"Kay Kenyon - Maximum Ice" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kenyon Kay)

"My children," she said, as she always did, referring to old and young alike.

It made Anatolly glad to hear her say those words, her voice steady and deep.

She looked toward the portal, then back at them. "Yes, I've seen it." She nodded. "Things change. Every
time I waken, things have changed. Who knows that better than our people? You are still my beloved
children. And that"тАФshe nodded at the windowтАФ"is still home." She drew herself tall. "Or it will be,
when the Rom make their footprints in the snow."

Rebeka Havislov dabbed at her eyes with a kerchief. But she was smiling.

Anatolly sighed. The women were crying and making plans. Perhaps things would be all right, after all.

Then the crowd was surging forward to embrace Ship Mother and shake her hand.

Amid the press of well-wishers, Zoya's voice came unmis-takably: "Bring me my boots."

As someone ran to do so, she called after him, "And some wine."
PART I:

A Fearful Symmetry

CHAPTER ONE

тАФlтАФ

Zoya lay on her bunk in the shuttle cabin, listening for sounds of earth. But there was nothing, not even
wind. The earth was a silent place, at least here, in this wide valley.

The shuttle had set down in northwest Canada, between the continent and Vancouver Island. The names
meant nothing now, especially the political names. Among the few relevant geo-graphical names were the
mountains. As they had descended yesterday, they had glimpsed the range of the Olympics jutting up
through the planets new firmament.

Their landing site had once been the Strait of Georgia. Now it was a broad, flat valley between low hills
of crystalline land-forms. The shuttle crew was calling it crystal. After they had landed, people crowded
around the view screens, seeing the facets, the gem-shapes protruding from the ground like dis-torted
images of the vanished trees. There had been a profound silence as the crew stared out. The sun was
setting, putting a glare on the landscapeтАФa little disturbing and overbright, like a good song turned up too
loud.

Zoya sat up. By her wrist lex, it was almost dawn at this lati-tude and in this season, late autumn.

She touched the diamond studs in her ear. Their solidity re-assured her that she was awake, in the real
world. Ah, but what was real? The suspended land of quasi-sleep, or the consensual realm of waking?
Both lands had their claim on her. Sleep could brag of the centuriesтАФbut waking always got her
imme-diate attention. There was coffee, for one thing. Good gossip. Winning at cards. Actually, it was a
long list, and she recited it every time she awokeтАФthe reasons why life was good, even amid disasters.