On the east side of Piazza del Mare is the tavern which is reknowned throughout Eunesia- The Angry Sea Trout. It is a favored place for the sailors and the gamblers of Chelseanna. It is also known as a favored meeting place for the thriving smuggler racket. There's two stories- the patio of the Sea Trout above and the offices of Zoric Konstaninou below.
It's a block long and inside was one large room with pillars. The inside is pretty spare, with private rooms to conduct sensative business. Bartenders and waitresses work in teams to keep the wine, beer and spirits rapidly flowing to the crowd of thirsty customers. It's sparse, only with paintings and murals of sea scenes providing a little color.
On the ceiling of the long building is the immense patio area that overlooks the Piazza del Mare where most of the customers congregate to spend the pleasant evenings. There's a bar at either end of the patio with numerous tables and chairs in between.
Goods & Services:
Drinks only-
House Wine (red Chianti)- 5sp
Ale- 5sp
Rum- 5sp
Top Flight Ale (Famed house brew)- 1 gc
NPCs:
Roberto Bartender
Secrets :
Name:
Roberto Aiello
Race & Gender:
Human, Male
Age:
25
Physical Description & behavior:
Large and burly, he runs the servers of the Angry Sea Trout.
Skills:
Adv. Bartending
Can this NPC be used by players in self-moderation or training situations?:
YES
Zoric Konstaninou Owner
Secrets :
Name:
Zoric Konstaninou
Race & Gender:
Human, male
Age:
50
Physical Description & behavior:
Zoric is tall, broadshouldered and bald. His face is slightly scarred and he looks terrifying.
History:
Zoric is one of the main players of Port Chelseanna, rival to the Thane, and a leader of a powerful faction in the city. Zoric owns the Sea Trout, but also has flourished as one of the more prolific smuggler and fencer in Eunesia. He's fearless and savage, dislikend but feared. He's rich, has a gang of bullies, and knows that he's a powerful man.
Items or Property Of Note:
The Angry Sea Trout, Warehouses, and ships
Can this NPC be used by players in self-moderation or training situations?:
No
Factoid:
Secrets :
Location: Piazza del Mare Type of Location: Tavern Notability of Location: Common Knowledge Training/Employment Opportunities: Y Can This Location Be Self Moderated?: Yes Credits: Shortround
__________________
Beat it or I'll call the Brute Squad.
I'm on the Brute Squad.
You are the Brute Squad.
Kella was moderately savy to the way the empire worked. Forget libraries, heralds, record's halls, or even the local babbling idiot, taverns were the heart of the information trade. A little booze could do wonders in loosening a tongue, and it was cheaper and a good deal more fun than academic research.
Kella sighed, plus her brother would never be caught dead in a records hall. Unless its passages were carelessly strewn with buxom wenches and artisan crafted swords. Aeternia, fill a pit of writhing snakes with such elements and he would show. If anyone knew the whereabouts of the privateer (pirate was such an ugly word, he would say) and frequent smuggler Kellor, they would be the, ahem, distinguished sorts that graced the Trout.
Her steel blue eyes glanced over the marine frescoes that unfurled across the walls. One minuscule scene caused her to squint and quirk her head. Evidently the artist had been enamored with sirens, but Kella was not going to even guess what was going on between them and the mariner they had caught.
"A little violent aren't we?" she murmured to the unnamed artist.
Then a sudden realization came hurtling into Kella's brain with the speed of paladin to a damsel in distress.
This calls for a drink.
Whether the search for her brother really required libations was a moot point. Kella's inner voice seemed wise and fair to her in its recommendation.
Little time was wasted in her approach to the bar at the end of the patio. She dodged tables, chairs and waitresses with acrobatic agility, spurred on by the prize set before her.
With a half-cocked smile she slid up to the bar and its burly bartender, Roberto.
By Diana, he was a big fellow. Reminded her of Eyvind, but an Eyvind sapped of all sense of pleasantness.
"'Rale, Sir. Could I get a glass of the house wine?" Her primary purpose for being in Chelseanna was tagged on as an afterthought.
"Oh, do you happen to know if Kellor's been about here lately?"
She looked to her right and left, extending the query to the other patrons beside her. Hopefully, Kellor hadn't wooed their sweethearts or emptied their purses in gambling. She was in no mood to fight for her brother's "honor".
Roberto the bartender stopped midpour at the name of Kellor. A second later Roberto shook his head, finished the pour and placed the glass of house wine in front of Kella.
"5 silver please," Was all that he would say and would wait to be paid.
"Kellor Greeran?" A voice down the bar spoke up. The figure moved into the light and revealed a young man in his mid twenties. He had a thin moustache and gotee, his light wavy brown hair was pulled back and fastened with a fishing line. At his waist hung a rapier in a devilish angle. "It's on me Roberto..." He said and tossed a crown on the bar. "Keep the change my good man. How about some of the ol' Fannock 20 year scotch for myself?"
"Thanks Loris." Roberto grabbed the crown and went away to fetch the scotch.
"Madam," Loris sat beside her and leaned close. "Be careful of what you say here." He whispered into her ear. "Kellor's not the most fashionable name nowadays. However, he has always been my friend, and a friend I am to him. Tell me quickly, before Roberto returns- who are you to Kellor?"
__________________
Beat it or I'll call the Brute Squad.
I'm on the Brute Squad.
You are the Brute Squad.
(OOC: Timestamp! Timestamp! We don' need no stinkin' timestamp. )
Early Evening of the 14th Brightening of the second Cycle in Meloris, Spring, Era XIV Post Fractum.
IC:
Roberto was as helpful as she had surmised he might be, at least he didn’t prolong matters. But his flat tone and half lidded stare as he demanded payment made Kella feel like her very existence conjured feelings of immense boredom in him.
As she reached for her coins, a young man's voice interrupted the transaction.
Her eyes swept over his mildly swaggering figure as he moved down the bar. His rapier was at the perfect angle to imply both jauntiness and skill. It must have taken him a better part of the morning to manage that, she speculated.
"Never turn down a free meal or drink" was one of Kella's cardinal principles, but the dashing man before her reminded her of too many fellows she had known.
Well, perhaps "known" was not the correct term. He reminded her of the sort who would reel her in with a rakish smile and a cavalier laugh before dumping her directly on her arse.
Hopefully, he would not interpret the fact that he'd bought her a drink as a reason to lay claim to her time for the rest of the evening.
On the bright side, he did have good taste in his scotch.
"Thank you for the wine, Loris," she would at least be gracious.
The timbre of their encounter quickly changed when the man said her brother's name. Of course, Kellor would keep company with such a fellow. She could see them out carousing like a pair of boisterous jackdaws. Lud, her brother was probably having a great deal more fun than her of late.
A sly smile warmed her features as she looked to the man beside her, "I'm his little sister, Kella."
She took a sip of her wine before adding in a clandestine tone,
"For performers, our parents weren't very creative in the name department."
Loris gave a devious smile and a knowing nod as Kella mentioned that she was related to Kellor. "Kellor's little sister... an interesting turn of events, that is for sure. A less than witty choice of names perhaps, as some of the more traditional townsfolk will point out, then again wit is far overrated around here. As for Kellor..."
The man's eyes flickered aside, making sure that Roberto was still busying himself with the order before he continued. "Word is, he got himself in some trouble. Stomped on the wrong feet and all that. Bad things can happen to you if you get on the Podesta's wrong side, you know. I've been told Kellor's gone into hiding after two of the Podesta's henchmen tried to give him a one-man duel." The term was a slang expression on Chelseanna, meaning a duel in which only one person knew they were having a duel -- more commonly referred to as 'murder' on the mainland.
Loris shrugged. "He should have gotten himself more friends. Lone wolves tend not to get a second chance - I told him a few times, he didn't listen. My guess is that he just joined one of the pirate ships roaming the Northern waters. Smart folks, sailing out of the Navy's way for the most part. Not too easy to get in touch with them, though..."
The last sentence ended with a lingering pause, as if Loris himself was not fully convinced of the truth of his own statement. Meanwhile, Roberto was coming back with the drinks. Elsewhere in the room, money changed hands after someone rolled a double one. The loser touched himself in a rather vulgar way, as the thing was believed to bring bad luck.
A one man duel? Charming. Kella pinched the bridge of her nose as the story to began to wind into an even more perilous state of affairs for her dear brother. If Kellor just took that apprenticeship when the Medonian cobbler offered it, she wouldn't be here worried over whether or not his ring finger would turn up in a box somewhere. It really was a pathetic state of affairs when Kella was the responsible one.
Mimicking Loris's clandestine gestures, Kella glanced about a moment. Sadly, she was not quite sure who she didn't want to be listening. To play it safe, she'd assume everyone was a fishy character, even that biddy wheezing over her glass. Never could trust the grandma's. They'd offer you sweets from their pouch and end up trying to get mud off your face with the unholy mixture of a kerchief and their saliva. Kella was using a rather broad brush, but she was not informed enough to make any but somewhat clumsy judgments.
"Thanks, kindly for the information, Loris. Hopefully you're not just some puppet in a grand scheme to deceive me. If so, I'm flattered at the effort. But I'm a little lost on some of your jargon."
Kella rubbed the back of her neck with one hand, an immediate signal of some form of distress
"Who is this Pedestal guy? And what kind of stomping has Kellor been doing? I hope it's not over women again, those situations can get so…"
Kella's expression soured as she thought of previous entanglements she had fished the grinning Kellor out of.
"…Messy."
The arrival of Loris's scotch cut her off before she could ask about reaching the peripatetic vessels her brother had hitched on to. For a moment she wished she'd ordered something a little stronger than wine. Some concoction that would make her wince as she threw it down, and dull a bit of the apprehension Kellor was so skilled at mustering in his poor sister.
Loris grinned politely, hand partially covering his teeth and concealing a certain amount of amused surprise. He had assumed Kella to know more about the state of things on the island. "Podesta," he corrected gently, "well, if I were Miss Nivandas over at the Heraldic Museum I would delve into a two-candlemark lecture on how the original term was actually Podestà but the accent gradually faded out of use and was finally discontinued after the rebellion in Jaedaxia - they felt it sounded too Jaedaxian, you see. Sorry, I'm doing exactly what I said I'd spare you."
He grinned once more, accepting the glasses from Roberto, who turned and left to clean some mugs as every bartender in a seedy tavern seemed to always was supposed to do all the time. "It means Thane," Loris explained, offering Kella her glass of wine. "Now, you'd kind of expect me to be on his side, you see, my name is Loris Delot. It may not mean anything to you, but I'm the Maestro of the local fencing academy. It's named after my family, and my role doubles as Chief Constable for the Port. We fencers enforce the Law on the island... and yet here I am, buying you drinks in a tavern of ill-repute owned by the Podesta's worst enemy. Chelseanna is a peculiar town, Kella... may I just call you Kella?"
"Law and Chaos work differently here than on the mainland you are accustomed to. Much of what you would call 'crime' in the rest of the Empire, we call 'entertainment for the tourists'. They think it's exciting, seeing the smugglers go about their business deals in their dark corners. On the other hand, the one unspoken rule of crime on the island is that you never, ever harm the tourists. To do so will get you arrested by us - if you live long enough to escape vendetta at the hands of the gangs. As for Kellor, he made the mistake of becoming... obvious in its opposition to the Podesta. Appearances are important here. He tried to steal the Town Horse by his lonesome. The Podesta got wind of that. Simple as that."
The handsome young man took a sip of wine and prepared for the onslaught of questions that would surely follow.
When Loris began a discussion on the linguistic evolution of the title, Kella tried her very best to look like she was maintaining active attention. Her façade was just barely believable. If the digression had stretched any further it would have become excruciatingly obvious that Kella was mentally wandering and considering such important things as whether she should have packed more pants or what she wanted for the evening meal.
She murmured alongside Lori's explanation, "Poncy Jaedaxians and their liberal abandoning of vowels."
Where the history of local titles did little to snare Kella's interest, she looked like a druid at a tree-hugging contest when Loris mentioned a fencing school. Fencing, there was something she could come to relish. Enough of swinging an obscenely large sword, combat was much more interesting with a dash of finesse. Suddenly, the man was doubly fascinating. His request regarding her name was met with a self-deprecating smile, and a phrase that expressed more cheek then she felt.
"Can you call me Kella? Lud, Loris, if you're a Maestro for a fencing school and a Chief Constable, you can call me 'Chickadee' and I'll pretend it was the title my mother gave me."
Kella's shimmer of humor faded as her brother's situation was edged further into the light. She sipped her wine, feeling the need for a drink most keenly. The city's climate was curious, and the ability to keep the proper equilibrium was impressive. Of course, Kellor would feel a perverse need to not only upset the hypocritical apple cart, but to set the cart ablaze and dance like a heathen around the flames.
The Vagaran bit her lower lip a moment, trying to fathom how dire her brother's situation was.
"Loris, I am already in debt to you for what information you've given me so far, but I'm going to push my luck in typical fashion and ask for more. Maybe even a little help? Since you seem at least indifferent on the good Podesta." Kella almost seemed to wince at the question, unsure of how benevolent the gods were feeling today.
"I have been living under a rock for some time," the military had a tendency to be a mite restricting. "So I'm a little bemused on the significance of a Town Horse, and why on earth my brother would want it. Was he just shaking a hornet's nest then wearing it like a hat? Metaphorically speaking that it."
Loris gave a vague smile, a practiced one to be sure, and possibly one that worked more often than not. "If the circumstances were any less serious, I would be talking to you about how lucky some rocks are," he said non-chalantly, "but since this is about family, I'll try and get to the point. Kellor is a good lad, and you can't say the same of a lot of people on this island. So... where to start? The Town Horse."
"You have to take this leap of faith and believe me when I say that people here can't have horses," Loris explained calmly, "they are forbidden from owning one. Not unlike Ieffreon, yet not like them either. We use mules, or rather hinnies, for the most part, and only the Podesta can keep a single horse - the Town Horse. It's one of our old traditions, dating back to when the town was rebuilt after the disappearance of the Duchess Chelseanna. That was around the time of Aeric and Antediluvian. The Town Horse fathers most of the mules here, and is typically an expensive horse. The Podesta makes lots of money from his activity as a stallion."
"Kellor had plans to steal him - Fulmine, that is. Means 'lightning'. Looks like your parents were not the only ones lacking originality in the name department, eh? Anyway, I'm not sure what he planned to do with him, probably sell him over to someone, or maybe it was just meant to be an insult to the Podesta, though I doubt that, myself. Someone must have ratted on him, and the Podesta found out. End of story. As the Constable, all I know for sure is that I've never found his body on the island, but knowing his past contacts my guess is with the pirates, as I said. Now, you wouldn't be expecting a Constable to be in touch with them scurvy pirates, would you?"
He grinned, revealing pearl white teeth. "Well, the world is full of surprises after all!"
)
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