overture

[isthisart]

Nine days into their fourteen-day trip, the courier ship arrives in the Komarr system. Five more jumps to go. Miles is not yet capable of peeling himself off a willing Linya before he passes out (and willingness is in no short supply), and the resulting peculiar sleep schedule causes Ivan no end of giggling. Linya draws him diagrams of more complicated braids as aspirational goals (getting five and a half feet of slidy-soft hair to be in even the simplest braid properly is a little tricky), which induces Miles to spend most of a day fascinatedly braiding and rebraiding her hair in various configurations. She, meanwhile, writes pen software that eats standard comconsole software and renders it for pen-ability in what she thinks is a user-friendly manner, and works on Russian.

When they reach the Komarr system, there's a message squirt, bounced at lightspeed from the little ships that do nothing but dance back and forth from side to side of the intervening wormholes collecting and broadcasting data. It says that Captain Illyan invites Miles to supplement his mission report by bringing his wife along.

Comments

[thisvorlunatic]

Once again, Miles is called upon to navigate. Vorkosigan House is not quite as mazelike as ImpSec HQ, but it definitely has its quirks.

[isthisart]

Linya plucks her pen from its resting place and draws herself a little map as they walk. She doesn't break stride, but she does slow down a little; it is not externally obvious whether this is to make cartography easier or because she's nervous about meeting the Countess.

[thisvorlunatic]

"Ooh, that's well thought of," says Miles when she starts drawing the map. "Maybe you won't get lost here as often as most people."

[isthisart]

"Is that a common problem?"

[thisvorlunatic]

"Yeah. New Armsmen, new servants, new anybody."

[isthisart]

"Perhaps there should be a stack of flimsies at the door with maps."

[thisvorlunatic]

He laughs. "Maybe. I don't know, it's not really that people get lost frequently per se, it's just that nearly everyone gets lost at least once or twice. I could easily imagine all the newcomers deciding the maps were overkill, only to regret that judgment sometime after midnight when they take a wrong turn on the way to the lav."

[isthisart]

"No one could say they had not been warned, though."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Well, now, that just makes setting out the maps seem cruel."

[isthisart]

"Perhaps they should be pinned to the walls at intervals. With 'you are here' marked."

[thisvorlunatic]

He giggles. "Will that be your contribution? It's sort of a tradition, for every new Lady or Countess Vorkosigan to add something or change something about the house - my mother put in a lift tube."

[isthisart]

"I think I'd want to mull that one over longer. I didn't know I was actually entitled to remodel something when I suggested the maps."

[thisvorlunatic]

"There's nothing stopping you from making more than one change, of course - well, not in principle. In practice, of course everything has to run by my parents, who might squawk a bit if you suggested a force dome over the whole house or, I don't know, a kitten orchard."

[isthisart]

"Your house is not ugly enough for me to suggest force-doming it, and I do not have any particular interest in overseeing a kitten orchard."

[thisvorlunatic]

"Well, that's a promising start."

[isthisart]

"Something in the garden department is a possibility, but I think it would probably wind up being strictly composed of plants."

[thisvorlunatic]

"No rush, anyway. Get to know the house before deciding what you want to do to it, that seems logical."

[isthisart]

"Mm-hm." Map map. Follow follow.

[thisvorlunatic]

They arrive at the library soon enough. Shelves of real print books stand in tidy old-fashioned rows, interrupted by the occasional cozy-looking alcove in which to read them. The overwhelming majority are printed in the Barrayaran variant of the Cyrillic alphabet that saw common use for all four of the planet's languages during the Time of Isolation. A comconsole perches near the empty fireplace at the far end of the room, looking faintly out of place, a newcomer uncertain of its welcome even after however many years it has lived here. Miles paces into the room, scouting for parents.

[greatcomposure]

There's one!

She emerges from one of the alcoves and envelops her son in a brief hug, then stands back with her hands on his shoulders and a faintly chastising look on her face. "Miles, heart, you do have the most incredible way of turning up unexpected complications in unlikely places. And I wish you'd sent some form of personal message - I had to find out you were married from Simon Illyan. I don't even know if congratulations are in order, or..." and here her gaze travels to Linya as she lets go of Miles, "something more complicated. Am I welcoming you to the family, or housing an exile or a refugee? Some combination? None of the above?"

[isthisart]

"I am not technically exiled, nor presently seeking refuge from anything in particular," says Linya. "It's nice to meet you."

[greatcomposure]

"Likewise," says Miles's mother. "So we've ruled out exile and refugee. That leaves Family, or Other. Which do you prefer?"

[isthisart]

"Having no experience whatever with families, I feel unqualified to answer beyond the part where I am, in fact, married to your son."

[greatcomposure]

"I think that makes it family by default, but I'm not sure of all the intricacies here."

[thisvorlunatic]

"We don't plan to stop being married, if that's what you're driving at," interjects Miles. "I'm in this for the long haul."