“Stop at once!” voices shouted, and several Thistle guards ran out onto the board. “All flight is canceled by order of the Sage, effective immediately!”

Foragers waiting to leave shouted their disappointment, but more guards ran out and pushed all the bees back from the edge. Others began laying homecoming flares, and another pulled Sister Cowslip from Flora’s grasp and threw her over the edge.

“We should not do that!” Flora’s engine thrummed inside her chest, the filigree of blood vessels in her wings were tight with power, and her feet were light on the wood. To be so long in darkness and servitude, and then at the very lip of freedom to be turned away—

“They come—stand back!” The guards pushed all the bees back as returning foragers approached in the flight corridor to the hive. Some of them swerved wildly and Flora held her antennae aloft, but there was no trace of wasp attack, only the soil and the plants and the incoming sisters.

The first bee crashed onto the board at her feet. She was a forager from the kin of Poppy, but her scent was overlaid with something alien and ugly, and a gray film covered her whole body. She crawled toward Flora.

“Help me, Sister. I beg you.”

Some instinct made Flora jump back from the forager’s desperate lunge, and all the bees stared in bewildered horror as the Poppy stopped and was violently sick. Other bees came crashing down onto the board around her, their eyes wild and their bodies speckled with the gray film.

Thirteen

HER BODY TENSE FROM THWARTED FLIGHT, FLORA WENT back into the hive. Pausing in the crowded corridor to relatch her wings, she heard weak, raised voices of the Poppy and other sisters coming from an antechamber near the morgue. Before she could hear what they said, the Thistle guards hurried everyone back inside, pushing them toward the Dance Hall.

Jittery bursts of buzzing came from the large assembly of bees. The pulses in the comb had called them there but it was not time for Devotion, nor, despite the definite trace of fear drifting in from the landing board, was there any smell of wasp. There was, however, an unpleasant odor somewhere close, and Flora instinctively drew away. The whole crowd rippled and flexed as one, and when the movement stopped, certain bees stood isolated in pools of space. Each was a forager, standing with her head down and her sides heaving for breath, and each showed the same gray film on her body as had the Poppy who crashed to the landing board.

A Sage priestess rustled her long, elegant wings for attention. Her antennae scanned the large hall.

“Sisters in One Mother, we give thanks for the sacrifices and valor of our noble foragers, Amen.”

“Amen,” murmured the bees, currents of alarm passing between them.

“Behold our sister foragers, whose work is honor and whose precision, zeal, and stamina give life, health, and wealth to our hive. But whose mistakes and hubris bring disease, disgrace, and death. Many sisters have fallen sick and died today, and now we are certain of the cause.” Sister Sage pointed and two Thistle guards brought forward an old forager. Those bees nearest gasped in shock.

“Madam Lily 500,” intoned Sister Sage. “What do you wish to say to your sisters and to Holy Mother, whose life you have brought into danger with your error?”

Lily 500 raised her head. Her voice was hoarse but calm.

“I do not make errors. The field was clean when I was there.”

“No. It was poisoned. And in your error you sent countless sisters to their deaths. See the wounded now, the venomous mist burning holes in their bodies? And we have found tainted pollen in the stores, no doubt also gathered in error after your directions. Your prestige has made you careless—”

“I danced the truth!” Lily 500 raised her voice. “If the pollen was tainted I would not gather it. If the field was poisoned I would die rather than return—I swear on every royal egg—”

“And now blasphemy!” called out Sister Sage. “Blasphemy, pride, and error.”

“—and I swear on my love for the Queen that when I went to the flowers the mist was not there, nor have I ever gathered unclean pollen!”

Sister Sage spoke quietly. “Brave sisters who suffer, come forward.”

Those isolated bees whose bodies were covered in the tiny gray specks and bore the strange scent walked or were guided forward to the center to join Lily 500. Some of them still scraped away at their bodies, trying to remove the gray film. Lily 500 stared at them, then bowed her head.

“Forgive me, my sisters. I should rather have died than brought this home.”

No one spoke. Then a squad of identical bees parted the crowd, their fur slicked dark and their kin-scent veiled under a thick masking odor. They stood by Sister Sage.

“Madam Forager, Lily 500, you have endangered our hive by your error. For the protection of Her Majesty the Queen, source of life and Immortal Mother, we must cleanse our hive of sickness.” Sister Sage looked around the silent hall. “If any sister ails, let her prove her love for Holy Mother and come forward.”

No one moved. In the silence Flora ran her consciousness around her body. On the landing board she had forgotten everything in her excitement at flight—but now she could feel the strange sensation in her belly again. It had more pressure, and as she focused on it, strange prickles of excitement ran through her. It was no longer pain, nor did she feel sick in any way. She decided not to speak of it.

Sister Sage looked at Lily 500.

“We will remember the wealth you brought. Praise end your days.”

Before the old forager could respond, the police dragged her away. At this humiliation of one of their greatest, all the sisters stared in shock.

Sister Sage’s face shone bright, and tremors flew up her antennae as if she were at Devotion. “The Kindness is only for the diligent. Those whose carelessness endangers the hive may not receive it. We fearlessly protect Holy Mother, for we know From Death comes Life Eternal.”

“From Death comes Life Eternal,” responded all the bees. Then in one shared impulse, every affected forager unlatched her wings and stepped forward. Together they faced the police.

“Death flies close on every mission,” said one, her body speckled with the gray film. “We need no escort now.” The foragers bowed to their sisters. “Accept, Obey, and Serve.”

“Praise end your days,” said all the bees. The foragers walked out, the police guard behind them. The bees waited in silence, the comb underfoot completely still. They heard the weak engines of their sisters start up on the landing board and the power surge as they leaped into the air. Every bee in the Dance Hall strained to hear their engines fading as the sick foragers flew far from the hive, never to return.

“Back to work,” Sister Sage announced. “Prepare for health inspection.”

THE ATRIUM EMPTIED at great speed. Sisters rushed to get away from the police, and Flora attached herself to a large detail of sanitation workers. They were going to the morgue, where the day’s dead bodies must be removed, and their supervising sister was another Bindweed.

“Because of poisoned pollen you will drop the bodies far beyond the orchard,” she told them, “and you will not return.”

The workers looked at each other in alarm, but Sister Bindweed smiled.

“It is to the honor of your kin! You are so numerous that we can easily spare a few to ensure good hygiene. It is your privilege: Accept, Obey, and Serve!”

As the sanitation workers mumbled their incoherent response, Flora heard a cry of pain. She smelled Lily 500 close by, mixed with the harsh scent of the police.

“Let me die with honor,” came the forager’s hoarse old voice. “Let me go with my sisters. . . . I promise I will not return—” She cried out as if she had received a blow. The sound came from the waste depot near the morgue.