‘It’s a pleasure to meet you again, mimic,’ Geralt said coldly.

The doppler was breathing heavily and hoarsely.

‘Leave me alone,’ it finally grunted. ‘Why are you tormenting me, Witcher?’

‘Tellico,’ Geralt said, ‘You’re asking foolish questions. In order to come into possession of Biberveldt’s horses and identity, you cut his head open and abandoned him in the wilds. You’re still making use of his personality and ignoring the problems you are causing him. The Devil only knows what else you’re planning, but I shall confuse those plans, in any event. I don’t want to kill you or turn you over to the authorities, but you must leave the city. I’ll see to it that you do.’

‘And if I don’t want to?’

‘I’ll carry you out in a sack on a handcart.’

The doppler swelled up abruptly, and then suddenly became thinner and began to grow, his curly, chestnut hair turning white and straightening, reaching his shoulders. The halfling’s green waistcoat shone like oil, becoming black leather, and silver studs sparkled on the shoulders and sleeves. The chubby, ruddy face elongated and paled.

The hilt of a sword extended above its right shoulder.

‘Don’t come any closer,’ the second Witcher said huskily and smiled. ‘Don’t come any nearer, Geralt. I won’t let you lay hands on me.’

What a hideous smile I have, Geralt thought, reaching for his sword. What a hideous face I have. And how hideously I squint. So is that what I look like? Damn.

The hands of the doppler and the Witcher simultaneously touched their sword hilts, and both swords simultaneously sprang from their scabbards. Both witchers simultaneously took two quick, soft steps; one to the front, the other to the side. Both of them simultaneously raised their swords and swung them in a short, hissing moulinet.

Simultaneously, they both stopped dead, frozen in position.

‘You cannot defeat me,’ the doppler snarled. ‘Because I am you, Geralt.’

‘You are mistaken, Tellico,’ the Witcher said softly. ‘Drop your sword and resume Biberveldt’s form. Otherwise you’ll regret it, I warn you.’

‘I am you,’ the doppler repeated. ‘You will not gain an advantage over me. You cannot defeat me, because I am you!’

‘You cannot have any idea what it means to be me, mimic.’

Tellico lowered the hand gripping the sword.

‘I am you,’ he repeated.

‘No,’ the Witcher countered, ‘you are not. And do you know why? Because you’re a poor, little, good-natured doppler. A doppler who, after all, could have killed Biberveldt and buried his body in the undergrowth, by so doing gaining total safety and utter certainty that he would not be unmasked, ever, by anybody, including the halfling’s spouse, the famous Gardenia Biberveldt. But you didn’t kill him, Tellico, because you didn’t have the courage. Because you’re a poor, little, good-natured doppler, whose close friends call him Dudu. And whoever you might change into you’ll always be the same. You only know how to copy what is good in us, because you don’t understand the bad in us. That’s what you are, doppler.’