Skyblaze Read Online Free PDF

in,
as they'd know if she had. If her cup wasn't on the counter and she
wasn't at one of the two back tables she favored, then she'd
comin-gawn, because usually dishwa happened once per day at
close.
    The reggers sometimes talked about the years
with numbers of the local calendar, and it had been those
discussions -- forwarded perhaps for her edification, who knew? --
that had convinced her of the good boots. They had told over people
she saw sometimes daily, walking with a gait they'd ''picked up on
'66 and they'd lost the little toe for burnfrost,'' or ''backta
'59'' when the rains came for a week in mid-winter and toes and
feet had mildewed or molded along with the clothes, until the thaw
died.
    Granita returned from the kitchen, her
skinny face coming back to a smile from its work-a-day lines, as
she answered Vertu's question.
    ''Huh, girl. You come in here wif snow in
your curls and boots, and down inside the collar. That's a day with
wind, and newfuns sometimes takeaback when the real weather gets
in. Still, you're a worker, I can tell, and bet you don't let no
boss down timewise.''
    The bow fell from her
shoulders along with the nod -- here at least no one was annoyed if
she might have Liaden habits, nor asked. Here was reggers, locals,
strangers, or flights, and reggers might share a confidence, or
might never. She'd seen some of the reggers in the wider world,
where they'd sometimes think to raise left hand to left eyebrow in
recognition, but else reggers mostly left reggers be, if not
invited to converse.
    ''Not my best sun, this morning,'' she said,
using one of the common phrases, ''but bright enough to get
in!''
    Granita's smile got broad, and she pointed
toward the warming tray.
    ''Got's some starcheese just in to spice our
Ronian Cheese if you want some, or the crackers haven't been hardly
dredged yet 'cept for The Hooper, if you want something
ribstickers.''
    Vertu blinked, considering. She'd be early
in line if the snow slowed folks down: early in and as likely early
out.
    ''Ronian Cheese, that be fine.''
    The bow came to her shoulders again, but the
woman was already fetching the cube for her cup, and missed it.
    *
    Her ears burned, and not from the wind and
snow.
    Vertu held herself at her
fullest height, glad for a new reason that her collar was high and
her coat voluminous. She continued to look ahead as well she could
while the man behind her muttered to the man behind him in a Terran so odd
even that one had requested a sayagain.
    There were things on Surebleak of which she
was still unsure and finding answers was not always as easy as
asking the person in line behind you, nor reading an
infoscreen.
    '' Hworked treedays, mysel, liddle miz, donya haz to hwork toady
yuwon booznrazzle. Payada ferya, feedsya an feelya fine. Gotz heat,
gotz smokes, gotz dembigbed, yez, no bliz tashov, no
dreamslong .''
    That was as clear as she'd made it out after
he'd tapped her diffidently on the shoulder -- he'd apparently been
repeating something she hadn't understood was directed at her.
    She shouldn't have asked for a sayagain, for
it came with a wide gap-toothed grin and the clear odor of alcohol
and smoke and rampant decay.
    The hurt of it was that his face was comely
with mouth closed, and his person elsewise no more unkempt than any
of the seven in line behind him.
    She'd managed a ''Nothangya,'' accented as
well as she might recall from bakery talk, holding back the bow as
much as it hurt her nerves to do so, for the bow would have brought
her closer to the lips with their near-blue inner smoke stains.
    For the first time this day she doubted her
decision to leave Liad and then shook herself with a derisive inner
laughter in recognition that the choice had barely been
hers.
    Still, of the outcomes she'd considered,
public solicitation for prostitution was proof that she'd erred
--
    NO!
    She stamped her foot, the act stinging for
her and unremarked by others here -- who knew when one needed to
rid the boot of snow