Edmund Munro had never feared death, not really. He had been a military man for so long, he didn't give it much thought. It was simply a matter of course. Kings made war, but it was men like him who would pay the price in the end.
No, Col. Edmund Munro did not fear death. He was afraid of his own children.
Cora had been stubborn and spirited since the day she was born. Willful to an absolute fault. Col. Munro and his wife had tried to reign in that willfulness, but with little success. True, they had been able to outwardly mold her into a proper lady. But the intelligence in those dark eyes and sharp looks belied any softness. As an absolute last resort, he had taken her to Austria on campaign. Instead of dampening her spirit, it only solidified it. It hardened her edges. If she had been a son, he might have been proud of her. With her mind and personality, a son would have done well in the world. Would have risen high in the military, or politics. Had she been a son, he wouldn't have resented her independence.
Alice was entirely different. She had been fragile as a child, and it was thought unlikely she would ever survive any number of childhood illnesses. She had defied all reason when she survived the influenza that killed her mother. If he resented Cora her independence, he loathed Alice's unlikely resilience. Where Cora was outspoken and impulsive, Alice was quiet and methodical. She had a steady gaze that could see right through people. The intelligence in that forthright, hazel gaze unnerved him. Alice was so like Cora and yet...so unlike her in so many ways. Until coming to North America, it had never occurred to him that Alice should come as well. He had always thought it better to lie about what war could do to a person.
Until the day his horse was shot from under him, Col. Edmund Munro had feared his daughters. When the horse collapsed on top of him and pinned him to the ground, he regretted that fear. When the man called Magua stood over him, he finally knew what it was to fear death.
"Grey Hair, before you die, know that I will put your children under the knife and wipe your seed from the earth forever."
It was perhaps one of the few times he was proud of his daughters in equal measure. He knew as no other man did, that those girls were as fearsome as the Scottish highlands of his youth. Alice and Cora Munro were made of stronger stuff than this man knew.
