"At least we'll have the advantage of strength over some parents of Cathays," Fendros said, looking at Rhazii as the cub brought his tail to his mouth with his hands again. The end of Rhazii's tail was almost always sticky or moistened with saliva these days. After a short pause, Fendros looked to Ahnasha, "Say, how have you been feeling lately? Has the extra sleep been doing you good? It has for me."

Before Ahnasha answered, Fendros noticed Rhazii's face begin to momentarily strain in an unmistakable way. They would probably would not be able to get too deep into the conversation before moving somewhere to clean Rhazii.

With an apprehensive gentleness, Sabine inspected Kaleeth's head fins with her fingers. They felt as strange as they looked; they lightly bent at the touch, but seemed flexible enough not to snap,and the webbing was more like skin than scales. The strangeness of them almost made Sabine giggle. "Hair is annoying. It picks up sweat and dirt, it dries slowly, it gets tangled, and it keeps growing," Sabine responded, though not with too much annoyance as she tested the flexibility of Kaleeth's fin webbing with her thumb and forefinger, "The hair on the head seems to grow the most. You need special salves and brushes to make it straight and shiny like other women," Sabine withdrew her hand and pulled on a matted lock of her own hair, "that's why mine is all messy. Ariel tried to brush the tangles out when I stayed with her for a night, but she stopped because it pulled my hair too much and hurt. Even Meesei's feathers don't tangle like that. You are both lucky that you don't have hair." Sabine still managed to smile, Kaleeth's company wasn't nearly as intimidating as the sailors. They both seemed curious enough about each other that the conversation felt good. "At least I won't get hair on my face, like men do," Sabine remarked with a wider smile.