The Vor Game

'Good.' He wiped his palms on his trousers again. 'It's mind-to-mind, between Cavilo and me, before it ever becomes ship-to-ship . . She's a compulsive plotter. If I can smoke her, wind her in with words, with what-ifs, with all the bifurcations of her strategy-tree, just long enough to get her eye off the one real now …'

'Signal,' Elena warned.

Miles straightened, waited. The next face to form over the vid plate was Gregor's. Gregor, alive and well. Gregor's eyes widened, then his face went very still.

Cavilo hovered behind his shoulder, just slightly out of focus. 'Tell him what we want, love.'

Miles bowed sitting down, as profoundly as physically possible. 'Sire. I present you with the Emperor's Own Dendarii Free Mercenary Fleet. Do with us as You will.'

Gregor glanced aside, evidently as some tactical readout analogous to the Ariel's own. 'By God, you've even got them with you. Miles, you are supernatural.' The flash of humor was instantly muffled in sere formality. 'Thank you, Lord Vorkosigan. I accept your vassal-offering of troops.'

'If you would care to step aboard the Ariel, sire, you can take personal command of your forces.'

Cavilo leaned forward, interrupting. 'And now his treachery is made plain. Let me play a portion of his last words for you, Greg.' Cavilo reached past Gregor to touch a control, and Miles was treated to an instant replay of his breathless sedition, beginning with—naturally—the flim-flam about the named heir, and ending with his offer of himself as a substitute Imperial groom. Very nicely selected, clearly unedited.

Gregor listened with his head in a thoughtful tilt, his face perfectly controlled, as the Miles-image stammered to its damning conclusion. 'But does this surprise you, Cavie?' asked Gregor in an innocent tone, taking her hand and looking over his shoulder at her. From the expression on her face, something was surprising her. 'Lord Vorkosigan's mutations have driven him mad, everyone knows that! He's been sulking around muttering like that for years. Of course, I trust him no further than I can throw him—'

Thanks, Gregor. I'll remember that line.

'— but as long as he feels he can further his interests by furthering ours, he'll be a valuable ally. House Vorkosigan has always been powerful in Barrayaran affairs. His grandfather Count Piotr put my grandfather Emperor Ezar on the throne. They'd make an equally powerful enemy. I should prefer us to rule Barrayar with their cooperation.'

'Their extermination would do as well, surely,' Cavilo glared at Miles.

'Time is on our side, love. His father is an old man. He, is a mutant. His bloodline-threat is empty, Barrayar would never accept a mutant as emperor, as Count Aral well knows and as even Miles realizes in his saner moments. But he can trouble us, if he chooses. An interesting balance of power, eh, Lord Vorkosigan?'

Miles bowed again. 'I think much on it.' So have you, apparently. He spared a quelling glance at Elena, who had fallen off her station chair somewhere around Gregor's word-picture of Miles's mad soliloquies, aside at state banquets no doubt, and was now sitting on the floor with her sleeve jammed in her mouth to muffle the shrieks of laughter. Her eyes blazed, over the grey cloth. She got control of her stifled giggles and scrambled back into her seat. Close your mouth, Arde.

'Then, Cavie, let's join my would-be Grand Vizier. At that point, I will control his ships. And your wish,' he turned his head to kiss her hand, still resting in his grasp on his shoulder, 'will be my command.'

'Do you really think it's safe? If he's as psycho as you say.' 'Brilliant—nervous—skittish—but he's all right as long as his medications are adjusted properly, I promise you. I expect his dose is a little off at the moment, due to our irregular travels.'

The transmission time-lag was much reduced, now. 'Twenty minutes to rendezvous, sir,' Elena reported, off-sides.

'Will you transfer in your shuttle, or ours, sire?' Miles inquired politely.

Gregor shrugged carelessly. 'Commander Cavilo's choice.'

'Ours,' said Cavilo immediately. 'I will be waiting.' And ready. Cavilo broke transmission.

16

Miles watched through the vid link as the first space-armored Ranger stepped into the Ariel's shuttle hatch corridor. The wary point-man was followed immediately by four more, who scanned the empty passageway, converted into a chamber by the closed blast doors sealing each end. No enemies, no targets, not even automatic weapons threatened them. An utterly deserted chamber. Bewildered, the Rangers took up a defensive stance around the shuttle hatch.

Gregor stepped through. Miles was unsurprised to see that Cavilo had not provided the Emperor with space armor. Gregor wore neatly-pressed set of Ranger fatigues, minus insignia; his only protection was his boots. Even they would be quite inadequate, if one of those heavy-armored monsters stepped on his toe. Battle armorwas lovely stuff, proof against stunners and nerve disrupters, most poisons and biologicals; resistant (to a degree) to plasma fire and radioactivity, stuffed with clever built-in weaponry, tac comps, and telemetry. Very suitable for a boarding expedition. Though in fact, Miles had once captured theAriel himself with fewer personnel, less formidably armed and totally unarmored. He'd had surprise on his side, though.

Cavilo came through behind Gregor. She wore space armor though for the moment she carried her helmet tucked under her arm like a decapitated head. She stared around the empty corridor, and frowned. 'All right, what's the trick?' she demanded loudly.

To answer your question. . . . Miles pressed the button on the remote-control box in his hand.

A muffled explosion made the corridor reverberate. The flex-tube tore violently away from the shuttle hatch. The automatic doors, sensing the pressure drop, clapped shut instantly. A bare breath of air escaped. Good system. Miles had made the techs make sure it was working properly, before they'd inserted the directional mines in the shuttle clamps. He checked his monitors. Cavilo's combat shuttle was tumbling away from the side of the Ariel now, thrusters and sensors damaged in the same blast that propelled it outward, its weapons and reserve Rangers useless until the no-doubt-frantic pilot regained attitude control. If he could.

'Keep an eye on him, Bel, I don't want him coming back to haunt us,' Miles spoke into his comm link to Thorne, on deck in the Ariel's tactics room.

'I can blow him up now, if you like.'

'Wait a little. We're a long way from sorted out, down here.' God help us now.

Cavilo was snapping her helmet on, her startled troops in defensive formation around her. All dressed up, and nothing to shoot. Let them settle down for just a moment, enough to prevent spinal-reflexive fusilades, but not enough to think. . . .

Miles glanced around at his own space-armored troops, six in number, and closed his own helmet. Not that numbers mattered. A million troops with nuclears, one guy with a club; either would suffice when the target was one unarmed hostage. Miniaturizing the situation, Miles realized sadly, had made no qualitative difference. He could still screw up just as big. The main difference was his plasma cannon, sighted down the corridor. He nodded to Elena, manning the big weapon. Not normally an indoor toy, it would stop charging space armor. And blow out the hull beyond. Miles figured that, theoretically, they could blow away, oh, one out of Cavilo's five at this range, if they came on at a dead run, before all became hand-to-hand, or glove-to-glove.

'Here we go,' Miles warned through his command channel. 'Re-member the drill.' He pressed another