it was Mitch and Simon’s turn to run through their fight, and I had to admit it did look pretty amazing sped up. They started out with blades, taking turns having the advantage, until they’d disarmed each other and sent each other sprawling with punches to the jaw and jabs with elbows. Simon was smaller but he proved to be more than a match; the sleeves of his T-shirt strained against biceps I didn’t realize he had. He wasn’t built like Mitch—he was more lithe, almost wiry—yet he was still able to flip the larger man over his shoulder, kilt flying. Dammit, Mitch was wearing bike shorts.
I turned to Stacey, betrayed.
“I know, I know.” She shook her head in sympathy. “It’s a disappointment, right? But this is a family show.”
I grumbled under my breath, turning back to watch as Mitch landed on his feet and spun, throwing a punch that Simon easily blocked. But Mitch used the twist of his body to conceal the action of pulling a dagger from his boot. I heard myself cry out a warning before realizing I’d made a sound. Mitch backhanded Simon, who went to his knees, and the fight ended with Mitch holding his dagger to Simon’s throat. The two men froze in that tableau for a few beats as we all erupted in applause: the other fighters, the girls in the grass, all of us.
“Huzzah!” My hands stung from clapping, but the guys deserved it. That had been an incredible show.
They broke the pose, and Mitch extended a hand to help Simon up. They were both sweating, chests heaving from exertion, and they turned to acknowledge our applause with grins and waves. Mitch noticed Stacey and me sitting on the hill and pointed his massive sword at us in acknowledgment. He leaned over to Simon, saying something, pointing in our direction, and when Simon looked at me the force of his smile hit me in the chest. I smiled back at him in a Pavlovian response. But his grin faltered, as though he didn’t know what to do with mine. He made a gesture that seemed to start as a wave, but at the last second he changed his mind, pushing his hair off his forehead instead.
“So what did you think?” Stacey nudged my shoulder as we walked back into the high school auditorium. “Pretty cool, right?”
“Yeah.” The fights had been incredible to watch, and cheering them on with the girls had made me feel like I was a part of something. But I glanced back over my shoulder at the field, watching Simon talk to a couple of the others. The knowledge that he didn’t want to share his joy with me rankled. What was I going to have to do to prove I was worthy of that smile?
More importantly, why did it bother me so much?
Five
The next weekend’s rehearsal took place at the actual Faire site. Only two more weeks until we were up and running. And while that was exciting, this new meeting location threw off my routine. After all these weeks, I could practically drive to the high school on Saturday mornings with my eyes closed. Now my Jeep and I had to shift gears, and while Caitlin read to me off some emailed directions (apparently the place didn’t show up on GPS), we ended up in a field-turned-parking-lot at the edge of a forest.
“The hell?” I got out of the car and squinted toward the trees. “We’re going in there?” This was exactly how stupid white girls died in horror movies.
“Come onnnn.” Caitlin hadn’t watched the same horror movies as me, and she tugged on my arm and led me toward a path snaking into the trees. I sighed and followed her. What the hell. By now April was mostly mobile. She’d be able to take care of herself if I was hacked to pieces by a serial killer in a hockey mask out here.
The wide, well-trod path opened up almost right away into a clearing, with multiple smaller paths forking out in all directions. A few stages were constructed within sight of the clearing, and other wooden structures dotted the distance. It was like a whole civilization hidden inside the outer ring of trees.
Caitlin, with the confidence of an excited kid, led me down a path on the right winding through full green trees that acted as a filter for the early-morning sunlight. When I glanced back over my shoulder the parking lot wasn’t visible