Chapter 8 #5
Daphne’s mouth twisted grimly. “You have a real knack for putting words in my mouth.” She handed Sam the book of matches from off the counter, then stepped back.
“I meant what I said before. Some people can’t see what’s right in front of them.
Other people don’t want to see what’s right in front of them.
But, Sam? The price of knowledge might be steep, but the cost of ignorance will always be greater. ”
Daphne could say whatever she wanted. She could issue as many cryptic warnings as she liked. Sam’s mind was set. No amount of cajoling or coercing would convince her to morally bankrupt herself.
A loud ticking filled the air.
“Sixty seconds,” Daphne called out.
Sam struck a match and dropped it inside the saucepan. Blue flames rose from the burning whisky, and Sam had to move fast, pouring the alcohol over the dessert before it flamed out. She finished just in the nick of time, the buzzer blaring loudly.
“Chefs, please put down your utensils,” Daphne said, and Sam took a careful step back, eyes sweeping over the three plates in front of her.
Maybe not her best, but not bad for something she’d whipped up in under half an hour.
“If you’ll both please grab your desserts and join me at the judges’ table. ”
A plate in each hand and the third cradled carefully against her forearm, Sam followed Daphne, making it halfway across the arena before her footsteps faltered and she stopped dead in her tracks, frozen with her heart in her throat.
A beast of a dog easily as tall as an African elephant, with three heads and six menacing red eyes, stood behind the judges’ table.
Its fur was the blackest black she had ever seen, so dark it seemed to eat up the light, more void than animal.
Drool dripped from its meaty jowls down onto the table, and it shifted impatiently on its feet, razor-sharp claws dragging against the ground, leaving gouges the length of her arm in the stone.
Sam turned, expecting to see a look of horror splashed across Hannah’s face to match the distress she was feeling, but with her shoulders back and her chin up, a demure smile playing at the edges of her lips, Hannah looked utterly unperturbed. Calm, cool, collected, and ready to face judgment.
“Chefs, you may set your dishes down.”
Hannah stepped forward, carefully placing a plate before each of the dog’s three heads, and Sam wondered what it was she was seeing, because as Sam approached and set her own plates down, she couldn’t help the whimper that escaped when the monster curled its lips back, revealing three mouths full of fangs.
Daphne had promised no loss of life or limb; there’d be no rending of her flesh today, she reassured herself.
“Chef Liu, would you care to tell the judges what you’ve prepared for them?”
“Of course.” Hannah clasped her hands in front of her and smiled. “Judges, today I’ve prepared for you a chocolate digestive made with the repurposed secret ingredient along with a torched hazelnut rocher pate de guimauve.”
Sam tore her eyes away from the mouth of the dog’s head nearest her and looked down at Hannah’s plate.
A chocolate cookie-cracker had been placed at a jaunty angle beside a white-and-brown dollop of what she assumed to be the pate de guimauve, its exterior bubbled, toasted.
Atop it all was a dusting of edible gold.
The presentation was beautiful, a little work of art, too pretty to be eaten, not that that stopped the three-headed dog-judge from bending over and wolfing it down.
“So,” Daphne said. “You basically made a pretentious s’more?”
Hannah smiled tightly. “I prefer the word elevated .”
“I’m sure you do.” Daphne turned to Cerberus. “Judges, what do we think?”
The air trembled and the beast began to speak in a language Sam couldn’t understand, and yet somehow, she knew exactly what it was saying as if a translation was being fed right into the language center of her brain.
Beautiful presentation , one of the heads rumbled. Good flavor, but the cookie isn’t crunchy enough.
Yes , another agreed. The cake needed more time to dehydrate.
Your pate de guimauve isn’t very white , the third complained. Not enough air was introduced while whipping the egg whites.
Sam took a step closer to Daphne and dropped her voice. “What language is this?”
“Ancient Greek,” Daphne whispered back. “Doric dialect.”
Huh. Doric-speaking gourmand hellhounds. Go figure.
I’m less than impressed by the guimauve.
The second head nudged its plate away with its massive snout.
Traditional pate de guimauve calls for marshmallow-root extract, which this does not have.
I expected marshmallow-root extract. That is what sets it apart from marshmallow crème. You, Chef Liu, have served us fluff.
A menacing growl filled the air, and Sam flinched.
No amount of calling a dog’s tail a leg will make it so.
With each critique, Hannah’s face fell a little more.
Sam wished she could reach out, take her hand, squeeze her arm, soothe Hannah with her touch, her words insufficient.
But that would be odd to this Hannah who didn’t know Sam personally, this Hannah whom Sam was supposed to have met for the first time today.
“Judges.” Daphne clapped her hands. “Your final scores?”
Seventy-six.
Hannah covered her mouth with her hand, distraught.
Eighty-nine.
Hannah blew out a breath, shoulders slumping, and tipped her head in thanks.
The final judge deliberated for a moment, red eyes narrowed, its tongue lolling from its mouth.
Seventy-one.
Hannah turned away quickly, head in her hands, palms pressed against her eyes.
“Chef Liu, your cumulative score for the dessert round is 236, bringing your total score for the competition to 735. Respectable.” Daphne looked at Sam. “Chef Cooper, what delightful dish have you prepared for our judges?”
Sam gulped. “Right. Hi, I, uh, I have for you a chocolate bread pudding with brown-butter pears in a Sazerac sauce, which I have flambéed.”
Once more, the beast devoured the dish.
The absinthe was a brave choice , the head nearest her said. I was not enthused by the idea, but it surprised me, pairing nicely with the creaminess of the pudding and the richness of the chocolate. I only wish you would have dehydrated your cake first to better soak up the custard.
That was … a fair critique.
Very moist , the head farthest from Sam commended.
The middle head rocked up and down in a facsimile of a nod, somehow both canine and serpentine at once. The chocolate-and-pear combo reminds me of poires belle Hélène. And the Sazerac is a charming nod to your Louisiana roots.
Sam didn’t know what to say. This felt like one of those nightmares she had after taking Benadryl.
Or a fever dream, maybe. A vivid, bizarre, unpleasant acid trip of an experience that—even if she weren’t truly in any danger—once she left here, she’d be in no hurry to repeat. Never would still be too soon.
“Judges.” Daphne beamed. “It’s time to award your final scores.”
Yes, thank you, final scores. The sooner they got this over with, the sooner Sam could congratulate Hannah on a game well played and invite her over to talk about pate à choux.
Grandma Baker always liked to say that the way to someone’s—well, she’d said a man’s , but Sam figured it applied to everyone—heart was through their stomach, and food had yet to fail Sam as far as wooing Hannah went.
Hopefully it would work just as well this time around.
The judges took a moment to deliberate.
Eighty-nine.
Ninety-three.
Ninety-nine.
“Chef Cooper, your cumulative score for the dessert round is 281, bringing your total score for the competition to 843, making you the winner of Daphne’s Inferno !”
“Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor started to play from speakers unseen as confetti rained down from the sky, little strips of shiny red and pink paper that stuck to Cerberus’s fur. In the stands, the gluttons continued to writhe, now covered in not only mud and slush but the confetti, too.
Sam was going to need so much therapy.
“Your prize, Chef Cooper.” Daphne held out a trophy, a cheap-looking statuette of Cerberus, more yellow than it was gold. “Wouldn’t want to walk away without your winnings.”
No, Sam definitely wouldn’t want that.
Ignoring the trophy in Daphne’s hand, Sam made a beeline over to Hannah, who was staring at her feet, her body slanted away from the judges.
“Hi,” Sam said, raising her voice over the music so that Hannah would hear her. “Good show today. You were a very formidable opponent.”
Hannah ground the toe of her shoe against the floor. “Sure,” she said flatly. “ Formidable. ”
Sam frowned. “I mean it. The composition of your plating blew mine out of the water.”
And that wasn’t flattery. Sam really meant it.
Hannah pursed her lips, still not looking at Sam.
A pang of sympathy echoed in her chest. Hannah was taking the loss a lot harder than she had expected. “Look, I’m no marshmallow expert, but I’ve heard pate de guimauve can be really tricky to get right, so you shouldn’t feel—”
Hannah scoffed. “I don’t need your pity or your condescension. Save it, okay?”
Sam’s mouth opened and shut uselessly. “ Pity? No, I didn’t mean to—”
“You know, I didn’t even want to compete in this stupid competition, but my agent told me it would be a good way to elevate my brand and get people to stop thinking of me only as the Pepsi-from-scratch girl.
He told me that if I went on this show, I’d be tapping into a brand-new demographic and I’d be sure to get a bunch of sponsors and maybe even my own cooking show like Selena Gomez.
” Hannah sniffled and blotted under her eyes with her fingertips.
“Now I’ll be lucky if I don’t lose followers. ”
Little did she know, no one, at least no one … topside , was going to see this show. “You’ve got hundreds of thousands of followers, right? That’s a lot.”
Hannah stared at her flatly.
“You mentioned wanting to know my secret to making pate à choux earlier,” Sam said, trying to rally. “We could go back to my place if you want, and we could make my chou praliné comme un Paris-Brest together and—hey! You could even film the whole thing and post it on TikTok.”
Hannah’s eyes narrowed and her jaw hardened. “You’re joking, right?”
Sam shook her head, lost. “No, I—”
“I am mortified right now. Do you really think I’m interested in going back to your place ?”
Hannah made air quotes around the last part.
Sam just couldn’t seem to say anything right. “I didn’t mean it like that. I swear. I really just thought we could make some pate à choux and … and maybe get to know each other?”
Get to know her so that Hannah would fall in love with her.
Sam held her breath, waiting and hoping against hope that Hannah would say yes.
“Look, Chef Cooper,” Hannah started, and Sam’s heart shrank.
It was Chef Cooper again, not Sam. “You seem nice, but my focus is on my career at the moment. On growing my brand. I don’t have time for distractions, and even if I did, there’s no way I could date anyone who embarrassed me on national television the way you just did. ”
Sam tugged on the end of her braided hair in frustration. Dammit, this wasn’t national television. This wasn’t even real . “I was going to make cake pops. You told me not to take it easy on you.”
“Because winning against someone who made stupid cake pops wouldn’t have been much of a win at all,” Hannah snapped. “It would be like winning against a little kid playing with a handicap in mini golf. To be perceived as the best, you have to be seen beating the best.”
Sam had lost the plot, no longer even sure what Hannah was mad at her for anymore. “I thought you’d be impressed with—”
“Oh, consider me impressed, Chef Cooper. I hope all of your success keeps you warm at night.”
Hannah spun on her heel and marched off.
“Wait, Hannah, please!” Hannah’s legs were so much longer than hers, the distance between them growing greater and greater. Too great. “This show isn’t even real! I know it sounds crazy, but, please, if you’ll just listen and trust me—”
Hannah stormed through an arched doorway, disappearing from sight.
“Oh,” Daphne muttered from behind her. “That’s not good.”
Not good?
Not good?
Anger burned white-hot through Sam’s veins. All she could taste was scorched copper, like there was an old penny jammed under her tongue, like she had a mouthful of metal and ash. There was smoke in Sam’s throat and she could have spit. “ You did this. This is all your—”
“No.” Daphne flapped her hand impatiently, and Sam had never wanted to wallop someone upside the head with a cast-iron skillet so badly in her life. “That’s the wrong vomitorium.”
She reared back. “The wrong what ?”
“ Vomitorium. ” Daphne pressed her fingertips to the space between her brows and sighed.
“It’s a passage that leads out of the arena.
” She pointed across the arena, stage left.
“ That is the exit. It pops out right at the corner of West Forty-Eighth Street and Tenth Avenue.” She turned and gestured to the door Hannah had disappeared through.
“ That is the passage to the second circle, where carnal malefactors are condemned.” She looked at Sam from beneath her lashes. “Lusty little louses.”
“I got it,” Sam snapped. “Go—go stop her, then! Bring her back! Do something!”
Daphne grimaced. “I would … if I could.”
“What do you mean ‘would if you could’? Are your legs broken or something? Go!”
“See, here’s the thing about Hell. Unless you’re visiting”—Daphne nodded to Sam’s visitor’s sticker—“every soul who enters Hell, not just those overcome by lust, must pass through the second circle. And every soul who enters the second circle must confess their sins to Minos, who then sentences them accordingly.” Daphne tugged on her ear and avoided eye contact.
“Not even I have the power to unring that particular bell, Sam. Once you’ve been condemned, there’s no leaving here.
You are, as the youths of today say, cooked. ”
A bloodcurdling scream rent the air, coming from the direction in which Hannah had fled.
Daphne winced sharply. “I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that the glamour I cast just wore off.”
Seriously? Fuck it. Sam looked Daphne right in the eye.
“Shenanigans.”