House Deveaux

House Deveaux is a Great House with ancestral origins in the Central and Northern Dominances. Their primary financial avenue is the mining, refinement, and sale of metal, including but not limited to metals used by Allomancers. They are the second-oldest Great House currently alive in Luthadel. A secondary branch of the family resides in Urteau, managing the family's interests in the North.

Financial Avenues
While Deveaux has expanded on their specialty in many ways, the heart of their business always stays the same: metal. From when it is first mined until it reaches its buyer, Deveaux owns every step of their expansive metalworking process, sometimes to the point of having a near-monopoly in certain cities and Dominances.

Classified Ministry Contracts
Not all of Deveaux's service to the Steel Ministry is a matter of public knowledge. As a reward for their continued service to the Lord Ruler, and because of their metallurgists' considerable expertise, Deveaux has been given a secret duty by the Canton of Inquisition: hunting down and eradicating anyone who would dare to experiment with metallurgy in the hopes of discovering new Allomantic metals. The existence of metals such as aluminum and duralumin cannot be allowed to become public knowledge, and Deveaux has full authorization to do whatever they deem necessary to stamp out any signs of untoward experimentation.

In order to keep knowledge of these forbidden metals in as few hands as possible, Deveaux is also tasked with providing them for the Ministry's use. Of course, giving them to their own Allomancers is strictly forbidden - and, knowing all too well the price for disobedience, they are not inclined to challenge that restriction. The exact formula is only known by a handful of Deveaux's most trusted metallurgists, and the existence of these metals - and the contracts relating to them - is revealed on the strictest need-to-know basis. Otherwise, it is restricted to the highest of the upper echelons of the house.