Oser's eyes narrowed. "What about Tung?"

Miles shrugged. "Keep him locked up, for now, if you insist. Unharmed, of course." Just don't tell him I said so.

"Suppose I hang him."

"Ah . . . that would be irrevocable." Miles paused. "I will point out, jailing Tung is like cutting off your right hand before heading into battle."

"What battle? With whom?"

"It's a surprise. Cavilo's surprise. Though I've developed an idea or two on the problem, that I'd be willing to share."

"Would you?" Oser had that same man-sucking-a-lemon expression Miles had now and then surprised on Illyan's face. It seemed almost homey.

Miles continued, "As an alternative to my becoming your employee, I'm willing to become your employer. I'm authorized to offer a bona fide contract, all the usual perqs, equipment replacement, insurance, from my . . . sponsor." Illyan, hear my plea. "Not in conflict with Aslund's interests. You can collect twice for the same fight, and you don't even have to switch sides. A mercenary's dream."

"What guarantees can you offer up front?"

"It seems to me that I'm the one who's owed a guarantee, sir. Let us begin with small steps. I won't start a mutiny; you stop trying to thrust me out airlocks. I will join you openly—everyone to know I've arrived—I will make my information available to you." How thin his "information" seemed, in the breeze of these airy promises. No numbers, no troop movements; all intentions, shifting mental topographies of loyalty, ambition, and betrayal. "We will confer. You may even have an angle I lack. Then we go on from there."

Oser thinned his lips, bemused, half-persuaded, deeply suspicious.

"The risk, I would point out," said Miles, "the personal risk, is more mine than yours."

"I think—"

Miles hung suspended on the mercenary's words.

"I think I'm going to regret this," Oser sighed.

The detailed negotiations just to bring theAriel into dock took another half day. As the initial excitement wore off, Thorne became more thoughtful. As the Ariel actually maneuvered into its clamps, Thorne grew positively meditative.

"I'm still not exactly sure what's supposed to keep Oser from bringing us in, stunning us, and hanging us at leisure," Thorne said, buckling on a sidearm. Thorne kept the complaint to an undertone, in care for the tender ears of the escort squad kitting up nearby in the Ariel's shuttle hatch corridor.

"Curiosity," said Miles firmly. "All right, stun, fast-penta, and hang, then."

"If he fast-penta's me, I'll tell him exactly the facts I was going to tell him anyway." And a few more besides, alas. "And he'll have fewer doubts. So much the better."

Miles was rescued from further hollow flummery by the clank and hiss of the flex-tubes sealing. Thorne's sergeant undogged the hatch without hesitation, though he was also careful not to stand silhouetted in the aperture, Miles noted.

"Squad, form up!" the sergeant ordered. His six people checked their stunners. Thorne and the sergeant in addition bore nerve disruptors, a nicely-calculated mix of weapons; stunners to allow for human error, the nerve disruptors to encourage the other side not to risk mistakes. Miles went unarmed. With a mental salute to Cavilo– well, a rude gesture, actually—he'd put his felt slippers back on. Thorne at his side, he took the lead of the little procession and marched through the flex tube into one of the Aslunder military station's almost-finished docking bays.

True to his word, Oser had a party of witnesses lined up and waiting. The squad of twenty or so bore a mix of weapons almost identical to the Ariel's group. "We're outnumbered," muttered Thorne.

"It's all in the mind," Miles muttered in return. "March like you had an empire at your back." And don't look over your shoulder, they may be gaining on us. They'd better be gaining on us. "The more people who see me, the better."

Oser himself stood waiting in parade rest, looking highly dyspeptic. Elena—Elena!— stood at his side, unarmed, face frozen. Her tight-lipped stare at Miles was tense with suspicion, not of his motives, perhaps, but certainly of his methods, Now what foolishness? her eyes asked. Miles gave her the briefest of ironic nods before saluting Oser.

Reluctantly, Oser returned the military courtesy. "Now—'Admiral'—let us return to the Triumph and get down to business," he grated.

"Indeed, yes. But let's have a little tour of this Station on the way, eh? The non-top-secured areas, of course. My last view was so . . . rudely cut short, after all. After you, Admiral?" Oser gritted his teeth. "Oh, after you, Admiral."

It became a parade. Miles led them around for a good forty-five minutes, including a march through the cafeteria during the dinner rush with several noisy stops to greet by name the few old Dendarii he recognized, and favor the others with blinding smiles. He left babble in his wake, those in the dark demanding explanation from those in the know.

An Aslunder work crew was busy tearing out fiberboard paneling, and he paused to compliment them on their labors. Elena seized an opportunity of Oser's distraction to bend down and breathe fiercely in Miles's ear, "Where's Gregor?"

"Thereby hangs—me, if I fail to get him back," Miles whispered. "Too complicated, tell you later."

"Oh, God." She rolled her eyes.

When he had, judging from the admiral's darkening complexion, just about reached the limits of Oser's strained tolerance, Miles suffered himself to be led Triumph-ward again. There. Obedient to Cavilo's orders, Miles had made no attempt to contact Barrayar. But if Ungari couldn't find him after this, it was time to fire the man. A prairie bird thrumming out a mad mating dance could scarcely have put on a more conspicuous display.

Finishing touches on construction were still in progress around the Triumph's docking bay as Miles marched his parade across it. A few Aslunder workers in tan, light blue, and green leaned over to goggle down from catwalks. Military techs in their dark blue uniforms paused in mid-installation to stare, then had to re-sort connections and realign bolts. Miles refrained from smiling and waving, lest Oser's set jaw crack. No more baiting, time to get serious. The thirty or so mercenaries could change from honor guard to prison guard with his next roll of the dice.

Thorne's tall sergeant, marching beside Miles, gazed around the bay, noting new construction. "The robotic loaders should be fully automated by this time tomorrow," he noted. "That'll be an improvement—crap!" His hand descended abruptly on Miles's head, shoving him downward. The sergeant half-spun, clawed hand arcing toward his holster, when the crackling blue bolt of a nerve disrupter charge struck him square in the chest at the level Miles's head had been. He spasmed, his breath stopping. The smell of ozone, hot plastic, and blistered meat slapped Miles's nose. Miles kept on diving, hitting the deck, rolling. A second bolt splattered on the deck, its outwashing field stinging like twenty wasps up Miles's outstretched arm. He jerked his hand back.

As the sergeant's corpse collapsed, Miles grabbed at the man's jacket and jerked himself underneath, burrowing his head and spine under where the meat was thickest, the sergeant's torso. He drew his arms and legs in as tight as he could. Another bolt crackled into the deck nearby, then two struck the body in close succession. Even with the absorbing mass between it was worse than the blow of a shock-stick on high power.

Miles's ringing ears heard screaming, thumping, yelling, running, chaos. The chirping buzz of stunner fire. A voice. "He's up there! Go get him!" and another voice, high and hoarse. "You spotted him—he's yours. You go get him!" Another bolt hit the decking.