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The Winterfair season was winding down. Ivan couldn't remember a social season quite like it, with the usual round of parties exaggerated greatly this year by a parade of citywide celebrations in honor of Gregor and Laisa’s betrothal. Barrayarans, never ones to pass up any occasion to celebrate, had taken exuberant advantage of the historical event. Damn straight, thought Ivan. How often does one's emperor get engaged anyway? Thanks to all the recent betrothal hype, he knew exactly: it had been nearly two hundred years ago with the betrothal and subsequent marriage of Vlad Vorbarra le Savante and Lady Vorlightly. Apparently, Ezar’s marriage to the sister of the soon-to-be-deposed Mad Yuri, midway through Mad Yuri’s Civil War didn’t count. Not so much in the way of celebration for that one, he guessed.
A very long, loud, and boisterous evening started with prodigious indulgence in Things That Go Boom, a near universal and seemingly inherent Barrayaran cultural preference. Where had Miles gotten hold of those professional quality fireworks anyway? He suspected his uncle may have had had more to do with it than Miles let on. Uncle Aral had always been quite fond of fireworks displays, as Ivan remembered from Emperor’s Birthday festivities when he was a kid. It had always a toss-up as to who was more - well, enthusiastic was too mild a word for it - Uncle Aral or Miles. While he hadn’t seen the Count tonight since none of the parties were of an official nature which protocol would have required his uncle to attend – and since his heart transplant, he no longer stayed out as late as he might have liked, Aunt Cordelia saw to that - it was a near certainty he’d aided and abetted Miles in the planning of the evening’s pyrotechnics.
Said pyrotechnics had been followed by much drinking, dining and dancing at seemingly impromptu parties - one would pop up in a new location as soon as the previous one wound down. His lack of a date had put only a very slight damper on the night, for a change. He wasn't worried about drinking and driving, as Vorbarr Sultana's airspace and roadways were nearly deserted. Besides, he hadn't had that much to drink, relatively speaking. Just a pleasantly mild bit of a buzz going on at the moment - nothing he couldn't handle. It was either very late, or very early depending on how one looked at it. Fortunately, he didn’t have to work in the morning, not that he would have called it a night any earlier if he did. The city still wore a heavy blanket of snow following the recent blizzard. As he cruised along in the quiet whiteness, he contemplated whether to head on to the next party or go home, Ivan inexplicably felt the urge to go tell his father of his promotion.
True, it was a bit after the fact by quite a few months, but hey - better late than never, right? His mother had started the custom when he was a little boy, of taking him to the spot where his father's memorial plaque was. Every year, on his birthday - to the very spot where Captain Padma Xav Vorpatril was shot down by the Pretender Vordarian's security forces while trying to get the Lady Alys, who was in labor with him, to a doctor. Happy birthday, kiddo! One hell of a birthday present. He and the Lady Alys would follow up after the death offering with breakfast at a great little Keroslav District bakery around the corner - that part he didn't mind. Once he entered the Academy, he had taken over the ritual on his own, largely at his mother’s insistence, adding a few personal touches, having developed the habit of verbally giving his father annual progress reports of a sort - kinda silly, actually, when you thought about it - so it wasn't really all that unusual that he felt compelled to tell his father the latest news. OK, it was unusual that he felt the need to do it just now. Or maybe not - the realization that today was his father's birthday today had been floating around subliminally in his mind all day - make that the day before - which probably accounted for him carrying a copy of his promotion orders. Just in case. The customary fasting before performing funeral rituals meant that the earlier they were done, the sooner a man could have a decent breakfast. Since his father's plaque was in the middle of the street, and with the increase in traffic in the newly gentrified section of the caravansarai, unless he got there before dawn, it would be impossible to perform the proper ritual on the actual site any more that day. In the dead of winter, dawn comes late, too late for his purposes, so Ivan reluctantly decided to head over to the plaque despite the hellishly uncivilized hour of 5:00 AM.
Normally, when he came here on his birthday, he was able to park on the same block despite the narrowness of the ancient streets because his lightflyer was small and sleek, but today, he found the block closed off at either end and crawling with ImpSec personnel. The unseen security perimeter must have been out in full force, too, given the level of the ground detail. He wondered what the hell was going on, since all the storefronts but one were dark and shuttered as far as he could see, and the street itself was deserted. He had to park a block away and walk back toward his destination, wishing he’d worn his greatcoat. The cold had his teeth clattering like castanets. Olé! Heavenly aromas wafted in the pre-dawn air from several new artisanal bakeries that had sprouted up like mushrooms in the neighborhood, making his stomach growl. When he reached the corner, he saw the cause of the heavy security - there, in the middle of the block, in the middle of the street, was his Uncle Aral's stocky figure. He'd recognize that broad back and those shoulders anywhere! He wore the dress greens that were like a second skin to him and his service greatcoat (smart man!), his thick - and in Ivan’s opinion, hellishly dramatic - white mane ruffling lightly in the bone-chilling breeze. His uncle, down on one knee in the street, was brushing the snow from Padma Vorpatril’s bronze commemorative plaque, where Ivan’s mother had stubbornly insisted it be placed, on the exact spot where his father had fallen rather than on the more convenient sidewalk. As he knew better than anyone, what Lady Alys wanted, Lady Alys generally got, with little or no argument. Who would dare?!? Ivan sighed deeply.
An ImpSec team quickly surrounded him. He knew most of them and was quickly passed through the security cordon. They probably thought he was there to meet his uncle - a completely understandable assumption under the circumstances, he thought. A frozen looking lieutenant had lead him past the force field barricade toward his uncle before he could correct that assumption and leave quickly without him noticing the intrusion, but Uncle Aral, ever keenly alert, saw him and asked quietly if he would care to join him in making the offering.
At just the mere thought of Aral Vorkosigan, Ivan was mentally kowtowing; totally gobsmacked as usual. How could he not be? The man used to turn entire General Staffs to quivering pudding just by entering the room! Very probably still could. Damn! How could he refuse, as it was to honor his father? Despite his rising panic, he could tell his uncle was in a very odd sort of mood that he had never seen before - solemn, introspective and more than a little melancholy, his normally intense gaze focused inward, light years away. To his amazement, Uncle Aral told him he came here every year on Padma's birthday to burn a death offering. Ivan's eyebrows rose, threatening to launch themselves clear off his face. He’d heard over the years from various sources that the two cousins were supposed to have been close, but he had never once thought about how close that might have been. With a sudden perceptiveness that amazed him - the first of many little epiphanies that morning, as he was soon to discover - he realized that his uncle was still grieving, even after 30 years. While Ivan dutifully visited the site every year on his birthday/father's anniversary, he couldn't honestly say he actually grieved or had really ever grieved. After all, he had never known his father. His mother's public grief had ended years and years ago. Yet Uncle Aral is still grieving for my father.
Ivan was rattled, taken aback by this new insight. His uncle carried a brazier and tripod set in a black velvet bag with the Vorbarra crest embroidered in silver, explaining that he always used it for his mother, brother, sister, and Padma, rather than his Vorkosigan set. He was momentarily jolted by the reminder - even though intellectually, he knew, of course - hell, everybody on Barrayar knew - Uncle Aral was also Vorbarra. Was a Vorbarra heir. To hear some tell it, in only a slightly different reality, he was The Man Who Would Be King. Somehow, here and now, in this silent white setting with the glow of the streetlight overhead, not quite day or night - alone, the long coat fluttering around his legs and the glittering snow swirling like diamond dust around him, his hair now resembling a snowy crown, it seemed to Ivan that it could and should be true. The man had REGAL stamped all over him!
In spite of the bitter cold, he was barehanded. Ivan watched the big hands fumble slightly, with cold-numbed fingers. He had hesitated at first to help his uncle set up the brazier and tripod. Mentally berating himself - Ivan, you idiot! - enough to overcome his fear of possible rebuke, he removed his gloves and took up assembly of the tripod. Uncle Aral thanked him with an appreciative look. That was not at all what he expected, certain his uncle might be scornful or dismissive or worse - merely tolerating. Ever the master strategist, he had prudently thought to bring half a dozen pieces of quick-starting charcoal, to keep the flames going in this weather. Not exactly kosher, but eminently practical. The wind out of the north had become brisker, nearly strong enough to put out the flame before it could burn the offering - a snippet of hair and large pile of sodden-looking maple leaves, despite the non-regulation charcoal. Confounding Ivan yet again, Uncle Aral invited him to add his own offering.
"I'm sure you came for the same reason. I seem to have co-opted your privacy,” he said apologetically. “You're more than welcome to use the flame, if you’d like."
Gobsmacked again! It seemed on track to be one of those days. He hunkered down shoulder-to-shoulder alongside his uncle to block the wind, took out the copy of his captaincy orders and added it to the flames. Uncle Aral recognized what it was at once, and draped a big, strong arm across Ivan's shoulders. Freaking just a little at how strong and hard that arm was, considering his age and how many layers of uniforms and greatcoat he was feeling it through, Ivan was sure he most definitely would not want to ever meet his uncle in a dark alley any time soon - the man could probably still take down men half his age without working up too much of a sweat, new heart and all. Legend had it that back in the day, in unarmed hand-to-hand combat training sessions, he was actually able to take down the truly frightening and deadly Sgt. Bothari! Fairly frequently! Aunt Cordelia allegedly had pronounced him "small but vicious," after watching the two of them go at it in a demonstration match. Heh! That he could believe! And speaking of the late Sgt. Bothari, well, there was another one you’d never want to meet in a dark alley. Or even a fully lit one...
"Congratulations on your promotion, boy. Your father would have been proud of you." He hesitated a moment, then continued, slightly defensively, "I wish you had told me sooner, though. I’m proud of you, too, you know." He glanced sideways at Ivan, snowflakes catching on his long eyelashes, and added quietly, "You made captain younger than he did, by almost two years. Did you know that?"
Ivan shook his head negatively, shooting him an amazed look. He'd never heard that about his father before, or very much else like it, for that matter. Younger than his father, huh? Hot damn! All right! They watched together in silence as the flames died down, thankful for the small bit of warmth generated by the fire. Uncle Aral took an antique-looking silver flask with an ornately engraved VK on the front from an inside pocket of his coat and took a long swig. He raised the flask toward the rapidly dying flames and solemnly proclaimed in a raspy-voiced toast, "Xav Vorbarra's Grandsons, Forever."
He offered the flask to Ivan, who took a swig and promptly choked - coughing, gasping, eyes watering, nearly gagging. He instantly recognized the demon brew - the famous (make that infamous) maple mead! Uncle Aral's eyes were gleaming, crinkling madly at the corners, definitely not laughing at him, though, but some fond memory. Ivan, still gasping, passed the flask back and his uncle took another impressive swig.
“Your father was the only one who would drink this stuff with me. That was our toast,” eyes gone distant again. He and Ivan slowly took alternating swigs in companionable silence, scrunched together side by side. They relished the spreading warmth from the mead throughout their insides, replacing what little warmth the now extinguished fire had offered.
Uncle Aral put the empty flask away and began to clean the ashes from the bronze brazier and disassemble the tripod as Ivan watched, almost in a daze. The surreal quality of the morning so far was proving almost too much for his sleep-deprived, mead-encroggled brain to assimilate. He composed himself enough to discover his uncle looking at him with concern.
“Everything all right, boy?”
“I think so, sir. Um, kinda hard to tell, for some reason,” which drew a snort from his uncle. Hmmm, this was proving to be a seriously unusual morning in so many ways. Very unnerving, to say the least. He gathered what little wits he still had control of and held the black velvet bag open for Uncle Aral, who - with something approaching reverence, placed the ritual pieces back inside it.
“I’ve been doing this alone for 30 years now,” he said wistfully. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to have you with me this time. I should have thought of it sooner.” His tone was gentle, sincere, apologetic - and for some inexplicable reason, Ivan found this new revelation almost unbearably heartbreaking. The combination of incredulity and his customary awe of his uncle had him feeling completely discombobulated by everything he had seen and heard so far. He wasn't sure if was the mead at work or just the unreality of seeing Uncle Aral in this very unusual, almost vulnerable light. In all honesty, though he was still faintly panicking, the sharp edge was off. The ceremonial ritual now concluded, his uncle led the way across the street to a tiny, slightly decrepit looking shop that bore a sign grandly proclaiming it to be The Aral Sea Tea House. “It opens early exclusively for me on this date every year. I’d like it very much if you’d join me.”
Ordinarily, Ivan's instinctive reaction would have been to run - as fast as he could, as far as he could, in the opposite direction. He'd rather face an entire squad of nerve disruptors than have to make Small Talk with Uncle Aral. But with his newfound perceptiveness - who knew! - and in keeping with the morning's dreamlike, unreal air, it occurred to him that Something Special was going on and that his uncle seemed strangely eager to talk. To him! Ivan’s eyebrows took flight again and he began to hyperventilate a little as he realized he might have keep up an actual grown-up social conversation with the man. Just the two of them! Ivan Vorpatril! And Aral Vorkosigan! Alone! Mentally meeping, he was on the verge of what he knew was a full-blown anxiety attack of the sort he routinely experienced whenever Miles used to get that manic gleam in his eye and was looking for a partner in crime. He took several big gulping breaths to try and steady himself. Not working! Maple mead would have been useful just about then.
Noticing Ivan’s anxiety, his uncle clapped a hand on his back. A mischievous gleam began to light up his face. "Easy, boy! Calm down... relax. How bad can it be, eh? It's only me - your kindly Uncle Aral, not some damned ImpSec interrogation team. I put my pants on one leg at a time, just like everyone else.” He smiled reassuringly. “Really."
Violently disputing that mundane image, Ivan's mental gears came to a screeching halt. He heroically refrained from shrieking out loud. OH! HELL! NO! In what God-forsaken corner of this universe or any other is Aral Vorkosigan just like everyone else? Does he seriously not realize how that is just not conceivable to mere mortals? If it was possible to splutter non-verbally, he felt sure he was doing it. Deep breaths, take deep breaths, he told himself. He managed to ratchet his breathing back down to near normal and somehow conjured up a shaky sort of smile aimed in his uncle's general direction. He refrained from pinching himself to see if he was dreaming, fairly certain it could be construed as conduct unbecoming to an officer. But he was cold enough and tired enough and disoriented enough to hear himself, much to his very great surprise, agreeing to the invitation. He mentally blamed the maple mead. Gotta be the mead...
As they approached the shop door, Uncle Aral said, “This place is a real rarity here these days, a historical relic, founded in the early years of the reign of Dorca the Just. My grandfather Prince Xav used to bring me here when I was a young boy, whenever he made one of his trips to The Residence to confer with his brother Yuri." At the look of near horror on Ivan's face, he quickly amended, "Before Yuri went mad, of course." With a bemused expression, he continued, "When one is only 8 years old, it's quite the thrill seeing your own name - if only part of it - on a building like this. I loved it. Still do. Um, the shop... not the name part."
The matter-of-factness with which that tidbit of information was imparted, coupled with his failed attempt to picture little Lord Aral hand-in-hand with the famous Prince Xav, meeting with the equally famous (but for all the wrong reasons) Emperor Yuri, left Ivan - for the third time that morning - feeling well and goodly gobsmacked. His mental gears were spinning like the fruit in the windows of slot machines on Wrigley's Pleasure Planet, and not coming up all cherries! Making things worse, he was still stuck in that previous groove, still trying with no luck to digest the image of The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan (Yeah, so he did tend to think of Uncle Aral in uppercase titles - what of it?) putting his pants on one leg at a time just like everyone else. The mind boggled! He blamed the mead.
Inside, the Aral Sea Tea House looked like it might have been lifted intact directly from the ancestral homeland back on Old Earth; pine paneling, worn oriental carpets on the floor, icons of early Barrayaran emperors with Cyrillic captions enshrined on the walls, a huge brass samovar, handmade antimacassars capping the overstuffed chairs, quite an impressive collection of matryoshka, a traditional Russian-style masonry fireplace... The proprietress, Ma Kobylka hovered cheerfully close by like a doting granny, smiling ear to ear. She stopped just short of pinching Ivan's wind-reddened cheeks, and asked, "And who might this fine looking young fellow be, My Lord Count?" By her form of address, she gave herself away as one of Uncle Aral's beloved Dendarii hill people - Ivan was never good at local accents.
“This is ‘fine looking young fellow’ is Captain Ivan Vorpatril, my late cousin Padma's boy,” Uncle Aral told her. “He was with me burning his offering this morning,” and to Ivan's continued amazement, his uncle seemed to be genuinely fond of him. In public! Brain freeze! The moment passed quickly, as the two of them settled in comfortably at a table in front of the colorfully tile-faced fireplace with a crackling, cozy fire - munching on pastries to die for, washing them down with piping hot coffee so good it should be illegal.
"My Lord Count's favorites," Ma Kobylka proudly informed Ivan, as she set a plate of brillberry blini on table. My God, was the woman going to pinch Uncle Aral's cheeks??? Ivan was mentally shrieking again - he couldn't help himself. It seemed entirely and insanely conceivable! She did tousle his hair, though. Hell, the way this morning was going, he found himself tempted to tousle Uncle Aral's hair - it just seemed to be begging for it! He blamed the wave of galloping giddiness on the maple mead. Dangerous stuff, that. He felt it was a very good thing indeed that ImpSec wasn't present physically in the room. He couldn't imagine that strangers - even if only Ma Kobylka - getting too close to The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan's regal head wouldn't have them instantly on Red Alert status and the place in lockdown. For his part, his uncle was graciously playing the part of the backcounty squire to the hilt - totally at ease, laughing, joking and affectionately teasing the old woman and their two servers - Dendarii too, by the sound of them, and probably her grandsons. So far, Uncle Aral's boast that Ma Kobylka's culinary delights would make Vorkosigan House’s Ma Kosti's efforts seem like the work of an amateur was not very far off the mark. Ma Kobylka could easily give the incomparable Ma Kosti a run for the money. If he were a betting man, he’d be hard pressed to decide which of the two to put his money on. Yeah, that good!
Over instantly replenished coffee and an ever-increasing assortment of sweet rolls and buns, Uncle Aral regaled a dumbfounded Ivan with tales of his late father. How happy he - the ten year old Aral - had been when Padma was born, because he got to be a "big brother" for a change whenever the baby was around, calling him "my little Padma" - in fact, still calling him that when Padma entered the Imperial Military Academy, much to Padma’s great embarrassment. Solemnly, he related how he had been devastated by his older brother's death at the hands of Mad Yuri's death squad, but was deeply comforted by the toddler Padma's affection. Told him how later, he had tried to be for Padma what his own older brother had been for him. He found himself deeply moved by the image of The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan as an emotionally wounded child, taking solace in the company of his toddler cousin. Ivan didn’t blame the mead.
Continuing in that somber vein, Uncle Aral went on, "I don't know how much if anything you know or have heard about me at the time of my first wife's suicide.” With painfully raw honesty, he told Ivan it was probably safe to take the worst of whatever he'd heard and multiply it by two, “except I did not murder my wife,” and after a dramatic pause, “although I was never entirely sure my father didn't order it or do it himself." Ivan was still reeling from that revelation when he told him he always felt he had let Padma down greatly at that time, when Padma was just starting his formal military schooling, and was sorry for it; told him how the twelve year old Padma stuck with him when a lot of former friends did not... not that he blamed them. His voice huskier than usual with emotion, Uncle Aral actually apologized for not being more of a father to him as a child. Ivan felt his gut churning... God, what should he say to this?
Thinking out loud more than anything else, Ivan began, “I don’t think anyone expected you to be, sir. You were a brand new, first time father yourself. Miles' medical condition had to have made that exceptionally more demanding than it otherwise would have been. After Princess Kareen’s death, you had to become a foster father to Gregor, too. Miles told me something of your estrangement from your own father at the time, and why. You lost the home you loved for the next five years - that had to hurt like hell. Plus, as you well know, I have a perfectly competent mother,” that drew a wry snort from Uncle Aral, “and a boatload of Vorpatril relatives. It’s not like I was a poor orphan boy like Gregor.” Really warming to it, he kept going. “And there was the little matter of your day job as de facto emperor of three worlds. That had to have kept you fairly busy,” surprising the hell out of Ivan even as he said it. Where did that all come from, he wondered, since he'd never considered any of it before. Truth was, he had frequently been jealous of Miles and Gregor for having The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan as a father, even though at the same time he had been perpetually terrified of the man. He still didn’t quite understand how that worked! Go figure...
Well. And so. It was Uncle Aral’s turn to be a bit gobsmacked. A very tiny bit, but still. He regarded Ivan with an expression he couldn’t put a finger on, but definitely one that didn’t make him feel at all panicky. “I thank you for those kind words, but I still have no excuse. I should have found a way to be there much more for you, as a duty to your father. I owed him that much, I think."
Ivan found himself literally speechless. What could he possibly say to that? What could anyone say? One man could only do so much! Just how did Uncle Aral ever find time to do all extraordinary the things he did do during the Regency? Why did he imagine he had anything to blame himself for? It was a mystery, Ivan decided, not to be solved here and now, but as he contemplated the man before him with fresh eyes, his awe increased as his trepidation decreased. Now that was a novel sensation! He hoped to prolong it. Ma Kobylka poured more coffee for them both, as they snuck surreptitious glances at each other. Ivan gave Uncle Aral what he hoped was a comforting smile. It seemed to do the trick, brightening the mood.
He had heard many times from Miles that his uncle was an enthusiastic and energetic storyteller, but had always found that hard to believe - until now. Over yet more wondrous pastries, Uncle Aral told him that when the newly minted Ensign Vorpatril was assigned to his staff, both of them were thrilled and delighted; how he was never sure if it was purely by chance or if Ezar had anything to do with Padma's assignment, but he was overjoyed. With his eyes twinkling (!!!) he told a tale Ivan mentally filed as The Shirt Incident. Told him how his junior officers presented him with The Shirt as a gift on the occasion of his promotion to admiral - the youngest admiral in Barrayar’s history. It was an occasion for much hilarity among his junior staff, to hear him tell it! The men - his father, Korabik Gottyan, Aristede Vorkalloner, and Rulf Vorhalas - had bought the most hideous, floral monstrosity of an Old Earth Hawaiian-style shirt they could find, knowing he would feel honor-bound to wear it in public for them. Three of them were absolutely certain that with his natural reserve and keen sense of military decorum, he wouldn't be able to do it, or at least not without extreme mortification. As he explained, none of them would ever wear such a ghastly thing, even in private, and they were sure that no way in hell would he, the perfect soldier - their words - the ever proper Aral Vorkosigan, actually wear it, either. Padma, though, knew otherwise, and had won himself an exceptionally sizable wager - which extended to the crew at large. Padma knew that Aral Vorkosigan never shirked from a challenge no matter how gruesome, and master strategist that he was, would know the others would bet against it. More importantly, because of their lifelong relationship, Padma knew him more than well enough to know of his occasional mischievous streaks - Padma knew he would wear the damn thing just to prove them all wrong, wearing it publicly in their company to embarrass the hell out of them. In a good way, of course! A fun time had by all!
Ivan was getting really caught up in the tale, especially with his father’s role in it, when Uncle Aral unbuttoned his dress uniform jacket with a sheepish half smile to reveal the very worn, very faded - but obviously exceptionally loud and garish in its youth - tropical print shirt in question. “I wear it for the occasion every year,” he said, looking insufferably pleased with himself. Ivan blinked hard. Several times. Maple mead seemed to be called for.
Prior to this morning, if anyone had told him his uncle even knew of the existence of shirts such as that, in all its nightmarish, technicolor floral glory, let alone actually owned one and - horrors! - wore it in public - well, his disbelief would never, not-no-how, not-no-way suspend. In the languages of the planet - nyet, non, ochi, no! Not suspending one iota! Yet there the man sat, gleefully wearing the foul garment! Ivan's brain felt like it was undergoing a full core meltdown. Red Alert! Chortling, Uncle Aral told Ivan how Padma felt guilty about winning such a huge bet from the staff and fellow crew members, since he had, after all, insider knowledge of their new admiral the others did not. “I told him if he really wanted to ease his conscience,” he went on, “he could scout out and procure our next quarterly supply of maple mead with his winnings. The good stuff, too, none of that bootleg rotgut. He agreed, rather willingly, I might add.” Ivan felt at that moment he would NEVER be amazed by anything EVER AGAIN, having now seen - make that heard - it all now. Was there no end to the day’s surprises? Just who the hell was this very amiable officer and gentleman sitting across from him anyway, who looked so deceptively like his Uncle Aral? His head hurt. Couldn’t possibly still be the mead. Could it? He wished he had some just then. Ow, ow. Ow!
The very amiable officer and gentleman sitting across from him wasn’t done yet. No, sir! He continued with gusto, relating the tale of Padma and Hand to Hand Combat Practice, which was promptly filed away with the others. Crewmembers who knew Uncle Aral's reputation as a first class fighting man despite his compact size would bet against Padma, at first, even though Padma was taller and heavier. He seemed almost obscenely delighted in relating how Padma was able to take him down and win fairly frequent wagers - more marks for their Maple Mead Fund! God forbid he'd ever just let Padma win, though - oh, no - he gave as good as he got more often than not. Padma's signature move - the one that guaranteed a takedown - was possible because he knew his commanding officer’s ticklish spots, and had known since they were mere boys horsing around on summer afternoons at their grandfather’s estate. With mock indignation Ivan said, “Are you saying my Da cheated?”
“Hell, no,” Uncle Aral said, “there's nothing in the rules against it. Per se.” With a wolfish gleam in his eyes, he grunted, “Helps if you don’t get caught at it, though.”
Ivan could tell the memory of this bit of cousinly silliness obviously still delighted him, and found himself thinking, "Awwww... how sweet," before realizing this was the closest he'd ever been to anything even remotely warm and fuzzy relating to his uncle. This thought was followed immediately by fast and furious mental dithering at the very idea of Uncle Aral - The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan - ever being warm and fuzzy with anybody. Just as quickly - God, it made his head spin sickeningly at just how fast his gears kept shifting - he mentally smacked himself on the forehead. Ivan, you idiot, of course he must be at times! Aunt Cordelia is absolutely potty over him, having resigned her commission and traveled halfway across the galaxy to marry him, and Betans are notoriously big on all things warm and fuzzy! Heh! To hear Mother tell it, you couldn't leave the two of them alone for more than a minute before they were all over each other like a couple of hormonal teenagers, even after 30 plus years of marriage! Fervently wishing to leave that particular train of thought at the station, Ivan drained his just replenished cup of coffee in a single gulp, scorching his mouth. Open-mouthed, fanning his tongue, he stared aghast at his uncle who was complimenting a flushed and smiling Ma Kobylka on the excellence of the spread before them, which had grown to include several varieties of savory piroshky and traditional cheeses.
As he enthusiastically polished off a second helping of brillberry blini, Uncle Aral continued his Padma tale. “Your father was the most sweet-natured, even-tempered man I’ve ever known, but he seemed to enjoy going out of his way to annoy my father. I think Padma was possibly more proud of my promotion to admiral than even I was, never failing to bring it up, quite loudly, in my father's earshot. My father would then look daggers at us for the duration of the visit. You know the saying ‘If looks could kill...?’ Well... ” He shrugged off Ivan’s look of dismay. “Do you remember much about the General my Father?”
Ivan, laughed rather nervously and admitted, “Well, um, sir, I was never around him all that much. Um... I found him to be, actually... you know... er... even more terrifying than yourself. I mean that in a good way. Ah. Sir.” His uncle responded with a low, rumbling chuckle before a serious expression gradually took over his face. What next?
So very quietly, forcing Ivan to lean in toward him, he told him how his relationship with the Count his Father had always been complicated by the memory of his murdered older brother; how he had always been compared to his "perfect" brother by Old Piotr and had been found wanting, leaving him feeling inadequate - the leftovers - never able to please his father. Told him how Padma was keenly aware of that and fiercely protective of him. This shocked Ivan, deeply and profoundly; affecting him more than everything else he had heard that morning. The man was the Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan, for God’s sake, whose reputation had very early on eclipsed even that of his own great-grandfather Dorca the Just, plus that of his father - the hero of the Cetagandan Resistance, and Emperor Ezar to boot! How in the name of all that's holy could this man possibly feel inadequate compared to ANYBODY, let alone a long-dead boy? Not, he supposed, unlike the way he himself typically felt in comparison to Miles. A stunning realization came to him, unbidden - shaking him to the core. UNCLE ARAL KNOWS WHAT IT'S LIKE! Oh. God. He knows. And he wants me to know that he knows...
His mental gears ground to a complete halt. Feeling like Barrayar had come to a sudden dead stop on its axis, he found himself actually gripping the edges of the table, as if he had to hold on for dear life not to be thrown off into orbit. When the mental dust had settled, he looked across the table at Uncle Aral, who was contemplating him serenely. For the first time, he saw his uncle as a human being and not some kind of deity. Saw the man behind all the titles, the man Miles loved so dearly and idolized so intensely, and began to feel some of that emotion himself.
Throwing caution to the wind, taking his inspiration from Uncle Aral's confessional mode, he seized the metaphorical bull by its equally metaphorical horns and told him that he very much regretted being such a disappointment to him. An agonizingly prolonged silence, or so it seemed to him, followed. His uncle’s expression was thoughtful, if not a bit sad. Shit! Ivan felt the panic rising again, sure he'd just blown it, positive he’d ruined whatever the hell it was they seemed to have going this morning. He had not been aware that he was nervously twisting and bunching his napkin into a mangled mess until Uncle Aral laid a big hand on his own, stopping him. He managed not to flinch and mentally geared up for The Look and the usual accompanying Well-Intentioned Lecture - he'd heard it all so many times before. When he finally got up the nerve to sneak a peek at his uncle, the expected Look was not there. In its place was something very different. Was it sympathy? Compassion? Affection? All of the above? That look unnerved him more than anything his uncle could possibly have said just then.
His voice a low, soothing rumble, Uncle Aral finally spoke. “I hope to God, Ivan,” flashing him a wry grimace, “you know how much I hated having to come off as so much of a nag all the time. But when your mother asks a favor, like anyone else, I can't say no. Trust me, boy, I always felt as uncomfortable delivering those lectures as you did getting them - maybe more so.” The steel gray eyes locked in on Ivan. “It's not that you've been a disappointment as such. I’d have to say I’ve been more frustrated than anything else, because I know you're capable of so much more. Nothing would make me happier than for you to realize your own potential and not allow yourself to be so overshadowed by Miles. Those of us who know and love you know full well you’re not an idiot, no matter how well you’ve cultivated that image. Time and again, you’ve proven yourself to be more than competent.” The intensity of his gaze increased to the maximum, causing Ivan to squirm in his seat, and asked, “Why hide your light under a bushel the way you do? Why? Why not take the initiative more often - take the lead?”
Ivan hesitated - all this soul-searching honesty was a new experience for him and dammit, no matter how warm and fuzzy the man was being, it was still The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan sitting there, boring a hole clear through him with that gaze. He cleared his throat tentatively before speaking. “Sir, I know only too well what most people think of me these days - if not ‘that idiot Ivan’ then surely ‘Does just enough to get by Ivan.’ I’m beginning to fear I may have played the part too well over the years. I know our family's history. I'd hoped that lying low, staying out of the spotlight, and coming off as merely ‘average’ at best might make me a far less obvious target.”
Uncle Aral nodded his shaggy head and responded with an irony-laden grunt. "Ah! As I’d always suspected... An excellent strategy, avoiding the Imperium. How does the old saying go? 'It's not paranoia when they really are out to get you?' As I've told Mark, in this place, paranoia is the key to good health!" A quick, sardonic chuckle followed - then a devastating pause before continuing so quietly Ivan had to again lean in very close to hear him. "I never had that luxury, myself, though, having had a target on my back all my life.” Ivan winced - he knew that to be very literally as well as figuratively true. Terrifyingly so.
Miles always said his father's eyes were the most penetrating he'd ever encountered. Those eyes were downcast now. It was Uncle Aral's turn to fumble silently with the napkin. Ivan knew the man wasn’t looking for sympathy - never! - merely stating a cold, hard fact. His cousin once told him stories he'd gotten from some of Old Piotr's armsmen; how the great guerilla general's wife and children were continuously on the run from the Cetagandans after losing their ancestral home in the destruction of Vorkosigan Vashnoi, during what would be the final years of the Occupation. The Cetas, who had no qualms about destroying an entire city and its inhabitants, leaving the massive crater that was still radioactive three generations later, would have liked nothing better than to capture Princess Olivia Vorbarra Vorkosigan and her children, to use as hostages to force the General to capitulate - or worse. The General’s hard, ferocious reputation was such that Ivan could all too easily imagine him refusing to negotiate for the lives of his family. The child Aral had spent the first six or seven years of his life on the run, in hiding with his family in the Dendarii District's mountains and hill country, never staying more than three or four days at a time in any one place; military camps, safe houses, abandoned homesteads, even caves. On very rare occasions during infrequent lulls in hostilities, the Princess and her children might briefly stay with one set of grandparents or the other before being forced to flee again.
Miles said his father had never spoken to him of his early childhood. No shit! Who could blame him for not wanting to talk about it? What a nightmare! If that all hadn’t been bad enough, not too many years later, when he was eleven, branded as a traitor and having survived the death squad that killed his mother and brother, young Aral had been forced to live on the run again for two more years, becoming both hunter and hunted during Mad Yuri’s Civil War, before actually taking part in his great-uncle’s execution. He'd survived numerous other assassination attempts over the years, including the horrific one that crippled the embryonic Miles. He’d heard Emperor Ezar supposedly had said Vorkosigans were hard to kill - hah! What an understatement! But until Gregor and Laisa popped that all-important heir, Uncle Aral was still #1 on the Imperial Hit List. The danger for him had always run both ways, from factions that wanted to see him on the campstool and those that didn’t. Then there were external threats - from Cetagandans seeking retroactive vengeance for the old Count’s wartime actions, and assorted Komarran radicals just being radically Komarran. In the context of his uncle’s life, his own whinging at being #3 - a distant #4 actually, if you counted Mark - well, how could he not feel embarrassed, even ashamed? Uncle Aral had always faced ‘the family curse’ as he called it, head on - no quarter given, no excuses. How was the man not as mad as Old Yuri himself after all these years?
Those penetrating gray eyes turned on Ivan, full bore again. He felt like an insect on a specimen board, pinned to the spot. “Your mother didn't put me up to this, by the way - this is just between us. You and me. Man to man. I like to think that in a way, I'm speaking with your father's Voice when I say this - it’s high time for Ivan to just be Ivan. Not for your mother, not for me, not for Miles, but for yourself. Can you understand what I'm trying, probably very badly, to say?” From Uncle Aral's passionate expression, it was obvious to Ivan that it was very, very important to him for Ivan to understand. "Stop running away from yourself, boy. With Gregor betrothed, and the empire at peace, it’s safe now - as safe as it can ever be, still being Barrayar and all. The captaincy is a good start. I knew you could do it. All anyone can ask is that do your best, and that will be enough. More than enough. For what it's worth, as a final bit of advice, I humbly offer you what Gregor likes to call The Speech - I gave it to him, too. ‘Reputation is what other people know about you - honor is what you know about yourself. Guard your honor. Let your reputation fall where it will. And outlive the bastards.’”
He sighed deeply, ran a hand across his face and with a sheepish, lopsided little smile, grumped good-naturedly that he was done pontificating for day, then added, “If you're brilliant once, it might pass for a fluke. More than that and the cat's out of the bag. People will know, and expect it. Ask me how I know.” Eyes crinkling, he said, “Not that I'm expecting you to be brilliant all the time, mind. Miles in a good place now, for maybe the first time in his life. Mark... well, Mark is Mark, and doing a hell of lot better than anyone ever could have anticipated. I’m betting he’ll come out on top in whatever he chooses to pursue. I’ll always be eternally grateful for the friendship and companionship you’ve given Miles. I must confess that when he very young, I was afraid, very much afraid, that he would never have real friends, just those sucking up to him because of who his father and grandfather were. I know it can't have been easy for you, getting drawn up, usually against your will, by the force of nature that is Miles.”
Ivan snorted, “It really wasn't hard, sir, so much as it was damned exhausting. Even sniper fire can’t stop the hyperactive little git.”
Heh,” Uncle Aral snorted in wry agreement. “I’m not a religious man, but for the past 30 years, I’ve been thanking whatever gods there might be that you were always there for Miles. Well done, boy. Very well done, indeed.” He sat back and unleashed an amazingly attractive, incredibly boyish grin. Ivan had never actually witnessed it himself but had heard of The Grin. Had he ever! Dutiful son that he was, he had been keeping his weekly luncheon date with Lady Alys in one of the finer dining establishments in Vorbarr Sultana. As they were leaving, they had met a small group of her fellow Vor dragons. From long experience, he knew what was coming. Ivan, darling, be a dear, won’t you, while I have a moment with Countess Vorwhatshername? We won’t be long! Ivan had sat back down, doing his most excellent impersonation of an inanimate object, trying to remain unnoticed for as long as possible so he wouldn’t get roped into the conversation. His mental White Noise Generator had effectively drowned out the sound of the women’s voices until his ears pricked up at the mention of Aral Vorkosigan. How the conversation had gotten around to The Grin, he didn’t have a clue. To his growing discomfort, he heard his mother and one of the other ladyships who had had occasion to witness it, telling their less fortunate companions about The Grin. Raving about it. Gushing. Rather ecstatically. Uncle Aral? Getting the womenfolk hot and bothered? Whoa! Too much information! He blushed through the entire red end of the spectrum on his absent uncle’s behalf. He had to admit, though, seeing The Grin in person, the effect was rather stunning. Uncle Aral was not a handsome man by any means and never had been, but The Grin more than made up for it. Oh, yeah... he could certainly see how most women would find The Grin extremely appealing, applied full force like that. Uncle Aral wore it well. Huh! Who would’ve guessed?
That boyish, sunny grin still firmly in place, his uncle repositioned himself more comfortably in the cushy chair. "So, the next thing on the agenda is for you boys to find wives and settle down - and please, please, please - don't wait as long as I did! By the time your Aunt Cordelia and I got married, my father was so relieved he wouldn’t have cared what species of wife I dragged home, as long as she was fertile. Same goes for me! I’m not getting any younger, you know. I want grandchildren, dammit - and nieces and nephews, too! I want another Little Padma Vorpatril to spoil outrageously! Is that too much for a tired old man to ask?”
Ivan sputtered loudly at Uncle Aral's description of himself as ‘a tired old man’ and responded in the same spirit, "Well, hell, sir, when you put it like that, how can I refuse? I'll have to start on it right away.” To his credit, he snickered only a very little. “But, er... you'll have to talk to Miles and Mark about the grandchildren bit." Satiated with Ma Kobylka's excellent fare and brimming with familial affection, they sat there looking at each other, basking in the warmth of the moment, the water in their eyes gleaming. Life is good, Ivan thought, utterly relaxed for the first time in his uncle's presence. Uncle Aral looked pretty damn mellow himself. Happy, even. Yeah, life was definitely good.
At an almost imperceptible signal from him, Uncle Aral’s armsmen appeared in front of the windows outside the shop. The fulsome goodbyes from Ma Kobylka included hugs and kisses for her Dear Count, followed by his promise to return next year. As the two men left the tea shop, Ma Kobylka trotted out with a small box of tea cakes for both of them, eliciting yet another round of thanks.
“Can we drop you off at home or work?”
“No thank you, sir. I have my lightflyer parked on the next block north, but I’ll walk you to your groundcar.” They walked with his armsmen fore and aft, to the old, heavily armored groundcar - a real battleship even on a modern street - parked two blocks away due to the narrowness of the old streets near the tea shop. It was near full daylight now, and still snowing lightly, but the wind had died down almost entirely.
Before he got into his waiting vehicle, Uncle Aral hesitated in front of him. He looked back over his shoulder, eyes gone distant again, toward Padma's plaque, nearly covered with new snow, then reached out and gripped Ivan’s right arm. “Thank you, again, for staying with me after the death offering.” His rumbling baritone cracked with emotion. “I’ve never had anyone to talk to about your father - my Padma - in a way that was so meaningful. It just wasn’t the same with your mother. She never could understand about the shirt, or the mead, or... well, any of it. This means so much to me, having Padma's son to share my memories with, especially on his birthday. Thank you, Ivan. Just... thank you!”
At the rate the surprises and shocks had been piling up that morning, Ivan probably should not have been caught off guard by that, but he was. Overcome by a slew of emotions that he couldn't possibly sort out on the fly like this, he locked eyes with Uncle Aral's deep, deep gray ones. “No, sir. I’m the one who should be thanking you, for sharing my father with me. I felt closer to him and learned more about him today than in the rest of my life altogether. Absolutely the best Winterfair gift ever I’ve ever had!”
“Sorry I didn’t think of it years ago, boy.”
Oh, hell! Ivan lost it completely at that point - he stooped a little to embrace his uncle, long and hard. Uncle Aral returned the embrace wholeheartedly (hereafter mentally filed away by Ivan as The Hug). In retrospect, The Hug was everything he'd always imagined it would be, enviously watching Miles on the receiving end of so many of them. Warm, strong - very strong - but gentle, fiercely protective, and above all, affectionate - unabashedly so. Just like his uncle, as he was belatedly finding out. With water in their eyes, they pulled away pounding each other on the back in manly, Vorish fashion and shook hands, grinning broadly, before Uncle Aral lowered himself into the waiting vehicle and Armsman Pym closed the canopy around him. Ivan watched him leave and wondered, awed yet again, how a physically smallish man like that could make himself seem so huge and overwhelming. Miles had clearly learned it from a master!
Walking to his parked lightflyer, dodging shop owners clearing the evening's snow from the sidewalks, Ivan sucked in the frigid air in an attempt to clear his head and make sense of the morning, very certain something momentous - something to be cherished had happened. He briefly entertained a wish for something like Simon Illyan's old memory chip so he could replay it over and over in his mind and savor every bit of it exactly as it had happened. By the time he reached his flyer, he had compiled a mental list he dubbed:
Ten Things We’ve Learned About The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister
Count Aral Vorkosigan
ticklish!
does warm and fuzzy rather well for a Barrayaran
in scary good shape for an old guy
maple mead - who knew?
surprisingly sentimental if the Tea House and The Shirt are any indication
has a well-developed appreciation for traditional Barrayaran pastries
very, very, very good friend to his cousin Padma - (ridiculously happy for both of them)
knows what it's like to have absurdly famous relatives
knows what it's like to feel overshadowed and underestimated by them
(that was the shocker of the day - aside from The Shirt)
puts his pants on one leg at a time (OK, so the jury was still out on that one)
*****
EPILOGUE:
All that year, Ivan often had moments when he was never quite sure if that morning had actually happened, due to the dreamlike quality of it. As Winterfair and his father's birthday approached at the end of the year, he was tempted at first to let Uncle Aral have his own time alone with the memories of his beloved cousin Padma. He would forever remember that first sight of his illustrious uncle down on one knee, brushing the snow from the plaque in private remembrance (or as much as the poor guy was ever allowed any kind of privacy in public) Why that one image stuck out so forcefully was ever a mystery to him. But there it was - it stayed with him, perhaps because of the combined potency of the mead, the early hour, and the then nerve-wracking and surreal experience of being absolutely, terrifyingly alone with The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan for the first time. He was powerfully reminded - when all was said and done, of the sheer, overwhelming and unexpected humanity of the man he had come to know that morning. And love.
It was that humanity, in the end, that was the deciding factor. Every year, for the rest of Aral Vorkosigan's life, Ivan would show up at the same time and place, and they'd burn their offerings together. He'd finally learned to see beyond the titles and the aura of greatness that enveloped his uncle so completely - the power, the history, the personal charisma. There was no getting around that, but it no longer terrified him the way it used to - the image of the very human little Aral Vorkosigan, enjoying tea and cream cakes with his Grandda in the Aral Sea Tea House had a lot to do with that. He'd finally and belatedly learned how to relax and enjoy Uncle Aral's eminently enjoyable company. Nothing about the setting changed much - most of the time it was snowing, but sometimes not. The third year there had been a blizzard that ended only hours before - the entire snowbound city was shut down to all but small lightflyer traffic. Ivan had been fairly certain Uncle Aral's security people would not allow him to be out and about in that mess, but there he was, at the usual time, looking fiercely determined. As if a mere blizzard could stop The Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan! Especially when said Legendary Admiral Prime Minister Count Aral Vorkosigan still had ImpSec at his beck and call to clear the path. The sixth year, Ma Kobylka had retired and had been replaced by her equally talented daughter-in-law, who not only ruffled his uncle's hair but Ivan's as well, AND pinched his cheek for good measure, to his uncle's great delight. His uncle's delight - that was what Ivan cherished the most about their time together on those mornings. God knew the man deserved as much delight as he could get, and Ivan was only too happy to indulge him. Uncle Aral had a seemingly endless supply of stories about his Little Padma, and it was hard to say which of them got more pleasure out of his telling them.
That first year after Uncle Aral's death was hard - so much harder than he'd feared, and he had feared it quite a lot, but he forced himself to be there for his uncle's sake. He had brought his blue velvet bag with a gold-embroidered Vorpatril crest - Miles no doubt had inherited the Vorbarra one. He’d brought his own flask, filled with maple mead from Uncle Aral's Vorkosigan Estates Meadery. But most importantly, under his uniform, he wore The Shirt - willed to him by Uncle Aral, to everyone's surprise but his own. Wearing it, he felt closer to his uncle and his father than ever before. It felt supremely satisfying and complete, somehow. Full circle, yeah! He gulped down that first encroggling swig of mead and raised the flask toward the flames. "To Xav Vorbarra's Grandsons, Forever."