(( Open to any humans or wicks who want to come chill with the King of the Underworld. Business will be discussed, drinks will be drunk, and whatnot! If you're looking to get in with the BB, now might be your chance. Oh and Cor, this one's for you. ))

The room had not gone silent when Silas Hawke walked in. It never did. No one wanted to be the last one tinkling piano keys or laughing at a joke or dropping his mug in the dead, awed silence, so everybody kept doing what they were doing before in an effort to appear casual and remain under the cloak of anonymity. Over the years the King had become well accustomed to hearing the subtle change in mood that overtook an establishment when he patronized it. He liked it. It was like a personal symphony, the clangs and rattles of peasant life, resonating with nervousness just for him.

He put up his boots on the table, and ordered a silly and complex drink. The barmaid nodded smartly, surreptitiously tugging up her bosom as she hurried off. Up on stage, Zelda DeVonne winked at him as she crooned. A table full of gambling men were all suddenly unlucky.

"Ain't nothin' quite like Vienda," remarked one of his entourage, reaching for his packet of poppy. "I mean, ent no Rosie, but she's got 'er charms."

"You are correct, indeed, my pudgy compatriot," replied Hawke happily, closing his eyes and adjusting his ridiculous hat; It had more feathers on than Zelda DeVonne. "But it is not for mere pleasure that we pay a visit inland, if you remember. There are matters to discuss. Items to purchase. That sort of thing."

A hard-looking woman sniffed and lit up a cigar.

"Buying the love of AW oughter be interesting," she said. The others shushed her, but she paid them no mind; they were less likely to be overheard in this bar than they were anywhere in Old Rose. "And you said you've got a meeting with whassisface, too? The posh fellow?"

"Well remembered, Rinata," said Hawke silkily. "But tonight, I think, we relax. The voyage was hard on us all. Nasty things, boats. I can't imagine why anyone bothers with them."

They laughed dutifully; soon enough they would be drunk, and Hawke's jokes would seem less sinister under the haze of inebriation.

Fion had heard that Hawke was in town. It might have been better to say that she had over-heard and made use of the information. She was sitting in a corner, dressed in keeping with the other women about, neck line low and eyes rimmed with kohl. Fion had seen herself in the mirror and had been forced to admit to herself that she made a good tramp.

She currently had her eyes pointed away from the Old Rose tourists, comfortable that she didn't look enough like her usual self to be remembered too quickly or at all. She wasn't of the opinion they'd found her to be at all memorable the first time. She was there to listen and see what was to be seen, inconspicuously.

It was almost fun. There was music and alcohol and she could almost pretend this was a genuine night out. She adjusted the hat she was wearing so the netting was less dense over her eyes. She'd filched the feathers from here and there and dyed them so they looked brighter.

AW? Buying love? What was all this, then?

Gannon strode in late on the shindig, his hair and shoulders a little wet from the drizzle outside, but the majority of that was remedied when he shrugged out of his overcoat and--after making double sure that nothing was in the pockets--relinquished it to the coat rack by the door.

It wasn't often that Gannon went to the Toy Lantern. In fact, it wasn't often he got out of the Stag much these days. Bar ownership tended to turn one into something of an involuntary shut-in and the indoors could certainly grate on Gannon's nerves. This evening he'd felt particularly claustrophobic, and after a long walk through the streets, he'd found himself at this place. Predominately wick hang-outs didn't bother him in the least, after being raised around five of them, you certainly got used to wicks, even if they weren't exactly spokes.

The few times he had visited, the smoky air had been warm and fragrant in its own musty fashion that Gannon did find calming. But tonight...well, the air was still smoky and smelled about the same, but an undercurrent of tension was making the place vibrate and Gannon paused at the doorway, instinctively tense. However, standing was not always the best option, so he strode—outwardly calm if not inwardly—to a good spot at a table that had a nice view of the door and various windows and did not expose his back to either.

Gannon's good eye trained on the frilly-looking peacock at the bar and his entourage. The huge bartender would bet his last bottle of Hoxian vodka that he was the cause of this atmosphere. Something about the way he sat...he looked less like a man and more like a leering panther perched on a rock. And one did not oft trifle with panthers, especially when they were surrounded by scroungy guard dogs.

Gannon decided not to order just yet, but merely to wait and watch. It might have been safer to get up and leave, but Gannon's pride would not let him depart. He had walked into a wolf's den tonight...

Come what clocken' may....

Fion's prediction had been correct; none of the crew seemed to recognize her in her getup. But she caught sight of one member of the entourage who wasn't acting relaxed at all; while the others laughed and joked and drank, Rinata sat quietly and gazed around the room with sharp eyes, smoking her cigar slowly.

"Get ye somethin', luv?" said a witch in an apron, patting Gannon on the shoulder. She batted her long eyelashes at him, but there was a hint of nervousness in her mannerisms.

Smoke and painted light were old things Caiaphas found himself craving, more by more. The Toy Lantern reminded him off Bethas, if you put it over flame and reduced it down to a simple syrup. Thick, garish, and lovely. Only when he was heartsick for home did he ever venture into this plush cave.

He'd told the husband he was just skipping out for about an hour. Headin' down t'market and things, ye chen?

'And things' was what Caiaphas was up to now. Secured away in a quiet table, alone. He was craving alone more by more, too. Green wine still sour with the sun, tasting like dirt and wedding kegs. A soft cloud of opium smoke hissed through his teeth, hovering in an oily corona around his head. Black eyes straying to the glamour and curves of the witch on stage. Hovering brief over the curve of her mouth and thoughts of if he were young and dark and sleek again.

When the pretty bird flounced in, he didn't need automatic recognition. Names eluded him, but the aura didn't. The quick ripple of adrenaline, the stiffening of shoulders that swept across the basement room. It interrupted the vapid din was loud as scream, to him. Brunno, beata, da, daoa. All his blood lines flung far as the eye could see. Thick as thieves. It was a curious feeling, grating up along the insides of his chest, being on the outside and staring into that black mass tension for once. The Spindles could quiet a camp, once, somewhere in the dusty cogs of memory.

Caiaphas leaned back on the rickety legs of his chair, floorboards whining under their plush skin of carpet. He rolled the green bite of wine on his tongue -- pensive, watchful. All their swagger and hatcher smiles made him ache for distant recollections; the lacquered wood of his rifle, clutched in sweating palms. The flash of his beata's swords somewhere in the corner of his eye. He saw a sliver of her there for a moment, her inky hair and massive nose, in the dreadlocked woman with her teeth champed around a spur. The flesh looked different, but the smoke and shark smile were all the same. Good and dishonest things.

But he'd just go on missing them. No bundle of thugs flouncing through town was going to change that. Much to his chagrin, Caiaphas Spindle had become what some would call a 'good man'. Whatever preposterous thing that could mean. But he could sit and listen and remember, all those things he was getting so clever at in his advancing years.

A long drag on his opium spur, settling his shoulders against the lush paint of the wall. A fresh plume of smoke. Dark eyes resting under lashes on the smiling faces across the room.

It wasn't if they were trying to keep their business quiet, anyway.

Gannon stiffened when the hand came down on his shoulder though the voice stopped him from leaping from his chair. He forced his hand from the hilt of his blade and, with effort typically used to heft around barrels, placed it on the table. Good Lady, he was far too tense. One would think that he'd put himself back in the sweaty damp roar of the Basin for all the blood that was hammering through him. Gannon let his breath hiss through his teeth in a long sigh.

That place had put more mannerism in Gannon than he realized. No one ever tapped someone on the shoulder from behind in the Basin. It was a good way to get a knife to the gut. No. If you wanted someone's attention, you came from the front and kept your hands out of your pockets. Anyone doing anything else probably wanted you dead.

He looked up at the witch and was not so surprised to find that she too looked as twitchy as a three day clock. Get you something? Yeah, a gun sounded about right, but all he requested was Bastian whiskey if they had it. Before she departed he asked: "An' who're they?" jutting his chin in the direction of the feathery individual and his cronies.

Annie loved a good rumor. The one that was whispered here and there recently about the crime lord from Old Rose who'd just come into town was a real treat, too. She'd asked around here and there, picking up on stories people had heard from friends of friends. Supposedly he was amazingly magic, really tall, ate children for lunch--no! breakfast!--could take on twenty gollies at once one handed while kissing a wench, has killed men with tridents (although nobody seemed to know where he'd actually gotten the tridents), and various other bits of nonsense that Annie was mostly certain had been made up on the spot just for the telling. Being the truth seeker she was, Annie decided to find out for herself.

She arrived at the Toy Lantern alone and slightly damp from the perpetual drizzle, wearing that red dress she'd picked up at the wick Festival and a short tie-front black jacket. Hopefully it was the right kind of thing to wear when out at a bar. Annie wasn't entirely certain; she'd never really gone 'out to a bar' before, at least not one where she wasn't also on assignment. Stepping in the door, the usual bar sights, sounds and smells greeted the reporter with a gagging embrace. The haze of the smoke, the occasional swear words spoken too loud, the clink of glasses on tables. There was a tension in the air, though, so thick you could cut into it with a knife and serve it on a plate. It was enough to make you smile or puke, one or the other. Annie's eyes panned the room slowly before coming to rest on one particular group at a particular table. The callous ease of at least one of its residents practically screamed his name. Hawke. The reporter shifted her gaze and walked casually to the bar. She was determined to find out something good, even if she couldn't publish it. It was just who she was.

"Whiskey sour, if'n ye please." she ordered, attempting to seem like she didn't care.

"You just haven't spent enough time on a boat, that's all."

Hummed Corwynn from over the rim of his glass without an audible hint of his usual sarcasm, so drenched was his tone with amusement. The blond galdor had somehow managed to keep his personal disdain for Vienda from his expression, though he'd loathed the place for decades as it was. Sure, the gollies were prettier and the streets cleaner, the food generally better and the beds fluffier, but it still brought the gunman too close to the society he made a point not to fit into for his personal comfort.

"And the Arova hardly compares to the sea, last time I checked." He concluded, quite comfortably nestled in the crowd of their entourage. Corwynn grinned, broad and catlike, knowing full well his time working the Vein had been meant to be punishment.

Shifting in his seat, feeling slightly off by the lack of a familiar weight at his hip, the older gunman shrugged dismissively, letting his blue eyes travel over the patronage before landing on Rinata mischievously, as if he contemplated accusing her of being unable to relax.

Refraining with some obvious difficulty, Corwynn simply returned to his drink.

The barmaid's eyebrows flew up at Gannon's question.

"Ye're kiddin'," she said, then realized after a moment that he wasn't. "Hawke, Silas Hawke, King of Old Rose, at our joint! Hard to believe, eh? But there he sits. Now I'll get you that whiskey, brunno, if ye sit down and don't make trouble wi' him, ye chen?" Her eyes pleaded with him.

Already there was a tilt in the general atmosphere of the bar. Not everyone in Vienda was as afraid of the Bad Brothers as they might have been, and after a decent night's drinking and smoking poppy, bad ideas were beginning to get fuzzy around the edges, enough so that they started to look like good ideas. A similar effect was to be observed in how attractive the barmaid was beginning to look to some of them.

Annie's request went temporarily unheard while the bartender tried earnestly to look busy, but the bar-back caught her eye and nodded dutifully. The 'sour' here was of unknown origin and could probably eat through shoes, and the whiskey made it seem as mild as milk. The bar-back respected a gel who could order an unwise drink.

---

Hawke smiled thinly. Corwynn had an annoying habit of turning a critical eye to his little jokes, drawing them out and making them seem less and less amusing as he did so. He made another silent plan to kill him, then put it aside for later, after attending his sister's wedding but before rearranging the furniture in his east study.

Rinata caught Corwynn's eye and glared briefly. It was an eloquent expression, but similar enough to her usual appearance that it could have been easily missed in the darkness.

"Lotta fidgeting, I see," she commented quietly, gazing over at the bar. "Lotta eyes. Eyes that might need to be put out." It was clearly wishful thinking on her part.

"Don't start trouble," warned Toothy Ted between puffs of opium. "We're here on a friendly visit, right?"

She frowned. "Was it wise to come to this pub, sir? Tension's high enough among the wicks already, and the law thugs have been doing extra rounds, or so a little bird tells me. They're paranoid."

"You know, Rinata my dear, I recall a brief but poignant parable about a black pot and his good friend, the kettle," said Hawke, smiling beatifically. "But it is faint in the annals of my memory. Care to refresh my recollection, anyone?"

“Hmmmh,” Gannon grunted, settling back into his chair, growling low, “I imagined him taller….”

He knew he Silas Hawke was. One didn’t operate a bar, or live in Vienda, or live in Anaxis for that matter, without hearing that name and learning of him in some capacity. Of course, most of the stories he’d heard were probably long yarns—“Oh yeah, sure. He’s half golly.” or “I saw him slay eight people once by hisself wid one worda’ magic. An’ just cause they were inna’ way of th’ door!”—and other such trite. That wasn’t to say that the man didn’t look every inch the crime lord he was: silken and poisonous all at once.

Gannon found himself easing in his chair a bit, almost relaxing to the point that he could enjoy the sound of DeVonne’s smoky voice as it slid into his ear and around his mind. He always did like to hear that woman sing.

It was always easier to handle a threat when you knew what it might be. Better a snake in the daylight than a snake in the dark.

Fion was watching the table of brothers very carefully, out of the corner of her eye.

She was looking for the one that would respond best to company. As close to Hawke as she could get, without crossing his inner circle entirely. Her eyes were slowly passing over the table, hidden partly by the netting around her head, looking for little cues like how many glasses were in front of each man and whether he seemed merry or bored, if any of them were looking at the women around. She kept her head tilted so it wasn't pointed in their direction. She never looked directly, carefully sipping her drink every time she turned her eyes to the side. She was careful never to look directly and never to look for too long. She spent most of her time with her gaze directed at the stage.

As Fion studied the men, she noticed that most of them seemed to have relaxed since stepping into the bar. What did they have to fear from such simple townsfolk, after all? Their weapons were not obvious or threatening, but years of experience in the resistance had taught her that they were purposefully concealed, in a position to be seen if one were looking to start a fight but not obvious to any casual observer; at any moment the men could be ready to defend the King. But it was a small entourage, not the type of band Silas would have taken with him if he were truly concerned for his safety. The presence of the tow-haired galdor probably had something to do with that.

They drank, the bodyguards in moderation but the rest of the crew in merriment; only Rinata and Corwynn seemed to be abstaining. One man with big, white teeth was grinning and looking around the room as though inspecting the local color; some of the others seemed to be glued to the stage, watching Zelda DeVonne, but she could swear she saw them glance every so often around the room, performing a subtle perimeter check.

Fion was a little surprised to see that Hawke's band of brothers were more professional than they were acting. Their subtle perimeter checks did not necessarily bode badly for her, though. It wasn't as though they were looking out for busty prostitutes. Fion didn't look like a threat and hopefully wouldn't be treated as one. She decided that the toothy one was her best bet.

Fion finished her drink and gave the glass a long, twisty smile. She was going to have to pretend to be charming or at the very least, incredibly available given the right motivation. Trying to feel the right mood was almost like bartending, surprisingly so. She encouraged people to talk on a daily basis, she told herself it wouldn't be difficult. She smiled like she meant it and stood.

"Hello there." Fion said, her voice dipping and rising like a wave, deep as a well. She had to resist the urge to offer him something to drink.

Her right hand was light on his shoulder, her left on her hip and her breasts were at Toothy Ted's eye-height. Fion giggled, biting her lip to keep it to the one. It was so refreshingly blatant. She had to laugh. If she hadn't been so pre-occupied, she might have thought it was liberating.

Toothy Ted could hardly ignore a threat when it was that close to him. He glanced up and snickered.

"Lemme guess," he said, wrapping one lean, brown arm around Fion's waist. "You want to get in good with the King, so you picked the dumbest lookin' bloke in the whole band of us to bat yer pretty eyes at."

Some of the other Bad Brothers made gestures that indicated that this had happened many times before. Silas Hawke was blissfully unaware of this, however, as he was absorbed in a low conversation with Corwynn.

"I can help ye out there, doe-eyes," he said, giving her a lazy nudge. "Late night, he's a great one for the autographs, he is. Got a special pen, just for the occasion. Course, I got one o' those as well..."

"Yarr, Teddy's famous," said Tom Bones sarcastically. "Ask anyone."

Fion kicked herself a little, wondering if she should have gone for one of the prettier ones and then realised she was in an ideal situation. They thought she was interested in joining... or at the very least 'joining' with Hawke. Fion looked a little embarrassed, which was easy enough given that she was, then pouted. She turned so Ted's arm remained on her waist, bending her knees and settling herself in his lap.

"Don't be mean." Fion purred, running her index finger down his jaw and smiling like she meant it. "You're supposed to be nice to girls."

She felt like she was telling her face that it was Stu in front of her and she hadn't seen him for week. It was an odd sensation, like her body had become puppet pieces and each had to be a different colour. Her distanced bravado was wonderful when she was keeping people at arm's length and plying them with drinks but it wasn't the sort of approach she could take with the Brothers.

"How big is the pen?" She asked, keeping her tone light and airy and almost sincere.

Hopefully they'd keep cracking jokes and she'd be able to listen in on to what Hawke was saying.