Dame-Engineer Branwen Stoltenberg

Branwen holds the dame-engineer's certification from the central foundry guild, which means three honor-duels, formally fought and won, with witnesses. Most people with that certificate retire and run a salle for the children of the houses. She tried it for a year and disliked the children.

She took the certificate, her dueling rapier, and her commissioning bonus and built the Blade of the Foundry, a small precise skirmisher whose forward armament is a single oversized cutting-lance she designed. She fights for hire, for retainer, and as a champion for houses too dignified to bloody their own decks. The contract terms are formal. The code of engagement is older than the Confederacy. The rates rise sharply if the hiring house has been rude to her before, which, given how the houses speak of freelance dame-engineers, is most of them. She is younger than most lords, and her ship is smaller, and the master houses still take her to dinner, because they have all needed her.