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Alessan caught her hand and she stopped her babbling, suddenly shy. They were alone, even though Desdra's amiable taunting of Capiam for his timorous dexterity and B'lerion's cheerful encouragement of Oklina were audible.
"You said that we could remain here as long as it took to complete the harvest," Alessan said quietly. He was kneeling beside her now. "And return with no more than an hour elapsed there. . . . ." His eyes searched her averted face, and his hands captured hers before she could reach for more needlethorns. "Can we not make a little time for ourselves?"
Oklina's delighted laugh rang out, followed by B'lerion's startled curse.
"Damn things bite!"
Moreta gri
"What more can you expect of a one-handed man?" B'lerion demanded in a loud complaint.
Moreta and Alessan broke apart, but the bronze rider was still out of sight, if audible. Alessan gri
"It will be far too hot to work midday, Alessan, and I have no doubts that we can find some privacy then."
"Clever of you to bring mixed pairs, wasn't it?"
"One is always more sorry for the things one didn't do than the things one has done." Moreta spoke with mock severity, and Alessan quickly silenced her the most effective way.
"Personally, I don't like it when it's too hot," Alessan was saying, releasing her lips to give her eyes and cheeks and ears and throat equal attention. An injudicious movement brought his arm in contact with the needlethorn bush and he spun away, dragging Moreta with him. "They really do bite, don't they?" He rubbed his arm where a fine row of bloody beads rose on the skin.
"Oh, dear, they do." She reached for the cut ging and squeezed some of the sap onto the punctures. "There, that'll seal them too. Really, Alessan"-and she gave him a quick kiss, fondling his ear– "we have to do what we came here for!" She tried to be stern, but he was still frowning from the indignation of having his ardor abruptly pricked.
"I'll settle a score for myself, too," he said, snatching handfuls of the needlethorns from the bush that had wounded him. "That'll teach you, my spiny friend! There! There! and There! You're stripped!"
Laughing at his outraged monologue, Moreta worked as fast as she could to pack the products of his vindictive harvest.
"You picked the first one. Now you pack for me!" Alessan said with a growl. But his hands impeded hers as she worked to close the last package. He kissed her at the base of her throat, then on her chin.
"Fastest packer on Pern," he said in a complimentary tone while his hands made investigations of their own.
"Now it's my turn to pick," Moreta said, nibbling at his ear and ru
"I'll trim you if you don't get to work, Moreta."
"I work faster than you." She allowed herself to sound peevish as she snapped quick handfuls off the nearest bush, piling them for him to pack.
"Can't you two get along together?" B'lerion demanded, bursting suddenly from around a bend of the ravine.
"She'll learn!" "He'll learn!" they said in chorus, waving cheerfully. B'lerion looked at them for a long moment then stalked off.
"Work now, play later," Moreta said, continuing to strip the needlethorns down.
"It's as easy to combine work and play." Alessan drew a gentle finger from her ear to her shoulder.
They worked steadily, but each utilized every opportunity for a quick caress or a kiss exchanged as deft hands folded ging over a pile of needlethorns. They knelt by the bushes, knees or thighs touching. Moreta felt the light hairs of her arms rising toward his, she was becoming so sensitized to the delightful friction of his proximity. She had an idiotic desire to giggle and saw that Alessan, too, wore a rather foolish grin on his face most of the time. They were scarcely conscious of the others and almost forgot their existence until B'lerion and Oklina crashed to the top of the ravine.
"You have been busy," B'lerion said with grudging approval. "Haven't you noticed the heat?" He had stripped to the waist, and Oklina had tied her shirt up under her breasts, leaving her midriff bare. She carried four nets of packaged needlethorns. "I'm hungry, too, even if you aren't." He swung his shirt by the sleeves so that its burden was discernible. "Found some ripe fruit and chopped down one of those palms for the edible heart. You can't keep on at the pace you've been going"-he gestured to the filled nets-"without sustenance– and a bit of a rest in this humidity. Capiam! Desdra! Let's eat!"
Capiam and Desdra were arguing about the astringent properties of the ging sap when they sauntered up to join the others. Capiam, too, had stripped off his tunic, which was now draped over his shoulders. He was very thin, his ribs showing plainly.
"I know it's hot," Moreta began adroitly, "but none of us can return to Ruatha suffering from sunburn."
Capiam exhibited a leaf he was using as a fan. "Or heat prostration. " He raised his eyebrows in satisfaction with the filled nets. "We left ours back a bit. I rather thought we should rest, as is the custom on this hot island, during the hottest part of the day."
Everyone agreed that that was a sensible idea.
"I found some melons and the red roots that Istans are so fond of," Desdra said, producing her contribution.
"There're clusters of softnuts on all the trees, Alessan. That is, if you can climb at all," Moreta said.
"I climb, you catch."
Alessan took on" his shirt to keep it from being torn. Moreta used it as a receptacle for the softnuts. He was a dexterous climber and a swift picker. When finished, he sought his reward in a close embrace, his hands slipping up the back of her tunic, caressing her shoulders as she found, to her surprise, that his skin was as soft as Orlith's and the smell of him almost spicy in his maleness.
They recalled themselves to the task, not wishing to take too long for what was a simple enough operation. Moreta decided that her flush would be attributed to an incipient sunburn.
"Sun's rays at this latitude are too strong for winter-white skins," Desdra said, lounging on some ging fronds that she and Capiam cut just for that purpose. "And that heat's enough to drain anyone," she added, making use of Capiam's fan.
They relaxed during the meal. The red roots were succulent, the softnuts just ripe, and the melons so close to fermentation that the Juice had a winey tang to it. The palm heart was crisply cool and crunchy, a nice texture to complement the others. Throughout the meal, B'lerion kept up a stream of quip and comment about his being one-handed in a venture that was destined to save the continent. Would he receive full marks for his participation or just half for the hand that had worked?
"Is he always like this?" Alessan asked quietly after B'lerion had told an extravagantly fu
"He sings a good descant, but B'lerion's always seemed to be the epitome of a bronze rider." ,