Mostly About The Vorkosigans

Canon quote from Barrayar, from Aral to his wife, Captain Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan:

"I was so afraid for you, I forgot to be afraid for your enemies. I should have remembered. Dear Captain."

Okay I see what you all were talking about when you said wait till you get to Mirror Dance. Omg.

Lord Mark Vorkosigan. What an icon. Mark who was built as a weapon while in captivity and becomes a tool on his very own initiative only needs four to seven people to care about him as a human before he remakes his entire self and becomes a goddamn hero. Mark figures out how to do Internal Family Systems therapy on himself while being tortured horribly for five days. Hobbies include personal finance, scheming, and responding "round is a shape" when Aral and Miles say to get in shape. By the end he's setting up to the the Mycroft to Miles' Sherlock.

Mark suffers so much abuse and makes So Many Bad Decisions with So Many Consequences and only to end up literally writhing on the floor in the Unprecedented Agony of Being Perceived and Loved. (This is the part that broke me… I saw it coming and was like: Oh noooo, this part is gonna break me. And then it did, and it was perfect.)

Also, the entire, pervasive, complete and total Cordelia-ness of this novel whether or not she's in the room or even on the planet. She gives Mark the assignment of figuring out how to be Mark and there we goooo. And even after Miles has died and gone amnesiac, there's Cordelia's voice: WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH YOUR BABY BROTHER?? This is the thing that gets the memory cascade going! It's Cordelia. And she's got Elena too: "But mostly because someday Countess Vorkosigan will ask me what I did for her son... Mark... she'll mean you." It's Cordelia All The Way Down and I am HERE for it.

I am also really... happy for Cordelia that Mark is here. Because Mark has Cordelia's number in a way that I'm not sure either Aral or Miles does, as deeply as they do know her and adore her. Until Mark, maybe Gregor is the only other person who can even begin to read her the way she reads everybody else (and Mark clocks that too!) and Gregor is way too busy being emperor to give Cordelia the runaround she deserves.

Miles: wow, those Cetagandans were so wild to deal with; they've got all these arcane hierarchies and complicated noble titles and rules of social engagement that are pretty much incomprehensible to outsiders. Not to mention all the long-running power plays between their various internal factions and complex politicking involving a bunch of history and agendas that I feel like I barely scratched the surface of. Can't believe their aristocracy hasn't collapsed yet.