Shadow's End (Elder Races, #9)(87)

Somehow, then, she found all kinds of strength and energy, as she wrapped around him, crooning a wordless comfort, crying with him until neither one of them had any tears left, and together, they took the first steps toward healing.

? ? ?

The next evening was the Masque of the Gods, the huge annual gala event that Dragos held in the banquet hall of the Tower.

Bel had wondered if Dragos would cancel the masque, but he had apparently decided to move forward. Possibly, it would have been too unwieldy to cancel. Dignitaries and tourists had already flooded the city.

More than likely, though, she thought it was a statement of defiance to the rest of the world.

Here we are, the statement said.

We may have been dealt a terrible blow, but we are unbroken.

She didn’t see Graydon at all that day. He had returned to light duty, and he wouldn’t be able to attend her at the masque. When he apologized, she put her hand over his mouth, stopping him in midsentence.

“I know who you are, and I know what you have to do,” she told him. “What’s more, I’ve known it for a very long time. It’s part of what I love about you. Don’t ever apologize to me for doing your job.”

Almost imperceptibly, his expression lightened. He asked, “You’re okay with me being a glorified cop?”

He was so much more than that. She had already seen how other people came to him with their problems and questions, and each time, he did his best to help fix them. Over time, maybe she could help him with that. Maybe people would start coming to her, too, once they grew to know and love each other, and they got used to the fact that she was truly part of their world.

She was even beginning to look forward to doing that again, helping people, listening to them and fixing their problems. When the day came, she would be ready for it.

Reaching up on tiptoe, she kissed him, and said against his mouth, “I’m more than okay. I’m proud of you, and I wouldn’t have you any other way.”

She was far too old and experienced to be under any illusions. There would be hard times, and hard waiting. She knew sometimes she would be scared, and that nothing would make it right again until he walked through the door and came home to her.

She also knew he was more than worth all of it.

When evening came, she went through her clothes, trying to decide what to wear. As a short-term solution to her move to New York, she had ordered her clothes to be shipped from the Elven demesne, and they filled Graydon’s walk-in closet to bursting. She would have to decide what to do with her other possessions—furniture, artwork, etc.—but those were decisions that could be made over time.

Finally, she dressed in a simple dark blue dress with a matching domino. She rolled her hair into a twist, pinned it at the back of her head, slipped on a pair of high heels and kept her makeup subtle.

Others would carry on with the masque as normal, but, for her, in the face of the loss that both the Wyr and the Djinn had suffered, she felt anything more elaborate would be wrong.

Linwe met her at the apartment door. The younger woman had dressed soberly as well. She had also dyed her hair black. The color was much starker than her natural dark brown hair.

The black highlighted her elegant bone structure, and the depth and shape of her dark eyes, although Bel knew Linwe hadn’t dyed her hair for vain reasons.

“Very appropriate,” Bel told her. Gently, she touched the ends of Linwe’s short hair. “Although, I must confess, I’ll miss the pink.”

Linwe ducked her head. “Maybe it can come back someday.”

“Is your apartment okay?” she asked.

She had not been able to dissuade Linwe from coming to New York with her, and the younger woman had been so impassioned about the subject, she didn’t have the heart to try very hard.

In any case, if she were honest with herself, she found a selfish comfort in Linwe’s devotion. While she was ready to make such a deep, overarching change, and she embraced it, leaving the Elven demesne and so many loved ones behind was still hard. It had been her home and her mission for so long.

“This isn’t the Wood,” Linwe said, with a small shrug. “That’s okay. This will be its own thing.”

“I’ll let you in on a secret,” Bel whispered.

A sparkle returned to Linwe’s eyes. She whispered back, “What’s that?”

Bel smiled to herself. Linwe’s sparkle could never be doused for long. She confided, “I’m going to change this Tower for the better.”

“Ooohh?” One of Linwe’s eyebrows lifted. “How so?”

“I’m going to bring in a touch of the Wood,” said Bel. “It’ll take some time—and actually quite a lot of money—but you wait and see. The Wyr will thank me for it.”

Linwe threw her arms around Bel. “We’re going to have such an adventure here!”

She hugged the other woman. “Yes, we are, aren’t we?”

Together, they went downstairs. Linwe kept her company as she searched the crowd for Ferion.

Perhaps inevitably, the task threw her back to the Vauxhall masque, two hundred years ago. She had been so anxious and worried that night as she looked for Ferion.

Now, so many things had changed.

In the latter part of the nineteenth century, the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens had slipped away into the past. Over the years, King Oberon had grown colder and more distant, until he stopped attending public functions.