High up within the rotting boughs of an ironwood cypress seventy paces to the north, three figures crouched in absolute stillness against the peeling bark.
They wore the dark iron masks of the Silent Crows, their features hidden behind cold metal while their sleeveless leather tunics blended seamlessly with the gray lichens clinging to the wood. Each man held his breath in the precise, three-count interval required to suppress internal circulation, allowing the natural vitriol vapor rising from the marsh to drift over their shoulders without triggering a single ripple in their cloaks. Below them, through the drifting purple haze, they had watched the five swamp crocodiles collapse into the sludge, noting with professional calculation how cleanly the common soldiers had executed their defe
