"Orson Scott Card - Ender's Saga 03 - Xenocide" - читать интересную книгу автора (Card Orson Scott)

But she was still a woman; even revolutionaries are allowed to have a life,
aren't they? Moments of joy-- or pleasure, or perhaps only relief-- stolen here
and there. She got up from her seat, ignoring the pain that came from moving
after sitting so long, and twisted her way out of the door of her tiny office--
a storage bin, really, before they converted the starship to their own use. She
was a little ashamed of how eager she was to get to the room where Jakt would be
waiting. Most of the great revolutionary propagandists in history would have
been able to endure at least three weeks of physical abstinence. Or would they?
She wondered if anyone had done a study of that particular question.
She was still imagining how a researcher would go about writing a grant proposal
for such a project when she got to the four-bunk compartment they shared with
Syfte and her husband, Lars, who had proposed to her only a few days before they
left, as soon as he realized that Syfte really meant to leave Trondheim. It was
hard to share a cabin with newlyweds-- Valentine always felt like such an
intruder, using the same room. But there was no choice. Though this starship was
a luxury yacht, with all the amenities they could hope for, it simply hadn't
been meant to hold so many bodies. It had been the only starship near Trondheim
that was remotely suitable, so it had to do.
Their twenty-year-old daughter, Ro, and Varsam, their sixteen-year-old son,
shared another compartment with Plikt, who had been their lifelong tutor and
dearest family friend. The members of the yacht's staff and crew who had chosen
to make this voyage with them-- it would have been wrong to dismiss them all and
strand them on Trondheim-- used the other two.
The bridge, the dining room, the galley, the salon, the sleeping compartments--
all were filled with people doing their best not to let their annoyance at the
close quarters get out of hand.
None of them were in the corridor now, however, and Jakt had already taped a
sign to their door:
STAY OUT OR DIE.
It was signed, "The proprietor." Valentine opened the door. Jakt was leaning
against the wall so close to the door that she was startled and gave a little
gasp.
"Nice to know that the sight of me can make you cry out in pleasure."
"In shock."
"Come in, my sweet seditionist."
"Technically, you know, I'm the proprietor of this starship."
"What's yours is mine. I married you for your property."
She was inside the compartment now. He closed the door and sealed it.
"That's all I am to you?" she asked. "Real estate?"
"A little plot of ground where I can plow and plant and harvest, all in their
proper season." He reached out to her; she stepped into his arms. His hands slid
lightly up her back, cradled her shoulders. She felt contained in his embrace,
never confined.
"It's late in the autumn," she said. "Getting on toward winter."
"Time to harrow, perhaps," said Jakt. "Or perhaps it's already time to kindle up
the fire and keep the old hut warm before the snow comes."
He kissed her and it felt like the first time.
"If you asked me to marry you all over again today, I'd say yes," said
Valentine.
"And if I had only met you for the first time today, I'd ask."