[OPEN] deal me in

[unshut]

WHO: Fitcher + you and also you
WHAT: A weekly card game
WHEN: At some point every week, without fail
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: Catch-all mingle space; threadjacking encouraged and time is an illusion. Threads are not required to have anything to do with cards or even include Fitcher; may be before/after the game etc. No rules, just right; get your banter and gossip on.

There are really only two rules to play at Fitcher's table: you mustn't be a bad sport, and come prepared with conversation.

In theory, an invitation and the lady in questions presence are also required but both those guidelines have been broken: anyone who shows up in the the dining hall on the right evening who displays any interest in the game being played at one of the tables earns themselves an invite; and at least once Fitcher has appeared, slung back a single glass of wine, then announced, "I've work elsewhere tonight, but I expect a full account of all that occurs," before disappearing into the night.

It's sometimes loud and it's sometimes quiet. There are nights where more drinking is done and others with only a single shared bottle. Sometimes there are enough players to warrant splitting the game and sometimes it's just Fitcher, lying out a spread for Solitary as she smokes from a pipe and occupies herself with a little evening bookkeeping.

It's pleasant. It's a good distraction. One should never think too hard about these things.

Comments

a

[overharrowed]

"Madame de Cedoux got a pair of socks from me, once," he says, lightly, at the unusual wager. "I thought it was a joke and she'd eventually give them back, but she insists they're quite warm."

A light smile, which suggests absolutely nothing about his hand. He's not a regular in the sense of coming to the game every week, but this isn't his first time. He usually wins slightly more than he doesn't, but only very slightly; whether that speaks to average skill or above-average diplomacy is anyone's guess.

"Though I admit, currency does make gambling a bit more convenient. Not trying to value various items of collateral on the fly makes Wicked Grace go much quicker than I grew up playing it."

[unshut]

"But rather less personal, don't you think? I expect your socks say more about you than the coins from your pocket do, Enchanter. Madame de Cedoux must surely treasure them."

She smiles in return, fetching up a fresh card and ridding herself of another. With a look about the table, she adds, "Mind you all, I quite like that pin. I would like to have it back."

[overharrowed]

"Well, if you didn't care about it at all, it would hardly be a sporting wager, would it? Though I daresay the socks are more valuable as a reminder of a victory than anything." Not that he begrudges it, under the circumstances; he'd been fairly beaten on grounds of gullibility.

He lets another round of drawing (and a chance for anyone else to speak) pass before he adds: "Does it have sentimental value, the pin? Not that its aesthetic qualities aren't evident, of course."

[unshut]

With a tip of the head, reminiscent of a sharp eared terrier, she glances up over the top of her cards. There's something bright and cheerful about the lines of her face, a quirking shift toward some sentiment like How charming that you'd ask.

"In the sense that I've had it for rather a long time. You must have thing like that - which have accrued sentiment just by the merit of being surprisingly persistent about not being misplaced."

[elegiaque]

( the brevity of it means she doesn't have to decide how to respond to it, especially when the way she laughs at the idea of missing orlais is so immediate, so sincerely uncomplicated. it isn't the sharp sort of laugh of someone mocking the question (not because she isn't capable), but the sudden reminder of relief. a release valve.

no. she doesn't miss orlais. and she tells herself, so firmly that it will become true, that she doesn't miss her father, either. )

What's not to miss?

( other than everything. the things she does miss are, for the most part, things that she can or has taken with her; things that she can live without. orlais, itself—

the homes she lived in, the lives she led. the thought of being pulled back into them makes her skin crawl. )

[unshut]

I hear the food is quite good.

[Which is a mild, neutral thing to say. The sidelong look Fitcher gives her says she knows it is - that she picked it to be so. Fetching up the pipe from its resting place, she makes a point of tap, tap, tapping it further before tucking it away into the pocket of her coat.]

Have you a thought for where you will go? When this business is over and done with.

[bouchonne]

[ He sighs, heavily, and plods over beside her. Sits - sprawls, really, seeming somehow to be more ligament than man. ]

Can you do something to comfort me?

[unshut]

[A soft click of her teeth as she removes the pipe from between them, breathing out the low cherry tinged smoke. She offers the pipe to him, her wrist at some easy angle across the point of her knee. He takes up most of the step and she has no reason to disallow it.]

There is a tobacconist in Hightown whose stock is fairly legitimate, if you care for that sort of thing.

[overharrowed]

"Perhaps one or two." Fewer than he likely would have had his life gone a different way, but that's hardly light conversation for a card game. (He knows relatively little about Fitcher, but he's certainly not missed her sharpness. He wonders about her motivation for setting up the weekly game; he knows what his would be, if he'd done it.)

Julius meets the wager with the more conventional coins, at least for now. "I did leave a book back at Skyhold that I've been annoyed about losing for months. I sent a raven, but apparently someone just shelved it somewhere in the library and now it's been lost to the stacks."

[unshut]

The cards in her hand and the pot is given some serious contemplation. She only has so many hair pins at her disposal, after all.

"Oh?" This, without looking up from her hand. "And which book would that be?"

Eventually, Fitcher deigns to remove a small brass ring from her smallest finger. It must be cheap; there's a dark line left behind on the skin where the metal sat.

[overharrowed]

With mild regret: "A volume I wanted more for my marginalia than for the contents, unfortunately. The title itself is common enough, but I'd been marking that copy idly for years." A small, inward smile. "Now the Inquisition is stuck with my adolescent epiphanies, I suppose, even if it is no longer stuck with me."

It's certainly one way to look at it. He consider the pot, and draws another card.

[unshut]

She laughs. It's a low, rich sound even in the wide mostly empty hall, which has a habit of washing out the depth of most thing. That long hand with its little black mark is set to her chest just below her neck - a motion of some endearment or sympathy. "Oh, that is a shame. The things I committed to paper as a girl--"

There are women who, after that first barking outburst, might make an effort to laugh behind their hand or the fan of their cards. Fitcher evidently isn't that breed: she is all bare delight. "If it's any comfort, Enchanter, I'm sure some Inquistion scholar will find it entertaining when they most need it. Which is more than anyone can say about an old hair pin."

[elegiaque]

( easier and more difficult to think on than her father. gwenaëlle toys with her skirts, swaying a little where she sits, something about the wryness of her expression when she returns that sidelong look more generally telling. she is a tolerable gambler, but by and large does not have much in the way of a poker face.

it's easy to see her become more and more comfortable. )

Thranduil wants...

( an exhalation. wants what, wants to not be in a fucking circle tower? she doesn't have to finish that sentence for it to be immediately clear that the question of where gwenaëlle will go at the end of all this is still an open one, the moreso for the steady ground beneath their marriage license having lasted less than a year.

he would not go easily. it goes without saying. it's probably better not to say it. )

I think he'd actually quite like to go to Orlais, ( for reasons both political and petty, ) but I don't know.

[unshut]

[From where her chin is tucked in the palm of her long hand, Fitcher's eyes narrow in something like exaggerated study of her company. It doesn't quite outstrip the warmth of her, some latent easiness beneath or maybe because of all the put on faces, and yet--]

And in which direction would you prefer to go?

[elegiaque]

( away from orlais? away from war, and the unceasing wrangling, and— )

With him.

( she is very young, yet. )

[unshut]

[Something in her face softens behind against the palm of her hand. It's sweet, and sweet things deserve-- well, nevermind the particulars. The sentiment at least warrants some respect.

She isn't so old and hard as all that.]

I felt the same.

[Which is not like telling a secret. It's only a statement of some gentle fact, held tenderly for its delicacy in the warm night.]

[bouchonne]

Ah! Very much.

[ He perks up at the offer, reaching out and taking the pipe from her. Funny thing, isn't it, how smoking someone else's pipe, putting your lips where their lips had been, can feel more intimate than a kiss, at times. He inhales with reasonable gusto. ]

A poor broke fellow like me must choose the vices to which his limited funds go, and tobacco is not always the top priority. But it is a delight when you can get it.

[unshut]

[Drawing her knees up, she arranges the lines of her limbs so she might set her cheek against the knuckles of her hand and watch him comfortably. It's a warm night - they've all been so - with very little breeze, and the filaments of their smoke lingers in the air here.]

What usually is the top priority?

[bouchonne]

You would think wine, wouldn't you? Given my reputation. But in truth -

[ He gestures towards himself, to his very on-trend and well-made outfit. ]

This is what I cannot resist. To look the finest I can.

[ Another puff, and then he passes the pipe back. ]

And you? What are your sins?

[unshut]

[A moment here to give him a thorough once over. One should always respect another person's confession.]

You've seen most of them. [A tip of the head back toward the hall. Cards and liquor and smoking. And then as if something has occured to her:] But you know--

[A pause. She sets the pipe between her teeth and pulls from it.]

[bouchonne]

[ He waits for her to finish; when it becomes clear she will not, he completes her incomplete thought. ]

...far less than I should like to, but more than most.

[ An arched eyebrow invites the actual conclusion to what she was going to say. ]

[unshut]

[To say that she fixes him with a sidelong look isn't strictly true. She looks at him, her face gentle and half turned in her upturned hand, eyelashes especially dark in the heavy shadow of the courtyard of evening. She turns her hand, shielding her mouth from the open air so she might say in the security behind it:]

I have something of a sweet tooth.

[bouchonne]

[ That's -

...not really what he expected. It surprises a very genuine laugh out of him. ]

Dear Maker. I don't know if I can continue speaking with someone so depraved.

mhavos dalat | ota.

[murderbaby]

a. DO YOU KNOW WHAT TIME IT IS?

Mhavos wasn't aware there was a card game. If he had, he'd have avoided it. But it's late and the library is closed and he has more work to do-- mostly self-imposed-- so he takes a pile of books to the dining hall, balanced carefully underneath a bowl of cold porridge.

And then there's a card game, a few tables away.

Mhavos falls back into familiar patterns. He does his work, scribbling in lines and sums and translations almost by rote, while he listens to the talk a few tables over. It occurs to him that counter-intelligence within Riftwatch might be useful. It occurs to him that all sorts of things may be discussed in a situation such as that.

It occurs to him that he just wants to join the game. The urge is as unidentifiable as it is undeniable.

His work done, books carefully folded away and porrige finished, he wanders over to the nearest game.

"Deal me in?" His tone is polite, making it into a request rather than an order.

b. WAS THAT A CARD TRICK.

He's played a few rounds. Won some, lost some. He has an excellent face for it, carefully expressionless, but no special luck nor willingness to try cheating. He is having fun, though.

At a lull between games, he takes the deck and moves his hands over it. "I learned this," he says, voice so even-toned it's difficult to tell if he's joking, "in a closet."

c. WILDCARD, LITERALLY.

[im up 4 anything.]

[unshut]

[Her smile flashes wide, all self-satisfied before she begins once more to puff away at what remains of the bowl.]

What a tragic end to our association.