/greenjam/ Yam Jam


                                            >Jan Boury was absolutely disgusted.

                                            >The grinning earth pony chortled as she resealed her mason jar and its putrified smell.

                                            >"Not bad, hey? Said to my feller before I left, 'Have a whiff of this, Gaz!' and he were proper falling about the place. I'm telling you," she patted the jar, "it's dynamite. So what are you bringing?"

                                            >Jan took a moment before answering. He hadn't prepared for Trottinghamites and their disreputable 'cuisine' when he'd left Grifhelm earlier that week.

                                            >He reached a claw for the duffle bag slumped over his back, but hesitated.

                                            "Revealing my masterpiece now would be casting pearls before swine," he said curtly.

                                            >He ruffled his one and a half wings and, without another word, departed.

                                            >"All sunny days, you are," she called after him.

                                            >Despite his manner, she rejoined him at the shoulder, her lightly bouncing trot keeping casual pace with his heavy lumbering. "Who're you supposed to be, then?"

                                            "My name," Jan held his chin high as he walked, "is Jan Boury. And I am the greatest chef griffonkind has ever produced."

                                            >"So why do your clothes have so many holes in them?"

                                            >To her delight, Jan swept his moth-eaten cloak around him with an offended glare.


                                            *


                                            >"Reckon we'll get fed at Castletown?"

                                            >Jan didn't know why Pammy Granite ("Pam, duck, all my friends call me Pam") was still following him.

                                            >The fragmented trail through the Grey Hills was the only way to Castletown. He could be stuck with her for a while. The thought had him gazing at the sky and its indifferent clouds.

                                            >He shifted his scarred half-wing. The nub still ached and likely always would.

                                            "It would be remiss of a chef's conference to not provide food, one would think," he said at last, to which she grew a wry smile.

                                            >"Certainly 'one' would. Scouts'll be there, you know. Gaz were keen on that. Said to me, 'Look here, Pam, if you don't hook one first day, grab him and pull him in a closet with you.' I said, 'Cheeky git, what kind of mare do you think I am?' we had a proper laugh, we did. Proper funny, my Gaz."

                                            >On she went.

                                            >Jan watched the clouds and not the ground. He didn't want to lower his head because it might bring Pam's obnoxiously curly mane back into his periphery, and he was starting to hate the colour red. He clenched his beak and thought about warm beds, but it didn't help.

                                            >"By the way, duck, you stepped in deer shit."


                                            *


                                            >"I call it Pam’s Yam Jam. Nice name, hey?"

                                            "Adorable."

                                            >"Think so? You're just saying."

                                            >Jan had hoped that stopping to rest early would mean Pam might continue on without him, perhaps wander off deeper into the woods to get lost or eaten by a bear.

                                            >She was instead poking the young fire with a stick, her bottom perched on a log hauled before her tent – pegged directly beside Jan’s own under the emerging stars.

                                            >”Hey, want to know a secret?”

                                            >She was staring at him. Wide blue eyes writhing with reflected fire.

                                            “Perhaps the secret to everlasting silence?”

                                            >”Why’d you want a thing like that? No, listen, my jam? It’s not even yam!”

                                            >She giggled like it was the dirtiest joke ever shared between two chicks in a school roost.

                                            >”Guess what it is! Go on, you’ll never guess.”

                                            “Potato mash,” Jan grunted. He didn’t look at her, fixated instead on assembling his mouse-and-pepper kebab.

                                            >”Cereal!” she crooned. Jan paused, sparing a quick glance at her idiot grin.

                                            “Explain,” he said.

                                            >”It's just cereal, innit? Mashed it up in a blender, mixed with water, packed it in a jar with yam flavouring and a bit of that old funny leaf for giggles, know what I mean?”

                                            “And you hope to sell this?”

                                            >”Well scout’s not gonna know, is he? All they care about is recipes. Whole point’s to make a buck and scarper, can’t do that if I’m sitting on my arse explaining this that and the other about how profound it is. Gaz told me, ‘Make a sale, not a customer’.”

                                            >Jan forgot his kebab. The stick hung limp, the skewered bell pepper merrily consumed by the hungry flame.

                                            “You’re not even a chef?”

                                            >”’Course I am,” she winked. Her bleach-white teeth gleamed. “Been one all season. Summit'll be good business, mark my words."

                                            >The stick twitched in Jan's tightening claw.

                                            “The Summit is about honing our craft. We are artists...” he wanted to continue, but she was laughing again. It was a pitched laugh that peaked early and often, each peak stabbing his ears like forks into a joint.

                                            >”Pull the other one, duck. What’s your hustle, then?”

                                            >He didn’t answer immediately, instead leaning away and frowning at the shrivelled nugget that was once a pepper.

                                            “I am the greatest chef," he told the nugget. "Like my cousin Gustav le Grande, I must enlighten through taste alone."

                                            >”That pay well?”

                                            “It pays whatever it pays, money isn't important."

                                            >”That's what they all say ‘til the fridge is empty. Bet you wouldn’t turn down a hundred-grand.”

                                            “So what if I wouldn't, what difference does that make? I live to perfect my art. You... you aren’t even a chef!”

                                            >”Listen, Janny, you’ve got this whole thing flank-backwards. Chefery’s not about making 'art' or any of that donkey’s nads, it’s about scamming rich suckers and making off with a killing! Look at it this way, you spend three hours in a kitchen making Celestia-knows-what, and maybe some toff eats it and gives a hundred bits for it. What’s that, thirty bits an hour? But me...”

                                            >She patted her mason jar with a knowing smile, the thing hanging on a thick strap around her neck.

                                            >”I sell this to a corporate scout at some fancy bash in Castletown. He thinks it’s the next big thing. Reckons buying the patent rights will make him and his bosses a cartload in sales. He don’t know a thing about food, all he sees is bits. He gives me two-grand for it, thinks he’s robbed it off me, runs on home with a jar of mashed cereal I spent ten minutes cobbling together and what am I left with? Two-grand and a free afternoon to spend it however I like.”

                                            >She leans back, insufferably smug.

                                            >”Food’s a con, mate. Always has been. Ponies only want what they’ve always had: bread, sugar, cider. Give a pony that and she’s happy as Derpy. Anything else is window dressing. No point. It all comes out brown the other end, so why bother?”

                                            “The point is art!” Jan leapt to his paws, fuming. “It is about turning the mundane into something beautiful! Griffonmade transcendence!”

                                            >His reservations forgotten, he wrenched open his duffel bag and with trembling claws prised open his own ceramic jar. An aroma of rosemary death billowed forth and Pam covered her muzzle with a distressed gasp.

                                            “This is my opus: my Mélange de Viande!"

                                            >”What in-- that’s rank, that is!”

                                            >Her comment unnoticed, Jan’s claw tips rap delicately on the ceramic. The griffon was hunched on the grass before the fire, the jar in his lap. He didn’t look up from it as he breathed in the fragrance and spoke reverently.

                                            “Young mutton, pork, and rare herbs. Minced and broiled for a half-hour with a dash of South Equestrian sea salt. The key herb is a rarity of rarities – crambe, not seen anywhere here. Native only to the far east...”

                                            >”I’m gonna throw up.”

                                            “Ah, of course it would be offensive to the uneducated senses of a pony like you, but to griffons? This is magnificence itself. It will win the recipe competition most assuredly.”

                                            >”The competition? You joking? You whip that out in a room of ponies and they’ll have you arrested, they will.”

                                            >Jan’s expression hardened again and he snapped the jar shut.

                                            “Idiot. The chefs of Castletown are my artistic kin. They will appreciate its beauty. I’ll hear no more of your deranged rambling!"

                                            >He stomped off to bed.


                                            *


                                            >It stormed overnight.

                                            >Jan was awake for most of it, listening. Like any griffon, thunder made him yearn for the open skies, but his nub throbbed to remind him his place.

                                            >The morning trail was mud, and his frustrations with Pam were offset only slightly by her hooves being poorer on the path than his own solid claws. The highlight of his day was a squawk followed by a wet slap. He didn't turn to check on her, not wanting to ruin the mental image.


                                            *


                                            >The bridge had been built a century prior – by bored, unemployed masons, if Jan was remembering his history.

                                            >Yet history it was, as the only remnants of it were the stonework posts at opposing sides of the river. All over the downstream stretch, chunks of white limestone were lodged in the banks and poking from the water. Pam knocked a pebble into the muddy torrent.

                                            >”That's a kick in the teats. Now what?"

                                            >Jan scratched his cheek and surveyed the area. His keen avian eyes spotted something further downstream, but he pondered still.

                                            >The Castletown Culinary Summit was in less than a day. He didn’t have time to waste looking for alternatives.

                                            >He hummed, and without a word to his unwanted companion, turned and hauled his bulk away along the top of the burst embankment.

                                            >Pam trailed him, but as they approached Jan’s target she rushed ahead, nearly shunting him into the water in her haste.


                                            *


                                            >”Beavers! Count on beavers to survive a storm like that!”

                                            >A misshapen driftwood dam reached across the river's width.

                                            >Families of industrious beavers chattered excitedly, patching up great holes in the structure and ignoring the pair. Pam grinned and flashed Jan a wink.

                                            >”Useful one to know, you are! All right, make way, beavers!”

                                            >Without a second thought, she jumped down onto the dam. The thing shook, a few pieces of wood coming loose, and the beavers yelled.

                                            >They shook tiny fists and jabbered as Pam stumbled and crawled her way across the length of the dam, her legs wet to the knees but the rest of the cream mare untouched.

                                            >As she clambered ashore she waved back, then ducked away with a laugh when a beaver threw a twig at her head.

                                            >”Come on, Janny! It’s not far!”

                                            >Jan surveyed the dam. As one, the beavers turned their glares on him. One of them did the beaverish equivalent of rolling up its sleeves. Jan took a wary step back.

                                            >The Summit was in less than a day. He had no choice.

                                            >He grimaced. He leapt.

                                            >The structure quaked under his crushing landing. He managed one step, then a second before the section collapsed beneath him.

                                            >He and several beavers were dragged into the surging river.

                                            >Pam howled with laughter.

                                            >He panicked. His wings flapped uselessly, claws slashing at the unyielding water. Was he drowning?

                                            >He wrenched his duffel bag forward, tried using it as a float only to find it too heavy, so instead he thrashed on as passing wooden shards scored him like so many former roasts.

                                            >Pam continued to roar, on her back with tears in her eyes in mockery of his plight.

                                            >He entered shallower waters nearer the edge, found it easier to move, and a few beavers, now realising the imposing size of their target, fled.

                                            >Jan glowered from the water, shivering with cold and rage, at the pony on the bank above.

                                            >”Hey!" she recovered and called down. "Hey, have a nice soak, duck? Now you even look like one!"

                                            >Her laugh peaked. Stabbed his ears.

                                            >And he snapped.


                                            >Tossing away the kilogram of damn lamb, ham and crambe spam, Jan swam past the dam to ram Pam's sham yam jam scam right up her stupid--