"I've—encountered their work in another context. Damned if I can't name the lab most likely to have done it, too. They're experts at cloning. Among other things, they do the illegal brain-transfer operations—illegal anywhere but Jackson's Whole, that is—where the young clone is grown in a vat, and the old brain is transferred into it—the old rich brain, needless to say—and, um, they've done some bioengineering work that I can't talk about, and . . . yes. And all this time they had a copy of me in the back room—those sons of bitches, they're going to find out they're not as bloody untouchable as they think they are this time . . . !" Miles controlled incipient hyperventilation. Personal revenge upon Jackson's Whole must wait for some more propitious time. "So. The Komarran underground invested nothing except money in the project for the first ten or fifteen years. No wonder it was never traced."

"Yes," said Galeni. "So a few years ago, the decision was made to pull this card out of their sleeve. They picked up the completed clone, now a young teenager, from Jackson's Whole and began training him to be you."

"Why?"

"They're apparently going for the Imperium."

"What?!" Miles cried. "No! Not with me—!"

"That . . . individual . . . stood right there," Galeni pointed to a spot near the door, "two days ago and told me I was looking at the next Emperor of Barrayar."

"They would have to kill both Emperor Gregor and my father to mount anything of a sort—" Miles began frantically.

"I would imagine," said Galeni dryly, "they're looking forward to just that." He lay back on his bench, eyes glinting, hands locked behind his neck for a pillow, and purred, "Over my dead body, of course."

"Over both our dead bodies. They don't dare let us live. . . ."

"I believe I mentioned that yesterday."

"Still, if anything goes wrong," Miles's gaze flickered toward the light fixture, "it might be handy for them to have hostages." He enunciated this idea clearly, emphasizing the plural. Though he feared that from the Barrayaran point of view, only one of them had value as a hostage. Galeni was no fool; he knew who the goat was too.

Damn, damn, damn. Miles had walked into this trap, knowing it was a trap, in hopes of gaining just the sort of information he now possessed. But he hadn't meant to stay trapped. He rubbed the back of his neck in utter frustration—what joy it would have been to call down a Dendarii strike force on this—this nest of rebels—right now—

The door clicked. It was too early for lunch. Miles whipped around, hoping for a wild instant to find Commander Quinn leading a patrol to his rescue—no. It was just the two goons again, and a third in the doorway with a stunner.

One gestured at Miles. "You. Come along."