Miles, Mutants and Microbes - Lois McMaster Bujold [299]
No wonder that by the time he had arrived in Rho Cetan orbit last night to interrogate Miles in person—with exquisite courtesy, to be sure—he'd looked as tired, even under the face paint, as Miles felt. Their contest for the possession of Russo Gupta had been brief. Miles certainly sympathized with Benin's strong desire, with the ba plucked from his hands by the Star Crèche, for someone to take his frustrations out on—but, first, Miles had given his Vor word, and secondly, he discovered, he could apparently do no wrong on Rho Ceta this week.
Nevertheless, Miles wondered where to drop Guppy when this was all over. Housing him in a Barrayaran jail was a useless expense to the Imperium. Turning him loose back on Jackson's Whole was an invitation for him to return to his old haunts, and employment—no benefit to the neighbors, and a temptation to Cetagandan vengeance. He could think of one other nicely distant place to deposit a person of such speckled background and erratic talents, but was it fair to do that to Admiral Quinn . . . ? Bel had laughed, evilly, at the suggestion, till it had to stop to breathe.
Despite Rho Ceta's key place in Barrayaran strategic and tactical considerations, Miles had never set foot on the world before. He didn't now, either, at least not right away. Grimacing, he allowed Ekaterin and ghem-General Benin to help him from the van into a floater. In the ceremony to come, he planned to stand on his feet, but a very little experimentation had taught him that he had better conserve his endurance. At least he wasn't alone in his need for mechanical aid. Nicol hovered, shepherding Bel Thorne. The herm sat up and managed its own floater controls, only the oxygen tube to its nose betraying its extreme debilitation.
Armsman Roic, his Vorkosigan House uniform pressed and polished, took up station behind Miles and Ekaterin, at his very stiffest and most silent. Spooked half to death, Miles gauged. Miles couldn't blame him.
Deciding he represented the whole of the Barrayaran Empire tonight, and not just his own House, Miles had elected to wear his plain civilian gray. Ekaterin seemed tall and graceful as a haut in some flowing thing of gray and black; Miles suspected under-the-table female sartorial help from Pel, or one of Pel's many minions. As ghem-General Benin led the party forward, Ekaterin paced beside Miles's floater, her hand resting lightly upon his arm. Her faint, mysterious smile was as reserved as ever, but it seemed to Miles as though she walked with a new and firm confidence, unafraid in the shadowed dark.
Benin stopped at a small group of men, glimmering up out of the murk like specters, who were gathered a few meters from the lift van. Complex perfumes drifted from their clothing through the damp air, distinct, yet somehow not clashing. The ghem-general meticulously introduced each member of the party to the current haut governor of Rho Ceta, who was of the Degtiar constellation, cousin in some kind to the present Empress. The governor, too, was dressed, as were all the haut men present, in the loose white tunic and trousers of full mourning, with a multilayered white over-robe that swept to his ankles.
The former occupant of this post, whom Miles had once met, had made it plain that outlander barbarians were barely to be tolerated, but this man swept a low and apparently sincere bow, his hands pressed formally together in front of his chest. Miles blinked, startled, for the gesture more resembled the bow of a ba to a haut than the nod of a haut to an outlander.
"Lord Vorkosigan. Lady Vorkosigan. Portmaster Thorne. Nicol of the Quaddies. Armsman Roic of Barrayar. Welcome to Rho Ceta. My household is at your service."
They all returned suitably civil murmurs of thanks. Miles considered the wording—my household, not my government, and was reminded that what he was seeing tonight was a private ceremony. The haut governor was momentarily distracted by the lights on the horizon of a shuttle dropping from orbit, his lips parting at he peered