For a bravo, the pitfalls of a tychistic view of the universe are many. No matter how polished your blade or your reputation, you could die betrayed by a loose flagstone or a stumbling thrust. And that’s just if you fight without flourish, without scrambling along trestles or snatching axes off the wall; without the whole point.

The downside to a deterministic view, conversely, is simple: the grim mathematics of the duel.

Verlaine will take the former, thanks. She whets her lucky coin on the same stone as her rapier. On a soft surface, she can make it land on edge.