Whiskey and Philosophy

[Eralam]

Eralam nodded, then sipped his drink and looked at his hand. 8 of diamonds and 5 of spades.

Not a particularly good hand, but not terrible either. His best chance was to catch a straight.

"Alright, I check."

He had a feeling they wouldn't start going for blood. Though there wasn't any currency on the line, secrets could be just as valuable, even if they were strictly personal. He had no intention of trying to leave himself overexposed.

 

[Sinistra]

Sinistra checked her cards, ace and 9 of diamonds. Not too shabby. Could turn out to be something, could be nothing. Depended on what got turned up next.

"Check."

She left her cards alone, and sat back, crossing one leg over the other and sipping her whiskey.

"This is excellent, by the way. What is it called?"

 

[Eralam]

"Black Cask," Eralam said as he burned and turned.

King of Hearts, Queen of Hearts, 6 of Spades

"There's a small brewery out of Dantooine that makes it. Really high credit stuff, nothing leaves the place until it's aged 50 years, and the 50 year stuff is mainly for pikers. This batch is a 90 year, and probably costs as much as a small warship."

The cards were not in his favor. Best he could do was hope for a pair. Three of a kind, if he was lucky.

"I'll give you their card, if you're willing to spend a secret on it. Check."

 

[Sinistra]

"Done, a secret it is."

She looked at the cards facing her on the table and responded without hesitation.

"Check. Do you want the secret now or later?"

She waited for him to turn the next car over, hopeful she would get something useful but plastering a look of indifference on her features. Her opponent was a Shard and though he might be close to droid, there was a sentient being in there and maybe he would have a tell.

 

[Eralam]

10 of Hearts

Eralam suppressed a snarl. This definitely wasn't going his way.

"I'll take it now, I suppose. It's not like we're in a hurry, but I don't see any particular reason to hold off. After all, good whiskey is meant to be shared- to a point."

He still didn't have any cards, but the situation wasn't so dire that he was willing to fold. For starters, it wasn't like there was anything in the pot aside from a couple of fibs.

"I'll raise a fib."

What the hell. Maybe she'd think he had something.

 

[Sinistra]

A glance at the card, then back to him. She weighed her options carefully.

"Call."

It was soft, confident and maybe a little sultry, as she had been smoking and drinking which tended to make her mezzo sound deeper and richer than normal. She took in a deep breath and sighed with a "hmm."

"A secret. Let's see. I had my husband murdered after our wedding since getting married was a requirement of my mother's in order to become matriarch."

 

[Eralam]

Eralam slid the business card over.

"You wouldn't be the first wife to end up widowed on her wedding night. I'm told Kuatis play hardball when it comes to stuff like that.

8 of spades.

Well, that was a pair. What the hell, might as well.

"I'll raise a lie."

It was a low probability hand, but they were early enough on in the game that it wasn't quite time to start playing overly cautious or taking big risks.

 

[Sinistra]

"Fold."

She took the business card and tucked into an inner pocket on her long overcoat, then pushed her cards towards him so they could move on to the next round.

"It was far enough after the wedding that the official paperwork was in to cement me into power. Tragic accident, wrong place at the wrong time."

There was a twisted smile on her face at the circumstances of her late husband's death. It had never come out that it was murder as it was in the middle of an attack in a public place. Collateral damage had to be included to complete the job. It needed to look senseless. It needed to look random and it was beautifully executed. It had earned her a promotion from her master from acolyte to knight.

"Do you want to switch off dealing or would you prefer to keep on?"

 

[Eralam]

Eralam passed the deck over.

"We'll swap off, just to keep it interesting."

Though that little tidbit wasn't in her file, the Shard wasn't surprised. Sinistra was as ruthless as they came when the times called for it, but she wasn't a brute. She was a scalpel in a world of hammers, and that had done wonders for her. She might not be as flashy as the other Sith, but that just made her all the more dangerous.

"That puts me up four fibs. That makes, what, a secret?"

 

[Sinistra]

"Yes, indeed."

She nodded as she took the deck and shuffled the cards, then set them in front of him to cut. Once he had, she dealt them out a pair of cards each, setting the deck down to take a sip of her whiskey and lit another black clove cigarette.

"Tell me your secret Eralam, and not something so old it is inconsequential now."

There was a gleeful smirk on her face as she waited for the juicy tidbit, a slight motion with her right to peak at her cards. 8 of hearts, 9 of diamonds. Could be promising.

 

[Eralam]

8 and Jack of Clubs

Not bad, all things considered. Chance at a high straight, or even a straight flush.

"Come on now, My Lord," Eralam said, voice dripping with charm and more than a little accent. "On a side note, I'm gonna drop the formalities a bit, if ya don't mind. Liquor doesn't do a whole lot for keeping titles straight and all."

Speaking of liquor, he drained the rest of his glass and motioned for the bartender.

"I may have been born a rock, but I sure as hell wasn't born under one. You lost, you spill."

 

[Sinistra]

"I was hoping you wouldn't notice." There was a long, slow, deliberate exhale of mock exasperation. "You can call me Sin, we are to be friends."

She waited until both their glasses had been refilled as she thought of a secret to tell. What foray into her personal history would delight the metal man now? She didn't mind that he was dropping the honorific. She was seldom called by it anyway.

"I have a keepsake from an old lover that I'm never without."

There was no elaboration, no more to the story she was willing to tell. There was something sacred she kept in her past, something that belonged only to her. To acknowledge that it existed at all was giving away a secret. In a way, she had given him two. She'd had lovers, but to keep something implied that the connection was ever so much more than just carnal desires sated. At least somewhere in her past, something had meant something, something had stirred something in her. The details and memories were hers alone. There was no other record of to her knowledge.

Her attention turned back to the deck before her and she burned and revealed the flop. 2 of spades, 2 of diamonds, 2 of hearts.

This was looking up, although with those showing, he was likely to open the round.

 

[Eralam]

Eralam nodded gravely.

"Sin it is."

Now that was a juicy tidbit. Nothing in the records showed that she had a lover. Nothing at all. The Shard highly doubted she was celibate, but Sith were, in their own way, just as likely to eschew attachment as Jedi. Both of them, oddly enough, saw it as a weakness.

This could go either way, with the cards. On the one hand, there was nothing decent on the table. On the other hand, there were several ways this could work out very well for him.

He decided to take a gamble. That was, after all, why they were there.

"I'll raise a lie."

 

[Sinistra]

"Call." There was some mirth in her voice to see him get slightly aggressive with his betting.

Even though the first secret had been to get the name of the whiskey distillery, she had to give up two secrets to him already. She was feeling conservative. She burned another card and revealed the turn.

8 of spades. She had a full house. But then again so might he. Or 4 of a kind. Only way to know was to keep playing. She took a drag of the forgotten clove cigarette in the ashtray and blew a stream of smoke through full lips, watching him.

"I'll raise a lie."

 

[Eralam]

"I see you and raise you another lie," he said.

She wanted to play dangerously? Well, he was sitting on a full house. It was entirely possible she had one of her own, but that was fine by him.

Eralam didn't have a poker face, because he didn't have a face. Which was a good thing, because it would be hard not to smile in a self-satisfied sort of way.

This was getting fun.

 

[Sinistra]

Her eyebrow arched delicately over her left eye, looking at him with a measure of satisfaction. The pot was getting good, two secrets now. It could even them up.

"Call." She burned a card and revealed the river. 7 of hearts.

She was sitting on a full house, with a 9 for a kicker. She'd seen worse hands.

Two secrets in the pot. And soon to be more. The only question now was were they his or hers?

"I'll raise a secret."

 

[Eralam]

"Call," Eralam said as he turned over his cards. Full house, twos over eights with a Jack kicker.

Well, that was another pot in his hand. Sin had a full house of her own, but his Jack was the high card.

"I do believe I take this hand. That's four secrets in the pot, darlin'."

There was nothing disparaging about the way he said the word darling, just an affectionate term from the dialect he preferred. He was a wee bit tipsy at this point, and his accent was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

 

[Sinistra]

"I think poker is not my game today." Another exasperated sigh, another moment of silence to think of 4 secrets to spill to the legendary Shard spymaster. She settled on the information, gesturing with the two fingers holding her cigarette in the right hand as she counted through the four secrets with the fingers on her left hand.

"One, a Sith lord who ran a small academy on Kashyyyk was my half brother. Two, as long as my mother lives, so shall my sister. Three, I once accidentally shot myself with a blaster when I was training. Four, I am responsible for the deaths of 7 people on Coruscant during the Republic's reign that have nothing to do with my work as a spy or Kuati merchant business."

She sat back, fairly confident that the things she exposed would satisfy him for the last round.

 

[Eralam]

"Interesting," Eralam said. "Very interesting. I suppose it's my turn to deal."

Eralam shuffled the deck, then offered it to the Sith to cut.

The fact that she had admitted to seven unnecessary deaths was enlightening. He suspected there was some significance to the number, perhaps some hidden message that meant something to her. Was it for revenge? For fun? He didn't know. That would be something to dig into later.

4 of Diamonds, 10 of Clubs

Not a very good hand, all things considered. But he had won off of worse, and lost off of better.

"Let's make this a little more interesting. Five secrets is a question. Instead of taking five secrets at random, you get to ask one question of your choice, one that has to be answered. Interested?"

 

[Sinistra]

She cut the cards, butted out the cigarette and took a look at the cards dealt her before she responded.

King of clubs, 10 of diamonds.

Once more into the fray.

"Can't be any worse than I'm already doing, so why not. 5 secrets is a question."

She picked up the glass and sipped it considering her run of luck.

"I'll open with a lie."