Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

It’s happening again.

Not Candy Apple’s outbursts. Those, Pure Vanilla had learned to deal with. A sweet treat, maybe a proper meal, or a walk outside the spire (which he had managed to convince Shadow Milk allow him, with the promise to be back before an hour was up.) and she could figure out how to express her sorrows with words. Simple, childish words at first but he was teaching her new skills everyday. Eventually she even started appearing to him before Black Sapphire when she was in a bad mood.

He would pat her on the head, let her cry it out and then take her for one of the aforementioned cheer-up routines.

Shadow Milk hated it. And it was hilarious. Absolutely, no filters or barriers or fingers to hide his giggles, hilarious. 

They would be mid-torture, and he’d glimpse Candy Apple cookie watching on the side before rebooting his motivation with a breath and overcoming whatever strange game Shadow Milk had placed him in. 

Or, that was just one time. Mostly he would be stuck in strings or shuffling cards or answering uncomfortably personal questions when he heard a yelp from down the hall. But Shadow Milk, being the awful and sadistic beast he was, would hang the guilt of not being able to help over him — even if it meant listening to her yelling and breaking things as he hurried to finish the game as soon as possible.

Sigh.

One day, he was going to catch Shadow Milk in a state of distress and show him why all his efforts to help Candy Apple cookie were so necessary, and not just for those around her.

And when that day arrived, Shadow Milk would just have to hope he didn’t look good crying, because his sadomasochistic tendencies were starting to rub off on his other half. But, that’s for another story.

Today: The issue, neither Candy Apple nor Shadow Milk.

No, today it was Black Sapphire cookie.

He had known by his own guesswork and a whole lot of evidence left about the margins of Black Sapphire’s personal life in the spire — his room, the almost hungover moods he would be in after returning from long missions, the romance novel with a queer protagonist that he left hidden in the pillow room (and also, he only found one book, the second novel in a trilogy, which is could only mean someone was lending him the books) — Yes, it all lead up to the same conclusion; Black Sapphire Cookie had a secret lover. It wasn’t hard to deduce who, either: all it took was snooping through his room one time to find his hair brush and blame its displacement on Candy Apple cookie and instead he found… a bell. A silver bell.

Could this boy get any less discreet?!

But that wasn’t the point. So, he was dating Silverbell. Not the Recluse’s problem, if they got caught he’d just watch the flames engulf the silver kingdom with no expression. Shadow Milk might like it if he smiled, so he’d make an attempt at looking placid and fail miserably to hide the despair in his eyes. Woe is he, and also those two loverboys who he was avoiding getting to the point about.

Black Sapphire hid a lot of Polaroids of them in his treasure chest, under a normal amount of Shadow Milk paraphernalia, batteries, notebooks filled with scrawls, a master key and some other things not of importance. Cute photos, Silverbell seemed rather happy, other times flustered. 

Certainly no comparison to the perfumed letter Black Sapphire had received, read in the living room, causing him to go deep shades of red and quickly get up to leave: he found it, under the bedsheets, the same perfume note — lily of the valley.

He… thank the stars Silverbell wrote in sheet music or else his eyes might’ve skimmed the wrong things.

Ah, cheese, Maybe Shadow Milk was right about his perversely intrusive attitude. Did Shadow Milk even go this far to snoop into his minion’s lives?

Well…

Well.
If he ever wants to go snooping, It was perhaps a little late for it now. 

Recluse had been smelling something hideous for days now. Days referring to sun and moon cycles, not chronological measurements. You would think those are the same, alas…

He eventually figured out the source of the smell: Black Sapphire’s bedroom. 

So, he and Shadow Milk cookie had been ignoring it in favour of their little mind-torture monopoly games, but Black Sapphire hadn’t been acting right the entire time. More on edge, quiet, less patient with anything and everything. 

To put it in witches’ terms, Cookies don’t have menstrual cycles but if they did, this would’ve been the tell-tale sign of a luteal phase.

Moody, unfocused, messy, rapid-fire between consumption and abstinence when it came to food, not to mention the diet—

Uncharacteristically sweet or salty, the spire was running out of dark chocolate, salted caramel and salted-caramel flavoured dark chocolate.

The worst offender was the loud angsty ballads he screamed at… All hours, regardless of what was happening. If he wasn’t out and about, giving everyone attitude, he was locked up in his room crying to Mint-ski. Oftentimes the Recluse found himself humming the opening to “I bet on losing cakehounds” with Black Sapphire’s sobs in the background.

Shadow Milk knew. He knew Pure Vanilla knew.

Both of them knew the other person knew. 

Whatever.

“He’s going through a breakup.” Pure Vanilla said, tossing the dice and moving his piece. “Shit.”

“Hand up!” Shadow Milk beckoned for the Monopoly money, “Ahem, yes. I can tell. He’s been awfully prickly as of late, never seen him lash out so hard.”

“That’s probably your fault, just so you know.” He watched Shadow Milk cheat the dice and slammed his hand over them to stop them from moving. “He’s burning the Polaroids. Can’t you smell it?”

“Humph! What am I supposed to do?!” Shadow Milk complained, “Listen, I respected his privacy, and now he’s making his trauma everyone else’s problem. If you let him cry it out, it’ll pass, no?”

“Unfortunately not.” Pure Vanilla took his turn, landing on go and taking $200. “If there’s anything we can learn from your other minion, it’s that space is only going to help so much before he starts looking for other solutions. Being met with silence will only make him harden up, and not in a pleasant way.”

Shadow Milk scoffed, “She’s a kid. Of course she needs someone older to guide her, but Black Sapphire is fully grown. He’s always had a handle on his emotions, he’ll recover from this just like he recovers from everything!” He landed on the jail square and cursed. 

Pure Vanilla took the dice back, rolled them, landed on his own square and upgraded it to a hotel. “Fun. Let’s see… did he ever try reaching out to you for help?”

Shadow Milk squinted. “Oh, I know that tone.”

“Pleasant.” He smiled, “then you know where I’m going. Saves a lot of time.” He rolled again, moved his pawn and landed in jail as a visitor, “Hello Milky~!” 

“Shut up.” 

“You don’t let him express his own feelings, essentially placing him in the role of the level headed and logical one you can agree with most of the time. This is probably not going to reflect well on him now that he’s been screaming and crying himself to death for the last few days.”

“Mhmm… what does this have to do with me?”

“Just saying, if you won’t take care of your own subjects, I guess I’ll have to step up — hopefully you won’t be too upset when he doesn’t rely on you anymore: not that he could in the first place. Mhmmm, I would wipe your tears if I could.”

Shadow Milk growled and threw up his hands, flipping the game board. “Fine!! Help him, see if I care.”

The Recluse stood up, took up his staff and pinched the beast’s cheek affectionately, “You are so funny when I have an upper hand over you. Suddenly I understand why you find power so intoxicating.”

He stepped down the silent stairwell, the one which moved when it heard your footsteps or voice too loud. Far too many doors on the twisting walls, he was sure there spawned new ones every other week. One that stayed however was Black Sapphire’s purple door with black metal accents, a sign which read “On Air: DND” and a few flashy other things. And, smoke coming down the bottom of the door.

Loud bass pumped from inside, loud enough to make the stairs be in constant swinging motion. It took far more time that would be necessary to make it down, knock real loud and turn the knob: locked. 

Hah. Haha. What a shame! 

If only he had a master key… hm!

Click!

“Oh sapphire~!” He called, a bit too enthusiastic for his own liking. “Can you please turn that down, Master Shadow Milk is starting to tip over the— is that Falafel Roan?”

“She’s got, She’s got a waaaay!” Black Sapphire was too absorbed in the anguished belting of the outro to notice anybody had even unlocked the door to his room.

He was sitting in a pile of broken photo frames and flaming pictures. There was messy eyeliner and mascara running down his cheeks, some streaking away from his eyes to suggest he’d tried wiping it away. Actually, it was like he’d poured ink all over his face with the way it was streaked around his eyes. Not a picturesque look in the slightest.

“Eh… sir.”

“She got away! She got away, she got away, YEAAAHAAAAHHHHH—“

Pure Vanilla hummed. Yeah. Maybe Shadow Milk was right for a change. 

Admittedly his imitation of lesbian yearning was… worthy of merit. Major support towards the theory of PMS symptoms he was experiencing. Was the breakup overlapping with Actual PMS??? What a way to find out.

But he couldn’t celebrate this diversity win forever, as Black Sapphire’s playlist eventually switched songs, to Vampire by Olivia Burrito Cookie, the single from her sophomore album Crumbs: Spilled.

He failed to hide his snicker. “Why are you listening to this song?”

Black Sapphire looked up at him pathetically, “You have no right to judge my music taste! You literally stan Sugarfly Cookie!” (That’s Sabrina Carpenter btw) 

The Recluse crossed his arms, “True, however I own the full cd of this album. Out of all the songs you picked, you picked the one that was literally written about YOU as a person.”

“So??? Can’t I wallow in my own misery of how I’m such an awful, evil boyfriend?!!??”

Pure Vanilla’s brows unfurrowed, “…Are you blaming yourself for the breakup?”

Black Sapphire wiped his eyes again and threw a Monster High doll at the cd player. “No, you know what, it’s fine. We can skip it.”

Pure Vanilla reached over to turn the music off entirely. The flames cracked for a moment before he spoke again. “It’s normal to feel guilty when you hurt someone you love. I can help you, so please tell me what happened.”

Black Sapphire winced and flapped a hand in the direction of the cd player. “Turn it back on, I can’t be alone with my emotions.”

“I’m… I’m here to help you.” 

“Yeah, sure. Just turn it back on.” He hiccuped. 

Recluse obliged him and a guitar song started up. He didn’t recognise it at first, but a few lyrics in and he knew the voice. Bruno Mars-Bar cookie. 

“Okay. Firstly Sapphire, your crashout is valid.” a little bit of modern slang went a long way. Black Sapphire glared up at him. Pure Vanilla continued, “I’m serious. Shadow Milk might think you can handle this, but you can’t, and I’ve been seeing it for weeks now.”

“Seeing what?” Black Sapphire wiped at his tears again, “I’ve only been heartbroken for a day or two.”

“This is a lot more than heartbreak.” He gestured to the room around him, in ruins. “You keep your emotions in. I learned from Candy Apple that you care a lot about your belongings, and yet here you are, there’s photo frames and figurines and Polaroids everywhere. Something bigger lies beneath all this other stuff.”

Black Sapphire sniffled. “Uh, yeah. My whole life lies beneath it all. You don’t know what it’s like, having to pretend to be okay the whole time, because otherwise you’ll get all the slack for being emotional and embarrassing!”

“That’s not true.”

“And then, having to upkeep that facade when you feel like you’re falling apart inside!”

“I do.”

“And then, when you Finally find an outlet, someone who is safe to be yourself around, you lose them to some stupid feud between your dad and his biggest enemy’s successor!”

Oh, is that why Silverbell had cut things off?

“That doesn’t sound like your fault.”

Black Sapphire groaned, “But it is! If I wasn’t… if I wasn’t on the opposite side to him, he wouldn’t have been so scared to open up to me, and we could’ve talked about it.”

“He was probably confused.”

“Of course he was confused!” Black Sapphire shrieked, shoving his fingers through his hair, “God, can you fucking imagine?! Having to hide this whole committed relationship from your parents and eventually finding out that your boyfriend is so much worse than he made himself out to be when he first met you, and the last time you meet him to try and break things off he nearly fatally wounds you in the process?! I’d be shocked out of my mind too if I knew my boyfriend was a proprietor of an entire empire of rumours that have brought down civilizations!”

Pure Vanilla wasn’t sure whose side to take here. It seemed like the whole thing was a bit less black and white than meets the eye. 

“Sigh. Okay. Let’s start with the most present issue: how do you feel right now?”

“Sad?!! What do-“

“And how does that manifest inside of you? Is there tightness in any part of your body, maybe your head is pounding, or ears ringing, or your heart is pumping faster than you can breathe?”

“Stop.” He said, “This is making it worse.”

Pure Vanilla skipped the song and something calmer started playing. Piano instrumental. “Okay, try to take back control of your breathing. If you can breathe, you can talk, and if you can talk, all those thoughts of self loathing will have somewhere to go. Just…” he inhaled, held, exhaled.

“Haaah…hooo…” sapphire followed the instructions and slowly began to lower his hands. “Haaah…. Why are you helping me?”

Pure Vanilla stepped closer. “Shhh… keep breathing. Can I hold you?”

Black Sapphire squinted. “…Sure. Whatever that means.”

He approached and carefully wrapped Black Sapphire cookie into an embrace, pulling him close and resting his chin atop the fluffy and despondent mass of hair on Black Sapphire's head. “You’ll make it through this. Just keep breathing.” 

“Nn….nnnnmmnnn!” He broke again, his sobs coming quieter, but he instead just let them out rather than trying to tear something apart or screaming. 

Pure Vanilla could only hum again, the first song on his mind — that mint-ski song was a pretty good match. He even started singing the lyrics. 

Black Sapphire stayed quiet after that, a calm warmth descending over the two of them. 

“It’s going to take a long time to heal.” Pure Vanilla said when he finished the first verse and chorus, “You’ve got a lot of pain inside of you. But if you would let me visit every now and then, I can help you recover from this heartbreak. Promise I won’t tell a soul about it.”

“Except for master Shadow Milk?”

“No.” He said, “Not unless he reaches down my throat and pulls the words out himself.” He smiled to himself, “he wouldn’t get far down enough before I started trying to freak him out.”

Black Sapphire sneezed, “To freak him out?”

“Let’s not worry about me. It’s you that needs caring.” He pulled away to check and yeah, he was still a mess. “Feel any better?”

“No.”

“Mhm. I thought so. The sea feels endless when you’re nowhere near the shore.”

*

Shadow Milk was still in the game room, waiting for Pure Vanilla to return. 

And for some reason, he was still thinking over what Pure Vanilla had insinuated before leaving him to go handle Black Sapphire.

“Did he ever try reaching out to you for help?”

“You know where I’m going with this.”

“Since you won’t help your servants.”

“I would wipe your tears if I could.”

What did he mean by that last thing? 

He bounced the question around in his mind until Pure Vanilla returned looking solemn but much more at ease than he had been before. No, not at ease… just honest. No longer pretending everything was fine.

“So is he fixed?”

The Recluse shrugged, “Not even close. But he’s on track to it now. If you would allow me permission to visit him every now and then, perhaps… every second moon?”

“pfftt! That’s way too often.”

“You control the moon. You can make it so I never see him again. Would fit right up your alley, wouldn’t it? Sadistic, cruel and wholly pointless. You like your subjects when they’re at their worst. I, for instance, haven’t eaten in ten days and I’m starving.”

Shadow Milk shrugged. “Just pretend not to be hungry like you always do! Or is this a ploy to get me to feed you?” 

“Pathetic.”

“Hm?”

Recluse sat down before the game board. “That’s what you’re calling me in your mind, isn’t it?” He moved the piece back to their places. “It’s alright, you can say it to my face. Better me than you, anyway.”

What kind of games was he playing right now?! 

Shadow Milk’s eye twitched. “Just. Shut up. And don’t say anything unless I command you to speak.”

The Recluse smiled again, showing his blunt teeth. Contrasted by the canines, growing sharper with every rare smile. 

They returned to the game in an unnerving silence. Not even the card soldiers were hobbling. Every tap of the pawns on the board and the dice hitting the table echoed up to the high ceilings.

For once, Shadow Milk’s felt oddly as if he were being left alone with himself, despite Pure Vanilla being right there. He was hardly even breathing. 

Unsettling. So, so very unsettling. 

“Sheesh, okay. You can speak again.”

Pure Vanilla stuck his tongue out. “Are you upset?” He whispered. “Do you feel anything?”

“?? No.”

“Good.” He drew out the word in a breathy tone, “I’m here for you, if you ever want to address it.”

“Pure Vanilla. Stop being weird.”

Both their eyes turned up, silently, to meet. “I can do you one worse,” he rattled the dice and let them hit the table too hard, “I learned something about you today that I’m not sure you’ll ever be able to make me forget.”

“No.” He hissed. “You didn’t. Everything you know is a lie. Are you an idiot? Pure Vanilla cookie, you are an idiot.”

Pure Vanilla, eyes wide in some kind of trance, let the light hit them. “I am an idiot.”

“Pfft! Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

Suddenly Pure Vanilla placed a hand over his, catching him off guard. He was too busy shivering from the sudden contact to pull his hand away whilst Pure Vanilla spoke. “I love you.”

?!!

“What?”

“You heard me. I’ll say it again; I love you.”

Shadow Milk’s hand tried to flinch away but Pure Vanilla caught it. “What’s wrong?” His tone was flat like a robot, “Do you not like hearing those words?”

“You’re playing me. This is a dumb trick. You’re dumb.”

“Hm. Why so? Do you believe me, or not?”

The way Pure Vanilla was holding his stare, the air started getting tight. His eyes all begged to look away, some were watering from being forced to stay open. 

“No.”

“Am I telling the truth?”

“No.” He said again, on instinct, or perhaps because he wanted this awful tight grip on his wrist, his eyes, his body, gone. 

“Am I lying, then? Don’t I love you?”

“No.” He said, “That’s stupid. You’re a terrible liar.”

“Aha. No, I’m a phenomenal liar, according to you. What do you base such qualities on, anyway? To be found or to be believed? Oftentimes the greatest liar is the one who Everyone believes is virtuous and truthful. Hardly ever does a liar pride themselves so publicly on being such.” 

Shadow Milk hissed, finding the strength to pull. It did nothing. Pure Vanilla smiled, wide and happy like there wasn’t a thing he’d rather be doing and bringing his hand closer to his mouth. “But you’re not easily fooled. Yes. I was lying. I don’t love you.”

Obviously.

Pure Vanilla’s eyes lidded. “And that’s because…” the light faded from them as he raised his Shadow Milk’s fingers just inches from his lips, “Nobody does. Not a single soul in the whoooole wiiiide world.”

His shoulders shook like he was laughing.

“…You little scoundrel.” He said, “You… stupid, pathetic, lying little scoundrel.”

“Mhm?”

“You think that’s going to hurt me.” Finally he pulled his hand away, “You’re nothing more than mirror, a reflection. If nobody loves me, they don’t love you either.”

“Correct.” the Recluse said simply, “Not even I do. I despise myself so deeply I sometimes wonder if it’ll kiss the beginning of its own misery and make me delusional: prideful, self indulgent, self-centred and worst of all self destructive. I’ll go down in a glorious and beautiful spectacle, and when I look into the river awaiting to collect my soul and pass it on, I’ll see your glassy blue eyes pleading at me, their owner, to turn around and find a different ending. Who could’ve known a mirror to be so unforgiving.” 

His hand followed the momentum of his emotions and cracked Pure Vanilla across the face. “Shut up!” He seethed. “Shut up, get out, do not come back until I summon you from your rooms.”

Pure Vanilla was momentarily too stunned to move. Then his hand raised to his reddened cheek, and something akin to acceptance crossed his features. “There is a very long road ahead of you, should you choose to keep walking.”

Chapter Text

Tonight, someone new was crying.

The worst part? It was quiet. Quiet, and the recluse wouldn’t have heard it if its source wasn’t wrapped around him with its head buried in his shoulder.

But before he did the misdeed of revealing just How someone else managed to be in the same bed as him, especially in his state of discontent with his life, he would have to wind it back. This was, after all, a series of events.

About two weeks ago, Black Sapphire had broken up with Silverbell, and ever since then, pure vanilla had visited him every few moons, making sure he hadn’t ripped his bedsheets apart or harmed Shadow Milk’s toys in the process. Shadow milk had tried giving him things to throw, but inevitably he would be furious if any of those toys actually suffered harm — so the recluse prevented the damage from the get go by checking in more often than he promised.

Through honest conversation, messy art hobbies and a few jam out sessions to his breakup playlist, sapphie was doing better.

But a new problem had arisen.

See, Shadow Milk’s cookie minions were not the only ones with minds of their own. Apparently everything that worked in the spire had a consciousness, and quite a lot of them were unhappy with their treatment by their master — but couldn’t say so until pure vanilla had arrived to constantly stand up to him.

For instance, the rumour weavers were working harder than ever these days, and a lot of them approached him on their slivers of off time to ask for advice. A lot of them seemed like they had real lives outside of their work, even though there’s not a chance in the oven may of them could simply leave the spire, not when they were cards or knights made of plastic or bunny rabbits on their hind legs.

He decided to start asking for favours and small rewards in exchange for his service and soon enough he was practically running a business on it.

Shadow Milk cookie should’ve been furious. But he reasoned that it was all a part of leaning the currents of deceit so he never tried to stop pure vanilla.

At least, until he somehow started a rebellion within his employees.  Which brought him to the second part of this story, the main body paragraph of his apology letter.

See, it had been a normal day of answering the prayers of those card soldiers when a rumour weaver approached explaining that something terrible was happening, and he must’ve fallen ill.

“The master rumour weaver will not be happy with me if I keep skipping out on my job!”

Pure Vanilla felt a duty to help this poor rumour weaver, even if he didn’t know how yet. “Tell me your symptoms.”

“Ehh, stomach cramping, exhaustion, lack of focus, We’ve all been so much more irritable lately, the smallest thing makes us all angry.”

“Including the master Rumour weaver?”

“Yes! He’s so patient usually, and yet he’s been so short tempered as of late!”

Pure Vanilla thought about it, and in the end he suggested it was an oncoming bug, but someone else was there to greet him when he opened his mouth to say it.

“Oh my darling Silly Vanilly! It’s dinner time!”

“Dinner? Now?”

“Aha, yup. The main course: your friends!” He was forcibly dragged through a portal and sat at the head of a table with his friends tied together wearing headbands with candles on them. “I was too lazy bake a cake for the occasion of your one month anniversary, so instead I’m using your darling friends. Hope you don’t mind!”

Pure Vanilla glared at him. It got the message through enough, but it only served to make shadow milk happier seeing him so upset. “What’s the game this time?”

“The game? Pfft! Oh, you want a game now? Great, because I already prepared one. Go on, make a wish.” Shadow milk gestured to the candles on the hero cookies’ heads.

He scowled and blew the candles out, summoning up the first wish that came to mind: to go back to that rumour weaver and tell him exactly what was wrong.

“Oops. Looks like you didn’t blow hard enough. Try again, maybe they’ll blow out this time.”

He tried again. Still, the candle flames merely flickered but never stopped. Gingerbrave pointed out that the candles weren’t going out, and the Jester’s smile widened.

“Oh no, the candles!” Strawberry cookie said.

“Obviously he’s making it so the candles never go out.” Wizard said, “he’s going to keep us here until pure vanilla goes faint from trying to blow them out!”

“Oh no, what if they melt before he can do it?” Strawberry asked, “We have to find a way to turn the candles off ourselves.” She struggled against the bindings and they got tighter. “No!!”

“Quick, pure vanilla cookie needs to turn the candles off some other way! Is there water on the table.”

shadow milk watched it all with an amused huff. “You’ll make yourselves soggy if you try that.”

Pure vanilla sighed. “So you’re just going to make me watch them get burned alive.”

“Well, that would be funny wouldn’t it? Alas, I do make solutions to all my puzzles, you’ll just have to find them.” He put his hands behind his back and tilted his upper half forward. “Hint hint, right in front of you!!”

Pure vanilla stared into the candle flames. Indeed, he could just reach out and grab the answer by his bare hands. Was that what he was expected to do?

Only one way to find out.

He spotted the napkins on the table a little too late, pinching the flames out one by one and seeing them stay out for once.

“Pure vanilla cookie, your fingers!”

He shook his hand to flick the suds off. “They’re fine.” He turned his eyes up to the master of the tower. “The candles are out. Do I get my wish now?”

Shadow milk floated down to his level with his signature grin. That grin never seemed to slip from his face. If only there were a way to make it do so. “Hmm. Shame, I was hoping our play time would last longer. But fine! Have it your way: I’ll be back later.”

He was teleported back to the rumour weaving studio.

Pure Vanilla navigated himself down to the first kitchen he could find. This kitchen most definitely ran on deceit, so if he wanted to fix the problems of the rumour weavers, he’d simply have to take extreme measures; some good old poison should do.

He grabbed as many inedible things as he could; milk crowns, various wires, lighter fluid and strange colour changing berries the sizes of tomatoes.

He went through the process of making a pasta sauce using all the ingredients he found and boiled the wires in water. He was nearly scared to take them out, lest he be electrocuted.

Still, using a strainer he managed to drain the water and pour the wires back into the pan, then add the most definitely radioactive sauce. He brought it over to the rumour weaving studio along with witches knows how many forks.

“I found just the solution. Wait wait-! Finishing touch.” He took a bottle out of his pocket with a skull on it and poured it over the concoction. “Bon appetite.”

The head rumour weaver looked over and its eyes blinked out of sync. “Are you trying to poison us.”

“It’s pasta, sir.”

“it’s—“he was silenced by the recluses waggling his finger.

“Check again. Is it really what it looks like?” Everyone gathered around to check and Lo and behold, completely normal looking pasta, arguably tempting but he resisted taste testing himself. “Dig in. I figured out that the problem playing all of you is hunger. Once that’s gone, you’ll all be fixed. Perhaps you should request your Master feed you more often, if this problem persists.”

He walked out of the studio, satisfied with himself.

Another days work done.

Ah, but that doesn’t explain shadow milk’s grievances nor how someone came to be in his bed. Well, there was a series of events, not just this one. Perhaps he’d continue explaining this story another time. For now, he needed to lie down.

Chapter Text

So, Shadow Milk’s attempt at getting Pure Vanilla to eat something had failed. 

Granted, that was His Friends and all, but surely he would’ve at least indulged himself on the little bowl of cherries left to his side. Didn’t he see it? Maybe he just didn’t like cherries.

No, no. He was thinking about this wrong. He needed to tempt him with something he actually liked, clearly not cherries. What did Pure Vanilla like again?

He paced his own bedroom (which nobody knew he had, not even Pure Vanilla!) and groaned, clawing at his fringe in a desperate attempt to rip the ideas out of his skull.

“Ugh! What would I do, if I had a weird relationship to food and I desperately needed to eat something? Granola bars? Fucking… wood?!  Like a termite?! Who even came up that idea!” He ripped his soul jam off his collar, “You! You’re smart, do something!”

He turned around and imitated himself with a different accent, “I don’t know either, perhaps you should get outside feedback!”

He returned to his side of the rug he was floating over and pinched his nose, “I’m not asking him myself, that’s lame. He wouldn’t tell me anyway.”

“Ooo, Grandiose Thinker, of course not! Maybe you should ask the mannequins in the closet.”

He pointed to his wardrobe and a mannequin wearing a berry purple dress was pulled forward. “Well?”

“Maybe an apple dish will make him feel better! You know how those apples in the court yard always leave people wanting…”

“That’s— not a bad idea. I wish I remembered where on earthbread I obtained a dress in that ugly shade. Off you go!” He flicked his wrist and it soared back into the dark depths of the closet. He released a sigh and crashed next to his vanity table.

“Maybe I should install a mirror here or something…” he stared at the starry patterns on the wall behind the desk. “Why do I even own a vanity without a mirror? This feels like… forget it. I’ll get one eventually.”

It was settled then. Apple crumble it would be.

*

He had no idea how Pure Vanilla managed to find the real kitchen in this place when making Candy Apple that foam coffee. Maybe she lead him there without thinking. Flawless explanation, and it made Shadow Milk a little angry at her recklessness. But at least her problems were improving, thanks to Pure Vanilla’s little efforts. She smiled the same but it was less forced, like she wasn’t trying as hard to appear the bright and perfect child she thought Shadow Milk wanted.

Pfft. Why did she act like that anyway? Clearly it was either a one sided crush or a desire for a parental figure she never had. But again, he was never good with children, and he certainly didn’t want to be taking care of one if he could help it. So, the fact someone else was finally stepping in was a huge burden off his shoulders.

But that wasn’t important now.

He got the green apples instead of blue, since those needed to be used sooner rather than later, about four of them. He tossed them in a pot with a splash of water to soften them beforehand. Yes, this is apparently necessary! After about half an hour, he strained them and finally peeled and sliced them evenly, placed them in a bowl, sprinkled them with a quarter cup granulated sugar, a table spoon lemon juice and half a teaspoon each of cinnamon and nutmeg, then mixed a bit and put the mixture in a (greased!) baking dish.

Shoot, the oven! He snapped his fingers and it instantly heated to 180C (that’s 350F so yall don’t have to do the conversion.)

And now for the crumble part:

That being, half a cup of flour, oats and brown sugar, a quarter cup of softened (unsalted) butter and a good pinch of salt.

This part was easy, just measurements of ingredients, mix together until crumbly and sprinkle on top!

Wow. Did he really just attach a recipe someone found randomly online into this story? Again? (Jk you guys like me hehe.)

Just when he thought there was suspicious lack of emotional therapy going on, he placed the pan in the oven and as he was setting the timer for half an hour, a servant hopped into the kitchen to lay a letter on the desk. He gave Shadow Milk an odd look as he turned around to exit. Heh, what did they have to say about this? It was perfectly normal to be baking apple crumbles at crazy hours of the night.

He cleaned his hands before picking up the letter, examined its messy but legible scrawl, definitely cookie jam for ink, and the page inside was yellowed like it had been dyed with turmeric.

Burning spice cookie, summoning him of all cookies? Someone was feeling different. The location, the— The Garden of Delights?! Was he about to propose destroying it or something? Actually, that would make sense. He was waiting on an opportunity since he got out, Shadow Milk knew from observing him.

Alright, sure. But first, he’d have to feed this apple crumble to Pure Vanilla cookie.

The time passed in a blur of ticks and giving his workers instructions on where to paint next, what kind of rumors were in fashion, and peaking in on black sapphire who was in the living room… playing board games with candy apple cookie. Rare sight! Pure Vanilla must’ve been doing wonders for them.

Speaking of which, where even was Pure Vanilla cookie?

***

Pure Vanilla cookie was cutting the excess growth off one of the rose bushes of the purple court yard. It had a name, he just couldn’t remember, but the flowers here were purple and sang odd melodies at him when he listened too long to the breeze.

Somehow the servant usually did this work had fallen ill, and now he was tasked with it in his place after being the first person in the vicinity of the garden manager. Yes, Shadow Milk had a garden manager, one for each courtyard or garden in fact. They were differentiated by their colors, corresponding to the flowers.

Admittedly he’d only properly met the blue and orange ones, occasionally seeing the white or red in passing, and meeting purple today was a complete accident.

He had already decided he wasn’t a fan of the purple garden for its cacophony of horrid insults and lies, unlike the white or blue where the flowers were only background chatter, or they sang in beautiful melodies that intended to lure one deeper into the garden and fall into a thorn trap.

“You’re guilty. So guilty!” Said one flower. He clipped it off to silence it.

“All your friends know that you failed!” Clip.

“She will never love you back!” Snap!

“Master Shadow Milk cookie is looking for you!” Nice try, clip.

“No really—“  Clip.

“Look behind you!— ah. Why did you stop?”

Because, it seems the flowers weren’t kidding, he could feel his soul jam tingle when the master of the spire was near, and currently he was floating over the whole spire searching for something. When his eyes landed on Pure Vanilla, he felt his stomach drop. Clip!

“Nilly! How come you’re doing the hard work of tending to my gardens?”

Pure Vanilla put the shears down and stepped away from the bushes that oooh’d and aaah’d as Shadow Milk descended to sit on a stone bench. “Your servant fell ill. I was the first in sight.”

“Pfft! Oh you, classic overworked soul aren’t you? You’ll never survive in this place if you do everything you’re told!”

“I was threatened with these very same shears if that convinces you. Tell your employees to give me more respect if you’re so concerned.”

“Respect,” he said, twirling a finger, “is earned. I can’t just order them not to walk all over you.”

Pure vanilla glared. “Yes you can.”

“Mmmm. Are you hungry?” He said, raising back into the air all a sudden. “Really, let’s go inside.”

He pulled Pure Vanilla with him and the flowers were far beneath them before he knew it. When they landed on one of the walkways, Shadow Milk dropped his smile. “I hate that courtyard. Reminds me too much of an old colleague.”

Now he was being lead to a room that, while it appeared pristine, had certainly not been swept or mopped in the past week. The floors were too matte, cabinets forming the thinnest layer of dust perceivable to his eyesight — which as many might know, wasn’t very good to begin with. Embracing deceit had made it clearer, somehow.

“Don’t worry about spilling crumbs on this floor. I just wanted to find somewhere that wasn’t pristine so you don’t ruin my minions hard work. Anyways I have a surprise for you! Sit down!”

Of course, to anybody else this room appeared perfectly fine, it fit the aesthetic of the spire and it was cleaner than the rooms in most cookies’ houses. He placed himself on the cerulean cushioned sofa and Shadow Milk moved the coffee table over using his magic. Then, reaching through a portal he carefully pulled out a porcelain dish smelling like apple and placed it down on the table. “There ya go!” He snapped twice and two forks appeared in his hand. He handed one to Pure Vanilla and sat down on the opposite sofa. “Dig in, whenever you’re ready.”

“What’s in it?”

Shadow Milk pouted, “Can I not reward you for your good work? You don’t eat enough. Can’t have you working yourself to crumbs only to have those crumbs be tiny and flat! How will I make use of you if there’s nothing left when you die of exhaustion?!”

“So you’re feeding me apple pie?”

“Crumble.” He corrected with a swirl of his fork, “important distinction.”

“It really isn’t— mph!” Shadow Milk shoved a chunk into Pure Vanillas mouth. His stomach flipped at the odd causality of it. At least the taste of it was swoon worthy, not that he’d make that obvious.

“Ah, there we go. Do I need to spoon feed you? I’ll do it if I have to!” He seemed to go back on those words through his posture, “I’ll— I’ll just complain the whole time.”

Pure Vanilla swallowed. “So will I, thank you very much.”

“Mhm, you’re welcome!!”

“No, that’s not— ugh, nevermind.” He bent forward to take a second chunk. He was quite sure these were going to end up being the same apples from the blue courtyard, the ones that had special side affects. Alas, just one bite had his body reminding him that he was in fact starving, and now he simply Had to indulge himself on this poisonous delight.

“Hey, quick question, do you call everything you think you don’t deserve poisonous? I notice that rhetoric in your thoughts a lot.”

“Why do you care?!”

Shadow Milk paused. “I don’t.” He shoved another piece in Pure Vanillas mouth to stop him from retorting. What a unique game he was playing, feeding his prisoner sweet delights like he hadn’t literally tried to kill his friends yesterday. And being so grossly intimate about it, too. Still, after the First instance involving apples (which he couldn’t talk about because this fic has a teen rating wink wink), Pure Vanilla was in a mind to pay him back for his weird behavior; and what better way to do it than to play along?

Pure Vanilla pat the space next to him. “Don’t you think it would be easier to do this if you were sitting next to me?”

Shadow Milk scoffed. “So now you want me in your space? Awww, and here you were, telling me you wanted me gone.”

“It’s only for this one instance. Don’t get it twisted.” Or do, play right into my hands.

“Oh no Nilly! Never ever.” He happily took his place next to Pure Vanilla and took a bite of the apple crumble himself. “Mmh! I really outdo myself each time.”

“Mhm. I can only imagine.”

Shadow Milk took another piece for himself and then stopped mid-chew and swallowed heavily. “Is that a compliment?”

He smirked. Sarcasm, but sure. He expected Shadow Milk to rattle on about his brilliance, which would take their minds off the prospect of torture for another ten, maybe thirty minutes, but this confused stare he was receiving was far better.

“Does nobody tell you they like your baking?” Pure Vanilla said. Shadow Milk crossed his arms and turned his face away. Pure Vanilla leaned in, taking up too much of his personal space. “No! You don’t feed your minions, is that it?”

“I feed them as much as they’re supposed to be fed!”

“And how often would that be?”

Shadow Milk shoved him away. “Every four days to keep their energy high. They can survive up to ten times that duration, but after a few days their systems start decomposing for energy, and I can’t have them leaving their crumbs on my shiny floors.”

Certainly explained their attitudes. It was nearly funny how befittingly cruel it was. “Shadow Milk, Cookies need to be fed daily to maximize their energy.”

“You think I don’t know that? This is the spire, Nilly. Food doesn’t even count here. They can hold out.” Upon seeing Pure Vanilla hold his amusement, he squinted, “What’s so funny?”

“Oh no, it’s just that you play your character of a cruel master too well, I’m almost convinced you’re doing this for the bit.” He took his hand away from his smile, “Blame me if I’m growing a bit fond of it.”

Shadow Milk’s expression flashed into indignation before he shrank back into the sofa with his eyes all turned away. “You’re being foolish again.” Pure Vanilla could swear he saw color in his cheeks before he turned his face away. Normally, Shadow Milk would’ve changed the topic or dragged him into another game so he could pretend away the vulnerable moments they had, so why was he choosing to sit with it?

Instead, the air had grown tense, like both of them were waiting for the other to sit up, to speak, anything. Pure Vanilla went over the choices he could make. Some stuck out as a bit unorthodox, but considering the atmosphere was already so charged…

He reached with his fork, cut out a chunk of apple crumble, very carefully reached out to Shadow Milk cookie to cradle his face and push the fork in his mouth.

And the real kicker — he accepted the offering without thinking, at least until Pure Vanilla was pulling the fork out of his mouth and he flinched away. God, the look on his face spelled murder, and it was hilarious. “You… Are setting yourself up for a horrible punishment, Pure Vanilla cookie.”

“Paint me as terrified,” he said, hardly holding the laugh back from his voice, “The master of Deceit finally snaps and breaks one of his toys! A tragedy of the ages, never yet before seen.”

“Humph! You know Dolls aren’t meant to play back, don’t you?” Pure Vanilla could smell the venom in his tone, but his heart was thudding too fast for his common sense to follow along with — he pushed even further.

“Mm, I’m your Doll? Quaint. I don’t think you’re meant to feed those things, shadow milk.”

“You!—“ he scoffed and turned away. “You know what? Drop it. Just finish eating.” He scampered off the couch and, surprisingly didn’t fly through a portal immediately. No, he settled with his legs crossed onto the opposite seat. “And if you say another word before you’re finished, I’ll curse you so you can’t hold down food or water for a whole week, and I’ll set the temperature in your room so it’s always too cold, even when you’re feverish.”

He was about to suggest a simple instant crumbling, but shadow milk pinned with him a stare that was so intensely malicious he already felt his stomach turning like it was going to push all that apple riiiight back up. Alright, fine. Settle them both in uncomfortable silence, he’d already won anyway.

Chapter Text

So, an incredibly eventful two weeks had passed since that moment with the apple crumble.

Well, not really eventful, but certainly memorable. Firstly, he’d failed to stay quiet and had indeed been cursed, and as if the worst timing had hit, the complaints and jobs and games racked up so much that he passed out on the way to the game board one random cold night.

For the next week and a few days, he was bedridden and Shadow Milk had taken care of him (as if he hadn’t cursed him in the first place) until he was able to take care of himself again.

He was sure this was all part of Shadow Milk’s ploy to seduce him to humiliate him.

It wasn’t often, but it was most certainly effective; sometimes he’d do things to get a reaction, and Pure Vanilla would snap insults or glare at him until he gave up.

And most recently before this point, an apple in the blue courtyard went too far, leaving him completely at the mercy of his captor. Shadow Milk didn’t like talking about it, and all he got from rumour weavers was vague statements about him being chained by the neck like a dog.

He didn’t understand it until now, what Shadow Milk was so secretive about; really, if he wanted to use this as another way to break Pure Vanilla, it would do him better to tell Pure Vanilla exactly what happened and watch him recoil in disgust and horror.

But no, instead he was still here, in Pure Vanilla’s bed, and he was crying.

He could hardly say it happened yesterday, the moon and sun hadn’t even switched places in the duration of the event. But hours had passed, that much was certain.

He was tired already, crashing into his bed and hardly bearing Shadow Milk’s teases. Last night he’d chosen to shoot back a bit and the argument escalated until Shadow Milk took his soul jam out of his hands and squeezed it just a bit too hard.

And that lead to a terrifying, dizzyingly intimate discovery.

He’d thankfully allowed Pure Vanilla to rest for the night but when he returned the next morning, things returned from zero to one hundred fast.

That’s where he discovered… a lot, at once.

Up till that point, he’d gotten glimpses from that day with the apples, recalled one key thing: a feeling of powerlessness.

And thanks to the corruption of his already so diminished soul jam, he could feel it from the other side of the tether: that fragile pride his other half harbored at getting to command him like a puppet.

He remembered having a moment of clarity, finding himself sitting on Shadow Milk Cookie’s lap, distantly understanding that he was meant to be completely powerless, and the wasn’t. But in such an inbetween state, he couldn’t help but test his limits. He pushed the boundary, stole back power and found the results startling.

The same happened a few hours ago… he saw an opportunity and he took it. He reached out to touch Shadow Milk’s burning soul jam and his arms buckled in an instant. From there it was far too easy to flip their positions, having taken complete control of the situation.

He’d never seen Shadow Milk looking so meek. His eyes were watering, and his jaw clenched as if his teeth could stop the sounds from escaping. Adorable and heart wrenching for how upset he looked at being overthrown.

Still, he eventually allowed Shadow Milk to continue whatever he was doing, with the added bonus that he was still leaning over the beast, trying not to let his balance falter under the weight of keeping himself propped up. Nonetheless Shadow Milk put a stop to their experiment, supposedly unable to handle the vulnerability it took, being in that position.

And now, he was… sobbing.

Ironic, wasn’t it? Maybe he thought Pure Vanilla was still asleep. Oh well.

He turned over to face the beast. “Was it something I did?”

His brows turned up, the sorry expression on his face becoming cartoonishly miserable. “Don’t even ask me that.”

“So, yes.” He reached out to swipe a tear falling out of the corner of his eye, “I just followed my instincts, Shadow Milk Cookie. I’m sorry that I’m not as weak and innocent as you thought.”

“But I don’t get it.” He said through clenched teeth, “What possessed you to do that?”

“You’re focusing too much on me. I did what I wanted to. Instead tell me this: why did you do what you did?”

Shadow Milk didn’t speak. His eyes lowered to stare at the golden key design on Pure Vanilla’s robes. After a while he shrugged, “I guess I was curious what effect it would have.”

“And were you happy with the results?” He asked more quietly, a corner of his mouth turning up, “I know I was.” His eyes stayed on Shadow Milk’s face, watching his brow furrow like he was vengeful, “Oh what? Are you upset about that? I won’t deny it, milky.”

“Stop it.” His fingers dug into the sheets, the crackle of pulled fabric sounding quietly under his nails, “You were meant to be ashamed about it. So why aren’t you?”

Just that sentence alone opened up a whole new world of unspoken things on both sides. Pure Vanilla adjusted his head to rest under his arm, “Guess it just wasn’t the first time I’ve ever done that sort of thing. You probably noticed that I told you what to do to make it tick, right? That kind of knowledge isn’t intuitive, Shadow Milk, it’s gained through experience.”

Shadow Milk turned away, but he didn’t get out of bed yet. “Stop. Just shut up.”

He still didn’t understand why the beast was so upset. “You can’t possibly be innocent like that either if you knew what to do with it.”

“I’m… sigh, I can’t find the words for it, okay? Just leave me alone until I figure it out.” He buried his face deeper into the pillow. Pure Vanilla did what his heart told him and wrapped his arms around Shadow Milk’s waist.

“Alright. Is this okay?”

“Whatever.”

“I’ll wait for you. We can talk this out, dear.” He hadn’t meant to let the nickname slip, and doing so incited a pitiful whine out of Shadow Milk’s throat, and he continued sobbing more overtly, Pure Vanilla could feel the sobs shaking through him.

What a poor creature, left alone for so long that he could hardly handle the slightest amount of honesty about himself. Just how long had he been like this?

He found himself asleep once again and when he woke up, he was hugging a plushie in his likeness. A welcoming present normally left on the chair in front of his desk. Shadow Milk had escaped his clutches again. He had the distinct impression that the master of deceit would probably never acknowledge this again, even if he asked. So be it, he’d simply act as if it had never happened.

Or, he’d try his best.

After all, he had plenty of minions within the spire that needed his attention. First on the list was that poor heartbroken boy, Black Sapphire Cookie, who hopefully hadn’t ripped his room to shreds in the time that Pure Vanilla hadn’t talked to him at all.

But when he went to check, Black Sapphire’s bed was empty, so was the… thing, he hung from like a bat while he was sleeping (at this point Pure Vanilla was sure the bed was installed both as a cover and a convenient cushion for other reasons. Funny how the sheets had last been changed only a few days after his breakup with Silverbell, and had stayed unused enough to not need changing for another month or so.) but moving on, his room was empty and also suspiciously clean for once, signaling he’d either turned a new leaf or was planning on returning to the very same old one. Only time would tell.

His next ambition, make some breakfast to celebrate his regained ability to eat.

He found Candy Apple Cookie and offered to make her the most delicious strawberry or mango milk if she showed him where the kitchens were again and she excitedly jumped out of her bed to run right down to the pantry.

“Ta~daaa! It has all you could ever need.”

“Thank you, you really are such a blessing.” He rubbed the top of her hair and reached for the rack of seasoning. “Alright, what do you think the other workers eat?”

“Uhh. I dunno, I never asked, what are we having?”

“Well, you and I can have pancakes!” He winked, “what do you say to lemon drizzle? As for the rest of them, I’m considering some kind of stirfry rice dish, and to use up the frozen veggies. Not the best because it lacks protein but…”

“Oh, we have protein!” She rummaged through a few cupboard and fridges (it should be important to note that the kitchens had several) and pulled out a few packs of tofu, “okay, nevermind but I found tofu! That counts, doesn’t it?”

“I’d say so. Covers the scenario in which any of those things are vegan.”

“We’re all made of dough and jam and icing, how could any of us be vegan?” She rolled her eyes, “Hmmm, are you gonna make the milk with strawberries or mangoes?”

“I’m leaning towards… mango. I mean, it’s the same process isn’t it?”

*

The witches who watch over these events must pause to acknowledge three recipes were mentioned and we really don’t have the time to go into detail for all of them. Fret not dear audience, you will get your fried rice recipe eventually. But we shall focus on the pancakes and the mango milk for now :3

*

After adding the finishing touches to the rice he nearly wanted to take a bowl and eat the entire thing himself. Alas he had workers to feed, and he had promised pancakes. Still he scooped some into a side dish bowl before calling Candy Apple in to deliver it to all the various stations in the spire. Witches bless her portal magic, he would’ve hated to travel the full distance between places.

She was finished her delivery before his bowl was even empty.

“Is it good?!” He offered a spoonful to her and she hummed.

“You have to make that for me next time! You gotta! Or else I’m gonna burn your socks off in your sleep.”

“What if not wearing any?” He scraped the remains out of the bowl and held the spoon out for her again. “Kidding, I’ll make sure my feet are covered for the next week so your evil plans can hatch. Let’s start on those pancakes now.”

-

Pure Vanilla was sure he didn’t need to specify the recipe of pancakes. Yes, if anybody was curious, they could check the comment section. (/srs)

He and Candy Apple Cookie collaborated on the process, where she was measuring the dry ingredients while he prepared the wet ingredients. He let her hold the bowl with the wet ingredients to pour it in bit by bit while he held the mixer. She was good for obeying the “go” and “stop” commands in that regard, but he was still not sure to trust her with the electric whisk.

Then of course, he added a few mixed berries and maple syrup onto the stacks of pancakes and a swirl of whipped cream for decoration. They enjoyed the pancakes sitting against the stove and chatted about current events, and this is where he hit to ask her about sapphire’s odd disappearance this morning. Or, afternoon. They were both eating their first meal of the day right now while the sun had been up for ages. Or it would’ve been if time worked normally, which it didn’t! Appearently he’d been out for a while, way before Pure Vanilla woke up anyway.

And he’d been acting weird since Pure Vanilla went out of commission temporarily. Scribbling notes into his script, annotations that made no sense. He was, as Candy Apple had called it “practically writing love letters in the margins of his rumor agendas.” This would all be funny enough if Pure Vanilla hadn’t previously worked so hard to help him get over his breakup.

“Geez, all those jam out sessions for nothing.” He rested his head against the glass door of the oven, “Will it be good for him, do you think?”

“What do I know? I’ve never had a boyfriend. Or girlfriend. Or… any friend.” He paused briefly, “But that doesn’t bother me! Shadow Milk Cookie’s attention is all I need to stay alive! Besides, now that master Shadow Milk Cookie is back from his imprisonment, there’s been so many new playthings coming to the spire. I’ll friends out of them while they last.”

“Do they?”

“Hmmm, naw. They get so boring after a while, they just don’t understand the wonderful things deceit can do, so they gots ta go!”

Hmm well. “If you’re not opposed to it, I can be your friend. No pressure. I’ll still make you mango milk if you say no.”

Candy Apple crossed her arms and drummed her fingers along her biceps. “I’ll think about it, mister Vanilla Cookie. I’m still jealous of you, ya know!”

Only natural, since he took up quite a lot of Shadow Milk time for the last week or so. Last several weeks. How strange, that the master of lies never seemed to leave him alone: except for today, just after sharing their most vulnerable moment yet.

Was that all it took? Prying too far into Shadow Milk’s true self, hardly touching beyond the illusion and yet scaring him so harshly he hadn’t even tried to stop Black Sapphire Cookie on his way down.

Really, who knew? Him, potentially. But everything in this spire was potential. Well, almost everything.

“I’ll attend all your tea parties and bring the tastiest biscuits I can bake?”

She pursed her lips in thought. “Deal.” She said, extending her hand and almost letting the plate fall off her lap before catching it with her other.

“Deal.” They shook on it.

He took the plate from her hand and placed it in the sink with his own.

*

While he was busy chopping up the mangoes, a particularly careful gait followed the shadow creeping down the hall. He only knew because Candy Apple was too light and Shadow Milk’s feet hardly ever touched the floor.

“Welcome back, Black Sapphire Cookie.”

“Huh? Oh. Hello. You’re looking… refreshed.”

He pushed the mango cubes aside with his knife and cut the other half of it. “Had a nice morning, Candy Apple is in the living room waiting for me to make this mango milk recipe. Say, does your boyfriend like mangoes?”

“Silverbell? I’m pretty sure he hasn’t ever tried—- Waitwaitholdonasecond?!” He waved his hands out in front of him, “how did you know me and Silverbell were…”

“Spotless room, books and figurines arranged to be off the floor, vinyl records and cds on the wall instead of in the cd player or gramophone, and carpet is even hoovered so there’s no beads, crumbs or candy wrappers on the floor.”

Black Sapphire slouched and crossed his arms, “So?? Maybe I was in a cleaning mood while you were busy making your bedroom messier by the day.”

“Oh, I’m sure my bedroom could’ve gotten Very messy in the last day or five.” He didn’t need to imply that, it just that the next thing he was going to say required him to slip into equally strange territory; “But you, Black Sapphire Cookie, left a jarring piece of evidence behind.”

“Oh yeah, and what’s that?”

He pushed the second batch of mango cubes aside and reached for a second mango to peel it. “Your bed wasn’t made up.  Or more like, it was, but in that specific way that one might effortlessly toss their sheets back into place on an early morning when they’re too tired to make it neat; you slept in your own bed last night instead of on the ceiling.”He raised his eyes back up to catch Black Sapphire’s hilarious reaction, “So obviously, you were trying to make your bed smell like you, which you wouldn’t have done unless you wanted to have a boy over. Though tell me, why’d you immediately assume I meant Silverbell when I asked about your boyfriend?”

“Because… um…” he slinked back across the threshold, “Fine, you caught me. I went to see him again, and now he’s chilling in my room. Grrhhh, Shadow Milk should have fed you an apple before he left for the Garden of Delights. That way he could’ve told you to stay quiet until he came back and you’d listen.”

“Oh? How do you know where he’s off to?”

“I read his letter. Anyway it’s not that important. He’s going to be gone a couple of days, so I thought it was a good time to…” he blushed, “Listen, do not let Candy Apple Cookie, or anyone else for that matter know about this. It remains our secret.”

He kissed his pinky and held it out. “A good therapist promises confidentiality. Your secret is safe with me, Saffy.”

Chapter Text

Shadow Milk didn’t return for quite a while, long enough that a few sun and moons had risen and fallen when Pure Vanilla woke up to Candy Apple shaking him and talking about his promise to make her fried rice. He looked for a clock — Shadow Milk hadn’t installed one — and then the calendar.

“Wasn’t it March when we last checked?”

“What’s wrong?” Candy Apple said, “ohhh you mean, why we’re almost at June now? Yeah, spire does that. It’s only a few months, don’t look so glum!”

“But what happened between then and now…?”

“Did anything happen at all?” She giggled, “maybe you’ll remember eventually. But till then, how about that rice!”

***

He started by eye balling the rice. This is not recommended if one is a normal person, but Pure Vanilla is very explicitly not normal which is obviously the explanation for his behavior in this whole story.

Anyway, once he tossed a bit of tumeric over the rice and filled with enough water to cover the rice, he got started on the veggies;

He diced the carrots into chunks, repeated the same for the bell peppers and used up all the remaining spring onions (both white and green parts.)

He placed the wok pan on the stove and set it to the highest heat. “Do we have chicken or anything now?”

“Uh, let me check.” Candy Apple opened the drive and gave a thumbs up, “we also have tiny bacon bits.”

“Oo yes, less effort. Put em in.”

Remember that it’s always recommended to cook the meat first no matter what. Wok or deep frying pan, high heat, any cooking oil, add a little bit of brown sauce to the meat for flavour.

After a few minutes, Pure Vanilla poured in the carrots and mixed them around. The witches who bring this story to you have never measured the specifics of time for each section, but thankfully this is the spire where time doesn’t actually matter at all.

Next he added the bell peppers and spring onions. At the request of Candy Apple Cookie he also diced up some white mushrooms beforehand and put them in.

Uhhhh do we talk about seasoning?

Tap in to your inner cooking spirits and add to the whims of said spirit: Soy sauce, garlic powder, salt and pepper, even more soy sauce oh and add an egg or two to the rice when you put it in if you want egg fried rice. Alternatively, after adding rice and seasoning, push everything to one side, add in your egg and then use (WOODEN!!!) chopsticks to mix it around until it starts turning into little pieces of fried egg. It’s meant to feel like scraping the flakes off the bottom of the pan.

Recipe moment now over, Candy Apple insisted upon some kind of ‘comment section’ with more detailed instructions(?) listed.

He let Candy Apple take her bowl before he added in the egg, since she apparently wasn’t a fan. Pure Vanilla was in the process of mixing and scraping the egg when his soul jam started humming. He acknowledged it but thought nothing of it.

Until he heard the voice of his mysterious other half, oddly gentle and speaking in third person;

“Oh, is that Pure Vanilla Cookie I see, making breakfast?” He said, like he was cooing, “Aww, how kind of him! Why don’t you go say hello.”

“Shadow Milk, I swear to the Witches, if you have some kind of feral cat in your arms right now I’m going to hit you with the bowl from the rice cooker. It’s here, in my reach.” He felt a tug on his hair, “Shadow Milk.”

“Oop. He doesn’t like that. Hmmm, no! Sit down, I’ll handle this.” He plopped the mysterious creature down and reached his arms under Pure Vanilla’s to encircle his waist.  “Hey Nilly~! You’re looking feral and slightly off putting as always.”

“Is that meant to be a compliment?”

“Just modelling correct behavior for the youth! You know, apparently looking feral and filled with bloodlust is a compliment in the Kingdom of Destruction.”

Pure Vanilla tried to elbow Shadow Milk so he’d stop leaning his head on his shoulder. “Well, I also hear they’re very privy to violence, it’s a rather foundational part of their heritage. Now let go of me before I get cancelled on twitter for cultural appropriation.”

“Pfft! I forgot you were funny.” He slinked back and tapped whatever was sitting on the counter behind him on its nose, according to the narrated ‘boop!’ He said out loud. “Hear that, little Spice? That means he wants to kiss me!”

“I do not— who are you even talking to?!” He finally turned around and found… a child, tiny and half kitten half Cookie, sitting on the counter. “What is that.”

“Your new assignment!” Shadow Milk bowed, “Surprise! No more torture monopoly for two weeks! You’re raising this child for me.”

Thankfully all the cooking was done now, as Pure Vanilla set the wok off the heat and left the utensils in it so he could turn fully around and pin Shadow Milk with a death glare. “No.”

“Yee~es.”

“Shadow Milk, do you understand the amount of responsibility it takes to raise… not just a kitten, but a Cookie?!”

Shadow Milk raised himself up onto the counter and carried the baby spice onto his lap. “Nope. That’s why you’re doing it for me.”

“Absolutely not. You could not bribe me with the finest pot of gold. You couldn’t even levy my soul jam.”

“Not even your freedom?”

“Well, that’s—“ he gestured to his clothes; navy apron, which replaced his shawl, robes with sleeves that only went down to his elbow. He also wasn’t wearing the cape, just in case the swoop of it knocked a jar over. “It’s a little late to set me free now, isn’t it?”

“Eh, I’d wager you wanna see your little Lily again — who knows, maybe you’ll change your mind about children after this final challenge.”

Pure Vanilla pinched the bridge of his nose, “I have a lineage, Shadow Milk. I know what it takes to raise a kid.”

“And that makes you perfect, doesn’t it?” he placed the cat back on the counter and it hopped onto the floor to sniff around. Shadow Milk also pushed off the counter, floating a few inches from the ground to drape his arms around Pure Vanilla’s shoulders. “I’ll sweeten the deal, how about a month of no torment, at all. Just happy camping while you focus on your maid-mother duties.”

“Mother…?”

“Well. You’re a bit too…” Shadow Milk’s eyes all trailed down to his feet and back up, “Feminine, to be a father. Like, who else do I know that consistently wears only loose robes like you?!”

“Your lack of understanding in this field really shows, former Fount of all knowledge.”Recalling the last conversation he remembered between them, Pure Vanilla pushed him back against the counter and smiled, “Oh but do tell me about how perfect I am, I think I liked that part.”

Shadow Milk’s eyes went appropriately massive. “What?”

“Just modeling correct behavior for the youth.” He leaned his hands on the counter behind Shadow Milk, “how about this: All of those things you just said, with the added bonus that you either feed your servants in my place OR you take care of this child with me. I’m not cooking for the entire spire and trying to modulate recipes for this thing’s diet. That’s too much work and I will rally your rumour weavers to say some nasty things about you to your other staff if you don’t agree to these terms.” He pressed his chest more firmly against Shadow Milk’s, “Ooo, scary paperwork to fill out because they’re going to go on strike~!”

“Why are you pressed up against me right now—? Umph…”

“What, are you scared? Disquieted by it? Better say yes to my terms, Milky.”

“Oh, shut up!” He pushed Pure Vanilla back so there was at least a couple centimetres of breathing room available. “Fine. Have it your way. The servants will be fed so you won’t have to worry, I’ll lessen the trials and because I’m just so nice, I’ll bake a cake for you when the week is over. Your choice.”

Pure Vanilla tried what used to be a benevolent smile but in his position and clothes probably looked more like a grin of premeditated murder. “You’re so very kind to me, master of Deceit. I sure do hope you of all Cookies would keep your promises, it would be a shame if I told your servants about—“

“Aah! What the crab-apple!” A high pitched voice said from the doorway. Candy Apple Cookie, right there on the threshold.

Shadow Milk shoved Pure Vanilla back and smiled nervously. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing.” He snapped, “you saw none of that.” After a moment of her staring at him blankly she shook her head and when she looked back up at him, she was practically bouncing on her feet.

“Master Shadow Milk Cookie!”

“Heh, yeahhh, I know I know. Careful, there’s a cat on the floor.” He picked it up and it growled innocently in defiance, “Burning Spice Cookie gave it to me, said I couldn’t last a week with a kid on my hands. Man, what does he think I do for a living? Sell crypto?! Actually I do, just not for a living.”

He turned back to see Pure Vanilla’s seething stare. “Whaat? It’s a profitable business venture! …For me. Not for my buyers.”

The organised deal; Burning Spice Cookie had challenged Shadow Milk to take care of a kitten for one week, and bonus points if he made it to two. What the bonus points were for, Pure Vanilla didn’t care.

So, he would spend most of his time with the kitten-Cookie, trying to teach it whatever it needed, to feed it, to comfort it at night. Essentially, the routine Shadow Milk had set for him previously was being put on pause to do this. Now, did this really count towards the challenge? No, definitely not. But burning spice had forgotten the option that Shadow Milk could simply hand this work off to a servant and left him with a kitten from the nutmeg clan. He must’ve thought it disposable if he just Handed it right over, especially when the whole ordeal happened in the Garden of Delights.

Pure Vanilla had read in the fairy library that the beast of sloth was a gentle and kind soul before her fall. Maybe she was cruel enough to let the deal happen, hence why he was stuck here, trying to feed it ham slices without getting bitten.

“Oh, Nilly. You know what would be more effective, if you made it battle for the ham slices?”

“Battle. Shadow Milk,” he pinned Shadow Milk with a bemused smile, “Theyre not hardwired to want violence, it’s just the culture they grow up in. They aren’t allergic to a bit of gentle parenting.”

“Well, if I return this kitten and it’s all outta whack, he’ll say I failed.”

“I’d agree.” Pure Vanilla said, placing down another torn up ham slice and pulling his hand away before the kitten could mistake it for a sausage. “You set this upon me instead of taking the challenge like a real Beast Cookie. I won’t protest or anything but you should at least acknowledge you’ve already given up before you even started.”

Shadow Milk grumbled and pulled him up by his collar, “You are so very annoying, Pure Vanilla Cookie. Alas, I did promise no pain for you. Don’t take advantage of it, it’s all stacking up for what I’ll do when the two weeks are over.”

“Oh, if you’ll kill me when this is done I’d be glad to take as much liberty as I want with my words.” He sneered, “Witches forbid you get me excited for all the pain you’ll inflict only to leave me alive at the end of it.”

“Woah. That’s kinda weird.” He backed away to an appropriate distance, “did you wake up more overt or something?”

Pure Vanilla blinked. “Firstly, Get your mind out of the gutter. Secondly, If you’re not going to provide meaningful support can you please get out of here?”

“I live here!! I am literally the power source that makes this place possible.”

“Uh-huh. Aww, does kitty want more?” He ripped up another ham slice, “Now, you can be better behaved— noooo. No teeth. Okay, fine. Yes teeth.” He threw it and it landed on the kitten’s face, “whoops.”

Shadow Milk covered his face. When he took his hands away he was, thankfully, smiling normally, “Now look who’s talking weird. You were staring at me like I was crazy back there. Double standards I say!!”

Pure Vanilla hummed, “I wasn’t even looking at you for most of that conversation.”

“I could feel it through the back of your head. Speaking of which—“ he ran his fingers through Pure Vanilla’s hair. “I think you need a bath.”

Wow. Rude. But fine, he was feeling rather unclean after the two months skipped without any explanation. “Are you going join me?”Shadow Milk stopped in his tracks, frozen midair. The last of Pure Vanilla’s locks slipped out of his hands. “Hey. It’s an innocent question. You were there for ages when I was sick.”

“Yeah, cause you couldn’t do it yourself.”

“That’s— okay fine let’s not debate the specifics of it. I’m not asking you to be there, I’m asking if you’ll be there regardless of my feelings on the matter.”

Shadow Milk crossed his arms. “No.”

“Okay.” Pure Vanilla pushed himself up and left the kitten to roam the floor, “Keep an eye on her while I’m gone. Don’t turn her blue.”

**

He had his hair wrapped in a towel when he returned, and the kitten flinched away. It must’ve thought he was someone new.

“Wow, you look stupid.”

“Would you rather I drip all over your pristine marble floors? Didn’t think so.” He sat down on a sofa and Shadow Milk placed the kitten in his lap. “You’re right, it’s a She! I don’t know why I doubted you at first.”

“You don’t trust me.” Pure Vanilla said easily, “Major flaw in your design, but I can’t fault you.”

“What?”

“Nothing.” He let the tiger kitten smell his hand again, petting its back. “Eh, does she have a name yet, or did burning spice just toss you some random baby and expect it to be alive when you returned?”

Shadow Milk shrugged and took a place on the arm of the couch, “Alive is stretching it. In one piece is more like it.”

Pure Vanilla glared up at him, “You are so awful,” he covered the kitten’s fur with his hand, “How could he ever think you capable to do this without me?”

“He didn’t! That’s why he gave me a kitten and not some grown up General of his. Besides, mortal Cookies are expendable to him, they’re all fated to be swallowed by the tides of destruction anyhow. None of us beasts have let ourselves get attached to mortal Cookies in years. He can sacrifice one of his own to prove a point.”

“The point being…?”

“That I’m a terrible parent! I couldn’t foster a child if I tried. Well, now I’ve tried. I’d say it’s been going pretty well.”

Pure Vanilla sneered in disdain. “I should start taking longer baths, daily, so you’re forced to spend more time on the challenge you’ve handed over to me in your place.”

“Heyyyy you took it without a hint of hesitation. Couldn’t even sense it on your insides. You wanted to take care of a child again, don’t even deny it.” Shadow Milk leaned in close, mere centimetres between them. “Your caring heart never falters, and I’m just making use of it while you’re alive.”

He left Pure Vanilla to figure out how to put the baby to sleep by himself. Thankfully he was kind enough to offer a cat bed to put the baby into, but cooing it to sleep was a hassle, seeing as it had so much energy. In the end he just let it run around until he fell into slumber in his own bed. Hey, if he woke up with scratches, he could always heal them right up!

Sigh.

This was going to be a very long week.

Chapter Text

Adopting this adorable nutmeg tiger kitten (which they decided would simply be called that) changed the way things had to be run in the spire. Firstly, since Pure Vanilla’s responsibility of feeding the spires inhabitants was no longer upon him, he woke up feeling like his morning was being delayed. He still traveled down to the kitchen and finding nobody there, would start on making breakfast only to be interrupted by Shadow Milk who reminded him he didn’t need to be doing that.

And then, as if he’d decided out of nowhere to change his mind, Shadow Milk sat on the counter and watched him. He even asked questions. Pure Vanilla only made breakfast for himself of course, though there was usually enough of whatever he made that Shadow Milk would sneak some for himself. At some point, Pure Vanilla made a proper second plate of jelly bacon just for him and watched as Shadow Milk snuck over to the stove and realized what Pure Vanilla had done.

He stopped stealing after that.

The kitten appeared just fine with meat, or the crispy cat treats Shadow Milk had magicked up, but Shadow Milk told him she also needed a bit of spice in her food to survive, else her nutritional pallet wasn’t complete. This was according to his study on spice Cookies as a fount, so Pure Vanilla had no choice but to take it at face value.

He researched on spice dishes that could be made with what they had in the spire. Obviously, all the recipes were wrong, listing the wrong ingredients and measurements and adding extra things that would surely ruin the dish. He ended up giving up and just making his usual recipes with chilli or a side of pure spicy paste. The kitten licked the paste up and meowed like it wanted more. He couldn’t help but give it another teaspoon in spite of Shadow Milk insisting he’d use up the tube before the end of the week.

Next was exercise and play. Shadow Milk had no trouble letting it rip and claw at his discarded drafts of plushies, or giving pillows with Pure Vanilla’s face to claw at.

“Whaaaat? At least she’s not clawing at the real you!”

“She will if she only sees me on the pillow and mistakes the real me for it.”

“Pfftt. Not my problem.”

They let Candy Apple Cookie play with the Cookie however she wanted, chasing it or being chased while holding feathers or string. Seems she and Black Sapphire were subtly teaching the child to outsmart or to not get tricked by playing pranks and then sometimes explaining them.

“Is it even old enough to understand what we’re saying?” Candy Apple Cookie asked one day.

Black Sapphire shrugged.

Time passed and Black Sapphire even brought the kitten up to his boyfriend, Silverbell Cookie and let it nap on his bed. The one which had ever so conveniently had its sheets changed recently. Now it had purple bedcovers and tufts of red fur.

On day six or seven, Shadow Milk had— Hey. I see one of you scrolling down to the comment section. Don’t you dare.

Shadow Milk had said he was taking a quick trip away from the spire, and that he’d be back within a moon or three. For reference, time was measured in moons instead of suns because Shadow Milk preferred the night, the darkness of the other realm.

His servants were both begging him to stay, maybe just because three moons was a lot of time for whatever he had planned. Pure Vanilla Cookie couldn’t wait to have the kitchen back, all to himself.

Three moons ended being so much longer than he could’ve ever expected.

In the real world, it would’ve been about 28 days for the moon to wax and wane completely. Nobody ever feels the true length of that time until they’ve lived it within a day. Three times over.

It gave him a lot of time to explore the spire, completely free of the burdens of traps or games, and now that he had the time, he even sketched it: towering walls of reflective marble, so shiny that looking into them shows the exact reflection, if a bit distorted by length. The clocks had all stopped in the ticking corridor. The eerie silence that remained set him to even greater unease. Before, he’d been so sure there a monster in the walls of the circular corridor, and without any dark corners for it to hide, it would probably be the type to run after him until he was at a door, any door. Now instead he was forced to walk around and around, never hearing anything remotely close to footsteps aside from the tapping of his own bare feet.

And that was another thing. The floors were cold, but that was it. No freeze burns, no spikes, no sizzling tiles, not even a surprising lack of friction when he opened a door to step inside a room — aside from the rooms designed with it on purpose. Sometimes the floors just did all of those things, strange to know it was indeed Shadow Milk Cookie’s tricks that caused it.

The paintings were… he didn’t want to get into what they were like normally. If anybody ever visited the spire, he would want them not to look at any painting too long, lest it drive them mad. Now he could look and it did nothing.

The non-cookie inhabitants of the spire appearently weren’t hungry at all in the duration of time it took to pass, proving they were all indeed bound to the spire and its magic forever. He still cooked for Black Sapphire and Candy Apple Cookie, took care of the kitten, documenting his every move regarding it in case Shadow Milk returned and thoroughly had decided he could step away from childminding.

Candy Apple Cookie had started a count for every time Silverbell was over and away in the time it had taken even the first day to pass. Suddenly Pure Vanilla Cookie understood why they were begging their master not to go. Did they know beforehand that this would happen?

He asked this to Black Sapphire Cookie on the second day when they were hanging out in the living room stacked with shelves of board games, puzzles, twisty doohickies and a whole lot of chess pieces. They sat on  black and white bean bags, and Black Sapphire Cookie sighed hopelessly. “He was so eager to leave, even though he couldn’t ever be late for anything. Candy Apple Cookie also mentioned noticing his behaviour was weird coming up to it.”

Pure Vanilla’s curiosity piqued. “Oh? Tell me.” He said, shifting on his side and leaning his head on his hand.

“Well. It… it kinda had something to do with you getting sick… I mean, first he loads all the chores onto us, then we see him floating around the towers looking kind of distressed, and Then he doesn’t talk to you, his favourite plaything, for several days. I noticed. He was gone for a little while and then… well, the next time either of us saw him, he was weirdly close to you, according to Candy Apple Cookie. You had him against a countertop, I hear?”

“Oh. Yeah, guess I can’t deny that.” He said, cheeks flushing. “It’s nothing though. He’s been mostly normal since then.”

“Hm. No, he’s been worse, actually.”

“Oh?”

Black Sapphire crossed his arms. “Again, you don’t see much of him because he’s making you take care of the cat, but this whole time he’s gotten so into collecting puzzles and practicing knots and— with you out of the kitchen, he’s even started cooking for us!”

“I told him to do that last thing,” Pure Vanilla mentioned quickly.

“It’s still weird. He was more distracted, staring off into space for like, hours at a time, zoning out out my updates, he even stopped listening to his rumour weavers explaining a pressing issue in the printing press to go back to his room and ponder or what have you.” Black Sapphire’s single purple eye drifted down to Pure Vanilla Cookie. “Has he been touchier with you as of late?”

“Huh!” Pure Vanilla sat up, “…No… why would you think so?”

Black Sapphire smirked, seeing the colour on his face. “Go figure. Well, it’s nothing. Don’t even worry about it.” He said all a sudden, seeming to have completely changed his mind about whatever he was thinking.

Pure Vanilla stared at the dark crevices of the ceiling and allowed them both to fall into silence. He should’ve questioned it. Really, his curiosity was burning his nerves up. But whatever secret Black Sapphire was keeping from him, he was sure it wouldn’t make his final day in purgatory any more comfortable, especially when there was a chance Black Sapphire Cookie was just trying to deceive him again. He did that sometimes. Said the right thing to make more questions pop up, answered them with lies and false accusations that stirred drama. His motives were unclear this time around, but with nearly a full two months having passed in the span of a mere two days, he was probably bored beyond belief.

The third day was thankfully not a full one.

In the final stretch of Shadow Milk’a absence he’d finally found a recipe that worked for what was called Gochujang chicken. Originating from the Flour Peaks, particularly Strong Flour ridge, consisted of the obvious plus some other ingredients. Shockingly straightforward. He set to making it right away, and thank goodness he had the page time for it!

Candy Apple Cookie had decided then and there to tell him all about this story idea she’d conjured up after sitting in the blue garden and listening to them sing choir and opera while some of the black Vanilla Orchids played orchestra solos using their leaves and stems to hold instruments.

“So, so. It starts off with these three Cookies — warlock, doctor and pilgrim — finding themselves in an alternate world!”

He added minced garlic, sugar, regular soya sauce, sesame seeds and oil, a spoon of gochujang, cornstarch and water into a bowl as she spoke, “Uh huh?”

“And this alternate world — I will have to do some research for inspiration — is super weird and unlike anything two of them have seen — except the warlock but that’s in their backstory which we haven’t gotten to yet.”

He mixed the ingredients as she punctuated her story with a sip of tap water she’d gotten as he was measuring out the ingredients.

“And basically, these three protagonists are all from way different backgrounds but as the story goes on, they learn they’re not so different. I probably shouldn’t get into the details or else we’ll never make it to the rest of the story.”

“Oh but, we’ve got a whole day. Really, a whole eternity.” He said as he struggled to pull open the fridge and take out the pack of chicken breast, “I’ll be here till I’m done so, it’s not like you’ll run out of time.”

“Okay, well, basically they learn about this dude right, I dunno what to call him but he’s super evil and he’s controlling the whole world — oh, this is because a read a book once and I really wish they’d done the villain better, so it’s all power fantasy from here.”

“Makes sense.”

“So they witness him doing some really evil stuff, coercing this girl to sacrifice her life for her sister, kinda almost murdering their dad, ya know I’ll figure it out. Point is, he starts crumbling the world! Like, it’s falling apart and they’re running away and the dude whose backstory I still need to write is able to use his magic to call on a higher entity and open a portal!”

“This sounds incredibly thought out, are we sure this is still a gochujangchicken recipe?” He said, having sliced the chicken into smaller chunks and dropped them into a bowl of flour to cover them evenly. “Okay, keep going. Now where are the frying pans…”

“Cabinet to your left. Down, no no, other way, there!” She pointed as she tried to guide him, though he really couldn’t see behind him without his staff aside from quick glances. “Yeah, there you go. So, the portal, right? Evil guy is almost there, so one of them decides to stay behind to fend him off while the other two run back into their world.”

“Do we get to learn much about the evil entity? That’s fascinating.” He put the stove on medium high heat, and as he waited for it to heat up he gave his commentary, “I think it could be really interesting if instead of that character staying behind, the evil entity takes them away as a price for using his magic. An eye for an eye situation.”

“Yes! Oooh, thanks for the idea. What’s that?”

Once the oil in the pan had heated up, he poured the flour-coated chicken into and begun to mix it around. “It’s for the kitten, but I’m sure you can have a plate too.”

“Yay!!”

He turned the fan above the stove to maximum, and continued stirring, “So does the story end there?”

“No, I have a part two and three already planned out.”

“Tell me about it.”

She continued on to explain what might be the second book in her trilogy, the one where the two remaining protagonists find a way to save the third, and she told him about all sorts of new side characters she was going to introduce, such as another powerful sorceress, a courageous knight, and finally a strangely familiar sounding angel, who Candy Apple said she wasn’t really sure where to include, just that she liked the idea of having more women in the story to even out the casting.

“Maybe she just exists to boost morale and guide them to their next plot point.” Now he had set aside the golden crispy fried chicken and used the same pan to fry some onions (conveniently left over from his last kitchen excursion) until they were translucent. He brought the bowl of sauce back and poured in all the contents, then allowed it to simmer. “Well, what happens after they meet her?”

“Uh. I dunno. I’m thinking of a tea house, but that sounds way too out of place. Unless I set it in some mystic garden where the other protagonist, the doctor is from.”

“That works.”

“Yeah, so. They figure out a way to get the third character free but, because I Really want this to be an epic trilogy, I’m making a third plotline as a direct consequence of freeing them.”

“Oooo. Neverending tale, you could be a millionaire if you tried.”

“Oh please, money means nothing to those who follow master Shadow Milk Cookie.” She said, spinning around the high chair and kicking her feet. “The third part is kinda underdeveloped but basically they have to fight this huge monster that eats people’s souls, and the big plot twist is that it’s both the reason why they got sent to the alternate world, and it has an intrinsic connection to all three of them.” Candy Apple Cookie flipped her hands around, “Like I said, not thought out yet but the climax… I want it to be, one of them gets eaten and they sacrifice themselves to kill the monster.”

“What about the doctor? Does she play a role?”

“Ooo. Yeah, forgot about her.” Candy  Apple squinted, “She can be the focus of book two when I get more subplots, the story is meant to end with the remaining two grieving the loss of a friend, some kind of bittersweet ending. I dunno, a sad song was playing when I imagined the ending. But that’s what I have so far!”

Pure Vanilla checked on the sauce which had thickened quite a bit, and poured in the chicken then stirred and garnished with sesame seeds and green onions. “What a coincidence, this dish is basically finished, can you get some bowls and a little plate out for me?”

Candy Apple Cookie did as she was told and he gave her a portion, one for himself and a nice mini-plate full of it for the kitten which had been laying asleep on a white jacket distinctly giving off a floral scent when he leaned down to carry the sleeping baby onto the table so it could eat.

“Whaddya think? Any notes?”

Pure Vanilla smiled and picked up a piece of chicken with his chopsticks (Seeing as the dish originated in the Flour Peaks, he should use their utensils too.) “well, I’d be excited to read it if you ever got around to making a first draft. Maybe you could try adding a bit more context to the relationship between the magician and the pilgrim? And, just to link it all together, maybe the entity they call upon to free them from the alternate world is the same monster they end up having to fight in the end.”

“I was gonna have the Warlock’s patron be a character in the second and third book, but I’ll consider it.” She said. “Oh, what brings them all together is that they’re all worshipping their own false deity, and as they connect they learn to let go of the lies and overcome uncertainty together. Something like that.”

The kitten had its fill of meat, Candy Apple Cookie complimented his cooking yet again and they played a few rounds of Uno with Black Sapphire and Silverbell, who was finally comfortable enough to talk to everyone.

Candy Apple Cookie said he looked the same age as her and he insisted he was a least as old as the silver tree. She plus two’d him and said, “Wish that would go to your age instead of your card deck, my bro ain’t catching a case this early into his life.”

“I’m also as old as the silver tree, brat. Older even. I was alive when this place was still called the tower of all Knowledge.”

“Booo, you and your boyfriend should be in a retirement home, not playing cards with us hipster kids.” She leaned over to Pure Vanilla Cookie, “You only have my respect because you’re helping me win and you fed me chicken earlier.”

“Do you have a plus two?”

“Uh. Not telling.”

He smiled and placed a reverse card. “I’ll be nice to you. For now.”

“Swear to Shadows, if you pull a plus two on me, I’m going to start telling you to collect your pension.”

Silverbell smiled nervously, “Sapphie…”

“Yes Bell?”

He put down a plus two.

Sapphire grinned viciously and put down another plus two.

“Are we stacking?!” Candy Apple asked.

Pure Vanilla scrunched his face apologetically and placed down the third and final plus two. “I’m so sorry, kid.”

“AAAAAAGGGHH!” She screamed, throwing her cards up in the air, “Fuck you, Fuck you, and especially,” she said, pointing at Black Sapphire Cookie, “I hope you die of organ failure from your old age.”

“Ahaha. Good thing the spire had feee healthcare.” He said. “Oh, Candy Apple Cookie, calm down. I’ll let you plus four me.”

“I don’t have a plus four.” Silverbell said quickly, handing the six cards over to Candy Apple Cookie who was fuming. Maybe three months ago she would’ve ripped the whole deck up. Credits to Therapist Nilla for getting her to a state where she didn’t.

“Do you have a blue reverse?” Pure Vanilla asked. Silverbell meekly placed down an colour changer and set the colour to green, then Sapphire placed the green reverse, Silverbell put down his second last card and called uno, and Candy Apple Cookie out down her plus four, Pure Vanulla followed suit, and Black Sapphire Cookie made a dramatic show of lowering his cards, turning his eyes to Silverbell with the evilest grin known to Cookie kind.

“…don’t do it.” Silverbell said. “Please.”

“Ehehehe….Aahahaa,” most would call it descending into laughter, this was more like ascending. “Quick— Quick question. Can we double stack if we have two of the same cards?”

Everyone yelled out or laughed or, in silverbell’s case, shrieked.

“NOOOOO!” Silverbell screamed. “NO! OR I WILL LEAVE YOU HERE FOR THE REMAINING MONTH YOU HAVE TO LIVE THROUGH.”

Pure Vanilla looked at the rules and shrugged. Candy Apple Cookie clapped her hands together in excitement.

“It doesn’t even say you can stack plus cards; so I guess you can do it now if you want.”

“Oooo, Silverbell~!” Black Sapphire said, pulling out two cards. Pure Vanilla accidentally caught sight of the two cards and knew he needed to prepare a healing spell for the black bruise incoming.

“Please. Please no.” Silverbell sobbed dramatically.

Black Sapphire put the cards down and started taking his eight cards. Silverbell sighed with relief.

“I was bluffing.” Black Sapphire sorted the cards by colour into his deck, “I don’t have any plus fours.”

“Oh you scheming lying sour little— you’re bottoming next time.”

“Excuse me?!” All three of them roared into shock, Candy Apple shrieked, Black Sapphire went bright magenta and Pure Vanilla couldn’t help but laugh his eyes to tears.

“Silverbell, I would never think!”

“Don’t tell anybody from the fairy kingdom about this, okay? Especially not her Highness White Lily. She’s been gone for a while now, but when she comes back I’d rather she not… you know.”

“Again, the secret is sealed. What happens in the spire stays in the spire.” He kissed his pinky again as a gesture of promise. Silverbell kissed his pinky too. And then, he placed down the final card and won the game.

That night, or whatever point in the long and infinite stretch of the day Pure Vanilla had decided to take a nap, he was getting undressed when he noticed a strange darkness over the lights in his room. The bed looked no different, the eyes hidden around to survival him were… back to normal. He felt the cold uneasy sensation of something slipping around him, although not entirely corporeal. Shadow tendrils.

“Look at you. So untouched. So unburdened. I saw your little card game. Adorable how comfortable you’ve found yourself. You could almost be living here forever.”

“Shadow Milk Cookie.” He said darkly, “I didn’t appreciate your extending of the days to match whatever strange journey you’ve taken. We nearly ran out of ingredients.”

“Aww. That’s your first concern?” He said, sliding a dark tendril around Pure Vanilla’s bare waist. “I should be glad. I do notice you’ve made a couple new incisions to your wrists while I was gone?” A few blue eyes opened up in the darkness, taking in his body from head to toe, “Hm. Guess you only do your legs when it gets bad. Better for me, it means less work to cover up what happened.”

“What, where, why? Start there.”

Shadow Milk’s dark inky essence retreated into a corner where he formed with his hands behind his back. “What I did, where I went, why I did it? Mhhh, I think for once you should get some sleep. Time is back to normal. Better to rest while you still have the night.”

Pure Vanilla turned around to face him, but when he looked in the corner, Shadow Milk Cookie wasn’t there.

Chapter Text

Okay fellas I think I’ve confused myself with the timeline of events lmaoooo I’m gonna do a second draft of some of the stuff in this whole series

basically I wanted to link all the fics in the series into one timeline but because two of those fics are e-rated I don’t really know how to bring up the lore of them without making this one more needlessly explicit. 

and also, I know some ppl don’t wanna have to read explicit stuff in order for the story to make sense, so instead I might just separate the first few chapters of this fic from the remaining ones bc they all focus on a completely different plotline 

i think it would be good to put the plot about them taking care of a kitten into a separate fic because too much is happening that gets in the way of the focus on the child, and it’s been really frustrating that I can’t seem to balance mentioning the cat and going right back into the more pressing matter, which is shadow milks odd behaviour after coming back from his three month absence. Like basically I have three different stories happening at once and it’s too messy. 

uh so if you were actually reading this fic (thank you btw) I am probably gonna redo every after they get the kitten and upload it separately. 

oaky so developments.

1. Keeping the cat plot in here but I’m rewriting from ch. 6 onwards

2. removing the 2 month timeskip. I have no idea how that other fic makes sense in content to this one but I’ll find a loophole, maybe it’s some weird time paradox where they’re happening at the same time in different timelines and I’ll make those timelines converge in a SEPERATE fic. That way they’re kept seperate the entire time and we can focus only on Kitty.

3. Little Kitty will be changed to be only a kitty, no cookie body. Idk why it kinda hard to account for both the cat and baby behaviors so I’m changing it to be only a cat. Also SMC is cat coded so they’ll be easier to parallel hheehhe

4. if it wasn’t clear already, I REALLY DIDNT wanna make this one freaky. So I WONT :D there will still be humour, flirting and moments that are a bit 😳 what did I just witness 😳 but nothing explicit. Not even the soul jams.

Okay now that all the issues are thought through, it’s time to rewrite!!

Chapter Text

That night he had no dreams. He could do naught but lay awake with thousands of questions burning his mind. His body felt oddly hot despite the cold, and his stomach tingled like he was going to sick in the morning. But he laid still, on his back, letting his head spin until it found its way into the unconscious and the night skipped to daylight, or the spire equivalent. Usually that constituted more eyes, more warmth to the air if even by a margin, and most importantly a bright paper cutout sun hanging in the sky. 
Despite the odd feverish symptoms of yesterday, today he felt lighter, somewhat empty, and his wrists hardly hurt at all. Weird, they should at least be itching. But when he got out of bed to check, he saw the changes made and he squinted to make sure he wasn’t in a dream. He stepped over to the mirror. 
His skin was smooth as porcelain, not a single piece of evidence left that he’d ever brought anything dangerous close to it, his arms elegant and soft, his legs the same. His belly felt like it should have a big gash in it, and yet that too was smooth and perfect.  His lashes were also longer, hair in need of a wash but otherwise silky. It was like he’d become a a living doll.
Well. He wasn’t a doll, and he was very much in need of a bath from the last three days, so he took his opportunity to sneak into the milk baths with minimal clothing and plopped himself right in. 

Ah, the Milk Baths, always that little bit of chill to the milk when he first got in that he had to adjust to before taking his swim. He was sure it didn’t need to be said by now that the milk baths were more like massive pools of shimmering enchanted milk that cleaned and softened skin all by themselves, save for the hair which needed to be shampooed. After adjusting to the temperature and getting himself throughly soaked, he swam over to the edge where there was raised platforms under the milk to sit on or use as a way to climb out safely. But when he sat back down in the milk after taking a shampoo bottle out of the tall shelf hidden in the wall, a shadowy tendril wrapped around it and pulled it out of his hand, then sank beneath the milk.
“Oh. Hello?”
Shadow Milk cookie crawled onto the raised wall with a curious glint in his eyes. “Need any help with that?”
“Not particularly.” He said, missing the hint completely, “What was that about, the thing last night, then the way you… well, you removed all my scars. All of them.”
“I just thought you’d look better as a clean canvas.” He said, reaching out to run a hand down Pure Vanilla’s arm. “Aren’t you so lovely and untouched now? Just Imagine all the ways in which I could use that clean space…” his teeth grew into fangs, “Oh, I can’t wait to ruin you all over again.”
“Um.” 
Shadow Milk snapped out of it. “Oh but how’s the kitty? I take it the poor lil thing was fine without me, you fed it the good spice, yes very…” his hand was on pure vanilla’s side now, and his voice trailed off completely as he ran the tips of his fingers along the back of pure vanilla’s hand which had settled on his lap.
“Oh, did you fix my nails too?” He took his hand out of the water to check and yes, the cuticles were restored, now his nails were short but past his fingertips. “I really must thank you, I was worried I would get infected one day with all open scars around my nails, and why are you still looking at me like I’m a chew toy?”
Shadow Milk’s head was tilted forward, his eyes were wide, trained on Pure Vanilla’s face as his hand hesitated moving from its position on the inner part of his thigh. This wasn’t predator animal behaviour. He knew what the predator Beast stare looked like from all the other times he’d seen it. This was something different. Wilder, deeper, raw and incredibly wrong for someone like shadow milk cookie.
“Unbelievable…” he whispered, finally finding the vestiges of his breath lodged in his throat and letting it free. His hand twitched, and then it went higher, “Two moons and I still… Ngh, what have I done what have I done—? Nilly.” He leaned forward, sharpened nails digging to where pure vanilla’s hip bone was. “Would you forgive me if I did something terrible to you, and you didn’t remember a single bit about it?”
“What…?” He shifted his weight onto his hands, “I don’t know what you’re talking about… stop looking at me like that.” He his heart was pounding now and he couldn’t tell why, “It’s like you wanna eat me.”
“You’re close,” His breathing grew ragged. “Please don’t freak out about it. Especially don’t let anybody know.”
Pure Vanilla’s heart dropped into his stomach. “Shadow Milk cookie… I noticed an odd phantom pain in my stomach last night. Was that your doing?”
Shadow Milk sank back with eyes that crinkled with regret, “Please, from this point forward, be nothing but completely indifferent to me. But don’t hate me. Especially don’t treat me kindly. Not unless you’re prepared for pain beyond your mind’s capacity.” 
As if that ominous warning was any explanation, he disappeared into shadows and that was the end of it. The shampoo bottle floated innocently next to pure vanilla’s hand and he grabbed for it and washed his hair as quickly as possible. 

He didn’t see much of that strange little jester for the day, except when he appeared in the living room, picked up the kitten, mentioned it needing its daily exercise and disappeared before anybody could ask questions. He found them in a big open space where shadow milk was watching from his high perch on a chandelier as the kitten fought his ballerina puppets with a wooden sword. She was making progress on standing up and charging at her enemies, through she’d trip if she tried to stand on only two legs.
The two adult cookies made a brief eye contact before Pure Vanilla disappeared from sight. 
He was right.
Pure Vanilla cookie had grown incredibly comfortable here, certainly exacerbated by all that time he spent in those three month-long days where nothing dangerous happened. But now with the master of the tower back in position to toy with him, he felt the same uncertainty crawling up his back everytime the air got too cold, or god forbid Shadow Milk seek him out.
Fortunately, he hadn’t.
…
At least, not till the day was over. 
This time he was making a curry for the tiger, which he couldn’t really replicate the recipe for, seeing as he was doing it from memory of his time in Crispia. 
Shadow Milk was sitting on the spinning chair by the countertop and watching him. Completely quiet, he wouldn’t have even noticed if not for their soul jam’s resonance. 
And, as strange as it was, he could usually feel when the eyes of deceit were on him. They surveyed him constantly, the only time he got a break was during his baths or when he was fully unconscious. One might think Shadow Milk would enjoy seeing him so vulnerable.
Well, One could only know the taste of poison if they’d tried it themselves. And that’s to say, he knows I know about the surveillance. It would’ve been enough to discomfort him if he thought he wasn’t safe even in complete nudity, but that would require modesty to matter at all in the spire — and considering shadow milk had a strange detachment from all of that unless it was convenient…
“You think about me like I’m not sitting right behind you.” He said. “And to answer the question of why I don’t watch you bathe, if just doesn’t amuse me that much. I’ve seen it all a thousand times in different timelines and through your memories. The cookie body is nothing more than a combination of ingredients and flavouring. And thus, it really holds nothing more than sentimental value at the end of the day.”
“Mhm. Which is exactly why your eyes are tearing through my skimpy little outfit right now, right?” He hadn’t meant to be so vulgar, but come on! He was again wearing the version of his gown with shorter sleeves, and shorter cut, ending somewhere at his knees. This was all for freedom of movement while he was cooking, and he’d renovated a copy of his robes by himself for this purpose. And lastly, the black and gold apron with little sheer frills on the edge. He had no idea where this came from or why it was in his colour scheme. Nobody would tell him, Candy Apple cookie even theorised it a gift from her Master, and then went grim in the face.
“I didn’t come here for chats. Keep cooking.”
Oh, so he really was just coming to watch? How characteristically suspicious. But, Pure Vanilla’s dough chilled at the thought of what might happen, lest he be anything more than indifferent. And so, he didn’t argue. He didn’t even tease. 
There was a danger inside the spire again, and he’d grown far too careless not to see it before. After all, it was only month he was promised, of no tests and games or trials. Peace was finite.
He left the pot to simmer and turned around. The kitten was sitting on a newspaper no doubt drafted by black sapphire cookie, trying to comprehend the words.
Shadow Milk was helping it do so, half heartedly, as if he was merely trying to turn his attention away from the chef in this kitchen or the very clear glare he was receiving for teaching the wrong words to the child. 
His other hand was tapping its long nails against the countertop, sometimes stopping to dig in or leave claw marks. Impatience, or narrow self control?
“Milky—“
“Stop.” He growled. “Don’t… nicknames are too affectionate.” He hunched over the countertop. “I’m not in a mood for them.”
“What are you in the mood for? You’re been strange since you came back to the spire.”
Shadow Milk’s eyes trailed up, first his coattails, then his hair, and his face stayed turned down but pure vanilla could almost hear the tension of the mental chord keeping it down. “I never left.”
He seemed he was about to disappear, until the kitten forced his attention away and he put on a threatening grin and continued to baby talk it. 
“Shadow Milk Cookie.”
“What?!”
“If you’re going to bring your weird negative energy in here, I’d prefer you just leave. You’ll ruin the curry’s flavour.”
“I am not bringing negative energy in here.” He insisted, baring his teeth.
Pure Vanilla pinched the bridge of his nose. “Well your presence is annoying me. Get out.” He turned back around and said nothing more on the subject. Eventually the room’s warmth increased and he was finally able to be alone with his thoughts.
What the hell was up with him?! 

Pure Vanilla didn’t bother asking the servants this time. When he returned his room, his head hurt too much to fall asleep, so instead he sat down and started journaling all his confusion, in the form of letters that shadow milk might sift through whilst he was sleeping. 
He wasn’t going to answer, that was obvious. But putting the questions out there at least set some kind of goal, one he may or may not pursue the Truth to.