He explains that a mercenary in the employ of the visiting Baroness Kiell stopped by the stables at day's end, all smiles, and invited Tom to play a few rounds of Hazard with her comrades. More keen on the company than the pastime, Tom drank their ale and tossed his chances until he'd had his fill of losing.
"But then the six of them, all sharpening their knives and the like, were just ever encouraging that I should keep trying my luck, and…"
He shrugs helplessly. "I'm the fool for not walking away while my purse still had weight to it."
You scratch Brute absently as you listen. Poor Tom is inclined to blame his ill fortune, but to you the tale smacks of predation, a scheme of which Tom may be just the most recent target. What gall, for visiting mercenaries to squeeze coin from hard-working souls within His Majesty's walls.