"Thank you." Miles rose, and preceded him out of his office, his hand rechecking the tangible thanks in his pocket.
Medals, huh. Medals buy no fleet repairs.
He paused at a transparent portal, caught half by the vista from the jump station and half by his own reflection. Oseran/Dendarii dress greys were all right, he decided; soft grey velvet tunic set off with blinding white trim and silver buttons on the shoulders, matching trousers and grey synthasuede boots. He fancied the outfit made him look taller. Perhaps he would keep the design.
Beyond the portal floated a scattering of ships, Dendarii, Ranger, Vervani, and Alliance. The
Prince Serg
was not among them, being now in orbit above the Vervani homeworld while high-level—literally—talks continued, hammering out the details of the permanent treaty of friendship, commerce, tariff reduction, mutual defense pact, & etc, among Barrayar, Vervain, Aslund and Pol. Gregor, Miles had heard, was being quite luminous in both the public relations and the actual nuts and bolts part of the business.
Better you than me, boy.
The Vervani jumppoint station was letting its own repairs schedule slacken to lend aid to the Dendarii; Baz was working around the clock. Miles tore himself away from the vista and followed the station commandant.
They paused in the corridor outside the large briefing room where the ceremony was to take place, waiting for the attendees to settle. The Vervani apparently wished the principals to make a grand entrance. The commandant went in to prepare. The audience was not large—too much vital work going on—but the Vervani had scraped up enough warm bodies to make it look respectable, and Miles had contributed a platoon of convalescent Dendarii to fluff up the crowd. He would accept on their behalf, in his speech, he decided.
As Miles waited, he saw Commander Cavilo arrive with her Barrayaran honor guard. As far as he knew, the Vervani were not yet aware that the honor-guard's weapons were lethally charged and they had orders to shoot to kill if their prisoner attempted escape. Two hard-faced women in Barrayaran auxiliary uniforms made sure Cavilo was watched both night and day. Cavilo did a good job of ignoring their presence.
The Ranger dress uniform was a neater version of their fatigues, in tan, black, and white, subliminally reminding Miles of a guard dog's fur.
This bitch bites,
he reminded himself. Cavilo smiled and drifted up to Miles. She reeked of her poisonous green-scented perfume; she must have bathed in it.
Miles tilted his head in salute, reached into a pocket, and took out two nose filters. He thrust one up each nostril, where they expanded softly to create a seal, and inhaled deeply to test them. Working fine. They would filter out much smaller molecules than the vile organics of that damned perfume. Miles breathed out through his mouth.
Cavilo watched this performance with an expression of thwarted fury. "
Damn
you," she muttered.
Miles shrugged, palms out, as if to say,
What would you have of me?
"Are you and your survivors about ready to move out?"
"Right after this idiot charade. I have to abandon six ships, too damaged to jump."
"Sensible of you. If the Vervani don't catch on to you soon, the Cetagandans, when they realize they can't get at you themselves, will probably tell them the ugly truth. You shouldn't linger in these parts."
"I don't intend to. If I never see this place again it will be too soon. That goes double for you, mutant. If not for you . . ." She shook her head bitterly.
"By the way," Miles added, "the Dendarii have now been paid three times for this operation. Once by our original contractors the Aslunders, once by the Barrayarans, and once by the grateful Vervani. Each agreed to cover all our expenses in full. Leaves a very tidy profit."
She actually hissed. "You better
pray
we never meet again."
"Goodbye, then."
They entered the chamber to collect their honors. Would Cavilo have the iron nerve to accept hers on behalf of the Rangers her twisted plots had destroyed? Yes, it turned out. Miles gagged quietly.
The first medal I ever won,
Miles thought as the station commandant pinned his on him with embarrassingly fulsome praise,
and I can't even wear it at home.
The medal, the uniform, and Admiral Naismith himself must soon return to the closet. Forever? The life of Ensign Vorkosigan was not too attractive, by comparison. And yet . . . the mechanics of soldiering were the same, from side to side. If there was any difference between himself and Cavilo, it must be in what they chose to serve. And how they chose to serve it.
Not all paths, but one path. . . .
When Miles arrived back on Barrayar for home leave, a few weeks later, Gregor invited him for lunch at the Imperial Residence. They sat at a wrought-iron table in the North Gardens, which were famous for having been designed by Emperor Ezar, Gregor's grandfather. In summer the spot would be deeply shaded; now it was laced with light filtering through young leaves, rippling in the soft airs of spring. The guards did their guarding out of sight, the servants waited out of earshot unless Gregor touched his pager. Replete with the first three courses, Miles sipped scalding coffee and plotted an assault on a second pastry, which cowered across the table linen under a thick camouflage of cream. Or would that overmatch his forces? This had it all over the contract-slave rations they'd once divided, not to mention Cavilo's doggie chews.
Even Gregor seemed to be seeing it all with new eyes. "Space stations are really boring, y'know? All those corridors," he commented, staring out past a fountain, eye following a curving brick path that dove into a riot of flowers. "I stopped seeing how beautiful Barrayar was, looking at it every day. Had to forget to remember. Strange."
"There were moments I couldn't remember which space station I was on," Miles agreed around a mouthful of pastry and cream. "The luxury trade's another matter, but the Hegen Hub stations did tend to the utilitarian." He grimaced at the associations of that last word.
The conversation wandered over the recent events in the Hegen Hub. Gregor brightened upon learning that Miles had never issued an actual battle order in the
Triumph's
fleet tac room either, except to handle the internal security crisis as delegated by Tung.
"Most officers have finished their jobs when the action begins, because the battle transpires too rapidly for the officers to affect it," Miles assured him. "Once you set up a good tac comp—and, if you're lucky, a man with a magic nose—it's better to keep your hands in your pockets. I had Tung, you had . . . ahem."
"And nice deep pockets," said Gregor. "I'm still thinking about it. It seemed almost unreal, till I visited sickbay afterwards. And realized, such-and-such a point of light meant this man's arm lost, that man's lungs frozen. . . ."
"Gotta watch out for those little lights. They tell such soothing lies," Miles agreed. "If you let them." He chased another gooey bite with coffee, paused, and remarked, "You didn't tell Illyan the truth about your little topple off the balcony, did you." It was observation, not question.
"I told him I was drunk, and climbed down." Gregor watched the flowers. ". . . how did you know?"
"He doesn't talk about you with secret terror in his eyes."
"I've just got him . . . giving a little. I don't want to screw it up now. You didn't tell him either—for that I thank you."
"You're welcome." Miles drank more coffee. "Do me a favor in return. Talk to someone."
"Who? Not Illyan. Not your father."
"How about my mother?"
"Hm." Gregor bit into his torte, upon which he had been making furrows with his fork, for the first time.
"She could be the only person on Barrayar to automatically put Gregor the man before Gregor the emperor. All our ranks look like optical illusions to her, I think. And you know she can keep her own counsel."
"I'll think about it."
"I don't want to be the only one who . . . the only one. I know when I'm out of my depth."
"You do?" Gregor raised his brows, one corner of his mouth crooking up.
"Oh, yes. I just don't normally let on."
"All right. I will," said Gregor.
Miles waited.
"My word," Gregor added.
Miles relaxed, immeasurably relieved. "Thank you." He eyed a third pastry. The portions were sort of dainty. "Are you feeling better, these days?"
"Much, thank you." Gregor went back to plowing furrows in his cream.
"Really?"
Crosshatches. "I don't know. Unlike that poor sod they had parading around playing me while I was gone, I didn't exactly volunteer for this."
"All Vor are draftees, in that sense."
"Any other Vor could run away and not be missed."
"Wouldn't you miss me a little?" said Miles plaintively. Gregor snickered. Miles glanced around the garden. "It doesn't look like such a tough post, compared to Kyril Island."
"Try it alone in bed at midnight, wondering when your genes are going to start generating monsters in your mind. Like Great Uncle Mad Yuri. Or Prince Serg." His glance at Miles was secretly sharp.
"I . . . know about Prince Serg's, uh, problems," said Miles carefully.
"Everyone seems to have known. Except me."
So that
had
been the trigger of depressive Gregor's first real suicide attempt. Key and lock, click! Miles tried not to look triumphant at this sudden feat of insight. "When did you find out?"
"During the Komarr conference. I'd run across hints, before . . . put them down to enemy propaganda."
Then, the ballet on the balcony had been an immediate response to the shock. Gregor'd had no one to vent it to. . . .
"Was it true, that he really got off torturing—"
"Not everything rumored about Crown Prince Serg is true," Miles cut hastily across this. "Though the true core is . . . bad enough. Mother knows. She was eyewitness to crazy things even
I
don't know, about the Escobar invasion. But she'll tell you. Ask her straight, she'll tell you straight back."
"That seems to run in the family," Gregor allowed. "Too."
"She'll tell you how different you are from him—nothing wrong with your mother's blood, that I ever heard—anyway, I probably carry almost as many of Mad Yuri's genes as you do, through one line of descent or another."
Gregor actually grinned. "Is that supposed to be reassuring?"
"Mm, more on the theory that misery loves company."
"I'm afraid of power . . ." Gregor's voice went low, contemplative.
"You aren't afraid of power, you're afraid of hurting people. If you wield that power," Miles deduced suddenly.
"Huh. Close guess."
"Not dead-on?"
"I'm afraid I might enjoy it. The hurting. Like
him.
"
Prince Serg, he meant. His father.
"Rubbish," said Miles. "I watched my grandfather try and get you to enjoy hunting for years. You got good, I suppose because you thought it was your Vorish duty, but you damn near threw up every time you half-missed and we had to chase down some wounded beastie. You may harbor some other perversion, but not sadism."
"What I've read . . . and heard," said Gregor, "is so horribly fascinating. I can't help thinking about it. Can't put it out of my mind."
"Your head is full of horrors because the
world
is full of horrors. Look at the horrors Cavilo caused in the Hegen Hub."
"If I'd strangled her while she slept—which I had a chance to do—none of those horrors would have come to pass."
"If none of those horrors had come to pass, she wouldn't have deserved to be strangled. Some kind of time-travel paradox, I'm afraid. The arrow of justice flies one way. Only. You can't regret not strangling her first. Though I suppose you can regret not strangling her after. . . ."
"No . . . no . . . I'll leave that to the Cetagandans, if they can catch her now that she has her head start."
"Gregor, I'm sorry, but I just don't think Mad Emperor Gregor is in the cards. It's your
advisors
who are going to go crazy."
Gregor stared at the pastry tray, and sighed. "I suppose it would disturb the guards if I tried to shove a cream torte up your nose."
"Deeply. You should have done it when we were eight and twelve; you could have gotten away with it then. The cream pie of justice flies one way," Miles snickered.
Several unnatural and sophomoric things to do with a tray full of pastry were then suggested by both principals, which left them laughing. Gregor needed a good cream pie fight, Miles judged, even if only verbal and imaginary. When the laughter finally died down, and the coffee was cooling, Miles said, "I know flattery sends you straight up a wall, but dammit, you're actually good at your job. You have to know that, on some level inside, after the Vervain talks. Stay on it, huh?"
"I think I will." Gregor's fork dove more forcefully into his last bite of dessert. "You're going to stay on yours, too, right?"
"Whatever it may be. I am to meet with Simon Illyan on just that topic later this afternoon," said Miles. He decided to forgo that third pastry after all.
"You don't sound exactly excited about it."
"I don't suppose he can demote me, there is no rank below ensign."
"He's pleased with you, what else?"
"He didn't look pleased, when I gave him my debriefing report. He looked dyspeptic. Didn't say much." He glanced at Gregor in sudden suspicion. "You know, don't you? Give!"
"Mustn't interfere in the chain of command," said Gregor sententiously. "Maybe you'll move up it. I hear the command at Kyril Island is open."
Miles shuddered.
Spring in the Barrayaran capital city of Vorbarr Sultana was as beautiful as the autumn, Miles decided. He paused a moment before turning in to the front entrance to the big blocky building that was ImpSec HQ. The Earth maple still stood, down the street and around the corner, its tender leaves backlit to a delicate green glow by the afternoon sun. Barrayaran native vegetation ran to dull reds and browns, mostly. Would he ever visit Earth? Maybe.