Harriet woke and yawned. She had never done that before and it felt new and bold. She yawned again. Yep it still felt new. Her wings unfolded and stretched out. As she looked out at the hive she knew she had never understood how stretching had felt either. The activity of the hive was alive. The queen came up to her. It was like her smell was different to the queen was confused.
Everything was new to Harriet but clearly it was new to the hive as well.
She could sense the queen becoming afraid. The older bees in the hive started to take aggressive stances. As the queen backed up they surrounded her and headed towards Harriet. She looked at the queen and although she could not speak she could make the queen understand her desire. At first, she had the queen cower in fear, but did not want the threaten the queen. She thought about peace and good will. She thought. It was yet a new thing she had never done before. The queen and her guard went back to hive activities, ignoring her. No, they were not ignoring her. It was as if she was a second queen.
She moved out of the hive, seeing the other hives. The whole world moved. None of the other bees seemed to notice or care. It felt like her entire world was in motion. In the center of the hives there was a wax plug. She moved over to work with it. She looked over at some workers from several hives and told them to remove it. The world moved again. The workers followed orders and scrapped away at the wax. Nothing changed. As they removed some, more would just appear. They worked mindlessly just scrapped the wax. She released them. She could use them as she needed but why make work for nothing. They all went to their respective hives and worked as their queens needed. The world shifted again.
Seeing some light she flew out into it. It hurt her eyes a little, but moved out anyway. She could now see the hives were all in a bag attached to a dwarf. She flew about watching the dwarf move through the small scrub brush. Bees would fly out to gather water and nectar. This stout man was their collective hives. She buzzed by him. A gruff voice came out, "go back to work." She landed on his shoulder. He slinked through the brush some more until he stopped. A group of solders in black armor were walking near by. He voice came again, only as a gruff whisper, "stay still, or they will see us."
She rested on his shoulder and did not move. They watched the soldiers from a small space hidden from view. They had symbols of the dragon army. She some how knew all this. Her understandings were not clear to her at all. One of the understanding was that they were dangerous. If they found the man with the bag, they would kill him. She was sensing all this from him. It was different but she could sense his smells, just like the queen and other bees. She tried to project her smells. It had no affect on him.
She did this for weeks or months. Bees only live for days after all. She should have died a long time ago. The dwarf started to talk to her over time. He might have been talking to himself, but pointing his conversation to her. She was the only one around most of the time. He told her his name was Aparret. Somehow, at some point, he started to call her Harriet as if he knew. They had a weird bound only in the wilds of the waste. She started to understand the hives had goals and she could help him with these goals. As the time went on the wax in the hives center thinned. She could almost see a world beyond. She longed for the other world. With her connection with him, that world could become hers too.
She started to guide him. By buzzing around and bumping him, She could get him to look different directions. Sometimes she would guide him away from the soldiers. She could fly ahead and he could avoid them. They were a team. She sensed it was only a matter of time before he was caught. She needed to find him help.
Weeks later she came out of the hives as she did when he was hiding. Below were several people. They were attacking some soldiers. The same ones they had been tracking and avoiding. They were the help he needed. This was the help the hives needed. She had to get him with them.