ONE IF BY LAND, TWO IF BY SUBMARINE

CHAPTER 1

Thirteen-year-old Kep Westguard followed one rule: out-hustle your competition. That simple. His MO: 110 percent, every minute, every practice. He'd competed against stronger swimmers, more talented swimmers, but never a swimmer who put in more effort or lane time. 

Three straight days out of the pool? Didn't happen. Ever. 

Till now. 

Kep gritted his teeth. Not a chlorinated pool in sight. Stuck at this crazy Revolutionary War reenactment camp, he had two choices: go hard or go home. And he'd bust a gut before he quit. He needed that prize money and he'd do anything to get it—anything! Which was why he'd been playing toy soldier for the last seventy-two hours.

Despite marching on blistered feet under a blazing sun, the strap to his wooden canteen cutting into his right shoulder, and his whole body steam- ing in a heavy wool Continental Army uniform, Kep refused to complain, even to himself.

Winners never quit. Quitters never win. As he thumped his drum every other step, he repeated the mantra to the beat. Not that the beat was particularly steady. His lifetime percussion experience consisted of that morning's thirty-minute crash course from the camp's official drum and fife corps, and his playing reflected it. He couldn't even dodge his own drum, which banged his knee every other step.

To his left, his little brother Max puffed along, trying to get enough wind to blow a few tuneless shrieks out of his fife.

Kep cringed at each note. "Can't be much farther," he whispered out the side of his mouth. Talking wasn't allowed in the ranks.

Max nodded miserably, his uniform hanging off his bony shoulders. Small and skinny for his age, his favorite pastimes were reading ginormous history books and doing science experiments in their basement back home. A five-mile military march in the heat and humidity of a Wisconsin summer didn't make the top five hundred on the list of fun things to do.

A twinge of guilt jabbed at Kep when Max used the back of his hand to rub peeling layers of sunburned skin off his nose. Max's normally vam- pire-pale skin—a result of preferring libraries to outdoor activities—had turned a painful-looking bright pink, and Kep was partly to blame. Camp guidelines discouraged the use of modern products including toothpaste, mouthwash, dental floss, deodorant, and sunscreen. And Kep had urged Max not to unpack any of the stuff Mom had sent; they had to follow every camp guideline, no matter how dumb. "Maybe the judges dock us if they catch a whiff of minty-fresh breath. Bad breath and BO, that's period appropriate."

Kep had quickly figured out that Fort Liberty, the name of their camp, prized historical accuracy above all. It went way beyond avoiding personal care products. There were no computers, no electric lights, no flush toilets, and no toilet paper. At the latrine, the softest corncobs went first.

As they marched along the dirt road, thick noon heat pressed around them and sweat dribbled from under Kep's tricorn hat into his eyes, making a blur of the stars and stripes held high by the flag bearer ahead. That guy looked old enough to be someone's grandpa, and considering his beet-red face and Santa-sized gut, Kep hoped the camp had an historically inaccurate defibrillator stashed somewhere just in case.

But the old guy didn't miss a step even as mosquitoes swarmed from hedges to attack. With bug spray also on the period inappropriate list, the flying bloodsuckers enjoyed total victory. Swatting at them was like spitting to douse a bonfire.

Like the flag bearer, the other forty or so adult reenactors advanced grim-faced, rifles at their shoulders, taking this fake battle march scary seriously. Kep thought they were kinda old for war games. But no judgment. For all he knew, the final competition would involve a march and if so, he needed all the practice he could get.