“You!” he gasped. Was he about to faint? Or attack me? He might think I was the one who’d tried to pull him underwater. “You!” he spluttered again, staring at me wide-eyed as he painfully pulled himself into a sitting position. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my entire life!”

I snorted pond water out my nose. The guy was … what? Nineteen? He lived on a farm with his father and grandfather. How many naked women could he have ever seen?

“Thank you,” I said, wiping my nose. “That’s nice of you …”

“I mean it! You’re more beautiful than …” He creased his brow, clearly trying to think of beautiful women of his acquaintance. “Angelina Jolie!”

I laughed again. He was kind of cute. “Well, I don’t know about that, but again, thank you. I’m just glad you didn’t drown. You know, you really shouldn’t fish here.”

His eyes went even wider. “Are you the Lady of the Lake? Did I break a rule so you had to punish me?”

“No! Or … er … yes!” I straightened my spine and shook out my hair. “I am the Lady of the Lake,” I intoned in a deep, sonorous voice. I used a little bit of what I’d learned as an owl to make my voice kind of echoey. “I protect these woods and streams. Tell all your friends that no one should come fishing here. Or else!”

“Or else what?”

“Um … or else they’ll feel my wrath!”

He furrowed his brow again. “But you saved me,” he said.

“Only so you could spread the word. Next time I won’t be so lenient.”

“You’ve got feathers in your hair.” He leaned closer to me, not at all cowed by my act. “Hey, you’re not the Lady of the Lake, are you?”

I slumped, disappointed at myself for not being able to pull it off. Angelina Jolie would have. “Okay, you got me …”

“You’re an owl princess!” he said, plucking a feather from my hair. “You’re one of those animals that turn into beautiful women. My Nana told me stories of your kind – selkies and swan maidens.”

I sighed. I would get the one fisherman raised on animal bride tales. “I’m not an owl princess …”

“You are! And I’ve got your feather, which means you gotta come with me and be my wife.”

I punched him in the arm. “That’s the thanks I get for saving your life?”

“Ow!” he said, rubbing his arm and looking hurt. “You don’t want to marry me?”

“Sorry, but no. Not that you’re not a perfectly nice young man … um …”