"George R. R. Martin - A Song for Lya" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

The cities of the Shkeen are old, older far than man's, and the great rust-red metropolis that rose
from their sacred hill country had proved to be the oldest of them all. The Shkeen city had no name. It
needed none. Though they built cities and towns by the hundreds and the thousands, the hill city had no
rivals. It was the largest in size and population, and it was alone in the sacred hills. It was their Rome,
Mecca, Jerusalem; all in one. It was the city, and all Shkeen came to it at last, in the final days before
Union.
That city had been ancient in the days before Rome fell, had been huge and sprawling when Babylon
was still a dream. But there was no feel of age to it. The human eye saw only miles and miles of low,
red-brick domes; small hummocks of dried mud that covered the rolling hills like a rash. Inside they were
dim and nearly airless. The rooms were small and the furniture crude.
Yet it was not a grim city. Day after day it squatted in those scrubby hills, broiling under a hot sun
that sat in the sky like a weary orange melon; but the city teemed with life: smells of cooking, the sounds
of laughter and talk and children running, the bustle and sweat of brickmen repairing the domes, the bells
of the Joined ringing in the streets. The Shkeen were a lusty and exuberant people, almost childlike.
Certainly there was nothing about them that told of great age or ancient wisdom. This is a young race,
said the signs, this is a culture in its infancy.
But that infancy had lasted more than fourteen thousand years.
The human city was the real infant, less than ten Earth years old. It was built on the edge of the hills,
between the Shkeen metropolis and the dusty brown plains where the spaceport had gone up. In human
terms, it was a beautiful city: open and airy, full of graceful archways and glistening fountains and wide
boulevards lined by trees. The buildings were wrought of metal and colored plastic and native woods,
and most of them were low in deference to Shkeen architecture. Most of themтАж the Administration
Tower was the exception, a polished blue steel needle that split a crystal sky.
You could see it for miles in all directions. Lyanna spied it even before we landed, and we admired it
from the air. The gaunt skyscrapers of Old Earth and Baldur were taller, and the fantastic webbed cities
of Arachne were far more beautifulтАФbut that slim blue Tower was still imposing enough as it rose
unrivaled to its lonely dominance above the sacred hills.
The spaceport was in the shadow of the Tower, easy walking distance. But they met us anyway. A
low-slung scarlet aircar sat purring at the base of the ramp as we disembarked, with a driver lounging
against the stick. Dino Valcarenghi stood next to it, leaning on the door and talking to an aide.
Valcarenghi was the planetary administrator, the boy wonder of the sector. Young, of course, but I'd
known that. Short, and good-looking, in a dark, intense way, with black hair that curled thickly against
his head and an easy, genial smile.
He flashed us that smile then, when we stepped off the ramp, and reached to shake hands. "Hi," he
began, "I'm glad to see you." There was no nonsense with formal introductions. He knew who we were,
and we knew who he was, and Valcarenghi wasn't the kind of man who put much stock in ritual.
Lyanna took his hand lightly in hers, and gave him her vampire look: big, dark eyes opened wide and
staring, thin mouth lifted in a tiny faint smile. She's a small girl, almost waiflike, with short brown hair and
a child's figure. She can look very fragile, very helpless. When she wants to. But she rattles people with
that look. If they know Lya's a telepath, they figure she's poking around amid their innermost secrets.
Actually she's playing with them. When Lyanna is really reading, her whole body goes stiff and you can
almost see her tremble. And those big, soul-sucking eyes get narrow and hard and opaque.
But not many people know that, so they squirm under her vampire eyes and look the other way and
hurry to release her hand. Not Valcarenghi, though. He just smiled and stared back, then moved on to
me.
I was reading when I took his handтАФmy standard operating procedure. Also a bad habit, I guess,
since it's put some promising friendships into an early grave. My talent isn't equal to Lya's. But it's not as
demanding, either. I read emotions. Valcarenghi's geniality came through strong and genuine. With
nothing behind it, or at least nothing that was close enough to the surface for me to catch.
 We also shook hands with the aide, a middle-aged blond stork named Nelson Gourlay. Then