I took it, but didn’t eat it immediately. There was no sound outside, save the buzzing of cicadas, though the air had a sultry thickness to it that often presaged rain. It was early in the summer for storms, but one could only hope.

“You’ve thought of it, too, haven’t you?” I said quietly.

He made no pretense of misunderstanding me.

“Well, it is the twenty-first o’ the month,” he said.

“It’s June, for heaven’s sake! And the wrong year, as well. That newspaper clipping said January, of 1776!” I was absurdly indignant, as though I had somehow been cheated.

He found that funny.

“I was a printer myself, Sassenach,” he said, laughing through a mouthful of sweet roll. “Ye dinna want to believe everything ye read in the newspapers, aye?”

When I looked out again, only a few men were visible under the chestnut trees. One of them saw my movement; he waved his arm slowly to and fro above his head—then drew the edge of his hand flat across his throat.

The sun was just above the treetops; two hours, perhaps, to nightfall. Two hours surely was enough time for Mrs. Bug to have summoned help, though—always assuming she had found anyone who would come. Arch might have gone to Cross Creek—he went once a month; Kenny might be hunting. As for the newer tenants … without Roger to keep them in order, their suspicion and dislike of me had become blatant. I had the feeling that they might come if summoned—but only to cheer as I was dragged away.

If anyone did come—what then? I didn’t want to be dragged away, much less shot or burnt alive in the ashes of my house—but I didn’t want anyone else injured or killed in an effort to prevent it, either.

“Come away from the window, Sassenach,” Jamie said. He held out a hand to me, and I went, sitting on the bed beside him. I felt all at once exhausted, the adrenaline of emergency having burned away, leaving my muscles feeling like heat-softened rubber.

“Lie down, a Sorcha,” he said softly. “Lay your head in my lap.”

Hot as it was, I did so, finding it a comfort to stretch out, even more to hear his heart, thumping slow and solid above my ear, and feel his hand, light on my head.

All the weapons were laid out, ranged on the floor beside the window, all loaded, primed, and ready for use. He’d taken his sword down from the armoire; it stood by the door, a last resort.

“There’s nothing we can do now, is there?” I said after a little. “Nothing but wait.”

His fingers moved idly through the damp curls of my hair; it fell to just above my shoulders now, long enough—barely—to tie back or pin up.

“Well, we might say an Act of Contrition,” he said. “We did that, always, the night before a battle. Just in case,” he added, smiling down at me.

“All right,” I said after a pause. “Just in case.”

I reached up and his good hand closed round mine.

“Mon Dieu, je regrette …” he began, and I remembered that he said this prayer in French, harking back to those days as a mercenary in France; how often had he said it then, a necessary precaution, cleansing the soul at night in expectation of the possibility of death in the morning?

I said it, too, in English, and we fell silent. The cicadas had stopped. Far, far away, I thought I heard a sound that might be thunder.

“Do you know,” I said after a long while, “I’m sorry for a great many things and people. Rupert, Murtagh, Dougal … Frank. Malva,” I added softly, with a catch in my throat. “But speaking only for myself …” I cleared my throat.

“I don’t regret anything,” I said, watching the shadows creep in from the corners of the room. “Not one bloody thing.”

“Nor do I, mo nighean donn,” he said, and his fingers stilled, warm against my skin. “Nor do I.”



I WOKE FROM A DOZE with the smell of smoke in my nostrils. Being in a state of grace is all very well, but I imagine even Joan of Arc had qualms when they lit the first brand. I sat bolt upright, heart pounding, to see Jamie at the window.

It wasn’t quite dark yet; streaks of orange and gold and rose lit the sky to the west, and touched his face with a fiery light. He looked long-nosed and fierce, the lines of strain cut deep.

“Folk are coming,” he said. His voice was matter-of-fact, but his good hand was clenched hard round the edge of the shutter, as though he would have liked to slam and bolt it.

I came to stand by him, combing my fingers hastily through my hair. I could still make out figures under the chestnut trees, though they now were no more than silhouettes. They’d built a bonfire there, at the far edge of the dooryard; that’s what I’d smelled. There were more people coming into the dooryard, though; I was sure I made out the squat figure of Mrs. Bug among them. The sound of voices floated up, but they weren’t talking loudly enough to make out words.

“Will ye plait my hair, Sassenach? I canna manage, wi’ this.” He gave his broken finger a cursory glance.

I lit a candle, and he moved a stool to the window, so he could keep watch while I combed his hair and braided it into a tight, thick queue, which I clubbed at the base of his neck and tied with a neat black ribbon.

I knew his reasons were twofold: not only to appear well-groomed and gentlemanly, but to be ready to fight if he had to. I was less worried about someone seizing me by the hair as I attempted to cleave them in half with a sword, but supposed that if this were my last appearance as the lady of the Ridge, I should not appear unkempt.

I heard him mutter something under his breath, as I brushed my own hair by candlelight, and turned on my stool to look at him.

“Hiram’s come,” he informed me. “I hear his voice. That’s good.”

“If you say so,” I said dubiously, recollecting Hiram Crombie’s denunciations in church a week before—thinly veiled remarks clearly aimed at us. Roger hadn’t mentioned them; Amy McCallum had told me.

Jamie turned his head to look at me, and smiled, an expression of extraordinary sweetness coming over his face.

“Ye’re verra lovely, Sassenach,” he said as though surprised. “But, aye, it’s good. Whatever he thinks, he wouldna countenance Brown hanging us in the dooryard, nor yet setting the house afire to drive us out.”

There were more voices outside; the crowd was growing quickly.

“Mr. Fraser!”

He took a deep breath, took the candle from the table, and threw open the shutter, holding the candle near his face so they could see him.

It was almost full dark, but several of the crowd were holding torches, which gave me uneasy visions of the mob coming to burn Dr. Frankenstein’s monster—but did at least allow me to make out the faces below. There were at least thirty men—and not a few women—there, in addition to Brown and his thugs. Hiram Crombie was indeed there, standing beside Richard Brown, and looking like something out of the Old Testament.

“We require ye to come down, Mr. Fraser,” he called. “And your wife—if ye please.”

I caught sight of Mrs. Bug, plump and clearly terrified, her face streaked with tears. Then Jamie closed the shutters, gently, and offered me his arm.



JAMIE HAD WORN BOTH dirk and sword, and had not changed his clothes. He stood on the porch, bloodstained and battered, and dared them to harm us further.

“Ye’ll take my wife over my dead body,” he said, raising his powerful voice enough to be heard across the clearing. I was rather afraid they would. He’d been right—so far—about Hiram not countenancing lynching, but it was clear that public opinion was not in our favor.

“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live!” someone shouted from the back of the crowd, and a stone whistled through the air, bouncing off the front of the house with a sharp report, like a gunshot. It struck no more than a foot from my head, and I flinched, instantly regretting it.

Angry murmurs had risen from the moment Jamie had opened the door, and this encouraged them. There were shouts of “Murderers!” and “Heartless! Heartless!” and a number of Gaelic insults that I didn’t try to understand.