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  “Bianca, thank God.” Angus took the helmet from her outstretched hands. “You’re as brilliant as you are beautiful,” he said. She was amazing-looking—young and strong and tall, dressed in an “Amazon warrior meets Renaissance villager” sort of costume: a leather bodice and knee-high boots over a hip-length poet blouse and leggings. “Did you bring the gorget too?” he asked.

  Bianca stood up straight, put her hands on her hips, took a deep breath, then coughed. Really dusty out here. She shook her head.

  “Doesn’t matter. Gorgets are for cowards. Thank you.” Angus grabbed Bianca’s face and kissed her on the lips. I loved it when Matt kissed me that way. It seemed like it’d been ages.

  Bianca didn’t appear to feel the same way. She pulled away from Angus, glowered at him, and ran off. Riley stared after her, his back unnaturally stiff.

  “I’ll see you at the joust,” Angus said to Riley. “Prepare to meet thy doom.” He flashed a smile in my direction, then strode off down the road.

  “That’s the guy who helped me up,” I said. “He was great.”

  “He can be.” Riley kept his eyes on the path Bianca had taken.

  “What’s a gorget?” asked Matt.

  Riley shook himself like a dog after a bath. It must have helped him shake off whatever was bugging him, because his sunny nature returned. “It’s a piece of armor that protects the neck.”

  “Is it important?”

  “All armor seems important to me.”

  “Why did he call you an apple-john?” Cody asked Riley.

  “It’s an insult from Elizabethan times,” I said. “It means “withered apple.”

  “It does?” said Riley. “I always thought it had something to do with Johnny Appleseed.”

  “Johnny Appleseed was cool,” said Cody.

  “Right?” said Riley. “Right?!”

  “So you’re friends with Angus?” I asked. The energy between the two men was strange—a mix of camaraderie, competition, and something else I couldn’t put my finger on.

  “He’s kind of my friend,” said Riley. “He’s also kind of an asshole.”

  Cody’s eyebrows drew together. He was obviously confused about why someone would be friends with an asshole. I couldn’t say.

  “I’m his squire,” Riley continued. “He trained me. Normally I’d be helping him, handing him lances and stuff, making sure he has his effin’ helmet. But today I get to joust and they thought it’d be cool if I went up against him. Angus doesn’t know it yet, but I’m going to tickle his catastrophe.” Riley grinned. “That’s Ren faire speak for ‘kick his ass.’”

  Chapter 3

  “See you at the arena.” Riley jogged away.

  “Break a leg,” I yelled after him.

  He turned around but kept running, backwards now. “I get to joust!” he shouted, grinning wider than the sky. “I still can’t believe I get paid to be here.”

  “Did he just jog in chain mail?” asked Matt. “In ninety degree heat?”

  I rubbed my shoulder where the boy had hit me. His sword may have been wooden, but it packed a wallop. Again, Matt didn’t notice. I wished I knew what was on his mind.

  We’d been doing fine—better than fine—until just this last week or so.

  Except for a fight last month about me possibly going on tour and not telling him. Could that be it? We’d made up, but maybe my equivocation still bugged him.

  I grabbed Matt’s hand as we all walked into the jousting arena. He gave my hand a gentle squeeze, but didn’t look at me like he usually would. Stop it, Ivy. He was probably just checking out the place.

  The jousting arena looked like a dirt soccer field ringed with bleachers, the middle divided by horizontal “fences”: wooden stanchions topped with railings, like the barriers they use to keep people in line. Several entrances broke up the bleachers: the wide public walkway we’d just entered, and two open gates—one that led to the desert and the other to a staging area. The bleacher areas were divided into four sections, each marked with a different color. We climbed into the green section, as Riley had instructed, but didn’t find four empty seats until almost the top row. Sarah sat down, then jumped back up again. “Ouch!” She frowned at the aluminum bleachers and tugged at her shorts. Matt spread his faire map across the hot metal seat for Cody and Sarah. I did the same for us. We rustled when we sat.

  Cody nodded at my turkey leg. “Are you going to eat that?”

  I shook my head. The tension with Matt had stolen my normally voracious appetite. I handed Cody my untouched turkey leg. Matt frowned at me. “I’m fine,” I lied. I was not about to spoil this outing with my emotional insecurity.

  A bugle blasted through the desert air. Across from us, people dressed in royal-looking Elizabethan costumes filed into a theater-style box covered by an awning.

  “I think that’s the queen,” said Sarah.

  “Ladies and gentlemen!” said a man who stood next to the royal box. “Are you ready to meet your knights?” A roar from the crowds. “Presenting Squire Riley, jousting for the first time today!” The gate opened and Riley rode out on a dappled gray horse, carrying a banner with a green and white coat of arms that matched the cloth covering his horse’s flanks. He stopped in front of the royal box and bowed to the queen, who acknowledged him with a wave. He straightened up and galloped around the perimeter of the arena, the banner streaming behind him. As he rode past the green section, the crowd stood up and cheered. Riley stopped in front of us, raising an arm in greeting. He was helmetless and his grin infectious, even from up high in the bleachers. “Oh my God,” said a young woman near me. “I want that knight for Christmas.”

  The announcer introduced two more knights, then said, “And now, the most notorious—I mean victorious knight of them all, the Knight of the Black Death, Sir Angus!”

  “Really?” Matt said. “He named himself after a plague?”

  A huge black horse burst out of the gate, hooves pounding the dirt. The knight on his back carried a tattered black banner.

  “That symbol on his flag,” whispered Cody. “It’s made of a skull and bones.”

  “It’s creepy,” Sarah said.

  Huh. The courtly knight I’d met earlier did look creepy. Angus had added some pieces of armor so that black spikes jutted out from his shoulders, like a dragon’s hackles. He stopped in front of his section of the crowd. “Arrr!” he yelled, arms in the air. Angus’s section responded in a tribal sort of roar rather than the good-natured yell that had greeted Riley. I reminded myself that the men were just actors playing their parts, a Renaissance riff on good cop, bad cop.

  The announcer introduced two more knights. After all of them had left the field, he explained the rules of the joust, then said, “First on the field of battle: Sir Evan the Blue Knight, and Sir Collier the Red.” The two knights, now helmeted, rode out on horseback, their audience sections cheering wildly. “The rules of chivalry apply. You may salute your opponent.”

  The two men did so, then steered their mounts to opposite ends of the arena. Squires handed them long lances and shields.

  “They have to carry both of those?” said Cody. “How do they stay on their horses?”

  How indeed, I thought as the knights’ steeds flew toward each other. Crack! The blue knight’s lance smacked Red’s shield so hard that the tip of the lance shattered. “Huzzah!” shouted the blue section.

  After a few more passes, it was determined that the blue knight had won that round. The crowd went crazy. You would’ve thought their team had won the Super Bowl.

  “And now,” the announcer lowered his voice, “the most feared knight in Christendom: Sir Angus, the Black Death.” Angus thundered into the arena. He’d painted a slash of black across his helmet so that his eyes looked like bottomless holes. “He’s like a Ringwraith from Lord of the Rings,” whispered Matt.

 
“I was thinking about a horseman of the Apocalypse, but Ringwraith works too,” I whispered back.

  Angus raised his visor. “My squire, whom I trained, dares to challenge me!” he shouted. “I will meet the challenge of this dissembling peasant and put to rest his perfidy, once and for all!”

  The crowd hushed. Angus was some actor, making you feel his intensity even when you couldn’t see his face. His squire handed him his lance.

  “Where is he?” shouted Angus. “Has he run off to hide like the little boy he is?” His horse reared up, then raced around the arena, pulling up just a few feet in front of a squire dressed in green and white. “Where is your master?” shouted Angus. He shook his lance at the sky. “Come and face me, coward!”

  Riley appeared in the gateway to the staging area, suited up in his silver helmet and armor, his shield and lance already in hand. His squire began to run toward him, then veered off as Riley tore around the arena on his gray horse, passing Angus, whose horse reared again, whether on purpose or not I couldn’t tell. Riley stopped at the opposite end of the arena, facing Angus. He and his horse were a head shorter than Angus. A thrill of fear went down my back. How much of this joust was a drama played out for the audience, and how much was a real blood sport?

  “Commence!” said the announcer.

  The horses rocketed toward each other, the knights’ lances pointed at each other. Crack! Angus’s lance glanced off Riley’s shield.

  “Did you see that?” Matt whispered. “It looked like Riley pulled up his lance at the last minute.”

  “I saw.”

  The two horsemen faced each other again. Angus’s monstrous black horse pawed at the ground.

  “Commence!”

  The horses ran straight at each other. Once again, Angus bested Riley. “He pulled up again,” said Matt.

  “I know.” Was this part of the act? Or was Riley scared to go up against Angus? It’d be natural, his first tournament and all.

  “Last pass,” said the announcer.

  Horses and knights lined up again. “On to victory!” shouted Angus. His section of the crowd roared with him.

  “A cheer for the green knight,” said a wench dressed in Riley’s colors. Our huzzah sounded puny next to the primitive yell of Angus’s crowd.

  “Commence!”

  The horses charged. Riley stampeded toward Angus so fast he was almost a blur.

  “Now he’s going for it,” I said.

  Crack! Riley’s lance slammed into Angus’s head. Angus’s shield and lance went flying. His body followed. It landed in the dirt with a thud.

  “What happened?” asked Sarah.

  I didn’t reply. I was too busy watching Riley ride out of the open gate into the desert beyond.

  Chapter 4

  Angus lay in the dirt. He didn’t move. His squire ran over and knelt beside him.

  “Don’t worry,” I said to Cody and Sarah. “He’s just acting.” But I didn’t take my eyes off Angus. None of us did, but it didn’t matter how hard we stared, he didn’t move.

  “Is there a doctor in the house?” the announcer asked. “If so, could he or she please proceed to the arena? Everyone else, please exit the jousting area in an orderly fashion, beginning with the first rows of bleachers.”

  People surged out of their seats. They didn’t exit but crowded together at the guardrail, straining to see through the small ring of people that now surrounded Angus. The squires and costumed wenches who’d been leading the cheers tried futilely to keep order. Our little group couldn’t move.

  “Riley hurt him,” Cody said.

  “I think so,” Matt said.

  “But why?” Cody asked.

  “I’m sure it was an accident.”

  “But why did he ride away?” I said. “And why isn’t anyone going after him? Hey!” I shouted as loud as I could. “Shouldn’t someone go after Riley?”

  Even my actor-voice wasn’t loud enough to cut through the hubbub. “Hey,” I tried again. “Hey!”

  Finally the red squire looked my way. I pointed at the open gate. “Shouldn’t someone go after Riley?” I must’ve gotten through to him because he turned toward his knight, when a hush fell. The crowd turned like one body toward the gate that led to the staging area—where Riley stood in his chain mail. “What’s going on?” He stumbled into the arena, rubbing his head. “Where’s my helmet? And my horse?”

  For a moment, people stood still, unsure where the greater drama lie. Then a few of them rushed toward Riley. I joined them, leaping over bleachers. Snatches of conversation hit my ears: “What the hell?!”

  “Who was that jouster?”

  “Is the other guy dead?”

  I finally got close to Riley. “What happened?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I was almost ready. I had just put on my helmet and...that’s the last thing I remember.” He rubbed his head again. “My head hurts.” He pointed to the ring of people surrounding Angus. “What’s going on over there?”

  I didn’t answer. Riley’s eyes looked glazed. “Sit down for a minute, okay?” I said.

  Riley began to sit, then collapsed. He lay there sprawled in the dirt, smiling up at me as if this kind of thing happened every day.

  “Could we get some water over here?” I shouted to the crowd. “Some medical attention?”

  A woman ran up with a bottle of water. “I’m a nurse.”

  “I think he may have been hit on the head,” I said. “Can you check for a concussion?’”

  “Do you have a headache?” she asked Riley.

  “Yeah.”

  “Feel like vomiting?”

  “Now that you mention it...” Riley began to heave and I turned away, not just to escape his barf but to check out the staging area. Lots of footprints and hoof prints, but no sign of anyone, nothing that could tell me what happened.

  “I think he should get checked out,” the nurse said to me. “Someone called 911 for, uh,” she motioned toward Angus. “We’ll have them take a look at this knight too.”

  “Riley,” I said. “His name is Riley McFarlane.”

  “What?” said Riley. “You rang?”

  I watched the nurse cover Riley’s vomit with a faire map, but my mind was busy elsewhere. Something was wrong. But what? So much was wrong, the addled Riley, the too-still Angus...ah. I intercepted the Red Knight who was walking past. “Hey,” I said. “Did you catch the fake Riley?”

  “That’s what my squire was trying to say.” The knight turned around and ran toward his horse and jumped into the saddle. “I will catch him!” he called to me, and rode his horse out of the gate into the desert.

  Matt came up next to me. “I sent Cody and Sarah back to the faire. Told them we’d call Sarah’s cell when we were ready to leave.” We rejoined Riley’s group, where an EMT was shining a penlight in his eyes. “You probably have a mild concussion. Did you lose consciousness?”

  “For a minute or two.”

  “And it looks like you vomited.” The EMT nodded to the lumpy place in the dirt covered by the map.

  “Yeah,” said Riley. “But it could’ve been the steak-on-a-stake I ate right before the joust. Or the funnel cake. Or the fish and chips.”

  “I think we should take you in to the hospital, just to be sure,” said the EMT.

  “No. No way. I heard how much that costs.”

  “Riley,” I said gently.

  “Seriously, I’ve been hit on the head way harder than this.” That could explain a few things. “No hospital.”

  “All right.” The EMT stood up and brushed the dirt off his knees. “But can someone check on you every so often, just to make sure you’re okay?”

  “Yeah. Bianca can.”

  “The woman we met earlier?” I asked

  “Yeah. She’s my girlfriend.”

  �
�She is?” This was the first Riley had mentioned a girlfriend. I remembered the woman running in the dirt street, Angus kissing her on the lips, the tightness in Riley’s face as he watched them.

  “Yeah. We live together, in her fifth-wheel. It’s cool. Much better than my tent.”

  Right then, Bianca appeared at the entrance to the stadium, disheveled and panting. She stood there, looking back and forth between Angus and Riley. Finally, she ran toward us. “I was doing my show,” she said. “I just heard—” she looked over her shoulder at the medical personnel surrounding Angus. “What happened?’

  “Hi babe.” Riley grinned at her affectionately. “Not sure. I think someone hit me on the head.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. I got a head like a rock.”

  “And what about...?” She turned again toward Angus. We’d kept Riley’s back to the spectacle, not saying anything about it. Better for him to find out when his head was clear.

  Riley followed Bianca’s gaze. Hope his head was clear enough now. “Wha?” His mouth dropped open.

  The EMTs lifted a stretcher. Angus lay on it, his head and neck in a brace, his face covered by an oxygen mask, his body uncannily still.

  “Oh, Riley.” Tears spilled onto Bianca’s cheeks. “What did you do?”

  Chapter 5

  Riley waved at the stretcher. “I didn’t do that.” The EMTs loaded Angus into an ambulance parked at the gate where the jouster had escaped. “Right? Right?”

  “No. You couldn’t have done that.” I explained what happened, to him and to Bianca.

  “Bastard.” Riley stood up and turned in circles like he was trying to figure out where to go or who to fight. “He stole my helmet.” He held up his bare hands. “And my gauntlets. That’s expensive shit. Bastard.” He stopped turning, stricken, and sat back down in the dirt. “And my horse. Oh my god, he stole Thunder. We have to get him back.”