Valley of Gold you may encounter the body

Tvar’s spin on things elicited a huff of laughter from the youth. He supposed that was one way of looking at it. He drew in a breath, his chest expanding with it, then blew it out with a slight raspberry only his brother-in-law would hear. Luckily, it wasn’t loud enough to drown out the man’s followup questions.

-“Yeah… if she’s not at the caldera, she’s gotta be somewhere around here,”- he said, gesturing at the lowlands. Looking for me, Bushtit thought with another heaping helping of guilt. -“We probably just missed each other,”- he added, some of the remaining tension loosening as he allowed himself to feel reassured.

Sometimes, Towhee’s deafness was a pain in the ass. Bushtit knew better than to say that, not just because of Jr’s own condition but because he was in polite company. His dark eyes swung to Tvar, taking a moment to assess his sister’s mate. Now that his panic was subsiding, his curiosity grew.

-“It’s good to meet you, Tvar. Sorry about all the confusion and stuff,”- Bushtit said, cheeks warm as he realized he’d embarrassed himself in front of him. -“Thanks for being so gracious about it,”- he murmured, then cleared his throat and asked, -“So, when are your guys’ kids due?”-

They’d wanted to meet with Towhee and they’d gotten him instead. Bushtit hoped he could salvage the situation a bit, his curiosity about their offspring quite genuine. He knew about the mechanics, though if Towhee had ever specifically mentioned gestation, he couldn’t remember how long it usually lasted. And it wasn’t like he knew when these two had boned—a thought which had him wrinkling his nose and laughing, seemingly inexplicably.