Miles Errant - Lois McMaster Bujold [364]
"Not really." Ryoval pursed his lips with interest. "I'll take a look at them."
"Whatever is going on, he's not faking it. That I am sure of."
"So impossibly fast . . ." murmured Ryoval. "When do you think he snapped? How could I have missed it?"
"I'm not sure. Early. The first day—maybe the first hour. But if he keeps it up, he's going to be very elusive, to bring much force to bear upon. He can keep . . . changing shifts."
"So can I," stated Ryoval coldly.
The pressure in his stomach was growing into pain. Howl prodded anxiously, but Gorge would not give way. It was still his turn. The Other listened attentively. The fourth one always listened, when Baron Ryoval was present. Rarely slept, almost never spoke.
"I didn't expect him to reach this stage of disintegration for months. It throws off my time-table," the Baron complained.
Yes, Baron. Aren't we fascinating? Don't we intrigue you?
"I must consider how best to re-focus him," Ryoval mused. "Bring him to my quarters later. I'll see what a little quiet conversation and a few experiments will yield, in the way of new directions."
Beneath his flattened affect, the Other shivered in anticipation.
Two guards delivered him/them to Baron Ryoval's pleasant living room. There were no windows, though a large holovid display took up most of one wall, presently running a view of some tropical beach. But Ryoval's quarters were surely underground. Nobody would break through windows here.
His skin was still patchy. The techs had sprayed the raw areas with some kind of coating, to keep him from oozing on Ryoval's fine furniture, and dressed the other wounds with plastic bandage, so they wouldn't break open and bleed and stain.
"Think this'll do any good?" the tech with the sprayer had asked.
"Probably not," his comrade had sighed. "I suppose I'd better go ahead and put a cleaning crew on call. Wish he'd put down a tarp or something."
The guards sat him now in a low, wide chair. It was just a chair, no spikes or razors or impalements. His hands were fastened behind him, which meant he could not settle back. He spread his knees and sat uncomfortably upright, panting.
The senior guard asked Ryoval, "Do you wish us to secure him, sir?"
Ryoval raised an eyebrow. "Can he stand up without help?"
"Not readily, from that position."
Ryoval's lips crooked up in amused contempt, as he gazed down at his prisoner. "Ah, we're getting there. Slowly. Leave us. I'll call you. Don't interrupt. It may become noisy."
"Your soundproofing is very effective, sir." The flat-faced guards saluted and withdrew. There was something wrong with those guards. When not following orders, they tended to just sit, or stand, wordless and blank. Constructed that way, no doubt.
Gorge and Grunt and Howl and the Other stared around with interest, wondering whose turn it was going to be next.
You just had your turn, said Howl to Gorge. It'll be me.
Don't bet on it, said Grunt. Could be me.
If it weren't for Gorge, said the Other, grimly, I'd take my turn right now. Now I have to wait.
You've never taken a turn, said Gorge curiously. But the Other was silent again.
"Let's watch a show," said Ryoval, and touched a remote. The tropic display changed to a life-sized vid recording of one of Grunt's sessions with the . . . creatures, from the bordello. Grunt watched himself with great interest and delight, from all these new angles. Gorge's work was gradually threatening to put many interesting events out of sight, below his equator.
"I am thinking of sending a copy of this to the Dendarii mercenary fleet," Ryoval murmured, watching him. "Imagine all your senior staff officers, viewing this. I think it would fetch a few to me, no?"
No. Ryoval was lying. His presence here was still secret, or he wouldn't be present here. And Ryoval could be in no rush to give that secret away. The Other muttered dryly, Send a copy to Simon Illyan, why don't you, and see what that fetches you. But Illyan belonged to Lord Mark, and Mark wasn't here, and anyway, the Other never,