“Believe it,” said Jay, examining his sword.
“We’ll see,” Chad said with a smirk, but he didn’t have his usual overconfident tone and his curls appeared a tad wilted.
“Something wrong, man?” asked Jay.
Chad shrugged. “Nothing. Audrey dumped me. Whatever.”
“Oh, that’s too bad,” said Jay. “Sorry about that.”
“It just doesn’t make any sense!” wailed Chad, adjusting his face mask.
The coach blew his whistle to start the match. Chad tapped his sword against Jay’s. “Let’s go!”
“En garde!” said the referee. “Prets. Allez!” On guard. Ready. Go.
“Allez,” said Jay, pulling down his face mask. He raised his sword as Chad did the same. On the balcony circling the courtyard, a group of cheerleaders and random students gathered to watch the match.
Chad came out swinging, literally, and Jay feinted and parried, advanced and attacked. If the breakup with Audrey had affected Chad, he didn’t show it. Years of lessons had turned him into a graceful and formidable swordsman. But Jay held his ground, executing riposte after riposte.
“You’ve gotten better,” said Chad. “But not good enough.”
Jay snorted. Chad moved left, seeing an opening, and Jay feinted right. But at the very last moment, he struck toward the left, his sword coming up underneath Chad’s chin in a decisive victory. “Touché!” Jay called triumphantly, breathing hard from exertion.
The whistle blew, signaling the end of the match.
Chad removed his face mask in annoyance. “You cheated!”
Jay hesitated, but the coach was clapping his hands, and there were cheers from the balcony. Jay looked up and saluted Mal, Evie, and Carlos, who had come to support him.
“It’s a legal move,” said the coach. “He won fair and square. Good job, Jay. Welcome to R.O.A.R.”
Chad threw his sword and shield down on the mat in disgust.
“Thanks,” said Jay, grinning widely.
“You beat the captain of the team,” said the coach.
“Chad was captain?”
“Not anymore,” said the coach. “Now you are.”
Chad stormed off in agony. He’d lost his pride and his captaincy all in one fell swoop.
“Good job,” said Lonnie, who’d been watching from the balcony.
“Thanks,” said Jay, pleased with how everything had turned out. He smiled when he realized he hadn’t even had to steal anything to get what he wanted. He’d done it all by playing by the rules.
“Turn around, let me see it twirl,” said Evie, as Arabella stood in the middle of the room in her Cotillion dress. Arabella spun, and the dress floated gracefully around her ankles.
“It’s gorgeous!”
“You’re gorgeous in it,” said Evie, and she took a few pins, adjusted the pleats on the neckline, and fluffed the sleeves.
The dress was an exact replica of Ariel’s dress, a pale lavender color with silver accents, but with a few Evie touches—brocade instead of plain silk, a few more layers of taffeta to accentuate the waist, and lace instead of satin ribbon around the sleeves.
Arabella was back to her old fun self now that the trident had been returned to the museum, and her grandfather had no inkling of the danger she had brought to the kingdom. “What are you wearing to Cotillion?” she asked, still admiring herself in the mirror.
“I haven’t even started on my dress,” said Evie. “I haven’t had any time for myself, I’ve had so many orders to fulfill for all the other events coming up first.”
“How did you learn to sew so well?” asked Arabella, as she removed the garment and changed into her jeans and T-shirt.
“Back on the Isle,” said Evie, putting Arabella’s dress in a garment bag and zipping it up, “I was castle-schooled. I spent a lot of time at home, and I had to amuse myself.”
“The Isle of the Lost must have been good for something, then,” said Arabella with a smile.
“Yeah, I guess it was,” said Evie. “I’m never going back, though.”
“Of course not.” Arabella shuddered. “Who would ever want to go back there?”
Evie nodded. The past was past, and it was time to concentrate on what the future would bring. She escorted Evie out of the door just as it opened again.
“Hi-ho,” said Doug, who’d shown up to take her to dinner.
“Hey, Doug.” She gave him an affectionate hug. “I’ll be ready in a sec, I just have to make a few more adjustments to this dress,” she said, taking out the beautiful blue-and-gold dress that she’d hidden from Arabella.
Doug took a seat at her desk and saw all the messy receipts, calculations, and dress orders. “Is this how you’re keeping track of all your clients?” he asked.
Evie glanced over and looked embarrassed. “I’ve been meaning to get organized, I just haven’t had time. Orders keep piling up, and I need all my free time to sew.”
“Here, let me do it,” said Doug, taking his laptop out of his backpack. “I’ll make a spreadsheet and keep track of payments.”
“You will?” she asked.
“Yeah, dwarfs are really good accountants. We have to be, with all the diamonds and jewels in the mine,” he explained.
“That would be such a great help!” she enthused, watching as he began to plug numbers into a column.
They worked side by side for a moment, Evie on the dress and Doug filing away all the order slips. When he was done he showed her the invoicing system he’d set up. “So you just enter the name here, and then the dress here, and the amount here,” he explained.
“You are a lifesaver!” she said. “Oh, and I came up with a name for my label.”
“Yeah?”
“Evie’s 4 Hearts. You like it?” she asked. “I got it from Mal’s spell. You know, the one that says ‘The Power of Four Hearts Are Better than One.’”
Doug smiled. “I love it.”
Evie sat back down at her sewing machine. Doug watched her thread a needle. “Oh, and Evie?” he said finally.
“Yes?” she asked, the needle in her teeth.
“I’ve been meaning to ask, will you be my date for Cotillion?” he said nervously.
“Me?” she said coyly.
“Um, I don’t see any other princesses in the room?” he said. “Unless you’d rather go with a prince?” His shoulders slumped.
“Why would I do that when I have you?” Evie said warmly. “Of course I’ll be your date. I’m honored. I was wondering when you would ask me, actually.”
Doug mopped his forehead in relief. “I still can’t believe you’re real, that we’re real. It’s like a fairy tale.”
“Fairy tales come true,” said Evie with her sweetest smile.
“By the way, where were you guys?” asked Doug. “I was looking all over for you the other day.”
Evie put away the dress and grabbed her purse. “Oh, let’s just say we had a little excitement under the sea. But we’ve got to hurry. Ben wants us all there in five minutes. So I’ll tell you all about it at dinner.”