He raised her hand and touched her knuckles to his lips. “You're not shortchanging me , I promise you.”

Miles's own mother was adamantly in favor of the use of replicators, with cause. He was reconciled now, at age thirty-odd, with the physical damage he had taken in her womb from the soltoxin attack. Only his emergency transfer to a replicator had saved his life. The teratogenic military poison had left him stunted and brittle-boned, but a childhood's agony of medical treatments had brought him to nearly full function, if not, alas, full height. Most of his bones had been replaced piecemeal with synthetics thereafter, emphasis on the pieces . The rest of the damage, he conceded, was all his own doing. That he was still alive seemed less a miracle than that he had won Ekaterin's heart. Their children would not suffer such traumas.

He added, “And if you think you're having it too luxuriously easy now to feel properly virtuous, why, just wait till they get out of those replicators.”

She laughed. “Very good point!”

“Well.” He sighed. “I'd intended this trip to show you the glories of the galaxy, in the most elegant and refined society. It appears I'm heading instead to what I suspect is the armpit of Sector V, and the company of a bunch of squabbling, frantic merchants, irate bureaucrats, and paranoid militarists. Life is full of surprises. Come with me, my love? For my sanity's sake?”

Her eyes narrowed in amusement. “How can I resist such an invitation? Of course I will.” She sobered. “Would it violate security for me to send a message to Nikki telling him we'll be late?”

“Not at all. Send it from the Kestrel , though. It'll get through faster.”