“Brass & Barrel Armory occupies a narrow lane off the old merchant road - a storefront of smoked glass, oil-streaked brass, and the faint smell of gunpowder. The windows are arranged to display a rotating selection of firearms mounted on velvet hooks and small placards listing range and reload notes. Inside, benches are littered with bits of metal, coils of spring steel and trays of polished bullets. The sound of a hammer tapping metal is constant. The owner, Ketta Brasshook, is a rock gnome artificer and former caravan armorer. She wears goggles perched on her forehead and a half-smile that suggests she knows the better price but likes to bargain with a story. Ketta talks like she measures time in ticks of springs - quick, practical and wry. She will clean a customer's old pistol free if they buy at least a tin of bullets, and she keeps a ledger of trusted customers for repairs. The shop rules: no firing inside, no touching display pieces without gloves, and if you bring in something magical you want fixed, bring enough coin for a new spring and tea for Ketta.”