Birth of the Red Hands

Founding

Merthin Rongeur—then still a young port-warden under his mother Lady Ysmera—authorized a “dock syndicate” to stabilize smuggler feuds. Led by Korrin Vey, a one-handed cutpurse from Leadenport, and Selra the Tide, a Vipère courier, the syndicate swore a crimson-palm oath: any thief spilling blood on Tudor soil would mark their hand red and pay tithe to the Rongeur treasury. That oath became legend—the Red Hands were born, their initiation requiring the burning of a blood-soaked palm over a brazier of black salt.