Cordelia's Honor - Lois McMaster Bujold [225]
They settled into a cramped, cheap upstairs room, giving Kou and Drou first shot at the beds. As dawn seeped through the window, Cordelia followed Bothari back downstairs to forage.
"I should have realized we'd need to bring rations, to a city under siege," Cordelia muttered.
"It's not that bad yet," said Bothari. "Ah—best you don't talk, Milady. Your accent."
"Right. In that case, strike up a conversation with this fellow, if you can. I want to hear the local view of things."
They found the innkeeper, or whatever he was, in the little room beyond the archway, which, judging from a counter and a couple of battered tables with chairs, doubled as a bar and a dining room. The man reluctantly sold them some seal-packed food and bottled drinks at inflated prices, while complaining about the rationing and angling for information about them.
"I been planning this trip for months," said Bothari, leaning on the bar, "and the damned war's bitched it."
The innkeep made an encouraging noise, one entrepreneur to another. "Oh? What's your strat?"
Bothari licked his lips, eyes narrowing in thought. "You saw that blonde?"
"Yo?"
"Virgin."
"No way. Too old."
"Oh, yeah. She can pass for class, that one. We were gonna sell it to some Vor lord at Winterfair. Get us a grubstake. But they've all skipped town. Could try for a rich merchant, I guess. But she won't like it. I promised her a real lord."
Cordelia hid her mouth behind her hand, and tried not to emit any attention-drawing noises. It was an excellent thing Drou was not there to learn Bothari's idea of a cover story. Good God. Did Barrayaran men actually pay for the privilege of committing that bit of sexual torture upon uninitiated women?
The 'keep glanced at Cordelia. "You leave her alone with your partner without her duenna, you could lose what you came to sell."
"Naw," said Bothari. "He would if he could, but he took a nerve-disruptor bolt, once. Below the belt, like. He's out on medical discharge."
"What're you out on?"
"Discharged without prejudice."
This was a code-phrase for, Quit or be housed in the stockade, as Cordelia understood it, the ultimate fate of chronic troublemakers who fell just, but only just, short of felony.
"You put up with a spastic?" The 'keep jerked his head, indicating their upstairs room and its inhabitants.
"He's the brains of the outfit."
"Not too many brains, to come up here and try to do that bit of business now."
"Yeah. I think I could've had a better price for that same piece of meat here if I'd had her butchered and dressed."
"You got that right," snorted the 'keep glumly, eyeing the food piled on the counter before Cordelia.
"She's too good to waste, though. Guess I'll have to find something else, till this mess blows over. Kill some time. Somebody may be hiring muscle. . . ." Bothari let this trail off. Was he running out of inspiration?
The 'keep studied him with interest. "Yo? I've had something in my eye I could use a, like, agent for. Been afraid for a week somebody else'd go after it first. You could be just what I need."
"Yo?"
The 'keep leaned forward across the bar, confidentially. "Count Vordarian's boys are giving out some fat rewards, down at ImpSec, for information-leading-to. Now, I wouldn't normally mess with ImpSec whoever was running it this week, but there's a strange fellow down the street who's taken a room. And he keeps to it, 'cept when he goes out for food, more food than one man might eat . . . he's got someone in there with him no one ever sees. And he sure isn't one of us. I can't help thinking he might be . . . worth something to somebody, eh?"
Bothari frowned judiciously. "Could be dangerous. Admiral Vorkosigan blows back into town, they'll be looking real hard for that little list of informers. And you have an address."
"But you don't, seems. If you'd front it, I could give you a ten percent split. I think he's big, that fellow. He's sure scared."