Isabella looked at Ophelia and Shelia first. "You two go get a bucket of water and bring the big bowl too."
The two girls imdiately got up.
Ophelia asked, "Only one bucket?"
Isabella gave her a look. "Do i look like i want to knead flour with air?"
Ophelia laughed again and hurried off with Shelia.
Then Isabella looked at Luca. "You help bring the flour."
Luca looked pained. "Why is it always ?"
"Because your face annoys less when you are useful."
Luca was speechless.
Valen had to turn his head away because he was very obviously trying not to smile too much in front of another male’s suffering.
Next Isabella turned to Cyrus, but before she could even say anything, he had already begun moving.
"I’ll prepare the table and everything we need," he said gently.
Of course he had already guessed.
Isabella smiled at him at once. "Good."
Then her eyes shifted to Zyran.
The mont Zyran saw that look, he imdiately tried to defend himself. "I feel unwell suddenly."
"Peel," Isabella said.
Zyran stared at her. "You truly have no rcy."
"Peel," she repeated.
Seeing him lose again, Osiris imdiately looked happy for so reason. "Then what am i doing?"
Isabella looked at him and thought for a mont. Then she said very carefully, "You can carry things."
Osiris brightened. "That is easy."
"But," Isabella added, "you are carrying things far away from the fire."
Osiris’s face fell again.
That made Kian finally let out another low laugh from the side, and when Isabella turned to look at him, his eyes were already on her.
To be honest, the whole place felt warm and full in that mont.
Everyone was talking at once, moving around, laughing, complaining, and still doing exactly what Isabella told them to do in the end. It was noisy in the way a real ho was noisy, and because of that, Isabella felt her heart soften a little as she stood there watching them.
Then she smiled and said, "Good. Since all of you are finally useful, let’s get everything ready first."
And as the kitchen burst into movent, with people groaning and laughing while gathering what she needed, Isabella stood in the middle of it all feeling very satisfied.
At least this ti, no one could escape.
After Isabella assigned everyone their work, the whole kitchen area beca lively at once.
Even though this world was still in the primitive age, it had long stopped looking fully primitive around Isabella.
There were tables now, and chairs, and better shelves, and bigger bowls for mixing food, and even smooth stone counters that had been made just for her because she had once complained that bending over too long while cooking made her waist ache.
So the place looked half like a beastman ho and half like sothing Isabella had stubbornly dragged into existence with her own hands.
Outside, the winter air was cold enough to bite, and the snow still rested quietly around the village. Inside, however, the room was warm from the fire, the steam, and the bodies moving around.
The won were all wrapped properly because the cold this season was no joke, but Kian was still wearing only his usual hide skirt, which made Isabella look at him again and again with disbelief.
To her, it was completely crazy that a man could walk around like that in winter and still act as if nothing was wrong. But then again, beastn were stronger than won, so Kian looked perfectly fine while everyone else looked like they would gladly crawl into the fur storage and stay there forever.
Isabella clapped her hands once and said, "Alright, if you all are going to stay here and breathe my air, then work properly."
Zyran, who had already been leaning in a chair with the air of a prince in exile, looked personally offended. "You say that as if my beauty is not already helping the atmosphere."
Luca imdiately muttered, "If beauty could knead dough, we would all be full already."
That made Ophelia laugh first.
She really was still so cute, because the mont she laughed, her whole face brightened. Shelia beside her also smiled, though hers was more controlled and quieter. Still, the warmth in her eyes made her look very pretty.
Zyran slowly turned to Luca. "I knew from the day I t you that your mouth would bring you trouble."
"And yet you still keep talking to ," Luca replied.
Before the two of them could continue, Isabella pointed at the large bowl on the table. "Enough. Cyrus, bring the flour here. Valen, cut the vegetables thinner. Ophelia, Shelia, wash the leaves again. Osiris..."
Osiris straightened imdiately, his eyes bright with expectation.
Isabella narrowed her eyes. "Stay away from the fire."
Osiris looked deeply wronged. "Why do you always say that first?"
"Because every ti I look at you, I rember danger," Isabella replied.
That made everyone laugh again.
Osiris folded his arms and muttered, "I am actually very reliable."
Zyran clicked his tongue. "Yes. Reliably explosive."
This ti even Kian let out a faint low chuckle, and hearing that sound made Isabella glance at him at once with satisfaction. Good. If he kept laughing like this, then perhaps he would stop looking like the village owed him three years of sleep.
Soon the work truly began.
Cyrus brought the flour over and placed it in front of Isabella before gently adjusting the chair for her first. He always did little things like that. He would move a stool slightly, bring sothing closer, fix a fur around her shoulder, or quietly notice when her hands had beco cold. Then when she finally sat down, he handed her the water bowl and asked softly, "Is this close enough, or should I move it more?"
Isabella looked up at him and smiled. "This is fine."
Cyrus’s eyes softened at once, and then he stayed nearby preparing the at filling exactly the way she asked.
To be honest, he was the easiest to work with because he listened so well that Isabella barely needed to explain things twice. He chopped the at, sorted the fat, cleaned the herbs, and passed her things at the right ti as if the two of them had been cooking side by side for years.
Ophelia and Shelia were on the other side handling the vegetables. Ophelia looked sweet and serious, but every now and then she still got distracted by the scent of the filling and tried to peek into Cyrus’s bowl. Each ti that happened, Valen would lightly touch her shoulder and guide her back to her own task with that patient look of his.
"Focus," he said gently.
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