Percy didn’t need the Queen to complete her explanation to know what she had in mind – her meaning was already clear. As luck would have it, the two had actually wanted the same thing all along! If only she’d told him the last time he was here – instead of trying to have her children kidnap him – they could have avoided so much trouble!

  ‘You seem to have figured it out already,’ she said, before pointing at Micky with her other foreleg. ‘Indeed, I want you to do the same thing you did for that creature, to help me produce a new heir.’

  Percy didn’t bother correcting her. Obviously, the wasp only wanted him to turn one of the inert eggs into a regular familiar – she likely had no idea that Micky had already fused with him and turned into an aspect. Still, there were a couple of things he didn’t understand.

  ‘How did you even learn about him? I’m sure you’ve observed us through your subjects’ eyes, but you never witnessed Micky’s creation.’

  ‘Correct. In fact, I didn’t see you possess the wasps either. There are too many wasps in the hive for me to control at once, and the weaker ones have rather undeveloped minds too, which makes sharing their senses difficult – if not downright unpleasant. Most of the time, I just send them vague commands en masse. Things like “harvest mana outside” or “attack the intruder”.’

  ‘Then how?’

  The giant bug sent Percy the mental equivalent of a shrug. ‘I did notice that something strange had been interfering with my control over the Starry Soldier for months, though I couldn’t have imagined that it was somebody deliberately getting in my way. I’d simply assumed that it had been a defective wasp. I only realized that it was you after I took control of that Starry Knight. Sadly, the Soldier had already been destroyed at that point, otherwise I could have taken advantage of our mutual connection to reach out to you.’

  ‘So, you did the next best thing and tried to capture us alive,’ Percy replied.

  ‘Yes. Looking back into the signals I’d received from the Soldier, I was able to infer how you’d injured and possessed it. And I could tell how the bird differed from the others at a glance. The wasps had merely been your minions – temporary shells you had to constantly coerce to do your bidding. But not the bird. It’s a permanent creation with its own personality and better growth potential. I admit that I have no idea what happened to it in this most recent battle, but it has confirmed my guess that you can even bring creatures back from the verge of death.’

  Okay. The Queen had clearly noticed that a few things had been off with “Micky’s” behaviour since she brought them here. Perhaps they should be more cautious while negotiating with the Violet beast. She was far sharper and wiser than they’d given her credit for. Either way, their condition didn’t really affect the situation much.

  ‘Whatever the case, I hope you can do something similar, to breathe life into one of the inert eggs. If I’m not mistaken, turning one of my offspring into a permanent subordinate has been your goal too, right? It’s why you infiltrated my hive the last time, and also why you returned to this place now.’

  ‘It is,’ Percy admitted, still finding the Queen’s willingness to cooperate difficult to believe. ‘Aren’t you worried about placing your hive’s future in the hands of a complete stranger though?’

  ‘My hive’s future is already bleak. I would be a fool to worry about my unborn daughter’s allegiance when I cannot even grant her a life without your help. Besides, I very much hope that our arrangement will be temporary. You’ll foster my successor for a single generation, until she can pass the hive to a child of her own. After that, you and your kind will leave us be and never disturb our home again.’

  Percy sighed.

  Under these circumstances, he had no reason to decline the Queen’s generous offer. If anything, this was quite the opportunity for him too, in more ways than one. Not only was the Violet beast willing to give him exactly what he needed, but the princess would make for an even better familiar than he could have hoped for.

  With a single move, he’d be helping Nephthys and the Amenthei, saving Remior from certain destruction, as well as gaining leverage to prevent the other Houses and possibly even the gods from bullying his loved ones. Finally, he’d obtain his personal source of not just nectar, but royal jelly – assuming that he could find a way to take advantage of it without compromising the hive’s survival.

  ‘I’m more than willing to try, but I can’t promise results. I’ve only ever made a single familiar before, and it was completely by accident. At the very least, your eggs need to have some life in them for this to work,’ he said, before scratching his head. ‘Also, I have to fuse a different soul into your daughter’s body. I already have someone in mind, but I need you to understand that your hive’s future will ultimately belong to her. I’ve already explained how important the Starry Wasps are to her, but she only ever agreed to be placed in the body of a regular wasp.’

  ‘If she was willing to be reborn as a lowly Drone, finding herself inside the body of a Princess sounds to me like a bargain,’ the Queen insisted, some irritation flaring through their connection.

  ‘I can’t deny that, and you can rest assured that I’ll let her know how much is depending on her. Still, I can’t guarantee that she’ll be willing to give you a granddaughter, and I’m not going to force her,’ Percy replied, standing his ground.

  He knew it wasn’t ideal, but he couldn’t help it. He’d have to hear the goddess’s opinion before committing to anything else.

  ‘I understand,’ the Queen spat a few seconds later, not sounding very pleased.

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  Percy continued, however. ‘Even if we fail, it doesn’t mean that there’s nothing we can do. I would ask you to give me a regular egg to put my friend in. In exchange, I swear I’ll do everything in my power to reach out to the Divine Order in your stead, to get your other daughter back. I don’t know what state she’s in, but anything is better than nothing.’

  The Queen remained silent, but Percy could tell that she was in agreement. Pulling her leg back, she severed their connection, slowly turning around. Each thunderous stomp of her colossal limbs sent a tremor through the cavern as she entered one of the wider tunnels, motioning for him to follow with her antennae.

  As they walked through the long corridor, Percy had Micky examine the pyramid again. Unlike the previous time they’d checked, there was now a giant crack that had nearly split the structure in half, revealing Nephthys’s wisp.

  The radiant soul that had once struggled to fit within the shrunken pyramid now only occupied a fraction of its volume, several thin tendrils stretching to every corner to keep the object from falling apart, and to shield her subjects from harm. Their own souls were barely perceptible – mere dots glinting faintly within the goddess’s wisp. And if that hadn’t been enough, Nephthys’s soul appeared to be evaporating even faster without the pyramid’s protection.

  “Please hang in there just a little longer. We’re almost there,” Percy whispered, fully aware that the goddess probably couldn’t hear him.

  The Queen brought them to another chamber, this one even wider than the last. There were fewer exits – though still dozens of them – and fewer wasps too. But there was something else here.

  Two colossal pits had been dug into the floor; each filled to the brim with green goo. And Percy noticed piles upon piles of spherical objects faintly visible beneath the surface. Each was about the size of an apple, though their glossy shells were pitch black, with countless colourful dots adorning them – much like the wasps’ carapaces.

  The eggs in one pit appeared slightly different, however. Golden watermarks rippled around their surfaces, giving them a pattern resembling the one on the Queen’s own exoskeleton.

  Stopping at the centre of the room, the Violet beast waited for Percy to reestablish their mental link – something that he didn’t hesitate to do. Only then did she explain what they were seeing.

  ‘Our kind can be separated into three main types. The first are the royal wasps like me and my kidnapped daughter. Only one can be born per generation, but you can clearly see all my failed attempts at producing a second,’ she said, pointing at the piles of eggs with the golden markings. ‘Wasps with a royal lineage are only considered mature after reaching the Violet grade, at which point they are known as Starry Queens. Like I mentioned earlier, they are born at Orange instead of Red, and are called Starry Princesses up to and including the Blue grade.’

  Percy nodded. ‘I guess the second type includes all the other wasps I’ve seen until now?’

  ‘Indeed. Those make up the overwhelming majority of our ranks. From Red to Blue, they are the Starry Drones, Workers, Soldiers, Knights and Commanders. But what you might not know, is that non-royal wasps are incapable of evolving past Blue.’

  Percy frowned upon hearing that. This was something that he hadn’t heard before. Until today, he hadn’t even known that the Queen came from a different caste of bugs than the rest.

  The reason for their inability to grow past a certain point wasn’t difficult to guess – it was probably the same one that restricted the Queen from producing multiple Princesses. Less competition for her heir. If every wasp had the potential to reach Violet, some might fall outside her control, challenging her rule.

  Whatever the reason, it was his lucky break that the Queen had offered him a superior egg to fashion his familiar out of, otherwise he might have ended up stuffing Nephthys’s soul into a defective body stuck at the lower grades.

  ‘I take it the Drones hatch from this other pile of eggs, then?’ he asked.

  ‘Not quite,’ the Queen said, shaking her head. She remained motionless for a few seconds, probably relaying a command to her subjects.

  A few of the smaller wasps in the room crawled into the second pit, placing a few of the eggs without the golden markings onto their backs before carrying them out of the chamber and through some of the other tunnels. Only once they were alone did the Queen resume her explanation.

  ‘There are tens of millions of wasps in the hive, and only a single Queen. Naturally, it would be impossible for me to lay all the eggs by myself. That’s where the third type of wasps come in – they act as the intermediary between me and the rest.’

  The Violet beast remained perfectly still, clearly waiting for something. The cavern shook again, another massive creature slowly approaching. Percy watched curiously as a second behemoth crawled out of a corridor about a minute later, a Blue star thrumming rhythmically inside its thorax.

  At first, he thought this was a Starry Commander – the first of its kind that he’d ever laid eyes upon. But he soon realized that this wasn’t quite right. This wasp had a very different body structure from the others he had seen, including the Queen. It clearly wasn’t designed for combat or even moving around much.

  First, the creature had no wings or eyes! Its frame was far bulkier than the rest, its thorax and abdomen almost fused into a single, bulbous cylinder that its six stubby limbs struggled to support. On closer examination, the wasp appeared too large for a Blue beast – it was still smaller than the Queen, but not by much. At the very least, it was far bigger than the creatures Percy had seen on Thess’kala. Finally, it didn’t have a stinger either, but rather countless small holes spiralling all the way from where the stinger should have been, to about two-thirds of the way around its abdomen.

  As if to demonstrate their purpose, the creature’s body convulsed a coupled of times, squelching sounds emanating from the holes as they vomited countless small eggs. They were coated in a similar type of green goo to the ones in the pits, but these were smaller than the others, barely the width of two fingers. The creature didn’t stop until two tall mounds had formed by its sides.

  ‘These will hatch into Drones,’ the Queen explained. ‘As for the ones in the pit, they will hatch into the Orange versions of the Starry Breeders – much like my wingless daughter there.’

  Percy nodded in understanding.

  Each Queen could only directly give birth to a single Princess and countless immature Breeders, while the Breeders themselves would be the ones tasked with populating the rest of the hive after reaching Blue. In essence, all the wasps Percy and Micky had seen in the past – as well as all the bugs that the Guild’s hunters harvested nectar from on a daily basis – weren’t actually the Queen’s children, but her grandchildren.

  However, the Violet beast hadn’t brought them here just to give them a tour of the hive. Turning her head toward the pile with the marked eggs, she spoke again.

  ‘Well? What do you think? Is any of them salvageable?’

  Micky walked up to the Queen, placing his hand on one of her legs to establish a new mental link with her, freeing Percy up to examine the eggs. Reaching the edge of the pit, he leaned slightly over the viscous fluid to scan the objects.

  He took an awfully long amount of time too, checking the entire pile carefully from tip to base, making full use of his mutated eyes as he searched for any traces of life that he could capitalize upon.

  By the time he announced his verdict, his heart had sunk.

  ‘Every single one of them is dead.’

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