Frontier Chef: My Cooking Skills Are Broken-Chapter 24: Welcome to Harken

The teeth of metal cranked upward and Harken breathed out hot air and damp steam all at once.

It smelled worse than the beetle saliva, and that itself was a feat.

The road led into the heart of the settlement, where people were already starting to gather. Some were leaning against the black walls of low buildings.

The ground was no longer dirt. It looked like asphalt that had lost a fight. Black, cracked, and uneven. Better than sand, though. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

Ezra was tired of sand. His ass agreed.

’First buildings I’ve seen and they look like they were carved out of a volcano.’

They were indeed. The foothills behind Harken were volcanoes. The whole settlement was built from what the ground gave up. Obsidian slabs for walls, black stones for roads, dark gravel packed into every gap.

Two main roads crossed in the center. A dry stone fountain sat at the intersection. The basin had cracks running through it and someone had stacked firewood in it like it hadn’t held water in months.

The walls had promised a city and Harken delivered a village.

’Better than anything out there.’

Steam hissed from a grate in the street and Patches jumped sideways into Ezra’s ankle. The ground was warm underfoot. Unlike the desert and the sun, this heat lingered and threatened to peel the soles off his feet.

The people were gathering by the dozens now, staring at Ezra, the furball, and Neve who was struggling to keep the cape draped over her shoulders. Her eyes were closed, skin paler than he’d ever seen.

She looked dead this time.

The gate behind them closed with finality. The commander who had been keeping pace ahead glanced back at the trio. She raised a gloved hand and more people emerged from the crowd, adorned in black robes that seemed terribly inconvenient in this heat.

They lifted Neve off Ezra’s back and onto a stretcher carved from beetle chitin. A woman in white robes embroidered with black accents started rattling off instructions before the stretcher was level.

Neve’s good hand released his forearm last.

’First time we’ve been apart since the jungle.’

The thought landed weird.

He didn’t have time to sit with it.

Not when they were already pacing down the street.

"Where are you guys taking her?"

Nobody answered. That was the weirder part.

Someone handed him a shirt three sizes too small and trousers that barely held his thighs in place. Better than nothing, considering he’d been naked the entire fucking time.

Patches growled at the healer as they carried Neve down the main road.

Ezra let it, not like he knew what the hell to do in the moment. At least it wasn’t biting on any limbs.

He took a step after the stretcher. A woman with a ledger and a quill stepped into his path, her robe the same color as the ones carrying Neve away.

He didn’t even get to say goodbye.

"Name," the woman chirped. "Hello, sir? Are ya there?"

The woman was looking him up and down, biting her lower lip as she measured his height and build in silence.

’That’s a first.’

"Ezra," he said, trying to see where they took the bird girl.

She hopped into his view, her baby blue eyes blinking three times in rapid beats. The auburn bangs over her forehead stuck to the skin. She didn’t seem to care at all.

"Surname, please?"

"Just Ezra." He moved her out his way like he would a stray cat drenched in the rain.

She wrote something on her ledger that was definitely not "just Ezra."

Patches growled at her quill every time it scratched.

"Class?"

"Uh, I don’t have one."

[ You have a class, host. You are a Frontier Chef. Are you stuck or struggling with something? Activate the help feature by saying ’help’— ]

"Shut up."

The quill stopped.

"Excuse you?"

’Fuck, did I say that out loud?’

[ Yes, you did ]

She looked up at the shirt clinging taut over his chest, at the bone necklaces and dried blue saliva still flaking off his forearms.

"As you are in the company of the Emerald Avian, you are deemed a valuable guest." She scribbled something else in the book. "See to it that you don’t ruin it for yourself."

The commander was still ahead, waiting now. Staring at the woman and Ezra. What the hell could she want?

"A word," the commander said.

’That was not a suggestion.’

The woman with the ledger bowed once and glared at him longer than necessary before walking away, humming something to herself.

"Careful with that Ossalaka," the woman sang. "Whatever it does, you get punished for it."

She stopped near the commander and saluted once before moving on.

’What’s the deal with that woman? Second pretty girl that wants to kill me.

Oh shit, here she comes.’

The commander stepped forward and crossed her arms.

"So, did you?"

"What?"

"Did you touch the Emerald Avian?"

’I plead the 5th.’

"Depends on what ’touch’ means to you."

She scoffed.

Definitely the wrong fucking answer.

"So you did," she said. "Knew it from the moment I saw you. You have the look in your eyes."

Before the words left Ezra’s mouth she was already barking.

"Guards."

Two appeared from inside the gate like they’d been waiting for this exact fucking moment.

’That was fast.’

"Holding cell. Until the Honored Slayer wakes and confirms his account."

"Account of what?" The guards grabbed his arms and pulled. He didn’t budge an inch. "I carried her across a desert."

"You carried the Emerald Avian across a desert. Without a Keepsake, or even proof of registration." She unfolded her arms. "And you touched her."

"I saved her life, twice."

"That’s for her to confirm. Not you."

The guard on his left arm pulled again. The other reached for the hilt by his waist and Patches lunged at the man’s ankle. Its teeth sank into leather.

The guard shook his leg and Patches held on, growling through a mouthful of boot.

"Call off your animal."

"He doesn’t listen to me. That’s kind of the problem."

The guard kicked once and missed. Kicked again for the hell of it.

Patches let go and skidded across the black stone and was back between Ezra’s feet before the guard could take a second step.

They walked him through the commons. Fifteen heads turned to see two guards being dragged more than pulling Ezra.

The kitchen was on the left—stone counter, iron pots, a coal pit thick with dust.

A clay jug at the end of the nearest table sat empty. The barrel against the wall looked like it hadn’t been filled in days.

’Water’s rationed. Whole place is dry.’

The two guards steered him toward a corridor he hadn’t noticed. Narrow and sloping downward, it was carved into the volcanic rock. The air got cooler and damper with every step. From the cracks in the wall, steam was leaking out.

The cell was what he expected. Stone shelf, and that was about it. The iron bars looked older than the settlement, welded on crooked like whoever built the cell did it in a rush.

In the corner was a tiny bucket that Ezra didn’t want to think about its uses just yet.

They pushed him in and met a brick wall.

"You can just ask," Ezra said, yawning.

"Get in."

Patches walked in after him like it was the most normal thing.

The guard looked at the Ossalaka.

"The animal stays?"

"You wanna try removing him?"

The guard did not.

They shut the door and turned the lock. Their footsteps faded up the corridor.

He could still hear the whispers.

"Brute."

"Giant."

"Stinky."

Ezra sniffed himself. Couldn’t smell anything but gas and beetle saliva.

’I’m not even that tall.’

Patches circled twice on the stone floor and sat down. Staring at Ezra, waiting or just happy to be there at all.

’Roof over my head. Technically.’

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