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Tatya breaks up with him, because, she says, he’s been so distracted lately and she doesn’t think their relationship is a priority for him.
And that’s fair, honestly, because their relationship isn’t a priority for him right now, not comparatively. And what would making their relationship a priority even mean ? It’s not like he was going to marry her.
She’s really nice about it, too, she has good people skills, Tatya, knows how to bring you down gentle. She says she hopes they can be friends still after this, and Ivan thinks there’s a chance they actually will. But he won’t pretend it doesn’t sting a little.
And yeah, yeah he’s distracted. Because Miles accidentally committed treason for the second time, and then he was in the hospital for ages (more as punishment than for his health, Ivan gathered, but still) and then went off on some kind of super secret mission. And yeah, Miles ratted Ivan out to Illyan about that little security issue in Ops, so honestly, fuck Miles, but the point is that being the man’s cousin is stressful.
And then Gregor got sick. Or at least, they said he was sick, which would have been bad enough on its own. Because if the Emperor was sick, sick enough that people were admitting it and he was going off to Vorkosigan Surleau to recover, it had to be something pretty serious. But it was worse than that, because Mamere and Uncle Aral and Tante Cordelia were being all weasley about the whole thing, and Ivan had a terrible conviction that they were actually covering up something else, and he didn’t even want to think about what could be worse than the Emperor being too sick to sit through meetings.
So Ivan’s been worrying about Gregor, he can’t help it, and that’s why he hasn’t been paying attention, and that’s why Tatya isn’t his priority.
But the thing is, the thing is ordinary people are allowed to worry about their cousins. When normal people’s mothers tell them that their normal cousins are ill they can trust that their normal mothers aren’t lying to them for the safety of the Imperium. And when a normal person has a cousin who is sick, it’s normal to be upset. And normal people can tell their girlfriends that that’s what’s wrong, and their girlfriends understand, and maybe even bring the normal cousin of their boyfriend soup or something. But Ivan isn’t normal, as much as he tries to be, and Gregor definitely isn’t normal. So Ivan can’t tell his girlfriend that he’s worried about the Emperor’s health, and he definitely can’t tell her he’s worried that it’s something worse. And it’s a very, very, terribly lonely feeling, not being ordinary.
So he just says “Sorry, sorry,” and brushes it off like it’s nothing, and Tatya says, “I don’t think this is working, Ivan,” and Ivan can’t disagree.
And of course right after that it’s all hands on deck at Ops because suddenly they’re sending the Prince Serg to fight the Cetagandans in the Hegan Hub, and Uncle Aral is going himself, which almost has to mean that Miles is mixed up in it somehow (and Ivan still doesn’t know what’s up with Gregor). And then the Battle of the Hegan Hub is won, and the Hegan Hub Alliance is forged, and Gregor is the hero of it all, even though Ivan would swear by anything that Gregor wasn’t on the Prince Serg, and in fact would have had to have been in the Hub before it got anywhere close in order to set everything up like he seemed to, and Ivan thinks about the chronology of when Gregor got “sick” and when the Serg launched, and when the Cetas attacked and thinks what the fuck? What the Actual Fuck?? (And of course, the Dendarii Mercenaries are the other heroes of the Battle of the Hegan Hub, so that explains Miles at least.)
So between the fact that Ivan lost a girlfriend over this, and the general what-the-hell-ness of it all, Ivan feels perfectly justified in abandoning his policy of Not Asking and cornering Miles into telling him what happened.
“It’s classified,” Miles says.
“Uh huh, so was Metzov’s file. Spill,” Ivan says. And so, after a little additional prodding, Miles spills.
On his twentieth birthday, Gregor had slipped away from the festivities and into a pavilion in Ezar’s garden to get properly drunk, and Ivan had slipped after him to do the same.
They had toasted each other and Barrayar and Ivan had thought, better you than me, poor sod, better you than me. And Gregor had grown increasingly morose as he grew increasingly drunk, the weight of the Imperium bearing down on him crushing, so that Ivan almost thought he could see it (had felt a gnawing terror that if he made one wrong move it would topple over and crush him too). And Ivan had thought, about halfway to being truly fall-down drunk, that he’d better slow down so that at least one of them would have enough wits about him to see that the Emperor made it back to bed. And Ivan had watched as Gregor got quieter and quieter and smaller and smaller, Barrayar devouring him before his eyes.
“I’d run away, I think,” Ivan had said, because he hadn’t drunk as much as Gregor, but he was still plenty drunk.
“Can’t,” Gregor had said, “Only way out of this job is death.”
And Ivan hadn’t known what to say to that.
“You’re a good friend, Ivan,” Gregor had said at some point. And Ivan had grinned, and nudged Gregor companionably with his knee, and thought I’m never going to do this again. We’re never going to be friends again after this. Because it was one thing to grow up with the Emperor before his majority, to play hide and seek with him in Ezar’s garden and go swimming at Vorkosigan Surleau. But it was something entirely different to be the close friend and confidant of the ruling Emperor, the sort of who got drunk with him at night, who his security left alone with him in a dark pavilion as he got increasingly incapacitated. And Ivan had felt selfish and he’d felt lonely and he’d felt like the worst traitor imaginable, even though it wasn’t treason, really, it was just not wanting to be someone who could commit treason if they wanted to, or if they were pushed the wrong way, not wanting to ever, ever be mixed up in it all.
But Ivan had sat with Gregor all that first night of Gregor’s majority, not saying goodbye, and he even made Gregor laugh once, towards the end. And then some nice ImpSec men had come to take Gregor away discretely to his bed, and Ivan had staggered back to the party to be scolded by Mamere, and Ivan can count on one hand the number of conversations he's had with Gregor since.
Ivan thinks about that night and he thinks about how Miles’s words don’t quite add up right (you can always tell when Miles is hiding something, but that never helps because he always convinces you to go along with him anyway.) and he thinks about Gregor saying, “Only way out of this job is death,” and he thinks about Gregor drinking all alone on Komarr and he feels a little like being sick. And Ivan doesn’t know if he wants to hug Gregor or slap him, but he knows that he can’t do either, because Gregor is the Emperor, and even if he wasn’t, Ivan’s lost the right.
So Ivan puts his big boy shoes on, and goes and talks to Illyan, and makes it ImpSec’s problem, because it’s too big for Ivan to carry, because Ivan has chosen to be small. And after that, he leaves the party early.
When Ivan gets home he thinks about comming the girl he was with to apologize for abandoning her, and maybe salvaging something. And Ivan thinks about comming Tatya, just to have someone to talk to. But in the end Ivan just lies awake in bed, thinking about family.