Gisse's mother practically pounced on some information her daughter had missed, highlighting it and passing it to her daughter.

Looking at the deer that Elspeth was now trying to butcher with a cleaver on her workstation, Gisse nodded and shifted her sight to one attuned to souls. It was hazy, being an animal soul, but it still clung loosely to its corpse. "It's fresh." In all her years of practicing demonic veganism, Gisse had never been so tempted to devour a whole soul before.

Fighting the urge, Gisse worked some magic to draw the soul to her and break its tie to its former vessel. "Come here, I promise to make this not hurt. You'll be able to move on."

"Interesting magic you're working. It's some kind of net, right? What are you catching?" Stanton asked, having sidled up beside Gisse.

"Gah!" Almost jumping out of her skin, Gisse fumbled and almost lost the spell and the deer soul. "Wh—?" She stopped, took a deep breath, and made sure to work the soul into a soul-grinding spell she'd just put together from what her mother had taught her. "It catches souls. Uh, I used it to grab the one from that deer, but I'll let its core go before it finishes grinding."

"Fascinating. I can't see the soul, but I can see the magic doing something. I take it other demons would use this on people, too?" The reluctant nod from Gisse was all Stanton needed to know about that. "Well, good luck. I look forward to tasting your food."

The praise perked Gisse up and she found herself anticipating winning even more. Stopping the spell before the soul was completely ground up, she released it on to whatever existence it was bound for and got to work folding the fresh soul into her already cooking dish.

As Stanton reached Casandra again, he grinned at her. "You'll never guess what the spell was."

"You know I specialize in evoking, so you're right, I won't guess."

"Spoilsport. It's a soul snare. She grabbed the soul of the deer and is going to use it in her dish." The level of quick thinking delighted Stanton, and made him want to taste her food even more. "What about you, anything you look forward to trying?"

"I'm waiting for Lorissa to cook her fish. She's been carefully washing rice for most of the time the others were preparing, and now she's cooking the rice—but not any of the fish." She tapped her chin in thought. "She isn't going to serve it raw, is she?"

"I think she is. There are some odd smelling condiments she has there. Either way, it's better than dragging a freshly killed deer in and demanding I eat it."

Cassandra couldn't help but look at Elspeth. The werewolf was doing her best to press the blood out of the steaks she'd cut, but it was obvious that what they were going to get served wouldn't win any prizes. "I expected her to walk out."

"She wouldn't. She has pride, Cass. Pride, for a werewolf, is way stronger than anything else. If you don't have that, you're barely even a member of society anymore. Elspeth tried to play the physical game, got beaten, and now she's taking her licks. That's honor among werewolves." Stanton had ensured he spoke loud enough that Elspeth could have heard, and he was rewarded when he spotted her ears twitch and turn in his direction. "Before this, I figured she was all bite and bark. Now I can see she's serious."

"And I thought being a noble was weird. You werewolves have this whole other honor thing going on. Wouldn't it be easier if you didn't have to deal with all that?" Cassandra asked.

"Easier? Yeah. It'd be so much easier if I could walk up to any werewolf, throw down with a fight, and kill them if I wanted. Waaaaaay easier." Stanton gave Cassandra a significant look. "The rules are there, and our pride is how it is, to stop us becoming monsters to fear.

"Let's take the dragon that's causing trouble as an example. They have no morals. Happily beating up on random folk and, or so I heard, almost demolishing a building. It was only a wandering mage nearby that saved the place. Is there any consequence for their actions? Even if they had a society, from what I've read, dragons weren't big on self-censoring behavior."

By the time he'd finished talking, Cassandra wanted to strangle Stanton. "Maybe the dragon is bound by its own code of ethics that we can't figure out?"

"Have you read the history of them?" Stanton leaned back in his chair. "Next time I—" Stanton caught himself before saying too much, covered with a cough, and then turned his attention to Triana. "Look at her go with those little potatoes and—oooh, garlic butter."

Derailed from what had been becoming a heated argument, Cassandra looked at Triana's plate too. It was bizarre to see a huge werewolf daintily placing food on the plate, but from the initial steak, the sauce, and the shrimp atop it, right through to the potatoes and light salad—it looked like it should be in a restaurant. "That actually looks good."

"Glad you're not facing anyone off in this contest?" Stanton asked, grinning at Cassandra.

"Pfft." Cassandra gestured at the room. "I could beat all of them. It's a shame I'm not competing, really, because then you'd get some real food."

"And what, in your opinion, is 'real food'?" Stanton asked.

With righteous certainty, Cassandra started with, "Well, stew for one. Anything you can eat that will give you all the energy you need for a day of work and without having to spend too much to get it."

"Ah, so those green candies I see you eating are purely for the sugar they contain? Good, rugged fare?"

"Look, I mean—" Cassandra was saved by Triana approaching with two plates of food. Her size made the portions look tiny, but when she set them down Cassandra realized they were actually huge cuts of meat.

"I can't spend more time working on this without it going cold. It's well rested and ready now, so here you go." Being so large in her werewolf form, Triana had spent a lot of time practicing to not be a menace and liability to everything around her. Thus, she was able to set the plates down and step back without crashing into anything.

First, Stanton cut through the middle of the steak. He checked the cut, finding a bit of pink in the middle, which was how he preferred it. "This looks good. Time to dig in."

Cassandra wished she could criticize the food. The beef was cooked perfectly and the shrimp had a perfect red tint to them. She salved her annoyance by noticing all the ways it could have become more expensive. The steak was a nice cut, but not excessively so. The potatoes were a staple of the working class, and while the salad had a tangy dressing on it, it was no more overpriced than the things they got for lunch on the street. "'S good!"

Stanton, knowing they were going to need to eat more, was careful not to eat too much, but he noticed Cassandra wolfing down the meal with no thought that she'd face several more meals. By comparison, he sampled a little of each part of the serving and then slid the plate back to Triana. "Thank you, that was delicious. Well seasoned, the sauce was really nice without any lumps, and you got both meats perfect. If I had to grade it, that would be a seven out of ten."

Fighting her urge to complain that a seven didn't sound good, Triana had to remind herself that it was Stanton's scale. She looked at Cassandra next, and smiled at seeing an empty plate before her.

"That was great! Stanton's too used to stodgy upper-class stuff, but a filling meal that also tastes good is not as easy to do as those annoyingly small bite-size things served at parties that everyone seems to compliment. Nine out of ten." Surprising herself with the praise, Cassandra couldn't find any reason to deny it as being true. While she doubted she could actually feel satiated since becoming a dragon, she was sure feeling more upbeat with a full meal in her stomach.

The sentiment about high class food was something Triana didn't share, but she wasn't going to tell Cassandra that there was a small fortune of spices in the not "stodgy upper-class" meal. She bobbed into a slight curtsy and collected her plates.

"Nine?" Stanton asked Cassandra in a whisper. "What if you find something you like more—then find something better than that?"

Cassandra stuck her tongue out at him. "Then I'll give them an eleven."

"…" Stanton had no words for that, so instead he shook his head and laughed. "Oh, here comes Lore. Lore, I saw you cooking rice, but not the fish. What's up here?"

"This is sushi. It's from"—she glanced down to the long, sharp blade at her waist that was Swiftpaw, then to Cassandra—"my parents' original homeland. I was reminded of it recently and wanted to share a little of my heritage with you both." It was all a load of BS, and she was sure Stanton knew it. "There are three dishes here for you to try. The first is sashimi."

"That's raw fish," Stanton said. "You expect us to eat raw fish?"

"You'd insult my heritage?" Giving her best shocked expression, Lorissa used her chopsticks to pluck a piece of finely sliced tuna, dab a little of the wasabi on it, then a touch of sweet soy. She popped it in her mouth and let out a slow sigh of delight. Complete fabrication the backstory might be, but the food was absolutely delicious.

The obvious deception, Stanton thought, could be hiding another—but he doubted it. Shrugging, he didn't trust himself with the chopsticks Lorissa was using, so used his fingers instead. The first sizzle of the wasabi was a shock, but it was fading as fast as it arrived and left a spicy bed of flavor for the fish to lay upon and, finally, the soy's light sweetness came in a bit later to compose a symphony of new and exciting flavors on his palate.

"I'm not going to eat raw—" Cassandra was expecting Stanton to be backing her up. Instead, he was reaching for another slice. "There's no getting out of it, I guess. So I dab on a little of this green stuff, then a bit of this black stuff, and just—"

The flavor combination caught Cassandra off-guard. She widened her eyes and started chewing the morsel. The parts of her brain that governed olfactory, taste, and texture were overruling the tiny part of her still screaming that this fish was raw. It was raw, but it tasted great.

After his third piece, Stanton took a moment to stop himself and look at the other two plates Lorissa had brought over. The first looked like some other kind of seafood on a little thumb-sized blob of rice, with some kind of black parchment holding it in place. The second was more of that parchment wrapped around rice with something inside it. "What else do we have?"

"First you eat some of this. It's ginger done with a quick pickling process that should—that will—clear your palate for the next sample." Confidence! Lorissa, upon seeing them both enjoy the sashimi, was feeling buoyed up to continue things, but absolutely couldn't give the game away. "Then you have these, which are awabi nigiri. They are fresh abalone on rice with some dried seaweed holding it in place. The last plate will be a sushi roll consisting of lightly cooked shrimp and wasabi wrapped in rice. Please, try them both."

When the rest of her food went down with much excited noises coming from Stanton and Cassandra, Lorissa felt that if not victory, she would at least have given her friends something nice.

"A solid nine," Stanton said. "The only reason I don't give this a ten is that there is so little of it. The rice is nicely filling, but I don't think this would make a good main meal on its own."

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Her previous review came back and hit Cassandra in the face. All the things she'd praised Triana's meal for not being, this was—but at the same time it was good. But, the overwhelming sense that Lorissa wasn't a noble and therefore it wasn't a high-society canape meant she felt justified in giving it a, "Nine. Not as filling as Triana's, but it made up for it with an exotic flavor that I really liked."

Almost bouncing in excitement, Lorissa felt a shadow reach over her from behind that made her eyes widen as a deep and hungry-sounding voice said, "Move over and let me—Mom! Stop it! Out, now!" The latter words were as shrill and harsh as the first were sensual and velvety. The whiplash of the change in tone left her a bit dazed, but moving out of the way.

"No, I won't. Now, out!" Expending power, Gisse expelled her mother and shunted her back to their home plane. She figured she'd get a chewing out later for it, but was fine with that. "S-Sorry! I just had a little, uh, parental-possession problem. She's gone now."

"'She'?" Stanton asked.

"M-My mom. I needed one of her—my—old recipes. It was the easier way to get it rather than summoning a whole library." With the cat (or mother) out of the bag, she decided going forward was the only option. "This is a Decadence Pie. Normally they are layered with souls, whole, but I only used parts. No souls were destroyed in the making of this."

Looking at the pie, which looked like any other kind of pot pie from the top, Stanton smiled up at Gisse. "Shall I cut it?" Getting a nod from her, he brought the knife to the pie and began cutting into it. The red glow coming from within was the only warning he had before a rush of hot energy poured from the thing. It coiled around him, guided him to finish cutting a slice, and then serve one to each of them.

Before Stanton even knew what was happening he was lifting a fork of the savory pie's contents to his mouth and, in a slight daze, he put it in his mouth.

Myriad lives stretched out, opening themselves to Stanton's mind's eye. He watched the deer that Elspeth had killed grow, become a fine buck, and then get hunted by the werewolf. Blended with that was another soul, a wolf. That wolf had eaten many animals in its long life. Some of those souls had been carnivores too. By the time he gulped down and swallowed, he'd lived a thousand lives of a thousand souls that had all played a small part in the pie's construction. "Wow."

More resistant to the effect than Stanton, thanks to her natural dragon resilience, Cassandra was nonetheless almost unmasked when the taste of the pie stirred her draconic hunger to the point that she already wanted a second helping not halfway through the first. "It's intense. You ate this regularly?"

Stanton was barely aware of the two talking about the pie. In his mind, he continued to sort through all the lives and experiences of the souls used to make it. He was still stuck in that contemplation when Gisse's hand brushed his and swept all the souls to the side for him. "Th-Thanks." For the first time since meeting her, it was Stanton who had the nervous stutter. "Is that what eating souls is like?"

"Uh, not really. Devouring an entire soul is way more intense. I—I don't like it." Pouting a little, Gisse wanted to ignore the whole idea of eating a complete soul, but it kept coming back to haunt her. "Did you like it?"

"The pie is interesting. I can taste the meat, but I'm not sure if I can identify the origin of it. As for the experience of eating it, it's amazing. Also, I can respect the dedication that you didn't destroy any souls to make it." Steeling himself, and leaning on the lingering warmth of Gisse's hand on his, he tried another bite of the pie.

The rush of life-history was more tolerable now. Gisse's power seemed to hold back the more intense feelings so that Stanton could appreciate each of the lives involved in this ephemeral expression of life. "What do you think, Cass?"

"It's not bad. It, uh, comes on a little strong, but I think I might have a natural resistance to the effect you're getting." It was cheating and Cassandra knew it. The average person would have no resistance at all. Even a trained wizard like Stanton couldn't fight it off. "Seven out of ten."

Stanton shook his head. "Food is about more than taste. It's an experience. When you eat food from somewhere else, you're not just filling your need for sustenance, you're embracing a culture. This, like Lore's sushi, is a cultural experience. The pie tastes good, but having something cooked by a demon who genuinely wanted to share the culture she enjoyed—is what makes this worth a nine."

It wasn't a winning score, but Gisse didn't care. Stanton got her. He understood what she was trying to do and he appreciated it. Bubbles of joy welled up inside and Gisse wanted, more than ever, to protect and take care of this one human who saw past her hips and chest—to the woman she was inside. "Thanks!" The word didn't come close to expressing how his support made her feel, but she was sure she would explode if she kissed him and really showed him.

"Go on," Triana said, her voice cutting through the silence that ensued after Gisse's judging. "This will end any responsibility for losing our fight. I expect our next one to be with a better trained werewolf."

Nodding, Elspeth wanted to hate Triana for beating her, but every protocol of werewolf culture had been followed. Even voicing excitement at future fights was encouraged among werewolves. It would mean Elspeth would need to train more, though, and she found that boring. "Thank you for the leniency." She wanted to shove the deer carcass in Triana's mouth and choke her with it—but instead she tucked her ears back and walked to the table Stanton and Cassandra sat at, with her best effort at making a presentable meal from the deer.

With two dishes set down on the table, Stanton was surprised to see that the dish looked, and smelled, quite good. "You only had meat to make this?"

"Triana Eyesbright let me have an onion and garlic. I made a blood-broth and reduced it, then seared an individual roast cut from the hindquarters, braised it with more of the broth, and this is the result." She had worked her fuzzy butt off making something that wouldn't be completely terrible, and once she got over being furious at Triana, the gift of some vegetables and spices had been a welcome one. She looked at Cassandra. "Sorry if it is more meat than your palate can enjoy. I promise I will present a better meal to both of you in time."

It was hard for Cassandra to not immediately inhale absolutely everything in the large, shallow bowl before her. To her draconic senses, this was the best meal of the lot so far. She strained to hold her form human while the tantalizing umami aroma dared her to become a dragon to eat it.

Seeing the way Cassandra devoured the food she'd prepared was a surprise to Elspeth. "You eat like a wolf." The words had spilled out without her meaning to say them, a major faux pa in higher circles.

The accusation surprised Cassandra enough that it broke the brief spell the meat had her under. "Uh. Y-Yeah. Not a werewolf—"

"But she definitely eats like one," Stanton said. "I remember that time you first discovered the local curry specialties. She would hoard her money to spend exclusively on that. I think you've done a lot with what you had. Nice work, Elspeth, six out of ten."

Wincing at what she was about to say, Cassandra contented herself only with the knowledge she was being truthful. "Ten. This is delicious, and Stanton has no clue what he's talking about."

Seeing the result as an average of the two, Elspeth let out a sigh. "I'll do better with your next challenge."

"Next challenge?" Stanton asked, looking around with a moderate amount of panic evident in his features. "Of course! The next challenge will be, uh, dancing!" It made as much sense to him as cooking, and would hopefully result in less stepped-on-toes.

Perking up further, Elspeth asked, "And what will be the prize? Another date?"

"You're going to have to step things up a bit, Stanton. How long do you have until this is all confirmed and set in stone?" Cassandra was curious, mostly to know how long she had to overthrow the nobles and steal him for herself.

Triana was first to reply. "There is still nine months and one week remaining."

"A kiss." Stanton's gaze swept all the eager expressions. "A kiss for the second prize, and the third will be a whole day spent together. The most competent fiancee in all three contests will be allowed to live in my tower if she so-wishes."

Elspeth's ears jolted upright from their semi-defeated position and she noticed Triana at her side now looking far more like an enemy again. "What will the third contest be?"

"I'll announce that when the judging is done for the second." It was a struggle to keep control of the situation, but making rules for the contest was the best chance he had to do so. Otherwise these huge, powerful women would run roughshod over him until his mother's contest had run out and she decided who he'd be with for the rest of his life. "But there's something else we must do first." His eyes settled on Battlemaid.

"After analyzing ten thousand three hundred and forty-six meals, applying your particular tastes, and computing the optimum Stanton-meal, I have deduced that there isn't one. Therefore, I have simply prepared five of your favorite meals, Master." Bowing and lifting the plates of food from her arm, Battlemaid set them each before Stanton and Cassandra.

Stanton stared at Battlemaid, then to the dishes, each of which probably should have taken a good chunk of the time given, let alone all five. He reached, first, for one of his favorite street foods, crayfish in bread with cheese and butter. Closing his eyes, he held the bread up to his mouth and started eating.

Ignoring the initial errors she was getting, which were only that her jaw servos seemed to be working delicately at her lower lip, Battlemaid watched as Stanton ate, then Cassandra followed suit. She quickly built new subroutines to expel butterflies she was sure shouldn't be inhabiting her torso cavity while they both worked their way through each plate.

As he sampled the last plate, which was a sweet-savory spiced aubergine and nectarine that was served in the flesh of a melon, Stanton let out a delighted noise at how perfect each was. The normal versions he'd had a hundred times over were good, but these used the best ingredients available. "Billi, these are wonderful. That you took the time to figure out what foods I like makes you a strong contender for top scoring, but executing these better than the originals is what makes this a ten."

Nodding her head, Cassandra barely managed to put down a stew bread bowl she'd been sipping from. "Ten— Wait, I already gave a ten. Make it a twelve." At the look of anger on Elspeth's face, Cassandra nodded to one of the untouched bowls of stew. "Try it."

It seemed stupid to Triana. Street food, she was sure, couldn't stack up to any of their more adept cooking. Lifting the bowl up to her canine snout, she sniffed it and her eyes widened with surprise. She wasn't quite sure of the process between smelling the food and devouring the last bite of the bowl, but Triana was absolutely positive she loved every moment of it. "Wow."

There were no more stew bowls, but Elspeth took the last of the cheesy lobster flatbread and started eating. The flavor of the normally shunned crustacean was absolutely decadent. She couldn't believe how good it tasted compared to her own dish. Nodding to Triana, she realized that neither of them could compete with Battlemaid when it came to cooking.

Crowding the table too, Lorissa and Gisse each collected a piece of food from Battlemaid's entry and tried it themselves. Lorissa nodded as she ate, having sampled the mechanized maid's food before. Beside her, Gisse was staring openly at the little balls of egg and meat, crumbed and deep fried, and couldn't believe how good it was without a need for any souls at all.

"I guess this means I'll be having that date with you, Billi."

The words stunned her. Battlemaid wasn't sure if her cooling systems could handle it, but she employed them at maximum strength to counter the overwhelming heat her errant systems were producing. It made her cheeks flush. "R-Really?"

"When will the dancing event be?" Triana asked, still chewing on the last of her flatbread.

Stanton, who was definitely content making eyes at Battlemaid—especially when she looked a little flustered—gestured expansively. "One month from today. That should give you plenty of time to train." He turned his eyes sideways briefly to look at Cassandra. "This won't be a normal dance, after all. Cass will be selecting a partner and there will be a combat element to it."

"I will?" … "There will?"

The questions came from everyone present, except for one. Trying desperately to be noticed, Cleverclaws (minus her two companions) reached as high as she could to set her cloche-covered plates on the table. "You haven't tried mine!"

"I'll only try it if you tell me your real name and why you want a date," Stanton said.

Looking between Stanton and Cassandra, her worry rising, Cleverclaws started to shake. Panic enveloped her and she wanted to scream. What happened was she got picked up and hugged. Tilting her head back, she stared up at the underside of Stanton's chin as he looked down at her. "C-C-Cleverclaws."

Not having seen a kobold close up without punching them, Stanton was nonetheless sure he could handle just one. Besides, he figured, he had two huge werewolves, a samurai, a lightning mage, and a robotic battle platform for backup. "Cleverclaws? That's a cute name. Now, why do you want to date me?"

It was all for her master. A dragon was the most important thing in the world to a kobold, and Cassandra was no exception to that, but Stanton was really nice and she liked him being nice to her. "B-B-Because you're nice."

Giving Cleverclaws a scratch under her chin, Stanton smiled down to her. "That's a good answer. Now, what did you make for us?"

Comfortable more than she'd ever been in her life, Cleverclaws managed one look at Cassandra and—seeing her curious expression—pushed on as though she wasn't messing with things she shouldn't have. "Crepes with blueberries and iced cream."

The announcement had Stanton reaching across, keeping Cleverclaws balanced with one hugging arm, to lift the cloche of the nearest plate. The food looked amazing. Ripe and juicy blueberries, with what looked like a glaze on them, clustered atop ice cream while a trio of thin crepes were carefully balanced against the pile such that he could add the filling to his deserts however he pleased. "Oh wow. This looks great!"

Watching Stanton eat her cooking made Cleverclaws squirm a little. He used one hand, and a spoon, to cut the crapes then scooped the ice cream and berries onto it and ate them. She froze, not daring to breathe.

"It's delicious. A perfect end to a great series of meals." Scooping the next bit onto his spoon, Stanton let the wonderful flavors play over his tongue as he savored the dessert. "I'd definitely give Cleverclaws' dish a solid eight."

Nodding along, having tried some of her own crepes, Cassandra wasn't at all surprised by Cleverclaws' cooking prowess. If anything, she figured that any imperfections in the food would be because of the "assistants." So, nodding, she reached over and put a hand on Cleverclaws' shoulder reassuringly. "I give it a ten."

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This story is released under the Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license. If you are paying money to see this or the original creator, Damaged, is not credited, you are viewing a plagiarized copy of the story.