Diplomatic Immunity - Lois McMaster Bujold [21]
"I was sorry as hell about it."
"I'd say, not half as sorry as I was, but you were the one who did the dying." Bel looked away briefly. "Among other people. It wasn't as if either of us had a choice, at that point. I couldn't have gone on. And—in the long run—it was a good thing. I'd got in a rut without knowing it, I think. I needed something to kick me out of it. I was ready for a change. Well, not ready, but . . ."
Miles, hanging on Bel's words, was reminded of their place. "Sit, sit." He gestured to the little table; they took seats next to each other. Miles rested his arm on the dark surface and leaned closer to listen.
Bel continued, "I even went home for a little while. But I found that a quarter of a century kicking around the Nexus as a free herm had put me out of step with Beta Colony. I took a few spacer jobs, some at the suggestion of our mutual employer. Then I drifted in here." Bel tucked its gray-brown bangs up off its forehead with spread fingers, a familiar gesture; they promptly fell back again, even more heart-catching.
"ImpSec's not my employer any more, exactly," Miles said.
"Oh? So what are they, exactly?"
Miles hesitated over this one. "My . . . intelligence utility," he chose at last. "By virtue of my new job."
Bel's eyebrows went up farther, this time. "This Imperial Auditor thing isn't a cover for the latest covert ops scam, then."
"No. It's the real thing. I'm done with scam."
Bel's lips twitched. "What, with that funny accent?"
"This is my real voice. The Betan accent I affected for Admiral Naismith was the put-on. Sort of. Not that I didn't learn it at my mother's knee."
"When Watts told me the name of the supposedly-hot-shot envoy the Barrayarans were sending out, I thought it had to be you. That's why I made sure to get myself onto the welcoming committee. But this Emperor's Voice thing sounded like something out of a fairy tale, to me. Until I got to the fine print. Then it sounded like something out of a really gruesome fairy tale."
"Oh, did you look up my job description?"
"Yeah, it's pretty amazing what's in the historical databases here. Quaddiespace is fully plugged in to the galactic information exchange, I've found. They're almost as good as Beta, despite having only a fraction of the population. Imperial Auditor's a pretty stunning promotion—whoever handed you that much unsupervised power on a platter has to be almost as much of a lunatic as you are. I want to hear your explanation of that."
"Yes, it can take some explaining, to non-Barrayarans." Miles took a breath. "You know, that cryo-revival of mine was a little dicey. Do you remember the seizures I was having, right after?"
"Yes . . ." said Bel cautiously.
"They turned out to be a permanent side effect, unfortunately. Too much for even ImpSec's version of the military to tolerate in a field officer. As I managed to demonstrate in a particularly spectacular manner, but that's another story. It was a medical discharge, officially. So that was the end of my galactic covert ops career." Miles's smile twisted. "I had to get an honest job. Fortunately, Emperor Gregor gave me one. Everyone assumes my appointment was high Vor nepotism at work, for my father's sake. Over time, I trust I'll prove them wrong."
Bel was silent for a moment, face set. "So. It seems I killed Admiral Naismith after all."
"Don't hog the blame. You had lots of help," Miles said dryly. "Including mine." He was reminded that this slice of privacy was precious and limited. "It's all blood over the dam now anyway, for you and me both. We have other crises on our plate today. Quickly, from the top—I've been assigned to straighten out this mess, to Barrayar's, if not benefit, least-cost. If you're our ImpSec informer here—are you?"
Bel nodded.
After Bel had handed in its resignation from the Dendarii Free Mercenaries, Miles had seen to it that the hermaphrodite had gone on ImpSec's payroll as a civilian informer. In part it was payback for