CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

   The lightflyer banked. Miles craned his neck, and caught a glimpse of what was below. Or what wasn't below. Dawn was creeping over a wintry desert. There appeared to be nothing of interest for kilometers around.
   "S" funny," said the guard who was piloting the lightflyer. "Door's open." He touched his comm, and transmitted some sort of code-burst. The other guard shifted uneasily, watching his comrade. Miles twisted around, trying to watch them both.
   They descended. Rocks rose around them, then a concrete shaft. Ah. Concealed entrance. They came to the bottom, and moved forward into an underground garage.
   "Huh," said the other guard. "Where's all the vehicles?"
   The flyer came to rest, and the bigger guard dragged Miles out of the backseat, and unfastened his ankles, and stood him upright. He almost fell down again. The scars on his chest ached with the strain from his hands bound behind his back. He got his feet under himself, and stared around much as the guards were doing. Just a utilitarian garage, badly-lit, echoing and cavernous. And empty.
   The guards marched him toward an entrance. They coded through some automatic doors, and walked to an electronic security chamber. It was up and running, humming blankly. "Vaj?" one guard called. "We're here. Scan us."
   No answer. One of the guards went forward, looked around. Tapped a code into a wall pad. "Bring him through anyway."
   The security chamber passed him. He was still wearing the grey knits the Duronas had given him; no interesting devices woven into the fabric, it seemed, alas.
   The senior guard tried an intercom. Several times. "Nobody answers."
   "What should we do?" asked his comrade.
   The senior man frowned. "Strip him and take him to the boss, I guess. Those were the orders."
   They pulled his ship-knits off him; he was far too out-massed to fight them, but he regretted the loss deeply. It was too damned cold. Even the ox-like guards stared a moment at his raked and scored chest. They re-fastened his hands behind him, and marched him through the facility, their eyes shifting warily at every intersection.
   It was very quiet. Lights burned, but no people appeared anywhere. A strange structure, not very large, plain and_he sniffed_decidedly medical in odor. Research, he decided. Ryoval's private biological research facility. Evidently, after the Dendarii raid of four years ago, Ryoval had decided his main facility wasn't secure enough. Miles could see that. This place did not have the business-air of the other locale. It felt military-paranoid. The sort of place where if you went there to work, you didn't come out again for years at a time. Or, considering Ryoval, ever. He glimpsed a few lab-like rooms, in passing. But no techs. The guards called out, a couple of times. No one answered.
   They came to an open door, beyond which lay some sort of study or office. "Baron, sir?" the senior guard ventured. "We have your prisoner."
   The other guard rubbed his neck. "If he's not here, should we go ahead and work him like the other one?"
   "He hasn't ordered it yet. Better wait."
   Quite. Ryoval was not the sort to reward initiative in subordinates, Miles suspected.
   With a deep, nervous sigh, the senior man stepped across the threshold, and looked around. The junior man prodded Miles forward in his wake. The study was finely furnished, with a real wood desk, and an odd chair in front of it with metal wrist-locks for the person who sat in it. Nobody ran out on a conversation with Baron Ryoval till Baron Ryoval was ready, apparently. They waited.
   "What do we do now?"
   "Don't know. This is as far as my orders went." The senior man paused. "Could be a test. ..."
   They waited about five more minutes.
   "If you don't want to look around," said Miles brightly, "I will."
   They looked at each other. The senior man, his forehead creased, drew a stunner and sidled cautiously through an archway into the next room. His voice came back after a moment. "Shit." And, after another moment, an odd mewling wail, cut off and swallowed.
   This was too much even for the dim bulb who held Miles. With his ham hand still locked firmly around Miles's upper arm, the second guard followed the first into a large chamber arranged as a living room. A wall-sized holovid was blank and silent. A zebra-grained wood bar divided the room. An extremely low chair faced an open area. Baron Ryoval's very dead body lay there face-up, naked, staring at the ceiling with dry eyes.
   There were no obvious signs of a struggle_no overturned furniture, nor plasma arc burns in the walls_except upon the body. There the marks of violence were focused, utterly concentrated: throat crushed, torso pulped, dried blood smeared around his mouth. A double line of fingertip-sized black dots were stitched neatly across the Baron's forehead. They looked like burns. His right hand was missing, cut away, the wrist a cauterized stump.
   The guards twitched in something like horror, an all-too-temporary paralysis of astonishment. "What happened?" whispered the junior man.
   Which way will they jump?
   How did Ryoval control his employee/slaves, anyway? The lesser folk, through terror, of course; the middle-management and tech layer, through some subtle combination of fear and self-interest. But these, his personal bodyguards, must be the innermost cadre, the ultimate instrument by which their master's will was forced upon all the rest.
   They could not be as mentally stunted as their stolidity suggested, or they would be useless in an emergency. But if their narrow minds were intact, it followed that they must be controlled through their emotions. Men whom Ryoval let stand behind him with activated weapons must be programmed to the max, probably from birth. Ryoval must be father, mother, family and all to them. Ryoval must be their god.
   But now their god was dead.
   What would they do? Was I am free even an intelligible concept to them? Without its focal object, how fast would their programming start to break down? Not fast enough. An ugly light, compounded of rage and fear, was growing in their eyes.
   "I didn't do it," Miles pointed out with quick prudence. "I was with you."
   "Stay here," growled the senior man. "I'll reconnoiter." He loped off through the Baron's apartment, to return in a few minutes with a laconic, "His flyer's gone. Lift tube defenses buggered all to hell, too."
   They hesitated. Ah, the downside of perfect obedience: crippled initiative.
   "Hadn't you better check around the facility?" Miles suggested. "There might be survivors. Witnesses. Maybe . . . maybe the assassin is still hiding somewhere." Where is Mark?
   "What do we do with him?" asked the junior man, with a jerk of his head at Miles.
   The senior man scowled in indecision. "Take him along. Or lock him up. Or kill him."
   "You don't know what the Baron wanted me for," Miles interrupted instantly. "Better take me along till you find out."
   "He wanted you for the other one," said the senior man, with an indifferent glance down at him. Little, naked, half-healed, with his hands bound behind him, the guards clearly did not perceive him as a threat. Too right. Hell.
   After a brief muttered conference, the junior man pushed him along, and they began as rapid and methodical a tour of the facility as Miles would have wished to make himself. They found two of their red-and-black uniformed comrades, dead. A mysterious pool of blood snaked across a corridor from wall to wall. They found another body, fully dressed as a senior tech, in a shower, the back of his head crushed with some blunt object. On descending levels they found more signs of struggle, of looting, and of by-no-means-random destruction, comconsoles and equipment smashed.
   Had it been a slave revolt? Some power struggle among factions? Revenge? All three simultaneously? Was the murder of Ryoval its cause, or its goal? Had there been a mass evacuation, or a mass killing? At every corner, Miles braced himself for a scene of carnage.
   The lowest level had a laboratory with half a dozen glass-walled cells lining one end. From the smell, some experiment had been left cooking far too long. He glanced into the cells, and swallowed.
   They had been human, once, those lumps of flesh, scar tissue, and growths. They were now . . . culture-dishes of some kind. Four had been female, two male. Some departing tech, as an act of mercy, had neatly cut each one's throat. He eyed them desperately, his face pressed to the glass. Surely they were all too large to have been Mark. Surely such effects could not have been achieved in a mere five days. Surely. He did not want to enter the cells for a closer examination.
   At least it explained why more of Ryoval's slaves did not try to resist. There was an air of awful economy about it. Don't like your work in the bordello, girl? Sick of the boredom and brutality of being a guard, man? How would you like to go into scientific research? The last stop for any would-be Spartacus among Ryoval's human possessions. Bel was right. We should have nuked this place the last time we were here.
   The guards gave the cells a brief glance, and pressed on. Miles hung back, seized by inspiration. It was worth a try. . . .
   "Shit!" Miles hissed, and jumped.
   The guards spun around.
   "That . . . that man in there. He moved. I think I'm going to vomit."
   "Can't have." The senior guard stared through the transparent wall at a body which lay with its back to them.
   "He couldn't possibly have witnessed anything from in there, could he?" said Miles. "For God's sake, don't open the door."
   "Shut up." The senior guard chewed his lip, stared at the control virtual, and after an irresolute moment, coded open the door and trod cautiously within.
   "Gah!" said Miles.
   "What?" snapped the junior guard.
   "He moved again. He, he, sort of spasmed."
   The junior man drew his stunner and followed his comrade inside, covering him. The senior man extended his hand, faltered, and on second thought pulled his shock stick from his belt and prodded it warily toward the body.
   Miles smacked the door control with a duck of his forehead. The glass seal slid shut, barely in time. The guards smashed into the door and up it like rabid dogs. It barely transmitted the vibration. Their mouths were open, howling curses and threats at him, but no sound passed. The transparent walls must be space-grade material; it stopped stunner fire, too.
   The senior man pulled out a plasma arc and began burning. The wall started to glow slightly. Not good. Miles studied the control panel . . . there. He pushed at menu blocks with his tongue till it brought up oxygen, and re-set it down as far as it would go. Would the guards pass out before the wall gave way to the plasma arc?
   Yes. Good environmental system, that. Ryoval's dogs crumpled against the glass, clawed hands relaxing in unconsciousness. The plasma arc fell from nerveless fingers, and shut off.
   Miles left them sealed in their victim's tomb.
   It was a lab. There had to be cutters, and tools of all sorts . . . right. It took several minutes of contortions, working behind his back, during which he nearly passed out, but his shackles gave way at last. He whimpered with relief as his hands came free.
   Weapons? All weapons per se had been taken, apparently, by the departing inhabitants, and without a biotainer suit he was disinclined to re-open the glass cell and retrieve the guards' gear. But a laser-scalpel from the lab made him feel less vulnerable.
   He wanted his clothing. Shivering from the cold, he trotted back through the eerie corridors to the security entrance, and donned his knits again. He turned back into the facility, and began to seriously search. He tried every comconsole he came to that wasn't smashed. All were internally dedicated, no way to tap an outside channel.
   Where is Mark? It occurred to him suddenly that if there could be anything worse than being held prisoner in some cell here, waiting for his tormentors to come again, it would be to be locked in a cell here waiting for tormentors who never came again. In what was perhaps the most frantic half-hour he'd ever experienced in his life, he opened or broke open every door in the facility. Behind every one he expected to find a sodden little body, its throat mercifully cut . . . He was wheezing and fearing another convulsion when, with great relief, he found the cell_closet_near Ryoval's quarters. Empty. It stank of recent occupation, though. And the bloodstains and other stains on the walls and floor turned his stomach cold and sick. But wherever Mark was, and in whatever condition, he was not here. He had to get out of here too.
   He caught his breath, and found a plastic basket, and went shopping in the labs for useful electronic equipment. Cutters and wires, circuit-diagnostics, readers and relays, whatever he could find. When he thought he had enough, he returned to the Baron's study, and proceeded to dissect the damaged comconsole. He finally managed to jump the palm-lock, only to have a little bright square patch come up on-view and demand, Insert code-key. He cursed, and stretched his aching back, and sat again. This was going to be tedious.
   It took another pass through the facility for equipment before he was able to jump the code-key block. And the comconsole would never be the same. But at last, finally, he punched through to the planetary communications net. There was another short glitch while he figured out how to charge the call to House Ryoval's account; all fees were collected in advance, here on Jackson's Whole.
   He paused a moment, wondering who to call. Barrayar kept a consulate on the Hargraves-Dyne Consortium Station. Some of the staff were actually diplomatic and/or economic personnel, but even they doubled as ImpSec analysts. The rest were agents-proper, running a thin network of informants scattered across the planet and its satellites and stations. Admiral Naismith had a contact there. But had ImpSec been here already? Was this their work, rescuing Mark? No, he decided. It was ruthless, but not nearly methodical enough. In fact, it was utter chaos.
   So why didn't you guys come looking for Mark? A bothersome question, and one to which he had no answer. He punched through the consulate's code. Let the circus begin.
   They were down on him in half an hour, a tense ImpSec lieutenant named Iverson with a rented squad of local muscle from House Dyne in paramilitary uniforms and with decent military equipment. They'd dropped straight from orbit in a shuttle; heat wavered off its skin in the watery morning light. Miles sat on a rock outside the pedestrian entrance, or more properly speaking, emergency exit he'd found, and watched sardonically as they all galloped out, weapons at the ready, and spread out as if to take the installation by assault.
   The officer hurried up to him, and half-saluted. "Admiral Naismith?"
   Iverson was no one he knew; at this level of the echelon the man must take him for a valued, but non-Barrayaran, ImpSec hireling. "The one and only. You can tell your men to relax. The installation is secured."
   "You secured it yourself?" Iverson asked in faint disbelief.
   "More or less."
   "We've been looking for this place for two years!"
   Miles suppressed an irate remark about people who couldn't find their own prick with a map and a hand-light. "Where is, ah, Mark? The other clone. My double."
   "We don't know, sir. Acting on a tip from an informant, we were about to make an assault on a House Bharaputra location to retrieve you, when you called."
   "I was there last night. Your informant did not know I was moved." Had to be Rowan_she'd got out, hooray! "You would have been embarrassingly late."
   Iverson's lips thinned. "This has been an incredibly fouled-up operation from first to last. The orders kept changing."
   "Tell me," Miles sighed. "Have you heard anything from the Den-darii Mercenaries?"
   "A covert ops team from your outfit is supposed to be on its way, sir." Iverson's "sirs" were tinged with uncertainty, the dubious regard of a Barrayaran regular for a self-promoted mercenary. "I ... wish to ascertain for myself if the installation is fully secure, if you don't mind."
   "Go ahead," Miles said. "You'll find it an interesting tour. If you have a strong stomach." Iverson marched his troopers indoors. Miles would have laughed, if he weren't screaming inside. He sighed, slipped from his perch, and followed them.
   Miles's people came in a small personnel shuttle, swooping right into the concealed garage. He watched them on the monitor from Ryoval's study, and gave them directions how to find him. Quinn, Elena, Taura and Bel, all in half-armor. They came clanking into the study double-time, almost as impressively useless as the ImpSec crowd.
   "Why the party clothes?" was his first weary question as they heaved into view. He should stand, and receive and return salutes and things, but Ryoval's station chair was incredibly comfortable and he was incredibly tired.
   "Miles!" Quinn cried passionately.
   With the sight of her concerned face he realized just how very angry he was, and guilty for it. Furiously angry because furiously afraid. Where is Mark, damn you all? "Captain Quinn," he put her on notice that this was duty-time before she could fling herself on him. She skidded to a halt in mid-fling, and came to a species of attention. The others piled up behind her.
   "We were just coordinating with ImpSec for a raid on House Bharaputra," Quinn said breathlessly. "You've come back to yourself! You were cryo-amnesic_have you recovered? That Durona doctor said you would_"
   "About ninety percent, I think. I'm still finding holes in my memory. Quinn_what happened?"
   She looked slightly overwhelmed. "Since when? When you were killed_"
   "Start from five days ago. When you came to the Durona Group."
   "We came looking for you. Found you, after nearly four bleeding months!"
   "You were stunned, Mark was taken, and Lilly Durona hustled me and my surgeon off to what she thought was going to be safety," Miles cued her to the focus he wanted.
   "Oh, she was your doctor. I thought_never mind." Quinn bit back her emotions, pulled off her helmet and pushed back her hood, raked red-tipped fingers through her smashed curls, and began organizing the information into its essentials, combat-style. "We lost hours at the start. By the time Elena and Taura got another aircar, the snatchers were long gone. They searched, but no luck. When they got back to the Durona Group, Bel and I were just waking up. Lilly Durona insisted you were safe. I didn't believe her. We pulled out, and I contacted ImpSec. They started to pull in their people, who were scattered all over the planet looking for clues as to your whereabouts, and sent them to focus on Mark. More delays, while they worked through their pet theory that the kidnappers were Cetagandan bounty-hunters. And House Ryoval had about fifty different sites and facilities to check on, not including this one, which really was secret.
   "Then Lilly Durona decided you were missing after all. Since it seemed more important to find you, we diverted all available forces to that. But we had fewer leads. We didn't even find the abandoned lightflyer for two days. And it yielded up no clues."
   "Right. But you suspected Ryoval had Mark."
   "But Ryoval wanted Admiral Naismith. We thought Ryoval would figure out he had the wrong man."
   He ran his hands over his face. His head was aching. And so was his stomach. "Did you ever figure that Ryoval wouldn't care? In a few minutes, I want you to go down the corridor and look at the cell they kept him in. And smell it. I want you to look closely. In fact, go now. Sergeant Taura, stay." ,
   Reluctantly, Quinn led Elena and Bel out. Miles leaned forward; Taura bent to hear.
   "Taura, what happened? You're a Jacksonian. You know what Ryoval is, what this place is. How did you all lose sight of that?"
   She shook her big head. "Captain Quinn thought Mark was a complete screw-up. After your death, she was so angry she could barely give him the time of day. And at first I agreed with her. But ... I don't know. He tried so hard. The creche raid only failed by a hair. If we'd been faster, or if the shuttle defense perimeter had done their job, we would have brought it off, I think."
   He grimaced in agreement. "There's no mercy for failures of timing in no-margin operations like that one was. Commanders can have no mercy either, or you might as well stay in orbit and feed your troops directly into the ship's waste disintegrators, and save steps." He paused. "Quinn will be a good commander someday."
   "I think so, sir." Taura pulled off her helmet and hood, and stared around. "I kind of came to like the little schmuck, though. He tried. He tried and failed, but no one else tried at all. And he was so alone."
   "Alone. Yes. Here. For five days."
   "We really did think Ryoval would figure out he wasn't you."
   "Maybe . . . maybe so." Some part of his mind clung to that hope himself. Maybe it hadn't been as bad as it looked, as bad as his galloping imagination supplied.
   Quinn and company returned, looking universally grim.
   "So," he said, "you've found me. Now maybe we can all focus on Mark. I've been all over this place in the last hours, and I haven't found a clue. Did the absconding staff take him along? Is he out wandering around in the desert somewhere, freezing? I've got six of Iverson's men looking outside with 'scopes, and another one checking the facility's disintegration records for fifty-plus kilo lumps of protein. And other bright ideas, folks?"
   Elena came back from a peek in the next room. "Who do you figure did the honors on Ryoval?"
   Miles opened his hands. "Don't know. He had hundreds of mortal enemies, after his career."
   "He was killed by an unarmed person. A kick to the throat, then beaten to death somehow after he was down."
   "I noticed that."
   "You notice the tool kit?"
   "Yeah."
   "Miles, it was Mark."
   "How could it have been? It had to have happened sometime last night. After what, five days of being worked over_and Mark's a little guy like me. I don't think it's physically possible."
   "Mark's a little guy, but not like you," said Elena. "And he almost killed a man in Vorbarr Sultana with a kick to the throat."
   "What?"
   "He was trained, Miles. He was trained to take out your father, who is an even bigger man than Ryoval, and has years of combat experience."
   "Yes, but I never believed_ when was Mark in Vorbarr Sultana?" Amazing, how being dead for two or three months will put you out of touch. For the first time, his impulse to fling himself directly back into active-duty command status was checked. A maniac with three-quarters of a memory and a habit of going into convulsions is just what we want in charge, sure. Not to mention the shortness of breath.
   "Oh, and about your father, I should mention_no, maybe that had better wait." Elena eyed him in worry.
   "What about_" He was interrupted by a buzz from the comm link Iverson had given him as a courtesy. "Yes, Lieutenant?"
   "Admiral Naismith, Baron Fell is here at the entrance. With a double-squad. He, ah ... says he's here to collect his deceased half-brother's body, as next-of-kin."
   Miles whistled soundlessly, and grinned. "Is he, now? Well. Tell you what. Let him come inside, with one bodyguard. And well talk. He may know something. Don't let his squad in yet, though."
   "Do you think that's wise?"
   How the hell should I know? "Sure."
   In a few minutes, Baron Fell himself puffed in, escorted by one of Iverson's rental troopers and flanked by a big green-clad guard. Baron's Fell's round face was slightly pinker than usual with the exertion, otherwise he was the same plump, grandfatherly figure as ever, exuding the usual dangerously deceptive good cheer.
   "Baron Fell," Miles nodded. "How good to see you again."
   Fell nodded back. "Admiral. Yes, I imagine everything looks good to you just now. So, it really was you the Bharaputran sniper shot. Your clone-twin did an excellent job of pretending to be you, afterward, I must say, much to the confusion of an already very confused situation."
   Argh! "Yes. And, ah, what brings you here?"
   "Trade," stated Fell, Jacksonian short-hand for, You first.
   Miles nodded. "The late Baron Ryoval had me brought me here in a lightflyer by two of his erstwhile bodyguards. We found things much as you see them. I, um, neutralized them at my first opportunity. How I came to be in their hands is a more complicated story." Meaning, That's all you get till I get some.
   "There are some extraordinary rumors starting to circulate about my dear departed_he is departed, I trust?"
   "Oh, yes. You can see in a moment."
   "Thank you. My dear departed half-brother's death. I had one firsthand."
   A former Ryoval employee from here fled directly to him as an informant. Right. "I hope his virtue was rewarded."
   "It will be, as soon as I ascertain he was telling the truth."
   "Well. Why don't you come look." He had to get up out of the station chair. He marshalled the effort with difficulty, and led the Baron into the living room, the House Fell bodyguard and the Dendarii following.
   The big bodyguard shot a worried glance at Sergeant Taura, looming over him; she smiled back, her fangs gleaming. "Hi, there. You're kinda cute, you know?" she told him. He recoiled, and sidled closer to his master.
   Fell hurried to the body, knelt by its right side, and held up the severed wrist. He hissed with disappointment. "Who has done this?"
   "We don't know yet," said Miles. "That's how I found him."
   "Exactly?" Fell shot him a sharp glance.
   "Yes."
   Fell traced the black holes across the corpse's forehead. "Whoever did this, knew what he was doing. I want to find the assassin."
   "To . . . avenge your brother's death?" Elena asked cautiously.
   "No. To offer him a job!" Fell laughed, a booming, jolly sound. "Do you realize how many people have been trying, for how many years, to accomplish this?"
   "I've an idea," said Miles. "If you can help_"
   In the next room, Ryoval's half-butchered comconsole chimed.
   Fell looked up, eyes intent. "No one can call in here without the code-key," he stated, and heaved to his feet. Miles barely beat him back into the study, and slid into the station chair.
   He activated the vid plate. "Yes?" And almost fell out of his seat again.
   Mark's puffy face formed above the vid plate. He looked like he'd just come out of a shower, face scrubbed, hair wet and slicked back. He was wearing grey knits like Miles's. Blue bruises, going greenish-yellow around the edges, made what skin Miles could see look like a patch-work quilt, but both eyes were open and very bright. His ears were still on. "Ah," he said cheerfully, "there you are. I thought you might be. Have you figured out who you are yet?"
   "Mark!" Miles almost tried to crawl through the vid image. "Are you all right? Where are you?"
   "You have, I see. Good. I'm at Lilly Durona's. God, Miles. What a place. What a woman. She let me have a bath. She put my skin back on. She fixed my foot. She gave me a hypo of muscle-relaxant for my back. With her own hands, she performed medical services too intimate and disgusting to describe, but very badly needed, I assure you, and held my head while I screamed. Did I mention the bath? I love her, and I want to marry her."
   All this was delivered with such dead-pan enthusiasm, Miles could not tell if Mark was joking. "What are you on?" he asked suspiciously.
   "Pain killers. Lots and lots of pain killers. Oh, it's wonderful!" He favored Miles with a weird broad grin. "But don't worry, my head is perfectly clear. It's just the bath. I was holding it together till she gave me the bath. It unmanned me. Do you know what a wonderful thing a bath is, when you're washing off_never mind."
   "How did you get out of here, and back to the Durona Clinic?" Miles asked urgently.
   "In Ryoval's lightflyer, of course. The code-key worked."
   Behind Miles, Baron Fell drew in his breath. "Mark," he leaned into the vid pick up with a smile. "Would you put Lilly on a moment, please?"
   "Ah, Baron Fell!" said Mark. "Good. I was going to call you next. I want to invite you to tea, here at Lilly's. We have a lot to talk about. You too, Miles. And bring all your friends." Mark gave him a sharply meaningful glance.
   Quietly, Miles reached down and pressed the "alert" button on Iverson's comm link. "Why, Mark?"
   "Because I need them. My own troops are much too tired for any more work today."
   "Your troops?"
   "Please do as I ask. Because I ask it. Because you owe me," Mark added, in a voice so low Miles had to strain to hear. Mark's eyes burned, a brief spark.
   Fell muttered, "He used it. He has to know_" He leaned in again, and said to Mark, "Do you know what you have in ah, hand, Mark?"
   "Oh, Baron. I know what I'm doing. I don't know why so many people have so much trouble believing that," Mark added in a tone of hurt complaint. "I know exactly what I'm doing." Then he laughed. It was a very disturbing laugh, edgy and too loud.
   "Let me talk to Lilly," said Fell.
   "No. You come here and talk to Lilly," said Mark petulantly. "Anyway, you want to talk to me." He nailed Fell's eye with a direct look. "I promise you will find it profitable."
   "I believe I do want to talk with you," murmured Fell. "Very well."
   "Miles. You're there in Ryoval's study, where I was." Mark searched his face, for what Miles could not guess, but then Mark nodded quietly to himself, as if satisfied. "Is Elena there?"
   "Yes . . ."
   Elena leaned forward on Miles's other side. "What do you need, Mark?"
   "I want to talk to you a moment. Armswoman. Privately. Would you clear the room of everyone else, please? Everyone."
   "You can't," Miles began. ". . . Armswoman? Not_not leige-sworn? You can't be."
   "Technically, I suppose she's not, now that you're alive again," said Mark. He smiled sadly. "But I want a service. My first and last request, Elena. Privately."
   Elena looked around. "Everybody out. Please, Miles. This is between Mark and me."
   "Armswoman?" Miles muttered, allowing himself to be thrust back out into the corridor. "How can_" Elena shut the door on them all. Miles called Iverson to arrange transport, and other things. It was still a polite race with Fell, but it was clearly a race.
   Elena emerged after a few minutes. Her face was strained. "You go on to Durona's. Mark has asked me to find something for him here. I'll catch up."
   "Collect all the data you can for ImpSec while you're at it, then," said Miles, feeling bewildered by the pace of events. Somehow, he seemed not to be in charge here. "I'll tell Iverson to give you a free hand. But_Armswoman? Does that mean what I think it does? How can_"
   "It means nothing, now. But I owe Mark. We all do. He killed Ryoval, you know."
   "I was beginning to realize it had to be so. I just didn't see how."
   "With both hands tied behind his back, he says. I believe him." She turned again toward Ryoval's suite.
   "That was Mark?" Miles muttered, heading reluctantly in the opposite direction. He couldn't have acquired some other clone-brother while he was dead, could he? "It didn't sound like Mark. For one thing, he sounded like he was glad to see me. That's Mark?"
   "Oh, yes," said Quinn. "That was Mark all right."
   He quickened his pace. Even Taura had to lengthen her stride to keep up.
   

CHAPTER THIRTY

   The Dendarii's little personnel shuttle kept pace with Baron Fell's larger drop shuttle; they arrived at the Durona Group's clinic almost simultaneously. A House Dyne shuttle belonging temporarily to ImpSec was waiting politely across the street from the entrance, by the little park. Just waiting.
   As they were circling for a landing, Miles asked Quinn, who was piloting, "Elli_if we were flying along, in a lightflyer or an aircar or something, and I suddenly ordered you to crash it, would you?"
   "Now?" asked Quinn, startled. The shuttle lurched.
   "No! Not now. I mean theoretically. Obey, instantly, no questions asked."
   "Well, sure, I suppose so. I'd ask questions afterward though. Probably with my hands wrapped around your neck."
   "That's what I thought." Miles sat back, satisfied.
   They rendezvoused with Baron Fell at the front entrance, where the gate guards prepared to code open a portal in the force screen. Fell frowned at the three Dendarii in their half-armor, Quinn and Bel and Taura, trailing Miles in his grey knits.
   "This is my facility," Fell pointed out. His own pair of green-clad men eyed them without favor.
   "These are my bodyguards," said Miles, "for whom I have a demonstrated need. Your force screen appears to have a malfunction."
   "He was taken care of," said Fell grimly. "That won't happen again."
   "Nevertheless." By way of concession, Miles jerked his thumb at the shuttle by the park. "My other friends can wait outside."
   Fell frowned, thinking it over. "All right," he said at last. They followed him inside. Hawk met them, bowed to the Baron, and escorted them formally up through the series of lift tubes to Lilly Durona's penthouse. .
   The word for it, Miles thought, rising past the chromium railing, was "tableau." It was all arranged as perfectly as any stage setting.
   Mark was the centerpiece. He sat back comfortably in Lilly Durona's own chair, his bandaged right foot propped on a silk pillow on the low round tea table. Surrounded by Duronas. Lilly herself, her white hair braided today like a crown wreathing her head, stood at Mark's right hand, leaning bemusedly on the upholstered chair back, smiling down beneficently upon the top of his head. Hawk took up position on Mark's left side. Dr. Chrys, Dr. Poppy, and Dr. Rose clustered admiringly around them. Dr. Chrys had a large fire-extinguisher by her knee. Rowan was not here. The window had been repaired.
   On the center of the table sat a transparent cold-box. Within it lay a severed hand wearing a big silver ring set with what appeared to be a square black onyx.
   Mark's physical appearance disturbed Miles. He had been braced to witness traumas of unnamed tortures, but Mark was covered neck to ankle in concealing grey knits like his own. Only the bruises on his face and the bandage on his foot hinted at the past five days' activities. But his face and body were strangely and unhealthily bloated, his stomach shockingly so, more than the stoutly-balanced figure he'd seen here in Dendarii uniform just a few days ago, and far beyond the almost-duplicate of himself he'd tried to rescue from the raid on the clone creche four months ago. In another person, Baron Fell for example, the near-obesity wouldn't have made him even blink, but Mark . . . could this be Miles himself, someday, if he slowed down? He had a sudden urge to swear off desserts. Elli was frankly staring, horrified and repelled.
   Mark was smiling. A little control box lay under his right hand. His index finger kept pressure on a button.
   Baron Fell saw the cold-box containing the hand, and started for it, crying, "Ah!"
   "Stop," said Mark.
   The Baron stopped, and cocked his head at him. "Yes?" he said warily.
   "The object you are interested in is sitting in that sealed box on top of a small thermal grenade. Controlled," he lifted his hand with the remote in it, "by this dead-man switch. There is a second, positive-control switch in the hands of another person, outside of this room. Stun me or jump me, and it will go off. Frighten me, and my hand might slip. Tire me out, and my finger might give way. Annoy me enough, and I might just let go for the hell of it."
   "The fact that you have made such an arrangement," said Fell slowly, "tells me you know the value of what you hold. You wouldn't. You're bluffing." He stared piercingly at Lilly.
   "Don't try me," said Mark, still smiling. "After five days of your half-brother's hospitality, I'm in a real hostile mood. What's in that box is valuable to you. Not to me. However," he took a breath, "you do have some things that are valuable to me. Baron, let's Deal."
   Fell sucked on his lower lip, and stared into Mark's glittering eyes. "I'll listen," he said at last.
   Mark nodded. A couple of Duronas hurried to bring chairs for Baron Fell and Miles; the bodyguards arranged themselves standing. Fell's guards looked like they were thinking hard, watching the box and their master; the Dendarii watched the green-clad guards in turn. Fell settled himself with a formal air, half-smiling, eyes intent.
   "Tea?" inquired Lilly.
   "Thank you," said the Baron. The two Durona children hurried out at her nod. The ritual was begun. Miles sat gingerly, and clamped his teeth together, hard. Whatever was going on here, he hadn't been briefed. It was clearly Mark's show. But he wasn't entirely sure Mark was sane, right now. Smart, yes. Sane, no. Baron Fell looked like he might be coming to the same conclusion, staring across the tea table at his self-appointed host.
   The two opponents waited in silence for the tea to arrive, sizing each other up the while. The boy brought in the tray, and set it beside the gruesome box. The girl poured just two cups, Lilly's finest imported Japan Green, for Mark and the Baron, and offered tea cookies with them.
   "No," said Mark to the cookies in a tone of loathing, "thank you." The Baron took two, and nibbled one. Mark started to lift his tea cup left-handed, but his hand was shaking too badly, and he set it hastily back in its saucer on the arm of Lilly's chair before it could spill and scald. The girl slipped silently up to him, and lifted it to his lips; he sipped and nodded gratefully, and she settled down with the cup by his left knee to serve again at his word. He's hurt one hell of a lot worse than he's managing to look right now, Miles realized, his stomach cold. The Baron looked at Mark's trembling left hand, and more dubiously at his right, and shifted uneasily.
   "Baron Fell," Mark said, "I think you will agree with me that time is of the essence. Shall I begin?"
   "Please do."
   "In that cold-box," Mark nodded toward the severed hand, "is the key to House Ryoval. Ry Ryoval's, ah, secret decoder ring." Mark cackled loudly, bit back the laugh, and nodded to the girl for another sip of tea. He regained control of his voice and continued. "Embedded in the ring's crystal are all of the late Baron Ryoval's personal code-keys. Now, House Ryoval has a peculiar administrative structure. To say that Ry Ryoval was a paranoid control freak would be a gross understatement. But Ryoval is dead, leaving his scattered subordinates at scattered locations without their accustomed direction. When the rumors of his death reach them, who knows what they will do? You've seen one example.
   "And a day or two from now, the vultures will be flying in from all over to tear at the carcass of House Ryoval. Possession is rather more than nine points of the non-existent law around here. House Bharaputra alone has obvious congruent interests in House Ryoval's wares. I'm sure you can think of others, Baron."
   Fell nodded.
   "But a man who had Ryoval's own code-keys in his hand today could be at a considerable advantage," Mark went on. "Particularly if he was well-supplied with personnel to provide material back-up. Without the tedious delays of cracking Ryoval's codes one by one, he could put himself in position to take immediate control of most or all of House Ryoval's current assets, from the top down instead of piecemeal. Add to that a well-known tie of blood to lend legitimacy to his claims, and I think most of the competition would sheer off without need for any expensive confrontation at all."
   "My half-brother's code-key ring is not yours to trade," said Fell coldly.
   "Oh, yes it is," said Mark. "I won it. I control it. I can destroy it. And," he licked his lips; the girl raised the teacup again, "I paid for it. You would not now be offered this exclusive_and it is still exclusive_opportunity if not for me."
   The Baron gave a very tiny nod of concession. "Go on."
   "What would you say the value of the Durona Group is, compared to the value of House Ryoval's current assets? Proportionally."
   The Baron frowned. "One-twentieth. One-thirtieth, perhaps. House Ryoval has far more real estate. The, er, intellectual property value is harder to calculate. They specialize in rather different biological tasks."
   "Leaving aside_or leaving behind_the real estate. House Ryoval is clearly enormously more valuable. Facilities, techs, slaves. Client list. Surgeons. Geneticists."
   "I would have to say so."
   "All right. Let's trade. I will give you House Ryoval in exchange for the Durona Group, plus value in a bearer-paid credit chit equal to ten percent of the assets of House Ryoval."
   "Ten percent. An agent's fee," said Fell, looking at Lilly. Lilly smiled and said nothing.
   "A mere agent's fee," Mark agreed. "Cheap at twice the price, which not-coincidentally is at least what you will lose without the advantages of Ry Ryoval's code-keys."
   "And what would you do with all these ladies if you had them, ah Mark?"
   "What I wist. Wist, from wistful. I think I like the verb form better."
   "Thinking of setting up in business here yourself? Baron Mark?"
   Miles froze, appalled at this new vision.
   "No," sighed Mark. "I wist to go home, Baron. I wist it real bad. I will give the Durona Group_to themselves. And you will let them go, free and unmolested and without pursuit, to wherever they_wist. Escobar, was it, Lilly?" He looked up at Lilly, who looked down at him and smiled, and nodded slightly.
   "How very bizarre," murmured the Baron. "I think you are mad."
   "Oh, Baron. You have no idea." A weird chuckle escaped Mark. If he was acting, it was the best acting job Miles had ever seen, not excluding his own wildest flights of scam.
   The Baron sat back, and crossed his arms. His face grew stony with thought. Would he decide to try to jump them? Frantically, Miles began trying to calculate the military options of a sudden fire-fight, Dendarii on deck, ImpSec in orbit, himself and Mark at risk, the sudden bright muzzle-flare of a projectile weapon_oh God, what a mess_
   "Ten percent," said the Baron at last, "less the value of the Durona Group."
   "Who calculates the value of that intellectual property, Baron?"
   "I do. And they evacuate immediately. All property, notes, files, and experiments in progress to be left intact."
   Mark glanced up at Lilly: she bent and whispered in his ear. "The Durona Group shall have the right to duplicate technical files. And have the right to carry away personal items such as clothing and books."
   The Baron stared thoughtfully at the ceiling. "They may carry away_what each one may carry. No more. They may not duplicate technical files. And their credit account remains, as it has always been, mine."
   Lilly's brows drew down; another whispered conference behind her hand with Mark. He waved away some objection, and pointed orbit-ward. She finally nodded.
   "Baron Fell," Mark took a deep breath, "it's a Deal."
   "It's a Deal," Fell confirmed, watching him with a slight smile.
   "My hand on it," Mark intoned. He snickered, turned his control box over, and twisted a knob on the underside. He set it back down on his chair-arm, and shook out his trembling fingers.
   Fell stretched in his chair, shaking off the tension. The guards relaxed. Miles almost fell into a puddle. Cripes, what have we done? At Lilly's direction, assorted Duronas scattered in a hurry.
   "It's been very entertaining, doing business with you, Mark." Fell rose. "I don't know where home is for you, but if you ever decide you want a job, come see me again. I could use an agent like you, in my galactic affairs. Your sense of timing is ... viciously elegant."
   "Thank you, Baron," Mark nodded. "I'll keep it in mind, should some of my other options not work out."
   "Your brother, too," Fell added as an afterthought. "Assuming his full recovery, of course. My troops could use a more active combat commander."
   Miles cleared his throat. "House Fell's needs are mainly defensive. I prefer the Dendarii's more aggressive type of assignments," he said.
   "There may be more assault work, upcoming," said Fell, his eyes going slightly distant.
   "Thinking of conquering the world?" Miles inquired. The Fell Empire?
   "The acquisition of House Ryoval will put House Fell in an interestingly unbalanced position," said Fell. "It would not be worthwhile to pursue a policy of unlimited expansion, and cope with all the opposition that must result, for a mere five or so years of rule. But if one were to live for another fifty years, say, one might find some most absorbing work for a military officer of capacity. ..." Fell raised an inquiring brow at Miles.
   "No. Thank you." And I wish you all joy of each other.
   Mark gave Miles a slit-eyed, feline glance of amusement.
   What an extraordinary solution Mark had wrought, Miles thought. What a Deal. Did a Jacksonian defy his upbringing by joining the side of the angels, rebel by becoming incorruptible? So it appeared. I think my brother is more Jacksonian than he realizes. A renegade Jacksonian. The mind boggles.
   At Fell's gesture, one of his bodyguards carefully picked up the transparent box. Fell turned to Lilly.
   "Well, old sister. You've had an interesting life."
   "I still have it," smiled Lilly.
   "For a while."
   "Long enough for me, greedy little boy. So this is the end of the road. The last of our blood-pact. Who would have imagined it, all those years ago, when we were climbing out of Ryoval's sewers together?"
   "Not I," said Fell. They embraced each other. "Goodbye, Lilly."
   "Goodbye, Georie."
   Fell turned to Mark. "The Deal is the Deal, and for my House. This is for me. For old times' sake." He stuck out a thick hand. "May I shake your hand, sir?"
   Mark looked bewildered and suspicious; but Lilly nodded to him. He allowed his hand to be engulfed by Fell's.
   "Thank you," said Georish Stauber sincerely. He jerked his chin at his guards, and vanished down the lift tube in their company.
   "Do you think this Deal will hold?" Mark asked Lilly in a thin, worried voice.
   "Long enough. For the next few days, Georish will be much too busy assimilating his new acquisition. It will absorb all his resources and then some. And after that, it will be too late. Regret, later, yes. Pursuit and vengeance, no. It's enough. It's all we need."
   She stroked his hair fondly. "You just rest now. Have some more tea. We're going to be very busy for a while." She turned to gather up the young Duronas, "Robin! Violet! Come along quickly_" She hurried them into the interior of her quarters.
   Mark slumped, looking very tired. He grimaced in bemusement at the teacup, switched it to his right hand, and swirled it thoughtfully before drinking.
   Elli touched her half-armor helmet, listened, and vented a sudden bitter bark of laughter. "The ImpSec commander at Hargraves-Dyne Station is on the line. He says his reinforcements have arrived, and where should he send them?"
   Miles and Mark looked at each other. Miles didn't know what Mark was thinking, but most of the responses that were leaping to his mind were violently obscene.
   "Home," said Mark at last. "And they can give us a ride while they're at it."
   "I have to get back to the Dendarii fleet," said Miles urgently. "Ah . . . where are they, Elli?"
   "On their way from Illyrica to rendezvous off Escobar, but you, sir, are going nowhere near them till ImpSec Medical has cleared you for active duty," she said firmly. "The fleet is fine. You're not. Illyan would pin my ears back if I sent you anywhere but home right now. And then there's your father."
   "What about my father?" Miles asked. Elena had started to say something_icy terror seized his chest. A kaleidoscopic vision of assassinations, mortal illnesses, and political plots all rolled together spun through his mind. Not to mention aircar accidents.
   "He had a major coronary failure while I was there," said Mark. "They had him tied to a bed in ImpMil waiting for a heart transplant at the time I left. Actually, they should be doing the surgery right about now."
   "You were there?" What did you do to him? Miles felt like he'd just had his magnetic poles reversed. "I have to get home!"
   "That's what I just said," said Mark wearily. "Why d'you think we trooped all the way back here, but to drag you home? It wasn't for the free holiday at Ry Ryoval's health spa, let me tell you. Mother thinks I'm the next Vorkosigan heir. I can deal with Barrayar, I think, but I sure as hell can't deal with that."
   It was all too much, too fast. He sat down and tried to calm himself again, before he triggered another convulsion. That was just the sort of little physical weakness that could win one an immediate medical discharge from the Imperial Service, if one wasn't careful about who witnessed it. He had assumed the convulsions were a temporary snag in his recovery. What if they were a permanent effect? Oh, God. . . .
   "I am going to lend Lilly my ship," said Mark, "since Baron Fell so-thoughtfully has stripped her of sufficient funds to buy thirty-six passages to Escobar."
   "What ship?" asked Miles. Not one of mine . . . !
   "The one Mother gave me. Lilly ought to be able to sell it at Escobar orbit for a tidy profit. I can pay back Mother and get Vorkosigan Surleau out of hock, and still have an impressive amount of pocket-change. I'd like to have my own yacht, someday, but I really couldn't use this one for a while."
   What? What? What?
   "I was just thinking," Mark went on, "that the Dendarii here could ride along with Lilly. Provide her with a little military protection in exchange for a free and fast ride back to the fleet. Save ImpSec the price of four commercial passages, too."
   Four? Miles glanced at Bel, so very silent throughout, who met his eyes bleakly.
   "And get everybody the hell out of here, as fast as possible," added Mark. "Before something else goes wrong."
   "Amen!" muttered Quinn.
   Rowan and Elli, on the same ship? Not to mention Taura. What if they all got together and compared notes? What if they fell into a feud? Worse, what if they struck up an alliance and colluded to partition him by treaty? North Miles and South Miles. ... It wasn't, he swore, that he picked up so many women. Compared to Ivan, he was practically celibate. It was just that he never put any down. The accumulation could become downright embarrassing, over a long enough time-span. He needed . . . Lady Vorkosigan, to put an end to this nonsense. But even Elli the bold refused to volunteer for that duty.
   "Yes," said Miles, "that works. Home. Captain Quinn, arrange Mark's and my transport with ImpSec. Sergeant Taura, would you please put yourself at Lilly Durona's disposal? The sooner we evacuate from here the better, I agree. And, um, Bel . . . would you stay and talk with me, please."
   Quinn and Taura took the hint, and made themselves scarce. Mark . . . Mark was in on this, Miles decided. And anyway, he was a little afraid to ask Mark to get up. Afraid of what his movements would reveal. That flip phrase about Ry Ryoval's health spa was entirely too obvious an attempt to conceal . . . what?
   "Sit, Bel," Miles nodded to Baron Fell's vacated chair. It put them in an equilateral triangle, he and Mark and Bel. Bel nodded and settled, its helmet in its lap and its hood pushed back. Miles thought of how he'd perceived Bel as a female in this room five days ago, prior to his memory cascade. His eye had always conveniently interpreted Bel as male, before, for some reason. Strange. There was a brief, uneasy silence.
   Miles swallowed, and broke it. "I can't let you go back to command of the Ariel," he said.
   "I know," said Bel.
   "It would be bad for fleet discipline."
   "I know," said Bel.
   "It's . . . not just. If you had been a dishonest herm, and kept your mouth shut, and kept on pretending to have been fooled by Mark, no one would ever have known."
   "I know," said Bel. It added after a moment, "I had to get my command back, in the emergency. I didn't think I could let Mark go on giving orders. Too dangerous."
   "To those who'd followed you."
   "Yes. And ... I would have known," added Bel.
   "Captain Thorne," Admiral Naismith sighed, "I must request your resignation."
   "You have it, sir."
   "Thank you." And that was done. So fast. He thought back over the scattered pictures in his head of Mark's raid. There were still pieces missing, he was pretty sure. But there had been deaths, too many deaths had made it irredeemable. "Do you know . . . what happened to Phillipi? She'd had a chance, I thought."
   Mark and Bel exchanged a look. Bel answered. "She didn't make it."
   "Oh. I'm sorry to hear that."
   "Cryo-revival is a chancy business," sighed Bel. "We all undertake the risks, when we sign on."
   Mark frowned. "It doesn't seem fair. Bel loses its career, and I get off free."
   Bel stared a moment at Mark's beaten, bloated body, huddled down in Lilly's big chair; its brows rose slightly.
   "What do you plan to do, Bel?" asked Miles carefully. "Go home to Beta Colony? You've talked about it."
   "I don't know," said Bel. "It's not for lack of thinking. I've been thinking for weeks. I'm not sure I'd fit in at home anymore."
   "I've been thinking myself," said Miles. "A prudent thought. It strikes me that certain parties on my side would be less paranoid about the idea of you running around the wormhole nexus with a head full of Barrayaran classified secrets if you were still on Illyan's payroll. An informant_perhaps an agent?"
   "I don't have Elli Quinn's talents for scam," Bel said. "I was a shipmaster."
   "Shipmasters get to some interesting places. They are in position to pick up all kinds of information."
   Bel tilted its head. "I will . . . seriously consider it."
   "I assume you don't want to cash out here on Jackson's Whole?"
   Bel laughed outright. "No shit."
   "Think about it, then, on the way back to Escobar. Talk to Quinn. Decide by the time you get there, and let her know."
   Bel nodded, rose, and looked around Lilly Durona's quiet living room. "I'm not altogether sorry, you know," it said to Mark. "One way or another, we've pulled almost ninety people out of this stinking gravity well. Out of certain death or Jacksonian slavery. Not a bad score, for an aging Betan. You can bet I'll remember them, too, when I remember this."
   "Thank you," whispered Mark.
   Bel eyed Miles. "Do you remember the first time we ever saw each other?" it asked.
   "Yes. I stunned you."
   "You surely did." It walked over to his chair, and bent, and took his chin in its hand. "Hold still. I've been wanting to do this for years." It kissed him, long and quite thoroughly. Miles thought about appearances, thought about the ambiguity of it, thought about sudden death, thought the hell with it all, and kissed Bel back. Straightening again, Bel smiled.
   Voices floated from the lift tube, some Durona directing, "Right upstairs, ma'am."
   Elena Bothari-Jesek rose behind the chromium railing, and swept the room with her gaze. "Hello, Miles, I have to talk with Mark," she said, all in a breath. Her eyes were dark and worried. "Can we go somewhere?" she asked Mark.
   " 'D rather not get up," Mark said. His voice was so tired it slurred.
   "Quite. Miles, Bel, please go away," she said straightly.
   Puzzled, Miles rose to his feet. He gave her a look of inquiry; her return look said, Not now. Later. He shrugged. "Come on, Bel. Let's go see if we can lend anyone a hand." He wanted to find Rowan. He watched them as he descended the lift tube with Bel. Elena pulled a chair around and sat across it backwards, her hands already opening in urgent remonstration. Mark was looking extremely saturnine.
   Miles turned Bel over to Dr. Poppy, for liaison duty, and sought Rowan's suite. As he'd hoped, she was there, packing. Another young Durona sat and watched, looking a little bewildered. Miles recognized her at once.
   "Lilly Junior! You made it. Rowan!"
   Rowan's face lit with delight, and she hurried to embrace him. "Miles! Your name is Miles Naismith. I thought so! You've cascaded. When?"
   "Well," he cleared his throat, "actually, it was back at Bharaputra's."
   Her smile went a little flat. "Before I left. And you didn't tell me."
   "Security," he offered warily.
   "You didn't trust me."
   This is Jackson's Whole. You said it yourself. "I was more worried about Vasa Luigi."
   "I can see that, I suppose," Rowan sighed.
   "When did you each get in?"
   "I made it yesterday morning. Lilly came in last night. Smooth! I never dreamed you could get her out too!"
   "The one escape was lock-and-key to the other. You got yourself out, which enabled Lilly to get herself out." He flashed a smile at Lilly Junior, who was watching them curiously. "I did nothing. That seems to be the story of my life, lately. But I do believe you'll all make it off-planet before Vasa Luigi and Lotus figure it out."
   "We'll all have lifted before dusk. Listen!" She led him to her window. The Dendarii personnel shuttle, with Sergeant Taura piloting and about eight Duronas aboard, was lifting heavily from the courtyard of the walled compound. Point-women, going up to prepare the ship for the others to come.
   "Escobar, Miles!" Rowan said enthusiastically. "We're all going to Escobar. Oh, Lilly, you're going to love it there!"
   "Will you stay in a group when you get there?" Miles asked.
   "At first, I think. Till it gets less strange for the others. Lilly will release us at her death. Baron Fell anticipates that, I think. Less competition for him, in the long run. I expect he'll have the top people stripped from House Ryoval and installed here by tomorrow morning."
   Miles walked around the room, and noticed a familiar little remote box on the sofa-arm. "Ah! It was you who had the other control to the thermal grenade! I might have known. So you were listening in. I wasn't sure if Mark was bluffing."
   "Mark wasn't bluffing about anything," she stated with certainty.
   "Were you here, when he came in?"
   "Yes. It was a little before dawn this morning. He came staggering in from a lightflyer wearing the most peculiar costume, and demanding to speak with Lilly."
   Miles raised his brows at the image. "What did the gate guards say?"
   "They said Yes, sir. He had an aura ... I don't know how to describe it. Except ... I could picture large thugs in dark alleyways scrambling to get out of his way. Your clone-twin is a formidable young man."
   Miles blinked.
   "Lilly and Chrys took him off to the clinic on a float-pallet, and I didn't see him after that. Then the orders started flying." She paused. "So. Will you be going back to your Dendarii Mercenaries, then?"
   "Yes. After some R&R, I guess."
   "Not . . . settling down. After that close call."
   "I confess, the sight of projectile-weapons gives me a new and unpleasant twitch, but_I hope I won't be cashing out of the Dendarii for a long time yet. Um . . . these convulsions I've been having. Will they go away?"
   "They should. Cryo-revival is always chancy. So, you . . . don't picture yourself retiring. To Escobar, say."
   "We visit Escobar now and then, for fleet repairs. And personnel repairs. It's a major nexus intersection. We may cross paths again."
   "Not the same way we first met, I trust." Rowan smiled.
   "Let me tell you, if I ever do need cryo-revival again, I'll leave orders to look you up." He hesitated. I need my Lady Vorkosigan, to put an end to this wandering. . . . Could Rowan be it? The thirty-five sisters-in-law would be a distant drawback, safely far away on Escobar. "What would you think of the planet Barrayar, as a place to live and work?" he inquired cautiously.
   Her nose wrinkled. "That backward pit? Why?"
   "I ... have some interests there. In fact, it's where I'm planning to retire. It's a very beautiful place, really. And underpopulated. They encourage, um . . . children." He was skirting dangerously close to breaking his cover, the strained identity he'd risked so much lately to retain. "And there'd be lots of work for a galactic-trained physician."
   "I'll bet. But I've been a slave all my life. \Vhy would I choose to be a subject, when I could choose to be a citizen?" She smiled wryly, and came to him, and twined her arms around his shoulders. "Those five days we were locked up together at Vasa Luigi's_that wasn't an effect of the imprisonment, was it. That's the way you really are, when you're well."
   "Pretty much," he admitted.
   "I'd always wondered what adult hyperactives did for a living. Running several thousand troops would just about absorb your energies, wouldn't it?"
   "Yes," he sighed.
   "I think I'll always love you, some. But living with you full-time would drive me crazy. You are the most incredibly domineering person I think I've ever met."
   "You're supposed to fight back," he explained. "I rely on_" he couldn't say Elli, or worse, all my women, "my partner fighting back. Otherwise, I couldn't relax and be myself."
   Right. Too much togetherness had destroyed their love, or at least her illusions. The Barrayaran system of using go-betweens to make marital arrangements was beginning to look better all the time. Maybe it would be best to get safely married first, and then get to know each other. By the time his bride figured him out, it would be too late for her to back out. He sighed, and smiled, and gave Rowan an exaggerated, courtly bow. "I shall be pleased to visit you on Escobar, milady."
   "That would be joust perfect, sir," she returned, deadpan.
   "Ow!" Dammit, she could be the one, she underestimated herself_
   Lilly Junior, sitting on the sofa watching all this with fascination, coughed. Miles glanced at her, and thought about her account of her time with the Dendarii.
   "Does Mark know you're here, Lilly?" he asked.
   "I don't know. I've been with Rowan."
   "The last time Mark saw you, you were going back with Vasa Luigi. I ... think he'd like to know you changed your mind."
   "He tried to talk me into staying on the ship. He didn't talk so well as you," she admitted.
   "He made this all happen. He bought your passage out of here." And Miles wasn't sure he wanted to think about the coin. "I just trailed along. Come on. At least say hello, goodbye, and thank you. It will cost you nothing, and I suspect it would mean something to him."
   Reluctantly, she rose, and allowed him to tow her out. Rowan gave them a nod of approval, and returned to her hasty packing.
   

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

   "Did you find them?" Lord Mark asked.
   "Yes," said Bothari-Jesek tightly.
   "Did you destroy them?"
   "Yes."
   Mark flushed, and leaned his head back against Lilly's chair, feeling the weight of gravity. He sighed. "You looked at them. I told you not to."
   "I had to, to be sure I was getting the right ones."
   "No, you didn't. You could simply have destroyed them all."
   "That's what I finally did. I started to look. Then I turned off the sound. Then I put them on fast-forward. Then I started just spot-checking."
   "I wish you hadn't."
   "I wish I hadn't. Mark, there were hundreds of hours of those holovids. I couldn't believe there was so much."
   "Actually, there were only about fifty hours. Or maybe it was fifty years. But there were multiple simultaneous recordings. I could always see a holovid pick-up hovering, out of the corner of my eye, no matter what was going on. I don't know if Ryoval made them to study and analyze, or just to enjoy. A bit of both, I guess. His powers of analysis were appalling."
   "I ... don't understand some of what I saw."
   "Would you like me to explain it to you?"
   "No."
   "Good."
   "I can understand why you'd want them destroyed. Out of context . . . they would have been a horrible lever for blackmail. If you want to swear me to secrecy, I'll vow anything."
   "That's not why. I have no intention of keeping any of this a secret. Nobody is ever going to get a handle on me again. Pull my secret strings ever again. In general outline, you can tell the whole wormhole nexus, for all I care. But_if ImpSec got hold of those holovid recordings, they would end up in Illyan's hands. And he would not be able to keep them from the Count, or the Countess either, though I'm sure he'd try. Or, eventually, Miles. Can you imagine the Count or the Countess or Miles watching that shit?"
   She drew in her breath between her teeth. "I begin to see."
   "Think about it. I have."
   "Lieutenant Iverson was furious, when he broke in and found the melted casings. He's going to send complaints up through channels."
   "Let him. If ImpSec cares to air any complaints about me or mine, I will air my complaints about them. like, where the hell were they for the last five days. I will have no compunction nor mercy about calling in that debt on anyone from Illyan down. Cross me, will they . . ." He trailed off in a hostile mutter.
   Her face was greenish-white. "I'm ... so sorry, Mark." Her hand touched his, hesitantly.
   He seized her wrist, held it hard. Her nostrils flared, but she did not wince. He sat up, or tried to. "Don't you dare pity me. I won. Save your sympathy for Baron Ryoval, if you must. I took him. Suckered him. I beat him at his own game, on his own ground. I will not allow you to turn my victory into defeat for the sake of your damned . . . feelings." He released her wrist; she rubbed it, watching him levelly. "That's the thing of it. I can shed Ryoval, if they'll let me. But if they know too much_if they had those damned vids_they'd never be able to leave it alone, ever. Their guilt would keep them coming back to it, and they would keep me coming back to it. I don't want to have to fight Ry Ryoval in my head, or in their heads, for the rest of my life. He's dead, I'm not, it's enough."
   He paused, snorted. "And you have to admit, it would be particularly bad for Miles."
   "Oh, yes," Bothari-Jesek breathed agreement.
   Outside, the Dendarii personnel shuttle, with Sergeant Taura piloting, lifted the first load of Duronas to Mark's yacht in orbit. He paused to watch it rise from sight. Yes. Go, go, go. Get out of this hole, you, me, all of us clones. Forever. Go be human too, if you can. If I can.
   Bothari-Jesek looked back at him and said, "They'll insist on a physical exam, you know."
   "Yeah, they'll see some. I can't conceal the beatings, and God knows I can't conceal the force-feedings_grotesque, weren't they?"
   She swallowed, and nodded. "I thought you were going to_oh, never mind."
   "Right. I told you not to look. But the longer I can avoid examination by a competent ImpSec doctor, the vaguer I can be about all the rest."
   "You have to be treated, surely."
   "Lilly Durona has done an excellent job. And by my request, the only record is in her head. I should be able to slide right by."
   "Don't try to avoid it altogether," Bothari-Jesek advised. "The Countess would spot that even if no one else did. And I can't believe you don't need . . . something more. Not physically."
   "Oh, Elena. If there's one thing I've learned in the past week, it's just how badly cross-wired I really am, down in the bottom of my brain. The worst thing I met in Ryoval's basement was the monster in the mirror, Ryoval's psychic mirror. My pet monster, the four-headed one. Demonstrably, worse even than Ryoval himself. Stronger. Quicker. Slyer." He bit his tongue, aware that he was starting to say far too much, aware that he sounded like he was edging into dementia. He didn't think he was edging into dementia. He suspected he was edging into sanity, the long way around. The hard way. "I know what I'm doing. On some level, I know exactly what I'm doing."
   "In a couple of the vids_you seemed to be fooling Ryoval with a fake split personality. Talking to yourself. . . ?"
   "I could never have fooled Ryoval with a fake anything. He was in this trade for decades, mucking about in the bottoms of people's brains. But my personality didn't exactly split. More like it ... inverted." Nothing could be called split, that felt so profoundly whole. "It wasn't something I decided to do. It was just something I did."
   She was looking at him with extreme worry. He had to laugh out loud. But the effect of his good cheer was apparently not so reassuring to her as he might have desired.
   "You have to understand," he told her. "Sometimes, insanity is not a tragedy. Sometimes, it's a strategy for survival. Sometimes . . . it's a triumph." He hesitated. "Do you know what a black-gang is?"
   Mutely, she shook her head.
   "Something I picked up in a museum in London, once. Way back in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, on Earth, they used to have ships that sailed across the tops of the oceans, that were powered by steam engines. The heat for the steam engines came from great coal fires in the bellies of the ships. And they had to have these suckers down there to stoke the coal into the furnaces. Down in the filth and the heat and the sweat and the stink. The coal made them black, so they were called the black-gang. And the officers and fine ladies up above would have nothing to do with these poor grotty thugs, socially. But without them, nothing moved. Nothing burned. Nothing lived. No steam. The black-gang. Unsung heroes. Ugly lower-class fellows."
   Now she thought he was babbling for sure. The panegyric of fierce loyalty for his black gang that he wanted to sing into her ear was . . . probably not a good idea, just now. Yeah, and nobody loves me, Gorge whispered plaintively. You'd better get used to it.
   "Never mind." He smiled instead. "But I can tell you, Galen looks . . . pretty small, after Ryoval. And Ryoval, I beat. In a strange sense, I feel very free, right now. And I intend to stay that way."
   "You appear to me to be ... excuse me ... a little manic, right now, Mark. In Miles, this would be normal. Well, usual. But eventually, he tops out, and finally he bottoms out. I think you need to watch out for this pattern, you may share it with him."
   "Are you saying it's a mood swing on a bungee cord?"
   A short laugh puffed from her lips despite herself. "Yes."
   "I'll beware of the perigee."
   "Hm, yes. Though it's the apogee where everybody else has to duck and run, usually."
   "I'm also on, well, several painkillers and stimulants, right now," he mentioned. "Or I would never have made it through the last couple of hours. I'm afraid some of them are starting to wear off." Good. That would account to her for some of his babble, perhaps, and had the advantage of being true.
   "Do you want me to get Lilly Durona?"
   "No. I just want to sit here. And not move."
   "I think that might be a good idea." Elena swung out of her chair, and picked up her helmet.
   "I know what I want to be when I grow up, now, though," he offered to her suddenly. She paused, and raised her brows.
   "I want to be an ImpSec analyst. Civilian. One who doesn't send his people to the wrong place, or five days late. Or improperly prepared. I want to sit in a cubicle all day long, surrounded by a fortress, and get it right." He waited for her to laugh at him.
   Instead, to his surprise, she nodded seriously. "Speaking as the one out on the sharp end of the ImpSec stick, I would be delighted."
   She gave him a half-salute, and turned away. He puzzled over the look in her eyes, as she descended out of sight down the lift-tube. It wasn't love. It wasn't fear.
   Oh. So that's what respect looks like. Oh.
   I could get used to that.
   As Mark had declared to Elena, he just sat for a time, staring out the window. He was going to have to move sooner or later. Maybe he could use the excuse of his broken foot to inveigle a float-chair. Lilly had promised him that her stimulants would buy him six hours of coherence, after which the metabolic bill would be delivered by hulking bio-thugs with spiked clubs, virtual repo-men for his neuro-transmitter debt. He wondered if the absurd dreamy image was the first sign of the approaching biochemical breakdown. He prayed he'd hold out at least till he was safely in the ImpSec shuttle. Oh, Brother. Carry me home.
   Voices echoed up the lift tube. Miles appeared, with a Durona trailing along after him. He was skeletally thin and ghostly pale, in his Durona-issued grey suit. The two of them seemed to be on some kind of growth-reciprocal. If he could magically transfer all the kilos Ryoval had foisted on him the last week directly to Miles, they would both look much better, Mark decided. But if he kept growing fatter, would Miles attenuate altogether, and vanish? Unsettling vision. It's the drugs, boy, it's the drugs.
   "Oh, good," said Miles, "Elena said you were still up here." With the cheerful air of a magician presenting a particularly good trick, he urged the young woman to step forward. "Do you recognize her?"
   "It's a Durona, Miles," said Mark, in a gentle, weary tone. "I'm going to see them in my dreams." He paused. "Is this a trick question?" Then he sat up, shocked by recognition. You could tell clones apart_"It's her!"
   "Just so," smiled Miles, pleased. "We smuggled her out from Bharaputra's, Rowan and I. She's going to go to Escobar with her sisters."
   "Ah!" Mark settled back. "Ah. Oh. Good." Hesitantly, he rubbed his forehead. Take back your coup, Vasa Luigi! "I didn't think you were interested in rescuing clones, Miles."
   Miles winced visibly. "You inspired me."
   Er. He hadn't meant that as a reference to Ryoval's. Clearly, Miles had dragged the reluctant girl up here in a bid to make Mark feel better. Less clearly to Miles, though like crystal to himself, was an element of subtle rivalry. For the first time in his life, Miles was feeling the hot breath of fraternal competition on the back of his neck. Do I make you uneasy? Ha! Get used to it, boy. I've lived with it for twenty-two years. Miles had spoken of Mark as "my brother" in the same tone he'd use for "my boots," or maybe, "my horse." Or_give credit, now_"my child." A certain smug paternalism. Miles hadn't been expecting an equal with an agenda of his own. Suddenly, Mark realized he had a delightful new hobby, one that would provide entertainment for years to come. God, I'm going to enjoy being your brother.
   "Yes," Mark said cheerily, "you can do it too. I knew you could, if you only tried." He laughed. To his dismay, it turned into a sob in his throat. He choked off both. He didn't dare laugh, or express any other emotion, right now. His control was much too thin. "I'm very glad," he stated, as neutrally as he could.
   Miles, whose eye had caught the whole play, nodded. "Good," he stated, equally neutrally.
   Bless you, Brother. Miles understood this, at least, what it was like to teeter on the raw edge.
   They both glanced at the Durona girl. She moved uneasily, under the weight of this double expectation. She flipped back her hair, mustered words. "When I first saw you," she said to Mark, "I didn't like you much."
   When you first saw me, I didn't like me much either. "Yes?" he encouraged.
   "I still think you're funny-looking. Even funnier-looking than the other one," she nodded at Miles, who smiled blandly. "But . . . but . . ." Words failed her. As cautiously and hesitantly as a wild bird at a feeder, she ventured nearer to him, bent, and kissed him on one puffy cheek. Then like a bird, she fled.
   "Hm," said Miles, watching her swoop back down the lift-tube. "I was hoping for a little more enthusiastic a demonstration of gratitude."
   "You'll learn," said Mark equably. He touched his cheek, and smiled.
   "If you think that's ingratitude, try ImpSec," Miles advised glumly. " 'You lost how much equipment?' "
   Mark cocked an eyebrow. "An Illyan-quote?"
   "Oh, you've met him?"
   "Oh, yes."
   "I wish I could have been there."
   "I wish you could have been there too," said Mark sincerely. "He was . . . acerb."
   "I'll bet. He does acerb almost better than anyone I know, except for my mother when she's lost her temper, which thank God is not very often."
   "You should have seen her annihilate him, then," said Mark. "Clash of the titans. I think you'd have enjoyed it. I did."
   "Oh? We have a lot to talk about, it seems_"
   For the first time, Mark realized, they did. His heart lifted. Unfortunately, so did another interruption, via the tube. A man in House Fell livery looked over the chromium railing, saw him, and gave him a semi-salute. "I have a courier delivery for an individual named Mark," he said.
   "I'm Mark."
   The courier trod over to him, flashed a confirming scanner over his face, opened a thin case chained to his wrist, and handed him a card in an unmarked envelope. "Baron Fell's compliments, sir, and he trusts this will help speed you on your way."
   The credit chit. Ah, ha! And a very broad hint along with it. "My compliments to Baron Fell, and . . . and . . . what do we want to say to Baron Fell, Miles?"
   "I'd keep it down to Thank you, I think," Miles advised. "At least till we're far, far away."
   "Tell him thank you," Mark told the courier, who nodded and marched out again the way he had come in.
   Mark eyed Lilly's comconsole, in the corner of the room. It seemed a very long way off. He pointed. "Could you, um, bring me the remote-reader off that comconsole over there, Miles?"
   "Sure." Miles retrieved and handed him the board.
   "I predict," said Mark, waving the card around, "that I will be seriously short-changed, but not quite enough so that I would risk going back to Fell and arguing about it." He inserted the card into the read-slot, and smiled. "Spot-on."
   "What did you get?" asked Miles, craning his neck.
   "Well, that's a very personal question," said Mark. Miles uncraned guiltily. "Trade. Were you sleeping with that surgeon?"
   Miles bit his lip, curiosity obviously struggling with his gentlemanly manners. Mark watched with interest to see how it would come out. Personally, he'd bet on curiosity.
   Miles took a rather deep breath. "Yes," he said at last.
   Thought so. Their good fortune, Mark decided, was divided exactly fifty-fifty; Miles got the good luck, and he got the rest. But not this time. "Two million."
   Miles whistled. "Two million Imperial marks? Impressive!"
   "No, no. Two million Betan dollars. What, about eight million marks, I guess, isn't it? Or is it closer to ten. Depends on the current exchange rate, I guess. It's not nearly ten percent of the value of House Ryoval, anyway. More like two percent," Mark calculated aloud. And had the rare and utter joy of rendering Miles Vorkosigan speechless.
   "What are you going to do with it all?" Miles whispered, after about a minute.
   "Invest," said Mark fiercely. "Barrayar has an expanding economy, doesn't it?" He paused. "First, though, I'm going to kick back one million to ImpSec, for their services the last four months."
   "Nobody gives money to ImpSec!"
   "Why not? Look at your mercenary operations, for instance. Isn't being a mercenary supposed to be profitable? The Dendarii Fleet could be a veritable cash cow for ImpSec, if it were run right."
   "They take out their profit in political consequences," said Miles firmly. "Though_if you really do it, I want to be there. To see the look on Illyan's face."
   "If you're good, I'll let you come along. Oh, I'm really going to do it, all right. There are some debts I cannot ever repay," he thought of Phillipi, and the others. "But I intend to pay the ones I can, in their honor. Though you can bet I'll keep the rest. I should be able to double it again in about six years, and be back to where I started. Or better. It's a lot easier to make two million out of one million than it is to make two out of one, if I understand the game correctly. I'll study up."
   Miles stared at him in fascination. "I bet you will."
   "Do you have any idea how desperate I was, when I started on that raid? How scared? I intend to have a value no one can ignore again, even if it's only measured in money. Money is a kind of power almost anyone can have. You don't even need a Vor in front of your name." He smiled faintly. "Maybe, after a while, I'll get a place of my own. Like Ivan's. After all, it would look funny if I was still living in my parents' house at the age of, say, twenty-eight."
   And that was probably enough Miles-baiting for one day. Miles would, demonstrably, lay down his life for his brother, but he did have a notable tendency to try to subsume the people around him into extensions of his own personality. I am not your annex. I am your brother. Yes. Mark rather fancied they were both going to be able to keep track of that, now. He slumped wearily, but happily.
   "I do believe," said Miles, still looking nicely stunned, "you are the first Vorkosigan to make a profit in a business venture for five generations. Welcome to the family."
   Mark nodded. They were both silent for a time.
   "It's not the answer," Mark sighed finally. He nodded around at the Durona Group's clinic, and by implication to all of Jackson's Whole. "This piecemeal clone-rescue business. Even if I blew Vasa Luigi entirely away, someone else would just take up where House Bharaputra left off."
   "Yes," Miles agreed. "The true answer has to be medical-technical. Somebody has to come up with a better, safer life-extension trick. Which I believe somebody will. A lot of people have to be working on it, in a lot of places. The brain-transplant technique is too risky to compete. It must end, someday soon."
   "I ... don't have any talents in the medical-technical direction," said Mark. "In the meantime, the butchery goes on. I have to take another pass at the problem before someday. Somehow."
   "But not today," Miles said firmly.
   "No." Out the window, he saw a personnel shuttle descending into the Duronas' compound. But it wasn't the Dendarii one returning, yet. He nodded. "Is that by chance our transport?"
   "I believe so," said Miles, going to the window and looking down. "Yes."
   And then there was no more time. While Miles was gone checking on the shuttle, and couldn't watch, Mark rounded up half a dozen Duronas to help pry his stiff, bent, half-paralyzed body out of Lilly's chair and lay him on a float-pallet. His crooked hands shook uncontrollably, till Lilly pursed her lips and gave him another hypospray of something wonderful. He was perfectly content to be carried out horizontally. His broken foot was a socially acceptable reason not to be able to walk. He looked nicely invalidish, with his leg propped up conspicuously, the better to persuade the ImpSec fellows to carry him to his bunk, when they arrived topside.
   For the first time in his life, he was going home.
   

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

   Miles eyed the old mirror in the antechamber to the library of Vorkosigan House, the one that had been brought into the family by General Count Piotr's mother as part of her dowry, its frame ornately carved by some Vorrutyer family retainer. He was alone in the room, with no one to observe him. He slipped up to the glass, and stared uneasily at his own reflection.
   The scarlet tunic of the Imperial parade red-and-blues did not exactly flatter his too-pale complexion at the best of times. He preferred the more austere elegance of dress greens. The gold-encrusted high collar was not, unfortunately, quite high enough to hide the twin red scars on either side of his neck. The cuts would turn white and recede eventually, but in the meantime they drew the eye. He considered how he was going to explain them. Dueling scars. I lost. Or maybe, Love bites. That was closer. He traced them with a fingertip, turning his head from side to side. Unlike the terrible memory of the needle-grenade, he did not remember acquiring these. That was far more disturbing than the vision of his death, that such important things could happen to him and he didn't, couldn't, remember.
   Well, he was known to have medical problems, and the scars were almost neat enough to look medical. Maybe people would let them pass without comment. He stepped back from the mirror to take in the general look. His uniform still had a tendency to hang on him, despite his mother's valiant attempts to make him eat more these last few weeks since they'd arrived home. She'd finally turned the problem over to Mark, as if yielding to superior expertise. Mark had grinned with amusement, and then he had preceded to harass Miles without mercy. Actually, the attentions were working. Miles did feel better. Stronger.
   The Winterfair Ball was sufficiently social, without formal governmental or military obligation, that he was able to leave the dual dress sword set at home. Ivan would be wearing his, but Ivan had the altitude to carry it off. At Miles's height, the long sword of the pair looked damned silly, practically dragging on the ground, not to mention the problem of tripping over it or banging his dance partner in the shins.
   Footsteps sounded in the archway; Miles turned quickly, and swung one booted leg up and leaned against a chair-arm, pretending to have been ignoring the narcissistic attractions of his reflection.
   "Ah, there you are." Mark wandered in to join him, pausing to study himself briefly in the mirror, turning to check the fit of his clothing. His clothing fit very well indeed. Mark had acquired the name of Gregor's tailor, a closely-guarded ImpSec secret, by the simple expedient of calling Gregor and asking him. The boxy loose cut of the jacket and trousers was aggressively civilian, but somehow very sharp. The colors honored Winterfair, sort of; a green so dark as to be almost black was trimmed with a red so dark as to be almost black. The effect was somewhere between festive and sinister, like a small, cheerful bomb.
   Miles thought of that very odd moment in Rowan's lightflyer, when he'd been temporarily convinced he was Mark. How terrifying it had been to be Mark, how utterly isolated. The memory of that desolation made him shiver. Is that how he feels all the time?
   Well, no more. Not if I have anything to say about it.
   "Looks good," Miles offered.
   "Yeah." Mark grinned. "You're not so bad yourself. Not as cadaverous, quite."
   "You're improving too. Slowly." Actually, Mark was, Miles thought. The most alarming distortions of whatever horrors Ryoval had inflicted upon Mark, and which he resolutely refused to talk about, had gradually passed off. A solid residue of flesh yet lingered, however. "What weight are you finally going to choose?" Miles asked curiously.
   "You're looking at it. Or I wouldn't have invested the fortune in the wardrobe."
   "Er. Are you comfortable?" Miles inquired uncomfortably.
   Mark's eyes glinted. "Yes, thank you. The thought that a one-eyed sniper, at a range of two kilometers at midnight in a thunderstorm, could not possibly mistake me for you, is very comfortable indeed."
   "Oh. Well. Yes, there is that, I suppose."
   "Keep exercising," Mark advised him cordially. "It's good for you." Mark sat down and put his feet up.
   "Mark?" the Countess's voice called from the foyer. "Miles?" "In here," said Miles.
   "Ah," she said, sweeping into the antechamber. "There you both are." She smiled at them with a greedy maternal gloat, looking most satisfied. Miles could not help feeling warmed, as if some last lingering ice chip inside from the cryo-freezing finally thawed, steaming gently. The Countess wore a new dress, more ornate than her usual style, in green and silver, with ruffs and tucks and a train, a celebration of fabric. It did not make her stiff, though_it wouldn't dare. The Countess was never intimidated by her clothing. Quite the reverse. Her eyes outshone the silver embroidery.
   "Father waiting on us?" Miles inquired.
   "He'll be down momentarily. I'm insisting we leave promptly at midnight. You two can stay longer if you wish, of course. He'll overdo, I predict, proving to the hyenas he's too tough for them to jump, even when the hyenas aren't circling any more. A lifetime of reflex. Try and focus his attention on the District, Miles. It will drive poor Prime Minister Racozy to distraction to feel Aral is looking over his shoulder. We really need to get out of the capital, down to Hassadar, after Winterfair."
   Miles, who had a very clear idea just how much recovery chest surgery took, said, "I think you'll be able to persuade him."
   "Please throw your vote in. I know he can't fool you, and he knows it too. Ah_just what can I expect tonight, medically speaking?"
   "He'll dance twice, once to prove he can do it, and the second time to prove the first wasn't a fluke. After that you'll have no trouble at all persuading him to sit down," Miles predicted with confidence. "Go ahead and play mother hen, and he can pretend he's stopping to please you, and not because he's about to fall over. Hassadar strikes me as a very good plan."
   "Yes. Barrayar does not quite know what to do with retired strong men. Traditionally, they are decently deceased, and not hanging around to pass comments on their successors. Aral may be something of a first. Though Gregor has had the most horrifying idea."
   "Oh?"
   "He's muttering about the Vice-royalty of Sergyar, as a post for Aral, when he is fully recovered. The present viceroy has been begging to come home, it seems. Whining, actually. A more thankless task than colonial governor I cannot imagine. An honest man gets ground to powder, trying to play interface between two sets of conflicting needs, the home government above and the colonists below. Anything you can do to disabuse Gregor of this notion, I would greatly appreciate."
   "Oh, I don't know," Miles's brows rose thoughtfully. "I mean_what a retirement project. A whole planet to play with. Sergyar. And didn't you discover it yourself, back when you were a Betan Astronomical Survey captain?"
   "Indeed. If the Barrayaran military expedition hadn't been ahead of us, Sergyar would be a Betan daughter-colony right now. And much better managed, believe me. It really needs someone to take it in hand. The ecological issues alone are crying for an injection of intelligence_I mean, take that worm plague. A little Betan-style prudence could have . . . well. They figured it out eventually, I guess."
   Miles and Mark looked at each other. It wasn't telepathy. But the thought that perhaps Aral Vorkosigan wasn't the only over-energetic aging expert Gregor might be glad to export from his capital was surely being shared between them, right this second.
   Mark's brows drew down. "How soon might this be, ma'am?"
   "Oh, not for at least a year."
   "Ah." Mark brightened.
   Armsman Pym stuck his head around the archway. "Ready, milady," he reported.
   They all herded into the black-and-white paved hall, to find the Count standing at the foot of the curved stairs. He watched them with delight as they trooped into his view. The Count had lost weight in his medical ordeal too, but it only made him look more fit, in his red-and-blues. He managed uniform and sword-set with unconscious ease. In three hours, he'd be drooping, Miles gauged, but by then he'd have made a lasting first impression on his many observers, on this his first formal outing with his new heart. His color was excellent, his gaze as knife-sharp as ever. But there was no dark at all in his hair anymore. Aside from that, you really might think he could live forever.
   Except Miles didn't think that anymore. It had scared the hell out of him, retroactively, this whole cardiac episode. Not that his father must die someday, perhaps before him_that was the proper order of things, and Miles could not wish it upon the Count for it to be the other way around_but that Miles might not be here when it happened. When he was needed. Might be off indulging himself with the Dendarii Mercenaries, say, and not get the word for weeks. Too late.
   Being both in uniform, the Lieutenant saluted his father the Admiral now with the usual tinge of irony with which they commonly exchanged such military courtesies. Miles would rather have embraced him, but it would look odd.
   To hell with what it looked like. He walked over and hugged his father.
   "Hey, boy, hey," said the Count, surprised and pleased. "It's not that bad, really." He embraced Miles in return. The Count stood back and looked them all over, his elegant wife, his_two, now_sons. Smiling as smugly as any rich man could, he opened his arms as if to embrace them all, briefly and almost shyly. "Are the Vorkosigans ready to storm the Winterfair Ball, then? Dear Captain, I predict they will surrender to you in droves. How's your foot, Mark?"
   Mark stuck out his right shoe, and wriggled it. "Fit to be trod upon by any Vor maiden up a hundred kilos, sir. Steel toe caps, underneath," he added to Miles, aside. "I'm taking no chances."
   The Countess attached herself to her husband's arm. "Lead on, love. Vorkosigans Victorious."
   Vorkosigans Convalescent, was more like it, Miles reflected, following. But you should see what the other guys look like.
   Not to Miles's surprise, practically the first person the Vorkosigans' party met upon entering the Imperial Residence was Simon Illyan. Illyan was dressed as usual for these functions, parade red-and-blues concealing a multitude of comm links.
   "Ah, he's here in person tonight," the Count murmured, spotting his old Security chief across the vestibule. "There must be no major messes going on elsewhere, then. Good."
   They divested their snow-spangled wraps to Gregor's household staff. Miles was shivering. He decided his timing had been skewed by this last adventure. Usually, he managed to arrange an off-planet assignment during winter in the capital. Illyan nodded, and came over to them.
   "Good evening, Simon," said the Count.
   "Good evening, sir. All calm and quiet, so far tonight."
   "That's nice." The Count raised a dryly amused eyebrow at him. "I'm sure Prime Minister Racozy will be delighted to hear it."
   Illyan opened his mouth, and closed it. "Er. Habit," he said in embarrassment. He stared at Count Vorkosigan with a look almost of frustration. As if the only way he knew how to relate to his commander of thirty years was by making reports; but Admiral Count Vorkosigan was no longer receiving them. "This feels very strange," he admitted.
   "You'll get used to it, Simon," Countess Vorkosigan assured him. And towed her husband determinedly out of Illyan's orbit. The Count gave him a parting half-salute, seconding the Countess's words.
   Illyan's eye fell on Miles and Mark, instead. "Hm," he said, in the tone of a man who had just come out second-best in some horse-trade.
   Miles stood up straighter. The ImpSec medicos had cleared him to return to duty in two months, pending a final physical exam. He had not bothered mentioning the little problem with the convulsions to them. Perhaps the first one had just been an idiosyncratic effect of the fast-penta. Sure, and the second and third ones, drug flashbacks.
   But he hadn't had any more, after that. Miles smiled diffidently, trying to look very healthy. Illyan just shook his head, looking at him.
   "Good evening, sir," Mark said to Illyan in turn. "Was ImpSec able to deliver my Winterfair gift to my clones all eight?"
   Illyan nodded. "Five hundred marks each, individually addressed and on time, yes, my lord."
   "Good." Mark gave one of his sharper-edged smiles, the sort that made one wonder what he was thinking. The clones had been the pretext Mark had given Illyan for handing over to ImpSec the million Betan dollars he'd sworn he would; the funds were now in escrow for their needs, among other things paying for their place in that exclusive school. Illyan had been so boggled he'd gone absolutely robotic, an effect Miles had watched with great fascination. By the time the clones were out on their own the million would be about used up, Mark had figured. But the Winterfair gifts had been personal and separate.
   Mark did not ask how his gift had been received, though Miles was dying to know; but rather, drifted on with another polite nod, as if Illyan were a clerk with whom he had just concluded some minor business. Miles saluted and caught up. Mark was suppressing a deep grin, resulting in a smirk-like look.
   "All this time," Mark confided to Miles in a low voice, "I was worried about never having received a present. It never even crossed my mind to worry about never having given one. Winterfair is an entrancing holiday, y'know?" He sighed. "I wish I'd known those clone-kids well enough to pick something right for each. But at least this way, they have a gift of choice. It's like giving them two presents in one. How the devil do you folks give anything to, say, Gregor, though?"
   "We fall back on tradition. Two hundred liters of Dendarii mountain maple syrup, delivered annually to his household. Takes care of it. If you think Gregor's bad, think about our father, though. It's like trying to give a Winterfair gift to Father Frost himself."
   "Yes, I've been puzzling over that one."
   "Sometimes you can't give back. You just have to give on. Did you, ah ... sign those credit chits to the clones?"
   "Sort of. Actually, I signed them 'Father Frost.' " Mark cleared his throat. "That's the purpose of Winterfair, I think. To teach you how to ... give on. Being Father Frost is the end-game, isn't it?"
   "I think so."
   "I'm getting it figured out," Mark nodded in determination.
   They walked on together into the upstairs reception hall, and snagged drinks. They were collecting a lot of attention, Miles noted with amusement, covert stares from the flower of the Vor assembled there. Oh, Barrayar. Do we have a surprise for you.
   He sure surprised me.
   It was going to be huge fun, having Mark for a brother. An ally at last! I think. . . . Miles wondered if he could ever draw Mark on to love Barrayar as he did. The thought made him strangely nervous. Best not to love too much. Barrayar could be lethal, to take for one's lady. Still ... a challenge. Enough challenges to go around, no artificial shortages of those here.
   Miles would have to be careful about anything Mark might interpret as an attempt to dominate him, though. Mark's violent allergy to the least hint of control was perfectly understandable, Miles thought, but it made mentoring him a task of some delicacy.
   Better not do too good a job, big brother. You're expendable now, y'know. He ran a hand down the bright uniform cloth of his jacket, coolly conscious of just what expendable meant. Yet being beaten by your student was the ultimate victory, for a teacher. An enchanting paradox. I can't lose.
   Miles grinned. Yeah, Mark. Catch me if you can. If you can.
   "Ah," Mark nodded to a man in a wine-red Vor House uniform, across the room. "Isn't that Lord Vorsmythe, the industrialist?"
   "Yes."
   "I'd love to talk with him. Do you know him? Can you introduce me?"
   "Sure. Thinking of more investing, are you?"
   "Yes, I've decided to diversify. Two-thirds Barrayaran investments, one-third galactic."
   "Galactic?"
   "I'm putting some into Escobaran medical technology, if you must know."
   "Lilly?"
   "Yep. She needs the set-up capital. I'm going to be a silent partner." Mark hesitated. "The solution has to be medical, you know. And . . . do you want to bet she won't return a profit?"
   "Nope. In fact, I'd be very leery of laying any bet against you."
   Mark smiled his sharpest. "Good. You're learning too."
   Miles led Mark over and performed the requested introduction. Vorsmythe was delighted to find someone who actually wanted to talk about his work here, the bored look pasted on his face evaporating with Mark's first probing question; Miles turned Mark loose with a wave. Vorsmythe was gesturing expansively. Mark was listening as though he had a recorder whirring in his head. Miles left them to it.
   He spied Delia Koudelka across the chamber, and made for her, to claim a dance later, and possibly cut out Ivan. If he was lucky, she might offer him a chance to use that line about the dueling scars, too.
   

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

   After a most fascinating chat on the topic of Barrayaran high-growth economic sectors, Vorsmythe was reclaimed by his wife for some escort purpose, and dragged out of the window embrasure he and Mark had taken over; he parted with Mark reluctantly, promising to send him some prospectuses. Mark looked around for Miles again. The Count was not the only Vorkosigan in danger of over-doing it tonight while trying to prove his health to assorted observers, Mark had realized.
   Mark had, by default, become Miles's confidant for self-tests he didn't want to share with his ImpSec superiors, checking knowledge bases, going over old material ranging from Service regs to five-space math. Mark had made a joke about it exactly once, before he realized the depth of terror that was driving Miles's obsessive probing. Particularly when they actually found some hole or another in Miles's memory. It bothered Mark deeply, this new hesitation, this desperate diffidence in his big brother. He hoped Miles's obnoxious self-confidence would return soon. It was another strange reciprocity, that Miles should have things he wanted to remember, and couldn't, while Mark had things he wanted to forget. And couldn't.
   He would have to encourage Miles to show him around some more. Miles enjoyed playing the expert, it put him automatically in the one-up position to which he was addicted. Yeah, let Miles expand his highly-inflatable ego a bit. Mark could afford it, now. He'd give Miles a run for it some other time, when Miles was up to speed again. When it was more sporting.
   Finally, by hopping up on a chair and craning his neck, Mark spotted his brother just leaving the reception chamber, in the company of a blonde woman in blue velvet_Delia Koudelka, Kareen's tallest sister. They're here. Oh, God. He abandoned the chair and went on a fast search for the Countess. He finally ran her to ground in a third floor lounge, chatting with some older women, obviously cronies. She took one look at his anxious smile, and excused herself to join him in a nook in the carpeted corridor.
   "Have you run into a problem, Mark?" she asked, arranging her skirts on the little settee. He perched gingerly on the opposite end.
   "I don't know. The Koudelkas are here. I promised back at the Emperor's Birthday to dance with Kareen, if I made it home in time. And ... I'd asked her to talk with you. About me. Did she?"
   "Yes."
   "What did you tell her?"
   "Well, it was a long conversation ..."
   Oh, shit.
   "But the gist of it was that I judged you an intelligent young man who had had some very unpleasant experiences, but if you could be persuaded to use that intelligence to get your problems straightened out, I could support your suit."
   "Betan therapy?"
   "Something like that."
   "I've been thinking about Betan therapy. A lot. But I dread the thought of my therapist's notes all ending up in some ImpSec analyst's report. I don't want to be a damned show." Again.
   "I think I could do something about that."
   "Could you?" He looked up, shaken with hope. "Even though you wouldn't get to see the reports either?"
   "Yes."
   "I ... would appreciate that, ma'am."
   "Consider it a promise. My word as a Vorkosigan."
   An adopted Vorkosigan, even more so than he. But he did not doubt her word. Mother, with you all things seem possible.
   "I don't know what details you told Kareen_"
   "Very few. She's only eighteen, after all. Barely assimilating her own new adulthood. More, hm, advanced matters could wait, I judged. She has to get through school, first, before undertaking any long-term commitment," she added pointedly.
   "Oh. Um." He wasn't sure if he was relieved, or not. "It's all out of date anyway. I've acquired ... a whole new set of problems, since. Much worse ones."
   "I don't sense that, Mark. To me, you have appeared much more centered and relaxed, since you and Miles got back from Jackson's Whole. Even though you won't talk about it."
   "I don't regret knowing myself, ma'am. I don't even regret . . . being myself." Me and the black gang. "But I do regret . . . being so far from Kareen. I believe I am a monster, of some sort. And in the play, Caliban does not marry Prospero's daughter. In fact, he gets stomped for trying, as I recall." Yes, how could he possibly explain Gorge and Grunt and Howl and Killer to someone like Kareen, without frightening or disgusting her? How could he ask her to feed his abnormal appetites, even in some dream or fantasy play? It was hopeless. Better not to try.
   The Countess smiled wryly. "There are several things wrong with your analogy, Mark. In the first place, I can guarantee you are not subhuman, whatever you think you are. And Kareen is not superhuman, either. Though if you insist on treating her as a prize and not as a person, I can also guarantee you will run yourself into another kind of trouble." Her raised brows punctuated the point. "I added, as condition to my blessing on your suit, the suggestion that she take the opportunity during her schooling on Beta Colony next year for some extra tutoring. A little Betan education in certain personal matters could go a long way, I think, to widening her perceptions enough to admit, um, complexities without choking. A certain liberality of view an eighteen-year-old simply cannot acquire on Barrayar."
   "Oh." That was an idea which had never even crossed his mind, tackling the problem from Kareen's end. It made ... so much sense. "I'd . . . thought about school on Beta Colony for myself, next year. Some galactic education would look good on my record, when I apply here for the job I have in mind. I don't want to leave it all to pure nepotism."
   The Countess tilted her head in bemusement. "Good. It seems to me as though you have a sound set of long-range plans, well-coordinated to advance all your goals. You have only to carry them through. I entirely approve."
   "Long-range. But . . . tonight is right now."
   "And what were you planning to do tonight, Mark?"
   "Dance with Kareen."
   "I don't see the problem with that. You're allowed to dance. Whatever you are. This is not the play, Mark, and old Prospero has many daughters. One may even have a low taste for fishy fellows."
   "How low?"
   "Oh ..." The Countess held out her hand at a level about equal to Mark's standing height. "At least that low. Go dance with the girl, Mark. She thinks you're interesting. Mother Nature gives a sense of romance to young people, in place of prudence, to advance the species. It's a trick_that makes us grow."
   Walking across the Residence ballroom to greet Kareen Koudelka felt like the most terrifying thing Mark had ever voluntarily done, not excepting the first Dendarii combat drop onto Jackson's Whole. There the resemblance ended, for after that, things improved.
   "Lord Mark!" she said happily. "They told me you were here."
   You asked? "I've come to redeem my word and my dance, milady." He managed a Vorish bow.
   "Good! It's about time. I've saved out all the mirror dances and the called reels."
   All the simple dances he could be expected to do. "I had Miles teach me the steps to Mazeppa's Minuet last week," he added hopefully.
   "Perfect. Oh, the music's starting_" She hauled him onto the inlaid floor.
   She wore a swirling dark green dress with red trim, that set off her ash-blonde curls. In a sort of positive paranoia, he wondered if her outfit could possibly have been deliberately color-coordinated with his own clothes. Surely it must be a coincidence. How_? My tailor to my mother to her mother to her. Hell, any ImpSec analyst ought to be able to figure out that data trail.
   Grunt, alas, had a distracting and distressing tendency to mentally undress her, and worse. But Grunt was not going to be permitted to speak tonight. This one is Lord Mark's job. And he isn't going to screw it up this time. Grunt could just lurk down in there and build up steam. Lord Mark would find a use for the power. Starting with keeping the beat. There was even a dance_Mazeppa's Minuet, as it happened_where the two partners touched each other, holding the hand or the waist, for almost the entire pattern.
   All true wealth is biological, the Count had said. Mark finally saw exactly what he meant. For all his million Betan dollars, he could not buy this, the light in Kareen's eyes. Though it couldn't hurt . . . what was that damned Earth bird or other, that built wildly elaborate nests to attract a mate?
   They were in the middle of a mirror dance. "So, Kareen_you're a girl. I, uh, had this argument with Ivan. What do you think is the most attractive thing a fellow can have? A lightflyer, wealth . . . rank?" He hoped his tone suggested he was running some sort of scientific survey. Nothing personal, ma'am.
   She pursed her lips. "Wit," she said at last.
   Yeah. And what store are you going to buy that in, with all your Betan dollars, boy?
   "Mirror dance, my turn," said Kareen. "What's the most important thing a woman can have?"
   "Trust," he answered without thinking, and then thought about it to the point of almost losing his step. He was going to need a mountain of trust, no lie. So, start building it tonight, Lord Mark old boy. Hauling one bloody basket load at a time, if you have to.
   He managed to make her laugh out loud four times, after that. He kept count. ,
   He ate too much (even Gorge was sneakily sated), drank too much, talked too much, and danced far too much, and generally had a hell of a good time. The dancing was a little unexpected. Kareen reluctantly lent him to a string of several curious girlfriends. He was interesting to them only as a novelty, he judged, but he wasn't inclined to be picky. By two hours after midnight he was stimulated to the point of babbling, and starting to limp. Better to call it quits before Howl had to come out and take charge of his burnt-out remains. Besides, Miles had been sitting quietly in a corner for the last hour, looking uncharacteristically wilted.
   A word passed to an Imperial household servant brought the Count's groundcar back for them, driven by the ubiquitous Pym, who had taken the Count and Countess home earlier. Miles and Mark took over the rear compartment, both sagging into their seats. Pym pulled out past the Residence's guarded gates and into the winter streets, grown as night-quiet as the capital's streets ever did, only a few other vehicles prowling past. Miles turned the heat up high, and settled back with his eyes half-closed.
   Mark and his brother were alone in the compartment. Mark counted the number of people present. One, two. Three, four, five, six, seven. Lord Miles Vorkosigan and Admiral Naismith. Lord Mark Vorkosigan and Gorge, Grunt, Howl, and Killer.
   Admiral Naismith was a much classier creation, Mark thought with a silent sigh of envy. Miles could take the Admiral out to parties, introduce him to women, parade him in public almost anywhere but Barrayar itself. I suppose what my black gang lacks in savoir fairs, we make up in numbers. . . .
   But they all ran together, he and the black gang, on the deepest level. No part could be excised without butchering the whole. So, I'll just have to look after you all. Somehow. You just live, down there in the dark. Because someday, in some desperate hour, I may need you again. You took care of me. I'll take care of you.
   Mark wondered what Admiral Naismith took care of, for Miles. Something subtle but important_the Countess even saw it. What was it she had said? I won't seriously fear for Miles's sanity till he's cut off from the little Admiral. Hence the desperate edge in Miles's drive to reclaim his health. His job with ImpSec was his lifeline to Admiral Naismith.
   I think I understand that. Oh, yes.
   "Did I ever apologize, for getting you killed?" Mark asked aloud.
   "Not that I recall. ... It wasn't altogether your fault. I had no business mounting that drop mission. Should have taken Vasa Luigi up on his ransom offer. Except . . ."
   "Except what?"
   "He wouldn't sell you to me. I suspect he was already planning to get a higher bid from Ryoval, even then."
   "That would be my guess. Ah . . . thank you."
   "I'm not sure it made a difference, in the end," Miles said apologetically. "Since Ryoval just tried again."
   "Oh, yes. It made a huge difference, in the end. All the difference in the world." Mark smiled slightly, in the dark. Vorbarr Sultana's wildly assorted architecture passed by outside the canopy, snow-softened to a kind of unity.
   "What do we do tomorrow?" Mark asked.
   "Sleep in," murmured Miles, oozing down a little further in his stiff uniform collar, rather like paste being sucked back into a tube.
   "After that."
   "The party season ends here in three days, with the Winterfair bonfires. If my_our parents really go down to the District, I suppose I'll divide my time between Hassadar and here, till ImpSec lets me come back to work. Hassadar is slightly warmer than Vorbarr Sultana, this time of year. Ah_you're invited to come along with me, if you like."
   "Thank you. I accept."
   "What do you plan to do?"
   "After your medical leave is over, I think I'll sign up for one of your schools."
   "Which one?"
   "If the Count and Countess are going to be mainly residing in Hassadar, maybe the District college there."
   "Hm. I should warn you, you'll find a more, um, rural crowd there than you would in Vorbarr Sultana. You'll run into more Barrayaran old-style thinking."
   "Good. That's exactly what I want. I need to learn how to handle those hassles without accidentally killing people."
   "Er," said Miles, "true. What are you going to study?"
   "It almost doesn't matter. It will give me an official status_ student_and a chance to study the people. Data I can get off a machine. But I'm weak on people. There's so much to learn. I need to know . . . everything."
   It was another kind of hunger, this insatiable gluttony for knowledge. An ImpSec analyst must surely possess the hugest possible database. The fellows he'd met at the coffee dispenser in ImpSec HQ had conducted flashing conversations with each other over the most appalling range and depth of subjects. He was going to have to hustle, if he wanted to compete in that crowd. To win. Miles laughed.
   "What's funny?"
   "I'm just wondering what Hassadar is going to learn from you."
   The ground car turned in at the gates of Vorkosigan House, and slowed. "Maybe I'll get up early," said Mark. "There's a lot to do."
   Miles grinned sleepily, puddled down in his uniform. "Welcome to the beginning."