Title: Four Times a Queen Chose Her Knight and One Time She Never Chose
Universe: Yumeiro Patisserie, manga focused
Theme/Topic: 4 + 1
Rating: PG
Character/Pairing/s: Ichigo/Hanabusa, Ichigo/Andou, Ichigo/Kashino, Ichigo/Henri Lucas
Spoilers/Warnings: None, really?
Word Count: 1,401
Summary: There once was a sweet Queen with a court of knights.
A/N: I'm an amateur baker when not being a harried student. My other indulgence is fluffy shoujo manga. Good lord, what have I done?
Disclaimer: No harm or infringement intended.
1. The Rose Prince
Their romance is one of gentle chiding and laughter. He dresses her like a doll in the latest fashions (in pink or red or pure white), has her wear pearls around her slender neck and curls her chestnut red into ringlets. She never wears rose perfume, just for him, but she chooses to share a bed scented with dried rose petals with him and the rose gold and ruby ring on the chain around her neck.
He needs her much more than she ever needed him and it frightens him to contemplate that. After all, he's too happy to be wanted and needed and sought after. He can make his choice then, to be gracious and charming and just a little out of reach.
But when he's on his knee in front of her, he realizes she has a sword in her hand and though its blade is flat on his shoulder, it is perilously close to his neck.
She is truly terrifying because she never realizes it.
Instead, she kisses his cheek after his teasing kisses. She makes his tea just how he likes it, always holding the cup and saucer with comically exaggerated care. She smiles the same smile when he brings her pearls or a new dress or a hundred sugar roses or the sugar for her coffee. And really, he knows somehow that smile is meant for him, even if doesn't seem to change one iota to the expression she presents to the world, whether to her apprentices or her customers or her family. It's just his and his alone, somehow, just like the cake she bakes for their anniversary, that marvelous dessert of peach and berry and passionfruit atop flaking meringue and vanilla bean ice cream. Sweet and bright and easily loved, of silky and creamy vanilla in deceptively easy harmony.
He wouldn't trade the coiling and uncoiling complex fright and warmth and desire and tension for anything in the world. It's a beautiful thing, after all.
2. The Merchant Prince
Theirs is a quiet romance.
Theirs are of early mornings when he brushes her hair from her face and kisses the tip of her nose. Theirs are the moments when he pauses when she's in the middle of washing pots or sifting flour just to marvel at her honest smile and her low humming.
She always blushes when he takes her hand in his. He likes to pull her forward by that hand, until she is comfortably resting against his chest and he could almost hear the rhythm of her heartbeat quickening. She rests her forehead against his chest and their hands still remain entwined.
They don't say the words in those moments because they don't need to.
They are two people of wordless actions of affection together, despite her cheery chatter to customers and even at him when they are in that particular flurry of preparations. It's because some things don't need to be said, but do have to be shown. He ties the ribbons of her apron though his bow loops are always just a little crooked. She cleans his glasses even though she almost always misses one spot. It is in the black sesame macaron with dark caramel filling she bakes him or her sweet potato sponge with melting flakes of chestnuts atop vanilla cream – with love, care and dedication.
Every night, they put on their wedding bands, her from the silver chain around her neck, him from his pocket. He reaches out to warm the small but bright diamond that graces her finger, a diamond bought a hundred years ago from India. With his hands around hers, he says, quietly, "I love you."
She smiles just for him and it doesn't threaten to split her face but it's so impossibly lovely that he falls in love with her again.
3. The Dark Prince
Theirs is a romance of fire.
They wind around each other, glaring and spitting and clutching at each other. Theirs is a contrast of flavors – sweet to tart, soft to dense, salt to bitter to sweet all over again. Strawberry slices atop ganache on dense torte, apricot jam and raspberry jam with shards of salted almonds.
He doesn't ask of her; he demands of her. But the hands he holds her with are gentle and hesitant and his eyes are as soft as his voice is harsh.
If he swings her up in front of his saddle, he doesn't give a care if she bruises or loses all dignity. But he holds onto her and follows her and never once lets her fall.
He doesn't dare call himself a prince; he refuses to title her a queen. But the form is still the same and he grumbles to himself about it.
Sometimes, he wonders if he will bruise her so much, jostle or scar her so that she will flee him and never return. He finds himself pushing her away and hates himself for it. There may be that time she won't be back, that she sees that there is no romance to him at all, that he's prickly and spoiled and pigheaded and all too human.
But she always comes back.
She isn't understanding and gentle and ever-smiling. Sometimes there are shrieks, a throwing of a pan just aimed to miss, a few choice unrepeatable words. But she forgives him and that forgiveness is what matters. They kiss and they both still, frozen and lost to each other.
4. The Gold Prince
It is only when they are older. She is definitely older and wiser, her hands scarred from hot sugar syrup burns, her arms well-muscled. She still has the same smile, though perhaps even sweeter, no longer the bright, irrepressible expression of youth but the content and secretive curve of womanhood.
He hadn't wanted this. But one day, he had turned and realized she had grown up right in front of him and his feelings weren't nearly so fraternal anymore, the warm sentiment no longer so comfortable and, well, appropriate.
And it was just too easy to fall into a pattern with her, swapping narratives and deepening flavors. If there was once a time of tart berries and silken vanilla mousse, it was now a time of bitter chocolate and gold oranges and dark rum.
When he tastes from her plate proposal, he understands. He looks down at choux pastry filled with honeyed chestnut and brandy cream, draped with bittersweet chocolate and dotted with strawberry sauce. Sweet and rich, oily and dark, ever lingering yet easily dissipating.
"'Winter Lovers,'" he repeated.
She smiles that smile that is honest and shaky and bright. She doesn't say anything because he tastes stories and really, it should speak for itself.
He kisses her then as he cannot help himself. He's waited just long enough.
5. The Queen and Her Men
There is a little shop called "Cuillère de la Reine" run by a pleasantly smiling woman with long brown hair she keeps in loose curls that look like pulled taffy or curlicues. Occasionally, she is helped by a gallant young man, to the joy of the schoolgirls fortunate enough to come in. Then the case is filled with tea infused custards, tarts of apple slices placed in a petal pattern, and "Antonia," slender slivers of almond and raspberry cake with rose cream and pomegranate macaron hearts. Sometimes, the shop is helped by a politely pleasant man in glasses who offers free samples of matcha caramels until the woman swats him for stealing customers. Then the case presents chestnut pound cake and sweet potato egg tartlets with brittle honey lattices and "Tsuki," a soy cookie tartlet filled with kudzu and blackcurrant jelly adorned with a white chocolate crescent. It is rare when customer is directly helped by a scowling blonde who seems far more comfortable in the back, though his arrival means the day's limited release of the gloriously decadent Tasse de la Reine with its crisp, easily shattering layer of bitter chocolate and soft coffee and rum flavored mousse.
But the woman is always there and always smiling. She often serves her customers herself, pouring tea from a bone china pot patterned with wild strawberries with bright green leaves and pale pink blossoms. And even with chocolate smeared on her cheek, her apron dusty with flour, she is no less warm, welcoming and gently regal.
Additional Notes:
I really wish that there was more character development for Andou and Hanabusa in the manga series. As cute as the relationship between Kashino and Ichigo is, I find the other two Sweets Princes to be fascinating in their own right, particularly the implied troubled backstory for Hanabusa based on the tragic death of his father. While Andou is probably the most well-adjusted of that entire bunch, I would like to see more hidden depths to him and possibly him stepping up as being the gentle guide to the entire group, with Ichigo as their representative and "glue."
Hanabusa's dessert is meant to evoke two notable desserts associated with Australia: the pavlova and the Peach Melba. Both desserts are named after famous figures, namely the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova and Australian opera singer Nellie Melba. A pavlova is a meringue cake topped with fresh fruit and passionfruit jam. A Peach Melba is vanilla ice cream served in half a peach and covered with raspberry sauce.
Andou's desserts are made up in part by me. Black sesame macarons are popular in Japan and Korea, as black sesame is a popular flavor in both countries and are believed to be healthy. Sweet potato cakes are inspired by sponge cakes often sold at Korean bakeries though they don't add chestnut flakes.
Kashino's "dessert" is of course inspired by the Sachertorte which he made for his grandfather's birthday in the manga but also the Linzer torte, an almond based cake dotted with raspberry or apricot jam.
Henri Lucas's dessert is made up by me as well. But the name is not mine – it's based on a fried ice cream dessert made by a character in the cooking manga Bambino!. At the same time, it makes a lot of sense given the winter imagery so often associated with Henri Lucas (Like Mari-senpai's confession).
Cuillère de la Reine – The Queen's Spoon
"Antonia" – Hanabusa and Ichigo were inspired by Marie Antoinette's transition from the Austrian court to the French court so they created a cake that had French and Austrian elements.
Egg tartlets – technically not a Japanese sweet but a Taiwanese one. Still I think this has enough fusion in it to be something Ichigo and Andou would come up with.
Kudzu jelly – kudzu is a Japanese flowering vine that is cultivated for its young shoots and blossoms, which can be used to make a jelly. It's also an invasive species in the southeastern United States.
Tasse de la Reine is inspired by an actual drink drunk by the French court in the 1700s - a combination of chocolate, cream and ambergris (Yes, the stuff used in perfumes).