Sophia plunges her memory, of all the moments and times she had witnessed someone putting some edible item into a pot, a pan, or even right onto a fire; how all the times she snuck into the main kitchen and just watched as that Tiancin chef happily, and tacitly prepared a secret meal for the Fourth Princess (sometimes father joined her too, these small moments the only salvation for the spicy food lovers; away from the judgement of mother who hated even the sweetest of Capital Valley pepperoncini).
Who in this Goddess forsaken family could even cook?!
Mother, Alice, and even Naomi were off the table; two too prideful to even touch this lowly activity while the other simply ate whatever barely edible military rations that would come onto her tray.
Father certainly knew, despite his very feminine hobbies of hiking and mountaineering he was still a responsible dad when he needed to be. When the servants were out sick or chefs on their vacations, he was the one to bring forth bowls of stew, sauerkraut-beef sandwiches, and walnut pies from the kitchen to the cheers of his children (they were all half ‘savages’ anyway). And the people of Hautwarden respected the finer, simpler arts; to bring good food to the table was—according to her paternal grandfather, when he brought forth a leveled cheesecake that was demolished in less than thirty minutes—as honorable as fighting in war.
But Natan and Beatrice?
Natan was the pinnacle of husband material, as per his own stupidly hard working nature. Sophia was certain that father had taken him under the wings during his teenage years, whispering into his vulnerable ears the secrets that both seduced the sole Imperial Heir and the necessary additives of garlic, salt, and fragrant spices to add to any cooking dish. That brother of hers could probably create pancakes from gleaned corn grain, craft a tomato pasta out of raw spite (Sophia hated tomatoes with a religious passion), and a soup from pond water and frogs.
And Beatrice? Beatrice was good at everything.
Sophia just stares at the set of tools laid before her, how there was supposedly a methodology to creating something edible with pots, pans, and a charcoal furnace. And she quickly takes a peek into the pantry; observing how the jars of grain and barrels of preserved foods dominate the space, how the stacks of spices lined the shelves and how the sheen of bottles of wine spat back at her from deep within the underground storage space.
What’s something easy to make?! Her internal monologue asks the entire Council of Consciousness. What can we do?!
Check what we have first! A thought process suggests; its voice the only answer out of a room of silence. We must take inventory!
Printed paper glued onto each barrel and can, each label handwritten; marking the contents within with volume, date of purchase, date of manufacture, and item. The Tiancin Alphabet stares back at the Fourth Princess longingly, begging to be read and understood.
The labels! The visual cortex hisses. We can’t read this garbage!
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Sophia seizes up, shocked at this oversight before another part of her barks out the easiest solution. Just open the damn barrels and find out!
She somehow gets the three food groups out, extracted from a basin, a barrel, and a sack. A single onion, the size of both her fists put together, sits on the counter alongside a pre-cut flank of salted pork; sat alongside a large bowl of dried corn kernels. Vegetables, a protein course, and the necessary carbohydrates for survival… perhaps a decent meal?
This won’t ever be a meal. Her hippocampus waves dismissively. The last time someone in your family ate like this was probably father, out of rations at the very last legs of a mountain climb; resorting to eating whatever he could salvage out from his guard team of impericutta legionaries or hunt in the deep forest lands.
And now his fourth daughter shall carry on that legacy, in a fully stocked kitchen with all the time in the world she would be making food for the sole purpose of survival.
Fried pork and onion, side of porridge. Sophia’s internal monologue answers as it recalls. This is the iconic Hautwarden peasant dish. Simple, easy, delicious.
Sophia lets out an exasperated sigh at this sudden idea. Is there nothing else I can make?!
There’s a very long pause, her monologue replying simply. Based on your skill set? No.
It wasn’t like Sophia didn’t like the simple things in life. The day to day meals served within the Imperial Palace were very much crafted to the Central Ensolian palette; soups and grains, stews and steaks, and occasionally delicate pastries. A humbleness to such a thing, a continuation of their family’s balanced budget (two hundred years, debt free) and an insistence from their parents:
To spoil children spells disaster for the household.
It was good advice, applicable to every single one of the five kids except for Sophia. If anything on the table was disagreeable to her exceedingly strict palate, that young girl would rather starve. If just a single slice of tomato, a slimy mushroom, or mashed potato was placed to corrupt the food before her she would simply not even touch it.
Like on a hunger strike she would just sit in silence, stubborn as some political activist or religious extremist. Beyond reproach from the soft encouragements of supportive parents, onto the light teasing of teenage siblings, escalating to threats of groundings and even the removal of donuts from her diet.
The only way the Fourth Princess of Ensolia would ever touch any food item that she hated (and such a list it was), was if she was forcibly strapped to a chair with a feeding tube run directly into her stomach.
Cook this thing now, we’re starving. Her entire mental faculties speak at once.
Sophia just looks at the ingredients, the charcoal furnace, and monstrous black iron cookware. I’ve never cooked a single thing in my entire life…
And? Her internal monologue snaps back at her, some distant ancestor taking over with a vicious bark. When has ignorance stopped the Imperium? When has the Elise line taken pause before leading an army to battle? To give the final order to end a war? Are we not the most intelligent, wise, and beautiful leaders in the entire continent? What little thing such as…
Sophia takes her hand and places it onto the pot first. What about a recipe…?
A recipe is foolish, you’re smart enough not to use one.
Confidence surges, grasping the cast iron with wild determination. “I am Sophia Elise the Eighth, Fourth of the Silver Throne; heir to the Ensolian Imperium. And I swear upon my family name that I shall not be defeated here!”
LET. HER. COOK.
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