We’d arranged to meet on Wednesday.


    Winged Ones don’t use a seven-day week. They go entirely by phases of the moon, with a different name for each of the twenty-eight—or twenty-nine, when their astrologers call for it—days in their shifting months. They do not find our seven-day cycles particularly odd, however. They can see from above how we subdivide everything: our fields, our towns, our mountains. Ourselves. Creatures of walls and roads and fences are we; of course, they reason, we would quarter our months.


    I still had to explain Wednesday to Sheshef, however, as the name meant nothing to her. To her, that day was Hesh, the thirteenth day of the month, just before the full moon. A day of merriment and adventure, as were all the five days of lunar fullness, when the Winged Ones could see well enough to be up all night, weather permitting. On the other end of the cycle, the five days of the new-moon darkness were for rest and renewal; making amends for quarrels, co-preening, taking long, uninterrupted naps. The remaining eighteen days were for the typical labors of their kind.


    Sheshef could go where she wished on Hesh. Adventures were encouraged.


    Alas, I had school.


    And, as of late, my afternoons were spoken for almost every day of the week. On Mondays, I had music. I was not very good at it. I had no ear for tune, and little interest in the purported social advantages, so although my hands were nimble and my sense of rhythm was good, the classes eventually devolved to me accompanying the music teacher on a drum as he worked out his latest composition, or else tuning the harpsichord. It was always going flat.


    On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I had fencing. I was supposed to, at least; in practice, the classes actually occurred perhaps one time out of every four. I meant to change that, however, via means not yet clear to myself. I was determined to beat Francesca if ever we were to cross swords again. So those afternoons were out now, too.


    On Fridays, I had deportment. It filled my afternoon with forks and manners, graces and addresses, bows and titles and endless, endless genealogy. I dreaded it more than music.


    Saturdays were for cleaning; of myself, of my chambers, and of whatever corner of the villa Renella felt would best be suited to the task of ensuring I did not grow into a useless lordling. In retrospect, this was one of her better parenting decisions, but I was not in a frame of mind to appreciate it at the time. Soldays were for chapel, of course, and ever since my bout of “illness” had resulted in a whirligig, I had been set to some task or other that left me thoroughly supervised after prayer had concluded.


    So it had to be Wednesday.


    But before that was Tuesday.


    Typically, I would be taken by carriage back to the villa. The distance wasn’t particularly far, and I wouldn’t have minded the walk, but Renella insisted that I be transported in a manner befitting my station. So on I would get, and the poor horses would have to haul myself, the driver, and the creaking old carriage up a dusty and very, very vertical series of switchbacks, snorting and blowing irritably. I didn’t blame them. I tried to sneak them extra apples whenever I could.


    On Tuesdays, I would alight from the carriage, divest myself of my schoolbag, eat a plate of bread and cheese and fruit—fresh fruit in summer, dried the rest of the year—and descend to the piste in the armory, there to amuse myself in solitude while awaiting a teacher who rarely came. I had tried on most of the suits of armor by age twelve, waiting for the man, and damaged at least one mace by overestimating my ability to heft it and sending it thudding to the floor instead. I barely managed to get it back on the rack.


    But not this Tuesday.


    As soon as I climbed into the carriage, I slid open the quarter window and called, “Giacomo.”


    Giacomo startled, badly. He was never as comfortable with people as he was with horses, and given that I had never addressed him as he drove before, I did not fault the nervousness of his voice as he replied, “Yes, Master deRye?”


    “We’re not going straight home. We’re picking up Master Fiore in town first.”


    “We are?”The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    “Yes.”


    Giacomo swallowed anxiously. “The Lady made no mention of this, Master.”


    I considered my next words carefully. Some instinct told me I could very effectively bully the man—simply order him around, insist that I had the right as Master deRye—but I was either too kind or too cowardly. Possibly both. So instead I said, “I am confident she would approve. She’s getting barely a quarter of the fencing lessons she’s paying for. I’ll vouch for you if there’s any trouble.”


    “As you say, Master deRye.” Giacomo clucked at the horses and snapped the reins. I closed the window and settled back as they set off, carriage swaying.


    I had never been to the fencing master’s abode before. In fact, I had no idea where he even lived. I trusted Giacomo to know, and he did. Master Fiore evidently let a room over a flower shop in the heart of town, just across the street from the tavern responsible for his recurrent absenteeism. I gazed idly out the window at the passers-by as I waited for Giacomo to fetch him, drumming my fingers on the sill.


    A few townspeople gawked, but the carriage was not an uncommon sight—Renella made a point of being “active in the local community,” as she liked to put it—and enough word had filtered out from the school that I was not a freak, but rather a disappointingly ordinary boy, that I was no longer an object of particular interest. More attention was being garnered by the itinerant tinker who had set up shop by the fountain.


    Giacomo crossed from one side of the street to the other—apparently, Master Fiore was not at home—and entered the tavern. A short while later, both men emerged. Giacomo was all but carrying the fencing master, who kept slurring something plaintive. I couldn’t hear what it was, but the result was Giacomo becoming very red in the face and slinging the drunk into the carriage with me with uncharacteristic roughness and slamming the door.


    He looked muzzily up at me from the general vicinity of my feet and mumbled, “Fencing?”


    Now, then, was the time to be a bully.


    “Yes,” I said, as haughtily as I could manage, “fencing. We are paying you to teach me the blade. Sober up and do as you’re paid to.”


    Somewhat to my shock, the act worked. Master Fiore scrambled to his feet, lurching unsteadily as the carriage started off, and fell into the seat opposite me. He rubbed his bloodshot eyes and grated out, “Is there water?”


    “Yes. At the villa.”


    He rubbed his eyes again. “Would very much appreciate some water,” he muttered. His breath was sour.


    “Good thing we’re going to the villa, then.”


    Pure Renella tartness was spilling from my mouth—and it was working. Master Fiore put his head in his hands and remained silent for the remainder of the trip. I marveled.


    Without being asked, Giacomo hauled the fencing master back out of the coach and treated him to a complimentary head-dunking in the watering trough once we arrived. The man emerged spluttering and coughing and fighting mad, but clearly more in possession of his wits. Giacomo said nothing the entire time he was berated; he simply glowered in stony silence until the imprecations petered out. I, for one, was delighted by the impromptu vocabulary lesson. If nothing else happened this afternoon, it was already a win.


    “All right,” he growled, once the two of us were alone at the piste. He was still dripping a little. “What’s this really about?”


    “I need to win a duel.”


    That caught his interest immediately. “Oh? To the death?”


    “No,” I said, taken aback. “Just a regular duel.”


    “That’s all?”


    I stared. “I’m twelve.”


    “Oh. Right.” He worked some water out of his ear with his pinkie and flicked it to the floor. “For your honor, then?”


    I considered it. “Sort of,” I said at last. “It’s complicated.”


    “It always is.” Master Fiore began to stretch, and indicated I should do the same. I bent over obediently to touch my toes. “Tell me about your opponent.”


    “Taller,” I said at once, speaking into my knees. “And a year older.”


    “Mmm.” He straightened and began to loosen his shoulders. “Training?”


    “Regular,” I said, somewhat acidly. He grunted. “But probably not very rigorous.”


    “Why do you think that?” He stepped into a lunge.


    I took a deep breath. “Because she’s a girl.”


    The fencing master straightened at once. “You’re dueling a girl.” His voice was flat.


    “More like sparring,” I admitted.


    “You were beaten by a girl.” I could hear the horror growing in his voice.


    “It was a tie,” I snapped. “And I am a good pupil. Everybody knows it. So who do you think will catch the blame?”


    He cursed under his breath, no longer even remotely aloof. “Who else knows?”


    “I didn’t tell anyone,” I replied. “No knowing what she’s said to whom.”


    His eyes burned. “All right,” he growled again. “Let’s begin.”


    I went to bed that night exhausted, aching, and bruised, but grimly satisfied.


    We’d see who needed more practice next time Francesca and I met.