voraciously hungry, but unable to manage for himself.

  Vorkosigan returned to the spring. "I found this." He handed her a small geologist's shovel about a meter long, used for digging soil samples. "It's a poor tool for the purpose, but I've found nothing better yet."

  "It was Reg's," Cordelia said, taking it. "It will do."

  She led Dubauer to a spot near her next job and settled him. She wondered if some bracken from the forest might provide some insulation for him, and resolved to get some later. She marked out the dimensions of a grave near the place where Rosemont had fallen, and began hacking away at the heavy turf with the little shovel. The sod was tough, wiry, and resistant, and she ran out of breath quickly.

  Vorkosigan appeared out of the night. "I found some cold lights." He cracked one pencil-sized tube and laid it on the ground beside the grave, where it gave off an eerie but bright blue-green glow. He watched her critically as she worked.

  She stabbed away at the dirt, resentful of his scrutiny. Go away, you, she thought, and let me bury my friend in peace. She grew self-conscious as a new thought struck her—maybe he won't let me finish—I'm taking too long. . . . She dug harder.

  "At this rate, we'll be here until next week."

  If she moved fast enough, she wondered irritably, could she succeed in hitting him with the shovel? Just once . . .

  "Go sit down with your botanist." He was holding out his hand; it dawned on her at last that he was volunteering to help dig.

  "Oh . . ." She relinquished the tool. He drew his combat knife and cut through the grasses' roots where she had marked her rectangle, and began to dig, far more efficiently than she had.

  "What kind of scavengers have you found around here?" he asked between tosses. "How deep does this have to be?"

  "I'm not sure," she replied. "We'd only been downside three days. It's a pretty complex ecosystem, though, and most imaginable niches seem to be filled."

  "Hm."

  "Lieutenant Stuben, my chief zoologist, found a couple of those browser hexapeds killed and pretty well consumed. He caught a glimpse of something he called a fuzzy crab at one of the kills."

  "How big were they?" asked Vorkosigan curiously.

  "He didn't say. I've seen pictures of crabs from Earth, and they don't seem very large—as big as your hand, perhaps."

  "A meter may be enough." He continued the excavation with short powerful bites of the inadequate shovel. The cold light illuminated his face from below, casting shadows upward from heavy jaw, straight broad nose, and thick brows. He had an old faded L-shaped scar, Cordelia noticed, on the left side of his chin. He reminded her of a dwarf king in some northern saga, digging in a fathomless deep.

  "There's a pole over by the tents," she offered. "I could fix that light up in the air so it shines on your work."

  "That would help."

  She returned to the tents, beyond the circle of cold light, and found her pole where she had dropped it that morning. Returning to the gravesite, she spliced the light to the pole with a few tough grass stems and fixed it upright in the dirt, flinging the circle of light wider. She remembered her plan to collect bracken for Dubauer, and turned to make for the forest, then stopped.

  "Did you hear that?" she asked Vorkosigan.

  "What?" Even he was beginning to breathe heavily. He paused, up to his knees in the hole, and listened with her.

  "A sort of scuttling noise, coming from the forest."

  He waited a minute, then shook his head and continued his work.

  "How many cold lights are there?"

  "Six."

  So few. She hated to waste them by running two at once. She was about to ask him if he would mind digging in the dark for a while, when she heard the noise again, more distinctly.

  "There is something out there."

  "You know that," said Vorkosigan. "The question is—"

  The three creatures made a concerted rush into the ring of light. Cordelia caught a glimpse of fast low bodies, entirely too many hairy black legs, four beady black eyes set in neckless faces, and razor-sharp yellow beaks that clacked and hissed. They were the size of pigs.

  Vorkosigan reacted instantly, smashing the nearest accurately across its face with the blade of the shovel. A second one flung itself across Rosemont's body, biting deep into the flesh and cloth of one arm, and attempting to drag it away from the light. Cordelia grabbed her pole and ran full tilt upon it, getting in a hard blow between its eyes. Its beak snapped the end off the aluminum rod. It hissed and retreated before her.

  By this time Vorkosigan had his combat knife out. He vigorously attacked the third, shouting, stabbing, and kicking with his heavy boots. Blood spattered as claws plowed his leg, but he got in a blow with his knife that sent the creature shrieking and hissing back to the shelter of the forest along with its pack mates. With a moment to breathe, he dug out her stun gun from the bottom of the too-large disruptor holster where, judging from his muttered swearing, it had slipped down and stuck, and peered into the night.

  "Fuzzy crabs, huh?" Cordelia panted. "Stuben, I'm going to scrag you." Her voice squeaked upward and she clamped her teeth.

  Vorkosigan wiped the dark blood from his blade in the grass and returned it to its sheath. "I think your grave had better be a full two meters," he said seriously. "Maybe a little more."

  Cordelia sighed in agreement, and returned the shortened pole to its original position. "How's your leg?"

  "I can take care of it. You'd better see to your ensign."

  Dubauer, drowsing, had been aroused by the uproar and was attempting to crawl away again. Cordelia tried to soothe him, then found herself having to deal with another seizure, after which, to her relief, he went to sleep.

  Vorkosigan, in the meanwhile, had patched his scratch using the small emergency medical kit on his belt, and returned to digging, slowing down only a little. Getting down to shoulder depth, he pressed her into hauling dirt up out of the grave using the emptied-out botanical specimen box as a makeshift bucket. It was near midnight before he called from the dark pit, "That should be the last," and clambered out. "Could have done that in five seconds with a plasma arc," he panted, recovering his wind. He was dirty and sweating in the cold night air. Tendrils of fog writhed up from the ravine and the spring.

  Together they dragged Rosemont's body to the lip of the grave. Vorkosigan hesitated.

  "Do you want his clothes for your ensign?"

&nb
sp; It was an unavoidably practical suggestion. Cordelia loathed the indignity of lowering Rosemont naked into the earth, but wished at the same time she had thought of it earlier, when Dubauer was so cold. She horsed the uniform off over the stiffened limbs with the macabre sensation of undressing a giant doll, and they tipped him into the grave. He landed on his back with a muffled thump.

  "Just a minute." She dug out Rosemont's handkerchief from his uniform pocket and jumped down into the grave, slipping on the body. She spread the handkerchief over his face. It was a small, reality-defying gesture, but she felt better for it. Vorkosigan grasped her hand and pulled her up.

  "All right." They shoveled and pushed the dirt back into the hole far more quickly than it had been excavated, and packed it down as best they could by walking on it.

  "Is there some ceremony you wish to perform?" Vorkosigan asked.

  Cordelia shook her head, not feeling up to reciting the vague, official funeral service. But she knelt by the grave for a few minutes making a more serious, less certain inward prayer for her dead. It seemed to fly upward and vanish in the void, echoless as a feather.

  Vorkosigan waited patiently until she arose. "It's rather late," he said, "and we have just seen three good reasons not to go stumbling around in the dark. We may as well rest here until dawn. I'll take the first watch. Do you still want to bash my head in with a rock?"

  "Not at the moment," she said sincerely.

  "Very well. I'll wake you later."

  Vorkosigan began his watch with a patrol of the perimeter of the glade, taking the cold light with him. It wavered through the black distance like a captive firefly. Cordelia lay down on her back beside Dubauer. The stars glimmered faintly through the gathering mist. Could one be her ship yet, or Vorkosigan's? Not likely, at the range they undoubtedly were by now.

  She felt hollow. Energy, will, desire, slipped through her fingers like shining liquid, sucked away through some infinite sand. She glanced at Dubauer beside her, and jerked her mind from the easy vortex of despair. I'm still a commander, she told herself sharply; I have a command. You serve me still, ensign, although you cannot now serve even yourself. . . .