A Long Awaited Homecoming
Twenty-Fourth Day of the First Month 293 AC
The settlement stretching out from the long weathered docks is perched right about on the edge of a village with aspirations of being a true town. A few tall houses with their second floor and even third floors overhanging shadowed courtyards stand almost uneasily besides taverns and shops that to a Braavosi eye seem small though well-cared for and even handsome after their own manner.
Plain plaster walls are given a bit more luster by pressing small colorful stones around the windows and doors in curls and floral patterns beneath steep roofs, thatched for most and bright tiles for the well off. The gables are often graced with tiny leaden rose windows that might make decent arrow-slits in times of war. Bunches of dried herbs hang over doors alongside wind-chimes of bone, wood, or even silver... though you rather suspect the latter are taken down at night.
To your eyes it looks quaint, another tableau to add to the many you have seen in your journeys, but to Waymar it is if not home then at least near enough to make no difference, the narrow paths he must have walked as a boy alongside his parents as soon as he was judged able to leave the walls of Runestone, perhaps the site of childhood mischief. You catch sight of a tear in the corner of his eye, though wild horses could not drag a comment about it from you.
"So what's the best inn in town?" Tyene asks cheerfully.
Waymar breaks off his reverie, tilting his head in thought for a long moment, then replies, "The Guiding Star, I reckon." His part in your little charade is to lead your company of 'Tyroshi merchants' about as a local guide, since there is no hiding his accent from people who have lived here all their lives. If nothing else his good cheer makes him take to the role with considerable enthusiasm, recounting directions, local tales, and several-year-old gossip with equal verve.
Oddly enough, however, his eyes seem to slide down from looking upon the battlements that stretch out above the town. Runestone proper broods above the town like a mother eagle above her chicks, all sharp angles and wide sweeping arches like the span of a bird in flight. The contours are certainly alike the dream vision, though more restrained for having to be worked in stone and mortar and not the ever-mutable substance of the Dreamlands...
"No one's going to bite your head off if you look, lad," you hear Ser Richard whisper gruffly to Waymar. He had been trying to play his part it seems... albeit by conspicuously not looking at the most impressive thing before him. Not as though it really matters. If sharp-eyed spies already fill the docks of Runestone ready to report to the Usurper and his lackeys then you had already failed in your task...
***
As you arrive at the tavern you find the innkeeper uncommonly solicitous, accommodating even before he'd seen a single silver stag. Before your hackles can rise too much Tyene discretely motions to a hooded man seated in the corner by the fire. Though wisps of hair turned almost snowy white escape his hood he sits with a warrior's easy posture, and by his side is a well-cared-for if plain sword sheath. That his eyes are the blue grey of fine steel is only the final clue and almost an unneeded one. Bronze Yohn Royce, master of Runestone and lord of these lands, has chosen to come and greet his long absent son in person.
Sharp and canny those eyes are as they meet your gaze from beneath craggy brows, though also filled with worry as he looks upon the flesh masks all your company wears to find his son... and perhaps unsurprisingly he does so quite quickly, from voice or posture or a thousand other small clues that transcend even sorcery's ability to hide.
"I..." Waymar opens his mouth to speak, then looking from you to Tyene he shrugs a little sheepishly, realizing both of you already know.
For yourself you are more concerned about the innkeeper recognizing his lord, though the man probably imagines he is simply here to strike some quick bargain with eastern merchants without drawing too much attention to the matter. "The good ser... that is," he starts to babble, but you raise a hand to spare the poor man the trouble.
"We will, of course, accommodate the noble knight in whatever manner we are able," you announce smoothly. From the look of relief on his face you suspect the innkeeper might almost part with half the coin you give him in gratitude.
As you are quickly led away to a smaller hall, kept apart for the highborn and wealthy, you consider how to greet the lord of Runestone.
What do you do?
[] Let Waymar do the introductions
[] Speak first
-[] Write in
[] Write in
OOC: I know this does not move things along too far, but this is your first sight of the Vale in the flesh and I figured some local color would not go amiss. Also I figured it would be out of character for Yohn Royce not to come out personally to greet his son.
