The Bees
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‘Linden!’ His shout echoed around the holy chamber. ‘Come here, you fine little runt, and taste your namesake – lime-blossom is good eating!’
‘Only the best for me.’ A small drone straightened his neck-ruff and crossed to where Sir Quercus stood gorging. When he bent to taste it, the other pushed his face in it, then grabbed him by the fur and pulled him out, laughing at his jest.
‘A king’s share, to console you for your certain failure.’
Sir Linden wiped his face of honey and forced a grim smile.
‘You are too sure, my brother. For I hear of queens who will favour wit over strength.’ He pulled his ruff straight. ‘Such a one will be mine.’
‘Ha!’ Sir Quercus patted him so hard he staggered. ‘My wit is all pent in my prick, so I shall triumph with her as well.’
‘Unless a crow choose you first and snap you in its great blue beak!’
The sisters gasped at the mention of the bird.
‘More likely take you,’ said Sir Quercus, ‘who can barely keep up with a butterfly. Though you’d not make much of a feast.’
Sir Linden continuing his grooming. ‘Unlike you, so large and magnificent.’
‘You speak truly.’ Sir Quercus turned to the sisters. ‘Fortune favours me, does she not, ladies?’ And he swelled his sturdy thorax, raised his fur in three tall crests on his head, and pumped his male aroma so it rose up around him in a cloud. Some sisters swooned, and some, like Sister Prunus, spontaneously applauded.
‘Who will groom me?’
Several sisters rushed forward and other drones unlatched their wings in invitation and they too were attended. Flora began edging to the doors.
‘You there – wait!’ Sister Prunus came towards her. ‘We have not called for Sanitation – what in the air is a dirty flora doing here? Did housekeeping leave the scent-gate down again?’
Flora was about to answer, then held her tongue. She nodded and grunted.
‘Oh, these shortages are becoming abominable. The wrong kin everywhere – and yours so stupid and slow you cannot follow the simplest track.’ Sister Prunus looked at Flora suspiciously. ‘Unless you were stealing!’
Flora urgently shook her head and put her antennae low. Her kin behaved cravenly, she had seen and hated it so many times – but now she did the same, backing away as if in terror. She bumped into someone behind her, and Sister Prunus smacked her on the head between the antennae.
‘Your Maleness, allow me to apologise.’ Sister Prunus smiled sweetly. ‘Please forgive the soiling contact. I will call a higher kin to groom you clean.’
‘From Sanitation, is she?’ It was Sir Linden, the only drone unattended. ‘Are they all so hairy? Do not trouble yourself, Sister Primrose, today I have a mind for something different. This one may groom me.’
‘Your Maleness – a flora?’
‘Do not question His Maleness’s particular preference.’ He looked at Flora, and she saw how honey was still caught in his fur. ‘Bring me some spurge nectar.’
‘Spurge? Your Maleness jests!’ Sister Prunus laughed hysterically. ‘He knows that we would never serve it, corrupt as it is from the Myriad’s feet.’ She folded her hands. ‘You will not find it in this hive.’
‘Oh. A pity, for I heard it was good, with a cricket’s kick.’
‘Your Maleness, nobody here would say that, for no forager—’
‘It was no forager, Sister Plantain—’
‘Prunus, Your Maleness.’
‘As you wish, madam. But it was a fine dark fellow at Congregation who stank of it, and he said it made his dronewood hard as the twig we stood on.’
‘Stop, please! Your Maleness speaks too boldly—’
‘At least, I think that’s what he said, in his thick and foreign tongue.’
‘Foreign?’ Sister Prunus recovered herself. ‘From what direction? I only ask because the Sage like to be informed of all immigrants in our neighbourhood.’ She lowered her voice. ‘In case of disease, you see. Also, they take our nectar.’
‘Calm yourself, Sister, this Congregation was further than you could fly.’
‘Oh, I am just a house-bee, I did not presume! But – Your Maleness is not thinking of inviting any guests? Our pantries are emptier than we would like—’
‘Do you not think I have enough competition as it is?’ Sir Linden looked gloomily at the other drones being groomed. ‘In any case, the dark fellow was last seen leading the field in pursuit of a very fine princess, and is probably now king in some sumptuous palace. Run and tell your dreary priestesses that.’
‘Fresh news, I shall!’ Sister Prunus bobbed a curtsy, rejuvenated with excitement. ‘News is always of value to Sister Sage – thank you, Your most generous Maleness.’ She ran off.
Flora started after her, anxious to be gone.
‘You’re not going anywhere.’ Sir Linden pointed to his crotch. ‘You have to groom me. I can’t be the only one without someone.’
At his strong smell, another pheromone lock burst open inside Flora’s antennae. Her mind flooded with disordered images—
—larva babies in their cradles – a shrivelled wing pulled taut—
She felt him trying to push her down.
‘Are you deaf? Groom me when I tell you – it’s the Law.’
A baby on a hook—
Flora shoved him away and ran out into the prayer-filled corridor. He followed.
‘I am a Prince of the realm! You will obey me!’
Trapped between the drone and a phalanx of identical Sage priestesses marching towards the Fanning Hall in a cloud of incense, Flora hunched herself down like the lowliest sanitation worker.
‘How dare you—’ Sir Linden lunged for her and slipped in the path of the Sage priestesses. Unable to pass a male without obeisances, they were forced to stop while he got to his feet, cursing wildly.
Flora did not look back but ran as fast as she could. She almost missed the small dark doorway, but as she dashed in to hide, the ground fell away under her feet and she tumbled, for it was not a room, but a staircase.
The steps were deep and steep and she kept her wings tight against her body as she struggled to right herself. Falling against an old wax wall, she clung and listened for pursuit from above.
There was neither scent nor sound, only the pumping of her own blood and the thirsty pull of air into her breathing spiracles. Flora forced her panic down. Her newly functioning antennae told her she was on the lowest level of the hive, and the final flight of steps levelled out into a narrow corridor that led to a door. She crept forward to scan what was beyond.
Through the old wax she first detected the distinctive odour of her own kin, and then the long inert forms of bees. It was a worker dormitory, and a cleaning detail. Deeply relieved, Flora opened the door – and stepped into the morgue.
Several of her kin-sisters stared back in equal surprise, then emitted a strange sound, that might have been laughter. One signalled her to close the door, then they continued taking bodies down from the racks. For the first time, Flora became conscious of a definite intelligence behind their strange faces. With a start of excitement, she understood that these floras were from the top echelon of Sanitation, taking the cadavers to the landing board, to fly them out of the hive.
Flora bit hold of the biggest, heaviest corpse she could see, a bald old sister from Patisserie with hidden pollen in her pockets. Then she followed her kin-sisters out of the morgue towards the sun-warmed wood of the landing board, and the vault of sky beyond.
Eight
A great crowd blocked the lobby to the landing board and the sanitation corpse-bearers were forced to wait. Eddies of warm dry wind swirled towards them, then came cheers and applause as bees pressed back to make a corridor of space, and the foragers came rushing through. Awestruck, Flora stared at the dishevelled sisters with their blazing faces and radiant ragged wings, who smelled of no kin but the wild high air. They ran into an imposing atrium that opened off the lobby, from where there was more stamping and cheering, and the crowd poured in behind them.
The sanitation workers moved on towards the landing board, into a cordoned-off area, to prevent contamination of higher kin passing to and fro on hive business. The sun’s warmth created a festive atmosphere, and Flora thrilled at the sound of her sisters’ flight engines humming through their registers. She watched water-gatherers returning with bulging throats, their faces sculpted sleek from their work, then chains of receivers passed in exotic loads of raw pollen, never dropping a single grain. More wind-blown foragers came and went and Flora admired them with all her heart.
‘Corpse-bearers next!’ It was the stentorian voice of a Thistle, traditional guards of the landing board.
Flora walked out of the dark, closed hive into a dazzling world of light and space, and a floor made of wood. It was completely blank of any codes except the bright scent beacons laid along the edge to guide the foragers home, and the only other marker was the sun.
‘It’s busy, so stay low and be quick.’ The Thistle guard spoke loud and slow. ‘You know where to go – don’t linger, and return on the left.’
Flora shook her head.
‘Your cleansing flight – even your kin can remember that one place.’ The Thistle called to the bees jostling behind Flora. ‘Patience, sisters!’
Flora raised her antennae, searching for information. It made her head hurt and she looked down. Below the landing board in the tangle of grass and nettle and dock and trefoil that locked to the dense wet earth, disturbing scents wove strong and strange, telling of other creatures that lived there. The green began to seethe.
‘Stop that – no one looks down.’ The Thistle pulled Flora away. Both of them turned at the huge rumble of thoracic engines. The pungent smell of drones billowed out onto the landing board and led by Sir Quercus the drones marched out. Plumes high, visors down and their massive chests expanded, they turned to the Thistle sentries and showed their best aspects. The Thistle guards dropped nominal curtsies.
‘Worship to Your Malenesses.’ Their tone was respectful, if not fervent.
‘And honour to our hive!’ roared Sir Quercus, and all his brothers cheered as they crowded out onto the landing board. The smell of honey percolated through their thick aroma. As one, the sisters looked down. Their precious golden wealth clogged the drones’ feet, was trodden across the landing board and trailed back into the hive. Shocked faces of other sisters crowded in the doorway behind them and the Thistle guards’ antennae flickered rapidly at each other. No one said a word.
With a mighty bang the drones unlatched their wings, fired their engines for flight and tuned their roars to a rousing thunder. Flora saw Sir Linden at the rear, his fur still sticky as he struggled to stabilise his own slightly higher pitch. Too late she shrank behind a Thistle guard.
‘You there!’ he shouted into the noise. ‘How dare you disobey me? Come and lick my feet clean—’
He jumped back as a forager landed on the board in front of him.
‘Make way, Your Maleness.’ She pushed past to where Flora stood with Sister Thistle. ‘Lily 500 returning.’ Her nectar-scented voice was hoarse, her bright ragged wings told her age, but she radiated energy like a tiny sun.
‘Madam Forager, we know you well.’ Sister Thistle bowed deeply to her.
Lily 500 was about to go into the hive, then turned to the drones.
‘No sister shall lick our sacred honey from your feet. Would you draw the Myriad to watch and mock us?’
‘What Myriad, noble crone?’ Sir Quercus barged forward. ‘There are none today, so wish us Queenspeed and be out of our way!’
The old forager glanced at Flora, but spoke only to the Thistle.
‘You are charged to keep the board clear, yet a corpse-bearer lingers.’
‘Forgive us, Madam Forager, you are right, but they have sent out an ignorant one! What am I supposed to do? I cannot send a corpse back in, and she certainly cannot drop it from the board—’
‘As if I would suggest that. Shortages and incompetence—’ Lily 500 pulled out one of Flora’s wings. ‘Nothing the matter with them!’ She scanned Flora’s antennae with her own. Flora winced, and the forager looked to the guard. ‘They have wrecked her brain so badly it is a wonder she can see or hear.’
‘Good madams!’ interrupted Sir Quercus. ‘Gossip elsewhere: you delay our squadron. We like to leave with a good show, not all raggle-taggle like you ancient independents. So now if you would kindly move.’
Lily 500 held her ground. She flicked an antenna and a young Clover receiver ran out from the hive, knelt before her and opened her mouth. Lily 500 arched her body, triggering a stream of golden nectar from her own crop into the Clover’s mouth. When there was no more, the Clover bobbed a curtsy and ran back inside.
‘Crone vomit?’ Sir Quercus was appalled. ‘Is that what we’re drinking?’
‘Nectar, Sir. How did you think we carried it?’ Lily 500 turned to Flora. ‘Hold your burden tight, and follow.’
She pushed her off the board.
Blades of grass slashed towards Flora’s face, the rough wooden slats of the hive grazed past her antennae and the sun spun as she tumbled through the air. She flailed for balance and then, with a thunderous vibration, her flight engine fired her up in a great jet of speed and she was aloft, mounting the air behind the silver trace of Lily 500’s wings. Behind her came the massive blast of the drone squadron lifting off, and faint cheering from the hive far below, but she did not look down.
They rose up over the orchard, cool wind streaming down Flora’s sides and fluttering the dried edges of the dead sister’s wings, still held tight in her mouth. The sun warmed her wings and a thrilling power surge took her higher so that the world spread wide in all directions, the grid of green and brown below, the dark rise of the hills, the rough odour of the sprawling town—
It seemed to Flora that she heard the Holy Chord, though that was impossible for they were far beyond the hive. Its source was Lily 500, her wings two humming arcs of light around her. Flora sped forward to her side. The old forager veered away and Flora followed through trails and tunnels of scent, sweet and bitter threads of odour, focusing into the strong clear scent of resin and propolis as the conifers came into range. Lily 500 made a tight agile loop around Flora, forcing her down so she saw where to make her drop.
With the release of the burden Flora shot up into the sunshine and flew loops of pure joy and relief. Her vision sharpened so that far below she could see two raucous bluebottles chase each other, and below them, male mosquitoes whined their song over a pond, their blue streamers fluttering from their antennae. Even lower the dark blood-filled females cruised at the water’s edge and Flora stored every minute detail before she surged higher. For the first time in her life she was utterly free, with no walls or rules to curb her, and she dived and soared for joy. The more the sun warmed her, the greater grew her strength and skill and she looked for Lily 500 to thank her – but the old forager was already a speck in the distance.
She was alone in the bright vastness. In an instant, a ravenous hunger seized Flora’s body and homesickness hit her soul so hard that she cried out in surprise. She could not smell the Queen, nor any sisters, nor the hive, the orchard, nor one familiar thing.
The more she searched, the more the void of sky pressed her body to a speck, until she felt so small and alone that without a sister to cling to she thought she was dying. When her body lifted on a wave of acrid air, Flora soared crazily and saw that it came from a great black bird high above her – a crow! Her alarm glands fired and she sped away from it in blind panic.
Devotion Devotion Devotion – Flora searched the air for any scent trace of Holy Mother and scanned the foreign shapes and colours below her in an effort to reorient herself. Massive green and beige fields dulled the air with their monotonous scent and she veered away to glean any clue for home. With a surge of relief she picked up the scent of the orchard and then of her sisters – never more beautiful. Their mingled scent grew stronger as Flora entered the air corridor back to the hive, and her joy in flight was nothing compared to her gratitude in homecoming. The little green ruffle of the orchard came into view, and then the tiny grey square of the beehive. Not until this moment had Flora known how much she loved it and all who lived there. She could not wait to fold her wings and run into its warm depths, and press wing to wing with her sisters in the sacrament of Devotion.
At the thought of the Queen, Flora scented the precious molecules of her divine fragrance, poised and spinning like jewels where the air currents converged. Her heart filled with passion and confidence, but as the hive came nearer and the earth and trees raced past below, she saw foragers streaming back through the orchard, racing for the landing board. A new scent mixed with the homecoming scent, and as Flora began her descent her venom sac swelled hard in her belly and her dagger unsheathed.
The code was alarm: the hive was under attack.
Nine
Laid at close intervals along the length of the landing board, the alarm pheromone flashed its message across the orchard air. The last foragers rushed to get in as a foul alien scent mingled with it, sweet and corrupt like rotting fruit. It came from the lurid straggle of wasps hovering near the hive, drunk and jeering. Flora could hear her sisters yelling at her to hurry, but as she descended through the smeary marker trails the wasps littered in their wake, they turned their black gazes on her and sizzled their stings in welcome.
Flora curved up again on a blade of air and the wasps shrieked with laughter at her cowardice – before she hurtled at one of them and knocked the vile creature out of the air into the apple leaves. The touch of the wasp’s body against hers enraged her and she drove herself up higher, looking for another. But the wasps were already above her, buzzing high and furious as they swayed on their points of air, not to be taken like that again.
‘Dirty fiends!’ shouted one of the Thistle guards to the wasps. ‘Infidel!’ But her trembling antennae gave lie to her brave words.
Flora dropped down onto the landing board between the sentries. She smelled their flaring war-glands and knew her own streamed as strong, but a wave of fear came from within the hive.
‘What did we expect,’ muttered another guard in a low voice, ‘leaving honey on the board? Advertising our wealth to the Myriad, no one to clean it, everyone rushing out crazed as soon as the sun shines—’
She sprayed a great jet of her war scent into the air and the wasps laughed shrilly. They flung back the challenge with a hard gust of their own harsh smell and its oily particles settled on the landing board.
‘Closer!’ yelled the first Thistle who had spoken, her antennae rigid with rage. ‘I cannot smell you until I stick my dagger between your filthy plates.’ She too buzzed a blast of her war-gland at them.
‘Oh, you fat and useless creature,’ called back one of the wasps, pirouetting to show her tiny waist. ‘What pale squirt was that? I doubt you can even fly.’ Her friends reeled in the air, hissing with laughter.
‘Stay!’ A new Thistle held back her colleague. ‘They try to draw us.’ She motioned to Flora. ‘You’re big and brave – get inside and hold the line.’
* * *
Sisters stood densely packed and silent, their battle glands flaring and weapons at the ready. The smell of fear trickled up here and there, but every sister pointed her antennae forward and none gave way to it. Flora waited in the vanguard as the Thistle pumped out wave after wave of war scent, but the orchard was silent.
The bees waited. Murmurs began. Perhaps the wasps had gone. Wings crushed, the heat was rising, and a tide of irritation seeped through the crowd. And then – a wave of acid air rushed in and every sister’s feet felt the heavy alien vibration as a great wasp settled on the landing board. There was the sound of a hard scuffle and then a cracking sound. A Thistle guard screamed, then another. Standing right at the front, Flora saw it all.
The wasp was a huge female with bands of acid yellow and glossy black. Her head was as large as three sisters’ and she used her slashing claws to catch the guards one by one, killing each one with a snap of her heavy jaws. Then she flattened her long antennae, crouched down and peered inside the hive.
Spasms of fear shot through all the bees at the sight of her glittering malevolent eyes, but not one of them moved. Flora stared back at the wasp and felt her dagger slide out. The wasp smiled at her.
‘Pretty pretty …’ She drove a whip of her acid scent down the passageway, wrapping round the antennae of dozens of bees so that they yelped in anger and disgust. She pushed her huge face closer, blocking the light.
‘Greetings,’ she hissed softly, ‘my sweet, juicy cousins.’ Her claw flashed into the hive, close enough for Flora to see the entrails on its tip and smell the Thistle’s blood. To stop herself running, she dug her claws harder into the comb. Deep within the hive, a faint vibration pulsed towards her. It spoke in her mind.
Keep still. Hold firm and wait.
Flora gripped harder into the wax and held the wasp’s stare. The wasp gazed softly into her eyes, willing her closer. The scent of its malice rose stronger.
Draw her in, spoke the thought in Flora’s mind. Lure her, lure her …
Flora stepped backwards and all her sisters moved with her. The vibration in the comb came stronger and they felt it too. She kept her gaze locked with the wasp’s.
Lure her. Draw her.
Flora let her antennae tremble and the wasp pushed in closer.
‘Are you the one, shall it be you?’ Her voice had a soft sing-song cadence, but her gaze was hard and calculating. ‘What a fat feast you will make, little cousin …’ The wasp eased herself deeper into the hive entrance, and Flora could not hold in her fear, for with her sisters so dense behind her there was no retreat from mortal combat.
The wasp’s body rasped on the hive floor. Four of her six elbows were in, the only light the yellow striping of her face. Flora dug down into the wax again, but the voice in her mind had stopped. She would be the first to die, but she would fight for her sisters’ lives, for Holy Mother’s life.
She unlatched her wings and heard the sound of every sister doing the same.
‘No,’ the wasp crooned, pulling her last pair of legs into the hive. ‘We should not fight: all I want is to take you to meet the chil … dren, all the hungry … little … children—’ A claw slashed out and she laughed. ‘Forgive me, you’re too delicious.’
DRAW HER …
The voice was clear and strong in Flora’s mind. She whimpered and backed away and the wasp crawled in after her. The smell was suffocating and her soft hissing struck terror into Flora’s body. She felt that all her sisters had crept around the edges and their numbers had filled from the back. There was no more room to move. The monster gathered herself to spring.
NOW!
Flora roared it as the wasp lunged – and sprang upon the monster’s back, her claws scrabbling for purchase on the slippery armour.
The wasp hissed and writhed in a frenzy of rage, one sister after another shrieking as she snapped their heads in her jaws and ripped their bellies with her claws. Flora fought her way up to the wasp’s head and the lashing black whips of the creature’s antennae. She caught one in her mouth and bit down.
The wasp cried out and hurled herself against the walls, trying to crush her attacker against them. Flora clung on and spat the foul blood as below her sisters threw themselves at the thrashing foe. Then Flora lunged for the other antenna, cracking it off the wasp’s head so that the hole jetted pulses of green blood. Screaming in agony and rage, the blinded wasp killed sister after sister, but she was one against many and the tide of bees kept coming until the stinging biting weight of their bodies covered her and held her down unable to move.