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Leaves and twigs snap underneath your feet, barely audible between the ever-growing growling of the beasts chasing behind. Low-hanging branches snag against your armour, tearing even more scratches into the once so shiny silver.
You run, sword clenched in your fist low by your side. From your hand to your arm to your shoulder, it aches, the tension threatening to crack your dough apart. But the flashing eyes of monsters keep you moving.
Your other hand is clutched to your side, squeezing what’s left of the shredded armour to your tender skin. With every rushed breath, every wince from the metal poking into your wound, thin trails of jam flow through your fingers. It’s sickly sweetness attracting more hungry creatures.
Beast Yeast has been getting worse; the encounters with monsters more frequent and violent.
Eternal Sugar told you not to worry about it, since the monsters never dared to step foot into the Garden. But it was the surrounding villages and travellers that you couldn’t get off your mind.
Unsure if you should intervene, a large cake wolf’s corpse – ripped to shreds and missing its guts – cemented your decision. If the creatures in the woods had to start killing each other to survive, who knows when they would start going after the nearby cookies? You couldn’t help but pity the poor animals, however despite your qualms, it had to be done.
And you did your best. With all those years of fighting experience and your knowledge of travelling it was easy to follow the beasts’ tracks and hit them before they could even see you coming, blade working swiftly and cleanly. But your best wasn’t enough.
Saying you had underestimated how many monsters would be lurking in the forest would be an understatement. The further your journey went, the more frequent, the louder, the hungrier the growls from the under bush became. Until sharp teeth sank into your dough from behind your back, and you escaped within an inch of your life.
Luckily, your armour isn’t very heavy. You wore neither the helmet – fearing it would turn inconvenient once the forest got denser – nor the full body set. With how fast your legs had to carry you just to stay out of claw’s reach, metal chafing against fresh bruises, you were grateful for every lack of extra weight on you. Your throat burns, yet you can’t slow down.
The grass beneath your feet is damp and cold, no light able to pierce the ceiling of leaves. How far had you walked this morning? You’d promised you wouldn’t be too far. Yet now the trees seem to cover and endless distance in front of you, with no space between you and the snarls and bites. Your legs feel like honey brittle, your hand is sticky. Every small rock could trip you to your doom, every breath could be your last.
But as you run – hot, wet breath in your neck – it hits you.
That sweet scent. Of flowers, and caramel, and strawberries, and everything pure and good in this world.
There is no time to find a proper entrance, not with the threat of beasts still at every corner. So you dive through the deep hedge, tiny branches further irritating your injuries, and all the growling, flashing, creaking and crunching just...stops.
You roll out of the hedge and onto soft grass, resting there for a few moments. Fresh, cool blades free of leaves and sticks that are stuck in the crevices of your armour.
You are in a remote area of the Garden, deep breaths echoing through the air.
A few years ago you wouldn’t have dared lay down so close to where you know death is waiting. It would take a cake wolf not a second to bite through your neck.
But not in the Garden. Never in her Garden. When you first arrived here, Eternal Sugar promised every day that no monster would rear its ugly head in this place. Of course, you didn’t believe her, not after the horrible things you have seen out in the wild. Yet never once have they crossed the threshold into Eternal Sugar’s domain. You feel your heart rate slow down steadily, breathing in the crisp, sweet air of paradise.
Under groaning and hitched breaths, you lean heavily onto your sword, until you manage to hold yourself semi steady on your feet. You don’t want to keep your wife waiting, after all.
But first, you have to clean yourself up.
Back set straight, you begin walking through the Garden, trying to keep up your usual disciplined-yet-comfortable stride. You sheath your dirty sword and press your arm against your jam-covered side, hopefully not raising much suspicion.
When you’ve reached a more central space, a couple fairies greet you, asking about your journey. They sink to the ground as they speak to you, a position of respect usually reserved only for Eternal Sugar Cookie. They don’t question you, when you are uncharacteristically quick to brush them off; quickly complimenting their work on the surrounding fruit trees and then going on with your day without stopping once.
The quick pace you’re keeping doesn’t agree with the fresh cuts still rubbing against your armour, but you tough it out. Gears in your head turn at max speed, trying to figure out how you are going to hide the worst of today’s...experience.
Internally, guilt nibbles at you. You should tell her, of course. But you can’t get yourself to. You had promised to be careful, that you could handle it, that you wouldn’t get hurt. Eternal Sugar had expressed how worried she’d be about you, and you had justified that worry. She has so much on her plate already, you don’t want to make it worse.
Your gaze travels along the floor sorrowfully. She always gave so much for you. The delights of her Garden, her never ending affection, her unconditional trust. And you couldn't even do one thing for her.
Your train of thought – and any further planning – is cut short, as you are suddenly hoisted into the air. A wonderful aroma surrounds you, and only you, while soft locks tickle your face, and giggles fill your ears like music.
“Oh, my dearest has returned to me!”, Eternal Sugar twirls you in the air, her large wings causing a calm breeze to kiss you all over.
“Hello darling.”, you coo. She looks even more radiant than the last time you saw her.
Eternal Sugar smiles, nuzzling her forehead against yours, humming sweetly. Around you, you feel the atmosphere shift, as if the whole Garden just became happier.
“I missed you so much~ I wasn’t sure I could take your absence much longer. You must tell me everything.”, she kisses your cheek, small, light pecks across your entire face, until you have to nudge her away with a laugh.
“My knight in shining armour~”
Slowly, she starts flying towards the center of the Garden, your favourite place to rest in each other’s company. Though as she lays down on her back to drift on the slow winds, she shifts her hold on you, her elbow brushing against a bruise causing you to wince.
Instinctually, you bite down lightly on your hand. An old habit from your wandering days, as to not garner any attention.
But Eternal Sugar would never miss a sign of pain. Not in her Garden. Not from you.
She lands, sitting on the ground, holding you so gently it feels like you’re floating on air. “What happened to you?”, her voice doesn’t deflect from its usual calm tone, but you hear the panic bubbling under the words. With utmost care, her hands search across your body, feeling carefully underneath your armour, and despite your best efforts to reassure your love you wince and hiss with every wound she finds. And with every stuttering breath that escapes you, her search gets more thorough and her voice softer and gentler.
“What happened, my love? Where does it hurt?”
Her eyes are filled with worry and pain, as if she could feel your injuries as well.
However behind that, you see more. A rare, kindling anger, ready to turn into an inferno at your command.
‘Who did this to you?’
“I’ll be fine, honey.”
“Of course. I will make sure of that.”
Behind your back you suddenly feel a light pressure, as she holds onto the upmost latch of your armour. Her hand sits there loosely, and if it had been anyone else you would have already fallen on the ground to rip yourself from their grasp. The two of you just stare at each other.
“May I?”, your wife asks, trying obviously to suppress the pain in her voice.
“You may.”
The weight of metal lifts from your body, the armour carefully removed from every limb and placed on the ground next to you. Eternal Sugar lays you across her body so that your head sits in her arm. Now, almost every dark bruise is visible to the world.
It doesn’t take much longer for her to notice the tacky jam stain on your side, and for a second her hands freeze above your body.
“Angel?”, her voice forms a knot in your throat. “Why did you not call for me immediately?”
She does not want to accuse you. If her words ever caused you unnecessary pain she would never forgive herself. But you can see how much, at this moment, she wishes she could lock in the Garden for all eternity, messaging your scalp as you eat delicious fruit, far, far away from danger.
She presses your head lightly to her side, while a warm rush flows through you.
“I did not want to worry you.”, you admit sheepishly, not looking up at her.
In front of your eyes, the cuts and scrapes in your dough close, bruises disappearing and taking any lingering pain with them. A soft kiss meets the top of your head, while you slowly heal in Eternal Sugar’s arms.
“Please,” she breathes against you, “worry me. Even if it’s just scuffs on your palm, I never wish to see you suffer. No matter how small.”
You breathe in Eternal Sugar’s sweetness. It seems to follow her everywhere, like the beautiful rose she is. You feel toasty and crisp as freshly baked by her side; you hadn’t even noticed how cold the forest had been. And here, the last of the adrenaline that had been your life force for hours leaves you, fatigue taking its place.
Your eyes are heavy in the tender embrace of your wife, her soul jam energy radiating through you. She hums to you, until even the memory of your pain has faded into sweet nothingness.
“None of this is your fault.”, she cradles your head, delicately lifting your gaze to meet hers. “You fight so hard to protect your fellow cookies. It’s one of the many, many things I love so much about you.”
Your hand strokes through her hair, rubbing a small part of her scalp with your fingertips. She happily leans into the touch.
“I love you so much, my dear.”, she presses a kiss, tender and slow, to your face.
“I love you more.”
“I’d like to see you try.”, she giggles.
Not one to back down from a challenge, you pull yourself up on your wife’s shoulders with almost enough force to knock you both over. You stop not even an inch from her face, lingering for just a moment, before she leans into your embrace and your lips touch.
Your arms wrap around her, twirling a strand from her long locks around your finger. She tastes like sugar, soft lips like balm against your battle-hardened and lightly scarred own.
Her warm, divine laugh fills the air, as you both gently pull away from another.
“Oh, my champion~”, the tip of her wings brush underneath your chin.
“How about a slice of cake, my love?”, you let your hands slide down her arms, now sitting upright in her lap. “Perhaps some tea?”
“That sounds wonderful”, she beams. “But-”
Suddenly, she rolls onto her back, taking you down with her before her wings lift you into the air. “You are not moving another muscle today, sweetheart.” Her arms hold you snugly to her stomach like a seat belt. Around you, a few sugar fairies gleefully spring to their duties, picking up the discarded pieces of armour and weaponry for cleaning and polishing.
You sigh playfully.
“Alright, if you insist, darling.”
“I do, thank you very much.”, she brushes her hand against your cheek, your head, the side of your body. Finally free from dirt and injury.
She would never stop you from fulfilling your sworn duty to cookie kind. She loves you too much to suppress such an important part of you, as much as it pains her to see you go.
However, she will make sure none of those beasts ever touch you again.
Now is not the time to think of such dreadful memories, though. Not if your wife can help it.