Morning came thin.
Not bright. Not kind.
Just light enough to prove the night had let him go.
Cole woke with his cheek in the dirt and his coat pulled tight around him like it might wander off if he loosened it. The sky overhead was a washed-out blue, scraped pale by wind. No clouds. No birds. Just empty up there, same as most places now.
Dusty lay a few feet away.
Breathing.
Slow. Heavy. Like sleep was work.
Cole watched the dog for a while. Longer than he needed to. Making sure the rise and fall stayed steady. Making sure the miracle hadn't decided to collect interest overnight.
It didn't.
The dog stayed.
Cole pushed himself upright. The world tilted, then settled. His bones argued. His head felt packed with wool, thoughts moving late, like they had to check in with something before forming.
He didn't remember his dreams.
That bothered him more than bad ones would've.
He sat there, elbows on knees, and tried to sort what felt real from what felt placed. The cold of the ground was real. The ache in his hands. The smell of dust and old iron. The weight of the Ace inside his coat—cold as ever.
Everything else felt… negotiable.
Dusty opened one eye. Then the other. Didn't get up. Just watched Cole like he was checking whether the day was worth starting.
"You too," Cole said.
His voice came out rough. Untested.
The dog huffed once and rested his chin back down.
Cole stood and walked the small perimeter he'd chosen the night before. A shallow cut off the road. Scrub thin enough not to hide anything big. Rocks placed wrong enough to slow anyone coming in fast. He'd slept light. Woken often. No footsteps. No pressure. No text bleeding into the corners of his sight.
For once, the House had kept its distance.
He found the stash by accident.
A bent sheet of metal half buried at the base of a collapsed culvert. Looked like trash. Everything did, if you looked long enough. Cole nudged it with his boot and heard the wrong sound. Not hollow. Not dead.
He crouched. Pulled the metal free.
Under it, wrapped in oilcloth and patience, were boxes.
Ammunition.
Old stock. Pre-collapse manufacture. Brass still clean. .38s. Enough to matter.
Cole didn't smile.
He checked for markers. Dealer tags. Royal stamps. Nothing. Just someone who'd thought ahead and never come back for it.
"Luck," he murmured.
The Ace stayed cold. Didn't agree. Didn't argue.
He took what he could carry and left the rest where it was. A man didn't empty a place like that unless he wanted the world to notice.
Dusty followed, tail low but loose.
They moved off the road before the sun climbed too high. Found a patch of broken land where the wind carved sound away. No straight lines. No obvious approach. Cole set camp the way he always did when he wanted to disappear instead of rest.
He sat with his back to a rock and let the quiet stretch.
It felt wrong at first.
No wagers. No pressure behind the eyes. No sudden rules clarifying themselves in cold type. Just time, moving the way it used to.
That made his hands shake.
He steadied them by working.
Rabbits were thin this time of year. Careful. Nervous. Cole waited anyway. Patience had always been cheaper than bullets.
When one broke cover, he raised the revolver, breathed once, and fired.
Clean.
The sound echoed more than he liked, but nothing answered it.
He took two more before the land went still again.
Enough.
Back at camp, he skinned them slow. Respectful. Waste was another way the House collected, even when it pretended not to watch.
He built a small fire, shielded, smoke kept low. The stew took time. Water heated. Meat browned. The smell crept out despite his care, rich and simple, tugging at something behind his ribs that hurt when it moved.
Dusty sat close. Too close. Eyes locked on the pot.
"You're shameless," Cole said.
The dog's tail thumped once.
They ate when it was ready.
Cole burned his tongue and didn't care. The warmth spread, real and earned. For a few minutes, the world narrowed to heat and taste and the scrape of a spoon against metal.
No one tried to take it.
After, he leaned back and watched the sky shift toward evening. The light softened. Shadows grew long and honest. The road stayed quiet.
Cole waited for the House to intrude.
It didn't.
That scared him more than if it had.
He checked the perimeter again at dusk. Nothing new. No cards where there hadn't been cards. No smells that didn't belong. Just land, doing what land did when it wasn't being bent.
He slept deeper that night.
Not deep enough.
He woke once to nothing and lay there until his heart slowed. Woke again just before dawn, breath caught, hand on the revolver, convinced someone had said his name.
No one had.
The quiet held.
Morning came again.
Dusty rose stiff, shook himself, then leaned into Cole's leg like gravity worked different for dogs.
Cole rested a hand on his head. Solid. Warm.
Real enough.
They stayed another day.
No reason to rush. The road would still be there tomorrow. Rustline wasn't going anywhere. Tables didn't fold themselves unless someone forced them to.
Cole cleaned the revolver. Counted rounds. Rewrapped the extra ammunition. Mended a seam in his coat that had started to fray like it knew trouble was coming.
He let himself sit.
Let time pass without measuring it.
The House didn't like that.
But it didn't stop him.
That night, the fire burned low and safe. The stars came out sharp and distant. Cole watched them until his eyes ached, trying to remember which ones had names.
Most of them didn't anymore.
He slept with his back to the rock and the dog at his side.
For one night, the world didn't ask him to wager anything.
And that—more than any win—felt dangerous.