“I could kill you, so.”
The hand left her neck, and touched her, deliberately, knee and shoulder, cheek and chin, emphasizing her helplessness. She jerked her head away, not letting him touch the wetness, not wanting him to feel her tears of rage. Then the hand pressed sudden and brutal on the small of her back. She made a small, choked sound and arched her back to keep her arm from breaking, thrusting out her hips backward, legs spread to keep her balance.
“I could use ye as I would,” he said, and there was a coldness in his voice. “Could you stop me, Brianna?”
She felt as though she would suffocate with rage and shame.
“Answer me.” The hand took her by the neck again, and squeezed.
“No!”
She was free. So suddenly released, she pitched forward onto her face, barely getting one hand down in time to save herself.
She lay on the straw, panting and sobbing. There was a loud whuffle near her head—Magdalen, roused by the noise, leaning out of her stall to investigate. Slowly, painfully, she raised herself to a sitting position.
He was standing over her, arms folded.
“Damn you!” she gasped. She slammed a hand down in the hay. “God, I want to kill you!”
He stood quite still, looking down at her.
“Aye,” he said quietly. “But ye can’t, can you?”
She stared up at him, not understanding. His eyes were intent on hers, not angry, not mocking. Waiting.
“You can’t,” he repeated, with emphasis.
And then realization came, flooding down her aching arms to her bruised fists.
“Oh, God,” she said. “No. I can’t. I couldn’t. Even if I’d fought him…I couldn’t.”
Quite suddenly she began to cry, the knots inside her slipping loose, the weights shifting, lifting, as a blessed relief spread through her body. It hadn’t been her fault. If she had fought with all her strength—as she had fought just now—
“Couldn’t,” she said, and swallowed hard, gasping for air. “I couldn’t have stopped him. I kept thinking, if only I’d fought harder…but it wouldn’t have mattered. I couldn’t have stopped him.”
A hand touched her face, big and very gentle.
“You’re a fine, braw lassie,” he whispered. “But a lassie, nonetheless. Would ye fret your heart out and think yourself a coward because ye couldna fight off a lion wi’ your bare hands? It’s the same. Dinna be daft, now.”
She wiped the back of her hand under her nose, and sniffed deeply.
He put a hand under her elbow and helped her up, his strength no longer either threat or mockery, but unutterable comfort. Her knees stung, where she had scraped them on the ground. Her legs wobbled, but she made it to the haypile, where he let her sit down.
“You could just have told me, you know,” she said. “That it wasn’t my fault.”
He smiled faintly.
“I did. Ye couldna believe me, though, unless ye knew for yourself.”
“No. I guess not.” A profound but peaceful weariness had settled on her like a blanket. This time she had no urge to tear it off.
She watched, feeling too limp to move, as he wetted a cloth from the trough and wiped her face, straightened her twisted skirts, and poured out a drink for her.
When he handed her the freshly filled cup of cider, though, she laid a hand on his arm. Bone and muscle were solid, warm under her hand.
“You could have fought back. But you didn’t.”
He laid a big hand over hers, squeezed and let it go.
“No, I didna fight,” he said quietly. “I gave my word—for your mother’s life.” His eyes met hers squarely, neither ice nor sapphire now, but clear as water. “I dinna regret it.”
He took her by the shoulders, and eased her down onto the piled hay.
“Do ye rest a bit, a leannan.”
She lay down, but reached up to touch him as he knelt by her.
“Is it true—that I won’t forget?”
He paused for a moment, hand on her hair.
“Aye, that’s true,” he said softly. “But it’s true, too, that it willna matter after a time.”
“Won’t it?” She was too tired even to wonder what he might mean by this. She felt almost weightless; strangely remote, as though she no longer inhabited her troublesome body. “Even if I’m not strong enough to kill him?”
A clear cold draft from the open door cut through the warm fog of smoke, making all the animals stir. The brindled cow shifted her weight in sudden irritation and let out a low-throated mwaaah, not of distress so much as of querulous complaint.
She felt her father glance at the cow before turning back to her.
“You’re a verra strong woman, a bheanachd,” he said at last, very softly.
“I’m not strong. You just proved I’m not—”
His hand on her shoulder stopped her.
“That’s not what I mean.” He stopped, thinking, his hand smoothing her hair, over and over.
“She was ten when our mother died, Jenny was,” he said at last. “It was the day after the funeral when I came into the kitchen and found her kneeling on a stool, to be tall enough to stir the bowl on the table.
“She was wearing my mother’s apron,” he said softly, “folded up under the arms, and the strings wrapped twice about her waist. I could see she’d been weepin’, like I had, for her face was all stained and her eyes red. But she just went on stirring, staring down into the bowl, and she said to me, ‘Go and wash, Jamie; I’ll have supper for you and Da directly.’ ”
His eyes closed altogether, and he swallowed once. Then he opened them, and looked down at her again.
“Aye, I ken fine how strong women are,” he said quietly. “And you’re strong enough for what must be done, m’ annsachd—believe me.”
He stood up then, and went to the cow. It had risen to its feet and was moving restlessly in a small circle, swaying and shuffling on its tether. He caught it by the tether rope, gentled it with hands and words, made his way behind the heifer, frowning in concentration. She saw him turn his head and look, to check his dirk, then turn back, murmuring.
Not a loving butcher, no. A surgeon in his way, like her mother. From this odd plateau of remoteness, she could see how much her parents—so wildly different in temperament and manner—were alike in this one respect; that odd ability to mingle compassion with sheer ruthlessness.
But they were different even in that, she thought; Claire could hold life and death together in her hands, and yet preserve herself, hold aloof; a doctor must go on living, for the sake of her patients, if not for her own sake. Jamie would be ruthless toward himself, as much as—or more than—he would be to anyone else.
He had thrown off his plaid; now he unfastened his shirt, with no haste but neither with any wasted motion. He pulled the pale linen over his head and laid it neatly aside, returning to his watching post at the heifer’s tail, ready to assist.
A long ripple ran down the cow’s rounded side, and the torchlight glimmered white on the tiny knot of a scar over his heart. Uncover his nakedness? He would strip himself to the bone, if he thought it necessary. And—a much less comforting thought—if he thought it necessary, he would do the same to her, without a moment’s hesitation.