Merchant Crab

Chapter 144: Margo’s Baking Boutique

“Margo’s Baking Boutique”

The sign above the small storefront practically glowed in Balthazar’s eyes.

He did not know what a “boutique” was, but he knew what baking meant, and he knew there was no way he would just walk away from that place without going inside.

“Pies, cookies, and tarts,” the crab mumbled while skittering towards the shop’s door. “It’s just been so long. I’m sure five minutes won’t hurt.”

Stopping in front of the entrance, he quickly turned to Druma and Blue. “You guys wait here, I won’t be long, promise!”

The goblin exchanged a quick glance with the drake and shrugged, but by then the merchant was already disappearing into the building.

A bell rang above the door as Balthazar pushed it open and stepped inside. As it closed behind him, the buzzing hubbub of the busy streets outside was as if completely removed from the air around the crab, now replaced with soothing silence and a sweet aroma of sugary treats.

Balthazar felt himself getting dizzy, both because of the intoxicating scents flowing into him, but also due to the fact that he kept spinning in a circle looking around the room.

The colors were nearly as overwhelming to the senses as the aromas. A bright array of colorful pastries and other sweets filled the tables and counters of the tiny shop. Cakes with multiple creamy layers sat prominently atop display structures at the center of carefully constructed arrangements, surrounded by plates of meticulously placed éclairs and macarons. Wooden shelves covered the walls, each filled with all manner of colorful bags containing treats of different shapes and sizes. And behind the glass of the counter, Balthazar saw it, perfectly round as a whole, immaculately triangular as a slice: pie.

His heart beat faster at the sight of his beloved, after so many weeks apart, deprived of her beauty, her scent, and most importantly, her taste. Breathtaking as everything else around him was, right there and then, all the heavy breathing crustacean wished was for the world to fade away, the glass separating them to cease to exist, and to have a few minutes alone with that sweet pastry.

“Ah, good morning. You may leave them by the—” a lady’s voice said, approaching from the back of the store. “Goodness gracious! There’s a crab slobbering all over my glass counter!”

With a jolted start, Balthazar’s confused eyestalks snapped back to reality. A reality where he was leaning over the baking display, with his face pressed against the glass, mouthing like a fish at the pie on the other side.

“Oh, I… I’m sorry,” the traveling merchant awkwardly said, taking a couple of steps back from the counter as he wiped the corner of his mouth. “I got a little too focused on your… uh, impressive selection of goods.”

The woman’s finely plucked eyebrows perked up. “Ahh, you can talk. For a moment I worried you were an adventurer’s wild companion who wandered into my shop.”

Her response gave Balthazar some relief, even if it still felt odd to him how casual everyone in that city seemed to be about a talking crab.

“At first I was expecting you to be one of my suppliers delivering some milk jugs,” she added. “He’s running late today.”

The crab glanced at the floor briefly. “Yes, who knows, maybe some of his product went missing…”

“Never you mind that, though,” the fancy-dressed lady said. “Welcome to my boutique. What can we offer you today to satisfy your sweet tooth?”

With a warm smile, she spread her arms and placed both hands on the counter. If she was a baker, she did not show it at all. Unlike Madeleine, who always wore simple dressing, fit for working in a kitchen and by the oven all day, this woman sported finely tailored vestments, makeup, and an absurd amount of jewelry.

“Pie,” Balthazar simply said, one pincer extended towards the pastry on the other side of the glass.

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“You want one of our pies?” the shopkeeper said. “Of course you do. They are one of our most requested products. I’m sure you’ve been hearing about them nonstop before even arriving in Marquessa.”

“Nope,” the crab bluntly said. “Never heard of you, this place, or your pies. I was just passing by on my way to the city hall, saw a bakery, and came in to get pie.”

“Oh,” the woman said, taken aback by the slight disappointment laid onto her by the crustacean, before regaining her composure and returning to her friendly manners. “Well, in that case, I’m sure you will soon be the one spreading tales far and wide about our delicacies. I’m Margo, owner of this baking boutique.”

Balthazar started impatiently tapping a foot on the polished granite floor.

“Great, great. I’m Balthazar, owner of a hungry belly. Now, about that pie?”

“Certainly,” the lady said, pulling the large plate with the pie from the glass display and placing it on top of the counter.

Perhaps it was due to all the weeks spent away from any baked goods, deprived of the nourishing sight of a pastry, but the pie before Balthazar’s eyes looked nothing short of divine.

Its crust was flawless, and visibly fresh, no doubt baked just a few hours ago, but it was its filling, visible from the one triangular slice cut and placed on top of the rest, that really caught the crab’s gaze. Of a yellowish orange color, it was dense and humid, compact and devoid of any air pockets, almost like a more solid jelly.

“Quite something, isn’t it?” the smiling shopkeeper said, resting her elbows on the counter.

Balthazar nodded, eyes fixed on the plate. “What is it?”

Margo raised her eyebrows in surprise. “A mango pie, of course.”

“A mango pie?” the traveling merchant repeated, lifting his gaze to her.

“Not from around these parts, are you?” the woman said with a coy smile. “Probably from the west of the continent, if I had to guess.”

The crab’s eyestalks arched. “How did you know?”

“It would explain your surprise at seeing something made with mango,” Margo explained with amusement.

Balthazar’s curiosity now grew at a similar rate as his hunger.

“How come I never even heard about mango pie before?”

The simple idea that a type of pie could have existed all this time without his knowledge, and worse, without him trying it, was leaving the merchant filled with great internal outrage.

“That’s quite simple, my dear,” the bakery owner said. “The climate on the west side of the continent is no good to grow mangoes, unlike our more temperate fields here in the east.”

“So?” said Balthazar with a slight frown. “Why not export them there? Seems like a wasted business opportunity to me.”

Margo chuckled, covering her mouth with a hand full of rings.

“Maybe if it was that easy, but mangoes don’t keep well during a several week cart trip to the other side of the continent, my dear. We sell them to nearby towns and settlements, but only those within a couple of days ride, otherwise no one wishes to trade in rotten fruit.”

His aspirations of bringing a new delicacy to the lands of Ardville dashed for now, Balthazar focused on finding solace in the one good thing in front of him.

“Alright, enough chit-chatting, time for chewing.”

The baker pulled a small plate from under the counter, along with a serving spatula. “I mean no offense by it, but I should mention we did have to increase our price on mango products recently, if you must know before I serve it to you.”

The crab’s eyestalks stood to attention. “Hold up! How much?”

“25 crowns a slice,” said the shopkeeper. “A bargain once you taste it, I assure you.”

Balthazar gulped. “25 gold coins for just a slice?!”

Used as he was to Madeleine’s more than “affordable” deals for him, the merchant now found himself faced with the impossible dilemma of which of his two loves he cherished more: coin or pie.

“Why do you say you had to raise the prices on mango products?” he asked, trying to find any way into a bartering opportunity.

“Ah, I suppose you haven’t been in town long enough to hear,” said Margo, with a sigh.

The shop’s bell rang again, and they both looked up at the front door to see who had just arrived.

A rotund man wearing a bowler hat stepped into the store with hurried steps, his thick walrus mustache twitching and shaking as he grumbled to himself.

“Marvin, darling, what happened?” the boutique’s owner asked with concern.

The man stomped his way around the counter and through the doorway to the back, seemingly not even noticing the giant crab standing in front of the counter. There he stopped by a coat stand, hanging his hat and jacket before angrily putting on an apron.

“It happened again, Margo!” Marvin exclaimed, while fiddling with the straps of the apron he was attempting to tie behind his back.

Margo placed an open hand—along with about four or five oversized rings and bands—on her chest, looking distraught. “Tell me you don’t mean what I think you mean.”

Exhaling exasperatedly, the man nodded his head.

“Yes I do,” he said. “The mango thieves attacked again.”