Captain Vorpatril's Alliance by Lois McMaster Bujold Read Free Book Online Page B

commanding a major territorial District on the north continent of their planet. In their way, Tej supposed they were the equivalents of a Jacksonian Great House barons, except that they came by their positions by mere inheritance, instead of having to work and scheme for them. It seemed a poor system to her, one that did nothing to assure that only the strongest and smartest rose to the top. Or the most treacherous , she was uncomfortably reminded. Count Falco, a bluff, hearty looking, white-haired man, had no son named Ivan. Pass on.
    Several high-ranking military officers followed, and some Imperial and provincial government men with assorted opaque and archaic-sounding titles. There was an Admiral Eugin Vorpatril, but he had no son named Ivan either.
    Belatedly, she remembered the little paper cards from Vorpatril’s pocket. There were several Ivan Vorpatrils, including a school administrator on Sergyar and a wine merchant on the South Continent, but only one Ivan Xav.
    His entry was short, half a screen, but it did have a confirming vid scan. It seemed to be of him as much a younger officer, though, suggesting that he had improved with age. Tej wasn’t sure how such a stiff, formal portrait could still look feckless. His birth date put him at 34 standard-years old, now. The entry listed his father, Lord Padma Xav Vorpatril, as deceased, and his mother, Lady Alys Vorpatril, as still living.
    Her eye paused, arrested. His father’s death date was the same as his birth date. That’s odd . So, her Ivan Xav was half an orphan, and had been so for a long time. That seemed…painless. You could not miss, fiercely and daily, a man you’d never met.
    She was reminded of his horrible vase. Who had he sent it to, again? She bit her lip, bent, and spelled the awkward name out very carefully. All those Vor names tended to come out as a blurred Voralphabet in her mind, unless she paid strict attention.
    Double oh .
    A very uncommon name, Vorkosigan; barely a dozen or so living adult males. But she should have recognized it nonetheless. The clan Count of that surname appeared, when she reordered the entire database by significance, second on the whole list, right after Emperor Gregor Vorbarra. Count, Admiral, Regent, Prime Minister, Viceroy…Aral Vorkosigan’s entry scrolled on for what seemed several meters of closely written text. Unofficial titles included such nicknames as Butcher of Komarr , or Gregor’s Wolf . He did have a son named Miles, of just about her Ivan Xav’s age. VorMiles also had an entry much longer than Captain Vorpatril’s, if much shorter than his sire’s.
    Tej was not as vague as most Jacksonians about the history of this patch of the wormhole nexus. But she’d never expected even to visit here, let alone be trapped for months, so she hadn’t exactly studied up. Her original evacuation route had called for a direct transit across the Barrayaran Imperium, not even touching down on the surfaces of Komarr or Sergyar, just making what orbital or jump-station transfers were needed to reach her final destination of Escobar. Or even, when that goal had begun to seem unsafe as well, to Beta Colony of imagined-happy memory. No one would blink at Rish there. Well, all right, they probably would blink, she was made to be riveting, but no one would harass her. Anyway, the point was, this stop had never been on any sensible planner’s itinerary.
    Barrayar had one of the most bizarre colonization histories in the whole of the Nexus, which was full of the relicts and results of audacious human ventures. The story extended far back to the 23rd Century CE, when wormhole travel had first been developed, launching a human diaspora from Old Earth. A prize because of its breathable atmosphere, the planet drew an early settlement attempt of some fifty thousand would-be colonists. Who promptly disappeared from all contact when their sole wormhole link proved unstable, collapsing with catastrophic results. Missing, presumed