The Fiery Cross, Page 33

  ,,:"Ob, Lord, the words formed themselves in my mind, without conscious lihought, I commend to you the soul ofyour servantjames. Help bim, please. And ,,,dirnly thought, but help him with what?

  Then he crossed himself, and rose, and time started again, without my havIng noticed it had stopped. I was moving down the hillside toward him, grass brushing my skirt, with no memory of having taken the first step. I didn't recall his rising, but Jamie was walking toward me, not looking surprised, but his face filled with light at sight of us.

  `M"o cbridhe,' he said softly, smiling, and bent to kiss me. His beard stubble was rough and his skin still chilled, fresh with water.

  "You'd better put your trousers on," I said. "You'll freeze." "I'll do. Ciamar a tba tbu, angille ruaidb?"

  To my surprise, Jemmy was awake and drooling, eyes wide blue in a rose-leaf face, all hint of temper gone without a trace. He leaned, twisting to reach for Jamie, who lifted him gently from my arms and cradled him against a shoulder, pulling the woolly cap down snugly over his ears.

  "We're starting a tooth," I told Jamie. "He wasn't very comfortable, so I thought perhaps a bit of whisky on his gums ... there wasn't any in the house."

  "Oh, aye. We can manage that, I think. There's a bit in my flask." Carrying the baby to the spot where his clothes lay, he bent and rummaged one-handed, coming up with the dented pewter flask he carried on his belt.

  He sat on a rock, balancing Jernmy on his knee, and handed me the flask to open.

  "I went to the mash house," I said, pulling the cork with a soft pop, "but the cask was gone."

  "Aye, Fergus has it. Here, I'll do it; my hands are clean." He held out his left index finger, and I dribbled a bit of the spirit onto it.

  "What's Fergus doing with it?" I asked, settling myself on the rock beside him.

  "Keeping it," he said, uninf

  ormatively. He stuck the finger in Jemmy's mouth, gently rubbing at the swollen gum. "Oh, there it is. Aye, that hurts a bit, doesn't it? Ouch!" He reached down and gingerly disentangled Jemmy's fingers from their grip on the hairs of his chest.

  "Speaking of that. . - " I said, and reached out to take his right hand. Shifting his other arm to keep hold of Jemmy, he let me take the hand and turn his fingers upward.

  It was a very shallow cut, just across the tips of the first three fingers-the fingers with which he had crossed himself. The blood had already clotted, but I dribbled a bit more of the whisky over the cuts and cleaned the smears of blood from his palm with my handkerchief.

  He let me tend him in silence, but when I finished and looked tip at him, he met my eyeswith a f

  aint smile.

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  "It's all right, Sassenach," he said.

  "is it?" I said. I searched his face; he looked tired, but tranquil. The slight frown I had seen between his brows for the last few days was gone. Whatever he was about, he had begun it.

  'Ye saw, then?" he asked quietly, reading my own face. "Yes. Is it-it's to do with the cross in the dooryard, is it?" "Oh, in a way, I suppose."

  "What is it for?" I asked bluntly.

  He pursed his lips, rubbing gently at Jemmy's sore gum. At last he said, "Ye never saw Dougal MacKenzie call the clan, did you?"

  I was more than startled at this, but answered cautiously. "No. I saw Colum do it once-at the oath-taking at Uoch."

  He nodded, the memory of that long-ago night of torches deep in his eyes. "Aye," he said softly. "I mind that. Colum was chief, and the men would come when he summoned them, surely. But it was Dougal who led them to war."

  He paused a moment, gathering his thoughts.

  "There were raids, now and again. That was a different thing, and often no more than a fancy that took Dougal or Rupert, maybe an urge born of drink or boredom-a small band out for the fun of it, as much as for cattle or grain. But to gather the clan for war, all the fighting men-that was a rarer thing. I only saw it the once, myself, but it's no a sight ye would forget."

  The cross of pinewood had been there when he woke one morning at the castle, surprising him as he crossed the courtyard. The inhabitants of Leoch were up and about their business as usual, but no one glanced at the cross or referred to it in any way. Even so, there were undercurrents of excitement running through the castle.

  The men stood here and there in knots, talking in undertones, but when he joined a group, the talk shifted at once to desultory conversation.

  "I was Colum's nephew, aye, but newly come to the castle, and they kent my sire and grandsire." Jamie's paternal grandfather had been Simon, Lord Lovat-chief of the Frasers of Lovat, and no great friend of the MacKenzies of Leoch.

  "I couldna tell what was afoot, but something was; the hair on my arms prickled whenever I caught someone's eye." At last, he had made his way to the stable, and found Old Alec, Colum's Master of Horse. The old man had been fond of Ellen MacKenzie, and was kind to the son for his mother's sake, as well as his own.

  "'Tis the fiery cross, lad," he'd told Jamie, tossing him a currycomb and jerking his head toward the stalls. "Ye'll not ha' seen it before?"

  It was auld, he'd said, one of the ways that had been followed for hundreds of years, no one quite knowing where it had started, who had done it first or why.

  "When a Hielan' chief will call his men to war," the old man had said, deftly running his gnarled hand through a knotted mane, "he has a cross made, and sets it afire. It's put out at once, ken, Nvi' blood or wi' water-but still it's called the fiery cross, and it will be carried through the glens and corries, a sign to the men of the clan to fetch their weapons and come to the gathering place, prepared for battle."

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  "Aye?" Jamie had said, feeling excitement hollow his belly. "And who do we fight, then? Where do we ride?"

  The old man's grizzled brow had crinkled in amused approval at that "we." "Ye follow where your chieftain leads ye, lad. But tonight, it will be the Grants we go against."

  "It was, too," Jamie said. "Though not that night. When darkness came, Dougal lit the cross and called the clan. He doused the burnin' wood wi' sheep's blood-and two men rode out of the courtyard wi' the fiery cross, to take it through the mountains. Four days later, there were three hundred men in that courtyard, armed NNT swords, pistols, and dirks-and at dawn on the fifth day, we rode to make war on the Grants."

  His finger was still in the baby's mouth, his eyes distant as he remembered. ai 441 "That was the first time I used my sword against another man," he s d. mind it well."

  "I expect you do," I murmured. Jernmy was beginning to squirm and fuss again; I reached across and lifted him into my own lap to check-sure enough, or convenience. his clout was wet. Luckily, I had another, tucked into my belt f

  I laid him out across my knee to change.

  "And so this cross in our dooryard . I said delicately, eyes on my work. "To do with the militia, is it?"

  Jamie sighed, and I could see the shadows of memory moving behind his eyes.

  "Aye," he said. "Once, I could have called, and the men would come without question-because they were mine. Men of my blood, men of my land." His eyes were hooded, looking out over the mountainside that rose up be

  fore us. I thought he did not see the wooded heights of the Carolina wilder ness, though; rather, the scoured mountains and rocky crofts of Lallybroch. I eel the heat of laid my free hand on his wrist; the skin was cold, but I could f

  him, just below the surface, like a fever rising.

  "They came for you-but you came for them, Jamie. You came f

  or them at Culloden. You took them there-and you brought them back."

  Ironic, I thought, that the men who had come then to serve at his summons were for the most part still safe at home in Scotland. No part of the Highlands or the most had been untouched by war-but Lallybroch and its people were f

  part still whole-because of Jamie.

  "Aye, that's so." He turned to look at me, and a rueful smile touched his face. His hand
tightened on mine for a moment, then relaxed, and the line deepened again between his brows. He waved a hand toward the mountains around us.

  "But these men-there is no debt of blood between them and me. They are not Frasers; I am not born either laird or chief to them. If they come to fight at MY call, it will be of their own will. 11

  "Well, that," I said dryly, "and Governor Tryon's.11 He shook his head at that.

  "Nay, not that. Will the Governor ken which men are here, or which ones come to meet his summons?97 He grimaced slightly. "He kens me-and that will do nicely.'5

  I had to admit the truth of this. Tryon would neither know nor care whom

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  Jamie brought-only that he appeared, with a satisfactory number of men behind him, ready to do the Governor's dirty work. s bo

  I pondered that for a moment, patting Jernmy' ttom dry with the hem of my skirt. Ali I knew of the American pevolution were the things I had heard at second hand from Brianna's schoolbooks-and 1, of all people, knew just how great the gap could be between written history and the reality.

  Also, we had lived in Boston, and the schoolbooks naturally reflected local history. The general impression one got from reading about Lexington and Concord and the like was that the militia involved every able-bodied man in the community, all of whom sprang into action at the first hint of alarm, eager to perform their civic duty. Perhaps they did, perhaps not-but the Carolina backcountry wasn't Boston, not by a long chalk.

  * *. ready to ride and spread the alarm," I said, half under my breath, 'to a

  every Middlesex village andfarm."

  "What?" Jamie's brows shot up. "Where's MiddleseV'

  "Well, you'd think it was halfway between male and female," I said, "but it's really just the area round Boston. Though of course that's named after the one in England."

  "Yes?" he said, looking bewildered. "Aye, if ye say so, Sassenach. But-" "Militia." I lifted Jemmy, who was bucking and squirming like a landed fish, making noises of extreme protest at being forcibly diapered. He kicked me in the stomach. "Oh, give over, child, do."

  Jamie reached over and took the baby under the arms, hoisting him from my lap.

  "Here, I'll have him. Does he need more whisky?"

  "I don't know, but at least he can't squawk if your finger's in his mouth." I relinquished Jemmy with some relief, returning to my train of thought. "Boston's been settled for more than a hundred years, even now," I said. "It

  has villages and farms-and the farms aren't all that far from the villages. People have been living there for a long time; everyone knows each other."

  Jamie was nodding patiently at each of these startling revelations, trusting that I would eventually come to some point. Which I did, only to discover that it was the same point he'd been making to me.

  "So when someone musters militia there," I said, suddenly seeing what he'd been telling me all along, "they come, because they're accustomed to fighting together to defend their towns and because no man would want to be thought a coward by his neighbors. But here . . ." I bit my lip, contemplating the soaring mountains all around us.

  "Aye," he said, nodding, seeing the realization dawn in my face. "It's different here."

  There was no settlement large enough to be called a town within a hundred miles, save the German Lutherans at Salem. Bar that, there was nothing in the backcountry but scattered homesteads; sometimes a place where a family had settled and 'spread, brothers or cousins building houses within sight of one another. Small settlements and distant cabins, some hidden in the mountain hollows, screened by laurels, where the residents might not see another white face for months-or 'years-at a time.

  The sun had sunk below the angled slope of the mountain, but the light still

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  lingered, a brief wash of color that stained the trees and rocks gold around us and flushed the distant peaks with blue and violet. There were living creatures in that cold, brilliant landscape, I knew, habitations nearby and warm bodies stirring; but so far as the eye could see, nothing moved.

  I Mountain settlers would go without question to help a neighbor-because they might as easily require such help themselves at any moment. There was, after all, no one else to turn to.

  But they had never fought f

  or a common purpose, had nothing in common without to defend. And to abandon their homesteads and leave their families

  defense, in order to serve the whim of a distant governor? A vague notion of duty might compel a few; a few would go from curiosity, from restlessness, or in the vague hope of gain. But most would go only if they were called by a man they respected; a man that they trusted.

  I am not born either laird or chief to them, he'd said. Not born to them, nobut born to it, nonetheless. He could, if he wished, make himself chief

  "Why?" I asked softly. "Why will you do it?" The shadows were rising from the rocks, slowly drowning the light.

  "Do you not see?" One eyebrow lifted as he turned his head to me. "Ye told me what would happen at Culloden-and I believed ye, Sassenach, fearful as it was. The men of Lallybroch came home safe as much because of you as because of me."

  That was not entirely true; any man who had marched to Nairn with the Highland army would have known that disaster lay somewhere ahead. Still ... I bad been able to help in some small way, to make sure that Lallybroch was prepared, not only for the battle, but its aftermath. The small weight of guilt that I always felt when I thought of the Rising lifted slightly, easing my heart. "Well, perhaps. But what-"

  "Ye've told me what will happen here, Sassenach. You and Brianna and MacKenzie, all three. Rebellion, and war-and this time ... victory. "

  Victory. I nodded numbly, remembering what I knew of wars and the cost of victory. It was, however, better than defeat.

  "Well, then." He stooped to pick up his dirk, and gestured with it to the mountains around us. "I have sworn an oath to the Crown; if I break it in time of war, I am a traitor. My land is forfeit-and my life-and those who follow me will share my fate. True?"

  "True." I swallowed, hugging my arms tight around me, wishing I still held Jemmy. Jamie turned to face me, his eyes hard and bright.

  "But the Crown willna prevail, this time. Ye've told me. And if the King is overthrown-what then of my oath? If I have kept it, then I am traitor to the rebel cause."

  "Oh," I said, rather faintly.

  "Ye see? At some point, Tryon and the King will lose their power over mebut I dinna ken when that may be. At some point, the rebels will hold powerbut I dinna ken when that may be. And in between . . . " He tilted the point of his dirk downward.

  "I do see. A very tidy little cleft stick," I said, feeling somewhat hollow as I realized just how precarious our situation was.

  To follow Tryon's orders now was plainly the only choice. Later, how-

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  ever ... for Jamie to continue as the Governor's man into the early stages of the Revolution was to declare himself a Loyalist-which would be fatal, in the long run. In the short run, though, to break with Tryon, forswear his oath to the King, and declare for the rebels ... that would cost him his land, and quite possibly his life.

  He shrugged, with a wry twist of the mouth, and sat back a little, easing Jernmy on his lap.

  und myself walking between two fires "Well, it's no as though I've never fo

  before, Sassenach. I may come out of it a bit scorched round the edges, but I dinna think I'll fry." He gave a faint snort of what might be amusement. "It's in my blood, no?"

  I managed a short laugh.

  "If you're thinking of your grandfather," I said, "I admit he was good at it. Caught up with him in the end, though, didn't it?"

  He tilted his head from one side to the other, equivocating.

  "Aye, maybe so. But do ye not think things perhaps fell out as he wished?" The late Lord Lovat had been notorious for the deviousness of his mind, but I couldn't quite see the benefit in planning
to have his head chopped off, and said so -

  Jamie smiled, despite the seriousness of the discussion.

  "Well, perhaps beheading wasna quite what held planned, but still-ye saw what he did; lie sent Young Simon to battle, and he stayed home. But which of them was it who paid the price on Tower Hill?"

  I nodded slowly, beginning to see his point. Young Simon, who was in fact close to Jamie's own age, had not suffered physically for his part in the Rising, overt though it had been. He had not been imprisoned or exiled, like many of the Jacobites, and while he had lost most of his lands, he had in fact regained quite a bit of his property since, by means of repeated and tenacious lawsuits brought against the Crown.

  "And Old Simon could have blamed his son, and Young Simon would have ended up on the scaffold-but he didn,t. Well, I suppose even an old viper like that might hesitate to put his own son and heir under the ax."

  Jamie nodded.

  "Would ye let someone chop off your head, Sassenach, if it was a choice betwixt you and Brianna?"

  "Yes," I said, without hesitation. I was reluctant to admit that Old Simon might have possessed such a virtue as family feeling, but I supposed even vipers had some concern for their children's welfare.

  Jemmy had abandoned the proffered finger in favor of his grandfather's dirk) and was gnawing fiercely on the hilt. Jamie wrapped his hand around the blade, holding it safety away from the child, but made no effort to take the knife away.

  "So would I," Jamie said, smiling slightly. "Though I do hope it willna come to that."

  "I don't think either army was-will be-inclined to behead people," I said. That did, of course, leave a number of other unpleasant options available-but Jamie knew that as well as I did.

  I had a sudden, passionate wish to urge him to throw it all Up, turn away from it. Tell Tryon to stuff his land, tell the tenants they must make their own

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  way-abandon the Ridge and flee. War was coming, but it need not engulf us; not this time. We could go south, to Florida, or to the Indies. To the west, to take refuge with the Cherokee. Or even back to Scotland. The Colonies would rise, but there were places one could run to.

  He was watching my face,

  "This," he said, a gesture dismissing Tryon, the militia, the Regulators, "this is a verra little thing, Sassenach, perhaps nothing in itself. But it is the beginning, I think,"

  The light was beginning to fail now; the shadow covered his feet and legs, but the last of the sun threw his own face into strong relief. There was a smudge of blood on his forehead, where he had touched it, crossing himself. I should have wiped it away, I thought, but made no move to do so,

  "If I will save these men-if they will walk wi' me between the fires-then they must follow me without question, Sassenach. Best it begins now, while not so much is at stake."

  "I know," I said, and shivered.

  "Are ye cold, Sassenach? Here, take the wean and go home, I'll come in a bit, so soon as I'm dressed.

  He handed me Jemmy and the dirk, since the two seemed momentarily inseparable, and rose. He picked up his kilt and shook out the tartan folds, but I didn't move. The blade of the knife was warm where I gripped it, warm from his hand.

  He looked at me in question, but I shook my head. "We'll wait for you."

  He dressed quickly, but carefully. Despite my apprehensions, I had to admire the delicacy of his instincts. Not his dress kilt, the one in crimson and black, but the hunting kilt. No effort to impress the mountain men with richness; but an oddity of dress, enough to make the point to the other Highlanders that he was one of them, to draw the eye and interest of the Germans. Plaid pinned up with the running-stag brooch, his belt and scabbard, clean wool stockings. He was quiet, absorbed in what he was doing, dressing with a calm precision that was unnervingly reminiscent of the robing of a priest.

  It would be tonight, then. Roger and the rest had clearly gone to summon the men who lived within a day's ride; tonight he would light his cross and call the first of his men-and seal the bargain with whisky.