Asha faltered despite his overly welcoming appearance.
“If you’re busy, should I come back later?”
“No! It’s okay!”
Pavel quickly wiped his hands on the apron and welcomed Asha. As the sun was setting, Pavel, who had not even lit a light, began to light the lantern in a hurry. Asha tilted her head.
“Pavel, what happened?”
“No! No… Everything is fine.”
“I think your expression is a little off. Do you feel sick if nothing happens?”
“No… no. There’s something that bothers me. It is said that a delegation from the Noctis Elves will come soon.”
“Oh! Are you preparing dinner, too?”
“Ah, that’s what they’re going to do in the main palace.”
In other words, it was a matter for the chef of the palace where the Emperor is staying. It’s not his job as the chef of the Crown Prince. Asha gathered her eyebrows.
“But even so, Pavel’s expression…”
Asha mumbled, but Pavel turned first.
“So, are you here to make something again today?”
“Huh? Uh, uh, yeah. Do you happen to have an apple?”
Pavel patted his chest with a confident face.
After that, Pavel took out butter, flour, eggs, and sugar as she recited, washed the ripe apples, and put them on the cutting board.
“Is it a snack made of apples?”
“Yes, cookies. Sweet and sour. If you cut the apple into small pieces and bake it in an oven, it’ll be chewy, right? It’s a cookie filled with it. Add plenty of butter to the sable cookie and melt away.”
Asha came to the scaffold to match the height of the counter, and by that time Pavel had already chopped the apple in half.
“Argh! Pavel!”
“Isn’t this right?”
“That’s right… that’s right, but I was going to do it!”
“Huh. I’d be glad if you didn’t cut off your fingers.”
“I’m not going to cut it!”
“But if there is a scratch on your hand, even if it is a little, at the corner, my neck may be cut off.”
“…”
Asha stopped being stubborn and apologized. Pavel cut the lemon in half and juiced it while she scooped from a sugar bag to a scale. The sweet smell of the apple spread over the sour smell of the lemon.
She added the cut apples, weighed sugar and lemon juice, then spread the mixture on a pan and tossed it in the oven. She was going to put this in a cookie-like jam.
Asha, who saw Pavel set the temperature at her request, rolled up her arms again. It was time to make cookie dough.
“Oomph!”
Mix butter, sugar, and a pinch of salt, and stir until creamy.
The more you stir here, the softer the dough swells to create a soft texture. As the apple, which is the content, is heavy, it makes this side soft.
If the butter is clear enough, add eggs and vanilla beans to it, add flour, and then a little bit of the previously made Phoebe powder, and finally a little bit of cinnamon powder.
In the meantime, the baked apples were minced and made like jam, and the cold cookie dough was thinly spread on a small circular mold. Fill it with chopped apples and cover it with cookie dough, and that’s it.
It was the very moment when she was going to fill up a whole plate and put it in the oven.
“Asha? Are you here?”
“Oh?”
“Who came… Geeuk…”
Alexei, who came over the kitchen door frame, appeared with a smile. Asha opened her eyes wide in surprise. Alexei, a smiling face, was coming into the kitchen, making his servants return.
“Your Highness, Crown Prince!”
“Alyosha? How can Alyosha…”
“I went to see you, and I came because I heard you were here.”
At that moment, a light smoke burst into the kitchen. It was due to the fire of the lanterns that lit the kitchen.
<Alexei! Alexei! Look at me! Asha! Asha, tell me what I’m saying. I’m Alexei…>
<When will this fool be able to talk to his contractor?>
Fafnir and Phoebe bickered while Asha blinked, and Alexei greeted Pavel with a simple glance.
“I feel like it’s suddenly bright inside.”
Asha sighed at Alexei’s words as he looked inside. Alexei, who noticed the cause after seeing Asha’s reaction, smiled softly.
“It must be because of Fafnir. I have to apologize.”
“Oh, oh, no.”
Pavel shook his hand in a hurry. Alexei smiled a little at Pavel and then approached Asha, who stood in front of the counter. Then he looked down at a tray of cookies she had just finished forming and took a handkerchief out from his chest pocket.
“You said all the things you gave me were baked by yourself, but it was true.”
“Of course.”
Alexei smiled faintly and gently wiped Asha’s cheek with the handkerchief in his hand.
“I didn’t drop the peas in a flour bag, what is this?”
“Oh, my.”
Asha blushed with embarrassment and nudged Alexei away.
“P, put this in the oven first.”
“How long should I bake it?”
“Fifteen minutes at 170 degrees.”
At Asha’s words, Pavel adjusted the temperature and put the pan into the oven instead.
“By the way, Alyosha, what brings you here?”
“Didn’t grandfather give you a special gift?”
Alexei, who said so, was clearly smiling, but he had a complex expression that seemed to have sunk somewhere.
“…I wanted to give you something along the way, so I was going to ask you, but I heard from your lady-in-waiting that you were here. I didn’t know you were really making sweets.”
“Lise…”
Asha seemed to know why Lise had to tell Alexei about this. It was clear that she thought Alexei could control Asha, who didn’t listen to her.
At that time, Alexei lifted Asha without notice, sat her on the edge of the counter, and held her ankle in her hand.
“Even with this ankle, you wanted to stand in front of the counter and make snacks.”
Asha, whose hands were dirty, couldn’t even push Alexei away because she was touching the cookie dough a while ago.
“I’m almost healed, aren’t I?”
“How the hell did you get here? Were there no attendants guarding the door?”
“Don’t make the kitchen table dirty! Get me off now!”
“Or you were there, but you were so small that no one saw you? It’s understandable that they didn’t see you because you’re only a pea.”
“…”
The words didn’t work. Asha only pursed her lips. After this one-sided remark, it seemed that all Alexei wanted was for her to quickly clean up the kitchen and go back to her room to rest.
“…Just finish making this, then I’m going back to my room, so please put me down quickly!”
“Promise me that you will not come to the kitchen and will rest until your ankle is completely healed after you have finished baking these cookies.”
Asha bit her lips tightly and looked at Alexei with a resentful expression. Compared to her height, the counter was quite high, so she made snacks while standing on a footrest. It was quite burdensome to stand on a high footrest with an injured leg.
“You promise, right?”
“Then there’s no snack for Alyosha.”
“I don’t have to eat.”
“The snacks I made aren’t that delicious, so you don’t want to eat them?”
Hearing this, Alexei, who was silent for a while, smiled and rubbed the tip of Asha’s nose with flour from the flour bag next to him.
“If anyone speaks like that, I will punish them.”
“Oh, no! That’s not it!”
Alexei covered Asha’s cheeks with flour with his fingertips this time.
“Then you won’t let me eat your cookies again.”
“Oh, that’s not it…!”
This time it was the forehead.
“Or should I drop them in an ice lake?”
“That’s not it! I’m talking about Alyosha!”
Alexei had no sign of answering properly, so Asha eventually promised that, when she finished, she would rest in her room until her ankle was all better. Alexei finally dropped Asha on the floor.
“I was wondering what you were talking about because you asked me to give you sugar and butter as a gift…”
“Puheub.”
Asha flinched after putting cookie dough in a mold and filling it with boiled apples. It was Pavel, who had been silently listening to their conversation, who made the sound of the wind blowing.
“…Did I?”
“It was like that when you were lying down with a fever. I guess if you can’t remember that it was a dream?”
“…!”
Alexei looked at Asha’s concerned expression, not knowing what to answer here, and turned his words around instead.
“So how do you make this snack?”
“Oh, so… Add the apples, mince the baked into jam, and place in the cookie dough. Then you can bake it in the oven.”
“It looks very delicious.”
“Alyosha, do you like stuff with cinnamon? I put some cinnamon in the cookie dough too! I hope it suits your taste.”
“Are you going to give it to me, too?”
“Of course~!”
Asha smiled broadly as she said that, then tilted her head at the scent that brushed the tip of her nose. She seems to have smelled only sweet butter until now, but suddenly…
“Oh? Why does it smell like something burnt?”
“Oh, really?”
“Did something happen?”
Pavel, who had been quietly holding his breath beside her, looked around with a slightly embarrassed face. Nothing was lit except for the lantern, and the oven was obviously set to the right temperature.
“It smells like it’s coming from the oven? Why? Mister, let’s open it.”
Pavel nodded and opened the oven door with thick gloves in his hands. And at that moment, Asha and Pavel were greatly embarrassed by the sudden heat.
“W, wow! What is this?!”
Alexei quickly pulled Asha and covered her with the hem of her robe. Asha, meanwhile, poked her head out to examine Pavel.
“Pavel, are they burnt?”
“I, it was fine. No, it was an oven that was fine until lunch, but why…”
Pavel checked the temperature again, but the temperature was definitely right. In the oven, however, the cookies were still ripening, halfway between brown and black.
“Is the oven broken?”
Alexei asked.
