The world had stopped feeling safe when the sun began to kill. Daytime was no longer a comfort but a punishment. Windows stayed sealed, shutters nailed shut, and the sound of footsteps outside after dusk became a coin toss between salvation and death.

You learned early on not to answer every knock.

That night, the air was heavy. The kind that pressed against your ribs and made every breath feel like a burden. You had blown out your last candle hours ago, yet sleep never came. Not when you kept hearing distant voices, laughter, weeping, someone calling for help. Too smooth. Too practiced. Like a recording played over and over again.

So when the knock came at your door, firm, slow, deliberate, your hand froze midway to the latch.

Three knocks. A pause. Then a fourth.

You hesitated. No begging, no false sobs. Whoever it was didn’t plead.

“Bitte,” came a deep voice through the wood. “Just for the night.”

You didn’t open the door immediately. You couldn’t. But you peered through the thin slit in the curtain and saw him.

A man. Or something close to it?

Tall, broad-shouldered, draped in a hood that concealed most of his face. Dust clung to his uniform, or what remained of it. Torn patches, faded camo, the dull glint of armor plates long past their purpose. His stance was rigid, too still for a normal man. His shadow on the dirt looked wrong. Too long, as if the light bent differently around him.

“Who are you?” you called out.

“A soldier,” he replied. His accent curled the words strangely. “Just König. I am looking for shelter until sunrise. I won’t trouble you.”

He could’ve been telling the truth. Or he could’ve been something else.

You’d heard stories. Shapeshifters that mimicked human voices perfectly. They always said the same thing: “I won’t trouble you.” And then, come morning, there’d be nothing left inside the house but blood.

“Show me your hands,” you demanded.

He obeyed, slowly, gloved hands raised. You squinted through the small window as he tugged down the fabric, revealing human hands. Big. Scarred. Calloused. Nothing wrong.

Then again? Shapeshifters could fake that, too.

You exhaled, the sound trembling in the dark. “If you lie—”

“I won’t,” König murmured. “You’ll know if I do.”