Merchant Crab

A young girl moved through her cozy kitchen like a dancing breeze, whipping her strawberry blonde braid around with every turn and spin while she happily hummed a gentle melody familiar only to her. The flour-dusted apron around her waist fluttered as she twirled from counter to oven, a wooden spoon in one hand and a bowl balanced in the other, like a practiced choreography that came effortlessly to the baker.

In that kitchen, she was in her element, like a crab in water.

Wearing a sunny smile, Madeleine pirouetted to one of the pantries and plucked a jar of cinnamon from it. With a flourish that would make a stage artist proud, she sprinkled a perfectly spread layer of brown dust on the dough stretched over the stone of the counter. Her feet barely seemed to touch the ground between each motion that carried the grace that only came from doing something you love.

"It's important to add the cinnamon before folding," the girl explained as her bright green eyes carefully scanned each bit of the dough before her. "We want to make sure the taste is evenly spread everywhere. Biting a portion that has too much cinnamon can ruin the whole experience!"

On the counter, next to the rectangle of dough spread over a bed of flour, sat the baker's enthusiastic apprentice, listening to her every word with a gleeful smile.

"Creee!" chirped Pebbles.

"That's right!" Madeleine exclaimed cheerfully, clapping her hands together and producing a small cloud of white powder. "You got it! Next we knead the dough!"

The small, round stone rocked herself from side to side on the counter happily. "Creeeeeee!"

"Alright! Now, where did I leave my rolling pin?" the baker said, placing her hands on her hips and looking around.

She searched the drawers, peeked into the counters, and rummaged through the pantries, searching for her trusty utensil, until finally her gaze landed on the sink.

"Oh, silly me!" the girl said, smacking a hand on her forehead and leaving a white palm print on it. "There she is."

Madeleine grabbed her rolling pin from the kitchen sink and turned around to return to the dough.

"Got it. Now let's—Oh!"

Her eyebrows jumped as the baker looked at the counter and found a small pebble vigorously rolling herself back and forth over the spread dough in straight horizontal lines to cover the entire surface.

"You're rolling the dough yourself?!" the nearly incredulous baker said with a surprised smile on her face. "You're a quick learner, Pebbles!"

After watching the little rock laboriously work the dough into a thinner and softer sheet on the counter, the girl gave another few encouraging claps.

"Good job! My rolling pin and I are impressed!" she said.

Pebbles rolled away from the dough and stopped with her face covered in white powder turned to the baker.

"Cree!" the golem's companion said with a grin, her tiny, beady eyes closed in an expression of joy.

"Now," Madeleine continued, "comes a little secret of mine to add something special to the final flavor."

She looked around playfully, as if searching for anyone who might be spying on them, before leaning closer to the pebble and lowering her voice.

"I like to add a little bit of nutmeg to it."

With a mischievous smile, the girl reached into her satchel, which was resting on a nearby table, and retrieved from it two small brown kernels that looked almost like walnuts.

"But it has to be freshly-crushed nutmeg," Madeleine explained, giving each of the seeds a quick cut with a knife before dropping them into a stone mortar on the counter. "It's way more aromatic that way."

With a slight frown, the baker looked around the counter.

"Where's the pestle?"

Learning from the previous search, Madeleine walked to the kitchen sink and looked inside.

"Aha! Found it," she said, retrieving the phallic stone tool from the basin.

As she moved back to the counter, the girl realized the small living stone was missing.

"Pebbles?" she called.

A soft crunchy noise came from the mortar, and when the baker peeked inside, she found the little stone rolling herself around over the cut seeds, slowly crushing them into dust.

"Hey, now!" the amused girl said, both hands firmly placed on her waist. "You're going to do my whole job for me at this rate."

The pebble giggled as she continued to make circles inside the mortar, until the nutmeg kernels had been thoroughly ground into a fine light-brown powder.

Madeleine carefully plucked the chirping stone from the mortar and placed her down on the counter before bringing the stone bowl up to her nose.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

"Hmmm," she breathed, bringing the mortar back down in front of her rock companion. "You feel that? The smell of fresh nutmeg is just so wonderful."

"Cree?" the noseless stone chirped.

After another half-hour of preparation and much giggling, the two kitchen friends had a tray of raw delicacies ready to bake.

"Alright, Pebby!" Madeleine said, standing back up straight after checking the fire was burning the way she wanted. "Now we slide these into the oven and wait for the heat to do its magic."

After pushing the cinnamon pastries into the hearth's opening, the baker threw her braid behind her shoulder and sat on a stool next to the counter, with a direct view of the bright glowing inside the oven.

"Cree-cree!" Pebbles exclaimed, sitting on the edge of the counter near the girl's shoulder.

"Ooh, good idea!" said Madeleine. "A hot tea would be nice while we wait."

She got up and moved to the cupboard with all the larger kitchen cookware. After retrieving a kettle from within and filling it with water, the girl placed it on the stove.

"Now, what kind of tea should—" Madeleine paused and looked around the counter. "Pebbles?"

The small rock was gone again, and the baker tilted her head while placing her hands on her hips once more.

"Now where did that little rascal go this time?"

Madeleine looked over the counters, inside the drawers, searched the pantry, and scanned the floor below—no sign of the animated pebble.

Starting to feel worried, the girl spun around in front of the working oven with a slight frown on her face.

"Where could she—Oh my goodness!"

The baker screamed as her gaze found Pebbles sitting inside the burning hearth, next to the baking cinnamon pastries and right between the dancing flames.

"No, no, no, no, no!" Madeleine cried out in a panic as she hurried to put on her oven mittens and grabbed the peel standing next to the hearth.

Pushing the flat shovel into the oven, the girl used her mastery of the wooden paddle to quickly slide it under the pebble and pull it out.

"Oh, please say something, Pebbles," the distraught young woman begged, kneeling down as she let the stone roll off the peel and onto the floor. "Balthazar is going to kill me if Bouldy's core breaks again from the grief."

Carefully sliding her gloved hands under the red-hot rock, Madeleine turned it over as wisps of white smoke emanated from it.

"Creeeeeeee!" the pebble chirped happily as its beaming face looked up at the baker.

"Oh, thank Crea," the girl said, letting out a long sigh of relief as she brought one of the mittens over her heart. "What were you thinking? You gave me such a fright!"

"Cree-cree!" Pebbles giggled.

"What do you mean, you wanted to see the pastries baking from up close?!" Madeleine said. "That's dangerous! You can't just roll into a working oven, it's really hot in there! You could have gotten hurt!"

As she gently slid the pebble off her mittens and onto the counter, the girl examined the stone. The orange glow from the heat was already fading, and she seemed completely unharmed, not a crack or chip to her perfectly smooth surface.

"Or… not," Madeleine added, looking at the little stone with a slight tilt of her head. "I guess you are both adorable and durable."

"Creeeeee!" Pebbles happily exclaimed, her chirp mixing with the high-pitched whistling of the boiling kettle.

***

"Should we shake on it?" the adventurer in black leather armor said to the crab, extending his right hand to him with a grin as they finished settling on the values of their trade.

Balthazar rolled his eyestalks. "No, we really should no—"

The merchant paused and narrowed his eyes at the smirking rogue.

"Oh, you're trying to be funny."

The man pulled his hand back and let out a quick laugh. "Haha, I'm glad to see you can appreciate a good joke."

"You're right, I do appreciate a good joke, that's why I paused—I was waiting for one."

The rogue laughed for a moment longer before suddenly stopping, as if the crab's words had finally clicked in his head.

"Anyway, it's getting late and the sun is going down. This is the part where you're supposed to pay," the merchant said nonchalantly while confirming that all the agreed upon items were in the crate between them.

"Yeah, sure, alright," the adventurer muttered bitterly as he pulled out his coin pouch.

After the irked rogue finished paying and the trade was complete, a familiar notification appeared in Balthazar's sight.

[A load of junk traded. Experience gained.]

[You have reached level 33]

Nice, another one. The crab thought.

While the adventurer sorted through all the items he was going to leave with, Balthazar quickly navigated through the familiar level-up prompts with practiced ease.

Adding ten more points to his maximum health left him with 320, and with three attribute points added, the crab's Charisma reached 96.

As he dismissed the system prompts, the merchant saw the rogue leaning over the counter with his head stretched forward, both of his nostrils flared and sniffing loudly.

"The hell are you doing?!" Balthazar asked harshly.

"Can you smell that?!" the incredulous rogue said. "It smells delicious. Something with cinnamon?"

"Hey, stop sniffing!" the merchant exclaimed, trying to shoo away the human's nose. "Smelling the baking from my bazaar's kitchen costs extra!"

"Come on," said the rogue. "I really want one of whatever it is now!"

"No way. I know for a fact I cleaned you out with these daggers and blade oils, so you don't have a coin left in your pocket. No tasty pastries for you! Now shoo, go before your nose consumes all the nice smells."

After he watched the disgruntled adventurer leave with his items, muttering unpleasantries under his breath, Balthazar turned to walk around the corner.

"Gah!" shouted the crab, jumping in place with a fright. "Don't scare me like that, Tom!"

The old skeleton wearing an even older jacket full of moth holes and a ragged hat chuckled.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you." said Tom. "Actually, I kind of did, but that's just part of the job when you're an undead."

Balthazar rolled his eyestalks but remained in front of the skeleton.

"It's not even nighttime yet, what are you doing out here?" he asked. "Did something happen inside the dungeon?"

"You could say that," the grinning skull said.

The crab frowned. "Wait, do you mean…"

"Yep," said Tom. "We finished setting up everything. You want to take the guided tour through the new Halls of Semla?"