In that very instant, the crowd stopped being an audience and became a force of nature, a living tide that surged toward me in a riot of silk, leather, and lacquered boots, a collision of every conceivable color and texture the fashion industry had ever vomited into existence.
They pressed in from all sides, momentum driven not by violence but by awe—the collective movements of people who'd just witnessed something so extraordinary they needed to physically touch the person responsible, as though doing so might somehow siphon off a fraction of what they'd seen, drawing that impossible energy down into their own bones and convincing themselves, if only for a moment, that they'd been close enough to greatness for it to leave a mark.
Hands closed around my arms, my legs, my shoulders, lifting me higher and higher until the sand pit fell away beneath me and I was floating—truly, unmistakably floating—carried above a sea of bodies that churned and roared beneath me.
Hundreds of strangers craned their necks with shining eyes and open mouths, staring as though I'd personally delivered salvation to their doorstep, neatly gift-wrapped and presented with a bow.
I still had the gun in my hand—which seemed like a safety concern nobody was addressing—and found myself slightly surprised by the sudden advance, caught between genuine shock and, if I'm being completely honest with myself and the metaphorical audience observing my life choices, slightly aroused by being manhandled by this many people at once, because apparently my brain had decided now was the perfect time to remind me I had a very specific kink about being the center of attention.
Julius was the first to reach me, his hands closing around my forearm with a grip that was half celebratory and half the desperate clutching of someone who'd genuinely, truly believed he was about to watch his friend's brain redecorate the casino floor.
He was crying—not the dignified, single-tear variety that poets wrote about, but full, ugly, wonderful crying, tears streaming freely down his flushed face while he laughed simultaneously, the combination producing an expression so thoroughly wrecked it was almost painful to witness.
Grisha had a wicked smirk splitting her tusked face, her amber eyes gleaming with satisfaction, and I noticed with both alarm and a spike of heat that she was the one grabbing my ass, her massive hand squeezing with possessive firmness that sent very clear messages about what she intended to do later. She caught my eye, winked without a shred of shame, and squeezed harder before I could formulate an appropriate response.
Nara was bouncing on the balls of her feet with such manic excitement that her bunny ears flopped wildly around her head, her crimson eyes wide and delighted, making little squeaking sounds that suggested she was physically incapable of containing her joy.
Felix looked so relieved he was about to melt into a puddle of pure emotion, his delicate features trembling as tears gathered in those impossibly large eyes, his hands clasped together in front of his chest like he was praying to whatever deity protected adorable boys from cardiac arrest.
I lifted my gaze above the crowd, scanning upward toward the second floor where the balcony caught the torchlight in warm amber ribbons, and found Brutus exactly where I'd left him—standing tall, solid, and magnificently unbothered by the chaos unfolding below him, his massive frame silhouetted against the stone like a monument to reliability.
He caught my eye across the distance, held it for a long beat, then gave me a single nod. Just one. Slight. Barely perceptible to anyone who wasn't looking for it. But coming from Brutus, that nod carried the weight of genuine respect.
Ribbons appeared from somewhere—gods knew where anyone had been hiding them, because ribbon production in the middle of a gambling pit seemed like a logistical nightmare—and were flung into the air alongside drinks that arced through the torchlight in glittering trajectories before splashing down among the crowd in spectacular fashion.
With each passing second the cheering grew louder, building on itself like some kind of acoustic feedback loop of collective euphoria, voices layering until individual words became impossible to distinguish and the whole thing transformed into pure noise, beautiful, overwhelming, and slightly painful to my sensitive ears.
And through it all, Oberen remained exactly where he'd been deposited, kneeling in the sand at the center of the pit, the two Velvets flanking him like black-clad bookends, the celebration swirling around him like water around a stone in a river, parting, flowing, completely, deliberately ignoring his existence.
The bullet hole in his chest was still seeping blood in slow pulses that suggested I'd hit something important but not immediately fatal—which had been the goal, because dead men can't transfer property, sign legal documents, or do any of the other tedious administrative tasks that would make this victory actually land.
Eventually—after enough celebrating, enough being groped, enough having my ears assaulted by Julius's increasingly incoherent expressions of relief—the noise settled just enough for my voice to carry when I chose to use it.
I lifted my hand, and the crowd quieted almost immediately, a ripple of attentive silence spreading outward from my position like the inverse of the cheering that had preceded it.
"Get Oberen medical attention," I said, my voice carrying across the pit with easy authority. "He's no use to anyone dead, and I have plans for him that require him to be conscious for at least a few more hours." I paused, then added with a small smile, "The good kind of plans. For me, anyway."
The Velvets moved without further instruction, hauling Oberen upright between them and beginning to guide his barely-conscious form toward whatever medical facilities the casino possessed.
I was set down then—gently, surprisingly, as though the crowd had collectively agreed that after everything I'd just survived, the least they could do was return me to ground level without dropping me.
The second my boots touched the sand, I was moving, pushing through the crowd with polite but firm elbows and the kind of directional certainty that comes from knowing exactly where you need to be and having absolutely no interest in taking the scenic route.
The sandstone stairs leading up to the second floor were familiar territory now, worn smooth by countless footsteps over what had to be years, the stone warm beneath my palms as I used the railing to pull myself upward faster, taking the steps two at a time with energy that suggested my body hadn't gotten the memo about how exhausted I should be.
Brutus was waiting at the top, leaning against the railing with an expression that conveyed approximately nothing—which, for Brutus, was functionally equivalent to a standing ovation.
"You," he rumbled, his deep voice carrying just a hint of amusement, "are either the luckiest bastard I've ever met or the universe's favorite comedy project. I genuinely can't decide which."
I grinned at him with enough smugness to probably qualify as a weaponizable substance. "Why not both? I like to think I've achieved a perfect synthesis of cosmic favoritism and absolutely unhinged decision-making that transcends normal categories." I gestured vaguely back toward the pit where the celebration was still ongoing. "Also, did you see that shot? Right in the chest, non-fatal but extremely painful. I'm basically a surgical sniper at this point. They should give me a medal. Or possibly arrest me. The line's getting blurry."
Brutus snorted, the sound like rocks tumbling down a mountainside. "You lost all the fingers on your left hand playing a game you knew was rigged just so I could steal some documents. That's not luck, Loona. That's weaponized stupidity with a side order of 'I hate my future self.'"
"Ah, but it worked," I countered, holding up my left hand where four fingers and a thumb should have been but were instead just... absent, replaced by hastily bandaged stumps that throbbed with persistent pain I was aggressively ignoring. "And besides, fingers grow back. Probably. Maybe. I'll ask Willow if there's a spell for that. Point is, we won! Oberen is defeated, the casino is ours, justice has been served, and I look amazing doing it. Check all the boxes for a successful evening in my book."
"Your book needs better quality control," Brutus muttered, but I caught the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "You're insane. Genuinely, certifiably insane. I'm half convinced you're going to accidentally conquer the entire city just by being too stupid to realize when you should quit."
I pressed a hand to my chest with theatrical offense. "Brutus! That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me! I'm genuinely touched. Might cry. Need a moment to process this emotional vulnerability you're showing." I paused, then dropped the act slightly, my voice softening. "But seriously—thank you. For getting those documents. For trusting me even when the plan sounded absolutely batshit. For being here."
Brutus's expression did something complicated, cycling through emotions too quickly for me to track before settling on gruff affection. "Yeah, well. Someone's gotta keep you from getting yourself killed through sheer audacity. Might as well be me." He straightened from the railing, his massive frame unfolding to full height. "Now, you want to see Oberen's hidden office or are we going to stand here having feelings until someone notices we're being suspiciously sincere?"
"Oh gods, yes, take me to the office before I do something embarrassing like hug you," I said quickly, grateful for the subject change.
Brutus nodded once, then pushed off the railing and gestured with his head for me to follow, turning to navigate down one of the second floor's corridors that branched off from the main casino floor.
I fell into step beside him—or rather, beside his elbow, given that his stride covered roughly twice the ground mine did—and we moved through the casino's corridors in companionable silence, passing through the busier sections and into quieter hallways where the torchlight thinned and the silk hangings gave way to bare sandstone.
We descended a short flight of stairs, turned left through an archway draped in heavy fabric, then arrived at a silk curtain that looked distinctly out of place compared to everything else in the establishment.
Not the rich, lustrous material that adorned the rest of Oberen's domain, but something older, darker, the fabric itself seeming to rot and mold at the edges as though the passage of time had been particularly unkind to this one specific piece of decoration while leaving everything else pristine.
It was the kind of curtain that practically announced "something important is behind me but I'm trying very hard to look uninteresting about it," which was, in fairness, a noble if ultimately futile endeavor.
Brutus pushed through without ceremony and I followed suit, brushing past the disgusting fabric with a grimace, and then I blinked in genuine surprise at what lay beyond.