Jeb smelled ozone start to build between himself and the Archdruid as the leader of the Druidic Enclave stared him down. Unsure exactly what the issue was, Jeb did his best to keep the Swarm calm. Unsurprisingly, they did not react well to the Archdruid’s clear displeasure at their Bonded companion.
“Is everything all right?” Jeb asked, attempting to defuse the situation at least slightly.
“Have I not already gone above and beyond any reasonable treatment for a Republican?” he demanded, streamers of deadly flame coiling around each word. “Has your President,” he spat the word out, “truly done anything worth this level of blind obedience?”
The flames began to wrap around the Archdruid, growing darker and thicker as they spiraled up into the sky. Jeb, too distracted by the rush of Magic, was no longer able to keep his bees from reacting as they thought appropriate. Literal walls of Earth and Stone rose up between Jeb and the Archdruid as Elementally Aligned bees for the Elements flew into the shape of Creation Glyphs.
That reaction seemed to stir something in the Archdruid, and the light in his eyes died slightly. The storm still raged above, but Jeb no longer felt as though his skin was seconds away from catching flame. Eyes hard as granite, the Archdruid dismissively flicked his hands in Jeb’s direction.
The walls ceased to be.
Jeb did not watch them crumble into dust or be blown apart by a careful application of will. In fact, the Archdruid did not use any Magic at all, as far as Jeb could tell. He simply decided that the walls were not a part of the Enclave, and so they were not. Despite the fact that the walls had never been, the Magic that the bees had expended was still there. The loose motes of Earth and Stone Mana continued to float in the air.
Jeb shook his head, pain lancing through it as he tried to understand the reality of the Archdruid’s domain. To his relief, the Archdruid did not take either his shaking or his attempt to pierce through the layers of reality as another affront. If anything, the Lord of the Enclave, as Jeb realized he absolutely was, seemed to calm down that little bit more. The bright flashes of lightning which continued to arc across the darkened skies seemed more friendly somehow. The Archdruid gestured, and Jeb found himself speaking. It did not feel like compelled speech, it simply felt as though he had no reason not to speak his case anymore.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jeb replied honestly. “I mean, yes, you have been a fantastic and courteous host, and you have gone above and beyond your obligations,” he hurried to add, intentionally leaving out the fact that he had forced Jeb to tear his own hand apart. “But I do truly have no idea what about the President you’re referring to. I’ve never met the man, and my family generally doesn’t have the most positive opinion of him.”
“And yet you remain a Republican,” the Archdruid said simply, his words the emptiness and void that surrounded all creation. “Why?”
Jeb frowned, looking down as he thought about the question. “For starters,” he said, “you have not offered me a place in the Enclave, and this is the only other-” he hesitated, trying to figure out what the Enclave and the Republic were. The core of himself wanted to say Domains, but that wasn’t the word that he intellectually wanted.
“Nation?” the Archdruid helpfully supplied.
“-nation,” Jeb agreed, finding his place in the conversation again, “that I’ve been to. How would I be anything but a Republican citizen?”
“One need not be bound by any nation,” the Archdruid said, and Jeb felt the faintest whiff of intention behind the word bound. It was clear that he was not referring to the same way that Jeb was Bound to his bees, and yet it was more than the strictly mundane binding that the sentence would have implied.
Before Jeb could probe that feeling anymore, the Archdruid continued, “Of course, you are still very young. I presume that your family remains within the Republic?”
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Seeing Jeb nod, he sighed. The storm around them seemed to sigh too, dying down now that there were no flames of righteous anger to sustain them. The sky remained dark and dangerous, but it was the leashed danger that Jeb was beginning to understand surrounded the Archdruid like a mantle.
“Why do you wish for your Swarm to colonize the Enclave?” he asked, voice sounding as aged as the stones around them.
“Um,” Jeb replied, not entirely sure about the framing of the question, “I didn’t really think of it as colonization, honestly. The Druids in the Circle of Swarms said that I need to make sure that my bees have a purpose. The only use I have for them,” Jeb grimaced at the idea of using his bees, even after they had made it clear that was what they wanted, “is to help me move about more quickly. I can teleport between the different Hives relatively easily, and it does a lot to make traveling faster.”
The Archdruid stroked his beard, small arcs of lightning lighting between his fingers. Jeb felt a great sadness in the older man’s gaze.
“Where did we go so wrong?” he asked, eyes lost looking out at some long ago memory. “When did Fundamental Understandings shift from where we began to where we ended?”
The ancient man, stooped with the weight of years, leaned heavily on his staff and sighed. “There is far more to being Bound to a Swarm than simply giving them a task to make them feel useful.”
He paused, clearly offering Jeb the space to leap in with some minor quibble about choice of words. When he did not, the Archdruid continued, “Do you understand what a Binding is? It is not the Swarm and yourself, any more than your hand and foot are two distinct entities. They serve different purposes, it is true, but one could never do anything if he wanted to treat each part of his body as its own unique being with its own unique needs, wants, and desires.”
The staff pulsed green, and the Archdruid’s eyes closed. His brow furrowed and a bead of sweat formed on the top of his brow as he slowly lifted himself back up to the fully erect position that Jeb associated with him. Opening his eyes again, Jeb saw that they blazed with a vibrant darkness. Just like trying to understand where the wall had gone, Jeb found pain lancing through all of him as he tried to meet the Archdruid’s gaze.
“You may establish a Hive for your Swarm at the central gathering for any Circle which will allow you access to their spaces. As with teaching you, I will neither require nor prevent any Circle from making their own choice.”
His tone sounded as aloof and powerful as it had the first time that Jeb had met the man. After seeing the moment of weakness, though, Jeb had to wonder how much of that was an act.
He could understand the need to appear strong, not just in the presence of outsiders, but also simply to make his own people feel safe. Having seen the man sink under the weight of years for only the briefest moment had left Jeb shaken, and he did not rely on the man for protection. After the initial tirade, Jeb felt as though he had a slightly better picture of the relationship between the Enclave and the Republic. It was not a pretty picture.
Jeb thought about the fact that there were dueling competitions every term at the Academy, even as removed from combat as it was supposed to be. As faculty members went on semi permanent leaves, more and more former members of the Army came to take their places. The crops that the Republic demanded its Farmers grow had not a single luxury item any longer.
That wasn’t to say that the Druidic Enclave was any different, though. If the fact that he had been soundly thrashed in a fight with someone many Tiers his junior was not enough, there was the tense way that each of the older Druids held onto their Magic. Every few minutes, they sent out a small undirected pulse, as though they were trying to make sure that no new workings had been wrought while they were distracted. Even Brian, who did not seem to have the slightest explicit training in violence, was gently led into making his Swarm a weapon. Sure, the Druids couched their suggestions in reasonable sounding ideas like making sure that his bees were able to fly more quickly or communicate more easily. Looking at the advice through the lens of mentors attempting to prepare their youth for war, though, Jeb realized that his own childhood had been influenced by the same thoughts.
His grandfather had not molded him like a weapon. His grandfather had, if anything, erred too far in the opposite direction. Jeb began to realize just how behind he was in understanding the broader political pressures that were bound to shape the course of his life moving forward. He was only a single level from the Ninth Tier. Even ignoring the Archdruid’s cryptic clues, Jeb knew that there were fewer and fewer people at each increased Tier. Regardless of whether he wanted to or not, the world was going to begin to have specific demands on Jeb, and he was going to have the ability, no the responsibility, he corrected himself, to make sure that he acted how he thought best.
His bees, sensing the turmoil within him, started to swarm around him. Feeling the sense of love they gave off, Jeb thought about the Archdruid’s claims about Bonds. He did not think of his bees as much as they deserved.