"Sire, My Lord Guardian, my lords." Dono moistened his lips, and launched into the formal wording of his petition for the Countship of the Vorrutyer's District. He reminded all present that they had received certified copies of his complete medical report and the witnessed affidavits to his new gender. Briefly, he reiterated his arguments of right by male primogeniture, Count's Choice, and his prior experience assisting his late brother Pierre in the administration of the Vorrutyer's District.

Lord Dono stood legs apart, hands clasped behind the small of his back in an assertive stance, and raised his chin. "As some of you know by now, last night someone attempted to take this decision from you. To decide the future of Barrayar not in this Council Chamber, but in the back streets. I was attacked; luckily, I escaped serious injury. My assailants are now in the hands of Lord Vorbohn's guard, and a witness has given evidence sufficient for the arrest of my cousin Richars for suspicion of conspiracy to commit this mutilation. Vorbohn's men await him outside. Richars will depart this chamber either into their arresting arms, or placed by you above their jurisdiction—in which case, judgment of the crime will fall upon you later.

"Government by thugs in the Bloody Centuries gave Barrayar many colorful historical incidents, suitable for high drama. I don't think it's a drama we wish to return to in real life. I stand before you ready and willing to serve my Emperor, the Imperium, my District, and its people. I also stand for the rule of law." He gave a grave nod toward Count Vorhalas, who nodded back. "Gentlemen, over to you." Dono stood down.

Years ago—before Miles was born—one of Count Vorhalas's sons had been executed for dueling. The Count had chosen not to raise his banner in rebellion over it, and had made it clear ever since that he expected like loyalty to the law from his peers. It was a kind of moral suasion with sharp teeth; nobody dared oppose Vorhalas on ethical issues. If the Conservative Party had a backbone that kept it standing upright, it was old Vorhalas. And Dono, it appeared, had just put Vorhalas in his back pocket. Or Richars had put him there for him . . . Miles hissed through his teeth in suppressed excitement. Good pitch, Dono, good, good. Superb.

The Lord Guardian banged his spear again, and called Richars up for his answer to Dono's petition. Richars looked shaken and angry. He strode forward to take his place in the Speaker's Circle with his lips already moving. He turned to face the chamber, took a deep breath, and launched into the formal preambles of his rebuttal.

Miles's attention was diverted by some rustling up in the gallery: more latecomers arriving. He glanced up, and his eyes widened to see his mother and father, in the row directly behind Ekaterin and the Professora, murmuring a negotiation for seats together and apologies and thanks to a startled Vor couple who instantly made way for the Viceroy and Vicereine. They'd evidently got away from their breakfast meeting in time to attend this vote, and were still formally dressed, Count Aral in the same brown-and-silver House uniform Miles wore, the Countess in a fancy embroidered beige ensemble, her red-roan hair in elaborate braids wreathing her head. Ivan craned around, looked surprised, nodded a greeting, and muttered something under his breath. The Professora, intent on hearing Richars's words, shushed him. Ekaterin hadn't looked behind her; she gripped the balcony rail and stared intently down at Richars as though willing him to pop an artery in the speech centers of his brain. But he droned on, coming to the summation of his arguments.

"That I have always been Pierre's heir is inherent in his lack of acknowledgement of any other in that place. I grant there was no love lost between us, which I always considered unfortunate, but as many of you have reason to know, Pierre was a, ah, difficult personality. But even he realized he could have no other successor but me.

"Dono is a sick joke of Lady Donna's, which we here have tolerated for too long. She is the very essence of the sort of galactic corruption," his glance, and his hand, flicked to mutie-Miles, as though to suggest his enemy's body was an outward and visible form of an inward and invisible poison, "against which we must fight, yes, I say fight, and I say it boldly and aloud, for our native purity. She is a breathing threat to our wives, daughters, sisters. She is an incitement to rebellion against our deepest and most fundamental order. She is an insult to the honor of the Imperium. I beg you will finish her strutting charade with the finality it deserves."

Richars glanced around, anxiously seeking signs of approval from his dauntingly impassive listeners, and continued, "With respect to Lady Donna's feeble threat to bring her claimed attack—which might in fact have come from any quarter sufficiently outraged by her posturing—onto the floor of this chamber for judgment. I say, bring it on. And who would be her stalking horse, to lay the case before you, in that event?" He made a broad gesture at Miles, sitting at his desk with his booted feet out and listening with as little expression as he could maintain. "One who stands accused of far worse crimes himself, even up to premeditated murder."

Richars was rattled; he was trying to set off his smokescreen way too early. It was a smoke Miles choked on all the same. Damn you, Richars. He could not let this pass unchallenged here, not for an instant.

"A point of order, my Lord Guardian." Not changing his posture, Miles pitched his drawl to carry across the chamber. "I am not accused; I am slandered. There is an unsubtle legal distinction between the two."

"It will be an ironic day when you try to lay down a criminal accusation here," Richars parried, stung, Miles hoped, by the implied threat of countersuit.

Count Vorhalas called out from his place in the back row, "In the event, Sire, my Lord Guardian, my lords, having viewed the evidence and listened to the preliminary interrogations, I should be pleased to lay the charge against Lord Richars myself."

The Lord Guardian frowned, and tapped his spear suggestively. Historically, permitting men to start speaking out of turn had quickly led to shouting matches, fist fights, and, in prior eras when weapons scanners hadn't been available, famous melees and duels to the death. But Emperor Gregor, listening with very little expression himself, made no move to intervene.

Richars was growing yet more off balance; Miles could see it in his reddening face and heavy breathing. To Miles's shock, he gestured up at Ekaterin. "It's a bold villain who can stand unashamed while his victim's own wife looks down at him—though I suppose she could hardly look up at him, eh?"

Faces turned toward the pale black-clad woman in the gallery. She looked chilled and frightened, jerked out of her safe observer's invisibility by Richars's unwelcome attention. Beside her, Nikki stiffened. Miles sat upright; it was all he could do to keep himself from launching himself across the chamber at Richars's throat and attempting to throttle him on the spot. That wouldn't work anyway. He was compelled to other means of combat, slower, but, he swore, more effective in the end. How dare Richars turn on Ekaterin in this public venue, invade her most private concerns, attempt to manipulate her most intimate relationships just to serve his power-grab?

Miles's anticipated nightmare of defense was here, now. Already he would be forced to turn his attention not just to truth but to appearances, to check every word out his mouth for its effect on the listeners who could become his future judges. Richars had put himself one-down through his botched attack on Dono; could he scramble back up over Miles's and Ekaterin's bodies? It seemed he was about to try.