“Ah!” said Gregor. “A publicity stunt.”

“It was not a stunt,” Mark grated.

“Excuse me. I did not mean to imply your effort was trivial. Quite the reverse. But you did have a coherent long-range strategy after all.”

“Yeah, but it went down the waste disintegrator as soon as I lost control of the Dendarii. As soon as they knew who I really was.” He brooded on the memory of that helplessness.

At Gregor’s prodding, Mark went on to recount Miles’s death, the screw-up with the lost cryo-chamber, their aborted efforts to retrieve it, and their humiliating ejection from Jacksonian local space. He found himself revealing far more of his real thoughts than he was comfortable doing, yet … Gregor almost put him at his ease. How did the man do it? The soft, almost self-effacing demeanor camouflaged a consummately skillful people-handler. In a garbled rush, Mark described the incident with Maree and his half-insane time in solitary confinement, then trailed off into inarticulate silence.

Gregor frowned introspectively, and was quiet for a time. Hell, the man was quiet all the time. “It seems to me, Mark, that you devalue your strengths. You have been battle-tested, and proved your physical courage. You can take an initiative, and dare much. You do not lack brains, though sometimes … information. It’s not a bad start on the qualities needed for a countship. Someday.”

“Not any day. I don’t want to be a Count of Barrayar,” Mark denied emphatically.

“It could be the first step to my job,” Gregor said suggestively, with a slight smile.

“No! That’s even worse. They’d eat me alive. My scalp would join the collection downstairs.”

“Very possibly.” Gregor’s smile faded. “Yes, I’ve often wondered where all my body parts are going to end up. And yet—I understand you were set to try it, just two years ago. Including Aral’s countship.”

“Fake it, yes. Now you’re talking about the real thing. Not an imitation.” I’m just an imitation, don’t you know? “I’ve only studied the outsides. The inner surface I can barely imagine.”

“But you see,” said Gregor, “we all start out that way. Faking it. The role is a simulacrum, into which we slowly grow real flesh.”

“Become the machine?”

“Some do. That’s the pathological version of a Count, and there are a few. Others become … more human. The machine, the role, then becomes a handily-worked prosthetic, which serves the man. Both types have their uses, for my goals. One must simply be sure where on the range of self-delusion the man you’re talking to falls.”

Yes, Countess Cordelia had surely had a hand in training this man. Mark sensed her trail, like phosphorescent footsteps in the dark. “What are your goals?”

Gregor shrugged. “Keep the peace. Keep the various factions from trying to kill each other. Make bloody sure that no galactic invader ever puts a boot on Barrayaran soil again. Foster economic progress. Lady Peace is the first hostage taken when economic discomfort rises. Here my reign is unusually blessed, with the terraforming of the second continent, and the opening of Sergyar for full colonization. Finally, now that that vile subcutaneous worm plague is under control. Settling Sergyar should absorb everyone’s excess energies for several generations. I’ve been studying various colonial histories lately, wondering how many of the mistakes we can avoid … well, so.”

“I still don’t want to be Count Vorkosigan.”

“Without Miles, you don’t exactly have a choice.”

“Rubbish.” At least, he hoped it was rubbish. “You just said it’s an interchangeable part. They could find someone else just fine if they had to. Ivan, I guess.”

Gregor smiled bleakly. “I confess, I’ve often used the same argument. Though in my case the topic is progeny. Bad dreams about the destiny of my body parts are nothing compared to the ones I have about my theoretical future children’s. And I’m not going to marry some high Vor bud whose family tree crosses mine sixteen times in the last six generations.” He contained himself abruptly, with an apologetic grimace. And yet … the man was so controlled, Mark fancied even this glimpse of the inner Gregor served a purpose, or could be made to.

Mark was getting a headache. Without Miles … With Miles, all these Barrayaran dilemmas would be Miles’s. And Mark would be free to face … his own dilemmas, anyway. His own demons, not these adopted ones. “This is not my … gift. Talent. Interest. Destiny. Something, I don’t know.” He rubbed his neck.

“Passion?” said Gregor.

“Yes, that’ll do. A countship is not my passion.”

After a moment, Gregor asked curiously, “What is your passion, Mark? If not government, or power, or wealth—you have not even mentioned wealth.”

“Enough wealth to destroy House Bharaputra is so far beyond my reach, it just … doesn’t apply. It’s not a solution I can have. I … I … some men are cannibals. House Bharaputra, its customers—I want to stop the cannibals. That would be worth getting out of bed for.” He became aware his voice had grown louder, and slumped down again in the soft chair.

“In other words … you have a passion for justice. Or dare I say it, Security. A curious echo of your, um, progenitor.”

“No, no!” Well … maybe, in a sense. “I suppose there are cannibals on Barrayar too, but they haven’t riveted my close personal interest. I don’t think in terms of law enforcement, because the transplant business isn’t illegal on Jackson’s Whole. So a policeman isn’t the solution either. Or … it would have to be a damned unusual policeman.” Like an ImpSec covert ops agent? Mark tried to imagine a detective-inspector bearing a letter of marque and reprisal. For some reason a vision of his progenitor kept coming up. Damn Gregor’s unsettling suggestion. Not a policeman. A knight-errant. The Countess had it dead-on. But there was no place for knights-errant any more; the police would have to arrest them.

Gregor sat back with a faintly satisfied air. “That’s very interesting.” His abstracted look resembled that of a man assimilating the code-key to a safe. He slid from his stool to wander along the windows and gaze down from another angle. Face to the light, he remarked, “It seems to me your future access to your … passion, depends rather heavily on getting Miles back.”

Mark sighed in frustration. “It’s out of my hands. They’ll never let me … what can I do that ImpSec can’t? Maybe they’ll turn him up. Any day now.”

“In other words,” said Gregor slowly, “the most important thing in your life at this moment is something you are powerless to affect. You have my profound sympathies.”

Mark slipped, unwilled, into frankness. “I’m a virtual prisoner here. I can’t do anything, and I can’t leave!”

Gregor cocked his head. “Have you tried?”

Mark paused. “Well … no, not yet, actually.”

“Ah.” Gregor turned away from the window, and took a small plastic card from his inner jacket pocket. He handed it across the desk to Mark. “My Voice carries only to the borders of Barrayar’s interests,” he said. “Nevertheless … here is my private vidcom number. Your calls will be screened by only one person. You’ll be on their list. Simply state your name, and you will be passed through.”

“Uh … thank you,” said Mark, in cautious confusion. The card bore only the code-strip: no other identification. He put it away very carefully.

Gregor touched an audiocom pin on his jacket, and spoke to Kevi. In a few moments there came a knock, and the door swung open to admit Ivan again. Mark, who had started to rock in Gregor’s station chair—it did not squeak—self-consciously climbed out of it.

Gregor and Ivan exchanged farewells as laconically as they had exchanged greetings, and Ivan led Mark out of the tower room. As they rounded the corner Mark looked back at the sound of footsteps. Kevi was already ushering in the next man for his Imperial appointment.