Naamah's Blessing

“Good girl.”
    Accompanied by my escort of ants, I made the long trek around the mountain and over the terraces.
    I felt guilty at having given in to fear and weakness. The miserable failure of my attempt to appeal to Raphael’s better nature, which had had the exact opposite effect I’d hoped, had shaken me more than I reckoned, making me unsure of myself. But the memory of Bao’s fierce grin bolstered me. If my stubborn peasant-boy was nowhere ready to surrender, neither was I.
    In the palace, I found my quarters empty. The ants swarmed up the sisal rope, forming their writhing ball.
    “It’s not your fault,” I said to them. “You didn’t choose this either, did you? I do not blame you.”
    The outermost layer clicked their mandibles at me. With reluctance, I touched their thoughts.
    They were hungry.
    Cusi was supposed to attend to their needs, but she was nowhere in sight. I ventured into the courtyard garden, the ants swarming back down the rope to follow me. One by one, I gathered all the fruits from the tree I’d quickened, splitting them open and laying them on the ground.
    The grateful ants poured over them, devouring the sweet pink pulp from the inside out. I spotted their queen among them, several times larger than her subjects.
    It occurred to me that if I could touch their thoughts, mayhap I could influence them, too. I could do it with larger, more sentientanimals. For the better part of an hour, I tried to no avail. Their hive mind was too alien, responding only to their own language of scent. I wondered how Raphael had learned to manipulate his own.
    I wondered, too, what would happen if I killed the queen of this colony—if it would render them rudderless, or if Raphael somehow functioned as the queen of queens in the ant world.
    Although I was tempted to try the experiment, in the end, I stayed my hand; partly from the knowledge that there must be hundreds of colonies functioning under Raphael’s command with queens to spare, and partly out of fear that this one might turn on me if I did. The thought of being swarmed by thousands of bereaved drones made my skin crawl.
    At least I felt as though my wits were working once more, which made the situation seem a little less hopeless.
    To wash away the illusory sensation of ants crawling over me, not to mention the day’s sweat, I bathed in the artificial waterfall. After scrubbing myself thoroughly with a soapy root, I closed my eyes and let the water pour over me, willing it to further clear my thoughts.
    When I opened my eyes, through the streams of water cascading over me, I saw two figures standing in the courtyard.
    Stifling my surprise, I stepped naked from the waterfall. One of the figures was Cusi, biting her lower lip and eyeing me uncertainly. The other was an older woman with iron-grey streaking her black hair. She had intelligent, watchful eyes and a bearing that indicated she was someone of status.
    Ignoring my nakedness, I shifted my hands into a
mudra
of respect and inclined my dripping head to her. “
Rimaykullaykil
, my lady.”
    The old woman pursed her mouth and looked me up and down, her face impassive. Murmuring apologies in two tongues, Cusi darted forward with a clean garment of fine-combed wool dyed a bright saffron hue, helping me to don it.
    “This is Ocllo,” she said to me, indicating the other woman. “She is old and wise. Not like me.”
    I smiled at Ocllo. “Well met, my lady.”
    She folded her arms over her chest, glowering, and declined to return my smile. “Cusi say you make the
guayabo
tree’s fruit to ripen.” She pointed at the tree with its branches barren of aught but dark green leaves. “But I do not see it.”
    I pointed to the stream of ants circling the courtyard. “I fed it to them.”
    Ocllo’s nostrils flared. “True?”
    “True,” I said.
    “Do it again,” Ocllo demanded. “Do it for me!”
    I shook my head. “That tree is tired. I forced it past its season. It is too soon. Choose another.”
    Stalking the courtyard, the old woman examined various trees and shrubs, settling on a tough, woody vine that stretched between two trees, narrow leaves and tight-knit buds dotting its length. “This one.”
    I summoned the twilight.
    I touched the vine and breathed on it.
    One by one, the furled buds opened and blossomed, pink and crimson petals spreading to greet the sunlight.
    “Well!” Ocllo studied the vine, poking and prodding, nodding to herself. “Well, well, well! It