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Along with tasting notes, our coffees come with memory notes—a mouthful of words to contextualize what you’re drinking.

Rubies in Snow

Tidings of King Othor’s demise flood the realm’s troupes with foreboding. The king’s heir, newly-crowned Queen Agathe, has always despised the arts and nurtures militant ambitions for Vega. ‘Bows and strings are for archers, not minstrels,’ her first edict declares.

But the old king had not shared his daughter’s appetite for conquest, favoring poetry and acrobatics over warmongering. Many seasons ago when he had ascended the throne, King Othor sipped on prized pink lemonade offered as a gift by a family of jugglers. He cultivated a tenderness for these traveling folk and their libations ever since. 

But those days are buried. And hidden beyond sunlight’s reach in the ever-gloom of Gwandel Woods, Honeysuckle despairs. On the stairs of her family’s caravan, she watches her children attempt the Nooferniggle Knack – a juggling trick that involves balancing on an ostrich egg. 

Watching her, Robin sidles up to his beloved. ‘What troubles you, my flower?’

‘I wonder if we fail the children by keeping them with us,’ Honeysuckle confesses. ‘Perhaps they would fare better enlisting in the citadel’s barracks and trading our clubs and balls for weapons.’ She drops her eyes. ‘I ache to say it, but the queen has turned us into brigands, cowering here in the dark.’

Robin gently lifts her chin before he speaks again. ‘Remember the red currants, my darling. In the furthest depth of winter, the gods reveal them like rubies against the snow, showing the starling what to eat. So too will we be in their safe-keeping.’