Rowan Steele knelt in the mud where the village had burned. Twelve homes, all ash now. He had come to find one thing: which noble house sent the killers. His faith in the throne died here a year ago, when soldiers wearing no crest cut down these people. Now the broken royal crest welded over his chest weighed on him like a grave marker. He would name the lord who ordered it, or he would die trying. But he could not name a house he could not prove. Accuse the wrong lord, and every guard in the land would hunt him by dawn. He needed one true fact. He pulled the dark cloak tight over his chest, hiding the shattered crest, and walked to the old watchtower on the hill. Ex-soldiers drank there now. Men who once wore many banners. If any place held the truth, it was among men who had marched under it. Inside, the ruined tower had become a rough tavern. Lanterns swung from cracked beams. Grey veterans hunched over tables and cheap ale. Talk stopped when Rowan entered. They knew that walk. They knew that armor. A one-eyed man near the fire waved him over. He had lost the eye to a spear, and he laughed like he had lost more. "Sit, ghost," he said. "You reek of dead villages." Rowan sat. "I need the house behind the burning down south. A year gone. Killers in plain armor." The old soldier drank slow. "Costs you," he said. Rowan set his last coins on the wood. The man swept them up. "Blackmoor," he whispered. "House Blackmoor paid my old company. Not me, thank the roots. But I saw the pay chest. Their raven sigil on the seal." Rowan gripped the table. Blackmoor. A name at last. "You would swear it?" The man snorted. "I swear nothing. But I saw it true." A shadow crossed the doorway. Two small winged creatures darted in first, a scaled little dragon and a fluffy flying dog, circling the beams. Then a woman entered beneath them, hood back, a raven brooch pinned at her throat. The room went still again. The old soldier's face drained white. "That is a Blackmoor rider," he breathed. "They keep those beasts. They track deserters." She scanned the tables. Her eyes stopped on Rowan's cloaked chest, then on the coins still glinting in the old man's hand. She had heard the name spoken. Rowan saw her mark him. He stood. The cloak slipped, showing the broken crest beneath. The winged creatures snarled. The rider stepped back through the door and was gone, running for horses. Rowan had his answer. He also had a witness who would tell House Blackmoor exactly who was hunting them. His question was solved. Now Blackmoor was hunting him.

The rider was gone, but Rowan heard hooves fade down the hill. He knew the truth now. He also knew what it cost him. She had seen his face and his broken crest. If he stayed in this town, her house would send more riders. They would corner him before dawn. He had to leave before that happened. He pushed out of the ruined tower into the cold. The rider's horse was already a shadow far down the road. Rowan could not catch her on foot. But her two beasts had not gone with her. They circled above the tower, confused, snapping at the wind. Rowan understood. Those creatures tracked deserters. If they lived, they would lead the rider straight back to him wherever he ran. He needed them grounded, or he needed them gone. A small dragon with blue scales dove at his head. Beside it flew a dog with wide feathered ears, teeth bared. He did not swing his sword. Killing them would only prove what the rider claimed. Instead he pulled the dark cloak from his shoulders. The cloth that had hidden his crest now became a net. He waited. The dragon dove again. Rowan threw the cloak wide and swept both beasts down together. They thrashed inside the folds. He held the bundle tight against his chest and ran. He ran off the road, away from the town, into the trees. The beasts squirmed but could not free their wings. He stopped at the base of a huge tree. Its roots rose taller than a man, coiled like walls. Rowan knelt and forced the wrapped beasts into a deep hollow between two roots. He pinned the cloak with a stone. The dragon shrieked. The dog scratched. But the roots held them, and the cloth held them, and no rider would hear them this far off the road. Rowan stood over the hollow, breathing hard. His chest was bare now. The broken royal crest showed plain in the moonlight, welded shut, useless. He had given up his only disguise to blind his hunters. It was a fair trade. Without the beasts, the rider had no way to track him. She would return to the tower and find him gone. She would find her creatures gone. She would have to guess which road he took, and she would guess wrong. Rowan looked south, toward Blackmoor land. That was where the massacre orders had come from. That was where the noble waited who had burned twelve homes. Now the same house hunted him. So he would go to them. He wiped mud from the crest with his thumb. No more hiding it. No more asking careful questions in dark rooms. They knew his name. He would learn theirs. He turned from the trapped beasts and walked into the dark, toward the house that wanted him dead.