Readers,

Hi, sorry it's taken me so long to get this done and up. I have been considering alternate titles for this story, including, All Astonishment, The Darcy Debacle, and simply Being Mr. Darcy. If you prefer one, please let me know. Happy Spring!

Best,

Grace

It was Mr. Collin's satisfied smile that infuriated Darcy. How dare the cretin take such liberties with Elizabeth's reputation by visiting here? Darcy again fought the urge to strike the man.

"Collins!" Darcy's voice roiled with emotion. "What are you about intruding on a private space like this?"

Collin's smile returned, flickering briefly. "I will not tell anyone if you do not."

Odious man. Darcy squeezed his fists into balls and wondered how hard Elizabeth's hand could hit. Probably harder than he guessed. Though he loathed fighting, Darcy himself knew how to land a solid punch. And he was discovering that Elizabeth Bennet was stronger than she appeared.

Collin's smile curved upward. "But cousin, we have not had our promised dance." As he spoke, Collin's eyes raked over Elizabeth's figure suggestively.

"For God's sake!"

Light streamed in as another figure appeared from behind the curtain. For a moment, the figure was blotted by light and difficult to make out, but Darcy could see it was tall and almost certainly male. And oddly familiar.

Mr. Darcy stood, looking more dashing than he remembered himself appearing. Somehow Elizabeth Bennet was a better Darcy than he.

Collins startled and bowed deeply to the taller man. "Mr. Darcy."

Elizabeth's Darcy flashed a devil-may-care grin as she took them both in. "Miss Bennet, I have come to collect the dance you promised."

Collins sputtered in protest but paused when the taller gentleman held out his hand for Elizabeth Bennet to take. Darcy took the arm immediately if only to get away from Collins.

"Forgive me, Mr. Collins," Darcy said cheerfully as they passed under the curtain and out into the bustling dance floor.

"Thank goodness you came upon us," Darcy said lowly, still reeling from the shock of being cornered by Collins.

Elizabeth glanced at him sharply. "Yes, I was beginning to worry I might find you affianced to my cousin if I did not."

"I can assure you we were not in any danger of that. Collins wished to dance, the cretin."

Elizabeth sighed and for the first time Darcy could smell brandy on her breath. "I do hope you understand how much I dislike the man, and how much I wish to avoid being alone with him."

Here Darcy nearly stopped. "Of course I do. Let me assure you that you–or rather, I–were in no danger."

"Oh yes, you seemed completely in control of that incident," Elizabeth said.

Heat flooded Darcy's neck. "I was." He watched as other couples move out of their way, realizing they were in the middle of the dance floor. He leaned in and sniffed near her. "Have you been drinking?" he whispered.

"Just a glass or two with Bingley. Perhaps three. Shall we?"

People were watching them out of the corner of his vision. They were eyeing him especially, he realized, taking in his dress, his hair, even the small ear bobs he wore. He had thought he'd been the subject of conversation as Mr. Darcy–and he had been, but never with the same intensity now that he was Elizabeth. Both men and women judged his face, his figure, and even his gestures. He felt their heavy gazes in a way he hadn't before. From the men, there was an almost predatory sense coming off some of them. Everywhere he moved, he felt eyes on him, always searching Elizabeth out. He had no idea women had to be so careful and guarded. It was like being a gazelle in a pride of lions. He felt their desire as he moved around even simply taking a turn across a room. As Darcy, he simply moved about, doing what he wanted–within reason for society, of course–but now he felt the sly judgments all around him as though they waited for him to fail. Frankly, it was exhausting.

The music started. He nearly took her hand but remembered to wait to let her lead.

"I do not know how you do this," he said.

Elizabeth cocked her head. "Do what?"

"Be you, be stared at all day. By everyone. And judged. There is not a single moment you are left to your own society. And the men…"

Now Elizabeth's lips quirked upward. "You are finding being female taxing?"

Darcy huffed as he allowed his partner to step first. "They attempt to converse with you at every possible moment. It is exhausting."

Elizabeth smirked a bit, nodding. "You should try walking into town alone."

Darcy's eyes widened. "I wouldn't dare. I hope you know better than to take such risks. They say the vilest things! Why just yesterday, I was called….shan't mention it in mixed company."

Elizabeth looked merely amused. Was she really so nonplussed about being treated thus?

"I can assure you it was not at all pleasant. Some members of this town should be locked up."

Elizabeth spoke lowly. "You must have observed male behavior before, even if you were not the subject of it."

"Well, yes, at times…" he chose his work carefully, "...vulgar men sometimes spoke to women in that manner, but they were…" he paused, "not gentlemen's daughters as you are."

He thought she might be shocked, but she just smiled and patted his arm. "Fear not, I'll try to keep you safe."

"Unacceptable behavior," Darcy muttered as he stepped to and from his partner in time to the music.

"I was not aware you were so sensitive." Her eyes still alighted with amusement. In his short period as a female, he had suffered a thousand slights he wished to react against but could not.

"How are you enjoying yourself? Tankards and billiards and such? And brandy, apparently."

Elizabeth pulled a mock grimace. "I am terrible at billiards, but I told the men I injured my wrist. And I cannot abide cigar smoke!"

"It's quite unpleasant, is it not?"

He realized he was smiling up at her. She was much taller than he, which made his face warm, for a reason he could not ascertain.

"This…enchantment must be undone."

"Yes, of course. Do you think I like being you?"

"Surely it is more tolerable than this," Darcy gestured to his person, his hand ruffling his skirt.

Elizabeth smiled again. "I never thought I'd say this, but you look well in my clothes, although your hair part is pulled too tight. Are you allowing Sally to pin it?"

Darcy rolled her eyes. "The steps in a woman's toilet are extensive."

"Allow Sally to pin your hair. Currently, you look more like Mama."

Darcy's eyes narrowed. "An extremely taxing woman, your Mama."

"Yes, but do not be too hard on her. She means well, I believe. Most of the time. Everyone is well at Longbourn, then?"

Darcy nodded as Jane and Bingley danced close to them, their faces firmly locked on each other. Darcy felt a pang of jealousy at his friend's circumstances. Bingley was dancing in his beloved's embrace at a ball he had thrown, while Darcy struggled with skirts and hairpins. How had his life come to this?

Elizabeth saw Darcy's perturbance etched in her former features as they danced. It was clear Darcy was not doing well in her place, and as much as she wished to laugh at him, she knew it put them both in danger.

"I have been considering our vexation…or enchantment…whatever it is, and I wonder if the cause may be something that occurred just before our…bewitchment. If we can trace back our actions just before this enchantment, perhaps we might find what caused it."

"I suppose that makes as much sense as this," he gestured to his figure.

"If I recall, we were in the library the evening before when you read a Scottish spell from a book, do you remember? Although it seems illogical–to say the least–I cannot but wonder if that may be the cause."

Darcy's mouth set in an unhappy straight line. "I do not believe in magic, Mis– Mr. Darcy."

Annoyance flared in Elizabeth. "I did not either until I woke up…" she lowered her voice, a blush coloring her cheeks, "with a decidedly male anatomy."

Now he turned crimson.

"You must allow that there may be laws of nature we are unaware of. Perhaps that explains this predicament."

He nodded curtly. "I am listening."

"Perhaps if we went back and found the book of spells, we might see how to undo it."

Darcy chewed his lip momentarily and seemed to consider it. He nodded brusquely. "How might we do that?"

"Can we not sneak away? I doubt we would be noticed."

Elizabeth nodded. "We cannot be away long, but yes…"

At that, Darcy nodded to the nearby door. She let him leave the ballroom first, then glanced around, made sure no one was watching, grabbed a thin candle from a table, and followed him a few moments later.

She found him standing in front of the library, dim light from candles on a side table shown on her dress.

"Do you remember where you found the book?" She whispered as they stole past the heavy wood door.

Darcy immediately headed toward the back of the library. "It was somewhere here, towards the rear shelves."

Elizabeth followed behind. She watched him point to a shelf higher than he could reach. "Up there, I believe."

She chose not to comment on the irony that she now had to reach to the shelf instead of him. She reached up as he stepped away so he could view it better.

"I do not feel anything. Can you see the book?" Elizabeth said.

"I do not." He squinted as he peered up the shelf. "It was a thin book, it almost seemed homebound."

"Here, I feel something now," Elizabeth said, standing on her tiptoes to reach. She pulled a thin book down to see, wiping dust from the cover.

Crop Rotations in the Fourteenth Century. Most decidedly the wrong book.

"This is not the one."

"Do you see any others?"

"I do not," he said again, as the candle he held wavered in the dim light. "Do pursue the other shelves."

She frantically scanned the shelves in front of her, seeking the small, strange book she vaguely remembered seeing in his hands so many weeks ago. Somewhere outside the door, the muffled din of the orchestra ended and she knew their time was growing small.

She was about to move on to another row of stacks when a sound made her jump. She smelled a familiar Jasmine scent.

"What do we have here? Darcy and Miss Bennet all alone in the library?"

Elizabeth's throat tightened. There was only one person with that haughty lilting voice: Miss Caroline Bingley.

"I wondered to where you had disappeared, but I was not aware that you had company."

Elizabeth forced her lips upward into a pleasant smile and turned to face Caroline's pale visage. "Miss Bingley, surely you are leaving men heartbroken at the ball by being away."

Caroline's lips turned up in faux sweetness. "Darcy, how thoughtful of you to think of me, especially as you have your hands full here in the library."

Elizabeth swallowed her disdain as Darcy flinched at Caroline's comments.
"And what are you two doing in here anyway? Not burnishing Miss Bennet's reputation, I expect."

"Jesus Chr–," Darcy said but stopped himself.

"I'm sorry, Miss Bennet, were you going to speak?"

Darcy inhaled as though he was going to say something, but a different voice rang out instead.

"No one informed me that the party had moved into the library," Mr. Collins said, smiling stupidly.

"Collins, for God's sake," Darcy muttered under his breath.

Collins laughed to himself. "I do hope I'm not interrupting…"

"Dear Lord," Caroline said. "Are any other village idiots joining us?"

Elizabeth wondered what comment she might be able to utter that was acceptable, and finally gave up when she could think of none. She could only remember one thing: the book. How would they find it with these two in tow?