“Son, this is Jeb, the newest member of the Enclave.” Arthur sounded completely genuine to Jeb, which only made it more surprising when his son scoffed.
“I was at the celebration last night. I know that. Why did you call me over?”
Jeb briefly recalled the way that his own sister had been somewhat annoyed by their parents after she had gotten her First Class.
Arthur was clearly trying to keep himself from showing any irritation at his son. “I know that you’ve been having trouble with your Studies,” he said in a placating tone.
Something dangerous flashed in the young bear’s eyes, and Jeb jumped into the conversation, “your father thought that since I have a Swarm but almost no experience with mentoring people, it might be good for both of us if I took some time to talk to you about how I Bound it.”
That seemed to calm the bear down, and he begrudgingly nodded.
“Wonderful!” his father clapped his large paws together before walking away, leaving Jeb with the young Druid.
“I’m sorry that you had to see that,” the bear said once his father was out of earshot. “Things between my father and I have been somewhat tense over the past few months. I know that he’s trying to just gloss over the fact that we have such different Fundamental Understandings, but I want to talk about that.”
Seeing Jeb nod understandingly, the bear flushed a little, “sorry. I didn’t mean to immediately vent. I would be honored to learn whatever you are willing to teach me.”
Jeb did his best not to let his panic show. More than making a fool of himself, he was terrified that he might accidentally lead the young Druid down the wrong path. As soon as the thought had fully formed and passed through his mind, though, Jeb realized that it was a ridiculous notion. Any bad influence he might have on the bear was certain to be overwhelmed by his more formal teacher.
“Well, why don’t we start with some introductions,” Jeb finally spoke, realizing that the silence had grown uncomfortably long. “I know that you told your father you knew about me already, but I don’t know what information you have other than the fact that I’m in now the Enclave.”
“I know that you went through a much longer Trial than most, though I will admit that I don’t know what Trial finally led you to your Fundamental Understanding.” Hearing both uses of the word in the same sentence made Jeb realize that Druidic had two distinct terms for Trial, even if his own mind condensed them to one meaning.
“I would rather not discuss that, if you don’t mind,” Jeb said, forcing his mind away from the bandages on his hand. “Given that I’m supposed to teach you about Binding a Swarm, why don’t I start with the story of how I bonded my own Swarm? I’m curious to know how my approach differs from the approach used in the Enclave.”
“How did you even find the bees that you ended up Binding?” Brian asked.
“My aunt gave them to me,” Jeb replied. “How do you find a Swarm here?”
“Well, given that I haven’t found mine, I can’t answer for certain. Char, my mentor, says that it’s about opening myself to the swarms nearby and reaching out to see if any are interested in a Bond. So far, though, that hasn’t worked.”
The two walked in silence for a few minutes, before Brian spoke again. “What do you mean that your aunt gave you a swarm of bees? I thought that once something was Bound it couldn’t be transferred.”
“To the best of my knowledge, my aunt is not Bound to her hives,” Jeb responded with a shrug. “Honestly, I didn’t intentionally Bind them either. It just sort of happened.”
Seeing the bear’s mouth drop open, Jeb walked him through the story of how he had learned Bardic Magic and accidentally tied his soul to the bees’ in the process.
“I don’t think that Char would support me learning lute for this.”
A laugh escaped Jeb’s mouth when he looked over to see that Brian appeared completely genuine with his comment. Seeing the young Druid’s expression start to darken, he hurried to say, “I’m not laughing at you, but I do generally agree. I think that you would be better served by focusing on Binding a swarm itself rather than doing so as a side effect of what you are hoping for. Do you know what species you would be most interested in Binding to?”
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Brian shrugged. “I have a gut feeling that I’m called to Bind with bees, but I’m not sure if that’s just the,” he gestured at his fur covered body, “you know.”
Jeb nodded, despite the fact that he had no idea at all what the bear was referencing. “Do you have a particular kind of bee in mind? There are any number of species of bee, and they behave significantly differently.”
As if to demonstrate his point, a dozen of Jeb’s most specialized kinds of bees started floating around him.
The bear looked at Jeb as though he wasn’t sure whether he was being mocked. Seeing Jeb’s genuine explanation, he explained, “I think that I would be most interested in Binding to honey bees, like you have.”
“That shouldn’t be too difficult then! If nothing else, I have some insight into the way that my Swarm behaves, and I can’t imagine that they’re too different than normal bees.”
“Sure,” Brian responded doubtfully, watching as one of the foot long defensive bees rammed through a branch, spearing a bird.
“Do you know where any wild bee hives are nearby?” Jeb asked, continuing the conversation.
“No,” Brian replied hesitantly.
“That’s easy enough to fix!” Jeb gestured at his bees, and hundreds of small scouting bees suddenly appeared around them. Even though almost all of his bees radiated Elemental Mana of some sort or another, these were practically invisible to his Magical sight. They dispersed, and Jeb sat down, pulling out his lute.
“While we wait for my Swarm to come back, would you want to tell me about your Fundamental Understanding?” he asked, absently strumming his lute.
“Uh,” Brian seemed more than a little dazed by the bees that had flown around them, “sure. You’ve met my dad, and his view of the center of the universe as a river delta absolutely influenced my own. When he took me to his Central Delta as a young cub, I saw a number of flies swarming around a corpse. At the time, I thought nothing else of it, seeing it as a part of the rest of the environment.”
“Sure. I take it that you feel differently now?”
“Yeah.” The two sat in silence for a few minutes as Brian clearly struggled to make a coherent narrative out of his experience. He opened his mouth a few times as though to speak before closing it when he realized that he did not know where the story ended.
Finally, he spoke again, “even though your Trial lasted longer than any other I have heard of, mine was also relatively long. At first, I was trying my hardest to see the world as an ecosystem, but something about that just didn’t click. When my Magic finally manifested, though, I saw the way that systems emerge from individuals. The Enclave is, at its heart, a living being made up of all the living beings within its boundaries. It has a consciousness outside of it,” he chuckled, “or at least it does when the Archdruid is away.”
He swallowed before forcing himself to continue, “the way that most Swarms have their intelligence almost entirely distributed suddenly made complete sense to me. Since waking from my trance, I no longer feel complete as an individual. Char has been helpful with that, given that she was herself originally a part of a whole, rather than a being of her own.”
Jeb wanted to ask what that meant, but his bees excitedly danced that they had found another swarm before he could. Brian leapt at the opportunity, and the two went off to find the bees. After walking for an hour or so, they came to another clearing, where a hive of honey bees had established themselves.
For a moment, Jeb was confused. The bees were far smaller than he remembered bees being. Looking back at his scouts, even they were larger than most of the bees around.
It’s probably all of the Mana they’ve been consuming, Jeb rationalized.
“What now?” Brian whispered.
Jeb shrugged. “You said that your mentor recommended meditation to reach out to swarms. Why don’t you try that and see how it works?”
Brian gave Jeb a dubious look before sitting down and closing his eyes. His breathing quickly evened out, and Jeb felt a momentary pang in his soul when his now absent Meditation Skill tried to resonate with the bear’s actions. The nearby swarm started to calm down, and Jeb saw that they began to move as a whole, starting to pulse with the Druid’s breathing. Unlike when Jeb did so, they were far from moving in unison. Still, it seemed like a promising start.
Just as Jeb felt a glow rise in him at the idea that he had been helpful, Brian’s eyes shot open and the bees flew as though in a frenzy. He bounded away on all four legs, and Jeb followed, seeing from his bees that the other swarm had calmed down when the bear left their clearing.
“What happened?” Jeb asked, hands on his knees as he tried to catch his breath.
Brian, by contrast, was only now returning to a bipedal position. He was not breathing hard as he replied, “everything was going really well until the bees realized what I am. Obviously, they were not fond of the idea that they would be beholden to,” once again, he gestured at his body.
Jeb cocked his head. “What do you mean beholden?”
Brian looked into Jeb’s eyes, confusion clear in his own. “What is your relationship to your Swarm?”
“Honestly, we’re relatively independent of each other at this point. Before I went to the Academy, I felt responsible for keeping them safe and helping the Hive to grow. While I was there, however, the bees became almost entirely independent. Since leaving, I haven’t really had the chance to figure out how we should interact going forward.”
Seeing the blank look on Brian’s face, Jeb asked, “what relationship do you plan to have with your Swarm?”
“Almost everyone here is Lord over their Swarm. For those bound to bees, they take the place of the queen, leading the broad strokes for how the Hive develops.”
“Huh. Why?”
As Brian thought about the question, Jeb took his lute back out and practiced some scales. One thing he realized during his Trial was that he had been neglecting his Bound Lute.