The Outlander Series 7-Book Bundle (472 page)

What was troubling me, though, was not the thought of Lieutenant Hayes and his men; it was Jamie. Outwardly, he was calm and assured as ever, with that faint smile always hiding in the corner of his mouth. But I knew him very well; I had seen the two stiff fingers of his right hand—maimed in an English prison—twitch against the side of his leg as he traded jokes and stories with Hayes the night before. Even now, I could see the thin line that formed between his brows when he was troubled, and it wasn’t concern over what he was doing.

Was it simply worry over the Proclamation? I couldn’t see why that should be, given that none of our folk had been involved in the Hillsborough riots.

“… a Presbyterian,” he was saying. He glanced over at me with a wry smile. “Like wee Roger.”

The memory that had niggled at me earlier dropped suddenly into place.

“You knew that,” I said. “You
knew
Roger wasn’t a Catholic. You saw him baptize that child in Snaketown, when we … took him from the Indians.” Too late, I saw the shadow cross his face, and bit my tongue. When we took Roger—and left in his place Jamie’s dearly loved nephew Ian.

A shadow crossed his face momentarily, but he smiled, pushing away the thought of Ian.

“Aye, I did,” he said.

“But Bree—”

“She’d marry the lad if he were a Hottentot,” Jamie interrupted. “Anyone can see that. And I canna say I’d object overmuch to wee Roger if he
were
a Hottentot,” he added, rather to my surprise.

“You wouldn’t?”

Jamie shrugged, and stepped over the tiny creek to my side, wiping wet hands on the end of his plaid.

“He’s a braw lad, and he’s kind. He’s taken the wean as his own and said no word to the lass about it. It’s no more than a man should do—but not every man would.”

I glanced down involuntarily at Jemmy, curled up cozily in my arms. I tried not to think of it myself, but could not help now and then searching his bluntly amiable features for any trace that might reveal his true paternity.

Brianna had been handfast with Roger, lain with him for one night—and then been raped two days later, by Stephen Bonnet. There was no way to tell for sure who the father had been, and so far Jemmy gave no indication of resembling either man in the slightest. He was gnawing his fist at the moment, with a ferocious scowl of concentration, and with his soft fuzz of red-gold plush, he looked like no one so much as Jamie himself.

“Mm. So why all the insistence on having Roger vetted by a priest?”

“Well, they’ll be married in any case,” he said logically. “I want the wee lad baptized a Catholic, though.” He laid a large hand gently on Jemmy’s head, thumb smoothing the tiny red brows. “So if I made a bit of a fuss about MacKenzie, I thought they’d be pleased to agree about
an gille ruaidh
here, aye?”

I laughed, and pulled a fold of blanket up around Jemmy’s ears.

“And I thought Brianna had
you
figured out!”

“So does she,” he said, with a grin. He bent suddenly and kissed me.

His mouth was soft and very warm. He tasted of bread and butter, and he smelled strongly of fresh leaves and unwashed male, with just the faintest trace of effluvium of diaper.

“Oh, that’s nice,” I said with approval. “Do it again.”

The wood around us was still, in the way of woods. No bird, no beast, just the sough of leaves above and the rush of water underfoot. Constant movement, constant sound—and at the center of it all, a perfect peace. There were a good many people on the mountain, and most of them not that far away—yet just here, just now, we might have been alone on Jupiter.

I opened my eyes and sighed, tasting honey. Jamie smiled at me, and brushed a fallen yellow leaf from my hair. The baby lay in my arms, a heavy, warm weight, the center of the universe.

Neither of us spoke, not wishing to disturb the stillness. It was like being at the tip of a spinning top, I thought—a whirl of events and people going on all round, and a step in one direction or another would plunge us back into that spinning frenzy, but here at the very center—there was peace.

I reached up and brushed a scatter of maple seeds from his shoulder. He seized my hand, and brought it to his mouth with a sudden fierceness that startled me. And yet his lips were tender, the tip of his tongue warm on the fleshy mound at the base of my thumb—the mount of Venus, it’s called, love’s seat.

He raised his head, and I felt the sudden chill on my hand, where the ancient scar showed white as bone. A letter “J,” cut in the skin, his mark on me.

He laid his hand against my face, and I pressed it there with my own, as though I could feel the faded “C” he bore on his own palm, against the cold skin of my cheek. Neither of us spoke, but the pledge was made, as we had made it once before, in a place of sanctuary, our feet on a scrap of bedrock in the shifting sands of threatened war.

It was not near; not yet. But I heard it coming, in the sound of drums and proclamation, saw it in the glint of steel, knew the fear of it in heart and bone when I looked in Jamie’s eyes.

The chill had gone, and hot blood throbbed in my hand as though to split the ancient scar and spill my heart’s blood for him once again. It would come, and I could not stop it.

But this time, I wouldn’t leave him.

I followed Jamie out of the trees, across a scrabble of rocks and sand and tufted grass, to the well-trampled trail that led upward to our campsite. I was counting in my head, readjusting the breakfast requirements yet again, in light of Jamie’s revelation that he had invited two more families to join us for the meal.

“Robin McGillivray and Geordie Chisholm,” he said, holding back a branch for me to pass. “I thought we should make them welcome; they mean to come and settle on the Ridge.”

“Do they,” I said, ducking as the branch slapped back behind me. “When? And how many of them are there?”

These were loaded questions. It was close to winter—much too close to count on building even the crudest cabin for shelter. Anyone who came to the mountains now would likely have to live in the big house with us, or crowd into one of the small settlers’ cabins that dotted the Ridge. Highlanders could, did, and would live ten to a room when necessary. With my less strongly developed sense of English hospitality, I rather hoped it wouldn’t be necessary.

“Six McGillivrays and eight Chisholms,” Jamie said, smiling. “The McGillivrays will come in the spring, though. Robin’s a gunsmith—he’ll have work in Cross Creek for the winter—and his family will bide with kin in Salem—his wife’s German—until the weather warms.”

“Oh, that’s good.” Fourteen more for breakfast, then, plus me and Jamie, Roger and Bree, Marsali and Fergus, Lizzie and her father—Abel MacLennan, mustn’t forget him—oh, and the soldier lad who’d rescued Germain, that made twenty-four …

“I’ll go and borrow some coffee and rice from my aunt, shall I?” Jamie had been reading the growing look of dismay on my features. He grinned, and held out his arms for the baby. “Give me the laddie; we’ll go visiting, and leave your hands free for the cooking.”

I watched them go with a small sense of relief. Alone, if only for a few moments. I drew a long, deep breath of damp air, becoming aware of the soft patter of the rain on my hood.

I loved Gatherings and social occasions, but was obliged to admit to myself that the strain of unrelieved company for days on end rather got on my nerves. After a week of visiting, gossip, daily medical clinics, and the small but constant crises that attend living rough with a large family group, I was ready to dig a small hole under a log and climb in, just for the sake of a quarter hour’s solitude.

Just at the moment, though, it looked as though I might be saved the effort. There were shouts, calls, and snatches of pipe music from higher up the mountain; disturbed by the Governor’s Proclamation, the Gathering was reestablishing its normal rhythm, and everyone was going back to their family hearths, to the clearing where the competitions were held, to the livestock pens beyond the creek, or to the wagons set up to sell everything from ribbons and churns to powdered mortar and fresh—well, relatively fresh—lemons. No one needed me for the moment.

It was going to be a very busy day, and this might be my only chance of solitude for a week or more—the trip back would take at least that long, moving slowly with a large party, including babies and wagons. Most of the new tenants had neither horses nor mules, and would make the journey on foot.

I needed a moment to myself, to gather my strength and focus my mind. What focus I had, though, was not on the logistics of breakfast or weddings, nor even on the impending surgery I was contemplating. I was looking farther forward, past the journey, longing for home.

Fraser’s Ridge was high in the western mountains, far beyond any town—or even any established roads. Remote and isolated, we had few visitors. Few inhabitants, too, though the population of the Ridge was growing; more than thirty families had come to take up homesteads on Jamie’s granted land, under his sponsorship. Most of these were men he had known in prison, at Ardsmuir. I thought Chisholm and McGillivray must be ex-prisoners, too; Jamie had put out a standing invitation for such men, and would hold to it, no matter the expense involved in helping them—or whether we could afford it.

A raven flew silently past, slow and heavy, its feathers burdened by the rain. Ravens were birds of omen; I wondered whether this one meant us good or ill. Rare for any bird to fly in such weather—that must mean it was a special omen.

I knocked the heel of my hand against my head, trying to smack the superstition out of it. Live with Highlanders long enough, and every damn rock and tree meant something!

Perhaps it did, though. There were people all round me on the mountain—I knew that—and yet I felt quite alone, shielded by the rain and fog. The weather was still cold, but I was not. The blood thrummed near the surface of my skin, and I felt heat rise in my palms. I reached a hand out to the pine that stood by me, drops of water trembling on each needle, its bark black with wet. I breathed its scent and let the water touch my skin, cool as vapor. The rain fell in shushing stillness all around me, dampening my clothes ’til they clung to me softly, like clouds upon the mountain.

Jamie had told me once that he must live on a mountain, and I knew now why this was so—though I could in no wise have put the notion into words. All my scattered thoughts receded, as I listened for the voice of rocks and trees—and heard the bell of the mountain strike once, somewhere deep beneath my feet.

I might have stood thus enchanted for some time, all thought of breakfast forgotten, but the voices of rocks and trees hushed and vanished with the clatter of feet on the nearby path.

“Mrs. Fraser.”

It was Archie Hayes himself, resplendent in bonnet and sword despite the wet. If he was surprised to see me standing by the path alone, he didn’t show it, but inclined his head in courteous greeting.

“Lieutenant.” I bowed back, feeling my cheeks flush as though he had caught me in the midst of bathing.

“Will your husband be about, ma’am?” he asked, voice casual. Despite my discomfiture, I felt a stab of wariness. Young Corporal MacNair had come to fetch Jamie, and failed. If the mountain had come to Mohammed now, the matter wasn’t casual. Was Hayes intending to drag Jamie into some sort of witch-hunt for Regulators?

“I suppose so. I don’t really know
where
he is,” I said, consciously not looking up the hill to the spot where Jocasta’s big tent showed its canvas peak among a stand of chestnut trees.

“Ah, I expect he’ll be that busy,” Hayes said comfortably. “A great deal to do for a man like himself, and this the last day of the Gathering.”

“Yes. I expect … er … yes.”

The conversation died, and I was left in a state of increasing discomfort, wondering how on earth I was to escape without inviting the Lieutenant to breakfast. Even an Englishwoman couldn’t get away with the rudeness of not offering food without exciting remark.

“Er … Corporal MacNair said you wanted to see Farquard Campbell as well,” I said, seizing the bull by the horns. “Perhaps Jamie’s gone to talk with him. Mr. Campbell, I mean.” I waved helpfully toward the Campbells’ family campsite, which lay on the far side of the slope, nearly a quarter mile from Jocasta’s.

Hayes blinked, drops running from his lashes down his cheeks.

“Aye,” he said. “Perhaps that’s so.” He stood a moment longer, then tipped his cap to me. “Good day to ye, mum.” He turned away up the path—toward Jocasta’s tent. I stood watching him go, all sense of peace destroyed.

“Damn,” I said under my breath, and set off to see about breakfast.

2

LOAVES AND FISHES

We had chosen a site well off the main path, but situated in a small, rocky clearing with a good view of the wide creekbank below. Glancing downward through a scrim of holly bushes, I could see the flash of green-and-black tartans as the last of the soldiers dispersed; Archie Hayes encouraged his men to mingle with the people at the Gathering, and most were only too glad to obey.

I wasn’t sure whether this policy of Archie’s was dictated by guile, penury, or simply humanitarianism. Many of his soldiers were young, separated from home and family; they were glad of the chance to hear Scottish voices again, to be welcomed at a homely fireside, offered brose and parritch, and to bask in the momentary warmth of familiarity.

As I came out of the trees, I saw that Marsali and Lizzie were making a small fuss of the bashful young soldier who had fished Germain out of the creek. Fergus stood close to the fire, wisps of steam rising from his wet garments, muttering in French as he rubbed Germain’s head briskly with a towel, one-handed. His hook was braced against the little boy’s shoulder to keep him steady, and the blond head wobbled back and forth, Germain’s face quite tranquil, in complete disregard of his father’s scolding.

Neither Roger nor Brianna were anywhere in sight, but I was rather alarmed to see Abel MacLennan sitting on the far side of the clearing, nibbling a bit of toasted bread on a stick. Jamie was already back with the borrowed supplies, which he was unpacking on the ground next to the fire. He was frowning to himself, but the frown melted into a smile at sight of me.

“There ye are, Sassenach!” he said, rising to his feet. “What kept ye?”

“Oh … I met an acquaintance on the trail,” I said, with a significant look toward the young soldier. It was evidently not significant enough, since Jamie knitted his brows in puzzlement.

“The Lieutenant is looking for you,” I hissed, leaning close to him.

“Well, I kent
that
, Sassenach,” he said, in a normal tone of voice. “He’ll find me soon enough.”

“Yes, but … ahem.” I cleared my throat and raised my brows, glancing pointedly from Abel MacLennan to the young soldier. Jamie’s notions of hospitality wouldn’t countenance having his guests dragged away from under his rooftree, and I would have supposed that the same principle applied to his campfire as well. The young soldier might find it awkward to arrest MacLennan, but I was sure the Lieutenant would have no such hesitation.

Jamie looked rather amused. Raising his own brows, he took my arm, and led me over to the young man.

“My dear,” he said formally, “may I present Private Andrew Ogilvie, late of the village of Kilburnie? Private Ogilvie, my wife.”

Private Ogilvie, a ruddy-faced boy with dark curly hair, blushed and bowed.

“Your servant, mum!”

Jamie squeezed my arm lightly.

“Private Ogilvie was just telling me that the regiment is bound for Portsmouth, in Virginia—there to take ship for Scotland. Ye’ll be glad to see home, I expect, lad?”

“Oh, aye, sir!” the lad said fervently. “The regiment will disband in Aberdeen, and then I’m off home, so fast as my legs will carry me!”

“The regiment is disbanding?” Fergus asked, coming to join the conversation, a towel draped round his neck and Germain in his arms.

“Aye, sir. With the Frenchies settled—er, beggin’ your pardon, sir—and the Indians safe, there’s naught for us to do here, and the Crown willna pay us to sit at home,” the lad said ruefully. “Peace may be a guid thing, all in all, and I’m glad of it, surely. But there’s no denying as it’s hard on a soldier.”

“Almost as hard as war, aye?” Jamie said dryly. The boy flushed darkly; young as he was, he couldn’t have seen much in the way of actual fighting. The Seven Years War had been over for nearly ten years—at which time Private Ogilvie would likely still have been a barefoot lad in Kilburnie.

Ignoring the boy’s embarrassment, Jamie turned to me.

“The lad tells me,” he added, “that the Sixty-seventh is the last regiment left in the Colonies.”

“The last Highland regiment?” I asked.

“No, mum, the last of the Crown’s regular troops. There are the garrisons here and there, I suppose, but all of the standing regiments have been recalled to England or Scotland. We’re the last—and behind our time, too. We meant to sail from Charleston, but things went agley there, and so we’re bound for Portsmouth now, so fast as we can make speed. It’s late in the year, but the Lieutenant’s had word of a ship that may risk passage to take us. If not—” He shrugged, glumly philosophic. “Then we shall winter in Portsmouth, I suppose, and make shift as we can.”

“So England means to leave us unprotected?” Marsali looked rather shocked at the thought.

“Oh, I shouldna think there’s any great danger, mum,” Private Ogilvie assured her. “We’ve dealt wi’ the Frenchies for good and all, and the Indians willna be up to much without the frogs to stir them up. Everything’s been quite peaceful for a good time now, and doubtless it’ll stay so.” I made a small noise in the back of my throat, and Jamie squeezed my elbow lightly.

“Have ye not thought perhaps to stay, then?” Lizzie had been peeling and grating potatoes while listening to this; she put down the bowl of glistening white shreds by the fire and began to smear grease on the griddle. “Stay in the Colonies, I mean. There’s plenty of land still to be had, to the west.”

“Oh.” Private Ogilvie glanced down at her, her white kerch modestly bent over her work, and his color deepened again. “Well, I will say I’ve heard worse prospects, miss. But I am bound to go wi’ my regiment, I’m afraid.”

Lizzie picked up two eggs and cracked them neatly against the side of the bowl. Her own face, usually pale as whey, bore a faint pink echo of the Private’s rich blush.

“Ah. Well, it’s a great pity that ye should go awa so soon,” she said. Her pale blond lashes swept down against her cheeks. “Still, we’ll not send ye away on an empty stomach.”

Private Ogilvie went slightly pinker round the ears.

“That’s … verra kind of ye, miss. Verra kind indeed.”

Lizzie glanced up shyly, and blushed more deeply.

Jamie coughed gently and excused himself, leading me away from the fire.

“Christ,” he said in an undertone, bending down so I could hear him. “And she’s been a woman less than a full day, too! Have ye been givin’ her lessons, Sassenach, or are women just born wi’ it?”

“Natural talent, I expect,” I said circumspectly.

The unexpected advent of Lizzie’s menarche after supper last night had in fact been the straw that broke the camel’s back, with regard to clean clouts, and the precipitating event that had caused me to sacrifice my petticoat. Lizzie naturally had no menstrual cloths with her, and I didn’t want to oblige her to share the children’s diapers.

“Mmphm. I suppose I’d best begin looking for a husband for her, then,” Jamie said in resignation.

“A husband! Why, she’s scarcely fifteen!”

“Aye, so?” He glanced at Marsali, who was rubbing Fergus’s dark hair dry with the towel, and then back at Lizzie and her soldier, and raised a cynical brow at me.

“Aye, so, yourself,” I said, a little crossly. All right, Marsali
had
been only fifteen when she married Fergus. That didn’t mean—

“The point being,” Jamie went on, dismissing Lizzie for the moment, “that the regiment leaves for Portsmouth tomorrow; they havena got either time nor disposition to trouble with this business in Hillsborough—that’s Tryon’s concern.”

“But what Hayes said—”

“Oh, if anyone tells him anything, I’m sure he’ll send the depositions along to New Bern—but as for himself, I imagine he’d not much care if the Regulators set fire to the Governor’s Palace, so long as it doesna delay his sailing.”

I heaved a deep sigh, reassured. If Jamie was right, the last thing Hayes would do was take prisoners, no matter what the evidence to hand. MacLennan was safe, then.

“But what do you suppose Hayes wants with you and the others, then?” I asked, bending to rummage in one of the wicker hampers for another loaf of bread. “He
is
hunting you—in person.”

Jamie glanced back over his shoulder, as though expecting the Lieutenant to appear at any moment through the holly bushes. As the screen of prickly green remained intact, he turned back to me, frowning slightly.

“I dinna ken,” he said, shaking his head, “but it’s naught to do with this business of Tryon’s. If it was that, he might have told me last night—for that matter, if he cared himself about the matter, he
would
have told me last night,” he added. “No, Sassenach, depend upon it, the rioters are no more than a matter of duty to wee Archie Hayes.

“As for what he wants wi’ me—” He leaned over my shoulder to swipe a finger round the top of the honey pot. “I dinna mean to trouble about it until I must. I’ve three kegs of whisky left, and I mean to turn them into a plowshare, a scythe blade, three ax-heids, ten pound of sugar, a horse, and an astrolabe before this evening. Which is a conjuring trick that might take some attention, aye?” He drew the sticky tip of his finger gently across my lips, then turned my head toward him and bent to kiss me.

“An astrolabe?” I said, tasting honey. I kissed him back. “Whatever for?”

“And then I want to go home,” he whispered, ignoring the question. His forehead was pressed against mine, and his eyes very blue.

“I want to take ye to bed—
in
my bed. And I mean to spend the rest of the day thinking what to do to ye once I’ve got ye there. So wee Archie can just go and play at marbles with his ballocks, aye?”

“An excellent thought,” I whispered back. “Care to tell him that yourself?”

My eye had caught the flash of a green-and-black tartan on the other side of the clearing, but when Jamie straightened up and whirled round, I saw that the visitor was in fact not Lieutenant Hayes but rather John Quincy Myers, who was sporting a soldier’s plaid wrapped round his waist, the ends fluttering gaily in the breeze.

This added a further touch of color to Myers’s already striking sartorial splendor. Extremely tall, and decorated from the top down with a slouch hat stuck through with several needles and a turkey quill, two ragged pheasant feathers knotted into his long black hair, a vest of dyed porcupine quills worn over a beaded shirt, his usual breechclout, and leggings wrapped with strings of small bells, the mountain man was hard to miss.

“Friend James!” John Quincy smiled broadly at sight of Jamie, and hastened forward, hand extended and bells chiming. “Thought I should find you at your breakfast!”

Jamie blinked slightly at this vision, but gamely returned the mountain man’s encompassing handshake.

“Aye, John. Will ye join us?”

“Er … yes,” I chimed in, with a surreptitious look into the food hamper. “Please do!”

John Quincy bowed ceremoniously to me, sweeping off his hat.

“Your servant, ma’am, and I’m much obliged. Maybe later. Right now, I come to fetch away Mr. Fraser, though. He’s wanted, urgent-like.”

“By whom?” Jamie asked warily.

“Robbie McGillivray, he says his name is. You know the man?”

“Aye, I do.” Whatever Jamie knew about McGillivray, it was causing him to delve into the small chest where he kept his pistols. “What’s the trouble?”

“Well.” John Quincy scratched meditatively at his bushy black beard. “ ’Twas his wife as asked me to come find you, and she don’t speak what you’d call right good English, so may be as I’ve muddled the account of it a bit. But what I
think
she said to me was as how there was a thief-taker who’d grabbed holt of her son, sayin’ as how the boy was one o’ the ruffians who broke up Hillsborough, and meanin’ to take him to the gaol in New Bern. Only Robbie, he says no one’s takin’ a son of his anywhere, and—well, after that, the poor woman got right flustered and I couldn’t make out but one word to the dozen. But I do believe Robbie would ’preciate it if you’d come by and lend a hand with the proceedings.”

Jamie grabbed Roger’s bloodstained green coat, which was hung on a bush waiting to be cleaned. Shrugging into it, he thrust the newly loaded pistol through his belt.

“Where?” he said.

Myers gestured economically with one large thumb, and pushed off into the holly bushes, Jamie at his heels.

Fergus, who had been listening to this exchange, Germain in his arms, set the boy down at Marsali’s feet.

“I must go help
Grand-père
,” he told Germain. He picked up a stick of firewood and put it into the little boy’s hands. “You stay; protect
Maman
and little Joan from bad people.”

“Oui, Papa.”
Germain scowled fiercely under his blond fringe and took a firm grip on his stick, settling himself to defend the camp.

Marsali, MacLennan, Lizzie, and Private Ogilvie had been watching the byplay with rather glazed looks. As Fergus picked up another length of firewood and plunged purposefully into the holly bushes, Private Ogilvie came to life, stirring uneasily.

“Er …” he said. “Perhaps I … should I go for my sergeant, do ye think, ma’am? If there’s like to be any trouble …”