"I am not." He was firm.
I bristled a bit at this. "Why not?"
"Because you're a woman, Sassenach."
I felt my face flush at this. "Oh?" I said sarcastically. "You think women aren't bright enough to understand the workings of a gun?"
He looked levelly at me, mouth twisting a bit as he thought over various replies.
"I've a mind to let ye try it," he said at last. "It would serve ye right."
Rupert clicked his tongue in annoyance at us both. "Dinna be daft, Jamie. As for you, lass," turning to me, "it's not that women are stupid, though sure enough some o' 'em are; it's that they're small."
"Eh?" I gaped stupidly at him for a moment. Jamie snorted and drew the pistol from its loop. Seen up close, it was enormous; a full eighteen inches of silvered weapon measured from stock to muzzle.
"Look," he said, holding it in front of me. "Ye hold it here, ye brace it on your forearm, and ye sight along here. And when ye pull the trigger, it kicks like a mule. I'm near a foot taller than you, four stone heavier, and I know what I'm doin'. It gives me a wicked bruise when I fire it; it might knock you flat on your back, if it didna catch ye in the face." He twirled the pistol and slid it back into its loop.
"I'd let ye see for yourself," he said, raising one eyebrow, "but I like ye better wi' all of your teeth. You've a nice smile, Sassenach, even if ye are a bit feisty."
Slightly chastened by this episode, I accepted without argument the men's judgment that even the lighter smallsword was too heavy for me to wield efficiently. The tiny sgian dhu, the sock dagger, was deemed acceptable, and I was provided with one of those, a wicked-looking, needle-sharp piece of black iron about three inches long, with a short hilt. I practiced drawing it from its place of concealment over and over while the men watched critically, until I could sweep up my skirt, grab the knife from its place and come up in the proper crouch all in one smooth move, ending up with the knife held underhand, ready to slash across an adversary's throat.
Finally I was passed as a novice knife-wielder, and allowed to sit down to dinner, amid general congratulations—with one exception. Murtagh shook his head dubiously.
"I still say the only good weapon for a woman is poison."
"Perhaps," replied Dougal, "but it has its deficiencies in face-to-face combat."
* * *
19
The Waterhorse
We camped the next night on the banks above Loch Ness. It gave me an odd feeling to see the place again; so little had changed. Or would change, I should say. The larches and alders were a deeper green, because it was now midsummer, not late spring. The flowers had changed from the fragile pinks and whites of May blossom and violets to the warmer golds and yellows of gorse and broom. The sky above was a deeper blue, but the surface of the loch was the same; a flat blue-black that caught the reflections from the bank above and held them trapped, colors muted under smoked glass.
There were even a few sailboats visible, far up the loch. Though when one drew near, I saw it was a coracle, a rough half-shell of tanned leather on a frame, not the sleek wooden shape I was used to.
The same pungent scent that pervades all watercourses was there; a sharp mix of tangy greenness and rotted leaf, fresh water, dead fish, and warm mud. Above all, there was that same feeling of lurking strangeness about the place. The men as well as the horses seemed to feel it, and the air of the camp was subdued.
Having found a comfortable place for my own bedroll and Jamie's, I wandered down to the edge of the loch to wash my face and hands before supper.
The bank sloped sharply down until it broke in a jumble of large rock slabs that formed a sort of irregular jetty. It was very peaceful under the bank, out of sight and sound of the camp, and I sat down beneath a tree to enjoy a moment's privacy. Since my hasty marriage to Jamie, I was no longer followed every moment; that much had been accomplished.
I was idly plucking the clusters of winged seeds from a low-hanging branch and tossing them out into the loch when I noticed the tiny waves against the rocks growing stronger, as though pushed by an oncoming wind.
A great flat head broke the surface not ten feet away. I could see the water purling away from keeled scales that ran in a crest down the sinuous neck. The water was agitated for some considerable distance, and I caught a glimpse here and there of dark and massive movement beneath the surface of the loch, though the head itself stayed relatively still.
I stood quite still myself. Oddly enough, I was not really afraid. I felt some faint kinship with it, a creature further from its own time than I, the flat eyes old as its ancient Eocene seas, eyes grown dim in the murky depths of its shrunken refuge. And there was a sense of familiarity mingled with its unreality. The sleek skin was a smooth, deep blue, with a vivid slash of green shining with brilliant iridescence beneath the jaw. And the strange, pupilless eyes were a deep and glowing amber. So very beautiful.