They led him through the night-dimmed ship and exited a lift-tube at something marked "G-Deck." Miles snapped alert. Gregor was supposed to be around here somewhere. . . . They arrived at an otherwise-blank cabin door marked 10A, where the guards beeped the code-lock for permission to enter. The door slid aside.
Cavilo sat at a comconsole desk, a pool of light in the somber room making her blond-white hair gleam and glow. They had arrived at the Commander's personal office, apparently, adjoining her quarters. Miles strained his eyes and ears for signs of the Emperor. Cavilo was fully-dressed in her neat fatigues. At least Miles wasn't the only one going short on sleep these days; he fancied optimistically that she looked a little tired. She placed a stunner out on her desk, ominously ready to her right hand, and dismissed the guards. Miles craned his neck, looking for the hypospray. She stretched, and sat back. The scent of her perfume, a greener, sharper, less musky scent than she'd worn as Livia Nu, sublimated from her white skin and tickled Miles's nose. He swallowed.
"Sit down, Lord Vorkosigan."
He took the indicated chair, and waited. She watched him with calculating eyes. The insides of his nostrils began to itch abominably. He kept his hands down, and still. The first question of this interview would not catch him with his fingers shoved up his nose.
"Your Emperor is in terrible trouble, little Vor lord. To save him, you must return to the Oseran Mercenaries, and retake them. When you are back in command, we will communicate further instructions."
Miles boggled. "Danger from what?" he choked. "You?"
"Not at all! Greg is my best friend. The love of my life, at last. I'd do anything for him. I'd even give up my career." She smirked piously. Miles's lip curled in repelled response; she grinned. "If any other course of action occurs to you besides following your instructions to the letter, well … it could land Greg in unimaginable troubles. At the hands of worse enemies."
Worse than you? Not possible . . . is it? "Why do you want me in charge of the Dendarii Mercenaries?"
"I can't tell you." Her eyes widened, positively sparkling at her private, ironic joke. "It's a surprise."
"What would you give me to support this enterprise?"
"Transportation to Aslund Station."
"What else? Troops, guns, ships, money?"
"I'm told you could do it with your wits alone. This I wish to see."
"Oser will kill me. He's already tried once."
"That's a chance I must take."
I really like that 'I,' lady. "You mean me to be killed," Miles deduced. "What if I succeed instead?" His eyes were starting to water; he sniffed. He would have to rub his madly-itching nose soon.
"The key of strategy, little Vor," she explained kindly, "is not to choose a path to victory, but to choose so that all paths lead to a victory. Ideally. Your death has one use; your success, another. I will emphasize that any premature attempt to contact the Barrayaran could be very counterproductive. Very."
A nice aphorism on strategy; he'd have to remember that one. "Let me hear my marching orders from my own supreme commander, then. Let me talk to Gregor."
"Ah. That will be your reward for success."
"The last guy who bought that line got shot in the back of his head for his credulity. What say we save steps, and you just shoot me now?" He blinked and sniffed, tears now running down the inside of his nose.
"I don't wish to shoot you." She actually batted her eyelashes at him, then straightened, frowning. "Really, Lord Vorkosigan, I hardly expected you to dissolve into tears."
He inhaled; his hands made a helpless pleading gesture. Startled, she tossed him a handkerchief from her breast pocket. A green-scented handkerchief. Without other recourse, he pressed it to his face.
"Stop crying, you cowar—" Her sharp order was interrupted by his first, mighty sneeze, followed by a rapid volley of repeats.
"I'm not crying, you bitch, I'm allergic to your goddamn perfume!" Miles managed to choke out between paroxysms.
She held her hand to her forehead and broke into giggles; real ones, not mannered ploys for a change. The real, spontaneous Cavilo at last; he'd been right, her sense of humor was vile.
"Oh, dear," she gasped. "This gives me the most marvelous idea for a gas grenade. A pity I'll never . . . ah, well."
His sinuses throbbed like kettle drums. She shook her head helplessly, and tapped out something on her comconsole.
"I think I had best speed you on your way, before you explode," she told him.
Bent over in his seat wheezing, his water-clouded gaze fell on his brown felt slippers. "Can I at least have a pair of boots for this trip?"
She pursed her lips in a moment of thought. ". . . No," she decided. "It will be more interesting to see you carry on just as you are."
"In this uniform, on Aslund, I'll be like a cat in a dog suit," he protested. "Shot on sight by mistake."
"By mistake … on purpose . . . goodness, you're going to have an exciting time." She keyed the door lock open. He was still sneezing and gasping as the guards came in to take him away. Cavilo was still laughing.
The effects of her poisonous perfume took half an hour to wear off, by which time he was locked in a tiny cabin aboard an inner-system ship. They had boarded via a lock on the Kurin 's Hand; he hadn't even set foot on Vervain Station again. Not a chance of a break for it He checked out the cabin. Its bed and lavatory arrangements were highly reminiscent of his last cell. Space duty, hah. The vast vistas of the wide universe, hah. The glory of the Imperial Service—un-hah. He'd lost Gregor. . . . I may be small, but I screw up big because I'm standing on the shoulders of GIANTS. He tried pounding on the door and screaming into the intercom. No one came. It's a surprise.
He could surprise them all by hanging himself, a briefly attractive notion. But there was nothing up high to hook his belt on.
All right. This courier-type ship was swifter than the lumbering freighter in which he and Gregor had taken three days to cross the system last time, but it wasn't instantaneous. He had at least a day and a half to do some serious thinking, he and Admiral Naismith. It's a surprise. God.
An officer and a guard came for him, very close to the time Miles estimated they would arrive back at Aslund Station's defense perimeter. But we haven't docked yet. This seems premature. His nervous exhaustion still responded to a shot of adrenalin; he inhaled, trying to clear his frenzy-fogged brain back to alertness again. Much more of this, though, and no amount of adrenalin would do him any good. The officer led him through the short corridors of the little ship to Nav and Com.
The Ranger captain was present, leaning over the communication console manned by his second officer. The pilot and flight engineer were busy at their stations.
"If they board, they'll arrest him, and he'll be automatically delivered as ordered," the second officer was saying.
"If they arrest him, they could arrest us too. She said to plant him, and she didn't care if it was head or feet first. She didn't order us to get ourselves interned," said the captain.
A voice from the comm; "This is the picket ship Ariel, Aslund Navy Contract Auxiliary, calling the C6-WG out of Vervain Hubside Station. Cease accelerating, and clear your portside lock for boarding for pre-docking inspection. Aslund Station reserves the right to deny you docking privileges if you fail to cooperate in pre-docking inspection-The voice took on a cheery tone, "I reserve the right to open fire if