‘Prince Oran arranged that. Ritual, prayers and so on. All of us were there to see her buried. All of us but Lady Flidais. Feeling poorly; a big shock.’

A big shock. Well, it would be. How would it feel, finding yourself in someone else’s body? I try to imagine myself as Donagan, or as the prince. Morrigan’s britches! Doesn’t bear thinking about. Worse than that, she’d be seeing her own body put in the grave. Enough to turn anyone a bit odd. I know one thing. If it was me I’d tell the truth, even if folk thought I was crazy.

We get the work done, then have some food and drink, and when the fellows need to go back to Winterfalls I pack up and go with them. Forget sleep for today; I’ve got to see Blackthorn. Hoping she can think of a plan. Seems impossible to me. Why would Flidais – Ciar, I suppose she is – agree to take another swim in Dreamer’s Pool, when the weather’s cold enough to freeze a man’s bollocks off, and she knows Blackthorn’s suspicious, not to mention the prince? Can’t see Oran forcing her to go over there and throwing her in. And even if he does, what happens if it doesn’t work? Charges of murder, that’s what. But Blackthorn’s clever. She’ll find a way.

37 Oran

37

~ORAN~

Bramble. Flidais. I stared at Blackthorn, wordless. I saw on her face that she expected me to challenge the theory, to argue that such things simply weren’t possible. To tell her that although I’d suspected strangeness of some kind, this went beyond belief.

‘I knew it,’ I said when I had found my voice again. ‘I knew she wasn’t gone, I knew she was still here somewhere.’ I wanted to run out right away and find Bramble, to hold her close, to keep her safe until . . . What Blackthorn proposed was both wonderful and terrifying. I could barely bring myself to consider it.

‘It’s only a theory at this point,’ the wise woman said. We were in my council chamber, she and I, with the door closed behind us. Grim had been half-asleep when they came to find me; she’d sent him off to rest. ‘Acting on it would be extremely risky. If we were wrong, there could be most unfortunate consequences.’

I was shivering from head to toe, so full of feelings I thought I would burst apart. What if Flidais had retained her human understanding, what if she had understood every single thing I had said to her? ‘When can we do this?’ I asked, and my voice shook like a terrified child’s.