Mirror Dance b-9

by Lois McMaster Bujold

  I wanted to be Lord Mark. I just wanted to be Lord Mark. Was that so bad? He still wanted to be Lord Mark. He’d almost had it, brushing his grasp. Ripped away. He wept for it, hot tears splashing like molten lead on his not-skin. He could feel Lord Mark slipping from him, racked apart, buried alive. Disintegrating. I just wanted to be human. Screwed up again.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  He circled the room for the hundreth time, tapping on the walls. ’If we could figure out which one is the exterior,” he said to Rowan, “maybe we could break through it somehow.”

  “With what, our fingernails? What if we’re three floors up? Will you please sit down,” Rowan gritted. “You’re driving me crazy!”

  “We have to get out.”

  “We have to wait. Lilly will miss us. And something will be done.”

  “By who? And how?” He glared around their little bedroom. It wasn’t designed as a prison. It was only a guest room, with its own bath attached. No windows, which suggested it was underground or in an interior section of the house. If it was underground, breaking through a wall might not be much use, but if they could bore into another room, the possibilities bloomed. One door, and two stunner-armed guards outside of it. They’d tried enticing the guards into opening the door last night, once with faked illness, and once for real when his frantic agitation had resulted in another convulsion. The guards had handed in Rowan’s medical bag, which was no help, because then the exhausted woman had started responding to his demands for action by threatening to sedate him.

  “Survive, escape, sabotage,” he recited. It had become a litany, running through his head in an endless loop. “It’s a soldier’s duty.”

  “I’m not a soldier,” said Rowan, rubbing her dark-ringed eyes. “And Vasa Luigi isn’t going to kill me, and if he was going to kill you he’d have done it last night. He doesn’t play with his prey like Ryoval does.” She bit her lip, perhaps regretting that last sentence. “Or maybe he’s going to leave us in here together till / kill you.” She rolled over in bed, and pulled her pillow over her head.

  “You should have crashed that lightflyer.”

  A noise from under the pillow might have been either a groan or a curse. He had probably mentioned that regret a few too many times.

  When the door clicked open he spun as if scalded.

  A guard half-saluted, politely. “Baron Bharaputra’s compliments, ma’am, sir, and would you prepare to join him and the Baronne for dinner. We will escort you upstairs when you’re ready.”

  The Bharaputras’ dining room had large glass doors giving a view onto an enclosed, winter-frosted garden, and a big guard by every exit. The garden glimmered in the gathering gloom; they had been here a full Jacksonian day, then, twenty-six hours and some odd minutes. Vasa Luigi rose at their entry, and at his gesture the guards faded back to positions outside the doors, giving an illusion of privacy.

  The dining room was arranged stylishly, with individual couches and little tables set in a tiered semi-circle around the view of the garden. A very familiar-looking woman sat on one of the couches.

  Her hair was white streaked with black, and wound up in elaborate braids around her head. Dark eyes, thin ivory skin softening with tiny wrinkles, a high-bridged nose—Dr. Durona. Again. She was dressed in a fine flowing silk shirt in a pale green perhaps accidentally reminiscent of the color of the Durona lab coats, and soft trousers the color of cream. Dr. Lotus Durona, Baronne Bharaputra, had elegant tastes. And the means to indulge them.

  “Rowan, dear,” she nodded; she held out a hand as if Rowan might give it a courtier’s kiss.

  “Lotus,” said Rowan flatly, and compressed her lips. Lotus smiled and turned her hand over, converting it into an invitation to sit, which they all did.

  Lotus touched a control pad at her place, and a girl wearing Bharaputra brown and pink silks entered, and served drinks, to the Baron first, curtseying with lowered eyes before him. A very familiar-looking girl, tall and willowy, with a high-bridged nose, fine straight black hair bound at her nape and flowing in a horse-tail down her back… . When she made her offering to the Baronne, her eyes flicked up, and opened like flowers to the sun, bright with joy. When she bowed before Rowan, her up-turning gaze grew startled, and her dark brows drew down in puzzlement. Rowan gazed back equally startled, a look that changed to dawning horror as the girl turned away.

  When she bowed before him, her frown deepened. “You … !” she whispered, as if amazed.

  “Run along, Lilly dear, don’t gawk,” said the Baronne kindly.

  As she left the room, with a swaying walk, she glanced covertly back over her shoulder at them.

  “Lilly?” Rowan choked. “You named her Lilly?”

  “A small revenge.”

  Rowan’s hands clenched in deep offense. “How can you? Knowing what you are? Knowing what we are?”

  “How can you choose death over life?” The Baronne shrugged. “Or worse—let Lilly choose it for you? Your time of temptation is not yet, Rowan my dear sister. Ask yourself again in twenty or thirty years, when you can feel your body rotting around you, and see if the answer comes so easily then.”

  “Lilly loved you as a daughter.”

  “Lilly used me as her servant. Love?” The Baronne chuckled. “It’s not love that keeps the Durona herd together. It’s predator pressure. If all the exterior economic and other dangers were removed, the far corners of the wormhole nexus would not be far enough for us to get away from our dear sibs. Most families are like that, actually.”

  Rowan assimilated the point. She looked unhappy. But she didn’t disagree.

  Vasa Luigi cleared his throat. “Actually, Dr. Durona, you wouldn’t have to travel to the far reaches of the galaxy for a place of your own. House Bharaputra could find a use for your talents and training. And perhaps even a little autonomy. Head of a department, for example. And later, who knows?—maybe even a division.”

  “No. Thank you.” Rowan bit out.

  The Baron shrugged. Did the Baronne look faintly relieved?

  He interrupted urgently, “Baron—was it really Ryoval’s squad who took Admiral Naismith? Do you know where?”

  “Well, now, that’s an interesting question,” Vasa Luigi murmured, eyeing him. “I’ve been trying to contact Ry all day, without success. I suspect that wherever Ry is, your clone-twin is also—Admiral.”

  He took a deep breath. “Why do you think I am the Admiral, sir?”

  “Because I met the other one. Under telling circumstances. I don’t think the real Admiral Naismith would permit his bodyguard to give him orders—do you?”

  His head was aching. “What’s Ryoval doing to him?”

  “Really, Vasa, this is not dinner-conversation,” reproved the Baronne. She glanced curiously at him. “Besides—why should you care?”

  “ ’Miles, what have you done with your baby brother?’ ” The quote came from nowhere, fell out of his mouth. He touched his lips uncertainly. Rowan stared at him. So did Lotus.

  Vasa Luigi said, “As to your question, Admiral, it turns on whether Ry has come to the same conclusions as I did. If he has—likely he’s not doing much. If he hasn’t, his methods will depend upon your clone-twin.”

  “I … don’t understand.”

  “Ryoval will study him. Experiment. His choice of actions will flow from his analysis of his subject’s personality.”

  That didn’t sound so bad. He pictured multiple-choice tests. He frowned, bewildered.

  “Ry is an artist, in his way,” continued the Baron. “He can create the most extraordinary psychological effects. I’ve seen him turn an enemy into a slave utterly devoted to his person, who will obey any order. The last man who attempted to assassinate him and had the misfortune to live ended up serving drinks at Ryoval’s private parties, and begging to offer gratification of any kind to any guest on request.”

  “What did you ask for?” the Baronne inquired dryly.

  “White wine. It was before your time,
love. I watched, though. The man had the most haunted eyes.”

  “Are you considering selling me to Ryoval?” he asked slowly.

  “If he’s the highest bidder, Admiral. Your and your clone-twin’s raid upon my property—and I am still not certain you did not plan it together from first to last—was very costly to my House. And,” his eyes glinted, “personally annoying. I’ll not bother avenging myself upon a cryo-amnesic, but I do wish to shave my losses. If I sell you to Ry, you’ll be better punished than even I care to think about. Ry would be delighted to own a matched pair.” Vasa Luigi sighed. “House Ryoval will always be a minor house, I fear, as long as Ry allows his personal gratification to outweigh its profits. It’s a shame. I could do so much more with his resources.”

  The girl returned, served little plates of hors d’ouvers, refreshed their drinks, some wine-and-fruit concoction, and wafted out again. Slowly. Vasa Luigi’s eyes followed her. The Baronne’s eyes narrowed, noting his gaze. Her lashes swept down, focusing on her drink, as his head turned back.

  “What about … the Dendarii Mercenaries, as a bidder?” Yes! Just let Bharaputra make that offer, and the Dendarii would come knocking on his door. With a plasma cannon. High bid indeed. This game must be a short one. Bharaputra could not put him up for auction without revealing that he had him, and then, and then … what? “If nothing else, you could use their competition to force Ryoval’s bid up,” he added slyly.

  “Their resources are too finite, I fear. And not here.”

  “We saw them. Yesterday.”

  “A mere covert ops team. No ships. No back-up. I understand they only revealed their identity at all in order to get Lilly to talk with them. But … I have reason to believe there is another player in this game. My instincts twitch, looking at you. I have the oddest urge to take a modest middleman’s profit, and let the negative bidders apply to House Ryoval.” The Baron chuckled.

  Negative bidder? Oh. People with plasma cannons. He tried not to react.

  Vasa Luigi continued, “Which brings us back to the original question—what is Lilly’s interest in all this? Why did Lilly set you to revive this man, Rowan? For that matter, how did Lilly obtain him, when some hundreds of other earnest searchers could not?”

  “She didn’t say,” said Rowan blandly. “But I was glad for a chance to sharpen my skills. Thanks to your security guard’s excellent aim, he was quite a medical challenge.”

  The conversation became medical-technical, between Lotus and Rowan, and then more desultory, as the clone-girl served them an elaborate meal. Rowan evaded as smoothly as the Baron questioned, and no one expected him to know anything. But Baron Bharaputra seemed not to be in a hurry. Clearly, he was setting up to play some land of waiting game. Afterwards the guards escorted them back to their room, which he realized at last was part of a corridor of identical chambers designed, perhaps, to house the servants of important visitors.

  “Where are we?” he hissed at Rowan as soon as the door shut behind them. “Could you tell? Is this Bharaputra’s headquarters?”

  “No,” said Rowan. “His main residence is still under renovation. Something about a commando raid blowing out several rooms,” she added snappishly.

  He walked slowly around their chamber, but he did not take up banging on the walls again, to Rowan’s obvious relief. “It occurs to me … that there’s another way to escape besides breaking from the inside out. That’s to get someone else to break from the outside in. Tell me … would it be harder to break in and take someone held prisoner by House Bharaputra, House Fell, or House Ryoval?”

  “Well … Fell would be the hardest, I suppose. He has more troops and heavy weapons. Ryoval would be the easiest. Ryoval’s really a House Minor, except he’s so old, he gets the honors of a House Major by habit.”

  “So … if one wanted someone bigger and badder than Bharaputra, one might go to Fell.”

  “One might.”

  “And … if one knew help were on the way … it might be tactically brighter to leave said prisoner at Ryoval’s, rather than to have him shifted to some more formidible location.”

  “It might,” she conceded.

  “We have to get to Fell.”

  “How? We can’t even get out of this room!”

  “Out of the room, yes, we must get out of the room. But we might not have to get out of the house. If one of us could just get to a comconsole for a few uninterrupted minutes. Call Fell, call someone, let the world know Vasa Luigi has us. That would start things moving.”

  “Call Lilly,” said Rowan sturdily. “Not Fell.”

  I need Fell. Lilly can’t break into Ryoval’s. He considered the uneasy possibility that he and the Durona Group might be starting to move at cross-purposes. He wanted a favor from Fell, whom Lilly wished to escape. Still—one would not have to offer very much to interest Fell in a raid on Ryoval. A break-even in materials, and the profit in old hatred. Yeah.

  He wandered into the bathroom, and stared at himself in the mirror. Who am I? A skinny, haggard, pale, odd-looking little man with desperate eyes and a tendency to convulsions. If he could even decide which one his clone-twin was, glimpsed so painfully yesterday, he could dub himself the other by process of elimination. The fellow had looked like Naismith to him. But Vasa Luigi was no fool, and Vasa Luigi was convinced of the reverse. He had to be one or the other. Why couldn’t he decide? If I am Naismith, why did my brother claim my place?

  At that moment, he discovered why it was called a cascade.

  The sensation was of being under a waterfall, of some river that emptied a continent, tons of water battering him to his knees. He emitted a tiny mewl, crouching down with his arms wrapping his head, shooting pains behind his eyes and terror locking his throat. He pressed his lips together to prevent any other sound escaping, that would attract Rowan in all her concern. He needed to be alone for this, oh yes.

  No wonder I couldn’t guess. I was trying to choose between two wrong answers. Oh, Mother. Oh, Da. Oh, Sergeant. Your boy has screwed up this one, bad. Real bad. Lieutenant Lord Miles Naismith Vorkosigan crawled on the tiled floor and screamed in silence, just a faint hiss. No, no, no, oh, shit… .

  Elli …

  Bel, Elena, Taura …

  Mark … Mark? That stout, glowering, controlled, determined fellow had been Mark?

  He could not remember anything about his death. He touched his chest, fearfully, tracing the evidence of … what event? He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to remember the last that he could. The raid downside at Bharaputra’s surgical facility, yes. Mark had engineered a disaster, Mark and Bel between them, and he’d come flying down to try and pull all their nuts out of the fire. Some megalomanic inspiration to top Mark, show him how the experts did it, to take those clone-children from Vasa Luigi, who had offended him … take ’em home to Mother. Crap, what does my mother know about all this bynow? Nothing, he prayed. They were all still here on Jackson’s Whole, somehow. How long had he been dead … ?

  Where the hell is ImpSec?

  Besides rolling around here on this bathroom floor, of course.

  Ow, ow, ow… .

  And Elli. Do I know you, ma’am? he’d asked. He should have bitten his tongue out.

  Rowan … Elli. It made sense, in a weird way. His lover was a tall, brown-eyed, dark-haired, tough-minded, smart woman. The first thing presented to his confused awakening senses had been a tall, brown-eyed, dark-haired, tough-minded, smart woman. It was a very natural mistake.

  He wondered if Elli was going to buy that explanation. His taste for heavily-armed girlfriends did have potential drawbacks. He inhaled a hopeless laugh.

  It clogged in his throat. Taura, here? Did Ryoval know it? Did he know what a lovely big clawed hand she’d had in the destruction of his gene banks, four years ago, or did he just blame “Admiral Naismith”? True, all of Ryoval’s bounty hunters he’d encountered subsequently had seemed focused obsessively and exclusively upon himself. But Ryoval’s troopers had mistaken Mark for
the Admiral; had Ryoval? Surely Mark would tell him he was the clone. Hell, I’d tell him the same if it were me, on the off-chance of confusing the issue. What was happening to Mark? Why had Mark offered himself as Miles’s … ransom? Mark couldn’t possibly be cryo-amnesic too, could he? No— Lilly had said the Dendarii, and the clones, and “Admiral Naismith” had all escaped. So how did they come to be back?

  They came looking for you, Admiral Dipshit.

  And had run headlong into Ryoval, looking for the same thing. He was a damned rendezvous.

  What a merciful state cryo-amnesia was. He wished for it back.

  “Are you all right?” Rowan called doubtfully. She stepped to the bathroom door, and saw him on the floor. “Oh, no! Another convulsion?” She dropped to her knees beside him, long fingers checking for damages. “Did you hit yourself on anything?”

  “Ah … ah …” I’ll not bother avenging myself upon a cryo-amnesic, Vasa Luigi had said. He had better remain a cryo-amnesic then, for the moment, till he had a better grip on things. And on himself. “I think I’m all right.”

  He suffered her to anxiously put him to bed. She stroked his hair. He stared at her in dismay through half-lidded, pretend-post-convulsion-sleepy eyes. What have I done?

  What am I going to do?

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  He had forgotten why he was here. His skin was beginning to grow back.

  He wondered where Mark had gone.

  People came, and tormented a nameless thing without boundaries, and went away again. He met them variously. His emerging aspects became personas, and eventually, he named them, as well as he could identify them. There was Gorge, and Grunt, and Howl, and another, quiet one that lurked on the fringes, waiting.

  He let Gorge go out to handle the force-feedings, because Gorge was the only one who actually enjoyed them. Gorge, after all, would never have been permitted to do all that Ryoval’s techs did. Grunt he sent forth when Ryoval came again with the hypospray of aphrodisiac. Grunt had also been responsible for the attack on Maree, the body-sculptured clone, he rather thought, though Grunt, when not all excited, was very shy and ashamed and didn’t talk much.