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 Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2009 11:43 am
Right off the dancing square is the wine tent, naturally. This is the largest tent in the entire Gather, indicated with a cloth dyed dark red, like a fine wine. Most of the wine here is cheap and serviceable to get drunk on, but little else. If you want good quality wine, you'll have to shell out major Marks. The interior of the tent is lined with cushions and rugs, and a few long benches to sit upon. There are a few basic food necessities offered- meatrolls and klah to sober up, and some tubers. There's fruit, but that comes at a higher price than the rest.
Connected to the wine tents is the gambling tent. It's somewhat smaller and more dimly lit. There are dice games and card games available to play, and it stinks of wine and somewhat unpleasantly of urine. This isn't a very fun area to be in- most of the people here seem to be hardcore gamblers, addicted to their 'sport'.
A more pleasant area for those who wish to wager are the runner race tracks, which are off to the side of the Gather. You can place a bet on which runner you think will win, and if they do, you get a cash reward based on the odds! You won't strike very big, but you can make a tidy profit if you're lucky.
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Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2009 8:36 am
The gamblers tent was still mostly empty, but Dusen knew that as the day went by, more and more people would wander into the darkish tent. He didn't have any plans to leave, after all, he had already collected his snacks for the day, and anyways the wine tent wasn't that far off if he needed something else.
He wasn't actually planning on playing, not yet anyways, he was content on watching his fellow competitors. There would be plenty of time for it, and besides, this way they would underestimate the small teen more.
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All the Weyrs of Pern Captain
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2009 10:47 am
[[OOC: Please note- While you're not required to reply to this, it should give your characters something to think about and I'd like to see them sort of think about it at some point. This will mark the beginning of a lot of the tensions. Thanks. Sil out!]]
In the heat of midday, the wine tent was getting increasingly crowded. The servers bustled to and fro, trying to accommodate everyone. Holders and dragonriders alike stood jammed shoulder to shoulder, or sat next to each other on floors and benches, trying to quench their thirst, trying to forget something from the bottom of the bottle.
Heat has the odd quality of making people irritable, especially if they've not had enough sleep. The irritability is a universal quality, again uniting dragonriders and holders... or dividing them.
The server reached forward to offer a bottle of midgrade Telgar wine, but she couldn't recall who had ordered it. Was it the brownrider, or was it the minor holder? "Erm... Which one of you had this then?" She was new to her job, forgetful, and probably wouldn't last long. It would be back to working as a drudge for her, a life she resented.
"That would be mine," the brownrider said, leaning forward to take the bottle from her, fully prepared to swig down its contents.
"I believe you're mistaken, my good sir. I ordered before ye." The holder stood halfway up, grabbing the bottle of wine.
"No, I think you're wrong." The brownrider was beginning to get angry. He had never had an even temper, and even the words of his gentle dragon was not enough to calm him.
"It's mine." The holder also suffered from that personality flaw, and his voice had gone low and dangerous.
"Think of it as the tithe that your folk seem to be sending less of," the brownrider remarked, a sardonic grin on his face.
"Oh, will this be about the tithe? The tithe we send to the useless? Defenders of Pern? Bah! Maybe Turns and Turns ago, but things are different now. There's no more Thread. You and your overgrown wherries take up space, take up all our food. We need that food for our families. When we send a herdbeast tithe to you, we're taking it away from others." The holder was impassioned now, and a few of his friends moved behind him, as well as those who agreed with his words.
"Your duty is to the Weyr. We've always protected Pern, and we will continue to do so, shard it! How dare you insult our dragons?" His anger all consuming, the brownrider leapt at the holder. As he did so, his dragon bugled in alarm. Several other dragonriders, obviously siding with their own, moved to pull him off. There were two clear sides to this argument now, and the gossips were already moving from inside the tent to the outside, spreading the word. The holder's speech was repeated, and tensions slowly began to rise. The battle of wills, from holders versus dragonriders, had begun...
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Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2009 1:07 am
Terroll had spent much of the day wandering through the gather with nary a drink to quench his thirst. The night before had been a quiet one, only a general message received about the gather (which he had known about days ago) - but also a puzzling message. It was in code, and since the drummers down the line often kept coded messages to a strict rhythm, it had been hard to hash out the message. It was a message for all drummers (truly, the gossipmongers of Pern) to take extreme care in the next sevenday - coded messages were not to go out, save those coming from the Harper Hall.
This enforced silence did bother Terroll somewhat. While it was not like living in the Harper Hall (where all important gossip filtered down), to have the whole of the Drums of Pern silenced...it was unnerving.
Ducking into a noisy wine tent, the Journeyman found a place to sit himself down and call to the serving girl his order for both water and wine - Benden if she had it, and was hailed in a general way by a few men who took note of his knots.
He found a game of dice that was going on, first watching to see if it were a fair game, then partaking in a few rolls. He naturally bowed out on the third roll, as was customary for a Harper, to show that he was only there for fun. He watched the game for a few more minutes, then coughed at the dryness in his throat - where WAS that girl? He flagged her down and repeated his order, but she seemed very rushed and he was certain that she had ignored him completely.
Bidden by his driving thirst, Terroll scouted out a half-filled jug of water and gulped it down without care. It was hot in the tent and he felt himself wondering if it was worth staying. Certainly, there might be a nicer place to acquire some chilled wine. Something to drink at any rate. He was due to sing in just a few hours time (as one of the Harpers who lived in the area), they likely had something set aside for him.
Just as he finally gave up on ever getting anything from this tent (which was something of a disappointment for him), he heard an argument break out only a few tables away. The noise in the tent lulled as the voices became very clear.
Then the brownrider had leapt to his feet, other dragonriders as well. Terroll knew his lessons well - should one of these men die in a brawl, their dragon would wink between, just like that!
Having filled his mind with thoughts of his own dragon (still warming on the sands at Ista Weyr as it might be), the concept of a fight between holders and dragonriders made his heart roar with rage.
He had to do something - and fast.
Grabbing an empty bottle off of his table, the young Harper jumped to his feet, and then onto the table beside the angry men.
He took a deep controlled breath and raised his formidable voice. "Gentlemen! Control yourselves!" He opted to use a tone as he would with young apprentices. "Do not tell me that the men of Pern are going to have a fight over wine! BAD wine at that!" He held up his empty wine bottle and waggled it.
He turned to the dragonriders, and shook his head with true disappointment, then to the holders with a sigh. "This is a gather day, and a bloody right hot one at that. I'll sum up this nonsense to the heat. I hear they have cold drinks in the middle square. Go shake yourselves off!"
He then turned squarely to the girl who was standing in the midst of all this, and offered her a hand. "Milady - if it would not be too forward - I should like to speak with your head of staff - it seems clear..." he lowered his voice, "that there may be trouble brewing."
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Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2009 9:41 pm
After winning a few games, and losing a few, Dusen had moved over to the wine tent. He had quickly snagged a skin of cheap wine, and found a bench pushed off to the side that had somehow been overlooked. He settled down in the tent, and just watched the crowd.
The argument was unnoticed by him at first, but as it continued, his eyes, like many of the others in the tent, were drawn over to the two. He could hear their argument, and his hands clenched into fists.
He had known that some holders felt like that, even some of his father's crew did, but it was different hearing it now that he was a candidate. That made it much more personal.
"Getting into a fight will get me kicked out," he muttered under his breath, and then slipped out of the tent.
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