Blue Dolphin Inn

The Blue Dolphin Inn is one of the most famous locations in all of Niya-Yur.
The Blue Dolphin Inn Tavern was originally a small tavern with six rooms, a public room, and a rather intelligent owner, Mr. Cendric Randall. Its location only a couple of blocks from the central wharves of Llino gave it and the competing taverns, more than enough business. However, The Lively Eel Tavern, immediately west of the Blue Dolphin Inn provided cheaper fair and more robust entertainment. Mr. Randall slowly bought more of the properties around his tavern. First, he added a bathhouse, then stables, provided a practice yard for warriors, with the genius idea of letting the city guard use the area free of charge. The Blue Dolphin grew in popularity with fighters, soldiers, and guards. The merchants preferred to stay at the Blue Dolphin as it was safer and had significantly fewer disturbances than its competitors due to the constant presence of city guards and trained fighters more than willing to take up a real fight for better practice.
Mr. Randall retired to a back card table at the Blue Dolphin passing the Inn on to his three sons who ran the Inn together housing their families and many of the staff families in the expanding property. After three generations The Blue Dolphin had bought almost three times the property around it than most warehouses. Most of the Blue Dolphin's competition failed when their owners died with no one interested in taking over the business. By The Blue Dolphin's 200th anniversary it had grown to be a central location for merchants to find guards and people to find fighters for their expeditions.
When Damega began hiring out as a mercenary he established the pattern of putting a dagger into the center of the tables as a signal they were out for hire. The Blue Dolphin's Dagger Mercenaries became the most expensive and elite fighters for hire in the entire continent. Duke and Damega became friends and Duke took up semipermanent residence at The Blue Dolphin. Together with the Randall family Damega and Duke established the Dagger code and the Randall family became the keepers of the line for Daggers.
When someone gets into a conflict Daggers are the first they seek out to hire if they are on the side of the light and the last they want to encounter if they are not. Daggers have existed since before Niya-Yur was created by the ancients with the immortals and are said to have come from the empire Duke served before the migration to Niya-Yur. The Blue Dolphin is now the heart of the Dagger forces. Many of the Randall family have moved out to other cities and established their own Inns there modeled on The Blue Dolphin.
Duke and Damega are directly responsible for The Blue Dolphin's current design. They paid to have the one block three-story building constructed. The central stone staircase also houses impenetrable underground vaults and is reinforced to create the airship landing platform that makes up the entire roof of the central part of the building. All of the Blue Dolphin's staff and families live in comfortable quarters in special side buildings behind The Blue Dolphin nearer to the wharves. The stables and practice fields are large enough to accommodate all of the Blue Dolphin's patrons if they were all so inclined. About a third of The Blue Dolphin's rooms are the permanent residences for the highest-ranked Daggers. The Dolphin is rarely without rooms and can generally claim that at least a quarter of all the ship captains and waterway merchants rent rooms when in town and conduct business out of the immense public room.
In addition to the large public room, the Blue Dolphin also has many private meeting rooms, over thirty private baths, two large open baths with saunas, a full laundry on-site, and top-grade stables for all types of mounts. The Blue Dolphin is celebrated for its gilded age brilliance  tiled mahogany bar, carved gargoyles, pressed-tin ceilings, and solid mahogany back bar, hand-placed mosaic-tiled floors, and bar. Cendric Randall's initials, CJ, are still visible in the tiled mosaic on the side of the bar and in the magic glass light domes that light the public room. Exploring The Blue Dolphin always yields some interesting architectural elements for prior eras' standards. For example, there is a shallow water pool on the floor below the main public room that is said to have been used for various water sports involving flexible balls made of tough hides that could float.
By far the most interesting feature of The Blue Dolphin is the mirror silver anchoring loops built into the stone roof that are anchoring points for airships. The roof was rented for parties by nobles from time to time but no one ever expected an airship to return to the skies of Llino. That was until the Nhia-Samri War when the Dagger Team lead by Ticca of Rhini Wood and Lebuin recovered the Emerald Heart which was Damega's ship.

Login or Create a Free Account to Pick your level:

Login

Create Free Account

Follow this world to unlock hidden bonus content!

Type

Inn