It took three tries and a good deal of laughter to boost Laisa aboard. If Gregor was trying to cop a feel, he'd managed to do so with stunning savoir faire. She settled into the velvet-padded saddle looking delighted, self-conscious, and a little proud of herself. Gregor recovered the line from the groom, motioned him away, and led off for a tour of the garden paths, talking and gesturing.

Miles, wide-eyed, swallowed a large gulp of scalding tea. "So, Aunt Alys . . . are you playing Baba, or what?"

"It's beginning to look like it," she said dryly, her own eyes following the delicate little cavalcade.

"When did this happen?"

"I'm not quite sure. I looked around, and . . . there it was. I've been scrambling to catch up ever since."

"But Alys . . . a Komarran, for Empress?" It had to be an Empress that Gregor had in mind; Alys would never have leant herself as a procurer. "Aren't the conservative-wing Vor lords going to shit themselves? Not to mention the remaining radical revolutionary Komarrans. They'll shit themselves sideways."

"Please do not use barracks-language at the table, Miles. But in answer to your question . . . perhaps. The Centrist Coalition will like it, though. Or could be persuaded to."

"By you? Or by their wives, through you, do you mean? Do you approve?"

Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "Taking it all in all . . . yes, I think I do. Since your mother would not bestir herself in that department, I have by default been supervising Gregor's bride-search for the last decade. And a frustrating task it has been. I mean, he'd just sit there, and stare at me, with this dreadful, doleful, Why are you doing this to me? look on his face. I think I've paraded every tall, slim, Vor beauty on the planet past him at one time or another, to the great disruption of their lives and the routines of their families; I've offered dozens of resumes . . . nothing worked. I swear, Gregor has been even more frustrating than Ivan, and Ivan has lost so many good opportunities. . . . A certain nameless wit, or half-wit, even whispered I ought to start trying boys, but I pointed out that would not solve the heir problem, which is the whole point of the exercise in the first place."

"Not without a great deal of unprecedented genetic engineering interference," Miles agreed. "No, not boys, not Gregor. But not a Vor either. I had that figured out years ago—I wish you'd have asked me. Gregor's even more closely related to Mad Emperor Yuri than I am. And, um . . . he knows more about his father, the late unlamented Crown Prince Serg, than I think my parents might wish. He has these historically well-founded genetic paranoias about—well—paranoia. And about Vor inbreeding. He'd never let himself fall in love with another Vor."

Alys's fine dark brows twitched. "I eventually figured out the Vor part for myself. It left me with a dilemma, as you may imagine."