Cookies & Curses – Chapter 1
Dungeons and Dough
Hazel Serenella Burn preferred her chaos punctual and her evil well-organized.
She’d been managing this dungeon for twenty years now, ever since her parents had… well, since it became just the three Burn sisters. At ten years old, she’d inherited her Demon King father’s clipboard, with barely a spare day to rest. Now, at 31, she had spent two decades babysitting the Source-of-Evil with nothing but a hand-me-down clipboard and increasingly creative threats about proper dungeon etiquette.
As always, the Hexenvale goblins were running six minutes behind schedule on their battle roar practice. Hazel rapped her clipboard as she studied a fresh crack spider-webbed along the opposite dungeon wall—souvenir of the adventuring party who’d blundered through here before breakfast, blasting fireballs like crazy (rude) and arguing about whether they’d remembered to pack enough healing potions. The adventurers, of course, had fled the moment they turned the corner and met Hazel, muttering about finding an easier world to save.
Hazel had calibrated that wall’s structural integrity only three days ago, a meticulous dance of mortar, rune, and artisanal moss undone by five minutes of heroic buffoonery.
A goblin rounded the corner, panting and unleashing what was presumably meant to be a roar.
“Sorry, Glorp. Try again,” Hazel said.
Glorp, the lead goblin, puffed his wiry chest.
“I meant… GRAAAAAHHHHHHH!” he let out a sound that landed somewhere between kettle whistle and hiccup.
Hazel winced and made a crisp notation on her clipboard: Goblin Battle Cry: 2/10. “Volume adequate, timbre questionable. Commit to the diaphragm next time. That wasn’t so much ‘fear me, mortal’ as ‘fear my reflux.”
She adjusted the nearest torch by a quarter inch because symmetry mattered. She took a long, steadying breath of the dungeon’s signature perfume: one part sulfur, two parts singed leather, and a delicate note of earlier fireball residue. It always smelled like someone had tried to toast bread over a dragon’s nostrils in here.
“Sorry, Boss Monster,” Glorp squeaked.
The title stung Hazel a tad. Sure, she was larger than most and could easily bench-press a minotaur with one arm, but the Embern Triune fusion with her sisters was dormant for the day, boss-monster mode safely tucked away. Besides, being called “Boss-Monster” when you’re technically off the demonic clock was like calling a judge “Your Honor” while they’re buying a hemorrhoid ointment at the apothecary—accurate but contextually a bit mortifying.
“Next battle cry, try inhaling through your nose. Less ‘allergy achoo,’ more ‘alluring apocalypse.’ You’ll get there eventually.” Hazel tapped her clipboard with a fingernail that had seen more dungeon maintenance than manicures.
Glorp nodded vigorously, his oversized ears flapping like wet lettuce.
“Now go rally your goblin squadron to practice their battle stations for the night already. Snarl with verve, but no viscera on the stairs again; I just mopped.”
Glorp skipped away, green limbs flailing as Hazel pivoted toward the Heartchamber. Her boots—polished obsidian, heel scuffed just enough for traction—thudded a brisk cadence. Each step announced: “Important dungeon management approaching! Hide your unauthorized snacks, and that secret shrine to Bob the Barbarian whose muscles you’ve been collectively swooning over!” But each footstep also felt like a countdown to destiny, or at least to her next debrief.
Control, the name for her bicep on her right arm, flexed under rolled sleeves. Chaos, the left, twitched. Hazel gave each bicep an approving pat. “Don’t worry. We’ll be retired by sunset, ladies,” she reminded them in a whisper. “One shift left more; let’s finish this strong together.”
After today, no more red-level alarms, no more patching walls still warm from wizardry gone wrong, no more guarding the You-Know-What.
As she snaked through the corridors, Hazel paused. Behind the final iron door, the Source pulsed. A gargantuan bud of black-veined crimson, petals closed tight as a secret, exhaled a lull that skimmed the edge of a lullaby. Hazel’s skin prickled; the melody matched half-remembered bedtime hums—her mother’s voice, nearly forgotten.
“Not today,” she muttered, choking the nostalgia before it sprouted. “Not anymore.”
“Meeting time, dear sisters,” she called out through the chamber.
The strategic table in war-room 15 tottered beneath teetering stacks of parchment—battle maps, rota charts, recipe drafts for cardamom-laced manabuns. Hazel shoved aside a diagram titled “Moat Temperature vs. Adventurer Courage” and cleared a space exactly clipboard-sized.
“Oh, goody,” Sage said, cracking her knuckles. She tossed a broom against the wall, where it smoldered happily. “I was getting bored. Please tell me this debrief will be about making the traps more exciting. I’m thinking rotating flamethrowers. Or drop-bears. Flaming drop-bears!”
“Flammable wildlife is off the table,” Hazel said. “Also, the table is off again it seems…” She nudged the war-room furniture two inches right to align with the flagstones.
Rosemary Lunaria Burn drifted, barefoot, chewing on a stick of incense, a flower crown tangled in her curls. She carried a rusting goblin helm like it was a bouquet. “Do we really need another meeting? I was about to archive today’s arrow wounds.”
“Necessary,” Hazel said. “And quick.” She clicked her pen, the universal signal for Big Sister Means Business.
Both of Sage’s younger sisters slid into stone chairs—Sage vibrating, Rosemary still daydreaming.
Hazel inhaled to the count of four and released. “I hereby call to order the 1,672nd Hexenvale Post-Raid Review, final edition.” Clipboard gavel: bang. “First agenda item: retirement.”
Sage blinked. Rosemary dropped the helm, which clanged and rolled over a few times.
“That’s a joke, right?” Rosemary said breathlessly.
“No joke.”
Sage’s eyes flared molten. “We just waxed an eighty-level paladin last Tuesday. Why quit when we’re at peak performance?”
“Because peak performance should not require me to recalibrate walls every sunrise,” Hazel said evenly. “Because adventurer incursions have tripled, Goblin Union Local 73 is striking for hazard pay, and—” she flipped to a fresh page—“I want a life that doesn’t come with spontaneous sword wounds.”
Rosemary toyed with a wilted petal in her hair. “But we’re the Keepers of the Ancient Hearth,” Rosemary said softly. “It’s what we’ve always done. It’s what our parents did.”
“Our parents are dead, Rosie.” The words came out harsher than Hazel intended, but she didn’t take them back. “They’ve been gone for twenty years. And you know what I’ve figured out in the twenty years of managing this place?”
She turned to face her sisters, clipboard held like a shield against tradition and expectation. “I’ve learned I’m tired.”
“But you’re our tank, you don’t get tired.”
“I’m tired of this,” Hazel clarified, gesturing at the destruction. “We spend our time fighting people who think they’re heroes, playing roles that were written for us before we were even born.” She walked to the crater in the wall and ran her fingers along the rough edge. “When was the last time someone asked us what we wanted?”
Sage leaned back in her chair, her sharp features thoughtful. “Well, you’re not wrong.”
“But…” Rosemary protested then seemed to lose what she wanted to say..
“When was the last time someone came here who didn’t immediately try to kill us? Is that what you really want?” Hazel begged.
“They’re so many fond memories, though,” Rosemary tried to say.
“We’re not children trailing after Father’s cape anymore. We’re three competent sisters, and we spend our time maintaining a dungeon for something we barely understand.” Hazel said.
A wisp of red flashed behind her pupils—Hazel felt it, saw it, like heat near an oven door. The Triune was calling, that fused storm of shared power. Destiny whispered: become legend, crush foes, no menial dishes to wash!
“What are you even saying, Hazel?” Rosemary asked.
Hazel straightened her spine. “I propose we dissolve active duty, archive the Ember Triune as a last-resort protocol, and explore civilian vocations and passions.”
“Um. What kind of passions exactly?” Sage asked, though there was a spark in her winter-mint eyes that suggested she already had ideas.
“We’ve talked about it forever.”
They both looked up at her blankly.
“Bakeries,” Hazel tried to prompt them.
“But we were just daydreaming about those,” Rosemary replied.
“Were we?” Sage bit back. “I mean, I’ve been thinking about it more and more lately. What if we could actually do something that didn’t involve people trying to stab us every other day?”
Hazel smiled. “Bakeries are the answer. Enchanted ones. Ethical ones. Places where magic helps instead of hurts, where we can use our skills of potion mixing to make recipes, to bring people together instead of driving them away. Zero exploitative tyranny.”
“I’m not so sure…” Rosemary said in a small voice.
Sage’s grin flickered. “If we do this, I keep my broom. And if a bakery customer tries to stab me, I’m allowed one immolation.”
“Maybe one,” Hazel agreed, jotting it down—policy must be explicit. “But you have to try to solve it with diplomacy first.”
Sage’s grin returned sharp as winter frost. “There are baking tournaments out there, right? With prizes?”
“I’m sure,” she said. Gods, she loved how competitive Sage could get when properly motivated.
“But what about the Source?” Rosemary asked, her voice small. “What about our, you know… duty?”
Hazel looked toward the sealed doors, feeling the familiar pulse of ancient power behind them. Whatever was down there, it had been contained for generations. It could wait a little longer.
“I mean… we can’t just… leave it here all alone, can we?” Rosemary whispered.
Hazel’s chest tightened. She’d been hoping they wouldn’t ask that question, not yet. She could feel the Source pulsing behind its iron door, that lullaby melody threading through the stone walls like smoke through cracks. Her mother’s voice, or what her memory insisted was her mother’s voice, hummed along in harmonics that made her teeth ache.
“The Source has been here longer than our family,” Hazel said carefully. “I’m sure it’ll survive without us.”
“But remember what Father used to say about—“
“Father said a lot of things.” Hazel’s grip tightened on her clipboard until the edges bit into her palm. “Maybe,” she said more carefully, “if our duty is to truly understand The Source, we can’t do that from inside this dungeon any longer, playing the same roles over and over again. I want, no, I need to see what we can all do on our own.”
“You mean our own, as in split up?” Rosemary asked, the words barely audible.
“Not split up… more like grow up,” Hazel said. Gods, she was making a mess of this. “Look, we don’t have to decide everything in the future. We just need to decide if we want to try something for ourselves.”
Sage drummed her fingers against the stone table, each tap releasing tiny sparks. “Twenty years of having each other’s backs…”
“And you want to scatter us like dandelion seeds?” Rosemary finished.
“Well…” Hazel said, at a loss for words.
Sage stopped drumming. The silence stretched until Hazel could hear the goblin squadron practicing their battle cries three corridors away—gods, still more wheeze than roar.
“The source’s call and the Triune’s allure are too strong. We’d be back to the dungeon in a week if we didn’t split up now. Plus, we’ve always wanted to run different kinds of bakeries, right? We’d step on each other’s toes otherwise.” Hazel insisted.
“Well, fine by me, you two always weigh me down anyway,” Sage joked.
Hazel’s chest loosened. One sister down.
Both sisters looked at Rosemary, who was twisting her hands in the flowing sleeves of her robes. Her fox-bright eyes were wide with uncertainty, but there was something else there too—a flicker of curiosity, of possibility.
Rosemary opened her mouth. Closed it. Then did so again. “I think we should wait and—”
“Well,” Hazel said, flexing both of her biceps. “Control and Chaos vote for decisive action.”
“Your biceps shouldn’t get a vote in this matter,” Rosemary argued.
“Sorry sis, it’s two to one still. I’m with Hazel on this,” Sage said.
Rosemary slumped. “You two always outvote me.”
“So, the motion passes?” Sage asked, ignoring Rosemary, as usual.
Hazel raised her clipboard like a ceremonial platter. “Motion passes. Effective immediately.”
Rosemary ran up and placed her hand on the grimoire. “Fine. But this needs to be fair. If we’re really going to do this, we need to divide the power equally.No sister gets an advantage, no sister gets left behind.”
The ancestral tome rested on a velvet pedestal, its cover the color of dried blood and candied cherries. Runes crawled lazily across its surface, smelling faintly of cinnamon and something older than time.
Hazel’s fingers hesitated at the clasp. The book had been mother, mentor, monster. Within its pages lurked instructions equal parts recipe and ritual—how to coax bread into prophecy or turn an irksome hero into a decorative topiary.
Her sisters flanked her: Sage vibrating with anticipation, Rosemary still hesitant, but also the strongest Hazel had ever seen. She knew independence would be good for them.
Hazel cleared her throat. “Yes. We can’t haul the whole thing on separate paths. Too powerful, too tempting.” She rested a palm on the cover. A low purr traveled up her arm—a cat inviting her to unsheath claws.
“No Triune,” she reminded the book, and herself. “We divide. It’s what’s right for us.”
Hazel visualized a clean, even slice, like portioning dough into thirds. With a whispered incantation—flour, fire, future—the tome glowed. A seam split down the spine, flickering ember-gold. Heat rose, hot-cake warm, not searing.
Control and Chaos flexed in tandem. Hazel exhaled, guiding the magic rather than wrestling it. Three slim volumes peeled free from it: one bound in ember cloth, one in moon-touched silk, one in storm-cloud leather. The original cover withered into ash, duty fulfilled.
The sisters stared at the newborn books.
Hazel handed the ember cloth tome to Sage. “For your spark. May it remind you that creation can burn brighter than destruction.”
Sage clutched it, awe dimming her usual confident swagger.
Rosemary received the moon-silk volume. “For your wonder,” Hazel said. “May you explore without losing yourself to nostalgia.”
Rosemary traced the silver threads, tears trickling down her face.
Hazel kept the storm-leather book, Tome-Three. Its scent—rain on warm stone—settled her nerves. “And mine, for balance.”
A hush gathered, denser than dungeon gloom yet kinder. Hazel felt lighter, as if decades of inherited weight had redistributed into fair portions.
The Source, a corridor away, pulsed—displeased or merely curious, Hazel couldn’t tell. She squared her shoulders. “Pack your essentials. We exit the dungeon at sundown.”
They parted at the junction where the dungeon’s main artery split into three tunnels, each opening onto a separate world. Goblins peered from crevices, confusion turning their ears lopsided.
Hazel hugged Sage first—armor scraping flannel. “Remember: one immolation max.”
Sage smirked. “Don’t worry, I’ll try flame-kissed marshmallows first.”
Rosemary pulled Hazel into a perfumed embrace that left petals on Hazel’s tunic. “Remember to consult the grimoire when you feel lost,” she whispered.
Hazel nodded, throat tight. “And you… take care of yourself, okay? No more collecting injured goblins and romantic notions about nursing wounded creatures back to health.”
Rosemary’s laugh came out watery. “I can’t promise that.”
“Try.” Hazel stepped back, memorizing her sister’s face—the dreamer’s eyes that saw magic in mundane things. She squeezed once more and released.
The three sisters stepped into their chosen passages. Sage strode north, fiery broom a torch. Rosemary tiptoed east, moon-book cradled like an egg. Hazel faced west, toward Puddlewick, a rumored land of gentle hills and abnormally polite ducks.
She paused, letting the dungeon’s cool breath wash over her one last time. Memories flickered: father demonstrating lava-pit maintenance, mother humming while adjusting the Source’s shackles, the sisters fusing into a towering Triune to scare off an army that deserved it. Good, terrible, complicated years.
Hazel saluted the darkness with her clipboard, then tucked it beneath one arm beside Tome-Three. The open road beckoned, smelling not of sulfur but distant woodsmoke and maybe—in her most hopeful imaginings—cinnamon.
She took her first step out of Hexenvale, leaving the echo of goblin roars and the lull of forbidden power behind. Each stride was a knead, stretching possibility. Flour, fire, future—she repeated like a mantra, pulse syncing to the words.
By the time the last torch-glow faded, Hazel’s weariness had transmuted into something sturdier: defiant hope. She tightened her grip on Tome-Three and patted her biceps.
“Control, Chaos,” she whispered. “Let’s bake a world worth really tasting.”
Wind swept her hair loose from its tight “don’t test me” bun, and she immediately wrestled it back into submission. There was no room for disarray, not today. Ahead lay the town of Puddlewick—and somewhere in its modest marketplace, an oven waiting to be warmed.
You have been reading Cookies & Curses...
The most dangerous threat to a retired Dungeon Boss wasn’t a hero wielding a sword. It was the infuriatingly optimistic apothecary elf next door who believed her bakery needed a little more chaos.
Hazel Serenella Burn fled her past to open Burn & Batch in the cozy town of Puddlewick. No monster mobs. No adventurers. Just precisely measured magic.
Then she accidentally unleashed a batch of Truth Cookies that caused the Great Cookie-Quake, sending the town into emotional chaos.
Suddenly, her bakery is suspended by the rigid local constable. Her only hope is Oswin Reed—the warm, intuitive elf who sweeps the flour off her floor without asking and insists that letting go is good for the soul. To save her fresh start, Hazel has to team up with Oswin to heal the town’s baking divide.
Working side by side with him was supposed to be strictly business. She didn’t plan on his gentle support breaking down her carefully constructed walls. Or the way he looked at her like she wasn’t a monster at all.
If she can’t learn to let go of her need for absolute control, she’ll lose her desperately needed fresh start. But trusting Oswin might be the most dangerous—and delicious—risk she’s ever taken.
