Mark retreated to Elena’s side. “Is he a doctor?”

“No, just a medic.” Elena was out of breath too.

The medic looked up and reported, “It’s the heart, but I don’t know what or why. Don’t have the Prime Minister’s doctor come here, have him meet us in Hassadar. Without delay. I think we’re going to need the facilities.”

“Right.” Elena snapped orders into a comm link.

Mark tried to help them get the Count temporarily positioned on the float bike, propped between Elena and the corpsman. The medic glared at Mark. “Don’t touch him!”

The Count, whom Mark had thought half-conscious, opened his eyes and whispered, “Hey. The boy’s all right, Jasi.” Jasi the medic wilted. “S” all right, Mark.”

He’s frigging dying, yet he’s still thinking ahead. He’s trying to clear me of suspicion.

“The aircar’s meeting us in the nearest clearing,” Elena pointed downslope. “Get there if you want to ride along.” The bike rose slowly and carefully.

Mark took the hint, and galloped off down the hill, intensely conscious of the moving shadow just above the trees. It left him behind. He slammed faster, using tree trunks to make turns, and arrived at the double trail with palms scraped raw just as the ImpSec medic, Elena, and Armsman Pym finished laying Count Vorkosigan across the backseat of the rear compartment of a sleek black aircar. Mark tumbled in and sat next to Elena on the rear-facing seat as the canopy closed and sealed. Pym took the controls in the front compartment, and they spiraled into the air and shot away. The medic crouched on the floor by his patient and did logical things like attaching oxygen and administering a hypospray of synergine to stabilize against shock.

Mark was puffing louder than the Count, to the point that the absorbed corpsman actually glanced up at him with a medical frown, but unlike the Count, Mark caught his breath after a time. He was sweating, and shaking inside. The last time he’d felt this bad Bharaputran security troops had been firing lethal weapons at him. Are aircars supposed to fly this fast? Mark prayed they wouldn’t suck anything bigger than a bug into the thruster intakes.

Despite the synergine the Count’s eyes were going shocked and vague. He pawed at the little plastic oxygen mask, batted away the medic’s worried attempt to control his hands, and motioned urgently to Mark. He so clearly wanted to say something, it was less traumatic to let him than to try and stop him. Mark slid onto his knees by the Count’s head.

The Count whispered to Mark in a tone of earnest confidence, “All … true wealth … is biological.”

The medic glanced wildly at Mark for interpretation; Mark could only shrug helplessly. “I think he’s going out of it.”

The Count only tried to speak once more, on the hurtling trip; he clawed his mask away to say, “Spit,” which the medic held his head to do, a nasty hacking which cleared his throat only temporarily.

The Great Man’s last words, thought Mark blackly. All that monstrous, amazing life dwindled down at the end to Spit. Biological indeed. He wrapped his arms around himself and sat in a huddled ball on the floor, gnawing absently on his knuckles.

When they arrived at the landing pad at Hassadar District Hospital, what seemed a small army of medical personnel descended instantly upon them, and whisked the Count away. The corpsman and the armsman were swept up; Mark and Elena were shuttled into a private waiting area, where they perforce waited.

At one point a woman with a report panel in her hand popped in to ask Mark, “Are you the next-of-kin?”

Mark’s mouth opened, and stopped. He literally could not reply. He was rescued by Elena, who said, “Countess Vorkosigan is flying down from Vorbarr Sultana. She should be here in just a few more minutes.” It seemed to satisfy the woman, who popped out again.

Elena had it right. It wasn’t another ten minutes before the corridor was enlivened by the clatter of boots. The Countess swung in trailed by two double-timing liveried armsmen. She flashed past, giving Mark and Elena a quick reassuring smile, but blasted on through the double doors without pausing. Some clueless passing doctor on the other side actually tried to stop her: “Excuse me, ma’am, no visitors beyond this point—”

Her voice overrode his, “Don’t give me that crap, kid, I own you.” His protests ended in an apologetic gurgle as he saw the armsmen’s uniforms and made the correct deduction; with a “Right this way, m’lady,” their voices faded into the distance.

“She meant that,” Elena commented to Mark with a faint sardonic curl to her lip. “The medical network in the Vorkosigan’s District has been one of her pet projects. Half the personnel here are oath-sworn to her to serve in exchange for their schooling.”

Time ticked by. Mark wandered to the window and stared out over the Vorkosigan’s District capital. Hassadar was a New City, heir of destroyed Vorkosigan Vashnoi; almost all its building had taken place after the end of the time of Isolation, mostly in the last thirty years. Designed around newer methods of transportation than horse carts, it was spread out like a city on any other developed galactic world, accented by a few sky-piercing towers gleaming in the morning sun. Still only morning? It seemed a century since dawn. This hospital was indistinguishable from a similar modest one on, say, Escobar. The Count’s official residence here was one of the few entirely modern villas in the Vorkosigans’ household inventory. The Countess claimed to like it, yet they used it only when in Hassadar on District business; more of a hotel than a home. Curious.

The shadows of Hassadar’s towers had shortened toward noon before the Countess returned to collect them. Mark searched her face anxiously as she entered. Her steps were slow, her eyes tired and strained, but her mouth was not distorted with grief. He knew the Count still lived even before she spoke.

She embraced Elena and nodded to Mark. “Aral is stabilized. They’re going to transfer him to the Imperial Military Hospital in Vorbarr Sultana. His heart is badly damaged. Our man says a transplant or a mechanical is definitely indicated.”

“Where were you earlier this morning?” Mark asked her.

“ImpSec Headquarters.” That was logical. She eyed him. “We divided up the work load. It didn’t take the both of us to ride the tight-beam decoding room. Aral did tell you the news, didn’t he? He swore to me he would.”

“Yes, just before he collapsed.”

“What were you doing?”

Slightly better than the usual, What did you do to him? Haltingly, Mark tried to describe his morning.

“Stress, breakfast, running up hills,” the Countess mused. “He set the pace, I’ll bet.”

“Militarily,” Mark confirmed.

“Ha,” she said darkly.

“Was it an occlusion?” asked Elena. “That’s what it looked like.”

“No. That’s why this took me so by surprise. I knew his arteries were clean—he takes a medication for that, or his awful diet would have killed him years ago. It was an arterial aneurism, within the heart muscle. Burst blood vessel.”

“Stress, eh?” said Mark, dry-mouthed. “Was his blood pressure up?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Yes, considerably, but the vessel was weakened. It would have happened sometime soon anyway.”

“Was there … any more word come in from ImpSec?” he asked timidly. “While you were there.”

“No.” She paced to the window, and stared unseeing at the web and towers of Hassadar. Mark followed her. “Finding the cryo-chamber that way … was pretty shattering to our hopes. At least it finally goaded Aral into trying to connect with you.” Pause. “Did he?”

“No … I don’t know. He took me around, showed me things. He tried. He was trying so hard, it hurt to watch.” It hurt still, a knotted ache somewhere behind his solar plexus. The soul dwelt there, according to somebody-or-other’s mythology.