“No interest! Happily married, man.”

“How’d you convince him to come here and fight Felix?” I ask Marilou.

She smiles wanly. “I offered him money, actually, but he turned it down. Said he’d do it for the story.”

Right. The chance to fight Felix Hughes must be tempting. He’s landed on a lot of Most Punchable Celebrities lists.

Jake has better technique, but Felix has desperation. He’s unpredictable, steps jagged, and after sneaking one successful jab he builds up his confidence to land another. Another. Another. A small smile plays at his lips. Jake stumbles, falls; he shakes his hair from his face as he stands, breaths deepening. They circle each other like wolves, dragging their swords against the earth. Rich people settle their disputes in really unhealthy ways.

Hall takes me aside, looking agitated. “I’m experiencing ugly-colored feelings about Jake’s dexterity with a sword. I’ve seen jealousy exhibited in others, but I’ve never felt it from my own point of view. I’m astonished by the physical aspects of this emotion. My stomach is sick! I’m trying to seem happy so that nobody notices, because I don’t want to vocalize these unacceptable feelings, but smiling when my stomach feels like mildewed oatmeal is unnatural.”

Jealous Hall! He doesn’t know how ridiculously cute he looks, frowning like that. “We’ve all been there. Ashlee Simpson threw a White Russian smoothie out of her car window at me once when I was out jogging, because she was jealous of my custom Nikes.”

“I won’t throw a White Russian smoothie at Jake from my car.”

“That’s good. Keep a handle on those urges.”

He looks away. “Maybe a Mello Yello from a bicycle.”

Meanwhile, the fight is still going on. “Is he actually winning?” Kaia says, marveling.

A clump of snow in an overhanging tree bough slips sideways, falling with a splat on Felix’s head.

Felix jumps, sword slanting midstrike, and I notice, too late—

“The cap! The rubber cap fell off!”

Jake’s staring up into the tree where the snow fell from, and Felix pounces on his distraction to go in for the kill.

“For . . . my . . . marriage!” he bellows, bringing down the sword. It slices Jake’s left arm off.

“Aghhhhh!” we all scream again. Blood spurts where Jake’s arm used to be, spraying Felix’s traumatized face. Jake stares down at his own exposed bone and his eyes roll back into his head.

“Jake!” Marilou shrieks.

Felix drops to his knees. “I didn’t mean to!”

Marilou picks up Jake’s arm and smushes it against the wound as if she can reattach it. “I thought those couldn’t cut!”

“Of course they can, they’re longswords,” Frangipane yells out, scathingly. “Rapiers are dueling swords.” He and Octavian roll their eyes at each other.

Hall and I look at each other in panic. I raise my eyebrows in silent question, and he nods. He seizes my wrist, and we’re turning, turning, sucked through black space, spitting back out on the front lawn as it appeared a couple of minutes before. Jake’s arm is whole once more, all of his blood safely inside his body, where it’s supposed to be. Nobody notices our reemergence, all eyes on Jake and Felix as they circle each other. The déjà vu makes me queasy. Kaia says once again, “Is he actually winning?”