<blockquote>Elena Bothari is eighteen years old when Tante Cordelia, no, Countess Vorkosigan tells her about her mother. They'd been talking about the plans for the trip to Beta Colony and Elena had brought up trying to find her mother. And then... and then she'd found out that everyone had lied to her for her entire life. That everyone had known where she had come from. That they'd lied to her every day they never told her. That they gave her to the man who tortured and raped her mother to raise as his daughter.
Elena doesn't want to, or even need to, hear why they'd done it. This is Barrayar. It's about honor. It's always about honor. But no one had cared about her honor.</blockquote>
