stream began to fall and the baby quieted as it fed. Confused, Flora stepped back.
‘The miracle,’ said a kind, familiar voice, ‘was that you could feed at all.’
Sister Sage stood by her, beautiful and frightening. She smiled.
‘If your job bores you, 717, I will give you something more exciting to do. Consider it another test.’
At the sight of Sister Sage all the Category Two nurses and nannies curtsied, though they looked warily at Flora walking with her. The priestess was not angry that her Flow had stopped, and seemed only to want to talk.
‘I would have said the experiment was a success,’ she said to Flora. ‘And I am sure Sister Teasel impressed on you the privilege of such sacred service.’
‘Yes, Sister. I am very grateful.’
‘But you are very curious about Category Two – a rather prosaic place, to my mind. Why is that?’
The more she breathed of Sister Sage’s strong scent, the more Flora grew calm, and felt an overpowering desire to tell the truth.
‘In Category One everything is always the same.’
Sister Sage laughed.
‘The very point of identical care. Yet it bored you.’
‘Yes, Sister. Forgive me.’ Flora lowered her head, but Sister Sage raised it and held her long antennae over hers.
‘We will forget the folly of the curtsies and your boldness in hoping to see Holy Mother, for I hear you are also very devout and hard-working.’
‘I hope so, Sister.’
‘And you love the Queen?’
‘With my body and my soul.’ Flora’s antennae trembled as she felt Sister Sage reaching deep into her mind.
Would you serve Her any way you can?
‘With my whole life.’
‘Good.’ Sister Sage walked on. ‘In this time of scarce forage, you have been surprisingly useful in the Nursery. Sometimes it works to spare the deviants, and experiment a little.’ She smiled. ‘Is this place as you imagined?’
‘Better, Sister! It is so lively, so full of wonderful things—’
‘Then look your fill. I wish you to know it.’
* * *
Flora could not take Category Two in at once, with its decorations and beautifully tiled play areas. Pretty nurses and nannies sat with their vigorous little charges, singing and playing games, or feeding them from shining platters. Healthy beautiful child-grubs were everywhere, their cheerful snubby little faces speckled with golden pollen dust. Gone was the heavy scent of Flow and the mumble of prayer, and in its place nursery rhymes, laughter and the bright aroma of fresh bread.
Sister Sage watched her. ‘What do you know of feeding patterns?’
‘Nothing, Sister.’ Flora admired two fat child-grubs, chuckling as their nurses tickled them. ‘Sister Teasel asked me that. All I know is that timing is very important and there are a lot of bells.’ Her own arms tingled to hold one herself and she turned away lest the sin of Desire take hold. ‘And we must always stop at the right moment and never give a drop more.’
‘Because …?’
‘I’m not sure, Sister.’
Sister Sage touched one of Flora’s antennae with her own, and Flora felt a piercing resonance in her mind. The sensation grew almost unbearable, then abruptly stopped as Sister Sage released her.
‘Good. You are truthful.’ Her long antennae flexed. ‘Tell me, though, about my sisters Teasel: do they hold any meetings or gatherings in the Nursery?’
‘I don’t think so.’ Flora felt a strong urge to please the priestess with the right answer. ‘But I know only the one, my supervising sister.’
‘Ah yes. To you they are all the same. And so they very nearly are, though they must still use speech to know each other’s thoughts. It is most quaint. But you will tell me if they hold private meetings, do you understand?’
‘Yes, Sister.’
They had come to the end of the Category Two ward where great panels of carving marked another set of doors. Flora could not decipher the markings but knew instinctively not to touch them. Sister Sage answered her unspoken question.
‘They speak of Holy Time, when we have all slept in prayer.’ Her voice was soft and her face shone as if she experienced some great inner joy. ‘Each Devotion, we recall something of that state.’ She remained rapt in contemplation.
Flora felt it correct to stand in silence beside her. A movement caught her eyes. It was another of the wretched sanitation workers, working along the ward gutter with her pan and brush, and looking directly at Flora and the priestess. Flora pressed her knees together and drew herself up as thin and tall as she could, trying to emphasise their difference. Steadily sweeping, the worker passed on. Though nothing more than a look had occurred, Flora was angry and agitated.
‘Do not blame yourself: no one may choose their kin – or all would be Sage.’ No longer in her enraptured state, the priestess smiled. ‘Because you lack botanical heritage, yours forms the base of our society. Or rather, you draw it from impure and promiscuous flowers, shunned by this hive.’
‘Sister Sage! Sister Sage!’
Sister Teasel’s high, strained voice reached down the long corridor of Category Two. They smelled her streaming panic before they saw her, running towards them with antennae waving and wild fear on her face.
‘Please – you must – both of you, I beg you—’ Sister Teasel could hardly speak. ‘Everyone must report at once, the fertility police are here now on our ward!’
* * *
As Flora followed Sister Sage back through the Category Two ward, every nurse and nanny clutched her little charge tight to her, and stared at them in silence. Up ahead through the big double doors, the Category One ward was no longer dim and hushed but starkly illuminated and pulsing with a harsh bitter scent. Flora stumbled as her brain struggled to recall it. Sister Sage took her by the arm to quicken her pace and strengthened her own scent around both of them.
‘You have nothing to fear.’
They went into the ward. At first Flora thought the nurses had gone because all the cribs were unattended and the babies were already starting to cry, but then she saw them all standing in lines near the ward sisters’ station. Some openly wept in fear, their antennae waving uncontrollably, while others stood rigid. Standing around the edges of the ward were the fertility police. Their kin-scents were hidden under their masking scent, their eyes were blank, and their fur was slicked dark against their bands – but Flora recognised them from the Arrivals Hall. Sister Sage curled a filament of her own scent around
