Summary

In Chapter 10, the Sage takes her to the highest level of the hive to meet the Queen. The Queen’s ladies in waiting wash and groom Flora until she barely looks like herself. They teach her manners and feed her delicious food unseen in the lower levels of the hive. Before meeting the Queen they take her to the Library, where six panels of scent-coded tiles depict a story. The Ladies renew the scents each day rather than doing the Queen’s Devotion. One panel describes each of the kin, all of which are based on flowers; however, the flora is not mentioned. After only one, the ladies tell Flora they can stop because the other stories “hold terrors,” but Flora reads the second panel, The Kindness, which foretells a bee’s death. Flora is eager to try one more scent-panel, called The...