A patch of wet hair emerges for only a moment is dunked back under and I gasp as I realize what they’re fighting over. Rangen.
Betrayal makes me ill, but it doesn’t slow me down. I crunch through the snow on the shore and launch myself – fully clothed – into the water. I don’t know what I’ve done with the soup. Fury gives me the strength of three men as I scoop Fliad up first and fling her to shore, followed by the lighter Iva, and then Rangen – oh please don’t let him be dead.
I’m trying to catch my breath as I emerge from the frigid current when Iva launches herself at me, her hands around my throat, throttling me, but she’s a woman and her hands are small. I wrench them off and throw her to the bank again, leaping to straddle her and keep her down.
What madness is this? I feel like a man whose own sword has turned on him.
Fliad scrambles around us to get to Rangen and I want to stop her, but Iva claws my face, and I must settle her first. We fight and it tears my heart to pin her hands against the ice, to see them purple and bleeding, to see her soft flesh abraded and bruised under my hands.
I search for her eyes, for her warm eyes full of kindness, and all I see is a violent arrogance. I haven’t seen an expression like that since the night Fliad stole my Hessa.
Wait.
My eyes flick to Fliad, tenderly nursing Rangen. He’s coughing up water as she gently rubs his back and whispers to him.
Back to Iva.
“You’ve switched bodies,” I say stupidly. That’s why you shouldn’t talk unless you have to. It comes out stupid.
Iva – no Fliad in Iva’s body – lets fly a string of curses in Iva’s soft voice and I’m so stunned I almost lose my grip on her. She shakes her head, snaps her jaw shut, takes a long breath, and then looks me directly in the eyes and I can’t help it. Even knowing this isn’t Iva, I can’t help the jolt that goes through me when our eyes meet.
“I was going to kill the witnesses, but why kill you? Why not just ask you to agree?” she says and she sounds weary. “Why wouldn’t you want this, too? I’ve seen how you are together. It must be eating you up to think of her with another man. But it doesn’t have to be like that. I’m not married. No offers for my noble hand, but you’re a knight and you could offer to marry me – her – and the two of you could live happily together. Don’t tell me it’s the body. My figure is twice what hers is.”
I’m so stunned that I just speak.
“We need peace,” I say grimly. “I’m sick to the point of death of war. My heart cannot stand more of it.”
“I’ll marry the fae king – this Precatore of Iceheim,” the Iva that is Fliad says. “I care not if he’s shadows and fire or antlers and tail. I was made for royalty. I was made for better things, and I plan to seize them if they are not offered to me.”
I can see it all in my mind – fleeing all this. Starting a new life at Castle Tor with Iva. Me, working hard. Iva, mending my clothing and making soup and smiling that smile that breaks my heart with all its hope. It wouldn’t matter which body she was in, I would want to be with her. I’d want to clutch her hand on dark nights and hide her in my shadow on dark days.
It’s a tidy solution. Everyone would get what they want. But what if it didn’t work? What if it was the soul that mattered and not the body?
“The prophecy is specific,” I say between gritted teeth. I have a good memory and every word of the prophecy is ingrained within it.“The Golden Prince a bride must take, A mortal crowned for amity’s sake. She who nearly usurped the place, Of her with greater royal grace. Thus, bloodshed ends in solemn vow, We kneel as one in common bow.”
“Prophecies are only what people use to manipulate others,” Fliad says coyly. And that looks she gives me fires my blood because my brain keeps insisting it’s Iva looking at me like that. “And what I want is a throne. And what you want is each other.” I feel my face flame at that. “What’s so terrible about all of us getting what we want?”
I look at the Iva inside Fliad’s body. Is she in on this? She looks away and toward the north, pain in every crease of her face. I do not think this was her idea but perhaps she needs to be reminded of that.
“By your honor, you must do this,” I tell her simply. “By my honor, I must see it done.”
And that’s wistfulness in her eyes. I can see it plain as the snow under the sun. She wishes she could say yes. She’s thinking about it, chewing her lip as she decides between freedom and the doom of marrying for everyone else’s peace. I hate myself for what I say next. I hate that the words even come out of my mouth.
“If it’s not you, there won’t be peace. Would you give the lives of others to have peace for yourself? Would you give their futures for your own?”
I know she won’t. I know what she’s made of, even after such a short time, but it sickens me to hold her to this. I’m no better than the father selling her, or the king buying her. I bury my revulsion deep down next to my spine.
She looks like she might cry, but she shakes her head and rips her amulet off, flinging it into the river where the current will drag it away. I reach forward, not daring to wait for Fliad’s goodwill, and I rip the chain from her neck, breaking the clasp, and fling it into the depths to join the other necklace.
Suddenly, I’m straddling the curvy Fliad and it is slight Iva trembling and miserable with Rangen’s head on her lap. I can’t help it when I scramble off the lady and lose the soup I just ate into the frigid river.
I couldn’t save my dog. I couldn’t save this girl.
Am I even a man at all?
19
IVA FITZROY
