Regina hadn’t expected to have to fight a war, and she especially hadn’t expected the threat to be to the south, rather than the north or east. Despite that, the hive wasn’t caught unprepared, and it shifted into high gear to complete its preparations quickly.

She wasn’t sure what the gnomes would do, which was the biggest issue. While Regina kept Winged Drones flying above their territory as well as she could to try and spy on them, it didn’t exactly tell her much about their plans. Were they going to start raiding into her territory, assemble an army to invade, or sit back and wait for her to attack them?

Obviously, she had to make preparations for all of those possibilities, as well as decide whether to go on the offensive herself. Regina was inclined towards patience on that point. While she didn’t like the thought of giving them any more time than she had to, the fact remained that not only had they already had plenty of time to prepare before they attacked, but she needed time to build up her hive’s forces. She also wanted to get some impression of which way they were going to go, at least.

Tia and others were busy laying minefields outside the hive’s main bases to prepare a defense against an invasion, and everyone who could had already started Conjuring and assembling materials to build explosives. That was still one of their bottlenecks, but there was a lot you could do with even a small volume of certain materials, if you had the right knowledge. And knowledge was one of those things she had on her side, her biggest advantage. At the moment, Regina was fervently glad that she’d thought to ask Galatea for more than just magical or historical records, but also technical knowledge and data. Little things like the complete periodic table of the elements, or the formula for gunpowder. Even if a lot of things she would have liked hadn’t been in her databases, and Regina had been reluctant to actually use and reveal much of it. She couldn’t afford that kind of hesitation now, though.

Besides these constraints, not coming to attack the gnomes with a bloodthirsty swarm of drones might have other advantages, given what she’d discussed with Enais and Anuis, regarding her enemies’ cohesion and morale. It was in her best interests to make it as clear as possible - to outsiders, but maybe also some gnomes themselves - that their allegations had little basis in fact. Hivekind were more naturally suited to terror tactics, she supposed, but that also wasn’t the kind of strategy you could easily turn away from.

It also gave her the opportunity to watch things play out in Ariedel. Enais and Anuis were true to their word, and in the hours leading up to the Assembly meeting, Enais met with several other prominent elves and sowed the seeds for the inevitable confrontation.

Ray was invited as a guest, but he didn’t actually get to see most of the Assembly session. The elves clearly had things they wanted to talk about in private, so he simply waited in a chamber inside a tree trunk adjacent to the meeting hall and enjoyed the view from a window carved out of the tree’s bark. The actual hall was more of an open-air pavilion stretching across the unnaturally straight boughs of several trees lining it. That theoretically made the elves’ deliberations visible to all, but in practice, actually hearing them was hard even for Ray over the wind and rustle of leaves. Even if they weren’t using magic to stop the sound from reaching too far. Luckily, he wasn’t afraid of heights.

A secretary working for the Assembly gestured him out onto the canopy after a while, and Ray stepped forward just in time to hear the start of the gnomish ambassador’s address.

Regina listened through his ears, taking in the gnome’s words and trying to watch for the reactions of the gathered elves at the same time. Most of them were quite high-level, high enough that Ray couldn’t see their levels, and they had a varied assortment of Classes. She paid more attention to the ambassador himself, though, who had a class simply called Envoy instead of one of the gnomes’ more common, poetically named ones. He also spoke eloquently, and she had the impression this wasn’t the first time he’d addressed the elves here.

The content of his words was less than pleasing, unfortunately. As she had expected, he squarely blamed the entire ‘incident’ on the Hivekind. Who he immediately outed as being Hivekind, too. Probably some remnants of the original monstrous hordes who had escaped their downfall hiding away in the dark corners of the world — or underneath the surface world, more likely, in the deep darkness — before they resurfaced to take over where their ancestors left off.

So, the gnomes had defended themselves valiantly against a sudden attack by the traitorous Hivekind. And it just so happened, of course, that among the Hivekind drones killed in the fighting was someone with an Envoy Class, which they of course hadn’t known before. Who knew, perhaps it was, after all, just a ploy to suggest that the gnomes had groundlessly killed a diplomatic envoy?

He definitely implied that part, anyway, even if he didn’t quite come out and say it. Everything else was rather clear, though.

Regina found it pretty interesting in a macabre, analytical sort of way. It also offered her some insight into how the gnomes were spinning this for their own people. Of course, she assumed there were differences between this and the version the gnomes were telling at home. He must have adapted some things for the elves’ public consumption. Then again, if this was what they used for the elves, she might be giving their judgment a bit too much credit.

It was pretty obvious the elves didn’t have nearly the same kind of ideological antipathy to the Hivekind as the gnomes did. She saw more than one of the gathered representatives giving Ray speculative glances at the ambassador’s repeated reference to their species, but they didn’t look particularly hostile. She also didn’t get the impression many of them were inclined to believe him, although Regina didn’t know how much of that had to do with Enais’ preliminary efforts.

The organizer, or chairman, of the Assembly - called the Moderator of Discourse, according to the information Enais had given them - also seemed to be on Enais’ side. He immediately let her speak when she stood up after the gnome was finished, anyway, cutting right through the somewhat tense silence that followed his words and quieting the occasional murmured word from the delegates.

Enais spoke calmly, reasonably, and without any undue embellishment or emotional appeals, which seemed to give her a serious, even objective air. She reported what had happened, relating that she had discussed these events with the Hive Queen herself, and that she gave credence to her words. In the process, she also subtly reminded everyone of their alliance against the humans of Nerlia and Cernlia. And then, she called on Ray.

"Thank you, Special Minister,” he said, standing up, stepping closer, and taking a moment to let his gaze pass across the assembled people. “I appreciate the conciseness and clarity you have shown in relating what happened in City Telimelekilete-En, since I am afraid I will not be able to speak as dispassionately. Whatever the gnomish Confederation may claim, we are talking about a sickening act of betrayal and murder. In the middle of trade negotiations meant to foster closer understanding and prosperity for both of our peoples, they deliberately and with malice aforethought murdered my sister Bea and her escorts.”

That caused a small stir to go through the gathered elves. Regina had discussed this with Ray, and he’d done quite well, in her opinion. Like the slight emphasis on Bea being his sister. Anyone who knew more about Hivekind or thought about the presumed social structure of demihumans with ‘hives’ might realize it should be basically meaningless, since every drone was the Hive Queen’s offspring, and thus they were all siblings. But that clearly didn’t apply to all of the elves here. And so, Ray didn’t just enter the stage as an envoy carrying carefully crafted appeals, he was also a young man - a boy, really - who decried the brutal murder of his sister.

Regina watched and listened quietly, trying not to distract him, as he continued and the elves started to ask questions and develop a discussion. The gnomish ambassador was visibly uncomfortable about him. In fact, he flinched backward once when Ray turned and pointed accusingly at him perhaps a bit too theatrically. It was pretty amusing, though, and Regina chuckled in the privacy of her own room.

Anyway, despite the gnome’s vehement protests, the outcome of the whole thing was pretty much a foregone conclusion. The elves’ spokesman politely but firmly complimented him out, and Ray withdrew as well, after a quick exchange of whispers with Enais.

The elves would have to deliberate on it first, so it would take a bit of time, but Regina didn’t doubt that they would offer their support. Probably not in terms of soldiers — although they might permit volunteers and mercenaries, and maybe even a few ‘volunteer’ special forces members ‘on leave’ or something — but logistical support would be more than welcome, as well. Come to think of it, getting their help on the diplomatic front, especially when it came to taking news of this to the other kingdoms, might be just as priceless.

In the meantime, Regina pushed her own preparations. Ultimately, she couldn’t rely on anyone besides her hive.

She conferred with Ben and the other senior warriors regularly. They still didn’t quite have a formal chain of command, although that might change sometime soon now, but these were the equivalent of her officers. Well, arguably every sapient drone was basically an officer, commanding troops of Swarm Drones.

Effectively, while Max was still senior to him, Ben was the general of the army. It wasn’t just his Class as a Drone General, but also a job he did admirably, organizing, training and commanding the warrior-type sapient drones and overseeing the War and Winged Drones that weren’t used for other things. Of course, Regina was still involved, and she was definitely the ‘commander in chief’ of the hive personally, but she still couldn’t run the day-to-day of her armed forces. Besides, she’d probably be worse at actual military strategy than Ben.

For now, her plan seemed to be going pretty well. She’d discussed it with all of them and agreed to some refinements. Ben and the others had also picked out the actual locations where they would be establishing outposts and bases. Regina’s foremost priority and contribution right now were really to provide the Drone Breeders they needed. She was hard at work on that, too. Making a lot of their eggs in a short time frame was a bit uncomfortable, but she bore with it and didn’t complain.

Still, growing her hive didn’t take all that much time, so she had enough time to monitor what was happening and contribute to the planning.

The gnomes didn’t seem ready to immediately rush out and attack, which gave them some time to at least get rudimentary defenses in place and prepare the ground for more. They were putting up quite a few defensive measures, even pretty close to the gnomes’ territory. The Winged Drones were a great help with that. Even if the hive still didn’t have enough Mounts to carry more than a few people, rather than an army, that still let them get some people to where they needed to be quickly. Regina had even allowed Baron Neralt to ride one of them.

At the moment, Neralt was at the site Volance had pointed out and which would probably be their major fort in the area. Their main forward base, if they could hold it. Tia had joined him, as well, and together with a group of drones, they were laying down foundations and putting up walls.

Regina had pointed out a few things to add to the design, like the need for bracing against artillery instead of just ballista bolts and catapults for the walls, but Neralt had contributed the most. His ability to assess the terrain and work with it was more impressive than she’d really expected. It let them set up quite a few firing positions, fallback positions and ambush spots in addition to the actual fortress, all concealed so well she doubted the gnomes would notice before they were forcefully pointed out to them. And the best point was that the longer Neralt spent here, the more powerful it got.

On the whole, they were doing pretty well, Regina decided. Unfortunately, the fortress, or any of the other bases, couldn’t be built in a day. And even if they got enough time to complete them, that also gave the gnomes time to muster their forces. That was one of the reasons she decided to step up her efforts to get information about them.

Carefully, of course. Regina had to rely on her scrying magic in addition to Winged Drones overhead, since they couldn’t exactly send infiltrators into the gnomish cities. The different races made that kind of intelligence gathering a bit hard in this time and place. She’d decided to be very careful and only watch from a distance, at least to start with. Who knew what kind of countermeasures the gnomes might have?

Luckily, while she’d never been in that city herself, she had had enough of her drones there for long enough that it basically didn’t matter. So, Regina started with the city her drones had died in, and carefully visualized its appearance from overhead.

It worked, thankfully. She got a pretty good view of the city. Distant enough she’d have no chance of spying on anything happening there in detail, unfortunately, but at least she should be able to tell general patterns. Especially the gnomes’ mobilization. Armies tended not to be particularly stealthy.

Right now, even watching carefully, she didn’t find anything that really looked like one. There were a few groups of soldiers, but none that looked bigger than a company or so. Of course, they could be in the buildings. Or, for that matter, they could be traveling through tunnels.

Regina sighed to herself. Now she just had to figure out a way to follow those to other places, especially other cities, even if neither she nor her drones had ever been there. She wasn’t optimistic about managing that. And she’d have to regularly check on the city, as well.

At least things seemed to be fine for now. She was hoping she’d find their main army soon, though. Assuming they had anything like that. Well, maybe not seeing it is a good thing, she told herself. She still wasn’t exactly happy with the situation, but that would be a bit too much to ask for.