Summary

In Chapter 38, Flora returns to her hidden egg, now hatched, and feeds it Flow. When she returns to the hive, she finds the bees confused and off-kilter. Many sanitation bees are going to the Dance Hall to clean again the scent of the Queen’s blood. Several Teasel bees enter, holding the dead body of the bee that spoke against the Sage the day before. They demand to know how the Sage can remain in power if they have not produced a Queen. The head Sage bee challenges the head Teasel bee to allow herself to be mentally purged, to free herself from such errant thoughts. The Teasel dies in the process, the Sage blaming it on her own spiritual impurity. Another Teasel argues that Divine Right does not make a Queen; it is how a worker bee is fed that makes her...