Thistle Flourish came stumbling out of the secret passage from Full Lance's room into the main hall. The main hall was currently decorated with: a few banners representing the neighboring lords, dukes and other prominent crests, some rusty weaponry that Full lance had a strange attachment to for some reason, and a few coarsely woven mats near the main doors. Thistle noted that Minty was slowly consuming the hall's space with shelves and other forms of storage, especially around the kitchen door.
As Thistle approached the shelving, a young pale green stallion was laboring to move a sack of grain out of the kitchen. From outside Thistle could already hear Minty giving a string of helpful commentary to stallion, saying "I wasn't kidding when I said that if you went any slower I was going to have you move all the grain in that pantry!"
"But issh shoo densh!" the stallion whined.
"Yeah, well apparently that sack of barely isn't the only thing that's dense around here," Minty punctuated this by hitting the stallion on his skull with her wooden spoon. "Now get hauling, or I'll give you a kick on that shapely rump you won't forget!"
That shut the poor stallion up.
As Thistle smoothly slid between the stallion and the door frame Minty's expression softened as she greeted him, "Ah Thistle, back already?"
"Yeah," Thistle began, "Herr Lance was already up when I got to his room. Though he was a real grump."
"Oh he always is when he drinks too much." Minty giggled, "Yes he sure did drink a lot last night, I would pay to see him like that again."
"Ah... I see," Thistle said awkwardly. Thistle noted that the narrow kitchen had made remarkable strides towards recovery since he had last night; most of the pots had been gathered up, there were exceptionally few stains remaining on the cupboards and floors and cabinets, and there were almost no stray ingredients floating about. Of all the things Minty was, a slob was not one of them.
"Say," started Thistle, "Where'd all your assistants go, Frau Minty?"
"Thistle, you know you can drop the honorifics. Do I have to tell you every single day?" Minty took a deep breath, "Unfortunately, my assistants all have their own homes to tend to, so I had to let them go."
Minty began starting a fire underneath a large pot in the fireplace. "Besides, aside from the mess I had them clean up, there really isn't that much to do around here with just you, me, Full Lance, and the few 'servants' Full Lance allows in. There's just not enough to do around here to warrant it..." Minty thought for a bit as she dumped water into the pot.
"That said though, I'll be damned if those girls didn't learn a thing or ten about cooking under my control!" Minty chuckled and looked back at Thistle, "Thistle, weren't supposed to be doing something?" her tone made it clear that, yes there was something Thistle was supposed to be doing.
"Oh! I almost forgot, there's a leak in the pantry somewhere!" Thistle looked up at Minty, "I have to find it and have Grind Seed patch it up."
Minty nodded approvingly. Thistle started off toward the pantry.
"Now," he thought out loud, "Where is this supposed hole I wonder..."
As Thistle approached the old wooden door to the pantry he noted the strong scents of dry straw and... moist hay? Suddenly the door opened! And it very nearly would've bonked Thistle on the snoot had he not had such swift reflexes. He coiled away from the door, like a cat chasing a mouse, but in reverse! He crouched on all fours, as time slowed around him as he assessed this rogue door opener. In fact it was none other than... the stallion who was hauling grain for Mint Simmer! Hmm, maybe I got a little carried away there, Thistle thought. Nonetheless, the stallion was dragging the sack by his teeth so he must not have been aware that Thistle was right behind him. As the stallion turned around to drag the sack along side him instead of behind him Thistle closed up behind him and rotated in sync, just barely brushing the stallion's green mane and back hair, and entered the pantry. Thistle thought he heard Minty giggle behind him, she must have thought of another one her baking jokes, Thistle silently remarked.
Inside the pantry Thistle took note of the condition of the walls. They were old, but quite sound, made of gray granite and dark stone blocks slotted together in a fairly impressive show of masonry. Just like the rest of the manor, so there shouldn't be any problems. Thistle observed relatively little cracking or jointing in the mortar, but perhaps the leak is in a corner...?
After some searching and contemplating, Thistle laid down upon the floor and-- found the leak! It was a gap between the bottom right corner of the wall about half a hoof wide! It was time to go get Grind Seed!