Claimed By The Exiled Tiger King

Abigail register

lungs. The cough was violent, shaking her entire body, but it only dragged

re

r three-Michelin-star restaurant in Paris. The gleaming copper pots. The scent of thyme a

n-the e

o the stove, adjusting the flame on a demi-glace she had been perfecting for six months

ng an award tonight. Instead,

ield herself from the smoke, but her arms wouldn't move. A rough, fibrous pressure bit into her wrists. She twisted, and the

legs, so close it felt like standing in

her feet. Flames, bright and hungry, were already

the abstract fear in her mind congealing

no emergency crews. Instead, a wall of strange, hostile faces surrounded her. People dressed in animal skins, their face

how, impossibly, being parsed into meaning inside her head. Her stellar-universal translator implant-stand

the ou

e must be

ined mind somehow still sharp despite the terror. I'v

ars. James Beard Award. Author of The Art of Extraction, a cookbook about drawing maximum flavor from minimal ingredients

d here. Here, she was ju

th elaborate feathers and what looked like a priestess's ceremonial robes. Her

fted a bur

was high and sharp. "She frightened away the sacred hunt!

cruel smile twisting her lips, a

ames e

hem of her simple tunic caught fire. A scr

rms raised. "She is a demon! Her sc

azed Abigail's forehead, sending a trickle of warm blood down her t

instinct kicked in. An instinct forged from twenty years of working in kitchens where one mistake meant ruin. An instinct

she thought grimly. This is jus

breath, the smoke searin

OUG

three-Michelin-star kitchen for a decade, who had shouted down line coo

ied in their throats. For a single, stunned

athered, his eyes holding a severe, calculating authority. He wore the pe

Chieftain, we must not listen

gail's brain, working on pure adrenaline, cataloged him instantl

t. A pragmatist

eftain said, his voice a low rumble. "You

s was blistering. She bit down on her lip, tasting

r voice raspy but steady. "What did the

d. "Three deer. Enough to fe

you have

f you," Ch

hieftain. "You're facing starvation because you lost a

ng laughter went

k female!" s

ow how to skin a rab

le. "You're right. I don't know how to skin

etting the si

ake one rabbit f

murmured

into a meal that will stick to your ribs for an entire day. I know how to preserve meat so

vor from minimum ingredients. I made pigeon taste like steak and cabbage taste like silk. Yo

change, but something flickered

e said slowly. "With what? The fore

me go into that forest, and I will come back with enough

shrieked. "She

studied Abigail for a long moment. The fire cra

ou live. If you return with nothing-or if you try to run-y

derst

her d

, Abigail's strength gave out. She collapsed off the pyre, landing hard in the hot ash and embers. Her hands sl

s were burned. Her head throb

she

oice was cold. "T

ed toward the dark maw of the forest, her legs s

furious whisper: "She won't co

almost

i

flé rise perfectly during a Michelin inspection. She had once cooked a seve

n a forest full of edi

he thought, limping into the t