"Barrayar 15 - Miles Vorkosigan 13 - Diplomatic Immunity" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bujold Lois McMaster)

УThere'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?Ф

УOh, yes.Ф Her lips twisted in distaste.

УWell, 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, ahЧnot-lies. There may well be people who will talk to you who won't talk to me, for one reason or another.Ф

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

УAnd...it would be a real relief for me to have someone along I can talk to freely.Ф

Her smile tilted a little at this. УTalk, or vent?Ф

УIЧhem!Чsuspect 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.Ф

УYou know, you keep claiming your job is boring, Miles, but your eyes have gone all bright.Ф

He cleared his throat and shrugged unrepentantly.

Her amusement faded, and her brows drew down. УHow long do you think this sorting out will take?Ф

He considered the calculation she had doubtless just made. It would be six more weeks, give or take a few days, to the scheduled births. Their original travel plan would have put them back at Vorkosigan House a comfortable month early. Sector V was in the opposite direction from their present location to Barrayar, insofar as the network of jump points people navigated to get from here to there could be said to have a direction. Several days to get from here to Graf Station, plus an extra two weeks of travel at least to get home from there, even in the fastest of fast couriers. УIf I can settle things in less than two weeks, we can both get home on time.Ф

She breathed a short laugh. УFor all that I try to be all modern and galactic, that feels so strange. All sorts of men don't make it home for the births of their children. But My mother was out of town on the day I was born, so she missed it, just seems... seems like a more profound complaint, somehow.Ф

УIf it runs over, I suppose I could send you home on your own, with a suitable escort. But I want to be there, too.Ф He hesitated. It's my first time, dammit, of course it's making me crazy, was a statement of the obvious that he managed to stop on his lips. Her first marriage had left her riddled with sensitive scars, none of them physical, and this topic trod near several of them. Rephrase, O Diplomat. УDoes it...make it any easier, that it's the second time, for you?Ф

Her expression grew introspective. УNikki was a body birth; of course everything was harder. The replicators take away so many risksЧour children could get all their genetic mistakes corrected, they won't be subject to damage from a bad birthЧI know replicator gestation is better, more responsible, in every way. It's not as though they are being shortchanged. And yet...Ф

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

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, УAnd 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.Ф

She laughed. УVery good point!Ф

УWell.Ф He sighed. УI'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?Ф

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

УNot at all. Send it from the Kestrel, though. It'll get through faster.Ф

She nodded. УI've never been away from him so long before. I wonder if he's been lonely?Ф

Nikki had been left, on Ekaterin's side of the family, with four uncles and a great-uncle plus matching aunts, a herd of cousins, a small army of friends, and his Grandmother Vorsoisson. On Miles's side were Vorkosigan House's extensive staff and their extensive families, with Uncle Ivan and Uncle Mark and the whole Koudelka clan for backup. Impending were his doting Vorkosigan step-grandparents, who had planned to arrive after Miles and Ekaterin for the birthday bash, but who now might beat them home. Ekaterin might have to travel ahead to Barrayar, if he couldn't cut through this mess in a timely fashion, but by no rational definition of the word, alone.

УI don't see how,Ф said Miles honestly. УI expect you miss him more than he misses us. Or he'd have managed more than that one monosyllabic note that didn't catch up with us till Earth. Eleven-year-old boys can be pretty self-centered. I'm sure I was.Ф

Her brows rose. УOh? And how many notes have you sent to your mother in the past two months?Ф