Peeve's Anchor

[The Smith]

"Just knock on the door. It will be two gold each." She replied.

[Horas]

"Thanks love," Crawley dismisses her with a wave, taking another swig of his ale. Once she is gone, he turns to Tomas. "Figure we should scope out the players here," Crawley says. "You can be from my company, back from the Stepstones with the spoils a war. Unless you got a better idea why a fella who looks like you is flashin' gold around."

[The Stranger]

"Wealthy noble women pay me to take them to bed," Ser Tomas replied, with a snort. "As if that ever happens anywhere. Your company it is."

[Horas]

Crawley snorts. "Probably the better of the two stories, all things considered." He drains the last of his ale, then gets to his feet. He walks to the indicated door and knocks on it.

[The Smith]

A large bear that seemed to be completely shaved and wearing boots and trousers opened the door. "Can I help you?" The bear seemed to speak common tongue... it was then the two men realized this was just the biggest, toughest, ugliest man they had ever seen.

[Horas]

"This is where the game is, eh?" Crawley jingles a coin purse.

[The Smith]

The bear nodded. And held out one meaty fist.

[Horas]

Crawley pays two gold, as does Tomas.

[The Smith]

They are let into the room, and there area two large tables. One a man sits at alone shuffling a deck of cards. The other has six chairs, five of which are occupied. There are piles of ivory tiles. The four players take turns placing a tile and then placing coins down on top of the tiles.

[Horas]

"Gentlemen," Crawley smiles broadly, examining each face in turn and taking the empty seat. "I hear this is where the real money gets passed around."

[The Smith]

One man was the one in charge of dealing out the new chips. The other four men were clearly merchants, or lords.

[The Stranger]

Ser Tomas scanned the faces of the Merchant/Lords looking to see if he recognized any of them.

"How it is?" he asked, peeking over the table at the tile game to get a sense of the stakes and who was winning.

[The Smith]

The game was something that Tomas had never seen. All the tiles had a small etching on each of their four sides. The players were taking turns placing tiles, and then laying gold coins on top of the tile they had placed. Occasionally a man would place a tile and then cover it with a coin but then remove several other coins from adjacent tiles.

The first man was clearly a merchant and had the biggest pile of coins.

The second was older with thinking hair and a white mustache. His pile was second largest.

The third was young and drunk. He had the third largest.

The last was almost out of coins and had many layers of fat and muscle.

[Horas]

"What's the rules at this table?" Crawley asks the dealer.

[The Smith]

"One gold per connection." The man replied.