Music is "The Only Exception" by Paramore.

Picture is Claudia Doumit as Sarai.

}0{

Apinae Trigona

Commonly referred to as vulture bees, Apinae Trigona are the only known bees which do not rely on plants for food. Much like their namesake, A. Trigona are carnivorous, consuming the flesh of dead animals. This unusual behavior was only discovered in 1982, nearly two centuries after they were first classified.

}0{

Chapter Thirteen: Trigona

Wanda locks eyes with me, grabbing my hand as I sit in the center of the room. A crystal grid surrounds me, candles light every corner of the pattern, and Stephen is preparing the words of the spell. The shop is closed to the public and the curtains are drawn. In the candlelit room, surrounded by pagan paraphernalia, I've never felt more fucking nervous.

"Are you sure you're ready for this?" she asks.

I take a deep breath and nod shakily. I take Melizza from my shoulder with my other hand and let the little honeybee crawl onto Wanda's shoulder.

"Beee careful," Melizza tells me, quoting my bad joke from earlier in the school year.

A soundless laugh escapes my lips, and Wanda laughs with me. Before we worked on this spell, she completed the blessing to let her communicate with Melizza. Now we can both hear the little honeybee.

"I will," I tell Melizza, wishing I could open my mouth and tell Wanda the same thing.

I've never wished more than right now that I wasn't mute. My disability has never bothered me, not from the moment I stopped talking to the moment before this. Sure, sometimes it's inconvenient, but I never wished I wasn't this way. I never wished that my time on the streets of Beirut hadn't made me the silent woman I am today. Not once.

But now I have something I want to say to someone I care about. I want to tell Wanda how much she means to me. She's become more than a roommate or classmate. She might even be more than a friend. No one has accepted me this wholeheartedly, no one but Hal Chapelo. She reminds me of him in so many ways. If only I had met her before he got sick.

"She knows," Melizza tells me.

Wanda turns to the bee. "Who knows what?"

"Nothing," Melizza replies, flying over to Stephen and landing on the dark curls on top of his head. He looks up at her and sighs, a small smile on his face. "I told you I liked this one."

"She likes you Stephen," Wanda giggles.

"Just don't sting me and we're all good," he chuckles.

"Oh, I would never do that," Melizza replies, knowing full-well that he can't hear her. "That would kill me as well!"

Wanda and I laugh with each other as Loki lights the last candle. He shakes the match out and turns to Stephen. "You about ready?"

Stephen gives a single nod, careful not to jostle Melizza. "Whenever you are, we're good to go." He look up at me. "Just like we explained, okay? You'll go into a trance, meet your grandmother, talk to her, then we'll pull you out after five minutes. No more, no less, so make sure you get what you need pretty quick. Time flows differently in the astral realm, so be cautious."

I nod, all sign of laughter wiped from my face. I let go of Wanda's hand and nod towards Loki, a silent order telling her it's okay to go. She backs up, keeping her worried gaze on me.

"Good luck," she tells me.

I'm gonna need a damn lot more than luck.

Stephen starts moving his hands and chanting the spell. Most of the words I don't understand since they're in another language other than English or Arabic, but I get the gist. It's a call for the ancestors, specifically my father's lineage.

I close my eyes and sit cross-legged, preparing for what comes next. I'm not sure what to expect, so when a wave of vertigo washes over me. I attempt to open my eyes again, but they're sealed closed. In my mind's eye, I start to see shapes and colors swirl and shift. They change just as quickly as they appear, and I start to feel my body drift away from the occult shop and the friends inside.

My out-of-body experience just keeps getting fucking weirder by the second. The moment the shapes and colors fade is the moment my body feels like I'm both flying and falling. If I could scream, I would, but I can't open my mouth. Whether this is due to the astral acid trip or fear, I'm not sure.

In the place of the mirage of psychedelics come images from my own life. I see my childhood with my parents and younger siblings. I see the house we lived in in the urban part of the capital. I feel the warmth from my mother and the pride of my father rolls over me, and for a split second, I forget what comes next.

The bombing. The fire. The brimstone. Then I was running. I never looked back. The next four years pull at my heartstrings. Everything from living on the streets to stealing from vendors just to stay alive, I did a lot of things I'm not proud of.

I close my eyes to what's in front of me, not wanting to live it all over again. A kind voice brings me out of the dark, one I've heard in my sleep for the past few months. I feel a warm hand on my shoulder, and when I open them, I see Hal. His bright smile is striking against his dark skin. He tilts his head, and his long dreadlocks fall to the side. It's like he hasn't aged a day since he found me on that freighter.

"Hey there, sunshine," he states, his voice deep and kind. "What're you doin', hiding back here?"

Just as I reach out for him, he's gone, just like all the other memories. It fades away between my fingers, and I let my hand drop as if it's the heaviest thing on earth.

"He was as much your father as my son," a new voice says from behind me. This is a woman's voice, a sound much clearer than the memory of Hal.

I stand up, turning on my heel to face the source. The woman is petite, but with a curve to her hips that reminds me of myself. In fact, the longer I look at her, the more similarities I see. Dark and wavy hair, eyes somewhere between brown and green, thick eyebrows and a fuller bottom lip, medium and warm skin: it's like staring into a mirror twenty-five years into the future.

The woman smiles softly at me and folds her hands behind her back. "You look so much like Charbel," she sighs. "I mean, when he told me he was going to have a daughter, I didn't expect her to be so beautiful."

"You're her," I sign. "You're my grandmother."

"Call me Vai," she tells me. "And yes, I am, but you don't need to sign here, child. You can speak freely. We're in the astral plane. You're free from any disabilities here."

I lower my hands and open my mouth. At first, nothing comes out. I'm still operating as if I'm in my own body. But this isn't my body, and this isn't the real world. This is the astral realm. Anything is possible here, even me speaking for the first time in over a decade.

"I need your help," I say, hearing my own voice. I nearly jump at the sound, the way it reverberates in my own ears, the way the sound rattles my throat. It's terrifying and invigorating at the same time.

Vai nods once. "I know. You've come to ask me about your abilities."

I nod. "Can you help me? I'm lost. I don't know what to do and I don't want to make the same mistake I did earlier."

Vai steps forward. "I can tell you what you can do as a Queen, but I cannot tell you what to do with it. That is your choice."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, there are many paths you can take as a Queen of the bees. You might do as I did. I hid my powers from most of the world and raised my only son by myself. I chose the quiet life of a beekeeper, did my part as the Queen, and stayed quiet. This is what my mother did, and her mother, and her mother before her. I can't remember a time when our family was out in the open about this lineage. It's been centuries, I suppose."

"Why?"

Vai sighs, "Because the times were different, especially in Lebanon. Women were mothers and wives, not Queens. Not free like they are now. This was the case in most of the world." She smiles up at me. "But you, Sarai, have another option. The world has changed. You can do whatever you want with these powers. You stay in the dark as I did, or you can show yourself and change everything. You can protect the bees from the humans like maybe I should have."

She pauses for a moment, then reaches for both of my hands. She turns them palms-up and squeezes them while looking directly in my eyes. "You can do so much more than you think, child. You can summon the bees, talk to each of them, but you can also be like them. You can fly if you really wanted to."

A huge grin covers my face. "Fly? Like a superhero?"

She chuckles, "Like a bee, Sarai. Like a bee, but don't go jumping off buildings. Flying can take years to master." She clasps both of my hands in her own, a very grandmotherly gesture. "But more than talking or flying or summoning, you will start to have the knowledge of bees that no one else on earth will have. This comes in two forms: it will come in random thoughts, epiphanies, at random times. Over the years you will be able to collect this knowledge and share it, if you wish. You can help bees like no one else can."

"And the second way?"

Vai's smile widens. "You will be able to tap into the sight of any bee on the planet. Think of it like the hive mind, only a hive sight. Wherever they are, you can be there, too. You will be able to see through their eyes."

I shake my head, letting a laugh--a real laugh--slip out. The feelings of wonder and amazement are overwhelming. I never expected to learn this much, not in this short amount of time.

"This is fucking unbelievable," I state, throwing up my hands in excitement.

Vai laughs, placing her hands behind her back. "I knew you'd get some joy out of it, but there's more I haven't gotten to yet." She pauses, her face growing more serious. "But I have to ask you something first."

"Anything," I reply, still giddy.

Vai tilts her head, looking me over. "I sense magic all over you, and not your own magic. I sense a witch."

I clear my throat. "That's, um, that's Wanda. She helped me get here. She's a close friend."

My grandmother still looks unconvinced. "I know what your mother did to you after I died, the spell she put on you. You can't trust witches, Sarai. They're dangerous. They have no rules, no code to follow, no one to hold them accountable."

Crossing my arms over my chest, I reply sternly, "Wanda wouldn't do anything like my mother did. She broke my mother's spell, to begin with."

Vai shakes her head. "I sense a man's presence, not a woman's."

"Stephen and Loki are Wanda's friends. They're sorcerers."

The brunette shifts where she stands. "Not a sorcerer. A witch. Witches can be male or female. The presence I sense, it's much older than your friends. I sense..." She trails off, her kind smile returning to her face. "Just be careful, Sarai."

"I will, Vai," I reply, knowing she means well.

She nods, her expression shifting back to one of excitement. "How long do you have here in the astral realm?"

"Stephen told me about five minutes in the real world."

Vai laughs, offering me a hand. "Well, we have hours then. Come along, child. Let me show you what you can really do."

END CHAPTER THIRTEEN.