Messa Bron-Mara

Messa Bron-Mara, the Shop on Legs

Messa Bron-Mara is a traveling merchant and a member of the Itinerant Merchants’ Guild (one of the few institutions present in every city, whatever the people or the crown). For anyone who wants to take to the road, the Guild is often the first door: there you learn the routes, the tolls, and the people to avoid. Its members stick together, at least in front of others, and whatever happens between them is settled between them. Messa only sells what fits on her back. Yet she almost always has what you need.

Describe her

You hear her coming by the clinking of her load: a vial against a buckle, one scroll against another. She smells of fresh bread and sealing wax. She greets you from afar, like an old acquaintance, and looks you over from head to toe: your boots, your belt, the hand you keep near a pocket. By the time she stops in front of you, she has already undone a strap.

Play her

Play her smiling, helpful, and a merchant down to her fingertips. She does you a favor before offering a deal, and the offer always comes at the right moment. When asked for an item, she rummages, she mutters, and she ends up finding it, or pulls out something close enough to do the job. Never explain how. If a player asks, she laughs and talks about something else. If anyone harms her or one of her own, the matter goes up to the Guild, which settles it itself, and people always hear about it later.

What she says (rarely)

“Hold on… I must have that somewhere.”
“This one, I’ll let you have at a friend’s price. We’ll be friends, you’ll see.”
(closing her pack with a wink) “Don’t ask me where it came from. Ask yourself what else you need.”