Chapter 3 | A Regular Night
– Irhaal –
The sun had already set and a crackling campfire lit.
Tonight was a clear and glittering night, only streaked by lost clouds.
As I was standing beside my caravan and peering into the sky, my friend Rae came out of the nearby woods with bundles of firewood in his arms. This was, of course, not the wood we would use for today's fire, but the reserve we would stow somewhere on our carriages to dry for later.
"Today is your turn to cook, 'haal," Rae informed me while passing by.
"Oh, I'm sorry," I blinked, "did you say something just now?"
"Glad to see your ears are still working," Rae chuckled and continued, "No but really, I know we run the risk of dying from your cooking, but you also improve every time, and in addition to that, it's your turn. You can't hide behind your wife all the time, and I have to do some other stuff. "
"What stuff you sham!?" I asked, trying to hide the uneasiness in my voice.
But before I could squeeze anything out of him, the voices of Sali and Channy reached our ears: "Guys, there is something seriously wrong here! The fire is on, but the food isn't!"
With raised eyebrows, Rae smirked, "Better get to it." and turned to stow away the wood.
I sighed and made my way back to the campfire, where two hungry women and a big empty pot were waiting impatiently.
My charming wife asked, "Food, when?" with a deadpan expression.
Got to love her sense of humor. I thought to myself and started with the preparations for a hearty stew before she got hangry.
It was the strangest thing. Tasks that required fast thinking, or remembering chronological orders or specific details, were right up my alley. But when it came to cooking, I was completely and utterly doomed.
Alright, let's get this over with. What came first? Remember, me.
I had my cutting board on my lap and began cutting onions. I forgot the reason why Rae cut them into pieces or slices, but decided to just divide them into four chunks and be done with it. Ah, I know, I should just do the same with every ingredient! And since I was making a stew, I probably didn't need to peel the onions either.
I felt Channy's eyes on my back. The pressure was on.
After the onions were all cut and ready, I began to dice the dried meat from one of the beasts that attacked us in the night a couple days ago.
Much to my own surprise, it was all coming along nicely.
After about five minutes of inept chopping on my part, Channy gave me a pitiful look, sat down beside me, grabbed a cutting board herself, and began cutting some potatoes in silence.
Much to my own surprise, it was not coming along nicely.
After a couple minutes of cutting had passed, she placed a bottle of oil suspiciously close to me on the ground. W-Was this a hint?
While I was busy keeping my face, my wife and Lilitella sat down near the fire and continued their heated debate that seemed to be about which bakery made the best cake back in Millishion. A pointless discussion, if you ask me, but I kept that to myself and poured some oil into the pot and placed it over the fire.
I assumed that I was partway done and almost felt relieved. Imitating what Rae always did, I threw some spices, the meat, and onions into the pot to roast.
"Obviously, 'Tanny's Beer-Pastry' was the number one place to visit first." I overheard Lilitella talking to Salihn confidently about a dwarven bakery.
Deciding that the meat and onion were now not raw anymore, I threw in a good handful of spices and berries. I also had wine at hand, so I took a good sip and poured the rest in there as well, then closed the lid. Rae always did it like this, more or less, and what could go wrong anyway?
"Yo not cool dude, building a harem over there," the man himself said, and took a seat.
Apparently, he had just lost a game of cards and needed a distraction in the form of alcohol.
Meanwhile, Lilitella was firmly defending "Tanny's" bakery for their unmatched usage of sugar, carrots, and sausages.
Brand, Zoralihn, and Grizzly were also coming back from their daily little reading session. Brand moved to his caravan and cut a good chunk of dried meat and fed it to the dog, which happily tore into it.
Brand, with my daughter hanging in front of him, now made his way to the fire and sat down with the laughing group that had relieved Rae of his bet.
Salihn, on the other hand, was making a valid point by saying, "the moist carrot cake with ground almonds in it that "Dan's Pasture" served was a kiss from the gods." Lilitella couldn't help but laugh.
I could tell by Rae's confused look that he too doubted her words. No, judging from his wavering, I would say he was more likely drunk already.
He still couldn't hold his liquor. While watching him gaze into the fire, I reminisced about the times we were thrown out of taverns because of him.
An innocent laugh pulled me back. Right, sweet little Zora had all eyes on her. She very likely didn't know it herself, but it was not just her who looked forward to this time of day. It was everyone else, too. The past few months had been rough on everybody, and reasons to laugh were practically nonexistent. Obviously, with all that had happened to all of us. But here she was, infecting everyone with her cute little smile and such adorable laughter that no one could resist.
"... or what do you think?" I suddenly heard Rae slur into my ear.
"I think it's..." Without knowing the context, I began to reply, but got cut short by Lilitella.
"Aah, shu 'your hole with your third-grade business understanding!"
It appeared that Rae had decided to involve himself in the debate. This was bad.
"Oh look who's talking now!" was the best reply Rae could muster.
"Well, it was you who sold top-grade armor for a loss." Salihn stated, not to Raes' amusement. The correlation between cake and armor was lost on me.
"It was only that one time I messed up the prices a little and you still hold that over my head! My dear Channy, please help me out a little and I will make it up to you."
"You are so full of shit, even your eyes are brown!" Channy replied, shaking her head.
In an overdramatic way, Rae opened his mouth, pretending he was struck dumb with horror, and put a hand to his heart.
"Well, you clearly like to rely on Irhaal in those kinds of situations, don't ya?" Lilitella stated, dragging me into this.
Argh! Why, I was trying my best to keep a low profile! I should feign ignorance for now. But just in case, I prepared a good comeback in my mind.
"Is the damn food done already?" Someone asked me. I didn't know the correct answer to that, so I replied, "Yeah sure, have some." I said and began serving bowls in the hopes that they were edible.
But the reaction to my food wasn't long in coming.
"The seasoning of this wine is not half bad, only the potatoes are still raw," said Channy dryly.
While Salihn and Brand were still deciding whether Rae should show more insight on why all his business ideas failed or not, Lilitella went to the pot to help herself to some food.
Meanwhile, the obviously drunk Rae appeared to be acting sassy and shuffled on his tree trunk, which he was sitting on, and tried to trip her up.
Needless to say, she caught up on it instantly and turned the tables on him by putting her foot under his and pulling it up to make him lose balance.
While this worked and resulted in him falling from his seat, she didn't account for the frantic rounding of his arms, the flying bowl of hot stew, and the dramatic landing of said stew on his face.
"Ahh, it buuurns! Water, quick, water!" Rae screamed while trying to wipe his face clean with my sleeves.
"Ha, serve you right to get dunked in this crap!" she said, adding salt to injury.
But little did she know that I had already prepared a comeback, so I blurted out: "Strong words coming from someone who thinks that "Tanny's Beer-Pastry" makes the best cakes. It's obviously "Volk's Ever Longing", with their elegant and delicious cup-cakes served with tea." I said, matter-of-factly.
A moment of silence. This was my victory.
"WHAT WAS THAT?" she exploded in my face.
Total defeat.
"Yeah, tell her!" Rae cheered, further escalating whatever this was.
Behind Lilitella I saw my wife with an exasperated expression and tried to calm her down. But Lilitella was not having any of it and was now out for blood. My blood.
"Talk about a sensitive topic, haha." came the shout from somebody else, set on witnessing the havoc and effectively putting the last nail in the coffin.
The evening ended with Rae hiding in a nearby forest, chased by a screaming dwarf, a very amused infant, and many exhausted and hungry faces.
Tonight's meal was not a hit, and the only one who seemed to have enjoyed himself was Grizzly.