I tidied my hair quickly, braiding it with nimble fingers and then turned to Jamie. I took a breath and then knocked on Fergus' bedroom door. I pushed it open to see Fergus pulling the sheets on his new bed taut. "It looks magnificent Fergus." I said. It really did, Jamie and his family had done a fine job. I turned to him. "How much do the men want for the work?"

"Jus' the smile of a lady and her new son is enough."

"Nonsense. You all deserve a few coins." I made a mental note to sort that out later.

"Fergus…" I started awkwardly, sitting on the end of his bed.

"Oui milady?" He sat next to me.

"I've… discovered something about myself recently. I do have magic." I waited to watch his reaction. He didn't appear scared or nervous. "I wanted to tell you because it made me very ill last night and made Jamie frightened. He didn't want you to be frightened like that if you ever saw me become ill."

"D'accord." (Okay.)

"You can be scared for me, but I never want you to be scared of me. I want you to know that I would never ever hurt you."

"I know milady. I'm not scared. You heal people, not hurt them."

"Thank you Fergus." I pulled him closer and hugged him tightly. "If you want, you may go to Maison Elise today. I'm sure the women would be excited to see you. Just make sure you're home before dark."

"Thank you milady."

I re-joined Jamie in the parlour. "I made ye some food." He said, setting a plate stacked high with meat and bread and a bowl of porridge.

"I'm not all that hungry." I was far too nervous about using my magic again.

"Ye'll be stronger wi' a full stomach."

"I suppose. Thank you." I sat down and began to eat. Jamie sat opposite me and laughed, but quietly acquiesced when I pushed the bowl of porridge towards him.

We both ate in silence. I barely made a dent in mine. Fergus came in and I slid the plate in front of him. Jamie raised his eyebrows. "Come on, I ate as much as I could. I'll be sick if I eat anymore."

"Fine." Jamie stood and I followed him to the backroom downstairs. I wasn't planning on opening the shop today except for an emergency. "Okay Sassenach. Light the fire." I crouched down by the wood and reached for my tinderbox. "Wi' magic mo chridh."

"Oh. Right." Of course he meant for me to use my magic. I focused as hard as I could. I imagined a warmth. But warmth doesn't create fire.

I reached up for Jamie's hand and dragged him down to sit next to me in front of the logs. I envisioned a spark in between our two hands. Jamie jumped and tried to move away but I gripped him tighter. I guided our hands towards the logs and then dropped the spark.

Warmth quickly filled the room. "Christ, yer…" I looked up at Jamie. "Why did ye use my hand?"

"I'm not sure. It just felt natural. Did it burn you?"

"No. D'ye feel alright?"

"I feel fine."

"Good. Wha' else can ye do?"

"I don't know. Maybe I could change my hair colour."

"Dinna do that lass, yer hair is so bonny."

"Oh, okay." I blushed. I never thought it was a nice colour, but it didn't seem like he was lying to me. "Maybe I can heal."

"But ye'd need something tae heal first."

"Right." I grabbed the blade that always sat attached to Jamie's hip and raised it to my palm. Jamie gripped the hand with the knife in it and moved it over to his palm. Jamie used my hand to cut open his.

He wiped the blood off on his britches. I set about imagining the flesh stitching itself together. I ran my finger over the wound and it was healed, completely gone. "That's definitely going to be useful."

"Aye." Jamie seemed off.

"Are you okay?"

"Just a wee bit o' nausea, dinna fash." His skin was pale. I raised my hand to his cheek and saw the colour return. "Thank ye. An' are ye alright? No' feelin' unsteady?"

"No. I'm not sick. But you are. Do you not like the sight of blood?"

"No' my own when it's outta my body where it shouldna be."

"I guess that's fair enough." I looked around for something else I could do and my eyes were drawn to the drying herbs that hung from the rafters. I stood up and extended my arms to a bundle.

I visualised the process of evaporation and watched heat come from my hands, clearly drying out the herbs.

Fergus rushed through the shop doors with a key I had given him. "Milady!" I dropped my arms. "Vera is giving birth!" He was crazed, grabbing my hand and pulling me out of the shop. "You have to help her, la bébé's in trouble."

I turned back around and headed inside. "No milady, you have to go."

"I need my medical box first." Fergus breathed again, realising I was not leaving his friend in danger. Jamie was there then, carrying my medical box. He was quick to follow as the three of us headed to Maison Elise.

I didn't know a lot about Vera, I'd only met her once. But I remembered she was about the same age as I was and that she hadn't been working for Madam Elise all that long.

When we arrived, I could smell the sickly sweetness of death in the air. Fergus led us up the stairs to a bedroom. Vera was lying back on the bed in her shift. Her skin was so pale it looked translucent and the bed was stained red underneath her waist.

"Hello Vera." I said, taking my medical box from Jamie and calmly moved over to Vera's bed. "Do you remember me? We met once."

"Oui, La Dame Blanche."

"Yes, that's me… Claire. I'm here to help you."

I examined her quickly and talked her through the birth. Jamie kept outside, only coming in to be my assistant when I asked. And Fergus was sitting on Vera's pillow, cradling her head in his lap.

It was a painful birth. A couple of times I placed my hand on Vera's thigh and sucked the pain from her. Jamie knocked my hand away every time he saw it. "Yer doing enough Sassenach, no need to risk yerself too." He whispered when I glared at him the first time.

After a while, Vera regained some of her colour and looked less frail. I cleaned up the baby, cutting the umbilical cord with a disinfected knife. Jamie had to leave at one point to retrieve some alcohol.

The baby was a girl. But I was afraid. She wasn't crying. Vera started to panic. I heard Jamie and Fergus calming her down, but I didn't turn my attention away from the child.

I laid my ear on her chest. I couldn't hear a heartbeat. I began CPR, careful of breaking her ribs. I blew air into her mouth. I manually pumped her heart.

Tears stung at the corner of my eyes as I heard Vera crying. I kept up the CPR, even while Jamie came up behind me. He wrapped himself around my back and pulled my arms away from the baby.

I snatched back one of my hands and placed it over the baby's heart. I imagined it beating, flowing blood, inflating lungs. When I opened my eyes she was dead. I lifted her in my arms and tried again.

I kept trying to breathe life into the baby with my magic until Jamie took her from my arms. "No! No, you can't. She'll die." I said, voice scratchy from crying. Jamie looked at me like his heart was breaking.

"She's already dead Claire, stop. Ye did everything ye could." He passed the baby over to a sobbing Vera.

I sank to the floor. My hands were braced against the wood. "Wha' will ye call her, fer the grave?" Jamie asked Vera.

"Clara. For Claire. You did so much, you tried everything. Thank you truly." Vera said to me. I couldn't breathe.

"But it wasn't enough." I said.

"No, but sometimes nothing is enough." Vera said holding her daughter close to her chest.

Vera had called her Clara, after me. I appreciated the honour, but I couldn't help but think it a bad omen. Young Clara heading straight for an early grave.

"I have to go." I said to Jamie. "I need to leave."

"Aye, we can go." Jamie said. "Fergus, stay wi' Vera tonight, make sure she's okay, come and get us if she's no'."

I felt Jamie lift me from the floor and carry me down the stairs and all the way home. I was shaking. I burrowed closer to his chest.

He laid me carefully on the bed and then went to leave. "Jamie?"

"Aye?" His face was soft.

"Stay with me?"

"Aye." He removed his boots and then climbed onto the bed next to me.

Jamie held me in his arms and didn't say anything about the tears that were soaking his shirt. He stroked down my back with a dependable consistency. "Jamie?" I mumbled against his chest. "What's your last name?"

"Fraser." I felt the deep brogue echoing with my cheek pressed to his chest.

"I was pregnant once." I confessed. "I was in England with my Uncle Lamb on a dig… trying to find old relics and historical artefacts underground. He hired this research assistant Frank.

"Frank was older than me, but I liked his maturity. We… courted and well, he took my virginity. But then my" I paused. "courses were late. I thought Frank would want to marry me. I told him that I was with child and he told me I was a liar, that even if I was pregnant it wasn't his."

"What happened?" Jamie asked, his mouth moving against my hair.

"I lost the baby not long into the pregnancy. I was barely showing. It died inside me." I took a breath. "And then I told my Uncle I wanted, needed to take a trip for myself. So I moved here." Technically the trip was to Scotland, through the stones at Craigh Na Dun, and then here, but it ended the same.

"I'm sorry Sassenach."

"I never wanted a child until I had one."

"D'ye still want a bairn?"

"Bairn?"

"Baby."

"Oh. I do. You're young, I know, but have you ever thought about kids?"

"Aye. I think about it sometimes. I think I'd want a whole litter." I smiled.

"As many as possible huh?"

"Aye." I felt him smile into my hair.

This time, when we fell asleep, we were in one of my memories. I watched, frozen in place, as a younger version of myself yelled at Frank over the telephone. "What do you expect me to do Frank? Be a single mother on the road? And what happens when your son or daughter asks where daddy is? What would you like me to tell them Frank?"

I could remember his reply as clear as day. "This is not my future Claire. Do what you want." And then he hung up. I watched as younger-me was too shocked to cry. I gave it a minute and then sent us back to the hearth.

"Claire?" Jamie asked, obviously confused. "Wha' was that?"

"That was the last time I heard from Frank." I evaded his actual question, but he didn't give up.

"An' the thing in yer hand ye talked into?"

"That… one day I will explain, I promise. But not today."

"Yer dress too… why no' today?"

"It's not easy to tell, or believe, and I don't want to risk you not believing me."

"Okay, no' today. But someday, aye?"

"Someday." As much as I didn't want to tell him the truth, for fear it would send him running, I had decided to trust him eventually.

"Can we have a quiet day? I haven't had a quiet day in a really long time." I asked when we both woke up. I was laying in his arms, his figure solid at my back.

"I'll go retrieve Fergus and check on Vera and then we can have a quiet day Sassenach." Jamie swung his legs off the bed and grabbed his boots.

"Thank you." I rolled over, feeling scoured to the bone and world-weary. I sighed as Jamie left.

I hadn't thought about Frank in a really long time. I knew I never loved him and he never loved me but the betrayal stung no less.

I had made breakfast and boiled some water to put in the bath tub for Fergus to wash. "Wash first, then eat." I said as he came through the door, solemn mood lifted a little. I passed over a vial of lavender oil for him to use.

"But milady, I don't want to smell like a girl."

"You live here Fergus. You already smell of pretty herbs. Even Jamie's starting to smell like them."

Fergus took the oil and disappeared to bathe. Jamie and I sat down to eat while we waited. "How's Vera?" I asked.

"She's much better. Wanted me tae say thank ye again." We sat in silence eating until Jamie spoke up again. "So Sassenach, what does a quiet day consist of fer ye?"

"Well, I have to wash some of mine and Fergus' clothes and then I thought the three of us could talk, tell stories, get to know each other better."

"Aye, tha' sounds like a bonny idea."

"I should probably wash your clothes as well, you've got some blood on them."

"Aye, if ye insist."

"I do." I smiled. I wondered who took care of him before he met me. He hadn't been in France very long, but Murtagh seemed important to him. "Jamie, is Murtagh married?"

"Why, are ye interested?" His eyes sparkled and I laughed.

"Not like that. I was wondering who took care of you both."

"We take care of each other. Jus' like me and ye." He smiled at me and I smiled shyly back. But I couldn't help but think that I had abducted Jamie from Murtagh. He spent all of his time here and hadn't seen a great deal of his godfather.

Fergus returned dripping wet in his last clean shirt and britches. He moved to sit but I took his shoulder before he did. "Milady?"

"You're all wet. Hold on a moment." I imagined warm air blowing all around him, pulling the moisture from his skin and hair.

"Sensationnel milady." (wow) Fergus laughed, all warm and dry now. He sat down to eat.

"Hopefully washing the clothes will be just as easy." I said.

When I had finished eating, I gathered mine and Fergus' clothes and put some more water on to boil. I looked around for something for Jamie to wear but only had my blanket. "It's only for a few hours, until your clothes are dry."

He came back naked but for the blanket wrapped around him like a kilt. Jamie passed over his clothes. "I've never seen you wear a kilt. Is it something you used to wear in Scotland?"

"Aye, everra day. But it got lost on the journey here, an' ye canno' get a kilt in France."

"Tonight, show it to me and I'll see what I can do." I said cryptically.

We moved everything outside into the garden. I gasped in shock at what I found there. "Jamie, it's beautiful. When… How?" I ran my hands over the smooth wood of the new bench that faced my herb garden. The back had some simple carvings of strawberries. Fraser. I smiled.

"We had some extra wood. T'was me being selfish Sassenach. I wanted a place to sit an' watch ye in yer wee garden."

"Thank you, it's wonderful."

I began to wash the clothes as my boys sat on the new bench. "Fergus?" I asked.

"Oui milady?"

"Perhaps you could tell us about your life until you came here. I haven't had a lot of time to hear about it but we've got time now." I smiled.

"D'accord." (Okay.) Fergus started to regale Jamie and I of his early childhood living at Maison Elise.

His mother died in childbirth and it was unclear whether his father was a patron of Maison Elise or a lover of his mother. The girls promised he'd not be a bother and that they'd look after him. So during the day he was doted on, and at night he was watched by whichever girl had the night off.

He told us about his innate ability to pickpocket and how he often stole from the men when their heads were turned. But that he only stole to help feed himself, to take the pressure off Madam Elise so she wouldn't kick him out.

And then, one day, he was in one of the bedrooms when a man came in. He was beaten for not being submissive and letting the man fuck him. Fergus said that when the man left, he tossed a coin that hit the boy in the head.

"Tha's a hell of a story lad." Jamie looked thoughtful.

"Oui, but then I met milady, and you milord. I liked the women but it didn't feel like home."

"Aye, I would think no'. Sassenach, I'd wager ye've got a few stories yerself. I think it's yer turn."

"Alright." I tried to think of something. There were so many stories I couldn't tell because they involved something that hadn't happened yet. But Egypt was a safe bet, and Jamie already knew a little about it.

"As you know, I travelled the world with my uncle. He was" will be "an archeologist. We went to many places, but one of my favourites was Egypt."

"Why Egypt?" Fergus asked.

"Because of all the history." I gave them both a brief history lesson about the pyramids and pharaohs and Gods. "I think it's incredible how so many civilisations separated by seas and time built similar structures. The Ancient Egyptians had the pyramids and so did the Mayans and the Aztecs, there are some in China and Italy too. It's unbelievable."

"And wha' did those civilisations use them fer?"

"Some used them as temples, places of worship. But most built them as mausoleums or places for burial. It was fascinating opening up the wall of one of the pyramids in Egypt with Uncle Lamb. The air was thick, hadn't been breathed for centuries, and our lamps didn't light up all that much. We found several sarcophagus', coffins."

"Were there bodies inside?" Fergus was enthralled by my story.

"Yes." I said with a huge smile on my face. "But they didn't look like you or me, the bodies had been there so long they had mummified. Their skin was like leather and they wore enough gold to fill your bedroom." Fergus laughed.

"How did they build the pyramids then, if they're as tall as ye said?" Jamie asked curiously.

"They built in stages. They'd build layers and when they couldn't reach anymore, they built ramps of mud brick and rubble. As the pyramids got taller, they made the ramps taller, and then wider to make sure they would stay up. All along the walls inside would be carved, and sometimes painted, hieroglyphics. It was there written language but it was in pictures. They told of the events that happened. Most would be related to whatever pharaoh, king, laid buried in that pyramid. It's like nothing you could ever believe. Haunting and beautiful at the same time."

"D'ye ever want tae go back? I ken yer Uncle Lamb wouldna be there, but…"

"As much as I loved it, it would be different now."

"Wi'out him, aye." No, I thought, in this time. But I nodded anyway.

I turned away to pin up the wet clothes to dry. "I guess it's my turn now." Jamie said. Fergus turned his attention on him, and I often turned my head to look back at him. "I've told ye of some of this story Fergus, but Claire hasna heard it, so don't spoil the ending." He smiled and Fergus nodded dutifully. I finished hanging up the laundry so I sat at Jamie's feet, leaning back against his legs. His hands found their way into my hair.

"My mother was a MacKenzie, the laird's elder sister. Neither of her brothers wanted her tae marry but fer love. Back then the relationship between Clan MacKenzie and Clan Grant was strained a' best, violent a' worst. Each week there'd be a report or two of cattle robbin' or brawls between the clan men. So, tae make peace, my uncles decided they would marry my mother tae a Grant." Jamie's hands were still in my hair, pulling twigs and leaves from it and combing it through with his fingers.

"They prepared for a great weddin'. But, when it was time fer Grant tae meet my mother Ellen, neither turned up. I dinna think Grant wanted to marry a MacKenzie as much as my mother dinna want to marry a Grant. She ran off wi' my father Brian Fraser, and Grant left wi' a horse by himself."

"What happened then?" I asked when he paused.

"They holed up in a cottage fer a few months. They got married and as soon as my mother was showing wi' child, they returned. My uncles werena happy but the Grants were as embarrassed as the MacKenzies. Grant dinna ken that Ellen had left. So they came to a peaceful negotiation. All was well."

"And your parents went to Lallybroch?"

"Aye, they did."

I wish I could remember my parents past my father's smile and my mother's lips on my forehead. Would I love them as much as Jamie clearly loved his, or would I be disinterested as I knew some to be, especially in my time? What kind of person would I have become if they raised me in Oxfordshire and not travelling with Uncle Lamb? Maybe not as adaptable. I might not have been able to survive here without his guidance. Gosh I missed him so much. He would love this, 18th century France. It would be another adventure to him.

"Are ye alright mo chridh?" Jamie asked. I was sniffling, I hadn't even realised.

"Fine. I just miss my uncle."

"Aye. Weel, I'm sure he'd be proud of ye."

"For what?"

"Survivin', becoming a strong lady, taking in a couple a' strays." He laughed. Jamie rested his hand on my shoulder. I reached up and took it in mine.

"I think you're right." I said. "I think he'd like the new family I've built."

We watched the insects and butterflies about the garden for a while until somebody came around the side of the house. Jamie stood, helping me up. "Mistress Beauchamp?"

"That's me." I brushed the dirt off my dress.

"The king wishes to see you right away."

"So much for a quiet day." I said under my breath. "I need to get changed into a more suitable dress first. I'll be as quick as I can." The man nodded.