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Aral Vorkosigan, who, in his life of ninety and not so little more, had been bisexual and monogamic, an evader and a killer, an Admiral and a Regent, a Prime Minister and a Vice-Roy of Sergyar, was now peacefully dreaming in the armchair at the fireplace. Only a little light oozed through the thick veil of falling snow, but despite being dim, this light reflected from everything. The earth was wrapped in snow, and snowflakes were lazily floating in the air. The old count approved the snow blanket, though he chose a woolen plaid for himself. A distant descendant of Zap the Cat occupied his lap with all his weight– not a chance to move him - having chosen the old count in his turn.
Or rather, Charcoal, a luxurious black beast with the noticeably bitchy temper, had long taken his preferences in Aral. He expressed his favor by graciously accepting his food from the count’s hands, by claiming the right to prior attention and care, by seizing an available limb with his teeth in case of rejection, and by affectionate trembling of his tail in any other case.
In his mind Aral had been already calling the feline “Vorrutier” long ago. As a result, he once scared Cordelia to death, when he woke up because of shuffled meows and honestly said “Vorrutier” as an answer to what he was looking for in the wardrobe in the middle of the night. Let whatever the countess concluded from that event be on her head, but up to now all the counts Vorkosigan, damn it, had perished sound in mind and memory, and the Tenth Count was not going to break the tradition, though he used to break a lot of this stuff, for sure…
Aral yawned and scratched Charcoal behind the ear, before the cat decided to take the huff. A cat is not only a cute, affectionate creature, and, at the very worst, several pounds of meat, but also an excellent hand warmer, so it is no good to offend the good animal prematurely. Although, this particular animal would most likely be an offending party himself. Oh, he rumbled. Now Aral had to scratch for a while, until he got bored. Until the cat got bored. When it happened, he would bite, continuing to rumble, and would manage to dodge no matter how tight he was held… Vorrutier, indeed. He’d better check how many balls he pulled from the Winterfair Tree today and where he managed to roll them in. Later.
The main thing now is not to slip up on this balls, though when the house is ruled by a capricious cat who demands constant worshipping, one gets used to checking the ground automatically… Aral grinned in his dream, remembering, how often Charcoal impudently lied in the center of a room, fooling just anyone without a long practice to step on him… And Aral told them not to make a fuss of the goddamn cat, or they were not going to control him anymore, but everybody – all of them – were soon penetrated by a guilt complex, and soon the beast was turning folks and servants around his tail. Vorrutier, no doubt… Well, one may allow it to a cat. Behind the ear, now his throat… If only the joints weren’t in pain, what d’you say, beast? It can’t be helped, the impacts of the soltoxin poisoning articulated themselves more with the time going, and we will look at you when you’re just short of a hundred…
His fingers found something not referring strictly to the cat. Curiosity appeared to be stronger than doze and managed to make him lift his eyelids a little bit. Charcoal followed the lead and stared at him with his big intensively yellow eyes – something like, why, master, I’ve not even bitten you, keep on sleeping, just make sure you keep scratching and petting as well – and yawned wide and temptingly. A thing around his neck now became identifiable – it was a blue ribbon. How happened he didn’t pull it away still? Interesting. The cat couldn’t bear Miles’s offsprings but Sander, whom he tolerated charitably, probably, as he sensed his master’s oldest grandson in him, but he let Mark’s youngest daughter, Lucinda, to do just everything. And what direction this world goes? Why should they bring so many new names in the house, a citizen of the world, so to say, why not call just one Cordelia, but of course, you shouldn’t expect even this much from a Jacksonian clone, though Miles doesn’t do any better, this awful youth, and where the world goes anyway… “And it doesn’t mean I start to resemble my father, not a bit”, Aral explained to Vorrutier, “because I don’t say it aloud. Well, now do you want to tell me, bro, how come you let Lucy tie a ribbon on you? You’re showing off, bro, you’re showing off…” Charcoal meowed agreeably and rubbed Aral’s palm with his ear. Good beast, good. But it’s just not right. Seven granddaughters, and not a single Cordelia.
Something trembled and buzzed outside the window – it was photoreceptors starting work, and the lights turned on. Why, is it so late already?.. He’d better drowse a little and get up, but the evening is so heavy, it’s pressing his chest with its soft, but tangible burden, and he doesn’t feel like moving at all. He can open his eyes once again as well, there are no joints here, but he has already done it, and so what?.. What a disgrace, really, he got too lazy, and even partnered with a cat on this ground. Shame on you, officer… All right, let’s sleep on as a ruse de guerre. Because lately Cordelia acquired a habit of harnessing him to some socially useful tasks, wherever she saw him in vertical position outside the bedroom, regardless of the fact his presence usually made no difference to the task whatsoever.
Somewhere in the middle of this thought Aral’s nose itched. He didn’t feel like pulling the other palm from under the plaid, so he scratched his nose with the right one, drawing Vorrutier’s attention from the halt in his petting by the conversation.
“Don’t you think, beast, that the Countess is too energetic the last months? Or is it me breaking down?” and he shivered when instead of soft black fur his hand returned on the wiry – black? – curls. The weight on his lap also changed somehow… What’s that, did I fall asleep or what?
“I’m the last person to know it, really, my dearest cousin”, a purr from his lap came. Aral was even abandoned by his sleep at this sound, as much as it was possible. His eyes opened on their own, and stared at a young man, resting his head on his lap. The man smiled. Very tenderly, very sweet, making Aral’s chest itch and a veil cover his eyes. He managed to blink it out at last and could see a blue ribbon, being a very comical sight on the neck of a very young Ges, who, on top of that, was making a blatantly innocent face at the moment. “What a silly death!” Aral thought grumpily. And scratched one more Vorrutier behind his ear. He dodged cat-like – really like Charcoal – and stopped when Aral already expected a bite. He touched Aral’s wrist with a tongue. Licked once, then again.
“Well, now, it’s enough, bro”, warned Aral.
His touches were… pleasant, even too much.
“You don’t like it?” whispered Ges. “I may as well really stop, you know”.
“I know”, Aral sighed.
Ges stopped toying and turned to him, wishing to see the results of his… administrations. He is beautiful. He is intoxicatingly, devastatingly beautiful, impossible to keep in mind, letting alone to draw…
“Am I dead already?” offered Aral, clumsily trying to catch the loose end of the bow. When the world turns upside down, the first priority is not to surprise and try to catch up with the details of the scene.
“Are you in such a rush to die?” Ges was amused. “Or to unpack me?”
“To move an unsuitable detail of the outfit. Were you told by chance, bro, that you’re not exactly a birthday present? In any sense”.
“Cruel”, he caught his hand, pressed his check against the palm.
“Don’t overdo it. Where did you put the beast?”
“Somewhere”, he waved with his free hand. “There are lots of space… Hell, he’s all right, don’t be afraid. You always care about your folks too much, don’t you, A-ral…”
“Something like that”. You used to be one of “my folks” too, you see. And you still would have been, if you had not screwed up as a selfish son of a bitch, and the way you cried out my name, syllable by syllable, chanting-like, truimphatnly… I forgot that part. I forgot and didn’t let it on the surface, but it was like this. Ges? Ges, is that you? Are you real?
He lost his track and missed the moment when Vorrutier’s hands started to pet the grabbed palm with light, careful moves, and realized only when his fingers became hotter and more persistent.
He needs to stop this, but he can’t help it… And Ges is good at carnal things, an immanent talent. He pets, and pinches, and stretches the muscles, speeds up the flow of blood, and you are ready to forget about the pain… Until he pulls the big finger impudently and blankly. And again, with more effort, and you can hear the disgusting crackle, and he grins even more widely. “You like it, ddddont’t you?” Aral whispers. He is perfectly capable of choking him even with these hands, if only he lets himself… But no pain comes. On the contrary… And Ges is now working on the swollen joints, and the dreaming pain wakes up to meet the dry hit flaming up – and the pain burns itself. There is no pain any more, only a blinding shine, where every cell is enjoying peace at last, and it’s so unexpectedly easy to be mobile again. “What the hell…”
He needs to stop. He needs to stop this. Immediately. His curiosity is in the way, though. (Let it be curiosity?) Shall he shift his look and get hold of himself? It’s going to make things only worse. His index finger is held in one hand, his middle one in the other, and Aral can’t see Ges’s eyes when he attends his tongue to the big finger, and his memory and imagination surely have conspired to throw all kinds of nonsense into his head. “Well, bro, any massager would get a heart attack seeing your tricks”. But unexpectedly it is… pleasant. It’s pleasant, when you have a piece of your body, relieved from pain, licked immediately. Literally now. So, it’s high time to explain it to him that a dead man need to lie where he should, that is, where he was put, and don’t make things which even living people… ah!
There are lots of sensible nerves in the tips of fingers, and… yeah, bro, it sounds like you to excite them all. Let us assume, one can get used to this external touches, even to these touches of the tongue, but when he melts a joint by a joint, saturate them with the light and freedom, with the moaning joy of healing, when Ges starts to administrate the wrist, at the same time embracing his suffering big finger with his lips, and yet tenderly, carefully sucks and teases…
He has to stop this. He doesn’t have to. Because that’s a dream, it can’t happen in his real life, can it? Here, he’s already stopped it himself.
“Do you want to thank me?” offers Ges ironically, tenderly lulling (“Good God!” as Countess say) his appeased palm in his own.
“Erm… well, thank you”, he is out of breath because of all his antics and can’t keep the tone. He says it almost heartedly. Almost up to his true… sensations.
“Well, thank you?” teases Ges. Kindly, unlike himself… maybe it’s how things are supposed to be in a dream. “Well, you’re welcome”, he lays a satisfied limb on Aral’s lap and covers it with a plaid. Then he pulls the other from the warmth… unequal exchange, but he doubts he cares… It won’t do to fall asleep while sleeping. “Now I’ll awake. Right now”.
“Please, wake me up, will you?” he means: you lulled me, you should wake me up if you want to chat, but his brain has retracted and is making acid comments that he sure went barmy in his sunset years, who you’re asking and about what? And, above all, in what expressions?
“A brick to the ear, a kiss to the window?” despite evil giggles and all the non-standard disposition at his disposal, the kiss is pretty much according to the canon, though the relevance of the canon is in question. His lips gently touch the back of Aral’s palm.
“Am I tender enough?” he asks smarmily.
Enough. Meaning he could do something worse – it’s surely not going to do any good… The only good thing Countess wouldn’t know he dreams about Vorrutier, standing on one knee and kissing his hand. The only thing he lacks here is a psychoanalyst. A Betan one. Right. If you see a foolish dream, you’ll see a Betan psychoanalyst, sure sign…
“Didn’t you mixed up the poses, bro?” he should at least try to moderate him, what if he succeeds? “I didn’t look exactly like a beautiful dame even in my best years. Which, I may assure you, are far behind”.
“I see”, Ges giggles again. He raises his hand, runs his fingers over Aral’s face… Yes, wrinkles and pain lines, what would he expect. Yes, the brows are gray too. And grew too much, and you don’t groom them. Oh. Ges, it can’t be you like me like this, can it? You’re teasing, right?
“Stop it. It’s late already”.
“Why late? Half past five”, when once during a training travel Ges lost his watch, he looked at Aral’s with the same spontainety. He would twitch for a couple of days, then got used… “I have enough time for a second hand”.
“You can”, let’s hope it won’t do any harm.
“Shouldn’t you ask?” smarmily again.
“Ges, please”.
“Shouldn’t you ask politely?» even more smarmily, almost dangerously. “You don’t know the words? Shall I prompt?”
He pulles the finger, crackle… It’s painful like this, the nerve system notifies indignantly. We’ll take it into the account, but won’t demonstrate. Good, he may as well howl silently.
“You’re macho, aren’t you, bro? Do you enjoy it?”
“What about you? Do you need a foreplay?” offensive giggle. “I didn’t know you were a maiden, coz”.
You enjoy it, no doubt. That’s OK, you’ll stop now. It’s your right to insult and my right to ignore. And to pull my hand out.
“So you don’t know the words, let me prompt. “Adjure te…”
“Actually, they usually adjure snakes. And jinns. I bet you won’t make it into the bottle?”
“First, I know this joke”, hostile smile, “second, you’re better at sticking your head in inappropriate places…”
No, he didn’t blow. What for? He passes his big finger from his temple to the lips and backwards, touching with the other fingers his black curls and the ear.
“You’re beautiful. How could I forget?”
It’s over. Short circuit. He’ll never get him like this anymore, a pity. You didn’t expect it, bro, did you? Well, I’m sorry!
“Thank you for the hand, Ges. You really have a gift”.
“What gift?” he screws his eyes up. You’re not playing now, Aral thinks, you’re not playing and not counting…
“Your intuition. You always knew the best way”.
Alas, the best way for the body only. No, he shouldn’t make it clear. And he shouldn’t say a body can make mistakes.
“You’re so accommodating”, he says smugly. Yes, go on thinking it was your service. “Why didn’t you realize it earlier?”
“I was an idiot, that’s why”.
I was. When I thought that we could be together with you always desiring… to know the best way.
“You’re not going to anymore?”
“How should I know? I’ll try, though”.
The first kiss on the lips is bittersweet, as a prize for previous omissions. “Ges. It’s so easy with you and so hard. The rules are so simple, but it’s so hard to accept them. And how many times can we start once again?”
“Once again?” Aral whispers in his lips. Ges laughs.
“As you wish, bro… wait a bit”, he backs off. Aral stretches his hand to dive into his hair again – and… it’s not that he forgets about his intention, but… almost. Because it’s his hand. Young, strong, healthy. Only the hand?
Aral leans forward. His back. Neck. Legs… Ges climbs on his lap. Let him sit, no use to resist… To embrace? He may as well embrace him…
“Don’t bite it, I don’t like it”, he needs to remind.
“You do”, he reminds.
“I don’t”, imagination boggles, he discusses a matter of principle. “Just get excited in bed”.
“Nothing funny”, Aral thinks, trying to find a comfortable position for his palms on Ges’s back. He may press his palms, and he may lower… Damn! A comfortable position on Ges’s back is when his hands are sliding this back. Especially when Ges bends it like this… By the way, it’s really not funny.
“Aral”, Ges whispers. “Aral, Aral. My happiness. My joy. My bitter sweet, my merciless sun. Come with me. I’ll show you away from here… You’ll be forever young… Come with me. Aral, come with me. Please…”
Aral closes his eyes and remembers the very first time. He couldn’t remember his flight on the lightflyer through the storm. It was the voice in the transmitter he remembered well, which he thought to be a delirium at the time. How they sawed a completely unwounded, healthy body from the royally crushed machine… he didn’t remember that…
The same as at that time, he answers “yes”.
“No”, says Ges. “Why should I? Did you always come when I needed you?”
His second time. A familiar face, breaking his sleep several moments before it was too late to wake up. He said “yes”. In despair, thinking only that it might work again if it had worked before, thinking only it was too early to die for a woman beside, if not for him. He let the word away and dismayed: what if this time… But no.
They even didn’t report Cordelia about the third time. After the forth time Aral got scared. It’s not a human who calls him. A human would understand, twig, change the pattern… When Ges came at the fifth time, Aral couldn’t hate him.
“No,” Ges says. “You’re gonna live”.
Aral opens his eyes to imprint the cruel young face in his memory. It’s just the dark room. And the cat on his lap.
Well, let’s say the negotiations with death were quite successful for today. It’s not like he really believed. It’s a complete nonsense. There is no such thing as a posthumous replica of someone’s personality with the power to turn off misfortune. There are no such personalities who thinks that “you’re gonna live” is the cruelest punishment, if anything.
So why did he lie?
Because it works!
Vorrutier jumped from his laps and went to the door, showing his impatience. Well? What else? Aral yawned and stood up. Unexpectedly easy. Well, of course, his joints crackled. But still…
“Yes, yes, enough, bro. I’m on my way”, Aral opened the door. The black beast pressed his back to Aral’s leg and ran to the kitchen with the short meow. Stopped. Turned around tentatively. Got it. It will happen here. That means he needs to go and do things, to feed the cat, to look for Countess, and so on…
Let aside Vorrutier, let aside living people, but he is ashamed to lie to The One Who Calls. As if he is lying to the child. Or to a mentally disabled. But he can’t leave Cordelia alone. Not like that. Not on Barrayar she hates. She is here because of him. And he is here for her. It was and it will be. Because the Vorkosigans, damn it, never leave their people. Because Aral found his women and will never leave her alone. And if Betans live one hundred and twenty years, well, he’ll have to live for one hundred and thirty. Even if he’ll have to negotiate with Death ten thousand times. It’s not like he believed, anyway…
He heard the explosion in the kitchen. The explosion, that has ruined the room with the fireplace for sure. It’s a pity, it was a good plaid. He reached for the comm: “Sweetheart, I’m all right”. They were people to take care about the rest.
After all, once he told Ges the truth. Before she came back. Very long ago. Many years ago.
But that doesn’t count.