"L. E. Modesitt - Timedivers -Timegods - 03 - Timegods' World" - читать интересную книгу автора (Modesitt L E)

I could tell she had been up early and had completed her morning workout, although she
had probably not taken a run, as she usually did. Once or twice I had tried to follow her
regimen and decided against it. She was only a shade taller than I was; but underneath
her careful tailoring were muscles it would take years before I could match. Yet she never
made an issue about it. She just got up and did it, without fail, every morning.

She had taken a degree herself, in economic theory and practice, and had published one
or two monographs, claiming that it had been "just to keep her hand in," whatever that
meant. She also was far more physical than my father, both with her own exercise room in
the cellars and her ongoing classes in Delkaiba--that was the old Westron martial art. All
the same, I was never quite sure what she did while I was in school or on her infrequent
but long and solitary "vacations." Neither she nor my father ever mentioned it. And,
somehow, my innumerable questions never quite got answered.

"Have some sausage, Sammis. Need some protein, not just starch."

I reached for the least burned sausage on the platter.

"What do you think about this business on Mithrada?"

"What business?" I was looking for an unburned roll, preferably to avoid having to take
another sausage.

"The strange reports about the project problems. You don't discuss it in school?"

My mouth was full. So I nodded. I hadn't paid that much attention. So the emperor wanted
another planet. There was still plenty of room in Westron, and more than that in Eastron.

"Waste of money. Terrible waste of tax revenues . . ." mumbled my father.

My mother frowned, which was also strange. Usually she wore an exercise singlesuit to
breakfast and never showed other than a pleasant disposition. Again, she changed the
subject quickly. "Are you sure that uniform is warm enough?"

"Ice storm was a freak," I mouthed. "Melting off already."

"Don't talk with your mouth full." That was Father.

"All too many freak occurrences," murmured Mother, so softly that Father, with his bad ear
that he refused to have examined, heard nothing.

I looked at her, and she shook her head minutely, as if to tell me not to ask. I didn't.
Instead, I grabbed the last roll, taking bites first from an almost ripe chyst and then from
the roll.

Father pursed his lips and took a last sip from his cup.

"Coming?"