Page 62 of Chaos and Crowns

“Heart rate is going back down to normal,” he confirmed, tone impressed.

“Thad for the win. Suck on that modern medicine!” Thad exclaimed, but quieted when Drew shot him a look that clearly intimated not the time. Still, he looked quite pleased with himself.

“What—where…” Biderman’s eyelids fluttered as she seemed to become aware of her surroundings again.

“You fainted darling,” Thad patted her hand sympathetically.

As Biderman began to look around dazed, everybody hurried to tuck their weapons behind their back, no small feat for Nora’s spear. Between her and Adam, they managed to conceal it. Antony snatched Odelle’s bloodied blade off the ground to hide behind him. Seraphina hastily slid the crown, lying forgotten on the floor, under the puddle of her skirts where she knelt.

“Why don’t we get you to a bench where you can sit down and I’ll get you some help.” Thad looked pointedly at the others as he and Drew helped the harried woman to her feet. She looked disheveled, but surprisingly steady on her feet for having been exorcised of evil incarnate minutes earlier.

As Thad led Biderman from the room before she could gain her bearings and wonder at the odd crowd of people gathered around her, she patted her rumpled updo in confusion and glanced around. Then with a shrug, she let herself be led past the rope that Thad lifted out of the way for her. They disappeared around the corner, Drew trailing behind to provide any unforeseen medical care.

“We’re going to need to make ourselves scarce,” Adam said as soon as the trio rounded the corner. “I’ll put the rover back and then we’ll split up to divert any suspicion.”

Seraphina began setting her dress and hair to rights, looking surprisingly unruffled despite her role in the fight. Odelle followed her lead, as Antony pulled a handkerchief from an inner pocket and wiped off her dagger. He handed it back to her so she could tuck it back into the safety of her prosthetic.

“I’m surprised security hasn’t come running already with the racket we made. I thought Biderman’s screaming could have been heard from Mars,” Odelle commented as she looked around to check if anything else was out of place. She scooped up the mangled tray of Thad’s shield on the ground. She threw it into a nearby trash can with Antony’s ruined handkerchief.

“The Shadow tends to mask its presence from non-Eteria-members when it can, like how no bystanders noticed the Shadow when you fell off the bridge,” Antony commented as he helped Adam redo the bowtie that had come undone in the fray. “If the general public knew about the physical Shadow creatures, they would be a lot easier to fight. Negative feelings and impulses when you don’t know where they’re coming from are a lot trickier.”

Adam, bowtie now in order, chimed in, “And when the Shadow disappeared a few minutes ago, we lost that lovely dampening on our presence, thus the need for a hasty retreat.”

Nora gathered Adam and Thad’s swords, presumably to put them back in their former hiding spots to be smuggled out later. Seraphina meandered off through the exhibit, heading off through a different exit.

Antony took Odelle’s arm and began leading her out of the room. They stepped back over the velvet rope and strode back towards the exhibits where partygoers congregated.

“We’ve overstayed our welcome considering we weren’t even on the guest list. We should go,” Antony murmured to her as they meandered back into a room where a few people milled on the edge of the festivities.

It was odd to think of a party happening just a few rooms from the battle Odelle had just been witness too. Still, the whole encounter lasted only a few minutes, not even a full drink for these partygoers, even though it might have lasted a whole lifetime to Odelle. Was that how it always felt for Eteria members? Fighting on the outskirts while watching society pass them by for thousands of years? That didn’t fit with Antony’s narrative of resisting the Shadow’s influence by celebrating everything good in the world. Not letting everything be about the fight—that’s what the Light really called for.

“You’re telling me we snuck into a black-tie event and defeated the physical representation of evil, and you’re not even going to share one dance with me?” Odelle countered.

“I wouldn’t think you’d feel up to dancing after that ordeal.” Antony shot her a sidelong glance as they walked arm in arm.

Odelle contemplated his words before responding. “I don’t think I truthfully understood what fighting the Shadow meant until I put that crown on and faced what it did to my own thoughts. How it took things I like about myself—my confidence, my drive—and turned them against me. It used them to make me irritated and want to push away everybody around me, to isolate myself to prove that I don’t need anybody’s help.”

Odelle stopped walking, pulling on Antony’s arm so she could look him in his eyes, back to their original dreamy hazel. She liked them better this way.

“Then I looked at you, and I finally understood the Light. That even when it is used for battle, it is rooted in compassion…and love. Even though we beat the Shadow today, letting it chase us home would be a victory for it. Sharing a dance with and celebrating the man who saved so many lives today? That’s exactly how we fight the Shadow.”

Antony looked down and interlaced his fingers with hers.

“The man who you love?” Antony’s voice turned up at the end, somehow asking for confirmation despite all they had just been through.

Odelle brought their joined hands up to her lips and brushed a kiss on his knuckles.

“The man who I love more than I ever expected,” she confirmed.

The smile that split Antony’s face was even more radiant than the golden Light he had channeled not ten minutes earlier.

“In that case, I consider it my sacred duty as a defender of the Light to show you my love by dancing you into a stupor,” Antony declared as he pulled Odelle by their joined hands to the room from which the sounds of a band drifted.

Stepping onto the dance floor, Odelle felt more like a goddess than she ever had in her life as Antony pulled her close with an arm around her waist. She drifted across the dance floor with him, feeling as if she were floating. Between the shimmering legs that never chafed, the white chiffon gown skimming her curves like water, and the lithe warm body pressed against hers, she felt Antony’s presence through every inch of her body. She basked in it, thinking of how much care he took in everything he crafted and knowing her heart was in good hands.

23

Odelle’s head rested in Antony’s lap as he mindlessly flipped through channels on her television. She was happy to see the crisp picture intact after he had indeed managed to take it apart and reassemble it that morning. She considered getting up to work but his nimble fingers lazily carding through her hair kept her rooted in place.