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The levels were not yet in the danger zone. A few more days before he had to put in the mouth-guard
and do it again. Having left his Armsman, Pym, who usually played valet and general servant, back on
Barrayar, he would have to find another spotter. The doctors had insisted he have a spotter, when he did
this ugly little thing. He would much prefer to be helpless and out-of-consciousness and twitching like a
fish, he supposed, though of coursehe was the one person who never got to watch in complete privacy.
Maybe he would ask the Professor.
If you had a wife, she could be your spotter.
Gee, what a treat for her.
He grimaced, and put the device carefully away in its case, and crawled into bed. Perhaps in his dreams
the space wreckage would reassemble itself, just like in a vid reconstruction, and reveal the secrets of its
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fate. Better to have visions of the wreckage than the bodies.
CHAPTER FIVE
Ekaterin studied Tien warily as they undressed for bed. The frowning tension in his face and body made
her think she had better offer sex very soon. Strain in him frightened her, as always. It was past time to
defuse him. The longer she waited, the harder it would be to approach him, and the tenser he would
become, ending in some angry explosion of muffled, cutting words.
Sex, she imagined wistfully, should be romantic, abandoned, self-forgetful. Not the most tightly
self-disciplined action in her world. Tien demanded response of her and worked hard to obtain it, she
thought; not like men she'd heard about who took their own pleasure, then rolled over and went to sleep.
She sometimes wished he would. He became upset with himself, with her? if she failed to participate
fully. Unable to act a lie with her body, she'd learned to erase herself from herself, and so unblock
whatever strange neural channel it was that permitted flesh to flood mind. The inward erotic fantasies
required to absorb her self-consciousness had become stronger and uglier over time; was that a mere
unavoidable side-effect of learning more about the ugliness of human possibility, or a permanent
corruption of the spirit?
I hate this.
Tien hung up his shirt and twitched a smile at her. His eyes remained strained, though, as they had been
all evening. "I'd like you to do me a favor tomorrow."
Anything, to delay the moment. "Certainly. What?"
"Take the brace of Auditors out and show 'em a good time. I'm about saturated with them. This
downside holiday of theirs has been incredibly disruptive to my department. We've lost a week
altogether, I bet, pulling together that show for them yesterday. Maybe they can go poke at something
else, till they go back topside."
"Take them where, show them what?"
"Anything."
"I already took Uncle Vorthys around."
"Did you show him the Sector University district? Maybe he'd like that. Your uncle is interested in lots of
things, and I don't think the Vor dwarf cares what he's offered. As long as it includes enough wine."
"I haven't the first clue what Lord Vorkosigan likes to do."
"Ask him. Suggest something. Take him, I don't know, take him shopping."
"Shopping?" she said doubtfully.
"Or whatever." He trod over to her, still smiling tightly. His hand slipped behind her back, to hold her,
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and he offered a tentative kiss. She returned it, trying not to let her dutifulness show. She could feel the
heat of his body, of his hands, and how thinly stretched his affability was. Ah, yes, the work of the
evening, defusing the unexploded Tien. Always a tricky business. She began to pay attention to the
practiced rituals, key words, gestures, that led into the practiced intimacies.
Undressed and in bed, she closed her eyes as he caressed her, partly to concentrate on the touch, partly
to block out his gaze, which was beginning to be excited and pleased. Wasn't there some bizarre mythical
bird or other, back on Earth, who fancied that if it couldn't see you, you couldn't see it? And so buried its
head in the sand, odd image. While still attached to its neck, she wondered?
She opened her eyes, as Tien reached across her and lowered the lamplight to a softer glow. His avid
look made her feel not beautiful and loved, but ugly and ashamed. How could you be violated by mere
eyes? How could you be lovers with someone, and yet feel every moment alone with them intruded upon
your privacy, your dignity?Don't look, Tien . Absurd. There really was something wrong with her. He
lowered himself beside her; she parted her lips, yielding quickly to his questing mouth. She hadn't always
been this self-conscious and cautious. Back in the beginning, it had been different. Or had it been she
alone who'd changed?
It became her turn to sit up and return caresses. That was easy enough; he buried his face in his pillow,
and did not talk for a while, as her hands moved up and down his body, tracing muscle and tendon.
Secretly seeking symptoms. The tremula seemed reduced tonight; perhaps last evening's shakes really
had been a false alarm, merely the hunger and nerves he had claimed.
She knew when the shift had occurred in her, of course, back about four, five jobs ago now. When Tien
had decided, for reasons she still didn't understand, that she was betraying him with whom, she had
never understood either, since the two names he'd finally mentioned as his suspects were so patently
absurd. She'd had no idea such a sexual mistrust had taken over his mind, until she'd caught him following
her, watching her, turning up at odd times and bizarre places when he was supposed to be at work and
had that perhaps had something to do with whythat job had ended so badly? She'd finally had the
accusation out of him. She'd been horrified, deeply wounded, and subtly frightened. Was it stalking,
when it was your own husband? She had not had the courage to ask who to ask. Her one source of
security was the knowledge that she'd never so much as been alone in any private place with another
man. Her Vor-class training had done her that much good, at least. Then he had accused her of sleeping
with her women friends.
That had broken something in her at last, some will to desire his good opinion. How could you argue
sense into someone who believed something not because it was true, but because he was an idiot? No
amount of panicky protestation or indignant denial or futile attempt to prove a negative was likely to help,
because the problem was not in the accused, but in the accuser. She began then to believe he was living
in a different universe, one with a different set of physical laws, perhaps, and an alternate history. And
very different people from the ones she'd met of the same name. Smarmy dopplegangers all.
Still, the accusation alone had been enough to chill her friendships, stealing their innocent savor and
replacing it with an unwelcome new level of awareness. With the next move, time and distance attenuated
her contacts. And on the move after that, she'd stopped trying to make new friends. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]