Seoyeon tried very hard to keep herself to herself after the humiliating exchange with Captain Park in the hallway.  Once she’d calmed down, she had descended once more to oversee the goods arrivals, dutifully checking that everything that was on the list was in the carts and caravans and writing down the extra things that weren’t on the list (along with their cost), as well as spending some time thinking through what kinds of things ought to be added to it.  Most of the incoming goods were food, materials, and military-related items.  As far as Seoyeon was aware, there was no way of making cuts in those three areas without lowering the number of people in the fortress, and there really wasn’t that much in the way of luxury stuff either.

The very last package she took in contained mail.  Most of the correspondence was for her father, even though he’d not yet been there a week, so it had clearly been sent in anticipation of him taking up the position, but there were several letters for a number of different soldiers, including, she noticed with an involuntary curl of the lip, for Captain Park Chanyeol.  She very nearly ripped it up just to spite him.

Her father’s letters she took up to his study, but, unsure what to do with the rest of them, she went in search of Minseok, who seemed to know everything about Ximo and how it was run even if he was always reluctant to talk about it.  He sifted through the envelopes, studying the names on them, and plucked out two that were addressed to him that Seoyeon had forgotten about before handing them back.

“Baekhyun’s eating lunch through there now,” he said, pointing through to an unadorned dining room next door where the servants ate.  “Grab him when he’s finished and he’ll take you up to the mess hall to show you which chairs to put the letters on.”

Seoyeon did not particularly relish the opportunity for a second chance to meet Baekhyun, but that was the extent to which Minseok was going to help her, and so she figured she had to it up and just get on with it.  Still, it didn’t prevent her from lingering in the kitchen for as long as she possibly could before Minseok actually shooed her into the servant’s dining hall.

Baekhyun was finishing up a bowl full of yogurt, and Seoyeon winced when she saw him.  Unlike any remotely ordinary person, his spoon lay neglected on the table and he was noisily slurping the yogurt from the bowl itself.  When he saw that he had company, he gave an extra loud slurp, winked at her, and popped the bowl down on the table before away the yogurt moustache he had grown.

“Good afternoon!” he boomed in a voice far louder than anything a fifteen-year-old should have been capable of her.  “How may I help you, fair lady?”

“Get yourself some dignity,” Seoyeon shot back, horrified.  Baekhyun scooched his chair back and treated her to a flamboyant bow, his forehead almost touching the table.

“I humbly beg your pardon, ma’am,” he said cheerfully.

Seoyeon almost called him out on the bullsh*t, but caught herself at the last moment and clapped her hand over before she could swear.

“Twoddle,” she grumbled instead.  “I’ve been informed you know where the soldiers’ post goes.”

Baekhyun looked delighted.  He stood up at once, snatching his miniature bugle from the table.  “Indeed I do!  I take it you are in need of these services?”

Not in the mood for flippancy, Seoyeon glared at him.  Unaffected, Baekhyun pranced out of the room and beckoned for her to follow.  Seoyeon was pretty sure she was in for the longest fifteen minutes of her life.

Once she got used to his exuberance, Seoyeon was startled to discover that Baekhyun was more than tolerable.  He was a chatterbox who was almost incapable of shutting up, and Seoyeon was very unsure of how much he took seriously, if he took anything seriously at all.  He insisted that the fully laid mess table was the perfect place to dance some old soldier’s folk dance from the area, which had her cringing in horror at how close he came to knocking all the crystal goblets off the table and crushing all the crockery underfoot, but after a while she realised that he was actually incredibly surefooted and that mishaps were unlikely, and she began to relax.  Baekhyun asked her to call out the names of the various soldiers on the front of the letters and waltzed over to the chairs that they sat at, giving her little anecdotes about the man in question for each one of them.  Seoyeon didn’t know enough of them for the anecdotes to actually strike home, but she was very surprised to learn that Kim Minseok and Kim Junmyeon were brothers and only a year apart.  Lieutenant Kim and Lieutenant Do were the two highest-ranking military commanders in Ximo after Commander Hwang, whom Baekhyun described as a smelly old git who reported solely to the governor.  Commander Hwang had six letters that Seoyeon dumped unceremoniously in his chair.

The last one in her hand was the one for Captain Park, and Seoyeon grimaced as she read the name out.  Baekhyun teetered on the edge of the table, windmilling dramatically before he leapt over the back of the chair in the way and sauntered a couple of steps down to another one, which he placed both hands on — evidently where Captain Park sat.

“I know something very interesting about Captain Park,” he said with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.  “Apparently, a lady of rather high status declared her undying love—”

Seoyeon brandished the letter.  “Keep talking and I will give you a paper cut.”

He laughed, messing absently with his bugle.

“All right, all right,” he said.  “I’ll give you some actual information.  Did you know Captain Park is a Borderlander?”  He raised a conspiratorial eyebrow.

Seoyeon raised a sceptical one back at him.  “Everybody in this fortress is a Borderlander exce