The table stood in the open.
That was the first wrong thing about it.
No canopy. No shade. No wall to lean against. Just wood and stone set clean in the center of Rustline's main square like the city had grown around it by accident and never bothered to correct the mistake.
Two chairs.
One empty.
One pulled back.
Cole slowed the mule and felt the pull sharpen until it bordered on pain. Not a command. Not a shove.
A schedule.
People gave the table space without knowing why. Conversations thinned as he rode closer. Dice went quiet. Cards stayed undealt. Men who would've stared down rifles found reasons to look at the ground.
Dusty stiffened.
The dog didn't growl.
Didn't bark.
He watched the table the way he watched storms—like sound was a liability.
Cole dismounted ten paces out.
The Royal agent stood off to one side, immaculate coat unmarked by dust, boots clean enough to insult the street. He didn't block Cole's path. Didn't guide him either.
Just witnessed.
That was worse.
Cole walked the last few steps alone.
The chair waited.
Not for a Ranger.
For this Ranger.
He saw it carved into the wood when he got close. Not his name. Something older. Something truer.
MARROW.
Not the man.
The line.
Cole rested a hand on the chair.
Cold.
Not from weather.
From patience.
He didn't sit yet.
He looked around the square, committing faces to memory the way he always did before violence. The young woman stood on a balcony above the square, coat wrapped tight, eyes sharp. She didn't smile. Didn't look away.
She understood what this was.
Good.
The House chose that moment to clear its throat.
Text slid into Cole's vision, steady and indifferent.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // RESERVED ENGAGEMENTTABLE STATUS: ACTIVEOPPONENT: ASSIGNEDANTE: DEFERREDNOTICE: OUTCOME WILL SET DIRECTION
Direction.
That word mattered.
Cole sat.
The chair did not creak.
Across from him, the other chair remained empty for a count of three.
Then the air thickened.
Not pressure.
Density.
Like a decision taking shape.
A man resolved into the seat.
No flash. No distortion. Just presence asserting itself until the world agreed.
He was older than Cole. Not by years. By posture. By the way his stillness felt deliberate instead of cautious. His coat was plain. His hands bare. No weapons visible.
That didn't mean anything.
"You're late," the man said.
Cole studied him. "Didn't know I was invited."
The man smiled faintly. "You were born invited."
A Royal, then.
Not crowned.
Not adorned.
Just ranked.
"What's the game," Cole asked.
The man gestured to the table. "That depends on what you think you're here to do."
Cole's jaw tightened. "You set this table."
"Yes."
"You destabilized the city to do it."
The man shook his head. "No. I allowed the city to show its balance point."
"People died," Cole said.
"They always do," the man replied, calm as a ledger. "The question is whether their deaths clarified anything."
Cole leaned back.
This wasn't bluster.
This was philosophy sharpened to a blade.
"What do you want," Cole asked.
The man folded his hands. "To see if you're a corrective force… or a contaminant."
Cole snorted. "That sounds like your problem."
"It becomes mine if you win," the man said.
The deck appeared between them.
Not dealt.
Placed.
Clean. Dark-backed. Edges too precise.
Cole didn't reach for it.
"What's the ante," he asked.
The man looked at him with something like curiosity. "You already paid it."
The Ace of Spades went colder.
Cole felt the scar on his arm ache in sympathy.
"And the stakes," Cole said.
The man's voice lowered a fraction. "Rustline."
That landed.
Cole glanced around the square. The people. The tables. The hidden knives and visible hunger.
"You win," the man continued, "and the distortion collapses. The hide fragments go inert. The city stabilizes."
"And you," Cole said.
"I lose influence here," the man replied. "Temporarily."
Cole's eyes narrowed. "And if I lose."
The man's smile returned, thin and exact. "Then Rustline becomes a proving ground. Controlled instability. Royals only."
The young woman shifted above them.
Cole felt the pull of the hide fragments like static in the air.
"You're using people as variables," Cole said.
"People are variables," the man replied. "You of all men should understand that."
Cole thought of his wife's bracelet. His daughter's glass.
Variables.
He didn't look away.
"What's my hand," Cole asked.
The man tapped the deck. "That depends on how much of yourself you're willing to admit to the table."
Cole breathed once.
"Deal," he said.
The deck cut itself.
Five cards slid to Cole.
Five to the Royal.
Cole looked down.
Nothing special.
Low. Disconnected. A hand that didn't pretend to be anything it wasn't.
Across from him, the Royal didn't look at his cards.
Didn't need to.
"You know," the man said, conversational, "most people think the House enforces morality."
Cole didn't answer.
"It doesn't," the man continued. "It enforces clarity. Morality is just what people invent to survive their own decisions."
The first card hit the table.
Cole's.
He played slow. Honest.
The Royal matched him without hurry.
The square held its breath.
As the hand unfolded, Cole felt it—not luck, not foresight.
Alignment.
The city's distortion pulled at the cards, trying to bend them, to express itself through the outcome.
The hide's echo wanted chaos.
The Royal allowed it.
Cole resisted.
Not by force.
By refusal.
He played exactly what he had.
No bluffs.
No reach.
When the final card fell, the result sat between them, plain as a scar.
Cole had it.
Barely.
A narrow, undeniable win.
The Royal looked down for the first time.
Then nodded.
"Well played," he said.
The House spoke.
WIN RECORDEDOUTCOME: CORRECTIVEREGIONAL ADJUSTMENT: IMMEDIATE
The square shuddered.
Not violently.
Precisely.
Wind snapped and died. The pressure lifted. Somewhere, coats lost their unnatural warmth. Dice fell like dice again. Cards behaved.
People staggered as if waking from a dream they hadn't known they were having.
The young woman grabbed the balcony rail as the strip of hide in her coat went dead—just leather now. Heavy. Ordinary.
She laughed once, sharp and surprised.
Cole exhaled.
The Royal stood.
"Rustline will remember this," he said.
"So will I," Cole replied.
The man inclined his head. "That's why you're dangerous."
He stepped back.
The chair emptied.
The table remained.
For now.
Text lingered at the edge of Cole's vision.
NOTICE: DIRECTION SETSTATUS: RANGER CONFIRMEDWARNING: ROYAL INTEREST INCREASED
Cole stood.
Dusty pressed against his leg, tail low but wagging once, uncertain.
Cole looked up at the balcony.
The woman met his eyes.
No apology.
No gratitude.
Just understanding.
He nodded once.
Then he turned away from the square and walked back into the noise of Rustline, the city settling behind him like a body relearning how to breathe.
The House had collected.
But for once—
So had he.