Adon felt every nerve in his body stand on end as the unfamiliar voice rang through his mind.

Who are you? he thought.

There was silence for a moment. Then the strangely melodic female voice continued, as though Adon had said nothing.

Adon, do you know how long I’ve waited for this meeting?

Maybe a week, Adon thought. Less than two weeks for sure! Are you going to answer my question?

Silence reigned once more. It took Adon a moment to realize that all of the thoughts he had been thinking had lived and died inside of his own mind. He had not reactivated Telepathy since he stopped talking to the voles. He quickly corrected that.

I do not know how long you have waited for this encounter, um, noble wasp. Do you mind if I ask how you know my name? Do we know each other, perhaps?

The speaker paused for a moment, as if surprised.

I was starting to wonder if you had Telepathy at all, she sent finally, her voice less eerie now that it sounded almost puzzled. If you were completely nonverbal, it would explain why I couldn’t read your mind the way I normally do with my, um, allies. As for how I knew your name, I just used Identify on you.

Adon’s spirits fell a little. I had hoped we might know each other a little, perhaps from a previous life. Now he knew he had no reason to expect any mercy from her.

I do feel as if the red slayers’ venom is wearing off a little, though, he thought very quietly, making certain not to broadcast that. Maybe if I can just keep her talking a little while…

I remember little of my last life, she sent. Do you remember more, then?

It’s good that she’s curious about me, he thought internally.

I do, he replied. Do you mind if I ask where you are? I assume you’re one of the wasps nearby me, but it’s a little awkward to talk to someone I can’t see.

Oh, of course! she sent. One moment.

The wasps that had him firmly in their grasp began flying higher up, above most of their brethren, and Adon began to wonder if he would regret asking for a face to face with this thing that could clearly control all of these wasps. She was probably a big, scary wasp. And Adon had already decided much earlier that these things were almost certainly natural predators of his species.

Face to face also meant more convenient to eat.

But he had already set the encounter in motion. Now he would simply have to make the best of it.

As Adon rose above the din of the general crowd of red slayers, he expected to stop and be faced with his conversational counterpart at any moment.

Instead, the drones that held him kept moving, floating higher and higher until he was at eye height with the roof of the palace. It was then that he saw her.

Hovering above the palace roof, there was a truly massive wasp. Her body was surrounded by a gentle purple glow. Though the glow was soft, it gave Adon a feeling of malevolence. She was ringed by other wasps that looked beefier than the ones Adon had seen before, roughly exactly in the middle between the Queen and her drones in size.

Identify.

Regina, Red Slayer Spider Wasp (Queen)

Of course she’s the Queen, he thought, keeping it to himself. She’s huge!

He didn’t want to accidentally call the Queen fat, but she certainly wasn’t small. Her form was just as slender and elegant as that of her drones. She could have been one of them, except for her size. But on that metric, she was almost on a different scale.

Her drones had seemed unusually large for wasps. Almost an inch and a half long. Significantly smaller than Adon, but large when one considered that he had drastically increased his size over and over through his short life.

The Queen must have been about five inches in height, and her wingspan was naturally even longer. She rivaled a small bird in size.

He turned his gaze on one of the other large wasps that surrounded the Queen.

Red Slayer Spider Wasp (Royal Bodyguard)

That’s interesting, he thought. Also ominous. It implies they have enemies…

Well, now we can see each other, the Queen sent. Her tone sounded slightly impatient, as if the silence had been annoyingly long for her to bear.

Yes, Your Majesty, Adon sent in a sycophantic tone. It’s a pleasure to finally look at you. You are quite radiant—

You can spare me that, Regina sent, cutting him off. I was hoping to find a friend in this garden, not a boot-licker. I know I’m a Queen, but royalty gets that kind of treatment all the time. What I really want is more of an equal than anything else.

Oh, of course. That makes sense. Do you mind if I ask, then, why your subjects here attacked me? If she wanted someone who could speak to her as an equal, he could give her that too. He could communicate very frankly, given that his life seemed to depend on it. He found that his usual social awkwardness had melted away quite a bit in this situation, and he filed that information away for future use.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Well, the answer to that is complicated, dear Adon, she replied. It’s a good question. First, can I ask you, what’s your relationship with Princess Rosslyn?

Huh? The question took him off guard. He knew in an instant he would have to tread cautiously.

Your relationship with the Crown Princess of Claustria? Next in line for the throne. Ringing any bells? Regina sounded irritable again.

Adon decided not to beat around the bush, but also not to be any more polite to her than she was to him.

I know who you’re talking about, Adon sent. I’m surprised you’re asking. There’s almost no relationship to speak of. We’ve spoken exactly once.

Are you sure about that? she asked, her voice still prickly.

You need to tell me why you’re asking these questions—and for that matter, why the hell did you order your creatures to attack me in the first place? I am not volunteering any more information. I’m not your subject. Adon had heard there were some people who needed to be spoken to very directly like that, and it seemed to work well in entertainment programs he was fond of in his last life.

The Queen floated in the air for a moment, silently stewing.

I suppose those must seem like fair demands from your current position, Regina sent.

Adon had to restrain himself from nodding. He could feel that his basic capacity to move was back again, but he recognized that he couldn’t trust her with that information. Not right now. Especially not while he was in midair, vulnerable to being mobbed by hundreds of wasps before he could touch the ground.

In the back of his mind, he began formulating a plan of escape.

You need to have it made clear to you what your exact circumstances are, the Queen continued. You have little bargaining power in this situation. Unless, of course, you do not value the lives of your little spider friends by the garden wall.

Adon was suddenly torn. He wanted to ask what Regina meant by threatening Red and Goldie. Was she going to send her drones to kill them? Were there creatures already there, ready to fulfill her orders?

He wanted to ask questions and make demands, but he forced himself to remain as calm as possible. Suddenly it seemed as if one wrong word could get his friends killed.

There’s no need to bring anyone else into this situation, Adon sent. I’m trying to cooperate with you. And those two spiders are just the only people I’ve had the chance to talk to in this garden. They’re not, um, important or anything.

He felt sharp pangs in his abdomen as he formulated the lies. In case this interaction went further South than it already had, he desperately wanted to prevent the Queen from jumping to the idea that she should kill his friends to retaliate.

You don’t need to lie, Regina replied. They’re the only life forms I can associate you with besides the Royal Family. So if things go badly here, you can rest assured that whatever I feel about you, I’ll take out on you and them. Even if I might be mistaken, that’s what will happen.

Can we try to keep this calm? Adon asked. I still don’t know why we’re talking about things going badly.

He heard a sigh through the telepathic link. Then silence for a moment. Perhaps the Queen was trying to calm herself. Regain some of her regal demeanor, to the extent that she had any to begin with.

Adon, I’ve worked very hard, she began. I remember when I hatched, less than a mile from here, months and months ago. I was the only egg to survive the cruelty of nature. You probably wouldn’t know much about that, growing up as the pet insect of the Royal Family in the seclusion of their garden. Fed on table scraps and taught magic by members of the family. Given all sorts of unfair advantages over your fellow creatures…

He wanted to break into her monologue and object to the misleading characterizations—I’ve gotten almost no help aside from the table scraps, even though the Princess actually asked me if I wanted help—but it did not seem productive to interrupt the Queen, who was working herself up as she spoke.

I watched you from an early age, you know. Well, that’s not entirely accurate. My worker wasps watched you, and I used their eyes and sense of hearing to get an idea of what was going on. Telepathy is a marvelous gift! Especially once you train your subordinates to allow you to use their senses like video to explore the world…

The Queen waxed poetic for a few minutes about how much of the world she had seen. It amounted to a few miles in each direction, which Adon had to admit to himself, though far from impressive, was substantially more than he had seen in this life.

But you have no idea what I’ve been through. Regina finally got back on track with the story she apparently wanted to tell. When I hatched, I was a simple worker wasp. I could feel the shortness of my lifespan in my body. I would only live a matter of weeks. I had to work my butt off to evolve and become a higher species, and from there, I evolved into a queen. Each time, I extended my lifespan and grew more powerful. Yet in all that time, I was alone. Sure, I could create workers and drones once I was a queen, but they were no good for social activity! They just wanted to be commanded. None of them were like me—or you.

There was hope, though. I had been watching the Royal Family for some months, before you came along. I thought it was a stroke of remarkable good fortune that I would happen to be born near a palace. That they might be interested in me. Understand me. Value what I could contribute to their nation. I purchased the humans’ language from the Evolution Store. I had already purchased Telepathy much earlier, so I could control my subjects more efficiently. With a new goal in mind, I enhanced Telepathy repeatedly. I thought, just maybe, I might be able to make connections among the humans. Then my long struggle to pull myself up from the muck would finally have something to show for it. My isolation, which had threatened to drive me mad, would be at an end. Finally, I would have a friend…

That sounds like a wonderful idea—Adon began.

Until you ruined it! she continued.

Nothing can ever be easy in this life, huh? he thought very quietly, keeping it to himself. I don’t quite understand what her grievance is, but it feels like this is really a crazy misunderstanding. Can’t we just be friends? I could put aside her workers stinging me into paralysis as a hilarious prank.

How did I ruin it? Adon finally sent. The Queen had not resumed her monologue. She seemed to be silently fuming. He took that into account and formulated his words carefully, trying not to waste a syllable. Aware that the conversation could break down into violence if he wasn’t cautious. I can tell you I had no intention to hurt you in any way. I’ve been hoping to make friends in this life. If I just knew you were out there, maybe we would have connected before now.

Please believe me, he thought. Please understand. Please accept my good intentions.

You ruined my plans to befriend the Princess, the Queen finally answered. You got your hooks into her first. How? That’s what I really want to know. What did you say or do to endear yourself? What made her decide she liked you enough to start treating you with such favoritism? In other words, what could I do?