Chapter 14
The perfumer's scents finally make sense, or vice versa
I find myself laying back in the recliner, staring at the Ceta with half-lidded eyes. He's rubbing his forehead with the palm of his left hand, and staring back at me as if he's just been watching a particularly gruesome holovid drama. How long has my mind wandered this time?
" . . . I didn't piece together the story of my grandfather's perfume until years after he was dead," Lord Yenaro says, apparently continuing some remark of his. "He'd sealed up his laboratory after the visit from Celestial Garden Security, so it wasn't until I reached my majority — rather earlier than is customary — that I could get inside to look over grandfather's notes and examine his equipment. While poking around in there I also discovered my own talent for perfumery, by the way.
"The problem wasn't that ex-General Yenaro had been trying to devise an aromatic complex specifically targeted to induce a fatal allergic reaction in the children of his old nemesis, General Piotr Vorkosigan — "
I don't even blink at the name.
" — That was understandable. The real problem was, in the process he had been delving into human genetics. Um, human genetic research just isn't done by the Ghem-lords without a special dispensation from the Celestial Garden." Yenaro actually blushes. "That's the Star Crèche's prerogative."
"Anyway, sometime shortly before he had to close his lab, my grandfather must have suborned the automatic production equipment at Parfumes des la Alhambra, by remote control as it were, and set it to producing his tailored compounds. I don't know how he planned to get a hold of then, afterwards.
"I suppose the quality control people there shut down production as soon as they realized something strange was going on, but somehow or other some of the initial run got decanted into bottles intended for Sultana's Dreams.
"I deduced all this about two years ago, when Ghem-General Benin looked me up. He's the Celestial Garden's Chief of Security. He wanted my opinion as a professional perfumer on some chemical formulae he had come across in the process of tracing the history of a particularly troublesome opponent of ours, one Admiral Naismith."
Him, again? Again, I don't react. Too much of a bother.
"Imperial Security analysts — Benin's Imperial Security analysts — had found a newstape showing Admiral Naismith openly inserting nose filters when he came within scent range of a Commander Cavilo, just before the two of them were awarded metals by the Hegen Hub Alliance for thwarting one of our, um, unauthorized military adventures.
"Benin didn't tell me how he acquired the formulae, need-to-know and all that, only that his analysts believed that they were for this Cavilo woman's fragrance. It didn't take me long to notice a certain similarity to my Grandfather's compounds. What threw me off, at first, was that the analyzed compounds had been exposed to atmospheric oxygen for a while. Once I had them identified, I filled in Ghem-General Benin on what I knew of the ex-General's tailored-compound activities, with my guesses on what he could have done as a corresponding consultant to an Escobaran perfumer, and that was that. For then, anyway."
"You know, I once nearly tested Grandfather's relaxant on Lord Miles Vorkosigan? It was some years ago, now, when he was one of the Barrayaran envoys to the late Dowager Empress Lisbet's funeral."
What? I ask myself.Vorkosigan was on Eta Ceta?
"It was during a party I'd invited Lord Vorkosigan to," Yenaro says. "But I lost my nerve and warned him off from the fragrance bowl at the last minute." Yenaro looks a bit wistful.
I try to smile. "Thass' some relaxan' of yours," I mumble.
"Oh, yes," he says. "It has some interesting properties. One element strongly affects habitually tense muscle-nerve complexes. Would you believe, recent research show that people who repeatedly kill without remorse have the most extraordinary tension in certain muscle-nerve complexes? They're completely unconscious of them, of course."
What??
"Another element of the relaxant works most effectively on natural blondes. Put them together and after a given time the effect on blonde sociopathic killers is positively synergistic."
Something is wrong. Something is very wrong.
"The real trick is paralyzing most the killer blonde's muscular system without shutting down the breathing reflex." Yenaro sounds both pained and smug at once. He rubs his forehead again.
Mentally I leap into action: Kicking the bowl over the holoplate, slapping several sensor pads on my armrest, snapping out code phrases. But all that actually happens is, my feet twitch, my left arm slides limply off the armrest and I mutter a string of slurred syllables. I half-recline there, breathing very evenly.
"Breakers," I manage to get out. "Breakers!"
Behind Yenaro, the hatch arcs inward. Through the hatchway I can just make out the motionless legs of one of the Amazon Twins on the friction matting.
Yenaro continues, "Do you know, for some reason you seem to have hired the most extraordinary number of killer blondes? Perhaps you feel a certain affinity for them, eh, Commander?"
Commander. I think about that.
"That's a remarkable job of biosculpting your surgeon did on you," Yenaro's voice intrudes. "He got almost everything right. Except he forgot to change your natural scent. Its all wrong for your apparent genetic makeup, and I should know." He's stopped pretending that I'm not Commander Cavilo. All I can do is lay there, breathing. And listening.
"If you really want to pass for an Afro-Caucasian hybrid, you might look up this new clinic on Escobar. I understand they've found how to make bodies rebuild themselves, cell by cell in situ. They could fill all your cells with genuine Afro-Cauc genes."
"And that's nothing compared to what the Celestial Garden's geneticists can do with the technology." He smiles. "It's still being tested, mind you, but they can make the pineal gland turn itself into an entirely new organ that gives you amazing psychic powers." His left hand rubs his forehead. "Along with amazing non-psychic headaches."
The smile goes away, starting with his eyes. "Then they can have it unmake itself again, so you'd never know the new organ ever existed, while you forget whatever you learned while using it. Security." He spits the last word.
"I'm not really here by my own choice, you know," Yenaro adds. "My Celestial Master insisted. It's all due to Lord Vorkosigan."
"Wha'?"
Did the Barry mutant Mind Trick the Cetas into doing him a favor? I wonder.
"Um, it was rather the other way around, I gather," Yenaro says, just as if he's reading my mind. He is reading my mind. "I'm not really privy to all the details, but while Lord Vorkosigan was nosing around the Celestial Garden, he seemed to have discovered and thwarted some high-level plot running counter my Celestial Master's intentions. Well, I think it also ran counter to the Barrayarans' interests, but there you are. That favor earned him the Emperor's Regard."
The Emperor's Regard?
Seeing my eyes widen, Yenaro adds, "That's no honor, by the way. When you are in the Emperor's Regard, our Imperial Security looks over everything you've ever done, every one you've ever met and what they've done in connection with you, and reports it all to the Emperor. Or whoever He thinks ought to know about you.
"That lead them back to me, eventually. Security pretty quickly discovered that I'd intended to expose Lord Vorkosigan to my Grandfather's relaxant. My Celestial Master was already quite aware of some other harmful pranks I'd attempted on Lord Vorkosigan, although those weren't my own idea, but — Well, that's neither here nor there.
"Let me see. I'd guess our Imperial Security had some sort of watch program going for the key words "Sultana's Dreams." I don't know how they do those things. However they did it, they discovered a Lady Sally McGregor" — he nods at me — "had been making persistent attempts to obtain a non-standard version of Sultana's Dreams perfume. The only other person they knew who had used a non-standard version of that perfume was Commander Cavilo, who they'd lost track of some years previously.
"Both ladies seemed to leave a trail of missing or dead people in their wakes, although rather fewer could be put to Lady McGregor. Maybe she'd learned some restraint during the missing years?
"I'm afraid my Celestial Master has a certain low taste for irony. You tried to play a scent trick on Admiral Naismith. I nearly played a fatal scent trick on Lord Vorkosigan. Therefore it pleases my Celestial Master that I atone by playing a scent trick on you."
I've been thinking during Yenaro's speech.
"Godda deal. S-solid. Tell y' wha' I know, y' lemme go," I manage to get out.
"Oh, dear, do you really think you can trade Admiral Naismith's other identity for your freedom?" Yenaro sighs. "You're years too late. I figured out who 'Naismith' was, myself; only the direct descendents of General Piotr Vorkosigan are susceptible to my Grandfather's scent compounds. Ghem-General Benin didn't seem the least bit surprised when I told him that deduction. And if I've understood Benin aright, 'Naismith' retired from active duty several years ago. So only a handful of old Ghems he defeated some years ago still show any interest in his whereabouts.
"By the way, there are a couple of reasons why 'Naismith' didn't have a fatal reaction to your perfume. For one thing, he's half-Betan and I heard that his biology was all screwed up by a poison gas attack in his youth, or something like that.
"For another, you unsealed the compound's bottle several years before you met the little Admiral. Once oxygen gets into it, the compound's full effectiveness is lost within days."
I think some more. Then I start to say, "Nod dad I'm complanin', min' you . . ." Not that I'm complaining, mind you, but why isn't a squadron of ghem-lords in revenge-hunt facepaint laying siege to this ship right now?
Lord Yenaro nods. "Oh, dear," he says, "those Ghems." He shudders the slightest bit. "Too much testosterone. I wonder how many generations it's going to take to live down their reputation? The old model lacks a certain flexibility of outlook, a certain subtleness. The Celestial Garden has been re-thinking the Ghem genotype, you know.
"To answer your question, the Ghem High Command has been re-evaluating the frontal assault school of military strategy. They've decided that sometimes using subtlety and misdirection plays better in the end. You could say they've been taking lessons from their opponents. Such as Naismith's Dendarii, or Randall's Rangers' infiltration units.
"This time they decided to send in someone to scout around in advance and neutralize the opposition, someone that you'd never suspect was a spy." He essays a slight seated bow. "Like me.
"Although the 'Old' Ghem still have their uses. As you're going to see in a little while."
The administrator's shuttle?
"Got it in one," Yenaro says. "Speaking of which, how do you turn off this ship's automatic defenses?" His face goes blank for half a dozen seconds as his left hand twitches through a combination of sensor-pad touches that I, and only I, have memorized.
"Oh, don't worry," Yenaro says as he comes around the holoplate desk. "We're a lot more interested in intelligence than in revenge, these days. You're in for a lot of interviews, but at least without any worries about fatal fast-penta reactions or nerve stimulants applied to sensitive organs. Although I suppose the interrogators will be disappointed when they find out how 'Naismith' really made you cede control over your Rangers to the Vervaini. Intelligence was so hoping that he'd employed some kind of psychological warfare or mind control on you that we could adapt to restrain overly aggressive Old Ghems.
"On the other hand, I suppose you're going to learn exactly what it's like being inside other people's heads, to learn to fully empathize with your potential victims and discover that they are real, live people — more alive than you've ever allowed yourself to be. I understand our Haut geneticists and the mental health specialists are fascinated by the problem of getting murderers who take pleasure in snuffing out other people's lives to feel remorse for those deeds. But they haven't convinced the few suitable 'Old' Ghem volunteers to stay in their research programs long enough to get significant results. So they can hardly wait to start poking around in your brains after Intelligence is finished with you."
He pauses as he slides around the recliner to make better contact with the sensor pads, struck by a thought. "You know," he adds, "I believe I'm also here because my Celestial Master really hates seeing loose ends flapping around that haven't been wrapped up.
"Even the other side's loose ends."
(C) 2007, Luminator Thelms