by Mary E. Lowd
Originally published in Oxfurred Comma Flash Fiction Contest, July 2022
![](https://deepskyanchor.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Ryffnah_a_royal_honeybee_wearing_a_crown_surrounded_by_honey_dr_a4591d58-213b-49fc-8d7f-05cbb57deeb3-300x300.png)
Amber fluid dripped from the hive, but it wasn’t honey. It was thick and gooey and satiated. The amorphous being, gold and honey-like, had infiltrated the hive, feasted on the honey and then on the worker bees who’d made the honey; then the drones who the worker bees had waited on; and finally, on the delectable morsels of unfinished dough that were the eggs and pupae.
But not the queen. Continue reading “The Freedom of the Queen”