She had just bent to gently feel the surface of an unfamiliar hairy sort of silver-green leaf—she thought it had a nice smell—when she saw a pair of very blue eyes that no plant had ever sprouted. She swallowed, reminding herself that there were no strangers on the ship; she was safe. The eyes could belong only to another passenger who, like herself, was investigating the peaceful garden.

“Hello,” she said in a tone between surprise and cordiality.

The blue eyes blinked. “Go ’way. You don’t belong here,” a young male voice growled at her.

“Why not? This is open to anyone, so long as you don’t damage the plants. And you really shouldn’t be crouched down in there like that.”

“Go ’way.” A grubby hand emphasized the order.

“I don’t have to. Who’re you?”

Her eyes, adjusted to the shadows, clearly read the boy’s resentful expression. She hunkered down, looking in at him. “What’s your name?” she asked.

“I doan gotta tell nobody my name.” He spoke with a familiar accent.

“Well, excuse me, I’m sure,” she said in an affected tone. Then she realized that she recognized his accent. “Hey, you’re Irish. Like me.”

“I’m not like you.”

“Well, deny you’re Irish.” When he didn’t—because he couldn’t, and they both knew it—she cocked her head at him, smiling agreeably. “I can see why you’d hide in here. It’s quiet and it smells so fresh. Almost like home. I don’t like the ship either; I feel—” Sorka hugged herself. “—sort of cramped and squashed all the time.” She lengthened the words to make them express her feelings. “I come from Clonmel. Ever been there?”

“Sure.” The boy’s tone was scornful, but he brushed a strand of long orange hair from his eyes and shifted his position so that he could keep his eyes on her.

“I’m Sorka Hanrahan.” She looked inquiringly at him.

“Sean Connell,” he admitted truculently after considerable delay.

“My dad’s a vet. The best in Clonmel.”

Sean’s expression cleared with approval. “He works with horses?”

She nodded. “With any sick animal. Did you have horses?”

“While we was still in Ballinasloe.” His expression clouded with resentful grief. “We had good horses,” he added with defensive pride.

“Did you have your own pony?”

The boy’s eyes blinked, and he dropped his head.

“I miss my pony, too,” Sorka said compassionately. “But I’m to get one on Pern, and my dad said that they’d put special ones in the banks for you.” She wasn’t at all sure of that, but it seemed the proper thing to say.

“We’d better. We was promised. We can’t get anywhere ’thout horses ’cause this place isn’t to have hovervans er nothing.”