unravel," he paused, sitting back puzzled, "the mystery . . ." He flipped through several screens.
"What?" Elena agitated.
"Thought I'd peek into near the time you were born—I thought he'd quit the Service just before, right?"
"Right."
"Did he ever say he was involuntarily medically discharged?"
"No . . ." She peered over his shoulder. "That's funny. It doesn't say why."
"Tell you what's funnier. His entire record for most of the
preceding year is sealed. Your time. And the code on it—very hot. I can't crack it without triggering a double-check, which would end—
yes, that's Captain Illyan's personal mark. I definitely don't want to talk to him." He quailed at the thought of accidentally summoning the attention of Barrayar's Chief of Imperial Security.
"Definitely," croaked Elena, staring at him in fascination.
"Well, let's do some time-travelling," Miles pattered on. "Back, back . . . Your father doesn't seem to have gotten along too well with this Commodore Vorrutyer fellow."
Elena perked with interest. "Was that the same as the Admiral
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Vorrutyer who was killed at Escobar?"
"Um . . . Yes, Ges Vorrutyer. Hm." Bothari had been the
commodore's batman, it appeared, for several years. Miles was
surprised. He'd had the vague impression that Bothari had served
under his father as a ground combat soldier since the beginning of
time. Bothari's service with Vorrutyer ended in a constellation of
reprimands, black marks, discipline parades, and sealed medical
reports. Miles, conscious of Elena staring over his shoulder, whipped past these quickly. Oddly inconsistent. Some, bizarrely petty, were marked with ferocious punishments. Others, astonishingly serious—
had Bothari really held an engineering tech at plasma-arc-point in a lavatory for sixteen hours? and for God's sake, why?—disappeared
into the medical reports and resulted in no discipline at all.
Going farther into the past, the record steadied. A lot of combat in his twenties. Commendations, citations for being wounded, more
commendations. Excellent marks in basic training. Recruiting
records. "Recruiting was a lot simpler in those days," Miles said enviously.
"Oh! Are my grandparents on that?" asked Elena eagerly. "He never talks about them, either. I gather his mother died when he was rather young. He's never even told me her name."
"Marusia," Miles sounded out, peering. "Fuzzy photostat."
"That's pretty," said Elena, sounding pleased. "And his father's?"
Whoops, thought Miles. The recopied photostat was not so fuzzy
that he couldn't make out the blunt, uncapitalized "unknown" printed in some forgotten clerk's hand. Miles swallowed, realizing at last why a certain insulting epithet seemed to get under Bothari's skin when all others were allowed to roll off, patiently disdained.
"Maybe I can make it out," Elena offered, misinterpreting his delay.
The screen went blank at a twitch of his hand. "Konstantine," Miles declared firmly, without hesitation. "Same as his. But both his parents were dead by the time he joined the Service."