Free The Druid Gene by Jennifer Foehner Wells Page A

Um, is he…she…?” Darcy asked with a sidelong glance toward Nembrotha, who no longer seemed to be interested, but whom she suspected was listening.
    Selpis’s large eyes blinked slowly and Darcy thought she detected amusement.
    “They are hermaphroditic and I would recommend you take care not to misgender them. They get a little grumpy when people do that. Understandably, I think.”
    “Oh.” Well, that made sense then. Darcy reminded herself not to stare, but she was intrigued by Selpis’s anatomy, just as she’d been by the hymenoptera. Selpis’s ancestors had clearly learned to walk upright at some point in their distant past, just as humans had. But their tails, flowing to a tapered point directly from their trunks, must have altered the way that their pelvises had evolved. Selpis was bowlegged. Her tail appeared to be prehensile, curling around her body. Perhaps it lent balance to her upright stance.
    Selpis’s face wasn’t the pointy, triangular face you’d expect from a lizard. It came to a softer point, pushed back and rounded, displaying brachycephaly—the same phenomenon that makes the faces of human infants and baby animals appealing. Combined with her large, limpid eyes, it gave her a very youthful appearance.
    There was frank understanding in the delicate features of Selpis. She seemed calm and kind as she settled into a tranquil position that reminded Darcy of a yoga pose, her fingers splayed out over her corded knees and her thick tail wrapped around her body. Darcy decided instantly that she liked her.
    Silence fell as they regarded each other in furtive glances. Darcy’s heart returned to a more normal rhythm as she came to terms with the newest situation she found herself in.
    Nembrotha slowed their agitated slithering, though the stalks on their head continued to ripple and twitch. The motion brought to Darcy’s mind her childhood dog, scenting the air. Perhaps there were chemoreceptors in those organs.
    Darcy tried to relax, but it was very difficult because she felt like she was being watched, assessed. She couldn’t stop looking for some sign of Adam in the sea of bodies, and that just meant she continued to catalog exotic faces.
    Someone should have told Hollywood a long time ago that aliens weren’t anthropomorphized animals. Sure, economics probably dictated that aliens in sci-fi would have to look human with some slightly different defining aspect—scales for a reptilian species overlaid on a human face, for example—because makeup was infinitely less expensive than CG.
    But reality was quite different. Hollywood got it right that sentient alien life would take many forms, evolve from many kinds of species, but as it turned out they weren’t just human versions of lizards or insects or slugs. They seemed to be lizards or insects or slugs that had developed a certain, almost undefinable type of useful intelligence.
    Something in the back of her mind speculated about the conditions under which this type of intelligence might evolve—was a certain brain mass necessary? A requisite body size? Or perhaps it required opposable digits or simply the use of tools. None of that explained Nembrotha. Maybe every species was on the same path to sentience, but took a greater or lesser span of time to achieve it.
    It was too much. She sat down on the mat in the center of her yellow octagon, curled her knees up and rested her forehead on them. She wished for Adam to hold her the way he had in the gorge, to help her feel better. She wanted it all to go away.
    “Feeling overwhelmed? That’s natural. You’ve just arrived. It’s an adjustment,” Selpis said gently.
    Darcy didn’t reply. She just shook her head.
    Nembrotha piped up, “You don’t know the half of it. Her anatomy’s been violated.”
    Selpis said, “Violated? That’s…a bit unusual, even here.”
    Nembrotha sounded disgusted. “You mean sex. I’m talking about surgery.”
    Darcy could almost see the reptile’s pupils