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If I Would...	By : quietann Category: M through R > Miles Vorkosigan Saga Views: 1351 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Miles Vorkosigan Saga, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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4
Aral's next off-planet stint was scheduled to be only a few days long. From what Ges could tell, Aral was serving as an aide de camp, carrying messages and documents between the space-based forces and various government factions to push forward some delicate negotiations. Aral's departure from Vorrutyer House was cheerful; Ges's sister planted kisses on his hands and face and gazed at him adoringly, while Aral embraced Ges in a hearty, masculine hug. For Ges, it was all very confusing; after all, less than a week ago, Aral had nearly thrown himself at Ges, and then immediately gone and made up with his wife in what Ges assumed to be a rather brutal way -- and just the previous night, Ges and Aral had had such an undercurrent of lust between them, as Aral had sketched Ges. And now Aral was acting maddeningly like none of that ever happened, all was well among them, and he'd look forward to a happy reunion with his wife.
This picture of domestic bliss was marred when only a night later, Ges's sister once again had Lord Vorwyn visiting her. Ges, who felt something like a child watching a balloon getting inflated, knowing it would pop sometime, chose to spend another night away. He wondered when his fellow officers would start teasing him about the number of nights he was spending cooped up in the spartan bunkroom at Ops rather than the relative opulence of Vorrutyer House. Or how long it would take for them to figure out that he was staying away from some sort of domestic trouble. It was farcical to think that his official duties were at all overwhelming; this was Ops -- one step above "the scum of the Service," the brave warriors who sometimes got out of control. Like Aral? But the only one who seemed to have noticed Ges's changed habits was Major Olrent, who'd given him the honor guard requisitions to handle, and also was one of the men Ges had seen at Lis's pub when he and Aral had been there.
Olrent had offered him a ride out there one night, but Ges had declined. "It's not really what I'm after, these days."
"Well, it sure looked like it was, when you and Vorkosigan were visiting. I don't know what happened behind that curtain, but you two practically set the place afire with the heat between you."
"Um... yes. I don't really want to talk about it, though. Ar... Vorkosigan's honor is worth more than a bit of gossip." Ges's slip of the tongue had won him a quirked eyebrow from Olrent, but Ges supposed that his relationship, such as it was, with Aral was an open secret now. In fact, he had to assume that ImpSec had an agent out at Lis's monitoring the clientele, and probably some poor ImpSec analyst counting "monitoring Aral Vorkosigan's lovelife" among his duties.
"Well, Vorrutyer, I can see that you might not want to talk with a superior officer about it. But if you're distracted with heartache over it, go talk to Lis some afternoon, before things get busy."
Aral himself had told Ges that Lis was a good confidante, which increased the value of Olrent's endorsement. After lunch one day during the week that Aral was gone, Ges begged off his duties, pleading exhaustion -- which was true, given that he'd logged into his comconsole in the middle of the night and got through more than a day's work by lunchtime -- and headed out.
Lis smiled at him as he came through the door and shook the snow off his coat before hanging it up. There were only a handful of men visible, plus whoever coupled beyond the curtains of a few of the private booths. He glanced towards them, and Lis said, "Those men'll keep themselves busy for a while. Tell me -- Ges, right? -- what's brought you out here to talk with me?" So Aral was slightly wrong about Lis; not only did she know everything that happened here, she seemed to know a great deal about what happened elsewhere, among men of a certain persuasion.
"Eh, what you usually hear, I'll bet. Love troubles." He tried, and failed, to sound diffident.
Lis pulled him a mug of her excellent cider. "Well, you've picked yourself a good partner for that sort of thing. I don't know Aral well, but he's got a stick up his butt about honor, and a temper, and a wife. Your sister, in case you've forgotten. Why the hell do you want to get tangled up in that?"
Her language was blunt, but her tone was kind, and Ges supposed she picked up a few crude phrases from spending all her time with men. He doubted that any of her clientele moderated their language around her as they would for a proper Barrayaran woman. "It's been going on a long time. Nearly five years, actually."
"You mean...you didn't stop when he got married? He doesn't seem the sort who'd go for that, at least not for a few years until he realizes that your sister isn't going to cure him of his affliction." Lis shook her head sadly.
"Well... he's stopped in some ways, but not others. And I only stopped because he did. So I wait. Part of the reason -- OK, the main reason, as far as I am concerned -- that he's married to my sister is that I set the whole thing up. But it's not going well. She needs more attention than Aral can give her, and ..."
"I know all about your sister's reputation. Beautiful little minx she is; I'd have her myself if I thought she'd even give a fat old lady like me a second glance."
Oh. Lis's self-mocking didn't disguise anything. For a moment, Ges contemplated whether Lis and his sister might enjoy each other's company, but for all his sister's varied appetites, she'd never given him any evidence that she was interested in women. And her life was complicated enough, and managing those complications was Ges's duty, too, in a way.
"So what do you want?" Lis asked him.
"Aral."
"And what have you been doing to get him?"
"Directly? Not much. It's strange." Ges had a sudden insight, and went on. "He's... well, he's always been the one doing, so to speak, between us. Except now, ever since we graduated from the Imperial Service Academy, he never quite finishes what he starts."
"I about figured as much, after that night. I don't ever think I've seen two men so frustrated as you two were, walking out of here." She took a deep breath. "Here's my take on it. You've set him a nice little trap with this marriage, expecting that he'd eventually just walk into it and reopen his arms to you. But he's got too many obstacles in his mind to actually get that far. He's much too Old Vor. We are, after all, discussing the great General Count Piotr Vorkosigan's son. You are sitting there waiting for him instead of chasing him in."
The metaphor made a lot of sense to Ges. So much of what he was doing with Aral now, and so much that he'd done when they were at the Academy, was a sort of gentle persuasion, showing Aral what he could do and making it easy for him to do it.
"So I need to push, instead of pull." The idea terrified Ges.
"Yes. No guarantees of course, but all this waiting isn't helping you any better."
The night before Aral was scheduled to return, Ges escorted his sister to the wedding of one of Count Vorpatril's sons. At the reception, his sister's eyes lit up when she spotted Andros Vortorren across the room. She took Ges's hand, and plunged through the crowd to get to her lover.
Vortorren nodded a greeting to Ges, and took his sister's hands and bent to kiss them. Ges noticed that the gesture was a bit more than a kiss, as Vortorren circled his fingers around his sister's wrists, turned her hands over, and tightened his grip as he kissed her palms. Then he pushed her arms apart and up against the wall behind her with a steady pressure. As he released her, he asked, "So, have you considered my offer?"
"Yes," she said. "I'm very excited." Her eyes sparkled and she blushed.
"Well then." Vortorren gave the air a delicate sniff. "So you are, my dear. A nice lesson I have set up for you, as you'll see. Ges, you'll give us a ride back to Vorrutyer House in an hour or so?"
"Of course," Ges replied amiably. Vortorren was clearly aware that Ges knew his sister's secrets, and the man had the savoir faire to make it seem like it didn't matter.
Vortorren moved off into the crowd with Ges's sister, promising to introduce her to some of his friends. As Ges turned, he found Count Vorkosigan, standing off to one side about ten feet away with a hard, cold frown on his face. He'd obviously heard everything.
Ges thought back to Lis's advice, and added to it. Get to Aral before Piotr does. He'd thought he would have at least a few days to plan how to push Aral instead of pulling him. Now, he had the rest of the night, and not much more.
Ges had a reasonably good idea about what plans Andros Vortorren had for his sister. He'd never been too interested in that sort of play, but it promised to be different enough to be well worth watching, so he slipped into his usual spot in the closet, behind the grille. He noticed that the bed was freshly made with the sheets he'd given her and Aral for their engagement. She'd packed them away when she'd started her affair with Vorwyn, and this was the first time she'd used them with any partner other than Aral. Ges found this to be vaguely disturbing.
He heard laughter from the other room, and then Vortorren and his sister came in. Vortorren handed her a prettily made up jar of women's depilatory and tilted his chin towards the bathroom.
"All of it?" his sister asked, seeming a bit uncertain.
"Yes," Vortorren replied. "It will not sting or burn even the most tender areas. And if you want this from me, you must learn not to ask unbidden questions." Ges's sister blushed slightly and lowered her head, and went into the bathroom. Vortorren closed the door behind her.
While she was gone, Vortorren reached into the bag he was carrying and pulled out four cuffs on ropes, which he attached them to the bedposts. He tested the knots for strength. Satisfied, he sat in a chair that faced the bathroom door. He was normally very cool and composed, but tonight he was restless and full of anticipation. He did not undress.
A few minutes later, Ges's sister emerged. A few droplets from the bath shimmered on her skin. She was naked and, yes, without the usual mass of ringlets at her crotch. It was startling to Ges to see this nakedness on a grown woman. On his sister.
She giggled slightly when she saw the cuffs, and Vortorren held a finger to his lips, reminding her to be silent. He took her hand and sat her on the edge of the bed across from his chair.
"Hm, yes, very nice. Show me a little more." He pushed her knees apart. "Oh, extremely nice. You are lovely, you know." He spent a few moments taking her in before continuing. "Now, my dear, before we do anything more, you need a safeword."
"What's that?" she asked. Ges knew what a safeword was -- not that he'd ever needed one -- but much to his surprise, his sister didn't.
"A word... you say if you need me to stop. I can guarantee that you'll be screaming 'No!' when you really don't want me to stop at all. Think of something that you would never, ever say in an erotic context. A word that will grab my attention in case I am too... distracted by your loveliness to see that you can't take any more."
Ges's sister pondered this for a moment. "Aral." She said it flatly, as if it meant nothing to her.
Ges winced as he wondered whether this could possibly be the same woman who'd fawned over her husband only a few days before. Vortorren raised his eyebrows, clearly as startled as Ges was. "Things are that bad between you and your husband? You've never cried out his name at the height of your passion?"
"Never." Ges's sister's voice was extremely cold. "I cannot say that he ever excites me enough," she said with a bored drawl. Ges winced again. He knew Aral wasn't broadly skilled at lovemaking, but what Aral did choose to do, Ges had always thought he'd done extremely well.
"Well...." Vortorren was clearly uncomfortable.
"It is my choice. There is no better use for that name," she said bitterly.
"Well then. Until we are done, that is the last choice you get. No changing your mind, later on."
Ges didn't think he could bear to hear his sister use her safeword. Could Aral really mean that little to her? He made a silent prayer, hoping that Vortorren was skilled enough to judge his partner's limits.
Vortorren lifted Ges's sister into his arms, and then laid her out on her back in the bed. She seemed to take having her arms and legs restrained spread-eagled with no particular problem. Ges couldn't help but stare, she was that beautiful, bare and vulnerable. He unbuttoned the top button of his pants, surprised at how quickly he was getting aroused.
Vortorren walked around the bed, clearly pleased with the montage he'd created. He switched off the lights, and smiled. Ges understood why, as he saw that the moonlight, combined with the lights of Vorbarr Sultana, illuminated his sister nearly as brightly as the indoor lights had, and cast a warm glow over her pale skin.
"Follow me with your eyes, my sweet." Vortorren's instruction was given lovingly. He watched and kept walking from one side of the bed to the other. When Ges's sister broke eye contact momentarily, Vortorren whipped out a hand and pinched one of her nipples, hard. "Keep watching me." She made a great effort, and every time she failed, Vortorren would hurt her in some way. After a while, he stood still and locked eyes with her, and started bringing out various toys to use on her. Sometimes he'd put them aside and just use his fingernails or his teeth. She was breathing hard, and glistening.
Watching her like this was overwhelming Ges. When she'd offered herself up to him, before her marriage, he'd fled in a panic. Now, I could... have her, like this. I could do anything I wanted. He didn't know if he was angry or glad that the closet door in his sister's room was now locked from her side, so he couldn't get through. His hands wandered down... he had never done this before. He'd always stored up the images he got from his watching for later. But this time... no. He found himself following his sister's patterns, as Vortorren brought her to the brink and then stopped, again and again. He imagined himself in Vortorren's place, but taking her further.
When Vortorren picked up his next toy, Ges's eyes grew wide, just as his sister's did. It was exactly like something he'd given to Aral as a joke once, when they were still at the Academy. But... larger. His sister was biting her lip.
"You're not losing courage on me, are you? Not ready to use that most interesting safeword, are you?"
"I'm ... N-no." Ges had never heard his sister sound so unsure of herself. She squeezed her eyes shut and strained against the cuffs a little. Vortorren waited, smiling, as she started to beg. "But... I, please, I want..."
Vortorren plunged the toy into her, hard and fast, so her eyes flew open and she gasped. Ges wasn't sure he could hold off much longer... He didn't want Vortorren to hear him.
Her ecstatic screams drowned out the sounds of his own climax. Ges sank back, spent, shocked, gulping in big breaths. He knew he was in trouble now, as none of his usual muzziness or sleepiness manifested. All he could think about was her.
Aral's arrival the next day was marked by more of that weird married-man cheer that was so confusing to Ges. He walked up and clapped Ges on the back, all very masculine, then stood back and looked him up and down. "Ges, I'm not used to being met... You look spooked. What's up?"
After the previous evening's events, Ges was, in fact, feeling a bit spooked. "I just need to talk with you before you get home."
"Is something wrong?"
"Nothing serious." Well, that wasn't quite true. "One man to another, OK? Someplace private."
They chose to go back to the cafe where Aral had asked Ges to be his Second for the wedding. Aral seemed a bit baffled by the need for a private room, but acquiesced when Ges pushed him a little about it, and offered to pay the extra cost. After their drinks had arrived, Ges caught Aral's eye. Aral's expressions shifted, but Ges was too nervous to speak. Lis was right... Aral had always taken the lead. But Come to me, Aral would not work now. You are going where I want you to because I'm making you go there.
Finally Aral ran out of patience. "So, Ges. What's this all about?"
"The drawing. You remember, right before you left, that last drawing you made?" It felt a bit like beating around the bush, but Ges wasn't quite ready to make his proposition. And providing some evidence to Aral of Aral's own feelings would strengthen his case.
"Y-yes. Look, you were pushing your limits there. I only did it as a favor."
Oh, you think you can just dismiss me.... "You're lying and you know it. You loved making it. I shouldn't be crude, but when your eyes weren't fixated on mine, they were fixated on my crotch."
Aral lowered his eyes, and they both sat in silence. "Well... perhaps," he said after a minute or so.
"You still want me. I still want you. We need to deal with it." It felt strange to Ges to be so forward, and he wished he'd asked Lis for some more direct instruction.
Aral leaned back and somewhat defensively crossed his hands over his chest. "I've been thinking about that myself. I hadn't anticipated that when we married, you'd practically be part of the marriage too. Perhaps it's time for us to get our own place."
"Wasn't having me part of it the point?" Ges was getting annoyed.
"What do you mean?"
"Look, Aral, stop being so thick-headed." Ges leaned forward. "You know .... hell, you took me to Lis's and..." Ges held up two fingers about an inch apart, just in front of Aral's face. "... came this close to throwing me over that table and having me right there. You had no reason to stop, but you did. And I know you weren't doing it just to tease me."
"I don't cheat on my wife." A flat statement, like "The world is round." Except Aral wasn't really stating something incontrovertible, and it sounded like he knew it.
"Please. This is ridiculous. You've been cheating on her all along, with me. Sure, we haven't actually... fucked since graduation, but you know it's going to happen. Why all the demurral? You're acting. Nice act, too. Like the dirtiest whore would do, 'cause she thinks Barrayaran men get off on conquest."
Aral sat back and stared at him, open-mouthed. He took a deep breath in and closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, he said, "You've convinced me that I'm right. We need to move, get away from you. You're a bad influence, I just didn't let myself see it."
Wait, you're not supposed to run away. In desperation, Ges fell back on a quid pro quo. "There's no reason for you to be faithful to her," he snarled. "She's certainly not being faithful to you. You know you're just going to be stretching your pay to rent bedspace for her and her boyfriends."
"What!" Aral's face was red, and he rose from his chair and moved towards Ges like he was going to attack.
"Andros Vortorren. Jonas Vorwyn. And your wife. They've been running circles around you for months now. And it's not exactly a big secret, either."
Aral put his hands on Ges's shoulders, uncomprehending. For some reason Ges wanted to kiss him, but that seemed a very bad idea at the moment. I wish I could make it all better for you.
"I don't believe you. She's not the sort who would.... she's too..."
"Innocent. That's what you were going to say, right?" That hit home. "If you believe that, you don't know her at all. Ask around. Ask your father. He knows. I assure you, you are full of hopeless illusions about her." He was furious at Aral for being so stupid.
But then Aral just crumpled. All his pride and conviction went right out of him as he sat back down. "I can't take this."
Ges's near-rage had vanished, replaced by... Ges put his finger on it. Love. "I could help..."
"No. You want.... what you want is not going to happen." Aral rose and opened the door.
"Where are you going?"
"To... take care of this. Permanently."
Rage again. And a deep desire to hurt Aral. "Oh. Like the last time. You'll go and rape her again. Did you know she loves rough sex? Fixed things right up between you, the last time. You should get some lessons from Vortorren; he'll show you how it's really done." This was said to Aral's retreating back, though he turned for a moment and stared at Ges. And then he was gone.
Ges let out a huge sigh, and hung his head between his hands. This was not what he'd intended at all. He supposed that he ought to feel relieved that Aral hadn't beat the stuffing out of him, or worse. Instead he was just angry at Aral -- and at himself, for ever thinking that he could just jump right in and change the dynamic between them. Not after five years of this delicate dance of him gently persuading Aral into forthright action. He could forgive himself -- but only a little -- because he'd been forced to try too soon, to try to influence Aral before Piotr could.
He called to the waiter through the open door, ordered a bottle of brandy, and swore to drink it all before he left the cafe.
Ges spent yet another night in a bunk at Ops, this one alternating between vomiting and very unrestful dozing. He wished he could just crawl back into bed and stay there until the waves of nausea that were afflicting him ran their course, but he'd been away so much dealing with his personal crises that he didn't think his commanding officer would be too forgiving of absences. He was just relieved that Ops duty was so much less demanding than most Service assignments; he couldn't imagine the depths of unhappiness that would exist by now if he'd been assigned to ship-duty, or even to a real base. His sister had been leaning on him, and he wasn't sure if there was anyone else in Vorbarr Sultana who could support her as well as he could, without also trying to get into her bed.
Up until now. The images from two nights previously flooded into his consciousness. It was no coincidence, he realized, that this happened just as he was starting to use his depilator cream on his face. Naked. Opened. Oh, god.... she was so lovely like that. Ges stopped for a moment and leaned his head against the wall, finding that arousal and nausea didn't mix very well. He wondered how long Aral would be in Vorbarr Sultana, and how he could tell his sister that he wanted her, now.
Ges felt like he was at war with himself. His sexuality was already transgressive enough, by Barrayaran standards. But transgressive didn't necessarily mean harmful. He watched, but only what others did willingly. And he'd never actually had sex with -- hadn't even kissed -- anyone but Aral. What he was considering now definitely crossed some boundary into harmful that he hadn't even been aware of, a few days before. At the same time, his sister flirted with him, and before she was married, she had invited him into her bed. If he could just let it happen, maybe he could take those cuffs and toys to her...
Stop.
Ges started breathing again. He realized that he didn't need to rush. And his sister was like Aral, in that from what Ges had seen, a man only needed to show her the possibilities he offered to get her rushing eagerly into them. This will probably be easier than trying to reverse roles with Aral was... Ges had to chase the images from his talk with Aral out of his mind; it was just too depressing to think about how badly he'd erred.
He finished dressing and reported for duty. His commanding officer seemed surprised to see Ges up and about, but didn't comment.
After several hours of drinking coffee and very low productivity, it was time for lunch. The mess hall was crowded and noisy as usual, but luckily for Ges's still-rebellious stomach, today's meal was a bland one.
As he approached his usual table, the junior officers who were already there grew very quiet. Ges sat heavily, and said, flatly, "Hungover." His peers wouldn't look him in the eye, and they stayed silent.
Ges coughed, and asked, "What's going on? Have I turned leprous and just don't know it yet?"
"Um, Ges..." The man speaking, or trying to, was one of the newer additions, someone Ges didn't know very well yet. It almost seemed like he was going to say "Yes" to Ges's joking question.
"What?!? Spill, already!"
"Um, two men killed each other in a duel this morning."
"And?"
Just at that moment, Major Olrent came up to the table. "Vorrutyer, could you come up to my office?"
"Do you know what's going on here?" Ges asked.
"Yes. I think you want to leave your lunch now and come up with me." It was a command, backed with an implied threat. Well, it wouldn't be difficult to leave his meal behind; Ges had been poking at it throughout the conversation, trying to decide whether vat-chicken or rice was more likely to make him vomit all over the table.
When they reached Olrent's office, he shut the door behind them. "Vorrutyer, I'll get right to the point. The two men who killed each other by dueling were Andros Vortorren and Jonas Vorwyn. Who, I believe, both had, ah, an interest in your sister."
"What do you... wait, what?"
"I suspect that you'll be needed at home. If Aral Vorkosigan knows anything about his wife's affairs... Take the rest of the afternoon."
"Thank you, Sir." Aral does know about his wife's affairs. Too much. Thanks to me. When it came to Ges's sister, Vortorren and Vorwyn were hardly rivals. She managed them both -- sometimes at the same time and I wonder if they'd have me too.... Of course, they might have found something else to fight about, but Vortorren? Dueling? His skills seemed confined to the interpersonal realm, so how could he have managed to do in Vorwyn before being done in himself?
He turned to leave, but Olrent stopped him. "Vorrutyer -- Ges -- I know that things are complicated, right now, but people are starting to notice your absences. The Service only asks for nine hours from your day. Try to confine your outside life to the remaining hours if you can."
By the time he left the building, Ges was terrified. There was no way that a duel between Vortorren and Vorwyn could have ended with both of them dead. Aral did it. Killed them both, and arranged it to look like they'd killed each other.
When Ges arrived home, Armsman Ruben, one of the two who stayed permanently in Vorbarr Sultana, rushed up to him. "Oh, we are so glad you're here, sir! Lord Vorkosigan never showed up last night, but he's upstairs with his wife now. He was very angry, he threw all the servants out in the hall, threatened to kill them if they tried to interfere.... There's a terrible fight going on."
It was disturbing to see an Armsman so rattled. "OK, I might be able to help." Ges broke into a run... and took the wrong staircase.
The remodeling done for the young couple had included blocking off the hallway between Ges's room and his sister's. Thus, they used different staircases now. And Ges had taken the one to his room, rather than his sister's. Maybe it was an unconscious mistake. He could hear the fighting, and it sounded violent, but maybe things would calm down enough that he'd be able to get Aral and his sister to let him in... and if not, he could probably breach the old closet door, hopefully without Aral turning a weapon on him. He remembered the last time he'd thought about breaking through the door, as an image of his sister with Vortorren flashed into his mind and then vanished.
Ges settled into his customary hiding spot. Aral and his sister were not in the bedroom, but in the sitting room.
"I'd challenge you to a duel myself for humiliating me like this!" his sister shouted.
"I wouldn't fight a woman, even one who wronged me as much as you have." Aral's voice was tense but softer than Ges had expected.
His sister goaded Aral. "Coward!"
There was a brief scuffling sound, and something in the sitting room crashed to the floor. And then Ges saw shards of china flying, as one of them had hurled an antique lamp into the wall. But it didn't sound like they were actually hitting each other.
Ges saw the cuffs still attached to the bed, and his stomach sank. One of them was curled over his sister's pillow, like she'd clung to it in her sleep, and perhaps she had. But he hated to think what would happen if Aral found them, and hoped the couple would stay in the sitting room. But if Aral really had raped her... did he have the same thing in mind, if she did not relent soon?
Something in the fight caught his attention. "... reason you married me is so you could keep fucking my brother!"
"That is ... not true." There was a note of hesitance, and normally Ges would have cherished it. But not now.
"I saw you! I saw you when you were drawing him, saw how he was all sprawled back, inviting you, and your eyes were so hungry for him I don't think you would have noticed if I'd taken off all my clothes right there. Unless I'd stood in your way, and then you would have pushed me aside to get at him."
"You're wrong. I married you for you, though now I wonder why."
"Get a divorce, then!" Ges's sister spat out. "I am done with you."
A few moments of silence followed. Ges felt he had to give Aral credit for defending his somewhat battered honor, especially under the circumstances.
There was another horrible crash, and Ges's sister was shrieking, though her ability to form actual words seemed to have vanished, and Aral was pushing her into the bedroom. He had her in a distinctly non-regulation body lock, though he couldn't stop her screaming and swearing. Aral was silent, determined, and -- Ges's heart caught when he realized it -- very aroused.
Aral pushed Ges's sister face down onto the bed, and held her down with one hand while the other was reaching to undo his belt, when he just... stopped. Just like he had with Ges, that night at Lis's. He released her as he picked up one of the cuffs. With almost incomprehensible hurt, he asked, "What are these?"
"Andros gave them to me." Her voice flinched at the pain of recalling her dead lover. "He gave me a nice lesson the other night. He knew how to make love to me." She curled onto her side, drew her knees up and wrapped her arms around them.
"Ah. So I should have believed your brother when he told me. My father was right about you. Not just a slut and a bitch but a pervert, too."
His sister said nothing.
"Talk to me, dammit!"
Silence.
Aral didn't force her. Rather, he stripped off his Service-issue stunner and plasma arc, and threw them aside. "OK then. I am going back to my ship, to await my arrest. And then my well-deserved death. And I will keep asking myself until the very moment my last breath leaves my body whether I made a mistake by ever assuming you had honor to defend in the first place."
More silence. But Ges's sister rolled into a sitting position and looked up at Aral with an awful, shocky, stare. Very quietly, she said, "Please, just leave."
"That's it?!? I am going to die and that's all you can say?"
Yet more silence.
"Well then. I suppose that you shall enjoy my execution. And I suppose that I shall have to haunt you for the rest of your life, for causing it to happen. Three deaths on your hands, bitch!"
Nothing.
Ges couldn't stand it any more. Even as he heard Aral leave the room, he moved towards the closet door, hoping that maybe he could comfort his sister. He could hear his sister's soft weeping as he knocked on the closet door from the inside. "It's Ges," he said.
"Go away," came her anguished voice from the other side of the door.
There was a key to the door somewhere, but he didn't want to force his way in. "I'm so sorry," he said. The apology sounded weak to him, and maybe it was.
"For what? It's all your fault; you just made sure we got married so you'd still have a chance with him." Her words were biting now.
"It's not that simple... but you're right, I didn't want to give him up. But he didn't want to give me up either, I think. I hoped that ... look, you're more open-minded, that maybe ... we could share him."
Just as Ges said this, he heard soft footsteps behind him, in his room. Miss Elisa, the maid who'd come from Vorkosigan House when his sister and Aral were married, put a hand to her mouth in shock as he turned to face her. Of course the servants and the two Armsmen who stayed at Vorrutyer House permanently knew the depths of the sadness and anger coming from this ill-fated marriage. But they hadn't known certain details. Ges didn't care that they would, now.
Ges rattled the doorknob, and got what sounded like boots thunking against the other side of the door in return. The sound of a few quick footsteps indicated that his sister was just inside. If he could just get to her...
Then his sister hissed, "You just used me. Both of you." Her voice rose, fury ringing through every syllable. "He thought I'd give the right impression to all those men he's trying to butter up for his fucking career! A beautiful wife of the appropriate social class, eventually a couple of children, everything looking all right and proper when it's really just a sham, all rotten underneath. I should kill you both, just for that alone. And that's not even considering that he killed Andros... and Jonas."
Ges deserved all her epithets, and more. At that moment, if she'd faced him down with a lethal weapon, he would have opened his arms and begged her to fire it. He shook the doorknob again, and then started kicking the door.
"Stop! Don't you dare! I told you to go away, and I meant it!"
Ges's next kick made a small crack in the outer door panel. "So what would you do to stop me?"
"Your lover left his weapons behind. I'd take his plasma arc and burn this whole house down if that's what it takes to keep you away from me!"
Ges didn't doubt that she would do exactly what she said; and furthermore, he didn't think that she would try to save herself, if she did. That switch of terms, from 'Aral' or 'my husband' to 'your lover' captured just one of her losses -- or maybe two. She likely counted Ges as lost to her, not just Aral. And Andros Vortorren. And Jonas Vorwyn. She was tough, but losing four of the five most important men in her life, all but the Count her father, in one day, might be more than she could bear.
"I'm going out for a walk," he said. No reply came from the other side of the door.
As Ges left Vorrutyer House, he wondered how much more he could take.
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If I Would...