Young Miles - Lois McMaster Bujold [67]
Miles shook his head. "I'll worry about that if we live through this. Just so he doesn't figure out which Count's son."
"Well I think you did a good thing. It seems to mean a lot to him. Anyway, he thinks you're about his age. Your father, whoever he was, disinherited you, and exiled you from Barrayar to . . ." she faltered, "to get you out of sight," she finished, raising her chin bravely.
"Ah," said Miles. "A reasonable theory." He came to the end of a circuit in his pacing and stood absorbed, apparently, by the bare wall in front of him.
"You mustn't blame him for it—"
"I don't." He smiled a quick reassurance, and paced again.
"You have a younger brother who has usurped your rightful place as heir—"
He grinned in spite of himself. "Baz is a romantic."
"He's an exile himself, isn't he?" she asked quietly. "Father doesn't like him, but he won't say why . . ." She looked at him expectantly.
"I won't either, then. It's—it's not my business."
"But he's your liegeman now."
"All right, so it is my business. I just wish it weren't. But Baz will have to tell you himself."
She smiled at him. "I knew you'd say that." Oddly, the non-answer seemed to content her.
"How did your last combat class go? I hope they all crawled out on their hands and knees."
She smiled tranquilly. "Very nearly. Some of the technical people act like they never expected to do that kind of fighting. Others are awfully good—I've kind of got them working on the klutzy ones."
"That's just right," he approved eagerly. "Conserve your own energy, expend theirs. You've grasped the principle."
She glowed in his praise. "You've got me doing so many things I've never done before, new people, things I'd never dreamed of—"
"Yes . . ." He stumbled. "I'm sorry I got you into this nightmare. I've been demanding so much of you—but I'll get you out. My word on it. Don't be scared."
Her mouth set in indignation. "I'm not scared! Well—some. But I feel more alive than I've ever been. You make anything seem possible."
The longed-for admiration in her eyes perturbed him. It was too much like hunger. "Elena—this whole thing is balanced on a hoax. If those guys out there wake up and realize how badly they have us outnumbered, we'll crash like—" He cut himself off. That wasn't what she needed to hear. He rubbed his eyes, fingertips pressing hard against them, and paced.
"It's not balanced on a hoax," she said earnestly. "You balance it."
"Isn't that what I said?" He laughed, shakily.
She studied him through narrowed eyes. "When was the last time you slept?"
"Oh, I don't know. I've lost track, with the ships on different clocks. That reminds me, got to get them on the same clock. I'll switch the RG 132, that'll be easier. We'll all keep Oseran time. It was before the jump, anyway. A day before the jump."
"Have you had dinner?"
"Dinner?"
"Lunch?"
"Lunch? Was there lunch? I was getting things ready for the funeral, I guess."
She looked exasperated. "Breakfast?"
"I ate some of their field rations, when I was working on the regs last night—look, I'm short, I don't need as much as you overgrown types . . ."
He paced on. Her face grew sober. "Miles," she said, and hesitated. "How did that pilot officer die? He looked, well, not all right, but he was alive in the shuttle. Did he jump you?"
His stomach did a roller-coaster flop. "My God, do you think I murdered—" But he had, surely, as surely as if he had held a disrupter to the man's head and fired. He had no desire to detail the events in the RG 132's wardroom to Elena. They looped in his memory, violent images flashing over and over. Bothari's crime, his crime, a seamless whole . . .
"Miles, are you all right?" Her voice was alarmed. He realized he was standing still with his eyes shut. Tears were leaking between the lids.
"Miles, sit down! You're hyper."
"Can't sit down. If I stop I'll . . ." He resumed his circuit, limping mechanically.