She crossed her arms in front of her, narrowing her eyes at me. “See, you do not need me. I could have gone up with Guidy and Tegha to meet your bride.”
By the sea gods, this girl was just like her damn father. “Wrong. In fact, I need you to do the next check up,” I said, unhooking the leather satchel at my waist to throw it to her. “Make sure you do not forgetanyone.”
Her jaw dropped as she caught it. “You are joking, right?”
“Do I look like I am joking?” I deadpanned. Her throat bobbed. “Exactly. Go ahead. By the time you are done, we should be stopping for the night and expecting the human shuttle to arrive.”
She gave me a once over. “I truly hope you will take the time to shower and put on clean clothes.” Her wince told me everything I needed to know about my current appearance.
We had been walking fordaysalready and it would be a couple more weeks before we reached our summer destination.
“Of course I will,” I said, although I could not know for sure if I would be able to find a water source suitable for bathing near our camp tonight. “Do you take me for some savage?”
Juni pondered it but did not grace me with an answer. Instead, she asked, “How do you think she looks?”
I wish I knew. The only other human female I had ever seen was Ghauro’s female. She looked beautiful, but I had no idea if all of them looked similar…Human male varied from one to the next, it was only safe to assume it worked the same. As for my own species…I guess, for an untrained eye, females and males looked alike. But our colors went in a lot of different shades. Whereas I was a bright red, my brother was a grayish blue with purple undertones—which he had given to all his children and made me more and more of an outcast.
“I do not know,” I told Juni. “Icantell you that human females have something here,” I said, pointing at her chest. “Ghauro called itudders, but his human called itbreasts.”
She hummed quietly, still not leaving to take care of the task I had given her.
“So, you will make babies?” she asked suddenly and I nearly tripped.
Why wasIthe one having the reproduction talk with her?
“Shit,” I cursed under my breath. “Did you not have this kind of talk with your own parents?” I grumbled.
“Oh, I did. I know I was conceived in a bottle and grown into a glass box in the sky until I was big enough to be born.”
Right. The reproduction talk was a weird one to have nowadays.
“Father said your bride couldmakereal babies,” she said excitedly. “Like, inside herownbody. It sounds awesome!”
For fuck’s sakes. Why me?
“Uhm,yeah. That is about all you need to know.”
She frowned, and I couldfeelthe damn question forming in her mind.
Please, do not ask it. Please. Just, please.“Thenhoware babies made?”
Fucking fuck.
“Ask your father.”
She looked confused. I ignored her and kept moving forward, even increasing my pace. “But Idid,” she argued. “He told me about the box thing. And then, when he told us about your bride, he said she was the one who was going to carry the babies. What happened to the box?”
Someone please fall and need assistance. Anything to rescue me from this conversation.
No one did. Nothing saved me from having to explain. “The box was never supposed to happen,” I gritted out. “You know all the species in our system are infertile, right?” She nodded. “It is because ofthisthat the human created the box. So we would not go extinct while they fixed the whole issue.”
“So your bride is the one fixing this?” she asked innocently.
“Sort of. She is here to at leasttryto fix it.”
“And if she succeeds,” Juni asked, “will everyone get a human bride? Even me?”
Okay. That was enough for me. “Ask your father,” I gritted out again. “I will not be scolded by him because I told you how sex works.”
