《Lady of mazes 》作者：- Karl Schroeder【EPUB】

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LADY OF MAZES Karl Schroeder ISBN 0-765-35078-5 Acknowledgments Thanks to David Hartwell and Moshe Feder at Tor for their editorial expertise and to RebeccaMaines for correcting my rampant capitalizations. Thanks are also due my agent Donald Maassfor his patience in shepherding this project to completion. Most of all though my gratitude goes to my wife Janice Beitel for keeping faith with methrough the many versions and revisions of this tale. PART ONE The Conquest of Abundance Different ideas of social and political life entail different technologies for theirrealization. — Langdon Winner Autonomous Technology 1977 1 Livia Kodaly opened her eyes to gray predawn light All was silence within the crumbling stonewalls where she had slept. Real sheets not virtual were bunched around her legs she clutched a pillow and watched thefaint radiance of dawn swing down from the eastern sky. Around and about her within the wallsand ceiling and floating on every minuscule speck of dust a thousand other eyes watched. Tothem she might seem like a figure of porcelain her mop of fair hair touched only now and thenby an errant breeze. So still was she that to those ubiquitous eyes and monitors she mightseem just another fixture of the room. When the rectangle of black from the French doors turned gray Livia sighed at the ceiling anduntangled herself from rest. She walked through the French doors onto the broad stone balconythat encircled the estates guest apartments. Curled up in one of the old crenels she lookedout over the manicured grounds with their posing topiary and past the indistinct forest tops.Stars still shone Jupiter on her right the pastel curves of the Lethe Nebula to her left. Itwas that time of day when the world seems to pause between breaths — the towering redwoodtrees that carpeted the hillside were motionless and all would be silent if not for thechattering of thousands of wakening birds. When the solitude began reminding her of sadder times she looked out one last time at theempty gardens and then summoned her Society. A hum of voices welled up around her and ghostlyfigures began appearing above below all about some seemed to stand on the air above thegardens. Each luminous person acknowledged her with a wave a smile or a bow. Some wereengaged in conversation some stood alert but motionless. Livia didnt want to talk to any ofthe real inhabitants of the estate at the moment so she excluded them from her