Chapter Eight
Three weeks earlier …
As Zenandra laboured alone to establish the nest, Sabrina, her firstborn, was preparing to spin a cocoon. Thanks to her mother’s dedicated care, she’d grown long and fat as a wasp grub should. She’d shed her skin five times and had stopped feeding, refusing her mother’s offerings. Time to clean up her cradle.
It wasn’t a hard job to discard the few scraps of skin and uneaten food. In the three weeks since her birth, Sabrina had never fouled her bed. These wastes showed as a dark spot through the creamy, translucent skin of her abdomen.
Once her cell was pristine, she started to weave fine strands of silk produced through her spinneret. Instinct guided her to attach these silken threads to various points on the cell wall, forming a loose, anchoring fr
