yarrr, ye scurvy boy-king, halt ye whinin'

"I'm glad you survived long enough to finally grow into yourself. So you're not losing your forward momentum with age, are you, boy?" The Count refrained from following this up with one of those we're-getting-so-old complaints mainly designed to invite the listener to offer a contradiction.

"I don't think so," Miles's eyes narrowed in a brief moment of introspection. His new calmness was still there, inside, but it did not feel at all weary. Quite the opposite. "It's just taking another direction. Vorhovis tells me I'm the youngest Imperial Auditor since the Time of Isolation. It's not a post you ever held, I understand."

"No. I missed that one, somehow. Your grandfather never held it, either. Nor your great-grandfather. In fact...I'll have to look it up, but I don't think any Count or Lord Vorkosigan has ever been an Auditor."

"I did. None has. I'm the first in the family," Miles informed him smugly. "I am unprecedented."

The Count smiled. "This is not news, Miles."

from Memory by Lois McMaster Bujold