The Vor Game

His thoughts were still running like a hyped-up rat on an exercise wheel, spinning to nowhere, when the door code-lock beeped again.

Yes, he would fake cooperation, promise anything, if only she'd give him a chance to check on Gregor.

Cavilo appeared with a soldier in tow. The man looked vaguely familiar—one of the arresting goons? No. . . .

The man ducked his head through the cell door, stared at Miles a moment in bemusement, and turned to Cavilo.

'Yeah, that's him, all right. Admiral Naismith, of the Tau Verde Ring war. I'd recognize the little runt anywhere.' He added aside to Miles, 'What are you doing here, sir?'

Miles mentally transmuted the man's tan and blacks to grey and white. Yeah. There'd been several thousand mercenaries involved in the Tau Verde war. They all had to have gone somewhere.

'Thank you, that will be all, Sergeant.' Cavilo took the man by the arm and firmly pulled him away. The non-com's fading advice drifted back down the cell bay, 'You ought to try and hire him, ma'am, he's a military genius. …'

Cavilo reappeared after a moment, to stand in the aperture with her hands on her hips and her chin outthrust in exasperated disbelief. 'How many people are you, anyway?'

Miles opened his hands and smiled weakly. Just as he'd been about to talk his way out of this hole . . .

'Huh.' She spun on her heel, the closing door cutting off her sputter.

Now what? He'd slam his fist into the wall in frustration, but the wall was sure to slam back with greater devastation.

13

However, all three of his identities were granted an exercise period that afternoon. A small on-board gymnasium was cleared for his exclusive use. He studied the setup sharply for the hour as he tried out various pieces of equipment, checking distances and trajectories to guarded exits. He could see a couple of ways Ivan might succeed in jumping a guard and making a break for it. Not fragile, short-legged Miles. For a moment, he found himself actually wishing he had Ivan along.

On the way back to Cell 13 with his escort, Miles passed another prisoner being checked in at the guard station. He was a shambling, wild-eyed man, his blond hair damped to brown with sweat. Miles's shock of recognition was the greater for the changes it had to encompass. Oser's lieutenant. The bland-faced killer was transformed.

He wore only grey trousers, his torso was bare. Livid shock-stick marks dappled his skin. Recent hypospray injection points marched like little pink paw prints up his arm. He mumbled continuously through wet lips, shivered and giggled. Just coming back from interrogation, it seemed.

Miles was so startled he reached over to grasp the man's left hand, to check—yes, there were his own scabbed-over teeth marks across the knuckles, souvenir of last week's fight at the Triumph 's airlock, across the system. The silent lieutenant wasn't silent any more.

Miles's guards motioned him sternly along. Miles almost tripped, staring back over his shoulder till the door of Cell 13 sighed shut, imprisoning him once more.

What are you doing here? That had to be the most-asked, least-answered question in the Hegen Hub, Miles decided. Though he bet the Oseran lieutenant had answered it—Cavilo must command one of the sharpest counter-intelligence departments in the Hub. How fast had the Oseran mercenary traced Miles and Gregor here? How soon had Cavilo's people spotted him and picked him up? The marks on his body were not over a day old. . . .

Most important question of all, had the Oseran come to Vervain Station as part of a general, systematic sweep, or had he followed specific clues—was Tung compromised? Elena arrested? Miles shuddered, and paced frenetically, helplessly. Have I just killed my friends?

So, what Oser knew, Cavilo now knew, the whole silly mix of truth, lies, rumors and mistakes. So the identification of Miles as 'Admiral Naismith' hadn't necessarily come from Gregor as Miles had first assumed. (The Tau Verde veteran had clearly been scrounged up as an unbiased cross-check.) If Gregor was systematically withholding information from her, Cavilo would now realize it. If he was withholding anything. Maybe he was in love by now. Miles's head throbbed, feeling on the verge of exploding.

The guards came for him in the middle of the night-cycle, and made him dress. Interrogation at last, eh? He thought of the drooling Oseran, and cringed. He insisted on washing up, and adjusted every burr-seam and cuff of his Ranger fatigues with slow deliberation, till the guards began to shift impatiently and tap fingers suggestively on shock sticks. He too would shortly be a drooling fool. On the other hand, what could he possibly say under fast- penta at this point that could make things worse? Cavilo had it all, as far as he could tell. He shrugged off the guards' grasps, and marched out of the brig between them with all the forlorn dignity he could muster.

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