The winter wind sliced through the air like a sword, cutting Rat's exposed skin as he moved across the field. The snow covered the floor in uneven drifts, stained red and brown where the earth swallowed the violence of men. The sky above was dull, gray, heavy with the promise of more snow.

  Rat shivered, pulling his patched coat tighter around him as he tried to move fast through the aftermath of the battle. The day lasts shorter, the wild animals come sooner. He doesn't have much time left. His breath was visible. The visible puffs rising like ghostly figures into the cold air. The ground beneath his boots was terrible to walk on-frozen mud with patches of ice that cracked with each cautious step.

  The dead lay scattered like broken toys, their armor dulled and their bodies twisted in unnatural poses. Some were half-buried in the snow, their faces turned towards the sky in silent screams. Others had been stripped of anything useful, their belongings claimed by those who had come before Rat. Today, once again, he was late because of his search for the unknown sister of the female knight.

  But he didn't mind, he was patient. Always patient.

  Rat crouched by a fallen soldier, his gloved hands moving fast. The man's armor was dented and bloodied, the tunic beneath torn to shreds. Rat tugged at the leather pouch hanging from the soldier's belt, something inside it was jingling softly. Coins, perhaps, or maybe a few trinkets. He pocketed it without a second thought.

  A faint sound caught his attention-the whisper of the wind through shattered helmets, the creak of a corpse shifting under the weight of ice. Rat ignored it, focusing instead on the next body.

  This one was younger, barely a man, his pale face half-hidden beneath a tangle of frostbitten hair. His hands were curler around something, fingers stiff and frozen in place. Rat kneeled down to get a closer look.

  The dead man held a pair of dice.

  They were carved from bone, their surfaces worn smooth from use. One lay in his palm, the other caught between his fingers. Rat's mouth released another ghost as he reached out, his gloved hand trembling slightly. He froze for a moment, he wanted to know the story behind the pair of dice. Rat took off his glove, and while grabbing the dice, he touched the man's skin. It was freezing.

  The moment Rat's bare fingers touched the man's frozen skin, a jolt like lightning shot through him. His breath slowed down, and the field around him seemed to vanish. Rat was no longer kneeling in the frozen aftermath of a battle; he was somewhere else entirely.

  He stood in a dimly lit tavern, the scent of stale ale and desperation filled his nostrils. The clatter of dice echoed off wooden walls, punctuated by jeers and laughter. The man was there, alive and vibrant, but hollow in a way that Rat could feel in his own chest.

  The young man leaned over a crude table, his eyes wide and wild. Sweat beaded on his brow, and his hands trembled as they hovered over the dice. A small pile of coins sat before him, pitiful compared to the stacks of wealth his opponents had.

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  “Come on, come on,” the gambler whispered, pleading.

  He rolled the dice, and they tumbled across the table. The room held its breath.

  Snake eyes.

  The gambler’s face fell, and the crowd erupted in mocking laughter. Someone clapped him on the back, hard enough to make him stumble.

  “Better luck next time, boy,” an old man laughed, taking the rest of the man’s coin.

  But there was no next time. Not for him.

  The vision shifted, blurring into another scene. The gambler sat hunched over a small hearth, his mother’s tired face barely visible in the weak flicker of firelight.

  “You promised,” she said, her voice heavy with disappointment. She clutched a tattered scarf around her shoulders, her hands frail and knotted from years of hard work.

  “I know,” the gambler said, his voice barely audible. “I’ll make it right, Ma. I swear.”

  But the scarf on her shoulders was gone a week later, sold for a handful of coins.

  Another shift, faster this time. The gambler was running through a narrow alley, his breath ragged and desperate. A man shouted behind him, his voice laced with fury.

  “Thief! Get back here!”

  The gambler clutched a small purse to his chest, his legs burning as he sprinted. But the shadows swallowed him, and the next time Rat saw him, the gambler was sitting alone in a makeshift camp.

  The dice were in his hand, his only remaining possession. He rolled them over and over, as if hoping they might finally bring him the fortune they had always denied.

  The final shift came with a sharp, icy clarity. The gambler stood in a line of soldiers, his armor ill-fitting and his face pale with fear.

  “This is it,” he murmured, clutching the dice in one hand and a crude sword in the other. “This is where it turns around.”

  But the god of luck had abandoned him long ago.

  Rat blinked, the vision shattering like glass. He was back on the battlefield, the cold biting into his exposed skin. He stared at the dice in his hand, their smooth surfaces gleaming faintly in the weak winter light.

  “Guess it didn’t turn around after all,” he muttered, pulling his glove back on.

  He straightened and glanced at the field around him, the dead lying silent and still. Somewhere in the distance, a crow cawed, its voice sharp and mournful.

  Rat walked on, his boots crunching through the icy crust of the battlefield. It wasn’t the first time he’d seen someone’s life play out like that—clear, raw, and uninvited. He’d touched enough bodies to know the stories they carried didn’t always end with peace. The gambler's tale was just another in a long line of sad, broken lives that reached him too late.

  Gamblers always lose. The thought came unbidden, sharp as the winter wind. Whether it’s dice or life itself, the odds never favor the desperate. He felt a flicker of pity for the boy’s mother, though. She didn’t deserve the burden of her son’s mistakes. Most didn’t. What good is working your fingers to the bone if your child still rolls the dice and bets everything you’ve scraped together? Did she even know he was dead? Did she wait by the window every evening, straining to hear his voice? Or had she already given up, knowing luck never ran in their family?

  Rat’s lips tightened. He didn’t want to think about it. He’d wasted too much time before—letting the stories of strangers settle in his mind like unwelcome guests, haunting him with questions that had no answers.

  They died, and then he learned their stories. What use was that? He couldn’t warn them. He couldn’t stop their foolishness or make them pick another path. By the time the echoes reached him, it was already too late. The gambler would still have rolled the dice. The knight would still have drawn her sword. The stories didn’t change anything, and neither could Rat.

  He shook his head sharply, trying to push the thoughts aside. The world didn’t stop for a dead man’s regrets. If he lingered on them, he’d freeze before he made it back to the sewers. And then who would be left to deliver the knight’s necklace? No one, that’s who. At least now, for the first time ever, he had a chance to do something good for the dead.

  With a sigh, he adjusted his coat and pressed on, focusing on the next body ahead.