Chapter 10
Coming down to the kitchens has brought me joy for as long as I can remember, but that's nothing compared to how it feels to come down here knowing that Nate is going to be around after so many years without him.
Baking has been the thing I do when I want to calm my mind from the intensity of the day, and doing it alone helps with that.
Doing it with Nate is on a whole other level.
Ember isn't as wary as she was last night and jumps off my shoulder the moment we enter the room, soaring over to the oven without paying any attention to Nate.
He looks up from the dough he's making. "Well, I guess that's an improvement on yesterday."
"Feed her a couple more times, and I bet she'll be sitting on your shoulder."
"I look forward to it," he responds. "Let me just finish getting the dough ready, and then we can use the dough I made yesterday to make croissants together."
"What do you need more dough for?" I ask curiously.
He chuckles. "I'm not here for a holiday, Evie. I'm working. And part of that means getting ready in case my employers arrive tomorrow morning."
"Oh, right." I frown. I know he's here because of the upcoming visit of the delegation from Wafeland, but it feels so normal, and so much like home, to have him here, that it's hard to remember. "Do you like working in Wafeland?"
"It's been an experience," he says as he encases his dough around butter, just like he did last night.
"Is an experience good or bad?" I ask.
"Both. I like the job. It pays well, and I get to do what I love."
"But?" I prompt.
"But it's not Falhaven," he responds. "I know the job that I want, and this is it. But the only position available is the one for the pastry chef, and I'm not qualified for that."
"You're more qualified than your father," I point out. "He's a baker first and foremost."
Nate shrugs. "I can't make myself have more experience than I do."
My heart aches in response. "I wish I could give you a job."
He laughs. "And that's probably why you're not allowed to."
"I'm not allowed to because King Harold III said so."
"How many grandfathers back is that?" he asks.
I think about it for a moment. "Three, I think."
"I'm sure there was a reason for him making the rule."
"There was. He found out that his daughter, so my great-great aunt or something like that, was having an affair with one of the maids, and didn't want her to have control over the woman's employment if things went badly."
He pauses, an intense expression on his face. "Did they?"
"What? End badly?" I check.
"Yes."
"They got married and had a baby," I say. "So I have to assume it went fine."
"I didn't realise." He wraps his dough in a cloth.
"Probably because you haven't been forced to memorise my family tree," I point out.
"Mmm, true. I'm going to take this to the ice house." He lifts the pastry bundle and heads out of the room.
I sigh and look over to where Ember is watching from the top of the oven. There's a strange feeling within me. I can't even start to place what's causing them.
Nate returns before I can get any further with trying to untangle them, and puts a cold block of pastry on the table, along with what looks like a bowl of custard.
"What's that for?" I ask.
"Well, the Graaf and Gravin aren't here, so I thought we could make half of the pastry into croissants, and half into pain-aux-raisins."
"They don't seem very Wafelandian," I say. "Aren't they Gaullessian pastry?" I wish my command of languages was better, but I've always struggled with it.
"They are. One of the reasons I got the job is because I trained in Gaullesse, that's where the previous pastry chef working for Prince Willem came from, and the family gained a taste for both," Nate says. "I don't mind it. I find making croissants soothing."
"That's because you haven't made them with me yet," I joke.
"Not true at all. I think I'll like making them even more, because I'll think about your impatience."
"I'd rather you think good things about me," I respond.
"I do that too," he promises.
I meet his gaze, something I don't do with many people, but when it comes to Nate, it feels natural. Like it's something we should be doing.
He clears his throat. "Croissants," he says.
"Erm, yes." I look down at the dough in front of us. "I don't think I did too badly at this part when I was making them."
"I assumed as much," Nate responds. "Your problem with patience isn't going to impact this part."
"I wish I were better at it," I admit. "I don't mean to be impatient."
"You're a princess, Evie. You haven't really had to wait for anything in your life," he points out.
"I waited for you to come back," I whisper.
"Impatiently," he teases.
I laugh without meaning to. "I'm not that bad."
"Having seen other royals in action, I'll agree," he teases. "So if you think you've got this part sorted, why don't you make the croissants?" He holds out a rolling pin to me.
"Are you sure?"
"We're baking together," he reminds me. "You can roll it out, then we'll both shape the croissants. But don't forget to split the dough in half first."
I flour the table and press down on the first half of the dough in the way that his recipe tells me to. I think it's supposed to loosen the butter or something like that. While I love to bake, I don't necessarily know the mechanics behind all of the methods.
Satisfied, I roll out the dough, feeling Nate watching my every move.
I know I'm doing it right because he doesn't make any comments about how I should be doing it differently.
This part of us baking together is a little strange to me.
In the past, we've learned a lot about baking together.
But now it's different. He's learned plenty of things during his apprenticeship and subsequent jobs.
Once I'm satisfied with the size of the dough, I set aside the rolling pin and take hold of the ruler, marking out the side of the dough so that we can make perfectly consistent croissants, except for the tiny pieces on either end.
"Wait, are these the scraps to make palmiers with?" I ask.
"Yes," he responds. "Or sometimes, we'd make mini-croissants with them so that we could have a snack after they came out of the oven."
"That's a good idea," I respond. "How am I doing so far?"
"Good," he responds. "Just be careful with the slices of the knife. You should use the ruler to guide you."
I do as he suggests, gliding the blade through the soft dough, hoping that I manage to get the lines straight enough. Once I'm done, I add a slit in the bottom of each triangle, getting an approving nod from Nate as I do.
"You just have to wait a bit longer to let your dough rest, and you'll be a master at making croissants," he tells me.
I laugh. "I doubt it. There are people like you who are making them most days who are going to be better."
"I'd still say you've done pretty well," he says as he takes one of the triangles and stretches the dough from the tip. I watch him make the first one. I'm reasonably sure that I've been doing it right, but I haven't had a chance to see him in action, and I want to make sure.
He rolls the croissant from the base to the tip and presses down the dough to seal it. And he does it much faster than I've ever managed.
I take one of the triangles for myself and roll it, pleased when it gains the croissant shape and looks like it's supposed to.
"You've got good technique," Nate says.
"Your instructions were really good," I respond. "And the drawings helped a lot too."
"I thought they might. I don't think they're always necessary, but I thought it might make an unfamiliar technique feel a little bit easier to do."
"You were right." A warm feeling settles inside me at the reminder of how well he knows me.
We continue rolling the croissants, putting them on a baking tray. My technique may be acceptable, but it's immediately clear to me which of them I rolled and which belong to Nate. I suppose that's to be expected when he's had so much more practice than I have.
"Now comes your favourite part," Nate teases.
"I know, I know. We have to let them prove again," I say.
"And then let them rest in the ice house too."
"Maybe I should tell you only to send quick recipes from now on."
He laughs. "They'd never keep you happy, you like a bit of a challenge."
"I do," I agree.
He covers the croissants and moves them over to a warmer part of the kitchen. "You're probably going to have to find a new spot to prove things if the wood-fired oven is going to be fully replaced."
"I'll have to find a new spot for my dragon if that happens too." I gesture to where Ember is still sitting on top of the oven, though her eyes finally seem to be closing. "So, pain aux raisins?"
He returns to the workbench and leans against it, a smile on his face that feels like it's the only thing I can see. I return it, hoping that I get to see it many more times before he leaves to return to Wafeland.
"We need to roll out the dough, a similar size to the croissants," he says. "Then we'll add the creme patisserie." He touches the bowl with the custard in it.
"And presumably some raisins?"
"Dried citrus peel too," he says. "We don't always have any in Wafeland, but I saw some in the pantry here.
"We make them from the peel of the oranges we get from Someil," I say. "We're free to use them though, I don't think they get used very much."
"Good, because a little bit of citrus peel really adds to the pain aux raisins."
"You've always said the advantage of us baking together is that you get to use whatever ingredients you want to."
"Pretty much," he agrees. "I've definitely missed that," he admits as he rolls out the pastry.
"Have you not done any extra baking?"
"Of course. But I've had to buy the ingredients rather than the kitchen supplying them," he says. "It's much easier here."
"There's got to be some reason you want to come back."
He pauses what he's doing and looks right at me. "I have lots of reasons to want to come back. Getting access to more ingredients to experiment with is nowhere near my most important reason to want to be in Falhaven."
"What is your most important reason?" I almost surprise myself by realising that I know what I want him to say.
A strange silence builds between the two of us until he looks down at the dough.
I'm not sure what to make of it. I'm not normally good at reading people, but I feel like I can with Nate sometimes. But not tonight. Maybe I should get us back onto a safer topic of conversation.
I clear my throat. "Do we put the custard on now?"
He looks up, surprise on his face. "What?"
"The custard," I say, gesturing to the bowl by his arm. "Is that what we're supposed to do next?"
He nods and picks up the bowl, handing it over to me.
I take it from him and start brushing it over the dough, not going too heavy with it.
The dried fruit follows, dotting the dough and briefly distracting me from the confused feelings within me about the conversation we're abandoning.
I want him to say that I'm the reason he wants to be in Falhaven.