The Stand-In Daughter and the Forgotten Heiress

After the other soul departed from my body, I became Jenny againthe timid, forgotten heiress.

My own parents allowed Ivy to push me into the icy lake, a desperate, cruel attempt to summon the other soul back into my body.

The chill seized my lungs, and I fell gravely ill.

Only my fianc came to visit my sickbed.

He tucked a hand warmer into my arms, his hands gentle as he fed me medicine, yet his questions were only of her,

"Do you have any idea where she went?"

I lowered my gaze.

"Yes, I know."

She had promised to return in three days's time.

To take me away from this gilded cage for good.

Ivy shoved me into the water again.

The first time had been a calculated performance.

She jumped in after me, ensuring all attention and rescue efforts flew to her.

That day, I nearly drowned, and the System Tasker's soul was summoned into my body.

This time?

She crouched on the edge of the small boat, pried my freezing fingers from the wooden edge one by one, and smirked.

"Let's see if that sharp-tongued version of you will come back now."

On the shore, my parents watched from a distance.

Their eyes were fixed on mebut they were looking through me, searching for a glimpse of someone else.

This had been their idea.

Mom said Ivy wanted to apologize, that she was leaving the Capital and would stop overshadowing me. She swore they'd make peace before her.

I believed her. I received a blade in the back instead.

The early spring water was a thousand piercing needles of ice.

I fought to break the surface, gasping, but Ivy kept shoving my shoulders down, holding me under.

Tears mixed with the murky lake water blurred my vision and stinging my eyes.

My strength was fading.

Just before I sank for the last time, I saw my parents step closer to the bank.

Their eyes were wide with a frantic hope a terrible, eager anticipation.

"She'll come back now, won't she?"

I was unconscious for a full day.

When I finally woke, Mom was smiling as she fed me medicine.

She blew carefully on each spoonful, her tenderness so foreign that Ivy, standing in the corner, glared with pure, unadulterated envy.

A lump formed in my throat. She hadn't been this patient with me in years.

But mere minutes later, Mom slammed the ceramic bowl onto the bedside table.

"No," she muttered, her voice turning to ice. "This isn't her."

I flinched, my fingers clutching the silk quilt.

"If Jenny knew Ivy had pushed her, she'd have flown into a rage immediately. She'd never just lie here and take it."

Mom walked out of the room without looking back.

Ivy, who had paled momentarily, shot me a triumphant, gloating smile.

"Pathetic."

"At least I only lived in her shadow. You? You're not even worth that."

She hurried after Mom, linking her arms, chirping, "You still have me, Mom!"

I sat up slowly, lifting the medicine bowl.

The dark, bitter liquid reflected a gaunt, hollow-out face.

An unlovable face.

A single tear splashed into the medicine, rippling the reflection of my own despair.

I remember a time when I was happy.

Before I was kidnapped at four, I wasn't the broken girl from some remote village.

Mom was the picture of grace. In those days, I was shy and clung to her skirts. She'd sing soft lullabies to lull me to sleep every night, her hand tracing gentle circles on my back.

At thirteen, I finally escaped my adoptive parents and knocked on the Prime Minister's door.

Mom stared at the Jenny locket I presentedthe proof of my identityin heavy silence.

A girl my own age burst into the room, shoving past me to throw herself into my mother's embrace.

"She's filthy! Why'd you let her in?"

I stumbled back, barely catching myself on the edge of a carved mahogany table.

Mom sighed pulling the girl closer. "Don't be cruel. This is Jenny. Your sister now."

The servants whispered, Mom had adored me. When I vanished, her grief nearly consumed her. To soothe her, my father had brought home an orphan from a distant province, a girl who bore a faint resemblance to me.

Now that I was back, Ivy would be cast aside.

They were all wrong.

Now, Ivy was her favorite.

Terrified of being sent back to the institution, Ivy clung to Mom, mastering the art of tearful, daily devotion.

Afraid I would reclaim what was mine, she wove a web of subtle lies about my character and my past.

Her friends ganged up, taunting me in chorus.

I ran to tattlesomeone tripped me.

When Mom saw me, covered in dirt, she dabbed my face with a damp cloth, chiding.

"You're too old to be so careless."

The cloth scraped over a fresh cut on my cheekbone. I winced.

"Ivy tripped me," I whispered, the words barely audible.

Mom's hand stilled for a moment. "She's just being childish," she said, resuming her task. "There's no real malice in her."

I swallowed the sharp retort, biting down on the rest of my words.

Too scared to speak.

Only Lucas had ever openly shown his dislike for Ivy.

Lucas was her fianc first.

Now he was mine.

The only thing I'd truly reclaimed.

He was devastatingly handsome, aloof in a way that intimidated most, his presence commanding silence.

When Ivy deliberately dressed me in garish, mismatched clothes for my first ball in the Capital, hoping to make me a laughingstock, it was Lucas who stepped in.

He took me riding, to flower festivals, to parties.

For two years, I was truly happy.

Ivy seethed with a jealousy that grew like a poison.

Her breaking point?

Shoving me into the lake.

And in doing so, she accidentally summoning the Tasker.

The Tasker called herself Ava.

She appeared in my mind's eye just as the water was closing over my head.

A small, golden orb she called "System" floated beside her.

System commanded her to replace me, to punish Ivy, to win Lucas back, and to reclaim the life that had been stolen from me.

She was brilliant at it.

She publicly slapped Ivy, confronted my parents about their blatant favoritism, and exposed their favoritism to the whole city.

She seemed to know everythingeven how to charm the Empress, who had previously been indifferent to me.

My parents' initial anger and confusion melted into awestruck admiration.

This, they said, was how a Prime Minister's true daughter should carry herself.

Bright, fearless, beloved by all. As if I'd never been stolen away for nine long years. As if I'd never suffered.

Sometimes, my mother would gaze at Ava's facemy faceher eyes brimming with a love I hadn't seen in years, and sigh, "If our Jenny hadn't been taken she'd be like this."

They all knew.

Everyone saw that I'd changed.

They even stopped calling me "Jenny." Now it was "Ava," a new name spoken like an affectionate nickname.

When Ava was nearly finished her mission, she decided to quit.

She had started to feel my pain, my hollowed-out heart.

We could sometimes talk, in the quiet spaces of our shared mind.

I'd let her take over completely. My life was already in ruinwhat did it matter?

But when my mother smiled at her with that genuine, adoring look, my own heart would shatter. Ava would clutch her chest, my tears streaming down her-our-cheeks.

She told System, "This isn't fair to Jenny."

"I'm done. Give me a new task."

System retorted sharply, "You don't get to just quit!"

"If you leave, what do you think will happen to Jenny?"

Ava paused, then turned her attention inward, asking me, "Come with me. Please?"

I hesitated.

Because of Lucas.

Our wedding was only a month away.

Ava had done so much for me.

But she'd consistently avoided Lucas.

She knew I despised this family but that I still loved him.

One afternoon, she dressed carefully and climbed the wall into Lucas's private garden wall.

He was playing chess in the gazebo.

With his black hair and white robe, he looked like a god descended from a painting.

His opponent, a visiting noble, asked casually, "The Prime Minister still seems to favor Ivy. Do you ever regret switching the engagement to Jenny?"

Lucas moved a piece,his expression unreadably calm.

"Ivy's a spoiled brat. Marrying her would have been a disgrace to my family's name."

"Jenny's obedient. Causes less trouble."

"It's all politics. One simply picks the easier one."

A knife twisted in my chest. Slow, brutal.

Ava's grip on the garden wall tightened, her knuckles turning white.

Tears spilled overmy tears, from her eyes.

She asked me silently, "Now? Will you come now?"

I choked out, "Take me with you."

"Thank you, Ava."

She promised to make the arrangements and return for me in three days.

Lucas heard the rustle from the wall. His eyes widened as he saw us. "Ava!"

A roof tiles slipped. I fellbut not to the ground. Into his arms.

He held me, apologizing, his voice frantic. He sounded so sincere.

But my mind was finally, perfectly clear.

Ava was gone. And with her, the last of my illusions.