[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
still leaked out. Her eyes were alight.
I swear it wouldn't a' been half so bad if I'd had my briefs on backwards and
my stunner holster on frontways. I can still hear
Pym's voice . . . He mimicked the senior armsman's driest tones:
'Your weapon is worn on the right, Armsman.'
She laughed out loud then, and looked him up and down in somewhat unsettling
appreciation.
That's a pretty amazing word picture, Roic.
Despite himself, he smiled a little. I guess so. I dunno if m'lord's forgiven
me, but I'm right sure Pym hasn't. He sighed.
If you see one of those damned vomit bugs still around, squash it on sight.
Hideous bioengineered mutant things, kill 'em all before they multiply.
Page 21
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
Her laughter stopped cold.
Roic reran his last sentence in his head and made the unpleasant discovery
that one could do far worse things to oneself with words than with dubious
food products, or possibly even with needlers. He hardly dared look up to see
her face. He forced his eyes right.
Her face was perfectly still,
perfectly pale, perfectly blank.
Perfectly appalling.
I meant those devil-bugs, not you!
He managed to stop that idiocy on his lips before it escaped to do even more
damage, but only just. He couldn't think of any way to apologize that wouldn't
make it worse.
Ah, yes, she said at last.
Miles did warn me that
Barrayarans had some pretty ugly issues about gene manipulation. I
just forgot.
And I reminded you.
We're getting better, he tried.
Good for you. She inhaled, a long breath. Let's go in. I'm getting cold.
Roic was frozen straight through. Um. Yeah.
They walked back to the gate in silence
***
Roic slept the day around, trying to force his body back onto the boring night
shift cycle that by the duty roster was to be his junior armsman's fate this
Winterfair.
He was quite sorry to thus miss seeing m'lord take his galactic guests and a
selection of his in-laws-to-be on a tour of Vorbarr
Sultana. He'd have been fascinated by what the two disparate parties made of
each other. Madame Vorsoisson's family, the Vorvaynes, were solid
provincial Vor types of the sort
Roic had always regarded as normal to the class, before he'd taken up his
duties in Vorkosigan
House's high Vor milieu. M'lord, well . . . m'lord wasn't standard by
anybody's standard. The four
Vorvayne brothers, though dutifully pleased with their widowed sister's upward
social leap, plainly found m'lord an unnerving catch. Roic wished he could see
what they would make of
Taura. He melted into sleep with a vague scenario drifting through his reeling
brain of somehow imposing his body between her and some undefined social
insult.
Maybe then she would see that he hadn't meant anything by his awful gaffe . .
.
He woke at sunset and made a foray down to Vorkosigan House's huge kitchen,
below stairs. Usually m'lord's genius cook, Ma Kosti, left delectable
surprises in the staff refrigerator and was always looking for a good gossip,
but tonight the pickings were slim and the personal attention nonexistent.
The place was plunged into final preparations for tomorrow's great event, and
Ma Kosti, driving her harried scullions before her, made it plain that anyone
below the rank of count, or perhaps emperor, was very much in the way just
now.
Roic fueled up and retreated.
At least the kitchen did not have to deal with a formal dinner atop all the
Page 22
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
rest. M'lord, the count
and countess, and all the guests were off to the Imperial Residence for the
Winterfair Ball and midnight bonfire, the heart of the festivities marking
solstice night and the turning of the season.
When they all decamped from
Vorkosigan House, Roic had the vast place to himself, but for the rumble from
the kitchen and the servants rushing about completing the last-minute
decorations and arrangements in the public rooms, the great dining room, and
the seldom-used ballroom.
He was therefore surprised, about an hour before midnight, when the gate guard
called him to code open the front door. He was even more surprised when a
small
car with government markings pulled up under the porte cochere and m'lord and
Sergeant Taura climbed out. The car buzzed off, and its passengers entered the
hall, shaking the cold air out of their outer garments and handing them off to
Roic.
M'lord was dressed in the most elaborate version of the brown and silver
Vorkosigan
House uniform, befitting a count's heir attending upon the emperor, complete
with custom-fitted polished riding boots to his knees.
Taura wore a close-fitting, embroidered russet jacket, made high to the neck
where a bit of lace showed, and a matching skirt sweeping to ankles clad in
soft,
russet-colored leather boots. A
graceful spray of cream-and-rust colored orchids was wound into her braided-up
hair. Roic wished he could have seen her entrance into the Imperial Winterfair
Ball, and heard what the emperor and empress had said upon meeting her . . .
No, I'm all right, Taura was saying to m'lord. I saw the palace and the
ball-they were beautiful-but I've had enough. It's just that I was up at dawn,
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]