The Revolutionary Committee considered communicating that squad's movement to the woodland friends, but then forgot about it. The losses incurred, they weren't too heavy.
Besides, you've got more room to breathe now, so it's all good.
"I's gonn' kill ye dead! DEAD, ye cheatin' scum!" the scream sounded, turning heads in the silence now broken. Faint fingers clasped around a sooty neck, throttling the life out of a grimer. The czarina was beyond her usual livid self. Another day was ending in Shadow Gate.
Eventually, deep into the night, the czarina was satisfied. Pleading, bargaining, begging, and most especially flattery - these all usually managed to save the situation. Playing dead had its results, too. She went back to drinking and gambling, playing with cards, things that reminded her of her former glory, her former life at the head of Bogarus. After three or four drinks, she would understand that Shadow Gate was her new dominion, an up and coming empire in the shadow of Bogarus and Jomon. It was good. She would rise and stamp out the new republic, and then call the orientals to heel. Damned savages don't know what's good for them. After six drinks, she would take to violence, much to the dismay of the population of Shadow Gate. She would bring out her frustration at having been usurped by the revolution, losing the winter palace and her servants. When was the last time she had had a massage, anyway?
She was now on her ninth drink. The more you drank this swill, the better it would taste, she thought, and looked at her hand. A pair of Sovereigns and three useless minor cards -- and then she saw it. These Sovereign cards had new art. Pale men in expensive robes, looking smug and old. Where was she?
"Whatinchernobogsnameisthis", she said in a whisper, shaken to her core. The dealer grinned maliciously, having heard her, "New art, my lady. Sleek, no? The old cards were getting, how do you say... worn down. Decrepit."
She stormed out of the den of villains, eyes wild with new truths. It had been years since the usurpers had taken all of her stuff, but had she ever really acknowledged it? Katarina was still living as if she was a czarina, and not a lonely, loveless drunk in a lawless, tiny town. She wept, for she now saw herself for what she was, and did not like what she saw.