Page 35 of The Hopeless Romantic’s Guide to Enchantment

“I was—” I begin, waving at the window.

He puts a finger to his lips and whispers, “You have almost escaped. Do not ruin it now.”

I am escaping – from the scene of a murder – and so I open my mouth to protest that it is not as it seems. Then I see his grin. He thinks I’m a young woman escaping the watchful eye of a parent or husband.

I dip in a shallow curtsy. “Thank you, sir.”

As he sets the pitchfork upright, I glance along the narrow passage. When I entered the house this way, I mistakenly believed it a safe entrance, but the alley seems to be used as a shortcut. I really do need to be more careful.

I bid the young man farewell, but when I set out, he heads in the same direction.

“I do not believe I have seen you about town,” he says. “Though I am fairly new myself. Apprenticed to Aran, the blacksmith. Do you know him?”

“Not personally, but I have heard the name. It is a good job to have.”

“Good enough.” A jingle as he shakes coins in his pocket. “Even better on payday. I don’t suppose I could interest you in a pint?”

When I glance over, he raises a hand. “Just a drink and conversation. As I said, I am new to town.”

I must look suspicious, but that’s how I always look, and this young man gives off no sense that I would be in danger if I said yes… or if I said no. Both can be treacherous ground for a young woman. I peer at him in the moonlight, with his easy smile and cloudless blue eyes, and I wish I could say yes. Just as I some times wish for a place to lay my head for more than a night or two, I sometimes wish to live the life of a normal young woman, free to say yes to a drink with a handsome young man.

All right, on another night, I would have said yes. While I play the role of virgin when monster scenarios require it, I have not been one for years. No one ever checks; they’re just happy to have a sacrificial victim.

Tonight, though, I have no time to dally, and I regret it because that smile says this is a young man I would not mind dallying with.

“I am so sorry,” I say. “But I slipped out on urgent business.”

“Ah.” A moment of silence. Then, “May I escort you wherever you are going? It is late for a young woman to be about. I heard whispers from other towns. They say…” He clears his throat. “Well, I will not repeat what they say, but it is cause for concern.”

That has my steps slowing. The murders I have been tracking are horrific, and news does travel fast between towns, but the killer has been careful with their pattern, never striking settlements close enough together that they are likely to have heard of the body it left in the last one.

Still, this young man said he is new to town. It is possible he comes from someplace where news of several of the deaths has coalesced. And yet…

“That is very kind of you,” I say, and I take his hand and squeeze it.

The sudden touch of my hand on his surprises him, and his eyes shimmer from blue to brown to yellow before snapping back to blue, which is exactly what I was watching for. I have my dagger at his throat before he can react.

“Doppelgänger,” I whisper.

He blinks those innocent blue eyes. “What?”

I back him against the wall at knifepoint. “You know what I said.”

“I heard a word, miss, but I do not know the language.” He tries for a laugh. “I suppose I should not have been jingling a pocketful of coins and bragging about payday. You were not slipping out of that house. You were robbing it. No matter. Take my coins and—”

“I am going to take more than your coins, monster.”

“I do not know—”

I kick him in the shin. Again, he doesn’t expect that, and his eyes shift.

“Doppelgänger,” I repeat through clenched teeth. “Your eyes cannot hold their color when you are startled. You killed the young woman in that house. Killed her and took her hands.”

His shoulders slump, and disappointment settles in my stomach. I chide myself for it. What had I hoped? That there just happened to be another of this very rare species in town?

“I was hoping she had not struck yet,” he says.

“She?”