"If he was involved with the Komarran expatriates on Earth," said Destang neutrally, "the courier didn't know of it."
Not exactly an affirmation of heartfelt trust, that. "It was quite clear," Miles said, "that the captain was a card Ser Galen thought he was holding in reserve. But the card refused to play. At the risk of his life. It was chance, after all, that assigned Captain Galeni to Earth—" Galeni was shaking his head, lips compressed, "wasn't it?"
"No," said Galeni, still at parade rest. "I requested Earth."
"Oh. Well, it was certainly chance that brought me here," Miles scrambled over the gap, "chance and my wounded and cryo-corpses who needed the attention of a major medical center as soon as possible. Speaking of the Dendarii Mercenaries, Commodore, did the courier divert the eighteen million marks Barrayar owes them?"
"It was never sent," said Destang. "Until Captain Bothari-Jesek here arrived at my office, our last contact with your mercenaries was the report you sent from Mahata Solaris wrapping up the Dagoola affair. Then you vanished. From the viewpoint of Sector Two Headquarters, you've been missing for over two months. To our consternation. Particularly when the weekly requests for updates on your status from Imperial Security Chief Illyan turned into daily ones."
"I—see, sir. Then you never received our urgent requests for funds? Then I was never actually assigned to the embassy!"
A very small noise, as of deep and muffled pain, escaped the otherwise deadpan Galeni.
Destang said, "Only by the Komarrans. Apparently it was a ploy to keep you immobilized until they could make their attempted switch."
"I'd guessed as much. Ah—you wouldn't by chance happen to have brought my eighteen million marks with you now, have you? That part hasn't changed. I did mention it in my memo."
"Several times," said Destang dryly. "Yes, Lieutenant, we will fund your irregulars. As usual."
"Ah." Miles melted within, and smiled blindingly. "Thank you, sir. That is a very great relief."
Destang cocked his head curiously. "What have they been living on, the past month?"
"It's—been a bit complicated, sir."
Destang opened his mouth as if to ask more, then apparently thought better of it. "I see. Well, Lieutenant, you may return to your outfit. Your part here is done. You should never have appeared on Earth as Lord Vorkosigan in the first place."
"To which outfit—to the Dendarii Mercenaries, you mean, sir?"
"I doubt Simon Illyan was sending out urgent inquiries for them because he was lonely. It's a safe assumption that new orders will be following on as soon as your location is known to HQ. You should be ready to move out."
Elli and Elena, who had been conferring in very low tones in the corner during all this, looked up brightly at this news; Ivan looked more stricken.
"Yes, sir," said Miles. "What's going to happen here?"
"Since you have not, thank God, involved the Earth authorities, we're free to clear up this aborted bit of treason ourselves. I brought a team from Tau Ceti—"
The team was a cleanup crew, Miles guessed, Intelligence commandos ready, at Destang's order, to restore order to a treason-riddled embassy with whatever force or guile might be required.
"Ser Galen would have been on our most-wanted list long before this if we hadn't believed him already dead. Galen!" Destang shook his head as though he still couldn't believe it himself. "Here on Earth, all this time. You know, I served during the Komarr Revolt—it's where I got my start in Security. I was on the team that dug through the rubble of the Halomar Barracks, after the bastards blew it up in the middle of the night—looking for survivors and evidence, finding bodies and damned few clues . . . There were a lot of new openings for posts in Security that morning. Damn. How it all comes back. If we can find Galen again, after you let him slip through your hands," Destang's eyes fell without favor on Galeni, "accidentally or otherwise, we'll take him back to Barrayar to answer for that bloody morning if nothing else. I wish he could be made to answer for it all, but there's not enough of him to go around. Rather like Mad Emperor Yuri."
"A laudable plan, sir," said Miles carefully. Galeni had his jaw clamped shut, no help there. "But there are a dozen Komarran ex-rebels on Earth with pasts just as bloody as Ser Galen's. Now that he's been exposed, he's no more threat to us than they are."
"They've been inactive for years," said Destang. "Galen, clearly, has been quite the reverse."
"But if you're contemplating an illegal kidnapping, it could damage our diplomatic relations with Earth. Is it worth it?"
"Permanent justice is well worth a temporary offended protest, I can assure you, Lieutenant."
Galen was dead meat to Destang. Well, and so. "On what grounds would you kidnap my—clone, then, sir? He's never committed a crime on Barrayar. He's never even been to Barrayar."
Shut up, Miles!
Ivan, with a look of increasing alarm on his face, mouthed silently from behind Destang.
You don't argue with a commodore!
Miles ignored him.
"The fate of my clone concerns me closely, sir."
"I can imagine. I hope we can eliminate the danger of further confusion between you soon."
Miles hoped that didn't mean what he thought it did. If he had to derail Destang . . . "There's no danger of confusion, sir. A simple medical scan can tell the difference between us. His bones are normal, mine are not. By what charge or claim do we have any further interest in him?"
"Treason, of course. Conspiracy against the Imperium."
The second part being demonstrably true, Miles concentrated on the first part. "Treason? He was born on Jackson's Whole. He's not an Imperial subject by conquest or place of birth. To charge him with treason," Miles took a breath, "you must allow him to be an Imperial subject by blood. And if he's that, he's that all the way, a lord of the Vor with all the rights of his rank including trial by his peers—the Council of Counts in full session."
Destang's brows rose. "Would he think to attempt such an outré defense?"
If he didn't, I'd point it out to him. "Why not?"
"Thank you, Lieutenant. That's a complication I had not considered." Destang looked thoughtful indeed, and increasingly steely.
Miles's plan to convince Destang that letting the clone go was his own idea seemed to be slipping dangerously retrograde. He had to know— "Do you see assassination as an option, sir?"
"A compelling one." Destang's spine straightened decisively.
"There could be a legal problem, here, sir. Either he's not an Imperial subject, and we have no claim on him in the first place, or he is, and the full protection of Imperial law should apply to him. In either case, his murder would—" Miles moistened his lips; Galeni, who alone knew where he was heading, shut his eyes like a man watching an accident about to happen, "be a criminal order. Sir."
Destang looked rather impatient. "I had not planned to give
you
the order, Lieutenant."
He thinks I want to keep my hands clean. . . .
If Miles pushed the confrontation with Destang to its logical conclusion, with two Imperial officers witnessing, there was a chance the commodore would back down; there was at least an equal chance Miles would find himself in very deep—deepness. If the confrontation went all the way to a messy court-martial, neither of them would emerge undamaged. Even if Miles won, Barrayar would not be well served, and Destang's forty years of Imperial service did not deserve such an ignoble end. And if he got himself confined to quarters now, all alternate courses of action (and what was he contemplating, for God's sake?) would be closed to him. He did not want to be locked up in another room. Meanwhile, Destang's team would carry out any order he gave them without hesitation. . . .
He bared his teeth in a smile, of sorts, and said only, "Thank you, sir." Ivan looked relieved.
Destang paused. "Legality is an unusual concern for a covert operations specialist, at this late date, isn't it?"
"We all have our illogical moments."
Quinn's attention was now riveted upon him; a slight twitch of her eyebrow asked,
What the hell . . . ?
"Try not to have too many of them, Lieutenant Vorkosigan," said Destang dryly. "My aide has the nontraceable credit chit for your eighteen million marks. See him on your way out. Take all these women with you." He waved at the two uniformed Dendarii.
Ivan, reminded, smiled at them.
They're my officers, dammit, not my harem,
Miles's thought snarled silently. But no Barrayaran officer of Destang's age would see it that way. Some attitudes couldn't be changed; they just had to be outlived.
Destang's words were a clear dismissal. Miles ignored them at his peril. Yet Destang had not mentioned—
"Yes, Lieutenant, run along." Captain Galeni's voice was utmost-bland. "I never finished writing my report. I'll give you one Mark, against the commodore's eighteen million, if you take the Dendarii off with you now."
Miles's eyes widened just slightly, hearing the capital M.
Galeni hasn't told Destang yet that the Dendarii are on the case. Therefore, he can't order them off, can he?
A head start—if he could find Galen and Mark before Destang's team did— "That's a bargain, Captain," Miles heard his own voice saying. "It's amazing, how much one Mark can weigh."
Galeni nodded once and turned back to Destang.
Miles fled.
Ivan trailed along as Miles returned to their quarters to change clothes for the last time back into the Dendarii admiral's uniform in which he'd arrived, a lifetime and a half ago.
"I don't think I really want to watch, downstairs," Ivan explained. "Destang's well launched into a bloody reaming. Bet he'll keep Galeni on his feet all night, trying to break him if he can."
"Damn it!" Miles bundled his green Barrayaran jacket into a wad and flung it against the far wall, but it didn't carry enough momentum to begin to vent his frustration. He flopped down on a bed, pulled off a boot, hefted it, then shook his head and dropped it in disgust. "It burns me. Galeni deserves a medal, not a load of grief. Well—if Ser Galen couldn't break him, I don't suppose Destang will either. But it's not right, not right . . ." He brooded. "And I helped set him up for it, too. Damn, damn, damn . . ."
Elli handed him his gray uniform without comment. Ivan was not so wise.
"Yeah, nice going, Miles. I'll think of you, safely up in orbit, while Destang's headquarters crew are cleaning house down here. Suspicious as hell—they wouldn't trust their own grandmothers. We're all in for it. Scrubbed, rinsed, and hung out to dry in the cold, cold wind." He wandered over to his own bed and regarded it with longing. "No use turning in; they'll be after me before morning for something." He sat down on it glumly.
Miles looked up at Ivan in sudden speculation. "Huh. Yeah, you are going to be rather in the middle of things for the next few days, aren't you?"
Ivan, alert to the change in his tone, eyed him suspiciously. "Too right. So what?"
Miles shook out his trousers. His half of the secured comm link fell onto the bed. He pulled on his Dendarii grays. "Suppose I remember to turn in my comm link before I leave. And suppose Elli forgets to turn in hers." Miles held up a restraining finger, and Elli stopped fishing in her jacket. "And suppose you stick it in your pocket, meaning to turn it back in to Sergeant Barth as soon as you get the other half." He tossed the comm link to Ivan, who caught it automatically, but then held it away from himself between thumb and forefingers as if it were something he'd found writhing under a rock.
"And suppose I remember what happened to me the last time I helped you sub-rosa?" said Ivan truculently. "That little sleight of hand I pulled to get you back in the embassy the night you tried to burn down London is on my record, now. Destang's bird-dogs will have spasms as soon as they turn that up, in light of the present circumstances. Suppose I stick it up your—" his eyes fell on Elli, "ear, instead?"
Miles thrust his head and arms up through his black tee-shirt and pulled it down, grinning slightly. He began stuffing his feet into his Dendarii-issue combat boots. "It's only a precaution. May never use it. Just in case I need a private line into the embassy in an emergency."
"I cannot imagine," said Ivan primly, "any emergency that a loyal junior officer can't confide to his very own sector security commander." His voice grew stern. "Neither would Destang. Just what are you hatching in the back of your twisty little mind, Coz?"
Miles sealed his boots and paused in seriousness. "I'm not sure. But I may yet see a chance to save . . . something, from this mess."
Elli, listening intently, remarked, "I thought we had saved something. We uncovered a traitor, plugged a security leak, foiled a kidnapping, and broke up a major plot against the Barrayaran Imperium. And we got paid. What more do you want for one week?"
"Well, it would have been nice if any of that had been on purpose, instead of by accident," Miles mused.
Ivan and Elli looked at each other across the top of Miles's head, their faces beginning to mirror a similar unease. "What more do you want to save, Miles?" Ivan echoed.
Miles's frown, directed to his boots, deepened. "Something. A future. A second chance. A . . . possibility."
"It's the clone, isn't it?" said Ivan, his mouth hardening. "You've gone and let yourself get obsessed with that goddamn clone."
"Flesh of my flesh, Ivan." Miles turned his hands over, staring at them. "On some planets, he would be called my brother. On others he might even be called my son, depending on the laws regarding cloning."
"One cell! On Barrayar," said Ivan, "they call it your enemy when it's shooting at you. You having a little short-term memory trouble? Those people just tried to kill you! This—yesterday morning!"
Miles smiled briefly up at Ivan without replying.
"You know," Elli said cautiously, "if you decided you really wanted a clone, you could have one made. Without the, ah, problems of the present one. You have trillions of cells . . ."