Princess Rosalind ran the royal bakery, and she was the best cake decorator in the whole kingdom. Tonight, the kitchen smelled of warm vanilla and burnt sugar, and six layers of golden cake stood stacked on the counter, waiting. One last thing was missing: the crown of sugar flowers she'd been making all week.
She reached for the cooling shelf — and stopped. The shelf was bare. Every single flower, gone. But there, on the stone floor, was a tiny trail of pink sugary footprints leading straight out the bakery door. *Pitter, pitter, pitter.* Small ones. Very small ones. Rosalind picked up her piping bag, because a baker is never without her tools, and followed the trail. The night air was cool against her flour-dusted cheeks. The footprints crossed the kitchen tiles, squeezed under the door, and disappeared into the royal garden.
*Pitter, pitter, pitter.* She followed them past the rose bushes, past the old stone fountain, past the pumpkins that were nearly the size of wheelbarrows. The grass was damp and cold through her bakery slippers, and she walked slowly, watching the ground. The trail turned left behind the lavender hedge.
And there — tucked between two roots of the big oak tree — was the most carefully decorated burrow she had ever seen. Every sugar flower, placed just so, around the tiny round entrance. Pink roses. White daisies. One very lopsided star. And sitting in the middle of it all was a hedgehog. A very small hedgehog. She had one sugar daisy balanced on her nose and was trying, with great seriousness, to place it above the door. She had not yet noticed the princess.
"I can't be cross," Rosalind said. "It's the best decorating I've seen all week. And I've been decorating all week." She sat down right there in the damp garden grass, crossed her legs, and uncapped her piping bag. "But I do need more flowers. Shall we?" The hedgehog tilted her head. Then she sat down too. *Pitter, pitter, pitter* — the piping bag moved in small loops and curls. Rosalind showed the hedgehog that roses were hardest and stars were easiest, and the hedgehog turned out to be excellent at stars. She made six. She was very proud. You could tell because she kept looking at them.
By the time the moon was straight overhead and the lavender smelled sharp and cold in the night air, they had finished. She piped each flower onto the cake, one by one, saving the best star-shaped one for the very top. It sat there, a little lopsided, just like the hedgehog's. Rosalind decided she liked it better that way. The Grand Harvest Feast was a triumph. The six-layer cake stood in the centre of the long table, gleaming under the candlelight, every sugar flower perfect and one star slightly crooked. And at the worktable in the back of the bakery, Princess Rosalind sat with her head resting on her folded arms, a smudge of flour on her nose, the empty piping bag still loosely held in one hand.
