Diplomatic Immunity - Lois McMaster Bujold [20]
CHAPTER FOUR
At the Kestrel's lock, Boss Watts took Bel aside for a low-voiced conversation with some anxious hand waving. Bel shook its head, made calm down gestures, and finally turned to follow Miles, Ekaterin, and Roic through the flex tube and into the Kestrel's tiny and now crowded personnel hatch deck. Roic stumbled and looked a trifle dizzied, readjusting to the grav field, but then found his balance again. He frowned warily at the Betan hermaphrodite in the quaddie uniform. Ekaterin flashed a covertly curious glance.
"What was that all about?" Miles asked Bel as the airlock door slid shut.
"Watts wanted me to take a bodyguard or three. To protect me from the brutal Barrayarans. I told him there wouldn't be room aboard, and besides, you were a diplomat—not a soldier." Bel, head cocked, gave him an indecipherable look. "Is that so?"
"It is now. Uh . . ." Miles turned to Lieutenant Smolyani, manning the hatch controls. "Lieutenant, we're going to take the Kestrel around to the other side of Graf Station to another docking cradle. Their traffic control will direct you. Go as slowly as you can without looking odd. Take two or three tries to align with the docking clamps, or something."
"My lord!" said Smolyani indignantly. ImpSec fast courier pilots made a religion out of fast, tight maneuvering and swift, perfect dockings. "In front of these people?"
"Well, do it however you wish, but buy me some time. I need to talk with this herm. Go, go." He waved Smolyani out. He drew breath, and added to Roic and Ekaterin, "We'll take over the wardroom. Excuse us, please." Thus consigning her and Roic to their cramped cabins to wait. He gripped Ekaterin's hand in brief apology. He dared not say more until he'd decanted Bel in private. There were security angles, political angles, personal angles—how many angles could dance on the head of a pin?—and, as the first thrill of seeing that familiar face alive and well wore off, the nagging memory that the last time they'd met, the purpose had been to strip Bel of command and discharge it from the mercenary fleet for its unfortunate role in the bloody Jackson's Whole debacle. He wanted to trust Bel. Dare he?
Roic was too well trained to ask, Are you sure you don't want me to come with you, m'lord? out loud, but from the expression on his face he was doing his best to send it telepathically.
"I'll explain it all later," Miles promised Roic in an under-voice, and sent him on his way with what he hoped was a reassuring half-salute.
He led Bel the few steps to the tiny chamber that doubled as the Kestrel's wardroom, dining room, and briefing room, shut both its doors, and activated the security cone. A faint hum from the projector on the ceiling and a shimmer in the air surrounding the wardroom's circular dining/vid conference table assured him it was working. He turned to find Bel watching him, head a little to one side, eyes quizzical, lips quirked. He hesitated a moment. Then, simultaneously, they both burst into laughter. They fell on each other in a hug; Bel pounded him on the back, saying in a tight voice, "Damn, damn, damn, you sawed-off little half-breed maniac . . ."
Miles fell back, breathless. "Bel, by God. You look good."
"Older, surely?"
"That, too. But I don't think I'm the one to talk."
"You look terrific. Healthy. Solid. I take it that woman's been feeding you right? Or doing something right, anyway."
"Not fat, though?" Miles said anxiously.
"No, no. But the last time I saw you, right after they thawed you out of cryo-freeze, you looked like a skull on a stick. You had us all worried."
Bel remembered that last meeting with the same clarity as he did, evidently. More, perhaps.
"I worried about you, too. Have you . . . been all right? How the devil did you end up here?" Was that a delicate enough inquiry?
Bel's brows rose a trifle, reading who-knew-what expression on Miles's face. "I suppose I was a little disoriented at first, after I parted company