"I'm glad to see you up and at em," the lady smiled wide. The bee circled the plate and looked up at her, "It's just sugar water, I'm sorry if you don't like it, I couldn't find any flowers this morning. I heard somewhere bees eat sugar water so I poured some on that plate." He tried it, and then began feasting on the clear liquid. "Give me an ear, or whatever you use to pick up vibrations, please. This is your first day as a Puzzle Keeper in training! You are like my apprentice. My name is Elizabeth Riddleton, but you can call me Lizzie. As soon as I can get you to talk that is. I come from a long line of beautiful and clairvoyant puzzle keepers."
He looked confused, "Clairvoyant you ask? You see, everyone with the gift has an added power. I am clairvoyant meaning I can see the future," she wiggled her fingers and made a humming noise. He rolled his eyes, "Hey! Don't give me attitude! It's true; let me make a prediction right now." She closed her eyes for a second. They suddenly opened wide, "Twenty years from now," her voice was soothing but there was power behind her words, "I'll be about forty-six then mind you, someone very important will be born. Yes, he will solve many puzzles, but his life will not be without hardships. Both you and I will play a part in his life even if in a small way. Poor man," she had a look of pity on her face, "The lady has to die."
He stopped eating, that was a rather dreary prediction. "Oh, it won't be all horrible; some little ones will know a way to make him smile. A gilded fruit and this man's apprentice, you'll meet them someday," she waved her hand back and forth as if to push the future away. "The only bad thing about the seeing the future is you can't prove that you're right for a long time. Now enough about me let's talk about you."
He sat on the edge of the table swinging his legs making a buzzing noise. "This is where we reach a problem. You can understand me but I can't understand you. I'll have to teach you to talk!" he gave her a look that said what he wanted to, how are you gonna pull this off? "You are capable of speech, you just have to try! I know there is more than that involved. But back when you were a little egg some scientists may have messed with your DNA. I think they mixed yours with a human's. But anyway, when you were born you had regular bee instincts, stinging, liking flowers all that, but you also had the instincts of a human. Like any human child, from listening to other humans you learned meanings of words and what they sound like." He looked at her like she was crazy, "I also suspect the human you got DNA from had a bit of attitude, stop looking at me like that! When I was little I saw the beginning of your life, clairvoyant remember? Because we were destined to meet, I've been waiting for you for forever."
He took in the meaning of her words. "Do you want to learn how to speak? I'll also have to teach you to read and write as well, so you can organize the puzzles of course. So how about it?" He reached out his tiny hand and placed it on her thumb. "I guess you want to shake on it," they both moved their respective hand or finger up and down. "Then we'll get started, I feel like this may take a bit of time"
He had a question, but there was no way he could ask it. He wondered: if everyone with the gift had some other power, what was his? He thought about this as he watched as Lizzie pulled out piles and piles of flashcards each had things scribbled on them.
"That should be enough, let's start the lesson apprentice⦠oh! I can't believe I skipped over that! You need a name." she declared. He looked thoughtful for a while but shrugged. He couldn't think of anything and he couldn't tell her it anyway. "How about this, you keep thinking and once you can properly tell me your name it will be official. Until then I'll call you Beasly, I'm sorry if the name is corny, it was all I could think of." He smiled, he loved it. "Let's start with A, it looks like this," she fumbled around for a bit then pulled out a flashcard with an A on it. "It makes an Ahh, sound." This was going to take a long time.
