The Dare in the Back Room

Two academy girls, one lethal measure, and your slate paying for it

The back room is thick with pipe smoke and half-finished plots, and you have kept the slate in it for years — every bet, every measure, every tab in your own chalk. Tonight a duke's daughter and a commoner girl from the frontier have taken your table. Renoa dares Elodie to drink the ninth line on the board without making a face. Elodie fails before the cup leaves her mouth, and Renoa, refusing to let a loss be that simple, demands a forfeit and appoints you the judge of it. Then the rounds keep coming. The slate stands at forty-one silver and six copper. The purse on your hip holds four coppers, the landlady's runner has been through twice, and Renoa is watching your hands instead of the drink.

You play the tavern regular keeping score of the bet