The scene with Baru and Iscend in the river before Baru’s parents find her is yet another chapter I would consider perfect. Of course the Clarified, selectively bred and conditioned from birth by a man who believes in passing down “flesh memories”, would be the ones to counter his methodology and posit the existence of genes. Of course Baru, even knowing that there doesn’t need to be a ‘reason’ for gay people to exist and deserve the same rights as everyone else, still can’t suppress an eureka moment when she theorizes that isoamory may be beneficial to a species overall.
All of the lore drops about how Falcresti gender roles - and the reasoning that they believe in them in the first place - is fascinating, like watching someone observe a pattern then confidently come to the wrong conclusion (much like modern western gender roles, but in a different direction). Baru unable to process any metaphor without putting economics in there somewhere. Iscend confessing that the first time she came was when a bunch of needles were shoved in her. - “I want to feel good in a way they didn’t plan for me.”
All of it is so fucking good.
