Seoyeon’s first night in Ximo was a nightmare incarnate.  Her room might have been gloriously big, but it was also absolutely freezing.  It didn’t really help that very few of her belongings had been unpacked, and still lay in the trunks stacked in the room.  She could have insisted the maids do it, but Seoyeon was very particular about knowing where her personal things were and she didn’t particularly want anybody touching some of her more precious possessions.  However, because she was too busy lurking outside her father’s parlour in the hopes of catching him onces the officers had all left and asking him if he could do something about Captain Park, she lost a good couple of hours she could have used to unpack (though she did get through half a book), and the loitering didn’t even pay off: the party was still in full swing by the time she was beginning to drift off against the cold stone wall, and so she gave up and retreated to her arctic room.

Somebody had been in to turn down the bed and had left a large, sweet-smelling candle burning on her bedside table.  Shivering as she huddled under the blankets, Seoyeon wondered idly if the grate in the wall opposite her bed was a functioning one, because a fire would never go amiss, and whether there would be enough candles in the weekly supplies to satisfy the chandelier that she’d brought and intended to put up in her room.  Very few things improved a room as quickly as candlelight reflecting off the dangling crystals of a chandelier.  Tucking herself up into a ball, she snuffed out the candle and closed her eyes, imagining how the room would look when she was done with it, and drifted off.

Wind howled in her dreams, bringing strange cackles of laughter and flighty, grotesque shapes – some almost human, others of monsters or other horrifying creatures.  At  some point, Seoyeon woke up in a cold sweat to the wind tearing through her room, slamming the shutters of the window back against the wall and whipping the bed covers around her.  It took her a good few minutes’ struggling with the windows and the shutters, both of which she was certain she’d bolted shut before going to sleep, before she managed to force them closed again and bolt them, her face and fingers numb from the hail that had sluiced into her through the opening.  The wind continued to howl like a banshee as she stumbled back into bed, teeth chattering, and bundled herself up in all the blankets available like a small child.  On second thoughts, realising that she wasn’t going to be able to sleep with such a gale rattling the entire fortress, she lit the candle again in an attempt to dispel some of her fear.

Before she was even aware she’d fallen asleep, it was morning, and Seoyeon found herself cranky and tired, having nodded off still sitting against the headboard.  Her back ached as she tried to stretch herself out.

All in all, it was actually somewhat reassuring when there was a soft knock and a secret door slid open as Jieun, the maid who had been assigned to her, slipped inside.  She bowed to Seoyeon when she saw that she was up and about and then averted her eyes, quickly opening one of the clothes trunks and selecting some neatly folded clothes at the top for Seoyeon.

“Did you sleep well, ma’am?” she asked politely.

Not in the mood even for smalltalk, Seoyeon grunted.  Jieun filled a basin with warm water for her so that she could wash her hands and face, and then busied herself with making the bed while Seoyeon got changed.  Her stomach was growling viciously by the time she had started brushing her hair, and once she was done, she slipped out into the passage to join her father in the parlour.  To her relief, he was alone and there was a magnificent spread on the table.

She greeted him as she sat down and immediately started piling her plate.

“Good morning, darling!” he said cheerfully.  “Did you sleep well?”

“No,” said Seoyeon bluntly.  “I hate this place.”

“Oh, come now, you can’t judge it so quickly.”

He was in too good a mood for Seoyeon to be able to win an argument against him, and so she let the subject drop.  He hummed happily to himself as he dipped toast into the yolk of his egg.

Once she had munched her way through the fruit, which wasn’t quite as nice as she was used to getting back home, and finished off the last slices of toast, she decided to broach the subject of the previous evening.

“Father, do you think you’re still going to go ahead with the cuts?”

Surprised, he stopped eating to look up at her.  “I’m hoping to.  I wouldn’t have thought it would interest you.”

“Well…”  She chewed her lip.  “I was wondering if I could help.  I mean, I don’t know anything about these things, much, but I would have thought the easiest way to cut costs is simply to get rid of excess people.  There’s nothing here — there hasn