Chapter 331 - New Bee-fenders of the Hive
The next morning, the First of the Fifth’s First Daughter flew with Frelis and a dronedancer to the bumblebee meadow. King had taken the amazing, incredible seed found by the Fourth of the Seventh and tasked the hive of hives with deciding what to do with it, the queens and gardeners had discussed it before going to bed. The gardeners assessed that the seed required as large a living host as possible, preferably King-sized, so there was only one possibility.
The First Daughter arrived outside of the nest of the one of the bumblebees. The queen herself soon crawled out, ran a circle around the smaller bees, and then rushed over to start rubbing her antennae all over them.
The First Daughter could feel the bigger bee at the edge of her awareness, clearly part of the hive of hives, yet she hadn’t felt the bumblebee dance. She wasn’t sure the bumblebees could, their movements were simpler than the monster bees’ own. A second reason First Daughter had come here was to see if she could resolve that.
So, she unleashed her mana and focused it upon the bumblebee, with the dronedancer dancing to weave their mana together.
“First Bumblebee Queen of First Dynasty of First Bumblebee Spawner, want dance with hive of hives?”
The First Bumblebee Queen tilted her head and tapped her antennae around, clearly confused. But she enthusiastically accepted the First Daughter’s mana, allowing the First Daughter and the dronecaster to strengthen the bumblebee queen’s connection to the hive of hives. First Daughter could now look beyond the dances and the gestures and read the First Bumblebee Queen’s mana directly, gaining an insight into her mental state.
First Bumblebee queen was confused…as she thought she was already part of the hive of hives.
The First Daughter’s antennae drooped as she hastily began to dance.
“Of course! Bumblebees always part of hive of hives!”
The First Daughter was thoroughly chastised. She realized now…yes, she could feel the bumblebees and their impressions if she focused in. She hadn’t simply because their impressions weren’t as apparent as a monster bee’s dancing and so easily passed over during a hive of hives dance. She would have to take more care to pay attention to those bees that did not dance as powerfully as a monster bee queen.
First Bumblebee Queen didn’t seem bothered, though, as she happily zipped around again, then crawled back over to the First Daughter and stood, waiting there. First Daughter could tell she was curious as to the visit and took that as her cue to present her request.
“Have new seed, needs to grow in living thing. Can grow on bumblebee?”
First Bumblebee Queen began zipping around again, feeling quite happy to help. The First Daughter further resolved to include the bumblebees in more matters from now on, but for now continued with the request.
“Thanks, hive of hives thinks best to grow on new bee. Also thinks best to try on new queen so can make more bees, bumblebees can raise queens and drones?”
The bumblebees hadn’t raised any new queens, so the hive of hives wasn’t sure if they could or if they needed particular conditions to do so. Yet another purpose for the First Daughter’s visit today, if there was anything holding the bumblebees back, the hive of hives would do its utmost to help.
The First Bumblebee Queen, however, picked up speed as she ran around the First Daughter. The First Daughter’s antennae twitched. Apparently, not only could the bumblebees raise new queens and drones…they already were.
The First Daughter focused on her link with the bumblebee queen and, like with any queen in the hive of hives, found she could look through the eyes of the bumblebee’s children. She looked into the First Bumblebee Queen’s nest and indeed found a bigger wax pot than normal, being tended to by workers…or so she thought. But then she noticed several of the workers appeared different from the others. She looked more closely…and realized they were drones! Drones…that were acting like broodtenders!
The First Bumblebee Queen shifted her attention along with the First Daughter and her impressions provided additional clarity. Apparently, the bumblebees didn’t have to raise drones separately because their drones could instinctively help around the nest, so they already had some. They just needed a bit more time to grow than monster bee drones, which was why the bumblebees hadn’t raised new queens yet. But now the drones were fully grown and the bumblebees were ready for a new generation.
Stolen novel; please report.
“Amazing, incredible…bumblebees need honey to evolve drones?”
The First Bumblebee Queen indicated confusion. The First Daughter shifted her attention to the dronedancer with her.
“Evolved drones don’t die if mate, so don’t make King sad.”
But the First Bumblebee Queen remained confused, tapping her antennae around again. Now the First Daughter joined her in confusion, did she not understand the explanation? First Daughter focused more closely on the First Bumblebee Queen, trying to decipher more nuance out of her impressions…and then froze solid.
First Bumblebee Queen was confused because…her instincts told her that bumblebee drones didn’t die in the first place, even after mating. First Daughter observed the bumblebee drones more closely…and found them using mana freely to tend the brood like any worker would. And like any worker…their mana slowly began replenishing as soon as it was used.
It took the First Daughter a moment before she could respond, while the dronecaster with her dropped the connection as he froze as well.
“Bumblebees…amazing, incredible.”
Belissar handed the monster plant-hybrid seed off to the hive of hives, believing that they would be able to figure out the best way to plant it on a bee. After that, it was well into the night and the sigmaka-Compact negotiations would resume the next morning, so everyone went home to get what sleep they could.
Belissar, fortunately, was blessed to be a Tower Keeper who would be restored by the Tower when he awoke, so he had no trouble waking up the next morning. He skipped his own breakfast since he’d be eating at the meeting, but he still held his morning briefing where the bees reported on things he wanted to keep track of. And, both to his surprise but also as he expected, the bees reported the hive of hives had already made a decision on the new seed.
“Frelis says seed wants big host, so hive of hive wants give to bumblebees. Bumblebees raising queens and drones, will give to new queen. King says ok?”
Belissar smiled and nodded.
“Of course. Ah, just let me know before you do, I’m supposed to let Wardmaster Varilold know too.”
“Ok!”
The wardmaster remained in his dungeon last night, using the time before the delegation arrived to work on the wards in his Tower, so Belissar was able to visit her right away. She agreed to the idea of using it on a newly born monster rather than any of his existing queens, so Belissar gave the hive of hives permission to proceed.
At that point, the delegations from both sides started to arrive, so it was time for Belissar to make his way back to the negotiations as well. Belissar served them a light breakfast again today, much to everyone’s delight, and talks resumed smoothly. Second Queen Berbiya and Loremaster Anyadre, on behalf of Wardmaster Varilold, ended up making the same recommendation: making a preliminary agreement solely regarding mutual defense so that the new alliance could begin preparing defenses immediately, and then discuss all other topics for as long as required.
There was some back and forth but with the wardmaster’s prompting both sides agreed to this. It still took them the rest of the day to work out the details of the mutual defense pact, but in the end they got it done. The overall gist of the agreement was simple, the sigmaka would enter into the same terms with both Belissar and the fair folk as Belissar and the fair folk had with each other: mutual defense against unprovoked attacks by other parties and mutual guarantees not to harm each others’ people, subject to terms and conditions of course. The wardens would be permitted to set up defenses in the sigmaka’s territory with coordination and approval by the sigmaka, while all parties would grant military access to their lands if and when they declared a crisis and requested assistance.
There was still much to settle but the agreement would be sufficient to allow the wardens to begin their work, as well as to enable military coordination should a crisis arise before a full compact was signed. As such, both sides agreed to bring King Ratuatapi and the signatories or their authorized representatives tomorrow to sign the preliminary agreement. From tomorrow on, the sigmaka would join Belissar’s alliance with the fair folk in full, upgrading his own pact with them as well into a bulwark against all foes.
Which might prove very timely indeed, for the Fourth of the Seventh’s new tunneling nomadic bees had just found a strand of spiderkin web down in the Underway…
While King was busy in the Beyond, the hive of hives moved to fulfill his will. The new seed was moved to the First Bumblebee Queen’s nest along with some monster bee gardeners and healing bees from the Second of the Sixth. The First Bumblebee Queen’s hive prepared a new wax pot that the hive of hives filled with mana honey, holding off on the swirled honey as to avoid overwhelming either the seed or the new queen. First Bumblebee Queen laid a new queen egg in the pot, then the gardeners laid the seed alongside it before the bumblebees sealed up the pot.
From then on, healing bees, gardener bees, bumblebee drones, and even a bumblebee gardener began to monitor the pot. First Bumblebee Queen watched as they passed their mana through the pot, then turned around to report.
“Seed…still sleeping. Needs egg to hatch!”
“Egg growing! Should hatch ok, will check then.”
First Bumblebee Queen happily spun around and then returned to her other business. Most of the bees departed, arranging shifts to keep one bee watching the wax pot until the egg grew closer to hatching.
But as they were arranging the shifts…none of them noticed when a tiny stream of golden mana passed from the roots of the flowers in the walls of the bumblebees’ subterranean nest…and to the wax pot and the seed within…