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Cordelia sat on the ground with her back against a tree, the insulated blanket underneath her keeping her from the ground's cold, and watched the light play across the lakewater. This gift from Barrayar, at least, was an unmixed blessing. Of course, she would not fall for the error that 'unmixed' meant 'greatest;' here, on this planet, her greatest griefs were mingled inextricably with her greatest joys. She paused for a moment, thinking of her father, and corrected the thought. That wasn't Barrayar, however peculiarly Barrayaran some of her griefs might be, that was pure bloody human condition.
Still, she thought a little dryly, it was nice to have some of your blessings unmixed.
She sighed.
For a few moments more, she continued to watch the sunlight on the water. Then movement in the corner of her eye caught her attention: Illyan, walking along the grass. He noticed her attention and cocked his head in inquiry; after a moment she patted the blanket next to her, and he headed over. Might as well stop going in circles inside her head, she thought, even if Illyan was not, right at this moment, precisely the company she'd have chosen.
He came over and took his seat on the blanket, looking out with pleasure over the water. "It's beautiful here."
"It is," she agreed. "Sunlight, water, and soil. Just what you need for new growth." She reached back and patted the tree behind her. "Or old growth, for that matter, I suppose."
"Just so." He smiled at her, his small but genuine Illyan smile, and looked back out at the water. They watched it together in silence.
She chewed on her lip.
"Simon—" she began, then cut herself off.
"Milady?" He looked at her inquisitively.
"No, it's—" It wasn't nothing. "You saw Miles, earlier, organizing his little expedition."
"Yes." Illyan's lips curved up in amused remembrance. "Quite the little troop he had going there. He's going to be a fine officer some day."
God damnit, thought Cordelia, and wanted to scream. It always came back to that, didn't it. "Not everything comes down to how good at killing people he's going to be," she snapped.
Illyan paused, his body language going extremely neutral. She made herself take a deep breath. Unfair, to take this out on him. She tried to register the comment as the support it was meant to be—how many people dismissed Miles' chances out of hand—and why couldn't it be more of them, damnit—no, no. "I'm sorry," she made herself say. "That was rude of me."
"It's all right." He was frowning at her, concerned. He hesitated, then said tentatively, "I didn't mean that he has to be an officer."
"It's this whole damn society." God, she was tired. She shook her head. "I'm sorry, Simon. I know you're trying to support him."
Illyan hesitated again. "He might not always want to be an officer, in the long-term."
She closed her eyes. He had touched directly the heart of her pain: not just Barrayaran culture, as thoroughly messed up as it was, but the whole-hearted and unquestioning adoption of certain elements of it by Miles. By her son.
"Do you really believe that?"
"Ah—no." He sounded chagrined.
How could she explain what it was like, the surreality of it all, to someone raised in this benighted society? On Beta Colony, where growing up wanting a job killing people would be viewed—rather like wanting to become the local equivalent of a LPST was, here. Surely that was completely backwards. How could killing be thought of as more honourable than sex?
Although wanting to be a scientist who worked on Beta Colony's famous weapons program—would not be looked at the same way. A contradiction that had become rather more salient to her, after she moved to Barrayar.
She heard Illyan shifting; she opened her eyes to look at him. He caught her eyes, uncertain, and she gestured for him to go on. "He wants recognition," he said slowly. "But he wants also—to serve, I think."
"Military seems to be the only kind of service anyone here can imagine." She remembered her old service, for knowledge and humanity and science.
"It's the default," he acknowledged. "I don't think it's the only. —'Regent' is not a military position."
She stared at him. "Are you trying to console me with the idea that he'll go into politics?" He's been politics since before he was born, Captain. But she kept her mouth shut on that one. Illyan, she knew, still blamed himself for that failure of intelligence—in more than one sense, she thought—that had led to the soltoxin attack.
He tilted his head in acknowledgement of the point, but continued on. "I've seen you work with my Lord Regent, on policies." He gestured, opening out his hand. "It's my job to keep an eye out for everyone your policies piss off. But they help a lot of people, too."
She thought of the reports from last year's group of her scholarship's students, and couldn't help but smile. "I do know that."
Illyan shrugged, which she rather thought meant, I thought you could use the reminder. Well, he wasn't wrong.
She sighed. "I suppose you'll also point out that Aral's military background is essential to his political career."
Illyan smiled uncertainly. "That too."
I never wanted my son to want to grow up and kill other people's children. She could not, unfortunately, protect him from being Barrayaran; he wouldn't thank her if she tried.
She considered the problem again. "I think," she said, "I think—I am going to have to trust him." If he was military-mad, and perhaps occasionally other forms of mad, it was nevertheless up to him what he ended up doing with his madness. Her job, ultimately, must be to support him, and to trust in whatever choices he ended up. Maddening as it might be to her, in its own turn.
She couldn't grow for him, no matter how much she wished sometimes he would take his brilliance and direct it in another direction.
"Thank you, Simon."
He gave a nod. "Milady." He smiled, suddenly, and nodded again, this time to the water. "To new growth."
Her own lips quirked up. "To new growth."
Illyan would have to go soon, she knew; she herself was not exactly lacking for things to do. But they could find some space to enjoy watching the water.
This is his birthright, too. She would give him sun and shade and light on the water, as well as all the rest of it. And make sure he knew about his options. And make sure he knew he had her faith.