Page 56 of Mated on Live

Serval hissed something Sophie didn’t quite understand as he pushed her away in favor of coming to Sophie’s side as she choked on her laughter. He grabbed onto her waist, clutching her to him as his sister laughed.

“I did not play with my olules into my teens,” he said, like that was the worst thing she’d said. “And you stay away from my mate.”

“Valorei,” Ellow gave her daughter a look. “Go make sure their room is ready.”

“We checked it like five times.”

“Check it again.” Ellow’s voice did that deep, firm thing that moms somehow perfected. Valorei didn’t argue any further as she turned to do as she was asked. Ellow beamed back at Sophie. “Come, let’s introduce you to the rest of the family. Everyone is so excited to meet you!”

She wasn’t kidding.

Sophie was quickly enveloped in a storm of happy, excited allowee. She met Serval’s aunt – who behaved just like his mother – and their uncle who looked like he was just happy to be there and didn’t have a thought in his head. His cousins were a group of big, muscular males that worked on the family ovili farm, which required a lot of heavy lifting and swimming. All of them posed for her and offered to steal her from Serval, which just made Serval grumpy and hang onto her harder. Sophie could only laugh, because she sensed their playfulness.

Besides his blood relatives, there were also five other families that shared their commu. And Sophie met practically all of them. She quickly forgot names and faces as they were paraded in front of her, all of them grabbing her hand warmly, smiling so wide with their sharky teeth. However, no one hugged her, and she couldn’t help but notice that, when they approached, their olules all began to point backwards, like they were standing in a strong wind.

No one wanted them to touch her with them, she realized. And it was only her. When they were around the others, they didn’t seem to care. Sometimes, their olules just reached out and touched an arm or a shoulder without seeming to notice. No one really wrapped their olules together, but they also didn’t seem to mind them brushing against each other.

They didn’t want to sting her. They knew their olules could be hurtful to people who weren’t allowee and they were trying to be considerate. Sophie didn’t know if all allowee stings would be okay for her or if it was just Serval, so she let it happen without comment.

She noticed as she met more people that the older a person, the longer their olules. When she met the elders of the commu, their oldest member had olules that reached all the way to her calves. They never stopped growing but couldn’t be cut because they were sensitive like fingers.

And when she met the youngest members of the commu, little babies cradled in their father’s arms, they looked totally bald. Meanwhile, the kids running around between people’s legs had nubs or short stubs wiggling upright in the air.

The young ones didn’t have the color differentiation that the adults did. They were the same shade all over their body, from their olules to their toes, which seemed to be a color between the dark and light color their skin would eventually become. It was also impossible for her to differentiate their gender just from looking – which was really impressive since a few were naked. She just kind of thought they all happened to be girls until one was called a he.

The surprise must have shown on her face, because Serval chuckled as he walked her away from his latest batch of friends.

“Rei are not sexually dimorphic, but he’s already declared his gender.”

“Huh?” She looked at him, confused.

“We’re born rather genderless,” he said, smiling at the rei running around. “We have the capacity to become either. Our gender manifests in puberty. He doesn’t have any external signs yet, but the rei usually know before we do what they’ll become.”

“That’s… so… cool!” She laughed, grabbing onto him.

He chuckled. “It’s rather rare in the universe, true. When our external genitalia manifest, we have a beading ceremony, where we’re given our first beaded skirt, based on our gender.”

“You can’t take a DNA test or something to figure it out before then?”

“No, I told you. We can become either. Our genetics isn’t split into male or female. We carry the capacity for both. It’s rather random which one you’ll get, though I believe it’s based partially on how many of the other gender are around you growing up. If you are raised around a bunch of males, it’s more likely you’ll manifest as female, and so on.”

She looked around at his predominantly male cousins. “So, I should expect girls from you.”

“If the gender is determined our way, yes. Unless they spend more time with my sister. But even then, it’s not fully guaranteed what you’ll get,” he said, running his hand down her hip. “It will be interesting to see how they emerge, combining our two genetics, but I will adore our rei regardless of how they manifest.”

Sophie smiled at him but didn’t get to say anything else because at that moment dinner was called and everyone began moving inside.

The piece of land Serval’s commu lived on was shaped like a crescent moon, a big one, with the bay of their island forming the ovili farm they harvested. Their homes were built both on land and underwater around the rest of the edge of the moon. One large building at the bottom curve of the moon served as a communal area where food was served for everyone or where the clan could gather and enjoy time together.

And in the middle of the moon, speckled throughout, were the nesting pools.

Sophie knew immediately what they were, even before being told. They were little ponds ranging from the size of a kiddie pool to the largest, central pool that was the size of a regular swimming pool. They were cut off from the ocean, and the area around them was carefully carved into sitting and lounging areas that had been worn completely smooth by time.

But what really set them apart was the glowing.

All the pools glowed, shining bright, silvery blue, even in the afternoon sunlight. They were clear, allowing her to see straight to the bottom, but they were illuminated with their own glow. Not speckled like there was phytoplankton in the water. The water itself glowed like it was radioactive.

Paths made of seashells, worn smooth by generations of feet, wound through the pools in soft, gentle curves. No path was straight, because to make a straight path would have meant needing to cut through a nesting pool, and Serval already told her they would never do that.

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