Queen & Commander (Book One of the Hive Queen Saga)

Chapter Six: Commander Ceridwen

Rhiannon reached the address Gavin provided at that time of morning when the sun shone at an angle that simultaneously got in your eyes and didn’t actually illuminate anything.

The tiny office suite had a waiting room with thin carpets that didn’t cushion the floor. A female receptionist, her lips pursed and chin tilted at a defiant angle, gestured to an area with eight orange chairs. Three other Queen or Commander hopefuls already occupied some of those chairs.

Rhiannon couldn’t help but notice she was the youngest in the room by at least forty years. Oh yeah, she had a chance. Not. The interviewer would take one look at her and laugh.

She didn’t know whether to feel relieved or sad. Even her most youthful rival, chewing a wad of gum and slouching like the bizarre angles of her chair didn’t bother her, had to be at least eighty. Middle-aged.

The second, also eighty-ish, was more formal in a monochromatic red pantsuit. She’d braided her hair so tightly under a golden circlet-crown that her eyebrows extended to her hairline. She exuded seriousness.

The last was much older, elephant-wrinkled and paler than milk. At first Rhiannon thought she was bald, but a second inspection revealed close-cropped, thinning white hair.

Rhiannon wished she had the nerve to chop her own hair that short. Women with short hair always seemed happier and more in control of their lives. Her own shoulder-blade length, brown-black waves never seemed to get above her neck when she went to the barber. Such a drastic change shouldn’t be undertaken lightly, her mother had cautioned when she was seven. That warning echoed in her sixteen-year-old ears, no matter how quickly any mistake might grow out.

The woman in the circlet and red pantsuit gave Rhiannon a slow evaluation, starting at her loose hair, going down to her barely heeled boots, and traveling back up again. Rhiannon did her best to ignore it. At school, the Queenlets who hoped for a Queen’s Test results did the same thing all the time. Those girls tried to one-up each other with these games and psych-outs. Rhiannon stayed away from their mock-courts and proto-Hives and left them to it.

She’d never be a political, crown-and-gown kind of Queen, even after she went to university. She didn’t want to separate herself too much from normal women. Sure, she’d be blessed with more options and what some called a harem of the best men. But she wasn’t better than them. She couldn’t go on a date or have kids without her Hive’s express permission. She’d always be responsible for more than a single person ever should be. Why did I want to be a Queen again? She grinned to herself, but schooled her face when the red Queen glowered. Right, because I like people and it sounded fun. Who needs to date anyway?

Rhiannon looked over to the only non-Queen in the room. When will the receptionist call someone into an interview? She could definitely leave all this posturing and glowering behind.

Maybe when she was done here, she’d have a celebratory-cum-cheering-up moment and hack it all off at the barber shop. She’d leave the building with her head high, confident that she’d done her best to get the Cauldron. Confident that when she tried again in ten years, circumstances would align. She’d find a fashionable capital city barber to change her hair, change her image, change her into the kind of woman who didn’t need cascading locks or face-framing layers to feel good about her appearance. Although, she really did like playing with the ends.

The lounging Queen snapped her gum. Rhiannon jumped, looking towards her. The gum-chewer didn’t notice her attention, however. She was too busy glaring at the superior woman in red.

The crowned one sneered at the gum-snapper’s antics. “They’ll never give it to a slovenly thing like you. I’m going to get the ship and the prestige. You’ll just be a sad, washed-up wash-out who never made it as a Queen.”