Young Miles

  It was the measured, cultured voice that triggered the connection. Metzov's face, reddened with excitement, drained white. He looked around involuntarily—for Illyan, Miles guessed.

  "Uh, this is General Stanis Metzov," Miles explained.

  "The Kyril Island Metzov?"

  "Yeah."

  "Oh." Gregor maintained his closed reserve, nearly expressionless.

  "Where is your security, sir?" Metzov demanded of Gregor, his voice harsh with unacknowledged fear.

  You're looking at it, Miles mourned.

  "Not far behind, I imagine," Gregor essayed, cool. "Let Us go Our way, and they will not trouble you."

  "Who is this fellow?" Cavilo tapped a boot impatiently.

  "What," Miles couldn't help asking Metzov, "what are you doing here?"

  Metzov went grim. "How shall a man my age, stripped of his Imperial Pension—his life savings—live? Did you hope I would sit down and quietly starve? Not I."

  Inopportune, to remind Metzov of his grudge, Miles realized. "This . . . looks like an improvement over Kyril Island," Miles suggested hopefully. His mind still boggled. Metzov, working under a woman? The internal dynamics of this command chain must be fascinating. Stanis darling?

  Metzov did not look amused.

  "Who are they?" Cavilo demanded again.

  "Power. Money. Strategic leverage. More than you can imagine," Metzov answered.

  "Trouble," Miles put in. "More than you can imagine."

  "You are a separate matter, mutant," Metzov said.

  "I beg to differ, General," said Gregor in his best Imperial tones. Feeling for footing in this floating conversation, though concealing his confusion well.

  "We must take them to the Kurin's Hand at once. Out of sight," said Metzov to Cavilo. He glanced at the arrest squad. "Out of hearing. We'll continue this in private."

  They marched off, escorted by the patrol. Metzov's gaze felt like a knife blade in Miles's back, prodding and probing. They passed through several deserted docking bays till they arrived at a major one actively servicing a ship. The command ship, judging by the number and formality of duty guards.

  "Take them to Medical for questioning," Cavilo ordered the squad as they were saluted through a personnel hatch by the officer in charge.

  "Hold on that," said Metzov. He stared around the cross-corridors, almost jittering. "Do you have a guard who's deaf and mute?"

  "Hardly!" Cavilo stared indignantly at her mysteriously agitated subordinate. "To the brig, then."

  "No," said Metzov sharply. Hesitating to throw the Emperor into a cell, Miles realized. Metzov turned to Gregor and said with perfect seriousness, "May I have your parole, sire—sir?"

  "What?" cried Cavilo. "Have you stripped a gear, Stanis?"

  "A parole," Gregor noted gravely, "is a promise given between honorable enemies. Your honor I am willing to assume. But are you thus declaring yourself Our enemy?"

  Excellent bit of weaseling, Miles approved.

  Metzov's eye fell on Miles. His lips thinned. "Perhaps not yours. But you have a poor choice of favorites. Not to mention advisors."

  Gregor was now very hard to read. "Some acquaintances are imposed on me. Also some advisors."

  "To my cabin," Metzov held up his hand as Cavilo opened her mouth to object, "for now. For our initial conversation. Without witnesses, or Security recordings. After that, we decide, Cavie."

  Cavilo, eyes narrowing, closed her mouth. "All right, Stanis. Lead off." Her hand curved open ironically, and gestured them onward.

  Metzov posted two guards outside his cabin door, and dismissed the rest. When the door had sealed behind them, he tied Miles with a tangle-cord and sat him on the floor. With helplessly ingrained deference, he then seated Gregor in the padded station chair at his comconsole desk, the best the spartan chamber had to offer.

  Cavilo, seated cross-legged on the bed watching the play, objected to the logic of this. "Why tie up the little one and leave the big one loose?"

  "Keep your stunner drawn, then, if he worries you," Metzov advised. Breathing heavily, he stood hands on hips and studied Gregor. He shook his head, as if still not believing his eyes.

  "Why not your stunner?"

  "I have not yet decided whether to draw a weapon in his presence."

  "We're alone now, Stanis," Cavilo said in a sarcastic lilt. "Would you kindly explain this insanity? And it had better be good."

  "Oh yes. That—" he pointed to Miles, "is Lord Miles Vorkosigan, the son of the Prime Minister of Barrayar. Admiral Aral Vorkosigan—I trust you've heard of him."

  Cavilo's brows lowered. "What was he doing on Pol Six in the guise of a Betan gunrunner, then?"

  "I'm not sure. The last I'd heard he was under arrest by Imperial Security, though of course no one believed they were serious about it."

  "Detainment," Miles corrected. "Technically."

  "And he—" Metzov swung to point to Gregor, "is the Emperor of Barrayar. Gregor Vorbarra. What he's doing here, I cannot imagine."

  "Are you sure?" Even Cavilo was taken aback. At Metzov's stern nod, her eye lit with speculation. She looked at Gregor as if for the first time. "Really. How interesting."

  "But where is his security? We must tread very cautiously, Cavie."

  "What's he worth to them? Or for that matter, to the highest bidder?"

  Gregor smiled at her. "I'm Vor, ma'am. In a sense, the Vor. Risk in service is the Vorish trade. I wouldn't assume my value was infinite, if I were you."

  Gregor's complaint had some truth to it, Miles thought; when he wasn't being emperor he seemed hardly anyone at all. But he sure did the role well.

  "An opportunity, yes," said Metzov, "but if we create an enemy we can't handle—"

  "If we hold him hostage, we ought to be able to handle them with ease," Cavilo commented thoughtfully.

  "An alternate and more prudent course," Miles interjected, "would be to help us swiftly and safely on our way, and collect a lucrative and honorable thank-you. A, as it were, win-win strategy."

  "Honorable?" Metzov's eyes burned. He fell into a brooding silence, then muttered. "But what are they doing here? And where's the snake Illyan? I want the mutant, in any case. Damn! It must be played boldly, or not at all." He stared malignantly at Miles. "Vorkosigan . . . so. And what is Barrayar to me now, a Service that stabbed me in the back after thirty-five years. . . ." He straightened decisively, but still did not, Miles noticed, draw a weapon in the Emperor's presence. "Yes, take them to the brig, Cavie."

  "Not so fast," said Cavilo, looking newly pensive. "Send the little one to the brig, if you like. He's nothing, you say?"

  The only son of the most powerful military leader on Barrayar kept his mouth shut for a change. If, if, if . . .

  "By comparison," Metzov temporized, looking suddenly fearful of being cheated of his prey.

  "Very well." Cavilo slid her stunner, which she had stopped aiming and started playing with some time back, soundlessly into her holster. She moved to unseal the door and beckon to the guards. "Put him," she gestured to Gregor, "in Cabin Nine, G Deck. Cut the outgoing comm, lock the door, and post a guard with a stunner. But supply him with any reasonable comfort he may request." She added aside to Gregor, "It's the most comfortable visiting officer's quarters the Kurin's Hand can supply, ah—"

  "Call me Greg." Gregor sighed.

  "Greg. Nice name. Cabin Nine is next to my own. We will continue this conversation shortly, after you, ah, freshen up. Perhaps over dinner. Oversee his arrival there, will you, Stanis?" She favored both men with an impartial, glittering smile, and wafted out, a neat trick in boots. She stuck her head back in and indicated Miles. "Bring him along to the brig."

  Miles was removed by the second guard with a wave of a stunner and the prod of a blessedly inactivated shock-stick, to follow in her wake.

  The Kurin's Hand, judging from his passing glimpses, was a much larger command ship than the Triumph, able to field bigger and punchier combat drop or boarding forces,
but correspondingly sluggish in maneuver. Its brig was larger too, Miles discovered shortly, and more formidably secured. A single entrance opened onto an elaborate guard monitor station, from which led two deadend cell bays.

  The freighter captain was just leaving the guard station, under the watchful eye of the squadman detailed to escort him. He exchanged a hostile look with Cavilo.

  "As you see, they remain in good health," Cavilo said to him. "My half of the bargain, Captain. See that you continue to complete your own part."

  Let's see what happens. . . . "You saw a recording," Miles piped up. "Demand to see 'em in the flesh."

  Cavilo's white teeth clenched rigidly, but her annoyed grimace melted seamlessly into a vulpine smile as the freighter captain jerked around. "What? You . . ." He planted himself mulishly. "All right, which of you is lying?"

  "Captain, that's all the guarantee you get," said Cavilo, gesturing to the monitors. "You chose to gamble, gamble you shall."

  "Then that—" he pointed to Miles, "is the last result you get."

  A subtle hand motion down by her trouser seam brought the guards to the alert, stunners drawn. "Take him out," she ordered.

  "No!"

  "Very well," her eyes widened in exasperation, "take him to Cell Six. And lock him in."

  As the freighter captain turned, torn between resistance and eagerness, Cavilo motioned the guard to open distance from his prisoner. He fell away, brows rising in question. Cavilo glanced at Miles and smiled very sourly, as if to say, All right, Smartass, watch me. In a cold smooth motion Cavilo flipped open her left side holster seal, brought up a nerve disrupter, took careful aim, and fried the back of the captain's head. He convulsed once and dropped, dead before he hit the deck.

  She walked over and pensively prodded the body with the pointed toe of her boot, then glanced up at Miles, whose jaw was gaping open. "You will keep your mouth shut next time, won't you, little man?"

  Miles's mouth shut with a snap. You had to experiment. . . . At least now he knew who'd killed Liga. The rabbity Polian's reported death seemed suddenly real and vivid. The exalted look flashing over Cavilo's face as she blew the freighter captain away fascinated even as it horrified Miles. Who did you really see in your gunsights, darling? "Yes, ma'am," he choked, trying to conceal his shakes, delayed reaction to this shocking turn. Damn his tongue. . . .

  She stepped down to the security monitoring station and spoke to the tech at—frozen at—her post. "Unload the recording of General Metzov's cabin that includes the last half-hour, and give it to me. Start a fresh one. No, don't play it back!" She placed the disk in a breast pocket and carefully sealed the flap. "Put this one in Cell Fourteen." She nodded toward Miles. "Or, ah—if it's empty, make that Cell Thirteen." Her teeth bared briefly.

  The guards re-searched Miles, and took ID scans. Cavilo blandly informed them that his name should be entered as Victor Rotha.

  As he was pulled to his feet, two men with medical insignia arrived with a float-pallet to remove the body. Cavilo, watching without expression now, remarked tiredly to Miles, "You chose to damage my double-agent's utility. A vandal's prank. He had better uses than as an object-lesson for a fool. I do not warehouse non-useful items. I suggest you start thinking of how you can make yourself more useful to me than as merely General Metzov's catnip toy." She smiled faintly into some invisible distance. "Though he does jump for you, doesn't he? I shall have to explore that motivation."

  "What is the use of Stanis-darling to you?" Miles dared, pigheaded-defiant in his wash of angry guilt. Metzov as her paramour? Revolting thought.

  "He's an experienced ground combat commander."

  "What's a fleet on all-space wormhole guard duty want with a ground commander?"

  "Well, then," she smiled sweetly, "he amuses me."

  That was supposed to have been the first answer. "No accounting for taste," Miles muttered inanely, careful not to be heard. Should he warn her about Metzov? On second thought, should he warn Metzov about her?

  His head was still spinning with this new dilemma when the blank door of his solitary cell sealed him in.

  * * *

  It didn't take long for Miles to exhaust the novelties of his new quarters, a space a little larger than two by two meters, furnished only with two padded benches and a fold-out lavatory. No library viewer, no relief from the wheel of his thoughts mired in the quag of his self-recriminations.

  A Ranger field-ration bar, inserted some time later through a force-shielded aperture in the door, proved even more repellent than the Barrayaran Imperial version, resembling a rawhide dog chew. Wetted with spit, it softened slightly, enough to tear off gummy shreds if your teeth were in good health. More than a temporary distraction, it promised to last till the next issue. Probably nutritious as hell. Miles wondered what Cavilo was serving Gregor for dinner. Was it as scientifically vitamin-balanced?

  They'd been so close to their goal. Even now, the Barrayaran consulate was only a few locks and levels away, less than a kilometer. If only he could get there from here. If a chance came . . . On the other hand, how long would Cavilo hesitate to disregard diplomatic custom and violate the consulate, if she saw some utility in it? About as long as she'd hesitated to shoot the freighter captain in the back, Miles gauged. She would surely have ordered the consulate, and all known Barrayaran agents on Vervain Station, watched by now. Miles unstuck his teeth from a fragment of ration-leather, and hissed.

  A beeping from the code-lock warned Miles he was about to have a visitor. Interrogation, so soon? He'd expected Cavilo to wine, dine, and evaluate Gregor first, then get back to him. Or was he to be a mere project for underlings? He swallowed, throat tight on a ration blob, and sat up, trying to look stern and not scared.

  The door slid back to reveal General Metzov, still looking highly military and efficient in the tan and black Ranger fatigues.

  "Sure you don't need me, sir?" the guard at his elbow asked as Metzov shouldered through the opening.

  Metzov glanced contemptuously at Miles, looking low and unmilitary in Victor Rotha's now limp and grimy green silk shirt, baggy trousers, and bare feet—the processing guards had taken his sandals. "Hardly. He's not going to jump me."

  Damn straight, Miles agreed with regret.

  Metzov tapped his wrist comm. "I'll call you when I'm done."

  "Very well, sir." The door sighed closed. The cell seemed suddenly very tiny indeed. Miles drew his legs up, sitting in a small defensive ball on his pallet. Metzov stood at ease, contemplating Miles for a long, satisfied moment, then settled himself comfortably on the bench opposite.

  "Well, well," said Metzov, his mouth twisting. "What a turn of fate."

  "I thought you'd be dining with the Emperor," said Miles.

  "Commander Cavilo, being female, can get a little scattered under stress. When she calms down again, she'll see the need for my expertise in Barrayaran matters," said Metzov in measured tones.

  In other words, you weren't invited. "You left the Emperor alone with her?" Gregor, watch your step!

  "Gregor's no threat. I fear his upbringing has made him altogether weak."

  Miles choked.

  Metzov sat back, allowed his fingers to tap gently on his knee. "So tell me, Ensign Vorkosigan—if it is still Ensign Vorkosigan. There being no justice in the world, I suppose you've retained your rank and pay. What are you doing here? With him?"

  Miles was tempted to confine himself to name, rank, and serial number, except Metzov knew all those already. Was Metzov an enemy, exactly? Of Barrayar, that is, not of Miles personally. Did Metzov divide the two in his own mind? "The Emperor became separated from his security. We hoped to regain contact with them via the Barrayaran consulate here." There, nothing in that that wasn't perfectly obvious.

  "And where did you come from?"

  "Aslund."

  "Don't bother playing the idiot, Vorkosigan. I know Aslund. Who sent you there in the first place? And don't bother lying, I can cross-question the freighter
captain."

  "No, you can't. Cavilo killed him."

  "Oh?" A flicker of surprise, suppressed. "Clever of her. He was the only witness to know where you went."

  Had that been part of Cavilo's calculation, when she'd raised her nerve disrupter? Probably. And yet . . . the freighter captain was also the only corroborating witness who knew where they'd come from. Maybe Cavilo was not so formidable as she seemed at first glance.

  "Again," Metzov said patiently—Miles could see he felt he had all the time in the world—"how did you come to be in the Emperor's company?"

  "How do you think?" Miles countered, buying time.

  "Some plot, of course." Metzov shrugged.

  Miles groaned. "Oh, of course!" He uncurled in his indignation. "And what sane—or insane, for that matter—chain of conspiracy do you imagine accounts for our arrival here, alone, from Aslund? I mean, I know what it really was, I lived it, but what does it look like?" To a professional paranoid, that is. "I'd just love to hear it."

  "Well . . ." Metzov was drawn out in spite of himself. "You have somehow separated the Emperor from his security. You must either be setting up an elaborate assassination, or planning to implement some form of personality-control."

  "That's what just springs to mind, huh?" Miles thumped his back against the wall with a frustrated growl, and slumped.

  "Or perhaps you're on some secret—and therefore dishonorable—diplomatic mission. Some sellout."

  "If so, where's Gregor's security?" Miles sang. "Better watch out."

  "So, my first hypothesis is proved."

  "In that case, where's my security?" Miles snarled. Where, indeed?

  "A Vorkosigan plot—no, perhaps not the Admiral's. He controls Gregor at home—"

  "Thank you, I was about to point that out."

  "A twisted plot from a twisted mind. Do you dream of making yourself emperor of Barrayar, mutant?"

  "A nightmare, I assure you. Ask Gregor."

  "It scarcely matters. The medical staff will squeeze out your secrets as soon as Cavilo gives the go-ahead. In a way, it's a shame fast-penta was ever invented. I'd enjoy breaking every bone in your body till you talked. Or screamed. You won't be able to hide behind your father's," he grinned briefly, "skirts, out here, Vorkosigan." He grew thoughtful. "Maybe I will anyway. One bone a day, for as long as they last."