"These aren't recipes you'll find in Guild textbooks," Henrik said. "They're not elegant. They won't win awards. But Louvel—" His voice went quiet, serious. "These recipes fed me as a child. My family was poor. My mother made Hearthstone Loaf every week because one loaf could stretch for days. I learned fancy cooking later. But I learned cooking from watching her make something from nothing."
Marron looked up at her intimidating, perfectionist instructor and saw something she'd never expected: vulnerability.
"That's why I support what you're doing," Henrik continued. "The street vendors, the resistance against the decree. Those vendors aren't making fancy food. They're making honest food, efficient food, the kind of food that respects both ingredients and the people eating them. The Merchant's Guild dismissing them as 'unhygienic' or 'substandard'—" His jaw tightened. "It's dismissing the food that actually sustains this city."
