Daisy Duke's Arc

Chapter 5 of 22

The morning after the sellout, Daisy stacked fresh sun bread in the box and felt her stomach drop. Skeeter leaned on his cane, ready to dance. The line already curled past the rose lamp. But she had only one thing to sell. The same loaf. The same Sunday. She heard a customer sigh at the window—the man in the work coat, back again. "Got anything else?" he asked. She didn't. She only knew how to bind one flavor to one day. Tomorrow her line would find an empty counter and drift away. "You bind Sunday and nothing else," said a flat voice. Daisy turned. A stranger stood at the edge of the light, mouth full of teeth where a face should be. She raised one hand and waved before she spoke. "I greet the new ones. I'm Harriet. I watch who comes and goes. Your line will thin by the third dry day." Daisy's eye stung. "I know how to anchor bread to Sunday. That's all the Void Chef taught me." "Then anchor to something else," Harriet said. "A day is one anchor. There are others." Skeeter spun his cane. "A grudge holds tighter than any morning," he said. "What does the waking world never forget?" Daisy thought. Sundays were slow and warm. But people remembered sharper things too. Cravings. The wanting that came at night, when you couldn't sleep and wished for something sweet. She could bind to that. She worked fast behind the counter. She whipped a cold shake, pink and blue, and topped it with cream and star sprinkles. She dipped a long pretzel twist in dark chocolate. Then she spoke the anchor the way the Chef taught her—not a day, but a want. She tied the shake to midnight cravings. She tied the twist to the itch for something salty and sweet at once. Harriet watched. "Now carry them through the door." Daisy pushed both through the cafe passage into the waking dark. She held her breath. They did not crumble. The shake stayed cold. The twist stayed glossy. She brought them back and set them on the counter beside the sun bread. "Try," she told the man in the work coat. He sipped the shake. His shoulders dropped. He bit the twist and laughed, a sound like relief. He set down three coins, not one. The line stirred. Now there were three things to buy, each tied to a different hunger. Daisy grinned, eye and petals and all. Harriet turned to go. "You'll need more anchors soon," she said. "Three flavors fill a morning. They won't fill a shop." She paused. "And the more you bind, the more the Chef will want back." Daisy's grin held, but her hands went still. She had new pastries now. She also had a debt that grew with every flavor she pulled through the door.