Chapter 13 – From Shards to Crowns

  The street outside the Ashborne Café was already lively when Mira flipped the board around. Chalk dust clung to her fingers, the fresh lines catching the morning sun. Beneath the usual list of rolls, pies, and sweet buns, four new entries gleamed in bold script:

  Aurelian Citrus Tart – 1 Crown

  Calvessan Sunfruit Custard – 1 Crown

  Zerathian Spiced Chocolate Cake – 1.2 Crowns

  Virelian Cream Parfait – 1.5 Crowns

  A knot of dockhands on their way back from the night shift slowed, one jabbing a finger at the board.

  “Would you look at that—the Ashbornes are on a roll these days. New recipes coming out like it’s nothing.”

  “Mm,” another said, leaning closer. “Makes you wonder how they’re pulling it off. Yesterday it was rainbow buns, now Aurelia citrus?”

  But as the numbers sank in, their excitement faltered.

  “Crowns? Wait… crowns? Not shards?”

  A student carrying a slate frowned. “One crown for a tart? That’s not shards… Did they make a mistake?”

  “They must’ve,” someone muttered hopefully. “What café in Lanternreach charges crowns for pie?”

  The small crowd murmured, excitement fading into worry. If everything had gone up to crowns, the Ashborne Café would no longer be a place for daily bread and rolls—it would become a luxury stop, too costly for them to come every day.

  When Mira opened the doors, the group shuffled inside together, a wave of eager questions spilling ahead of them.

  Lucien had expected this. He wiped his hands and stepped forward, steady. “The board is correct. Yes, some new items are in crowns. But—” he raised a hand as a few faces tightened, “everything you’ve always bought here stays exactly the same price. Shards, as always. Bread, rolls, pies—nothing has changed.”

  The collective sigh of relief was almost comical. Shoulders dropped, and a few nervous laughs broke the tension.

  “So the everyday food’s safe?” one asked.

  Lucien nodded. “Safe, yes. The new recipes are different. They use ingredients from Aurelia, Virelia, and Zerathis—brought fresh here by the Marilon Logistics Guild. Those aren’t cheap to bring here, so the cost is higher. That’s why they’re marked in crowns. They’re not meant for every day—they’re something special.”

  A dockhand whistled. “So that tart really has Aurelia citrus in it? From the empire’s groves?”

  “And the parfait—Virelian cream?” a student asked, eyes wide.

  Lucien let his voice warm, turning explanation into invitation. “Exactly. Aurelia’s citrus, Virelia’s dairies, Zerathis’s spice blends. Even the sunfruit custard—our own Calvessan tradition, refined with better technique. These are flavors you don’t often see here in Lanternreach. The price reflects the journey they take to get here. But they’re options, not replacements. Think of them as a festival treat, except you don’t have to wait for a festival.”

  The group exchanged curious looks. One student grinned. “Never thought I’d see Aurelia’s citrus on a menu here in Lanternreach.”

  Another dockhand rubbed his hands together. “All right then, Ashborne. One tart for me. Let’s see if the empire’s fruit is really worth a crown.”

  The others chuckled, hesitant but intrigued, as Lucien passed the order back into the kitchen. Already the whispers had shifted—no longer about mistakes or gouging, but about curiosity and pride. After all, it wasn’t every day folks in Lanternreach could taste Aurelia, Virelia, and Zerathis all in a single morning.

  The first plates went out cautiously, each set down with more care than usual. Mira placed a slice of the Aurelian Citrus Tart before a pair of older dockhands, the glaze catching the light as if it had been brushed with gold.

  One of them poked his fork in, chewed slowly, and raised his brows. “Sharp as a ship’s wake, but clean. Cuts right through the tongue, doesn’t it?”

  The other chuckled, already halfway through his slice. “Aye. Haven’t tasted anything this bright in years. Worth the coin just to wake you up.”

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  At another table, a pair of students leaned over a shared Virelian Cream Parfait, spooning carefully through layers of cream and duskberry. One shook her head in disbelief. “It’s like eating silk. If the professors served this in the dining halls, no one would skip lectures.”

  “Forget lectures,” the other muttered between spoonfuls. “I’d skip meals just to save for this again.”

  Nearby, a group of merchants tried the Zerathian Spiced Chocolate Cake. The eldest, a man with salt-and-pepper hair, broke it open and let the spiced filling run across his plate. He tasted, sat back, and whistled. “Dark, rich, warming. Reminds me of winters up north. If I served this at a negotiation, half the contract would sign itself.”

  One of his companions grumbled good-naturedly, licking his fork. “Rich, aye. And so’s the price. Tastes divine, but I’d need deeper pockets to make it a habit.” Laughter followed, easy and warm.

  The Calvessan Sunfruit Custard drew its own crowd: families, apprentices, even a gray-haired grandmother who tapped her cane against the table before taking her first bite. She chewed, eyes closing, then smiled faintly. “It’s the custard I grew up with—but gentler, smoother. Like memory, polished.”

  Her granddaughter clapped her hands. “See? Even gran approves.”

  As the morning stretched on, the café filled with a strange mix of chatter: laughter at the prices, exclamations over flavors, and the low hum of satisfaction. A young courier joked to his mates, “I’ll stick to rolls for breakfast, but I’ll sell a delivery run or two just to taste that parfait again.”

  Another voice rose near the window. “Well, look at that—Lanternreach finally has a café serving Aurelia and Virelia imports. No more trekking across the city just to taste something fine.”

  Heads nodded, mugs raised in agreement. For once, their corner of Marilon wasn’t so bad.

  The orders kept coming. One crown at a time, then two, then more. What had started with cautious curiosity became a rush.

  By mid-morning, Mira was wiping sweat from her brow as she ferried plates back and forth. “Another citrus tart!” she called, already reaching for the next order slip. “And two more parfaits for the students by the window—no, make that three!”

  Jareth swore softly under his breath as he pulled another tray of chocolate cakes from the oven. “We’ll run out of spice paste at this rate.”

  “Already steaming the next batch,” Lucien said quickly, hands moving without pause. His apron was dusted with flour and citrus zest, his fingers sticky with syrup, but he barely noticed. Every time one plate left the counter, another order landed in front of him.

  Even Elias, usually calm behind the slate, shook his head as he logged the sales. “They’re not hesitating. Crowns, Lucien. Actual crowns, and they’re paying them without blinking.”

  Cerys laughed as she carried a custard to a family table. “Looks like first-day luck. Everyone wants to be the first to brag they tried it.”

  “Or maybe,” Mira said breathlessly as she rushed past, “they’re just tired of being told Lanternreach doesn’t deserve things like this.”

  Lucien glanced up at the room, at the mix of students, workers, merchants, even older couples leaning close over shared plates. The air was thick with citrus and chocolate, laughter cutting through the clatter of forks and mugs.

  He hadn’t expected this. Premium items weren’t supposed to move like rolls and pies. They were meant to be occasional splurges, steady extras to pad the margins. Yet here they were, selling faster than he could bake them, as though the price tag only added to the excitement.

  Maybe it was novelty. Maybe first-day luck. Either way, the ledger was filling with crowns instead of shards, and the kitchen’s tempo had never been so frantic.

  Jareth grinned at him as he slid another cake onto the rack. “Busy day, boss. We’ll be counting this one for weeks.”

  Elias observed as he was shifting in his chair, eyes flicking between the customers and the growing column of digital tallies on his slate. The numbers weren’t just rising—they were leaping.

  At last, he gave a low whistle. “Lucien, if we had sales like this every day, the café’s debts would be gone in no time.” He angled the slate so Lucien could glimpse the figures, glowing faintly in the air. “And after that? Pure profit. No wonder the big cafés make fortunes on premium items. The margins on these…” He tapped the parfait entry with his stylus. “They’re three, four times what we make on a roll.”

  Lucien leaned over his shoulder, eyes flicking across the figures. Elias was cautious, as always—but Lucien saw the sharper edge beneath. One crown dish outweighed a dozen rolls in profit. Even if the ingredients were costly, the margins were staggering. He let the thought linger without speaking it aloud, a quiet certainty settling in his him.

  Elias continued. “Look around you. They’re paying crowns as easily as shards. Some are splitting desserts to share, some aren’t even hesitating to order seconds. If this pace keeps up…” He sat back, almost stunned. “I’d believe it if someone told me we were already out-earning last week’s entire take—and it’s barely noon.”

  Jareth gave a short laugh as he was passing by the counter. “So this is what it feels like to work in one of those uptown places, huh?”

  “Difference is,” Mira said, ducking past with a tray of tarts, “our food actually tastes better.”

  The room hummed with laughter and conversation, punctuated by the scrape of forks and the clink of crowns hitting the counter.

  By evening, as the doors clicked open for the late crowd, Lucien’s usual circle slipped in almost as if they belonged to the café itself. They had been coming nearly every night for weeks now, their laughter and sharp debates filling the corner booth that Mira had started referring to as “the council table” on her first day of the job.

  Tonight was no different. Kaelen dropped his satchel onto the bench first, already pulling out one of the new molten cakes. Riven trailed after him, sketchbook under one arm, while Seliora claimed her usual seat with the quiet grace of a queen arriving at court. Evelis slid in last, smiling warmly as she set down a flask of tea she’d brought for the staff. Dorian, as always, settled opposite Lucien, measured and silent—until the food arrived.

  They each tried a plate of the new recipes, and the reactions were immediate.

  “Lucien,” Riven declared, fork raised like a conductor’s baton, “if you don’t open a branch at MICF, you’re committing a crime against art. These deserve their own stage.”

  Kaelen grinned, mouth still full. “Stage? Forget that. Put one of these desserts in the engineering dorms and you’ll have half the students working overtime just to afford them.”

  Seliora leaned forward, eyes glittering. “At the Institute, novelty becomes legend in days. Imagine your name on every tongue, the café as a must-visit stop. It would become a story in itself.”

  Evelis laughed softly. “You’d be doing more than selling desserts—you’d be comforting exhausted students. Food like this heals more than the body, Lucien.”

  Their voices overlapped, each piling on suggestions until Dorian set down his fork with a deliberate click. He had eaten quietly until now, tasting each dish twice, his expression unreadable. When he finally spoke, the table stilled.

  “You all know I’m from Aurelia Prime, the capital of Aurelian Empire” Dorian began, his voice low and steady. “I grew up in a city where you can find nearly every recipe under Caelora’s skies. I won’t pretend I’ve tried them all, but I have tasted more than most.” He gestured at the tart, at the molten cake, at the parfait that Riven was already sketching in exaggerated detail. “And yet—I have never eaten anything like these. Not in the capital, not even in the Aurelia’s finest.”

  The words landed like a seal. Dorian was not prone to exaggeration, and everyone at the table knew it.

  “I am one hundred percent certain,” he continued, “that if you brought these to MICF, they would be a phenomenon. Not just popular—a cultural storm. But—” He fixed Lucien with a steady look. “You need to steady this café first. Pay off the debts quickly, and prove that your foundation is secure. Only then can you think of expansion.”

  Lucien inclined his head, already thinking the same. “That’s my intent. Today alone proved we can climb out of debt faster than I imagined.”

  “Good,” Dorian said, then leaned back. “And don’t neglect your writing. Recipes will bring in coin, but stories will bring in people. If you want to keep these seats full every day, you’ll need more than desserts. You’ll need an audience that follows you from the page to the café.”

  The others nodded at that, even Riven, who was sketching exaggerated portraits of Alina sneaking bites of parfait.

  Lucien let the words settle. He looked at his friends—artists, builders, visionaries, and a strategist who had tasted Aurelia Prime’s finest—and, thinking about what he said.