Memory

nice tall galactic diplomat for the rest of the evening.'

'It's not that,' she denied, eyeing his shortness.

'What I lack in height, I make up in speed.'

'That's the trouble.' She nodded vigorously.

Galeni turned over his modest vehicle to the waiting Imperial servant, who drove it away, and arranged his own lady's hand upon his arm. It took some knowledge of Galeni to read his saturnine features; Miles made him out as a little proud, a little smug, and a little embarrassed, as a man who arrives at a party wildly overdressed. Since Galeni, albeit almost painfully neat, scrubbed, shaved, and polished, wore the same dress green Service uniform with glittering insignia as Miles did, it could only be the effect of his companion.

He ought to be smug, thought Miles. Wait'll Ivan sees this.

If Laisa Toscane possessed more brains than beauty, she had to be some kind of genius. Yet the exact source of her intense physical impression was elusive. Her face was softly molded and pleasant, but not nearly as striking as, say, Elli Quinn's expensive sculpture. Her eyes were unusual, a brilliant blue-green, though whether the color was cosmetically or genetically conferred Miles could not tell. She was short even for a Komarran woman, two handspans shorter than Galeni, who was almost as tall as Delia. But her most distinctive feature was her skin, milk-white and almost seeming to glow—zaftig, Miles thought, was the word for that rich flesh. Plump was misleading, and not nearly enthusiastic enough. He had never seen anything so edibly female outside a Cetagandan haut-lady's force screen.

Wealth did not always confer taste upon its possessor, but when it did, the results could be impressive. She wore dark red, loose trousers in the Komarran style and a matching, low-cut top, made subtle with a boxy open jacket in cream and blue-green. Understated jewelry. Her hair was too dark to be called blond, too silvery to be called brown, and curled in short wisps in a forthrightly Komarran fashion. Her smile seemed pleased and excited, as she glanced up at her escort, but by no means overwhelmed. If she makes it past Aunt Alys, Miles decided, she's going to do just fine. He lengthened his stride to match Delia's, and bowed his little party indoors, as if Emperor Gregor's State dinner was his personal gift to them.

They were vetted through by the Imperial guards, and a majordomo who determined that they had no wraps to be relieved of, nor, under Miles's escort, further need of guidance. The next person they encountered was indeed Lady Alys Vorpatril, who stood at the foot of the staircase. Tonight she'd chosen a gown of dark blue velvet trimmed with gold, in salute perhaps to the Vorpatril colors of her long-deceased husband. She'd worn a widow's dove gray all through Miles's childhood, he seemed to recall, but had at length given it up, possibly about the same time she had finally forgiven Lord Vorpatril for getting himself killed in that particularly outrageous fashion during the War of Vordarian's Pretendership.

'Hello, Miles dear, Delia,' she greeted them. Miles bowed over her hand, and introduced Captain Galeni and Dr. Toscane with more formality. Lady Alys nodded approval—Miles was relieved that Ivan had indeed followed through and arranged their addition to the guest list as promised, and not forgotten till some embarrassing last minute, or later. 'Gregor is receiving everyone in the Glass Hall as usual,' Lady Alys went on. 'You'll be seated at his table for dinner, down from the Escobaran Ambassador and her husband—I thought we ought to intersperse the galactics with a few natives this time.'

'Thanks, Aunt Alys.' Miles glanced past her shoulder at a slight, familiar figure in officers dress greens, standing in the shadows in the door to the left of the staircase and talking in low tones with an ImpSec guard. 'Uh, Delia, would you show Duv and Laisa to the Glass Hall? I'll be right along.'

'Sure, Miles.' Delia smiled at Laisa, swept up her long skirts with the ease of practice, and led the Komarrans up the wide stairs.

'What a lovely young woman,' stated Lady Alys, gazing after them.

'Ah, you mean Dr. Toscane?' Miles hazarded. 'She was all right to bring, I take it.'

'Oh, yes. She is the principal heiress of those Toscanes, you know. Quite appropriate,' Alys spoiled this encomium somewhat by adding, 'for a Komarran.'

We all have our little handicaps. Lady Alys was employed by the Emperor to see that the Right people were admitted; but Miles had spotted the other member of the team, the man Gregor employed to see that the Safe people were admitted. Chief of Imperial Security Simon Illyan glanced up at last from his conversation with the ImpSec guard, who saluted him and disappeared through the doorway. Illyan did not smile or beckon Miles, but Miles ducked around Lady Alys and made for him anyway, trapping him before he could follow the guard.

'Sir.' Miles gave him an analysts salute; Illyan returned an even more modified version, a slightly frustrated wave more repelling than acknowledging. The ImpSec chief was a man in his early sixties, with brown hair going gray, a deceptively placid face, and a permanent habit of blending quietly into the background. Illyan was clearly on duty tonight supervising the Emperors personal security, evidenced by the comm link earbug in his right ear and the charged lethal weapons on both hips. This meant either that there was more going on here tonight than Miles had been briefed about, or that there wasn't much going on anywhere else to nail Illyan down at HQ, and he'd left the routine to his bland and steady second-in-command Haroche. 'Did your secretary give you my message, sir?'

'Yes, Lieutenant.'

'He'd told me you were out of town.'

'I was. I came back.'

'Have you . . . seen my latest report?'

'Yes.'

Damn. The words, There's something important I left out of it seemed to choke in Miles's throat. 'I need to talk with you.'

Illyan, always closed, seemed more expressionless than usual. 'This is neither the time nor the place, however.'

'Quite, sir. When?'

'I'm waiting on further information.'

Right. If it wasn't hurry up and wait, it was wait and hurry up. But something must be about to break soon, or Illyan wouldn't have Miles dancing attendance in Vorbarr Sultana on a one-hour report-for-duty notice. If it's a new mission, I wish to hell he'd let me in on it. I could at least be starting some contingency planning. 'Very good. I'll be ready.'

Illyan nodded dismissal. But as Miles turned away, he added, 'Lieutenant …'

Miles turned back.

'Did you drive here tonight?'

'Yes. Well, Captain Galeni did.'

'Ah.' Illyan seemed to find something mildly interesting to look at over the top of Miles s head. 'Sharp man, Galeni.'

'I think so.' Giving up on prying anything further out of Illyan tonight, Miles hurried to catch up with his friends.

He found them all waiting for him in the broad corridor outside the Glass Hall; Galeni was chatting amiably with Delia, who seemed in no hurry to go in and find Ivan and her sister. Laisa was gazing around with obvious fascination at the handmade antiques and subtly colored patterned carpets lining the corridor. Miles strolled along with her to study the elaborate and painstaking inlay on a polished tabletop, a scene of running horses in the natural hues of the various woods.

'It's all so very Barrayaran,' she confided to Miles.

'Does it meet your expectations?'

'Indeed, yes. How old do you suppose that table is—and what went through the mind of the craftsman who made it? Do you suppose he ever imagined us, imagining him?' Her sensitive-looking fingers ran over the polished