Written for james's prompt at fic_promptly: "Vorkosigan Saga, any, hands-on history demonstrations in grade school." When I read the prompt, I was immediately reminded of the short story "The Schartz-Metterklume Method" by H. H. Munro: "to make children understand history by acting it themselves."

Thanks to seishonagon and avanti_90 for beta-reading.

Cordelia stepped outside the door to survey the damage. Bothari, expressionless, was carrying Miles, whose set expression doubtless meant that he had broken a bone again. Ivan was disheveled and limping slightly, with a streak of dirt across his forehead. Elena was very quiet and looked worried but had no visible injuries.

"Is anyone hurt?" Cordelia asked. "Besides Miles?"

Elena shook her head. "I have blisters," Ivan muttered, looking down at his fingers. "And someone dropped a log on my foot."

"Elena was completely justified." Miles hastened to her defense. "And besides, you were supposed to be holding off Lord Vorlakial."

"My army was resting," Ivan protested. "I was tired after moving all those rocks."

The Lord Regent's doctor-on-call hurried out of the house. He sat down by Miles and took the boy's arm between his hands to examine it. Miles let out a hiss of pain. "Broken," the doctor confirmed in a resigned tone. Cordelia stood by as the doctor went through the familiar process of treating her son's broken arm. Ivan's foot was pronounced only bruised.

Once the doctor was distributing ointment for blisters to Ivan and Elena, Cordelia felt she could indulge her curiosity. "What exactly were you doing?"

"It was a project for school," Miles volunteered.

"Your teacher assigned you to build something with rocks?" That seemed eccentric, even for Barrayar.

"Well, not exactly. We were assigned to write about an event with historic significance. And I decided to write about the third battle of Aremberg, with the attack on the fort, but I thought it would make more sense if I built it first."

"You built a fortress?" Cordelia had dizzying visions of a vast tower rising beside the lake. Surely even Miles couldn't work that fast.

"I was the one who actually built most of it," Ivan muttered.

"Just a little one. A scale model. And then Ivan was General Vorbatz and Elena was Lord Vorlakial –- she was brilliant, by the way - and I was everyone else. It was going perfectly, until I fell off the wall." Miles brooded over this injustice.

Cordelia sighed. "Kiddo, check with me or your father before building any more fortifications on the grounds, okay?"

"All right," Miles promised blithely. "I'll do that next time."