Brakka Stonepot is the head cook of Hollow King Claim, a mountain of a goliath whose kitchen feeds everyone from chained labourers and exhausted miners to guards, officers, and Overseer Borrik Valecairn's ridiculous high-table fantasies. He is built like a siege ram, with scarred forearms, a broad square face, and hands big enough to lift stockpots alone that normally take two men. Most people meeting him for the first time assume he must be a labour boss, pit fighter, or executioner. Instead, they find an apron, a ladle, and a man who cares with almost sacred intensity about whether the stew has enough salt.
Brakka’s job is two kitchens in one. By dawn and midday, he runs the brutal, practical side of the operation: huge kettles of beans, barley, bone broth, root mash, salted meat, and whatever rough fuel will keep bodies upright through another shift in the dust and dark. By evening, he is expected to become an artist for Borrik Valecairn's table — rich sauces, roasted game, sugared fruits, polished silver platters, and fancy little dishes for a dwarf playing lord in a fortress above a mining wound.
He hates that second part a little. He’s also very, very good at it.