In the cold corrupt system of the colony mining worlds, one man’s life and liberty aren’t worth much; the vital spacelanes are rigidly controlled, and it’s as much as your life is worth to go against the system. But there is one man with both the unbroken spirit and the technological mastery to open the lanes and free his fellow men from tyranny. And on grim Stellamira, N.N. Gallagher builds the first resistance. His materials: downtrodden colonists with nothing left to lose, and worlds to gain; a clever, rebellious young madame and her entourage; a native starship captain with a lot to learn, and a battlefield to learn it on; and a great ice-asteroid that engineering genius has transformed into a ship called GALLAGHER’S GLACIER.