<b>Name:</b>Valery Bucren.<br/><b>Location:</b>Blood on the Vine, tavern of Boravia.<br/><b>Tagging:</b>Xavier (xavierrol), Esperanza (xanaphia), Katya (Touch of Temperament), Pias (NPC), Ismark, son of the Burgomaster (NPC).<br/><div style="text-align: center">--​</div><br/>If words alone could be a guarantee in these times, Bucren would have no need of a sword at all. But it wasn’t the stern faced bodyguard who was making him uneasy. Something about the two girls was not right.<i>A family matter</i>they had claimed. It felt more like some foreboding of doom. Whatever fragile tranquility Boravia was experiencing, it was about to endure an upheaval unlike any before. And Bucren knew any way out of this hellhole would come about this change. Just…what was it? And what could it be?<br/><br/>Pias however was unchanged as always. No amount of sympathy or promise would invoke his change. Five gold a head to enter. It was not of his concern that prowling wolves might be making a meal of them soon if they remained out here. The wee shit had a point. Bucren could curse, beat and threaten, but for all intents and purposes he was a drowning man flailing for any sort of purchase in the vast darkness threatening to engulf him. His newfound companions included. At the tip of a knife, he sighed and let go, making a mental note that if he was ever face to face with his doom, and this cunt was anywhere nearby, he wouldn’t care about the laws of men. He would make sure his face was the last Pias would see.<br/><br/>But for now, the little shit had the power. The door opened and Bucren dug out the five coins, slapping them on a nearby counter, making sure that one or two clattered to the ground and force that pitiless door warden to do something useful and strenuous for once, rather than blackmailing poor travelers. He snorted without apology and strode on by, pausing between some tables to let the travelers go in first. He was curious about what they would be up to, though he wasn’t sure that he had an open invitation to join them and hear their talk. Bucren wouldn’t deny that he had a curiosity for it. News from outside Boravia was rare. And besides the constant death and threat of death, it could get oh so bleak and dull in this town.<br/><br/>His eyes however rested on a lone patron by the door.<i>Ismark.</i>The poor sod, back in his cups again. Not that alcoholism was something unknown to Boravia. People needed their coping mechanisms. Some chose hard work. Others chose what little recreation there was. Others prayed and made offerings to distant and strange powers. And some chose their cups instead.<i>It made Bucren wonder what his coping mechanism would be. Or, if he had already broken and was but a shell without knowing it.</i>After all, what did he have to smile or laugh about these days?<br/><br/>“Whatever swill your pitchin’ these days, Arik.” Bucren simply gestured for himself, a coin between two fingers, tapping it on the table. As for food, he had his own lodgings where he had some rations left over. If he survived this night, he could replenish then. Better to save what little coin he had left. The door price alone set him back several grueling months of labour.<i>And now I’m supposed to drink the extortionist priced liquor here?</i><br/><br/>“They aren’t my mates.” He retorted half-heartedly when one of the girls commented on them. He thought it was Esperanza who asked him but a second look showed it was the other girl, whose name he didn’t know. Mates didn’t exploit their fellows, trapping them between death and bankruptcy. At the invite, he moved to sit, slumping hard into the rickety chair, legs spread and his posture relaxed. His sword hilt protruded over his lower abdomen and he rested his forearm over it. Water dripped from his clothes, pooling on the floor around his boots. He didn’t mind. One grew used to the filth here, in time. He didn’t answer the offer to join the game with Katya. His disinterest would be answer enough. Instead he gave her a shrug of his shoulders.<br/><br/>“Every night. Though you must have brought some friends with you given how violent it is tonight.” He commented back, like conversational speech about the weather was something he had long mastered. What else could they discuss in Boravia? Anything actually, to keep away the thought of constant death.<br/><br/>Ismark’s movement in the tavern was as auspicious as a hewn tree toppling in the woods. Everyone would hear it and know. “Ismark.” He told the bodyguard, who reacted quite diligently at the drunken man’s approach. He merely mentioned his name to let the escort know Ismark was a known quantity and that perhaps one should keep a restrained hand. In any case there was no danger, as the short man launched into a drunk diatribe about the two girls…and their relation to Lady Ireena herself.<br/><br/>Bucren had to sit up straighter, all but ignoring Ismark as he looked intently at the two girls. One called herself Esperanza Sergovia, the other his name he did not know yet.<i>How could they be related to Ireena?</i>The girl’s name seemed a foreign and faraway thing to a place like Boravia. But like Bucren himself, it could be but an alias, or not her full name.<i>Look at you, believing this drunkard.</i>Bucren then realized…that he wanted it to be true in a way.<i>Like he thought before, it invoked a sense of change. And he knew all too well that it was needed in Boravia.</i><br/><br/>“He’s harmless enough.” Bucren snapped back to the gypsies who stood. He didn’t stand in reprisal to their stance. What were they going to do? “Don’t act like you care though. Not as if you’re helping to control his drunkenness here, now are you?” He questioned the gypsies in return with a snort. But when Arik returned with the traveler’s food, Bucren was surprised when he laid out a key for them as well. Now something was definitely afoot if the barkeep was in on it. He was the center of any social development here. People always talked into their cups. Arik knew something and that only further confirmed Bucren’s thoughts about these people. Who were they, really?<br/><br/>He had his drink. He closed his eyes for a moment as he sipped it, letting the taste explode over his tongue and mouth, before burning its way down his throat.<i>Maybe he should have stayed at the barn. Just continue life in an ignorant fashion.</i><br/><br/>“Well know this before you go.” Bucren said to the girls. There was no reason to but after enduring the exploitative prices, surely a little free advice would be harmless. “If there is anyone to know, it’s definitely that man. Ismark. He wasn’t always…well, you saw it. But if there was anyone in this town who knew everyone of worth or status, it would be him. A lot more sociable, before his father went off. If you got something to settle in Boravia, he’s the one you want to speak to. Him, or his sister, unless the father returns.” Bucren paused for a moment, overwhelmed a moment by the sheer implication of how badly a shitstorm might be brewing in the Burgomaster’s absence. “But he’s gone. And the Lady is in a place beyond the howling of the wolves.” He jerked his head back towards the door, before slumping further in on himself to get as comfortable as he could. He wasn’t paying for a room. Seemed wasteful when he his own lodgings to get a room in the tavern. Yet nor was he going anywhere anytime soon.<i>Unless they wanted to go see Lady Ireena.</i>