If the Rho Cetan business becomes any more peculiar, I'll want you safely home. The communications lag between Barrayar and Sector V is going to be too long to for me to breathe over your shoulder, but some occasional status or progress reports from you would be a nice touch, if you don't mind.” Gregor's voice did not change to convey irony. It didn't need to. Miles snorted. “Good luck,” Gregor concluded. The image on the viewer returned to a mute display of the Imperial Seal. Miles reached forward and keyed it off. The detailed reports, he could study once he was en route.

He? Or we ?

He glanced up at Ekaterin's pale profile; she turned her serious blue eyes toward him. He asked, “Do you want to go with me, or continue on home?”

“Can I go with you?” she asked doubtfully.

“Of course you can! The only question is, would you like to?”

Her dark brows rose. “Not the only question, surely. Do you think I'd be of any use, or would I just be a distraction from your work?”

“There's official use, and there's unofficial use. Don't bet that the first is more important than the second. You know the way people talk to you to try to get oblique messages to me?”

“Oh, yes.” Her lips twisted in distaste.

“Well, yes, I realize it's tedious, but you're very good at sorting them out, you know. Not to mention the information to be obtained just from studying the kinds of lies people tell. And, ah—not-lies. There may well be people who will talk to you who won't talk to me, for one reason or another.”

She conceded the truth of this with a little wave of her free hand.

“And . . . it would be a real relief for me to have someone along I can talk to freely.”

Her smile tilted a little at this. “Talk, or vent?”

“I—hem!—suspect this one is going to entail quite a lot of venting, yes. D'you think you can stand it? It could get pretty thick. Not to mention boring.”