Damned if you do. Damned if you don't. Don Pieter de Gotha was taking chances on this night, and he knew it. Oh, visiting the Dew Drop inn it itself was hardly the pinnacle of risk - this was a fairly decent place in one of the more reputable areas of the city. And having a discrete look around upon entering was habit, if one born by the experiences and scars earned from lack of such prudence's in the past. Also he had Corben with him, and was carefully not exchanging open glances with him. But right now the risk lay in the next step, not in his past ones.<br/><br/>A shaved head was Corben's most immediate visual feature. The simple cut of his clothes defined him as of the working class, but the way he filled them out indicated muscle of a kind that was not acquired with slow mundane work. Nor did the size of the dagger on his hip or the leather bracers on his wrists speak of a farmer's life. No, the burly man leaning against the wall not far from the entrance door was easily recognizable to cunning eye as a man of action; perhaps a former soldier, or a mercenary. Corben happened to be both, but he was drinking his grog with care because he was also gainfully employed and right now at work, watching a certain table where his employer was seemingly residing without a care: the dark-curled merchant Don Pieter, working on his second cuplet of wine and a plate of the best fried somethings that the Dew Drop Inn could muster. While this was hardly a place for the common cutthroat, the merchant had other worries than being robbed by a mere mugger. You can only get out of trouble so many times before the residue starts to build up, and Don Pieter had both trade opponents of various unsavouriness and the more ruthless kind of vengeful acquaintance. So Corben drank in silence, and watched while trying not to be noticed unduly.<br/><br/>Pieter, dressed for a jolly occasion in his red and black doublet with a matching wide cap, had been there together with Corben for over an hour. Happily he had not unexpectedly met upon any familiar faces, which would have been a bloody nuisance on this particular occasion. It was just one more perk of this place which had suggested itself so handily, when his swift handed acquaintance and some times business compadre Hani Silverthorn had mentioned that a certain Guard captain had become a patron of the very place she worked at and called her home. Knight-Captain, Sir Doryn Aelland... now there was a right piece of work, evidently. As well as a tongue twister. Word about town, which was sketchy, was of a warrior that had earned a place among the nobles. An interesting rise to power in a city where you normally had to be born into any kind of title, but normally not someone Pieter would search out. Traders of the more dubious kind of goods tended to keep a bit of careful distance to the keepers of the law.<br/><br/>However, Pieter was in a quandary and had been there for over a month now. A quite valuable shipment of his had had the misfortune of being taken into official custody, although under a false name and false contents. Being caught with it would have been very unfortunate; losing the investment was bad enough for business; still the biggest current pain for the merchant was failure itself. De Gotha had taken losses before and truly knew that while the wins build your career it is the losses that kills your heart. While there still was a hope of regaining his goods he was not going give up. But to do this, to get anywhere with his plan, he needed an insider. Greasing the palms of a mere customs guard so he'd look the other way was not going help enough, not this time. But buying the help of a born and bred lord would take more money that Pieter had ever owned. Perhaps a lord not born and bred?<br/><br/>And so Pieter and Corben ere waiting, patiently, eating and drinking slowly and using their eyes well. They had seen Hani when she arrived, too. Pieter had ordered the last refill of wine from her, said nothing knowing he did not need to but smiled. They had been there when Sir Aelland had arrived with his walking-wall man as well; Pieter had only the most rudimentary description of the man but it was not exactly difficult to notice when a man of such expansive nature entered. A couple of most discrete questions had confirmed this to be him. The merchant was now left with the decision to go for this knight or not. It was just part of business for Pieter to be quite careful with judgement of the people he dealt with one way or another. Were they going to be honest with him? Was there a backstab attempt waiting to happen? Were there weaknesses he could if necessary turn against them? Or, to come down to cases, was the nobleman he was carefully not looking at, either a potential blackmailer or someone who would literally call for the guards when the offer lay on the table? That was the trouble with word about town; it never contained the information you needed most. It was his best shot so far though, and time WAS running out. In the end Pieter's decision hinged on one single fact - that Hani said she knew him. And whatever else could be said about Hani, she didn't spend much time with the pure and untarnishable. Which was one of the reasons why Pieter liked her. So eventually he looked at her until she looked back, and winked slowly to her while smiling. It was hardly an uncommon thing to do to an inn wench. And it was also the sign that he had decided to go through with this meeting, and that she was to prepare for a discrete chat between the three of them. Pieter, always the man with a plan, was already preparing a couple of white stories to get him out of the meeting should things smell bad.