A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking

by T. Kingfisher

across the floor. She was wearing grimy boots with mismatched socks. That seemed very sad. I mean, it was sad that she was dead anyway—probably, unless she’d been a horrible person—but dying with mismatched socks seemed especially sad somehow.

Bro theres a dead girl in your bakery and you think of that.....

on smoothly, it gives me a headache. Icing is not nearly as friendly as dough.) Since I was—apparently—a dangerous criminal, one of the constables rode in the coach with us, possibly to protect Inquisitor Oberon. I guess he might have thought he needed protection from a fourteen-year-old girl because I was a magicker. People get uneasy about that sort of thing. You can’t testify in court if you’re a magicker unless you’re holding a piece of iron, because iron is supposed to counteract magic, even though it doesn’t do anything of the sort. I use an iron skillet all the time. It’s just an old superstition. Frankly, an iron skillet would be a lot more dangerous than my magic at the moment. I could at least hit Oberon with it.

“I’m a wanted criminal!”

Metaphor was not Spindle’s strong suit.

Bro's really funny

“I wonder if Lord Ethan knows about this.”

She's a simp for him but i dont trust him at all idk why

They had died an awfully long time ago, but I still remembered how my mom smelled, and the way my dad chuckled, a furry sort of chuckle down deep in his chest.

Thats sad :(

“The Duchess,” I said out loud.

Not sure about that girl, but of you go ig TT

I had to get up once in the middle of the night and measure it.

Is she becoming insane or was she always autistic and I never noticed??

Well, that was depressing.

Its called propaganda

“You’re just like a brother to me. In the most annoying possible sense.”

Awwww

“You been eating too many of your own pastries!”

Boy that girl is probably underweight lmao

“You don’t have hips! Now pull!”

BAHAH

“Oh, my dears…” The Duchess’s face crumpled. “I know. I know. And I don’t know what to do!” And she burst into tears.

OMG NEVERMIND POOR BABY

When you’re different, even just a little different, even in a way that people can’t see, you like to know that people in power won’t judge you for it.

Spring Green Man.”

He's a bitch

Joshua very kindly donated,

I feel like joshua is hot

“Very deaf,” said Joshua, putting his knife away.

BAHA AND HE'S FUNNY

Joshua took up a post by the door.

Boy 0o0

he was in charge.

Damnnnn

It was the ripples. The ripples distorted everything. The flicker of pale green that appeared behind him was too broken up for either of us to notice it until the Spring Green Man put a knife into Master Gildaen’s back.

NO I LIKED HIM. Edgar or wtv the fuck your name is… Im coming for you.

Whatever Master Gildaen had said about his fading skills, I’ll swear that water was boiling when it hit the Spring Green Man.

RIP old grandpa, we will remember you

Joshua dragged the Spring Green Man off me.

YAAAAAAAA

He had clubbed him over the head with a chair.

BAHAH

I’d known him for less than an hour, but I wanted to bawl my eyes out. He’d been kind to me, and he hadn’t acted like I was just a little two-bit magicker, and he’d sent the message that might save us, and if I’d just been looking up instead of into the water—

I feel you mona

The Duchess reached under her dressing gown and pulled out a knife. It was as long as the big butcher knife that Aunt Tabitha used to cut up pork for our pork buns. She sat down next to the Spring Green Man and held the knife a few inches from his throat.

Omg i love her so much. Mommy

“So, do you think this will work, or are we all going to die?” didn’t strike me as very good either. “Think this’ll work, or are we all going to die?” asked Spindle, who was not troubled by social niceties. I sighed.

Omg spindle read the room (i love him)

I would have him executed

without any of the niceties if I dared.

Frrr

Harold was even less talkative than Joshua.

We love a mysterious man!! Although i think i might just be really into guards hihi

“Your men await.”

That sounds hot

We locked them in a pantry. They may be innocent—I think it likely that some are—but I would not be surprised if one or two of them are in Oberon’s pay, and it seemed better that they not have a chance to carry tales.”

He's always the funniest

swords, and a couple had those big halberd things that look like an axe and a spear got together and had really scary babies.

Bro why are you so random its killing me. You do have a point tho, after researching it makes sense

A low growl rose from the guards, like a great dog on a chain.

Ok yeah guards are hot

Somebody wanted their Duchess dead, and the guards were not happy.

Like damn boys. Loyalty is an attractive trait

I was fourteen.

somehow adults always forget about details like that when you're a "hero"

“I was in the army when I wasn’t much older than you,”

That random lore drop tells you the uncle is one of the best characters

You expect heroes to survive terrible things. If you give them a medal, then you don’t ever have to ask why the terrible thing happened in the first place. Or try to fix it.”

That goes hard

“My! Such handsome young guards they have these days!”

SEE?? She understands

Joshua grinned and the tips of Harold’s ears turned pink.

OMG

“I…but…bread!”

Oh how i've been waiting to see if she can make a bread golem

they’d be fourteen feet tall.

YASSSS

Golems.

YESSSS

From Aunt Tabitha, this was the equivalent of being consigned to the blackest depths of the abyss.

LMAO I just imagine aunt tabitha as a big buff women all tanned with an apron

“Mona, did you never wonder why he travels with an army? He throws lightning, certainly, but he could no more face the Carex alone than you could. He just happens to have two thousand trained men at his back at all times. If he were here, he’d tell you so himself.”

Josh my babe

After this, Our Lady of Sorrowful Angels would step down off her church spire and roll up her sleeves and begin punching dough alongside Aunt Tabitha.

Help

It’s a strange way to feel when you’re fourteen.

:( she's younger than me

“I’d add broken glass if I didn’t think it would hurt my hands,”

I love her

It is nearly impossible to be sad when eating a blueberry muffin. I’m pretty sure that’s a scientific fact.

Me with chocolate muffins

Wiggly Bob or whatever their names are—and have them do it?”

GIRL

My gingerbread man finished his arm waving, turned, bowed, and extended an arm in my direction. The bad cookies looked to me expectantly.

I love him too