Chapter 49: Apparently, Zorathys May Like Ice Cream
Chapter 49: Apparently, Zorathys May Like Ice Cream
Dinner was the same as yesterday or maybe it was just similar and not exactly the same. Zorathys and I sat in the same positions we sat yesterday, and this was mainly because he had removed all the other chairs and left only two. He claimed it was a precaution.
I wondered where he had been throughout the day, wondering if he had been sleeping, but then I remembered that he was king. He wouldn’t be sleeping — obviously, he would have been working.
But that wasn’t any of my concern though. There was something I was beginning to understand and also appreciate about the demon realm. And yes, it was their food. I had no idea how Kethra and the kitchen staff did it, but each food they brought out was like a feast, and I had no doubt it would be delicious also.
For dinner today, there was a pearl broth... at least that’s what Kethra called it. It was a clear, smoky stock studded with slivers of silver kelp and tiny dumplings that burst with a warm, herbaceous paste; a platter of charcoal-kissed stone-turnips glazed with a honey reduced from moonflower nectar, crisp at the edges and melting inside; a dish of seared skyfish served with a shard of candied citrus; and a small plate of lacquered fungus fritters, each puffed and caramelized, scented faintly of cedar smoke.
The dishes here were interesting, and even though they had different names, the taste was similar to the foods in my past life. And it was also better than Aelthryn.
With the way I appreciated the food, one would think I knew anything about food except to eat.
Zorathys, as usual, nudged his plate with the back of a spoon, studied it as if it were a riddle he didn’t understand and refused to understand.
He deliberately took a single measured bite, then pushed his plate away, flatly, as if he had confirmed it.
I wasn’t even surprised.
"You didn’t even try the broth," I said around another mouthful of stone-turnip, because why not be direct.
"I didn’t need to," he said with a yawn.
"Why?" I asked him.
"I’ve had it before. I didn’t like it."
"What if she improved the recipe?"
"I still wouldn’t like it."
"So you also don’t like everything set on the table before you. Good to know." I told him with a nod. "Seems you really want a big head."
Zorathys just gave me a bland look which I ignored as I ate my very delicious food that he couldn’t appreciate because... well, I don’t even know the fucking reason.
By the time I had finished eating, Zorathys had finished his glass of wine and water and then yawned loudly, stretching his arms.
"I’m tired," he announced, sounding like someone who had not slept properly in weeks.
I’ve only known Zorathys for a short while, but one thing I know is that he was always tired. Always fucking tired, like he had just run a marathon or something.
"Wait a minute," I said, because Kethra was about to walk back in with something I had begged her to bring: the dessert experiment she’d worked on earlier.
Zorathys looked at me with a frown. "I told you—"
"Wait," I interrupted. "Just wait for a bit. I need you to try something."
He huffed softly as if the universe were simply being deliberately tedious. "I am tired."
"Yes," I said, hands folded as if I were a magistrate. "You may be tired. But we are not finished."
He made a sound that sounded like he was half annoyed.
The doors opened, and Kethra came in carrying a shallow crystal dish like someone presenting a small, dangerous jewel. The three scoops sat there in a neat triangle: one inked the color of deep Veilwood nightberries, one glowed like emberfruit pulp, and the last was pale as moonlight with silver veins spun through it.
Zorathys leaned forward to inspect it as Kethra placed it in front of him.
"What is this?" he asked with a frown on his face.
"It’s a dessert," I said, because apparently we had to remind the Demon King what desserts were.
"A dessert," he repeated. "Hmm."
"We call it ice cream," I told him.
Then I turned to Kethra with a smile on my face, signaling her to continue the explanations, but she just stood rooted to the ground. Her hands were clasped in front of her, and they shook badly.
Her face had a mixture of fear, anxiousness, and a bit of anticipation... in short, she looked suffocated.
Zorathys lifted the tiny spoon to his mouth and took the white frostvine bite first.
I watched every micro-movement. His mouth moved slowly, and then he swallowed.
Then he took a larger spoonful of the nightberry this time. He sat straighter; his hands steadied. He tasted the emberfruit last.
I expected him to push them away at some point, but he didn’t. He kept on eating and took larger bites. He ate quietly without a word, and I watched as he finished everything. There was not a drop left on the plate.
I looked at Kethra, who now looked like she could breathe freely. She exhaled.
"Do you like it?" I asked him, intrigued.
"It’s not bad," he said to me, then turned to Kethra. "What are the main ingredients?"
"Nightberries from the Veilwood. Emberfruit pulp reduced with heat-spun syrup to capture the fruit’s bright warmth. And frostvine blossom — shaved fresh, folded into milk of crushed frostroot to give the final a clean, cooling finish. The three are balanced so the palate shifts from cool to warm to floral without becoming heavy."
Zorathys nodded, then stared at her with droopy eyelids. "I only asked for the main ingredients, not how you made them. I’m not really interested in how you made them."
Kethra swallowed, then nodded.
"I’m sorry."
Zorathys waved her off. "Well, at least I could eat it. The fruits are only tolerable to me, but you made them into something I could eat. I do not hate the texture of it nor the taste. That’s... okay, I guess."
Relief cracked across Kethra’s face into a smile so wide I felt warm all the way down to my ribs.
"Firefly," Zorathys said with an undercurrent of a whine. "Can I go now? I’m tired."
I didn’t even get to answer. A second later, he disappeared, the only thing left was a residue of a shadow that disappeared immediately too.
Kethra exhaled in a noise that was half laugh, half sob. "My lady," she said, "He finished it. He actually finished it."
"He did," I said with a smile.
Her eyes shone with gratitude. "For the first time in seven hundred years," she breathed, "the king has eaten something I prepared and finished it. This is—this is because of you. Because you insisted."
I shrugged, feeling shy all of a sudden. I didn’t really do anything.
I stood up from my chair. "I’m going to go to bed, Kethra."
"Oh, um, can you wait a moment, my lady? I have something for you," she told me.
I frowned but obeyed, and she turned into a tiny flame and moved out of the dining hall.
I had no idea Kethra could turn into a flame.