After a couple of minutes, a querulous voice issued from the intercom. The little square of its vid viewer stayed blank. "What do you want?"

Dono glanced at Szabo, and whispered, "That Vorfolse?"

"Sounds like," Szabo murmured back. "It's not quavery enough to be his old Armsman."

"Good evening, Count Vorfolse," Dono said smoothly into the com. "I'm Lord Dono Vorrutyer." He gestured at his companions. "I believe you know Ivan Vorpatril, and my senior Armsman, Szabo. Miss Olivia Koudelka. I stopped by to talk to you about tomorrow's vote on my District's Countship."

"It's too late," said the voice.

Szabo rolled his eyes.

"I have no wish to disturb your rest," Dono pressed on.

"Good. Go away."

Dono sighed. "Certainly, sir. But before we depart, may I at least be permitted to know how you intend to vote on the issue tomorrow?"

"I don't care which Vorrutyer gets the District. The whole family's deranged. A plague on both your parties."

Dono took a breath, and kept smiling. "Yes, sir, but consider the consequences. If you abstain, and the vote falls short of a decision, it will simply have to be done over again. And over and over, until a majority is finally reached. I would also point out that you would find my cousin Richars a most unrestful colleague—short-tempered, and much given to factionalism and strife."

Such a long silence issued from the intercom, Ivan began to wonder if Vorfolse had gone off to bed.

Olivia leaned into the scan pickup to say brightly, "Count Vorfolse, sir, if you vote for Lord Dono, you won't regret it. He'll give diligent service to both the Vorrutyer's District and to the Imperium."

The voice replied after a moment, "Eh, you're one of Commodore Koudelka's girls, aren't you? Does Aral Vorkosigan support this nonsense, then?"

"Lord Miles Vorkosigan, who is acting as his father's voting deputy, supports me fully," Dono returned.

"Unrestful. Eh! There's unrestful for you."

"No doubt," said Dono agreeably. "I have noticed that myself. But how do you intend to vote?"

Another pause. "I don't know. I'll think about it."

"Thank you, sir." Dono motioned them all to decamp; his little retinue followed him back toward the lift tubes.

"That wasn't too conclusive," said Ivan.

"Do you have any idea how positive I'll think about it seems, in light of some of the responses I've gotten?" said Dono ruefully. "Compared to certain of his colleagues, Count Vorfolse is a fountain of liberality." They collected the Armsman, and descended the lift tube. Dono added as they reached the ground foyer, "You have to give Vorfolse credit for integrity. There are a number of dubious ways he could be stripping his District of funds to support a more opulent lifestyle here, but he doesn't choose 'em."

"Huh," said Szabo. "If I were one of his liege people, I'd damn well encourage him to steal something. It would be better than this miserable miserly farce. It's just not proper Vor. It's not good show ."

They exited the building with Szabo in the lead, Dono and Olivia somehow walking side by side, and Ivan following, trailed by the two other Armsmen. As they passed through the pedestrian entry to the dim garage, Szabo stopped short and said, "Where the hell's the car?" He lifted his wrist comm to his lips. "Joris?"

Olivia said uneasily, "If somebody else had come in, he'd have had to take the car all the way up, back down, and around the block to let them past. No room to turn that car in here."

"Not without—" Szabo began. He was interrupted by a quiet buzz, seemingly out of nowhere, a sound familiar enough to Ivan's ears. Szabo fell like a tree.

"Stunner tag!" bellowed Ivan, and jumped behind the nearest pillar to his right. He looked around for Olivia, but she had dodged the other way, with Dono. Two more well-aimed stunner shots took out the other two Armsmen as they broke right and left, though one got off a wild shot with his own weapon before he went down.

Ivan, crouching between the pillar and a dilapidated groundcar, cursed his unarmed state and tried to see where the shots had come from. Pillars, cars, inadequate lighting, shadows . . . further up the ramp, a dim shape flitted from the shadow of a pier and vanished among the tightly packed vehicles.

Stunner combat rules were simple. Drop everything that moved, and sort them out later, hoping that no one harbored a bad heart condition. Dono's unconscious Armsman could supply Ivan with a stunner, if he could reach it without getting himself zapped. . . .

A voice from up the ramp whispered hoarsely, "Which way did he go?"

"Down toward the entry. Goff'll get him. Drop that damned officer as soon as you get a clear shot."

At least three assailants, then. Assume one more. At least one more. Cursing the tight clearances, Ivan retreated backward on his hands and knees from his stunner-bolt-stopping pillar and tried to work his way between the row of cars and the wall, edging toward the entry again. If he could make it out onto the street—

This had to be a snatch. If it had been an assassination, their attackers would have picked a much deadlier weapon, and the whole party would be well-mixed hamburger on the walls by now. In a slice of vision between two cars, away down the descending ramp to his left, a white shape moved: Olivia's party dress. A meaty thunk came from behind a pillar there, followed by a nauseating noise like a pumpkin hitting concrete. "Good one!" Dono's voice jerked out.

Olivia's mother, Ivan reminded himself, had been the boy-Emperor's personal bodyguard. He tried to imagine the cozy mother-daughter instruction rituals in the Koudelka household. He was pretty sure they hadn't been limited to baking cakes together.

A black-clad shape darted.

"There he goes! Get him! No, no—he's supposed to stay conscious !"

Running footsteps, scuffling and breathing, a thunk, a strangled yelp—praying everyone's attention would be diverted, Ivan dove for the Armsman's stunner, snatched it up, and ducked again for cover. From the ascending ramp to the right came the whuff of a vehicle backing rapidly and illegally down toward them. Ivan risked a peek over a car. The back doors of the battered lift van swung wildly open, as it jerked to a halt at the curve. Two men hustled Dono toward it. Dono was open-mouthed, stumbling, a look of astonished agony on his face.

"Where's Goff?" barked the driver, swinging out to look at his two comrades and their prize. "Goff!" he shouted.

"Where's the girl?" asked one of them.

The other said, "Never mind the girl. Here, help me bend him back. We'll do the job, dump him, and get out of here before she can run for help. Malka, circle around and get that big officer. He wasn't supposed to be in this picture." They pulled Dono into the van—no, only half into the van. One man pulled a bottle from his pocket, flipped off its cap, and placed it ready-to-hand on the edge of the van floor. What the hell . . . ? This isn't a kidnapping.

"Goff?" the man detailed to hunt down Ivan called uncertainly into the shadows, as he crouched and skittered past the cars.

The, under the circumstances, extremely unpleasant hum of a vibra knife sounded from the hand of the man bending over Dono. Risking everything, Ivan popped to his feet and fired.

He scored a direct hit on the fellow seeking Goff; the man spasmed, fell, and failed to move thereafter. Dono's men carried heavy stunners, and not without cause, apparently. Ivan only managed to wing one of the others. They both abandoned Dono and dashed behind the van. Dono fell to the pavement, and curled up around himself; with all this stunner fire flashing around, probably no worse a move than trying to run for it, but Ivan had a gruesome vision of what would happen if the van backed up.