Severyn Nightshade left the old king's service the day they smelled death on him. No last pay. No goodbye. Just a hard walk into the swamp with one plan: build a guild of shadows that answered to no crown. But the crown was not done with them yet. A bone pendant lay in the mud outside their camp this morning, carved with a mark Severyn knew well. Loyalists. They had found the deserter. Severyn crouched by the vines and turned the pendant over. The old king was dead, but his followers still hunted anyone who walked away. To them, Severyn was a traitor worth killing. A guild could not form while marked men tracked its founder. The threat had to end here, before it followed them everywhere. "You should have run further." The voice came from the trees. Severyn rose slow, favorite blade already loose in their hand. Three men stepped into the clearing. Each wore a bone pendant on a cord. The one who spoke had a red beard and dented armor and a knight's ruined bearing. Severyn had seen his face on wanted bills. A disgraced knight who still served the old crown out of spite. "Aldric Blackmoor," Severyn said. "You hunt for a king who rots in the ground." "I hunt oathbreakers." Aldric drew a saber. "You wore his colors. Then you left him to die alone." "He was already dead. I just refused to feed the corpse." Aldric charged. Severyn stepped aside and let the vines do their work. The swamp growth here rose and coiled at movement. A thick strand caught Aldric's ankle and dropped him. The other two lunged. Severyn's blade found the first man's wrist, then his throat. The second swung wild. Severyn ducked and drove the point up under his ribs. Both fell. Aldric tore free of the vines and swung from the ground. The saber grazed Severyn's arm. Severyn kicked the blade away and pinned Aldric with a boot. The knight's chest heaved. Severyn held the favorite blade to his eye. "How many of you carry these?" Severyn asked. "Enough. We answer to someone above the king's old court. You will never see them coming." Severyn could have killed him. Instead they lifted the boot. "Then carry a message. The deserter is done running. Tell your master to send the next ones to this swamp. I will meet them here." Aldric backed away, bleeding, and vanished into the fog. Severyn gathered the two pendants from the dead. Three marks now sat in their palm. Three answers, three threads leading up to whoever gave the orders. The hunt had turned. Severyn was no longer prey being tracked toward a shallow grave. They knew the loyalists were coming, knew where to stand, and knew a leader waited above them all. The guild of shadows would not be born in hiding. It would be built on the bodies of the men sent to end it.