Chapter Text
Rain beat against crooked windowpanes and dripped through holes in the roof of the Witch's Hut.
Old iron chains struck the stone walls whenever the wind pushed through the room, while glass bottles rattling across shelves that had not known a Witch’s hand in longer than any of them could guess. The First Oven groaned somewhere behind Gingerbrave, its enormous metal body still radiating enough heat that the damp air turned humid around it. Steam feathered around his shoulders and making every breath taste faintly of rust, smoke, and scorched sugar.
Someone was shouting, their voice barely able to be separated from the thunderous booming in his ears.
"Keep it away from the Oven!" Pure Vanilla Cookie’s voice echoed.
His staff scraped sharply against the floor when another tremor threw him sideways, one foot skidding through rainwater before the golden head of the staff struck stone and caught his weight. The Ancient shoved himself upright again. White and yellow robes hung heavily from him, dark with rain and streaked with soot, one sleeve burned open from wrist to elbow. The Light of Truth had narrowed to a strained little glow at his chest, far too dim where it should have painted warmth across his face.
"Whatever happens," Pure Vanilla called, breath catching between the words, "do not let it reach the First Oven!"
A burst of blue tinged magic struck the floor to Gingerbrave's left.
The impact flashed across the wet stone and sent a crawling net of electricity beneath the Ultimate Cookie's feet, but the darkness composing its lower body split around the current. Wizard Cookie stumbled into view behind the blast with his staff clenched in both hands, hat hanging crooked over his face. Strawberry Cookie followed several steps behind him, the heel of one boot dragging where her leg had been struck earlier, both hands twisted around the handle of her oversized lollipop.
Despite the fighting, the kept stealing glances toward Gingerbrave, and he was sure he knew why.
His arms burned. The pain ran from his fingertips nearly to his elbows, deep and raw beneath the surface of his dough, where the Oven's heat had passed through him while he lowered the glowing Cookie into its flames. He could still remember the warmth of that little body against his palms. The light had been almost weightless.
Then it was just gone. There was that awful, brilliant glow sinking farther into the First Oven until the flames had swallowed it completely, and moments later the thing before them had arrived.
The Ultimate Cookie turned its head, its two wide white eyecings staring straight at him.
Black dough shifted where dough should have remained solid, its surface crawling continuously between smoke, flame, and a viscous darkness that pulled itself into limbs only to begin unraveling again at the edges. Its icing rose in tongues of black fire from its head, interrupted by one brilliant white curl that swept upward in an imitation of Gingerbrave’s own.
Its eyecings were too broad and too luminous, uninterrupted fields of white without pupil or iris, and whenever its face moved, the darkness stretched around features it had not possessed a second before.
A mouth opened, something like white fire separated into a smile. Thin strings of blackness stretched between the upper and lower halves.
"Gingerbrave…"
Thousands of voices seemed to call out his name.
Those voices were old and young, delighted and angry, exhausted and wide awake. Some spoke from somewhere across the room while others pressed directly against his ears, whispering from inside his own skull. Something deeper beneath all of them breathed as they spoke, a humming sound that settled into Gingerbrave's chest and vibrated through his ribs.
Behind the creature, the First Oven groaned again.
The Ultimate Cookie's eyecings flicked toward it, but it made no move to run into the yawning depth. It just kept staring at him.
Gingerbrave couldn't move back any further. His heel had already reached the raised edge of the stone platform behind him. His eyecings shifted from the looming creature in front of him to the cookie just behind it.
Pure Vanilla stood within a half circle of magic carved into the floor, one hand white-knuckled around his staff.
The cookie's eyecings were red and hollow. He had long since stopped crying. Now there was only a dull, awful acceptance inside them, shut away behind pale white lashes.
"Don’t look away." The voices were suddenly closer, hissing in his ears.
The Ultimate Cookie was already there.
There had been no footfall, no rush of displaced air, no visible crossing of the ruined floor for Gingerbrave’s mind to catch and make sense of. One instant the creature had stood several paces away, its white eyecings burning from within the darkness, and the next black fire crowded his vision, close enough that thin curls of smoke drifted across his icing.
One long hand separated itself from the shifting mass of its body and lifted toward him. Fingers took shape one by one with dreadful care for his face.
"Aren't you exhausted?"
With a care that made every crumb of Gingerbrave’s dough crawl, its fingertips touched his cheek.
They sank no deeper than the surface of his dough, cradling the curve beneath his eyecing with an impossible delicacy while smoke curled between the strands of his icing.
Somewhere behind it, Wizard's staff discharged again. Light flashed along the creature's back, but again it didn't turn. All of its focus was on Gingerbrave.
It tipped his face upward. Gingerbrave could see himself reflected nowhere in those enormous white eyecings, only brightness without depth, a blankness so complete that his own body seemed to disappear at its edge.
"You've fought for so long…"
Its thumb moved beneath his eyecing in a gentle caress. The blackness composing the finger separated around his cheek and joined itself again.
Gingerbrave swallowed around the pain in his throat. Everything around him felt too hot, like being in the Oven all over again. His arms still burned where he had placed the glowing Cookie inside the flames, his fingers trembling when he raised one hand toward the creature's wrist.
Out of the corner of his eyecing, he saw Pure Vanilla move. The Ancient Cookie lifted his staff high above his head, a renewed vigor alight in his gaze.
The symbols on the floor ignited one after another and the Ultimate Cookie's eyecings widened.
Black flame burst outward.
The tender hand at his cheek became an arm around his shoulders, not striking him, not crushing him, but dragging him close with enough force that Gingerbrave’s feet left the stone. His face struck darkness, his cheek meeting a surface that yielded around him, hot and cold at once. Smoke poured past his nose with the sour, yet sweet scent of burnt sugar.
"No!" It screamed, clawing at Gingerbrave's back in a desperate embrace.
Every bottle in the hut shattered.
The sound came all at once, shelves erupting into glittering fragments that bounced across the stone and disappeared beneath the spreading darkness. Strawberry threw an arm over her face. Wizard ducked low, one shard striking the brim of his hat and spinning away into the dark.
The Ultimate Cookie twisted its body around Gingerbrave until black fire covered nearly everything he could see. One arm locked around his middle while the other cradled the back of his head and forced his face into the yielding mass of its chest, almost as if to protect him.
There was the sound of wood cracking as Pure Vanilla's staff hit the floor. Gold light flooded through the carved grooves, rushing past the Ultimate Cookie and its claws curled into Gingerbrave's back.
The light followed the path carved for it until every line converged at Gingerbrave's feet.
His body seized at the magic rushed through him. It passed through the soles of his shoes, through cloth and dough and every deeper layer beneath. It flowed through him so completely that at one point, Gingerbrave couldn't tell where the magic ended and his own body began.
His eyecings widened at light sparked beneath his dough.
Thousands of tiny points appeared along his arms, little motes burning throughout his dough suddenly blazing white through the surface. They ran upward from his fingertips to his wrists, threading through his elbows, spreading across his shoulders and chest until his body shone from within in a constellation of magic that had always lived in his dough from the very moment of his birth.
The Ultimate Cookie recoiled.
Its body folded inward until Gingerbrave could feel the creature everywhere, blackness sliding along his shoulders, smoke winding around his legs, an arm breaking apart against his back only to gather again across his chest. The darkness clung to him with a desperation so intimate that his stomach twisted. There was nothing of a blow in it, nothing resembling the violence with which it had torn through everything else standing between it and what it wanted.
It only held him.
And beneath the thousand voices, Gingerbrave heard one of them begin to cry.
"No, no, no, no, no!"
Pure Vanilla's hands shook around his staff and for some odd reason, that minute detail dragged up more fear and worry in Gingerbrave than the burning of his own Magic Powder.
"Pure Vanilla Cookie…"
His own voice came out thin and wavering, but it was jut enough to make the Ancient's eyecings snap toward him.
For a heartbeat Gingerbrave forgot the arm crushing against his ribs, the black smoke filling his lungs, the magic crawling hot beneath his dough. Pure Vanilla looked horrified, and not by the creature.
By him.
Gingerbrave forced his fingers to uncurl. He reached through the darkness until his palm found the creature's wrist.
"Its okay."
Pure Vanilla's face crumpled. Gingerbrave wasn't sure he even heard him as the magic erupted.
White light struck the hut so violently that every shadow seem to vanish under its might.
Gingerbrave cried out. His knees buckled, but there was nowhere to fall while the Ultimate Cookie held him. Magic tore through his body in the opposite direction now, pulled out of him in streaming threads that passed through the creature's black dough and raced toward the crystal behind it. The motes beneath his arms multiplied until he could see the bones of his own fingers outlined in light.
There was too much, far too much for the simple body that contained it.
The magic creating the Moonstone drank it all in anyway.
Its old mineral veins filled first, lines that had been dull gray flaring brilliant silver, then blue, then a color Gingerbrave could not name because looking at it made his thoughts slip loose. New fractures branched outward through the crystal, not breaking it but widening its interior, carving channels where none had existed before.
The Ultimate Cookie screamed. The sound had no single source. It came from the walls, the Oven, beneath Gingerbrave's shoes, inside his teeth.
Its arms tightened around him.
"Stay! Don't leave! Don't force us away!"
Black fingers spread across the back of his head.
"Staystaystaystaystaystay—!"
Gingerbrave's breath caught in his lungs as the Moonstone pulled and the creature stretched.
For one hideous instant the arms around him became too long, black dough thinning into ropes that still refused to release him while the rest of its body dragged backward. Its torso lost every recognizable boundary. Smoke peeled from its shoulders in sheets. That imitation of Gingerbrave's white curl remained visible longer than anything else, trembling above two enormous eyecings that never left his.
Its fingers slid across his cheek, almost tenderly.
Then they were gone.
Darkness rushed past Gingerbrave in a torrent, pulled toward the Moonstone so quickly that the hut seemed to inhale with it. Black flame tore between his fingers. The voices collapsed into one another, thousands becoming hundreds, hundreds becoming dozens, each word losing its shape until only that terrible humming remained.
Two white eyecings floated within the storm, then there was nothing at all.
The Moonstone flashed and brilliant blue and everything finally stopped.
Gingerbrave hit the floor hard enough for his teeth to strike together.
He remained on his hands and knees, staring at his own fingers against the wet stone. White sparks still traveled beneath his dough, disappearing one after another. His palms were red and thin cracks had opened along his fingertips.
His chest hurt and he could still feel the shape of a hand against his cheek, just beneath his eyecing.
Behind him, the Moonstone pulsed once and thin streams of darkness moved somewhere deep inside.
Gingerbrave turned toward Pure Vanilla, who had fallen beside his staff.
The boy was moving before the pain in his legs could properly register. He slipped once on the water spreading across the stones, caught himself against one hand, pushed upright again, and crossed the carved circle while the last scraps of gold magic went dark beneath his feet.
"Pure Vanilla?"
The Ancient lifted his head and a minute relief filled Gingerbrave's dough.
The Moonstone continued to pulse behind him, bright and blinding, reinforced by magic pulled from Gingerbrave until the crystal's veins gleamed even after its central light subsided.
Somewhere beyond the ruined hut, thunder rolled across the forest.
Somewhere inside the First Oven, there was no light at all.
"Gingerbrave?"
Footsteps beat against the stone, fast and almost slipping against the smooth surface.
He turned his head to see Wizard running toward him through the wreckage, one hand gripping his staff while the other reached forward. His hat had fallen somewhere behind him. Wet icing clung against his forehead and terror had widened his eyecings until Gingerbrave could see the whites around the blue.
Strawberry ran beside him.
Her injured leg almost folded beneath her on the last step, but she caught herself against Wizard's shoulder and kept going. Her hood, the top half of it almost ripped off, had fallen backward. Rain streamed down the sides of her face.
"Gingerbrave!"
Their voices struck him, almost blurring together. Light shifted around them, passing over Wizard's face and Strawberry's hands, obscuring Pure Vanilla's eyecings.
"Gingerbrave!"
Everything seemed so far away. The rain quieted to a pitiful trickle and the floor seemed miles from his feet, but at the same time the ceiling stretched about him like it was the sky itself.
"Gingerbrave."
The rain stopped and Gingerbrave blinked.
Sunlight lay across his hand.
His fingers rested around the handle of a porcelain cup decorated with little gold lilies, untouched tea gone lukewarm inside it.
The smell of burnt sugar lingered in the air.
For one confused heartbeat Gingerbrave expected to taste smoke when he breathed. But he just smelled the tea he had begun to register he was staring at.
Rain against broken windows became fingertips tapping once against a polished surface.
Wizard's face beside him blurred, blue and brown bleeding into white and gold. The shape of Strawberry beside him stretched upward, becoming one of the tall windows lining the conference room. The Moonstone's glow remained caught in the glass until Gingerbrave blinked again and realized it was only afternoon sky reflected across the panes.
"Gingerbrave? Are you listening?"
His thumb moved against the porcelain cup. Beyond his hand, afternoon light stretched through the tall windows of Pure Vanilla Castle in rectangular bands, illuminating drifting dust and the glossy surface of a conference table so thoroughly polished that every Cookie seated around it possessed a second, warped reflection beneath them.
Across the table, Clotted Cream Cookie was looking at him.
One gloved finger rested near the edge of an open document. Four folders had been spread between them, pages covered in neat figures and annotations, their corners lifting whenever the pleasant summer breeze wandered through the cracked window.
Gingerbrave stared, blinking suddenly as his expression changed.
It happened quickly enough that anyone who had not been watching him directly might have missed the transition, the brief vacancy behind blue eyecings filling with recognition before his mouth curved upward into a soft smile.
"Sorry," he said. "You were saying?"
Across from him, Clotted Cream's perfectly maintained smile never faltered.
Gingerbrave set down his cup.
His icing had grown well past the short, unruly crop he had worn during most of his adventures. Brown strands now brushed his shoulders before fading gradually into white toward the ends, the color change most visible where afternoon sun struck the locks resting against his red cape. A single white curl swept prominently across his bangs, curved close enough to his brow that it nearly touched one of his white lashes when he lowered his eyecings toward the papers before him.
Hollyberry Cookie’s chair creaked loudly to his right.
"Ha!" she barked, leaning back far enough that the carved rear legs threatened to leave the carpet. One broad gloved hand slapped the table, rattling it and sending Clotted Cream’s nearest stack of documents shifting. "Don’t you apologize for zoning out! If anyone can keep their head on straight through a meeting this dry, I’d like to applaud them."
Gingerbrave steadied his cup before Hollyberry’s palm could rattle any tea over its rim.
Clotted Cream looked down at the displaced pages. He reached out, pinched the corner of the stack, and drew it back into perfect alignment with the folder beneath it.
"Your Majesty," he said, "I do ask that you pay attention. I understand such… boring matters don't stir up much in your passionate soul, but this is important."
"They’ve stirred it plenty." Hollyberry reached for her cup. "Mostly toward the door."
A laugh escaped Gingerbrave before he could seem to think about it. It was light, pleasant, and brief, just loud enough to fill the space Hollyberry left for laughs to be had.
Out of the corner of his eyecing, Gingerbrave saw Pure Vanilla's lips curve into a small, shaky smile.
The Ancient sat at the table’s head with both hands wrapped around his own cup. The tea remained nearly untouched, the surface gone perfectly still.
Of course, it was years ago. One shouldn't expect the cookie to rule in soiled clothes.
There were deep shadows beneath Pure Vanilla's eyecings, and the fingers around his porcelain cup had gone so still that Gingerbrave could see the faint tremor beginning at the knuckles.
Gingerbrave reached for the honey spoon beside his saucer.
"I really was listening before that," he said, turning his attention back toward Clotted Cream while his fingers scooped honey from the little crystal pot. "We were talking about the new trade routes."
"The western and northwestern routes," Clotted Cream specified, with enough good humor in his tone to make it almost companionable.
He slid one sheet from beneath the others and rotated it across the table. A map had been printed over the page, Beast Yeast rendered in careful lines, coastlines and mountain marks interrupted by more empty spaces than any cartographer in the Republic would have tolerated closer to home. "The question is whether opening both at once would place unnecessary strain on your existing escorts. If the northern passage remains as it is, the Republic can direct most trade through the western route until traffic stabilizes."
Gingerbrave stirred the honey into his tea.
"The western road’s safer," he chirped. "We’ve had supply carts make it through without trouble."
"Without much trouble," Hollyberry corrected.
She rested her chin on her hand, a slightly troubled look making its way into her eyecings. Gingerbrave blinked slowly, letting himself nod.
"The bigger issue," he continues, "is where the route goes after the western checkpoint. We can’t just draw a straight line across the continent."
Hollyberry set her cup down with enough force to make the liquid jump. "And nobody is going straight through the Garden."
Clotted Cream’s eyecings shifted toward her.
Hollyberry pointed one thick finger at the map, her nail landing on a broad stretch that had been colored more than anything around it. A large upside down and angular heart had been drawn around it.
"I mean it," she said. "I don’t care if it saves a few days or a whole blasted month. The outer paths are fine if Eternal Sugar keeps allowing caravans through. The Garden itself stays off the route."
"The current proposal places the road along its boundary," Clotted Cream said.
"Good."
"Though a direct passage would considerably shorten travel—!"
"No."
"Hollyberry Cookie," Pure Vanilla murmured.
"No," Hollyberry repeated, turning toward him with a smile that remained bright while every bit of humor vanished from her posture. "I know what you’re about to say. I know we’re talking about trade, and neighbors, and letting old bygones be bygones— I’m all for it! Truly. But I’m not having merchants wander into that place. It's off the table."
Pure Vanilla’s fingers tightened around his cup. Gingerbrave leaned back taking in the sight of the two staring at each other. He let that buzzing feeling in his mind take over jsut a bit more, waiting.
Hollyberry sighed, lowering her shoulders.
"I'm just saying…" She traced one fingertip around the rim of her cup without lifting it. "I know they're doing their best. But I don't want to risk any sort of… relapse. You understand, right?"
"I know," Pure Vanilla said.
His voice carried easily despite its softness, and the conversation bent around it. Even the curtains seemed quieter where the breeze moved through them.
Clotted Cream inclined his head. "Then the Garden will remain excluded from all formal routes."
"Thank you," Hollyberry said, settling back into her chair. Her finger finally withdrew from the marked boundary on the map.
A line scratched beneath Clotted Cream’s stylus.
"The Spire may offer a better eastern terminus, in that case."
Gingerbrave blinked, his mind suddenly forcing its way into being active. His lips tightened, holding his smile as his glanced at Pure Vanilla Cookie.
The older cookie exhaled slowly. The breath left his body through his nose, long and low, and his shoulders sank beneath the white fall of his robes.
"There is no point," he said.
Clotted Cream’s stylus remained raised as Pure Vanilla looked toward the map without appearing to see it.
"The Spire of All Knowledge remains empty."
Outside the cracked window, a bird called from somewhere in the lower gardens. The sound crossed the room once, bright and ordinary, then disappeared beneath the whisper of paper shifting in the breeze.
Gingerbrave set his spoon down.
The click against porcelain made Pure Vanilla’s eyecings shift toward him.
Grief aged a face. Gingerbrave had learned this gradually.
Certain names and places seemed to pull every year a cookie had survived toward the surface at once. The Spire did that for Pure Vanilla. So did the Faeries, white flowers, plays, that sort of thing.
Gingerbrave knew better than to bring those things up anymore.
He smiled toward Clotted Cream instead.
"We can use the coastal settlements," he said. "There are a few ports that have started taking smaller shipments again. Nothing huge yet, but enough for medicine and tools. If we keep the routes limited, we can see what holds up before we start sending full caravans."
Clotted Cream watched him for half a second longer than the answer required.
"That would be… sensible. Thank you, Gingerbrave."
Gingerbrave nodded and let the conversation move forward, though his attention lingered for another second on the exhausted set of Pure Vanilla’s shoulders.
Beside him, the Ancient finally released his cup. His hand slipped from the porcelain and disappeared beneath the edge of the table, hidden by the heavy fall of his robes, and a second later two fingers came to rest against the back of Gingerbrave’s wrist.
The contact was gentle, little more than minor pressure, but Gingerbrave felt the faint tremor still running through Pure Vanilla’s hand. He kept his eyecings on Clotted Cream and maintained the same mild smile he had worn through the discussion, giving no outward indication that anything had changed while Pure Vanilla’s thumb passed once across his wrist.
If he acknowledged it too openly, Pure Vanilla sometimes pulled away and apologized, which usually left him more shaken than before. Instead, Gingerbrave waited until Clotted Cream looked down at the documents in front of him, then turned his hand beneath the table until their palms met and curled his fingers around Pure Vanilla’s.
Despite having grown taller over the past few years, Gingerbrave’s hand still felt small inside the Ancient Hero’s. Pure Vanilla’s fingers closed around it almost immediately, not hard enough to hurt, but with far more force than the touch had begun with, and Gingerbrave returned the pressure with an easy familiarity.
His own chest still felt oddly hollow from the mention of the Spire, and that cottony pressure had begun gathering behind his eyecings again, making Clotted Cream’s voice seem farther away than it should have been, but Pure Vanilla’s hand was shaking, so Gingerbrave pushed the sensation aside. He could deal with himself later. Pure Vanilla needed him now.
Pure Vanilla’s grip remained tight for several breaths. Gradually, the tension beneath his sleeve eased enough for his arm to rest against the side of his chair instead of holding itself rigid. Gingerbrave watched the change without appearing to watch at all, keeping his attention politely fixed on Clotted Cream until Pure Vanilla’s breathing finally settled into a steadier rhythm.
Clotted Cream continued speaking, and Gingerbrave listened wherever he could, catching the shape of sentences about roads, shipments, and settlements while his attention remained divided between the conversation and the hand holding his beneath the table.
The familiar buzzing pressed more insistently at the back of Gingerbrave’s eyecings, blurring the room at its edges, but he ignored that too and kept smiling while Pure Vanilla held on.
The rest of the trade discussion passed in broad shapes. They discussed shipments and other small things. Hollyberry objected loudly to a proposed import limit on berry wine until Clotted Cream pointed out that the number on the page was a minimum rather than a maximum, which improved her opinion of the document immediately.
Gingerbrave answered when questions were directed toward him, keeping his small smile plastered on his face the whole time.
He always had an answer. He smiled at the correct moments, laughed when Hollyberry was funny, and made space whenever Pure Vanilla spoke.
He was perfectly pleasant the entire time. People had begun telling him that often, lately, usually with an affectionate laugh and some remark about how much he had matured. He was no longer the bumbling and excitable child he had first been when he escaped the Oven.
He had become dependable, even thoughtful. Easy to work with.
Everyone seemed so pleased about it.
"Now that we have that settled," Clotted Cream hummed, "perhaps we should move on to a slightly more serious topic."
"More serious than sending people to Beast Yeast?" Hollyberry hummed, "Well, color me surprised!"
"Ah, yes. Well, hopefully that illustrates the gravity of what I am about to discuss." Clotted Cream crossed his legs, resting his clasped hands on the elevated knee.
Gingerbrave's smile warmed obligingly, waiting for more, but Clotted Cream didn't immediately continue. Instead he gathered the trade documents into a single stack, tapped their lower edges twice against the table, then slid them into their folder. The little ritual cleared the space between them.
A different folder waited beneath his hand, much smaller than any other.
"The Moonstone," Clotted Cream said.
Pure Vanilla's hand closed around Gingerbrave's so abruptly that the pressure pushed his knuckles together. Gingerbrave blinked, bringing up his free hand and leaning his cheek on it. His pinkie brushed gently beneath his eyecing.
"What about it?" Gingerbrave asked, smiling.
"I wanted to inquire about its continued security—"
"The seal has held just fine." Pure Vanilla said. His voice was still quiet, but all of the warmth in it has vanished.
Clotted Cream's gaze rose from the page. "I have not suggested otherwise—"
"The Moonstone has been inspected thoroughly on a monthly basis. The Cookie Kingdom has been extremely diligent in its security." Pure Vanilla murmured, almost too quickly.
"I'm.. aware, Your Majesty. I merely wished to bring up a suggestion, is all."
Gingerbrave smiled across the table. "What did you have in mind?"
Clotted Cream's attention moved to him.
Nothing changed in the Consul's expression, but a portion of the stiffness withdrew from his shoulders.
"A supplement to the existing guard," he said. "Nothing more. The Crème Republic would be willing to dispatch a rotating unit of Paladins to assist your own forces."
"That's quite the generous offer," Pure Vanilla said.
"One we would make without expectation of compensation," Clotted Cream replied.
Hollyberry's brows raised a bit as she lowered her cup, "Well, that's a strange thing to bring up."
Clotted Cream laughed quietly. "I assure you, Your Majesty, there is no hidden invoice. This is simply a kindness from the Republic. After what you all have done for this world, it's nothing."
Gingerbrave watched the exchange with his cheek still resting in his hand.
Irritatingly enough, her could understand Clotted Cream's request.
The Moonstone had eventually been moved from the Witch's Hut for the simple reason that leaving the Ultimate Cookie too far away from anybody equipped to guard it had sounded increasingly absurd once the immediate catastrophe ended. The reinforced crystal now rested beneath layers of wards in the Cookie Kingdom, buried farther below the castle than most Cookies even knew the foundations went.
But Gingerbrave knew.
He knew every stair, every door, every guard. He knew how the light of the fire in the lanterns reflected off of that smooth blue surface and covered the floor in dozens of shades of blue. He knew how to tilt his head just so, to see the dark trapped inside.
He would stand there and listen, his ears stretched to take in the low humming that vibrated through his bones—
Pure Vanilla's hand tightened its grip on his by a fraction, dragging Gingerbrave away from his thoughts.
"It's probably not necessary," Gingerbrave said.
Clotted Cream's eyebrows lifted as Gingerbrave sat a bit straighter, withdrawing his hand from his cheek.
"I'm going back to the Cookie Kingdom later this week anyway. I can check the Moonstone myself while I'm there. If I see anything wrong, I'll consider your proposal."
For the first time since the meeting had begun, Pure Vanilla looked directly at him.
"Oh."
It was less of a word, more a breath leaving Pure Vanilla's lungs. The sound caused the smallest of twitches at the corner of Gingerbrave's smile.
Pure Vanilla’s hand went still around his.
"Gingerbrave," he murmured, "I thought we had not yet decided whether you would be traveling this week."
"I know."
"You've been having more trouble with your health recently…"
Hollyberry's posture changed as she looked over at Gingerbrave. The shift was small by her standards, only a slight turn of her shoulders, but Gingerbrave could feel the table's attention narrowing toward him.
He kept his smile tight.
"I've been fine."
Pure Vanilla's eyecings had an exhausted brightness in them, the one that made him look both years older and painfully young beneath the crown. His free hand had moved toward the table's edge, fingers curled against the wood.
"I'm just not sure…"
Gingerbrave watched the older cookie's expression fall, his hand coming away form the table to cover his mouth. He could see the fear and worry trickling into Pure Vanilla's posture, tightening his shoulders and bringing back that faint tremor.
"Okay," Gingerbrave said. His voice sounded too far in his own ears. "I can wait."
The tension left Pure Vanilla visibly. His shoulders descended beneath his robes and some of the brightness behind his tired eyecings dimmed as he gave Gingerbrave a shaky smile.
"If I'm feeling better by the end of the week, we can talk about it again."
"Yes," Pure Vanilla said quickly. "Of course. I am not forbidding you to go. I would never want you to feel that I was forbidding you. I only think that perhaps, given how frequently the pain has been returning, it may be wiser to postpone the journey until your condition is more stable."
His fingers remained wrapped around Gingerbrave’s beneath the table, the pressure gradually easing now that he had received the answer he wanted.
"Sure."
Gingerbrave’s answer came easily. He shifted back into his chair and let the heel of one loafer slide beneath it, the movement small enough to hide the restless flex of his ankle. His free hand found the edge of his saucer and turned it a few degrees, lining the painted lilies with the cup as the room fell briefly quiet around him.
Clotted Cream's gloved finger rested against the closed Moonstone folder.
"In that case," he said, "my proposal may have more merit than I initially realized."
The attention was drawn back toward the Consul as he folded his fingers together with a soft tilt of his head. His blond icing shifted slightly out of its perfect coif, giving his face a slight shadow.
"Purely on a temporary basis. If Gingerbrave's health currently limits his ability to make the journey himself, additional personnel could reduce the burden placed upon the existing guard."
He uncrossed one leg and leaned forward, not enough to crowd the table, but enough to bring himself nearer to the folder between them. Two fingers tapped once against its cover before he drew his hand away again.
"The Republic has benefited from the stability created by your efforts," Clotted Cream continued. "By all of your efforts. The routes we have spent the afternoon discussing would not exist if the Ultimate Cookie remained free. Offering personnel to assist with what is, whether we enjoy admitting it or not, a shared threat hardly seems unreasonable."
Hollyberry grunted and lowered her forearm onto the table. One thick fingertip tapped against the polished wood in a slow rhythm while she looked between Clotted Cream and Pure Vanilla, her mouth pulling briefly to one side in thought. Each tap landed near the edge of the Beast-Yeast map, making one loose corner tremble.
"When you put it that way…"
"I do try." Clotted Cream’s smile sharpened by a fraction.
Gingerbrave hummed lightly and looked toward Pure Vanilla.
The Ancient had gone quieter beside him. His eyecings had lowered toward the folder, but his attention seemed caught somewhere much farther away. The hand holding Gingerbrave’s had loosened enough that their palms no longer pressed together fully, his fingers resting instead around the side of Gingerbrave’s hand without quite releasing it. His staff leaned against the side of his chair, untouched.
The Consul straightened and placed one hand against his chest, smoothing the front of his coat beneath his palm before allowing his expression to soften.
"Your Majesty, the responsibility for the seal has fallen disproportionately upon you and Gingerbrave since its creation. That has never struck me as particularly fair. You have both done more than anyone could reasonably ask."
Pure Vanilla’s lashes lifted, opening his eyecings a bit further.
"It is not a matter of fairness," he said.
His fingers slipped away from Gingerbrave’s beneath the table. He brought both hands above it instead, one settling beside his cup while the other rested flat against the wood. The movement was controlled, but his fingertips had spread farther apart than usual.
"No?"
Clotted Cream’s hand lowered from his chest.
"No."
The Consul eased back again, putting the breadth of the table between himself and the Ancient.
The rear of his chair gave a quiet creak beneath the shift of his weight. One ankle settled across the opposite knee again, though his shoulders remained square toward Pure Vanilla rather than relaxing with the posture.
Pure Vanilla's gaze hardened. "It is a matter of responsibility."
The breeze passing through the cracked window lifted the nearest curtain and let it fall again. Sunlight moved across Pure Vanilla’s sleeve, caught briefly against the gold embroidery, and disappeared when the fabric settled.
Clotted Cream’s fingers curled loosely over his raised knee.
"And responsibility cannot be shared?"
"Not all of it."
Pure Vanilla’s hand closed beside his cup.
His knuckles pressed into the table hard enough that the porcelain trembled against its saucer with a faint click.
"I really thought you'd be more open to it, Your Majesty, considering—"
Pure Vanilla moved before Clotted Cream finished.
His chair scraped sharply backward across the carpet as he stood, the sound abrupt enough that Hollyberry’s tapping stopped at once. Both of Pure Vanilla’s hands came down against the table, not slamming, but planting there with enough force to flatten the corner of a loose document beneath one palm.
"Considering what, Consul?"
Gingerbrave’s head lifted fully now.
Hollyberry straightened in her chair, one hand remaining on the table while the other lowered slowly from her cup. Clotted Cream’s posture changed by only a fraction, his crossed leg dropping until both feet touched the floor.
For the first time since the meeting began, the Consul hesitated.
His eyecings flicked toward Pure Vanilla’s hands, then rose again to meet his stare.
"Considering… the loss of the Light of Hope."
Pure Vanilla's eyecings flew open.
His face emptied so completely that Gingerbrave felt the fine hairs along the back of his neck rise. The exhaustion remained beneath his eyecings, the grief remained, but both had been pressed beneath a stillness sharp enough to make the air around the table feel suddenly cold. The lines of his mouth disappeared into something perfectly flat. One hand remained braced against the table, fingers spread over the polished wood, while the other had gone motionless beside his cup.
Even Hollyberry stopped moving.
The curtain nearest the window drifted inward on the summer breeze, its hem brushing the stone before floating back again. Somewhere outside, a fountain continued trickling through the gardens. A spoon in somebody's abandoned saucer settled with one final metallic tremor.
Clotted Cream stopped smiling.
For the first time that afternoon, the Consul's practiced ease seemed to desert him completely. His shoulders remained straight, his chin remained lifted, but one gloved thumb slipped from where it had rested against his opposite hand and curled toward his palm. His gaze flicked once toward Hollyberry, perhaps searching for some easier expression to read, then returned to Pure Vanilla.
"I think that's all we have time for today." Pure Vanilla said.
The words came quietly enough that Clotted Cream couldn't have mistaken them for anything except deliberate.
Hollyberry stood before Clotted Cream could answer. Her chair shot backward, its legs grinding several inches into the carpet before catching, and one broad hand landed between Pure Vanilla's shoulders.
Her palm settled there, warm and firm, fingers spreading over the embroidered back of his robe before applying enough pressure to turn him toward the door.
"Right!" she announced, brightness returning to her voice with great force. "We've got enough trade routes to choke a dragon. And I would know, hm? The rest can wait."
Clotted Cream rose more slowly. He placed both hands against the arms of his chair before pushing himself upright, smoothing the front of his coat automatically once he stood. "Your Majesty, I meant no offense."
Pure Vanilla paused beside his chair. The staff remained leaning against it.
For one strange second, Gingerbrave thought he might leave without the thing at all. Then Pure Vanilla's hand reached back, fingers closing around the shaft just beneath its golden head. The polished wood gave a faint click against the chair as he lifted it.
He still had not looked away from Clotted Cream.
Gingerbrave thought he might answer. His fingers flexed against the folds of his robe, then curled until the fabric gathered into his palm.
"Good afternoon, Consul."
That was all.
He walked from the room with Hollyberry beside him, staff tapping once against the floor with each measured step. Gingerbrave was already gathering his papers by the time the door opened, fitting them into the thin leather case he carried for ambassadorial work.
He slid the last page beneath the flap, stood, and hurried after them.
"Gingerbrave."
His hand stopped halfway to the strap over his shoulder.
Clotted Cream had remained beside the table.
Gingerbrave's eyecings flicked toward the corridor. Pure Vanilla and Hollyberry had already made it several paces away, their figures interrupted by the high stone arch around the doorway. Hollyberry had turned toward Pure Vanilla while she walked, one hand moving animatedly at her side despite whatever restrained volume she had adopted. Pure Vanilla's head remained bowed toward her.
"Could I borrow one more minute?" The Consul asked.
Gingerbrave looked toward the open door. Hollyberry's voice drifted from the corridor, lower than usual, followed by Pure Vanilla's answer too quiet to make out.
He adjusted the case against his hip.
"Sure."
The door swung inward behind him until only a narrow slice of the corridor remained visible.
Clotted Cream waited until the footsteps outside had faded before moving around the table. "I had another matter I hoped to raise with you personally. Nothing so dramatic, I promise."
"That's reassuring."
The answer came with a shift of the strap of his bag more securely onto his shoulder as he leaned his hip against the edge of the nearest chair rather than standing with his back perfectly straight beside it. Clotted Cream studied him through the motion.
The way he was looking at Gingerbrave reminded him of the way Wizard Cookie would look at a particularly interesting spell. Like he was something to figure out, something to dig into and discover the secrets of.
But he had nothing to hide.
"The Republic has been working to expand its diplomatic outreach," Clotted Cream said. "Public confidence has improved considerably, but certain impressions have proven… persistent."
Gingerbrave hooked one ankle loosely behind the other. "People remember things like that pretty well."
"Indeed." Clotted Cream's own expression tightened pleasantly. "And you have always had a …remarkable talent for helping them remember the better parts."
Gingerbrave said nothing.
A very, very small part of his brain, a piece he has spent so long burying under everything else he has going on, supplied a response immediately.
Oh, you have got to be kidding me.
Gingerbrave pressed his tongue against the back of his teeth. He kept himself quiet and his expression pleasant.
Clotted Cream reached the end of the table and rested his knuckles against its polished edge. "You were extraordinarily honest during your first visits to the Republic. Painfully so, at times. Yet Cookies listened to you. They trusted you. I thought perhaps you might be willing to attend some upcoming civic events on our behalf. Speak with residents. Be seen alongside our officials. Nothing formal enough to call an endorsement, naturally."
While speaking, he nudged the chair Gingerbrave leaned against away, opening the space between them. The gesture looked casual. Everything Clotted Cream did looked casual when he wanted something.
Gingerbrave could already picture it with aggravating clarity. Stand beside a Republic official. Shake a few hands and smile.
He wondered whether Clotted Cream had rehearsed the request.
"Naturally."
Gingerbrave shifted his weight from one foot to the other. One loafer dragged half an inch over the carpet before he caught himself and planted it again.
"You understand what I mean." Clotted Cream hummed.
Gingerbrave did. What Clotted Cream wanted was a poster boy, someone to toss at the crowds to make the behave.
Instead of speaking the thought aloud, Gingerbrave caught one loose tail of the blue bow around his waist between his fingers and worried it back and forth, eyecings dropping briefly to the uneven fold he had created.
"I appreciate you thinking of me," he said. "But I don't think I can fit that in right now."
Clotted Cream's brows rose. "The schedule would be flexible."
"I'm sure it would." He flattened the abused ribbon beneath his palm.
Clotted Cream turned more fully toward him, one hand remaining against the table. "And given the Republic's willingness to assist with security, I had hoped this might be a convenient opportunity for cooperation."
And suddenly it all clicked.
Gingerbrave's blue eyecings remained soft, almost dull beneath his white lashes.
"I said I'd consider the Paladins if we need them," he smiled. "We haven't agreed to anything yet."
Silence settled between them. Clotted Cream's expression froze before smoothing itself over again, and a small spark of satisfaction warmed Gingerbrave’s chest.
Then Clotted Cream smiled.
"Of course. Forgive me. I would never wish to imply otherwise."
"It's okay."
Gingerbrave pushed his chair back into the table and crossed the room. His loafers made almost no sound against the carpet. At the door he could hear Hollyberry farther down the hall now, loudly insisting some to Pure Vanilla.
He reached for the door, "See you next time, Clotted Cream."
"Gingerbrave."
His fingers paused on the handle, curled slightly over the brass. Gingerbrave lifted his head and eyed the Consul over his shoulder.
Clotted Cream stood beside the table, one hand resting atop the polished surface. His expression remained pleasant, almost casual, but there was thought behind his eyecings now, the quiet calculation of somebody testing a surface with one careful finger to find where it might crack.
"There is one thing I don't quite understand."
Gingerbrave waited as Clotted Cream made a show of bringing a finger to his chin and tapping it.
"You declined because you're busy, yes?"
"I did."
Clotted Cream tipped his head.
"It just… well. I hate to say it, but it doesn't really add up. Pure Vanilla Cookie handles most affairs of state himself. Your kingdom has been peaceful for some time. The Moonstone requires inspection, certainly, but not daily attention. Your friends seem quite capable of managing their own travels."
Gingerbrave's hand remained on the door as Clotted Cream smiled.
"I suppose I only find it curious. You’ve always been rather good at keeping yourself occupied, Gingerbrave, but these days… one would think you had all the time in the world."