Chapter 46
When Jamie finally made his way back to the dining room, Sorcha and Jenny were missing and Murtagh and Ian had retired to the library.
The men shifted in their seats to look his way but remained silent.
"Where's?"
"Sorcha was taken home and Jenny is with the bairn." Ian explained, trying his best to pretend he didn't hear the screaming.
Jamie nodded taking his leave. After wandering outside in the moonlight for a few hours he drifted to the cottage and fell asleep. He hadn't dared returning to his room because the temptation to finish his discussion with Daniea was too much for one night.
The bright early morning sun rays casting through the cottage door jarred Jamie from his dreamless sleep. He had pondered all night on his next course of action and was now ready to approach Daniea once again.
Making his way back into the house he bounded up the stairs and knocked on her bedroom door. While he waited he quickly readjusted his rumpled clothes as best he could.
No answer.
He knocked twice more.
Still no answer.
Finally he peered inside, quiet as to not wake her, but found the room deserted. He searched the upper and lower levels and found no hint that she had been there. Running outside towards the pasture he found Murtagh leaning against the gate, sharpening his long knife.
Brushing past him, he searched the pasture where Raven was turned out and once again came up empty.
"She's gone lad." He interjected, not taking his eyes off the wet stone in his hand.
"Into the village?" Jamie huffed, trying to catch his breath from running around Lallybroch.
"No, she's gone. She took off in the middle of the night, I suspect."
"How do ye ken?"
Murtagh handed over a small folded paper from his chest pocket.
I am sorry I could not bear to wait any longer.
With love always~ Daniea
Jamie peered up.
"Murtagh… I saw her wrist last night."
"The burns, aye.."
"No. Her stitches." He interrupted.
Murtagh stopped his sharpening.
"Did she?" His voice couldn't form the words, knowing what he was asking was sacrilege.
"Not my tale to tell lad." he stressed, moving away from the fence to walk back to the stables.
"I need ta know."
Murtagh spun around, grabbing Jamie's collar, pulling him near.
"I've had just about enough of yer needs boy! God knows I love ye and I would die fer ye but I am through with….with all this damned madness!"
The men's attention soon snapped to the feral shout bursting from the side door,"Where is he!"
Barreling towards them was Jenny, wielding a long wooden carpet beater as if it were a broadsword.
As she charged forth, Jamie took off running knowing full well what she intended to do with the paddle.
"Jenny, hold on now dammit." He pleaded, his arms in front of him as if she was an enraged mare.
"Who in their right mind ever taught ye to talk to a woman in such a way. If mother was alive she would skin yer arse!"
"What I say in private is no business of yers sister."
"The hell it is! I would never allow ye to speak in such a manner towards any woman under my roof!"
"You listen here, I am Laird,"
"Could have fooled me, ye act more like an overgrown peacock than a ruler ye wee fink!"
"Now listen here! What I say or do in my own home, with my wife, are my affairs! And ye best be staying out of 'em!" Jamie commanded.
Silence….
"Yer wife? What do ye mean yer wife?"
"Former." Murtagh added, crossing his arms as he watched on in glee.
"Brother!"
Jamie growled, agitated that he had revealed his own secret.
"Daniea was my wife..."
"Was? What do ye mean was? Were ye married proper? Handfasted?"
"Aye we were but..."
"There are no buts brother. If ye were handfasted that is forever."
"I had the marriage deemed invalid." Jamie interjected.
"A scrap of paper does not end a marriage, ye fool. If ye spoke before god and promised yerselves to each other in the old ways then she is yer wife Jamie Fraser!"
"Not anymore and I won't be having ye yell at me about it."
THWAP!
In the flash of an eye, Jenny brought the paddle down hard across Jamie's backside, sending a shooting sting up his rear.
"JENNY!" He shrieked, jumping away from the pain.
THWAP!
"Did ye leave those marks upon her that we saw last evening?" She finally questioned, uncertain by the shouts she heard through the stone.
"Never!" He sneered, whirling on her like a wolf. "I have and would never harm a hair on her head, and don't ye ever accuse me of such a thing ever again Janet!"
"Then how did she come upon them?"
"She...they... some people tried to burn her at the stake as a witch." He finally choked out.
Jenny was silent for some time, the shocking news making the paddle fall from her hand into the grass.
"I had heard rumors of a woman in Cranesmuir that…"
Murtagh nodded, confirming.
"How could someone survive such a thing?"
"I believe it would be best to tell them the whole history lad, starting at the beginning" Murtagh urged as Ian joined Jenny.
Murtagh pushed the group indoors away from everyone. When Jamie wouldn't speak Murtagh began the tale and didn't leave a single bloody detail out.
After the men ended their argument of a tale, which consisted of each other constantly interrupting the other to add or correct details, the room sat wholly silent.
Jenny rose and poured herself a large drink, downing the dram in one full go.
"I… don't appreciate being lied to, brother." She began, her voice strained.
"From what I took from yer tale is that...ye both have done wrong to each other but never to be purposely malicious. Seems to me ye both are trying to protect each other from yerselves which is why yer in this predicament…..ye finally have met yer match brother." Jenny crooned, as she shared her thoughts.
"Do ye love the lass?" Ian spoke, looking at his friend intently. "Truthfully."
Jamie didn't answer immediately. He pondered his heart for some time before speaking.
"I try not to love her." Jamie softly admitted as he turned away towards the window. "But...I only end up loving her more desperately than the day before.
The sheer undiluted gravity of those words shook him to his very core. He had not admitted it to himself, let alone others but there it was. The verity that tore him apart day after day, fight after fight.
"Even with what ye know the lass is capable of and her past?" Murtagh poked, knowing that was his weak point.
"Aye."
"Then what are ye still doing here?" Murtagh smiled, internally praying that Jamie had finally found his senses.
"Where were ye taking her?" Jamie pleaded, as he nodded to Ian to prepare Raven for travel.
"A tiny village on a place called Achill Island just off the coast of county Mayo Ireland...I have a map."He added.
"Will ye help me make this right?"
"I wouldn't like anything more." Murtagh smirked, grasping Jamie firmly on the arms.
An hour later the two men had packed their horses. Bid their farewells, while being threatened by Jenny and Ian alike, if they didn't return. And were headed, for the first time in either of their lives, to the Emerald Isle in search of one of her lost daughters.
