Cole didn't look back when he left.
Rustline didn't ask him to.
The road east pulled thin and pale under the morning sun, a strip of dust and cracked asphalt that pretended it was neutral. Cole knew better. Roads learned names. They learned weight. They learned what you carried and what you'd left behind.
Dusty walked ahead.
Not scouting.
Listening.
His gait had changed. Not limping. Not stiff. Just… precise. Each step placed like it mattered a fraction sooner than it should have. He paused once, head lifting, ears angling east, then resumed without looking back.
Cole followed.
Behind them, Rustline breathed and forgot.
The town would tell stories later—about the night lights flickered wrong, about a warehouse that fell for no good reason, about a Ranger who came through and stayed just long enough to make things worse and better in equal measure.
They wouldn't remember what was missing.
That was the House's fee.
Cole felt it settle as they crested the first rise. A heaviness behind the ribs that didn't ache, didn't throb. Just existed. Like a pocket sewn shut where something used to live.
He didn't touch it.
Touching made absence louder.
The wind picked up as they climbed. Carried the smell of iron and old rain and something like ink drying too fast. Cole adjusted the strap on his pack and kept moving.
Dusty stopped.
Not sudden.
Deliberate.
He stared at the open land ahead—miles of broken scrub, rusted towers, and a horizon that refused to promise anything.
Cole halted beside him.
"What is it," he asked.
Dusty didn't look back.
Didn't growl.
Didn't bark.
He took one step sideways.
Then another.
Like he was avoiding something Cole couldn't see.
Cole felt it then.
A table forming.
Not here.
Far.
Too far for sound.
But close enough to matter.
The House stirred—not pressing, not correcting. Just… aligning.
Text slid faintly into view, barely there.
HOUSE OF RECKONING // PATH SELECTION ACTIVEGUIDANCE: MINIMAL
Cole snorted. "Of course it is."
He looked down at Dusty.
The dog's eyes flicked toward him, then back to the road. Not asking permission. Informing.
"You're sure," Cole said.
Dusty barked once.
Short.
Certain.
Cole nodded.
They turned slightly north of east, cutting away from the cleanest line like men who'd learned straight paths charged interest.
The land changed as they moved. Subtle at first. Scrub thinning. Ground hardening. The kind of place where old highways remembered being important.
Cole felt the Ace of Spades shift cold against his ribs.
Not warning.
Recognition.
Somewhere ahead, someone was setting a table they didn't want him to see until it was ready.
Too bad.
He walked until the sun climbed and the shadows shortened into honesty. Walked until the world felt like it had stopped pretending to be kind.
Behind him, something moved.
Not following.
Recalculating.
Cole didn't turn.
"You keep listening," he said to Dusty. "I'll keep walking."
Dusty's tail flicked once.
Agreement.
The road stretched out, long and patient.
Ahead, the future bent slightly, like it had noticed them coming and wasn't sure it liked the idea.
Cole Marrow walked anyway.
Because the House had blinked.
Because a King had learned resistance hurt.
Because a dog had learned to hear intention before it became action.
And because some roads didn't care who owned them.
They remembered who survived them.