She almost threw away the rock with its still-hidden treasure in her eagerness to take the rough emerald from him. She held it to the sun, saw the flaw, but had no complaint about the clear deep green. She weighed it in her hand. Why, it had to be thirty or forty carats. With a clever lapidary to cut beyond the flaw, there would be fifteen carats of gemstone. And if that stone was just a sample … The idea of apprenticing as a gemstone cutter and using that magnificent jewel to learn on amused her.

“Where?” she demanded, her breath constricted with urgency.

“Over there.” He half turned, pointing up into the thick vegetation. “There’s a whole cave of them embedded in the rock.”

“You just walked in and it winked at you?” She forced herself to speak lightly, amusedly, smiling up approvingly at his beaming face. He looked so bloody pleased with himself. She continued to smile but ground her teeth.

“I’ve klah for you,” he said, gesturing to the fire where he had rigged a spit and a protecting rock for his kettle.

“That abominable stuff,” she exclaimed. She had a fleet-incurred preference for strong coffee, and the last had been served at that pathetic Thanksgiving shindig—and spilled when the tremor had shaken the urns from their stands. The last coffee from Earth had seeped, undrunk, into the dirt of Pern.

“Oh, if you use enough sweetening, it’s not all that bad.” He poured her a cup even though she had not said that she wanted one. “They say it’s got as much caffeine in it as coffee or tea. The secret’s in drying the bark thoroughly before grinding and steeping it.”

He had lashed sweetener into the cup and handed it to her, expecting her to be grateful for his thoughtfulness. She could not afford to alienate Kimmer even if he sounded revoltingly like a good little colonist, approving of good colonial substitutes.

“Sorry, Stev,” she said, smiling apologetically at him as she took the cup. “Early morning nerves. I really do miss coffee.”

He gave a shrug. “We won’t for long, now, will we?”

She kept her smile in place, wondering if he knew how inane he sounded. Then, she cautioned herself severely, if she had only been more careful with Paul, she might have been first lady on Pern. What had she done wrong? She could have sworn she would be able to maintain his interest in her. All had gone perfectly right up until they entered the Rukbat system. Then it had been as if she no longer existed. And I got them here!

“Avril?”

She came back to the present at the impatience in Stev Kimmer’s voice. “Sorry!” she said.

“I said that I’ve already got food for the day, so as soon as you finish that we can go.”