The table didn't hurry.
Neither did Cole.
He stood where the square widened, hands resting on the wood, feeling the heat of it seep into his palms like a low fever. The three cards lay face-down between him and the weight across the table. No Dealer. No hands. Just the implication of one.
Rustline had emptied itself.
Doors shut. Shutters down. Canvas flaps pulled tight. The square that had been loud with watching a minute ago now held only echoes and dust. Somewhere a loose sign clinked against a wall and stopped.
Cole breathed once. Slow. Counted it.
Behind him, Dusty stayed planted at the edge of the square. Wouldn't cross. Wouldn't look away either. His growl had settled into a low vibration, steady as a motor running under load.
The presence across the table shifted again.
Not closer.
Just… attentive.
The House hovered at the edge of sight, text half-formed, like it hadn't decided which voice to use.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // TABLE STATUS: PARTIALDEALER: UNASSIGNED
Cole snorted quietly. "Figures."
One of the chairs creaked.
Not the one across from him.
The one to his right.
It slid back an inch.
Invitation.
Cole didn't sit.
He reached out instead and flipped the nearest card.
It turned without resistance.
A number card. Low. Scuffed at the corners like it had already lived a life before landing here.
Not a House card.
Royal print.
The ink was too deep. The texture wrong. As if the suit had been pressed into the paper instead of printed on it.
Cole's eyes narrowed.
The pressure behind his eyes spiked, then eased. Like someone leaning in, then deciding to listen instead.
Text sharpened.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // FOREIGN INFLUENCE CONFIRMEDADVISORY: PROCEED WITH CAUTION
"Helpful," Cole muttered.
The second card twitched.
Not flipped.
Just… aware.
A sound came from the edge of the square. Soft. Careful.
Footsteps.
Cole didn't turn.
"Don't," he said.
They stopped anyway.
A voice followed. Low. Male. Trying to sound casual and failing.
"Ranger."
Cole exhaled through his nose. "You shouldn't be here."
"Neither should that," the voice said, nodding toward the table.
Cole glanced sideways.
The man stood just inside the shadow of a building. Same minor Dealer from before. Gray stitching. Hands visible. Pale.
"You didn't leave," Cole said.
The Dealer swallowed. "I circled."
"Bad habit."
"Good information," the Dealer said. "Sometimes."
Cole studied him. The man's eyes kept flicking to the cards. Not greed. Fear. Familiar fear—the kind men got when they'd seen a thing work once and never wanted to again.
"Say it," Cole said.
The Dealer hesitated. Chose words like they were loaded.
"That table," he said, "doesn't start clean. Never has."
"Define clean."
"No buy-in," the Dealer said. "No opening call. No terms agreed to out loud. It wakes up already mid-hand."
Cole looked back at the cards.
Three face-down.
One revealed.
"Whose hand," he asked.
The Dealer shook his head. "Depends who finishes it."
A chair scraped again.
This time the one across from Cole.
The presence leaned forward.
The air compressed. Dust on the table shivered, then settled in a pattern that made Cole's teeth itch.
Text bled in, sharper now.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // ALIGNMENT DRIFTVARIABLE INSTABILITY DETECTED
"Drift," Cole said. "That's new."
The House didn't answer.
The Dealer's voice dropped. "This table only activates when three interests align. House. Royal. And—"
"—something else," Cole finished.
The Dealer nodded. "A hinge. A correction. A knife, depending who's telling it."
Cole's jaw tightened.
"And you're telling me to walk away."
The Dealer didn't answer that.
Instead, he said, "No one here will sit with you."
Cole glanced around the square. Empty. Quiet. Rustline holding its breath like a man underwater.
"They don't want to be collateral," the Dealer added.
"That's smart," Cole said.
Another sound.
A fourth chair creaked.
Cole froze.
There were already four.
He looked.
No new chair.
Just the same four, suddenly… closer together.
The table seemed smaller.
Or the space around it had decided to give up ground.
The second card flipped itself.
A face card.
Not King. Not Queen.
Jack.
Bent smile. Knife tucked where a heart should've been.
Cole felt a prickle at the base of his skull.
Royal again.
"You see it," the Dealer said softly.
"I see enough."
"You don't," the Dealer said. "Not yet."
The third card slid forward a fraction.
Still face-down.
The presence across from Cole shifted its weight again.
Impatient now.
The House flickered.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // OPTION EMERGINGWARNING: UNDECLARED TERMS
Cole laughed once. Dry.
"Story of my life."
He finally pulled out a chair.
Not the one offered.
The one opposite Dusty.
He sat.
The wood was warm under him. Too warm.
The Dealer flinched like he'd watched someone step off a ledge.
"That's it," he said. "Once you sit—"
"I know," Cole said.
The table hummed.
Not sound.
Agreement.
Text snapped fully into place.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // TABLE ENGAGEDMODE: ROYAL INTERFERENCESTAKE CLASS: ENVIRONMENTAL
The Dealer went pale. "That's not supposed to—"
The last card flipped.
The suit wasn't spades. Wasn't hearts.
Clubs.
The Ten.
Cole felt the Ace in his coat go cold as a stone dropped into water.
"Ten of Clubs," he said.
The presence across from him stilled.
The Dealer whispered, "That card shouldn't be here."
"Neither should I," Cole said.
The table responded.
Lines carved into the wood lit faintly, tracing old cuts and burn marks until they formed a pattern too deliberate to ignore. A map. Not of land.
Of outcomes.
Rustline's lights flickered.
Once.
Twice.
Somewhere a generator coughed and died. Another picked up the slack. Then another failed.
The town groaned.
Cole felt it then—the wager forming around him without asking. The town itself tightening like a fist.
"You said environmental," Cole said.
The House answered.
ENVIRONMENTAL STAKE CONFIRMEDASSET: RUSTLINE HOLDCONDITION: RESOLUTION REQUIRED
The Dealer backed away. "This isn't a draw. This is a bleed."
"Everything is," Cole said.
The presence across from him leaned closer.
For the first time, Cole felt… shape.
Not face.
Not body.
Just a sense of mass where a man should've been.
Old mass.
Patient.
The Jack card lifted.
Turned.
Became something else.
A sigil burned through it from beneath, warping the ink.
A crown.
Spades.
The King's mark.
The table shuddered.
The House hesitated.
Just a fraction.
Cole felt it like a hitch in his breath.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // CONFLICT OF AUTHORITYSTATUS: REVIEWING
"You're late," Cole said to the empty air.
A voice answered.
Not from the table.
From the buildings.
From the walls.
From the town itself.
"Am I."
It wasn't loud.
Didn't need to be.
Cole stood slowly.
The chair scraped back.
The presence across from him didn't rise.
Didn't need to.
The Dealer had gone still as a statue.
Cole didn't look at him.
"Show yourself," Cole said.
Laughter rippled through the square.
Not mocking.
Amused.
The lights along Rustline's main strip dimmed in sequence, like someone turning down a line of candles.
One stayed on.
At the far end of the square.
A doorway Cole hadn't noticed before.
Light spilled from it—steady, white, wrong.
The House spoke again, quieter now.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // OVERRIDE DETECTEDSOURCE: ROYAL CLAIMSTATUS: CONTESTED
Cole rested a hand on the table.
The wood burned.
"Guess that makes it official," he said.
The door at the far end opened wider.
Something tall stood in the light.
Not human.
Not entirely not.
The Jack card snapped back to normal.
The Ten of Clubs stayed where it was.
The table waited.
Rustline waited.
Dusty growled, louder now, and took one step forward—then stopped, like he'd hit a wall.
Cole felt the town lean toward the outcome.
He squared his shoulders.
"Alright," he said. "Let's see what the King thinks he owns."
The light spilled farther into the square.
And something old stepped into it, bringing jurisdiction with it.