After a few evening (the first of them rather embarrassing, honestly), Vex got pretty good at hitting even relatively small targets at quite a distance. But she couldn't say she liked it. It was too loud, and the smell was unpleasant, and the metal felt alien in her hands. Plus she thought if she tried to use it regularly, the jamming and breaking would drive her crazy.
Percy conceded her points when she told him all this. It also left him concerned about how himself smelled to her, but she was quick to reassure him she minded the smell less when it was faded and mixed with his general scent. She even demonstrated to him exactly how much she didn't mind his smell at all.
He did get her to still occasionally go to the range and practice with the pistol. Sometimes she ended up doing so alongside the rifle corps members, and they generally clapped and cheered her on, the baroness training alongside them. She even ended up recruiting a couple of them into the Grey Hunt part time, thought she did insist they learn the use of stealthier, more reliable weapons as well, for that.
When she first said Percy should try to learn how to use a bow, Vex meant it half as a joke. But somehow it turned serious quick, and it wasn't at all long after she found herself talking him through the use of the oldest and simplest of her bows. He struggled with it way more than Vex had with the gun; she's not sure she wouldn't have given up, honestly, had she been in his place.
But Percy was a determined son of a bitch when he wanted to be, and he persisted with it. He never got nearly as good as her, of course, but he got to be a pretty decent shot.
He even took some shots with her more magic bows, culminating with that memorable day when he (accidentally) took down a bird with Fenthras. Although when the dead bird landed on the castle, the staff was not too happy about the resulting tree. He stuck to her other bows after that.
Back in the field, they stayed with their normal weapons, the ones they knew how to win with. But from then on, they knew they could at least try to fall back on each other's, too, if need be. It also helped them read each other's moves in combat better, be more prepared for what each of them did. And sometimes, when Vex stood with her husband's gun on the range during practice, she thought she understood him better overall, and she hoped the same was true for him.