Page 16 of Dragons & Dumplings

"Yes." I lift it out of the proving box and pop it on the table in front of me. The smell of fresh dough reaches me and I let out a satisfied sigh. It'll be even better when it's baking, but I still love this part. It's everything. The smell, the repetitive movements of working with dough, and the way it feels under my fingers. It's smooth and sticky, but all that means is that it holds the promise of the bread to come.

Once it's in a log, we split it into equal portions. I'm excited to see how these buns turn out. The dough feels a little wetter than I expect it to, but I suppose it's making something I haven't had before, so that's probably normal.

Nate picks up one of the lumps of dough from his end and deftly rolls it into a ball, while I do the same from my end. It doesn't take us very long to have twelve perfectly sized dough balls sitting between us.

"And now we wait," I say dramatically.

He laughs. "Not for too long." He covers the dough balls with a cloth and heads over to wash his hands.

I do the same, pausing on the way back to turn over a smaller hourglass that only counts for a quarter of an hour. "I know it needs time to rest, but it still makes me impatient. I want to find out how it all comes together."

"I know you do." It's possible to hear the smile in his voice.

"And you don't?"

He bumps his shoulder against mine, making me smile. "You know I do," he reminds me. "But patience is part of baking."

"I know, I know," I promise.

"But this wait is basically up," he says, nodding towards the hourglass.

Rather than rushing, I head over to my journal and check the next part of the instructions. "We're filling the buns," I say. "Weneed to flatten the dough balls and put a tablespoon of mixture into them, then put them onto a tray with the bottoms down."

He nods and slides a tray covered in a layer of baking paper.

"I'm nervous," I admit. "What if we get this part wrong?"

"Then no one will know," Nate assures me. "And we'll get rid of the evidence."

A laugh escapes me without me meaning it to. "By eating it?"

"Only if it tastes good," he says as he pulls the cloth off the dough balls. "I'm not going through the debacle where you overcooked the custard again."

"As if that's worse than when you set the almonds on fire," I counter.

"That one was bad too," he agrees. "So, what do you think?"

"They look good," I say as I examine the dough balls.

Nate pulls the bowl with the filling in closer, putting it between the two of us and adding two spoons so that we can both work at once.

I flour my hands and pick up the first dough ball. "What do you think? Flatten it with my hand? Or a rolling pin?"

"Hands, I think."

I nod and start working on my first dough ball, making sure it's a perfect-ish circle. I pause before moving on to the next one, trying to decide if I want to roll out all six before doing any filling, but I don't think I really have the space for that.

I pick up the wrapper and add a spoonful of the filling. It's surprisingly red and has a sweet but savoury smell about it. I kind of want to try it already, but it's too late for that. Maybe once the buns are in the oven, I can. The edges squish together fairly easily, and I pop the bun down on the baking sheet next to the one Nate made.

We barely speak as we make the rest of them, mostly because we're used to baking like this together, and it feels comfortable. I don't think there's anyone else in the castle I can spend thismuch time with and not feel overwhelmed by their personal habits. Though maybe it's just because there are a lot of things for me to focus on in the kitchen, and it drowns out the sound of his breathing.

I've never really thought about it too much.

"I'm going to pop these on top of the oven for their final prove," Nate says as he picks up the tray, setting it in place.

I nod and use my spoon to scoop up some of the remaining pork mixture. I know it's cold, but I'm curious about how it tastes.

Nate turns around and raises an eyebrow. "And?"

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