symphony

[isthisart]

The day of the party approaches. Linya learns a Barrayaran-original solo piano symphony, adds some flourishes of her own where the composer has marked that it may be played "freely", memorizes the whole thing, and arranges to be playing it on the grand piano when party guests file in on the day of. She smiles and nods at them and takes note of how they arrange themselves in the room; there are thirteen minutes in the piece unless she decides she needs an extra three (if there seem to be a lot of stragglers; if there isn't a good path to the people she wants to meet and around the people she wants to avoid) and takes the repeat at the end to prolong it.

She doesn't wind up taking the repeat; the end of the symphony without it has her playing the final chord when Lord Auditor Vorthys is nearer than anyone she's hoping to evade. She counts out the beats, holds for a moment longer, and then lifts her hands from the keyboard. She has decided that given her choice of titles she's going to address this particular guest as -

"Professor Vorthys."

Comments

[first_loyalty]

"Ick," says Ekaterin. "About Jackson's Whole, I mean. I don't know very much about the place, but the little that I know is... ick."

[isthisart]

"I agree completely. If it had turned out to be a complete disaster to have me here and there had been no choice but to ship me off somewhere else my stated criterion was that it be a reasonably civilized planet - defined significantly to exclude Jackson's Whole."

[first_loyalty]

"That seems like a reasonable definition of civilized. But... I hope Barrayar will be civilized enough to keep you."

[isthisart]

"I'm very happy here so far. I have a piano and a market for pens and a Miles."

[first_loyalty]

Ekaterin giggles. "Is that last part very important?"

[isthisart]

"Quite. I'm terribly fond of him."

[first_loyalty]

"I'm glad!"

[isthisart]

"He's so cute."

[first_loyalty]

"He did seem charming, from what I saw of him."

[isthisart]

"Yes. Also, he braids my hair."

This is a party, so Linya's hair is in a particularly ambitious braid cluster.

[first_loyalty]

"...He's very good at it," says Ekaterin.

[isthisart]

"Yes. He is. He practices a lot and is very perfectionistic about it and it's adorable."

Linya is bragging about her adorable husband! Is this better than bragging about pens? Unclear!

[first_loyalty]

"It sounds it!"

[isthisart]

"How did you and your husband meet?" wonders Linya.

[first_loyalty]

"Oh - he knew my father, and my father arranged us."

[isthisart]

"Is that commonplace here?"

[first_loyalty]

"Among the Vor, yes. Although I think it's getting less so. My father is a little old-fashioned."

[isthisart]

"Does it tend to work out reasonably well? I'm gathering that unlike the awarding of haut-wives, where it's entirely possible for the pair in question to barely interact, there remains an expectation for arranged marriages under other circumstances that they be - marriagelike."

[first_loyalty]

"It's... it's all right. We're not forced to marry, if we don't like each other - if I'd been put off Tien from the start I could just have declined to say my vows, and not have suffered anything but my father's disappointment. I took my oath of my own will."

[isthisart]

"Okay. Well, I suppose it's okay unless your father has particularly disastrous disappointment."

[first_loyalty]

"Not especially, no."

[isthisart]

"All right then. Haut out-marriages are usually ostensibly volunteered for, if not as enthusiastically as mine, but someone who was meant to be shown the door and didn't go would find this uncomfortable after a few declined opportunities... internally there's no relationship arrangement of any kind, though."

[first_loyalty]

"Uncomfortable?"

[isthisart]

"Oh, if I had gotten to age forty-five without befriending Lisbet or marrying Miles or doing anything else very much off-script, and I'd turned down two or three or four ghem-lords due to be awarded brides over the last fifteen years, I imagine I would find that on aging out of my improv group the more advanced one would find that I mysteriously didn't pass their audition, that the kitchen was always having mysterious shortages of whatever I wanted to eat, that I couldn't convince any of my favorite servitors to put in for transfers to a private estate when I was ready to move to one, that I couldn't secure such an estate at all, that whenever I marked a spot in any lab or workshop as being mine I'd come back to find all my tools put away and my project disturbed, that no one would talk to me, that if I had a love-poem - I'm not sure of the best word to encompass the category in local dialect; lover? - if I had a romantic interest, at any rate, that all his friends thought he was too good for me and ought to leave me to my lesser marriage-related fate, that I was not invited to go anywhere or do anything but sit in my apartment and become resigned."

[first_loyalty]

"That sounds... uncomfortable, yes."