Time for Another Tease

 

Book 2 in the Twins of Bellesfées series has gone to the publisher. What can you expect? Well, it's called Femmes Fatales for a good reason! Have a little peek:

 

Mr. Smith cleared his throat. He seemed ill at ease. “I don’t wish to alarm you overmuch. Only, what you say about the dead child… In my youth—that is, my sister—” 

He paused, and they waited anxiously as he organized his thoughts. Finally, he drew a deep breath and released it in a sigh, his eyes no longer lit.  

“I have a sister. Dear to me. Very dear. When she was about your age, Madame Duval, she went to reside with our aunt, and together they moved to Bratislava, on the border of Austria and Hungary. Our aunt was a devout woman, and they made many visits to the local convents, doing works of charity with the good sisters there for a few years. The sisters told a tale, one repeated throughout the region, of someone who stalked women during the night. Young women, young girls of the villages, would fall ill, weak and listless. Then they were found dead, and deathly white rather than blue or mottled, as if they had been drained of their blood. They said—and I am only repeating my sister’s story—they said it was a vampire.”

Jacqueline wrinkled her nose. Ghosts. Revenants. Sorcerers. Now a vampire. More dire myths and legends come to life, invading Jacqueline’s ordered world of science and logic. She sighed and rubbed her brow. De Guise gave a quiet grunt of agreement.

Mr. Smith glanced from one to the other, confused by their lack of horror. “Perhaps you have already heard this tale. I counted it as peasant superstition, as did my sister. But superstition aside, something has killed a child and attacked two women here in Forge-à-Bellesfées.”

“Only women.” Jacqueline glowered. “I’m sick of attacks on women!”