#i think it's a “you are taking crumbs rather than a whole loaf of bread simply because the crumbs come from a man” thing

[fiapple]

do i like jason todd? yes, i think about him far too often.

do i think the section of his fan-base who posit storylines, narrative positioning, & other writing choices for him that either aren't present or are deeply mismanaged/inconsistent in-text, & which have already been canonically given to comic-women (while often also being better written) should at least try branching the scope of their reading out a bit? oh, jesus fucking christ, absolutley.

#like i don't think for *all* the people doing it that it's intentional transference like a) a lot of it is influenced by fanon people who #either do not read comics or only read from new52 on unless they HAVE to & b) they would have to actually care enough about the #women-characters in question to know details about them beyond what is discussed HEAVILY in fan-spaces... and i don't think many do tbh #like i think for at least a good portion of those who exemplify this behaviour it is either like incidental & they just are unaware of the #overlap with these women entirley or it's passive in that they've been told and don't care... still fucking misogyny though #& like there are for sure some people who have read the comics and do it intentionally dgmw like you can tell #and a lot of people tend to respond to criticisms like this by saying “oh well you need to accept characters are going to have overlap” #and like i do. jason does have overlap with quite a few female characters. #but the way that overlap is discussed is- more often than not- more similar to one of the women's *actual canon material* than it is jason' #& i'm not even against wanting to see that overlap explored! but often with jason this overlap is very loose (poor background for ex) #based on an implication (the potential overlap with mia) or based on something that is largely mismanaged in the actual text in a way that #it isn't with the woman it overlaps with (morality) #and taking that into account what's basically being expressed is that you find all these bits & pieces interesting and want to see them #more thouroughly explored... but when that's actually happened with a woman you don't care. #and like again i get wanting to see things in the context of a specific character & that i'm speaking very generally here #but you can't claim that there is an abscene of something in the text just because it isn't on a certain character #and when you ignore the prescence of whatever overlap is in question just because it's on a woman... thats misogyny hun. #and like i said it's not even an “i dont think you actually like jason” thing #i think it's a “you are taking crumbs rather than a whole loaf of bread simply because the crumbs come from a man” thing #and fans of those women (shout out to mia fans you lot seem to be getting a lot of this lately <3) are allowed to feel angry about it #also this isn't a jason exclusive issue either. it happens with every batboy and it makes me want to tear out my eyelashes. #radfems dni #terfs dni #fandom misogyny #dc #helena bertinelli #mia dearden #stephanie brown #jason todd #selina kyle

[dreamyautumns]

TreyMal fanfic for my boyfriend💚🖤

~~~

Crack!

Trey turns around. The basket in his arms creaks a bit as he searches for the source of the mysterious noise.

“Did I just imagine that…?”

Trey goes back to walking down the path to Riddle’s house, when he suddenly hear’s something again. This time, it sounds like a low growl.

Something’s definitely in this forest…

Trey pulls out the magic pen from his pocket and looks around, wondering what the source of the noise could be.

“Hello, human…”

Trey finally decides to look up. He’s suddenly caught trapped within the gaze of jewel green eyes. A dark shadow casts over the land as he realizes what it is.

Oh damnit… it’s a dragon!

~

It’s hard for Trey to become particularly frightened since he’s so calm. But being face to face with a gigantic dragon, who he assumes is around 50 feet tall, was highly unsettling. Trey slips the pen back in his pocket and backs away, holding his hands up.

“L-listen, sir… I don’t want any trouble. Honest. I’m just delivering goods to my friend who lives in the village through the woods…”

The dragon dips its head down to meet Trey’s golden, amber eyes. Smoke pours out of its nostrils as it inspects the basket, flicking it’s tail back and forth. Trey holds his ground, but it’s hard for him to resist the urge to drop his basket and run.

“You… are a baker? I can smell sweets,” the dragon rumbles.

“Uh… y-yeah! Yeah, I’m a baker. I live with my family in town? We got a whole bunch of sweets there,” Trey answers. “Did you… wanna try one?”

The dragon pulls back before tilting its head. “Hmm… they do smell rather delectable. Alright, then. Indulge me with your “sweets”, human…”

The dragon suddenly glows bright green. Trey’s eyes are blinded as he feels the cold, ominous shadow fall back a bit. When the light fades, he looks up to see the dragon no longer there.

“Huh?”

In the dragon’s place now stands a man who towers over the forest. His skin is pale, and his horns glisten in the light. His eyes remain as bright and peridot green as ever, and his fingernails are painted black. Trey assumes it must be to match his claws. The man seems no older than Trey by a year.

“Fufufu… are you startled by my appearance?” The dragon asks. Trey rubs the back of his head awkwardly.

“I mean… can’t say I was particularly keen on knowing you were also a giant human…”

“Correction; I am a giant fairy. I am half dragon, half fairy. My name is Malleus Draconia.”

“Malleus Draconia…” Trey repeats. “Quite the strong sounding name you got. I’m Trey Clover. Nice to meet you…?”

Malleus exhales, a puff of smoke surrounding the baker. Trey coughs a bit as his glasses are fogged up. “The pleasure is mine, Clover. Now, I’d like to try one of your sweets, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Trey nods, pulling out a small loaf of bread he packed for extra measure. Malleus takes it and swallows it as if it were no more than a mere crumb.

“So, was it t-to your liking?” Trey asks nervously.

“It was quite delicious… you make these goods yourself?” Malleus asks, shuffling. His movements cause a slight tremor to run through the ground. Trey holds himself against a tree to stabilize himself.

“Yes, m-me and my family make them.”

Malleus turns and dips his head down, looking at Trey at eye level. The dragon fae smiles in a teasing manner before blowing another puff of smoke at him. Trey coughs once again and wipes his glasses off.

“How lovely~ you’re quite the charming human.”

“Charming?” Trey chuckles awkwardly. “I’ve never really been described as “charming”, to be honest.”

Malleus chuckles again, his laugh rattling the trees. “You’re quite funny. I think I wish to keep you.”

“Huh? Keep me?” Trey asked. “Malleus, what do you-“

Before he can even get a word out, the giant scoops him up in the palm of his hand and levitates off the ground, smiling at the boy in his hands. Trey holds onto Malleus’ fingers and looks down in a state of worry.

“U-uh, Malleus?! Where are you taking me?!”

“You’re coming home with me, only for a little bit. You fascinate me. Do keep me entertained, human~”

#g/t writing #g/t #twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland g/t #trey clover #malleus draconia

[clefairymuke]

regrets | chapter eighteen

prev. chapter | next chapter

pairing: levi ackerman x reader

themes: enemies to lovers, slowburn, angst, fluff, smut

tw: violence / explicit sexual content

word count: 2018

His composure was frightening. You sat across from him at his desk, still half struggling to regulate your breathing as he poured still-steaming tea into your cup. It was as if nothing had happened: no fighting, no ignoring, and definitely no shameless and obnoxiously loud sex. He was a strange soul. He had cleaned you up rather quickly afterwards and directed you to his shower, leaving you with ten minutes to come to terms with what had just happened; however, you were left only with questions. When you returned, he was bringing his teapot from the stove to his desk, on which sat two teacups and a small stack of papers.

Your hair, combed back out of your face, was still damp; every so often, you felt cold little drops of water trickling down your neck and into the clean shirt Levi had given you to wear. You were sure his trousers wouldn't be the best fit; instead, you opted for just underwear. The shirt fell low enough, you thought. White socks kept your feet cozy as they could be, tucked beneath your thighs in a criss-cross. No words yet. That concerned you.

You cleared your throat and took a sip of your tea; it burned the tip of your tongue a bit, but you didn't mind. You could taste hibiscus. "That was . . . nice," you commented before mentally cursing yourself. What the hell was that? That was nice? Really? you thought, shrinking into yourself.

He chuckled — a rarity — and shook his head. You watched the way his fingers gripped the teacup from the top, lifting it to his lips in a way that you'd think would be uncomfortable, but he made it look fluid and natural. "Why do you hold it like that?" you asked, curious. His brow furrowed a bit, looking at you, unsure of what exactly you were asking. "The cup, I mean," you clarified. "The way you hold it is strange."

He looked down at it before meeting your gaze yet again. "That's a conversation for another day. You have dinner to get to soon, you know."

"You aren't going?" You pouted a bit without meaning to. His eyes were understanding, a tiny smile creeping across his lips.

"I'd rather stay in," he replied. "You can too, if you want." His tone was nonchalant and yet peaceful — a stark change from that of only an hour before. It was the comforting sound you'd grown accustomed to before he sealed it away behind his freshly-mortared wall of excuses. Worrisomely curious of him as you were, however, you couldn't help but wonder what was unfolding behind the slate grey stare that was impaling your own as you sat across from him. Your questions had yet to subside, and it was doubtful that they would. Levi was not one for blatant explanation, usually — his bluntness was at times occluded by his unwillingness to admit his own shortcomings. Counting the times you had to dedicate critical thinking to his invisible emotions would keep you busy well past dinnertime. You swirled your finger along the rim of your cup, getting lost in your thoughts.

You couldn't help how your eyes lingered on the man in front of you as he began to focus on the stack of papers in front of him. As his head tilted down to read the hand-written words, his still-messy hair occluded his forehead. Its inky color matched that of his eyebrows, drawn down in concentration to frame silver eyes. His nose sloped elegantly to a point, resting just above full, pink lips. His features were soft where they needed to be and chiseled where they didn't — his cheeks were full and plush-looking, while his jaw angled sharply into his chin. He was beautiful.

"Why are you staring at me?" he deadpanned, not bothering to meet your eyes.

"You're really pretty." I should just leave now, you decided. Why does my mouth allow this kind of shit to come out of it? This is getting annoying.

He looked up at you with one brow cocked up in questioning. You felt like getting up and walking out was a solid option; deserting couldn't possibly lead to a fate worse than this. You wondered if it would be more embarrassing to look for your pants first or just risk someone seeing you.

"How have you been sleeping?" he asked. You let out an audible sigh of relief; a subject change was much-needed to prevent your spontaneous combustion.

You shrugged at him. "I haven't, really. An hour or two a night is the extent of it." You yawned, right on cue. His eyebrow fell from mocking to its typical position for concern, making you grin. "I don't know why that surprises you."

"It doesn't. You look tired," he answered bluntly. If it came from anyone else, especially in a tone such as his, you might consider it an insult; however, the way his hand found yours across his desk and laid atop it reassured you otherwise. You found yourself gazing down at it, inspecting the way each blue-green vein trekked its own path across the pale landscape. You were quickly redirected by the fingers of his other hand finding your chin and lifting gently until your eyes met his. You experienced something not unlike chills down your spine as his thumb grazed your cheek before returning to his side. "What keeps you up?"

"That's a conversation for another day. It was really easy to get to sleep when you stayed with me in the infirmary, though. I would say I have trouble being by myself, but I haven't slept in a room alone in a long time." You shrugged again, watching gears turn in his eyes as he thought on your words.

His hand shifted from laying atop yours to grasping it, his thumb loosely caressing the top of it as you waited for him to speak. It was strange how this made you feel — the intimacy felt foreign despite how close you were to him only a half hour earlier. Something so common and simple was so unheard of when it came to him. You thought of how your sweaty hand felt in Jean's death-grip earlier that day, comparing it to the gentle hold Levi had on you now. This must be why couples hold hands for so long. "Let's get you something to eat," he said, finally.

He rose from his seat and started toward the back of his suite, which held an icebox and a wood-burning stove; he opted instead for the pantry. From it, he retrieved something wrapped in cloth and a jar of red jam. You stared open-mouthed at him. "I've been eating the same nasty soup as breakfast for weeks and you've had jam this whole time?"

He chuckled, unfolding the cloth to expose a loaf of bread. He pulled a breadknife from a drawer and began to cut it into slices. "Bread or toast? I'm about to put a skillet on for myself." He looked back at you, eyes absorbing yours into what felt like one of a thousand trances he'd held you in in the past few hours.

"Toast sounds nice," you replied, tapping your fingers absentmindedly on the wood of his desk. Your vision wandered yet again to the contents of the room, exploring every spotless inch like it was the last time you'd see it — with how hot and cold he could be, it very well may have been the last time. "How do you keep it so clean in here all the time?" you asked curiously.

He scoffed as he put the skillet on the stove, not even turning to acknowledge you.

---

The sky had become dark as it acted as a simple backdrop to your evening with Levi. The two of you had eaten at his desk; however, you were unsure of how he managed to finish between all of his not-so-kind comments about you allowing crumbs to fall on his desk and floor. You helped him clean up afterward to soothe his complaints, but his colorful language didn't cease until it looked as if no one had eaten anything at all — ever.

You now sat on his sofa, tucked in the corner of it with your knees drawn to your chest. The evening had brought on cooler weather than you would've liked, but you refused to complain. The company you had was worth a bit of a chill. Levi was perched on the other end of the couch, sipping tea and reading from a fistful of papers. The way he simply lived as if it were a typical day almost made you laugh; he didn't seem the type to entertain company, and today proved that he surely wasn't.

Besides, your friends would soon be wondering about your whereabouts, and your eyes were growing tired. It would soon be time to head back to the dorms for another battle with sleep, but you found comfort in the idea of not fighting with your own emotions to top it off. You thought maybe it wouldn't take too awfully long to get to sleep that night.

"Levi," you said, voice soft and full of sleep. He looked up at you, laying his papers in his lap and devoting his attention to your words. Little things like that were difficult to notice, but they meant everything once you did — it reminded you that no matter how dismissive he may act at times, he still cared enough to listen. "I think I need to get changed and head back. It's getting late."

He leaned forward and placed the documents on the table in front of him, blank-faced beckoning you toward him with one finger as if he was calling you for a scolding. In his eyes, on the other hand, you saw soft, inviting pools of silver. You scooted over to his side, letting your feet rest on the cool ground. He took your hand in his, reminding you again how secure and comfortable he was capable of making you feel. "Will you be able to get to sleep?" he asked, running his thumb across the top of your hand.

You shook your head at him. "Probably not. But I can't really stay here, you know."

He nodded, letting loose his hold on your hand. "I know. Your clothes are laid out on my bed. You can go change."

You got up from his side and went into his room, shutting the door behind you. Every part of you wanted to crawl into his bed and rest, despite obvious reasons telling you you couldn't. You changed as quickly as you could, leaving his shirt folded neatly near his pillow. When you left his room, he was still sat on the sofa. He rose quickly and met you in the middle of the room, escorting you to the door.

"My leg works fine now, you know. You don't have to walk me everywhere anymore," you laughed, shaking your head. He didn't reply, though; he simply opened the door for you.

"Don't break anything on your way back," he told you. You noticed the dark circles under his eyes growing more prominent as the night continued forward.

"No promises. I'll see you tomorrow?" you asked, a mischievous grin covering your lips.

You watched as he considered that for a moment, unsure of his answer. Finally, he settled on, "We'll see." You nodded at him, smiling, knowing that "we'll see" was as close to a yes as you could get with Levi. You started to walk out, but your brain stopped you in your tracks, turning to face the man with his gaze still fixed on you. Deliberation with yourself took place within less than a second as you leaned in close, kissing him quickly before turning on your heel and starting your trek back to the dorms.

A few yards away, you allowed your head to turn back at him, delighted to see that his eyes were still on you.

#AoT #levi aot #aot fic #attack on titan #levi attack on titan #enemies to lovers #slowburn #levi x reader #levi #levi smut #levi fluff #levi angst #snk #snk fic #snk x reader #aot x reader #shingeki no kyojin #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman

[starshipsofstarlord]

Perception is Key

Part Two to Hell on Earth

avengers x reader

series masterlist

masterlist

Summary; dread is all you feel as you take up temporary residence in New Asgard. Something big is coming, and you are not the only one that can feel it, but despite that, Thor tries to make you feel safe in his rebuilt kingdom, though all you see is it falling before your knees

Warnings; mentions of death, angst, secrecy

divider by @firefly-graphics

Death, it was a certain doom for all living mechanisms, even Asgard had been demolished by its inevitable demise. Yet here you were, nursing an off handed bottle of ale that came from the gods, whilst you breathed in the salt scent that regarded from the ocean that crashed by. New Asgard, the home of Thor and his brothers in arms, whilst his real sibling was killed by Thanos. It was a shame to see the brave deity in mourning, however, there was nothing that you could do about it. Nothing.

The concept of the end came to all, it was a daunting curse that teased its victims, and pried them into sculpting their own fears of it. But for all the people in the galaxy knew, death could be peaceful; you liked to think that you were the same. A wound cog that did not work for their purpose, a villain that could do some good. And whilst you had never threatened the end of the world, your hereditary abilities sure as hell did. It was another danger to humans and more, thus making you one in regard.

Killing was a route that you didn’t want to take, it was dark, and there was no way back for redemption. Murderers and the bad guys, if they wanted penance, would spend their whole lives trying to make amends for what they did, in exchange for a forgiveness that they would never be granted. And if you did such a thing, as regretting causing exhibitions of death, your father would send for you from the underworld, and have you dragged back down to his bleak halls.

Those heroes would rise, as the ones that you came to know and befriend were brought to bottomless pits of service for Hades, suffering for all eternity as they knelt before the god whom ruled hell. Mother could only prey that he would give up his display of the deceased, he used them like puppets, and it was not a friendly scenic for the next batch of Demi gods that they were planning. You were brilliantly strong, but they would be stronger, as not only would they have the army of warriors behind them, they would be invincible.

Their carriageway into ironic new life, was affecting to you, you could feel it as their existence seared through your veins. There was a war coming, and it was going to be a blood bath, there would be bodies littered on all the planets as they respected their appetites, and they would come for you. It wasn’t silly for you to fear them, they had been around before, it was a rebirth for the ages, a damning revolution that would drain all the breathing from the lungs of species, flushing their external beings into whisperings of blistered remains.

Zagreus and Macaria were coming, pursuing the punishment that was deemed worthy for your scoundrel self, you were nothing more than another revamped version of yourself, raised from the ashes, and taking your overdue time to age. You were supposed to be the cause for the world’s destruction, but they, they would tear every atom down piece by piece, because you were unable to complete your mission of birthright.

Humans, nor other vessels of aspiring and mundane inventions, had the impact of defence to protect themselves from more dominant species. They were simply specks with heart beats in the universe, thumping in their chests as they strived to usher their own planet under the hypocrisy of a dying climate.

“Heimdall once said that Hades had a vision, and he, a seer of all people, couldn’t see how far his faction of thought went. There was no end with his quarrel with the nattering of life, instead, it was competently endless, going on for light years upon light years, straggling the gods into the grand demise. To put it into other words, you are his vision.”

“Well I’m not sure that our Vision back at the compound would be too pleased if I coined his name.” But all joking aside, the air shifted every time that you brought lightness to your words. Continuing, you spoke to Thor, whom had brought you to his evolved demeanour of his homeland, and stole you from the consequences of the violent struggle that you had instinctively conquests upon James Buchanan Barnes. “However, on a more serious note, you are aware of my origin, and the truths that Hades is my father. You know of why he crafted me, but there will be a greater shadow than my foresworn self, and the others need to know of this oncoming riot.”

“We shall tell them, but first; eat.” The god of thunder intended for you to follow through with his kind hearted order, though a heated rumble shook the core of the earth, the energy trembling up your legs. They had been born, sooner than anticipated, and much closer to your break from the ruckus than you had wanted.

“I am not sure we have the time, you felt that cause of apocalyptic foreshadowing, I can tell by the fearful promise on your face. My father will not rest until he has me, a weapon in his hold returned, and to do so, he will tear apart this family, in literal terms, so that I can return to my biological home.”

“Eat.” Thor spoke once more, gulping down the terror that graced his long spanned veins. “If there is to be a fight on earth for the ages, destruction raining down on midguard, then you will need your strength. There is no need to deprive yourself of basic necessities, young warrior.”

Accepting the small loaf from his hand, you watched as the crumbs fled a trail through your palm. Even you appetite was frolicking trauma upon bacteria that swayed in the depths of the bread; the gathered yeast feared you, much like you feared yourself. “I’m going to have to return to the compound, as much as I hate to do so after what I had done, they have to know. And throughout our excursion of informative speech, then they shall have to know of my dreaded secret.”

But what if they already knew?

“A weapon like that...” Steve shook his head as he threw the classified papers onto the desk space he had reserved for his affiliated research. “We have to protect the earth, and if we have to do so from her, then we will have to stretch to any means necessary.” The captain gulped, not pleased as he divulged deeper into this situation with his friend.

Bucky remained shocked from the fleeting threats that had deranged from your form; it was like a curse adorned you, but it turned out, it was just you. Nothing had made you this way, instead, you were born a vigil monster, a daughter of a fraternising god.

“The daughter of Hades... I miss the old days where we believed in one god, and went to church every Sunday morning.” He wasn’t have supposed to have heard Barnes talking, but the figure did as he pressed himself against the wall, his hearing inclined to listen to more.

Peter’s eyes bulged as he was silently affirmed with the truth. He had a web stringing each digression together as he thought of your independence that you had been determined to keep. They were going to tell everyone, swaying their opinions from what they knew, rather than what they did not.

But that made you a legend, a mortal infliction of ancient religion; there must have been more to know. He had to be silent to ensure he didn’t trigger an alert to the super soldier’s enhanced hearing, as the boy that was pursed with a spider bite slipped away, portraying his fawning portrayal of being a vigilante.

His assumed destination that his quiet feet were carrying him too was the library. There’d surely be something useful in the walls of filled shelves, and if there wasn’t, then the internet was a useful friend. As he entered the subjective room for required reading, he saw the Falcon himself, Sam Wilson, seated at a small and solitary table.

Perhaps... no, it’d be wrong to turn him against his close friends... but possibly what was necessary. Peter allowed his doe eyes to scan the various sections. Mythology. Though, all avengers knew that there was some truth to every realistic evolution of belief, though it was usually only a little. But maybe, in your case, there would be more.

Tony had told him there had been an incident, and Peter had believed that Mr Stark was concealing a devise of perception from the rest of the aligned team. It was certainly wrong for him to delve against the ruin of the circumstances, but he was eager to do anyways. Whatever happened must’ve been lined coursing seriousness, and he was afflicted with firm interest to find out what.

Ah, he found something. Adjoined with the abilities he knew that you were capable of, he knew it must have been in regards to you, it just made sense. The spine spoke with integrity, daring anyone to read the biblical novel of fumed remark that raised hell on Earth.

The goddess of invoked, bringer of nightmares and madness, Melinoë.

#avengers fanfiction #avengers series #avengers x platonic reader #avengers x teen!reader #avengers x fem!reader #avengers x you #avengers x y/n #avengers imagine #avengers fic #avengers oneshot #avenger reader #avengers reader insert #marvel x reader angst #marvel x y/n #marvel fanfiction #marvel imagines #marvel series #mcu fanfiction #mcu ff #mcu fic #mcu reader insert #marvel reader insert #imagines #imagine #xreader #marvel masterlist #mcu imagine #mcu x reader

[batgurl1989]

Running With The Wolf Chapter Four

Summary: You and Geralt explore Novigrad, getting ready to take down the real killer

Word Count: 1850

Warnings: As always Spoilers

A/N: If you want to be added to my taglist, let me know :)

Chapter One  Chapter Two  Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five

Taglist: @rmtndew​ @princesssterek​ @djinny-djin-djin​ @cynic-spirit​ @henrynerdfan​

Chapter Four

You and Geralt searched for evidence all over the city. From the Harbour all the way to Gildorf in the northernmost part of the city, Geralt chased down any clue that might have led to the real killer. A trail of blood here. A scent to follow there. An eyewitness swearing up and down that they saw the whole thing. The pieces alone didn’t mean much. In a city like Novigrad, there were probably a couple murders a night. But when put all together, the evidence seemed to point to someone who wasn’t Dandelion.

When you brought this theory to the King of Beggars, he was willing to listen, just as you expected. When you told him you thought it was nobleman who had paid to have the spy killed, Francis nodded along, agreeing that it made sense. Every day, they received information on the rich of the city, which in turn was useful to someone for a price. The nobleman probably wanted to silence the information before it made it back the Putrid Grove.

After staying up late, Geralt and you finally had a plan. After running it past the King to get the right information about how to play it out, you found yourself shopping in Hierarch Square for a dress to wear to the wedding that night. The King had let you in on the recent whereabouts of the nobleman, and it turned out that night he would be attending the wedding of a Vegelbud, one of the prominent families in Novigrad. The wedding would be at their estate and would be attended by invite only. Luckily, the beggars had come through and had procured the invites for you and Geralt to get into the party.

You felt Geralt’s arm brushed yours as he appeared at your side while you perused the dress shop. Dress shopping was certainly not his thing, but still he had gone out to find clothes to wear to the wedding at your insistence. He couldn’t show up at the party dressed in his Witcher armour, or he would stick out like a sore thumb and blow your cover. Under his arm he had a package wrapped in brown paper, and your curiosity piqued. Your mind began to wander as you pictured him in formal attire.

“Which one are you going to get?” Geralt asked, drawing your attention back to the three dresses you had narrowed it down to. An elaborately embroidered red velvet dress with gold edges and a green and silver dress with bell sleeves were laid out in front of you on the table. Both were beautiful and within your price range. Beside them was a dress with a dark green skirt and white top with a lace up corset belt to go with it.

“That depends.” You sighed. You wished you could buy them all, but you definitely had no reason to own that many dresses. Geralt raised his eyebrows, silently encouraging you to continue. “The red one would fit more with the nobles, the green one would look amazing with my hair, but the white and green one would be more practical for a quick getaway.”

“Which do you want the most?” Geralt asked, leaning with his back to the table, his full attention on you. His golden eyes searched your face for any sign you liked one dress over the others as he crossed his arms.

You looked at him, also searching his face, trying to decide what to tell him. But instead you found yourself getting lost in those golden pools. You noticed his nostril flare and were glad to know that you affected him as much as he did you. Placing a hand on his chest, your fingertips grazing the patch of skin visible in the triangle his shirt created at his neck, you grounded yourself in him. It was the most contact you two had had in public since entering the city, and you were relishing it.

“The green and silver one.” Geralt said after clearing his throat. You blinked, as though waking from a dream, and turned to look at the dresses again. He handed you a small pouch of coin to pay for it. You started to protest, but he waved it away. “It’s Dandelion’s fault we have to go to this. The least I can do is pay for your dress.”

“He’s my friend too.” You frowned. You didn’t want Geralt thinking you couldn’t pay for your own things.

“Yes, but I am the one who always has to bail him out.” Geralt pointed to the green and silver dress when the shopkeeper came over. “The lady will be taking this one.”

“Excellent choice.” The shopkeeper smiled, taking the dress away to wrap it up. You rolled your eyes at the triumphant look on Geralt’s face.

“Fine. But I am getting the money for it from Dandelion to repay you.” You said, flicking your red hair over your shoulder, a note of finality in your voice.

“Even better.” Geralt laughed. He gave your arm a squeeze, his fingers trailing across your skin in a heated path, before leaving the store to go explore more of the outdoor market set up in the square.

You waited for the shopkeeper to come back to hand them their coin. With your package in hand, you left to go find Geralt. You scanned the market until you found him, though it wasn’t hard since he didn’t have his hood up. Hair as white as his was always easy to spot, especially when he stood taller than those around him. You took a moment to admire him from a distance before taking the steps down into the market.

When you reached him, he had a loaf of warm bread in his hand and a bag of apples. The apples were probably for the horses later. He grinned when he heard your stomach growl over the din of the market at the delicious smell of the freshly baked bread. He ripped off a chunk, passing it over to your eager hands.

“Thank you.” You said before taking a bite. You couldn’t help the moan that escaped your throat at the taste of the buttery bread on your tongue. Your eyes slid close as you savoured the bread, the warmth it gave you spreading through your body.

When you opened your eyes again, you noticed Geralt watching your every move with darkened eyes. The molten gold orbs tracked your tongue as you licked the last of the crumbs from your lips. It dawned on you that the hungry look in his eyes was for you and not the food he held in his hands. Glancing around at the people crowding the market, a blush painted your cheeks. The look on his face promised pleasure beyond what your mind could comprehend, and had your body singing with need. You were frozen in his gaze, only wanting to move towards him. You foot slid forward, bringing you closer to the heat coming from the Witcher.

“Tonight.” That single word he uttered had you gasping for breath. The moment passed when he moved to leave the market. You stood, rooted in place, for a beat longer, trying to slow your heart down.

Looking over your shoulder, you wondered if you would survive travelling with him. Not because the monsters you would inevitably face, but because Geralt might cause your heart race itself to bursting.

By the time you had yourself under control, he was out of sight. Mentally kicking yourself, you rushed to catch up. You knew Novigrad like the back of your hand, but there were so many streets and alleyways he could have ducked down, that finding him would be difficult. Looking down a few streets, you sighed. You had lost him. Figuring he could find you using his Witcher senses, you headed back to the Chameleon to change.

By the time you were changed, Geralt still hadn’t shown up. You gave yourself a once over in the mirror, double checking the dress, and making sure your hair was pinned properly in the braid crown you had painstakingly worked it into. Everything looked to be in order, and you decided to wait down in the tavern rather than up in the room alone. Maybe you could convince Zoltan to play a quick round of Gwent with you.

“Lass, you look perfectly stunning.” Zoltan’s praise met you before you had finished walking down the stairs. The Dwarf stood behind the bar as usual but was ignoring the patrons as he stared at you.

“Thank you, Zoltan.” You smiled brightly, happy to know that your efforts were not wasted. Glancing around the room, you noticed Geralt still wasn’t there. You were surprised to feel disappointment bubble up inside you. You smile must have faltered, because Zoltan abandoned his post to join you at the bottom of the stairs.

“I am sure Geralt will be here momentarily.” Zoltan said quietly, guessing at your thoughts. He gave your forearm a reassuring squeeze, gesturing for you to join him at the bar. “He probably just went to make sure everything was set.”

“And to get the horses.” Geralt’s voice sounded from behind you. Your heart leapt at the sound, flooding you with happiness and banishing the disappointment from before.

“Geralt! Late, but at least you are here.” Zoltan gave the Witcher a hard time, taking his spot behind the bar. He winked at you, and started filling orders once again for the disgruntled customers he had left a moment before.

“You look stunning.” Geralt ignored Zoltan, turning to you. His attention had you suddenly self-conscious, and you touched your hair to make sure it was still in place.

“You clean up nicely yourself.” You noticed he had changed into an embroidered black waist coat with a white linen shirt underneath. He still had on his travelling boots, but he had changed into a pair of black deerskin pants. You found yourself doing the domestic thing and straighten his collar.

“Shall we?” Geralt smirked down at you once you were done. He gestured toward the door and followed you as you left the Chameleon with a wave to Zoltan. Geralt stopped you before you could mount Marabelle, an arm around your stomach. His breath tickled the shell of your ear as he spoke. “That dress is perfect on you.”

“I’m glad you approve.” You whispered back to him, unable to say more as your mouth suddenly went dry. He growled in your ear, giving you a squeeze before regretfully letting you go.

“Tonight.” He whispered before stepping away to go mount Roach.

You were out of breath as you settled into the saddle, arranging your dress around you as you could ride. It wasn’t a far ride to the Vegelbud estate, but you would relish the cool breeze on your face. His promise had kept you on edge all day, and if he kept making it, you wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the mission ahead. The fresh air and cool breeze would do you good.

#Geralt of Rivia fanfic #Geralt x reader #Geralt Fanfic #Witcher fanfic #Henry Cavill Fanfiction #Henry Cavill Fanfic

[soyeahitsmiddleearth]

May I?

Bard x Reader

Breasts are natures greatest built-in hand warmers, and somebody wants a turn.

Cringy summary warning.

Why must this god forsaken town always be so. Damn. Cold. The winter is bad enough, but even in the spring and fall it is usually much chillier than it has any business being. 

It probably has to do with the high altitude and waters that surround your town, but even if it does make sense doesn't mean you have to like it. 

You own a simple shop in the Laketown, you home since you were but a child, and in this shop you sell a small variety of different things. 

Some of the things you vend include spices, sometimes baked goods, and individual ingredients like flour and butter as well. You're inventory is mostly kitchen goods. The payments you accept consist of more than just money, too. You barter your things in exchange for services and other goods that you need. For example, if someone comes in and they don't have enough, they offer a trade of your things for a service or something that they may sell depending on if they own a shop. 

This is common practice here in Laketown. 

For the most part, you gather your own ingredients for spices and concoct original blends for both sweet baked pastries and savory meats, and yo usually go out on weekly trips to collect more of the herbs, fruits, and other plants you need. 

Your biggest problem in the beginning was finding a mode of travel out of the town, but that all changed after you met Bard. 

Well, you actually met his children first. Tilda, Bain, and Sigrid. They were out getting the groceries when they came across your little home-stationed store. They were browsing around and you got caught in a pleasant conversation with Sigrid, and when you mentioned needing to find a boatman for hire to leave the next day, she positively lit up. 

"My Da has a boat! He goes out of the town all the time, and I'm sure he'd be happy to take you." 

Suffice to say you sent them home with a nice basket full of things from your store. 

Later on in that same day their father entered your store and greeted you very nicely. He told you his name, Bard, and thanked you for all the things you gave his children. 

At the time you laughed, "It was purely selfish, I'm afraid. Your daughter, Sigrid, informed me that you're a Bargeman." 

And then you offered him a very generous price to take you across the lake each week, and, for some reason, he declined payment and agreed to do it all the same. This arrangement has been going on for quite a few months now, and it didn't remain strictly business for long. 

Anyways, brining you back to your current problem with the cold. 

You are seated just to the left of Bard on a small box, relaxing as he steers the two of you through the calm waters. Your fingers are freezing and stiff from reduced blood flow, and your nose feels as if it's about to fall off. 

With a glance up at Bard you can tell the weather doesn't bother him quite as much, so you don't bother complaining and instead move to rummage through the covered basket you'd brought with you. 

"The waters are rather calm, why don't you take a seat and come see what I've brought." You state suddenly, tilting your head up to look at him again. 

His gaze flickers to you from the open waters ahead, then back, seemingly considering your suggestion. "As much as I'd love to see what spoils you've brought, I think it would be better if we land first." His eyes flicker to yours then back again, "You can wait 10 minutes, sweetling, can't you?" 

A small, childish pout shows your displeasure, so nudges your knee with his foot to grab your attention. "Come on now, do not look at me like that." He says with a contagious smile. You can't help but to grin back. 

"Fine. I'll be patient." 

---

His promised time is rather accurate, you find, when not even 15 minutes later he's bringing the boat to shore and tying it down firmly. 

Once he's done securing the vessel, he steps back in and settles into a crouching position in front of you. "Alright, now show me what you've got there." 

Despite your stiff fingers you still manage to open up the basket rather quickly from excitement to present your items. 

Inside the basket you stored a newly baked loaf of bread, various fruit pastries, some seasonings and spices, and, finally, some fancy butters and spreads you managed to snag from a woman the other day who traded you for a few things from your shop. 

Once he registers all the things in the basket he looks up at you in shock. "I cannot possibly accept all of this!" 

You narrow your eyes at his bafflement and reach over to pinch his cheek. "Well, you don't let me pay you, and I know that your children love my baking. If you refuse to accept my gift then I will only bring it by your house later on." 

Reluctantly you release his cheek, his face is much warmer than your own and it feels nice on your frozen fingertips, and smooth your hands down your skirt to flatten out the waves. 

"The warmth you provide my bed at night is appreciation enough, but if you still think you're lacking then by all means come and show me how thankful you are again." He tells you slyly, a smirk on his face as he wraps one of his arms around your waist.

Your face heats up at the very clear implications behind his words, though it's true, and playfully smack his arm. "You absolute scoundrel! You're corrupting me, I swear." 

He laughs good-naturedly and releases you, moving to sit with his back leaning against the side of his ship.

The basket creaks as he lifts it up and places it on his lap, it seems he's no longer rejecting your gift, to look through the assortment of pastries and condiments you gave him. 

While he sorts through your basket you look down at your hands and flex your fingers to try and increase the blood flow, frustrated at how the cold almost burns you. The cold even seeped in through the thick material of your jacket, though to be fair to it's quality, you are wearing a rather thin blouse. 

You open and close your fist a few times, then reach up and unbutton the first few buttons of your jacket. Then you shove your hands down your shirt and curl your frosty fingertips under your breasts and have your thumbs press against your palms. 

The stark contrast in temperature of your hands versus your chest makes you squeeze your eyes shut for a second, but it doesn't last long so you look back over at Bard who is, now, looking at you with a weird look on his face. 

His gaze drops to where you've situated your hands, and you glance down as well. 

"My hands are cold." You say shyly, returning your attention back to his face. 

He raises an eyebrow at you in questioning, but doesn't verbally respond. 

"Oh come on, I'm not trying to seduce you by warming up my fingers. It's warm in here and I am not ashamed of my nature-given hand warmers." You grumble, still quite embarrassed despite your words insisting otherwise. 

Bard moves the basket to rest on the ground again and scoots forward, "If you're so cold then allow me to warm you up." He suggests mischievously, clearly teasing you.

"No thank you, I'm quite content with what I've got here." You reply, lifting your hands a bit to jostle your shirt.

"If it's as warm as you say, then I would like a try." Comes his arbitrary request. 

Your face heats up at the nonchalant way he says this, and while the warmth is nice, you're still quite flustered. "You would l-like a try?" You stutter out, watching that devilishly handsome smirk appear on his face. 

"That's what I said." 

Gosh, his confidence is sexy. 

You drive that thought away quickly, slipping your hands out of your tucked in blouse and letting them drop to your lap. 

His eyes follow the movement of your hands, then looks at your face again expectantly. 

"Fine. But if you pull anything I will take that basket and tell your children not to allow you to have even a crumb." Your threats only make him chuckle, and you can't help but to smile in return. 

He wraps his hands around your waist and tugs your towards him, turning you so your back presses against his chest and you're seated between his legs. 

First, he wraps his arms around your shoulders and crosses his wrists, simply messing with the fabric of your blouse for a few moments. 

You grasp the bodice of your shirt and pull it forward, dipping your head down briefly to invite him in already. And he takes that invitation swiftly.

He pushes his hands into your shirt and you shift around at the temperature difference (though you were expecting it). His right hand rests on your left breast, and his left hand lays on the opposite. 

Now, you'd never admit it verbally or anything, but you actually quite like it. The cold contrast of his palms pressing into your heated skin creates a whole new sensation you're not used to, and the strength you know those hands have only make the gentleness of his hold so much sweeter. 

You bend your knees and press them against your blouse and hand clad chest, then lay your head back against his shoulder. 

His own legs come up and bend at the knees much like your own, but he instead presses his knees into yours and presses you tighter against him while also moving his head down to nuzzle the junction between your neck and shoulder. 

The moment is intimate, but in a way that isn't quite sexual despite the current location of his hands and the way he presses his nose against your neck. 

The two of you sit just like that for who knows how long, and you love every second of it. Though eventually you simply have to ask, "Are you hands warm yet, my dear?" 

He doesn't reply right away, and for a moment you wonder if he's fallen asleep, but a gentle squeeze of you bosom tells you that he is, in fact, very much awake. 

"What did I say about funny business, Bard?" You scold, though the annoyance doesn't actually fill your voice. 

His chest practically vibrates against your back as he laughs, and he presses a light kiss to your neck. "Forgive me, I have trouble controlling myself when such a wonderful woman is within my grasp." 

Oh this man is a complete flatterer. 

"I'll allow this infraction to pass, but one more slip up and you'll really be in for it." Once again the threat has no actual success in intimidating him, but that's alright. 

"We should probably get to work, now."

#the hobbit #fluff #bard the bowman x reader #bard x reader #bard the bowman #bard #the hobbit fanfiction #romance #reader insert #reader #cringy summary but decent story

[searchingwardrobes]

The Convenient Groom: 10/14

Well, here it is everyone! One of the chapters I have been really looking forward to! There’s no kissing, but I give you platonic bed sharing plus emotional hurt/comfort with a side of jealousy. Enjoy!

Summary: Killian Jones just happens to be there when Emma Swan gets the phone call that changes everything: her fiance is leaving her at the altar. The thing is, it could also mean the end of her career. Convenient that Killian has nothing better to do that day. Convenient that he’s secretly in love with her. Not that Emma has to know that. Written for @spartanguard​​ .

Rating: M

Words: about 5k in this chapter

Also on Ao3

Tagging:@snowbellewells​ @whimsicallyenchantedrose​​ @kmomof4​​ @let-it-raines​ @teamhook​​ @bethacaciakay​​ @xhookswenchx​​ @tiganasummertree​ @shireness-says​​ @stahlop​​ @scientificapricot​​ @welllpthisishappening​ @resident-of-storybrooke​​ @thislassishooked​​ @ilovemesomekillianjones​ @kday426​​ @ekr032-blog-blog​​ @lfh1226-linda​​ @ultraluckycatnd​ @nikkiemms​ @distant-rose @optomisticgirl​​ @profdanglaisstuff​ @carpedzem​ @ohmakemeahercules​​ @branlovestowrite​ @superchocovian​ @sherlockianwhovian​​ @vvbooklady1256​ @hollyethecurious​​ @winterbaby89​​ @delirious-latenight-laughs​ @jennjenn615​ @snidgetsafan​

Emma sighed as she polished off another piece of toast. She brushed the crumbs from her lap and relaxed into the comfortable chair on the back porch. She enjoyed the view of the ocean and the soothing sound of surf. It felt wonderful to be out in the fresh air after days cooped up inside sick. She contemplated going back to the kitchen for something more substantial, but she had given Killian her word. Besides, she’d already pushed her luck by spreading an extremely thin layer of butter on her toast.

Her cell phone started ringing on the patio table, and she jumped as if Killian had some sort of sixth sense about the butter. It was Ruby calling, however, not Killian.

“Hey, Rubes.”

“Hey, Ems,” Ruby’s simple reply was laced with meaning, “sooo, how’s it going being married to Mr. Hottie? Please tell me he leaves crumbs in the bed or smells really bad when he first wakes up in the morning. Otherwise I’ll be depressed over the state of my love life.”

Emma laughed as she flicked a few more errant crumbs off her pajama pants. “Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but he’s annoyingly neat. As for what he smells like when he wakes up, I wouldn’t know.”

There was a fumbling sound on the other end and a muttered curse from Ruby. “I’m sorry, I almost dropped my phone. How the hell do you not know? Please tell me you’re not -”

“Making him sleep on the couch? Well, yes. This isn’t the fifteenth century where I sold my body for a goat or something.”

“So the poor man has to sleep on the couch indefinitely?”

“Well, technically, I’ve slept on the couch the past couple of days. I had some sort of stomach bug.”

“That sucks, Ems, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Killian took good care of me.

“Did he?” Once again, Ruby’s voice was laced with unspoken meaning.

“Don’t start, Ruby, he was just being nice.”

“If he took care of you when you were sick, I personally think you should let him back in the bed.”

Emma rolled her eyes. “I can’t let him back in bed if he was never in it to begin with.”

“Girl, I would change that arrangement ASAP.”

Emma just laughed and shook her head. “Ruby -”

“Emma,” her friend countered, “if you’re going to be married to that for a year, you might as well enjoy it.”

“And the purpose of this call is exactly . . . “

“Fine, fine,” Ruby muttered, “straight to business, if that’s what you want.”

“Yes. Please.”

“Okay, well Regina asked me to call and go over your itinerary for the book promotion.”

Emma rose from her chair to go back inside and find her laptop so she could pull up her calendar. “That’s good. I feel so out of the loop. I mean, I’m back to normal at my practice, but the new book has honestly been the last thing on my mind.”

“I don’t blame you with that fine piece of -”

“Ruby,” Emma cut her off, “focus.”

“Right, right, okay . . . so, we’ve got that interview set up on The Tiana Show. And Regina did tell you that will also have a Q&A segment with the audience, right?”

“Mhm,” Emma said as she scrolled through her calendar, “yeah, I made a note of that.”

“They also requested that Killian be there, and Regina okayed it.”

“Wait - what?”

Ruby’s voice was reassuring. “They just want him in the audience. You know, so they can pan to his reactions and stuff.”

Emma slouched back on the couch and wearily rubbed her forehead. “Ruby, how could the two of you not check with me first? Killian has a business to run. He might not be able to take off to New York in the middle of the week.”

“I don’t know, the man seems pretty willing to come running when you call.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, never mind,” Ruby said hurriedly. She changed the subject to the next item on Emma’s itinerary, and Emma didn’t press it. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know what her friend meant by the comment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When Killian came home from work, he had a huge pot of chicken noodle soup that Elsa had made. It made Emma wonder if the woman cooked anything but soup. She was also grateful for something to eat that wasn’t toast. Personally, she could go for a cheeseburger, but she doubted Killian would agree.

He did, however, agree to eating outside on the back porch. He also said nothing when Emma slathered a hunk of French bread with butter. The bit she had at lunch hadn’t bothered her stomach, not that she would tell Killian that.

“Why do you look so nervous?” Killian asked her after blowing on a spoonful of soup.

Emma jabbed at a chunk of chicken with her spoon rather than looking at him. “I just have to ask you something, and I’m a little nervous you’ll be pissed.”

His forehead creased. “Why would I be? Emma, seriously, you can ask me anything.”

Emma gave him a tentative smile. “That’s sweet, but it’s just . . . well, my agent kind of agreed to something for you.”

Killian rested his elbows on the table. “Okay, I guess that was inconsiderate of her, but I’m not going to blow up about it or anything. Especially not at you.”

Emma let out a breath of air. “Good, and I told Ruby that they need to ask first from here on out.”

Killian tore a piece of bread from the loaf and dipped it into his soup. “So, what is it? I may have to tell them no, depending on what it is, but . . . “

He trailed off and shrugged as if to say he would have an open mind about it.

“They want you to go with me to do a talk show in New York City in a couple of weeks. Not to be interviewed or anything,” Emma rushed to add, “just to be in the audience. The show wants you there for like, reactions or whatever while they’re interviewing me.”

Killian nodded, completely calm, and it honestly threw her more than if he’d gotten pissed. “That’s fine with me. When is it?”

“A week from this coming Wednesday?”

He shook his head at her as a smile lifted the corner of his mouth. “You don’t have to phrase it as a question. I don’t bite, love. Unless you ask me to, that is.”

He punctuated the innuendo with a wink, and she rolled her eyes as she laughed. “You think you’re cute, don’t you?”

“I try.”

“So can you do it?”

“I don’t see why not. I don’t have any plans.”

“But isn’t this your busy time of year? I mean, with all the tourists around.”

He reached out and took her hand. “Not so much that I can’t take one day to support your career.”

Emma felt her jaw drop slightly, and her gaze flicked to where his thumb was caressing her knuckles. When he saw her expression, he quickly pulled his hand away and cleared his throat.

“I mean, that’s the whole reason for this arrangement, aye?”

“Right,” Emma said with a nod, “to save my career.”

Silence fell between them as they continued eating their soup. Emma drained her bowl with a sigh, almost embarrassed at how ravenously she had eaten.

“Did that hit the spot?”

“Definitely,” she replied, patting her stomach, “I just hope I don’t regret it later.”

“I’m sure if your appetite has returned that you’ll be fine. Besides, it was soup.”

She nodded, regarding him thoughtfully as he continued to leisurely eat his own dinner. “So,” she finally worked up the courage to ask, leaning her elbows on the table, “your half of the bargain was that I would casually help your brother out with his marriage. But from what I see, they’re fine.”

Now it was Killian’s jaw dropping as he paused his eating, spoon held in midair. Emma arched one brow at him.

“Well,” he finally said, resting his spoon on the table, “they do love each other tremendously, and Elsa’s good for Liam -”

“But?”

“But, there’s been some tension lately.”

Emma searched his face intently as she rested her chin on her clasped hands. She didn’t know why in the world he would lie about his brother needing her help, but it felt like he was grasping for words. “Tension?”

“Aye, tension. Elsa’s ready to start a family, you see, and Liam -”

“Doesn’t want kids?”

“No, no, it’s not that. He does. It’s just . . . he wants to be sure they’re ready. Financially speaking.”

“That’s wise. Having children isn’t something you do lightly.”

“And Elsa understands that, but she -”

Emma lifted a hand. “If you say anything about her biological clock, I might dump the rest of that soup over your head.”

His eyes widened at that. “Okay, I sense a touchiness -”

She gave him a withering glare. “I just don’t like women being treated like they have a shelf life, that’s all.”

Killian leaned back in his seat, his arms crossed, his brow furrowed. Uh-oh. “So you’re going to deny basic biology?”

“What basic biology?”

“That there are a certain number of years -”

“Choose your words very carefully, buddy.”

His hands dropped to the table, and she noticed that his hands were now clenched in fists. “All I’m saying is that Elsa’s waited the first five years of their marriage for something she wants deeply, and my brother is being way too practical. As usual.”

“You have to be practical - it’s a lifetime commitment!”

“But no one can ever be one hundred percent prepared!”

This had quickly gotten out of hand, both their voices rising slightly, and Emma wasn’t even sure where the conversation had gone off the rails. She took a deep breath and when she spoke again, she used her professional therapist voice.

“It’s a big decision that you shouldn’t rush into.”

Killian leaned across the table, his eyes flashing. “Or it’s something that scares you to death, scares the hell out of you actually because you never had a good example of what a father should be. So even though you want it more than you ever wanted anything, that fear holds you back. So you wait, then wait some more, until one day you’ve waited too long!”

He rose from the table then, so forcefully that the chair behind him flew backwards and wobbled, almost toppling over. Then Killian turned and left, the screen porch door slamming behind him as he headed down the beach.

Emma just sat there for a moment, processing what the hell just happened, and suddenly understanding dawned. She didn’t have a phD in psychology for nothing.

This had nothing at all to do with Elsa and Liam.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Killian came to a dead stop halfway down the beach when he realized what he was doing. He leaned over his knees, taking big gulps of air. It wasn’t from the exertion of his run - he was in better shape than that - it was the sudden fear washing over him. How could he be this stupid twice? And Emma was just getting over being sick. What if she tried to follow him, got dizzy, and . . . and . . .

He couldn’t finish the thought. Instead, after one more deep breath, he raced back the way he had come. The fear was even worse when he saw how far he’d run. The house seemed so far away . . .

Finally, he slowed down right at the back of the house. In the distance, he saw Emma by the fire pit talking to Anna. Relief flooded through him, and he suddenly felt like he’d run a 10k in less than a minute. Once again, he was leaning over, bracing his hands on his knees. Emma turned towards him, but he couldn’t tell from here if she was angry or not. Then she turned back to Anna, gesturing in his direction. Anna nodded, then turned around and went back into the house.

Killian straightened as Emma drew closer. Her arms were crossed, holding a sweater around her frame, and the ocean breeze tugged at her hair. Even when she got close, her expression was unreadable.

“I’m sorry.”

Seemed as good a place as any to start.

She tilted her head at him. “I’m sorry too. I didn’t know.”

Killian blinked, then looked back over Emma’s shoulder at his brother’s house. He sighed, “Anna told you?”

Emma nodded, then her expression changed, and her eyes widened. “Wait - did you race back here because you were worried about me?”

Killian ran a hand wearily over his face. “It was just so eerily the same. A fight, me running off -”

Emma stopped his words with a gentle hand to his arm. “Her death wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t anyone’s fault. It was just a senseless accident.”

“You don’t understand, Emma. We fought about . . . “ he swallowed the sudden lump in his throat. “We were renovating our house, on the other side of Storybrooke. We added on a new master suite, giving us three bedrooms instead of two, and then Milah suddenly starts referring to one of them as a nursery.” He turned to look out at the water, his hand raking through his hair. Emma said nothing.

“I always brushed her off with a joke or something. Finally, we talked about it, and I told her I wasn’t sure we were in a good place financially. The truth was, I was scared.”

“Of what?”

He turned to look into her green eyes. “Of failing. As a father. My dad left us when we were kids, you see, and . . . well, how was I supposed to know what a good father looked like?”

Emma just nodded. “I understand that fear.” She settled down in the sand and motioned for him to join her. He did, knowing she might still be weak from being sick.

Killian shook his head and sighed before continuing. “But it meant so much to her. Her first husband never wanted kids either, was really volatile about the issue, and it got to be a touchy subject between us.”

Emma said nothing, just looked at him with an expression that made him feel it was safe to go on. No wonder she was so good at her job.

“One day, we were in the middle of working on the house, and she confronted me about it, wouldn’t let me deflect. We ended up getting into a huge fight, and I took off in anger. Just like I did tonight.” He struggled to go on, lowering his head so she couldn’t see the tears starting to form.

“You don’t need to explain the rest if you don’t want to. Anna told me.”

“If I had been there, she might not have fallen off that ladder.”

“You don’t know that.”

“She might have lived.”

“Killian,” she said in a soft voice, “Anna told me what the coroner said. She broke her neck. Even if you had been there, you wouldn’t have been able to save her.”

He shook his head, clenching his jaw. “But she might not even have been on that ladder if I hadn’t taken off. She might have been more careful. She was probably so distracted . . . “

“Killian look at me,” Emma knelt down in front of him in the sand and took his face in her hands. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“I was only gone for ten minutes. No one expects their life to change that much in ten minutes.”

Emma gave him an encouraging smile. She had also started to stroke his face, and he wondered if she even realized she was doing it.

“Exactly. Ten minutes. How could you have possibly known what would happen? You left for a few minutes to calm down. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“I . . . I didn’t . . . it wasn’t my fault.”

Emma nodded. Liam had told him the same thing a thousand times. So had Elsa. And David. Yet for some reason, here on the beach with Emma’s soothing voice and gentle hands, the truth of it finally washed over him like the waves crashing against the shore. Something broke inside of him, and his head fell forward onto Emma’s shoulder. She wrapped one arm around him while she stroked his hair with her other hand. He waited for tears to come, for sobs to shake his body, but instead he felt lighter somehow. He supposed he’d shed an ocean of tears for Milah over the years, and nothing but a shaky sigh was left.

“She wouldn’t want you to blame yourself,” Emma told him.

He pulled back and took Emma’s hands in his. “You’re right. She wouldn’t.” He stared down at Emma’s hands for a minute, rubbing his thumbs over her knuckles. The sound of the ocean surrounded them, and he slowly breathed in the salty smell of it, then exhaled.

“Better?” Emma asked.

He nodded, feeling slightly sheepish all of a sudden. He rose to his feet and offered Emma a hand, which she took. Once she was up, he turned towards the house, but she didn’t relinquish his hand.

“You know,” he told her, “I never scheduled a session.”

She laughed. “Lucky for you I had an opening.”

“How much do I owe you?” he teased, bumping her hip.

“This one’s on the house, Jones.”

Despite their fight and the intense conversation on the beach, they spent the rest of the evening the way they normally did - on the couch with Netflix. Around eleven, Emma stretched and yawned.

“You’ve got me falling into the sleeping habits of an old man,” she told him, poking his leg with her toe.

“Hey, I may have a few years on you, but I’ve retained my youthful glow.”

She laughed and rolled her eyes as she rose from the couch, wrapping an afghan around her. “What about you?”

A yawn cracked his own jaw as he rubbed at his tired eyes. “I think I’m ready to turn this couch into my bed for the night.”

Emma chewed on her lower lip as she regarded him carefully. “Why don’t we just share the bed?”

He arched a brow at her. “Seriously?”

She shrugged. “Yeah, why not? I mean, we’re both adults.”

Killian rubbed at his jaw as he thought it over. He wouldn’t lie, he was sick of the couch. And as long she was comfortable with it . . .

“Come on,” Emma said, giving him a playful kick, “don’t make a big deal out of it. You know you miss sleeping in a real bed.”

“Well, if you’re sure -”

“One hundred percent.”

“Okay then.” He tossed aside the remote, got up, and followed Emma down the hall. She had already changed into her pajamas, so she brushed her teeth while Killian changed in the bedroom. He went ahead and slipped under the sheets and flipped off the light before Emma came in. Why was his heart pounding like a fifteen year old?

He heard Emma shut off the faucet and flip off the bathroom light. “Whoah, it’s dark!” Emma cried as she stepped into the room. “Why are you hiding? Do you sleep in the nude?”

“No,” Killian protested, “well, not totally. I mean, I’m wearing boxers.” Shut up, he reprimanded himself, you sound like a nervous idiot.

Emma swore under her breath as she tripped over something on her way to the bed. Knowing her, it was a pair of shoes. He felt the bed dip as she got in and wrapped herself up in the covers. He tried to make her out in the dark, but all he could see was her hair.

“Good night,” Emma whispered.

“Good night,” he whispered back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Killian was awakened the next morning because something was tickling his nose. It was Emma’s hair - spread all over her pillow and his. He brushed it out of his face as he rolled over. Emma was curled up on her side, her back to him. He took the opportunity to admire her creamy shoulders on display. One strap of her tank top had slipped, and the sight had him getting hard. He was just about to slip out of bed before she noticed how - er - excited he was to see her, when she suddenly rolled over to face him.

“Hey,” she said groggily.

“Hey,” he answered, his voice strained. He tried to inch farther away from her without making it obvious.

“You don’t have to be embarrassed.”

He blinked. “Uh, why would I be embarrassed? Like you said last night, we’re adults.”

“Exactly,” Emma replied through a yawn. She arched her back and stretched both arms over her head, which definitely didn’t help his erection. “And I’m also an adult who counsels couples and has extensive knowledge of sexual physiology and psychology.”

“Are you bragging, Swan?”

“No. I’m just trying to explain why I understand your situation. After all, it’s extremely normal for a healthy man to wake up with an erection.”

She smirked at him as he coughed. He wished he had control over the red creeping up his cheeks. He quickly recovered, however, and winked at her.

“That confident that I’m happy to see you?”

She shrugged, that damn strap still teasing him. “Guess it’s good I’m not a cuddler, or there would be no doubt.”

“Oh trust me, love,” he told her, dropping his voice an octave, “when I jab you with my sword, you’ll feel it.”

Now she was the one blinking rapidly as a blush stained her cheeks. He laughed as he flung the sheets aside.

“Now look away, darling, unless you want an eyeful. My boxers have never been able to contain my prodigious manhood.”

She didn’t respond at first, and he chuckled again. But when he reached the door of the bathroom, his pillow hit him in the back of the head.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sharing a bed was changing Emma’s sleeping habits. She was getting up earlier for two reasons: one, she had lied to Killian. She apparently was a cuddler. Every morning her eyes flew open before the sun was up when her body sensed something warm, solid, and hairy beneath her cheek. She always extricated herself from his embrace before he woke up. Second, Killian had convinced her to ditch her treadmill and join him on his jogs. She had to admit, she looked forward to her morning workout more with the combination of the gorgeous setting, Smee’s encouragement, and Killian’s company.

He wasn’t chatty on the morning runs, for which she was grateful. She preferred getting in the zone when she exercised. However, they were talking over breakfast and coffee each day. Now that she was up earlier, she had time for more than a bagel as she dashed out the door. She could honestly say that they were friends now, and she enjoyed his company. She had hopes that things wouldn’t be weird after all this was over, and they could still hang out. Especially since they worked in the same building.

Emma was far more aware of the sounds coming from below her than she used to be (heavy metal music aside). She now knew the difference between the sound of the table saw versus the sander, for example, though both were faint by the time they reached her ears. Her clients probably didn’t even notice.

She also knew when he was meeting with a client. The sounds in his workshop ceased and the pleasant timbre of his voice drifted up through the vents. Not enough for her to eavesdrop, but enough to bring a smile to her face. He was talented at what he did, and she wanted him to succeed.

Right now, she could hear the buzz of his table saw as she listened to her current client talk about finally setting boundaries without apologies with the man she had just started dating. Emma was encouraged by her progress, and honestly proud of the young woman. When she first started seeing Emma, she was broken and filled with social anxiety after going through a very public breakup. It had taken a year for the woman to even accept a date from a man who had already proven himself as a good friend. Now, here she was speaking up for herself without apology.

“You know, Jasmine,” Emma told her, “I think you are at a very healthy place. How about we try meeting every six weeks instead of monthly?”

“Really?” the woman asked, beaming. “I think that would work. Does that mean I don’t need the citalopram anymore?”

“No, I think you should still take it. Talk it over with your doctor, but it’s a really safe medication, and ten milligrams a day is a very small dose. Besides, remember what I always say?”

“Medication is just another of my tools to help me cope and nothing to be ashamed of.”

Emma grinned. “Exactly.”

They both rose, and Emma showed Jasmine to the door at the top of the stairs. Over the brunette's shoulder, she saw Killian welcome in a smiling redhead. The woman flipped her hair over one shoulder as she laughed, then she laid a hand on Killian’s bicep. Killian smiled back, then - Emma’s breath caught - he reached up and scratched behind his ear! Emma’s lips pressed together in a thin line. That was his tell when he was nervous - usually sexually nervous. Emma barely heard Jasmine’s goodbye as her head spun. She leaned over to try and see the pair, but Killian led the redhead further into his shop and out of sight.

Emma went back into her office and started pacing in the small waiting area. Ariel! That was the woman’s name. Killian had made an arbor for her wedding to Eric, similar to the one he had made for her. Well, this Eric might want to know that his wife was flirting with other people’s husbands.

As soon as the thought entered her brain, Emma tried to put on her therapist hat and remind her subconscious that the woman’s red hair had triggered memories of Walsh’s infidelity with Zelena.

Her subconscious was hearing none of it.

Emma stilled her movements and cocked her head as she tried to make out the low voices from the first floor. Were they laughing again? The woman sure was smiling a hell of a lot.

Maybe she always smiles a lot. Therapist Emma tried to say.

Her subconscious ignored Therapist Emma.

Emma marched over to the floor vent near the door so she could hear better. All she could make out was Killian’s accent and Ariel’s more bubbly voice, but not what they were saying. She rolled her eyes and let out a huff of breath before getting down on her hands and knees. Wait, was that more laughter? She leaned closer, turning her ear to the vent and concentrating. She thought she heard Ariel say Killian’s name. In her mind’s eye, she saw her smiling brightly at him, flicking that unfairly beautiful shade of red hair over one shoulder, and gushing, “Oh Killian, you are just so funny.”

Emma snapped back to reality and realized that it had gone quiet. Why were they quiet all of a sudden? What were they doing? Emma’s ear was practically pressed to the vent at this point, and -

“What the bloody hell are you doing?”

Emma let out a strangled yelp as she jumped up from the floor. Killian was standing there in her doorway, looking at her with confusion etched on his brow and barely contained humor teasing the corners of his lips. She blinked and suddenly wanted the floor to open up and swallow her. She had been acting like a complete fool!

“Umm . . . I was . . . looking for something. What are you doing up here?”

He arched a brow at her and struggled to keep a smile at bay. “It’s lunch time. We were going to go over to Granny’s - remember? What did you lose?”

“Lose?”

“You said you lost something,” he said, gesturing to where she’d been on all fours like a dog.

“My earring,” she lied quickly, “I thought maybe it rolled into the vent.”

“Oh,” he said, “well let me help you -”

“No that’s okay!” she told him hurriedly. “I found it, see?” She held up an empty hand with the fingertips pinched together as if she were holding something, then she pretended to fiddle with her earring. Thank God she wore studs!

Killian arched a brow at her, then sauntered close. So close, his chest almost brushed hers. She had to tilt her head to look up at him. He leaned down, his lips almost brushing her ear.

“You mean this earring, love?” he purred. He reached up and caressed the ruby stud with his calloused fingers. “The one you were already wearing when you first stood up?”

He pulled back just enough so he could look her in the eye, and the sinful smile upon his face should have made her furious.

But it didn’t. Damn him, it almost made her melt into a puddle of goo on the floor.

HIs eyes scanned her face, and for one thrilling moment she thought he would kiss her. Kiss her with absolutely no one watching. But then he pulled back and walked backwards towards the door.

“You coming, love? Grilled cheese at Granny’s?”

“Uh . . . yeah,” she muttered.

Emma wanted a way to wipe that shit eating grin off his face, but she couldn’t figure out how to do it.

“Oh and Emma,” Killian said before she could head down the stairs, “Ariel was smiling and laughing because she and Eric need me to make them a cradle. For their new baby.”

His satisfied smile as he sauntered past her down the stairs made her want to kick him in the ass as hard as she could. Mostly. But another part of her was too busy being relieved about Ariel’s order.

#cs ff #cs modern au #cs marriage of convenience #slow burn #humor #and some angst #for spartanguard

[babettekourelos]

Flour Power

Flour is flour, right?

Wrong!!

All flour is definitely not made equal. Not only do we need to differentiate between cake flour, bread flour and all purpose flour - we also have to consider the differences between commercial and artisanal flour i.e. bleached/unbleached and roller milled or stone ground flour. Not to mention organic flour, enriched flour, whole wheat and rye. Gluten free and alternative flours are also worth discussing but will form the subject of a different article.

If we were to take a look inside most pantries around the world, we would in all likelihood find a bag of cake or all purpose flour. These flours are perfectly suited for the occasional weekend or holiday bake. In the last 12 months however, another flour has become prevalent in our kitchens... I am of course referring to bread flour. As a result of the lockdowns imposed by governments across the globe in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the world watched a bread baking revolution unfold on social media. When our survival instincts kicked in, flour became a hot and very scarce commodity. Bread after all is and has always been the staff of life. Suddenly GLUTEN was the least of our problems and everyone scrambled to get their hands on the last available bags of flour. Even the folks who had never baked a single thing in their lives prior to the pandemic, now boasted well stocked baking cupboards but had no idea where to start. I am guessing that many have eventually taken the leap and at least baked a handful of times - but for those of you who are still sitting on the baker's fence, hop on over and let me guide you the first steps of the way.

First off, we have cake flour. As the wheat flour with the lowest protein content (5% - 8%), cake flour is perfect for making soft, light and airy baked goods such as cakes, cookies or pancakes. Cake flour is made from soft spring wheat and due to the low protein content, this flour is not suitable for bread baking as it is impossible to achieve a strong gluten structure which consequently results in a dough which cannot retain its shape (unless it is baked in a bread tin). Cake flour is able to absorb more liquid and sugar than all purpose or bread flour and thus your baked goods will stay moist for longer. Yum!

Pastry flour has an 8% - 9% protein content, which results in a slightly more developed gluten structure, which in turn allows for easier shaping and handling of the dough. Pastry flour is best suited for flaky pastries, sweet or savoury pies, tarts and quiches. Not as common as cake, bread and all purpose flour, you will probably struggle to find pastry flour at your local grocery store. You may have better luck sourcing it from a speciality bake shop or online.

Next up, we have all purpose flour. This flour is pretty versatile, as it is a perfect mix of soft and hard wheat flour. With a protein content of 10% - 12%, this flour is well suited for bread baking as it is capable of forming a decent gluten structure. All purpose flour is most commonly found in North America, where it is the go-to flour for most types of baking. You can easily make your own all purpose flour by mixing together equal amounts of cake and white bread flour. If a bread recipe calls for all purpose flour, but you only have bread flour on hand, don't stress - you will still be able to bake a decent loaf of bread. There really is no reason to over think it.

Bread flour usually has a protein content of 12% - 14%. Due to the high protein content, this flour is able to produce a strong gluten structure, which will allow the dough to easily retain its shape. The final loaf will also boast good volume and yield a wonderfully chewy crumb. The terms whole meal ,whole grain and whole wheat are often used interchangeably and simply refer to bread flours containing varying degrees of the entire wheat kernel. If you are looking to incorporate more whole grains into your diet, you can easily replace half of the amount of white flour required in a recipe with the same amount of whole grain flour. Whole grain flour boasts a slightly darker colour (think brownish/tan) and coarser texture as a result of the presence of the wheat bran. Unlike pure white wheat flour, baked goods made with whole grain flours will be a little more dense, heavy and compact. This is due to the fact that the bran is razor sharp and easily severs the delicate gluten strands, which severely weakens the dough structure and thereby inhibits the size of the final loaf. However, rest assured that while you may be sacrificing volume, the final loaf is guaranteed to offer a tastier and more wholesome loaf than a standard white loaf.

Next we have rye flour. Rye falls within the wheat family but has a low glutenin content, which consequently results in a lower gluten content in the dough and the final loaf. (Note: Gluten = a full/complete protein and is formed out of the two partial proteins 'glutenin' and 'gliadin'.) People who suffer from slight gluten or digestive issues, may find it beneficial to favour rye bread over pure wheat breads. It is important to note however that some folks incorrectly assume that rye is gluten free. Although lower in gluten, it is definitely not gluten free. It is also worth mentioning that the three types of commercially available rye flours (light, medium and dark) actually do not refer to different varieties of rye, but rather to the amount of bran left in the flour. Thus, the darker the rye, the more whole grain the flour. The lighter the rye, the more refined the flour. When it comes to baking, the texture of rye can be a bit intimidating if you are new to rye - it is sticky and tacky and a little tricky to control. So you may want to consider using a mix of 50% white flour and 50% rye instead of immediately tackling a 100% rye recipe. Although rye is considered by some to be an acquired taste, I believe the only reason people think they do not enjoy rye is due to the common addition of caraway, cumin and sometimes fennel seeds. You can easily omit these fragrant seeds and enjoy the natural taste of the rye instead.

When you are just starting to bake bread at home you, you have the wonderful opportunity to make informed decisions about the type of flour you will be using. Thus it is important to understand the manner in which the wheat was grown, harvested, milled, and which (if any) additives are present in the final product. However, before I delve into the finer details, I would like to mention that no matter what flour you do decide to use when baking at home, your final loaf will be a million times better and healthier for you (and your family) than the commercial sandwich loaves from your local super market. So if after reading this article and weighing all your options, you still decide to rather buy bread than bake your own, I urge you to seek out your closest artisan baker - who (if worthy of that title), will take the necessary care on your behalf.

Stone ground, unbleached flour is the flour of choice for most artisan bakers. Sometimes referred to as artisanal flour, this flour (if true to its name) should be free of pesticides, preservatives and any other additives. When flour is milled using millstones as opposed to high-speed roller mills, more of the natural goodness of the grain remains in tact. This is due to the fact that stone milling doesn't reach the same high speeds or searing temperatures, which ensures that most of the nutrients remain undamaged and are not burned off. Furthermore, stone ground flour is also more likely to be composed of the entire wheat kernel. I.e. It still has the wheat bran, endosperm, and wheat germ in tact. (Having said that, I would still recommend checking with the miller, as this may vary from brand to brand.) The advantage of having all three components in the final flour, is that you are getting all the natural goodness (vitamins and minerals) as well as the added benefit of the fibre which is provided by the wheat bran.

Commercial flour on the other hand, has the wheat germ and bran removed in order to extend the shelf life and to produce a whiter, more refined flour. This flour is often bleached using chemicals such as chlorine, bromic acid and peroxide. (On a side note, there does however appear to be some movement away from bleaching and a focus towards the optimisation of the shape of the wheat kernel - to achieve a higher yield of the white starch). Wheat germ, which is oily by nature and consequently has the tendency to go rancid, is removed from the flour. This extraction, in addition to the nutrients which were already lost during the milling process results in a flour with very little nutritional value. The solution?  Commercial flour producers add artificial vitamins back in to make the flour more nutritious. This is referred to as 'fortification' or 'enrichment'. Take a closer look next time you buy a bag of flour and scan for the words 'fortified' or 'enriched'. In some countries, the enrichment of flour is enforced by law. (In countries where bread is an important staple food, fortification is often used as a means of improving what may otherwise be limited access to essential micronutrients. Fortification has however not always proven to be successful. This is due to the difficulty of successfully spreading a concentrated amount of micronutrients into an industrial bread batch - some loaves end up with too much and others not any. It is also questionable whether those micronutrients are bioavailable.)

At this point the flour has already undergone quite significant changes, but is then subjected to further preservatives, dough conditioners, dough enhancers and other chemicals in the commercial bakery setting (which speed up or entirely eliminate the bulk fermentation time). This is good for business, but not so good for our digestion. What makes matters worse, is the fact that many of the additives and processes are conveniently omitted from the list of ingredients on the final loaf. Some commercial bakeries also request that the additives be added at the milling and flour production stage, which allows them to circumvent providing a full disclosure of all the additives. Hungry yet?

When it comes to organic flour, it is required (at least in theory) that the flour be made from top quality natural and GMO free grain, which was grown in soil containing only natural substances/fertilisers. In addition to this, no pesticides or other chemicals should be used in the growing or harvesting of organic wheat. True organic flour is also not subjected to fumigation or irradiation -  measures which facilitate pest control and prevent food poisoning from harmful bacteria. The problem with organic flour however is two-fold. One - it is considerably more expensive than the rest of the flour on the market. Two - not all products sold under the organic label are in fact organic. Business is business after all. Even more reason for the concerned and responsible consumer to start asking pertinent questions.

However, judging from the growing popularity of home mills (small counter top grain mills), and an increasing community of small, independent millers, the importance of good quality natural flour and the need for clear/honest labeling are slowly but surely becoming topics of global discussion. Knowledge is power and an informed consumer can be the catalyst for positive (and healthy) change. So don't be fooled by natural looking packaging and words such as natural, organic, 'bio', artisanal, etc... Ask the relevant questions. Take an interest in the way your flour and other foods are produced. Have discussions and share your findings. If we are what we eat, shouldn't we be paying closer attention to what we are really consuming?

As always, I would love to hear your thoughts. What flour are you currently baking with? Have you made any interesting discoveries? 

You can reach me at [email protected]

© Babette’s Bread Ltd.

[whimsicalworldofme]

Mothers, Fathers, and Forgotten Children - Part 2

Ava finds herself drawn to a course of action that she hadn’t previously considered. 

Word Count: 1214

Content Warnings: None

“Ben Solo has a son…” Rey struggled to wrap her mind around the knowledge while Ava kept on with her work, shifting over to the other side of her since she’d finished cleaning off the other portion of counter she’d been working on. “But he thinks he’s alone.”

               “He doesn’t know,” Ava stated. “And for the sake of my son’s safety, it needs to stay that way, all right?” She raised a brow, pausing with a hand on her hip, trying to look intimidating rather than pleading.  “I heard you can see each other, speak to each other. Can he see what’s around you?”

               “No,” Rey shook her head. “He can only see me. I won’t let him know,” she promised.

               “Thank you,” Ava went back to scrubbing. Looking over she could see that Rey had many more questions, the way that she avoided Ava’s gaze but kept giving her furtive glances spoke to that fact. They worked in silence for a few minutes. “Did you grow up on Jakku? Your whole life?”

               Rey nodded.

               “You and your parents were scavengers?”

               “I was. I don’t remember my parents,” Rey said quietly. “They left me on Jakku when I was four.”

               “Sorry,” Ava frowned. “I didn’t know.” She saw the casual shrug that her companion gave but it clearly masked her struggle for understanding. “My parents kind of left me too. They were entirely consumed with fighting the Empire. They just couldn’t stop. When I was born they passed me off to my aunt. They died when I was eight. And then my aunt died after I went to study with Master Luke. It’s tough, wondering why they didn’t care enough to stick around.”

               Rey said nothing, but her expression softened a little, understanding that Ava was trying to make amends for the unintentional pain she might have caused in mentioning parents.

               “There are a lot of orphans running this Resistance,” Ava sighed. Rey finished her patch of counter and moved to the other side of her to start on another. “We made our own family from the others who were left behind by their parents. If you stick around, you’ll be so surrounded by family that you’ll be sick of us before long,” she grinned and Rey laughed, her nose and eyes scrunching up. She was cute, like a ray of sunshine come to life. Since she’d had to grow up so quickly, Ava felt a very motherly affection towards Rey, wanting to protect her. She wasn’t that much older than Luke.

               “I haven’t decided what to do yet,” the Rey confessed. “I don’t know how I’m meant to help but I feel like that’s what I’m meant to do.”

               “Everyone goes through that when they first find themselves in the Resistance,” Ava put some real elbow grease into clearing one particularly sludgy spot on the counter before getting fed up with it and chucking her scrubber in the sink. “You want something to eat?”

               “I have rations in my room,” Rey was a bit taken aback. “I don’t want to take your food.”

               “Well it’s the base’s food, so it’s yours as much as mine,” Ava smiled and went to the pantry pulling out all the necessaries to make something fresh to eat. She’d managed to get her hands on a loaf of crusty bread and some eggs in the space port a few days prior. It didn’t take long to fry them up some toad-in-a-holes. She put a plate in front of Rey with a bit of flourish.

               “Eat,” she insisted, wondering if Rey had ever had a real, decent home cooked meal in her life. Not that this was the most remarkable thing she’d ever made. But it beat rations. She tucked into her own food, watching as Rey devoured and savored at the same time.

               “This is good,” Rey pointed at the runny bit of the egg yolk running onto the bread. “What is this?”

               “Eggs,” Ava said trying to hide her surprise that at nineteen the girl had never had eggs before. But it kind of made sense. She doubted Jakku had much in the way of living creatures that laid eggs fit for consumption. “Some kind of bird eggs. I don’t know what bird. Native to whatever that planet was we stopped at after Crait.”

               “I’ve never had anything like it,” Rey took another bite, her eyes rolling shut in delight.

               “I used to cook every day, every meal, at the old base,” Ava hadn’t realized how much she missed their old home until saying it. “Hopefully we can stay here long enough for things to get back to normal.” She sighed, wondering if there would ever be normalcy in any of the galaxy. “I need the routine to keep me sane.”  

               “You only cook?” Rey asked. “You don’t go on missions or do anything as a Jedi?”

               Ava knew that tone, the confusion and disbelief that someone would squander the gift of being connected to the Force by staying holed away in a kitchen all day, every day. She got it from everyone who learned of her abilities.

               “I haven’t wanted to be a Jedi since I was seventeen,” she brushed the crumbs off her fingertips. “I teach my son how to control his abilities because I have to. He’s strong and being a little kid with that power is terrifying and confusing. If he chooses to follow in the footsteps of Luke Skywalker that’s his choice. If he chooses to be a pilot like his Pop, that’s his choice. All I want is for him to control his connection, not have it control him. As for myself, I wouldn’t miss my connection to the Force if it vanished tomorrow.”

               “Can you teach me?” Rey asked, leaning forward with her elbows propped on the counter. “I still don’t know entirely how this works and I only had a few days with Master Skywalker. I could use help with meditating.”

               Ava didn’t know how to respond right away. She hadn’t ever considered herself an expert. Luke was her responsibility, so she taught him. No one else there could. But to teach another person? With her limited knowledge? There were plenty of ways it could go wrong. But meditation, patience, and control were all things that she knew she had managed to master more than most. Being a mother at seventeen had forced her into it. And if Rey was going to be their only hope in defeating Kylo Ren, Ava felt she had a responsibility to help when asked.

               “I’ll have to ask my son if he’s ok having you join us in his lessons,” she said slowly. “I’m not a Jedi master, you know.”

               “You have six years of training under Luke Skywalker,” Rey interjected with eager emphasis. “I can’t think of anyone better to teach me.”

               “All right, flatterer,” Ava tried to laugh off her nerves. “Come by my quarters at seventeen hundred hours. Number 5B.”

               “Thank you, Ava,” Rey popped up and gave her a hug, which completely threw Ava for a loop. She returned the affection before watching Rey bound off with elation in her steps.

               “Oh Ava, what have you done,” she chided herself, shaking her head before going back to her chore of scrubbing.

Last Chapter        Master List          Next Chapter 

#fanfiction #fanfic #fic #Star Wars #Star Wars au #Star Wars fanfiction #Star Wars fanfic #Star Wars fic #oc #Rey #Poe Dameron #story #multi chapter #multi chapter fanfiction #multi chapter fanfic #multi chapter fic

[easyfoodnetwork]

Beyond the Nut Loaf

Coming up with new ways to make vegetables the main course wasn’t always easy for Deborah Madison. | Charles Amundson/Shutterstock

In an excerpt from “An Onion in My Pocket,” chef Deborah Madison creates a four-course vegetarian menu at a time when vegetarian fine dining was still a foreign concept to many

Deborah Madison is the author of nearly a dozen books on vegetarian cooking. Although not a vegetarian herself, since the publication of her first book in 1987, The Greens Cookbook, Madison has had significant influence on the way Americans eat and cook with vegetables.

In her new memoir, An Onion in My Pocket, Madison traces her path to the forefront of the vegetarian movement of the ’80s and ’90s. That path includes growing up San Francisco’s counterculture and decades spent as an ordained Buddhist priest, but perhaps the first clear indication that vegetables would play a major role in Madison’s career trajectory came when Madison took on the job as chef at Greens Restaurant. The vegetarian restaurant opened in 1979 as a part of the San Francisco Zen Center. There, Madison was tasked with creating a vegetarian fine-dining menu that would appeal to even non-vegetarians at a time when the nut loaf was considered by some to be the pinnacle of vegetarian cuisine. In this excerpt from An Onion in My Pocket, Madison explains how she made it work. — Monica Burton

Buy An Onion in My Pocket at Amazon or Bookshop.

Dinner was the meal that transformed Greens from a noisy, busy lunch place to a more tranquil restaurant. Tablecloths were laid out. Chunks of Swedish crystal held candles, and the dining room atmosphere turned quietly festive, a place where diners could take time with their meals while enjoying the unfolding evening sky and the eventual end of the day.

This is where I immediately took up the Chez Panisse style of offering a set menu rather than an à la carte approach. Now Greens offers a limited choice dinner menu, which I imagine makes it much easier to accommodate today’s more choosy eaters. But then we really didn’t have requests to cater to the special preferences of vegans and others. I’m not sure that there were vegans then. But that’s not what influenced my decision to go for a set menu. I simply felt it would work well for us because it would help introduce the concept of a somewhat formal four-course vegetarian dinner, which was still a foreign notion to a great many people.

How do you put together a menu for a meal that is meant to go on for a while, without the anchor of meat? This was the question I faced every weekend and how to answer it was a challenge for me, for us. I imagined it might be even more baffling for our customers, to have things all twisted about, to have what were usually appetizers suddenly become main courses. Some form of crepe? A vegetable ragout with polenta? Today this is hardly as problematic as it was then. Good vegetarian food — and Greens itself — has been around long enough that the meatless menu is not as mysterious as it once was. But in 1980 such possibilities were new, and people were unaccustomed to the idea of eating this way, without meat at the center of the plate.

There was another reason for the set menu. By being able to concentrate on a single menu and a particular progression of dishes, rather than having to produce a whole range of foods, I was hoping that we might be able to undertake somewhat more challenging fare, which we did. And having an ever-changing dinner menu was a way to accommodate all the new ideas that I had been putting in my notebooks, but it made for some dicey afternoons and evenings.

Most of the dishes we made none of us had ever cooked before, or even tasted before. We put our heads together and tried to figure them out before we started cooking. Of course getting that food from an idea to the table was a group effort. I could never have done any of it without the amazing staff I had. Jane Hirshfield, the poet, was then working with me. She was the most faithful and trusting right (and left) hand one could have. I’d ask Jane to make something I had only a vague idea about, and she would pleasantly say, “Okay,” and charge ahead without showing any worry or fear. I think she actually believed that things would work, and her assumption gave me the belief, or at least the hope, that they would, too. I wonder if she would have been so accepting had she known how thin the ice beneath us actually was.

Usually our untried dishes worked. But I held my breath a lot, hoped a lot, and I was continually anxious and always vaguely amazed when people let us know how much they liked the food. The best moment was when a guest would come into the kitchen and tell us, “The food was so good that we completely forgot there wasn’t any meat.” That was the highest compliment.

I’d never forgotten the good bread and butter that started the first meal I ate at Chez Panisse in 1977. Why not begin a meal with the best promise possible, good bread? (Remember, people ate bread then.) Those giant fougasse that Alice and I had bought in France impressed me with their bold shapes, and I thought we could make smaller ones suitable for two-tops or four-tops and just put them, still warm from the oven as they invariably were, right on the tables for people to break apart. A few slashes of the knife followed by a series of tugs, and an oval slab of rustic dough flavored with olive oil assumed the shape of a ladder or a tree. Sea salt and rosemary or sage were rolled into the surfaces and when the breads came out of the oven, they were brushed with olive oil. Their crusty perforations invited customers to pull off a rung or break off a branch. The crumbs scattering over the tablecloths said, “Relax and enjoy yourself; you don’t have to worry about keeping that tablecloth pristine.”

I tried to imagine some tired man dully anticipating a plate with a big hole in the middle where the meat would have been.

While we always had the bread, another thing I liked to do was present a table with roasted, salted almonds twisted into a package of parchment paper. This was an idea I gleaned from a few sentences in Elizabeth David’s book Spices, Salts and Aromatics in the English Kitchen, about a Somalian cook she had in Egypt, who twisted roasted almonds in paper to stave off nibblers. We could have put the almonds in a dish, but there was something about the rustle of that paper parcel being opened that warmed up the big dining room, especially early in the evening, before it filled. And of course, everybody likes a present, even roasted almonds.

First courses and soups weren’t a problem; we were pretty competent there. Salads made with the beautiful lettuce and herbs from Green Gulch were something we could count on to please. And from my time with Lindsey Shere at Chez Panisse, I was confident about making desserts to fill out the offerings from the Tassajara Bread Bakery. It was what to put in the center of the plate that I had to wrap my head around.

As I mentioned, our customers were not necessarily vegetarians. People came to Greens for the view, its growing reputation, maybe curiosity about what vegetarian food was like, but not because they were true believers. A lot of women came to lunch, then when we opened for dinner, they dragged along their husbands, who were probably looking forward to a steak, not to a meatless meal, on Friday or Saturday night. We had a good wine list, but I imagined the husbands would prefer to pair a Chalone pinot noir with a piece of beef over whatever we could offer. I tried to imagine some tired man dully anticipating a plate with a big hole in the middle where the meat would have been, should have been. He was the customer I worried about, and I thought constantly about what might fill that hole in the center of the plate. This was my big concern, what I lay awake thinking about.

I knew that it had to be something that caught the eye and proclaimed without wavering, “Here I am! I’m what’s for dinner! No need to look elsewhere!”

Of course, the “it” dish also had to be sufficiently familiar that the diner felt at ease. But it also had to have physical stature. It couldn’t be some shapeless thing like a plate of pasta or a stir fry or a vegetable ragout. It had to have substance and form, be something you could point to, look at, focus on. As one gets used to not eating meat, this problem pretty much tapers off and finally goes away, invariably returning on special occasions when, once again, the answer to “What’s for dinner?” has to be more than the name of a vegetable.

The most difficult kind of dish to present, and this was generally true whether there was meat present or not, was a stew, or ragout, which was too bad because these were dishes that I felt I had something of a gift for. Sadly, lunch favorites, like the Zuni Stew or Corn, Bean, and Pumpkin Stew, never made the dinner cut, and a dal, as appealingly as it can be made and garnished, didn’t either. Not then, anyway. A mushroom ragout, I found, did work, though, if it were paired with something that had a clear shape, like triangles of grilled polenta, a square of puff pastry, or a timbale of risotto. But the stew also had to have a very good and well-crafted sauce, and wild mushrooms helped enough that they became almost mandatory.

Years later, after having left Greens, I was visiting Calgary’s Blackfoot Farmers’ Market, researching my book Local Flavors. That chilly fall evening I ate at the River Café, a rustic building that sits on an island in the middle of a river. There the chef presented me with a vegetarian stew, which worked perfectly in her fine-dining restaurant although I think she made only the one serving since it wasn’t on the menu. The stew was based on winter root vegetables, but this handsome dish also contained black lentils and a potato puree and it was all circled with a rich, deeply flavored red wine sauce. The flavors were harmonious and complex. There were different textures to go to so that the dish was interesting to eat. It was also gorgeous to look at and extremely satisfying in every way. It was a perfect vegetarian entree. In fact, I was so impressed that I came up with my own version of it in Local Flavors. That was the kind of stew that worked at Greens, but you can see how many elements have to be there for it to really grab the diner.

Mostly I looked for dishes that could be folded, stacked, layered, or otherwise given shape. Tart-based and crepe-based dishes were shoo-ins when it came to form and they still are. Crust always helps provide definition and many things can fill a tart shell besides the classic quiche filling that had introduced the idea of a savory pie in the first place. Some possibilities were chard and saffron; roasted eggplant and tomato; artichokes, mushrooms, leeks with lemon, and goat cheese (new then); winter squash with Roquefort; goat cheese thinned with cream and seasoned with fresh thyme. A tart made into a single serving with the help of special small tart pans really stood out. It was far more special than a wedge, even if everything else about it was the same.

Crepes had the dual advantage of being familiar and being endlessly versatile. Personally, I don’t think crepes ever really lose their appeal; I still make them and people always like them. Plus there are a great many things you can do with crepes. At Greens we made them using different flours — wheat, corn, buckwheat, masa harina — and filled them with an assortment of good things, then folded, rolled, or stacked them. Today I season a crepe batter with saffron and herbs and serve it in place of bread. I also use quinoa, spelt, and other flours that have since entered the culture in the batter. The Many-Layered Crepe Cake, inspired by a Marcella Hazan recipe, not only was one of the most delicious entrees we served, but, when cut, its eight exposed layers told the diner that a lot of care had gone into her entree, and surely that counted for something.

I didn’t see any need to offer meat substitutes when vegetables could be so stellar on their own.

Timbales — those vegetable and herb-saturated custards paired with sauces — also made good entrees with their solid yet tender textures and attractive shapes. The basic idea came from Julia Child’s Art of French Cooking, but we expanded on it, changing the size and shapes of our timbales so that they could transcend their original role as a small garnish to a meat dish and assume their position as a main course. Roulades, or rolled soufflés, were light and pretty to serve with their spiraled interiors showing the layers of filling. Being egg based they went especially well with spinach, chard, sorrel, and mushrooms, or sauces based on these vegetables, such as the sorrel-mushroom sauce in The Greens Cookbook. Filo pastries assumed the form of spanakopita but not the flavor as the fillings changed to include vegetables other than spinach (such as artichokes), plus nuts (like hazelnuts), and cheeses other than feta.

We were careful about serving pasta as a main dish. A main dish had to have some volume so that it lasted for a while, but a large portion of pasta could become tiresome to eat — and it could chill down before it was finished if people were eating slowly, as they generally were when enjoying dinner and conversation in a restaurant. Yet there were many intriguing pasta recipes to explore, especially filled or layered ones. If we did serve pasta as a main course, we made our own dough, formed it into crescent-shaped agnolotti, and filled them with things such as herb-flecked ricotta, butternut squash with toasted pecans and sage — not common then — or a mixture of roasted eggplant and pine nuts. We might feature wild mushrooms in a lasagna. Simpler pasta dishes appeared as smaller first courses, where they could be eaten more quickly, without being too filling.

Cheese and Nut Loaf was the kind of seventies vegetarian dish that I dreaded meeting up with. I didn’t see any need to offer meat substitutes when vegetables could be so stellar on their own, but when a senior student brought in a recipe that her sister had sent her with the promise that this was a truly fantastic dish, I felt obligated to try it. We did and unfortunately people loved it. There was no big mystery as to why they liked it so much, despite the funky name. Nut Loaf was insanely rich with roasted cashew nuts, pecans, a miscellany of grated cheeses, cottage cheese, eggs, mushrooms, and finally, a little bit of brown rice to give all this fat something to cling to. It was dense, chewy, and good in an obvious sort of way, the way sausage, bacon, and meatloaf are good. Once we put it on the menu as a lunch special it was hard to get rid of. We served it just like meatloaf with tangy tomato sauce; turned it into a meatloaf sandwich, grilling it first over mesquite; and we used it to stuff peppers and cabbage. It made a few appearances on the dinner menu but I always found it embarrassing to serve. Still, people loved it.

In general, the dishes that had the best possibilities of succeeding were those usually served as first or second courses, or as (amplified) garnishes to the main dish in more classic cuisines. If I just shifted everything a notch and eliminated the meaty center, I could usually solve my main dish problem. Even a vegetable gratin worked if I made it in an individual dish and slid it onto a bed of wilted greens or perhaps a salad that benefited from being wilted by the heat.

At that time I had a tendency to cook richly, using plenty of butter, eggs, and cream when it made sense. I was unsure about bringing vegetarian food into a mainstream venue, and I knew that we could always make something good when we relied on cream or buttery crusts, and that customers would like them. Fat was easy to fall back on in this way. Also this was 1979 and the early 1980s, an era of cream, butter, and cheese — not just at Greens, but in restaurants everywhere. Our dinners were rich, celebratory splurges, not substitutes for home cooking. I can’t tell you how many people have told me they were proposed to at Greens, or got married there.

Think of this: When we first opened we had only one vegan customer, whom we nicknamed “Non-Dairy Jerry.” Jerry made a big deal about not having cheese in his meal and as he was the only one, we could easily accommodate his wishes. We could even give him a name. Today I suspect there are plenty of vegan, gluten-free, raw, grain-free, and other special eaters. But it is also true that now people find lighter dishes as appealing as the rich dishes that we offered then, even far more so than when we first got started and vegetarian food was pretty much a novelty and eating out was special, not just a way to find sustenance.

Excerpted from AN ONION IN MY POCKET: My Life with Vegetables by Deborah Madison. Copyright © 2020 by Deborah Madison. Excerpted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/3naCRtB https://ift.tt/2Io6N6F

Coming up with new ways to make vegetables the main course wasn’t always easy for Deborah Madison. | Charles Amundson/Shutterstock

In an excerpt from “An Onion in My Pocket,” chef Deborah Madison creates a four-course vegetarian menu at a time when vegetarian fine dining was still a foreign concept to many

Deborah Madison is the author of nearly a dozen books on vegetarian cooking. Although not a vegetarian herself, since the publication of her first book in 1987, The Greens Cookbook, Madison has had significant influence on the way Americans eat and cook with vegetables.

In her new memoir, An Onion in My Pocket, Madison traces her path to the forefront of the vegetarian movement of the ’80s and ’90s. That path includes growing up San Francisco’s counterculture and decades spent as an ordained Buddhist priest, but perhaps the first clear indication that vegetables would play a major role in Madison’s career trajectory came when Madison took on the job as chef at Greens Restaurant. The vegetarian restaurant opened in 1979 as a part of the San Francisco Zen Center. There, Madison was tasked with creating a vegetarian fine-dining menu that would appeal to even non-vegetarians at a time when the nut loaf was considered by some to be the pinnacle of vegetarian cuisine. In this excerpt from An Onion in My Pocket, Madison explains how she made it work. — Monica Burton

Buy An Onion in My Pocket at Amazon or Bookshop.

Dinner was the meal that transformed Greens from a noisy, busy lunch place to a more tranquil restaurant. Tablecloths were laid out. Chunks of Swedish crystal held candles, and the dining room atmosphere turned quietly festive, a place where diners could take time with their meals while enjoying the unfolding evening sky and the eventual end of the day.

This is where I immediately took up the Chez Panisse style of offering a set menu rather than an à la carte approach. Now Greens offers a limited choice dinner menu, which I imagine makes it much easier to accommodate today’s more choosy eaters. But then we really didn’t have requests to cater to the special preferences of vegans and others. I’m not sure that there were vegans then. But that’s not what influenced my decision to go for a set menu. I simply felt it would work well for us because it would help introduce the concept of a somewhat formal four-course vegetarian dinner, which was still a foreign notion to a great many people.

How do you put together a menu for a meal that is meant to go on for a while, without the anchor of meat? This was the question I faced every weekend and how to answer it was a challenge for me, for us. I imagined it might be even more baffling for our customers, to have things all twisted about, to have what were usually appetizers suddenly become main courses. Some form of crepe? A vegetable ragout with polenta? Today this is hardly as problematic as it was then. Good vegetarian food — and Greens itself — has been around long enough that the meatless menu is not as mysterious as it once was. But in 1980 such possibilities were new, and people were unaccustomed to the idea of eating this way, without meat at the center of the plate.

There was another reason for the set menu. By being able to concentrate on a single menu and a particular progression of dishes, rather than having to produce a whole range of foods, I was hoping that we might be able to undertake somewhat more challenging fare, which we did. And having an ever-changing dinner menu was a way to accommodate all the new ideas that I had been putting in my notebooks, but it made for some dicey afternoons and evenings.

Most of the dishes we made none of us had ever cooked before, or even tasted before. We put our heads together and tried to figure them out before we started cooking. Of course getting that food from an idea to the table was a group effort. I could never have done any of it without the amazing staff I had. Jane Hirshfield, the poet, was then working with me. She was the most faithful and trusting right (and left) hand one could have. I’d ask Jane to make something I had only a vague idea about, and she would pleasantly say, “Okay,” and charge ahead without showing any worry or fear. I think she actually believed that things would work, and her assumption gave me the belief, or at least the hope, that they would, too. I wonder if she would have been so accepting had she known how thin the ice beneath us actually was.

Usually our untried dishes worked. But I held my breath a lot, hoped a lot, and I was continually anxious and always vaguely amazed when people let us know how much they liked the food. The best moment was when a guest would come into the kitchen and tell us, “The food was so good that we completely forgot there wasn’t any meat.” That was the highest compliment.

I’d never forgotten the good bread and butter that started the first meal I ate at Chez Panisse in 1977. Why not begin a meal with the best promise possible, good bread? (Remember, people ate bread then.) Those giant fougasse that Alice and I had bought in France impressed me with their bold shapes, and I thought we could make smaller ones suitable for two-tops or four-tops and just put them, still warm from the oven as they invariably were, right on the tables for people to break apart. A few slashes of the knife followed by a series of tugs, and an oval slab of rustic dough flavored with olive oil assumed the shape of a ladder or a tree. Sea salt and rosemary or sage were rolled into the surfaces and when the breads came out of the oven, they were brushed with olive oil. Their crusty perforations invited customers to pull off a rung or break off a branch. The crumbs scattering over the tablecloths said, “Relax and enjoy yourself; you don’t have to worry about keeping that tablecloth pristine.”

I tried to imagine some tired man dully anticipating a plate with a big hole in the middle where the meat would have been.

While we always had the bread, another thing I liked to do was present a table with roasted, salted almonds twisted into a package of parchment paper. This was an idea I gleaned from a few sentences in Elizabeth David’s book Spices, Salts and Aromatics in the English Kitchen, about a Somalian cook she had in Egypt, who twisted roasted almonds in paper to stave off nibblers. We could have put the almonds in a dish, but there was something about the rustle of that paper parcel being opened that warmed up the big dining room, especially early in the evening, before it filled. And of course, everybody likes a present, even roasted almonds.

First courses and soups weren’t a problem; we were pretty competent there. Salads made with the beautiful lettuce and herbs from Green Gulch were something we could count on to please. And from my time with Lindsey Shere at Chez Panisse, I was confident about making desserts to fill out the offerings from the Tassajara Bread Bakery. It was what to put in the center of the plate that I had to wrap my head around.

As I mentioned, our customers were not necessarily vegetarians. People came to Greens for the view, its growing reputation, maybe curiosity about what vegetarian food was like, but not because they were true believers. A lot of women came to lunch, then when we opened for dinner, they dragged along their husbands, who were probably looking forward to a steak, not to a meatless meal, on Friday or Saturday night. We had a good wine list, but I imagined the husbands would prefer to pair a Chalone pinot noir with a piece of beef over whatever we could offer. I tried to imagine some tired man dully anticipating a plate with a big hole in the middle where the meat would have been, should have been. He was the customer I worried about, and I thought constantly about what might fill that hole in the center of the plate. This was my big concern, what I lay awake thinking about.

I knew that it had to be something that caught the eye and proclaimed without wavering, “Here I am! I’m what’s for dinner! No need to look elsewhere!”

Of course, the “it” dish also had to be sufficiently familiar that the diner felt at ease. But it also had to have physical stature. It couldn’t be some shapeless thing like a plate of pasta or a stir fry or a vegetable ragout. It had to have substance and form, be something you could point to, look at, focus on. As one gets used to not eating meat, this problem pretty much tapers off and finally goes away, invariably returning on special occasions when, once again, the answer to “What’s for dinner?” has to be more than the name of a vegetable.

The most difficult kind of dish to present, and this was generally true whether there was meat present or not, was a stew, or ragout, which was too bad because these were dishes that I felt I had something of a gift for. Sadly, lunch favorites, like the Zuni Stew or Corn, Bean, and Pumpkin Stew, never made the dinner cut, and a dal, as appealingly as it can be made and garnished, didn’t either. Not then, anyway. A mushroom ragout, I found, did work, though, if it were paired with something that had a clear shape, like triangles of grilled polenta, a square of puff pastry, or a timbale of risotto. But the stew also had to have a very good and well-crafted sauce, and wild mushrooms helped enough that they became almost mandatory.

Years later, after having left Greens, I was visiting Calgary’s Blackfoot Farmers’ Market, researching my book Local Flavors. That chilly fall evening I ate at the River Café, a rustic building that sits on an island in the middle of a river. There the chef presented me with a vegetarian stew, which worked perfectly in her fine-dining restaurant although I think she made only the one serving since it wasn’t on the menu. The stew was based on winter root vegetables, but this handsome dish also contained black lentils and a potato puree and it was all circled with a rich, deeply flavored red wine sauce. The flavors were harmonious and complex. There were different textures to go to so that the dish was interesting to eat. It was also gorgeous to look at and extremely satisfying in every way. It was a perfect vegetarian entree. In fact, I was so impressed that I came up with my own version of it in Local Flavors. That was the kind of stew that worked at Greens, but you can see how many elements have to be there for it to really grab the diner.

Mostly I looked for dishes that could be folded, stacked, layered, or otherwise given shape. Tart-based and crepe-based dishes were shoo-ins when it came to form and they still are. Crust always helps provide definition and many things can fill a tart shell besides the classic quiche filling that had introduced the idea of a savory pie in the first place. Some possibilities were chard and saffron; roasted eggplant and tomato; artichokes, mushrooms, leeks with lemon, and goat cheese (new then); winter squash with Roquefort; goat cheese thinned with cream and seasoned with fresh thyme. A tart made into a single serving with the help of special small tart pans really stood out. It was far more special than a wedge, even if everything else about it was the same.

Crepes had the dual advantage of being familiar and being endlessly versatile. Personally, I don’t think crepes ever really lose their appeal; I still make them and people always like them. Plus there are a great many things you can do with crepes. At Greens we made them using different flours — wheat, corn, buckwheat, masa harina — and filled them with an assortment of good things, then folded, rolled, or stacked them. Today I season a crepe batter with saffron and herbs and serve it in place of bread. I also use quinoa, spelt, and other flours that have since entered the culture in the batter. The Many-Layered Crepe Cake, inspired by a Marcella Hazan recipe, not only was one of the most delicious entrees we served, but, when cut, its eight exposed layers told the diner that a lot of care had gone into her entree, and surely that counted for something.

I didn’t see any need to offer meat substitutes when vegetables could be so stellar on their own.

Timbales — those vegetable and herb-saturated custards paired with sauces — also made good entrees with their solid yet tender textures and attractive shapes. The basic idea came from Julia Child’s Art of French Cooking, but we expanded on it, changing the size and shapes of our timbales so that they could transcend their original role as a small garnish to a meat dish and assume their position as a main course. Roulades, or rolled soufflés, were light and pretty to serve with their spiraled interiors showing the layers of filling. Being egg based they went especially well with spinach, chard, sorrel, and mushrooms, or sauces based on these vegetables, such as the sorrel-mushroom sauce in The Greens Cookbook. Filo pastries assumed the form of spanakopita but not the flavor as the fillings changed to include vegetables other than spinach (such as artichokes), plus nuts (like hazelnuts), and cheeses other than feta.

We were careful about serving pasta as a main dish. A main dish had to have some volume so that it lasted for a while, but a large portion of pasta could become tiresome to eat — and it could chill down before it was finished if people were eating slowly, as they generally were when enjoying dinner and conversation in a restaurant. Yet there were many intriguing pasta recipes to explore, especially filled or layered ones. If we did serve pasta as a main course, we made our own dough, formed it into crescent-shaped agnolotti, and filled them with things such as herb-flecked ricotta, butternut squash with toasted pecans and sage — not common then — or a mixture of roasted eggplant and pine nuts. We might feature wild mushrooms in a lasagna. Simpler pasta dishes appeared as smaller first courses, where they could be eaten more quickly, without being too filling.

Cheese and Nut Loaf was the kind of seventies vegetarian dish that I dreaded meeting up with. I didn’t see any need to offer meat substitutes when vegetables could be so stellar on their own, but when a senior student brought in a recipe that her sister had sent her with the promise that this was a truly fantastic dish, I felt obligated to try it. We did and unfortunately people loved it. There was no big mystery as to why they liked it so much, despite the funky name. Nut Loaf was insanely rich with roasted cashew nuts, pecans, a miscellany of grated cheeses, cottage cheese, eggs, mushrooms, and finally, a little bit of brown rice to give all this fat something to cling to. It was dense, chewy, and good in an obvious sort of way, the way sausage, bacon, and meatloaf are good. Once we put it on the menu as a lunch special it was hard to get rid of. We served it just like meatloaf with tangy tomato sauce; turned it into a meatloaf sandwich, grilling it first over mesquite; and we used it to stuff peppers and cabbage. It made a few appearances on the dinner menu but I always found it embarrassing to serve. Still, people loved it.

In general, the dishes that had the best possibilities of succeeding were those usually served as first or second courses, or as (amplified) garnishes to the main dish in more classic cuisines. If I just shifted everything a notch and eliminated the meaty center, I could usually solve my main dish problem. Even a vegetable gratin worked if I made it in an individual dish and slid it onto a bed of wilted greens or perhaps a salad that benefited from being wilted by the heat.

At that time I had a tendency to cook richly, using plenty of butter, eggs, and cream when it made sense. I was unsure about bringing vegetarian food into a mainstream venue, and I knew that we could always make something good when we relied on cream or buttery crusts, and that customers would like them. Fat was easy to fall back on in this way. Also this was 1979 and the early 1980s, an era of cream, butter, and cheese — not just at Greens, but in restaurants everywhere. Our dinners were rich, celebratory splurges, not substitutes for home cooking. I can’t tell you how many people have told me they were proposed to at Greens, or got married there.

Think of this: When we first opened we had only one vegan customer, whom we nicknamed “Non-Dairy Jerry.” Jerry made a big deal about not having cheese in his meal and as he was the only one, we could easily accommodate his wishes. We could even give him a name. Today I suspect there are plenty of vegan, gluten-free, raw, grain-free, and other special eaters. But it is also true that now people find lighter dishes as appealing as the rich dishes that we offered then, even far more so than when we first got started and vegetarian food was pretty much a novelty and eating out was special, not just a way to find sustenance.

Excerpted from AN ONION IN MY POCKET: My Life with Vegetables by Deborah Madison. Copyright © 2020 by Deborah Madison. Excerpted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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[findingflavorland]

Sourdough Bread: Sun-dried Tomatoes & Parmesan // Roasted Garlic & Rosemary

Test Recipe 01

Sun-dried tomato, parmesan boule (front)  // Roasted garlic & Rosemary boule (back)

Overall Outcomes

Bread Score: 7/10

Would have preferred larger, open crumbs. Bread was denser than I would like, but I was happy to see an even distribution in crumbs overall, a good sign of better shaping. Nice oven-spring and rise on the loafs. Beautiful coloring on crust. Much better compared to my first foray into breadmaking. See section on bread to see what I tried this time round that made it better.

Flavor Score: 2/10 The low score wasn’t because it tasted bad. Rather, it was simply the lack of flavor that was disappointing. It just tasted like plain sourdough. I ended up eating it with some whipped cream cheese. Whenever there were bites that contained the flavor bombs, it was great. 

On the Roasted Garlic, Rosemary loaf:

Best enjoyed toasted. Cream cheese complemented the herbaceous flavors really well, kinda reminiscent of Boursin’s garlic chives cream cheese. 

The Good

The sticky, mushy garlic helped the herbs clump together, which ensured those flavors always lived together, rather than separate.

The Bad

Mushy clumps of roasted garlic ruined the texture of bread. It was also unevenly and scarcely distributed throughout the loaf. 

The Techniques

Roasted a head of garlic in the oven for 45 minutes till caramelized and mushy. Cut cloves into chunks, not tiny because I thought I wanted bites of flavor. This was a terrible experience. It was mushy, sticky and hard to handle. it caused all the rosemary to clump together and I could not get the incorporated into much of the dough because of the low volume.

Flavor bombs were introduced in final shaping stage as well, incorporated with every fold in the Tartine book’s packaging fold technique.

There must be a better way to infuse garlic flavors into the loaf. 

Things to potentially try next time:

Definitely MORE VOLUME of garlic & rosemary. I used 1 head of garlic. There wasn’t much garlic from it after roasting. Might need 3-4 heads of garlic next time for a half-sized boule.

Incorporate smaller bits of roasted garlic instead of chunks

Mash into a butter with olive oil and chopped herbs and incorporate into a loaf through a lamination method, like a cinnamon roll/babka or croissant instead.

Try diced, raw garlic. Maybe it’ll roast and caramelized during the baking period to get the same effect and you won’t have to deal with messy, mushy garlic that stuck everywhere.

Would garlic oil work? How would fat incorporated into a dough affect proofing and rise? Would it still become bread?

Tips from the FB sourdough community:

I roast the garlic in foil in the oven just to the point where it is roasted and the cloves are still holding together so I can dice it. I don't roast it until I can just squeeze it into a paste. Once it is minced I will put it in a little bowl with just 10-15grams of EVO just to keep the garlic from clumping and to help it distribute through the dough a bit. 

I add it at my 2nd turn. I will autolyze and then start my turns and at the 2nd one I will add the garlic and EVO mix to the dough and squeeze through until the extra liquid is absorbed and the garlic is distributed through. At most reduce your water amount by a few grams if you are worried about the hydration level. 

~ Stephen Blanchard from https://stephensbreads.com/

On the Sun-dried Tomato, Parmesan loaf:

“oh what a beautiful crumb”

The Good

The loaf smelled AMAZING while in the oven. You could smell the gorgeous scent of Parmesan and sun-dried tomatoes. I was expecting it to be very rich in flavor.

The Bad

I was nervous any cheese on the surface was going to burn real badly during the bake, but I was wrong. Not only did it not burn, it gave the crust a glorious golden brown.

I wished there was more cheese on the surface, and in the interior of course.

Since I had used shredded cheese, the flavors were really mild, if not, undetectable. 

The sun-dried tomatoes on the other hand, burned to a bitter, charcoal crisp on the exterior of the bread. Next time, make sure any sun-dried tomatoes are on the interior of the bread. Thankfully, those on the surface were easy to pick off without any visible damage to the boule. 

The Technique

I used 1.5 oz shredded cheese and opted for 2 oz dry-packed sun-dried tomatoes instead of the oil-packed variation for fear of what the excess oil would do to my dough. 

Flavor bombs were introduced in final shaping stage as well, incorporated with every fold in the Tartine book’s packaging fold technique. Even after chopping the sun-dried tomatoes, they were still bulky and made folding and shaping difficult. Building surface tension on the dough was a little trickier with this. 

Things to potentially try next time:

Soak sun-dried tomatoes in water, then use that water for the doughChop sun-dried tomatoes smallerUse more cheese, both on interior and exterior of loaf.

On the bread making:

Base Recipe: I used the recipe for the Basic Country Loaf from the Tartine Bread book. 

(img credit: Tartine Bakery)

I halved the recipe, so my boules are only half-sized boules, perfect for portion control for me.

For my Levain: I made 120g of levain even though recipe only needed 100g, so that I would have 20g remaining to keep as the mother starter.

20g starter 

50g flour (25g All Purpose flour, 25g Whole Wheat)

50g water

For the 2 half-sized boules (about 6in in diameter):

350g water

100g levain

450g AP flour (would prefer to use bread flour next time)

50g Whole Wheat flour

10g salt, dissolved with 25g water

Thoughts on Technique

Dissolving levain in water first then mixing in flour for autolyse, incorporating salt dissolved in water after dough has rested for 1 hr. I really liked this technique. Joshua Weissman uses this as well. I felt that the levain and salt water were better, and more evenly, incorporated into the dough this way, versus the finger poking, stretch and fold method from Mike Greenfield from Pro Home Cooks.

Using a clear, transparent tupperware for bulk proofing/stretch & folds. This allowed me to measure and track how much the dough was growing as a better indication of proofing stages, versus when it was in a stainless steel bowl. I did not see very much bubbles, like in a starter, but I could see the change in volume. Dough also felt lighter and aerated over time, become more fluid in the container, but not in a gloopy, sticky dough sense. It detached cleanly from the container. It still wasn’t clear to me whether or not dough was perfectly proofed though. Is this over? under? No idea. Note: I proofed for 4 hrs with 6 sets of stretch & folds ever 30 minutes in a ~78F environment.

Dip your hand in (unchlorinated/boiled and cooled) water before handling dough. This creates a magical glove that prevents the dough from sticking to your hand. Did not realize dough was hydrophobic(?), but that was cool. Not entirely sure if using normal tap water was fine, but since chlorine could kill the bacteria and yeast in your starters, I didn’t want to risk killing it when I needed them to proof the dough.

Use a bench scraper. It is your friend. This made shaping the dough so much easier, especially the turns & tucks. Make sure to wet your bench scraper prior to using to prevent the sticky undersides of your dough from sticking to it though.

Do the circumference pull and pinch dumpling method for first shaping to develop more dough surface tension first, before the turn and tuck. I only did the turn and tuck, as instructed by the book, but it didn’t feel like enough surface tension was built. Use this technique that Jack the Baker recommends instead to prevent your dough from spreading. I used this to tighten up the dough later when it was in its proofing bowls.

It’s fine to shape, shape and shape again. After a beautiful first shaping, the dough deflated and became a sticky mess in my second attempts of shaping after incorporating the flavor bombs. So defeated was I, that I had expected to get 2 flat, frisbee-like dense loafs the next morning. I had already placed the doughs in its final proofing bowls, dusted with rice flour, so I didn’t want to risk reshaping and incorporating rice flour into the doughs. After taking a break and leaving the doughs in the fridge for its overnight proof, I mustered up enough energy to try another Hail Mary pass to save it. I pulled the dough out of the fridge, pulling the edges of the dough and folding it into the center to create surface tension, then pinching the dough folds together until the seams were invisible. Not sure if it helped, but it created the (dis)illusion that I’ve incorporated more air into the boule for hopefully, a decent rise during the bake.

The next morning, I did the turn and tuck for one final time until it looked like a beautiful, round, and tall ball of dough before baking. This worked extremely well and the final boule came out looking very well shaped versus if I had just placed it into the oven as is, without shaping.

Proofing covered with a dish cloth instead of cling wrap/plastic Now my bowl is deep enough for my tiny boules, so I don’t have to worry about dough spilling out during proofing. I didn’t use plastic wrap this time when resting my doughs overnight in the fridge. I covered it in my dish cloth loosely. I did not dust my doughs of excess dough prior to baking either. Having it uncovered by plastic allowed the dough to try out abit more, resulting in a nicer, crackled crust this time round and I liked it better.

Baking withOUT a dutch oven Yes, it’s possible. The last time I did made bread, I baked it uncovered in my cast iron skillet with a tray of ice cubes in a tray underneath for steam, as suggested by Mike Greenfield from Pro Home Cooks. I didn’t think it was enough, and my bread came out with the ugliest crust (see pic below). Dissatisfied, I needed to find a better method. 

My first sourdough breads. SEE THAT UGLY OLD ASS CRUSTY TOP??? Looks like your grandma’s ashy butt. No. can. do. 

Research with various videos and the FB group of sourdough experts revealed it was an issue with insufficient steam during the bake. So this time, I provided a heavier source of steam, and trapping any steam generated from the dough during the bake by covering the top with another skillet. 

I had bought an official Easy Tiger sourdough loaf, placed it in my cast iron skillet to measure height. Turns out, having two cast iron skillets stacked on top of each other was tall enough, especially for a half boule. Here’s my setup:

2 cast iron skillets, a baking sheet, and a small cake pan.

The tray under cast iron was set to prevent the base of my boules from burning. Is it necessary? I’m unsure at this point. Would have to test it out next time round, but no harm no foul to be extra safe on these early, vulnerable babies.

The spouts on the cast irons meant that steam could escape, unlike an enclosed dutch oven or combo cooker. So, I went overboard by providing an additional source of steam underneath in the form of boiling water poured into the cake pan...just in case. 

Removing the top skillet during the bake revealed that it did provide some level of steaming with it’s paler, shiny crust, but there was still enough crust to indicate that it didn’t do a great job trapping steam inside the skillets, so having additional steam was beneficial after all. I can’t say this with confidence. Only changing things up and experimenting during my next bakes will confirm my hypothesis.

Next Iteration

I would definitely stick to this Tartine recipe for bread making. It was easy, seemed fool-proof, and the number of people using it as a guide meant you had lots of tips available on the youtube channels. 

Would definitely use bread flour instead of normal white flour next time round for a stronger gluten structure though. That might give me a more open crumb this time. 

Would also stick to majority of the techniques, with changes in:

incorporating flavor bombs during stretch & fold instead of final shaping stage

changing the shaping techniques to generate more surface tension and reduce spread of dough.

volume and treatment of flavor bombs as mentioned in the earlier sections.

#sourdough #experiments #recipedevelopment #bread #breadmaking

[resinonao3]

*puts a cucumber behind feline!Bucky*

I think he’d nope out of there so quickly! 

OR something like this…

“I don’t know, Buck…” Steve doesn’t usually give up on a political debate so easily, and he’s particularly skeptical about the RNS’s motivations for sabotaging the ESPO pipeline, but he’s distracted.

“I think that’s what it all boils down to: pride.” Bucky continues walking up the stairs just ahead of him, tail swinging back and forth right in front of Steve’s face. Bucky isn’t doing it on purpose, he’s just excited by the latest news coming out of Russia. “Remember when they blew up the convoy headed to Kiev? Nothing but chickens. The just did it because they thought it made Russia look weak, allowing the US to provide thousands of chickens to Kiev’s farms.”

“Oh,” Steve says, because he does remember the convoy bombing, but he’s also watching that sleek, spotted tail swish, swish, swishing in front of him. It’s hypnotizing, like watching a metronome. “I still think there’s more strategy behind it than that.”

They are each carrying a brown paper bag of groceries from Trader Joe’s, since Steve finally broke down and agreed to cook his maple-glazed salmon rather than order takeout. Bucky is in the mood for something sweet, and he insisted the French restaurant that delivers doesn’t ‘do it right.’ Really, the casual intimacy of Bucky’s words caused a twinge of happiness in Steve’s chest and he was excited to cook for his hungry cat. It’s nice to have such a domestic plan for the evening, given everything going on.

“That would imply the RNS is a lot more organized than our current intelligence suggests,” Bucky grumbles, unsatisfied with Steve’s stubborn argument. Steve can’t seem to think of anything else to back up his position though, since all he wants to do is put this stupid bag of fish down and tuck his fingers into Bucky’s soft fur. Why did they even start discussing politics to begin with? That never leads to anything fun. “If they were that organized, they probably would have succeeded in the attack on the pipeline.”

“I just want to sink my teeth in your ass,” Steve sighs, and Bucky abruptly stops on the stairs before he turns around with open shock painted across his face as his eyes grow larger and larger.

Wrestling both themselves and the bag of groceries up the stairs while they struggle to keep their hands off each other is no small feat, but they manage. Steve flings open his door and Bucky slams it shut, and the bags are haphazardly dropped on the counter as soon as Steve plants Bucky on cool granite. “Shit, Steve,” Bucky breathes into his mouth, in the brief breaks between Steve’s attempts to taste every single one of his barbs. “Mmm, more!”

Steve shoves him back, yanks up his shirt and suckles his left nipple. He loves feeling it grow rigid between his lips, can taste the salt and inhales Bucky’s delicious graham cracker scent. Steve rakes his fingers down Bucky’s back, dips below the waistband of his shorts and grabs entire handfuls of Bucky’s ass. Steve is hard as a rock, the edge of the counter pressing uncomfortably against his fly, and for a moment can’t decide what he wants more; getting his mouth on Bucky’s cock or just fucking him on the spot.

He figures he’d let Bucky decide, and reaches back to press on the root of his tail. “Fuck!” Bucky cries out, his hips spasming back, and his tail arcs just enough to knock both bags of groceries over. Bucky ignores it, latches onto Steve’s neck with his teeth, and for a hot, wet second, Steve’s mind completely blanks, lost in the sensation of the sharp little bite.

Then Steve sees the eggs slip out of the toppled bag. “Wait! Shit!” Steve lunges forward, arms wildly scrambling past Bucky to catch hold of them before they roll off the counter. Bucky just hangs on, trapped between Steve and the counter. “Shit, shit!” Steve gasps, grabs the carton with two fingers, and blows out a sigh right in Bucky’s chest. “That was close.”

Then both bags of groceries topple right over the edge and crash onto the floor.

Bucky winces, not daring to look behind him, ears folded down at the sound of the produce crunching under the weight of the glass maple syrup, and the packages of fresh salmon slapping against the hardwood floor. A head of lettuce for the salad rolls out, along with a jar of peaches and a tub of ice cream. It takes a surprisingly long time for everything to settle.

“Fuck.” Steve deadpans, then raises an accusatory eyebrow right at Bucky’s tail.

“Don’t you dare,” Bucky warns him, picking it up off the counter and pulling it protectively into his lap.

Steve blows out a laugh, then releases his death grip on the egg cartons. “Let’s rescue your dinner.”

Bucky rolls his eyes, bored with that idea but apparently on board. He hops off the counter and scoops up the lettuce while Steve rights the paper bags. “Wow, that loaf of bread made it all the way into the hall,” he says, quietly impressed, and heads past the sofa to rescue the plastic bag of sliced whole wheat. Steve turns back after settling most of everything back on the counter — because that’s what counters are actually for — and spots the cucumber that had rolled halfway under the side table next to the couch.

“Everything okay?” Bucky says, heading back towards him.

“Nothing broke,” Steve shrugs. “Oh, behind you,” he says, since Bucky didn’t see it.

“Hm?” Bucky glances down and then Steve’s peaceful evening erupts into chaos.

Bucky shouts, his whole body spiraling six feet directly up in the air. Steve’s stomach plummets to his feet and he launches himself backward shouting, “Who’s there!” for some reason. He flings his arm out across the refridgerator, like he’s trying to protect it, and Bucky comes back down on the back of the couch before he springs over the coffee table and scrabbles to stop himself before obliterating the television. He winds up on all fours, claws gouging deep ruts in the floor, ears laid back, tail straight up behind him and poofier than Steve has ever seen.

Steve is gasping through his heart attack, still clinging onto the refrigerator. “Fuck! What the! Fucking! And what!”

“What was that!” Bucky snarls, gnashing his teeth.

Steve feels dizzy, and he’s worried he may actually have had a small heart attack. He unclamps his grip on the edge of the fridge and staggers forward. “What was what!”

“That— ” Bucky growls. “That thing!”

Steve’s legs feel like water. Did he pee a little? “Oh my fucking god,” he gasps. “Bucky it’s just the cucumber.” He walks over to where the bread landed, which has been stomped into a sack of sad crumbs, and picks up the cucumber, waving it at the scaredy cat cowering by the window. “For the salad?”

Bucky sits down hard, yanks his claws from the wooden floor. His eyes grow wider and wider as his face grows redder and redder. “Oh.”

#myfics

[orangebatsanctuary]

Extraordinary dinner’s served! 

Floret by icinks

If you wanna feel like winning lottery, read this fic!  icinks made it extra special for us.

I mean, this is one of the best fairy tales AU InaSure that will make you fall in love with them right off the bat! I’m in heaven...

Read on OrangeBat Sanctuary website:

http://www.orangebat-sanctuary.com/icinks

or click ‘Keep reading’ below.

Have fun reading!

Love,

Rosiel

Floret

By icinks

 Tags: Implied/Referenced Suicide, Referenced Homicide, Referenced Bullying, Anxiety, Fluff & Angst, Fairies

｡.:*☆☆*:.｡ 

 “Hello? Hello!” A soft, insistent voice echoed in the cold air, its source standing somewhere close by. Slaine crouched behind a boulder and waited for the human to leave, more out of some false instinct than necessity. They were the same size now - humans were no longer a threat to him.  Crunching footsteps, another call.  Whoever it was, they did not seem ready to go away anytime soon.

“Hello! Miss Fairy, are you here?  Please let me speak with you...” the voice was a little louder this time.

Fairy? Slaine frowned.  Humans avoided fairies, but this boy was seeking one out.  And how did he know that she was here?  Slaine listened closer now, waiting for the boy to speak again. However instead of the voice, his own stomach was first to break the silence. Right, he hadn’t eaten in awhile. On top of that, he was hungrier much faster than he was accustomed to.  Perhaps it was this large form that was sapping his energy.  Clapping a hand over his mouth, as if it would stop the rumbling in his abdomen, Slaine crouched as close to the boulder as possible in hopes that the boy wouldn’t notice him.

He was quickly disappointed as footsteps soon headed his way.  He looked around him for someplace else to dash to, but the moment he stood up, a wave of faintness came over him and he stumbled and fell into the leaves.  The trees around him span, circling dizzyingly against the winter sky above. And then he was staring up into the flushed face of a boy with eyes the color of cherries.

“Are you alright?”

 ❋❋❋

 Inaho hated winter.  The cold gnawed at him no matter where he was or what clothes he put on.  The stove in his little home was about the only place that didn’t feel unbearable this time of year, but lying against its warm clay walls could only thaw half of him at once, and that in itself was unpleasant in its own way.  It was a good thing that he already spent most of his time at home regardless, with little reason to venture out into the bitter wind outside.  Standing over a hot cauldron of stew was welcome labor, though sometimes he wondered whether Yuki really would rather stay at home instead of work, and simply said nothing for his sake.  If it was just the cold, he would switch places with her in a heartbeat, but there was another reason he rarely left the confines of their modest property.

It was that reason which drew him out into the woods every day that week.  The fairy he searched for year after year, winter and summer, when she might be visible to him during the solstice, was unsurprisingly absent again.  He was sure she must be there somewhere, probably high amongst the barren canopy, but she never showed herself to him.  For ten years he had been met only with silence.

Today, for the first time, he heard someone there.  It wasn’t the fairy, he knew that much when he began walking in the direction of a sound, but it was someone, and that someone might know something about her. A moment later he was looking down at a boy lying stunned in the leaves at his feet.  He had fallen all on his own - Inaho had watched him tumble headlong and roll a bit down the incline that sloped towards the valley below. Habit withheld his hand from helping the boy up, but he approached to a safe distance just to be sure there were no injuries.  The peculiar sound that had initially caught his attention was probably the boy’s empty stomach, he realized, which was being clutched by two thin, poorly clothed arms, and was no doubt also the reason for his stumbling.  Inaho rummaged in his pockets for something edible to give him; he had brought along a bit of bread wrapped up in a handkerchief for himself. Since he hadn’t found what he was looking for, it wouldn’t much matter if he gave away his meal and headed home. There was over half a loaf remaining on the kitchen table, if Yuki hadn’t yet descended upon it.

“Are you alright?” he asked, taking the bread and placing it beside the boy before stepping back.  It felt a bit like setting out food for the rabbits back home, but he wouldn’t take any risks.  There had been too many mistakes in the past.

The boy seemed relieved, anyway, that he’d backed off a little.  He stirred, and pulled himself up into a seated position, but did not touch the food.  Instead he looked as though he was preparing to make another run for it.

“You should recover your strength,” Inaho quickly advised him, “the food is safe, I made it myself.”

Blue-green eyes shifted to him, wide and wary, though the effect of the boy’s threatening expression was somewhat lost amongst the leaves littering his hair.

“Do you live in the village?” Inaho questioned, with the thought that they might return together before the sun dipped below the far peak.  It was already beginning to get colder.  Since he’d rather not abandon the boy, it would be a convenient arrangement to help him safely to wherever he belonged, though ultimately, he suspected that this person was neither lost nor from the village. It seemed he might be wandering, and had probably come from someplace else.  Anyone from the village would know better than to venture into the mountain forests alone.

The boy shook his head in answer.  His hand reached tentatively for the wrapped bread, and as he sniffed it another loud complaint resounded from his stomach.  Immediately the light pink at the boy’s cheeks deepened several shades, and for a brief moment he looked as though he would hurl the morsel into a nearby shrub.  Instead, his fingers began to tremble as they curled around it, and something damp began to fall onto the cloth.  Inaho realized that the droplets were coming from the boy’s eyes, and that tears were traveling down his face and onto the bread.

“I promise you, it’s safe to eat,” Inaho repeated, at a loss, and not a little curious as to what would cause this boy to be so wary of him that he would suspect him of keeping poisoned food on hand in case of chancing upon him.  Was someone hunting him?  “Here, give it back,” he pointed to the ground where he had originally placed it.  Perhaps if he ate some of it himself, the boy would trust him.

“No. I believe you,” answered the boy, very low, and Inaho realized now that the tears had meant relief, “Th... thank you.  Is this human food?”

It was a strange question to hear from a human.  “Yes.  Are you… a fairy?”  He had heard that sometimes fairies took human form, and even lived their whole lives that way, though it seemed unreasonable to him to go through the trouble of being something you weren’t.  Being human wasn’t all that great.

“I’m not,” was the swift reply.  The boy slowly lifted the bread to his mouth and took a very small bite.  It was quickly followed by another, and another, and Inaho had to warn him not to scarf it too quickly lest he give himself a stomachache.

“Do you know the fairy that lives here?” he inquired as the boy ate.  It was unlikely, but worth asking, on the slim chance that he had finally discovered someone who could help him.

The boy looked up at him again, and brushed the crumbs from his mouth before answering. “There are many fairies that live here. Which one do you mean?”

Inaho looked around him.  Could it be that he truly couldn’t see them at all?  Perhaps the fairy he sought had actually answered him, and he was simply unable to see her...

“I don’t think there are any here right now,” the boy added, noting his searching eyes, “It’s winter, so they’ve probably gone to stay at the Glade.  Do you know her name?  What does she look like?”

“She had hair like a pearl, and sapphire wings like cracked stained glass, the same color as her eyes.  And she wore a gown made of a lily.”

The boy’s eyes narrowed somewhat, and from the slight, wary tilt of his head, Inaho was sure that he had finally found a clue as to her whereabouts.  “What do you want with that fairy?” the boy inquired instead, his words all but confirming that he knew her, or at least knew of her.

“I have a favor to ask of her.”

“In that case, you shouldn’t bother.  She probably won’t grant it.”

Inaho was aware of that much.  The fairy girl would likely not be easily persuaded, especially given she was the reason for his needing the favor in the first place.  “Do you know where she is?  Can you take me to her?”

 ❋❋❋

 Slaine eyed the human with suspicion.  One could only describe this fairy in such detail if they had actually met her, unless she was the stuff of bedtime stories, which he very much doubted given what he’d been told.  This boy must have encountered her before at some point.  As far as Slaine was aware, fairies and humans had little reason to interact, and the former stuck mostly to the remote mountain forests, while the latter took refuge along the river in the lush valley.  It was best for all of them if they simply kept to themselves.

“I don’t know her, or where she is,” he answered in half-truth.  The full truth was that he was also searching for this same fairy, and would rather not have someone interfering with his mission, especially someone he didn’t even know or especially trust.  Anyway, it was very unlikely that she would answer the request of an ordinary human boy.  If what he had been told about her was true, she wasn’t a very friendly person.  It would be difficult enough to complete his own quest. “You should go home,” he added, noting the path of the sun, “it isn’t safe here after sundown.”

“It’s not safe for you, either,” the other returned, “If you need a place to sleep, you should come with me.  You’ll freeze to death up here in those clothes.”

Slaine watched the boy take a step back, rather than extend a helpful hand as he pulled himself to his feet, and couldn’t help but wonder if there was not some distrust on both sides.  Even so, the boy had been very generous and kind thus far, for a complete stranger. Slaine glanced at the sky once more, and recalling the torturous hours of the early morning when he had set out, he gave a resigned nod.  A stranger’s home would be far better than staying in the cold forest, with nothing to eat and only a boulder to shield him from the harsh mountain wind.

“What may I call you?” asked the boy, “my name is Inaho.”

Slaine took his time in answering.  He didn’t like handing out his name so flippantly in unknown territory, but this boy seemed safe enough.  In any case, he was going home with him.  With another sigh, he answered quietly, “Slaine.”

 ❋❋❋

 The house was smaller than he had expected.  Slaine could not remember having ever set foot in a human home, though he was sure he must have been born in one.  The circumstances of his birth were as much a mystery to himself as to anyone, but he liked to think there was something normal about it, and that after a perfectly ordinary infancy, there had been good reasons for his mother to abandon him in the forest.

Or rather, that was what he used to believe.  He knew better now - his birth was not a mystery at all, and nothing about his life had been left to chance.  Knowing that his mother had never meant to part with him was small comfort in the face of the realization that everything else in his life had only ever been a farce.  He wondered what it would have been like to grow up within walls like this, snug and comfortable and welcome.  The place where he was raised was nothing like the valley; the Glade was much warmer, being kept that way by the fairies themselves, and generally there was less between them and the earth.

Immediately, the bread on the table caught his attention, and he felt his stomach complain again.  It was inconvenient having to eat so often; back home with the fairies, he only ate when he felt like it.  The thought that perhaps his body was lacking sixteen years’ worth of nutrients made him uneasy, but he supposed if that were true, he’d have perished upon his return to this form.  What he was feeling might actually be normal for a human.  He wouldn’t know.

“Do you live on the East Mountain?” inquired Inaho as he gestured towards a chair.

He was beginning to tire of these questions.  Especially since he felt obliged to answer, given the hospitality he was receiving.  “Yes.” There didn’t need to be explanation. There wasn’t much to tell, anyway; anyone from the East Mountain was either a traveler, a fairy, or a madman. Humans didn’t live there, unless they were a changeling.

“You were raised by them,” Inaho guessed easily.

Slaine did not deny it.  He accepted an offered cup and peered at its contents before taking an experimental sip. The liquid was warm in his mouth and the taste was sweet and somehow familiar.  Drawing the cup away from his lips, he looked into it again in an effort to determine what it was.  He had not watched its preparation, being too preoccupied with his surroundings.

“It’s made from a rose syrup,” Inaho offered, apparently noting the curious look in his eyes as he stared and sipped in turns.

“Rose? But it’s winter…”  He was quite sure roses did not bloom in winter.

“The syrup is made during the summer, and keeps in the cupboard all winter.  A spoonful is added to hot water as a medicinal drink.”

It sounded very nice, and he let the warmth settle inside him, the sensation strange but comfortable.  The fairies did not make hot drinks.

 ❋❋❋

 “Do you live alone?”

It was the first true question Slaine asked him.

“My sister lives here with me,” he answered, and glanced at the door.  Yuki was late coming home, but then that was not unusual.  She often got carried away with her work and lost track of time.  Inaho had gotten quite used to it, and so long as she returned before bedtime he felt no need to worry.

As he watched the onions sizzle cheerily in the butter at the bottom of the cauldron, he considered how to persuade Slaine to help him.  If it was a petty favor, he would have abandoned it years ago, but this was something he simply couldn’t give up on.  He would find that fairy by any means necessary.  Yuki’s life could depend on it.

Steam curled in thin clouds above the cauldron as the soup began to boil.  He carefully sliced vegetables and dropped them into the broth, along with various herbs selected from jars in the cupboard.

“Do you get lonely?” came another unexpected inquiry.  Though perhaps the question was not really all that strange, considering fairies were, from his understanding, very social creatures. Slaine was probably used to constant, lively company.

He tapped the wooden spoon against the rim of the cauldron and hung it on a hook by the stove, hands following their routine path while his mind considered the question.  “It doesn’t matter,” he eventually replied. It didn’t matter, not for him.  Though it might, if Slaine would help him.  “I can’t be near other people.”

“Can’t?” Slaine looked at him with eyebrows slightly raised in question, voice echoing a bit in his nearly empty cup, which he had just raised to his lips.  His dark lashes fluttered in the steam which puffed into them as his breath gently stirred the hot liquid.

The lengthening gaze showed no sign of averting, and Inaho resigned himself to giving answer.  It might help his cause in persuading Slaine, anyway, if the circumstances which prompted his mission were understood.  On the other hand, it could also drive Slaine away, and then he would be back to where he’d started.

He met the other’s eyes, saying nothing at first.  He wasn’t quite sure where to begin, because he had never had to explain it to anyone before.  Either they knew from what they had seen or heard, and looked at him as though he were the Devil himself, or they were blissfully unaware, and Inaho had to go out of his way to avoid them in order to prevent any terrible accidents.  He was never quite sure which was worse - being hated, or having people mistake his caution for contempt.  These days there was less of the latter, since in the end most everyone in the little village had found out one way or another, and branding him anathema had forced him into near total seclusion.  He could not complain.

The vigorously boiling soup gave him an excuse to break eye contact, and he turned back to the stove to stir it.  It would be better to tell Slaine, he assured himself.  There was no sense in keeping it from him.  Perhaps, because Slaine had lived amongst fairies and their magic, he would understand.  Yes, it would be better to say it… He wiped the sweat from his palms onto a rag cloth and carefully moved the cauldron away from the direct heat of the fire, leaving it to simmer.  Then he seated himself across from Slaine.

“When... I was a child...” he began, uncertain, “I went into the mountain forest alone.  There I was cursed by a fairy, and ever since, if I touch another human… they die. I want to ask the fairy to reverse it.”

Slaine set his cup down slowly and leaned forward, expression unreadable.  “You haven’t touched another human since childhood?” he asked, voice low and incredulous.

“I have.”

There was a very long silence after that confession, and he debated whether providing directions to the nearest inn might now be the wisest course of action. There was little reason for Slaine to remain here with someone who had just freely admitted to murder, let alone aid him as he’d hoped.

“It must be difficult,” answered Slaine in a tone that sounded earnest and free of reproach.  He craned his neck a bit to cast a glance over Inaho’s shoulder at the soup.  “That smells good.”

Before Inaho could determine what to do with such a reaction, there was a rustling, scuffing sound at the door, and a moment later Yuki appeared.  She seemed as though she was going to say something as she stepped into the house and closed the creaky wooden door behind her, but was immediately distracted by Slaine, who was in the middle of reaching for the remaining bread.

“Oh!” she exclaimed instead, “Nao, who is this?”

 ❋❋❋

 No fairy could produce a curse - they were not capable of that sort of ill-intended magic. The more likely explanation was that she had meant for it to be a blessing, but that the gift had backfired due to lack of experience.  Or perhaps Inaho had just been the unlucky recipient of a stray spell, which young fairies sometimes cast in the forest for play or practice, so as not to disrupt anything at home.  Whatever the case, it was a terrible thing to live with.  His life must have been traumatic, if people really did die when they came in contact with him.

Slaine let the thoughts drift to the back of his mind as he focused his attention on the woman who had just entered the little house.  She looked at him with cheerful, curious eyes, though he could easily detect the jaded exhaustion that lay beneath the surface.

“Welcome home, Yuki,” Inaho greeted her, with the first smile Slaine had seen from him. He introduced them briefly before ducking into a cupboard for some bowls.

She smiled as well, casting an uncertain glance between them, and excused herself to wash up for supper.  Slaine watched her disappear up some wooden stairs, looking at the home with new perspective as he listened to her footsteps above them in the loft. Everything was separate, even down to the chairs at the far ends of the table, and the gloves that were laid neatly on the shelf above the stove, Inaho immediately pulled onto his hands again when he had finished cooking.  They were obviously very careful, but one little mistake would end in tragedy, and with them living in such close quarters, the chances of such an accident occurring eventually were that much higher.

Slaine returned his gaze to Inaho.  “I understand your urgency,” he admitted, pausing to accept the bowl that was set in front of him, “If you want… you can come with me.  I am also searching for that fairy.”

He would probably regret his offer, but then this house was wonderfully warm, and the soup smelled very good, and he had no provisions to speak of, nor knowledge of how to prepare any of his own.  His body would give out again in a day or two if he tried to go it alone in this harsh environment.  It would be best to take someone experienced with him, someone with food and human skills, even if it might result in some unwanted interference.

Slaine glanced up from his soup, and saw that Inaho was still standing there.  He couldn’t quite read his expression, but he seemed pleased at least. Perhaps it was relief?  “Thank you,” Inaho said quietly, before turning to fill another bowl for his sister.

   Slaine shivered in the icy air of early morning.  There was no wind, but the rising sun had not yet touched the valley, and even with the extra layers of clothing Inaho had insisted he take, Slaine could not keep his teeth from chattering or his body from shaking.

“You’ll warm up once we’ve walked a bit,” assured Inaho, who was also shivering, and might even have been a little grumpy about it, if the very slight furrow of his brow was anything to go by.  The rest of his face was all wrapped up in a long strip of woven fabric.

Slaine adjusted the pack he was given to carry.  It was a little heavy, but Inaho was right that the exercise made him warm. Supposedly it was filled with provisions, so there wasn’t anything to complain about.  The first leg of their journey wasn’t all that difficult, since they merely had to cut through the village to the other side, which lay at the foot of the West Mountain.  From there they would travel up into the forest in search of the fairy.

“I’m told she lives on the West Mountain now,” he had explained to Inaho as they planned their journey the previous evening, “Apparently there is a fairy that was tasked with watching over her, though he disappeared some years ago.  Hopefully his information is still correct regarding her whereabouts.  Her name is Princess Lemrina.”

There were very few people in the streets at that hour, and after witnessing the various scornful looks cast their way, he was grateful for it. Passing through town when everyone was up and about would probably have been a painful affair for Inaho, regardless of how unaffected he seemed by their hateful eyes, their whispers, and their wide berth of him.  His expression may not have betrayed any reaction at all, but ever since entering the main part of town Slaine noticed that he looked mostly at the ground as the walked, only every now and again glancing in the direction of Slaine’s feet as though to check that he hadn’t strayed too close. The mere fact that Inaho was going to such lengths to regain his normalcy spoke more clearly of his true sentiment, though Slaine supposed it was possible that his sister had more to do with it than anything.  He could not imagine being in such a precariously dangerous position with Asseylum.

As they trudged past the final few houses at the outskirts of the west side, the sun crept over the east peak and shed its warmth against their backs.  The heat felt good, and strange at the same time as it contrasted with the cool breeze coming down off the mountain from the forest they were about to enter.  Before they ventured into it, having scrambled their way up the fenced pastures filled with tall grasses, bent over from the frost and hiding the thicker, treacherous brambles that grew close to the earth, Inaho came to a stop by a large, fallen tree, and suggested they eat breakfast before proceeding.

Slaine sat down on the tree and waited for instructions as to what they were to eat. He hadn’t watched Inaho fill the packs - he had been fast asleep at the time.  Inaho was already drawing something out from his own pack, a thick brown cloth folded around something that gave off the faintest mist of steam in the cold air.  Slaine could already smell it as it was placed beside him on the uneven tree bark.

As he unwrapped the warm bread and began to eat it, he glanced sidelong at Inaho.  He wondered whether that quiet nature was innate, or acquired from so many years of solitude.  Inaho had not said much at supper the previous night, not even in the presence of his sister.  In fact, he had actually said less at the table than before she’d arrived.  Slaine didn’t mind it, though; the silence wasn’t uncomfortable or tense.  He felt calmer somehow, not having to think of things to say to someone he didn’t know.

Once they had finished their meal and packed up, they continued on their way up the mountainside, into a grove of evergreen trees.  The further into the forest they went, the surer Slaine became of one thing.  Inaho must have noticed his unease, and halting by a pile of broken rocks, turned to face him.  “Is something the matter?” he asked, his head tilting a little and eyebrows slightly raised in question.  Slaine noted that the wind-burned red had left his cheeks, replaced by a soft, flushed pink, no doubt from the exertion of climbing.  Inaho was probably not accustomed to much exercise of this kind, and Slaine admittedly was not either.  Somehow moving took less energy when he was smaller, and when magic and nectar sustained his body.

Slaine chewed at his bottom lip.  “I’m… not sure that I can actually see fairies anymore.”  For some reason, he felt terrible admitting it.  He had told Inaho that he would help him, and now he was saying he actually couldn’t help at all.  In truth, anything useful he’d had to offer had been shared already.  No one from the Glade knew exactly where the lost Princess had gone, not since five or six years ago, so it was anyone’s guess where on this mountain she had settled.

Inaho did not seem particularly upset.  “The solstice will-”

“That’s a myth,” Slaine cut in, “If you ever saw a fairy without magic to help you, it was because she wanted you to see her.  There is no veil between us, it’s simply that, due to such a lack of magic here, their natural presence is too faint for most humans to see.”

“Then you normally use magic to see them?”

He shook his head.  “The magic in the Glade is strong enough that I don’t need to do anything in order to see them.  The fairies’ presence is strengthened by the foundational spells of the Royal Court - any human would be able to see them there.”

“But you can use magic to see them here,” stated Inaho, somehow unphased by all this discouraging news, “can any human use magic?”

Their eyes met, and Slaine felt himself wither at the question.  Clearly Inaho intended to try it, if it was possible, and being the one to enable him made Slaine feel directly responsible for the outcome.  He ought to feel lucky that here was someone possibly willing to make a sacrifice that he would have otherwise had to make himself, but instead he was only filled with reluctance and a nagging feeling of guilt.

In the end, he managed to convince himself that it would be best to allow Inaho to make his own decision, even if it was self-serving.  After all, at this rate Inaho would be stuck like this forever, and that would undoubtedly be the worse fate for him.  There were few sacrifices that would outweigh the misfortune that already existed.  Would Inaho give anything to live alongside his sister without fear?  To someday kiss a lover, or hold the hand of a child?

“Yes,” Slaine answered simply, at last. “But there is a cost.”

“If I won’t die, it’s not a problem.”

Slaine gaped at him for a moment before collecting himself.  He had expected that response, but the speed with which Inaho had made the decision without even knowing what it would do to him was still a little staggering.  This was Inaho’s answer to ‘would you give anything?’

Slaine exhaled.  “You won’t die.  There is an ointment that will allow you to see them, but after several hours the eye imbued with magic won’t be able to see anything at all.  I brought it in case, but I wasn’t expecting to really use it.” He truly hadn’t, because up till now he had been desperately relying on the hope that enough residual magic had stuck with him to get by outside of the Glade without anything extra.  Somehow, his rational side had planned a little better, and had taken the ointment along as a backup.  Obtaining it was an especially risky business, because the Princess would have cried if she’d known about it, and so he had needed to steal it without her finding out.

Asseylum did not know about this world, or how different it was from the Glade.  He might have asked her for a few spells to make the journey easier, but that would have necessitated explaining the various dangers and inconveniences to her, and then she might have revoked her permission for him to go entirely.  He was already walking on thin ice in that regard - it had taken him several weeks to convince her that she was needed at Court, and that she ought to send someone else to find her sister.  Naturally, he had suggested himself; not just to protect Princess Asseylum, but because this long lost sister was also someone he very much wanted to personally bring home.  Asseylum knew this as well, and her understanding of the latter was what in the end prevailed against her reluctance with the former.  Yet even knowing how she would feel about the ointment, and what the consequences would be of using it, Slaine had taken it, because if luck did not favor him on this mission, he would need a way to search. It was too important a quest to come home empty-handed.  

Now luck had favored him, and despite the guilt, he reached to unclasp the silver chain that encircled his neck, and slowly handed over the tiny vial that swung from it.  A clear liquid sparkled within its crystal walls, reflecting the sparse sunlight that filtered through the evergreen branches above and casting tiny flecks of dancing color on Inaho’s outstretched palm.

 ❋❋❋

 Inaho had expected that some form of cost would be required of him from the fairy, if he was able to find her and convince her to remove the spell from him, so one more sacrifice wasn’t too much of an issue.  However, it would be inconvenient if he lost his sight completely - he might become even more of a burden on Yuki until he could learn to function without it, and that was something he would rather avoid.  Time would be of the essence once the ointment was applied to the first eye.  He pocketed the vial and looked to Slaine once more.

“When is the best time to encounter fairies?”

“Just after sundown, or in the morning when the dew is still fresh.  During the warm midday we-... they sleep,” Slaine caught himself awkwardly, sounding a little despondent as he continued, “Though I admit I’m not sure about the fairies on this mountain.  Perhaps they differ from the ones at home…”

Inaho thought that was probably true, if the rumor was to be believed that the fairies on the West Mountain were for the most part outcasts and loners.  It was likely that they differed a great deal in social matters, but he had to wonder if it would make much of a difference in something natural like sleep.

“I think we should travel a little further,” added Slaine as he began to walk ahead, “and then make camp.  They will probably like the fire, and might even come to us on their own if they assume we can’t see them.  Then we can ask whether they’ve seen the Princess.”

Inaho watched him clamber up the hillside for a moment before following.  He disliked seeing the boy falter along the path; it always made him feel like something terrible would happen, and he would be powerless to do anything about it.  He would never try to catch someone again.  Not until this curse was lifted, anyway.  But Slaine was so unsteady, he found himself moving in spite of everything, on reflexes he had buried long ago.  Inaho pulled his gloves on more securely.

 ❋❋❋

 Starting the fire turned out to be a difficult feat in the damp forest, but eventually the they were able to get a decent blaze going.  Supper was a simple affair, and neither said much.  Inaho was running the various outcomes of this night in his mind, though he was fairly certain of his decision from the outset. Even if he was blinded, and they did not find the fairy after all, he would have at least prevented Slaine from using the ointment on himself.  That compensated for the loss somewhat, though he wasn’t sure it could be considered a satisfactory result overall.  Really, there was no reason for him to count it as a pro, considering he should reasonably feel no responsibility for Slaine.  That didn’t change the fact that he did, though.  Ever since he saw the boy collapse from hunger, he had felt responsible for him.  Maybe it was only because he’d never had someone to take care of before.  Or, maybe it was because Slaine was the first person to act normally around him.  Most would have run away after discovering what sort of creature he really was, but Slaine had not been phased by it at all.  He still wasn’t.  It was a different feeling, having to keep his distance from someone other than Yuki, who actually knew but didn’t seem to care.  It was comfortable and stressful at the same time.

The sun dipped behind the mountain, and accordingly Inaho reached into his pocket for the vial.  If all went well, they would be able to find the fairy soon.  If things didn’t work out as they hoped, they would have to come up with something else.  And while Inaho was sure he could continue trying to change his situation for years to come, he would much rather it be sooner than later.  Yuki shouldn’t have to take care of him forever, and he liked to think that, once cured, he would be able to live self-sufficiently, though in reality he well knew that his stigma would not lift along with the curse. A place in human society was something he would never have, regardless.

He watched Slaine thoughtfully chew his bread, and thought he seemed more fidgety than before.  It reminded him of how Yuki got restless when she had something to say to him that she didn’t want to say.  He wondered whether that was typical, or if people’s habits differed and meant different things.  Slaine had no reason to hold anything back from him, it wasn’t as though they were close friends or family.  They had nothing to lose by offending one another.  Even so, Slaine’s eyes remained downcast and evasive.

Inaho had seen lots of people’s eyes in his lifetime, before he’d begun avoiding them, but he’d never seen any quite like Slaine’s.  At first he thought it was the color, but then he might’ve seen a little girl with blue-green eyes once, a long time ago.  Now that he thought about it, she’d looked rather like Slaine in other ways, as well.  Slaine’s eyes had a look in them, though, that was different than most people’s. Maybe it was because the expressions Inaho was most used to were limited to the spectrum of disgust and fear, but he’d seen plenty that didn’t realize he was there.  Eyes that smiled, and laughed, and teased, and adored.  People who were enjoying each other’s company, unaware of the young reaper that quietly watched them from a distance.  There was a time when Yuki’s eyes sparkled, too, before they were tinged with the dull sheen of continual worry and weariness.

Slaine’s eyes were different.  They were full of life, despite the distant, melancholy look in them, like something wild and lonely.  Inaho wondered what the reason for that look could be.  As the light faded and the stars came out one by one, he removed his gloves and took the vial between two fingers, removing the cap very carefully with his other hand.  He laid an index finger over the open top, and turned the vial over once.  Would his own eyes look different after this?

Slaine’s gaze jumped to him as he lifted his hand to his left eye, but he didn’t say a word.  The liquid stung a little and Inaho blinked away the tears that tried to wash the substance out.  He’d barely had time to think about what he had just done to himself when a soft, purple glow nearby caught his attention.  There by the fire, sitting cross-legged and holding a stick thrice her own length, with some sort of mushroom poked onto the end of it, was a fairy. She seemed rather pleased with herself to have chanced upon such an opportunity, though her purple eyes bore a dark intensity that seemed somehow discordant with the calm sway of her little frame and the cheerful bob of her chestnut hair as she moved to some unsung tune.

She must have felt his eyes on her, because he’d hardly made the assessment that this was not the fairy they sought before she noticed that he was able to see her. She tensed a little, but didn’t move from where she sat toasting her mushroom.  Then her mouth opened, and he thought she was probably asking him something, but he couldn’t quite hear it, so he leaned a little closer and asked her to repeat it.  His sudden movement caused her some alarm, and she lept to her feet, holding the stick between them like a javelin.  After a wary moment, she lowered the stick a fraction and asked again: “Why can you see me?”

“Fairy ointment,” he explained simply, and then added, before she could decide whether she liked that answer or not, “I’m looking for someone.  A fairy.  Can you help me find her?”

“That’ll turn you blind,” she replied with a skeptical look, as though he didn’t already know that. “If you’re wanting a guide, find someone else.  I’m not interested.”

“I only want to know if you’ve seen her.”  Inaho went on to describe the fairy princess.  He hardly expected the first fairy he came across to have seen her, but he would ask every single one of them until he found one that had, or until he went blind trying.

“Her?!”  The fairy stared at him as though he’d described a fantastic monster. “Nobody’s seen her.  Not recently, anyway; nowadays she never leaves her house.”

“Can you tell me where she lives?”

The fairy girl cast a wary glance at Slaine.  She leaned on her stick, placing a tiny hand on her leaf-clad hip. “I thought I told you already, I’m not interested.”

“You don’t need to guide us there.  We can find the place ourselves if you tell us where to go.”

She shook her head.  “No, you can’t.”

“We can. We have to.”

“You can't.  Perhaps if you were a fairy you could fly there easily, but humans have to go to all sorts of trouble to find it.  She doesn’t like visitors, either, from what I hear.”

Inaho hadn’t expected the pearl-haired fairy to be very sociable, so the news wasn’t all that surprising.  It didn’t matter one way or the other what sort of a person she was, so long as he could finally see her again, and make his request.  He did not, however, want to get lost on the way, if it really was as difficult to find as this fairy claimed.  They might need some sort of guide, after all.

“We really need to speak with her.  Do you know of anyone who might be willing to take us there?”

While he had been thinking the matter over, the girl had sat down again, and put the stick across her lap, and was in the process of testing the doneness of her mushroom when he asked the question.  She did not look up at him, but cast a quick glance at the thicket to their left. “I suppose I might know someone,” she answered coolly. “They’re sort of an airhead and might only get you lost, though, so don’t blame me if something goes horribly wrong.”

There was a faint, indignant shout from the thicket, and now Inaho was sure someone else was there.  He squinted at it, and a tiny face came into focus.  It peeked out from between two thick, glossy holly leaves, and a cluster of red berries rested on her head like baubles.  Her glow was also purple, but a bit more vibrant, and less intense than the fairy with the stick’s.  She must have been leaning on a twig, because a moment later it snapped beneath her, and three fairies came tumbling out of the thicket in a heap.  There was another girl, and a boy, both with hair the color of wheat.  The three tried to scramble back into the thicket all at once, but only ended up tangling themselves further, and getting nearly swallowed up by the autumn leaves that littered the ground.

“Wh-who are you calling an airhead, Rayet?!” demanded the girl with the purple glow, having given up her attempt at escape and now marching heatedly towards the first fairy, who must be called Rayet.

“Does it matter?” replied Rayet, her mouth all full of mushroom, “All of you are.”

There was a collective outrage amongst the others, and Inaho almost didn’t notice the soft laugh from across the fire.  He had actually forgotten Slaine was still there.  Rayet must also have heard the laugh, because her eyes were on him, more suspicious than ever.

“Can you hear us?” she asked flatly, and at that everyone hushed up in an instant.

Slaine cast a reluctant look her way.  “I can,” he answered with a quiet nod, “though not very well, and I still can’t see you.” The way his eyes missed her while he was looking right at her confirmed that he was not lying about that, and she seemed somewhat satisfied with the answer, though no less wary.

“What are you?” she inquired again.

Slaine scrunched his nose.  “That’s rude. I’m human.”

“Humans don’t notice our voices if they’re not looking right at us and making a great effort to listen.”

“I’ve lived my entire life with fairies,” reasoned Slaine, “It would be stranger if I didn’t notice your voices if I’m already aware that you’re speaking.”

“Hm.” She made no further comment, and took another bite of her mushroom.  It appeared he had confirmed something in her mind, which she was now mulling over quietly.

Slaine was now the one eyeing her suspiciously, but he let the matter rest. In the meantime, the other three fairies had begun to play some sort of game by the fire, and were running around it so recklessly with squeals and laughter that Inaho was afraid one of them would end up falling right into it.  They never did - they were far too nimble for that, and their magic, or their wings, would probably protect them anyway.  Seeing them reminded him of how he used to watch the village children play games together, too.  Back when keeping his mother and sister in the dark about what truly happened when they sent him out to play with the others was all that he’d had to worry about. Perhaps if he’d said something then, he would never have had to run away into the woods that day, and then he would never have encountered that fairy.  She must have known that they would be waiting for him to return, just before dark when the forest became too cold to endure any longer.  Had she followed him to the edge of the village to see her curse at work?

Inaho had always suspected there was something inherently wrong with him, he had even asked his mother about it once, though she had looked alarmed at the question and quickly assured him that he was mistaken.  He had never brought it up again after that - it wasn’t worth worrying her over something he couldn’t change.  And then the curse had only brought to light the deficiencies as a human that had always been there, that everyone but his family could plainly see from the time that he could walk.  It swept away any uncertainty on the matter when he never, not even now, felt responsible for those children’s deaths.  It wasn’t as though he could have stopped them, but he was supposed to feel guilty for it.  That was natural and right.  Regret or sadness, even, might have sufficed, but he’d only ever felt relieved.  Those children wouldn't hit him and push him down anymore, they'd never yell in his face or make him do awful things ever again.

“How awful, for a child to do such a thing.”  The horrified whispers began immediately.  “I always knew there was something eerie about him.”  “That boy murdered my child, why do they do nothing?  Why does he not pay for his crime?!”  They had no proof.  They would not burn a child, even if they did.  “A sorcerer disguised as a child.” “Possessed by demons.”  “A servant of the Devil.”  They thought of every possibility, except the one that was true. “A changeling” came closest to the mark, but he wasn't a fairy.  After a while it didn’t matter what he was, so long as he stayed away.  “Even his mother is afraid of him.  Look, he fell down and his knee is bleeding, and still she won’t go near him.”  If there had been any doubt in their minds that there was something terribly amiss with him, it was banished the moment she collapsed in the street, her arms still wrapped around him.

His mother had always been a strong woman, never giving up even after the scandalous and untimely death of her husband, enduring cheerfully as she worked herself thin to feed her two children and raise them all alone.  Inaho had never wanted her to know that the other children tormented him, that her precious child was disliked, hated; because he was different, and because their parents didn’t like her.  After that day, slowly, month by month, he had watched her succumb to despair.  Eventually, she could no longer bear it.  He would never really be sure whether the embrace had been an act of love, or if she had merely used him to take her own life.

“You should probably get going soon.” Rayet’s voice brought him back to the present. “That ointment only lasts so long.”

The other fairies had given up their game and were now sitting round the fire in a circle, toasting various foods on sticks.  They all looked a little surprised at Rayet’s words, and after a minute or so of whispering amongst themselves, finally the boy got to his feet, face very solemn, and explained to Inaho that fairy ointment would cause blindness in humans.

Rayet gave him an exasperated look. “He knows that already.  Are you going to guide them or not?”

“Count me in!  This place bores me to death,” chimed the girl with the blonde hair, whose glow was such a bright pink that it made her hard to look at.

The other girl seemed less enthusiastic, her tiny brow furrowed in serious thought as she drew circles in the dirt with her finger.  “I don’t think we should go there…” she said at last, so quietly that Inaho nearly didn’t hear it.

The boy seemed as though he was about to agree with her, and so Inaho quickly interjected with an offer.  “If it’s in my power, I’ll give anything you want in exchange.”

“Honey!” they all exclaimed at once, except for Rayet, who looked about ready to hit them all with her stick.  “You lot only think about your stomachs,” she muttered, though the way her eyes studied Inaho’s satchel, she was clearly also hoping that he would give them honey.

Inaho accordingly drew forth a jar of honey, and set it down amongst them.

“So much!” squeaked the purple one, eyes near as big as her head as she pressed her face to the glass and stared in awe at the sticky-sweet substance within. She seemed to have entirely forgotten her former opinion, and now readily agreed to their quest.

 ❋❋❋

 Even though Slaine could hear the fairies’ chatter, it was difficult to follow the sound of their voices.  Like the quiet rustle of trees in the wind, or the babbling of a brook, he could not quite tell where the sounds were coming from when they moved about, leading the way to the home of the princess.  Inaho walked a little ways ahead of him, and often glanced over one shoulder, probably to make sure that he was still there.  Slaine thought again of how little use he had been, nor would be. There was no reason for Inaho to bring him along now that he’d found fairy guides.  Inaho must know at this point that he was only being used, by someone who would put any opportunity to his advantage to achieve his own ends. Slaine could rationalize it all he wanted, that Inaho was the one who had asked for magic, that it had been his choice, that the self-serving results were only coincidental.  He wondered why he felt badly at all, because Asseylum and her sister were the only ones he ought to care about.  They were his mission, anything that fell in his path towards making amends with Lemrina, towards making Asseylum happy and bringing her last remaining family member home safely, was unimportant.  The guilt only grew.  It pooled and twisted in his stomach as he noticed Inaho look over his right shoulder, rather than the left as before.

After an hour or so of walking this way, Inaho came to a halt on the path ahead.  Slaine paused, as well, his heart beating fast as Inaho turned to face him.

“Is something wrong?  We can rest, if you’re tired.”

Slaine thought he ought to be the one asking that question.  Something was definitely wrong.  This was all wrong.  “No.  Nothing…” his gaze dropped to the ground.  “I’m sorry.”

“You haven’t done anything to apologize for.”  Inaho turned to continue on, and added over his shoulder, “don’t walk so far behind, it’s too dark.  It’ll waste time if we get separated.”

It would be a waste of time to search for him out here, that was certain.  

 ❋❋❋

 The sun had long set by the time they reached the part of the mountain where she lived.

“This place gives me chills…” whispered one of the fairies, and Slaine had to agree. They were looking down into the yawning mouth of a cave, which beyond the first few steps, lit by the pale moonlight, gave no hints as to where to put one’s foot and proceed.  In the pitch blackness, he thought he might have caught the very pale glow of the fairies, but then it could just as easily have been his eyes playing tricks on him.

Even though he focused intently on placing each foot carefully as he clambered down after Inaho, there was apparently still much he had to learn about what would and would not bear the weight of a full sized human.  A root that felt secure when he grabbed hold of it, suddenly came loose the moment he tried to steady himself with it, and with a startled yell he went flailing backwards, snatching at thin air as he tried to right himself for the landing.  If the ground had been much further away, the fall might have been serious for both of them, but thankfully this cavern did not seem very deep after all.  It might actually have only been a hole in the hillside. He lay still for a moment to catch his breath and steady his shaking limbs.

“Are… are they alive?” came a small voice above him, and in the stillness of the cave he could now make out the faint flutter of their wings, like the whisper of petals in the breeze.

“They’re fine,” replied Rayet, who had for some reason come along after all, despite her adamant rejection of playing guide. “Humans aren’t that fragile.”

Slaine was just about to affirm their safety when he heard a shaky exhale beneath him.

“Please... get away from me…” Instead of harsh, the words were tremulous and barely audible.  That was when Slaine remembered that the impact with the ground was the least of their worries, and that their faces, the only parts of them not covered and bundled, were close enough to feel the other’s breath.  A little to the left and he would have died just then.

Slaine hastily scrambled to his feet.  He expected Inaho to follow, but there were no sounds of movement, only the nervous whispers of the fairies.  It was several minutes before he stood up, and they continued on their way in silence.

After that incident, Slaine made an effort to keep his distance, despite Inaho’s conflicting words of only a few hours before.  Somehow, the danger hadn’t felt real until it was quite literally staring him in the face.  Just then, he caught a glimpse of the other side, of the people who had lived alongside Inaho for all these years.  Painful as it must be to him, if what Inaho said was true, that someone had once died by his touch, then the villagers’ hatred was not unjustified, even if the crime was unintentional.  His mere existence was a threat to everyone they held dear.

The moon had never appeared so bright to him as the moment they came out into the open air again.  Even the stars that shimmered in swaths across the sky seemed more brilliant to him than they had even a little while before.  They had walked a great distance over the past several hours, and now that the trees were no longer shrouding the heavenscape above, it dominated their view, making even his human form feel small in comparison.  The ground beneath them sloped sharply down towards a glittering lake, cradled by the mountain like a bowl, and on its even surface grew soft grasses, weighed down here and there with patches of snow.

As unexpected as it was to enter this secluded little corrie, it was not nearly as surprising as the little house that met their eyes, built right into the hillside about halfway down.  He had expected a home of some sort, of course, but this was a human home, made of logs and stones and thatch. Smoke drifted from its chimney, and light glowed from its windows, just like Inaho’s home back at the village.

Inaho paused to thank the fairies, and tie up the honey in a cloth that would be easier for them to carry.  It still seemed like a great weight for them to lug back across the mountain, but he supposed they’d wind up stopping along the way to eat most of it anyway.  It was an odd sort of luck, their meeting such willing fairies, though he was beginning to wonder if Inaho had brought that honey along for just such a purpose.  He had never taken it out for them to eat during any of their meals, yet there it was, the perfect persuasion at the opportune moment.  Not that he wouldn’t have taken such a bribe himself, or wasn’t, in a sense, doing that very thing now, since after all he was still depending on Inaho for his basic sustenance.  Cunning was added to dangerous in his mind as he watched his travel companion start down the path towards the house.

   It had been many, many years since Inaho had last come so close to another person. Close enough that he could almost feel the warmth of a body not his own.  In that moment, he could hardly keep himself from reaching out and pulling Slaine closer, to feel the touch that he so feared and craved.

Slaine had gotten unusually distant since then, in a different, more cautious way than before, and Inaho could only assume that the boy had been shaken enough by such a close call to now look at him with a proper perspective.  While it meant he had less reason to worry about any more future accidents, Slaine’s former carelessness around him was something he hadn’t expected to miss.  It had been sort of nice, while it lasted.

Inaho shelved the matter as he shifted his attention to the unexpected view now before them.  Did the fairy live with a human?  Had these fairies led them astray, after all?  He inquired whether they were sure, and all of them confirmed it.

“I suppose she prefers this form, after all…” Slaine said half to himself as they approached the door, and Inaho was not quite sure what he meant by it.

“Are you sure you want to meet her?” he asked, hand raised to knock, “She might only curse you, too.”

Slaine’s gaze shifted away.  He seemed nervous, but muttered “I have to” nevertheless. It was a while before anyone came to the door, and Inaho feared no one was at home, despite the obvious signs of habitation.  He rapped again periodically in case - maybe she was asleep, or in the cellar, or was occupied with something.  Eventually, the door did open, and a girl appeared.  Immediately he assessed that she did not look like the fairy he had met in the forest all those years ago.  Rather than round and sapphire blue, her angled, dark-lashed eyes were almost perfect replicas of Slaine’s.  Even her hair, the color a perfect match, fell in the same soft layers, moved in the same light, airy way, though it reached to her shoulders where Slaine’s was cropped more closely to frame his face.

“Hm,” she regarded each of them in turn, and then smiled impishly, “The persecuted boy and the changeling prince… I expected you two might find this place eventually, but I never imagined you’d turn up together.”

She turned away from the door, leaving it open for them to enter, and paced across the smooth wood floor to a chair by the fire.  Inaho noted a slight limp in her step, and wondered whether it was chronic or a recent injury.  He filed the thought away as he stepped into the house, surveying the room at a glance. Only now that he was in the light did he notice the full extent of what had been slowly changing in his left eye during the night’s journey.  He was still able to see with it, but only light and shadow shifting in colors and shapes. It was almost more effective to simply close it and rely on his right.

Once she had settled comfortably, and pulled her knitting basket into her lap, she looked up at them and gestured to the sofa.  Inaho looked at it for a moment before sitting down.  He’d never actually seen such a nice piece of furniture, let alone sat on one with dirty clothes, though Slaine seemed so accustomed to his own cluelessness in the area of human conventions that one more oddity made no difference to him, and he plopped onto the upholstered seat without a second thought.  He was probably exhausted.  Inaho sat gingerly at the far end of the sofa.

The girl picked up her knitting needles, and coiled the yarn around her fingers. “You don’t seem surprised one bit by my appearance, Slaine.  Although, I suppose you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t already know the truth.”

Slaine frowned, staring hard at the floor and twisting the edge of his scarf between his fingers.  “Why do you live as a human?” he asked at last.

She tilted her head, letting her hands fall idle in her lap.  “Why do you live as a fairy?  It was what was decided for us.  A beautiful human boy to marry the beautiful fairy princess.  A perfect match.  They had no need for a defective, extra princess like me; one who was born flightless and sickly.  Did you enjoy a carefree life, while I learned the truth of myself, alone, neglected, and at last orphaned by the parents that were never mine?” She laughed bitterly. “Luck is a terrible thing... whether human or fairy, you can see people’s fates written plainly in their eyes.”  Her gaze shifted to Inaho as she spoke the last bit, and he was certain now that this was the pearl-haired fairy in human form.  He would never have guessed that she was a changeling girl, whom he might have met in this form in the past and never knew. She picked up her yarn again. “So, what is it?  What have you come to demand of me?”

Inaho did not let the opportunity slip by and promptly made his request.  “Please lift the curse you placed on me ten years ago.”

Her eyes narrowed a fraction and she purled an entire row before speaking.  “That was no curse.”

“Was it an accident, then?” inquired Slaine, for some reason getting involved. He had stopped staring holes into the floor and was now looking straight at her.

“It was intentional.  I saw a child in danger, and I protected it.  That is all.”

“You don’t seem very fond of people.  Why would you protect him?”

She shrugged one shoulder.  “A whim, I suppose.  Or perhaps it was revenge on the girls and boys who also found joy in tormenting the one other child that was not like them.  Do you remember me, Inaho?  I remember you.”

The girl with the blue-green eyes.  He only remembered seeing her once, but perhaps he had been too caught up in his own misery to notice her, if she had truly been there the whole time.  Whether revenge or protection, he could not resent her answer.  And if not for the catastrophic effect the spell had had on his own life, he might even have been understanding.  In the end, nothing would ever have been worth Yuki’s life.  It was never worth his mother’s.  And now, more than ever, he was realizing that if he remained this way any longer, he would never be able to stay near someone like Slaine, regardless of whether or not he was accepted.  The closer he came to anyone, the more urgent it would be that he put distance between them again.  It was too dangerous.

“If whatever purpose you had then is now fulfilled,” he said, “please undo the spell.”

The fire crackled noisily on the hearth, accompanied by the quiet clack and scrape of her needles.  Not a word passed between them.  Slaine appeared lost in thought, his eyes downcast and uncertain.

“And what about you, Slaine?”  The sudden sound of her voice drew both of the boys’ gazes back to her. “Why have you come here, after all these years?”

Slaine pressed his lips together, and did not look away this time.  “I’ve come to bring you home.”

 ❋❋❋

 Slaine had known that she would likely not be willing to return to the place that had once rejected her, but he had hoped she would, nonetheless.  The mocking smile that curled at her lips as she carefully tied two strands of yarn together was a confirmation of her disinterest.

“Home, you say?  This is my home.”

“Your sister, Princess Asseylum, wishes above all else to see you and-”

“It’s too late to make amends now.  If she wished to see me, she would have come herself.”

Slaine shook his head.  “I am the one that convinced her not to come, because I was afraid the journey would be too much for her.  She’s been very anxious ever since discovering that you were given away as a baby, and that no one had ever told her of your existence until she found out by mistake.  I assure you that she wants nothing more than to meet you now that she’s learned the truth. You are her one and only sister, after all.”

Lemrina pursed her lips and gave a small huff, though the look in her eyes confirmed that Slaine’s words came as a surprise to her.  “What sort of story did they tell her, I wonder…” she muttered, dropping her gaze.

“The same as they told me.  I was mercifully rescued from abandonment, and taken in by the fairies as one of their own.  And you… you never existed.”

No one said anything more for a while, and Slaine was beginning to think she would toss them out after all, given the displeased look she was giving her yarn. But then she gave a heavy sigh and said, “How about a compromise?  I will either remove the spell from Inaho, and Slaine will remain here with me, or I will return to the Glade, and the spell remains.  Slaine, you will decide.”

Slaine felt his stomach twist at those words.  A quick glance at Inaho did not help matters, as the boy was looking expectantly back at him, expression unreadable.

“Take your time and think about it,” said Lemrina, standing up and putting away her knitting.  Then she opened a door at the far end of the room and disappeared through it, returning a few minutes later with a wand.  It was not like the ones from the Glade, all silvery and forged of the purest silver and crystal, but rather made of wood, as though someone had whittled it until it was smooth and fit in one’s hand comfortably.  She moved some things aside to clear a space before the fire, and then with a soft intake of breath, she lifted her wand, eyes closed, and produced a feather mattress and warm blankets with a few whispered words.

“Even I would hardly put you out on a night like this,” she defended, when Slaine gave her a skeptical look. “It’ll rain soon, and there’s not many hours left till dawn, anyway.  You ought to sleep.”

 ❋❋❋

 When she had left the room, Slaine turned to offer the bed to Inaho, perhaps as some form of apology for this situation, but the words never left his mouth.  With Lemrina’s departure, Inaho had wilted, and suddenly looked very distressed.  Slaine’s lips pressed in a line, and he was afraid that if he spoke he would only do further damage, or worse, meet with a glare filled with a decade’s worth of repressed resentment, which had now found another worthy target.  He stood and glanced around the room for a suitable place to lay down.  The sofa was the most comfortable looking option, especially since it was reasonably close to the fire, but lying down on it would require asking Inaho move, which he was in no way prepared to do.  He would simply have to wait for Inaho to speak, or move, or do something other than sit in dismal silence.

Slaine was just turning to sit down again, when suddenly Inaho stood and began removing thick layers of outer clothing.  It was getting a little stuffy, since they were still bundled from their trek, but Slaine still felt a lurch of panic as his mind connected ‘pent up resentment’ with what Inaho was actually capable of doing to him if he so chose.  And then he realized that Lemrina had not actually given him the decision at all.

He had already concluded earlier that Inaho would do anything to regain his normalcy… would he?  Do anything…?  Perhaps his distress was due to the anticipation of having to kill one more time.  One last victim, a sacrifice to free himself and protect the one person he truly cared about.

Slaine took a step back as Inaho pulled off his gloves, stumbling over the curved leg of the sofa and falling to the floor.  Inaho’s eyes followed him, but he did not move from where he stood neatly folding his cloak.  Rather than bitterness, the look Slaine was met with was disillusionment.

“You’re afraid of me now, after all…” Inaho said quietly, crestfallen, as though he had just confirmed a growing suspicion. “I suppose you have no reason to believe me, but I won’t do anything.  You were the one tasked with deciding, so you should choose what’s best for you.”

“B-but… you…” Slaine fumbled, ashamed of himself for allowing fear to cloud his judgement, when Inaho had never been anything but generous to him.  The terror of a moment before had vanished, and now more than ever he felt terrible about all of this, about the ointment, about everything that had happened since meeting Inaho in the woods yesterday. Did everything work in his favor because of luck, as Lemrina said, or was it because he was selfish, and Inaho was not?  He had never wanted for anything, never had any real problems until a week ago, and even now everything settled conveniently into place for him.  He had also never disappointed, or abandoned, or betrayed Asseylum.  The idea of doing all three at once was terrifying.

Inaho seemed to notice the dread and doubt welling up in him, and offered an encouraging smile.  “I have no intention of giving up.  I have connections now… if it’s not too much trouble, would you mention my wish to Princess Asseylum?  Perhaps she can help me, instead.”

“But…” Slaine wasn’t so sure, given that the method by which spells were removed was often closely linked to how they were initially cast, and so Lemrina might actually be the only fairy with the knowledge to undo it.  If anyone else was skilled enough to succeed, it was Asseylum, but that was still a risky assumption.

“I’ve been living like this for most of my life,” reasoned Inaho, “I’ll be fine a while longer.  You’ve never lived outside the Glade, would you really be alright living in the middle of nowhere, with only a stranger who trapped you into staying here for a companion?”

Slaine got to his feet again and began taking off his own winter clothes as the warmth from the fire in the small room began to make him sweat.  “I’m sure she’s just lonely…” he said, and truly believed it.

Inaho shook his head.  “If that was all, she would go with you without conditions.  She’s only toying with us.”

“Perhaps, but that’s only because of how she’s been forced to live all this time.” He wasn’t sure that he should be defending her, since Inaho was likely correct, but she was still Asseylum’s sister. He couldn’t just assume the worst about her.

“You think too well of people,” warned Inaho as he set his shoes by the door, the last of his outer clothing, “that’s dangerous.”

“And you doubt them too easily.”

“When people are afraid of you, you see their true nature more often.  But I suppose you’ve had more experience with people in general than I have.”

Slaine laughed bitterly and sat down on the sofa again.  “I’m sure I have, but I’ve started to wonder recently whether the love and kindness I received from everyone at the Glade was simply a facade for their fear of my position as the future royal consort.  I should be less trusting after learning just how extensively I’ve been lied to all my life, but it’s not as easy as I thought it would be.”

Inaho sat as well, looking pensive.  “I see. In the end, you weren’t actually all that lucky.”

“No, I was. I won’t pretend that my life wasn’t perfect in nearly every way.  This changes little, fundamentally, but it does hurt.  I probably deserve it, for what became of Lemrina because of me.”

“Don’t you think it could be the other way around?  Are you sure that if you were in your proper homes, with your own parents, you both wouldn’t have had a good life?  It’s when others tamper with the way things ought to be that people become lucky or unlucky.  Before that, life is simply the choices we make.”

Slaine wasn’t sure he entirely believed that.  Sure, choices played a role, but there was chance involved, too.  “It sounds like you had it pretty bad before this spell, though,” he pointed out, “Are you saying that was your fault?”

“It was. I could have spoken up about it, but I didn’t.  In the end, my attempt to spare my mother’s feelings was precisely what shattered them. My silence killed her.”

Slaine frowned, drawing his knees up to his chest.  So, his mother...   “You’re awfully hard on yourself.  Besides, if your life was fine, you wouldn’t have been targeted in the first place. Obviously there were things beyond your control even back then.”

“... maybe.”

Silence settled between them, and Slaine glanced at the mattress.  They should probably sleep.  They had been awake since dawn, nearly an entire day, and he was beginning to really feel it.  Inaho had been yawning for the past half hour, as well.

“I’ll sleep on the sofa,” he announced, taking one of the blankets from the bed and pulling it over him before Inaho could object.  “You’ve never slept in one before, right?” he added with a smirk. He had noted that Inaho’s home only had straw mattresses, and figured feather was probably too expensive for a commoner to own.  At home, Slaine slept on a dandelion down mattress, which was probably more comfortable than anything in the human world anyway, but he wasn’t about to mention that. In any case, the single mattress seemed to confirm Inaho’s theory that Lemrina was, in fact, toying with them. It was actually large enough for two, but she knew perfectly well that they couldn’t share it.

Slaine closed his eyes.  The sound of the fire on the hearth, and the steady rain that had begun to fall outside, lulled him softly to sleep.

“Thank you,” he heard just as he was drifting off.

Slaine shook his head, opening his eyes.  “There’s no need. Anything I’ve done was for my own benefit, too.  I should be thanking you...”

The rain poured down harder, making him even more grateful for the roof over their heads and the warm fire close by.  Inaho looked exceptionally comfortable in the fluffy bed, with the blanket pulled up to his chin.

“You considered my wish in earnest,” he said, catching Slaine’s gaze and smiling warmly, “You could have given her an answer immediately, but you didn’t. You’re very kind to me.  Thank you.”

 ❋❋❋

 Inaho sighed contentedly.  The bed was very comfortable, and he was sure he must have been sleeping in it for far too long, but the dreamless slumber he’d been blessed with until gently waking just now was the best he’d had in years.  The fire had not reduced to embers, as he would have expected, but rather continued tirelessly burning on the hearth.  He rolled to his opposite side to get a better estimate of the time of day, and also to see whether Slaine had awoken already.  A bit of dread hit him as he recalled the discussion of the night before, and the implications it held for him, and more importantly Yuki.

He blinked lazily, taking in that it was still daytime, as far as he could tell, though it was difficult to discern much more with the shutters closed.  The primary object of his attention was the deterioration that had completed in his left eye.  He reached up on reflex to touch it, perhaps an instinct to make sure it was still there, though he already understood what had happened.  He had done it to himself willingly.  Now he wondered for what.  In the end, he had still failed.

The soft thud of footsteps approached from somewhere behind him and before he could inquire who it was or what time of day he had slept to, Slaine was crouching in front of him, a cheerful glow in his eyes.

“Good afternoon,” he greeted with a smile, “did you rest well?”

Inaho nodded his head suspiciously.  Something was off, though nothing seemed particularly wrong, especially given the excitement Slaine was now exuding.  Inaho sank further under the blanket, pulse racing every time Slaine teetered towards him on the dubious balance of his toes.  He did not want to ask what made Slaine so happy, because despite everything he had said, giving up his own request was possibly the hardest thing he’d ever done.  Seeing Slaine’s vibrant eyes so exuberant was both painful and reassuring.

“Inaho?” Slaine leaned closer and peered at him with concern, “do you feel alright?”

He wasn’t entirely sure why he should not be feeling alright, but he nodded in answer and attempted to avert his gaze.  Physically, he was very comfortable, but in everything else he was far from it.  Slaine’s head angled to get a better view of him, following his eyes like a curious bird, and Inaho had never wanted so badly to touch someone.

“You’d best let him be for a while,” said Lemrina, though he had not seen or heard her enter the room.  Perhaps she had approached from his blind side; it would be awhile before his other senses bridged the gap.  “Slaine, I’m sure you’re acquainted with the physical effects of removing a spell that has been in place for so long.  He’ll need some time to rest.”

Inaho blinked at her.  Removing a spell?  From whom? He looked up at Slaine again, and this time noticed the fairy perched on his shoulder.  Her soft, pearly hair curved around her face in exactly the way he remembered it, while two tiny, jewel-like eyes watched him with guarded interest.  His hand flew automatically to his right eye, though there was no way he could have detected whether there was ointment in it or not.

“I haven’t done anything to your eyes,” assured Lemrina, “this home is a magical space.”

Inaho closed his eyes to think.  Had she really removed the curse?  If so, then that meant Slaine had chosen his request after all.  It crossed his mind that it could all just be a terrible joke, like those pranks the children used to play on him, where they would pretend to be kind to him and then laugh in his face when he foolishly believed it, but he couldn’t bear to think that Slaine was capable of something so cruel.

“Why did you do it?” he asked, voice muffled by the blanket.

The floorboards creaked as Slaine settled on them, sitting down more comfortably.

“I couldn’t leave you that way.  It’s okay, though… when I gave her my answer… well, you were right.  She was toying with us, just not in the way that we thought.”

“Testing.  It was the quickest way to determine what sort of people you really are,” Lemrina defended, “I have no interest in helping those who only care about themselves.”

“You’ll be going with Slaine to the Glade, then?” asked Inaho.

Lemrina coughed a little and looked away.  “I suppose…” she answered vaguely, and then quickly added, “but if I don’t like it, I’m returning home.”

 ❋❋❋

 It had been several hours since Inaho awoke, and still he said nothing. Lemrina had decided that they would depart for the Glade in two days time, though Inaho was of course welcome to return home whenever he pleased.  Slaine was hesitant to let him make the trek back to the village on his own, but in the end it was up to Inaho to decide.  In any case, Inaho did not seem to be in any hurry to go anywhere, and kept mostly to himself in a chair by the fire.  Only when suppertime arrived did he stir from his aloof state and offer to help with meal preparations.  Lemrina was not particularly talkative, either, but he found she was far more pleasant company than he would have imagined given her reputation.  It made him happy to know that this was Asseylum’s sister, and that the two would be reunited very soon.

When it was time for bed again, and Lemrina retired to her bedroom, Slaine finally mustered the courage to ask Inaho if something was wrong.  Lemrina did say that he might feel listless for a day or so as his body readjusted to its freedom from the spell, but it didn’t seem like that was the issue.

“I’m afraid to believe it,” answered Inaho with unexpected directness. “If she’s lying-”

“Then there would have been no point in your going to such lengths to ask it of her. You have to trust, Inaho.”

Inaho stared vacantly at the fire, his thumbs slowly circling each other in his lap. “It’s dangerous…” he murmured.

Slaine sighed.  “I know.”

If Inaho was too afraid to confirm the truth, then Slaine knew he would simply have to confirm it instead, and began looking for the right time to do so.  It would be a bad idea to frighten him by being too overt.

“I’ll sleep on the sofa tonight,” Inaho announced, and then waited for Slaine to move off of the furniture so that he could lie down on it.

Slaine did not budge.  “There’s no reason to switch, I’m perfectly comfortable where I am.”

It took some more convincing, but eventually Inaho did lie down on the mattress and closed his eyes.  Slaine waited until he was asleep before tiptoeing from the sofa to the mattress, and crawling carefully inside.  Inaho stirred slightly, but did not wake.  Now that he was so close, suddenly Slaine began to doubt Lemrina, as well.  He was almost positive that she should have no reason to deceive them, but that small part of uncertainty kept him neatly on his side of the bed for a long time.  Eventually, wrapped in warmth and soothed by the crackling fire and the soft breathing just beside him, he drifted off to sleep without ever verifying her words.

 ❋❋❋

 “Slaine?! Slaine!”  The frantic repetition of his name roused Slaine from sleep, and he blinked confusedly at the person calling it.  It was still dark, and the fire cast flickering shadows all over the room.

“Hm? Inaho?” he yawned, wondering why he was being woken in the middle of the night.

Inaho collapsed back onto the mattress and buried his face in blankets.  “You’re... alive…” he murmured.  “Why… why did you…”

So much for not scaring him.  The plan seemed to have backfired somewhat, but at least they now knew that Lemrina had not lied.  Or at least he assumed they did, because he must have been asleep during any contact between them.  Just to be doubly sure, and seizing a brief moment of fortitude, he reached out a finger and poked Inaho’s forehead, which was the only visible part of him.  Inaho pulled back and ducked under the blankets entirely.

“Inaho~” Slaine called softly.  He peeked under the blanket to be sure Inaho was alright, but it was too dark to see anything.  “I’m fine, see?  I’m talking to you, so I’m fine.  You’re really free of it.”

Inaho said nothing, and after a few minutes had passed Slaine thought he might have fallen asleep again.  That, or he was still reeling in shock.  But then he heard the gentle rustle of fabric and felt the blankets move just a little, and a warm hand tentatively touch his arm.  He shifted a bit just to assure Inaho that he was still breathing.

Slowly, fingers curled over his arm and rested there, and he heard Inaho sigh softly. “You’re too reckless…”  A pink face emerged from under the blankets and looked at him with something between relief and disapproval.

“Maybe,” Slaine admitted, “but if I didn’t do something you’d have continued living year after year under a curse that no longer exists.”  To him, and to most others, touch was something that occurred naturally on a daily basis - a helping hand extended, the embrace of a friend, the brush of arms while sitting side by side, an affectionate pat on the head. He could not fathom being so utterly starved as Inaho had been for the past ten years.  Continuing on that way out of fear would have been a tragedy.  “Besides,” he added, “better me than your sister.”

“No,” Inaho countered immediately, shaking his head, “you’re important to me, too.”

Slaine wasn’t sure whether to humor him or laugh and deny it.  “You’ve only known me for two days,” he pointed out instead.

“Why does that matter?”

Slaine opened his mouth to reply that two days wasn’t nearly enough time to consider someone as important as family, especially when one had such a cynical view of people in general, but the complete sincerity in Inaho’s eyes as he inquired why that wasn’t enough time made Slaine begin to second guess himself.  Maybe the truth was that he didn’t want any ties with someone he was preparing to part ways with, in all likelihood never to see again.  But now he realized it was too late for that.  He would never forget Inaho, the selfless boy who had looked out for him, the one who had been prepared to give up his most precious wish so that he could be happy.  Slaine inched further under the blanket, feeling the soft warmth of an arm link through his, and mumbled, “You’re the one who’s kind.”

   A pleasant breeze brought the aroma of honeysuckle and trumpet flowers in from the lattice outside the open window, carrying with it the sounds of spring. Inside the cottage, the warm scent of bread wafted up from the oven as Inaho reached in to remove the fresh, steaming loaf.  In some ways, everything had changed since that day.  In others, nothing had changed at all.  Inaho found himself living a life much the same as he always had, milling industriously about the house and garden, and keeping away from the villagers who would never believe the miracle that Slaine had given him.  Yet for what it was worth, though the loneliness crept deeper than it ever had before, and the days seemed emptier somehow, he no longer felt the gnawing dread and anxiety that had governed his life for so many years.  He knew the truth, if they didn’t.  And most importantly, Yuki was safe.  The glow in her amber eyes, every smile and embrace she had given him since his return, was worth the paltry loss of half his sight.  He wished it wasn’t also the gain and loss of the only friend he’d ever had.

Nothing could ever quite compare to the quiet, uneventful comfort of home, but ever since they parted ways, Inaho found himself wondering what had become of Slaine during all these months.  He supposed the two Princesses had been reunited, hopefully with success.  If Slaine was meant to wed Princess Asseylum, he could be preparing for his marriage by now.  He wasn’t sure at what age fairies were considered fit to wed, but his guess was that Asseylum must be a few years his senior, if Lemrina was his equal, and she might be eager to proceed with the union the moment Slaine came of age.  It all sounded very nice, having family and new family come together happily at last.

He was looking out of the window at the budding trees, which swayed gently against the backdrop of a cloudless sky, birds twittering busily amongst their branches, when a knock at the door roused him from his thoughts.  He stood up to answer it, and the moment he reached the door, his attention was called back to the window.

“Is that bread?!” said Slaine, peering in.  His eyes were fixed on the loaf and he looked fully prepared to climb right through the window to take it.

“It’s very hot,” Inaho quickly warned as Slaine actually did hoist himself through the open frame and trotted right over to the table.  In his concern for the safety of Slaine’s mouth, he forgot to be surprised by the sudden appearance of someone he thought he’d never see again. Eventually gathering his thoughts while Slaine seated himself in a chair, he asked the obvious: “What are you doing here?”

Slaine looked up at him, and then sheepishly twisted a strand of hair between his fingers.  “Er… I’m actually… I’d like to… I’ve… I’ve come to live with humans,” he finally said it, and then looked away quickly. “Would it be okay if I… stayed here for a little while… just until I find someplace to live…?”

“There’s no need to look elsewhere.  You already have a place to live.”  The words slipped out of his mouth before he’d really thought about them, but he didn’t regret it.

Slaine seemed confused by his answer and tilted his head.  “I’m not sure what you-”

“Stay here. Stay with me.”

Teal eyes blinked at him in surprise.  “A-are you… sure?  But there’s no room for me…”

“I’ll make room.”

Slaine stared at him for a long time before his expression slowly softened.  He smiled, a faint blush at his cheeks. “What if I don’t want to stay with you-”

“Then why did you come back?”  Why else would Slaine leave his royal life behind to come live amongst humans he didn’t know?  What could be the reason except that Slaine had wanted to see him again?

Slaine gnawed at his bottom lip as he turned away, an agitated look in his eyes. Without a word, he stood and paced across the kitchen to the adjoining bedroom, peering in critically and leaning heavily on the doorframe.  His soft, pale arms rested crossed against the thin fabric of his shirt, catching the afternoon light.

Inaho moved as though under some new spell, his mind tangled in a daydream.  He was standing beside Slaine now, he wanted to reach out, but his body would move no further, hands stubbornly drawn in to his sides.  A habit, a fear he still could not ignore.

“I suppose…” Slaine said suddenly, slowly, still looking away, and Inaho felt a warm hand slip into his.  Fingers laced lazily, palm against palm.  “I suppose I came because I wanted to choose my own life.  I wanted to live where you are.”

Inaho smiled, and drew their hands up, pressing the back of Slaine's to his cheek. “Then it's fine.”  He reached out his other hand to touch Slaine's face; warm, unfamiliar, no longer forbidden.  There were no more reasons to keep away.  His hand dropped to Slaines chest, searching for the gentle thrum of his heart, and he curled into him quietly.  Slaine's arms came up around him, and slowly, seeping into him, settling warm and comfortable like sunshine on his skin, a feeling took the place of the loneliness that had carved itself in him so deeply.  He sighed contentedly.  “We can start over together.”

   Fin

 ｡.:*☆☆*:.｡  

 Author’s Note

 Thank you for taking the time to read this story - I hope it was enjoyable!  I’m not very good with short stories, so it was a struggle from start to finish, and there’s a good bit I would’ve liked to develop more thoroughly (their cultural differences, Slaine’s life, the Areash family’s involvement, etc etc).  Originally I had something different in mind for the direction of the plot (a lighter story overall, if “hellish” would have allowed), but it sort of took off on its own, and there really is nothing for it when Inaho decides to angst it up. Luckily(?) for Slaine, that wound up giving him a pretty enviable fake life by contrast. :’D

 I’d like to thank Ryoku for her encouragement in this and all my writing endeavors, and for taking pity on me and helping me hash out some kind of workable idea for this after my months of floundering between a dozen other potential AUs.  And many thanks to Astor, as well, for sticking around and supporting me throughout all my daily, incessant whining and despairing, even when I ignored the very sound advice to withdraw if it was getting to be too stressful.  I’m very glad to have been able to complete a piece in time, and I’d never have been able to do it without them.

 A final thanks to Rosiel for her tireless dedication to this project and support of all the writers & artists involved.  Even long before the Orangebat games, she has always been one of the kindest, most faithful readers and commenters on all of my fics, for which I am incredibly grateful. ♡

 icinks

#ALDNOAH ZERO #az anthology #icinks #inasureanthology #inaho kaizuka #slaine troyard #inaho x slaine #orangebat #floret #fairy #AZ #azfanbook #fantasy

[cookingawe]

Quarantine Sourdough Experience (first time making sourdough bread)

New Post has been published on https://cookingawe.com/quarantine-sourdough-experience-first-time-making-sourdough-bread/

Quarantine Sourdough Experience (first time making sourdough bread)

Quarantine Sourdough Experience (first time making sourdough bread)

Submitted by kaylakebab on May 19, 2020 – 6:47pm.

So, I have made a sourdough starter, like everyone else this quarantine, to keep me occupied and learn something new. I have been keeping a journal in a notebook to record recipes and changes I make, but since I started this account I thought it would be fun to document it here as well, for anyone else feeling a little intimidated by their first starter and just for me to look back on.

Day 1: The starter is born! (31 Mar 2020) 1 cup white flour (all the store had) and 1 cup water, mixed in a jar covered with cloth and left on the counter. 

Day 2-7: Growing and developing yeast (1-6 Apr) Added 1/2 cup water and flour each day, switched to whole wheat on day 3 (I know you are not supposed to do that, but it turned out fine haha). Started discarding all starter but 1 cup and fed. It started smelling like fresh bread around day 6ish, which meant it was making yeast! It would be very bubbly in between feedings. 

Day 8: The first mistake (7 Apr) Since my starter was bubbly and active and ready to use, I made some onion bread using a recipe from a bread machine cookbook. At this point I didn’t realize sourdough breads rise for anywhere between 4-12 hours, I was just looking for a way to make my own yeast since the stores were all out. So I let this bread rise for just 90 minutes and gave up and baked it anyway rather than throwing it out. Also, there may not have been as much yeast as I thought in the starter. 

Day 9: Fed

Day 10: The first actual sourdough loaf!! (9 Apr) I used this half-batch recipe I wrote down from a combo of King Arthur Flour and a few other blogsites:

1. 1 cu starter, 1/2 whole wheat, and 1 cu water in a bowl, let sit 10 min 2. Add 2/3 tsp salt, then 1 1/2 cu whole wheat one half cup at a time, mixing in between  3. Once mixed, let sit 10 min, then knead for 5, sit for 10, knead and sit until passes windowpane test 4. Fill loaf pan with dough 1/3 way up, rise 4-12 hours (until doubled and domed) 5. Place in cold oven, turn on to 350, bake 50-60 minutes (until it sounds hollow)

I fed the starter the morning I baked it then put it in a warm spot until lunchtime, and it got nice and frothy. The bread came out ok, it was very dense and stopped rising after only maybe rising 1/3 of the way (5.5 hours). At least the flavor was good, slightly less sour because of the young starter. I do think it looked pretty though!

Day ?: Sourdough #2  After the first sourdough, I kept the starter on the counter and fed it, then I ended up refrigerating it while I was busy with classes, for about two weeks. I did take it out and feed it every few days, just to make sure the yeast wouldn’t starve and to develop it a little more before I used it again. I kept the cloth cover on it the whole time, and had to switch to white flour again, oops. The second sourdough came out much better than the first. this time, I made sure the starter was fully active and doubled before using, and used a little more flour (1/2 cu) than the recipe called for (I used all white flour). I also kneaded it much more, and baked it in a dutch oven rather than a loaf pan. I rose it in my “proofing box” I made with a space heater under my desk and a blanket, which kept the space a nice 80 degrees. It rose much better, but the inside was still dense and it didn’t form a nice heavy crust or make as many bubbles. It still was edible enough, and was eaten by my family within the week. 

Sourdough #3: Again I took another break from bread, and came back to my starter after semi-abandoning it in the fridge. It seemed okay, and after two days to recover it was ready to be used again. I followed the same recipe (white flour again), but proofed it in the proofing cave for almost 10 hours, then baked. The crust was chewy and light, the crumb not quite to traditional sourdough but almost, and the sourness of the starter was really coming through (eau de refrigerator). By far the best attempt. I really wish I had pictures, because with the white flour and the dutch oven I use, the loaf really comes out looking like a cheese wheel. (Also, getting it to dome is a problem I’ve been having, but my dutch oven doesn’t have a round bottom like others). 

Sourdough #4:  Pretty much a repeat of #3, but cheated with a little yeast to see if I could get it to dome. I am having trouble making a nice crust, but the crumb is improving and so are my kneading skills and ability to gauge how much rising/kneading it needs. 

Whew! For the future, I am definitely using a pot/dutch oven thing that the loaf doesn’t get stuck in because of the lip. Also, switching back to whole wheat as soon as the store has some. Would like to try nuts, raisins, or honey/molasses in the dough as well. I also have found that putting some olive oil on the kneading surface keeps it from sticking but also from getting too thick from adding flour to it. 

Here is the most up to date recipe: 1. 1 cu starter, 1/2 flour, and 1 cu warm (100-110 deg) water in a bowl, let sit 10 min 2. Add 2/3 tsp salt, then 2 cu whole wheat one half cup at a time, mixing in between  3. Once mixed, let sit 10 min, then knead on LIGHTLY oiled surface for 5, sit for 10, knead and sit until passes windowpane test but should still be sticky (reason for oil, not flour), but add flour if it won’t hold shape at all 4. Tuck dough into ball and place in floured pan, rise 6-12 hours (until doubled and domed) in 80 degree place 5. Dust with flour, place in cold oven, turn on to 350, bake 50-60 minutes (until it sounds hollow)

[zazzyzoo]

Cookin' with wrestlers! It's the seventh night of Hanukkah, and you know what? I'm excited! I'm a Christian, and I'm stoked for Hanukkah. That's because it's a great excuse to do something a little different in the kitchen, and at the same time, learn a little bit about another religion. Rebecca Rubin has been waiting eagerly to break out a Jewish recipe for you all, and now is the perfect time.

Have you ever heard the term ecumenism? Basically, it's the idea of fostering unity among world faiths -- calling to mind common ground rather than harping on differences. As a Catholic, I learned about ecumenism in religion class at school. I was taught to stay true to my beliefs while building bridges with my non-Catholic neighbors.

If I think in terms of food (and I usually do), I notice that Catholics and Jews both use bread in celebrations and rituals. Bread is a core motif in our Scripture as well. Unleavened bread plays a part in the Hebrew Exodus from Egypt, which Jews commemorate by eating matzah during Passover. Catholics receive consecrated bread (the Eucharist, or Body of Christ) during the celebration of the Mass, following the example Jesus set during the Last Supper. And let's face it, bread is the foundational element of our physical subsistence, whatever our religion or lack thereof.

So today, in the spirit of ecumenism, Jewish and Christian cooks -- Rebecca Rubin and Jay Briscoe -- joined hands and attempted Mini Challah Bread. Yep, a mini challah -- baby steps first! Neither Rebecca nor Jay has used yeast before, so for their first shot at this classic Jewish celebratory bread, they didn't want to risk botching a giant loaf.

Anyone's first time using yeast is a little nerve-racking. What if the dough doesn't rise? How do you know whether the yeast is even active? When is it over-proved, or under-proved? Watch any cooking competition, and you'll see some people's dough do a whole lot of nothing during that crucial stage. Will it work for Jay and Rebecca? Well, er... read on and see. I won't spoil this one ahead of time.

1 & 1/4 tsp active dry yeast

1/4 cup warm water (NOT hot, just pleasantly warm to the touch)

2 tbsp vegetable oil

2 tsp sugar

2 tsp honey

3/4 tsp salt

1 egg

1 & 1/4 cups flour, plus extra for dusting

In a medium bowl, dissolve the yeast in the warm water. Shouldn't it be bubbling to show the yeast is active? Jay looks suspicious. But eh, let's just press on.

Add the oil, sugar, honey, salt, egg, and flour. Blend with a whisk just until all the flour is incorporated.

Turn out the dough onto a floured surface and knead until it's smooth and a little stretchy. When you tug at it, it'll be somewhat elastic, like this:

Lightly oil the bottom and sides of a large bowl and lay the dough in it. Turn it over once to get a sheen of oil on all sides of the dough. Note the size of the dough at this point, relative to Jay; we want it to rise until doubled in bulk.

Cover the bowl with a towel and set it in a warm spot in your house where it can rise (hopefully).

"Doubled in bulk, mah a$$. Dis ain't risin' fer sh*t."

Well, shoot! And that was a brand-new packet of yeast, too! What the heck happened? 2 1/2 hours to rise and it doesn't do squat?? Yeast is a lie!! Oh well, let's just keep going, I guess.

Divide the dough into three pieces. Roll and pull each piece into a strip about 9" long, like so:

Set the dough-strips on a baking sheet lined with greased tinfoil and braid the dough-strips just as you'd braid hair. (There are much more complex challah-braiding techniques; feel free to Google those at your leisure if you feel more ambitious.)

Set the braided loaf aside and cover with the towel. Let it rise until doubled in bulk.

*One hour later*

"WHY AIN'T IT RISIN'?? DA HELL'S WRONG WIT' DIS DOUGH??"

Ugh, whatever. Either the yeast was dead or there's something wrong with the recipe itself. But it's wrong to waste ingredients, so let's keep a-goin'.

Brush the top of the loaf with a thin sheen of vegetable oil and bake at 350°F for about 25 minutes. Keep an eye on it starting at the 15-minute mark. Take it out when the top is a deep golden brown. ________________________________

You know, for a dough that didn't rise, this turned out pretty decent. It puffed up a bit in the oven, and it didn't seem dense or anything. When Rebecca sliced it, it shed fluffy little crumbs just like real bread should. And it tasted good, which is the only part that really matters. Take a look for yourself:

That said, if you're a bread-making expert and you have an idea as to why the dough didn't rise, feel free to share your insight via my ask box.

The method was inspired by the recipe at Taste of Home, but my sous chefs modified some of the proportions and ingredients based on comparisons with similar recipes.

#recipe #rebecca rubin #jewish #challah #jay briscoe #briscoe brothers #kirsten larson #catholic #world religions #holidays #hanukkah #bread #baking #ring of honor #american girl #american girl dolls #beforever #roh

[jipgeven]

10.06.18

Bread is an object constantly in the process of becoming something else - grain to flour, flour to dough, dough to loaf, loaf to crumb. This holds true even for bread’s symbolic existence: while people have historically gathered to ‘break bread together,’ bread has also driven social conflicts, from ‘bread riots’ to its divisive role as an ethnic, religious, and class signifier. 

Some other books that could be really interesting:  - Brother Juniper’s Bread Book; Slow Rise as Method and Metaphor by Peter Reinhart. As well as books about baking bread by the same author. 

In any case, what captivates me most is not so much bread as a product, nor even an idea, but as a process and an experience. 

One might say that bread is both quite difficult to make. On the other hand, simple breads can be made by anyone in an average home kitchen, and with only a modest investment of time and effort will equal or surpass, in nutritional value and eating pleasure, anything you can buy wrapped in plastic at the grocery store. On the other hand, the finest artisanal breads are the product of an extraordinary and intricate craft that one learns only gradually, and perhaps never masters absolutely. For an amateur like myself, to watch a professional baker at work is as humbling as it is enthralling. Yet even the very finest of bakers will sometimes acknowledge that the process of baking is not exactly, or not simply, one of mastery: for one does not so much make bread as work with it. 

In a great many other ways as well, bread - which ‘appears at first sight to be an extremely obvious, trivial thing’ - can be shown to be ‘a very strange thing, abounding in metaphysical subtleties and theological niceties.’ 

For of course it is finally because bread does present itself, quite literall, as the master of so many - the ‘staff of life,’ the ultimate staple commodity, an object marking the very line of survival itself - that bread as either an object or an idea has accumulated such overwhelming symbolic power. This is obviously why the word and image ‘bread’ often signifies value itself, and refers metaphorically either to food in general, or to something like ‘livelihood,’ in expressions such as ‘breadwinner,’ ‘taking the bread out of his mouth,’ and so forth. Similarly, both ‘bread’ and ‘dough’ have been used as slang words for money. And no wonder, because it is precisely in societies like ours, societies radically divided along lines of wealth and poverty, that bread becomes (as Piero Camporesi writes), a ‘polyvalent object on which life, death and dreams depend... the culminating point and instrument, real and symbolic, of existence itself.’ To think of bread at all is therefore necessarily also to dream of what the utopian socialist Peter Kropotkin calls, in the title of his most famous text, The Conquest of Bread: the unappeasable demand for a world in which there is not single man who lacks bread, not a single woman compelled to stand with the wearied crowd outside the bakehouse-door, that haply a coarse loaf may be thrown to her in charity, not a single child pining for want of food. 

Even for those of us who have never known real privation, our individual and collective experience of bread can never be entirely separated from violence and scarcity, from famine and dearth. Yet if bread thus necessarily serves as the very symbol, figure, or instance of the ‘iron law’ of economy (what Marx calls the realm of Necessity), by the same token it also figures the realm of Freedom. The medieval peasants in France known as the Jacquerie revolted against their masters with the slogan le pain se love - the bread rises. As Kropotkin writes, all ‘utopian dreamers,’ first and last, ‘shall have to consider the question of daily bread.’ 

Bogost suggests that the figure of the ‘alien’ should not apply merely to the literal extraterrestrial or ‘space-alien’ - nor even, as one might venture to add, to the noncitizen, the migrant or ‘illegal alien.’  - Which people fall outside of the system of ‘our daily bread’? Homeless people, (refused) refugees, people with an gluqenallergy. How can I use this as a metaphor/system? How can you express this practically? 

(Or perhaps, much more simply and personally, I just cannot force myself to think in terms of ‘withdrawal’ with regard to objects such as flour, yeast, dough, and bread - things that literally coexist with me, things that have filled my hand, my mouth, my time and my space, things that metabolize for me even as I later metabolize them, things I have digested in every possible sense of the word. 

This time, I have in mind a simple fact about the making of many kinds of bread whose radical strangeness cannot quite be extinguished even by our scientific and practical familiarity with all of its mechanisms and details. The most familiar kind of bread - the kind made of nothing more than flour, water, salt and yeast, which are mixed, fermented, shaped and baked - is the product of a remarkable cooperation or symbiosis between human beings and a variety of microorganisms. This so-called ‘leavened’ bread has been given its shape and appealing lightness by a combination of certain peculiar properties of the starch and protein molecules in the wheat, and by the microbial action of yeast (a fungus) and lacto-bacteria, who themselves cooperate symbiotically in the process known as ‘fermentation.’ Making bread thus quite literally involves a deliberate manipulation of organic processes otherwise associated with decay and decomposition. Accordingly, across a long tradition of discourse and social practice, fermentation has been seen almost as often as a vaguely frightening form of contamination as it has a benevolent miracle. 

The development of an industrial model of mass-produced bread in the twentieth century (something commonly deplored by practically everyone who writes about bread today) was, at least in part, designed specifically to shield from the senses of the consumer all traces of the messy biological details of bread making. Can we by showing the messy details of bread making also show the messy details about money or not having money? 

In our times, another current of thought has emegered that regards bread as fundamental human mistake.  An even larger group of people, estimated to be as many as one third of Americans, avoid bread because they have been convinced that of one of its distinctive ingredients, the protein gluten, is bad for them - notwithstanding a scientific consensus that there is nothing whatsoever wrong with gluten for the vast majority of human beings. Today a veritable industry of cookbooks and ‘gluten-free’ products has developed to confirm the new nutritional creed and fulfill its self-formulated requirements.

It turns out, on the contrary, that at least in some people’s eyes, I am in love with a monster, and indigestible poison, the number on culprit for cancer and capitalism, obesity and war, and pretty much everything else that has ever gone wrong in the whole human adventure. 

At most, I will suggest that this new rejection of bread partakes of a familiar cultural nostalgia about the irretrievable past. Perhaps it even echoes the ancient association of yeast and corruption and expresses an unconscious distaste for this dangerous familiar: the literally alien being who live, work, and die with us in our homes, our bakeries, and our bodies. 

It is, rather, that the thought of bread is so often, and in so many ways, a thought of the Self and the Other. As I have suggested, the simple act of eating or making bread finally links us to all those who have been or are deprived of it. At another level, bread also involves an intimate interaction between human beings and various examples of what we might call, following Donna Haraway, ‘companion species.’ 

Yet, Haraway and many others have observed, the very word ‘companion’ derives from the Latin cum panis, ‘with bread’. This Latin phrase and its modern English derivate seem to indicate a small shift of meaning from the object at issue to the human subjects who will consume it. The being-with designated is not so much a relation of human beings to bread, but the sharing of it by ‘companions’ who will, in the conventional phrase, ‘break bread’ together. Just as bread has often been a collective thing in its practical conditions (the grain ground by the neighborhood miller, the bread baked in communal ovens, the loaves themselves usually large enough to invite or require sharing), so bread in its very idea commonly serves as the very token, rubric, or occasion for the ‘with’ of companionship itself. 

Even in itself bread is also the ultimate transformational food, something always in process of changing from one thing to another. As the great contemporary baker and baking teacher Peter Reinhart writes, among the myriad varieties of bread in the world, the one universal thing is ‘transformation’ - a process by which ‘a tasteless pile of flour, like sawdust on the tongue, is miraculously transformed into a multilayered series of flavors and textures.’ 

-    Bread - Scott Cutler Shershow